Conventions of War (68 page)

“The Martinez Method it is.”

 

E
ngines fell silent. Ships made minor adjustments in their trajectories. Engines flared again.

Each squadron's deceleration was slightly different. Sula's deceleration was the heaviest, Martinez's the lightest, Michi's somewhere in the middle. Their courses began to diverge.

Communications and sensor techs fed the sensor data of all Chenforce into one vast, webbed system. The technology had existed for ages, but it was complex—the computers had to compensate for the amount of time it took the signal to arrive from each ship down to the merest fragment of a second, which meant that Chenforce's ships were continually bouncing ranging lasers off each other, and the data from these worked into the sensor feed calculations.

Chenforce didn't starburst yet, but Chandra Prasad assigned each squadron a starburst pattern based on Sula's formula. Each used a separate formula so the Naxids would have a harder time figuring out that the maneuvers weren't completely random; but each squadron knew the others' patterns, so the ships could continue to share sensor data.

“Engine flares!” Maitland's baritone voice rang in the close confines of Command. “Engine flares at Wormhole Three!”

Sula looked at the display and saw a whole constellation of stars flying into the system, plasma tails blazing. Probably the vast majority were decoys, but there were at least three real ships, giants like the converted transports.

Whatever they were, they were too late. Even though they were accelerating at crew-killing velocities, they'd still flash past Naxas a day after the battle.

If Chenforce won, they'd have the newcomers for dessert. If the Naxids won, the newcomers would be redundant.

Michi Chen, with her furious pursuit, had succeeded after all in wrecking the Naxids' schedule.

Chenforce raced on, Michi's heavy squadron now in the center flanked by the two light squadrons. The Naxids responded by deploying squadrons of their own. The nine giant auxiliaries were clumped on the far side of the warships, with the smaller ships as their screen.

The warships fired, a volley of over three hundred missiles. Sula checked the chronometer: 2314.

“Message from Flag, my lady,” said Ikuhara. “Return fire at will.”

“Right,” Sula said. “Let's make sure this is the
last
battle, shall we?”

C
ountermissiles lashed out. Antimatter fury raged in the space between the ships. More missiles were on the way.

Martinez looked at the display, the two light squadrons attached to Michi's heavies like a pair of wings, the Naxids in a formation that countered that of the loyalists. Everyone was in the same plane, just as they'd been at Magaria.

He messaged to Chandra. “Do we really want to limit ourselves to just two dimensions?”

There was no answer till the next salvos of missiles found each other, blossoming to create a screen, and then a series of orders came from Chandra. The two light squadrons were ordered to rotate about a common axis, with Michi's squadron joining them equidistant from the others. The squadrons were also ordered to starburst.

Martinez's acceleration cage creaked as it swung to the new heading. He could only imagine the alarm in the minds of the Naxids as they saw Chenforce swinging into its new configuration, the three squadrons rolling around one another as the individual ships darted and flashed in alignments that had never been prescribed by any tactical manual, the ships like chaff flying before a crazed typhoon aiming at their destruction. He wondered how the Naxids could possibly react.

Let's hope it's with panic,
he thought.

“Message from the flag,” Falana reported from the signals station. “All ships to volley in succession at fifteen-second intervals.”

That would put a lot of missiles into the pattern over a period of time, create a lot of plasma splashes, and help mask Michi's movements. The maneuvers might look all the more ominous if the Naxids only glimpsed them between roiling plasma spheres.

“Fire Pinnace One,” Martinez said. The little craft raced away, heading away from the mass of explosions between the opposing fleets. A set of sensors to peek around the corner of the antimatter curtain and see what was happening on the other side.

The Naxids took their time to respond to Michi's maneuver, and did so simply by matching it, one Naxid squadron planting itself in the path of each Chenforce element. The enemy were still in close formations, ideal close-packed targets for swarms of loyalist missiles.

Martinez felt a course change tug at his inner ear, and along with it a rising sense of optimism. The opposing forces hadn't yet truly engaged, but already Chenforce was in a much better position for this stage of the battle than Tork had been in Magaria.

“Missile flares, my lord!” Warrant Officer Second Class Gunderson, at the sensor station, spoke in a deliberate sonorous calm. “There seem to be…well, hundreds.”

The nine giant ships had finally fired, and the number of missiles blossoming into existence on the tactical display was truly phenomenal. Hundreds, many hundreds. Thousands, perhaps.

Martinez's nerves began to cry a warning.

This wasn't going to be easy as he'd thought.

“Fire Pinnace Two,” he said.

He had a feeling he was going to need more than one extra set of eyes.

