When the alien attack came the defenders weren't quite as worn from waiting as they had been previously. As shocking as it had been the probe ships had given them actual targets and had ended the waiting. Only one ship had escaped back through the warp point, but that was all it took. Then the waiting started again. Now that they had their information, how long would it take for them to follow up?
Lieutenant Thompson was on duty again, this time in the middle of the shipboard day, supposedly much more alert than in the dead hours of the night, and the computer still beat him to the alarm, this time.
Krishmahnta was long past the "drop everything—literally—and run" mentality of her days as an ensign. It never did anyone any good for officers to arrive on deck disheveled, panting, looking as though they'd just fought off an Orion zeget or an Earth tiger to get their uniform back, wresting it out of needle-fanged jaws. She'd had one captain who did just that, almost every time, and while he was a good officer she'd certainly learned that it always played merry Hell with morale. It still took her under a minute to take her place on Gallipoli's command deck.
"Admiral, they're coming through in force!" The one thing she didn't do was sit down. She was so keyed up that she stood rather than sitting in her command chair, but she didn't pace, clasping her hands behind her back, taking in the glittering tank with blip after ominous blip emerging red from the warp point. They began blinking as the mines engaged, and began to vanish, but slowly the inexorable pressure of ship after ship began forcing the defenders back. The space around the BR-01 warp point was a hellish expanding bubble of wreckage and radiation. The tank in the command center of the Gallipoli was having a hard time compensating for the background glow and still give enough contrast to let Krishmahnta and her staff discern what was happening. It hiccupped and suddenly the display came clear.
It was an ugly, brute-force assault, with the aliens showing themselves utterly willing to spend their ships and themselves in a way that chilled everyone watching, raising the specter of the monster under the bed, the monster in the dark. There were not enough mines and when the last had taken an SD with it, the alien assault force began to expand faster. The defenders had already been pushed back a full dozen light-seconds.
"Commander Williams' com-net has gone down, Admiral."
Damn. Damn. Damn. She didn't let that get off her tongue. Without the net to coordinate ship movement more of her people were going to get killed. "All units pull back. Retreat to point Alpha."
The fighters from Celmithyr'theaarenouw were the last to break off, even accounting for the lag—like all Tabby fighter jocks they always rode the edge—and before their final attack group peeled away they managed to take another alien SD out, but the explosion wiped out most of the group as they fled the expanding blast. Krishmahnta had held Celmithyr'theaarnouw out as far as possible and she had orders to retreat through the warp point once she had all her fighters back, at least all those who made it back. But it had been hard enough to get the Tabby captain to hold back so far.
The older carrier had been halfway through her refitting and had been withdrawn to join up with her forces with human engineers still working as they withdrew. She was just as glad that Kiiraathra'ostakjo was used to working closely with humans, especially out here. It was sheer fluke that she had two Orion CVs, counting the damaged one that had brought them the images of the first battle, to try and retake Bellerophon.
Most people believed that the fighter was little more than a distraction against the heavy metal of the ships of the line, but the fighter primary beam still made them formidable, especially in numbers against an alien foe who'd never had to deal with such tiny, agile foes. It was somewhat like a knight in full armor being swarmed by wasps; one or two would annoy, dozens or hundreds would kill. Erica could almost imagine the Orion howls of victory, even though none of that would be transmitted.
Erica sat down as she watched the tight group of Commander Williams' command drift apart, captains attempting to maintain the cluster that made both their offensive and defensive fire so deadly; trying and failing.
Against all his instincts Least Claw Kiiraathra'ostakjo pulled the Celmithyr'theaarnouw back as ordered, restraining the thunderous rumble in his chest as Orion and human engineers struggled to find the glitch that had caused the failure of the com-net all down the line. The acrid stench of burnt insulation in the air made everyone's fangs visible as their noses wrinkled, but they ignored all of that, even as they ignored the technicians frantically pulling panels, struggling to keep the carrier's missile fire as coordinated as possible with the rest of the group. "Least Claw! We have it! We have it! Com coming back up. Commander Williams, Sir!"
