Author's notes:
- Thanks for Zurvan in helping find a name for the Shai Alyt and Alyt of the Drala'Fi.
- Special thanks for Susan Hilton for not only betaing this huge chapter, but for doing it very fast.
- Thanks for everyone who continues reading this story, even with the speed of my updates.
- I added a map on the facebook page for you to see where things are happening. I did that three times, and for some reason its not working properly. Last night, I checked it, and it wasn't there. Let's hope its just a bug from facebook that will soon be corrected. If you don't see it there. It's not my fault. (I'm just praying its a bug and not a hacker.) I know there a nicer maps out there, but I found that one to fit perfectly with Lord of Misrule's 'The Dilgar War' beacon lines, and since this is intended as a continuation of that story, I'll be using that map until I create my own.
Chapter Seven
Hyperspace – Near Earth Alliance's border
New London Beacon Cluster – Heading towards Quadrant 15
EAS Pythia – Oracle class cruiser
November 20, 2245
During the last month, EFNI had been assigned with a total of 139 jump capable ships. 60 Oracles, all of that type remaining, and 79 Sagittarius of 126 remaining. The EAS Pythia was one of the first ships assigned to the new Rangers. The vessel was still manned by most of its original crew since only a low percentage of Rangers were fully qualified for their new task. Their training was being done fast, but the mission could not wait, so the first detachment departed with Earth Force naval crews still operating the vessels.
In the case of the EAS Pythia, Captain Jeff Easum had been transferred to command one of the new Nova IIIs coming out of the production lines. His former XO, Commander Erin Cunning had been promoted to Captain and given command of the old Oracle class vessel. She had also asked for a permanent transfer into the EFNI Rangers.
Her ship was part of a detachment of eight vessels tasked with beaconing the route to Minbari space. One of her escorts was the EAS Didyma, the only ship left from the original Pythia detachment that saw the start of the Minbari War. The rest had been the none-jump capable Olympus and Artemis that had either been destroyed in the last battle or were still assigned to Earth Fleets in the Vega Cluster. The new six additions to the detachment were also of the Oracle class. This class of ships had not enough firepower to engage Mimbari vessels, but the detachment was not reinforced with Sagittarius as their mission did not require it.
The beaconing operation they were undertaking required a different vector of approach, as the direct line between the Vega cluster and the Minbari system where all of their communications originated from, had a strong Minbari presence. The risk of losing ships on approach to Minbari space was almost guaranteed. That line was in the process of being interdicted by Earth Force ships, but the new line to be created by EFNI was to be used as a means of entering Minbari space with the least amounts of casualties as possible, and to allow a big number of ships to reach and operate inside enemy controlled space with impunity.
The new route selected was through an area of space currently unexplored. It required ships to move from the other side of Earth Alliance space in relation to Minbari space. The closest Human colony on that area was New London. The detachment had to head towards Centauri space crossing through quadrant 15 were they would have to deploy several beacons to open a doorway through that area. They will then link their sensors to the Centauri beacon of Gorash, and then skim through the beacons of Cargan, Beta 2 and Batain, also in Centauri space. It was then that the detachment will be heading directly to the Minbari colony of Sh'Lekk'Tha; a designation acquired from Centauri sources.
The operation was politically risky. If the Minbari saw human ships approaching from a Centauri vector, it could either trigger a conflict between those two powers, or it could backfire and make the Centauri move against the Earth Alliance with the excuse that humanity tried to frame them by looking like to the Minbari that they were helping the EA. Risking Centauri intervention, even if it was done only to close their borders by blocking this new corridor was not an option for EFNI, so while they'd be skimming Centauri beacons, they would do the final approach from a vector that didn't conflict with Centauri space. They were also going to be increasing the width of that corridor by adding redundant beacons all along it, so that even if the Centauri moved forces to close their borders, the EA could still operated through an intermittent networks of beacons that were only going to be activated by the ships making the crossing.
Beacon redundancy was also considered, as the Minbari could detect a beacon and jump to destroy it, effectively stranding ships making the approach, or breaking the beacon line into their space. The solution was to install dozens of them and to operate them intermittently, making human ships rely on many of them than in just a few.
The Pythia detachment had already crossed inside quadrant 15. They were still in sensor range of the New London Beacon Cluster, but they had already deployed several beacons. Some were latched to stable gravitational Lagrange points inside several solar systems, while others were just simply dropped in interstellar space. Those last beacons were certainly not going to be able to function for triangulation purposes, because their drift would slowly make them ineffective in that regard, but they were still relatively fixed to the huge size of normal space to provide a safe passage through hyperspace, and that's what EFNI needed.
Accompanying the detachment were two tankers providing the fuel required to go all the way to the Minbari border and back. These Oracles were not equipped with fuel harvesting shuttles, and were not going to operate behind enemy lines, so the tankers were there to re-supply them for their trip home.
"Captain, we are about to lose beacon contact with the New London beacon cluster. Beacon intensity is at 3.22 percent of optimal." announced the navigational officer.
"Activate one of the newly deployed beacons. How much time until we are able to pick Gorash's beacon emissions?" asked Captain Cunning.
"If our course is correct, then in approximately four more days, Ma'am."
"Then activate two beacons, and fix our course to them. Let's not get lost out here. This mission is very important. There are several detachments that will be following us very soon, and which are heading for operations inside Minbari space, so let's give them a safe approach."
"Yes, Ma'am."
Vega star system – Earth Alliance
Orion class space station "Vega" - ex-10th Fleet Headquarters
Geostationary orbit above Vega IIA outpost complex
Orbital Command and Control
November 24, 2245
"That's another one, Vice Admiral." The sensor officer pointed out. "They are getting closer, Sir. I really can't say if they are at engagement range, but I believe the Hyach would be."
"Range?" asked Vice Admiral Roger Blight. He had been the commander of 10th Fleet's 39th Battle Group, but with the losses sustained during the last battle, and older ships being assigned to the EFNI Rangers, the 10th and 11th Fleets had ceased to exist. Surviving ships were either reassigned to the 9th Fleet under Admiral von Koester, or were now in EFNI control. He had found himself without a Battle Group to command. Admiral Ferguson had personally requested him to take command of the Vega colony's defenses as Admiral Boyarskaya loss placed him as the most experienced officer in the cluster after von Koester who was still in command of the 9th Fleet.
"2.43 Giga meters." replied the sensor officer calmly.
"Are our defense satellites linked with the outer sensors?"
"Yes, Vice Admiral. But the closest sensor is still more than 1 Giga meter away from the Minbari ship's position. We'll still have some emissions lag of almost 4 light seconds. But the target is moving on a fixed heading and speed."
"Then please tell them that they are not welcome, and use twice the satellites that the battle parameters specify for engagement. Let's not bet if they have the range to engage us. I don't want to lose a single sat to them. Let's keep our grid strong."
"Yes, Sir."
Space around the Orion class space station "Vega" had been heavily reinforced with mark II Global Orbital Defense Satellites, commonly referred as GODS II. A total of 72, half of the newly build ones since the beginning of the conflict, and which were supposed to be joining the defenses of Earth, had been transferred instead to Vega. The numbers deployed at Earth were close to 1,600 not counting the GODS I, so while the defense grid at the human homeworld was still being reinforced, half of the newly built satellites were now helping the Vega colony to stand a chance against a Minbari invasion.
The engagement range of more than 8 light seconds made it extremely difficult for the weapons to precisely calculate the engagement zone, but the hundreds of sensor satellites deployed beyond the orbits helped with target acquisition as the tachyon communications used to transmit that information effectively reduce the standard emissions lag of passive sensors. If one were to count the emission travel lag, then, the engagement range in this case would have required 16 seconds, but had been reduced to 11 thanks to the outer sensors.
The Minbari Tinashi scanning the orbits of Vega II for any possible human ambush was unaware of the pack of angry gorillas setting their sights on it from Vega IIA. Eight flashes of light barely reached the Tinashi from that moon, when they were closely followed by eight bright orange beams, each covering a possible heading vector. One struck the Tinashi piercing it from bow to stern on the port side. It missed the Quantum Gravimetric reactor, but the strength of the impact had been so strong that its crew had been literally bounced around.
It had taken the sensor satellites a little more than four seconds to confirm that the Minbari ship had not been destroyed, and then a little more than eight seconds for another set of eight beams to reach it again. Its crew had not even been given the chance of picking themselves from the floor, when this time, one of the bright orange beams pierced it again striking the reactor with the obvious consequence to that. The ship blew up in component parts.
For the next twelve days, the battle intensified in small engagements of guerrilla styled warfare.
The Minbari tried to keep scouting the second planet from even longer ranges. In one, the Earth Alliance used three missiles equipped with the EMS/STL (Electromagnetic Spectrum / Search, Track, and Lock) sensor upgrade. They reached a distance of 2 light seconds from the target, and the GODS II were again able to engage the Minbari ship at almost 3.1 Giga meters away.
A third attempt by the Minbari had been performed at 5.7 Giga meters. Vice Admiral Blight had dispatched several patrolling Starfuries to provide sensor readout at Tachyon speeds. But even with this benefit, the battle management system had requested a total of 41 satellites to engage the Minbari target at 19 light seconds away, and to do so in a slashing pattern to provide a greater area of coverage for each beam. The Vice Admiral used every one, and of the 72 beams, dozens struck with a less damaging slashing attack, but still with enough cumulative strength to destroy the third Tinashi.
From then on, the Minbari learned to avoid the extreme engagement range of the human colony's defense grid. After that, they used Nials to try and determine if this was indeed a human colony, or another attempt at an ambush, but no other Minbari ship was destroyed by the GODS II during those twelve days of guerrilla warfare.
The real battles that ensued were performed by the ships of the 9th and 8th Fleets. The last one was now freed by the 6th Fleet to allow its deployment in the Vega Cluster. With the older Novas having been upgraded with the EMS/STL sensor system, and with a stronger defense grid in the form of additional interceptors. Earth Force had decided that it was no longer necessary to escort those ships with Hyperions and had concentrated them in the 5th and 6th fleets. That forced the same for the Hyperions, and now the 8th Fleet was composed of 512 of them, while the 9th Fleet had 23 Hyperions, 59 Avengers, 47 Sagittarius, 164 Artemis, and 146 Olympus. With 439 ships it was no longer at full strength, but the two fleets at 951 ships made it a strong opposition for the Minbari with the tactics that were being employed.
