Alien Honor by Heppner Vaughn

Author:Heppner, Vaughn [Heppner, Vaughn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction, Fantasy
ISBN: 9781477858820
Amazon: B00C6NK82O
Goodreads: 18516744
Publisher: 47North
Published: 2013-11-26T08:00:00+00:00

4

Cyrus was in the bridge module at Argon’s orders, sitting in the weapons officer’s chair. For the past few hours, the officers had been giving him a crash course on how to operate each of their stations. It was on the assumption that the aliens could successfully sleep the crew a second time. If Cyrus found himself alone again, Argon wished him to be able to make the best decisions.

“Continue to scan the enemy warship,” Nagasaki said.

Lieutenant Tanaka used radar and advanced teleoptics. It had been a day since their destruction of the alien habitat. The alien warship still accelerated toward them, but it already moved at its incredible velocity. In a little less than forty-eight hours, it would be in range of Discovery’s primary laser. In three days, the warship would have covered the distance from Saturn to Neptune—the distance from the ringed gas giant to New Eden’s asteroid belt—about three billion kilometers.

Teleship Discovery moved at a fraction of the enemy warship’s speed.

Tanaka shifted one of his screens so Cyrus could view it with him. “The enemy warship has a similar mass to a Solar Navy battleship,” Tanaka said, “although its configuration is different. Our navy uses circular vessels. The enemy warship has a teardrop shape.”

“Is that important?” Cyrus asked.

“It would be if they had particle shielding,” Tanaka said. “A Sol battleship has large asteroidal rocks or particles to protect it. Those particle shields use mass to absorb enemy lasers and missiles. Given enough time and energy, a laser will cut through anything. A Sol battleship can rotate particle shields, lengthening its existence by putting fresh protection into place.”

“We lack rotating shields on Discovery,” Cyrus noted.

“True, but we do have asteroidal mass. We can also rotate the entire ship, aiming undamaged mass at enemy lasers, providing they use such beams. Once their lasers punch through the outer rock, they will have to drill through armor. A Sol battleship has collapsium armor. We are not a warship, however, but an armed and armored colonizing vessel.”

Cyrus understood all that. “What kind of armor does the alien have?”

Tanaka licked his lips. “Analysis shows they don’t have collapsium, which is lucky for us. It appears to be regular steel plating. How thick is the plating? I’m not sure. If I were to guess from the data, it appears the thickness is much less than our asteroid rock. That means, without another form of enemy defense, our lasers should be able to punch through their armor.”

Cyrus recalled what had happened while beaming the alien habitat. “The first time, they stopped our laser several hundred meters before the armored skin. You’ve watched the video, right?”

“I have,” Tanaka said, “several times.”

“How did they stop the laser?” Cyrus asked.

“Their ability is a mystery to us. Our sensors didn’t pick up a force field or force screen. Such defensive screens have been a staple desire of military strategists for some time. Back home, we’ve never come up with anything remotely like it.”

“What does that suggest to you the aliens are doing?” Cyrus asked.

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