Close Combat (Final Fall)
Once, long ago, opposing ships had drawn opposite each other on the high seas of Remnant to delivery devastating broadsides. That age had long since passed, but there were still battles to be fought, if in space instead of upon the open sea.
X X X
No one spoke on the bridge of the Imperial dreadnought Valorous Heart. Instead, the minds of everyone on board were linked in a sort of quasi-telepathy established by the vessels artificial intelligence. Commands were issued faster than thought itself and obeyed just as quickly. Organic and machine worked in perfect unison to ply their deadly trade.
“They’re pulling alongside,” Heart, the artificial intelligence of the ship, murmured through the shared comms. “They’re looking for close combat.”
The ship’s captain, Artanus, took a split-second to consider the situation even as Heart gently pushed the results of thousands of simulations into his mind. The captain’s lips curved up into a smile, and he ran one hand through his thinning grey hair.
“Oblige them.”
X X X
The Federation dreadnought, Flame of Adan, had led the Federation’s attack on the systems held by the House of Arc. It had delivered a crushing blow, successfully defeating the Arc flagship in orbit over Benevolence IV. The one hundred mile long ship had gone down, splitting into several pieces before impacting the surface with extinction-level force.
This time it sought to repeat the feat against the flagship of the Imperial suppression force that had arrived to shield the fleeing remnants of the battered Arc and Lie Fleets. Blasting its way toward the heart of the Imperial formation, Adan, the artificial intelligence, had almost expected his foe to seek shelter in his escort. Instead, he received a reply worthy of an Imperial dreadnought espousing a sentiment he shared.
“Death before dishonour.”
His captain chuckled at the message.
“Move in for close combat.”
X X X
In an age where weapons could fire at interstellar distance, it seemed absurd to close to within only a few hundred miles of each other before opening fire. Yet at the same time, it made an awful kind of sense. Electronic counter measures, evasive manoeuvre, stealth technology, and protective advances had all increased the survivability of ships to match their weapons output.
But at this range, there would be little such frivolity. Instead, they would be betting everything on the skill of their crew, the advancement of their systems, and the quality of their engineering and weapons
As an Imperial dreadnought, Flame would put his systems, crew, and engineering against any ship in existence. The Empire’s finest shipwright had designed him and his classmates, and the mightiest of the navies shipyards - a multi-system manufactory - had laid his keel and forged his hull, whilst the Dia-Farron themselves had installed only the deadliest of weapons. For a hundred years, he had stood unyielding in the face of the Empire’s enemies. He would not turn and run, not before the Adan, not before any vessel.
For the Adan, it was a simple matter. If the Flame could not be defeated, then the Empire’s forces would surely triumph. The Flame possessed superior ranged weaponry, but the Adan was one of the most advanced dreadnoughts in the Federation’s fleet, and his crew was amongst the most experienced. Moreover, his weapons were designed specifically for close combat ship-to-ship warfare.
For a brief moment - a handful of the supremely swift processing cycles of his kind - he admired the other ship. The Flame was magnificent, a testament to the Empire’s naval tradition. And then the admiration gave way to excitement, to joy. He was a dreadnought, and battle was his trade.
“Weapons free!” his captain ordered through the quasi-telepathy, dozens of other, more specific orders being transmitted to gunners, engineers, and other staff. “Engage!”
X X X
Thousands upon thousands of laser batteries lit up, spanning the gap between the two vessels with impossible speed. Missiles followed, and the space between them lit up as their shields erupted in coruscating defensive displays. Minute holes appeared, bored into the shields by the handful of specialised shield-disrupting missiles that had managed to connect only to be patched over by dedicated shield projectors.
The rail guns opened fire next, titanic mass driving behemoths that could slag planets. Projectiles tipped with exotic materials designed to unleash localised singularities or anti-matter driven explosion amplified to absurd degrees rocketed forward at close to light speeds, each weighing thousands of tonnes.
This was the modern equivalent of the broadside, a glorious no-holds-barred barrage that sought to bury the opponent beneath sheer weight of fire. The shields of both ships flickered beneath the assault, enough power to crush solar systems raging against their defences. In a longer-range duel, there might have been an option to unleash nova cannons or other more powerful weaponry, but not at this range.
The plasma batteries, photonic-kinetic weapons, and singularity weapons came online last. The shields of both ships finally splintered, and space and time went insane. Weapons that defied reality and tore the very fabric of space-time sent sensor pods wailing in distress, and at last, at long last, the final layer of the ships’ defences was called into play.
Their armoured hulls.
Neutronium, Infinitum, and materials so exotic that they could not have been produced in more than trace amounts only a few centuries ago made up the armoured hulls. Star-killing forces carved furrows in the hull, and the klaxon of alarms rang out on both ships as furrows became cracks and holes.
Engineering crews rushed to stymie the damage alongside drones as the two ships continued their relentless assault. But slowly but surely, one of them was gaining an advantage.
X X X
Flame passed the message onto his captain and crew. There would be no evacuation. Short-range teleportation and so on would be impossible with this much exotic radiation still in the area thanks to the weapons exchange.
“We could surrender,” Flame offered. “They would let us live.”
The captain sent the question through the telepathic comms channel, and the reply was unanimous.
“Overload all reactors,” the captain ordered, a small smile on his face. “For the Federation!”
X X X
“Sir, the Flame has overloaded his reactors,” Heart said quietly. “They’re going out shooting.”
“Understood.” Artanus nodded gravely. “Then the least we can do is oblige them.” He took off his hat. “Match output. Destroy the Flame.”
X X X
As Flame’s hull came apart and his crew died, he took a few cycles to reflect on his impending death. There would be no backups for him. The interference from the lingering radiation was too great to transmit a copy, and the version of him in the archives was far too outdated to even be considered a copy of the AI that he was now.
“Congratulations,” he sent the words across the void to Heart. “You’ve won.”
The other AI was sombre. “You fought well. It should not have come to this.”
“But it did,” Flame replied. “And so here we are.”
His processors began to stutter as an explosion tore through his innards, vaporising his reactors and sending energy spikes radiating throughout his systems.
“It looks like this is the end for me,” Flame said. He’d thought that he might be frightened when this day came. Instead, there was only quiet satisfaction. He'd held nothing back. He and his crew had been as close to perfect as it was possible to be. Their loss could not be laid at their feet.
“You can keep talking if you like. I’ll listen.”
And so, for the last few cycles before he vanished in a blinding explosion, Flame told Heart about the beauty of the shipyards where he’d been built, of his brothers and sisters who had fought so proudly for the Federation. As the last cycle came, he sent across a wave of emotion, what passed for a smile amongst their kind.
“It was an honour to face you.”
“The honour was mine.”
X X X
Author’s Notes
A glimpse of ship-to-ship combat in that era.
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