Empire Ascendant

by Dietmar Wehr

  “The EG-drive won’t make much of an interception timing difference, but they won’t be able to use gravity wake detection to track it, and every bit of additional warning I can get will help. Proceed, Lieutenant,” said Saville.

  After the drone had been reprogrammed, the FTO cleared his throat and waited until Saville turned to look at him.

  “Admiral, we could do the same thing with a missile volley. Launch them now under their EG-drives to adjust their heading. They’ll pull ahead of us as we continue to decelerate, and they can be programmed to activate their L-drives when they’re within range. The enemy won’t be expecting that.”

  Saville hesitated. What the FTO was describing was a tactic that had been tried in simulations but not in the field. The sims said it should work, but no one knew for sure if it would. If the missiles’ programming or propulsion systems encountered an unforeseen problem, the entire volley could end up being a waste. But if it did work, it would give the Shogunate Admiral a hell of a shock and at least partially make up for losing the element of surprise that their scout had taken away.

  “Set up the volley, but wait for my order before we fire, Lieutenant.”

  The FTO’s enthusiasm in his acknowledgement was obvious.

  Within a surprisingly short time frame, the FTO cleared his throat again. “All ships and all missile tubes loaded. All missiles have been programmed for EG-drive maneuvers and delayed L-drive activation. Ready to fire when you give the word, Admiral.”

  Saville took a deep breath. “The word is given, FTO.”

  “First volley is away!” said the FTO seconds later. “Reloading in progress!”

  “Very good. How long until terminal guidance range?”

  “Eight and a half minutes, Admiral.”

  Saville shook his head. “Those eight minutes are going to seem like eighty.”

  Shogunate flagship (Kirishima):

  Hashimoto allowed himself a wide grin and didn’t mind if the rest of the Flag Bridge crew saw it. The single missile had destroyed the enemy’s recon drone before his fleet was detected, and the enemy fleet wouldn’t get within detection range themselves for another six minutes if they elected to switch on their own radars. He eagerly awaited to see when they would do that. His fleet would not go to active scanning. They already had enough targeting information from the enemy’s gravity wakes to get their missiles to the general vicinity of the enemy fleet, and then each missile’s own radar would guide it the rest of the way. This seemed like a good time to make a quick log entry. He was halfway finished dictating the entry when the tactical display sounded the very loud two-tone signal that incoming missiles had been detected.

  “Incoming missiles! MULTIPLE INCOMING MISSILES!” shouted the tactical officer. “Two hundred four missiles inbound! ETA eighty-nine seconds! Counter-missile tubes ready to fire. Lasers on automatic fire!”

  Hashimoto quickly got over his shock and did the math. It had to be 17 heavy cruisers.

  “How long until they’re within OUR range?” he asked.

  “Not until after their missiles arrive, sir!”

  “Then get our first volley ready and fire as soon as they’re within range without waiting for my order. Is that clear, Lieutenant?”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Hashimoto checked the timer for the incoming wave. Less than 30 seconds now. Counter-missiles had already started launching and the lasers would begin firing any second. The sidebar on the tactical display showed how many incoming missiles were still accelerating. It was already almost half of the original number and dropping fast. He held his breath until the last missile was disabled or destroyed, with less than eight seconds left.

  Atlantian Third Fleet flagship:

  Saville bit back a curse as it became obvious that all 204 missiles had been intercepted.

  “Have they started scanning us yet?” he asked.

  “Not yet, Admiral,” said the FTO.

  “Then signal the fleet to cut deceleration to zero and fire another volley, FTO.” With his order acknowledged, Saville said a silent prayer to the Gods of War to let this second volley be more fruitful. He was certain the enemy fleet would fire back any second now, and eliminating all gravity wakes would force the enemy admiral to begin active scanning in order to target Third Fleet’s ships. His own missiles would then home in on the enemy’s radar signals. If that didn’t work, then he and Third Fleet would be in big trouble.

  “Make sure all defensive systems are online and set for automatic, FTO,” said Saville in as calm a voice as he could manage. The officer started acknowledging the order but switched in mid-sentence.

  “Defense systems on—THEY’VE FIRED, ADMIRAL! TWO HUNDRED SIXTEEN, REPEAT, TWO HUNDRED SIXTEEN MISSILES INBOUND!”

  “Have we fired again yet?” shouted Saville. The tension was getting to him too.

  “Firing now, Admiral! Defense systems are firing too!”

  Saville checked the time left on the enemy’s volley. My God, thirteen seconds left, and we’ve only stopped half of them! He suddenly realized that he hadn’t put on his helmet yet. He had just enough time to do so and confirm that everyone else had theirs on in spite of him forgetting to tell them to do that when his flagship heaved so violently that he felt his left shoulder become almost certainly dislocated. Power fluctuated but came back on. He heard damage alarms and multiple voices over his helmet’s speakers. The tactical display was having difficulty updating itself. He had no idea how the rest of Third Fleet had fared! His flagship’s status was quickly clear from the sidebar data. The ship was damaged, but the nature of the damage suggested a near miss by a very powerful warhead rather than a direct hit. The ship could still maneuver, and some of the missile tubes were still operational, but as things stood now, he’d be firing blind.

