Alpha One - Chris Burton [17]
“I believe I have outlined a fully justified and coherent plan for additional funding.”
Just then Alpha’s chief of staff entered. Admiral Neville was Alpha’s commander in chief. De Voort asked him to attend to give substance to some of his costing plans. The Admiral was late, which offended the President, and he didn’t like the Admiral either which offended him even more.
It was right at this point that President Roslyn elected to make a stand. There will be no additional funding. The economy cannot afford it and Alpha would have to cope by cutting costs elsewhere. The media would have their say, but that would die down. In the end he was doing this for the good of his party and the next president.
Chapter Eight
The Wounded Fox
The Aurora 5 limped into Alpha Territory at sub-stellar speed, having sustained a velocity in excess of light speed for over 36 hours. This was much longer than Hoskins intended, but it was clear they were still being pursued, and to reduce to sub-light speed before would have almost certainly resulted in the Sentinel ship going in for the kill. He had the relative protection of territorial space, even though his ship was still over twenty light years from home. Surely Yoshi would not try to engage in battle here?
The rational was simple, made simpler by the fact that while the Aurora’s stellar drive still operated, most of his ship clearly didn’t. Repairs were carried out to all decks affected, but the bulkheads were damaged. No amount of patching up mid-flight would resolve this problem for long. In addition the shield systems faltered, plus the ship’s pitch and yaw controls were knocked out of balance by twenty percent. The Auxiliary drive was back on line, but the plasma injectors in the stellar drive poured plasma into the void, leaving a trail for all to follow. Like a wounded fox, the prey was being pursued; his blood was the plasma, and with a weakening heart, he waited for his attackers to catch him and finish their kill.
The Sentinel vessel still pursued them. It was some way back, but within range, and the gap between them was definitely closing.
Hoskins turned his attention to the location of the nearest Alpha vessels. There were two ships within short range and a further four just outside. His communications officer tried to contact them but this area of space was notoriously bad for comm links. Hoskins knew he needed to get nearer to a sub-space communications booster before his transmissions were picked up. At current velocity, the Aurora 5 would be within comm range in fifteen minutes. Hoskins knew he could not rest on his laurels waiting, so he left his quarters and headed straight to the main hangar deck.
The Aurora’s jump ships were stacked two high each in an individual ‘workshop’ to the left of the hangar. The ship’s CAG was Lieutenant Eileen Collins and she looked up as Hoskins walked towards her.
Aurora 5 had a complement of twenty-seven vessels stored within two hangars in the center of the ship. This provided protection and allowed the jump ships, in particular, the opportunity to achieve maximum thrust before they left the relative safety of their mother ship.
The main hangar housed twenty Rapier jump ships, twelve of which were Rapier 7’s. The other eight, the reserve fleet, were aging Rapier 6’s. The smaller hangar deck to the rear of the main deck housed five Sabres and two Eagle carrier ships.
Hoskins briefed his CAG some hours earlier that the likelihood was that he would be calling all the Rapier 7’s and three Sabres into action. In this situation, the jump ships would provide the Aurora 5 with ‘cover of last resort’, if the comm links failed to call in assistance from the other nearby Alpha vessels.
Hoskins knew his options were running short and it was time to brief his CAG and get the jump ships primed and ready for launch. This was the kind of decision he hated. He was about to order his crew into action, with the likelihood that some would not return. This was different from the elation of a few days before. The hunter