Astrid's War Read online

  Astrid’s War: Attack on the USS Valley Forge

  Book One of the Astrid Amundsen Military Science Fiction Series

  Alan Householder

  Copyright © 2019 by Alan Householder

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. The characters and events in this work are products of the author’s creativity and imagination. Any similarity to actual people (living or not) or events is unintentional and coincidental. Exceptions: Any actual historical events and people mentioned herein are used in a fictitious manner.

  Contents

  Thank You, and Welcome to Astrid’s War

  Prologue

  1. No Rest for the Weary

  2. Summoned to the Bridge

  3. Long Odds

  4. Hated and Feared

  5. Eleven Red Icons

  6. Combat Models and Captain Jefferson

  7. Course Twenty-One, Twenty-Five

  8. Bad News for My Friends

  9. General Quarters! All Hands, Man Your Battle Stations

  10. One for the Books

  11. Talos Speaks Regarding Mutinies

  12. Hell Through the Viewport

  13. Too Many Cooks

  14. A Dubious Plan

  15. Mabel’s Dream

  16. Outside the Valley Forge

  17. Tragedy in the Turrets

  18. The Two Gurneys

  19. Lennox Says Boyle Is Dead

  20. Back in the Ready-Room

  21. Damage Report

  22. Nash’s Question

  23. Jefferson on the Loose

  24. No Helmets

  25. No Fool Like an Old Fool, Except Maybe Three Young Fools

  26. Out of Our Way! We’re U.S. Navy Pilots!

  27. Captain, Suggestions?

  28. The Flight Back

  29. It Was Just Doggerel

  30. Twelve Light-Years From Earth

  31. Momentary Lucidity

  32. Captain Jefferson and Admiral Farragut

  33. Back to the Bridge

  34. Remorse and Shame

  35. Cloaked and Undetectable

  36. The Gratifying Explosion

  37. Defending Section ‘N’

  38. The Unofficial Leader

  39. A Fine Jig Between Heaven and Hell

  40. The Clever Sailors

  41. Amassing in the Bays

  42. I Can Blow the Bay Doors

  43. Incendiary Grenades

  44. Taking Care of the Wounded

  45. You Forfeit Your Life

  46. Clearing the Fighter Bays

  47. He’s Still Alive

  48. Limited Trust

  49. Captain Jefferson’s Fate

  50. Looking Back

  Acknowledgments

  About Alan Householder

  Bonus Content

  Boarding Party, Chapter 25 Superstition

  Boarding Party, Chapter 26 Launch Failure

  Boarding Party, Chapter 27 Anybody’s Guess

  Boarding Party, Chapter 28 The Hot-Runner

  Thank you, and welcome to Astrid’s War!

  I greatly appreciate your buying this book, and I hope you will enjoy it!

  The book can stand alone (no unresolved cliffhanger ending). But Astrid’s story continues in Boarding Party, which is scheduled to be released on January 14, 2020.

  Until then, Boarding Party is available for pre-order on Amazon at a special pre-release price.

  —Alan Householder

  Boarding Party:

  The Boarding of the USS Invicta

  by Alan Householder

  Book Two in the Astrid Amundsen Series

  Release date: January 14, 2020

  Special price until then!

  Available for pre-order on Amazon,

  or read for free on Kindle Unlimited.

  Prologue

  Readers tend to skip prologues, so I will keep this one short.

  I was sent to war when I was a fourth-year student at the Naval Academy. I was surprised at how many of the choices I had to make as a midshipman in combat involved ethical dilemmas.

  I don’t think I ever made a decision as to which fellow-crewmen should live and which should die, though some people might see things differently. As to the enemy, it’s a different story entirely.

  Whether I always made the right choices, or whether right or wrong choices even existed, remains an open question.

  —Astrid Amundsen

  November 2370

  1

  No Rest for the Weary

  We headed back to the USS Valley Forge after some mock dogfights. Space can be beautiful, but the preceding hour had been nothing more than flying in nearly absolute blackness, trying to gain missile locks on my team members, and avoiding them getting locks on me.

  The only lights visible outside of my cockpit were the stars of the Milky Way and occasional glimpses of the rocket blasts of my friends’ interceptors.

  It had been a wearying hour of my feet slamming down on pedals and my hands yanking on the control wheel.

  Lennox was out in front of me. I was about ten miles behind her. Nash was the same distance behind me. When we were two hundred miles out, we flipped our interceptors, so that we were pointed away from the Valley Forge. Then we relit our engines and began deceleration.

  A few seconds after my engines ignited, an alarm sounded from the main control-panel of my Banshee—a rapid series of short tones.

  This indicated that I had been picked up by a Kerleegan detection sweep. Navy intelligence held that there were no Kerleegans within light-years of us, so the alarm seemed to be a malfunction or a false positive.

