A day later, the Oort changed course to avoid the oncoming Harbok, but Landers did not pass that information to Greg or to the Harbok. The uncloaked and unshielded scout did not change its own course either, not even a little bit. Landers did not want the Oort to know he was tracking them. The Oort saw a single ship and the Harbok fleet continuing on an intercept with their old course, but they would no longer be there. Meanwhile, the scout vectored the An’Atee fleet into position just like an air traffic controller.
The weeks passed slowly. Greg and Kannick continued their long runs through the hallways of the base. Few Harbok were there to observe them since most were on their way to meet the Oort. The ones who stayed behind tended to remain on duty for extended periods, some even sleeping in the command center. Greg never saw Lor Tas’val leave the command center.
Several hours before the battle was joined, another armada of Oort began popping into existence on the other side of the system. Pandemonium broke loose. Orders edged in panic sent the limited number of close-in, last resort Harbok ships toward the new batch of Oort.
They would be hopelessly outnumbered.
Greg and Kannick strolled into the command center completely unaware of what was happening. Tas’val approached them with a bitter expression on his face. “The Oort outsmarted us. Most of our ships are committed to the first battle. We’ll bring half of them back, but the intercept will be close to Haldor. They won’t have much time to engage.”
“Surely this has happened before?” Greg asked.
Tas’val nodded. “It has. To compensate for the Oort cloaking device, we sent most of our reserves to the main battle.”
Several hours later, an emergency message arrived from Grayson. By the time the message arrived, it was already four hours old. “Check behind you,” he said. “I’m jumping out of the system momentarily and will return in a better position with my reserves, but it will be a close thing. We have to jump closer in than we’d prefer. I have to be uncloaked and unshielded during the final stage of my attack, but Angie will vector me until then.”
Greg and Kannick watched as the small contingent of An’Atee ships uncloaked momentarily far out on the outskirts of the system, then vanished. Greg called Angie. “Do you know what’s going on?” he asked.
Eight anxious hours elapsed before he received her reply. “Yes. Harold briefed me. I’m splitting my command, sending half of them to the new sector. There may be an Oort or two hiding out there to observe. He won’t get them all, you know. That would be asking too much. You need to prepare to take on the ones who make it past Harold. I fear for him.”
There wasn’t much Greg and Kannick could do, but there might be a little. They pulled Tas’val aside.
Before Greg could speak, Tas’val asked, “Would your baseship consider returning here to evacuate as many of us as it can?”
“We’ll get it started back immediately, but it’s too soon to give up, Tas’val.”
“No. Haldor is lost. It’s time to look to the future.”
“Then we’ll get the process underway. In the meantime, I can guarantee that a significant portion of the second wave of Oort will not make it to Haldor. Your ships will only have to deal with stragglers.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I told you we have a secret weapon. Admiral Grayson is positioning himself to use it. He will destroy most of the second wave. We should keep our primary focus on the first wave.”
Tas’val stared daggers at him before saying, “I can’t count on that. My men will hold the horde off long enough for some of us to abandon the planet.”
“You’d leave some of your people behind?”
“Yes.” Tas’val had a grim set to his lips. He was not a happy man.
Greg thought for a time, then said, “I need you to focus on my words, Tas’val.”
“Speak.”
“Here is the situation as I know it: the first wave of Oort are not where you think they are. They changed course to avoid your fleet, and they’ve continued making small, random adjustments since then. We’ve been tracking them with our uncloaked ship, our scout, and it’s sending the necessary course adjustments to our fleet for the intercept. However, our scout could not change its own trajectory without letting the Oort know it’s tracking them, so it’s out of position. Your ships have been following our scout, so they’re out of position too. I don’t know how far out of position your ships are, but they will get there after mine.”
Greg watched Tas’val visibly hold back his hatred for the Earthman and the An’Atee who had not been forthcoming. For the first time in his life, Greg thought he might be on the receiving end of a hard fist, and one strike from this Harbok would do the job.
