The Oncoming Storm

by Christopher Nuttall

  And a duke, if accused of something that was very close to treason, would be able to disrupt government for months before the matter was resolved.

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” he said grudgingly.

  “I do understand your feelings,” the king assured him. “But we must win first.”

  A dull chime echoed through the room. “That will be the ambassador,” the king noted. “Please stand to the side.”

  Lucas obeyed, motioning for Sandra to join him. There was a short delay, then the Theocracy’s ambassador was escorted into the chamber. The last time they’d met, Lucas recalled, he’d worn neat white robes and looked surprisingly dapper. This time, it was clear that he’d been thoroughly searched—and none too gently. His implants would have been deactivated before he was allowed anywhere near the Royal Palace.

  And what, Lucas asked himself, if the ambassador is carrying something we are unable to detect?

  He pushed the thought aside as the man staggered forward, escorted by two burly marines. One of them was female, Lucas noted, perhaps explaining the ambassador’s clear irritation. Being manhandled was bad enough, but being manhandled by a woman would be nightmarish for a Theocrat. Lucas felt a moment of pity for the ambassador’s wife, a girl who stayed in the embassy and never went out onto the streets. No doubt the diplomat would take his rage out on her.

  “Ambassador Paul,” the king said, with studied nonchalance, “let me guess. You’ve come to apologize.”

  Paul gave the king a furious look. “This treatment is abominable,” he thundered. “A gross breach of diplomatic courtesy!”

  “And so is launching a war,” the king said. “Speak your piece and leave.”

  The ambassador drew himself to his feet. “Peace is the will of God,” he said, “and the Theocracy has worked for peace since the One True Faith was brought into being by the Final Prophet. But peace has been threatened, again and again, by the actions of your illegitimate union of worlds. You have invaded our space, incited our populations to rebellion, and sought to control the spread of the One True Faith. These actions can no longer go unpunished.”

  He took a breath. “I am ordered to offer you one last chance to submit yourselves before the Believers of the One True Faith,” he continued. “You must welcome us to your worlds, surrender your ships and industries to our custody, and prepare your people to embrace the One True Faith. Should you refuse, we will wage war until you are bowed in submission, ready to embrace God and take him into your hearts. There will be no further negotiation. It is submission or death.”

  Lucas wondered, absently, if Paul genuinely believed his own words. It would certainly be far more convincing if he did, he knew, but it was hard to imagine anyone who had spent time on Tyre believing the crap he was spewing out. The Commonwealth hadn’t supplied anyone with weapons, let alone incited them to rebel. And they hadn’t even tried to ban missionaries from spreading through Commonwealth space.

  He winced inwardly. That would have to change. And who knew what else would be lost along with religious freedom? What would happen if all of the Commonwealth’s guaranteed rights were stripped away in the name of security? How much of what his ancestors had helped build would be lost forever?

  The king was leaning forward angrily. But he managed to control himself before he spoke.

  “You are correct on one point,” he said. His voice was icy cold. “There will be no negotiation.”

  He took a breath. “You have mounted an unprovoked war against my people, commencing with a series of cowardly terrorist attacks that have left upwards of nine thousand civilians dead. Your . . . pathetic attempt to give us a declaration of war, too late for us to put our forces on alert, is only the icing on the cake. There will be no further negotiation—and there will be no negotiated peace. The Commonwealth will fight until the Theocracy has been crushed, Ambassador, and it will be crushed.

  “Your people want freedom. We will give it to them. Your conquests want independence. We will give it to them. Your sons want the right to learn more than how to recite your prayers by rote. We will give it to them. Your wives and daughters want the right to make their own choices. We will give it to them. And the entire galaxy wants to sleep peacefully, without fearing conquest by you. We will give it to them.”

  He met Ambassador Paul’s eyes. “I promise you nothing, but war to the knife,” he growled sharply. “And the next time we meet, it will be when I take your surrender in the ruins of your homeworld.”

  Lucas, standing to one side, sucked in a breath. It was dangerous to drive a foe into a corner, he knew, particularly when it might be more profitable to allow them a way out, but he also knew the king spoke for his people. No one would be interested in a negotiated peace with the Theocracy, not now. They’d want to crush the Theocratic navy, liberate its conquests, and sow the grounds of its homeworld with salt.

  But the king was still speaking. “Because we are a civilized people, we will allow you and your embassy to leave peacefully,” he concluded. “It will no longer be necessary.”

  He looked at the marines. “Get him out of my sight.”

  Lucas watched as the marines escorted the ambassador out, then turned to the king.

  “Parliament will be behind you,” he said. He knew it to be true, despite his doubts. The attacks on Tyre had seen to that. “But should we not offer them their lives?”

  The king waved a hand towards the window, where plumes of smoke could still be seen.

  “No one will want mercy, Your Grace,” he said. His voice was very dark as he surveyed the scene before him. He turned to face Lucas. “Nine thousand civilians—perhaps more—are dead, killed by the vilest treachery. There can be no mercy to a government that considers such sneak attacks a legitimate way of opening the war. And I will offer none.”

