Ghosts in the Ether

[Soto Terius]

Half a sector away, the indicator on the comms console blinked. Terius let out a breath he hadn't realised he'd been holding; he was on his feet before the Lieutenant had even confirmed that the transmission was authenticated. Luckily he turned before he spoke; what would have been a verbal aknowledgement was turned simply into a silent nod.

"Give the order," Terius replied; simple words, but they sparked a flurry of activity. Several comms officers set to work, relaying instructions to the various ships of the flotilla. The conning officer barked orders at helmsmen on the bridge, the navigations officer chiming in with his announcement of hyperspace readiness. Weapons officers transmitted orders to the gun crews and missile loadmasters. Tactical officers readied shields, and braced themselves for what was to come.

Like a well-oiled machine, the entire flotilla completed the same meticulously planned preparation steps; and in almost perfect synch, a dozen mismatched vessels blasted their way into hyperspace.

*

Mere moments passed; lurking in deep space between star systems, the flotilla had crept as close as it dared to the Delrakkin system, lingering just out of range of the planet's long-range sensors.

Now however, the flotilla was decidedly in range, and panic had broken out on the planet. Sirens wailed throughout the Imperial Garrison on the surface, fighter pilots scrambling as fast as they could towards the planet's moderate force of TIE Fighters. Frantic exchanges were exchanged between the Outpost, and the lone Imperial Star Destroyer that stood vigil in orbit. Delrakkin was home to an Imperial research facility; one that had played a crucial part in developing interdictor technology for the Empire. It had been abandoned after the Battle of Yavin; but in the aftermath of Endor, the Imperials had been reclaiming and reactivating a lot of their former facilities.

Those frantic exchanges were intercepted by the Lieutenant at Terius' comm station, who fought the urge to grin at the sheer panic in the Imperial Officers' voice. He didn't quite manage to hide it well enough to fool Captain Terius however, and earned himself a stern look.

"We haven't won yet, Lieutenant."

"No, sir," the Lieutenant agreed, wishing that he could shrink down into his uniform. "Orders?"

Terius clasped his hands behind his back, staring out at the distant dagger shape of the Star Destroyer. "Standard attack formation," he instructed. "Order the flotilla to engage."

"And signal Captain Raurrssatta: let him know that we have begun our attack.

[MARCUS]

The E-WAR station lit up like a Life Day tree as it routed both deceptive spectrum toward the enemy and sifted through its own chaff to give Novgorod an understanding of her battlespace and the mission beyond.

"Imperial Trade Lane Task Force is maneuvering into attack formation. On course to intercept decoy package.

Coded HoloNet transmission received. Authenticating. Esk Flotilla has engaged the enemy."

The holographic battlespace around Morgan expanded to include a second theater, this time with non-realtime telemetry displaying the balance of Esk Flotilla against a snapshot of the force they faced at Delrakkin. On paper, the surprise was complete.

[Morgan Evanar]

Morgan's eyes flitted across the new data. It would take over an hour for the Trade Lanes patrol to arrive and tip the balance. Delrakkin was further up on the Trade Spine, and pinning them here with a phantom fleet was inspired strategy. He refocused on their more immediate problem, and studied the Imperial formation. They were not maintaining a tight group. The Deuce was separating from the rest of the fleet, partly by virtue of it's better engines, and partly because the Carracks were maneuverable enough to work on their own. The Victory-class was there to protect the Immobilizer 418. It was plain they intended to anvil/hammer the fake fleet. The Interdictor was an interesting beast. It was a powerful tool, but an automatic target. It was standard practice to keep them at least somewhat protected in combat. He queued projections of the present heading versus... and adjusted the body of the fleet to intercept the Imperial-Class. It would buy them another thirty seconds.

"If we change heading to 187 by 6 degrees we'll buy ourselves another 30 seconds and still look tactically viable." That extra thirty seconds away from the Interdictor could be edge between life and death.

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Cirr nodded at Morg's advice.

"Sajine..."

"One Eight Seven by Six, Aye Aye."

With the Imperial task force pushing full steam at their position, they'd hold the ruse as long as they could betray the Imperial sensors. Once they were in closer range the deception was up, and they had to leave as fast as possible. The capital ships they could outpace at sublight range. The TIEs they would launch were another matter entirely.

Morgan's trajectory slipped them out of the lagrangian point and back toward the mass shadow of the nearest planet, at the trailing arm of the system. Another hundred thousand kilometers. Another break in the line of sight if they were lucky.

A klaxon sounded.

"Captain, the task force is dumping fighters on a direct vector intercept!"

The battlespace map lit up the bridge, showing a phalanx of fighters origininating from the Task Force locus. Still far enough to play the ruse, but the time they had to exploit was halved.

[Morgan Evanar]

Morgan's fleet adjusted heading, too, for an intercept with the Deuce. A smart commander would do as much damage as possible and then jump before in range of the Interdictor. This was not an even fight with a pair of MC-80s and a much larger compliment of support craft. If things went right, they'd kiss the mass shadow and then clear it with time to spare.

Morgan replaced Soto's theater with a more accurate representation of the inbound TIEs and associated fighter types based on speed. They were throwing a lot of TIE Interceptors at the problem, although given it was a Trade Lanes patrol, that was not surprising that they had a higher than usual compliment of Interceptors. They lost 15 seconds by virtue of the extra TIE-I's.

