Chapter 8: The Asteroid

Six hours later the attack was launched. The first force of dogs and Marine AIs entered the defense fleet ships and captured the senior officers and Mob leaders. They replaced the crews with skeleton crews and sent the ships to Porquenta.

Simultaneously the platforms were disabled by the explosive charges previously planted by the dogs and Marine AIs. A small second force of dogs and Marine AIs ensured that any remaining functional platforms were disabled.

The larger third force consisting of dogs carrying Mech warriors, Marine AIs, and Marines entered the asteroid.

Jason, Andrea, and Linda sat looking at the hologram of the inside of the asteroid. They had multiple video streams from the dogs, Marine AIs, and the Mech warriors. It was a huge space that had been carefully carved out. The interior was of dense iron ore. Large fingers projected out, emerging from the sixty yard thick walls. They projected six to eight miles towards the center with further docks attached to them at right angles. It was a hive of activity as they had counted four super carriers, fifteen battleships in various stages of completion, one hundred fifty cruisers, fifty destroyers and tens of thousands of shuttles and gunships. Near the rear of the facility was a large barracks that could house fifty to sixty-thousand troops.

The super carriers and battleships were so large that they were berthed at long docks parallel to the walls right at the end of the largest docks.

There were cannon and missile emplacements in pockets around the walls facing inwards. Holes could be seen in the walls that led to the outside cannon and missiles. Near the barracks, tethered to the docks, were thousands of gunships and shuttles. Internally on the docks and in the facilities there was gravity, and they had noted shield projectors.

Just inside close to the doors were two large fingers projecting from the walls each having similar sized barracks with cannon and missiles facing the doors and also facing outwards. The doors themselves had two leaves and were supported by twenty massive hinges on each side, with enormous motors attached to mechanical rams to open and shut the doors. The doors were three yards thick made of a dense alloy very similar to the shielding of the ships.

A fourth force of similar composition landed on the surface of the asteroid, on the planetary side of the doors. The doors were protected by cannon, missiles and had dense point defenses. They had noted very large shield projectors with adjacent boxes a yard wide by a yard high, of unknown function. They began to lay explosives next to the weapon systems, gravity projectors and the unknown boxes. Boarding drills on tripods were also attached to the doors with explosives on each hinge.

Electronic chatter was suddenly detected from within the asteroid and seconds later a dense shield was projected outside the asteroid and inside over the docks. Troops quickly began pouring out of the barracks with gunships and shuttles being launched. As they launched the shield opened and shut to facilitate their passage.

On the outside of the asteroid gunships emerged from pockets behind hidden doors followed by Marines pulling what turned out to be a mix of heavy weapons. The outside dogs and Marines alternately began to attack the gunships and outside Marines disabling them. They then discovered the purpose of the unknown boxes. They were ion weapons which disabled all the dogs in their proximity.

The ship lost all feed from both inside and outside the asteroid as the shield formed and electronic countermeasures were activated. Jason continued to receive images from Rover. He saw the dogs both inside and outside the asteroid lose consciousness in droves. He continued to receive a few images from inside the asteroid. Rover indicated to Jason that the trans-dimensional energy tap that the dogs relied upon, was largely blocked by the shields. It did not kill them, but rendered them unconscious at worst and ineffective at best.

As Jason received the information he relayed what he saw to the table.

“Fire shield buster missiles and then target the following area,” Andrea said and pointed to an area that would not expose the troops to danger.

“Continue to target the shield until we have cleared a big enough area for the dogs to function. As soon as we have communication with our troops order them back from the doors after they have used their explosives which should be in a minute’s time, but no longer. By then we should have some of the shield down. Fire missiles at the doors. There is no easy way to win this now. Bring the ships to the agreed coordinates. Launch gunships and fighters, I can see fighters and gunships coming up from the surface. Target all surface positions where you see ships originating. Target all surface ships as they leave the atmosphere.”

