by Peter Grant
His musings were interrupted. “Plot to Command, the enemy is moving, sir! One of their ships is heading this way. A second is steering toward the eastern task force. The largest drive signature is still in orbit around the planet. It doesn’t seem to be moving out, sir.”
“Command to Plot, very well. Keep me informed.”
He settled down in his command chair. It looked like things were soon going to get interesting.
BROTHERHOOD REFINERY SHIP BASHKIM BREGIJA
“Butranti Cutter Three to Bashkim docking control, over.”
There was a brief pause, then a harassed voice replied. “Bashkim DeeCee to Butranti Three, go ahead, over.”
“Butranti Three to DeeCee. Request clearance to dock, in accordance with orders from Butranti for all small craft to report to you.”
“DeeCee to Butranti Three. Negative. All our airlocks are already occupied with other small craft. You are the fifth stray we have had to take in. There is no room for you right now. Take station in trail, and wait until we can figure out what to do with you. Maintain three kilometers separation, to prevent interference between our gravitic drive and yours.”
Lieutenant Nikolla grinned in satisfaction. Now he would no longer have to find an excuse to stay aboard his cutter, instead of disembarking. “Butranti Three to DeeCee, understood and will comply. I will listen on this circuit for further instructions. Out.”
He guided his cutter into position, three kilometers behind the enormous, multi-million-ton bulk of the freighter-turned-refinery-ship. He set the automatic pilot to remain at least three kilometers behind the larger vessel, then turned to gaze out of the viewscreen. The bright dot that was his brother’s ship was fading to a mere pinprick as it headed away at full blast. Skodar was already out of visual range.
He set his console to display the feed from Bashkim Bregija’s Plot display, and settled down to watch. If he should be needed, he would be ready.
26
Destruction
HCS LARKSPUR
“I don’t get it, sir.” Lieutenant-Commander Urquhart’s voice was puzzled. “His force wasn’t large to begin with – it looks like just two armed merchant cruisers – yet he’s sending one against each of our task forces. That’s crazy! Every military academy in the settled galaxy teaches concentration of force, not dividing it!”
Dave shrugged. “What choice does he have? Sometimes circumstances override military maxims. He can’t know exactly what we are, but our speed of advance speaks volumes in itself. Only fast freighters and warships can maintain a quarter of light speed, and no regular freighters come here. It’s obvious we’re after them. That being the case, if he waited with all his ships in orbit around the planet, he’d be confronted by eleven attackers. Against those odds, he’d have very little chance. This way, he might get lucky.
“Remember, we’ve run into their armed merchant cruisers before. The one that attacked us at Mycenae fired something over a hundred and fifty missiles, more than even a destroyer carries. That makes them equivalent to a light cruiser. As far as we know, they have no idea we have arsenal ships. The only Brotherhood ships that have run into them were destroyed, with no chance to tell their friends about them. He may think he’s facing only four corvettes, plus a fast freighter to collect the loot we hope to capture. That’s a logical assumption, because corvettes make up most of our fleet. Four corvettes, with forty to fifty smaller missiles apiece, won’t look so bad if he’s got a hundred and fifty to two hundred missiles of his own.”
Bruce nodded thoughtfully. “I get it, sir. He’s hoping that, even if we hurt him badly, he can hurt us badly enough to drive us off. At the very least, he’ll want to clear a path for long enough to let his refinery ship get away.”
“I think that’s it. If so, he’s going to get the shock of his life, real soon now.”
“More like the shock of his death, sir.”
Dave laughed. “Nice turn of phrase, that. Let’s hope you’re right.”
The skipper called, “Command to Weapons. Given our closing velocity, at what range can we launch Sorubim’s missiles?”
“Weapons to Command. Our closing velocity will extend their powered range by at least fifty per cent, sir, so we can launch at eighteen million kilometers from the target.”
Dave pursed his lips in a soundless whistle as Bruce replied, “Command to Weapons. Let’s give the missiles a bit of wiggle room, in case she maneuvers. Plan to commence firing at sixteen million kilometers range, and flush two-thirds of Sorubim’s warload at her in the first salvo. Use a wide pattern, so that no matter what way she might twist and dodge, some of the missiles will find her. Start programming the missiles now, while there’s plenty of time. Break. Command to Communications. Signal Sorubim that we will open fire at sixteen million kilometers range. Larkspur will provide fire control guidance and direct the launch. Signal Aconite and Wolfsbane to each take control of half Sorubim’s defensive missiles. They can handle incoming threats. That’ll free us to concentrate on killing the enemy.”
BROTHERHOOD ARMED FREIGHTER BUTRANTI
Commander Nikolla walked over to the Plot display, trying hard to portray an imperturbable commanding officer who wasn’t in the least worried by the enemy bearing down on him. He had a sneaking suspicion that he wasn’t succeeding. He stared at the oncoming formation, now only a hundred million kilometers ahead. Both sides were moving at one-quarter of light speed, giving a closing velocity of fully half Cee. Unease wormed its way into his mind. Would Butranti’s makeshift fire control system be able to guide her missiles to their targets at such outlandish speeds, given the effects of relativity on her sensors? He thought a moment, then shrugged. It was too late to worry about that now. It would work, or it wouldn’t. It was not like he’d had much choice, anyway.
