Legacy Fleet: The Complete Trilogy

by Nick Webb

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  He glanced at the clock. Sixty seconds.

  Fifty.

  Forty.

  Another stirring speech? There was still time, given his tendency toward brevity. No, they were ready. Another quick readiness review of the weapons crews? No, only thirty seconds left. That would take at least another five minutes.

  Twenty seconds. The Swarm fleet began to resolve on the screen, shifting from pixellated blobs to menacing, multi-nacelled behemoths that were already disgorging thousands of fighters.

  “The three New Dublin ships have engaged the Swarm, sir.”

  He watched the screen as the three sacrificial lambs plunged swiftly into the fray, forcing the Swarm fleet to suspend its approach to New Dublin and deal with the defenders.

  But despite the new iridium armor plating and the upgraded smart steel defenses—which now worked much better thanks to a reset of the modulation frequencies that the Swarm had somehow decoded for their first run at Earth two months ago—the defenders sustained punishing fire, and the lead cruiser burst apart in a dazzling, sickening bright blast.

  “In weapons range, sir.”

  “Fire.”

  Every mag rail gun aboard the Warrior blazed as hundreds of high-velocity projectiles leapt out from the hull and slammed into the nearest Swarm vessel. The view on screen pulsed with brilliant explosions as the slugs rammed into the other ship, which began disgorging fire and debris as the mag rail projectiles ripped through its hull.

  “Retarget. Hit the next ship with the mag rails. Laser crews target the holes in the first.”

  “Aye, sir,” came the reply from the tactical station, and Lieutenant Diaz coordinated the new orders.

  Granger glanced at the clock, cringing as he realized the time was nearly up for their first pass. The ship rumbled and jolted as the Swarm fleet understood it was being attacked from a new vector. Granger watched on the viewscreen as the enemy vessels grew large, then began to shrink as the camera switched views, indicating that the Warrior had sailed right on by the pitched battle.

  The ship rumbled a few more times as the Swarm ships managed to fire off a few more shots—the viewscreen flared up with an intense green glow every time the deadly pulses made contact with the hull—but soon the other ships receded completely from view, falling behind the limb of the planet as the Warrior continued its blazingly-fast orbit around New Dublin.

  “Right. First pass complete. Time to second?” he said, turning to navigation.

  “At this speed, six minutes.”

  It wasn’t fast enough. They’d planned on ten ships. Not thirteen. “Increase thrust to one g, aft.”

  Ensign Prince swiveled in his chair to look at Granger with a raised eyebrow. “But sir, that will require a steady increase in thrust radially inward toward the planet. That’ll take us over the safety threshold within three minutes.”

  “You heard me, Ensign.”

  From deep within the deck plates, the ship groaned as it tried to keep up with the increased gravitational stresses. Granger placed his hand on the console. She was no Constitution, but she was just as good. He didn’t want to openly admit it to himself, but she was actually a whole lot better, given her extensive refit after the battle over Earth two months ago.

  “ETA now three minutes, sir.”

  “And the Swarm? Have they resumed their course?”

  Ensign Diamond at sensors studied his readings. “Yes, sir. The three ships in the first wave are destroyed. But the second wave is intercepting now.”

  He suppressed the pit in his stomach. No time to feel guilt. No time for remorse. There was only time to survive. After survival, there would be time for luxuries. Luxuries like feeling.

  “Adjust heading to meet them.”

  His fingers drummed the seconds away. On the screen, the planet rotated serenely, almost blissful in its apparent ignorance of the destruction and carnage occurring far above its peaceful atmosphere. New Dublin was a beauty, for sure. Green and blue and cloudy. Why in the world the Swarm wanted this planet so badly—enough to send thirteen ships against it—made him wonder. The planet, and the sector, held modest strategic importance. It was relatively centrally located. It had some resources, but no more than any other average world. It was almost identical to the other three planets being assaulted today in the Swarm’s four-pronged attack, but the fleet attacking it was the largest by far. What was he missing?

  “Ten seconds,” said Prince.

  Granger shook his head. There would be time for solving mysteries later. He would make sure of it.

