Topic: Liberty

[Lieutenant_Q]

Author's Note: The first few chapters are highly political, but they almost have to be to place the Liberty in the appropriate context, eg.  Earth's Early 21st Century Space Cruiser.  In Chapter 2 or 3 (There's a chapter I don't know if I really want to post or not, I'll decide that when I get there).  I knew that Bush would win Re-election, but I had thought/hoped that Colin Powell would remain in the State department.  He will remain there in the story line, because I don't see the scene working between Dr. Rice and her former Deputy as well as it worked between General Powell and Dr. Rice.  This will be my off beat story, Ill work on it when Im stuck on Star Trek XI, and when I'm done with it completely.

Chapter 1

US Warship- USS Cole (DDG-67)
Docked, Aden, Yemen
12 October 2000
1110 Local Time (GMT +2)

   Lieutenant Junior Grade Michael Roberts sat in the Mess Hall staring at the clock, his breakfast sitting before him, untouched, except for the coffee mug that was empty in front of him.  This was his third cup, I?m not hungry he told himself, in truth he was, but once again he hadn?t had a good night?s sleep last night, and was more focused on trying to wake up rather than trying to get something to eat.  His shift started in twenty minutes, Captain Lippold had promoted him to first shift, as a step towards a possible command of his own some day.  This was going to be the second first shift-watch he was going to serve, and the switch from graveyard command was showing itself.  He had been so used to sleeping in the day, and having the entire night to himself and the rest of the graveyard crew.
   Deciding that he can?t go to work on an empty stomach, he started to force some of the food down, oblivious to everyone around him, he ate as quickly as he could.  Michael had gotten through half of his breakfast, when he decided that he really couldn?t eat anymore.  He got up and put the food in the disposal, and poured himself another cup of coffee, glancing up at the clock as he left, he noted the time, 11:17.  No one knew at that moment that that clock, and the seventeen crewmen in the room, had less than a minute of life left to them.
   Michael walked to the ladder leading up to the bridge.  Now begins the fun part.  Trying to climb the ladder with a hot cup of coffee in his hands.  He?d done it before several times, and in rougher seas than they currently were in right now, docked in port.   He could have used the gangway, but would have had to go around to the far side, and he still had twelve minutes.  Each time was a challenge, but he expected this one to be easier to climb.  Grasping the Styrofoam cup between his thumb and forefinger, he began the ascent.
   He never made it.
   An explosion rocked the ship and threw him off the ladder, the hot coffee spilling over him.  Ironically, having the coffee cup in his hand quite possibly saved him from serious injury, he had only been a few rungs up the ladder when the explosion happened, as such he only fell a few feet, because he had been climbing more slowly than he would have without a cup.  Subconsciously he did a tally of all his important body parts. Satisfied he wasn?t seriously injured he got up and climbed the ladder much faster than he normally would have.  Jumping off the ladder he ran the last few meters to the bridge.  The scene was pandemonium, between the helm officer trying to keep the ship in place, and the Comm officer trying desperately to restore the damaged communication system.  The bridge was only illuminated by the exterior lights and the emergency lights.  No senior officer was present on the bridge, so he took command.
   ?Report!?
   ?A large explosion went off near the mess hall sir!  Unable to determine at the moment whether the blast was internal or external.  Comm and electrical systems are down, the Captain ran down to engineering to check on their status.  We have a twelve degree list to port, and appear to be taking on water.?  A marine in the back finished the report, and went back to the electrical work.
   ?Keep an eye on the water line, if we start to sink, I want to know about it.  Was it possible the fuel caught fire during re-fueling??
   ?Negative sir?Sir!  Report from our port side sentry, a small craft had come up alongside the ship, ignored our warnings to keep clear, when the marine prepared to fire, the boat exploded.?
   We were attacked?


Area 51, Las Vegas, Nevada
11 September 2001
0757 Local Time (GMT ?

