Battle of Sol

by Lee Guo

  His attention went back to the enemy capital ships coming out in single file. At the moment, there were three enemy capital ships — three megastar-class superdreadnoughts — that had left the churning opening that was the wormhole exit. Two were fully operational, although their armor had been battered by Yamato’s concentrated anti-ship fire. The last one, which was the first to exit, had been completely decimated and had lost all power generation — it was a wreck. A fourth was currently making transit through the opening.

  While he was observing them, he noticed that all these enemy ships were firing at his stationary and mobile units while they could.

  It’s time!

  It’s time to use my ship-killer missiles.

  “All ship-killer missiles,” announced Yamato, “fire in sequential batches at the enemy ships. Don’t attack them all together — that will waste our missiles so we won’t have any left — but attack them little by little. 400 of our normal ship-killer missiles is more than enough to kill one of their capital ships, especially since they don’t have screening destroyers to fire point defense ammo at our missiles. We must not allow the enemy warships to coalesce into a large group outside the wormhole exit.”

  As for the enemy’s ship-killer missiles… there was nothing he could do but take the blow full-frontal.

  **

  Enemy missiles poured out of the hurricane-like wormhole opening. Their newly crafted shields were not as strong as those on human missiles, but the addition of shields helped these missiles resist human point defense fire well enough to make them twice as survivable. Combined with the strength of Argonan armor, these missiles lasted much longer than their predecessors.

  Wave after wave of enemy missiles slammed into human units protecting the wormhole exit. The third wave consisted of 2,000 enemy ship-killer missiles. Human point defense fire from all human units surrounding the wormhole killed 1200, but the remaining 800 smashed into a dozen stationary laser turrets. These human laser turrets did not have the shields to repel such a combined detonation yield. The turrets exploded.

  Immediately after, a fourth wave of enemy ship-killer missiles gushed out of the opening and, once again, 1200 were lost to human point defense fire, but the remaining 760 smacked into a trio of human warships. The warships had their shields blown off. Each suffered high amounts of damage to their armor and internal hull, but they did not die… not immediately.

  The next wave of enemy missiles finished them.

  Meanwhile, a wave of 400 human ship-killer missiles veered towards an Argonan superdreadnought that had just exited the wormhole. The superdreadnought fired its point defense, killing 80, but the remaining crashed into the Argonan capital ship. 320 missiles were well enough to penetrate through the dreadnought’s armor and into its internals, causing massive destruction to its inner compartments. The enemy dreadnought became immobilized and the combined plasma dart fire from all human capital ships destroyed the lone enemy unit.

  For an endless 10 minutes, more waves of enemy ship-killers exited the wormhole, veering for human targets.

  The pattern repeated until the enemy stopped sending any more ship-killer missiles. It was not because they didn’t have any ship-killer missiles left, but they simply had no more they wished to devote towards this purpose.

  … The fourth phase of the battle began…

  Flag Bridge, Federation Battlecruiser Carpathia

  Yamato eyed a display showing the damage to his fleets’ warship numbers. He blinked. It was a disaster. He had lost 4 capital ships to the enemy’s missile waves — 3 battlecruisers and one superdreadnought. Additionally, eight other capital ships in his fleet had their shields either completely ripped off or were in the low digit saturations. That did not pose well for whatever the enemy had to come.

  This wasn’t all. He had lost 19 destroyer-sized screening ships. He had 69 to begin with, but losing 19 would deal a big blow to his ability to deflect future missile attacks.

  As for his stationary units… well… he had lost 110 out of 240 stationary laser turrets.

  The only things that weren’t damaged were his pulsar class battlecruisers — which were positioned in the far back of his formation because they had weapons with the longest range — and his carriers and star fortresses.

  Yamato sighed. He gazed at his remaining capital ships. He now had 21 artemis-class battlecruisers and 7 warhammer-class superdreadnoughts left, along with 16 carriers and 5 pulsar-class battlecruisers.

