Admiral's War Part One Page 4

  Faces darkened across the committee as the members were once again reminded that they had personally requested a Sector Judge to go and beg for a fleet by offering promises which they, in the form of the MDL top military leadership, had ultimately repudiated.

  “Your point is well taken, Judge Pao,” the Head Chair said with a nod. “However, perhaps you could lay out for us the reasoning, in your mind, why we of the MDL steering committee should consider laying out considerable resources when our two Sectors—especially your home region of Sector 23—are still trying to deal with the devastation and aftermath of the Droid invasion? Our resources are stretched thin, Judge Pao.”

  Kong Pao nodded seriously and then, for several minutes, proceeded to lay out the argument he felt would most likely sway the committee.

  “Thank you for this chance, Chairman,” he said, bowing before the committee after completing his bold proposal.

  There was a very loud snort from direction of Von Straubergen, but other than that outburst no one else interrupted.

  “My motivating reasons for responding to this information are two-fold. First, if the MSP leadership is telling the truth then anything we can do to delay the arrival time of an enemy fleet from beyond our two Sectors is worthwhile. Miring down a potential invader and allowing the…” here he shot a sideways glance at his most vocal critic of the day, “‘machine lovers’ to bear the brunt of the conflict while we secure time to rebuild, rearm and repair our economies and defense fleets should be done. Second, assuming Sector 25 loses we will have acquired critical information on a potential enemy, allowing us the chance to explore both military and diplomatic solutions.”

  “That’s assuming this threat is even real, or that they can’t simply deal with it by themselves,” the Vice-Chair pointed out with narrowed eyes.

  Kong Pao nodded with genuine appreciation.

  “In that case, a small commitment of forces would allow us to maintain the appearance of assisting a former ally while at the same time giving us the opportunity to pursue diplomatic options. Securing foreign aid, ties with nearby Sectors, and a window into our neighbors politics that do not rely upon reports from the,” again he allowed a sideways glance and a faint smile at Von Straubergen, “‘machine-lovers’ would be ideal. Not to mention the possibility of a trade treaty, alliance or other arrangement which might strengthen our economy.”

  “What could they have that we possibly want?” sneered Von Straubergen.

  “Have you not heard?” Kong Pao pantomimed surprise. “The Tracto System has a rich and thriving trillium mining operation. As we all know, our own home-grown hyper drive fuel industry has taken a serious blow thanks to the war and is only now starting to recover. For a minimal investment of men, ships and materials we might find that assisting the ‘lovers’ gives us a return of several times that investment. I don’t have to tell you how badly the freight hauling trade has suffered this past year…do I?” he finished with a cocked eyebrow while off to the side Von Straubergen looked like he was going to have a stroke, giving out only incoherent noises as he struggled against his obviously rising ire.

  “You propose offering assistance for a substantial trade deal?” the Chairman said with surprise.

  “While assisting an ally out of nothing more than goodwill makes for a fine moral position, I have found that doing so for direct, immediate and tangible benefits to be far more profitable than a mere tug on the…heart strings,” he said, deliberately leaving the word ‘non-existent’ absent as he looked at Von Straubergen.

  “People still starve in the streets thanks to those Droids, and now he mocks us with this farce of a treaty notion!” bellowed Von Straubergen. “All so he can help his human betraying friends?!”

  “That will be enough, Member Von Straubergen,” the Chairman said forcefully.

  “I concur; we must at least consider sending forces if by doing so we can increase the carrying trade. Do you realize how many crucial supplies, such as food and medicine, are not able to get to those in need simply because our freight companies do not have the funds to purchase the hyper drive fuel?” said the Vice Chair.

  “I will not be a part of this farce,” Von Straubergen roared, standing up and moving to exit the room in protest, “better that a few of us starve, decreasing the surplus population, than we willingly give a foothold to the Droid menace in human territory. Billions of our ancestors died so that we might be free,” pausing, he turned to grandstand as he finished, “I’ll leave you with a few words: man, not machine.”

