The Merrimack Event (Shieldclads Book 1)

by David Tatum

  “A Captain Mia Spirit had a wonderful idea involving some old jump gates,” McCaffrey said. “I can’t say where they are right now, you understand, but I will say that they can return to Sol at a moment’s notice.”

  Beccera nodded. “I’ll accept that. But what are we going to do now? They had shield technology, and it looked to be better than our own in terms of pure sophistication. They’re going to crush us if they deploy that full scale.”

  “We’ll be deploying our own shield systems full scale, as well,” McCaffrey noted, amused. “There is a technology gap, perhaps, but I think we showed we had the edge in tactics and ingenuity. I must say,” McCaffrey continued, “I was quite pleased with your own actions. You were a very effective flag officer, despite your inexperience.”

  Beccera shook his head slowly. “Thank you, sir, but it wasn’t me. I didn’t know what I was doing. I could only listen to my subordinates and make a decision based on their recommendations. Not all of those recommendations I took were sound, either. I’m afraid I let Captain Meier pull me around by my nose a bit too much before I started to catch on.”

  McCaffrey huffed under his breath. He was one of the few people who knew exactly how Barbara Meier got where she was, but he had no evidence to prove it. She’d been held in place by what could best be described as office politics, a game she played better than most. A recommendation by Admiral Michael ‘The King of Maverick Officers’ McCaffrey would do little to harm her in that regard without something more substantial to back up his allegations. Plus, they were now heavily understaffed, and the Navy would be unlikely to rid itself of any Captain that could possibly be considered capable.

  “The key is that you figured her out, and took charge when needed,” McCaffrey pointed out. “It’s true even in the Army, is it not, that a flag officer must rely on his subordinates, but also must maintain discipline and know how to say ‘no’ when necessary?”

  “Of course!” Beccera snapped. “That’s why I’m so angry at myself over this. I should have picked up on it sooner and stopped her right out of the gate. We wound up making several mistakes during that mission because I didn’t. Some were mistakes we were fortunate enough to turn into advantages, but they were mistakes nonetheless. I’m looking forward to going back to my little job leading a field battalion in the Army.”

  McCaffrey coughed nervously. “Yes, about that... I’m afraid you won’t be going back to the unit you left.”

  Beccera paused. “And why is that? Are they finally forcing my promotion to General?”

  “You are being promoted, but not to General,” McCaffrey admitted. He pulled a small box out of his pocket, revealing two golden pins shaped like five pointed stars. “Congratulations... Rear Admiral Beccera.”

  “What the hell? I’m an Army officer!” he protested.

  “Yes,” McCaffrey agreed, grinning. “However, the Army has agreed to extend their loan of you to us indefinitely. Come on, take the box. We won’t let you refuse, and you know it.”

  ——————————

  EAS Chihuahua

  Most of their crewmates had departed, preparing for the major overhaul needed to salvage what was left of the Chihuahua, but Chris and Rachel remained. Somehow their small, battered quarters on that ship felt like the right place. It felt like home.

  They had shed the rest of their doubts along with their clothes, settling easily into what they hoped would be a life long attachment. Now, however, it was morning, and Rachel sighed, listening to Chris sleep. She could tell he was wrestling with another nightmare as his tossing jostled them both. She pulled his arm around her more tightly. Every night since the battle. Well, we’ll fix that in time...

  She glanced at the old fashioned analog clock, still ticking despite all of the damage Chihuahua suffered. As soon as the work crews were briefed as to the modifications they made to the ship, she and Chris would have to leave as well... and that meeting was scheduled to take place in two hours time. “Chris?” she whispered gently, twisting round to look at him.

  His eyes opened suddenly, in a panicked stare. Then his eyes settled on her, and he relaxed and smiled. “Morning, Rache.”

  “You need to get up and get dressed,” she said. He nodded slightly, but didn’t move the arm that was pinning her to the bed.

  “You know we’ll have to tell the Navy officials. That is, if you want us to be official.”

