Warpath (Rise of the Empire Book 4) (21 page)

She knew that Adrian’s Warpath fleet would start its trip to Nelus in a month, the trip from Warpath to Nelus was much shorter than what her fleet would need to go through. She also knew that Adrian had some kind of new ships, but not much about them.

For a moment she debated contacting him, but so much time had passed between their last talk that she was afraid that she wouldn’t have anything to say. She would be lying to herself if she didn’t admit that there were times during the last thirty years when she regretted not waiting for Adrian. She and Harry had a good marriage, for the first few years. And then after the reality of her life calling hit her husband, they started to fight, constantly. Eventually he found someone else to keep him company during the time she was away.

When she found out about it, she was surprised that when it didn’t hit her as hard as she thought it would be. She cared for Harry, but she knew now that she had made a mistake. But even with that knowledge she had refused to get a divorce. Instead she insisted that they try to mend things. And they did in a fashion, although things were never again the same.

She knew why she stayed and insisted on them fixing things. It was because of her Pride. All her friends had told her that she was making a mistake, and yet she ignored them all. And now she didn’t want to admit to all those who had warned her that she was wrong.

Shaking her head she dismissed those thoughts and turned to her holo. There she saw her fleet of three hundred and seventy ships on its way deep into the Sowir territory. Her fleet was about to use the trans-station, and soon her ships will start the transfer. Bethany watched as her ships stopped in the Sanctuary-Waypoint trans-station, and she opened the comm to her fleet.

“This is Fleet Commander Jones-Wright to the Second Fleet, prepare for transfer.”

***

Fleet Commander Nair Hakeem of the Third Fleet watched as Second Fleet entered the trans-lane vortex in a violet wave of light. It will take them several hours to go through the trans-lane, several hours during which no ship could enter that lane. That was why his ships will be using the trans-lane to Nuva. Their travel time will be two days, and then they will need to take several more lanes to get to Sowir territory. The two fleets would be going to different areas of their territory, the Third Fleet will strike at their border systems, while the Second Fleet attacks the systems deeper in the Sowir controlled space.

The two fleets will still have to use hyperspace travel to their targets, the Empire hadn’t explored all the trans-lanes in the Sowir territory. But it would still be much faster than the Sowir fleet, the two fleets will be in position before the Sowir arrive at Nelus. But since Sowir now had FTL communications they needed to wait until Warpath’s fleet attacks that fleet in order to prevent it turning around to defend their space. Their attack won’t start until the Sowir fleet commits to sieging Nelus. Nair commed his fleet, and announced their transfer.

***

October; Year 31 – Warpath

The ten massive ships moved slowly out from the massive opening of the asteroid. Each of the ships completely different than the other, their hulls painted in different colors. But all shared one thing, the emblem of their fleet, the Vanguard Fleet as it was dubbed by Clan Leader Adrian Farkas. A red shield with two swords crossed on it.

The ships moved in formation with two ships that were larger than the others in the lead, followed by the others arranged in two rows of four. The small force increased its speed as they exited the asteroid and set a course towards the trans-station to Waypoint. About thirteen hours later, the fleet arrived in Waypoint system and was greeted by a fleet of three hundred and fifty sovereign class battleships. At 800 meters long the two hundred battleships were a force to be reckoned with, but they were an old class, their hulls built only with metals that the humanity had used before the forming of the Empire. They were still powerful, the level of their technology on par with Sowir Dominion, but the ten ships that moved to join them were far more advanced.

The two forces met and joined in a fleet. In concert they moved towards one of the Waypoints less used trans-stations that would take them in the direction of the Nelus system. The travel time was about a week, but the fleet would sit in wait for the Sowir fleet to arrive and begin its assault on the system. Then when they were committed, the Warpath Fleet would enter the last trans-lane and catch them from behind, while the Nelus fleet attacks from the front. Together the two smaller fleets would be able to take on the Sowir fleet.