EAS Akagi – Avenger class carrier
Flagship 9th Fleet
November 24, 2245
A few seconds after the first Vega IIA defense grid engagement.
"At what range?"
"More than 2.4 Giga meters away, Admiral." stated Lieutenant Commander Agnar Kofoed, the EFNI specialist.
"Damn! Vice Admiral Blight is looking for a promotion. I can't wait to get my hands into a Nova III. If we can engage them at those ranges, this war will get far easier for us and far more difficult for them." added Admiral Otto von Koester.
"Yes, sir. Many Nova IIs are already being upgraded to Nova III standards. We'll soon have enough ships equipped with long range engagement capability to really complicate matters for the Minbari." replied Agnar with a smirk.
"But in the meantime we'll have to do with these crappy designs." added Otto pessimistically. "Now... tell me... Where else do they have a presence?"
Agnar guided his speech with the use of the holographic display, showing the admiral the exact position of the Minbari units. "There are four more Minbari destroyers. Two are entering sensor satellite range. One at Vega I, and another at Vega III. The other two ships' sensor emissions are barely detected by the sensors installed at Vega IV and V."
"What about VI and VII?" asked the Admiral.
The Vega system had a total of seven planets which were designated with Roman numerals. The Earth Alliance had a colony on the first moon of the second planet, and a small research outpost at the seventh planet.
"No contacts, Sir." answered Kofoed.
"Hmm. I'm not sure if we should show our cards yet or wait a little longer."
"I would recommend we engage them now, before their numbers become too big to manage, but there is also the matter of the Minbari ships in hyperspace."
"Yes, they will know what we are up to either way." the Admiral added sighing, and then said. "Just give it a minute. Let's wait until we can determine the exact position of the other two vessels. Then we hit them. Run them by the numbers. I want at least two detachments per Minbari ship."
"Yes, Admiral. Shall I assign the 35th Battle Group to handle the four vessels?"
"What do we have on hyperspace?"
"All that remains of the 36th Battle Group: The entire 141st Group, and three detachments of the 142nd Group, one of them with 7 ships. Several detachments are acting as hunter killers interdicting the Minbari approach into the Vega cluster. They have already been able to destroy a Minbari transport in hyperspace. But three detachments of the 141st are providing Early Warning outside the heliosphere hyperspace boundary. They have several Starfuries supplementing recon drones into determining the position of the Minbari ships deployed in hyperspace."
"OK. Reassign every interdiction operation. Pull them back, and make them supplement the 141st on Early Warning and space denial. I need to know the precise moment the Minbari fleet makes their approach. Have the 35th Battle Group to handle the four vessels. But I don't care if the Victory's detachment showed that they were able to destroy two Minbari destroyers on VCB-37. I want at least two detachments per enemy vessel engaged. Make that very clear. Those detachments are not composed of Hyperions, and are heavily out-gunned by the Minbari. Exploit fighter attacks and have them use warships only if they need to block a retreat."
"What about the Minbari hyperspace emissions, Sir? The 141st already have the vectors of those emissions, but they have no yet detected a Minbari ship. If we jump now, their ships in normal space may be given the heads up and be ready to defend against us. They may even try to engage us in hyperspace."
"Have the 141st launch some missiles in the general direction of the Minbari emissions, and have them detonated at the same time our ships make the transition. Let's hope some thermonuclear explosions are enough to mask our vortex openings."
"Yes, sir."
A couple of minutes later, two sets of missiles exploded on the general direction of the two Minbari hyperspace emissions detected. At the same time, 64 ships made the transition into hyperspace, and coordinated their formations to prepare another jump for intercepting the Minbari.
The vortexes opened again to intercept the four Minbari ships.
The one in Vega I, was intercepted by two accurately opened vortexes in front of its approach. 192 Starfuries poured from it, and immediately paid the price of being in the Minbari's ship frontal area where almost every gun had a clear shot to fire. The approach on that vector was necessary as doing so from another position would have allowed the far faster Minbari ship to move away unscathed. In the end, while the losses in Starfuries were high, the fusion missiles launched from the remaining human fighters were enough to destroy the ship. The capital ships of those two detachments stayed in hyperspace waiting for their two available Sagittarius to make a dual transition to bring the fighters back, and then moved away of the heliosphere boundary to avoid detection.
A similar engagement occurred on Vega III, and the Minbari ship was destroyed.
On Vega V, two vortexes opened to pour out anti-capital-ship-missile equipped Starfuries. But in this case the Minbari ship turned away instead of firing into the human fighters, and another two sets of vortexes were necessary to bring down the Minbari vessel. 6 Olympus, 6 Artemis, and 2 Sagittarius made their attack run. As in the Battle of VCB-37, the Artemis paid the price of moving first. Two ships were destroyed just as they made their transition. The Minbari vessel split its firepower, and its green beams pierced them from bow to stern.
The two that followed suffered the same fate, but were able to at least fire an alpha strike that rocked the Tinashi when the dozens of rail gun penetrators clawed deep into its armor, and in some cases pierced it. The plasma rounds of the same alpha strike only scarred the surface, but helped point out the fact that they were not welcome.
Two more Artemis closely followed by the six Olympus made the transition, and the last vessels launched their missiles at once. The Minbari ship maneuvered to port to try to avoid the Olympus launched missiles, and those already launched by the Starfuries, but the range was too close, and the added strength of the heavy missiles launched by the just transitioning Sagittarius made it impossible for the Tinashi to survive. In the end, the Minbari vessel destroyed 4 Artemis and 1 Olympus before dying at the hands of hundreds of fusion missiles.
The situation on Vega IV on the other hand was almost a disaster. The two Avenger class carriers of the two detachments tasked in intercepting the Minbari ship opened their vortex and sent their Starfuries through. But the Minbari vessel already aware of the human attack on its far away companions, was better prepared to deal with the incursion. Instead of staying to face the human fighter onslaught, it opened a vortex at the same time as the Starfuries were making their transition.
The EA ships detected the vortex opening and ordered an immediate jump. The carrier EAS Kaga was able to move fast enough, and followed its Starfuries into normal space, but the EAS Courageous was not, and two neutron beams made quick work of it. The vessel was pierced and sliced several times, and its remains had little resemblance to the once proud capital ship.
But that was not all. The Minbari ship made a 360 turn that fighters other than Starfuries would have been envious of. The other two EA formations were centered around two jump capable Sagittarius. One had already opened a vortex, and its ships were making the transition with the exception of an Olympus that had lag a little behind while preparing to form for the original interception mission. The other Sagittarius was the target of the Minbari vessel's fury.
The Tinashi opened fire with all of its weapons, including its antimatter, neutron, and fusion cannons. The explosion of the human missile cruiser was huge, and it severely damaged the other 6 ships accompanying it. It was good that they were nowhere near a Foucault current, for the consequences would have been disastrous for every ship present.
The remaining none-jump-capable ships tried in their damaged state to engage the offending unit. The Minbari on the other hand knew quite well the capabilities of the human ships present, and had split its firepower against the Olympus to avoid a missile barrage. The three units of the class ceased to exist before being able to fire in response. The Artemis on the other hand had every gun not damaged on the Sagittarius' explosion firing against the Minbari vessel. But it was the Olympus from the other formation that ended the slaughter.
The Captain of that ship knew they had no chance, and that if he didn't act, the Minbari ship would be able to jump back to finish the ships that escaped to normal space. He fired all of its missiles. The Tinashi had received some damage from rail-gun rounds and was venting atmosphere, but had in turn made quick work of the remaining Artemis.
The only human ship firing back was the Olympus. Its missiles already underway left only its single rail-gun and its four plasma cannons to do some damage to the Minbari ship. The battle was chaotic to say the least. Plasma pulses veered of vector through the influence of hyperspace magnetic fields, while fusion beams from the Tinashi did the same, but the distances were so short that adjusting targeting sensors was an easy thing.
The Tinashi didn't waver and finished the Olympus before itself being immolated by several fusion missiles. The blast of the missiles and the quantum gravimetric reactor decompression vreated a huge wave of energy that disintegrated any remaining wreckage. The waves that followed were slightly felt by the vessels outside the heliosphere.
The Earth Alliance had been able to intercept the four Minbari ships, but it was now clear that they were already adapting to that strategy, as the cost of 1 Avenger, 1 Sagittarius, 7 Artemis, and 5 Olympus attested to.
The bridge of the Akagi was in silence. The captain of the carrier had unbuckled himself a few minutes earlier and floated toward the rear of his command chair to approach the Admiral's station. He had seated in one of the empty chairs to watch all the action.
"The 140th Group got hit pretty bad." stated the Captain of the Akagi.
"Yes, Sir. They are combat ineffective." added Kofoed.
"The hell they are combat ineffective!" replied von Koester angrily. "Tell the 35th Battle Group to manage its resources! I want its 140th Group's units operational again!"
"They lost too many ships, Sir. The 559th detachment is no more. The 557th lost three ships, the 558th two, and the 560th one." stated Kofoed sympathetically.
"I don't care, Agnar. They still have ships combat ready. Have the 35th Battle Group reassign them. If the 140th Group has enough ships to reform two detachments, then that's what they have. But I want every ship ready for combat."
"Yes, Sir. What about the ships that expended their missiles?"
"Reform the detachments concentrating empty ships in them, and have the reformed unit move to the deep space supply depots to re-arm. I want them ready as soon as possible. If we keep having these casualties, we'll need every available ship to slow the Minbari advances. That's our job. The 8th Fleet has another, and let's hope command sends reinforcements fast for them to join the 8th, or they are going to have a hell of a fight."
"Yes, Sir. I'm adding the order to the battle-net."
The Admiral was clearly worried. While he was using the weakest detachments for engaging the Minbari, as he was leaving the more capable ships to engage harder targets, the losses his units were sustaining were very high.
"I'm starting to second guess my decision of distributing the Hyperions on the detachments. They are far stronger combined." stated von Koester.
"There are only 23 on the 9th. We'll barely be able to form 3 detachments with those numbers, and all the none-jump-capable units we have on this fleet would be ineffective without the addition of their jump capabilities. I think your decision was correct, Admiral." replied Kofoed.
"I'm with the Lieutenant Commander in this." added the Captain. "We just don't have sufficient jump capable vessels on this fleet."
