“One hours and thirty-five minutes,” said Xiun, who had gotten on top of the local situation soon after they had arrived. “They will be coming in at point nine one light.”
“And the fighters behind them”
“They are three and a half hours away, ma’am,” said Xiun, closing her eyes for a moment to read the link. She opened her eyes and looked at her superior. “They can’t expect to actually destroy us with those missiles, can they? I wouldn’t count on them getting that many hits, if any.”
“They wouldn’t have launched the attack if they didn’t think they could do something,” said McCullom, holding up a finger. “They’ve been known to make mistakes due to their arrogance, and this might be another one of them. But it wouldn’t do for us to become so arrogant that we make the same mistakes, now would it. So we spend this time trying to analyze just what they are trying to do.”
“Yes, ma’am,” agreed the Aide. “I’ll get the staff working on it immediately.”
“Put everyone on it, Captain.”
“What about the front?”
“They will take care of themselves. Lenkowski and Mgonda have full staffs. We were just there as a backup, to catch anything they might miss. Now we have to let them assume all responsibility for their commands, while we take care of this battle.”
“Yes, ma’am. I’ll get everyone right on it.”
* * *
“We’ll start bringing through fighters again,” said the Captain of Fool’s Bane, looking at his Ca’cadasan supervisor. He looked back at the plot that was monitoring the system, and the one next to it that was showing the activity of the wormhole. A hundred thousand missiles had come through in five minutes, accelerated on the other side according to a timetable, entering the hole and translating through while it was aimed at the Donut. It was a maneuver demanding pinpoint accuracy, and nothing the Ca’cadasans had ever tried before. Amazingly, the first part of the launch had gone perfectly, nothing getting in the way, every missile coming through without incident.
The problems had come when the ship had turned to take each of the series of wormhole gate rings under fire. Someone had miscalculated, and the ship had not been able to move in time, sending several thousand missiles flying out into empty space. There was no way they could change their course at this time without giving away the game. Almost eight thousand had gone out on the proper course, and the ship had been able to line up on all the others on the proper timetable.
And in a little over an hour they should be approaching their targets, coming out of nowhere, thought the human with satisfaction, never for an instant thinking that what he was doing might doom his species once and for all.
Chapter Thirteen
A military man can scarcely pride himself on having smitten a sleeping enemy; it is more a matter of shame, simply, for the one smitten. Isoroku Yamamoto
H-1.
“There it is,” said the woman, stepping out of the wormhole that connected her not just to another place, but another time. The space around them rippled just a bit, a tremor that went through their bones, causing both to grunt at the slight pain. “Right where it was supposed to be.”
“It’s just a little thing,” said the man, gritting his teeth for a moment until the spasm passed. “One small life. But it can change so much.”
“Let’s do this,” said the woman, stepping away from the shimmering mirror that hung in the air behind them. In front of them was the round object they had seen through another wormhole several days prior. Or is that several weeks in the future, thought the woman. The temporal concepts still confused all of them. It was enough to know that they had gotten to where they were supposed to be at the proper moment, well before the search and rescue people would find the object.
“It looks pretty badly beaten up,” she said as she opened the access port and plugged the small device into the dock. She read the data coming through for a moment. “It took a lot of damage, but the interior is still intact.”
“We knew he survived,” said the man, looking around. “Get the damned thing open so we can get this over with.” He tossed the small bag he was carrying to the ground and readied his heavy particle beam rifle.
The woman nodded and accessed the locking mechanism. With a hiss the sphere opened at the top, revealing the occupant, who started screaming bloody murder as soon as he was exposed to the air.
The woman picked the baby up, looking him over, not worrying about the emotional state of the infant. “He appears to be healthy, though I wish he would shut up.”
“Just make sure you don’t drop him,” said the man, opening the bag and taking out the body of a like sized baby.
He tossed the body into the compartment from which the heir had come, then motioned for the woman to step back. She pulled the override device from the port and complied, pulling a covering over the child that blocked out all signals from his implant. The man aimed and fired his particle beam rifle, vaporizing the small body until there was nothing left but generalized protein residue. He continued to lay the beam over the carrier until much of it had melted, then fired a couple of more shots for good measure, putting a couple of representative holes through the side.
“That should do it,” said the man, motioning back to the wormhole.
The pair headed for the portal to the future, while spacetime rippled around them once again, then they were through. The portal closed behind them, its purpose served.
Minutes later the first of the search and rescue vehicles came in, settling down next to the ruined carrier. Moments later the signal went out that the heir’s carrier had been found, and that the baby was dead.
* * *
It had been an arduous journey through the wreck of the station to get to a part where everything was still functioning. At one point the station had shook from another hit, but that had been it. Crenshaw wasn’t sure if the enemy had been beaten back, or had just decided that the priority was now the shipping and building slips that comprised the majority of Central Docks.
