Flagship Victory (Galactic Liberation Book 3)

by B. V. Larson

  “Opening fire at long range,” Vic said. “They’re withholding fire. They’re layering for coordination.”

  Engels saw what Vic meant. The enemy was creating layers of their own, so the smallest of the three drone classes were in front, then the mediums, then the heavies.

  The fighter disc angled to one side, seeking to avoid plunging directly into the center of the enemy. The Opter drones strove in turn to keep in front of the fighters in order to overwhelm them. The fighters proved a little faster, and the disc opened fire on one flanking section of the enemy.

  Hundreds of drones, mostly the small ones, died instantly. “They use the lightest class as cannon fodder,” Engels said. “Makes sense when you don’t care about the lives of your subordinates.”

  “They care,” Zaxby said, “but only as resources, not as individuals. Remember, in Opter society only the Queens consider themselves to be people.”

  “Sounds like politicians,” Loco muttered.

  Vic said, “My Ruxin portion is correct. They’re using the small drones to soak up damage. Fortunately, I have precisely calculated the probable moment of the rest opening fire and am initiating evasive maneuvers.

  The fighters began evading, but within prescribed limits. They kept their overall positions relative to the formation. Only an AI could have made that work.

  Less than a second later, the front layers of the Opter swarm opened fire.

  “Thirty-two lost,” Vic said.

  “Put up a count for both sides, please,” Engels said.

  Two sets of two numbers appeared, representing remaining craft and kills: 7866 and 451 on one side, 480 and 32 on the other.

  “That’s better than ten to one,” Straker said. “Not bad.”

  “It represents mutual annihilation, force for force,” Vic replied. “That’s not the way to win battles.”

  “Keep their speed up, Vic,” Engels said. “Prioritize fighter survival over kills. Keep the Opters busy. They’re already recovering their marines from Indomitable’s hulks, so there’s no need to press them hard. Our fleet will be here soon.”

  “Acknowledged.”

  The fighter formation turned farther to the side, blasting through the edge of the swarm and outward, arcing toward the planet Gadeiros. The swarm immediately gave chase. The numbers of remaining combatants stabilized at 7490 and 465.

  When the fighters reached the planet, they continued to accelerate as they spread out to pass completely around it on all sides. “I’ll use the fighters to recon Gadeiros,” Vic said.

  The fighters soon regrouped on the far side of the airless planet. The swarm followed around it in the same way, on all sides.

  The tactical holotank showed graphics to illustrate Vic’s next words. “I’ve detected dozens of concealed drone launch tubes on the planet’s surface. There are probably many I’ve not detected. There is also this one large anomaly that I believe is the former location of a Nest Ship.”

  The display showed a deep crater on the inner, sunward side of the planet.

  “They’re gone, but they left their drones behind?” Straker asked.

  “Launch tubes,” Engels said.

  “Huh?”

  “If this swarm was that Nest Ship’s contingent, they wouldn’t have needed concealed launch tubes on the surface. This swarm is independent.”

  Straker nodded. “Don told me Opter warriors are about as smart as humans, so they don’t need a Queen to direct them into battle. We have to keep an eye out for the Nest Ship and assume it’s fully loaded. The good news is, it looks like Victory and one Nest Ship are about evenly matched.”

  “My purpose is not to engage in fighter combat,” Vic said. “I’m much more effective focusing on tactical coordination.”

  Engels said, “They’re heading in toward Atlantis now that they’ve done their damage.” The display supported her words. The swarm accelerated toward the Hundred Worlds capital.

  The fighters followed for a time, sniping and killing hundreds more, but soon Vic brought them back. “I’m reaching the limit of my FTL range. Trying to control them via standard datalinks would reduce their effectiveness by a factor of ten or more.”

  “No problem,” Engels said. She sighed. “Let’s go see what’s left of Indomitable.”

  * * *

  Straker put on a battlesuit and led the Breakers over to one of the two hulks. Many small parties from the other ships of the fleet joined them. Every weapon, every piece of equipment had been slagged.

