Penn-5

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==Chapter 5 - Pennants==
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===But it's still tomorrow…===
Eagle's Rest, Magistracy of Canopus
January 1st, 2770
Anh studied first.
"We can take them," she said. "We don't have to wait for the heavies either."
"Ma'am?" Kyle Vu Dao looked puzzled. "There's more of them than there are of us, Ma'am."
The ship she was in command of began life as SLS Farnsworth, a Bonaventure class Corvette that up until three weeks ago, had been the RWS Forager.
"I said, we can take 'em. And we can do it without the heavy assets from 7th Fleet," she articulated.
She was here with the ship (now renamed again to KS Fatiama) with two salvaged Type 51 Gunships they'd managed to purloin from storage in the Winter system.
"The trick is, they have to defend. And that means what, Kyle?" She turned to the young miner who was learning-on-the-job how to XO.
"I'm not sure, ma'am," he confessed.
"It means we can force them to split their force. Force it enough times, and we can beat them piecemeal and there's not a lot they can do to stop us except hunker down. And if they hunker, then we've got the run of the whole system with all these lovely asteroids."
"We throw rocks?"
"Only enough that they know they have to send someone out to make us stop," she asserted. "Get rigging teams on the small craft. We're going to practice…celestial mechanics and navigation at sub-light speeds."
"Aye, mum."
We get them to pursue and they can be beaten, heavier ships or not.
It was the inverse corollary to Mahan's advice, the advice that has guided Navies since the Global wars of the 20th century. She wasn't going to give the defending squadrons at Eagle's Nest the decisive battle they could win. But she would force them to battle: a battle with their forces divided.
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===In the Now===
Kowloon Republic Coast Guard Ship Fatiama (Pinto class Corvette)
Uninhabited System, 2 jumps short of Kentares
February, 2797
Two major assets. Anh knew there were two major assets that the Combine forces would actually suffer from losing.
The trick being to separate either the McKenna or the Carrier from the main body of their escorts.
This scenario was different from Eagle's Nest. She had a different class of ship under her boots, and the conditions were not favorable for what worked there.
Toshiro will see it… But will he understand it? This would be much more complicated with a less well trained opponent.
We threw rocks at Eagle's Nest to make them chase us. Well, they're chasing us now anyway.
Toshiro was chasing them. I kinda wish I hadn't told him to save himself.
"Down pitch angle thirteen degrees, increase thrust by one quarter gravity."
It's too late for what could've been.
"We're different people now," she muttered. "Cutter Two, Cutter Three, alter course port twenty degrees, positive zed axis thirty degrees. Go after their outlying dropships."
I can still make him break his formation, he's following SLDF doctrine!
How do you defeat an SLDF wall of battle? Make them spread out, or concentrate at the wrong location.
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===Small Talk between Former Lovers===
Elbar system, Terran Hegemony2775
"Blockade only works on the major zenith and nadir points, or in close orbit," Rear Admiral Kaneda lectured. "Your concept of striking their logistics trains won't work for long. The area is too large!!"
<<"It's been working so far.">> Commodore Anh Cu'ong of the Kowloon Coast Guard, the rebel militia raised in the Kowloon system that was here to support the assault landings and recover the Naval storage depot, didn't raise her voice as she argued.
"What do you mean, 'so far?" he demanded from the bridge of the SLS Miyamoto Musashi.
<<"I mean, we've been doing it for six weeks. They haven't gotten a supply dropship since we started," she explained. "They also haven't been able to launch a courier and have it actually meet with a jumpship because we've been knocking them out of the sky. You tough guys handled the four Pintos and the Cruiser, but those guys were out of position because we've been chewing up their logistics and not sticking around to give them a fair fight.">>
There hadn't been this…rift between them back in the day. It hurt him to look across the table at her and see the eyes of a stranger, a suspicious stranger, untrusting and cold.
Not that he really expected to ever see her again, after she'd been 'sent away' in '57.
What did they do to you?
<<"It's called 'recon' for a reason, sir," she added. "We've been in this system for weeks ahead of the main body. My ships need ammunition, but we're good on fuel and consumables.">>
"How are you managing it?" he asked her.
