Ghosts from the Past (The Wandering engineer Book 7)

by Chris Hechtl

  He would have liked to have seen some work on San Diego, but they had at least kept it functional and some progress had been made. Not as much as he'd like, but some. Horatio had apparently been devious in using solar panels ... and he had even sent modules to Agnosta to get their stations online and to even build space based training facilities there. Apparently both the solar panels and the modules were the idea of Sergeant Jethro Mclintock, Horatio had cited him and several members of his squad on a few of the ideas. Irons nodded and made a mental note to find a better way to signal his appreciation at a later date.

  Horatio's people had thrown together dozens of stations, some they had leased to civilian contractors, a few were manned. All were powered by solar power. One had been taken over by squatters and marines had been sent in to evict them. Apparently the station and colony the people had come from had barred them from coming back. That had put Horatio into a political minefield.

  They'd come to a compromise, the squatters had become civilian contractors living and working on the station. That was one way to turn a potentially explosive political situation to your own advantage.

  Irons turned his attention to the status report of the Pyrax yards once more. Horatio's teams had built the structure of a class one yard. Not a refit yard, but a full yard, one on par with the yards of old Terra. Once they slotted in the industry and AI needed to support such a facility it would begin churning out new ships. He'd even gone to the extreme of building a secondary yard for civilian ships that the navy serviced. The civilian yard was looser, further away from the main yard. According to Horatio's notes he'd done it with Commander Montgomery's recommendation to keep any prying civilian and media eyes away from the navy's building slips. The admiral nodded in approval.

  Ignoring the frames and components of the five hundred gunships and thousands of drones the yard had started then mothballed, Horatio's teams had built nearly four hundred hyperspace capable hulls, everything from corvettes right up to their first Newmannn class Battlecruiser that had been mothballed two days before Firefly had left the system for B101a1. Of course the hulls were in pieces, grand blocks that were missing key components. The major ones were reactors, weapons, and hyperdrives. Irons intended on rectifying that as soon as possible.

  Horatio had also stuffed every cargo station with parts and equipment. Parts for every ship that he could manage. He could quite possibly build another two hundred hulls with all the components.

  He was tempted to switch his station to Pyrax, to get it sorted while Antigua sorted itself out but he didn't have the luxury of time. Besides, the transit times involved ... no. Not now. Perhaps when Antigua was functional he'd take a fast courier over. For now they would run trade between the two navy yards. That would allow Horatio to start moving that stockpile of parts and goods while giving Antigua a jump in production. A necessary jolt in the arm while they got their own infrastructure here up to speed. And trade would be great for the economy of the area. But convoy escorts ... he shook his head. Another headache to handle.

  Pyrax had also not been idle on the recruiting. They had over fifty-four thousand people in uniform, nearly 5 percent of Pyrax's reported population though only a half that number were from Pyrax. A third weren't even in Pyrax anymore, most of the marines were on Agnosta or scattered in small recruiting detachments in the star systems around Pyrax.

  Still, it was quite the achievement, the people involved were also the best at productivity too, throw in their training and military discipline and they will be a force to reckon with in or out of uniform. Matilda had done a bang up job training them into a professional team.

  Agnosta had added about four thousand to that number, most of them were marines. That number was steadily going up as well. Gaston and the other star systems around Pyrax had yet to match those numbers, but eventually they would. There was even a report of some recruits arriving in a steady trickle from Epsilon Triangula. He nodded in approval at that news.

  They were a bit lopsided on the marines he thought with a wry twist of his lips. There were twenty thousand yard dogs, yard workers, another eighteen thousand squids, two thousand support personnel and nearly fourteen thousand marines. He'd projected half that for marines and twice that for navy personnel. They'd have to make some adjustments to their recruiting he thought.

  Of course right now a lot of the Yard Dogs were either doing manual labor or manning posts on the various bases and space stations they had constructed. Another thing to sort out he thought. They needed managers and others to oversee the business. They also needed to train people to man the stations and then get back to their own job in the yard.

  When he had pitched the Yard Dog concept he had selected people who were doers but without a lot of management skills. He had hoped they would have brought on friends and others who had those skills. He'd been half afraid they would have ended up talking the subject to death without accomplishing much but they'd come through. He was proud of them. All of them.

  “So, Admiral about this plan,” Sprite said.

  “It all hinges on the politics right now, Commander,” he said.

  “I understand that. But we have to be a couple steps ahead. Which you are. But I'm still concerned about all the details involved.”

  “Oh?”

  “You plan to build key components in Agnosta and then ship some of those parts to Pyrax while also building the navy yard. Pyrax will install them, do the fitting out and builders trials, and even man some of the ships. They will also ship back parts to speed up the yard construction and ships under construction on this end. I got that. And somewhere along the lines we have to consider convoy security as well as security in each star system and the security of the star systems in between and contributing to our efforts.”

  “Okay, so, what is your problem with that, Commander?”