Chapter Nineteen

December; Year 31

Adrian sat and waited for the Sowir forces to arrive at Nelus. The timing was tricky, his fleet needed to arrive early enough to prevent as many Nel casualties as they could, but also late enough for the Sowir fleet to be already engaged with the defenders. Which was why his fleet was waiting for their monitoring drone to report on Sowir’s arrival. It will take the invading fleet about five hours to reach the first of Nelus installations in the orbit of the system’s gas giant, and it would take Adrian’s fleet five and a half hours to arrive by trans-lane.

Giving Sowir an hour and a half to attack the installations. Nelus had about forty ships stationed there as a defense, in spite of Adrian’s suggestion that they move them and evacuate the installations. The Nelus council was still playing games, they refused to believe in anything that the Empire told them. Deluding themselves in some kind of superiority. They believed that they could take the Sowir fleet, if one existed, by themselves. Adrian just hoped that the council doesn’t do anything stupid once they realize the magnitude of the threat.

***

Nelus

The relative peace and calm of Nelus system was shattered as the Nelus defending fleet’s light speed sensors detected a fleet of invading ships exiting hyperspace at the barrier of the system. Immediately after their arrival two thousand and two hundred ships started moving towards their closest target, a fueling station in the orbit of the system’s gas giant.

Short time before that, unnoticed by anyone a small monitoring that was positioned close to the most likely arrival point of the invading fleet, detected the invaders and sent out an FTL feed of their arrival to another system. The hyperspace communication was undetected by the invaders whose own sensors were blinded by the massive hyperspace transfer of their fleet.

***

Upon receiving the feed from the drone, Adrian immediately passed the information back to Sanctuary and then ordered his fleet to open a vortex to the trans-lane. A few seconds later his ships were washed in a violet wave of light and disappeared. It will be five and a half hours until they reappear again.

***

Bethany read the orders coming in from Sanctuary. She ordered her ships to enter the trans-lane, on their way towards one of Sowir key systems. Her ships would travel for a week, but would travel some twenty light years. The system had only a few ships defending it as it was deep in the Sowir territory. But it had a significant industrial capability, which her ships would take for the Empire. Any installation that they could land troops on will be taken, any other will be destroyed.

The Second Fleet opened a vortex to trans-space and entered.

***

Nair Hakeem got the same order from Sanctuary that the Second Fleet did. His Third Fleet was in one of the Empire’s border systems, waiting to enter the trans-lane to the closest Sowir system. His ships would be the first to strike at the Sowir held system in this new war, as the travel time through the lane was just two days. The system that was his target had a moderate military presence, sixty Sowir ships were always stationed there, with dozens moving through the system on and from their patrols of the border.

Nair sent out the order to his ships, and they entered the trans-lane.

***

Nelus – five and a half hours later – warship Harbinger

The Warpath Fleet entered Nelus system between the hyperspace barrier and the system’s gas giant, at the Nelus only incoming trans-station. Immediately their sensors went active, bathing the system in a tachyon burst. The fleets FTL sensors came back painting the exact picture of the system on Clan Leader Adrian Farkas’ small holo on his command board.

The Sowir Fleet was moving further into the system, towards the fifth planet of the system its three moons and twenty four stations orbiting them and the planet. There was nothing in the orbit of the sixth planet – the gas giant, only debris from destroyed ships and installations. That angered Adrian, he had warned the council to abandon those installations and move his ships back to the fifth planet which was much more defensible.

The council had stationed a fleet of four hundred ships at the fifth planet. Again they had refused to listen, and had kept the rest of their ships in orbit of Nelus. The Sowir had started preparing their ship formations for the siege of the planets defenses. Adrian could see it in their movements, a glance at the information provided by Clan Leader Jusan told him that the Sowir ships were just outside the effective range of the station’s weapons. The Sowir had put eight hundred ships forward while the rest were adjusting their course to move around the planet and proceed deeper towards the next planet.

