Triumph & Defeat (Shaitan Wars Book 4)

by Sudipto Majumdar

  “Even if I kill none of the ships of the Hadean fleet, but cause significant damage to most of them then the single colony of Beta Shaitan would be stretched beyond its means to repair over a hundred ships. Depending on the damage we cause, it would take them at least a decade if not more to repair all the ships. Even if the Shaitans decide to repair only a few ships and launch an early attack, then the outcome would be no worse than the course you are suggesting Daniella.

  “No… We cannot let too many of the ships of the Hadean fleet escape unscathed. It is decided, we don’t have too much time we need to reprogram those MKK-1 missiles now… Capt. Nugent, I believe Lt. Ramu is the weapons targeting wizard for the MKK-1 munitions. Get him to reprogram the missiles’ detonation timing to ensure that at least 80% of the ships have probability of receiving at least 50% of the damage required to kill a Shaitan warship. There is no need to detonate the missiles successively as originally planned. He can detonate them all together to cover a wider area and ensure better hit rate, as long as the damage is at least 50%. As soon as he has done so and tested the simulation, have it uploaded to the MKK-1 munitions. We don’t have a moment to lose. That will be all captains, you have work to do.” With those words, Justin cut off the line to let his two captains get to work. He put in a silent prayer that he had made the right decision and that history would not judge him harshly.

  Ramu got time to do just one iteration of testing his reprogrammed attack parameters on the simulator. The MKK-1 missiles were straining just to keep up with the deceleration of the Hadean fleet. There was hardly any spare thrust vector available to the missiles to perform minor targeting adjustments for the repositioning that would be required for the modified attack vector that Ramu was reprogramming. So Ramu had to upload the program as early as possible which gave him almost no time. After the programs had been uploaded and the MKK-1 missiles started thrusting to execute the modified attack vector, Ramu relived the anxiety of his college days after an exam, when one is paranoid that he may not have written the correct answer, and there is nothing that can be done about it now. He did now what he had done during his college days – pray.

  ---XXX---

  Commodore Justin Brogan was a veteran and a pioneer of the Alpha Shaitan campaign. If there was someone who had seen enough space battles in his life, it had to be Cdr. Brogan. Yet this was to be the most surreal space battle he would observe in his life.

  The real time feed from the telescope had gotten slightly more detailed as they came closer to the Hadean fleet, but the computer still needed to draw an outline around the Shaitan warships for the human eyes to be able to distinguish them. There wasn’t enough light this far out away from the Sun a third of a light year away to illuminate the ships, so there was no hope of human eyes seeing the Shaitan warships unassisted however close they got.

  That situation changed suddenly as individual Shaitan warships started glowing. The Intrepid and Magellan had already passed by the Hadean fleet by the time the Shaitan warships started glowing, since the two human ships were at the same velocity as the MKK-1 missiles and passed the Hadean fleet at the same time as the MKK-1 missiles detonated and impacted the Hadean fleet. The attack and its impact on the Hadean fleet was being recorded by multiple cameras aboard the two human ships at nearly a million frames per second, the current limit of recording technology.

  In addition it was also being recorded by a few probes released by the two ships a few months before the attack, which had been allowed to drift far behind the ship. That way there would be recordings of the attack’s impact both from behind the line of attack where the probes currently were, as well as from front where the human ships currently were. The high speed recordings would be dispatched to the command HQ, where military personnel and weapons designers would pore over them for thousands of hours to analyze the effect of the first of its kind attack that the USC had executed on an enemy.

  Justin was watching the feed slowed down by a factor of over five hundred. That was the only way a human could make any sense and analyze the impact of such a high speed attack. He noticed that the computer stopped drawing outlines for some of the ships as they started glowing. The glow according to the computer was in the infrared, so they would still not have been visible to the naked eye. Jason reckoned that the ships which still needed an outline to be drawn by the computer were either not hit at all or were hit by too few grains of sand to have made any significant impact. He would have to make a detailed analysis of those Shaitan warships later to assess how many of them escaped completely unscathed.

