by Cameron, TR
“Per the provisions in our current nonaggression-treaty with the UAL, we are sharing information with them, and they are preparing their defensive strategies against the invaders. In the meantime, we will bring ourselves to maximum effectiveness for when the enemy turns to us.”
Another admiral took over, “Each of you should be sure your ship is fully provisioned and rearmed. Resources will be shifted back from our forward bases, and transports are already delivering supplies and personnel away from the front. We don’t plan to abandon those installations, but they will have the minimum number of people necessary to fight, and not a single person more.” She gestured, and a display screen lit up in the far side of the room. “From a tactical viewpoint, there isn’t much more we can do. We recommend those of you with fighters recalibrate their sensors to find the small projectiles that the enemy has been using. Obviously, those that attached to the bases are gravitic in nature, and it’s probably safe to assume the ones that defeated our tunnel drives are as well. A sensor update has been issued to improve detection of gravity-related anomalies.”
The first admiral spoke up again, “We will now take questions.”
Dima stood at attention, his hands clasped behind him. “Respectfully, admirals, are we really going to just stand back and watch as the enemy takes on the Union forces?”
Mutton chops blew through his mustache and gave Dima a look that had probably withered many a young officer over the years. “Captain First Rank Petryaev, everyone in this room well knows your experience and success, and your opinion is heard and respected. However, each division of the military has come to the same conclusion. Adding our forces to theirs right now will be far less effective than biding our time in preparation, waiting for an opening to exploit.”
“The prudent thing isn’t always the right choice, sir,” Dima’s voice cast a chill in the room.
“Nonetheless, Captain, we will do that prudent thing and protect the lives of our people for as long as possible. We will not invite our own destruction. We will, instead, gather data and try to find a different route to victory.”
“And if the Union should be destroyed by the enemy before we discover it, so much the better, right?”
“What are you implying, Captain?”
“I’m implying nothing, sir. I am stating, for the record, that our decision not to support the other half of humanity at this moment in our history is myopic, ill-advised, and cowardly.”
The admirals rose as one and Laskin spoke a final time, “This meeting is over. You, Captain Petryaev, are dismissed. Return to your ship and do not let us see you again anytime soon.”
Dima stood unbowed, his eyes locked on the admirals as they left the room.
* * *
“Do you believe that nonsense?” Captain Ikumi Shoda of the Osaka asked her fellow captains over the comm channel. This virtual gathering of Dima and those officers who’d served under him and were now in their own commands was inevitable, given the state position of the AAN leadership.
“It’s insanity,” Captain Do Dae Han replied. His ship, the Busan, was a match to the Beijing, and was one of the last ships commissioned with a wormhole drive. “We’re abandoning our only opportunity to overwhelm them with superior numbers.”
Dima cleared his throat, and the chatter fell silent. “Gentlemen, ladies, we’re at a moment of decision. Our admirals have made their opinions clear. I, for one, do not agree with them. Despite what has gone before, we are now allies with the United Atlantic League, and standing by while they’re attacked is not what an ally does.”
“To do anything other than stand by would be treason, would it not?”
“Hiroji, as you well know, there’s treason, and then there’s treason. I have enough influence with the staff in the admirals’ office to arrange a patrol schedule that would concentrate those of us who are of, shall we say, like minds, near the area where the next battle will most likely be fought. However, it’s true we could be held accountable as traitors if the admiralty chose to do so.”
There was a jumble of crosstalk on the channel, and Dima took a bracing sip of the tea he’d spiked with spicy liquor. If ever there was a moment for spirits, this was it.
Finally, the chatter died down, and Captain Shoda spoke into the quiet. “Even if we’re in the right place, at the right time, do you think we can be of benefit? We’re only a couple dozen ships, at best.”
Dima let slip an involuntary growl of frustration. “I don’t know. I really do not. We are in uncharted territory here. What I am positive of, though, is that we abandon our honor if we abandon our allies. It’s a fine distinction, and the admiralty would say we abandon our honor by not following orders. I—”
Dima’s voice was drowned out by laughter from across the channel. Captain Do spoke for them all when he said, “And we’re all aware of how you feel about orders you haven’t personally given, Captain Petryaev.”
Dima joined in the mirth and spoke again when it subsided, “Fair enough, although all of you should be far politer to your elders. As I was saying, I believe it’s the right thing to do, and I will do this thing. Will you do it with me?”
They agreed, every single one of them.
Much later, in the hours where night turned to morning, Dima sat alone in his cabin, behind the ebony pieces of a meticulously carved chessboard. The opponent’s forces were arranged in a classic mid-game formation in which black was heavily outnumbered. He leaned back in his chair and let his mind explore how to deal with his opponent’s numerical superiority. A smile grew as he saw an opportunity, and he moved pieces around the board, running through moves and countermoves at a fast pace. When the field was clear, and only white was left standing, he stood, sighed, and refilled his tea.
