Warlord's Invasion (Starfight Book 1) (16 page)

Mu Pei was silent, again. “Emotions are based on a lot of things. But in your case, it has to be new data. What new information exactly are you basing this feeling on?”

“I don’t know, sir. I can’t tell. At this moment, I don’t know where I’m getting the information or even what information I’m using to create this judgment. I just know it’s there and I have to do something about it. Maybe it’s based on old information. Maybe it’s the mixing of the current situation with what I already know. Maybe it’s their formation, or the way they’re moving, or just the existence of everything that has led up to here. I just
know
. Please, sir. Please.”

Mu Pei tilted his head back. He seemed to gulp all she said in a distasteful manner. He raised his
fingers to his chin and…

Were his shaking? His hands were trembling.”Sir?”

“I agree,” he said finally. “I believe your words and their judgment blindly even though every tactical thought I know says I should go ahead with this attack.”

Vier felt a wave of relief down her back. Suddenly, the blanket of misery in her scalp cleared away. “Why?”

“Because you said it has never failed you.”

“Okay. What will we do now, sir?”

Mu Pei paused, thinking. “We will retreat. It is not too late.”

“Just like that?”

“Yes.” He nodded. “Because I believe in you. Despite our differences in opinion and mentality of our approaches, and our age and
gender as well as socioeconomic background, we are on a team, and a team needs to trust other team members. I will delay the battle for one week and see what they do, and then…I will try to fight smaller battles in which the stakes are smaller but not insignificant like our scouting battles, to truly test their technology and strategy. That has always been my fall back plan in case I somehow, succumbed to your restraints, and I have. We will lose another dozen star systems almost immediately, of course. Now, I must relay orders to the other flag officers. Well done, admiral. Mu Pei out.” The hologram of Mu Pei’s head disappeared.

Vier’s relief was counterbalanced by the shock of seeing what had been a stubborn commanding officer change so suddenly.
What had changed in that elderly admiral? A sudden spark of empathy and consideration? Or was it truly a sudden leap of faith? Or was it...

The fact of the matter was, she had fought 17 other flag officers and won. Everyone had been against her. But she had somehow changed everyone’s situation in the last moment by going to the leader. It was a relief, and if she thought too much about it, she could feel deluded with power.

Now, if she was wrong...

She shook it away. She was not wrong.

No, she was definitely not wrong.

Ka's First Fleet, Main Group

Supreme Battlecruiser Usha'Tera

Hal-Dorat hissed. The dozens of lower ranking Cats around him shifted uncomfortably in their seats.

Of all the hundreds of holographic data parcels displayed before him, the most disappointing one had come. The Pra had somehow, in some sudden manifestation of ingenuity, turned away in a retreat. Ten million sophonts had averted sudden destruction—just like that.

Well... the emphasize was ‘sudden
’
. ‘Sudden’ meant they wouldn’t all die in the next hour. But that didn’t mean a lot of them wouldn’t die in the next day. Surely, the very fact that they had amassed in a single area with so many
slow
technologically disadvantaged ships meant at least half of their battle strength would be taken out. Somewhere, in the head of Hal-Dorat’s, the chants of bloodlust echoed constantly without end. In his five hundred years of living, he’d never been one to disengage from an obvious chase. And this was exactly what it was. A hunt.

For the might of the home sun, he would obliterate as much as he could from the Pra, despite
their sudden brilliance. There was no greater trophy, in the conventional battle sense, than to see the wreckage of the enemy’s vessel, however temporary, or his corpse. Whether it was in a fight without modern weapons or one in space, that particular satisfaction could only be brought with the end of one’s enemies. And—what made it all more soothing is that he
knew
the Pra’s generals were on their slowest ships. What
they
thought as their greatest assets and means of protection were in fact—slow-moving coffins destined to disappear into hyperspace once their warp bubbles fade.

If only the Pra knew what was about to await them, they’d be spreading out in every direction trying to evade what was coming in the belief that Ga sensors wouldn’t be able to search and destroy them all.

If only they knew...

But of course, Hal-Dorat hissed…they didn’t.

He ordered the fleet directly in front of the retreating enemy…not the three fleets hidden behind him…to move at fastest speed for every ship. That meant his spheroid formation would break as his faster ships would outrun the slower larger ships, but of course, it was necessary.

Betelgeuse Combined Fleet

Dreadnought Beginner's Luck

Bridge…

“They’re breaking formation! My god, they’re fast!” the sensor tech yelled.

Vier stopped speaking to Captain Willock and now she
saw
her suspicions coming true.

To an ordinary observer, it didn’t make sense. If the Cats broke formation, they would be destroyed easily. But that was only assuming the Cats had comparable battle technology, like all along. But if the Cats were far more advanced, then the break in formation would not be much of a danger to their fleet.

The sound of hurried adrenaline woke the bridge into a new rampant frenzy. Beside her, Captain Willock barked orders.

She saw the thousands of fast moving enemy ships, moving at speeds of 25,000 SL to 35,000 SL. That was a lot faster than previously believed. And if their fearlessness was any evidence that they were right to be fearless, every ship within the human fleet slower than 25,000 SL was in danger—including hers, every flag officer, every dreadnought, battlecruiser, and heavy cruiser.

Her tactical mind went into overdrive. Ships heavier and larger than heavy cruisers comprised of over 50 percent of the human fleet, and over 90 percent of fleet personnel as well as tonnage. Losing them would be a serious blow to sector assets. A plan must be created to save them.

