Shadow of the Blue Ring

by Jerome Kelly

  “But what do you, personally, think about it?” Ansare asked him, “I’m sure there must be some within your fleet who are opposed to this course of action.”

  “Yes, there are those of us who have doubts,” said Kalmar, “I do not believe that this is the best way forward for our people at all. There is only so long that we can keep this piece of the Shadow Bringer safe from the Hunters. They have been scouring every system in the sector for decades now and no matter how long we keep prolonging it, they will find it eventually.”

  “So what options does that leave us with?” James asked, “we can’t go against the Hunters as we are now, they’re too strong for us in a straight-up fight. We can’t go back to the alliance and just hope this all goes away and we can’t just hope that the Hunters simply never find the weapon either. I’m not seeing a lot of alternatives here.”

  “There may be one other option,” said Kalmar, who had that look in his eyes that suggested to James that he was prepared to do something that would not have been looked on kindly by his superiors, “you could find the piece of the weapon yourself and take it away from here, ensuring that it stays well out of reach of the Hunters.”

  “But your people have already stated that they wont help us,” Saavoy pointed out, “and I can’t imagine that your leaders would agree to this course of action.”

  “No, they wouldn’t,” Kalmar agreed, “but I personally do not believe that the senate’s plan will continue to work for much longer. A couple of our strategists have analysed the movement patterns of the Hunter ships as they search the region and they estimate that they may arrive at our world within two of our years. Our current way of doing things will not continue to work forever, something needs to be done and it needs to be done soon. Unfortunately, neither myself nor any of my colleagues can defy the wishes of the senate without serious repercussions. It would be treason.”

  “I doubt we would be able to do this alone,” said James, “we don’t know this region well enough and we still don’t know enough about the Hunters or about the Shadow Bringer to really do anything about it. We would need someone who knows more than we do to help us carry out this plan of action.”

  “I was hoping you might say that,” Kalmar said eagerly, “James, if you would have me, I would be happy to accompany you and your crew back to your ship. If I come along with you then I can tell you everything I know regarding the Hunters and our war with them as well as the Shadow Bringer and all the other Jaiytid relics in the region.”

  “Your people will know that you helped us,” James warned him, “you would be risking a great deal to help us out with this. It would likely end your career within the fleet and I’m guessing there would be some pretty harsh punishments to go along with it.”

  “My people’s survival matters more than I do,” said Kalmar, “this course of action will allow us to achieve the aims of both my people and your own. It is in everyone’s best interests.”

  “I agree, this is a good plan,” said Ansare, “we might not be able to defeat the Hunters but we can at least stop them from achieving their goals for long enough to work out a plan to deal with them.”

  “Then it’s settled,” said James, “captain Kalmar, welcome to the crew of the Evening Star.”

  “It’s very much appreciated,” said Kalmar, “I’m looking forward to working with you all. I will need to have my crew make a delivery to your ship before we leave but otherwise, I’m ready to go.”

  “Then lets get back to the ship, we have some hunting of our own to do.”

  The group returned to the Mantis flyer, almost with a spring in their step. Ansare quickly got them off the ground and back into orbit to rejoin the rest of the crew aboard the Evening Star. Quite how the Adean senate would respond to this course of action… James had no idea. Surely they would not be able to deny that James and Kalmar were acting well within their interests, regardless of the actual course of action they chose to take. After all, they would be helping them to keep the Shadow Bringer out of the hands of the Hunters. With Kalmar now on the crew, they would at least have someone who knew the region and someone who had previous experience dealing with their new enemy.

  The flyer returned to the Evening Star, just as an Adean shuttle left the hangar bay, Kalmar having sent word ahead for one of his officers to deliver his gear to the Evening Star before he arrived. Once on board, there was no reason for them to hang around, James ordered everyone back to the bridge to begin planning for the next part of the mission. On returning to the bridge, James was a little surprised by the presence of one of his crew.

  “Hey there, welcome back,” said a very cheery looking Isha, “how did your meeting with the senate go?”

  “I’ll explain the situation to everyone shortly,” James replied, almost a little taken aback at Isha’s sudden change of tone, “and what about you, you’re looking… better.”

  “Yeah, whatever it was has passed now,” said Isha, “like I said, I just needed an extra hour or two. I’m back to my best now and there wont be any more trouble for the rest of the mission.”

  “That’s great news,” said James, although he did not believe her for one minute, he knew she was still hiding something from him. He wanted to confront her about whatever it was that was bothering her but he simply didn’t have the time, he needed to get the crew assembled so that Kalmar could bring everyone up to speed on what they had learned from the Adean senate. Kalmar, meanwhile, was making no disguise of the fact the he was impressed with the Evening Star.

  “This is a very impressive ship,” he noted, taking a good look around the ship’s bridge, “the technology is definitely a long way beyond that of the other ships you sent out here. From the look of it, I’m guessing its brand new too.”

