course.
Doomsday spared a quick glance at his tactical as half a dozen red blips closed in.
'She's closing, closing,' Paladin chanted softly, punching in a guidance command as the torpedo lost lock for a second, his guidance laser firmly tracking on the torpedoes tail. The fact that Kruger had half a dozen of the new ship-to-torpedo laser guiding systems in his munitions inventory had surprised Doomsday, who figured it was best simply not to ask how they got into Landreich hands.
'Closing, closing . . . impact, laddie, we got them!'
Doomsday punched in an aft visual and saw an expanding fireball of light erupting from the carrier's main engine bank. A second ball of light snapped as one of Doomsday's torpedoes slammed into the explosion. Four of the Landreich's old obsolete scimitars darted in towards the carrier's tail, disappearing into the inferno, two of them reemerging from the fireball seconds later and as they pulled out, a solid ripple of explosions shuddered across the carrier's stern from the missile spread they had launched, now that the aft shielding was overloaded and down. The entire aft end of the carrier suddenly disappeared in a white hot light.
Doomsday watched the Scimitars, amazed yet again at the suicidal tactics of the Landreich pilots, flying fighters that should have been on the scrap heap years ago.
'Fuel igniting, she's going!'
The explosion burst out, the blast wave washing over Doomsday's Sabre, shuddering it as if from a direct hit. He lost sight of the two surviving Scimitars, who were simply consumed in the ball of light, the enemy fighters pursuing them disappearing as well.
'Look out ahead!' Paladin shouted, and Doomsday looked up to see a frigate turning directly in front, her gun mounts shifting, tracking straight down on him, preparing to fire a full broadside at near point blank range.
'All weapons fire independently and at will,' Jason announced calmly, standing now and pacing behind his row of bridge personnel, who remained hunched over their tactical, communications, damage control, and fire system holo displays.
He looked up at the main holo battle screen, watching the converging line of blue and red dots. A blue dot, representing a light frigate winked out, followed an instant later by two red dots to either side, one of them a cruiser, the other a destroyer.
'Landreich frigate just detonated her reactor pile, crew has ejected,' the tactical officer announced calmly.
'These people are insane,' Jason whispered, realizing that even if the crew had ejected, a bridge team would have had to stay on board to time the detonation.
The explosion cut an opening straight through the middle of the Kilrathi defense line deploying aft of the three carriers. All of the strike fighters from the four escorts had already launched and were inside the picket line, engaging the carriers. A dozen fighters disappeared within seconds caught by the crossfire between the picket line and carriers, hundreds of blinking yellow dots marking the crisscrossing paths of missiles. Bright green snaps of light flared inside the holo display, detaching from half a dozen fighters.
'Torpedoes are launched and running,' tactical reported.
'All ships close and advance on carriers, follow me.'
Kruger's image appeared on the command screen only long enough to pass the order then disappeared. Helm, lock on Kruger's ship, follow her maneuver.
Kruger turned in, racing through the opening created by the Landreich frigate's sacrifice, and within seconds every battery on Tarawa was engaged, trading shots with Kilrathi frigates, and destroyers to either side.
Jason suddenly imagined that he could almost hear a bugler blowing charge, the way the Marines still did when their landing craft went in on an assault. as they raced straight towards the three carriers. It was madness; they were about to close and trade broadsides with capital ships at point blank range. The center carrier in the holo flared, exploding outward.
'Scratch one flattop!' tactical shouted, and Jason looked up at the visual, watching the explosion, then back down at the holo as two fighters, his own, emerged out of the fireball. A Kilrathi frigate turning towards Tarawa moved in front of the fighters, its guns turning to fire.
'All weapons, train on frigate, port side!' Jason shouted.
Turrets swung about, fire rippling out from Tarawa, the frigate swinging her guns back on Tarawa, ignoring the two fighters as they raced between the two ships.
A shuddering explosion ran through Tarawa, battle lights winking out for a second, a gust of acrid smoke filling the bridge, red lights coming back on again in the now shadowy gloom
'Main generator off line, emergency back up, shielding down to seventy one percent'
'Tarawa, close it up, hit the carrier to starboard.'
Kruger's image appeared for only a second and was gone again
The fleet flagship was out forward of the charge, a Kilrathi cruiser angling in, opening with a spread of missiles. Flare, chaff, and noise makers streamed out of the destroyer and the two ships traded fire. Behind the flagship the four escorts, moving in two lines of two, stormed through the maelstrom, while frigates, corvettes, destroyers, and fighters swirled about them.
Another shudder ran through Tarawa, damage control shouting out a report, red lights blinking on his screen. Jason could barely hear the officer as the explosions echoed through his ship, the concussion nearly bringing him to his knees. The Kilrathi cruiser shot past, unable to turn in tight enough to run parallel.
On the port side the still expanding wreckage of the blown carrier continued to swirl out and then was astern. Kruger arced his destroyer directly across the stern of the carrier they were pursuing, lashing out with a volley of torpedoes and missiles at near point blank range. Landreich corvettes raced past the escort carriers, closing in on the prey, two of them fireballing from the strikes of Kilrathi fighters, the survivors launching torpedoes, most of which were shaken off by the carrier but three impacting nevertheless. Four more of the corvettes disappeared.
'Her shieldings down!' tactical shouted.
Jason felt as if he were about to explode with excitement. The battle had lost all semblance of tactical maneuvering, the old standard of fleets launching fighters at long range, and capital ships rarely if ever coming within ten thousand clicks of each other, was gone in the mad confusion. He thought of Nelson at Trafalgar, charging into a broadside exchange with the French and Spanish, and felt that if Tolwyn were here the old man would be proud.
The Kilrathi carrier was less than fifteen hundred meters ahead.
'Fire on her, fire!
Simultaneously the four escort carriers opened fire, hundreds of mass driver rounds and neutron bolts, from the anti-aircraft batteries, now slamming into the stern of the enemy carrier. Explosions rippled, jagged fragments of metal hurtling off into space. Tarawa raced down the length of the carrier, stitching the side of the ship with everything she had, while Gallipoli turned to cross the T of the Kilrathi carrier astern. The Kilrathi, however, were firing with everything in return, and explosions rocked Tarawa. Jason felt as if the frenzy of battle had torn into the heart of his soul. He stood rigid, wanting to roar with both rage and delight. More than one of the bridge crew had broken discipline, pounding the sides of their monitors, screaming curses, oaths, encouragement, and whooping with joy at the destruction.
'Gallipoli's going!'
Jason looked up at the aft visual and saw his sister ship splitting open as if she had run straight into a buzz saw that was tearing the ship apart from stem to stern. The fuel cells astern ignited and the ship fireballed, her flame washing over the topside stern of the stricken enemy carrier.
They darted past the ship, turning to starboard while the Kilrathi carrier edged over to port and started to dive.
'Tactical report!'
'Enemy carrier suffered multiple hits, computer counting two hundred plus hullings, secondary explosions igniting, three of five engine pods destroyed.
'Damage control?'
'Sections one, three through five portside hulled, midships port mass driver gun mounts destroyed, main generator still off line, shielding down to forty-two percent, holding steady.'