Thinking deeper, she realized there were, actually, several methods to save them. Outrunning the enemy while maintaining fleet solidarity was impossible, so now everything relied on two things, how well they could defend against the enemy attack if they chose to maintain the fleet together, which relied on what new surprises the enemy had in store for them, and whether it was better to initiate the Scatter method.

The Scatter method’s official name was called the Evasion Protocol, which was the last resort tactic in case the fleet battle was totally lost. Basically, the plan entailed every warship within the fleet to literally split up in a massive cone shaped dispersion. It would be unlikely the enemy fleet could properly hunt down each of the runaway ships since human hyperlight scanner probes would go into hunt-and-kill mode to take down enemy sensor probes. Each human warship would also activate their sensor jammers to further prevent an accurate sensor scan. Depending on the level of alien sensor technology and how sophisticated their sensor probes were in fighting human probes, anything from ten percent to eighty percent of the remaining human combatants could leave the battlefield intact.

However, there were things that required more judgment. Was the Scatter method needed? Could they defend against the incoming threat of small, but fast attack ships that the enemy suddenly revealed?

On her chair, there was a button to the admiral. She hit it.

A minute later, a rushed Mu Pei appeared in holographic form. “Hold on, Kleingelt. I’m patching everyone to the flag command net.”

Seconds later, eighteen holographic faces hovered in front of Vier. Each flag officer within the fleet, from First and 2
nd
commodores to rear admirals to vice admiral Mu Pei himself, appeared before her in an organized display.

The center face, Mu Pei, spoke, “Let me be blunt, people. We have approximately half an hour before their fastest ships reach our slowest ships—providing we continue retreating the pace of our slowest ship. I have opened this meeting to discuss what to do in light of the fact that we did not plan for this contingency. I assume that it is obvious by now to everyone that the enemy has been hiding unknown technology, as Admiral Kleingelt has suggested, at least about their propulsion capabilities. Since the enemy does not fear the fact that they’ll be fighting with their smallest ships unsupported by their largest ships, we must also assume that they believe their smallest ships can outmatch or outgun our entire fleet by themselves using technology unknown to us. Since our slowest ships comprise 90percent of our manpower and battle strength, I want to focus on how to save our greatest assets without beginning the Dispersion Protocol. I am open to the possibility that they cannot be saved without dispersing the fleet, but I don’t want to focus on that scenario yet. I will go first with a plan that is most obvious.

All the commanders remained silent as they listened.

Mu Pei cleared his throat. “The most straightforward plan is to take everything we got, including our fastest ships, and align them in a perfect Catch-cloud to receive the enemy’s attack. We will continue to use a concave lense formation, except this time we’re facing a much smaller enemy fleet in our immediate battle range. Because we’re facing only their fastest ships, the total enemy combatants will be reduced by as much as fifty percent, maybe less. Of course, the fact that we’re facing 50 percent less ships is less important than the fact that we’re facing them with a 9 to 1 tonnage advantage, since their fastest ships are also the least powerful.
”

Some of the commanders nodded from their holoscreens

“However, I cannot reiterate how blatantly dangerous this all seems,” Mu Pei continued. “It is obvious that they
are
willing to fight such an uneven battle. That means, unless they intend to suicide their fastest ships, they believe they have the technology or tactics to fight even at such a mass disparity. Of course, there is always the possibility that they have some type of technology which makes it even more unfair, for instance, something that enables them to damage us at a range that is beyond our missile weapons. In that case, we have no choice but to disperse or hope their ammo supply runs out if there is a limit to such a potential technology. If their fastest ships are equipped with such a technology, we will be in a devastating position. Any thoughts?”

“Sir,” Commodore Stamos spoke with a stern face at the lower left. “What if they
don’t
have any new unrevealed weapon technologies and are simply sending all of their fastest ships at us for a different reason?”

“And what reason is that, commodore?” Mu Pei raised his eyebrow.

“Perhaps,” she replied. “They wish to delay our fastest ships from retreating at their fastest pace, through forcing them inside a concave lens formation that is formidable but slow-moving?”

“Why delay our fastest ships? For what purpose? If they have the technology to defeat our slowest and fastest ships together, allowing our fastest ships to escape means nothing. If they don’t have that technology, and their whole purpose is to bluff or threaten us with the possibility of having such a technology, then what for?” Mu Pei asked.

Stamos shrugged. “I don’t know, sir. I’m just suggesting a possibility. Um...perhaps they hope to destroy our slowest ships
and
our fastest ships together when their slowest ships reach us?”

Mu Pei thought about it, and then shook his head. “Unlikely. As you recall, while we are in this concave formation, our fastest speed is the speed of our slowest ships. The fastest speed of their slowest, biggest ships are almost equal, but slightly slower. They will never catch up at this rate, unless one presupposes that they are once again, hiding some new propulsion technology.”

“I understand, sir,” Stamos said, now quiet.

Mu Pei gazed back in silence momentarily. “If their purpose for sending their fastest ships is to simply delay us from running away so their medium-speed ships can reach us, it still relies on the assumption that their lightest and medium lightest ships can outfight our entire fleet without their heaviest ships. This assumption still relies on a technological superiority. Any other thoughts?”

“Sir,” Rear Admiral Ju-Pont interjected. “Stamos’s idea opens up new possibilities. There is an even greater problem. We don’t know what other assets they could be hiding. If they have hidden their propulsion technology, they could be just be as well be hiding entire fleets. We don’t know if 4800 warships comprise the majority of their assets or are just a portion of their total assets within this sector. What if they are attempting to prevent our fastest ships from running away because they have a
whole fleet
of fast ships able to move at 30,000 SL, and we cannot see this fleet because it’s beyond our sensor range?”