Ballista-Class

The Ballista is the second of three support classes in the Fleet's small craft inventory. Two hulls, side by side. The starboard hull carries the crew. The port hull is the weapon, and it is the larger of the two.

Three aboard: a pilot, a weapons officer, and one on power management, because the shot is not a trigger pull. It is a process, and somebody has to run it.

Reach no other small craft has, paid for with a window either side of the shot where the ship can do nothing at all. It goes out under heavy escort or it does not go out.

The charge takes long enough that the crew watches it happen. Through the port glass, an arm's length away, the coils wind up in sequence and the light climbs the barrel toward the muzzle. Then the ship fires once.

Then it waits. Recharge is measured against how long a slow target stays alive in open space, and a Ballista is a slow target with a discharged gun for all of it.

Against something that cannot move, it is the most efficient weapon the Fleet ever fielded. There has not been much that could not move.

Early in the expansion, a squadron of Ballistas went to Karth Field under escort to open a navigable channel through the Scatter. The shots landed. The rock came back.

Bombers proved more versatile, and the class was drawn down. They are still on the books. Nobody has ordered a new one in a long time.