by D. J. Holmes
With an effort, Becket put an end to her line of thinking. There was nothing she could do to change the realities of the war with the Karacknids. She could influence the coming battle, that’s where her mind needed to be. Activating the simulator built into her command chair, she played out different strategies. It would be hours before the Karacknids revealed themselves and she wanted to make the best use of the time.
“Contacts,” the sensor officer reported excitedly three hours later. “Hundreds of gravimetric signatures are lighting up the board!”
And so it begins, Becket thought as the Karacknid war fleet revealed itself. They had travelled roughly half way into the system under stealth. More than enough to make sure that Ya’sia’s fleet could not fall back to the shift passage that led to Alliance territory without being engaged. Now that retreat was impossible, they had no reason to hide. As she watched the Karacknid fleet split into six smaller groups that Handmaiden’s tactical officer designated Task Forces One through Six. Becket nodded, it was typical Karacknid battle doctrine. Each task force would operate independently and together they would spread out to envelop an enemy in multiple fields of fire. “They don’t think we have any fighters,” Becket said as she looked at Ya’sia.
“It would seem not,” Ya’sia agreed. “Hopefully, we can make them pay for that mistake… Task Force Six,” she said moments later. “That will be our target. It’s maneuvering to cover their right flank. I’d like to focus on Task Force Three, but that would give away our exit strategy. Work out our fighters’ attack timing based on their current course and speed. Assume they will remain at maximum missile range.”
“Yes Admiral,” Becket responded. She was responsible for planning out the fighters’ missions. She would work out the best attack strategy and send it to the fighters’ Wing Commander for final approval. After checking her plan for a third and fourth time, she shared it with Ya’sia and then Wing Commander Gaz’zam. Then she returned to watching the Karacknid fleet. For another hour it steadily approached Delta Fort. When Task Force Six settled into its final attack vector, Becket altered her plan slightly and transmitted it. Three salvos she thought as she looked at the massive wave of enemy ships. Ya’sia’s plan called for them to weather three salvos and then act. If we survive that long that is, Becket couldn’t help thinking.
“Missile separations,” the sensor officer called seconds after the Karacknids came into range. Becket held her breath as Handmaiden’s sensors counted the new gravimetric signatures accelerating towards the gas giant. The number didn’t stop rising until it tipped over seventy thousand. She couldn’t help glancing at Ya’sia. The Crian’s face hadn’t changed, but she had to be thinking the same thing as Becket. Seventy thousand missiles was an unheard of salvo. Becket hadn’t seen anything like it except in simulations.
“Return fire,” Ya’sia snapped in a crisp tone that carried none of the emotions Becket was feeling. “Then activate all defense satellites.”
From Ya’sia’s fleet, the battlestations of Delta Fort and the much smaller orbital missile platforms, thirty thousand missiles were launched from their acceleration tubes. All were targeted at Task Force Six. Good luck, Becket thought as she watched the missiles go. The advantage of the Karacknids’ battle doctrine was that Alliance point defense gunners would have a much harder time engaging their missiles. The disadvantage was that Ya’sia was able to target Task Force Six with all her missiles. Two other Karacknid task forces were close enough to engage Ya’sia’s salvo, but the rest of their fleet were not. Of course, that means that after this battle, Task Forces One through Five will be fully intact and undamaged. They will be able to immediately continue offensive operations. Becket didn’t know which strategy she preferred, the Alliance and Humanity’s or the Karacknids’, at the moment though, she didn’t like the idea of Task Forces One to Five being able to pursue them. Not while our ships are all going to face the incoming enemy salvo.
Before the first Karacknid salvo came crashing in, the Karacknids fired a second, and Ya’sia’s ships did the same. Then the real battle commenced as the Karacknid missiles entered range of the Alliance’s point defenses. Though she wanted to close her eyes, she forced herself to watch the estimated number of Karacknid missiles. Hundreds of thousands of defensive laser beams and counter missiles raced out to try and lower the number. They were quickly joined by electric pulses from the Varanni arc emitters installed on Handmaiden and the battlestations of Delta Fort. Even so, the number was not decreasing anywhere near fast enough.
“The fleet will take cover,” Ya’sia ordered when there were still ten thousand Karacknid missiles coming in. The thousand ships in her fleet maneuvered themselves behind the battlestations and other smaller defense satellites. In the seconds it took them to move, thousands more Karacknid missiles were destroyed. Then the remainder detonated among their targets.
When the alarms on Handmaiden died down, Becket assessed the situation. Seven of the orbital battlestations had been destroyed and more than one hundred and fifty of the defense satellites. Forty ships were gone and a number more were reporting damage. Glancing at Task Force Six, Becket saw that eighty ships had been taken out. At least sixty more were pulling back, having obviously suffered significant damage. She just had enough time to reassess the attack plan for the fighters before the second Karacknid salvo struck home. Hundreds more defense satellites, battle stations and ships were destroyed.
Again, Becket glanced at Ya’sia, trying to read the Admiral’s mind. Yet there were no discernible emotions visible. “Fire our third salvo!” Ya’sia ordered. As soon as the missiles were away she spoke again. “Begin fall back maneuver. All ships, maximum acceleration. Those that cannot are to stay and fight with the battlestations.” The order was harsh, but Becket knew there was no other choice.
