The Inception: The Augmented Human Rebellion - Book 1 (16 page)

The Augmented Human Navy emerges well outside of the Parin System.
Admiral Nemo expects to make a short FTL hop, in order to place the Fleet
exactly where he wants it to be, at the appropriate time. He is guessing
that there will be enough time, before the action starts, for the FTL drives to
cool.

And he is right. The Verm Navy Fleet has emerged and is preparing
to assault the Darinx Fleet, which is positioned inside the Parin System.
The Darinx Fleet is outnumbered by a factor of about 2 to 1. It will be
120 Verm warships against 58 Darinx warships. And both sides have some
behemoths. It is apparent that this system has been a ‘bone of
contention’ for some time. This battle will decide the future of the planet
Parin.

Admiral Nemo surveys the situation, understanding full well that if he
can see the Verm Navy, the Verm Navy can also see him. The Darinx Navy
can see everyone, as well.

But the AH Fleet is an unknown quantity to both of the other
fleets. The AH Navy has 28 warships and 3 freighters, and the other
fleets don’t know which side the AH Navy Fleet is on. The Darinx admirals
are, no doubt, looking at the fleet, which includes Verm warships and a mixture
of other ship types, and are concluding that the ‘unknown fleet’ is probably
Verm Navy.

The Verm Navy Fleet Admiral, no doubt, sees the Verm warships – and
especially the dreadnaught battleship - and concludes that the unknown fleet is
the AH Navy, which has been such a ‘pain in the butt’, to them. But whose
side are they on? They deserted from the Darinx Navy – will they now
fight for them? Perhaps they are here, like vultures, for some ‘easy
pickings’ as the damaged or destroyed ships fall out of formation.

At any rate, the battle will be joined. The presence of the unknown
fleet just means that everyone will need to ‘watch their backs’ - even more
than usual.

The Darinx Fleet is arrayed in front of the Parin space station, and the
Verm Navy Fleet is cautiously advancing, from the edge of the system.

The AH Navy Fleet also advances - from the side - and begins to slide in
back of the Verm Navy Fleet. The Verm Navy Fleet Admiral probably sees
this as a sign that the unknown fleet will attack the Verm Navy, from the rear
when the battle is enjoined. That forces the Verm Fleet Admiral to assign
1/3
^rd
of his warships to guard the rear.

Using 1/3
^rd
of the Verm Fleet, to guard the rear, effectively
reduces the size of the Verm Fleet attacking the Darinx Fleet from 120 to 80 –
a much more manageable number. The Darinx Fleet Admiral is probably
breathing a sigh of relief – his 58 vessel fleet at least has a chance.

There are comm messages coming to the AH Navy, from both fleets.
Admiral Nemo ignores them for the moment. A little mystery will give his
Fleet an advantage.

The Verm Fleet Admiral intends to force a move from the AH Navy. He
orders the 40 rear guard vessels to advance against the AH Navy Fleet.

“That’s a good decision,” thinks Admiral Nemo. “Forcing us away from
the battlespace will mean that the Fleet Admiral doesn’t have to worry about
us, while he is battling the Darinx Fleet. The Verm Navy sent one of
their better admirals to this battle.” Aloud he says:

“All AH Navy warships, Nemo here. Reverse course and maintain the
current distance, from the Verm warships.”

“Drawing 1/3
^rd
of the Verm fleet away from the battle will be
the best use of the AH Navy fleet, at this moment,” thinks Admiral Nemo.

And that is the way the battle plays out, in the beginning stages.
1/3
^rd
of the Verm Fleet is chasing after the AH Navy vessels, while
the other 80 Verm warships attack the 58 Darinx Navy warships. If you
include the considerable firepower of the space station’s defensive arrays, it
brings the Darinx force about even, to the Verm attackers.

The Darinx Fleet Admiral orders a missile and rail gun assault against
the Verm ships. “Good choice,” thinks Admiral Nemo. “That space
station is probably loaded with lots of missiles, and probably has lots of
anti-missile protection.”

The Verm Fleet responds with missile and rail gun barrages, of their
own. Both fleets take losses, but the Verm lose more than the Darinx.

