Extremis (63 page)

Into the superheated cloud of discorporated human ships emerged a fast flurry of SDHs from the Treadway warp point. And by the time the remnants of Combat Group Sierra reformed, the Arduans had managed to activate a datahub. Missiles—guided with one mind and purpose—reached out toward the human ships that were still struggling to respond.…

TRNS
Taconic
, Allied Fleet, Athena System

Riding her own gargantua of metal, composites, weapons, and death out of the warp point into Athena, Li Han nodded to her staff: she needed updates. Immediately.

And because she needed so much information so very quickly, she closed her eyes as they surrounded her: this way, the collage of excited faces did not distract her from the voices that contended with each other, weaving the chaotic tapestry and tale of a battle already in progress.

The AMBAMMs had done their work well, igniting as a rapidly advancing cascade of blue-white actinic spheres: each seemed to spawn another, stretching across the insufficient Baldy minefields like a string of annihilatory pearls.

But as the human ships started coming through, the enemy missiles came in from all points, unerringly guided by the Baldies’ innumerable data hubs. These hubs demonstrated surprising resilience, able to rebuild faster than Li Han’s ships could break them up: the enemy had multiply cross-patched their ships’ computer control systems like an ancient telephone switchboard. The human point-defense batteries were eroding the consequent waves of antimatter warheads, but not fast enough: the first smaller ship that had come through the warp point—the fleet-footed battlecruiser TRNS
Greyhound
—was not able to handle her share of the deluge and was consumed by a cluster of antimatter explosions.

The devastators of Li Han’s command, and now the supermonitors as well, were holding their own, reaching out and squashing the Arduans with overwhelming firepower. But they had to advance slowly, wielding their immense batteries like battle-axes. In contrast, the enemy SDHs were fast and agile, stabbing here and there with their épée-like armaments. When the human craft struck, the blows dealt death; when the Baldies jabbed or slashed, they always drew blood. But there were far more épées than battle-axes on this battlefield, and Li Han foresaw that pressing forward into the Athena system was going to be akin to hacking through a veritable thicket of just such nimble blades.

She opened her eyes. “Send back word: the Fleet Reserve is needed. It is to make best speed for the Athena warp point.”

Then she turned her eyes to the plot she had avoided looking at for as long as possible, forcing herself at last to witness the carnage depicted therein.

Arduan SDH
Nelsef’s’hed’rem
, Tangri-Containment Task Force of the
Anaht’doh Kainat
, Mercury System

“Junior Admiral, we have lost all thr—”

(Known.) Nejfel had seen the three crippled SDHs at the leading wedge-point of his van blink away in rapid sequence. The few human SMTs that had been in ready response range when he came through the Treadway warp point were now being aided by one of the new human DTs. This mountainous human ship could not be resisted, could not be held, could not even be delayed. And if there was not some way to deter it, then not only would Nejfel’s own task force die—it was, he frankly admitted, dead already—but the one in Athena might be lost as well, if the humans attacking there perceived no dire need to leave these reserves behind to guard Mercury. So, using the eight SDHs he had kept carefully cloaked, and veering away from the main engagement with the human warships, he acknowledged—as he had thought from the very first—that there was but one way to effectively strike at such a seemingly impervious adversary.

Upon entering the system, he had recited an old
Destoshaz
axiom invariably taught in the first week after the Caste-choice Ceremony: “There are enemies too great to contest, let alone defeat. Accept this—and search for their weaker associates. Threatening those lesser proxies may allow you to shape the behavior of a foe you could not hope to influence directly.” And so, good
Destoshaz
that he was, Nejfel had found the weaker associates of his unassailable foe.

“Helm, all cloaked SDHs on us. Bring us to 342 by 317. Tactics, if we make directly for the auxiliaries the humans have deposited at the edge of the Desai limit, how close will we pass to that behemoth and its escorts?”

“Twenty-five light-seconds, sir, and that presumes they will alter course to engage us. If they do, they will be able to hit us with missile barrages. However, their cruisers and fighters will probably reach us first and work in around our sterns if we don’t change course. Both of those problems will arise just about the time we start engaging the human auxiliaries.”

