Defiant Page 27

  An hour before the jump I assembled the Command staff in the briefing room one last time. I went through each report, ensuring we were as prepared as we could be. When I was satisfied, I dismissed the staff, including Karina, and brought up Dobrina and Zander on the conference screen.

  Thirty minutes to go.

  “The way I see it, we do an immediate assessment of any danger in the area, then accelerate as fast as we can to mission max speed and get inbound. With luck, that will draw in some of Arin’s fleet,” I said.

  “Assuming they’re there,” said Zander.

  “Always the optimist, Lucius,” I replied with a smile.

  “What about the Wasps and auxiliaries?” asked Dobrina.

  “I have no time to wait for them to set up. They’ll have to get it done themselves. I’ll leave half a dozen Wasps behind to cover for the auxiliaries, but the rest come with our attack flotilla. Remember, until Maclintock arrives in-system, I’m your commander. And I command we kick some ass as quickly as possible,” I said.

  “What about our egress route?” asked Dobrina. That got my ire up.

  “In case of defeat? Not an option, Captain. But in case you missed it, there is no egress jump space in the Corant system. That much our scans have shown, and it fits with what we know about it from popular mythology. During the days of the old empire, an unscheduled jump into Corant space was grounds for instant destruction. No one went in or out of Corant space except by their own means, meaning local jump point generators or jump gates like the one at Levant, and I haven’t heard of too many of those. No, we stay and fight to the end. Once it’s over we’ll pick the nearest known star system and make our jumps home, even if it requires time in traverse space,” I said.

  “So you expect to win?” she asked. I looked at her and Zander on their respective screens.

  “I’ve considered no other option,” I replied.

  “Captain, if I may,” said Zander. “I might recommend the Minara system as an egress point. It’s been surveyed, it’s within our direct jumping range at twenty-nine light-years, and it might even serve as a refuge for damaged vessels in need of repair. If this battle goes on, we may need such a place.”

  I contemplated my former commander. His wisdom was something I couldn’t argue with. “Very well. Tell the flotilla our plan to use Minara as a backup staging area for the auxiliaries. But I shouldn’t need to remind you that only the Lightships and Wasps will have the capability to direct-jump there. The other ships will be on their own in Corant space until the battle is over and will require rescue at that point.”

  “I recommended the same strategy to Wesley last night. He said there will be auxiliaries stationed at Minara by the time we need them and a pathway home from there.”

  “So you were only humoring me by passing this strategy along now, Lucius?” I said.

  He shrugged. “You’ve had a lot on your mind, laddie,” he said.

  “Anything else?” There were negative shakes from both of my captains. I couldn’t help but feel I’d drawn the better hand than Maclintock. I wouldn’t want to go into this battle with any Lightship captains other than these two.

  I checked my watch. “Twenty-three minutes to the jump, Captains. Follow Defiant on my mark.”

  “Aye, sir,” I got from both of them. Then Zander signed off, but Dobrina stayed on.

  “Something else, Captain?” I asked. She nodded.

  “I just want you to know there will be no repeat of what happened at Skondar. I will follow your orders, sir. To the letter,” she said.

  “Thank you, Captain,” I said. “I have complete confidence in you.”

  And with that I signed off and made for my bridge.

  The countdown for our flotilla to jump through the Levant gate to Corant seemed agonizingly long. I spent the time walking the bridge decks, checking monitors, and making sure all was in order, but I was just killing time. At 0658 we got the “go” signal from Wesley, and I ordered my flotilla to full prep status. I watched as the jump gate ring fired to life, its shimmering blue-and-silver energy waves indicating its readiness to receive as many ships as we saw fit to push through the portal. I had three Lightships, twenty Wasps, two Repair and Refit ships, and one medical auxiliary under my command. The auxiliaries’ orders were simple: jump, station in place, and prepare for what we hoped wouldn’t be necessary.

