Opening Moves

by James Traynor

  “You are correct. That's what he said,” she agreed, sounding almost sad. “I expect he doesn't realize his actions will lead to war. He has had too much Ashani poison dropped in his ears lately. Merr'Uht, he trusts them when they say the Rasenni will retreat from Oscan, when I think they will fight for it. It may be him talking, but the words come straight from the Ashani strategoi.”

  Merr'Quan was still pacing the floor, now talking about the weakness of the Rasenni and how they had mercilessly destroyed a lost and damaged Ukhuri ship. It was the sort of speech given before war was declared.

  “We cannot risk a war,” Ta'Kai said. “The Ashani want us distracted. They want a war between us and the Rasenni. They want our two peoples to bleed each other dry so that when the victor emerges they can come and strike him down.”

  “Even if Merr'Quan doesn't see that, the First Circle must,” Merr'Uht prompted in weak protest. “He cannot act alone. He must have the backing of the People's Council.”

  “Look around you,” she told him mildly. “See how they all hang on his every word? None of them would question him. They would follow him blindly into the teeth of hell itself. At any other point I'd have called that an admirable quality. But a war against the Rasenni Empire will put our whole species at risk. We all joke about them being decadent and weak, but remember what happened when we pushed them off the home world. Or when the Ortani pushed them too far,” she warned him. There was no longer a species called the Ortani.

  “So, let's assume that our greatest leader wants to take us to war,” Merr'Uht began.

  “Ah-ah,” Ta'Kai chided. “He wants to take Oscan. He doesn't realize it will spark a war because he thinks what the Ashani want him to."

  “Fine, so what do you propose?” Merr'Uht gave her a sideways glance. “Unless this is just all idle conversation?”

  “Simple, we remove the Ashani influence from our council,” she stated plainly. “They have given us the means to do so.”

  “What do you mean?” Merr'Uht frowned.

  “Merr'Quan himself,” she shook her head, giving him a smile befitting one of her duller students. “He has declared support for the Ashani, yet he does not appreciate what that means. Have you seen how the Ashani fight? Very dirty, very nasty. It'll enrage every other star-nation's opinion and he has just ensured we Ukhuri will be just as vilified for supporting them. We must sever ties with the Ashani, and that means replacing Merr'Quan.”

  “Ah, I see,” Merr'Uht nodded. “You're nuts.” He smiled and edged away.

  “I expected more from you. Of all the People's Council, you, at least, seemed to have a brain,” Ta'Kai said sullenly and sighed.

  “But you see, I do have a brain,” Merr'Uht with an amused grin spreading on his lips. “And right now it's running in circles and yelling 'Treason! Treason!', and I imagine myself in prison forever. I appreciate you confiding in me, but no, thank you. You want to depose our leader you will have no patsy in me.”

  “If we go to war, we will lose. The only winners will be the Ashani!”

  “I realize you feel for our people, but I suddenly also realize Merr'Quan's removal will open up a place within the First Circle. How... convenient if it would just so happen that you might want to fill it?” Merr'Uht grinned broadly. “You're clever, I give you that, but I'm not convinced. The Ashani and Rasenni are too preoccupied at the moment. Nothing bad will happen to us if we exploit the situation.”

  “Well, if it does,” she replied coolly. “I'll be waiting for you to offer your help.”

  Merr'Uht smiled. “Then I hope you are very, very patient.”

  Senfina Colony

  The Érenni Republics, Pact of Ten Suns

  From a distance they looked almost like a swarm of insects. They had a mottled green color patterned across their bodies, with heavy and angular thoraxes which led into a long slender abdomen terminating in a bulky collection of blocks and cylinders. The most striking feature of these insects however were their maws, blood red openings flanked by vicious looking mandibles curving like scythes out in front of the thorax. An assortment of spikes and blades studded their fronts and added more menace to their silhouettes: they were hunters, predators of the void and they were gathering for their prey.

  Fleet Captain Pyshana was part of this gathering of thousands of ships. Two entire fleets of the Ashani Dominion had assembled for this opening battle, with a further eight preparing to attack in other regions of space within the next few hours. It was the greatest show of strength anyone could remember and made the Rasenni actions of the Ortani War look like amateurs fumbling around in the dark. The timing and precision was exquisite, the plan flawless and the will to see it through unshakeable. On this day their names would never be forgotten, honored by generations of Ashani to come and feared by their enemies through all time. History was waiting to be written.

  * * * * * * *

  Alexej gave the panel a long look, then punched it. Nothing happened.

  “You know, punching it won't make it do what you want,” Rául chuckled from behind the pilot's chair.

  “Funny,” Alexej grunted. “Works fine on people.” He turned and gave Rául a very deliberate smile.

  The young navigator chuckled. He'd been on the crew long enough to spot when Alexej made a joke, and his rather odd sense of humor had become something of an acquired taste. Despite his years in the crew he had never seen Alexej lose his temper. Sure he'd been in fights and brawls but the big man had never once lost his composure or gotten emotional. He was an utterly ice-cold individual, which made him an excellent pilot and had allowed the IRON MAIDEN to survive its recent drama, though not exactly intact.

