Free The Void War (Empire Rising Book 1) by D. J. Holmes Page A

looked up from her console to answer her commander’s question, “We only got data from the active scans so I can’t tell you about the north and south hemispheres, just the equator. There seems to be abundant plant life although no sign of any sizeable animals, certainly no signs of intelligence.”
     
    “That’s a relief,” James said with a half-smile. “We don’t need any more surprises; aliens would be just too much! Tactical, any sign of our Chinese friend?”
     
    Now that Drake had passed the third planet, her heat vents were pointing away from the suspected position of the Chinese ship whilst all her passive sensors were aimed at where they estimated her to be.
     
    Sub Lieutenant Becket who was now manning tactical took control of the main holo-display, replacing the rotating projection of V2 Fisher had up with the estimated plot of the Chinese ship. “If she hasn’t altered her approach speed or angle, based on the recon drone’s data we should expect her to be somewhere in this region, so far we haven’t picked anything up yet.”
     
    Gupta sat forward in alarm. They had expected to pick up the Chinese ship on thermal scanners immediately after passing the planet. It made sense for the Chinese ship to be venting their waste heat towards the planet as that was the one place they could be reasonably sure no British ships were. Without waiting for Somerville’s permission Gupta reacted. “Re-orientate the thermal scanners. Do an expanding sweep from where we last picked up the Chinese ship. It is out there somewhere and we need to find her.”
     
    Becket quickly turned back to the tactical console and her fingers began to fly over the controls. The main holo-display began to update itself, gradually expanding the view of the system out from the point they had expected to pick up the Chinese ship. Something caught Gupta’s eye. “There, sector thirty seven point four. Re-orientate the thermal scanners and focus in on that sector.”
     
    Becket worked the tactical console again and this time the holo-displayed zoomed in and a number of data streams appeared beside the growing blip. As Gupta sat back in relief James took over, “Becket what are we looking at?”
     
    “Sir, the heat signature is consistent with that from the recon drone. It doesn’t appear as if the Chinese ship has boosted up their reactors. From the wave length distortion it seems the ship is heading away from V2. They must have turned around as we approached the planet and are heading back out of the system. They are not following the vector they came in towards the planet but they are on a roughly parallel course.”
     
    “Any chance they can detect our heat signature from their new position?” James queried.
     
    “No Commander, our vents are still directed three hundred and fifty two degrees away from them. I’m realigning them to be the full three hundred and sixty now.”
     
    The bridge sat in silence for another twenty minutes as the passive sensors remained focused on the Chinese ship. Once he was satisfied the Chinese didn’t intend any more course corrections James got up out of the command chair. “Lieutenant Gupta, you have the bridge, I’m going to retire to my quarters. Shannon, I want you to plot a series of micro jumps to V48 and V31. We’re going to jump in at the edge of the system and launch a spread of recon drones. Then plot us a course to V17. That’s the closest habitable plant to Chinese space; we need to see what’s going on there so we’re going to have a look for ourselves. We can then swing back and pick up the other recon drones. Call me when we are ready to begin our first jump.
     
    Nodding Gupta stood and took the commander’s chair. Inwardly she was already trying to control her anger. The commander was a glory hunter, of that she was sure! They had just made the greatest discovery in the history of the RSN. They should be high tailing it back to Earth to tell the Admiralty and let