Counterstrike

by D. J. Holmes

  “We’ll be in range to fire in five minutes,” Anderson reported. “They are taking their time organizing the retreat,” he added. “I’ve already liaised with Lightfoot’s tactical officer; we’ll coordinate our fire.”

  James nodded to acknowledge the report. He was still staring at the Karacknid Command Dreadnought. His opponent had fallen for his bluff. With the damage the two Karacknid forces that were attacking Sanji and Taitou had taken, clearly the Karacknid commander wanted to keep his largest fleet fully intact. Even if they were to try it for real, it was unlikely Lightfoot’s ships would get to energy weapon range, but the threat was still there. They don’t know we don’t have another trick up our sleeve, or more fighters to throw into the mix, or maybe they are scared of Tranquility? James thought. Whatever it was, for once, he felt like he had actually outsmarted his opposite number.

  A groan from one of the sensor officers pulled James’ attention away from the largest Karacknid fleet. When he checked the secondary holo displays, he saw what had caused it. Another missile salvo from the two fleets pursuing Koroylov’s ships had struck home before Ya’sia’s ships got close enough to provide help. Taking a page from the Human tactics, the Karacknids had focused all of their missiles on Koroylov’s battle squadron and left Suarez’s alone. James groaned when he saw what had happened. More than a hundred ships had been wiped out or crippled. Desperately he searched the display for Constitution, Koroylov’s battleship. But he couldn’t find any sign of it. “Where is Constitution?” he demanded as he looked to his command staff. Ivanov was already staring at him. A tear running down her cheek. Ever so slowly she shook her head as she closed her eyes. Two more tears escaped. James swore as he punched his command chair. Ivanov had served with Koroylov long before he had met her. Of course she had been keeping a close eye on his flagship. “Inform Ya’sia she is to assume overall command of our left flank,” James snapped. “She is to get her ships back here at once.”

  “Firing our missiles,” Anderson announced, either unaware or unaffected by Koroylov’s loss. “Fleet is going into full reverse,” Miyagi added as soon as the missiles were clear. Though James knew he should watch the progress of his and Lightfoot salvos, he focused on what was left of Koroylov’s battle squadron. As the warships raced away from Sanji more and more had to be abandoned. Then Ya’sia’s ships reached them. They were just in time to help fend off another missile salvo. Even so, sixty more ships were blown apart by the Karacknid missiles. Beyond them, the reserve fighter force launched an attack run against the weakest of the two Karacknid fleets. They charged in right after the salvo of mark V missiles from New Shanghai. More than a hundred Karacknid warships, most of them capital ships, were taken out. It wasn’t enough. Less than a minute later what remained of the Karacknid fleet fired again. As another missile salvo crashed into the retreating warships, more antimatter detonations bloomed taking out many targets. Then what was left of Koroylov and Suarez’s battlefleets crossed the outer range of New Shanghai’s point defenses. They were safe. Though James wanted to breathe a sigh of relief, he couldn’t. Far too few ships had returned. Koroylov’s battle squadron had been decimated. Only seventy ships and twenty freighters had made it back. Their losses had been nearly eighty percent.

  With an effort, James turned from the battered battle squadron. He was just in time to see the salvo from his and Lightfoot’s fleet reach the largest Karacknid fleet. As he expected, the Karacknids blasted most of the missiles out of existence long before they got close enough to detonate. Less than a hundred actually reached their targets. Drake’s sensors counted forty ships destroyed and close to fifty more damaged. The attack had barely made a scratch on the Karacknid fleet. In contrast, also as James had expected, the large Karacknid fleet had targeted all of the missiles from the one salvo it had been able to fire at Lightfoot’s fleet. As those missiles crashed home, far more burst through the point defense fire. Nearly two hundred freighters and warships were wiped out as antimatter particles collided with normal matter and the two disappeared in a blinding flash of energy. “Get all our ships within range of New Shanghai’s point defenses,” James ordered. “I need an immediate status report on each battle squadron. We need to know what strength we have left and what our capabilities are.” The Karacknids had achieved their goal, they had smashed Sanji’s and Taitou’s defenders back towards New Shanghai. Even as he watched, the four fleets that had attacked the moons set about pummeling what little orbital defenses were left. The thermonuclear detonations on the moons’ surfaces finished off the final mark V missile launchers. As soon as they were done, the Karacknid fleets began to maneuver again. Each of the two fleets that had attacked one of the moons joined together to form a larger fleet. Then the Karacknid battlefleet, now in three large fleets, moved to positions where they could assault New Shanghai and put the defenders in a crossfire.

