by Lee Guo
Flag Bridge, Federation Battlecruiser Carpathia, retreating towards Mars
On the holomap, an enemy missile ship exited the wormhole. Then another.
Yamato stroked his brow. Phew! We got out of there just in time! Thank the gods that I retreated out of their missile range when I did. Now, we have to maintain relative position just outside their missile range all the way to Mars in the unlikely event the enemy can somehow attack our carriers — which will rendezvous with our main fleet soon enough. We will need to be able to defend them if that happens.
Although… I don’t think it’s necessary. But it’s a sensible precaution.
Speaking about my carriers… are they ready to sortie out?
Yamato zoomed the holomap out, so he could gaze at his carriers all the way back in Mar’s orbit. He instructed the computer to display their status on a nearby panel, and saw that they were indeed fully equipped with as many fighters as they could hold.
This was a very good thing, the fact that there were some fighters left over that not even 16 near-depleted battlecarriers could hold. That meant that later on, if he lost fighters, he could replenish them by ransacking Mars’s fighter reserves once again.
That’s if the enemy doesn’t destroy Mars’s fighter base completely, which they will once they get within range. There’s nothing I have that can stop it.
Suddenly, a part of Yamato wondered why he didn’t position his reserve fighters from Mars’s fighter base at the wormhole exit, instead — so that way he could have launched all his 5000 fighters at once at the enemy fleet while they were coming out bottlenecked. And then his memory answered.
We didn’t have the capability to recreate another fighter base like Mars fighter base at the wormhole exit. If we could have, we would. So the only way we could have kept the excess fighters — that can’t be stored and serviced by our carrier fleet — at the wormhole exit is by telling them to be adrift and afloat. But we didn’t know when exactly the enemy would begin their attack on Sol, so we would have left those reserve fighters adrift near the exit for days or even weeks. Human pilots can’t withstand that much misery and isolation. They need to be able to access facilities for eating and sleeping. That’s why the excess fighters were stocked at Mars.
And the reason why we didn’t send the fighters from Mars by themselves towards the battle at the wormhole exit when the battle was happening was because there was too much distance, and the fighters can’t travel that distance with their own fuel supplies.
Yamato blinked. He looked at the status indicators of all his fully replenished carriers, again. But, anyway, it’s time. “All carriers currently at Mars, disengage refueling and proceed at maximum speed towards our retreating main fleet,” he said into the command net. “Once you come to us, you are to sortie your fighters at maximum fighter strike range. We will strike those missile ships before they can attack our pulsars, once again.”
He closed the connection and reclined back in his seat. Suddenly, Yamato wondered if he was making a mistake to retreat his pulsars instead of facing the missile attack upfront immediately… before his fighters were able to hit the enemy’s missile ships. After all, if his pulsars somehow survive the next coming missile swarm full on, he would be able to use his pulsars to fire on the enemy fleet as they went towards Mars. That’s another two and a half hours of pulsar attacks. By forcing his pulsars to retreat outside of the enemy’s missile range, he was going to have to give up all that time where he wasn’t firing pulsar beams on the enemy fleet.
After all, there must be a chance some of my pulsars might survive a second missile attack from enemy missile ships before the human fighter strikes come in and thus, whatever pulsars are left — from such a hypothetical battle — could be used to fire at the enemy ships as they traveled towards Mars…
Am I making a mistake?
Of course not! Our pulsars would be utterly decimated by the enemy’s second missile swarm — if the missile ships aren’t taken out by a fighter strike. We lost two in the last swarm, and now with depleted destroyers and numerically lower pulsars as well as shield and armor damaged on these pulsars, we can’t survive another swarm. I’ll be lucky if one pulsar survives a second full enemy missile attack!
What I am doing is right. My current orders are right. I’m going to let my commands stand!