"I know. That was the reason I assigned them that way, but losing 14 ships to engage 4, when we made every effort in just using fighters, doesn't give too much support to that decision." replied the Admiral, while keeping his eyes in the holographic display. "We know the Minbari have replaced their losses in force. We have detected more jump vortex openings in their reformed stagging area at VCB-165 than the ships we faced on VCB-37, and we have had confirmation through tachyon com emission detection near that area that they have more than an EA fleet deployed in the Vega cluster." The Admiral turned to look at Kofoed. "You are sure they haven't jumped out?"
"There are constant vortex openings on that system, Sir, but not fleet scale. The time single vortexes remain open suggest individual ship transits. Between their transports ships and scouts, there are many coming and going, but unless our spy satellite and the several recon satellites are not working properly, their main fleet is still there." answered Kofoed.
"Their scouts arrived at Vega several hours ago. Last time, we were already engaging their main fleet. What are they planning? It's clear they are scouting the system. They are probably trying to determine if they are not going to suffer the same losses than the last battle. But they should at least be making their way here. They should be scouting in force."
"I don't know, Admiral." Kofoed answered shaking his head.
"Well, its fine with me. This plays to our advantage. How is our reinforcement situation?"
Kofoed accessed the computer to retrieve the information and answered. "The 5th has 369 upgraded Novas or Nova Charlies deployed on the Dakota cluster. Some of those ships are patrolling the New London, Canton, Myoto, and Berlin Clusters. The 143 Nova IIs of that fleet are in the process of being upgraded to Nova III standard, and are still on Earth's and Proxima's shipyards."
"The 424 upgraded Novas and 88 Hyperions of the 6th Fleet are all deployed on the Signet Cluster, with some of its ships patrolling the Jericho, Delphi, and Deneb clusters."
"The 7th Fleet with 512 Hyperions previously deployed in the position of the 5th Fleet is redeploying here. Some of its units are still in Dakota, but many are in transit. There are ships in the Sirius and Cooke clusters, but at least 20 percent of them have already arrived at Signet. They are refueling there before making their way here, and there are at least 3 detachments already en route. One will arrive in a day." answered Kofoed.
"Where is their Flagship?"
"Still in Dakota, sir."
"So, who's in command?"
"No one, sir. They are being assigned to the 8th Fleet for the moment, and will remain so until the redeployment is completed. The 7th Fleet's Admiral is still in the process of delivering command control to 5th Fleet Actual."
"No word on when we are getting some Nova IIIs at the front?"
"No, sir. But it's still too early. They say it takes two months of shipyard work to replace the plasma mortars and install the two particle cannons and the new sensors, and Command wants to bring those ships in numbers before they are willing to commit them."
"Yeah, they want to cause an impression, and with what I've seen the Mark II GODS do today, I'll tend to agree. But that will still leave us with older ships to do the job. They should have left the 7th in defense of Dakota and adjacent clusters, and send the 5th's Novas here. They would have considerably increased the firepower of the Hyperions of the 8th."
"What I've heard is that they wanted to upgrade the Novas with the new particle-ion hybrids that are soon to make their appearance into the Nova IVs. That way they will have a good chance against the Minbari. I think they didn't count on the Minbari to replace their losses so fast. The transfer of the 7th was already underway before the Minbari ships started to arrive in force."
"Then we are stuck with Hyperions." The Admiral chuckled. "Fifteen years ago, during the Dilgar war we would have been ecstatic of having a full Hyperion fleet. The firepower would have been impressive. Now I feel as if sailing in a sea of fire with paper ships."
"I share your feelings, Admiral."
"Get me in contact with Admiral Cotter. Use short range systems and the comm sats for relay. Make sure we don't expose any ships' position."
"Yes, Admiral." Agnar got to work, and a few seconds later, he relayed the transmission with Admiral Cotter of the 8th Fleet.
"Audio only, Admiral. Authentication confirmed."
"Admiral von Koester. I saw the battle relays. Is there any way we can assist you?" the female voice of Admiral Cotter could be heard speaking.
"Not directly Admiral. You have your job, and it's imperative the Minbari don't know you are here. But you could help me indirectly. There are several ships of the 7th Fleet making their way to reinforce the 8th. Any detachment you could spare will greatly assist me. As you know we have a lot of none jump capable vessels, and I was forced to dilute my strongest units. As soon as the Minbari starts arriving in force, we'll surely start losing a lot of ships. I may be able to reform some detachments with stronger units, but I could use with several hard hitting ships packed in single detachments to engage heavier or more numerous Minbari ships or formations."
"I see. How many ships are we talking about?"
"If I could have 1 or 2 Groups, it could help matters greatly."
"64 ships?"
"If possible, yes. If not, then 32 from one Group could really help me."
There was a moment of silence before Cotter answered. "You know the task assigned to me. Any ship I send your way is a ship that will not face the Minbari's main forces, and you know they have more than replaced their losses from the last battle. I don't even know if I can make it with the 7th Fleet's units. I'm not willing to part with them or we could risk everything. We don't even know if they will keep sending scouts or skirmishers, or if they'll send their entire Fleet next time. What I'm willing to do, is keep some detachments from the 7th Fleet deployed separately but still in range of the main ambush area. If the Minbari sends more scouts and your actual forces are not strong enough to face them, I'll assign them for your use, but until that time, I'm forced to concentrate on what forces I have for what is surely to come."
"I understand your situation, and rest assured that I'll be joining your attack. But if I can't keep this fleet from falling apart, I don't believe there will be much left to send your way. Some Hyperion detachments could reduce the number of casualties the 9th suffers, and I may be able to muster a stronger force to send in your assistance when the time comes."
Another small moment of silence before Cotter answered "OK. Take the 112th Group. There are already 3 detachments on the way. The fourth is still refueling at Signet."
The conversation continued for a moment, but von Koester had at least been able to secure a Group of Hyperions to reinforce his fleet.
For the next days, the situation was relatively calm. Only the Minbari hyperspace units remained, but on the 26th of November, just two days after the first skirmishes, a second wave of Minbari vessels arrived.
The Minbari Commander had clearly studied the previous engagements and had planned accordingly, but he still refused to send any Sharlins into normal space. Another wave of Tinashi frigates approached the Vega star with stealth systems fully active. They made the transition into normal space and relatively close to each planet. A total of 7 sets of 3 ships each entered the star system, while a Sharlin, its 8 escort Tinashis, and its complement of 15 Nials, remained in hyperspace to intercept any human ships moving to attack their scouts.
The first ship lost was a Minbari Tinashi. It was the one that approached the first moon of the second planet. This time it made the sensor sweep from 3.1 Giga meters away.
As the Minbari ship detached from its companions and approached its scanning position, the human defense grid released three missiles which went to maximum thrust. The Minbari scans swept the area identifying the number of defensive satellites deployed near the human space station. If Vice Admiral Blight had waited a little longer, enough detailed intelligence of the defense grid and specially the fact that it was indeed a human colony and not just an ambush would have been acquired by the Minbari, so even though the missiles were still more than 2 light seconds away from the Tinashi Frigate, the triangulated target information was filtered to the GODS IIs which fired in numbers against the Minbari vessel. It was completely destroyed by three impacts.
EAS Akagi – Avenger class carrier
Flagship 9th Fleet
A few minutes earlier …
"Is every ship ready?"
"Yes, Admiral." answered Kofoed.
"How much time?" asked von Koester.
"They have been steadily approaching at maximum thrust for the last 35 minutes. They are still a little more than 2 light seconds away."
"If Blight waits any longer, I can bet you the Minbari will shoot them down."
"The missiles are approaching erratically, Sir. They should have a hard time intercepting them at those ranges."
"I'd still bet you on that one."
Agnar was about to reply when three beams of several dozen fired, struck the Tinashi frigate completely destroying it.
"Am I still able to bet, Admiral?"
Von Koester chuckled, but he was clearly stressed of what was about to come. Every human Captain had learned to fear Minbari ships even with the successes they have had so far. The engagements were so fast that delayed decisions almost meant the destruction of the day dreaming ship. While he was not about to engage a Minbari vessel, his orders were about to force that into other Captains, and a small degree of nausea was building up inside him "OK." he said in a strong tone of voice so that everyone felt easy about what was about to come. "That's our cue. Release the Wolf Packs, and have the 141st and the 142nd ready to engage any hyperspace ambush."
This time the Minbari knew what was coming, so Admiral von Koester didn't risk a full interception, but decided to do it in stages.
The entire 139th Group jumped into hyperspace and positioned themselves to intercept the most critical group; the one that had two Tinashis remaining close to Vega II. But their hyperspace openings had been detected by probes launched by the Sharlin and its escorts deployed in hyperspace, and they moved to intercept. Monitoring of the red dense blur of hyperspace was not only a Minbari thing, as more than 40 EA ships were doing the same form outside the heliosphere to avoid detection and interception, and they also had drones and fighters dotting the inner sphere. One of those drones picked up a Minbari Tinashi before being destroyed.
A contact alert sounded in the holographic station of the Akagi, and Agnar was fast to inform. "A Minbari ship is moving to intercept the 139th in hyperspace, Sir."
"You know the drill, Agnar! Don't wait for my command!"
"I'm already on it, Admiral. The 139th had been advised, and fighters from the 141st and 142nd are heading to intercept."
Seconds passed before Agnar spoke again. "The 139th is positioning, slowing, and preparing for transition."
A tingling sensation of alert permeated the Admiral's body. His senses were in overdrive and the hair on the back of his neck stood on end. He didn't expect what was about to happen, but was at least fast to react. Two jump vortexes started forming from normal space and into hyperspace. It was clear the Minbari vessels in hyperspace had determined the location of the human ships jump position, and had alerted their two units in normal space at the second planet. Those didn't waste time and jumped either to retreat or to fight. But he was not going to find out, and immediately barked and order. "Interception! Release missiles and jump!"
The order filtered through the battle-net, but the Rear Admiral in command of the 139th was way ahead of him clearly showing the degree of training of EA personnel. The four carriers and four Sagittarius of the Group opened up their vortexes, and with their escorts started entering them at the same time as the Minbari Tinashis were arriving into hyperspace.
The Sharlin and its escorts made every attempt to intercept the human ships, but their range was still too high, even though that didn't stop them from firing dozens of neutron beams in their direction. One of them got more of a lucky shot than a true hit from a precise firing solution, but the strength of the beam made it irrelevant. An Olympus was struck on its port-dorsal engine mount, and the stream of neutron particles went through all the way to the other side causing havoc to the little vessel. It veered out of formation unable to rejoin the already jumping ships, and heading straight for the transitioning Tinashis. Its dutiful captain did what any true officer would do in their position. Fight to the death.