   We were attacked? just a half hour ago the second tower crumbled away leaving the smoldering first tower alone, and it was only a matter of time before that one went too, George Sinclair was sure of that.  Already personnel were scrambling around to secure the facility.  As if it wasn?t already secure enough he thought.   He had been woken by the alarms that sounded off shortly after the second plane crashed in the World Trade Center, as soon as they knew that it wasn?t an accident.  He staggered to the Cafeteria, where the grim scene in New York were unfolding on every television monitor.  He had intended to get breakfast, but suddenly lost his appetite as he saw the smoke billowing from the two towers.  It didn?t take long for him to wake up after seeing that.
   Most of his staff was in the cafeteria with him, watching along side him.  They had been working particularly late last night, they didn?t log off until 2300.  All of them were tired, but none showed it now.  Getting the Fusion Reactor to work was their job, and the exact method of going about it eluded them.  Every method they tried turned into another cold lead.  But the reactor was the furthest thing from their mind as they sat there and stared as the first tower began its slow, inevitable decent to the streets.
   We are at war?

Baghdad, Iraq
19 March 2003
0534 Local Time (GMT +3)

   We are at war? the air raid sirens confirmed it.  What the Americans were using, no one was saying, but the Americans had said repeatedly that this was a war to topple Saddam Hussein, and to restore Iraq to its people.  If true, then the Americans deserved Ahmed Al-Eisa?s support, but even before the attack was launched America was sending mixed signals, while the cowboy, Bush, was repeatedly stating that the goal was to overthrow Saddam Hussein, return all of Iraq to its people.  Others in the American Congress and on the American CNN were saying how Bush was attacking to conquer Iraq for its oil.  If that were true, then he would fight just as hard as the Iraqi Army to keep the Infidels out.  Al-Jazeera was supporting what CNN and some in Congress were saying.  But al-Jazeera had lied to the Iraqi people before, so Ahmed had to decide what to do, and quickly.
   He was in his final year of study at Baghdad University, a rather strange five-year stint.  Air Raid sirens were a constant during his first three years, every time Hussein tried to shoot down an American or British Warplane; something in Baghdad blew up instead.  During his fourth year, it was constant interruptions by United Nations Weapons Inspectors.  This year, it was an invasion.  One way or another he was going to finish his degree.  At least, if he lived through the Invasion, Occupation or not, the Americans were sure to re-open the university as soon as possible, and if not, his grades were in the top 5 percentile, he could easily transfer to another University, maybe in Kuwait or Qatar, or maybe even to America, should they prove to be liberating us.  He had made up his mind right there.
   We are fighting for our future?


US Carrier - USS Enterprise (CVN-65)
On Station - Los Angeles, California
28 October 2004
1412 Local Time (GMT ?

   We are fighting for our future? Two hours ago a terrorist set off several dirty bombs in the heart of the Los Angeles Metropolitan district.  The USS Enterprise had been turned into a giant floating infirmary in less than an hour.  All attack aircraft had been flown to Pasadena, and any helicopter in the area had flown aboard emergency medical supplies.  Now those Helicopters were being used to transport the wounded onto the carrier?s deck, and the wounded kept coming.  The main hangar deck had almost ten thousand beds, while sickbay handled the most seriously wounded.  All personnel not needed to hold the ship at its current position or those needed to run all eight nuclear reactors at maximum were being used as orderlies and nurses assisting the too few doctors and trained medical personnel.  Lt. Commander Lynn Neuman had lost count of the number of people she had treated for radiation burns, many all she could do was make them comfortable until the proper treatment could be implemented.  The dead, and there were a lot of dead, were taken to the maintenance deck.  She hadn?t lost count of them yet, 534 people lay in that room, another two or three hundred here in the hangar deck would be going there shortly.  There was just nothing that could be done for them.  They focused their efforts on saving those that could be saved, and making those that couldn?t comfortable.  That is the first goal of a Triage team.
   They were woefully understaffed, and they were undersupplied.  Although a transport ship was en-route, carrying medical personnel from the USS John F. Kennedy and her escort fleet.  Medical supplies were constantly being landed on the deck, some of these supplies were landing in time to save several dozen people, and others are landing in time to ease the pain of those about to go.  Clearly Al-Qaeda attacked in an attempt to influence the outcome of the election.  It succeeded beyond their wildest dreams in Spain, and they were going for 2 for 2.
   A cry echoed out over the low moans of the injured, one of the newly arrived was resisting a radiation treatment injection, a nurse was struggling to calm him down.  Ordinarily, the time would be taken to calm him down before proceeding, but the line behind him was at twenty, and another chopper was arriving at that very moment, with at least another twenty.  They didn?t have the time, Lynn grabbed a hypodermic from her cart, the young man had made it more difficult for himself, instead of getting the needle-less injection that everyone else had been getting, he was getting a needle, and he was getting it in the first place Lynn could get to.  The young man threw the nurse onto the floor and tried to run for it, but a marine caught him and pinned him face down onto the cot.  He fought against her, but her training had won over his strength.  It gave Lynn the time to rush in and jab the needle into the man?s butt.  He shrieked as the needle broke the flesh, but quickly went limp as the heavy sedative rushed into his system.  Lynn nodded and the marine got up off the man and helped the nurse to his feet.  ?Thank you, Corporal.?
   ?Yes, Ma?am.?  The corporal snapped off a quick salute and went back to escorting patients in.  Those patients that had noticed the scuffle had been more cooperative the next time a nurse come around.  Those that heard the shriek didn?t pay much attention to it; an occasional scream was something to be expected now and then.  Lynn looked around at the gathered patients, and thought just how many more are going to be here, or dead, before the day was out.

