by Lee Guo
The beetle’s return fire slashed at the Veritas. The H-wave was almost half as large as the surface of Veritas exposed to the alien ship. The Veritas’s h-deflectors protected maybe twenty to thirty percent of the destructive destabilization field. The rest slammed into the Veritas, causing over a hundred thousand tons of hull matter to disappear. Atmosphere and human crews spurted out like innocent dolls from a temperamental child. Explosions detonated and energy discharged out across the human ship’s damaged surface.
All this time, Lucinda and her three remaining pilots kept firing.
The two major combatants fired on each other again, without mercy, without any apparent worry with what was happening to both of them. They – the ships themselves – were killers in a deadbeat battle for tactical dominance and supremacy.
Another wave, and then another, slammed into the human battlecruiser, destroying so much matter that by this time—its hull looked like a shattered and wrecked corpse half eaten by a bear. But the Veritas kept firing with whatever it had. Its remaining forward H-beam ports were long gone, so it turned to its side and prepared to fire its side-ports. An h-wave slashed at the human’s now vulnerable side, and killed even more exposed systems.
Eventually, the human battlecruiser limped, like a bird in the air suffering from a bullet wound, floundering this way and that, trying to come to senses to what was happening to it and avoid the enemy at the same time. Meanwhile, the feline beetle came closer for the kill – just when the bird released a last attempt to take down its killer, an h-beam aimed right into a partially exposed section of the insect’s ventral hull. The h-beam did not get blocked, but managed to eradicate twenty thousand tons of armor and hull plating, mesmerizingly on target.
The much smaller insect furiously followed through with its killing blow. Waves after waves of destabilization fields cut deeper and deeper into the bird’s most crucial areas, until the corpse had all its stomach contents eaten out. Then, the Veritas’s energy containment failed and it exploded.
About 4000 humans gone.
The insect turned its attention back at Lucinda and her mates...when Lucinda fired her weak h-beams into the exposed and damaged hull hole that had been created by the Veritas not more than thirty seconds earlier. Her h-beam, combined with two other h-beams from her mates, erased even more matter within the alien’s jugular. Because Lucinda and her squadron mates were so close to the alien, much closer than they would have been had the Veritas not appeared, all the alien had to do was fire a single h-wave and it would have killed Lucinda on the spot. She did not have the distance or reaction room this time to agilely evade it – but nothing happened. The alien did not fire.
Instead, a shockwave emanating from deep within the alien’s hull, right where Lucinda’s squadron had fired their h-beams, blowing and exploding the alien vessel into three gigantic, flaming parts. The beetle broke apart.
“Yahoo!” the survivors of the battle yelled over the squadron-net.
“Congrats guys, we did it,” Lucinda said, watching the enemy’s warp bubble destabilize. “Now, let’s find another—” Her eyes gazed at her antimatter fuel readouts. 0 percent...
Meaning her warpspace suspenders were already deactivating, meaning her warp bubble was about to destabilize as well.
“Uh…guys?”
Betelgeuse Combined Fleet
Flagship, Beginner’s Luck
Flag Bridge…
It was one of the most mysterious occurrences in her life. She didn't know how she did it — maybe it was a miracle, maybe it was because of the innocuous decisions of her captains, or maybe it was her will itself — but now Vier Kleingelt found herself in a position of winning the overall battle.
Not by much. Just barely.
She sat there, eyes gazed at the main holomap, thrilled and shocked, all the same.
The tides of war could just as easily turn against her again, she surmised, but the vast majority of her logical brain made her believe that if things continued the way they were—she would win.
Yes...her remaining heavy battlecruisers and dreadnoughts, light cruisers and destroyers could beat this force of feline light attack ships. The scent of possible victory still smelled like victory, regardless of the fact that, in the beginning, she outweighed the enemy by 40 to 1.
