My brow furrowed. “Can I get a verification on the speed of those freighters?” I asked, wondering if the enemy was being deliberately slow for some reason.
Lieutenant Brightenbauc ran the numbers and then turned to report. “Their speed is consistent with the top output of the engines most commonly found in freighters of that type, Admiral,” he reported and then glanced back down at his information. “Actually, according to sensor returns and estimated top performance ratings for their engines, the convoy is moving at one hundred and five percent the rated maximum of the slowest freighter in that convoy. And the other freighters, even though they aren’t at top speed, are still over ninety percent plus their top end performance evaluation.”
I frowned.
“The enemy is burning hell-bent for leather, Admiral Montagne,” said Captain Hammer. “Why? Is something off?”
I shook my head. “They can’t fight us off. They can’t escape us. Why haven’t they split up yet?” I demanded.
“I’ve already run the numbers,” she said, “they need to be further into the star system before they reach their optimal dispersion rate. They’ll reach that range soon, within another ten minutes or so, but the window is pretty large before they have to split.”
I nodded unhappily and sat back, watching for another five minutes as the enemy continued its doomed to fail burn deeper into the star system.
“Message to Commodore Kling,” I finally said.
“Ready, Admiral,” Steiner said, looking relieved to have something to do after more than an hour of inactivity.
“Divide your command into three equal parts: space them out around the main fleet in a triangular formation. Your Corvettes are fast so I want you to push them out as far as you can and still be able to get back to the rest of the fleet before anything can hit you. I want our sensor range increased; I don’t want anyone getting cut off from the group,” I instructed.
Steiner relayed the message and then its reply. “Command acknowledged, Sir,” she said, though her words were redundant as it appeared the Comm. Officer wasn’t the only one of my officers eager to do something.
Within moments of receiving the message, Sub-Formation 4 split into three equal groups and started to move in different directions. One group remained out in front of the main fleet, increasing the distance a bit but nothing major, meanwhile the other units moved out to guard the flanks.
Another several minutes passed as our Corvettes spread out and went to active scan.
“Initial returns indicate nothing new to report,” our Sensor Officer reported after receiving a routine update from the Corvettes.
“Tell him to keep after it,” I instructed. I silently rapped my fingers in a rhythmic pattern along the edge of my armrest, debating whether I should speed up and try to catch them more quickly or slow down and wait until they scattered before going back up to full speed.
I didn’t know which way to go, and that was killing me. Sure, I had some experience with fleet maneuvers, both practical and simulated, but I could acutely feel my lack of expertise. Was I jumping at shadows?
While I mulled it over, the freighters suddenly began to scatter and the screen exploded with projected tracks as all fifty four freighters went off on their own unique courses.
“Enemy convoy is breaking up!” reported Hart eagerly.
I opened my mouth to order my warships to go up to full speed, but my eyes snagged on the warships of Task Force 3.
Moments later, the individual warships of the enemy task force started to scatter as well.
“Do you want to order a general pursuit, Admiral Montagne?” Hammer asked eagerly, a hungry look in her eye.
That had been the original plan, but now that I was at the moment of truth I wondered if it was really necessary.
“Order to Commodore Kling and Sub-Formation 4: all units of Sub-4 are to disperse and begin a general pursuit of those supply transports,” I ordered and then thought to add, “they are to maneuver for effect and avoid engaging any enemy warships Destroyer-sized or larger.”
“Yes, Sir,” said Steiner.
“As for the other three sub-formations, each one is to select an enemy Battleship and—” I was interrupted before I was half-way through with the new instructions.
“Sub-Formation 2 is breaking up and dispersing into a general pursuit pattern. They’re going after the enemy, Admiral!” cried Lieutenant Hart.
“Bugger me,” I cursed, unconsciously giving voice to my feelings on the subject. Silverback just couldn’t wait, could he? That small-minded blighter was really starting to get on my nerves. All I could say right now is he was fortunate my Sister was on a penal colony or else I just might have a method for her to begin to get back into my good graces. Fortunately for everyone involved I was too wise to keep her around.
“Do you want me to relay a message to the Admiral, Sir?” Steiner asked carefully. Silverback wasn’t the only Admiral in this lash-up, but we all knew who she was referring to.
I looked carefully at the screen before answering.
“Relay to the Admiral that he is to his lead his formation against the enemy Battleship designated Bat-2 and destroy or neutralize the target before engaging in a general pursuit,” I instructed, thinking there probably wasn’t a chance in the blue blazes that Silverback would follow the order at this point but determined to enter it into the record anyway.
“Aye, Sir,” said Steiner after a moment, “even though I have a machine transcript indicating receipt of the message, there is no acknowledgement of the order, Admiral.”
“Silverback is a man that prefers to rely upon the good graces of the Demon Murphy over the call of his own common sense,” I said dismissively. “I just hope he doesn’t get a lot of good men and women killed while he’s busy cutting deals with the Demon in an attempt to show the rest of us up. At this point there’s only so much I can do for them as long as they’re determined not to follow orders.”
Steiner seemed taken aback and, glancing at the screen to the battle bridge, Hammer appeared both scandalized and appalled.
