Chapter 9

As the Chinese 2 dreadnoughts 20 cruisers and 40 frigates of the Chinese fleet accelerated towards the Leviathans the people on every ship reported to their battle stations, checked and rechecked their posts in the hopes that a little bit more preparation would allow them to survive the coming fight. With just her own ships in the battle she only had numerical superiority and was not even close to matching her enemy in tonnage. Inwardly cursing the politicians back in Bejing that had ordered her to stay so far from the other fleets Admiral Zetian could only focus on the battle in front of her rather than the politicians at home.

Nearly 130, 000 kilometers from each other the Chinese fleet opened fire first on the Kraken. The kilometer-long dreadnoughts of the Chinese fleet coordinated their fire with their smaller cruisers and even frigates in order to bracket the massive Alien on all sides. With the older of the Chinese Dreadnoughts having 48 guns and the newest having 60 there were over 100 15-kg slugs and hundreds more 5 kg solid slugs heading towards the massive creatures at a fraction of the speed of light.

Unfortunately, due to the incredible distances involved it still took more than 30 seconds for the slugs to reach the enemies, and even with hundreds of rounds heading towards it the large ship was still able to evade most of the smaller rounds and all of the dreadnought rounds by heading in a downward direction relative to its position.

With the Kraken now moving and another 108 dreadnought slugs accompanied by hundreds of cruiser and frigate rounds moving towards it, the Leviathan found itself quickly running out of directions it could dodge in. Most of the rounds were leading the Kraken and the massive creature was not so nimble that it could simply stop its momentum and start moving in a different direction.

The Chinese gun crews of course knew this and planned for it, during the years of planning it was agreed by every major power that forcing a ship to move was the first step in a battle. Once it was in motion in any direction it wasn’t easy to redirect millions of tons of steel or in this case flesh and you should have a better idea of where it will be for the 2nd or 3rd salvos. This was also part of what would hopefully make stealth ships so useful, if they could tell their fleet which engines were firing and when, it would be easier to predict their evasive movements.

However, with no stealth ships in its Navy the Chinese gun crews would have to simply trust in their computers for the most likely directions their enemy would dodge and hope that the gigantic creature wouldn’t be able to dodge all the incoming fire.

Most of the next 108 dreadnought rounds were aimed at all the most likely places the ship would be in 25 seconds, and not where it was now. With only a few rounds aimed at the enemy itself the Kraken slowed its downward momentum as best it could and attempted to change its course to an eastward direction.

6 of the dreadnought slugs impacted the ship, with 2 of them being glancing hits to the creatures face. The other 4 rounds were almost all dead center. If the crew was hoping for a titanic explosion or the front of the Leviathan caving in, they were unfortunately disappointed.

One slug simply slammed into the creatures face with barely an entrance wound and a murky liquid exited the hole created by the rounds but there was no other visible damage. The remaining 3 slugs hit the Kraken and made small entrance wounds as well, these however were followed by larger exit wounds on the sides of the Krakens head as the slugs couldn’t penetrate the dense inner flesh of the Alien and ricocheted off into space.

A few seconds later the two Dreadnoughts guns spoke a 3rd time. With the Leviathan having bled off most of its momentum and sitting almost unmoving it was an easy shot to make and both of the ships once again sent another 108 slugs, this time the hundreds of smaller slugs from the cruisers and frigates began landing as well.

With the hundreds of slugs approaching it from multiple angles the Leviathan did it’s best to dodge, but its great bulk worked against it and it was only able to dodge a third of the shots. Of the almost 100 rounds to slam into it only a dozen dreadnought rounds were able to find their target and impact into the front of the creature, while the rest of other railgun rounds impacted the front and sides of it.

Feeling excited at being able to score hits against their foe the ships redoubled their efforts and fired more and more rounds at it, and while the creature was clearly being damaged, large gashes were being rent in its face and sides, entire sections of the creature were being torn off and dark liquids were pouring from the large holes in its body. The beast was however nonetheless still alive and still dodging.

While the Chinese fleet was firing everything they had against the Kraken in front of them, the rest of the creatures opposite them were preparing themselves as well. When the Chinese fleet was within 80 000 Kilometers they acted. As one the Guppies faces opened and 6 jagged holes ripped open.

The holes themselves were 6 meters across and looked like tears on their faces. Tears with dozens of tentacles and rows of teeth in them. If an observer had been looking at just the right angle they would have also seen something deeper inside, a pointed mass of flesh with a glowing red tip.

From the holes in their faces lances of directed energy weapons reached out and towards the Chinese fleet. Immediately across the Fleet the beams began touching the ships, and where they did, they began scoring shallow gashes the hulls of their ships, destroying smaller point defense weapons and sensor emplacements.