  So saying, he marched out of the room.

  There was a momentary pause as the committee members looked at each other uneasily. Then the Chairman cleared his throat, “How about we begin by looking at the particulars of the proposal, and then review what resources we have to offer in exchange for the trillium?”

  There was a faint sense of easing in the room as the tension began to abate.

  Kong Pao once again cupped his hands respectfully, all the while silently making a note to remember how the MDL Committee once again felt free to treat him, a Sector Judge, as an errand boy.

  “I have nothing as grand as a proposal. However, I do have a few thoughts,” Judge Pao said easily and then started to lay out his ideas so far. It was the collective duty of everyone who loved the worlds and sectors of the spine and greater Confederation at large to do whatever was within their power to save them from conquest and collapse. There was no point in standing on dignity and watching whole Sectors burn.

  The thought that he was only mortal lingered in his mind. He knew that those who disrespected his office had best hope they never showed up in his courtroom, for if they did they would only find a strict—and unbending—interpretation of the law.

  On the outside, he smiled and continued to field the questions and stated frustrations of the Mutual Defense League without a word of complaint. He had succeeded in principle—all that remained now was the politics.

  Chapter Three: Smoothing out the rough edges

  “All ships report confirmed arrival at first rendezvous point, Admiral,” reported Lieutenant Commander Leonora Hammer.

  “Thank you, Captain Hammer,” I said with a simple nod, but on the inside I was frowning. Managing a fleet of more than 100 warships—a coalition fleet made up of multiple groups, no less—was proving to be even more difficult than the computer modeling had predicted.

  “Fleet is now ready to begin charging jump engines and proceed to the next waypoint on your order, Admiral,” reported the Captain of the Royal Rage, my latest flagship.

  “Understood,” I replied and then fell silent.

  After realizing I wasn’t immediately giving the order to charge the hyper drives, Captain Hammer cocked her head and gave me a look before turning back to running her bridge.

  Tapping on the screen built into the arm of my new Throne, I pulled up the information on the last group of ships to jump into this waypoint system and pursed my lips.

  The corvette group had been the last to reach this way point, two hours slower than their estimated travel time, which would have been bad enough except for the fact that it had been MSP ships—the newly refurbished Border Alliance warships—that had held up the corvette group and thus slowed down the entire fleet.

  Due to the way the hyper drives worked, each ship class had a different charge rate on their hyper drives. Larger ships went further with each jump but took longer to charge their drives, and smaller ships jump faster but covered far less distance with each point transfer. Each ship varied in how far and how fast they could go in a single transfer, but generally speaking ships of the same size could jump close enough together that they traveled together in fleet movements.

  There were two schemas a fleet commander could use when moving his fleet. The entire fleet could jump together each and every time, but that limited the group to the jumping as fast as their slowest ship could cycle its jump engines and only as far as their shortest range vessel could move, thus slowi
ng the entire fleet down to a crawl.

  That meant that a fleet only moved all together at the same time during battle conditions. The more common fleet movement order was the one I was currently using: break the fleet up into squadrons of ships roughly the same size and set rendezvous waypoints for the entire Fleet to periodically meet up at a mathematically-generated rendezvous space and time.

  “Lieutenant Steiner, if you would be so kind as to ask our corvette commanders if they need any assistance—the temporary services of our engineering staff perhaps—I would greatly appreciate it,” I said, thin-lipped.

  “On it, Admiral,” replied the Comm. Officer.

  A series of rapid denials from each captain was soon relayed by Lieutenant Steiner.

  “Get me the Perseverance,” I snapped.

  Steiner turned back to her console.

  “I have the Perseverance now, Admiral,” said the petite Communications Officer.

  A young enlisted communications operator appeared on my Throne’s built in screen.

  “Get me Captain Kling,” I ordered.

  “Bob Kling here, Sir,” said the short, stout Captain a moment later, “how can the Perseverance help you, Admiral?”

