Checkmate: (AE Competition Winner Redrafted)
The stars were silent, eerily silent within the vastness of space, as the United Colonies fleet tumbled
blindly through the void. There was an industrial hum within the background as the heat continued to
sink into the stinking clothes of the crewmen aboard the bridge of the UCS Wraith of Hades.
They were running dark, one of twenty-five ships, all assembled into a small blob formation slowly and
silently moving through an asteroid field. Only the red emergency lights were active casting an eerie
crimson glow across the ships interior where the dark shadows crept forth from the numerous sealed
bulkheads. Men and women of the navy, their vacuum suits stripped down to their waists, silently
watched the fleet coms as beads of thick sweat stained their revealed thermal underwear.
There was a ping! A loud supersonic sound echo shrieked like a banshee through the solar system. Lord
Admiral Horton, Supreme Commander of the Nemesis Center Force, waited patiently while seated at
the helm. Sweat dripped down his forehead as he watched the holographic navigational charts glowing
before his visage.
His plan depended upon timing. He would only get one chance to ambush the enemy fleet moving
through the Los Primus Star System named after its capitol world. If his adversaries picked up the United
Colonies warships energy signatures or received an unidentified mass response from sound feedback
‘ping’ his plan would fail.
These were desperate times. Just six years ago the United Colonies possessed a military so vast and
powerful that nothing could challenge them. The Ravens March changed that. Those monsters had cut a
bloody swath through colonial space in a matter of weeks butchering every human they could get their
hands on.
Then, they had just simply vanished and left the greatly diminished UC Navy to pick up all the pieces. In
the years long past, back before the alien menace gutted the colonial military, none of the older colonies
within the Argon Cluster would dare revolt against the UC government, but things had changed. Petty
solar states seceded spontaneously throughout the stars without warning. They did it for numerous
reasons, but usually for financial motivations. For the UC, it was like putting out a trillion fires with a
single water gun.
“No contact…” said the helmsman. The UC fleet continued to move through the asteroid belt. Small
rocks popped off their metallic hulls with dull thuds which failed to register upon sensors at a distance
for sound did not travel in space.
Lord Admiral Horton continued to watch the blue holographic lines of his star charts slowly spin through
the solar system shrouded within the asteroid belt. The enemy warships belonging to a rouge star
system patrolled along a nearby intercept course which would pass them overheard within the next 0:10
seconds of sub-light-FTL relative time.
Ever since the war, the United Colonies had been forced to adapt without the benefit of numerical
superiority. Missions that once would be allocated two Dreadnoughts were now given two Heavy
Cruisers. It was just the reality of the situation. The UC no longer had the ships to spare and thus the
navy simply had to make do with less.
This was not to say that the old Earth government lacked the ability to defend itself. No, it just had to
reprioritize. There was little the Navy could do about its lack of ships, but its officers on the other hand?
Lord Admiral Horton had earned his place amongst the UC Directorate through his talents as a military
commander. He accomplished more with less both before and after the Raven menace cut through
humanity like red death. But now, this was a critical skill at a time when what remained of the UC
military was all but in shambles. His enemies were human now, not alien, and they knew him by
reputation if not as a myth.
In the years before the war, Rear Admiral Horton had been but one of many talented UC military
tacticians. In the post-war, with so many brilliant minds snuffed out in the blink of an eye, he was a
single skilled leader and those who sought battle against the weakened UC knew him simply as, ‘The
Chess Master.’
Horton found the title somewhat gaudy, but those who served under him approved fondly thus he
embraced it nonetheless. Of course, it was also better than the annoying title used by the extra-solar
press spreading post-war propaganda, ‘Horton the Undefeated.’ Really? Undefeated? Well, the Lord of
Admirals guessed that the Ravens March didn’t count towards his defeat tally now did it? Aye?
The intercept lines continued to converge as the UC ships moved running cold and silent through the
asteroid field. They were using just enough engine power to maintain forward movement against the
forward collisions of space debris.
Digital time continued to be logged on the holographic navigational chart, counting down, as the two
relative fleet positions drew closer and closer. This was a key difference between ships moving at or
above FTL1, and ships moving below the light barrier. Relativistic position could be determined using
mathematical certainty algorithms until ships breached the light barrier. This was because at any speed
exceeding FTL, external light photons beyond the warp transit field maintained zero movement. At the
very best, ships moving at FTL could only get an after-image from the static photon particles external to
the ships. Being in FTL was like being blinded unless a local source could feed communications data into
the computer systems of an inbound fleet to determine relative positioning data.
