The rules around that export were strict, though. Badgers were a Class Two military export, with a relatively loose list – Excelsior couldn’t sell them to the Commonwealth, or to any system or star nation currently on a watch list. Class Ones were for sale to allies only. The Typhoon, the current Class One export ship, was still a perfectly functional starfighter for being ten years out of date. Excelsior was only permitted to sell Typhoons to members of the Alliance. Cobras, being the Federation’s current front-line starfighter, weren’t cleared for sale to anyone without direct Senate sign off.
“I don’t know what Excelsior was making off a sale,” Randall said, “but Larson’s chunk of each was enough to buy me, Liago, and a bunch of other guys,” he shrugged. “We controlled Avalon’s MPs, the surveillance systems, everything.”
“How did you hide the starfighters going missing from the flight crews?” Kyle asked, curious. Every flight crew he’d ever known was obsessed with their ships.
“I guess the ‘hero of Ansem Gulf’ never served on a backwater posting like this, have you?” Randall asked bitterly. “We had new flight crews coming in every week, old flight crews going out even more often. We always had an extra squadron of birds, and an excuse to re-arrange squadrons. A little bit of switching people between flight decks and squadrons, and no one notices that starfighters are being replaced.”
“You couldn’t hold this façade up forever though,” Kyle noted. “Sooner or later, an inspector would come through, or Avalon would be either called up or scrapped – or, hell, just Larson being replaced would have brought all of this out.”
“Thought the same thing myself,” Randall admitted. “It took a year before Larson let me in on his endgame – if it ever came out, or after we ran out of real ships to sell, the plan was to steal Avalon. Captain Riddle was a non-entity, and we owned the MPs and the armory. Anytime we wanted, we’d seize the ship and fly off.”
Kyle couldn’t help but stare at the Commander in shock. The sheer brazen audacity of the plan was mind-boggling. Even old and obsolete as Avalon was, she was still a Federation Deep Space Carrier, which put her light years beyond the ships available if they’d taken her, say, further rimward from the Federation.
“We were out of starfighters other than Badgers and were about ready to run when Larson learned about the refit plan,” Randall told them. “He wanted the new guns, the new fighters – and he wanted the refit ship.”
“With the old Avalon, we could have made ourselves the supreme mercenaries in rimward space,” the prisoner continued, a fiery enthusiasm lifting his voice. “With the refitted carrier, the Falcons, and a refit ship to give us the core of a new industry? Larson meant to found a new empire, and Liago and I would have stood at his right hand.”
With a sigh, Randall slumped.
“Then Blair came in like the goddamn Inquisition,” he said quietly. “Arrested half of our people for other offenses – transferred the other half out-system. Suddenly, we had no manpower. Larson was on the station, where we barely trusted anyone. Some of the folks we’d been bribing were getting nervous. Some of the folks we’d been threatening or blackmailing were getting hopeful.”
“Once you arrested me,” Randall shrugged. “Larson had to act on his threat to Stanford, or the whole house of cards would come tumbling down as people called his bluff. Of course, that’s what happened anyway, and he ate a bullet for his troubles.”
“I’m going to need names, Randall,” Khadem told him firmly. “Who you were dealing with at Excelsior. Who’s left of your little conspiracy on the ship. Everyone involved in this mess.”
“If you’re really co-operative,” Kyle reminded him cheerily, “we might even say enough nice things to the Court Martial to get your sentence under half a century.”
Randall glared at him.
“You’re an asshole, Roberts,” he said resignedly. “I’ll give you what you want, I don’t want a bullet ‘tween the eyes. Hell, I can even give you Larson’s blackmail files – see who you can nail of those guys.
“You’ve killed my dreams of wealth and empire, and I’m enough of a bastard to want to kill a whole bunch of other folks’ dreams on my way down.”
7
New Amazon System, Castle Federation
11:15 August 4, 2735 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
DSC-001 Avalon – Main Infirmary
“Well, Flight Lieutenant, I have good news,” Surgeon-Commander Pinochet said cheerfully.
