The final salvo from the remaining fifty Alliance pulsar-cannon streaked down range, seeking out the last of the Ganthoran Cruisers. However, the Alliance gunners were about to be disappointed. The remaining Cruisers rode their good fortune one last time, and were missed by the white-hot searing pulsar-bolts that streaked past their hulls to smash into Destroyers and Axe-blades alike. The Trionic Cannon aboard Olympus fired once again, this time down the Ganthoran left flank. It could still only fire obliquely at the Ganthoran flanks for fear of hitting any of the surviving Eagles amongst the debris in front of the “Six-Cigar” Carriers. Once again, the surviving Ganthoran Cruisers managed to escape destruction.
The Ganthorans, having weakened the Alliance formation, then changed tactics. To close with the Alliance warships had been costly, so the Ganthoran commander ordered his surviving Cruisers and Destroyers back into the debris field in front of Third Fleet. The Cruisers and Destroyers needed some form of protection from the Trionic Cannon whilst they unleashed the surviving horde of Axe-Blades at the weakened enemy formation. The long- range bombardment had proved to be more costly than the Ganthorans had expected. However, with no single-seat fighter cover, the Axe-Blades could rampage through the Alliance formation and wreak havoc before the surviving Cruisers and Destroyers could return and finish off the survivors.
Of the twenty-five thousand Axe Blades that had joined the attack on Third Fleet’s position, fifteen thousand had survived the terrible destruction amongst the Cruisers and Destroyers. Fired up to avenge their comrades lost on the approach, the Axe-Blade pilots were ready to create a little bit of mayhem and destruction amongst the Alliance ships. As the surviving Cruisers and Destroyers turned and scampered for cover, the surviving Axe-Blades flung themselves forward at the line of damaged and shaken Alliance warships. With the cohesion of their formations broken in the approach to the Alliance ships, the Axe-Blades swarmed forwards in a great chaotic straggle.
Except that Admiral Parbe’an had his own method of dealing with fighter attacks on his large vessels. Unknown to the onrushing Axe-Blade pilots, the hull of every Alliance warship was studded with small low-yield pulsar-cannon turrets. Known as Self-Defence Turrets, each turret carried two low-yield pulsar-cannon of the same calibre as those aboard Alliance Eagles. Each Star Cruiser carried nine hundred Self-Defence Turrets. The Fleet Carriers had close to three thousand Self-Defence Turrets and the Star-Destroyer over ten thousand.
With the vast majority of the Self-Defence Turrets operated remotely by the Alliance warship’s Tactical Computers, there were very few actual live trigger fingers to be dodged and outwitted by the Axe-Blades.
Aboard the Olympus, the Senior WATO on Admiral Parbe’an’s staff was well aware of what was approaching. It had taken her only a few seconds to pass the order to link all of the Tactical Computers in Third Fleet to the tactical Computer aboard the Olympus. As the Ganthoran Axe-Blades streaked into their attack, the linked Tactical Computers were rapidly crunching the number and permutations; calculating the Threat Potential of every Ganthoran fighter. Based on the known capabilities of the Axe-Blade fighter, the Tactical Computers could approximate how threatening each individual fighter was to the Alliance formation. With its speed, weaponry, and expected proximity to every vulnerable Alliance ship, the Tactical Computers allocated a Threat Potential Score; this, in turn, was fed into the Firing Solution. The remotely operated Self-Defence Turrets would target each individual fighter based on its Threat Potential Score. The higher the Threat Potential of the fighter, the higher up it appeared on the targeting priority in the Firing Solution. The more dangerous you were, the sooner the Self-Defence Turrets would seek you out.
As the horde of Ganthoran Axe-Blades approached Third Fleet’s position, the billions of calculations and permutations were being calculated every second.
Aboard the Olympus, Admiral Parbe’an held the Self-Defence Turrets in readiness when the Axe-Blades were close enough not to be able to avoid the weapons fire. First Admiral Caudwell had used a similar tactic against the Bardomil almost a year before, with devastating results. Almost twenty thousand Bardomil Harpoon fighters had fallen to the guns of the Aquarius and two hundred Eagles in that battle.