  As the Karacknid fleets maneuvered, James assessed their strength. Of the two thousand ships that had attacked Lightfoot and Taitou, only one thousand two hundred appeared to be battle ready. A secondary squadron of more than two hundred was pulling back, clearly too damaged to fight on. Of the two thousand that had attacked Koroylov and Sanji, many more were battle ready. They had only lost three hundred and fifty warships leaving them one thousand six hundred and fifty. When Miyagi sent him a status update on his ships, James’ spirits sank even lower. Koroylov’s battle squadron was essentially out of the fight. In addition, between them Suarez, Lightfoot, Jil’lal and Klack had lost another three hundred warships and close to a thousand freighters. Essentially, his fleet was down two battle squadron’s worth of warships. Worse, Chen’s fighters’ strength had been reduced from twelve hundred to six hundred. And they haven’t even used their asteroids yet, James thought as he eyed the enemy Command Dreadnought. He was sure they would be coming soon. As soon as the Karacknids had reformed themselves, they would attack. There was no reason to wait. Our only hope is to bleed them even more, James said to himself. He had no hope that he could successfully defend New Shanghai. But if he could bleed the Karacknid fleet to the point where they didn’t have enough functional warships to advance any further, he could buy Christine and the Alliance fleets time. Even that was a long shot, James knew, but he had to try. He couldn’t give up yet. “Make sure Chen has his Corsairs prepped for launch. Their priority is to intercept asteroids when the Karacknids deploy them. We’ve taken out enough of the fighters that our Spitfires can handle any fighter attack the Karacknids launch. I want Chen’s bombers held in reserve. We’re going to hit that Command Dreadnought once the fighting gets intense. Perhaps if we can take out their commander we can disrupt their cohesion,” James instructed. He also hoped it might delay any advance further than New Shanghai when the colony fell, but he couldn’t say that to his subordinates.

  “Karacknid fleets are advancing again!” Anderson shouted. “They’re moving into missile range. Their mining freighters are heading to the front of their fleet. There are far more of them than we tracked coming into the system from the gas giant!”

  James’ head whipped round towards the holo display. More than a hundred freighters were moving ahead of the Karacknid fleet. “Where did they come from?” he demanded. “Trace their previous courses!” If all the freighters were full of asteroids cloaked in Karacknid stealth technology, his fleet was doomed.

  “Working on it,” Ivanov responded before anyone else. “It looks like they came in with one of the recent supply convoys. We got a recon probe pretty close to them as they came into the system. There was no indication that they were mining freighters. Analysis of their acceleration profile suggested that they weren’t fully loaded. They certainly didn’t look like they were full of asteroids.”

  “Thank you,” James replied as he studied the freighters. Was it another trick of the Karacknid commander? Had he found a way to make the freighters look like they were empty when they were full of asteroids mined from another system? James had no way to know for sure. “Target a
ll those freighters with our first salvo of mark Vs,” he ordered. “Organize Chen’s first fighter wing to attack with our second salvo. The more freighters we take out far away from New Shanghai, the more time their asteroids will have to spread out. Maybe some of them will miss us.” James hated using fighters against enemy freighters, they were much better used against warships, but the asteroids were too big a threat.

  “First salvo of mark Vs will launch in thirty seconds,” Anderson reported.

  “Look Admiral, they’re bringing up forces to defend their freighters,” Fisher said as she pointed to the holo display. Nearly three hundred light ships and what James presumed were all of the fighters the Karacknids had left moved ahead of the central Karacknid fleet and took up positions protecting the charging freighters.

  “There’s nothing we can do about that,” James replied. “Chen’s fighters will have to fight their way through the point defense fire.”