"Good. Kiiraathra'ostakjo here."
The translation was broken but clear. "Regrouping as ordered, Good work, Claw. We've lost Arbalest. Longbow's closing to cover your flank."
"Acknowledged." Kiiraathra'ostakjo watched his plot as the alien ships continued to warp in, in a never-ending stream. The odor in the air had nothing to do with how much fang he showed.
The aliens were still bringing up units. Dammit, Krishmahnta thought. Where are they coming from? How could they have built so fast? Superdreadnought after superdreadnought came through so close that several annihilated each other; yet they were still coming through the carpet of missiles she'd laid down when the alarm blared. Tension in the picket had ratcheted up once the probe ships had zipped through the warp. They knew they hadn't destroyed all of them and she and her staff had planned their best with what they had.
The aliens were treating SDs like fighters that could make warp and the human defenders were starting to feel like people trying to plug a hole in a dyke with their palms, against the weight of the sea.
When it hit the fan and the first alien ships came through, she'd wished to be at Pegasus rather than downstream of Misty but she could hardly go back four star systems and around another four just to make herself feel better. It didn't matter.
She'd had to assume that the aliens were now using the warp points and would be attacking through both of them and she could only hope that Vice Admiral Yoshikuni was doing better over at Pegasus. On some level every human was somehow reassured now that they were fighting a war whose shape they understood, even if it raised all the horrors of Bugs anew in everyone's nightmares.
She bit her lip, but pulled her mouth straight, refusing to be distracted by her own concerns and concentrated on the mess that was the battle. The faint, almost subliminal twitch told her gut that her ship had fired again.
"They're still coming." The channel broke up in an aural shower of static before coming back, the voice as flat as suppressed panic could make it. "They don't give a damn, sir." Even over the light-minutes the officers on the Gallipoli could see it. The alien SDs were coming through with the same disregard for their own safety as they had before. The red enemy icons continued coming through, an expanding bubble as they forced a space around the warp point.
Given enough weight of ships and willingness to throw them through a warp point, a toehold could be forced. You couldn't put mines right on the warp point—they'd only be torn apart by the stresses and you had to back off to a certain extent. That was what had allowed the small ships to get in and out again to give the aliens their information.
"Admiral—" The Norfolk's icon was beginning to flash yellow.
"—I see it, Mr. Aetlan, thank you." She leaned forward unconsciously, as if she could pull the ship in trouble out with her will alone, but as she opened her mouth the Omega code flashed. She heard a muffled sound from the exec that could have been a curse.
If the aliens were following true to form they would not pick up life-pods or try to save those aboard a disabled ship. "All command groups. Fall back. Fall back. Pick up as possible. Repeat, as possible." In the holo tank the green dots of the defenders began breaking free of the ugly swath of red in the center, falling back in their command groups. There were so few of them compared to that red tide.
They had planned for this, trained to make their withdrawal as costly as possible for the aliens. She thought of Misty, and hoped like hell that they could stem this tide, this god awful, relentless flow of alien ships. She turned to the image of the hideous flood still coming through the warp point. Ship after ship after ship. Dammit. Dammit. Thank the gods that they don't seem to have anything like the Desai Drive. In a straight run for the warp point, they can't hope to catch us.
(Self-satisfaction.) Torhok looked along the Council table, sending the cascade of his elation out freely. His supporters, at his end of the table, picked it up and amplified it without needing to know the contents of the reports resting under his right hand, bracketed by his claws.
It was all but impossible for one of the People to completely hide what he or she felt, but Senior Speaker Ankaht nearly managed. It was one of the things that irritated him. Well, we will just see her react once I let her and the rest of the rock-bound idiots know.
"Admiral," she said quietly. "I understand you have your reports for us?" (Polite inquiry. Tiredness.)