  He had killed 10 enemy capital ships — 4 megastar-class enemy superdreadnoughts and 6 shark-class enemy battlecruisers. Now, there were no surviving Argonan ships outside of the wormhole — they had all been destroyed. What Yamato found odd was that their ships had ventured out in single file while sharing the width of the wormhole exit with their missiles.

  Yamato frowned in puzzlement. It didn’t make sense for the enemy to send so few capital ships at a time. They were meat to his concentrated anti-capital ship fire from his stationary units and his missiles. What the enemy should have done was either send out all their capital ships together while utilizing the full opening of the wormhole… or send out all their missiles together — not send out capital ships and missiles together, sharing the wormhole exit’s space.

  By sending out capital ships and missiles at the same time, the enemy had created a double error for themselves. One, the obvious error was that so few capital ships left the exit and each were easily destroyed in pieces before the sum total could coalesce into a group above the exit. Two, because enemy ship-killer missiles exited fewer at a time as the wormhole exit space was shared with capital ships. It’d become easier on human point defenses to kill a higher percentage of missiles whereas if more missile exited at once, more of them would have survived human point defense fire. After all, human point defense fire could only kill so many missiles at a time.

  Yamato grimaced and tried to think why the enemy had done exactly what they had done. He thought about it hard for the longest minute, and then finally came up with a reason. It didn’t explain their actions fully, but it at least made partial sense.

  The enemy must have thought that when it became obvious to Yamato that they were launching a missile attack on his units guarding the exit, they must have expected Yamato to pull his capital ships behind his screening anti-missile destroyers… in an attempt to protect his capital ships from the enemy’s missiles. If Yamato had done that, and the enemy must have thought he would, then it made sense to send out a few capital ships. The enemy could use these capital ships to attack Yamato’s destroyers, while they themselves would have suffered minimal damage, as Yamato’s capital ships would have been pulled out of range of the wormhole exit.

  But the enemy thought wrong... because Yamato had neglected to pull his capital ships back entirely. Instead, Yamato’s capital ships had been in position to destroy the enemy’s capital ships with concentrated anti-ship fire, but in turn, Yamato’s capital ships had taken a frontal blow from the enemy’s missiles as they hadn’t been pulled back behind Yamato’s screening destroyers.

  So although the enemy had lost the capital ships that the enemy had sent out little by little ‒ because Yamato had neglected to move his capital ships back ‒ the enemy had succeeded in damaging Yamato’s capital ships with ship-killer missiles.

  It was a win-win solution by the enemy to send out some of his capital ships.

  Or was it???

  Now Yamato wondered if the enemy’s capital ships might have been utterly destroyed anyway even if Yamato had pulled his capital ships back. After all, even if Yamato had done that, the exit would have been guarded by his star fortresses and pulsar class battlecruisers — which were in range of any enemy ships that came out of the exit.

  Would that concentrated fire been enough to disable each of the enemy ships that came out? Yamato didn’t know. But he did know he had no shortage of ship-killer missiles to take out whatever enemy ships came out of that exit in single file.

  Yama
to sat there, in the flag bridge, wondering. Now, Yamato was more confused than ever. His explanation of why the enemy had sent ships and missiles out together had failed.

  As Yamato wrestled with his hair, he thought about it some more. Maybe… maybe… the enemy hadn’t expected him to use his missiles… after all, he had forgotten to use his missiles on their screening destroyers phase… maybe —

  RING, RING, RING. An alarm sounded throughout the flag bridge.

  Yamato came out of his reverie and looked up at the source of the alarm, which came from the main holomap. He saw it.

  The wormhole exit… Eight Argonan ships came out at once — 3 capital ships and 5 screening destroyers. Now, they were using the maximum area of the wormhole exit for their ships. As Yamato searched, he saw no missiles this time. This time, they were playing for keeps.