  “A lot can and will go wrong, Admiral,” She warned. “Politics for one. Manning the fleet will take people, skilled people from both systems and from neighboring systems. Those systems will have to be picketed. And some way, somehow we have to pay for all this,” she said flatly. “We haven't even gotten into that part yet. At least not very far.”

  “It was an imperfect plan, but the best I can come up with for now,” Commander. “My focus is on my end. Politics isn't my strong suit.” He made a disgusted face.

  “You've got that right,” Sprite replied darkly. “That definitely qualifies as understatement of the century, though you've gotten better recently,” She said. He snorted. “Something tells me it can still come around and bite us firmly on the ass if we're not careful, Admiral,” she warned. “You also need to forge the weapon to smash Horath too.”

  The admiral nodded. It was going to be a race, he knew it. While they were doing what they could to prepare the enemy would have time to rampage throughout the sector and beyond. He couldn't help it. “Remember perfect is the enemy here, we don't need it perfect, we need it functional. We can tweak and plug holes as we go. Right now let's not the decision process paralyze us. I want the first shipment off to him in less than a week from when we get set up.”

  “Well! That's short notice,” Sprite said. “Are you sure we can do that?” He nodded. “That is a lot to do, Admiral. And not a lot of time and resources to do it with,” she warned.

  “Then we better get onto it now. Get the right people in from the ground up to make sure they are up to speed and can hit the ground running once we get the go ahead,” he said making a face. “I'll start getting parts out as soon as we have the supplies.”

  “You mean you'll delegate it to the crews of the colliers and the depot platforms you are going to have the Yard Dogs eventually build,” she said. He nodded grudgingly. “Well, at least we've got the shipping to handle it. But that still leaves the issue of the convoy escorts, Admiral. If you pull them out of here that will mean this system is all the more vulnerable. And if Horath knows how juicy this star system is, and how much of a threat it will soon become ...”
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  “One thing at a time, Commander,” the admiral said shaking his head. “One thing at a time.”

  ...*...*...*...*...

  He'd seen the imagery, the slip had been a twisted mess after the pirates had been beaten back. The far end broken and twisted to wrap around itself. Fortunately truss segments were easily replaced. The Yard Dogs had cut off the mess and then pulled it off to one side. For a while they had made due with half the dock, right up until the first convoy had entered the system. Now their original dock was rebuilt and two more slips were hanging in space a few thousand kilometers apart. Another two slips, these much larger were under construction. One was under contract to the navy with three additional follow-ons.

  The remains of the wrecked trusses still drifted in a parking orbit a hundred kilometers away, a torn mess and a grim reminder of what would happen if the fleet failed. “It would be far better and quicker to just cut the mess up and start over,” the admiral said when he noted a mech picking through the cloud of debris. Apparently a net was around the bundle keeping it all together. The mech picked out a couple of tubes then put one bent one back. It checked its first find over then went looking for more.

  “True,” Sprite said. “That is ... inefficient. I believe they have a glut in raw material however. Too much to feed to the truss factory you left them, Admiral.”

  “I see. Well, we'll just make another right? And trade them for it of course,” he said with a half smile. She chuckled on his HUD.

  Fuentes had been in the star system but had been recalled to escort Convoy 2 back to Pyrax. According to the briefings Xavier had Fuentes was slated to return as the primary convoy escort of Convoy 4. He hoped Captain Vargess had an easier time of things.

  Apparently the two transports that had been held back in Pyrax were not going to return to Antigua. Horatio was turning them over to Agnosta to carry the marines to hot spots as needed. He could definitely see the wisdom in that, though they would need a proper escort.

  He shook his head and turned his attention back to the star system. The orbital fortress at B450C had caught his attention. The asteroid fortress was large, but she was a hollow rock with no weapons. Another had been under construction at the Triang jump point but her construction was scaled back drastically when the convoys returned. Apparently trying to manage it all had been too much for the good lieutenant. Irons nodded. Well, he could fix that. And if he didn't have spare weapons to send the fortress construction crews ... well, he could do something else. He rubbed his jaw and then nodded. He'd take a page from Horatio's book and order the architects to enlarge or even triple the flight bays. For now, each of the fortresses would house fighters, hell, bombers, gunships, and tugs—the works! Whatever he could get away with. That would give him an elastic ability at each jump point as well as time to expand on them at a later date. He made a note to have a work crew round up another rock for the Senka jump point and other rocks as follow on fortresses.

  He frowned at a reference Sprite highlighted, and an attached link. He clicked the link and then scanned the report. Apparently there had been some accidents at the orbital fortress under construction in Agnosta at the B452 jump point. There had been several fatalities, and the construction had been scaled back twice, most recently because the convoys had sucked away a lot of the shipping needed to get the fortress up to habitability, let alone functional. “Is this supposed to serve as a warning, Commander?” He asked mildly, looking up when he finished the report.

  “For several purposes, Admiral,” Sprite agreed with a nod on his HUD. “One, you can get bogged down and two, diverting supplies from the fleet could be hazardous. Three, it is a major manpower suck. Four, you don't want to get stuck in a bunker mentality, Admiral, on the defense.”

