“And what do you think, McGregor?”
“There is a lot of evidence that these are the same creatures that chased us out of the home world,” said the IIB head.
“Evidence can be faked,” said Decker.
“Granted. But this is the most elaborate hoax in history, if it is one.”
“That is not the subject of this meeting,” said Streeter, glaring from one co-conspirator to the other. “Whether they exist or not, it is important that we have a seated Emperor. And it is important to us that we have an Emperor who will do what we tell him. The Parliamentary bodies, especially the Lords, should have the responsibility of running the government in time of war. Not some jackass who gets the job just because of an accident of birth.”
Granted that I am just such a jackass, thought the Prime Minister with a smile. But by God, I deserve the position, regardless of the cause.
“Countess. I want you to work with the Office of Information to get ads out on all the major outlets, as persuasive as possible. We will acknowledge the threat, and let the people know that the best plan is to get an Emperor on the throne, now. And we will ask the military to produce the heir, if he still lives. If they don’t, then we need the people to assume that he is dead, and let us go on with the business of getting a warm body on the throne.”
“I think we can do that,” said Decker with a smile. “I have a good advertising firm in mind that has always gotten results.”
“I, in the meantime, will see about getting together a coalition across houses and parties to pass a Parliamentary Resolution to seat an Emperor. And another resolution charging those military fools with obstruction of civilian oversight, if they continue to deny their support.”
“McGregor,” said Streeter, turning to the junior member of the team. “I want you to establish a law enforcement task force for the express purpose of taking these people down if they try to object to the Parliamentary Resolutions.”
“You want us to go up against the military?” asked McGregor in a tone of disbelief.
“Not against the military,” said Streeter, pointing a finger at the man. “Against some outlaw leaders. And I’m sure that when they have become outlaws the people below them will back down. We are the authority here, not they. And the sooner everyone realizes that the better.”
McGregor nodded, but didn’t say a word, and Streeter wondered if the man was really committed to the cause, or if he had just joined to advance his own career.
“Let’s get to work, people,” said Streeter, standing up. “I want to see progress on all fronts by tomorrow.”
* * *
SUPERBATTLESHIP VALKYRIE, JEWEL ORBIT.
“Son of a bitch,” yelled Len, glaring at the holo, which showed one of the newest of the political ads that the Lords were casting on all the local networks. “And we can’t even rebuke what they say about the war.”
“It was a very clever stratagem on their part,” said Commander Yin, sitting at the table with her flat comp open to her front. “And they’ve placed the ad on holo-boards, and even subliminal messages on entertainment shows and theater productions.”
“This must be costing them a pretty Imperial,” said Captain Heidi Svenson, Lenkowski’s intelligence officer.
“Billions of Imperials,” said Yin, consulting her computer. “All coming out of the Lords’ discretionary fund.”
“Is there some kind of campaign we can run to counter this?”
“I really don’t see what it would accomplish, Admiral,” said the Intelligence Officer. “The only counter you really have that would do anything would be to produce the heir. Otherwise, everyone will just believe you are stalling because you don’t support this particular aspirant.”
“But I don’t have an heir to produce,” cried Lenkowski. “If I did we wouldn’t be in this situation.”
“Exactly,” said Svenson with a nod. “That’s exactly why this plan was so brilliant.”
“So what should I do?”
“The smart play would be to bow before the inevitable and not oppose the succession,” said the Intelligence Officer, looking at him with an expression that indicated she wished it were not so. “At least publicly, in your position on CNO. After they retire you then you can speak up as a private citizen.”
“Retire me,” shouted Len, slamming his fist on the table. “No fucking way they are going to retire me.”
“I’m afraid the new Emperor will be able to remove you from your position, sir,” said Svenson. “By force, if you refuse to go.”
“Whose side are you on, anyway?” asked Commander Yin, glaring at the other officer.
“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that remark, Commander,” said the Captain, returning the glare. “I am on the Admiral’s side, of course, or he wouldn’t have asked me here. I am just stating fact.”
I swore an oath to defend this Empire from all enemies, foreign, and of course, domestic. I can’t back down just because my career or personal safety are threatened. I just can’t.
“Thank you for your advice, Captain Svenson,” said Len, standing up to indicate that the meeting was over. “I’ll call you in again if I need another appraisal of the situation.”
“What are you going to do, sir?” asked the Captain, folding up her comp, then standing and placing it in its belt pouch.
“I’m not sure yet,” said Len, shrugging his shoulders. “When I come up with a response I will let you know.”
The Captain saluted, then walked from the room, her back stiff, obviously put off by the answer she had gotten.
Can’t blame her much there, thought Len, watching her go through the door. I all but told her I don’t trust her, when I really do. But the fewer people in the know the better.
“Zhen,” he said, looking at the Commander. “I think you had better prepare that contingency we discussed earlier.”
“So, you’ve decided to not to back down on this?”
“How can I,” said Len, a shiver of fear passing through him as he realized he might not win this fight, and losing could be disastrous. “I’m obligated to defend the Empire, up to and including at the cost of my life. How can I back down when it’s only my freedom at stake.”