  I had changed my mind at the last minute, holding back only three Wasps for defense of the auxiliaries. There would be more of them available at Minara if this battle dragged on, and I didn’t want to lessen the impact of my attack force any more than I had to. The Wasps, with their upgrades, could defend against anything up to a dreadnought, and any three Wasps could probably trade punches evenly with one. My expectation, however, was that Prince Arin would concentrate his heavy ships around himself and whatever he was protecting on Corant and use lighter ships at the periphery of his defense. For my part, I intended to use a tight cone formation with Defiant at the point, Resolution and Vanguard at the next level, and the attacking Wasps filling out the formation. The Auxiliaries and the Wasps protecting them would occupy the center of the formation, but their orders would be to stay put once we advanced inward. My hope was to cut decisively through the enemy defensive line and then to head straight for Vixis and Arin. By the time Maclintock and his flotilla jumped into the fray an hour later, I hoped we’d have a distinct advantage.

  At precisely 0700 I gave the advance order, and my flotilla, already in formation, moved forward to the jump gate ring. We began a slow acceleration, and as I watched, the ring grew in size on Defiant’s main bridge display. The rippling event horizon, looking as much like ocean water as anything else, increased in size until I felt the ripple effect of the crossing pour through my consciousness. A moment later we were in uncharted space, facing the unknown. I gave the other ships a few seconds to complete the crossover, then demanded reports, first from my crew, then from the whole flotilla.

  “Battlefield status,” I demanded of my longscope officer, who also happened to be my wife.

  “Still evaluating, sir,” said Karina.

  “Hurry it up, Lieutenant,” I prodded in a not-too-friendly manner, then turned my attention to Duane Longer at Propulsion.

  “Engage the HD impeller drive. Give me .55 light, Mr. Longer. Inward directly to the planet,” I said.

  “Aye, sir,” he replied. I turned back to Karina.

  “Where’s my report, ’scopeman?” I asked.

  “Coming up now on the tactical, Captain,” she said, then started narrating the battlefield overview. “Not what we expected, Captain. I count thirty active dreadnoughts in battle groups of three, 120 HuKs, numerous suicide drones, and an unbelievable amount of scatter mines throughout the system. They’re dispersed, sir, rather than in a compact formation. Range from the planet of these ten battle groups is anywhere from 1.5 AUs to 3.5 AUs. They’re defending a large swath of space, sir. We’re actually inside the range of one of the battle groups, sir, but they’re on the other side of the system.”

  “And Vixis?”

  “As far as I can tell, the prince’s Lightship is not in the Corant system, sir,” Karina said. That was troubling.

  “Topography of the system?” I asked. She replied quickly again.

  “There are two moons—or rather, irregularly shaped asteroids, moonlets—in Corant’s tidal lock, sir. Both have nearly identical dimensions, twenty-seven by twenty-two by eighteen kilometers, and they’re in equatorial orbits in equidistant orbit distances from the planet, sir. There is a debris field where a third moonlet might have been located, sir, almost exactly the same distance away from moonlet two. Other than that, the system is free of planets or objects of any kind. Almost like it was wiped clean of debris, sir.”

  “Those moonlets likely contain defensive platforms of some kind, if I’m guessing right. But without V
ixis to deal with, I have no interest in the planet. Mr. Layton, how long at current speed to the nearest dreadnought battle group?” I asked.

  “Eighteen minutes, sir. It looks as though they’ve spotted us, as they are starting to accelerate toward us. In fact, two other groups seem to be responding to our presence as well,” he said.

  “First things first. Target the nearest battle group and plot an intercept course,” I ordered.

  “Aye, sir.” I turned to Longer.

  “Plan a max acceleration curve toward the Imperial battle group, then a full deceleration to engage them, Mr. Longer. I want us inside thirty thousand clicks when we reach the battlefield,” I said.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “XO, I want to use the anti-graviton plasma first, then a volley of missiles with frequency-busting warheads, and then I want the gravity weapons at my disposal,” I said to her.

  “Aye, sir,” replied Babayan. “What about the scatter mines?”

