“I understand, Dad. I’ve got a security clearance now; I know I can’t talk about certain things,” Ethan responded.
“During our last major battle with the Zodarks, we captured a working star map of the Zodark empire and the systems they’ve explored up to this point. The Vipers are being tasked with surveying as many of them as possible. We’re going to have them conduct deep space recons to help us identify where the Zodark planets, starbases, and other strategic facilities are located. Their goal is not to engage in a fight but to find the enemy and report their positions back to the fleet. It’s a dangerous and incredibly important job, Ethan,” Hunt explained.
Ethan looked at him with excitement. “You can get me assigned to one of them?”
Hunt shrugged. “I think so. Probably. But if you want this assignment, you’ll have to go through a few more training courses. The first ships aren’t going to be completed for at least eight months.”
“I know their primary mission is reconnaissance, but will they see combat?”
“Ethan, if this ship sees combat, chances are it’ll get destroyed. It’s thinly armored. While we’ve given it some offensive weapons to carry out hit-and-run missions if needed, if it gets hit, it’s a goner. I know you’re itching to get into the fight, Ethan, but a posting on a ship like this would allow you to see more of the galaxy than I ever could.”
Hunt really hoped his son would go for this assignment. “It’s also a small ship, Ethan,” he added. “That means it has a smaller crew, which will give you more opportunities to grow as an officer and think on your own. If you get an assignment to a battleship, you’ll be one officer out of three or four hundred. On this ship, you’d be one of just six. If you want command of a starship one day, then this will probably facilitate that a lot faster than going down the track of the big battlewagons.”
Ethan didn’t say anything for a second. He looked at the image of the ship in front of him, then reached over and grabbed the shot of whiskey still sitting on the desk. Like his dad, he drank it down in one gulp.
Finally, he asked, “You really think I should take this assignment, Dad?”
Without hesitation, Hunt replied, “I do, and this isn’t me trying to protect you. You’ll be in a lot of danger away from the fleet and largely on your own nearly all the time, but it’s an incredible opportunity. These new frigates are going to be like the submarine service was to the Navy back in the twentieth century—the eyes and ears of the fleet, operating alone and deep behind enemy lines.”
A smile finally spread across Ethan’s face, and he nodded. “I’ll do it. If you can make it happen, Dad, I’ll do it. You’re right; this is an incredible opportunity. I shouldn’t balk at it. Man, my friends are going to be jealous when they hear about this.”
Hunt let out a sigh of relief. He was happy his son had agreed and relieved his wife wouldn’t hate him for not insisting that Ethan accept an assignment on Admiral Bailey’s staff. This really was a good alternative. It’d spare his son from any pending combat in the next twelve months, and it’d place him on a ship that wasn’t looking for a fight.
The rest of Christmas Day went by with everyone happy. The Hunt family enjoyed their time, alone and together. God only knew what the future would bring them, or when they’d all be able to celebrate another Christmas together. They decided to make the most of it and enjoy the time they had.
Chapter Nine
Stargates
The Rhea System
RNS Voyager
Admiral Abigail Halsey paced in front of her chair on the bridge as she waited to hear from her ground commander. They had disembarked their Republic Army contingent nearly four months ago, and still they hadn’t finished mopping up the remaining Zodarks left on the planet. They were still finding small pockets of resistance that continued to harass their operations on the surface.
She turned to her operations officer. “Has the general’s shuttle arrived yet?” she asked.
Her Ops officer looked down at her station to check on the status of the shuttle. She smiled. “Yes, Admiral. It just finished docking.”
“Very well, Lieutenant. Please inform him he’s to report to my office immediately,” Halsey said and then left the bridge to head to her private office.
Halsey found herself spending more and more time either in her office or in the ship’s wardroom, sitting through various briefings and daily reports. Between the scientific team, the ground operations, and the mining operations, she was inundated with the managerial duties of running a small empire out here on the far edges of the frontier.
New ships arrived from Sol every five days, bringing with them more soldiers, more military equipment, and other supplies needed to fortify the system. With each arrival, she sent back enormous amounts of Trimar and Morean to Earth, along with a steady count of body bags. RA soldiers were still dying in combat on the surface, and that was a problem. Her force was supposed to have completed combat operations on the planet a few months ago, yet here they were, still fighting a guerilla war against the remaining Zodarks.
Brigadier General Ross McGinnis knocked on her door and waited to be recognized. “Enter,” she said loud enough for him to hear. The AI automatically opened the door after she authorized him to enter.
The soldier in charge of the ground forces walked in with a couple of officers in tow. McGinnis was a short man, a hot-tempered, hard-charging soldier who seldom took no for an answer. But he was also known for aggressively going to bat for his subordinates and taking care of his people. From all the reports she’d read and the informal conversations she’d had about him, she’d learned his men were fiercely loyal to him and would charge the gates of hell if he ordered them to do so. She knew she needed that kind of general in charge of the ground war.
McGinnis stood at attention in front of her desk, as did the other two colonels that were with him. She gave them a hard stare for just a moment before she relented. “At ease, General. Please, take a seat. We have a lot to discuss.”
