by Jay Allan
“Your plans appear flawless, Tesserax. I see no weakness, no point that even begs for review. Surely, the operation will be a great success, and the final pacification of the humans cannot now be long delayed. The head of the Colony Church paused for a moment, clearly concerned about something, even as he gushed praise for the plan. “What are the loss projections for the boarding operations?”
Tesserax understood his comrade’s concerns. The effort to capture key human personnel had been his request, and for all the humans’ inferiorities, the prospect of closing with boarding ships, especially on their heavy units and their giant fortress, was a daunting one.
But Tesserax only smiled. “You needn’t worry, Phazarax. Losses will no doubt be heavy. We both know the Rim humans have a seemingly natural inclination for war, and it behooves us not to underestimate them, lesser creatures that they are. But our attack plan has been carefully developed, and I have issued some special ordnance to a chosen group of Stockton’s wings. One thousand fighters will not participate in the battle with the human squadrons. They will have another purpose, one that will serve our attempts well, and open the door for our soldiers to board…and seize the cream of the human command structure. Some of their top officers will die fighting, no doubt, but the boarding teams will have stun beams as well, along with strict orders to take captives whenever possible.
“One hopes a decisive victory in the coming fight will be enough to shatter their morale, but if we are also able to secure a reasonable number of their top leaders, a swift victory is assured. Seeing their heroes employed against them will be crushing to whatever spirit remains to continue fighting, and the trove of tactical and strategic secrets we will obtain is beyond simple valuation. Victory is victory, of course, but the thought of an encollared Tyler Barron leading our fleet toward the heart of the Rim is quite extraordinary. It is hard to imagine the effect this would have on any humans who continued to resist. Any remnants of their forces would dissipate, and all of the Rim would be ours.”
“That is indeed a pleasant thought, Phazarax. The Collar is an extremely useful device, one that will continue to serve us well. Though, if we are able to secure the chance to encollar Admiral Barron, that will exceed even my wildest expectations. He does not seem the sort to surrender, but perhaps our forces will have the chance to stun him and bring him back.” Tesserax sat and smiled for a moment. Tyler Barron had caused him considerable difficulty, and part of him raged at a mere human standing in his way. But his intellect saw Barron as an interesting case study, and a hopeful sign of the utility the Rim dwellers would provide when deployed to the main front.
And there was satisfaction in the thought of an encollared Tyler Barron, serving the Highborn dutifully, as he had once opposed them. There was an elegance to it all…the human most responsible for the intolerable defiance against Highborn rule turned into the tool to bring about the final capitulation and enslavement of his people.
Tesserax stood silently, a smile slipping onto his normally grim face.
Chapter Thirteen
CFS Vandengraf
160,000 Kilometers from Fleet Base Grimaldi
Krakus System
Year 328 AC (After the Cataclysm)
“I want the squadrons rearmed and launched again…now! What I don’t want are excuses.” Simpson’s voice was hard edged, the stress of battle fueling his urgency, and the immense pressure with which he was driving his spacers. He’d gotten a litany of excuses as to why the remaining fighters weren’t back out again. They were all legitimate—damaged bays, mother ships locked in the fury of battle, battered fighters that had barely made it back—but he didn’t care. Grimaldi had to hold…and that meant the battle raging around him would be one to the death.
There would be victory, or there would be annihilation. He wouldn’t do any favors to his spacers by accepting their excuses, no matter how valid they were. Pushing them to the brink, beyond all the bounds of reason, was the only way to save their lives.
Some of their lives, at least.
“Flight control advises ten minutes until launch operations commence, Commodore.”
“Six minutes, Lieutenant. By God, if we’re still sitting here in ten minutes with those fighters in their cradles, I’ll go down to the launch bay myself…and then everyone down there will really have something to be afraid of!” Simpson could barely recognize himself, the thing he’d become, a relentless automaton, devoid of human feeling, of understanding. There was only the battle, and nothing else. All that mattered was victory, holding Fortress Grimaldi whatever the cost. Perhaps, if he survived, if his people could prevail, his humanity would return to him. Just then, he didn’t have time for it.
He barely heard the officer’s tepid response, and then his relaying of the command. He could hardly recognize himself, and he imagined he seemed like a man possessed to the officers used to working around him. He’d been in desperate fights before, but other than the recent close call during the retreat back to Grimaldi, he’d never commanded in one. He’d always imagined the stress Tyler Barron or Clint Winters felt, but as he sat there on Vandengraf’s bridge, he realized he hadn’t even come close. He felt as though his entire body was in a vice, and every breath was an effort, and even more of one to try to hide his uncertainty and fear.
The battleship lurched hard side to side, challenging even the iron sturdiness of his space-hardened gut. He told himself the evasive routines were the only reason any of his people were still alive, and he knew that was nothing but the hard truth. But it didn’t quiet his roiled insides.
The air smelled of burnt machinery and caustic chemicals. Vandengraf had taken two hits, one of them fairly serious. The battleship was still in the fight, but Simpson wasn’t certain how much more the vessel could take before dropping out of the battle line…or worse.