  He looked down at the hard marble floor, then up at Lucas. “Prepare yourself for your new responsibilities,” he ordered. “Our forces will need everything from starships to armored combat suits and rations. You will be charged with meeting their demands. And you will be advising me on the course of the war.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” Lucas said. There was no choice. It was him or someone else, someone who might be less invested in victory. “It will be my honor.”

  The king nodded. “I think we shall offer the ambassador’s family the chance to remain,” he added. He smiled brilliantly. “And his servants too. Wouldn’t that make their lives more interesting?”

  Lucas frowned. “Why, Your Majesty?”

  “The Princess Drusilla is also on her way here,” the king said. “We could find a use for her, I’m sure. And we could find a use for our ambassador’s family too.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  “No sign of pursuit, Captain,” Roach reported. “Hyperspace is clear.”

  Kat let out a sigh of relief. An engagement in hyperspace might have allowed them a chance to reverse the outcome of the battle, but it might also have proven disastrous. Two or three antimatter warheads would have started an energy storm that would have seriously threatened both sides. Trying to raise a storm near the enemy fleet would have seemed a workable idea if she hadn’t been certain she would risk her own ships too.

  And will it seem a viable weapon of war in the future? she asked herself. Or will both sides refrain from using it for fear of the consequences?

  “Stand down from battle stations,” she ordered. The red lights dimmed. “Damage report?”

  “No major damage,” Lynn reported. The engineer sounded relieved. “We lost a pair of shield generators, which will need to be replaced, but the remainder are intact.”

  “Thank God,” Kat said. She turned to the XO. “And the fleet?”

  “Battered,” the XO reported. “Nine superdreadnoughts are gone. Four more are almost certainly not going to be combat capable without yard time. The remainder of the superdreadnoughts have damage ranging from minor to several weeks of repair work.”

  Kat sighed. “Can we do any rep
air work in transit?”

  “We’ll have to shuttle engineering crews round the fleet,” the XO said. “But we’re still doing head counts. We don’t even have an accurate idea how many people we have on the ships, Captain. And we certainly don’t have an inventory of spare parts.”

  If Admiral Morrison isn’t dead, Kat thought, I’m going to kill him personally.

  She looked at the display for a long moment. Two squadrons of superdreadnoughts—and thirty-seven other starships—were nothing to sniff at. By any reasonable standard, she was the youngest fleet commander in history, although she knew she wouldn’t be allowed to keep the fleet. She didn’t have a dedicated command ship, for one thing. But it would have been a high point of her career, if the ships hadn’t been so badly damaged. It would be a long time before 7th Fleet was combat capable again.

  We might just break up the formation and assign the usable ships to other fleets, she thought morbidly. I don’t think anyone will care.

  “Complete the head count, then work through the engineering reports,” she ordered. She wasn’t trained for fleet command. What if she missed something? “Shuttle engineering crews round the fleet, concentrating on the ships that can be returned to operational status sooner rather than later. If a ship needs yard time, leave a skeleton crew and get the rest somewhere where they can be more useful.”

  “Aye, Captain,” the XO said. “Doing it under transit will prove a challenge.”

  Kat nodded. “But do we have a choice?”

  She thought fast. Her father’s brief update had stated that Admiral Christian and 6th Fleet had been ordered to Gamma Base, a star forty light years from Cadiz. But she hadn’t heard anything since then and there was no way to tell if the fleet had already reached its destination or if it was still in transit. It might not matter, she told herself. Her first duty was to report to the Admiralty and Gamma Base had a working StarCom.

  Or it should have had a working StarCom, part of her mind noted. What if the Theocracy got there too?

  She dismissed the thought, then looked at the display. “The 67th Destroyer Squadron is largely intact,” she said. “Reassign two more destroyers to fill the holes in the squadron’s roster, then order her CO to return to Cadiz. They are to monitor the star system at a safe distance and, if possible, attempt to open communications with forces on the ground.”

  “Aye, Captain,” the XO said. He paused, then opened a private channel to Kat. “Captain, it is unlikely they will be able to get close enough to the planet to open a secure channel to anyone.”

  “I know,” Kat sent back. She thought, briefly, of the millions of crowns invested in Cadiz by various corporations, including her own. The Theocracy had gained a valuable prize when it overran the system. There had been no time to rig the facilities to self-destruct. “But we have to try.”

  She settled back in her command chair, feeling very tired. It was her first major engagement and all she’d been able to do was run. And she was already tired of running. Part of her wanted to lurk on the edge of the system until her fleet was ready, then go on the offensive, but she knew it wasn’t possible. They didn’t have any supply dumps closer than Gamma Base. Admiral Morrison should have had pre-positioned stockpiles along the border. That he hadn’t, Kat knew, was yet another sign of criminal incompetence.

  Or outright treason, she thought. But was that really possible?

  “Set course for Gamma Base,” she ordered the helmsman. “Best possible speed.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Weiberg said. “We’ll be there in four days.”

  “Prepare to detach a destroyer to run ahead of us,” Kat ordered the XO. “She can take our reports to the StarCom.”

