Hektor Gap

Hektor Gap

We caught the Belters flatfooted at Hektor. Commodore Gautam fooled them good. It looked like we were headed to relieve our people at Strentor, and the 'Roiders concentrated their whole L4 force to meet us.

We started our turnover burn just like we were heading in, then we turned and vectored straight towards Hektor, the main Belt settlement in the Leading Trojans. There was no way the 'Roiders, could turn around and beat us there, especially with their lower max Gs.

Hektor is a binary asteroid: two big lumps of rock locked in a tidal dance. They're only separated by a couple of klicks and the exact size of the gap varies pretty much chaotically. There's also a mess of rocks - some klicks in diameter- circling around the two big ones - spawn of the whole bump and grind dance. So the whole place is kinda of a navigational hazard. And we were coming in at almost 2000kps.

The main settlements on Hektor are on the outboard limbs of the twin rocks. They've got pretty good defenses, so we came in at a vector that limited their reach: a mesh of ships and fighter using the rocks against them. At our velocity, the whole combat envelope was going to last just a couple of minutes.

We dumped our ordinance, burned our glasers, and shot for the Hektor Gap. The Durga was in the van - thirty seconds and 50K klicks ahead on the timetable. It turned to vapor, but whether from enemy fire or a collision, I didn't have time to tell. The thirty of us, my crew and the squad of marines, sat strapped in our chairs, the crew cage spinning to orient against the bursts of thrusters on overload. The gap would pass in less than a blink of the eye. Nothing a human could do now, but trust the computer.

Trust the computer... trust the computer...

-Lt. Commander Pavel Mirza, HMS Vishnu 27 March 2519
Battle of Hektor, Phase I