Exodus - Empires at War 04 - The Long Fall (Exodus Series #4)

by Doug Dandridge

  But how many are targeted at us, and how many at our missiles? thought the Commodore. That really hadn’t been a common tactic at the beginning of the war, but since the humans had used it early on the enemy was now doing so as well. Mei stared at the holo through the relative silence of the bridge as the two waves converged. Several hundred of her missiles dropped from the plot, their hyperdrives going offline with annihilation. The rest continued on toward the enemy, while the foe’s weapons kept coming toward the fleet.

  They think they have enough to overwhelm us, she thought, her own tension feeding from that of the flag bridge crew. The hope was that they didn’t. Unless they fired everything they had. Which seems unlikely given what we know about their ships.

  “Impact in ten minutes,” called out the Tactical Officer. “Closing velocity point four c.”

  “That takes a lot of their advantage away,” said her Flag Captain, looking over at her from his station.

  “Yes,” agreed Mei. “It does. And if they don’t get us with this one the next will be more massive.”

  “Impact in eight minutes.”

  “Signal the release of counters. We better get them out while we can.”

  The Tactical Officer acknowledged and sent the signal. Seconds later the first of the countermissiles came through the wormholes. At four minutes out they started to engage the enemy missiles, while more came out from the wormholes behind them.

  “We’re making the jump in three minutes,” came the voice of Admiral Sims over the wormhole com.

  “Very good, Admiral. We’ve got them lined up for you.”

  The enemy missiles were beginning to disappear from the plot, but so were her offensive weapons. It looked like she might get a couple of hundred into close in weapons range, probably not enough to take out more than a couple of their ships. She monitored her own com, making sure that the other force knew exactly where everything was. And then the enemy moved into the trap.

  “Jumping now,” came the voice of Sims, and the hyperdrive sensors picked up twenty ships making the transition from normal space to hyper VII. The holes opened, and twenty hyper VII battle cruisers slid into space at point two c, on the same heading as the enemy force. As soon as they entered VII they acquired the Ca’cadasan ships, and opened fire with all beam weapons.

  Mei’s two hundred and fifteen surviving missiles were coming in to the front, while the new battle cruisers opened fire with their missile armaments. Six of the battle cruisers were of the same class as Jean de Arc, and started releasing their own arsenal of elsewhere fired missiles at the enemy.

  Mei stared at her own holo, which showed her light cruiser seriously damaged, and one of the battle cruisers and a destroyer simply gone.

  “We have missiles in the pipeline,” called out the Tactical Officer. “Opening fire.”

  Jean de Arc started to cycle her own missiles down the enemy’s throat, six hundred in five minutes. When her second strike hit the battle was over. She stared at the holo that was devoid of enemy ships. Devoid as well of fourteen of Sims’ battle cruisers, including the Admiral’s own.

  “We took them out, Admiral,” reported Mei over the wormhole com. “But at a heavy cost.”

  “Good work, Commodore,” said Lenkowski. “I’m putting you in charge of the entire force.” The holo went blank for a few moments, then Lenkowski’s face appeared again with a worried expression. “Rendezvous with the fleet at the Carmile system. We’ve got troubles here. I’ll try to bring as much of the fleet as I can to that rally point. Lenkowski out.”

  The com faded, but the data was still coming across the open link. The tactical holo switched views to the feed from the main battle fleet. Over a thousand icons appeared within the system, and what looked like a thousand red icons were approaching in hyper VII. While Mei watched vectors and accel figures began to appear under the icons, the fleet starting to accelerate away, making for the other side of the system and open space. Mei prayed to the Universe that they would make it.

  Chapter Nine

  Fain would I climb, yet fear I to fall. Walter Raleigh.

  FAYAL SYSTEM, SECTOR IV, NOVEMBER 21ST, 1000.

  Lieutenant SG Rogelio Fujardo still wasn’t sure why he had volunteered for this suicide mission. Of course, they had told him there was a better than even chance he and his crew would make it, and it was an important mission. The cargo in the courier’s hold was of strategic importance.

