Battlegroup (StarFight Series Book 2) (33 page)

“New diverging vector track set,” Louise called from her station.

“All StarFight ships, form along the
Lepanto’s
track,” he called over the neutrino comlink. “Cruisers first, then the destroyers, then the frigates.”

“Moving to your tail,” called Swanson from the
Chesapeake
.

“Us too,” called Wilcox from the
Hampton Roads
.

Jacob looked to the situational holo that showed the wasp ships as purple dots with human ships as green dots. No planets or moons were shown on this holo that covered a few hundred thousand klicks. It didn’t matter. He recalled the Scissor Blades formation as one his father had used against the cluster of rebel mining ships near Callisto. To the outside observer it looked like a splitting of forces, making each group smaller in numbers than the approaching enemy force. His scissor blade had just eight ships in it, while his father’s blade had ten. They faced fifteen ships. But in reality it was a variation on the ancient pincer formation, but led this time by Battlestars armed with antimatter cannons, followed by powerful cruisers loaded to the hilt with CO
2
and proton lasers, a railgun on each cruiser’s nose and four missile silos at the rear. Plus top and bottom plasma batteries for close-up protection.

He liked Scissors because it gave the
Lepanto
and the cruisers the chance to use their side-mounted proton lasers in a raking fire mode where their proton beams could join with the proton beams fired by the following destroyers. For his formation, that made for six red proton beams, all aimed at a single target. His father’s formation included three cruisers and four destroyers, which gave the admiral a combined strike ability of eight proton beams. Jacob knew from past battles that hitting any of the smaller wasp ships with eight, or even six proton beams meant fast destruction of that six-sided log-like ship. After the formation hit the enemy with raking proton fire, the formation called for his ships to reverse course and come up the tails of the surviving enemy ships, hitting them with combined CO
2
laser fire. The railguns on the cruisers and Battlestars would fire Smart Rocks during both attack runs. But first of course would come enemy beams since the wasps had the range advantage.

“Incoming,” called Oliver at Weapons.

Green and yellow beams struck out from all fifteen wasp ships. They were grouped in two sets of ships, one of seven and one of eight. One group of seven ships fired on the
Lepanto
. The other group of eight fired on the
Midway
.

“Nav, lift our nose a bit,” he called to Louise. “Protect our cannon node.”

“Lifting,” responded the right side redhead.

“Hits on our nose,” called the left side redhead as Rosemary tapped her Tactical control pillar. “Shall I spin the ship?”

“Yes,” Jacob said. “But stop the spin when I order our right side proton laser to join in firing on one of the wasp ships. Can’t disrupt Quincy’s targeting aim.”

“Spinning.”

The ship cross-section holo showed a second hit from seven ship beams. The front ring of each ship fired two green lasers and two yellow lightning bolts at the
Lepanto
, making for fourteen hits on the nose and now the front belly of his ship. The belly railgun died in that fire. At least his two topside railgun launchers were operational. He planned to add multiple volleys of Seek-And-Kill Smart Rocks to the proton laser fire. Briefly he realized he should have loaded nuke warheads on some of the Smart Rocks, in the hope a few nukes would get through and blow holes in the log-like ships. Well, beams were faster and just as deadly.

“Range is now 9,937 klicks,” called Rosemary.

Finally.

“Tactical! Stop the spinning. Aim our proton mount at wasp ship W5. Fire!”

“Firing,” called the woman whose milky-white skin could not take a tan.

In the true space holo that filled the middle of the wallscreen, the wasp ship closest to his scissor blade became the target of six red proton beams as the StarFight cruisers and destroyers joined his fire. The
Midway
was leading the counter-attack on a wasp ship close to it.

The nose of W5 became red, then yellow, then white.

A vast explosion filled the front of the wasp ship, spreading rearward as the six red beams changed angle to run along the top spine of the wasp ship. Before those beams reached the rear weapons ring, it happened.

A white-yellow star glowed in carbon black space.

“Bandit splashed!” called Rosemary. “Launching first load of Smart Rocks.”

A vibration touched his boots as the railgun launchers on the
Lepanto’s
topside shot out a hundred beach balls loaded with plastique and maneuvering jets. A second vibration said his tail railgun had joined in the attack.

“Targeting W1 now,” called Rosemary.

A second white-yellow star flared on his father’s side of the approaching wasp formation. The combined eight proton beams from his blade of the formation had cut through the middle of his target, breaking it open. Silver water globules and white air filled the middle between the two ship halves. But they disappeared as the ship’s fusion reactor lost containment and created a decent fusion bomb that blew apart the two halves.

A third star flared where W1 had been.

“Second bandit splashed by StarFight,” Rosemary said, sounding even more excited.

“Punch through on our belly!” yelled Joaquin at Life Support. “Water shell is venting. Control valves closing. Inner hull still intact.”

That punch through from combined enemy beams had happened between the old belly punch through and the front nose of his ship. Both belly railgun launchers were long gone. Jacob bit his lip as Rosemary initiated a third volley of proton laser fire, this time targeting another wasp ship.

The situational holo counter now changed. It had shown the two wasp groups down to five ships on Jacob’s side and seven on his father’s side, with their two rows of green dots nearing the front of the enemy formation of two purple dot clusters. That now changed. A green dot vanished.

A new star filled this part of the cosmos.

“
St. Mihiel’s
gone,” called Oliver.

Jacob felt his gut tighten. He would miss the good humor of Dekker Lorenz and the 71 men and women aboard the frigate. Dekker had been firing his nose laser against W1, adding to that ship’s disintegration. Now his ship fragments joined the icy coldness of black space.