“It’s going to be a long night,” he muttered to himself as he reset the pieces to try a different solution, knowing the right one was lurking in the dark and quiet part of his mind, and only relentless effort would bring it into the light.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Cross shook Petryaev’s hand as he entered through the Washington’s airlock. “Welcome to my ship, Captain”
“Please, call me Dima. I think we are beyond most formalities here, are we not?”
“Do you mean because we are both technically traitors at this moment?”
“Exactly,” Dima said, inclining his head.
“Well, then, you should continue to call me Cross. Everyone does.” He gestured toward the hallway leading off to the left. “I thought we’d keep things informal and meet in engineering. Our chief engineer and my executive officer await us.”
A short time later they were seated, drinks in hand. Jannik took a sip of his and grimaced.
“Listen, I’m all for a nice cup of tea, but if ever a moment called for a stiff drink, this is it.” As an icebreaker, it shattered the tension as everyone engaged in a somewhat rueful round of laughter.
“Cross, Chief, Lieutenant Commander—”
“Kate, please.”
Dima nodded and continued, “Those above me have decided that we should only preserve our own people, while awaiting an advantageous position to strike during your battle with the alien invasion. Several of my captains and I are in agreement that this is shortsighted and believe it’s possible to influence matters enough to put us near the incursion point so we can act in support. I cannot, however, promise how many ships we’ll be able to provide, or when they may arrive.”
Cross drummed his fingers and sighed quietly. “I must admit, I hoped the news you were bringing would be full of a few more ships than that,” he said. “Say, your entire fleet, maybe.”
Dima shrugged. “I’m sure it’s the same in your service as it is in mine. The higher you go up, the less open your mind becomes.”
“Amen,” said Jannik. “That’s why I’ve never made it past chief. Too smart. Not like the lieutenant commander there.”
Cross gave him a long-suffering glare and turned to Kate. “What’s the late
st?”
“Pickets are patrolling all the likely incursion areas, spread in an arc that should give us the most response time regardless of the vector they come in upon. That assumes a great deal, but we can’t defend all of space, either.”
Dima agreed. “We face a similar challenge in considering how to best respond to this alien threat. Until we understand how their technology works, it’s almost impossible to predict what they’ll do. However, they have provided a few clues.”
“Do tell, Dima,” Cross said, pushing his sudden hopefulness down deep where no one could see it.
“Just as we can analyze one another by examining strategies and tactics through the lens of a common frame of experience, like a chessboard, I’ve been trying to do the same with our alien friends. Ignoring for a second the advantages of technology, and their motivations which we cannot even guess at, there are several important factors we must take into account.”
Dima stood and walked over to a display surface covered with notes in Jannik’s scraggly handwriting. He looked over for permission, and the chief engineer gave him a brief nod. Dima cleared the screen and sketched out each point as he made it.
“First, let’s assume that the two attacks so far were testing strikes. In the first, they sent a minor force in to test our response to their tactics and one particular technology, the gravitic mines. They succeeded in this effort, by suffering fewer losses than you did and destroying the starbase. In that battle, they arranged their forces in subgroups to support one another, and laid a sophisticated trap that almost peeled off one of your own defensive ships.” He didn’t look at Cross, but he shrunk in his chair anyway and looked up through half-lidded eyes. Dima continued to write, never releasing his military bearing or perfect posture.
“In the second, they dispensed with pairs and worked with larger groups, to lesser effect. They brought more decks, and tried a different tactic, boarding the starbase before destroying it. In so doing, they tested our Marines as well as our ships. They also deployed a new surprise, no doubt based upon their analysis of our own technology, defeating our tunnel drives.”
Jannik interrupted, “You think they whipped those up in response to what they saw from us? That seems awfully quick.”
Dima turned to face him and shrugged. “There’s no real way to tell whether they had an existing tool they could repurpose, if they’ve seen the tunnel drive before and already had a defense built against it, or if they were working from zero. We can’t make assumptions about that.”
Jannik nodded, satisfied by the other man’s logic.
The Russian’s deep voice began again, “Closer analysis shows that there were two ships hanging back during the second attack, coordinating the actions of larger groups. When we examine the numbers of both battles, we discovered that the enemy most likely thinks in sets of eight. Two command ships overseeing squadrons of eight ships each. If they are true to their escalation, the next advance should have thirty-two ships, and we would expect at least one ship to coordinate the actions of four sub-command vessels. As there are over two hundred decks in their staging area, by our estimates, this wouldn’t be a difficult force for them to commit.”
Cross snorted out a sharp laugh. “No offense, Dima but there’s a lot of assumption going on there.”
“Too true. But what else do we have at this point?” Dima sat again in his seat at the table. “At the very least, we should consider two plans, one for if they bring thirty-two ships, and one for if they bring sixty-four ships.”
“And if they bring more, what then,” Kate asked.
Cross supplied the only logical answer, “Retreat, as fast as we can.”
* * *
An hour later, they’d moved on to what Jannik considered real drinks, and they dug into the options for dealing with the potential invasion forces. Dima had taken off his jacket and loosened his tie, and the other officers had achieved similar levels of comfort with their own attires.
