“All right, people, the party’s come to us,” she said. “Let’s do this thing!”
Headsets filled with cheers and battle cries as space around her cockpit began popping with enemy flak.
“For what we are about to receive, may we be truly grateful,” cracked Little John.
The pre-battle rah-rah period was past. It was time to get down to the bloody business of the day, and today’s strategy wouldn’t be elegant. Even the enemy seemed to know that. No elaborate bull-horn maneuver to surround the IDF fighters this time—they were coming on as a ravenous horde intent on crushing the meager flying force opposing them.
“Bandits at twelve o’clock!” shouted Captain Obvious. “And eleven and ten and nine….”
Ballbreaker sloughed off her CAG role like an ill-fitting suit as the sky around her filled with Swarm fighters. Adrenaline shot through her veins as she redlined her throttle, and the first chicken of the day drove straight for her. It tried to break right before colliding, but Ballbreaker was ready and barrel-rolled in the same direction, tracking the fighter’s evasion with her fire. When she scorched it and flew through its fireball, she squealed over comms for five hundred IDF pilots to hear.
“I hope you’re hungry, people! There’s plenty for everyone!”
Bridge, ISS Intrepid
Kilgore watched as their fighter wings echeloned, one behind the other, into the enemy’s lines. It felt a bit to her like watching bugs splatter on a windshield. But since the IDF pilots weren’t turning to fight, many were getting through to the line of Swarm carriers behind the protective cloud of cumrat fighters. The Indy’s wing had already passed the storm of Swarm resistance and was threatening the first capital ship.
The enemy pilots were adapting to circumstance and circling back on the sixes of the birds that slipped past. That’s where the second and third waves from Invincible and Avenger came in. If they could disrupt the greater numbers of the enemy long enough, Avenger herself, followed by Intrepid’s massive firepower and the other starships, could divide the oncoming Swarm battle line. It was an old strategy: break a stronger enemy into weaker parts and defeat each one in turn, rather than face superior numbers as a cohesive force. It was also a long shot. But it was humanity’s only chance at victory here.
Who’re you kidding, Melinda? There’s no victory here, only death delayed.
The Swarm force was just too overwhelming.
But maybe with the Russians’ help, we’ll show them what the human race is made of, by God.
“Admiral, Spartan reports its task force ready to engage enemy fighters,” said her comms officer.
“Execute, Lieutenant.”
Behind her, she heard the order relayed to the destroyer’s captain. Spartan and her escorts had one task: plunge headlong into the cloud of Swarm fighters and provide close fire support to the fighter wings. Useless against the carriers, the destroyers’ shields would offer some protection against attack by the enemy fighters. Then the bigger ships, led by Avenger, would take on the line of carriers.
“Everything according to plan,” said Captain Vickers, his eyes, like hers, glued to the viewscreen. “And it’s a good plan, ma’am.”
“So far,” she replied. “So far.”
But it all hinged on the blocker following up the destroyers and charging through that weakened enemy line.
It all hinged on Avenger.
Bridge, ISS Avenger
“Flank speed, Mr. Harkness.”
“Flank speed, aye.”
Avenger aimed for the heart of the hornet’s nest, where Swarm fighters and IDF destroyers were packed so thick, no clear path through seemed obvious.
“Once we make it to the other side of that enemy line, what then?” asked Hathaway.
Avery didn’t answer at first, though she appreciated her XO’s optimism. Once we make it through….
“We kill them, Mr. Hathaway. We kill the bastards before they kill us.”
“Simple enough,” he acknowledged.
“Captain, we’re entering the Swarm lines. Implementing firing solution.”
The high-velocity scream of the ship’s mag-rail batteries drowned out the constant buzzing of the Swarm as Avenger spat thousands of rounds a minute at the enemy fighters. Explosions were constant around them as Swarm pilots met death.
“Mr. O’Brian, you transmitting to CENTCOM?”
“Confirmed, ma’am.”