Michelle Williams was back in uniform and feeling better than she had in over a year. She’d been back on Avalon for four weeks now, seeing Pinochet for counseling sessions every day, and she’d even managed to get a haircut. Her black hair now hung to her shoulders, a neat, functional, cut that could be easily worn under a helmet and pushed aside to allow access to the datajack under her left ear.
“What’s the news, Doctor?” she asked softly.
“I met with Wing Commander Roberts and Flight Commander Stanford this morning,” Pinochet told her. “As of the end of this meeting, you are officially reinstated to active duty. These sessions have gone well and you’ve got back on an even keel far faster than I expected, especially given how long everything was neglected.”
The pilot didn’t leap to her feet in joy, but it was a struggle for a moment. During her exile aboard the Reserve Flotilla Station, she’d barely spent any time in space. Finding out, on her return to Avalon, that she was grounded until she got her issues squared away had been frustrating.
“You will,” Pinochet continued, her tone sharper, “still be required to meet with me for twice weekly sessions. We’ve made immense progress, my dear, but your mind and heart aren’t healed yet. Do you understand me, young miss?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Michelle replied crisply. “Thank you,” she continued, more quietly. “I was starting to think, well, that I was going crazy.”
“My dear, if it takes me four weeks of chemical, nanite, and talk therapy to get your head back on straight, you were going crazy,” Pinochet told her bluntly. “We’re done with the first two, thank God, but let me know if you have any issues or concerns, all right? We’re booked in for your next appointment in four days, but you’re on a priority list that the ship will let through to me at any time of day or night. If you need me, do not hesitate. Understand?”
“Yes, ma’am,” the younger woman repeated. “When do I get back to work?”
“You have a meeting with Stanford in his office at noon,” Pinochet told her. “Your implants should be updating with your new schedule now.”
As the doctor was speaking, Michelle ‘heard’ the soft ping she’d long ago associated with a data update to her in-head computer. A quick skim of the data, in a blink of an eye, confirmed that she was back on active flight duty, and assigned to Stanford’s squadron. The meeting with the Flight Commander was on her schedule, but nothing later than that.
“We’re done here,” Pinochet continued. “I’ll see you in a few days. Good luck, Michelle.” The doctor offered her hand.
Flight Lieutenant Michelle Williams took it with a smile.
Williams was early for her appointment with Commander Stanford, arriving easily ten minutes before she was supposed to be meeting with Avalon’s senior squadron commander. Nonetheless, as soon as she arrived at the door to his office, it slid open for her and the pale-haired officer waved her in.
She hadn’t been in Stanford’s office since returning to the carrier, and was surprised to realize that it was the same office he’d been in before. Being the senior squadron commander, Stanford should have been able to move into Randall’s old office, which was much larger.
This office, though, seemed to fit her new commander like a well-worn glove. The Flight Commander had served on Avalon for two years now, and the office showed it in the peculiar organization of the files and screens. Nothing was quite the way regulation would have it, with desk screens forsaken in favor of using the entire wall-screen as a working space.
&
nbsp; As Williams entered the office, she caught a glimpse of what looked like her file on the wall, then Stanford wiped the wall to a view of outside Avalon with a sweep of his hand. Turning to her, he offered his hand.
Michelle returned the gesture with a firm handshake and nod, wondering once again how short the Commander was – she’d forgotten over the last year that she over-topped Stanford by an easy fifteen centimeters.
“Please, Flight Lieutenant, have a seat,” he instructed. He watched her carefully as she obeyed, clearly taking in her cleaned up appearance and ease of motion. “It’s good to see you looking better,” he said softly. “I’m sorry.”
“It wasn’t your fault, boss,” Williams told him. “They say I owe you my life.”
Stanford made a throwaway gesture. “A lot of people were involved in that,” he said quietly. “I should have acted a year ago, and to hell with Randall or Larson.”
The younger pilot shook her head. “Without someone other than those two on station, I don’t think that would have ended well for either of us,” she told him. “Let’s leave the past in the past, Commander,” she continued. “We have a job to do.”
