Exodus: Machine War: Book 3: Death From Above

by Doug Dandridge

  They could still take the Machine force under devastating fire, if they had the proper target. The Machines had just shown that they could maneuver much quicker than the human ships, an advantage the Imperials had seemed to have forgotten about. Now they had been reminded that once again they were not dealing with organic frailties.

  “They’ve fired another volley of missiles, sir,” called out the Fleet Tactical Officer. “Five hundred of them.”

  “Target?”

  “They’re heading in the direction of one of our volleys, sir. They just fired another one. This one is on a heading for the other volley.”

  “What in the hell are they thinking?”

  “They appear to want to reduce both of our waves, sir,” announced the Captain in charge of the analysts.

  “Sir,” called out the Fleet Tactical Officer, his voice stressed. ‘They just launched another volley on another vector. Toward the gas giant mining facility.”

  What now? thought the panicking Admiral. This last move didn’t make sense. While the gas mine in the upper atmosphere was important to the military effort of the system, it was not that vital.

  “Can we vector the inertialess fighters in on that wave?” asked the Admiral.

  “We could,” said the Fleet Tactical Officer. “But we would have to pull them off the next strike toward the missile wave heading to the planet.”

  “Shit.” It looked like the gas mine was just going to be a loss. “Order the region around the gas giant evacuated. Then come up with a plan to deal with these bastards.”

  * * *

  The AI didn’t know that the humans called the missiles it launched suicide ships. But the humans were closer to the truth than they knew. The weapons were actually the design of an alien race that the Machines had destroyed, and then assimilated their technologies and designs. They had added their own slant to the craft, which truly had been heavily armed suicide ships.

  The humans thought them the equivalent of missiles, which in a way they were. But while they didn’t have the acceleration of human missiles, they had durations in the range of fast attack craft. Each of the weapons could accelerate and decelerate across a star system dozens of times before they ran out of power. They could boost after a target for days at a time, though three hours in hyper was about the limit. In normal space they could maneuver like a warship, and they could carry weapons of their own. Normally they didn’t, but on this mission they were armed with the same kind of counter missiles their warships used. And in five hours they would start doing the unexpected.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Anything that's living is a machine. I'm a machine; my children are machines. I can step back and see them as being a bag of skin full of biomolecules that are interacting according to some laws. Rodney Brooks

  BETWEEN BOLTHOLE AND MACHINE SPACE.

  Mara Montgomery cursed to the Gods as she stared helplessly at the plot. There was the enemy, clear as day, within range of her force. She wanted to move in and kill as many of them as possible. Unfortunately, it was impossible for her to get at them.

  They had five of the planet killers. Five of the big damned bastards, arranged around their other ships. There was one opening in their coverage, and she had tried to get missiles in through that hole, only to find that they had arrayed a bunch of their graviton beam equipped battleships in that so called weak point. They didn’t have the range of the planet killers, but it was range enough to drop her missiles out of hyper. So all she could do was shadow the enemy force as they drove toward Bolthole, invulnerable until they reached normal space.

  Not the way we planned it, the Admiral and I, thought the Scout Force commander. They had known that they were unlikely to get any hits in on the planet killers, but every ship they could whittle away from the Machine force was one they wouldn’t have to deal with when they reached the system. Now that total looked like zero.

  “We can’t do a damned thing to them, Admiral,” she called over the wormhole com. “Damn the gods, they’re in too tight.”

  “Understood,” said Benardczyk. “It might not be a bad thing if their tight like that when they translate back into normal space. So what I want you to do is to keep close enough to force them into that formation all the way in. Clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am. And can you tell me what your plan is?”

  “There is no plan, Admiral. At least not a firm one. Just a hunch based on some info I’ve received from Fleet Command. They may just be shitting me, but I have to hope they’re not.”

  Banradczyk told her subordinate the information she had been given by command, about a weapon they had recently unleashed on the Cacas. A weapon of devastating power, like nothing ever before used. Something that was sure to shock even the Machines if used properly.

  If used properly, thought Montgomery, remembering her history lessons about when the ultimate weapon was used. And the short term shock value of all of those weapons. Plus, the method of deployment would probably only work one time. All we need is for it to work once, thought the Admiral. Then we can come up with something new the next time. And they can’t have many more of those damned things, can they?

  * * *

  “I’m afraid we’re going to need more ships, your Majesty,” said Bednarczyk over the com. “And I’m about to remove that idiot Hahn. He blew his initial deployments.” She glared at the holo and shook her head, trying to compose herself. “I know you sent him to me, but I have a half dozen officers I trust more than that moron.” Beata wondered if that would be the last thing she said as the commander of this front. But it was her front to command, or it wasn’t, in which case someone else needed to come out and crawl before the powers that be.

  “That is your decision to make, Admiral. Hahn came at the request of one of the sector commanders. He’s yours to do with as you please. You can’t kill him, and you can’t bust him in rank, but otherwise, put him in whatever position you want.”

  Beata smiled. She had garnered some more reservations about the monarch when the flag officer had been foisted on her. Now she pushed those reservations aside, since the Emperor was willing to support his commander on the spot over higher ranking jackanapes.

