Troy Rising 2 - Citadel (49 page)

Lhi'Kasishaj was pretty much resigned to his fate. He was going to get his head cut off, even though his people had pointed out that six AVs were simply insufficient.

Taking down the docks was, as always, taking time. They had to be disassembled and then moved through the gate in portions otherwise the relatively fragile platforms would be damaged. But at this point, he was ready to get out of the system. Even though that probably meant being shorter.

“You spineless coward!” Gi'Bucosof screamed. “That would be your choice. You and your working group that couldn't even figure out the Thermopylae was online!”

They'd gotten that much of a transmission from the second group. That they were taking fire from the Thermopylae and the Troy was physically blocking the gate. The humans were back to thoroughly jamming hypercom so they didn't know more than that.

“When we get back I am going to denounce you as incompetent and a coward,” Gi'Bucosof continued. “This was, after all, your command.”

“Which you, unilaterally, took over,” Lhi'Kasishaj pointed out. “The mission logs show that every order was given by you. I was relegated to listening to my mission be destroyed by your orders!”

“We'll see what High Command has to say about . . .”

“Marshall . . .” Captain Azugom said. “I'm getting word that there is a gate activation. The codes are for Terra.”

“Perhaps . . .” Gi'Bucosof said. “Perhaps the first group survived?”

“And perhaps this battle is truly over,” Lhi'Kasishaj said, voicing the thoughts of every sane person in the meeting. “Captain, send a signal to the fleet to prepare to defend the system against the Terran mobile forces . . .”

“Marshall . . .” the captain said in a low tone. “It's not cruisers . . .”

“Damn . . .” Kinyon said. “We fit!”

“Close,” Captain Pohlman pointed out. “We actually had to sort of bump off of some fields on the gate. That's a pretty powerful system.”

“And we have . . .” Captain Sharp said. “Uh . . . oh . . .”

“Define ‘uh, oh,' ” Admiral Kinyon said, looking at the tac screen. “Uh, oh.”

“Uh, oh,” Low Commander Osipheth said as the mass of nickel-iron emerged from the gate.

Aggressor squadrons consisted of one Aggressor, four Cofubof cruisers, two Gufesh destroyers and two Sheshibas frigates.

As the commander of the Sheshibas class frigate Yettoj, LC Osipheth was about the lowliest commander in the system. But it was still a command and one that he loved.

Watching the Troy emerge was, therefore, pretty much the end of any joy he might have had. Because the entire fleet was well aware that six Assault Vectors had just taken it on and not come back. Their effect was evident from the scarred surface. Which, along with a credit, would buy you a drink in the club.

“Jachchud signals taking override control,” the tactical officer said.

The Aggressors could integrate fire from their full battle group. With the Jachchud taking control of the battle, that was pretty much it for commanding as well. Except for the battle damage.

“Relinquish control,” Osipheth said. “For what good it will do.”

“We hit it!” Ucelef said. “I don't know who or what . . . But there's a continuous set of . . . nuclear explosion . . . s . . .” He trailed off.

Osipheth had been looking at the same readings and had the same moment of elation. But he'd also gotten to the fine print faster than his tactical officer.

“I think . . . that's their drive,” the commander said.

“Hah, hah!” one of the tactical enlisted Rangora said. “That's their . . . that's their . . .”

“Twenty-five megatons every tenth second,” Ucelef said. “Twenty . . . five . . .”

“That's their drive!” the tactical tech said. “Their drive! Their drive! Hah, hah . . . hahhahhahhahhahahaaaaaaa!”

“Appears to be slowing them down, though,” Osipheth said. “I think we need a medic up here. And I could use a drink.”

“I have twenty four Aggressor squadrons, total,” Sharp said. “Two forward guarding the docks. That was expected. The twenty-two and an AV were not.”

“Hit the guards first,” Admiral Kinyon said. “Boot them in the ass, don't piss on them. Then swing around the gate to engage the heavy forces.”

“Kick in the ass, aye,” Sharp said. “Full launch, Sector Two. Target Sierra Twenty-three. Full launch, Sector West. Target Sierra Twenty-Four. We need to maneuver to engage with lasers. I don't have any guns on North.”

“Maneuvering, come about,” the Admiral said. “Bring West and Two around to target the guard forces on the way by. Keep East, One and North towards the main fleet. Prepare to launch parasite craft.”

“Come about, aye,” Captain Pohlman said. “West and Two to spinward, aye. East, One, North to anti-spin, aye.”