The Verm vessels, chasing after the AH Navy, also decide to attack with
missiles and rail gun projectiles. Admiral Nemo sees the projectile
barrage and says:

“All ships. Nemo here. On my mark, launch 10 missiles and
fire rail guns continuously for 20 seconds, at ships selected by Danion.
Following the launch of projectiles, all ships form up in ‘tip of the spear’
formations.” After Danion signals that target selection has been
completed, the Admiral says: “All ships ……
Fire
.”

One of the weaknesses of the AH Navy is in the disparity of weapon and
defensive systems – especially projectile defensive systems. The vessels,
which were captured from the Verm Navy, have the best missile and projectile
defense systems. The other ships defensive systems rank from ‘OK’ to ‘not
OK’.

In order to compensate for that weakness, Admiral Nemo has implemented a
‘tip of the spear’ formation. The ‘tip of the spear’ formation puts the
ship with the best projectile defense system, at the point and every other ship
in the group, lines up directly behind the point ship.

That does a number of things:

o
The rail gun projectiles
are not guided, and will miss their targets, because the ships have moved out
of the way.

o
For another thing,
the guided missiles will all be aiming at the point ship. The ‘bunching
up’ of the missiles, as they approach the point vessel, will cause some enemy
missiles to re-acquire targets, and then to destroy other verm
missiles. The debris from those explosions will elicit the
destruction of even more missiles.

o
For a third thing,
missiles which are not destroyed by other friendly missiles will be confronted
by a debris field; and then by anti-missile missiles; and lastly by energy
weapons.

o
And finally, if the
point ship is destroyed by missile strikes, the debris field created by
the explosion of the point ship, often eliminates any following missiles.

There are 5 verm-made warships in the AH Navy, including the Admiral’s
ship. Those ships are at ‘point’, with 4 or 5 ships lined up behind each
of them. The Admiral has put a lot of emphasis on this weakness, and has
made improvements to the anti-missile systems aboard the verm vessels - by
adding more debris, and by modifying the anti-missile missile
system. He is hopeful that the ‘point’ ships will survive the
attack, never the less he holds his breath along with everyone else.

At the end of the missile attack everyone is alive, and all breathe a
sigh of relief, say a prayer, and then get back to work.

The Verm Navy ships are not so fortunate. 28 of them had been
targeted, and 5 have been destroyed, or disabled to the point where they have
fallen out of formation.

Admiral Nemo decides that he wants to close the gap between the Verm Navy
vessels and the AH Navy vessels, for two reasons:

1. Energy weapons are the AH Navy’s strength.

2. The threat of missile or rail gun fire will be diminished, because those
weapons are largely ineffective, at close range.

He says: “All ships, Nemo here. Resume ‘Spread’ formation, on my
mark. ……………..
Engage
.” And then: “All ships, full flank
charge, on my mark. Stay in your group and engage the enemy with energy
weapons. Gang attack, and target the Engineering sections. …………
Engage
.”

And they are
off
! At last, a chance to get in close and
attempt to gut the enemy. This is not just a random selection of
targets. It is more like a choreographed dance, with two or more AH Navy
vessels targeting a selected Verm Navy vessel. The AH Navy vessels all
target the Engineering section, while energy weapons fire from the Verm Navy
vessels is unfocused.

As the AH Navy vessels are targeting the Engineering section on a
selected Verm target, each AH Navy ship is rotating so that the heat from the
enemy’s energy weapons is spread over the whole hull - making it much less
likely that the shields will fail. Targeting specific points on selected
enemy vessels, while the ship is rotating, is only possible because the
Artificial Intelligences
(Danion’s
offspring)
are at the controls. Danion is a proud parent today.

The Admiral has the Conqueror in close and is chasing the largest Verm
vessel. It’s a good bet that the group’s commander is on board that
vessel. The ship is a battleship, similar to the Conqueror, and Admiral
Nemo is thinking about how nice it would be to have a matching set of
battleships. “Aim for the Command Bridge, Danion,” he says. “Sever
the head of the beast.”

The two behemoths move away from the rest of the battle and ‘slug it out’
mano-a-mano. Once again, the biggest difference between the two attackers
is their tactical approach. The Conqueror is targeting a single point,
and is pouring all of its energy into that one spot, while the response of the
Verm vessel is uncoordinated, with individual gunners deciding where to aim.