  The courier had been modified for the one way mission it was on. Its designation had been CH7-19D25, but Fujardo had wanted to call it the Forlorn Hope. Upon learning that the name had already been taken by another foolhardy officer for his courier, he added the designation II to the appellation.

  “They still chasing us?” he asked his sensor tech, cursing himself for a fool as soon as he said it. He could see for himself that the two enemy scouts were still on his tail. Normally in a long range chase they would have caught him. One of the modifications to his ship had been strengthening of the forward electromag shields, at the expense of those to the stern, giving his ship the ability to reach point nine six c in hyper. Added to that was the requirement for the crew to wear battle armor at all times, and the supplement of their antirad nanos. He had been told he had a seventy percent chance of making it to his target. The result had been their blowing past everything the enemy had on picket.

  The holo showed the enemy scouts still well behind him, and he was opening that distance with every hour. The critical time would come within the hour, when he started to decel toward the hyper limit of the target system, Fayal. The enemy ships would then have a choice to make. They could continue to accel, and chance running into the hyper barrier. Or they could curve around the other star and take a shot at the courier with their missiles. Or they might just let him continue into the system, and let the forces there deal with him. He was thinking the second possibility the most likely, and that was not good news.

  Of course, they have no idea about the wormholes we’re carrying, he thought, and that was his ace in the hole. One of the two wormholes was connected to a missile port to the stern, a feature normally not installed on couriers, which didn’t have room for more than four missiles, normally mounted on the hull. Those mounts were gone, replaced by extra grabber units.

  The clock ticked, and the hyper VII barrier approached. The courier went into its decel profile, pulling six hundred and thirty gravities.

  “The enemy is launching,” called out the Sensor Tech who doubled as the tactical officer. The holo bloomed with icons, twenty missiles heading their way.

  And normally that would be an overwhelming number against a ship like mine, thought the officer with a grim smile, hoping that was not true this day.

  “They’ll reach us six minutes before we get to the hyper barrier,” called out the Navigator, also a rating.

  And by the time they see the result, or hopefully, lack of, it will be too late to launch another. Unless they want to jump one down, which means they can’t be moving faster than point three c, their limit.

  Again the clock was moving down, and the enemy missiles drawing closer, their closing speed decreasing as the courier slowed. At five minutes distance the Lieutenant signaled the release of the counter missiles.

  The hyper capable counters started to eject from the single stern tube of the courier, coming from an acceleration tube around another star and out into hyper VII, their drives active. In a minute there were sixty missiles in space, three for every enemy incoming. At three minutes to impact on the courier they closed with the enemy birds. A series of bright flashes showed where the counters were engaging the foe, and only two missiles came through to track onto the courier.

  At one minute out the courier engaged one of the missiles with its laser, while four more counters popped out to engage the other. Both flared antimatter fire well away from the courier.

  A hole in space opened, and the courier slid through at point two two c, another of her modifications. Fujardo w
aited on the edge of his seat for the enemy to launch again, but it didn’t come. They’ve decided to let the system handle us, thought the ship commander, happy for the moment at their decision.

  The Forlorn Hope II stair stepped down the levels of hyper and appeared in normal space just a few light minutes from the hyper I barrier. The ship immediately began scanning the system on all sensors, and what it saw was frightening. There were scores of ships in the system, and a large station in orbit around the habitable planet. And a four million ton supercruiser less than thirty light minutes to port. As soon as it saw the courier it started to accelerate toward it, detectable by the graviton emissions of its grabbers.

  “Let’s get this thing going,” said Fujardo, getting up from his command chair. The Sensor Tech sent the signal through to command, and twenty small missiles popped out of the wormhole and started to accelerate toward the supercruiser, hopefully catching its attention. After it released the last missile part of the hull reconfigured itself into a probe, releasing from the ship and carrying that wormhole into space, where its small size and stealth capabilities made it invisible to detection.