"Fif.. no, 45 seconds to fighter sensor intercept." Morgan announced.

"I recommend we dump the ruse with 10 seconds to spare." He added. It would give them extra time to balance the ship's power systems and grant them extra burn. Most importantly, it would give them extra time to spool the hyperdrive and free MARCUS to make a faster jump calculation.

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Cirr was nodding along, as if the two of them were face to face. He was back in his chair, feeling the faint moisture of perspiration on his forehead. Second after agonizing second. They were all staring at the sun, betting each other they could keep their eyes fixed to the spot the longest without going blind. Every second they could bullshit the task force was time Captain Terius could use to punish the enemy with impunity. The Star Destroyer his flotilla faced was utterly outclassed without the support they were denying them. Still, the danger was real.

No fighter support, and until the ruse dropped, limited resources. They burned slower, their sensors couldn't ping active. They couldn't active lock missiles. For all the power of E-WAR, the terror lied in those slivers of time when you had to ask yourself if you could afford to keep it going for one more moment.

The TIEs ticked onward. He could almost hear the ion engines screaming.

"Load rrearr tubes wjith djiamond borron mjissjiles. Prreparre thrree salvos."

Behind him, the gunny barked an Aye Aye, sending the ordnance command to the battery.

Sweat.

He rattled off a long breath, wiping at his forehead with the back of his hand.

The TIEs were shaving the orbital horizon of the planet they skirted. Those pilots had eyes, and they were about to use them.

"Morrgan, now!"

[Morgan Evanar]

Morgan had already directed MARCUS to start calculating hyperspace exit vectors, but there was one final card he had: simulated hyperspace wake. With Cirr's word, the pseudo-fleet pseudo-jumped. With MARCUS's attention directed at the Navicomputer, Morgan's was directed at the ship's power systems. While the retrofitted automatic systems were good, they did not know things Morgan did. Morgan knew life support had an easy 30 second buffer before it would matter that it wasn't being fed any power. Morgan knew there were enough batteries for aux to go at half power for an hour, so it wouldn't mind being given the short end of the stick for a few minutes, and he knew that he could do an incremental decreases as each ship-shadow jumped.

"Morrgan," Hyperspace wake appeared staccato, each "jumped" mere seconds before active sensor contact. "... now!" By the time the pair of "cover Corvettes" jumped, the ship was at 92% available power.

"Sensor contact!" Morgan barked.

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Now the ruse was up, and it could clearly be seen in the TIE formation. They formed up into a tighter kill spike, no longer fooled by the phantom fleet that was breaking and delaying the lie.

"Go forr full burrn!"

"Full sublight burn on hyper approach vector, aye aye!"

They were soulbound to this trajectory until the navicomputer locked them into their escape. By now, the added push from engines at their zenith was putting distance on the Task Force. They only had to contest this space with the TIE fighters.

"Torrpedo volley fjirre!"

Novgorod shuddered slightly as the aft torpedo tubes fired in unison, sending a pair of diamond boron missiles into the void. The closely-formed TIEs quickly broke ranks, but the high explosive warheads were dumb-fired, detonating in the heart of the flock. A shockwave claimed an entire squadron, cutting a gash in the heart of the Imperial hunter killer group.

"Rreload and fjirre at wjill!"

The Imperials weren't likely to make the mistake of massing their fighters on the exit vector again, but then again, Novgorod only had to buy herself a few more seconds. The first fighters reached attack range, spraying laser fire across the aft shielding.

[Morgan Evanar]

"MARCUS?" Morgan asked as an Interceptor pair smashed together in a panic to avoid another missile salvo. They hadn't really taken any damage yet, and the rear gunners were putting up a good deterrence. The agile TIE/In were whittling away at the rear shielding. Morgan heard a distant whoop when one of the front gunners put a turbolaser bolt through an eyeball on a loopback. The craft disappeared in a gout of flame and debris.

"I'm getting gravitational flux from that Interdictor, but we're still well out of range." Morgan said. He didn't know what the spool time was on an Interdictor. He didn't care to find out, either.

The TIEs pounded the Novgorod's shields, but they were designed for capital ship engagements and held. There was nearly a whole wing of TIE Fighters bearing down on them now, though, plus Bomber support. Those would be trouble.

"Bombers inbound." Morgan announced. "Navigation solution complete."

"Hyperdrive Status Green." The Navigation Officer announced a few seconds later.

"Engage!" Cirr said, and the Novgorod jumped.

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Cirr reclined back in his seat a bit as the bridge erupted into whoops and cheers. The vortex of hyperspace yawned in front of them as a sign of their victory. They'd gone in, fooled the enemy, and got out just before the heat. Terius had ample time to trounce the Imperial target his flotilla aimed for.

Feeling a wave of relief come over him, he glanced back to Morgan, and gave him a nod.

"Damn good worrk, Morrgan. Damn good."

He paused to enjoy the thought of it, undoing the top of his jacket slightly.

[Morgan Evanar]

"Lets try to not cut that so close next time." Morgan gave Cirr a somewhat tired smile, and Cirr half-smiled and shrugged. Everything had worked perfectly though. They got a Trade Lanes fleet to chase it's tail. Morgan stood up and stretched, and then queued a telemetry review.

"Grabbin' grub." He announced to the Captain, who dismissed him with a wave. Jedi. Well, more Morgan.

"Damage rreport." Cirr went back to being The Captain again. He needed to know how his ship and crew were.