Sol Strike (Battlegroup Z Book 3) by Daniel Gibbs (red novels .txt) 📗

“Well, don’t keep it to yourself.”

“Their configuration. More point defense than we’re used to seeing. They’re optimized to attack fighters. If our Ghosts try to land, they’ll get cut apart.”

Somehow, I knew this wouldn’t be as easy as it sounded. Tehrani let a breath out. “We’ll have to do this the old-fashioned way, then. Navigation, belay previous orders. Intercept course…” She glanced at the plot. “Master Five. TAO, firing point procedures, forward neutron beams, Master Five.”

“I was afraid of that,” Wright muttered.

“Aye, aye, ma’am. Firing solution set,” Bryan replied.

Just in range. “Match bearings, shoot, forward neutron beams.”

Two beams of blue energy erupted from the Greengold’s bow. Moving at the speed of light, they immediately smacked the League frigate’s shields, which held under the strain as energy radiated in all directions amid a red glow. As the energy-weapons capacitor exhausted itself, the outgoing fire faded in power before blinking out.

“Conn, TAO. Master Five shields under twenty percent, ma’am.”

Tehrani did some mental arithmetic and didn’t like the answer. “It’ll take us too long to knock these frigates out. Asking our fighters to attack would be suicide. We need options.”

“The stealth raiders,” Wright said. “They should be close by or within jump range.”

Yes! “Good thinking,” Tehrani replied. “Communications, request fire support from any friendly stealth raider in range. Target Master Four and Five.”

“Aye, aye, ma’am.”

“Conn, TAO. Aspect change, inbound wormholes,” Bryan interjected, his voice rising in pitch slightly.

Instinctively, Tehrani knew it was more Leaguers and not the stealth raiders. She steeled herself for the report to come as she pondered how bad it would be. Allah, please, do not let me have led us to our doom.

“League signature confirmed—six Alexander-class battleships, designated Master Ten through Sixteen. Numerous heavy cruisers, destroyers, and frigates. Three frigates designated Master Six through Eight emerged within weapons range along with one destroyer, designated Master Nine.” Bryan turned around. “Target-rich environment, ma’am.”

“As you were, Lieutenant,” Tehrani replied. “How close are those capital ships to us?”

Bryan checked his board. “No more than ten minutes, ma’am. Maybe less.”

“The frigates that dropped in next to us, they’re the anti-fighter variant, Colonel,” Wright interjected.

Tehrani sucked in a breath and fought to clear her mind. Think, Banu. What’s the fastest way out? They had to disable the League frigates before the battleships and their respective escorts arrived. We’d last thirty seconds against that kind of force. Without help, they weren’t likely to pull it off. Regardless, she would try. “TAO, time to energy-weapon-capacitor recharge?”

“Ninety seconds, ma’am.”

“Bleed every milliwatt of power possible to the weapons.” Tehrani turned to Wright. “We might need to use your trick for overcharging the neutron beams again.”

“Single-use, ma’am. Remember?”

“I know.” She forced down the overwhelming fear that threatened to take over at any moment, as they were six thousand light-years from home, in the League’s home system, and surrounded by enough firepower to take out half the CDF. “TAO, firing point procedures, forward neutron beams, Master Five.”

“Firing solution set, ma’am,” Bryan replied.

She counted down mentally for a full charge. “Match bearings, shoot, forward neutron beams.”

While the words “give up” weren’t in Justin’s vocabulary, a few minutes prior, he would’ve admitted the situation was grim at best. Again in a position to make peace with death or worse—capture by the League—he’d adopted an almost Zen mental stance, working through each problem in turn. When the Zvika Greengold arrived, not only did he nearly jump out of his skin in joy, but it also changed everything. They had a chance to survive, and his job was to see to it that as many of his pilots as possible made it to the carrier.

“What’s the plan, sir?” Feldstein asked. “I don’t think we’ll make it through a landing evolution with the combat damage most of us have sustained with those point-defense frigates positioned around the Greengold.”

“Take out the frigates,” Green interjected. “If we had our Boars here, it wouldn’t be a problem.”

“When we make it home, you can do all the stupid sound effects you want, Lieutenant,” Justin replied. “That’s a promise. For now, the best I can come up with is a massed attack on the nearest frigate to the port docking bay. Then we go for a combat landing.”

“Those frigates will eat us alive.”

His fellow squadron commander’s observation was correct, but they had no other choice.

An unfamiliar voice broke into the comms channel. “Red Tails, this is CSV Astute actual. Our position is roughly a few hundred kilometers from your starboard quarter, with the Leviathan. Hold off on your attack, as we’re about to break stealth and engage.”

“Uh, wilco, Astute. Didn’t realize you guys were still out there.”

“We’ve maintained comms silence to preserve stealth, but now that your ride has arrived, it seemed like a good time to pitch in.”

A good time indeed. The hope that had sprung up in him after the Greengold’s arrival grew.

“Can you hear me, Spencer?” Martin asked.

“Go ahead, Lieutenant.”

“Even if they take out a couple of those League ships, we still have to take down two more to make sure the most heavily damaged fighters can land. I’m not leaving my mates again. You hear me?”

“We’ll do the best we can, Francis.” Justin used Martin’s first name for emphasis. “That’s all we can do, okay?”

“Yeah. We’ll see. Get my mates home. That’s all that matters.”

I wonder what’s up with him. Martin’s mood had shifted as the war went on, and he’d become less and less the outgoing, boisterous pilot and more of a reserved man wrestling with loss.

But Justin had no time for further rumination, as multiple new icons appeared on his HUD. Starbolt missiles erupted from two contacts marked as Terran Coalition stealth raiders. They raced away and separated toward two distinct targets: Master Six and Seven. League fighters were out of position to intercept, and with eight missiles per ship, the point-defense frigates couldn’t shoot everything down. Bright miniature suns blossomed against their shields, armor, and hull plating. One of the vessels simply ceased to exist, and