Wing Commander’s Cockpit, Fighter 001, on board the Carrier Enterprise — sliding at maximum speed towards the enemy fleet
So much for keeping my head cool. Trevor noted how his sweat kept falling into the lower rims of his helmet. I totally blew it. If anyone had seen me, they’d know the hypocrite I am.
All that talk about keeping your head cool to prepare yourself for combat… well…
He shook his head. I am human after all. I’m not the superman they think I am. And I’m not going to punish myself for it. It’s not every day you hear your closest friends die.
“All fighter pilots, this is the captain,” said Captain Willoc on the hangar bay’s loudspeakers. “We are now moving towards the enemy fleet. Prepare for combat. ETA is around 60 minutes to enter maximum fighter-strike range, providing the enemy fleet continues to close the distance with us.”
60 minutes? Trevor nodded. Not bad. I thought we only had 30 minutes left since we already used up 30 minutes.
“I repeat,” continued the captain. “All fighters are to be prepped and ready in 50 minutes, including the newest members. All new fighters are to be integrated into existing wings. I don’t care how you do it. Just do it! This is the captain, out.”
Light years ahead of you, pal.
On his cockpit map display, he saw the carrier he was in, as part of a 16 carrier battlegroup. He saw the entire carrier force moving out of Mars’s orbit and heading towards the direction of the wormhole exit to intercept the enemy fleet coming from it, with his fighter and those of the new trainees docked inside.
I hope this works… we now have a full complement of 2,400 fighters within the entire carrier force. I hope we can make a difference, despite, as a group, the lack of veteran pilots due to the new additions.
Flag Bridge, Federation Battlecruiser Carpathia, retreating towards Mars
50 minutes later…
The carriers finally arrived. They were here.
For the past hour, Yamato had been thinking of his decisions over and over, and as he watched the main holomap and saw both human fleet partitions uniting into one, he came to agreement with himself that his decisions were the best, based on the information he had attained so far.
Perhaps… in the future, when he knew more, he’d be able to chastise himself for making the wrong decision, but that was for a future that had gone horribly wrong because of something he didn’t know at this moment in time.
At this moment in time…
Yamato simultaneously gulped with anxiety and gazed in satisfaction as his three pulsars and five other remaining capital ships welcomed the 16 battlecarriers that had come from the opposite direction. His fleet, previously 32 non-carrier ships ‒ if he added the destroyers ‒ now was 48 ships large. And since his noncarriers were already positioned just outside the enemy fleet’s maximum missile range, his carriers, now at the same distance from the enemy as his noncarriers, were in ideal position to launch their fighters.
Yamato looked at the enemy fleet. They seemed to know exactly what he was thinking… like any good, competent enemy would. They positioned their fragile missile ships at the back of their formation, guarded by their Titans, which were in-turn guarded in front by layers of superdreadnoughts, battlecruisers, and destroyer sheets.
He saw it, and reminded himself that he knew this would happen, that this was how any competent enemy would react, and he also he knew that he had to take down those missile ships at all costs, or else his remaining pulsars would never be able to be used to their full advantage.
No time for regrets… I knew all of this would happen. Now it’s time to go with the plan.
B
ut wait! Yamato’s eyes widened.
Can I do something else, instead? Can I make a sudden adjustment that will increase my fighters effectiveness ten fold?
Yes, I can!
“All carriers,” announced Yamato, “move to closest safe distance from the enemy’s missile fleet and launch fighters when ready! Attack the enemy missile ships! Follow my attack plan that I’m about to forward to you!”
Wing Commander’s Cockpit, Fighter 001, on board the Carrier Enterprise — maintaining relative position just barely outside the enemy fleet’s missile envelope
We’re launching fighters much closer to the enemy fleet than expected. Trevor noted. What’s the delay?
Trevor sat in his cockpit, wondering why the order to launch hadn’t been given. He wondered and wondered, and then he saw the reason why.