[Lieutenant_Q]

Chapter 2

College Station, Texas
19 February 2005
1914 Local Time (GMT ?6)

   ?I can?t believe you put those men there, Sean.?  Philip Snyder was looking at his gun-line situated on top of Cemetery Hill, and the four hundred Confederate soldiers right in front of it. ?Lets see now?I have four, six, ten Napoleons and four, eight, nine TBs.  So, I?ll take one thirty-six Grapeshot, one forty-two grapeshot, and the others will try to re-ammo.?
   ?You sure you want to shoot those Phil?  I might capture them.?  Sean Stanek looked back from across the table, he knew the troops were dead, in fact that?s exactly why they were there.  They were the only survivors from Archer?s Brigade, and he was using them as shields for Early?s troops.  Next turn, Early would be up on the gun line, and they could do some damage.  Ron Wright had pulled a brilliant delaying move that tied up XII Corps for a turn, and it was now most likely that XII Corps would have to retake Cemetery Hill.  But Phil had another ace up his sleeve; he reached over and grabbed his two dice, one red, and one black.
   ?Black?s to hit.?  He threw the dice into the box.  The red die came up a three, while the black die spun on its end for a few seconds before coming up a five.  ?Two-star!  I think rolling for rout and pin is a bit pointless.?  Phil grinned as he picked up his dice.  Sean merely smiled as he removed the counter that represented the two hundred men that were just killed in a massive Artillery Barrage.  Phil moved his placeholder over a column.  ?Black hits again.?  He threw the dice once more into the box, the red die came up a six, but the black die fell flat and came up a two. ?One-star.  Roll for rout.?  Phil was a little disappointed; Archer might live to fight another day.  Sean threw his die into the box and it came up a four.
   ?Morale?s three, plus one for being BCE, minus one for a leader, darn, rout back three, morale check?? Sean threw his die in the box again, and this time a six stared back at him. ?They pin.?
   ?Roll for leader loss.?  Ron piped in from his side of the map.  ?Don?t get Archer killed, that?s five points for the Union.?
   Sean grabbed two dice and tossed them into the box, the dice read six. ?Archer?s just fine.?
   Phil scanned the map, ?Well, that?s it for me, every thing else is out of range now.  Our move, Shawn??
   ?This is where I get to pull out my saber and scream ?Charge!?  Shawn Gamble picked up the 3rd Wisconsin Regiment and placed them right next to Early?s left flank, the rest of Iron Brigade passed through the hole made by the 3rd Wisconsin.  ?Take your shots Ron, the 3rd Wisconsin is going to take the hits.?  The move was risky, the 3rd Wisconsin could only take three hits, and it was the only regiment of the Iron Brigade that hadn?t been hit yet.  The rest of Iron Brigade had been shot to pieces, but that five morale made it a difficult nut to crack, and it hadn?t broken yet.
   ?Shame there?s no exploitation phase.? Phil grinned as he counted the spaces between Buford?s last cavalry unit and Robert E. Lee, all out by himself, just north of Gettysburg.  Ten.  That?s how many spaces between Buford and Lee, and the cavalry could run twelve.
    At that point, the phone rang.
   ?That?s odd.?  Phil said as he got up from the table.
   ?What?? Ron asked in response to his statement.
   ?The number of people that have this phone number I can count on one hand, and three of them are in this room right now.  For the other two, it would be a long distance call, so they would rather call my cell.?
   ?It?s a solicitor, let it ring. Move your troops.? Shawn spoke up as he was moving the rest of the I Corps to better defend their position.
   ?My troops don?t need to move, and I haven?t had a solicitor call on Saturday in three months.  Could it be Pat??
   ?No, Pat?s in Dallas, Drew?s in the Ukraine.?  Ron answered.
   Phil snapped up the phone and pressed the talk button. ?Hello??
   ?Mr. Philip Snyder?? The male voice came back.
   ?Speaking.?
   ?I?m calling in response to the proposal you sent to the President?s Commission on Implementation of US Space Exploration Policy.?
   ?Yes??
   ?Just hang up on ?em Phil!? Sean shouted.  Phil waved him off.
   ?I apologize for calling on the weekend, but we are impressed by your proposal.  I was calling to ask you if you had any more details on the type of ship you were proposing.  Your paper was rather general in the specifics.?
   ?I, uh, have done some preliminary sketches and even drew up a deck by deck plan of the interior.  I could mail them to you, if you?d like to see them.?
   ?That wont be necessary, we will come to you.  What time is good for you on Monday??
   ?Monday?  Ahh? anytime after one.?
   ?Then we will be there at two-thirty.  Your address is 1501 Holleman Drive Apartment 81 correct??
   ?That?s right.  Why would you not want me to mail them?
