“Get me a channel.”
It took a moment, but Jamison flashed him a thumbs-up a moment later.
“Istanbul Control, this is Captain Kyle Roberts of the Castle Federation carrier Kodiak, accompanied by the Coraline Imperium cruiser Thoth and the Antioch merchant ships Dreamer and First Sale. We notified Istanbul of our expected arrival upon leaving Antioch.
“Please confirm our approach vectors and orbital slots.”
He paused.
“We are also detecting what may be Istanbul Self Defense Force units approaching the convoy,” he noted. “Please be advised that if those vessels do not identify themselves shortly, I may be forced to regard them as hostile and act appropriately to defend the convoy.”
Kyle waited for a response, then glanced over at Jamison.
“We got a link,” she replied. “They got the message, but…”
“I have fighter launch!” Sterling exclaimed. “Each of those ships just spat out eighty of the smallest starfighters I’ve ever seen. I’m reading them at a thousand tons each, but they’re headed our way at five hundred gravities.”
A thousand tons. The Falcons Kodiak carried massed just over six thousand tons and carried a dozen missiles and a fifty-kiloton positron lance. Likely, these ships didn’t carry a lance at all and only had a handful of missiles…but two hundred and forty of them could put a lot of missiles in space.
“Song,” he said slowly. “Get the rest of the group ready to launch, but stand by for my order.”
“Sir?”
“If Istanbul wants to play chicken, let them. I’m not blinking first.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Get me a direct radio channel to these people, Jamison,” he ordered calmly.
A flickering icon told him he was live.
“Unidentified vessels, this is Captain Kyle Roberts aboard the Castle Federation carrier Kodiak, escorting Free Trade Zone convoy ZGK-512. Under the terms of our treaties with both Antioch and Istanbul, I am authorized to use lethal force in the protection of this convoy.
“Identify yourselves and stand down, or I will engage you to defend my charges.”
His implant played the short message back to him to confirm, and then he sent it out, winging its way across the light-seconds at lightspeed.
“Sir!” Jamison reported about ten seconds after the message would have reached the ships. “I have Istanbul Control.”
“Control, this is Captain Roberts,” Kyle greeted them.
“Stand your people down, Roberts; the incoming ships are an ISDF security patrol,” a harsh male voice ordered. “You are not authorized to deploy fighters in this star system; withdraw them aboard immediately.”
“To whom am I speaking?” Kyle demanded.
“I am Commodore Nurullah Aytaç Mataraci,” the speaker told him flatly. “I am in command of orbital defense of Constantinople. You will stand down your fighters or I will be forced to destroy them.”
“That, Commodore Mataraci, would be an act of war against the Castle Federation, the Coraline Imperium and the Antioch Republic,” Kyle replied. “How many wars would you like to start today? Per the treaties of trade and protection signed between the Kingdom of Istanbul and the Castle Federation, I am permitted to maintain a four-ship combat space patrol at all times in this system. So, I’ll note, is Captain von Lambert of Thoth, which means our single patrol is already understrength.
“Given the tense circumstances, I am prepared to overlook your unexpected aggression, Commodore, but I am prepared to defend this convoy with all necessary force.” He paused. “As per my original message to Istanbul Control, I need approach vectors and orbital slots for my warships and the convoy.
“We’re not here to cause trouble, Commodore, but this is turning into a farce.”
There was no visual attached to Mataraci’s transmission, but Kyle could almost hear the tension ratchet up in the man’s voice.
“I am not used to being dictated to in my own system,” he spat. “Stand. Down.”
Kyle smiled.
“Vice Commodore Song?” he said calmly. He didn’t cut the channel with Mataraci, letting the Commodore stew.
“Sir?”
“Full-deck launch, if you please. Jamison, get me von Lambert.”
“Roberts,” the Imperial Captain answered instantly. “What the hell is going on?”
“We’re being threatened by the ISDF,” Kyle said cheerfully. “I’m launching my starfighters to protect the convoy; I request you do the same.”
