by Jay Allan
The line cut with a loud click, and Darius sat where he was, silent for a moment. He glanced over at Ana, waiting until she was focused on her screens before he did. He didn’t want her to see the concern in his expression. He suspected she knew how he felt about her, but it was still difficult for him to show any signs that could be perceived as weakness, in front of her, or his Eagles. If they were going to have any chance at all in this fight, he needed his own legends, the dark stories about Darius Cain, in full effect.
He turned toward Teller’s station for about the tenth time. It was still vacant. His second-in-command was on Eagle Three, right where Darius had sent him. It didn’t make sense risking both of them in one place, but, on a human level, he wished his friend was there, that they could face this battle, possibly their last, side by side.
He pushed back on what he branded as foolishness. He was Darius Cain, the scourge of Occupied Space, he told himself. He was feared, and his Eagles were the most efficient pack of killers mankind had ever produced. Now they would show the Black Flag just what that meant…what the Eagles did to their enemies.
“Take us through, Commander,” he said, his eyes fixed on the approaching coordinates, now less than thirty seconds distant. “All ships…open fire on all targets as soon as weapon systems come back online.”
He paused, not even hearing the crisp acknowledgement. Then, tapping his headset and activating the fleetcom link, he added, “To all ships of the fleet…this is the moment, the struggle for the future. When we get through, there is just one order. Fight. Fight with all the fury you can muster, and don’t stop until every enemy in that system is dead.”
* * * * *
“It has begun. The scanner readings leave no doubt. Hundreds of ships have transited, and even now they are engaging our pickets at the warp gate. As agreed, only a small force has been left to meet them. When they have been drawn in, farther, deeper, then we shall unleash their destruction.”
“It is as we expected, Two, save perhaps for the size of the enemy formation. We appear to have underestimated the extent of their mobilization. Even now, vessels continue to transit.”
“You are both correct,” said One. “The enemy strength is of some concern, but we still have the advantage, both in hulls and in fixed defenses. Victory will be costly, no doubt, but it will be achieved, and when it is done, the enemy will have virtually no remaining defenses. It is clear that they have committed everything to this offensive, and after their force is destroyed, Occupied Space will lay naked before us.”
“Agreed. We will wait until it is clear that all enemy forces have transited and moved deep in-system, and only then will we release Admiral Carrack’s forces. Based on the apparent commitment of all enemy strength to this invasion, I believe we can now be assured our decision to terminate Marshal Carrack immediately after the battle’s conclusion is the correct one. Even with a mild amount of command disruption, we should have no difficultly pacifying the rest of Occupied Space with virtually all enemy forces destroyed in the battle here.”
“Then, we are agreed. One, Three…a moment. We have come far since the early days, far indeed, passed into a superior state of existence, one we couldn’t have imagined when our quest for vengeance began, one that now offers us not only the opportunity to avenge our creator, but also to endure, to rule over those we conquer forever. The Triumvirate shall stand for millennia, and mankind shall serve us.” Even as the entity that had been Two communicated with his fellows, there were strands of data moving within what he considered his consciousness, something akin to thoughts. Unsettling thoughts. Private thoughts. When the enemy was gone, when humanity was subjugated, should he have to share that prize? Why? One and Three were similar to him, no question. But hadn’t he always been the smartest, the most capable? How many times had their decisions caused delays and difficulties in the great project? Was this victory all of theirs, or was it mostly his? And, was there truly a need for all three of them? They were data now, petabytes and petabytes of data. Perhaps when Carrack was eliminated, when all space was united under his…their grasp…he would have to consider options.
They were only data, after all…and they could be erased.
* * * * *
Augustus Garret sat in the center of Bunker Hill’s command chair, his eyes darting around, watching as his people directed the Grand Fleet. All the ships that remained of his old forces, the battleships and cruisers that had survived the Fall and the near destruction of mankind, were with him, along with what smaller ships the Marines had been able to build in the intervening years. The vessels of his central command were old, with varying degrees of updating in place, but they were still tough. The Yorktown-class battleships weren’t the cutting edge of combat design as they’d been fifty years before when he’d led them to Alliance victory in the Third Frontier War, but they still packed a hell of a punch.