Dima pointed at Cross. “You’re basing your plans on surprise. There’s no way we can gain that against the alien threat. They’re the invaders. They’ll know what’s coming. Improvisational tactics won’t suffice as they did in the previous battles, given their numerical superiority.”
“Dammit.” Cross smacked his hand on the table. “You’re right, I know. Why do you have to be right? Is there no way to get more of your people to join us?”
Dima shook his head. “I can only rely on those that I trained. In this area, there are only eight.”
Cross looked over at Kate, who shook her head as well. “We’ll have twenty, maybe twenty-four if the enemy waits long enough. After that, though, expect at least two weeks before the first ships being refitted are ready for battle. Until then, they can only serve as our defense force for a retreat.”
“Jannik. Something in your bag of tricks to help us here?”
“We can apply the sensor upgrades to all the ships in the fleet. I can also provide a copy to you, Dima, if you agree to keep it only among those you’re bringing.” Dima gestured his agreement. Jannik reached up to scratch his skin through his beard. “That really only gives an advantage against their smaller mines and tunnel drive blockers, though. I don’t have anything to help with their shields, or to make ours more effective against their weapons. On the offensive side, I have something in mind, but I can’t promise it will work. My people are designing it right now. It’s not ready for sharing.”
Cross knew better than to push his chief engineer. “Okay, okay. So, there are several things we must accomplish. First, we need to blunt their initial attack and hold them in the engagement sector. We can’t let them run about our systems in force, which means we need to engage as many of them as possible. Second, we have to figure out a way to not die while doing it.” He banged his forehead on the table. “Well, that’s simple. We’ve got this all figured out.”
This drew a few laughs, and a teasing comment from Kate, “You’re in charge now, Cross. You have to maintain your image for the troops. No putting your head down on the table.”
Dima looked up, clearly thinking about something. “That’s it, Kate. The leaders. That’s the one thing we don’t know, how the aliens will act in the absence of those ships coordinating the battle. If we lost most of our commanders, we would retreat and regroup.”
“We would do the same,” Cross said thoughtfully. “But they’ll be at the rear. So how do we dive into them without getting ripped to pieces on the way?”
They looked at one another and found no answers lurking in the space between.
* * *
“Well, we’ve made good progress, anyway,” Dima said, standing. “It’s time for the Beijing to get to his designated post before my admirals discover that I’m not where I ought to be.” He shook hands around the table, and then asked, “Would you like to see my ship before we go, Cross?”
“Of course, Captain Petryaev.”
As the two men entered the Beijing, Dima’s executive officer came up to them carrying a small rectangular object. Dima nodded, and the officer opened the equipment case, displaying the contents. An array of computer chips and blocky devices lay inside. She closed the case, set it down at their feet, saluted Dima, and departed.
“There are so many things, Cross, that we don’t know about one another. However, I believe in my heart that this is a time for open honesty and trust. In here are the specifications for every equipment system where we estimate we have an advantage over your forces. Provide it to your chief engineer, and he should be able to make improvements to your ship immediately. Also included is a decoding device that will allow us to communicate together, and you to communicate with the other ships in my group.”
“I propose that going forward, if an attack is in your space, you will coordinate our combined efforts. If it is in our space, I will coordinate our combined efforts. Wherever possible, we will collaborate to determine strategy and tactics.”
Cross nodded and extended his hand. “Regard
less of what our higher-ups say, truce until all of this is over?”
Dima shook it, hard, and gripped Cross’s forearm with his other hand. “And longer, if we can make it stick.”
“That’s a goal worth surviving for, Captain. Together, we’ll give these bastards some surprises.”
“That we will, Lieutenant Commander, that we will.”
Chapter Forty
“Dammit,” Kate said, putting her face down on the table display in front of her. “Our survey maps are the worst. Who did they assign to do this? Academy freshman? Anyone with half a brain would’ve done a much more systematic job.”
Jannik’s expression was turned away from her, but Kate was pretty sure he was smiling or quietly laughing at her. To be honest, her histrionics were more theater than anything. The frustration, though, was real.
He spoke, “Well, my girl, we only have what we have, so it’ll have to do.”
Kate sighed and lifted her head from the table. “You’re right. I know you’re right. But still, if we could travel back in time and tell these people to do a better job, that would be a lovely thing. Why were we so bad at this?”
Jannik looked thoughtful and scratched his chin. “Well, since you ask, we never developed the skill. Most of our maps were, shall we say, ‘creatively licensed’ from the Alliance.”
“What?” Kate stared at him. “Are you serious?”
“Of course. What officer worth his salt wouldn’t find a better option than sending probe after probe out into distant space if it could be avoided? One of our early ships liberated the exploration records from an Alliance ship before he was scuttled. That data formed the basis of our exploration plans, so we sent out far fewer probes and survey teams than you might think. We were looking for colony spaces, not exploring the universe the way the Alliance was.”