ALTERNATE TALES OF THE
STAR FORCE
STAR BLAZERS—THE BATTLES
OF THE MAGELLENIC AND THE MILKY WAY
Being the eighth part of
THE NEW COMET--- BY: Frederick P. Kopetz
This Act is being completed with the
Cooperation and Assistance of Derek A.C.
Wakefield (as usual)
ACT ONE: FIRST BLOOD IN
THE SANZAR SYSTEM
I.
ENTER ADMIRAL
The
Edge of the Sanzar System
Wednesday,
July 1, 2207: 2141 Hours Earth Space-Time
After the news of June 21, 2207, the
The
waiting ended one tense night on July 1, 2207, around 2141 Hours. Then, first
contact was made between the attacking forces and the defenders when a Gamilon
mobile fleet of carriers and space battleships commanded by General Fraken
engaged a Cometine missile ship and carrier fleet that was simply huge.
The enemy force was commanded by the new Admiral Jena,
Invidia’s great new lover, from the decks of the Tyranjea, a new twin-deck command carrier that Invidia had given
him.
“Remember!” barked Invidia over the main screen, all
business now as she commanded the battle from the rear in the Eritz Gatlantis. “Preserve your forces
for the battle near Gamilon in case we have to destroy it; but only as a last
resort!”
“Of course,” replied
A moment later, one of his officers came up and said,
“Combined Gamilon and Earth fleet spotted! Range, two hundred gerad distance!”
“Launch planes!” snapped
“Launching
planes!” repeated the combat air group officer.
A moment later, the Tyranjea
began launching Scorpion attack boats and other fighter escorts as the fleet
sped towards the combined Gamilon and Earth force.
It was not long until the fighting began.
On his flagship, a Disk Command Cruiser known as the Alvagard, General Fraken of the
Gamilon-Garuman forces quickly took stock of the situation as he snapped, “All
Gamilon carriers, launch fighter and attack planes! Order the EDF carrier Shiryu to launch the second wave of
torpedo and attack planes to back us up!”
“Preparing attack mode!” snapped the helmsman on the Alvagard.
“Yes, General!”
snapped Fraken’s executive officer, a Gamilon known as Captain Jakal. “Gamilon
carriers one through five; launch at once! Cruisers and destroyers, screen the
carriers! Order the Shiryu to launch
sixty seconds after our launch!”
“Understood!” said the Captain of the first massive
Gamilon-Garuman twin tri-deck carrier Sahardta.
“Enemy forces attacking at high speed! Prepare to meet and oppose enemy boats
and planes!”
“Launching
planes!” snapped back the first Gamilon squadron leader as he prepared to take
off. “First squadron away!”
“First squadron away! Second squadron, backing us up!”
“Prepare for SMITE!” snapped Fraken as they gathered before
his flagship while he stood with his hand on the controls.
“Roger, Preparing for SMITE!” barked Leftenant Von Schiver,
the leader of the first torpedo squadron.
“ACTIVATE!” barked Fraken, who laughed evilly as the Gamilon
and Garuman planes faded away in white and pink flashes of light.
Soon, the Gamilon planes were launched, and they were
launched towards the Cometine fleet with their new and improved SMITE
technology.
Before Captain Dershal,
A
moment later, the Gamilon planes were appearing around his fleet in bright,
terrible flashes of pink light.
In a few moments, Gamilon planes were blasting torpedo after
torpedo into the Cometine missile ships.
Dershal was not a happy man, to say the least.
“Damn them!” he screamed as he tried to evade the enemy
planes. “Where are they pulling those planes from?”
“The Gamilons, it appears, have the intiative,” said an
underling of Dershal’s with a sick grin.
“Curse you!” he
screamed as he pulled out his weapon and shot the man. “Replace that Leftenant!
FIRE MISSILES!”
A moment later, his ship was firing every missile that he
could into the enemy planes’ midst. Many of them missed, but many of them found
their targets as Gamilon planes blew apart.