   ?Because we need to see them immediately, and we are in Houston, so mailing would be slower than physically coming to you.?
   ?I don?t understand.?
   ?We?ll explain when we get there.  Enjoy your weekend.?  The phone clicked as the man hung up.  Phil pressed the talk button to terminate the phone connection, and placed the phone back in its cradle.
   ?Well? What did they want?? Shawn asked.
   ?Ron, remember that paper I had you proofread over and over last spring??  Ron nodded. ?Well, I did send it in, typical bureaucracy, took ?em this long to finally read it.?
   ?At least they read it, what do they want??  Ron asked.
   ?They want to know if I have any more about it.?
   ?Do you??  Shawn inquired.
   ?A Notebook full of sketches, some quite a bit off, I think I slapped a warp drive on two of the pictures, and dumped the Grav deck on a half dozen more.  Once during a rant between an Iranian American and the English Comp instructor I actually drew up a deck plan of the ship.  Most of the ship is designed to be in Micro-gravity the entire time, although the ship?s decks are aligned so that when the ship is moving, the bow of the ship is up.??So?? 
   ?So they?re going to come and get them, and who knows what else.  Monday about 2:30.?
   ?What were they ranting about?? Ron changed the subject.
   ?He was a typical ?progressive? liberal, anything that Bush does is wrong.  The latest subject he was trying to put over on us was Abu Ghraib.  The Iranian in the front had apparently had enough of his political rhetoric.  The next day he put up an article by some woman who writes for the Progressive, and held it up as a lofty example of a well researched paper, even though she referenced only one source in her entire article, Amnesty International.  If we had had time, I?m sure he would have said something about that, I almost did as he claimed it as well researched.?
   ?I?m sure he was disappointed when Bush was voted for a second term.? Sean said, half-heartedly, he was apparently thinking what he was going to do with what he had left.  Early?s force had folded a bit on the left flank and XII Corps was now going to make it to the hill in time to relieve XI Corps.  But you never knew with Sean.
   He proved it right there.  He picked up Lee and placed him on a stack with nine hundred men.  Then moved the stack next to what was left of the Iron Brigade. ?This is the game right here, all comes down to one die roll.?
   ?Two actually, but I thought you hated random die rolls.?  Phil responded.
   ?I do.?
   ?Sean, I thought I taught you better than that.?  Ron looked nervous, if this was a re-enactment, Sean was putting the Confederacy on the line by putting Lee in the line of fire.  ?If you get Lee killed, it doesn?t matter the outcome of the battle, we lose.?
   ?I know, but if I get this Melee, the entire Union front collapses as Iron Brigade routs, and then we take the hill and win.?
?Shawn, just get a hit, doesn?t matter what kind of hit.  Just get a hit.?  Phil grinned.
   ?Come on lads, the war?s over with one shot.?  Shawn grabbed his die, ?7 to 10 shot.?  He threw the die off the box?s wall.
   ?Five or a six!? Shawn and Phil yelled to together.
   ?One or a two!? Sean and Ron screamed back.
   Five.
   Ron spoke in a whispered voice. ?Roll for leader loss.?
   Sean picked up two dice and tossed them into the box.  The first die came up a three, while the other die spun around on its corner.  Everyone in the room held their breath.
   The die stopped spinning, on its face was the skull and crossbones.  That represented a one, and the death of Robert E. Lee.
   No one spoke for a few seconds; they just stared into the box.  Finally, Ron spoke up again.  ?Now I?ve seen everything.?
   ?Somehow though, I thought Pat would have been the one to get Lee shot.?  Phil responded.
   ?You haven?t seen Drew lose at Wellington?s Victory yet.?  Sean quipped.
   ?I was hoping that the three of you would be the first ones to do it next month when he gets back from Kiev, but now I don?t even know if I want to even acknowledge that I know you.?  Ron jabbed at Sean.
   ?Had it worked, you would have said that I was your best student, and you were proud of what I had done.?  Sean jabbed back.
   ?I wouldn?t quite go that far, Lee isn?t supposed to be used like that, regardless of the situation.?
   ?Shall we pack it up now?  Or does the entire Confederate Army have to roll for rout??  Shawn asked jokingly.
   ?I don?t think there?s a rule in the original game that covers Lee getting killed.  I know I didn?t put one in there.  I didn?t think it would ever be an issue.? Ron glared at Sean.
   ?Well?? Phil started.
   ?I don?t have the original rules with me, Pat has a copy and my copy is at home.  I say the Confederate Army rolls for rout by Brigade.  Any Brigade that routs, routs and never returns, any brigade that stays, checks their individual regiments as well.?
