System Supervillain, Chapter 149

Chapter 149 – Telling Blow

(Command Nest, Gel-nak Imperial Navy Ship Threefold Destruction of the Unworthy, Srusk System, Gel-Nak Empire)

Ship High Commander Arlushk cursed under his breath as he saw the devastation left in the impossible ship’s wake. The fighters had been the best chance they had of dragging this ship down, unless they could exhaust the power to its shields somehow. The few fighters who had survived the negative matter explosion had critical damage across all systems. Worse, their radiation alarms were screaming. If they hadn’t been in their flight suits, then even the crews who had survived would have been dead by now. As it was, they were going to need hours of decontamination before they could be allowed around other Gel-nak, and their fighters were basically out of the fight.

Now, this damned Rhuk was closing with his warships! “All ships, fire at will! There has to be a limit to what those shields can take! We fight for the Gel-Nak Empire, which has never been invaded, never been conquered! Throw these mammals back into the cold dark of space they came from!”

The next moment gave strength to his words, as the destroyer Bane of Traitors traded blows with the enemy. Those gravity beams crossed through the air, and the Bane fired their primary blaster array in turn. Both sides’ weapons splashed against shields and armor designed to take worse. If they could maintain a stalemate, then, eventually, they would be able to find a chink in the ship’s armor.

And then everything changed. The Rhuk drew close enough that point defense weapons could target the Bane. Four turrets with rapid-firing blasters fired upon the destroyer, and promptly shredded it. Twenty blasts struck the Bane of Traitors, but it was already over after the first ten. The blasts tore through the destroyer’s armor, and then ripped apart the more vulnerable insides. The reactor failure moments later ensured that there would be no survivors.

“Report! What kind of weapon was that!”

The Science Advisor shook his head. “It appears to be a rapid-fire point-defense weapon, Ship High Commander! Likely an Energy Blast built with Autofire and Penetrating capabilities. Roughly 8d6 in strength. Without the Penetrating, it would probably be useless against our ships, but with it? It appears as though each weapon emplacement can fire five shots in rapid succession. With the targeting systems they clearly possess, it is likely that they would be able to take down any of our ships in a single pass, should they get close enough. Including the Threefold Destruction of the Unworthy.”

“All ships, go evasive! Do not let the enemy ship get within range of those weapons!”

“Ship High Commander,” the Science Advisor called out in alarm, “we are detecting increased power at the fore of the enemy ship! Weapon signature unlike anything we’ve seen so far!”

Arlushk’s eyes narrowed as he looked at the screen displaying the enemy vessel. Doors had opened at the tip of the dagger-like ship, and a bright glow was coming from what was obviously a cannon stretching the length of the ship. The Imperial Navy had used designs like that in the distant past, he knew, but they had been phased out due to the inflexibility of use. You could not capture and enslave enemies who had been scattered into their component atoms, after all.

Of course, the main issue with a weapon like that was the fact that it was impossible to aim without adjusting the trajectory of the ship itself. And while his ships were not the most nimble things in space, he doubted that the enemy was planning on taking a shot at them with that thing. To be worth the hassle, such a weapon would have to have either an enormous power draw, which may weaken the ship’s shields, or it would require charges, which meant limited ammunition in the course of a battle. And using it on a planet, without getting close enough for detailed scans first was foolish. No, there could be only one target that this Iceblade was aiming for. The one target in the system that couldn’t maneuver: the Orbital Station Authority of Order.

Eyes frantic, he turned back to the tactical display. There was only one ship that could intercept the track in time. “Contact the Vision of Supremacy, and order them to block the line between the Rhuk and the Authority of Order, now!”

To their credit, the crew of the Vision did not hesitate. No doubt, Ship Commander Shrus saw the same thing he did. She would know that a cruiser was a fair trade for the station, and the Fleet High Commander. Without them, all semblance of order in the Srusk system would collapse. That could not be allowed to happen.

“All other ships, focus fire! Even if you end up blinding their sensors, make sure that they do not have time to react to the Vision’s sacrifice!”

But the fire was in vain. The ship sailed through it as though it were nothing but lights for children to play with. The weapon kept charging as the ship shot forward, but when the Vision entered range of those damned point defense weapons, they shredded an area two thirds of the way from the ship’s bow. With horror, Arlushk realized that they had been directly targeting the main reactor. These upstart mammals knew the layout of their ships, and were able to target critical infrastructure!

The Vision of Supremacy disappeared in the radiance of a new sun as the reactor blew, blinding their sensors. When the glare cleared, the Rhuk was past the remains of the cruiser, having barely needed to maneuver, trusting in their shields and armor to protect them from the blast. And not without reason, given what he’d seen so far.

Twelve seconds after the cannon began charging, it fired. A bolt of light passed through space, a quirk of the System causing it to strike faster than light could reach the station, despite the projectile being subluminal, and yet they all saw the trail. That was the way of things when you fought at interplanetary distances.

The target struck the station with the force of an angry god. The Orbital Station was designed primarily as an administrative center for the system’s military and civilian commands, as well as a focal point for trade ships, so they could be properly inspected. While it had armor and shields, even weapons, it was not designed for this kind of warfare.

“Report!”

“Enemy scored a direct hit on the station. Combat logs determine that it was a 10d6-1 Armor Piercing Ranged Killing Attack, physical projectile. Damage to the station is severe. They’re down to 37/50 BODY, shields are offline, life support is on local emergency power! Ship High Commander, we have an incoming transmission from the Fleet High Commander!”

“On screen!”

