“All right people, we have eight unknowns coming in a slow trajectory, and the Old Man wants us to make a sweep and see who they are,” he told them. “We’re going to play it nice and careful, and that makes that sweep at half a million klicks and as high a delta-v as we can turn between here and there. We are not—I repeat, not—going to try and take on eight starships with sixteen starfighters. You get me, ladies and gentlemen?”
A series of acknowledgements came back and the Vice Commodore smiled grimly. He might have his suspicions about this whole affair, but either way, his people were going to put on a good show and come back alive.
“One point six light-minutes and counting, people,” he told them. “Go.”
Any sense of acceleration would have suggested imminent failure of the six-thousand-ton starfighter’s mass manipulators, but Michael Stanford was linked into his Falcon’s computers via his own neural inputs. In a very real sense, the pilot was the little ship.
And he accelerated toward the potential enemy at five hundred times the gravity of humanity’s ancient home.
Forty-five minutes later, Michael’s squadrons were pushing six and a half percent of lightspeed relative to their targets and watching as the starships spread out into an anti-fighter formation. The formation was a bog-standard one, used by every force that had encountered starfighters repeatedly, that cleared everyone’s lines of fire.
No clue there as to the strangers’ identity. Sensor reports from his fighters were filtering back in, combining to give him a somewhat more detailed image of the ships. All eight were roughly the same mass and cubage, the roughly twelve million tons and thirty million cubic meters of the capital ships of a decade and more ago.
“Everyone go full active with sensors at our closest approach,” he ordered. “Radar, lidar, light them up and give me targeting solutions we can feed the Battle Group missiles.”
His starfighters carried blocks of quantum-entangled particles linked back to a switchboard facility in the Castle system. Since Avalon carried almost identical blocks, any message they sent via the quantum-entanglement communicators would reach her in fractions of a second, the longest delay being the length of the fiber-optic cables back home. Data Stanford fed Battle Group Seventeen could be used for immediate missile launches.
Normally, this kind of scouting was the job of automated probes, which was part of why the CAG figured his people had to have smelt the rat by now.
“Pulsing sensors…now,” his engineer reported. The starfighter shivered slightly as it unleashed enough energy to strip paint at close range, and Russell waited patiently for the beams to hit their targets and rebound.
His fighters were four seconds past their closest approach as the data came in and the computers began to crunch it. The Vice Commodore ran over it with a practiced eye. Two battleships, two carriers, four cruisers…no fighters launched except a defensive patrol—yet.
Then his computer pinged happily and dropped class identifiers onto every ship on the display. The carriers were both Ursine-class and the battleships were Hammer-class. Both of which were fifteen-year-old Castle Federation designs.
The cruisers were a mix, one Last Stand–class battlecruiser—another Federation ship—accompanied two Fearless-class Star Kingdom of Phoenix ships and a single Rameses-class Coraline Imperium strike cruiser.
Every last one of the eight warships was a starship of a member state of the Alliance of Free Stars, and as Michael watched, IFF and Q-Com arrival codes suddenly began transmitting. His computer happily changed all of the icons to green in front of his mental “eyes” and tagged each ship in turn with its name and hull number.
With a grunt, the Vice Commodore opened a direct link to Captain Roberts.
“They’re friendlies, Captain,” he said in a gracefully calm voice. “Looks like the Horus and a few friends from home.”
“That’s good to hear,” Roberts replied, his voice far too level for the stunt he’d just pulled on his crew and fighters. “It’s always nice to have friends this close to the front.”
“You realize we fooled absolutely no one, right?”
13:10 February 20, 2736 ESMDT
DSC-078 Avalon, Bridge
Kyle grinned as he received Vice Commodore Stanford’s…eloquent description of the other man’s opinion of the trick Admiral Alstairs and her Captains had agreed to pull. He took a moment to check that it was a direct, private link—there was a lot he’d put up with from the older hands and his senior officers in private—and then let the Commodore vent. In four languages.
He hadn’t even known Stanford spoke French.
