by Jay Allan
“Send orders to Admiral Winters, Atara. He is to abort his movement toward the main line and bring his fleet about to defend point one.” Barron had no idea what would be coming through that point so many millions of kilometers distant, but Winters’s force was all he had left to face it. Four hundred vessels constituted a large force by any measure, even if it was light on capital ships and mostly made up of escorts and cruisers. Still, whatever the hardware, there wasn’t a nastier wildcat he could throw at the enemy than Clint Winters. After all, it wasn’t every day the enemy faced an admiral nicknamed, ‘the Sledgehammer.’ Barron didn’t feel confidence, exactly, but if he had to depend on someone to defend the rear of his fleet—and his only escape route—there was no one he would have picked over Clint Winters.
“Yes, Admiral.” Atara’s usually emotionless voice betrayed her own exhaustion this time. Barron watched as she activated the comm, and sent the command to Winters. It would be almost a minute before it arrived, but that didn’t matter. He knew Winters would do what he had to do, fight like a raging firestorm to hold back whatever came through the transit point. But it didn’t matter. Whatever Winters managed to do, without his forces, the main line was as good as finished. His second-in-command would be fighting not to win the battle, but to hold open the line of retreat.
Assuming there even was a retreat.
* * *
“Full power to the engines. All weapons systems prepare to engage.” Sonya Eaton stared straight forward, struggling with all her strength to ignore the fear, to fight back against the pressure pushing down on her from every direction. Colossus was like no other ship in the fleet, no other vessel that existed, at least as far as anyone on the Rim had ever known. Much of the vessel’s awesome power came from mysterious imperial technology, almost as far beyond the Hegemony engineers who’d spent twenty years repairing it as it was any of her people. It felt at times, not so much like commanding a warship as petitioning for some supernatural favor. Anya Fritz had done everything imaginable to unlock the great ship’s secrets and to train its engineering teams, but then she’d returned to Dauntless for the battle. It didn’t make a lot of tactical sense—and Eaton resented slightly the loss of the engineering wizard—but she understood. War was about more than mathematics, and she knew exactly why Fritz had chosen to fight the battle on Tyler Barron’s flagship.
“All engines engaged.” The reply echoed in her headset. The speaker was on the bridge with her, just across and to the left. But Colossus’s control deck was so immensely huge, officers would have had to scream at each other to be heard. Far better to connect everyone via the comm system.
Eaton listened to the sounds of the ship, the strange, almost alien hum of the vast engines off in the distance, kilometers away, in the stern of the massive vessel. She had risen rapidly in the chain of command, too quickly, for her tastes. She had been ambitious once, driven to match, and even exceed, her older sister’s accomplishments. But Sara was dead now, killed in action, and Sonya felt more lost than satisfied at the importance of her posting. Everywhere she looked in the endless corridors of the great battlewagon, she saw her sister looking back, a shadowy image watching over her…and perhaps judging her a bit as well.
Or was that last part her, judging herself, measuring her abilities against those of her now idolized version of the elder Eaton?
Whether she was ready ro not, command of Colossus was important. The great vessel was a match for half the fleet, and she knew just how badly her comrades needed that strength. But as strong as the ancient ship was, as unimaginable as the energies roaring through her vast network of power lines, Sonya Eaton believed—knew, even—that it wasn’t going to be enough. She’d spent the battle mostly cut off from the action. The gas giant that provided Colossus’s cover also blocked her scanner arrays. But Eaton had gotten enough data from satellite relays to draw some conclusions, and as she stared, as most of her people on the bridge did, at the continuing fight, and the massive losses the fleet had suffered, she realized just what Colossus would face when it entered the fray.