The main viewscreen changed from the view of the hateful enemy ship, to the Primary Command Nest of the Orbital Station. Or what was left of it. Lights were on emergency power, and he could see crew members rushing to put out open fires from consoles that had exploded. Fleet High Commander Drisz was standing, but green blood was flowing from a wound over his right eye, and his right arm hung limp by his side. Shrapnel damage, from the looks of things.

“This is Fleet High Commander Drisz to all remaining Imperial Navy Forces in the Srusk system. All remaining fighters are to rendezvous with the Threefold Destruction of the Unworthy. All remaining ships are to then break off contact and maneuver to the hyperspace lanes. Scatter, and inform the Empire about what has happened here. The Navy must find counters to this ship’s capabilities, or we are all lost. Warn them that the Rhuk of Earth is coming.”

Before he could respond, the signal was hijacked, and that damned Iceblade, who called himself a Rhuk, appeared on the screen, his face hidden behind a mask, as always. “Well, this is unfortunate. I had hoped to make a clean sweep of the ships in this system. But it appears that some of you actually have more brains than the commanders who were sent to Earth. Not that it matters. Your running away like scared little children does nothing but help spread the fear of me. Assuming that the ones you go crying to believe you, or are not to bound by their own genetic programming to ignore cowards who ran from a fight where they outnumbered the enemy by thirty-seven to one, and were still losing.

“Actually, the genetic programming, what your masters call ‘ordering’, makes sense, now. A race as spineless and incapable as yourselves would never be able to conquer and control other species without using genetic engineering to make resistance impossible. I bet, if I looked through your history, there would not be a single race you’ve conquered that was even close to your technological level. You are a race of bottom-feeding scavengers, not warriors or conquerors. So run, little lizards, and tell the so-called Empire that they are about to learn the consequences of their actions. Or stay, and let me enjoy the hunt a little longer.”

(Bridge, Rhuk, Srusk System, Gel-Nak Empire)

I chuckled as the transmission cut. “Well, that was satisfying. Nemesis, hunt as you please. We have a map of the system’s ‘hyperspace lanes’, so I’ll let you decide whether or not anyone gets to escape or not.”

The so-called hyperspace lanes were not actual physical paths, routes, or stellar phenomenon. Rather, they were mapped out and patrolled ‘safe routes’ between star systems, where you would not need to worry about little things like running into a rogue planetoid or a comet while traveling many times the speed of light. That kind of impact tended to ignore your ship’s defenses, no matter how good they were.

“It appears that they’re all scattering to different lane entrances. Probably so we can’t destroy all of them. Target preferences?”

I chuckled at the AI’s question. “Target the biggest ships first. They’ll have the most experienced commanders, and be the hardest to replace in a hurry, especially if the Empire is falling apart like it seems to be.”

“As you command, Iceblade.”

“Master,” Web Mistress called out, from her console. “I’ve looked over the combat logs for our fight. I believe we can retune the Gravity Lances to have a slightly more effective output. They’ll draw from ship power, rather than being net zero as they are now, and have a slightly lower absolute power, but gain the Penetrating ability, like the blasters. That will still give us the range we want, and the raw power against lightly-armored craft, while allowing us to do more than simply whiff at actual warships.”

“If you’re going to be retuning the weapon systems, I’d suggest looking at the point defense weapons, as well. I think we can squeeze a bit more range out of them without a major rebuild if we alter the focusing iris slightly. Shouldn’t reduce power output or affect point totals, either.”

“All right,” I nodded. “Well, if we’re talking about how to rework things, we should probably talk about the main gun. For all its power, I found myself rather underwhelmed by the raw output. Is there any way we can rework it? I would prefer to be able to knock out a station, or at least a cruiser, in a single blow.”

“I have been running those numbers as well. It would require more extensive rebuilds, but if we replace the ammunition bay with one of the matter-energy converters, from the fabrication bay, and set things correctly, while increasing the charge time to one minute, we should be able to exchange the ‘Armor Piercing’ ability on the main gun’s space-based attack for the No Normal Defense one, with the defense being the Insubstantial power. That, and the other changes would reduce the main gun’s power to 8d6 instead of 10d6-1, increase the active point cost to 300, and require 60 points of END from the ship reserves, but all of the damage would be going through, instead of just what managed to overpower the defenses. Best part? I think we can work all the changes we’ve talked about for one extra point to the ship, which we should be able to swing with whatever XP this fight gives us.”

“The math checks out,” Web Mistress nodded, but she had to pause as Nemesis let out a cackle of digital glee as the battleship wilted under the point defense guns. It wasn’t like our conversation stopped the battle, or anything. “Also, I’ve run the numbers for the other weapons, the Grey Goo Blast and the Sunkiller. Both should work, but to complete the changes would be the process of weeks, maybe months. The System actively dislikes you trying to alter planets and stars, it seems.”

“I figured as much. But it will give us options if we come across a system that is too heavily defended for us to handle. However many of these ships escape, they’re going to bring combat data on us. I’m sure someone out there will be smart enough to try and adjust their weapons so that the things will actually hurt us.”

“Probably,” Web Mistress nodded. “In the meantime, we should probably call the Russians. See which world they want us to set up the gate on.”

“Better yet, find us a starport. Somewhere with transport ships. We can set the Russians up there, while letting our former heroines rescue the women and children on the ice world. When the Russians have enough of whatever city we land them in clear, they can use transports to haul their people to the gate. That way, they get to get their mad on, and Victory and the others will get to feel useful, since I know they didn’t have anything to do in this fight.”