  “Aye, Captain,” the XO said. “But it will only shave a day off our time before we can report in.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Kat said. By now, someone would surely have noticed that they’d lost contact with Cadiz. All StarCom shutdowns should be notified in advance. Someone would surely draw the correct conclusion . . . and alert the Commonwealth that it was at war with the Theocracy. But what if someone hadn’t drawn the correct conclusion? Or what if something else had gone badly wrong? “We need to get our report out as quickly as possible.”

  She rose to her feet, feeling almost too tired to walk. “I’ll write the report now,” she said. “You have the bridge.”

  “Aye, Captain,” the XO said. “I have the bridge.”

  Kat stepped into her Ready Room and closed the hatch behind her, then sagged onto the sofa and put her head in her hands. She’d failed, she told herself, as despair threatened to overcome her. Her father had expected her to gather proof the war was about to begin and galvanize the admiral into action, but she’d barely succeeded at the former and failed completely at the latter. And the end run they’d done round Morrison and his ass-kissing subordinates hadn’t been enough to save the fleet. They’d had no choice but to flee.

  We made it out, she told herself. The fleet might have made it out, but it had been too badly battered to be considered combat capable any longer. We could have lost everything.

  And she had lost Davidson. She cursed herself angrily, first for pulling him back into her bed and then for sending him to Cadiz. He could have called General Eastside from orbit and to hell with Marine protocol. It was easy to imagine him dead now, his shuttle slammed into the ground, his body lying in a ditch . . . or him having been taken prisoner by the Theocracy. She knew what they’d do to a trained marine.

  She had loved him, once. She still cared deeply for him. And she had sent him to his death.

  You’re too young, a voice whispered in the back of her head. You’re too unpolished to be put in command of a heavy cruiser, let alone a fleet.

  And stop whining, you stupid bitch, another voice said. However you got it, you’re in command. You have a responsibility you cannot shirk. Or are you going to cower in your Ready Room like a stupid little girl and leave the officers under your command without orders? And prove that everyone who had doubts about you was right all along?

  Angrily, she pulled herself to her feet and looked in the mirror. She looked awful, despite the genetic engineering that had gone into her body. Her hair was soaked with sweat, her uniform clung to her in awkward places, and her face looked tired and worn. She wanted to shower, then sleep for a week. Instead, she walked into the washroom, splashed water on her face, and then returned to her desk. She had a report to write.

  And hope it doesn’t get me shot out of hand, she thought. She was the fleet commander now, at least until a senior officer was assigned to the fleet. There was no way her father’s influence could save her from a Board of Inquiry. And if she was found responsible for the disaster, she might well lose her career at the very least.

  Shaking her head, she reached for the terminal and started to work.

  “It is my duty,” Doctor Braham said, as William entered the compartment, “to warn you that Sickbay is critically low on personnel.”

  “Duly noted, Doctor,” William said. He’d ordered two-thirds of her staff reassigned to the superdreadnoughts. Over five hundred crewmen had been injured and the head count had yet to be completed. Several of them would have to be shoved into stasis until the fleet reached safe haven. “Get back to work.”

  “Aye, Commander,” the doctor said tartly. “However, regulations clearly state . . .”

  “The regulations were written in peacetime,” William snapped. They were clear. Among other things, a vessel’s senior medical officer was not to leave her ship without the captain’s direct permission, while her complement of medical crew was not to be reduced by more than a third. “This is war.”

  He sucked in a breath. How the hell had Fran’s late, unlamented commanding officer managed to get away with sending over half of his medical complement on leave at the same time? The fleet had been in orbit, with little real chance of disaster . . . but it should still have been a court-martial offense. Or had someone merely decided there was no point
in trying to bring charges against one of Admiral Morrison’s cronies?

  “Yes,” the doctor said. “But . . .”

  “But nothing,” William said. He’d expected better from her. “Those are your orders, Doctor, which you may have in writing if you wish. We do not have the medical complement on each ship to avoid breaking regulations.”

  He watched her storm off, then turned back to the endless stream of reports. Admiral Morrison had done a good job of suppressing initiative too, he noted. William was being asked to approve matters that should, by rights, have been handled by local officers. He should have told them to promote themselves to captains, as long as they were in command of starships, but it was unlikely they’d accept such orders. It was certainly unlikely he had authority to issue them.

  But they’re in command now, he thought sourly. They should be captains.

  He pushed the thought aside as he reviewed the first after-action report. Most of 7th Fleet’s deficiencies were hardly news to him, but there were a few interesting points. Notably, the shield generators had been out of harmony on several superdreadnoughts, weakening their shields under the onslaught from the gunboats. Missile hits that should have been shrugged off had done real damage to starships that not only cost far more than a single gunboat, but took much longer to produce. He read the rest of the report, then dropped a copy in his private subsection of the datanet. If there was an attempt to whitewash Admiral Morrison in the wake of his presumed death, William was damned if he was going to let it succeed. A few independent media outlets would be very interested in the files.

  “Commander,” Roach said, “I have a detailed tactical report of our performance as a fleet command ship.”

  “Shit-awful,” William snapped. He forced himself to calm his temper with an effort. It was hardly Roach’s fault that the battle had gone so badly. Hell, it couldn’t be blamed on the captain either, although she’d issued the order to retreat. “How badly did we do?”