Captain Davis Lammarr set his cup of coffee down on his seat's cup-holder. He decided he was glad to be the captain, his seat was the only one with a cup-holder. He picked up the novel he had been reading, Red Planet by Robert A. Heinlein, when all the sudden the sensor tech shouted into his voice comm.
"Three Sensor Contacts! No transponder, civilian or military! ITS THE ALIEN BASTARDS!"
Immediately Lammarr's heart began to pound. The aliens where back? No...they had just entered the system and begun to survey it. This was another New York. The orginal survey team had perished to the merciless scumbag aliens. His hands begun to shake as the realization that he was facing three hostile enemy ships that would probably try very hard to kill them all.
Even thoug Lammarr was technicaly a navy captain he wasn't really in the navy. He was just part of the Survey corps, who were all civilians really, and given naval ranks since most of their work was for the government.
"Captain?" His sensor officer asked. Everyone on the bridge was looking to him for orders.
Yes. He was the captain, he was in charge. Damn.
"What are they doing?"
"It looks like they are on an intercept course, Sir. Estimated speed of 7500 km/s."
Damnit again. His Portland Survey Cruiser was fast, way faster than most ships, being able to clock 2500 km/s. It wouldn't be enough to get back and escape the system. The aliens could follow them anyway.
He turned to his cargomaster. "Bren, take some engineers and activate the emergency missile systems. Turn on the point defense launchers and ready the targeting system for the box launcher."
Yes, he started to hope, The Portland is far different from those first survey ships. The military kept it top secret, only the captain and cargo master aboard the ship could know, but each Portland Survey cruiser was armed with ten anti-missile launchers and a single box launcher with a Novafury missile loaded into it. At the time the Portland was designed the war effort was in full swing to build the North Carolina and the designers had decided it was critical that the survey ships be defended. Now that the aliens had supposedly been defeated for 50 years budget cuts had almost completely disarmed the fleet.
Not the Portlands though, the survey crews and the military had a very keen remembrance of the first contact with the aliens. Over ten thousand lives perished as the aliens mercilessly cut into the unarmed survey ships.
Stares from all around the bridge centered on him.
"We have weapons?"
"Our ship is armed?"
"The military has right done armed a merchant ship!"
and
"frakking A, lets blast those alien motherfrakkers!"
Lammarr agreed with the last, but he knew they only had one real shot, and multiple enemy ships.
"Set course for the jump point, maximum speed. Order engineering to remove all the limiters and squeeze as much speed as possible."
They could either try to go straight away from the aliens, or speed for the jump point. Since the aliens would catch them either way, he decided the jump point would be the best way to go.
Hours passed...the aliens came within Novafury range, but he didn't fire. he didn't want to provoke them...but they kept coming anyway. Finally an alarm sounded.
"Alien ships are sending out active radar pulses!"
Damn...that mean they were targeting them now!
"Target the larger alien vessel! Fire the Novafury!" The launcher spit out its single charge. The Novafury was a powerful missile, able to clock a high rate of speed while delivering ten laser warheads on targets going nearly 10km/s.
Time passed and...
"Final defensive radar detects 2 incoming missiles! Now 4!"
He didn't have to order the point defense missiles to fire, they launched automatically.
"Now 6! smeg...8!"
Nothing he or his crew could do now but pray the defensive systems worked.
Anti-missile spat out at missile...explosions dotted the space near the Portland vessel and huge amounts of radiation was deflected by the hull.
It took three anti-missiles for each missile to ensure a hit. They only had 100 anti-missiles.
"Missiles 1 and 2 destroyed...three destroyed...smeg! All missiles missed 4! Its coming in!"
The missile slammed into the ship and Lammar flew out of his seat and into the back of another officer's chair. He thought he broke his jaw but he got up and clamored back into his chair.
"Status report!"
The officer at the engineering console was on the ground, unconscious. He ran over to the console and looked. The belt armor had held. A pit had occurred in a second of the armor that went halfway through. Thank god for the amount of armor on the ship.
"More incoming missiles...damn...18...20...22..."
"How many can they fire!"
Anti-missile met anti-missile. Another missile made it through and another explosion ripped through the ship. It was stopped by the armor as well.
Then disaster.
"Warning: Warning: Anti-Missile Magzine depleted. Please refill ordinance bay."
The rate of fire from the aliens hadn't let up. Damn.
"This is then." Lammarr said softly to himself.
"Sir, the aliens are moving away from the Novafury missile!"
They probably realized we are already dead....dammit all.
Missile after missile slammed into the Portland and it was all he could do to hold onto his chair to keep from being slammed about.
Then everything stopped.
Electronics sparked with complaints of overstress but he could see the engineering station, the tech that had been unconscious beside it gone. He dragged himself over to it and looked at the readout.
The armor had gaping wounds in from where the missiles had carved their way through. Half the engines were inoperable...hundreds of casualties were on the list. But the fire had stopped...and miraculously the active sensors had held. The aleins were still moving away from the Novafury.
Lammarr couldn't keep a hold of his consciousness. Finally he passed out.
