Admiral's Fall

by Luke Sky Wachter

The entire bridge was frozen with inactivity until a loud bang, originating from the starboard side of the warship, shook the bridge.

  “What’s happening?” Beecher asked, fury fighting with fear—and somehow winning—as he turned to Captain Pretorious

  “We’ve already lost two Battleships with a third heavily damaged and…there goes a fourth. Their ships are hitting us hard. We’ve already lost a squadron of Battleships, Vice Admiral,” reported the Tactical Officer.

  “Impossible,” Beecher’s mouth gape mouthed, “but we didn’t retreat!”

  “The sensor feed has been verified by communication intercepts. We’re down to sixteen Battleships, Admiral… seventeen if you count the Nebula Storm which just lost one of her main engines and main hyper dish,” said the Tactical Officer.

  Beecher stood there, mouth opening and closing, before a his face suddenly flushed red.

  “She’s betrayed us again!” he cried like a stuck pig.

  “Sir?” asked Luke Pretorious backing away with alarm.

  “Monica. It’s Monica Comet Buster! This is all her fault. She was supposed to bring us victory but she betrayed me to the enemy instead. S-she must have reported our movements to the rebels! That’s the only way. Gah!” cried Beecher, picking up the bowl of fruit from the holder built into the arm of his command chair and smashing it onto the floor, “how could I have been so blind?”

  “What do you want us to do?” asked the Flag Captain in a tremulous voice.

  “We have no choice. Our every plan has been handed to the enemy on a silver platter by the shrew. We…,” he clenched his fists, “we’ll have to make a strategic withdrawal until I can hire another strategist.”

  Captain Pretorious gaped at him. “I thought you wanted to stay and fight,” he said with disbelief.

  “It’s the only way,” Beecher said, talking to himself as much as to anyone else.

  He nodded firmly and sat down in his seat completely ignoring the smashed bowel and scattered fruit on the floor.

  “We’ll retreat past the hyper limit. Reclaim our lost warships like I wanted to do all along from the beginning and…” Beecher got a malicious gleam in his eye, “detach every single Destroyer in the fleet for spoiling raids to destroy as much of this star system’s infrastructure and carrying trade as humanly possible. They want to delay the grand reunification of the Spine with civilized space and humiliate me personally? Well then they can just live in squalor, grubbing it out in the dirt for food,” he spat.

  Realizing that no one was moving, Beecher bent to pick up a fruit and then threw it at the ship’s captain.

  “What are you waiting for, an engraved invitation?” he said picking up a second fruit and pelting the captain with it. “Or are you part of Monica’s cabal?”

  Before he could pick up a third projectile, the fruit-splattered Captain turned to the bridge.

  “You heard the Vice Admiral: sound the retreat! Tell the other ships to run for it. We must reach the hyper limit at all costs!” the Captain panicked.

  A com-tech immediately began to verbally relay the orders.

  Beecher stared at the captain and then threw the third fruit at the com-tech.

  “No, you idiot! Stay in formation. Order everyone except the Destroyers to stay in formation and move toward the hyper limit as a group; the Destroyers are supposed to hit the orbital industry,” shouted the Admiral.

  The com-tech jerked around to stare at the Admiral in fear.

  “Relay my orders exactly as I’ve said them or you’ll be shot—just like Mrs. Comet Buster,” Beecher said brandishing his weapon.

  “I-I-I’m sending an audio clip of your orders now, Admiral,” squeaked the com-tech, and within half a minute of receiving their new orders Task Force Beecher began to fragment.

  Between the confused orders and pressure from the Spineward Sectors Rebel Fleet, half of Beecher's force broke formation and ran at full speed for the edge of the star system.

  Roughly half the Destroyers and a squadron of Light Cruisers decided to follow Beecher’s orders to attack the orbital industry while the rest of the fleet gathered around the flagship for protection. Sadly, it was the more badly-damaged ships that saw the virtue of following orders, while those with undamaged engines were the quickest to break formation.

