by Saxon Andrew
“What do we do about the other ships?” Leo asked.
“The Romanov Fleets are highly organized and they will maintain their ranks during the battle. The trick is to isolate the units with overwhelming numbers, hit it fast, and run from the others. We’ll organize our fleet into four hundred ship units and tell them to run around the Fleets avoiding contact until a two hundred ship unit breaks out to attack. They’ll turn and all of them will open fire at once. They’ll then turn and run before they can be hit by superior numbers.”
“Do you honestly think this will work?” Blakely asked.
“We’d be overwhelmed and beaten if they just released their ships to go after us in mass. But commanders like to command and get their egos stroked by doing it. They will refuse to lose control of their subordinates by breaking ranks to go after us. Remember, there are many directions to run in open space and by rapidly changing course and keeping a distance between our units, we will spread them out and run them into our units as they’re chasing us. They will be ordered to focus on their assigned targets and will not see our units moving around them until it’s too late. It is during this time that we will find the ships where their leaders are located and take them out.”
Blakely looked at Leonidas and shrugged, “Do you think our Commanders can do this?”
Leo looked at Gem, “You are going to have to explain it to them.”
“I will and I will also create a pattern our units should follow while evading that will put them in position to fire on other Romanov units on the fly. However, all of us need to make sure that we know if the Romanov Fleets take enough punishment and go after us in mass, then we will stop using units and it will be every ship for themselves.”
Leonidas shrugged, “I was going to do that from the start. This sounds like a good plan. Thank you, Gem.”
Blakely exhaled sharply, “Just how do you know any pattern you develop will work against them. You don’t know how they’ll be forming up to meet us.”
Gem smiled, “They will form up between us and the planet. If we spread our ships out, they will have to do the same to keep us from rushing around them towards the planet and attacking. We know how many ships they’ll be using and that tells us how many will be facing our units. If we start the pattern as they move forward, it will work.”
Blakely looked at Leonidas shaking his head, “My mind is just not big enough to really understand how we’ll do this but I’m going to trust he knows what he’s suggesting.”
“We’ll still be heavily outnumbered but this plan gives us an opportunity to whittle down their numbers before they send in the other fleet holding station above Romania,” Gem replied to him.
Blakely blew out a hard breath, “We’ll connect all our ships on the general frequency in an hour and you can tell us what we need to do.”
“It is going to take us the better part of two days to get the units established, organized, and practice the pattern so they understand it. Once that’s done, we’ll go and pay Serge Romanov a visit,” Gem said with a smile. Leo and Blakely nodded.
• • •
Serge stared at one of his major trading partners on his console’s monitor and heard him say, “You were incredibly stupid to attack the Unity, Serge.”
“I DIDN’T DO IT!”
The Egulen looked at Serge and shook its head as it said, “Serge, Serge, Serge, you’ve placed me in an untenable position. All the planets I trade with have called for a boycott of anyone that does business with you. I personally had no love for the Unity and detested the way they stopped some of my business plans, just as I’m sure you did as well. But claiming you had nothing to do with it is ludicrous?!”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I had my engineers make that device that was shown during your speech and by the way, it was a marvelous speech, Serge, you almost made me weep. However, they then searched a shipment of electronic parts I purchased from you recently and found that frequency coming out of a box that have not been opened. That frequency was emanating from numerous devices inside the box. I had it opened and they found fifteen electronic parts that had some sort of small device inside them causing that frequency. So unless someone boarded your freighter, inserted those devices into those sealed electronic parts, without your crew seeing them do it, they came from you! That pretty much proves that you are the one that destroyed the Unity and I’m pretty sure every inhabited planet in the galaxy has performed the same searches and knows it as well.” The Egulen paused and said, “I’ve been wondering, Serge. We’ve been friends for years and I’ve bought trillions of credits worth of your products. Why did you send those devices to my world? My engineers have found them scattered around my planet in most of the cities and also on the ships I use to trade?” Serge sat and stared at the Egulen in silence and he finally said, “Well…until you can answer that question satisfactorily, I will have to no longer purchase your products. Even if you choose to make them free, I really think no one is going to accept them after what you did to Cruet.”