“Yes, ma’am,” General McGinnis replied in a tone that conveyed that he was obviously annoyed at being taken away from his duties on the surface.
She almost chuckled at the hidden attitude in his voice. He probably thinks that having a face-to-face with me, a “fleeter,” about ground combat is a waste of his time, she mused.
“General McGinnis, I called you up here to meet in person because I want to understand what the problem is down on the surface. Why are we still suffering hit-and-run attacks against our people down there?” she demanded. “It’s a little hard to build a base and a colony on the surface when we still have bands of Zodark soldiers running around.” Halsey didn’t try to hide her irritation. She was annoyed that his people still hadn’t fully secured the surface.
McGinnis cleared his throat. “With all due respect, Admiral, things are a bit more complicated on the ground than they may appear from up here in orbit.”
Condescending bastard.
“Really? Please, do tell me why I keep sending dozens and sometimes hundreds of body bags back to Sol every five days,” she countered, sarcasm dripping from her voice.
“Admiral, the Zodarks know the terrain better than we do,” McGinnis explained, undeterred. “It’s taking time for our people to adjust to this new environment. Plus, there’s magnetic interference near the mountains and the areas around the mines. This interference is making it incredibly hard for our sensors to detect and track them from the air or with our drones. We’re placing a variety of ground sensors around our sensitive sites to help us detect them as they approach our facilities—in the last three days, these sensors helped us identify and deter two attacks before they could get started. I believe this is going to help us turn the tide.”
“Huh,” Admiral Halsey replied, crossing her arms. “OK, then what are you going to do about eliminating the remaining ground forces still running loose?” she asked, not letting him off the hook just yet.
“Admiral, we’re mount
ing more and more patrols both around our facilities and in some of the locations where we believe the remaining Zodarks are operating. It’s rough, rugged terrain, so what we’ve done is break it down into grid boxes or sections. As more engineering units arrive, we’re building firebases and patrol bases inside those grid boxes to deny the enemy the ability to freely operate there.
“As these bases are completed, we’re positioning a battalion of soldiers there to carry out round-the-clock patrols of the area. Right now, nine battalions of soldiers are on near-constant patrols. We’re taking losses, and the body bags are piling up because we’re actively looking to engage the Zodarks.”
He sat up even straighter, which seemed impossible to Admiral Halsey. “As much as I don’t want to lose any of my soldiers, this is just part of the job,” he insisted. “If we find and then fight them—when we do, we’re going to lose people. I’m confident our current strategy is working, and we’ll finish them off in the coming months.”
General McGinnis had been skating on thin ice with Admiral Halsey before this meeting, and they were both acutely aware of the tension. His ground forces had been requesting a lot of orbital strikes from the Voyager, and while she’d happily provided them, it had only reinforced her opinion that his command was not winning the ground war.
Halsey leaned forward in her chair and stared daggers at him. “Listen, General, my ship can’t stay in orbit forever. We still need to finish our survey operations of the nearby moons, and we need to keep an eye out for any additional Zodark ships. I need to know that you have things under control. We need the mining operations to continue and the space elevator to stay protected.”
“Are you leaving any ships in orbit?” he pushed.
“Do you need me to?” she asked skeptically.
McGinnis sighed. “Admiral, I understand you’re a fleeter, and you may not fully understand the intricacies of the ground operations. Right now, the high ground for the kind of war we’re fighting is orbit. A starship sitting up here can send a railgun slug down on a hard target or provide direct fire support beyond what our VACs can.
“This is important to our mission. As long as we’re hitting the Zodarks with orbital strikes, they’ll know we have ships in orbit. When that stops, they’ll know help isn’t coming and that we aren’t getting reinforced. We must keep reminding the enemy that we’re not abandoned out here. If possible, I’d like it if you could keep at least one of the fleet ships in orbit over our positions.”
Halsey sat back in her chair. She hated to admit it, but she knew he was right. Maybe she’d misjudged the man. If leaving one of the ships in orbit meant it could save a few soldiers’ lives and help end the fighting on the ground sooner, then she’d do it.
After a pause, she nodded. “OK, General, you’ve made your point. I’ll leave the Wanju in orbit. They’ll provide you with any further orbital strikes. Now, when I return in a couple of months, I expect to hear that you have the planet secured and our operations on the ground are running at full speed. Understand?”
It was more of an order than a request. General McGinnis nodded. “I’ll do my best,” he replied.
The ground soldiers got up and left her office. She felt a lot more informed and comfortable about what was going on down on the surface. She probably could have handled this talking-to through the holographic communicator, but she wanted them to have to trek up to her turf. She needed to remind them who was in charge, which for the time being was her, until an officer with more stars than her showed up to relieve her.
*******
A day later, she ordered her ship out of orbit and set a course for the closest moon, Tigris. They were finally starting their geological survey of it after months of delay. The moon itself was fascinating. Unlike the farther moon, Pishon, Tigris could not support or sustain life. It had an atmosphere, albeit thin, but it had one. However, Tigris had a lot of volcanic activity. It spewed forth far too much toxic mess into the atmosphere to ever make it livable. But that wasn’t what drew her scientific team to the moon. It was the composition of the moon. It was incredibly rich in heavy metals, resources that would be in high demand if they were going to turn this system into a real forward operating base.
