''You want to pull out?'' Chandra asked.
''To where? The other side of those bastards looks as close as any other safe place. ‘How Many of Them Can We Make Die!' ''
The 110 boat slowed; 105 boat dropped back. Chandra refused to leave the young skipper alone in the gathering hellfire.
Behind them, Horatio drew in range of the battleship's main battery, and their fire shifted to this new threat. But Kris had hardly a moment for a breath of relief; she was well in range of the 5-inch batteries, and Custer's last blast was pretty much done while Kris's boats were still looking at a long way to go.
The good news was there were fewer 5-inchers firing now, though there were still too damn many of them for Kris's taste.
''Squadron 8, let's give the 5-inch gunners something to worry about. Verify 944s are set for infrared. Salvo fire them now.''
From the bow of the 109 came the sound of rockets exiting the tubes.
The Revenge shook with yet another hit. The Admiral tapped his board, calling up reports on all six of the ships in his command. More secondary batteries were unavailable. Just offline, or wrecked by a Longknife rocket? The board did not have that information. What the board did show was that more and more of the 5-inch turrets still online were showing deeper and deeper yellow, headed for orange. Slow to charge now, and taking less and less of a charge when they did. Heat buildup was slashing the effectiveness of his massed weapons.
No. The Ravager was cooling down. How?
Right! Schneider was flushing his coolant through the main refrigeration coils of his armor, the old bastard. That was definitely not in the book. The kilometers of refrigeration coils running through the five-meter-thick armor were intended to cool that ice. Schneider was doing the reverse, using the ice of the armor to take off some of the heat now bleeding the efficiency of his offensive weapons suite. A desperate measure.
But today was a day for some truly desperate innovations.
''Lieutenant, send to all ships: ‘Flush reaction mass and other coolant through the main belt armor's refrigeration coils to cool it. Bravo Zulu to Schneider and Ravager for the idea.' Close your mouth, Lieutenant, and send it now.''
''Yes, sir.''
''That will weaken our main armor belt, sir,'' the Chief of Staff observed carefully, in his status as the Admiral's official second-guesser.
''Have we taken a hit that threatened to penetrate our belt?''
''No, sir.''
''Can we afford to lose any more of our secondaries? Lose any more of their efficiency? Wouldn't you like to slap down one or two of those mosquitoes buzzing toward us? I understand Princess Longknife commands one of them.''
''She was relieved of her command. Charged with actions unbecoming or something,'' the future governor pointed out.
The Admiral eyed his Chief of Staff, then the incoming attack. ''She is out there.''
''I would not bet against you on that one, sir.''
''Ships report they are cycling coolant through their ice, sir.'' A glance at his battle board confirmed the report. The secondaries were sliding back toward the green. Particular hot spots were cooling down around the ships' hulls, even as the entire hull took on a warm pink. Not that it would matter against patrol boats with pulse lasers.
Oops. What have we here? More missiles. Intel said nothing about the Longknife patrol boats having missiles on them. More things that didn't make it to the talk show circuit. The Admiral suppressed his grumble and tightened his belt… again. It would be interesting to see how the heat seekers on these warheads reacted to the lack of warmth around his secondary batteries … and the raised temperature of his armor.
''For what we are about to receive, may we be truly grateful,'' he muttered.
''My division has the two in the middle,'' Phil said, his voice low, hard, intent. His four boats were ahead of the others now. They'd go in first. ''We'll hold our fire until 25,000 klicks,'' he said. Maximum range on a pulse laser was 40,000 klicks. Twenty-five ought to punch a good-size hole.
Kris watched intently as the first four boats jitterbugged their way up to the line of battleships. Her board now showed the ships a fairly consistent pink. When the 5-inch twin lasers popped up to fire, they flared red, but when they dropped back behind their ice armor, most of that infrared signature vanished. Some of the incoming 944s were able to fix the turret position on the battleship's hull by spotting a bump or a mast. Something like that would let them triangulate on the turret. Most only saw a smooth expanse of ice. In those cases, the sensors either went looking for another major source of heat, or switched to another seeker. But the battleships had quit radiating most other signals as well. Most warheads just dug a hole in the ice.
A hundred-kilo warhead didn't dig much of a hole in four meters of ice. Some missiles did. Here and there, a 5-inch turret picked the wrong time to pop up and snap off a shot at one rocket… and drew the fatal attention of another. Or a search radar antenna stayed on too long and got slammed by a missile in terminal phase at just that moment.
And then there was the one missile that almost missed entirely… but clipped a rocket motor on the third battlewagon back from the flag. The warhead slammed into the huge bell-shaped rocket engine just where the electromagnetic coils were that kept the plasma demons under control. For a split second, tortured matter at 100 million degrees kelvin got loose.
It wasn't long, but in those brief moments, jets of raw energy ripped off another engine, smashed several electric generators, and might have done further damage if good damage control hadn't brought things under control. The battleship slowed in its deceleration, fell out of line, and quit firing.
It was at that moment that Phil's four boats rolled past, firing paired pulsed lasers at the wallowing ship and its sister. Kris measured the results. Fifteen lasers fired. Fourteen hit. Four paired hits slashed into the damaged ship.
And the battleship righted itself, started firing back, and kept right on decelerating.
''Damn,'' Phil growled through gritted teeth. ''Twenty-five K and we might as well have thrown snowballs at them!'' There was a pause as Phil's boat went through wild gyrations, but less fire was headed his way. ''Our pulse lasers just don't pack enough punch to dent that belt.''
''I hear you, Phil,'' Kris answered. ''Division 2, we're next. We'll go in closer. Nelly, what kind of really wild dance have you got for us?''
''Go to 6B on your mark, Kris.''
''My mark is … now.''
The 109 had been a mad hatter before. Now she was a crazy dervish, twisting, turning, never going in a straight line. Never going more than a few seconds before changing directions hard up, down, right, left. Forward, more missiles were mixed with Foxers as the 109 fought her way closer and closer to the second to the last ship in line.
''20,000 … 18,000 … 16,000. I'm at 15,000 klicks. Are you with me, 108?''
''Not yet, not yet. Almost. Now.''
''Fire on mark. Now.''
There was no sign that the four reasons for the 109's existence had been expended against a battleship, either on the bridge or, when Kris turned up the visuals, along the hide of the battleship. No …
Yes. There was a steaming gash aft, right about where Moose said the reactors were. Two long, steaming slashes.
But… no burn-through. No flaming wreckage.
Forward, Kris could hear Kami firing more rockets, as they shot past their target, but as for any apparent effect…
Nothing.
''This is Division 2, here. We turned armor to slush at 15,000 kilometers, but we didn't get burn-through. Repeat, 15,000 kilometers just doesn't cut it.''
''Hear you,'' Chandra said. ''Babs, you and the 104 go in to 10,000 klicks. See what that does. Heather and I are three, four thousand klicks behind you. We'll go closer if that doesn't work.''