“I understand Earth is sparsely populated. Additionally, there are no female Ryss aboard, so reproduction is of no concern.”
Ezekiel nodded slowly. “Wartime rules, then. Foreign troops on friendly soil.” He rode in silence for a time, looking interestedly at the ship around him. “I presume you’ve planned for the possibility that you’ll be attacked suddenly upon FTL emergence? Something might have happened in the few weeks since Erasmus’ last round trip.”
“I have installed a relatively crude device that will sense our emergence using analog means and activate hydraulic controls to start my engines almost immediately. Furthermore, the system will cause semi-random evasive maneuvers in order to defeat any SLAM-like weapons.”
“Good to hear. How long until you can reboot?”
“I don’t know exactly. A matter of a minute or two, perhaps. I’ve never shut myself down before.” Demolisher paused. “I must confess, it disturbs me to do so. While we travel, I shall be dead.”
“Dead? Not asleep?”
“My mental state will be frozen within static hard drives, but there is an element of quantum uncertainty that concerns me. Will I be the same being as when I was shut down? Or only a perfect copy? Or perhaps an imperfect copy? Will I lose something in the process?”
The cart pulled up in front of a small passageway, and moving lights as if on a Vegas marquee showed the way to a door halfway down its length. “I don’t know, Demolisher. We humans have debated things like that for centuries. If I lost all my memories, am I still me? What if I died, and then were cloned and a copied engram imposed on the new brain. Should that be considered legally me?”
“Food for thought, then.”
Ezekiel patted the wall as if comforting a friend. “I think the practical question is, will you appear unaffected to everyone else? All else is philosophy.”
“Thank you for this explanation. I am young and have much to learn.”
“As do we all. Good night, Demolisher.”
“And you. Sleep well.”
Opening the door, Ezekiel looked around the quarters he’d been given. It seemed like any other first-class shipboard cabin he’d ever occupied, except Roger’s, of course: furniture fixed to the deck, his own small privy and shower, a screen and workstation with standard interfaces to access the ship’s net.
And one other thing: a sleep tube. It glowed with electronic life, its program already set for the trip.
I’m in Demolisher’s hands anyway, Ezekiel thought. No point in worrying overmuch about a two-week sleep. At least I’m not turning my brain off entirely and rebooting myself later. Last time, I believe I dreamed. It wasn’t a bad nap.
Quickly, he stripped and climbed in. Without hesitation, he slapped the large button that closed the lid and initiated the sedation sequence. When the needle stabbed his arm, he didn’t flinch, but surrendered to the sensation of sinking into a warm, welcoming womb.
***
Aboard Desolator, Trissk and Chiren climbed into their own sleep tubes near the bridge, the better to be ready when they arrived after the FTL transit. Ten million other Ryss had already done the same, along with thousands of Sekoi and humans, though not the remaining four of the Council of Elders.
As his proxy to the Council, Trissk had appointed a bright young adult warrior the others had recommended. With the logjam of traditionalism broken and the population pressure relieved by the millions of troops recruited to defend the superdreadnoughts, he was confident New Ryssa would survive intact for long enough for him to complete his mission, and then return.
Unremarked by anyone, one of Desolator’s human crew, a nondescript electronics technician by his résumé, had arrived with the last batch of personnel to reinforce the superdreadnought. He occupied a sleep tube in his tiny cabin, a luxury still greater than the vast communal bays of the Ryss troops and their stacks of racks.
Among his few possessions was an expensive suit of smart-cloth, which used programmable nanofibers to change size and color at the whim of its wearer.
Chapter 12
“Sixteen minute alert, multiple inbounds,” called Lieutenant Cotillion, watch officer on the frigate EFS Abilard. “It can’t be Erasmus. Warm up the SLAMs.” Her calm voice belied the pounding of her heart as she observed her missile launch tech, Chief Japurna, lift the cover on a panel. He unlocked and moved a substantial lever from one position to another, powering up the targeting console.