  “Who would you prefer lead the forces in Klassek?”

  That gave Beata a pause for thought. She knew Rosemary much better, having served with her in the past, and having her in the force at Bolthole. But the Count was also an experienced officer, and he had time in grade. “I would have Count Lysenko take command. His record speaks for itself.”

  “Very well. Promote him and put him in charge, if you want to do that. Though I’m not sure if it’s a good idea changing commanders in the middle of a battle. Now, what do you need?”

  ‘We are being beset by a large Machine force in Klasssek, and they aren’t acting like we had expected them to. Add to that, Admiral Hahn split his forces at an inopportune time, and…”

  “I know what’s going on at your front,” said Sean, his eyes narrowing for a moment, then a smile creeping across his face. “I make it a point of knowing what’s going on with my military. I just don’t believe in back seat piloting. So, what are you asking for? And I’ll see if I can get it for you.”

  Of course you can get it for me, thought Beata, staring at him in disbelief. You’re the supreme commander.

  “Thinking I can get anything I want, eh, Admiral,” said Sean after barking a laugh. “I wish it were so easy. Oh, I can give commands and thousands of ships move at my words. But there is often a price to pay, and sometimes it is not politically expedient to pay that price.”

  And are you willing to pay that price to save the dream of your father, and an entire living world? thought Beata, mentally crossing her fingers. “We could use more of everything, your Majesty. But especially more capital ships. And maybe some stealth/attack.”

  “You realize that the only way we can get stealth/attack out to you quickly is through the wormhole gate, and that means they won’t be able to carry their
own holes with them. You’ll have to sacrifice some of your wormholes to use them, and I’m not sure the tradeoff is worth it.”

  And if we’re lucky, we get some more holes just before the Machine force reaches Bolthole, thought Beata, weighing her options.

  “I still would rather have them on hand and not need them, then need them and not have them on hand.”

  “Wise, Admiral. I think I can cut some of them lose. As far as capital ships go, would twenty more squadrons of battleships help out?”

  “Would they ever, your Majesty. And as many hyper VII as you can give me.”

  “There’s the rub, Admiral. I can certainly get you that many hyper VI battlewagons, but VIIs are still very hard to come by. I can maybe get you a handful of battle cruisers in VII, and double that number of light cruisers, but that is the best that I can do for the moment.”

  “And one more thing, your Majesty. We need them in the Klassek system, yesterday.”

  Sean laughed at that, though Beata saw nothing funny about the situation. “Hold on for a couple of minutes.”

  Beata cursed under her breath. There was a battle going on in the Klassek system, and she needed to change the command structure, now. “Get me Count Lysenko on the com,” she told her Com Officer.

  “Admiral,” answered Lysenko right away.

  “Count Lysenko. On the directive of the Emperor I am giving you a battlefield promotion to full admiral and placing you in command of the battle force in the Klassek system. After the fight, if you survive, we will see about making the promotion permanent.”

  “What about Admiral Hahn?” asked the surprised officer.

  “He will be relieved of command as soon as you are off the com. And I am trying to get the Emperor to give you some more reinforcements.”

  “How many?”

  “I don’t know. Not yet. Bednarczyk out.” She took a deep breath and prepared herself for the next contact. Relieving an officer of command was never easy, especially during an action. The Admiral had not shown cowardice in action. He was a good task group commander, but to her way of thinking the man had risen to his level of incompetence. If he would listen to reason, she still might be able to use him. If not, then she would promote another officer up to lead the battle force that Lysenko would need to turn over when he assumed overall command.

  And then the Emperor was back, the smile on his face telling her that the news was going to be good.

  * * *

  The AI checked the plot once again and calculated the odds, revising the plan in progress. It did this several times a second, most times not making a change, other times making a minor adjustment when it was possible and beneficial. It was something the organics wouldn’t do, couldn’t do, and it was to the Machine’s advantage. It calculated that its attack against the planet was going to succeed unless the organics pulled something out that was unexpected. Its missile attack, really attacks, against the incoming human missiles, should have no problem whittling them down to manageable waves, especially since they wouldn’t be closing at the same time.

  It had accomplished its mission, the death of the planet, but there were still targets in the system whose destruction would be of great benefit to the Machines. And there was a fleet that would have to be taken care of, either now or later. Considering the odds, it thought that now was the time. If it lost most of its ships, or even all of them, and destroyed this enemy force, it would be a victory. It knew it could out produce the humans, or at least from the resources they had in this region. And once they were gone it could go ahead and destroy all of the living worlds in the region, and then build up for an invasion of the human empire, to solve the problem of the creators once and for all.

  It thought for a moment about what it would need to invade and destroy the human empire. Of course that wasn’t its job, that was for the incidence of the AI in the prime industrial system. But it had the processing speed to go ahead and look at the problem, so it did so. It didn’t have sufficient data on the human fleet, or those of any allies it might have, so it wouldn’t be able to come up with a realistic plan, but it could play with different iterations of the organics’ resources. There was a point in the possible enemy dispositions where what the Machines would have in the next year would be enough, and after that various points where a couple of years was needed, up to several decades. It didn’t think the humans would give them those decades.

