Koban 6: Conflict and Empire (20 page)

“I suspect these defenses are the remnants of the Federation’s war with the Krall, and that fight may have ended only four or five orbits ago, perhaps longer if they pushed them back slowly before their final victory. I doubt if their war was a short one.”

“Sire, do you think this planet retained many active soldiers after the Krall were defeated? I don't think they would require many troops to set up their space defense batteries. Those large mobile laser cannons are mounted on tracked hulls, similar to the chassis of our Pillagers, and they could have been driven quickly to those pre-existing pads around the cities. Since they did that in advance of our arrival, I’d say you were correct that an attack was expected here, but not this soon. Our AI’s detected no sizable military bases, so there may not be many ground forces.”

Thond was dismissive. “Even if they have reserves to recall to active duty, I have two hundred thousand Ragoons in the army I brought. A Ragoon in powered armor, with a full weapons load, is a dangerous opponent. Transport of significantly more reinforcements if needed would be limited, with only four hundred Pounders to use. If we encounter that strong of a resistance here, I may have to send our Pounders home to Tantor, and bring another two hundred thousand Ragoons, plus their Pillagers. There are nearly a million more reserves on our own three worlds, and another million posted on ten Empire base worlds. My problem is that I can’t withdraw the Ragoons, Pounders, and their armored units and equipment from any Empire base, not without informing the High Command of why I need them. I don't intend to inform them of this attack until we’ve taken the planet. It’s hard to criticize success.”

Grudfad bobbed his body in assent then broached a subject of personal importance. “Force Commander, will you be joining your Ragoons, to remind them you were once one of them, and show them why you are called Bone Breaker?”

In truth, Force Lieutenant Commander Grudfad was far less interested in his superior perpetuating his outsized reputation as a very physical ground force warrior, than he was in becoming Acting Space Force Commander. Grudfad believed his future career depended on displaying his ability as a Space Force officer, something he believed he was better suited for than even Thond. His time spent in full command of the Space Force elements would elevate him above officers with whom he was competing, gaining in experience they couldn’t easily match.

Thond, his ego stroked by his second in command, observed the furry shivers of delight, visible on the hairy shoulders of the Bridge crew who had heard Grudfad’s question. He knew his Space Force Bridge crew loved his dual reputation as a bold and brave leader of both the Space Force, and of the Ground Forces. He was one of only three such dual command Ragnar leaders in at least the last thousand years, and the most recent examples were centuries dead.

“I do intend to see this enemy face to face. The human ships are too few to worry us, and they haven’t proven ready to fight us yet. Call Commander Hitok, of Pounder Group 1, and have him pull his own ship next to my flagship when we descend to meet him. Tell him I will join my old friend, Head Basher, and we’ll both show the young Ragoons how to intimidate an enemy.” He shivered his silver tipped fur, and thumped his chest twice before he rose to complete a formality.

“Lieutenant Force Commander Grudfad, I offer to transfer command of the Space Force fleet elements to you. Do you accept?”

Grudfad rose to face him. “I do, Force Commander Thond.” They brushed knuckles in a sort of fist bump, and a salute of acknowledgement, and the log would reflect the moment the combined command elements, Space Force and Ground Force, were divided. At least until Thond returned to his flagship.

****

“Athena, those suspected troop ships over on this side are all moving towards lower orbits. And my AI thinks they’re clustering into two groups.” That was a Comtap link from Ardan O’Brian, leader of her fourth squadron, presently on the far side of Tanner’s from Christopoulos’ ship Hermes.

“I see them doing the same on this side, Ardan, descending and clustering. If we both see two clusters forming, then I think they plan to establish four different landing areas. Standby.”

She too made a change on the fly of her plans, altering the stealthy maneuvers she’d directed her eighty-six ships to initiate. She used a group Comtap link to announce the modified plan. “All ships, you have new targets, so cease the infiltration of their supply ships. We’ll now target the large, fat looking black and tan colored ships starting to descend. Instead of the enemy waiting for the space bombardment to weaken ground defenses, I think they’re landing troops near a couple of cities, and out of range of the orbital lasers, to attack those defenses on the surface. Questions or comments, from Squadron leaders only.”