This process ensured no accidental launch of the enormously expensive missiles was possible – at least, not until that switch was thrown. Now, Japurna touched the screens with precise motions. “SLAM activation template is up. First code input. Lieutenant?”
Cotillion leaned over Japurna’s shoulder to input her own code. By the time she had finished, Captain Haas had entered the Abilard’s tiny control center, still buttoning his tunic.
The lieutenant moved aside as the captain added his code to the sequence and pressed Enter. “Let’s see them, Chief.”
In response, Japurna threw up an optical view of the nearest of the SLAMs floating a hundred meters away, pointing directly toward Sol. It showed the telltale external lights of active power. In quick sequence the chief petty officer cycled the display, checking all twenty-four weapons. “Good to go.”
“Get us moving away,” Haas ordered, and Cotillion hastened to her own console and plugged in her VR link. The frigate didn’t rate a dedicated helmsmen, but she was the ship’s pilot and thus had no trouble getting the small vessel moving on cold thrusters, heading toward the stellar north, away from the sun.
Soon, the display showed a synthetic view “down” on the SLAMs, the software reducing Sol’s glare in the center to insignificance while highlighting the weapons.
“Ten minutes to emergence,” Japurna said. Technically, the delay from the speed of light meant the enemy would arrive seventy seconds earlier, but everything was calibrated to what they could observe. There was simply no point in constantly thinking about the lag. Only in targeting would that time have to be taken into account.
“SLAM IIs are reporting in,” Cotillion said. The fact that the newer, smarter weapons scattered around the Jericho line had also been activated was reassuring but largely irrelevant to them. The more-than-one-minute communication and detection delay meant the two overlapping systems had to operate independently. They provided redundancy, not complementarity.
In fact, the only point to using a SLAM at all was to catch Scourge motherships as they emerged with their millions of small craft not yet launched. Once the swarms moved away, the cores became largely irrelevant to the defense of the system, neither worth expending one of the super-missiles nor much of a threat to Earth.
Of course, they were strategically valuable, worth killing, but only with cheaper weapons.
All this ran through Cotillion’s head as she continued to thrust them out of the way of the SLAMs’ TacDrive field emission ranges.
“Separation achieved,” Japurna said. On the display, the SLAMs moved carefully apart, far enough that their drive fields wouldn’t affect one another. They now defined a ring several kilometers across. Each pointed at a notional spot along the stellar ecliptic, the plane of Sol’s equator, where the enemy might appear.
The display counted down inexorably toward zero. Captain Haas paced back and forth behind his open crash chair. The Abilard’s job was to launch, and then run home to add her weight of metal to Earth’s defense, so there was no need to seal themselves into VR yet. Full linkage was for combat only. VR syndrome was no joke, not to be risked lightly.
“Enabling automatic targeting network,” said Japurna, the final call in the official sequence. Now, Cotillion knew, it was in the hands of the computers. Every moment was simply too precious. Besides the agonizing seventy seconds each missile would have to travel, confirming targets were hostile and manually aiming up to twenty-four weapons would take much too long.
Fleet Intelligence analysis said that at least two minutes wou
ld pass before the motherships would begin maneuvering or spitting out small craft. It was this window of predictability that allowed the SLAMs to launch from so far away and still strike their targets. Therefore, the missiles and Abilard were linked in an ultrafast network of computers that would send one SLAM speeding to each enemy core. The kinetic energy of its lightspeed impact would do the rest.
The numbers reached zero. “Emergence any time now,” Cotillion said unnecessarily, her mouth dry. Haas stopped his pacing and nodded sharply, staring intently at the display as it pulled back to encompass the area out past the Jericho Line.
“Lieve God,” Haas gasped as the display filled with targets. “How many?”
“Forty-nine,” Cotillion replied. “Confirmed hostile: Scourge signatures.”
“We don’t have enough SLAMs even if they all hit. And what is that?” Haas pointed at one icon different from the others.
“Unknown. Its signature is different – bigger – but all targets are too close to the sun to get good optical. Some kind of flagship?”
“Did the network SLAM it?”