She nodded. Whatever the outcome here, however long they lasted against the Swarm, at least the leadership back home would have a record of the battle to analyze, to use in planning future tactics against the enemy.
“Ma’am, encrypted transmission from Renegade. Our fighters made it behind enemy lines!”
Avenger shook as she came into range of the Swarm carriers. Sam could see them on-screen now, huge and coming on, refusing to break formation as the IDF force penetrated their battle line.
It’s almost like they’re too busy to stop and deal with us, she thought. Well, that’s just insulting.
In that moment, Sam knew Kilgore was right. The Swarm was here to destroy the Shipyards and exterminate the entire sector. Turning to fight would only delay that mission.
“Captain,” continued O’Brian as reports came in, “Spartan reports four destroyers gone. The carriers are targeting them, though they haven’t slowed their advance on Wellington. And we’ve lost a quarter of our fighters in the run up the middle.”
Avenger shuddered again. They were almost on top of the carriers.
“Reconfigure firing solution to target the carriers to port and starboard,” said Avery calmly. “It’s time for Operation Can Opener.”
“Aye, ma’am.”
They were passing between the nearest two carriers now, and there was the reassuring sound of Avenger’s rail guns again, spinning out slugs non-stop, broadsides against the enemy ships to port and starboard. The carriers answered in kind with their deadly, green energy beams, and it was only by the grace of her tungsten hull that Avenger survived those first moments of close action. Avery glanced at the ceiling, to offer a silent prayer or assess hull integrity as her starship groaned around her, she wasn’t sure which. The great bulk of the carriers disappeared from the viewscreen as Avenger slipped behind them and straight into a vicious storm of fighter combat behind.
“Get me Admiral Kilgore.”
Bridge, ISS Intrepid
“Very good, Captain Avery. We’re following up on your targets.”
“Orders, ma’am?” asked Avery, the screen fading to snow and snapping back.
“Give ’em, hell, Captain.”
Avery grinned. “Aye, ma’am. Avenger out.”
“Split screen,” Kilgore said. “Dual targets.” Each half of the viewscreen now showed the enemy carriers closing to either side of Intrepid. The battleship’s batteries spun up, the slugs widening to raging infernos the hot holes drilled by Avenger into the carriers’ sides. Minor explosions vomited bright green from within both vessels.
And still the Swarm wasn’t stopping, wasn’t turning to fight.
“Captain Vickers, we’re passing through their line,” reported Tactical. “Looks like the cumrat fighters are targeting Avenger’s engines on the other side.”
“Lieutenant, retarget forward batteries and clear the bugs off Avenger’s tail,” Vickers ordered. “Retarget aft batteries to provide cover for Invincible and Independence as they follow up on primary targets.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Comms, get me Admiral Volkov on meta-space, encrypted,” said Kilgore. “It’s time to have the Russian bear charge out of his cave.”
“Hailing, ma’am.”
A low rumble passed through Intrepid—enemy laser fire against the tungsten plates of the battleship’s hull. Unlike the Constitution-class ships with their solid tungsten hulls created from hollowed-out asteroids, Intrepid was only plated in tungsten to make her more maneuverable in space. It was an experiment in balancing speed with defense, mod
eled after the overlapping scales of the Swarm’s own hull design.
I guess we’ll know how well that works by the end of this, thought Kilgore.
“Ma’am, something strange….”
“Lieutenant?”
“The Russians … they’re not answering.”
“Jamming by the Swarm?”
“Um … no….”
The deck under her feet vibrated with enemy laser strikes aft. Was it her ship’s shaking or suspicion that sent tiny shivers up her spine?
“Tactical,” said Vickers, “scan the asteroid cluster near Athena.”
“Ma’am, Invincible and Independence have engaged the primary targets.”
“Understood.” All well and good and according to plan. But if the Russians didn’t do their part and flank the Swarm, the entire IDF force would be left behind enemy lines.
Cut off. Easily surrounded.
“Captain Vickers, I’m reading nothing but asteroids….”