The other moon, Pishon, could support life—well, not human life as the atmosphere wasn’t compatible with humans outside of EVA suits, but Halsey’s scientific team had already discovered that Pishon could support plants and other life-forms. On Earth, some microbes, insects and plant life survived in places with an altered atmosphere, but they still didn’t know for sure what life-forms existed on Pishon, or what exactly they would find there.
As the Voyager settled into orbit over Tigris, her science teams deployed several satellites to orbit the moon and continue the geological survey. Next, they dropped a handful of drones into the atmosphere and a ground lander. These would focus on finding a suitable location to establish a biodome habitat for a mining colony to start their activities.
In a few months, a ship equipped with the necessary equipment to construct a space elevator would arrive from Earth. Once completed, it would help transport the mined minerals from the surface to orbit and bring people and resources from orbit down to the surface.
It was a complicated process to establish multiple colonies in a new system far from the support of your home system. For Admiral Halsey, it represented one of the most tedious and challenging parts of her job.
She wanted to be out searching for Zodarks. She also knew a stargate was somewhere nearby, and her force just hadn’t found it yet. She had her lone destroyer and two of the three TPA ships out searching for it while she kept the Voyager and one of the TPA cruisers near New Eden in case the Zodarks somehow slipped past her.
When is the new fleet from Earth going to arrive? she asked herself. We’re sitting ducks out here with what we have…
Publicly, she was the stoic image of a fearless commander. In the quietness of her own mind, though, she was nervous. If the Zodarks returned before she had reinforcements from Sol, she wasn’t sure she could stop them.
I miss Hunt, she realized. He knew how to fight his ship and win…he was fearless…
Losing the Rook at the outset of this campaign had really hurt. It was a deep gut blow to morale too. She had some of the crewmen from the Rook on her ship now. Their presence only reminded her of that tragic loss. She often chided herself over losing the Rook and so many of its crew. Her ship was just as armored as the Rook, yet she had ordered them into a position that would place them in harm’s way while protecting her ship. She told herself she should have kept the Voyager in the lead position and not Hunt’s. His ship was already badly damaged, and they couldn’t afford to take any more hits.
Halsey knew her hesitation in that last battle had cost her the Rook and a lot of dead sailors; she couldn’t make that kind of mistake again. In a way, she hoped Admiral Bailey would send a more senior admiral out here to take charge of the situation—someone who could make the tough decisions for her, who would tell her what to do and bear that responsibility and not her.
“Admiral, we’re receiving a message from the Boston. Shall I go ahead and play it?” asked her coms officer.
Halsey nodded.
“Admiral Halsey, this is Captain Shale. I believe our long-range sensors have found the stargate we’ve been looking for. Attached to our message is our current location and the location of the stargate. We’re going to move forward and investigate. I’ll send another message when we arrive, along with a video image of the stargate. Captain Shale out.” The message ended, leaving everyone both excited and anxious over the news. This was precisely what they had been waiting on. They had found the stargate.
“Lieutenant, how long ago did Captain Shale send us this message?” Halsey asked, trying to gauge how far away they were.
The lieutenant looked down at her screen, searching for the time stamp. “Um, five hours ago, ma’am. They’re far out. At FTL speeds, they’re close to a half day’s
travel.”
“OK. Thank you, Lieutenant. Keep me apprised of any other messages. Load this newest piece of intel into one of our emergency com drones in case we need to send a warning back to Earth,” Halsey ordered. It wasn’t that she was worried about her ship being destroyed in the next few hours or anything; however, it was critical that Sol was alerted that they had found the stargate.
Chapter Ten
Reinforcements
New Eden
RNS Viper
“Captain, we’re coming out of FTL in five seconds,” called out Ensign Ethan Hunt from his navigation terminal.
“Excellent. Once we’re out of warp, let’s spin up our electronic sensors and conduct a full sweep of the area. We need to make sure the place is still in our control,” Commander Amy Dobbs ordered.
Dobbs was the first captain of the very first Viper-class frigate. It was a great honor to be chosen to take command of a ship like this. While it was a small ship, it was fast and incredibly agile. Her only gripe was that she didn’t have a more experienced crew—although, she also realized her own real experience in this new war thus far consisted only of her two-year tour on the Rook before it had been blown apart. She didn’t fault Captain Hunt for the loss of the ship, but she did harbor some bitterness toward Admiral Halsey for placing them in the situation that had led to their demise. Then again, if the Rook hadn’t been destroyed, she probably never would have been promoted and given command of the Viper.
A few seconds later, their ship came out of FTL, and they found themselves immersed in the blackness of space once again. Dobbs liked traveling inside an FTL bubble. She found it mesmerizing and beautiful. She loved all the swirling lights and the flashes of stars in the distance whipping past them.
Into the Battle Page 14