He returned to his console and sat down. “Weapons, our missiles are from different sources, so they have powered ranges varying from three to six million kilometers. Our closing speed with the enemy will extend that by up to fifty per cent. Prepare a firing pattern against all four of the smaller emission signatures. Those will be their corvettes. Ignore the freighter. I want to open fire at eight million kilometers with our longer-range weapons, and bring the others into play as the range decreases. Set up your fire plan accordingly.”
“Aye aye, sir!”
Nikolla watched the Plot as the range dropped. The distance between his ship and the enemy was shrinking by almost nine million kilometers every minute – a mind-boggling number. At this rate, they’d be in range in about nine and a half minutes. He felt his nerves tingling at the prospect.
As the range dropped to twenty-four million kilometers, the Weapons Officer reported, “Sir, pattern complete and locked in. Ready to fire at your command.”
“Excellent! You have done well. When the enemy reaches eight million kilometers range, you may open fire at once. Weapons free.”
“Aye aye, sir!”
The Commander smiled grimly to himself. So these little corvettes thought they could scare him, did they? They were about to learn differently. He looked across at the Plot, and the counter that was spinning downward as the range shortened. A million kilometers ticked off every six and two-thirds seconds. Nineteen million kilometers… eighteen million… seventeen million…
His breath caught in his throat as the Plot operator almost screamed, “Missile launch! The enemy has launched multiple missiles – they are still launching, sir! There’s a torrent of them!”
For a moment, his mind froze. How could this be possible? Corvette missiles were small, having a powered range of five to six million kilometers from rest. Had the enemy miscalculated the range? Then realization dawned. Those must be bigger, longer-ranged missiles… and that meant the big emissions signature at the center of the enemy formation was not just a freighter. It must be an armed merchant cruiser like his own, but with far larger, and probably far more lethal, missiles.
He heard his own voice saying, with preternatural ca
lm, “Weapons, set firing pattern to automatic for our main battery missiles, and lock it in so you don’t have to launch them manually. After that, defend us against incoming weapons.”
“A-aye aye, sir.” The Weapons Officer’s voice was tightly controlled, shaky. The man was clearly terrified at what was bearing down on them. Well, he has reason to be, the Commander acknowledged mentally. We are really up against it now. I must encourage the crew.
He clicked the ‘All Stations’ button on the ship’s intercom. “Commanding officer to crew. We are about to engage the enemy. Stand fast! Be resolute! Remember – we are the sons of the Patriarch! We fight in his name! Show the enemy our steel, and strike home!”
HCS LARKSPUR
Sorubim’s eight missile pods spat out their weapons at the rate of four every second. In fifty seconds, she fired a hundred and sixty cruiser-size missiles and forty decoys at the enemy… and in that time, the distance between them decreased by a staggering seven and a half million kilometers. The missiles streamed away ahead of the formation, spreading out so that no matter which way the enemy vessel might dodge, at least some of them would catch her.
To Dave’s surprise, the Brotherhood vessel didn’t dodge at all. She stayed firmly on her course, closing the range with every second. Beside him, Commander Urquhart exclaimed, “She must be trying to give her missiles the best chance to hit us. She’ll trust her defenses to do their best, as long as she gets a piece of us.”
“We’d better make that as difficult as possible,” Cousins murmured, and raised his voice. “Command to Communications. Message to all ships. Larkspur and Amanita will use their counter-missiles to thicken our defensive barrage as enemy weapons get closer. All ships are weapons free with their laser cannon.”
“Communications to Command, aye aye, sir.”
As he finished speaking, the Plot operator shouted, “Plot to Command, enemy is firing, sir!”
Dave glanced at the range counter. It had just spooled down past eight million kilometers. He said softly, “For what we are about to receive…”
Bruce Urquhart joined him in the last words. “May the Lord make us truly thankful!”
Butranti’s older-technology missiles, bought clandestinely from four different planets, had less powerful mass drivers in their launch tubes than Sorubim’s, and not as much reactor power to draw upon. Their rate of fire was only two missiles every second, and they had no decoys. Even so, they put out sixty missiles in the first half-minute of firing… but then the first enemy weapons drew near, and chaos descended.
The Weapons Officer began launching defensive missiles to intercept the incoming enemy weapons; but the rate of fire overall could not be increased. For every defensive missile fired, a main battery missile had to wait. Butranti’s offensive fire slowed precipitously, to less than one missile every two seconds as her defenses took priority, then ceased altogether. Commander Nikolla noticed at once, and opened his mouth to yell at his hapless Weapons Officer… but he hesitated, then shook his head, looking at the torrent of missiles headed his way. There was not enough time for more offensive missiles to make a difference, given their closing speed. This entire fight would be over, on both sides, in far less than a minute. Silently, in the Orthodox fashion, he crossed himself.
