Free Fleet Box Set 1

by Michael Chatfield

  How thankful she was now that he was willing to do what was needed to win. She knew that before she wouldn’t have been able to. He was the only one who had seen the truth of the world. Winning was everything. There was no real consolation prize for the runner-up. In the past, she’d have reacted much the same way that Krom had, but now it was different. She shook her head, clearing such thoughts from her mind.

  “There is no need to worry, mistress. Your husband is a resourceful man, and he will live through this. Of that I am sure. He will return to you as quickly as possible,” Krom said reassuringly, not knowing her own thoughts.

  Yasu’s hands turned into fists. As he comes back to me, he’s done well keeping his activities out of the purview of his protection detail; he must really like this “swinger” woman he’s found. Or maybe he’s not even with a human. Rage flowed through her.

  “You—get me updates on his position.” She singled out someone who looked less harassed than the others in the makeshift command center. He looked up, shocked by the request. “Request that I have a meeting with the commander.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Natsuko, find me Takahashi.” With nothing more than a nod, she moved away silently. Tomaki still waited by her mistress.

  “I have the leader of the shadow group on the view screen.”

  “Good.” Yasu strode over to where a view screen and communications suite had been set up. She looked at the shadow leader.

  “Do you all wear armor constantly, still covered in blood?” the leader said in disgust.

  Yasu was already displeased with the man. “The armor keeps us safe and allows us to survive multiple different circumstances. The blood, well, we just cleared the Syndicate forces from your planet and I haven’t had time to clean my armor.”

  “Both inadequate reasons, but I will let it pass,” he said regally.

  As soon as they think they’re back in power, they change in an instant.

  “Thank you.” Yasu rolled her eyes as she bowed her head. When she got her hands on James, he was going to pay for making her have to kowtow and praise this—what looked like—bureaucratic asshole.

  He waved his hand, imperiously sweeping the subject aside.

  “I request that I see my husband.”

  “Your husband?” He now studied Yasu closer. “You chose to mate with a creature like him?”

  “He chose me, in a way.”

  “You let him?” he asked incredulously.

  “I stabbed him and nearly killed him before he asked me to become his mate.” She left out the fact that he’d knocked her out afterward as she unconsciously worked her jaw.

  “Your race is quite a violent one.”

  “We were forced by the Syndicate into a marriage ceremony before we were shipped out into space to fight for them, thinking that they were actually a force that would keep our friends and family back on Earth safe, instead of keeping them enslaved and us blind cannon fodder. Now, may I see my husband?” she said conversationally, but her eyes were fierce as she flexed her fists outside of the pickup’s field of view. This alien jackass was making her defend James.

  “Very well, you will be allowed to meet, but you will not be allowed to couple nor wear anything powered that can act as a weapon. Or bring anything that would do anything like that. If you do so, you will be arrested as well and charged according to Chaleel law,” he said in an offhanded manner, as if her troubles were beneath his attention.

  “Agreed. I will be at the command bunker within an hour.” She cut the channel before he could say anything and marched out of the room. “Get me a transport of some kind,” she said to Takahashi, who’d entered the command center during the exchange. He nodded, rushing off to obey as she went to the mobile armory that had been attached to the command center. Eddie was there as she came in. He looked at her with confusion.

  “I’m going to see James, so I need to store my Mecha and weapons,” she said in way of answering his gaze.

  He nodded his head seriously and he helped her out of her Mecha with practiced hands.

  She felt naked without the Mecha enveloping her, even more so without the comfortable weight of a pistol and her sword.

  “Transport is ready.” Takahashi returned to the room. His forces were in the reserve, ready to move where Iron Bok Soo and Henry were at any moment. While he was waiting, he’d been updated by the Sato sisters on everything that had happened and wasn’t happy, but he kept his mouth shut around Yasu.

  “Thank you.” She debated taking a shower or not for a few seconds before she shrugged. They already thought of her and all humans as violent, disgusting creatures. Hopefully the smell of being in a Mecha for a day would keep them away from her.

  She walked out of the room, Takahashi guiding her to a fast wing jet. The pilot already had the engines humming as she accepted a helmet and took the secondary seat. The canopy closed over her as the remainder of Samurai’s Revenge waited at the edge of the craft’s blast area. It rose into the air vertically and pushed forward.

  The person she’d told to keep track of James was relaying information to the pilot already as they made adjustments in the air.

  “We should be there in twenty minutes,” the pilot said through a speaker in the helmet she’d been given.

  “Thank you. I didn’t know we had any aircraft like this aboard the fleet?” She turned the statement into a question.

  “We don’t, ma’am. This was one of the products that the Syndicate was making. Highly weaponized and versatile, but incapable of exiting atmosphere. So, great for suppressing a population, yet if it’s captured then it can’t attack ships in space.”

  “So, how do you know how to pilot this?”

  “I was part of the group stationed here, so I learned to pilot it through learning programs. Iron Bok Soo was able to convince the Syndicates we would make great pilots. With a fix, we were able to pull the kill switches and keep the Syndicate’s flyers on us instead of the ground forces. We basically cancelled out their fighters, and with the added fast shuttles and ship support, we were able to win,” he said as he went through a high-g turn, talking the whole time with ease.

