Shadow Space Chronicles 1: The Fallen Race

by Kal Spriggs

  Lucius shook his head, still disturbed by that ability. Human ships couldn’t make a jump through shadow space at any less than a light year without spending a massive time in calculations. Even then, the accuracy of the jump would be lousy. Tactically, most considered it impossible.

  To the Balor, apparently, it was merely difficult.

  “Very well, they’re gathering data. I trust all our ships are on standby to minimize emissions?” At the nods, he relaxed some. They couldn’t hide the presence of the colony, not if the Balor had the sensors to see it. They could make it difficult for them to judge the strength and disposition of the United Colonies forces.

  “I’m glad we’ve got the majority of the fleet away from Faraday.” Lying quiet and distant from the colony, the fleet would be almost invisible, especially in the cluttered star system.

  The glaring exception, of course, would be the captured Chxor ships and Emperor Romulus’s forces. Both forces sat in standby orbits over Faraday.

  “OK, if they follow their normal course, then, they’ll send a group of dispersed scouts in, looking for trouble.” Lucius stared at the map. “They’ll probably kick off sometime later tonight, maybe early tomorrow morning.”

  “Odds are, they’ll see the Nova Roma forces in orbit.” Lucius nodded at Admiral Mund. “Since they don’t know for certain about the Dreyfus Fleet,” he looked to Kandergain for confirmation, “we can reasonably expect they’ll think that’s the sum of our forces.”

  “What are you saying?” Admiral Mund said.

  “I’d like to keep our full strength unknown for as long as possible.” Lucius said. “We can probably clobber the hell out of their scout forces with our full strength, but then they gain the knowledge they want. If we conceal our full strength until the opportune moment…”

  Admiral Dreyfus nodded slowly. “You want to keep the main body here?”

  Lucius nodded, “Any additional forces we use we can move out with maneuvering thrusters, then light up a few thousand kilometers clear of the Fleet. The Balor will, hopefully, think it’s just a detachment.” The Fleet lay between the orbits of the unnamed gas giant Lucius had ambushed Kleigh at, and a barren, lifeless rocky planet. The Faraday colony lay inside the next orbit after, several million kilometers star-wards.

  “So…” Lucius frowned, “We peel off our fast units, to deal with their scouts. They’ll coalesce into a body to test our strength, and we clobber them… say here.” He pointed at the gas giant. “That stops them well clear of the colony and won’t give them reason to look here.”

  “You realize if they see us anyway, they can jump in on top of us and fire before we realize they’re here.” Admiral Dreyfus said.

  “Yes.”

  “Oh, good, glad you took that into consideration,” His light tone belied the worry on his face. Admiral Dreyfus frowned, “So, we’re the backstop, I don’t mind setting out the early fighting, but what’s the overall plan should the worst happen?”

  “The worst?” Lucius asked.

  “He means what happens if you die,” Admiral Mund said, dryly.

  “Ah.”

  “Well, hopefully we drive the scouts back, and then let the main body come in. Try to pull them towards the main fleet at high speed.” Lucius frowned, “Get them coming in chasing our faster ships and we might get them moving fast enough they can’t avoid a head on close weapons pass with main body.”

  “That… might work.” Admiral Dreyfus admitted. “Of course, if they see us in time, they can just alter course and do a quick firing pass outside our range. Or they could volley all their missiles.”

  “Yeah.” Lucius said.

  “What do I tell the Emperor to do?” Admiral Mund said.

  Lucius looked at him. Despite their best efforts, many of the Nova Roma ships still required significant repairs. Almost all of them were combat capable, but they were still low on personnel and many had systems in marginal shape at best. Finally, Lucius shrugged, “Pray.”

  ***

  The War Shrike, the Peregrine, the Gebneyr, and all eight of the Nagri-class battlecruisers, along with three squadrons of destroyers, coasted a hundred thousand kilometers before they lit off their drives and altered course to intercept the largest body of the scouting Balor.

  The Balor altered course almost immediately.

