‘Yeah,’ she mused. ‘About that . . . I’m not so sure being subtly manipulated by the Neána is necessarily the best option for anyone.’
‘It’s an option – which is more than most species get at the moment. Besides which, we’re talking about immediate tactics. The Olyix oneminds will have to decide how badly they want to keep the wormhole network. My guess is: pretty badly.’
‘Saints, I hope so. The more I’m reviewing our sensor data, the bigger their resources seem to be.’ She looked away from the tactical displays to see Kenelm’s tense expression.
‘They’ve been actively running this crusade for a couple of million years,’ sie said. ‘Even if they’ve plateaued or stagnated – whatever you want to call it – they’ve had all that time to prepare for an assault. Because they knew damn well that someone would eventually come here to challenge them.’
‘It doesn’t matter now. If we win, the galaxy will be free of them. If we lose, well . . . we won’t be around to care.’
‘You are such an odd fatalist.’
‘Yeah, I know.’
Yirella glanced back at the displays playing within the windows. The huge flotilla of Calmissiles that were racing out into the gateway system was now over a quarter of a million kilometres away and spreading wide. Forty per cent of them were heading straight in for the gateway, while the remainder were targeting the ring, fanning out so they would cover every industrial station. Sensors were showing her thousands of Olyix ships accelerating towards the invaders from across the system. The majority were on course to intercept the wormhole terminus, while the rest were outbound to confront the Calmissiles.
‘Multiplying,’ Immanueel announced.
Again, there were few visual clues, even from Ainsley’s sensor fronds, leaving Yirella to rely on the armada’s tactical network. The portals covering the Calmissile fuselages expanded out to half a kilometre in diameter. Hundreds of additional Calmissiles flew out of each one. It was like a firework starburst, but inverted, with lightsinks rather than dazzling flares. The newcomers also started accelerating away at a thousand gees. Five minutes later, they too expanded and released another batch of Calmissiles.
‘Half a million active portals effected,’ Immanueel said ten minutes later. ‘That should occupy their ships, if nothing else. We’ll have complete access to the entire system in twenty-four hours.’
Despite having tens of thousands of ships and thousands of industrial stations in the ring, the Olyix seemed uncertain where to direct their forces. As Yirella predicted, every ship within an AU of the gateway headed there to defend it, while the remainder were dispersed to deal with the proliferation of Calmissiles.
Approach speeds were a big factor. Resolution ships simply didn’t have the kind of acceleration that could catch the Calmissiles. They had to go for head-on interceptions, using entanglement suppression with supreme accuracy. The armada tactics were simple enough. If a Resolution ship was flying to intercept, the Calmissile would manoeuvre to strike it. While they were still ten thousand kilometres apart, the Calmissile fuselage portal would expand so that a battle cruiser next to the portal’s twin would open fire with graviton beams or ultra-powered X-ray lasers. If they missed, it didn’t matter; the Resolution ship would be travelling away from the gateway system at a velocity that would take too long to cancel before it could return to the ring or anywhere else it could be of use. The same went for a Calmissile that succumbed to suppression and broke apart from solar wind collision shock. It had diverted the Resolution ship from defending strategic assets, so it had achieved its goal.
Despite the scale of the armada forces, and the importance of reaching the gateway, Yirella kept focused on the seven thousand Calmissiles that were heading in for the star. It wasn’t an obvious manoeuvre; their course vectors should be interpreted as taking them to the ring on the far side of the star from the wormhole terminus. But they were critical to the assault plan. In total, it would take them three hours to reach the corona, by which time the Olyix might realize their true goal. But if it did take them that long, she knew, it would be too late.
Three major squadrons of mixed Resolution and Deliverance ships attacked the wormhole terminus as it sped across the system. Tactically, they faced the same problem as the ships trying to tackle the Calmissiles. Closing velocity gave them a single chance, and the armada could see them coming, plotting their trajectories with remarkable precision. Multiplying Calmissiles backed up by battle cruisers took care of two squadrons, while Ainsley’s phasefolded shield devastated the third.
Eighty-seven Resolution ships were orbiting the huge star, thirty million kilometres above its equator and the titanic black power ring that was spinning fast above the fringes of the corona, stirring up a necklace of gigantic prominences. As the seven-thousand-strong formation of Calmissiles streaked in, their target now obvious, the Olyix finally responded to the incursion. Every ship they had within fifty million kilometres accelerated towards the threat at their full ninety-gee acceleration. Even if the Calmissiles punched a thousand holes through the power band, it wouldn’t have had much effect on such a vast structure, but the Olyix clearly weren’t taking any chances.
‘Too little, too late,’ Yirella murmured in satisfaction.
The Resolution ships were good, and by now the Olyix were refining their techniques, clumping three Resolution ships together and triangulating the entanglement suppression effect. They started picking off the Calmissiles on the fringe of the formation, but the armada only needed one.
When it was fifteen million kilometres above the star, the Calmissile stopped accelerating. Its fuselage portal expanded, and Ainsley slipped out. He fired eight missiles with quantum-variant warheads at the power band.
‘Eight?’ Yirella queried.
‘We have to be very certain,’ Ainsley replied, then slipped back through the portal to resume his escort duty at the wormhole terminus.
The first two