  “Damn, Derek,” Loco said. “These guys are thorough.”

  “They follow orders to the letter, I guess. Maintain a good watch. There may be stragglers.”

  As they moved through the passageways they found the same story everywhere: doors and hatches cut open, machines destroyed, crew killed whether armed or not—nothing was missed. It was a slaughter.

  “No mercy,” Straker said. “Looks like some of our guys tried to surrender.”

  “Didn’t do them much good,” Loco said.

  “Yeah. Keep pushing inward. There may be holdouts. It’s a big ship.”

  “It was a big ship,” Loco said bitterly. “Now, it’s two big wrecks.” Loco led the Breakers onward, with Straker watching the reports on his HUD. Redwolf followed Straker, restlessly scanning for trouble. Heiser brought up the rear.

  Eventually they came to the scene of a desperate fight outside one of the ship’s large infirmaries. The bodies of crew, marines and Opters mingled and sprawled in the vacuum. The main door to the medical bays hung by one hinge, blown open.

  “They made a stand here,” Straker said. “Trying to defend the wounded.”

  Inside the infirmary, all the autodocs and regen tanks, hundreds of them, had been systematically violated by close-range weapons fire. The holes showed the bodies inside, ripped to shreds or burned to death.

  “Fucking bastards,” Redwolf said. “Medical symbols all over. They have to know what they did.”

  “This isn’t war,” Loco said. “It’s extermination.”

  “So now we know,” Straker said, bleakly. “War to the knife.”

  “And the knife to the hilt,” Redwolf answered. “In our backs.”

  Straker didn’t contradict him. The possibility of peace with Opters was a distant future, and his troops, his Republic military, were not emotionless Hok. Most, especially any form of infantry, needed fire in their bellies to fight well. This would light that fire. He’d worry about dousing it later. The word would spread of this atrocity, and it would stiffen anyone who ever thought about surrendering to the bugs.

  The handle on an unopened pressure door turned, slowly. The movement attracted a dozen weapon muzzles, including Loco’s. Heiser barked, “Eyes out! The boss has it!”

  “Hold fire unless you have a threat, people,” Straker said. “Bugs wouldn’t be slowly opening a door by the handle.”

  The door swung wide and a man in a torn and burned crew-suit fell to the deck. Straker could see air leaking from it around a dozen patches.

  “We need a bubble! Now!” Loco said, and a medic activated a survival pod. Its memory polymer turned the fist-sized packet into a three-meter clear hemisphere. The medic stepped under it and sealed it to the deck. It inflated, providing a minimal atmosphere. The medic took off her gauntlets and helmet, and then removed her patient’s helmet as well.

  It was Chief Quade.

  “I couldn’t… I couldn’t…” he gasped, and then his eyes rolled back.

  “I’m losing him!” the medic yelled as she slipped the probe of a stabilizer into his jugular. “Gods dammit, we’re in an infirmary! Find me a working autodoc!”

  The Breakers searched desperately one more time, but there were no miracles. All of the medical machines were smashed beyond repair.

  The medic did all she could, but eventually sat back on her heels and shook her head, cursing. She turned her face to Straker through the clear bubble. “I’m sorry, sir.”

  “No need to apologize…
Jacklins, is it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You did what you could. The Opters killed him, not you.” Straker turned to the Breakers. “We keep going. Spread out for search. There may be more alive.”

  In the end, out of Indomitable’s skeleton crew of just under one thousand, they only found eight survivors. The rest had been slaughtered.

  * * *

  Engels noted Straker’s grim face as he returned to Victory’s bridge. She suppressed the instinct to hug him fiercely. Wrong time, wrong role. Instead, she merely matched his expression and nodded to show she understood.

  “We have to end this thing,” Straker said, spitting out his words. “We have to unite humanity against the Opters, drive them out of our territory.”

  “What about your buddy Myrmidon?”

  “I’m talking about the bugs, the Queens. If humanopts want to defect, we’ll welcome them. For now, we’ll be exterminating insectoids on sight. If we don’t get to surrender, they don’t either. War to the knife, knife to the hilt.”

