The Rampant Storm

by J. Alan Field

  “Negative, sir. It’s from a heavy cruiser, ID’d as the Commonwealth vessel Morrigan.” Barzilli’s head snapped around to Maxon, but the Fleet Admiral coolly stared forward.

  “Play it, Lieutenant,” said Maxon.

  “Transferring to your personal viewer, Admiral.”

  “No, Lieutenant—put it on the big screen,” Maxon said.

  On a large holoscreen appeared the image of a disheartened Massimo Ferraz, his eyes downcast. Slowly, he looked up at the camera.

  “Admiral Maxon, this is Captain Ferraz, commanding the Commonwealth cruiser—the cruiser Morrigan. Hello, Channa.”

  Maxon, Choi, Carson, Barzilli, Ferraz—they had all been in the vanguard of Victor Polanco’s People’s Rebellion, a coup d’état perfumed with flowery rhetoric and symbolism to make it seem like something more noble that one man’s grab for power. Those were great times four years ago, thought Maxon as she stared at the crestfallen face of Ferraz. How the hell did we get to where we are now?

  Ferraz continued, searching to find the words to express himself. “Channa—Brin is… Admiral Choi is dead.” Maxon showed no outward reaction, knowing that her entire staff was watching.

  “She was killed in an explosion in Beresford,” said Ferraz. “I think she was assassinated, but the details are still murky.” He took a deep breath, clearly relieved that he had gotten through the most difficult part of his message. “As captain of the Morrigan, I am going to withdraw the ship from the field. We’re allowing the Gerrhans in the crew to disembark, but most of my people are still the Sarissans that Choi brought with her two years ago.

  “These people have been through a lot, and they deserve better than to die for… hell, truth is, I don’t know what they would be dying for. I’m responsible for them now, and I’m going to protect them. As soon as possible, we’re leaving this system for—someplace. Maybe we’ll head for Olybria or Essadon—anywhere we can trade in our uniforms for civvies.”

  Ferraz stopped speaking, fumbling for a way to end the message. “Brin was always scheming, always plotting her next big grab for power. I’m sorry it had to happen, but we both knew it would end this way for her. Anyway… Ferraz out.” He started to punch a key to end the recording but halted. “Oh, and Channa, for what it’s worth, regarding the Gerrhans—it’s lions led by donkeys on this side. The Commonwealth enlisted people are good, but their leaders are clueless morons. May the Many Gods be with you.” His face faded from the screen.

  Channa Maxon had not moved, not reacted during the entire Ferraz message. Now she simply leaned further back in her chair and crossed one leg over the other. Barzilli leaned close to the Fleet Admiral for a private word.

  “Why do you suppose Massimo came back to her?” he asked.

  Maxon looked his way and gave a small sigh. “For the same reason I was with her, Hector—he loved her.”

  The captain gave her a sympathetic look and nodded. “You know,” continued Barzilli in a low voice, “if there was an explosion, Casca may have died along with Choi. That would be very handy for us. It would cover a lot of tracks.”

  “That thought had crossed my mind,” said Maxon. “When you have time, tap into the Gerrhan Nets and see if you can find out what happened.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” acknowledged the captain.

  * * * *

  Twenty minutes into the operation, the main Commonwealth fleet was standing pat.

  “We’ve caught them with their pants down—they don’t know what to do,” crowed a confident Barzilli.

  “No, it’s not that,” said Maxon. “They’re waiting for reinforcements. Ordinarily, they would have called on their fleet in Dijana, but Sykes has them occupied. Now they’re trying to scramble assets from the Leopold system, but we’ll have both Gates soon. Once Tovar and Pettigrew take the Gates, it will be weeks before they can mount any kind of counterattack. By then, we’ll be entrenched and the planetary blockades will be in place.”

  Captain Hamilton saw it at his station before anyone on the flag bridge noticed, his image materializing next to Maxon. “Admiral Maxon, do you see what’s happening at the Zephyros Yard?”

  Carson’s Strike Force Charybdis was almost within energy weapon range of the Commonwealth shipyard now, the immense structure hanging above the blue gas giant Zephyros. Three Union frigates, a destroyer, and a cruiser preceded Carson’s battleship. They had taken out the four enemy garrison ships, but not without significant damage to the frigates Iria and Hecate. The force was now turning its weapons on the facility itself.