  “Have the Wasps clear us a pathway with coil cannons or missiles, Commander. I want my flotilla to be all-in on this engagement,” I said. Then I sat back in my safety couch as my crew carried out my orders.

  We began our deceleration to the battlefield eleven minutes later. Four minutes after that, Longer had Defiant and the rest of the flotilla ready to engage in our first skirmish. The Wasps had cleared the pathway to the battlefield through the annoying scatter mines, and the enemy flotilla was coming right at us, like automatons do, I decided. I stood and looked at the tactical display, then activated the command com line.

  “All ships, stay in formation until we engage. Lightships Resolution and Vanguard will take on the trailing dreadnoughts, Defiant will take on the leader. Each ship should use the battle plan locked into their AIs for the initial contact with the enemy. Allow your AIs to direct the attacks. I will free you to go to manual at my discretion,” I said. I got a series of acknowledgments, then looked to my acting weapons officer.

  “The anti-graviton plasma first, if you will, XO,” I said.

  “Ready, sir,” Babayan said. I took a deep breath.

  “Fire!”

  The shimmering silver-gold beam exploded out of our forward weapons arrays and toward the lead dreadnought. The range of the weapon was beyond anything the dreadnought had, but we knew from our earlier encounters that they now had a defensive field of some kind, very much like a Hoagland. Whether they could survive all of our weaponry remained to be seen.

  The plasma impacted the lead dreadnought’s shielding, and she started to spark and was wracked by explosions as her shielding overloaded. Whatever the shielding was, it wasn’t as strong as a Hoagland Field. The follow up frequency-busting missiles hit her hard, cutting obvious holes in her defenses. She staggered and bucked, vainly trying to get off coil cannon shots and missiles against our defenses but with little success. I checked the rest of the battlefield.

  Resolution and Vanguard were having similar successes against their opponents. The enemy had done us a big favor by breaking into small task forces. Probably no three dreadnoughts could hold the battlefield against a single Lightship.

  Our Wasps were also cleaning up against the enemy HuKs. With full Hoaglands and upgraded coil cannons and missiles, the unshielded HuKs were no match for the Wasps. As I watched, though, an HuK broke formation and made straight for the nearest Wasp on a suicide run. The impact was tremendous, but our Wasp survived. I commed to the ship’s captain; she had structural and stress damage and her field was weakened, so I ordered her back to the auxiliaries for repairs with orders to rejoin as soon as possible. I passed the word around to the other Wasp captains via com that the HuKs were going suicide and that they should adjust tactics accordingly. They did, switching to longer-range missile strikes rather than using their shorter-range coil cannon arrays.

  I turned my attention back to the capital ships. All three dreadnoughts were in various stages of desiccation, burning, listing, or drifting. They were all disabled now with large holes in their defensive fields, but they weren’t destroyed. I got on the command com line.

  “Captains, prepare your gravity plasma weapons. Set them to implode. I want the field cleared of every last dreadnought. Let’s not waste missiles and torpedoes on them,” I said.

  “They’re helpless as they are. Why not just leave them?” asked Dobrina.

  “Because my goal is to clear this system of every enemy ship that can harm the Union, Captain,” I replied.

  “That may not be Maclintock or Wesley’s goal,” she said.

  “Neither of them are here at the moment, Captain Kierkopf,” I reminded her. Zander stayed diplomatically quiet on that front.

  “Aye, sir,” Dobrina finally said. I turned to Babayan.

  “Gravity weapons on my display, XO,” I ordered, then went to my console, brought up the implosion beam, locked it into the weapons array, and counted down five seconds to firing the weapon. The beam swept toward the target dreadnought and within a few seconds had crushed it from existence. Resolution and Vanguard quickly followed suit with their enemies. I then ordered us to attack at will any remaining HuKs or drones, and within another ten minutes the battlefield was clear of enemy targets.

  “That was . . . clinical,” said Dobrina over the command com line. I ignored her.

