Mira watched the Admiral glance from one Captain to the other and sigh.
“All right,” she told them, her voice calmer now. “We’ve got time, so let’s beat this till the horse stops bleeding. We’re going to do a full fleet-wide reexamination of the power grids. I am not losing a ship to a power failure!
“Second, I want every lance in the fleet recalibrated.”
Mira winced, along with the rest of the Captains. Examining Camerone’s power grid would be relatively painless, if not quick. It was a chore for bots by the dozen but didn’t require very many people.
Regulations required a human set of eyes on the calibration statistics of a positron lance. Even the lightest lance fired a beam of pure antimatter that could devastate a planet relatively quickly. Camerone alone had one hundred and forty-four positron lances. Recalibrating them all would take days.
The starfighters weren’t as big a deal. None of the little ships in the fleet were more than a year old—and recalibrating their lances was part of their regular post-flight maintenance.
“Our last update placed our Marine brigades four days out,” the Admiral continued. “We should be able to complete the recalibration in three days. It’s been a rough day for a lot of our people, so I suggest we let everyone off the hook tonight and get started in the morning.”
Mira tried not to look too relieved as she glanced at Kyle Roberts’ image in the holoconference. As the holotank slowly shut down, she realized she hadn’t managed it, as both her XO and Admiral Alstairs were grinning at her.
21:00 February 28, 2736 ESMDT
Alizon Star Guard Orbit One, Commercial Concourse
There were enough shuttles flying back and forth between all of Seventh Fleet’s ships and the main orbital platform of the Alizon Star Guard for Kyle to simply add himself as cargo to one of them. He wasn’t entirely surprised that Orbit One had picked up a number of civilian entrepreneurs selling to Alizon’s rapidly rebuilding self-defense forces—it had been built as a “civilian transfer station’.”
That “transfer station” had required less than two days’ work to transform into a fully functioning starfighter base. Within two weeks, positron lances and missile launchers hidden on the surface had been brought up and mounted into preexisting slots.
Whoever had come up with the design had been both bold and brilliant. It had enabled Alizon to be reasonably safe even when Kyle’s then-Admiral had dragged Avalon on a wild-goose chase, abandoning the system with a single Federation fighter wing and a pile of stolen and refitted Commonwealth starfighters for defense.
Since the station had passed Commonwealth inspection as civilian, however, it still had a large trade concourse in place. The empty stalls and restaurants spoke as much to the current disorganized state of Alizon’s government and economy as much as anything else.
At some point, likely while the station was under construction and trying to fool the Terrans, someone had installed a water fountain at the end of the concourse and trees along the entire center line of the two-hundred-meter mall.
Mira was standing next to the fountain, but it took him a minute to recognize her. This was actually the first date they’d managed to pull together, and he’d never seen her out of uniform. She wore a long blue dress that offset her dark skin to perfection, and he found himself frozen in place for a long moment, just staring.
Finally shaking himself, he approached her with a smile.
“I didn’t realize there was a dress code,” he told her, gesturing down at the uniform he had worn.
“Kyle, do you even own something other than a uniform?” she asked with a chuckle.
“I think I have a suit somewhere,” Kyle hedged. “It might not fit.” He stepped back from their embrace, looking at her in awe. “You are beautiful.”
“And you are a walking eyeball magnet in your uniform, so you’re doing just fine,” Mira replied. “Come on, the restaurant’s this way.”
She took his hand and led him towards one of the occupied stalls. A sign proudly announced it was the Third Charm restaurant, featuring ‘traditional Tau Ceti cuisine’.
“What’s Tau Ceti cuisine?” he asked as they approached the live human dressed in a dark burgundy suit at the front door.
“I have no idea,” his lover replied cheerfully. “It’s the only sit-down restaurant I could find that we could get to without commandeering shuttles for a date.” She stepped up to the host. “Reservation for Solace.”
The host, however, was looking directly at Kyle.
“Of course, ma’am,” he said crisply. “If you could wait here a moment?”