  “What the hell?” said a perplexed Maxon. “The battleship and cruiser have the shields, they should be leading the attack. What is Carson doing?”

  “Admiral, my concern is for what’s emerging from the shipyard,” said Hamilton.

  It was a Gerrhan battleship. The computers on Maxon’s flag bridge identified it as the Bonaparte, one of the largest ships in the Commonwealth Space Service. The massive vessel was sliding out of a shipyard work bay as one of Carson’s frigates, the Iria, strayed too close. Three wide particle beams sprang from the port side of the battleship, slicing through the Iria’s modest armor. The frigate staggered, lost helm control, and began spinning out of control before it smashed into the side of the station.

  “Damn it!” yelled Maxon as she and her staff watched the action via recon drones released into that part of space. The Fleet Admiral jabbed at a key on her command chair. “Admiral Carson, this is fleet command, do you copy?”

  A virtual screen materialized near Maxon. “Carson here.”

  Maxon dialed back some of her ire before continuing. “Admiral, why is the Charybdis not in the forefront of your attack? Your two shielded ships should be leading the charge, protecting the ships without shields.”

  Carson looked flustered. “Admiral, Charybdis and Kaiju are the most valuable assets of this strike force. It would be unwise to expose them to unnecessary danger.”

  You mean it would be unwise to expose yourself to unnecessary danger, don’t you, Alexander? She finally understood.

  “Ma’am,” said one of the staffers, “the enemy battleship is maneuvering to put itself on an attack vector for Charybdis.”

  “Admiral Carson,” she said firmly. “You will move Charybdis to engage the enemy battleship advancing on you. That is a direct order. Maxon out.” Carson started to protest but was cut off as the screen disappeared.

  Bonaparte gained speed now that it was free from the shipyard and began a wide swing around the station. While the Gerrhan ship was picking up velocity, the Union force was repositioning. Carson had ordered his four other remaining ships to form a box formation in front of his vessel. As the ships slid into position on the tactical display, Maxon tried unsuccessfully to contact Carson again.

  “The Gerrhans are probably jamming our signals,” ventured Barzilli.

  “Then how are we still receiving data from the recon drones?” asked Maxon.

  “The drones use tight beam lasers to transmit their signals, ma’am,” answered a staffer.

  “Then get me a tight beam channel to the Charybdis!” fumed Maxon.

  Virtual Dusty Hamilton reappeared. “Admiral, I don’t believe there is any crew aboard that Gerrhan battleship.”

  “Computer controlled?” she speculated, as Hamilton nodded his head in the affirmative. She considered the situation and it made sense. If the ship were in for repairs, the crew would have disembarked. In a system with two inhabited worlds, there would be no reason to keep a crew on the station while work was ongoing. The Bonaparte’s company was most probably dirtside.

  “My guess is that someone aboard the station ordered the Bonaparte’s AI to take the ship out,” explained Hamilton.

  Barzilli wasn’t convinced. “I could see if they were trying to save the battleship, but if they were doing that, the ship would be headed away from our strike force. We all know AI’s can’t fight worth a damn.”

  It was the reason human crews were still aboard warship
s. Ship computers could do amazing things, but they still had not been developed to the sophistication necessary to outwit most human commanders in a tactical battle situation. Perhaps computer science would be farther along today if it hadn’t been disrupted so badly during the period of the Diaspora. However, for much of the twenty-third century, humankind’s main goal had been survival, not science.

  “I don’t think the enemy battleship is going to try to engage Charybdis,” said Hamilton in a dire tone.

  Maxon grasped Hamilton’s meaning. “It’s a suicide attack. Bonaparte is making a kamikaze run at Charybdis.”

  “My Gods,” Barzilli said. “Shields are meant to stop missiles, not something the size of a battleship!”

  “Do we have that laser link established with Charybdis yet?” asked Maxon to anyone who might answer.

  A lieutenant commander spoke up. “No ma’am. Our strike force is relatively close to the gas giant now, and there is a lot of natural debris in orbit around Zephyros—millions of small chunks of ice. It’s interfering with our direct sight comms. The recon drones are farther away, so they’re not being affected.”