  Lucius chuckled slightly, “Somewhat arrogant, aren’t they?” The enemy destroyers, rather than scatter, began to draw closer into a formation. Clearly they preferred hard data to estimates via sensors.

  “They’ve only been defeated a handful of times. I’ve never heard of them in this kind of strength.” Kandergain said. “They must believe it’s impossible for them to lose.”

  “Well, it’s the impossible I get paid for.” Lucius said, then frowned, “Remind me to ask Kate if I actually do get paid.” Oddly enough, it wasn’t something he’d considered yet.

  “Why don’t we focus on the immediate problem rather than whether you’ll be eating out of the garbage in a month or two?” Kandergain said.

  “Hmmm, yes, definitely remind me to ask her.” He rapped his fingers on his leg, “Message to all ships, keep the speed down. Let’s not clue them into the fact we can match their speed with this force. Well, not until we chase down the survivors.” Lucius grinned.

  “They’re not the only ones being a little over-confident?” Kandergain asked.

  “Ah.” Lucius shrugged, “That reminds me.” He opened a channel to broadcast to all of the United Colonies ships. “Defenders of the United Colonies, this is Baron Lucius Giovanni. Today, the tyrannical Balor invade our system. They think that their empire, their race, shall supplant humanity. They come to destroy our society and to consume our people as food.”

  “Today,” Lucius said, “We take a stand. Today, we will drive them back. Today, the Balor will know defeat as never before.”

  “A century from now, your grandchildren will look back on this day and know that everything changed at this time. They will know that humanity, in its darkest hour, came together and said ‘No!’ They will know this day as the end of fear.”

  “I know of no other place I would rather be. I know of no other men and women I’d rather stand beside,” Lucius said. “The Balor, the Chxor, they think we are a doomed race... a fallen race. Today we are the Champions of Humanity and we’ll prove them wrong.”

  ***

  The two forces closed faster. Lucius watched the interception force closed up formation. Lucius put the squadron of Kris-class destroyers out front, with their anti-missile batteries. He hoped the two Archer destroyer squadrons would help to balance the missile capabilities of the enemy.

  He knew his five squadrons of fighters would help some.

  Even so, he angled to force the engagement near the gas giant and its moons. Should the destroyers launch a truly devastating missile launch, they could try to use the planet to cover a withdrawal.

  “Launch the fighters,” Lucius said.

  The ship thrummed as the twelve fighters launched. The small craft formed up, to bolster the formation. A moment later the War Shrike's fighters launched as well. Lucius watched the sensor data on the enemy firm up, despite the heavy jamming.

  “Looks like three of their Ravager cruisers, and an even dozen Daggers,” Reese said as he massaged data out of the emissions. “I’ve got sensor lock on all of them.”

  Lucius just nodded. They neared the maximum enemy powered missile envelope at just under six hundred thousand kilometers, if the scout elements carried the heavier missiles.

  “Nothing yet sir.”

  They waited, and Lucius finally sighed. He would have preferred the launch, for it would have meant the Balor had half of the larger missiles to throw his way.

  The next possible engagement, unless they merely played with him, lay at two hundred fifty thousand kilometers. Even with the new missiles, Lucius’s maximum range lay at only a hundred eighty thousand kilometers given their closing velocities.

  Bo
th forces kept their speeds low; their combined closure rate meant he’d be in range in just under fifty minutes. The Balor’s destroyers could volley their external racks, potentially forty of their hundred megaton warheads for each of the twelve destroyers in twenty five minutes more.

  He’d have to weather that storm just to fire in return.

  The clock ticked away the time. Lucius’s eyes returned to the icons of the ships in the outer system. This whole engagement set the ground for that battle. He knew, quite confidently, that he could defeat this force. He wasn’t sure he wanted to pay the price it would cost.

  He just didn’t see any other way to win.

  He looked up. The Balor launch approached.

  “Missile launch, multiple launches.” Reese reported, his voice calm. “I have excess of seven hundred enemy birds in the air.”