I get it! We’re going to try to circumnavigate our fighters around that massive forward cluster of enemy capital ships so our fighters can hit the enemy missile ships at the far back from the side… with minimal losses to enemy point defense! The reason we’re launching so much closer to the enemy fleet is so our fighters have enough fuel to circumnavigate the enemy’s forward cluster of ships!
“All fighters,” said Enterprise’s captain on the loudspeakers, “we have reached optimal distance with the enemy fleet. Commence launching procedures! Routes will be sent to your navigational computers. Godspeed!”
Trevor glanced outside his cockpit at the maintenance crew that had been working on his fighter. He saw the crew leader give the thumbs up before each of the workers ran out of the way. The path was clear.
“Alright, Alpha Wing! Let’s do this!” said Trevor on the Wing net. “This is Alpha-one, launch!” Trevor jammed his sliding drive to 0.2% and immediately his fighter sped out of the hangar bay into space. To his left and right, he saw the other members of his Wing coming out through the atmosphere shield as well.
Immediately, he looked at the route assigned to him through space. It was almost a half circle. “Alright, Alpha Wing. You know what to do. Let’s align ourselves in formation and follow our assigned routes.”
“Yes, sir,” his Wing members said.
Trevor silently nodded, and this time realized that the captain of the Enterprise had asserted much more control over the entire sortie. It was almost like micromanagement, but Trevor understood why it was needed. If it wasn’t micromanaged carefully, the whole operation might fail. For instance, if each Wing from Enterprise was simply given the order “go around the enemy’s forward cluster of ships” all the wings might, in some miraculous disaster, decide on the same path to circumnavigate, and then all the enemy had to do was reposition their forward clusters of ships to intervene that path. With the captain’s intervention, all 16 wings of Enterprise followed different paths, and if the enemy wanted to intercept all the wings by repositioning their ships, they would have to dilute their ships by making them reach separate interception positions. The end result would be that the effectiveness of the enemy’s total point-defense anti-fighter coverage diminished.
On Trevor’s navigational map, he saw all 15 other members of his wing aligning themselves in position around his fighter. Pretty well organized, too, and fast. Not bad for newbs with no prior practice!
It would take 10 minutes to get to the enemy’s missile ships using their assigned roundabout route, and then 10 minutes to get back — if they took that same route.
Wing Commander’s Cockpit, Fighter 001, on an attack route to bomb the enemy’s missile ships
5 minutes later…
Trevor saw the other 160 wings of human fighters moving on separate circumnavigation routes around the enemy’s forward cluster of warships. There were so many perfectly designated individual routes that Trevor wondered how command had managed to organize the attack so well.
As expected, the enemy began repositioning their warships on his cockpit map display. As time passed, and as Trevor’s wing neared their position to make their attack run, he realized that it didn’t take much trouble for the enemy to reposition their ships so that instead of all being clustered at the front, they would surround their missile ships on all sides. After all, the distance the enemy warships had to move was much lower than the distance the human fighter wings had to move. Mostly because the human fighters had to evade each enemy warship’s point defense envelope during their circumnavigation while the enemy ships could go a direct route — even if the fastest an enemy warship could move was 0.2 c and the fastest a human fighter could move was 0.65 c.
Still, it all worked to humanity’s benefit. Now, as all wings were almost in place ‒ Trevor’s wing included ‒ a human wing’s final attack run didn’t have to go through the anti-fighter point defense envelope of twenty enemy warships, but only one or two ships. That would be a huge benefit!
True, each of the enemy warships would still be shooting the same amount of anti-fighter fire at the same amount of human fighters, but the density of human fighters coming from one direction would be much lower, and the thus the chance of a hit would be much lower. Also, this meant that the exploding flak wall created by enemy warships would be much weaker, as it would be forced to cover a much larger area.
“Alright boys, let’s do this!” Trevor shouted in the Wing net. “Dive! Dance and dive! Dance and dive!”
By the time the human fighters were in position to make their attack runs, the enemy anti-fighter defenses — namely their capital ships and destroyers — were already in position, surrounding the enemy missile ships on every side. The human fighters then zoomed in for the kill on the enemy missile ships. The enemy fleet fired.