  “Fire.”

  Chapter 5

  New Dublin, Eyre Sector

  Planetary Command Center

  “Admiral Azbill, the Praxis, the Harrier, and the Crenshaw report engagement with the Swarm!” reported an officer at the tactical station.

  Azbill furrowed his brow. “Where’s the Warrior?”

  Proctor motioned him over to one of the command stations she’d commandeered. “Take a look, Admiral.” She pointed to the tactical schematic. The Warrior, still advancing under the cover of New Dublin’s horizon, was bearing down on the pitched battle with blazing speed. Far faster than a regular orbit at that altitude. “She’s orbiting at a two-x low-orbital speed. In a few seconds, the Swarm’ll never know what hit them.”

  He frowned, pointing to the area on the screen where the invading fleet had momentarily stopped to deal with the three New Dublin ships. “But what about the—”

  One of the dots disappeared, and Azbill’s hand jerked away.

  “Sir! We’ve just lost the Praxis!”

  Azbill pounded Proctor’s command console. “Dammit, Commander, there were five hundred people on that ship!”

  The tactical officer called out again. “The Harrier is reporting hull decompression. They’re not going to make it much longer. The thirteen Swarm vessels have them completely surrounded.” He typed in a few commands, and the view on the screen that comprised one of the walls of the command center was replaced by the camera feed from a satellite passing the field of battle.

  The Harrier and the Crenshaw flitted in and out of the enemy ships, targeting all their mag rails and lasers on the cloud of fighters belching out of the Swarm carriers, moving between the massive vessels as quickly as possible—just as Proctor had instructed them. Their job was to interdict and impede, at the expense of their lives.

  And they were doing a hell of a job. The fleet of Swarm ships buzzed like an angry bee’s nest.

  “Here she comes,” murmured Proctor.

  The satellite’s camera angle widened, and from the right side of the screen the Warrior blazed in, all guns firing, making a ferocious dive for the Swarm ship in its sights.

  And Proctor grinned—the Swarm ship was getting the snot beat out of it. Multiple deep gouges sprouted in its starboard hull, which exploded as the Warrior’s laser crews trained their guns on the erupting wounds.

  A second Swarm ship soon found itself on the receiving end of the Warrior’s guns. And the next moment, she was gone as she disappeared behind the limb of the atmosphere, leaving destruction in her wake.

  Admiral Azbill paused, his mouth temporarily gaping open. “Lieutenant, status of those two Swarm ships?”

  Some fumbling with the controls, and a moment later the woman replied, “No active energy readings from that first ship, sir, and reading massive power failures and structural integrity fluctuations in the second. Though it is still firing at the Harrier.”

  A moment later the satellite’s camera, just before it passed out of view, revealed the remaining Swarm ships descending on the Harrier and the Crenshaw in a tide of green anti-matter pulse beams. The Harrier exploded, and the camera cut out.

  “Fine. That’s one and a half enemy birds out of commission.” He turned to glare at Proctor. “But at the cost of three of our best ships? Three ships that we just tossed out there as cannon fodder? Over fifteen hundred officers and crewmen?”

&
nbsp; She met his gaze, and held it. “Yes. Three ships. We’ve tried one, but they don’t stop for one. They don’t stop for two. They stop for three, and so three is the number we sacrifice so that the rest of us have time to fight.”

  The room fell to a quiet murmur as she spoke. The statistics were grim. Sobering. Ghoulish. But they all knew she was right. The unspoken historical statistics were far more grisly. At Earth, two months ago, over thirty of IDF’s best ships fell before they’d even made a dent in one Swarm vessel.

  She swiveled toward the tactical station. “Send the next three from their holding pattern in low orbit. Direct intercept course. Same as before.”

  The officers at the tactical station paused, and looked to Admiral Azbill, who, frowning, finally nodded.

  “This had better be worth it, Proctor, or—”

  An alarm started blaring, and Proctor didn’t have to ask what it meant. On the wall’s viewscreen, from the camera of one of the ships approaching the Swarm invasion fleet, she saw the tell-tale bright shimmer.

