by Ira Tabankin
The combined Neanderthal and human war planning committee had decided to use unmodified ships, crewed by the worst criminals in the Neanderthal society who had been converted into androids to lead the battle with the Overlords. Since the Earth forces they’d face knew of the ship’s weakness, almost none were expected to survive the initial attack.
Leading the attack would show the Overlords the Neanderthals were loyal and following their orders. When the Overlords were satisfied the Neanderthals were blooding the humans while also being bloodied then the Overlords had begun to commit their own ships to the war then the new Neanderthal battleships would enter the war from the Overlords relatively weak rear. The Emperor wanted to bloody the Overlords for tricking and lying them for thousands of years.
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The people of Earth had been warned of the coming invasion for over twenty years and they’d grown tired of the sacrifices they been told they had to make in order to prepare the planet for the upcoming war. By the time Christmas Eve 2049 arrived, billions of Earthlings had had enough of the constant war hype. People had money as most of the world’s population had been lifted out of poverty due to the massive employment due to the upcoming war. Massive shelters had been built around the world. Thousands of mountains had been hollowed out to build shelters. Tunnels and even subways had been turned into shelters. Each shelter had supplies to last their survivors for a year.
The world paused on Christmas to celebrate the birth of Jesus and to allow people time off to spend time with their families. People needed time off. Even with nanites and robots, there was so much work people needed to perform that most worked five and half or six days a week. If you wanted to work seven days a week, you easily could.
With total employment and many hours of overtime, money flowed like water. People were constantly reminded of the upcoming invasion, but on the other hand, most had never seen the amount of money flowing in as they were earning. Consumer spending pushed higher employment and more income.
As Earth paused on Christmas Eve, a small wormhole opened between Earth and the moon. Alarms screamed across the planet. Pilots ran to their fighters, massive cruisers, larger battleships and the largest Earth ships, the Monitors went on alert. Many of the largest ships had only a skeleton crew on board due to the holiday.
A glowing probe popped out of the wormhole over Earth’s equator. The probe spun and completed five orbits of Earth before it made contact with the planet’s population. At the precisely 6 PM GMT, every monitor, TV, radio, web site, and communication was interrupted by the probe’s message which was broadcast in every language used on Earth. “Attention people of Earth, attention people of Earth, we are the people who once lived on the fourth planet you now call Mars which you named after your ancient God of War which is very appropriate. We used to live on Mars. We destroyed our planet in a massive war which consumed our planet. We’ve spent thousands of years in another system where we’ve rebuilt a new world.
“We have decided we want to rebuild our home world, and we’re going to use the Earth as our forward operating base. We are going to offer you one, let us repeat that, we are offering you one chance to surrender and work for us. We know many of you will reject our offer without proof you stand no chance of winning a war against us.
“We will therefore show you an example of our power, your scientists should watch the first planet in your system, the one you call Mercury. In one hour, we will demonstrate our power. We will give you one of your planetary rotations to decide if you will agree to surrender or if we are going to have to invade and kill most of you. Remember, in one hour watch the planet you call Mercury.”
The world’s scientists and military leaders focused all of their sensors and telescopes on Mercury when as the probe said, in one hour, a massive wormhole opened between Venus and Mercury. A strange egg-shaped ship emerged from the event horizon of the wormhole and it took up orbit over Mercury. When the orbit had stabilized, a series of fifty-foot-thick beams shot out from the ship. The beams struck Mercury. When they did, they cut off a chunk the size of Earth’s moon from Mercury. The chunk from Mercury was shot again and again until only small rocks remained. These were sucked into the Sun’s orbit where they burned up.
The probe again took control of Earth’s communications network, “Now you have witnessed our power from a single ship. We have hundreds of such ships. Ships which can destroy your planet if you do not agree to surrender and follow our every order. We will wait a single rotation for your answer. All you have to do is broadcast on any frequency, we will be listening on all of them for your agreement. Once you surrender, we will send our military ambassador to set the rules you’ll live under as a member of our new society.”
Rhett and Kalteck had been prepared for this event. Earth’s massive fleet had been cloaked in technologies the military prayed the enemy didn’t know about. They ordered a planet wide alert and recall of every crewmember as the Earth went on full war alert. Civilians not directly involved in the war effort were ordered to their shelters while those involved in the munitions industry were ordered to work around the clock while their families were sent to their shelters.
Rhett sat on the command bridge of the recently updated Lincoln which had been updated while in the Neanderthal’s system and nodded towards Kalteck who was on his own ship. Rhett was connected to the three leaders of Earth, each of whom were in deeply buried shelters. Rhett looked at the four faces on the monitors looking back at him. “The event we prepared for and prayed wouldn’t come has arrived, my first question is directed to Kalteck. “Will the chunk of Mercury they blew apart have any negative impact on us?”