A wall of flak exploded in a protective sphere around the enemy warfleet, a futile attempt to take down the human fighters. This wall was much weaker than before, because the area it had to cover was much larger. The human fighters seeped in and penetrated this wall with minimal losses. Out of 2400 fighters, only 80 fell.
The next zone of defenses were ‒ and could only be — the enemy fleet’s point defense laser cannons. Enemy screening destroyers and capital ships opened their PD laser ports and hammered away at the incoming human fighters. Lasers shot out into the void, in every direction, as the fighters came from every direction. Because the density of incoming human fighters in any given area was much lower, the chance of a laser hitting a fighter decreased by a lot. Whereas, a full-on fighter attack through one side of an enemy fleet would have been met with a wall of outgoing laser beams — now, this wall was much weaker, as it also had to cover a much larger area, namely the entire sphere around the enemy fleet.
The human fighters penetrated this wall, losing 165 fighters in total before reaching the enemy’s center and delivering their payload on the enemy missile ships.
It was utter annihilation. Out of 76 enemy missile ships, 45 exploded in the megaton blasts — their inadequate armor never designed to withstand the destructive energy of a 500-megaton bomb. A full 60% of the enemy’s original missile ships — each fully loaded with missiles — lost drive control at the minimal. Most simply exploded — their cratered carcasses detonated by antimatter fury — and their on board missiles added to this explosion. It was a catastrophic firework display for the enemy fleet, fueled by the death of their own ships.
Flag Bridge, Federation Battlecruiser Carpathia, guarding the carriers while maintaining relative position with the enemy fleet outside the enemy’s missile envelope
Yamato fist pumped into the air, and watched gleefully as the computer tallied up the enemy ships killed on the holomap. It was utter happiness — a good idea finally coming to fruition.
60 percent! 45 missile ships dead! That’s a loss of about 86,000 enemy missiles!
He couldn’t believe the number of his own ships he had saved by eliminating all those enemy missiles!
This is turning out very well! This could very well be the turning point! I might just win this battle! Of course, I won’t be able to save Mars — Mars is doomed no matter what, but Ear
th! Earth might very well come out of this battle alive!
Yamato thought about it some more. There would be at least a second fighter strike after his fighters came back from the enemy fleet. That number of 60% enemy missile ships dead could very well be 100% soon. All of the enemy’s missile ships might not make it in time to Mars, or to even shoot at his fleet.
Let’s see… it took 10 minutes for our fighters to get there, 10 minutes to come back, and 10 minutes to refuel and rearm. We’ll be able to send at least one more fighter strike before that enemy fleet reaches Mars. Maybe two.
And once the enemy’s missile ships are gone, my pulsars can once again go back to doing what they’ve always done! But will there be enough time for my pulsars to do their thing to completely wipe the enemy fleet during their journey to Earth?
Suddenly, Yamato wondered if he should have fighter struck the enemy’s missile ships before they were able to launch their first swarm of missiles at his pulsars. That way, he wouldn’t have lost 2 out of his original 5 pulsars.
But no, if he had done that, there wouldn’t have been enough time for the carriers to be reloaded with new fighters to launch even one fighter strike at the enemy fleet. In fact, if he had done that, the carriers may never have gotten away from Mars in time, and he wouldn’t have new fighters at all. And even if he was able to launch one fighter strike at the enemy fleet, Mars would have been destroyed before he’d be able to launch a second.
But at least I would still have five pulsars.
But then… my pulsars wouldn’t have been able to shoot freely at the enemy ships when they retreated back at the wormhole to wait for their reloaded missile ships with their second swarm of missiles. The enemy wouldn’t have retreated at all, and so I wouldn’t have been able to take down another 16 enemy capital ships.
15 minutes later…
Wing Commander’s Cockpit, Fighter 001, docked within the Enterprise