Cody's War: Flight Of The Phoenix, page 10
He wasn’t surprised when Nora raced to join him on the lift. He smiled at her.
On the bridge the situation seemed normal. Toby Ramirez gave him an apologetic look.
“Admiral Ford here,” Cody said.
“About time!” Dorit Williams’ much-augmented voice came back. “Didn’t know I had tach comm, did you?”
“I presume you got it from Governor Hartman,” Cody replied. “We’re just over two days out from you.”
“So I heard,” Dorit said. “And I’ve heard you’ve been very busy.”
“And how did you hear this?”
“Well, as soon as we got the tach comm working — and we’re upgrading to FM as we speak — I sent your favorite person on a quick fact-finding mission.”
Cody looked confused and glanced to Nora. “She sent Ellaz to talk with the other Ellaz’s,” Nora explained. Cody nodded. He’d wondered why Ellaz Whirly had been so silent the past several days.
“Did you hear about Perky?” Cody asked.
“No,” Dorit said. “Apparently my spy wasn’t as thorough as I’d hoped.”
“The Perkettes wanted to detain Emma and her ships as pirates,” Nora spoke up.
“You two are on the same ship?” Dorit replied immediately. “Good.”
“She’s just visiting,” Cody explained.
“Sure,” Dorit agreed. “Anyway, I also heard about the wild plans you have and I spoke with a certain Miss King.”
“Yeah, she’s my agent on Carlow,” Nora said. “And?”
“I arranged to get our science boffins to talk with yours on Nettles,” Dorit said. “On top of which, I got Boris to take on the problem of synchronizing our disparate arrays.”
“And?” Cody asked, not liking the direction of this conversation.
“We think that we’ve got a problem,” Dorit said. “So, son, scramble your butt here so that we can hash it out.” She paused. “Also, I’ve been busy.”
“Ellaz?” Cody said up to the ceiling. If Dorit could use her as a spy, he could too.
“They’ve got thirty Meath-class ships working up,” Ellaz reported. “And five tenders, kitted out like Tristan.”
“You’re going to leave me for the kill, are you?” Dorit muttered. “Well, we’ve also laid down six cruisers and three battlecruisers. Single ring ships. Completion time on the cruisers is twelve months.”
“And the battlecruisers?” Cody asked.
“That’s why I’m calling,” Dorit said. “I’d like Nora’s permission to place them with Jurgen/Carlow.”
“Done!” Nora said immediately. “And send us the plans.”
“I have the plans,” Ellaz announced. “You’ll see Whirly throughout the engineering docs.”
“Great!” Nora growled. “That means I’ll be fixing all sorts of stupid mistakes!”
“Hey!” Nora Wasp protested. “I went over those plans, they’re solid!”
Cody raised a hand for silence. “Dorit? I trust my crew completely. Spill.”
“You owe me a hundred,” Ellaz Deneb said clearly.
“Yeah, yeah,” Dorit grumbled. “Cody… we have a target.”
“How big?” Cody asked.
“We’re still counting,” Dorit replied. “But, as near as we can tell, roughly seven hundred. And those battleships you encountered at Midway? We were wrong. Those are cruisers.”
“What mass?” Cody asked.
“We’re still trying to synchronize, so everything is iffy,” Dorit replied. “But if we’re right, the biggies are two hundred megatonnes.”
“Okay, so big,” Toby said, grinning at Cody.
“How long?” Cody said.
“Well, we’re still trying to get the readings refined,” Dorit said. “But… roughly four hundred days. They’re moving at the same speed, Warp 5 point boring numbers.”
“Get me Gail,” Cody said to Toby. Toby nodded. A moment later, he signaled Cody that she was on. “Merge the comms.”
“Gail this is Cody,” Cody said. “I need you to stop and turn around.”
“You mean Dorit told you about the big nasties?” Gail replied coming in much clearer over the FM tach comm. “Good! But I think we should continue on for a bit —”
“Seven hundred ships, Gail!” Nora said, shooting an unrepentant look to Cody.
“Oh, we’re not going anywhere near them!” Gail replied. “But… we think we should at least track to see what happened to the other two lost ships. And — maybe — we can spot one of their spy ships.”