  “So what you’re telling me is that we can watch but can’t communicate with the strike force.”

  “Not in FTL, ma’am.”

  As the Gerrhan battleship swung around the shipyard, the five ships of Carson’s force launched a series of missiles, some of them aimed at the enemy vessel and others at the shipyard facility. The Sarissan force and the Gerrhan ship danced around the spacedock while explosions ripped through the structure. Sections of the station started to break off and drift into space. One large piece of wreckage came perilously close to colliding with the Union vessel Goshawk, missing the destroyer by only meters.

  “He’s wasting his missiles on the station,” observed Hamilton. “He can get that anytime, but he won’t be alive to get it if he doesn’t stop that battleship.”

  Maxon said nothing. As she watched the battle, anger raced through her mind—anger and guilt. All the signs had been there, but she stubbornly refused to accept them. It wasn’t Alexander Carson’s intellect that made him unfit for a field command, it was his backbone. Planning a campaign was one thing, but leading ships and spacers into battle was another. The mind-numbing terror of actual combat had been a burden too heavy for more than one commanding officer to carry. Carson’s fear was suffocating his tactical genius.

  As the Bonaparte crept closer to the five Union vessels, the crumbling Zephyros Shipyard was all but forgotten. Now the Sarissan ships directed all of their fire at the Commonwealth battleship. At the same time the cruiser Kaiju released a salvo of Scion torpedoes, it was bludgeoned by four batteries of enemy particle beam cannons, which cut through Kaiju’s shields like scissors through paper. Shields were effective against missiles and torpedoes but less so against energy weapons. Multiple compartments of Kaiju gave way under the assault, and the cruiser was lucky to put some distance between it and its attacker.

  The destroyer Goshawk was not so fortunate. As Union missiles, torpedoes, and now particle beam cannons blasted away at the enemy, fire from the Gerrhan battleship was slowing. The Union battle formation having dissolved early in the engagement, Goshawk had maneuvered to a position off the enemy’s stern in an attempt to target the larger ship’s engines. At virtually the same moment the Sarissan destroyer fired six missiles at the engine ports of Bonaparte, the battleship launched a salvo of missiles from its aft tubes. Sixteen enemy projectiles slammed into Goshawk at nearly point-blank range, and the ship was vaporized.

  Charybdis and her two remaining consorts were pummeling the enemy ship now. Sarissan smart missiles targeted Bonaparte’s engines and weapons ports. Fire from the Gerrhan battleship was almost silent, save for a few intermittent and wildly aimed plasma cannon bursts. Its engines severely damaged, only inertia continued to carry Bonaparte in the direction of Alexander Carson’s flagship. At the same time, Charybdis was closing fast on the enemy vessel in order to administer a deathblow.

  As she watched the pictures transmitted from the recon drones, Channa Maxon slowly rose from her chair. “No, no, no, no, no!” she said, each ‘no’ louder than the previous one. The staff collectively looked at her, their eyes then turning toward her Chief of Staff.

  “He’s going in for the kill,” Barzilli said uneasily.

  Captain Hamilton was also standing now, watching on his tactical display several decks above on the bridge of Huntress. “If the AI was sent on a suicide mission, it’s still a suicide mission,” he said.

  “Oh, no,” Barzilli said softly as he realized what was about to happen.

  The Charybdis moved closer to finish off the enemy vessel. As Carson’s ship poured fire on the enemy from less than two hundred meters away, there was a sudden flash. The Gerrhan shipboard AI had ordered a deliberate overload of Bonaparte’s power core. Had Charybdis been further away from its adversary, it might have survived, but the Sarissan battleship was too close for even her shields to make a difference. The catastrophic explosion took both vessels to their deaths as six hundred-fifty people aboard Charybdis perished.

  Channa Maxon slowly returned to her seat. There was silence on the flag bridge. Operation Bronze Talon was barely an hour old, and already the Union had lost three ships and nearly a thousand people.

  Dusty Hamilton cleared his throat. “Admiral Carson was a good man,” he said. “He will be missed.”

