Waking the Sleeping Giant: The First Terran Interstellar War 2 (Founding of the Federation Book 5)

by Chris Hechtl

  Chapter 42

  Even before the bombers had turned around, both sides were performing a hot wash of the initial exchange. Each side did its best to note the changes in the other's doctrine and hardware. Both sides realized that they each had come up with slightly better missiles as well as better warheads. The Taurens ECM and decoys were crude in comparison to the Terrans, but since they were tethered, they had far more power.

  It remained to be seen who would come out on top in the next exchange.

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  The Alpha bull ordered a course change when he noted the carrier force had picked up speed and closed the distance while he had been distracted with the initial exchange. He was not happy with himself that he'd missed it. He'd been so intent on the initial exchange he'd not even heard the report.

  The course change momentarily lengthened the distance between the battle lines forcing a brief lull in the battle. He took advantage of it to recall the strike bombers for resupply while his techs did what they could to learn and adapt from the last exchange.

  The good news was that they had the data from the bomber herd leader's craft to help them improve things greatly. He glanced over to the weapons department. Something seemed to be going on there however, from the sounds; it didn't sound good.

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  Jan shook her head as she scanned the report. She had instantly realized the Tauren bombers had proven the point of carriers all over again. They had done so much damage out of proportion to their losses. Now her people had to do it right back she vowed.

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  The cyberworms inserted into the bomber's data stream hit their zero mark on their countdown timers and then began to unpack themselves. In microseconds they had been transferred from the communications system to the tactical departments of the great defenders. They mapped the system and then began to strike at the Tauren computers.

  Doctrine had evolved after the herd had learned of cyber threats. The tactical computers running the data were the backup systems and had been air gaped after receiving the data. When the worms went live, they suddenly bogged the system down with viruses.

  “Viruses in the tactical computers!” the coder assigned to watch over the data banks said without even testing the system.

  The ship's Beta bull looked up in alarm but the coder followed protocol. Before he could get the bull to stop, the coder had pushed the purge button and had shut the system down. As the computers shut down, the viruses continued to inflict damage to the software and hardware.

  “It will take time to process the system and reboot it one piece at a time,” the coder warned. “It was a near thing; it was trying to get into the other ship's systems,” he said as the Beta bull stalked over to him fuming over the loss.

  The ship's Alpha bull heard the tail end of the report and winced as he turned to the herd leader. “And again, Dreamer's innovations in the form of compartmentalized systems saved the day,” the herd leader observed.

  “Yes, but it has thrown us off. We've lost all that data. Where did it come from?” the ship's Alpha asked, pitching his voice to the coder and Beta bull at the far end of the compartment.

  “The bomber leader's data stream. We were running our own data files in the primary systems. If they had timed it differently, we would have begun to have merged the two data sets into one, and they could have taken our entire tactical department down,” the coder replied loud enough for everyone on the bridge to hear.

  The Alpha bull winced.

  “Order the bombers to purge their systems and go to backups. “Communications do the same. Make sure everything is cleaned thoroughly,” the ship's Alpha bull ordered.

  “Yes, Herd Leader,” the communications bull replied as he turned to follow out the order.

  “We can't try that again,” the Alpha bull said quietly as he leaned over to the ship's Alpha bull. “We'll need to send the command bomber with the defensive line next time,” he said.

  “Yes, Herd Leader,” the ship's Alpha bull replied, making a note of the order change.

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  Admiral Rutledge noted the tonnage imbalance and didn't like coming in second best. He didn't like it one least little bit, and he made certain everyone around him knew it too as he turned the air blue for several minutes venting. Finally, he settled down and glared about him. “Pick up the pieces, people, come on!” He clapped his hands meaningfully to get them moving faster. He turned to his TO. “What did we learn? You've got a couple minutes to get it sorted out before we fire again or they do. Make it quick.”

  “We're still processing the data on the missiles now. All of them had shaped charges, I can tell you that much,” Commander Fowler replied.

  “What else?”

  “They have better ECM and penetration aides and are concentrating on the screen, which is contrary to their old doctrine. So, they are evolving,” the chief of staff observed as the TO turned away to check something.

  “Work on that. What about our hits?”

  “We got some good penetration. Some solid hits on one cruiser, it's a confirmed kill. The other took light damage. Only minor damage to the BB and to several other ships.”

  “Not good enough. Come on people! We need to do better than this!” the admiral growled.

  The TO frowned as he finished what he was reading and turned back to his superior officer. “Admiral, an analysis of the bomber strike revealed something of interest. Only seven of the bombers fired. The last one was what appeared to be a command and control craft on the same vein as an AWAC,” Commander Fowler reported, looking up from where he was standing to the admiral.

  Admiral Rutledge grunted.

  “I noted it as well. It was recording everything we were transmitting and presumably sending a live feed back to the enemy fleet. I sent a series of worms to the ship,” the ship's A.I. stated.

  “And?” the admiral asked, already knowing the answer.

