“The launch/no launch decision must be made within the next two hundred fifty seconds,” Sir Isaac said, “in order to intercept the target before it is within firing range of Cadmus Base. This assumes, incidentally, a ten million-G acceleration to bring the projectiles up to a velocity of 171 kps, which gives a time-to-target of 19.4 minutes.”
“Colonel?” Steve said.
“Definitely,” she replied. “Go! This may be our only opportunity to take these people.”
“I agree. I’d rather not have to fight them coming around the back side. Okay, Sir Isaac. You have the con. At your discretion, take down the hostile.”
“Affirmative. Initiating launch sequence.”
Seconds passed, and Kaitlin felt a series of bumps transmitted through the deck. Sir Isaac fired maneuvering thrusters to precisely align the Jefferson with the distant target.
“All hands, this is the ship’s control system,” Sir Isaac said over the ship intercom. “Stand by for maneuvering, possibly violent, within the next three minutes. I recommend you take seats and strap yourselves down.” An interesting distinction, that, Kaitlin thought. AIs were not permitted to give orders aboard ship, only to make suggestions. “Secure all loose gear and prepare for both zero-G and sudden acceleration.”
Currently, the Jefferson was under thrust, facing away from Jupiter as she decelerated down from her skew-flip point. They’d delayed the skew-flip, the one way they could dramatically shorten the travel time to Europa, cutting over two days off their ETA. The tradeoff was the maneuver they were going to have to pull at Jupiter in order to kill their excess velocity.
“Sixty-seven seconds to firing,” Sir Isaac said. “Cutting thrust in five…four…three…two…one…cutting thrust.”
Gravity vanished. The A-M cruiser dropped tail-first toward Europa, in free fall.
“Initiating roll-pitch maneuver.”
Kaitlin and Steve were strapped down now in adjacent seats on the bridge deck. She glanced across at him, trying to read his expression. She wondered how it felt to have his ship under the command of a computer—how it felt to leave the entire battle in a machine intelligence’s figurative hands.
That was happening more and more in combat systems on Earth, certainly. Robot or teleoperated fighters could maneuver with accelerations that would kill a flesh-and-blood pilot. Some combat situations demanded a computer’s speed and precision. If space combat ever became common, it would almost certainly be left in the hands of artificial intelligences that could draw on far more information much more quickly than humans, to make decisions in fractional seconds, with weapons and targets so fast that no human could react quickly enough to control them.
A semblance of gravity returned, a hard tug against the seat restraints and the feeling that she was hanging upside down in her seat, as the 250-meter length of the Jefferson spun end for end. There followed several more bumps and nudges, and then a long, weightless wait.
“Firing sequence in five seconds,” Sir Isaac said. “Four…three…two…one…Firing sequence initiated.”
The mass driver down the Jefferson’s core began cycling, each launch causing a savage nudge, pushing them against their harnesses. The shots were staggered, with several launches seconds apart, followed by a sudden slam-slam-slam of rapid fire. In all, Sir Isaac launched fifteen ten-kilo slivers of depleted uranium, spaced out across twelve seconds, with several periods of maneuvering along the way. “I have ceased firing,” Sir Isaac announced. “With repeated hyperacceleration, temperature inside the railgun barrel was beginning to exceed safe limits.”
The first of the rounds would reach the vicinity of the Star Wind in just over nineteen minutes.
The question was whether the Star Wind would see them in time and be able to maneuver to avoid them.
PRC Cruiser Xing Feng
In orbit, one hundred kilometers
above Europa
1651 hours Zulu
The Star Wind was approaching firing point, 100 kilometers above the rolling, ice surface of the moon. General Lin had joined Captain Tai Hsing-min on the bridge, determined to see with his own eyes the obliteration of the CWS base.
“I must point out, General,” Tai was saying, “that our orders explicitly require the preservation of key CWS facilities. We are at war with the American government, not with the CWS scientific community.”
“Pah!” Lin replied. “Legalistic nonsense. This base has already cost us far too much in terms of time, life, and materiel. We end this. Now.”
Tai began to reply, then thought better of it. Lin was not known for his reasonable manner. “Yes, sir.”