She’d been particularly horrified at the losses her comrades had endured, particularly the bomber squadrons. The fighter corps had always borne the burden of high casualty rates, but this was the second war in a row where they faced an enemy without their own small craft. That seemed at first glance, a good thing, one that should reduce losses. Dogfighting with enemy interceptors had long been the deadliest part of fighter-bomber operations. But the past seven years had shown just the opposite result. The squadrons had been compelled to make the most possible out of the fleet’s sole tactical advantage, and that meant increasingly reckless attacks, through the worst point defense the enemy could throw at them. The loss rates had soared during the Hegemony War, but now it was evident that had merely been a precursor to the horrors of fighting the Highborn.
She glanced down at her screen, and she was startled by the thrust figures. She’d know intellectually, of course, what rate of acceleration Colossus could manage, but it still surprised her that something so large could generate such massive thrust—just over 70g—and that the dampeners were so effective, she felt as though she was sitting on a park bench on Megara.
She looked up at the main display, at the enemy fleet now appearing on Colossus’s own scanners. The ship had come out from behind the massive planet, and she knew, as she could see the enemy, they could see her. The Highborn had enjoyed a technological advantage during the entire battle…but Colossus was a match for anything they had, at least one on one. Even two or three on one.
But hundreds to one…
Eaton knew her duty, and her ship was on a vector toward the enemy flank. She would hit them hard, just as Admiral Barron needed. Her crew was still learning how to handle the great battleship, but she had faith in them all. Some of the very best spacers in the fleet had been assigned to her crew, veterans all.
“Main weapons systems…charge up and prepare to open fire as soon as we enter range.”
She didn’t believe a single ship, any ship, even Colossus, could make the difference and turn the battle around. But she was going to give it everything she had.
Everything Colossus had.
* * *
Stockton’s wings were being torn to shreds. He’d lost a third of his people going in, but now the survivors were launching their torpedoes. He knew the fleet was watching, Tyler Barron and the others likely stunned as they saw the aggressive tactics, the almost insanely close ranges to which Stockton had led his bombers before they released their weapons. Huge numbers of them had been destroyed as they came in, but then, almost as a mass, the survivors had sent their double loads of torpedoes forward…and all hell broke loose along the Highborn line.
Plasma torpedoes spat forth from his ragged squadrons, moving toward the enemy ships in great clouds of death. His pilots had run the gauntlet, they had taken their ships to the closest possible ranges. The torpedoes launched and converted to energy almost at once. At least a dozen of his bombers got caught up in the blasts of their own weapons and destroyed. Another twenty or more failed to pull up in time, and they slammed into the targeted Highborn ships, adding kinetic impact to the attack’s effect, even as they perished.
The plasmas struck less than two seconds after launch. With no time for their targets to maneuver or evade, the superhot balls of energy slammed into the Highborn vessels. Not even the Sigma-9 emissions and the strange material of the enemy hulls could prevent more than ninety-five percent of the weapons from striking their targets.
Explosions burst out along the Highborn line, as hulls were melted and torn open. Compartments were blasted open by sudden decompression, and chunks of metal, fully or partially molten, flew away from the stricken ships.
But the Highborn vessels were tough, strong beyond anything possessed by the Rim nations or the Hegemony. For all the damage inflicted, the vast and cataclysmic forces unleased by Stockton’s desperate attack, the enemy line remained. It was batt
ered, half a dozen ships destroyed outright, and scores of others damaged. Stockton’s people had performed beyond even his expectations in valor and skill. But they hadn’t made the difference.
The fleet was still losing the battle.
Stockton reached down and grabbed his ship’s controls. He knew whatever disordered squadrons had managed to launch from the battered ships of the line weren’t going to be strong enough either. But he couldn’t give up. He wouldn’t give up.
“Return to base, all wings,” she snapped into his comm, as he blasted his own engines, decelerating hard. He could only hope his people could make it back to the fleet, past the enemy fire, and that they somehow managed to land on their beleaguered base ships. He knew many of those vessels had suffered devastating damage, that their bays were out of action, if not outright destroyed. But there was nothing he could do about that, so he pulled his mind away from such thoughts. All he could do was wish the returning squadrons luck. He wasn’t going back with them. Not yet.
