Asteroid Belt Reconnaissance (3)
Frederick shook his head with a hearty laugh as he looked at Freesia’s slightly dazed expression. “It was a joke. Just a joke. That’s not something we’d actually do.”
“Haha… right?” Freesia forced an awkward laugh at Frederick’s remark, and he added another line whose tone was impossible to read. “That would only ever be a last resort, wouldn’t it?”
Was that a joke too? It had to be. When a man who had been in the service since long before Rear Admiral Lavair was even born said something like that, it was impossible to tell where the joke ended and the truth began.
“Would you take a look at this? The outline of this operation is to sweep the pirate forces hiding in the asteroid belt. Their estimated strength is close to three companies. However, since the bulk of their power is concentrated in fast-attack craft, they’re hardly a threat to a regular cruiser squadron.”
“In simple terms, one shot from a cruiser’s main battery erases one fast-attack craft. Even if you add up the output of several fast-attack craft, they might theoretically match a cruiser’s main gun, but that never happens in actual combat.”
“In other words, while the pirates’ total output is close to three companies, their real combat effectiveness is lower.”
“If you look at the search routes of the squadrons under the task force, you’ll notice several points where they approach the boundary between the asteroid belt and the star system.”
“You’re right. Let me see… roughly every month and a half, they come up to the boundary line. Is that for resupply?”
Frederick nodded with a satisfied smile. “Correct. The squadrons under the task force are scheduled to approach the boundary for resupply every month and a half. That means they have to carry a full three months’ worth of provisions. But our situation is different.”
“Ah, free role, then.”
“The rear admiral has authorized independent search-and-destroy operations for the reconnaissance battalions. Our resupply cycle isn’t entirely up to us, but we can adjust it with some flexibility. Of course, as the battalion commander said, the importance of provisions on long-term missions can never be overstated. However, when resupply is this flexible, the value of comfort items tends to rise as well.”
Freesia looked at him with genuine respect. The advice came from hard-won experience: even a single bite of a snack could revive exhausted crew members for at least an hour. That kind of insight was something she could never have learned from regulations alone, not with her rapid promotions and the fact that she still carried the manual everywhere she went.
Freesia continued asking questions for a long while after that. Watching her absorb the information so quickly, Frederick chuckled and patiently explained every detail.
“Battalion Commander, spatial jump complete. We will arrive at the asteroid belt in thirty minutes.”
At the operations officer’s report, Freesia nodded quietly. The radar screen was filled with a dense cluster of white dots. Somewhere among those countless points, they had to find and deal with barely twenty enemy ships. Fast-attack craft were only forty to fifty meters long. The sheer volume of the asteroid belt… A sigh escaped her.
At least the belt wasn’t a perfect sphere enclosing the star system like the notoriously closed Magna System. It was a ring-shaped belt that circled the system once. If it had been a sphere, no one would have even considered searching it with only seven battalions. Even so, searching this asteroid belt with seven battalions still felt absurd.
Freesia switched the radar to a smaller scale that showed the entire star system. A single blue dot appeared on the opposite side, with five scattered green dots elsewhere.
These were the comrades she would be working with for the foreseeable future. When she had suggested they have dinner together before departure, every one of them had looked like they were chewing on something unpleasant.
“We’ll conduct a briefing before entering the asteroid belt. Summon the supply ship captain and the company commanders.”
The communications officer relayed Freesia’s order to the subordinate companies, and the operations and personnel sections began moving busily. Watching the bridge grow active, Freesia carefully reviewed the materials, checking for anything she might have missed or misunderstood.
By the time she received word that the supply ship captain and company commanders had arrived aboard the flagship, she felt a measure of relief. She had spent the last two years of war commanding combat units, so while administrative work for a battalion was still new, combat command was something she had done until she was sick of it.
Having already led a combat battalion of thirty-one ships, commanding a reconnaissance battalion of only fourteen—including the supply ship—didn’t seem particularly difficult. It was fortunate she had experienced a combat battalion first; if she had gone straight from reconnaissance to combat command, she might have thrown the manual across the room in frustration.
Thanks to that experience, she had been able to hold her own in last night’s late operational meeting and even lead it. The staff had quietly rejoiced that they wouldn’t have to spend hours adding footnotes to tactical reports.
Shortly after the supply ship captain and company commanders arrived on the bridge, the operations chief began the briefing.
“Because of the nature of the asteroid belt, simple detection makes it difficult to find pirate ships that have powered down and are docked. We must therefore deploy detection satellites while continuously running Precision Scanning.”
