by Blaze Ward
“You did what?” Tom let his shock show. “How?”
“We’re the Republic of Aquitaine Navy, Vanguard,” Phil announced proudly. “That’s what we do.”
Yeah, one of Jessica’s people.
“So what proof do you have that I should believe you, CS-405?” Tom growled at this cheeky interloper.
“The best one imaginable, Vanguard,” came the response.
Tom should have known any guess he might make would be too mundane, too linear.
Too something.
Kosnett apparently changed camera images at his end, pulling back from the personal one on his console, like Tom was using, to the larger view, with the whole bridge crew on screen, even if very few of them were facing the right direction.
“Admiral?” Kosnett looked away from Tom’s pickup and said quietly to someone down front.
Tom followed movement as one of Kosnett’s people, in what was normally the Pilot’s chair, unbuckled and stood.
“My God.” Tom Provst was seeing a ghost. “Carlyle?”
“Hello, Tom,” Admiral Gustavsson replied in a surprisingly calm voice for a man that had been Missing, Considered Lost for almost a decade. “We have a fantastic story to tell you, but first, I need you to help me bring home the rest of my men, and then make sure everyone else has a chance to make it home as well.”
“How…?” Tom started to ask.
“We located and liberated a prison planet in Altai sector, Vanguard,” Phil said. “We brought them all home, but my mission is not yet complete.”
Tom felt the bottom of his world drop out. He looked at Charlie and put the line on mute for a second.
“Prepare to send the fast courier,” Tom said. “Get him in motion to St. Legier as soon as he can load supplies and enough crew to make the run, once I record a message to get Emmerich out here. If this is real, we’ll need the Grand Admiral on the frontier. Keller’s folks might have just done the impossible, and we’ll have a very limited time to exploit whatever intelligence they bring home. Find me a second courier to send to Jessica and launch him as soon as we know where we’re going next, because it won’t be to her. And send a note to General zu Arlo. If they have rescued folks from a planetary surface, I know where he’ll want to go next.”
“On it,” Charlie leaned back and began typing furiously.
Tom considered that this might be a trap, designed to pull his squadron far enough away from home that they could be ambushed where nobody could help, but he was willing to push the margins on this one.
He cleared the line again and let his eyes focus on Carlyle Gustavsson. They had worked him up a pretty good replica of his old red jacket, but it hung on the man like a toga. Carlyle looked to weigh half of what he had the last time they had met.
“Send me coordinates, CS-405,” Tom decided. “We’ll follow you out and escort you home. Good thing you arrived when you did. I was close to heading out to meet Jessica, but I’ll send her a note.”
“Just glad to see a friendly face, Admiral Provst,” Phil Kosnett replied. “I was expecting to have to explain it all to a bureaucrat, rather than one of us.”
One of us?
Tom supposed that he qualified now, but Kosnett wouldn’t have known about the second mission to Severnaya Zemlya.
No, the man was talking about warriors, rather than paper-pushers.
They had their place, keeping things organized. Or, in the case of men like Gunter Tifft, sliding through the reams of paper to find the diamond that would have been lost until it was found in the after-action recriminations.
“Transmitting coordinates now, Valiant,” Kosnett said. “Let me know when you want to jump.”
Charlie nodded that he had them, and was bouncing the message to the whole squadron. Then he muted the line again.
“What’s our offset, Tom?” Charlie asked.
Tom blanked the camera and smiled. Gift horses, and all that.
“Drop us seventy-five light-seconds long, facing inward, with Hans Bransch on point, instead of one of the cruisers,” Tom grinned. “And have Qin Lun longer and protecting the rear flank. I’ll trust a pirate to have his ass covered, and ours by extension.”
Charlie laughed and started typing.
Tom opened the audio and video lines again.
“Jump when ready, CS-405,” he ordered. “We’ll follow you out.”
Chapter LVII
Imperial Founding: 181/04/02. IFV Valiant, Deep Space
To his dying day, Tom Provst, Admiral of the Red, Fribourg Empire, knew he would never forget the image the screens showed him as Valiant dropped out of jump.
