- CHAPTER 45 -
- Qo'noS, Planetary Governor's Palace -
"Get those BLOODY AAA batteries ONLINE DAMNIT!" Peter Issard screamed, his voice augmented by his power armor's external speakers. No one heard him but the Mobile Command Post's staff and its crew. The mobile Viking Phalanx AAA battery's crew were doing their best to set the lightly armored hover up in its new location, yet their best wasn't enough to satisfy the Commandant. The damn jamming was making nearly every com channel, both in subspace and old-fashioned radio, awash in white noise. That left only line of sight laser and even more old-fashioned vocal communication as about the only things left that still worked. Peter thanked God that the Academy still taught ground combat units to function without their modern communications. It was a good thing that the Klingons appeared to want prisoners from the Palace, lest they open up with their shipboard weaponry and fry the powerful yet not powerful enough theatre shield that spread out over the compound and into the forest beyond. He had seen the silver edged white orbs that slammed into the nearby planetary shield emitter installation. Though the weapon did very little damage in comparison to weaponry regularly employed in planetary assaults, it did generate a shock wave that would have thrown a light tank end over end. Hence the most likely reason why they weren't being used here was because they might kill those whom the Klingons wanted for hostages. Thank God for small miracles, at least he might live through this, even if it meant ending up in a POW camp. But anything was better than being incinerated by a starship phaser or disruptor blast. Heck even a torpedo would easily ruin his day if it landed near by. Though they weren't as powerful as current phasers or disruptors, they did have greater range and seeking capabilities the energy weapons didn't, meaning they had their place in combat. What was more, their launchers took up less space than your normal phaser emitter, so they could be shoehorned in areas where the more powerful phasers could not.
Finally the Phalanx battery settled its anchors into the soft ground. A split second later, a stream of 12 micro quantum torpedoes belched from the launch tube, engaging their impulse engines almost as soon as they left the launcher. Even as the stream broke to target individual B'rel's, K'Vort's, Shrike's and Drop Ships, they launcher was retracting its stabilizers from the earth and speeding towards another position. With its chameleon cammo engaged, it was nearly invisible. The reason behind the chameleon skin was to keep enemy sensors from locking on to the launcher. Standard cloaking stuck out like a sore thumb to tachyon based scanners, but with a little ECM to hide from sensors and the chameleon cammo to hide visually except from extremely close ranges, it made the battery a considerably harder target during combat. Moving after every volley also kept the enemy from backtracking the Phalanx battery's own fire and hitting it. Peter's power armors own chameleon cammo was inactive, seeing as how he was nestled in the safety of the Palace's Conquistador Mobile Command Post's own, more powerful, cammo and ECM. The MCP's sensors were his eyes as he followed the barely visible outline of the Viking. The MCP's sensors and computers knew where to look for it, yet even they had trouble keeping the fleet, stealthy battery in sensor contact. Seconds after the battery left its firing position, a flail of green bolts turned the ground there to a microcosm of hell. The ground melted to liquid under the assault and was subsequently thrown into the air by the disruptors' minute yet still present kinetic force.
But even as the multiple streams of disruptors slammed home, the fist sized blue/white orbs of Phalanx torpedoes swung towards their victims. A B'rel's shields flashed as a quartet slammed into its rear. It survived the first three, but the forth burst directly over its impulse drive. With its after end a glowing crater, the B'rel began a lazy unpowered spiral to the ground. An attacking Shrike was struck as well, it shields flaring out of existence followed closely by the frigate's own eye tearing funeral pyre. The bellow the explosion made in Qo'noS' atmosphere would be nearly deafening to unshielded ears nearby. Another explosion sounded to Peter's left, the total 3-D sound system of his armor making it sound exactly where it would have if he hadn't been wearing his suit. He caught the explosion on his 360 degree view of his HUD and spun around in time to center the view on the last few pieces of what had been a Klingon Drop Ship fall to earth.
A power-armored figure, noticed only because his suit whisker commed the CP for attention, came out of the bushes that marked the edge of the cleared zone around the Palace. Peter's HUD IDed him as a member of the Palace's Scout Platoon.
"Report!" Peter barked into his helmet pickup after switching to the appropriate laser com channel.
"We have about a companies worth of infantry and light tanks coming in from the west and north, they're about 12 minutes out. A brigade of APCs and heavy tanks are coming down the main road to south, they're about 30 minutes out." As the scout spoke, his computer automatically fed the total gathered info to Peter's suit computer. Only reason they aren't here now is thanks to the minefields I ordered emplaced holding them back, Peter thought. The subspace mine fields weren't much danger to low flying starships or even assault shuttles operating in atmosphere, but things like infantry, APCs and tanks were in danger to their small but concentrated warheads. That required that the fields had to be cleared, and that took time. It was a good thing he had ordered them set up, as the previous base Commandant had not bothered as much as he should have with security and had paid the price when a phaser beam burned him from existence.