   ?You can start with them.? Shawn pointed at the large line of counters stretching from Gettysburg west halfway on to the next map.
   ?Morale?s a four, plus two for Lee, minus one that they haven?t been hit yet, sound fair??  Ron asked.
   ?Sounds good. Fifty-Fifty chance of breaking.?  Phil responded.
   Sean wordlessly picked up his die and tossed it, this was the only Brigade that stood even a remote chance of staying.  A six faced up.
   ?Goodbye.? Shawn waved at the Brigade
   Sean cursed under his breath and began picking up the entire Brigade, normally they shouldn?t even be on the board to begin with, since they play more of a part in the second day, but lately they?ve been the deciding factor, getting one or two good attacks on Cemetery Hill before night falls.  Roll after roll, Brigade after Brigade, the Confederate troops demoralized by the loss of their leader, were pulled from the board, when all was said and done, only three regiments remained on the map, Ron and Sean ceded the game.
   At that point, Shawn?s phone rang.  He picked it up and stepped outside.  While Sean, Ron and Phil began picking up the pieces and sorting them out.  ?So what do you plan on showing them??  Ron asked.
   ?Showing them what?  Oh.  Well, the sketches are scattered throughout pages of Calculus and Physics Notes.  I was thinking, I would scan the sketches into the Computer and put them on a disk.  I also know a couple of CG artists, maybe I can convince them to take my profile sketches and turn it into a 3D image.?
   ?Any reason why they?re coming here?? Sean asked and then added, ?And can I be here when they get here??
   ?If I had to guess, I?d say they don?t quite know what to make of me, and want to see if I am serious about this.  I?d also say the military, either the Air Force or Navy, have a stake in whether it?s real or not.  The Navy more than the Air Force, because if I were doing it, I would take the money from the Navy, say short them a Destroyer or Cruiser, to build the Liberty.?
   ?The Liberty??  Ron inquired.
?I?ve designated the ship a Liberty Class Starship, since the class is named after the first ship in its class, the first ship would be Liberty.  As to why they are coming here, I have no clue, and if you want to be here Sean, you?re more than welcome.?
   ?So If you had full control over the ship, not a very likely scenario of course, what would the ship be like?? Ron asked.
   ?Well, you remember the paper?  Command Module would house the bridge, armory, sickbay, four science labs and a decontamination chamber, along with primary life support systems, LIDAR array and the main docking port.  The habitat deck would be a gravitational generation deck that can hold forty people, two mess halls, and food supplies.  The cargo section would hold the fuel stores and the main shuttle bay.  While the Engineering section would have a fusion or fission reactor, backup life-support systems, and an additional LIDAR array.  Ship?s armament would be six Megawatt class lasers and two multipurpose missile launchers.  The hull plating would contain a polarization matrix not unlike that shown on Enterprise.  All of this stuff is science fact, not fiction, although some of it may be a tad expensive.?
   Sean spoke first, ?Six lasers??
   ?Two forward-dorsal, two forward-ventral, one aft-dorsal, one aft-ventral.  Both missile bays would be forward mounted.  Not that the missile bay?s orientation really matters, the missiles would be guided, so it wouldn?t take a whole lot of effort to turn them around to get a target in the aft quarter.?
   Ron had a comment next, ?What about the treaty preventing the deployment of military devices in space??
   ?The 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the President tore that thing up three years ago, remember??
   Shawn came back in from outside, ?Well guys that was my wife, the kid?s not doing so well, so I gotta get going.  See ya?ll later.?
   ?I should be going as well, She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed will have something for me to do this weekend.? Ron said as he grabbed his tote. ?Help me out with this Sean??
   ?Sure thing.?
   ?See you guys later.?  As he watched them go, Phil looked around at his small apartment.  It was essentially two rooms, a bedroom, a living room, and then a kitchen barely bigger than a walk-in closet, and a bathroom of similar size.  There was a slight clutter, mostly on the counter between the living room/dining room and the kitchen, it would take him a grand total of five minutes to clean the apartment up completely.  He went into his bedroom where his computer was stored.  He logged onto Dynaverse.net, where some of the more talented computer graphic artists resided.  Phil entered the Model section and began to type in his request.