“Captain Crenshaw,” said the young Commander of Engineering when she had made it back into the powered part of the station. “We’ve lost all contact with Command and Control.”
“I just came from there, Commander. We need for you to get together a team to restore power and communications. And I need to get word out to our forces. We think we know where the enemy fighters are coming from.”
* * *
The battle cruiser shook from another hit, from the intensity not much of a weapon for attacking warships. The launching fighter sped away, trying to change its vector and actually flying into a close in weapons stream that scattered its pieces through space.
“Those fighter missiles are not doing much damage, ma’am,” called back the Tactical Officer. “But if they put enough of them into us..”
Mei Lei nodded, looking at the damage schematic. A ten megaton missile barely penetrated the armor and through to the hull underneath. Unfortunately, that missile had taken out two eletromag field projectors and a cold plasma injector, as well as damaging two barrels of a close in weapons system. They could die the death of a thousand cuts from those kind of weapons.
A brilliant flare lit the near space, a much larger warhead going up from the hit of a close in weapon.
“Captain Matthers is reporting damage to his forward most laser ring, ma’am.”
Mei was about to reply to the Com Tech when that rating’s eyes went wide. “We’re receiving an all units broadcast from Central Dock. Targeting information coming through.”
Mei looked at the information that was populating the plot, wondering what Central Dock could tell them about the environment that they didn’t already know.
“What the hell is that?” she asked, watching as a blinking red circle appeared about twenty thousand kilometers from their location. At first it was unrecognizable, until the sensors zoomed in to show what looked like a tramp freighter. “They want us to open fire on a tramp?”
<
br /> “That’s the order, ma’am. They think that’s where the wormhole is located.”
“The wormhole? They think these fighters are coming in through wormholes?”
“That what they seem to be saying, ma’am,” said the Tactical Officer.
“Any way to verify their conjecture?” asked the Admiral, horrified at the thought of firing on a freighter that belonged to Imperial citizens.
“What in the hell would they be doing sitting there without being touched?” asked the Tactical Officer, looking back at her, an eager expression on his face.
What indeed? thought the Admiral, making up her mind. The enemy had made a major mistake stationing their gate so close to the system. It probably would have served them better if they had stationed it fifteen light minutes away. But then again, they wouldn’t have gotten the advantage of surprise they had achieved.
“Target that ship with all laser rings,” ordered the Admiral. “Let’s make sure we take it out.”
“What the hell is that?” exclaimed the Tactical Officer as another object appeared on the plot, followed in less than four seconds by another, then a third. “My God. Those are supercruisers.”
The four million ton ships that served the Cacas as their intermediate sized warships started to move as soon as they were through the gate, arraying themselves between the freighter and the Admiral’s force. Ships kept coming through the gate, until there were ten of the vessels, arrayed in a protective sphere around their gate. The lasers from the task group now had the electromag fields and armor of the Caca ships to deal with. Those ships were firing back with every beam weapon they had, a knife fight that was almost even. And meanwhile more fighters were coming through.
* * *
“What’s that?” cried Margo as the trumpeting sounded over the rumble of explosions in the distance and sirens close by.
“I don’t know,” said Tomas, grabbing her arm and pulling her close to the building.
The climb down the stairs had been long and arduous, but they were both young and in good shape, and it had been down, after all. The entrance to the basement and the subbasements below it had been sealed off by what looked like an armored blast door, and if there was anyone on the other side, they weren’t paying attention to the pair yelling and pounding on the closure with a piece of metal. So they had vacated the building and gotten out on the street, worried that a kinetic might come down on the structure and collapse it on top of them.
The outside had been frightening, and had almost driven them back in. The air was filled with so much dust they were constantly coughing, and the ever present haze obscured their sight to no further than a couple of hundred meters. In that distance they could see a couple of buildings that had collapsed. It was almost impossible for a modern structure to be taken down by ground shocks, no matter how powerful, so they had obviously been hit by something coming down from above with major force.
The trumpeting grew louder, and the pair tried to press their backs through the wall, wondering what new horror had been unleashed on the city. And then the forms had grown out of the haze, monstrous beasts with heads on the end of long necks, running as fast as they could plod along. The first pair were followed by three more, an adult and two juveniles. They disappeared once again into the haze, their trumpeting slowly growing more faint.
“They must have come from the zoo,” said Tomas, giving the haze one more wide eyed look.
“Those poor creatures,” said Margo. “And I thought we were scared. They don’t have a clue as to what is going on.”
Tomas nodded. He agreed with her assessment. Something must have hit the zoo, probably more kinetics. There was no telling how many of the animals had been killed. These five must have been the lucky ones. If they had been close enough to the hits, even their great bulk wouldn’t have saved them.
“We need to get under cover,” said Margo, pulling at Tomas’ arm.
Something grunted, coming from the same direction the big herbivores had come from. The grunt was answered, and then two large bipedal creatures came trotting out of the haze.
