Valkyrie Burning (Warrior's Wings Book Three) (22 page)

The Hood and the Cheyenne were on the main feed, closing just ahead of the rest of the taskforce by virtue of having just a couple more seconds’ warning on the countdown, she supposed. Vectoring in from other angles, the rest of the force was keeping itself well spread out just in case the enemy was holding back a gravity valve or two. It would be nicer to have a little more close-in fire support for point defense, but they would have to make do with the PD capabilities of two ships.

The conflagration ahead was lighting up every sensor pointed even in its general direction, forcing them to turn down the sensitivity to avoid damaging the optics. Basically rendering every array pointed in that direction worthless.

Lovely
.

Half blind, operating on data that was now minutes old and possibly dozens, if not hundreds, of kilometers off, the fleet continued to plunge forward. They could read that the enemy assault on the defenses in Hayden orbit was slowly increasing, as were the response fire from those same defenses. That much was evident just from the number of explosions erupting in the black of space that was now a contested no-man’s-land between Hayden and the enemy squadron.

She and likely every eye not doing critical tasks were staring at those screens intently as they tried to spot anything that might indicate that they themselves were about to come under fire.

Considering the crushing weight of the acceleration, and how very nearly impossible it was just to breathe, she’d be surprised if anyone saw more than the spots in front of their eyes.

*****

Parithalian Alliance Ship
Noble Venture

“They mount an aggressive defense, Ship’s Master.”

Reethan conceded the point with a wave of his hand. “Not so much as they could, I believe.”

“You think they’re still holding back?”

Reethan was certain of it, in fact, and didn’t mind saying so.

“Without doubt. We have seen none of their explosives yet, merely mass moving devices. They’re waiting to engage us in closer. It is not an unwise stratagem,” he said. “We know that they used nuclear force weapons against the Ros’El, Ke?”

That wasn’t a pleasant reminder, not even for someone confident in Parithalian Fleet superiority. His apprentice grimaced but had to concede the point nonetheless.

“That will be…aggravating, once we close the range.”

“We aren’t going to close the range.”

“Excuse me, Master? Then why did we come in so close to begin with?”

“I wanted to see their defensive system, and now I have,” he said. “Arrange a course to curve us about the larger moon and take us into deeper space.”

“Uh…yes, Ship’s Master. As you say.”

Reethan watched his apprentice work, slightly amused but mostly pensive as he considered what he knew about the current situation.

The enemy certainly had effective defenses for conventional assault. However, against a Ros’El singularity device, none of them would prove to be worth a cometary fragment in the corona of a star. Luckily, or perhaps not, for them, he didn’t have a ship class SD on hand so he was going to have to be a little more creative.

The close pass told him everything he needed to know about the local defenses, and that was that they were effectively immobile. No matter how impressive the strength of that material holding the large station in place, it was holding the large station
in place
. Since the only other defenses they showed to the pressed assault were from an immobile orbital network, the best course of action was to engage them from well beyond their range.

A few kinetic strikes against the station should eliminate it with little problem, the orbital paths will be child’s play to calculate.

He was already well underway to making those calculations when his apprentice let out a shout and turned an unhealthy shade of blue-green.

Reethan rose from his station, knowing when to get a look at a situation with his own eyes, and swore under his breath when he saw the display that caused the reaction.

So, they had a mobile force waiting behind the smaller moon. Clever.

“Too late to back down now!” he called out, his voice echoing powerfully around the command center. “Stand prepared to engage the enemy ships, increase acceleration to full power, hold current course!”

They were going to be caught between the two forces for several passing moments, but he wasn’t too worried about the immobile defenses. Not yet at least, since they were at an innate disadvantage given their relative immobility. A short passing engagement was all the flotilla would have to endure with them before they were clear and moving too quickly for their relatively slow weapons to have much value.

The enemy ships, those could be a different issue, but only marginally so if the intelligence was accurate. While he certainly didn’t want to slug it out at close range with an enemy that used nuclear force weapons, he was also aware that their relative acceleration was a fraction of his own. A passing engagement would be measured in fractions of a momentary cycle, and then they would be clear and able to reevaluate the local situation.

Unfortunately, it looks to be an exciting few fractions indeed.

“Watch for guided weapons! Here they come!”

*****

United Solari Fleet’s Task Force Five, more commonly called Task Force Valkyrie, had taken a beating since it had originally commissioned. They’d begun with an even dozen Cheyenne class cruisers, and half that again in Longbow class vessels. By the time Hayden had been retaken from its alien occupation, they’d lost several of their number, but over the years since that battle, there had been more losses and, indeed, more reinforcements. Now, Valkyrie stood as the most powerful human fleet outside of Earth Space. With fifteen Cheyenne class cruisers and nine of the Longbow class, they were a force to be reckoned with by almost any standard.

They were beaten, battered even, after years of battle, but their crews knew their jobs and the repairs had been completed competently and with dispatch. The ships now flinging themselves into combat were every bit as dangerous as they had been when they floated clear of their docks.

The crews who manned them?

Now
they
had done nothing but get more and more dangerous as the years went by. In human terms, there were likely no men and women anywhere more competent at their jobs, more driven to do them, and more willing to sacrifice for their victory.

So even as the alien ships increased their acceleration, Admiral Nadine Brookes and her crews had already given, and acted on, the orders to open fire.

Valkyrie didn’t lead with their rail guns, they went straight to the main course of the coming conflict, and over one hundred fifty high-yield warheads surged into space on antimatter-powered plumes of flame.

****

USS Cheyenne

The ship rocked with each launch, the powerful shock of the missiles firing felt through the entire ship even while they were under acceleration.

Captain Roberts strained under the extreme acceleration, eyes on the plots. He could see the enemy ships increasing their speed and knew that they’d been spotted.