Stanford visibly shook himself.
“So we do,” he agreed. “The CAG has shaken up the squadrons quite a bit,” he told her. “I’ve taken charge of Alpha Squadron, and about a third of my personnel are from the two squadrons Roberts brought from Alamo. You’ve been slotted into my squadron structure since we did the reorganization.”
“You’re assigned as the pilot for Alpha Six,” he concluded. “You’ll be in our second flight, flying under Flight Lieutenant Pritchard. I know you’re senior enough for your own flight,” Stanford told her, “but you’ll forgive us for wanting to ease you in at least a little bit.”
“I understand, sir,” Williams said calmly. She hadn’t been senior enough to lead a four ship flight – the combat sub-unit of a fighter squadron – before her exile to the Reserve Station. She hadn’t even considered the possibility of commanding one on her return to active duty – and now she did consider it, she was glad she was being ‘eased back in’.
“In that case, let’s introduce you to your crew,” Stanford told her. His eyes made the small sideways flicker of someone accessing implant data, and then he smiled at her. “They actually just arrived, their timing is perfect.”
Behind Michelle, the door slid open and a man and woman, both with the two silver carets of Junior Lieutenants. The woman’s carets were over a silver cannon, marking her as Michelle’s gunner, where the man’s were over a wrench, marking him as their engineer.
“Flight Lieutenant Williams, meet Junior Lieutenants Hans Garnet and Christine Devereaux,” Stanford introduced them.
Michelle eyed them for a moment. Garnet was a black man of her own height with a shaven head and a physical pudginess not quite at the limit of regulation. Devereaux, on the other hand, was taller than Michelle and whipcord thin, with blond hair and a feminine athleticism that would have intrigued her were the woman not her subordinate.
“Mr. Garnet, Ms. Devereaux,” Michelle greeted them. “I look forward to working with you.”
“I suggest you take some time and get to know each other,” Stanford told them. “You are booked for an all-squadrons drill at thirteen hundred hours.”
Williams glared first at her squadron commander, and then at her implant clock.
“In that case, sir, as you say – we should take some time.”
In forty five minutes, after all, she was going to have to lead this pair into simulated combat in front of the entire flight group.
New Amazon System, Castle Federation
13:00 August 4, 2735 ESMDT
DSC-001 Avalon – Flight Deck
There weren’t enough simulators aboard Avalon for all forty-eight of her starfighter crews to be in them simultaneously – an oversight corrected in later designs, but there’d never been enough space to retro-fit any more into the first carrier.
Fortunately for the ability of the carrier’s fighter group to train as one body, the starfighters themselves could be used as simulators. Stanford watched from the deck next to his own Falcon as the crews climbed into their ships.
He spotted Michelle at her fighter’s dock, only five away from his own Alpha One, and made a point of picking out the other squadron commanders. He did not, however, see Wing Commander Roberts anywhere.
At least, not until his giant of a CO slapped a meaty hand on his shoulder.
“How you feeling this morning, Michael?” Roberts demanded cheerfully.
“Good, sir,” Stanford replied hesitantly. “The Group is shaping up well.”
“I agree,” the big Commander told him. “Which means it’s time to start throwing wrinkles into the mix.”
“Sir?”
“My crew and I will be taking over the OpFor for this exercise,” Roberts told Stanford. “Unless I misread my chain of command this morning, that puts you in command of SFG-001.”
“Good luck,” the Wing Commander finished with a wicked grin.
With another boisterous clap on Stanford’s shoulder, Roberts walked off towards Avalon’s Starfighter Control Center.
Stanford looked after him for a long moment, then turned back to the ladder, meeting his gunner’s gaze.
“What do we do, boss?” the younger man asked.
“Get in and jack in,” Stanford ordered. “Then we show the CAG we’ve been paying attention in school.
