Chapter Two Fifteen Preamble to Battle (Patreon)

Countryman stepped onto the bridge and made for the strategic console where Greyman was standing. “I hear our patrols found something?”

Greyman nodded and pointed to a location along their ‘Northern’ border. More of a shorthand term than anything else, a system humanity had adopted to describe points on a star chart. In normal space North pointed towards the galactic center, while South pointed out towards the rim, West was clockwise along the rotational axis, and East was counterclockwise. Directions up or down were described in relation to the galactic ecliptic plane by a measure of degrees. Ships usually travelled fairly close to the ecliptic for obvious reasons. Here in the storm, using the galactic center for reference wasn’t very easy, so instead they’d picked the center of the storm as their central point.

“So they did, at 0400 hours this morning, Pilots Sali and Fujiwara located a Raider Fleet. They’ve been shadowing the fleet on my orders for the last four hours, and have counted their number and heading. Three battleships, a dozen heavy cruisers, thirty light cruisers and over two hundred destroyers and frigates on a heading for The Lodge.”

“Can we intercept?”

“I’ve already followed the plan, we are moving towards The Lodge at best speed, but our forces won’t arrive until after they get there. Our friends will have to hold for nearly three hours before we can show up to give battle.”

Countryman blinked, “Three hours may be too long. The Raiders have three battleships. The Lodge doesn’t even have one protecting it and those defenses aren’t really set up to face three battleships.”

“I’m aware of that sir. I’ve asked Richards to see what she can do about getting us there faster.”

Countryman didn’t think that would be easy. Certainly not in the storm where constant course corrections were required. Plasma turbulence and other phenomenon would constantly throw a ship off course. It wasn’t as simple as just push the engines harder. “Don’t try too hard, I’d like be able to fight when we get there.”

“So would I,” commented Greyman.

“Now more importantly, have we relayed this tracking data to the Lodge?”

“I sent the transmissions right away, so far we have not received a response. I imagine they are still discussing the information, and expect them to reply within two hours.”

Countryman nodded and then took another look at the star chart. “In the meantime we should plan out the battle, anything to give us a lead. Hmm, doesn’t look like we have much in range to hit them with.”

“It’s the timing sir, if they’d shown up just a couple weeks later, we might have been able to hit them with a couple of Vulcan Corvettes, but there aren’t any on the north border. Fuji’s patrol is currently there, but there is another patrol not too far off that we could divert. If they change course now, they could rendezvous with Fuji in three days, that would give us a dozen fighters.”

“Not the biggest force I’ve worked with, but it should be enough to tip things in our favor.”

“Got something in mind?”

Countryman nodded, “Those battleships are the biggest problem on the field, their heavy guns will make short work of the defenses at the Lodge. Our allies don’t have anything there that can take on a large heavy capital ship like that. If we could remove one or two of them from the equation...”

Greyman blinked, “You know that might just work, but it's going to be tight. I doubt we will be able to make more than one, maybe two attack runs before they respond. After that we’d be risking our pilots.”

“So we need to make sure our torpedoes count. Now remind me of the composition of those two patrols?”

“Fuji has four SF-1204 starfighters, and two SFB-1208 Sparrows with a recon package in her squadron, along with two X-1205 combat shuttles acting as a supply and barracks for her group. The other patrol has a half dozen SF-1204s and two X-1205s.

“Alright,” replied Countryman as he considered the scans of the enemy vessels, “That gives us ten fighters and two bombers to work with. Can’t use the shuttles, since they’ve been outfitted for patrol duty. Hmm, we should split them into two attack groups, five fighters per group, escorting one bomber.”

“I think I see where you are going, if the fighters take out the shields, one bomber may be enough, assuming they hit the right spot.”

“Agreed, which is why Fuji is going to spend the three days waiting for her reinforcements, planning the attack and gathering data. Relay the general parameters to her, I’m confident she can carry out the mission well enough.”

_______________

August 26th, 008 SDE; Fuji’s Patrol, Northern Border, Command Shuttle:

Fuji shifted a bit, as she leaned over the table, a display of local space prominently on it, along with data on their targets. Nearby Sali sighed, “You sure we can’t wait a little longer, get a few more pilots? Maybe even a full bomber squadron.”