“Prepare to launch parasites, aye,” Commodore Marchant said. “We're stacking them in the launch tubes.”

“Anti-spin Aggressors are in movement,” Sharp said. “They've opened fire.”

“Joy,” Admiral Kinyon said. “Try to keep it off the Orion, why don't you?”

“What about my ships?” Commodore Marchant said.

“Nothing says being in the Navy's safe,” Admiral Kinyon said.

“Joy,” LC Osipheth said as the battle globe opened fire. In the first three seconds it had fired more missiles than carried by the entire BBG. He'd already flushed his racks and was potting at it with his four terawatt laser. If any of the lasers of the defending fleet were bothering it it wasn't evident. It was turning, slowly, in space, apparently trying to maneuver to take the main fleet under fire.

“Missile fire targeted on the Jachchud,” Lieutenant Ucelef said. “Half of it. The other half is going for the Ru'Kezhilix.”

“That's their problem,” Osipheth said. “Defense link up?”

“Full lock,” Ucelef said. “Not that it's doing much good. We're stopping them but not fast enough.”

“I can see that,” Osipheth said. “No lasers at least. They don't have that damned solar laser to hit us with.”

“Laser fire,” Ucelef contradicted him. “Heavy. Targeted on the Ru'Kezhilix. Ru'Kezhilix is . . . gone.”

The laser of the Troy was not the SAPL but it concentrated more power in one battlestation than any five Assault Vectors. Many of the aiming collimeters had been damaged in the battle but there were more than enough left to hammer the defending Battleship Battle Groups.

It had taken some time to rotate the Troy around to where the main laser could engage but it was in the target box before the missiles got through the Rangora defenses.

One shot was all it took to take down an Aggressor's shields. The next pretty much ripped the wildly maneuvering ships to shreds.

Then the missiles started hunting for viable targets.

✺ ✺ ✺

“Take us in alongside the Jachchud,” Osipheth ordered. “The port remnants, that is.”

The heavy battlewagon had barely withstood the laser of the globe for a second. Then it was cut in half long-wise. Then the viciously powerful laser went on to find other targets, starting with the cruisers. Which gave the Yettoj a few moments of breathing room.

“Alongside the port remnants, aye,” the pilot replied.

“Sir?” Ucelef said.

“If we can get in there and shut down, we might not be noticed by the remaining missiles,” Osipheth said. “We're not going to win this battle but I'd like to survive it.”

“Still trying to sort out the sheep from the goats,” Captain Sharp said. “We're about in the basket for the beginning of fire from the main fleet. But the defenders are mostly gone.”

“Flush the parasites,” Kinyon ordered. “All of them as fast as possible.”

The Troy maneuvered like an aging tortoise. They still hadn't killed their velocity from gate exit and were somewhat in danger of hitting one of the docks. But it was time to come around and face the main fleet.

“Flush parasites, aye,” Commodore Pounders said.

“After everything else about the Troy,” Captain Kepler said, “this is one thing I can't quite get over.”

“Concur, sir,” Booth said.

“Carter, stand by for launch.”

“Ready for launch, aye,” Captain Kepler said, bracing himself into his chair. He didn't really need to. The launch system was a lower gravitational constant than the Carter's acceleration; the onboard inertial compensators would handle it easily. But knowledge and emotions were two different things. A two hundred meter long, fifty meter wide, ship was about to get shot out of a kilometer long ejection tube in less than a second. It should feel like you were in an accelerating Ferrari.

A really, really big Ferrari.

The Carter slid up the launch tube and jetted into space, hurtling towards the target ships at forty kilometers per second.

“Make sure our IFF is up,” Kepler said. “There's still a bunch of the Troy's missiles floating around hunting targets. Status on the Battle group?”

“Warrington and Mayrant are out of the tube,” the CIC officer said. “Monaghan and Trippe are flushing now.”

“And we're in business,” Kepler said. “Any incoming fire?”

“Not on us,” Booth said. “Don't ask about the Troy.”

“This is rather unpleasant,” Admiral Kinyon said as the first flight of missiles broke through the defenses. The Troy was ringing like a cymbal.

“CruRon away,” Commodore Marchant said. “Launching shuttles.”

“Arrh, me hearties!” Kinyon said, neutrally. “Boarders away! Adjust missiles to full anti-missile settings. Keep them off the parasites. And let's see how many they carry.”

