2954-04-22 – Tales from the Service: The Mission at Håkøya 

It took three more passes to disable the cutter, though even then it wasn’t totally destroyed, only badly holed and without engine power. Everything resembling a comms antenna on its hull was broken, so its time furiously transmitting intelligence rearwards was over anyway. 

“Think there’s anyone still alive on that thing, Five?” Six asked, as the pair finally set course for the rendezvous. Most of the squadron was already there. 

“Probably.” Ansa Harper didn’t care one way or another. She was at peace with the idea that war meant killing people – a great number of them maybe before the rest stopped fighting back – but it was unwise to be either too eager to shed blood or too hesitant about it. Milliseconds stood between life and death, and both passions could lead to one passing from one to the other most unexpectedly. 

“Think Fleet will send someone for them?” 

“Eventually.” Intelligence briefings constantly stressed what was provided via prisoner interrogations, so more fodder for that pipeline certainly held some amount of value upstairs. 

Six had nothing else to say for the moment, so Ansa scanned the tactical plot, looking for any changes she had missed while they were attacking the picket cutter. The destroyer squadron had formed up into a close mutual support formation and was accelerating on an oblique course. She didn’t know the squadron’s full mission, but she did know her squadron’s role well enough. The Pumas, designed and normally used as close escorts for troopships, were being let off the leash today. Their small size, high acceleration, and heavy cannon armament made them excellent escort fighters, but it was about to prove just as useful in a tactical offensive. 

Ansa and Traverse reached the rest of their squadron at the same time as Eleven and Twelve, the last to launch and from the destroyer on the far side of the formation. 

“Report ready-op.” Commander Ghadavi called out gruffly as soon as the stragglers were in formation. “Slave nav systems.” 

Ansa waited for the green light to appear on the nav panel, then flipped the switch below it. “Five, ready-op.” 

“Six, ready-op.” Traverse, already having his nav system slaved to Ansa’s, didn’t need to do anything; the network automatically transferred control over his own Puma to Lead. 

The rest of the squadron reported in over the next few seconds. When they had all confirmed their readiness, Ghadavi called up maximum aceleration. The whole squadron smoothly pulled away from the destroyers, angling for a gas giant on the near side of the system, only a few light minutes from the resolution area. 

“Think we caught them with their pants down?” Four asked on the squadron net. 

“With all those pickets strung out there?” Six scoffed. “Not likely. Command better get this raid done and get us home before the big Ts find us.” 

“Gravitic spike.” Nine barked. “Behind us! It’s an ambush!” 

“The mission continues.” Lead growled. “We expected company.” 

“We did?” 

Ansa glanced at the tactical plot. They were still only a few light seconds from the resolution area, so it didn’t take long for someone’s IFF system to ping the newcomers and share the results on the fleet network. She switched her comms back to the direct line with Six. “What did I tell you?” She allowed herself a thin smirk. “I spy with my little eye, something called Maribel.” 

Maribel, the newest and most powerful member of Fifth Fleet’s core battle group, was indeed responding on the network. Over the next few seconds, five other battleships joined it. 

“Stars around.” Six gasped. “This really is the big one.” 

“And we’ve got a job to do.” Ansa reminded her wingman. “We might get a moment to sit back and watch the big boys slug it out later.” 

Job to do or no, their course wouldn’t get them much of anywhere for nearly an hour and a half. Ansa settled back, took a sip of water, and tried to remember what Håkøya space was like. There were only two gas giants in the outer part of the star system, as she recalled, and both of them were home to extensive mining installations. Their target, identified only as a facility on a small airless moon, was probably one of these, repurposed for military use, but she couldn’t think of what it was doing to earn a visit from a whole Puma squadron. 

The facility wasn’t the only target, of course. Their charter included destruction of any space vessels near the target facility, and priority targeting of any vessels attempting to flee the installation. They hadn’t been told why, but apparently somebody at that facility had really pissed off Command. Whoever it was, Ansa hoped he really deserved it. 

As of this posting, we are receiving reports that the fleet action in the Håkøya system is going well – Fifth Fleet seems to be in control of all bodies in the outer system, after a few inconclusive skirmishes with Incarnation forces. Those forces, whose strength is not known except presumably to those officers on the scene, have retreated back into orbit over Håkøya itself, where presumably they have some fixed defenses as well as fleet facilities. 

[N.T.B.] Whether Fifth Fleet can break this defense is not clear, but I would wager they can. The account we’ve been providing during these tense weeks suggests Confederated forces benefitted from good intelligence on the situation in Håkøya before launching this attack, and if fleet command did not think they could retake the place, they wouldn’t have gone in with the battlewagons.