Kris Longknife 13 - Unrelenting (43 page)

“We’re going to have a hell of a fight on our hands, what with a thousand of those warships of theirs now having six hundred of their fast movers to outflank us,” Admiral Kitano said slowly. “I’d like to have Benson with me. Sorry to strip you down to just about nothing.”

“I’m leaving four Bird class guard ships at Alwa. The other eight will escort the beam ships,” Kris said.

“I’ll try to have a decent-size fleet when we rally to your position,” Kitano said.

“The beam ships should attrite the aliens for you before the fight.”

“When do we move?”

“There’s no use in further delays,” Kris said. “The yards have finished up the last of the battlecruisers. Even if they were to lay down another squadron for us, I’m none too sure we could find crews. We head out day after tomorrow. Sortie at 0900.”

“How are you going to get on the
Conqueror
?” Amber asked. “I noticed you sent Captain Drago over to kick butt and take names when the beam ships screwed up.”

“Yep. Baby and X-rays do not mix. They’re taking me over in
Wasp
’s pinnace. It’s hardened enough for orbit. They’re also jacking up the hardening on the
Conqueror
. It should be a piece of cake.”

“You’re setting your pretty ass down on the biggest target, and you call it a piece of cake. Admiral, you’ve got a skewed perspective.”

“No doubt I do. I’m a Longknife,” Kris said, with a chuckle.

The two went to study the order of battle on the wall of Kris’s flag plot. Jack stood at Kris’s elbow, Admiral Furzah and Captain Drago at Kitano’s.

“Who commands Fourth Fleet?” Kitano asked. “You took it out last time.”

“I’m short flag officers,” Kris admitted. “Captain Zermatt of the Helvetican never fought more than a squadron. Commodore Nottingham fought the Earth task force when Admiral Yi funked out on us. There is one captain who might fit a three star slot.”

“Who?” Kitano asked.

“Captain Drago,” Kris said.

“What?” the mentioned captain said.

“You were an admiral once upon a time,” Kris said. “A damn good one, I hear. You left a desk job to keep a certain princess delinquent out of trouble, which got you into enough trouble and fights to satisfy any fighting man. We’re heading into a desperate fight. I won’t be commanding a fleet from my old flag. Why don’t you take Fourth Fleet out for a spin?”

Captain Drago stood silent for a long minute. “It sounds like an honor I can hardly refuse,” he finally said.

“You have any problem with this?” Kris asked Kitano.

“I’d say you’ve been underutilizing this man for a long time. I’d be glad to see him back in the saddle.”

“Nelly, cut the paperwork,” Kris said.

“It’s on Admiral Longknife’s desk,” Nelly said with glee.

Kitano retrieved the certificate. Kris signed it, and handed it to her longtime friend. “You better go find some stars.”

“Thank you, I think. Wouldn’t you know I’d get a fleet with just days to get ready.”

“What do you expect from one of those damn Longknifes?” Kris said.

Admiral Drago saluted. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a rather tough job at hand.”

“You want to keep
Wasp
?” Kris asked.

The freshly minted admiral shook his head. “I think having
Wasp
and
Intrepid
with those Birds will be the least I can do for you.”

“Thanks. Let’s hope I don’t need them.”

“Yeah, right,” Drago said with a smile, and exited.

For a long moment, Kris and Amber continued gazing at the screens. Both gravitated toward the one showing System X. Kris measured and remeasured the distance between the alien base at one end of the system, her neutron star toward the other, and the jump she’d use to enter.

“You think they’ll charge you once they take a few hits?” Amber asked.

“But will they charge in without decelerating or come in slow and light on their feet to dodge?”

“I’m ordering the ships on blockade duty to refuel on their way to the rally point. I’ll have the ships here take on double their normal reaction mass load. If they don’t use it, they can dump it, but if they need it . . .” Amber left unsaid.

“Nelly, calculate a Condition Zed for the battlecruisers with excess reaction mass.”

“How much excess?” Nelly asked.

“I don’t know.”

“You’re no help,” Nelly growled.

“There’s no way to tell until we get there,” Amber answered for Kris.

“A fat lot of good all that nice crystal armor is going to do you if you’ve got reaction mass bulging out love handles.”

“Love handles, Nelly?” Kris yelped.