In the war Room aboard Aquarius, Billy Caudwell was watching the Ganthoran Axe-Blade attack being pushed home on the three-dimensional War Table image. He had just seen Third Fleet drive off the Ganthoran Cruisers and Destroyers. The losses in Third Fleet had been heavy; four Star Cruisers was more than any Fleet had lost, to date, in the Universal Alliance military. However, Billy considered it could have been much worse. Like everyone else, he had stopped breathing for those few seconds when the stricken Star Cruiser had almost crashed into one of the Fleet Carriers. The battle in the debris field in front of the Ganthoran Carriers was still going on; the Eagles of Third Fleet were still somehow surviving in the maze and warrens of debris against the hordes of single seated Axe-Blade fighters’ pitched against them.
Now, the real battle was back in front of Third Fleets’ formation. The great cluster of Ganthoran Axe-Blades was rapidly cutting down the distance to Third Fleets’ position. In a few more seconds, they would be within range to utilise their Screaming Death weaponry. However, Billy Caudwell knew that against the Force Shielding of Third Fleet, it would be less effective than if they had support from Destroyers and Cruisers. Billy knew that Parbe’an would wait until the Axe-Blades couldn’t avoid the Self-Defence Turrets of his surviving ships. Then, in a few moments of sheer cold-blooded murder, Parbe’an would blast the single-seat fighters to oblivion.
Meanwhile, Admiral Parbe’an was holding his Self-Defence Turrets in readiness. The Senior WATO had repeated for the hundredth time that Optimal Firing Solution was ready. Admiral Parbe’an was already well aware that the Firing Solution would be effective, but he had his own particular twist to add to the situation.
Watching on the three-dimensional War Table image, Billy Caudwell could see the tiny Ganthoran Axe-Blades rapidly closing the range with Third Fleet’s position. In the pell-mell dash to attack the Alliance position, the Ganthoran Axe-Blade pilots were racing with one another for the honour of being the first to break into the enemy formation. All reason and military logic appeared to have deserted the Ganthoran pilots, and their fighter controllers. In an instant, the great blizzard of small single-seat fighters hurtled forwards with no regard for the possible consequences. At ten kilometres from contact, the Ganthoran pilots began to select their targets, and started to peel away to attack the individual Star Cruisers in Third Fleet’s defensive position.
Again, to Billy Caudwell there seemed to be no logic or reason for what the Ganthoran pilots were doing. The battle madness must be on them, Billy considered as the only explanation for the Ganthorans’ inexplicable and extraordinarily unprofessional behaviour. Billy watched the distance numerals on the side of the three-dimensional War Table image drop down to below six kilometres in range. At that moment, the Ganthoran fighters; their red, tear-drop weapons pods deployed, opened fire on the Alliance formation.
Without the heavy weapons of the Cruisers and Destroyers to support them, the Axe-Blades’ weapons fire was little more than an irritant to the Alliance warships. With Force Shielding set at only ten metres from the hull surface, the Alliance ships with functioning Force Shielding simply absorbed the blows and waited for their moment to respond. The ships with weakened Force Shielding weathered the barrage of low-level Ganthoran weaponry as best they could. Unfortunately, for the Ganthoran pilots, most of the vulnerable Alliance ships had already been dispatched by the Cruisers and Destroyers in the exchange of heavy weapons fire. What remained on the Alliance firing line may have been damaged and bruised, but they could still fight with their Self-Defence Turrets. There were going to be very few, if any, weak spots in the Alliance formation for the Ganthorans to exploit.
At two thousand metres, point blank range in space terms, Third Fleet’s surviving vessels prepared to reply to the Ganthoran fig
hters that were still trying to strafe their position with their hopelessly inadequate weaponry. The Ganthoran pilots had chosen the warships they planned to attack, unwittingly making the job of the Tactical Computers linked to the Self-Defence Turrets that little bit easier. One again, the Tactical Computers crunched the numbers, making the billions of calculations every second that delivered the updated Optimal Firing Solution to the Senior WATO aboard the Olympus. This, however, was the all-important Optimal Firing Solution. The Ganthorans would pass the two thousand metre mark before the Tactical Computers could calculate another one.
