Into the Darkness: Crimson Worlds Refugees I (3 page)

He stared straight ahead, watching the cloud of missiles on his display accelerating toward the enemy. “Let’s close to laser range, Commander. The task force is to accelerate at 5g.”

Time to finish this.

*  *  *

“All squadrons, this is the highest precision operation we have ever attempted.” Hurley’s voice was like ice. She didn’t have Compton’s confidence that any of her people would make it through, but that didn’t matter. Live or die, she would do it following the admiral’s orders. And Compton had been clear. Besides, if they were fated to die, it meant something to her that they die well, hurting the enemy and helping give their comrades a chance to escape.

“We will be commencing our assault in one minute. You will each make a single attack run at your assigned enemy vessel, and then you will execute the exact navigation plan locked into your onboard computers. You will not delay, not for any reason. I don’t care if you think one more run with lasers will take out a Leviathan…you will follow my orders to the letter. Admiral Compton’s orders.”

Her eyes were on the chronometer. It read forty seconds, thirty-nine, thirty-eight…

“There is no room for hesitation, no margin for error. We have to reach the rendezvous point on time, and align our velocity and vectors with our specific landing platforms. Then we will have to land rapidly, again with no room for delay or mistakes.”

Twenty-four, twenty-three, twenty-two…

“I expect not only the best from all of you…I expect perfection. And so does Admiral Compton. It’s time to do this, people, and do it right. And then we get the hell out of here so we can fight another day. Good luck to all of you.”

She cut the line and looked over at Wilder. The pilot was also staring at the chronometer, waiting for it to count down to zero. “Alright, John. You ready for this?”

The pilot nodded slowly. “Yes, Admiral. I’m ready.”

Hurley turned toward the rest of the crew. “Boys?”

The others nodded. “Yes, sir,” they said almost simultaneously—and unconvincingly.

Hurley took a deep breath as she watched the display worked its way through the single digits…to zero.

She leaned back as Wilder hit the thrust and the pressure of nine gees slammed into her. She could hardly move, but she managed to glance down at her screen. The entire formation, 243 small blue dots, moved ahead in perfect order. She felt a rush of pride. Her force included craft from most of the superpowers, crews with different training doctrines and capabilities. There were former enemies fighting together, men and women who had struggled against each other in the great battles of the Third Frontier War. But she had forged them into a single cohesive unit, and she’d done it in just two years. And she was damned proud of every one of them.

Many of her people were already dead. Indeed, almost two-thirds of her strength was gone in the battles of the last few days. More would die soon, she knew, but the fighter wings had done their part and more. They had given all they had to give to defeat mankind’s enemy.

“Captain Kato’s ships have fired their missiles, Admiral.” Kip Janz was the fighter’s main gunner, but now he was manning the small scanning station. He was struggling to hold his head up over the scope, to push back against the massive forces bearing down on them all. “It looks like they somehow launched everything in one continuous volley.” Janz’ tone was thick with confusion, but Hurley understood immediately.

He blew off his racks. Hopefully, he didn’t sustain too much damage.

“We’ll be at Point Zeta in thirty seconds, Admiral.” Wilder’s voice was as strained as everyone else’s. No one, not even the hardest veteran, could take nine gees without it affecting everything they did. “Cutting thrust in three…two…one…”

Hurley felt the crushing pressure disappear, replaced by the weightlessness of free fall. She looked down at her display, watching the icons align as thirty squadrons cut thrust simultaneously, maintaining almost perfect order. Then her eyes glanced toward the top of the screen, where a line of large red ovals marked the enemy vessels.

Her birds were already entering firing range, but not a shot came from any of her fighters. Every one of them was loaded with double-shotted plasma torpedoes, and the plan was simple—fly through everything the enemy could throw at them and close to point blank range before firing. She knew they wouldn’t all make it through, but the enemy ships in the first line had been badly shot up, and with any luck, the defensive fire would be light. The First Imperium didn’t have any fighters, and their defensive tactics had been thrown together to meet the threat posed by the small craft of the human fleets. Her birds were coming in fast, and that would minimize the time they spent in the hot zone. But they were also heading directly for their targets, and at almost 0.04c, they weren’t going to be able to maneuver or alter their vectors quickly. In space combat, high velocity reduced the variability of a target’s future location, in many cases making it easier to target them.

