Epilogue

Epilogue, Kilroy’s return

Kilroy lay in his bunk reading the same crap novel, he had read many  times now, one he had found in one of the bunks. Jeb, Holt, and the Chief were playing cards again, but he didn’t feel like playing, he was sick of it, it had been their primary way to pass the time in the 8 months it had taken them to reach the McCray system. It was supposed to take them 5 months, but they had drifted off course using manual navigation, and the FTL shielding had failed, it took them along time to notice, now that they were getting pings from McCray, they realised they had lost as least another six - eight weeks. They were finally braking for McCray, another couple of hours and they would be in the system. He read the page again, then threw the book down in disgust. He was getting antsy, with their destination now so close, he was over waiting, he’d been on this damn ship too long. He sat up, said, “Jeb, how long?”

Jeb was laughing at something the Chief had said, looked up, “Hey Cap, another couple of hours”.

Kilroy looked around the main crew living area of the Cahn Destroyer, there was shit everywhere, they had all got used to it living together in this cramped space for so long, he would never have accepted it before, he said, “Alright you lazy bastards, look at this place, clean up time”.

He got groans and complaints from them, and they didn’t move, Kilroy was already in a bad mood, they just gave him an outlet, he spat it, “move you fucking pigs, in a couple of hours Alliance fleet will be onboard, is this what you want to be remembered for”

They all jumped to it, albeit slowly, it took some time to clean 6 months’ worth of filth. They had just stacked the last bag of rubbish, and holt was wiping over the table and galley, when the comms channel came alive, scratchy, modulated voice said, “Unidentified vessel, you are entering restricted Cahn space, turn around now, or you will be fired upon”

They scrambled back to their stations, Chief suited up, heading back to engineering to control the drive, Jeb put on his headset, keyed his mic. “McCray control, this is”, he paused, it had been such a long time, looking at the bridge plate, “CRFS 10880 Caerfan, survivors of Coad Llai, over”

They waited for a response, then the message was repeated, Kilroy said, “Can’t they hear us Jeb”. Jeb moved over to the comms console, it appeared OK, he frantically changed frequencies and repeated his message. They still got the same reply.

Kilroy keyed his mic, “Chief, we don’t seem to have comms, any ideas why”.

“Yeah, now that you mention it, I’m pretty the comms array, was right where that big hole is in the side”.

Shit thought Kilroy, “Holt slow us down, we just have to hope they investigate before they fire, anything on sensors yet.

Jeb said, “Yep, 2 alliance frigates on an intercept course, 15 mins out”

“Well at least the gate is still here people, don’t do anything stupid and we’ll be fine”, although he thought, he was relying on others not being stupid. “You better warm up the point defences Jeb, just in case”

“Roger, Cap”, Jeb said, giving up on the comms console, moving back to the weapons station. Activating the 2 laser cannons, giving them a quick tracking test and test fired them, making sure they still worked.

“What’s happening Cap”, Chief’s voice came thru his headset, when he heard the guns firing.

“We got 2 Alliance Frigates in bound on us, we have slowed, but we have no comms, what distance is a suit comms good for?” Kilroy said, thinking out loud.

Chief replied, “couple of hundred kilometres, why? You would need to be outside the ship for that to work.”

Kilroy immediately suited up, he said, “Jeb, by all means shoot anything that comes our way, but don’t fire on them” as he put his helmet on, floating towards the rear bulkhead door, he entered the corridor, shutting the door behind him, Pushing off he quickly reached the next bulkhead door, he hit the emergency button for corridor de-pressurization, hearing the air hiss out as it became a vacuum, he opened the bulkhead door and placed his boots down on the deck, mag boots engaging with audibly clunks. He walked to the huge hole in the service corridor leading to engineering, got as close as he dared and looked out, a beautiful star vista greeted him. He keyed his mic, “Where are they Jeb?”

“Half a million klicks and closing, 5 minutes”

“Keep slowing us down, Holt, we don’t want to give them a reason to fire, we didn’t just spend the 8 months getting here, only to be shot down by our own fucking people in site of our goal, you better all suit up people, just in case”

Captain Montain was excited, he was newly promoted, he had a second date tonight with Lt Danae, he couldn’t stop thinking about her, and the training mission he was on with Captain Payne, had just turned real, as they altered course to intercept the unidentified contact, although it was only one ship and it appeared to be slowing.

