Warborg - Star Panther (14 page)

Martin looked around at the others in the meeting. He was by far the junior officer present, and the only other cyborg was Commander Briton. He and Briton attended the meeting by looking on from displays in opposite walls. His attention went back to the Admiral from Intelligence.

The Admiral hesitated as a projection of a very complex curve appeared in the holodisplay. “This is the subspace distortion curve generated by the first micro-drone when it self destructed. It’s actually a highly modified FTL field signature. Since then we have managed to find and track two more of the devices. Utilizing the same technique from the first encounter we triggered them.”

Two more curves appeared in the holodisplay. One was very similar to the first, but the second was noticeably different.

The Admiral highlighted the similar one. “This was the second encounter and we used exactly the same tactic, it was allowed to identify two squadrons of warborg strikes.” He highlighted the third curve. “This time the device was headed toward a small battle group of mixed missile cruisers and fighter bases. We let nature take its course and jumped the entire group as soon as the device passed through. As you can see this curve is noticeably different from the other two. Twenty five seconds later an overwhelming Koth attack fleet appeared in the area.” The Admiral nodded toward Martin’s display. “So apparently Major, your initial deduction was correct. The micro-drone self destruction emits a subspace data burst that not only establishes a location, but some reasonable detail of what was detected.” The Admiral sighed. “Also thank you Major, as I said the third device would have picked up the battle group on its own and that would have been a disaster without prior warning it was coming.”

“Sir.” Commander Briton injected.

“Yes, Commander.” The Admiral nodded toward Briton’s display.

“Do we have any idea why my group was scouted by the Koth strike fighters prior to the attack?”

The Admiral sucked his front teeth for a second. “No, not really. There have been a few postulations ranging from it was a freak occurrence, once in a while normal reconnaissance operations do hit pay dirt, to the device was not as sophisticated as these or it malfunctioned somehow.” He shook his head.

Commander Briton gave a quick nod. “Thank you, Sir.”

“So the question now, is what are we going to do about this latest development?” The Admiral asked in general, throwing the floor open for suggestions.

“We have to defang this threat.” Admiral Chinn stated. “I propose we set a trap.”

“Hmmm, that would make them leery of using them.” Another Fleet Commander added. “So we’re only going to get one shot at this. When they realize we’re on to the micro drones it will be a lot harder to draw them in.”

Admiral Chinn nodded. “I suspect you’re right, so this has to be a big, nasty beast . . . with a heavy price tag if we mess up.”

Martin listened to the others formulate a plan and observed in quiet amazement as the sheer massiveness of the trap became apparent. “Sirs?” Martin asked quietly during a lull in the conversation.

“Yes, Major.” The Intelligence Admiral responded.

Martin felt a momentary apprehension at being the center of attention from all the high ranking officers. “If we make the operation this big we’d best be ready for their wildcard. If they send in the killer ship and we’re not ready for it . . . that would be devastating.”

The meeting fell eerily silent. Finally the Intelligence officer spoke. “Thank you Major, calling having a third of all the fighting ships in sector destroyed in seconds devastating is a vast understatement.” He looked around at the others and seemed deflated. “What DO we DO if that son-of-a-bitch shows up?”

“Run.” An anonymous voice ventured. The room filled with nervous laughter.

. . .

Admiral Chinn felt like someone was twisting an ice cold knife in her gut as she watched the progress of the Koth micro-drone. It had taken two days to find one and they had been painstakingly tracking it since while they gathered the battle group. All of the fleets had sent ships, mainly warborgs, over the past seventy two hours and now they were ready. She gazed at the decoy fleet of four hundred mixed ships, alone this was an incredibly powerful battle group. But the thought of the eight hundred plus fighting ships hanging in space just out of sensor range was mind boggling.

“ETA, two minutes.” The anonymous voice droned over the fleet comm system.

“All groups prepare for battle.” Her voice didn’t sound as shaky as she felt. She noticed her white knuckles from gripping the arms of her command seat and shook out her hands. An aide gave her a re-assuring wink and a nervous smile. She pursed her lips and tried to smile back. The chatter from the battle channels was tense and quiet.