The three company commanders’ expressions darkened at the prospect of running Precision Scanning all day long until the pirates were eliminated or driven completely out of the system. Freesia sympathized deeply and added an explanation.
“Precision Scanning will be rotated between the flagship and the patrol ships. Starting at 0800 AST, the flagship will run it for six hours, the 1st Company for three hours, and the 2nd and 3rd Companies for two hours each. From 2100 AST, when the duty rotation begins, we’ll switch to wide-area detection instead. Maintain strict vigilance around the perimeter regardless.”
The three company commanders looked at Freesia with a mixture of relief and surprise. Even with the burden shared, six hours was still six hours. Numerically, that was three times the load of the 2nd and 3rd Company commanders, yet she was saying she could handle it.
At Freesia’s nod to continue, the operations chief went on. He explained the planned search routes, resupply schedule, and the response protocols depending on the size of any enemy force encountered.
“The pirates’ estimated strength could reach as many as four companies. Therefore, we will maintain a concentrated formation while conducting our search.”
A diagram of the expected formation appeared on the main panel: the supply ship in the center, the flagship cruiser in front, patrol ships to the rear and flanks, and numerous fast-attack craft positioned around them.
Once the formation briefing ended, Freesia glanced around and asked if anyone had questions. None came. This operation was nothing more than repetitive, open-ended searching; it didn’t require sophisticated tactics or strategy.
Just as she was about to conclude the briefing, Patricia, the chief medical officer who had been silent in the corner, quietly raised her hand.
“Battalion Commander, I have a suggestion.”
Freesia nodded lightly. Patricia asked for permission, then operated her military terminal to display a data screen filled with complex figures on the main panel.
“This is a paper published last year by Medical Command summarizing the strain placed on a captain’s mana circuit when operating a ship.”
Everyone, including Freesia, looked at the material with curiosity, but their expressions soon turned weary. Without medical knowledge, they couldn’t make sense of the dense technical terminology. Patricia switched to a graph that was easier for non-specialists to understand, focusing on the data related to Precision Scanning.
“This section shows the point at which long-term strain begins to cause abnormalities in the captain’s mana circuit. The baseline is 100% ship output.”
She pointed to the graph showing how the mana circuits of cruiser and patrol ship captains in the reconnaissance battalion would change if they ran Precision Scanning for set periods each day. A blue line gradually approached a red boundary line.
“Running it three hours a day showed symptoms of gradually decreasing output after about two weeks. Six hours a day produced the same symptoms after roughly one week. Of course, that was without any countermeasures. With proper measures, the strain on the captain can be significantly reduced. Although it isn’t mandatory yet, in accordance with Medical Command guidelines issued three months ago, I recommend that ship captains undergo examinations every three days, and executive officers and adjutants on duty rotation every week.”
Freesia fell into thought at Patricia’s unexpected suggestion. Maintaining Precision Scanning was certainly taxing. While it was nothing compared to fleet combat, continuously operating the mana circuit for long periods was no small burden. And no matter how optimistic she tried to be, this operation wouldn’t end in a day or two. If it were only going to last three or four days, she might skip the checkups, but if it could stretch to a month or two, even light examinations to reduce the load on the mana circuit were worth implementing.
Medical Command had apparently conducted this research to lessen the burden on captains and improve combat sustainability.
“How long does each examination take?”
“If there are no abnormalities, about ten minutes. If symptoms appear and a detailed examination is needed, it could take thirty minutes to an hour. For captains, every other examination will include thirty minutes of treatment to restore and stabilize the mana circuit.”
Ten minutes every three days, plus thirty minutes every other time—that was time worth investing. Even Freesia, with her exceptional mana sensitivity and recovery, would eventually tire if she ran Precision Scanning six hours a day. If they could maintain peak condition longer in a situation where they never knew when the enemy might appear, there was no reason not to implement it.
“Can these examinations also be conducted on the patrol ships?”
The key question was whether the medical bays on the patrol ships serving as company flagships could perform the checks. No matter how short the examination time, having company commanders travel to the cruiser every three days would be an enormous waste of time.
“Yes. It would be difficult on fast-attack craft, but the medical bays on patrol ships are fully capable. However, if the mana circuit abnormality exceeds a certain threshold, they may still need to use the cruiser’s medical bay.”
Satisfied with the answer, Freesia nodded and accepted Patricia’s proposal. After summarizing all points, the operational briefing concluded. It was time to begin combing through the asteroid belt.