Attunga - 35. Part 35.

ATTUNGA Part 35.

***

Wirrin moved from his quiet, almost meditative state at a signal indication and watched Thom respond on his console. From the set of his features as he turned it was bad news.

“It's another course change and this initial data says it's towards the habitats. I'll soon have it more accurate but it's enough to discount Jupiter.”

“It can't be.”

Wirrin felt the same disbelief Calen was voicing, and watched with a hope he knew wasn't justified while Thom checked the more precise course which every extra second of scanned information allowed.

“It is. This makes it definite.”

“They're insane.”

“I know. What do we do?”

“Thom we're already doing it. You've been planning in your mind what will happen when we match up haven't you?”

“Of course, but it doesn't feel real, more like one of my simulator battles.”

“Good, because you always say they're harder than real ones.”

“Yes, but not against seven ships.”

“That won't matter.”

Calen interrupted.

“Should we contact Pirramar?”

Thom shook his head.

“They'll know before our transmission gets through.”

Wirrin didn't say anything for a moment. Calen's words were ringing in his mind.

“Yes we will. Calen's right. This is insane. It really doesn't make sense.”

Wirrin thoughts whirled while Thom and Calen, seeing his intense thinking, waited in anticipation.

“This asteroid can only affect one habitat and they know there'll be retribution from the other two. They' must be going to do something to the other two to protect themselves. It's the only way it can make sense.”

“Do what? Throw more asteroids? There aren't any.”

“...Yes there are. Lots of them, parked right next to K74. Thom, contact Pirramar and warn him. ...Tell him to get every Comet racing towards K74 as fast as possible. I need to think about this.”

Thinking in this case meant a concentrated burst with the InfoSystem, only distracted momentarily by the authoritative sound of Thom prefacing his transmission with a PRIORITY ONE signature.

Wirrin gathered every bit of information he thought relevant. As a stroke of luck, or more likely typical AI thoroughness, it had been sent as a matter of course with Pirramar's main situation transmission.

He summarised for Calen and Thom who were again waiting in anticipation.

“I hope I'm wrong but these asteroid course changes appear to have been purposely designed to keep us in doubt till the last possible moment, and that feels very much like a Rogue strategy to me. The Cadre might be angry enough to try and destroy one of our habitats but the Rogue would be too clever to let them because of the consequences they'd face.

Unless, it was part of something bigger. Then they could have themselves in a position where they think they could ignore consequences.

We've always wondered why they've built thirty Cadre ships and this could be the reason. Seven are with the asteroid and those other three are on the way to K74. I looked for the other twenty and, according to Pirramar's information, just over an hour ago not a single one of them was off on any sort of expedition. The whole twenty were in close proximity to K74, along with thirty-nine of those large asteroids they've collected. Thirty asteroids are associated with construction sites but that leaves nine extras.”

“And they could throw them at our habitats?”

“It makes sense as a strategy, and I do remember Thom telling us one time that kinetic weapons could be very dangerous for Attunga.”

“How big are the nine extras?”

Wirrin checked the sizes and flashed the results for Thom to see.

“.9 up to 1.3 cubic kilometers. ...They could move them at about 5G. ...Unless they doubled up, and then it would be close to ten.”

Thom did more calculation.

“An asteroid that size would have trouble getting past the habitat multi-spectrum beams. They're much more powerful than the Comet ones and the speed wouldn't be anything like the really big asteroid's.

“What about three at once?”

“That would be bad. Two would get through. ...Except they wouldn't because of the Comets.”

“How long to reach our habitats from K74?”

“At 5G or 10 G?”

“Both.”

“Um. ...At 5G it would be just over two a half hours and 10 G would be. ...Close to 1 hour 50 minutes.”

“And how long for the big asteroid to get there?”

“...Three hours and forty minutes from now. ...And we'll match up with it in two hours forty-five minutes.”

“Fifty-five minutes to spare. Will that be enough time to stop them?”

“It'll have to be Calen. I've been thinking about it and Wirrin's right. I'm sure I'll be able to disable one of them before they can retaliate too much, but then time will be critical because once I activate our multi-spectrum beam they'll all know where we are and they'll send thousands of missiles at us.”

“Thousands?”

“That's what they're set up for and I expect every ship will be involved.”

Calen looked stricken.

“What will we do?”

“We'll get away. Once I turn off the multi-spectrum beam our stealth protection will start coming into effect and most of the missiles will be confused.”

Wirrin interrupted.

“How long for our Comets to get to K74?”

“They'll go at high G so it will be nearly two hours.”

“That can't be right. You just said it was less than that from K74 with only 10 G and the Comets are twice as fast as that.”

“The Comets have to be stopped when they get there. It's a different calculation Calen.”

“Wombats! I'm not thinking right. Of course it is.”

“That's not good enough.”

“Why not? It's the best they can do.”

“If it's the Rogue organising this then I bet he'll have everything happening at once and that means the K74 asteroids would be on their way before our Comets can get to K74.”

“Not by much. ...twelve minutes.”

“Yes, but it would have been best to stop them before they started.”

“I'm getting confused by all these times.”

Wirrin wasn't, and Thom was trained for this kind of planning so he wouldn't be either, but it was worth twenty seconds to build a clearly labelled timeline on a section of the display for easy reference.

“Calen, send another transmission to Pirramar and Quambi telling them to watch carefully for any sign of the Cadre ships moving towards those asteroids. I'm sure they're are already doing it but I think it's very important. Explain everything we've been talking about.

Thom, I might be able to get the pico-factory working for us.”