O’Brian, who had been first to observe the movement, had an additional observation. “Mam, the fifty Ravagers that were previously defending the supply ships are leaving them to join the troop ships, which makes sense to escort them down. It appears that only the lightly armed Shredders, and the eleven ravagers with damaged hulls will defend the supply ships. Can we attack both? Hitting the supplies as we descend?”

Checking her own sensor displays, she considered several factors. “I see what you mean Captain O’Brian. However, their willingness to allow us to threaten those ships suggests something to me. That they’re less precious to the Ragnar than the troop ships, and I doubt half of the supply ships are even crewed by Ragnar. There are at least ten widely different design types among the five hundred or so present, and a big difference in hull paint schemes and markings on even similar ship designs. They don’t look uniform or military, and half of them have little similarity to the coloration, hull and engine designs of the military ships we know are Ragnar built. I think they might belong to other species under Thandol control, and may have have been forced to participate and carry supplies for the Ragnar.”

O’Brian had at least one supporter for his idea. “Mam, this is Captain Hanover. Arden has a point. We can damage the supply ships without any loss of time as we pass by them, since the Shredders and just eleven replacement Ravagers can’t possibly knock out all of our missiles.”

Christopoulos had a better counter argument, and it didn’t depend just on her authority to make the decision. “There’s a possibility half the ships are crewed by subservient species to the Empire, and they might become future allies against the Thandol if we don’t cause them harm. Besides, unless you know how to blow them up quietly, we’ll be alerting the enemy we’re returning to the fight. Getting those first easy shots at the troop ships isn’t going to be nearly as safe for us if they realize we’re on the attack.

“The Ravagers used AI coordinated joint fire at Zanzibar, like we and the navy do, something the Krall never did. Every time one of our stealthed ships launched a missile or fired an energy beam, revealing our position, all of the nearest Ravagers fired close around where they were just seen. Our very first pass by these fat targets had better be our most destructive. Then we need to immediately micro Jump away, and plan our next attack.

“Our two hundred reinforcements are still close to two and a half hours away, so let’s not get overconfident. Any other questions or comments?”

There was none, so she dispensed with the tactic she’d intended to use for the attack just abandoned. That tactic involved careful positioning via Normal Space drives, getting between several nearby targets, waiting to shoot until everyone was in place. Unknowingly, she was avoiding the risk posed by the mass detectors she didn’t know the Ragnar had, which would reveal slow moving stealthed ships. As in every battle, luck played its part.

“I want everyone to set up two micro Jumps. The first one exits close to a specific troop ship, and please let your AI’s coordinate that to avoid duplication, and we’ll all Jump in at the same time. Fire your missiles and beams, and then immediately Jump to hell back to your previous orbit. Get your coordinates set, and wait for my signal to go…, in about two minutes.”

It was just under two minutes in coming. “When I say the word go, we all Jump. Ready…, Go!”

The Eighty-six Kobani ships exited within one or two miles of their selected targets, and all hell broke loose within the Ragnar fleet. An equivalent number of the fat bodied troop ships took a brief pounding from multiple missiles strikes, and were savagely raked with heavy lasers and powerful plasma bolts, all within a deadly two-second interval. Then, the invisible attackers were gone, before most of the escorting Ravagers, and badly out of position Shredders even returned fire. When they did fire, it passed through the points in space where the Kobani had just departed. The Shredders, in their classical disposition, were positioned around their fleet, to defend against missiles and diving attacks on the ships they defended. That was what less insane species did when they fought, not choosing to risk a fatal intersect and a powerful detonation, if they struck an enemy spacecraft. The Shredders didn’t fire into the volume they were protecting, because that risked friendlies, and that was where the enemy appeared.