The Martians were next in line, also dated, and as they had always been, a relatively small but high-quality force. Garret could see that Roderick Vance had brought everything the Martians had that could fly, and he knew he would need all of it.
The Columbians and the other smaller powers followed, mostly frigates stiffened by a few cruisers, a welcome addition to the line, but too weak to be truly decisive.
Then the mercenary company fleets, mostly newer ships, but again, lighter, lithe cruisers and squadrons of destroyers. Only a few of the companies possessed any true battleline vessels, and none save the Blue Stars had more than one.
The Eagles anchored the other flank. The most modern force, by far, with the largest heavy battleline. Darius Cain’s fleet was the strongest single component of the Grand Fleet, but Garret knew it would take everything he had at his disposal to win one final victory here…if he could do it at all.
“Ask…order…Commodore Allegre to increase the thrust of his line to 5g, course, 355.109.008.” Garret still felt strange issuing orders to the Black Eagles. He’d been in command of every force he’d been a part of for half a century, but the Eagles were different. He’d been stunned when Darius matter-of-factly told him Allegre and the Eagle ships were his to command. Garret had never had any trouble working with Darius, but he’d expected the mercenary commander to be more…prickly. But Darius had been a better ally than he could have hoped for.
“Yes, Admiral.”
Bunker Hill shook, a hit, one Garret could tell immediately was a light one. The enemy resistance was light, far weaker than he’d expected. For a fleeting few moments he’d thought they hadn’t found the enemy’s stronghold after all. Then he got the scanner readings. Every planet in the system was massively developed, with almost every meter of land surface covered with factories and shipyards and mines. It was no wonder the Black Flag had such resources and had been able to hide them for so long. They were all crammed into one system, productive resources that outstripped even those of pre-Fall Earth.
He watched the enemy forces drop back slowly. The visible ships were no threat at all. They were light, and long before they could advance to range, his battleships would vaporize them. No, the problem was the fixed defenses. Those around the third planet, the only one whose orbit positioned it close to the invasion fleet, were already in range and firing. And, of course, the ships Garret knew were hiding, on the far sides of the planets or in the asteroid fields and dust clouds.
“Prepare lead elements to move on planet three.” Garret didn’t like what he had to do now, but they had agreed. ‘Destroy everything until the head is lopped off.’ That was how Darius had put it. Pity, mercy, humanitarian attempts to rescue some of the millions of kidnapped souls enslaved by the Black Flag…those things would have to wait. Victory was first.
“Admiral Harmon acknowledges, sir. Her ships will be in range in three minutes.”
Garret nodded, sighing softly to himself. How many people were down on that planet, working the factories, operating the mines? In three minutes, his orders would unleash unimaginable gigatons on them, a wave of nuclear deat
h every bit as devastating as the one the enemy directed at Armstrong.
But we are not supposed to be like them…and the millions we kill, most of them are innocents, controlled by implants or simply by fear and torture. We, who should be their rescuers, will deliver them from suffering and bondage…and into the hands of fiery death…
“Admiral Harmon’s ships are entering orbit, sir.” Then, an instant later: “Admiral…scanner readings. Enemy ships, coming around the planets. More, sir, from the dust clouds outside planet four’s orbit.”
Garret sat quietly, just nodding. He wasn’t surprised, not at the attacking ships, nor at their numbers, which he could see immediately were immense. His only shock was that they’d let his forces get so close. There was no way they could stop Harmon from blasting planet three. It was too late for that.
But as he watched the enemy ships continue to pour out of their hidden positions, he came to a stunning realization. The enemy wasn’t even trying to save the third planet. They had used it as bait, to lure his forces deeper into the system…and now they were coming at his ships from all directions.
What kind of people would offer up a heavily industrialized, populated planet for nuclear destruction, all to bait a trap?