“No, the Enterprise has already recalled what ships she could and set out to meet them at the Lodge. What ships remain are either too far, or in the wrong direction to reach them in time, we are it.”

“Wonderful, a dozen fighters against a fleet, what fun.”

“Well you did say you were bored,” commented Fuji.

“This wasn’t what I wanted, not at all!”

Nearby Samantha Mitchel giggled, “Well that’s what you get for tempting fate, now we all have to pay.”

“Yeah, yeah laugh it up,” she said, responding to the familiar pilot. Sali had gotten to know her a bit on that first patrol she’d taken. One that had been part of a very desired test flight, so pilots from both wings were on it. Harris had been fun to tease, he made it so easy, but sadly he wasn’t on this flight, so no teasing there. She might get her chance another day, he was a Beta wing pilot.

Fuji grinned, “Hey don’t worry about it, you made a good showing in your first battle. Just stick with me and follow your instincts and you’ll come out fine.”

“Um, sure, so what’s our plan of attack?”

Fuji tapped one of the three battleships, “This one looks ripe, her armor is much thinner than the other two, likely a weight saving compromise as she’s got some rather large guns. From the look of it, she’s also got a spinal weapon mount, two of them if I was reading the emitter layout right. Of course her shields are pretty heavy, our particle cannons would never penetrate them, and they are triple layered, making photon penetrating unreliable.”

“Heavy indeed,” commented Sali, she’d seen the energy readings, there had to be several petawatts in that shield. “How are we going to get through those?”

“The pulsars are our best bet, but I suspect we will need more than one hit. I’m going to assign a full squadron to get through that.  I’m hoping several hits in short succession will disrupt the shield long enough for our bomber pilot to score a few hits with her photons.” Fuji said before highlighting several locations. “The light armor opens the main engineering sections for impact, based on the scans available,  a hit in any of these locations would cripple the vessel’s main power distribution net, shields, weapons, and engines will all be affected. That should give us a chance for the main target; her forward magazines. A strafe to weaken the armor, followed by a photon hit just might cook the missiles off.”

Sali nodded, then Samantha asked, “So what is our second target?”

Fuji highlighted another battleship, “This battleship is the other target, the other fighters and remaining bomber will hit her. The shields are much weaker, but the armor is quite thick and it’s powered. Again the pulsars will be key here, we should open with them to knock out the shields and disrupt their systems. While she is reeling from the pulsars, we will then strafe her with particle shot and torpedoes.” Fuji highlighted a few sections, “Based on the scans, these sections seem most vital, any penetrating hits should do a lot of damage. Hopefully fatal, but I’ll settle for crippled.”

“Now what kind of resistance should we expect after we kick the hornet’s nest?” asked Sali.

“Flak cannons, rapid fire pulse cannons, light air to air missiles, mostly plasma warheads, and drones. We’ve received more than a few reports about the Raiders employing drone fighters, smaller and less heavily armed than our fighters but numerous. Nothing we can’t handle, just don’t get careless.”

“Understood.”

“Alright ladies, board your fighters!”

Sali rushed to the airlock with the others, as they started rotating fighters through the docking port using remote guidance so everyone could get back into their birds. Sali felt her heart beat a little faster, but she steeled herself for the strike mission that was about to start.

________________She took a breath, as she listened to the attack chatter, they were closing on the first target now. The other group was closing on the second target. In just a moment they were going to go weapons free. Her hands drifted to the weapons console, flipping a switch made bold red lettering popped up, reading; Pulsars Armed. Text that blinked steadily, as she brought her hand over the trigger.

Fuji appeared on the hud, “All fighters weapons free, fire for effect and stay frosty!”

Sali locked her targets, then pulled the trigger, two blue-white streaks shot from her craft, but she didn’t watch them, instead she had half an eye on the recharge indicator and the moment she could she fired again and again. Other fighters joined in just as quickly.

Idly she noted the blue-white spheres slamming into the active shields on the Raider battleship. Her powerful shields flared brightly as they attempted to absorb the highly charged projectiles. Several major fluctuations registered, just as her alarms went off.

“Missiles!” shouted someone over the comms.

Fuji interjected, “Maintain formation, let your webs deal with that first volley.”