“No, it shouldn’t. While it looked like they destroyed the chunk, in reality if you study the images frame by frame, you’ll see they broke apart the planet and they’ve sucked up the minerals they broke out from the chunk they broke off. They did it to impress, to scare us and to give themselves a supply of heavy minerals.”
President Haley asked, “What should we expect to happen next?”
Kalteck responded, “When the time runs out and you reject their offer, they will threaten to bring their main fleet here to enslave us. The first ships will be the Neanderthals. They will expect us to destroy each other and then their fleet will arrive, they expect, unopposed to crush humanity. They will expect we will have lost most of our ships fighting the Neanderthals so they will be able to arrive in Earth’s orbit unopposed.”
Rhett asked, “Do we have any idea where they’ll open their wormhole to arrive? Can we mine that area with more mines?”
Kalteck responded, “If their probe sees us doing anything in space its AI will assume, we’re going to reject their offer and we’re preparing to fight back so they’ll close out the time and invade sooner. We’ve already seeded the system with over eight hundred billion mines which sounds like a huge number but remember how vast the system is. We’ll have to hope they’re in the right locations. I recommend we keep the fleet where it is and masked.”
President Melotove asked, “What about our shuttles taking crew to our ships? Won’t they alert the probe?”
Kalteck responded with a leering smile, “They know we have orbiting facilities and bases on the moon. Since many of the fleet units are hiding on the far side of the moon, they should assume those shuttles are carrying workers and people to the moon and orbiting facilities. So far, the probe hasn’t interfered with the shuttles. As long as the shuttles are unarmed, they usually do not interfere. Tell your shuttle pilots to steer clear of the probe and do not use any armed shuttles.”
President Xi asked, “Do you still have confidence the Neanderthals will live up to our agreement?”
Rhett nodded, “Mr. President, I do. I’ve spent time with their Emperor. He is a man of his word and his military is in total support of the agreement. Look at it from his side, we’re going to be destroying many of his ships when they enter our system ahead of the enemy’s main fleet. Hopefully, we’ll only lose the se
cond line ships because we’ll need every front-line ship to fight the main attack. I think we’re going to surprise the enemy like they haven’t been surprised before.”
President Haley asked, “What will the enemy do first?”
Kalteck responded, “I expect the enemy to use the Neanderthal ships to bombard the planet with kinetic weapons in their first pass. Our defenses should be able to stop some of them, I want you to know many are going to make it through. They are going to destroy many of our largest cities. You should get everyone possible into a shelter as quickly as possible.”
The three Presidents’ faces paled, Xi asked, “How many cities will they destroy?”
Kalteck lowered his voice, “They will attempt to destroy every one of them. That’s why we built planetary defense bases, why we armed the space stations and have military AIs on line to coordinate the defensive side of the battle. The objects will be falling at speeds in excess of Mach 25. My AI has confirmed the defensive AIs are online and ready. Our defensive sites are online and ready to fire. In the worst case, we could be looking at billions of deaths.”
The three leaders were silent when they realized their countries were really going to get pounded. Rhett broke into the conversation. “I’m sorry to interrupt, I need to drop off the conversation and would like to have Kalteck with me. I want to check on all of our last-minute preparations.”
The Presidents nodded, President Haley said what the three were thinking, “Admiral, may you go with God.”
Kalteck whispered, “May the creator of All watch over all of you.”
Chapter 24
The probe superimposed a countdown clock on the world’s media and when the clock stuck zero, it broadcast, “This is the time you must respond. What do the people of the planet you call Earth say, life as a member state of the Empire or death? I urge you to choose well, you’re lives and the lives of your tribes and families rely on your response.”
The three Presidents ordered Rhett, “Fleet Admiral, blow that alien probe out of our system.”
“Yes, sirs and madam.”
Rhett turned to Admiral Dune, “Admiral, you are cleared to fire. You are weapons free. In fact, please connect me to the fleet.”
A moment later the communications officer said, “Admiral, you are connected to the fleet.”
“Thank you.”
Rhett pressed a button on his command chair, “Members of the combined fleet, the largest, the most powerful fleet humans and Neanderthals have ever seen, today we are going into battle to free our combined people from being under the thumb of our common enemy. We want to crush the enemy so they can’t ever threaten us again. If everyone does their jobs, the jobs they’ve trained years to carry out we will win. Let me repeat that, if everyone who hears this does their jobs WE WILL WIN! Repeat after me, WE WILL WIN.”
The ships shook from the shouting from the crews. The ships rang with the cheers from the crews. Rhett continued, “Don’t get me wrong, we’re in for the fight of our lives. The good news is our common enemy isn’t expecting a major fight. The only people who’ve put up a fight against them have been Kalteck’s people. Hence, they will arrive thinking we’ll be a pushover. Now let’s discuss the situation of the Neanderthal fleet which the enemy will be sending in as the point ships of their attack, we will have to fight our own. The good news is most of those ships have been converted to operate under AI control. The small Neanderthal crews will eject as soon as we hit their ships.
