Communications announced, “Sir, the enemy is now five minutes from reaching our gravity drive missile.” John nodded, “Have the cruisers begin launching as soon as the enemy fighters are in range. They are to fire all available missiles, and as soon as the enemy comes within range of our heavy missiles, they are to resume. Are all fighters on station?”
He put down the cup and stood, rather abruptly. He wasn’t the admiral.
The cruisers began launching streams of the gravity drive heavy missiles. Three minutes later they ceased firing while crews hurriedly maneuvered huge missiles into launch tubes.
The rebel fighters continued to sweep toward John’s force, presumably indicating they were armed only with light missiles.
He watched the plot as the cruiser missiles accelerated outward toward the fighters. By the time the enemy reached light missile range of John’s fighters, the rebels had already expended half of their own missiles in defense. They didn’t launch their remaining missiles at the federal fighters, and John promptly ordered three hundred fighters to begin accelerating back toward the carriers – the enemy’s targets. He also warned James, who was maneuvering all his fighters from their position outside of the carriers. James announced, “The target of the rebel fighters will be our carriers. I’m moving our rear guard forward to put ourselves between the rebels and our carriers.”
John’s remaining fighters launched twelve missiles each, waited one minute, then launched three missiles.
The combined velocity of the incoming fighters and outgoing missiles equaled or even exceeded the missiles’ targeting ability. The heavy missiles had only managed to kill seventy-three fighters, and as he watched, his light missiles attempted to intersect the maneuvering fighters. Despite having a six-to-one advantage in missiles versus fighters, slightly over six hundred and fifty rebels survived. John’s fighters launched their remaining missiles at a distance of forty thousand kilometers. Two thousand more missiles streaked out. With less time to maneuver, and better targeting data, the rebels fared a little more poorly this time. Ugly blossoms erupted as missiles intercepted their targets, killing another two hundred seventy nine crews.
Over a period of less than one minute, energy weapon fire lanced in both directions as the remaining three hundred and seventy six rebels flashed into the ranks of the federal fighters. Sixty-two federal fighters were hit, along with ninety-one rebels, and then the enemy flashed into the open, pursued by more laser fire. By the time the rebels swept out of energy weapon range of the federals, another seventeen had been hit.
James fighters were in position in front of their sixteen carriers and the cruisers, which now began launching scores of light missiles.
The remaining rebel fighters finally launched their remaining missiles. The rear guard, plus James fighters launched, and over three thousand missiles erupted into the rapidly closing space separating the two forces.
Forty-one rebel missiles somehow survived and were immediately targeted by energy weapons. Seventeen missiles struck seven carriers, causing two to lose their drive, and causing slight to moderate damage to the other five. Later, John would wonder at the desperation that would send hundreds of trained crews to their deaths, in exchange for a small amount of damage to his carriers.
Even before the rebel missiles struck home, John ordered the cruisers to accelerate along the path of the soon-to-be retreating rebel fighters. The rebel survivors were probably already running on fumes, signifying that unless the enemy had intended this as a suicide mission, their carriers were going to have to jump into the system, perilously close to the planet. John wanted to try to intercept them.
In reality, it had been a suicide mission, one that also took the lives of many of his own people.
Meanwhile, his two squads had made contact with what was being called the provisional government. His men were severely outnumbered, yet a stream of government officials, both elected and appointed, civilians, engineers, technicians and scientists were being brought in to the hospital, one of the few places John had considered both large enough for his purposes, and safe from attack.
By now there remained only seven weapons installations in the hands of the rebels. Three of them had missile launchers, posing a danger to virtually everyone save possibly his own fighters. John hesitated to destroy them with a missile attack, since the rebels would have enough warning to launch their own missiles, possibly at the hospital. One of his pilots suggested that they slowly move multiple fighters as closely as possible to the three, and synchronize an attack with their energy weapons. John agreed, and allowed his CAG’s to organize it. It took nearly two additional hours to move fighters into range. On command, all thirteen fighters ascended to altitude and fired. Two sites were able to launch, but the missiles were destroyed almost immediately. His fighters promptly launched their own missiles at the sites, and followed up by hovering over the rubble to visually inspect it.
The remaining energy sites were promptly attacked with more missiles.
After a war that had lasted more than four years, Orleans was once again in the hands of the federal government. John thought about the deaths of more than one thousand people, some of them civilians, and wondered if the cost in human lives and treasure could possibly be worth it.
He sent three hundred fighters after the cruisers, which reported the appearance of ten carriers approximately ten million kilometers beyond their current position. John called them back. The few rebel fighters that had survived their mission were not going to get caught.
Chapter 31
Over the next two weeks, the provisional government gradually took over the reins of government while overhead John’s crews worked around the clock to get the damaged carriers operational.