Each of the Aggressors carried four hundred missiles. The Assault Vector Dwarf Mauler carried an additional five thousand.

The Aggressors could flush their magazines in under a minute. The AV took a bit longer, two minutes.

Two minutes after the Troy exited the gate, just short of fifteen thousand missiles, each having the kinetic energy equivalent of a ten megaton nuclear weapon, were in space and headed towards the battlestation.

But the Troy had missiles as well. Most of those were set to target on the enemy ships. Ten percent, though, were set to engage incoming missiles.

About ninety percent of the fire was getting through the defenses with the Troy sending most of its fire to the enemy fleet. Two hundred megatons of energy was hitting the battlestation every second. Most of it, however, was hitting on the North sector which was pointed at the enemy fleet. Which just meant it was slowly mining out the sector and otherwise doing no damage other than marginally changing the Troy's delta v.

As the missiles shifted to defense, that fire dropped off. The Troy, even with all the damage it had sustained, fired fifteen hundred missiles per second.

In ten seconds, Troy had launched as many missiles as the entire enemy fleet launched in one hundred and twenty. The missiles were successful at interception fifty percent of the time. Some hit multiple times. Those that “missed” were automatically programmed to continue on to the distant ship targets.

Ten seconds after that, there were no more enemy missiles.

“Cease fire,” Admiral Kinyon said. “Let's close a bit before we use up more missiles. No need to leave them in the target basket longer than necessary.”

“Close the fleet on the Dwarf Mauler,” Lhi'Kasishaj said. “Keep those missiles off of us. Activate the gate. We're getting out of . . .”

“We are going no where!” Gi'Bucosof shouted. “Close on the battlestation and destroy it!”

“You're insane,” Lhi'Kasishaj said. “That thing has more firepower than we can possibly face!”

“There are things you do not know, coward,” Gi'Bucosof said. “In a moment, it will simply be a very rich prize.”

“You don't seem to be enjoying the game, Niazgol,” Tyler said, moving a pawn. He had to be careful to get it into the right space since the Troy was rocking in a most unpleasant manner.

“I have rather had my fill of battles,” Gorku said, considering the board. “And being in this one seems unnecessary.”

“Depends upon the definition of unnecessary,” Tyler said. “Your move.”

“I know,” Gorku said. “I'm considering it.”

“I think the vulnerability of my rook is rather obvious,” Tyler said.

“And I'm wondering why you put it out in the middle of the board,” Gorku said. “Unsupported by other pieces.”

“It seems rather unnecessary, doesn't it?” Tyler said.

“Yes,” Gorku said, looking him in the eye. “What game are you playing?”

“More like which,” Tyler said, smiling. “Seriously. Your move.”

“I rather don't want to do this,” Gorku said, ruffling his back fur. “But . . . Paris.”

“Yes, Benefactor?”

“Code Tol-Par-Kie-Fon,” Gorku said. “Override Benefactor Six One Seven Four.”

“Yes, Benefactor,” Paris replied. “All defense shut down. Evacuating all personnel areas. Shutting down drive. Opening bay door. Sending surrender codes to Rangora fleet.”

“I'm sorry, Tyler,” Gorku said. “But it has to be this way.”

“Yes, it does, rather,” Tyler said as the hatch slid open. Three marines in suits entered with their lasers pointed casually at the floor.

Gorku blinked in surprise. He could clearly feel the Orion drive continuing to fire. And there was a hum under all the fire of the lasers still functioning and missiles being ejected. Through the crystal wall, the ripple of distortion from the maneuvering drives was visible.

“How?” Gorku said. “That . . . that is a hard coded override! It's a Benefactor override!”

“What you failed to consider,” Tyler said, gathering up the pieces, “was that Earth had a rather developed IT field before we met the Glatun. And while we had immense trouble with the complexity of your software when we first encountered it . . . well we've had seventeen years. That's the same time as from the development of the Apple Two to the internet boom. If you think we were going to put the survival of Earth in the hands of AIs we didn't fully understand . . . Seriously, did you really think we were that stupid?”

“How long had you known?” Gorku asked.

“AIs don't come fully awake until they're activated,” Tyler said. “We rather thoroughly vetted the software before we activated it. And once we knew what back-doors would look like in Glatun code, we were able to find them easily enough. Not to mention things like Benefactor overrides. We've had full control, including overrides, on all the AIs you supplied for some years now. We've even reverse engineered the coding so we can make our own. I was just wondering if you'd really go through with it.”