Aboard her Flag Ship Admiral Wu Zetian was feeling optimistic. Although there were dozens of damage reports coming in across her ship none of them looked to be regarding critical systems, even the smaller ships on the fleet seemed to be fairing well against their enemies’ weapons. She had been confused by the larger ship not even attempting to return fire but now that she had seen how the Guppies had needed to expose their inner hulls in order to fire she thought she understood why. With so much fire heading towards it the Kraken had decided it couldn’t use its main weapon without the weapon being destroyed instantly so it simply absorbed fire. Now she had to decide should she have her fleet continue to open fire on the Kraken suppressing its fire hoping to outright destroy it or begin firing on the Guppies and hoping the Kraken decided not to expose itself.

Now that she was reliably scoring hits on the largest of the ships it was time to deal with some of the smaller enemies.

Ordering each of her fleets task forces to target a specific Guppy she watched as her ships began to target the different creatures. Leaving just her own dreadnought and 2 of its escorting cruisers and 4 frigates to continue firing at the Kraken, by now her own ships fire was reliably hitting the Kraken so she felt comfortable splitting her fleets focus.

With the distance between their fleets rapidly shrinking it was becoming easier and easier to target the enemies. This was fortunate as their enemies, aim was unerringly accurate and while the damage from the enemies, energy weapons was minor, especially against her larger ships damage was slowly building up over time. Several frigates had been severely damaged and even a cruiser had lost two of its four turrets.

As her ships fired their guns at their targets the results were less inspiring than Admiral Zetian had hoped for. Although her other Dreadnoughts fire had managed to impact one of the Guppies head on with several direct hits and large gouges and rents had been opened in their enemies faces. The creature was nonetheless in one piece and firing from whatever weapons were undamaged. If she had hit one of her own dreadnoughts with as much force as she hit one of these ships with it would be in pieces, but these were still functional, even if they were bloodied and battered.

Looking at the damage reports Admiral Zetian did some quick calculations and realized at the rate they were dealing damage, versus how much they were receiving it was unlikely that much of her fleet would be able to escape this engagement alive.

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“Weps, have all of our ships begin using the light anti-ship rounds, have them focus their fire on the enemy’s weapons, attempt to disable weapons rather than destroy ships. Use a close-range deployment detonation.” If they could knock out most of their enemy’s weapons perhaps they might be able to escape in better order. “Also order all ships to begin spinning, we can’t dodge laser fire but we can at least prevent them from hitting the same spot continuously.”

The order received it started being disseminated throughout the fleet and ship by ship they switched their ammunition and began their evasive maneuvers.

The Slugs that her fleet had been using up to this point were simple solid conical shaped masses of depleted Uranium with a dart shaped Tungsten tip on the front. Excellent for penetrating the heavy armor of Human warships. Unfortunately, when they hit and Leviathan flesh they seemed unable to cause more than superficial damage. The lighter anti-ship rounds were very different.

A steel cone shaped round that instead of being solid, was filled with fist sized ball bearings made of depleted uranium and a small charge at the back of the round. The round was designed to be fired normally but when they reached a preset distance from their ship the charge would detonate, and the ball bearings would erupt from the shell in a cone in front of them at incredible speeds like a 15 kilogram shot gun shell.

They were designed for use against ships that were far enough away from that they would be able to dodge a standard round. With the balls reduced mass they couldn’t damage the hull of large capital ships, but they were far more likely to hit their enemies at all, and they were excellent for destroying weapon emplacements or incoming missiles. With a close-range detonation Admiral Zetian was ordering their crew to allow the weapons to get extremely close to their enemies before detonating. This would hopefully allow the ball bearings inside to be more tightly packed together and make it more likely that they could knock some of their enemies weapons out of commission.

As the first dreadnought sized shells reached their target and exploded in front of the Guppies showering them with hundreds of balls, the difference between the solid slugs was immediately apparent. With the ball bearings slamming into the front of the Enemies a handful managed to find their way into their insides where they tore flesh away from the Guppies laser weapons. Even the ball bearings that did not manage to find their way inside still ripped the outer flesh of the guppies away in large chunks. On each of the Guppies the task forces were targeting many of their weapons were quickly destroyed and their outer hulls were ripped away far more effectively than Admiral Zetian had predicted.

Large pieces of the enemies were torn off and a dark liquid was pouring out of the front of them. The Guppies that had been targeted turned away from the fleet trying to hide their damaged sides and returning fire.

Seeing the effectiveness of their weapons Admiral Zetian ordered her fleet to begin firing weapons free. Instead of coordinating their fire to try and destroy the targeted enemy as quickly as possible, ships would now fire at whatever target was closest, or their Captain ordered them too. It was more important that they reduce their enemies’ weight of fire more than it was for them to destroy them outright.

Still even with this success the situation looked grim. While she had learned how to most effectively damage the Guppies they had learned too. At the start of the battle the Guppies lasers played over the hull of her ships, but as time went on their fire became more concentrated as multiple lasers combined their efforts to quickly pierce a ships hull. Soon after that they started targeting the weapon turrets on the Chinese ships and even though the turrets were extremely well armored very quickly guns began to be melted into scrap metal and occasionally exploding killing crew and crippling vessels.