  Beecher railed against the rest of his fleet, working hard to keep his task force together, but despite his best efforts not every captain and sub-Admiral in his fleet was willing to listen. Worse, his full attention was soon occupied by the Rebel Fleet and it was all he could do to keep his flagship from being destroyed.

  “Why are they targeting us specifically?” demanded Beecher.

  “When we gave the initial order to withdraw, the technician—who you threw your fruit and threatened to shoot if he got the message wrong—forgot to engage the standard fleet encryption,” reported the Communication’s Department Commander, looking at the Vice Admiral with disapproval.

  “Probably another conspirator! Throw him in the brig alongside Comet Buster,” shouted Justin Beecher, “they can stew in their own juices down there together.”

  “Sir!” protested the Comm. Officer.

  “Marines,” yelled Beecher pointing at the com-tech.

  “You’d better come along with us...for your own protection, spacer,” advised the Marine Corporal escorting the technician off the bridge.

  “Why am I suddenly surrounded by traitors and incompetents?” demanded Beecher looking around the bridge with wild eyes. “This is the worst carried out police action in the history of the Confederation—I want to know why!”

  “Sir, we’re all loyal to you,” said Captain Pretorious

  “I don’t care how much they’re paying you. I’ll give a fifty thousand credit bonus to each and every member of the bridge crew when our flagship successfully jumps out of this star system,” Beecher promised in a rising voice, “do you hear that?? And I’ll double that when we’re victorious against these rebels and outlaws in the Spineward Sectors!”

  Chapter 11: Manning Victorious

  Manning watched coldly as his battered warships drove the now-broken fleet in front of him out of the star system.

  “See? No Bugs or machines necessary,” he said with cold satisfaction.

  “Sir?” asked Senior Captain Rogers.

  “What’s the status of the orbital defenses?” he asked.

  “The SDF reports all defenses are ready to receive the Confederation Destroyers and Hart System Command are once again demanding you release our light units to help in the defense of their home world, Grand Admiral,” Rogers reported neutrally. The Confederation spoiling attack was still hours away from the inner star system but Manning and his fleet were still harrying the Glorious Fleet of Liberation’s heavier units to the hyper limit.

  The SDF reinforcements, along with the orbital turrets they’d towed to the outer system, had already turned back in a desperate attempt to defend their planet and orbital industry from an attack that was clearly coming.

  “Don’t bother replying until after we’ve finished driving off the Glorious Fleet,” Manning said flatly.

  “Hart’s World retained their defenses over their home world, but they were forced to draw those turrets from somewhere. Their shipyard defenses were weakened and orbital supply dumps are completely uncovered. We won’t have a quick resupply if those Destroyers take out the dumps,” warned Senior Captain Rogers.

  “Nothing else that happens in this system matters if the Glorious Fleet regroups. Right now they’re running from us but they still have the numbers to contest our fleet and capture this star system,” said Manning, “our duty to the Confederation at large, and to the people of Hart’s World, comes before a little system infrastructure and the panicky cries of the provincial government.”

  “It’s your call to make,” shrugged Rogers. With Hart’s Heart out of the picture, thanks to its captain covering the initial retreat of the rest of the fleet, no significant strength was going
to be lost even if anyone disagreed with the orders anyway.

  “It is. Keep up the pressure on their presumed flagship and rebroadcast my demand that they surrender,” Manning said turning to the Communications Department.

  “Re-transmitting now,” said the Comm. Officer as he listened into his ear piece and then looked back over at the Grand Admiral helplessly, “all I’m getting is a lot of abuse and another counter demand that we recognize the authority of the Grand Assembly and surrender to Vice Admiral Beecher.”

  Manning sighed and shook his head.

  “Is that all?” he asked. He’d already listened to half a dozen rant filled diatribes from the presumed commander of this Glorious Fleet contingent. He didn’t need to listen to another one.

  “Well this time he’s offering you personal concessions and a cash reward for you and your family if you surrender First Fleet to him,” said the Comm. Officer.