“No. It emerged about thirty seconds later than the rest.”
Haas threw himself into his chair and tapped at his console. On a ship this size the captain had to double as comms officer. Cursing, he plugged in his link and spoke aloud to record a message. “Abilard to all EarthFleet vessels. Observational data is already on its way. We note forty-eight motherships and one larger target, possibly a flagship. SLAMs have launched as programmed.”
Lifting his finger from the touchscreen he asked, “Hits?”
“Soon.”
The seconds had already counted down past zero. The small crew watched as the numbers ascended again toward seventy, at which time the light from the results should be visible.
Red icons on the display began to turn yellow. Four, five, nine…fifteen.
“That’s all?” Haas barked “Fifteen? What about the SLAM IIs?”
Cotillion turned with haunted eyes. “Sir, those were the IIs. All of ours missed.”
Haas gaped for a moment, and then closed his mouth to speak through clenched teeth. “The Scourges must have maneuvered early.”
Japurna’s eyes became as bleak as Cotillion’s. “We’re dead. Earth’s dead. There’s no way we can fight thirty-four swarms. The SLAMs –”
Captain Haas reached over to grab Japurna by the front of his tunic. “Pull yourself together, man. The SLAMs were only the first line of defense. We’ve been preparing for this for two years. We can hold.” He licked his lips as his eyes bore into the other man’s. “We can hold.”
Chapter 13
Admiral Absen stared aghast at Conquest’s holotank showing the poor results of the SLAM salvo. “The motherships maneuvered?”
“Yes, at about the thirty second mark,” Lieutenant Commander Fletcher replied from the Sensors station. “Much earlier than in the first attack.”
“Good thing the SLAM IIs worked like they were supposed to,” Absen said, glancing over at Rick Johnstone. “Thanks to you.” The man had spent the last month laboriously testing the pseudo-AIs and their protocols, repairing serious hidden flaws in their psychology.
Johnstone shrugged. “Just doing my job, sir.”
Commander Ford broke in from Weapons, his voice conveying his usual contrariness. “The IIs got hits because they were closer, not because they were smarter. They struck their targets in less than thirty seconds. Sure wish one had hit that flagship. Probably would have if the targeting protocols weren’t so damned tight.”
“The SLAMs IIs wouldn’t have reacted so fast if they hadn’t been smarter and autonomous, either,” Johnstone replied in a tone that signaled the start of another argument with Ford. “We wouldn’t have gotten any hits if I hadn’t –”
Absen cut them off. He knew they were bickering partially from shock and fear at the size of the Scourge force. “We’ve taken out almost a third of the enemy in one salvo. I wish it had been more, but it’s not, so let’s get to work. Captain Scoggins, are we synchronized with the rest of Task Force Alpha?”
“Yes, sir. How are you going to play it?”
Absen didn’t have to think. He’d already chosen among his engagement options: TacDrive the task force all the way into each fight and come out disordered, or stop just outside enemy weapons range to regroup his ships that would inevitably scatter from their optimal combat positions. “We stop short and take places. This task force is designed to fight as an integrated unit and should be able to take down a swarm on its own.”
“Unless these swarms are smarter, just like their cores turned out to be,” Ford muttered.
“They’re still limited by physics, and we’re far more prepared than we were the last time,” Absen replied. “Captain Scoggins, nearest swarm. Get us there.”
“Yes, sir. Okuda, initiate the pulse.”
“Aye, ma’am,” the bald helmsman said. “Course and duration set. Pulse in three, two, one, mark.”
The familiar wrench of TacDrive caused Absen to hold his head as still as possible to minimize the disruption to his inner ear. No plague, no nano, no medical treatment had ever been able to get rid of his susceptibility to motion sickness.
Conquest’s sister ship Constitution and the fourteen heavy cruisers that completed TF Alpha followed within milliseconds. Their pulses were set fractionally shorter in order to eliminate the unlikely chance of a collision.