  “It’s our maiden voyage actually,” said James, “this ship was a little bit of a last minute surprise for us, the very latest technology, all based on Jaiytid designs. It didn’t do us any good against the Hunters though, they still cut through our defences like they were nothing.”

  “Well I can help you out with that,” said Kalmar, “we managed to take down one of the Hunter ships a few years ago and we were able to do a full analysis of their ships from the wreckage. We have highly detailed technical readouts highlighting all of their weaknesses and outlining all of their technology. It could give you an edge and help you to survive an attack should you run into them again.”

  “That would be really useful, anything you can give us will be an enormous help,” said James, “we can use those readouts to run a simulation and work out a defensive plan for our next encounter with the Hunters.”

  It would be interesting to see what else Kalmar had brought aboard, his crew had delivered plenty of gear to the Evening Star. He would certainly have not passed up on anything that could give them even the smallest advantage in their fight against the Hunters. Working together, there was a chance that they might finally be able to end this long war between the Adeans and the Hunters and save both them and the alliance from losing any more people to this aggressor.

  Chapter Nine

  The Twilight City

  “Login, captain James Tavarez, ID number two-three-one-zero-four-zero-beta.”

  “ID number recognised,” said the ship’s VI system, speaking with a synthesised woman’s voice, “welcome to Alliance in Chaos, the Earth Nations Fleet’s strategic simulation training program.”

  “Well at least it’s not a total waste,” James though to himself. He’d had no idea how to work the ship’s VI and it had taken him four attempts to get it started up. It was not a sentient machine like the Iyacs back on Raylia, it was a simple command-activated program designed to respond to individual commands but James had no idea exactly what to say to it. If only admiral Davidson had left an instruction manual…

  “Please select your battlefield,” the VI said once more, giving James the option of several poss
ible battlefields.

  “Open space please.”

  “Open space field selected,” the VI now bringing up the background of space as the chosen battleground, “please select your faction.”

  “Human,” said James, “load saved file Evening Star.”

  “Loading… Please wait… save file Evening Star loaded, please select your opponent.”

  “Load custom opponent file, Hunter,” James had suggested Kalmar upload his readout of the Hunter ship into the Alliance in Chaos simulation game so that he could try and run simulations of a one on one battle between themselves and the Hunter ship.

  “File uploaded, please deploy your faction.”

  It was time to see if the simulation was worth it. The simulated Hunter ship was now on the screen on the virtual battlefield across from the simulated Evening Star that James would be commanding.

  “I have to admit, using a teenagers’ video game as a method of training your people in strategic combat is not something I would have ever thought up,” said Kalmar, who was assisting James with his simulated battle, “your people certainly have some interesting ideas, I will give you that.”

  “Well, this is the first time I will have used it so I have no idea how much good it will actually do us,” said James, “I guess its time to find out if its all worth the trouble… begin battle.”

  “Ok, lets try a forty-five degree approach,” said Kalmar, watching on as James made his first move, “it keeps you out of direct contact with their forward and broadside weapons. They will move to close off your approach angle very quickly though so make sure you’re ready for it.”

  “Ok, I’ll try.”

  He moved the Star as Kalmar has suggested, slowly and steadily towards the Hunter ship’s starboard side. As he got into weapons range, he began firing everything he could into the Hunter ship but as had happened in reality, their shields just absorbed everything that came their way. The Hunter ship returned fire, striking the Evening Star on its front-left section despite James’s efforts to dodge.

  “Damn, they’re too fast.”

  “Increase your speed,” said Kalmar, “you’re giving them too much of an easy target, the game is predicting your movements far too easily. You’re playing it like it’s just a game, you’re not playing it as if it was your own ship.”

  “I’m trying, I’m not used to this kind of… damn it!” James had made one tiny error and the Hunter ship had struck his virtual Evening Star and cut through it’s shields. He had no time to react, another wave of fire crippled the ship and he was left with nowhere to go. Barely moments after he had commenced the battle, his ship was about to be destroyed by the lethal Hunter ship.

  “You have been defeated,” the ship’s VI announced as the ‘mission failed’ sign appeared on the screen over the virtual battlefield. James did not need the extra reminders from the VI, he knew that the Hunter ship outmatched the Evening Star in every way but there just had to be a way they could at least take advantage of a vulnerability in the Hunter ship from somewhere.

  “Restart match, I want to go again,” James ordered the VI, “begin battle.”

  “Try a different approach,” said Kalmar, “most of their weapons are based on the lower part of the ship, go in from above. It’s a strategy that has worked for us before when facing the Hunters.”

  “Ok, I’ll give it a go.”

  James instantly took the simulated Evening Star to attack speed and took it above the Hunter ship, preparing to go in from above as he got closer. The simulated enemy was able to respond though, turning it’s broadside towards James’s ship as he tried to move to attack.

  “Stay on it’s dorsal side,” Kalmar tried to keep him on track, “see that gap in the armour? Try to hit it, the shields there are slightly weaker than across the rest of the ship.