Tas’val turned to Kannick. “I thought better of you. I was wrong. My men have been right all along.”
“Tas’val, what your gut sensed about me was right. Hear us. Together we can save Haldor. If we’re wrong, you lose no more than you would with your present plan.”
Tas’val came close to turning away in disgust. Kannick placed a hand on his forearm, but Tas’val shook it off. “Say what you have to say, then call your baseship back,” he growled darkly.
“Grayson will take out the second wave of Oort,” Kannick said. Tas’val simply returned a stare filled with disgust and disbelief. “Trust me,” Kannick pleaded. “We’ve told you about our secret weapon that can destroy a baseship. Well, it can—and it will—destroy a whole lot more than that. It will take out a significant chunk of that second wave. But it won’t get all of them. Some will get through. We need ships between Haldor and them to pick them off.”
“Wait, Kannick!” Greg corrected his friend. “The Harbok won’t be able to find them either. They don’t have the sensors to see them. We need to bring some of our own ships back.”
He though hard. To bring An’Atee ships back here would seriously weaken Admiral Landers’ attack force. He blinked his eyes a few times, then he raced for the communicator. Could he raise Landers?
He tried, and he got through. Landers was not pleased with the interruption since he was only hours away from engaging the Oort.
“What do you want, Greg?” he demanded.
“Do you know there’s a second wave of Oort?” Greg asked.
“Of course.”
“Grayson’s on his way to do his thing. Some of the Oort will get through. I need some of our ships to locate cloaked survivors.”
There was a long delay before Landers came back to him. “I guess you do, and I guess that’s why you pay us the big bucks. By the way, when do we get a paycheck?” Without pause, he added, “I’ll get Admiral Pence started on his way back to Haldor with his wing. I guess you know what that means to us out here?”
“I do, Admiral. I’m sorry to make your job harder.”
“I need support from the Harbok. I want them to cloak. Provided they agree to cloak and to stay cloaked, they won’t give away our surprise, so I can vector them into the main battle. They’ll be late, but they’ll be good reinforcements. I don’t want our two fleets to merge. Our tactics are too different. Advise the Harbok command staff that I’ll assign them an area of targets that is separate from our own. Now leave me alone while I realign my forces.”
“Good hunting,” Greg replied, though he knew the reply would, by now, take a couple of hours to reach Landers.
Tas’val had been listening. “How many ships are in a wing?” he asked.
“Thirty plus a command prime ship. It’s all he could spare.”
“I appreciate that. He is severely outnumbered. Give me new coordinates for my ships. I guarantee they will change course only when cloaked.”
“Only if you agree to send some back here. We have no way of knowing how many will get past Admiral Grayson.”
“Done. You’ve sent 30. I’ll bring 200 back and keep the rest out with the main battle.”
“And tell all of them to get back here as fast as they can when they’re done out there. The
re’s a distinct possibility that there may be some fighting on the planet.”
“We will scour it if necessary. Not a single Oort can survive. Do you really think Admiral Grayson will make a difference?”
“I do. If he doesn’t, you’re no worse off than you were without him.”
Tas’val issued orders to the 200 ships to return. Admiral Landers relayed the new coordinates to the rest of the Harbok fleet. When the Harbok ships disappeared from the screens at the command center, everyone was forced to sit around and wait. Among all the symbols on the screens that depicted the main battle, the position of only one small An’Atee ship was known with certainty.
* * * * *
Aboard Admiral Landers’ baseship, the Tactical Operations Center, already busy, got very busy. He called his mission planners together.
“Grayson is going to use our secret weapon to take out the second wave of Oort. I’m sending our reserves to mop up any that get through. They’re closest. Jourll, get on the horn and tell Admiral Pence to get going.” Commander Jourll, an An’Atee, stepped over to a communications specialist to raise Pence.
