He cringed as one of the alien ships turned its weapon on a fighter and swiftly ripped it apart. A pilot dead, and more likely to follow. But over four hundred men and women served on the Pindus who could be saved through their efforts.
One of the fighters inverted and dove full vertical to intersect a swarmer’s path, succeeding in drawing its attention away from the Pindus’ damaged hull. On reaching the bottom of its arc the fighter pivoted and opened fire on the sinister, glowing oculi at the center of the alien craft.
The swarmer promptly returned fire. The fighter’s shielding crumpled under the barrage in less than three seconds, and the small vessel shattered into pieces before the pilot was able to eject.
Damaged but not destroyed, the swarmer broke off and redirected its focus to the Pindus.
SENECA
CAVARE, MILITARY HEADQUARTERS
* * *
“Stanley, pause and reverse four seconds.”
Are you speaking to me, Commander Lekkas?
Morgan made a face any human would interpret as one of annoyance. “There’s no one in here but us. Yes, I’m talking to you.”
But my title is STAN.
“First off, it’s not a ‘title’—it’s a name. And when I’m with you, your name is Stanley.” She held a mild…if not disdain, at least offhand disrespect for the Artificial. ‘Stanley’ had been the surname of the horrid administrator of her boarding school when she was a teenager, so….
She valued its computational capabilities well enough, for they were nothing short of astonishing. But its tactical analysis was crap. She’d been told it was because the Artificial was new and its metaheuristic algorithms were still evolving and maturing, but the fact was that when presented with a battlefield layout it couldn’t determine in five hours what she could in five seconds. The Artificial was simply unable to grasp the nature of the unpredictable ebb and flow of humans in combat against one another.
Of course, they now battled aliens. What this meant for its tactical decision-making capabilities remained to be seen.
Reversed 4.0000 seconds.
She enlarged the frozen frame to study the damage that had been inflicted on the alien vessel: one tentacle shorn off and another left dangling, plus a hole blown through the outer edge of the oculi. Another two, perhaps three seconds and the hole would have grown large enough to obliterate the vessel.
They needed more time for even suicide strikes to be successful. Preferably, they needed a way to make strikes on swarmers not be suicidal.
“Have you processed sufficient footage to create a sim of a swarmer’s maneuvering and attack behavior?”
I have, Commander.
She didn’t mind being addressed by her rank, but she couldn’t shake the wholly unjustified sense the Artificial was being condescending in its excessive use of it. “Good. Fire it up and put me in a ship.”
The reclined, form-adapting chair in the otherwise bare room made for as comfortable a location for sim immersion as it did for reviewing footage in a full-sensory overlay. Sensors attached to her hands to capture her motions and she was set.
Her sim environment consisted of a standard basic training field. Stars shone in every direction, but there were no planets, suns or other objects to get in the way. The participants were for now a single swarmer, Morgan and her ‘fighter.’ It wasn’t her fighter and as such lacked many of the tools typically at her disposal—but the rest of the pilots wouldn’t have access to those tools so neither did she.
The mission: discover a reliable way to destroy a swarmer without destroying one’s ship or oneself.
“Begin sim.”
She accelerated instantly, before sighting the attacker.
Rule #1: Never stop moving.
The alien vessel materialized in the right quadrant at -32.4° vertical. She gave chase.
Rule #2: Offense is the best defense.
It spun and accelerated toward her, rapidly closing the distance. Its speed was even more impressive inside the sim environment. She altered her trajectory and continued to alter it as she drew closer.
Rule #3: Never stay on the same trajectory long enough to get a bullseye painted on your nose.
The swarmer fired before her ship’s weapons were in range. Another difficulty in need of a solution. She diverted all non-motive power to the forward shields and yanked the ship hard to port and in reverse.
The cockpit’s dynamic pressure adjustment system mitigated the effect of the g-forces, but she still felt the nauseating lurch in her stomach as the ship propelled her in directions and at speeds the human body was never intended to tolerate.
At first the beam grazed the fighter, but it quickly adapted to lock onto her movements. Her strengthened shields lasted seven seconds, but despite some impressive gyrations she was unable to escape the beam.
Fighter destroyed.
No shit, genius.
Rule #4: Practice until you win.
“Again.”
Morgan stood at parade rest a polite distance from the conference table at which Field Marshal Gianno huddled with a number of advisors. While she waited she flexed her calves and clenched and unclenched her shoulder muscles. The recliner had lost most of its comfort three hours in.
Finally the Marshal dismissed the others to carry out their orders—mostly details involving the preemptive diversion of resources to Elathan—and turned to her.
“Commander Lekkas. According to Security, you’ve been plugged into STAN for six hours with only two five-minute breaks.”
Morgan snapped to attention. “Sounds about right, ma’am.”
“At ease, Commander. I trust you have insights to share.”
“Yes, ma’am. We need the bending laser weapon the military’s been researching or we are dead.”
The Marshal’s expression did not change. “Normally I would inquire how you knew about the research—or deny its existence—but time is short and most of the old rules are falling away in the face of exigent circumstances. The arcalaser weapon is not ready for field use.”
“I’m not sure that matters. It’s a question of necessity.”
