Citadel Page 39

  "Arrh, me hearties!" Kinyon said neutrally. "Boarders away! Adjust missiles to full antimissile settings. Keep them off the parasites. And let's see how many they carry."

  —|—

  Each of the Aggressors carried four hundred missiles. The Assault Vector Dwarf Marauder carried an additional five thousand.

  The Aggressors could flush their magazines in under a minute. The AV took a bit longer, two minutes.

  Two minutes after the Troy exited the gate, just short of fifteen thousand missiles, each having the kinetic energy equivalent of a ten megaton nuclear weapon, were in space and headed towards the battlestation.

  But the Troy had missiles as well. Most of those were set to target on the enemy ships. Ten percent, though, were set to engage incoming missiles.

  About ninety percent of the fire was getting through the defenses with the Troy sending most of its fire to the enemy fleet. Two hundred megatons of energy was hitting the battlestation every second. Most of it, however, was hitting on the North sector, which was pointed at the enemy fleet. Which just meant it was slowly mining out the sector and otherwise doing no damage other than marginally changing the Troy's delta-V.

  As the missiles shifted to defense, that fire dropped off. The Troy, even with all the damage it had sustained, fired fifteen hundred missiles per second.

  In ten seconds, Troy had launched as many missiles as the entire enemy fleet launched in one hundred and twenty. The missiles were successful at interception fifty percent of the time. Some hit multiple times. Those that "missed" were automatically programmed to continue on to the distant ship targets.

  Ten seconds after that, there were no more enemy missiles.

  —|—

  "Cease fire," Admiral Kinyon said. "Let's close a bit before we use up more missiles. No need to leave them in the target basket longer than necessary."

  —|—

  "Close the fleet on the Dwarf Marauder," Lhi'Kasishaj said. "Keep those missiles off of us. Activate the gate. We're getting out of—"

  "We are going nowhere!" Gi'Bucosof shouted. "Close on the battlestation and destroy it!"

  "You're insane," Lhi'Kasishaj said. "That thing has more firepower than we can possibly face!"

  "There are things you do not know, coward," Gi'Bucosof said. "In a moment, it will simply be a very rich prize."

  —|—

  "You don't seem to be enjoying the game, Niazgol," Tyler said, moving a pawn. He had to be careful to get it into the right space since the Troy was rocking in a most unpleasant manner.

  "I have rather had my fill of battles," Gorku said, considering the board. "And being in this one seems unnecessary."

  "Depends upon the definition of unnecessary," Tyler said. "Your move."

  "I know," Gorku said. "I'm considering it."

  "I think the vulnerability of my rook is rather obvious," Tyler said.

  "And I'm wondering why you put it out in the middle of the board," Gorku said. "Unsupported by other pieces."

  "It seems rather unnecessary, doesn't it?" Tyler said.

  "Yes," Gorku said, looking him in the eye. "What game are you playing?"

  "More like which," Tyler said, smiling. "Seriously. Your move."

  "I rather don't want to do this," Gorku said, ruffling his back fur. "But... Paris."

  "Yes, Benefactor?"

  "Code Tol-Par-Kie-Fon," Gorku said. "Override Benefactor Six One Seven Four."

  "Yes, Benefactor," Paris replied. "All defense shut down. Evacuating all personnel areas. Shutting down drive. Opening bay door. Sending surrender codes to Rangora fleet."

  "I'm sorry, Tyler," Gorku said. "But it has to be this way."

  "Yes, it does, rather," Tyler said as the hatch slid open. Three Marines in suits entered with their lasers pointed casually at the floor.

  Gorku blinked in surprise. He could clearly feel the Orion drive continuing to fire. And there was a hum under all the fire of the lasers still functioning and missiles being ejected. Through the crystal wall, the ripple of distortion from the maneuvering drives was visible.

  "How?" Gorku said. "That... that is a hard-coded override! It's a Benefactor override!"

  "What you failed to consider," Tyler said, gathering up the pieces, "was that Earth had a rather developed IT field before we met the Glatun. And while we had immense trouble with the complexity of your software when we first encountered it... well, we've had seventeen years. That's the same time as from the development of the Apple Two to the Internet boom. If you think we were going to put the survival of Earth in the hands of AIs we didn't fully understand... Seriously, did you really think we were that stupid?"