The host was gone for several minutes and Kyle was wondering just what was going on when he reemerged, trailing a tall dark-skinned woman with a red tattooed dot between her eyes and a chef’s hat. She almost met Kyle’s own height, and as she approached him, she swept off the hat in a deep bow.
“Captain Roberts!” she greeted him. “We didn’t know you were coming; we would have made extra preparations!”
Kyle swallowed awkwardly. “That’s not necessary,” he told her slowly.
“Alizon is free, thanks to you,” the chef—and, he was guessing, owner—replied. “Come in, come in! Mukesh, the best wine in the house! Ninette, clear the high table! We have Captain Roberts in the house!” She swung on Kyle himself. “And do not think for one moment you are paying to eat in my restaurant, Captain!”
“Let it go, Kyle,” Mira murmured in his ear. “I hadn’t thought about this, but you did save their planet, after all.”
He nodded his acceptance and followed the Third Charm’s owner in. Mira was right next to him, her hand still warm in his and bringing a smile to his face.
They were promptly seated at a table near the kitchen but out of the way of traffic, on a slight dais with an incredible view of the restaurant. The Third Charm had been extremely carefully decorated, with circular tables and wire-framed chairs that wouldn’t have looked out of place in an old movie’s Paris café’, matched with hand-woven tapestries depicting Hindu gods and scenes from Tau Ceti’s colonization.
Looking at the menu, Kyle rapidly ended up relying on his implant for translation. It was technically in English but an odd dialect with a lot of French and Hindi words added in.
“So, looking at this,” Mira told him, “Tau Ceti cuisine is what happens when a Frenchman marries an Indian woman and they’re compromising on what to feed the children.”
After poking at translations through their implants, they settled on the ‘escargot rogan josh’ for an appetizer and continued to peruse the menu.
“You know we’re going to be in different battle groups,” Mira said quietly after the waiters had moved on.
“It makes sense,” he admitted. “Split the modern warships up, we’re half again the volume and mass of the ships from the Reserve. Avalon’s our most powerful unit, too.”
“It’s going to be a busy few days with the recalibration now, too,” she sighed. “You are not permitted to die on me, Kyle Roberts. Is that clear?”
“I wasn’t planning on it,” he chuckled. “The same is true for you, you know. I need to introduce you to my mother. And my son, for that matter,” he admitted. “Apparently, his mother looked up your picture online. I’m told she approves.”
It was Mira’s turn to chuckle.
“You should have seen the twenty-two-minute-long loop of exclamation and shock my sister sent me back when I told her,” she replied. “I’m not entirely sure she breathed.”
Kyle smiled, but he also understood why she’d raised the topic.
“We probably won’t manage to get together again before we move out,” he acknowledged aloud. “We’ll survive, though. Duty divides so many.”
“It does,” she nodded. “For tonight, however, I must point out that this station has more than one entrepreneur aboard—and one of them has opened what I’m told is a very nice hotel.” Her hand sneaked across the table to settle on his. “Suffice to say I h
ave a room booked and nearly ten hours before I need to be back on ship. Let’s take what time we have.”
He lifted his glass in a silent toast of agreement.
9
Alizon System
12:00 February 29, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
DSC-078 Avalon, Bridge
“We have Alcubierre emergence signatures,” Xue reported. “I have four signatures and they are on schedule for Suncat and her companions.”
Kyle studied the emergence signatures on the screen. Suncat herself was a thirty-million-cubic-meter, twelve-million-ton carrier—effectively an Ursine-class ship like Polar Bear or Grizzly built under license. The two strike cruisers accompanying her—Excelsior of the Thorn Defense Force and Voltaire of the Sebring Space Navy—were home-built ships of a similar technological pedigree.
The fourth ship was a Federation vessel, a Myth and Truth–class mobile shipyard intended to bring those three ships up to the same specifications as the Reserve ships assigned to Seventh Fleet. The addition of the Basilisk and Toad had caused the delay in Suncat’s arrival. No one had wanted one of the incalculably valuable mobile shipyards flying unescorted.