With baited breath aboard Aquarius and every other ship in the Alliance Fleets, the crews waited for the hammer blow to fall on the Ganthoran fighters hurtling towards their own doom and devastation.
At two thousand metres, Admiral Parbe’an gave the fire order to the Senior WATO. So, it was with one deft push of a small blue button on a console aboard the Star Destroyer Olympus that a nightmare volley of computer-targeted low-yield pulsar-bolts was unleashed. Tens of thousands of Self-Defence Turrets; set to rapid fire, lit up the Ganthoran attack like hundreds of thousands of tiny fireflies. But every single one of those fireflies spelt destruction for the Ganthoran fighters. In the face of an almost solid wall of low-yield pulsar-bolts, the first ranks of Ganthoran Axe-Blades stood little, or no, chance of survival. The first ranks of Axe-Blades simply vanished in a huge wall of tiny red and orange explosions. Like tiny stars sparkling in the evening sky, thousands of Ganthoran pilots perished in the burning maelstrom of destruction.
For most, their destruction was mercifully painless and instantaneous, but for some, who struggled to regain control of damaged fighters, their last few moments were of terror and desperation. For those who were blessed with inordinate good fortune or supremely fast reflexes, the first moments were a nightmare of destruction. They saw comrades that they had served and flown with scythed down by the Alliance’s gunfire in a few short moments of indescribable savagery. Barely aware of what was happening within a few yards of their own cockpits, the Ganthoran pilots struggled desperately to make sense of the exploding nightmare around them. Focussed entirely on survival, the more fortunate Ganthoran pilots dodged and weaved their fighters, violently, through the hail of Alliance pulsar-bolts.
However, for some of them, the avoidance of one Alliance pulsar-bolt brought them squarely into the path of another. For many, their previous good fortune ran out very swiftly. In a few moments, more than a third of the Ganthoran fighters were annihilated. Worse was about to follow.
When Parbe’an had given the Senior WATO the order to open fire, he had also instructed the Senior Engineering Officer to extend the Force Shielding of Olympus and the other Alliance vessels to their full capacity. The maximum distance an Alliance warship could deploy its Force-Shielding from the hull surface was three kilometres. As the white-hot stream of pulsar-bolts from the Self-Defence Turrets streaked away to find their Ganthoran targets, the Alliance warships disengaged their Force Shielding generators for the split-second it required for them to re-calibrate.
Half a second later, with the deadly stream of low-yield pulsar-bolts snaking outwards to hunt down more Ganthoran fighters, the Alliance warships; with their Force Shielding generators screaming at maximum output, re-initiated the defensive screen. At three thousand metres distance, the Force Shielding would never stop a wave of Screaming Death from a Ganthoran Cruiser or Destroyer, but it would stop the weak and fragile structure of a Ganthoran Axe-Blade fighter. Admiral Parbe’an had calculated well. With a kilometre of clearance between the first volley of the Self-Defence Turrets gunfire and the wall of Force Shielding, the Ganthoran pilots who survived the first salvo, or who were behind the first ranks, would not be able to avoid the collision.
The stunned survivors of the first rank of Ganthoran fighters; many momentarily blinded by their exploding comrades around them, were too busy trying to avoid the hail of white-hot pulsar-bolts that filled their entire world in a few brief moments. Those behind the first ranks suddenly found themselves facing the horror of Alliance pulsar-bolts and running a gauntlet of debris from exploding fighters all about them as they sped forwards. Once more, the debris from exploding and damaged fighters caused damage to their neighbours compounding the destruction and devastation of the battle. And, as the Ganthoran pilots struggled to comprehend what was happening around them, to avoid the Alliance gunfire and the debris of their comrades’ fighters, they slammed, at high speed, into the Force Shielding.
Whilst the volley of fire from the Self-Defence Turrets had struck the Ganthoran fighters down randomly in their attack run, the Force Shielding struck down its victims like a rampaging bulldozer as it smashed forward into position Almost ten thousand Ganthoran Axe-Blades slammed into the invisible wall of Force Shielding. At full attack speed, the Ganthoran pilots had no chance of avoiding the deadly impact. Like explosive bullets, the Ganthoran fighters hurtled towards the invisible wall of Force Shielding oblivious to its existence. Like explosive bullets, they detonated on impact.
