The scale on the hologram happily informed everyone that Shipyard Alpha was over fifty kilometers across and seventy high, the single largest manmade structure in the star system.
“Shipyard Alpha single-handedly represents forty present of the construction capacity in this system and roughly one point two percent of the military construction capacity of the Commonwealth,” he explained. “It also has a lot of noncombatant personnel aboard and is a massive target. A direct assault on the facility would be an arguable war crime, one I am not prepared to countenance regardless of the level of secrecy cloaking this operation.”
Despite the size of the station, such an assault would be far from futile. He’d run the numbers in private: if the estimate on the defenses was correct, a full salvo from all forty of their starfighters would punch through the defensive suites and deliver more than enough firepower on target to vaporize the entire station.
Along with about a hundred and twenty thousand people, less than ten percent of whom were even uniformed Navy personnel, let alone combatants.
“Depending on where in their approach we trigger the system alarm, the Wing will use their missiles to destroy the orbiting defense platforms and close with the station to launch precision positron-lance strikes,” Kyle continued. “There are twelve capital ships in various stages of construction, including two Volcano-class supercarriers that our intelligence suggests are mere months from deployment.”
Twelve capital ships was more than all but four members of the Alliance fielded. They could destroy an entire Navy’s worth of ships in a single strike…and they would only mildly inconvenience the Commonwealth.
“Our third objective is to terrify the Commonwealth,” he said calmly. “We want them looking over their shoulders for the monsters in the night. We want them blaming the League for pirates and condottieri breaking down their doors.
“We are striking at the very heart of the Commonwealth’s military machine.” One of several such hearts, but that was beside the point. “We want them to be afraid, in a way the Commonwealth has never known fear.”
He smiled coldly at his people.
“That’s the plan, ladies and gentlemen. We have nine days until we have to execute it. By then, I want us to have gone over every way we can think of it breaking. We’re going to test and wargame every scenario we can think of.
“We’re pretending to be condottieri, after all, which means we need to be thinking about our return on investment.”
#
Chapter 38
Deep Space, Under Alcubierre Drive
20:30 June 14, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
Chameleon
Wing Commander Russell Rokos watched his exhausted flight crews shuffle slowly off the flight deck, keeping his face utterly impassive as he watched them go. It would never do, after all, for them to realize the taskmaster whipping them along was actually extremely pleased with their progress!
He was planning a break for them, giving them a half-day off and some positive words. It would be a surprise to most of them—he tried to be constructively critical, but they were still doing a lot wrong.
“So, CAG, have they stopped blowing each other up in simulations yet?” the Captain asked cheerfully from behind him.
“We managed to progress past that stage relatively quickly,” Russell told him. “Though I’ll admit I was expecting it to take us longer to get there. Your Navy people have set to with a will, and their skill sets transfer better than we were afraid they would.”
“Shall we chat in your office?” the Captain replied, revealing the inevitable pair of beers in his other massive hand. “Catch me up.”
Russell grabbed the beer and gestured for his superior to proceed him. His office was only slightly farther from his starfighter’s flight deck hangar than it was from PriFly, a sensible design choice in his admittedly biased opinion—and one that was shared between both Terran and Castle warship design.
Collapsing into his chair, he popped the beer on his desk and regarded Roberts levelly.
“We’re not doing great just yet,” he told the Captain. “If we put together a single squadron of my Space Force people and gave them Falcons, they’d eat this entire Wing alive. But…” He held up a hand. “They are improving. Rapidly.
“I think we’ve underestimated just how cross-compatible our drones and nano-repair systems are between the Navy versions and the Space Force version. It’s the same hardware, software, everything. But we have ourselves half-convinced that it’s a different skill set.
“It certainly helps, though, that all of the missileers were cross-trained on fighter missiles because of Chameleon’s armament,” Russell admitted. “We’re not building skills from the ground up in either case, just teaching people how to apply them in new circumstances.
“Our biggest weakness is going to be ECM. I’ve kept it to one Navy crew per fighter, and all of our people have some training in ECM, but the only birds that are going to be running jammers and decoys at full power are the ones with Space Force flight engineers.”
“But they’ll be ready?”
“They’ll be ready,” Russell said in a rush of breath. It was the first time he’d dared say that aloud. “I was hoping for seventy percent effectiveness, and I’m thinking we might be as high as eighty-five. Your people sent me good techs.”
“Good,” the Captain rumbled. “I’d hoped so, but it shows solid judgment from them both. Speaking of my people, though, Taylor’s thrown a new wrinkle in the plan.”
“And what’s that?”
“She thinks we should keep a squadron in Chameleon’s tubes for a CSP,” Roberts explained. “It gives us more flexibility for a lot of our scenarios, but it cuts your strike force by a quarter.”
“It does,” Russell said, thinking it over. “It depends on which squadron, really. If I leave you ten Scimitars, that has less of an impact than if I leave the Katanas.”
“And yet,” the Captain said, letting the sentence hang in the air.
