Spineward Sectors 03 Admiral's Tribulation

by Luke Sky Wachter

  One by one all the departments on the ship except for damage control indicated they had reduced their emissions as much as possible.

  “Silent running engaged,” muttered Tremblay, sounding rebellious.

  “Excellent work, team,” I clapped my hands, “our Helmsman and Navigator are to be commended. How long until we reach the target?”

  Shepherd looked down at his console, “If we don’t make any adjustments on our course to Omicron Station, I estimate our time of arrival at 75 hours, 33 minutes,” he reported, sounding professional.

  “Just over three days, is it,” I said contemplatively, “well that’s about what we expected before the point transfer,” I said with a shallow sigh. One of the hardest things about this Admiraling business was the waiting. Of course, I’d take waiting over combat any day of the week, so I guess I needed to shape up a little and adjust my thinking.

  “It's not too late to charge up the hyper drive and jump out before they have a chance to spot us. Omicron Station would never even know we’d been out here, since we made sure to arrive so far outside the system that we’re beyond even their extended sensor range,” offered Tremblay for the umpteenth time this trip.

  “Thank you, Officer Tremblay,” I said courteously, “please use laser communications to instruct the armed freighters as to our ETA on target, as I understand the laser communication array is much more difficult to detect than our other forms of communication for some reason,” I instructed.

  “Of course, Admiral,” replied the former First Officer before turning to relay the orders.

  Now, other than listening to my officers squirm and keep suggesting we turn around and run away, we were committed. There wasn’t going to be much more to do until we got within striking range of the Omicron. We weren’t going to jump in right on top of them like a running rabbit; instead, we’d come at them slow and steady like the tortoise, which should win us this race. Hopefully, they would never even see us coming until it was too late.

  Chapter 5: Matters Come to A Head

  Officer Tremblay took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. His eyes narrowed as he stared at the door in front of him for several long seconds before giving a weary shake of his head quickly followed by a decisive nod. Marching up, he abruptly signaled his desire for entrance.

  There was no going back now. From this point forward he was committed.

  The door whisked open, and a chime indicating someone, in this case him, was about to enter.

  Stepping inside the room, he braced to attention and raised his arm in salute.

  The man behind the plasi-metal desk stood up and briefly returned his salute before indicating he should take a chair

  “Welcome, Officer Tremblay. It’s so good of you to finally join us,” said Captain Jim Heppner, “we have much to discuss.”

  Around him the other men gathered in the room nodded in agreement.

  “We were beginning to suspect your loyalties had become…conflicted,” said Commander Justin Suddian, the ship’s new Morale Officer.

  “Long live the Elected Parliamentary Government of Capria,” Tremblay said with feeling, ignoring the Commander and staying focused on the Captain.

  “Long Live Parliament,” echoed the more than half dozen other officers in the room, speaking almost simultaneously, and wholeheartedly echoing the sentiment just expressed by the young Intelligence Officer.

  “Are you sure you want to do this, Lieutenant,” Captain Heppner asked evenly.

  “You have orders, Sir,” Tremblay demanded his gaze turning fierce, “legitimate orders from Parliament in Exile, placing you in command of this ship?”

  “I do,” Captain Heppner said simply.

  “Then whatever it takes to get a Montagne, especially that Montagne, off the Flag Bridge and out of Command of this Battleship, I’m in,” Tremblay said firmly. “The blighter seems to think he’s some kind of prince of the old blood reborn into these later days,” his lips worked as if to spit, “What’s worse,” he cursed, “is that most of the crew are starting to believe he is as well.”

  “Most of the former crew perhaps,” Heppner said nodding his head slowly, “however there are now somewhere on the order of just over twelve thousand staunch parliamentarians on board this ship; men who were exiled from Capria because of their unwavering support for the elected order,” a slow smile crept over his face. It had a hard edge to it that warned anyone getting in his way was going to get hurt.

  “The men who’ve been with him for a while, especially those old royalists settlers, aren’t going to be so easily convinced to turn their coats,” muttered Tremblay.

  “I think we can deal with a little more than three thousand plus holdouts,” Captain Heppner shrugged dismissively, then his eyes hardened and the look he shot Tremblay’s way was enough to cut duralloy, “so long as the men invited into this planning session are willing to play their part to the utmost in the days ahead.”

  “No one loves the elected order more than I, Sir,” Tremblay said with feeling, “Jason Montagne’s going to get us all killed if we don’t put a stop to him and soon. Right now he’s planning to take on the next best thing to a fully fledged battle-station with over three times our firepower and more than that in its ability to take a punch. To say nothing of all the pirate ships, including ships of the line we’ll have to deal with! He’s been deceived by that AI slave into thinking he can trust it over the advice of his own command staff!” Tremblay clenched his fist and struck the arm of his chair.

  At this last statement the gathered officers in the room stirred like a hive of angry bees. “Man not machine,” growled a number of the assembled officers, closely followed by several more exclaiming, “Murphy take those blasted Montagnes!”

  “It’s been my experience that most of the royals you encounter in this business are either fools or incompetents,” Heppner said with a nod and a shrug after the noise had died down, he smiled grimly, “they aren’t both at the same time.”