A monstrous, obviously-civilian megafreighter flagged as RAN Packmule dominated the formation when they emerged.
RAN Forgotten Mercy flew just ahead of the freighter. The transponder signal marked her as a captured medical cruiser.
How in the hell had these people managed to steal a floating hospital? And why?
RAN Queen Anne’s Revenge was a weird-looking civilian cargo transport, with the addition of a gun mounted forward, where a ramp had been welded shut to fix the emitter.
But the best part was IFV Persephone flying in the van. Not RAN, but IFV on her transponder. She was an old D-Class police cutter, and challenged Valiant like a Teacup Chihuahua facing down a Mastiff.
Faced down all of them, as a matter of fact, challenging his squadron’s right to be in Persephone’s space. One heavy dreadnaught. Four cruisers. Seven corvettes.
Hell, Tom’s fast courier wasn’t that much smaller than Persephone.
It brought a smile to his face, once Hans Bransch had scanned the space around here for any risk of ambush. With his paranoia cranked up as high as it would go.
CS-405 took up an escort position opposite Queen Anne’s Revenge outside the line of other vessels and waited for the rest of Tom’s force to form up.
“Second Squadron, in line astern behind Packmule,” Tom ordered. “Hans Bransch in high escort, everyone else take up your wings.”
“Persephone, this is Valiant, Tom Provst commanding,” he said.
Let the Teacup Chihuahua have his moment in the sun. Tom had enough force, just with Valiant, to annihilate these pirates if this was a trap. The other cruisers were just for icing at that point.
“Valiant, this is Flight Lieutenant Granville Veitengruber, previously off IFV Germania,” the captain of Persephone transmitted back. “Now RAN Centurion In Command of Persephone.”
That sounded like one hell of an interesting story, once they got home. How many prisoners were out there? Not forgotten by their mates, but lost. Like Carlyle.
The man looked tall and lanky when the camera caught up. Dark but rather forgettable. Still something burned hot and angry in his eyes, though. It was a look Tom knew well from his mirror.
“Transmitting coordinates now, Veitengruber,” Tom said, nodding to Charlie and watching the man send them. “Come out on this vector and prepare for a full customs inspection.”
That got an entirely-inappropriate laugh across the comm. Tom presumed that something along those lines had been a ruse for the pirates to get close enough to hit someone.
“Acknowledged, Admiral,” the man said. “Stand by to jump.”
Tom was impressed with the group of pirates. They all moved as a single entity, vanishing within a second of each other. Tom’s team went in right after them.
On the other side, as before, Second Squadron had a small offset, the kind that both lined up his ships for inspection and honor guard, and put every one of the pirates under a Bubble Gun and enough Type-4 beams to settle any issues quickly.
Tom wasn’t playing. Didn’t matter if Kosnett was offended or not. If he was a pro, he would be expecting it.
And Valiant got there first, as planned. Charlie sent off the courier to the Grand Admiral even before Kosnett’s squadron emerged, with orders to break records getting home in such a way that Tom Kigali would be impressed when he heard the story, and possibly
challenged to beat them at a later date.
Em needed to be here, right now. especially if Carlyle had come home from an unknown prison planet.
As before, IFV Persephone flew up to challenge the squadron.
It brought a smile to Tom’s face that felt alien, watching one man grieve such a huge force by himself. Tom looked forward to meeting the man and hearing his story.
And then going off and finding all of those men who had been lost over the years, when Fribourg had been slowly pushed back and couldn’t do anything about it.
Tom was happy to change that.
Chapter LVIII
Imperial Founding: 181/04/05. System Headquarters, Osynth B’Udan
This was not the day Vo had planned. But it was war and he was prepared.
Always prepared. The galaxy will not wait for you to put your gun on.