  “Shall we add our multistage missiles to her second salvo of mark Vs?” Anderson asked.

  James shook his head. “No, they would not have enough fuel to evade point defense fire. We’ll wait and see what damage Chen can do. We may need them to target asteroids.” As James spoke, the holo plot filled with more than a thousand contacts as the battlestations in orbit around New Shanghai opened fire. For ten minutes they accelerated towards the central Karacknid fleet. They easily caught up with and then passed Chen’s fighter wing. Then they disappeared for a split second. In the place of each missile, six multistage missiles appeared. Using their extremely high acceleration rates, they dove in and engaged the Karacknid freighters and escorts. Explosions filled Drake’s holo display as Karacknid warships and freighters were blown apart.

  “Detecting hundreds of asteroids spilling from the damaged freighters,” Anderson informed everyone needlessly.

  James grimaced. This was where the Karacknids had a distinct advantage. When defending from a similar attack, their antimatter missiles destroyed freighter and asteroids. His simply broke the freighter apart, spilling the asteroids out into space. Even as he grimaced, James’ eyes narrowed. There were far fewer asteroids than he had been expecting. “Analyze those additional freighters, what happened when some of them were hit? We’re not seeing nearly enough asteroids.”

  “You’re right,” Ivanov said in excitement. “I’m not detecting any asteroids coming from the newer freighters that were hit. The asteroids are coming from the mining freighters that we managed to damage.”

  “Are they decoys?” Fisher asked as she turned to James.

  James didn’t know. It was a cheap trick if they were. There were three of the newer freighters for every mining freighter that was still left. If he split his fire between them all, he’d never take them out before the freighters got close enough to self-destruct and spill the asteroids out towards his forces. “I’m sure they have plenty of spare freighters that they can throw away a whole bunch against us like this,” James said. Yet he wasn’t sure. In the back of his mind he feared the Karacknid commander was up to something. It seemed too easy. But what could it be? They had no indication the freighters were any more of a threat than they appeared. “Focus all our fire from the next salvo on the mining freighters. Inform Chen’s attack wing to do the same.”

  When the second salvo came in, it took out more of the mining freighters. Then Chen’s Spitfires and Corsairs joined the battle. Using their plasma missiles and anti-fighter missiles, they blasted apart more freighters, enemy fighters, and warships. Then, spinning round, they used their small plasma cannons to blow apart as many asteroids as they could. “Prepare Chen’s second wing,” James requested. One more good attack and it seemed like they might be able to negate the worst of the Karacknids’ asteroids. There were more than three thousand hurtling towards his defenses, but he had enough firepower to blast that many apart. If one of his officers acknowledged the command it was lost as more alarms went off. The three Karacknid fleets had just entered missile range. Between them, they launched fifty-eight thousand missiles towards New Shanghai. James’ had to fight to keep his face expressionless. He had only ever seen so many missiles before in simulations. Now he was about to encounter them face to face. In reply, New Shanghai’s battlestations fired their third volley of missiles. As the missiles passed James’ battle squadrons, all his warships fired as well. The number of Allied missiles totaled thirty thousand. It would rise to thirty-five thousand when the mark Vs released their multistage missiles, but even so, the response looked pitiful on Drake’s sensors.

  With an effort, James dismissed the disparity in missile salvos. His immediate concern was the Karacknid asteroids. If enough of them got so close that he’d have to engage them with his ships’ energy weapons, they’d fill space around New Shanghai with millions of asteroid particles. That would make it next to impossible for his ships to track fifty-eight thousand Karacknid missiles as they closed in for the kill. As the third salvo of mark Vs and then Chen’s second attack wing engaged the freighters, more of them were destroyed. James grinned at the results. He shared a look with Fisher and Miyagi. All but four of the mining freighters were gone. Yes, most of them had broken up releasing their asteroids, but they had broken up far enough away from New Shanghai that many of the asteroids were on ballistic courses that would miss the colony. As if to confirm his victory, the remaining four mining freighters self-destructed. As soon as their cargo tumbled out, the remainder of their escorts ceased accelerating and allowed themselves to fall back towards the main Karacknid fleet.

