Plague Wars 06: Comes the Destroyer (32 page)

Now came a general order to the Aardvarks to shut down their acceleration, only using enough thrust to keep station and adjust their ragged blanket formation into something more resembling a concave disc again, centered on the enemy. With slightly over a quarter of his fuel depleted, Vango knew that bingo was not far away. Because the fleet had been running generally away from the solar system the whole time, they needed about three fifths of their tanks to make it home within the ability of the coffins to keep them alive.

It was time to coast.

Now Vango really wished for those refuelers, but put it out of his mind. No point in wanting the impossible. Instead he slowed his time sense once again so the virtuality sped up around him, knowing the computer would return him from fast-forward mode if anything came up.

The chasing missiles seemed to leap forward impossibly fast, and what felt like a minute later they closed on the waiting Destroyers. Speeding himself up again brought Vango back to realtime, and he watched avidly as close to thirty thousand missiles converged on the enemy.

This time the weapons had plenty of time and information to set up perfectly. The enemy had not maneuvered. Doing so would have used extra fuel for both prey and predators, and would have complicated the Destroyers’ brute-force response to the attack. In their place Vango would have burned hard sideways at the last minute to complicate the Pilums’ targeting and skew their formation, but then, he wasn’t Meme. Perhaps they had something up their sleeves.

If they had sleeves.

Again the cloud of missiles enveloped the enemy like a concave hemisphere, a cup trying to scoop the Destroyers up from behind. This brought the maximum number from as many directions as possible, from the entire back half of their firing arcs.

As fusors reached out to touch them, the missiles detonated themselves. Their computers had been programmed by the best minds of the Blue Team, who had determined that a missile detonated was much better than a missile burned to a crisp. Even at extreme range the bomb-pumped graser cluster could do damage, and the blast itself served to disperse the hot plasma, gouging a hole in space that allowed any following missiles to get that much closer. Electromagnetic pulse and thermal overload might also interfere with the Destroyers’ targeting systems.

So each shell of missiles, from the inside out, sacrificed itself to gain a little bit of distance for its fellows following. Explosions marched on the display closer and closer to the enormous enemy ships.

The rearmost one suddenly spun madly as before, spraying plasma in all directions, though…Vango ran a comparison with the earlier scenario, and determined that its energy output was down by over fifteen percent, and the missiles were exploding closer in.

The forward Destroyer did not turn its nose backward this time, but rather engaged in a modified version of its fellow’s defensive gyrations, swinging its drive flame back and forth in a plane that provided defensive coverage of one side of the sternward ship. This allowed it to more or less keep station very close to the other, as little as ten kilometers away. Given the size of the two ships, this constituted only four or five of their own diameters.

The lead ship also fired its fusors profligately, taking down dozens of missiles per shot. Vango wondered about hypers, and then realized that such weapons were useless to engage missiles coming in so fast. Trying to strike one with another at these speeds was like trying to shoot bullets with bullets.

At least we’re keeping them burning resources, and they’re not shooting at us
, he thought.
They’re not so tough after all.
Then, belatedly, a sailor’s superstition about assuming victory overcame him.
What the hell am I doing tempting fate? I shouldn’t even be thinking such a thing.

That concern became a punch in the gut as the situation he watched suddenly changed again.

Just as before, the enemy’s torch-like defensive sweeps had cleared nearly all of the missiles from the bottom of the cup formation, leaving a thick ring sweeping up the sides and curling inward to attempt a maneuver similar to last time, trying to hit them from the front where their drives could not be used as shields.
Or
, Vango thought,
if they are, they will be decelerating back toward us, giving up their advantage.

Putting the lie to his prediction, both Destroyers abruptly flipped end over end, their main drives flaring even brighter. Either they were now at overload levels, or their thrust capability was even greater than predicted.

This maneuver seemed to catch the missiles flatfooted. Of course this was an illusion; machines could not be surprised, but they could and did take precious time to run the new situation through their processors and select from a list of alternatives, then distribute all those updates through their network.

In that brief moment the Destroyers seemed to dive back down the inside of that ring, putting the circling missiles behind them as they flew past. Now they were able to use their drives again on the majority of the Pilums, at the cost of allowing the pursuing Aardvarks to gain a lot of ground in their coasting chase.

“Let’s go, boys,” Dick’s voice came over the squadron net just a moment after the datalinked command told them to go to full burn again. The fleet’s commanders had seen immediately that they might have an opportunity to catch up, despite the lightspeed delay. The closer they got to their enemies, the more accurate their information became…and the nearer everyone got to their final options.

Inside the VR world Vango imagined he could feel the G forces as
Lark
leaped toward the enemy, using the chance to get as close as possible. “Everyone launch two more Pilums, nearest target protocol,” the squadron leader continued. “Fleet will push updates.”

Vango wondered how the general was holding up. The man must be running on the ragged edge of stims and adrenaline, and though his ship
Glennis II
had extra command and control capability, it was still an Aardvark, still just a tiny tube in space like the rest of them had, compared to the monsters they chased and stung.

Dumping the mass of two more weapons allowed the fleet to accelerate even more quickly, and now he felt like they had a chance to catch up. The distance and time to intercept fell faster and faster, though not as fast as he would like. Pilums away, he looked back at the fight situation, and gave a groan that probably could be heard on the net.

The two Destroyers had dove through the center of the ring of missiles and left behind those they had not destroyed. Switching positions now, the smaller, more damaged one led while the larger ship, in better shape but heavier, fell slightly behind. It took only a few moments for it to clear all of the Pilums that had tried to reverse course with them.

