“Thank you, Your Majesty.”
Roberts bowed his head and disappeared from the VR meeting room.
“Your report, Admiral Leicester.”
“Yes, Your Majesty. Admiral Shvets’s defensive plan was well-considered and well executed. She destroyed over ninety-two percent of the attacking force in hyperspace, before they ever reached the planet, and she did so exclusively on the Sintaran side of the Sintar-Annalia border. We don’t need to make any excuses there.
“The surviving platforms all managed one missile launch at the planet before being overwhelmed by Admiral Shvets’s follow-on attack. The remaining ships didn’t last two minutes once they down-transitioned from hyperspace. All were destroyed. Their destruction was so quick they had no time to refine their targeting solutions for the missiles they had launched.
“All but two of the missiles were destroyed in successive attacks, either by other picket ships down-transitioning from the chase of the Alliance force, or by missiles launched by a cordon of picket ships in normal space about the planet. Two survived to complete their attack runs, but their incomplete targeting solutions resulted in near-misses of the capital city.”
“We got lucky, Admiral Leicester.”
“Yes, Sire. We sure did.”
“What do you see as the failings in the defensive plan, Admiral Leicester?”
“I don’t see the problem as failings in the defensive plan, Sire, so much as a weakness in execution. The picket ship attacks in hyperspace were not as effective as we expected. Evasive maneuvers and off-line targeting of the picket ships by their point-defense lasers were both more effective than we anticipated.”
“And the picket ships were running under software control, Admiral Leicester?”
“Yes, Sire. Both their evasive maneuvers and their attack runs were under software control. Necessarily, given the lack of QE contact with them while in hyperspace.”
“Understood, Admiral Leicester.”
Dunham looked at his hands on the table for several seconds. Leicester, perforce, waited. Dunham looked up.
“Have we positively identified the attackers, Admiral Leicester?”
“Yes, Sire. We have identified ships from Annalia, Berinia, and Garland.”
“How was that identification accomplished, Admiral Leicester?”
“In two ways, Sire. First, the attacking ships were all home-built ships, not purchased from the DP. We don’t think there are many of those left, if any. Sensor logs clearly distinguished the ships in terms of class and nation of origin based on their emission signatures.”
“They were not transponding, Admiral Leicester?”
“No, Sire.”
“And the second way, Admiral Leicester?”
“We physically went out to the debris fields of a number of the attacking ships and used self-propelled HARPER units to collect identifying artifacts. These confirm the identification, Sire.”
“Were there any ships whose identification was suspect in any way, Admiral Leicester? In other words, did we miss anybody?”
“No, Sire. The ships that were physically inspected included all of those for which the sensor logs were at all questionable.”
“So you are confident Annalia, Berinia, and Garland were the only Alliance nations who participated in this attack, Admiral Leicester?”
“Yes, Sire.”
“I see.”
Again Dunham looked down at his hands on the table. He was actually consulting his notes for this meeting in another VR channel. Leicester again waited, until Dunham looked up and resumed.
“Are your plans for Operation Hadrian complete with regard to Annalia, Berinia, and Garland, Admiral Leicester?”
“Yes, Sire. They await only your signature, as we discussed.”
Dunham nodded.
“Very well, Admiral Leicester. I want the complete sensor logs of the attack and its defense, including the sensor logs of the picket ships involved in the hyperspace attacks, the photographs of the physical evidence collected from the wreckage of the Alliance ships, and the authorizations for Operation Hadrian.”
“Yes, Sire. I have the package for you.”
Leicester pushed the package to Dunham’s computer account, which the VR simulated as sliding a folder across the meeting table. The massive sensor logs were included not in their bulk, but as a pointer and permissions in to the storage location within the massive Imperial Navy computer archives.
I will have a decision for you on Operation Hadrian tomorrow, Admiral Leicester. One day will make no difference.”
“Yes, Sire.”
“Thank you, Admiral Leicester. You are dismissed.”
“Yes, Sire.”
Dunham and Peters dropped out of VR and were back in their private living room in the Imperial Apartment.
“So now what, Bobby?”
It was Saturday afternoon in Imperial City. Dunham checked the current time in another city, on another planet.
“I have to talk to Jared Denny.”
“All right. I’m going to go see to the kids. Meet us at the pool after.”
It was Saturday evening when Jared Denny received a mail message with an Imperial header in VR. He and Michelle had just had dinner, and were planning a quiet evening at home when the message came in.
“Oops. Important business message. I won’t be long.”
His wife was not part of Sintar Specialty Services and did not have a security clearance, so Denny did not elaborate on who the message was from. He accepted the meeting, and found himself in the VR simulation of the Emperor’s office, as before.
“Good evening, Mr. Denny. Please be seated.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“I hope I am not interrupting anything this Saturday evening, Mr. Denny.”
“A quiet evening at home, Sire. Not a problem.”
“Ah, good.”
The Emperor’s air of cheer disappeared and he got serious.
“Mr. Denny, the Empire was attacked in the last forty-eight hours by apparently rogue nations of the Alliance.”