  "How long had you known?" Gorku asked.

  "AIs don't come fully awake until they're activated," Tyler said. "We rather thoroughly vetted the software before we activated it. And once we knew what back-doors would look like in Glatun code, we were able to find them easily enough. Not to mention things like Benefactor overrides. We've had full control, including overrides, on all the AIs you supplied for some years now. We've even reverse engineered the coding so we can make our own. I was just wondering if you'd really go through with it."

  "The Glatun are conquered," Gorku said sadly. "What else did you expect me to do?"

  "So you didn't really escape," Tyler said. "Is the admiral aware?"

  "No," Gorku said. "No, he's not. He thought it was all valid. The order was. My escape, though, was provided courtesy of the Rangora High Command."

  "I recall you had Rangora servants," Tyler said. "So all that hooey about being a Glatun patriot was so much bullcrap. You were a spy all along?"

  "No," Gorku said. "I didn't give the Rangora a thing before the war. That didn't mean I didn't leave my options open. I saw that we could never face the Rangora. I did what I could to prevent the war and even to find allies, like Earth, that might help. But in the end... What would you have had me do?"

  "I guess... trust us," Tyler said. "But that was yesterday. For today, these gentlemen will escort you to slightly less comfortable quarters while we crush another Rangora fleet. And tomorrow... we will see what we can do for the Glatun."

  —|—

  "We are on vector for the enemy fleet, sir," Captain Pohlman reported.

  The Troy was finally flying straight now that the enemy's missiles were so much space dust.

  "Finally," Admiral Kinyon said.

  "We were getting a lot of alternative delta from the missile hits, sir," Pohlman pointed out. "But we're headed for them, now."

  "Keep North pointed at them," Kinyon ordered. "Tactical shift targeting to the AV. All tubes, all laser. Hold fire for my command."

  "All tubes, all laser, target the AV, aye," Sharp said. "This is gonna be fun."

  "How are the Marines and parasites doing?" Kinyon asked.

  "Nominal," Commodore Marchant said. "Just getting in range to start boarding actions."

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  "Holy crap," Dana said, maneuvering to dodge incoming laser fire. "Can we get some fire suppression here?"

  The space docks had "only light defenses." Light defenses were enough to take out a shuttle. As had already been proven too many times.

  "Roger," Hartwell said, firing their own pop-gun. "Carter, this is Thirty-Six. Could we get some fire suppression, over?"

  The shuttles were working in tandem with the cruiser battle groups. Each flight, supposedly, had a CruRon covering it. So far, it seemed like most of the covering was coming from their onboard lasers.

  "Roger, Thirty-Six," the Carter responded. "Can you pinpoint it for us?"

  The exterior of the three kilometer-long space dock was not smooth, it looked like the skyline of a city. Which meant that fire was coming from a dozen angles.

  "Try following the line of my fire," Hartwell said, firing another burst of lasers. "Good enough?"

  "Roger, got it. Incoming fire from the Warrington."

  The surface structure, whatever it was, vanished in a flash of light.
The Warrington had apparently fired a missile.

  "Thank you, Jimmy," Hartwell said.

  "You are welcome. Please consider us for all your future weapons of mass destruction needs."

  "And they made a nice LZ," Dana said, banking around to head for the destroyed structure. It was still outgassing, which meant the Marines wouldn't have to cut through a bulkhead.

  "Whoa," Hartwell said as they entered the structure. It hadn't been obvious how large it was from a distance. The blast from the Warrington had opened up a large support corridor of some sort. Large being defined as large enough for multiple shuttles to fit.

  "We're taking fire," Dana said as the hull rang.

  "Can't spot it," Hartwell said.

  "Thirty-Six, Thirty-Two. Fire coming from ten o'clock, low."

  "Got it," Hartwell said.

  A group of Rangora were clustered around a semi-portable laser. It had about the same output as the shuttle's, but was manually targeted.

  Hartwell laid the auto-caret on the group and walked laser fire across them. The power-pack from the laser blew up in a flash of actinic light, taking out the survivors of the crew. And a section of bulkhead and deck.