  “No joy?” Tarek pulled himself up into the cockpit where all five crew would sit during flight operations.

  “Comms are busted,” the tall Eurasian grunted. “I might be able to fix the short range stuff, but the tachyon boosters must've taken a hit along the way.” Alexej punched the comm control unit one more time with no appreciable results.

  “Consider it a secondary priority,” Captain Winters sighed as he sunk into his own seat. “The big deal is our engines. How are they?”

  Alexej exhaled. “Not exactly great. They weren't designed for being boosted. To be honest, we're lucky the system I cobbled together to get that fuel injection working didn't blow us all to kingdom come. Fact is, we'll need a space dock to overhaul them. A lot of the systems are fused together from the heat, but on the plus side, they should hold together long enough for us to get out of here. Expert's advice, boss? I wouldn't recommend putting too much juice through them again.”

  “But if we have to we can?” Tarek asked and received a hesitant nod in return. “Good, keeps our options open.”

  “Those odds included a fifty-fifty chance of them either going out or blowing up, taking us down with them,” Alexej rolled his eyes. “Best I've got to offer, sorry. What's up with the passengers?”

  “Shaken, but not stirred,” Tarek answered, quoting from the reboot of the 'James Bond' franchise. “Couple of minor injuries. Annie is patching them up while Llyr tells them it's all gonna be fine.”

  “And, is it going to be fine?” Rául asked the obvious question.

  “Come on, take a look out there,” he pointed out of the forward window. “There are more satellites and mines out there than I've ever seen, plus a beefy fleet and a battle station.”

  “A half built battle station.” Rául corrected. “And weren't you the one who wanted us out of here as fast as possible?”

  “Well, sitting here beats getting killed there,” he pointed at the ships that had taken up positions outside the range of Senfina's defenses. “And sure, it's a half-built battle station, but it's the half with guns,” Tarek smiled. “The Érenni are masters of defense. Nobody has broken their lines yet, Rául. Even the Rasenni got their noses bloodied when they tried in the past, and the defenses back then were nothing compared to all this. The Ashani are great at picking off isolated worlds, but this
is the senior league now. They're going down hard.”

  * * * * * * *

  On the bridge of the dreadnought SUNBURST Pyshana closed her eyes for a second. A million thoughts and images flashed through her mind as she relaxed for a precious moment, the last moment of silence before the terror began. She focused her thoughts, clinging to the warm images of home and family to give her heart and courage in this coming trial. Unlike many in the fleet, Pyshana did not hate the Érenni and did not take it personally that they were preparing to kill them by the millions. For her it was simply a job, a task that had to be done to ensure the ultimate goal of keeping the Ashani race alive. She didn't feel any connection to her enemies – some would say victims – no more than she would feel for locusts that required extermination. Her brother had called it survival of the fittest: the weak died and the strong lived, and that was how it had always been. In this case it was the Ashani who were the strongest. Now came the moment to prove it.

  “Engines ahead flank,” she ordered, her eyes still closed. “All batteries prepare to fire. There is no turning back now.”

  The warship shuddered as the powerful engines came to life and began to build up speed behind the craft. Coated in layers of thermo-resistant armor the color of bleached bones SUNBURST's sleek, feline lines were a mirror of the race that had built her. Together with the blade- and mandible-like spikes of sensors and gun ports everything about her and her many smaller sisters just seemed to scream 'danger'.

  Pyshana could feel the vibrations throughout her body and literally shivered with both excitement and fear, adrenalin surging through her blood stream and making her chest feel light.

  In the same instance across the frontline the mass of Ashani vessels began their approach towards Senfina's defenses. Wave after wave of fighters accelerated past the capital ships and fearlessly drove for the teeth of the Érenni guns. There was no finesse. No fancy tactics or inspired maneuvers could win this battle; the enemy's lines were just too tightly wound and carefully deployed. The only option the Dominion had was to hit the planetary defenses with everything they had and hope they gave way before their fleet collapsed. It wasn't going to be pretty and many fine soldiers were going to die in the next few hours, but victory had that price and it had to be paid.

  Pyshana opened her eyes, gripped her chair and waited to come into firing range.

  * * * * * * *

  “Movement,” deck officer Torok Sen warned.

  “Speed, type and bearing?” Captain Natara asked.

  Natara was commanding officer of the cruiser PERISAI, one of the new Melin-class ships of war which had recently been added to the Érenni police and patrol fleets. She and her crew were considered veterans among her people and the core command staff had served together for over ten years, scouting the borders of their space and working with the more aggressive Pact naval forces. Their broad experiences meant they were one of the first crews assigned to the new warships, which were considerably bigger and much meaner than their beloved patrol ship had been. Pretty much the whole crew had been very uneasy about their new role within the fleet. Nothing official had been said, but everyone knew that sooner or later they would be expected to go to war and actually kill other people, a thought which turned Natara's stomach. Fortunately, the government had foreseen that potential problem with their people's ingrained pacifism and hired mercenaries to man weapons' consoles in the new Érenni navy. It wouldn't do to hesitate in battle.

