Hero's Return, page 2
“What about civilian traffic?”
“You should have enough destroyers to stop and search everything leaving the system. If it’s normal trade, pass it on. We don’t want the star system’s trade to suffer.”
Kong chuckled. “The system leadership will raise enough hell as it is without doing that. What about people?”
“Thorough ID checks. If there’s the slightest doubt about a person’s identity, hold them. I’ll make sure you get the most recent information Imperial Intelligence has. Run facial recognition on everyone. I don’t want any senators in the Crux System sneaking out on a freighter.”
“There’s one particular senator I’d like to get my hands on.”
“Speaking of Senator Telana—if you get your hands on him, return him here immediately. I’ll include the warrants for his arrest in your orders, so legally, there’ll be nothing preventing you from detaining him.”
“That’s all clear enough,” Kong said, leaning back in the seat. “I’m sure things will come up that aren’t covered, but that’s why you pay me the big bucks. To make those decisions.”
“And why you’re the one who has to go,” O’Riley added. “You’re the only man with the experience, rank, and respect of the fleet to get this done.”
“You can stop blowing sunshine up my ass, Tom.”
“We get this done, then you can become the grand admiral. Just as Hazard originally planned.”
The passenger section of the limo fell quiet at the mention of their dead friend. It stayed that way for a while. Finally, Kong broke the silence.
“Edward giving the orders surprised me.”
O’Riley turned to look at his friend. “That’s right. I’d forgotten. You’ve never spent much time around him.”
“Or the empress regent,” Kong added. “Over the course of our friendship, I went to King Manor and saw both of them, had dinner with them many times, but it seemed to me Hazard was very protective of them.”
“He was.” Thomas nodded. “You know what happened with his brother?”
“That he turned into a traitor who tried to steal the throne from his mother? Everyone in the Empire knows that.”
“There’s a little more to it than that, but you have the gist of it.” Thomas waved a hand dismissively. “That’s a story to be told in closed rooms late at night. Hazard felt his brother, who his son was named after, turned out the way he did because of the people who surrounded him. He grew up as the crown prince and, starting at a young age, had dozens of hangers-on and sycophants telling him how great he was. Hazard tried hard to shield Edward from all of that. He wanted his son to have a normal childhood, or as normal a childhood as he could have, since he was the son of Hazard King.”
“And suddenly, at age eleven, he’s emperor.”
“Yes, but emperor in name only. Because of his age, his mother rules as regent. And not surprisingly, considering the genes he inherited from both parents, he’s quickly growing into the role. Edward’s goal is to wield his imperial power as early as he can.”
“But I thought he had to wait till he was eighteen,” Kong stated.
“At eighteen, he assumes full authority, with or without the approval of the Regency Council. But the council can grant him that power early, and that’s what he’s shooting for.”
“Seems Hiroko is supporting him,” Kong observed.
“You should know better than anyone, Gathii—” Thomas looked at his friend “—that the empress regent is calling the shots. Never doubt that. But she is supporting her son. And he’s no fool. He’s been very careful not to step on her toes. So far, there’ve been no disagreements, at least publicly, between the two.”
“And when there is?” Gathii asked. “He is Hazard’s son. It’s well known he argued with his mother when she was empress.”
“Never in public,” O’Riley stated. “Hazard never argued with her in public. Oh, sure, he’d argue with her in council. I know, because I was there. But even when Elizabeth lashed out at Hazard with her famous temper, he simply sat there and took it, then responded in that cold, calculating tone of his.”
Kong shivered. “I know that tone. I was on the receiving end of it more than once.”
Gathii remembered the lecture Emperor Hazard had delivered to him and Aiden Doheny after the Second Battle of Sol. He’d lost a third of the fleet defending humanity’s home star system against a powerful alien fleet. Oh, he was winning the battle when Hazard arrived with reinforcements, but he hadn’t been winning by much. And it hadn’t been the additional forces that had made the difference. It had been the tactical genius of the late emperor.
