Besides, his full force was hardly necessary to complete the task at hand. In a pinch, Odin and one of Gensonne’s cruisers could easily take out the four undersized ships on which the Volsungs were closing. Probably without even scratching their paint.
Just the same, Gensonne would indeed throw the full weight of his force against the Manticorans. After all, the only thing better than a painless victory was a fast painless victory. And a fast crushing painless victory should have a salutary effect on the ships in Green One, as well.
He keyed the com. “Admiral to all ships,” he called into the microphone. “Stand by battle stations. Relay status data now.”
For a moment nothing happened. Then, in proper order, the status board indicators began to wink on. Odin showed green; Tyr showed green; Copperhead—
Gensonne felt his eyes narrow. Floating in the sea of soothing green were a pair of red lights. “Captain Imbar?”
“It’s her ventral autocannon,” Imbar called from the com station. “Starboard sensor miscalibration. They’re working on it.”
Gensonne mouthed a curse as he looked back at the status board, where more green was filling in around Copperhead’s red lights. Should he give Copperhead a few more minutes? The Manticoran force was in deceleration mode, their kilts to the incoming Volsungs as they aimed for a zero-zero at the distant Naglfar that was now well behind the advance force. If Gensonne signaled Naglfar to raise her acceleration a bit, the Manticorans would presumably respond by increasing their deceleration rate, which would postpone the rapidly approaching moment when the enemy’s sensors would finally pick up the warships coasting stealthily toward them.
Gensonne straightened up, feeling the uniform collar peeking out from above his vac suit’s helmet ring pull briefly against his neck. Ridiculous. Even if every one of Copperhead’s lights went red he still had overwhelming superiority.
Besides, the far larger Green One force was also burning its way toward them across the Manticoran system. Postponing the Green Two skirmish would mean less time to reorganize and rearm before Green One showed up.
Green Two was nearly in range.
Time for them to die.
“Tell Copperhead to keep working until they get it right,” he growled to Imbar. Keying his mike again, he straightened a little more. “All ships: stand by to light up wedges.”
* * *
Heissman had sent Belokas and Woodburn off the bridge for a short break, and Travis was strapped into the Tactical Officer station when the moment everyone aboard Casey had been waiting for finally came.
Only it wasn’t the single ship they were expecting. It was far, far worse.
“New contact!” Rusk snapped from Tracking, the words cutting across the low-level conversation murmuring across the bridge. “I make it six ships on intercept vector at two hundred fifteen gees. Missile range, approximately sixteen minutes.”
“All ships, increase acceleration to two KPS squared and go to Readiness One,” Heissman called into his mike, the calm of his voice in sharp contrast to the sudden pounding of Travis’s heart. “Mr. Long?” he added.
Surreptitiously, Travis touched the helmet of his vac suit, fastened securely beside his station. Knowing it was there made him feel marginally safer. Marginally. “Six ships confirmed for Bogey Three,” he said, his eyes flicking back and forth between the displays and CIC’s running analysis of the incoming data. One of the many things Woodburn had beaten into him over the past few weeks was that you never simply took a computer’s word for anything when you could do your own assessment and analysis. “From wedge strength I’m guessing two battlecruisers, two heavy cruisers, and two light cruisers or destroyers. One of the latter is hanging back in com position.”
“Which pretty much confirms they’re a war fleet,” Woodburn’s voice came over Travis’s shoulder.
Travis looked up to see the TO float up behind him, the other’s hard gaze flicking coolly across the displays. “Yes, Sir,” Travis agreed, reaching for his restraints.
To his surprise, Woodburn waved him to stay where he was.
“Any read on origination or class?” Heissman asked. “I know they’re not running transponders.”
“Too far away for anything definitive,” Woodburn said. “But the over/under configuration matches Solarian military doctrine.”
“Which doesn’t tell us much,” Belokas pointed out as she floated rapidly across the bridge toward her station. “A lot of militaries run Solarian doctrine.”