 

L
ight Squadron 17 flew amid a riot of missile tracks as the weapons officers of each ship tried furiously to match the incoming missile barrage with countermissiles.

The first barrage from the converted transports had totaled around eighteen hundred missiles, which exceeded the average squadron salvo by a factor of something like fifteen. There were so many missiles that they were coming in from all angles, some flying direct, some swooping far out to drive in from the loyalists' flanks.

That first massive barrage had been followed by a second. Then a third.

Counterfire was complicated by the fact that Chenforce was now flying through the cooling remains of plasma bursts, which was beginning to fuzz sensor readings.

Squadron 17 had fired a pair of pinnaces well away from the squadron to provide a clearer view of events, but the two fragile little boats were beyond the range at which the squadron could protect them. If a group of the enemy missiles decided to target them, there was little Sula could do to prevent it.

“Message to Flag,” Sula said. “Query: press the enemy? End message.”

There was no point in staying in this shooting gallery any longer than necessary. The sooner Chenforce could buzzsaw its way through the Magaria survivors and destroy those huge missile platforms, the better.

“Message from Flag,” Ikuhara said a few moments later. “Engage more closely. End message.”

Sula gave the necessary orders, then copied to all other ships so the sensor net could be maintained. Ships swung on their axes. Gravities began to drag at Sula's heart.

“All ships,” she ordered, “fire full batteries in succession at fifteen-second intervals. Target nearest enemy.”

The sensor operators were working furiously with their counterparts in Auxiliary Command, and with the weapons station, to spot flights of incoming enemy missiles and take them under fire. Ahead was a vast irregular plasma wall, radio-opaque, toward which Chenforce was advancing and from which the Naxids were flying.

In the virtual display, she raced toward the plasma wall, gauging its shape and the areas where it was likely to fade and cool or brighten with new bursts of fire. She shifted the center of the squadron's movement toward areas where there were likely to be gaps, where she could see farther.

She sent her own offensive missiles plunging through the wall at denser points, to blind enemy sensors to their presence.

She wished she had a tactical officer to absorb some of the work. Commanding the squadron and
Confidence
both was a job worthy of two people.

Enemy missile bursts came closer. Point-defense lasers flickered out, seeking the missiles that wove and dodged to avoid their beams.

The converted transports unloaded another vast barrage. Sula began to taste desperation on the air.

She saw the enemy movement at the same time as Maitland's baritone rang out.

“Starburst, my lady! The enemy's starburst!”

The enemy force that had opposed Squadron 17 was flying apart, each ship trying to put as much distance between itself and the others as possible. Sula narrowed her eyes—uselessly, since her view was projected not on her retinas, but on her optical centers—and carefully studied their movement.

They were not moving within the free-seeming calculations of Ghost Tactics. The enemy were just dashing away from one another.

Relief sang in her bones. The enemy had seen Squadron 17 cut through Naxid formations at Second Magaria, but they either hadn't realized that its movements weren't random or hadn't had a chance to do a proper analysis. They'd concluded that battles were best fought from starburst formations.

Each enemy ship was now moving and fighting on its own. Squadron 17 was still a coherent entity that flew and fought as one.

She was going to pick off the enemy one by one.

Sula chose one of the enemy ships, reached into the virtual space with one gloved hand and stabbed it with a finger. It shifted from blue to white.

“Message to Squadron,” she said. “Copy to all ships. Center formation on target vessel, beginning at”—she checked the chronometer—“twenty-four forty-nine.”

Half a minute later
Confidence
swung to a new heading, its engines still blazing. Sula's acceleration couch swung on a short arc, then returned slowly to its deadpoint.

The hunt was on.

 

M
artinez watched the radiation counter as the point-defense lasers of Squadron 31 flashed a dozen attacking missiles into a brilliant random pattern of overlapping spheres, like a spatter trail flung by a careless brush.

Thus far, he thought, the squadron had been lucky. Despite the vast quantity of missiles thrown at them, the enemy had been kept at bay. The Martinez Method was keeping the ships of the squadron within supporting distance of each other, and the overlapping fields of defensive fire were walling off the enemy attack.

So far, anyway.

The missile batteries were firing as fast as they could be reloaded. The sensor and weapons techs who shared Auxiliary Command with him, crew who normally sat out combat unless their cohorts in Command were taken out of action, were fully occupied tracking enemy attacks and plotting responses. Forty percent of
Courage
's missiles had already been fired, mostly as countermissiles. If this expenditure continued, there could be dire consequences. Martinez found it ludicrous that he might find himself in a superior tactical position, about to administer the coup de grace to the last Naxid formation, and find himself with empty magazines.

