by D. J. Holmes
Looking away from the carnage, James wanted to request a damage report on the Karacknid fleet but he resisted the urge. Like the professionals they were, Drake’s bridge officers had their full attention on the incoming Karacknid missile salvo. Though Drake and the other ships in his fleet had point defenses far superior to the ones Human ships had just five years ago; sixteen hundred missiles were still a lot for his ships to deal with. As much as James wanted to do something to help, he knew he was just a passenger at this point. He could only watch the incoming missiles. There was nothing more he could do to prevent them from unleashing their deadly antimatter.
Squeezing his hands into fists, James refused the temptation to close his eyes and not look as the wave of death came closer and closer. Drake and her consorts threw everything they had at the missiles. Flak cannons, laser beams, plasma bolts, AM missiles and arc emitters all reached out to swat at the Karacknid missiles. Even so, many kept coming. Fisher called for Drake to be thrown into evasive maneuvers. Seconds later, every ship in his fleet was doing the same. Then the explosions began. Balls of expanding antimatter blocked Drake’s sensors from seeing what was going on around her.
When a massive tremor ran through Drake and James’ restraints tightened around his chest, he knew they had been hit. No follow-up alarms blared, however. Looking around him, James frowned. Fisher’s First Lieutenant solved his confusion. “That was a proximity hit Captain,” he called out. “The impact was quite a ways away and the gaseous shields absorbed almost all the antimatter that came our way. They have been depleted by ninety percent. But barely any anti-matter got through to the hull. No breaches are being reported.”
James let out a sigh of relief and then turned to his command staff. “Miyagi?”
“Eighteen ships are not reporting in Admiral. Though I can still see Cossack, Broadsword and Industrious. Their COMs must be down. Four other ships look like they have taken some serious damage, they’re falling out of formation. Including Catalyst,” Miyagi answered.
“Order them to get to safety,” James responded at once. He and Miyagi knew Catalyst’s Captain well. If it was humanly possible, she would get out and pull her ship along just to keep it in the battle. James didn’t want her to throw away her and her crew’s lives, however. If her ship was too damaged to fight, she needed to fall back.
“Firing second salvo now,” Anderson announced above the din of Drake’s bridge officers as they took stock of their ship. From the remaining Human warships, one thousand two hundred missiles were launched towards the Karacknid depot.
After watching them go, James turned back to his Chief of Staff. “The Karacknids?” he asked.
“Analysts are still going over the data,” Miyagi responded. “I’d say more than a third of their fleet is gone, including all but one of their dreadnoughts. We won’t know for sure how hard we have hurt them until they open fire again, but it looks like we have evened the odds despite our losses.”
“That’s what I want to hear,” James said as he forced himself to grin. “Let’s finish off their damaged ships and then we can start to take out their stations. Make sure Chen and his fighters get back as quickly possible. If they can refuel and rearm they’ll be able to devastate the depot.”
The sound of alarms tore James’ attention from his tactical officer. The Karacknids had opened fire again. Like most heads on the bridge, his turned to the main holo projection. His grin wasn’t forced this time. Less than a thousand missiles were coming his way. That was a number his ships could handle. He would still take losses, but unless luck was against him, they had broken the back of the Karacknid defenders. Eight minutes later his second salvo crashed into the Karacknid warships that were left and another eighteen were taken out. James’ confidence grew. Another salvo was on its way and within moments a fourth would be launched from his warships. They were now targeting the various supply stations that orbited the gas giant and the two gas mining stations the Karacknids had built.
As Drake’s third salvo was engaged by the Karacknid point defenses, James watched them twist and weave as they pumped out gigajoules of ECM. More missiles than in the previous salvos were taken out as they had to fly past the Karacknid warships. The handful that made it through detonated, firing their beams of energy into the guts of Karacknid stations. With far less armor, the stations disintegrated after just one or two strikes. Those that weren’t destroyed outright quickly lost structural integrity and broke apart. The gas giant’s gravity would do the rest. “Keep hitting them,” James ordered. “I want them hit again and again.” The missile salvo had destroyed seven stations. One of Drake’s tactical displays counted that over one hundred still remained. And both the mining stations were still intact. “I want those gas stations taken out. They’re priority number one,” James added.
James watched as they engaged the Karacknids’ next salvo. Only one missile got close enough to detonate near its target. Sadly, its target was a destroyer and a proximity hit blew through the destroyer’s gaseous shields and the antimatter wiped half of the ship out of existence. The rest continued to float through space as if nothing had happened as its momentum carried it away. “Send rescue shuttles after that destroyer immediately,” James snapped. There were bound to be some survivors left on board.