Both sides were learning the tactics of the other. The Minbari were reacting to previous engagements in normal space by intercepting the EA units in hyperspace, but that didn't mean the EA wasn't going to adapt to the Minbari strategy as well. Some missiles had been fired by the transitioning human ships, but the damaged and stranded Olympus released all of which it had available.
The Tinashis made the crossing and were fast to deal with the Olympus while accelerating away to avoid the incoming barrage. The human cylinder shaped weapons detonated at the same time as they detected that their distance to the Tinashis started to increase due to the Minbari vessel's far higher accelerations.
The advanced ships were fast, but not fast enough to avoid the shock wave of so many fusion warheads detonating in unison. The two vessels were obliterated by the huge shock wave, leaving very little in the form of structure. Hyperspace combat was a very tricky business, but one that played against the Minbari as their ship's advantages were clearly reduced, and that was something that didn't go unnoticed for the two EA Admirals present in the area.
"Tell the 139th to head for the defense grid, and have Blight cover them."
"Yes, Admiral." replied Agnar.
"Now. Where are the Starfuries?"
"With the 139th, Sir. They all jumped together."
"No. The ones in hyperspace."
The situation was chaotic, but Agnar was fast to catch up. He increased the size of the holographic representation of hyperspace, while reducing that of normal space, and showed the Admiral where those units were deployed.
"These ones are just scouts," he said while pointing to some units. "while these, these, and these are the main concentration of starfuries." he added while pointing to some massed blue dots.
"Where did the drone detect the Minbari?" asked the Admiral.
"Here," answered Agnar, pointing to a position farther away from the massed Starfuries. "and we detected weapons fire from here. So they are approaching the center of the system." he pointed to another position closer to the Starfuries.
"Press them forward! Don't let them back of! Have the capital ships fire missiles behind them, and at every position we had contact with their ships. Move the starfuries forward, but open up the umbrella. Keep them loose. And have the 141st guide them away from any Foucault current. Don't get anywhere near them, or it'll be a slaughter once the missiles detonate."
"Sir, the fighters are going to be extra vulnerable to hyperspace fighting. Do you think it wise to send so many of them to intercept the Minbari?"
"Son, it's everything but wise. But our chances in hyperspace are far better than in normal space. Give the order now, before they move away."
"Already sent them before questioning, sir. I was not rebuffing your order."
The Admiral stared at Agnar with piercing eyes, and then gratefully nodded. "This war will not be easy for us, Agnar. If we have to do what every race avoids to do to have a chance against such advanced foes, then we'll do it, but no matter what. Those ships are not getting out of there alive."
"I agree, Admiral." replied Agnar with a nod, and then the two of them turned to look at the holographic display.
Another drone and a scouting Starfury disappeared in a flash before they even got a chance to detect a Minbari ship, but the weapons fire was triangulated and the several missiles already on their way were redirect to press the Minbari forward and into the mass of Starfuries.
The first fusion detonation far behind the Minbari ships slightly lighted the red blur of hyperspace where they were located. Moments later several more fusion detonations started flashing behind the Minbari forcing the ships to accelerate forward.
There was not enough target data to launch a full missile barrage, so the EA was hitting the areas of previous contacts, but had also created a huge umbrella of Starfuries where the Minbari ships would be force to break through to avoid the exploding warheads.
It was in a sector of that umbrella that a literal hell broke loose. A Starfury was destroyed by a small beam, and then several others. The EA fighters started converging to that location, and soon more Starfuries arrived. The first engagement was done between the human fighters and the few Minbari Nials, and while human losses were high when the beams of the capital ships sum to the attack, every Nial was destroyed.
Then came the first contact with a warship, and the Starfuries quickly, but not without losses, destroyed that Tinashi with several well placed fusion missiles. The explosion of the ship erased 3 full squadrons of Starfuries.
The Minbari ships started spreading out to avoid interception, but only came in contact with different squadrons of Starfuries converging on their location. The battle lasted just a few minutes. Tinashi after Tinashi died in fiery explosions, two of them were lost without the help of the human fighters, as they were close enough to the other exploding vessels to suffer the same fate.
Quickly the only Sharlin operating in the area lost its escorts, and one after the other, the fighter based anti-capital-ship-missile made the warship crumble as their warheads buried into the crystal armor, and detonated with impunity.
The shock waves of the different ships struck one another, and after the angered and screaming waves passed, everything soon faded away into nothingness.
A few minutes passed of heavy scouting before Agnar said. "There don't seem to be any more contacts other than the two units scanning from deep hyperspace, Sir. At least we are not detecting any more sensor emissions or weapons fire."
"How many ships were there?"
"Nine, including one of their dreadnoughts. All are confirmed destroyed."
The Admiral nodded gravely. "How many fighters did we lose?"
"431, Sir. We lost two thirds of the fighters deployed on the 141st and 142nd."
The Admiral frowned, but didn't say a thing about the losses. "Have both units replaced by two Groups, and then send them to replace their losses and re-supply. But wait until we've dealt with the other Minbari ships. For the moment keep them scouting."
"Yes, Sir."
"Proceed with the attack. Let's move fast before they reinforce hyperspace."
"Yes, Admiral."
There were 6 Minbari scouting groups still on Vega, and while the critical one had been taken out, the EA couldn't allow the Minbari to fully scan the other planets, or soon their entire attention would be focused on Vega IIA. The longer they could prolong the Minbari scouting operation, the longer the chances of receiving reinforcements, and avoiding a major Fleet engagement.
The 138th was the first to make a double transition. They took the Minbari at the seventh planet by surprise, and while the battle was difficult and with a lot of losses, it was exclusively done with Starfuries.
Then followed the 137th at the sixth planet. Its Starfuries were able to destroy two of the Tinashis, but a warship interception was required for the third. It was also destroyed, but with the loss of four Artemis and two Olympus.
The 136th attacked the scouting units at the fifth planet, but at this time the Minbari had already realized that they were not going to regain contact with the units in hyperspace, because in any logical conclusion, they were most probably destroyed.
The Alyt commanding the scouting forces on the fifth planet, and after confirmation that the ships at the seventh and sixth planets were lost in combat, dispatched a single Tinashi into hyperspace to ascertain the situation. He signaled the other scout groups on the other planets to prepare for the worse.
The Tinashi that made the transition found the bulk of the EA 136th Group preparing for the assault. It not only forced the human ships to jump into normal space to avoid destruction, but alerted the two remaining ships of what was coming their way. It was able to destroy an Avenger class carrier, an Artemis frigate, and two Olympus before being overwhelmed by rail-gun rounds, and a few missiles launched by the transitioning human ships. But the losses sustained by the humans were small compared to what was waiting for them.
By being forced to jump earlier, and with the heads up given to the remaining two Tinashis, the human ships arrived in normal space out of position, and in the receiving end of antimatter, neutron and plasma beams.
The losses to the group were massive. The EA ships fired with everything they've got, and missiles launched from both; capital ships and fighters were already heading straight for the two Tinashis. Rail-gun rounds, and plasma pulses added into the huge missile release, but the distance that the hard hitting weapons had to cover to reach the Minbari ships, was enough for the Tinashis to deliver hell to the EA Capital ships.
Two Sagittarius exploded when two antimatter beams struck them head on. A pair of neutrons struck an Avenger several times until there was nothing left of it. The Artemis raced forward to cover the jump and missile capable vessels only to receive the attention of the fusion beams. A quick succession of fusion beam pulses devastated five of the human frigates to the point that little was recognizable of them.
But the amount of fire being thrown at the Minbari ships was taking its toll, forcing one of the Tinashis to deploy a spherical gravitic drive field to avoid damage from the low strength human weapons, and while it was effective in accomplishing that, it also force the Minbari ship to fire only with neutron cannons. The other Tinashi having lost one of its neutron canons to a well placed rail gun round, opted to do as much damage before being destroyed, and kept all of its weapons firing without deploying its gravitic drive field.
In the end the fusion missiles covered the distance, and that signaled the end for the two Minbari units, as the strength of the missile warheads made even the gravitic field deployed by one of the vessels irrelevant. The two ships exploded majestically.
On the other side, and full of melted holes and completely broken apart, lay the remains of 2 Avengers, 3 Sagittarius, 5 Olympus, and 7 Artemis, plus the Avenger, Artemis and 2 Olympus lost in hyperspace. 21 ships lost for 3 Minbari vessels destroyed. Only 11 human vessels from the 136th Group remained operational.
"21 ships lost, Admiral. The 136th has only two jump capable vessels."
"Keep them in normal space until we have dealt with the other Minbari units."
"Yes, Admiral. The 135th is already making its transition into hyperspace... Wait... We have outbound jump vortexes."
"How many?"
Agnar paused a little to confirm the number and answered. "9, sir."
"They are retreating. Order the 135th to maintain their position and to fire every missile they have into the opening vortexes. Have the 141st and 2nd to join in with all their missiles. Blanket the area. NOW!"
The order was filtered into the battle-net. One after the other the missiles left their launch tubes and headed to the last known position of the Minbari vortexes which had opened in three different locations.
The human missiles accelerated at maximum speed and started to spread out to increase the area of effect. They had detected the massive energy emissions of jump vortexes, but they were unable to detect the Minbari ships in the dense blur of hyperspace. Soon, the missiles started detonating one after the other. The flashes of fusion detonations were seen as lightning inside a red cloud. Thousands of missiles detonated in staggered positions all around the areas where the vortexes were detected.
In the end, two Tinashis were destroyed, mostly due to the sheer numbers of missiles, and warhead strength, than from precision firing. Seven ships left the area unscathed towards Minbari controlled space. The first, third, fourth, and fifth planets were confirmed without any human presence.
The eye of the storm returned for a second time. The few days that followed were completely uneventful, apart from the two Minbari units scanning hyperspace from long range. The EA had tried to locate them through sensor emission triangulation, but to no avail. The Minbari units turned their sensors on and off, repositioned and started again. But the range they were making their active and passive scans could only provide them with high intensity emission as those given by a beacon, and, or vortex openings.
They probably knew the number of incoming and outgoing vortexes, and could get a picture of the number of ships coming and going, but the EA had made a similar number of two way jumps. When reinforcements arrived, they did so with several ships through a single vortex, and then single ships jumped back just to show the Minbari the same number of vortexes so that they couldn't guess the number of ships present in the system. The outgoing ships then returned through the same vortex used by the reinforcements.
