The staff officers of this patchwork fleet laughed pleasantly—most likely because they thought Yang was joking. They didn’t know him like the core leadership at Iserlohn did. Frederica was the only one there who knew he was speaking in earnest, and she wasn’t laughing.
After listening to the emergency report from the patrol that had sighted Yang’s forces, Karl Gustav Kempf stared at the screen and considered his options. Deep creases were etched into the fleshy space between his brows.
Just as Yang had supposed, Kempf was now under pressure to make a decision. A few days prior, he had sent a report back to Odin on the progress of the battle—and had had no small difficulty with the wording. He hadn’t lost, and he had delivered a psychological blow to the alliance’s forces, as well as inflicted considerable physical damage; Iserlohn, however, while damaged, was still very much operational, and he still hadn’t managed to get a single soldier inside. Things were not merely at a deadlock; truth be told, the vast fortress called Gaiesburg was a little too big for Kempf to handle. Tech Admiral von Schaft had spoken of his own achievement in the most self-congratulatory ways imaginable, but in fact, the difficulties faced by the one who proposed a mission were nothing compared to those faced by the ones who executed it. Even so, there were three different scenarios that might happen if Kempf reported he was having trouble, and any one of them would leave a wound on his pride: he might be dismissed, he might be given orders to withdraw, or a colleague might be sent to reinforce him. In the end, Kempf worded his report as follows:
“We have the advantage.”
At about the same time, a massive fleet of over twenty thousand ships was making its way from imperial territory toward the Iserlohn Corridor. This fleet was divided into two divisions—fore and aft—with the forward division under the command of Senior Admiral Wolfgang Mittermeier and the rear division commanded by Senior Admiral Oskar von Reuentahl—they who were praised as the “twin pillars” of the Imperial Navy. Having received sudden orders from Reinhard, they had mobilized rapidly and were on their way to reinforce Kempf’s forces.
Mittermeier had looked slightly bewildered while receiving those orders. Von Reuentahl had put the sentiment into words: “I’m honored to receive your orders, milord. Still, if we attack the enemy at this juncture, don’t you think Admiral Kempf might mistakenly believe that we’re stealing the credit for his successes?”
Von Reuentahl had spoken out of careful concern for the psychology of the frontline commander, but the response this elicited from Reinhard was a low, dry—one might even say lifeless—laugh.
“There’s no need for such worries on your part, Admiral. Although that might not be the case were Kempf actually having any successes.”
“As you say, milord.”
“Don’t expand the front any more than necessary. I leave the rest to your own good judgment.”
The two admirals withdrew from Reinhard’s presence, and once they were walking together in the hall outside, von Reuentahl posed a question:
“What do you think Duke von Lohengramm’s really up to? If the fighting has turned into a quagmire, then there’s certainly reason enough to send us. But if Kempf is winning out there, there’s no need for us to go. And if he’s been defeated, this is a waste of time because it’s already too late to do anything for him.”
“No matter what the case may be, we still have our orders from the imperial prime minister,” said Mittermeier, crisply reminding him of their own circumstances. “We’ll just have to do as best as we’re able. If the situation when we reach the battlefield does demand that we fight, we can decide how to go about it then.”
“You’re right,” von Reuentahl said.
If they arrived and Kempf had won or was winning, there would be nothing to worry about. If things were in a deadlock, they would have to consult with Kempf and his people on-site and decide what to do together. The one thing that Mittermeier and von Reuentahl did need to talk about now was what they should do if they got there and found a defeated Admiral Kempf being harried by pursuers. That matter was settled in two or three exchanges. One could search the empire and alliance both and never find another pair of equally ranked commanders who were as finely tuned to one another’s thought processes as they.
After he gave Mittermeier and von Reuentahl their orders, Reinhard was glancing again at the report from Admiral Kempf when Senior Admiral Paul von Oberstein came by and paid him a visit.
“I noticed that you seemed somehow displeased with the update from Admiral Kempf,” he said.
“I’d thought Kempf would do a little better than this, but it looks like distressing the enemy is the best he can do. The objective is to render Iserlohn powerless. He doesn’t necessarily need to capture and occupy it. In an extreme scenario, it would even be acceptable to crash one fortress into the other and destroy them both.”
Light flashed from von Oberstein’s artificial eyes. “Still, it was my understanding that Kempf has used Gaiesburg Fortress as a stronghold from which to boldly attack the enemy head-on.”
“And that’s why I say he’s reached his limits.”
Reinhard slammed the report down violently on his desk.
His synthetic-eyed chief of staff brushed back his gray-streaked hair with one hand. “On that point, the one who chose Kempf for this mission can’t escape the blame either. I myself made the wrong choice in recommending him. You have my apologies.”
“Oh? For you that’s rather commendable, isn’t it?” Reinhard said coldly. “However, I was the one ultimately responsible for choosing him. Although if we want to trace this all the way back to the beginning, everything started with von Schaft and his useless proposal. It would be one thing if we had merely failed to benefit, but now that this has turned out to be damaging, I don’t know what to do with the man.”
“Still, even a man such as he might prove useful in some way. It’s a hard thing to seize the stars through strength of arms alone. I think it’s best to gather as many pawns as one can. Even pawns fished from the gutter.”
