Alpha One - Chris Burton [149]
“We can patch up the hole, but the bulkheads have been damaged. How she will fare inside the wormhole is anyone’s guess.”
“I agree. Long range scans are showing a buildup of Kryl activity. I don’t think we have much choice. As soon as the harmonics are up and running, get some emergency shielding and stabilizers in place, and then we are going to need to head straight for the fissure.”
This is going to be close, he thought. Will Obeya have enough time to catch up, or will they have to take the Eagle through the wormhole separately? Things had not changed much. It still had the potential to be a bad day.
Chapter Sixty-Six
The Closure of the Wormholes
Things were looking up for Shenke. The combined forces of Alpha, the Sect Guard and, surprisingly, a small Sentinel contingent from General Yoshi’s Southern Fleet were making real inroads into the Kryl armada.
The Sentinels joined the fray some two hours previously. Shenke was advised of their arrival. He prompted his commanders to draw off ten ships and 200 jump ships. He anticipated the Sentinels came to join in the attack on the Alpha fleet and not to help them; however, the new Sentinel General, promoted from within by general agreement from the ranks following Yoshi’s death, had made immediate contact with the Pacific and offered his services. This bizarre turn of events had surprised the Alpha Command Team and it was initially greeted with suspicion, but, after a period of reflection following a further explanation from the Sentinel General, they realized that the offer was genuine.
It was General Yoshi’s personal crusade against Alpha that kept the battle against Admiral Rose’s fleet going after the wormhole had opened. Once he was dead, the new general quickly decided their interest lay with assisting Alpha and the Sect. The Sentinel force numbered only seventy-five vessels, but this was the edge Shenke needed to finish the Kryl off.
The Sentinel Fleet joined the attack on the mother ship which Shenke initiated four hours previously. Some one hundred twenty-five vessels surrounded the huge Kryl vessel and bombarded it with plasma fire. The majority of Kryl cruisers surrounding it were engaged in one-to-one fighting, with over two hundred Alpha ships commanded by Admiral Haines and the larger Sect vessels. The remaining Alpha vessels protected their flagship, which was itself engaged in a fierce battle with eight Kryl cruisers defending their own mother ship.
* * * *
In the meantime, the jump ship battle still raged separately from the main battle. The losses were huge on both sides, but Alpha’s problems began to mount up. They deployed over thirteen thousand vessels in total: nine thousand seven hundred fifty were lost and the remainder were either engaged, in repair or on fast turnaround for re-engagement. The pilots were exhausted, and this was beginning to tell.
The Kryl had more vessels. As fast as one Kryl fighter was destroyed, another would replace it. On the plus side, both the Rapiers and the Sabres held their own. They may have been technically inferior, but their pilots were not and this was telling. The Pacific chief CAG was charged with the fastest possible turnaround of ships. He had never seen anything like this, but his CAG teams were coping remarkably well. They were adapting to the situation and delivering.
The Pacific battle group destroyed five of the obstructing cruisers, and was beginning to get a clear line of fire towards the Kryl mother ship. This was critical. If they could destroy the mother ship, then the battle would be over. Shenke ordered his ship to move in closer to the Kryl vessel. He planned