That would have played well for Adrian’s fleet, if he had arrived a bit later. He knew that the Sowir would turn those ships around once they detect his ships. He checked the ranges and calculated that if his fleet starts moving at full speed immediately they would catch the eight hundred Sowir ships before the rest could return. It would take the Sowir awhile to detect his ships, as their sensors were still only light speed.

Assuming their fleet turns back the moment they detect his ships, he would have nineteen minutes until they get back and in range of Adrian’s ships who will by then be engaged with the force they left behind. In nineteen minutes his ships could do some real damage to the Sowir, if the Nelus ships push forward as well. Once the rest of the Sowir fleet returns, he might need to disengage regroup and then see what can be done.

Deciding on a course of action, Adrian recorded and sent a message to the defenders instructing them to have their ships push forward at the Sowir once his arrive. He also sent a message for Sowir to surrender as the Emperor ordered, but both of them knew that it was unlikely they would accept. Then, with a couple swipes of his hand and implant commands he sent out orders to his fleet’s commanders and watched as his ships started moving forward. The speed of his ships was much faster than that of the Sowir, but still the ten Warpath ships were moving at speeds that were less than what they were capable of as they had to keep at the pace of the battleships.

Adrian swiped his hand to his left, and a list of names appeared there. With his implant he found the Commander of the Specter and opened a channel. In front of him a window appeared with the video from the Command Center of the Specter and its Commander sitting in her chair.

“Warmaster?” Commander of the Specter Mariana Tully asked, using Adrian’s title when in command of a fleet. He was no longer a part of the Empire’s regular fleet so his old rank of Fleet Commander no longer applied.

“Commander Tully, it looks like you will have the honor of being the first of the Vanguard fleet to test the full extent of your abilities in battle. It is time for you to weave your web Commander. I’m sending you your orders.” Adrian said. He saw the Commander read through his orders and then grin.

“Understood Warmaster.” She responded. Adrian nodded and closed the link.

He looked at the holo in front of him and watched as the Specter dipped below the fleet, and then as it’s heat signature slowly started fading. The Specter was equipped with best heat sinks that the Empire could produce, which would allow it to move cold for about a day before they would need to expel the heat out of the ship. Plenty of time to fulfil Adrian’s orders. He checked the movements of the Sowir main fleet once more. They were still moving away, but the light from Adrian’s fleet hadn’t reached them yet. But it will reach the force Adrian was moving towards soon.

Adrian started issuing orders to the battleships and the Vanguard fleet. He instructed Lighthouse to send out its drones out and spread half of them around the force in front of them and to send the other half towards the main force. He moved Tiamat and Titan in front with the battleships, splitting the force into two wall shaped formations of one hundred and fifty ships each, remaining fifty battleships he pulled back to his ship Naming the formation task force zero.

Then he sent the orders for Valhalla and Twilight to move into the Tiamat’s formation, and Retribution and Ras’tar to move into the Titan’s, renaming the two formations into task force one and task force two. He kept Lighthouse and Invictus with his ship and the battleships in the formation between the two walls.

As his force drew closer to the enemy, he started to notice a change in their formation, they had finally seen his ships. Which meant that the defenders should have gotten his message. There was no response from the Sowir and their movements suggested that there wasn’t going to be one. Another couple of minutes later and Adrian noticed the Nelus fleet moving forward, abandoning the defenses of their stations and moving to engage the Sowir. He also noticed that the Nelus ships moved at speed that will let his ships reach the Sowir first. That was fine, their ship were less powerful than Sowir ships.

Then his ships entered into firing range. Firing missiles at the Sowir ships wouldn’t be as effective as it would have been against a smaller force, their ships were positioned close together and there was enough of them to provide protection for each other. But Adrian still sent out orders for task forces one and two to do so. His missiles might not even reach their ships, but it wouldn’t matter, the Sowir had no way of defending against his ships other weapons.