The ship was covered in destroyer turrets, also overpowered, firing cruiser pulses. It also had standard one hundred firing mosquito launchers dotted all over the ship, and plenty of bigger missile launchers for the latest types. And wherever there was a spare bit of space on the hull, there were point defense turrets, and anti-fighter turrets.
With a bridge right in the middle of the front of the ship, there was no ship view ahead, just gun barrels visible if you looked in any direction. Apart from the battleship turrets and the forward facing overpowered cruiser guns, the main broadside was two hundred torpedo launchers, in groups on the nose in each quarter of the ship front.
There were internal fighter bays for four twelve ship squadrons, which was the same as a Scimitar class carrier, but only because we didn’t need maintenance bays or launch tubes, or fabricators for parts. The bays could do basic repair and rearming, but if we needed replacement fighters, they’d be jumped to us. In addition, there were four Lightning couriers aboard, and both captain and admiral’s gigs.
There was a cargo bay under the bridge level, running the length of the ship, which I thought we’d been phasing out of new ships, but some of it was allocated for the storage of wrecked fighters to go back to the shipyard for repair, and the rest had enough ordnance to completely resupply the destroyers twice.
Needless to say, there was enough pilot accommodation for fifty people, plus the usual living and training facilities for them. There were already rifts in place from each bedroom to a fighter bay, allowing a just woken up pilot to take seconds to reach their ship. Their main living room also had forty eight rifts which did the same thing, not leaving much in the way of actual wall space left. There was also a rift back to Haven station.
On the bridge level, there was of course captain, XO, and third officer quarters, plus admiral’s quarters which were bigger than mine, and the major living area we’d come in through. The wet room had two thirty person spas, and the mess and conference rooms sat the same as the living room. It made me wonder if the ship had been designed to support double the number of destroyers. Admiral, XO, and third officer had their own offices, and mine was the usual ready room off the bridge. We had our own small armoury as well, with combat suits already standing in recharge bays for both of us, and our AIs.
I turned my attention to the Boulder class destroyers. They were essentially a scaled down version of my ship, and while destroyer sized at two hundred and fifty meters long, they were pocket cruisers. Almost identical to Judge but smaller, the front end was only different in having one hundred torpedo launchers. The Boulder class were long and thin, the same as Judge, where the Water class corvette was short and squat. So the front end of the destroyer wasn’t much bigger than the corvette had been.
Each destroyer was carrier to two squadrons of fighters. There was enough cargo space for a single full reload of both fighters and the ship, after which they needed resupply from Judge. But the way we fought at the moment, no fighter was going to use a full load of torpedoes in one action.
The navy captain had the usual captain facilities, but was expected to come to Judge for any gathering of navy people. The pilots did have everything they needed, and the captain could of course join them.
All thirteen ships were lean mean fighting machines. Designed for moving a large fighter force as far as needed, and supporting them. All we needed now was the extra squadrons.
One by one the others checked in as being ready to proceed, and I had to chuckle as I found out the ship names, which largely mirrored the Water class. Jill had Long Boulder. Dorm had Small, Davis had Big, Fina with Hot, Haynes with Cold, Edna with Still, Metunga with Rolling, Woof with Carved, Norden with Falling, Gitte with Sliding, Mel with Ice, and Loren with Space Boulder.
The Imperium military leaders were really fast tracking us. Lieutenants were now captaining destroyers, where once this was the realm of full commanders. Captains used to command cruisers, and now here I was in command of a pocket battleship while a newly minted lieutenant commander. Mind you, experienced full commanders were now piloting dreadnaughts, so I was one step closer to our goal to get one of these ourselves.
Leanne laughed when Jill announced Long Boulder was ready for anything, given it was the third ship we knew of with Long being the first part of the name. Her change of name had been vindicated faster than expected. And since Jill’s AI had a unique name which was not the ships, there was only one Long named AI out there we knew about. Long Ocean.
“Announce us ready for fighters,” I told Tamsin.
Three
Sixteen squadrons jumped in to meet us.
Four of them jumped aboard Judge, and I recognized them as the original Eagle Wing, plus one. One squadron joined each destroyer. This meant three more squadrons had gone operational in the last few days. I assumed we had another twelve to go.
All four on Judge were equipped with the Excalibur mark five. Eight of the destroyer squadrons were still flying the mark four, including the newly activated squadrons. The dynamics of four different types of ships in the task force was going to require some thinking, and a lot of practice. I braced myself for a long boring day.
Squadron Leader Lacey, still with the callsign Eagle, which was still also the wing name, in spite of him being demoted yesterday from Space Commodore, bounded on to the bridge looking a much happier man than he’d been in recent weeks. He took the empty XO’s seat as he always did, and grinned at me. He now wore the same insignia I did, and so did another fifteen officers, all like him, leading squadrons. He still had Imperium time in service on his side, which is why he was still acting wing commander.
Technically, we were equals. In practice, I commanded the navy squadron, which was always senior. But he had donkey’s years of experience through multiple wars, and I didn’t. Finding a balance was going to be interesting.
He opened his mouth to say something, but didn’t get the chance.
“Orders, Commander,” said Admiral Jane, as her half height image popped up on the console next to Serena. “You’re to go through the rift the Imperator left in place to the other side of the core, and jump to a system I’ve sent Tamsin. There you will find a small convoy of traders, and some Trixone fighters.”
“You want us to destroy the fighters?” I asked.
“No. Protect them. They are the sole survivors of the battle there a day ago, and the Imperator and others who watched it cheered them on as they escaped. They successfully avoided several Rawtenuga fleets, but they don’t know they’re about to run into another one. Go and save all of them.”
“Do we really care about Trixone fighters?” asked Eagle.
“Just these ones.”
“What if they fire on us?”
“Ignore them if possible. Jump in, kill the dinosaurs, and jump back to the end of the rift again.”
“You do know we’ve never so much as done a simulator run flying these ships,” I said, “let alone with sixteen squadrons of fighters as well?”
“We have faith in you. Get moving.”
Her image vanished. I looked at Tamsin and nodded.
“All pilots to your ships. Prepare for combat launch. This is not a drill.”
There was a solid thump behind me, followed by a lesser thump, and we looked around to see Eagle lying flat on his back on the deck.