War Angel: part thirty

Jack had called them to the dining table to lay out his plan.

“As you can see on screen, there is a single B-class battle cruiser in orbit around Saturn. Compliment of 1000 Omegans, 200 individual fighters. That’s the bad news,” he told them.

Kate, freshly showered and shoveling down a plate of food, asked the question that they each on their mind. “There’s good news?”

The new captain of the War Angel smiled. “Oh, yeah. One, the Omegans are a lot like us. They need water to survive. It isn’t perfect for them, but they can breathe Earth atmosphere. The atmosphere in their ships is pretty close, and their systems recycle the air the way ours does. They are omnivores, but their ships travel mostly with packed rations and freshly grown- what we could consider- vegetables. Most of it is consumable by the human digestive tract.”

Richard was incredulous. “So what? How do you propose to get our hands on it? Ask nicely? Perhaps you’re overlooking the 1000-to-5 ratio of us versus them? Not to mention what will happen when they launch those fighters?”

Jack walked around the table until he was standing over Richard. He placed his hands on Richard’s shoulders and gave him a pat, then continued circling the table. “Not at all. But they’re never going to have a chance to launch those fighters. Gina?”

Gina coughed and then pulled up a schematic of the Omegan ship on screen. “Okay, I went over this as best as I could, and the way I see it, our first objective has to be to take out the launch and landing bay.” She pointed to a large area along the bottom of the ship, the rear part attached to the engine housing, the launch window facing the front of the ship. “We have to prevent their warriors from being able to get to us.”

“I can’t imagine that’s not ridiculously fortified,” Sarah jumped in. “Do we have the firepower…?”

Jack shook his head no. “It’s probably the most shielded part of the ship.”

“Then how the hell…”

Jack cut her off. “Wait for it. Trust me.” He nodded at Gina. “Please go on.”

She continued. “We won’t be able to blow up the launch bay. Not unless we were inside it, at least. But we can make it inaccessible. We can make the entire ship inaccessible, I think. We just need some good shooting.”

Sarah shrugged. “That’s my department. What do I need to hit?”

Gina pointed at a small spot on the top side of the ship. “Here first.” Her finger them slid along the picture until it came to rest on a spot near the craft’s nose. “Then here. It’ll have to be precise.”

“May I point out,” Sarah replied, “that neither of those spots will be easy to hit? And that, just from looking, I can tell you that they don’t control any aspect that ship’s weaponry, life support, or shielding? So what the hell am I shooting at?”

Jack snorted a laugh. “Something even more vital.”