The Scimitars fired a second salvo sixty seconds later. The Alliance fighters didn’t respond—didn’t need to respond. Then the fighters slipped from Mira’s mind as the missiles closed the range on Camerone herself.
“Standby missile defenses,” she ordered crisply. Twenty-seven Commonwealth salvos were in space, and the first was now seven hundred thousand kilometers away and looming. “Engage at will.”
Lasers and positron lances began to fill the space around Camerone. Electronic emitters sang complex songs of temptation and jamming, confusing and beguiling missiles to their deaths. Four warships loosed the full power of their weaponry and computers against the smart—but not that smart—brains of the Stormwinds.
Then the missiles revealed at least part of why Zahn’s defenders thought they stood a chance. At the five-hundred-thousand-kilometer mark, with only a handful of their number destroyed, their acceleration suddenly doubled.
Over three hundred missiles lunged towards Battle Seven-One at an acceleration the Alliance targeting computers had never been programmed to handle. What should have been a thirty-second closing period was now ten.
Dozens of missiles died to lasers and positron beams—but it should have been hundreds. Where nothing should have made it through the outer perimeter, over a hundred missiles broke through and charged the Battle Group.
A dozen simply…blew up. The upgrade clearly hadn’t been designed into the missiles, it had to be a software kludge the missiles’ hardware couldn’t always handle. It showed in their AI, too. Missiles went off course, lured by ECM, or just plain missed without any apparent effort on the Alliance’s part.
But not all, and even Manticore and the logistics transports’ missile defenses engaged in the last-minute desperate attempt to survive as the starships maneuvered and fighters dived at the closing weapons.
They almost stopped them all.
Gravitas took the first hit, the strike cruiser the biggest ship in the battle group. The Imperial cruiser leapt through space as the gigaton warhead went off bare meters from her hull, her icon flashing bright orange on Mira’s display as her computers tried to assess the damage.
Two more missiles hit starfighters head-on, collisions the tiny ships could not survive.
The last pair collided with the logistics transport Venture and detonated, vaporizing the unarmored transport in a massive blast of antimatter fire that took eighteen hundred souls with it.
#
“Update the targeting parameters for that sprint,” Mira ordered, trying not to look at the explosion on the screen that had been a ten-million-ton freighter. “You have forty-five seconds,” she said flatly, using her implant override to slice part of the tactical controls over to her own console.
“I’ll take over ECM,” she continued calmly. “Notley, start using our Jackhammers in counter mode.”
Commander Rose ignored them both, her eyes closed as she ran through data in her implant, revising again and again as she adapted the defensive programming to handle a sudden doubling of acceleration. Figures and programs flickered back and forth between the tactical officers on the warships, each contributing their own pieces as the seconds ticked away.
Explosions lit up the space behind the incoming missiles as the starfighters starting lashing out at the missiles targeting them, the chaotic mess of the starfighter battle barely registering as Mira spun Camerone’s ECM emitters up to full strength and wove a dancing song of deception and lies across space.
Then the second wave of missiles hit the defensive perimeter, and they got to see how well the tactical officers had done—with thirty-odd thousand lives still hanging in the balance. Again, at the half-million-kilometer mark, the missiles doubled their acceleration.
Even more self-destructed this time. The thrusters weren’t designed for that kind of throughput; the mass manipulators weren’t designed to cushion the force… The ten-second terminal period burned as much fuel as an entire hour of regular flight.
Even losing a quarter of the missiles to systems failure, it was clearly worth it. Three hundred and sixty missiles, even capital ship missiles, shouldn’t have even been a challenge to the defenses of four warships. Now Mira desperately tried to lure the missiles aside with jammers and decoys, Rose slashed away with lasers and positron lances that now knew how fast the missiles were accelerating, and Notley guided the capital ship missiles he’d launched onto intercept courses forty seconds before.
This time, the lances claimed over two hundred victims, their explosive deaths marking the advancing front of the missile wave. Many of the others looked like they were going to miss…and then the Jackhammers struck.
There were no direct head-to-head intercepts. Those were difficult to arrange and inefficient. The Jackhammers detonated their one-gigaton warheads between missiles or close to them. Missiles were only lightly shielded—an explosion inside of five kilometers could get a proximity kill.
Seventeen missiles survived—only to careen off into deep space, their speed and Battle Group Camerone’s ECM befuddling their electronic brains.
“We’re dialing them in,” Rose reported. “That was lucky, but the next time won’t need luck.”
Almost as the tactical officer finished speaking, the Q-probes reported the arrival of their missiles in Zahn orbit. The four fighter platforms had been generously equipped with lasers and lances, but not generously enough against thirty-plus capital ship missiles arriving at eight percent of lightspeed.
They were almost enough—Zion One survived—but two near-misses stripped defenses and sensors from the platform. Twenty-four seconds later, a missile from the second salvo struck home, crippling that platform. The third salvo obliterated it.
Even as their launch platforms started to die, the tsunami of missiles from the Alliance starfighters slammed into their Commonwealth opponents. Against eight missiles apiece, the Scimitars didn’t have the defenses or maneuverability to survive. Less than thirty fighters survived—and flew into the teeth of the Falcons’ lances.
