Exodus: Empires at War: Book 8: Soldiers (Exodus: Empires at War.) (29 page)

“The enemy ships
are reducing their acceleration,” called out one of the Assistant Tactical
Officers manning a side station.  “Down to four hundred gravities.”

“Shit,” said
Lenkowski.  “That asshole in charge of their force is not stupid.” 
It looked as if the Caca had deduced that the ships couldn’t track them when
they were transiting warp space.  And he was adjusting his acceleration so
they would come out well ahead of his force.  The fighters would have no
shot at the enemy ships.  And there was nothing he could do about it.

Len slammed a
hand down on the chair arm once again, cursing the tech that allowed him to
observe so much, while unable to do anything about it.

“What’s our ETA
to the system?” he asked, sure that he would get the same answer.

“One hundred and
fifty-seven hours,” stated the Navigator.

“Get me on the
com to all ship captains,” ordered the Admiral, looking over at the Com
Officer.  “I want all ships to boost to point nine seven light.”

The Com Officer
looked at him with surprise, while everyone on the bridge turned to
stare.  Everyone knew that going above point nine five light would risk
damage to their cellular structure from the particles that would push past
their electromagnetic screen.  It would also cause a degradation of their
internal nanite cellular repair systems, adding to the damage.

“Medical is to
prepare nanite boosters and to keep them in protective isolation until we
decelerate back down to point nine five light.”

“Sir,” said the
Chief Medical Officer of the flagship on a side holo.  “Everyone is going
to get a little sick in about twenty-seven hours.  And very ill just after
forty-nine.”

“Then we’ll just
have to deal with it.  Our brothers and sisters are about to get into the
fight of their lives, and I want us right there with them as soon as possible.”

Len sat back in
his chair, realizing that a lot of people were going to second guess his
decision.  He was sure there was a lot of grumbling going on at this
moment.  As long as his people continued to do their jobs, he could deal
with that.

*    
*     *

“I’m not sure
Len is thinking clearly about this one,” said McCullom, standing by the
Emperor’s chair as they both looked at the trio of holos that showed the
operation in several scales.  The one to the right showed the planet, with
the ships in orbit battling it out with the small force of Caca ships that were
still fighting, and the representation of friendly versus enemy territory on
the planet.  The one to the left showed the entire New Moscow system, with
the location of every ship that was boosting shown as a vector arrow, those
that were not boosting but still known as icons, while the inertialess fighters
were represented by blinking icons showing their predicted location.

We could have
used those aliens, those Klassekians, with those fighters
, thought the
Emperor, turning his attention toward the central holo that showed the entire
area of operations.  The fighters missed because there was no way to
communicate with them, to let them know that the target was not at the point it
had been predicted it would be.  With the quantum connectedness of the
aliens, they might have been able to contact them, and adjust their vectors and
acceleration.

“Len is doing
what he thinks he needs to do to get his people into the battle as soon as
possible,” said Sean, looking up and over at his CNO.  “Can you think of
anything that might work as well.”

“No, your Majesty. 
But he is risking the safety and health of his personnel.”

Sean studied the
profile of his senior naval officer.  She had been in command of Home
Fleet before she had been promoted to CNO.  While technically a combat
command, Home Fleet had not in fact engaged in any combat action for over a
century.  Len had been CNO for over a decade, but before that he had
commanded the Sector III Battle Fleet, facing both the Lasharans and the
Fenri.  He had seen a lot of action in that post, and had had to make some
hard decisions, something the CNO had not had to do.  And that was one
reason she was now the CNO, which was more of an administrative position than a
combat command.

“His job is to
win battles and kill Cacas,” he said, narrowing his eyes.  “That is his
only concern.  His only concern.  That’s the kind of person I want in
command of my battle fleet.”

Sondra looked at
him for a moment, her mouth hanging open, then nodded her head.  “You are
correct of course, your Majesty.”

“It’s best to
let the commander on the spot choose his course of action,” said Sean, in the
same kind of lecturing tone he had heard at the academy.

The CNO
smiled.  “Even with wormholes that let everyone, including the Chief of
Logistics, look over that commander’s shoulder and second guess him.”

“Especially with
those wormholes,” said Sean, who had on several occasions had to rein himself
in when he wanted to second guess a commander on the spot.  He sat there
for a moment, then pulled up another holo that showed the disposition of Home
Fleet.  That massive formation was at only half of its pre-war strength,
and Parliament was constantly raising hell that it had been weakened to that
point, since it was the last line of defense, supposedly, for the core systems.

“Can we take
some task forces from Home Fleet and gate them to the New Moscow system?” 
Sean changed the main holo over to one that represented the wormhole gate
system as it stood at the moment.  There was a gate in the capital system,
right next to the Central Docks.  That led to a gate ring, a set of ship
gates protected by forts and squadrons of ships, in orbit around the black hole
at the center of the Supersystem.  Those gates led to different systems
around the Empire, but, unfortunately, none to the system they needed to go to.