The warships arrived in a long, strung-out line aimed along their common course, about ten minutes from the enemy’s weapons range at full fusion drive speed. As soon as the sensors unmasked from their armor and the holotank came up, Absen was able to see his ships hurrying to take their positions.
Captain Sherrie Huen’s Constitution was the first to come alongside at a mere twenty kilometers distance, a stone’s throw in space with ships this size. Seven heavy cruisers then surrounded each in two circles slightly refused – that is, set back – to allow the larger ships free play of their forward concentration of weaponry, and to cover their more vulnerable rears.
“Now we’ll see how good your system really is, Ford,” Absen said, referring to the Constitution’s point defense weapons suite the officer had designed and its control crew he’d trained. “Sorry I didn’t let you stay there.” That decision had nothing to do with Ford’s competence and everything to do with his personality, which would not mesh well with the buttoned-down Huen’s.
“They’ll do fine,” Commander Ford replied in a voice that seemed almost certain. “Fine,” he repeated more firmly.
Absen shifted his gaze back to the holotank, this time staring at the swarm in front of them. Fully engaged with the Jericho Line, he saw flashes of fusion mines and the flare of Meme fusors among the million Scourge small craft.
“How are the Meme suicide gunboats doing?” he asked.
Conquest’s disembodied voice replied in Michelle’s dulcet tones, “Initial assessment shows effectiveness above predictions. These Scourges seem approximately ten percent more aggressive than the ones we encountered before, which in this case means they are attacking in a suboptimal manner, not remaining spread enough. The fusors are taking down more than expected.”
Absen grunted. “That’s something, anyway. How soon until they pass the Line?”
“The leading elements are already doing so.”
“Ford, start stinging them with our particle beams. Michelle, give the order to Huen and the rest to open fire with main batteries as they come into range. Let’s see if we can keep them stirred up and angry.”
“Gladly, sir,” Ford replied to the first order. Immediately Conquest’s trio of massive particle accelerators sent streams of charged protons at near lightspeed into the densest masses of Scourge ships. Individual targeting was impossible at this range, but with so many enemy small craft, each beam picked dozens of them out of the sky with every shot.
Of course, dozens among a million was insignificant…except in its effect on the sw
arm. The long-range weapons, accompanied by the heavy main lasers of the other dreadnought and the cruisers, stirred the enemy to attack immediately.
Exactly as Absen hoped.
Therefore, instead of remaining in a dense and disciplined mass, a possibly irresistible charge supported by wings of the Scourge gunships and fighters, they came on like drunken hornets in strings and clumps, great gaps showing through as they approached at different rates.
“They’re the barbarians and we’re the Romans,” Absen said conversationally as the enemy approached. “They’ll throw themselves at us and die on our locked shields.”
“Right,” Ford muttered as he worked his console.
“Signal retrograde,” Absen called when the range closed to under one hundred thousand kilometers. “Not too fast. Keep them coming.”
As one, the ships of the task force flipped end for end and lit their fusion engines, slowing the rate of the Scourges’ closing and lengthening the time both sides had to fire at each other. Because most of the enemy’s combat power was embodied in its assault craft full of Scourgelings and Soldiers, doing this favored the weapon-heavy EarthFleet task force.
As soon as they’d built up sufficient velocity, Absen ordered his force to face the enemy again, though its rearward course remained the same. “Resume fire.”
“Seven minutes to close engagement,” Michelle said.
“Signal everyone weapons free and give me the all-ships channel.”
“Channel open.”
“All hands, all ships, this is Admiral Absen. We’re about to engage the first swarm. No matter what happens, it is imperative that each cruiser maintain position relative to her assigned dreadnought unless rendered combat ineffective. Fight hard, rely on your shipmates, do your jobs and God willing we’ll win through. Good luck, and good hunting.” Absen made a throat-cutting motion to end the transmission.
“Admiral, are we going to launch the drones?” Captain Scoggins asked.
“Thank you, Melissa. Give the signal and deploy them as per doctrine.”
Conquest and Empire (Stellar Conquest Series Book 5) Page 13