  For the moment, Jason’s attention stayed riveted on the Shaitan warships of the Hadean fleet that had started glowing. Some of those ships kept glowing brighter, till the computer switched those ships’ to visible light. At this point the ships that were glowing in visible light were all in dull red, but some of those got brighter and changed their color to yellow, and other kept on going brighter into light blue and then white. Two of the Shaitan ships actually exploded, but most of the superheated ships were simply losing their distinct shape and transforming into a rough ball of molten slag, red, yellow, blue and white in color.

  Each grain of sand that embedded on the hull of a Shaitan added heat worth a ton of TNT to the hull of the ship. Since the grains of sand impacted only once side of the ships, this unlucky side’s temperature quickly shot up. The multilayered hull of the Shaitan consisted of outer layers made of carbon and ceramic which were poor conductors of heat and inner layers made of metals which were good conductors. The outer layers initially did not spread the heat around the entire surface, but absorbed it till it reached its limit and started melting, leaving holes at the point of impact.

  If no more sand hit in the vicinity of that spot of the hull then that was it, the internal systems of the ships around that spot survived with most of the external sensors totaled and the hull sporting a nasty scar at that point. If more sand hit near the vicinity of that spot, then the internal metal layer of the hull took the hit and heated up rapidly and spread the heat all across the ship. This helped in keeping the local temperature lower below the melting point but taxed the electrical systems, sensors and the environmental system of the entire ship ensuring ship wide alarms went off blaring. Some of the electrical and environmental systems failed forcing the Shaitan crew to get into emergency disaster procedures they practiced in drills.

  If more sand hit the spot, then the outer layer could not spread the heat fast enough to prevent melting and that section of the ship opened up to space resulting in explosive and catastrophic failure of integrity in that section of the ship. The unfortunate Shaitan crew stationed in that section of the ship would almost certainly die a painful death.

  For the few unfortunate ships which got more than their fair share of sand blast, one side of the ship was filled with such molten spots and the molten material entered the insides of the ship, heating up the other side with the molten slag from the inside. For those doomed ships, nothing could stop the heating process until the entire ship had transformed into a rough ball of molten slag.

  ---XXX---

  Warmaster Resolve knew that he had misread the attack and its weaponry, and that his fleet was in deep trouble. He knew that he might be looking at a major setback if not an outright defeat. His own position might be untenable, but that was nothing compared to the existential threat to his beings that this attack implied. Yet, the warrior in him could not help but appreciate the sublime beauty and style of this strike from the Ka-Baal.

  Resolve was in his combat suit, as were all his being in all the vessels of the Grand Coalition fleet. He had hurriedly ordered the evasion plan when he realized the sneaky and audacious strike plan of the Ka-Baal. He was thankful that he had re-institutionalized the warrior practice of requiring to don the combat suit once the battle alarm was raised on a vessel. His beings used to follow this practice long time ago, but that discipline had slipped because their beings had not met another species capable of hurting t
heir vessels for hundreds of millions of cycles. They certainly had met one now in the form of Ka-Baal, and it was good that the warriors were in their combat suit. From the damage analysis that Resolve was sensing aboard his vessel as well as many others, it was clear that his ship as well as some of the others were open to space. The combat suits might just help save lives as well as help those warriors save the ships themselves by being able run emergency procedures.

  Resolve did not have to busy himself with running the affairs of the vessel he was on. There was a master for the vessel who took care of all the operations of the ship. He just needed to be cognizant of his duties for his own safety and those of his fellow beings, the same as any other warrior on this vessel. He noticed that his section of the ship was intact, and there was no critical lifesaving task that needed done on this section of his ship. So he went back to the fleet’s damage analysis. Thankfully most of the sensors in his section of his vessel were functioning, so he could receive reports from all the vessels capable of sending them, and inspect through the scanners and sensors the ships that were incapable of sending reports.

