First Strike (31 page)

He settled back into his command chair, worrying. Something didn't quite add up. He could have understood the Funks raiding the asteroid mining complexes or the cloudscoops, even though that would have irritated the other Galactics, but why would they send a demonstrably inferior force into a battle that could only have one outcome? Maybe the Empress wanted to get rid of the commanding officer… no, surely the Funks wouldn’t throw away so many ships just to assassinate someone who had displeased their Empress. Unless there were more ships hiding in cloak…

..But it would have required omniscience to
 
know
 
when they would be detected by the human defenders. One tactical lesson the humans – and the Funks, he assumed – had taken directly from the Galactics was that military operations should always follow the KISS principle. Keep It Simple, Stupid. The more complex a military plan, the greater the potential for a screw-up that would cost lives and equipment. Unless the Funks had their own secret stockpile of advanced technology, they couldn't have detected the sensor platforms… maybe they’d hoped to get closer to the planet before being detected. And yet even
 
that
 
didn't make sense.

“Admiral, the Funks are altering course,” Lucas reported. “They’re heading in right towards us.”

It
 
had
 
to be a trick, Tobias told himself. The Funks weren't
 
insane
. They had to know that their force was about to get chopped into mush, even though they’d damage the human fleet before they were destroyed. Were they so reluctant to go home and admit failure that they would prefer to be destroyed instead? There had certainly been some human commanders who would have understood that feeling, even shared it. Better death than dishonour...and yet, the outcome of a battle was never as important as the outcome of a war.

“Order the fleet to spread out,” Tobias ordered, finally. Maybe the Funks had come up with their own version of the missile cloud and arsenal ship. They might not have anything specially designed for the role, but they could cram extra torpedo launchers into their hulls or outfit a freighter as an additional torpedo platform. It would be surprisingly inventive, yet the Funks weren’t idiots. They’d seen the missile cloud in action and had plenty of incentive to duplicate it for themselves. Not that it would be
 
that
 
helpful against human technology, but it would certainly threaten the other Galactics. “Launch recon probes towards the enemy force.”

He watched as the probes slid away from his ships, heading out past the Funk formation. Recon probes were the most sensitive platforms in the fleet, although they weren't as stealthy as the satellites they’d positioned around the system. If there were additional cloaked units hiding behind the ships they’d spotted, they’d be detected before the human fleet flew right into their waiting jaws. But what if the Funks were trying something else…?

“Two minutes to engagement range,” Lucas reported. The human cruisers would pick up speed and manoeuvre around the enemy ships, rather than the battering match that the Hegemony commander seemed to be trying to entice them to accept. Phase cannon would tear through their shields and obliterate the enemy ships. “Admiral… one of the enemy ships just transited out.”

“Odd,” Tobias said. Something was nagging at the back of his mind. Why hadn't they
 
all
 
fled? “Why would they send one destroyer away...?”

He broke off as an alarm sounded. “Admiral, a new quantum gate is forming, right on top of us,” Lucas snapped. Tobias swore out loud as the shape of the enemy trap became clear. “I'm reading another nine battlecruisers and seventeen destroyers, closing rapidly on attack vector. They’re broadcasting a demand for surrender.”

“Alert all ships,” Tobias ordered, ignoring the surrender demand. They’d been suckered, all right. The Hegemony had kept the other half of the assault fleet in quantum space until the human ships were in the right position. And he’d flown right into the trap! “Prepare to engage the enemy.”
 

“Force Two closing to engagement range,” Lucas said. “Enemy ships are locking targeting sensors on us.”

“Deploy ECM countermeasures,” Tobias ordered. He would have preferred to keep those surprises for the next attack on a Hegemony system, but there was no other choice. Even if they wiped out the entire attack force, they’d still take heavy losses. “And then bring the fleet around. Take us right at Force Two.”

The Funks had planned their trap well, even though there were some aspects they'd have had to leave to chance. Hide a fleet in quantum space, dangle bait in front of the human defenders...and wait until the humans walked right into the trap. They’d even had the unexpected bonus that Tobias had left a third of his fleet in orbit, rather than bringing it all out to challenge the cloaked ships. There was no way they could have counted on that, which suggested that they felt that they had enough firepower to defeat all three cruiser squadrons. The only alternative to an engagement was to run – and that would mean leaving Garston undefended, ready for the Funks to move back in and launch reprisals against the non-Funk population.

Humanity’s ECM drones spread out ahead of the fleet. Each one was capable of creating a dozen sensor ghosts, a variant on the tactic that had made the missile cloud so effective. The Funks would be unable to tell the difference between real or ghost ships at long range, but they presumably had locked their sensors on the real ships. Using countermeasures, the locks broke, rendering it far harder for them to work out which ships were real. It still wouldn't be enough, if only because the ghost ships couldn't engage the enemy. The Funks would just fire on any ship that fired on their formation.

