“Any alien activity?” Sandy asked.
“No surprises. Admiral Miyoshi’s Second Fleet is getting close to the jump. He has two hundred atomic devices. We’ve got eight hundred more now distributed around the fleet. One ship per squadron is designated Special Warfare and we’ve reinforced the Marine guards.”
“Very good. Have you eaten?” Sandy asked.
“I had a sandwich earlier.”
“Suzie, I’ve changed my mind. Captain Velder and I will be having breakfast in the wardroom.”
“Yes, ma’am. If I may point out, Admiral, the wardroom is serving lunch.”
“Can they knock out some hash and sunny side up eggs?” Sandy asked.
There was only a moment’s pause. “Yes, Admiral.”
“Have them put together two. No, Suzie, is Captain Ashigara up yet?”
“He should be here in a minute or less.”
“Have them cook up breakfast for three.”
“Don’t you want to leave someone here?” Van asked.
Sandy glanced around and spotted a lieutenant commander at the comm desk. “Commander, you have flag plot. Let us know if anything changes.”
“Aye, aye, ma’am,” she said.
Sandy led her team out to breakfast.
19
“Now,” Sandy said, as they settled at a table with their plates and drinks, “About not waking me up. Suzie tells me that you two succeeded in suborning my computer.”
That conversation flowed directly into chewing the fat about the alien raiders and what they were doing while the screens were blank. The three of them came up with many ideas about what they’d do if they were the enemy, but no solid opinion of what they should expect next from the murderous aliens.
They were just enjoying a final cup of coffee when Suzie came to life with the voice of the Comm commander. “Admiral, we’ve got some developments on the bug-eyed monster front.”
“We’re on our way,” Sandy answered. She flagged down an ensign to bus their table, and the three of them bolted for flag plot.
The lieutenant commander was standing in front of a star map. “This just came in, not three minutes ago. We’ve got a report of activity in this system. It’s from a basic buoy, so it’s not telling us more than bogies are present.”
“How many?” Sandy asked.
“Twenty-eight so far.”
Sandy studied the star map. This was one of the two jumps that allowed fast-movers to skip the fourth system out and jump directly into the third. Unfortunately, it was the one that was the farthest from the present threat axis. She’d have to be careful about how strong she made her response here. Indeed, the more she thought about it, the more she wondered if this was another diversion. She’d just have to wait and see what they sent her with this thrust.
Three hours later, the buoys sent in a report that showed no new ships had arrived in the system within the last fifteen minutes. The hostiles must have been coming in fast; they’d held to one every thirty seconds or so. There were three hundred and fifty-seven of them; half were cruisers, the other half were the design they didn’t know a lot about. Their reactors had about double the power of the present battle cruiser reactors. However, if they didn’t have the Iteeche system to step up the power output of a reactor, their effective output was likely less than half of what our battlecruisers had.
That left several questions to mull over. Where were the battleships? Had some wolf pack chosen to go all fast-movers? Also, how long would it take the frigates and cruisers to cross this system?
They could have hit the other side of this jump at a velocity of anywhere from 51,000 KPH up to just shy of 300,000 KPH. They’d need to hit the next one at no more than 49,999 KPH if they wanted to stay on course for the cats. Too much, and they’d jump past them.
Now, how fast could the aliens cross this system? Would they settle for a safe 2.0 gees or risk jacking it up faster to cut their time crossing this system?
“Suzie, assuming they are able to maintain 3.0 gees, can you estimate the fastest time for these ships to cross the system and arrive at the jump slow enough to head our way?”
“Yes, ma’am. There are two possible outcomes, if they hold to an average deceleration of 1.45 gees, they will arrive at the jump in approximately eighty-two hours and fifteen minutes. However, if they accelerate at 3.0 gees and then flip to a 3.0 gee deceleration, they will cross the system in forty-one hours and seven minutes.”
“Did Mimzy teach you to estimate?” Sandy asked.
“Yes, ma’am. If you want precision, please tell me. If I forecast the need, I may give it to you, but I may, ah, guess wrong.”
“Fine. Velder, it looks like we’ve got a moving target for a while. Tell me, how many ships of ours do you think it will take to wipe out this bunch?”
“They’ve got a lot of ships,” her chief of staff said. “Worse, we don’t know exactly what we’re chasing. How powerful are their lasers? What range? How fast can they move? Maneuver? I know you don’t want to hear this, and I don’t want to say it, but there are just too many unknowns for me to give you anything but a guess.”
“Thanks for the honest answer. Now, tell me, where are the battleships? Drago’s intruders are half fast-movers and half battleships. None are here?”
“They might arrive later. That 1.45 gee deceleration is well within their power curve,” Ashigara put in.
“Yes,” Velder said, “but why split their forces? If they’re intent on using the fast-movers for all they’re worth, why have the battlewagons trailing so far behind?”
The Ops chief nodded.
“The more I look at this map,” Sandy said, “the more I get the feeling that we’re being gored on the horns of an attack. Every tactician I’ve ever heard of that sent forces right and left has had one hell of a center force.”
“Fake right, fake left, then go up the center,” Ashigara said.