He and Alan were up in orbit, aboard the massive station that was the bulwark of this system, almost comparable to the one guarding St. Legier. They were surrounded by people, but mostly forgotten, except by the two admirals and Phil Kosnett.
Vo didn’t know the Command Centurion all that well. Seen him in staff meetings and nodded companionably at each other, but not sat down to have coffee and shoot the shit.
Not that Vo had anyone like that within a thousand light-years.
This latest meeting was drastically cut down. None of the aliens, although Doctor Sam Au had been with them at the previous one, along with the first two prisoners, Kiel and Lan. Much of Kosnett’s inner circle was here, but a few were off elsewhere. Probably organizing things because they had the best feel for how to send the other prisoners home.
Vo had thought that Tom Provst would put his foot down, or put a fist in someone’s face, when Kosnett calmly announced that Forgotten Mercy and her crew needed to be loaded up with food supplies and sent back to Buran as rapidly as the engineers could handle the task.
But Tom had taken a deep breath and listened carefully. And then agreed, wonder of wonders.
The anger was still there. Vo could see it in the man’s face across the table as they settled for this next meeting, but this wasn’t the Tom Provst who had been hanging by a thread fourteen months ago. Nor that deadly, avenging angel that had followed.
It wasn’t quite a third person inhabiting the shell, but it was close.
Carlyle Gustavsson wasn’t anybody Vo knew, but he could see the hard years in what was apparently a prison camp. Work or starve.
Phil Kosnett had brought a group with him: his First and Second Officers, and his Dragoon. Nicknamed Lady Blackbeard, Ground Control, Stunt Dude, respectively.
Seriously?
Two others who were obviously Navy, but wore civilian clothing as if their honor rode on it. Bok Battenhouse, former Boatswain of CS-405. Avelina Indovina, who introduced herself to everyone as Duke of Lighthouse Station.
Whatever the hell that meant.
Tom Provst and Charlie d’Noir rounded out the group. Not even the local admiral’s staff was allowed to be here now. But neither Vo nor Tom had any degree of trust for the locals. Too many spies and loose lips around here.
Phil Kosnett looked up from his coffee and circled the room once with his eyes, lingering for an extra second on Vo and Alan, before continuing. The room was locked and sealed tight, and a little cramped with all the bodies, but the air conditioner was going like hell to keep the heat down.
“Mansi would be a useful target to hit, from a psychological standpoint,” Kosnett began, extending the conversation that most of them had just been part of an hour ago, in a different room.
When they had been with other folks, the kind that might talk too much around the wrong ears.
“However, there is nothing there worth our effort at present,” Kosnett continued, nodding to Gustavsson. “We liberated all the men alive at the time, and if three died on the trip home, they died as free men. We know where the rest of them are buried and can return at a later date to retrieve their remains.”
Vo felt a surge of emotion from an unaccustomed place as he heard those words. He had refashioned himself as the avenger, destroyer of Buran, but Kosnett had become the liberator, rescuing the men that had disappeared over the decades, as Fribourg slowly lost a two-front war.
“Recommendations, then?” Tom asked in a voice like the gravel bed of a dried river.
He held command here, with Jessica gone. That was why the local Blue Admiral had been pointedly ignored. Second Squadron and the 189th would do this themselves.
Tom Provst would make that call.
“Lighthouse Station,” Kosnett said. “We’ve established the beginnings of a forward base on the planet, and could easily expand it. The place is, as far as we know, unknown to Buran, as long as we’re careful. None of their captured maps show it inhabited, and none of their highways get even close. It is in a dark pocket, as well, surrounded on most sides by empty space and older stars starting to hit the red giant stage, although that star is young enough not to bother us.”
“What do we gain?” Tom asked.
Vo leaned forward to study both Kosnett and Indovina as the conversation progressed. She could make a legal claim of colonization. And had already filed the necessary legal work to become the Duke of the place, as soon as CS-405 had gotten to the station.
Whether Casey would allow it was another question, but that wouldn’t be decided for years anyway.