  Maxon suddenly shot up and walked briskly to the center of the flag bridge. “Captain Barzilli, order Katana and Envoy to detach from Main Seventh and join the remainder of Task Force Charybdis. Captain Halvorsen of Katana will be in command. Redesignate the group as Strike Force Katana. They are to move immediately on the second shipyard at Mithra. That yard has to be destroyed, or this trip will be for nothing.”

  As the staffers slowly regained their wits, Maxon clapped her hands together. “Let’s go people, we have a war to win.” Just then, a lieutenant at a tactical watch station turned to the commander of Seventh Fleet.

  “Admiral, the Commonwealth fleet near Gerrha has begun to move.”

  “Their projected course?” asked Maxon.

  “Straight for us, ma’am.”

  28: Fire

  Heavy cruiser Tempest

  Near the Dijana hypergate

  Eupraxa System

  As starship captains go, Chaz Pettigrew was seen as a congenial skipper—but not this week. In fact, there were times during the hyperspace voyage from Varasova to Eupraxa when he was downright brutal on his crew—and himself. Drill after drill was scheduled, the heads of junior officers were bitten off with regularity, and the captain spent several sleepless nights trying to figure out where it would all go wrong once the battle started.

  There had been too many changes to Tempest during her brief stay in the Strike Base Havoc shipyard. Too many upgrades and too much new equipment—all installed within a period of forty-eight standard hours. There were new shield generators, new HUD equipment for bridge personnel, and of course, the Electromagnetic Pulse projector that was to be used against the enemy hypergate had been installed in Forward Weapons Bay Two. The captain wasn’t an engineer, but his gut told him that all of this work should have been done over the course of weeks, not days.

  He had been riding everyone hard, including himself, and he knew deep inside that wasn’t good. It was important to be ready for action, but even he realized there was such a thing as being over-prepared. To lighten the mood at one staff meeting, Pettigrew mischievously threatened to go into battle while playing his collection of ancient songs over the ship’s sound system. He jokingly proposed fighting the Gerrhans while blasting out a tune called Seven Nation Army. Many of his officers thought the title sounded like a good military song, but Sunny Nyondo had heard it and assured them it was not.

  Just before translation into realspace, Captain Pettigrew spoke to the crews of all the vessels in Task Force 19.

  “I always tell you to follow your training a
nd believe in your crewmates. That was never truer that it is today. We are jumping into the home system of our enemy, and they will surely battle us with everything they’ve got.” Originally, at this point in his remarks, he was going to ask his crews to imagine how hard they would fight to protect their homeworld from invaders, but he decided against it. He and his crew were the invaders now, and deep in Pettigrew’s mind, he wasn’t exactly comfortable with that role.

  “Fight for honor, for duty, and for the Six Worlds. Carry on, Pettigrew out.”

  The translation into realspace had been a smooth one, with Pettigrew’s ships emerging some 300,000 kilometers from the Commonwealth hypergate that connected Eupraxa with the Dijana system.

  “The ship is secured and all stations are reporting green, Captain,” reported Commander Swoboda. “Picket drones have been launched and tactical is on the main screen, sir.”

  “Very good, XO,” said Pettigrew as he watched icon after icon pop up on the holographic display, and there were a great many of them. Not only markers for the many ships of Seventh Fleet and the Commonwealth forces, but also for the dozens of commercial space stations, mining stations, science complexes, and other installations strewn throughout the system. There were also icons showing merchant vessels and other civilian traffic, most of them scampering to safety or jumping out of the system altogether.

  At the Dijana Gate, dozens of civilian vessels that had been waiting in queue to transit were now scattering. However, four ships were standing fast—two Gerrhan destroyers and two frigates were moving into battle formation.

  “Pettigrew to Task Force Nineteen. Execute immediate move to battle formation Romeo Five as planned, then proceed to the target facility at two-thirds pulse drive. Sinopa will take the point. Blackthorn, stay close to Tempest.

  “You all know the plan. When we get close to the Gate, Sinopa, Helios, Zaria, and Brigand will take out the enemy ships while Tempest fires the EMP weapon and escorts the Marines. You can bet that Gate is going into their wildfire protocols even as I speak, so let’s do this. Pettigrew out.” The captain swiveled in his command chair toward David Swoboda. “XO, time to target?”