Lens of Time (33 page)

Cyanna had seen that when the Red Ships formed up, the ships in the base had their main beam turrets pointed forward until they completed the base. Then they turned their turrets to the rear. This time they had managed use that against them. Amie looked at the empty berths on the Amazon and wondered how costly this fight had been. Mikal saw that more than fifty thousand Needles had been destroyed. He watched as a Light Wave was fired into the planet and then he jumped his fleet away to lick their wounds. He had lost two thousand main battleships along with the needles. This was a victory in terms of numbers, but he knew the Union would run out of ships long before the Red Sector at the rate of loss he had endured. The numbers were just so overwhelming.

He waited for the report from Riebbe and worried about Loree. Would they have a future? He waited for the reports. The first news to arrive was that Loree’s ship had been hit and destroyed. Survivors were being picked up. He put his head in his hands and prayed. He understood the Red Ships hatred. He was starting to feel it as well. This was becoming personal. The next six hours were the longest Mikal had ever experienced. Then he lifted his head when he heard, “Bet I had you worried.”

Mikal took the deepest breath he had ever taken and said, “Thank you, God.”

Loree said, “You should thank the crew of the Zendra. The Hive Ship found my escape pod tangled up in wreckage. Don’t worry, my love. I’m alright.”

Mikal whispered, “My life is back. Stay safe.”

“I’ll do what I can in this crazy war. I’ll contact you after I organize my new ship and crew.”

• • •

RV watched the video of the battle and shook his head. “We need a more effective weapon against their ships. I know our ships are more maneuverable than theirs but that beam is so wide and the turrets can turn fast enough to hit our ships. They just use that beam to sweep the area around their ships.”

• • •

Phil and Anne were in RV’s conference room watching the video. They had come to the Havana to answer any questions he had about the information they had gathered on the Red Sector’s history. They waited patiently as Cyanna and RV tried to determine how to counter the advantages of the Red Battleships.

After a few minutes Phil said, “I’ve found that it’s often good to see what they can’t do to determine what should be done.”

RV and Cyanna looked at Phil and Anne hoped he hadn’t made the Admiral angry. “Tell me what you mean, Captain.”

“Well, I’ve been watching the video while we’re waiting and it appears they do a great job of attacking anything around them.”

“Go on.”

“I assume that you busted up their formation in an attempt to eliminate their combined fire.”

“That’s our plan.”

“Well, what do they not do well?”

Cyanna looked at RV and replayed the video. She looked back at Phil and asked, “What do you see?”

“They don’t change direction very quickly. Their turns are not done sharply.”

RV said, “They don’t have to; their turret beams cover the arc of their maneuvers.”

“Not from the rear of their ship.”

RV said, “Go on.”

“Notice that both turrets on the rear of the ship are slightly raised above the hull. They are designed to fire over the rear stabilizer fins and fan out above and below them. When they pass the fins the beams are at their narrowest.”

RV replayed the video and slowed down the replay of a Red Ship firing at a pursuer. “You’re right. Where are you going with this?”

“I think we’ve determined that the force fields around those ships is strong but not that much stronger than our own. I think you need to use a weapon that chases them and can move deftly enough to stay between those two beams as it moves in on their ships from the rear.”

Cyanna said, “There’s the same clearance on the front.”

Anne said, “True but the bow of the ship can be moved up and down much faster than the stern where the thrusters are located.”

RV stared at the two of them for a long moment and said, “Did you see this before you came in here?”

Phil looked at Anne and turned back to RV, “Actually, this is the first video of a battle with the Red Ships that we’ve seen. We’ve observed them fighting hundreds of thousands of years ago but this is the first current use of their ships we’ve seen.”

RV leaned back in his chair and said, “So what would you do with this information?”

“I’d back off on production of the Light Waves and start producing the mini-strikers.”

Cyanna was watching RV and saw that he had already arrived at the same conclusion, but wanted to see how this young captain’s mind worked.

“Why?”

