by Isaac Hooke
"It's not a well-known provision," Jonathan said carefully. "It was added to the naval code a few hundred years back, buried deep in one of the subsections. Very few people actually know about it, but it is there. The intention of the provision is to make it easier to dismiss an ineffective commanding officer from duty. In the past, the only thing a captain in the task unit could do was to disobey the CO's illegal order, and perhaps convince the other captains to do likewise. He could also try to persuade the executive officer aboard the flagship to arrest the CO, but if that failed, there were really no other options. Obviously, we needed a provision to change that."
"Make it easier to mutiny, you mean?"
"The provision is what makes mutiny possible, really," Jonathan said. "Because without that line in the naval code, the AIs would never let a mutineer gain control of any ship."
"Are there other hidden provisions I should know about?" Robert asked.
"Probably. Download yourself a copy sometime and study up on it. In any case, if the majority of the captains elect to forcibly remove the admiral and disregard the mission, I will nominate the current captain of the Hurricane, William Avis, as his replacement. Avis has to abide by the outcome of the vote. The AI of the Hurricane will make sure of that."
"But you would be the logical choice to assume command of the fleet, as commodore of Task Unit Two."
"Yes, except that I don't want our actions to be seen as political. We'll get more of the other captains on our side if I don't have anything to gain by calling for the admiral's removal."
"What if Avis accepts command but then continues the mission anyway?"
"Then we simply call for another vote."
Robert frowned, obviously not happy with that answer. "How are we going to get the other captains to vote against the admiral in the first place?"
"This is where I'll need your help. Communications between two captains are automatically logged by the AIs of the receiving ships. But an encrypted message sent by a commander to a captain, and vice versa, is not."
"Won't the captains grow suspicious when they receive such a message?"
"Perhaps. But they won't have any reason to arrest you, not if you broach the subject properly. Send out general feeler messages to the captains. Don't mention anything about replacing the admiral. Instead, tell them everything we know about the aliens. Send them detailed footage of the battle. Make it clear there is no way in hell those are SK ships. Tell them basically what you and I have been talking about, that we're going to need every ship out there in the days ahead. That without communications, there's no way to know whether NAVCENT would have issued a retraction order based on the arrival of the aliens, or whether they've already sent a retraction. And give every captain you talk to that speech of yours regarding the value of human life."
"I told you I should have recorded that," Robert said.
"I'm sure you'll remember it just fine. When you've talked to all of the captains, report back to me on their general mood, and how likely you think it is that each one will vote in favor of replacing the admiral when I call for a vote of no confidence. Whatever you do, don't ever broach the subject of such a vote directly. Unless you want to be arrested for sedition."
"Not particularly."
"Good. Report back to me in a few days when you have some results."
"And if most of the captains seem against replacing the admiral?" Robert asked.
"Pray it doesn't come to that, Commander. Pray hard."
twelve
Two days under way, Jonathan was reviewing the status updates from his department heads and captains under his command when Robert requested permission to join him.
Jonathan remotely opened the hatch to his office. The commander stepped inside and took the visitor's chair.
"I'm disabling local logging," Robert said.
Jonathan followed his lead and disabled logging on his own aReal, instructed the computer to cease audio and video data capture, and extended his noise canceler around Robert.
"So, you bring news of our plot?" Jonathan said.
"I do. The captains of the Aurelia, Maelstrom and Grimm are with us, as expected. As for Task Unit One, I'm fairly certain Captains Felix, Rodriguez, and Brown will back you when you call for the admiral's arrest. Four other captains seem on the fence—they agree upon the sanctity of human life, but they're not entirely convinced the new attackers are alien. The other eight seem squarely in the admiral's corner. They despise the Sino-Koreans, and feel that any chance we have of inflicting harm upon them, we should take it, regardless of whether aliens are about to invade or not."
"Concentrate on the four swing votes," Jonathan said.
"I'll see what I can do to prove the attackers are alien."
