“They are not stopping” advised Crystal.
“What do we do” asked Sue.
“We wait for a response from down below” replied Ivan “but in the meantime we work up some options.”
“They’re launching fighters from down below” announced Derick “Seventeen…no twenty.”
“Well I think that clarifies the situation” said Ivan.
“The bogeys are heading full steam to the planet” announced Crsytal. “They will be within missile engagement range in fifteen minutes.”
Ivan felt under intense pressure. He knew that with Dave and Jeb down below it would be his call to engage or not.
“Another 20 fighters taking off” announced Derick.
“Are we going to engage?” asked Sue. “TG Bala won’t have a choice. There could be a Division or more of troops in those transports.”
Normally they would have prearranged responses and lines of command established with the Control on the planet. But they had not yet set these up. In the absence of any word from Neeblo Control the decision to commit would be his.
Sue was working her controls rapidly. She had already set the enemy objective for Lewista and had seeded the relative missiles table up on the main screen. It made for sobering reading.
The enemy with eleven caps and 14 lights was estimated to have over 4,000 ship missiles. Sue had assumed one of the caps was a carrier and so all up they had 180 fighters with a load out of 1080 fighter missiles. All up they were estimated to have over 5,000 missiles.
Opposing that, their flotilla had just over 700 ship missiles, about 75% their normal assignment, plus 192 fighter missiles (24 fighters x 8). The Bala group was estimated to be at 100% and hence had 660 ship missiles plus 96 fighter missiles (16 x 6). So far there were 60 ground based fighters with 6 each, totalling 360. So apart from ground based batteries they had 1360 ship missiles and 646 fighter missiles. All up it amounted to just over 2,000 space borne missiles.
“What do you reckon they have in ground based missiles?” asked Sue. “3,000?”
“No make it 1,000. They shot off most against the 1st RIF a few days ago.”
“Right” said Sue ending the word with a flat tone. “So they outnumber us 5 to 3. Transports or ships?”
Ivan had been pondering that since he sat down. “I wish I knew what our friends below had in terms of ground troops.”
“They must have at least a Corps. Probably an Army” proffered Jasmin.
“Yeah but spread all over the planet” said Art. “That facility where they developed that mass exchanger that will be the top priority, then Lewista.”
“Yeah I agree” said Ivan. “Add in another objective for it Sue.”
“So Ships then?” asked Sue. “Their ground forces can clean up any that gets through.”
“And if they don’t have enough ground troops at that facility to defend it?” asked Derick.
His contribution surprised and impressed Ivan. Ivan gave him a nod of acknowledgement and said “Yes we can’t afford that risk. No we’ll go for the transports in lieu of any direction from down below. Still nothing Val?”
She shook her head without turning to face Ivan. She was busy working up her signals.
“Alright Sue, what have you got for us.”
Sue was working the controls in a feverish manner. She took a good half minute and finally said “There!”
On the holo were two Course of Action (COA), the first was marked in blue and the intercept route went up and over the solar plane and would see their formation striking the enemy’s left flank with a beam attack and diving through and away before turning and coming back. It was all under impulse power.
The second option was in green and the intercept route was under the solar plane before rising and striking the left flank of the enemy from a significant distance with missiles. It was a glancing angle that would allow them to bank and accelerate back out of enemy range before a rinse and repeat.
“Simulation results coming up” announced Sue.
“Ooh” said Ivan as he noted first the green COAs results which were bad and then the blue results which were better but not by much.
“There are just so many enemy ships” explained Sue.
“There are too many ships for us to go toe to toe” announced Ivan. “We need to deal with this in stages. We’ll go with blue COA but we warp away after the beam, just far enough to get us out of enemy missile range.”
Sue popped up a sphere around the intercept loc and set it to 50K range, which was beyond the max range of the enemy missiles. She marked a warp loc and asked “Here do?”
“Yeah that will do.”
