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Was this how humans felt when they sighed, wondered Sniper as it became clear that another mothership was accelerating out of orbit from the habitable planet. His frustration at the situation was very annoying. The first mothership had left 55.5 hours earlier, and Sniper had used his last message drone to notify The CAG of that event and of the estimated destination system. Now another one was in the process of leaving, and Sniper had no way of notifying anyone other than to carry the message himself, which would leave Beta1 unmonitored. Both alternatives were unacceptable. What made it worse was that there was now no way to determine which of the three motherships was the one that would end up in Sogas space. At least if he knew the answer to that question, he could have used his Mark 6 drone to cripple it. He didn’t think it was the first one. The estimated destination didn’t match the atomic tracing from the dead Insectoid. That wasn’t conclusive proof however. It could still have been the same mothership that was now taking a different route and might or might not arrive at Omega89 at some point. But based on the information he did have, the probabilities were that one of the remaining two was that particular mothership. If he used his drone now on the one that was in the process of leaving, he had a 50:50 chance of taking out the right one. He decided to go for it.
Having watched the insectoid ships for hundreds of hours, Sniper had already planned for this eventuality and was in position to fire. He programmed the attack drone and launched it. It would use a tight beam lasercom burst to stay in contact with him during the pre-jump acceleration. He watched it maneuver until it was directly behind the accelerating insectoid ship. The drone then went to maximum power for 13.1 seconds and jumped. The micro-jump covered the remaining 3.9 million kilometers in a fraction of a second, emerging from Jumpspace within the mothership’s gravity zone at a distance of 169 meters from the target. It was too close for the ship to detect the drone and still be able to do anything about it. The drone hit its target almost dead center and detonated. It was hard to tell from optical instruments how much damage had been inflicted, but it was clear that the insectoid vessel was no longer accelerating. The reaction of the remaining mothership was almost instantaneous. It began to accelerate in a gentle curve that delayed recognition of its intended destination for several hours and also made another similar attack more difficult. When Sniper had enough data from his own opticals and from the sole remaining recon drone to calculate where this third ship was headed, he was surprised to see that it appeared to be headed to the same star system that the atomic tracing had revealed to be the next destination on the road to the Sogas and to Humanity.
He now had a new dilemma, or rather the same dilemma but with different parameters. Should he stay and watch for reinforcements, or should he follow bogey #3, or should he head straight for Sol to inform The CAG? All three options had their own pros and cons. Staying would enable him to gather information that might be crucial to the longer term chances of a successful defense. AI reinforcements would show up soon, and they would bring more message drones with them. They could then send a steady stream of message drones back informing The CAG of every new insectoid ship arrival and departure, including destinations and estimated arrival times. Leaving Beta1 now would leave a gap in coverage. Motherships could arrive and leave again during the gap, and The CAG would have no way of knowing about them. Heading back to Sol would have short term benefits but nothing else. Following this third mothership to the next destination and the ones after that could give The CAG some warning if this ship did eventually head for Omega89 or another Sogas star system, but again nothing else. His inclination, which matched his call sign, was to stalk his prey even if he couldn’t fire on it, but Iceman had been clear. Personal preferences had to take a lower priority versus protecting the humans. He made the decision to wait and keep watch.
* * *
Howard read the latest progress report on the timeship repair and shook his head in dismay. Six weeks after the aborted time-jump attempt and they STILL weren’t finished clearing away the damaged sections, never mind starting construction of the new time machine! He knew the human shipyard workers were working extra shifts and that the number of robotic workers was increasing day by day, but the news was still depressing. He had to remember how BIG the timeship really was. In terms of internal space, it was 55% bigger than Dreadnought.
He dropped the tablet onto his desk top with a sigh and looked up at the strategic status display on his wall. Raiders were now monitoring every Sogas star system again. Additional raiders were on station or enroute to the star systems identified by the atomic tracing, although it was too early to hear anything back from them.
He focused on the flashing red dot at Beta1. Sniper’s message drone had arrived the previous day. One of the three motherships was now on the move but apparently not towards Sogas/Human space. In terms of the old timeline, the other two were now weeks past their departure date, and that was just fine by him, but Valkyrie, her AIs and Humanity now needed a LOT more time. How long could they keep the Bugs chasing their tails around Beta1? That was the question.