  The crew headed for the second wormhole, this one in a compartment near the outer hull of the ship. The Lieutenant watched as his crew disappeared through the rabbit hole one by one. He jacked into the ship and made sure that all was set to proceed as planned, then walked through the wormhole himself, appearing in a chamber of the Donut.

  “Welcome aboard, Lt. Commander Fujardo,” said the Vice Admiral in charge of the project. Fujardo shook the man’s hand as he realized what had been said. Everyone aboard his command was to receive a promotion and a bonus for this mission. We made it, he thought, looking at his smiling crew within the room. Next he looked up at the viewer that was showing the take from the wormhole probe that would stay in space to monitor the system for Naval Intelligence.

  In Fayal space the hull of the ship opened, and a small circle, the reduced frame and miniaturized wormhole, floated into space. As soon as it aligned itself a powerful laser came from the hole, turning it into a miniature rocket. The laser would only be detected if something happened to fly through it. Otherwise, the Ca’cadsans would never know it was there.

  Fujardo was there to watch the landing a week later, when the wormhole came through the atmosphere of the habitable planet and made landfall, then expanded itself to a personnel gate. He was there when the Naval Engineers came out of the hole, set it up in a secure location, and then expanded it to a cargo gate. And two weeks later he watched as ten missiles streaked into the sky and hit the enemy space station, blasting it out of orbit.

  *

  CAPITULUM, JEWEL, NOVEMBER 22ND, 1000.

  Sean watched the vid of the assassination attempt once again. It had been weeks since the event, and the news was still buzzing with it. Fourteen new members of Commons and ninety-one Lords had been seated since then, replacements for the permanently killed and those who did not want to serve after the trauma of the event. At least they didn’t get to the cabinet, or the military advisors, he thought. Or the Prime Minister.

  In fact, the Prime Minister, Countess Haruko Kawasaki, had become his Churchill after the attempt. She had thrown herself fully into her job, determined to give Sean and the military what he needed to prosecute his war. Not that the war was going any better, and help was not at hand. Both the Klashak Concordium and the Margrave Hegemony, strong allies of the Empire, were still involved in countering the Lasharan Autocracy. There were promises that ships would be available, soon, but the Emperor was not willing to count those birds before they were running in his yard. And the Fenri Empire was also demonstrating on his borders, stretching his military beyond their limits.

  And still no word from Elysium, he thought. He had expected thirty thousand advanced warships from that ally. He hadn’t expected a civil war to erupt just when he needed that force the most.

  On the vid the Secret Service Agent pointed the particle beam at him, then started to crumple as the Marine sonics began to hit. The beam went wide, and Sean still flinched as he saw how close that miss was. Five inches closer and his brain would have been vaporized as his skull exploded. The agent hit the ground, and the view panned to Countess Decker as she tried to fight her way out of the crowd. She shook as Sean hit her with the sonic he had strapped to his arm, then exploded before she lost consciousness.

  She detonated herself when she realized she wasn’t going to make it to the stage, he thought. When she realized they weren’t going to take out myself, my cabinet, and the heads of the military. So she did the next best thing, and took out as many members of the Lords as she could.

  He had looked over the reports from the Imperial Intelligence. The agent they had captured had carried a molecular explosive, as powerful as the one Decker had deployed. And she wasn’t human, which led to speculation that Decker wasn’t either. And then had come the talk of the legendary shape shifters of the ancient Elysium Empire, who might still exist in the modern Empire that only retained the name.

  He switched the vid to a view of the interrogation chamber where the prisoner was being questioned. It looked like Agent Chakra Sondrata, at least on the surface. But that appearance was only skin deep. Below the couple of centimeters of human cells that were an exact match for the Agent’s, there were alien cells like nothing ever seen, until the killing of the agent who had attempted the destruction of the Donut. And she, it? Is not talking. Nothing we can do to it will elicit any kind of response. Not pain, not drugs, not psychoprobes. Nothing. The perfect spy, able to duplicate anyone, and totally loyal, unable to be questioned with any kind of a hope for getting information.