He heard the sound of the batteries firing, the higher-pitched tone of the secondaries, their laser power lancing out in place of the disabled primaries. The particle accelerators packed a heavier punch, but Vandengraf was close to the enemy now, and the larger number of laser cannon offset the generally lower strength of each individual turret.
The close range was aiding in targeting as well, but the Sigma-9 radiation pulses from the Highborn ships were still wreaking havoc with the Confederation targeting systems. Simpson had enough force to defeat the enemy…assuming his ships could score a sufficient number of hits. So far, they were lagging what they needed.
He glanced over toward the main display, checking the time. As he did, the ship shuddered hard. Another hit.
The bridge lights flickered, but they remained on, and damage reports began to pour through his headset. Two more secondary batteries were down, and any hope of getting the primaries back online this side of a spacedock was gone. But the reactors were both still north of seventy percent, and, after what seemed like a torturous delay, he got the update he’d been waiting for. There was damage to the launch bays…but they were both still operable.
The screen showed less than forty seconds until his six-minute time limit expired. He’d been utterly clear, but he was well aware his words, however imperiously spoken, did not alter reality. He suspected that when a commander began to believe anything was possible simply because he had ordered it, he’d gone over to a bad place, allowed ego and arrogance to consume him.
Simpson was there, not yet, at least. He didn’t believe his orders made it possible to launch the ships faster…he just knew if his people didn’t get those squadrons back out there, the chances of any of them surviving the battle dropped precipitously.
For a few seconds, he wavered, unsure whether his flight crews would get the fighters back out—uncertain even if they did if it would be enough. His eyes moved toward the status display, checking the system reports. His flagship was badly battered, and he could almost see his sweating damage control teams crawling through the bowels of the ship, desperately struggling to keep the vessel in the fight.
But the laun
ch bays are still open…
A few seconds later, he felt something under his feet, a familiar sensation, distant vibrations. Fighters blasting down the launch tubes. He looked up at the display and saw the first squadrons forming up, the losses they had already suffered startlingly evident in the holes in their formations.
But they were launching. They were ready to head back at the enemy again, to fight until the battle was won.
A good fifteen seconds before his deadline.
* * *
Constellation shuddered hard, and even as Sam Taggart pulled on her headset and snapped out a demand for a damage report, her mind filled with dark and foreboding expectations. The power of Highborn weaponry was no longer a mystery, even if the way those baffling blue beams worked remained as much a riddle as ever. Visions of reactor damage, radiation leaks, huge sections of her ship torn open, hundreds of her spacers incinerated or cast out into the frigid void…all those images and more consumed her inner vision. But the response to the hit was both quicker than she’d expected, and the reality less dire.
“We’ve got considerable damage, Captain, but all main systems remain functional. We’ve got two power network breaches, but I think we can have those back online in fifteen minutes. Meanwhile, you’ve got at least eighty percent on the engines power, and the primaries are still functional.”
The chief engineer’s words sounded like the answer to a prayer, but even as she sat there, listening to the final words, she came to understand just how tough the new Excalibur-class ships truly were. The Confederation’s best and brightest had taken the very cream of the lessons of two decades of almost non-stop war and combined them with Hegemony technology—and a few things gleaned from the Highborn themselves—and created a class of ships that likely wouldn’t have appeared for a century or more in other circumstances. They weren’t a match to the ships of the ancient imperial navy, of course, but they were a hell of a lot closer than anything the Rim had seen in over three centuries.
“Very well, Commander. Recheck those primaries…and the transmission lines leading to them. We need as much firepower as we can get.”
“Yes, Captain.”
Taggart leaned back and let out a deep sigh. She was relieved, but even as she remained silent, her eyes still focused on the comm unit, she was realizing that her ship was still in good shape, still in the line and pounding away at the enemy, despite the direct hit that had overcome her evasion routines.
The battle was raging, and perhaps against all odds, the Confederation fleet was holding its own. Constellation was a big part of that, and Grimaldi was another. The rest of Commodore Simpson’s ships were mostly old and outdated. They were fighting hard, too, but they didn’t have to power to stand off against Highborn ships. Not really. They were doing some harm to the enemy, but they were paying a far higher price in damage and in lives lost. A dozen and a half of the ships in the makeshift fleet were gone already…but the enemy was suffering heavily as well, and almost thirty percent of the Highborn hulls had been destroyed, or they were floating in space, crippled or nearly so. It was better than she could have hoped…but she knew the fight was far from over. Victory would rest upon just how many losses the enemy was willing to sustain. If they pressed on, fought to the bitter end, Taggart’s experience and calculations—and her gut as well—told her they could probably destroy Simpson’s fleet and take down Fortress Grimaldi. That would leave the Confederation border wide open…but it would also leave the Highborn too weak to mount a real invasion.