   Looking for someone to create a model of a ship.  I have the profile views scanned into my computer and will send them to whoever responds.  Would like this done by Monday.  I know this is short notice, so I will understand if you all decline.
   As he waited for a response, Phil reached over to his cabinet and began looking through his stacks of notebooks.  Grabbing the one labeled Spring 2004 he pulled it out and began paging through it.  Not for the notes, but for the pictures of the USS Liberty in the margins, the headers, or even the entire page.  He flipped immediately to the best profile views that he had.  The Fore, Dorsal and Port side sketches showed real well, and they were also the cleanest, he spent the better part of a Physics Lab working on them.  Powering up his scanner he placed the page on the bed and began the scan.  The scans came in well, after importing the drawings into Photosuite, he cleaned them up a bit more.  Eliminating stray lines, erase marks that didn?t quite erase.  He switched his task back to the message board and checked for a response.  Not seeing one, he switched back to Photosuite and began to make a few more touch-ups.  Breaking the drawing into three different pictures and saving them, Phil began to add a little bit of color to the drawings, a little more details, like a viewing port in a few areas to give a little better perception of size.  Even without the model, it looked a lot bigger now.  Phil decided to add a overhead shot of the Space Shuttle Orbiter to the Dorsal view, for scale.  The Liberty was slightly wider than the Orbiter, but almost four times as long, and twice as tall.  Saving these sketches he again flipped back to the message board.
   This time there was a response, but not from someone he had hoped to hear from.  He read through the post, considered it of no value, and went back to the main board.  Leaving the monitor at that screen, Phil got up and checked the fridge for dinner.  Spotting the leftovers from Thursday he opened the lid and dumped the contents onto a plate.  Goulash, or as most people in Texas called it, Beef Macaroni, it wasn?t his favorite dinner, but after weeks of eating the same thing, he was ready for a change.  Setting the Microwave to a minute, he placed the plate inside and activated it.  Walking back to the computer, he slapped the F5 button to refresh the page.  A new message appeared, from someone he wanted to hear from.