“Maybe they’ll be kind enough to tell us who they are,” Heissman said. “Everyone watch and listen.” Reaching over, he keyed the com. “Unidentified ships, this is Commodore Rudolph Heissman, Royal Manticoran Navy. Kindly identify yourselves and state your business in Manticoran space.”
There was a pause, a little longer than the lag time necessary for the signal to make the round trip. Clearly, the other commander had been expecting the call and already knew what he was going to say. “Greetings, Commodore Heissman,” a deep voice boomed from the bridge speakers.
Travis looked at the com display. The face now filling the screen was light-skinned, the color of a man who seldom ventured out into the sun, with blue eyes and a mouth with a sardonic twist. From the shape and angles of its creases, Travis guessed that sardonic was the mouth’s most common mode. Above the face was a slightly balding carpet of pure blond hair cut in short military style. Below the face, a couple of centimeters of high-collared tunic could be seen above his vac suit.
“Black collar line, blue-gray knitted collar,” Woodburn murmured. Travis nodded, already keying the parameters into the computer for an archive search.
“My name and origin are unimportant,” the man continued, “but for convenience you may address me as Admiral Tamerlane. My business is, I regret to say, the destruction of you and your task force. I am, however, willing to discuss terms of surrender.”
He tilted his head slightly, and as he did so one of the muted insignia on his collar came into better view. A curved comet with a star at its inner edge, Travis decided, and added it to the search criteria. “This is, naturally, a limited time offer,” Tamerlane continued. “I read you as coming into missile range in just under eighteen minutes; somewhat less, of course, if you break off your pointless attempt to escape and turn to offer battle. I’ll await your answer.” He reached off-screen and his image vanished.
“Confident SOB,” Heissman commented. “Anyone recognize him or his accent?”
The bridge remained silent, and as Travis glanced around him he saw shaking heads. “Mr. Long?” Heissman asked.
“The uniform could be Solarian,” Travis affirmed, scanning the search results. “But a lot of Core World navies wear something similar. What we could see of the insignia looked more like something the Tahzeeb Navy uses.”
“Similar, but not exact,” Belokas said. “Though that may indicate they’ve worked with them. Best guess is that they’re mercenaries.”
“Probably,” Woodburn agreed. “Not sure what calling himself Tamerlane means. The original was an Old Earth conqueror who ran roughshod over a good chunk of the planet a little over two thousand years ago.”
“Tamerlane was also considered a military genius,” Heissman said. “I wonder which of those two aspects he’s trying to reference.”
“Either way, definitely the megalomaniac type,” Belokas said. “Confident, but probably not so confident that we can goad him into telling us what he has planned for Manticore after he runs us over.”
“Certainly not until he’s sure we can’t send anything useful back to System Command or Aegis,” Heissman agreed. “Speaking of Aegis, what’s their current ETA?”
“They’re still nearly two hours away,” Belokas said. “We could postpone the battle a bit by pushing our compensators right up to the red line, but it wouldn’t be enough for them to get here before we have to fight.”
“What about Bogey Two?” Heissman asked.
“Nothing since their last
course adjustment,” Woodburn said. “Depending on where in the plot cone they are, they’ll probably reach sensor range within the next ten to twenty minutes.”
“So no allies, but probably more enemies,” Heissman said. “In that case, I see no point in delaying the inevitable.” He keyed his com. “All ships, this is the Commodore. We’ve been challenged to a fight, and I intend to give them the biggest damn fight they’ve ever been in. Gorgon, maintain current course and acceleration—your job is to record what’s about to happen and get the data back to Manticore. Hercules and Gemini, stand by for a coordinated one-eighty pitch turn on my mark.”
Travis frowned. “A pitch turn?” he asked quietly. Most turns he’d seen had been of the yaw variety, where the ship rotated around her vertical axis, instead of a pitch flip that sent the ship head over heels and briefly put the stronger but completely sensor-opaque stress bands between the ship and the incoming threat.