Cody frowned sourly. He shot a look at Nora.
“Getting one of their ships is really important,” Nora said.
“Okay,” Cody said. “But you be careful!”
“Aye, sir!” Gail replied, cutting her connection before Cody could think to say any more.
Nora smiled and shook her head.
“Okay, Dorit, we’re going to put our heads together,” Cody said. “See you in two days.”
“Right. Out.” Dorit replied. The room was filled with the hiss of static as the connection was broken.
Cody turned to Toby. “Toby, you’re relieved,” Cody said, rising from his command chair. He tapped Nora on the shoulder. “Let’s get down to the lab.”
“Don’t yell at them, Cody,” Nora implored him. “They were just —”
“I know,” Cody said. “Well… what were you going to say?”
Nora blushed and shook her head. “Maybe they wanted to give you a break, or maybe they wanted to have a plan ready to present to you.”
#
“Okay, so… we’re screwed,” Cody said out loud the next morning as he, Toby, and Nora met in Briefing One.
“We can extend warp lances out to five hundred kilometers,” Nora reminded him. “And I think we can still use the AMC mines —”
“AMC torpedoes,” Cody said. “We build a warp ring, put a dummy commander onboard, have them match warp with the enemy and —”
“Kabloom!” Ellaz Whirly said over the speakers. “Cody, I love the way you think!”
“We’ll have to get close enough to launch them,” Cody said. “And we’ll need a lot —”
“Of a model that is only on the drawing board right now,” Nora reminded him.
Cody blew out a sigh. “Yeah.”
“So, we’ll tell the star systems,” Nora said. “And put them in charge of building their planetary defense.”
“We’ll give them the rights to everything we’ve got,” Cody added, glancing to Nora who nodded instantly. “If they attack in groups of twenty-six, twenty-six Meaths should be the —”
“Minimum force,” Toby Ramirez said. “But, if we give them the plans, they should be able to roll the ships out in thirty days, sixty max. And there isn’t a shipyard I know that’s capable of more than twenty ships at a time.”
“So that’s twelve hundred ships, per system,” Nora replied. “What’s wrong with that?”
“If we can get them all to build ships,” Cody replied. “But —” he nodded to Toby “I think we should advise them to build at least fifty of the Meaths for their planetary defense.”
“How do you get them to listen, though?” Nora asked. “You saw what they did at Perky.”
“We’re going to fix Perky,” Cody said.
“How? Invade?” Nora demanded.
“Maybe,” Cody allowed. Nora’s eyebrows jerked up. “Look, do we do nothing and wait for the Thrakzz to roll over them? Because we don’t want to upset the idiots in power? Or do we do whatever it takes to save mankind?”
“Whatever it takes,” Nora said, heaving a heavy sigh.
Toby Ramirez nodded in agreement. “Too many are dead already.”
“It’s more than that,” Cody said. “We’re in a fight for survival. No one gets to sit on the sidelines.”
“But Cody! If we have to use all our power just to keep people cowed, what then?” Nora asked.
“It won’t come to that,” Cody said. “As soon as we can get Emma reinforced, we’re going to deal with Perky and things will work out.”
“You have a plan?” Nora said. She caught his expression and snorted. “You don’t have a plan! So —”
“I’m going to appeal to wiser and older heads,” Cody said. “What we need to be doing is dealing with the aliens. Let others who are more used to that sort of thing deal with politics.”
“Oh!” Nora cried with laughter. “You’re going to sick Dorit on them!”
“And Don and Hanlan,” Cody said.
“President Hanlan?” Nora exclaimed in surprise.
“He was only just doing what he had to do with the threat gone,” Cody said. “When we prove to him that there’s an even bigger threat coming —”
“He’ll change his tune,” Toby Ramirez agreed.
“Cody! Those rings, when we’re done with them — they’d make great traps!” Tilly Ford declared excitedly.
“They would,” Ellaz Whirly agreed. “Hook up some AMCs and you’ve got one crisped ship.”
“What size?” Cody demanded. “What if they’ve got five hundred megatonne warships out there?”
