And how much of a hypocrite are you for having an AI? she asked herself. That was another of the few Galactic Union laws that were actually enforced.
Ghost said, obviously listening in on Alexis’ private thoughts.
Ghost was right, naturally. Her grandfather had found Ghost when he’d salvaged Pegasus, way back during Earth’s Alpha Contracts. Of course, since then, and long before Alexis was born, the Winged Hussars researchers had tried to duplicate Ghost. They’d spent millions of credits funding other organizations’ research into artificial intelligence as well. All of it was wasted. Ghost was unable to duplicate herself. She’d always insisted it was outside her abilities.
Still, the AI was an incredibly powerful asset. Besides being able to program exceptionally adept drones, she could also make incredible predictions in combat. More importantly, she replaced the ship’s hyperspace computer, effectively allowing them to emerge anywhere in a star system instead of the predesignated emergence point. Ghost explained it was a particularly interesting process to do that. Something that involved Tri-D, but she’d never explained what Tri-D was. Those abilities made her inability to reproduce the AI all the more frustrating.
“How’s the construction of the Avengers coming?”
She grunted and thanked the AI. She sometimes wished she could switch off her channel to the machine, just like she wished she could forget whose body it was living inside of. Unfortunately, both situations were not going to change any time soon.
* * *
Avenger One, Winged Hussars Prime Base, New Warsaw System
“Easy…” Lieutenant Colonel Walker said over the intercom as Ensign Thorb pulled the brand new Avenger-class bomber out from where it had been parked. Unfortunately, before they could move it to the new squadron spaces, the second bomber off Manufactory #2’s production line had been completed and parked directly behind it, with other craft located above and below it. While Thorb had assured Walker there was plenty of room for him to get the first Avenger out, he had neglected to mention that “plenty of room” was less than what the computer had determined was an acceptable safe distance, and the warning tone had gone off continuously. When it switched from “Collision Possible” to “Collision Imminent,” though, it really got his attention.
“Easy,” he said again, watching the monitor. He couldn’t see any space between the two bombers and really didn’t want to start his day by wrecking both of the new craft. “Easy!...Easy!...Shit! I hate it when you do that!” Once Thorb had determined he was clear, he had applied power, massively, to Avenger One and rocketed off. “Slow down, dammit!” he added. “We’re still within the confines of the shipyard.”
“What?” Thorb asked innocently. “I could tell I was clear.” The member of an aquatic otter-analogue race, Thorb was used to negotiating objects in three dimensions. He was also far more risk-tolerant than Walker.
“Look, I know you probably don’t fully understand what an asset this bomber is, or how many credits it cost to produce—”
“Fifteen million, two hundred seventy-five thousand and fifty-eight credits,” Thorb interrupted, “and some change. Give or take. That’s what the production manual said, anyway.”
“And I suppose you actually took the time to read the production manual?” Walker asked, grumpily.
“I did,” Thorb said. “That’s how I know it can do…this!” He snapped it into a roll that slapped Walker’s helmeted head into the canopy. “This is one of the most maneuverable bombers known. It can do 1,080 degrees per second—that’s three full revolutions!”
Walker grunted as he tried to clear the stars from his vision. Even though he had a helmet on, the impact with the canopy had been unexpected and violent. “Yeah, let’s not do that again, huh? At least warn me next time?”
“Just trying to get the feel for it,” the SalSha said, not sounding at all repentant. “This is almost better than swimming,” he added. “It’s too bad we didn’t fill the cockpit with water—then we could have done some really high-g maneuvering.” The bomber was built to fly with the cockpit in air or flooded; when flooded, the SalSha could pull enough Gs to not only knock Walker unconscious, but also to permanently damage him if it went on too long.
Knowing Thorb, Walker had vetoed the flooded cockpit option on general principle. While the SalSha wouldn’t have done anything to intentionally hurt him…sometimes Thorb’s “play” got a little rough—like the previous roll—and he still had another flight to do with one of the other SalSha when he got back from the current flight. He needed to see about borrowing some of the Winged Hussars flight instructors, or he was going to be perpetually black and blue. He certainly wasn’t going to let two SalSha out alone…not anytime soon.
