Ivan Kal - Onslaught

“And you think that you can manipulate us like that?” Adrian asked.

“You have some impressive technologies, that is true, which is why we can’t allow you and Shara Daim to make peace. I would’ve wished to interrogate you, learn of what actually happened between you and Dai Sha Anessa. But you can’t be allowed to interfere with Erasi plans,” Hanaru said.

“We are not dead yet, and you should’ve learned a lesson from what happened in Sol with the Legions,” Adrian said, and closed the link.

The Erasi had more ships, but they didn’t know the capabilities of either the Empire’s battleships or his Sentinel ship. And the Sentinel class was bigger than a dreadnought, though it had less firepower, about the same as a battleship. It was designed with long-term operations away from the Empire in mind. Neither the Erasi nor the Shara Daim had seen the Empire’s true warships in action, which meant that his ships had a slight advantage.

Adrian looked at Va Dan Reisi. “You better get to your ship, Va Dan. If we can’t defeat them, we will cover your ship as you leave.”

Va Dan Reisi looked at him in surprise. “You would sacrifice yourselves to help us escape?”

“Well, I will be sending you records of this ambush; if we don’t make it, I want you to let my people know what really happened.”

The Va Dan looked at Adrian with a strange expression, then he inclined his head. “As you say, Lord Sentinel.” Then he left the command center.

Just as he left, the holo started flashing with missile launches. Adrian’s face settled into a cold expression as his body and mind fully settled into his ‘battle persona.’ The three ships were already connected in a point defense grid, and as the missiles entered range, the lasers from the three ships opened fire, taking them down.

“Set a course towards the hyperspace barrier, shortest route,” Adrian said. He glanced at the holo and the timer for the skim drives—forty-four minutes. They had dropped out of the skim eight minutes before; now they needed to survive for forty-four minutes until they could use the drives again and get away from the Erasi force.

The shortest route to the hyperspace barrier was below the sun’s plane on a course directly beneath his ships’ current position. He didn’t really need to get there; in fact, it would take too long. He only needed to make the Erasi think that he was rushing towards the hyperspace barrier. What he needed was to buy time for the skim drives to recharge.

The Erasi were in a concave wall formation, with the two battleships in the middle of the formation and the destroyers and cruisers surrounding them. All were firing missiles at Adrian’s ships.

“Order all ships to lock on missiles at the destroyers and cruisers,” Adrian ordered. He debated using the Watchtower, but it had been designed for large fleet battles; there wasn’t really much that he would gain by using it now. So he brought up the command-board interface instead.

“All ships have a lock, Lord Sentinel.”

“Start firing,” Adrian said, and almost instantly the three ships started firing missiles. Soon they had almost matched the number that the enemy’s larger force was putting out. The battleships were designed for that, for holding points in space and blasting anything that came near them.

The Erasi were gaining on them, their gravity drives apparently more powerful than his ships’ hybrid drives. They had already entered the outer range of his proton beams, but they hadn’t yet opened fire with them; either they were waiting for some reason, or theirs couldn’t reach as far.

A few missiles went past the point-defense and hit the battleship Inglorious’s shields. The shields flared, and Adrian checked the holo for information. The seven missiles striking in quick succession only dropped the shields of the Inglorious by six percent.

Adrian debated for a moment waiting and keeping the full capabilities of Empire’s ships a secret, but then decided against it; there was no point now. They might not survive otherwise. Adrian used the c-board to monitor the battle and make adjustments to his orders. Iris was busy using the Veritas to guide the missiles, increasing their effectiveness, and soon the Empire’s missiles started passing through the enemy defensive fire, impacting their cruisers and destroyers. Adrian highlighted the ships that were hit by his missiles.

“All ships lock proton beams on these cruisers and destroyers and open fire.”

Erasi battleship Highborn

Hanaru watched as the area between the two forces was filled with exploding missiles. The enemy’s ships had a surprisingly high rate of fire, high enough that they were putting up almost the same number of missiles as his taskforce was. But he knew that they couldn’t keep that up forever. Still, a couple of their missiles passed through to impact on the shields of his cruisers and destroyers. Their missiles were powerful, and the shields of the cruisers and destroyers too weak, dropping dangerously low from those few impacts.

Then dark blue beams of energy lashed out from the Empire’s ships, striking the ships that had low shields, blowing right through them and mauling Hanaru’s ships.

“What is that?”Hanaru asked with his mind.

“An energy weapon, Weaver. The computers have a ninety percent match on the weapon; it is similar to the Shara Daim main energy weapon, but theirs have never demonstrated this kind of range,”Hanaru’s subordinate answered.

“How long before we are in range of our main weapons?”Hanaru asked.

“One minute, Weaver.”

Hanaru settled in to watch as the Empire’s beams mauled his cruisers and destroyers. He couldn’t do anything about it, not now. In a span of the minute, he had lost one of his destroyers and one heavy cruiser. But then his ships entered the range of their own energy weapons, and Hanaru ordered all ships to open fire.

Veritas

Fire from seven different enemy ships struck the Veritas’s shields.

“Shields down to ninety-six percent and dropping.”

Adrian had feared that happening. His ships were formidable, but they were still only three ships against almost seven times that number. The Erasi would overwhelm his ships’ shields, it was only a matter of time. He glanced at the timer—another thirty-six minutes left. He looked at the shields of his battleships and saw them dropping faster than those of Veritas; already the Fortunate’s shields were at sixty-seven percent.

They weren’t going to make it, not all of them. Time slowed down for Adrian as he considered all the possibilities. He went through hundreds in a span of second, until he finally found one that could work. He opened a channel to the commanders of the two battleships.

Their holograms appeared in front of him.

“We are not going to make it, not all of us, and not while we are running away and can’t fire all of our weapons,” Adrian said matter-of-factly.

The two Ship Masters had grim looks, but Adrian saw understanding in their eyes. They were ship commanders for a reason, and they too knew that Adrian’s options were limited.

“What do you want us to do?” the Ship Master of the Fortunate asked, her eyes resolute.

“I need both of you to put all of your non-essential personnel on skim-capable shuttles and skim them away from battle to these coordinates,” Adrian said. It wouldn’t be enough people. He knew only a couple hundred people combined from both ships could fit, even if they were crammed in the shuttles. The battleships had crews of one thousand two hundred each.