“Why are you so convinced? Our fighters have seen some level of success against the swarmers.”
“How many of them survived the encounter? How many of those who did survived due to blind luck and intervening factors? When you asked me to work on this problem, you said I was the best fighter pilot in the Federation. After exhaustively reviewing our combat footage I simmed against a single swarmer for a solid one hundred rounds. I eliminated it twenty-seven times. My ship was destroyed fourteen of those times as well as every time I failed. If we’re facing tens of thousands of them, we cannot survive those odds. Ma’am.”
Gianno took in the information without visible emotion. “Why do you lose?”
It wasn’t the question Morgan had expected; most superior officers equated explanations with excuses. “At a hardware and engineering level, the swarmers are superior to our fighters to an insurmountable degree. They are faster. Their weaponry has greater range than ours and I estimate upwards of fifty percent greater force.
“Absent the application of massive firepower—multiple sustained frigate weapons at a minimum—their only structural weakness is at the oculi and only while the swarmer is firing. Burning off some of the tentacles decreases the weapon’s force and accuracy but actually widens the beam, thus making it harder to avoid.”
She drew her shoulders up a notch. “Therefore, the sole way to destroy one is to fire directly into its oculi while it too is firing—an act all but impossible without being the recipient of its fire for longer than our shields can withstand. Unless we can remove ourselves from the line of fire.”
“Via bending lasers.”
“Yes, ma’am. I saw no evidence in the footage of the aliens having such a capability. I don’t know why they don’t. Maybe they never thought of it, or maybe they didn’t think they would need it.”
“Why use agility when
brute force will suffice.”
“Conservation of resources is an often-used and nearly as often effective strategy in combat. But I don’t care why they aren’t fielding the technology—I only care that they aren’t. And we can field it. We can, can’t we, ma’am?”
Gianno’s mouth tightened. Her gaze shifted to several screens displaying information which had nothing to do with bending lasers.
“The technology is thus far proving highly unreliable. The arcalaser has trouble maintaining the target selected by its operating ware. It fails to hit the target at a thirty-four percent rate, and when it fails the result is unpredictable. It can hit anything in its range, including friendlies.”
Ouch. The news was worse than she had feared. She was working on a suitable reply when Gianno’s gaze returned to bore into her with intimidating authority.
“The testing facility is at the Lunar SSR Center. Go there, get in a fighter and see if you can make it work.”
“Ma’am, I’m not an engineer.”
“No, you’re not. But it is my hope that by using the arcalaser and seeing it action, you can tell the engineers what is going wrong from a practical perspective. It is my further hope what is going wrong will be a problem they can fix, and quickly.”
Morgan thought that was something she could in fact do. “I’ll leave right away.”
CAVARE
* * *
The security guard—or agent, or officer, Alex wasn’t exactly sure—completed their quick tour of the safe house, deposited them back in the sitting room and vanished.
Having now seen ninety percent of the facility, she doubted they’d need to use anything not on the main floor. There were several bedrooms upstairs, but if they were here long enough to sleep they would sleep on the Siyane for no other reason than added security. And the ability to execute a hasty getaway. And privacy. On second thought, there were several reasons to sleep on the ship. Still, she hoped to be underway once more before it became an issue.
Free of onlookers for the moment, she took the opportunity to settle next to Caleb on the couch he had claimed.
“I just realized—I missed my birthday while we were in the time warp on the other side of the portal. Does that mean it didn’t happen?”
He chuckled softly as his hand wrapped around hers to tease her palm with his thumb. “I don’t think so. When this is over, we’ll celebrate.”
“No, I wasn’t fishing for special—”
“When this is over, we will celebrate. No grousing.”
She dropped her head to his shoulder. The lull in activity after so much running was allowing weariness to creep into her bones; she hoped it wasn’t planning on getting comfortable. “Director Delavasi seems like quite a character. You’ve really never met him until now?”
“Nope. Passed him in the hallway once or twice and exchanged nods, but that’s it. I don’t spend much time in the office, so it’s not too surprising. He does have a notable reputation, though.”
“As?”
“A renegade wielding a grandiose and often abrasive personality, but he’s also known to be a straight shooter.”
“I would’ve paid money to see him and Richard working together. I bet it—”
The Director rejoined them then, almost as if he had deduced he was the topic of conversation and didn’t want to encourage the habit.
“Okay, I got in touch with Navick. He can meet us on Pandora and will try to bring Admiral Solovy along as well. I was secretive and taciturn, just as you asked. I’ve also arranged for accommodations on Pandora which meet our needs—radically discreet and probably even more secure than this bunker. The wheels are in motion. So now it’s about time you tell me what exactly is going on here.”
She nodded faintly at Caleb, affirming he should take the lead here. This was his planet, his home, his agency and his boss, after all. It was with some interest she had noticed the slight adjustment in his demeanor upon their arrival. His bearing became more restrained and professional, casual yet guarded. The transformation was subtle but outwardly complete. He was on the job now.
He indicated for Delavasi to sit opposite them. “Director, the simple fact is the aliens have the ability to determine where we are at all times, except when we’re on the ship and the cloaking shield is active. We can also assume they know whatever we say and do—and there’s no guarantee even the shield will hide those details from them.”
