by Chris Hechtl
Two hours later, the Veraxin rear admiral wasn't so certain that things had gone right at all. At least, not in Konahagakure. Apparently, they'd had a scary bit in the star system. The light carrier's captain had let a delegation of natives on board, and they had tried to take over his ship. Dozens of personnel had been killed including the captain. Equipment damage had forced them to delay in the star system to make repairs. She was still processing the report, but there was no way that force was going to go to New Horizon.
Which meant Shredder's task force. She considered how best to utilize them. What could she get away with sending them with? She wanted to have enough firepower to do the job but not deprive her of them since she would need everything in Garth.
:::{)(}:::
Two days and six hours after the Konahagakure force's return, Prowler UFN-002p returned from New Horizon and reported in. Finally, they had the intelligence they needed to do the job.
Based on the prowler's report, there were six warships and four civilian ships in the star system. There were platforms in orbit and dozens of stations of various sorts. There were even a few moon colonies.
Captain Mary-Anne pulled no punches in describing her mistake in taking her ship into the inner star system to get a good read on everything there. The enemy had picked up on the prowler and had chased them across the solar system, using their ships and small craft to push them on a series of courses away from the jump point back to B-88R. It had taken weeks to get around them, then jump out, orient, and then jump back to their return path.
Which was unfortunate since it had alerted the enemy to their presence. But, then again, an entire CruRon of Federation raiders had passed through the system in the past year. Apparently, before the warships had arrived she thought, wondering about the timing.
“We have what we need from the prowler, ma'am. There is a division of medium cruisers, nothing larger. A single CEV task force can handle it.”
“Good.”
“I recommend we have Ark Royal cover the fleet train since they are still dealing with the damage to the ship. If we swap out one of the tin cans normally assigned to that duty, then we can use them elsewhere.”
“Agreed. I don't like losing a carrier however.”
“We'll try to get her back in service as quickly as we can, ma'am,” Commander Chi'th stated.
“Understood. Order Shredder to make her final preparations now. I want her force underway before we move.”
“Aye aye, ma'am,” the staff quartermaster stated.
“What I really want to do is hit it and then move on to Finagle and then Horath fast,” the Veraxin flag officer mused. “I'd love to do a Doolittle raid. Get in and punch them hard.”
“But we don't have the forces to do the job,” Commander T'rll protested.
“I know. I noticed how strong they are when I did the research. If ONI is right, we're in for a tough fight when we do eventually get there. I don't think we can take them, even with what we've got in the pipeline and what Second Fleet has. No way.”
“We would be stirring up a hornet's nest as well, ma'am. We're doing that now.”
“True. Okay, so that's out.”
“For the moment,” Commander T'rll said with some relief in his voice.
Chapter 60
Pyrax
Federation One appeared at the B101a1 jump point smoothly and without incident. After they transmitted their IFF, they were welcomed to the star system by the fortress commander. Admiral Irons was surprised to see most of Third Fleet on hand.
"Welcome to Pyrax, Admiral Irons," Commodore Ortiz transmitted from the orbital command fortress. The admiral took a moment to recognize the voice. The commodore was up for the next promotions board. He started to say something but another voice cut him off.
“Welcome home, Admiral Irons,” Commodore V'll'RR transmitted to him. “Your escort awaits.”
Federation One was escorted into the star system by most of Third Fleet. He was amused by the proceedings.
“They could have sent more ships, Admiral,” Admiral Pashenkov said when he observed their retinue.
“Unfortunately, this is all there is,” Admiral Irons said absently.
“This?” the Neomutt admiral asked, staring at the screen and then the plot. “That's it?”
“Yes. I'm surprised they sent an escort at all. I know I'm the commander in chief, but they have better things to do then show off for me or the cameras.”
“But … but this is barely a … and you call it a fleet?” the Neo sputtered, ears flat back.
Admiral Irons nodded, pinning the Neodog with a stern look. “That we do. We just started out. We also sent forces under Admiral V'r'z'll's command east from here and more forces northeast to Admiral Subert's Second Fleet.”
“But still …”
“We're just getting started. With Bek's help, we'll win this war and keep rebuilding while also pushing into the neighboring sectors. Which reminds me, we also have a task force going into Tau sector and another preparing to move into Pi sector.”
“Shouldn't you be focused on the warfront?”
“Yes. But the forces we're sending in those directions are primarily light units. I will admit we could use the shipping that is going with them, along with the material for other purposes, but getting other star systems online and chasing out the pirates is also important. It gives us more resources and populations to draw on and denies them to the enemy.”
“And gives you more to defend, Admiral. And it stretches you thinner. It invites defeat in detail, Admiral,” the Neodog warned.
“Also good points,” Admiral Irons nodded grudgingly. “It's something we're going to have to work with and try to minimize the risks. But we aren't going to stop. And hopefully, we've started something that will spread across the galaxy and end this damn dark age they keep talking about.”
The Neodog flicked his ears and then nodded ever so slightly in response.