I would be happy to try to put this model of yours together.  It shouldn?t take me more than a day and a half to put it together.  You should see it to download here sometime Monday morning.  Will that be soon enough for you?
   
   Typing in an affirmative response, he emailed the separate sketches to the modeler.  Once he got confirmation of successful reception of the email, he went to the microwave, which was now demanding his attention.  ?Good luck buddy.?

[Lieutenant_Q]

I got to thinking with this thread shortly after I put it up, and well...it is more of a novel than a short story.  So...rather than continue with the slowly creeping toward building the ship.  I'm going to jump around the story.  How exactly I'm going to do it I'm not sure yet... here's a teaser for all of you. 

17 July 2038 21:18 GMT
USS Liberty - Passing through Asteroid Belt
Ship's Log: Supplemental.  Utopia Planetia has been attacked.  A series of explosions have damaged or destroyed most of the city's protective dome.  Fortunately planetary terra-forming was nearly complete, and the forecasted sand storms last night were not as serious as was predicted, so no casualties have been reported from either decompression or exposure.  However the casualty count from the explosions stand at thirty-four.  My son is one of them, we are twenty minutes from Martian orbit.
"Commodore, I'm picking up an unusual energy signature bearing two-seven-one mark twelve."  Commander Clarke broke the silence of the bridge with his report.  Clarke was one of the "Old Guard" as Commodore Snyder liked to call them, there from the beginning.  He was in line for command of the Challenger four years ago, but turned it down.  Now the Columbia was nearly ready to be commissioned and he has yet again been offered command of that ship.  Earth's entire fleet consisted of thirty-seven cruisers, fifteen of them belonged to the Anglo-American Alliance while another ten belonged to the Communist Coalition Party.  The other twelve were divided between the European Union (four), Russian Federation (three), African Confederation (three), the Pacific Hegemony (one) and the Latin American League (one).  While supporting Destroyers and Frigates were uncommon, only the AAA and the CCP deployed any at all.  The AAA with its interests on Mars deployed twice as many as the CCP.
"Unusual in what way Commander?"  Commodore Snyder responded.
"Unusual in the fact that it's not supposed to be there." Clarke quipped.
Pirates.  The reason the AAA began escorting supply ships with Frigates and Destroyers.  They had made a haven for themselves in the Asteroid belt, where you almost had to run over them to find them.  Well they just had.
"Any sign they've noticed us?"
"They've just launched snub-fighters sir."
Snubfighters, small one-man impulse craft, not very dangerous unless they were carrying ordinance, which was rare for Pirates.  Occasionally they would use a ship-killer or two if they really wanted to take down a capital ship.  They nearly got the Destroyer Dover that way last year, but the timely arrival of the Cruiser Excalibur put a quick end to that convoy raid.  Still, Snubfighters were hard to kill, and Snyder wished they were in the their carrier configuration now.
"Battlestations.  Activate Hull Plating."
Warning klaxons blared throughout the ship.  Crew scrambled to get to their assigned stations.  Blast doors closed around the ship to prevent a hull breach from becoming catastrophic.  Outside, eighty-four apertures in the hull slid open noiselessly.  A long black cylinder slid out into space and unfolded into a large, red, polished titanium hexagon.  The hexagon then pulled itself closer to the hull and locked itself into place next to other, already deployed sections.  After full deployment, only the weapon ports, thruster exhaust nozzles, and impulse engines are left exposed.  The plating is normally positioned a meter and a half from the ship's hull.  Near the engines, the plating bends inward toward the ship until the plating is flush with the engines.  At the thruster and weapons ports, the ports themselves are extended until they are flush with the rest of the plating.  The whole process of deploying all the plating takes about forty-five seconds.
"Plating activated.  Laser Capacitor Charging. Fire Control System online.  Particle Cannons ready.  Missile Bays loaded with MIRV warheads.  Reading twelve snubfighters, odd...they don't appear to be carrying any ordinance."
"We'll take it as the blessing that it is.  Lieutenant, make sure we don't hit anything.  Fire at will Commander."
The Liberty and her sister ships were classified as Modular Cruisers.  While technological advancements had taken away much of the Liberty's Modularity, her cargo section was still original, meaning it could be swapped out wholesale with ease for one of two other modules.  A fighter carrier module, which would give the Liberty forty of her own snubfighters, or a troop transport module, capable of carrying and deploying a full battalion of Marines anywhere.  Nothing remained of the ship's original armament.  When she first sailed, she had six "megawatt-class" lasers and two multipurpose missile bays.  The laser arcs were very narrow, but the Lasers weren't the her hitting power.  As laser technology evolved, their yield grew larger.  Now Liberty's six main laser banks, four firing in the FH arc, two dorsal and to ventral, and two firing in the RH arc, one dorsal and one ventral, had a maximum output of four Megajoules, although for wear and tear purposes they were normally only fired at three Megajoules.  Liberty also had a bank of Particle cannons which provided her main punch, two of them filled the FA arc and were mounted on the very front of the ship, while one more filled the L and R arcs and another filled the RA arc, nestled neatly between the Impulse Engines.  She was also equipped with a rotating turret on both ventral and dorsal sides of the ship, in each turret was four two-Megajoule lasers, and two multipurpose missile bays.  These turrets were well armored and could fire at any target not hiding behind the ship.