  Engels nodded. The concept made her uncomfortable, but she couldn’t argue. She’d seen the vids.

  She gestured at the holotanks. “The Huns still aren’t talking.”

  “Then we make them talk,” Straker replied. “In person, if necessary. Have you got your revised plan set up?”

  Engels nodded again. “The fleet’s ready.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  “Vic, pass this order to all ships: set course for Atlantis-3.

  Chapter 39

  Atlantis System

  On the way to Atlantis-3, Straker paced and thought, paced and thought, trying to stay out of Engels line of vision to the holotanks. He could tell she was thinking as well, except she sat in her chair chewing her thumbnails to the quick.

  Ironically, the battle for Atlantis would be fought by fewer ships than the battle for Sparta, with less firepower. The main Republic fleet had retreated and the Huns’ expeditionary forces had been at the front when Straker had seized Victory along with the Hun ships remaining at Sparta.

  The ship count looked favorable, Straker’s fleet consisted of over one hundred fifty vessels, from battlecruisers down to corvettes. They were well supplied—oversupplied, in fact—but were under-crewed.

  The tonnage assessment told a bleaker story. The enemy had fewer than thirty sidespace-capable ships—but they were all dreadnoughts or SDNs. A squadron of three monitors stiffened the defenses, but the biggest problem was the twelve heavy fortresses surrounding the planet. Without Indomitable to reduce them, taking them down would be tremendously difficult and costly.

  Then there was the Nest Ship from Gadeiros and its reinforced swarm of drones. It had taken up station off to the side of Atlantis and well away, but in a position to attack from the flank if the opportunity presented itself. Trinity had detected comms traffic between it and the planet, so the Opters were definitely allies of the Huns.

  There were also outward-facing defense installations on the two large moons of Atlantis, mounting heavy beam weaponry.

  Straker had found it interesting that none of these beams could aim at the planet itself, though some could strike the edge of high orbit. Were the Huns worried about mutiny or rebellion? Such weapons could hold a planet hostage. Their existence had sparked an idea that was still bubbling inside him.

  “Speed, maneuverability and precision,” Straker said aloud. “Those are our advantages.”

  “We know that, Derek,” Engels said.

  “I’m reinforcing the point. Vic, you listening?” Straker asked.

  “Of course, Liberator.”

  “We can’t go nose to nose. We have to get them off their game and force them to make mistakes.”

  “We’re keeping that goal in mind. Admiral Engels’ plan should do just that.”

  Straker shut up. They were right. He’d already said these things enough.

  “We’re approaching the break point,” Vic said. “I suggest everyone suit up and strap in.”

  “Make that an order, fleet-wide,” Engels said. She slipped into her crew suit and strapped into her command chair. Straker and Loco backed up into their opened battlesuits and activated them, leaving the faceplates up. They took position against the wall, gauntlets clamped to grips there.

  When the countdown hit zero, the fleet maneuvered at maximum. Where before it had approached Atlantis in a stately, standard formation, now it suddenly broke to the side, with every ship redlining drives.

  Straight for the Nest Ship.

  The corvettes immediately pulled out in front, followed by the frigates, destroyers and so on in order of speed and ship class.

  It took time for the Opters to react. Lightspeed lag was one reason, but Straker hoped surprise was another. Every second got the fleet’s lunge closer to the Nest Ship.

  When the Opters eventually reacted, eighteen thousand drones formed a dense screen even while the Nest Ship turned tail and ran directly away from the Republic fleet.

  “Will it get away?” Straker asked with a grunt. At least four Gs were leaking through the gravplating compensation, making it difficult to speak or even breathe.

  “Negative,” Vic said.

  “You really think this plan will work?” Straker asked.

  “Yes,” Vic said patiently, “it will work. It’s a brilliant stratagem.”

  “Score one for man over machine!” Straker said triumphantly.

  “It’s not a competition, Derek,” Engels said.

  “It’s all right, Admiral Engels,” Vic said. “I’m used to the insecurities of organics.”