But the discussion had a purpose. Hazard had methodically pointed out the mistakes Kong had made. But he hadn’t just pointed out what Kong had done wrong; Hazard explained why it was incorrect and what Gathii could have done differently. It was a master-level course on tactics delivered by the Empire’s best battle leader.
“You’re going to be on your own, Gathii, when you get to Crux,” Thomas said, changing subjects as the limo rolled through the open security checkpoint on the military side of the spaceport. “That’s why you had to be the one to go. Unfortunately, we don’t have a lot of bench strength right now, as far as senior fleet officers are concerned. I trust Bridget Stevenson and Bjorn Moen to command their task forces and fight them well.”
“But they’re not ready for this. I agree,” Gathii responded. “Unfortunately, our best, most experienced combat officers all work for the Federation now. Aiden Doheny, Dorothy Evers, and of course, Julie.”
“She’s the one whose loss hurts the most,” Thomas said, “and not just because she’s my friend. Next to Hazard, she was our most experienced fleet commander. While you’re on blockade duty at Crux, you need to think about who we’ll train to replace them.”
“I’ll add that to the list,” Kong said. “Well, here we are.” He gestured out the limo window as the car pulled up next to his shuttle.
“Looks like my junior aide got here with your luggage,” Thomas said.
The CPO driver had jumped out to open the grand admiral’s door, while O’Riley’s senior aide opened Kong’s. Donning their brimmed hats, the two senior officers exited the car. They walked side by side to the foot of the shuttle’s ramp.
“Good luck to you, Gathii,” O’Riley said, extending his right hand.
“I think you’ll need more luck than me,” Kong said, accepting the handshake. “The ship captains Mason staffed the rebel ships with are long on talk and short on ability. They won’t come out to fight. I’ll just be sitting there, keeping them bottled up in one spot. You have the hard job of figuring out a way to fix the problem.”
“Hearing you put it that way makes me think I should go to Crux and leave you here,” Thomas said.
Kong walked to the top of the ramp, turned, and rendered O’Riley a parade-ground-perfect salute. O’Riley returned the salute with the same solemnity. He stood there watching his friend as the ramp rose. Gathii disappeared from sight as the ramp finished closing.
The grand admiral walked back to the car and slid into the back seat. When his senior aide began to climb into the back of the car with him, O’Riley held up a hand.
“Ride up front, Jerry. I need to think, and I prefer to be alone to do that.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” the aide said. “Where to now, Admiral?”
“Headquarters,” O’Riley said ruefully. “Let’s see how much shit has hit the fan since we were there early this morning.”
* * * * *
Chapter 2: Genesis Contested
61 Cygni A System
United Federation of Planets
Empire Date: Dec 1048
Rear Admiral Chuck Anderson looked up from the paperwork he’d been reviewing as the door to his space cabin opened, and his chief of staff, Captain Paul Wheeler, walked in. Anderson raised his coffee cup in a silent question.
“Thank you, no. I’m all coffeed out this morning, Boss.”
“Better,” Chuck responded. “At least you didn’t call me ‘Admiral’ this time. When we’re in private like this, I’d really prefer it if you went back to calling me ‘Chuck’ instead of a title. But I guess beggars can’t be choosers.”
The two men had been classmates at the Imperial Fleet Academy. That academic relationship had evolved into friendship as the two served together as junior officers on the old dreadnought Impervious. And even though there were hundreds of ships in the Imperial Fleet, it always seemed like Fleet HQ assigned them to ships in the same squadron. Neither had imagined that either would make admiral, or that one of them would end up working for the other. It took a war a thousand light years from home for that to happen.
“What can I say? That’s as much as I’ll bend on this issue,” Paul responded. “You’re an admiral, and I’m a lowly captain. Now, if you invite me for a drink sometime, I might—I repeat, might—call you by your Christian name. But I also won’t guarantee that.”
“You’re a pain in my ass.”
“Then send me back to my old ship to be a simple dreadnought captain again. Since that ship is now your flagship, it would be easy.”