John raided the university for the people and equipment to gather whatever evidence they could at the site of the nuclear detonation. Ominously, one of the first things learned was that the nuclear material did not come from Orleans. The weapon itself had been manufactured off planet, and modified to fit in a missile with a terrain-following function. It took John no time at all to begin to understand the game changing implications of the marriage of nuclear weapons and missiles.
He promptly convened a meeting with all his ship captains and flight commanders. They came to the conclusion that virtually every first generation carrier and missile ship had just been obsoleted. Even the new build carriers would be put out of commission and/or heavily damaged by a nuclear detonation within approximately twenty kilometers.
Two hundred and ninety four of the people on John’s list were now in custody. He’d obtained the information by tapping into the planet’s public communications network. A fairly large number had been able to demonstrate their innocence, but most of those in custody were clearly guilty, although that would be for a trial to determine.
The admiral finally got around to Orleans. In person. He arrived with an escort of two carriers and four missile boats, first generation in all cases.
He ordered John and his ship captains and CAG’s to his ship.
He strode briskly into the cavernous flight deck as soon as it aired up. Not surprisingly, only one aide accompanied him, and he was struggling to keep up. The admiral was notoriously difficult to be around, looked as if he’d lost a little weight, and went through aides as fast as possible. This one was already a little frayed, and not nearly as attractive as the last one.
After the salutes were taken care of, the admiral walked down the line of men and women, greeting each one and vigorously shaking hands.
Finished with the niceties, he turned and began walking away. Over his shoulder he ordered, “Come.” John almost smiled.
It took five minutes to arrive at a mess hall, filled with what must have been all the flight crews not out on station.
The admiral offered up a precise salute in answer to the senior officer present, who had, along with the several hundred other officers and enlisted in the room, jumped vigorously to his or her feet. The adm
iral pointed at an empty row of chairs and continued up to the front of the space. John and his men sat.
Admiral Grigorivich got right to the point, “We’ve been at war a long time. We’ve lost far too much of our most priceless possessions, the lives of the men, women and children who have been killed. Tonight, we shall honor some of those who are helping to bring this unspeakably ugly war to an end – the officers and enlisteds of Second Fleet.”
Almost abruptly, he walked up to stand in front of John and his officers. John froze for a fraction of a second, and then stood, followed by the rest of his people, followed by the entire complement. The admiral held out his hand, into which his aide placed a scrap of paper.
Admiral Grigorivich said, “Medals won’t bring back the dead, they won’t put right the injustices that have been perpetrated on humanity. Even if they could, I can’t issue a medal to every one of you, but this I can do. I am pleased to announce that I am issuing a unit citation to Second Fleet. I cannot personally speak to everyone, but I do want to ensure that you people speak, on my behalf, to all your people. I want them to know how deeply I appreciate your sacrifices, and possibly even more importantly, how much I appreciate your successes, plural. In particular, the manner in which you have taken control of this system was highly creative, aggressive, and yet very careful. I am also impressed by the report you prepared on the nuclear weapon. After reading it, I forwarded it to military headquarters. I included my own recommendations, none of which are particularly germane at this moment, although your report makes it obvious what needs to be done, both tactically and strategically.”
The admiral concluded by saying, “Finally, within just a few weeks, a relief squadron will assume responsibility for Orleans. As soon as you have been relieved, I want you to join First Fleet. Based on your analysis of the nuclear material used in the missile, I believe that the warhead was developed in the Fujian system, and it is imperative that we bottle it up before any more missiles can be manufactured, or worse, delivered to their fleet. So, that concludes my official remarks. I have a little time before I boost out of orbit, and it is my hope that I can spend it with you.”
Food was brought in, and after the least senior officer stood and made a fool of herself, they dug into a typically mediocre meal. The admiral left before the dessert was served.
It was over three weeks before their relief showed up. In the interim, the new civilian government continued to assume control of the planet. When he was certain that Orleans was stable, he revealed that while he had destroyed the satellites, he’d faked the destruction of the orbital facilities. He promised, in writing, that the communications and weather satellites would be replaced by the federal government. His announcement produced a great deal of relief – it meant that the planet would have a chance to continue to develop rather than become dependent on the hated federals. Unfortunately, and not surprisingly, it did not cause a sea change in attitudes.
John’s small fleet finally accelerated out of orbit. When it was far enough away from the various gravity wells, it began a series of jumps that took it to Fujian.
Upon arrival, six shiny new destroyers were transferred to John’s fleet. Almost shockingly, they were nearly totally defect-free. The federation seemed to have come to terms with corruption, at least to the extent that it was beginning to provide spacecraft that actually worked as advertised.
The federal fleet had scouts in the Fujian system, which was crawling with a very large number of fighters, possibly even more than the two combined fleets. There were an unknown number of capital ships, although it was believed that the system had been able to develop and field at least one new-build missile ship, cruiser or possibly a large destroyer, causing John to recall the four super destroyers he’d run into seemingly ages earlier. He promptly relayed all his sensor data from that encounter to First Fleet, failing to receive anything in return.