Tomas pulled Margo back to the wall, hoping that they hadn’t been spotted by the two creatures that had to be carnivores. Their large heads swung this way and that as their nostrils distended, picking up the scent of the quarry they were tracking.
The eyes of one looked in the direction of the two humans, and it grunted, getting the attention of its partner. That one looked over with the intense eyes of a killer, and Tomas wasn’t sure what to do, other than stand still and hope he didn’t soil himself. He and Margo had guns, but he doubted they would stop creatures like these.
The carnivores looked at each other, and Tomas thought they must be trying to decide if these little things in front of them were worth the effort. One started to lean forward, jaws agape, and Tomas thought he saw the end of his life, sliding down the throat of the beast. The hooting of the large herbivores sounded from the direction they had gone. The carnivore looked up, grunted, and both were on their way, trotting down the street.
Tomas let out his breath as Margo almost collapsed to the street. Both looked down the street the direction the beasts had gone, then up the way they had come from.
“We need to get off this street,” said Margo, and this time Tomas agreed with her. There was no telling what else was out there. If the zoo had been hit there could be a million creatures not native to this world roaming the streets.
“Let’s see if we can find an underground station,” he finally said. It might not be the best shelter, but it was better than nothing. And right now it looked a lot better than being eaten.
* * *
A bright flash to the east was followed by a thunderous boom some moments later, along with a shock wave that rocked the aircars in their tracks. Jennifer looked to the east through the side window of the aircar, which had automatically darkened from the flash. A massive fireball rose over the site of the blast, over fifteen kilometers in diameter according to the HUD display of her suit, making it a hundred megaton device. The fireball rose, forming the distinctive mushroom cloud rising up into the high atmosphere. Another weapon flashed even further to the east, and the Empress had to wonder if there were any going off well behind them.
“What could they be going after?” she asked her Chief of Detail. “Those are residential areas.”
“And the working areas for many of the people living there,” said the Chief. “A lot of small factories and businesses there, as well as outlying campuses of Imperial University.”
“And the people?”
“I expect that most of them will have gotten to shelters by now, or evacuated. And those were air bursts, nothing those underground would have to worry about.”
Jennifer knew speech meant to calm her nerves when she heard it. She had learned all she could about the capital city when it became certain that she was going to become Empress. The city was heavily defended, probably more so than most experts thought necessary, though after today none of them would admit to that viewpoint. There were massive ground defense batteries in every direction, in a circle a hundred kilometers from the built up areas. There were smaller batteries meant to take on any smaller craft that might come in. The one thing they didn’t have were enough shelters for the population. They were lucky if they had enough for half. Which meant half the population had to make do with whatever they could find. The underground, the interiors of stout buildings. Many would probably stay in their homes, which might normally be safe enough, but not with kinetics raining down on them.
“I have bad news, your Majesty,” said the Chief of Detail after listening to his link for a few moments, his face growing more troubled by the second.
Jennifer wanted to shout for the man to shut up, to not tell her the lie she knew was coming. Only it wouldn’t be a lie. It would be the truth, and something she desperately didn’t want to hear, though she needed to know.
“Search and rescue found the Prince’s carr
ier. It fell out of the car.”
“And Augustine?” she asked in a hushed voice.
“The carrier was penetrated. It looks like a particle beam hit it and burned through.”
Jennifer brought her hands to her face, striking the plate that was in the way. She lowered the plate and stared at the man, praying that she had heard wrong.
“As you know, your Majesty, the carriers are made to handle the destruction of the car that’s carrying it, as well as any kind of concussion. But a particle beam can still burn through.”
The Chief stopped, looking into the face of the horrified mother. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I don’t know what else to say.”
And the man had rambled to make it through the words he didn’t want to say.
“And the Prince?”
“It looks like the Prince was vaporized, ma’am,” said the Chief, closing his eyes for a moment, then looking at her with some of the most pain filled eyes the Empress had ever seen. “I am so sorry, ma’am. We failed you. We failed the Empire.”
The physician in Jennifer wanted to tell the man that he didn’t fail. That things just hadn’t worked out. But she couldn’t do that, not at this moment. All she could think about was the new life that had been snuffed out. A young man destined to rule the Empire, if they survived this war. A war he knew nothing of. And that hadn’t meant a damned thing, since it had still killed him.
“Get my surviving son to safety, Agent,” she finally said in a tone that could cut steel. “We’ll worry about everything else once that is done.”
* * *
H-3.
“We’re hitting the outer atmosphere, sir,” reported the Assistant Engineering Officer who was the acting tactical officer of the Dot MacArthur.
“Keep her steady, Helm,” ordered Captain the Duke Maurice von Rittersdorf, looking anxiously at the plot. He knew the Admiral had been joking about smacking his ships into the planet. Still, if he did that, he would never live it down.
Exodus: Empires at War: Book 11: Day of Infamy (Exodus: Empires at War.) Page 17