  Admiral Manning’s face hardened. “Send in the Cruiser squadrons and cripple the engines of that flagship; have our Battleships follow at our best speed,” he ordered.

  “Our Cruisers will get torn up,” warned Rogers.

  “Only if they abandon their limpers and focus on the defense of that flagship. Something I’m not sure the rest of those ships with the flagship are going to be willing to do,” said Manning.

  “If we take too many losses the other Old Confederation ships might see we’re too weak to stop them and rally,” warned Rogers.

  “If we take that flagship, we could put down the strongest quarter of their fleet right here and the rest might even possibly surrender. We could win it all,” Manning said decisively, “my orders stand.”

  Rogers nodded.

  Four squadrons of Cruisers lunged forward, as did the rest of the Battleships, with the rest of the fleet still accompanying Manning’s flagship into battle.

  For a minute it looked like the solid core of ships around Vice Admiral Beecher’s flagship were going to hold strong, and then the enemy flagship sped up abandoning its slower brethren.

  “I’m receiving a request for terms of surrender,” reported the Comm. Officer.

  “Accept on standard terms; tell them if they strike their fusion cores and prepare to accept a Marine detachment they’ll be granted every courtesy of a prisoner of war with all the rights and responsibilities that come along with it,” said Manning.

  As ships began to surrender, by the time the Cruisers were approaching Beecher’s ship a pair of captain’s Cutters broke free from the enemy flagship and accelerated beyond anything the pursuing Cruisers could manage.

  Within minutes of their commanding officer abandoning them, the remainder of the Glorious Fleet that had been holding formation surrendered.

  Twenty one old Confederation warships were still on course for the star system’s infrastructure while another forty four successfully reached the hyper limit and immediately began to initiate a jump. As for the rest of the Old Confederation warships, they had either surrendered or been destroyed.

  It would later be hailed by the government as one of the greatest victories in the entire history of the Spine, and the battle which finally broke the back of the Glorious Fleet of Liberation and put an end to their campaign.

  Manning’s stock within the New Confederation rose accordingly. At the same time the Tyrant was once again lambasted as a war criminal, promptly stripped of his position and fired for the use of biological weapons of mass destruction. The use of which, it was said, Manning definitively ‘proved’ through his later skillful campaigns, would have been won by First Fleet anyway—if only the Tyrant hadn't panicked, fearing a straight-up fight too much.

  The fighting spirit of the freedom fighters of the Spineward Sectors, the government mouthpieces loudly trumpeted, was without peer or rival—something the Tyrant of Cold Space was fundamentally unable to understand or properly harness.

  Of course, despite the various propaganda efforts of the new Government that turned black into white, the Glorious Fleet was not nearly as broken or defeated as the Spineward Sectors Assembly might like to promise the general voting public.

  There was still one star system under Old Confederation control.

  Chapter 12: A Front Admiral in Retreat

  “Where do we go next, Sir?” Commodore Fritters asked now that the relief of rejoining the rest of their small fleet wore off and the hard facts of their current situation had begun to set in.

  “It needs to be somewhere we’ll still have access to the ComStat buoys and yet at the same time allows us to make more than basic repairs, Chief of Staff,” Featherby mulled it over out loud. “We can’t just go directly home, much as we might want to. Any ship that tries will soon find itself stranded on this edge of the Reach unless it siphons off fuel from its fellows. The sad fact is we just don’t have the fuel to send more than a few ships directly back to the Confederation of Worlds even if we wanted to.”

  “The Overton Expanse then?” Fritters asked, referring to a the series of supply dumps and, in several cases, small repair slips that had been constructed as fall back positions early on in Praetor Cornwallis’s ultimately doomed advance into the Spine, “if we get there first there should be enough hyper fuel to outfit our ships for the return journey home.”

  Featherby started to lift a hand and then paused, a grim smile appearing on his face.