“Well, we can buy you a little more freedom, Admiral,” said the young officer. “I can’t think of a better hiding place.”
“You don’t have to get involved in this, Zhen,” said Lenkowski, hoping she would back out, afraid as well that she might. “You are risking much here, as much as I.” And I really need you to lean on, so I don’t make the coward’s choice and do what the politicians want me to.
“That’s my decision, sir,” said the Commander. “I, too, grew up as an admirer of the Emperor Augustine. And I believe that any son raised by that family will make the best choice of Emperor. Saddling the Empire with this reprobate Streeter wishes upon us would not only be disastrous in this war, but, if we survive, for a century or more afterwards.”
“Thank you, Zhen,” said the CNO, checking the time on his implant. “And now I think we should get ready for our meeting with Mishori and Betty. Their shuttle should be leaving the planet any minute now.”
The Admiral was on the flag bridge when he heard the news. The shuttle carrying Grand Marshal Mishori Yamakuri and Field Marshal Betty Parker had been shot at and hit by an unknown party. The beam had come from the ground, and Marines dispatched to that location found nothing other than the landing prints of some kind of vehicle.
“But we’re both OK, Len,” said the Commandant of the Marine Corps. “Even this old ground pounder next to me came through well.”
“I almost had a heart attack,” said Yamakuri, holding his hand over his chest theatrically.
“They’re trying to keep me isolated,” said Len over the com. The best encryption programs known were being employed, and the com was by tight beam from the ship to the Hexagon. And he had no doubt that the com was being tapped into and decrypted, and so would give no information he considered
vital over it. “I guess I’m going to have to do what I talked about last week.”
“If you must,” said Mishori, nodding his head and frowning. “I wish there was something else we could do, but I can’t think of anything either.”
Hell of a thing when officers of the Imperial Military aren’t even safe in the home system, thought Len, nodding his head. And there’s only one safe place I can think of now. “I think I must. I will be down to the Hexagon within a couple of days. Then we can discuss it.” And I’m not sure how much of that they’re going to buy. But anything that keeps them off target is useful. “I’ll talk to you in a couple of days. Lenkowski out.”
The com linked died, and with it any contact he had with his fellow conspirators. He wondered what the bastards listening in would make of their roundabout speech. With luck they’ll think we’re planning a coup, and go to a lot of effort for nothing.
* * *
THE DONUT.
“The Admiral wants us to catch this saboteur,” said the Fleet Intelligence Officer sitting in on the meeting.
“No shit,” said Agent Chung, sitting across the table.
“So what are you IIA types doing about it?” asked the Captain, leaning forward. “As far as I can tell you are no closer to catching him, or her,” the officer shot a glance over at Yu as he said that, “than you were before. And the loss of a wormhole construction apparatus at this time is intolerable.”
“Wormholer,” said one of the engineers attending the meeting.
“What?”
“We call it a wormholer,” said the engineer. “Not a Wormhole Construction Apparatus.”
“I don’t care if you call it your momma’s pussy,” yelled the Captain, his face reddening. “The important thing is it is essential government property, and we cannot afford to lose it.”
“To say nothing of the tug and the crewmen aboard,” said Lucille, looking into the Captain’s suspicious eyes.
“Those are not the priority,” said the Captain, waving off the statement by Yu. “Tragic, yes, but easily replaceable.”
Lucille decided that she did not like this man, whose name tag said Callahan. “People are never easily replaceable,” she said in an icy voice.
“The wormholes are needed by the Fleet,” said Callahan, ticking off points on his fingers. “The negative mater is needed for making wormhole gates, especially ship gates, which might just give us an advantage over the enemy they can’t overcome. And those, wormholers, are also needed to make gates. We are already losing people out on the frontier, Doctor Yu. I have seen the reports coming up the hyperwave relay. Unless we have those wormholes, we will lose even more people.”
The Captain turned his eyes away from her and looked down at his flat comp. “And where were you when all this was happening?” asked Callahan, looking back up and into the eyes of Lucille.
“I was in my office,” said Lucille, her heart fluttering as she realized that she might be under suspicion. “I was directing the tug to keep the station from being hit.”
“And before that?”
“Director Yu is above suspicion,” said Agent Chung, glaring at the Naval Intelligence Officer. “As part of her protection detail, I know for a fact that she was by no means responsible for this, or any other sabotage.”
Thank God for that protection detail, thought Yu, letting out a held breath. I’ve had quite enough interrogations to last a lifetime. She thought back for a moment on her stint on the prison planetoid Purgatory. She did not want to go through that again.
“Besides, we have evidence that someone else was responsible for the sabotage,” said the Agent. The holo screen on the table changed to a shot of someone moving through shadows to a control panel. A split holo came up showing the same scene, with the same time stamp, two hours before the incident occurred. But in this scene there was no man.
“As you can see, the saboteur was able to spoof the station surveillance cameras, but not the microbot cameras we had scattered,” said another agent, working his flat comp.