  It was an unmitigated disaster. No vessel in the Grand Coalition Fleet had escaped some amount of damage, however minor. He could see that some vessels had received very minor damage, such that they could proceed to a battle with small scrape and paint job to replace some of the outer hull shielding. These vessels could probably get into battle even without any repairs if needed. Unfortunately most of the vessels of the fleet did not fall in this category.

  Most of the vessels would require a fair amount of time at the building stations to get them battle ready once more. It was not just gaping holes on the vessels that needed to be repaired, but several of the internal systems would need to be inspected and replaced. The vessels with more severe damage included ones with their engines and propulsion system compromised. Such vessels may not even be repairable, or desirable for the warriors to go into battle with such repaired vessels. These may have to be mothballed and their parts cannibalized.

  Then there were the unlucky vessels that had been destroyed completely and unambiguously. The cause of explosion of two the vessels would have to be explored, but it was most likely nuclear munitions being heated catastrophically. The storage of the munitions was designed to prevent such an eventuality, but no engineering solution was 100% fool proof. The ones that turned into a ball of slag were morbidly fascinating for Resolve to taste. Here was an end to a vessel, even he had not surmised as possible. The Ka-Baal truly were masters of creativity when it came to designing new ways of killing their enemy.

  Fortunately the number of vessels that met their outright doom was small. He would do a detailed damage assessment later, right now he needed to understand this attack and set up vigilance to prevent any further attack of this type. Another such strike would wipe the Grand Coalition fleet for sure. Resolve had anticipated the Ka-Baal strike accurately, but had misread the nature of the attack.

  He had responded anticipating a conventional missile attack, when all simulations indicated that such a high speed missile attack at this angle was not possible. He had ignored this fact, assuming that either the Ka-Baal somehow had better technology to be able to target moving vessels with missiles at such high speed and angle, or this was an attack of desperation, but more likely this was an act of deception to keep the attention of his being focused somewhere, when the real attack might be happening somewhere else. It turned out to be none of those three option, but instead it was an attack using munitions that have never been seen by his beings before. The strike could still be part of an elaborate deception, but the strike was devastating enough in itself!

  He needed to consult his closest confidante and kindred spirit on this fleet. Every Warmaster had one, for Resolve it was Seer Taste of Logic. Taste of Logic was the eldest of the curious caste accompanying the fleet and the being the Warmaster would consult for anything involving technology or science. He needed to understand the attack and how to counter such an attack in the future.

  Taste of Logic was in his assigned niche, opposite to the one assigned to the Warmaster. Resolve could taste his virtual presence, although he could not make out what Seer Taste of Logic was doing at the moment. No doubt Seer Logic must be analyzing the attack just like Resolve was doing, but from a technology angle. Resolve wanted to reach out and taste his slime. It was the assurance of a kindred spirit that he needed right now. Unfortunately they were in their combat suits and it would not be advisable to get out of them. So he connected to Seer Taste of Logic virtually to seek his counsel.

  They exchanged emotions, information and speculations simultaneously and at various levels in the unique high speed way that only a Shaitan with the unique brain structure and chemical signaling system could do. At a conversational level, their dialogue went somewhat in the following fashion.

  “Seer Logic, I know it is too early to be asking this question, but do you have any idea of the munitions used in this strike by the Ka-Baal. It is obvious they did not use their usual missiles.”

  “As a matter of fact, I do have some idea of the nature of munition used in this strike, Warmaster. I just replayed the recordings of the attack and got a confirmation of what I was looking for to support my hypothesis. It is a weapon of extreme simplicity, yet supremely elegant, and as you can taste for yourself, enormously effective. I am a bit embarrassed that we curious caste never thought of such a beautiful weapon.”

  “Do not blame yourself or your caste Seer Logic, it is the primary duty of the Warriors to come out with weapons concepts, and neither did we think of whatever this is. It is clear that the Ka-Baal are not just competent but extremely creative warriors. We as a species might have been getting too proud, and it is time for us to show some humility and learn from the Ka-Baal.”