  "EM Hartwell, Staff Sergeant Pridgeon."

  "Go, Pidge."

  "We going to take any more fire? I've got a guy down and we're evacuated."

  "Don't know," Thermal answered. "But you're about to get to fire back. Ramp coming down."

  —|—

  "We have an entry near quadrant four engineering control," Major Ward said. Eric C. Ward was the operations officer of the 2nd Marine regiment, which was tasked with capturing both the space dock designated SO Two as well as its support ship, Sierra Two Eighteen.

  It was one hell of a task for a bare two thousand Marines.

  "It's the main engine transfer corridor," Ward continued. "There's enough space to put down a Flight."

  "Let's maximize that," Colonel Bolger said, moving his chew from one cheek to the other and spitting into a receptacle in his helmet. "Put in Two Batt."

  "Two Batt to LZ Charlie, aye," Major Ward said, sending the orders.

  "Time to move forward," Bolger said. "Get me a shuttle to saddle."

  —|—

  "Two-thirty there," Staff Sergeant Pridgeon said, pointing to the side. "Get me some covering fire down this corridor!"

  Rammer grabbed one handle of the crew-served laser and hefted as Lassie got the other.

  "Let's rock," Rammer said, humping the laser down the ramp.

  The "corridor" was about as high as a gymnasium and seemed to stretch forever. Whatever it was for, the steel bulkheads and deck were scuffed up and scratched as if something big was normally moved through it. Arrayed along the sides were more hatches than he could count. And all of them seemed to be disgorging armed Rangora who seemed strangely upset at the unexpected visit from the Terran Marines.

  Laser fire seemed to be coming from everywhere and he really had no fricking clue what they were doing. But the staff said set up the laser and give covering fire and that was good enough.

  He powered up the laser as Lassie latched down the tripod in case they lost gravity. It was about that time he realized the gravity was above Earth normal. Which just made him glad that was what they normally trained in.

  He scanned the vector for targets and caught a burst of fire from a hatch down the corridor. He swept the laser across the hatch and was rewarded by the sight of a burst of volatiles. A moment later a part of a Rangora tumbled out of the hatch.

  "We're taking fire," Lassie said as the bulkhead next to them flashed into gas. The laser had a shield but it wasn't much good against heavy fire.

  "Where?" Rammer snapped. Rangora were pouring into the corridor, taking cover behind the debris left by the strike from the ships. The fire could be coming from anywhere.

  Rammer walked the laser into the groups he could spot, getting some, missing others. He felt a punching sound to his side and looked over.

  "Frack," he muttered. "I need a new AG, Staff! Lassie's down!"

  "Missile, Missile, Missile," the battle comp chimed.

  "Crappity, crappity, frack, frack," Rammer said, sending another burp of coherent light downrange.

  —|—

  "Thirty-Six, pull out and go pick up more troops," Mutant commed. "'Ware fire."

  "Roger, Mutant," Thermal said, firing a burst of lasers into a group of Rangora about a hundred meters down the corridor. The bastards were big but they had a remarkable ability to hide in the rubble that the missile strike had caused.

  "Pulling out," Dana said, lifting off.

  The shuttle almost immediately went into a spin that slammed it into the bulkhead of the corridor. Dana corrected and got it limping back into space but it was hard. Something was broke.

  "What just happened?" Dana asked.

  "We got hit by Thirty-One," Hartwell said. "Damage to starboard maneuvering control. Get us out of this cluster and I'm on it."

  "What about Sean and Charlie?" Dana asked, crabbing out of the opening as another shuttle came in.

  "Thirty-One's toast," Hartwell said. "Ate a missile."

  "Crap," Dana said. "These had better be worth it."

  —|—

  "We're taking some serious fire from down-corridor, sir," Captain Silver said. Benjamin "Streak" Silver was the commander of Alpha Company, Second Battalion, Second Marine Regiment and had found himself on point of the regiment's assault. Which meant that his company, in particular, was soaking up the casualties. "Is there any way we can get some heavy fire support? The shuttles are doing what they can, but we're getting slaughtered in here."

  "Roger, Ben," the battalion commander commed. "We're working that exercise. Just maintain your Operational Status. I'm sending in Charlie company as force addition."