The banshee like shriek of a PPC used in atmosphere nearly drowned out the scout's final words. What it was opening up on became visible through the clouds seconds later. Qo'noS' surviving fighters were retreating to a last ditch defense of dirtside installations.
"Finally some air cover!" Peter spoke like it was a prayer of thanksgiving. He spoke to the scout, issuing the young woman new orders. "Go out and keep a close eye on the incoming infantry and light tanks. If they start making better progress, either come find me or launch a com drone if you can do it without being seen." Though UAV drones were highly useful and stealthy, they could still be seen at greater ranges than a stealthed armor suit when operating, so one had to be careful using them near the enemy.
"Aye sir." Then the scout brought the power-armored gauntlet not holding his grav gun's grip to his helmet in a jaunty salute, then turned and made a fast, shallow but long, bound back into the woods.
Peter turned to watch the incoming fighters. There weren't very many of them, which is only to be expected. Fighters had no choice but to die when facing the full attention of a fleet of capital ships. They might be tough, but nothing so small could mount a powerful enough shield grid to stop a starship's phaser or torpedo. Their wild corkscrews and jinks kept them one step ahead of their pursuing B'rel's and Shrikes, with both Imperial fighters and enemy frigates maneuvering nearly to fast for his eyes to follow them.. Those few launchers that weren't 100% engaged in taking out nearby Drop Ships and Assault Shuttles sent PPC bolts and Phalanx torpedoes back at the fighter's tailing enemies. The enemies either broke off or were destroyed by the amber and blue/white death reaching for them. An enemy assault shuttle managed to draw a bead on the MCP before it died, and it salvoed its disruptors. Though not as powerful as those on a starship, they were capable of taking out most heavy tanks after a few shots. But the MCP's ECM threw off the now dead shuttles aim point, and they slammed into the dirt nearby, creating an angry crimson puddle of melted earth near the MCP. The Conquistador shuddered lightly as the ground transmitted the impact of the disruptor bolts into its skids. Peter considered activating the AG drive and relocating then thought better of it. The AG field in operation was considerably harder to hide than in standby mode as it was now. It had only been luck that had allowed the assault shuttle to get a sniff of them, so he chose to leave the MCP where it was.
"This is Commandant Peter Issard to the Imperial fighters over the Palace. We have some heavy tanks and APCs at coordinates 330 mark 47. Your orders are to terminate with extreme prejudice!"
"Aye sir! Engaging enemy at 330 mark 47!" There was a wolf like quality in the squadron commander's voice, for he now had a target he could kill. The loitering fighters swung virtually as one and receded from view rapidly as they boosted upwards of Mach 20 towards the small popping explosions of the shrinking minefield south of the Palace. Barely two seconds later, a series of thunderclaps, mingled sonic booms and explosions, assaulted the MCP's audio pickup. The armored floor beneath Peter's feet vibrated from the distant destruction. Both above and below the horizon, boils of light flared into harsh existence as the fighters and tanks engaged each other. A hand sized, stealthed UAV drone relayed the sad statistics from the assault. All of the remaining fighters that had clustered over the Palace were now gone. At least they had severely blunted the enemy's main thrust towards the Palace. It wouldn't change much, not when they had the resources in orbit the Klingons had, but at least he was making the bastards pay for what they were taking. He looked about him, using the MCP's enhanced sensors and IFF systems to pick out his troop's foxholes. They were arrayed in a text book perfect defensive perimeter around the armor walls of the Palace. There was plenty of open, level, mined terrain in front of them, a perfect killing field the enemy had to wade through before the end inevitably came.
Suddenly there was a flare and thunderclap to his left. The Phalanx battery he had been tracking as it scooted around the Palace's perimeter exploded harshly as its fusion reactor let go. It had just let loose its next and now final volley of torps. But what had killed it? Then he saw another Phalanx battery, this one a good 500 meters away from the sealed main gate and the MCP, loose its salvo. Although the launcher itself was scarcely discernable, its volley of 20 independently targeting micro torps was like a giant arrow pointing directly back at the Viking. There was an imperceptible fraction of a second between first glimpsing the pale orange trail of ionized air and the thunderous explosion of the Viking.
