“Pointssss.”

- Antioch

***Outer Rim***

***Antioch***

“Let's fly past the planet and take a shot at the bottom left of their formation. That will take the ships behind the planet and the moon out of the picture and increase our odds,” I suggest after a lengthy study of our situation.

It took us a few hours to approach the Prip homeworld, given that the colony ships aren't the fastest in real space. I suppose that we could have attacked in waves, sending in our battleships first, but I didn't want to split our forces.

Martin shakes his head. “Do you really think that they will just sit there and wait while we do a drive-by?”

“Be that as it may. We can't change their reactions. If they decide to send a part of their fleet, or even everything they have after us, then we just have to deal with it. Right now, they are sitting ducks and it seems like they intend to stay at the Prip homeworld. We will change our plans as soon as they do. To be honest, I would prefer for them to leave the direct area around the planet. It would reduce the chance of us hitting something important on the planet.”

I stop my explanation there and study the people who are present. Silith is sitting next to me, clad in an adorable red dress which leaves her shoulders bare. Fiona and Lisandra chose similar outfits, only that their colours are blue and yellow.

Martin's hologram shows that he chose his black and grey military uniform, which Sam imitates, just that my son isn't showing off with as many medals. His wardrobe doesn't look as ridiculous as Martin's assortment of metal which could count as an armour of its own.

The holograms of Minerva and Jenny show that they aren't far behind my wives when it comes to the choice of clothes. Later, I have to talk with them. It feels disturbingly wrong to dress like this during a battle.

I would probably complain and force them to put on some armour - or at least a space suit - but there is really no point to it when everyone can survive the vacuum of space long enough to morph his clothes into an airtight garment.

With a wave of my hand I give the signal for the whole fleet to go on full acceleration, reducing the chance that our enemy can get a good target solution. “Let's give them hell. I want a course right past them and towards the star.”

Martin pumps his fist and salutes me. “Richtig so! Endlich wird zurückgeschossen! Ich habe eine Ewigkeit auf diesen Tag gewartet.”

I furrow my forehead. “What did you say?”

“I said-” he doesn't get any further, because Jenny kicks his shin hard enough to cause him to hop around on one foot.

“Don't recite quotes which can only give us bad Karma!” She huffs and crosses her arms in front of her chest.

I scan the faces of the others, but nobody is in the mood to enlighten me.

When I reach Fiona, she just shakes her head. “It's better to forget about it.”

“But I also want to know!” Silith complains.

Min clears her throat. “Children, be glad that you don't have to put up with the past. Some things are better forgotten forever, or those who want to think of themselves as better will keep reciting history for centuries.”

I raise a hand to stop my daughter. It's true that her personality is centuries older than mine, but her calling us - her parents - children, it doesn't sit well with me.

Our bickering gets interrupted when Samuel claps his hands together. “Attention! We are about to reach weapon range and the G.S. ships are up to something!”

I decide to solve the mystery later and concentrate on the enemy fleet. Several of the larger ships broke formation and are accelerating towards us. About five thousand ships in total. It won't be enough for a close-range engagement, but they will worsen our aim.

In space combat, where a battle is fought over distances which measure in lightseconds, everything is about being not where your enemy predicts you to be. Even high-energy lasers can miss if the target constantly changes its trajectory and speed.

“Change course, two degrees towards the planet.” If they want a good shot at us, then I am not against it. Fifteen thousand ships against five thousand do for a nice shoot-out.

As soon as the light of our own course change reaches the enemy, they decelerate, effectively countering my command. They want to engage us on their terms, relying on better technology, but they don't want us to plow right through their formation with superior numbers.

“That won't work. It's too early,” Martin suggests. “They have plenty of time to react to anything we do.”

I grumble and order the fleet to change its course back to the original vector. Sure enough, the advancing fleet immediately accelerates again, trying to be close enough to get a good firing solution while having a reasonable chance at evading our attacks.

On a second thought, it's now clear that they just want to test our range and accuracy.

Five minutes until we reach engagement range. Pursing my lips, I quickly do some math in my head. “Order the whole fleet to fire our railguns at a ninety-degree angle towards the planet. I want one minute of continuous fire with a randomized spread. Create a nice cloud of metal, but use only the smaller calibres with lowered energy, the ones with almost no muzzle flash. If we add our own current speed, then running into such a projectile will still be hell on any armour. I don't want them to see that we fired prematurely.”

Silith gets to work and Martin nods approvingly, understanding what I am trying to do.

Lisandra looks at me with raised eyebrows. “The railguns do nicely at close range, or as an active defence, but they are much too slow to have a chance at hitting at this distance. Isn't this a waste of irreplaceable ammunition?” She calls up the trajectory of our fleet and the enemy ships, with the cloud of metal between us. Even though our railgun technology isn't to be looked down upon, it's clear to the free eye that there is no chance for the projectiles to reach so much as the closest targets.

“Only if we miss.”

I order the fleet to accelerate away from the projectiles, exactly forty-four seconds from now, forcing the enemy fleet to accelerate too. If they don't follow us, then we will have wasted a little metal and there will be no engagement.

But if I am right, then they want to test our abilities, which means that they have to follow us. If they do, they will encounter our little cloud of pre-fired metal.