As soon as Handmaiden moved, Becket switched her focus to the third Karacknid missile salvo. It was slightly less than the initial two as a result of the battering Task Force Six was taking, but not significantly so. As the missiles got closer, Becket selfishly willed them to target the battlestations and ships still in orbit. If they targeted Ya’sia’s retreating ships, many would not survive. Yes, she thought as the missiles did not alter their initial trajectories. The Karacknid commander was content to destroy Delta Fort’s last battlestations and then turn his attention to Ya’sia’s fleet. To drive home the Karacknid Admiral’s decision, all six Karacknid task forces accelerated as they settled onto intercept trajectories. Ya’sia’s order had her ships racing around the gas giant to use its mass as a shield from enemy missiles while they fled the system. With the imminent demise of the orbital battlestations, the Karacknid ships were closing with the gas giant to carry out the same maneuver.
Here we go, Becket thought as the Alliance’s third missile salvo closed with Task Force Six. Cruising in behind the alliance missiles were the thirty-six Pulsar fighters. They had begun their attack run twenty minutes ago and had been slowly building up momentum while keeping their reactors and engines at minimal power. As soon as the Karacknid point defense weapons opened up they went to full acceleration. If the Karacknids figured out what the Pulsars were amidst the maelstrom of other weapons fire, it was too late. Just as Alliance missiles began to detonate amongst Task Force Six, the fighters came into range with their own weapons.
Just before they fired, two were taken out by point defense weapons. Becket grimaced but it was replaced by a whoop when thirty-four laser beams reached out and struck Karacknid warships. Every beam was targeted at an undamaged ship’s engines. Within seconds, the gunners of Task Force Six realized what was assaulting them and turned their guns on the fighters with a vengeance. Six more were destroyed as they twisted and weaved through the Karacknid fire. Then their capacitors finished recharging their laser cannons and another volley of beams struck out. Each had targeted a new intact Karacknid ship causing more damage to their engines and reactors. The aim of the attack was not to destroy Karacknid ships, but to cripp
le them. Ya’sia and Becket knew that they would not be able to win this battle, but the more ships they could take out of action now, the better chance they would have of winning the next.
“Fighters are pulling back,” Becket called when the remaining fighters escaped the Karacknid point defenses. “They’re angling to rendezvous with us now.”
“Make sure they are refueled and recharged immediately,” Ya’sia commented. She then turned her attention back to the main holo plot and the display of the pursuing Karacknid task forces. Becket followed her gaze. Task Force Six had been ravaged, the three missile salvos had destroyed or damaged nearly three hundred ships and the Pulsar fighters’ attack had made another fifty fall out of formation. Half of the task force had been removed from the Karacknid fleet’s number of battle worthy ships. But there were five other task forces keenly pursuing Ya’sia’s fleet.
“Task Forces One and Three will round the gas giant in five minutes,” Maleck reported, “They’ll be able to open fire immediately.”
Ya’sia nodded but said nothing more, Becket was confident the Crian Admiral understood exactly what was happening. Ya’sia waited three more minutes before speaking. “Now, activate phase one mines.”
Suddenly, right in front of Task Force Three, six hundred new active sensors powered up and scanned space around them. As soon as they located targets, small maneuvering thrusters re-orientated the stealth laser cannons and capacitors discharged all their force into the weapons. Some of the mines were out of range of their targets, but many others were not.
The Karacknids reacted almost instantly. The lead ships of Task Force Three carried out rapid evasive maneuvers whilst their own energy weapons reached out to destroy the mines before they could fire. Even so, more than a hundred laser beams struck Karacknid ships. A handful were destroyed as critical systems overloaded, most suffered light damage but were nevertheless forced to pull up and away from their course. Before them a whole wave of mines had gone active looking for targets. As Becket watched, more and more were coming online. She couldn’t help but smile as the line of mines activating spread out from the gas giant for more than ten light seconds. They stretched out towards the shift passage that Ya’sia’s fleet was falling back towards. Not so fast, she thought with satisfaction. The ships of Task Forces Three and One were all decelerating hard and pulling away from the mine field. As they rounded the gas giant and came into view the other Karacknid task forces were doing the same.
“Your tactic worked well Commodore,” Ya’sia said as Becket turned to find the Crian Admiral looking at her. “We live to fight another day.”
“We do,” Maleck agreed, “Though I imagine our opponent will not be happy when he learns how few mines caused him to lose his quarry.”
Not too unhappy, Becket thought. For he will still have us in his sights. Each of the fortified worlds the Alliance had set up had been outfitted with stealth laser cannon mines. When Becket had arrived the mines had been placed in low orbit around the gas giant to prevent any Karacknid ships from closing to energy weapon range with their battlestations. On the assumption that Delta Fort was the likely target of the Karacknid’s main push, she had suggested they be spread out along the Alliance fleet’s avenue of retreat. There had been far too few mines to actually prevent the Karacknid fleet from chasing them but enough to bluff with. All the mines Ya’sia had in place had powered up their active sensors. However the Karacknids had no way of knowing that so they would have to assume there were more. And by the time they find out there are not, we should be long gone, Becket hoped. But they will be hard on our heels. And she knew no trick with a few mines would stop such a massive fleet from pushing deeper into Alliance territory.