  “I NEED TACTICAL, DAMMIT!” He shouted.

  Shogunate flagship (Kirishima):

  Hashimoto had to wait until the enemy’s second volley had been dealt with before he could focus on the enemy fleet. Two of his battlecruisers had suffered one hit each. Damage was considerable, but the ships were still maneuverable and could be repaired eventually. The Atlantian fleet was not so fortunate. TacComp estimated 11 heavy cruisers obliterated, with the other 6 damaged by near misses.

  “Can we still reach them with another volley, Lieutenant?” he asked.

  “Yessir!”

  “Then allocate twenty missiles to each remaining target and fire.”

  The range was now so close that it only took 21 seconds for the second Shogunate volley to reach its targets. All remaining Atlantian ships were destroyed.

  When it was clear that the battle was over, Hashimoto ordered the fleet to stand down from Battle Stations. They were still tracking one wrecked heavy cruiser and were eventually able to visually see it. Half the ship had been vaporized, and the remaining half was a tumbling, twisted lump of metal that could not possible hold any survivors. The radiation alone from the hit would have killed everyone instantly. A quick check confirmed that the wreck’s trajectory did not pose any threat of collision with the planet.

  “What about the straggler, Admiral? Do we go after it?”

  Hashimoto momentarily didn’t know what the tactical officer was referring to until he remembered the ship that had veered off.

  “Can we get within missile range?” he asked in a quiet voice.

  “Only if the strangler lets us, sir, but if he wants to avoid battle, he can.”

  Hashimoto sighed and nodded. “Then let’s let him go. He’ll report what happened back to the King. With any luck, the King will decide to call off the war and save what’s left of his Navy.” If the Shogun lets him. Hashimoto was not eager to risk his fleet further, but that decision was out of his hands.

  His Majesty’s Ship Intransigent:

  Ortega stared at his tactical display in shock. First thirteen ships stopped decelerating, then the remaining four did as well. He couldn’t think of any reason that Admiral Saville would make that kind o
f tactical maneuver on purpose. Being destroyed or severely damaged in battle was the only scenario that made any sense. Intransigent was far enough away that if the first 14 ships had been involved in an exchange of missile fire, she would see the missile warhead explosions in another…thirteen seconds. That would tell the tale.

  “Executive Officer to the Bridge,” he said in as calm a voice as he could manage. If Third Fleet really had been destroyed, then Ortega wanted to confer with his XO on what to do next. It wasn’t a question of staying in this system or heading back, but rather one of how long Intransigent would stay before heading back. Multiple warhead detonations by themselves weren’t conclusive proof that Third Fleet was destroyed. There was always the possibility, however remote, that Admiral Saville had survived the battle and might need Intransigent’s assistance. The other possibility was that some or all of Third Fleet would surrender to the Shogunate Admiral, and if their L-drives were still working, they might be ordered to decelerate into an orbit around the planet. That was the kind of thing that his ship’s sensors could detect, and knowing whether some ships had been captured was just as important as knowing if they had been destroyed.

  “Multiple detonations at Third Fleet’s position detected, Captain,” said the tactical officer in a somber tone. He understood what that most likely signified.

  Ortega merely nodded. The XO entered the Bridge just in time to hear the tactical officer confirm visual detection of another set of detonations at precisely the right time and location relative to the change in deceleration of the last four ships. The XO could tell by the flashing green icon representing Third Fleet that the news was bad.

  As he stepped up to stand beside Ortega, the Captain turned to him and said, “It doesn’t appear that any of our ships are still capable of L-drive maneuvering. That means they’ve either been destroyed, crippled or…” he let the sentence dangle. The XO finished it for him.

  “Or they’re so badly damaged that they have to surrender. How long should we wait?”

  Ortega took note of the fact that his XO hadn’t wasted any time in getting to the heart of the matter. “There are no enemy ships close enough to us to be a threat, so I’m inclined to take our time in bringing the ship around to a heading back to Sheffield. While we do that, we can continue to monitor gravity wakes and EM transmissions, but if we don’t get any indications of survivors over the next,” he paused for a few seconds, “let’s say 36 hours, then I think we should head back. Your thoughts?”

  “I concur, Captain. If none of our ships are able to call for help within 36 hours, then they would have to be so badly damaged that I doubt if we could help them at all without the enemy trying to stop us. Unless they can maneuver away from the Shogunate planet in order to rendezvous with us, I don’t see how we could reach them.”

  “Then I’ll log your agreement to my proposed action, and I ask you to make a note of this conversation in your log as well. I don’t want either of us to leave ourselves open to charges of reckless abandonment. Being the only survivor of a massacre is not as bad as being killed too, but it can be damn close to it.”