A few brave Gamilons kept their wits about them, evaded the
missiles, and made suicidal torpedo runs against the enemy ships, coming close
enough to launch their heavy torpdeoes, even as they came within range of the
enemy ships’ lasers.
“This
is Leftenant Gorling!” snapped a Garuman commander over the circuit. “I have
just successfully launched against the enemy squadron flagship! Major damage
reported! I…”
Then, Gorling screamed as enemy laser fire blasted into his
cockpit and right into his helmet, killing him even as he launched his plane
into a death-dive into Dershal’s bridge with a final desperate scream.
In a moment, his plane spiralled as a final deadly missile
into Dershal’s bridge, blowing him and his ship to bits in one massive
explosion.
Other Cometine ships of the first missile ship squadron
followed them into death.
They were helped into oblivion by EDF planes from the Shiryu, which caught up with them just a
moment later.
“All right!” yelled Lieutenant Blankovitz, the commander
from the first attack plane from the Green Hornets, working off the Shiryu. “We’ve got those guys right where
we want them! Now, let’s attack!”
Thus, twenty minutes into the battle, the Green Hornets went
into history as the first EDF planes to engage the enemy at Sanzar.
They
streaked in, smiling as they blasted apart Cometine ship after Cometine ship like
clay target pigeons.
“Not bad!” yelled Blankovitz as he laughed.
“Good going, Dennis!” laughed another pilot as he smiled
while blowing apart a Cometine vessel.
“This is not good!” said another pilot.
“What is it?” said Blankovitz.
“The Shiryu’s under
attack herself! Scorpions have just SMITE’d in all around her!”
“Crap!” yelled Blankovitz. “
“Roger that!” they snapped.
They
broke off their attack in just enough time to defend their beleaugered ship.
In the meantime, Scorpions were braving the pulse laser flak
from the Shiryu like suicidal madmen
and madwomen to heavily damage the Earth spacecraft carrier and her escorts.
The Shiryu was
surrounded, and her men and women were even firing the carrier’s main guns at
the Scorpion boats to try and repel them.
The tactic was working; somewhat.
The EDF carrier was quite badly damaged in spite of the
spirited battle her men and women were fighting,.
“What’s our situation?” demanded the Shiryu’s skipper from his bridge.
“Commodore Raful, we’re taking major damage!” snapped
Commander Shimaseki, his XO.
“Keep
us in this battle as long as we can!” he demanded. “We still need to recover
our planes!”
“I don’t know how long that will be possible, sir! If they
hit the engine room with those heavy missiles, sir, we’re done for!”
“We’re not gonna pull out yet!” snapped Raful as an
explosion went off outside on his ship’s foredeck, even as the Combat officer
yelled, “Number Two turret out of action! Many casualties inside the turret!”
“Keep us fighting, Kamlin!” yelled Raful.
“Yessir,” said the Combat Officer. “Trying to!”
“Maybe we should call for help, sir!” suggested Shimaseki.
“We’ve just lost another one of the cruisers!”
“Miss Turrell!” snapped Raful at his comm officer. “Call the
Argo! We need some backup!”
“Yessir!” she said as she made sure her headset was on
snugly. “Calling Iscandar now, coded frequency!”
In
the meantime, on the Argo’s bridge,
near Iscandar, the New Comet itself had been spotted on Gamilon’s long-range
defense network, and a signal had just been sent from Gamilon to the rest of
the fleet, which was in orbit around Iscandar and Gamilon.
“Confirmed!” said Nova from Analysis. “New Comet advancing;
distance, one-half a lightyear away from the edge of the Sanzar System.
However, analysis indicates that it seems to be slowing down.”
“My guess is that they’re here to watch the show,” said
Sandor.
“Have Fraken and Raful engaged anyone yet?” demanded
Commodore Wildstar from his post.
“Word from Desslok’s flagship,” said Homer. “He reports that
Fraken and our task force are in battle now.”
“So, it’s started,” said Derek as he bowed his head. “Homer,
what’s the situation?”