  Lucius bit back a curse. “Activate jammers, launch the decoys.”

  He felt the acid bite of anguish at the coming onslaught. His people were good. They would survive it, but it was going to cost them. They had three minutes to watch the wave of missiles approach.

  As the inbound missiles drew closer, they launched counter-missiles. The War Shrike and the Peregrine had replaced their standard load-out with interceptor missiles. The eight Nagri battlecruisers mounted external racks of interceptor missiles. Even so, less than a hundred counter-missiles lanced out.

  They took eighty of the inbound missiles.

  Jamming burned out many more.

  When the missiles swept into range, they traveled at seventy two thousand kilometers per second. The firing solutions gunners programmed into the defense guns and even the main batteries swept a cone of destruction through the space ahead of the formation. They angled the fire in coordinated, overlapping patterns.

  That left nearly two hundred missiles that slipped through or around the defensive fire.

  The ships, moving evasively, did their best to generate misses.

  Sometimes that wasn’t enough.

  The Peregrine heaved, struck at least one glancing blow that made it through the defensive screen. “Missile tubes three and four are destroyed. The refueler is destroyed. Loss of atmosphere on decks six through fourteen.”

  Lucius’s eyes went to his other ships, seeing his own had survived.

  Others in the formation had not been so lucky.

  The Kriss-class destroyers Fox and Vixen, and battlecruisers Royal Gorge and Yosemite Park did not survive. Bands of gas and a haze of small debris signaled the futility of a search for survivors. The destroyer Minx barely coasted along, damage icons near it suggested that even if it survived the upcoming battle, it would be best to scuttle the ship. All of his other ships took damage to one degree or another, and two of his remaining battlecruisers boasted less than half their weapons systems operative.

  “Nearing launch range.” Commander Beeson said.

  Lucius waited, a dark hunger growing in his belly. “All ships, fire.”

  “All ships firing, sir.” Reese relayed.

  Lucius gave a feral grin, “My turn, bastards.”

  Nearly seven hundred missiles went out. They were slower, they probably would be less accurate, but each of those missiles carried a kilogram of antimatter in a polarized matrix designed to maximize energy release.

  “Roosevelt Forest reports damage to missile racks, they had to jettison their missiles.”

  “Understood.” Lucius answered. His eyes remained intent.

  The Balor had almost four minutes to watch the inbound missiles.

  “I’m detecting no counter-missiles. I think they fired everything they had at us.” Reese said.

  Lucius nodded, it fit their standard of operations. They were used to facing lighter human ships. A Republic force of cruisers and destroyers would not have survived, he knew.

  The Balor scout force began evasive maneuvers. They lay down their own cone of destructive fire. Three hundred missiles died. The jamming burned out another hundred.

  Lucius waited.

  Massive explosions blossomed in the midst of the Balor formation. The first destroyer died, then a cruiser, followed by another destroyer. The shields took a beating, but nothing the size of a destroyer could take more than a couple of hits from the massive warheads.

  Lucius snarled in satisfaction as the last of the explosions faded. One cruiser and three destroyers remained. All lacked shields. All bled atmosphere from damage. The survivors altered course and moved to escape.

  “Close with them, wipe them out.”

  Lucius ships went to full acceleration. “We’ve got them as long as—“

  He broke off as the surviving ships split. Each ship’s course took them on radically different paths. Lucius could divide his force to chase them down or watch them get away.

  “Break off the pursuit.” Lucius sighed. He was not about to throw away the victory by scattering his forces, not with how the main body lurked at the edge of the system. “Begin withdrawal towards Shadow Point, take it slow, let’s see if we can sucker them in.”

  ***

  An hour later, the Balor fleet finally began its approach into the system. Lucius stared at their course, and he felt the stirrings of depression. They swept in slowly, on a course that would take them past the ice moon with its penal colony. They could alter course, they could speed up, but Lucius felt certain the Balor would take a cautious sweep of the system. They couldn’t know what waited, but the enemy commander suspected something might.

