Fog of War (The Last Hunter Book 8) by J.N. Chaney & Terry Mixon

Author:J.N. Chaney & Terry Mixon [Chaney, J.N.]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Variant Publications
Published: 2023-04-23T00:00:00+00:00

13

Jack made sure they took their time placing the sensor buoys around Leaping Deer and finding the best place to jump in close to launch probes deeper into the system. As much as he wanted to utterly destroy the Locusts and free the humans trapped here, the true goal of this initial mission was to get as much information as he could so their attack could be as devastating as possible.

Even using the passive sensors from as far out as they’d been, it was evident that most of the Locust drones and motherships were still here. There were undoubtedly others scattered throughout the cluster, but they weren’t a threat to his ship like the ones here were. They’d have to be exceptionally careful not to be pinned down, or the enemy would tear them apart.

He kept Hunter at a lower level of alert except for the people watching the sensors. They’d gone to short watches so no one would miss something because they were tired. The probes would make the trip deeper into the system and back over a period of days. Once they had, they’d transmit the collected data via a tight beam laser link to avoid being detected.

Whatever controlled the Locusts here at Leaping Deer reacted to the destruction of the ambush party by sending an overwhelming force of drones and motherships out to scour the area, so it was a good thing his ship was no longer there. It did agitate the rest of the automated warships to the degree that even their passive sensors were getting a much greater understanding of the locations and strengths of the various groupings of vessels, so he’d count it as a plus.

At about the forty-eight-hour mark, he stood in his briefing room, looking over everything they’d learned on the big screen mounted to the bulkhead. The Locusts used an intricate pattern of overlapping patrols, and there would be no sneaking through to the planet. The best he could hope for was to draw as many as possible out to the system’s fringes and destroy them, though Hunter would surely take some damage in the process.

The question in his mind was whether it would be worthwhile to do that now or try later. Once he stirred the hornet’s nest sufficiently, he had no idea how the AIs controlling those drones and motherships would react. Hunter was humanity’s only battleship, and he couldn’t risk her unnecessarily.

His comm went off, so he answered. “Romanoff.”

“It’s Lieutenant Calvo, sir. Planting ourselves along the most likely arrival path of any Novarite reinforcements seems to have paid off. The hyperspace detector has picked up a group of incoming vessels. They’re traveling at twenty times the speed of light, so I believe they must be Novarites. Sir, there are a lot of them.”

“On my way.”

The journey from his briefing room to the bridge took less than thirty seconds, and he sat in his seat, looking at the screen to see what was coming. There was a large blob of vessels in hyperspace.

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