"Indeed, Elder." He fanned out the information wafers with his hand and handed them to the holodah'kri for him to take his and pass them down the table. People inserted them in the readers and the central display showed a diagram that the People had never seen before, a tree with miniature images of stars at each junction. "For everyone's perusal." He paused and uncharacteristically showed his grinders in a physical display that gave his selnarm far more force. "Admiral Narrok has seized another star system with more warp points leading on, though he is being blocked by the griarfeksh at one of them, others have been explored. The People now have access to six more stars." (Intense satisfaction.)
"Admiral Lankha on the other hand has seized and is holding seven star systems against very heavy resistance and hers is the holodah." (Personal regret.) Councilor Amunhershepeshef tapped one claw gently on the table to call attention to himself. (Concern.) "Admiral Lankha has also lost a great many trained souls to the Race."
Torhok restrained himself with effort. Obviously she had been working on undermining his efforts for the People. It didn't matter. Most of the Council believed in the Destoshaz way. We are now truly Star Wanderers, and Illudor's Glory will be our sokhata.
"I am, of course, pleased with my admirals." Torhok said quietly. "But I find that Lankha has more—shall I say—momentum. (Admiration.) Narrok is more cautious." (Mild distain.)
Amunhershepeshef merely repeated his mild claw-tap. "Yes. Yes. (Approval.) But we are not yet able to spread ourselves so thin, so fast. I repeat, 'trained souls.' It takes time to train someone, even in the Destoshaz." (Approval 5, Distain 10, Uncertainty 4.) Ankaht also tapped gently to call attention to herself. "Your reports, Admiral, also mention that there are few planets habitable to us, or with abundance of refined materials. We know we can build fast, but can we build fast enough?" (Mild inquiry.)
"Yes, Senior, we can. There are many who are working in orbit—also solving some of the problems you are having on the planet. There are numbers of people clamoring to get back into space." (Derision.)
"Have you been down to the planet surface, yet, Admiral?" She was still as the statue she sat next to, nothing in body or selnarm to give offense.
"No, Senior. I have not time for pleasure jaunts." (Suppressed anger.)
She looked away politely. "Of course, Admiral." (—.)
Torhok and other councilors registered confusion, but let her blankness pass uncommented on.
It was a G-type star that humans called Raiden and the habitable planet—Polixenes—was very dry, showing a tan and blue eye against the dark. The terminus on the planet's face showed habitation more, as a jeweler's display case of lights on black velvet followed it around the world.
No one in the vice admiral's briefing room was looking at the display screen on the wall that matched the planetary image. They were focused on the hologram over the briefing table that flickered into a the familiar shape of the warp tree. Everything "upstream" from Raiden to Bellerophon and from Andromeda to Bellerophon was an angry shade of enemy red.
The briefing room aboard the Gallipoli was silent, their faces still, as Captain Watanabe Yoshi drew a breath to continue. "We only have seven supermonitors left in fighting shape and we're hoping that we can get repairs on Temuchin done before the next week, if we have that long."
"So what you're telling us is that we've lost twenty-two percent of our forces," Krishmahnta said quietly.
"Yessir." Watanabe sat down as she turned to Kiiraathra'ostakjo's image to her left.
As she turned he spoke, the hissing rumble of Orion translated in the transmission. "Vice Admiral, the fighters Zteeffwiit'gahrnak and I have taken on, when Norfolk and Anne's Revenge were destroyed have settled in well enough. Fighter pilots seem to be alike across species." The black humor still managed to come through the machine.
"In other words," she continued, "they're all crazy—no offense to your race, Least Claw—"
"None taken." He nodded, smoothing one side of his whiskers.
"I'm glad to hear that they're integrating well enough." They didn't have enough CVs to have human- and Tabby-only ships any longer. In the slow, prying, one-finger-at-a-time battles for each star system, if a fighter's carrier was destroyed, any fighter berth space was welcome. One couldn't afford to be too fussy, even if cross-species lighting gave you a headache, the temperatures were all wrong, and the food didn't have the right trace elements. It was better than trying to breathe vacuum or get left behind because the aliens wouldn't pick you up. Though it wasn't the first time multispecies had been forced to share ships, more nightmarish echoes from the Bug War.