Never trust a fucking Russian. Kilgore blinked once, slowly, and exhaled. Goddamn you, Volkov!
The Russians had bugged out.
They were on their own.
Chapter 28
Britannia Sector
Behind Enemy Lines
Bridge, ISS Invincible
“Target those explosions and fire!”
On Halsey’s command, laser batteries erupted to port and starboard as Invincible passed between the carriers assaulted first by Avenger, then by Intrepid. Fires already burning inside the enemy ships began to spread. Minor blazes became major firestorms. Even as the Swarm ships returned fire, a new set of lasers arced in, targeting the same points of attack. Independence cruised five hundred meters below her sister ship, doubling her fire power.
“Careful to stay with the Indy, Helm,” said Halsey. Each ship was the other’s insurance, moving and firing as one unit, a key tactic of Kilgore’s divide-and-conquer strategy. She’d even graciously named it the Halsey Maneuver because it had worked so well in the previous battle.
“Aye, Captain.”
“Captain, energy buildup in the port vessel,” said Zoe Proctor at sensors. “Destruction imminent.”
“Helm, flank speed. Signal Independence to increase speed to—”
To port, the Swarm carrier began disintegrating from the inside out, consumed by its own energy overload, before exploding in space. Invincible shook as the shock waves reached her, but she’d passed far enough beyond her target—the effect was minimal. Halsey’s bridge crew shouted in triumph as the green-and-orange fireball blossomed on the main screen. No sooner had their celebrations begun to wane than a second, much milder shock wave reverberated through Invincible’s deck plates.
“That’s number two!” shouted Proctor, and again the Bridge cheered.
Halsey allowed herself a momentary, broad smile and accepted Hathaway’s proffered handshake of congratulations.
“Zoe, is the Indy still with us?”
“Aye-aye, ma’am!”
“Nichols, hail Independence.
“Aye, Captain.”
Well, they’d made it through round one of a fight that, if they were lucky, would last longer than two rounds. They’d accomplished Kilgore’s first benchmark of taking out two carriers at once, blowing a hole in the Swarm’s line of attack. Now? Now it was fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants time. And doing that as a team in the middle of the present chaos would prove damned difficult, Halsey knew.
“Congratulations, Addison, nicely done!” Noah Preble’s face beamed through the hazy screen.
“How’s the Indy, Noah?”
“Minor damage, nothing to worry about. Let’s turn these buckets around for another pass. You call the play.”
“My thoughts exactly. Attack Plan Delta, starboard. Let’s see if we can get these bastards to slow their roll.”
“I’m on it. Independence out.”
Halsey took a breath, but before she could order the maneuver, Nichols interrupted.
“Incoming, Captain. Priority signal alpha to the fleet. It’s Intrepid.”
Priority signal alpha? An emergency transmission to the entire fleet? In the middle of a battle?
That seemed a bit redundant.
“Put her through, Lieutenant.”
Bridge, SS Renegade
“Those Russky sonsabitches,” breathed Mimi. “Never trusted ’em.”
Laz stared out Renegade’s window at the battle before them. One thing was sure—he didn’t need a sensor screen to track the Swarm ships now. Fighters from both sides circled and dived and died less than a million meters away. Avenger and Intrepid were turning hard to port while the Indy and Invincible banked sharply starboard. All were turning for another pass to exploit the break in the Swarm’s line of battle. But without the Russian task force—hell, even with the Russian task force, had it stayed—they seemed to be only delaying the inevitable.
The score and more of Swarm carriers were finally beginning to turn and deal with the persistent annoyance of the IDF’s attack. Well, Kilgore achieved her goal, he thought. Stop the advance on the Shipyards by breaking apart the seemingly impassable wall of enemy ships.
The dog had caught the car it had been chasing. Now what?
“Well, I guess that’s our cue,” said Mimi.
“Cue?”
“Time to get the hell out of here,” she said. “You heard Kilgore. Without the Russians, it’s a suicide mission. Britannia’s nothing but a sector full of future debris and dead worlds. It just doesn’t know it yet. She gave us leave to go—so let’s go!”