The agent did something and the image enhanced, showing the face of the man through the darkness. Lucille gasped as she saw that face.
“But, that’s impossible,” she said, shaking her head in disbelief. “I saw him killed. No, not killed. Obliterated.”
“We checked the DNA on the prints he left behind,” said Agent Chung. “From all the tests it is indeed Dr. Bob Landry.”
“So where was the fake put in,” said Callahan, his face grim. “Was the vid of the death of Dr. Landry the fake? Or this vid?”
“We don’t know,” said Chung. “But one thing I do know. We’re going to put out a station wide alert for Dr. Robert Landry. A silent alert, that is.”
“What’s a silent alert?” asked Lucille, wondering how it could be an alert and be silent.
“We only tell security personnel about it,” said Chung. “So the subject doesn’t get wind of it.”
“Unless some of the security personnel are in on it,” said Callahan. “I think I need to bring in some more naval people and marines.”
“And I’m going to contact Director Sergiov to get some more of our people here,” said Chung.
Great, thought Lucille, looking at both of the men in charge of their respective contingents. So we have a combination witch hunt and pissing match. And I have to get those holes out no matter what. Just perfect.
Chapter Sixteen
The one constant in modern space warfare is that you cannot sneak up on anyone in hyperspace. It’s hard enough to do in normal space, with all of the heat that large ships generate. In hyper, with the gravity waves generated by the hyperfield, it’s impossible to move on something without shouting out your presence. They know you are there, and can guess what you are and where you are going. One solution is to translate beyond detection range and move toward the target in normal space. It is a solution with a horrible price, time. Travel in normal space takes time.
Lecture at the Imperial Naval Academy, Peal Island.
SESTIUS SPACE, MARCH 27TH THROUGH 29TH, 1000.
“The scouts should be going in now, your Majesty,” said the Admiral, looking over at Sean as he sat in the VIP seat.
Sean nodded his head, knowing exactly what was going on. A quartet of destroyers had moved in stair step fashion toward the Sestius worlds, creeping in without sending their grav wave signals into the proximity of the inner system. They accomplished this by making transition at a distance that was beyond the transmission range of those waves for each of the movements. Before they reached the Hyper I detection range limit they would drop into normal space and give the system a look over. At four light hours they would of course be looking into the past, but it was hoped that it would still be an accurate picture of what was waiting for them.
The battle cruisers waited in Hyper II, moving slowly toward the system at point two C. They were coming in on two different approaches, as were the smaller ships of the force on another series of vectors. It was planned to surround the system, so that nothing would slip out without a fight, hopefully one the aliens would not win.
But first they had to make sure that a superior force did not wait for them. The Admiral had insisted on that, so as not to put the Imperial Ruler at undue risk.
“While we’re waiting, your Majesty, perhaps you would like to ready yourself for battle,” said the Admiral.
“You have a suit for my use?” asked the Emperor, a smile on his face.
“I guess you could say that,” said the Admiral, getting up from her chair and gesturing for the Monarch to precede here.
She led him to a nearby ready room down the corridor from the bridge, where many suits of battle armor were set in cubbies for the crew that used them. One suit stood in a carrier that was used to wheel it into place, then locked down to the floor. Sean looked over the suit, his face alternating expressions from frown to smile.
“This suit looks different. Almost like a set of Marine shipboard battle armor,” sai
d Sean, running a hand over the alloy.
“It is different, your Majesty,” said the Admiral, smiling. “We took the schematics of the suit a Lt. General of Marines wears in a hostile environment, and adapted some of our Marine medium armor to meet those standards, as well as adding some extra armor protection.”
Sean frowned again as he looked at the suit, which had many more attachments to the outside than other suits or armor he had seen. And he was sure the inner workings were just as advanced.
“And before you say anything about wanting to share the dangers, your Majesty, you are sharing them just by being on one of these ships. I will do everything I can to protect you, orders or no orders.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Sean with a smile.
“Now, before we go into combat, you will be in this suit,” said the Admiral, pointing her finger at Sean’s chest. “And you will be on the flag bridge, where you will be as protected as I am. And I can keep an eye on you. Understood?”
“Yes it is, Admiral,” said the Emperor, nodding his head. “I promise not to back seat command.”
“Then let’s get back to the bridge and see what is developing.”
* * *
“We are picking up hyper resonances, my Lord,” said the sensor tech to the Low Admiral. “Mostly in the I band, but some in II and III.”
“Do you know what kind of ships?” asked the Admiral, looking up from the data he was entering into the log.
“Mostly their small scout ships,” said the Tech. “Though I have picked up something larger, maybe in the size of our own scouts.”
“How many?” asked the Admiral, wondering what this portended for his command. I have enough trouble fighting an action on the ground, without having to worry about a space battle.
“At least a dozen, my Lord,” said the Tech. “Maybe a score. Maybe more.”
“I want you to keep scanning with all your attention,” said the Low Admiral. “I believe there is something out there that we haven’t seen. And I want to know what it is as soon as you get a whiff of it. Understood?”
Exodus: Empires at War: Book 3: The Rising Storm Page 38