“You know, those things you get . . .”

“Yes, I know how you get then,” Kris said, cutting Nelly off, and patting her own very bulging “love handle.”

Amber was polite enough to almost stifle a laugh at Kris’s computer’s image of her fleet. Or Nelly’s discomforting of Kris. Kris didn’t ask which and changed the subject.

“Anything more we need to do?” Kris asked her Navy deputy.

“Yes, would you mind promoting Rear Admiral Hawkings to command the First Fleet so I can concentrate on leading all of them?”

“The Battlecruiser Fleet for you,” Kris said. “The Battle Fleet for me.”

“Something like that,” Kitano said, nodding.

“Nelly.”

“The paper is already on your desk,” Nelly answered.

Kitano retrieved it; Kris signed it. “I wish I had more ships for you,” she said as she handed Amber the promotion for her subordinate into her place.

“We took on the first alien base ships with what, thirty-four frigates with only 20-inch lasers. Now look at us. You’re sending me out with five fleets as big or bigger. What’s that, two-hundred-plus battlecruisers? How will I handle all of them?”

“You’ll find a way.”

“God help the aliens. If they’re still thinking of us as vermin, they won’t know what hit them.”

“You did read the report that they may have longer-ranged lasers on those fast cruisers. Maybe some on their warships.”

“I read it. I’ll keep them at arm’s length. I’m no Admiral Yi. My religion strictly forbids doing crazy charges. But we’ve got the 22-inch lasers and crystal armor. I’ll use it all—cautiously.”

“Good. Godspeed, good hunting, and sink them all.”

Admiral Kitano saluted. Kris returned it. Admiral Furzah, Penny, and Masao followed her out. Kris was left alone with Jack.

“You really that confident?” he asked.

“Hold me. Feel my trembling,” Kris said, folding herself into his arms.

59

Most
of the fleet was already on station, guarding three exits from System X. Word went out to pull back from Jumps Alpha, Beta, and Gamma and rally at Jump Eta.

A pair of courier ships were left at each jump to keep an eye on what the aliens were up to. At last report, they were still orbiting that gas giant, busy making more ships.

Three days later, every human battlecruiser this side of the galaxy was one jump out from System X. Kris joined the
Conqueror
, using
Wasp
’s pinnace. It had been strange, sailing with Commander Pett. She was a competent woman, well versed in Kris’s need, but she was not the friend Drago had become.

He had taken
Unrelenting
in Captain Becky Kaeyat’s division for his flag. Kris had issued a lot of promotions in the last three days. She would not send young people into bloody battle wearing junior rank for the job they’d do this day.

Admiral Furzah calculated the odds against them at sixty-four to one. She, the ever-optimist cat, had transferred with Kris, Penny, and Masao to the
Conqueror
. They would provide her key staff for the coming fight.

With the newly respun
Falcon
and
Harpy Eagle
keeping watch on the far side of the jump and reporting no activity from the aliens except in their own little corner of the system, Kris decided to risk a fast entry into System X. The
Conqueror
and her sisters would go through the jump at forty-eight thousand kilometers an hour. Keeping eight hundred kilometers between them, they’d make the jump a minute apart.

The battlecruisers coming out from the Alwa system were all under Admiral Kitano’s direct command. She had them tucked in closer, at a hundred-klick interval; they’d jump every ten seconds. Tight, but not likely to dent any hulls.

None of this would have been possible if the aliens had deployed even the most rudimentary pickets. They hadn’t even chased the
Victorious
away but left it to report on matters until Kris ordered it withdrawn as her beam ships approached the jump.

The
Victorious
and
Vanguard
waited patiently fifty klicks from the jump. Kris could only wonder how Hanson was taking the word of his promotion to commodore and command of BatRon 16 in Benson’s reserve fleet.

The jump went smoothly. Kris watched from her flag plot, reestablished in
Conqueror
’s core.
Wasp
had even brought over her desk, leather couches, and chairs. More importantly, they’d brought her screens. Nelly attached them to the very good sensor suite aboard the beam ship, necessary for targeting even if the designers hadn’t been nearly as committed to hitting something.

Kris and Nelly would see that changed.

Once through the jump,
Conqueror
set course at 1.5 gees for a burned cinder of a planet orbiting the neutron star. The other beam ships followed.

