Direction-finder gravsleds swept down the streets and over the buildings themselves.
Before the next wave of Tahn tacships came in for the launch, forty-seven guidance sites had been found; either the sites were eliminated along with their operators, or the Tahn fled, leaving their gear behind. The dozen or so left were IDed and removed after they attempted to illuminate the bomb targets.
The bombs scattered across the city. Harmlessly, if looked at from the military sense—only three significant targets were damaged. But they shattered Cavite City. There were 6,000 civilian casualties. The military defines its terms most selfishly.
The Tahn, however, did not escape unscathed. Sten's three tacships and a flight of patrolcraft were waiting on an anticipated orbit pattern. Twelve Tahn tacships were destroyed. The Tahn, expecting that their attacks would disrupt Cavite's air defenses, had sent in second- and third-class ships.
Three more waves came in, again at the Tahn-dictated interval of three hours. All three attacks were decimated.
All three bombing missions went wild. And more citizens, both Imperial and Tahn, died.
Then Lady Atago changed her tactics.
So did Sten.
"She's gone till her father's garden,
And pu'd an apple, red and green;
Twos a' to wyle him, sweet Sir Hugh,
And to entice him in."
Alex stopped muttering and looked at Foss. "What're y' gawkin't a', swab?"
"Didn't know you spoke any foreign languages, sir."
"Dinna be makin't fun ae th' way Ah speak. Ah hae yet't' makit up thae fitness report."
"So? There'll be no promotion/This side of the ocean/So cheer up my lads/Clot 'em all," Foss also quoted. "Sir."
The person to be wiled was of course not Sir Hugh, but the Tahn commander. And Sten was not planning to use an apple, either green or red. Instead, hung under each of the three tacships was a long, streamlined pod. It contained a full, destroyer-intended ECM suite, far more powerful if not as sophisticated as the countermeasure equipment on the Bulkeley-class tacships. Signals were fed from the pods and the tacships own electronics down a half-kilometer-long cable to strange and wonderfully configured polyhedrons below. The tacships hung about 200 meters above the main landing field.
"D' y' really thinkit this'll go?" Alex asked.
"Why wouldn't it?" Sten said.
"Ah. Try a differen' way. Supposin't it works aye too well?"
"We go boom."
"Ah no mind bein't expendable—but thae's no joy in bein't expungeable."
Sten had figured that when the operator-guided bombing missions failed, the next approach would be more conventional.
It was. Four Tahn destroyers multiple-fired operator-guided missiles from in-atmosphere, 1000 meters above the ground and about 400 kilometers away from Cavite City.
"I have a launch... I have multiples..." Foss suddenly announced in a monotone, his eyes pinned to a screen.
Equal reports chattered in from the Claggett and the Richards.
"All ships... stand by," Sten ordered. "On my order, activate...now!"
Foss touched a switch, and the electronic countermeasure pod hummed into life.
The Tahn operators were navigating their missiles with both radar and visual sensing fed into their control helmets. The visual range was extraordinarily easy to jam. Without excitement, the Tahn controllers put full attention on their radar guidance.
Their sensors punched through the clutter that was Cavite looking for their targets: large metallic objects. This strike was after what was left of the 23rd Fleet and the few ships Mahoney had remaining.
The skilled Tahn controllers found targets... their weapons computers kept all missiles from homing on a single ship... and the targets grew in the operators' radar eyes.
Narrow beams kept any of them from seeing those stationary ships move.
"Half speed," Sten ordered.
The tacships climbed.
"Do you have them?"
"Uhh... that's an affirmative. All missiles homing as projected."
"Full power... now! Drive power... now!
The tacships bolted into space.
The missiles were very close to the Imperial ships—or so the operators thought. What they were closing on were the radar-spoofing polyhedrons instead of the 23rd's grounded ships. Almost all of the missiles had their own automatic homing mechanisms active and, therefore, tried to follow the ships.
Stabilizing guidance systems tumbled, and the missiles spun out of control. A few, still under operator control, lost their targets and kept on keeping on while the controllers tried to figure out what had happened. A warship cannot vanish tracelessly.
Six of the missiles managed to track the false targets for a few moments until their fuel ran out and the missiles self-destructed.
A few AUs out, Sten ordered power cut, counted noses, and realized that they had gotten away with it. But that, he knew, would be a one-time-only gimmick.
He wondered what would happen next.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
Time became a blur for Sten and his crews. Their clocks and calendars were events half-remembered in mumbled exhaustion: That was the day we ran that recon patrol. No. We were escorting the sweepers then. Remember, that's when the Sampson blew up? You're full of drakh. We were out on a doggo ambush then.
No one knew for sure. Any of them would have traded their chances on an afterlife for two shifts of uninterrupted sleep, a meal that wasn't gobbled cold from a pak, or—don't even whisper it—a bath.
The ships stank almost as much as the sailors did, smelling of fear, fuel fumes, ozone, sweat, and overheated insulation. They were also starting to wear out. The Kali launcher on the Richards was kaput. That did not matter too much—there were only three of the giant missiles left. Both chainguns on the Claggett were capable of only intermittent fire, and its tell-me-thrice battle computer had lost a lobe. Sten's own ship, the Gamble, had only six Goblin launchers that still tracked.
All of the Yukawa drive units needed teardown—they were many, many hours outside the regulated service intervals. The AM2 drives still functioned, unsurprisingly since they had approximately as many moving parts as a brick.
But the navcomputers were all causing problems—projected courses had to be run four times and averaged. When there was time, at least.
And the Tahn forces kept getting stronger and bolder. Sten almost hoped for the day of invasion to come.
In the meantime, there were the missions. Escort X ships... patrol Y sector... escort Guard Unit Z and provide cover until its forward firebase is secure...
Routine missions.
It was on one such "routine" mission that they encountered the ghost ship.
A stationary sensor had reported an inbound transport following a highly abnormal course. The transport did not respond to any communication attempts, nor did its IFF give the correct automatic responses for the assigned time period. Both radar and a flash visual identified the ship, however, as a standard-design Imperial fleet tender.
Sten assumed some sort of Tahn trap.
He positioned the Gamble and the Claggett at an intersection point on the transport's orbit and waited. The Richards was grounded, partially torn-down on Romney. Sutton and his crew were sure that this time they had figured out what was wrong with the Yukawa drives and promised a quick fix.