by B. V. Larson
“Using algorithms I designed, this projection shows the likely limits of the Liberation, based on the forces available, how much we can acquire and use, and the Mutuality’s slow but overwhelming response.”
Straker stared at it. “We’d grow to almost half the size of the Hundred Worlds, but you’re saying we’ll get easily crushed. Why? Why are they holding, if we can’t?”
“The Hundred Worlds have advantages we would not. Their central systems are heavily fortified, and their industrial output is more than one hundred times that of our projected Liberation territory. They have a small, yet meaningful technological advantage that we do not. They have twenty times the population. Despite recent setbacks, they have a highly professionalized military structure that churns out trained personnel, many of whom have been genetically engineered for their roles.”
“And you don’t think the Liberation would spread on its own to more Mutuality worlds?”
“I have taken the statistical likelihood of that happening into account. The main obstacle to the domino effect is the presence of multiple fortresses above important populated planets. No rebellion can succeed when it can be attacked from above. Even if an entire planet revolted, its people are trapped on the surface, and fleets control all sidespace travel among star systems. Every world becomes, in effect, an isolated island.”
Straker rubbed his stubbled jaw. “So if we really want to spread the Liberation, we have no choice but to control space, and destroy or take control of fortresses.”
“That is correct,” said Zaxby with an air of perverse satisfaction. “And, without some factor I have not included—and I included all known factors—the Galactic Liberation is doomed to failure.”
Chapter 15
Sachsen Fortress, Command Center
The assembly of Breakers seemed to sigh as one at Zaxby’s declaration that the Galactic Liberation was doomed to failure. It was a sound approaching a gasp of despair, as of a dream snatched away and stepped upon by the cruel hand of fate.
“That’s bullshit,” Straker said firmly, trying to dispel the mood. “Oh, I’m sure your calculations are correct, but if there’s one thing I know, it’s that forecasting the future is impossible that far out. You’ve got probabilities stacked on probabilities, and as you said, you can’t take the unknown factors into account.”
“The Black Swans,” Aldrik Ritter said suddenly.
“The what?”
Ritter cleared his throat. “That’s what your Lazarus calls them. It means an unknown unknown—something so unexpected it couldn’t have even been conceived of. Like us taking this fortress. To the Mutuality, it was inconceivable, so they never really planned for it. I mean, all they’d have had to do is install computer-controlled heavy weapons at every intersection and we’d have no chance at all. Or had a garrison of sufficient size. Or given the garrison armored vehicles to control the large corridors. But nobody tries to capture fortresses—at least, not until they’ve pummeled them with capital-grade naval weapons.”
Straker’s eyes narrowed. “You’ve been talking to the Inquisitor?”
“When I’m taking my turn on guard. It’s something to do. But I don’t allow the soldiers to speak to him.”
“Or anyone else?”
“No, no, sir.” But Ritter seemed hesitant in his reply, a little off, or uncertain.
Straker told himself to remember to dig deeper later, but now was not the time. He went on, “Sergeant Ritter’s point is the same as mine, I think. The odds may be against us, but they’re still odds, odds that can be beaten.” He looked to his left and right, making eye contact with everyone in the room, all his Breakers. “So I need you to come up with ways to beat the odds, ways that I haven’t thought of.”
Engels began to put out a fist to be recognized, an old habit from their Academy days, but Zaxby beat her to it with a curled tentacle. Without waiting for Straker to give him leave to speak, he said, “I have a way.”
“A way that’s not incorporated into your simulation?” Loco said. “Why not add it in?”
“Because I have a superior mind, Lieutenant Paloco. I created my simulation to establish a baseline of fact, in order to show that we need what you so quaintly call ‘outside-the-box’ thinking. Fortunately, my species eschews boxes, preferring rounded containers or bottles. I suspect this gives us fewer limits in ideation, as we are not psychologically confined to cubical mentation.”
“Oh, now you’re just pulling made-up words out of your ass.”
