Annihilation: A Rose Grows In Weeds (9 page)

Terl said, “I also support your choice but I must make a decision you might not like, Admiral.”

“What is that Clan Leader?”

“I am going to give one of our divisions to your brother. After his defeat on Ross and the subsequent imprisonment by the humans, he has had great difficulty living with the shame of having murdered the Human Colonists. He must be given a chance to redeem himself. Fighting alongside these Humans may give him the release he so desperately needs.”

Dorg looked at Terl and said, “It was I that ordered those murders. My brother was a victim of my stupidity. I thank you Clan Leader for the opportunity. I could never have made that decision but I know he and I will never forget your kindness. Friends, you have twenty rotations to get your troops ready for transport. We will provide all their provisions; you need only worry about their military needs. You will be facing more than two million Plant soldiers. Make sure your warriors are prepared adequately.”

All three leaders looked at each other with the knowing expression that any warrior would recognize as the longing for the good fight against a worthy adversary. Then each of them went to notifying those that were lucky to be in the coming battle and explain to others why they weren’t going this time. It was going to be glorious.

Mikado studied the Algean fleet around the planet. There were 20 thousand ships with some of them more than 20 miles long with hundreds of missile and beam projectors. The Ultras and Empires were being refitted with pulse penetrator ports and all of them were supposed to be ready in 6 rotations. It was the success of that particular weapons platform that would determine the success of his fleet. His ships were going to be too busy knocking those anti-matter missiles out to really fire their weapons accurately. The penetrators were shoot and forget weapons and Mikado made sure that every ship’s Captain knew that he could not stock too many. “Fill every available space with all you can hold. You can get your provisions from the Asteroids after the action but you won’t need the provisions if you run out of weapons. Needles and penetrators; don’t get caught without them.”

Richard Wiseman stood in front of the auditorium facing the leaders of the troops that the SR was sending to take back the Pydres Planet. He thought long and hard about what to say and then turned on the video showing the plants attacking the Pydres settlements. The speed and viciousness of the Plants in their attack was incredible. They wore no armor but they had energy and projectile hand weapons. The floaters provided most of their heavy weapons fire. “What you see here is the enemy. They will not retreat, they will not back off, they will come at you in unimaginable numbers until they over run you. This is like nothing you have ever seen before and these creatures are incredibly strong. Picture a jungle vine capable of picking up a floater and you’ll get the picture of what they are capable of doing. They don’t use armor because if you shoot off an arm or leg, they grow a new one. We will have to totally burn all of the ones we hit. We are not going to wait for these nightmares to come to the southern continent to attack us. We are going to land close to their largest concentrations and dare them to take the ground from us. What I want all of you to know is that I and my Brother Marines will not leave you to die. As long as there is power in our armor, we will support you our brother warriors. We will not run and leave you defenseless. We know the importance of being able to trust your comrades to protect your back.”

The leaders in that room listened to him and knew he meant what he was telling them. They sat straighter and looked at their fellow warriors and each of them vowed to do the same for each other. “We will drop our fort in on the Algeans largest concentration which is located in the center of the northern continent. We will surround it on four sides with two divisions per side. General Dorg’s Division and my Division will take the northern side. Two of the Vgrig will take the south. The remaining Cainth and Vgrig divisions will take the east and the Two Glod Divisions will take the west. We will immediately dig in upon landing and get ready for the assault. We will not have to go to them; they will come to us. We need to handle them quickly because once the word goes out over the Plant message center that a new food source has arrived; reinforcements in the hundreds of thousands will be rushing to join in the conflict. We will need to have completed our fortifications to hold off the coming horde. We think we will have support overhead but we are uncertain of how much. I will let my XO cover you on your individual assignments and I will speak with you again once we are on the ground. There are millions of warriors around the Stars Realm that would actually kill to be in your place right now. Let’s go show them how real Warriors fight and give them something to try and better.”

The entire room stood up and cheered. Death stood among them and cheered with them and the warriors knew death waited for them on Pydres but they didn’t care. This is what they lived for, and this is what they were willing to die for. “This is a strong group,” Richard thought. “Let’s hope this new armor is all they say it is.”

Mikado was sitting on his new Megaship Rising Sun with Colonel McAllister who was charged with weapon development. “Colonel, I’m concerned that our pulse penetrators may not get thru the Algeans screens. The first needle fired at their scout ship did not get thru thought the following two did. The Ultra’s primary beam did make it thru one of their medium cruisers screen but I’m concerned that the way our hornet’s guidance systems are programmed that to only target one ship if it is designated by the sensor may not be enough to stop them. If we don’t impact them quickly after the first strike then their screen may have time to recover. I think from looking at the recording of our last fight that their screens are more powerful than any we have ever encountered but lose efficiency immediately after a hit for a short period. I don’t want to waste weapons but I’m worried about what will happen if we barrage them with single penetrators and none get thru.”

Colonel McAlister watched the display and said, “I see what you’re talking about. What if we set up dual protocols in the hornets software where we can change the system so that they will lock on any ship without a Coronado screen initially but if they don’t get thru we send a signal which will switch them to going after ships that have already been designated.”

“Would you have many then strike a single ship?”

