ONE: Shark Bait

He felt like a kid at a candy store, whatever that meant. He had heard his father use the expression before and for some odd reason as he pressed his face against the glass of the view port, he felt it was completely appropriate. If the Aquataine was a candy store then he sure as hell wanted to be there.
“Stand by docking clamps.”
The disembodied voice of the pilot reverberated through the cabin. Cary could hear the muted hiss of the docking collar pressurizing somewhere a couple of decks below. The Aquitaine was one of the largest vessels in the fleet but even she couldn’t hold a transport the size of the Minos. A transom and docking collar was how they were going to arrive.
He stood up, along with the other officers that were transferring to the Third Fleet, as the speakers announced that they had successfully docked with the Aquitaine. His footlocker was going to be transferred with all of the other footlockers for replacement troops and the supplies that the Minos was delivering.
There was nothing like GTVA door to door service.
The lingering feelings of homesickness had passed and he was excited and energized now that he was here, in the Capella systems about to transfer over to the Flagship of the Third Fleet.
It took fifteen minutes to get across and clear security. The main gangway hatch was adjacent to the flight deck. He could see stacks of fighter and bombers along the walls of the cavernous space. You needed to wear special suits to walk the flight deck area. There were caution signs and warning signs all over the place.
Caution: Plasma Flow Circulation.
Warning: Exo-Suit required for flight deck. Low gravity environment.
He heard a set of engines throttling up and looked up just in time to see a Myrmidon fighter lifting off the cradle and heading towards the flight line. It was quickly followed by three others. Somewhere in the cavernous expanse of the hanger, there was a fighter with his name on it.
His heart was racing.
“Hot damn.”
“Keep it moving newb, the tour don’t stop here.”
Cary turned to see a deck officer waving him through an access door. The sounds of the flight deck dwindled quickly as the deck officer closed the fire door behind him and as he made his way forward to find his new squadron, the 53rd Hammerheads, a well respected group with a lot of combat history. After a few minutes of heading in what he thought was the general direction, he made a right turn and suddenly found that he wasn’t where he had expected to be. It was one thing to memorize deck plans and schematics, it was another thing entirely to try and find your way around an actual living, breathing warship
He pulled a card from his back pocket and looked at the orders printed there.
“Excuse me Chief, where can I find Captain Loukakis?”
The pointed to a door at the end of the narrow corridor, “The Captain is right through there, Sir.”
“Thanks Chief.”
There was a scrap of dark, charred metal hung over the door. It looked like a panel from an old fighter. It had 53rd Hammerheads painted on it and the logo of a black hammerhead shark. He knew what a shark was. They weren’t indigenous to Vega but he saw pictures of them and films with sharks and other creatures found only on earth.
He stepped into the room.
It was brightly lit and pretty spacious considering it was on a ship. There were a few tables with pictures and various knick-knacks on the wall behind them along the port side of the room and a lectern and screen on the wall to starboard. The lectern had the same Squadron Logo on the front. In one corner, Cary noticed three men in flight overalls sprawled at a table on the far end playing cards.
“Excuse me, I’m looking for Captain Loukakis.”
One of the men looked up with a look of detached interest at Cary. His face was neutral in a bemused sort of way. Cary figured he was trying to decide whether or not to answer him truthfully or not. He had the stub of a cigar clenched between his teeth and was switching it from side to side as he stared at Cary.
“He ain’t here.”
“Do you know where I might be able to find him?”
“No. Probably up in CIC”
Victor nodded slowly but didn’t move.
The surly card player looked at his watch, “he should, uh, be back in a few.”
One of the other players smirked and tossed his cards down on the table, “I’m out.” He was young but had a worn look on his face despite the lopsided smirk he sported. A short tuft of brown hair peeked out from under a ball cap with the Aquataine logo on the front. He couldn’t have been more than twenty two or twenty three.
“Your dealing leaves a lot to be desired, Sir.”
The third man did the same, muttering a curse under his breath. He was a little older than the cap wearing pilot. They had to be pilots, Cary thought. He looked up and seemed to notice for the first time that someone else was in the room. He stood up and stretched, waving Victor over.
“Who might you be?”
“Ensign Cary Victor.”
“Ah, the new guy. Welcome aboard,” he said extending his hand.
“I’m Lieutenant Commander Henry Morales, Squadron XO. This is Ensign Cory Vellum,” he said pointing to the first guy to quit the card game. “And you’ve already met Denim,” motioning to the man with the cigar.
Denim stood up to offer his hand, “Lieutenant (j.g.) Hiram Blue.”
“So Vick, what squadron you transferring in from?” Denim inquired.
“Transferring? I’m not transferring in from anywhere,” Victor replied. That earned Victor a derisive look from Masher.
“Wait. What, you’re like fresh out of flight school or something?” Morales asked cautiously. Evidently they weren’t keen on rookie pilots.
“No way, Masher, no way command would send us a newb,” Denim interjected. “Even they’re not that mean,” he said, probably trying to convince himself as well as Morales.
Masher? Cary figured that was Morales’ call sign.
“Actually, Sir, I was assigned to Vega Sector Patrol while they hashed out where they wanted to send me. So I’m not technically coming straight from flight school.”
“A sky cap? They sent me a sky cap!?!” someone growled from behind him.
The new voice startled Victor.