“You should have at least told me, sir,” Anderson said quietly from next to his command chair. “As the exec, I should be aware of exercises like this.”
Kyle raised an eyebrow at the younger man and gestured him closer. Activating the privacy screen around his chair, he rotated to meet Anderson’s eyes.
“James, you were included on the memo Admiral Alstairs sent out,” he pointed out calmly. “All of the captains and XOs were. I know we get a lot of email, even sitting in orbit like this, and even with neural implants, it takes time to go through it all. But”—he raised a finger— “it’s your job to be on top of things. You should be bringing plans like that to my attention, not the other way around.”
Anderson looked embarrassed.
“With Solace gone, I’ve been playing catch-up since I took over,” he admitted. “My mail has not been near the top of my priorities.”
“I understand that,” Kyle told him. “And I should have realized you were that under water and backstopped you without you asking. Honestly, I’m glad we saw this now, not when a Commonwealth battle group came out of Alcubierre.”
A light flashed on his console, informing him that the Admiral was sending out an all-ships message.
“We’ll resume this,” he promised Anderson. “We both clearly still have some work to do!”
He dropped the privacy shield and looked over at the com officer.
“Put the Admiral in the ‘tank, Lieutenant Carter,” he ordered.
Rear Admiral Miriam Alstairs’ image appeared in the middle of the bridge’s main holographic display tank. Every officer in the room was linked into the computers via neural implants, but the Castle Federation Space Navy had long ago realized that a visual display was the best way to be sure everyone saw it.
“Ladies, gentlemen, as I’m sure you’re now aware,” she noted with a wicked grin that looked…incongruous… on the slim and graying older woman, “our reinforcements have arrived. I am inviting all captains, executive officers, and CAGs to report aboard Camerone for a working dinner this evening.
“I have our orders from Alliance High Command,” Alstairs told them, “and I want all of your impressions of them—new captains and old alike. Nineteen hundred hours ESMDT, people. Undress uniforms—like I said, this is a working dinner.”
The image faded, and Kyle glanced over at his XO.
“Arrange a shuttle, James,” he ordered. “It seems we and Stanford are invited to the Admiral’s party.”
19:00 February 20, 2736 ESMDT
BC-129 Camerone, Deck Two Officers’ Lounge
Captain Mira Solace, commander of the battlecruiser Camerone, was distracted to the Void and back again. She’d had several days’ notice of the Rear Admiral’s intent to host all of her newly expanded force’s senior officers, but it was also the first time she’d held complete responsibility for such an event.
Everything needed to go off perfectly. So far, it seemed to be going well. The two Imperial Lord Captains—Hendrick Anders from Gravitas and the newly arrived Ingolf Benn from Rameses—had been first to arrive. Their XOs and CAGs had found the buffet, but Anders and Benn formed a perfectly matched glowering pair of blond giants in one corner.
Anders had mellowed since the early days of Battle Group Seventeen. That seemed to have brought him down, roughly, to the new Captain’s level of discontent with a Federation officer being in ch
arge of the force.
As she scanned the room, six officers, all women, four in the dark-blue tailed jackets of the Royal Phoenix Navy and two in the dark burgundy jackets of the Royal Phoenix Space Force, entered. The senior officers of Indomitable and Courageous—fully half of the Royal Navy’s reserve ships—looked uniformly young. Like the Federation, it seemed that the Star Kingdom of Phoenix had dug deep into its junior ranks to find worthwhile officers for its re-commissioned reserve.
Admiral Alstairs was waiting for the Phoenix officers, cheerfully greeting each of them in turn as Mira matched their faces to the records in her implant, and then glanced past them to where her XO was guiding in a group of Federation officers from the new ships.
When the flag captain turned her attention back to the Admiral, the older woman was gone. Mira had a spasm of panic, glancing around for her boss, when a gentle hand fell on her shoulder.
“Breathe, Captain,” Miriam Alstairs told her softly. “You’ve done a good job, and your people have the matter in hand. Nothing is going to fall apart if you have a glass of wine and appetizer while the guests arrive. It is, after all, my party, not yours.”