  “Don’t count him out just because he looks like a smooth-faced royal fop, Captain. If you could have just seen him back when he still had all those scars on his face and was setting out to board the Imperial Strike Cruiser,” the Intelligence Officer shuddered, “This is one Montagne you underestimate at your own direct and personal peril,” he finished with feeling.

  “I don’t care if he’s got magic in both hands and a spine made out of pure, un-adulterated duralloy,” growled the Captain, “Jason Montagne Vekna, our very own Honorary Vice Admiral, the one and only Prince of Capria’s benighted royal house, isn’t going be standing in our way for very long.”

  “Here, here, Captain,” agreed the gathered command staff. “To the Imps with him,” cursed the Lieutenant in charge of Supplies.

  “Magic or not, he’s still got all those Lancers under Colonel Suffic stationed all over the ship,” Tremblay said in a low voice.

  “You let us deal with the barbarians,” assured the Captain a savage smile flitting across his face, quickly followed by a dismissive wave of the hand.

  Tremblay settled back into his chair.

  “We have reached an accord?” Heppner said sweeping the table with his eyes. “The Montagne has to go?”

  The growl that swept the room wasn’t just determined; it was hungry.

  “I think I speak for every man here when I say that one little prince-cadet, no matter how royal his bloodline,” said the new Morale Officer, his lips twisting into a sneer, “can never stand between us and our resolve to reinstall the elected Parliament of Capria.”

  “An accord has been reached,” said the Captain drawing himself up to attention. “I salute you,” he said crisply, then proceeded to do just that.

  The gesture was returned by each and every man in the room, including Officer Tremblay.

  “Now that Officer Tremblay has made clear where his loyalties lie, I think it’s time we spoke with one more person, a man who will be a crucial component of our upcoming operation,”
continued the Captain before sitting back down behind his chair and pressing a button built into the desk.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen, please allow me to introduce one of the most dedicated operatives in the fleet,” he said as the door slid back, “a man who has been on board the Lucky Clover for the better part of a year, and all the while he’s been loyally looking after Parliaments best interests.”

  A common member of the crew with Armory patches on his arm walked into the room, drawing himself up rigidly to attention as he came to a stop inside the doorway.

  “It is my understanding that you have positioned yourself in an area of the ship critical to any attempt to take back control of this battleship in the name of Parliament. You are currently assigned to the Armory,” said the Captain.

  “I am, Sir,” the crewman from Armory replied staring straight ahead.

  “I take it, that just like Lieutenant Tremblay here, you also have no issue with removing this would-be Montagne Admiral by any means that prove necessary,” the Captain asked mildly.

  The Crewman’s mouth worked, “Him and his wife are harder to kill than a pair of cockroaches. Sabotage, air leaks, knock them off the hull or stomp ‘em flat, you can even drop a string of plasma grenades right under their feet, nothing does the trick.” The man’s lips twisted in a sneer. “The little blighter runs around like he’s Larry One reborn, and she’s so lost to reality that she actually seems to think she’s some kind of warrior queen. In my personal opinion, there’s no greater threat to Parliament and the cause of restoring Capria’s rightful form of Government to its proper place in planetary affairs than Jason Montagne and Akantha of Messene,” he said evenly. “You have my wholehearted support in any plan that involves his death or removal from power.”

  Captain Heppner’s eyebrows slowly rose and he blinked in surprise. “It seems the pontsy young princeling has unplumbed depths,” he shook his head as if to clear it, “regardless, you’ve come to the right place, Agent Oleander,” he said evenly, “For that is exactly what we have in mind.”

  “Mr. Tremblay,” the captain continued, turning to the former First Officer and current chief of the admiral’s staff, “tell us everything you know about the Admiral’s current battle plan. Someone who knows what they’re doing needs to be ready to pull this thing out of the fire, at the appropriate moment, of course.” The smile he turned on the Junior Lieutenant was anything but benevolent. In fact, it was sharp enough to cut duralloy.

  “I think you’ll find that those of you who’ve been on this ship for the past year aren’t the only ones who are intimately familiar with this battleship,” the Captain said with a knowing grin, “nor is this Prince the first Montagne to take command of her. There are those of us who have served on this ship before and dealt with real princes of the old blood who were ten times the man and officer of this jumped up upstart; men who actually earned their rank and respect for their positions.”

  “Of course, Captain,” Tremblay said crisply. He then started to lay out everything he knew for the men of the ship’s new Command Team.

  Chapter 6: Miscommunication in the Admiral’s Quarters

  There was a knock on the door to my cabin, but Akantha’s arms reached around to hold me before I could do more than turn over to see who it was.

  I roused just enough to yell, “go away!” before rolling back over for comfort and a quick return to the realms of slumber. I was awake long enough to think It was nice being married before sinking back asleep.

  Once again there was a knock.

  My girl’s arms tightened convulsively, and suddenly it was all I could do to breath.

  The effort required to stay breathing in the face of her upper body strength applied to my midsection was enough to jerk me back to life with a convulsive explosion of air.