  In the PERISAL's case it was a Komerco male named Batal with intricate tattoos over his face indicating he had been part of a criminal brotherhood. Despite his unsavory background he was polite and courteous to the mainly female crew, and his presence meant all Natara had to do was keep her ship pointed towards the enemy. Batal would do the rest.

  Unfortunately it seemed as if that arrangement was about to be tested. She had hoped the Ashani would take one look at their defenses and just go home. In fact, the Republican Senate had seemed convinced that exactly this would happen. Her people had always believed in deterrence as the primary means of winning a war. After all, it hadn't failed them yet.

  However, the Dominion did not seem to have paid much attention to the government's resolutions and was now burning ahead for the planet in a suicidal frontal assault.

  “Ashani ships entering our sector, mixture of smaller craft as well as destroyers screening lead cruisers,” the sensor officer said in a slightly awed tone.

  Natara shared her amazement. The Ashani attack fleet's numbers were beyond anything she had ever seen before and the bravery of their attack defied logic – although to her all war defied logic.

  “Fighters are leading the way. They'll be at the minefield in seconds.”

  “Battle stations! Set condition one throughout the ship,” Natara ordered. “We will position ourselves in front of any breaches in the line. Mister Batal, if you would do your duty at that time it would be appreciated.” That of course meant kill anything that got through the lines, but obviously she couldn't form those words.

  He nodded grimly and began powering up the main plasma laser batteries. This would be only the fifth time the main weapons had been activated and the first time in anger. Thankfully, they all powered up normally. The targeting system began cycling through targets and fed data to the weapons' controls which made the minute adjustments for long range fire. The ship was ready.

  “Message from sector command,” her comm officer announced. “They're reminding us that there're two hundred and twenty million people on the planet below and hundreds of civilian ships in orbit. They urge us to harden our hearts and not to hesitate in the coming battle. This is our greatest test and we must not falter. They wish us luck.”

  Natara nodded. Command was located on the nearby Fathal-class battle station which looked deeply impressive on paper with ten times the firepower of the average dreadnought and enough armor to withstand direct hits with nuclear warheads. Even from quite close it looked menacing, with heavy weapons bristling from every angle, more like a Tuathaan facility than a product of the Érenni. Unfortunately, inside the station there was virtually nothing completed. The weapons and defenses had been rushed under the emergency conditions of the last year but the station's fusion reactors were still being built in the home system. If they were lucky the base had maybe a third of its power needs met, meaning most of its weapons would be useless. They had hoped the Ashani would assume it was operational and back off, but apparently that was not the case. Somewhere inside Natara wondered if the Ashani even cared if it was operational, whether they would have gone home if it met them with a massive alpha strike. She doubted it.

  “Enemy ships entering the minefield,” her sensor officer confirmed. “Defenses responding.”

  This was it. With a heavy heart Natara took her crew to war.

  * * * * * * *

  Space glimmered with a thousand twinkling lights, like a dark cloud parting to reveal the stars behind. Each little point of light was an ion engine coughing into life, driving forward a captor mine from the first layer of defenses. The mines swarmed forward like a cloud of fireflies and homed in on the leading elements of the Ashani fleet, in this case its fighter screen.

  Pyshana watched the mines activate with great intensity, calculating in her mind how many casualties they would cause and how best to deal with them. Sweepers would have been a waste of time, easy pickings for the orbital defenses. There was only one way through this: the hard way.

  “Order fighters to target the mines. Destroy them any way they can. They must not hit our ships.” There would still be enough other stuff coming their way sooner than she wanted.

  The Ashani fighters engaged their afterburners and tore forward, spitting beams at the small missiles with great vigor and determination. They managed to shoot down a respectable number of the first wave, but with two more waves of mines activating and streaking for the fleet's spear heads they were never going to shoot them all down, many pilots chose to not even try. Ord
ered to defend the fleet at any cost they placed their craft in the path of anti-ship weapons and rammed them, destroying both the missile and themselves in a bright pyre. It was madness. For a decade the population had been whipped into a frenzy of ultra-nationalism and xenophobia by the strategoi, and by this point the vast majority of them believed there was no greater glory than to die in battle for their people. They embraced death readily and made the sacrifice en masse to blunt the Érenni's retaliation. Pyshana admired their dedication, but deep down a part of her understood that they were throwing away their lives for nothing. When the next battles came their loss would be felt.

  The SUNBURST took a solid hit from a heavy missile, cracking open a section of hull and severing power lines as a small sun engulfed her upper port side for a moment. The ship faltered momentarily. Alarms blared through her and radiation warnings screeched through the suits of every surviving crew member in the sections close to the impact. But then SUNBURST continued on as damage control shifted the vessel's systems around the damaged area. The space before the Ashani fleet was awash with exploding fighters and mines and a flurry of small suns as they gradually pushed through the outer lines by sheer attrition.

  “Fleet command is ordering the first wave forward,” Pyshana's executive officer reported.

  “Monitor their progress closely,” she replied curtly. “Watch where the enemy fire comes from and plot firing solutions on likely targets.” It was almost guaranteed the twenty ships of that first attack would be cut to pieces. They were little more than a method of testing the enemy defenses and probing weak spots in their firing arcs. “Keep a particular eye on that star base.”