“I am not—”
“What’s your idea, Zaxby?” Straker interrupted, holding up a finger to Engels to show he knew she wanted to bring up an idea as well. “Some trick like you told me about? Firing stealth mines from railguns?”
“I already incorporated innovative weapons employment and tactics into my simulation. This is different. We’ve glossed over the possibility before, but simply put, we need to find and recruit aliens to our cause.” Zaxby tapped the table, and a whole new region appeared in green, an area extending into the unknown star systems outward from both Mutuality and Hundred Worlds space.
“I thought you already surveyed that area for allies, and discarded the idea.”
“Recruiting alien allies was not my first priority, but I have exhausted all higher ones. Now, low-probability, high-payoff possibilities must be considered.”
“Like that Pasqualli’s Wager thing,” said Loco. He might have winked at Straker with the eye away from Zaxby.
Zaxby slapped a tentacle to what passed for his forehead in a passable imitation of a similar human gesture. “Pascal’s Wager, Lieutenant Paloco, but yes, you have managed to dredge up an apt analogy from the depths of your mental sludge.”
“Loco’s jerking your chain, Zaxby,” said Straker mildly. “Whatever we call them, we need some long shots. If a mission to find nonhuman allies might pay off, then we need to give it a try. But that’s a big roll of the dice. I need more than that.”
Zaxby started to speak again, but Engels cleared her throat loudly, and Straker pointed at her. “Commander Engels.”
She leaned forward, tapping tentatively at the holo-table’s surface. “While Zaxby’s been programming complex simulations for fun, I’ve had a few people doing simpler work. We’ve been combing through the top-secret files here, looking for weaknesses or opportunities in the Mutuality databases. We’re not done yet, but I came across something weird.”
“A vid of Zaxby making sense?” said Loco.
“Lay off him, Loco,” Engels replied. “Yes, weird. I was concentrating on Mutuality fleet weapons and ship development, to see what surprises they might have in store, when I came across this.” She poked a finger at the table, and a hologram of a ship came up.
Most capital warships were cylindrical, with rounded noses, the better to disperse lasers and deflect kinetic or blast effects. Smooth curving armor bore up better under stress, like an architectural arch supported weight, and symmetrical circles simplified many processes, such as balancing mass, spin, and power requirements.
This ship, however, showed a distinctly octagonal cross-section, like an old-fashioned pencil, unsharpened. Compared with what Straker was used to seeing, it looked blocky, clunky, inelegant. Its nose was almost square, barely raked, which seemed as if it were asking to be targeted head-on. Yet, it also conveyed a sense of enormous power, like the head of a sledgehammer.
“Dammit, how do you…” Engels said, trying to work the holo-table controls.
“Allow me,” said Zaxby, running his subtentacles across its surface.
The hologram expanded to fill the space above the table, about two meters by two by three, and the detail became clear…including the scale. In one corner floated a box with the words PROJECT STARKILLER, PMN Indomitable, and a date seventeen years in the past.
“Oh, my,” said Chief Gurung. “That is a very, very big ship.”
“Yes, too big,” said Engels with a nod. “This ‘Indomitable’ monstrosity is sixteen tim
es as large as the largest superdreadnought ever built.” She lifted her eyebrows at Straker as if daring him to figure out why.
Straker spoke slowly. “It’s too big… because it can’t possibly jump. It’s ten times as big as Freiheit, and we barely got that thing into sidespace. So it’s, what, a monitor? A local defense ship as big as a fortress, but completely manufactured of crysteel and duralloy, and mobile within a star system. Tons of power, armor reinforcement that makes it almost impregnable… I can see that might be useful, but Unknowable Creator, the cost.”
Engels nodded. “For the labor and resource expenditure, they could have built sixteen to twenty supers. That’s a whole fleet, sacrificed to make this…”
“Battleship,” said Straker. “It’s a battleship.”
“I never heard of that ship class,” said Engels. “Not in space.”