  I shut down the alarm, and I said, “Lennox, did you get that alert? What’s your radar show?” Of the dozen or so functioning Banshees assigned to the Valley Forge, the one piloted by Lennox had the most-advanced sensors.

  Lennox took a little time before replying. Finally, she said, “Amundsen, I’m seeing what looks like a group of enemy ships less than three hundred thousand miles out.”

  That wasn’t good news. I said, “We can look closer when we arrive back on the Valley Forge. For now, I’m contacting Rabinowitz.”

  I transmitted a coded message to Commander Rabinowitz, who was second in command and in charge of navigation and weapons.

  My mental state had taken an abrupt turn. I had been tired but happy—and looking forward to some sleep. Now I was alert, on edge, and with an urgent need to find out what the Valley Forge’s sensors were saying.

  I arrived at the Valley Forge’s port fighter-bay immediately after Lennox, who had already entered. I used my reaction-control thrusters to move my Banshee into position for entering the bay. My cameras showed me that Nash was right behind me.

  I nudged my interceptor forward, through the ship-permeable forcefield that maintained the pressure within the bay. I set my Banshee down and engaged the magnets, then climbed out of the cockpit and hopped to the deck.

  I was in a hurry to get to the midshipmen’s ready-room, so that I could check the readouts on the Valley Forge’s sensors.

  The three of us—Lennox, Nash, and I—soon were together in the ready-room.

  Adler and Boyle were still outside in their Banshees. When the rest of us had headed back to the Valley Forge, those two still had propellant left, and they wanted to make sure they burned it up.

  The ready-room had an elaborate navigation console, with several monitors showing the output of the Valley Forge’s detection array. I punched a few keys and brought up the medium-range display.

  Lennox and Nash sat in their usual chairs, which were near the holo-table.

  I said, “I don’t think there was a malfunction. I’m seeing a cluster of ships, not much over two hundred thousand miles out. Our
navigation and weapons people must already be on top of this.”

  Plainly, we were facing a Kerleegan task force.

  I was about to follow up with Rabinowitz, but then we heard a knock on the bulkhead next to the ready-room hatch, and standing in the hatchway was Captain Jefferson.

  We don’t normally salute under such circumstances, but I did call out, “Officer on the deck, attention to orders!”

  Jefferson said, “As you were,” as he entered the ready-room. He was wearing an EVA (extravehicular activity) suit, and he held his helmet under his arm.

  I said, “Good evening, Captain Jefferson.” We don’t have evenings in space, of course, but on the Valley Forge everything was synced to UTC +0. “I gather you were outside of the ship?”

  Jefferson said, “Yes, one of the dorsal guns wasn’t rotating, and the mechanics were stumped. I took care of it.”

  I said, “Sounds good.” But actually, I thought that sounded highly weird. When does the captain of a warship go out alone to make repairs on a gun mount?

  Never.

  Lennox said, “What may we do for you?”

  Jefferson said, “We’ve picked up images of a Kerleegan task force in the area. Half a dozen carriers and several cruisers. Not sure what they’re up to. But stay on your toes.”

  Nash said, “We received similar indications when we were out in our Banshees. We thought it might be a malfunction of the sensors.”

  Jefferson said, “No malfunction.”

  I said, “Right, we confirmed that. I was about to contact Commander Rabinowitz.”

  Jefferson said, “I’m headed to the bridge right now, to discuss navigation with her. Be ready for anything.”

  We all exchanged a few more words with the captain, and soon he departed.

  Nash said, “What’s he mean, ‘be ready for anything’? That sounds almost like he expects a battle.”

  Lennox said, “This is a warship. We are at war.”

  Nash said, “I’m talking about prudence. We’re one lonesome little cruiser. They are six carriers and multiple other ships. We have a handful of interceptors. They have hundreds. I hope Jefferson isn’t considering engaging these guys. For us midshipmen, this was supposed to be a training mission, not a combat mission.”

  I said, “We’re in the Navy, Nash. We don’t get to decide what we’re going to do.”

  Nash said, “No argument there.”

  2

  Summoned to the Bridge

  I knew Nash quite well, and I realized that what he said was valid. He wasn’t concerned about himself. Nash was aggressive in everything having to do with training or battle. He had entered the Naval Academy after a stint as a crewman on a destroyer, and he had already been involved in clashes with the Kerleegans, as a turret gunner. He had been awarded the Silver Star for valor.

  Addressing me by my first name, Nash said, “Astrid, can you tell which direction they’re headed? Maybe they’re moving away at high speed.”

  Lennox clapped her hands twice and said, “Nash! Quit thinking so much!”

  I studied the monitors and then said, “They’re headed in our direction. They’re not accelerating, but they’re doing a good sixty miles per second. They’re not on a collision course, but they’ll come close if they don’t change their course or speed.”

  Nash said seriously, “How close to us will their present course bring them?”

  “Looks like about ten thousand miles,” I said. “And they’ll be here in about an hour. Less, if they light their engines.”