  They’d initiated a forced quantum singularity.

  Chapter 6

  New Dublin, Eyre Sector

  Bridge, ISS Warrior

  The shimmering spheres hovering amidst the invading fleet could only mean one thing. Fortunately, it was the last thing Granger worried about at that point of the battle. “Commander Pierce, deploy all wings.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  He turned to navigation. “Ensign Prince, full reverse. Slow us down for direct engagement.”

  The ensign keyed the commands in, and Granger could feel the scarcely perceptible sway of the internal gravity field as it adjusted to keep up with the changing inertia. It was strange—during his brief battle with cancer, one that he should have lost, he could feel every turn, every imperceptible shift. Even the slightest change in acceleration had registered with him on a visceral level. Something about the tumor in his brain had affected his balance, but in turn had let him detect even the slightest change in momentum.

  Now, that was all gone. He was healed. Whole.

  But how? The mystery had remained unsolved, and, frankly, he didn’t have time to sit around philosophizing about it. Especially right now.

  An alarm blared, and he chided himself for his momentary lapse into thought. The flashing indicator on his board told him they were nearly there. “All gun crews, prepare for operation Granger Two.”

  He glanced at the tactical stream relayed from the planet by Proctor. Mentally crossing his fingers that she’d managed to set up her end of operation Granger Two, he did a last minute check of their capacitor banks. Eighty-five percent.

  Good enough.

  “Sir, contact with thirteen New Dublin ships. They’re rising up through the atmosphere below and behind us.”

  Granger smiled. Good work, Proctor.

  “Continue braking maneuver, and open fire on my mark.”

  He watched as the blips on their sensors grew larger, and then the viewscreen on the wall split to reveal the thirteen New Dublin planetary force cruisers soaring up through the atmosphere like comets. Ultra-compressed gas streamed out behind them as they accelerated to speeds far greater than what was considered safe and prudent for an atmospheric ascent. Within another ten seconds, he supposed all of their exterior guns would be useless, just as their sensors, cameras, and anything else attached to the exterior hull were all long burned away by now.

  But it wouldn’t matter. All that mattered was the sacrifice of those skeleton crews. And what that sacrifice would accomplish.

  “Adjust speed, Ensign. Keep us right between our boys down there and the Swarm.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  He raised a hand, finger pointing toward the screen, poised to give the fire order. He glanced at the tactical readout. Five more seconds.

  Three.

  One.

  “Fire.”

  All the mag rails opened up, unleashing a storm of high-velocity slugs on the still-advancing fleet. In response, half the Swarm vessels returned fire. Over a dozen green beams lanced out, slamming into the Warrior head on. The ship rocked, and the deck plates bucked.

  “Brake. Hard, Ensign!” He sat down and grabbed his armrests, but didn’t buckle his restraints. He’d ride this out like a captain on an old sailing ship buffeted by hurricane force winds.

  The Warrior slowed dramatically and everyone aboard the bridge lurched forward as their momentum caught up with the ship’s.

  And from behind the Warrior came the New Dublin fleet, hulls still glowing faintly red from their destructively fast ascent through the atmosphere, accelerating like bullets toward the Swarm ships.

  All the green anti-matter beams ceased, and for a moment Granger could almost imagine the confusion on the faces of the Swarm upon seeing the thirteen ships blaze out of nowhere. Until he remembered that they didn’t have faces.

  What the hell did they have? It was a mystery he knew they’d have to figure out before they would have any chance of permanently defeating their enemy. They had to be more than blobs of green slime.

  “All enemy fire now directed at the New Dublin Planetary fleet task force,” said Lieutenant Diaz.

  For all the good it’ll do them. He watched as the thirteen ships approached their targets. No more than seven seconds away. They continued to accelerate. One exploded under the intense onslaught of the anti-matter beams. Then another.

  Each ship—or fragments of a ship—careened closer to its target, each one dwarfed by the massive Swarm carriers looming ahead.

  A voice scratched over the comm. Admiral Azbill’s. “This had better work, Granger. Even a high-velocity suicide run by one of our heavy cruisers won’t be enough to destroy a Swarm ship.”

