He vented his pent-up frustration in a scream, slammed his fist down on the alarm button and shouted into the intercom, "Battle stations! Chief Engineer, come to full power." Simultaneously he grabbed his battle armor and began to put it on. It took him less than thirty seconds to don the cumbersome gear and pressurize it. Before he was finished Advanced Sensor Operator and Sraowl-Navigator had bounded into the control room and started scrambling into their own suits. Already the missile status indicators were glowing red, indicating Senior Gunner was at his post. No more than forty-five seconds elapsed before Sraowl-Navigator reported, "Battle stations established, sir, power and drive coming on line, sensors and weapons systems ready.”
Chraz-Captain growled in approval, his hands busy entering targeting and course commands. His crew were second to none. Their performance could not fail to impress the senior officer. After weeks of tense boredom it was almost a relief to see combat. He keyed the intercom again. "The monkeys have set a snare for us. We will show them what it means to catch a kzin!”
"They're powering up," warned the ensign at the sensor console. Commander Mace had no need to sound the alarm. Her crew had been waiting on full alert standby for six hours now. Knowing their target's course and speed, Excalibur had found the enemy three days previously through their optical telescope. To her infinite relief it had turned out be a scoutship after all, Prowler class, reconnaissance variant. Now its image floated serenely on the bridge display screen, its absorptive hull coating only slightly lighter than the ultimate black surrounding it. A stylized twin glowed red on her combat console. Excalibur had gone to battle stations long before her wide-angle sensors had given the slightest hint of the icon's presence. It was a safe bet that the scoutship would have instruments as good or better than theirs, but Excalibur had the advantage of knowing their target's courseline.
She smiled a little at that thought. Detection technology had become amazingly sophisticated, but since the time of sail nothing beat a trained eye and a telescope – you just had to know where to look. She had an antique brass naval telescope hanging on the wall of her cabin and beside it an iron sextant. Thus she maintained her link with the generations of mariners who had sailed Earth's oceans. She also wore a skull-and-crossbones earring in defiance of UNSN regulation.) Elizabeth Mace was a Belter, and Belters were prone to identify with outlaws in general and pirates in particular.
She pushed the comm button. "All hands look sharp, we've been spotted. All systems on." She switched the comset to external. It was already set to the Terran emergency band; presumably the scoutship would be monitoring it. She'd spent some time in the last two months improving her command of the Hero's Tongue. One short speech had occupied much of her studies. "Kzin scoutship, this is the UNSN destroyer Excalibur. Surrender or be fired on.”
In reply the image on the display flashed several times. "Missile launch, radar lock," called the sensor ensign. Simultaneously a cluster of flashing icons appeared beside the enemy's symbol on her combat console. That was a bit of a surprise. The Prowler class mounted no beam weapons, but at this range it would take minutes for the missiles to reach Excalibur, more than enough time to shoot them down. Typical tabby behavior: attacking seemed to be more important than winning to them. Mace keyed the intercom again. "A and B turrets, hit the kzin. C turret, take the missiles." She felt relaxed and confident. They easily outgunned the scoutship and while it could outrun them it couldn't outrun a laser beam. She had them right where she wanted them.
Suddenly the viewscreen flared white. "Missile detonated," called the sensor ensign. Her combat display showed an expanding sphere of orange haze, marking the area where the warhead's energetic plasma degraded Excalibur's instruments. She waited for it to dissipate as it grew but it didn't. Mace's calm evaporated. The kzin hadn't intended to hit them, he was covering himself. Another warhead went off. The red icon and its gentle orbit curve disappeared from the display, replaced by a rapidly expanding course funnel. The scoutship could be anywhere inside it. Mace swore and swung the navigation cursor around until it intersected the outsystem side of the funnel. The enemy captain would be trying use his superior acceleration to get out of Excalibur's range and Sol's gravity well at the same time. She punched execute and felt the ship surge beneath her as the gravity compensator adjusted to the new load, The viewscreen flared again and she flipped it off. On her display Excalibur's icon began to slide towards the interception point, slowly at first, then faster and faster. A second volley of missiles detonated, filling the screen with more blobs of orange blankness.
Suddenly a new icon appeared, very close, flashing red. Even before the sensor ensign called 'Missile lock-on', she had stabbed the comm button. "All turrets – " Before she could finish, a green line flashed on her display, linking Excalibur and the missile. It flashed again and the icon disappeared.
"Good shooting, C turret," she finished. That one was too close for comfort. She cursed herself for not expecting the tactic and hoped the tabbies didn't have any more surprises like that up their sleeves.
Minutes later they had reached the expected intercept point but had yet to locate the kzin. Large areas of the screen were now covered in orange haze, but from their position they had a clear view of the portion of the kzin's course funnel that would give most promise of a viable escape route. There was nothing there.
Hypothesis: The kzin had much more powerful drives than the assumptions punched into the combat computer. If so they were already beyond Excalibur's range and beyond capture. It might be true but since it left no options, assume not.
Hypothesis: The kzin had accelerated deeper into Sols gravitational well. They might have escaped for the moment, but their mission was doomed. If Excalibur didn't find them the massive Earth-orbiting sensor arrays would be brought into play. Dozens of warships would be available for the hunt. That far into the singularity there would be no need for them to sneak up on their quarry. Perhaps the tabby had taken the risk, but if he had then Mace didn't need to worry about it.
Hypothesis: The kzin had reversed course when the warheads went off, his drive emissions covered by their blast. He'd simply followed his own missiles, overtaken the fog of charged particles, matched velocities and shut down again He'd just drift back out the way Excalibur had come in. By the time the haze dissipated enough to allow Mace's sensors to work reliably the volume the kzin could occupy would be immense. Before they could search that space he would be far enough out to use his hyperdrive.
Mace stabbed an orange sphere with her finger. That had to be it. With no power emissions to track and no precomputed course to search with the telescope Excalibur would be forced to use active scanning to search out her quarry. That might work but it would also give away their position. At the short detection ranges possible in the particle haze they'd probably earn a beamrider missile in the tracking array for their trouble. Earth's facilities were no use. They were powerful enough to find the kzin through the fog but Earth was over a light-hour away and hyperwave didn't work inside the singularity. It would take an hour to ask for help, two more for Earth to bounce a beam off the scout and another for them to tell her what they'd found. By then the kzin would be long, long gone.