Chapter 26
Retreating is never easy. Especially when colonies have to be abandoned. Yet every cadet quickly learns the importance of such actions. In the opening stages of any war, it is the fleets of each side that matter the most, not their individual worlds. Sometimes to preserve the fleet, a colony must be sacrificed in the hope it will one day be freed once again.
-Excerpt from Empire Rising, 3002 AD.
Handmaiden, Kalesh System, 23rd January 2482 AD (four weeks later).
“This is as far as we go,” Ya’sia said to Handmaiden’s bridge officers. “Take us three light minutes into the system and bring the fleet to a halt. We will form up into shield three formation. Captain Maleck, arrange a picket squadron to watch the shift passage.”
“Yes Admiral,” Maleck replied before turning to his staff to give out further orders.
Becket watched them go about their duties. There was a somber seriousness to all of Handmaiden’s officers that she recognized from before the before of Battle of Earth. They know it’s all or nothing now, she thought. For three weeks they had retreated from Delta Fort into Crian territory with the Karacknid fleet nipping at their heels. A constant wave of small fast attack frigates had been pecking at Ya’sia’s rear-guard. Though the losses had been relatively equal, any Alliance ships that got too damaged to keep up had to be abandoned. Ships Ya’sia couldn’t afford to lose. Along the retreat they had been forced to abandon two Crian colonies. Ya’sia had stripped the worlds of their warships, adding over two hundred to her fleet. It had done nothing to bolster the morale of Handmaiden’s officers. Never before had a Crian colony been threatened by another species, let alone abandoned to their mercy. And now we must fight them, Becket knew as she looked at the shift passage they had just exited, wondering how long it would take the main Karacknid fleet to appear. The Kalesh system was home to another Crian colony which had a population of over a billion. That was not why Ya’sia had chosen to fight, however. Three artificial shift passages had been made to the Kalesh system. One led directly to Cria, the Crian’s homeworld, another to Varanni space and a system just one jump away from Varanni Prime. The third led to the system the Varanni had given to the Mindus survivors. If Kalesh fell, it would be almost impossible to stop the Karacknids from striking multiple targets at ease.
“We’ve got movement in the inner system,” a sensor officer reported. “Multiple contacts are starting to accelerate.”
“My species’ Home Fleet,” Ya’sia said when Becket’s head spun in alarm. She had feared the Karacknids had managed to get ahead of them somehow. “I sent orders for them to rendezvous with us,” Ya’sia added. “Every ship that can should be racing here.”
Becket nodded, she already knew the call had gone out for every warship to race to Kalesh, she just hadn’t expected to arrive before them. “Signal them and send the coordinates we’re heading to, order them to rendezvous with us,” Ya’sia continued. “Request a full report on the number and status of their ships.”
When the report came in, Becket scanned it with interest. The Crian Home Fleet added another two hundred and sixty warships to their fleet. Two squadrons from nearby systems had arrived before them, adding another eighty. One thousand three hundred and forty, Becket thought as she added up the Alliance ship numbers. Not nearly enough, she concluded. Not when the Karacknids had more than three and a half thousand.
“Do not grow too concerned just yet,” Ya’sia said loudly enough for everyone on Handmaiden’s bridge to hear. When Becket looked up it was clear she was talking to her though. “This is where our artificial shift passages play out to our advantage. You will see.”
Becket smiled though she wasn’t fully convinced. She understood what Ya’sia was doing though, her bridge officers needed to believe they could win. And maybe we can, Becket said to herself as she tried to figure out just how that might be possible. There was no point wasting time wallowing in doubt.
*
It took the forward elements of the Karacknid fleet six hours to enter the Kalesh system behind Ya’sia’s fleet. After a brief skirmish with the picket squadron Ya’sia had put in place, they quickly jumped back out. To Becket’s surprise, the main Karacknid fleet did not appear right behind them. In fact, it took four days for the Karacknid fleet t
o jump into the system. What surprised her just as much was the number of Alliance ships that appeared in that time. Six squadrons added another five hundred ships to Ya’sia’s fleet. It was only when the third squadron arrived that Becket started to grasp the real significance of the Alliance’s artificial shift passages. Combined with the jump gates they used to push ships through shift space at extremely high velocities, key hubs like the Kalesh system were within two or three shift passages of tens of other systems. Systems that each had their own garrisons that were rushing to the scene of the coming battle.
“We do not have to beat them,” Ya’sia said to her Admirals and Captains in the holo conference she had called. Though Becket was invisible to those on the conference, she and the staff officers were listening in as well. “We just have to bleed them. Right now the fleets from our other Fort systems are racing here. If we can reduce the Karacknids’ numbers enough that they are not able to invade Cria or Varanni Prime, then our brethren will arrive in time to shore up our defenses. Every hour we delay them in this system gives more time for our reinforcements to arrive and for our larger fleets to get into position. Each one of us must give a good account of ourselves. Nothing less is acceptable.”