  "Gung-ho, sir," Silver said, trying not to sigh. Lieutenant Colonel Maddox was a great guy and a good commander. But he had a real problem with buzzword bingo. The company commanders had bets whether it would last in combat. Which meant Silver had just made ten bucks. If he lived to collect it.

  —|—

  "Roger, Two-Two..." Booth said, looking at the schematic of the battle area. The corridor the battalion commander was talking about was clearly highlighted and they even had good locations on the heavy enemy concentrations. "I can open that up like a tin can if you want. Tell your boys to hunker down for incoming."

  "Can you actually open that like a tin can?" Kepler asked.

  "Roger, sir," Booth said, sending the commands. "I'm going to use the main gun on the Monaghan. They're in best position. Permission to fire?"

  "Stand by," Kepler said, double-checking the vectors. The main gun on the Monaghan was a one hundred terawatt system. A near miss would cook the Marines. "Roger, permission to fire."

  "Permission to fire, aye," Booth said, pressing the firing button. "Eat coherent light, lizards."

  —|—

  "Bloody hell!" Father Patricelli said as the overhead of the corridor flashed into gas. The metal went white hot for just a moment, filling the corridor with a light bright enough to be a nuke.

  Despite being evacuated, the pressure of the gaseous material could be felt on their suits. And it was hot.

  "So much for resistance," Rammer said, poking his head out from behind the shield.

  The length of corridor where the Rangora had been gathering was now so much twisted and melted metal. What hatches remained were probably welded shut.

  "We won't be going that way," Father said.

  "Which we ain't," Pridgeon commed. "We're holdin' the LZ for Charlie and Bravo. Just make sure nobody comes that way no more."

  "Gotcha, Staff," Rammer said. "Las— Chaos, we need more ammo!"

  "Got that, Rammer," the private said, heading back to the LZ.

  "And watch out for—" Rammer said just before there was a truncated scream.

  "Bloody hell," Father said, shaking his head. "Corpsman!"

  "Bits of hot metal..." Ramm
er finished. "That can puncture your suit."

  "Looks like he's gonna live," Father said, turning to observe the private being carted away.

  "Boy needs to join the Army or something," Rammer said. "And, by the way, we still need more ammo."

  "On it," Father said. "Hope we don't run out. Nearest resupply's the Troy."

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  "Bit of a dog's breakfast," Admiral Kinyon said, flexing his jaw.

  The tac screen was too cluttered to make any sense of it. There were 216 separate Sierras—ships that were designated as targets—as well as a stream of outgoing and incoming missiles. Even on the large holo in the middle of the CIC, the entire thing was filled with vector markers and ship designators.

  "The AV's too tough to spread our fire on multiple Sierras," Kinyon said. "All fire on the AV. Wait for it, though. I want to get close enough that we can rotate to engage with laser and missiles simultaneously and mass strike with the missiles. Then work your way down the Aggressors, cruisers, etcetera."

  "They appear to be bolting for the gate," Captain Sharp pointed out. "If we wait too long we'll miss some of them."

  "Fine," Kinyon said. "We're between them and the gate. The President wanted to send a message. Battleships streaming air and water, limping through the gate is about the right balance of nice, don't you think? Don't let any of them get through without at least a kiss on the cheek."

  —|—

  "It's not firing," Lhi'Kasishaj said. "Why is it not firing?"

  "Waiting to get us in killing range," Colonel Koax said. The fleet tactical officer was considering the various vectors on the screen. "Since it has managed to maneuver around the gate, we can't get through without passing through its primary cone of fire. It is now apparent that there are only two zones that are fully prepared for battle. It can only fire its laser from those two zones."

  The Troy's onboard laser had been a very unpleasant surprise. Based on the spectroscopy of the light, it appeared to be composed of several different emitters. More emitters and more power than an AV main gun.

  "By closing, simply absorbing our fire, it can enter a range where no matter how many laser clusters we have, the missiles will overwhelm them," Koax continued. The fleet was now accelerating for the gate but the Troy, despite its relatively low delta-V, had started off closer than the fleet. All it really had to do was slow down, move to the side and the gate went "past" it. The fleet was having to accelerate to catch up. "And then it can use the laser to finish us off."