“Yes, sir,” Mira said automatically, and Alstairs chuckled at her.
“Mira, Avalon’s officers have just arrived,” the Admiral pointed out. “I am no fan, I must remind you, of impropriety—and I think it would be most improper if you didn’t sneak your boyfriend into a side corridor for a solid kiss.”
Mira flushed, turning to meet the Admiral’s gaze—and realizing that Alstairs was wearing what was getting to be a very familiar wicked grin. She hadn’t thought the Admiral was even aware of her relationship with Kyle.
“I’m neither that old nor that blind, Captain,” Alstairs told her with a wink. “Shoo. Enjoy my party. Believe me that I’ll have work for you later,” she finished, suddenly entirely serious again. “This many senior brains in one room definitely has value to me.”
2
Alizon System
20:00 February 20, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
BC-129 Camerone, Deck Two Officers’ Lounge
Kyle was looking for Mira Solace as soon as he and his senior officers entered the lounge. He promptly received a gentle elbow to the side from his CAG and glared over at Michael Stanford.
The wispy blond man met his glare levelly. All three men wore the same black jacket over shipsuit uniform, but Stanford’s was piped in the blue of the Space Force instead of the two Navy officers’ gold.
“Try not to be obvious you’re in lovelorn-schoolboy mode, skipper,” Stanford murmured. “It’s embarrassing the ship.”
A steward had just handed Commander Anderson a glass of wine, and the sound of his XO almost choking on the drink nearly made up for the low blow.
“And you wouldn’t be as bad if Commander Mason was here?” he asked genteelly.
“Probably would,” the CAG agreed cheerfully. “But Kelly is at the backend of nowhere fifty light-years from here, and I’m not the Captain and the national hero, Mister ‘Stellar Fox.’”
Kyle regarded Stanford levelly for a long moment.
“I’ve been a bad influence on you,” he concluded aloud.
“Sirs,” Anderson hissed. “Admiral.”
Avalon’s Captain was used to looking down at people. Miriam Alstairs didn’t quite require him to visibly bend his head down, but the older officer was even shorter than Stanford.
“Rear Admiral.” Kyle greeted her with a crisp salute, followed immediately by his subordinates. “Avalon party, reporting as ordered.”
“It is good to see you understand the concept,” Alstairs replied sweetly. “Welcome aboard Camerone. I look forward to hearing your…unique take on our orders after supper.”
“I live to serve, Admiral Alstairs,” the captain replied carefully. He thought she was teasing him, but he didn’t know Miriam Alstairs all that well. It hadn’t, after all, been Kyle who’d disobeyed orders and taken Avalon on a wild goose chase. That had been Battle Group Seventeen’s previous commander—whose orders Kyle had obeyed without sufficient question.
“And now,” Alstairs continued, “I intend to exercise my renowned powers of subtlety and slice off Commander Anderson and Commodore Stanford to discuss their impressions of the new Templar-type starfighters the Phoenix cruisers have brought us—leaving you, Captain Roberts, to the tender mercy of my flag captain.”
While they’d been speaking, Mira Solace had arrived behind the Admiral. The smile she directed at Kyle was surprisingly shy for a woman he’d seen remain a black onyx statue while ships and worlds burned around them. He suspected his own expression was something similarly foolish.
“Chop, chop, boys,” Admiral Alstairs told Kyle’s two senior officers, then turned to the two lovers with a serious expression on her face. “You’ve got about five minutes of privacy, then dinner is starting. We’ll be busy for a while after that, and I want both of your opinions on our orders. Use what time you have.”
With that, she swept off with two overwhelmed-looking officers in tow. Solace kept smiling at Kyle and he felt his heart flip.
“This way,” she said quietly, leading him out of the lounge into a side corridor.
Five minutes together wasn’t nearly long enough for them to catch up, even after only a week completely apart. But it was enough for Mira to regain some of her equilibrium and reenter the now-crowded lounge with equanimity.