"Good Lord! Where in the HELL did these damn Klingons get their hands on HVMs?!?" Peter muttered over the sudden icy squeaks of terror produced by the MCP's staff and crew. Probably the same place that they got power armor, tanks, APCs and that orbiting fleet the back of his mind whispered. The Hyper Velocity Missile was little more than an impulse engine with an armored nose. While shuttles and light starships could go that speed in atmosphere, it generally chewed up the scenery and a slight miscalculation in navigation would cause very bad things to happen, like smashing into a hill or even a small tree at a significant portion of lightspeed. Though the contact with a tree wouldn't likely do much to say a frigate, a shuttle could be thrown slightly off course, and that could be enough to cause it to slam into the ground before it could regain stability. Fighting in atmosphere was generally limited to high mach in order to enable finer control in weapons delivery and targeting and to limit the chance of accidents. HVMs on the other hand didn't have to worry about things like that, for they were intent only on their kamikaze runs on their assigned target. In planetary distances, the HMV appeared to hit as soon as it was launched. They wouldn't do much to assault shuttles, and nothing at all to light starships, but they were deadly against light tanks and APCs. Heavy tanks could survive a few hits, but even they feared HVMs.
Someone in the foreword defensive positions was on the ball, because their Grav Gun answered the HMV crews. Within seconds, a withering barrage of AP projectiles was flaying the tree line. The miniscule seeker heads in the AP rounds locked on to the enemy power armor and perforated the double two man teams before they could relocate. Then it was the foreword defensive positions turn to be attacked. Unknown to everyone except the Grand Alliance and the Orion Cartel, the Orion's had taken the standard TE Grav Gun and modified it so that every race in the Grand Alliance had a version they could use. Where the Imperials had expected to easily trace back phaser and disruptor fire to their owners, all they saw were their comrade's dying from the virtually invisible AP rounds fired by the Klingon version of the Imperials own Grav Gun. Hundreds of Imperials died in spite of their armor's cammo, because the Klingon strike team had been hiding under stealth since the moment they began digging their positions.
"All units open fire, I want that bush leveled as far back as our weapons reach!" Peter said over the command channel. The light speed nature of the whisker com laser caused the entire defensive perimeter to open fire a split second after he finished. The trees ringing the cleared kill zone around the Palace writhed and were cut down by the sword like swath of AP rounds, PPC fire and Phalanx torps. Soon the forest for miles around the Palace was a tumbled, splintered, cratered and flaming ruin. Infantry slapped fresh mags' home in their Grav Guns then turned their attention back to searching for the Klingons.
- Qo'noS, Planetary Governor's Palace -
"Get those BLOODY AAA batteries ONLINE DAMNIT!" Peter Issard screamed, his voice augmented by his power armor's external speakers. No one heard him but the Mobile Command Post's staff and its crew. The mobile Viking Phalanx AAA battery's crew were doing their best to set the lightly armored hover up in its new location, yet their best wasn't enough to satisfy the Commandant. The damn jamming was making nearly every com channel, both in subspace and old-fashioned radio, awash in white noise. That left only line of sight laser and even more old-fashioned vocal communication as about the only things left that still worked. Peter thanked God that the Academy still taught ground combat units to function without their modern communications. It was a good thing that the Klingons appeared to want prisoners from the Palace, lest they open up with their shipboard weaponry and fry the powerful yet not powerful enough theatre shield that spread out over the compound and into the forest beyond. He had seen the silver edged white orbs that slammed into the nearby planetary shield emitter installation. Though the weapon did very little damage in comparison to weaponry regularly employed in planetary assaults, it did generate a shock wave that would have thrown a light tank end over end. Hence the most likely reason why they weren't being used here was because they might kill those whom the Klingons wanted for hostages. Thank God for small miracles, at least he might live through this, even if it meant ending up in a POW camp. But anything was better than being incinerated by a starship phaser or disruptor blast. Heck even a torpedo would easily ruin his day if it landed near by. Though they weren't as powerful as current phasers or disruptors, they did have greater range and seeking capabilities the energy weapons didn't, meaning they had their place in combat. What was more, their launchers took up less space than your normal phaser emitter, so they could be shoehorned in areas where the more powerful phasers could not.
