The Bee dropped down below the dwarf. The Yellow Jacket went high. The Wasp went right. All three carriers fired at the two light cruisers and moved to slip back behind the dwarves. The Yellow Jacket had to pull up to be able to loop back behind the dwarves and presented a perfect target to the K’Rang fleet. A broadside from seven ships hit the Yellow Jacket in the port side AS-500 docks and folded the ship in half. CDR Milton and 700 crewmen died in an instant, as secondary explosions cascaded through the hull. The light cruiser N’Gal exploded five seconds behind it, as six sun-hot plasma balls burned through her hull. The light cruiser G’Bid evaded two plasma balls, but took one on the bow, causing minor structural damage. A fourth plasma ball hit the main deck and burned out an entire missile pod. G’Bid was still combat effective, but at a reduced level.
Admiral Minacci was shocked to hear of the loss of the Yellow Jacket and all its crew. He had never lost anyone under his command before. Now he had lost 700. He considered pulling the two remaining carriers back to his location, but the losses they were inflicting seemed to be worth the risk. He signaled the captains to continue, but not to put their ships in danger unnecessarily.
He pushed the loss of the Yellow Jacket into the back of his mind. He would mourn them later. For now, he had several hundred K’Rang memorials to arrange.
Connie watched the death of the Yellow Jacket and it all hit her at once. This was real. This wasn’t some simulator back on Antares Base, but real combat where real people died. She pushed her feelings back somewhere deep inside to be pulled out and mourned over later. She had just seen 700 crewmen die. Rather then cry over them, she would have to find out what went wrong so that it didn’t happen to others or to the Vigilant.
She asked Kelly, “Sir, what did they do wrong?”
Kelly thought for a moment, then replied, “The K’Rang must have seen their approach, probably that frigate lagging behind the fleet. They were waiting for them to pop out from behind those dwarves. Look how the guns were already swiveled in that direction. The Yellow Jacket went high and had to loop up and over to get back behind cover. If they had gone left, right, or down, they probably would have made it back under cover. The assault landing carriers have thrusters only on the bottom and sides. That loop, and the fact the K’Rang were waiting for them, killed them.”
Fleet Commander J’Kalt watched the debris of the carrier being slowly sucked into the brown dwarves’ gravity. That would make the humans more cautious and not so cavalier. It was time to recon by fire. He instructed all his ships to open fire with energy weapons on any suspicious location that could be used as a hide spot for Human ships. He also ordered an increase in speed.
J’Kalt watched how his ships reacted to their new orders. Every dust cloud, brown dwarf, and asteroid was grazed by energy weapons fire. That would keep the Humans’ heads down.
There was one threat J’Kalt had not experienced, and his lead destroyer was about to run into it. Just around the next bend was a threat with no fear and no head to keep down.
Chapter Seventeen
The autonomous missile pod had been constructed in the armaments factories on Schirra, otherwise known as Centauri B-7, the Energy World, Inc. planet. The pod and the others like it had been on their way to Algol Station, to be delivered to the Algolian fleet, when the Baratarians captured them. It had originally been programed to activate when Aldebaran ships came into its sensor field, but were easily reprogrammed to react to K’Rang engine signatures. This pod and the other five around it were waiting to accomplish their purpose.
It was another pod that first detected the engine signatures of multiple K’Rang ships approaching at 0.2 c. That pod sent a burst transmission to the other five, dividing the targets among the six of them. The pods stood behind their cover, unflinching, as energy bursts flew by or were absorbed by what they hid behind. When the ships were almost within minimum range, they rose up as one and let loose their missiles against the most valuable targets.
Sixty medium missiles launched against the K’Rang fleet. The missiles so close there was very little the K’Rang could do. The missiles were inside the minimum launch range for defensive missiles. All they could do was fire all guns in the incoming missiles’ direction and hope to hit something. The close in defensive guns took out some missiles, but a disproportionate number made it through to their targets. Two missile/gun destroyers were lost in antimatter explosions as bright as a sun. A damaged light cruiser went out in a similar way. Two support ships trying to evade the fire turned into the path of missiles aiming for the destroyers and disappeared in a number of blinding antimatter explosions.
Fleet Commander J’Kalt looked on his diminishing command and had them increase speed to 0.3 c. He must get through to this base that was reading stronger and stronger on his sensors. If he could reach their base, he could threaten it, causing the humans to have to come to its defense. There he could engage them in open battle and defeat them. He had his two newest defensive frigates reload missiles at their support ship. He pulled out the Shadow destroyer, his Shadow heavy cruiser, the remaining light cruiser and the two reloading frigates to ram through the remaining human defenses at 0.5 c. The remaining fleet would be under the command of the senior destroyer captain. J’Kalt’s heavy force would go to port and the light destroyer-led force would go starboard. The heavy force would push through quickly and assault their base. The light force would continue to feel its way through the defenses. When the Humans pulled back to defend their base, the light force would close with the heavy force, come in behind the Human fleet and destroy it in detail.
When the frigates were reloaded, J’Kalt gave the order to move out. He wished good luck to Captain H’Rak, the light force commander, and watched on his sensors as they went wide around a brown dwarf, firing the whole time. He ordered his heavy force to make half light speed and for the Shadow destroyer to find them the best route to this base.
Admiral Minacci watched the two groupings diverge on his tactical plot. As he watched the sensors resolve the ship types, it was obvious the force moving to port was the bigger threat. He revised his attack plans slightly, but both groups were still within the cone reconnoitered by LCDR Blake. He looked for how he could defeat this K’Rang in detail. He looked at the next trap for the group heading left and assigned two A-76 squadrons to cover the minefield they were about to blunder into at half light speed. The other group was heading toward another missile pod obstacle and he assigned two torpedo squadrons and an F-48 squadron against them. He sent a message to the Leviathan to start laying mines closer to Barataria, just in case.
Kelly watched the destroyer group and thought he saw an opportunity. The group was heading right through the gravity tunnel he’d found before. It had two opposing 90-degree turns and would reduce the task force’s ability for mutual support. He lined up and waited. When all but the support ships entered the bend he launched at FTL Power 1.1. He shot across the intervening space and stopped just aft of the four unguarded support ships. His gunners opened fire as soon as they came to a halt, and took out the engines on all four support ships. He jumped back out to his previous overwatch position as two of the support ships were wracked with explosions. Now the fleet had no reloads or spares. Kelly reported his kills to 3rd ALG operations. The news cheered up the Admiral.
Kelly had Connie go back to engineering and check on the status of the stabilizers. He knew he was putting a lot of stress on them and didn’t want a failure at a critical time.