Landers thought hard. “I’m not willing to engage without reserves. We’ll pull back two more wings and keep them in reserve. The rest of us are going to rearrange our plan, and quickly. We’re too few to take on all the Oort at once. Here’s what we’re going to do: we’ll divide into two sections and attack from both flanks of the Oort fleet, picking our targets, taking them out in groups, then moving inward.”
Startled looks met his words. He looked hard into the eyes of his staff. “It’s a risk, I know. We know what happened during training when we tried engaging specific segments of the attacking fleet. It didn’t work very well—the rest of the attackers ganged up on us. But we have two important factors that might change the outcome. The Harbok fleet is not too far behind us. They’ll take up the slack. The Oort are cloaked, and they’re new to cloaks. If they’re at all like our early cloaks, their refresh rates will be slow. They might even have to drop their cloaks as soon as they come under attack. I believe we’ll have a window of time when there will be confusion, which will let us select our targets with forethought. Start making assignments.”
Each wing commander was briefed on the new plan and given a preliminary area of targets. Each of those commanders then issued orders through the air traffic control ship to their squadrons, further pinpointing the initial attack. It was risky, and it required a lot of blind maneuvering since none of the fleet could uncloak to see their targets.
The solitary air traffic control ship, completely uncloaked and unshielded, issued vectors to squadrons on a nonstop basis. Landers frowned when he considered the impact that lone fighter had on the coming battle. Next time he would assign the duty to a larger ship that had a Tactical Operations Center.
“Who’s in that ship anyway?” he asked an aide.
The woman checked her records. “Well, well,” she said with a smile. “None other than your old bosses, ex-Admirals Shoemaker and Max Henderson.”
“They’re both on the same ship?” he asked in surprise. “They’re earning their pay today.”
He looked into his display with a frown. There were just too darn many flashing symbols depicting estimated locations of the Oort ships. Then he had an idea. He turned to his An’Atee science officer.
“Dr. Knowles, can we feed the display from our uncloaked control ship into this room?”
“You can, sir, but it will take time to set it up. A lot of time on their end.”
“Hmm,” he said, frowning. That wouldn’t do. The crew was already too busy. Turning to a communications officer, he said, “Get me the captain of that ship.”
Captain Boyer’s voice came back quickly. “Boyer here, sir.”
“Just how confident are you of the vectors you’re issuing? They’re key to everything.”
“We’re okay so far. Shoemaker and Henderson really have their heads down working on this. I don’t think they’ll be able to keep up when the fighting starts, though.”
“They won’t have to. I’ll take over that job, but I don’t want to uncloak before then. You’re that confident of what you’re doing?”
“I am, sir. I know you can’t see much, but a beautiful pattern is emerging on our screen. You’ll see what I mean as soon as you uncloak. We’re definitely under control here.”
Landers signed off, frustrated. It was his job to control, but he couldn’t control without seeing. With a shrug, he added it to a list of future improvements that would have to be made.
He and his reserves were between Haldor and the oncoming fleet of Oort. It was the best place from which to commit his reserves, and it was the best place to take on any surviving Oort that got through his main fleet. His guys were outnumbered almost four to one, though. Very poor odds. He would hold his reserves back as long as he could, but it might not be for as long as he would like. As near as he could tell, the cloaked Harbok were about an hour behind him. An hour was a long time in battle. Could his men hold on that long?
An hour later, Alliance ships suddenly began uncloaking. Uncloaked and with shields down, they quickly fell upon invisible targets. Landers immediately ordered the captain of his baseship to uncloak and drop his shields. He then ordered a complete refresh of his screens to clear the clutter of flashing symbols that depicted uncertain positions. His screens refreshed quickly, and a fleeting smile crossed his face before he got down to serious work. Yes! Shoemaker and Henderson had done their jobs well. He could not have wished for better positioning.