  Stupid underlings, they never knew when to stop knocking and let their Master and Commander sleep with his beautiful wife… then the very thought I’d just had jerked me the rest of the way awake as its implications made it through my still hazy consciousness. What the Hades was anyone doing knocking on my door when there was a perfectly good chime they could use?

  My sudden desire to start hyperventilating was directly countered by the vice-like grip of my wife which, among other things, was compressing my lungs.

  Tossing the weird blue blanket with intricate embroidery and native knot work woven all over it to the side, I made to get up but was still impeded by the arms of my ever-loving wife.

  “Let go,” I yelped as she dragged me back down beside her and when this failed to do anything, grabbed hold of one of the hands currently holding me and gave it a pull.

  Akantha muttered something in protest, but it was just a string of half mumbled native gibberish to me. Still, the intent was made clear by the tone of her voice: I was to lay back down and do so with all haste so she could keep using me like a teddy bear.

  “Akantha,” I said firmly, “let me up,” when this also failed to produce an immediate change, I started a determined effort to pry her loose.

  She was having none of it and snarled something under her breath before burying her head under the pillow.

  As whoever it was had yet to blow down the door or in any in any other way blast it apart, my insides unclenched slightly and I figured I had some time to work on freeing myself, in a safe and relatively peaceful manner.

  Since the current effort of pulling and tugging on her arms wasn’t getting me anywhere and (blast it!) whoever was outside was still pounding on the door, I did the only thing I was certain would cause her to let me go in a hurry.

  Wiggling around until I had turned around in her grip and was facing her, I paused and then gently placed my hand on her back. This caused her to relax slightly.

  Then I leaned over and started kissing and nuzzling her neck. A sleepy protest was my only response. It was only when I finally allowed my hands to start wandering, as if for another purpose entirely, that I got the reaction I’d been looking for.

  There was a short stream of native words, the only one of which I was familiar with was ‘Men’ and then instead of continuing to hold onto me as if for dear life, I was forcefully and unceremoniously ejected from said bed.

  Landing with a thump that did nothing except damage my in this case non-existent pride, I flashed the person hiding under our bed covers like some sort of burrowing creature a grin. Sometimes it was very nice being married.

  The pounding on the door had taken on a slightly rhythmic nature by this point and I scowled. All thoughts of perhaps diving back into said bed to harass, wrestle with and perhaps dig out said burrowing creature for an entirely different activity, were immediately crushed.

  Checking the location of the Minos Sword, in case I had to beat a hasty retreat, I grabbed the hold out blaster pistol under my pillow and held it behind my back.

  Activating the door, I scowled out into the corridor when I saw the expected pair of battlesuited native guards standing to either side of the door and a mousy little brown girl from the Communications Section standing in the doorway.

  “What!” I demanded in a voice closer to the bark of a recently thwarted husband than that of a stern and professionally Admiral.

  The Communications Technician gulped, her eyes widening.

  Realizing I was in one of those thin fabric native robes my girl had made clear I was to wear if I was going to sleep in her bed, I quickly cinched the cloth ties around my waist and adjusted the top portion so it was mostly closed. I was pretty sure I hadn’t flashed anything more revealing than my total lack of anything resembling chest hair, but with my wife still behind me in bed and in direct line of sight of said doorway, it paid to be extra careful. Extra careful with female visitors anyway.

  The last time she’d been suspicious of me and a dalliance with another (non-existent) woman, she’d flown off the handle in a jealous rage complete with high explosives, and blown in the door before proceeding to personally total my last apartment. I needed a repeat o
f that like I needed a hole in the head.

  Realizing the female crewman was still staring at me with wide eyes, I frowned. “Well?” I demanded turning my palms up for emphasis, “you have something for me?” It was only after I’d said those words that I realized how they could potentially be taken by the hopefully still slumbering burrow creature behind me.

  A different kind of panic crossed the Technician’s features.

  “We can’t talk out here,” she muttered, looking to either side, “we need to use as little electronics as possible, that’s why I knocked,” she mumbled raising a hand holding a metal multi-tool of some kind. From the looks of the handle, it was the very thing she’d been using to pound on the door with.

  My eyebrows raised on their own and I glanced at the Lancers to either side of the door.

  The male half of Akantha’s honor guard gave a subtle downward nod of his chin.

  “Oookay,” I said slowly.

  Before I had finished giving my agreement, the Comm Tech gave a bob of her head and careful to avoid contact with my pajama covered person, ducked past me and into my Quarters.

  Slightly befuddled by this turn of events I shot another look at the Lancer and got another subtle nod.

  Rolling my head to release some tension, I gave a shrug and followed the Tech into my quarters. When I saw her pull out a round mechanical device of some kind my eyes narrowed.

  However, I was distracted from whatever it was she was doing with said device by the sight of Akantha pulling her head out from under the covers.

  “World of Men, I hope you have good reason to bring another woman into our chambers,” she said in a low, threatening voice, “and it had best not involve the first purpose to cross my mind,” she finished, turning her hot and angry gaze on the (I now realized) surprisingly cute Communications Technician.

  “What!” I exclaimed, “you think I—” I verbally stumbled to a halt before staring at her in dismay when she turned her fearsome gaze back on me.