The first enemy missiles roared closer, to be met by Butranti’s first defensive missiles. However, with four incoming missiles to every two outgoing ones, the mismatch was immediately apparent. Butranti’s weapons did their best, but it was not, and could not be, good enough. More than half the incoming weapons screamed through the defensive missile barrier. Butranti’s laser cannon began to target them, but they could not change their aim fast enough to get them all.
One by one, missiles streaked into range, swiveled to point their laser cones at the ship, and erupted in thermonuclear blasts. Fifty laser beams erupted from each fireball. Some missed, but others smashed into and through Butranti as though the steel of her hull were so much paper. Within five seconds, she’d taken over a hundred hits. Her outgoing fire died as her secondary reactor, which powered her missile pods, went into emergency shutdown. That was just the beginning. Methodically, brutally, ruthlessly, every system on board was blasted into uselessness, every compartment vented to space.
By the time her primary fusion reactor lost its magnetic containment field and vomited its actinic fire, all of her crew were already dead. They and their ship simply ceased to exist. They did not live long enough to see the effects of their fire on the enemy.
Butranti’s slower, shorter-ranged main battery missiles might not have been up to the standards of the enemy’s, but they were still deadly weapons. They ran into a hurricane of counter-missiles launched from Sorubim, and more from Larkspur and Amanita, but the mind-bogglingly high closing speed imposed its own limitations on the Hawkwood formation’s defensive fire. Missile guidance systems found it hard to lock onto their targets, because of the effects of relativity on their sensors. They got in each other’s way, took each other out in the explosions of their warheads, and became confused when enemy targets were too close together. All in all, it took four or five defensive missiles to stop one of Butranti’s incoming warheads. In the very short time available – mere seconds – that was too many.
One of the enemy missiles flashed into range of Larkspur and detonated. Its simpler, smaller warhead fired only nine laser beams, but three of them found their marks along the corvette’s hull. One of her crew berthing units, her forward missile pod, and a storage area were smashed, the compartments voiding their atmosphere to vacuum. Airtight doors clanged shut with a wail of alarms, and her space-suited damage control team ran forward from their station in the stern to do what they could. Her whole hull shook to the energy transfer of the impacts… but they did no crippling harm, and caused no injuries, because the damaged compartments were empty during General Quarters.
Lieutenant-Commander Urquhart snapped orders to continue the fight, and dispatched his Executive Officer to report on the damage. When he returned to report, he listened carefully, then turned to Dave. “We’re not badly hit, sir. No casualties. We can patch the holes ourselves, given a few hours of peace and quiet, and make our way back to Constanta for permanent repairs.”
“That’s good news. Let’s wait to hear from Sorubim and Amanita. They were hit, too.”
A few minutes later, the arsenal ship reported that she was in good shape. A laser cone had splashed its beams across the upper part of her bow; but all her missiles were in the lower part of the ship, and the forward cargo holds were empty. She, too, could make it to a dockyard.
Amanita was not so fortunate. Her commanding officer reported, “We were hit by five laser beams, sir. We have at least ten casualties, dead, wounded and missing. A laser went through our Engineering section. Several capacitor ring cells are shattered, and electrical components are arcing throughout that area. We’re hit hard, sir.”
Ten doesn’t sound like a lot of casualties, but it’s over twenty per cent of her small crew, Dave reminded himself. He asked, “Do you require assistance?”
“I’d appreciate damage control teams, if the other ships can spare them, sir.”
“I’ll have Wolfsbane and Aconite send their teams to you by cutter, along with electrical repair gear. Keep us informed. Can you stay in formation?”
“For now, yes, sir. If our drive goes out, we won’t be able to slow down or maneuver freely, and I’m not sure about being able to hyper-jump.”
“I’ll order Wolfsbane and Aconite to stand by you. If necessary, they can use their tractor beams to slow you down and tow you to a rendezvous. Let me organize that now. Larkspur out.”
QNS MEIZHOU
The western task force’s engagement with the Brotherhood armed merchant cruiser Skodar was far more one-sided than that on the far side of the system. Skodar’s antique missiles had a powered range of only three million kilometers. Long before she got close enough to use them, she was hammered into scrap metal by P
ayara II’s missiles. Both of her fusion reactors went into emergency shutdown, her capacitor ring burned out, and every system on board failed. Most of her crew were killed or injured.
The task force sped past her battered wreck, and headed for the planet. Captain Liao called Jieyang on a tight-beam channel, and gave orders to her commanding officer.
“Meizhou to Jieyang. You are to leave the formation, turn around, and catch up to the wreck of that Brotherhood ship. I presume there are no survivors.” He knew Jieyang’s skipper would take the unsubtle hint, without needing bothersome explanations. “Place a nuclear demolition charge aboard the wreck. Make sure it is destroyed, then rendezvous with us at the second planet.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
BROTHERHOOD REFINERY SHIP BASHKIM BREGIJA
Commander Thanas stared as if transfixed at the Plot display on his bridge. Both armed vessels had been destroyed by the enemy, who were now heading in his direction, and slowing down as they drew near. Clearly, they intended him to be next.