“Admiral,” Hammer started as the Royal Rage, surrounded by the remaining might of MSP, remained in position while the Coalition warships of our allies and small fry of the newly arrived the Independent Worlds moved to engage the enemy battleship Bat-1. Around and beside us, the Corvettes of Sub-4 and warships of all sizes from Sub-2 thundered out in countless different directions each on a track for an enemy freighter or warship.
“Yes, Captain?” I asked when she seemed to have lost her train of thought.
Hammer gave herself a short shake. “Sir,” she cocked her head dubiously, “are you sure it’s wise to speak that way about another Admiral of the Fleet.” She lifted a forestalling hand, “I don’t agree with his decision either, but the man may have a point and you—”
“Contact!” cried a sensor operator jumping out of his chair with alarm and from his actions and caramel-brown skin-tone, he had to be one of my original sensor crew. For one nostalgic moment it was like I was once again back on the bridge of the Lucky Clover, leading a group of people who knew their jobs almost as poorly as I did, and then his next words poured cold water right down my back, “I’m reading multiple contacts coming around the extreme ninth planetary body of this star system!”
“Sit down and report properly,” growled the Confederation Lieutenant in charge of the Sensor Section.
“I’m sorry, Lieutenant, but it looks like a whole Murphy-benighted fleet,” protested the Operator.
“Bring that up on screen,” I snapped, not having time for office politics—or bridge politics as the case may be.
A moment later I saw a hazy image of a large number of warships coming around the outermost planet almost directly behind the enemy fleet. Sure, they were more than an hour out but if we continued after the freighters we’d have to deal with them eventually.
“I’m reading large power fluctuations from the center of that Fleet,” reported the L
ieutenant at Sensors his tense voice starting to shrill as he continued to speak. “And fifty sixty…no, more than seventy five unique contacts and still rising, Sir.”
I narrowed my left eye as the image of the ship in the center of the newly-arrived enemy fleet slowly clarified.
It was the Invictus Rising—Arnold Janeski’s Imperial Command Carrier.
“Rear Admiral…it seems we meet again,” I said as the final count of enemy ships came in at ninety warships, including eight battleships and one Imperial Command Carrier.
“Counting the Carrier, those 8 Battleships with her and the three from Task Force 3, we’re looking at twelve top-end enemy combatants, Sir,” Hammer said urgently.
“I can count just as well as you can, Captain,” I said with a calmness I really didn’t possess.
From the appearance of things, Admiral Silverback could count as well because the larger ships—the Cruisers and Battleships that had slower engines and couldn’t disperse as far as the rest of his warships—began to start drifting back together.
“Even numbers,” I mused because even not counting the freighters, the enemy only had 117 warships to our 166, 113 of theirs were Destroyer or larger and they matched us in the wall, while we only had 108 with the rest Corvette size or smaller. “This could be a very tough fight,” I said thinking that there was no way this was anything other than a trap—and one we’d blundered in like a blind caboose and sprung. An Imperial Admiral didn’t start fights he wasn’t sure he could win, which was why I’d ambushed Task Force 3: to force the enemy to face me at a time and place of my choosing. Now that the shoe was on the other foot, my feet were starting to feel decidedly pinched. Not that I didn’t think we couldn’t win, but doing so was going to wreck us.
“It’s not even numbers, Sir,” the Captain disagreed with me, “even though we outnumber them in total hulls, discounting those supply ships, that Carrier has to count for at least two Battleships—maybe as much as an entire squadron. And we already know the enemy has better tech. Stronger shields, faster engines, and longer-range beam weapons,” she said, ticking the points off one by one.
“We can still take them,” I said, my field of vision narrowing until all I was looking at that Command Carrier.
“I hope you’re right,” she replied.
“Well at least we know for sure that I was right to keep our forces concentrated,” I said with a sigh. “Can you imagine what would have happened if we’d split up into individual ships and scattered across the system before they were forced to reveal themselves?” Of course, what I didn’t say was that I was entirely wrong to enter past the hyper limit in the first place.
“That does make me wonder one thing, Sir,” Hammer said.
I cocked my head at her in question.
“Why they showed themselves? They weren’t forced to, Sir. We have no units in position to see around that planet and nothing on the way there yet,” she said.
“Maybe they want us to pull back and give their freighters the chance to escape?” I asked.
Hammer hesitated and then shook her head. “There’s still enough time to catch those freighters unless their escorts put up a better defense than I expect. Civilian ships are slow, Admiral. We could probably dash in and dash back out if we really wanted to,” she said.
I narrowed my eyes. “We’d have to break up the fleet,” I mused, mulling over the idea. I wanted to hurt these Reclamationists as much as possible, and even if we had trouble defeating their main force taking out their supply ships would be a definite feather in our cap no matter what.
“Yes, but we have the speed. Oh, not our Battleships, but our Destroyers and Cruisers could rush in there, hit them, bypass anything too big to deal with and be back before their main force can hit is. It’ll be close, but we can do it,” she said firmly.
“That’s good,” I nodded. It looked like the enemy had made an error this time and, if we pushed it, we could really hurt them—or at least their freighters before they could reply. I started to smile and then a thought occurred to me and my smile froze and congealed.
