Carinae Sector: 02 - Admiral's Fury - Part 2 - Hidden Menace by David Buck

next orders.
    ‘Bridget, fire the spinal mount weapon at the second ship in three minutes. I then want you to change course and take the Newport at full speed towards the lifters as that will force the frigates to turn to follow you.’
    The particle cannon timers counted down for a third time and once again the combined firepower of the destroyers lashed out at a frigate. Joel noted that the second frigate was also a tumbling ruin, even if the enemy ship’s shields were still operating at half strength. Lieutenant Chandra called out a warning, even as the Newport began her turn and accelerated.
    ‘Commander, the two remaining frigates have each launched six missiles at the Newport and impact is in two minutes.’
    Joel did not waste any time with his next order.
    ‘All ships are to target those missiles with all weapons.’
    The destroyers open fire with all the point defences and the turreted weapons on the twelve missiles, and Joel noted that one of the turrets on the Madrid destroyed three missiles in quick succession. The point defences easily claimed the remaining missiles as Joel now complimented the Madrid’s crew.
    ‘Commander Everson to the commander of the Madrid - that was good shooting by your dorsal turret crew to down those missiles. Now the Madrid is to target the frigate at red 50 with four missiles and the Newport can do the same to the other frigate at red 70. The Auckland will take down the damaged frigate at the rear with two missiles.’
    Laser fire from the turrets of the destroyers was being answered by lessening amounts of weapons fire from the remaining undamaged Jerecab frigates, as Joel watched the three sets of missiles track towards their targets. In minutes the damaged frigate was blown to fragments by both missiles from the Auckland. Joel then watched as both surviving Jerecab frigates went into violent evasive manoeuvres in a vain attempt to avoid the missiles. At least one missile was downed by each frigate before a pair of explosions erupted across each frigate. The commander noted that only large fragments of one frigate remained before they too detonated in secondary explosions.
    Joel next turned his attention onto the lifters with only a single instruction needed.
    ‘Okay, so that is the frigates done, now I want no missiles used for these lifters…’
    The three destroyers now opened fire again with their special ship killer weapon, the spinal mount particle cannon that Joel knew had taken a great deal of research to develop. He tried to ignore the masses of bodies that erupted from the first lifter after it broke into several smaller pieces. The bridge crew surmised that the large alien ship was a troop transport as Joel turned to the next phase of his mission.
    After another half an hour, the remaining three lifters had exploded into atoms and the human ships now fled the Topaz star system before they were intercepted. Joel looked over his orders with concern as he evaluated how he would deploy the masses of equipment and men crammed inside the three destroyer’s small cargo holds. He was hopeful that he setup a tech lab and refuelling station on an asteroid in the next system as they had earlier identified a suitable location. The commander knew that the other destroyers scattered around the former Dradfer colonies would be facing similar problems.
     
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    Gindane looked over the information of the recent battles with deep cynicism, also in part because the Jerecab Admiral had not been present when she arrived with her ships. The Jerecab were currently being badly beaten by the humans, but she knew that this could change very quickly. The Barus research captain also knew that the Jerecab commanders distrusted her, as she ordered the Rupane to lead two other cruisers and several destroyers further into the system. She could see that