The third missile salvo still required missile intercepts, but none of the Terran missiles made it past that last line of defense.
With the fourth, Battle Group Seven-One had their enemy’s measure—and the destruction of half of the orbital platforms had reduced their ability to adapt for the Alliance’s defenses. Not one missile made it past the missile defense net, and Mira breathed a sigh of relief.
“Ma’am!” Notley suddenly snapped. “Q-probes are picking up a wideband transmission from the surviving platforms—they surrender.”
“Order them to detonate their missiles,” Alstairs ordered immediately. “Reduce acceleration on ours until we’ve confirm the self-destructs, then move them on to retrieval vectors.”
“Their missiles are going up!” Rose reported. “Self-destructs propagating along at lightspeed. That was sent before they got our message, ma’am.”
“Guess they figured that was as clear as it could get,” Mira acknowledged. “Admiral? Your orders?”
“Maintain zero-zero course for Zahn,” Alstairs replied. “Once we’re in position to cover their approach, we’ll send in Marines to secure the stations and try to contact the surface.”
The implant communication channel was as much mental as vocal. It didn’t always carry emotion or intent as well as face-to-face, but it was definitely better at it than text communication. The Rear Admiral sounded both relieved and pleased.
“Zahn is ours.”
Chapter 14
Cora System
23:00 March 13, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
DSC-078 Avalon, Bridge
Avalon erupted into Cora space with the inevitable burst of blue Cherenkov radiation. Kyle had considered hiding behind the system’s gas giants, but they were too far away from the habitable planets to be useful.
Instead, he’d emerged directly on the ecliptic, a full light-minute from Montreal—Cora V. And they’d emerged alone—despite being the biggest ship i
n the Battle Group, Avalon had the best acceleration curve. She was best able to handle any trouble that came her way—and best able to get out of it.
“Stanford, get your people out there,” Kyle ordered. “Pendez, settle us into a nice, slow orbit. Let’s not rush in until we see what we’ve got. Xue, make sure all of our data is feeding back to the rest of the Group. Let’s see what we have.”
The kilometer-and-a-half-long carrier arced in the general direction of Cora’s two inhabited planets on a curve that would make her closest approach to Montreal just over six million kilometers. It wasn’t an aggressive course, and Kyle didn’t need it to be.
“What are we seeing?” he asked aloud, studying the tactical plot in his neural implant. The computers were already filtering out the civilian shipping, but he could see three true starships in orbit. Xue had the other layers of data; she would break down what they were and let him know.
“All right,” Xue responded slowly. “Bogey three here”—the largest of the starships flashed orange— “is a logistics ship—similar to Sunshine. She appears to be in the process of deploying orbital fortifications—I’m reading these”—two disks in orbit and several dozen smaller satellites flashed darker orange— “as two Zion-class fighter bases and missile launch platforms. None of them are reading as operational yet, which leaves us with these as a threat.”
The last two starships flashed bright red.
“Bogey One is a Paramount-class carrier,” she continued. “Old ship, probably being used to supply birds to the Zions, but she’s easily retrofitted with modern missiles and carries a hundred starfighters. Her friend is a bit more of a worry—I’m reading a Hercules-class battlecruiser.”
“Oh she’s going to be fun,” Kyle murmured. A Hercules was functionally brand-new, a contemporary to the Saint-class battleships and Volcano-class carriers carrying the main weight of the Commonwealth’s campaign against the Alliance.
“Unless the Zions have fighters aboard, and their energy signatures don’t look like it, we’re only looking at about a hundred and thirty starfighters,” Xue concluded. “But that battlecruiser has almost as many missile launchers as our Battle Group. She’s a sniper, and she can hurt Avalon bad.”
“Well, let’s see just what she does,” Avalon’s Captain replied. “And get me a vector on that logistics transport if she tries to run—I want that ship.”
“Yes, sir.”
#
It was fully ten minutes before the Commonwealth finally moved, and Kyle was starting to wonder if he needed to start insulting people’s mothers by radio to get a reaction out of the Terran ships. Finally, however, the Paramount’s fighters formed up on the battlecruiser, and the Hercules burned out after Avalon.
“The fighters are sticking to the same acceleration at the Hercules,” Xue reported. “Two hundred and thirty gravities—I estimate sixty-five minutes for the battlecruiser to make lance range.”
“Any missiles yet?”
“Negative.”
“Let’s change that, shall we?” Kyle asked cheerfully. “Give me…five salvos on the Paramount. Stanford gets the Hercules; he needs a second one on his resume.”
“You’re just nervous because you almost died the last time we met one of them,” the CAG replied. “Which, for the record, you are not permitted to try this time.”
Chuckles ran around Avalon’s bridge as the first salvo of nine missiles blasted into space. The crew was feeling a little twitchy at hanging out there on their own, even if they all knew where the rest of the Battle group was.
“Is anyone except the Hercules moving?” he asked.
“Rabbits are running for the bushes,” Xue replied. “Civilian shipping is burning away from us as fast as they can—they don’t want to be caught up in this. That Paramount is staying in orbit, as is the freighter. They seem to think the Hercules can take care of us.”