There was no IFF, which was strange, all Alliance vessels, especially out here, transmitted IFF so they didn’t get shot down. His ship was named Boomer, it was an Arrowhead class frigate, out of the Coba shipyards, same as Captain Payne’s ship, Gamrod. He keyed his mic, calling to the other ship, as they closed on the contact.

“Gamrod, this is Boomer, Captain Payne, orders please”?

“Boomer, just stay on this heading and prepare to launch torpedoes, we have no IFF, we have to assume hostile, over”.

Montain wasn’t OK with that, “Gamrod, please confirm, we have no IFF, should we not get a visual first”, one of his instructors smashed that lesson home, “never fire unless, you’re sure. Sorry, I made a mistake, cannot bring back a life. You do not fire unless you’re sure, or they fired first”.

“Boomer, cut the chatter, HVAC Torpedoes, tubes one and two now”.

“Roger”, Montain directed his crew to load the torpedo tubes, but he wasn’t comfortable with this, the ship could have broken comms, it was a pretty common fault, although all ships had backup systems, and the likelihood of both failing at the same time was remote.

They were approaching maximum firing distance, “Boomer, prepare to fire on my mark”.

“Gamrod, the vessel appears to be slowing and showing no signs of aggression, please confirm your order, over”, Montain said.

“Boomer, enough! fire now”, Payne said, as 2 missiles streaked away from the Gamrod, off to his starboard side.

Montain knew he was going to be in trouble, but he refused to fire on an unknown target, he directed his helmsman, maximum burn. The frigate shot away after the torpedos, in his ear ,”Boomer, what the hell are you doing? get back here”?

“Will do sir, just as soon as I get a visual”, Montain said, he watched the distance close, 20000, 15000, 10000, 5000, then shouted orders to his crew, “Cut the drive, reverse thrusters, now, can we see it?”, tiny in the distance, he could see, close proximity tracer fire, as the unknown ship shot down the torpedos, 2 more torpedos shot past him as he slowed.

“Just launched torpedos Cap, 2 heading our way 90 secs”, Jeb said as locked targeting on them, “Looks like only one of the ships is firing”.

Kilroy’s helmet telemetry display finally lit up with the ships, and then the torpedos, he realised he probably wasn’t standing in the best spot, should the ship get hit, activating his wide range broadcast, he shouted “Alliance Fleet vessels, hold your fire, this is the CRFS Caerfan, hold your fire, we have no comms”, he started repeating it over and over. The missiles were approaching, the point defences opened up, luckily getting both missiles, anymore and they would have been in trouble.

“One of the ships is closing Captain, fast, almost in rail gun range”, jeb said.

“Has it fired on us yet”, Kilroy pausing in his transmission.

“No sir, 2 more missiles fired from the rear ship, 40 secs”.

“Holt, swing us broadside, put that big hole where I am, facing the approaching the ships, you only just got both those missiles last time”, flicking channels, “Alliance Fleet vessels, hold your fire, this is…”

Boomer was fast approaching the contact, Montain was staring hard, waiting for the optics to find the ship, he could see tracer fire again, shooting down both missiles down simultaneously. The ships optics finally found the ship, it blurred into focus, it was an old Cahn destroyer, with a big hole in the side. Appeared to be a tiny figure waving frantically at him “Captain”, the comms officer shouted, flicking on the bridge speaker.

“This is the CRFS Caerfan, hold your fire, we have lost comms.”

Kilroy watched his ship swing broadside, bringing both point defences into play, it got both missiles, closing his eyes as one exploded to close for comfort, he breathed again, the forward frigate was fast approaching. “Caerfan, this is GAFS Boomer, confirm you have no comms”, crackled over his helmet.

“Boomer, thank fuck, tell your mate to stop fucking firing, we are survivors from Coad Llai”, Kilroy said, smiling, watching the frigate zoom past, quite close.

Montain looked closer at the ship as it swung by, there he was, standing in the big hole waving, “Gamrod, hold your fire, we have survivors”.

“From where Boomer”

“Coad Llai, there’s a huge hole in the side of the ship, I think it might be damaged”, Montain said.

He flicked back to local area comms, “Caerfan, Boomer, who’s speaking”.

“Captain Kilroy here, I only have helmet comms, limited range, originally GAFS Vector, out of Coba, there is only 4 of us”

Montain flicked over to alliance channel, “Gamrod, I got a Captain Kilroy, GAFS Vector, asking us to hold our fire, copy”, he directed his helmsman to turn back and swing past the ship again, no need to push it.

