“We’ll know their status in a few minutes,” McKnight said dismissively as she reviewed her tactical plotter. “But regardless of their success or failure, we have an Imperial Battle Group to deal with.”
“Thankfully there’s no Command Carrier,” Tremblay nodded. “But it looks like the group is under the command of one Commodore Blair—an eminently competent commander with fifty years of command experience, twenty three of which have come at his present rank and post.”
That last bit made McKnight grimace. Until now she had largely been up against officers whose individual command experience had only been a few times greater her own—but now she was up against someone with more than twenty times as much command experience as hers.
Still, she had reason to expect—or even hope—that the experience gap in this particular engagement would not ultimately prove decisive.
If it did, the game was already over.
“The Battle Group has reached extreme firing range,” Tremblay reported unnecessarily.
“Thank you, Mr. Tremblay,” McKnight said coolly as she checked her weapons grid’s present status. The latest tactical projections suggested that if she opened fire now with just the turbo-lasers, she could snuff nearly a third of the enemy ships—primarily focusing on the faster Destroyers—before the remaining Imps cleared an approach vector and used that vector to methodically strip away the moon base’s entire turbo-laser complement.
If she fired the torpedoes at the same time as the turbo-lasers, she could push that number up to just over half of the total enemy ships. But then the enemy would be able to en-globe the moon and her odds of escaping aboard the Mode fell to less than eight percent.
The only way to keep her escape odds above sixty percent, however, was to wait for the enemy fleet to approach to long firing range—which would have the unfortunate effect of roughly doubling the enemy’s accuracy. That meant that even fewer ships would fall to her turbo-laser fire, but it also meant that she could clear as wide of an escape path as possible.
With these options in mind, she made the only choice that any sane person could make.
“We’ll draw them in to long range,” she said smartly, more to bolster her own resolve than for Tremblay’s—or Waldo’s—benefit. “I’m charging all of the antimatter torpedoes; hopefully none of those ships is equipped with anything better than standard Imp sensors, otherwise our torpedo launchers will light up on their boards before we get a chance to fire them.”
Steadily the Imps drew nearer, but they were far from reckless or impatient in their approach. They inexorably constricted their globular formation as each ship in the formation maintained a perfectly-choreographed, arcing approach trajectory which ensured that no ship moved out of position as the Battle Group clamped down on the moon.
A few minutes before the enemy reached long firing range, there was a chime from the door of the command center. McKnight allowed herself to sigh in relief when she saw Lieutenant Spalding standing outside the command center with a handful of technicians nearby. She unlocked the door, prompting the handful of technicians to come into the room.
“Is it done?” she asked before they had taken two steps into the command center.
“It is,” Spalding nodded, and one look at his face told her that the story of his efforts at the Key merited re-telling. “Where do you need me?”
“Conduct everyone to the Mode as quickly as possible,” she replied as Tremblay stood and conferred privately with Guo as they appeared to go over the recordings which she hoped had captured the Core Fragment’s final moments. “The defenses are automated and need a target package. Once that package has been input, we’ll launch with the Mode and burn for the hyper limit under the cover of the base’s arsenal—”
“Incoming transmission,” Guo interrupted after sliding into his customary seat beside Tremblay, “it appears to be one Commodore Blair aboard the Sequatur Aeternam.”
“Let me see it—one way only,” she commanded, and a moment later the visage of a lean, hard-looking woman appeared on the main viewer.
“This is Commodore Toni Blair,” the Imperial Commodore said, projecting every bit of her fifty years’ command experience as she spoke, “effective immediately this star system is under Imperial quarantine in accordance with the Writ of Compliance. All law-abiding citizens are instructed to broadcast their identification and confirm their locations according to Imperial Law.” She leaned fractionally toward the pick-up before adding, “All rebels and would-be insurrectionists are encouraged to remain in your hiding holes, and to rest assured that Man’s justice will be swift and final—and far better than you deserve.”
The screen went dark and Jarrett immediately quipped, “That’s what she said.”
“That does not make any sense, Shiyuan,” Guo sighed.
“Your face doesn’t make any sense,” Shiyuan retorted.
“No…your face does not make any sense,” Guo said pointedly as a rare smirk spread across his lips.
In that moment, their banter was precisely what was needed in the command center. McKnight decided to seize on it as she barked, “All nonessential personnel are to evacuate to—“
The lights flickered, switching to local backup power sources as Tremblay and Guo began frantically flipping through the data feeds which slowly began to trickle across their screens.
“Report!” McKnight demanded after seeing her own feeds were largely void. Several seconds passed before she received the grim report.
“We got hit by some kind of interference,” Tremblay said tightly. “The systems look like they’re physically undamaged, but over a third of them will require full manual reboots.”
“Can we initiate the reboots from here?” she asked as data began to trickle across her own display.
“It looks like we can,” Tremblay said after a brief conference with Guo, “but I still don’t know what hit us, and until I do I have no idea what a second attack might do to these already-compromised systems. Everything on this base is as hardened as it can be, but whatever they used managed to overcome all but the last lines of defense for those systems.”