:::{)(}:::
Once Admiral Pashenkov took off, Admiral Irons opened a channel through the ship's tachyon array. It disrupted some of the downloads the ship was receiving, but that was fine. He had other matters to deal with. He put a call in to Phil to discuss the situation as Federation One and the other ships crossed the star system.
He was aware that the media had been made aware of his arrival. According to Protector's SITREP, the local media outlets were sending a barrage of requests for comment. Most of them were being ignored. Protector handled some by uploading a FAQ for them to use in their sound bytes.
“We've been waiting for you, Admiral V'r'z'll especially. She's been impatient to get her offensive launched. I can't say I blame her.”
“It already launched.”
“You and I know what I meant was the next step,” Phil replied testily.
“What about her side missions? Are they complete?”
“OTBP didn't have much in orbit as anticipated. They just got back a short time ago. As you know from the report from the prowler it left in B-87R, Konahagakure had only a light cruiser, transport, and destroyer picket force there. We're processing the encrypted data the prowler sent to us. All of those ships have been destroyed by the Ark Royal force though.”
“And?”
“And we're still processing it. It's encrypted. We don't have the key, and the ship didn't get a large sample. It is also out-of-date, so it's not a big priority for my computers to handle.”
“Ah. But you can identify senders and receivers?”
“That we can and did do. We also fingerprinted each ship based on our latest copy of the Horathian war book.”
“Is V'r'z'll moving on Konahagakure? Has she talked to you about it?”
“She sent the Ark Royal CLV task force to handle it when she passed through B-87R months ago. You should have seen it in the updates or you forgot about it. Given what I've heard has been packed into our ansible buffer recently, I can imagine you've got data overload.” Admiral Irons smiled sourly in agreement to that statemen
t. “I am downloading the data now. As I mentioned a moment ago, they are back and destroyed the forces in the star system. There is an incident report, however, so it is in the que.”
“Gotcha,” Admiral Irons said, checking the bridge. All seemed quiet there, which was a good thing. The helm team didn't have to get ready for a skip, which they seemed heartily grateful for.
He checked the download and grimaced. His audio conversation was eating into half the bandwidth available. That was a problem with tachyon set ups; they didn't have a lot of bandwidth to begin with.
“She reported destroying one scout and bouncing another scout a few weeks ago. A light cruiser and two couriers got away from her; though she's pretty sure her people crippled the cruiser. One light cruiser was destroyed several months ago.”
“She also reported ion trails and several captures. There are three ships with prize crews headed back to the Federation."
The admiral frowned. “When?”
“Months ago. It's in your inbox.”
“I might have missed it, or I filtered it out if it was low priority. The couriers escaped though?”
“Yes.”
He frowned. “Direction?” he finally asked.
“One up the New Horizon jump line, though they don't know if it survived to get there. The other one jumped up to Garth.”
“Frack, so Garth knows their south is threatened.”
“Exactly, unless the courier runs out of fuel along the way.”
“Don't count on it,” the admiral grumbled. He shook his head as he gamed out the scenario. “I don't think we can count on being that lucky. Not good. The duchess will press the panic button. ONI says she's married to their prime minister, so he'll take it seriously. It means more reinforcements will be coming to Garth. Quite possibly more than she and Second Fleet can handle at the moment.”
“That depends on what is sent obviously. We don't know. She's requested permission to send the prowler to Garth once it gets back from New Horizon. Yorgi approved it.”
Admiral Irons flexed his jaw. He didn't like leaving the other man behind but had no choice. Nor did he have a choice in leaving him in charge of the military. He wasn't acting president however; that fell on Moira. He worked well with her though.
He wondered again if they'd arranged this to get him out of the capital. It didn't feel like a trap however. Then again, the best traps never did.
“I don't want her to split her force. Let her send the prowler in. If she wants to send CEVs to punch out New Horizon and Hinata to cover her rear, feel free. But she's to leave a picket in the B-88R system to cover her rear. And she's to maintain contact.”
“Understood. I'll pass it on.”
“Good. I'll write it up too. It would be smart to forward deploy a CEV task force in New Horizon as a picket, but it's her call. Tell her it's her call if she wants to let a ship go there too.”
“Oh? Why would she … oh, I get it. Make the Horathians think she's headed up that direction and not to Garth? Throw them off?”
“Exactly. She'll need to scout ahead carefully. She doesn't want to run into the same roadblock Amadeus did.”
“Definitely not. She doesn't have the firepower for a capital ship exchange. She's been after me to send her a squadron of BCs.”
“You've got two available. You aren't building more. No.”
“Agreed.” Phil grimaced. “Speaking of Amadeus, you are aware of what he's up to?”
“I received the brief,” Admiral Irons replied with a nod. “I wish he'd waited until he was reinforced more heavily, but I understand his concern. Hopefully, he's not going off half-cocked again. Only time will tell I suppose.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It hasn't leaked, has it?”
“Not yet.”
“Good. We'll just forget to let people know it's happening,” Admiral Irons replied with a half-smile.
“Well, considering you are the man of the hour, people will be focused elsewhere.”
“I suppose there is some good from being in the spotlight,” Admiral Irons growled mockingly.