On the Vega colony things had also changed. A Global Orbital Defense command center was finally finished near one of the underground domed cities. At the bottom of the city, a tunnel boring machine had created a long tunnel away from the city, and at the end of it the Command center was created. This was to avoid the Minbari targeting the city as a military installation, but in any case the few civilians who had been stubborn enough to remain, had been forced to move to the other cities for safety.
Vice Admiral Blight had changed his command from the very exposed Orion space station to the underground command center.
From a fleet perspective, Admiral von Koester had disbanded some units to replace the losses sustained. The entire 142nd Group no longer existed, and only two detachments of the 141st remained, one of them with only 5 ships, but his fleet, even though with fewer vessels, was once again combat effective.
Admiral Cotter of the 8th Fleet still had her 512 Hyperions, but had been reinforced with two groups of Hyperions from the 7th Fleet that was still making the transfer from the other side of EA space. One of those groups was momentarily assigned to von Koester just in case he needed heavier firepower, but was none-the-less linked to the 8th Fleet.
Four days later, on November 30th,, a third wave of Minbari scouts arrived. Three detachments of nine ships each centered around one Sharlin, made the transition into normal space near the second, sixth, and seventh planets.
Six more detachments waited in hyperspace way outside the system's heliosphere. All of them were part of a Full Minbari Battle Group from the 2nd Attack Fleet. The Minbari commander in charge was taking even the scouting operation seriously.
Ahead of them, and heading inside the heliosphere in hyperspace were a total of 90 Nials. The entire fighter complement of the 6 Sharlins positioned in hyperspace. They were moving forward in pairs, so that they could patrol ahead to avoid a repeat of the interception that wasted a full detachment four days ago.
EAS Akagi – Avenger class carrier
Flagship 9th Fleet
That same time …
"Are those numbers confirmed?"
"Yes, Admiral. 9 ships on each formation. 1 of their dreadnoughts escorted by 8 destroyers. The formation at Vega II is holding station well outside GODS weapons range, while those on Vega VI and VII had jumped closer to the planet, and are on approach to them." answered Agnar Kofoed.
The Admiral was in deep thought, and took some time to answer. "There are too many."
"Yes, Admiral."
"Do we have any suggestions from the tactical systems?"
"Yes, Admiral. Previous simulations recommend at least 800 fighters to engage each formation with acceptable losses, and almost all normal space engagements met with heavy losses with less than 400."
"Two Groups?"
"With our ships? Yes, Admiral, and a full Battle Group if we are going to do the same with ships, at least with the ships we have. The 8th Fleet surely has a completely different set of combat parameters engaging with ships, but would still require the same amount of fighters if they are to engage with them."
"I know, but that is our job not the 8th's"
"I meant that we could use the Hyperions of the 7th Fleet's Group available to us."
"I'll only use them as a last resort. The Minbari have sufficient ships to make it very difficult to intercept without sustaining heavy losses, but not enough to warrant a ship attack. We'll stick with fighters as much as we can."
Agnar only nodded as he received more information from the battle-net. "Admiral, we have com emissions inside the hyperspace heliosphere boundary. A lot of it, but short burst transmissions. We have not detected any contacts, but have drones and Starfuries vectoring in."
The Admiral frowned, and after a few seconds replied. "Prepare the entire Fleet for combat, and advise the Rear Admirals that this will be a Group engagement."
"The entire fleet, Admiral?"
"Yes, Agnar. If we are picking up that many com emissions, it is because they are planning on hitting our ships before we are able to intercept their units in normal space. The 9th is evenly distributed around the heliosphere. If we all jump, we'll all act as a diversion for the units that will be going to intercept, forcing the Minbari to reconnoiter every jump vortex location, and if they commit, we'll have enough ships, fighters, and missiles to counter them."
"I agree, Admiral, but wouldn't we be sending the Minbari our force strength in this system? I mean, they are likely to guess how many ships we have."
"Yes and no. They won't know about the 8th, and they'll only be able to detect the number of jump vortexes we use. We'll concentrate every ship around the carriers, and make the jump with them."
"Yes, sir. Sending the orders."
The 9th Fleet prepared itself for combat. In the mean time, the Minbari units near the second planet detached a Tinashi for scanning operations of the EA defense grid.
Vega IIA - Global Orbital Defense underground command bunker
That same time …
"Do we have a contact?" asked Vice Admiral Roger Blight.
"Negative, Sir." answered the sensor's operator. "They shut down their sensors a few minutes after they arrived. We know where they jumped, but it's still too far away. There are several Starfuries vectoring in, but they'll take several hours to reach that position."
Blight sighed. "Keep me informed, and keep the defense grid charged and ready to fire."
"Yes, sir."
A few seconds passed, and the sensor operator spoke again. "Sir, I'm picking up tachyon emissions. It's consistent with Minbari active sensors."
The Vice Admiral didn't have to ask where, as the main screen showed the source of the emissions. It was located at 5.8 Giga meters and closing, while it also showed the closest Starfury to its position at more than 1 Giga meters away from the source.
"Do the Starfuries have a contact?"
"Not yet, sir. But they have the vector in which to focus their EMS sensors. Any time we should have enough combat data."
The few seconds that passed were heart stopping, but soon, Tachyon telemetry from the Starfuries started being received.
"We have a contact 19 light seconds away at 5.7 Giga meters. Tactical systems recommend engagement with 41 satellites and in a slashing pattern to have a successful engagement."
"Use every single one! FIRE!" ordered Blight.
The tactical station's officer assigned every unit available and gave the command.
72 GODS II released their huge capacitor banks into the particle accelerator's synchrotrons and the bright orange beams pierced the emptiness of space towards the Minbari target. The magnetic muzzle of the satellites moved the beam from one side to the other just 0.01 degrees. But at 5.7 Giga meters away that small correction on the muzzle made the beams travel in a slashing pattern from one side to the other on an area of 500 km. This allowed each satellite to cover a huge area of space in the receiving end, but highly reduced the effectiveness of the beam if it encountered a target.
The first beam to strike the Minbari Tinashi located on that area only boiled, and fractured some sections of the advanced crystal armor inflicting some damage, but the dozens of beams that struck it, completely destroyed the vessel, and only some glowing parts of its structure remained as evidence that it ever existed.
That ship was the third destroyed by the Vega colony's defense grid, and the destruction of the vessel was done just a few minutes before the 9th Fleet was ready to jump.
EAS Akagi – Avenger class carrier
Flagship 9th Fleet.
7 minutes later.
"All Groups are reporting ready to jump, Sir." stated Kofoed.
"Do we have any contacts?"
"No, Sir. The Starfuries have only encountered enemy fighters. They have been able to intercept a few, and have sustained moderate losses while doing so, but they have not encountered any capital ships."
"I'm sure they're still outside the heliosphere. Do we have a vector?"
"Yes, Admiral. We are receiving com emissions vectoring from Minbari controlled space, but single contacts and alternating. I'm sure they have many ships, but they are responding to their fighters with a single vessel, and then switch to another to avoid precision tracking. We only know the general direction of the vessels responding, but they could have the rest of their ships anywhere."
"And they probably have." replied von Koester. "Have the 134th and 133rd to fire a few missiles from each capable ship towards that area. Have them on cruise and opened wide. I want some weapons ready to engage the moment we detect any Minbari presence."
"Yes, sir."
The order was released to the two Groups currently patrolling hyperspace, and soon a couple of missiles from each capable ship left their launch tubes vectoring towards Minbari controlled space and the source of the emissions. The missiles opened their approach formation wide to cover more space, and kept their plasma engines on cruise. As soon as the Admiral saw that the missiles crossed the boundary where some of his ships were to make the transition, he gave the order. "This is 9th Fleet Actual to all Groups. You have your orders. Commence operations immediately."
Every detachment centered around their carriers. Jump and non-jump-capable ships gathered around them, and waited for the vortexes to form which they did just a few seconds later. 42 jump vortexes, representing every available normal space deployed detachments of the 9th Fleet, opened all around the Vega star's hyperspace heliosphere boundary.
In hyperspace, the lateral hangar doors of the EA Avenger class carriers opened up, and the thousands of Nova class Starfuries arrayed inside them started pouring out.
The capital ships started spreading around to avoid being damaged if a sister ship exploded nearby. The hyperspace Foucault currents, which amplified every explosion, were very hard to monitor as they were not only difficult to detect, but they shifted with still unknown patterns. But while the ships spread out to avoid them, they still kept sufficiently close to jump capable vessels in case they needed to jump away.
Electronic countermeasures were a common thing, and while every Human ship was operating under complete electronic silence, they were still supplemented by the huge amount of Starfuries with Wild Weasel load-outs that were filling hyperspace with wide area jamming emissions on an intermittent mode, but with the thousands of Starfuries deployed, it was a massive jamming operation. Nevertheless, the Minbari reaction was swift but not unexpected. Every single one of their ships went active, and the powerful tachyon emissions of 54 vessels were strongly felt by every passive sensor of the human fleet.
The Human reaction was fast as well. The entire 35th Battle Group and the 132nd and 131st Groups of the 33rd Battle Group headed to intercept the ships deployed in normal space. Two Groups per Minbari formation. The rest of the 9th Fleet prepared to hold any approach in hyperspace.
"Target enemy sensor's emissions, and start firing missiles. A full volley using 25 percent of them." ordered von Koester.
"Yes, Sir." replied Kofoed.
"Have every single Starfury ready for attack. Mark two heliosphere diameters out of the border from where they are approaching as a no crossing line. If the Minbari breach it, have every Starfury to launch an attack, and the entire fleet to move away from Vega."
"Sir?"
"They were able to detect our ships at VCB-165. Their fire came from inside the heliosphere of that system, and into units that were at the core. We know for certain that they can detect and target us at those distance. I'm hoping that two diameters are enough to avoid them targeting our capital ships, but I won't risk them coming any closer. If they cross that line, I want our capital ships to move away from Vega to avoid interception."
"Yes, sir."
"Also, set all the missiles fired first to engage the enemy's sensor emissions at flank."
"Yes, sir."
Missiles from every human detachment in hyperspace started pouring out. The thousands of contrails could have been easily seen in normal space, but the dense blur of hyperspace masked their emissions easily. The weapons quickly went into maximum thrust heading towards the Minbari sensor emissions. At the same time, the small amount of missiles that were fired first, accelerated to flank heading on the same direction as the ones behind them.