“Your fucking kidding me, really?  Payne had joined the Alliance fleet at the same time as Kilroy and Chief, a group of them had got themselves in trouble several times, and had become firm friends, he had seen Kilroy’s and Killain’s names of the casualty list from Coad Llai and had raised a drink to them in salute.

Kilroy flicked over to ship comms, as he made his way back inside, “OK people, I got them, you can breathe again, Holt, you can speed us up a bit, still a long way to McCray”

Several minutes later the frigates had pulled up alongside, close enough now for local comms, a sheepish Captain Payne, keyed his mic. ‘Roy, is that you”

“Major, you fuckwit, was that you fucking shooting at me”, Kilroy said, angrily, using his nickname.

“Yeah sorry, bud, orders, Captain Montain, should really be in trouble for disobeying orders”? Payne said.

“Why? cause you’re a fuckwit and he’s not, we were slowing down you fuck, attacking ships don’t normally do that, you should have checked, luckily for us Captain Montain did”, Kilroy said, angrily.

“Captain Kilroy, what happened to you”, Montain interrupted.

“That’s a story for over a drink, where are you taking us, there better be beer”, Kilroy said, still pissed off.

They escorted them to the new Alliance Fleet cruiser, Nelson, that was part of the large defensive formation protecting the gate, ready to blow it, if it was lost.

Sometime later, finally sitting in the officer’s mess, with a large crowd around them, including the Captain of the Nelson, an intelligent, medium built man, with black hair, black eyes, glasses, and friendly face, by the name of Tuan Hamish. Kilroy and Chief were already on their fourth beer, Jeb and Holt taking it a little slower, but not much, as they told their story. The battle had gone badly, but the crowd knew most of that, a hundred or so alliance ships had survived the battle, brought back various reports, but no one had hung around like they had.  The Vector had been destroyed and the 4 of them managed to get onboard the Caerfan, which appeared to have a reactor intact. They had repaired the ship, as best they could and got it underway.

They spoke of the Mejidi bombarding the planet from orbit and the mech’s sorting through the debris field, followed by them shooting down a Mejidi frigate as the escaped. It had taken them this long to get back, due to the damage to the ship, only to almost be destroyed by their own people, Kilroy stood up and moved over to Captain Payne, “That reminds me, this is for nearly killing me, you fuck”, he punched Payne in the face, hard as he could. He flew backwards over his chair, landing heavily, Kilroy rubbed his sore knuckles saying, ‘Thank fuck for Captain Montain here, who used common sense, let this be a lesson to all of you”, he looked around the crowd, “there is no such thing as a shoot first, ask questions later order, remember Captain Tokman, you all know the story”.

The crowd around them gasped, and moved back, Payne was a bit of a bully, and no one did that to him and got away with it, they were stunned when he got back up slowly, rubbing his jaw, chuckling slightly, “I suppose I deserved that, sorry”, he said, looking at the Vector crew. The crowd around them moved back in a little bewildered, but there were smiles all round.

Captain Hamish pulled Kilroy aside as he finished another beer, said quietly, “Captain, I think you need to take your crew back to Fleet command, you have intelligence they need to hear, no one has seen what you have, and returned”.

Kilroy looked at him, “We can, I suppose, Cap, we’re just happy the gate is still here, any ideas why they haven’t attacked?”

Hamish leaned in closer, “No one knows why they haven’t moved in 8 months; top brass has been expecting them to move any day, but they have been saying it now for 6 months”.

“What has the alliance been doing to prepare for them in the last 8 months, can we deal with those big guns yet?” Kilroy asked.

“We have been rebuilding the fleets, but no, they don’t have an answer yet”, Hamish said, “I heard something though, but it doesn’t make much sense”.

“What?”

“Apparently, there is something coming from Shosho’ne, it’s just rumours, but something big is coming”, Hamish said.

“Well, it’s about time they entered the war”, Kilroy said.

“Yes, I agree, but that’s the confusing part, it’s not Shosho’ne fleet, but it’s coming from there”.

“What?”, Kilroy said, confused.

“Like I said, it makes no sense, and it’s only rumours”.

“Why mention it then?”, Kilroy said, even more confused.

“Because I have heard it from more than one source, and the rumour says they have already won a victory against the Mejidi”.

Kilroy sat there thoughtful for some time, he looked at his empty beer, waved at the steward to get him another, he finally said, “well captain, that is a problem for tomorrow, today we rejoice making it home in one piece”, he turned and when his beer was refilled, raised it to his crew, “To tomorrow people”.