When Oscar checked the tactical display, he saw there were already more than two thousand Prime ships in-system. “Keep harrying the wormholes for now. Fleet command will let us know if they want us to switch tactics.”
“Captain,” Hywel said. “More wormhole activity.”
“Where?”
“Our hysradar is picking up an emergence…four hundred and eighty thousand kilometers out from the star’s corona.”
“Where?” Oscar thought he’d misheard.
“Directly above the sun.”
Oscar focused on the tactical display that was reconfiguring to show the latest development. Sure enough, a wormhole had opened close to Hanko’s G-class star. As he watched, ships started to slide through. “Fire a pair of Douvoirs at it,” he ordered, even though he knew it was pointless; it would take the Douvoirs a couple of minutes to reach the new invasion point. “What the hell are they doing there?”
“I don’t know,” Hywel said.
The level of tension in Wilson’s office was actually higher than it had reached during the first Prime invasion. Five minutes in, and Wilson was already contemplating doing his deep breathing exercise routine.
All of the Big15, as well as the fully developed worlds, had been mass-producing components for the missiles ever since the first invasion. The cost had been phenomenal, as much as the entire Moscow-class fleet. Even Dimitri had been satisfied about the level of protection they’d wrapped around Commonwealth planets over the last few weeks. Now it looked as though once again they had seriously underestimated the Primes.
The Douvoirs were taking too long to get out to the wormholes. Fleet Command, operating from a center several floors below his office in Pentagon II, was working on eventual scenarios the Primes would use to attack the planets, massed waves or an all-in-one blitz. With the ships still flooding through, they were reserving judgment; but either way there were serious limits on how many the planetary defenses could fend off, even when assisted by navy ships.
Evacuation had already been proposed several times. Wilson hated having to suggest that to the planetary governments and CST, but he was fatalistic enough to see that was the way the invasion was shaping up.
Physically, Wilson had been joined by Anna, of course, and Rafael. Dimitri had also been on standby in Pentagon II, and was slouched in one of the chairs, watching the holographic specks of light whirl around him. So far he’d said very little, occasionally contacting his team in StPetersburg to discuss the pattern of the attack. From the Seattle Project, Tunde Sutton and Natasha Kersley were attending via an ultra-secure link. Holographic images of President Doi and Nigel Sheldon had also materialized on either side of Wilson. So far the President had said very little; Nigel’s worried expression was almost accusatory.
“Confirmed forty-eight points of attack,” Anna said. “They’re all in phase two space except for Omoloy, Vyborg, Ilichio, and Lowick.”
“Roughly the distribution we expected,” Dimitri said. He didn’t press the point. It was his team that had been instrumental in deciding the distribution of the planetary defenses and allocating starships to complement them, choices that had so far proved remarkably accurate. Only nine of the worlds under attack were without starship coverage.
Wilson took a moment to study the strategic display. The office projectors were showing Commonwealth space as a rough sphere just over two hundred light-years across with a very erratic boundary. The Prime invasion was a hemispherical scarlet stain, centered around the Lost23, and intruding nearly ninety light-years inward.
“They’re trying to gain Wessex again,” Nigel said.
“Can you use CST wormholes to deflect them?” Rafael asked.
“I’ll look into it,” Nigel said. His image froze.
When Wilson flicked his attention to Wessex, the display expanded, showing him the Tokyo above the Big15 world, and Douvoir missiles chasing after Prime wormholes, never to catch them. Over four thousand ships were already in-system. There at least they would meet a formidable resistance. The industrial facilities in orbit around Wessex were all heavily protected with force fields, atom lasers, and their own close-range interceptor missiles. Multilayered force fields had roofed over Narrabri. Big aerobots patrolled at high altitude. It had more orbital defense stations than any other planet.
“When are you going to use the quantumbusters?” the President asked petulantly.
“When the tactical situation allows for it,” Wilson told her. “It’s designed to use against primary targets or close-clustered ships. Neither of which we have at the moment. The Prime ships are all flying away from each other. They’ll regroup eventually, as they close on our planets.”
“You mean it’s useless?”
“In these circumstances it is of limited effectiveness,” Natasha said.
“Somebody tell me we will be able to use it effectively.”
“When their ships begin to congregate again, then we’ll be able to deploy them with some success,” Dimitri said.
Doi gave him a vicious look.
“I’d emphasize that even switched to a minimal effect radius, we shouldn’t activate a quantumbuster within a million kilometers of any inhabited world,” Natasha Kersley said. “That’s the absolute minimum safe distance. Even if it only has the mass of a single Prime ship to work with, the radiation output would be seriously detrimental to the biosphere. They are doomsday weapons, Madam President. They were never intended to be used in dogfights.”
“You think we shouldn’t have issued them to the navy starships for this?” Doi asked.
“I designed them, I advise on their use,” the physicist said. “Ultimately, the situations in which they are deployed are a political decision.”
“Thank you, Natasha,” Wilson said before the argument and recriminations got out of hand.
“Additional wormhole activity,” Anna said. “Prime wormholes opening near the stars of the planets they’re invading. Damn, they’re emerging close; approximately half a million kilometers above the corona. Seventeen of them have appeared so far.”
“Above the stars?” Tunde asked, frowning. “I don’t understand. What’s coming through?” The faint waves of color surrounding him rearranged themselves quickly, displaying the hysradar returns of starships scanning the new development.
“Plenty of ships,” Anna said. “Everyone is launching Douvoir missiles; the wormholes will be closed down in minutes.”
“Moved,” Dimitri said. “They’ll be moved in a few minutes.”
Tunde and Natasha exchanged a few words. “I don’t like the positioning,” Tunde said. “It’s constant, look. The wormholes are all opening above the equator of the star, and they are directly in line with the habitable planet of the system. In other words, it’s the closest part of the star to the planet.”
“Meaning?” Rafael asked.
“I don’t know, but it cannot be coincidence. Admiral, we really need to know what’s being sent through.”
“Could it be something like a quantumbuster?” Wilson asked. The question generated a few moments of complete silence in the office. Wilson glanced at Nigel’s frozen image; the Dynasty chief was still dealing with Wessex. Wilson wondered what the hell he was doing there that was more important than this.
“I can’t answer that,” Tunde said. “Obviously it is a possibility.”
“What could a quantumbuster do to a star?”
The physicists looked at each other, neither of them willing to take the lead. “It would cause quite a disturbance to the photosphere,” Tunde said. “There might even be some impact on the top of the convective zone. But the overall damage would be minimal.”