“Commodore Raful has just sent a call for help, and…”
The radar began bleeping a moment later. “Enemy fleet
spotted!” cried Sasha from the main radar. “Range, fifteen megameters, speed,
twenty space knots and slowing,” she snapped.
“Analysis!” said Nova. “Attack squadron of Black Nebulan
forces! Ten space battleships, two carriers, and many escorts! It looks like
they’re heading towards Iscandar!”
“Damn,” snapped Wildstar. “Ready main guns! Order Hardy,
Hartcliffe,
“Roger,”
replied Domon. “Readying main guns! Black Tigers and Trojans, stand ready to
launch!”
A moment later, the Black Tigers began to roar out of the
lower hatchway of the Argo while the
Trojans followed them out of the upper port and starboard launch bays. The Argo was soon surrounded by forty-eight
planes that blasted rapidly into combat.
“Good launch, people!” snapped Hardy over his mike. “Let’s
see if we can take out those carriers!”
Hartcliffe,
“Five megameters to enemy fleet!” came Homer’s voice over
their speakers. “Sasha says they’re closing fast!”
“You know the drill, people,” said
A moment later, they closed with the enemy carriers and
engaged. A few enemy planes were in the midst of launching, but it looked as if
the planes from the Argo had the
initative since very few enemy ships had launched.
Hardy led the attack, with his flight being the first ones
over the flight deck of the enemy carrier. Missiles blasted into the enemy ship
like rain; and the enemy warship was soon smoking in several places.
Not far away, Deke and Brew were administering the same
treatment to the second carrier. Bangs Capistrano gave Brew a big smile as she
planted two missiles right into the enemy carrier’s island structure,
demolishing its bridge.
“Yeah, baby!” yelled Brew with a big smile. “Sticks, let’s
pump a few more missiles into that Black Nebbie thing’s flight deck!”
“Roger that,” said Deke. “Good thing we got that information
from that Radnar guy about these ships in that transmission on the 26th. I
wonder where he is?”
“Maybe he’s messing up Invidia?” laughed Brew.
“Maybe,” said Deke. He wished Sasha was in combat with him,
but he couldn’t argue with the argument that right now, she was needed on the Argo more than anywhere else.
Soon, their carrier went up, followed by the carrier that
Hardy and Hartcliffe had been after. “Scratch two enemy carriers!” laughed
Bangs over the circuit.
“Crap, we have to go after those battleships!” snapped Deke.
“They’re firing at the Argo!”
A moment later, Hardy gave them the order to attack. They
began to fly towards the battleships while the Argo began taking damage from their heavy guns…
A
second barrage of Black Nebulan fire roared towards the Argo as the space battleship withstood the minor damage.
“Main guns locked on and ready!” snapped Domon. “Wave motion
cartridges ready!”
“Fire at will!” responded Wildstar from the Captain’s chair.
A moment later, the Argo’s
forward main turrets went off, followed by her aft main turret.
The missiles slammed into one of the Black Nebulan space
battleships, which blew apart with a satisfying explosion.
“Turret aberration, plus two degrees,” said Domon as he made
a minor adjustment. “Second target being acquired, locked!”
“FIRE!” barked Wildstar.
The Argo fired
again after her gun crews pumped in nine more wave motion cartridges.
The cartridges roared towards the enemy fleet on streams of
fire.
Most of them blasted right into the second heavy space
battleship, making toast out of its dense armor as the ship was blown to bits.
Wildstar smiled as it was blown apart.
“Enemy
escort fleet retreating!” snapped Sasha from her post.
“Looks to me like they’re getting ready to warp, Derek!”
added Nova from Analysis.
“Your guess?” asked Commodore Wildstar.
“Yessir, based on the energy signatures I’m picking up,”
Nova replied.
“Not if we can help it!” said Derek with an evil grin.
“Kitano, pursue them! Domon, have the Tigers and Trojans pick off as many as
they can before they return to base! Then, after they come back in, ready main
guns, regular fire!”