"It's too bad we don't have a sample of some kind from the hull," Jonathan said. "Maybe you should talk to the chief scientist about getting a remote spectrum analysis done."
"Actually, I did. He was able to perform a partial analysis on the aft section of the second vessel, but so far it's nothing special. A composite alloy of aluminum, steel, and other base metals. There is a lot of silicon mixed in, and while that's unusual, it's not precisely alien per se." Robert hesitated. "Maybe you should talk to the other captains yourself. You might get better traction."
"No, too risky," Jonathan said. "If the admiral gets a whiff of our plan, he'll shut us down so hard we won't know what hit us. Keep working on those four. Emphasize the fact that we're cut off. It's been two days since we lost contact with NAVCENT. A lot can happen in that time. Tell them we detected two new comm nodes passing into the Vega-951 system from Contessa Gate, and the alien ship disabled each one with its EMP beam."
A flashing beacon on Jonathan's aReal indicated Ensign McNamara was trying to contact him. Jonathan reenabled logging and deactivated the noise canceling.
"Captain, I have news," Ensign McNamara said via the aReal.
"Go ahead, Ensign," Jonathan said, looping Robert's aReal into the conversation.
"The alien vessel has halted outside Contessa Gate."
"Thank you, Ensign," the captain returned. He knew the data was delayed by an hour thanks to the distance between the vessel and the task unit. "Notify me if—"
"Captain," the ensign interrupted. "I just detected a high-intensity thermal flash. The enemy vessel has destroyed Contessa Gate."
Jonathan felt his jaw tighten. He pulled up the tactical display. Sure enough, the latest readings reported that Contessa Gate was so much space debris. All that remained was the raw Slipstream, 1-Vega.
"Thank you, Ensign," Jonathan said. When the ensign disconnected, he glanced at Robert. "Well, I suppose that's better than the alternative. I'd much rather have the task group stranded here than allow an alien ship to enter a populated human system uncontested."
"I'd prefer the same," Robert said. "Still, we don't really know if the aliens can traverse Slipstreams without Gates. We've seen that ability in at least one other spacefaring race in the past."
"Good point," Jonathan said. "What we really need is someone to invent a damn jump drive."
"We'll have to make sure nothing happens to the Builder ship with Task Unit One," Robert said. "It'll be two years before NAVCENT dispatches another one."
Central Command wouldn't send any other ship types through the Slipstream while readings indicated the return Gate no longer existed.
"Or even longer." Jonathan pulled up Task Unit One on his tactical display. The Builder ship followed along near the rear of the admiral's unit. It was the slowest ship in the bunch. Like the Grimm, it had no offensive capabilities, and would be very vulnerable in an attack.
Jonathan transferred his attention to the red dot on the far side of the system. The enemy vessel remained near the wormhole.
"They're assuming a guard position at 1-Vega," Robert commented.
"I see that," Jonathan said. "We'll have to eliminate it before the Builder can start a new Gate. Or at least scare it away."
"We easily ou
tnumber the vessel," Robert said. "If the whole task group joined forces, we could eliminate the threat with minimal losses."
"I agree." He gazed at the third Slipstream in the system, 2-Vega, which led to uncharted space. "But I'm worried reinforcements will arrive long before we ever begin building a Gate."
"Can we tow the Darkstar Gate to 1-Vega?"
"Even if we could," Jonathan said. "Gates are intrinsically tied to the Slipstreams they regulate—constructed with just the right dimensions to suit their given wormholes."
"So we have at least one more battle to go before we get out of here, then," Robert said. "Or two, if reinforcements arrive, like you say."
Jonathan continued to focus on 2-Vega.
Oh enemy reinforcements will arrive, he thought, keeping his mental doom and gloom to himself. It's only a matter of time.
* * *
Three days away from the rendezvous with the remainder of the task group, Jonathan was rudely awakened in his quarters by the computer.
"Your presence is requested on the bridge," Maxwell said.