Both men owed their current rank and position to losses suffered in the battle of Pyrassun. A Zenkarr—or, as the fleet’s spacers and nearly everyone else referred to them, the Teddy Bears—rebel fleet had attacked the home of the Pyrassuns. Obligated to defend the Cats by treaty, the Imperial 1st Strike Fleet had rushed to defend the system.
But the entire attack had been a ruse. The Bear commander’s true aim was to ambush and cripple the Imperial force. The Zenkarr sprang the trap, and though the fleet had lost ships, it hadn’t been the crippling loss the Bears had hoped or planned for. But one of the casualties had been Commodore Kim Harrill, the strike fleet’s commander.
Chuck, who at the time was Julie Adams’ chief of staff, had been aboard Daring during the battle and, as the next senior officer, took command. He fought the rest of the battle and turned near defeat into a major victory. When Julie Adams arrived—she’d been off taking care of personal business—she immediately appointed Chuck as the new commander of the 1st Strike Fleet, and Chuck had tapped Daring’s commander, his old friend Paul Wheeler, to be his chief of staff.
“Nothing interesting happening this morning,” Paul reported as he took his normal seat in front of the force commander’s desk. The two men met every morning at 0700 to review the overnight reports and discuss any upcoming events.
“The 2nd Missile Destroyer Squadron is on its way back from refueling at the gas giant,” the chief of staff reported. “As soon as it’s back, 3rd Missile will head out to do the same.”
“When will that be?”
“Twenty hours.”
Anderson nodded. His 1st Strike Fleet was the principal combat force of the new Federation Fleet. Centered around the missile ships of the 5th Missile Dreadnought Squadron, the 2nd and 3rd Superbattleship Squadrons, and the 2nd and 3rd Missile Destroyer Squadrons. It had been the force that had broken two Zenkarr fleets.
And now the force faced a new enemy. A new alien enemy. The Eesni, an enigmatic alien race on the far side of Zenkarr space, had become interested in the 61 Cygni A Star System. Federation forces had already fought two minor battles in the system. One against a single cruiser-sized ship, and a second against six of the same type of ships.
Fleet Command considered both battles draws. The first battle had been a tactical defeat, but a strategic victory. The small squadron of improved Swarm cruisers assigned to defend the system had driven off the cruiser but had lost two ships. In the second battle, the Federation lost three ships, but also destroyed three of the alien cruisers, a tactical draw, but again, a strategic victory. The defense force had driven off the Eesni ships.
Based on the information Chuck had, destroying three of the alien ships was a major accomplishment. At least their Pyrassun allies thought so. The Pyrassun, the Cats, were a feline-like race and had a robust intelligence service operating inside Zenkarr space. According to their information, the Teddy Bears had failed to even scratch the paint of an Eesni warship, let alone destroy one. The difference in the two battles was a squadron of missile destroyers. They’d killed the three alien cruisers with their long-range hyper missiles.
And that’s why my force is here, protecting the new Cat colony on Atlantis. 1st Strike Fleet contains most of the Federation’s hyper-missile-equipped ships, Chuck thought.
“Have we heard anything from Federation Intelligence?” Anderson asked.
Wheeler shook his head. “I know Director Atwater put the word out to our allies. Because of the importance of this colony to the Cats, I’m betting they’re looking under every rock. But that takes time.”
“I just feel like we’re sitting here with our asses hanging out.”
The fleet knew the capabilities of the Eesni, even if they couldn’t explain those capabilities. The alien race had a different kind of faster-than-light travel. Scientists believed it was hyperspace-based but didn’t understand how it worked. They also had faster-than-light sensors. That capability concerned Chuck the most, because seeing someone else first meant you could shoot first. That, combined with the fact that the Eesni had their own faster-than-light weapons, worried the commander of the 1st Strike Force.
“We deployed the same way Bright Crystal deployed her force when The People defended the system, and the Eesni didn’t detect them,” Wheeler pointed out.