“All right,” Walker said after a few minutes, “we’re clear of the shipyard. Let’s proceed to the target asteroid.”
With a thought, Thorb flipped the ship upside down and initiated an eight-G pull. Definitely going to need some Hussars flight instructors, Walker thought when he woke up again.
* * *
Winged Hussars Prime Base, New Warsaw System
Colonel Alexis Cromwell looked at the Tri-V in her office displaying the task force she’d assembled and whistled.
“That’s a hell of a fleet,” the second in command of the Winged Hussars mercenary company, Lech Kowalczy, said.
“It’s the largest the Winged Hussars has ever fielded,” she said. He glanced at her curiously. “I checked. Sixty-three ships, not including dropships and other merc ships. Still, it’s hardly a decent-sized task force to the Izlians or the Maki.”
“They’re not expecting you,” Kowalczy said.
“We’re counting on that,” Paka reminded him. “If we transition into Golara, and there’s a squadron of Maki battleships there…”
“Yeah, I know,” Alexis said. “I’d really like to have Nuckelavee in addition to Shadowfax.”
“Last report from the yard was that all three reactors on Nuckelavee are toast. They’ve started fabricating replacements.”
“That’ll take days,” she said. Of course, Alexis was well aware of the status for her fourth new Egleesius-class battlecruiser. Along with Shadowfax, Phaeton, and Arion, they accounted for a massive increase in firepower for the Winged Hussars. The Egleesius-class was a relic of the Great Galactic War. They hadn’t been made in 20,000 years, which was part of the reason they were so effective in combat. They had the firepower of a battlecruiser, the profile of a cruiser, the shields of a heavy cruiser, and an incredibly powerful spinal-mounted particle accelerator cannon. Pegasus had been a nasty surprise to countless adversaries for a century. Often a fatal surprise.
“Still,” Alexis said, “Shadowfax is ready.”
“Captain Elizabeth Stacy is a very competent commander,” Kowalczy said. Alexis had watched Stacy come up through the command school not long after she’d graduated herself. After she’d served as TacCom on the carrier Phoenix, Alexis’ mother had moved Stacy to second in command of the frigate Empress Jito. Her first command was the cruiser Gallant Fox, followed by Sleipnir two years earlier. When Alexis found herself with four more Egleesius ships, Stacy had been second on her list for the command of one. Right behind Paka.
“Oh, Lech, that reminds me.”
“Commander?”
“I’ve decided; when Nuckelavee comes online, I want you to take her.”
“I…” he clearly hesitated, “I’m honored, but I really like Alicorn.”
“Sure you do. I liked her, too, when she was mine. You�
�re second in command of the Winged Hussars. I need you in an Egleesius. The Steed-class are damned fine ships. Better than fine. I helped design them, after all. But they’re not Egleesius. Plan on it when we get back?” He nodded, though it was obvious he wasn’t happy. “Fleet status?” Alexis asked her two chief subordinates.
“We’ve completed replenishment operations,” Paka stated. “All ships have full stores of reaction mass, F11 above 70 percent, consumables on board, and full magazines.” Alexis nodded. “The carrier Chimera took a little extra time. It was on a down cycle and not on the mission log. We’re positioning ships now.”
“Crew are almost onboard,” Kowalczy said. “With that many ships in the field, we’ve had to staff around 9% of positions with new graduates or members with less than a year of service with the Hussars.”
“Suboptimal,” Alexis said. Kowalczy spread his hands in a helpless gesture. “Okay, I understand.”
“We’re coming up short on marines,” he added. “I spoke with Commander Earl, he says his unit isn’t ready to deploy. Bert’s Bees’ combat losses at Karma were fairly high. KIA weren’t bad, but injuries were. He’s at half strength.”
“Never a good idea to split up a unit,” Alexis agreed. She had an idea. “Tell you what, assign them to Phaeton. Since they’re with us for the duration, we’ll be using the Egleesius more often than not. This gives them a chance to get used to the floorplan.”
