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.“Another flight of bombers is coming through.”Henry nodded, then fell into a protective position around the American bombers.The aliens, depleted slightly, seemed hesitant for a long moment, then swooped down on the bombers, forcing the human fighters to cover them.Henry picked off one of the alien fighters, then dodged another fighter as the American bombers started to launch their missiles.Moments later, an alien carrier had been blown into flaming debris.“That’s two,” an American voice carolled.“We got the.”His voice cut off with a sudden terrible finality.Henry didn't need to glance at the overall display to realise that the American had been killed, picked off in a moment of carelessness or distraction.He gritted his teeth as the recall order came in, summoning them back to the carriers.Like some of the other pilots, he wanted to argue, but there was no time.Besides, the planet-side fighters were closing in on the human fleet from the rear.The CSP might well be overwhelmed.***“The alien starfighters are closing in,” Farley reported.“They’re going after the American carriers.”James nodded, unsure if the aliens knew they were targeting Americans or if they were merely going after the biggest ships in the human fleet.Not, in the end, that it mattered, he knew.One good strafing run and there would be nothing left of the carrier, but an expanding ball of plasma.And the human fleet would be seriously dented.“Order our guns to cover them,” he ordered.He gritted his teeth as the storm broke over Franklin Roosevelt.The Americans fought back savagely, surprising the aliens with the plasma cannons attached to the carrier’s hull.They hadn't expected anything of the sort, James realised, even though they should have been prepared for it.But it wasn't enough to force the aliens to pull back.A hundred plasma bolts slammed into the carrier’s hull, burning through her thin armour and blazing through her innards.James didn't want to imagine what sort of hell her interior had become, knowing that it was only a matter of time before the carrier died.“Get to the lifepods,” he muttered, urgently.The Americans might be saved if they abandoned ship.“Get to the lifepods.”The American carrier exploded.For a moment, the alien craft hung in space – a gesture of respect or contempt; James couldn't decide which – and then went hunting for other targets.The remaining American fighters tore into them, followed rapidly by French and British fighters from the CSP.James let out a sigh of relief as the aliens scattered, then either fell back to the planet or died under vengeful human fire.But they'd already scored one big victory, he knew.Five thousand American spacers had just died.“Franklin is gone, sir,” Farley said.“I’m picking up a handful of lifepods.”“Detail a SAR team to pick them up,” James ordered.The aliens didn't make a habit of going after SAR operations, as far as anyone knew, but most of the previous battles hadn't lasted long enough for anyone to find out for sure.“And then bring them back to the ship.”He sighed, watching grimly as the alien carriers made their escape.The two sides had each lost a carrier, with one of the alien carriers badly damaged.But the aliens were much closer to their reinforcements, everyone assumed, than the human ships.There was no way to be absolutely sure.Bracing himself, he keyed a switch to call the Admiral.“Admiral,” he said.“The fighters are returning to the ship.”“Good,” Admiral Smith said.“Order them to rearm, then prepare for redeployment.We have a planet to target.”“Aye, sir,” James said.***Henry had always been raised to think of carriers as the queens of space.They were immense warships, even the smallest carrying over two thousand officers and men, seemingly invincible as they prowled through space.Even hearing about the first Battle of New Russia hadn't really convinced him otherwise, particularly after tactics were adapted and Ark Royal gave the aliens a series of bloody noses.But now.an American carrier, the largest in the fleet, had simply been blown into dust.He couldn't help feeling subdued as he slotted his starfighter into the landing deck and waited for the techs to go to work.“We’ll get the bastards,” North said, softly.Even he sounded subdued by the sudden evidence that even a fleet carrier was not invincible.They'd known about the two British carriers lost at New Russia, but it hadn't been quite real.It was now.“For Roosevelt.and for the others.”“Yes,” Henry muttered.“For them all.”He braced himself as the fighter was dragged through the landing tube, hastily reloaded with new weapons and fuel cells, then slotted into the launch tube.It didn't look as though they would be shot back out into space at once, much to his relief, but there would be no time to relax.They’d be going back out soon enough.Absently, he keyed his way into the datanet and looked through the information gathered by the drones.Target One supported a vast alien population, perhaps one numbered in the billions.In fact, one of the analysts had noted, if the aliens had cities that were completely underneath the waves, the population could be a great deal higher than any human world.It was an odd thought, but Henry had to admit it made a certain kind of sense.Target One’s oceans covered three-fourths of the planet.There was no shortage of food in the seas, as he’d learned on one of the few holidays he’d actually had a few days to relax before the reporters showed up to spoil his holiday by writing long articles about how the Prince was shaming himself by fishing in the sea.If the aliens lived underwater, it was quite possible that they never had to worry about food shortages.Hell, the oceans still helped feed millions of humans on Earth.What sort of society would that produce?“We launch in twenty minutes, unless the aliens attack earlier,” the CAG informed them.“I suggest you try to relax.”Easier said than done, Henry thought.I couldn't relax right now if you paid me.***“We pulled thirty-two crewmen out of the lifepods,” Lopez reported.“None of the others were recovered.”Ted nodded, fighting to keep the emotion off his face.Five thousand men and women had just died on his watch, including a large number of experienced officers.He hadn't been able to do anything to prevent it from happening, but he had a feeling the board of inquiry would feel differently.There were just too many civilians who believed they had the right to pass judgement on the military, even though they knew nothing about it [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]