She massaged her chin. As things were, it was very likely she would defeat this forward fleet before the enemy's main fleet of much bigger ships arrived. That was good. She didn’t want to be here when the Cats’ main fleet arrived.
The same could not be said about her MABs, Vier thought. Her MABs were in danger. She now turned her attention at a smaller holomap that concentrated on her marine assault boats.
For the past thirty minutes, she had watched one by one as her MABs got obliterated by stray feline ships that managed to penetrate her defensive line of warships and shove h-waves into their vulnerable surfaces. As long as the MABs were in the process of taking over another ship, they were very exposed to enemy fire.
With only three MABs left, each one worth more than their weight in antimatter. The fate of her race could very well depend on the remaining 2200 marines and their struggle inside the three incapacitated enemy ships...
If she could just hold onto the battle and win it, those MABs and their trophies would be free to retreat back to human space, and a new hope for humanity would arise from it, regardless of the extreme losses her main fleet had suffered here to the power of the enemy’s light craft.
Thus, she had to do everything in her power to protect them, to keep those assault boats alive.
She bit her lips and concentrated. She began formulating a new plan to encircle the MABs with even more of her strongest ships. Of course, she had to maintain and press her quantitative and qualitative advantage in overall craft, so she won the overall battle as well. It was a very unique balance.
Then one of her MABs exploded.
No!
700 hundred marines gone. A trophy gone.
How?
Then, she saw it. One of the enemy destroyers had seeped in through the holes. She quickly ordered her warships to fire on that alien vessel as it tried to head for another MAB. As it got into extreme h-wave range, one of her battlecruisers fired an h-beam right into the enemy vessel's belly.
The Cat stopped moving and exploded.
Vier tilted back a little, relieved. She would have celebrated had she not lost one of her three remaining trophies.
Then, she rapidly sent her new plan into motion. Hopefully, this way, it would keep them alive long enough....
Light Cruiser Hukna Sevank
Walkway outside the locked bridge…
Captain Huang Rui smiled as he carefully walked through the corridors towards the enemy's bridge. He could see his men in front of him drilling through the thick armor that protected the enemy’s command center. In his helmet HUD, all his teams made good progress towards the critical centers of the ship: the command nexus, the power core, the armory, the auxilliary control center, and even propulsion control.
The bottom line was, he just had too many men, and the defenders of the vessel had too little. Yes, the Cats fought like ferocious madmen, and a lot of firing still took place throughout the ship, but it was obvious by now that it wasn't matter of if but when the vessel would be his.
As outnumbered as the Cats were, Huang had to admit they were such noble creatures, with warrior's drive and spirit. He knew they would fight to the last man.
“Platoon H,” Huang said. “Meet with Platoon R and attack the bridge from the northwest entrance.”
“Will do, captain.”
“Platoon M will meet with Platoon A, and we'll both attack the bridge from the bottom entrance. Expect heavy resistance, all platoons.”
“Yes, sir,” the replies came back over the net.
He gave out orders for the marine platoons to assault the other key areas of the ship.
What would the Cats aboard this vessel do now that they were corne
red and surrounded into the key areas of the ship?
Huang watched as one of his men began laser carving a hole into the blast hatch that protected the bridge. He had an idea of what he could expect from the other side, the moment his men entered. He knew—he would lose a good deal of men. But capturing the bridge was necessary.
Judging from the nanoprobe war, he estimated that a good 80 percent of the feline starship's original 600 crew had been killed off or taken captive by his men. As a fair remuneration, he had lost over half of his original thousand. The Cats were true fighters, and their tactics often worked and would have succeeded completely had Huang and his troops not been just as well trained.
Slowly, Captain Rui watched as the laser drilling continued...soon, the bridge's main hatch would be opened and he would face the fighting wrath of the starship's bridge crew...
Ga First Fleet, Light Cruiser Hukna Sevank
Bridge…
“Detonate the charges!” Ky-Dorat yelled, staring at the holo bubble of his own ship. In his mind, he saw the impossibility of retaking his ship, of winning the infantry war. He had only one choice left.