  Going from above allowed him to get the Evening Star into a better position and the concentrated fire was having a greater effect, just as Kalmar suggested but the Hunter ship was still able to get into a position to return fire.

  “It’s no good, I can’t get enough speed up,” James grumbled, “damn it… not again!”

  “You have been defeated,” the ship VI said once more as James watched the virtual Evening Star blown out of the stars. There seemed to be a brief window where James was able to maneuver into a position to strike at the Hunter ship but despite it’s relatively slow speed, it was always able to move into a position to counter and then retaliate after a few seconds.

  James tried three more times but his efforts continued to be thwarted by the virtual Hunter ship. Every angle of attack and every approach strategy he tried, he was always taken down within two or three minutes without even being able to make an impact on the Hunter ship’s shields.

  “I really don’t think we’re going to get anything out of this,” Kalmar said as he watched James fail for a sixth time at trying to take on the Hunter ship, “we should probably head over to the briefing room and get things set up, there are a few things I’ll need to go over with everyone before we move.”

  “Yeah, Ok,” James sighed, “I guess this isn’t going anywhere. End program.”

  “Terminating program, thank you for playing Alliance in Chaos,” said the VI as James stepped away from the command console.

  “You’re welcome,” James grumbled.

  “Something tells me you don’t like this new VI they put on your ship too much,” Kalmar observed, “I’ll admit, I’ve never seen a system like it used before though, we’ve certainly never tried to use one.”

  “I just think it’s a waste of resources,” said James, “and it’s annoying as hell. I’m not even sure how to talk to it, hell I don’t even know what the damn thing is called.”

  “We call her Elina,” James had barely noticed Lucy enter the war room, “and you shouldn’t be so hard on her, she can be quite useful.”

  “Yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it,” said James, “I don’t suppose you’ve had any luck with it at all?”

  “It just takes a bit of getting used to, thats all,” said Lucy, assuming James’s position at the command console, “just watch… Elina, load file Maguire seven, resume at last save point.”

  “Loading now… welcome back lieutenant Maguire,” the Elina VI replied, bringing up the battleground of a city James did not recognise.

  “So you’ve been trying out the simulation too?” Said Kalmar, “I hope you’ve been having more luck than your captain.”

  “It’s actually a great game once you get going,” said Lucy, “of course I’ve only been trying out the recreational side of it, I wanted to get the Vulian conquest achievement, beat the Vulian forces in battle in a city on every alliance world. I beat Maranaya pretty easily, I beat Rosian without too much hassle and I just about got through Lorridan. I’m struggling with this one though, its the Naisan city of Kolharra. It’s very tricky.”

  “How so?”

  “It’s supposed to be a defensible location on the edge of the Lauann mountains. The city is split into three parts with mountains separating each district of the city. It’s really hard to maneuver all my forces through the gaps between them and I keep getting outflanked and having my men picked off.”

  “Let me have a look,” Kalmar joined Lucy at the command console and observed the field of play, “I’m guessing that you tried to deploy your forces in one go in the most defensible part of the city and tried to hold your ground?”

  “Yeah,” said Lucy, “the Naisans held this city for two weeks during the Vulian conquest, thats longer than most cities in the alliance did but I just can’t seem to get it right.”

  “The problem you have here is that your way of defending the city is very predictable and any skilled tactician would notice this,” said Kalmar, “what you’re doing is bunkering down and trying to resist the attack with your full strength in one place. Your outer de
fences are being overrun and the Vulian forces are able to move through the other two parts of the city freely and outflank you by using these narrow paths between the sections of the city. What you need to do is spread your force, block the entrances with heavy defensive units and keep your force mobile.”

  Kalmar redeployed all of Lucy’s virtual forces throughout the city, reorganised the arrangement of units and moved her set up of defensive armaments. James was impressed, Kalmar’s tactical ability was considerable, more so that he had expected from such a young captain.

  “Wow, it actually works,” Lucy wasn’t hiding her admiration for her new battlefield set up, “I think I can actually win this one now, thanks a lot.”

  James and Kalmar stuck around for a few minutes to see the results. Lucy was doing a very good job of commanding her simulated forces, the game was quite demanding and required a lot of focus but despite what she had been through over the past years, she still had an edge and she still knew what she was doing.

  “This is brilliant,” she beamed, “thanks so much, I might just make it to the next round now.”

  “You’re welcome,” said Kalmar, “let me know next time you’re on here, I’d be happy to come and help you through your next mission.”

  “Oh… you would?” Lucy almost blushed, “that would be awesome, definitely come back sometime, there are plenty more missions to fight, I’d love for you to help me out.”

  “Well until next time then,” Kalmar smiled at her before joining James on the way to the briefing room. James hadn’t seen Lucy smile like that since their days on the run from Valdor.

  “I think she’s just taken a liking to you,” said James, “am I right in thinking that you might have taken a liking to her too?”