  “We don’t have to destroy them. Just watch, Admiral.”

  And it was time. Two more heavy cruisers had exploded into fiery pieces, but it was too late—each one found its target. Each plowed into a Swarm vessel, initiating massive explosions that made the enemy ships shudder and convulse. The explosions were insignificant compared to the sheer size of the Swarm carriers, but it wasn’t the size of the explosion that mattered.

  It was the location of the explosions.

  “Lieutenant?” He turned to the tactical station, eyeing the man at sensors.

  Diaz’s eyes darted over his readouts, and he nodded. “Confirmed. All main fighter bays destroyed.”

  Granger leaned back and smiled. “Commander Pierce, scramble fighters. Get rid of those singularities, then beat the shit out of the capital ships.” He raised his head. “Admiral? Feel free to deploy the rest of your fleet. Target at will.”

  A silence. Granger supposed the man was deciding whether to cuss him out for losing sixteen of his largest ships or acknowledge that the odds were suddenly far more even. “There are still fighters coming out of those things, Granger, I fail to see—”

  Granger broke protocol and interrupted. “Each carrier has several fighter bays, yes, but the main one holds over seventy-five percent of their craft. Moreover, compromising their hulls in this fashion disrupts whatever they’re using to block our lasers—their ships are now vulnerable to our full suite of weaponry. What was before an unwinnable battle is now tipped slightly in our favor, but by no means won. We need the rest of your fleet out here now, Admiral. Target their weapons batteries first, then move onto the next. Rinse and repeat.”

  Another brief silence. “Very well, Granger. Azbill out.”

  Granger raised an eyebrow, then turned back to tactical. “Target every single gaping hole with lasers and open fire. Boil the bastards from the inside out. Send out some nukes for good measure.”

  “With pleasure, sir.”

  He glanced back at his command console, looking for the timer that would indicate when the first singularity weapon would most likely launch. Damn. Less than a minute. And there were six of them—each one capable of completely annihilating the largest city on New Dublin and the towns surrounding it for hundreds of miles ar
ound.

  The fighter pilots would have their work cut out for them.

  Chapter 7

  New Dublin, Eyre Sector

  Low Orbit

  Lieutenant Tyler “Ballsy” Volz pushed his fighter’s throttle to the limit. Thankfully, the morning’s hangover was a distant memory, and he was ready to kill stuff. The more stuff, the better.

  The Swarm carriers loomed ahead, forbidding and threatening, in spite of the fire and debris gushing out from their midsections where the main fighter bays should have been. Enemy fighters buzzed around them like bloodthirsty insects, but not nearly as many as there would have been without the sacrifice of those thirteen cruisers.

  “Spacechamp, on me. Pew Pew and Fodder, take the wings and prepare to deliver your cargo.” He glanced at his sensor map. “Bogey engagement in five. Look sharp.”

  Before he focused on the enemy fighters bearing down on them, he risked a glance to his side, toward one of his wingmen. Pew Pew, who’d replaced another nameless pilot Volz had lost the week before, held a tight formation despite the bulky cargo strapped to the undercarriage of the craft.

  The cargo: a brick. A brick of solid osmium. Only about two meters long and one wide, it was easily twice the mass of the rest of the fighter. And therein lay the key to their best defense against the unthinkably destructive Swarm singularities.

  Mass. Enough to close one of the miniature black holes before it launched toward the surface or the Warrior or whatever else the Swarm targeted.

  From within the cockpit, Pew Pew turned his head briefly and gave Ballsy a thumbs up. And with that, the alarm rang out, indicating enemy weapons fire in close proximity.

  It was time.

  In a tightly-coordinated and thoroughly-practiced maneuver, all four of them dove down, split off from their vector, curved out in a tight loop, and converged on a new vector: the nearest singularity. They ignored all the fire strafing across their path.

  “Watch your three o’clock, Fodder,” Ballsy said. He pushed his fighter into another tight loop, trying to shake off a bogey who’d latched onto his vector. “Pew Pew, I need help here—” he started to say, but a muted explosion out of the corner of his eye cut him off.