  “I think we can do better than a retreat into the Expanse, and that’s forgetting the political realities that would almost certainly see you and me sitting before a tribunal trying to justify our actions so far in this debacle. No, I see another option,” he said, pulling up a star chart and overlaying it on his slate. In a sea of blinking red and yellow star systems, indicating the worlds controlled by the locals or recently attacked, was a flashing green icon. It was the sole star system in Sector 25 that was still in the hands of a Glorious Fleet garrison, the formerly designated Imperial Provincial Capital.

  “Aegis,” Fritters sighed, hope stirring in his heart for the first time in what felt like weeks, even though it had only been a few of days since the Glorious Fleet had been handed its Imperial head, literally.

  “You still want to make a fight of it then?” he asked almost hopefully. Like his good friend and superior officer of many years had just mentioned, if they went home their lives might not be under threat but their careers would certainly be over. The military in general, and Fleet in particular, was currently viewed with suspicion and alarm back home, add on the stink of defeat and…

  “Look, if we fall back into the Overton Expanse I’m essentially admitting the campaign will be lost,” said Featherby.

  “It’s already lost,” pointed out Fritters, “however if we go back now we could be forced to accept the political liabilities that come with being among the few surviving senior officers,” pointed out Fritters.

  The two shared a mutual grimace of understanding. The Confederation of today was not nearly as understanding of the realities of military conflict as the Confederation that had raised, trained and sent them into combat earlier on in their careers.

  “By falling back on Aegis and the garrison there, we concede nothing and such accusations become a much harder case to make,” Featherby said baring his teeth, “we also kill several birds with one stone. By reinforcing the garrison, together we can hopefully present a force too strong to simply drive out or defeat. It also gives us time to try and figure out how to turn this crud bucket around.”

  “Making the Grand Assembly recall us does make it harder to level certain accusations. It also saves us from wandering through the Sector 25 like a stray dog without a home,” observed Fritters.

  “A morale killer if ever I’ve heard one. The men and women need time. Time to rest, time to recover and time to put our house in order. Hopefully the locals will hesitate long enough for us to make use of the captured Aegis shipyards, repair our ships, and wait for reinforcements and new orders to arrive,” Featherby agreed.

  “You’re not thinki
ng of any adventurism are you?” Fitters shot his superior officer a penetrating look.

  “Right now I just want to survive,” the Front Admiral said honestly, “we’ll let the future take care of itself. If we repair our ships and if the garrison commander recognizes my authority, or at least is willing to work together, and if the Grand Assembly doesn’t panic and start issuing contradictory orders… well, you know me,” Admiral Featherby said with a crooked grin. “I’m not above going after low-hanging fruit.”

  “So for the time being all we need to do is play for time,” said Fritters, looking like a previously drowning man who was now grasping a floating piece of wood.

  “Exactly,” agreed Front Admiral Featherby.

  “Then let’s do it,” said Fritters.

  Chapter 13: The Little Admiral Schemes at Home

  “Talk to me Spalding,” I said, gesturing toward a chair as a pair of rug rats clung to my legs. A yaya, or babysitter, started to come over but I motioned for the nanny to wait a moment.

  “Sure you aren’t too busy, Sir?” he asked as I swooped up one of the kids and started ruthlessly tickling her belly.

  My daughter screamed with delight, twisting and writhing around. Especially when I started strumming her ribs like a fake guitar.

  “Not at all,” I said, thrusting my daughter into the yaya’s waiting arms with a ‘swooping’ sound effect to match the motion and then promptly grabbed the next one.

  A quick but thorough tickling later and both my kids were on their way to a much needed nap, and Spalding and I were the only ones left in the room. Well, aside from my ubiquitous bodyguard.

  Royal Armsmen were harder to get rid of than ticks on a boar, and just as mean as both those creatures when the body they were guarding wanted some privacy.

  Spalding looked at the door for several seconds after the toddlers were gone. When he turned back I could see a gleam to his lone remaining organic eye that, for once, wasn’t crazy or humorous. If I had to guess, I’d have said the old engineer’s eye was a little wet.