"Commander Mackintosh, your analysis on our current situation?" She leaned forward and sipped at her coffee cup, realizing even as she lifted it, that it was already down to the dregs, set it down with a click.
Samantha Mackintosh was silent for a moment, but then she seldom spoke up quickly—except in emergencies of course. "Not good, Admiral. We simply don't have enough firepower to defend the Arm. We're already spread thin as a meniscus and Admiral Yoshikuni is holding Andromeda by the skin of her teeth."
"Anyone want to comment on that?" Erica looked around the table and met their bleak looks and grimaces as they shook their heads slightly. It was all on her plate. Well.
She'd already thought about it and hoped that someone would give her the extra piece of information that would let her pull a rabbit out of the hat . . . though she couldn't imagine why she would want a rabbit in a hat to begin with.
"Ladies and gentlemen, we do have a problem and at this point only one solution I can see." She leaned forward and put her hands flat on the table. "We have to pull back and set our backs to a wall of some kind. If we fight each system back along the warp line we'll lose them and lose our people to no effect." The image of the warp tree glowed in front of her face glittering like an absurd firework. It was haunting her dreams.
"I would prefer to hold the Bellerophon–Hotspur line." She traced it up, her index finger glowing briefly as she drew it through each star image, skipping up the line—Andromeda, Charlotte, Demeter, Hera, Athena, on up to Hotspur.
"We couldn't hold anything south of Treadway," Commander Mackintosh said quietly. "We could be outflanked through Mangus–Zhi." She indicated with her pen.
Krishmahnta nodded back at her. "Yes, thank you, Sam. We have only a bad choice her, people. We're going to hold the westernmost arm if we can. We'll be falling back—for once, not under direct fire—to Suwa. I will be sending orders for Yoshikuni's task force to withdraw to Charlotte and hold there, to forestall a flank from BR-01 through Polo. If they cannot hold there she is to retreat further to Beaumont, where we will be guarding their backs."
She paused to let them take in what she was proposing, feeling the sourness in her gut. She'd be commanding Miharu to leave the population of Cetus, the habitable planet at Andromeda, to the invaders, as well as the two hundred million people here in Raiden System.
"We'd be abandoning three hundred million people." That was Lieutenant Wells, one of Samantha's aides. He'd gone white.
Krishmahnta nodded at him slowly. "In effect. But we cannot defend them. It would be suicide and that is not our duty." She took a deep breath. "We are going to regroup. We have to get over heavy space, people, consolidate our position and defend what we can. Single warp point access is what we can defend given the weight of metal the aliens have so far shown us they have."
All around the table people looked sick but were nodding as they took in the possibilities and Commander La Mar had shredded most of the flimsy pad absently between his fingers.
"Samantha." The analyst looked up from the tabletop. "You and your staff are going to be the busiest people onboard. Because I need the largest evacuation plan ever attempted."
Mackintosh brightened and looked daunted, both at once, and Lieutenant Wells had positively blanched, if he could go any paler. "All those merchants that came from Bellerophon is where I'll start, then," she said. "All that haven't tucked themselves into mouse holes, or just run down the lines."
"Ms. Dafey. I want you to start finding, and moving every kind of industry we have. I'm aware that the bulk of this arm is agrarian, but someone has to build and repair the heavy machinery. I want it all moved down to Tilghman. If the relief force hasn't arrived yet, it will be months before it does."
If the silence had been profound before, it was deadly now. Kiiraathra'ostakjo's booming growl startled everyone. "This is stuff for the so-called 'long haul,' Ahhdmiraaaal."
She turned slightly toward him. "Yes, Least Claw." A slight feedback trick had her words, translated, echoing back through the link. "We are cut off and we will hold this space." The sound from every throat around the table in response to her declaration was atavistic; not a cornered sound but one ready to carry the fight to the enemy. A sound that the Orions could appreciate. They had been beaten back and had lost friends and lovers while being forced to retreat. That had to stop.
Erica symbolically drew a finger across the table in front of her, for all the world like she was drawing a line in sand. "This far. No further."