Topper stuck his head in. “She’s right, Skipper. We should head to Caliphate space. They aren’t even in the war, not yet. Maybe the aliens will leave them be. Nothing more we can do here.”
Laz was semi-focused on the laser show out there and less than half-listening to his old crew in here, but really he was thinking about Addie. The carriers had turned their full attention to dispensing quickly with the IDF ships before moving on to their primary targets in the system. The enemy fighters were making suicide runs at Independence, taking out her mag-rail batteries one impact at a time. And Addie wasn’t running.
Mimi wasn’t wrong, he realized. The math was set in concrete. It was only a matter of time.
He muttered something under his breath.
“Boss?” Little Dick had elbowed Topper aside.
“I said, I swore an oath. Again.”
Mimi sighed. “Laz, I get it. I really do.”
“No, I don’t think you do. When I left Renegade, I left piracy behind. I picked back up a standard I’d thrown in the dirt twenty years ago.”
“For her?” asked Mimi. Her words, like her tone, were chopped.
Laz didn’t answer at first. That was a good question. “Partly,” he said finally. “But mostly for me.”
“Skipper, I get that. I admire it, even,” said Topper. “But we’re pirates, not Fleet officers like you. Like her. We didn’t swear no oath. And suicide and I don’t get along.”
Laz plastered the old rogue’s smile across his face. “Might not be suicide. Might get lucky!”
His winking attitude was met with silence. They weren’t raw recruits raised on romantic tales of service and honor. They were used to their hearts hammering as they got away just in time with the plunder.
“I’m plotting a course—”
“Mimi, wait. A minute ago you said this place was a starship graveyard waiting to happen.”
“Yeah, so?”
“Well, there’s a lot of high-tech booty in a starship graveyard. Wouldn’t be the first time we dug up a body to pull a ring or two off fingers.”
Little Dick shuddered. “You’re a goddamned ghoul.”
“You think I was born yesterday?” demanded Mimi. “We bolt, we avoid the fireworks, we come back and plunder later.”
“And maybe miss the best stuff,” mused Gizmo, who’d crawled out from under his bearings. “Someone else could get it first. That alien shit would bring �
� well, a lot on the black market.”
“Fine,” said Mimi. “Then we sit here cloaked and wait out the storm. Then start digging.”
Laz took a breath. “Guys, say the Swarm exterminates the sector. Hell, let’s say the whole human race, because from where I’m sitting, that looks like a pretty good goddamned possibility. How long you think you’ll be living a pirate’s life of luxury?”
Topper grunted. “Didn’t think of that.” He shared a look with Little Dick. “No black market to sell to then, maybe.”
“Guys!” said Laz, exasperated. “Priorities!”
For a moment, the only sounds aboard Renegade were the constant pings of sensor returns and the static-filled drone of the Swarm underlying the combat reports streaming in.
“Dibs on salvage?” pressed Topper. “No IDF regulation military bullshit?”
“Done,” said Laz.
“Our claim is our claim,” groused Mimi.
“Done.”
“Fine, then,” said Little Dick. “As long as there’s a decent percentage, let’s save humanity.”
Bridge, ISS Independence
Independence rocked, the force of the Swarm beams resounding through her hull. Preble’s fingers ached with the effort of holding fast to the captain’s chair for so long. This was getting real old, real fast.
“They sure seem to like us, sir,” said the XO.
“It’s my new aftershave,” grumbled Preble with more bravado than he felt. The Swarm had turned away from the Shipyards, all right, just like the admiral wanted. And for some reason, they’d chosen the Indy to pound on first. “Mr. Hayden, target our starboard batteries at that oncoming carrier. Coordinate with Invincible to—”
“Sir, starboard batteries are down to twenty-five percent. The Swarm has been cumikazing emplacements again, and we were still below strength when all this started.”
Legacy Fleet: Avenger (Kindle Worlds) (The First Swarm War Book 2) Page 17