A light hour
away was another gate ring, currently holding eleven portals widely separated
so that nothing could take more than one out at a time.  The distance
between the rings was also there for that purpose.  If an enemy came
through a gate, the other rings would be too far away to attack except with
missiles launched at range.  That ring had a gate they could use, one that
linked to one at the Sector IV Fleet Base.  From there it was another hop
to one of the systems that was a marshalling yard for the fleet that was
sending ships to the near planet force.  Sean traced that path, the
shortest to get more ships into the system.  There was no direct link into
the systems that was supplying ships to the outer force, and even if there
were, it would still take almost twelve hours to accelerate those ships on a
path that would move them through the fast moving gates in the New Moscow
system.

“We can get
ships there within twelve hours,” said Sondra, following the path the Emperor
was tracing through the holo.  “But Parliament will raise hell.”

“Let me worry
about Parliament, Sondra.  They aren’t your worry, especially since you
have already achieved the highest rank you possibly can, so their approval is
not all that important.”  Sean glanced at the holo again, then looked at
the deployments to the planet that were already in the queue.  Thanks to
the destruction of two of the gates, it would take over eight hours to get the
rest of the ships through.  That would still mean a four hour period where
no ships would be available for transit.

“What if we
start sending ships over from this second ring?  Not all of them, just a
couple of squadrons.  Then we move the same number of squadrons over from
this ring.  And then when some of the ships come over from Central Docks,
we can station them at that first ring.  That way we don’t weaken the
defenses of either of those rings, and still get the ships where we want them
to be, with no delays in deployment.”

“That could work,”
said the CNO.  “Though I’m not really sure why we’re so worried about the
defense of those rings, as far behind the lines as they are.  It’s not
like the Cacas have any strike forces likely to force a gate further out.”

After what
they almost did to the
Donut,
I’m not about to take any chances
,
thought Sean, running the figures through his mind and seeing what he could
send.  He still didn’t think it was enough, but it would have to do.

“The crews are
going to be surprised,” said McCullom, pulling up a com holo so she could order
the movement.  “I’m not sure they’re going to appreciate the orders on
such short notice.”

“They’ll just
have to deal with it,” said Sean, returning the central holo to a view of the
operations area.  “They’re Fleet, and they must be ready to go where we
want and do what we say, no matter the consequences.” 
Just like it
will be my job to agonize over every one of their deaths.

Chapter Twenty

It was my duty to shoot the
enemy, and I don't regret it. My regrets are for the people I couldn't save:
Marines, soldiers, buddies. I'm not naive, and I don't romanticize war. The
worst moments of my life have come as a SEAL. But I can stand before God with a
clear conscience about doing my job.

Chris Kyle.

PLANET NEW MOSCOW, MID DAY, APRIL
8
^TH
, 1002.

“The first of
the reinforcements are coming in from orbit, Samuel,” said General Lucius
Arbuckle over the com.  Static still crackled through the transmission,
despite the best the Army could do to cut through it.

“That’s great
news, sir,” replied Lt. General Samuel Baggett.  “We can use them.”

The plan had
called for the third corps of the army to be delivered from orbit, along with a
division’s worth of support troops, and two divisions worth of Imperial
Marines.  Unfortunately, only two assault ships, carrying a total of two
brigades of heavy infantry, had arrived.  And while the Fleet was finally
in a position to provide orbital fire support, the Cacas had gotten most of
their troops out of their barracks area and into the field.  Most of their
aircraft were either in the air or deployed to hidden landing fields.  And
with all of the static being generated by jamming, the Fleet was having a time
of trying to locate even the targets they knew of.

“How is the
evacuation going?” asked the Army Commander, who must have a pretty good idea
already of how it was going.

“Slowly,” said
Baggett.  “I’m afraid we miscalculated on how fast we could move the
refugees.  I don’t think we took into account how sick and weak they might
be.  The logisticians seemed to have thought they were dealing with
healthy soldiers who could move quickly and surely to the gates and through.”

“I know,” said
the General in a voice that dripped with fatigue.  “I know.  And all
we can do is keep plugging away and get as many as we can through the
gates.  We…”

Baggett turned
as he heard the warning siren that signaled an air attack.  In time to see
a missile come tracking in on one of the camps, moving at what had to be Mach
twenty.  Missiles rose from the ground, fired from the heavy suits of a
weapons unit, or, in the case of one, a specialized antiaircraft vehicle. 
The missile was hit, though no one could be sure which counter weapon had
struck.  With a flash it went off in the sky, a mere five kilometers to
the south of the camps edge, at an altitude of four thousand meters.