New Amazon System, Castle Federation
13:10 August 4, 2735 ESMDT
SFG-001 Alpha Six – Falcon-type starfighter
For the first time in months, Michelle took her seat at the center of the small cockpit of a starfighter. Behind her, Deveraux sat on her right and Garnet was on her left. All three of the seats were recliners, easily set to whatever was most comfortable – once jacked into the neural interface, you weren’t very aware of your body. While the starfighter had a small bunkroom and kitchenette for long flights, combat could require as many as five or six hours jacked in – and completely unmoving.
After a fight or intense simulation, that reclining function was often the only reason starfighter crews could walk.
“You know, Lieutenant,” Deveraux said quietly as they all reclined back, “if you’re feeling rusty, I can fly us. I’ve been checking out on the simulator, I almost have the hours to apply for a switch to pilot track.”
Michelle pursed her lips, knowing the gunner couldn’t see her. The offer was probably genuine, but it was also a subtle undercut to her authority – after all, if the gunner could fly the fighter, why was the pilot in command.
“How many simulator hours do you have?” she asked after a moment.
“Two hundred and eighty-three,” Deveraux answered with pride, and Michelle smiled.
The gunner was telling the truth – with three hundred simulator hours in under a year, she could apply for a transfer to pilot, and it might even be granted. For now, though…
“I have four hundred in the last six weeks,” Flight Lieutenant Michelle Williams told her subordinate gently. “Over four thousand total, and fifteen hundred live flight hours. Your offer is appreciated, but unnecessary.”
“Jack in,” she ordered.
As the chair’s systems extended the leads that connected to her flight suit, Michelle smiled to herself. From the moment she’d been brought aboard Avalon she’d scraped every hour of simulator time her ‘invalid’ status would allow her. She was grateful for the practice, as it made the Falcon feel like a familiar warm blanket as the leads jacked home, and her mind slipped into the computers.
“Garnet, check the simulator interlocks,” she ordered over the starfighter’s internal net. She could feel the flight deck around her, the Falcon’s sensors feeding directly to her brain.
“The Deck Techs should have done that,” the Junior Lieutenant complained, though the net told her she was obeying.
“Do you want to be the fighter that accidentall
y fires the engines or – stars forbid – the positron lance because the simulator lock-outs failed?” she asked rhetorically. Firing the starfighter’s antimatter engines for even a fraction of a second would make a mess of the flight deck – firing the fifty-kiloton-a-second main gun would gut the carrier.
Of course, with the fighter’s zero point cells disabled and the little ship running on ship-fed power, that shouldn’t be possible. But it had happened. Once. That was more than enough.
“Interlocks confirmed,” Garnet responded after a few seconds. “All systems are disabled, control input is feeding to the simulation. We are cleared to enter the sim.”
A single thought-command from Williams later, the starfighter was suddenly in deep space. The other forty-seven fighters of Starfighter Group Zero Zero One surrounded them, but beyond the starfighters, local space was empty.
They weren’t the last into the sim, she noted, watching as more ships lit up slightly on one of her mental displays. Easily twenty seconds passed after Alpha Six’s arrival until the entire Group was fully jacked in.
“All right everyone, this is Wing Commander Roberts,” a voice said directly in her ear. “Flight Commander Stanford will be leading the group for today’s exercise. I am commanding the Opposing Force, which will be arriving… now.”
A massive burst of blue Cherenkov radiation announced the arrival of a starship exiting Alcubierre-Stetson drive, and then Michelle swore aloud.
Emerging from the blue starburst was the massive bulk of a Commonwealth Resolute-class battleship.
8
New Amazon System, Castle Federation
13:12 August 4, 2735 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
SFG-001 Alpha Actual – Falcon-type starfighter
Stanford stared at the immense bulk of the battleship for a long moment. The warship was a thousand meters from her rounded prow to the flat edge of her engines, with the smooth lines of her oval hull swelling to a three hundred meter bulk at her center of mass.
Avalon Trilogy: Castle Federation Books 1-3: Includes Space Carrier Avalon, Stellar Fox, and Battle Group Avalon Page 8