As more missile salvos were exchanged, James kept a running count of his losses and the Karacknids’. Here and there some of his missiles missed their targets and struck out at Karacknid warships. For the most part though, each salvo he fired took out a handful more orbital stations. His fleet was paying a cost, however. Even with their heavy losses, the Karacknid defenders were putting out enough missiles to penetrate his ships’ point defenses. Each salvo they fired destroyed or crippled two or three more of his ships. With every ship lost, his point defense fire fell. As much as James hated the mounting losses, he refused to pull back. Every extra salvo they released bought Earth time. The more supplies he could deny to the Karacknid invasion fleet, the more he limited how far they could thrust into Human space.
Between missile salvos, James kept an eye on how Maleck’s squadron was getting on. With the destroyers and frigates dispatched from the main Karacknid fleet accelerating at their best rates, they were all strung out. It allowed Maleck to keep his squadron in a tight formation and slip in and out of missile range of the Karacknids. At least, initially. Then the Karacknid commander leading the relief force changed tactics. Slowing his lead ships, he formed his two hundred warships into a formation to match Maleck’s. Though it radically increased the danger to the Alliance warships, slowing the Karacknids was his objective. To keep them at bay, Maleck brought his ships into missile range to duel with the Karacknids. Over the course of the twenty-minute engagement, he lost a quarter of his ships. James reckoned that Maleck had bought James’ fleet time for at least four extra salvos.
Just after James watched his eighth salvo tear off towards the Karacknid base, he once again turned to check on Maleck’s ships. He was just in time to see the Karacknids change tactics again as their fleet split in two. Though Maleck had taken out two Karacknid ships for every one he had lost, the Karacknids’ numerical advantage was still increasing. That made their move very dangerous.
“The Karacknids are attempting to close with Commodore Maleck,” Anderson announced.
“I see it,” James replied. Half of the Karacknid fleet of destroyers and frigates had turned onto a direct intercept course for Maleck’s ships. They were going to close to energy weapon range and sacrifice themselves. The other half were continuing towards the gas giant. “Order Maleck to pull back,” James said reluctantly as he caught his COM officer’s eye. If Maleck couldn’t stop the Karacknids, there was no reason for him to throw away the rest of his ships. James looked back at the holo projection of the system and calculated how much more time he had. It made him shake his head. He didn’t want to, but he saw no other option. Sacrificing his ships for nothing would not save Earth. “One more salvo and we are pulling back,
” he ordered, his voice far hoarser than he had intended. “Make sure every damaged ship we have is already getting out of here as fast as possible. If they pursue us we might have to abandon them if they can’t get clear. And target everything in our last salvo at that gas mining station.” One had been destroyed, but there was still one largely intact.
As his officers relayed his orders, James watched Maleck’s ships. For nearly a minute it looked like Maleck wasn’t going to obey his orders. Then the Alliance ships released one final missile salvo and turned. The Karacknids would be able to nip at their heels all the way out of the system if they wanted, but most of Maleck’s fleet would get out in one piece. Hiding a grimace, James turned to watch as his final missile salvo roared out of Drake’s tubes and accelerated hard towards the gas giant. If they could just take out the second gas mining station then the Karacknids’ invasion plans would be severely dented. At the beginning of the battle he had dispatched a couple of destroyers to take out the third station orbiting the second gas giant in the system that the Karacknids had left undefended. James wanted all three gone before he pulled back.
As soon as the missiles left his fleet and angled towards their target, it was obvious where they were all going. The Karacknid defenders shifted as many of their ships over to protect the mining station as were close enough to do so. The resulting hail of point defense fire tore into the Human missiles. James sat forward in his chair as the missiles got closer and closer. He was pulled back by his restraints as Drake’s altered course and moved away from the gas giant. Even so, he found himself tensing his upper body in a constant rhythm as he willed the missiles on to their target. Only six got close enough to engage. But they released eighteen laser beams. Ten struck the mining station. It didn’t detonate outright, but large chunks of it were torn off as beams melted through support struts. Here and there a few secondary explosions blew out more sections of the large station. James ground his teeth together. They had hurt it. They had probably cut its collection and refining capabilities by at least fifty percent. But the Karacknids could repair it. And it would be far quicker than trying to build one from scratch.
Just before he turned away in dismay, a sudden heat bloom made his mouth fall open. Something inside the station must have overloaded or the heat from a laser beam had finally radiated through to a fuel cell. Whatever it was, the mining station abruptly detonated in a brilliant ball of fire. The explosion was so large it engulfed several Karacknid ships that had moved close to the station. As the fireball dissipated, three of the warships didn’t reappear. All around James roars of victory erupted from his officers. James was surprised to find he had his fist in the air and was joining them. They might not have destroyed the Karacknid depot completely. But they had just delivered a crippling blow. For several seconds he continued to roar before regaining his composure.