  “You can help me by getting control of the MSP Corvette Squadron, Captain,” I said evenly

  “We’re doing the best we can, Admiral,” Captain Kling said fatalistically, “a quarter of our ships just came out of a hasty refit and haven’t had time to perform a proper shakedown. We’re still working out the kinks.”

  “There are a hundred and nineteen warships in this fleet,” I snapped, “and your units of the MSP have just caused over a two hour delay. I realize we’re still working up and that you’re dealing with new ships and captains, but yours is the slowest squadron in the Coalition Fleet! Get control of the situation, Lieutenant Commander, and if you need a few more engineers then by all means let me know—instead of refusing the assistance when it’s offered.”

  “It won’t happen again, Admiral Montagne,” the middle aged former Caprian Officer said, bracing stiffly to attention.

  “See that it doesn’t. I know going from command of the Tracto SDF’s six ships to the entire MSP contingent is a bit of a shift. But now is the hour to shine or fail, Captain. Take those seventeen ships and show me what you can do, or I’ll have to find someone else. Montagne out,” I finished before cutting the transmission.

  When it had come time to place an officer in charge of the MSP’s corvette squadron, Commodore Kling—who’d already been in command of Tracto’s SDF combined corvette and cutter squadron—had been at the top of the list. With more than forty starships including the freighters carrying repair parts and acting as colliers, all brought together at the same time, the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet had never been larger. Nor had so many warships to bring together in one place at the same time—and that wasn’t even counting the pair of corvettes left guarding Gambit, the Cutters at the Omicron, or the mixed warships left guarding Tracto.

  “Not bad for an honorary Admiral,” I said to myself.

  “Sir?” asked Leonora Hammer.

  “Nothing, Captain, just talking to myself,” I explained.

  “If you say so, Sir,” she replied.

  I grimaced but let it pass. I was probably being overly sensitive. I was in direct command of more warships than at any time in the past, including during the Droid Campaign. That was in no small part due to the Border Worlds and the tireless efforts of our engineering staff. And yet, despite this great achievement, the number of forces I controlled paled in comparison to the size of this coalition fleet that was currently assembled in this star system.

  With thirty some ships, counting freighters, from Wolf-9 and a similar number of New Sector Guard warships—not to mention the Promethean SDF refugee warships, Sundered squadron, and the nearly twenty warships of the droid contingent—the amazing thing was that my combined MSP Fleet was just around a third the total size of the forces currently under my command. Or was that merely under my ‘direction?’

  In any case, I was back in the big seat after almost a year of downtime in Gambit System while we rested, repaired and recuperated. Oh, right, during which time I also fought off a few dozen challengers to my dual roles as commander of the MSP and as Protector to my wife’s holdings on Tracto. While I was used to running a battleship, or even a few squadrons of smaller warships, with well over a hundred ships in this fleet I was starting to feel decidedly outside my comfort zone.

  In the past I’d always been able to tell myself—at least in the back of my mind—that even if I messed things up with the smaller ships, if I had control over the Lucky Clover or heavily-armed Furious Phoenix I could still turn things around using just the Flagship. At this point, however, things were decidedly different.

  The Royal Rage was a battleship and, yes, after its many various upgrades definitely the most powerful ship in this fleet. But with that said, there were three other battleships. And after word of that Imperial Command Carrier’s robust arsenal, I was no longer very confident that just riding to the rescue with the most powerful ship was going to work—let alone even be possible with the Invictus Rising lurking somewhere out there.

  Looking at the profiles of both warships, the Invictus Rising—assuming it was Arnold Janeski’s present command, as it had been when last we had seen him—was much more powerful than the aptly named and heavily upgraded Royal Rage. So wildly charging in with a full steam of my own brand of ‘royal rage’ and hoping for the best was right out the airlock. I’d tried attacking larger more powerful ships with the Furious Phoenix in our last battle and that had ended with the flagship knocked out of the fight, boarded, and I had personally been tortured after our engines were taken offline.