James remarked on that failure, “Captain, if you were an admiral, you’d have gotten a better response.” John nodded somberly, “Yes, commander, and if you were an admiral, the war would have ended years ago – and we’d be speaking rebel.” James snorted, but failed to reply.
John looked at his brother – they were alone in his cabin – and asked, “Anything you want to get off your chest?” James stood restlessly and said, “I’ve been married over six months, and I’ve actually been with my wife for approximately one week. This war just gets worse and worse. What happens if Fujian has a large stock of nuclear tipped heavy missiles? They could presumably launch them from fighters, and all it would take is one fighter, and one missile, to kill everyone on this ship.”
John looked up at his brother, “In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve gotten careful in my old age. I don’t want to lose one more crew, not one.” James replied, “It doesn’t matter what you want – if your ship gets hit by a nuclear missile, you’re dead.”
John sighed, “James, we’ve lost most of our class. You and I, and a few others, are all that remain. There are many nights I don’t sleep very well, and I dream about all the crews we’ve eaten supper with, who weren’t around for breakfast. I write my wife every day, in part because I’m afraid that one day I’ll not be able to.”
James asked, “Is that why you’ve become so private?” John nodded at his brother’s astute question, “I read about veterans of war who don’t want to learn the names of replacements. I used to think it was the historian’s creative misunderstanding. Now, I understand.”
John spent six hours with the admiral and his tactical team. The admiral started the meeting by saying, “We don’t have the luxury of time. Every moment that passes gives the rebels time to arm themselves with nuclear missiles. I’ve decided on a demonstration, with a second attack from a different quarter. This time, however, Captain Chamberlin will lead the feint while segments of our fleet attacks from the rear. John, your task is to pin the rebel forces in place. The moment the rebels begin to respond in force, I want you to give ground. You’ve got a decent supply of gravity drive missiles, enough this time for a short engagement. Use them as you see fit, but your main purpose is to try to pull the rebels away from the planet so that First Fleet can take out their orbitals and support ships. Just so you understand, I do not intend to leave Fujian with one single hull, not one. This planet gets occupied.”
John acknowledged the instructions, and after some additional points, the admiral asked John if he had any questions. John turned to Captain Ahmadiyeh, who he had been with since the second year of the war. The captain asked about emergency protocols for jumping out. With the advent of nuclear weapons, his question had become highly relevant. The admiral said, “Captain, what’s the condition of your engines? Of the other ships? I suggest, and this is only a suggestion, that you speak to the other captains. If you have one or more ships whose drives are suspect, then place them accordingly. This is your decision to make, not mine, but that is what I would do.” The captain nodded, but held his counsel.
For the next three days the relatively huge fleet practiced ship handling while the fighters honed their skills at getting out of the launch bays in the minimal amount of time, and learning how to fly in huge formations. Most of them suspected that this fight would be bloody. Fujian was not the most powerful or advanced of the remaining rebel worlds, but it was close and its people would know they were next.
The admiral spoke to John one last time before the combined fleets began their attack against Fujian. He said, “Captain, I’ve received word that Fujian knows that Orleans did not surrender, and intends to follow suit. I don’t think the planet knows the final outcome, but this is not going to be a walkover. I do not want your forces to get mauled, not now. Just pull the rebels away from the planet and let us do the heavy lifting.”
John acknowledged the order, one he hoped he would be able to obey.
Chapter 32
First Fleet jumped outside of the northern hemisphere, roughly twenty astronomical units out from the sun, and began its
leisurely acceleration inward. John’s Second Fleet – there were only four federal fleets, one of them was permanently assigned to earth, one handled logistics, and the third was John’s – jumped to a position along the planetary axis and moved inward. They were to accelerate for twenty hours before shutting down their drives. The rebels were not going to get surprised, but the closer the federals could get before they had to begin shooting, the better.
First Fleet was discovered in the outer system. Since the federals had frequently used a two-pronged attack, the rebels had to assume the ships they spotted were not the only ones, and increased their already extremely aggressive patrolling.
The admiral sent an encrypted message to John, telling him of the discovery, and that if he had an opportunity to take out the orbitals around Fujian, he should make the attempt. It took six hours for the message to reach him. It took him a moment to realize just how great a compliment he’d been given – the admiral trusted him to think on his feet.
Fujian was the fourth planet in a system that contained thirteen. It’s sun was significantly larger than Sol, and Fujian was further out, with a solar year that lasted slightly more than fifteen earth months. It also enjoyed greater extremes of weather than any other human occupied planet. Under the current federal guidelines it would have been passed over, a fact the ‘Jians’ were aware of.
Hawk Genesis: War (Flight of the Hawk) Page 30