Baggett’s
faceplate darkened, protecting his eyes from the flaring light.  The
civilians had no such protection, and hundreds of thousands were blinded, which
was not the worst by any means.  No, that came when the thermal wave
struck the camp and two hundred thousand civilians sustained severe
burns.  Fifty thousand were killed quickly from the damage, while the rest
screamed in agony.

“The bastards
just fired at the camp, sir,” said Baggett, zooming in on the camp with his
suit optics, grimacing as he saw the casualties.  People crying, holding
their hands over ruined eyes.  A woman lying motionless, her clothing
burned from her body to expose the horrific searing marks on her skin.  A child
stared sightlessly into space, her eyes ruined scar tissue in her face, her
hands reaching for the woman, who must have been her mother, trying to find the
comfort that would never be there again.

“I need more med
staff here, sir,” he told the General.  “We’re going to be overwhelmed
taking care of these people.  And I need more air defense.”

“And we’re short
on both, Samuel,” said the General in a soft voice.  “I’ll get you what I
can, but I can’t promise much.”

“I
understand.  But we’re going to have a lot of deaths here if we don’t get
some help.”

The General
killed the com.  Baggett couldn’t blame the man.  It took one tough
son of a bitch to look at suffering that they couldn’t do anything about
without feeling totally inadequate.

“General
Klash'tar,” said Baggett over the com, connecting to the commander of the 512
^th
Heavy Infantry Division.  “We think the enemy has a fire base somewhere
around this location.  I want you to assign some of your people to seek it
out and neutralize it.  As soon as possible.”

“How high a
priority?” asked the Phlistaran Major General.

Baggett sent a
shot of the mass of casualties in the camp.  “Does this answer your
question, General?”

“Yes, sir. 
We’ll find the bastards, and terminate with extreme prejudice.”

Baggett cut the
com, still staring at the camp.  That helpless feeling was still dominant
in his consciousness.  He had to do something.

“I need air
transport, and I need it now,” he said to his Adjutant over the Corps com
net. 
If I can’t do anything myself, I can at least be there to watch
the results of others doing something.

*    
*     *

“Target’s in
sight,” reported the Commando Scout over the com.

“We’ve got it,”
replied Lt. Commander Nahuel Runningdeer, landing on the side of a mountain
that overlooked the valley the gun was operating in.  Now that there were
really no worries about the detection of electronic signals the commandos were
in their light battle armor.  Not with a major land to orbit battle going on,
with both powers trying their best to jam all the sensors of the other
side.  Naval Commandos did not receive as much training on unarmored land
operations Rangers or Force Recon.  They received more training in armored
operations in space, which could also translate into using the armor on the
ground, like now.

A couple of
thousand meters below was what they had come to kill.  It was really
impossible to get a good look at it with all the holographic projectors it was
using to simulate the landscape around it.  Then it fired, a brilliant
flash at the end of the hundred meter long barrel.  The very air around
that barrel caught on fire from the velocity generated friction of the massive
round the gun had fired.  A tunnel of fire appeared leading into the sky,
seeming to instantaneously materialize.

There was
another flash in the sky, the antimatter loaded round hitting its target. 
Moving at point zero three light, or nine thousand kilometers a second, the
target had less than a second to realize the round was coming its way, much too
little for any kind of effective response.

The gun moved an
instant after the shot was fired, its supports rising back into the body,
lifting on its grabbers and scooting away at several hundred kilometers an
hour.  The decoy it had deployed, a small bot that radiated heat and
electronic noise, stayed in place a kilometer to the other side of where the
gun had been sitting.  While the gun was still moving a laser beam came
thrusting through the dusty air to hit the decoy, which exploded in a ball of
fire and sparks.  Moments later a trail of fire much like the shot of the
gun in reverse came down to hit a hundred meters from where the gun had been.

“Down,” shouted
Runningdeer into the com.  The kinetic hit with a force of multi-megatons,
a brilliant flash, a blast wave that leveled trees for kilometers in every
direction, while the fireball of a mushroom cloud rose into the air.  The
Commandos all hugged the ground, getting behind what cover there was to
take.  Their armor handled the blast and the radiation from the hit that
was several kilometers away, and the Lt. Commander was very happy that they had
the use of the suits again.

The gun moved a
couple of kilometers and settled back on the ground, its supports shooting down
like piston driven pilings.  The gun elevated, its massive two thousand
ton turret turned.  A moment later two particle beams shot from the
projectors to either side of the railgun.  They only fired for a fraction
of a second, before the main gun spoke again, sending another stream of fire
into the air.

“Why the hell
did they build such a thing and bring it here?” asked one of the commandos

“The Cacas
didn’t build it,” answered Runningdeer, gesturing toward the case that
contained his missile, while picking up the launcher.  His com was showing
him that the other missile team was also about the same stage of
preparation.  “They captured it from the New Muscovites, who had built it
for ground defense, but never got to use it.”