  Rachel stared into his eyes, giving him her most intimate smile. “If you want me to, I will. Somehow, though, I don’t think the Navy would object if we keep things ‘unofficial’ for a little while. Until this war calms down a bit, I doubt they’ll mind if we... fraternize.” Her nose wrinkled in just the way Chris found so appealing, and she ran a hand over his chest. “I admit I’m being selfish. I really don’t want one of us to be reassigned to a different chain of command right now.”

  Chris stared back, holding her gaze. “Well, ‘unofficially’ then, let me just add that I want to marry you some day. Wherever and whenever you want me to.”

  She squeezed his arm reassuringly. They still had a lot of issues to work out, she knew, but it could wait. Right now, she wanted to bask in the delight of having just ‘gotten engaged...’

  ...Unofficially, of course.

  ——————————

  Sol System, New Gosport Commercial Spaceport

  “I heard about your, um, promotion,” Burkhard said uncertainly, reaching from his wheelchair to offer his good hand to the newly-made Rear Admiral Beccera. “Are congratulations in order, or...”

  Beccera grinned ruefully and took the hand. “Well, I don’t seem to have much of a choice. I threatened to resign, but McCaffrey reminded me that there’s a newly instituted draft, now, so if I tried resigning they’d just draft me into the Navy and I’d never make it back to my old Army unit. I suppose, if I’ve got the right leadership team around me, I’ll be able to stay out of trouble as a flag officer. My superiors at Army Headquarters promise me that I can even take a field duty post when I return, whether I’m promoted to general or not, if I agree to stay on loan to the Navy for a while. And I suppose I could use the pay increase, so I guess that’s a worthy enough cause to celebrate.”

  “So, what’s going to happen to my ship?” Burkhard asked, gesturing out the window into the repair bay that housed the Chihuahua.

  “They’ll fix her up, even better than before... using Mr. Rappaport’s and Mr. Desaix’s plans, of course. They can’t afford to waste salvageable hulls at this point. They’ll even be able to make the changes Mr. Desaix wanted, but the lack of time in the tender prevented – things like pulling out her ancient single-barrel rail guns and replace them with higher caliber double-barreled versions. That will cut your gun crew requirements by about half. They’ll also make some modifications to her to allow for greater ammo storage, a full sized sick bay, and a rather non-standard engineering lab.” Beccera paused. “She’ll be bought back into the service as an experimental pocket frigate attached to my flag, sort of a test bed for crazy ideas. Which, I suppose, will make you one part of that ‘right leadership team’ that I mentioned will be needed to keep me out of trouble, since they’re going to keep together as many of the old crew as they can. That is, after your officers all undergo a three month crash course at the Academy to finish their training while the repairs are completed.”

  Burkhard smirked slightly. “Hm... I guess this means I get to keep my new rank?”

  “Not exactly. You’re being promoted straight to Captain. The personnel situation is so bad that almost every surviving officer in the fleet is getting some sort of promotion... a few of them pretty radical. The Academy students’ acting ranks are all being confirmed. Ms. Katz is being promoted to Commander, and should still wind up your XO. Given your ship’s experimental functions, you’ll get a new, hybrid position on your bridge named ‘tactical engineering.’ Mr. Desaix will be a Lieutenant Commander and will assume that role, possibly sharing it with Ms. Katz if they de
cide to give you a more experienced second-in-command. You’ll be given two new fully-trained navigators to work with Schubert and Weber, but not replace them. Rappaport also will be promoted and retain his position as chief engineer. Some of your other officers will remain as well... provided, of course, they all graduate from the Academy crash course they’ll be starting next week.”

  “Of course,” Burkhard laughed, and then nodded to a corner of the room. “But I think it’s time I made my excuses. I believe you have some company of your own to meet with.”

  Beccera started, before noticing a well curved figure he was quite familiar with stepping into the room. “Kimiko! I thought you were still at Barnard’s Star!”

  “I’ll leave you two to catch up. I need to go to the doctor to see if I can be released from this stupid chair,” Burkhard replied, knowing he wasn’t really being heard.