The shields on the Verm vessel break down at the Command Bridge location
and then there is fire, visible through a hull breach. “Danion, target
the Engineering section, but not enough to destroy the FTL drive,” says the
Admiral.

‘Aye sir,” responds Danion. “I’ll try for fire and smoke, but no
permanent damage.”

“Good plan,” replies the Admiral.

***

As Danion tries to surgically disable the Verm battleship,
Admiral Nemo studies the battlespace. There are a few disabled AH Navy
vessel and at least one has been destroyed, but the enemy has taken bigger
losses. The AH Navy now has a numerical advantage, which will allow for
more gang attacking. This part of the battle is under control.

The Admiral moves his attention to the battle, between the Darinx Fleet
and the larger part of the Verm Navy Fleet. The Verm Navy is winning that
part of the battle and is applying pressure to the space station, and to the
big ships of the Darinx Fleet. There are two fires on the space station,
and both Darinx battleships have hull breaches.

Admiral Nemo calls for the Intrepid, and the two vessels head for the space
station and the Verm Fleet Admiral’s ship. “Conqueror will take the big
one, Intrepid,” says the Admiral. “You keep the others off of our back.”

“Aye sir.”

The two vessels charge in, firing energy weapons as they approach.
The Fleet Admiral’s ship is even larger than the Conqueror, and bristles with
energy weapons. It turns to face the Conqueror, and begins pouring
massive barrages of laser and plasma canon fire, at the ship.

Danion starts the Conqueror rotating and spinning, in order to spread the
energy, and at the same time is targeting the Command Deck, on the larger
vessel. He probably thinks that the Admiral will want to capture this
ship, also. But at the moment, Admiral Nemo is much too concerned about
staying alive to think about expanding the fleet.

Danion is ultimately successful in his attack, and soon the Verm Fleet
Admiral’s Command Bridge is on fire. The Intrepid has teamed up with some
Darinx vessels, to surround the other two large Verm vessels. The tide of
battle is again turning in the human’s favor.

Now that the imminent threat of death is over, the Admiral does start to
think about how nice it would be to have the Fleet Admiral’s vessel.
“Danion,” he says. “Can you ‘herd’ it out, toward the edge of the
system?”

“I’m trying, sir. But ‘it’s like herding cats’ – whatever that
means”

***

Cleaning Up

The battle eventually slows down and ultimately stops, as the last of the
surviving Verm Navy vessels, make it to the edge of the battle, and disappear
into FTL space.

The Fleet Admiral from the Darinx Fleet comms Admiral Nemo, and this time
he answers. “Admiral Nemo here.”

“Admiral Nemo, first let me say ‘Thank You’, from the planet Parin and
from all of the Darinx Navy. We couldn’t have done it without you.

Now, if we may, I would like to switch to a more secure channel.
Please contact me at the frequency in the text message that you have just
received. Fleet Admiral Kingsley, out.”

Admiral Nemo comms Admiral Kingsley on the secure comm line and Admiral
Kingsley answers, in ‘private mode’. “Thank you again, for your excellent
service, Admiral. The Augmented Human Navy is living up to the
spectacular claims of the rumor mill. You are building yourselves an
excellent reputation. But as I am sure you know, that won’t help you in
the eyes of the Darinx Empire.

First, let me inform you that reinforcements will arrive here in three
days, and that there is a warrant for your arrest or death. In between
now and then, I will be much too busy to come after you. And if there is
anything that I can do to help you, without appearing to ‘aid and abet’, let me
know. Some of my engineers could accidentally get lost, and could wind
up, on your ships, if necessary.”

“Thank you Admiral Kingsley. That is a most gracious offer and I
will take you up, on it. Another thing that I would like to have is
permission for my shuttles to carry my extrucian crewmembers down to their
planet, to visit their families. And there may be some extra extrucians
on the trips back up. I am going to need some more crewmembers, if I can
get these two big ships repaired in time.

“I will ‘turn a blind eye’ to it,” replies Admiral Kingsley. “You
have my number.”

“Oh,” adds Admiral Nemo. “Can I dump all of our POW’s onto
you? They are more than I can handle.”