  “All ships prepare to proceed inbound. Contact with the next enemy task force will be in . . .” I looked down at George Layton.

  “Nineteen minutes, sir,” he said.

  “Nineteen minutes,” I repeated. “You have until then to reset your systems.”

  Then I sat back down and ordered up a new battle plan for the second task force. I’d never felt so calm or clear of purpose.

  The second engagement went much like the first, only this time I had us lead with the gravity lance to push the dreadnoughts off their marks. I didn’t want to use the same tactics every time and allow their battle AIs to gain any insight into our plans. An hour into the battle we had taken out nine dreadnoughts and dozens of HuKs and depleted the enemy forces by almost 20 percent. Not bad for the “smaller” of the two Union battle groups.

  Right on the hour mark Maclintock’s group flashed in, and there was a mad scramble from the enemy to compensate for a larger attack force so much closer to Corant. I called Maclintock and told him that so far Vixis had been a no-show and that those defensive platforms were an unexpected worry. He agreed and ordered us to continue in a sweeping maneuver, taking out as many task forces as we could.

  The battle went on like this for two more hours. Maclintock was having so much success he ordered his auxiliaries to move up and resupply his ships with missiles and torpedoes. I did the same. There were now just twelve dreadnoughts and thirty-two operational HuKs in the enemy force, and they were beating a hasty retreat to Corant, likely to the cover of those moonlet defensive platforms. The only question now was whether to pursue and finish them or hold off and regroup. The captains met yet again on the displays in the command deck briefing room, but this time, all seven of us were present.

  “We don’t know how much of a punch those platforms can dish out,” Maclintock said, “so I want to be cautious.”

  “With all due respect, sir,” I replied, “we don’t even know if they’re operational.”

  “I wouldn’t be so quick, laddie,” said Captain Zander from the screen. “Those dreadnoughts are making for them as though they are. And even the most basic battle AI has a survival instinct built in. I’m betting they know what they’ve got in those platforms.”

  “What bothers me is that the two platforms are built on almost identical moonlets. It makes me worry that they could be something more than they appear,” Dobrina said.

  “They’ve already lost two thirds of their fleet. You’d think that if they were anything other than missile or cannon bases, they’d have acted by now,” said Captain Von Zimmerman of Fearless.


  “I’ll have my ’scopeman run a scan and see if we can detect anything that might give us pause,” I offered. Maclintock agreed, and I passed the order on to Karina to send out two longwave probes to analyze the moonlets.

  We were now sitting in open space, our auxiliaries moved up, just 1.25 AUs from Corant itself. But without Vixis and Prince Arin on the scene, I was beginning to wonder what our mission goals were.

  “So what are your orders, Commodore?” asked Dobrina.

  “Continue to refuel and resupply. That’s what our support ships are for. When that’s done, we move into a single formation and finish this thing off,” he said.

  “And Arin?” I asked.

  “That’s your personal vendetta, Captain. Getting revenge on him is not part of my orders, nor this task force’s. Understood?”

  “Yes, Commodore,” I said. But in my heart I didn’t believe it. I felt in my bones that Arin would be here and that the difficult part of this mission was just beginning.

  The Battle of Corant

  Karina came back with her report within ten minutes. Her face appeared on one of the empty screen displays from the bridge even though she was only a few steps away from the briefing room.

  “I actually sent Out three probes,” she started. “One for each moonlet. One is just debris, though the telemetry is indicative of relatively equal mass compared with the other two. By the relative dispersal of the debris field, my best guess is that it was destroyed during the Imperial Civil War, between three hundred and four hundred years ago. The other two are both unique in their ways. The second shows evidence of massive damage, is in a state of severe disrepair, and it has a low-density core and exposed structured buttresses that can only indicate artificiality. In short, it was probably once inhabited on the inside, with a central hyperdimensional light and power source, somewhat like a ‘Dyson sphere,’ I believe it was once called. There is no evidence that this moonlet is operational, except for a ring of cannon and missile batteries on its surface, which appears to be a recent addition.