Immediately, battlecruisers began to shoot through. Thirty-five minutes later, the fleet was sorting itself into a cross of four task fleets, each with four or five squadrons. Admiral Benson trailed in reserve with four squadrons.

Wasp
and
Intrepid
caught up with
Conqueror
and took station well ahead. The eight Bird class frigates,
Ostrich
,
Cock o’ the Walk
,
Eagle
,
Falcon
,
Heron
,
Osprey
,
Kiwi
, and
Kookaburra,
came up the rear. Slower to join were
Merlin
,
Hermes
,
Apollo
,
Atalanta
,
Diana
, and
Artemis
. Unlike the Birds, they had four reactors instead of three. That gave them speed but only four 20-inch lasers to the Birds’ six. Birds could fight but not run. Merlins had better run rather than fight.

Kris had no idea which class would help her the most, but they were all she had. Beam ships could hardly run.

Hours later, the aliens answered Kris’s gambit. Every alien ship, warship, fast cruiser, and mother ship, took off for Kris’s side of the system. The mother ships accelerated at 1.3 gees. Most of the warships pulled ahead at 1.75 gees, then slowed to 1.5 gees. The cruisers had also bolted at first, at nearly two gees, but were slowing to keep close to mother.

Only the door knockers stayed in orbit. Interesting, that.

Kris ordered the battlecruiser fleets to slow to one gee and intercept them halfway across the system. That done, she urged the beam ships to lay on more acceleration, but the skippers of the three big round balls were reluctant. “Remember, we have to slow this steaming hunk of cow turd, Princess. If we lay too much energy on, we might not slow down, and then what?”

NELLY, ARE THE STRUCTURAL AND ENGINEERING LIMITS OF THIS CONTRAPTION AS LIMITING AS THESE FELLOWS THINK?

KRIS, I CAN TELL YOU THE REACTORS ARE STRESSED AT 1.5 GEES AND THE HULL IS MAKING ODD MOANING SOUNDS. I THINK HE MAY BE RIGHT. I DON’T THINK THE DESIGNERS OF THESE THINGS REALLY UNDERSTOOD WHAT BEING IN A WAR MEANT.

THANK YOU, NELLY. “Okay, Captain. Keep me informed.”

Jack smiled at her. “That didn’t hurt, now did it?”

“I guess I’m spoiled. The first
Wasp
gave us everything it had. The last two
Wasp
s didn’t leave me with a complaint in the world.”

“And now all your vultures are coming home to roost.”

“Something like that.”

“Why don’t you and baby take a nap?”

“Damn it, Jack, I hate being this tired,” Kris said, but through a huge yawn.

“It’s not time to fight yet,” Jack said. “Nelly, make her one of those nice chairs. Lean back, dear. I’ll get you and baby a blanket.”

“And what are you going to do? Watch me drool?”

“You don’t drool, love. But I need to check
Conqueror
’s Marine detachments. It’s got a lot of colonials, even a few Ostriches. I think the scientists are a bit taken aback to see a bird in Marine green. I don’t want any chest bumps to break out.”

“You do that. Baby and I will wait for you.”

She blew him a kiss. Instead, he trotted over and gave her a gentle kiss on her forehead.

To Kris’s disgust, she was asleep before the door closed.

60

Kris
came awake before
Conqueror
flipped to decelerate toward the burned-out planet that would be their base for this fight. About a third of an Astronomical Unit from the neutron star, the distance from Sol to Earth, the rock was in easy range of the star, but far enough away for the ships to avoid the worst of the huge magnetic waves coming off it.

Somewhere on Kris’s desk was a report marveling at how lucky they were that the two stars here were separated by nearly half of an AU, some seven million kilometers. If they’d been closer, they’d be dealing with a red dwarf being robbed of its substance by the neutron star and all sorts of nasty stuff.

Kris patted baby and told her how lucky she was.

The aliens had settled onto a solid course while Kris slept. The mother ships were in a diamond formation, one high, two middle, one low, some hundred thousand klicks behind the battle line. Their acceleration had slowed to one gee.

The warships had formed up into a huge battle array. Each mother ship had seven dishes of thirty ships ahead of it. This trip out, the dishes were arranged in groups of two high, three middle, and two low.