The distance between the two forces closed rapidly. Behind the Federation Navy, Force One abandoned its casual approach to Garston and brought its drives to full power, intent on helping Force Two to crush the human fleet. Once they combined their ships, they would presumably advance on Garston and force Tobias to engage them or surrender the planet. The gunboats twisted around, ready to slash down into Force Two. There would be so many targets that the point defences would have problems tracking the gunboats. But there were still only twelve of them...

“Force Two entering phase cannon range,” Lucas reported. Humanity’s slight range advantage might just even the odds. “All ships report ready to engage the enemy.”

“Fire at will,” Tobias ordered.

Nimitz
 
opened fire, brilliant beams of energy lancing out towards the enemy ships and striking their shields, just before the rotating modulation hit on the right frequency and slashed directly into the target’s hull. The enemy ship twisted at once, rotating its own shield frequency in hopes of avoiding serious damage, but it was too late to stop the phase cannon from digging deep into her hull. She rolled out of the enemy formation, trailing plasma as her crew fought to save their ship. An antimatter torpedo from one of
 
Nimitz’s
 
consorts finished her off before her crew could escape.

The enemy fleet opened fire seconds later, bombarding the entire human fleet with phase cannon fire. They seemed to be scattering their fire, something that made no sense until Tobias realised that it was a way to separate the sensor ghosts out from the real ships.
 
Nimitz
 
rocked as a phase cannon burst stuck her hull, just before she unleashed a spread of torpedoes towards an enemy battlecruiser. Compressed antimatter flared out in the darkness of space and the enemy ship lost her shields. A moment later, she vaporised as a torpedo exploded against her unprotected hull.

Tobias smiled darkly as the range continued to narrow. The Funks had largely separated out the sensor ghosts now, but they were still drawing fire as skilled ECM crews projected the ghosts forward, ahead of the advancing ships. Several human ships had taken damage, yet they were all still moving, their weapons digging into enemy hulls. The Funks opened fire with antimatter torpedoes of their own, only to discover that humanity had learned how to deploy their phase cannon as point defence weapons. Only a handful of torpedoes survived to strike home.

“
John Paul Jones
 
is taking heavy fire,” Lucas reported. “Her captain is requesting permission to disengage…”

“Granted,” Tobias snapped. It was too late. The cruiser had been broadsided by a pair of enemy battlecruisers, her shields failing before she could escape. A brace of antimatter torpedoes finished her off and she vanished in a ball of fire. “Order
 
Farragut
 
and
 
Cochrane
 
to watch for survivors as they blaze through that part of the enemy formation.”

Nimitz
 
rotated in space, spinning alongside the hull of one of the enemy battlecruisers. They were far too close to risk unleashing antimatter torpedoes, but her phase cannon dug deeply into the enemy hull. A direct hit blew through one of the battlecruiser’s fusion plants and a chain reaction of explosions tore her apart. Two of her consorts attempted to use her death agonies as cover to bring their own weapons to bear on the imprudent human ship, but
 
Nimitz
 
turned and showed them her heels, launching a spread of torpedoes to cover her retreat. Open space beckoned in front of the human ships and they raced for it, two cruisers trailing plasma as they escaped Force Two’s wrath.

“Order the 3
rd
 
Cruiser Squadron to leave orbit and reinforce us,” Tobias ordered. Between reinforcements and the damage they’d inflicted on Force Two, the odds would be a great deal more even. If he’d been in the enemy’s shoes, he would have seriously considered taking advantage of the brief pause to open a quantum gate and escape, knowing that he’d already dented the myth of human invincibility. “
Togo
 
and
 
Surcouf
 
are to break contact and jump out to Point Shiloh.”

“Aye, sir,” Lucas said. Point Shiloh, one light year away from Garston, was where the fleet train was waiting, a handful of ships loaded with supplies and repair workers. The mobile shipyard and fabricator wasn't exactly a new idea, but the Federation Navy had taken the risk of constructing mobile units rather than a handful of heavily-defended shipyards like most of the Galactics. Earth had only had fifteen years to produce a space-capable industry and a number of corners had had to be cut. “Force One and Force Two are uniting now.”

Tobias nodded. He’d expected as much, but unless the enemy chose to withdraw he would have to engage them again. There were hundreds of thousands of human soldiers on the planet, mostly national rather than Federation units. Abandoning them could bring down the entire edifice. In hindsight, they’d badly underestimated the Funks – and their ability to bounce back from losing more tonnage than the entire Federation Navy.

And a single defeat could mean the end of the war.

“General Chekov is attempting to raise you, sir,” Lucas said. Chekov was the overall commander on the ground, now that the Federation Marines had been relieved by national units. “The message is marked urgent.”

Tobias scowled. The Funks were sorting out their formation, slipping Force One’s ships forward to replace the losses inflicted on Force Two. Their datanets were presumably as capable as those belonging to the other Galactics; slotting the other ships into their holes wouldn't take longer than a few minutes. If they’d attacked then… but they couldn’t, not until his fleet was concentrated.

“Pass him to me,” he said, picking up his earpiece. “And order the fleet to prepare to move on my command.”