On the three-dimensional War Table image, Billy Caudwell saw the Ganthoran fighters race through the gauntlet of weapons fire, only to shatter themselves against Parbe’an’s Force Shielding trap. The tiny strands of Self-Defence Turret fire had torn into the Ganthoran attack, cutting the first ranks to ribbons, whilst giving the three-dimensional image the distinctive and disturbing twinkling and glittering effect.
This told Billy that large numbers of Ganthorans were falling to the weapon fire. However, when the Ganthorans hit the Force Shielding trap, the image was more of a sinister sunlight bouncing from the tops of gentle waves on a river. The orange and yellow flames of destruction were laced through with the silver and yellow of the explosion light, reflecting and refracting from the Force Shielding. The impact, being in one plane of vision, further enhanced the horrifyingly beautiful illusion on the War Table image.
The destruction of the Ganthoran fighters was not over yet. Having watched thousands of their comrades smash into the Alliance Force Shielding, many Ganthoran pilots tried to avoid the impact by climbing, diving or banking their fighters away from the exploding inferno in front of them. The great curtain of deadly flashing and exploding light that materialised before them activated the survival instincts of the Ganthoran fighter pilots. A form of controlled panic seized many, prompting violent manoeuvres to avoid this strange flashing and shimmering curtain of destruction that was being shot through by tens of thousands of Alliance pulsar-bolts. Admiral Parbe’an had still not ordered a cease-fire on the Self-Defence Turrets. Consequently, more and more disorientated, stunned and confused Ganthoran pilots were still falling to the gunfire.
For some Ganthoran pilots who had the good fortune to be on the fringes of the attack, there would be several seconds of heart-stopping terror as they applied all their might to the simple controls of their fighters. For others, the electro-magnetic drive of their Axe-Blade fighters would not respond quickly enough to the controls. For them, there was a brief and pointless struggle: of supreme exertion, and a few moments of terror before oblivion would claim them in the red-roaring flames of destruction. Such was the fate of the fighter pilot.
When it was over, and the explosion from the last destroyed attacking Axe-Blade fighter had been silenced of its echo, the surviving Ganthorans sat in horrified and dejected silence. Even the fighter controllers had fallen silent. There was just no way into this Alliance formation without massive losses.
In utter dejection, one of the few surviving Ganthoran Squadron Officers took charge of the survivors. In silence, they set a course to fly above the right flank of the Alliance position. The Officer decided to give the enemy a wide berth. They would return to the formation of Cruisers and Destroyers that had retired to the debris field after the initial bombardment of the Alliance formation. There, they would prepare to face whatever consequences befell those who disobeyed a direct attack order from the General. The confident, almost reckless Gantho
ran fighter pilots who had raced into the attack only a few minutes before now crept back into their own lines; dejected and defeated. They were in no hurry to return to the harsh discipline of the Ganthoran military structure.
As they flew over the Alliance warships, a few stray pulsar-bolts zipped harmlessly past the battered and bruised survivors to speed off into the oblivion of space. Looking down on the Alliance formation, the Ganthoran pilots could see the octagonal shape of the Star-Destroyer Olympus flanked by the two Fleet Carriers, and, in front of them, the surviving Star Cruisers. The Star Cruisers were setting up a ragged volley of high-yield pulsar-bolts at the Cruisers and Destroyers hidden in the debris field of the bombardment.
With the Axe-Blade attack having failed, the Cruisers and Destroyers had opened fire again from the safety of the debris of their own comrades. It seemed to be a very half-hearted volley from the Alliance ships after the terror and violence of the Axe-Blades attack. Both sides had been badly mauled, and were in a much more weakened condition than at the outset of the battle.
The surviving Ganthoran Axe-Blade pilots stared down at the debris field, their senses numbed by the shock and horror of it all. Staring down at the remains of their comrades, the Ganthoran pilots wondered if any of them would still be alive at the end of this battle. There would likely be court-martial for many, especially the Squadron Officers. But, at least, many considered, with a court-martial, there was a small chance of survival. Facing these Alliance creatures with their guns and shielding left them with no chance of survival.
Time Commander (The First Admiral Series) Page 7