“A pitch turn,” Woodburn confirmed, an edge of grim humor to his voice. “We can launch a salvo of missiles just before our wedge drops far enough to clear their line of sight, which will keep them from spotting the booster flares. By the time we’ve turned all the way over the missiles will be clear and ready to light off their wedges once Commodore Heissman decides which target he wants to go after first.”
Travis nodded. Casey herself had electromagnetic launchers that didn’t betray themselves with such telltales, but both Hercules and Gemini had the standard boosters on their missiles, vital for getting the weapons far enough from the ship to safely light up their wedges. If the Janus ships could launch without Tamerlane spotting the missiles it would give the Manticorans at least a momentary advantage.
“Pitch turn: mark,” Heissman called. “Stand by two missiles from each corvette and four from us, again on my mark.”
Travis looked at the tac display. Casey and the two corvettes were turning in unison, their loss of acceleration sending Gorgon toward the edge of the field even as the invading formation seemed to leap forward.
And the enemy would unfortunately have plenty of time to work on closing the remaining distance. Pitch turn or yaw turn, either type of one-eighty took a good two minutes to complete.
“Missiles on my mark,” Heissman said softly, his eyes on the tac.
“Missiles ready,” Belokas confirmed. “Target?”
Heissman watched the tac another moment, then turned to Woodburn. “Suggestions, Alfred?”
“I’d go with all eight on one of the cruisers,” Woodburn said. “The way they’re deployed strongly suggests the battlecruisers have opted for extra missiles instead of carrying their own countermissile loads, which would mean they’re relying on the cruisers to screen for them. If we can kill one of them right out of the box, we may have a shot at doing some damage to one of the big boys.”
“I’m sure Admiral Locatelli would appreciate us softening them up a bit for him,” Belokas said dryly. “I’ll go with Alfred on this one.”
Heissman looked at Travis. “Mr. Long?”
Travis looked at the tac display. Three small ships against six.…. “I’d throw four at each cruiser, Sir.”
“Reason?”
“We still don’t know exactly what specific classes their ships are,” Travis said. “Watching their defenses might give us some clues as to what they are and how to more effectively attack them. By attacking two at once, we’ll get that data a bit faster.”
“Alfred?” Heissman invited.
“We’d still do better to saturate one of them,” Woodburn said. “Frankly, Sir, we’re not going to get off a lot of shots in the time we have. We should concentrate on doing as much damage as possible.”
“You may be right,” Heissman agreed. “But Mr. Long is also right. Information is what we need most, both for ourselves and for Admiral Locatelli. I think it’s worth the risk.” He keyed his com. “Hercules and Gemini: one missile from each of you at each of the leading cruisers. We’ll throw an additional two at each one.”
He favored Travis with a small smile. “Let’s see how well Admiral Tamerlane can dance.”
* * *
Invincible’s bridge was already buzzing with tense activity when Metzger arrived, interrupted sleep still tugging at her eyelids. She scanned the displays as she maneuvered her way through the maze of people, stations, and monitors, looking for a clue as to why Commander McBride had sounded Readiness One.
And then, she spotted it.
Six contacts, bearing straight toward Manticore.
Six.
With only the four ships of Green Force Two standing in their way.
“Report,” she ordered quietly as she glided past Locatelli and braked to a halt beside the CO’s station.
“That bogie Janus reported a few hours ago has just turned into six bogies,” McBride said grimly as he unstrapped and floated free. “No IDs yet—Janus is still too far out for any fresh transmissions to have reached us and we can’t read any fine details from here. But the wedge strength alone implies they’re warships.” He gestured to the display. “The admiral has declared a Code Zulu.”
Code Zulu. Metzger turned the words over in her mind as she strapped into the command station. Code Zulu. The absolute worst-case scenario in Locatelli’s personal set of contingency plans. The contingency code Metzger had never, ever expected to hear.