  “I agree Warmaster. Let me explain the concept which is so simple that it is embarrassing. Although it works particularly well with the higher speed that the Ka-Baal vessels manage to generate, but it would work fairly well even with the kind of speed our war vessels can manage. The Ka-Baal literally threw sand at us, or something very similar in size and consistency!”

  “Sand! I am not sure what you mean Seer!”

  “I was incredulous too, and hence I was looking at the recording of the attack to check and validate my hypothesis, and I found this…”

  Seer Logic sent the recording made in the direction of the human attack a few milliseconds before the actual strike. Resolve could taste the tiny explosions of the MKK-1 rockets fractions of a second before the MKK-1 missiles were to intercept the Hadean fleet. The controlled detonation of the MKK-1 missiles spread the regolith sand stored in the missiles in a tightly programmed shape to maximize the efficacy of the strike.

  “That Warmaster, was the proof I was looking for to validate my hypothesis. Let me explain some basics about how much kinetic energy even a grain of sand can carry at that velocity…”

  Seer Logic explained the theory on which the MKK-1 missile was designed. It filled Resolve with a sense of awe and respect. Respect for the being who would have first thought of this magnificent method of killing a ship. Little did Warmaster Resolve know that the person who had first thought of this strike concept had just passed him by, moments earlier.

  Warmaster Resolve the warrior strategist that he was, started thinking of military strategies to try and defend against such an attack. He started appreciating this weapon even more, as he realized how difficult it would be for the target to evade such an attack. The beauty of the weapon was that it did not need to be very accurate to damage the enemy war vessel. It was a spread area weapon which needed to burst in the general vicinity of its target. It was nary impossible to evade it once the weapon had gone off.

  The only defense that the Warmaster could think against such a weapon was advance warning… not the kind he had received before the attack, but much more advanced warning. It had to be a warning that was received many cycles before the Ka-Baal ships
could intercept their fleet. Then a Warmaster could change course of their fleet to such a vector that would make it either next to impossible for the attacking Ka-Baal fleet to intersect the path of their fleet at high speed, or make that intersection happen at 90⁰ angle. In both cases the very high speed of the attacking Ka-Baal fleet would work against them.

  The high speed of the attacking Ka-Baal fleet meant that it could not move a lot laterally before they crossed the general position of their target’s fleet. So if a Warmaster had enough warning, he could apply emergency acceleration and move as fast as possible laterally and hope that the Ka-Baal don’t respond quickly enough. That way the attacking Ka-Baal fleet would miss their target. If the Warmaster was lucky, there might be some cover behind which he could duck his fleet like an asteroid or a planet.

  If none of these was possible, then the Warmaster would at least have time to change the vector of the direction the fleet travels, so that the Ka-Baal fleet would intersect the trajectory of the fleet of their beings at as close to 90⁰ as possible. Such an attack would be least effective at that angle. The high speed of the Ka-Baal attack would work against them, because the accuracy of timing and targeting required even for a cloud of sand at that angle and at that high speed is incredibly demanding, resulting in the least effective strike.

  So he had a strategy to foil this new weapon of the Ka-Baal, but there was a huge practical problem. He had assumed (fantasized actually), that he would have ample warning in terms of many cycles before such an attack. That was a fantasy. The Ka-Baal attack fleet would come in cold, just like they did in this strike. There was no way to detect them. Even now, the scanners of the Grand Coalition fleet had not been able to detect the actual Ka-Baal ships that had carried out the attack, which must surely be there somewhere in the vicinity.

  Just as Warmaster was wondering where the Ka-Baal strike warships might be, Scent of Stars connected from the controls station. “Warmaster we have detected the Ka-Baal warships! They just lit up their engines! I have forwarded to feed to your tasting station. There are just two Ka-Baal warships Warmaster! I can’t believe that such devastation to our fleet was caused by just two of their warships! There must be more Ka-Baal warships who have not lit up their engines.”