“Got it!” said Domon.
“Up to flanking speed,” said Kitano from his post.
“Increasing power to wave engine,” said Yamazaki from his
post.
At that, the Argo surged
forward, in hot pursuit of the small Black Nebulan fleet.
The Tigers and Trojans were recalled a moment later. After
the planes came back in, their ready rooms were full of pilots applauding,
clapping, and cheering at the kill rate while their planes were hastily
serviced and refuelled.
The Argo was
pounding at the Black Nebulan fleet with her main guns when Sasha gasped.
“Captain! They’re warping!”
“Crap!” Derek snapped as he banged his Captain’s desk.
“Estimated warp-out point,” said Nova from her post.
“Somwhere beyond the edge of the system…they’re running somewhere, Derek, but where? What’s out there?”
“Feed the coordinates to Kitano,” snapped Derek. “Then, to
the
“Yessir,” said Homer. “Hunch, sir?”
Derek
nodded.
A moment later, after signalling Iscandar (and assuring that
the Princess Astra and her escorts
would be on station), the Argo
prepared for a rapid space warp,
She and the
What they saw when they got there was…
….a big surprise.
“Look at that,” said Sasha as she changed the video panel.
“Some kind of floating fortress!”
“That’s their base,” said Domon.
“Nova, scan that thing from all angles,” snapped Derek.
“Sasha, track its course and speed. Domon…signal all planes to be ready for
takeoff…”
“Yessir,” said Domon.
“What are you thinking?” said Sandor.
“I’m gonna take them out before they get a chance to launch
any more ships,” said Derek as he stood up and shrugged off his peacoat. Eager
stood with him as they stood around Wildstar.
Derek nodded to Sandor and said, “Sandor, you’re in command
while I’m gone…Homer; tell Venture he has operational command over the rest of
this task group from the
“Derek?”
cried Nova as she ran up. “I don’t want you leading them, if it can be
avoided!”
“It’s my job,” said Derek.
“Are you sure it’s the right thing to do?” she insisted.
“You could get hurt out there in your fighter!”
“Nova, I’ll be fine, I’ll be in my Super Star…she’s the
fastest of our planes, and the most manueverable.” he said as he held her hands
and gave her a quick kiss. “Take the radar after you finish scanning that
fortress! I want Sasha in the plane with
“Yessir,” she replied with a nod, trying to hide her tears
as she did so.
Derek nodded at the group and ran out with Sasha.
“He’d better not leave me a widow; not now,” said Nova.
“I’m sure he’ll be just fine, Nova,” said Eager.
“He knows what he’s doing; he’ll be safe,” added Sandor.
“He’d better be,” said Nova as she wiped her eyes. “I don’t want
our children growing up without a father!”
“I can’t disagree with you, Nova,” said Homer.
Nova angrily wiped her eyes again and ran back to her post,
losing herself in her work so she wouldn’t have to worry.
Regardless, worry she did.
Even though part of her wanted to kill her husband about now…
A
short time later, Wildstar’s Super Star blasted off into combat from the aft
port catapult of the Argo, followed
by Hardy’s squadron, Hartcliffe’s squadron (which Wildstar took command of) and
Wakefield and Marrable’s squadrons.
“Range to the enemy fortress, two hundred megameters,” said
Nova over their headsets from the ship. “Speed, eight space
knots and slowing. They’re up to something.”
“Whatever it is, we’d better take them out fast,” said Derek.
“I’m in overall command! The
“Yessir,” said the other pilots over Derek’s headset.
“When we get in range, we’re attacking, and we’re attacking
fast!” snapped Derek as the Sun Tigers began to launch from the
A moment later, seventy-three planes roared off together as
one to attack the Floating Fortress.
They were expecting a battle; and a battle they would get…
II.
THE
The
Edge of the Sanzar System
Thursday,
July 2, 2207: 0032 Hours Earth Space-Time
Twenty minutes later, Wildstar’s planes had the Floating
Fortress in sight.