The ice-blue eyes that were fixed on the chief of staff gleamed with a particularly cold light at that moment. “Make no mistake, von Oberstein. I don’t want to steal the stars like some cowardly pickpocket—my wish is to plunder them as a conqueror.”
“As you wish.”
After von Oberstein saluted and left, Reinhard tossed back his luxurious mane of golden hair. His pale fingers were fondling the pendant at his chest.
“Is this what happens when you gain power?” he said. “There isn’t a soul left around here who even tries to understand me. Or is that my own fault after all?”
Ice-blue eyes were occluded by clouds of melancholy. This wasn’t what he had been searching for. What he had been wanting was something altogether different.
III
“We don’t have all that much time,” Yang explained to Frederica. Having learned that the Iserlohn Corridor was not yet entirely under his control, Reinhard von Lohengramm was sure to send reinforcements. When they arrived, their numbers would surely be vast; sending a small force would be tantamount to the folly of a piecemeal committal of forces. Yang estimated their odds of victory would plummet to near zero unless the space surrounding Iserlohn could be recovered before the empire’s reinforcements arrived.
“So basically, time has been on our side up until now,” said Frederica, “but from here on out that won’t be the case? If Your Excellency had been the enemy commander, you would have long since beaten Iserlohn, wouldn’t you?”
“Pretty much. If it were me, I would’ve smashed that other fortress into it. One big boom, and down they both go together. Then, with everything cleared out of the way, we could just bring in a different fortress, and that would be that. If the Imperial Navy had come after us with that in mind, there would’ve been no way to resist, but it looks like the imperial commander hasn’t been able to adjus
t his way of thinking.”
“That’s quite an extreme method, though.”
“Effective, though, isn’t it?”
“That I’ll grant you.”
“And of course, if Iserlohn had already been destroyed by that tactic, there’d be nothing this fleet could do to stop the invasion. That said, though, there is something we can do if they try that now.”
As he said these words, the look on Yang’s face changed, reminding Frederica of a young boy who had just discovered a new set of moves to use in chess. Yang hadn’t changed a bit since ten years ago, when he had commanded the evacuation of the El Facil stellar region. Despite a decade’s passage and the promotions received during that time, Yang still hadn’t picked up the smell of a military man. During that period, it was the eyes of those watching Yang that had changed. During the escape from El Facil, Frederica—then a fourteen-year-old girl—remembered what the adults had been saying to one another, some in hushed tones, and others in anger: “Are they serious, putting that useless greenhorn in charge of our getaway?”
Nowadays, Yang was the recipient of overwhelming praise—as well as malice that arrived along the same vector. Either way, though, others took a very different view of Yang than he did of himself.
“I think we can safely say that Iserlohn will not be overrun from the outside,” Frederica said.
“Well, I wonder about that,” Yang said with a slightly bitter look.
Never mind its defensive capabilities as a space fortress; one reason Iserlohn had long been thought impregnable was that the attacking side had always had its hands tied to some degree. The goal in attacking Iserlohn was to gain control of the Iserlohn Corridor and secure dominance over the route between the empire and the Free Planets Alliance. No other goal existed. It was that desire that had led the empire to build Iserlohn Fortress and that hope that had led the Alliance Armed Forces to attack it on several occasions—always at the cost of countless dead and wounded. That was how high the price tag on Iserlohn was.
In short, the goal in attacking Iserlohn Fortress had never been to destroy it, but to occupy it. And the only one in history who had succeeded in doing that was Yang Wen-li.
Still, that was in the past. If it were possible to establish a combat and resupply base in the corridor other than Iserlohn, the empire could then attack Iserlohn with the intent of destroying it. Such an attack would be vastly more intense and ruthless than an attack intended to occupy it.
Yang shuddered to think of such an assault, but the facts didn’t seem to be pointing in that direction. The imperial commander appeared to be using the new fortress exclusively as a base of operations from which to retake Iserlohn. That was the most luck that the weakened forces of the Free Planets Alliance could hope for.
Last year’s civil war—and above all, the crushing defeat of the year before at Amritsar—had left the combat potential of the alliance military in a weakened state to this day. The alliance military had lost two million soldiers in that fruitless battle. Many capable members of the admiralty had also left this mortal coil.
When he thought about it, Yang had been dealing with fallout from that defeat ever since. The burden on him would have been so much lighter if even one of those brave admirals who had fallen at Amritsar were alive today—Urannf or Borodin, perhaps.
There was no time now, however, to sink into pointless speculation. The dead were never coming back. The problems of this world had to be solved by the living—even though what came next was going to be exhausting, a lot of trouble, and something Yang really didn’t want to do.
Meanwhile, the bewildered imperial forces had decided on the direction they should take.
Kempf’s plan was as follows:
First, he would execute a rapid pullback from Iserlohn Fortress. When the alliance forces saw that, they would think he was retreating because reinforcements had arrived and come pouring out of the fortress, not wanting to miss an opportunity to catch him in a pincer movement. That was when he would reverse course and hit them. Then the alliance forces, thinking that the “arrival of reinforcements” had been a trap to lure them out of the fortress, would run back to Iserlohn and shut themselves up inside again. In this way, Kempf could confine them to their fortress, reverse course again, and destroy the forces that were on their way here to reinforce Iserlohn. Making good use of the time lag between the two battles, he would destroy both forces separately.
