Part Two of Piece of Cake

So this is the second and long half-3637 words-of a science fiction story I started last week.

He was about to fail spectacularly 

Enjoy:

A quick study of his options showed him that he needed to slip in-between the ship that had just cut him off and the planet to get to where he wanted to be. He breaths came harder, because his stress levels were up. His AI reminded him that it knew of stress reducing techniques but he didn’t have time to listen. Besides stress can be used.
He thought he smelled his own sweat but that had to be his imagination, the fighter would have cleansed all of that out of the air, even if he wasn’t wearing his flight suit.
Carlos watched his speed, he worked with the planet’s gravity. Tried to ride it like a gravity board rider. He dived toward the planet letting his ship pick up speed for a few seconds. When he reached the correct position he executed another curving turn; this time making it an easy curve to port.
His ship scooted by very close to the atmosphere of the planet but not yet touching it. This close though there was no clear beginning. His fighter jerked every so slightly when he ran through a puff of air that reached a bit further. One eye stayed on the range sensor. If he went too deep into the atmosphere he could start to heat up. He would be in no danger of burning up but anyone in the civilian craft who looked in his direction probably would see his ship start to glow. And of course warships would sense the heat. That would not be good.
He made it by the civilian ship and continued on.
Two deep breaths in relief and two patrol ships appeared on his screen. He held in a curse word, for this would be recorded. Both maneuvered closer to the planet and it looked like they would soon be near his course. Too near, he would have to maneuver around them and their “wakes” could effect his course. Bounce him which would slow his fighter and change its course for a second. That could be on purpose.
For a moment he wanted to panic, when the thought that he had been seen went through his mind. However a deep breath and a heartbeat later Carlos realized that their course would not directly intercept him after all. He would have to change his course again, but he could do that. And still make it, if his speed didn’t drop too much.
If he closed in to the atmosphere again he would need to knife through the beginning of the atmosphere. His ship had been designed to minimize how much heat it gave off. That was one reason for its shape. Mankind still designed streamlined ships because they liked the shape even though most vessels would never enter an atmosphere. His, however, had been designed that way on purpose, to allow it to fly through air. It would still produce a heat signature through and he needed a way to keep it from doing that. At the same time he needed a way to increase his speed without using his drives. The thrusters did not have enough power for that.
Sweat dripped into his eyes and he couldn’t wipe it out. Hopefully his bio helmet would soak it out. He chewed on his tongue and for a heartbeat thought he had bitten it, but that wasn’t the metallic taste of blood. After a few seconds of desperation an idea to do both came to his mind. Very dangerous and it was taking an extreme chance but he needed extreme to finish this mission.
He again used gravity to adjust his course, allowing his ship to be pulled closer to the planet. They were given so many warnings that when a ship entered an atmosphere it had to dive into the air just right or there was a danger that it could impact the atmosphere, even as lite as it was, in a way that would bounce the ship away. At the usual speeds that would be disastrous.
Carlos used the thrusters in tiny bursts to slow the fighter down, while waiting for his little craft to hit the upper atmosphere. He wanted to hit it just right. He finally hit with a thump. He used the force of the impact to propel his ship back up and forward. The fighter traveled out and forward for a few seconds then was pulled back down by the gravity, He bumped the air again and again the impact drove him away from the atmosphere. He used the bumps to move his ship forward. He thought that the small slaps against the atmosphere would not produce a heat signature significant enough to be noticed. Or so he hoped anyway.
Carlos continued to walk toward his goal in this manner. As he did started to sweat even harder. This was not shaping up as expected. Too many unexpected variables. While in training he had been warned that missions hardly ever shook out as planned but this one had looked so well thought out. Everything had been taken into account. Intelligence had seemed so sure. Only there were more ships, both military and civilian, than they had reported there would be. Then there was his mistake. He had turned the wrong way to avoid that civilian ship.
Stress built. Add to his problems what he was doing now, walking, like a one legged man, across a mine field. God, he wanted to spit but couldn’t. Saliva continued to build in his mouth. He thought he heard the bumps but wasn’t sure.
He had to watch and calculate his every move. He had to hit just right to move his craft up and forward at the same time. He had to hit everyone just right. Even with the AI during most of the calculations this had become a strain on his mind and body. A little too deep and he could catch a gust at the wrong angle. Too shallow and he wouldn’t get a hard enough slap. Too slow, the same thing. Too fast and or if he hit at the wrong angle and he could be sent in a different direction-into another ship. If his angle of impact was wrong, specifically if his nose was down too much, or if he hit a gust at another wrong angle, he could be sent into the atmosphere out of control. If that did happened he probably could regain control enough so that he would survive the experience since the ship was made for atmospheric flight but it would ruin his mission and probably ruin his career. Plus his survival wasn’t guaranteed. He tried to relax as he made minute adjustments to his maneuvering.
At one point he glanced at his time piece and realized, on top of everything else, that he was behind his schedule. He had taken too long making up the distance after that wrong way turn. His ordinance had to be launched on time so that it would hit it’s target at a certain time. More then a few seconds either way and his mission would be a bust, not to mention him being extremely embarrassed.
He had to figure out some way of speeding up. A few seconds
later he noticed something on his passive sensors, he thought he
could use. It was another civilian vessel moving. If it continued on the course it now was on and it looked like it was going to, he could use it. He changed course slightly, now a couple degrees to one side. The civilian ship was moving slowly and he caught up with it at the point he had predicted. He carefully bumped into the atmosphere one more time and on the way up he ignited his wing thrusters for a three-second burn. That raised him enough to allow him to enter the “wake” of the ship as it passed above him.
The wake of ship is a series of radioactive and magnetic energy streamers which were produced by a vessel’s drives. They flowed behind the ship. The shielding and armor starfighters were made out of would protect him for a few seconds, maybe a full minute. In most cases this maneuver would be avoided at almost any cost because the wake can create a turbulence that can cause a ship to spin out of control. The streamers could also damage various systems on that ship.