  Now all we have to do is deal with their missile salvos, James thought, unsure whether to feel relieved or not, for as soon as his mind turned to the Karacknid missiles, he was reminded of their number. “Tell Chen’s third attack wing to stand down,” James ordered, “they can join up with the bombers, we’ll use them to strike at the Karacknid capital ships if we can get an openin…” James didn’t finish his sentence. The Karacknid freighters, the ones that hadn’t been carrying asteroids, had suddenly accelerated ahead of the wave of asteroids. James knew something was wrong. The Karacknids were up to something! Then his mouth fell open in shock. Every holo display on Drake’s bridge turned bright blue. Then they went completely dark. Voices all around James shouted in alarm. Confusion and panic threatened to take over. For a couple seconds James failed to find his voice. Then he shouted as loud as he could. “Silence,” he demanded. “Those freighters were filled with antimatter warheads. Hundreds of them,” James explained, still shouting. “The anti-matter explosions have knocked out most of our active sensors. Increase power to all of Drake’s sensors, signal every ship in the fleet to do the same. The interference will clear. We need to be ready when it does! Get to it!” he added as he tried to shake his officers back into action.

  “But Admiral,” Fisher said as he leaned over towards James. “We just lost all of our active tracking on those asteroids and their missiles.”

  “I know,” James whispered through clenched teeth. “What else do you want me to do?” When he turned to Fisher he saw fear in her eyes. He guessed he looked the same. The Karacknid commander had tricked them! Sixty of his supposedly decoy freighters had survived the attacks James had launched against the mining freighters. Everyone must have been stuffed to the gills with antimatter warheads. Perhaps each had over a thousand in them. The massive wave of antimatter the detonation of each freighter had given off had crashed into the thick wall of asteroids. The mutual annihilation of so much matter and antimatter released a surge of photons and neutrinos that blinded all of his ships’ sensors. As the holo displays around him remained dark, James tightened his hands into fists. “Come on, come on,” he whispered as he rocked in his command chair. “Come on girl,” he said as he willed Drake’s sensors to reinitialize. “Yes!” he shouted as he pumped his fist. Images of New Shanghai had reappeared. “Begin tracking all incoming enemy ordnance,” he snapped. “All point defenses open fire as soon as they get into range.” When the image sharpened to the
point where James could see the massive enemy missile salvo, he cut off whatever else he had been about to add. The missiles were already within range of his point defenses; and there were so many of them.

  His sudden despair evaporated when Drake’s sensors detected explosions amidst the Karacknid missile salvo. Someone was already firing their point defenses. Glancing at his own fleet, James’ eyes were drawn to Tranquility. The energy readings from the Kulrean worldship were off the scale. Her sensors weren’t blinded, James realized as his excitement grew. Thousands of green energy beams were zapping Karacknid missiles out of existence. Drake’s sensors had no idea what the weapons were, but they were effective. In the seconds it took James to glance at Tranquility and then back to the Karacknid missiles, thousands had been blown away. The Kulrean defenses were smashing through the Karacknid missiles like a bull in a china shop. Wherever Tranquility directed her weapons, hundreds of missiles vanished.

  Even so, the vast majority of the Karacknid missiles charged towards their targets. When the rest of James’ warships, battlestations and defense satellites finally opened fire, flak cannon rounds, AM missiles, laser beams, plasma bolts and electromagnetic arc waves filled space with color and explosions. Yet it was nowhere near enough. The Karacknid missiles had already gotten too close.

  “All ships are to carry out evasive maneuvers,” James bellowed, his despair swelling once again. His order was far earlier than he would normally give it. It would impact the effectiveness of his ships’ fire, but the more maneuvers his ships carried out, the more chance they would have of shaking off the missiles targeting them. James needed his fleet to survive this salvo. If they could, then they could engage the next salvo properly. There was no way the Karacknids had enough antimatter warheads to repeat the same trick twice. If they did, they would have used it against Sanji and Taitou. At least, James hoped so. It was the last thing he had to hold onto.