  “Why the long face?” Kandergain asked as she came up to stand near him.

  “An aggressive commander, we could have trapped. A cautious one…” Lucius pursed his lips, “not good.”

  “Any hope?” Kandergain kept her face placid, but he heard the despair in her voice.

  “We’ll keep the speed down. With the damage we did take, they’ll think we’re worse off than we are. They might try to catch us short of the planet.”

  “But not likely?”

  “No. Not with the course they’re on, right now. It looks like they wanted the measure of us, and they got one.” He sighed, “We’re refining our data on their ships, as they get closer, but it looks pretty close to a nightmare case.”

  “They’ll pass the ice moon in a couple hours. They won’t be in engagement range for another six, maybe eight hours, depending.”

  “All ships, go to battle stand-by. Half-on watches, three hour rotations.” Lucius said.

  “Are you going to rest?” Kandergain asked.

  Lucius shrugged, he didn’t feel tired, but he knew even a few minutes rest could make all the difference between a poor decision and a good one. “A couple hours.”

  She clasped his hand, “You can do this, Lucius. I believe in you.”

  Lucius squeezed her hand, “I haven’t given up.” He snorted, “Though God knows, that’s been a recurring problem for me.”

  ***

  Four hours later, Lucius stared at the screens and wished some kind of change. The Balor scout force and the main body had combined and they swept in towards Lucius’s small force, and the as-yet concealed United Colonies Fleet. “Come on, I could use anything,” he muttered.

  “Sir, multiple new contacts, just emerged, vicinity the rocky planet.” Reese snapped.

  Lucius blinked in surprise, looking over at Kandergain, who shook her head, not her doing.

  “Who are they?” Lucius asked.

  Reese stared at his screen for a long time in silence. Finally he looked up. “Significant Chxor force. Looks like thirty dreadnoughts, around a hundred and twenty cruisers.”

  Lucius stared at the new contacts. He felt his heart sink. The Chxor, either through luck or coordination with the Balor, had put themselves in a position to squeeze his fleet between the Balor and their forces. He figured the UCF fleet could engage and destroy the Chxor force. Doing so would compromise the position of his forces to the Balor. The added damage might also tip the balance even more against him.

  He stare
d at the screen, suddenly out of ideas.

  He looked up to find Kandergain’s eyes.

  Lucius just shook his head.

  ***

  CHAPTER XV

  May 2, 2403 Earth Standard Time

  Faraday System

  United Colonies

  With the majority of the fleet in emissions control, Lucius couldn’t talk to Admiral Drefyus without possibly giving away his position. That meant he could contact Admiral Mund and Emperor Romulus. “I’m not seeing any viable options.” He said. He sat in the conference room aboard the Peregrine, away from the eyes of his crew.

  “Perhaps it’s time we withdraw,” the Emperor said. “It might be too late to evacuate most of the planet, but we can still save millions.”

  Lucius felt the temptation, but he just shook his head, “No, if we run now, the Balor will smell our defeat, they’ll hunt us.” He looked over at Kandergain and she nodded slightly. “Besides, I won’t abandon millions to their deaths, not when we have a chance at stopping them.”

  “We don’t, you said it yourself,” the younger man said angrily. “With the Balor and the Chxor working together to bring us down—”

  “Wait,” Admiral Mund said, “Why would the Chxor and Balor work together?”

  Lucius frowned, “Can it be anything else? They arrived at the same time, I don’t see how they coordinated this but…”

  David Mund shook his head, “This doesn’t fit with the mentality of the Balor or the Chxor. Does it?” His question went to Kandergain.

  She frowned, “No… No, the Balor might use the Chxor, provoke them into attacking us, but they don’t have any kind of alliance. The Balor don’t negotiate with anyone.”

  “So, you’re saying the Chxor just happened to attack us at the same time as the Balor?” Lucius frowned, “That doesn’t make any sense. Not unless they’re reacting to something.”

  “Like our attack at Melcer?” The Emperor asked.