Once in the wake the magnetic waves started to pull his ship up, down and sideways. He was glad this wasn’t a larger warship and that they won’t running the drives at full power. He managed, somehow, to use the waves to pull himself in a little closer. The increased temperature he felt had to be his imagination or his own body heat. His underarms felt soaked, without the suit he would smell his own sweat instead of this clean air. He might even be able to taste it in the air.
When he thought he was in deep enough, he fed power to his drives. The flares of his fighter’s drives should be covered by the drives of the larger ship. The extra flare might be spotted but it wasn’t really that big of a chance.
His passive sensors were having problems reading though the
interference caused by the radiation waves however. At the moment space seemed clear around the larger ship he gunned his drives for three-seconds. When the clock ticked the third second Carlos steered his ship out of the wake. There would be no radioactive flare for sensors to pick up that way. It also gave him a good size dose of inertia. Even as the fighter left the radiation waves he saw that he ha hit it close enough. After a slight course adjustment using his wing thrusters, he breathed a sigh of relief. He still wasn’t done with the mission and any number of things could go wrong but he was very close to being on time. And there was his target almost the right distance.
His special ordinance wasn’t a ship killer missile because it had no drives. No propulsion system of any type, not even a rocket engine. It also had no flight computer. There was nothing that could portray its presence. Its outer case was even more stealth then his fighter was. It could sail right past a porthole and anyone looking though the porthole would not see it. Supposedly that is, Carlos wondered how it would work in real life conditions like this. The missile was also a different shape. It had a blunt nose and the front half tapered down to half the size of the rear.
He could launch it now, however, because of all the extra ships, some of which were continually moving, he thought he should get in even closer. He adjusted his course slightly again, this time nosing the fighter up according to his prospective. After a few seconds he leveled his craft out and headed in. He was aiming right above a patrol ship that was acting as a guard. It was parked at a permanent station, near his target.
After a few seconds he angled his nose down, focusing on a
point near the bow of his target ship. Since his ordinance had no targeting computer, he had to aim it just using the passive
sensors and his sight. He coasted in determined to time it just right.
He started to sweat again as he whispered , “Not yet, not yet,” out loud every couple of seconds. He had to be careful since he had make sure it hit the right target. There were other ships around that it could impact on. Any other hit would be bad but an impact on a civilian ship would be the worst. He would really get yelled at if it did, for good reason.
Finally he said, “yet.” He then pulled a lever next to his left side that would manually lower the ordinance. Once a red light came on to signify that it sat in the correct position, he pressed the large button that would release his payload. He heard the clamps slip into their recesses in the belly of his fighter. He continued forward a bit longer. Since the ordinance would be using the inertia it had picked up when it was a part of his ship, it would it traveled the same speed as his ship. He had to very gently use his thrusters to slow his fighter. He had to do it very carefully to make sure neither any part of his ship nor any amount of exhaust from his thrusters touched the missile. If any did it would send it off course. Even a tiny course change could cause it to miss altogether or to hit some where other then the correct place. Not as bad as a miss but still not good.
He applied power to his thrusters again, after three-seconds of slowing he decided he could leave. He pivoted the stealth fighter until it was aimed forty degrees from his original heading. He slowly increased the power to the thrusters to full. It wouldn’t be quite so bad if he was detected now, but it still wouldn’t be good even though his mission was accomplished. So he hoped anyway. He had no way of checking to make sure his payload was headed in the right direction. Even this close his passive sensors would not detect it and he would not be to see it though his view window. As far as he knew it could still be under his belly. He just had to trust that it was acting like it was supposed to.
A patrol ship swung around in near him and he decided to use its wake. This patrol ship was small and was maneuvering at a slow speed. He managed to slip into the magnetic and radioactive waves streaming behind it. He then scooted closer to the ship and quickly fed power to his drives. They had been on stand by again so it took only a second for them to start producing thrust. He increased speed to match the patrol ship’s and followed it for a while. At one point it increased speed and the turbulence got worst. It was almost like riding a bucking horse, or what he imagined what one would feel like anyway. He watched his time piece as it counted down the time till the ordnance he had released would hit its target. It was going to be late, but only by two point six seconds. That should be close enough not to matter. If nothing else went wrong, that is.
He decided it was time to leave. He repeated the same procedure as last time. He fed full power to his drives then coasted out of the patrol ship’s radioactive streams of energy. There was more chance that the patrol ship would spot him this close to it but as before it did matter so much and now he was far enough away so he could probably escape.
He was not spotted and used his inertia to head away from the planet. His speed kept decreasing as the planet’s gravity pulled him back but it should get him out among the numerous ships in far orbit. Then if he lit off his drives they would just be another set among many. He could also turn on his full sensors. As he fled he watched the timer. He was disappointed that he would not be able to see it hit. and he knew there would be very little shock wave produced by it so he would not even feel it. Two point six seconds after the original time there was an explosion of light behind him. Multicolored light produced by his special ordnance reflected off his view window. Right on time which meant that it probably was right on target.
He raised one hand in a clenched fist and shouted. “Yea!”
Suddenly his exuberance turned to shock as another civilian ship made a sudden turn right in front of him, probably to see the sight better. Right above his fighter another large ship with a large drive wake quickly going to full came even with him. Below him were two small shuttles. He was boxed in and his thrusters would not have enough push to get him to turn in time. All he could do was ride his flight as it zoomed straight for that vessel. Now he would definitely be getting a closer look at its paint job, then he wanted.
*********