At least until they get more ships out here. They got these this far, so it’s a fair bet there are more on the way…
And I don’t know where we’re going to find more ships anytime soon…even with Gary Holsten stealing every half-finished vessel he could lay his hands on…
Her eyes caught a flash on the display, a pair of Constellation’s primaries taking one of the Highborn cruisers directly amidships. She could see the hit was a solid one, almost certainly extremely damaging, but she was still surprised when the target simply vanished.
She felt her hands clench tightly, a surge of satisfaction at her gunners’ achievement.
Then she saw another hit, Vandengraf this time. It was the third hit the flagship had taken in just a few minutes, and Taggart could see from the jerky movement on her display that the vessel was badly damaged. She muttered to herself, a series of almost silent curses that would have befitted the rugged third class spacers on the lower decks more than a senior Confederation captain. Taggart was generally friendly and mild mannered, well-liked by most of those with whom she’d served. But she had a mouth that would make a Marine sergeant major turn ten shades of red.
She’d been relieved at first when Simpson had decided to remain on his creaky old battleship. She didn’t relish the idea of serving as the fleet commander’s flag captain. Constellation was a huge jump up for her, but her previous commands, a destroyer and a light cruiser, had been her own. She wasn’t sure how well she would have done as the commodore’s glorified aide.
Now she regretted those thoughts, and she wished she’d fought harder to convince Simpson to fly his flag on Constellation where it belonged. The superbattleship was vastly sturdier and more powerful than Vandengraf. If the fleet lost its commander, the only officer present with the experience to even make even an effort at leading a force so large, they were all in for trouble. Gary Holsten was an amazingly accomplished organizer, and he’d almost singlehandedly put together the defense against the invasion. But he was the first to acknowledge he had no real military experience.
And the thought of commanding the entire fleet instead of just Constellation scared the hell out of Taggart.
“Come on, old girl…hang in there…” She muttered softly to herself, watching as Simpson’s damaged vessel remained where it was, in the line of battle, and still firing at least some of its guns. She didn’t know how many more hits Vandengraf could take, but she was sure of one thing.
There was nothing she could do except let loose all the death and destruction Constellation could spew forth. There was no way to prevent the enemy from inflicting damage…no way, except blasting the bastards to the seven hells of space…before they did the same to her and her comrades.
And that was just what she was going to do.
* * *
Gary Holsten sat quietly, trying to stay out of the way as the officers and spacers who actually ran Grimaldi struggled to keep the fortress in the fight. The fort’s massive guns outranged anything the Confederation’s mobile vessels could carry, and their reach was just about equal with that of the Highborn weaponry. That was a problem, since Grimaldi’s small repositioning jets lacked the capability for anything but a meager routine of evasive maneuvers. The station’s immense armor belts allowed it to withstand anything a Union ship—the enemy it had been constructed to face—might throw at it, but the enormously powerful Highborn guns were a different matter entirely.
Grimaldi had taken more than a dozen solid hits, and whole sections of the fortress hung at hideous angles, little remaining but twisted wreckage. The station’s systems were dispersed, a design intended to ensure its combat capacity endured even if any large area was destroyed. The fort had suffered massive damage, and casualties that likely numbered into the thousands, but it was still roughly fifty percent combat effective.
That meant it was still in the fight.
Holsten felt useless, helpless. He fought back against the repeated urges to do something, mostly because he knew there was nothing he could do. Nothing useful, at least. He’d done his part, all he had to offer, really. He’d assembled the fleet, drawn forces from every corner of the Confederation and dispatched them to the border, usually without the formality of valid Senate authorization. He would catch hell for it all, he realized, when he finally got back to Megara. At least he would if he was able to turn back the enemy invasion, or at least blunt it. While the threat of the Highborn advancing on the Core loomed heavily over the S
enate, he knew they wouldn’t interfere. Fear was an incredibly useful tool, and its only weakness was the speed at which its effects faded once it was gone. The terrified Senators who had silently allowed him to do what he had done, would howl for his blood once the enemy was driven back.
That didn’t really matter, he realized.
It didn’t matter because he couldn’t quite find the words or thoughts to express how little he gave a shit. He spent a few seconds, perhaps a minute, letting his mind wander back to Megara, to the swamp that governed the Confederation and how he might handle it…but the battle soon wretched his attention back.
He could hear the officers on the bridge speaking, and he realized some of that had been directed at him. Grimaldi had just finished refitting its surviving fighters, and it was launching a second strike. The first one had been enormously costly, with casualty rates north of twenty percent. That was a lot of dead pilots…and perhaps some still floating in space, betting to themselves whether their survival gear would sustain them long enough to have any real hope of rescue.
But there had been no consideration of holding back the battered and exhausted pilots. Every spacer in the fleet, and on Grimaldi, was giving his all, putting everything on the line to hold the breach, to keep the Highborn from pushing through into the heart of the Confederation. Holsten knew if five pilots returned from the hundreds launching, Colin Simpson would order them back out, and if one of those came back, he would take his lone fighter out again, just as quickly as the base’s crew could refuel and rearm it.