“Yes, I see it. Shortly after we attack their supply train, they will bring the great ship to bear and their missiles will make quick work of us. And those of us which survive that will certainly be annihilated by their fast craft. So I speak truth to you, Tactics—and all the rest: we will be discarnated within the hour no matter what course we set, so let it be one that diverts the humans from their focus upon Athena. Helm, all cloaked ships on us, flank speed plus ten percent, ready all missiles. Let our names be remembered until we are embodied again! Engage.”

TRNS
Taconic
, Allied Fleet, Athena System

Li Han knew, from the metronomic regularity of the flat-soled, ungracious footfalls, that Sarimanok was approaching, steeled to deliver a message he knew would displease his superior. “Yes, Commander?” she asked over her shoulder. “What is the bad news?”

If Sarimanok was surprised that she knew it was him, or that he was the bearer of ill-tidings, he gave no sign of it. “Admiral, we have had a signal from the Reserve in Mercury. There was an enemy attack in strength from Treadway—it wiped out Combat Group Sierra. The Reserve had to make best speed to engage, and then retake and secure the warp point.”

“So the Reserve will be unable to reach us in time.”

“Yes, Admiral. But there is more.”

There always is.
“Report, Commander.”

“Admiral, the Baldy attack force from Treadway was destroyed—every last hull—but a number of them eluded initial detection and penetrated almost to the Desai limit.”

Li Han closed her eyes. “The depot?”

“Yes, Admiral. The Baldies reached launch range. Because the ships were already forming into
ad hoc
space docks, and had already affixed stabilizing booms and tethers, they were unable to maneuver. Losses among the tenders and missile supply ships were disproportionately heavy.”

“And the Kasugawa generators?”

“One was lost before their tugs could pull all of them out of range.”

Li Han nodded, opened her eyes and looked at her tacplot. The news was not much better here in Athena: the enemy was managing to hold together longer than had been expected. The Baldies had obviously anticipated and prepared for losses: their data hubs were furnished with multiple redundancies, fresh hulls waiting to take the place of others that had been lost or crippled. This, and whatever mind contact they used, evidently provided them with many swift contingencies for rerouting. She turned to Sarimanok and looked him straight in the eyes. “So, the Reserves are not coming. In that case, it is all upon us.”

Arduan SDH
Tesnu’hep’heb
, Hera System Reserve Force, Athena System

Fleet Second Sentersep studied the holopod and watched the evolution of the engagement replay at 100:1 speed again. After punching through the minefields, the humans’ leading wedge of behemothic warships had made straight for the Hera warp point.
Of course: they want to roll us back as far as possible. Probably they’re hoping to reach Charlotte. And if they take Charlotte, then the question is no longer
if
they will be able to carry an attack into New Ardu, but
when
. And that is not acceptable.

Ebrenet, her long-standing tactical officer and second commander, sent a gentle tendril, as was his wont. “You must prevent them from reaching Charlotte.”

She sent (amusement, amazement). “Old friend, how is it you read my mind, even when our
selnarm
is not linked?”

Ebrenet, despite the carnage of the day, managed to find a mood that was a bit (fey, ironic). “Ah, Fleet Second—I have my ways.”

“I am sure you do.” She turned her attention to the tacplot again. “We will need to slow them even more.”

“Difficult.”

“Challenging. But not impossible. We have seen how ponderous these great ships are.”

“To be charitable, they turn quite slowly. What of it?”

She spoke in the code that long association produces. “We send our SDHs to the far flanks, outside the Desai limit; all fighters gather inside the Desai limit. They both use the same tactics: work toward the humans’ rear, keep them turning to protect their own sterns.”

“Yes. This is best. And it will allow us to minimize our casualties. We will not inflict many either, of course.”

“Of course—but we are fighting for time, not exchange ratios.”

“So true.” Ebrenet turned to the ops prime, whose eyes were goggling: even sharing an open
selnarm
link with the other two did not help him penetrate all their shorthand. “I will explain. The ships at the leading edge of the human attack are slow; this makes them vulnerable to rear attacks. Faster craft, such as our SDHs, if pushed out to the flanks, will compel them to slow down, to angle their heading so they both keep their bows to our SDHs and their course obliquely toward their destination—the Hera warp point.”