“You’re right, it’s a name from the era of Old Earth wet navies, almost eight hundred years ago. Battleships were the biggest surface combatants ever built, even bigger than dreadnoughts. The only things larger were aircraft carriers, but those had a completely different purpose.” Straker stared with fascinated wonder at the oddity floating above the table. “I don’t know what they call her, but to me, she’s a battleship.”
“But that thing is useless!” said Loco. “It can’t jump, so it doesn’t matter, as long as we don’t attack the system where it’s parked.”
“That’s what’s funny, Loco,” said Engels. “Zaxby, show us the sidespace engines.”
Zaxby tapped, and sixteen sections lit up, displaying the distinct shapes of sidespace generators.
“So it can jump! But that’s impossible…” said Loco. He snapped his fingers. “They must have cracked the sidespace limit. Somehow, they came up with new tech to let them move bigger things.”
Engels smiled. “That’s a good guess, but no. It wasn’t new tech that let them get around the limit. It was clever thinking, I’d say. Simple, elegant—and apparently something nobody ever thought of. Or at least, nobody ever actually tried to make it work—until now.”
“You’re slow-rolling us, Carla,” said Straker. “Show us your cards. How can it jump?”
She grinned wider. “Zaxby, you see how the ship separates into sections?”
Zaxby’s subtentacles squirmed like a nest of inverted snakes across the table, trying out various methods of pulling apart the simulation, until it abruptly split into sixteen distinct pieces.
First, the ship broke in half in the middle, front and back. Then the two pieces divided along their long axes, creating eight distinct parts each, with triangular cross-sections. Their narrowest, most acute edges sides pointed toward a common center, where they would rejoin.
Engels waved a hand through the nearest part of the hologram. “Sixteen superdreadnought-sized sections. Each has its own sidespace engine, fusion engines, impellers, thrusters, weapons suite, quarters, sub-bridge…”
Straker nodded slowly as understanding blossomed in his mind. “That’s brilliant! Each part transits separately. They reassemble in the target star system and, bang, a battleship big enough to smash fortresses.”
“Oh, come on,” said Loco. “It’s overcomplicated and expensive. It’s like having one super-Sledgehammer instead of a battalion of Foehammers. What makes this thing better than sixteen brand-new, tried-and-true superdreadnoughts? I mean, hell, a contact nuke could still take it out—and then you just lost sixteen ships-worth at once.”
“It is extremely complex and expensive,” Zaxby said in his condescending lecture-voice, “But you are forgetting that size does matter.”
“Oh, I know size matters.” Loco said with a grin.
“Your infantile humor aside, I will now demolish your argument with one simple comparison. If larger ships were inefficient and ineffective, there would be no superdreadnoughts. There would only be cruisers and smaller vessels. Yet the largest ships dominate battle.” Zaxby focused three of his eyes on Loco. “Tell me why.”
Loco rubbed his face. “Okay, smartass. Because one big ship can defeat three or four smaller ships, even if they add up to the same tonnage.”
“But why is that true?” Zaxby spread his eyes and rotated his head to take in everyone in the room. Engels widened her eyes and Chief Gurung’s smile broadened. Straker realized both knew the answer, but were keep it to themselves in order to allow Zaxby to play professor.
Straker took a stab at it. “Because the weapons get bigger, the range grows longer and armor gets thicker. Just like on a tank. The increased protection alone is decisive. It can shield the ship from all weapons below a certain size.”
“Well said, Commodore!” the Ruxin said. “Unlike your closest friend, you are not a complete dunce.”
“Hey!” said Loco.
Zaxby continued without even glancing at Loco. “As you so rightly point out, Commodore Straker, a ship this size can carry weapons an entire order of magnitude larger than even superdreadnoughts. Its primary centerline multi-weapon—assembled from pieces of the sixteen sections and able to fire both railgun bullets and particle beams—outguns even the largest fortresses. Unlike them, though, it can maneuver to evade return fire. Its secondary weapons are the equal of any superdreadnought’s primaries. Its armor is more than ten times as thick, with a similar power multiplier for its reinforcement fields. It will shrug off single hits from even contact fusion warheads.”