  “Ineffective at the moment. They may have detected them and purged them. If they did so, they would have had to have purged their entire database.”

  “So, they got away but didn't get anything out of it. Good to know,” the admiral rumbled. “Pass on your observations to Lexington. Perhaps they can do something more,” he said.

  “Aye aye, sir,” the A.I. and human commander replied in unison.

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  Admiral Oh moved ships in to fill the gap in the defenses and rotated the damaged cruiser out so her crew could initiate what repairs they could. It thinned his coverage however, but he had no choice. “Any ideas on how to have the same net with fewer ships? I had intended to spread out more to get more firing angles, but I think we need the data network and coordination we've got.”

  “No, sir. If we get too close, we'll be stepping on each other's toes and that's not good either,” his TO replied.

  The rear admiral grimaced but then nodded.

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  Roger Daringer checked the ship's systems on his rounds and then nodded as he looked up to the skipper. “Everything good?” the captain asked.

  “Aye Aye, ma’am. We're golden. I'm not sure what we can do about that missile storm though,” he admitted. She frowned. She didn't like his admitting that in public, but at least he was being honest. “The only thing I can think of is to fire our rail guns into the spread? Turn their own tactic against them?”

  “Run a sim with Guns, it looks like we've got the time. Make sure it doesn't run afoul of our point defense or counter missiles however,” the captain ordered.

  “On it,” the TO replied with a nod.

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  “Here we go,” Adrienne murmured as Prifly gave the green light. Terran fighters and bombers began to launch from the carriers in a steady stream. They formed up as they cleared their mother ships and settled in to the long ride to the enemy vessels.

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  The Alpha bull got the report of the long-range launch just after he got the report that the viruses had be
en purged and the computer systems were coming back online. He ordered an immediate course change to put some additional distance between the incoming enemy craft and his ships to draw out their fuel supplies.

  “We've got damaged hardware here. We're looking for replacements now. I suggest we pull the hardware and test it in a workbench that is air gaped before trying it again, or better yet, scrap it,” the Beta bull said with a shake of his head. “The problem is we only have so many computer banks and only so many spares.”

  “Work on it. Don't throw anything out; we might need it later. But see if you can get someone to test them as you mentioned,” the ship's Alpha bull replied as he turned to the herd leader. “When do we launch our own craft?”

  “We're going to wait until they are at the halfway point then launch. I'd like to take them on as far away as possible, but I don't want the enemy to see how many we've got just yet.”

  “Understood. Will we be launching bombers as well?”

  “Just the defensive craft at that time. The reserve,” the Alpha bull replied as the Beta bull walked off to issue orders to the engineers who had just came into the compartment. “How bad is the damage?”

  “We've had worse obviously. This is something I'd rather not see however; our own hardware turned against us. We need to find a better way to detect and counter it. And, we need to come up with better attack versions of our own,” the ship's Alpha bull replied.

  “Put it on the list,” the Alpha bull replied as he turned away.

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  Admiral Rutledge realized the course change would drive them together faster. He thought he was ready for it, but Commander Fowler reminded him of the enemy's main guns. “Sir, if we let them get into range of those things they'll tear us to shreds.”

  “Damn it …,” the admiral muttered. He paused to think the problem over carefully. After a minute he realized he was taking time away from any maneuvers he could perform. He decided to err on the side of caution since the enemy had him outnumbered. He cleared his throat and turned to the staff navigator. “Nav, adjust our course and speed. We need to keep the range open to missile combat only,” he said reluctantly.

  “Aye aye, sir,” Kimberly replied as she made a note in the log and then pulled up her running plot to adjust their course and speed.

  “We are under cyber-attack. It is crude, fire and forget viruses,” the ship's A.I. reported.

  The admiral scowled and turned to the A.I. and then away. “Deal with it.”

  “Already doing so. Protocol required I report it,” the A.I. replied, sounding distant.

  “If they are launching cyber-attacks of their own, that means ours were detected and dealt with,” Commander Fowler said quietly.

  “Probably,” the A.I. said, still sounding distant. The commander looked from his holographic avatar to the admiral.

  “Probably,” the admiral echoed. “This battle is being fought on multiple planes, some we can't even see. I'm not sure I like that,” he said with a grimace.

  “Yes, sir. I'm wondering how much damage we did,” Commander Fowler said.

  “No way of knowing unless we see it physically,” the A.I. replied.

  “Ah,” the commander replied as a rating in his department held up a tablet to get his attention. He turned away to attend to it.

  (@)()(@)

  Just before he launched the defensive fighters and bombers, the Alpha bull ordered four more cruisers to fire on the battle line escorts before they got out of range. The weapons bulls spread the fire; two hundred missiles were fired again, but on five targets not four.

  Once the missiles were clear and had settled onto their tracks, the herd leader ordered the carriers to begin launching craft against the incoming Terran strike as well as recover the incoming bombers. He realized with a pang that he needed a dedicated herd leader for small craft.

