Council Archon Ikthor sat robed in splendor aboard his flagship Exterminator, watching the battle on multilevel displays that flashed and swirled with colors unknown to the infestations. This breadth of visual sense demonstrated only one among many superiorities of the Brood over the animals around them.
His Battle Direction Archons ringed him, each of sixteen stations visible from his throne. Unfortunately, the plethora of available information was not particularly pleasing.
“The infestation is stubborn, Council Archon,” his most senior Director said. “Another swarm has been neutralized, despite its dispersion.”
“Don’t waste euphemisms on me, Raklog. Your position is secure.”
“Yes, Council Archon. I shall correct myself. Another swarm has been largely annihilated. The enemy ships’ weapons are obviously optimized against our small craft, and the mobility of their premier squadron is inescapable. In this, their technology is superior to ours.”
Ikthor waved one clawed limb. “We have prepared for their attacks, knowing full well that our casualties would be steep. As long as Exterminator survives, it shall perform the function for which it was named. Nothing can stand against it. The Brood shall prevail.”
“Of course, Council Archon.”
“Stay the course,” Ikthor shone in all directions. “As we press the infestation toward its nest-world, it will become increasingly desperate to attack this flagship, knowing it spells their doom. When they do, we will annihilate them. I shall add this system to my domain, and I will choose one of you to rule it in my name. Therefore, be diligent.”
***
Absen realized Commander Ford turned out to be more right than wrong in his optimism. With Bravo to fix them and Alpha to flank them, aided by the Meme in Charlie to guard against reinforcement as well as engaging as many of the enemy as it could, nineteen more swarms had been demolished.
However, Task Force Bravo had been beaten up, each encounter inevitably grinding away some of its weaponry, armor and drones. Now, the sixty-seven manned ships fled for Earth at their best speed. With seven more hours to go before the flagship and its mega-swarm arrived, they would have just enough time to make hasty repairs before the final stand above Earth.
The TacDrive-equipped ships of TF Alpha had, of course, bolted for home immediately, arriving mere minutes later to hurry into the shipyards. Another frantic hour of refitting had restored much of their capability; the orbital docks’ crews were getting a lot of practice.
“All right,” Absen addressed his captains in his conference room once again. “The Meme report they’re in great shape. They’ve refueled with their pre-positioned clusters of comets and will attrit the swarms as they pass toward Earth. The lead Scourges that are left will find the lunar and planetary defenses waiting for them, backed by TF Bravo. Our sims show we’ll have no problem winning that fight, though a few thousand small craft will probably land to be mopped up by the ground forces. It’s the flagship and the megaswarm attached to it that concern me.”
“We need to attack it by surprise,” Captain Riggin spoke up, apparently emboldened by the success of his earlier suggestions. “Pulse out to a position behind them, and then pulse in from out of the sun like dive bombers. They won’t see us coming and they won’t be able to react fast enough.”
“How do you know they won’t react fast enough?” Scoggins asked mildly, aware her position as the admiral’s flag captain could shut down the young man’s enthusiasm. “We have no idea of their capabilities. Their computers are as fast as ours even if they don’t have AI. They could be programmed to immediately blast anything that shows up with energy weapons, hitting us before our sensors recover and set up our targeting.”
Riggin set his jaw. “We could throw a bunch of decoys at them. They don’t even have to be aimed. Launch all our missiles as soon as we drop pulse, heading in their general direction. They can be updated later. A couple seconds after, we’ll have launched Exploders and we can pulse out.”
“They’re surrounded by their swarm. Five million small craft in a dense screen. We’ll come under immediate attack, and even with a few thousand missiles joining them, Exploders won’t get anywhere near their flagship,” Scoggins replied. “Unless, of course, we pulse straight to point-blank range, but if we do that, every weapon and sensor on the forward hull will be stripped by collisions.”
“Then we pulse in backward again.”
Scoggins shook her head. “If we do that, Conquest will probably lose her engines. Their swarm is so dense, we’ll take a thousand collisions at lightspeed, each one like a tactical nuke against our skin. At least one of them will go right up our tailpipes and wipe out the fusion drives, which by the way provide half of ship’s power.”
Absen cleared his throat, and the two captains subsided. “I like the general idea, trying to hit them hours out instead of right here at home. If we let them get too close, they might deploy some weapon we can’t stop. Out there, we force them to reveal their capabilities, and we still have superior mobility and speed. All we really have to do is figure out a tactical approach that gets us into Exploder range...and out again, I hope.”
“You hope?” Scoggins turned to the admiral with raised eyebrows.
“If it comes down to a choice between Earth and this ship, there’s only one real option.”
“If that happens,” Michelle said, “I can do it myself. There’s no need for organics to risk themselves.”
Absen shook his head. “I’m not proposing a suicide run, Commander, merely making the observation that no matter what the odds of fighting our way out, we may have to accept them.”
Captain Doughty of the Montgomery spoke up. “Why not let the AI give it a try, sir? That way, we don’t have to lose any people.”
The face on Michelle’s avatar froze, and Absen forced himself not to castigate the man in public. “Mister Doughty, Commander Michelle Conquest is as much a person as you or I. That said, there is some merit to losing only one person rather than thousands. Michelle, how much would it affect your combat capacity to run Conquest alone?”
“I’d retain about forty-five percent overall, though I can allocate effort as necessary. In practice, I’d retain one hundred percent of helm, main weapons array and Exploder capability, deprioritizing everything else.”