Of her ships almost a third had received some damage to either their weapons or engines, another third had been outright destroyed or crippled. There were Large gashes in ships hulls that oxygen and smoke was pouring out of as damage control crews attempted to save their ships. Some ships that had been all but destroyed were still able to fire from a few turrets that were functional, others were launching some scattered missiles that were quickly shot down, hoping that they could destroy or damage their enemies or save their friends. The final third of her fleet had at least slight to moderate damage, the dreadnoughts were fortunately faring better with their far thicker armor but even they had multiple small hull breaches as Guppies attempted to focus their fire.

The creatures were faring better than her own fleet but now that they were focusing on disabling weapons rather than outright destroying them the Chinese were having more luck. 15 of the Guppies had stopped firing or were only firing intermittently, their fronts a mass of gaping holes leaking fluids with a white armor visible underneath and they were now seeking shelter behind their larger brethren. The rest of the Guppies had each taken some damage but were still capable of firing.

By now the two fleets were practically within spitting distance of each other and Admiral Zetien estimated there was enough time for just one more salvo before her own fleet passed through the Leviathans.

“Weps, have all ships launch their full compliment of missiles. Prioritize the creatures that have taken the least amount of damage.”

While it was American Capital ships that prioritized missiles and drones, and Chinese ship doctrine focused on building the largest capital of ships with the largest guns, they nonetheless had at least some missiles on their cruisers and dreadnoughts to give them some long-range punch. In this case the Chinese Admiral was hoping that the with the Leviathans being disorganized by the battle and some of their weapons having been destroyed she would have a bit more luck getting her missiles to land solid hits.

As he fleet passed through the Leviathan position and began accelerating away across her fleet missile hatches blew open and missiles were accelerated out of their tubes on magnetic rails before their engines took over. Even as close as they were the Guppies and Kraken reacted almost immediately.

Weapons were redirected to the new threats and missiles were shot down by the dozen as the Kraken itself began to move. The Kraken had simply been dodging the incoming fire as best it could all battle long but now along the back of the Kaken dozens of new holes began to open. Teeth and tentacle were visible in the holes, and out from the new orifices beams of energy speared out swatting down missiles by the dozen.

Out of the almost 250 missiles that had been fired at point blank range only 29 managed to land solid hits. Unfortunately, while the creatures that were hit had their outer skin blacken and shriveled most of the creatures were still intact. There were a few instances where multiple missiles managed to hit a target, each subsequent missile doing more and more damage. But by the end only 6 Guppies had been completely destroyed by the fleet action with the rest still being mobile if extremely damaged.

With most of the Chinese fleet still accelerating their speed was such that they were able to quickly put distance between themselves and the Leviathans. They also kept up a steady salvo of fire hoping to dissuade the Leviathans from giving chase. Fortunately for the Chinese the Leviathans turned to face a new threat.

The promised missile barrage from the American carriers had arrived. 1000 missiles moving far faster than the Chinese missiles. Unfortunately, it seemed the Leviathans were holding back a bit as they were able to start shooting missiles down when they were much further away, almost 100 000 km. The extra time allowed the Kraken on its own to shoot down over 700 missiles with the lasers able to fire almost nonstop sweeping back and forth leaving a trail of destroyed missiles as it went. The Guppies that had surviving weapons added their weight of fire to the defense and the few dozen missiles that did make it through were only slightly more effective than the Chinese missiles.

Most of the missiles that arrived were the far less effective kinetic missiles, rather than nuclear weapons. Instead of simply detonating on contact the nuclear missiles rammed the Guppies and embed themselves into their hulls. This allowed far more of the destructive potential of their warheads to be used. As the explosions released their energy the scanners on ever human ship in the system were blinded. When the radiation cleared another 12 Guppies had been destroyed and even the Kraken had large parts of its hull blackened and scorched. But even with 1000 missiles deployed on a disorganized and injured enemy just over half of the enemy remained still functional and untouched by the barrage.

As the Leviathans surveyed the battlefield several of the creatures approached the drifting Chinese vessels. Using their tentacles, they tore open the ships like rusty tin cans. Crew members were cast into space, some wearing their emergency gear, some not, but all of them were quickly skewered by the Guppies as they passed. The crew on the ship fared no better as tentacles methodically searched the ships pulling any people they found apart or simply sucking them screaming into other tentacles to be pulled into the creatures. The wreckage itself was being eaten by the Kraken and some of the damaged Guppies so engrossed they were in that the Chinese vessels were able to retreat in as good order as could be hoped.

All too soon the battlefield was a deserted graveyard filled with hulks of ruined ships, the dead, and dying

The survivors of the Chinese fleet were in full retreat. With 13 of their 20 cruisers and 32 of their 40 frigates destroyed and every single surviving ship having at least moderate damage with many more requiring extensive repairs to make them battle worthy again Humanity had its first contact with life from outside the system, and it was a terrible defeat.