“Damn, look at the size
of that thing!” blurted out Contrail from his plane.
“Cut the chatter, second squadron leader!” snapped Cory
Conroy in his heavy accent. “Wildstar says the circuit’s
gotta stay clear!”
“All planes!”
snapped Wildstar from his cockpit. “We are 0.82 megameters away from the enemy
fortress! I’m picking up launches from that thing! Expect resistance!”
“What sorta launches?” barked Hardy from his plane.
“Fighters,” snapped back Wildstar. “Watch your entire area,
people! First wave launched!”
“Making contact to starboard!” yelled Deke from his plane.
“Sasha,
Deke
took a hard dive while Sasha’s stomach came up. Two Black Nebulan fighters had
spotted
“Uncle!” cried
Sasha from her post. “They’re after his plane!”
“Wildstar!” snapped
“Coming about!” yelled Wildstar as he did a hard flip.
Then, Derek snapped, “Hardy, we got a hairball here.”
“Ain’t a hairball, it’s a Goddamn pit bull fight!” whooped
Hardy as he fired some missiles at a Nebulan fighter of his own that he had to
contend with.
In
the meantime, in the the Black Nebulan ship, the alien pilot grinned evilly as
he got Wildstar in his sights.
“This will earn me eternal honor, getting the commander of
the Star Force! Damn that human!” he said.
The pilot laughed as he locked on and prepared to shoot red
energy into Wildstar’s belly.
Derek, as sly as a fox, let the pilot think he had him
before he flipped on his turboburners and abruptly put his Super Star up on its
tail.
“What?” hissed the Black Nebulan pilot.
“Damn that inferior organic; he is good!”
Wildstar and the Black Nebulan jockeyed for position again.
Both men were good pilots, but the Black Nebulan, who was named Lieutenant
Khimann, was beginning to admit that his Terran adversary was just as good as
he was.
Maybe better.
“You’re hard to pin down,” he hissed. “Got lock on you
again…how long do I hold it?”
Keep on following me, buddy,
thought Derek as he watched the pilot. Good.
I’m making you think I’m getting tired of this. Like hell I am! I have a wife
and kids to get home to. I don’t know what you have to come home to…an oil can?
They once autopsied you guys and found you were machines like the Technomugar.
What is it like, being a machine? Hope I never find out…
Derek whipped about and grinned as he got a lock on Khimann
while red energy bolts from another plane whipped all about him. “Now,
goodbye,” said Derek as he fired.
His nose guns went off, and he smiled as bursts of blue
energy whipped into the Black Nebulan’s cockpit.
There was a bright rose of flame, and Khimann screamed as
the fire burst into his armor and burned his natural head to bits as his
blue-grey skin shrivelled and crisped.
In a mere moment, he was dead and forgotten as Wildstar flew
his plane right through the ball of expanding gas that had been his plane and
went on to fight the next Black Nebulan commander.
And, they were now closer to the Fortress; only half a
megameter away from it now.
Soon, they would be ready to attack it.
Wildstar just hoped they got there before they launched a
major sortie. Even then, he saw a small squadron of ships blasting up out of
the Fortress’ dome.
He called the Argo
and said, “Sandor, they’re launching some kind of half-assed sortie; maybe ten
ships. They just warped! Tell Mark to expect company!”
“Acknowledged!” said Sandor over his headset.
From her plane, Sasha saw a precognitive image of the huge
dome closing and she cried, “Captain! We’re running out of time!”
“We’re almost done here!” said Wildstar. “We should be
pulling out and hitting that thing in maybe 120 seconds!”
A moment later, the enemy ships warped in near the Earth
task group. They were two space battleships along with eight escorts.
The
Argo soon had her guns turned on the
enemy fleet while, escorted by the new destroyers Hanley and Malenfant, she
opened fire on the enemy near a smallish moon of the Sanzar System’s outermost
planet.