“So what you’re saying is the enemy made a mistake,” I said.
“Not so much a mistake; we were going to catch up to those freighters anyway before their main fleet could react, thanks to our Corvettes and…Admiral Silverback,” she added that last bit after a moment’s hesitation.
And looking at the screen I could see that Silverback’s thinking must have mirrored mine because the short inrush of heavy units had reversed back into full burn in a clear effort to chase the scattered freighters. Clearly, he also thought we had a limited window to catch those freighters.
I started shaking my head. “I don’t think those Imperials made a mistake,” I said with finality.
“That’s what I said, Sir,” Hammer pointed out, “it’s only because we broke off part of our force early for a rapid engagement that—”
“An undisciplined force like ours? Undisciplined, at least, from their view of things,” I shook my head firmly in negation. “The expectation would be that we’d launch a general pursuit and run them all down as soon as we possibly could, not the reverse.”
Hammer looked at me sharply. “You’re saying they expected to lose the freighters. All of those supplies?” she asked mulishly.
“Aegis stumbles over a Reclamationist spy during a routine sweep, cracks the ComStat network only long enough to get the information about a supply run, and then we walk right into a trap?” I said, my mind moving lighting fast as I lined all the pieces up and then twisted and turned them until they started to make sense according to the new information. “Blast it…I should have known better. I did know better,” I whispered, damning myself to the cold confines of Hades for blundering into this like a fool.
“It was a trap all along…or else they found out about our data theft and turned it into a trap,” Hammer said with dawning realization.
“I doubt those freighters are carrying anything the Reclamationists can’t live without. And I’d wager their main fleet isn’t short of supplies. One good turn deserves another. The Demon’s out tonight!” I said, my emotions finally boiling over. “We ambushed them and now Admiral Janeski is returning the favor…with interest.”
“You could be right, but even though this is an ambush I still think—” she said.
I cut her off. “Message to Commodore Kling,” I shouted, turning to the Comm., “all ships of Formation 4 are to fall back on the main fleet immediately and without delay! The same goes for Sub-2. You tell Silverback he can shout at me later; for now I want all of our ships back here, Lieutenant. NOW!” I roared, slamming my fist into my Throne’s armrest emphatically.
Lisa Steiner startled with surprise jerking sideways in here chair. “Sir?” she asked, a sudden fear in her eyes. But I didn’t have time for her.
“Control yourself, Sir,” Hammer hissed, “everyone in this fleet takes their cue from you.”
I looked back at her with hot eyes. “As soon as our warships—or the majority of them—are back within coverage range of our main guns, I want the Royal Rage ready to reverse thrust and burn back for the hyper limit at full speed on my command. Do you understand, Captain?” I demanded.
“Kling has acknowledged and his ships are starting back. Silverback is refusing to fall back until he can speak with you personally to consult on the matter,” reported Steiner as promptly as I could have hoped.
“Are you sure you’re not overreacting, Sir?” Hammer asked, even though I could tell she was starting to believe in her gut that we were in trouble.
“If I’m wrong, those freighters will have a longer lifespan than they deserve—or they might even get away entirely. But if I’m right then we’re up to our noses in a steaming pile, Leonora,” I said.
Hammer saluted. “That’s all I needed to hear, Sir,” she said and started handing out orders rapid-fire.
I turned back to the Comm. Section. A great sage once said ‘never become so attached to som
ething so much that you can’t walk away from it in less than sixty seconds.’ That was the great discipline he espoused, if you could call it ‘great.’
I wish I had that kind discipline and detachment—as well as the sixty seconds—but right then every second counted. I could be panicking but…
I took a deep breath.
“Alright, there’s nothing for it. Sub-2 is on its own,” I said, making a snap decision. After all, if I was right flaming wrong then we could come back and help out later. Sub-2 outnumbered and outgunned the enemy. “Tell Kling he’s to use Silverback’s formation for coverage in case of a surprise attack as they make his way back to us at best speed. We can’t wait any longer.”
“Yes,” Steiner gulped.
“We might not get another chance to go up against the Imperials with even numbers,” Hammer warned.
I looked around the bridge—both bridges, thanks to the camera feeds to the mini-screens on my Throne. The Confederals looked concerned and professional, but I could also tell they were wondering if I’d just lost my nerve. But the men and women who had been with me from the beginning knew that their Admiral didn’t scare easily, and that if I was as worried as I appeared we were about to be back in the worst of it—a place we’d been plenty of times before.
They knew the real score while their new comrades were still learning whether or not they could trust my judgment. Unless, of course, I really was jumping at the dark. I wasn’t so egotistical that I didn’t allow for that.
“I could be wrong and, if I am, maybe a few freighters get away. But the real threat to this Sector isn’t freighters,” I said, growing more certain in my theory with each passing moment. “New orders to the fleet: Sub-1 and Sub-3 are to reverse course and heading. Now,” I ordered, “I might be wrong about what they have in store for us, but I’m not walking any further into this enemy ambush than I already have without stopping to assess the situation.”
“Royal Rage, begin to reverse course,” the Captain ordered.
Admiral's War Part One Page 28