Sixty thousand more missiles converged on the enemy, this time adopting a swept-back conical formation, point toward the Destroyers. This position provided the optimum parameters for a nose-on engagement, where density of weapons swelled in importance, and their dispersion diminished. With so much less time available as the two forces closed, detonations would be timed in milliseconds, perhaps nanoseconds. Often the weapons would be exploded by their computers almost as if they were mines set in the way of the Destroyers, but even machine speed would be hard pressed to hit targets at combined velocities approaching relativistic territory.

The best they could do was form a kind of explosive gauntlet, filling the two ships’ intended paths with graser beams, plasma shockwaves and debris.

The entire fleet of twenty-some-thousand ships, minus the many that were out of action due to failure or collision with Hills Cloud objects, tightened up, mimicking the cone of missiles, getting in the way of the enemy. It appeared to be an ideal situation for the Aardvarks, a nose-on fleet confrontation that would cost thousands of ships but would also allow them to bring most of their firepower directly on the Destroyers. Vango knew the general had no choice but to take the chance offered. Losing half, three quarters, even all of the fleet to destroy these two would be a tremendous victory, buying years of life for Earth and the solar system.

Destroyer 6223-2 was healing the weapons as fast as it could, One knew; obviously the stern fusors were of the highest priority after the drive itself. Because of that, he knew that the armor over his own precious self had thinned and cracked in many places, and the Humans’ damnable radiation weapons continued to kill both experienced and newly-cloned Meme.

He sucked in extra data from the ship-wide nerve network and his mood worsened. Digestion, Gestation, Vascular Circulation, all showed severe damage.

In fact, the only system not under severe stress was Close Combat. The insectoid Purelings stood impassively with their weapons, useless.

That gave One an idea. He put a call through to the Close Combat trium. “Close Combat One, this is Rear Fusor One. Can you taste me?”

“Communications are functional, Rear Fusor One. What do you want?”

“I have an idea. These tiny Human missile-launching craft cannot possibly contain troops, and even if they did, at current speeds the possibility of boarding is vanishingly small.”

“Ah, you bring me
such
good news. Now my function, merely marginal before, has been declared completely useless.” Close Combat One’s sarcasm came through unmistakably.

“Thus my idea,” Rear Fusor One replied, keeping his response even and reasonable. “We could use some assistance to keep our weapons functioning. Could you and your Purelings help clear dead tissue?”

Close Combat tria were selected for their decisiveness, so that One’s response came back swiftly. “Of course. An excellent suggestion. We will share the credit for increased efficiency.”

“Naturally. If we live. Communication remains open.”

Rear Fusor One monitored the progress of dead tissue removal long enough to confirm its acceleration, and congratulated himself for his cleverness. The insect-like Pureling troops were sturdy and powerful, though a bit clumsy.

If everything worked out, he had also made an ally above him who might be able to assist him upward. Would it be better to remain One of this trium, or be Three in a higher-ranked one?

That discussion had occupied idle Meme through the ages.

“We have destroyed all but a few targets,” the molecular voice of Two broke into One’s thoughts.

“Cease continuous fire and change to targeted shots.”

“Agreed.” Two and Three adjusted the necessary controls.

“You are overriding orders,” Three observed even as he complied.

“I am conserving precious fuel,” One replied, knowing Three was just trying to provide himself an excuse if their superiors inquired.
One ordered me to do it
he would undoubted say in that weak-moleculed way he had. Two shot him a look, and blinked his eyeball.

“Accelerating repairs,” Two announced. “The Purelings’ assistance is helpful, and the process is exceptionally efficient.”

“Of course.” One basked for a moment in the pride of his success.

“We are maneuvering,” Three called, for once providing useful information rather than mere complaints. “Reversing orientation.”

“Prepare for firing again. Close Combat One, please concentrate your efforts on those fusors with minimal blockages, in order of priority.”

“Yes, yes, I am doing so,” the higher ranking Meme replied condescendingly.

Rear Fusor One was about to mention the maneuver, but decided that nonessential communication with his counterpart just gave the other Meme more opportunities to act superior, and kept his molecules to himself.

“Continuous fire again.” Two passed the order. “We are decelerating and reversing toward the enemy ships.” A pause. “Continuous fire is effective.” The control room shook from a particularly near explosion, and a bubbling stripe appeared on one wall.

Three squealed at the near miss from the enemy radiation beam. “Cease that noise, Three,” Two said before One could. “We still live.”

“Return to targeted fire,” One ordered, seeing that only a few hundred scattered enemy missiles remained. More might get through with continuous fire stopped, but fuel supplies were now below twenty percent. He sent a request for more to be released from the central reserve, and saw his available hydrogen grow by only a few thousand tons.

“Our next engagement will exhaust the fusor tanks,” Two observed. “Main sensors show another double wave, and the Human ships behind. We cannot beat them head on.”

“I know,” One replied. “See if the recycling system can be squeezed for any more fuel, and pray to the One of Ones that Command thinks of something.”

“Maneuvering,” Two observed. “We are…rotating perpendicular and engaging full propulsion thrust.”

“There goes our fuel resupply,” Three mumbled. “They’ll probably take some back.”

“If they do, there’s a good reason,” One replied.

“New orders,” Two announced. “Return all but five percent of fusor fuel to the central reserve.”

“I knew it,” Three said.

“Also, essential fire only.”

“Knew that was coming,” said Three.

One held onto his control with every molecule of his being and replied, “That’s good news, not bad, Three. If we do not need to fire, we are not being attacked.”

“Oh. That’s true.” Mollified for now, Three shut his pores.

This proved little consolation as the hammer blows of exploding Human missiles shook their compartment again. One ignored Three’s accusatory stare.