A Pyrassun force had detected the unique energy signature of a single Eesni ship during the initial colonization effort. Following protocols, the Cat commander had pulled out all the forces she could rather than engage the alien ship. But the Cats refused to give up on the establishment of a new colony and asked for support from the Federation Fleet.
Admiral Dorothy Evers had assigned a newly formed squadron of upgraded Swarm cruisers to defend the system under the command of Lesser Chief Bright Crystal. She’d hidden her ships within the star system’s second asteroid belt, four light hours from its star. The ships of the under-strength squadron confronted the next scouting attempt. Crystal micro-jumped her cruisers close to the single cruiser-sized Eesni ship and attacked. She’d launched her needles, the small attack ships that were The People’s primary attack weapon and then closed in with her cruisers. The mysterious aliens destroyed two of the Swarm cruisers as they closed the range, but the remaining cruisers and the needles severely damaged the Eesni ship, which withdrew before they could finish it off.
Fleet Command reinforced Bright Crystal’s force, which Evers had dubbed the Genesis Defense Force, with more improved Swarm cruisers and the 1st Missile Destroyer Squadron. Several weeks later, a larger force of Eesni ships appeared, and the Federation force attacked to defend the system. The enemy destroyed three of The People’s ships this time, including Bright Crystal’s flagship, but the missile destroyers destroyed three of the Eesni cruisers and seriously damaged another with their hyper missiles. The remaining Swarm cruisers, along with their needles, killed the damaged enemy cruiser and knocked out another. The single remaining ship, though damaged, escaped.
And that’s how my force came to be here, Chuck thought. Admiral Evers decided hyper missiles were the only practical way of taking out the Eesni. With their own faster-than-light missiles and faster-than-light sensors, there’s no way a conventional force could get close enough to attack without suffering losses.
“I wish Dorothy had left me the 1st Missile Destroyer Squadron when she shifted forces around. We sure could use the additional missile launchers,” Chuck added. In private, he could refer to his boss by her first name, since the two were old friends.
“She had to reinforce the Swarm ships that took our old spot,” Paul pointed out. “As it is, the force defending Delta Pavonis is way under strength. All the Federation has there now is what’s left of the improved Swarm cruisers and two squadrons of missile destroyers.”
“Fortunately, the Teddy Bears are in no position to do anything, else we’d be in trouble,” Chuck said. “They’re as concerned about the Eesni as we are and have already lost several systems to them. Still, it would be nice to have those two missile destroyer squadrons.”
“We’ve come up with a good plan,” Paul stated. “We’re hiding in the belt, and we already know the Eesni sensors aren’t good enough to detect us until we move.”
“But all the assumptions are based on the Eesni not showing up with more ships than we have missiles,” Chuck responded. “And this force contains most of what’s left of the fleet.”
“So far, no one’s seen a force of over ten ships,” Paul said. “We have more than enough firepower to handle a force twice that size.”
“That’s if four missiles can take out one of the Eesni cruisers. And what if they arrive with larger ships?”
“You can ‘what if’ the shit out of it. Quit worrying, Boss,” Paul said. “It is what it is.”
“When did you become a philosopher?”
“When I realized there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about the situation.”
* * *
A day passed. Then another. Then a week. The monotony of waiting soon wore on Chuck Anderson. He began to worry about the readiness of his force. Anderson knew the strain would begin wearing on the officers and spacers of his ships. Men and women, stuck hiding in the fields of rocks that made up the outer asteroid belt. It wouldn’t matter how well trained or how disciplined they were, the endless boredom of just sitting and waiting would eventually affect the force’s war-fighting ability.
Chuck had just finished typing out his weekly report to Admiral Evers. It wasn’t much of a report. It was a duplicate of the previous two he’d sent.
No enemy forces detected. Maintaining patrol.
The narrative was short, but the Federation Fleet wasn’t any different from the Imperial one he’d once served. The bureaucrats in uniform needed their statistics, so numbers packed the rest of the report. Supplies used. Supplies remaining. Missiles of all types on hand, etcetera.