The display went dark and Serge slammed his fist on his console. That blasted Pirate had ruined his plan and now he was isolated. Every one of the planets that were members of the Unity had contacted him and told him to stay away. He was a pariah and it was all that Pirate’s fault…along with that cursed adopted daughter. But he could go out in conquest just like the Unity had done and force the planets to his will. The Unity had stripped them of their warships and they would be forced to obey him or be bombarded from space. But first, that Pirate had to pay.
Where was his security chief? He looked at his panel and scrolled back. He found the message where he was going to check out the Insectoid planets; he pressed a button on his console, “Have you heard anything from my Chief-of-Security.”
“No, Sir.”
Serge began to wonder if the Insects were still operational. But they had not shown up so they must have been harmed by his devices. He pressed another button on his panel and saw the two Senior Fleet Commanders appear on his display, “I am going to dispatch one of your fleets to Tortuga. I want you to go there and blast them into rubble and that includes the planet.”
One of the Commanders nodded and the other looked away for a moment. He turned back to Serge and said, “That won’t be necessary, Sir.”
Serge’s eyebrows came together, “Oh? And why is that?”
“I’ve just received word from the ships I’ve assigned to patrol the filaments at the intersection closest to Romania that thousands of Pirate Warships are coming out of the intersection and moving toward us on the Romanian Filament.”
“HOW MANY?!” Serge yelled.
“They counted several thousand before all of them were attacked and stopped reporting. None are reporting now. It appears the Pirates were not harmed by your devices and are coming here to hold you accountable.”
Serge sneered and looked at the junior Major Fleet Commander, “You will take your fleet out to meet them. I will hold the second fleet here against any of them breaking through your lines. My intelligence estimated before we initiated our attacks that the Pirates don’t have enough warships to be a problem for you. Move out and destroy them. Once that’s done, go to Tortuga and blast the planet!” The junior Commander nodded and disappeared from Serge’s display.
“Sir, don’t you think we should both go out to meet them.”
“NO! If just one ship breaks through, it will fire a nuclear missile at my city. You will gather your ships above the city now!”
“What about the rest of the planet?”
“FOLLOW YOUR ORDERS OR I’LL FIND SOMEONE WHO WILL!!”
“Yes, Sir. I’ll move into position immediately.”
Serge was frightened and that wasn’t something he was equipped to deal with. But he had them highly outnumbered with more modern warships; he should be fine. He began shaking and kept saying over and over, “I’ll be fine…”
Chapter Twenty-Four
The sixteen tho
usand and fifty-eight pirate ships were organized into forty units of four hundred ships. Blakely was in command of the fleet and he protested doing it initially, until Leonidas persuaded him to do it.
“Captain, our two ships are going to be completely focused on finding the warships with the Fleet Leaders on board and targeting them with a missile. There is no possible way for us to do that and also command the units.” Leo said to Blakely.
“But I’ve never commanded anything nearly as large as this.”
Gem looked at him, “You’ve commanded your forty ships, haven’t you?”
“Well, yes.”
“Then simply look at each unit as a single ship and act accordingly. You have the pattern they need to follow so your main task will be just keeping them on course. Controlling all the ships in each unit will fall to the Forty Unit Commanders, you can do this,” Gem said reassuringly.
Blakely closed his eyes and then opened them, “I’ll do what I can.”
Leonidas looked at him, “Captain, the ones that came here are here because you are here. They respect you and will do what you order. I’m not certain they would trust Gem or me if we were issuing them orders.”
Blakely rolled his eyes and nodded, “I said I’ll do it!”
