Blink: Interdiction (Book 4)

24

The schematic for the cracker didn't make for particularly happy reading. For rather self-evident reasons the massive structure had been designed with some of the heaviest security on the planet. Now that very security that had been so easily bypassed by the rebel commanders was staring them in the face.

There were two main entrances on either side of the dome that were large enough to accommodate vehicle transit. On top of that there were a dozen service and maintenance doorways, barely large enough for single-file access. Guard cupolas jutted out from the higher reaches of the dome, fixed with heavy calibre cannon emplacements that looked down over the approaches. Those defensive positions were completely under the control of the rebel forces now, and there could be no doubts about their willingness to use them. Any frontal assault would result in massive casualties on both sides.

But static defences presented a less daunting problem for the Blink operatives. With full blue-prints of the cracker's structure laid out across a series of tables in the barrack room, the young men and women examined them from every angle, hunting for the best approach; the quickest route to the jugular of the defenders.

The rumour mill on the base had been churning wildly since the cracker had been seized, but one thing that had been made crystal clear through the grapevine was that the navy was out for blood. Their first and still preferred recommendation was to smash the cracker to pieces with a gigantic orbital bombardment.

Amber shuddered at the thought.

Naval bombardment was a last resort, and for good reason. The main armaments of standard military cruisers fired solid anti-matter slugs that, when moving at muzzle velocity, would leave a crater a hundred feet across. A single round would easily level a building. But they were not homing weapons – they relied on the computerised firing solutions generated by the ships, and the individual skill of the gunnery officers.

When firing at a planet from high orbit, aiming at a precise target was like trying to throw a dart and knock another dart out of the air in mid-flight. The slightest deviation could send the slug hundreds of meters off target. If the navy did enact a bombardment of the asteroid cracker they would ensure maximum casualties. There was simply no way to engage in such an action without collateral damage.

And once that notion had been planted in Amber's mind she became more determined than ever to make sure it didn't happen.

Her eyes flicked over the blue-prints as she searched for the best points of ingress. For the operatives, there were several options. Actually stopping the cracker from being able to fire could be done relatively simply, by taking out the geothermal power plant built into its base that powered the gun itself. But they couldn't just blow it up. For one, a powerful reactor like that needed to be handled with care. For another, the planet might actually need the cracker. If they destroyed its power-plant, there was no way to know when it would be operational again given the state of the current conflict.

To her mind, they needed to get in and turn the reactor off without damaging it. The rest could be dealt with later once the cannon could no-longer be used to target the enemy ships. The concurrent objective was to deal with the defensive batteries screening the approaches Merlynn's troops would have to take to attack the structure itself.

"Those emplacements are a bastard, no mistake," Taggs grumbled, sitting at an adjacent table with his feet up, glowering over the blueprints. "Even for us getting at them is a snare."

Hekket nodded in agreement, shaking his head. "The platforms are so small – we'd only be able to Blink one operative on at a time. And even then you're contending with whoever's guarding the damn thing, too."