“Except these bug-eyed monsters have enough ships to hit us right, then left, then sweep in from the middle.”
“Or add a fourth attack from the back,” Sandy said, eyeing the half of the space around the cats that had been quiet.
“No one could coordinate attacks from all over the place,” Velder said.
“Coordination could be underrated,” Ashigara said. “If you’ve got all these ships, they can just swamp us. Does it matter if one prong is off by a day or two? Unless we defend the three jumps into this system, we’ll have to spread ourselves mighty thin trying to stop them somewhere out there.”
The longer this conversation went, the less Sandy liked it. She remembered the story of a cavalry officer who thought his two hundred and fifty sabers could take on four thousand of the locals. When help arrived, the locals had moved on, leaving a whole lot of dead bodies.
She was starting to feel like that guy, whatever his name was. She did remember where that had happened. A place called Big Horn.
Not quite two days later, the buoy in the next system reported the arrival of the fast wing of warships. The aliens were coming for them, and coming fast.
“Miyoshi is already racing out to intercept the first batch of intruders,” Sandy muttered to herself. “I’ll likely hold them three star systems out. Of course, that also means he’ll be farther away from this cat house.”
“We could order him to hold in the second system,” Velder said.
“And if that batch of bug-eyed monsters does a u-turn, he could spend a lot of time watching an empty mouse hole,” Ashigara said.
“And if they’ve made a run for it, we sure could use him back here,” Sandy said, thoughtfully. She shook her head. “Let’s have him keep up the advance, but Comm?”
“Yes, Admiral.”
“Send to Admiral Miyoshi an update on our situation. Append, ‘Stay alert to the hostiles turning their diversion into a faint and withdrawing. Admiral Santiago sends’.”
“On its way, ma’am.”
“Betsy, you’re next in line for an independent command. If that
herd of bug-eyed monsters goes 3.0 gees accelerating or decelerating all the way, where can you intercept them?”
Admiral Bethea summoned up a star map, then concentrated it on the path between the hostiles and Sasquan. “They’re already in the second system out. I can either hold at the jump into the next system, or I can jump through.”
Now the star map showed one system. “They’ll enter from here. I enter from the opposite side of the system. I’ve got an ice giant I can orbit in wait for them. They either come to me, or they make for the jump and I intercept them before they can get there. Either way, we find out how good those new frigates of theirs are.”
“So, do we assume you can fight outnumbered eight-to-one and gather intel on the aliens, or do we wait for them to charge the gate and wipe them out as they jump through?” Sandy asked.
“Point of interest,” the Ops chief said. “The last time we fought them, they were sending ships through in clusters of three. What if they go for bigger clusters?”
“That won’t be a problem,” Betsy said. “No matter how fast they enter that system, I’ll be waiting on the other side, ready to shoot them up at long range. If they try to get away from me by going faster, they’ll hit the jump way past where they can threaten us.”
That put the decision in Sandy’s lap. Miyoshi faced a mixed force that outnumbered him eight-to-one. He had to use the jump for a choke point. Bethea was just as outnumbered, but her hostiles were all light, probably thin-skinned fast-movers. Unless the aliens had a new, long-range laser, Betsy’s ships should be able to shoot them to junk at a safe range. If things went right, they would get intel on these new ships.
Of course, they were new ships. Clearly the aliens thought they were worth building. Were they a game changer?
“Betsy, put Third Fleet in orbit around that ice giant. If it looks like the alien force might be too big a bite, run for the jump and defend it.”
“Aye, aye, Admiral.
“We’ve got to defend the cats below from those bastards wiping them out. Even more, we’ve got to keep them away from our birds. Be guided accordingly. Do not trade one of your ships for ten of theirs. We can’t survive that exchange rate.”
“Understood. I can be away from the pier in two hours.”
“Good luck, Godspeed, and good shooting,” Sandy said, but it was to the back of her admiral. Betsy was already heading for the door.
“Penny says the cats have reached an agreement,” Suzie reported.
“Then I guess we go see what they’ve decided,” Sandy said, and headed off to see what her ally had to say.
20
It was a short hike to the hall where the cats had been meeting for several days. One had left to attend the birth of a grand cub, another had been hauled out on a stretcher suffering a heart attack. One had returned; the other was still in the hospital.
The cats were that serious.
The room had been rearranged; it was easy to see Mimzy and Penny’s work in it. One end of the room was terraced, each level forming a three-quarter circle of tables, rising so that those in back had as good a view as those in front.
Where a quarter-pie sized cut had been made in the circle stood a single desk. Penny stood there, waiting for Sandy. Jacques and Amanda were present as well. Several human specialists sat in chairs along the wall behind the table. Sandy noted her fleet’s senior gunnery and engineering specialists, as well as some of the managers from the fabricators that had come out with the tons of Smart Metal TM.
Directly across from where Sandy stood, in the first level of tables, were the delegations from Columm Almar and the Bizalt Kingdom. Seated side by side at the edges of their delegations were the President and Prime Minister of those two great countries.