“And so, we gain time.”

Ebrenet sent (accord), adding: “And by giving ground slowly, we minimize our losses, which will in turn allow us to hold them at the Hera warp point for a longer interval.”

The ops prime pulsed (accord, appreciation) and sent the necessary orders.

Five minutes later, Sentersep watched as her strategy unfolded. Her blocking force of SDHs had scattered out and away from the relentless path of the human DTs. In the tacplot, a diaphanous ring of her flotilla’s vermillion specks had formed around the leading edge of the lateral column of
murn
-colored icons that marked the advancing van of the human fleet. And as predicted, the lead elements of that van slowed, angling their courses so as to turn their engine decks slightly away from the SDHs which were now flanking them. Faster SDs emerged from the human van to engage and attempt to drive off the Arduan SDHs. And all the while—as each engagement resolved—the humans were losing precious time, turning away from their direct advance to the Hera warp point.

Tactics observed the evolving engagements as human SDs traded dire damage with Arduan SDHs, most hulls limping away from the combat like exhausted pugilists. “We will kill only a few of their ships this way. Our bases of fire are now too scattered, and our ships are too far apart to maintain their data hubs.”

“All true. But I am not interested in how many hulls they have left, Tactics.”

Tactics sent (accord, rue). “No, you are interested in how many hours they have left.”

“Just so, Tactics: just so.”

And as they watched the tiny, luminous fireflies chase each other slowly around the tacplot, the space beyond the hull of the
Tesnu’hep’heb
was being made bright with the sudden comings, goings, and dyings of the actual ships represented. Inside the Desai limit, hundreds of Arduan fighters were destroyed by their vastly superior human and Orion analogs in futile attempts to threaten the flanks of the leviathans. The pilots of the Allied Fleet shouted or howled in victory, counted their kills, imagined further glories—but all of it took time. Too much time.

Meanwhile, the van of the Allied Fleet continued to grind forward, vaporizing any Arduan SDHs that were foolish or unfortunate enough to come within its missile range. Those SDHs that attempted doubling around the devastators had to be cut off, herded away, and since that task fell to the speedy human cruisers, losses among that class of ship were high—along with lighter carriers, which were plugging any gaps that opened suddenly, unexpectedly. They were dispatched like fire brigades, sent out from the safe body of the van whenever an engagement did not go as planned. And too often, in their race to put out one such fire, they attracted and fell victim to another.

The minutes and the hours went by. Hulls great and small dodged, plunged, flared, and died—leaving either trails of debris or monomolecular dust to mark the site of their vaporization. And those ships that were not slain were almost all wounded, seamed and scarred by the brief glances of beam weapons and the close detonations of warheads. By the time Sentersep gave the order for a final withdrawal to, and through, the Hera warp point, her fleet had been reduced by fifty percent. The human fleet followed stolidly, much less diminished than hers, but too spent to give chase. It was merely ensuring that Sentersep did not change her mind and round on them once again, ensuring that she was indeed conceding the system.

And so she did, as the bow of her battered flagship
Tesnu’hep’heb
headed for the warp point to Hera.

* * *

Having outrun their supplies—Ian Trevayne had made a characteristically obscure reference to someone named Patton—the three senior human admirals could afford the luxury of an in-the-flesh meeting…the first they had had in a while, and perhaps the last they would have in an even longer while.

Thus it was that the three of them sat in
Taconic
’s otherwise empty flag lounge. The debriefings and staff reports were over, and now they shared a moment of companionable silence, with Trevayne sipping his trademark single-malt Scotch. Li Han’s eyebrows had risen as high as they ever rose when Mags had asked for the same thing.
He’s corrupted her!
She told herself not to follow the thought out to wherever it might lead. Instead, she sipped the white wine that was all she ever permitted herself and gazed surreptitiously at the two youthful faces and the looks they occasionally couldn’t help exchanging.