  Chapter Nine

  Kingdom of Atlantia Capital (Avalon):

  It was rare for King Trevor to lose his temper completely, but he gave himself permission when Senior Grand Admiral Wellington told him the news about Third Fleet. Wellington closed his eyes and cringed just a bit as the King screamed his outrage loud enough to echo down the corridors that stretched from the King’s private office. His face was still red when he turned back to look at Wellington.

  “The entire fleet is gone?”

  “All except for the heavy cruiser Intransigent, which survived the battle due to the fact that it developed L-drive trouble and was ordered to detach itself from the rest of the fleet by Admiral Saville. I’ve reviewed Intransigent’s tactical data logs. Intransigent’s Captain kept his ship in the New Java star system for almost two more days just to make sure there were no calls for help. There were none, Your Majesty.”

  Trevor took some time to calm down. Venting his outrage had been gratifying, but making smart decisions required a cool head. “Do we know how many enemy ships were in that system?”

  “The logs show that nine enemy ships were able to accelerate after the battle. Whether there were more than that and some were lost is impossible to say at this time, Your Majesty.”

  Trevor nodded. “Nine. Nine ships not six. I’m willing to bet they were nine battlecruisers too. So, let me ask you this, Senior Grand Admiral Wellington. Would a fifty percent increase in enemy hulls be enough to flip the outcome of the battle from an Atlantian victory to an Atlantian massacre?”

  Wellington took a deep breath before answering. He’d been asking himself that same question ever since learning about the battle results. “No, Your Majesty, by itself it wouldn’t be enough to shift the outcome that severely. Something else has changed. Some of my staff are of the opinion that the log data indicates that the Shogunate missile warhead detonations are significantly more powerful than they should’ve been. If they’ve developed a more destructive warhead, that would explain the defeat.”

  King Trevor’s face showed his confusion. “Wait. Tanaka has more powerful warheads too, just like Delisani?”

  “Or the Delisani Ambassador was secretly working for Shogun Tanaka instead of the Delisani Empire. If Delisani found out about the betrayal, and wanted to punish Atlantia, he might have ordered the surprise attack on Admiral Owens’ fleet to make it look like the Shogunate was attacking us.”

  The King’s confusion evaporated and was replaced by what Wellington thought of as the ‘aha’ expression.

  “Which would also explain the Ambassador’s assassination. Yes, Admiral, it all fits together very neatly. And if, in fact, your theory is, true, then I’ve made some unfortunate decisions. The question now is what do we do about them? If you have a recommendation, I’m prepared to listen to it.”

  “Thank you, Your Majesty. I would recommend the following: send messages to both Shogun Tanaka and President Hearst that you now believe it was the Delisani Empire that attacked Admiral Owens’ force and that you’re prepared to call off the war against the Shogunate without preconditions. In addition, an offer to join forces with the Shogunate against the Delisani Empire might get a favorable response.”

  “Get down on my hands and knees and beg for mercy, eh?” asked Trevor. Wellington started to object, but the King waved him off. “I know that’s not what you meant, Admiral, but I’m afraid that’s how it’ll look to Tanaka. It’s sound advice, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. I doubt if Tanaka will just forget the whole thing about his ships and forward base being attacked. If I was him, I’d demand something in return for the willingness to exercise restraint. What do you want to bet that he demands I give up sovereignty over the Three Sisters?”

  Wellington wasn’t sure if the King really expected him to answer that question, so he kept quiet. After pacing back and forth several times, Trevor stopped and turned to Wellington.

  “I’ll take your recommendations, but I’m going to go one step further. I’m also going to make Empress Brandenburg an offer she’ll have difficulty refusing.”

  Tau Ceti Empire Capital (Corona):

  “Has that King gone stark raving mad?” asked Brandenburg of Delacor as she read the King’s offer.

  Delacor shrugged. “That actually was my first impression too, Empress, but after I had a chance to think it through, I’m now more inclined to think there’s a method to his madness, if that’s what this is. We’ve already discussed the possibility of declaring the Three Sisters a Tau Ceti Empire protectorate in order to keep them out of Tanaka’s and Delisani’s hands.”

  Brandenburg interjected before she could go any further. “Yes, but he wants them back after the dust has settled! I don’t blame him for wanting them back, but I wonder why he thinks I’d be stupid enough to risk war with Tanaka over them and then give them back to the King with nothing to show
for having taken that risk.”

  “Quite true. However, King Trevor would also be taking the risk that you could choose not to give them back. May I ask if you might decide to do exactly that?”

  Brandenburg’s frown turned into an expression of amusement. “Yes, you may ask.” She waited until it was clear that Delacor understood the joke, then continued speaking. “The problem with keeping them after I’ve agreed to give them back is that others will interpret it as proof that my word can’t be trusted. So, if I agree to any kind of deal like this, my intention will be to honor the terms of the deal. Having said that, it would be interesting to see if King Trevor would be willing to agree to some conditions under which he wouldn’t get them back. Let’s have both our staffs do some brainstorming for ideas regarding under what circumstances the Empire would retain control of the Three Sisters. In the meantime, I’ll stall Trevor’s ambassador.