“What, did they implant surveillance trackers in you or something? I can get a top-flight military doctor here in under an hour to—”
“It’s nothing like that.” Caleb took a measured breath and dove in. “I recognize this will sound a bit insane, but the aliens can see everything which occurs…let’s say ‘in this galaxy’ for ease of reference. They possess the capability to know everything everyone says and does. Now we think there’s a delay, which works in our favor, though we don’t know how long of one. And just because they can see everything, it doesn’t mean they do see everything. But we need to err on the side of caution, because the aliens will be hunting us.”
Delavasi arched an eyebrow at the window to his left, then back at them. “And how the bloody fuck do they do that?”
Alex shrugged. She actually appreciated his blunt manner; this was not the time or place for bureaucratic pussyfooting. “Can’t say. We didn’t get a glimpse at the inner workings of this particular technology. But I witnessed it in action first-hand, and trust me when I tell you their observation of humanity is extensive.
“Now clearly there will come a point where we can no longer hide what we’re doing. We’re going to have to talk, then we’re going to have to act. But we need to maintain secrecy for as long as it’s feasible to do so.”
“Because you have a plan to defeat them.”
“We have…ideas on how to significantly strengthen our capabilities against them on the field of battle. I must say, I was thrilled to find out you guys and the Alliance stopped trying to kill each other, but rather surprised to discover how forcefully you’re combating the aliens.”
Delavasi ran a hand through unkempt salt-and-pepper hair. “As I hear it, the aliens offered us a truce. We turned them down.”
“Bullshit.”
“No bullshit. The terms were too onerous, and your government and mine jointly decided to fight.”
She laughed. “I never would have thought the politicians had it in them.”
“You can ask your mother all about it when you see her, since she was there. Speaking of…Ms. Solovy, I understand why you’re reluctant to discuss these ideas of yours with the Federation government prior to vetting them through your own leadership, but given the urgency of the situation shouldn’t we take advantage of location? Agent Marano, perhaps you could debrief—”
Caleb shook his head firmly before Delavasi was able to fully voice the suggestion. “This is Alex’s show. And for various reasons we can’t go into yet, I agree it’s better we start with the Alliance. But since you’re coming to Pandora with us, I can assure you a seat at the table when the time comes.”
Delavasi sank deeper into the cushion behind him. “All right. We don’t need to leave for an hour or so. If there’s anyone you want to contact, an encryption field over the whole building masks your location and scrambles the content. The passcode is HKTK#47421.”
Alex was already climbing to her feet. “Excellent, because I have a very important comm to make.”
4
SAGAN
INDEPENDENT COLONY
* * *
“ABIGAIL, I AM DETECTING THE PRESENCE OF 104 Earth Alliance vessels arriving 4.2 megameters above the planet. The presence of seven carriers suggests the force includes a minimum of 1,200 fighter craft as well.”
Dr. Abigail Canivon looked up from the inventory list in surprise. “They actually kept their word and showed up? Interesting. Inform me when the aliens arrive, if you would, Valkyrie.”
“Of course, Abigail.”
She had plann
ed to leave Sagan days ago. Her work at the Druyan Institute was important to her; still, it could be continued elsewhere. Sagan had made for a pleasant residence and she expected to miss it, but she had not intended to remain here simply to be killed by the aliens—and make no mistake, that would have been her fate. Sagan possessed no military force. Beyond two purely defensive orbital arrays and civilian police it possessed no capability whatsoever to protect itself.
Valkyrie was even more important to her, but relocating the Artificial was a difficult task made impossible by the looming invasion. All the space on the evacuation transports was being allotted to people, after all. While it pained her greatly to do so, she had finally accepted the necessity of leaving Valkyrie behind.
Then the Earth Alliance had informed Sagan’s governor it would be defending the independent colony against the aliens. An elated leadership had alerted the residents to the ‘good news.’
Abigail was skeptical, to say the least. Forty years working within the Alliance infrastructure had rendered her disgusted at the sheer stupidity endemic to the bureaucracy. It had eventually caused her to lose all faith in the system and the government she had devoted her professional career to, sending her to Sagan jaded and disillusioned. So suffice it to say when she had been told the Alliance was flying to their rescue, she had her doubts.
She’d nevertheless agreed to stay and help protect the hardware and data of the Institute—then proceeded to regret the decision approximately every half hour since.
“Twelve Metigen superdreadnoughts have exited superluminal and launched an offensive against the Earth Alliance fleet.”
“Nothing like cutting it close. Thank you, Valkyrie.”
“I will monitor the battle and keep you informed of noteworthy events. It should be exciting.”
“That’s one word among many for it.” She frowned at the screen and willed the reports containing her research to transmit faster. The Alliance’s provision of a method to circumvent the aliens’ exanet interference was proving most useful, she had to concede. In an act of moderate desperation she was sending all her data to Biosynth Frontiers in Rome. They were the most advanced cybernetics company on Earth, and two doctors she trusted to both understand and continue her research worked there.
Transcendence: Aurora Rising Book Three Page 4