Splendid! Müller had thought when the idea was proposed—and yet he hadn’t been able to help feeling uneasy as well. If this operation was successful, Kempf would be lauded as an artist of military strategy, but would the enemy dance to the tune he was playing? This was a plan that called for flawless technique, as well as perfect timing—one misstep, and the imperial forces would be caught in a pincer movement themselves. In and of itself, the tactic of attacking the two forces individually did seem the proper way to go about this, but Müller found himself wondering if it might be better to have Gaiesburg stay behind to keep an eye on Iserlohn, while sending the whole fleet out to destroy the enemy reinforcements first.
Müller offered that suggestion to Kempf. Due to a number of awkward circumstances, it took a bit of courage for him to do that, but Kempf, in a show of broad-minded generosity, made a number of changes to the operation, incorporating some of Müller’s ideas.
“So does this mean reinforcements are coming? Or is it a trap?”
In the central command room of Iserlohn Fortress, the top leadership, centered on Rear Admiral Alex Caselnes, was having trouble deciding what they should do. The Imperial Navy fleet, which until now had blanketed the space around Iserlohn with steady waves of attackers, was pulling away from them like a tide going out from the shore. Gaiesburg Fortress continued to maintain its distance of six hundred thousand kilometers, though. From that range, it could respond to cannon fire at a moment’s notice.
“What do you think, kid?”
Von Schönkopf’s question to Julian, who had just arrived bringing coffee, was probably meant as a joke.
“It might be both.”
That was Julian’s answer.
“Both?”
“Yes, sir. Admiral Yang’s reinforcements are sure to be somewhere nearby. The imperial forces may know that and may be trying to use that against us a trap. When our fleet departs Iserlohn and runs into an all-out attack, we’ll think, ‘Oh, it’s a trap—get back inside,’ right? By making a feint like that, they can make sure our fleet stays here and then go intercept our reinforcements with their full force.”
The top leaders of Iserlohn went completely silent for a long moment as they stared at the flaxen-haired youth. Finally, Caselnes cleared his throat and asked him, “What makes you think so, Julian?”
“The imperial fleet’s movements are just too unnatural.”
“That’s certainly true, but is that your only basis for thinking so?”
“Well, it’s like this: If this is only a trap, what’s the objective? To force a surrender? To use our own mobilization as a chance to get into the fortress? It would have to be one of those two, wouldn’t it? But even the enemy has to be well aware at this point that our side is focused on defense and won’t sortie far away from base. That being the case, they’re probably trying to seal us in by using our defensive mind-set. That’s why it’s far more likely that they’re counting on us to play safe and stay inside.”
“I see,” von Schönkopf said after a moment. “It just hit me—this young man was Admiral Yang’s finest student before he ever became mine and Poplin’s.”
Von Schönkopf’s words came mingled with a sigh. He turned his eyes toward Caselnes, and the acting commander asked Admiral Merkatz for his thoughts about a countermeasure.
“If that’s what’s going on, then the answer isn’t difficult. We should pretend to be hunkering down like they expect. Then, when they reverse course, we come c
harging back out and hit them on their back side. After that, if we and our reinforcements are thinking on the same wavelength, we’ll be able to catch them in an ideal pincer movement.”
Merkatz spoke flatly, and when he had accepted Caselnes’s request to take command of the attack, he turned to Julian and said, “I think I’ll have you join me aboard Hyperion. On the bridge.”
The surprise that captivated the veteran strategist was not as great as it had been two years ago, when he had first recognized the brilliance of Reinhard von Lohengramm, yet it was nonetheless a surprise made of similar stuff.
IV
“War can be compared to mountain climbing …;”
It was “Griping Yusuf”—Marshal Yusuf Topparole, architect of the Alliance Armed Forces’ sweeping victory in the Battle of the Dagon Stellar Region—who had once said those words.
“It’s the government that decides which mountain you climb. ‘Strategy’ means deciding which route you’ll take to the top and preparing accordingly. ‘Tactics,’ then, is the job of efficiently climbing the route you’ve been given.”
In Yang’s case, the route he should climb had already been decided for him. That acute longing he sometimes felt to determine his own route by himself was clearly at odds with his distaste for war, but even so …;
“Enemy fleet ahead at 1130!”
At the operator’s report, tension shot through minds and bodies of crew throughout the fleet. With friendly vessels on the order of five thousand, it was certain that the imperial force was more than double their size. There was no way they could fight them head-on and win. All they could do was wait for their friends from Iserlohn to appear at the enemy’s back side.
Yang was just praying that his staff back on Iserlohn would make the right decision. If they stayed inside the fortress twiddling their thumbs, Yang would lose with his inferior numbers—easy prey for the empire’s divide-and-conquer tactics. It was a prerequisite of Yang’s operational plan that they be able to carry out a tacitly understood play in coordination with Iserlohn.
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