  Wing Commander’s Cockpit, Fighter 001, above Sol’s wormhole exit

  Inside his cockpit, Trevor heard the fleet commander speak inside his helmet. “All available fighters,” commanded Yamato, “begin bombing runs on the enemy fleet that is coming out. All ships and stationary units, fire at will! Missile waves A, B, and C — advance towards designated targets! Specific targeting schemes will be relayed to your consoles. Good luck.”

  On Trevor’s cockpit’s main map display, targeting orders appeared. The object he had to attack ‒ a superdreadnought ‒ was highlighted in red. Trevor didn’t need to check with his wingmates to know that the same information had appeared to all the map displays in all the warbirds in his wing.

  “Alright boys,” said Trevor to his Wing, “you know what to do. Accelerate in formation alpha and begin the bombing run. Remember to fly defensively, as we’ll be in range of a lot of their anti-fighter envelopes.”

  The affirmatives came back. “Yes, sir,” his wingmates said.

  Trevor continued, “And when we get within range of the enemy superdreadnought B2, all birds between 001 to 006 will strike its aft armor and the rest will strike its drive rings. Remember what you learned about where the armor is weakest on an enemy superdreadnought. I don’t want to see any direct miss hits, unless it’s caused by the superdreadnought’s own movement. Even then, our targeting should be superb as the superdreadnought is maneuvering slowly since it’s close to its allies that are also coming out.”

  The affirmatives came back… and then he started hearing some chatter.

  “I bet I’ll be the one to blow it up,” said Hotshot’s voice.

  “In your dreams!” said Grim in Trevor’s helmet speakers. “Everyone should bet on me. I’ve got the best accuracy scores in the sims. That superdreadnought is mine!”

  Trevor let them have their moment. He wasn’t worried about whether or not his wing would take down the superdreadnought and accomplish their assigned objectives. Instead, all Trevor hoped for was that everyone would survive the coming bombing run, but he knew some would not…

  Flag Bridge, Federation Battlecruiser Carpathia

  Here it is… the enemy’s main push.

  Yamato watched the enemy come out. Superdreadnoughts flanked by battlecruisers. In the corners of whatever they could fit in that mass were screening frigates and destroyers. Each of their ships fired out at all the human ships surrounding them the moment they exited the wormhole.

  And here comes our full defense. Yamato nodded, observing all his units starting to move on the holomap.

  He saw his fighter groups moving in formation, zooming for the kill. He saw a large number of his missiles, not all of them, forming into attack runs. He had kept some in reserve for the enemy units that had yet to come out of the wormhole. He saw his star fortresses, laser turrets, both battlecruiser types, and superdreadnoughts opening fire with their main armaments.

  For a moment, he wondered if this was enough to prevent the enemy’s more and more numerous capital ships from coalescing into a large group in front of the wormhole exit. Only by forming into a group could they have a chance of taking control of the space around wormhole. And then he knew that whatever he did, it would not be enough. Some of the enemy would survive his hail of concentrated attacks. Some of them… would eventually coalesce with new, future enemy units coming out… and then it would be a large battle of attrition to see which group of opponents died first — and that… would depend on just how many ships the enemy had in their reserves to pour through the wormhole exit…

  Yamato cringed at the idea that the Argonans had nearly unlimited number of ships. For a while, he actually believed it. After all, they had a 6 to 1 production advantage. They had thrown away 10 capital ships earlier in the battle without a hint of remorse. After all, they had been able to repair all their damaged ships with lost propulsion in the previous battles in Alpha Centauri. While destroying ours.

  What could he do against an enemy that had that much an advantage?

  Pray, perhaps.

  And so he did.

  Yamato closed his eyes and started a quick prayer.

  May the star gods allow us to win this last and final phase of the battle.

  May our weapons be accurate and strike home hard.

  May our armor be thick enough to keep our troops safe so they can continue striking.

  … And may we repel the enemy from our home system…

  **

  The fourth phase of the battle of Sol began as enemy capital-ship flotillas poured out of the exit along with enemy screening destroyers. A trio of enemy capital ships and five screening destroyers came out of the exit. A minute later, another group of eight ships exited. Each of them came into the greatest concentration of opposing fire in the whole war. Every human unit fired at the newly emerging enemy ships.

