“I think I have an answer for that,” Tag said.
Atlas said, “Well let’s hear it.”
“The Cainth have military transports that can carry 20,000 troops and all their hardware. They are huge and we can bring in eight of them when the marines land and park them on the southern continent. Each of them can hold 60,000 if there’s no military hardware. If things get dicey, then each of them will make two trips to one fort and the population is lifted. Matter of fact, the second lift will just remain on the transport so the environmental field won’t be necessary for them.”
Kosiev said, “Why not just bring in sixteen and lift them in one lift. We might not have time if things go bad quickly. Also, once they jump into the gamma galaxy, the transports and the forts will all jump in different directions to throw off any attempt by the Plants to track their destination.”
Tag said, “Make it happen, Alex. We need to move on this quickly.”
The leaders of the Algeans stood in the rich golden soil on their home world. They had just learned about the strange ships that had appeared at one of the food bearing planets that they were harvesting and destroyed a number of their ships. The oldest leader said, “They actually only destroyed one of our ships. The rest were lost when they shot one of our power missiles and the chain reaction destroyed the other ships.”
“We are also missing one of our explorers. They probably killed that one too,” another leader said.
“How could they have destroyed the explorer before it could have sent a warning about their existence?” one of the younger leaders asked. “One of their ships also took a direct hit by one of the power missiles and survived it. It had also been outrunning it until it suddenly slowed just before impact.”
The group was silent. Finally the Elder said, “I wonder if it deliberately allowed itself to be hit to see if it would survive. I almost believe that they were attempting to determine our weapon capabilities.”
“What do we do about it?”
“We change the way we fire our missiles. No power missile may be closer than 50 geds from each other. We will also launch them from a longer range so that even if they hit them our ships won’t be harmed. We also notify the fifth fleet to be prepared to jump at the first sign of these ships. We need to know who they are and where they are; it could be another valuable food source. Make sure we track their line of departure.” The group buried their feet deeper in the rich soil and absorbed the wonderful nutrients that only existed on their home world.
Chapter 9
The SR fleet gathered in the gamma galaxy preparing for the coming offensive. Commodore Smith had 10,000 of the old Empire and Ultra ships. Admiral Mikado’s fleet of Megaships had grown to 500. They had just completed the software downloads and Colonel McAllister was running tests on the hornets to make sure they would go to the new protocols when a signal was sent to make the change. “Admiral, our tests have been confirmed and the hornets responded as programmed.”
Mikado looked at the old dreadnaught that had been used as a target and there wasn’t much left to look at. “Commodore Smith, take one of the ultras out to 100 miles and use the new focused primary beam to hit that wreckage, please.”
The Atlanta moved away from the fleet and took position then fired an intense beam at the derelict. The beam struck the wreckage and disintegrated half of the remains.”
“Captain Kelly, move the London out to 300 miles and let’s see if we can hit what remains.”
The Megaship moved out of formation and turned as it fired its new primary from 300 miles away. It only caught half of the remains but nothing was left of what it hit. McAllister said, “Admiral, I can only feel comfortable with targeting at 200 miles. Three hundred is stretching the envelope.”
“Did we hit it?” Mikado asked.
“Not a direct hit but yes you did.”
“Then I won’t hesitate to use it from 300 miles. The ships we’ll be shooting at will be more that twenty miles long in some cases. It’s a much bigger target than what we just hit.”
“You will only have 87 % of its energy at that range,” McAllister said.
“Colonel, if a penetrator hits one of those ships and weakens its screen, would the primary penetrate at 87 % power,” Mikado asked?
“If it’s a direct hit it wouldn’t need a penetrator to penetrate the screen. The focused primary beam is stronger at 300 miles than the normal primary beam would be at 80 miles.”
“I couldn’t ask for more than that. We are going to initially use it against ships that are hit by only one penetrator as a follow up. I’ve set up our sensors on the Megas to highlight the ships that only have one designated hornet. Our targeting systems will automatically aim a primary at those ships and also change the color in all the other ships targeting to indicate that a Mega has locked on so that we don’t overlap. We will launch our penetrators from 300 miles out once the second Algean fleet moves that far inside the jump limit so we have time to out run the answering Algean missile salvos. We will jump 300 miles behind the Algean fleet that jumps in to support the planetary ships, launch our penetrators, follow up with the new primaries, fire another salvo of penetrators, and then jump in to our fleet at the planet just before the Algean missiles reach our position. I’m hoping the second Algean fleet actually fires two salvos at us before we jump.”
McAllister said, “They shouldn’t know you can jump that far in system so they may even turn to move toward your first position which will delay their arrival to help the fleet they have at the planet.”
“That is exactly what I’m counting on; I plan to move away from them when they launch their first missiles and run to ensure a second salvo. We’ll jump in once the second fleet turns toward us.” Mikado said.
“Commodore Smith, form up your fleet and prepare to jump,” Mikado ordered. “Mega Captains, maintain formation and jump on my command and launch penetrators upon emergence into normal space. Commodore Smith you may jump when you’re ready. Notify me as soon as you learn whether or not one penetrator will get thru their screens.”
The bright white Ultra and Empire ships were formed into three lines of 3,300 ships per line and were glowing waiting for their jump instructions. The crews of those ships were anxious about the upcoming battle but had faith in their commanders.
“Will do, Admiral; prepare to jump on my command, Execute.” The 10,000 Stars Realm ships disappeared.
And reappeared at the jump limit in the Pydres system, “Start moving in system at? speed and hold your formation,” Smith ordered. Eric smith thought back to the time he was just the helmsman on the destroyer Moscow and wondered at how quickly the world had changed. His promotions had been fast and he attributed it to the time he had spent watching Kosiev and Mikado fight their ship in the battles against the old Alliance. He had learned a lot and he was determined to not let them down even though he was heavily outgunned by the Plant fleet. “Target the heavies first and be prepared to run from their missile salvo. Launch our penetrators at 240 miles and follow them in to 200 to use the primaries. Needle operators, no hornets initially; use them to target the anti matter missiles. If you’re hit and your screen goes blue, increase speed and move behind the other ships in your line until you bleed off the excess energy.” The SR fleet moved in system and for an hour it looked like the Algean fleet at the Planet didn’t know they were there.
“Lt. Barrett, have you detected that frequency the Plants use?”
“Yes sir, it started as soon as we broke into normal space.”