The entire
device massed over ten thousand tons, and harkened back to the rail guns of the
pre-space age.  It used powerful warheads to let it hit well above its
weight, doing more damage than any kind of dedicated particle beam or laser
platform.  Each of its antimatter warheads, massing five tons, carried the
equivalent explosive power of thirty megatons.  While not considered
massive as far as naval weaponry was concerned, the mass of the warhead hit
with considerable kinetic power to penetrate into the armor before the
explosive detonated.  The shells themselves were a considerable concern to
the Commandos.  If the attack went as planned, and the warheads remained
stable, there would not be a problem.  If several of them breached
containment and five or six hundred megatons detonated in this valley, they
were all dead men.

The gun moved
again, and the Commander hurriedly prepared his weapon, watching as his
assistant loaded the missile, knowing that the clock was ticking, and this
weapon was hurting the Fleet he had sworn to serve.  He hefted the launcher
onto his shoulder and sighted down on the gun.  The gun looked like a blur
in the sight, a bad painting of a landscape dominated by felled trees. From
space or high in the air those holographic projections were probably
perfect.  Here, on the ground, not so much.

“On my command,”
said Runningdeer over the com, his finger pulling the first trigger of the
launcher and setting the target.  “Fire.”  He pulled the second
trigger, sending the hypervelocity missile toward the target.

The Cacas
couldn’t have even known it was coming.  In a fraction of a second both
missiles struck, one just before the other.  Both penetrated the heavy
armor on the gun, not all the way through, but enough to aid the warheads in
their task of killing the weapon.  Forty megatons of explosive force
erupted at a distance of five kilometers from the missile gunners.  The
Commandos all ducked down, covering behind the rocks while the wind of the
blast wave blew past.

As the blast
wave decreased Runningdeer looked up from his position.  He smiled as he
saw the result of his attack.  The turret was cracked open and was rising
into the air, tumbling over and over.  The hull was also ruptured, and
everything that could burn was burning.  And the shells onboard hadn’t
breached containment, yet.

“Let’s get the
hell out of here,” the Commander ordered his people.  In seconds they had
lifted in their suits and were flying out of the valley, running away just in
case those shells decided to breach after all.

*    
*     *

“Keep those
people moving,” yelled Captain Stella Artois to the soldiers in her company.

The other
companies of her battalion were still helping to construct hasty fortifications
for the Rangers, leaving her people as the only ones, beside a couple of squads
of medics, to assist the civilians into the drop shafts so they could get to
the gate.  The people could get there by themselves, that wasn’t the
problem.  Holographic signs floating in the air, pointing to the egress
points, would lead them there easily enough.  At least those that could
see.  But the real problem was the stampede that would occur if the people
weren’t forced into some kind of orderly formations toward those points.

Everyone in the
camp wanted to get out of it, and now.  All knew that rescue had come, but
they were still in danger until they got off of the planet.  So they
wanted to get the hell off of it, now.

A large man
pushed past a woman and her kids who were next in line to go down a drop
shaft.  The woman was already smaller than average, and her time in the
camp had made her thinner still.  Her kids looked malnourished as well, on
the edge of starvation.  The man had obviously been much larger in the
past.  He had no shirt, and the rolls of skin over his torso and the backs
of his arm showed that he had once been fat.  Now he was lean, but still
larger than most of the people in sight.  The man grabbed the woman by the
shoulder and threw her back.  She landed on her back and her toddler ran
for her, crying.

The man was just
about to step into the drop shaft when Stella slapped an armor gauntleted hand
on his shoulder and squeezed.  The man grunted in pain, and tried to turn,
his right hand closed up in a fist.  Stella flexed her mechanical muscle
and flung the man away, to land on his back ten meters away.

“Wait your
turn,” Stella cautioned, looking at the man with her faceplate raised. 
“Ma’am” she said to the mother.  “Are you hurt?”

“Only my
backside,” said the woman.

A lot of people
had stopped to see what was going on.  But a lot were not paying attention
at all, their only thoughts still to get off this planet.

“I want to talk
to your superior officer, soldier,” growled the once obese man, getting up from
the ground and dusting off his pants.  “I’m an important man on this
planet, and I will not be abused by a damned grunt.”

“First of all,
Mr?”

“Koveleski,”
said the man, glaring at her.

“Mr.
Koveleski.  I am the officer in charge of this egress, and I am an
engineer, not a grunt.  And from where I stand, it doesn’t look like
you’re such a big wig at the moment.”

“Big words,
standing in a multi-million ruble combat suit,” said the man, a sneer on his
face.

With a thought
Stella ordered her suit to open.  The seals along the arms, legs and
torsos of the suit became existent as the nanotech opened them.  The suit
peeled back, and Artois stepped out of it in the skinsuit that all soldiers
wore underneath.