“ETA, ninety seconds.”

It took two days to find one of the damn things, then three hours ago a group had to dodge one.
She felt her anxiety roll up another notch.
So many, so much . . . too much. One little glitch and it’s over, maybe literally.
She took a huge breath and slowly blew it out.

“ETA, sixty seconds.”

She forced an involuntary shiver aside and clicked on a comm channel. “Commander Briton, you now have warborg battle command.”

“Affirmative, I now have command.” Briton’s voice came back sounding relaxed and confident.

Admiral Chinn shook her head slightly.
It’s just so strange knowing that one of my battle commanders is floating around out there in a strike fighter with a wingman instead of sitting at a command post in a flagship.
She felt a stab of envy.
Just like the ancient times when the leader would charge into battle with his warriors. I know he isn’t going to engage in the fight, but just knowing that you could.

“ETA, thirty seconds.”

Chinn clicked on a general command comm channel. “This is Admiral Chinn, all ships hold position. Surveillance ships report into Fleet Command comm.”
In thirty seconds I’m going to trigger a battle with so much firepower that it makes any other battle in the history of mankind look like a gnat fart.
Strangely she had a thought of Martin floating around out there somewhere in undetected silence and somehow it made her feel a little better.
GOD, I don’t want to do this.
She gritted her teeth.
How many hundreds, maybe thousands are going die in the next five minutes.
She bit her lips together and her stomach was an agony of wet knotted rope.

“ETA, ten seconds.”

“All ships initiate phase one on my mark . . . and God speed.” The comm links were absolutely silent.
May God forgive me.

. . .

“. . . and God Speed.” Admiral Chinn’s voice was steady, but with an edge as it came through the comm link.

Hang tough, Milady
,
was Briton’s fleeting thought as he studied his forces. ^Everybody hold position through phase one.^ He commanded over an open voice only hardlink to all his fighters. ^Everyone into position on my command, jump.^

“All comm silent.” Chinn ordered over the command channel.

Briton sat waiting apprehensively in the eerie silence.

“Contact.” The droning countdown voice sounded like a shout in the silence.

“We have a pulse. We have a pulse.” An other anonymous female voice calmly reported from a surveillance ship as if she were giving the weather.

“Mark.” Admiral Chinn barked over the command channel.

Fifteen seconds to get twelve hundred ships in position and establish the IFF
[5]
net, this should be . . . interesting.
Briton thought as the decoy fleet disappeared. ^JUMP!^

. . .

Martin watched with clinical interest as the decoy ships repositioned and were re-enforced a second later when three hundred warborg fighters blinked into existence. Within a few heartbeats the rest of the force was in position. The view from Martin’s vantage point was stunning. A tumulus collage of three hundred warborgs a hundred klicks across held center stage. Five hundred klicks out a loose constellation of eight hundred manned fighters formed a shell around the warborgs. Just beyond the manned fighters almost a hundred missile cruisers roved . . . anchored by thirteen strategically placed heavy battle cruisers.

There was a second of heady silence. “Plus ten seconds.”

“Initialize IFF.” Chinn commanded.

To Martin’s artificial eyes it looked like the entire fleet was momentarily engulfed in a haze of electronic hash as all the fleets ship’s on board IFF systems sorted out those around them. It faded to nothing and the suffocating silence returned.
Now we wait.

“Plus twenty seconds.”

. . .

“Plus twenty seconds.”

The droning voice grated on Admiral Chinn’s nerves like finger nails on a chalkboard. Streams of sweat ran from her armpits soaking her uniform. Her emotions were a rubber ball in a paint shaker, she didn’t know whether she was going to pee her pants, have an orgasm or just simply have a heart attack.
We invited hell to breakfast, now WHERE THE FUCK ARE THEY? GOD DAMMIT!
She studied the strained faces around the Command Center.

“Plus thirty seconds.”