He turned to find the Squadron Commander, Captain Vaile Loukakis, standing behind him. He hadn’t heard the Captain enter the room.
Cary drew himself to attention, “Ensign Cary Victor, reporting for duty, Sir.”
“At ease, Ensign,” he said in a voice that made Victor feel anything but. Loukakis had a confident but weary presence about him. He was tall and thin, just under six-three, with a razor thin patch of blonde hair on the top of his head and steel blue eyes. The patch on the right sleeve of his flight fatigues had the Squadron logo and the Captain’s call sign was embroidered underneath, Shadow.
Victor noticed for the first time that they all had similar patches.
“Things must be getting worse if they are sending us rookie replacements,” Loukakis said irritably.
“I knew Bosch was making inroads at Epsilon Pegasi but it’s got to be worse than Command is letting on,” Denim said gruffly. Cary thought that his voice matched him perfectly. He was on the short side, maybe five foot eight, but he had a broad barreled chest and strong arms that looked like he could pinch the head off of someone.
Not the sort of person you wanted to piss off.
“Yeah, same old same old.” Loukakis said wearily. He straightened up and shook his new pilot’s hand, “Lieutenant Commander Vaile Loukakis. Welcome to the 53rd Hammerheads Ensign.”
“Thank you sir.”
“Vellum, show Mister Victor to his bunk and help him get squared away. The Third fleet is being redeployed so we are all going to be busy for the next few hours.” Loukakis turned to Victor, “Are you up to date on the Myrmidon?”
“Yes sir. I have forty-three hours logged.”
“Forty-three huh? Once you get your gear stowed I want you to run through the training sims, Potshot will show you where the training facility is,” He said motioning towards Ensign Vellum.
“The rest of the battle group won’t be here for another thirty six hours and the Admiral isn’t due back until then. Get as many hours in as you can, you won’t have any room for error once we get out there Ensign. It is a singularly unforgiving environment and the NTF are far more clever than you have been led to believe.”
“Yes Sir.”
Loukakis walked into his office trailed by Masher and Denim. Vellum waved towards the doors that lead to the bunk area, “So, uh, Vick, you have a call sign yet?”
“No,” Cary replied truthfully. “You?”
He looked at the squadron logo, “Potshot? Was that the best you could come up with?”
Vellum groaned, rolling his eyes, “man, don’t get me started. The Lieutenant made me change mine after my first sortie. My call sign was Hotshot but I screwed up on my first sortie with the Hammerheads by not hitting anything but the side of a transport we were escorting.”
He laughed at the memory, “Masher said I couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn with a Destroyer. So I got changed from Hotshot to Potshot. It sort of stuck.”
“Ouch.”
They walked through the barrack room Vellum pointing to his bunk area vaguely and led him out another door in the back of the room that lead to the Corridor. Vellum pointed to a sign that had an arrow and the words Flight Simulator.
“How long have you been out here?” Victor asked.
They followed the sign’s directions.
“I guess about a year now. I was with the 232nd Fighter Squadron in Alpha Centauri, served on the GTD Minotaur. We got ambushed by the NTF. Minotaur went down after twenty Loki’s got through our fighter escort. We were overrun after that. We withdrew to Capella and what was left of the 232 was reassigned.”
Cary had not heard of the loss of the Minotaur. It was an old Orion Class Destroyer but it was still more than a match for anything the NTF had wasn’t it? As far as he knew the NTF wasn’t even interested in Alpha Centauri. Now they were in control of that system? Twenty Loki bombers in a single sortie? Since when did the NTF have those kinds of resources available?
“When was this?” Vick asked.
Vellum cocked his head to one side, trying to remember, “I dunno, I guess maybe three, almost four months now.”
“Four months? We got pushed out of Alpha Centauri four months ago?” Cary was incredulous.
“How else to you think they were able to take Deneb from us so easily?” Vellum shrugged. It was disconcerting. All of the media reports had said those systems were merely ‘contested’, which was a fancy word for battleground. Vellum made it seem like the battle had ended and the GTVA had come out on the wrong side of the score.
But that wasn’t possible, was it?
Vellum noticed the look on Vick’s face, “Cheer up man. It’s only temporary. Word is we are going back to, uh, relieve the NTF of the burden of leadership.”
He clapped him on the back laughing out loud.
Three minutes of tight turns and corners later, they had arrived at the training center. Vellum quickly introduced him to a frazzled looking chief and left Victor waiting for the trainer to be prepared.
“The Chief will see to it that you have a good time.” He turned to the Chief and winked, “Wontcha Willy?”
“Sure thing Sir. We aim to please,” the Chief replied.
Vellum disappeared through the hatch and Victor was alone again. The Chief mumbled something about giving him a few minutes to warm up the machines, leaving Victor with a few minutes to wait so he took a seat and contemplated the last twenty four hours of his life.
Yesterday he was safe and secure, relaxing on Vega.
Now he was on the pointed end of the lance that was about to be jabbed at the heart of the NTF. He had thought the NTF was a lot weaker than they turned out to be. He always thought of the NTF as a minor irritant for the GTVA but Ensign Vellum’s recounting of the loss of the GTD Minotaur and a few fragments of conversation he had heard on the flight over were beginning to paint a picture.
It wasn’t pretty either.
“You ready Sir?”
Victor looked up to see the Chief grinning down at him.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.”