“No, we will program them to lock on a ship if there are no penetrators locked on and then have the closest penetrator to see the single lock designate the same ship. If the penetrators sense that two sensor beams are locked on a ship, then they will ignore that ship. Until you send that signal, they will operate normally. I would suggest your initial salvo be limited so that you can see their effectiveness and then you may want to double your salvos very quickly to make sure you have enough to be effective. Our current magazines can fire a salvo every five seconds. If their screens can recover faster than that the ships that get hit with only one may not be destroyed and you’ll have to depend on your primary beams.”

“Colonel, if we get close enough to use our primary beams, then we are going to lose ships to their anti-matter missiles.”

“How far would you have to be to be able to escape the missiles?”

Mikado thought and said, “At least 100 miles to be able to get up to speed to out run them.”

Cade thought a moment and said, “Admiral, your primary beams are currently as wide as the ship is long. What if you focused all of that energy into a beam that was only 300 feet wide?”

“What would be the benefit of that?”

“The Megaships primary beam would have 95% of its power 200 miles away. The Ultras would probably be good for about 110.”

“Can we target a ship that far, Colonel?”

“The beam is moving at the speed of light. The ships you’re firing at would be relatively standing still. We could modify the software and have the beams automatically lock on anything your sensors detect. It would be hard to determine what part of the ship you would hit at that range but you could fire each primary on the Megas every five seconds and you have six of them instead of just two.”

“How long will it take to make these changes?”

“All of these changes are basically software changes. If you get all the ships you’re going to use in the upcoming battle in one location, I could download the changes in less than twenty hours after I write the programming. The program can be completed in fourteen days.”

“One more question, Colonel; could this same thing be done to the primaries on the asteroids?”

Cade thought for about a minute and scribbled notes on a pad, “Yes it can.”

“How far would the beam be effective?”

“Well, if you make the ten mile wide beam six hundred feet wide it would have 95% of its power at 4,000 miles. The seventy foot Asteroids would have a beam 1,500 feet wide at 30,000 miles. Remember that the 70 foot forts primaries are sixty miles wide out to 2,000 miles.”

“Colonel, why haven’t we done this before?”

“Admiral, our development processes were designed to protect a fleet in close fleet actions. We just haven’t focused on long distance engagements. Bigger and more powerful has been the watch word. The needle development has been the closest thing to a standoff weapon.”

“Could a hornet package be contained in those focused primary beams?”

“Not in time for your battle. The protective sheath around the hornets would not handle the high energy of the primaries. We’ll work on it but I doubt we’ll have an answer for that very soon.”

“Has anyone mentioned adding pulse penetrators to the asteroids weapons mix?” Mikado asked.

“As a matter of fact they have. All of the new seventy foot asteroids will have the magazines built right into the surface beside the needle ports and the forts will have more than twenty million penetrators in their stores.”

“Our ships and asteroids will be gathering in the gamma galaxy in twenty days. I’ll give you the coordinates and you can meet us there to download your changes.”

“I’ll need to get to work; I’ll see you there.

K
osiev contacted Tag and brought him up to date on what was being planned. Tag was at home with Danielle and the baby and he was concerned about the upcoming conflict. “Admiral, your fleet is going to be attacked by numbers that are almost unthinkable. Why do you want to start this conflict early?”

“Mr. Gardner, this is going to be a war of attrition on a monumental scale. Once we take a stand and stake out a position, then you’re right, it is going to be a huge battle. Our thinking is that we would rather start this at a place where a planetary population is not at stake. If we’re pushed out, then we take another position away from the Dremel; the longer they stay hidden from the Plants, the better their chance of survival. It will also give us time to get the transports for their population to move.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to wait until we have more Megaships in our arsenal?”

Kosiev looked at Tag and then said, “What if the Megaships aren’t enough. What if they can’t handle the Plants weapons? We need to know before we continue to throw all our development into them. We have some new tools that we hope will keep them at arm’s length but it may be that smaller ships equipped with these weapons are the way to go. We need to find out.”

Tag thought a minute and wished he had a bag of popcorn, “You’re right. We can always jump out and work on new weapons. Would it be a problem if I came to the party?”

“Absolutely not, Admiral Mikado would appreciate the help.”

“Admiral Mikado?”

“He is the leader of this excursion. It is his plans that we are following. He is also the one that came up with the new long range weapons we’ll be deploying in the coming battle.”

“I’ll take a pass then; I want him to be focused and not worried about my presence.”

Kosiev looked at Tag with a degree of amazement on his face, “You never cease to amaze me at your insight. I have to agree with you. He would defer to you and he needs to be the one making the decisions.”

“That doesn’t mean I won’t be watching,” Tag thought. “Keep me updated, Admiral.”

“I will Mr. Gardner.”

“Does that mean what I think it does?” Tag heard in his mind.

“Atlas, you’ve been snooping.”

“I always snoop so get used to it; am I right?”

“Yes you are. Would you like to go check out the planet before our fleet arrives?”

“I think that would be a good idea. When do you want to go?”

“After the baby is asleep; I’ll go tell Danielle now.”

Atlas and Tag were parked on the third moon of the Pydres Planet watching the ships that were harvesting the planet. “Atlas those are huge ships. They have to be 20 miles long or longer. They also look like they’re fully armed with beam and missile ports.”

“They are and they’re actually 23 miles 856 feet long. There are about 3,000 of them in place around the planet; most of the others are used as transports to bring the spoils from the planet to them.”

“How many plant warriors are there on the planet?”