“Well…” Tilly’s copy got thoughtful. “They might.”
“Or bigger?” Nora added. Cody shot her a look and she shrugged. “Well, we’re planning on moving a hundred million people through warp, how much mass is that?”
“More than five hundred megatonnes,” Cody replied. “In fact, closer to a gigatonne.”
“One point six five gigatonnes, including all anticipated ancillary objects,” Ellaz told them. “It will be the largest displacement —”
“Who will pick that up?” Cody asked.
“Anyone with a grav —” Ellaz began only to cut off abruptly. “If the aliens have a grav array, they will pick it up straight away. It’d be like a bonfire on a clear night.”
“A target,” Cody said grimly. “So we either leave everyone at Deneb or —”
“Paint the largest target sign you’ve ever imagined,” Nora agreed glumly. Then she smiled, “Or two.”
“Split them up, go to Creem and Bactra?” Cody guessed.
“And have people waiting for them,” Cody Wasp added.
“Pick your battles,” Cody said, grinning up at the overhead speakers.
“Exactly!”
Chapter Eight
“Cody!” Governor Don Hartman called when Cody exited the docking tube. Cody waved and smiled, casting a glance toward the newsies. He was glad that he’d let Nora badger him into wearing his best uniform, black with gold trim, four gold stars on his collar. He didn’t wear any ship name plate because he was the fleet admiral. He was joined a moment later by Nora, dressed as an admiral with the name plate Phoenix on her right breast, and Toby Ramirez with Tristan on his right breast.
“There you are!” Dorit Williams shouted, bustling through the throng to give Cody a huge grin. “And here, ladies and gentlemen, is the hero of the day, the savior of Deneb, the conqueror at Midway, and the only thing between us and annihilation.”
Governor Hartman had the presence of mind to look askance at her last words but said nothing, merely turning and waving a hand for Cody and the others to follow him.
“As you can see, Admiral, space station Hartman is still getting ready for her expanded duties but, I can assure you, we are taking our new responsibilities seriously,” Don said for the benefit of the newsies.
“So I see!” Nora, who was better at diplomacy than Cody, said loudly. “And I think we all agree that it’s very impressive what you’ve been doing here!”
It had been just over three months since Cody had thrown Hope in front of the five hundred million survivors of the Deneb Destruction — as it was now being called — in a desperate attempt to save the last people of the Deneb star system.
They made small talk until they entered the huge conference room down at the Admin Deck of the station. After letting the newsies vid them looking all diligent and serious, Don’s news director, Annette Harding, shooed them out, closing the door with her outside.
“Okay, Dorit, what’s the plan?” Don said when they were all seated.
“I think that’s up to Cody,” Dorit Williams said with a grin.
“Which plan?” Nora asked. “We’ve got about five, I think.”
“Gail is tracking two possible targets,” Cody said. “She’s spit her fleet sending one half to each. She and Tilly are on Mighty but I’m pretty certain that they’re traveling with the lead fleet —”
“Why not order them back?” Don asked.
“One, because it’s never wise to give an order that won’t be obeyed,” Cody said. “And two, because we need more intel.”
“Anyway, we’ve got enough ships here, Don,” Dorit said. She smiled at Cody. “Maybe you noticed them on the way in?”
“I did,” Cody agreed. “The Deneb Defense Force is looking quite admirable.”
“I put Langstrom in charge,” Don Hartman said.
“After I dug him out of his hole,” Dorit Williams replied. She explained to Cody, “He’s only one twenty-one. He was trying to say that he was retired!”
Don shook his head sympathetically. “Anyway, I let him take out Midway for a spin and… well, he converted.”
‘He’s good,” Dorit said. “He helped me with a revolution or two, just the sort we’re going to need.”
Nora nudged Cody. Cody nodded in reply. “Would your Admiral be willing to help us out?”
“How so?” Don asked.
“Well, you heard about Emma at Perky,” Nora said.
Don Hartman’s eyes gleamed. “Maybe pay a little courtesy visit?”
“At Warp Ten,” Ellaz Williams said over the speakers. “Two merged quads.”