“They are accelerating,” Martin announces with a smug expression on his face, and we watch as the trajectories of the cloud and our enemy slowly align. “All that's left to do, is to wait. Although, I assume that they will make some last-second adjustments right before the outskirts of our formation hit effective laser range.”

I shrug. “The cloud should be big enough to clip them at least. It will be a mighty surprise when some of their ships blow up out of nowhere. Let's hold our fire until that happens, then we accelerate towards them to lengthen the time of the engagement. If we are lucky, they will be too shocked to react. A few seconds of indecision might be enough to take out a few ships for free.”

In space, everything is about the law of gravity. Something that goes at a certain speed keeps going until the end of time unless it encounters another object or its gravity well. We know that there are ways to travel with an inertia-less drive. Hob's ships are proof of that, but neither the G.S., nor us, nor the Cyber seem to know how it's actually done. We have a few theories. Sadly, none of them are really worth the effort. As far as we know, an inertia-less drive would require the energy of an artificial singularity with the mass of a small planet.

“They are changing their formation!”

Martin returns my attention to the tactical display. As the incoming ships close in on us, they spread out, separating into two, square-shaped strike groups. Each is about half a lightsecond deep, allowing most of their ships to fire at once as soon as they reach the outskirts of our formation.

I absent-mindedly order our ships to imitate the manoeuvre. “They are probably anticipating that something is up, but they don’t know what we did. A part of their upper strike group will pass right through the pre-fired shots. Let’s wait for the exact moment when their paths intersect with the projectiles, then we change course and concentrate our fire on the upper group. I want the engagement to last as long as possible.”

Long is a relative term in this case, but two seconds of effective weapon range is more than enough to put thousands of laser shots into their path.

I feel the floor beneath my feet vibrate before we have visible confirmation that our attack succeeded. The colony's reactors cause the vibrations as our engines are stressed to the limit.

We are acting on purely calculated data since our enemies are still several lightseconds away. Acting now is the only possible way to lengthen the encounter.

If everything works as planned, then our enemies will be hit by the cloud of projectiles right before they see us changing course. If their commander is distracted for long enough, then we might end up gaining a favourable position.

Three seconds later I get visual confirmation, even if the result of our attack could be better. Only a few dozen ships are outright destroyed in balls of fire, a mediocre amount for the number of ships which make up the enemy formation. But far more ships in the formation’s bottom half slow down as they stop accelerating. This results in the whole formation stretching out as the ships which didn’t pass through a hail of bullets continue accelerating.

“Only a few kills, but several of their ships seem to have engine troubles. A far more likely outcome when a micrometeorite punches through the hull,” Sam observes.

It's clear that we have to take this chance.

“Good. Target the part of the formation which is in trouble. I want them out of the game for good. Don’t give them the chance to repair the damage,” I order, feeling confident that this is the right choice. There is no way to tell how likely it is that the enemy ships are critically damaged. Without knowing their systems, I can only assume that the damage isn’t as severe as I might want it to be. Many ships may be able to regain their manoeuvrability in short order and I would have wasted a perfect opportunity to destroy them for good.

But as long as they are forced to drift without active acceleration, they are perfect for target practice.

We enter firing range with both attack groups. Space lights up between the two fleets as both sides stop manoeuvring in favour of allowing their sensor platforms to acquire target solutions. The waste radiation from our own weapons quickly makes it impossible to get accurate measurements and we stop firing. Instead, we return to taking evasive manoeuvres.

Once more, it takes several seconds for the lights of plasma weapons and laser fire to bridge the distance.

Some ships on our side wink out of existence as they get unlucky enough to run into concentrated fire. Several more get damaged and the reports start rolling in.

A grin spreads across my face as we get visual confirmation that the other side took far more casualties. The combination of their spread out formation and their slowing down allowed us to acquire far better firing solutions than the enemy.

At the same time, it's clear that we don't want a direct shootout with the G.S. vessels. The few shots that hit made it clear that their energy output is far higher than ours, or they are simply able to focus their weapons better.

“Send out ships to collect our wreckage and survivors. Let’s stay on this course for one or two hours as we fly deeper into the system. Then appoint a course change towards the star and ready the solar sails.”

Martin confirms the order, leaving me to marvel at the system message I just got.

G.O.D.: A fleet under your direct command destroyed a hundred enemy ships, over a thousand casualties! G.O.D.: You get one additional skillpoint for killing your enemies! G.O.D.: A fleet under your direct command destroyed a hundred enemy ships, over a thousand casualties! G.O.D.: You get one additional skillpoint for killing your enemies!

I whistle as the messages scroll by, announcing the destruction of over a thousand ships, as almost half of the beaten attack group got wrecked. Over the course of the war with the Cyber, I got quite a few skillpoints for being the king. Anything my subjects did counted in some way. But just now I got a full point for only a hundred ships. It seems like taking direct command reduces the required number to get an award from the system.

I suddenly realize that the whole system is only about the amount of my contribution. That's right! In my early days, I got upgrades for killing just a few people with my own hands! The more directly I am involved in the battle, the greater is the reward!

If that’s true, then I’ll get a whole shitload of points before this is over. My eyes wander greedily to the fleet which is still guarding the Prip homeworld. “Guys, are you thinking the same thing I am?”

Martin and Samuel nod while the women watch us with inquisitive expressions, not knowing what's going on between the three of us.