Sali nodded, and diverted power to the web projectors, before pulling the trigger again. This time she watched the bolts a bit, as they punched... right through the shield, splashing against the hull. Charged plasma rippled across the alien hull, just seconds before the shield went down entirely.

“Shields down!” she reported promptly.

“Roger, vectoring for an attack run,” responded the bomber pilot.

“Sali, maintain pulsar fire, knockout their systems; everyone else, switch to particle cannons. Watch your targets and keep frosty.”

Everyone acknowledged, and Sali locked another target and fired as she brought the craft around. Her gaze looked around for any fighters, as several missiles sailed in at her. She barely flinched as her webs deployed. Several detonations briefly obscured her optics, but not one missile struck her hull. Sali fired again, noting the other fighters were now strafing the hull with particle fire, the thinner plating on this ship was already starting to buckle and degrade as the high yield particle bolts punched in and detonated, rupturing the plating. Sali had to admit that she liked these gen three particle cannons, they packed a wallop.

Her own pulsars flared out and slammed seemingly ineffectually into the battleship, but she knew otherwise.

“Drones! Incoming on vector two three seven mark three five.”

“Mitchel, Barnes, cover our six, all others maintain attack runs. Sali switch to photons, I’m sending you targets.”

“Understood!” she replied, as she flipped a couple switches on her weapons board. The blinking text now read, Photon Torpedoes, Armed.

New targeting data entered her computer, as she vectored her fighter towards the first target, a section that had been strafed two minutes ago, several plasma fires could be seen burning under the hull in that area, with some of the flames erupting out into the storm. She locked onto the section, and pulled the trigger, two streaks erupted from her fighter. On her weapons board, her torpedo count dropped from eight to six.”

The glowing blue warheads punched through the weakened armor and exploded in a brilliant pillar of fire and light, the entire section ruptured, then elsewhere another detonation ripped open the hull from the inside, then another. There wasn’t however, a forth detonation, still several internal detonations had done a lot of damage to the ship, her hull was now venting bodies, burning plasma and air. 

That had been an effective first hit, and she had a few more shots left, Sali vectored for the next target, idly glancing at the combat. Noting that the two fighters ordered to cover were doing a wonderful job tying up dozens of drones. Several exploded as she watched them get strafed with particle fire. Another set came up behind the fighters and opened up, only to miss as they twisted out of the way and revectored to fire back.

Sali focused back on her own position, weaving out of the line of fire of several pulse turrets, the energy sailing past her small fighter harmlessly. Then locked onto her second target, firing. Two more blue streaks sailed out and slammed into the massive ship, this time there was no pillar of fire, but the effect was no less effective. Several pulse turrets fell silent all at once, as fires erupted inside the hull. Bulkhead doors slammed shut as more charred bodies were sent flying out into the storm.

Elsewhere the bomber hit with her bombs, and another pillar of fire erupted on the hull of the battleship. Unfortunately she was a large, and structurally sound vessel, it was going to take more than one good hit to finish her, but it was already a start.

Her next target was coming up; two other fighters were just passing having strafed the outer plating, leaving it a ruptured and pockmarked mess. Sali had a feeling it wouldn’t resist a torpedo hit very well. She also noted she was approaching the bow of the ship. As she locked on, she checked the intel, this might be the forward magazines, she thought, just as she pulled the trigger, noting she was now down to two warheads left.

Just after she passed the target location, a pillar of fire erupted as the entire bow of the ship simply ceased to exist. A couple alarms blared as the blast struck her fighter and she took a moment to correct her course, quickly noting that her AIF had been drained by thirty percent. Other than that, she was fine, armor intact, no systems damaged. The battleship couldn’t say the same, as the mangled remains of her bow could attest, the ship was effectively crippled now.

Another blast rocked her fighter, as more detonations rippled across the hull of the large ship. Scratch that, she was finished. Right before her eyes the ship was breaking apart.

“Target destroyed! All ships, let’s get out of here.”

“Fujiwara ma’am we are still trying to sink the other ship.”

“Stick to the plan, withdraw!”

“Aye, ma’am.”

Sali pulled away, and switched to her particle cannons, just as a swarm of drones rushed the formation. Taking a breath, she locked onto the first ones coming into range and fired.