“We’ve got enemy missiles on the screen, Admiral.” Janz’ turned toward Hurley. “It looks like a heavy volley, but not as bad as it could be.”

Hurley could tell from Janz’ tone the enemy response was considerably weaker than he’d expected. “Man your guns, Lieutenant. It’s time to take out some missiles.”

“Yes, Admiral,” he replied sharply.

Hurley could hear a loud hum as the fighter’s anti-missile lasers powered up. The tiny ship had four of the small point defense weapons. They had an effective range of about 5,000 kilometers, almost nothing relative to the vast distances in space combat. But the missiles approaching weren’t the enemy’s big antimatter fueled, multi-gigaton ship killers either. They were barely firecrackers by comparison—20 to 50 megatons. They had to get close to take out one of her birds. A detonation within 300 meters would destroy a fighter outright. One half a kilometer away would probably give her entire crew a lethal dose of radiation. But any farther out, and the damage, if any, would be light.

She sat quietly and watched her tiny ship’s crew go about their tasks. She didn’t need to interfere. They were the best. She’d trained them, she’d led them. Now she would let them do their jobs.

“Missiles entering interception range in four minutes.”

Hurley nodded, but she didn’t reply. She just sat and waited. And wondered how the rest of the fleet was doing. Compton’s plan had seemed crazy to her at first, but the more she thought about it, the more she came to believe he just might pull it off. It didn’t pay to bet against Terrance Compton.

Getting through the warp gate didn’t mean getting away, but it was a step in the direction. Once the fleet transited, Compton intended to drop a spread of mines just on the other side and blast toward one of the system’s exit gates. The enemy fleet would follow, but its sheer size would slow its transit—and the minefield would disorder it further. With any luck, Compton would gain on the enemy, increasing the gap between the two forces. And he would need every kilometer he could get.

Compton had scouting data on X4, and the location of several potential exit gates. But whatever system lay beyond was a total mystery—and each successive transit would be a gamble. Would they manage to find an exit gate in each before the enemy caught them? Or would one of the systems prove to be a dead end, with no escape?

“Missiles entering range in one minute.”

Hurley had great confidence in her people, but she knew this was a more than just a difficult mission. She tried not to think of it as a suicide run, as much because she knew that’s what Compton wanted, and not because she particularly expected to survive. Her birds were moving at a high velocity, and that made the job easier for the enemy missiles. Her ships couldn’t quickly alter their vectors, which meant the incoming warheads had a small area to target.

“Commencing interception.”

Hurley heard the high pitched whine of the lasers firing, one shot after another in rapid succession. She’d always hated this part of an assault, pushing through the enemy’s long-ranged interdiction, powerless, waiting to see if her ship would get picked off by a well-placed—or lucky—shot. Her fighters’ weapons were deadly, but they were shorter ranged, especially if she wanted to do serious damage. And she damned sure wanted that. So there was no choice but to take what the enemy threw at her people, and hope for the best.

Survival wasn’t pure chance, of course, and a gunner’s skill was crucial in increasing the odds of a fighter closing to its own firing range. And Kip Janz was one of the best.

She glanced down at the screen, monitoring the status of the incoming volley. Janz and the ship’s AI had taken out seven enemy missiles. That didn’t mean all of those would have closed to deadly range, but still, she was glad they were vaporized. Anything that got within the 5,000 kilometer window had to be considered a serious threat.

She saw the warning lights go on—a detonation about two klicks away. Close, but not close enough to cause major damage. Still, there was a good chance she and her people would need a course of anti-rad treatments when they got back. If they got back.

The enemy missiles were mostly gone from the screen. Her birds were nearly through—and that much closer to releasing their own deadly attack. But Hurley’s eyes were fixed on a dozen flashing icons. Twelve of her fighters hadn’t been as fortunate, their gunners not as skilled as Janz, and now they were bits of plasma and debris. She found it hard to look at a scanner displaying that kind of data, at the generic symbols that represented real ships, real crews. A dozen flashing circles meant sixty of her people were dead, their ships destroyed before they even had the chance to fire. It was cold, impersonal. She wondered how the Marines and other ground troops fared, so often seeing their comrades killed right in front of them.
Is it easier that way? Or more difficult?