  After the incident all members of the Secret Service, the Marine guards, and any functionaries who might have access to the Emperor had been checked by biopsy. That had raised hell as well, as members of Parliament had protested the violation of their persons. Sean had been tested as well, and had made the results of those tests public.

  How many others of these things are there out there? thought Sean, watching the creature stare straight ahead and ignore its questioners. Sean had volunteered to interrogate the creature himself, thinking that he, being its target, might elicit some kind of reaction that would prove useful. The heads of all security and intelligence services had threatened resignation over that plan. No one wanted to risk the Monarch within reach of a creature with still unknown capabilities. And the answer to how many others were out there might not ever be known. But even the possibility of their existence was causing problems for security and intelligence.

  Sean jumped a bit as a soft form landed in his lap, then smiled as he looked down at the orange tabby that was sitting on him and purring. He laughed as he stroked its soft fur. “You want some attention, Jonah,” he said to the cat, one of many who roamed the interior of the palace, and his personal favorite. Something else they had brought with them from Earth, they had improved the felines like most other domesticated and some wild beasts. The animals were twice as smart as their ancestors, and had four times the life spans. Jonah had been his cat when he was a child, a kitten given to the young prince. And he would still be alive a decade from now.

  “You have a call from the CNO, your Majesty,” came a voice over the com.

  “Put her on,” said Sean, grabbing the cat before he could jump from the Imperial lap. “No you don’t,” he said, holding the cat with one hand while stroking it with the other.

  “Excuse me, your Majesty,” said Grand High Admiral Sondra McCullom, her face looking out of the holo.

  “Sorry, Admiral,” said Sean with a laugh. “The true ruler of the Palace is demanding my attention.”

  “So I see,” said the smiling Admiral. Her face immediately turned serious. “I’m afraid I have bad news from Sector IV.”

  Sean nodded. That was the hotspot, and there had not been much good news from there since the young Commander, now Captain, had brought back the captured Ca’cadasan scout. “So, what’s the ne
ws?”

  “Admiral Lenkowski has lost half his fleet,” blurted out the CNO, a hint of tears in her eyes.

  “How the hell did that happen?”

  “The enemy pulled a fast one on us, your Majesty,” said the CNO after a calming breath. “They used their speed to get a force around our flanks, and while we were ambushing small groups of their ships, they snuck in an ambush on us.”

  “What about Admiral Lenkowski?” asked Sean, fearing the worst.

  “He made it out,” said the CNO, a tight smile on her face. “He fought his fleet brilliantly once it became apparent the Cacas had an overwhelming force. Even more brilliant due to the fact that most of his force was VI.”

  “So what do you have heading his way?” asked the Emperor, knowing that they wouldn’t be able to replace half of the Battle Fleet overnight.

  “Admiral Mgonda is will be there in another day,” said the CNO, her expression now calm. “All his ships are VIIs. And the ships we’re transferring from Sectors I through XII will be trickling in. What we really need are more ships from Home Fleet, but Parliament will raise hell if we do that.”

  “Take what you need to stabilize the sector. I’ll deal with Parliament. Now, do you have any good news?”

  “That I do, your Majesty. Operation Trojan Horse has succeeded better than expected. Ninety-one percent of the couriers have made it through and seeded their wormholes. We’ve not only started to gather much more intelligence on the enemy, but have initiated guerilla campaigns on over a hundred planets, and have actually hurt some of their space based assets. But I’m also worried a bit about this success.”

  “How so?”

  “They’ve got to figure out that we’ve got some tech that they don’t, unless they’re complete idiots. And what happens if they duplicate our wormhole tech.”

  “The Director of the Donut doesn’t think that will happen,” said Sean, stroking the cat and hoping that was true. “Something to do with the power generating capabilities to make one, and the length of time it takes to build a station.”