  It thought about what kind of fleet it should build from here on out. A lot of resources had been put into the planer killers, and they had proven their worth against the worlds they had attacked. Or had they? Its conventional ships could have killed those low tech planets, and the three that had attacked the other human system in this region had been destroyed. So it was unsure if they were worth the resources that were put into them, each taking as much as thousands of battleships. And they were slow.

  The AI decided it had spent enough time on that problem, and reexamined the plot, recalculating the odds. And then those odds shifted a tiny amount as another ship appeared on the plot, near the world, one that hadn’t been there before, coming around the curve of the planet. Thirty seconds later another appeared, thirty seconds after that another. Had they been hiding doggo behind the world until this moment, or did the humans have another of those wormhole gates in the system. Another ship appeared, and the AI had to think that they had a wormhole, based on the way the human ships were appearing at regular intervals.

  It recalculated the probabilities, and decided that since more enemy ships were now near the planet, it should plan another volley of weapons at that world. A nanosecond later it reconsidered, deciding that it would assess the effectiveness of the first wave, since the second wave wouldn’t get there in time to reinforce the original volley, unless it slowed down that wave. And that would give the humans more time to pick away at it. After that consideration it made the choice to hold that volley, and see what happened.

  * * *

  “The first reinforcements are coming through, Admiral,” said the Com Officer.

  Admiral Lysenko nodded. His flagship, now the flag for the entire fleet, was situated near the planet, while Rosemary’s force was out near the gas giant. He wished he had her ships with him, and had thought for a moment ordering her back to Klassek. It would take too long, and the faster accelerating Machine force would be able to bring her to close battle well before he could reach her if he left the planet. And he wasn’t about to leave the proximity of the planet, which, with it singular species of sentient, was the jewel of this region. In fact, his force was in the process of deceleration so they could return, though it would still take almost an hour to come to a stop.

  “Wings are going into acceleration.”

  The Count looked at the plot, which was showing the newly arrived wings of inertialess fighters, two of them, two hundred and sixteen of the craft, fully armed with four missiles each. His ships were picking them up by graviton emissions since they were so close. The enemy would have no idea they were there, due to their small size, and the fact that all of his large ships near the gate were also moving. They really weren’t going anywhere, but they were moving enough, back and forth, to produce emissions to fool the enemy’s sensors.

  “Next wing coming through.”

  Another one hundred and eight of the wonder weapons came sliding through the wormhole, which was pointed at the area the Admiral wanted them to go, already up to point two light. That was a dangerous velocity for a manned vessel to transit at. If they hit the gate frame the ship and the portal were both gone. But he wanted them up to speed as soon as possible so they could go into warp bubble and disappear from any possible sensor sweep. It was worth the risk in the minds of the Admiralty, so they were being deployed this way.

  The fourth wing came through minutes later, moments after the portal realigned so it was pointed at the incoming missiles, deployed to defend the planet that was the main target of the Machine offensive. Five minutes after the last of the figh
ters was through the first of the warships came across. It was not a large ship, not a capital ship, but was one of the new anti-missile light cruisers. An eight hundred and fifty thousand ton vessel carrying twice the counter missile tubes of a normal cruiser, as well as four hundred cell launched weapons, it had been built as a dedicated antimissile screening ship, though it still possessed some offensive missile capacity as well as its lasers and particle beams. Thirty seconds later another of the same class of cruiser came through, on the same heading as the first, to deploy ahead of the incoming enemy missiles. For ten minutes they came through that way, until twenty of the craft were heading for their deployment point.

  After came the first of the antimissile destroyers, built on a smaller scale for the same task as the cruisers. For thirty minutes they transited, until there were sixty of the vessels heading out to line up just behind the force of light cruisers, another line of defense.

  The next ships through were battleships, again one every thirty seconds, already boosting at point two light on a heading out, set to join up with his force on their current course. For thirty minutes they came through, until there were sixty battleships on a heading toward his force, joined catching up to the sixty battleships, ninety cruisers and a hundred and twenty destroyers already on their way. After that came heavy cruisers and more destroyers.

  An hour into the process antimissile ships started transiting again, until another hundred of them were clustered twenty light seconds from the planet. Afterwards came a half dozen carriers, setting up in far orbit of the planet, a last line of defense against the missiles.

  * * *

  The AI was alerted as soon as the first of the warships came through the wormhole, their graviton emissions giving then away. It wasn’t sure what they were up to until they started decelerating into positions in line with the missiles it had fired at the inhabited world. It also became aware that the heavy ships and many of the escorts near the planet were already heading toward its force, something it couldn’t understand given the human predilection to defending living worlds. Now it became clear that they were building a wall with the new arrivals. They kept coming out, and now the AI wasn’t sure why the human battle force was heading out into a fight it couldn’t hope to win. Until the vector arrows of that force changed, and it was apparent that they were no decelerating, to stay near to the planet.