  “All defenders facing the incoming enemy small craft are to switch to counter small craft defensive plan Beta,” the Alpha bull ordered. “Prepare canister shot,” he ordered.

  The ship's Beta bull looked up at him sharply and then turned to the weapons section.

  “Canister shot? Against the small craft?” the ship's Alpha bull asked.

  “They'll think we're firing on their mother ships,” the Alpha bull rumbled. The ship's Alpha bull nodded slowly.

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  Commander Hatfield saw the report of the launch from the AWAC’s craft running ahead of the wings of bombers and fighters. She wondered where they had come from until she realized that the cargo ships were converted carriers. She passed on her observation back to Lexington and then began to issue orders to her people to prepare for a furball.

  “I want fighters to hit them from long range and keep them off the bombers. Two squadrons are to remain with the bombers escorting them all the way in. One squadron is going after the enemy bombers, I want as many bagged or driven off as possible so they can't get in the way. The rest of us are going to mix it up and thin out as many enemy fighters as we can,” she said. “CAGs, squadron commanders, divvy it up among yourselves and get back to me,” she said.

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  The two hundred Tauren missiles finished their maneuvers and then settled into their final courses to the Terran ships. Two were off course but only slightly, not enough for their computers to shut them down.

  There were no bombers en route for an additional distraction at that time. The Terrans also knew some of what to expect this time around.

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  Sixteen missiles had been fired in the direction of the enemy carrier force. As the missiles’ sensors picked up the telltale emissions of the Terran bombers and fighters, they adjusted course slightly and spread out to optimal attack range.

  The lead pilots saw the missiles on their scopes and decided to take some pot shots at them with their lasers. Every missile they bagged was one less their mother ships had to contend with. “I wonder why they sent so few?” a pilot asked over the link.

  “It's a test,” a squadron commander replied. “A long-range strike to make the carriers maneuver and to see what they've got,” she said just as the tiny computers in the missiles noted that they were crossing into their optimal firing basket. She had a moment to yelp in surprise and then the net broke out into cheers and consternation as the missiles seemed to explode as one.

  Commander Hatfield saw the missiles as they exploded, spewing space in their path with a wall of mass. She snarled as she realized what they were. “Rail rounds! Evade!” the CAG barked as she yanked back hard on the stick and did her best to evade.

  Each missile was loaded with tightly packed buckshot of rocks with an explosive charge and a force field backing them. The explosive and shield directed the unguided buckshot in one direction to the enemy in a spreading cloud of debris and death.

  For the pilots, one moment all was well and the next thing they knew all hell was breaking loose. Over two dozen fighters and bombers were chewed apart by the carnage before they could evade.

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  “Ma'am, the wings have just broken up. We've lost IFF on some of them,” Ensign Lex reported. Jan looked up from the report she had been reading with a frown.

  “Did they say what's going on?”

  “We're trying to figure that out, but the sensor readings are out of phase. I'm basing the observations off of our FTL sensors; the running communications link hasn't caught up,” he warned.

  “Find out what went wrong,” she ordered.

  “They were going after the missiles fired at us. Could that have something to do with it?” her tactical officer asked.

  Jan frowned thoughtfully. “I don't know. We better find out and they better get their act together, fast,” she said as the ticking blood red icons of the enemy fighters inched towards the mass of chaos that had once been orderly squadrons.

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  Since Adrienne had been one of the first to evade, it was her luck that she'd survived the carnage. She came abou
t, trying to get sense of the rest of the wing as well as the battle space. “Artoo, warn the flag about that shitstorm headed their way,” she ordered.

  Her A.I. beeped in acknowledgment.

  She grimaced as she saw the breakage. The buckshot had chewed up three dozen of the Terran bombers as well as eleven of her precious fighters. They were done, colanders at best. When that sort of mass, traveling at those speeds, hit craft going in the opposite direction at their own speeds, she was surprised there was anything left for her computers to see and recognize as wreckage.

  It had also thrown the survivors off and apart just as the Tauren fighters got into extreme weapons range. It quickly became a slugging match as the off-balanced Terrans tried to regain their cohesion and take on the enemy craft. She did her best to issue orders to save what she could before the chaos of the furball and trying to stay alive overtook her momentarily.

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  Jan read the report of the buckshot and grimaced at the idea and the casualties. It was a neat trick; one she wished her own people had thought of. It dovetailed neatly with the Tauren’s fascination with rain guns and flying metal, a simple warhead of metal combined with what all reports indicated was a shaped charge to direct it to them. “Pass on a warning to all ships to watch out for that,” she said in an aside to her communication's department.”

  “Aye aye, ma’am.”

  (@)()(@)

  The Alpha bull realized he'd erred in caution by firing on just five targets with only a small portion of his missiles. The enemy had obviously learned a lot from their last test engagement, so much that only one of their small escort craft was overwhelmed and destroyed. Two others took damage as did one of their cruisers, but one destroyer remained surprisingly unscathed.

  “We'll do better,” the ship's Alpha bull replied.