  Kimiko rushed over to join her husband, pulling him into a tight embrace. “Thank God you’re alive,” was all she whispered in reply. “They say the casualties from that battle were horrible, and I was afraid you were one of them.”

  “Admiral Hrudey of the Cygni Confederation was wounded pretty seriously,” he admitted sadly. He’d grown to like the pirate-like officer of their newly allied force, even if he’d barely met the guy. The words ‘A peg leg will get me a ton of respect around here’ were still ringing in his ears from the last conversation he had with the man. The last he saw of him, Hrudey was being taken away for surgery to amputate an irreparably damaged left foot. “But my own ship wasn’t even fired upon outside of a token shot across our bow by an orbital platform. I think we should have been more active.”

  “I’m glad you weren’t,” she said, pointing to the wrecked hull of the Chihuahua. “I saw what that thing could do first-hand, and look at what happened to it. I know you wanted to be on board her in the heart of the battle, but what would have happened to you if you had?”

  The scars of battle were quite visible, and indeed Beccera was shaken by the damage he saw. He’d helped bring Chihuahua back to life from her airless grave, and it was rather astonishing to realize he felt the same pride in his ship that many Navy men were famous for... and the same pain they felt at her crippling wounds. “I know. She’s a tough old dog, though, and she’ll come through it better than ever. So will her crew... at least those that survived.” He paused. “Are you all right? You’re straddling your loyalties between two powers at war, and that can’t be easy for you, either.”

  Kimiko took a deep breath. “I’ve heard you’re going to be stuck in the Navy for a while, right?” she said.

  Beccera narrowed his eyes. “Yes, I am.”

  “Which means you’ll probably be sent away for a while, right?”

  “I’m told that I’ll be given a permanent squadron in three months time,” Beccera said. “Which, yes, will probably be far away from Earth.”

  “So... you won’t mind if I leave for a while, since you won’t be here either. Right?” she asked cautiously.

  “Where are you going?” he asked, feeling his stomach drop.

  She sighed. “I’m taking a round-about route through neutral shipping into Pleiades.” Kimiko paused. “But not because I support them over Earth. You are my home, now, and that means Earth is my home. However, I have family in Pleiades which I need to contact, and if things are as bad over there as I’ve heard, they will need a rescue.”

  “You aren’t trained for that,” Beccera said, alarmed. “How do you expect to manage something like that? If you’re so worried, I have friends who could arrange a covert mission to—”

  “Shh,” Kimiko said, putting a finger to his lips. “You know as well as I do that sending in a team from Earth will just get everyone killed. I have some protection, at least, with my Pleiades citizenship. And I can manage. I beat down your defenses to win your love, and you’re a pretty tough cookie. Plus, I’ve learned a few things from you over the years which should help. I’ve even arranged for help – Lt. Christopher Shay is being discharged from the Navy for medical reasons after losing an arm and an eye. He says he’ll come with me, though, and watch my back.”

  Beccera sighed. “I’m not going to be able to talk you out of this, am I?” he said.

  “No,” she replied. “But I love you for trying.”

  ——————————

  Earth Alliance Naval Academy, Earth Campus

  Farmburg, ostensibly packing to move out of his old dorm room, studied the encoded communiqué from Admiral Hrudey (via his Cygni handler) intently. It seemed that despite their mutual interests with Earth, there were still some secrets from the battle with Pleiades that weren’t to be shared, at least until Cygni intelligence could make sense of them first. Chief among those secrets was that during the fight, the Cygni forces had intercepted an encoded transmission from Dr. Whitlow Foley, a reliable informant now claiming to represent a group of anthropologists and archeologists whose lives were in danger from their own government.

  In a rare moment of insight, the captain of the Cygni battleship Peregrine had put two and two together and put a priority on interpreting the message, realizing that if an archeological expedition on its way to Pleiades was worth starting a war to stop, then scientists from Pleiades might be even more valuable. The full import was still unclear, but something Foley had to say clearly had Farmburg’s superiors spooked. Farmburg’s new instructions were to cease disrupting the Academy, which made sense, and instead to immediately report any information he learned in Earth Alliance circles concerning fossils, skeletons, or archaeologists, which quite honestly confused the hell out of him. His curiosity was piqued, but at least this had the flavor of a real intelligence assignment, and for that he was grateful.