  Thanks, but no thanks—I’ll pass on a second helping of that particular constellation of outcomes.

  I was going to have to be smarter, faster, and better than I had at any point in the past. I was also going to do it while trying to outthink, outmaneuver, and just plain out-Admiral a man who had spent the equivalent of my entire life leading warships into battle.

  It was a daunting task but one I felt up to the task for. Of course it would be interesting to see if I still felt the same way after making contact with the enemy.

  “Fleet readiness status, Mr. Hart?” I asked of our Tactical Officer.

  “All ships, squadrons and sub-formations report ready for action, Vice Admiral,” said the new man. The more precise use of my rank indicated he was one of the Confederation sleepers we’d liberated from the droids during a prisoner exchange.

  I nodded. “Course laid in to our next Fleet waypoint, Mr. Brightenbauc?” I inquired of the ship’s first shift navigator, yet another Confederation sleeper. Even though he was a fine officer, I couldn’t help but feel a pang like that of a sore tooth at the loss of those who had been with me since what was essentially the beginning of this journey.

  “We’re ready whenever you are, Sir,” Brightenbauc said.

  “Pass the movement order to the fleet, Lieutenant Steiner,” I said, closing my eyes for a moment and then opening then with renewed determination. “We’ve stayed in this star system longer than I care to, Navigation. Let’s move out.”

  “Aye, Admiral,” replied the Comm. Officer.

  “Yes, Sir,” echoed Brightenbauc.

  I sat there watching as the lighter units, starting with the corvettes and then followed by the destroyers, charged their engines and jumped out of the system on course for the next scheduled waypoint.

  Moving an actual fleet was more complicated than running a single ship or even a squadron. Or maybe it just felt that way and I needed to step up my game. Either way, I was proud of what we’d done to this point.

  I was still mentally patting myself on the back when my musing was interrupted.

  “Contact,” reported the Second Shift leader for Sensors.

  “Location, Mr. Harding?” Captain Hammer said.

  Moments later a sma
ll icon appeared on the main screen.

  “A straggler?” asked DuPont, but I shook my head—I knew better.

  “All ships were already accounted for before the Admiral gave the order to jump the fleet, Helmsman,” Leonora Hammer said, an implied rebuke in her voice.

  “Sorry, Captain,” DuPont muttered turning back to his console with a wince.

  “Potential enemy action, Captain?” I asked, keeping my voice deliberately light.

  “I advise we ping the ship, Sir,” Hammer said and then turned to the Comm. section. “Do we have an IFF on that bogey, Comm.?” she asked sharply. “I’m not seeing it on the screen.”

  “They haven’t sent it—” Steiner started and then stopped.

  “Ping them,” I interrupted.

  “Signal coming in now, Sir,” Steiner continued after a brief pause, “we have a positive IFF. Computer says it’s the Speedy Delivery, a courier belonging to the Sector Government.”

  “Scan them anyway and make doubly sure they are who they say they are,” I commanded.

  “You heard the Admiral,” added the Captain.

  “Sensor profile matches that of a courier vessel,” Sensors reported back.

  “I’m receiving a burst transmission using the encryption key the New Guard sent us,” said Lieutenant Steiner, “it’s a text file, Sir.”

  “Send it to my screen,” I ordered.

  “Yes, Sir,” said the Lieutenant.

  Pulling up the file, I read halfway through it before cursing.

  “Are you feeling well, Admiral?” Captain Hammer asked, giving me the eye.

  “We have an intelligence update from the Sector Government,” I said flatly.

  “Are you sure this is the best time to discuss a classified report, Sir?” asked the Captain.

  A hush fell over the bridge.

  “New Pacifica has fallen,” I said, ignoring the tacit advice, “as such our plan to head toward New Pacifica, being the most likely target for the Reclamation Fleet after Prometheus, will have to be reevaluated. It’s not that we were wrong in our estimation of where they were likely to go but rather that they moved faster than we did. We were too slow off the jump and too far away,” I clenched my fist angrily.