  “What are the other atmospheric fighters doing?”

  “They’re now on call for MC support. We can hover and give cover from explosive ordinance and rake the enemy.”

  “These are, as you say, only planet-based machines. They can’t achieve escape velocity or works in space, and so of what use will that learning be then?”

  “They’re very similar to space fighters as well. So we can change out and use them. They’re more expensive in terms of how much materials and time they take to make them. Plus, we could increase the fleet’s firepower with faster, harder to detect fighters. With a station, we could be left in systems as internal security.”

  “I didn’t know we had fighters.” Yasu was now perplexed.

  “That’s because the ships that we have aren’t given a fighter complement. The only ship that is, is a carrier. I was able to finally look one up when the Free Fleet arrived. They’re massive, ranging from eight hundred meters to one point two kilometers long, with widths and depths half of the Resilient. They’re the biggest ships created other than some merchant vessels, but those are usually just frames with engines and wormhole dishes big enough to push it through a hyper jump with the cargo tagged onto it.” He rolled the fighter sideways and upward as an automated Chaleelian AA weapon tried to get a lock but was thrown off by the maneuver.

  “Who has a ship that big?”

  “The Union used to. The Syndicate has a few, but they stay closer to their home system, Dovark. They’re only used when a planet becomes dangerous to the Syndicate’s rule. I expect that we’ll be seeing them soon.”

  “Joy,” Yasu muttered as she watched the city underneath her moving past quickly, hoping that nothing else would make her pilot throw them into another high-g maneuver.

  “We’re here, ma’am,” he said as they approached
a military base. He began speaking on his radio as he slowed his descent. She could see weapon emplacements had shifted, covering the fighter as it came in. Military personnel poured out into the open areas of the base in various levels of dress, speaking of how they’d been roused to cover the aircraft.

  Finally, after a few minutes, the pilot sped up the descent, bringing the craft down near some hangars instead of along the tarmac.

  He popped the hood as a convoy of vehicles approached the jet. Yasu left the helmet in the jet as she climbed out and went to meet the vehicles. Their weapons pointed at her and the aircraft.

  “You may take off now,” she said through her battle suit’s communicator. “I will radio for pick up later.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’ll be in the area.” The jet’s hood closed as he took off vertically again. Weapons followed him as he sped up, turning away and up. She looked away as the dust cloud from the atmospheric fighter’s take-off rolled past her and she waited for the oncoming vehicles.

  The convoy reached her as she waited for them to stop. Something similar to an armored personnel carrier she’d seen back on Earth stopped closest to her. The side opened like doors as a large Chaleelian stepped out and walked over to her, shaking her hand.

  “My name is General Carsickle.”

  “Yes, the Chaleel forces commander. Yes, I know of you. Now, I came here to see my husband.”

  “Indeed. Come with me.” He indicated the inside of the APC. Yasu got in, Carsickle following her as the vehicle took off.

  He stared at her for a while as they rode across the base.

  “Are you going to keep staring or are you going to ask me what’s on your mind?” she asked after a couple of minutes.

  “I’m wondering how you could marry someone like Salchar and how this ‘Free Fleet’ hasn’t fallen apart.” Carsickle sat back in shock as Yasu laughed, taking a few seconds to bring herself under control.

  “Well, to the first one, we were basically forced to marry. The Syndicate have a marriage ceremony in which people from opposite sexes are picked to fight each other. If they don’t want a relationship, the stronger one wins and the other dies. If they do, then they have to fight to submit the other and then declare their intentions. With Salchar, I stabbed him in the gut and he knocked me out. Then, when I woke up, he declared he would marry me. I, of course, said yes. James is a different kind of man.”

  “James? I’m guessing Salchar’s name isn’t really Salchar.”

  “It’s his gamer name, as mine is Blade Mistress.”

  Even as the APC stopped, Yasu and Carsickle talked, walking around the building rather than going inside of it as Yasu explained to him what had happened to them since the time they’d been recruited to now. She left out any important military details.

  Carsickle leaned against a wall afterward. Four bodyguards were close by, two watching in, and two out.

  “He sounds almost impossible.”

  “Oh, he is,” Yasu said, a small smile on her face. “I don’t think anyone else could’ve done what he’s done, no matter what he says.” She turned and looked to Carsickle, her eyes imploring. “However impossible and annoying and damned right idiotic he is, he’s still our leader.”

  Her brow creased in thought. “No, he’s more than that; he is our hope, the hope for all of the races of the Free Fleet, for the hope of Chaleel. The hope for the people who were left on the sidelines, those who were bullied, attacked, and forced to do as others wished. He might not be the picture-perfect hero you think, or the kind, gentle soul you read about in fairy tales. He’s as hard as armor and as relentless as the sun and he will do everything in his power to keep those around him safe. As you can see here, he is willing to give up his life to try to create peace between our people while also coordinating a battle.”

  “He does seem a little far away.”

  “Oh, he’s actually running the battle through his internal implants. He’s using your communications tower to do so.” She grinned.