“Warp Ten?” Don said, looking aghast.
“We’ve worked out the numbers, they’re solid,” Ellaz replied. “We just need someone to take on the challenge.”
“We could send Jacob but —” Nora began.
“We are going to send him,” Cody corrected. “And we’ll have him stop at Quark on the way back to get upgraded.”
“But those are older ships,” Nora added.
“Not suitable for warp merge,” Ellaz Williams agreed. “My sisters and I have been having several confabs —”
“With adult supervision,” Cody Williams — the copy of Cody that had attached himself to Dorit Williams and her enterprises — added smugly.
“Interruptions, at least,” Ellaz allowed. She seemed slightly more mature than Ellaz Whirly, probably from her interactions with Dorit and the survivors of Deneb.
“Once Jacob has been refitted, we’ll send him to continue the diplomatic mission,” Cody — the real Cody — said.
“That woman was nuts, Cody!” Ellaz said, regarding Trudy Wilson. “I would have decked her.”
“You weren’t there,” Cody said.
“We heard,” Ellaz told him. “And those sisters didn’t help, you know.” She paused. “Anyway, I think Jake’s ready for an implant.”
“Off the topic,” Dorit said, glaring up at the speakers. “Do we have to turn you off?”
“No!” Ellaz said. “Anyway, you can only turn off the speakers, not me. Us.”
“Okay, so we send a fleet out to Perky,” Don Hartman said. “With what orders?”
“What are you willing to do?” Nora asked.
“Revolution,” Dorit Wililams said.
“But how long will that take?” Cody asked. “And how many people will die?”
“How many will die if we don’t get them to help?” Toby Ramirez asked.
Cody waved a hand. “Governor, this is more your thing than mine.”
“I don’t want to be Emperor Hartman, Cody,” Don admitted. “But… I’ll send a note to President Hanlan, explaining the issues.”
“For the big issue, we’re going to want a face-to-face,” Dorit Williams said.
“And — let’s cut to the chase — what’s the big issue?” Hartman asked.
Cody frowned but it was Nora who said, “We’ve got about seven hundred enemy ships due to arrive in three hundred and ninety-nine days. Our breakdown is still provisional but it looks like over five hundred ships massing over a hundred megatonnes. The other two hundred-odd are smaller, like the ships we fought.”
Don Hartman was silent for a long while. Then, “We’re screwed, aren’t we?”
“We’re planning, sir,” Cody said. “Dorit has already commissioned the Jurgen/Carlow shipyards to build us some cruisers.”
“And battleships,” Dorit said. “That Lucy —” she shot a nod to Nora “— she’s really pretty good.”
“We’re helping,” Nora added.
“I’ve convinced her to —”
“Set up a set of specialized bot fabrication lines,” Nora finished. “And we’ll diversify, ring segments, rings, ships, shuttles.”
“I’ve sent her fifty more people,” Dorit added. “A good super and a solid crew. They know how young she is —”
“She’s older than me!” Nora objected.
Dorit smiled. “And they know to let her take the reins.”
“Reins?” Cody said with a frown.
“A reference to an old earth animal guided by bits of metal in its teeth and leather straps,” Don Hartman explained. With a wolfish grin, he added, “Dorit is full of old anecdotes.”
Dorit flicked her middle finger at him. Cody laughed. “I know what that means!”
“It has traveled well,” Dorit agreed. “Anway, I have great hopes for her and the idiots on Nettles, too,”
“Speaking of which —”
“Dr. Noran has already placed Miz Wilson with our Care And Relocation people,” Don Hartman said, waving a hand. “I think she’ll come around with rest. In which case —” he grinned evilly “— I’m going to offer her a position she can’t refuse.”
“A neat title with no real duties,” Dorit Williams concluded.
“Exactly,” Don said.
“Our current plans have us commissioning the first cruiser in twelve months, and the first BB in eighteen,” Dorit said. “After that, we’ll have one of each type every six weeks.”
Cody did a quick set of calculations. “So that’s six BBs and seven CAs.”
“Yeah,” Dorit said. “We’re trying to speed things up but —” she shrugged.