Flashes lighted up hyperspace. The Minbari had detected the missile approach, and had started firing their weapons in slashing patterns to allow for easier interception. The human weapons were programmed to detonate on contact, or by remote detonation, and every Minbari beam that struck one of the highly evasive cruising missiles, made them explode.
"Minbari fleet formation pattern is shifting." stated Kofoed.
"They are clearly trying to keep their distance from the missile blasts. I think we'll have enough time after all. Are the interception Groups ready?"
"Almost, sir. The 132nd is still moving into position."
"OK. Prepare another volley. Launch it as soon as the second wave reaches mid point."
"Yes, Sir... Wait... Enemy ships are shutting down their sensors. There are only a few vessels with their systems on. They are shifting again."
"Tricky bastards." replied von Koester with a sigh. "Cancel last, but keep all missiles ready to launch."
"Yes, Sir."
The second missile volley crossed the line established by von Koester, and immediately the Minbari started shifting sensors to ships close to the missiles to allow for easier interception. Massive fusion explosions dotted hyperspace at the distance, but no Minbari ships were destroyed by the blasts. The missiles exploded by the precise neutron firing of the Minbari vessels, and while they were unable to score a kill, they were still able to stop the Minbari advanced, allowing the strike groups a chance to complete their objectives.
"Sir, the 132nd is reporting ready. Shall I give the order?" asked Agnar.
"Confirm the position of the three Minbari ship groups in normal space, and order the attack in unison."
"Sir, the Minbari units close to Vega II are outside the defense grid weapon and sensor range. We only have a general vector."
"What about the other two?"
"They are close to the planets, and approaching with active sensors. We have a good fix on their positions."
"We can't wait any longer. Have the two fixed Minbari groups engaged, and have our forces intercepting Vega II on hold in hyperspace, but ready to engage any Minbari escape from that area."
"Yes, Sir. Relaying orders."
A few seconds later, the units that were to intercept Minbari forces at the sixth and seventh planets opened their vortexes to deploy their Starfuries. Almost eight hundred human fighters on each location jumped into the prepared but unsuspecting Minbari ships.
With two human groups engaging each position, the Minbari were attacked in each location by a force of almost 800 Starfuries from eight different set of jump vortexes completely covering every escape sector.
Missiles poured out of the blossoming human fighters. Thousands of contrails from anti-capital-ship and anti-fighter missiles could be seen as a majestic display of firepower. The human pilots didn't relent on their attack, and used even the low powered anti-fighter missiles against the Minbari weapon turrets and sensors. The range was still high, but the missiles were approaching form different vectors except from behind, as they had no chance of defeating the Minbari acceleration from that area, and the Minbari accumulated speed meant that they couldn't avoid the barrage in time if they tried to retreat through the same area.
The human missiles were numerous, but the Minbari return fire was impressive. The EMP guns of the Sharlins were supplemented by every fusion, and neutron canon available. Only the massive anti-capital-ship antimatter and neutron guns remained silent.
On one of the planets, the Minbari powered off their gravitic drives to avoid approaching the barrage faster than they wanted. They couldn't set their engines in full reverse as the gravitic field required to do so would have hampered forward weapons fire from any weapon other than neutron guns, so the ships kept their momentum with every gun firing at the human missile approach. It was at the last moment, and only after inflicting serious losses to the human fighter wings, that they gave the order to retreat as they knew they couldn't stop the missile volley.
The entire Minbari detachment jumped into hyperspace only to run into the prepared guns of the 132nd and 131st Groups. Each detachment had a Hyperion with them, and the eight vessels of that class immediately made it clear why they were considered one of the most powerful ships of the Dilgar War. They were definitely far less advanced than even the Minbari Tinashis, but they were powerful none the less. The humans had deployed their Hyperions behind the Artemis and Olympus with their dorsal fire arcs ready and able.
The six main plasma canons from each ship started firing towards the opening vortexes and compensating for Hyperspace magnetic fields even before any Minbari ship could be glimpsed. The 638 TW turrets were nowhere as powerful as those equipped on the Novas, but the two 319 TJ bolts that were leaving each of them every second, made for a very dense wall of plasma.
Without the Hyperions, the Human ships would had already been preparing to jump away and releasing some missiles towards the opening vortexes, but with them, the tactical situation was different, as was attested by the Artemis and Olympus in combat formation, and with all weapons firing into the opening vortexes.
Only the Avengers, and Sagittarius kept their distance, but the last ones were ready to reciprocate with missiles in case the main combat force proved ineffective, missiles that could not be used in such close proximity as the fusion explosions would had been as harmful to EA ships as to Minbari ones, but they were still prepared to redeem their comrades if they were defeated.
The Minbari vessels made the transition, and their crystal armor immediately took the brunt of the attack. The human Captains knew the consequence of one of those ships blowing up in such close proximity, and had ordered their gunners to target the Minbari weapons and drive systems first. The first barrage struck a Tinashi. Twelve plasma pulses from a Hyperion, and several smaller ones from the Artemis and Olympus, plus rail gun rounds made their way into its crystal armor every second.
The massive barrage that the Minbari ship was receiving was being repeated with the others. The Minbari gunners made the mistake to analyze the targets and assign their firing solutions to Olympus and Sagittarius, as their combat information systems flagged them as the most deadly of the ships detected, and while the return fire was devastating to the poor human corvettes, it allowed time for the strong Hyperion Alpha strikes to do the their job.
The entire frontal area of the targeted Tinashi was shredded by the huge amount of plasma rounds it had received. Attesting to the strength of the Minbari vessel was the fact that it had received more firepower than what a Dilgar Mishakur class dreadnought could have absorbed, and the small Minbari ship was still giving a valiant fight. One if its undamaged beams pierced an Olympus with several hits. The sturdy human vessel broke apart very fast to the extremely powerful secondary fusion guns of the Minbari frigate.
The Human onslaught was only returned in kind by the Minbari, but before any side could have forced a defeat into the other, the complete chaos surrounding the battle field meant that every care taken into avoid destroying the gravitic reactors of the Minbari ships met with failure, and a Tinashi's quantum gravimetric reactor lost containment exploding with the strength of two human fusion warheads.
The massive shock-wave generated by such explosion washed away several of the nearby ships that not only included other Minbari vessels, but nearby Human ones. The firepower of the Minbari side was greatly depleted, allowing the remaining human warships to concentrate their fire in a smaller number of units.
The few Tinashis left were mauled and heavily damaged by the Human attack, but the scarred, damaged, but still operational Sharlin was still giving hell to the human formation. Its gunners had already identified the Hyperion as the gravest threat, and the main bow cannon opened fired almost point blank into one of the human cruisers. The result of the Minbari weapon interaction with the thick Hyperion armor was the same as that of an aluminum paper foil facing and industrial blow torch. The ship was completely destroyed.
The Humans didn't let the loss of a Hyperion alter them, and immediately every available ship turned their sights into the Sharlin. The Minbari vessel being now the center of attention, and with the huge amount of plasma pulses striking it, not much time passed until a second more powerful explosion filled that area of hyperspace.
The last remaining Tinashis and many Human ships were literally washed out by the explosion. 8 Tinashis and 1 Sharlin had been destroyed at the cost of 3 Hyperions, 4 Sagittarius, 9 Artemis, and 10 Olympus, most of them destroyed by the explosion than by Minbari weapons fire. The cost was high, but at least the Earth Alliance was showing the Minbari that they were a force to be reckoned with, and a race willing to pay the highest of price to stop them in their tracks.
Even with the huge jamming in the area, this time the combat data had reached the Minbari forces in hyperspace, and they were now aware of the new threat in the form of the Hyperions. The presence of a unit that while it couldn't compete one on one against a Tinashi, was still able to throw an impressive amount of plasma fire, was a reason for concern in the hands of a now accepted capable enemy.
The battle was not over. The second Minbari group being engaged by the Starfuries in normal space was seeking a completely different strategy. Instead of shutting down their engines, firing and escaping to fight in hyperspace, the commander of this group ordered his units to accelerate at maximum thrust, and to concentrate all fire on the forward vectors. The human Starfuries and missiles approaching form that sector were almost washed away by the intense firing, but while the strategy was deadly to the Earth Alliance's fighter wings, it proved deadly for the Minbari ships and fighters as well.
The 15 Nials available in the formations were destroyed by the anti-fighter missiles launched by the huge amount of Starfuries, and their mothership was also the center of attention for a great percentage of the anti-capital-ship missiles launched. The point defense guns of the Minbari ships were firing with unerring precision and speed, but the amount of missiles fired were proving overwhelming, and the destruction of the single Sharlin proved to the remaining ships that going through a densely packed wall of missiles wasn't the best option on the tactical market.
Soon, one after the other, the number of Tinashis started to dwindle, but the beam firepower on that area had been so strong, that two scarred vessels made it through. One of them was venting atmosphere and had its port side gravitic fin missing, while the other received several impacts of anti-fighter missiles in some of its turrets and armor, but both vessels were still combat able.
The human reaction was swift. The 140th and 139th Groups of the 35th Battle Group opened up eight jump vortexes creating a sphere around the remaining Minbari vessels. The 35th had no Hyperions available, so the attack was performed with Olympus, Artemis, and Sagittarius, and while the older ships were no match to a Tinashi, the amount of them made that reality moot, but still didn't save them from suffering several losses.
Again, the first Artemis out of the jump vortexes payed the price of challenging such advanced vessels, But the human ships were coming out of 8 hyperspace openings, and the firepower concentrated on the two Minbari ships was just too much for them to absorb in the conditions they were in.
Fusion, Neutron, and the occasional antimatter beam made their way into the Human ships, while the slower missiles, rail-gun and plasma rounds made it to the Minbari vessels. The humans losses were high, but once their ordnance reached the Minbari positions, the battle was over.
1 Sharlin, and its 8 Tinashi escorts were destroyed at the cost of 6 Artemis, 3 Olympus, and 1 Sagittarius. The losses were high as it had become common, but the Minbari presence in Vega was thankfully now only concentrated close to the second planet.
EAS Akagi – Avenger class carrier
Flagship 9th Fleet.
That same time …
"Anything on the second planet?"
"No, Admiral. The 138th and 137th are alternating their jump capable ships into deploying drones into the area. There are more than a dozen already in normal space, and they have linked their EMS/STL systems, but there is too much space to cover. As long as the Minbari keep a low profile we won't have a general vector to concentrate our efforts in." answered Kofoed.