“There is a whole planet, about a quarter of the way off dead center of the Altai sector as we face inward,” Indovina jumped in. “Inhabitable and pleasant. Enough space to drop several legions of troops for training and recuperation. We can put a station in orbit to handle warships. And then you can go stomp on all the other little systems around Altai, without having to come all the way back here each time, or live cramped on ships, instead of in barracks. We gain time, mobility, and surprise.”
Her gaze was fixed on him. She looked way older than twenty-two, and reminded him of Dash and some of the folks of Fourth Saxon. Stubborn enough you could get rich if you could just figure out how to bottle it and sell it.
“It also provides a place we could build a hospital facility,” Kosnett added. “Forgotten Mercy was taken because we needed to be able to transport an unknown number of men in suspect health an extreme distance, and a troop transport would have been too well guarded. From there we can hit places like Barnaul or Laptev and complete some of the task of rescuing people from slavery.”
“Vo?” Tom turned and pointedly asked.
“I don’t answer to Jessica, Tom,” he replied. “Em’s building me three new Assault Carriers, so we can send Akatsuki and Archangel home one of these days, but I plan to extend the RAN ships to a second year of contract service. Jessica and Arott might decide to join us there. Or maybe keep a second front in place, but I’m in favor.”
“I am as well,” Tom agreed. “Your legion can provide some of the construction forces we need, but I’d like to get Em out here and have him round us up a group of permanent settlers for the Duke. And the initial batch should all be active duty or recently retired.”
Tom turned to the Duke and fixed her with a hard stare. Vo nearly laughed out loud when she stared back and Tom blinked a tiny bit. That admiral still wasn’t prepared to deal with hard women.
Vo had been around Jessica, Dash, and Casey. Grown up around them, if you wanted to look at it that way. If Avelina wasn’t in their league, she wasn’t a pushover either.
“I realize you claim the entire planet, Your Grace,” Tom went ahead and treated her like the Duchy was a done deal. “I propose a settlement zone, outside your immediate valley, where colonists can place claims and purchase leaseholds. And a couple of military facilities, also under leasehold for now, although the Crown may demand those convert to freeholds at a later date.”
Vo nearly laughed out loud when the woman reached down and lifted a satchel onto the table. He hadn’t seen it earlier, but she had gotten here first and was across from him.
He watched her pull a stack of papers as thick as his thumb and smack them down on the table in front of Tom with a resounding thump.
“CS-405’s legal department has already prepared preliminary documentation, Admiral,” she smiled at the man like a mongoose goading a snake. “Two settlement zones have been identified and I have completed a preliminary survey of tracts. Two army training bases and a security barracks. Two starports, one serving the primary city I envision down on the coast, and the other on land claimed by my first colonist, where it can serve his ranch and my eventual palace grounds.”
Vo had seen a lot of emotions on Tom Provst’s face over the last couple of years, running the entire gamut of humanity. He had never seen the man at a complete loss for words, jaw hanging slack.
But Avelina Indovina had obviously spent a lot of time thinking about this, and had the obvious support of everyone aboard CS-405 to pull it off.
Tom just hung there for several seconds, as his mind caught up. Finally, he nodded and turned his attention to Vo.
“You were close to packed, right?” he asked.
Vo nodded, but kept the rude smile off his face. Inappropriate. Correct, but inappropriate. Sternness was called for. Even as much as he wanted to giggle right now.
“Affirmative,” Vo said. “Mostly packing the freighters right now, but my men and their vehicles are ready to go.”
Tom turned back to the young woman across from them.
“I can exercise Force Majeure,” he said simply. “However, I do not have the authority to authorize payment up front. We can provide a significant labor force, for which we would bill you later, and you can in turn bill the government for leaseholds. Is that acceptable at present?”
Vo liked the way she turned to both Battenhouse and Kosnett, and waited for them to nod, before she agreed. She might want to be a Duke, and be on her way, but this was a larger thing, and involved affairs of governments probably well beyond anything she ever envisioned.