  “He’s in the middle of my camp watching feeds for mundane patrols,” Carsickle said, shocked.

  “With James, nothing is as it seems. Wheels within wheels,” she said as if it explained everything while she read a text message from none other than James.

  “Which is why I do as he asks me—most of the time.” She pulled a data pad from the holder on her lower back. With a few swishes and taps, she handed it to Carsickle.

  Rules, regulations, standards and practices of the Free Fleet.

  “Why are you giving me this code?”

  “Now you know what is to be expected of planetary forces if an emergency occurs in this system, and we render aid. It also lists recruiting practices and I attached a recruiting drive form for multiple different civilian jobs.”

  “Why would anyone want to listen to you and go into space with nothing more than your word?”

  “If a few people take a leap of faith, then others will follow. We need to rebuild the lost trust between your people and the fleet. Plus, wouldn’t you feel safer if you knew that the fleet that’s protecting your area had people from your planet in it, so it couldn’t deny Chaleel help if it wanted because the Chaleelians would rebel?”

  “You want Chaleelians in your fleet?”

  “We’ll take anyone with a clean record, are of age of consent, and passes our tests,” Yasu said. “Now, could you show me where my errant husband is?”

  “Certainly—this way.” Carsickle led the way to the command bunker. They passed through security quickly.

  They reached a blast door that double guards opened for them. Carsickle gestured to Yasu as she looked inside. James sat in one of the seats behind the commander’s chair. Everyone around him stared at him uneasily as he mumbled or talked without words—alien gestures to those without implants. He looked up at her with a calm expression, as if everything was going as planned, as she entered.

  “James! You damned irritable jackass!” She stomped through the room. Carsickle’s eyebrows rose, a hint of a grin on his face as the door closed behind her.

  “I believe we’ll be using your conference room,” James/Salchar said as he nodded toward a door. Yasu went in first and he followed. He shut the door firmly.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she said as soon as the door was shut.

  “Sitting in a conference room,” he said matter-of-factly.

  “You are that—smart ass. You’re also missing from your command position of the fleet.”

  “Yes, well, we need to create trust between the Chaleelians and the fleet. This is the best way I could think of it. Otherwise, these people will never accept the fleet.”

  “So what if they don’t trust you? There are how many other systems that need your help?”

  “There’s bound to be people who don’t like me, or us. We’ve got to understand that.”

  “So why waste our time on them?”

  “Because although they might not like us, some of them might, and we need people. Pushing planets away is not going to help our manpower issues.” He shrugged.

  “You have a point.” She dropped into a seat. “Though you could’ve waited until after you had a check-up with the medics about your leg. You don’t know if it’s bleeding internally. They might just have to leave you alone and you’ll kill yourself.”

  “Ah.” His calm exterior showed fleeting embarrassment as he scratched his head, now his turn to look away.

  “The doc told me to ask if you feel light-headed, weak, have numbness in places and if you can feel your toes.”

  “No on the light-headed. I was a bit weak but I’m fine now. I have numbness in my side but I think that’s from my ribs cutting some nerve endings and I can feel my toes and move them.” He demonstrated, bringing his foot up a way and wiggling his toes in the thin shoes he wore.

  “I’ll tell the doc as soon as I get back.”

  He nodded his assent as his gaze sharpened and he turned to her. “Is everything good wit
h the fleet? Have you started the recruiting drive yet?”

  She knew he knew everything so far, but she also knew how he liked to use others as sounding boards, even if it was just him talking to himself.

  “Fleet’s fine—Rick’s running everything in the black. Henry’s pretty much got everything on the ground covered. Iron Bok Soo’s working with him. Takahashi is on reserve.”

  “Have you seen Bok Soo?”

  “No. He’s been moving from power plant to power plant and as soon as I heard you were arrested, I demanded to see you.”

  His eyebrows lifted in surprise at this.

  “I’ve told you before—the fleet needs you. You can’t be here. It’s shaken the fleet.”

  “They will learn to cope without me for a few days. If and when I do stop being commander, they’ll need to know how to react when I’m not there.”

  “It would still be nice to know when you decide on letting yourself get taken hostage!” Yasu yelled back, crossing her arms.

  “Yeah, I should’ve warned people. But what’s done is done.” He shrugged.

  The door opened as bodyguards and then the shadow leader walked into the room. Yasu instantly felt the hairs on the back of her neck raise up at the sight. Equally disturbed by their entrance as by the fact James hadn’t moved at all and barely acted as if anyone had entered the room. His eyes and body looked relaxed. The type of relaxed a veteran fighter looked before they’re about to pounce.

  “I came to make sure you weren’t coupling. Your race being so barbaric, I wasn’t sure that we could stop you from trying to mate if you were.” He smirked as Yasu flinched.

  “You’re the leader of these people and you’re making jokes about our mating habits? Shouldn’t you have more pressing matters on your mind? If I was you, I would be thinking about the fleet above my head and the military force that is two times your own and better equipped.” Yasu knew this wasn’t true but dismissed it as she was unconsciously figuring out how to subdue the people in the room. There was an edginess to them that she hadn’t felt even when around Carsickle and his highly trained bodyguards.