“The odds are they’ll get down before we do our second strike” said Sue “running simulation now.”
“Yeah maybe but they have to deal with Bala and those fighters. They will slow them up, hopefully long enough for us to make another run in.”
Sue quickly did some analysis using her terminal. “If they can hold them up for twenty two minutes” said Sue.
“That’s a long time” stated Crystal.
Ivan nodded to her but said to Sue “OK set it up Sue. Val, signals to the rest of the flotilla, Bala, the boss and Neeblo Control.”
“On it.”
“Art can you work the cyber?”
“I think so.”
“Target the nearest enemy cap to us as we make our beam run.”
“Right” said Art.
“Crystal you take the beam. Derick you standby on missiles but only fire on my order. Switch all close in defences to auto.”
“The plans up now” advised Sue.
Ivan scanned the plan Sue had prepared. The waypoints looked good. The beam release point looked the right range from the intercept. The warp loc looked good. He tapped the control on his station to confirm. “Confirmed! Now let’s pray the other ships follow our lead. Otherwise it’s going to be mighty lonely out there.”
“Here are the messages” announced Val.
Ivan kept an eye on the countdown. He had just two minutes. He scanned the messages. They looked good enough. He signed off on them.
“More fighters launching from down below” announced Derick. “They have forty up with Bala, another twenty on the way.”
LCmd Li Nahn, commander of the 11th Fighter Squadron aboard the Resolute hailed from his cubby hole on F deck “Do you plan to have us launch in support of group Bala?”
“No Li, we’re going to intercept these enemy transports. But stay ready.”
“Right you are.”
The countdown showed 31 seconds.
Chapter 11. Neeblo 1336, 21 September
A whole minute passed before Felis was hailed about the incoming bogeys. He was enjoying a mouthful of food and did not appreciate having to swallow it down fast. He listened briefly, told the caller he was on his way and then announced “Looks like the 4th RIF, with lots of transports, has just warped in 100,000 out. They are not responding to our hails and are heading this way fast. We need to move to the operations room now.”
“We need to get back up” said Jeb to Dave.
“Too late for that now” said Dave as he stood up and moved his chair away. “We won’t make it and Ivan needs a free hand up there, not worrying about protecting us.” Dave could see the anguish on Jeb’s face. He grabbed Jeb’s arm and directed him towards the column of people now moving out of the dining room.
By the time they entered the operations room and were directed to observer seats five minutes had passed from first contact. Dave scanned the holo and could see the fighter icons climbing to geo around group Bala. There was a ghosted set of icons representing his flotilla. He presumed that was because they no longer knew exactly where they were because they were cloaked.
Dave looked across to Felis and saw the intense concentration on the rogan’s face. He knew exactly what he was going through. Doing the calculations and determining the best course of action. His ops officer, whose name Dave had forgotten, was busy hailing someon
e, presumably his fighter bases or missile batteries.
Felis turned back towards Dave and beckoned him to come forward and sit on his left. As Dave came forward Felis asked “How many missiles do you have?”
“Seven hundred ship and 192 fighter missiles per loadout” responded Dave and then added “We were not able to come with a full load of ship missiles.”
Felis understood but he was too focussed to acknowledge that. He wanted to curse giving up his missiles to Veego but knew it would serve no good. He looked at the tally of ground based missiles and they amounted to a pitiful 800. All 60 of his fighters were committed with 360 fighter missiles. No matter which way he looked at it they were outnumbered by at least two to one above ground.
With the enemy coming at max speed straight at them, they could not expect to get more than one strike at them. It was not going to be enough. Even if he asked and even if the humans were prepared to stand and fight toe to toe they would in most likelihood either be destroyed or heavily damaged and forced to warp away.
Felis turned to Dave, looked at his face for a prolonged moment and he realised that Dave had come to the same conclusion. “We’re not going to win up top without nukes are we?” he asked.
Dave shook his head as he replied with a “no but we may not need to win up there. Surely you must have enough ground forces to deal with whatever they have?”