  Human superdreadnoughts and Artemis-class battlecruisers fired their plasma darts. Human pulsar-class battlecruisers fired their pulsar beams. The two human star fortresses happily fired their 100 fortress sized plasma cannons and their maxed out pulsar guns.

  Human missiles swarmed in from every direction. Some were taken down by enemy point defense fire — which was the enemy’s screening destroyers’ purpose — as well as the point defense laser blisters on board the enemy’s capital ships, but most slammed into enemy ships. Killing them. Burning them with antimatter fire.

  Human fighter wings screamed inward in attack runs from all sides, dying as they may to enemy point defense fire, before pouring their antimatter missiles into the weak underbellies of the enemy ships.

  Because the newly arrived enemy ships were initially crammed together upon exit, they could not accelerate to their full velocity of 0.2c to dodge the incoming human attacks. Only when they cleared the immediate vicinity of the exit, could they do so. This weakness gave the human units a golden opportunity to attack the enemy ships before they could start sliding laterally.

  Meanwhile, human ships could, at any time, perform such a maneuver.

  It was havoc. It was the god of all battles.

  The human superdreadnought the Excalibur’s Edge went toe to toe with an Argonan superdreadnought called the Pain of Eternal Harmony. Both ships fired their primary weapons at each other, and for the longest time, both ships could not penetrate the other’s armor. It was the human Excalibur that faltered first. Its shields had already been depleted and all defensive hopes rested on its inferior armor, which was pulverized until the Argonan superdrednought’s grazers could touch the human ship’s internals. Slowly, system after system deactivated and before long — the human ship became a shattered, neutralized wreck.

  The crew of the Pain of Eternal Harmony cheered, but this particular Argonan superdreadnought’s demise came not long afterward when a Pulsar-class human battlecruiser named the Infinity targeted the Argonan capital ship with the Infinity’s far reaching pulsar gun and slammed beam after beam of 500 megatons of destructive energy into the enemy ship. The enemy SD soon followed its earlier human nemesis when it lost control of its starboard antimatter containment fields and exploded.

  Elsewhere, two Argonan Shark-class
battlecruisers fired their plasma cannons at a lone human star fortress. The human fortress had far more firepower and far more defensive capabilities than the two Argonan ships. The Argonan ships were wiped out within twenty seconds, to be replaced by more fodder.

  Because in the early stages of this late phase, the number of human ships and stationary units overwhelmed the enemy’s units, so it was natural that more enemy ships fell… but as more and more enemy units poured out of the opening… things appeared to change…

  And… as ships from both sides became neutralized — attrition in the human fleet, and in the Argonan fleet — finally set in.

  Wing Commander’s Cockpit, Fighter 001, in an attack run, above Sol’s wormhole exit

  Trevor saw his target, the enemy superdreadnought, on his cockpit monitors. It looked as they always looked, devastatingly large and well armored as well as well-equipped to counter fighter strikes. It had hundreds of point defense blisters on its outer hull. Worse, it was flanked and protected by four enemy screening destroyers in its immediate vicinity.

  He cringed at the thought that his wing would have to penetrate through that destroyer screen and the superdreadnought’s point defense before getting in position to launch their bombs.

  Gods—there’s just so many enemy ships packed into one area! How… how are we supposed to penetrate that??

  As he saw more enemy ships pop out of the wormhole exit, and as his fears caught him again, he realized that his wing would have to penetrate through these new ships’ point defense as well.

  “Ah, sir,” said Mirage’s trembling voice on the Wing net. “Are you sure we’re supposed to do this? Can we really face that?”

  For a moment, Trevor didn’t know how to reply, but then he toughened up and said, “The Fleet Commander’s orders still stand. We will bomb superdreadnought A3 as commanded. Remember: all birds, commence defensive and erratic maneuvers the moment we enter the enemy’s point defense envelope, whether it be the targeted superdreadnought or its buddies.”