“I saw that on the news, Sire. Estvia, is that right?”
“Yes, Mr. Denny. That is correct. Despite knowing in advance of the attack, despite watching the attack coming, thanks to your map, we were unable to completely defend against it. It was the barest chance the missiles missed the sector capital. Tens of millions would have died.”
“What was our weak spot, Sire?”
“The performance of picket ships attacking in hyperspace under software control appears to be the biggest hole in our armor, Mr. Denny. Five thousand picket ships attacking three thousand enemy vessels, and the kill rate was barely six percent.”
Denny’s eyebrows shot up at that, then settled.
“Sire, this is a new area of combat, and there is no data to work with. We had no experience base on which to develop the attack software.”
“Oh, I am not complaining, Mr. Denny. Without the picket ship attacks in hyperspace, the results would have been horrific. Three thousand Alliance vessels sortied against Estvia.”
“Three thousand, Sire?”
“Yes. Repeated picket ship attacks in hyperspace left just over two hundred survivors to down-transition into Estvia. That is a remarkable achievement. Nevertheless, we must do better.”
“Yes, Sire.”
“To that end, I have a little present for you, Mr. Denny. The complete sensor logs of the attack, including all the sensor logs from the surviving picket ships. We have multiple complete views of almost two dozen attacks in hyperspace.”
“That is excellent, Sire. That’s exactly the sort of experience base we’ve been missing.”
The Emperor pushed the pointer and permissions to Denny, which the VR simulated as him handing Denny a piece of paper over the desk.
“I’ll leave it to you, then, Mr. Denny.”
“Yes, Sire. Thank you, Sire.”
At that, the Emperor dropped the connection, and Jared Denny was
back at home on his living room couch.
When Denny stirred and came out of the characteristic VR blank gaze, Michelle noticed.
“Back so soon?”
“Just a quick update on a project,” Denny said.
Dunham went upstairs to the rooftop gardens and walked over to the pool. Peters was playing in the pool with the kids while their childcare staff took a break. He lay down on the chaise in the sunshine and watched them.
Amanda Peters was just thirty-two, and the kids were approaching three years old. They were babble-boxes now, rattling on constantly, sometimes in normal speech, sometimes in an unintelligible lingo they had developed between themselves. It was a joyous family scene, a scene that was being played out all across the Empire and beyond. On Sintar. On Travers World.
On Annalia.
On Berinia.
On Garland.
A tear slid down Dunham’s cheek. Lost in his thoughts, he didn’t notice.
After a while, Peters came over and lay on the chaise next to his. She saw the tears on his face and said nothing. Eventually, she reached out and took his hand in hers.
Dunham started, came back to the here and now. He noticed the tears on his face and impatiently wiped them away with his other hand.
“You have a decision to make,” Peters said.
“I’ve already made it,” Dunham said.
“You have?”
“Oh, yes. What choice do I really have?”
“I understand.”
“That doesn’t mean I like it.”
“I understand that, too.”
They sat in the chaises, holding hands, and watched their children play.
Sunday brunch was, as always, taken with the Saarets in the dining room of the Consul’s apartment on the top floor of the Imperial Palace.
It was only after breakfast was done, over coffee, that Suzanne Saaret allowed ‘business talk.’
“Have you made a decision on Operation Hadrian?” Saaret asked.
“Yes,” Dunham said somberly.
Saaret picked up on his tone.
“You’ve decided to go ahead, then?”
“Yes.”
“Against all three?”
“Yes.”
Saaret nodded.
“Bobby, what is Operation Hadrian?” Suzanne asked.
“The destruction of the capital cities and military headquarters of Annalia, Berinia, and Garland.”
“Can you do that?”
“Oh, yes.”
“We’ve actually been holding back,” Saaret said.
Suzanne looked from him back to Dunham.
“But not now?”
“By their attack on the planet of Estvia, they have operationally removed themselves from the protections of the Treaty of Earth. I need no longer refrain from using our full power against them.”
“Would it be enough to simply remove the rulers somehow?”
“No.”
“I don’t get that.”
“Suzanne,” Peters said, “think about the situation here when Bobby took the throne. Nominally the supreme ruler of Sintar, the bureaucracy nevertheless controlled almost everything. Most of these rulers have more legal limits on their authority than the Emperor of Sintar.”
“To wield power effectively, I had to get rid of the bureaucracy,” Bobby said. “If we were to assassinate the king of Garland, say, another would stand up in his place, even more determined to wreak vengeance somehow, and with the bureaucracy behind him. And next time we might not be so lucky.”
“So the bureaucracy is just as culpable, in some sense. Or would just perpetuate the system, and the conflict?”
Dunham nodded.
“What about the military headquarters?” Suzanne asked.
“A military runs on coordination and logistics,” Bobby said. “Those flow from the center. To disable their ability to make this kind of attack, I have to break that coordination.”
“Can’t some admiral do it on his own, with the ships already assigned to him?”
“Sure. But where does he get reaction mass? Fuel? Missiles? Who orders those supplies, has them delivered to the right spot? With logistics command gone, who has the authority to do that? Which admiral is the correct successor to the position, without someone in authority to make the assignment?”