“We’re through the missile barrage, Admiral,” Janz said firmly. “Beginning final approach.”

Hurley looked over at Wilder. “The ship is yours, Commander.” Wilder and Janz had stepped aside during the last attack run, allowing their admiral to take the shot—a dead on hit that had finished off the ailing Leviathan. She’d appreciated the gesture, and she’d enjoyed the hell out of killing the First Imperium ship, but she didn’t intend to make a habit out of it. She’d accepted the stars Garret had given her, and she was resolved to behave accordingly and not act like some gung-ho pilot. Most of the time, at least.

Technically, Hurley didn’t have a job on her ship, at least not one involved in its operation. Her fighter’s purpose was to carry her wherever she had to be to command the strike force. Much to the frustration of Admiral Garret’s plans, it had proven impossible to keep her back from the fight, so now it was not only a moving headquarters—it was another ship in the line, one more attacker determined to plant a double plasma torpedo into the guts of a First Imperium vessel.

“Prepare for high-gee maneuvers,” Wilder said.

Hurley sat quietly, looking at the display. She knew just where Wilder was going. The closest ship was a Gargoyle. Half a dozen fighters had already made runs at it, and three had scored solid hits. The ship was still there, but there wasn’t much left of it, and there was no fire at all coming from it. But tucked in just behind was the target that had caught Wilder’s eye. A Leviathan, also badly damaged, but still firing at the fighters buzzing past it like flies on a carcass.

“Heavy incoming fire,” Janz said, staring at the scope as he did. The main First Imperium defensive weapon was similar to the Alliance’s shotguns. Both systems were essentially large railguns, firing clouds of metallic projectiles into the paths of incoming fighters. The First Imperium version had been designed purely as an anti-missile platform, but it performed well enough against fighters to make the hair on Hurley’s neck stand up.

The fighter pitched hard as Wilder hit the thrust. Hurley felt the force slam into her, an impact like five times her own weight. She focused on breathing deeply as the force increased…6g…7g…8g. She held herself straight in her chair, angling her head slightly so she could see her screen. Her movement was slow, steady, disciplined. At 8g, she knew she could pull a muscle just moving wrong.

She could see the enemy vessel getting closer—and bigger—on the display. Another fighter streaked across, putting its payload right into the huge enemy vessel. The scanners were assessing damage, feeding a continuous report on the status of the enemy ship. There were a dozen great rents in the side of the vessel, and liquids and gasses were spewing out into space. On a human-crewed ship, men and women would be dying in those compartments, blown into space or frozen and suffocated in place. But she knew it was impossible to disable a First Imperium ship by killing its crew. The robots onboard were impervious to cold, to lack of oxygen. No, to kill a First Imperium vessel, you had to tear the thing apart, bit by bit.

Suddenly, the thrust was gone, and weightlessness replaced the crushing pressure. She took a deep breath, grateful for the ease of it. She glanced over at Wilder and then back to her screen. The range was counting down rapidly. They were moving at 5,000 kilometers per second, and the enemy was less than 50,000 klicks away. They were ten seconds out and on a collision course. She opened her mouth, but she didn’t say anything. Wilder knew what he was doing.

Eight seconds. The pilot was totally focused, his head staring straight at the display, hands tight on the controls. Six seconds. The ship bucked slightly, as Wilder released the plasma torpedo.

Hurley stared straight ahead, watching the distance slip away.
We’re going to hit that ship…

Then 9g of pressure slammed into her like a sledgehammer, and Wilder hit the thrust barely four seconds from impact. A few seconds of thrust couldn’t do much to alter the course of a fighter travelling at over 3% of lightspeed. But it didn’t have to do much, just enough to swing the ship around the enemy vessel. And it did just that. Hurley looked down in disbelief at the scanners. The fighter had passed within 300 meters of the Leviathan before it continued on, putting 5,000 klicks a second between it and its stricken target.