Helfort's War Book 4: The Battle for Commitment Planet by Graham Sharp Paul
Book: Helfort's War Book 4: The Battle for Commitment Planet by Graham Sharp Paul
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Authors: Graham Sharp Paul
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score. Dropping any closer than 100,000 klicks is too damn risky. Let me just bring the probability array for Commitment online. Hold on … right, here we go.”
The holovid screen blossomed into life to display a funnel standing vertically thin end down, its curved walls representing Commitment’s gravity well, the funnel shading from an encouraging green through to an unpromising scarlet as the distance to the planet’s surface decreased. “Umm,” Ferreira said, “yes … there you have it.” She put a cursor on the funnel where green started to shade into yellow. “Minimum safe drop distance is 105,000 klicks. Drop there and we’re all dead. Every Hammer in orbit will have more than enough time to take us out. They’ll be able to use antimatter missiles on us, and they will. Drop closer and we’re equally dead. It just takes a bit longer and is probably a touch more painful.”
Ferreira’s gallows humor brought fleeting smiles to everyone’s face. The smiles faded fast; the silence hung like a pall across the meeting.
With a bang, the solution came to Michael. Judging by the look on Ferreira’s face, she had just come to the same conclusion. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Jayla?”
She grinned at him. “Yes, I think so. This damn graphic”—shewaved a hand contemptuously at the holovid screen—“is based on one key assumption.”
“Go on,” Michael said impatiently.
“It is a cast-iron Fleet regulation,” Ferreira continued, “that no starship drop out of pinchspace unless it can jump back again safely if everything goes to shit. So—”
“Yes, yes, yes!” Sedova could not contain herself. “So what we’re looking at is the product of two unconnected probability arrays.”
“Precisely,” Ferreira said, a touch smugly, Michael thought. “Smashing into the planet when dropping out of pinchspace is one risk. Jumping back safely without getting lost in deepspace is the second. We are only interested in this probability”—the holovid graphic changed; this time the green extended most of the way down to the planet’s surface—“and that’s because we’re not coming back. We don’t give a shit about the risk of jumping back into pinchspace ’cause we won’t be jumping back into pinchspace.”
“No, we won’t,” Michael said, his heart beginning to race with a newfound hope that Gladiator might work. “And if we drop close—”
Again Sedova could not hold back. “We’ll be well inside the Hammer’s defenses, the Hammers will be looking the wrong way, and there’s what, 10,000 k’s to cross before reentry? That,” she declared with a confident smile, “is a much better proposition than trying to cross 100,000 klicks.”
“It sure is,” Bienefelt said with feeling. “I have to say, I was worried there for a while.”
“Hold your horses, ’Swain,” Michael said, even though he knew that this was the answer they had been looking for. “We need to see if this will work, but it is looking good, I must say. Right. Jayla, Kat, can you take this and rework the plan? When you have something workable, we’ll run it through the sims to see how it holds up. Okay?”
“Sir,” the pair chorused.
Tuesday, August 28, 2401, UD
Nyleth system base
Face impassive even though his stomach was a mess, Michael waited for the down-shuttle to dock; he steeled himself for what came next: He had to resolve the last impediment to Operation Gladiator.
The planning had produced something that everyone agreed would work. Anna’s last vidmail confirmed she was still tucked away inside Camp J-5209. The latest intelligence reports following the progress of the New Revolutionary Army seemed encouraging. Under the leadership of Mutti Vaas, the NRA had recovered from its defeat at Bretonville in late July. Now they were pushing north and east out of their stronghold in the Branxton Ranges to attack the towns of Perdan and Daleel, and thanks to microsat transmitters—he had
The holovid screen blossomed into life to display a funnel standing vertically thin end down, its curved walls representing Commitment’s gravity well, the funnel shading from an encouraging green through to an unpromising scarlet as the distance to the planet’s surface decreased. “Umm,” Ferreira said, “yes … there you have it.” She put a cursor on the funnel where green started to shade into yellow. “Minimum safe drop distance is 105,000 klicks. Drop there and we’re all dead. Every Hammer in orbit will have more than enough time to take us out. They’ll be able to use antimatter missiles on us, and they will. Drop closer and we’re equally dead. It just takes a bit longer and is probably a touch more painful.”
Ferreira’s gallows humor brought fleeting smiles to everyone’s face. The smiles faded fast; the silence hung like a pall across the meeting.
With a bang, the solution came to Michael. Judging by the look on Ferreira’s face, she had just come to the same conclusion. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Jayla?”
She grinned at him. “Yes, I think so. This damn graphic”—shewaved a hand contemptuously at the holovid screen—“is based on one key assumption.”
“Go on,” Michael said impatiently.
“It is a cast-iron Fleet regulation,” Ferreira continued, “that no starship drop out of pinchspace unless it can jump back again safely if everything goes to shit. So—”
“Yes, yes, yes!” Sedova could not contain herself. “So what we’re looking at is the product of two unconnected probability arrays.”
“Precisely,” Ferreira said, a touch smugly, Michael thought. “Smashing into the planet when dropping out of pinchspace is one risk. Jumping back safely without getting lost in deepspace is the second. We are only interested in this probability”—the holovid graphic changed; this time the green extended most of the way down to the planet’s surface—“and that’s because we’re not coming back. We don’t give a shit about the risk of jumping back into pinchspace ’cause we won’t be jumping back into pinchspace.”
“No, we won’t,” Michael said, his heart beginning to race with a newfound hope that Gladiator might work. “And if we drop close—”
Again Sedova could not hold back. “We’ll be well inside the Hammer’s defenses, the Hammers will be looking the wrong way, and there’s what, 10,000 k’s to cross before reentry? That,” she declared with a confident smile, “is a much better proposition than trying to cross 100,000 klicks.”
“It sure is,” Bienefelt said with feeling. “I have to say, I was worried there for a while.”
“Hold your horses, ’Swain,” Michael said, even though he knew that this was the answer they had been looking for. “We need to see if this will work, but it is looking good, I must say. Right. Jayla, Kat, can you take this and rework the plan? When you have something workable, we’ll run it through the sims to see how it holds up. Okay?”
“Sir,” the pair chorused.
Tuesday, August 28, 2401, UD
Nyleth system base
Face impassive even though his stomach was a mess, Michael waited for the down-shuttle to dock; he steeled himself for what came next: He had to resolve the last impediment to Operation Gladiator.
The planning had produced something that everyone agreed would work. Anna’s last vidmail confirmed she was still tucked away inside Camp J-5209. The latest intelligence reports following the progress of the New Revolutionary Army seemed encouraging. Under the leadership of Mutti Vaas, the NRA had recovered from its defeat at Bretonville in late July. Now they were pushing north and east out of their stronghold in the Branxton Ranges to attack the towns of Perdan and Daleel, and thanks to microsat transmitters—he had
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