<<"We've been NOT following the manual for one thing. The enemy commander's a Norfolk Luna graduate. He's playing this by the book, which is how we've managed to degrade them. The method is 'fleet in being'. We move at the fringes and hit him every time he stops for a rest. But it's expensive for us too.">>
"How expensive?" he asked.
<<"Lost three Trackers so far, and two Type-Five-Ones… and our lone Bonnie. I'm down to some hot-rods, two Type Fifty Ones, and a captured Pinto.">>
"Hot Rods?" he asked.
"Strap the engines from a big dropship onto the ruin of an Aquila you've stripped more than half the volume off of, concentrate the remaining material. You can use anything with an older model core, they're piecemeal and make the boats the Taurians used in the Reunification war look modern. But they can hold enough fighters and small craft to make up for having a four-tube missile battery as the only capital bay."
He cleared his throat. "We're coming," he assured her. "We'll be into the inner system by Wednesday. Can you make it that long with what you have?"
"Ayeh, sir. We can… Provided you have the supply ships in convoy and enough support we don't lose them."
"I can do that," he assured her. "Anh… I was pleased to hear I would see you again."
<<"Likewise.">> She didn't smile, but through the holotank there was no freezing hostility now. <<"Congratulations on your marriage, Toshiro-Sama.">>
His wedding ring clinked as if he'd just remembered it. "Thank you."
<<"We'll see you in a few days.">> She cut the connection from her end.
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===Unique Insight from Yesteryear===
Unnamed system, 2 jumps from Kentares2797
"Do you know what the worst part of a civil war is, Tai-sa?" Kaneda asked his Flag Captain.
"No, sir."
"We know everyone we kill, sometimes intimately," he confessed. "It makes things… bitter."
"Yes, sir." Tai-sa acknowledged
"Adjust our formation. Pull the Pentagon Assault DropShips closer in to their Warship support, and order crews to rig for bracket fire. She's going to launch a fighter sortie behind those gunboats."
"How do you know-" Kaneda's Flag Officer questioned
"Because she did it to the Rim Worlds Navy at Elbar," he explained. "Six weeks of getting them to spread out, or pursue into ambushes. Divide and straggle so she could defeat them in detail. THIS ship got the pennant for that battle, but it was over by the time we actually got into position to contribute…and the SLDF was not about to give the victory credit to a bunch of rowdy colonists."
In the darkness, fighters entered into the merge.
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===Arrowhead though the Automated Juggernauts===
OPERATION LIBERATION
Sol System, Terran Hegemony
January, 2777
The ****** Caspars were fast, could maneuver recklessly, and they were persistent.
"Two and Six, close ranks ahead of SLS Miyamoto Musashi!" Anh ordered. "One and Five, on me. I've got robot spoor inbound and coming hot, positive solar zed axis fifteen degrees, estimate nine minutes!"
Cover the Mushi, the Musashi covers the dropships, that had to be covered, because they were full of ground pounders and couldn't move faster than one gee without crippling those soldiers on the landings.
That left the SLN having to pay in blood as escorts. Which meant the rallier units with ships of their own but no troops for the landing had to try and both cover, and clear the way for the landing assaults.
The inbounds were coming hot because they had three full gees of thrust and no crew or passengers to make them moderate it.
But the damned things were predictable.
"Ready torpedoes. Guns, I want pattern fire along this designated axis, thirty degree cone. They're coming so hot they can't maneuver out of it."
"Ayeh, Mum!!"
The ship vibrated as the naval autocannons, relatively light ones compared to the weapons on the battlewagons, pumped out a spray of self-fragmenting area-effect shells that ten years ago were rejected by SLN as a concept in total. After all, who needs to turn a warship's guns into giant chaff dispensers?
"Load solid behind the frangible." she added.
They were going to run out, she knew. And then it would be down to inadequate energy weapons and harsh language.
But, this part of the formation would, she was sure, reach Terran orbit, at least.
"Musashi's firing, mum!"
The massive batteries on the battleship, well…once they knew where to direct, were perfectly adequate for applying the punctuation.
"My compliments to Admiral Kaneda…" she almost whispered, as two of the Caspars, their armor already reduced, double-flashed with secondary detonations less than 30,000 kilometers out. "Everyone brace for impacts, that debris is coming in hot and it WILL cross our tee!!"
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