Free Storming Heaven by Christopher Nuttall Page B

as the energy torpedoes struck home on the Killer weapon ports, but they didn’t seem to be enough to prevent the Killers from firing back, even though every time an energy torpedo struck the hull the Killer starship’s power curves seemed to jump.  The human researchers suspected that the Killers actually used their seemingly unlimited power reserves to strengthen their hull against attack, but no one knew for sure.  It was just another mystery that he hoped capturing one of their ships would solve.
     
    “They hit the Defiant ,” Gary noted, as one of their wingmen blew apart in a blaze of white light.  The Killers were firing much more rapidly now as the Lighting flew away from their starship, allowing other units to launch their own attacks.  Andrew called up the readings from the active sensors and studied the results grimly.  Apart from massive fluctuations in their power grid, the Killer starship might almost have been untouched.  “Sir, I request permission to engage with antimatter torpedoes.”
     
    “Permission granted,” Andrew said, shortly.  “Fire at will.”
     
    Antimatter torpedoes were the most powerful weapon humanity had invented, yet they had their own limitations.  They couldn’t be used as energy weapons, but had to be fired as material missiles that could be shot down by the enemy point defence – if the Killers had their own point defence.  They had certainly never demonstrated any such capability in the past.  Gary launched a spread of torpedoes right towards the Killer ship, joined by spreads from other starships as they joined the attack before evading the furious return fire, and Andrew watched as the torpedoes struck home.  The entire Killer starship seemed to be wrapped in white light for a long second, and he wondered if they had, by some miracle, destroyed it, and then it burst out of the explosion, still firing.  It seemed totally untouched.
     
    That’s not possible , part of his mind gibbered.  The Killer starship was taking a beating that should have destroyed it long ago, yet if there was any actual damage, there was no sign of it – apart from the fluctuating power grid.  He sent a query into the MassMind, which was watching through the live feed from the attack wing, asking it to compute if the Killer power grid could be overloaded.  If it were possible to overload the field holding the Iceberg together, perhaps the starships could be destroyed after all.
     
    The response came back within three minutes, which was unbearably long for the MassMind, the greatest computing resource that humanity had ever created.  It should have had the answer almost instantaneously.  It had concluded that it should be possible, but the power levels required were astronomical and the Technical Faction would have to invent a whole new kind of weapon to handle the task.  Andrew fired a request that the Technical Faction invent the weapon yesterday and turned his attention back to the battle.  It wasn't going well.  The Killers had picked off twenty-three starships so far and were concentrating on the others.  The more they picked off, the less damage humanity could inflict – such as it was – and in the end, they would have to flee the battle.
     
    “But at least its not like it was at High Singapore,” he muttered.  He’d not been present at the battle, but he had studied it carefully.  The Killers had forced the Defence Force to stand and fight, while his attack wing could keep ducking and dodging, forcing the Killers to work to hit each of his ships.  He could drag the battle out indefinitely, yet the Killers would eventually open a wormhole and escape, or force him to back off, having inflicted little damage.  Another human starship’s icon flickered and vanished.
     
    “Gary,” he said, suddenly.  “Open a general channel to the attack wing.  I want everyone concentrating on targeting the following coordinates; I want them to break off and form up on