"Locking lasers on target...MIRV targets acquired.  Firing." Clarke spoke to himself often when he was shooting things.  Snyder often wondered if that's why he kept refusing promotion, he just enjoys blowing stuff up too much to be sitting in the center chair.  Violet laser beams lanced from the smaller laser emitters, occasionally striking a snubfighter, but more often only hitting a glancing blow or missing entirely.  The Ship's FCS just wasn't rated to successfully engage such small craft.  A Missile leaped from the launcher on a trail of smoke and fire.  The look on the Pirate pilots faces would have been great to see as the missile's nose split up into six smaller missiles and all began tracking a different snubfighter.  The Missile's FCS was much more accurate that the Laser's FCS and all six missiles struck six different targets.  The Pirates were not to be deterred, Light green laser bolts fired from their pulse laser generators, striking the red armor plating.  The armor discolored slightly where the lasers impacted.  If there were more fighters, that would eventually become a problem.
"Eight enemy fighter disabled or destroyed.  The remaining four are coming around for a second pass.  Armor plating is holding on all sections except twenty-seven, there's a stress fracture forming on that section."
"Sir, reading a massive power surge coming from the installation...pattern is consistant with a heavy Particle Cannon."  Ensign Travis was nearly screaming.  No surprise, it was his first combat engagement.
"Hang on!" Snyder shouted over the intercom.
The Installation fired a bright red burst from a gun on the surface of the rock, it sailed out and struck Liberty in the foreward starboard quarter.  Inside crew were thrown around by the impact.
"Direct hit, section twelve.  Armor integrity is down to thirty percent.  Overall integrity is holding.  But another hit to section twelve will expose the hull."
"Make sure those snubfighters don't exploit that.  Load anti-matter missiles in bays three and four."  Antimatter Missiles.  The newest invention of the Alliance.  Many people had asked if they should be called Photon Torpedoes.  The general consensus was no, in theory a photon torpedo was a matter/antimatter warhead surrounded by a magneto-photon force field.  This was simply a warhead with an antimatter filled bottle that was detonated by a small conventional charge.  The resulting explosion was far greater than the biggest Thermonuclear weapons that used to be carried by the Liberty Class and her Chinese Counterpart, the Sian Class.  Thermonuclear weapons used to be used as ship killers, and were still used to some extent, but the new armor plating on all the cruisers made a single Nuke almost worthless, two or three, and you've got a wrecked cruiser.  Even Antimatter Missiles weren't one shot one kill weapons, the biggest danger from a Nuke, was if the radiation penetrated the ship's hull, Anti-matter missiles used almost no radiation at all, but relied on their explosive force to rip the structural integrity of the target apart.  Antimatter missiles were dangerous in another respect, Nukes could be deactivated and detonated with out the Nuclear explosion, Antimatter missiles were constantly active and can not be detonated safely, as a rule all Liberty class cruisers carry only four of these missiles during normal operation and only twelve during active hostilities.  The Liberty, carried eight, she deployed on her science mission to Neptune during a particularly volatile "disagreement" between the EU and the CCP.  Being so far from port during a time when war was a possibility, however remote, command decided to issue the Liberty more than peacetime, but less than wartime allotment.
"Three more snubfighters destroyed, Section twelve has been destroyed, hull is exposed, evacuating B and C-deck, section four.  Antimatter missiles locked on to the installation."
"Fire."
Two missiles burned from their ventral side launchers and streaked toward the Pirate Installation.  The last remaining pirate fighter came around again, but in the middle of its bank a ruby beam from the Liberty's main laser bank incinerated it.  The missiles continued unabated and impacted in two locations approximately four kilometers from each other, the two massive explosions tore the Asteroid apart.
Watching the main screen, a small smile crept over Commodore Snyder's face.  "Escape Pods?"
Ensign Travis stared at the readout in front of him. "None sir."
Snyder just shrugged, and Clarke put that smug look on his face, the kind he always had on his face after a successful skirmish.  "Oh well, Commander get working on replacing armor section twelve and twenty-seven, stand down from battlestations, retract our armor plating.  Lieutenant, resume course for Mars, three-quarters impulse."

OK the teaser was a bit longer than I wanted it to be...but...hehe have fun