He stared at his long-range scanners, watching as a ragged line of bombers approached. There were three hundred of them, with maybe another two hundred strung out on a long line back to the fleet. All together, it was less than half the force he’d led on the last attack, but it was what he had, and he was going to take them in just as he had the others. He struggled to suck in a deep breath, just as the pressure of his ship’s thrust exceeded the ability of the dampeners to absorb it. It would be about ten minutes before he could bring his ship to a halt, before he could begin the journey back to meet his approaching squadrons.
He twisted his head around on his neck, trying to stretch the best he could. He was exhausted, as tired as he could ever remember, but his gritty stubbornness was stronger than any fatigue. He closed his eyes once, for a few seconds, and then he opened them again. The enemy fire had slacked off once he’d flown past their line, but that didn’t mean it had stopped. A pair of laser shots lanced past his ship, coming within two hundred meters or so. Then another shot, just as close.
He looked at the screen, trying to identify the source of the fire. There were four Highborn ships, all of the smaller class, and they were closing on his fighter. They were coming in from different directions, and he almost felt as though they were chasing him, herding him, cutting him off from any escape route.
He couldn’t understand. Had they identified him as a commander, as a significant target among hundreds of other bombers? It seemed ridiculous to him at first, but then he began to think. His comm patterns, his position in the formation. Perhaps it was possible to pick him out as a likely commander.
Stockton knew one thing with cold certainty. He would be the first to go after enemy command figures if he could.
He jerked his hand hard, reacting to the incoming fire, increasing the intensity of his evasive maneuvers. His ship shook hard as he blasted his positioning jets in one direction after another. Four more laser blasts ripped by his ship, purging him of any doubt the enemy was targeting him specifically.
He could feel the sweat pouring down his neck, and his normally steely nerves began to fray. His hands were trembling as he gripped the throttle tightly, putting all his skill and experience into making himself as difficult a target as possible.
He brought his ship around, cutting the deceleration and reaccelerating along his current vector. He’d never make it back through the enemy line, not with four ships chasing him, targeting him the whole way. If he could clear the enemy line, break through to the space beyond, just maybe he could make his way back.
He was angry. Furious that the enemy was keeping him from linking up with his incoming squadrons. But he knew it would do no good for them, and certainly not their morale, to see him obliterated just as they were approaching the enemy.
If the Highborn were going to take him down, better it should happen behind their line, where it would be obscured from his pilots.
He swung his hand to port, then to starboard…and port again, and his ship shook wildly as it blasted deeper toward the edge of the Sigma Nordlin system. He checked his scanner, and he felt renewed waves of anger as he saw the enemy vessels still pursuing him. There was no longer any doubt—none at all—that the enemy knew he was a senior commander or some other priority target. Perhaps an AI deep inside one of the enemy ships had tagged him as an enhanced threat.
It didn’t matter. All he knew was, he had to outlast them…or he would die.
He flew his ship hard, one wild maneuver after another, drawing on every bit of his training, every moment of combat experience in a lifetime. The shades of a hundred opponents flashed through his thoughts, pilots he’d fought, and every move he’d used to evade them, to turn the tables and destroy those who would destroy him. But opposing fighters he could fight…four Highborn cruisers were not enemy combatants he could engage. They were hunters…and he was the prey.
He lost track of his approaching squadrons. There was nothing he could do for them now…save to wish them the best and spare them from witnessing his death.
He pushed his ship hard, flipping all the safety levers and overloading his systems. He could hear his heart pounding in his ears, feel the thumping in his chest. The whining of his ship’s tortured reactor was almost earsplitting, but he ignored it. His mind was raw determination, but even as he continued his fight, as he put forth every bit of strength that remained to him, he knew he was cornered.
He jerked his ship hard to starboard again…but finally, he guessed wrong.
The fighter shook hard, and a shower of sparks flew over him from behind. He reached out, trying to grab the controls, but they were dead. The fighter spun end over end, even as spreading pain told him he was injured. His back was burned, and his survival suit was ripped to shreds along his right shoulder.
