“We’ve met,” Edmund replied. “What do you know about Silverdrake?”
“They’re smaller than Powells, lighter, faster, more maneuverable and don’t have much endurance,” the G-3 replied.
“More maneuverable,” Edmund pointed out. “How fast do you think the shipyards, hell, not even the shipyards, the ships’ crews, could put some sort of landing platform on the back of the ballista frigates?”
“You’re thinking of sending them out on the frigates?”
“I don’t know,” Edmund replied. “But it’s one possible answer. They don’t eat as much as the Powells but they’re going to cut into the frigates’ stores some. On the other hand, we’re going to be sending out supplemental resupply ships with the fleet this time. Okay, the Powells take off and they attack the fleet. How?”
“Each division will be assigned a carrier to attack,” Babak said. “We’ll probably have them go in high to avoid the ballista ships.”
“Why attack the carriers?” Edmund asked.
“They’re the main threat from the fleet,” Babak pointed out.
“Which are hard to destroy in the face of the anti-dragon frigates,” Edmund said, calmly. “You see what I’m driving at. Check your assumptions. Does taking out the carriers first work better than taking out the frigates? Do we carry enough bomb-load to fight a prolonged battle? Why have all the dragons scattered over the fleet? Why not concentrate the whole force on individual ships? Is there some way for the mer, delphinos or selkie to attack? Is there some optimum formation for our ships whereby they can give cover to the carriers, and each other? Circles? Squares? Staggered lines? What happens if they punch their invasion fleet at the same time as their main fleet? These are questions that your staff should be asking each other and you should be asking them. And then you get the answers, or the best guesses you can come up with.”
“Think outside the box,” Babak said, nodding.
“Think outside the box,” Edmund said with a smile. “Speed above all else, surprise above all else, utter ruthlessness.”
“Sounds like a quote,” Babak said, half questioning.
“It is, from one of the greatest generals of all time,” Edmund replied. “Major outside the box thinker. And an utter bastard.” He grinned. “Just like me.”
“Now that is a bastard weapon,” Shar Chang said.
The device on the workbench consisted of five narrow metal tubes attached to a large metal cylinder. There were a series of linkages set off to one side.
Chang picked up the device and hefted it, swearing.
“Damn, it must weigh eighty kilos.”
“Seventy-three point four,” Evan said, nervously. “Loaded and ready to fire. In its current state it’s closer to seventy.”
“And it works?”
“It should,” Evan replied. “It’s in the weight range of the Silverdrake with a small rider. There’s no effective way we can determine to aim it, however, so they’ll have to close to point-blank range.”
“And the best place to cripple a dragon is in the primary muscles,” Vickie Toweeoo pointed out. She wore new major’s pips and her leather uniform now sported a Jolly Roger patch. “Which means a frontal approach. Technically the best shot would be to fly directly at the dragon and roll for firing. But I don’t think we’re going to be doing that much.”
“One of these in the leg or the rear end is not going to make their dragons very happy,” Shar pointed out. “It would be safer to close from the rear.”
“We’ll have to see, won’t we, sir?” Vickie replied with a grin. “What I’m wondering about is training. Most of the Silverdrake riders have volunteered for sea duty. I’m not surprised, we’re a bit more… weird than Powell lovers.”
“You’ve been riding Powells the whole war,” Shar pointed out.
“That’s because it was all we were using,” Vickie said and grinned again. “But I’m a Silverdrake rider at heart. Powells are too slow and clumsy.”
Having had some heart-stopping rides on the “slow and clumsy” wyverns, Shar was pleased that he’d never have to ride a Silverdrake.
“This is where you were hiding,” Edmund said, striding into the workshop. “EvanÑsaw the air-guns for the ballista frigates. Marvelous.”
“Simple application of air-pressure engineering,” the engineer said, grinning. “And they have at least the same loft as a ballista.”
“Any chance of making some infantry-sized ones?” Edmund asked.
“Not infantry,” the engineer sighed. “We found out what Mother’s upper limit on pressure is. And while she’ll let you go past it momentarily, such as during firing, you’d have to way overextend it to make a decent infantry-sized air-pack. Actually, she allows more energy in a longbow or a ballista than she does in a system like this. This is about as small as it’s going to get.”
“And that ain’t infantry.” Edmund sighed, looking at the -contraption. “We’ve got sixty Silverdrake. How fast can you turn these out?”
“All the parts are available,” Evan said, his eyes going glassy. “I’d say about ten a day, more if I can get some more hands.”
“Vickie, how fast to get the riders trained?”
“We don’t even know if it’s going to work, sir,” Vickie replied.
“Oh, it works,” Evan said in a distracted tone. “We test fired it already.”
“The point is that there’s a lot that can go wrong,” Vickie said, pointing to the firing linkages. “And we’re talking about a saltwater environment. What happens when one breaks? Does someone on the carrier know how to fix it?”
“I don’t know,” Edmund replied. “But you’re not going to be on the carriers anyway.” He pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to her. “This is the list of ships that are going to be refitted, by their crews in the next two days, to handle the Silverdrake.”
“You want us to land on ordinary frigates?” Vickie asked, glancing at the list. “Six of these are supply ships!”
“And when they convoy back to the base they’ll have top cover,” Edmund said, raising a hand. “Deal with it, Vickie. There’s no room on the carriers. We don’t have any more carriers for the Silverdrake. We need the Silverdrake. Ergo they have to go on other ships.”
“I just got these guys trained to land on carriers, sir,” the major protested. “What about LSOs?”
“The way you talk about Silverdrake I was thinking they’d land on the crosstrees,” Shar said with a grin.
“Thanks a lot, sir.”
“As the duke says, ‘figure it out,’ ” Shar replied, smiling. “I’d get with the captains, who are probably going to be highly pissed off, today. Then, when the ships are converted, get out there and start figuring it out. In the meantime, Evan will be turning out his little toys. As they become available you can start training with the new weapons. Speaking of which, Evan, they’re going to need ammunition.”
“Done,” Evan replied, reaching behind the device and picking up a short metal bolt with a cone-shaped end and a wickedly sharp barbed point. “We’ve got a machine shop that’s figured out how to turn these out in quantity. Each of the guns only has five rounds, so by the time the guns are ready, we’ll have all the bolts we need.”
“Those ships have stays at the rear,” Vickie said, suddenly. “They’re in the way for landing.”
Edmund grinned. “I didn’t say it would be easy.”
“If I thought it was easy I wouldn’t be here!”
A hundred and fifty arms were hauling on ropes, swaying a mast upwards as Edmund walked by the training area. It was raining and the ropes were slippery and tending to stretch. Not to mention that the carefully secured butt end of the mast was over a hole in the ground that was probably rapidly filling with water. He watched as the mast slowly ascended to about forty-five degrees and then at a bellowed command stopped.