“Because they are one third the size of the main penetrators and have more space to maneuver in that gap between the beams. They’re weightless when they’re attacking, so then can move instantly to the commands being given by their guidance boards and can accelerate as fast as any missile we use. Just set them to detect the heat from the thrusters and launch them in waves.”

Cyanna said, “Wouldn’t all of them home in on the first blast?”

“You don’t set them to target all heat; only the specific heat being emitted by the Red Ship engines.”

RV said, “You’d have them also avoid any ship that had the frequency of a mini-striker between it and the thrusters.”

Phil tilted his head and nodded at RV, “You read my mind.”

“Where did you learn so much about the strikers?”

Phil smiled, “Anne taught me while we were collecting light from the Red Sector. She also told me that the weakest point of a force field is where the engines are sending thrust.”

RV looked at Anne and smiled, “She’s right.” He looked at Phil and said, “What have you learned from your study of the Red Sector’s past?”

“You are absolutely right about breaking up their formations. Once the formation is completed and starts moving, it is irresistible.”

“What do you mean?”

“Every Red Ship starts firing their beams which extend more than sixty miles in all directions from their location. The base of the pyramid fires to the rear and the four sides cover everything else. Nothing you fire at that formation can make it through their beams. Once it starts moving, it can’t be stopped.”

RV didn’t want to ask but needed to know, “Can a new attack craft with the new force field make it through?”

“I honestly don’t know. The data is just too close to call.”

RV looked at Cyanna and then said to Phil, “Does this formation have any weak points?”

“Not really; but the weakest point it has is where the base of the formation meets the four sides.”

“Why is that?”

“That’s a transition point. The ships in the base are firing at the rear of the formation and the ships next to the base are firing across their beams to cover the gap between the two walls. That area usually only has one of their beams firing through it.”

“That seems to be an area we can exploit.”

“Only if you can get a ship into that corridor without other beams moving before it hits.”

Anne added, “And the ship attempting to hit that corridor must be moving at extremely high velocity and be able to hit a moving target.”

Cyanna said, “What about the gaps in the thrusters at the base?”

“The ships are staggered in the formation so there is not a clear path to the ships.”

RV thought about the formation and how to crack it open. Then Phil said, “Sir, I’m not sure you understand the full magnitude of this.” RV looked up at him. “The base of that formation is a ten thousand mile wide square and the four sides extend more than twenty thousand miles in front of the base. It’s shaped like a spearhead that’s big enough to kill a universe. When that formation arrives at a planet it turns so that the base is pointed at the planet and it burns the planet into ash.”

RV looked at Cyanna and said, “That’s one heck of a box.”

Cyanna slowly nodded, “I’m force to agree.”

RV turned to Phil and said, “From this moment forward you are being reassigned to the Havana and will report directly to Admiral Hardy. The two of you are going to work on how to beat this formation.” Phil started to protest and RV said, “You have no excuses. We don’t need to see the past any time soon. I need the two of you in the present. You are promoted to Rear Admiral and Lt. Hardy you are promoted to Commodore. Now get to work.”

Phil sighed and looked at Anne, “I had to open my mouth.”

“We’ll get back to flying the Ninja when this is over. This is a challenging assignment. I’m looking forward to it.”

Phil smiled, “Then let’s get to work.” Phil turned to RV, “I need six main battleships.”

RV did a double take, “What on earth for?”

“I really need six thousand but six will do for a start.”

RV slowly shook his head and looked at Cyanna. She smiled and said, “You’ll have your ships in an hour.”

“Thank you, Admiral.”

The two left the room and RV watched them leave. Cyanna smiled, “You can still be surprised.”

“What surprises me is that they have been hidden in their current assignments. I’m thankful they came here.”

“Do you think they’ll come up with a way to penetrate the formations?”

“Smaller ones, maybe; I’m not sure there is a way to break the biggest one.”

“Let’s hope they find an answer.”