“I hope so and I can tell you've already got some ideas.”

“That sounded very dangerous when you said most of the missiles would be confused, so I'm wondering if we could make some sort of anti-missiles or jamming device for any that weren't? And maybe I could build some sort of stealth drone like we used at Freedom, but designed to disable a drive engine?”

“Forget about anti-missiles. We'd need hundreds, or even thousands, of them and our little ship simply hasn't got enough resources. A jamming device could be perfect but it would have to be incredibly powerful because as soon as it was released it would rapidly fall behind.”

“How long would have it have to last?”

“Ideally for at least nine or ten seconds while our high G takes us out of range.”

“What about the stealth drone idea?”

“It sounds brilliant but it would use a lot of material and I doubt if we could make more than one.”

“Another idea came into my head too. Tell me what you think about this.”

Thom listened, then spluttered, which wasn't a good idea under double gravity.

“Wirrin you should be in charge of Security. The AIs might be able to help, but I doubt it.”

Despite his body straining against the extra G force, and his mind straining against what was ahead, Wirrin was pleased. He now had something to get his teeth into. The immediate priority was another transmission to Pirramar.

***

Half an hour later Wirrin finished his planning for the missile jamming device.

Part of that time had been taken with Calen, who, tense and quiet with worry, had only relaxed when word came from Sonic that all the Enhanced dolphins were aboard the Comet and that he was safe and busily occupied with his dolphin version of the InfoSystem.

More time was taken with Thom in a discussion about the best use of the limited pico-factory resources but nothing could be resolved till they knew more precisely the amount of materials the different projects would need.

“Thom, I figure we can allow ten percent of our resources for the jamming devices. They're very small and we'd be able to make two effective deployments before we ran out.”

“How do you define a deployment?”

“You said they'd need to work for at least nine or ten seconds and they don't. They're so powerful they burn out after 2.9 seconds and we'll have to release four of them at very carefully timed intervals.”

Thom thought before answering.

“A series of releases like that's much better than a single one because it keeps the jamming in closer proximity to the ship. We really need seven deployments though, not just two. Is there anything you can do about that?”

“I've got an idea but it means cannibalising parts of the ship.”

“What?”

“I can design a tech-bot to dismantle and process ship components like non-essential walls or the grav-bunks and make it with the pico-factory. It would use up resources but we'd gain overall, maybe enough for two or three more deployments.”

“Do it. Anything that can make a difference is important. Can you tell me how strong the jamming signals are?”

Wirrin found the information and flashed it on Thom's display.

“Is that real? Just as well I asked. I'll have to protect our scanners for the duration or they'll be fried.”

Wirrin jumped on that statement.

“Could we stealth them close to the Cadre ships and put their scanners out of action?”

“That's a good idea but it won't work. Their units are much heavier duty than ours and not nearly as sensitive. It's the sensitive parts which give us our advantages that I have to be careful about.

Calen, I'm going to teach you some basic manual operations of the ship so you can take over if something happens to me or Wirrin.”

Wirrin sensed Calen's mental jaw-drop.

“Okay! ...You think there's a possibility I might need to?”

“Using the maximum G that Wirrin has given us will be vital and you'll cope with higher levels than Wirrin or me. If we reach an effective 5G in here I mightn't even be able to move my hands.”

“And you think I might? Thom, all my experience is in water, and that's practically zero-G.”

“Doesn't matter. You push yourself every day and your oxygen distribution and circulation levels are way better than ours. That's what counts. When you're ready we'll do some trials and see what happens.”

Wirrin left them to it and started on his engine disabler project. His own plans needed every moment he could cadge.

***

Wirrin closed his eyes and forced his mind to slow down. He was on top of the engine disabler but this next project was proving trickier than expected, and pressured and frustrated, he knew it was time to take a break.

The last hour had been quite eventful with Thom and Calen training with the ship controls, and then when that was finished, an eleven second trial at the absolute maximum acceleration the ship could generate.

Wirrin didn't like it. At just under 5G in the cabin, an invisible force trapped him in his seat and the effort to move his hands was too much after four or five seconds. Thom lasted the same but Calen, proving their point, somehow managed to keep his control all the way through.

He said seven repeats would be far too much but Wirrin and Thom both expected that when the time came his recuperative ability and determination would push him through.

They'd started a discussion about options if they couldn't return to the habitats but Thom cut that short because, for now, they needed to keep a positive attitude.

Next there was the distraction of the release and successful triggering of a single missile jamming device.

Half an hour of break would be ideal. Five minutes was all Wirrin would allow.

***

Wirrin snapped his eyes open to check on times. Seven minutes. He'd relaxed, or the best version of that he could manage with double weight, and gone slightly longer than he meant.

So, an hour and twenty minutes till the ship matched with the asteroid, and fifty minutes before acceleration was cut back to just under the limits of the grav-compensators.

A small head turn showed Thom and Calen motionless in their seats with their eyes closed. That would end with the change to single G and they'd become very busy, especially Thom.

The next check was on the progress of the tech-bot. Yes, it was doing well, and there was enough reclaimed material built up for an extra five jamming devices.

Now, time to focus on the InfoSystem.

***

Red warning lights flashed briefly.

Pirramar's image flicked into existence.

“Thom, Wirrin, Calen. Our situation is now critical.

Nine pairs of Cadre ships are connecting with asteroids, two of which have already commenced acceleration in our direction, and our correlators indicate a ninety-eight percent probability that Warrakan will be impacted by the large asteroid.”

***