It was almost certain that someone in the crowd had noticed her and Captain Roberts entering together and drawn the correct conclusion. As far as she was concerned, they were welcome to it—there were no regulations being violated, so as long as they were moderately discreet, there was no problem.
They returned just in time, as Mira’s chief steward promptly informed the gathered guests that dinner was served. Camerone’s captain had helped put together the menu, and she was eager to see it turned into reality.
The battlecruiser’s staff of stewards had truly outdone themselves on the preparations as well. Once dinner was called, the folding barrier that had split the lounge in half slid out of the way to reveal five small six-person tables and one larger table for the Admiral herself. Each table was covered in a white tablecloth and already held steaming bowls of soup.
Avalon’s officers, as befitted the staff of the Battle Group’s former flagship, were seated at the larger table with the Admiral, her chief of staff, and Camerone’s senior officers. Politely unobtrusive stewards made sure that each of the officers ended up at the table designated for their ship.
Once everyone was seated, Admiral Alstairs stood and tapped a spoon against her wine glass to gather everyone’s attention.
“Ladies, gentlemen, herms,” she greeted them. “We have four Navies and Space Forces represented here tonight, each with their own traditional toasts and greetings for these affairs. Unlike most of you, I served in the last war—a very young, very junior officer then—but I remember the tradition we forged in the face of the enemy.”
She raised her glass.
“Spacers of the free stars, I give you liberty and the Alliance!”
When the dinner was done and the food was cleared away, Kyle knew better than to let himself sink into a food coma. He might not have the high-powered link to his in-head computer he’d had as a starfighter pilot, but even the implant capabilities his injury had left him were enough to pick up the holographic display tank hidden under the white tablecloth.
Once again, Rear Admiral Alstairs rose and commanded everyone’s attention. Avalon’s captain found the small woman’s ability to do so impressive—he could dominate a room without much effort, but he was a good foot taller than Alstairs and twice as broad. Size wasn’t everything, but it certainly helped.
“As those of you who’ve been paying attention have probably realized by now, you’re not getting away without some work this evening,” she told them all. “We have received our orders from Alliance High Command, and I intend to pick your collect
ive brains on how best to achieve them.
“First, however, I have an announcement from Alliance High Command that affects you all,” she continued. “We are, as of twelve hundred Earth Meridian today, no longer designated Battle Group Seventeen. With the addition of our reinforcements, we are now the eighth largest deployment of Alliance warships and have been appropriately re-designated.
“We are now Alliance Seventh Fleet,” Rear Admiral Alstairs told her senior officers. “I have been informed that to avoid further disruption to our chain of command, I am to remain in command of Seventh Fleet for the immediate future. Admiralties being notoriously frugal, you can guess how much of a raise that came with.”
Kyle joined in the collective chuckle that resulted.
“I have also been informed that we are intended to act as one of the Alliance’s two main offensive forces until the rest of the reserve is online and fully refitted,” she said, her voice surprisingly calm. “The other force, designated Fourth Fleet, has been tasked with retaking the systems that fell in the Commonwealth’s most recent campaign. We, for our sin of being in one of the systems the Commonwealth took in their first attack, have a different objective.”
The projector underneath the head table whirred to life, and a three-dimensional image of the section of space the Terran Commonwealth had designated the “Rimward Marches”—and the Alliance of Free Stars simply called “home.”
The front ran through the middle of the map. On one side, the immense red sphere of the Terran Commonwealth, the largest star nation in human space—and one convinced that all human space should be part of itself. On the other side, the dozen different variations of green that marked the different polities that made up the Alliance of Free Stars.
“We are here,” she noted. A single star in the middle of the three-dimensional display flashed green. Many of the stars around it were red, marked with green carats to note that they had been Alliance worlds. “Thanks to Captain Roberts”—she nodded to Kyle— “we retook Alizon from the Commonwealth. But the other five systems that the Commonwealth took in their first offensive remain in Terran hands.
Avalon Trilogy: Castle Federation Books 1-3: Includes Space Carrier Avalon, Stellar Fox, and Battle Group Avalon Page 65