“I think I see what they used,” Jarrett said hesitantly.
McKnight moved to his side and narrowed her eyes after failing to recognize the mathematically-described energy signatures on his screen. “What was it?”
He cocked his head dubiously, “Some kind of tightly-focused resonance wave that interfered with nearly every piece of data-processing equipment we have. It originated from the Battleships, which seemed to project it in concert…and it looks like the only reason any of our systems survived is because we’re so far underground. There’s something familiar about it, though…”
“It is from the war strategy game Dimensional Subversion IX,” Guo mused as he examined an identical data stream at his own station.
“The un-lockable, third tier ‘Interference’ tech upgrade for the Federation faction, right?” Jarrett said with a comprehending nod which Guo silently returned. “Amazing…the game designers actually knew something about classified Imperial tech and put it in the game. I’d always suspected they were connected—“
“Focus, gentlemen,” McKnight snapped, hoping to curtail their foray into nerd-ville long enough to deal with the current crisis. “How do we counter it?”
“Pulling up DS-IX and all attendant archived forum content,” Guo said steadily as he booted the game up on his console.
“If it’s anything like in the game, I don’t think we can counter it,” Shiyuan shook his head warily, “at least not remotely. That hidden upgrade was a game-breaker for planetary siege scenarios like this.”
“You’re talking about a game,” Spalding snapped.
“Indeed,” Guo replied measuredly, “a game with multiple conspiracy theories surrounding it—including one which suggested that an Imperial engineer had been a primary tech consultant for the project, and that he had sprinkled it with references to classified Imperial technolog
y.”
“Contributing to the theory,” Jarrett piped in, “is that shortly after the game was launched he died of an unexpected brain aneurysm. Medical records from mere weeks prior to his death confirmed that he had no preexisting conditions which—”
“Gentlemen!” McKnight snapped.
“I think…” Tremblay began reservedly, “the local backup reboot circuits are offline in the turbo-laser mounts. The torpedo launchers look unaffected, but the turbo-lasers look like they’re going to require a full re-initialization of their targeting systems after each wave.”
“How long will it take to write the program that does that?” McKnight asked Jarrett, who gave her an ominous look for several silent seconds.
“I…well…considering the damage done to the systems…” he trailed off as he scanned the data stream. “The problem isn’t getting the system back online one time—it’s getting it back online every time they hit us with that wave. Here, watch,” he urged as his fingers began to fly across his console’s interface, and McKnight saw as he appeared to manually reconnect with one of the base’s turbo-laser mounts. Once connected, he performed a manual diagnostic which took eighty three seconds to complete. He then began reinstalling various subroutines and verifying their interactivity, which required another thirty three seconds, before he turned to McKnight and said, “There, that was the work required to reboot one of them once.”
“Writing a program to do for each placement individually would take hours—perhaps more,” Guo mused grimly as McKnight’s com-link unexpectedly chimed.
She saw the incoming call was from Yide, and for a moment her heart stopped as she received the call and said, “Report, Yide.”
“The ship is working, but many protective circuits were blown by that hit,” he said in his deep, rumbling voice—which had only deepened in recent months as he had nearly completed maturing into a full-fledged adult. “We cannot sustain more than one or two more hits before the stealth suite will be completely broken.”
McKnight winced, but in truth the news was not as bad as she had feared a few seconds earlier. “Copy that, Yide. Be ready to spin up the drives on the team’s arrival.”
“Commander,” Senator Bellucci stepped forward with uncanny poise, “I believe I have a solution to this particular problem—one which serves all involved parties.”
McKnight gave the Imperial noble a hard look, “You’re not in a position to issue orders here.”
“No orders,” Bellucci flashed a wicked smile, “merely a suggestion—one which it would behoove you to consider with all possible haste.”
Tremblay stood up from his console and hissed, “Senator—“
“Be quiet, Mr. Tremblay,” Bellucci held up a pair of fingers, like one might do with a well-trained dog, and McKnight’s eyes narrowed when Tremblay surprisingly held his tongue. “There is a secret escape vessel on this moon,” Bellucci explained, prompting Tremblay to angrily set his jaw, “one which Mr. Tremblay and I had intended to use strictly for our own egress. It is located too deep within the planet’s crust for the interference beam to reach it, and will enable us to escape along the same path that you clear for your own ship. You can depart in advance of us, but we should reach the hyper limit at approximately the same time.”
McKnight understood where the other woman was going, and she disliked—in the extreme—the premeditated appearance of this particular revelation. “I won’t abandon my people,” she said flatly, making pointed eye contact with Jarrett—who was the only one of ‘her people’ whose presence would likely be required to keep the weapons grid online long enough to clear a path to the limit.
“You have no choice, Commander,” Bellucci shrugged dismissively. “But I will make my ship,” she sliced a look over her shoulder in Tremblay’s direction, “available to your crew during the final evacuation of this facility, and I will agree to rendezvous with you at a predetermined location to transfer them back to your custody.”
“Custody? They’re my crew,” McKnight said through clenched teeth, “not my prisoners.”