Jason began to seek out telepathic Marines in order to obtain information as the feeds from the dogs were weak and fluctuated. Jason found a number of telepathic assault Marines on the surface of the asteroid and instructed them to detonate whatever explosives they had in place and move away from the doors. He noted that they had gained telepathic control of the attacking forces. He saw many unconscious dogs floating outside the asteroid.

Jason then moved his attention inwards. He found Colonel Janet Malone who he informed that they were going to attack the shield and then the door as had been agreed and to deploy the troops accordingly.

Jason looked through Janet’s eyes. He saw dogs floating around with Marines attempting to gather them while they were being attacked by shuttles and gunships. He also saw gunships attacking groups of dogs, with Mech warriors attempting to defend them. The attacks in all areas were stalled except for the internal attacks on the weapon positions on the walls and in the passage ways leading to external weapons. He related to Andrea and Linda what he saw.

“They have a formidable general or admiral in command of this facility. The design of the defenses has been outstanding and we have been out maneuvered because they neutralized the dogs. We have not been able to get anywhere near the control center at the back of the facility, or the secondary control facility near the doors,” said Linda.

From the ship they observed explosions on the hinges and several shield generators near the doors.

“We will hit the shield in 3... 2... 1 ... now,” said Andrea. He saw multiple explosions on the shield and watched the shield power fluctuate and decrease, but they did not knock out the shield.

“All ships with large anti-shield missiles target the asteroid’s shields at the following coordinates and follow up with targeting the door and its surrounds. Disable missiles that get through the doors or re-route to adjacent to the door if there is time. We need to clear the shield projectors in that area. The War AI on this ship is to supervise fire control,” said Andrea.

They carefully watched the hologram. They saw more explosions on the asteroid surface. Finally, a small area of shield blinked out, near the doors and unexpectedly another section some distance away.

Jason projected himself back to Colonel Janet Malone inside the asteroid. She appeared elated.

“Jason, our cyber warfare group that accompanied the Marines to some of the external emplacements have managed to tap into the computer system and have shut down a tenth of the weapons and the shield on the side opposite the planet. They are attempting to penetrate further into the system. Several other groups have begun taking over gun emplacements both internally and externally. If you look through my eyes you will see that the dogs are slowly recovering,” said Janet.

“We have hit the shield on the outside with little effect so far and are going to hit it harder as it takes a lot to knock it out. It’s very dense and the dogs cannot penetrate it. They must have a substantial power generation system. Maybe your guys can switch it off?”

Jason then showed her what he saw on the surface and the ships coming up from the planet. Their gunships and fighters from the ship had to remain out of range of the asteroid. A cloud of antimissile missiles left the asteroid too late to hit the missiles transitioning into trans-dim space. The next set of shield busting missiles hit a concentrated area of the shield and finally it caved, seconds before missiles hit the door and the surrounding area. The door was now vulnerable and the missiles could target shield generators, missile, and weapons emplacements from under the shield. Seconds later the doors were hit by ship killer missiles that blasted cruiser sized holes in the doors. The surface of the asteroid near the doors became a mass of explosions as large multi-warhead missiles split into independently targeted missiles that then penetrated point defenses and headed for their targets behind the shield.

Fighters and gunships penetrated the doors to meet intense, but then sporadic fire as defensive emplacements were destroyed by the rejuvenated dogs and thousands of the second wave of troops. These forces targeted the surface emplacements on the planetary side in order to protect the fighters and gunships engaging ships from the surface and to make it possible for the fleet support ships to come closer.

The tide of battle very slowly turned inside the asteroid. Fighters and gunships decreased the number of defensive gunships and shuttles, after intense dogfights. Dogs and Marines reestablished their attacks on the gunships and internal gun emplacements, while troops began to ready themselves to attack the barracks and control centers.

Suddenly, hidden internal doors opened on the walls to expose further missiles and gun emplacements. The air was quickly thick with missiles and plasma gunfire with both troops and ships caught in a lethal crossfire. Further waves of dogs, Marines, gunships and shuttles were called in to attack the walls, but they found the positions heavily fortified.