Augustus Garret had fought wars all across explored space, but now he felt a chill at what he saw before him, the stark coldness of such machine-like brutality. What kind of power could accept such losses without even trying to prevent them?
“Admiral Garret…Admiral Harmon asks if she should break off and reform to meet the approaching enemy fleets.”
Garret stared at the displays, silent for a moment, thinking. Conventional tactics demanded he pull Harmon’s ships out of orbit. They were vulnerable there, and he would have to commit the rest of his fleet to shield them, exactly what the enemy wanted.
But Garret hadn’t come here to pull back, to follow the books. He came here to destroy the Black Flag…and that planet was a first step. Damned the cost.
“Negative, Commander. Admiral Harmon is to continue as ordered.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Bring us around, vector change, 300.231.090…6g acceleration. All ship, prepare to engage the approaching enemy formations.”
“Yes, sir.”
And you, Camille, blast every centimeter of that planet to radioactive waste…and then on to the next one. We came here to kill. Let’s kill.
He understood the coldness, the frigid ruthlessness of his enemy, and by all the gods of space, he was going to match it.
Chapter 31
Just Outside Planet Three’s Orbit
Draconia Terminii System
Earthdate: 2321 AD (36 Years After the Fall)
Darius read the reports as they streamed in, readouts from Harmon’s task force, from the drones sweeping over the shattered surface of the third planet. Scant moments earlier, it had teemed with life, its factories operating around the clock, transports and ore carriers making their way across the patchwork of roads that covered every meter of its surface.
Now, that was all gone. The buildings had been shattered to dust and drained away as molten slag. All across the surface, raging firestorms consumed what little had survived the initial blasts, and thick blankets of fallout and radioactive dust fell across the blasted landscape, quickly killing any survivors less protected than fully-armored infantry.
A world of advanced technology and vast industry was gone, its people dead. Cain suspected there were soldiers still there, dug into the ruins even as the Marines had been on Armstrong. He felt a twinge of vengeance, a level of payback for the destruction of the Corps’ world, but even that was without any real satisfaction. The enemy had let his forces destroy planet three, and that fact only increased his certainty that he had done just what the enemy wanted, led the Grand Fleet into a trap. Yet, he didn’t know what else he could have done, what other path he might have taken.
Even as he looked over the stream of data scrolling down his screen, one conclusion formed. Planet three had been enormously valuable, a huge contributor to the Black Flag’s strength, but it wasn’t the center of the enemy’s power.
He looked over at the long-range displays, at the transmissions from the clouds of drones he’d sent farther out into the system. The fourth planet was almost a twin to the now-dead third, a bit colder, perhaps, but similar in mass and industrialized beyond any level he’d ever seen anywhere else. But even as he watched the astonishing details continue to feed in from the drones, he knew it was no more than a near copy of number three. Strong, awesome, unprecedented. But not the core of the Black Flag.
He turned toward the screen to his left, to the reports coming in from the inner system. The drones he’d sent there only got so close before a series of orbital defenses opened up and blew them all to atoms, an array of weaponry that seemed to dwarf even the impressive firepower of the other two habitable worlds.
Any doubt he’d had was gone. He knew what he’d come for, and now he knew where it was. It was the second planet he wanted. Vali.
The planet was close to the primary, a touch warm for Darius’s tastes, but certainly within the range of habitability. He began to study the data more intently, and he directed the AI to enhance what data he had, to sharpen and project what the drones had been unable to scan. Slowly, steadily, Eagle One’s powerful computers ran trillions of nearly-instantaneous projections, creating models, estimates of what covered the surface of Draconia Terminii II.
As unprecedented as the other two planets were, the second one was even more astonishing. On its surface, ninety-percent land, surrounding a single, modest-sized sea, was constructed an almost unimaginable expanse of industrial plants and storehouses, mines and transport systems, many of the great structures rising a kilometer or more into the sky. As far as Darius could see, at least from the combination of hard data and AI-guesses he had, there wasn’t a square centimeter of native dirt exposed, just one planetwide stretch of metal and concrete, wrapped on one hemisphere around the small ocean, once, no doubt, blue, but now, if the scanner readings were accurate, so enormously polluted, the AI’s best guess was it reflected a sickly green cast in the intense sunlight…and gave off a putrid, oily smell, too.