• • •

Dolly watched the Red Ships start to gather above Sierra-Garcia and the size of the fleet was growing by the minute. Thousands of ships would arrive and immediately take their place in the giant formation. According to George, these ships were only a small fleet compared to the ones being fought in M-87. She was so wrong in her thinking; there should be nothing withheld in fighting these creatures and even the other two sectors should have been allowed to die.

She sighed and knew that even that was an error in judgment. If our fleets weren’t in M-87 attacking the Red Sector, then billions of ships would be surrounding the planet instead of the millions gathering in orbit. She looked over at George and he said, “That’s only half of them.”

Dolly looked at her display again and wondered how they could possibly survive against such a massive force.

• • •

Cyanna sat in RV’s lap and sighed. It was two a.m. ship time and they were on the bridge looking out of the viewport. She saw a Moet ensign come in and relieve the sensor officer. “We’ve really been lucky.”

RV continued to stare out the viewport as he said, “Why is that?”

“Without the huge populations on the Alliance and Moet planets, we would have never been able to crew the ships in the fleets, much less the small craft. The fight with them could have gone another way.”

RV nodded and remained silent.

“Are we going to be able to use the small craft against their formations?”

“If we can’t, we’ll lose this war.”

“I suspected as much. How are we going to get them in close enough to be effective?”

“I’m still working on that.”

“Their force fields are just not strong enough to get through their massed beams. One would think that if they were moving fast enough the force fields wouldn’t be stressed very long.”

RV said, “Like moving your finger through a candle flame. Move it quickly and it won’t be burned.”

“Yeah, something like that.”

RV raised the command chair back from a reclining position and Cyanna saw the wheels turning in his mind, “What?”

RV hit his panel, “Admiral Phillips, you and Commodore Hardy report to the bridge immediately.”

Cyanna looked at RV with raised eyebrows and he said, “The problem with using the new attack craft the way they were designed is that they cannot hit a force field too fast or they’ll punch through and hit the ship inside it.”

“Yeah, so what?”

Phil and Anne walked in yawning, “Do you ever sleep?”

“It’s not on the schedule. I need you to make a quick jump to Sierra-Garcia and get a reading on how far from the Red Ship Formation their beams extend. I need you to do it now.”

Anne saluted and said, “We’re on our way.”

RV hit his panel again and Boden appeared, “How fast is the relay you put in the new attack craft?”

Boden said, “And good morning to you as well.”

“Oh, sorry about that. Good morning.”

Boden smiled, “It operates at light speed.”

“Yes, all our relays do because they’re electrical. What I mean is; how fast can it receive an input and activate?”

“If it’s done by the computer, almost instantaneously. Why do you ask?”

“The almost part is important. What if I want the relay to return a ship to weightlessness if it hits something, how long would it take to make that happen?”

Boden thought a moment and said, “Stand by just a moment.” He looked away and after a short pause another face appeared on the display beside his. “Tell Ramson what you want.”

RV repeated the question and the engineer began entering data on his panel. “I need more information. How fast will the ship be going when it hits?”

“I won’t have that information until a ship I dispatched returns. Let me tell you what I’m thinking and if it can be done.”

Cyanna listened as the two Federation leaders listened and nodded. After fifteen minutes Boden said, “We can’t bring all those ships in to make the kind of modifications you want within the time frame you’ve given us.” Cyanna saw RV’s excitement dissipate. Then the Engineer said, “You have to run the commands through the computer. If what I’m thinking works, it would only take a download.”

Boden eyes got a far-a-way look and then he said, “That’s eight actions that have to done.”

“If the speed isn’t too fast, it can do it in the time allotted.”

Boden didn’t look convinced and he said, “Let us work on this on our end and get back to us with the other data as quickly as possible.”

The Display went dark and RV said, “I’ll see you later.”

Cyanna chuckled and said, “Like a candle.”

RV smiled, “Blow them all out to have your wish come true.”

Two hours later Phil and Anne arrived and said, “Seventy-five miles.”

“Did you get a reading on the energy of those beams close to the ships firing them?”

“We did. I’ll have the computer send it to you now.”