Invasion.
God help us. “We’ve increased acceleration to one point nine KPS squared,” McBride continued. “But we’re still a solid hour from whatever’s about to happen.”
“Understood,” Metzger said, wincing. One point nine KPS squared was almost ninety-four percent of Invincible’s top acceleration, a full nine percent past the standard safe line for her compensator. But it would certainly get them to the combat arena sooner.
Whether the time gained by that kind of red-lining would be useful was another question. One school of tactical thought was that two forces rushing at each other should make no attempt to decelerate, but should simply fire their missiles in a single massive assault before blowing past each other’s formation, with the hope that enough would remain of their own side to collect the survivors after the dust settled.
But that strategy wasn’t an option here. Whatever happened to Green Two, Green One had to stay between the invading force and Manticore as long as it could. That meant that, however fast Locatelli forced his ships to travel on the way to the battle, he would have to bleed off that extra closing velocity as the enemy approached, forcing the two sides into as close to a face-to-face standing slugfest as possible.
And in the meantime, Green Two would be facing the invaders alone. Four ships against six, with the biggest one on the Manticoran side a light cruiser. Casey. Where Travis Long was currently serving.
Where Metzger had worked long and hard to put him.
There was a time for feelings of guilt. There was a time for feelings of fear.
This wasn’t either of those times.
McBride had disappeared, heading across to his battle station in CIC. But the Tactical Officer, Lieutenant Commander Perrow, had now arrived and was heading for her station directly in front of Metzger’s. “TO, I want a current status check of all targeting systems,” Metzger ordered as Perrow shot past. “And run me your list of Aegis’s weapons and their readiness states. Whatever we’ve got—more importantly, whatever we’re missing—I want to know about it.”
* * *
The three nearer Manticoran ships finished their turn—a pitch turn, interestingly enough—and with that, their throats were open to attack. “Stand by missiles,” Gensonne called. The first salvo would go to Casey, he decided. Odin’s telemetry could control six missiles at once, and while he normally would have added in a few missiles from his entire squadron in order to hit the cruiser with an overwhelming salvo, at this point it would be more useful to see what kind of defenses the Manticorans could bring against a slightly less overwhelming attack. “Fire salvo: one through six, targeting—”
r /> “Missiles!” Imbar snapped.
Of course missiles, was Gensonne’s first reflexive thought. He’d already said to stand by missiles.
And then he realized what Imbar was actually saying, and jerked his head around to the tac display.
There were missiles out there, all right: eight of them, creeping toward him with wedges down and only the relative velocities between them and the Volsungs providing them any movement at all. He opened his mouth to demand that Imbar tell him where they’d come from and why they weren’t running under power—
And then, abruptly, all eight missiles lit up their wedges and leaped forward toward the Volsung force.
“Where the hell did they come from?” Imbar snarled.
“It was that damn pitch turn,” Gensonne said as he finally got it, throwing a glance at the countdown timer. One hundred and three seconds until impact. “They fired while our view of their booster flares was blocked.”
Imbar grunted. “Cute.”
“Very,” Gensonne said darkly. “But don’t worry about it. We can play cute, too.”
Only for the next hundred seconds or so, he couldn’t. Forty seconds from now, sixty seconds before the incoming missiles’ projected impact, Copperhead and Adder would launch a salvo of countermissiles into the path of the incoming weapons. Forty-five seconds after that, all six Volsung ships would open up with their autocannon in an effort to stop any missiles that made it through the countermissile gauntlet.
The frustrating hell of it was that for most of the missiles’ run it would be impossible to tell which ship or ships they were targeting. Still, if Heissman had any brains he would be aiming this first salvo at one or both of the cruisers. A properly competent flag officer should have deduced from the Volsungs’ configuration that the cruisers were the ones carrying the countermissiles, and were therefore the ones that needed to be taken out before the Manticorans could have a reasonable shot at Odin or Tyr.