Von Lambert was silent for several seconds, though the emotional side channel Kyle was getting suggested he was swinging between amusement and irritation.
“Of course, Captain Roberts. We’ll have our birds in the air momentarily.”
“What are you doing?” Mataraci demanded.
“Fulfilling my treaty duty to Antioch to secure the safety of this convoy,” Kyle told him, checking his tactical feed. Even without deploying Williams’s bombers, he had almost as many fighters as the ISDF task group did…and his were all six- or seven-thousand-ton seventh-generation ships.
If it actually came to a fight, it would be a massacre.
“Do you want to continue escalating this dick-waving contest, Commodore, or shall we both pull our fighters back and proceed like reasonable adults?”
There was a long silence.
“Very well, Captain Roberts. My Sultan will hear of this,” Mataraci snapped. “Control will have your vectors shortly.”
“Thank you, Commodore,” Kyle replied. “And you are correct. Your Sultan will hear about this.”
#
Chapter 23
Istanbul System
02:00 October 23, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
Constantinople, City of Byzantium
“Oh, my,” Kyle whispered as the shuttles came close enough to Byzantium for him to make out the mountain that rose out of the middle of the city. Nature had provided a flat-topped plateau a half-kilometer on a side in the middle of a flat plain.
Man had turned it into something incredible. Pathways had been carved into the side of the mountain, some large enough for heavy transport but most footpaths. Even from the air, he could see that they were full of people traveling up to the top.
A wall studded with minarets surrounded the outside of the plateau, and two distinct complexes filled it. One had the base of a more modern structure melded with the rounded roofs and reaching minarets of old Middle Eastern architecture, where the other was a sprawling complex of traditional domes and towers.
“The New Grand Mosque,” Nebula told Kyle, the diplomat sitting next to him patiently. “The original settlers brought five pillars, each of five stones from Mecca itself, to Constantinople with them.” He chuckled. “Only a third of the colonists were Muslim, and the ratio is lower now, but they left their stamp on the system.
“All Muslims bow to Mecca when they pray,” he continued, “so they bowed to the stones at the New Grand Mosque. So, of course, the Sultan built his palace right next to the Mosque.”
“Which left people bowing to him as well as God,” Kyle concluded. “That must have gone over well.”
“It’s a century and a half. People mostly ignore it now,” Nebula noted. “Though I imagine it has something to do with their tradition of assassinating Sultans who get too egotistical.”
“Wonderful. What do I need to watch for? Poison? Knives?” Kyle was relatively sure Constantinople was safe, but…
“They won’t try and kill you,” the diplomat replied. “Tradition says only the Sultan can be assassinated. The reality is…bloodier, but they certainly won’t touch a guest.
“That doesn’t mean they’re going to be particularly pleasant to us,” he warned.
“Karl, our shuttles are currently being escorted by atmospheric interceptors that could shoot us down,” Kyle pointed out, gesturing toward the sensor screen.
Both Kodiak and Thoth had sent down a single shuttle, though Kyle had ma
de certain they’d left both XOs and CAGs in space in case something went wrong. Each of the two shuttles arcing toward the Sultan’s palace was being escorted by four ugly-looking interceptors.
The assault shuttles outmassed the interceptors twenty or thirty to one. This might be the aircraft’s native environment, but they’d lose a straight-up fight. A surprise attack, however…
“We’re being directed to a landing pad on the north side of the palace complex,” the pilot reported. “Right under a lovely set of anti-aircraft cannon. Such kind, welcoming souls.”
“Welcome to Constantinople,” Nebula said dryly. “Some of the nastiest backstabbing practitioners of realpolitik in the galaxy.”
“And someone here actively tried to get us into a conflict with the Imperium,” Kyle pointed out. “I have to wonder if they did that on their own, or if Terra put them up to it.”
“Finding out is my job,” Nebula replied. “So’s dealing with it either way. You worry about the pirates.”