The AI controlled energy beams from the more aggressive Ravagers, were able to touch only a couple of the human craft before they Jumped, but that was a matter of luck. The Kobani vessels had a high Normal Space velocity from their previous orbits for the two seconds they were firing. The miles-per-second velocity differential carried them rapidly away from their initial firing points, so the hits they suffered were random and isolated, and the two ships involved only suffered marred stealth coatings on one side.

It was vastly different for the enemy ships. Fifty-nine of the extremely heavily armored landers suffered one or two penetrating missile hits that made it past the Pounder’s own defenses or that of their escorts. Eight of them lost steerage for a short time and drifted, sixteen of them suffered up to five hits, causing secondary explosions internally, and they were lost. The troops and crews inside the surviving damaged ships were protected from the sudden vacuum, because Ragoons and ship crews alike wore sealed body armor on combat landings, a precaution against precisely this circumstance. All but three of the damaged landers were subsequently deemed capable of conducting an atmospheric entry, but only after some temporary repairs. A slower entry on a Normal Space drive was certainly possible, even with holes in their hulls, but not advised if under fire. They’d be easy targets for heavier atmospheric anti-ship missiles, and probably for some of the laser batteries if they didn’t stay away from the cities.

All of the Kobani ships returned to five thousand mile orbits, to observe their destructive effects. Christopoulos promptly made a radio call to Tanner’s Planetary Defense Center. “Colonel Gaffigan, this is Commander Christopoulos. Right about now might be a good time to activate those orbital rail guns. I assume you saw those four hundred big landing craft starting their descents. We just hit twenty percent of them in a flash raid that isn’t likely to work a second time.”

“Commander, I’m still getting reports on the damage you caused them. Hell, we can’t see you at all on our sensors, but I thought you were waiting for more help to arrive. I’m grateful for as many as you damaged or destroyed. But if even twenty-five of the four hundred got through, I think we’d be outnumbered. By asking returning war vets to fill out our ranks and using our spare suits, I only have ten thousand one hundred six armored personnel for the entire frigging planet. I sent a hundred to each of eight cities with laser defenses, but I kept most of them, ninety-three hundred, here at Ludlum, the capitol and largest city by far. I expect that to be a prime target.

“We’ll certainly activate the rail guns soon, but I doubt if they’ll be able to kill any of those big armored suckers. The enemy will go after them just as soon as they open up. So far they’ve ignored them, perhaps because they’ve never seen anything like them and don’t realize something so compact is a weapon. We’ll probably program them to go after the lighter Ravager escorts instead. Those will be trying to shoot down our heavy atmospheric missiles. The larger warheads definitely can bring down a lander. They killed tough clanships on Poldark, whenever one was able to catch them.”

“Colonel, I’m guessing there must be at least four hundred Ragnar soldiers on each lander, and I’d bet they brought armored vehicles with them. You’re facing at least a hundred sixty thousand in four groups if they can get down.”

“Commander, I don’t know how big a Ragnar ape-man is, but even if they’re the size of a Krall, I’d bet that five or six hundred could fit in one of those tubs. If they also have tanks aboard, then the lower number. They brought about two hundred thousand, and you killed perhaps fifteen thousand. With tanks, they could roll over us in a sort of blitzkrieg attack. Their men could then follow behind the armor. Or should I say their apes?” He chuckled sourly.

“Same old shit,” he complained. “Krall or apes. Too many too fast.” Gaffigan had fought the Krall on Poldark for two years, as an officer in the PU army. He’d faced bad odds before.

She reminded him of something he’d not experienced with the Krall. “I know you saw they brought those triangular Stranglers with them. Their Debilitaters will be devastating on your civilians if they can get close to the cities safely. What about your people in body armor? Our armor leaked, so we modified it to protect us better.”

“I guess we’ll find out. We used your people’s suggested do-it-yourself solution. We don’t have the Q-carbon deposition process to seal the joints, and couldn’t restore the damaged stealth coating anyway, not with the manufacturing equipment we have. We never built our own body armor.