“Looks like we’re the closest,” Kyle observed. There was no point in calibrating Seventh Fleet’s energy weapons without test-firing them, which required enough safety distance that the Fleet was spread out around the system. “Take us over to say hi and hail them for me.”
His bridge team was used to his idiosyncrasies by now, and Maria Pendez, his chief navigator, started the ship moving even as the com officer linked Avalon to Suncat—via a quantum-entanglement switchboard in the Castle system.
“Welcome home, Captain Larue,” Kyle said quietly as the channel opened, and the space-black face of the only surviving starship captain of the Alizon Star Guard appeared on his screen. “It’s good to see you and Suncat where you belong.”
“It’s good to be back,” Kojo Larue rumbled back at him. “And the welcome committee is fitting as well. I must thank you, Captain Roberts, for all you have done for my people—all that fate would not permit me to do.” He clasped his hands together and bowed over them.
Kyle nodded, acknowledging the bow as non-awkwardly as he could. Captain Larue had been the senior officer of the Star Guard and able to do whatever he wanted with his ship. His ship had been desperately needed where it was, and would also have been insufficient against the defenses Avalon had encountered in the system.
“Rear Admiral Alstairs will want to speak with you as well,” Kyle warned Larue. “So will President Ingolfson.” There was, after all, no way the senior survivor of the Star Guard was going to stay a Captain longer than it took Alizon’s president to find him and pin a set of Admiral’s stars on him.
Larue’s resigned expression suggested he’d made the same assessment Kyle had.
“Of course,” he allowed. “Our presence, I hope, is sufficient to allow you to liberate other systems as you did mine, Captain Roberts?”
Kyle glanced around his bridge. Everyone here was cleared on Rising Star, though the intended launch date was still being kept somewhat quiet. Larue needed to know though
“Operating Rising Star will kick off as soon as our Marines arrive, Captain Larue,” he told the other man. “We’re going back and we’re kicking the Commonwealth off our worlds.”
“With you at the heart, I do not think they will know what hit them,” the black giant on Suncat’s bridge said with a bright grin. “And other worlds will know the Stellar Fox as we do. We will speak before you leave, Captain Roberts, but may God go with you in all your travels.”
Kyle hated that nickname, but somehow it was less offensive coming from Larue than the news media.
“May the Gods walk with you as well, Captain.”
16:00 March 1, 2736 ESMDT
BC-129 Camerone, Shuttle Landing Bay
Mira Solace eyed the camera team she’d been ordered to allow on her ship more than slightly askance. She understood why the heavily jowled blond President next to her wanted this recorded, but she’d wanted to have her own public relations people do the recording.
The shuttle bay they stood in was hardly a classified portion of the battlecruiser, but she still didn’t trust the news people not to screw up something.
But President Ingolfson had wanted this recorded and broadcast to all of Alizon, and Admiral Alstairs had signed off on it. Which left Captain Mira Solace standing with those two worthies and Admiral Kojo Larue, waiting for her boyfriend’s shuttle to arrive.
With a band.
As the shuttle drifted slowly in to a safe landing, she wondered what he was making of it. All she’d been allowed to tell him when she’d asked him over was that they were having an in-person staff meeting with the Star Guard’s new Admiral.
Nonetheless, the shuttle door opened as soon as the area had cooled down, and Kyle Roberts’ massive frame was suddenly visible in that exit.
The band struck up as soon as they saw him, the spirited trumpets of “Alizon Triumphant” ringing across the shuttle bay as Kyle slowly stepped forward. He met Mira’s gaze with an arched eyebrow, and she smiled. She suspected his opinion of Alizon’s adulation of him, but he was taking it in stride.
Her opinion was that it had to be directed at either him or Vice Admiral Tobin, and since Tobin was in a jail cell awaiting shipment back to Castle, it landed on Kyle. Both Alizon and the Federation needed him to smile and take it.