Pegasus had undergone a number of modifications over the century the Hussars had used her. Some as a matter of necessity, others through expediency. Alexis had spent more than a few hours looking them over. She and her sister had played in Pegasus’ bowels as little kids. Touring the unmodified version was strange. A section of corridor would be identical to her ship, then an entire area would be different. Proportions had a lot to do with it. The Egleesius weren’t designed for Humans. The doors were too short and overly wide.
When she’d brought them home, the first order of business had been to make the new ships fully functional. All had seen combat; the one they’d named Nuckelavee more than the others. Battle damage was repaired. Next was the interior layout. Robots did a lot of that quicker than Humans or most aliens could. Finally came weapons. The Hussars had reduced the Egleesius’ forward and rear laser armament, replacing it with missile launchers, which fit their tactical doctrine better. The Hussars’ missiles were far superior to most. Phaeton and Arion were almost done. Almost. Gravity decks would have to wait until the war was over.
“You’re not leaving me much here,” Kowalczy said.
“You’ll have more once the other two Egleesius are operational,” Paka said.
“I’m leaving the Night Birds, too,” Alexis said. “They got a little chewed up in the breakout at Karma. Your Alicorn, cruisers Seattle Slew and American Pharoah, and frigates Tizona and Osman.” She looked around at them. “We all know if they find New Warsaw, it’s game over.” The other two nodded. “It’ll be sufficient. Prepare to deploy the fleet.”
The two officers acknowledged her orders and took their leave. Alexis walked over to the big window in her office and looked out. The station made a full rotation every three minutes to provide the three-quarters gravity onboard. Half the time, the planet was visible outside her window, with its dark landscapes and watery surface. It was a cold, dark place, but it was home to thousands of her people. The rest of the time she could see the shipyards around Prime Base, along with the materials yards and service facilities.
The stretched-cigar-shapes of the Egleesius-class ships were distinctive, even from many kilometers away. She still wasn’t used to seeing more than one. Four now floated in the staging area near Prime Base. Another was in the lattice-like web of an orbital shipyard: Nuckelavee. Then there were another two similar shapes a little further away—those were enigmas. They’d found all six ships together in 2nd Level Hyperspace.
She picked up a slate and looked at the request. After completing the modifications on the bomber prototypes now called Avengers and getting them into production, Sato was formally requesting permission to begin examining the two odd Egleesius ships. Identical in shape and size, the ships appeared to be missing any offensive armament other than an oversized spinal mount. They had four fusion torches instead of three, which suggested more speed. They had their shield emitters and possessed hyperspace shunts, like Pegasus, so they’d be able to enter hyperspace without a stargate. However, there was no sign of a hyperspace generator.
To complete the list of strangeness, the ships lacked airlocks at the four docking points they shared in common with the others of their class. What the hell are they, anyway? For a change, Ghost remained silent, just as she had ever since they’d discovered the two enigmatic ships. She sighed and typed an order, thinking she’d probably regret it.
“Sato, you have permission to investigate one of the two unusual Egleesius-class ships. You may not do more than examine the ship’s systems without first consulting with Kleena.” She hoped the elSha head of the team could keep him under control, but she rather doubted it. Still, Sato tended to listen to Kleena and wasn’t known to go dangerously off the rails. She shrugged; maybe he’d find out what the ships were for? She sent the order.
* * *
Jim waited as Splunk talked for a couple moments with Sly. He’d been trying to catch snippets of their speech and record it for analysis, mostly without success. He’d had precious little time the last few days to visit Upsilon, being fully occupied managing the Cavaliers aboard Bucephalus. The Hussars were more than generous with ordnance and consumables. It was clear that, after her initial hesitation, Alexis Cromwell was now in it to win it. Good thing, too. Without her fleet, they had absolutely zero hope.