Getting a local positioning reference was easy since his ships were transitioning through the star system
at significantly less than light speed. Thus, they were still able to maintain a point of reference while
moving through the asteroid field which also broke up the visual and mass profiles of his warships.
That was Horton’s plan. He had deactivated his warships friend-or-foe broadcast tags and used the Los
Primus asteroid belt to mask his approach. The solar debris masked his relative position on a signal
sweep while the vastness of space made direct observation of his relative position improbable… unless
they themselves knew where to look.
After a few more moments the clock finally hit null 000-000-000. The Admiral literally jumped from his
seat with his blue dress jacket unzipped and open to the waist, “This is Tactical Command Central, to
Flotillas Pegasus 01 to Pegasus 08, engage!! I repeat, engage!! All engine units to full power and begin
course alterations to swing broadside!! Sorties are to begin clean sweep following the first salvos!!”he
said while rezipping his dress uniform and drawing a pipe from his pants pocket. Horton rarely smoked
because it set a bad example on the ship, but in this instance he was going to make an exception.
The crew instantly brought the Command Ships power core up to full spin. The red emergency lights
shut off only to be replaced by a bright whiteness which seemed to fill every corner of the bridge. Spots
formed in the corners of Horton’s eyes as the shipboard AI constructs were awoken from low power
sleep. They assembled before him like kneeling knights before standing to man holographic command
consoles. Horton himself started to micromanage the ships navigational telemetry.
Hundreds of inter-fleet communications started to roll in and out as twenty Heavy Cruisers and Five
Dreadnoughts started to ascend from the asteroid belt like wales breaching the ocean crust. His ships
were running parallel to the enemy armada which reacted far too slowly in hopes of countering such a
bold move.
The AI constructs under Horton’s command organized a rapid firing plan and sent it to their likeminded
AI constructs aboard the Heavy Cruiser escorts and Line Dreadnoughts. Seconds later a rolling volley of
plasma fire raked an assembled task force of Battleships. The enemy fleet instantly lost its nerve before
photon fire from his Dreadnoughts could be brought to bear against the remaining Ion Frigates and Light
Cruisers.
Dozens of enemy warships broke from the engagement on another parallel running an outbound
intercept of +4:00 minutes from the Asteroid Belt to Los Primus itself. His own ships maintained
relativistic slow movement in comparison to the enemy warships and lagged behind the outbound solar
curve at +10:00 minutes.
Still, the extra time gave him an opportunity to make alterations to the ever changing plan. His fleet was
re-organized on the fly by his AI constructs while in hot pursuit. Fleet Admiral Horton had his fleet
intercepts rewoven into three interlocking spheres based upon relativistic time so that his forces could
obtain optimal fastest lines through the solar system.
His fleet now consisted of three separate Task Groups. The first were his Destroyers moving far around
Los Detriox to slingshot through the solar system. The second were his Cruisers moving in rapid pursuit
at +4:20 relativistic time. The third were his Dreadnoughts still lagging at +10:00 behind the fleeing
enemy armada. Horton also left a single Destroyer behind to feed reference data to his ships as they
breached the light barrier outbound from the asteroid field.
Los Primus, the location where most of his ships were heading, was a toxic moon whose only economic
worth was that it was along a popular commercial shipping route through the Argon Cluster and into the
Ajax Cataclysm. This was why the rouge militant solar state occupying the system fought so fiercely. It
was about money. It was always about money. The rouge states were like leeches feeding off of the
tarnished glory of the United Colonies now diminished from the Ravens March.
The enemy pursuit continued. It continued as additional fleet traffic timers counted down on a
holographic chart. There was more going on here than this simplistic skirmish. No, the UC was hunting
bigger game than a bunch of occupational troops moving through the star system.
Lord Admiral Horton was using his small skirmish force to attract the bigger fish. Los Primus and Los
Detriox had both fallen to a considerably sized naval force. That force had moved on to other targets
once the star system was secure. By now, that larger force had likely been made aware of the UC
attempt to reclaim the star system, and… they were now en-route.
The admiral watched the numbers count down. The rouge star state wasn’t even bothering to hide its
approach. Near Los Primus he could already see the third dimensional space in orbit of the planet
starting to distort as a huge mass of ships approached through warp.
Seconds later, at +3:20 relativistic time out from Los Primus, the enemy fleet exited warp. They were
numerous, like a swarm of locust, ten thousand frigates and forty thousand fighters. The solar states
launch point must have been from a nearby jumpgate or else their approach would have been along the
fastest line through the solar system using conventional stellar-drive coils.
“Alert! Alert! Enemy transponder codes identified 10 million kilometers off the port bow!!” roared an AI
construct in delay to the enemy appearance.