Which was exactly what he proceeded to do. Carefully giving the camera crew his best profile, he walked down the carpet Ingolfson’s people had laid on her shuttle bay deck and approached the Admirals and President.
“Ma’am.” He greeted Alstairs with a crisp salute, then turned to the Alizonis. “Sirs.” He saluted again. He gave Mira a firm nod, but she hoped the camera hadn’t caught the softening of his eyes when he met her gaze.
“Captain Roberts,” the Rear Admiral greeted him. “As I suspect you’ve guessed, there is more going on than a staff meeting. I don’t believe you’ve actually met Kenneth Ingolfson, President of the Alizon Republic?”
“I have not,” Kyle confirmed. His expression appeared bemused to Mira, but he shook the President’s offered hand.
“Captain Roberts,” Ingolfson said calmly. “I’m sure you have wondered at the lack of full gratitude from the government of the Alizon Republic. You saved our world, after all.”
“You seemed busy,” the big Captain demurred, and Mira caught at least one choked-off chuckle from the media contingent.
Maybe the reporters weren’t all bad.
“The biggest constraint, Captain, was that we had neither an Admiral of the Star Guard nor a fully reconstituted Congress. In the absence of both, my options were limited as to how we could honor you—and those options did not appear appropriate.
“Now, however,” the President continued, “Admiral Larue has returned to us and been properly promoted as the senior officer of the Alizon Star Guard. Now, with the permission of the current Provisional Government of the Alizon Republic, he has something for you.”
Larue was a big man, matching Kyle in almost every dimension and with skin and hair black as deep space. He seemed more…intense than Kyle too, and Mira found him mildly unnerving.
“Captain Kyle Roberts,” he said formally. “Kneel, please.”
Kyle obeyed, taking a single knee on the carpet runner.
“By the authority vested in me by the people, the Republic and the government of Alizon, as senior officer of the Alizon Star Guard, I hereby bestow upon you the Diamond Nova of Honor.”
Larue produced a gold medal on a black ribbon from a box the President handed him. Mira caught enough of a look to see the supernova carefully inlaid into the front in small diamond chips. In another context, it would probably be gaudy—but it was also Alizon’s highest award for valor.
“Please accept the Nova both on your own behalf and on behalf of your crew and pilots who fought bravely and victoriously to fre
e our system from the Terran occupation.
“While Alizon is free, your deeds will not be forgotten.”
10
Alizon System
18:00 March 1, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
BC-129 Camerone, Flag Conference Room
While Alizon’s medal-awarding ceremonies were thankfully brief, by the time the President and his media people were done with Kyle, he felt like a wrung-out dishrag—and then discovered there actually was still an in-person captains’ meeting taking place aboard Camerone.
The advantage to dating the flagship’s captain was that he had somewhere to store the gaudy atrocity the Alizonis had given him and didn’t have to wear the thing into the conference. He’d also stolen a shower and was feeling almost human when he sat down in the big conference room on the battlecruiser’s flag deck.
It was a small gathering, just Rear Admiral Alstairs and her twelve warship captains. The room was big enough that they only occupied the bottom tier of the four-tier amphitheater-style space. Alstairs stood in the center, looking at each of her people in turn as they settled in to see what was going on.
“While part of this meeting was an excuse to get Captain Roberts where President Ingolfson could successfully ambush him,” Alstairs admitted to a muted chorus of chuckles, “I also wanted to get us all together, face-to-face, at least one more time before we kick off Operation Rising Star.”
Tired as he was, that got Kyle to straighten up and pay attention. The high-level plan for Rising Star had been bounced back and forth between the captains and Alstairs’ staff for a while now, so all of the captains knew the plan. More detailed plans were dependent on which ships were assigned to which attacks.
Avalon Trilogy: Castle Federation Books 1-3: Includes Space Carrier Avalon, Stellar Fox, and Battle Group Avalon Page 70