  “A fleet is both an offensive and defensive weapon. Whereas a fortress is only for defense. And has very limited use,” the admiral agreed with a nod. “Gotcha.”

  “It can also only defend the space around it, Admiral. I do admit they could serve as training grounds, and the carrier option would allow their carrier wings to project power across the solar system as needed. But most fortresses were in orbit of a planet or place of importance,” she reminded him.

  “I know. A jump point is just a blank space a ship knows is safe to come in,” the admiral replied with a nod. “Like Firefly did in B101a1, they can come in short or even on a completely different vector with the right crew,” he said.

  “Exactly,” Sprite said.

  The admiral cocked his head. “I'm surprised you didn't drive that point home with your sims. That sim of defending Antigua for instance,” he said.

  “I had briefly toyed with the idea, Admiral,” Sprite admitted. “But I thought a proper defense would not only be educational, but it would also serve to enhance morale and further your need to knit the crews together.”

  “I see,” the admiral murmured. He rubbed his chin and then nodded. “Understood, Commander,” he finally said.

  “You're welcome, Admiral,” the AI returned. “Now, can I get back to work?”

  “Shoo,” he said. She disappeared from his HUD after a quick nod.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  “Are you going to make it official yet?” Sprite asked as the admiral waited for Commander Sindri to enter his office. “Commander Wood isn't going to work out. We both know that.”

  The admiral grimaced. He and Sprite had updated Commander Wood's implants with engineering keys but both officers were not impressed with the man. “Yes. We don't have a lot of time. I should have done this earlier, given the man time to get caught up with my plan.”

  “But he's familiar with it anyway,” Sprite said in amusement. He's read it so often I thought his eyes would bleed,” she teased just as the lieutenant commander stepped up to the open hatch and rapped on the hatch door with his knuckles.

  “Reporting as ordered, Admiral,” he said.

  “So formal?” Sprite asked from the desk's holo emitter. The dwarf shot her a look then looked at the admiral as he came to attention in front of the desk.

  Sprite studied him for a moment. “Something tells me he's anticipated you, Admiral,” Sprite said, turning as she crossed her virtual arms to face the admiral.

  “Chief, I've got another job for you. I think it is up your alley.”

  “In the yard?” Sindri asked hopefully.

  “In the yard indeed. How does an official posting as my acting G-4 and G-8 and the Antigua naval Yard Manager sound?” the admiral asked. He pushed a tablet across the desk to the chief engineer.

  “I ...” Vestri picked the tablet up and scanned the orders just as his implants pinged. He flipped them open with practiced ease and found a copy in his inbox. “Cute,” he said, shooting a glance at Sprite. “What about Maine and Captain Samuel, sir?” He asked. “Not that I'm not grateful and happy, but I don't want to leave her in a lurch, sir,” he said hastily.

  “She'll deal with it,” the admiral replied. “I need you more. She'll understand,” he said.

  “You hope,” Sprite said. He glanced at her then away. “...ah, okay, you don't care. She'll get over it. Play it that way,” she said.

  “Being in the navy is about doing the job. About doing it to the best of your ability. We go where we need to be. She will get someone else. Someone not as qualified perhaps,” the admiral cocked his head to the former chief.

  “Flatterer,” Sprite accused.

  “Just when I was getting used to it,” Sindri mock grumped.

  “You aren't fooling me. You are loving the idea,” the admiral accused. Sindri snorted. “You are going to have to get some implant updates,” the admiral warned. Sindri raised a shaggy eyebrow at him. The admiral nodded. “Software updates. Engineering keys,” he explained. That made the small man's eyes widen in surprise. “Don't let it go to your head. You'll be getting every engineering key I can get you for your rank. I can't give you more,” the admiral grimaced. Sindri nodded.

  “If you think fixing thi
s old gal was rough, wait until you see what's really involved in handling a shipyard. It's not all fun and games Commander. There is a ton of paperwork and a lot of balancing to get it right. You are going to need a good manager staff to get things moving or it'll all come apart. One bottleneck and ...” Sprite pretended to make a wringing motion with her hands. Sindri nodded.

  “We're still six hours out from the station.

  “First order of business is to get things sorted out on your own. That means getting up to speed now before we anchor. That way you can hit the ground running once I give the go order.” Commander Sindri nodded.

  “Until I've felt out the political situation, you are going to have your hands tied initially.” The commander's face worked in disgust. “Yes I know. The faster we get it sorted out, the better, but no promises.”

  “They can drag this sort of thing out for weeks. And if they know we're in a hurry, it could go on and on just to get stuff out of us,” Sprite said in disgust.

  “Bingo,” the admiral grumbled, swinging his chair from side to side for a moment. “So, get with your people and the people on the ships here. I want a full survey of each ship, top to bottom. Don't go off what they have on report, I want your version, then we'll compare them.”

  The commander nodded. That should keep his people busy. Very damn busy.

  “While you are doing that, pick out some of their people and put them on a list for the yard if you like them. People with the necessary mindset and skills,” the admiral explained. The dwarf nodded.