“They’re here,” replied a nearby helmsman mockingly as he checked the enemy fleet registry. He
whistled joyously as a particularly important name appeared on the roster, “The Acadian Clad? So they
got themselves a Levi in that cloud of frigs as well…”
Admiral Horton checked his star charts just to make sure that his data scrubbers weren’t receiving a
false friend-or-foe tag. The space distortion from the warp exit had dissipated just enough for him to
detect the gravity anomaly over the planet. There was indeed a Levi in orbit.
Horton checked his timers, and noted with satisfaction that his other troop movements were right on
schedule, “recall!!”
“Recall!!” erupted voice across the bridge as his task forces performed a tight point zero turn in relative
warp space and started to return back along their fastest curves through the solar system towards the
asteroid belt. The enemy warships noticed the gravity distortion meant for his arrival point over Los
Primus disappear and deduced his actions.
Given their superior relative time to the formerly inbound fleets recall destination the Frigates, Ion
Frigates, and Light Cruisers launched at a relative +4:00 intercept back to Horton’s recall point. They
would arrive +6:00 before his combat mobile leaving no chance for an escape.
In the meantime, the destroyers circled Los Detroix using Stellar Coils and were inbound to Los Primus at
intercept of +7:45 relativity. Lord Admiral Horton took one last chance to check the inbound fleets
before reclining in his command chair with a broadening smile. So eager were the enemy to sink his
ships that they failed to notice the other gravity distortion appearing over a nearby moon just +3:45 to
the asteroid belt.
Everything had been timed perfectly, and now… it was time to spring the trap. The Main Task Force to
the Nemesis Center Force arrived in system at +3:45 relative time before the enemy fleet could corner
the recalled United Colony ships. They instantly moved towards the asteroid belt giving an arrival time
at of +0:15 before the rouge star states own armada. Given that the arriving UC Task Force consisted
entirely of Ion Frigates the UC fleet outpaced the rouge star states own fleet which had incorporated
Light Cruisers into its mix.
To recall or to not recall, that was the question? The Rouge State decided to fight and continued on
towards the arrival point. The UC Ion Frigates arrived before them, deployed fighters, and at +0:05
before the enemy arrival, they launched for Los Primus and the enemy Leviathan.
The enemy fleet arrived shortly thereafter and were badly gored by the fighter drop. Small lasers
pierced paper thin armor as the fighter mobile tore the rouge star state’s mobile armada apart.
However, it wasn’t enough and slowly but steadily the enemy fleet started to overwhelm the fighters…
but they had forgotten about the inbound UC navy. By the time the Dreadnoughts and Heavy Cruisers
returned to the asteroid belt only a handful of Cruisers remained of the enemy fleet.
Horton eagerly gave the order to strafe those surviving enemy craft into ribbons before they could
escape. Plasma lance fire bombarded the badly pitted hulls of the enemy ships attempting to sail away
with blue plasma fires burning from their sterns. The remaining fighters left the hulls of the UC
Dreadnoughts and flew forth in a giant wave of vengeance. Together they doggedly pursued their
enemies and eventually corned the badly wounded enemy vessels before they could repair damage and
enter warp to flee the system. What remained of the enemy fleet within the asteroid belt was
slaughtered.
In the meantime, the destroyers moved in to fight the Leviathan, but they were a decoy meant to bide
time until the Ion Frigates could move in to actually kill the beast. Lord Admiral Horton shed no tears for
the destroyers for they were automated. The United Colonies Navy hadn’t used human crews within
destroyers for the better part of the past two hundred years. So, sacrificing a few robots didn’t burden
the admirals conscience even in the slightest.
Still, the Leviathan was greedy. It hit the destroyers again and again with photon fire until they were but
burning husks tumbling through the void. Only then did the juggernaut attempt to flee, but… it was far
too late. The inbound Ion Frigates arrived on the tail-end of the battle just as the lumbering massive
warship was attempting to slip into warp space upon a swirling ribbon of blue energy.
The Ion Frigates moved like wolves over the stern of the Leviathan capitol ship strafing holes into the
engines. It took a few anxious moments for the death nail to be delivered. Suddenly, the warp field
collapsed and the engines astern on the Leviathan exploded into a fiery red cloud of spiraling shrapnel.
Lord Admiral Horton watched the Ion Frigates move like an insect swarm around the Leviathan
pummeling it into wreckage. The enemy had been beaten, and with minimal losses. In critique, they had
been beaten because of greed. Had the enemy ships merely fled the system this particular trap would
not have worked. Tis a pity, for ‘The Chess Master’ knew how to time his fleets perfectly in relative
positions despite the limitations of the FTL Light Barrier.