Oort ships began popping out of their cloaking devices briefly to fight back. As soon as they did, Alliance attackers brought the laser tagger into operation. They could then raise their own shields and re-cloak as necessary while continuing to pound away at the unsuspecting cloaked Oort. The battle coalesced as more and more An’Atee squadrons reached their assigned targets, and soon many hundreds of Oort were visible on the screens in Landers’ Tactical Operations Center. As soon as an Oort was destroyed, another cloaked Oort would come under attack and be forced drop its cloak to return fire. Soon, entire squadrons of Oort began dropping their cloaks to engage.
Landers watched the battle unfold. As squadrons of Oort uncloaked, his men started taking losses. He called a wing commander, Captain Jacobs.
“Looks to me like they’re getting their act together. We’re starting to take losses, Harv.”
“Yes, but one on one, even one on two, we’re far superior. I’ve passed the word to my guys that when anyone comes under attack from three or more Oort, they’re to cloak and pull back, then select another target and reengage.”
“Good thinking, Harv. I’ll pass the directive on from here as well. We’re making big dents in them. Can’t say how long the rest of the Oort fleet will stay cloaked. The longer the better as far as I’m concerned. This is very manageable.”
“We’ve got great ships, sir, and the crews are magnificent.”
“Okay. Holler if you need help. I’m moving in closer just in case.”
“Yes, sir.”
Suddenly, the Oort seemed to decide their cloaking devices were worthless because they turned all of them off. Alliance ships fought back hard. Some fell, but the advanced capabilities of the An’Atee ships proved their value against the Oort. Computers didn’t fail. Flying the ships was intuitive. Cloaking devices worked well.
Landers committed his reserves as soon as he had a complete picture. He headed right into the center of the Oort, his escorts and the guns of his baseship blasting away. Unexpectedly, his baseship acted like a magnet to the Oort. The captain of the baseship spent a lot more time cloaked than he would have preferred, but he could not risk the 75,000 members of his crew. He fought hard but judiciously.
Landers, from his position in the Tactical Operations Center, grasped the significance quickly. The Oort knew who was commanding this battle, and most of their efforts were now focused on this one ship. Did they not know command was decen
tralized? More important, if that was their way, the Oort might have just revealed an important aspect of their own strategy. They might have only one command ship.
He and his staff studied Oort ship movements but could not detect any one ship that remained out of the action. He gave serious consideration to taking out the Oort prime ships, but he decided his losses would increase if he did, and he abandoned the idea. His men, so far, had focused on individual fighters before taking on the larger ships, and the strategy was working. He shelved the idea, but he made a mental note to reconsider it in future battle plans.
The arrival of the Harbok came as a great relief. Landers pulled his ships back and gave the Harbok free reign. He ordered his wing commanders to regroup, then head back to Haldor to assist there. He left one reserve wing in place, uncloaked and unshielded, to search for any Oort ships that remained cloaked. As it turned out, there were quite a few of them. The Harbok gratefully accepted vectors to the unsuspecting Oort.
Chapter Twenty-seven
Grayson jumped his small fleet out of Haldor’s system, regrouped, then jumped back in. He jumped as far into Haldor’s system as he could, re-cloaked, then began a long, curving approach to the Oort that would provide an intercept from ahead and abeam the Oort fleet as it raced toward Haldor.
Angie, uncloaked but far from the action, provided vectors, allowing Grayson to remain cloaked until the last half hour. He needed the half hour to get his ships into position and synchronize the timers aboard each ship.
At the half hour mark, his ships uncloaked and refined their positions. Then the timing devices came online. The Oort fleet changed course twice during that time, and Grayson was forced to adjust the trajectory of his own ships to match, sending a clear signal to the Oort that their cloaking devices were not hiding them.
Minutes from intercept, the Oort uncloaked. All of them. As they did so, they turned away from Grayson’s oncoming fleet, small though it was. This maneuver provided them with more time to engage Grayson’s ships before they flashed by at unthinkable speed. It did not give them a lot more opportunity, but it gave them a little.
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