“We all know that.” She hissed almost inaudibly.
Shit, I’m losing it!
The thought was edged with panic. She tapped out a quick sequence on a control pad in the arm of her seat, hesitated then tapped out a second sequence. Briton and Martin’s faces split a screen if front of her. “Thoughts?” was her single word.

Both men paused. “Gathering their forces.” Briton stated with a nod through squinted eyes. “They’re going to hit us hard.”

“Plus forty seconds.”

Chinn winced at the voice.

“You guys can court marshal me later.” Martin gave a tight smile. “But we have to loosen things up before we explode.”

“Don’t you just hate it when you throw a party and the guests of honor are late.” Martin’s voice was a loose drawl over the command channel.

Briton’s eyes bulged as he struggled not to laugh. The Admiral’s mouth hung open in surprise, then she started to giggle when the Command Center dissolved into howls of laughter.

“Incoming . . . holy shit!“ A deck officer bellowed above the laughter.

Admiral Chinn’s attention snapped around to a holotank showing Koth warcraft pouring into the area. She stabbed a button opening the Fleet Command channel. “The guests have arrived,” her voice faded into a hiss of seething anger she didn’t know she had, “if it’s Koth, make it dead.” She released the button and noticed both faces were gone from the display.
Court marshal you Major? I’d kiss you if I could.
Her attention swung to the battle at hand.

. . .

^GO!^ was Briton’s single command through the hardlink and Martin’s world disintegrated into the deafening howl of three hundred charging warborgs, it was a primal scream as old as time.

“Oh my God!” Martin muttered as he absently scratched Prowler’s ears. His mind couldn’t comprehend the sheer numbers of the ships on his displays. Over thirteen hundred Koth ships materialized in the combat zone in less that a second. The Koth may have had numbers on their side, but the Federation had surprise, and the fact that most of the Koth appeared in a hornet’s nest of rampaging warborgs.

Commander Briton signaled for a hardlink.

^Yes, Commander.^ Martin responded automatically.

^Major, are you and Prowler set?^ Briton was obviously busy watching his forces, but everyone knew what they had to do, so unless something changed all he could do was let the battle run.

Martin looked down at Prowler. “Are you ready?” The cat looked up blinked and uttered a low churup. ^Affirmative, we’re all set, Commander, and the missile frigates are in position.^

^Very good, Major,^ Briton gave a quick nod. ^Carry on.^ His image blinked out.

Martin’s attention was split between watching the battle rage and thinking about his mission. The magnitude of the battle made it surrealistic, absolutely mind boggling in size and ferocity. The warborgs were slaughtering the Koth fighters while the manned fighters hammered any Koth ships that dodged outside the main battle area, either destroying them or driving them back into the frenzied warborgs. The only Koth ships escaping the wrath of the warborgs were their missile cruisers and heavy warcraft. Most of these large ships had micro-jumped out or simply smashed their way through the fighters and were engaged in slugfests with their Federation counterparts.

Watching these huge ships dance and pirouette with micro-jumps of just a few hundred meters while twisting and turning with an agility that belied their size was hypnotic.
God, I could never do that!
Martin thought. In that second a Federation missile cruiser mis-timed a jump and was instantly transformed into a cauldron of slag by a sleet of Koth missiles. Martin shuddered. A moment later a Koth heavy and a Federation missile cruiser popped into existence side by side a hundred meters apart. It only took a second for the Koth ship to shred the Federation ship with cannon fire. But the human crew didn’t die in vain. The twelve missiles they fired crippled the heavy bad enough that it couldn’t jump. Five seconds later this magnificent piece of technology was a drifting derelict, a sitting duck gutted by three human missile cruisers. Martin tore his eyes away from the display, he’d never witnessed the heavies fighting in real life. He had seen the simulations, but nothing could prepare him for the brutal viciousness of the real thing. It re-enforced in his mind why when the heavies got into it the fighters would run for cover.
Jumping a heavy is one thing, but stepping in the ring when they are already going at it . . . I don’t even think so. I’ll stay with my little furball fights, thank you.
His respect for Admiral Chinn and her kind rose remarkably.