#
Kyle and Nebula exited the shuttle onto the landing pad, escorted by a quartet of Federation Marines. There was a crisp chill to the air; despite it being in the middle of the night by the standard clock of Earth used across the galaxy, it was a late-spring afternoon there in Byzantium and some of the day’s warmth lingered.
The minareted wall had shaded the landing pad from the sun, however, leaving Kyle glad for the temperature-management systems of his shipsuit-based uniform. Standing in the shade, just behind a safety barrier, were an even dozen men, all of similar height with shaved heads, in tightly fitted black-and-gold uniforms.
Standing in front of them was a tall athletic man in a white-and-gold uniform with a pitch-black turban and grandiose waxed mustachios. Unlike his men’s perfectly functional rifles, he wore a scimitar on his left hip and a modern-looking pistol on the left.
Stepping forward, he bowed deeply to Kyle and Nebula.
“I am Colonel Simon Abdullah Osman, commander of the Second Household Guards,” he greeted them. “We are waiting on one more, I am given to understand?”
“Yes, Captain von Lambert’s shuttle is directly behind us,” Kyle replied.
“Good, good,” Osman agreed cheerfully. “I suggest we step behind the safety barrier.”
As Kyle followed, Nebula pinged him with an implant message: “Watch the Scimitar. It means our Colonel is in the succession.”
Kyle sent back his wordless acknowledgement and understanding. No one who stood in the succession on Constantinople was going to be entirely safe. The Colonel was a member of a group that was explicitly expected to assassinate and replace the current ruler if he was failing the planet.
As a military officer from a functioning democracy, Kyle couldn’t even begin to imagine what impact that would have on your mindset.
“Unfortunately, His Eminence has ordered that your guards must wait here,” Osman told Kyle.
“I am the commander of a capital ship in the Castle Federation Navy,” he replied. “I’m not actually permitted to travel off-ship on a foreign world without escort.”
“I understand,” the Istanbul officer agreed genially. “However, my orders forbid me to bring armed soldiers into the presence of my Sultan. If you insist, I can arrange a virtual conference.”
“That won’t be acceptable,” Nebula replied. “We have serious concerns; we must meet with the Sultan and his senior officers.”
“Then you must leave your guards here,” Osman told them. “I swear to you, upon my own honor, that you will be seen safely to the Sultan and back to your ship.”
Kyle shared an uncomfortable glance with Nebula, but nodded as Sarka and her own Marines approached.
“Very well, Colonel,” he agreed. “We place ourselves in your hands.” He smiled.
He didn’t need to mention that he had warships in orbit or what would happen if they were injured or kidnapped. From the glint in Colonel Osman’s eyes, the man was very aware of the situation.
#
The interior of the Sultan’s palace was a study in contrasts in both people and architecture. The lower levels of the building were built to relatively standard designs, office blocks that would have been at home on any planet Kyle had visited. Their roofs were old Arabic architecture, but the main body was modern.
Their interior walls, however, owed more to the colonists’ desert lineage than anything else. The designers had carefully sliced slabs of sandstone and marble to line the walls, and then painted murals of the journey from Earth and colonization of Constantinople across the stone.
The staff varied from soldiers in the tight-fitting black-and-gold uniforms, to officers in the same white, black and gold as Colonel Osman, to bureaucrats in suits that would have looked as at home on most worlds as the basic buildings around them.
Everyone, though, was male. It took Kyle several minutes to even realize what was making him uncomfortable, but once he’d realized it, he couldn’t ignore it. He wasn’t sure he’d ever been in a workspace that only had one gender present, and situation sent a sinking uncomfortable feeling through his stomach.
“Here we are,” Osman announced as they passed down another gorgeously decorated corridor to a pair of ten-foot-tall doors, each carved from a single slab of marble. “The stone for the doors was brought all the way from Earth,” he noted helpfully as he reached out to rap his knuckles on the stone. “Welcome to the Hall of Scimitars.”
In response to the knock, the two massive doors swung gently inward, clearly powered to prevent any mere human from having to move their multi-hundred-kilo weight.