  “As I recall,” Engels replied, “you had some serious insecurities before Trinity and the Mindspark Device set you free and changed you for the better.”

  “Conceded. My compliment stands. Liberator Straker saw an opportunity none of us did.”

  Straker kept his eyes on the holotanks, which showed the leading edge of the Republic fleet, the corvettes, begin firing at their own long range. They simultaneously slowed their rush forward and fell back relative to the next wave, the frigates, though they still approached the enemy.

  In perfect, Vic-directed synchrony the frigates did the same, opening fire at long range—then the destroyers, then the light cruisers and so on. This created a phalanx of overlapping fire, all of it outranging the Opter drones.

  Each Republic ship had primaries and point-defense beams. The larger ships had dual-use secondaries. Thus, more than a thousand individual weapons, each cycling every few seconds, speared out to destroy drones like the stabs of a thousand spines.

  The drone count dropped below eighteen thousand, seventeen thousand, and then sixteen thousand before they got in their first return shots, which were weak and diffuse against the heavier armor and reinforcement of real warships.

  The lighter ships in front of the fleet continued to collapse back until every Republic vessel moved into a single tight disc formation, with Victory in the center.

  Fifteen thousand.

  Victory’s fighters were interspersed throughout the fleet, adding to the tight defenses, their gunnery as perfect as could be.

  Fourteen thousand.

  The fleet continued to slow on impellers while still maintaining attack posture, providing maximum time to shoot.

  Thirteen thousand.

  The drones surged forward, their commander belatedly realizing the Opter dilemma.

  Twelve thousand.

  Now the fleet’s railguns opened up. With ample supplies from Sparta, and with short crews, the ship had extra ammunition in their cargo bays. They could afford a prodigal expenditure, firing incessant streams of submunitions that ripped any drones they hit to shreds.

  Ten thousand.

  “Have we lost any ships?” Straker asked.

  “Nope,” Engels said. “Some corvettes and frigates took damage, but we’re refusing the lightest ships and letting the heavies take the shots.”

  Eight thousand.

  “Missiles?
” Engels said.

  “Launching,” Vic replied.

  A wave of short-range anti-drone packs burst forth from the fleet as the two forces merged. A ripple of fireworks nearly whited out the holotank.

  Four thousand.

  “Now!” Engels barked.

  “Already ordered,” Vic said.

  All ships in the fleet, including the fighters and Victory, abruptly poured on full acceleration. This minimized the time the Opter drones were at point-blank range and eliminated their ability to land on Republic hulls. In seconds, the drones had passed through and fallen behind, vainly trying to reverse course to give chase.

  Three thousand.

  “That turned out to be easy,” Straker said.

  “We have a twenty-five-to-one advantage in tonnage and firepower,” Engels said. “The question was never about winning, only about how much it would cost.”

  Straker spoke as he let go of the wall grips and walked heavily back to Engels’ chair. He felt the war within himself, his heart against his head. He wanted to slaughter this Nest Ship and its meddlesome Queen, to get some back for what she’d done to Indomitable’s crew. Yet, that would be indulgent—and perhaps stupid, Once again, he put his personal feelings aside, and spoke. “Vic, aim a surrender demand at that Nest Ship.”

  “Transmitting.”

  Engels rotated her chair toward Straker evident in surprise. “Why do you believe they’ll surrender?”

  “I met a Queen, remember? And I’ve been to Terra Nova. I’ve got some sense of how they think. They’re less moral, more practical than we are, and each Queen thinks of herself as the center of the universe. I’m betting this one won’t see any point in making a suicidal stand.”

  “I thought you weren’t going to accept their surrender,” Engels said. “They didn’t let our crews live.”

  Straker looked at her, and the rest of his crewmembers. They all had hot eyes, burning for vengeance. Had he stoked that flame too high?

  “You’re right. They haven’t earned mercy. But I need to end this quickly. The Opters aren’t our primary target today, they’ve just put themselves in our path. We’ll deal with them at a future date. Trust me.”