President Almar stood, and the low hum that had filled the room fell to silence. “What can you tell us about the threat that lurks at our door?”
A nod to Penny, and a large holograph filled the space between the them.
“The slowly pulsing green star in the center is your home, Sasquan, green with its gift of life,” Sandy said. “The other white dots are nearby stars. They are not all the stars, but only those connected by the trade routes that connect some systems to others. Do you have any questions?”
Sandy paused to survey the room. She was greeted by nods. Apparently, the facts of interstellar geography were catching on.
“Mimzy, light up the first problem. Both the first jump they entered, and where they are now.”
A white dot turned red, then, a red dashed line reached for a second light. It also changed to show a flashing red.
“This is the first enemy armada that we told you about. It is double the size of all my forces here. It is composed of fast cruisers, fast but more heavily armed frigates, and slower, but very heavily armed and armored battleships. They weigh in at five hundred thousand tons, maybe more. We’ve encountered a few that weigh in at a million tons, but we don’t think any of those are here.”
Mouths hung open. Several cats in military-looking harnesses back in the third or fourth row began stalking back and forth, tails lashing their side. Sharp claws were out.
“We now have a second intruder coming through the perimeter of picketed systems we’ve set up.” Now Mimzy showed a second system flashing red with a dashed line to another red system. “This force is all fast-movers. It consists of about one hundred and eighty frigates and an equal number of cruisers.”
Sandy paused for a moment to let those numbers sink in.
“I have dispatched Admiral Bethea, one of my most experienced commanders to halt the second intrusion. Her forty-four ships have about two hundred of your atomic devices. We hope she can destroy this force before it gets into the next system from here.”
“Forty-four ships!” That yowl came from quite a few cats. Sandy let matters run for a short while. Cats clawed the tables, not a good idea with Smart MetalTM. Mimzy must have softened the metal, because after a few screeches of pain, the tables began to let claws sink into them. The marks were erased as soon their paws were lifted.
If the clawing cat didn’t notice the near-magic of the tabletops, someone next to them did very quickly. That alone silenced the cats.
The President was still standing. When things quieted down, she said, “You have sent two forces out to face odds of almost ten-to-one. Yet, you hold half your forces here. May I ask a general and admiral on my staff to comment on your deployment?”
Sandy hadn’t really expected her decisions to be graded like a test. Still, she nodded.
From the third row, two cats, one in a leather-like harness, the other in a blue jacket, stood. There were several comments aimed at them from others similarly dressed. This resulted in a couple of paw swipes with claws out, but no fights. They made their way to an aisle and then joined the President. For a moment, the three spoke in hushed tones, then the one wearing the blue coat stood, and pulled down on her jacket.
“I am Admiral Ferrish. May we look at your star map again?”
Without a word from any human, Mimzy had the holograph of stars back up, floating in the air between Sandy and the admiral.
“Good ground is always important, even to a sea-going cat,” the admiral said. “I take it that the shipping lanes have a significant impact on both their path of advance and your ability to resist them. Could you show me those lanes, please?”
The avenue of advance for the two hostile intruders appeared as dotted yellow lines going from one star to the next until they met at Sasquan.
“I take it that deviation is not an option the enemy has?”
“No, they cannot advance, nor can they withdraw, but no other path leads here.”
“I take it that there are other paths?” the admiral asked.
“Mimzy, would you please show the admiral all of the other paths?”
“Yes, ma’am. Please understand that there are a lot of branches here. Let me start from each of the three jumps into your system and show you what we
have. Let’s start with the first intruder.”
From Jump Point Gamma, a tree of dotted yellow lines branched out. The planet flashing red was four systems out. There were murmurs around the room.
“I will lighten up the first tree, now, and give you the various paths from Jump Point Beta which leads to it.”
Another web of dotted green lines branched out. One of them showed the second intruder in the third system out.
“Thank you,” the admiral said. “Could you show us the options from the other jump into our system?”
Without a word, the net of orange dotted lines appeared leading from the Jump Point Alpha.
“The Alwa system that is our base is located farther out from that jump,” Sandy said.
“Yet they could approach that jump without going near your planet and its warning systems?”
“Yes,” Sandy answered the admiral.
“Madame President,” the admiral said, giving a respectful nod to her political leader, “Even without asking further questions about travel time between and across these nets, it is clear to me that she is maintaining half of her forces as a reserve. This is a very high percent, but considering the many options the enemy can exercise, it seems wise. If I may ask another question, do these forces you now have identified constitute the totality of the enemy’s fleet?”
“Unfortunately, I have no way of knowing that,” Sandy said. “We have already destroyed eight of the enemy base ships. There may be thirty to thirty-five more out there. How many of them have come back from roving the galaxy to engage us here is unknown. We know how many ships were usually deployed around a base ship. However, of late it appears that they are running their production plants at full tilt. So no, I have no way of knowing if this is it or if this is just a probe, a feint or a full assault.”
The admiral nodded as Sandy finished. She turned in place and eyed several of those in the third row. The cats there, who appeared to be in uniforms, were a somber lot at the moment. No one was up stalking the aisles or lashing their sides with their tails.
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