“We can’t do that, sir,” Scoggins said, turning earnestly to Absen. “She might take down the flagship, but the swarm would jump her immediately. She wouldn’t have the capacity to defend herself or even make it out with TacDrive. Every small craft she hits is a fusion bomb at lightspeed.”
“What about a SLAM?” Riggin said.
“We’re out of SLAMs,” Scoggins replied.
“I mean an improvised SLAM. We could evacuate the Loxley, load an Exploder warhead aboard, and aim her by remote.”
Absen held up a hand, thinking. “Michelle, is that flagship still taking evasive maneuvers?”
“Yes, sir,” the AI said. “It’s making constant and apparently random course changes, enough to make long-range targeting quite difficult. They saw what the SLAMs did, and they assume we have more.”
“How close would an improvised SLAM have to be to guarantee a hit?”
“If by guarantee you mean –”
“I mean guarantee, Michelle. Probability exceeding 99.999 percent, let’s say.”
“Not possible. Each impact from anything in a TacDrive-equipped ship’s path alters its course. With millions of maneuvering small craft nearby–”
Riggin broke in. “How about if the cruiser pulsed in to point-blank range, retargeted itself, and then pulsed again directly at the enemy, so close it couldn’t possibly miss?”
“Yes, Captain,” Michelle replied evenly. “That solves the accuracy problem, but not the issue of enemy weaponry. Even under computer control, there is a delay of at least two seconds before sensors recover from the drive field’s effects. Then, ship’s thrusters have to fire to line up for the next pulse, resulting in more delay.”
“All true,” Riggin said, standing up to emphasize his point, “but it’s worth a try. Trade one ship – my ship – for the opportunity to take that bastard down? I’m willing to take the chance.”
Absen looked around the room, trying to gauge his captains’ reactions. While a fleet was no democracy, only a fool didn’t pay attention to the effect major decisions had on the people who had to carry them out – or in this case, to watch. Most of them were nodding, if grimly, some staring at Riggin in open admiration, some in bleak sympathy. Nominating one’s own vessel for destruction couldn’t be easy, even for a hard-charger like Riggin.
“All right. We’ll do it,” the admiral said. “It’s worth the gamble. If it doesn’t work, we’ll lose one ship, but the enemy will likely have to reveal his capabilities. We’ll adjust from there. Captain Riggin, dock with Conquest and evacuate the Loxley. Get everything of value off her you can. Michelle, pass the word to Mister Nightingale to pull an Exploder warhead out of the magazine. No need for a detonator, either. The impact will set it off...either that, or the first Scourgeling to take a bite out of it will.”
Antimatter, unlike other explosives, was inherently unstable, held in check only by triple magnetic bottles keeping it from contact with normal matter. Rupture those fields and everything within a five-kilometer radius would be utterly vaporized, no matter what the armor. Beyond that zone, damage would be proportional to distance from point zero.
“What if this doesn’t work?” Scoggins asked.
“We’ll figure that out when we find out why it didn’t work,” Absen answered. “But you make a good point. Captain Doughty, dock with Constitution and evacuate Montgomery as well. We’ll operate her by remote, and if we have to make a second try, we’ll have saved preparation time.”
“Sir, I must protest!” the captain said.
“On what grounds?” Absen said with a lift of his eyebrows.
“My ship represents an enormous investment of materiel and time. You can’t throw it away like this.”
“I didn’t notice you protesting the sacrifice of Loxley,” Absen replied in a cooling voice. “One might wonder if your objection wasn’t more...personal in nature.”
“Of course it’s personal, sir. I might never have another command like this.”
And you just ensured you never will, Absen thought to himself. The man is concerned about himself and his career, not the mission and the needs of Earth. How’d this one slip past me?
“Sorry, Captain, but someone has to do it,” the admiral said.
“Senegal volunteers,” Captain Figueroa spoke up, standing.
“I’ll keep that in mind if we need to try a third time,” Absen said drily, “but for now, my order stands.” He stared at Doughty until the man swallowed and nodded. “Get to work, then. You’re all dismissed.” The avatars of all but Scoggins and Michelle faded around Absen.
“That was embarrassing,” Scoggins said.
“He won’t be getting another ship,” Absen replied. “Not for a while, anyway. Michelle, any indications in Doughty’s service record that he’s less than dedicated?”
“No, sir. On paper, he’s perfect.”
Absen lifted his eyebrows. “Perfect? How perfect?”
“Top marks on all FITREPs and evals. Top scores in all categories for Montgomery. In fact, technically, his ship has the best record in the fleet.”
“Hard to believe,” Scoggins said with a scowl.
“Very hard,” Absen said, his eyes narrowing. “Let’s go to the bridge.”
When the three arrived, the admiral called Rick Johnstone to his ready room and waved Michelle in too. Addressing the CyberComm officer, Absen said, “I have reason to suspect someone falsified the performance records of the Montgomery, Captain Doughty, or both. Others of his officers too, perhaps. I need you to take a look. I presume you have codes that will get you inside the systems of all of our ships?”
Johnstone smiled. “If I didn’t, I’m sure Michelle and I could crack them.” His mien turned sober. “Do you think this is anything sinister, or is it just misguided ambition?”
“That’s what I want you to find out. Doughty grew up in the defense forces under the Empire’s Blends, if I recall correctly. From his interview, I felt like he had the right attitude, but maybe he’s just a face man with personal ambition.”
Scoggins said, “The non-Blends weren’t encouraged to take risks, sir. Maybe it’s a case of being accustomed to telling his superiors what they want to hear. He performed creditably in the battles up until now.”
“I can’t take ‘maybe’ for an answer, Melissa. Johnstone will dig it out, and then we’ll know.”