“Admiral,” Chekov’s voice said. Like most officers cleared to work with the Federation, his English was perfect, although with a faint Russian accent. “I understand that we have visitors.”

“Yes,” Sampson said, tightly. Multinational operations had always been a headache even before Mentor had arrived and turned Earth upside down. At least Chekov had a reputation for being competent, commanding the Russian forces that had assisted in disarming and occupying North Korea after the Second Korean War. Some of the horror stories about multinational forces from before First Contact had been chilling. “I suppose you could put it that way.”

“I have ordered my forces to go dark,” Chekov said. “If you have to withdraw from the system, we’ll give the bastards a welcome they’ll never forget.”

“It’s not over yet,” Sampson said. He understood what Chekov was trying to say – and he was grateful – but the Funks would simply bombard the planet into submission from high orbit, once they drove away the Federation Navy. Chekov would be forced into surrender once his forces were targeted from well outside their own range. It was possible that the Galactics would respond harshly, particularly after so many horror stories about how the Funks had treated the other races had been transmitted onto the news networks, but Tobias knew that they couldn't take it for granted. “If we have to leave…”

He shook his head. “Thank you,” he said. “Earth will not forget.”

* * *

“Here they come,” Markus said. “On my mark...engage!”

The gunboats slipped out of their holding formation and raced towards the enemy rear. Unsurprisingly, the Funks had continued their drive on Garston, knowing that the humans would have to either engage them or surrender the planet when they got into orbit. Markus had positioned Grumble Squadron outside the Funk engagement range and waited. Now all twelve gunboats, supported by the most advanced ECM systems in the galaxy, closed in on their targets from the rear. It was the closest thing they had to a weak spot that could be exploited.

A handful of Funk destroyers turned to intercept them as the gunboats closed in on their targets, spitting point defence fire towards the human ships. It wasn't a bad tactic, Markus had to admit, but it didn't quite take account of gunboat speed and manoeuvrability. The gunboats lanced through the destroyers, holding their fire, and left them behind in their wake. Markus would have preferred to remain behind and engage them, wiping them out one by one, but there was no time to clear the way properly. Their targets were the big battlecruisers before they could engage the human cruisers.

The Funks refused to be distracted by the gunboats, either because they knew there were fewer gunboats in the attacking force than it seemed, or because they intended to absorb the damage inflicted by the gunboats and keep going. Without either gunboats or assault shuttles of their own, there was really little other choice. Markus braced himself as they slid into engagement range, and then led his squadron mates towards the enemy battlecruiser. He touched the trigger and sprayed a handful of implosion bolts towards the big drive structure at the rear of the ship. There were fewer point defence blisters surrounding their target, making it easier to hit.

There was an explosion and the Funk starship fell out of formation as her drives failed. Markus wanted to finish her off, but there was no time; instead, they had to cripple as many of the other battlecruisers as possible. The destroyers had caught up with them and were attempting to shield their larger companions, knowing that even if they served as targets for the gunboats they could still distract them from their mission. Markus cursed aloud as one of the maggots – the new pilots – slammed right into a destroyer’s shields, vanishing in a ball of flame that barely scratched the ship’s defences. A mistake at the wrong time could cost a pilot everything.

Another Funk battlecruiser loomed up in front of him and he led his gunboats towards her, firing implosion bolts that dug deep into the ship’s hull. The sheer volume of point defence fire was impressive, suggesting that the Funks had outfitted their ships with extra weapons from Hammerfall. There had certainly been enough cripples from the last battle to serve as a convenient source of spare parts.

Tiny explosions blossomed along the target’s hull as the gunboats raced towards her drives. A destroyer appeared out of nowhere, targeting the gunboats and picking off two of them before they could evade. Markus swallowed a curse as the remaining gunboats flipped over and drove away from the new threat, their weapons automatically tracking and picking away at their target. The battlecruiser would have time to engage before the remains of Grumble Squadron could reform and fall on her again. At least the maggots had more than proven themselves, those who had survived. Only six Grumbles remained to take the offensive once more.

They have to know we were bluffing now
, he thought.
 
We’d have launched every gunboat we had at them, if we’d had the gunboats to launch.

* * *

Tobias braced himself as
 
Nimitz
 
lanced towards the enemy formation, ready to open fire as soon as she came into range. This time, he intended to try a variant on an old Galactic tactic, one he wouldn't have dared try against superdreadnoughts. The fleet advanced and came to a halt, relative to the enemy fleet, as soon as it entered weapons range. Humanity’s phase cannon could harm the enemy ships from outside their own range, at least in theory. It was time to find out if that was actually true.

“Open fire,” he ordered. Deadly beams lanced towards their target, splashing away from enemy shields. The rotating modulation trick wasn't so effective at long range, if only because the phase cannon beams tended to fade as the range opened. Rotating shields randomly wasn’t supposed to be possible for the Galactics, but once they realised what the humans could do it was certain that they’d attempt to discover a countermeasure to the human weapons. “Damage report?”