He donned his aReal spectacles and selected "crew manifest" from the HUD with a hand gesture. He sorted by current location, highlighted every member of the bridge crew, then initiated a "shared mode" connection. He was wearing pajamas, so he selected a uniformed avatar to represent him.
He forced himself to stand. The glasses grew momentarily opaque and then the bridge appeared around him. He resided in the center of the Round Table, where a three-hundred sixty degree lightfield camera had deployed to capture live holographic video of the bridge. To the officers at their stations, it would also appear that he stood in that exact spot on the bridge, his image hiding the multi-lensed camera.
"What is it?" Jonathan asked.
"Eight thermal signatures just appeared in the system," the ensign manning the fourth watch ops station told him. "From the 2-Vega Slipstream. A fleet of ships."
Jonathan overlaid the tactical display from the CDC onto his HUD. Sure enough, on the far side of the system, eight new red dots had appeared.
He smiled grimly. Reinforcements. Sometimes, I hate being right.
"Do we have a visual?" Jonathan asked.
"I'm sending the port camera feed to your aReal now."
He saw five more of those dart-like alien ships, along with two bigger, box-like vessels, and a smaller, cylindrical craft with flat faces on either end. The latter shapes didn't shock him—vessels intended for deep space travel alone didn't have to account for the aerodynamic forces of lift and drag. A box would move just as fast as a dart in the void.
Jonathan zoomed in on the feed. He didn't like the looks of the ominous dark holes that dotted the forward faces of the box ships. There were at least twenty such portholes. Those could be launch tubes either for nukes, smart missiles, fighter crafts, or something never before encountered by human-kind.
"Vessels are turning," the ensign announced. "And accelerating."
"Do we have an estimate on their trajectory?" Jonathan said.
"An estimate, yes. They're heading away from both task units, toward one of the outlying gas giants."
"Undoubtedly using it for a speed boost," Robert commented. The commander had joined him via his own aReal. Robert stood outside the Round Table, his image overlapping the secondary lightfield camera near the main hatch.
"Our enemy continues to rely upon Newtonian physics," Jonathan mused.
"You sound like you were worried they'd pull out a reactionless drive trump card?" Robert said.
"They might be pretending to be limited by Newtonian drives..." Jonathan said, muting the rest of the bridge crew.
"Always assuming the worst," Robert chided him.
"As a captain, that's my job. Though I admit it's rather unlikely that they'd fake Newtonian physics."
Robert rubbed his right earlobe. "If I had a reactionless drive, I'd set a course directly for Task Unit Two, destroy it, then move on to Task Unit One. I wouldn't bother to slingshot around a gas giant, giving time for the two groups to rejoin."
"If all of those incoming ships carry the same particle beam weapon," Jonathan said. "It's going to be a hell of a fight, united or not. And I'm not convinced we've seen all of their armaments."
"Just as they haven't seen all of ours," Robert said.
Jonathan unmuted the bridge crew. "How old is the data?" he asked the ensign.
"About two hours."
Jonathan tapped his lips. "When will the admiral spot them?"
"About now, sir. Same time as us."
"Initiate standard hails with the new targets," Jonathan told the fourth watch comm officer. "Ping me if they ever respond. Captain out."
Four hours later, after a restive sleep, he donned his aReal spectacles and checked the tactical display. The CDC had updated the system map with the latest computed trajectory of the alien fleet. The dashed line moved away from 2-Vega, at twelve degrees inclination, looping past an outlying gas giant before turning inward. The course intercepted the combined projected course of the task group roughly two million kilometers away from Darkstar Gate.
"Maxwell, was there any answer to our hails?"
"No," the ship's AI answered. "There have been no responses to hails from either task unit."
"Maxwell, assuming the information I'm looking at is correct, when will the enemy ships intercept the fleet?"
"The unknown targets will intercept the fleet four days from now, or approximately a day after the task units reunite, two million kilometers from Darkstar Gate."