“Don’t they have contingency plans for that sort of thing?”
“Not with these autocratic regimes,” Saaret said. “Very strictly hierarchical. The king micromanages the military. Nobody of senior flag rank does anything without his approval, and that includes contingency and survivability planning.”
“And Bobby doesn’t micromanage our military?” Suzanne asked.
“No,” Saaret said. “They’re under his command, but he has a light touch. And they do have contingency and survivability plans in place.”
“I see. Well, as you say, Bobby, we got lucky. I, for one, don’t feel like rolling those dice again.”
“Neither do I, Suzanne.”
After brunch, Dunham went into his office in VR, signed off on Operation Hadrian for each of Annalia, Berinia, and Garland. He looked at the documents a long time, then sent them on to Imperial Admiral Leicester.
“Are we ready, Art?” Fleet Admiral Natalia Shvets asked.
“Yes, Ma’am,” Admiral Arthur Beck replied. “Their navigation programs are loaded and they’re ready to go.”
“All right. Let’s launch them, then.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
Four picket ships detached from her formations, passed through the hypergate projected by their light cruiser tender, and disappeared.
“Are we all set, Jay?” Admiral Maria della Espinoza asked.
“Yes, Ma’am,” Vice Admiral Kim Jae Seong said. “I checked the loading of the navigation program personally.”
“OK. Let’s get them on their way.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
Two picket ships detached from her formations, passed though the hypergate projected by their light cruiser tender, and disappeared.
In the city of Demos, on the planet Olympia, Harold Pinter met on Monday morning with his defense minister, Pavel Isaev, and his foreign minister, Jules Morel.
“So what happened?” Pinter asked.
“Annalia, Berinia, and Garland launched an attack on the capital planet of Estvia,” Isaev said. “They actually launched nuclear-warhead missiles at the planet.”
“And two of them got through?”
“Yes. Of three thousand ships, two hundred and twenty-seven got through the Empire’s defenses and launched against the planet. Of the two hundred twenty-seven missiles launched, two got through and detonated on the planet. They missed the capital city of Kehala, but not by much.”
Pinter turned to Morel.
“What the fuck did they think they were doing, Jules?”
“That’s actually a damn good question, Harold. We don’t know for sure, but King Michael of Estvia was present for the Alliance war vote. He spoke against it, and, when they voted for war, he withdrew from the council. Then, when the Alliance fleets had been largely destroyed, he annexed to Sintar. They may have speculated he told Sintar of the war vote, and they were seeking some kind of revenge for that.”
“Did they require a non-disclosure agreement before the war vote? Did everyone swear to the others they would hold the meeting in confidence?”
“I don’t believe so, Harold.”
“So they held a war vote to begin hostilities, with no one present bound by contract or honor to keep it a secret, and then they get mad when someone doesn’t? Is that what you’re telling me?”
“Yes, basically.”
“And do they not understand they have just unilaterally withdrawn themselves from the protections of the Treaty of Earth as far as Sintar is concerned? What do they think this Emperor is going to do to them now, Jules? Because he won’t take this lying down, I can tell you that.”
“I know, Harold. I know. I don’t thin
k anyone over there is thinking very clearly at the moment.”
“Well, that’s pretty clear.”
Pinter combed his hand through his hair.
“Shit. This has just gotten way out of hand,” Pinter said.
He looked down at the table for several seconds. Isaev and Morel waited while he thought.
“Look. I think this Emperor is going to do something spectacular to make a statement. ‘Don’t even think of doing anything like this to Sintar, ever.’ That’s what I expect.”
“How spectacular?” Isaev asked.
“Oh, I don’t know. How about a decapitation strike?”
“Can he do that?” Morel asked.
“He’s demonstrated so far he can do pretty much anything he wants, hasn’t he?” Pinter asked.
Pinter looked at Morel, and Morel nodded.
“OK,” Pinter said. “Pavel. I want us to be ready to flood into Annalia and Berinia if he takes out their governments. I don’t want him annexing them, and having Sintar right on our border. Can we do that?”
“Of course, Harold.”
“All right. Get into position to do that, because whatever is going to happen, I expect it to happen soon.”
Jared Denny called a group meeting on Monday. The best time for everyone was early Monday morning at his location, so he was up early.
“Good morning, everyone. We have a new project. Better attack software for the picket ships when used for attacks in hyperspace. You all remember how hard it was to design it in the first place, primarily because we had no data to design against. No existing experience base of how attacks in hyperspace might unfold.
“That has now changed. The Alliance attacked an Imperial planet last week. Almost two dozen attacks were carried out on the approaching force in hyperspace, and we now have the sensor logs of all the surviving ships.
“I spent Sunday going through these logs, building a VR simulation of each actual attack. My first impression looking at them is the Alliance crews grew successful at predicting the behavior of the attack ships as the attacks went on. In addition to that, the first attack was only about six percent successful, due to defensive strategies we did not anticipate and therefore the software could not counter.
EMPIRE: Warlord (EMPIRE SERIES Book 5) Page 17