“Listen hard, mister, real hard,” Jason snapped. “What’s the rear line today could be overrun tomorrow. The war hasn’t been going well. I don’t know what bull they’ve been handing to you and the civilians back home, but we’re hanging on by our fingernails. We lost a third of our carriers in the last three months standard, half of our fleet in the last nine months. I know that’s classified information, but you might as well know the truth now. That’s three carriers in just the last two actions, with full compliment of five hundred spacecraft, six hundred pilots, and ten thousand crew. The Kilrathi got the edge and they’re pushing it straight into our guts. So damn it, listen up. I don’t care if you’re the nephew of God himself, but aboard this ship, and in my command you’re going to run your butt off or I’ll kick it from here all the way back to your uncle’s office and it’ll be years before they put you back together again. Do you read me, mister?”
Kevin’s features flushed with rage. He opened his mouth as if to speak but a pilot sitting next to him reached up and pulled him back down to his seat.
“All right then. Get some sleep. I want all of you in the hangar deck at 0400 tomorrow and expect all your craft to be preflighted and ready for launch by 0445. Dismissed.”
The pilots stood up and started to file out and from the corner of his eye Jason saw O’Brian standing in the open doorway, as if he had been eavesdropping on the talk.
As the pilots left the room he saw O’Brian fall in by Kevin’s side, the two exchanging quick salutes and then a friendly handshake.
“So the captain knows where the bread is buttered.”
Jason turned around to see Janice by his side.
“I’ve heard he’s been sucking up to that Tolwyn brat ever since they left Earth orbit. Made him acting wing commander until Doomsday and I checked on board yesterday. Doomsday has some real scuttlebutt on that captain,” Janice said.
“I don’t want to hear it, Janice,” Jason said wearily.
“All right then. But he’s a political climber like we haven’t seen in a long time. Never had a combat command. Right after he graduated from the Academy he dinged a destroyer in a docking maneuver and they pulled him off to transport command where he’s been ever since. The bastard pulled this assignment thinking it’s a quick tour of duty, he gets his ticket punched, a red combat tab in his file and then he runs back to fleet headquarters and continues the climb.”
“I said I don’t want to hear it.”
“All right then Bear, all right,” she said with a smile. “But if the fur starts to fly, it’s gonna be real interesting to see how he acts.”
“If the fur starts to fly, we’ll be far more worried about keeping our new pups alive without getting killed ourselves,” Doomsday said, coming up to join the group, bringing along a mug of coffee, thick, black, and with four sugars the way Jason liked it.
Doomsday took a look sip of his own drink, and sighing leaned against the bulkhead.
“Average pilot here’s got less than three hundred hours, some were sent up with only two hundred and fifty of combat training flight time.”
Jason nodded. Fleet training was forced to cut corners, the pressure was so heavy to get replacements up. But it was a trade-off: less training, they got here quicker, and died quicker, destroying their precious spacecraft at the same time.
“How do their records look?”
“Oh the usual,” Janice said. “All the right check marks, but precious little real information to go on.”
“Well, we’ll find out tomorrow morning then,” Jason said quietly.
CHAPTER II
“Clear flight deck for combat launching sequence. Repeat, clear flight deck…”
Jason stood to one side taking in every detail. Lyford Beverage, the flight deck officer who looked like he showed real promise, ran down the length of the deck, shouting out orders. The young lieutenant was most likely exhausted. Jason had simply mentioned his wish to have the recon ships positioned in front of the fighter bombers and Lyford had stayed up through the night to get the job done right. There still seemed to be a lot of unnecessary movement going on, missing was the calm, almost dancelike choreography of launching, that he was used to aboard the Concordia.
His pilots were already in their cockpits. At least for this first time out he gave them that advantage. For safety’s sake he wanted to first see how they flew, before taking them up to a full emergency scramble, going from asleep in their bunks to launch in under four minutes.
Janice was first to go. Beverage gained the flight deck control room, located on an elevated platform facing the airlock door, took a final scan of the deck, and then raised his hand in a thumbs-up gesture to the launch and recovery officer, thus signaling that all was ready. The launch and recovery officer was now in control of the deck and for that matter the entire ship, since the captain of the ship had to clear any course or speed changes with him first.
Above the airlock door a green light snapped on. The exhaust deflector shielding snapped up behind Janice’s ship, she powered up, and snapped off the thumbs-up that all systems were go. The launch chief petty officer down on the deck gave a thumbs-up, saluted, and crouched down low, pointing forward. The launch officer back in the control room hit the catapult button. Janice’s ship snapped out of the bay and she broke hard right as soon as she was in space.
The ground crew hurried the next recon ship into place and Jason looked down at his watch. Nearly a minute passed before the green light signaled again and the second ship launched, this one breaking left off the port side in a wobbly turn that was using far too much control and thrust.
“Damn, its going to be a long day,” he sighed, and Doomsday nodded in agreement.
One after the other the ships went out, after the sixth recon the first three Rapier fighters, and then the second six recon Ferrets. Next went six more Rapier fighters to form the close-in combat air patrol, and by this time nearly a half hour had passed, exacerbated by the abort of two launches, one with an overheating engine, the other with a full power shutdown, made worse by several seconds of panic on the part of the pilot when he wasn’t sure if he had toggled the eject system back on, or had secured it to full off.
Both craft had to be towed off the launch line and Doomsday groaned with despair.
“Concordia would have launched eighty craft by now. If the furballs jump us, we’re cooked.”
“We’re going to have to go with four recon ships out at all times,” Jason said. “I want forward warning round the clock. A stealth could jump in, and before our ship tracking system found it, we’d be finished.”
“Should keep a Sabre on the hot line loaded with a dogfighting and anti-torpedo array ready to go in under a minute’s warning,” Doomsday added, and Jason nodded an agreement. It’d mean that Janice’s people would be flying eight hours a day, while every bomber pilot, copilot, and gunner would be sitting in their cockpits for two and a half hours a day on the hot line. The training at least would be good for them but he could well imagine how the captain would howl when he heard how much engine time the Ferrets would be burning up.
The launch cycle continued and dictating in some last minute notes on his wrist-mounted memo pad Jason turned away from Doomsday, went over to his Rapier, and climbed into the cockpit.
“I’ve checked them all out myself,” Sparks said, climbing up on the wing to help Jason in. “This one’s the best of the lot so I made sure she was assigned to you, sir.”
“Thanks, Sparks.”