Or was Ramirez really working the PIR, really trying to get her what she needed? How could she know?
“I don’t think any of us has much information,” Ndrem said. He turned to the screen upon which his briefing was projected. “Sector five-fourty-two is one of the more densely populated sectors, in terms of star systems. There are over two million stars. Seventeen have planets that are habitable, but only three have intelligent life and are therefore classified as protected.”
Mehta leaned forward, no longer worrying about Ndrem. He seemed to have the right information at his fingertips. But she was surprised at what she heard. Even for such a huge area of space, she had thought there wouldn’t be anything to discuss at all. Unlike the kind of Earth terrain she was used to hearing about in these briefings, wasn’t space just empty for miles and miles?
“There are three small nebulae, here, here and here,” he said. “This one appears to be forming stars, but the others are inert.”
“What effect do they have on operations?”
“They’re too diffuse to hide in,” he said. “This one has a lot of dust in it, and so if you’re on the other side of it, the visible spectrum won’t pass through, but if Species X ships are like ours, they can still see you in infra-red.”
“But not for several years. I mean, this is light-years across, isn’t it?”
“Our sensors propagate through Netherspace. So, we can see hundreds of light-years like it was only a few hundred-thousand kilometers.”
Mehta nodded. It made sense that sensor data would also have to operate in the FTL realm, but it was also unsettling, like there was nowhere to hide, no way to get far enough from your enemy to be unseen.
“Twenty-eight percent of the stars have solar systems,” Ndrem continued, “with planets already formed. Those are highlighted in green. Of these, most have a comet cloud about a light-year from their central star.” He pressed a button. “The stars that are highlighted in yellow are devoid of surrounding matter. And the stars highlighted in orange are in a planet-forming phase. They have hundreds of millions or even billions of asteroids which frequently collide. It’s not recommended to go into any of these systems.”
The members of each type of star system were roughly clustered together, creating zones where travel into the systems was safe, and others where there was not much reason to go there, or every reason not to.
She looked at Hiranaka and then back at Ndrem. “Do any of these objects—the comet clouds, the masses of proto-planets—offer some kind of cover we can use to maneuver around in?”
Ndrem looked at her blankly.
“How much distance between comets in an average comet cloud?”
“Thousands of kilometers?”
“Was that a question, or an answer?”
“Um... an answer I’m not sure about.”
“What about the asteroid disks?”
Ndrem bit his lip. “Maybe hundreds of kilometers.”
“We could work with that,” Hiranaka said.
“How can they always be colliding,” Mehta said, “if they’re so far apart?”
“We’re talking very long timescales,” Ndrem said. “But compared to a fully formed solar system, the collisions are quite frequent.”
“This is a briefing about the military significance of what’s out there,” Mehta said, “not a lesson in how solar systems are formed.”
“Yes, Ma’am.” Ndrem looked like he was going to melt into the deck.
“So, what’s the military significance?”
Ndrem cleared his throat. “The systems with planets are the ones we need to patrol, and the systems that are forming are better for using to hide in.”
“But they’re not intermingled.”
“No, ma’am.”
“Say we’re attacked at a protected system. How long to reach one of the more chaotic systems?”
“In Netherspace?”
Mehta nodded.
“Fifteen or twenty minutes, at best,” Ndrem said. “And no one’s ever lasted that long.”
“Anything else?”
“That’s all I have,” Ndrem said. He slunk back to his seat, clearly thinking he had done poorly.
“Good brief,” she said.
His glance told her he didn’t believe her, said that he thought she was just trying to make him feel better. That was part of the trouble dealing with the Mralans. All her old techniques for reassuring people didn’t work as well with them. They could tell when she was stretching the truth.
Even Trel, sitting silently in the back, looked distressed, and her little encouraging statement to Ndrem didn’t seem to have given him any sense of hope. He wiped his hand over his mouth, and his dark eyes looked more sparkly than normal. His fingers went from his lips upward to his eyes and brushed across them.
Major Hiranaka moved to the front and changed slides. “Based on the information we’ve gathered so far, we’ve come up with three courses of action.” She pointed to the first COA on the screen.
“Number one, we map out our patrols so that we’re always within ten minutes of either an asteroid belt, a comet cloud, or a solar system that’s still forming.”
“So then, if we contact Species X, we head to one of those areas?” Mehta said.
“Right. We’re looking at the maneuverability of the two craft. If we can use objects in the surrounding space to shield us from the enemy ship, we should be able to develop a system of hiding and then moving into view just long enough to fire.”
“There are a lot of ‘ifs’ in that course of action.”
“Yes, ma’am. We’re still working on it.”
The door opened, and Ramirez slipped into the room, taking a seat in the back, near Trel. Your timing is perfect, she thought angrily. You wait until the intelligence brief is over before you come in.
But then she noticed that Trel had straightened in his seat and stared at Ramirez.
Mehta motioned for Hiranaka to pause, then turned to Ramirez. “Do you have anything for us?”