A vicious gun battle soon ensured as the
On the Argo’s
bridge, the lights dimmed as the space battleship took her first actual damage
of the battle as a rocket anchor was blown off and a few circuits overloaded.
From his post, Sandor snapped, “Damage control units to the
bow area! Keep the fire from getting to the wave motion gun room!”
Men and women ran to their posts while Nova said, “Enemy
fleet all around us! Distance, two megameters! Oh, no! One of them is about to ram the Hamakaze!”
One of the EDF destroyers fired like mad as the wounded
Black Nebulan escort ship blasted in to ram, not caring about the consequences
as it smashed into the red and white space destroyer’s starboard side and
ninety men and women died in a ball of flame with the soulless mechanoid men
who were loyal to Skaldart and Invidia.
Nova gasped and shook tears out of her eyes as the Hamakaze’s end flashed across the Argo’s main screen. She thought, Please God, don’t let us end up like that! And
please watch over Derek! I hope he’s gotten them into that Fortress by now…
The Floating Fortress loomed before the sixty-nine pilots
that had made it this far through the first enemy wave of resistance.
It was a huge white and crystal construction with a huge
dome that was stuffed with carriers, battleships, escorts; the entire fleet
under Admiral Derdan’s command, ready to pounce on Iscandar and her few bases
in a landing operation that Invidia expected would be quick and vicious.
Skaldart, even now, was speaking with Derdan as he stood on
the bridge of his flagship, the Periandes,
ready to lead the sortie to Iscandar.
“How
goes the operation?” demanded Skaldart on Derdan’s pinkish, distorted screen.
“Ready to launch our great sortie and warp to Iscandar,”
said Derdan. “I have a small unit dealing with the Argo and the
“I heard from Ekogaru you have some resistance,” purred
Skaldart.
“Insignificant, my Lord,” laughed Derdan. “The Star Force
launched some fighter craft against us. They’ll soon be stopped when we close
the main dome, which I see we are doing now!”
“What about the sortie tunnel?” said Skaldart.
“We’ll have ships coming out of there like rain in about a minute!”
laughed Derdan again. “Sir, they’ll never get to us!”
“I am pleased. Remember. Capture Queen Starsha alive, if at all possible. If captured,
she is to be stripped at once and readied for the Sphere of Joy in the torture
chambers in the Eritz Gatlantis. A bounty to the man who brings her back here to my base ship in
chains.”
“I hope I am the one,” laughed Derdan.
He cut off as a trooper reported. “Sir!
Enemy planes detected!”
“Where are they? Probably trying to get into the dome?”
“No! The sortie tunnel, sir! We’re just ready to launch the
second wave, and they are getting in!”
“A minor concern,” said Derdan.
Wildstar had tried at the dome, but he had been frustrated
as the huge dome began to close.
Then, he and Sasha had spotted the tunnel.
“Follow me!” he snapped as he spotted the tunnel.
“Acknowledged!” said Hardy. “Tigers, let’s pounce on that
thing!”
“Yeah, man, I always wanted to ‘ave sex with a machine
dock!” sneered Hartcliffe.
“All planes, in through the tunnel, full speed!” snapped
Derek.
The Tigers followed Wildstar’s plane into the tunnel as
Derek’s heart sped up.
Several
Tigers roared along the outer carapace of the Floating Fortress as gun fire
raked at them, energy gun fire that came to naught as they neutralized the gun
posts.
Derek blasted through the tunnel, breathing hard as lights
whizzed past him in the dark.
A moment later, he was the first plane to emerge into…
…a floating dockyard that made the inside of the first Comet
Empire city seem small by comparison.
Ships of all sorts were inside the huge construction…
Spacecraft carriers…
Space Battleships…
Space Destroyers….
Space Cruisers…
Smaller Black Nebulan escorts of all kinds….
All
of them caught with their pants down as they prepared to launch and warp away!
All of them as easy as pie to begin shooting at as Tiger
after Tiger roared into the sortie tunnel to attack.
And, attack they did.