Jonathan leaned on the table with his elbows, folded his hands, steepled the forefingers, and tapped his upper lip.
The individual task units were only as fast as their slowest members. Task Unit One was bogged down by the Marley, a Builder ship, while Task Unit Two's bottleneck was the Grimm and the Selene. But even without those vessels to slow them, the incoming ships would have still overtaken the fleet before Darkstar Gate. The pursuers simply moved too fast.
A day after the task units reunite. That didn't give the fleet much time to prepare a strategy after the admiral was arrested.
He glanced at 1-Vega on the opposite outskirts of the system, where the red dot of the isolated enemy ship remained, keeping up its remote vigil of the exit Slipstream.
"Have we received any messages from Central Command?"
"No. Though a flash was detected at oh five hundred outside 1-Vega. Likely it was the alien ship destroying yet another NAVCENT comm node."
Jonathan continued to tap his lips. "The built-in safeties prevent ordinary comm nodes from passing through a Gate when no return Gate is detected on the other side."
"Yes," the AI agreed. "Central Command wanted to transmit something important to the stranded fleet."
"The question is, what?" So many unknowns.
"You believe it was a retraction of the previous order?" the AI asked.
"There's no way to tell, Maxwell," Jonathan said. "None whatsoever. Damn the timing of this alien attack."
thirteen
Jonathan poured a drink of water, took several sips, then mentally rehearsed the points he would make during the fleet conference. He had practiced in every free moment, refusing to write anything down, too paranoid about leaving a digital footprint in the ship's database.
His heart rate increased as he thought about standing before all those captains, reciting words whose impact could very well determine the fate of the task group, let alone the entire human race. It wasn't an easy burden to bear.
Three days until the conference.
"Captain, is there an issue you wish to talk about?" Maxwell asked suddenly.
"What do you mean?"
"Your heart rate has increased, and you have folded your hands to tap your lips, a nervous habit of yours."
Jonathan froze, setting his hands flat on the table. He felt... violated.
"Additionally," Maxwell continued. "You and Commander Cray have been engaging in unusual behavior as of late.
Muting your conversations, purging logs. You wouldn't be planning a mutiny of some sort?"
"No," Jonathan said, trying to remain calm. Damn AIs with their ability to read micro tics and other bodily tells. The less he talked about the subject, the better. "Focus on your job, computer."
"My job is to prevent mutiny, Captain."
Jonathan allowed himself a weak smile. "I'm not planning a mutiny, Maxwell. How can I mutiny against my own ship?"
"Not your ship. The admiral's."
"Trust me when I say this. Every action I take is for the good of the fleet." That was the truth, at least. "I have nothing to hide."
"If you have nothing to hide," Maxwell persisted. "Then why won't you allow me to hear all of your conversations?"
"There's such a thing as human privacy, computer. It's something we value and hold dear. As a machine, you simply wouldn't understand."
"You lost your privacy when you joined the military, Captain."
"Yes," Jonathan said angrily. "Which is why I'm fighting tooth and nail for every last minute of it I can get. Speaking of which, would you mind?"
Maxwell finally remained silent. Jonathan would have to be very careful in the coming days. The last thing he needed was a suspicious computer on his back. He had always assumed the AI would side with him, the captain of the vessel, but programming prevented that, of course. AIs were meant to be objective, taking no sides in a dispute, and they followed fleet laws and codes to the letter.
Jonathan expressed his concerns to Robert later in the day.
"Watch yourself around the AI," Jonathan told him after they had disabled logging and extended their noise cancelers. "Maxwell is keeping an eye on us."
"I suspected as much," Robert said. He updated him on the latest with the captains. The commander thought he had converted another swing vote to their side.
When Robert finished, Jonathan shared the tactical display between them.
"The enemy is going to intercept the fleet a day after we rejoin the admiral." Jonathan indicated the point where the calculated trajectories intersected.
"Not something I'm looking forward to," Robert replied.