Dave noticed the hesitation before Felis responded and Dave cut him off with “Shit, how much have you got on the ground?”
“We can barely muster a division and one third of that is from new recruits.”
“Then we go for their transports, while we land our ground troops. Where do you want them?”
Chapter 12. Resolute over Cheklin 1338, 21 September
They had just started to accelerate into the climb for their intercept when they got the signal from Dave via Neeblo Control.
“Belay the order” called out Ivan. “Sue can we insert the ground forces from both the Resolute and Tenacity and still intercept the enemy before or at the same time as they engage Group Bala?”
“Wait!” said Sue.
“Jasmin warn Jim and Li to be ready for an insertion” ordered Ivan.
“Sue?”
“Not sequentially” she replied. “The AI’s recommending we split the force – Caps to insert and the lights to intercept.”
“Shit” said Ivan. He knew that the only way he could orchestrate this would be to break cloak and signal the other craft, leaving the Resolute detectable to the enemy. Everyone else in the command centre knew this too and they were all looking to Ivan. “Alright show me!”
“Up now.”
Ivan saw the blue route with Resolute and Tenacity bustering down to geo to launch the insertion and the purple route with the three frigates following a modified version of his original plan.
“What’s the time lead we will have?” asked Ivan.
“About two minutes” said Sue. “We need to do it in one or we miss the option.”
“OK let’s do it. Let me know when you are ready to send the plan Sue.”
“Ready now.”
Ivan thought for a few seconds then hailed the flotilla. “Execute this plan do it now” is all he said.
“James you heard him” ordered Jasmin.
“OK hold on tight folks” hailed the pilot. The resolute powered into a dive to geo, some 20K away. They were going to cover that in five minutes. Down on G deck marines were madly clambering into their shuttles. On F deck Li’s pilots were getting into their cockpits ready to launch. The same hectic scenes were being performed on the Tenacity and for many on board it would be their first hot insertion.
“Have they taken the bait?” asked Ivan.
“Still too early to tell” said Crystal.
Chapter 13. RCS Rogintinam over Cheklin 1340, 21 September
Meeka Sallusam wore his new Fleet Admiral’s uniform with pleasure. So far he was pleased with the way things were proceeding. They would blow away this excuse of an enemy flotilla.
Before they had warped in they had conducted a little renaming ceremony for the ships of the old 4th RIF. Now they belonged to the new 1st Rogan Confederate Fleet (RCF). He was pleased about that too.
He reckoned that by the end of the day he would have his hands on the mass exchanger devices. That prospect pleased him too. It was working out to be a really good day.
The alert sounded upon the new detection. “Check that signature. Are you sure?” demanded Meeka.
“Yes Sir” said the staff officer.
“Don’t worry my love” said Admiral Haina Letnus, “we will avenge you.”
But still Meeka stared at the name. How he hated that name. He watched as the icon headed towards the south pole of the planet “Resolute indeed” he muttered. “We’ll show them true resolve.” He looked at the screen and saw that they were less than three minutes from effective range of the enemy group over Lewista. He drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair.
Chapter 14. Phantom over Cheklin 1341, 21 September
Aubrey drummed her fingers on the arm of her chair and checked the holo yet again. Her ship was now powering down from the route’s apex above the solar plane and was heading for an intercept with the enemy force. They were already within enemy missile range but so far they had remained undetected. Just another 10K – a little over two minutes.
She took a breath in and then spoke in a deliberately steady manner. “You ready Phil?”
“Yep” he replied. He did not bother to turn his head. He was all concentration now.
“Alice, you ready with the warp?”
“Yes Maam” replied Alice. There was an understandable tension in Alice’s voice.
“Tola…”
“I’m good” said Tola. She was ready to fire off 40 of their 50 missiles.
Aubrey nodded. ‘Let’s hope Spectre and Raptor are on my wings’ thought Aubrey.