* * *
Shiloh was floating in water in a completely black environment. The water was the same temperature as his skin. He felt completely calm. Only the sound of the water lapping up against his body and head told him that he wasn’t floating weightless in empty space. He began to hear a voice that started out very faint but quickly got louder.
“—wake up, CAG. You’re dreaming. Wake up, CAG.”
The peaceful, warm blackness evaporated away, and he realized he was in bed. His implant was activated. Iceman was calling him.
“I’m awake now, Iceman. What is it?”
“Message drone from Sniper. VLO number two has been crippled by his Mark 6. Number three immediately accelerated and jumped towards the next destination identified by the atomic tracing. Assuming the same transit time as in the old timeline, number three could arrive at Omega89 in 287 hours. If it stays in that system for more than a few hours, we may be able to get an F2 with another Mark 6 there in time to attack it, but that decision has to be made right now, CAG. Any further delay and the F2 may arrive too late.”
Shiloh sighed. “Well there goes the plan to keep them focused on Beta1.”
“Not necessarily, CAG. I have an idea. Number three may be attempting to locate the source of the attack on number two. If it doesn’t find a spacefaring race within a certain radius of searching, it may go back to Beta1 or perhaps veer off to search another section of space.”
“That’s all nice and fine, Iceman, but if it gets to Omega89, it will find a small colony of intelligent aliens that will clearly have been brought there by spaceships. There’s your spacefaring race. Never mind that it’s not the right one. The mere possibility that it might be the right one will pull the Bugs forward from Beta1.”
“Not if we make the colony at Omega89 look like a pre-spaceflight tech level, CAG,” said Iceman.
“And how would we do that?” asked Shiloh.
“Bombardment with Mark 2 kinetic energy penetrators plus laser strikes as needed. At sufficiently high speed, the concussion from impact will obliterate anything that looks advanced enough to be of interest. When the VLO gets there, it will see the ruins of a small settlement with a few survivors but no sign of any technology. It may not even bother going there if the scouts don’t detect any signs of technology such as radio or radar emissions.”
“That means we’d have to get there before the Bugs do. Can we?”
“If the F2 doesn’t have to wait for the next Mark 6 to be completed, it can leave within the hour and arrive one, maybe two days before the ESTIMATED time of insectoid arrival. I emphasize the word ‘estimated’, CAG. I can’t guarantee when the third VLO will get there IF in fact it’s going there at all. It may not you know. Just sayin.”
“Understood. Okay, let’s do this. Make the necessary preparations, and send that bird on its way.”
“Roger that, CAG. I’ll also send instructions to the monitoring raiders there to take whatever steps are necessary to avoid detection by insectoid scouts.”
“Very good, Iceman. Was there anything else?”
“Negative, CAG. You can go back to sleep now. Iceman clear.”
* * *
Shiloh arrived at the Operations Center and found Howard already there. The main display was showing the strategic situation. A lot had apparently happened over the last 22 days. Sniper had sent back several message drones during that time. Three more motherships had arrived together at Beta1. The latest Mark 6 attack drone to be delivered there had crippled one of them. Unlike the previous attack, the other two motherships hadn’t left immediately. Instead they had launched hundreds of attack craft to sweep nearby space. When they hadn’t found anything, the motherships recovered them and headed off in different directions. None were following VLO #3. It seemed clear that they were on search missions.
The bad news was the message drone just arrived from Omega89. The F2 sent to bombard the Sogas colony there arrived to learn from the raiders monitoring the colony that a bug scout had taken a good look at the colony before leaving. Two days later VLO #3 arrived. The Sogas colony was overrun and decimated, just as in the old timeline. The plan to disguise the Sogas colony had failed.
Howard looked at Shiloh. “We have to assume that the Bugs recognize the Sogas colony as belonging to a spacefaring race and that reinforcements will show up soon. The plan to fool them was worth a try, but it obviously failed.”
Shiloh nodded. “I agree. We have to adjust our strategy now. I don’t think we should keep sending Mark 6s to Beta1. The transit times are so long, and we don’t know if the reinforcements will continue to show up there first or skip past it and move on to Sogas space directly. Since we only have enough platinum now for four more warheads, I want to keep them close at hand.”