Another flight of missiles soared in. Point-defense weapons flashed in answer. Another part of the starscape burned with plasma light. A few missiles, dodging and corkscrewing, survived, but were retargeted and destroyed within seconds.

Courage,
already burning for the enemy under heavy acceleration, gave a swerve to dodge any theoretical Naxid beam weapons. The movement felt like a fist in Martinez's side.

The converted transports huffed out another vast barrage, like overripe weeds hurling a cloud of pollen onto the breeze.

Surely, he thought, they couldn't keep this up. Surely they'd run out of missiles before long.

Surely
.

Anger flashed through him.

“Message to Squadron,” he told Falana. “Each ship to fire one battery at converted transports.
Vigilant
to order a pinnace to accompany.”

It was time the weaponers aboard those Naxid transports had something to do other than plot offensive action. And the pinnace would be in a position to direct further barrages.

Courage
gave another swerve. Martinez's teeth clacked together.

“First blood to us, my lord.” Gunderson's mellow baritone was filled with satisfaction.

Martinez looked at the display and saw a sphere of plasma where an enemy ship had once been. Sula's Squadron 17 had made their first kill.

The enemy's defenses were beginning to break down. All three warship squadrons had starburst, and their fields of defensive fire weren't nearly as efficient as those of Chenforce.

Martinez plotted a missile strike and ordered it launched. The missiles would dodge through a series of plasma bursts to strike the enemy from an unexpected direction. He didn't want Sula's squadron to get all the glory.

He looked at the tracks of his missiles looping around the enemy warships to target the converted transports. A colossal number of enemy missiles were coming in the other direction. He clenched his teeth.

Courage
ceased its acceleration, and Martinez's ligaments shrieked with relief as he floated in his webbing. His acceleration cage made a shimmering noise as the frigate reoriented, and then the engines flamed on again and he was punched into his couch.

Another of the random-seeming maneuvers dictated by Sula's chaos mathematics. The constant dodging and shifting probably looked deeply sinister to the Naxids, the application of some principle they hadn't been able to decipher.

The enemy were dodging as best they could, but without the relentless purposefulness dictated by Sula's formula. The only Naxids who hadn't starburst yet were the converted transports, which were still moving forward in their inexorable way.

Martinez began to wonder if they
could
dodge. The transports were so huge that they couldn't dart about like a frigate, they carried far too much inertia.

Which meant—theoretically—the transports were vulnerable to beam weapons.

The most formidable beam weapons in Chenforce were the antiproton cannons in Michi's heavy squadron. He couldn't command them, and they were already heavily committed in knocking down enemy missiles.

“Message to Flag,” he told Falana. “Transports are not maneuverable. Suggest hitting them with antiproton weapons. End message.”

The second kill went to Michi's heavy squadron, an enemy ship erupting in a furious burst of angry antimatter. Martinez clenched his teeth and plotted another complex missile attack.

Parts of his display fuzzed out as the squadron flew through an expanding cloud of cooling plasma. He couldn't tell where all the enemy missiles were. His heart boomed inside the confined space of his helmet, and his gloved hands dug into the padded armrests of the couch.

He launched his own missiles into the murk. He launched another barrage against the transports. He launched countermissiles against an enemy barrage that he could barely detect in all the fuzz. He launched countermissiles against a barrage he couldn't see but somehow knew was there.

The enveloping plasma cooled and thinned, and his tactical display glowed with the glorious sight of his own missile striking home.

He watched as three enemy ships were engulfed in silent flame. His heart shrieked with triumphant joy and he raised a clenched fist against the gravities that were pinning him to the couch.

“Three for us!”
he shouted.
“Three for us!”

Hardly immortal words, but at least they had the virtue of sincerity.

He'd just incinerated a neat thirty percent of the enemy squadron facing him, and that would make killing the rest a lot easier.

And he'd scored higher than Sula and Michi, who had only picked off one apiece.

Martinez plotted another series of strikes and sent them on their way.

Things were improving.

 

T
wo.
Squadron 17's missiles had found a second Naxid warship, now a bright, hot expanding sphere of plasma as its supplies of antimatter fuel and munitions went up.

Lovely, Sula thought. Another star.

She sought through the radio murk for another target. Orders flashed to missile batteries. Missiles leapt off the rails.

It wasn't enough to shoot missiles at an enemy, she thought. You had to shoot at the enemy's neighbors as well, so missile defenses couldn't combine to aid your real target. You had to keep every defense laser busy—
more
than busy. Overwhelmed.