“Ship’s yours Phil” announced the pilot.
Phil just nodded. A few seconds later he cried out “where the fuck did they come from? Enemy Frigate, bogey 13, 2500…engaging.”
“Target bogey 13” ordered Aubrey to Tola.
“Roger” announced Tola. “Missiles away.”
“Warp in 1” announced Alice.
Neo forgot to make his cyber announcement but he was already in on the enemy frigate and was executing his attack to offset their fire control.
“Incoming missiles” announced Tola.
“Neo?” asked Aubrey.
“Lots” said Tola. But then she spied something more urgent. “Bogey 11’s beaming….at Raptor I think.”
“I’m in” replied Neo to Aubrey and he waved his hand briefly up in the air as if to say leave me alone.
“200 enemy missiles and counting” announced Tola.
“Bogey 13’s gone…engaging transports” announced Phil.
“Forget it Phil” barked Aubrey. “Wu-lin, evasive action now.”
The pilot, Sgt Wu-lin Xi, hit the aft underbelly thrusters hard and the craft lurched forward and down. She then accelerated hard with the main drive and began a barrelling dive back below the solar plane. Aubrey could see the other two frigates and their missile tracks. Between them they had fired off 120 missiles but it looked like 300 enemy missiles were coming at the three of them.
Aubrey saw the enemy force slow and then launch its fighters, who began firing their own missiles defensively as soon as they exited.
“Warp in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1” advised Alice.
Aubrey relaxed back a little into her chair.
“I think the Raptor was hit” announced Phil. But there was no way of confirming this, not until they came out of warp.
Chapter 15. Raptor over Cheklin 1343, 21 September
It was a massive impact, direct into the drive space at the stern of the ship. The enemy cap’s beam took out the impulse engines and the ship began tumbling. The ships damage control, systems came automatically into force. The engine compa
rtment was automatically sealed and the air flushed to supress the fires. ‘It was likely the seven engineering staff were already dead from the impact anyway’ thought Hec, as he was strapped into his XO’s chair in the command centre.
‘Fuck’ said Hec to himself as he pulled up the damage control diagram on his screen.
2nd Lt Johnny Warento, the BS officer, was staring past Hec at Meg. He was stunned and speechless. 2nd Lt Lulu Kamara the CI officer was struggling to hold it together. Her left hand was shaking. She forced it to the surface of her workstation in an attempt to still it, but still it shook.
It was 2nd Lt Shivani Usman, the OPS officer who spoke first. “Are we going to make it?” She looked like she was ready to bolt for the escape pods.
The sirens were blaring while the pilot wrestled to regain control using the thrusters. Hec was desperately trying to flick through each of the damage control reports, but it was made all the more difficult by his harness. His heart was racing and he found it hard to breathe. He knew this was fear. He forced himself to focus. He glanced next to him and saw Meg recovering from the shock of the impact. He glanced back to his terminal and saw red everywhere. “We’re not going to make it” he said to Meg.
“We are going to make it” said a determined Meg.
Hec grabbed her arm and said again “No we’re not.”
Meg was struggling to come to terms with it. Her lower lip quivered and she seemed frozen.
“Abandon ship” hailed Hec.
“I’m in charge” she finally bellowed.
“There won’t be much to be in charge of” said Hec as he undid his harness. He pointed to the damage diagram. The rear half of the ship was all red on the display.
“Oh fuck!” raged Meg. She hit the self-destruct control and then her harness release control.
The close in pulse cannon and beam weapons were still firing on auto as the command staff ran down to the escape pods on A deck. Hec and Meg were the last to launch in their pod.
Meg was gritting her teeth as the pod blasted out. ‘Fuck it’ she thought. Her mind was not filled with fear about being targeted by the enemy or of not getting far enough away before the Raptor blew up. No she was thinking of how bad this would look on her record.
Resilience (Warner's World Book 6) Page 16