“Admiral, they’ve seen us.”

“Understood,” Brookes said, sounding pained.

He felt for her, under the extreme acceleration they were pulling it hurt to breathe, let alone to talk. Even the best acceleration suits, with their hydraulic pressure massage, were a poor salve for a tortured body.

“Drop to one gravity, stand by for maneuvering orders.”

“Roger.”

He reached out painfully, keying the command that sent the signal to the helm. It was all automated, causing the drives to cut as the signal was sent across the fleet. Instantly the stress lifted, almost magically. He had to fight an instant sensation of peace and a desire to sleep as his muscles relaxed, his breathing eased, and his body conspired against him now that the pain and stress were gone.

“Stand by for maneuvering orders!” he called out, forcing himself to lean forward and keep his muscles working.

“Aye, sir, helm standing by!”

“Plotter! Missile track to main display!”

“Track to main display, aye.”

The forward display of the command center lit up with the plot, compiled from data gathered from every sensor unit in the area. The missiles were running straight, hot, and on target, while the enemy ships were clearly trying to accelerate through the kill zone as quickly as they could make it.

Smart move. They know they can’t turn and run, not even with their acceleration. Faster through is quicker done.

“Captain,” Admiral Brookes spoke over the command channel. “New track data, coming through.”

“Aye, ma’am,” he said, examining the new course data.

The admiral wants to play. Very well, then, let’s play.

“All hands, this is Captain Roberts. Stand by for combat maneuvers,” he said over the ship-wide. “The enemy has already decided to break through our field of fire and bolt for open space. The admiral would like to dissuade them of that notion. We
will
not disappoint.”

He closed the comm, sending the orders to the helm.

“Helm, you have your orders. Engage when ready.”

“Aye aye, sir! Engaging new course and acceleration…now!”

****

Redirecting the thrust of a VASIMR drive was no easy matter. In centuries past, ships would use vectored thrust panels to deflect the force of the drive to one side or another, thus turning the vessel. With a VASIMR drive, however, the output of the system was far too energetic to be deflected by any physical system.

For a system as powerful as the Cheyenne and Longbow class VASIMR drives, the only way to vector the thrust was by bending it electromagnetically as it exited the main drive tube. With full power to the containment, the Cheyenne’s engineers turned the thrust particles as they exited the blast tube and turned the whole massive ship on the proverbial dime.

With her, the rest of Valkyrie turned in formation, the taskforce no longer heading for where their enemy was…but now aiming at where they would be.

*****

Parithalian Alliance Ship
Noble Venture

“Target the incoming weapons, fire as you may.”

The
Noble Venture
continued to accelerate, not quite into the teeth of the coming assault, but closer than Master of Ships Reethan Parath would prefer. His preferences weren’t taken into consideration by the universe, as a general rule, and so it was this time too. Sometimes, for a better future, one had to accept a painful present.

“All Parithalians, stand prepared for collisions.”

The first of the missiles exploded under fire, almost too easily. Too easily indeed, he noted a moment later as the remaining weapons began to take evasive actions. The next few instants slipped by as the defensive guns missed, lagging behind as they took a few precious moments to recognize the issue and recalculate new strike points.

More weapons exploded then, but the last few were so close.

Are they designed to detonate on impact, or…?

Three nuclear-force weapons detonated off the flotilla’s bows, and in that moment, every screen they had went white and then black as armor slammed into place to prevent the sensors from burning out.

Odd…

Reethan was confused, a sensation he had no love for at the best of time. In battle, he loathed the feeling indeed.

The reports said that they used penetration weapons, not space burst designs…

“We’ve lost contact with the
Impervious Mantle
!”

Master of Ships Parath rose from his station, knowing what had happened deep inside though he had yet to look at the data on the screens.

“All ships, evasive maneuvers! They blinded us from the true attack!”

The ships began to turn in space even before he finished speaking, but on the screens he watched the data feeds from three other ships go dead.

Clever little monsters,
he seethed, admiring the guile just enough to keep from cursing them to the void.
You’ll not do that to a Parithalian flotilla again, on my life you won’t!

*****

USS Cheyenne

The crew, those who had access to external displays at least, roared with satisfaction as the first of the enemy ships went up. The modified bunker busters had blasted through the nuclear fire, tearing into the enemy ships’ armor, and detonated deep inside the alien cruisers. Unlike the class one aliens, these ships weren’t so well armored or so large as to take an internal nuclear detonation with anything resembling ease.

Even Admiral Brookes wasn’t immune to the surge of adrenaline that followed the strike. Knowing that they’d landed a telling blow without resorting to insane measures felt
good
, but she was well aware that this battle wasn’t over yet.

They were accelerating again, this time at
only
ten gravities, so the enthusiasm was short-lived. No one had the energy for more than their jobs at the moment, and no one dared
not
give their jobs everything they had.

The two opposing forces were now flying almost parallel, with Valkyrie holding the outside line and keeping the alien ships sandwiched between them and the planet’s defenses. TFV’s arc would bring them within a light-second of the enemy force, give or take a half million kilometers, which Nadine knew would practically be slugging range for both sides.

This is going to hurt.

“Captain,” she hissed through clenched teeth while panting for air, “go weapons free on the cannons.”

“Aye, ma’am. Rail guns, weapons free!” Roberts called a moment later. “Fire at will!”

“Aye aye, Captain,” the weapons officer replied. “All rail guns, firing at will!”

Acquiring a firing solution for the fixed electromagnetic rail guns was a tricky issue given their current heading, given that the rail lines were aligned with the ship, front to back. That said, Valkyrie was just barely aiming in to intercept the enemy ships, and they had the gravity of the planet on their side. It was a math problem slightly complicated by the position of Hayden’s two moons, but in the end, it was far from insoluble.