“Yes, Mila!” the replies echoed in his helmet.
Standing in the middle of the Hukna Sevank's battle bridge, Ky-Dorat's Cat-face was passive as he witnessed one-by-one his crew preparing to destroy the key areas of his ship using conventional explosives. A rough grumble emanated from within his throat. For the past four years, this vessel had been his life. The command of an imperial war-cruiser was an honor among the star clans. To see it being devoured by enemy Pra and to be forced to destroy it himself—felt like the opposite of glory and privilege.
In his helmet display, he saw the chemical charges placed around the ship's power core suddenly explode. BANG! The massive detonation sent shockwaves vibrating throughout ship, making Ky-Dorat feel the blow, even though he was a hundred dors away from it.
Ordinarily, if the ship’s power core had detonated, the entire ship would blow apart. Antimatter would be free to touch normal matter. But not in the presence of the enemy’s jammer field…
Ky-Dorat gazed at the massive explosion that had occurred there.
That was it. The ship's heart had exploded.
Now...it was time for the ship's brain to go as well.
Ky-Dorat gave one last glance at his command crew, who stood as honorable as battle-tested veterans could against his approving gaze. They eyed him back, with the look of true warriors. Having tasted battle with them many times, Ky-Dorat knew there'd be no greater glory then to die with his littermates in their vessel's finest hour.
Ky-Dorat closed his eyes. In another life, he would supersede his father and become the mightiest subjugator alive. But it seemed in this one, he would travel to the Outer Realm before his father’s time. At least he would see his sister soon, and this gave Ky-Dorat a great amount of joy—but to die in battle and take as many of the enemy with him gave him the greatest happiness.
He opened his eyes. “Open the bridge doors, Sul-Kra.”
“Yes, mila,” one of his officers replied, pressing a button on a panel.
The blast hatch – the same one the humans had been drilling through for the past two minor hands — suddenly opened.
Ky smiled at the surprised humans across the open space. “For the might of the home sun!” he yelled, and pressed the trigger.
Light Cruiser Hukna Sevank
Walkway directly outside the bridge…
The explosion blew through the blast hatch and the ensuing fireball threw all seventeen platoon members back like dolls from a spoiled child's temper tantrum. Huang Rui's body smashed into the ground and his armored exoskeleton skidded for over ten meters on metal plating. The shockwave blasted his senses into nothingness and it felt like going into oblivion.
He did not know how much time passed. Time no longer became measurable for him. He must have lost consciousness or blackened out.
When he awoke, again, he felt so dizzy. He immediately tried to get up, despite his dizziness but failed. So much pain in his abs!
Ah.. my rib cage.
He tried, again and again, but to no avail—the pain would not go away.
There was moaning on the net. Other soldiers surrounded him.
Finally, he relaxed his muscles and lay on the metal ground. “Platoons,” he said, surprised at the coolness of his voice. “All platoons, report status.”
“Heavy casualties! Twelve dead in Platoon J!”
“Six wounded in Platoon F! Three dead!”
“Platoon...” a hurried mix of voices sounded back at him. On and on, like a constant echo of death and destruction.
As Huang listened, he realized the worst part wasn't the casualties at all. The worst part was not the loss of manpower and experienced technicians who could take over the ship. It was the fact that he had zero chance of doing that even with a full crew in the immediate timeframe. The ship was dead. Its controls were probably fried. Its power core had blown. As for its central computer, he didn’t even know if it was still in one piece.
His mission to hijack the enemy warship had failed. He had only succeeded in the sense that he had neutralized all hostile resistance.
So what should he tell his marines to do, now?