  Then came a brief high-pitched tone over the ready-room speakers, followed by Captain Jefferson’s voice. “Midshipman Astrid Amundsen, to the bridge in ten minutes.”

  I clicked onto Jefferson’s comm line and said, “Aye aye, Sir.” I looked at the others and shrugged.

  Nash was the smallest of our group. I always wondered how a guy so little and light made it into the Naval Academy. He said, “This looks like an opportunity for you, Astrid. Keep moving up the ladder of success, and you might be worthy of me taking you out to dinner when we get back to the Academy.”

  Nash was a nice guy, always respectful, and I knew he was kidding around. I almost started to put together a witty response, but then Lennox spoke up.

  “Nash, problem is, you’d have to do away with Joseph first. And I don’t think you’re up to that. Little guy like you? Joseph would drop-kick you out of the yard.”

  Lennox was referring to Joseph Stone, my fiancé. He had graduated from Annapolis a few years earlier, and we were to be married soon after my own graduation.

  I said, “I don’t know, Lennox. I might be up for a free meal—if I prove worthy.” I turned toward Nash and said, “Thanks, Nash, that’ll give me something to shoot for.”

  Nash nodded, then looked at Lennox and said, “There you go, Lennox.”

  Lennox shook her head in mock disgust and said, “If Astrid ever allows you to take her to dinner, I’ll pick up the tab.”

  “Fine,” Nash said. “Start saving your money.”

  Both Nash and Lennox made a couple more wisecracks as I straightened my uniform in preparation for reporting to the bridge. The three of us, as well as Adler and Boyle, were on the Valley Forge for a three-week cruise during our fourth year at the Naval Academy. We knew each other well, and we liked to joke around.

  I reached for the hatch, and Nash said, “Word to the wise, though, Amundsen.” He took a bite out of a candy bar, then said, “Jefferson’s on the rampage again.”

  “Rampage?” I asked. “He seemed okay when he stopped by here.”

  Nash said, “Right, but his normal state is on the meaner side. I saw him chewing out your pal Waters a few hours ago.”

  “What for?”

  “Probably nothing,” Nash said. “Pretty sure the captain mistook Waters for somebody else. He called him by some other name. I didn’t catch the details. I was concentrating on blending into the background. Anyhow, Waters sowed the wind, and now you’re going to reap the hurricane.”

  Lennox said, “You mean reap the whirlwind.”

  Nash shrugged. “With Jefferson, it’s gonna be a hurricane.”

  I didn’t say anything. Lieutenant Waters was one of the eight Marine pilots assigned to the Valley Forge. He had taken me under his wing—I knew him from when he was at the Academy. He had showed me and the others some of the ropes on the Valley Forge. We midshipmen had received training, but we lacked practical experience. Well, Lennox, Adler, and I lacked experience. As I already mentioned, Nash had served before he came to Annapolis. The same applied to Boyle, who had served with Nash.

  Lennox tapped a few input keys on her wrist-computer. She said, “I’m going to bring up some visuals.” The tabletop began to glow.

  Above the square surface, as though resting on it, a cubical 3D-image appeared. It looked like an ordinary hologram, though the technology behind it was different.

  Lennox reached into the image and pointed at a cluster of red specks near an upper corner.

  “Well, well,” she said. “These are the Kerleegan warships.” Near a lower corner of the cube was a single blue speck. She pointed to it and said, “This is us.” Lennox looked at her wrist. “Here, I’ll sync up the stats with your wrist-computers. You can both track speed and distance all you want.” She hit more keys.

  In outer-space terms, a couple hundred thousand miles is kissing distance. And it looked like the Kerleegans might be leaning in to give us a peck on the cheek. My feeling of exhaustion was now a fading memory. A survival instinct had taken over.

  Nash and Lennox also seemed hyper-alert.

  We hadn’t expected to see enemy activity on this trip.

  Again, Lennox consulted her wrist-computer. “They’ve slowed a little. They’re down to forty-two miles per second, relative to us. I suspect that means that they see us.”

  Nash asked, “What took us so long to see them?”

  “I’m sure they were running super-cold,” Lennox said. “All engi
nes were off. Now their engines are on, for deceleration.”

  Lennox was an expert at manipulating 3D projections. She reached toward the enemy ships with both hands, then drew her hands apart, and the sector with the enemy craft now filled the cube.

  I didn’t like what I saw. It was as though we were looking into a cubical aquarium, four feet in each dimension.

  Eleven fish were swimming in the tank—fish shaped like Kerleegan starships.

  They were scattered throughout the cube. Six of them were large. Five were smaller. The bigger ones were three times the length of the smaller.

  I felt as though I had entered a nightmare.

  3

  Long Odds

  Rather calmly considering the circumstances, Lennox said, “Looks like six carriers and five cruisers. That’s consistent with what Captain Jefferson told us.”