Then his eyes saw it. A crack in the cockpit, a big one…growing larger with each passing second. He looked down at his helmet, but he knew it was uselss. His suit was beyond repair, at least any patch job he might try in the cockpit.
He looked up at the cracked canopy of his fighter, and at the cold death of space beyond…and as he watched the cracks spread, expanding into a growing web across the last protection between him and the vacuum beyond, he closed his eyes and whispered softly to himself.
“I love you, Stara…”
Chapters Thirty-Two
HWS Hegemony’s Glory
Sigma Nordlin System
Year of Renewal 268 (323 AC)
The Battle of Calpharon – The Breaking Point
“Chronos, there is no other way, no choice. We are soldiers, warriors. If we can continue the fight, at least with any hope of victory, we must do it. But there is no hope of victory. None. If we stay here, we all die…and with us, any hope that remains to eventually defeat the enemy. A heroic last stand is appealing on one level, I’ll admit that. Surviving defeat is perhaps a warrior’s greatest challenge.” Barron’s last statement seemed poetic perhaps, but he knew it was nothing but the truth. Dying in one magnificent moment, fighting with one’s last breath…Chronos realized, in many ways, Barron preferred that option to continuing the increasingly hopeless war against the Highborn. What could lay ahead save more death, more suffering, more struggle? And for what, a minimal chance of success, a frayed and dying hope for some miracle that saved everything? But it was clear the Confederation admiral knew it was his duty to keep the fight going, to hold off the enemy for as long as he could. To chase even that remote chance of success.
It was Chronos’s duty, too, and Barron was clearly determined to make that clear. Chronos knew it, too, though it was still distant, ephemeral. Nothing he could quite grasp…not yet.
“That is easier for you to say, Tyler…Calpharon is not your home.” Chronos stopped abruptly, and considerably more than the six second delay the distance imposed passed silently. Chronos realized his words had gone too far, that he knew what Barron was going to say.
“I do understand, perhaps better than you yet know. I stood
where you stand, as you well know. Will you do as I did? Will you place the needs of the war, the fight to preserve the Hegemony, and not just its capital, but all its people, above all? Will you accept the pain, the difficulty, the sheer exhaustion of fighting on, or will you take the easy road, a quick and glorious death here? That would be a breach of your duty, Chronos. You are intelligent and a veteran commander. You know we can’t win here, not now, with more enemy ships coming in almost behind us.”
Chronos looked down at the comm unit, and inside his head a war raged. The tactician, the intellect that drove his thought, agreed with Barron. Completely. There was no chance to hold Calpharon. The enemy was still bringing ships through the initial transit tube, feeding fresh reserves into the fight on a constant basis. They would take the Hegemony capital whether or not he died there.
The hoped for reinforcements from Admiral Winters’s command were lost, compelled to face the newly arrived Highborn force. That meant there were no reserves, no help left to come. The fighter wings would launch more attacks, at least as long as battleships remained with functional bays, but Stockton’s people had expended themselves. They’d done more than anyone had a right to hope they could, but they were a spent force. Groups of a few hundred bombers launched intermittently from a dozen ships weren’t going to turn the tide.
Chronos felt an almost overwhelming urge to defend Calpharon, to continue the fight, no matter what the cost. But he knew Barron was right. He could stand and battle the enemy to the end. Perhaps his new Confed and Palatian allies would remain with him, and die alongside his forces. It wouldn’t matter. They were going to lose anyway. Staying would only serve the enemy, help them by allowing them to destroy all their opposition in one climactic fight.
Calpharon had ten billion inhabitants, but they were less than four percent of the total population of the Hegemony. There were hundreds of inhabited worlds, many with vast metropolises of their own, and populations also in the billions. He was the military commander of the entire Hegemony, Number Eight among its hundreds of billions, and his duty was not just to those on the capital. If he lost the entire fleet at Calpharon, he was condemning the rest to certain defeat and enslavement. He wasn’t optimistic the war could be won given more time, but it was his duty to try.