“But the
Midway’s
group got another wasp! Now a second!” cried Cassandra from Gravity.

Jacob saw two new stars take form on his father’s side of the formation.

Tiny yellow lights now lit up among the leading wasp ships as the volleys of Smart Rocks fired by the
Midway
, the
Lepanto
and the cruisers managed to hit wasp ship hulls, blowing up sensor arrays and weapons tubes. Hundreds had been fired. A few dozen made it through the laser counterfire of the wasp ships.

Two bigger stars now filled his father’s side of the wasp formation.

They looked like three megaton thermonuke blasts. But that couldn’t be. Yet they had happened at the positions of two wasp ships. Which now disappeared from the situational counter.

“Admiral?” Jacob called.

His father looked at Jacob from his Bridge. A grin filled his face. “Told you I had a few surprises up my sleeve! We used the transit time inward and back to Valhalla to retrofit some Smart Rocks with magfield coils. Then we squirted antimatter into them. They were mixed among the plastique loaded rocks. Two of them got through!”

“Amazing,” he murmured, giving his father a thumbs-up. “Well done, admiral.”

The situational counter now showed three purple dots on his father’s side, which included the giant wasp ship. Five purple dots were on Jacob’s side. Wrong. Now four.

“Splashed another bandit!” yelled Rosemary. “That was W3. We’re combining proton beams against W7.”

The white-yellow star of the dead wasp ship slowly became rings within rings of orange, then red plasma shells as vaporized parts of the wasp ship added to the star that had once been filled with living wasps.

Jacob saw his scissor blade was about to move past the four wasp ships remaining on his side. That included the damaged giant wasp ship that had been led by Hunter One. It was also the ship that had sent down a shuttle loaded with a lightning bomb that had killed Admiral Johanson, Captain Miglotti and XO Anderson. Time to go after it.

“StarFight formation! Reverse course! Let’s run up the tails of these bastards!”

Even as he heard cheers from the other six ship captains, a new star took form. It had been a green dot.

“The
Inchon
is gone,” called Rosemary, her voice suddenly soft.

Jacob watched the situational holo as Louise turned the
Lepanto’s
nose into a seventy degree turn that would allow the Battlestar to lead the new attack formation. One part of his mind said the cruisers, destroyers and surviving frigate
Aldertag
would come about and follow his lead. Another part of his mind said Earth had traded a frigate and a destroyer to take out eight wasp ships. It was now sixteen green dots versus seven purple dots. He did not like the four-to-one tradeoff. The seven wasp survivors included the two giant ships. Which were combining their beams against the
Chesapeake
and the
Hampton Roads
. Water globules from
Chesapeake’s
right side said it had a punch through.
Hampton
wobbled in its course, then resumed its curve-around vector track.

“Navigation, put us in the path of the beams hitting our cruisers.”

“Maneuvering.”

The topside of the Battlestar became nearly sun hot as green lasers and yellow lightning bolts filled the space where his spine proton laser mount and topside plasma battery had been.

Two yellow-white stars filled the void.

“The
Midway
got one. The StarFight ships got a second. Both on our side,” called Rosemary, sounding very somber.

One part of Jacob’s mind said it was down to five wasp ships against sixteen human ships. Two wasps on his side and three on his father’s side.

“Punch through into Weapons Deck,” called Joaquin. “It’s through the inner hull. Hallway hatches closing. We lost some people in the hallway section opened to space.”

“Nav, lift us up ten degrees. Our belly proton mount can still fire,” Jacob said, hoping his crewmates listening over the All Ship vidcast would understand he cared about the crew who had died in the topside Weapons hallway. Just as he cared about those who had died when the
St. Mihiel
and the
Inchon
had become sun-hot vapor.

A new star showed. A green dot vanished.

“The
Red Sea
is gone,” Rosemary said so softly he wondered if she even meant to speak.

Fifteen versus five. Time to do something radical.

“Engines! Move us up to eleven psol! Now!” Jacob looked further left. “Power, increase reactor output by ten percent. Do it!”

“Power output increasing,” responded Maggie, her voice firm.

“All thrusters firing beyond rating,” called Akira. “I’ve increased power flow to the fusion pellet containment fields.”

They had done this once before, during the first wasp attack in Kepler 22. Jacob knew his ship could take it. The
Lepanto
would outpace the following StarFight ships, which even now were combining their fire against the single wasp ship that followed behind the giant ship that had lost its front nose section. But it allowed his Battlestar to close on the fleeing giant ship, which was making just ten psol.

“Tactical, connect me with Chief Linkletter,” he said.

“Linking,” called Rosemary, her tone now eager as she realized his intent.

“Chief Petty Officer Linkletter reporting,” came the voice of the young man whom he now knew much better than two months ago. “Captain, you have orders for me?”

“I do. Target wasp ship W8. It’s the giant one. Advise me when it enters the impact zone of the cannon’s beam.”

Seconds passed.

“Range is 4,011 kilometers and closing,” called Rosemary.

“Target W8 is within reach!” called Linkletter.

At last
. “Fire antimatter cannon!”

In the true space holo that filled the middle of the wallscreen, a black beam of magnetically confined negative antimatter shot out from the
Lepanto
and impacted on the stern of the giant wasp ship. It was target W8 on the situational holo.

The ship’s three fusion thrusters blew apart as a small white-yellow sun glowed where once matter had been. That glow grew larger and larger, moving forward.

“Damn!” grunted Richard.