Ramirez stood, hands clutching a piece of paper rolled into a cylinder, about to crush it. “Yes, ma’am.” He was sounding a lot more respectful now, earnest, leaning forward. “I think I’ve figured out where Species X is going to attack next.”
A collective gasp moved through the room. “Really?” Rbemfel said.
“How could you know that?” Pkrish added.
“We’ve been analyzing the pattern of where they attack,” Ramirez said. “At first, it appeared to be totally random, but after about six months, the pattern repeats, exactly, and it has done so reliably for the last ten years.”
“Wow,” Hiranaka muttered. “Where will the attack happen?”
Ramirez’s smile grew. Clearly, he was enjoying this moment, suddenly the hero. “Sector one-fifty-two.”
Trel jumped to his feet. “No!”
The other Mralans in the room started talking all at once, asking what was wrong, those closer to Trel gasping or trembling. Ramirez looked at him, face showing both confusion and concern. “You know someone there?”
“Any idea how much time we have?” Mehta said.
“A few days at most.”
“All right,” Mehta said, projecting her voice as loudly as possible without yelling, “quiet down. Let’s get through this briefing and see what we have.”
Hiranaka looked like a ghost, or like the weight of the entire ship pressed on her shoulders, eyes dazed, fingers knotted around her laser pointer.
Mehta nodded, hoping her gesture could put the major in a frame of mind to continue. “What’s the second course of action?”
“We thought we could add weapons to a shuttle, so that we can hit the enemy from multiple directions. The enemy would have to spread out their shields to more than just the ones facing our main ship, so some shots could get through.”
Rbemfel’s eyes enlarged. “A shuttle would be defenseless! It would be picked off like a floating bubble.”
“But if we cou
ld fire at the Species X ship from multiple directions,” Hiranaka said, then her voice trailed off.
“It would be suicide!”
“I would do it,” Trel said.
Rbemfel looked back at him with horror. “You’re crazy, and your allegiance to this woman will get you killed.”
“Let’s not get personal here,” Mehta said. “I take it you can’t put weapons on the shuttles?”
He shook his head. “They don’t generate enough power to do more than propulsion and shields, which you need to protect yourself from radiation, meteorites, and other space hazards.”
“So, you’d have to ramp up the power plant on the shuttle.”
“Weapons are very power greedy. You’d have to redesign the fuselage to accommodate a larger engine.”
Mehta nodded, a taste of bile in her throat. There was only one way this misstep could have happened. “Did you have someone from your section participate in the planning?”
Rbemfel shifted in his seat. “Um, I didn’t think anything we did would be relevant.”
She held her breath, her face turned hot, and her arm muscles tensed. She wanted to scream at Rbemfel, tell him his negligence would get people killed. Hell, no, she wanted to strangle the little bastard.
“Please calm down,” Opash whispered.
Mehta whipped her head around to look at Hiranaka. “Who else wasn’t in the planning meeting?”
“Quartermaster and personnel.”
“Damn it,” she said, then covered her mouth and looked away from them all. A few more breaths and she felt more in control. “Look, when you are tasked to send someone to planning, this is why. They can’t do it by themselves. So, follow your orders, got it?”
Heads nodded, faces solemn, contrite.
Damn, damn. Contrite wasn’t going to save them. Damn. She took another deep breath. “All right, for the time being, we’ve lost one of our courses of action. What’s the third?”
Hiranaka cleared her throat. “In course of action three, we pick some comets or asteroids from COA one that are fairly close together, and we plant a mine in them. Then, when the battle begins, we move past them and remotely detonate the mine when the enemy ship is closest.”
“Wow,” Pkrish said, “that really is a tactic we’ve never tried before.”
“Do we know how close they need to be?”
“Our weapons people are still working on that.”
“And do we have mines, or weapons that can be converted to mines?”
“Weapons people are working on that, too.”
“Very well,” Mehta said. “Continue your research and make it a high priority. And by that, I mean work around the clock. I need answers by tomorrow morning.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
If only she didn’t have this nagging feeling that she’d forgotten something.
The plan for course of action three was complete, all the research done, and the questions answered. Mehta had approved it, and it was agreed the plan would work well even for Trin’s ship, out there waiting for their show-down with Species X. So now she was on her way to communications, followed by an entourage, including Davis, Hiranaka, Opash, Ramirez and Trel. Her enforcers pulled up the rear.
She turned to Lieutenant Colonel Davis. “Before we send this thing, I want to go through the warfighting functions and make sure we’ve covered everything.”
“Can do,” he said, his voice booming in the narrow corridor, chest out, soft smile on his face.
“What are the warfighting functions?” Opash said. She clasped her hands in front of her, face still showing her discomfort with a leadership role.
“It’s a way of dividing out all the elements of a military operation,” Mehta said. “I like to use it as a checklist.”
“Wanna start now?” Davis said. “It’d be a good use of our time.”
She nodded. “We seem to have mission command under control.”
“That’s a tough one,” he said. “Lotta stuff under MC.”
“The staff functions are covered,” Mehta said. “And communications are up and secure.”