“Then why hasn’t the Mutuality used it? If it’s so great, why haven’t they won the war?” asked Loco.
Zaxby shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t know for sure. These plans show an adequate design, though any Ruxin engineer could improve upon it. Still, the inception of this Project Starkiller was seventeen years ago. The Indomitable should have been completed by now. Unfortunately, all we have are these blueprints—which have not been updated, and which are missing much detail.”
“So you think these diagrams are preliminary?” said Engels.
“They might even be fictional,” said Straker. “One reason for creating a highly speculative weapons program might be to leak information to the other side and force them to expend resources countering something nonexistent. I mean, if this is so great, how did the plans end up here, to be captured?”
Captain Zholin snapped to attention to speak, and then relaxed slightly as the others stared at him in amusement. “Where did you find this data, Commander Engels?”
“On the base commander’s private server. It appears he was killed by Sachsens before he could initiate a core wipe.”
“There you have it. The base commander was the senior military officer in the system. It’s standard protocol for top-secret data to be sent to him, but no one else. As Sergeant Ritter pointed out, this was a Black Swan event. The bureaucracy could not conceive of losing the fortress before its data drives were burned.”
“So…” said Loco in his usual needling tone, “why didn’t the duty officer—what was her name? Jimson? Why didn’t she wipe their core? It must have been on her checklist.”
Zholin presented a rare smile. “I asked her, once I convinced her to defect to us,” he replied. “She said while the fight was going on and she expected the Mutuality forces to win, she was afraid her superiors would be angry if she did. Once we’d won, she thought we might be angry.”
Loco’s jaw dropped, and he let his tilted chair fall forward with a clunk. “She was afraid the enemy would be angry if she did her duty?”
Straker spoke up. “She was just a subaltern. Like an ensign, right?”
“Yes,” said Zholin.
“That’s the problem with the Mutuality,” Straker said. “Total psychological submission. It’s just like in those prisoner-of-war exercises we did as cadets, Loco. Some people, especially the young, see their captors as the new, legitimate authority in their lives, and so they submit. Sounds crazy, but it’s been proven to happen over and over. She was merely looking ahead to us being in charge. Probably afraid we’d torture her out of spite, just li
ke the Mutuality would.”
“Stockholm Syndrome,” said Aldrik Ritter with a lift of his red-bearded chin. “That’s what we call it. But we Sachsens do not take part in it. We are fighters. We are a free people, not cowering Mutualist dogs.”
Engels shot a glare at Ritter. “Seems like those cowering dogs killed a lot of good Breakers today, and Sachsens as well. Don’t blind yourself to what they are just because their system is evil. Some are brave and moral, some are cowardly and corrupt and everything in between. We’re here to free them, not to spit on them.”
Ritter stood to return Engels’ glare, and then turned stiffly away to walk up to Straker. “Commodore, I will be returning to our father’s freehold. I will praise the name of the Liberator and encourage our volk to join you, but I am the eldest. Our scripture says a man who does not care for his family is worse than a traitor.” He held out his hand to clasp with Straker.
Straker grasped the man’s palm. “We’ll miss you. And remember, we’re not staying here. The Mutuality will strike back, in force.”
“We’ll be ready for them. Not like three years ago, when they came under a flag of parlay and stabbed us in the back. Conrad will stay with you to uphold our honor.” He leaned in to speak in Straker’s ear. “I suggest you promote him. He will need rank to deal with the proud and the stubborn among my people… and they will not care to take orders from your woman.”
Straker crushed Aldrik’s hand until he gasped. “They’ll take orders from whoever I damn well say, or they can sit at home like little girls.” He let go of the Sachsen’s hand, and poked a finger into his chest. “You tell them that. This isn’t some pirate gang. It’s a military outfit, and I’m in command. They don’t have to join, but if they do, they’re under my orders. If they don’t like that, we’ll win this war without them.”
“I tell them.” Aldrik worked his hand for a moment, and then saluted. “Heil der Befreier. Mach denen die Hölle heiss.”