Some things about the way the natives did battle would have to be explained to fully grasp what was going on. A grid was the understood maximum effective range of most Eden and Ayenee weapon systems that did not possess independent or built in targeting systems with the ability to change trajectory in flight. Faster than light weapon systems could also stretch the boarders of the grid but for most native weapon systems the grid or maximum effective range of their longest range systems was 250 kilometers. To clearly define a grid was to state that if any part of any two objects was within 250 kilometers of each other that these two objects shared or were on grid with each other.
There were two main reasons that a grid was defined as this small distance and why most battles within Ayenee and Eden happened between two or more units that shared a grid. The first reason dealt with the sensor and targeting interference caused to systems that supported manual or artificial intelligence based targeting systems that attempted to lock on or achieve a firing solution on any target that used hydromagnetic shielding as part of its defensive system bundle. Most of the natives of
Onyx used these defensive systems and even on grid they caused some variance on a target's predicted position, velocity, and direction of moment compared with what was true.
Beyond the soft limit of the grid this variance was magnified and caused extreme havoc to sensor bundles and thwarted artificial intelligences attempting to determine a target's position. Spatial fluctuations caused by the micro energy streams displaced sensor ghosts and visible reflections outside of the target's true signature radius. Impact on target due to this phenomenon fell well below fifty percent.
The second cause of this soft limit on distances was that just too much time was given to artificial intelligences and linked pilots to react actively or passively to mitigate incoming damage through the use of onboard sub-systems on all ships and evasive maneuvering on all sub-capital ships. Even when weapon systems that approached or slightly exceeded the speed of the photon were put to use the window of available reaction time gained through ship and sub-space beacon triangulation and reporting coupled with faster than light communication offered a ship a substantial bonus to mitigate incoming damage.
The cruisers, destroyers, and frigates had come onto the grid 200 kilometers off the most forward Taiyou ship between the Taiyou and the TZE-UB gate. A split second later and the mass of battleships landed on grid 100 kilometers away from that same Taiyou ship and between the Taiyou and the smaller Cáidheach ships. 1400mm double barreled Howitzers rotated forward as the ships spat angry light and vented heat. Each barrel's inner bore measured 1.4 meters in diameter. Each barrel extended very nearly 57 meters from its turret housing. It had taken the weapon teams 15.3 seconds to cycle and reload each and every barrel with individual 23 ton super heavy tungsten carbide sabot rounds. These were the monsters of projectile weapons in Onyx. Though dreadnought caliber projectile systems were far larger they were far rarer than the 1400mm. The 1400 was feared and rightly so despite the common conception of inferiority placed on projectile systems by most of the natives.
More than twelve thousand Warrior class light combat drones poured from the battleship drone bays to intercept, hary, and destroy the Taiyou Cosmo Zero fighter flights, the Taiyou fleets smaller escort ships, and their support vessels. Each was equipped with twin 50mm Gatling Auto-Cannons spitting torrents of depleted uranium rounds, a small compliment of defender and interceptor rockets with miniature nuclear payloads, a micro-warp drive, and a micro-hydromagnetic shield emitter. Each was controlled via on onboard smart artificial intelligence unit that would quickly learn and adapt as the fight progressed and it was all powered by a micro fusion reactor. Anything learned would be relayed to the drone control unit on board each ship and broadcast back through the network so that each victory or loss made the drones that much more of a threat.
The drones swarmed like a hive of bees beat with a stick to overwhelm the manned fighters with a wall of incoming projectile fire and maneuvered with thrusters at strange angles to avoid retaliation. The drones could bank, accelerate, and decelerate at impossible angles and speeds that would cause even a well equipped pilot to black out.
The Nidhoggur class carrier is a 2,188 meter long ship of Sekhmet origin.
A cynosural field ignited behind the formidable wall of battleships that even now started to split off in groups of fifty. Battle was joined by two Nidhoggur class carriers as they jumped in and cast spatial shock waves across the grid as more support was bridged in via a Cáidheach Ragnarok class titan just six jumps away to bring the ship count up to 2,000 all accounted for. Fleet links went up as ethereal streams of energy crisscrossed the Cáidheach fleet. These were not a group of unorganized ruffians. This was part of the main battle fleet of a major pirate bloc.
Space battles in Eden and Ayenee had been a struggle for controlled chaos by commanders since the advent of remote assistances devices and fleet links. Fleet commanders fought to control their respective fleets calling ship commanders and capsuleer pilots to obliterate selected targets before support could assist them. In this respect the Maelstrom class battleship armed with a full rack of 1400s was ideally suited for it took a relatively small number of ships armed as such to alpha strike through a target's shield, armor, and hull at impressive range on grid. The display that they had showed at the gate had been extreme overkill.
The Cáidheach commander ordered staggered fire. He transmitted from his position on board the Claíomh, one of the Nidhoggurs behind the battleship screen as Einherji class fighters started to pour from both carrier's flight decks. Primary and secondary targets for each battleship group were sent to the fleet. 24 groups started to track targets as guns swiveled. Half of each battleship group fired in unison on their designated primary targets which included one Yamato Class battleship, eight Aoba class cruisers, five Takao class cruisers, two Mogami class missile cruisers, seven Naginata class cruisers, and the Shokaku class carrier.
An 800mm shell next to a Soviet T-34-85 tank at the Imperial War Museum in London meant for the Schwerer Gustav. The round fired by the 1400mm is 175% larger.
Warp disruptors lashed out to hold the carrier and battleship on the grid as primary and secondary targets received similar treatment. 9,600 23 ton rounds were sent express mail at 100,000 meters per second to each designated target across 100 kilometers of space. It would take those rounds slightly more or less than 1 seconds to reach their targets leaving just 14.3 seconds after impact for the weapon's cycle time and the guns to be made ready to fire again.
Each ship called primary would taste 200 rounds or 4,600 tons of metal provided all met the mark with each round punching at 27.486 kilotons TNT. Each was a wrecking ball of mass and unstoppable inertia. The Cáidheach were using heavy slugs. For those that survived the second salvo was incoming on the count of 3 and would hit on the count of 4 to leave the first set of guns just 12.3 seconds of reload time remaining. If the primary went down the second volley from each group would be sent down range to a secondary target of cruiser class or above.
An emergency transmission came in across one FTL channel. "Is é seo an Alric Rosenthal ceannasaí luaidhe cabhlach na Comhghuaillíochta Deiscirt. Cuir tú féin in aithne", said the male voice as the video feed came through. There was a brief pause and another broadcast came across. "I know you are under fire. Please respond if you are able", he said in accented English.