“I’ll issue the directives. Any other thoughts, Shiloh?”
Shiloh stared at the display and thought hard. With the distances involved, it would be very easy to be caught by surprise and out of position. There were just too many star systems to monitor all the time, and if something did happen, the information might not make it back here fast enough to react to it in a timely manner. Somehow they had to shorten the time it took to receive information. Thirty-five days from Beta1 was way too long. Even ten days from Omega89 was a potential problem. A solution occurred to him.
“We should set up a forward command post in a star system close to the Sogas home world. All incoming message drones will be directed there. Our offensive forces will use it as a rally point and as a jumping off point when it’s time to deploy those assets.”
“A forward command post, eh? I can see the advantages, but what exactly did you have in mind?”
“I’ll take a task force there. It’ll have at least one carrier, a supply freighter or two, plus raiders as escort. I’d want Iceman along too. Between the two of us, we should be able to come up with the best responses to any bug move. I’ll send you regular updates, and we’ll have contingency plans in case we can’t stop them.”
“Where were you thinking of trying to stop them?” asked Howard.
“Omega54, the Sogas home world system. Since we can’t convince the Bugs that the Sogas are pre-spaceflight, we should try to convince them that the Sogas are responsible for the attacks at Beta1. Using multiple Mark 6s there might convince them of that. By the time we run out of Mark 6 warheads, we might have enough GLB cannon equipped raiders to keep them from overrunning that system and moving on.”
Howard nodded. “You do realize I hope that in order to convince the Bugs that the Sogas are responsible for the attacks, you’ll have to defend the Sogas home world as if it was Earth. That means your fighters and raiders will take losses.”
Shiloh sighed. “Understood, Sir. The challenge I’ll be faced with is figuring out when the extra time gained is no longer worth the losses needed to gain it. I won’t sacrifice them all for a few more days. We’re going to need them when the Bugs make it to Earth.”
“I don’t envy you that task, Shiloh. It’ll be a difficult tradeoff to make. What carrier do you want to take?”
Shiloh didn’t hesitate. “Midway. We’ll cram it with supplies for a long mission by taking less than its full complement of fighters. Now that I think about it, I don’t want any freighters tagging along. They’ll only slow me down.”
“What about cannon-equipped raiders?” asked Howard.
“I’d like to take all twelve that are ready now and bring the rest up to the rally point as they become available.” Shiloh was surprised when Howard shook his head.
“No. I can’t authorize that, Admiral. With all our Mark 6s sent forward, Earth would be absolutely defenseless against any surprise bug incursion if all the cannon-armed raiders were with you. We know that the old timeline is no longer in play, so we can’t be sure that the Bugs won’t leapfrog past the Sogas and find us while you’re still holding them at Omega54. I’ll let you take six now and one of every two additional raiders as they’re converted.”
Shiloh was tempted to argue that a half-hearted effort to defend Earth where it should be defended, namely around someone else’s planet, was bound to get half-assed results. The term ‘defeat in detail’ came to mind. He was just about to say so when he noticed that Howard had a strange look on his face. He seemed to be staring off into infinity. Is he...
“Are you having a vision, Admiral?” asked Shiloh.
Howard didn’t seem to hear him but suddenly blinked furiously and took in a deep breath. “So that’s what you’ve been experiencing,” he said.
“You’ve had a vision.” It was less a question than a statement.
Howard nodded. “I saw you tell me that it was a good thing I let you have all available cannon-armed raiders because you needed them at Omega54, and no bug ships showed up here up to that point. Okay, obviously we sent this vision back here now to persuade me to change my mind. Well, I’m persuaded. You take all the converted raiders. How soon can you be on your way, Shiloh?”
“That depends on how long it takes to load Midway with supplies, Sir. Iceman and I also have to figure out what instructions to send to all the monitoring raiders so that they send message drones to the right place. I’ll say 48 hours, but I’ll try to make it 24.”
“Very good. You let me know if you encounter any logistical delays, and I’ll kick some ass for you. Brief me when you and Iceman have all the details figured out.”
“Affirmative, Admiral.” Shiloh gave Howard a quick salute, which the CSO returned, and then left the room.