  ——————————

  Alcyone Star System, Pleiades Alpha, Hexagon Park

  Director Karlsson glared at Skorrjh... who glared right back at Karlsson. Without his WISPR agent mask, the Neanderthal looked more intimidating than usual.

  “I’ve read your reports,” Skorrjh snapped. “And I can’t see how you think you can paint the situation as anything but a complete failure. You failed to prevent Foley from unearthing the burial ground. You failed to prevent him from publishing his findings or alerting the Earth Alliance and others. You allowed much of your military infrastructure to be destroyed despite having what should have been superior forces. Finally, you failed to prevent Foley’s escape, along with a number of accomplices and their families!”

  “We might have stood a better chance if you had seen fit to assist us with more than a single corvette,” Karlsson said angrily. “And in fact it was your own shock from seeing your one supposedly invincible corvette defeated that created an opportunity for Foley to escape. You talk of failures, but of all our mistakes that is the only one which might give us trouble in the long run. You realize that at this point he probably knows who you are, or rather what you are?”

  “Then I suggest a two pronged strategy. On one end, we focus on recovering Dr. Foley and his colleagues, preventing them from revealing that information to others. On the other, we prepare for a renewed attack to weaken Earth Alliance enough for my people to act ahead of schedule.”

  “We can try that, but I suspect it’s too late to stop Foley,” Karlsson laughed bitterly. “You are trying to close the door after the target has fled. The Earth Alliance now has shield technology, too, and it looks like they can adapt it to their ships pretty quickly. Pleiades has no power to match that, unless you give us something more. Like, say, a handful of your ‘invulnerable’ ships. “

  “That’s out of the question. For one, I can’t even get a message to my people right now,” the Neanderthal said, although he was a little more subdued this time. “I don’t have the authority to reveal my home fleet’s position, and even if I did, the Flynohr was the only ship here that my people would not destroy on sight.” He paused. “Without regular communications, however, it’s likely someone will be sent to check on us in a
few months.”

  “Earth will crush us before then, if they can adapt that shield technology and streaming particle cannon technology fast enough,” Karlsson noted.

  “Then I’ll begin helping you with your technology now,” the Neanderthal declared. “But not, perhaps, as directly as you expect.”

  ——————————

  Earth Alliance Naval Academy, Earth Campus

  “Come on, Chris! Wake up! Rachel commed me, and she’s on her way here! You’ve simply got to wake up!” Lieutenant Wolfgang Schubert, who had only needed a few days rest to recover from his injuries, whispered frantically, shaking his bunkmate. “You can’t afford to get into trouble like last time!”

  “God, Wolf, I feel like hell. Can’t whatever it is wait for another hour or so?” Chris squinted at a nearby clock – an antique dial-face clock with laminated gold numbers. “I just got to sleep an hour ago!”

  “Didn’t you hear what I said? Rachel’s already on her way, and she sounded royally pissed off. You’ve got to get up and get into uniform, pronto!”

  The newly promoted Lieutenant Commander Christopher Desaix smiled in his sleep. “Oh, shut up and let her read the riot act to me,” he sighed. “She loves it and I do, too. There’s a war on, after all, and we should take such pleasures when we can get them.”

  The door opened suddenly – Chris had given Rachel the pass code to their bunks, of course, and she hadn’t hesitated in abusing that privilege. “Chris!” she growled. “What are you doing still in bed? I told you I was coming today! We were going to study for that Engineering qualifications test you insist you’re insisting I take!”

  Chris waved in acknowledgement from his bunk without waking up. “Hi, Rache. What’s up?” he drawled casually.

  “‘Hi, Rache?’ You, Mr. Desaix, are to address me as ‘Ma’am’ when on duty, and ‘Ms. Katz’ when off. You are never to address me as ‘Rache.’”