“I intentionally put my least-qualified flight teams on the Katanas,” the CAG admitted. “They’re solid fighters, easily the equal of Falcons in a lot of ways. The less-experienced crews weaken that squadron, but using the better fighters to offset the weaker crews gives me the strongest wing.”
“What are you thinking, CAG?”
“If I leave you the Katanas, that gives you the most flexibility possible in defending Chameleon, which is, I may point out, our only ride home,” Russell said thoughtfully. “It will also likely be easier to hide a three-squadron task force in the background of system traffic if they’re a homogenous force: I doubt the Commonwealth deploys mixed groups for in-system patrols.”
“And you can complete the mission with the Scimitars?”
“The mission becomes impossible to complete if Shipyard Alpha goes to full alert,” Russell replied. “It’s not going to matter whether or nor I have an extra ten fighters when that happens. If we can’t close to use lances, our options are to run or commit a war crime.”
“That is not on the table,” Roberts said flatly.
“Then I suspect the Katanas will be more valuable as our ace in the hole than as another set of positron lances to rip up Shipyard Alpha.”
The Captain took a giant swallow of beer.
“I wasn’t going to argue if you said you needed them,” he noted with a grin, “but I know I’m going to be happier with that hole card than without it.”
14:00 June 18, 2736 ESMDT
Russell was one of the first people out of the starfighters this time as they broke for lunch, making sure he was in position to watch his flight crews’ reaction as they exited their ships to find the center of the flight deck turned into a banquet hall.
While his people had been immersed in their virtual realities for the last six hours, as they’d done for the first half of every day in the eight days since the fighter wing had been reorganized, Master Chief Hanz had marshaled a small legion of t
he ship’s stewards. A dozen long tables had been laid out, as had chairs and massive piles of food and drink.
At the front of the whole ensemble was a small dais with a podium, and Russell walked over to it as his people stumbled to a halt, staring at the meal laid out for them.
“It’s real, people,” he told them as he stepped onto the platform. “Please, grab a seat, grab a plate and dig in.”
The crowd obeyed, slowly at first, then with alacrity as they started to catch on. Drinks and plates started to be passed around as the crews fell on the food like ravenous wolves.
“So, as any of the veterans can tell you, I’m a hard man to get praise out of,” Russell told them once they were seated and eating. “You’ve done well. Better than I expected, even. So I’m giving you all the rest of the day off.
“We’ve been beating our heads against this wall for a week. We can’t do twelve-hour days forever and then go into action, not and expect victory. Report back to your starfighter at oh eight hundred tomorrow and do not get in trouble until then.
“Enjoy the food and get some rest. You’ve earned it.”
Stepping down from the platform, he grabbed a plate of food of his own and slid into a chair next to Churchill.
“Ready to be wrapped in a silk glove?” he asked the squadron commander quietly.
“Is that what you call handing me every green pilot we have?” Churchill replied, his voice equally quiet as he glanced around to be sure no one could hear them.
“Chameleon needs a punch no one is expecting, a mailed gauntlet in a silk glove,” Russell pointed out. “That’s going to be your Alpha Squadron. And you got the Katanas out of the deal; don’t complain about your pilots.”
“I’m not complaining about my pilots; they’re good people,” the other man objected. “But no pilot in my squadron except me actually has their wings, CAG.”
“And that’s the other reason I’m willing to leave you as the backup,” Russell admitted. “The Katanas give you the punch if you’re needed, but if you’re not, we don’t have to risk your people.”
“Do we really think we’re going to get through this mess without needing backup?” Churchill asked.
“No. Which is why I want you to drill your people even harder than everyone else. When everything inevitably goes to shit, you’ll be the ones the Fox has to hand for whatever crazy idea will pull us out of the fire.
“I need your people able to pull that idea off. Think you can manage that?”
“Wilco,” Churchill said grimly, glancing around at his crews. “We’ll make it happen.”
#
Chapter 39
Tau Ceti System
18:00 June 21, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
Chameleon, approaching Tau Ceti H
The last of the uniforms had been packed away—destroyed in case the worst came to pass, in fact—and Kyle’s bridge was filled with officers and enlisted in unmarked black shipsuits. There were no Merchant Marine hats this time: the deception to come would be played out with computers and avatars, not his own theatrical abilities.
The room was utterly silent, unusual even in this era of neural networks and in-head displays. Everyone was focused on the main holographic display as Lau guided them in the last few seconds of Alcubierre drive…and then collapsed the space warp.
“Arrival,” the taciturn navigator announced into the silence.
Kyle refrained, by dint of great effort, from demanding an instant sitrep. Taylor’s people would have been working the instant the warp dropped and they started to receive current light from the system.
Live data began to propagate on the holo-display, rippling out in a spherical pattern around Chameleon as Taylor’s people focused on the closest potential threats first.
“Chownyk, how’s our IFF?” he asked, watching the display carefully as manmade objects began to appear on the display. Even in a system as rich as Tau Ceti, there were only a small number of warships—just one in Tau Ceti H orbit, in fact, though he presumed there were more over the two habitable worlds—but he could see multiple squadron-strength-or-more starfighter patrols and dozens of the in-system clippers that would fuel an industrialized system’s economy.