Finally the Phalanx battery settled its anchors into the soft ground. A split second later, a stream of 12 micro quantum torpedoes belched from the launch tube, engaging their impulse engines almost as soon as they left the launcher. Even as the stream broke to target individual B'rel's, K'Vort's, Shrike's and Drop Ships, they launcher was retracting its stabilizers from the earth and speeding towards another position. With its chameleon cammo engaged, it was nearly invisible. The reason behind the chameleon skin was to keep enemy sensors from locking on to the launcher. Standard cloaking stuck out like a sore thumb to tachyon based scanners, but with a little ECM to hide from sensors and the chameleon cammo to hide visually except from extremely close ranges, it made the battery a considerably harder target during combat. Moving after every volley also kept the enemy from backtracking the Phalanx battery's own fire and hitting it. Peter's power armors own chameleon cammo was inactive, seeing as how he was nestled in the safety of the Palace's Conquistador Mobile Command Post's own, more powerful, cammo and ECM. The MCP's sensors were his eyes as he followed the barely visible outline of the Viking. The MCP's sensors and computers knew where to look for it, yet even they had trouble keeping the fleet, stealthy battery in sensor contact. Seconds after the battery left its firing position, a flail of green bolts turned the ground there to a microcosm of hell. The ground melted to liquid under the assault and was subsequently thrown into the air by the disruptors' minute yet still present kinetic force.
But even as the multiple streams of disruptors slammed home, the fist sized blue/white orbs of Phalanx torpedoes swung towards their victims. A B'rel's shields flashed as a quartet slammed into its rear. It survived the first three, but the forth burst directly over its impulse drive. With its after end a glowing crater, the B'rel began a lazy unpowered spiral to the ground. An attacking Shrike was struck as well, it shields flaring out of existence followed closely by the frigate's own eye tearing funeral pyre. The bellow the explosion made in Qo'noS' atmosphere would be nearly deafening to unshielded ears nearby. Another explosion sounded to Peter's left, the total 3-D sound system of his armor making it sound exactly where it would have if he hadn't been wearing his suit. He caught the explosion on his 360 degree view of his HUD and spun around in time to center the view on the last few pieces of what had been a Klingon Drop Ship fall to earth.
A power-armored figure, noticed only because his suit whisker commed the CP for attention, came out of the bushes that marked the edge of the cleared zone around the Palace. Peter's HUD IDed him as a member of the Palace's Scout Platoon.
"Report!" Peter barked into his helmet pickup after switching to the appropriate laser com channel.
"We have about a companies worth of infantry and light tanks coming in from the west and north, they're about 12 minutes out. A brigade of APCs and heavy tanks are coming down the main road to south, they're about 30 minutes out." As the scout spoke, his computer automatically fed the total gathered info to Peter's suit computer. Only reason they aren't here now is thanks to the minefields I ordered emplaced holding them back, Peter thought. The subspace mine fields weren't much danger to low flying starships or even assault shuttles operating in atmosphere, but things like infantry, APCs and tanks were in danger to their small but concentrated warheads. That required that the fields had to be cleared, and that took time. It was a good thing he had ordered them set up, as the previous base Commandant had not bothered as much as he should have with security and had paid the price when a phaser beam burned him from existence.
The banshee like shriek of a PPC used in atmosphere nearly drowned out the scout's final words. What it was opening up on became visible through the clouds seconds later. Qo'noS' surviving fighters were retreating to a last ditch defense of dirtside installations.
"Finally some air cover!" Peter spoke like it was a prayer of thanksgiving. He spoke to the scout, issuing the young woman new orders. "Go out and keep a close eye on the incoming infantry and light tanks. If they start making better progress, either come find me or launch a com drone if you can do it without being seen." Though UAV drones were highly useful and stealthy, they could still be seen at greater ranges than a stealthed armor suit when operating, so one had to be careful using them near the enemy.
"Aye sir." Then the scout brought the power-armored gauntlet not holding his grav gun's grip to his helmet in a jaunty salute, then turned and made a fast, shallow but long, bound back into the woods.
Peter turned to watch the incoming fighters. There weren't very many of them, which is only to be expected. Fighters had no choice but to die when facing the full attention of a fleet of capital ships. They might be tough, but nothing so small could mount a powerful enough shield grid to stop a starship's phaser or torpedo. Their wild corkscrews and jinks kept them one step ahead of their pursuing B'rel's and Shrikes, with both Imperial fighters and enemy frigates maneuvering nearly to fast for his eyes to follow them.. Those few launchers that weren't 100% engaged in taking out nearby Drop Ships and Assault Shuttles sent PPC bolts and Phalanx torpedoes back at the fighter's tailing enemies. The enemies either broke off or were destroyed by the amber and blue/white death reaching for them. An enemy assault shuttle managed to draw a bead on the MCP before it died, and it salvoed its disruptors. Though not as powerful as those on a starship, they were capable of taking out most heavy tanks after a few shots. But the MCP's ECM threw off the now dead shuttles aim point, and they slammed into the dirt nearby, creating an angry crimson puddle of melted earth near the MCP. The Conquistador shuddered lightly as the ground transmitted the impact of the disruptor bolts into its skids. Peter considered activating the AG drive and relocating then thought better of it. The AG field in operation was considerably harder to hide than in standby mode as it was now. It had only been luck that had allowed the assault shuttle to get a sniff of them, so he chose to leave the MCP where it was.
