Koban 4: Shattered Worlds (84 page)

In the first hour, the Krall found they had lost more than four percent of their clanship force before they had even fired at the population centers. However, they “knew” they had as much as a week before the news of their attacks could reach wherever the navy had retreated. Then at least another week before the slow to act humans could reach the planets under attack. They intended to safely wear down the defenses and conserve clanships.

The patrol boats, poised a half million miles from the two Hub worlds, didn’t seem worth the effort of chasing to any of the Krall pilots, since they were small and had Jump capability to allow them to flee. However, mere seconds after the Krall arrived in each system the Comtap in the patrol boat reported enemy numbers and actions to each task force and to Koban. The relay of decisions of which force would go where was instantly shared between the three spread out naval task forces. They had been on constant alert for the past week, expecting a shoe to drop. They had contingency plans if two or even three shoes dropped.

Alders world was the shortest distance, located almost midway between two of the navy groups. A one-day Jump from TF 1, and it was almost two days from TF 5, so both forces would combine and Jump there, coordinating their timing to White Out simultaneously. TF 4, and thirty Kobani ships in a flotilla, would make slashing attacks on the Krall raid at New Glasgow, where their two hundred thirty ships would be outnumbered by more than three to one. The Kobani ships were three days away, and the navy only two, so the navy ships would attack first, to try to draw many of the clanships back up to orbit, and ease the attacks on the planet.

TF 1 and 5 would make their arrival at Alders world thirty-nine hours after the Krall started their attack. That would be roughly a week and a half sooner than the enemy would expect. The Comtap observer reported the attacks on the cities at Alders were apparently not being pressed as hard as possible, to soften the defenses and preserve clanships and missile loads for the end of the first week. By then, the ground defenses should be hard pressed to keep the Krall missiles from doing their maximum damage.

Planetary lasers and plasma cannons initially could knock many incoming missiles down, but slowly and surely, the defensive ground batteries were being knocked out along key corridors leading to the largest eight cities, done via weapons that couldn’t be intercepted. There was no shortage of power for clanship lasers and plasma bolts, so missiles could be saved for hitting structures after the city defenses were weakened.

After all, the Krall expected to spend a week of this softening-up and a week of destruction after that. The heaviest strikes would come near the end, when the clanships flew lower in greater safety. They were staying in higher orbits now, to prevent anti-ship missiles fired from highflying aircraft platforms from climbing quickly into space and reaching them in large numbers. Those human missiles were subject to laser and plasma counter fire all the way up, and only two more clanships had been destroyed in the second eight hours of fighting. Even then, it took massive and wasteful salvos.

The Krall set up a rotation of clanships, where a clan or finger clan would send their clanships down for repeated laser and plasma bolt passes over one of the eight cities for an hour or two and different clans would strafe the other selected seven cities. Then in rotation, a new clan would start strafing runs, to maintain a steady series of attacks on all eight cities, designed to wear down defenders that had a need to sleep every day. A continuous week of this and humans would be making more mistakes, unable to keep up with repairs and equipment replacement, as the Krall had long noted on Poldark and Bollovstic before that.

Their frequent high passes managed to take out a few more of the defensive batteries every hour, and they hit a large antenna array of a long wave radar system the Krall had figured out was being used in tracking their stealthed clanships. This radio wave detection system wasn’t new science, but it was a different application of old technology to the Krall, which reduced their stealth capability. It was similar to the detection system they had used on the newer and more effective human stealth coatings at K1, but in a slightly different radio frequency spectrum. However, once a clanship entered atmosphere their stealth partly vanished anyway in the stream of turbulence they left behind them, so the loss of full stealth wasn’t a critical weakness, once they understood what the system did and how. The surprise factor was gone after the initial losses suffered, and they had adjusted to the threat.

All that was required to leave these cities in flaming ruins, with bodies lying in the streets was the mere passage of time.

****

The spec ops observer in the patrol boat stationed at Alders world sent his mental images to the multiple Comtaps in TF 1 and TF 5, showing them the Krall’s present deployment formations and orbital parameters around the planet while they were enroute. They received updates every few hours, and made and adjusted their plans for arrival accordingly. Outnumbered perhaps seven hundred twenty to their four hundred ships, they knew they couldn’t expect the same full stealth capability as when they entered battle at K1, and they didn’t have the faster Kobani ships with them to draw away attackers. They could attempt the frequent Jump tactic, but without the reaction speed of the Kobani and the same high accelerations, that method was out of the question.

Their goal was for the two task forces to White Out close to the enemy, fire hundreds of anti-ship missiles, and leave ten Nova missiles behind under AI control, which should kill at least ten more clanships. They would Jump close to an outer planet, and let the patrol boat observer describe what the Krall did in reaction. Then decide on their next attack.

Almost half of the Krall force was in eight feeder formations attacking as many cities at any given time. By orbiting at nearly a thousand miles out, above effective missile attacks, these formations could provide continuous waves of swooping attackers, which maintained day and night strafing of the defenses. Most strafing clanships also fired lasers and plasma bolts on human nests in suburbs they passed over, as they were gradually able to fly lower. They hit some of the outlying buildings and industrial sites on the outskirts of the cities before climbing back to orbit, just after firing on the dwindling numbers of defensive batteries and missile sites. The defenses gradually weakened as the Krall worked closer towards the hearts of the cities. The uncharacteristic tactics were proof the Krall had adjusted to the new reality of shortages and were conserving their ships, taking more time.