Four hours later he marched into the base Commander’s office for his debriefing. He had landed and after a quick shower and a change to a clean uniform he had come straight here. Colonel James Hiker was seated behind his desk looking at a computer monitor. John, stood at attention, saluted then waited.
He had to wait only for three seconds before Colonel Hiker
returned the salute and told him at ease then to be seated. Carlos sat in the only chair in front of the desk. The place had a slight smell of cleaning products and a stronger after shave odor. The last had to be from the Colonel.
The Colonel spoke, “I have been scanning the data from your mission. That was a close call at the end, when those ships had
you boxed in.”
Carlos said, “Yes sir, it was. I remembered, just in time that I was far enough away to light my drives.”
To himself he added, “Barely remembered that is.”
Inside he shuddered a bit as an image flashed in his mind, of the hull of the ship filling his view window as he had started his drives. Good thing they had been on stand by, but he still had had to pull up before they were completely engaged. Not good for the drives nor for his blood pressure. He had been so close to that civilian ship that he had thought he was going to scrap it as he flew up its side. He had bit his cheek hard enough to make it bleed while he waited for the fighter to respond to the drives. Sweat popped out of his underarms at the thought.
His attention slipped back to the Commander who was speaking, “You accomplished your mission as planned. Or almost as planned. The Secretary of Defense finished his dedication speech two-seconds early. And since you were a touch late he had to wait over four-seconds after he said, ‘I christen you the Flying Warrior’. It was one of the longest four-seconds I have every had to wait, standing next to him as I was. I was just starting to think that you had failed when space lit up with a rainbow of light. It was so magnificent that the Secretary forgot about having to wait. The designers of that dedication ‘bottle’ deserves kudos. It was some of the best fireworks, I have ever seen in space. You deserve congratulations also for carrying out your mission so successfully. You got in, released your payload and got out without detection. And you did it on time, or close enough to it.”
Trying not to smile like a foolish rookie Carlos said, “Thank you sir”.
The Commander was not done though, “I do have some bad news
for you. It seems like there are no berths opened at the moment, so there is no assignment for you.”
John’s mind went blank, his heart dropped, No berths opened? That meant he was still a cadet, even after all that.
He fought not to show his shock so he did not notice the Commander shove a small box across his desk. He finally looked down at it as it reached his half of the desk.
His eyes went wide and his mouth twitched, he couldn’t help it for that looked like a specific type of box. One he had worked for longer then the four years he had spent at the Academy. He just stared at it for what seemed like a too long period of time.
Hiker most of thought he was taking too long also because he said, “Go ahead and take it. It’s for you.”
John looked up at him stupefied, then mentally shook himself and reached out to pick it up. He reverently took off the lid and as the lid cleared the opening enough for him to see the contents his eyes went wide again. For sitting in the center of
the box were two lieutenant signatures.
He looked at the officer and said, “But, you just said there were no berths for me, sir.”
The Commander smiled and said, “You would not be the first cadet to be promoted without a place to go. It happens rarely but with your marks at the academy and your successfully accomplished mission, while at the same time successfully testing our new stealth fighter under real world conditions, you have earned the right to join their ranks. Now though you are dismissed. You have packing to do.”
When the new lieutenant looked puzzled Hiker continued, “You need to move from the academy to the officer’s quarters.”
Carlos said, “Yes sir,” and jumped up.
He practically ran to the door, but as he was going though it Hiker spoke again.
“One more thing lieutenant, evidently your mission was rougher then predicted. I would apologize for that, but it is something you will need to get used to.”
Carlos said, “Yes sir, I will but, begging the Colonel’s pardon,” here he smiled and finished with, “this mission was a piece of cake,” then headed though the door.

The end