actual

back.”
Yu himself would have been happier if his targets had come straight at him, though he had no intention of telling Simonds that. Had they done so, he could have punched his missiles straight down the wide-open throats of their wedges. Even better, he could have used his shipboard lasers and grasers against those same unprotected targets.
As it was, Thunder of God’s energy weapons would never penetrate their targets’ sidewalls at their closest range, and he’d have to launch at better than three million klicks if his missiles were going to catch them as they passed, while Principality was even more poorly placed. He’d had to spread the ships to cover the volume through which the Graysons might pass, which meant the destroyer’s closest approach would be over a hundred million kilometers, and that she would have to launch at something like eight million. But even Principality’s actual flight time would be under a minute, and the two ships’ salvos would arrive within twenty seconds of one another.
Of course, Thunder would have time for only one effective broadside, though Principality could probably get two off. Even in rapid fire, their best reload time was a tad over fifteen seconds, and the Graysons’ crossing velocity was almost twice his missiles’ highest speed from rest. That made it physically impossible for him to get off more than one shot per launcher before the Grayson fleet zipped across his engagement range at a velocity his birds could never overtake. But this was an almost classic ambush scenario, and Commander Theisman already had his ship spinning on her central axis. Thunder was too slow on the helm and too close, but Theisman could bring both broadsides to bear in his window of engagement. He’d fire the first one with its missiles’ drives programmed for delayed activation, then fire the second as his other broadside rolled onto the target, which would bring them in