Deke and Brew fired eight missiles. Soon, with almost no
missiles left, they whooped as they saw carrier after carrier just blowing
apart.
“How many of them did we get?” whooped Deke.
“Don’t know, cuz, but this is almost better than screwin’
around with my lady!” laughed Brew.
“Did we really get them?” asked Sasha in shock.
“Damn straight we did,” said Deke.
“YEAH!”
yelled Hardy as he met up with his ex-student Flash Contrail as they blasted
apart a large part of the Fortress together. “Damn, this is better than practice!” laughed Hardy.
“You’re telling me,
sir!” laughed Flash as he roared up beside Hardy and gave him a thumbs-up as
Jeff attacked two docked Black Nebulan space battleships.
“How many did we get?” yelled Conroy over the circuit.
“I just gang-banged five destroyers,” said Hartcliffe. “Wham, bam, thank you, MA’AM!”
“I did you better!” mocked Bangs on another circuit as she
laughed. “Three battlewagons, shot to hell in a minute!” she laughed.
Bangs winced as one of her squadron mates went up in a ball
of flame. “Damn, poor Weyland!” she yelled.
“Use up your missiles, and get some more!” said Hardy.
“Wildstar wants to pull out in a minute!”
“Already?” laughed Hartcliffe. “Just when
it was getting good!”
“We’re starting a firestorm!” yelled Wildstar on the
circuit. “Now, for phase two! All planes, follow my lead and out
the way we came! They can’t sortie now! Back to our ships!”
“What’s phase two?” said Sasha from her post as the Tigers
began to pull up.
“I guess you weren’t at that briefing,” laughed Deke. “Phase
two is where the fun really begins!”
“Can’t wait to see what it is,” said Sasha…
TWENTY-FIVE
MINUTES LATER…
0118
Hours….
“You made it!” cried Nova as she hugged Derek on the Argo’s bridge.
“We sure did,” he said.
“Boy, is that thing burning,” said
Kitano as he looked on. The task force was only three megameters away from the
burning Floating Fortress now.
“Now, phase two,” said Wildstar.
“Prepare for a short space warp! Get us to within a megameter of that thing
before it can move…”
“Calculating course,” said Nova from her post.
“Prepare to warp, all
hands!” said Derek over his microphone. “Then, we take final action…”
“Which is?” said Domon.
“Guess,” said Derek.
“I think I like this,” he replied….
A
moment later, the Argo warped yet
again, followed by the
Destination, near the Floating
Fortress.
Destination, the place where they would take action at last…
“What happened to you?”
demanded an enraged Skaldart over the circuit to Derdan.
“Sir, they jumped us,” said Derdan. “I didn’t know that
their fighters were that potent! We have taken major damage!”
“How bad?” hissed Skaldart.
“Two-thirds of our ships, destroyed. One third,
badly damaged. My own ship has…”
“Launch your sortie.”
“Sir?” said Derdan.
“Launch, and finish off Iscandar! You still have enough
there to hit a few bases! Get out of that base ship now!”
“We’re damaged! We…”
On the Argo, the main guns moved up majestically as they trained, followed
by the guns of the
“One megameter away from the Floating Fortress!” said Nova from
her post.
“Wave cartridges ready,” said Nishina from his post.
“Ready to fire at will,” said Domon. “Rosstowski is also
ready on his ship!”
“FIRE ALL GUNS!” snapped Wildstar. “Target,
Floating Fortress!”
The Argo and the
A
barrage approximating 21% of the energy of the Argo’s wave gun roared out of both space battleships.
The shells plunged into Derdan’s Fortress and blew him apart
in mid-conversation with Skaldart.
Finally, at 0130 Hours, the first phase of the battle was
over.
Almost four hundred enemy ships and a huge base were
destroyed by the Earth forces.
Iscandar was thus saved from an invasion that had been
readied.
There was still more fighting to come, but Phase One of the
And the
At least…they had won the first round…
TO BE CONTINUED….
To Return to the Introduction to The New Comet, click here