• • •
Leonidas and Gem were far ahead of the incoming pirate fleet and came off the filament into normal space where it passed Romania at its closest point. A huge fleet of Romanov Warships were moving away from the planet and placing themselves in normal space between the filament and the planet. Leonidas looked at Embree, “Alright, it’s time to do your magic.”
Embree pressed a button on his panel and an image of the Romanov Fleet appeared on the huge wall monitor. A moment later, bright white lines appeared going between the ships and Embree began removing some of the ships with small numbers of white lines out of the image. Ten minutes later, only ships with numerous white lines moving toward them remained on the monitor and their numbers were decreasing rapidly. Leonidas watched the process and saw Embree pressing buttons furiously on his console, “What are you doing?”
“I’m sending half of those ships on the monitor to the Toy and I’m sending ship frequencies we’re going to go after to the missiles in our inventory. I’m arranging them from the ships with the most communications down to the ones with the least. The ones with the least are the twenty-five thousand ship commanders. We need to prioritize the senior leaders for initial attack and then go after the junior commanders once they’re eliminated.”
“You need to hurry, I don’t know how long they’re just going to sit there and allow us to scan them.”
Barney smiled, “Sir, they aren’t going to break up their formations to attack us. They probably think that’s what we’re trying to provoke them into doing. No, they’ll hold formation and wait for our fleet to arrive.”
Leonidas looked at Barney, “You think?”
“Sir, we’ve removed the scouts they have in subspace so they don’t know where our fleet is located. The fleet could be just outside normal space directly under us waiting for them to weaken their formations in order to attack us. If they knew where our fleet was, then they’d send ships out to attack us now. However, they don’t know so they’ll wait.”
Leonidas nodded, “You make a good point, Barney. Keep loading them in Embree!”
Embree nodded and kept his eyes on his panel. He hadn’t found the Senior Fleet Commander’s ship. Evidently, he had a well-trained fleet and didn’t need to issue instructions. He would have to wait until the fleet arrived and watch closely for a single transmission to be sent to all the Romanov Ships. That officer had to be eliminated early. He would be smart enough to recognize the pattern and takes steps to neutralize it. Leonidas looked at Embree and saw his expression, “Embree!”
“The Overall Major Commander of the Fleet moving toward us is not communicating. I’m going to have to wait for the fleet to arrive and see him issue the attack order before I can lock his ship down!”
“What if they’ve been ordered to attack when the fleet arrives and he remains silent?”
“Then we’re going to have to find him on the fly. He will see the pattern we’re using and start issuing orders to neutralize it.” Embree answered.
“He’ll issue the attack order.” Everyone on the bridge looked at Carl and he felt their gazes. He looked up from his panel and shrugged, “It’s like what that fellow Gem said, the Major Commander has a huge ego and will not allow anyone else to make that order. That order is his alone and his ego won’t allow him to subordinate it to anyone else.”
Leonidas stared at Carl and then said, “Am I like that?”
Carl rolled his eyes and said in fake sincerity, “Oh no, Sir. You are different from all the others.” Leonidas lowered his eyes as he stared at Carl and Carl shrugged, “It’s like when we were going in to take out the artillery on Regulus. All of us were in position and most of us should have already gone in but we had to wait for you to give the order.”
“But I had to make sure everyone was organized and ready,” Leonidas said defensively
Embree chuckled, “Sir, you had trained us to operate independently of each other from the beginning. Our units knew their targets and could have gone in as soon as we were ready but you made us wait.”
Leonidas looked at Desire and saw her shrug and then nod. He sighed and said, “That Commander will issue the attack order.” Carl smiled and turned back to his console. Leonidas learned a valuable lesson that moment and would not forget it. He thought about it and said, “Embree, connect me with Blakely.” He waited and a few moments later, Blakely appeared on the monitor, “Yes.”
“I’m sending you the coordinates of the Romanov Fleet you’ll be facing and I want you to form up the forty units in subspace and send them into normal space simultaneously. As soon as they enter normal space, start the pattern.”