His first thought was make sure that all of the enemy were, in fact, neutralized. “Platoons A through F, sweep the ship of enemy presence,” he said, gazing at his remaining troops in his HUD. Before the bombings of the ship’s crucial areas, he had 487 men. Now he had 329 fully functional men. “Bring the injured back to the marine cutters.” As for the enemy, he had no idea how much they had, but he guessed they had maybe around one hundred soldiers before the bombing, and now that number must have at least reduced to half. Then, he thought, it didn't make sense to kill themselves through the bombing, so that number was probably a little higher than half.
His next desire was to make sure that what they had bombed was in fact no longer accessible. “Platoons I through M, take over the crucial areas of the ship and see the extent of the damage.”
Then he waited for the bad news to come...
Ka's First Fleet, Main Group
Supreme Battlecruiser Usha'Tera
Bridge of Light…
Hal-Dorat felt like fainting. It was as if the entire world had suddenly collapsed around him. He saw the news—he had known what could have and probably would have happened—yet when reality hit him, he was still not prepared for it.
His firstborn was dead.
No more would he hear his laughter, or his haughtiness. No more could Hal-Dorat council him when it was needed. He could no longer berate him or advise him on the proper ways to live a life.
His son was dead.
And that was that.
He supposed he should feel angry, but he didn't. He felt—as if the entire world had been turned upside down and he was the only person aware of it.
He shook himself. How would his subordinates think if they knew what he was really thinking?
Return back to reality, Hal of the Dorat Clan, he told himself, before it's too late.
In that moment of pain and overwhelming bewilderment, a sudden coolness rushed through him. Not of the desire to avenge his son, nor was it out of hate, but simply the desire for necessity. He had to do what must be done, just as his son had done what was necessary for him to do.
Hal-Dorat had to kill his own warships. He had to make sure the humans didn't take those they stole from him back to their shipyards. He had to make sure the humans would never gain a technological edge over the Great Commander's invasion.
But how had it actually happened? How did the humans actually manage to steal and board some of his ships—including his son's ship?
The truth was...Fleet Commander Hal-Dorat had underestimated the humans.
He did not predict that enough of the humans' infantry attack boats could successfully take over that many ships within his fleet. He had relied on the belief that he could kill his own
ships even if it became incapacitated by shooting it with another one of his ships nearby.
So, how did the humans succeed? How had the enemy commander managed to keep some of his infantry boats and their prizes alive after all the attempts Hal-Dorat had tried to sink their prizes to prevent that eventuality?
The truth was—Hal-Dorat had underestimated how persistent the enemy admiral would be to retain his prizes. The enemy admiral had attempted numerous strategies to that affect.
So, what should Hal-Dorat do, now?
There were two of his Ga ships remaining that were currently being boarded by the enemy infantry boats. But these two ships were surrounded by the enemy admiral's large warships. It would extremely difficult to destroy these two ships, to prevent the enemy from taking them back to their worlds, where they could be disected and learned from for the duration of the war.
Moreover, the truth was—if Hal-Dorat did not sink them right now—the enemy would be able to do just that.
His fleet battle was losing. Somehow, the enemy admiral had managed to turn the tide of battle against him. Once Hal-Dorat's warship presence waned to a certain level, the enemy would be able to push out with their prizes while being surrounded by their lighter, faster ships. Since the speed of the enemy's infantry boats were fast, they could move with their prizes in tow at that same speed. Currently, they couldn't do that, because Hal-Dorat had enough small and fast vessels to take the prizes down even if it was surrounded by the enemies lighter ships. But if Hal-Dorat lost enough ships...the enemy would be able to run them away at the fastest speed, and not even his 2nd, 3rd, or 4th fleet and their small and fast ships would be able to chase them down.
That, Hal-Dorat thought, must not be allowed to happen.
So, he had to make sure those prizes were sunk. Right now.
He was losing. If he were winning, he wouldn't even bother, because if he won the battle, he’d be able to do that eventually anyway.
As Hal-Dorat stared at his hologlobe, and as much as he hated it, the right choice, the only choice, dawned upon him. He had to send everything to make sure the enemy's prizes would never be theirs for long...