Any one of those could doom the entire operation if they saw Chameleon as anything except a Commonwealth Navy vessel.
“Everything is checking out from here,” his XO replied. “We are TCNS Christopher Lee to everyone looking. If there’s some trick to their IFF codes, though…”
“We’re running their code on their hardware,” Kyle pointed out. “If that won’t work, this whole operation was doomed from the beginning.”
“The good Lieutenant is ready to go,” Glass told him, the spy having taken over the communications console on the bridge to allow him to run the simulacrum that would hopefully get them close enough to finish the mission.
“Thank you,” Kyle replied, then turned back to Taylor. “All right. Tactical: what do we see?”
“Shipyard Alpha and the Central Research Station are exactly where they should be,” she replied. “We have a Saint-class battleship orbiting Shipyard Charlie, roughly forty light-seconds from the area of operations.
“Defenses for both Alpha and the Research Station match up to our intel. I’ve got just over three hundred starfighters running security patrol through the Tau Ceti H planetary system and local space, but none of them are within two million kilometers of us at this moment.”
“Any other warships?”
“Two Lexington-class carriers and two Assassin-class battlecruisers are attached to a resupply station halfway between the two habitable planets,” she reported. “They’re the main system defense force, but they’re also over a day from H.”
Though with the various defenses around the gas giant, the battleship, and the thousand-plus starfighters swanning around the system, the main system fleet arriving a day late to the party wasn’t going to change the odds.
“We’re looking as clear as we’re going to get,” Kyle said aloud. “Commander Rokos?”
“I’m seeing it,” Rokos replied. “Your orders?”
“You have a go to drop ten minutes before we hit turnover,” the Captain ordered. That was still just over an hour away, and they’d still be almost ten million kilometers from the research station, thirteen million from Shipyard Alpha.
“All right,” Rokos confirmed. “Plenty of time for us to get dropped off like garbage. See you on the other side, skipper. Good luck.”
“Good luck to you too. Happy hunting.”
“Not the moment of truth just yet,” Kyle said cheerfully as the channel cut. “Any reaction to our presence in general?”
“Tau Ceti Traffic Control just sent out a handshake request from an automated sensor platform,” Chownyk reported from CIC. “We fed it into the old software and it sent back a response. I give it a few minutes before anyone realizes the Q-Com address doesn’t work anymore.”
The pirates who’d stolen what had then been Christopher Lee had destroyed her original quantum-entangled particle blocks within hours of seizing her. Inconvenient to Kyle now, though the current mix of League, Alliance, and “black” quantum blocks she carried was certainly secure enough. He had Commonwealth quantum blocks, but they weren’t Christopher Lee’s, which made them useless today.
“Your friend is going to be up in a few minutes,” Kyle told Glass, considering. How long would depend on who made the call to reach out by radio—and who actually did the reaching out.
“That’s what we have him for,” the spy said confidently.
The seconds ticked away, each carrying the Q-ship thousands of kilometers closer to her destination, accelerating towards their turnover point at a sedate one hundred gravities.
Kyle could imagine the consternation going on Tau Ceti Space Traffic Control. They were flying a Navy IFF, though the STC might have it listed as “lost in action”. They were doing nothing offensive. They had correctly replied to the radio handsh
ake, but the Q-Com connection they preferred to use for final setup was valid but coming up blank.
“We have an incoming radio transmission,” Chownyk reported.
“Throw it on the holotank; do not record for reply,” Kyle ordered.
The big system display in the holographic tank flickered and a flat video image appeared off to one side. The sole occupant of the image was a middle-aged woman in the black-and-red uniform of the Terran Commonwealth Navy.
“This is Captain Alice Nguyen, TCN,” she said harshly. “Tau Ceti System Control has flagged you as a potential threat. Christopher Lee, you are on our records as lost in action, details classified, and your Q-Com blocks are not functional.
“Identify and explain or I will be forced to deploy starfighters to destroy you.”
Nguyen’s image froze as the transmission ended, and Kyle waved airily at Glass.
“You’re up, Mister Glass. How’s the good Lieutenant feeling?”
“Mister Adelaide’s come a long way at great cost and is almost home,” the spy replied brightly. “He’s stressed but relieved. Let’s see what he has to say.”
Lieutenant Pierre Adelaide was a young man with pitch-black skin and hair from the Proxima Centauri colony. He had also been the Assistant Tactical Officer aboard Christopher Lee when she’d been captured by pirates—and had still been alive when Federation Marines had stormed the Q-ship.
Adelaide was a loyal son of the Commonwealth, but he was also very grateful to no longer be the personal sex slave of a woman who was the poster child for “psychopathic slaver.” Regardless of whether or not he’d knowingly given the Alliance any classified information, Federation Intelligence had a lot of video footage of the young man.
The image that appeared on a new video screen on the holographic display was a digital simulacrum assembled from that footage, one that would say and do exactly what Glass instructed in exactly the way that young Adelaide would.
Q-Ship Chameleon Page 26