Splunk finished her consultation and raced over to the waiting Raknar, flying up the side like a bullet. The interior of Upsilon wasn’t quite zero gravity. The asteroid base carried a fractional gravity of 0.01G; just enough for things to float to the floor. You could jump off a 50 foot ledge and only be going 17.6 feet per second. He shook his head, 5.4 meters per second. He needed to get rid of that old American habit. The Hussars used metric, anyway.
Splunk sailed into the cockpit, slapping the close control as she flew past. Much larger and more complicated than a CASPer, the 30-meter-tall machine’s chest area was made of overlaid and interleaved armor sections. It opened a little like origami to allow access to the cockpit, which was itself large enough for several grown men. Jim was already in the complicated harnesses which helped translate his actions into the movements of the war machine.
“All good?” he asked her as she settled onto the shelf behind his head.
“All good Jim,
When he’d flown over in preparation for the fleet deployment, Splunk had told him Sly had two of the Raknar he’d pilfered from the KzSha operational. Sly assured him the Fae would have the rest up and running in a few months. Of course, then the real work would begin. Jim put that off for now.
The biggest surprise he’d had upon returning was to find his personal Raknar, Dash, had received a thorough going over. His former girlfriend had managed, with Splunk’s help, to get the machine into working shape. The brigade of Fae had gone over it from top to bottom. They’d even given it a new Cavalier’s blue paint job, retaining the insignia and name “Jim Cartwright – Commander” on the chest, complete with its trademark rainbow swoosh.
“The Raknar looks fantastic,” Jim said as he finished the power-up sequence. The machine’s fusion core began to thrum as megawatts of power flowed through the systems. Displays filled with pulsing liquid began glowing, and some of the liquid flowed through tubes like an old Earth sci-fi film from the 1950s. That had been hard to get used to. When he’d first seen the goo, he’d thought it was a fungus invading the machine, not part of its mechanisms. Biologically conductive fungus, his science-minded people had explained it. When properly energized, superconductive, actually. He was pretty sure the stuff was one of the main reasons nobody
else in the Union had been able to operate the machines after the Great Galactic War. A vial of it was in Dr. Taiki Sato’s office, awaiting analysis.
“Jim,
“Akee,” he agreed. She reached out and touched his pinplants. There was a lurching feeling of being pulled from his body, and then he was the Raknar. The Fae was the other reason nobody’d figured the Raknars out. It took a symbiont. He needed to talk to a Lumar.
No longer looking at the bay through monitors on the inside of the cockpit, he saw it directly through the Raknar’s sensors as if they were his own eyes. Furthermore, all of the giant mech’s sensors built a 3D image in his brain. The power was intoxicating. He wanted to go destroy something. The fleet is waiting. Damn it.
“Let’s go,” he said, before orienting and gently pushing off. The 30-meter machine floated down the huge hallway as another door closed behind him. He was aware the corridor’s atmosphere was being evacuated at the same time automated systems within the Raknar prepared it for operating in space.
He didn’t know if he’d need the war machine in the Golara assault. However, Bucephalus had the room, so he was bringing it along. His second in command, Hargrave, thought it a bit crazy, but rank had its privileges. After seeing what he’d done with it during the assault on Karma, few doubted it could turn the tide of battle in a most spectacular manner. Also, Jim wasn’t going to admit it, but strapping the armor on was better than sex.
The Raknar floated past the entrance to a lock made to the Raknar’s scale. He unconsciously used tiny puffs of built-in attitude jets to maintain his spacing from the walls. The door slid closed behind him, and the one in front opened to show him the vastness of space.
“Oh, yeah,” he said as he flew clear. He automatically knew when he was a safe distance from Upsilon. At that point, he set the reactor to peak output, opened the thrust ports on his back and legs, and fed reaction mass through the fusion power plant. With an explosion of pure light and energy, Dash accelerated at eight Gs. “Wooohoo!” he exulted. Isolated from his body by the bonding experience, Jim Cartwright was unaware he was now cocooned in the glowing, pulsing ooze which filled the various cavities, tubes, and chambers of the Raknar’s heart. He felt none of the effects of acceleration.
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