The minutes passed, and the Minbari seemed to have disappeared on normal space as well as in hyperspace, but the first sign to the contrary, were several active sensor signatures closer to the Vega IIA defense grid.
"Sir, we are picking energy emissions close to the defense grid. Minbari active sensors. Emission's profile identify them as fighters."
"How close?"
"1.2 Giga meters, and closing. Vice Admiral Blight is dispatching fighters from the Station, and vectoring patrols towards them."
"Have a detachment from the 138th deployed into that area, and keep the rest of it and the 137th ready in case the Minbari capitals show their hands."
"Yes, Sir."
"Use the detachment's carrier to deploy, but keep that vessel in hyperspace. Have the fighters return via Sagittarius."
"Yes, Sir."
The Human forces jumped into normal space with 1 Sagittarius, 3 Artemis, 3 Olympus, and 96 Starfuries. They immediately engaged the Minbari fighters, but they made their jump close to one of the sensor emission detected. The Minbari fighters in that area were easily taken care of with the use of interceptors, and the anti-fighter missiles from the Starfuries. Very few Human fighters were lost, but the area in which they jumped, placed them out of position to engage the other Minbari fighters, and a total of 7 out of 15 kept their relentless advance towards the defense grid.
The human detachment jumped back via the Sagittarius jump engines, and another one made the jump to intercept the already spread out Minbari fighter formation, taking several more fighters out of the equation.
The remaining Minbari fighters were destroyed by the vectored Human Starfuries that were already on patrol.
For the Minbari, the loss of their fighters meant a reduced amount of information regarding the defense grid, but enough data was now on their hand about the Vega star system to decide whether to take or avoid it.
The last skirmish of the Vega campaign was about to begin, and while for the Minbari it was only an operation to retrieve the forces still deployed in Vega's normal space, for the 9th Fleet, it was a full fledged operation requiring every available asset to counter the attack.
The first sign of warning came when Minbari sensor emissions were detected all around the Vega's star heliosphere boundary on hyperspace. The Minbari had seen the missile swarm approach, and had decided to power off their sensors, and move in individual units to surround the star from every direction. The result was that the Human missiles were coasting towards an area of space with no Minbari ships, and that every other direction not including the approach from the Signet cluster had been covered by the 56 Minbari vessels.
The result wasn't catastrophic due to the fact that Human vessels were on stealth mode and emitting no emissions, while at the same time, the thousands of Starfuries deployed were jamming the area close to them. Minbari sensors, while being very advanced, were still not strong enough to pierce the jamming in the thick red blur of hyperspace, but that didn't prevent some Human ships being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The 141st Group of the 36th Battle-Group, which only consisted of two detachments, with one of them under-strength, was deployed as reserve outside the Heliosphere boundary on the right side of the ecliptic facing Minbari space.
An Avenger was destroyed when every single forward beams of a Sharlin struck it with full force. The human units had already responded when the sensor system of the enemy vessel went active, and every single missile of every capable unit were leaving their launch tubes when the Avenger was destroyed, but even though the Earth Alliance units were responding to the assault, the Minbari ship was sufficiently far away to enjoy of ample time to do its job.
One after the other, and starting with the bigger easier-to-detect ships, the Minbari Sharlin made it clear the huge technological disparity between both forces. The commander of the 141st ordered the immediate jump to avoid any further loss, but the destruction of the three Avengers present, left only a Sagittarius with the jump capability to retreat. In the end, only said Sagittarius with 3 Olympus left in one piece. The remaining 3 Artemis and 3 Olympus met the same fate as the previously engaged Avengers.
Such loss of life and units was somehow avenged by the destruction of the offending Sharlin at the hands of the missiles and Starfuries present in the area, but the 9 to 1 kill ratio was not something that improved morale for the rest of the Fleet, even if they were acting in Group commands, and not as a whole.
Admiral von Koester knew that his fleet was compromised, but also knew that activating engines and firing missiles would probably mark them as targets, so he gave the order to re-vector the already launched missiles, and to rely on Starfuries to get the job done. He then asked Agnar. "Are we having any other weapons fire from the Minbari?"
"No, Sir."
"Then mark four times the distance the Minbari vessel engaged the 141st as a no fly zone for the rest of the ships. If any enemy ship enters that range, the units compromised are to fire all their missiles. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Admiral. Transmitting orders via Starfury relays."
The tension was high, and in the mean time, the wings of Starfuries made their approach, while the Minbari did the same at high speed.
In some areas, the Human Starfuries were able to reach some Minbari ships. Some were detected and fired upon while the enemy vessel retreated, but in two circumstances, the Human fighters were able to close the distance with pure momentum to strike at their targets with impunity. Two Tinashis were destroyed this way.
In other areas, the Minbari ships entered the no-fly-zone of the 133rd and 136th Groups. Both human units did as they were ordered. Every single missile-capable-unit fired their ordnance, and as believed by the Admiral, the Minbari units fired back at the source of the emissions.
Beams, and missiles and Starfuries crossed paths, while the Human capital ships desperately jumped away to avoid destruction. An Avenger, a Hyperion, a Sagittarius, an Artemis, and 3 Olympus were destroyed before the two Human Groups escaped, but their missiles barrage made quick work of two more Tinashis, but even though the Human fighters were not in attack range, many of them were destroyed by the shock-waves created by the fusion detonations, and suffered heavy losses in consequence.
Of the 13 groups still available on the 9th Fleet, 5 have jumped to normal space to either retreat or engage Minbari forces, and 2 had received heavy losses while fighting the Minbari in hyperspace. That left only 6 groups to face a determined foe, but thankfully there were still thousands of fighters conducting hunter-killer operations in hyperspace, and it was them which did most of the fighting.
The Minbari kept their approach towards the location of their forces deployed in normal space, and that got them in contact with more and more Starfuries. Losses accumulated fast for the human fighters, but the more than a thousand Starfuries lost, made the Minbari pay a relatively high price. 11 Tinashis and a Sharlin were destroyed, before the 138th and 137th Groups that were covering the escape route of the Minbari ships in Vega II, became compromised.
"Sir, the Minbari are approaching the location of the 138th and 137th. Our other groups should be safe to engage at the distances they are deployed." stated Kofoed.
"Good. Tell every able ship to fire missiles, and for Starfuries to pull back. Tell the ships being approached to hold their fire for our other missiles to close, but have them release all of their available mines. As soon as the Minbari enter their no-fly-zone, have them jump away, launching some missiles to cover their retreat." the Admiral sighed, and then added. "Let's hope the Minbari units in normal space are not in firing or sensor range, or things will end badly for them either way."
"Yes, Sir. Sending orders."
The 134th and 135th Groups of the 34th Battle-Group, plus the 129th and 130th Groups of the 33rd Battle-Group fired all of their missiles while moving away of the Vega system to avoid interception. The human fusion warhead equipped weapons accelerated away towards the Minbari forces heading for the core of the system, while the 138th and 137th started releasing all of their available mines.
The small spherical weapons used their thrusters to increase the distance between each other, creating a huge sphere of mines where each explosion would amplify the ones adjacent to it.
The two human groups holding station above Vega II started firing their missiles when the Minbari crossed their no-fly-zone. Green beams immediately pierced the dark red of hyperspace. Many shots missed, but the slashing pattern the Minbari were employing, allowed their weapons to score hits. The impressive power of their beams allowed for even a small exposure to be lethal, and the fact was attested by the destruction of seven of the escaping ships, which included 4 Olympus, an Artemis, a Sagittarius, and an Avenger.
The Minbari had detected the two sets of missiles launches, so their urgency in retrieving their normal space units became a rush. As soon as they detected hyperspace openings from the Human ships, they ordered their units to jump to hyperspace, and they did.
Human and Minbari vortexes crossed paths. Some Minbari units arrived in hyperspace before the last human ships left to normal space. The destruction of the lagged units was swift, and the 551st detachment ceased to exist. 3 Olympus, 3 Artemis, and a Sagittarius joined their previously destroyed Avenger detachment flag ship.
The Minbari joyful cheers were quickly stifled by the fact they had arrived inside a minefield. The guns of the advanced warships slashed away against the static weapons which were programmed to detonate if 10 percent of their numbers had been destroyed. That percentage was reached fast, and a massive fusion shock-wave washed away the entire retreating Minbari Group. A Sharlin and the remaining 7 Tinashis were completely destroyed.
The same shock-wave caused some damage to the other approaching Minbari ships, but they were thankful of being sufficiently far away to avoid destruction. But it was not the end. The two sets of missiles converged on their location forcing the Minbari units to scatter to avoid a repeat of the previous loss. The hundreds of missiles were not programmed to detonate on impact, but on a predetermined position. Many of them were destroyed, but those which made it through taught the Minbari not to concentrate ships in hyperspace.
In unison every warhead detonated. Many of the 39 remaining scattered Minbari ships were inside the blast zones. 2 Sharlins and 15 Tinashis were obliterated, with several others sustaining damage.
EAS Akagi – Avenger class carrier
Flagship 9th Fleet.
That same time …
"Signal the Starfuries. They are to engage immediately. Don't let the Minbari move away from the core."
"Yes, Admiral." replied Kofoed.
"Where are our missiles? Show me."
Agnar increased the range of the display to show the entire hyperspace battle-field. The center was still active with a total of 22 red dots. Thousands of Starfuries were vectoring in, but on the outskirts of the system and coming from Minbari controlled space were the hundreds of missiles fired on one of the initial salvos that the Minbari flanked to avoid them.
"There, Admiral. They are on flank heading towards the Minbari forces."
"Shut them down."
"Admiral?"
"Now Mr. Kofoed!"
Agnar didn't waste time, and the missiles engines shut down. It was just seconds until Agnar found out what was in the Admiral's mind. The missiles were now coasting towards the Minbari positions still outside their active sensor ranges, but before he could say anything. The red dots disappeared.
"Sir, they have shut down their active sensors. We have no way of tracking them now."
"Calculate their last know heading and acceleration, and have our missiles detonate on the intersecting position. Have our Starfuries do the same. They should arrive far earlier. I want them to make just one pass. If they don't find targets, they are to move away to avoid the missile blasts."
"Yes, sir."
Squadrons upon squadrons of Starfuries moved in wide formations from different vectors towards the last know Minbari positions. The Human pilots were barely able to watch even their wing mans, as they had increased their range to cover more area. They were only watching their lock on the beacons to keep their heading on the designated battle-net trajectory assigned to each squadron.