“We need to make sure they’re all organized and in proper position when they enter normal space.”
Leo saw Carl smiling at his panel and exhaled sharply, “Do all that in subspace. They’ve practiced the pattern before we came here and we don’t want the Romanovs to change their formation before we can start the pattern around them.”
“Are you sure about this, Leonidas.”
“I am, Captain.”
Blakely sighed, “Alright, I’ll do it your way.”
The monitor went dark and Desiree said with a smile, “Carl is right.”
Leonidas saw Carl smiling from ear to ear and he shook his head, “Carl, I am going to promote you once this is over.”
Carl’s smile immediately disappeared, “Sir, why would you punish me for giving good advice?! You should appreciate it and leave me the hell alone.”
Leo smiled and lowered his eyes as he saw Embree lower his head to keep from laughing. Barney stared at his monitor and fought hard to keep a straight face. Carl saw them and said, “WHAT’S SO FREAKING FUNNY?!” The entire bridge crew burst out laughing and Carl stared at them with a scowl on his face.
• • •
Leo looked at the tactical monitor and saw that one half of Serge’s Warships were holding station above the planet’s largest city. It was currently on the opposite side of the planet from where the filament passed. The other half of Serge’s ships were formed up between the planet and the closest point to the filament. They were organized into twenty-five independent one thousand ship units arranged in five lines separated by four hundred miles between them. Their bows were pointed toward open space where his ships would emerge from the filament and enter normal space. There was twenty thousand miles between the filament and the planet’s current position and that would have to be navigated for the two fleets to engage in combat. That separation would allow the forty Pirate Units to move into position as the Romanov Fleet came out to meet them. Blakely appeared on Leo’s display, “We’re ready.”
Leo looked at Embree, “Find that ship!” Embree nodded and Leo looked at Blakel
y, “Start it rolling.” Blakely nodded and disappeared from the monitor. Leo pressed a button, “Gem, are you ready?”
“I’ve got the initial targets programmed in. I’m concerned about the overall Commander.”
“I’ll go after him once we locate his ship. You start taking out your targets and I’ll join in after we find that ship.” Gem nodded and disappeared. Suddenly, the Pirate Units appeared in normal space around the Thermopylae and accelerated away. Embree stared at his console and after a few moments that seemed to take forever he yelled, “GOT IT!! PROGRAMING THE FIRST TWO MISSILES IN THE LAUNCH TUBES!!”
Leo looked at Desiree, who was manning the ship’s controls and yelled, “GO, GO, GO!!”
The Thermopylae and Play Toy accelerated away from the Pirate Fleets entry location with Gem going vertical and Leo diving under the advancing pirate warships. Their ships were faster than any ships in the Pirate’s Fleet and they turned and headed toward the Romanov Fleet as it began moving out to meet the attackers. The two ships were masked by the Pirate Warships moving toward the Romanov formations and they came roaring in from above and below the Romanov Fleets before they were detected. Frick stared at his missile console and saw a warship glowing on his panel. He waited as the target ship attempted to move into the rear of the advancing formations in front of it and saw the launch button go green. He pressed it and saw two missiles leap away from the Thermopylae.
• • •
The Romanov Sensor Officer shouted, “Sir, I have an enemy vessel moving under our formations at high speed. It will be in blaster range in less than thirty seconds!”
The Fleet Commander had been focused on the pattern being used by the incoming wave of Pirate Warships and didn’t like what he was seeing. He had lifted his communicator to change the formations of his fleets but instead yelled, “MOVE US INSIDE THE REAR FORMATIONS NOW!!” He felt the acceleration push him back in his chair and activated his communicator, “Attention all fleets…” That was the only thing that was heard. There were no ships around his vessel to slow down the two missiles tracking in and they both hit a moment apart. The vessel exploded in a massive blast as the Romanov Fleet continued straight ahead.