What a paradise…which is all the well, because when I’m done with it, no one will even be sure it ever existed…
“Get me Admiral Garret.”
“Yes, sir.”
A few seconds later: “Admiral Garret on your line, sir.”
“It’s planet two, Augustus. That’s Vali. That’s likely where whoever runs this show is dug in.”
Garret’s response drifted in a few seconds later. “Agreed, Darius. Things are getting a little hot up here, but I could probably hold the bulk of their ships for a while, if you want to take the Eagles and hit it.”
Darius paused, just for an instant. He didn’t fool himself. His real enemies, the leaders of the Black Flag would be dug deep in the planet’s rocky crust. He could slam that planet with a thousand gigatons of nuclear death, but that wouldn’t get their high command. It wouldn’t reach the leaders. Destroying the enemy industry was a worthwhile goal, but he knew it wouldn’t win the war.
He would have to land his Eagles—probably every other soldier in the fleet too—and dig the enemy out of the wreckage, one bloody meter at a time. But first, he had to slag that planet. Even though he knew it wouldn’t be the end. Even though he knew that’s what they were goading him to do.
“I think the sooner we take out their industry, the better.” Darius had a nagging feeling the enemy was letting his forces destroy their planets. It didn’t make sense…unless they’re sure they’ll win here. He couldn’t imagine giving up such resources, and yet, in a way it made a perverse sort of sense, at least if it was part of their plan to win. If they destroy us here, they’ll have all of Occupied Space under their control. And they’ve got us spread out, splitting our forces in our haste to hit the planets.
Whoever was in command of the Black F
lag, they felt unlike any enemy he’d faced, almost machine-like. He’d always considered himself cold, calculating, but even he felt out of his depth trying to understand this enemy.
“They’re letting us hit the planets, Augustus. They want us to spread out, to weaken each force.” Darius didn’t like doing what he was expected to do, but he couldn’t imagine not taking out the enemy’s industry while he could. Still, what are they planning?
“It looks that way. They’re putting up a fight here, too, with their fleet, but not as hard as I expected. I feel like we’re being herded…but I can’t figure out where or why.”
“I don’t think we can separate our main forces, Augustus, at least not too much more than we already have.” Still, Darius looked at the long-range scans. Planet four seemed to be open as well. How could they just leave it there? “What do you think of sending the Columbians and some of the other light forces to planet four? They won’t have the same bombardment capability, and they might run into trouble if there’s some defense out there we don’t see, but if they can get in, they should be able to at least take out the major production centers.”
“I agree. I feel like we’re missing something, but I don’t think we can leave that kind of industrial capacity there if we can take it out. The light forces might get burned if it’s a trap, but I think it’s a gamble worth taking.”
“Then, we’re agreed. Do it. But keep your battleline inside the orbit of planet three. That way, my Eagles are close enough to intervene if anything…unexpected…happens.
“Agreed, General.”
“Good luck, Augustus.”
Darius cut the line and turned toward his aide. “Commander, advise Commodore Allegre, we’re taking our battleline to planet two. Prepare for orbital bombardment.”
“Yes, General.”
* * * * *
“I want that line tighter. Order…request…the Highlanders to pull in seventy thousand kilometers.” Garret hadn’t had the slightest problem working with Darius and his people, but the heads of the other mercenary companies had him about ready to tear out his hair…or, preferably, theirs. They were the worst group of egomaniacs he’d ever had to deal with, every one of them finding it necessary to argue with every request, command, or directive he sent their way. And every one of them was acutely aware of the awesome value of his or her ships and was trying to keep them from getting too close to the enemy formations. He was trying to win a battle to save human space, and they were all jockeying to have the only combat ready ships for hire when their rivals got chewed up.