Andrea was forced to risk frigates and destroyers to pound the walls, leading to severe damage sustained by many of them as point defenses operated poorly due to the short range to the walls. The dogs struggled to penetrate the positions as they had dense shields that were only lifted for brief instants whilst the weapons fired. The dogs found it difficult to navigate through the dense iron ore only to discover that the weapons were automated and booby-trapped.

The cyberwarfare group slowly managed to progressively shut down systems; but their work was slow due to the level of isolation of the systems, and the many layers of protection that had been built into them. The troops were forced to deploy to the walls to deal with the threat before moving on. They were constantly sniped upon from the barracks areas that they had believed were cleared and from further hidden emplacements that appeared to be repeatedly reinforced. Casualties rapidly mounted, despite Linda sending in close to an additional 500,000 Marine AIs to assist in the assault on the barracks, walls, and control centers. Assault shuttles continuously reinforced the positions both inside and outside the asteroid.

The situation on the surface of the asteroid was no better. Despite a dense bombardment on the surface of the asteroid facing the planet, new well fortified hidden emplacements kept popping up to do damage to the fleet’s gunships and frigates. The planet contributed to the difficulties faced as it appeared to have an endless supply of fighters and gunships with far too many of them managing to escape the planet to engage ships from the fleet and on many occasions enter the asteroid to support the defenders. Andrea placed many mines between the planet and the asteroid but they were spotted and destroyed by the point systems and missiles.

Dogs and Marine AIs engaged in defending against these ships and faced marines onboard with weapons that incapacitated the dogs leaving the marines and AIs trapped facing hostile enemies, while trapped in the ships. They had to assault each gunship with teams of dogs and Marine AIs who sustained significant casualties until they moved to an older strategy of placing multiple limpet mines near the engines and weapons pods. The gunships were heavily reinforced, and hard to penetrate and it took several of the heavier mines to do the job.

“Jason we have used more missiles and mines in this engagement then we have ever used. There were so many gunships coming from the surface at times that we were forced to use ship killer missiles and big cannon or we would have been overwhelmed in the asteroid. It was a very wasteful way of going about it, but we could not use our normal medium missiles as they do not have the range and they are easily stopped by their defensive systems; when they lose their power and are beyond their usual range. I’m embarrassed to say that we had to use nearly our entire supply of shield killer missiles and we are going to need further supplies urgently,” said Andrea.

“I have already ordered twenty freighters of equipment from Fort Sentinel. We will be quickly resupplied,” said Admiral Peter Kane. “General Morgan James has attached our fleet inventory system to the ordering system at Fort Sentinel and resupply occurs automatically. I simply have to ratify the order. Admiral Tito at Laomedeia Fleet Control has been sent an abbreviated feed of this engagement which has been summarized by the battle AI. She will understand well, from that, why we need to resupply in such depth, particularly if we have to move on to other planets. Our own freighters will resupply us enough armament to keep us out of trouble.”

“I am sending in our reserve gunships, Mech Warriors, fighters and shuttles from throughout the fleet to reinforce the inside of the asteroid and protect the opening” said Linda, “because if I don’t they are going to sustain further massive casualties inside. Our heavy ships are moving around the planet taking out all identified military facilities and the planetary defenses. This is now a numbers game and a head to head conflict for the first time ever for us. They have learned from experience and we are paying the price.

“We have received further dogs and I’m sending them in with Marine AIs. This is a very hard-fought engagement and it’s not all over!”

“I am moving the fleet closer to the planet and we are going to start cannon bombardment of the asteroid surface facing the planet. While we are moving closer,” said Andrea, “Linda please evacuate all asteroid surface troops. We will be in position in four minutes. I expect missiles from the intact parts of the asteroid, and from the planet. None of the asteroid cannon can target us. When we are closer I will send medium range missiles under the shield to hit the missile emplacements,” said Andrea.