“Semantics,” the Senator sighed. “Do you accept my offer?”
McKnight hated everything about this latest sequence of developments, but she had known that Tremblay was holding something back from her. This secret escape vehicle appeared to be what he had concealed, and now that she knew what it was she was relieved that it did not appear—at this point—to be a knife in the back as she had feared.
“Jarrett,” she said without breaking eye contact with Bellucci, “I’m not going to ask you to stay—“
“I am volunteering to do so, Commander McKnight,” he interrupted forcefully while continuing with the task of rebooting each of the turbo-lasers individually. “There is no other way to re-arm the defensive array sufficiently to ensure a safe escape but to have me remain and execute each reinstallation manually from this station. Guo’s expertise lies in other areas,” he said with a meaningful nod toward his fellow technician, “and he would be unequal to this task without my help. Only I can clear a path for us—and I can only do so if I remain here while you and the rest of the crew evacuate—immediately,” he finished confidently, sparing a determined look her way.
She disliked something about his expression in that moment, and she suspected that she would come to regret agreeing to this proposed course of action, but she was out of time. She had no way of knowing how often the Imperials could fire their interference beam, which meant that if she wanted to get her people to safety they needed to leave immediately.
A hard knot formed in her throat, which she fought back with a grimace as she said, “Clear a path for us, Jarrett. Everyone else—or at least those of us who haven’t signed on with the Senator here,” she said, casting a grim look Tremblay’s way as she turned toward the door, “move out!”
Several minutes after McKnight had evacuated with the rest of her people, Tremblay turned to the Senator with restored calm and said, “That would have played better if you’d stuck to the plan.”
Bellucci chuckled, drumming her fingers against her bicep in a picturesque arms-folded pose as she watched Guo and Jarrett work in tandem to restore the weapons grid. “A perfect plan is as impossible as divinity itself, Mr. Tremblay,” she said with thinly-veiled contempt. “One who clings to preconceptions in spite of new information is useless, and to this point in our association you have given me no reason to think of you as anything less than marginally useful. I suggest that in the coming minutes, hours, and days you do your utmost to ensure my opinion of you does not change in that particular regard—for I can assure you that you have nowhere to go but ‘down’ from your present, precarious perch.”
Tremblay had expected this level of insufferable arrogance—and, in a small but real way, he was grateful for Bethany’s ‘grooming’ of him in preparation for moments like this one. He did his best to keep his emotions hidden, but somehow she seemed to see right through him as she chuckled devilishly.
“Mr. Tremblay,” she chided, “I have been reading the hearts and minds of men since before my hormones began to flow. You do yourself a disservice by attempting to conceal what is all too obvious.”
“Fine,” he quipped, “I don’t like you, Senator—in fact I despise you.”
She quirked an eyebrow bemusedly, “Well said; I appreciate a direct approach.”
“But we’ve got common goals, at least for now,” he continued, to which she nodded approvingly, “so it’s going to be in our mutual interests to avoid springing surprises on each other.”
She cocked her head dubiously, “Is it, now?”
“It is.”
“I do not believe anything about that statement, Mr. Tremblay,” she said flatly before narrowing her eyes, “and that is a rare thing indeed.”
He ignored her, knowing precisely what she was alluding to and also knowing that he had no intention of giving her any more information than he already had. He turned to Jarrett and said, “How long is this going to take y
ou?”
“I have uploaded the auto-diagnostics to all platforms,” Jarrett replied, “and I have also queued the majority of the programs I will need to bring those systems back online.”
‘But you said—“ Tremblay began, only to be interrupted by Bellucci’s sharp voice as she took a step toward the technician’s console.
“He lied,” she declared flatly, “and she knew he was lying but, as I had said, the Commander had no choice in the matter.”
Tremblay cocked his head and saw an unthinkable sight: a tear running down Guo’s cheek as he worked alongside the spud-faced technician. Tremblay nodded grimly as he came to understand Jarrett’s plan, “Is there any chance you could—“
“No,” Jarrett said with finality. “Just because I’ve pre-loaded the subroutines and programs into the remote buffers doesn’t mean I won’t have to manually reinitialize each of them individually. If I had ten…maybe twelve hours then I could automate the system, but we don’t have that kind of time. This has to be done manually—by me—or nobody is getting off this moon.”
Tremblay knew just as well as everyone else in the room what that meant, but to his mind it was the logical choice. The primary mission for which he had dedicated himself—revealing to the AI cultists that their precious Data God was beyond resurrection—was far from complete, which meant that certain sacrifices would need to be made.
“We will remain here until the last possible moment,” Guo vowed as he, too, worked to bring the base’s various weapon systems back online.
“We will not,” Bellucci said coolly, “we will remain here until the last necessary moment—and not one second longer. Too much depends on our escape from this star system for us to succumb to sentimentality.”
“I understand, and I agree,” Jarrett agreed before turning to Tremblay. “I do have one thing I would like to say to you, Mr. Tremblay, before I lose the opportunity.”
“What do you want to say?” Tremblay asked, suspecting he already knew the other man’s thoughts.
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