On the Admiral's holographic display on the EAS Akagi, the blue dots representing the fighter formations were converging towards a center formed by a decreasing fighter sphere. He saw the image at the same time Agnar spoke.
"One Starfury destroyed. Another one! Weapons fire detected! Fighters are triangulating. CONTACT! We've got contact!"
A red dot lighted up in on of the borders of the fighter sphere. A few seconds later, every Starfury in that sector, disappeared from the holographic display as well as the Minbari contact.
"Speak to me, Agnar." said von Koester.
"Our Starfuries fired their missiles at point blank, sir. We lost three squadrons. 36 fighters. Enemy ship is believed destroyed."
The Admiral wasn't given the chance to respond, when the holographic display started losing blue dots in several sectors. Red contact marks started lighting up, and then disappeared the same way as before.
"God Damn it! We are losing a lot of good people out there! Research and Development better come with a solution for automation fast, or I'll get back there and bang their heads until a solution comes out!"
Agnar didn't take his eyes from the display, and was watching every battle-net alert, but he still answered the Admiral. "Unmanned fighters are highly susceptible to hacking or jamming, and a decent enough AI to mount on fighter systems is not an easy solution. It's a priority, but a bigger priority are the capital ships. I don't think we'll be seeing self-sufficient unmanned fighters soon enough, sir."
The Admiral just sighed, and spoke again when there were no more contacts. "How many?"
"13 enemy ships destroyed, including 1 dreadnought. 579 Starfuries lost. We detected a total of 22 sensor emissions earlier. There should be only 9 enemy ships left. We could have the Hyperions from the 7th Fleet on intercept."
"No. They are not in the best of positions. I don't believe we'll be able to cut them off. They'll face the missiles we have left, and that's it. Tell Admiral Cotter that the 7th Fleet's Hyperions are under her command. We didn't need to use them, and tell her that we are leaving to refuel and rearm at the supply depots. She'll be alone for a couple of days."
"Yes, Admiral."
The last 9 Minbari ships moved towards Minbari controlled space. Their crews were sighing in relief when every vessel started to shake intensely. The waves of fusion detonations washed on their vessels hard. Three Tinashis and the last Sharlin were lost with all hands. Only 5 Minbari vessels left Vega space alive, albeit with heavy damage.
The 9th Fleet had been tested to its limits, but they had been relatively victorious. Their losses had been high compared to the Minbari, but the boneheads didn't come out unscathed, as the loss of almost an entire battle-group was a hard thing to swallow.
Hyperspace – Near Minbari border
Approaching Sh'Lekk'Tha system
EAS Pythia – Oracle class cruiser
December 7, 2245
"Captain Cunning."
Erin just turned to see her navigator, and nodded.
"We are picking up Minbari beacon tachyon frequency. We have a lock with an intensity registering at 7.32 percent."
"Keep all systems at full stealth. Slow the vessel down and prepare to deploy Beacons. How is our link with the Didyma?"
"Holding strong, Ma'am."
The Pythia had been deploying Beacons all the way to the Minbari system of Sh'Lekk'Tha, but the last leg of the deploying operation was done without the use of any beacon for navigation. Instead, the Ranger detachment was using all of its ships to keep a navigational line open. If there weren't any beacons deployed, it would have been an extremely risky operation, as the loss of contact with a single unit would have meant that the rest of the ships out of the line would get lost, but in this case, the risk was lessen by the fact that they had deployed beacons all along the route, and in case of a loss of contact they could activate them. The problem was that they would lose the element of surprise, as the Minbari would certainly detect the beacon emissions and would be better prepared to defend themselves.
"I have said this before, and I don't want to sound repetitive, but it's important you understand that the success of the initial attack will be determined by the fact that we get detected or not. If the Minbari even suspect that we have the entire Ranger Fleet a few days from here, there won't be any chance we'll be able to inflict as much damage as we want. We need to cause such an impression that they focus their resources in engaging us and not our Fleets in EA space. Just keep that link safe. I don't want to be forced to activate any beacon."
"No problem, Ma'am. We are still redundant. I can reach the vessel beyond the Didyma if necessary. We are using only 40 percent of the power output on our com systems. The 8 ship line to the beacon is strong." replied the Navigational officer."
"Good. Lieutenant. Keep it that way. Now have the first beacon deployed, and then reposition to deploy the rest as we talk about."
"Yes, Ma'am."
Behind the Pythia detachment the entire Ranger Fleet composed of the remaining 52 Oracles, and 79 Sagittarius were just four days of reaching the Sh'Lekk'Tha beacon. Human forces were preparing to strike inside Minbari space. The bet was now on the table, and it was time for the Minbari to either fold, call, or raise it.
Vega Cluster Beacon 165 – Minbari controlled space
Drala Fi – Shargoti class War Cruiser
December 8, 2245
The Drala Fi was one of the few Shargoti class War Cruisers. It was a subclass of the Sharlin, and designed specifically as command and control vessel for every Minbari Fleet. Not even the Valen'Tha had this configuration, as that ship, even with all of its modifications, was built for the Grey Council long before the Shargoti design was even considered. There were only 6 ships available; one on each defense Fleet.
Now that the 6th Defense Fleet had been reassigned to form the 1st Attack Fleet, The Shargoti assigned to it was transfered to the 1st Defense Fleet protecting Minbar, as the Drala Fi that used to command that Fleet was moved some time ago to Human space for command of the offensive forces.
The Shargoti was very similar in many respects to the Sharlin. The differences were the nearly doubling of the thickness of its crystal armor, a highly modified and robust communications and control system, and a bigger hangar bay for increased fighter protection. While these modifications made the vessel slightly larger than the Sharlin, it had the same reactors, weapons, and gravitic drive. This made the Shargoti very survivable against energy weapons fire, and the preferred platform for command and control, but made the Sharlin faster, and with the same firepower it still retained the preference of its crew as the preferred combat platform compared to the Shargoti. But for the purpose of command and control, and combat endurance the Shargoti was unbeatable.
The Flagship of the 1st Attack Fleet was surrounded by 80 Sharlins and 648 Tinashis. The 2nd Attack Fleet was farther away and protecting the supply depot. It contained including the vessels on patrol and those few that returned from Vega, a total of 26 Sharlins and 198 Tinashis.
Inside the Drala Fi's holographic chamber, things were about to get in motion.
The Alyt of the ship entered the chamber, stood firm, and said. "Shai Alyt Ner'shen, I report as requested."
"Alyt Aeraan, I have given the command. We are leaving as soon as every ship reports ready."
"At last Shay Alyt, we'll avenge our fallen brothers."
Both command officers were of the Wind Swords clan who had lost a huge amount of its members on the battle that took place at VCB-37. Neither of the two strong looking Minbari had any kind of trouble in facing the humans. But for Shai Alyt Ner'shen, one of the most experienced officers in the Minbari Fleet, a degree of respect had started building up inside him. He knew the ships he was facing. He considered them relics, not even worthy of being called warships, but the Humans had still been able through sheer brilliant tactical thinking to inflict heavy losses to his forces. He knew quite well, that in an even technological fight, the Minbari would probably be fighting for their lives in home space.
After the losses sustained at the Battle of VCB-37, and the ones lost in reconnoitering the current human system, he was sure that any encounter with the Humans would be at least close to deadly if not enough precautions were taken. He had sent different recon waves to explore the Human world, and in every one of them he had thought that his forces were ready, only to receive a beating by the Humans. He knew he was inflicting more losses than he was sustaining, but even if he increased the number of units sent, the Humans still managed to break their backs, not to mention their pride.
He knew that given enough time, the Minbari would learn their lessons, and would start fighting more effectively, and in every respect it was true. The problem was that the Humans were not only getting better, but stronger. He was aware of better quality ships reaching the front lines, but their commanders were getting as bold as to risk fighting in hyperspace. Something that only Valen risked doing against the Shadows nearly a thousand years ago, and that still today was considered to be extremely risky. He knew that for Valen those tactics helped shorten the technological gap between the Shadows, and was quite aware that for the humans it was having the same effects.
He needed to fight in normal space, but also knew that the humans would seek otherwise. His strategy was centered in the premise of avoiding fights in hyperspace, and that required his forces to maneuver through it without being intercepted. He had study the human fighting strategies for the past few days, and had come up with a counter strategy to allow his units to position themselves in normal space safely.
"It is my hope that our brothers are avenged, but it is my responsibility to keep this fleet from being avenged in the future. We need to survive this battle, and I can guarantee you that the humans will do everything in their power to avoid that. They are cunning a race, Aeraan. They are deceptive, skillful, clever and ingenious. We are not fighting them above Minbar, only because our technology is far superior. They are the perfect tool for the Shadows. Even if some members of the council are not fully convinced about them being Shadow thralls, the possibility that a race of this skill is given advanced technology by them is unconceivable as they would become unstoppable. We can't allow that to happen. Even if they are a good race, we just can't risk it."
"You speak of them with respect. Do you really consider them able to defeat our fleets and defenses?"
"Wouldn't you respect an enemy that is able to defeat you, when you are using an energy weapon and him just a knife? That is what we are seeing here. I wouldn't use their ships not even as transports, and here they are, facing the mighty Minbari Fleet, and making us bleed for every system we move forward. Yes, Alyt. I do consider them capable of defeating us. Not because they are superior, but because we have grown complacent with our technology. We think that we are so advanced that every enemy that faces our guns would be defeated, but it never occurred to us that those enemies would probably seek ways to avoid our guns. We need to grow not only in knowledge but also in wisdom. Even if what I'm about to say sounds bad, we must learn to fight as the humans do. We must learn to adapt to every circumstance."
"We no longer have Valen to fight for us. We must learn to do that by ourselves. The Humans have proved that we are not ready to fight against the Shadows. We must teach them otherwise. And I intend to do it now. Head for the bridge and take us to hyperspace as soon as every ship is ready."
"Yes, Shai Alyt. What about the 2nd Attack Fleet?"
"I have ordered them to keep some vessels for defense, and some others to cover the approaches, while the rest of the fleet will move to back us up in case we need to replace losses."
Aeraan nodded, and left the holographic chamber to proceed as ordered.
A few minutes later, the entire Minbari 1st Attack Fleet entered hyperspace. The vortex emissions were picked up by the recon satellites deployed around the system, and by the spy satellite deployed relatively close to the Minbari depot. The Human forces at Vega were now aware of the Minbari approach, and were preparing themselves for the welcoming ceremony.