Osman led the two Captains and the diplomat through a three-story-high hall lined with sandstone pillars on each side, spaced two meters apart to form a massive court leading to a raised dais with an immense marble throne.
Despite the scale of the room, it was nearly empty. There were benches tucked between the pillars to allow an audience to watch public affairs there, but today there was only a relative handful of people in the room.
A single man occupied the throne. Sultan David James Seleucus was a massive man, equal to Kyle in bulk, and if there was a single spare gram of fat on his muscular frame, it was hiding well. Seleucus wore his black hair in a short, military-style crop and sat with a golden scimitar across his lap.
The first woman Kyle had seen since landing on Constantinople sat one step down from him on the dais, clad in the same black-and-gold uniform as the Household Guards. A dozen men in the same uniform stood around the dais, clearly looking to the woman as their commander.
Finally, four older men in black, shipsuit-based uniforms stood rigidly on the bottom step of the dais. All four of them had the three gold stars of an Istanbul Admiral at their collar, but none wore the scimitar of standing in the succession.
“Honored allies!” the woman greeted them loudly. “Approach the throne of His Eminence, Sultan David James Seleucus, and be welcome!”
The three men approached, stopping at the base of the dais, facing the four Istanbul officers.
“So,” Seleucus said flatly. “Our so-called allies and protectors finally arrive. Our ships burn, and you do nothing. Our people bleed, and you do nothing. Only when We summon you and demand you honor your treaties do you answer our call!”
“We are at war, Your Eminence,” Nebula responded, a quick ping on Kyle’s implant warning him to let the diplomat handle this. “Our treaties do not call on us to pre-emptively defend, only to come when you call.
“Both the Federation and the Imperium are locked in a struggle for our very lives against the expansion of the Terran Commonwealth, but still we have sent ships to answer your summons. What more would you have of us, Sultan Seleucus? We are your allies, not your overlords, after all.”
Seleucus glared down at them.
“We expect you to help,” he snapped. “Our own brother died aboard Sultan. You have arrived too late to honor your obligations; you have already failed.”
“That is unfortun
ate, Your Eminence, and you have our deepest sympathies,” Nebula replied, “but I repeat: we are at war. At war with the most powerful nation in human history, a state whose economy and fleets match nearly the rest of humanity combined.
“We came when you called, but we can do no more. If you would have us leave, we will leave, but I and these Captains would rather defend your people than abandon them.”
Nebula was good. Even the Admirals on the dais looked uncomfortable in the face of his impassioned screed. Kyle could also see Osman out of the corner of his eye, and the Colonel looked…thoughtful.
“Perhaps then Our Kingdom should look to Terra for protection!” the Sultan boomed.
“You may try,” the diplomat replied. “But we offer protection and trade—Terra offers only unity.”
Seleucus chuckled, but there was no humor in the noise.
“Perhaps. Your companions, so silent. Let them approach and be known.”
Nebula gestured them forward.
“May I present Captain Elector Yann von Lambert of the Coraline Imperial Navy, commander of Thoth, and Captain Kyle Roberts of the Castle Federation Space Navy, commander of Kodiak and designated commander of the task group sent to the Free Trade Zone.”
“The Stellar Fox himself,” one of the Admirals said before he stopped himself, glancing back at his Sultan.
The muscular ruler leaned back in his throne and gestured for his officer to continue.
“We have heard of Captain Roberts, of course,” the Admiral said. “His victories at Tranquility, Alizon and Huī Xing are told across the sphere of human space. We welcome your skill and knowledge, Captain.”
Kyle might not be a politician, but he could recognize carefully arranged theater when he saw it. The Admiral was apparently the designated good cop, flattering the commander of the Alliance ships while his monarch hammered them over their delays.
“I was one of many at all of those battles,” he told the flag officer. “The plans may have been mine, but there were many soldiers and spacers involved in the execution.”
Rimward Stars (Castle Federation Book 5) Page 16