“Drama, drama, drama,” Phil replied.
“Ah, zip it,” Admiral Irons laughed.
:::{)(}:::
Admiral Irons wasn't surprised that the first person he met off the ship was Vice Admiral Phil Subert. Commander Garretaj was discretely in the background, but that was fine.
“Good to see you back, Admiral,” Phil replied after they exchanged salutes. “Just you?”
“Just me. The others are too scared to get off. They seem to think they'll lose their seats if they do,” he said.
“Ah,” Phil replied. “It's nice to have you back though, Admiral.”
“And it is good to be back,” Admiral Irons said as he struck his salute. “And it's good to see you. Did you get your implant updates?”
“Yes,” Phil said dubiously.
“All of them?”
“The hardware,” Phil said in a more cautious tone of voice.
“Good. That means I can finish them off, upload more keys, and initialize your A.I.”
Saul made a small sound. They looked over to him, but he waved a hand and shook his head demurringly.
"So, it's that time?" Phil asked as he returned his attention to the admiral.
"Yeah, I think you've put it off long enough."
"Okay, okay. I'll get Saul to schedule it."
"It will take an hour. I've got an hour now. Guess what?"
"You mean now?"
"Now," Admiral Irons said firmly. “Let's go get comfortable and do this.”
“Yes, sir. This way,” Phil said grumpily.
:::{)(}:::
Once the admiral was off ship and Admiral Subert had been given his updates, it seemed like he switched to high gear. Saul had everything he could do to keep up with the man. No wonder he had implants.
Within five minutes of exiting Admiral Subert's quarters, Admiral Irons had inquired about the other flag officers in the star system. They had been assembled on Command One or were en route. Another flag promotions board had sat while he'd been en route. He had reluctantly signed off on several of the appointments. One of them was Commodore X'll'RR.
He met her and initialized her implants. “Sir, what is my future assignment?”
“For the time being, you will be second-in-command here and exercise command of the mobile elements under Admiral Subert's direction.”
“Yes, sir,” the bug replied in a neutral tone of voice.
“This doesn't mean you are completely forgiven for that little peccadillo, but we understand it wasn't all you.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You will need to get along with the Bekians.” he warned. “Learn how to deal with it. You did so before the Xeno war. Practice diplomacy again.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“I know, it's like pulling teeth, or, in your cases, chitten gum plates. Get over that. Now, let's work through the list, shall we?”
And that was how it went. Saul did his best to oversee the day-to-day operations of the star system while also keeping an eye on the proceedings. Dozens of officers came to the admiral, and he initialized their implants and uploaded keys. Sometimes in small groups if possible.
By dinner time, Admiral Irons had run through over a hundred senior officers and Admiral Subert had recovered from his initialization process.
“That should do it for now. I'm going to have to do that on each of the stops on the way to Antigua I suppose, but it's worth it to get everyone up-to-date.”
“Yes, sir,” Saul replied with a nod.
“I suppose I'll have to play politician too. Protector?”
“They and the media are salivating to meet with you, Admiral.”
Admiral Irons winced theatrically, then nodded. “I figured as much,” he said in a glum voice. “How bad is the clamor?”
“In decibel levels? I'd rather not say. Fortunately, there is a vacuum between here and where they are,” the
A.I. stated.
“Cute. Well, I have to update the politicians’ keys too and Jersey, Pasha, and everyone else for that matter.”
“Yes, sir. The rest of the group will be here in twenty to thirty hours, Admiral. I'm sorry we couldn't get them all here at once. To be honest, I didn't think you could do them like that,” Saul ventured.
“Like a factory? It makes it easier I suppose,” Admiral Irons replied. “I've caught up on some of the news but not all. Did I miss anything important?”
“Nothing in the past twenty hours or so, sir.”
“Good.”
“What now, sir? Commander Protector didn't give me an updated itinerary.”
“That's because I'm more or less making it up as I go along. Trust me, he's not happy about that either,” Admiral Irons said. “You chiefs of staff like everything neat and orderly. Everything in the right place at the right time.”
“Something like that, sir.”
“I think … yeah, I think we'll hit the yard and industrial models after dinner. You can catch some downtime and I'll play ping pong.”
“Sir?”
“My way of saying I'll hit every industrial replicator I can that is in the area and upload them with engineering keys. That way you can get more ship components in the pipeline, stuff you would have to wait on from Antigua.”
“We're getting some shipments of parts from the neighboring star systems. Most of the shipments are parts we already produce, but we appreciate them.”
“I know.”
“Sir, what you intend to do, build parts we don't produce here, it will disrupt the schedule,” Saul said with a note of dismay in his voice.
“I know, and you hate that,” the admiral teased. “But, it isn't as bad as you think because we're going to expand. You said this place is near saturation. Well, we are going to change that.”
“Sir?”
“You heard me. I'm also going to initialize some new hulls, plus the expansion plans for the yard. It'll be up to you to find the bodies to man the facilities.”
“We're near saturation levels with mining and resource management is tight, Admiral,” Saul warned. “Manpower is mixed. If we get more help from Bek though …”