Many of the large plasma cannons on the outer periphery, on the sides of the eight cities where the Krall focused their attacks, had been knocked out. Replacement big guns were being moved from the sectors not under constant attack. That decision weakened other approaches for Krall attacks, which would be arriving from new directions next week.

The Krall believed they had the relative leisure of waiting for the planet’s defenses to wear down over the remainder of this first week, and they could preserve their most valuable resources for the destruction of the inner cities. That resource was the clanships themselves, and their reserved loads of heavy ground attack missiles. They had the bigger missiles already loaded in every launch rack, in eager anticipation of the destruction to come.

Newly promoted Admiral Jon Willfem, commanding TF 1, intended to take on four of the Krall orbital formations with fifty each of his ships. He’d noted that there were roughly ninety clanships per formation that were feeding attacking clanships against whichever of the eight targeted cities they were closest to as they passed over them at a thousand miles. There was anywhere from twenty to twenty-five clanships descending towards a city for an attack, or were climbing back to orbit at any given time.

There were generally another four enemy craft gathered at one of the eight clanships designated as fuel tenders, which had additional internal storage bladders for reaction mass. Each of the attached clanships was replacing the binary fuel, since the majority of clanships had not suffered fuel tank punctures. Those clanships that
could
use thrusters had better low altitude avoidance of return laser and plasma fire, and this helped the pilot roll his hull and maneuver to distribute the heat of incoming energy beams. Four of these fuel tenders were in the selected formations Willfem would strike, where his people would find five clanships in close proximity. He had special welcoming gifts for those.

With twenty clanships always on attack runs, and twenty more involved with refueling, there were about fifty of each formation that were simply watching the active raiders, awaiting their turn to attack again.

Willfem intended to use a variation of the K1 attacks. His task force, composed of four separate fifty-ship groups, would White Out behind the four Krall formations assigned to him, and come out firing roughly ten miles from the rear of each enemy concentration. Leave the “gifts” they brought, ready to launch under AI control, then use their secondary tachyon Traps to Jump, just as soon as they fired their missile salvoes.

Admiral Freida Ahlberg, the first admiral from recent New Colony Fjord, had adopted a similar strategy after conferring with Willfem. However, she decided a bit of a morale boost for the ground defenders was in order. She was sending four ships, each one designated to White Out just above atmosphere over four of the chains of twenty or so clanships, engaged in low level firing at surface targets. Her reasoning was the enemy would not be looking above them, and would be intensely focused on what they were trying to destroy on the ground.

The tasks assigned to the four parts of each of the two task forces had been decided by the overall commanders, assigning which ships went where. All that remained was a brief stop in the outer reaches of the Alders system, two hours of light time away from the planet, so they could inform the captains of every ship what they would do and which of the attack elements they would join. There were no Comtaps on each individual ship this trip. The two commanders assigned ships to each of their temporary sub divisions, explaining what they would do, and when and where they would draw back to wait for the patrol boat observer’s new report. Then commanders asked for a quick update from the patrol boat, made a few minor disposition changes, and TF1 and TF 5 made the short Jump inwards to say hello.

****

Pradop was the Graka clan sub leader who the Tor Gatrol had appointed from his own staff to lead the Alders raid. This was a more favorable task than riding on the living ship, since Pradop didn’t expect it to return. No matter how many status points he might earn there, he was a warrior that wanted to flaunt his rank while living. Four systems attacked by a single living ship would be, he thought, too many to be able to complete the mission before the ship quit responding. The vessel might just vanish into Tachyon Space as some of the early ships used had done.

There could also be a million or more deaths on
this
planet, and as leader of the raid, he would gain a sizable share of status points. He personally had just completed a run on the second largest human nest, taking out another heavy laser battery, which added to his status score. It was enjoyable combat, and had the sort of risk he understood and had personal control over. He tethered to a refueling clanship to top off his tanks before joining with another group of ships, about to attack the largest human nest as their orbit took them closer. That city would come into view over the horizon of the planet shortly. As Raid leader, he could move to whichever formation that was about to strike a target that he wished to join.

The multiple sensor warnings of over eight White Outs of many human massed ships signaled this raid had just become more complex, and potentially more enjoyable if he could damage units of the human navy.

The nearly simultaneous alerts of hundreds of missile launches, coming from the rear of his present formation, showed he needed to break away from the fuel tender. He was alone on the command deck, with some of his crew eating below, but the range was great enough that he had plenty of time to prepare. The fuel tender was near the front of the formation and the attack was from the rear. He didn’t have any launchers loaded with their few anti-ship missiles, and his lasers and plasma cannons didn’t bear on the enemy to his rear. The enemy ships that had emerged far ahead to attack another formation, or behind a formation well to his left side, were almost zero probability kills at his distance. He needed to flip his ship to defend against the rear attack, and tearing away the two fuel lines was necessary.

He could hear the hurried warnings on various clan frequencies he was monitoring, and realized the attacks came from so close that there would be unavoidable losses. He intended to avenge them, and observed his automatic defense system fire towards incoming missiles. There were none directed at him or the three clanships that had also torn free from the tender. He’d expected to have to defend their replacement fuel supplies from missiles, but none was targeted on the tankers that would be lumbering easy targets. That seemed like an inefficient mistake on part of the attackers, ignoring a cluster of targets that were slightly hindered in their response. Stupid humans.

Then suddenly, all of the human ships winked out of this Universe. That was when he saw the first of a distant series of intense blue-white flashes, evidence that Jump intersects had just occurred. That was when he understood what was happening, and thought,
I should have gone on the living ship raid.