“We got facilities and equipment,” Davis said. “But processes and procedures…”
“Yeah, I know,” Mehta said. “Our battle drills are only half-way written.”
“Working on it.”
So, was that it? Was that the piece she had missed? It didn’t seem like it. For most events, the crew already knew what to do and were well practiced at it, even though the steps had never been documented. In addition, Major Hiranaka had made certain the new plan was detailed and complete. Mehta couldn’t think of a thing the plans officer hadn’t covered.
“Okay, then, intelligence. Are we missing something vital there?”
“Don’t think so.”
“I do want to put out an early warning system, but that’s going to require some research and development.”
“That’d be good.”
“And… everything else seems to be encapsulated in the ship. Movement and maneuver, fires, sustainment, protection. Isaac, what am I missing?”
“Don’t know, ma’am. Maybe you just have nerves.”
They’d reached the door, and Mehta hesitated. “It’s so important that we get this right.” Trin and all the other Mralans on his ship would live or die based on how well this worked.
“We don’t have much time,” Ramirez said. “The attack will happen soon, and the other ship needs time to get everything set up.”
“You’re right.” She turned to the door and felt herself grind to a halt again. She was just going to have to push through this fear, or whatever it was. They had to get the plan to Trin’s ship before it was too late.
She waved her ring, and the door slid open. Mlendish stood opposite her. “Holy dirt, I didn’t know you were bringing so many…”
“We need everyone, in case there are questions.”
“Well, let’s see if we can find some chairs.” He motioned for them to enter. “The conference screen is over here, and we already have the other ship ready to talk.”
Mehta sat in the center seat, while Hiranaka handed Mlendish several data wands. “These are the files you need to send them. I have them numbered, here.”
Hiranaka walked to the front and faced the screen. “Hello. Can you hear me?”
Trin nodded and grinned. So like his brother. “Yes. I’m Trin, and this is Bteg, our ship’s senior facilitator.”
Hiranaka proceeded to introduce all the people in the room, while Mehta tried to look confident. But the feeling was getting stronger. She’d missed something. Something important.
Maybe it was a mission command element. Bteg’s ship was still operating under the consensus paradigm. Could they do what they needed to do under those conditions?
Yes. She’d seen the way the crew of this ship operated with total efficiency as long as nothing out of the ordinary was happening. Everyone knew what they were supposed to do, and no one had to give them any orders.
Hiranaka had already started explaining the plan to them. “This file has the instructions on how to make a mine with the materiel you have on board,” she said, then nodded to Mlendish.
“Sent,” he said.
“And then you’re going to have to select some comets to install them in.”
They continued with questions and answers, while Mehta’s mind drifted again. What about fires? Did they have enough mines in the plan to disable the Species X ship? Ramirez couldn’t say for certain. Maybe that was the problem.
“This file will give you instructions on what indicators to use for mine detonation,” Hiranaka said. “If you trigger it too soon, it’ll just hit against their forward shields and do nothing.”
“Got it,” Trin said.
“Okay, then,” Hiranaka said. “That concludes my briefing.” She turned to Mehta. “Ma’am?”
Mehta stood and forced a smile. “I know we’ve just sent you a lot of information to go through, but I’m certain you’re al
so aware of how important it is.”
“Oh, yes,” Bteg said.
“But I do want to suggest that while your weapons people are working on their stuff, you have your bridge crew practicing the maneuvers they’re going to have to make.”
“Good idea,” Bteg said. “We’ll bring this to the council immediately.”
The screen went off, and Mehta closed her eyes. The council. Oh, crap, how long would it take them? How quickly could a council decide?
A warm hand covered her shoulder. “They’ll do fine,” Trel whispered. “They’re more aware than you of the urgency.”
She looked at him, into his warm eyes, and her heart fell. She couldn’t fail this man. She couldn’t. And yet, somehow, her fear wouldn’t go away. “I hope so.”
Aahliss entered her quarters smiling. She couldn’t help it. Things seemed to be going well, they had a tactic, and in a few more days they should know how well it would work. The humans could go back to their planet, and the Mralans could begin rebuilding their fleet. Her mission would be a success.
A chime came from her communications console. It was probably Fmedg, wanting to complain some more about Colonel Mehta’s way of running the ship. He was probably more upset by the fact that he’d been displaced, even though he’d been given the opportunity to be captain. Now, he was just another communications crewman.
She answered the call, and Eolith’s face appeared.
Dirt. She would rather have had to deal with Fmedg.
“Aahliss,” Eolith said, “it’s good to see you.”
“You want another report?” Aahliss sat on her stool and let her smile spread on her face again. Eolith was going to have a difficult time arguing with success.
“The Speaker is having nightmares,” Eolith said.
All Aahliss’s pleased feelings got caught in a whirlwind, sucked to the center of her body, where they wound themselves into a tight coil of fear. “How long?”
“The last few days. She wakes up screaming, terrified. It takes us several minutes to bring her back to reality.”
“I would like to talk to her.” There was always a possibility Aolyth didn’t have correct information or was exaggerating the situation.
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