"This is Commandant Peter Issard to the Imperial fighters over the Palace. We have some heavy tanks and APCs at coordinates 330 mark 47. Your orders are to terminate with extreme prejudice!"
"Aye sir! Engaging enemy at 330 mark 47!" There was a wolf like quality in the squadron commander's voice, for he now had a target he could kill. The loitering fighters swung virtually as one and receded from view rapidly as they boosted upwards of Mach 20 towards the small popping explosions of the shrinking minefield south of the Palace. Barely two seconds later, a series of thunderclaps, mingled sonic booms and explosions, assaulted the MCP's audio pickup. The armored floor beneath Peter's feet vibrated from the distant destruction. Both above and below the horizon, boils of light flared into harsh existence as the fighters and tanks engaged each other. A hand sized, stealthed UAV drone relayed the sad statistics from the assault. All of the remaining fighters that had clustered over the Palace were now gone. At least they had severely blunted the enemy's main thrust towards the Palace. It wouldn't change much, not when they had the resources in orbit the Klingons had, but at least he was making the bastards pay for what they were taking. He looked about him, using the MCP's enhanced sensors and IFF systems to pick out his troop's foxholes. They were arrayed in a text book perfect defensive perimeter around the armor walls of the Palace. There was plenty of open, level, mined terrain in front of them, a perfect killing field the enemy had to wade through before the end inevitably came.
Suddenly there was a flare and thunderclap to his left. The Phalanx battery he had been tracking as it scooted around the Palace's perimeter exploded harshly as its fusion reactor let go. It had just let loose its next and now final volley of torps. But what had killed it? Then he saw another Phalanx battery, this one a good 500 meters away from the sealed main gate and the MCP, loose its salvo. Although the launcher itself was scarcely discernable, its volley of 20 independently targeting micro torps was like a giant arrow pointing directly back at the Viking. There was an imperceptible fraction of a second between first glimpsing the pale orange trail of ionized air and the thunderous explosion of the Viking.
"Good Lord! Where in the HELL did these damn Klingons get their hands on HVMs?!?" Peter muttered over the sudden icy squeaks of terror produced by the MCP's staff and crew. Probably the same place that they got power armor, tanks, APCs and that orbiting fleet the back of his mind whispered. The Hyper Velocity Missile was little more than an impulse engine with an armored nose. While shuttles and light starships could go that speed in atmosphere, it generally chewed up the scenery and a slight miscalculation in navigation would cause very bad things to happen, like smashing into a hill or even a small tree at a significant portion of lightspeed. Though the contact with a tree wouldn't likely do much to say a frigate, a shuttle could be thrown slightly off course, and that could be enough to cause it to slam into the ground before it could regain stability. Fighting in atmosphere was generally limited to high mach in order to enable finer control in weapons delivery and targeting and to limit the chance of accidents. HVMs on the other hand didn't have to worry about things like that, for they were intent only on their kamikaze runs on their assigned target. In planetary distances, the HMV appeared to hit as soon as it was launched. They wouldn't do much to assault shuttles, and nothing at all to light starships, but they were deadly against light tanks and APCs. Heavy tanks could survive a few hits, but even they feared HVMs.
Someone in the foreword defensive positions was on the ball, because their Grav Gun answered the HMV crews. Within seconds, a withering barrage of AP projectiles was flaying the tree line. The miniscule seeker heads in the AP rounds locked on to the enemy power armor and perforated the double two man teams before they could relocate. Then it was the foreword defensive positions turn to be attacked. Unknown to everyone except the Grand Alliance and the Orion Cartel, the Orion's had taken the standard TE Grav Gun and modified it so that every race in the Grand Alliance had a version they could use. Where the Imperials had expected to easily trace back phaser and disruptor fire to their owners, all they saw were their comrade's dying from the virtually invisible AP rounds fired by the Klingon version of the Imperials own Grav Gun. Hundreds of Imperials died in spite of their armor's cammo, because the Klingon strike team had been hiding under stealth since the moment they began digging their positions.
"All units open fire, I want that bush leveled as far back as our weapons reach!" Peter said over the command channel. The light speed nature of the whisker com laser caused the entire defensive perimeter to open fire a split second after he finished. The trees ringing the cleared kill zone around the Palace writhed and were cut down by the sword like swath of AP rounds, PPC fire and Phalanx torps. Soon the forest for miles around the Palace was a tumbled, splintered, cratered and flaming ruin. Infantry slapped fresh mags' home in their Grav Guns then turned their attention back to searching for the Klingons.