“Well, then, let’s encourage them in that line of thought,” Kyle said. “Once those missiles are on their way, turn us directly away from the Hercules and go to two hundred gees. Let’s see if we can tempt them into a fighter strike.”
A little over two minutes passed, every twenty-two seconds marked by another set of nine missiles launching into space. Kyle noted approvingly that Xue had given them a more complex course than a straight path to the carrier. By arcing them around the Hercules, she’d increased their flight time by several minutes but prevented the battlecruiser from defending the carrier.
Thirty minutes to impact either way.
“We have missile launch from the Hercules,” Xue reported. “Twenty missiles inbound.”
“We are turning to run now,” Pendez announced. “Let their missiles choke on that.”
“Enemy missile time to impact, thirty-five minutes and change,” the tactical officer noted. “Our time to impact for first salvo, twenty-eight minutes and counting.”
Kyle checked the numbers. It would now be over two and a half hours before the Hercules brought Avalon into range of her massive, megaton-a-second positron lances. Their missiles were going to be more of a headache, but with all two hundred and forty of his starfighters flying carrier defense, that was more of a minor pain than a real issue.
As far as the Commonwealth could tell, the situation was well in hand. Either Avalon would flee into Alcubierre and the system would be safe, or the Hercules would bring her to bay and rip apart the carrier and her fighters with its lances at close range.
He checked the Hercules’ position and acceleration.
In a little over sixty minutes, the Terrans would learn not to take appearances at face value.
#
“Sir, we just received a warning notice from Camerone,” Anderson told Kyle quietly. “The defenders at Zahn have added what looks like a software kludge to give their missiles a terminal sprint mode. Not sure that our friend out here has it, but…it gave their missile defense issues.”
“Update our software for the possibility,” he replied. “We’ve got time.”
Anderson coughed his agreement, turning his attention back to the computers. Their own missiles were still fifteen minutes from the Paramount, which was maneuvering to both protect the transport ship and make sure none of the civilian space stations were in the line of fire.
The last was a consideration not every starship commander would have thought of, and Kyle mentally saluted the other carrier’s captain. It wasn’t going to save the Terran ship—the carrier could probably take the Jackhammer salvos, but it wouldn’t take a lot of bad luck for it not to, and Kyle’s plan for the Paramount had already been set in motion.
The Hercules’ first salvo would reach Avalon four minutes later, followed by another twenty missiles every twenty-five seconds for almost four minutes. The battlecruiser had sent ten salvos their way, then ceased fire to see what happened.
Two hundred missiles, even arriving in sequence, were going to be a handful for the supercarrier and her fighters. A manageable handful, most likely, but a handful.
Kyle wasn’t even bothering to send his own missiles back. Nine missiles a salvo into the teeth of a modern battlecruiser with a hundred and thirty starfighters flying escort? It would have been a waste of ammunition.
His starfighter wing was the only thing that could threaten the Hercules, though the hundred-odd Scimitars could blunt the worst of the strike if he sent Stanford in. Even with the Paramount’s wing in play, though, he figured SFG-001 could take the ship.
Even with Avalon alone, he figured he could take the system. Separating the Hercules from anything the Paramount could do would be the first step in that, so he was content to run at less than his top speed and let the battlecruiser slowly catch up.
For now, he watched his missiles close with the enemy. The carrier accelerated into their teeth, then turned at the last minute and opened fire. Lasers and positron lances did their work, and his first salvo died well short of the Terran ship.
The second and third suffered the same fate, though t
hey died closer to the Paramount than the third had.
Kyle wasn’t sure what happened with the fourth salvo. The Q-probes were close, giving him near-real-time data, but it still wasn’t clear. One moment, the Terran ship was sweeping the missiles from the sky—the next, an entire quadrant of the ship’s lasers stopped firing.
The spray of fire that took out the last of the fourth salvo was clearly desperate, almost random—and took the remaining defenses out of position for the fifth and final salvo.
One missile made it through. A one-gigaton direct hit split the old ten-million-ton ship in two, her prow and stern spinning off into space from the vaporized void that had been her middle third.
“Damn,” he said mildly. “I…didn’t actually expect that to work.”
23:45 March 13, 2736 ESMDT
SFG-001 Actual—Falcon-C type command starfighter
“Well, I hope you do expect this to work,” Michael Stanford told Roberts over the com. His five wings of forty-eight fighters apiece were feeling a little exposed, drifting a hundred thousand kilometers behind Avalon. “Because a lot of us are going to be in trouble if it doesn’t.”
“My faith in you is extensive, Vice Commodore,” the Force Commander replied brightly. “And I know when to get out of the way. Good luck.”
Michael grunted acknowledgement at Roberts, then switched to his fighter group’s channel.
“Rokos, Bravo Wing front and center,” he ordered. “Use your missiles, your lances, whatever you feel is needed. We’ll cycle the center Wing when you run out of missiles.”
“You just want me dead so you can take my bunk,” Wing Commander Rokos replied. “You’re not dumb enough to think you can get my wife.”
Battle Group Avalon (Castle Federation Book 3) Page 10