“Miyagi,” he called out. “Commander Miyagi,” he had to repeat before his Chief of Staff heard him over the ruckus. “Run a simulation, we still have three salvos of multistage missiles. Can we use them?” As Miyagi got to work Fisher gave out orders to get her officers back to work. James waited patiently as he watched the surviving Karacknid ships try to salvage what they could from their damaged orbital stations.
James let out a sigh when Miyagi looked up from his command console and shook his head. Multistage missiles didn’t have the same ECM as mark IVs. Firing a salvo or two as they retreated would only be a waste. Turning back to the main holo plot, James assessed the situation. If they couldn’t use the missiles against the Karacknid depot, at least he’d able to use them to fend off the Karacknid ships that tried to chase them. However, when he checked in on Maleck’s squadron, he was surprised to see the one hundred Karacknid ships chasing him had turned back towards the depot. That told James just how hard their attack had hit the Karacknids. If they were more focused on securing what little supplies were left in orbit above the gas giant, they must need them badly. James was happy to see that. He had plenty of damaged ships he wanted to send back to Earth if the Karacknids would let him. And it gave him an idea. His eyes settled on the far larger group of Karacknid ships still about halfway across the system. With better sensor data on them now, Drake had identified thirty dreadnoughts at the heart of the Karacknid fleet. With twice as many battleships and literally hundreds of cruisers, the main Karacknid fleet was completely untouched by everything he had just done. Of more interest to him however were the more than a hundred freighters accompanying the dreadnoughts. They had to be stuffed full of supplies. Their number meant it was still possible the fleet could pick up what it needed from the remnants of the depot and begin their assault of Human space. And yet if the Karacknids at the depot were so worried about their supplies, then things were tight for them.
James pulled his eyes away from the slow advance of the Karacknid fleet. “All right,” he said to his command staff. “Our immediate priority is getting the fleet out of here in one piece. Once we get to the shift passage we will jump out. Though we’ll only be jumping twelve light hours. We are not leaving just yet. That Karacknid fleet is here for one reason and one reason only. If we let it leave. It won’t stop until it reaches Earth.” As he spoke, James watched the joy and sense of victory vanish from the faces of his officers. They had momentarily forgotten the wider situation. James had not. They had nothing to celebrate yet. No one but his crippled ships were going home until the Karacknid invasion fleet was turned back. And that may cost us everything we have, James feared.
Chapter 40
Since Empress’ Dallen’s reforms of 2878 AD, every Imperial ship larger than a heavy cruiser carries enough repair bots to fabricate and replace almost all of its essential components. Unless a warship loses its main reactors then, given enough time, it can repair itself completely after a battle without having to return to a repair yard. Often in war however, time is the very enemy we are fighting against.
-Excerpt from Empire Rising, 3002 AD.
IS Drake
Ten minutes after jumping in and out of shift space, James was scanning through a report on the status of his ships. In the space of just three minutes he made snap decisions on sending sixteen ships back to Earth. They were all too damaged to continue the fight. As he read, he was aware of the frantic activity on Drake’s bridge. Both his staff officers and Captain Fisher’s bridge officers were trying to put his latest orders into effect. When he was done reviewing the status of his fleet, James sent a file to Miyagi to organize the ships that would be going home. Then he looked over to Lieutenant Anderson. “How is the transfer coming along?”
“Ten more minutes I think Admiral,” Anderson answered
“Make it no more than ten,” James replied. Time was not on their side. “Miyagi, what about our ships?”
“The final shuttles with the wounded being transferred to the ships going home have taken off. They just have to unload and return to their own ships and then we can proceed,” James’ Chief of Staff informed him.
James shook his head. “There’s no time to waste. Inform the shuttle pilots they can remain here and wait for us to return. Inform the Captains we’re jumping now.” James turned to Fisher. “Drake can lead the way.” Raising his voice slightly, James called over to Lieutenant Anderson. “Inform Ark Royal, Enterprise and Prometheus they are to proceed as soon as they have the last fighters on board. Our freighters can go as soon as they are unloaded as well.”
“Aye Admiral,” Anderson answered.
Just sixty seconds later Drake jumped into shift space and then reverted to normal space almost instantly. With such a small jump, her capacitors were only partially depleted. For five minutes the ninety-seven warships that were left in his fleet recharged their shift drive capacitors. Then they jumped again. This time they didn’t proceed further into the system but skirted around the outer edge of its mass shadow. As soon as they jumped out, James watched the sensor feed from the passive sensors. The main Karacknid fleet was detected almost instantly. It wa
s just an hour and half away from settling into orbit around the Karacknid depot. Being limited to the speed of their freighters had meant a long laborious flight across the system. But they were almost there now. Time was definitely not on their side. “Take us in.”