“Do not, I repeat, do NOT target the Neanderthal life pods. We have special red cross medical ships with the fleets whose sole function is to collect the life pods and to provide medical treatment the fleet warships can’t. Remember to where to target the initial Neanderthal ships. The friendly ships will be broadcasting a special IFF code which will tell your targeting systems they aren’t to be engaged.
“Remember, we’re fighting for our homes. We’re fighting so we, and our children, can be free. Let’s defend our freedom and our children’s lives. May God and the Creator of All smile on us and protect us this day. Fleet Admiral McIntire out.”
A moment later a small tactical stealth coated missile which had been launched from the Lincoln struck the alien’s probe with the kinetic force of a five-megaton explosion. Rhett buckled himself into his seat. “Here we go” he whispered as a massive wormhole opened and Neanderthal ships began entering Earth’s system. As soon as they began entering the system Rhett’s ships opened fire before they could stabilize. Four monitor class ships had been, by good fortune, close enough to open fire on the ships as they began entering the system. Many of the Neanderthal ships ran into the antimatter mines which ripped the invading ships open. The mines came a rude surprise to the invaders.
Energy beams flashed from the Monitors; thousands of antimatter armed missiles struck hulls before their shields could go up. Some of the Neanderthal ships who managed to enter the system ran into the antimatter X-ray mines which fried the ship’s AI cores and the small AIs in the Androids. Over five thousand life pods ejected from the Neanderthal ships. Rhett nodded to his CoS, “Get those pods picked up as quickly as possible. I want those people saved and checked out.”
“Sir, the medical ships and even the Piranhas are using their capture beams to drag pods to the medical ships.”
“Good! Keep them going. We need to get every last life pod out of the way before the enemy’s ships arrive. We don’t want our people caught in the middle of the battle.”
Admiral Dune smiled, “Sir, everyone knows what’s required.”
“I know, I’m just worried we won’t be able to save them all. I promised their Emperor I’d do everything within my power to save as many of his people as possible. I already feel bad we’re destroying so many of his ships. I gave him my word we’d help him rebuild his fleet after the war is won. I want a record of the number of launched life pods and the number picked up sent to the Emperor, so he knows we’re keeping our word.”
His CoS reminded him, “Sir, we’ve already shared the plans of our Monitors and Battleships with him.”
“I know. I’ve been thinking of a new class, one that uses the best designs of both his and our ships. I know the core designs are different, but I believe we can adopt both to create one massive almost unstoppable ship,”
“Sir, remember, in the days of the ocean navies they quickly learned no ship was unsinkable…”
“Yes, I know. You understand what I meant so please don’t play word games with me.”
Both laughed to break the tension. The weapon’s officer on the Lincoln reported, “Admirals, it appears the last of the Neanderthal ships have entered our system, only seven entered untouched. Nine Monitors and four Battleships are maneuvering to engage.”
Rhett shook his head, “Belay that order. Send only the Battleships, I want the Monitors to remain in formation to face the enemy’s ships. We know how to put the Neanderthal’s ships out of commission. Hell, our Battlecruisers could handle the task. No need to use a massive show of force.”
The Overlords were surprised when their allies, the Neanderthal’s ships were being blown out of space. They didn’t understand how the humans could have so quickly figured out a weakness in the Neanderthal ships. The initial ships were surprised when the humans managed to strike a small spot where the massive lower saucer connected to the central hub. Each particle beam strike hit the same spot. The beams burned through the weak spot on the shields and entered the lower saucers filled with fighters, fuel, and weapons.
The Overlords were also surprised by the unusual weapons which seemed to appear out of nowhere. Their explosions sent massive doses of hard radiation and EMPs into the Neanderthal ships which either destroyed or disrupted the ship’s AIs and androids to the point the ships lost control and nineteen crashed into each other. The resulting explosion with the energy of the wormhole caused the wormhole to close with some ships caught in the middle of the wormhole.
Rhett watched the battle unfold from the secu
rity of the armored command bridge of the Lincoln. The ship was a million miles away from the wormhole and battle. The video was relayed by a relay sensor. Admiral Dune stood next to Rhett, “Admiral, do you want to send in the Piranhas?”
“Not yet, the Battleships appear to have the situation well in hand. So far, the enemy doesn’t know about the Piranhas, I don’t see any need to educate them to all of our weapons until they arrive in force.”
“Do you think they realize the Emperor turned sides on them?”
“No. His ships are attempting to fight ours. We made sure their AIs didn’t know about the mines so they couldn’t avoid them or have any defense against them. The enemy is most likely wondering what they ran into.”
