It felt like hours before they finally came out of the pipe. The darkness pressed around her like a living thing; it was a relief when they saw glimmers of light in the distance. Gaunt swam upwards as soon as they reached the end; Adeeba followed her, gasping as her head broke the surface. They seemed to have come out in a giant swimming pool, although it looked as disused as the reservoir. But there were working lights in the ceiling ...
“Get out of the water,” Gaunt ordered, as she clambered up the ladder and out of the pool. “We’ll need to dry ourselves, then run for it.”
“Understood,” Adeeba said. The whole experience seemed to have become a nightmare. She would sooner have been on a starship hulk than go swimming through the pipes again. “Where are we?”
“This used to be a famous resort,” Gaunt said. “That was centuries ago, of course.”
“Of course,” Adeeba agreed.
***
Jackson was starting to think that the rebels had definitely abandoned the complex before the Blackshirts had arrived. Apart from a handful of IEDs, they’d found no one – and nothing that they could use to find other rebel bases. Indeed, it looked as though the underground had been very careful to strip out anything that could be used to locate other bases. They were normally careful, but there was usually something. This time, there was nothing.
“There are forensic teams on the way,” his CO said. He’d been logging onto the command network and nagging for results, then logging off before Jackson could work up the nerve to point out that nagging him wasn't exactly productive. “Secure the complex, then clear the way for them.”
“Understood,” Jackson said. He checked his HUD – the Blackshirts had swept the entire complex – then nodded. “We’ll wait for them here.”
He couldn't help wondering just what the underground had been thinking. Sure, life on Earth wasn't good, but they could easily emigrate to another planet. There were colony missions departing all the time. Or they could get proper jobs. Jackson himself hadn't whined about unfairness when he’d finally grown old enough to seek employment, he'd gone out and looked for work. And when they’d decided that he was suited to be a Blackshirt supervising officer, he’d been certain of a good career. There was no reason the underground couldn't do the same.
Probably they prefer to whine instead of actually doing something to improve their lives, Jackson thought, as the Blackshirts returned to the centre of the complex. It had been certified IED-free after a quick check. Or knock us down rather than build themselves up ...
There was a dull rumble in the distance. Jackson blinked in surprise, wondering if someone had discovered another IED, then frowned as he realised that the rumbling was actually getting closer. Had the bastards managed to collapse the ceiling? It was solid, according to the briefing; the city’s designers had made it’s foundations out of the strongest material they’d had at the time. It would take a nuke to do real damage ...
And then he saw the water, rushing through the corridors and coming right at him.
There was no time to sound the alert or to grab hold of something solid. The water struck with the force of a tidal wave, picking him up and effortlessly slamming him against the far wall. He heard his armour crack, the impact stunning him; moments later, he felt cold water drifting up his body and into his mask. There was another crash ...
And then there was nothing. Nothing, but darkness.
***
“There was an ancient water storage chamber down there,” the security officer explained, reluctantly. “They must have had it mined, ready to explode. Once the Blackshirts relaxed, the underground triggered the explosives and dumped a few thousand tons of water into the complex. Any clues left behind will be gone now.”
“Along with several thousand Blackshirts,” Tiberius said. He'd watched through the network as the Blackshirts invested the rebel base. By the time the water had reached its zenith, most of the investing forces had been drowned. “This will cause interesting problems for us, won’t it?”
“Yes, sir,” the security officer said.
Tiberius masked his reaction with an effort. The underground had not only pulled off a successful campaign, they'd managed to lure a vast number of Blackshirts into a trap – or at least that was how they were certain to explain it. They might have been inconvenienced, but the Blackshirts had taken a bloody nose. It was quite likely that the underground would get thousands of new recruits on Earth – and probably hundreds more off-world. The sabotage campaign had already spread to Mars, Titan and Io. How bad could it get in future?
He disconnected from the network, then looked at the report from Admiral Foster. The aged Admiral was trying, at least, to clean out the corruption in Home Fleet. But it wasn't an easy task when telling the difference between patronage and outright corruption was difficult. And, unlike Admiral Wachter, Admiral Foster’s victims had the Families Council on Earth to complain to. Their patrons had to intervene on their behalf.
We need a unified front, Tiberius thought. If we all made the same response, the clients would behave themselves. We could move them to safer places and keep them out of the front line.
But it was the age-old problem. A patron had to support his client or the client would take his services elsewhere. Tiberius’s assistants had told him that they’d received several offers from senior officers who felt betrayed by their former patrons. It would have been a good time to expand his own networks if he hadn't been more worried about the state of Home Fleet. By his most optimistic calculations, the rebels were three months away. If they realised just how weak Home Fleet was, they might bypass Morrison altogether and strike directly at Earth. They might win the war easily.
Admiral Foster had proposed swapping one of his superdreadnaught squadrons for one of Admiral Wachter’s squadrons. Reading between the lines, Tiberius suspected he meant that he intended to give Admiral Wachter the task of reassigning or relieving the corrupt officers while taking advantage of Admiral Wachter’s purge. In theory, it wasn't a problem; in practice, it was likely to pose a major headache. What if Admiral Wachter objected to losing a squadron he had trained into something resembling acceptable condition?
“Damn it,” Tiberius swore, out loud. He picked up the datapad in frustration and threw it across the room, aiming at the portrait of a nobleman with an impossibly firm jaw. It missed, slamming against the wall and crashing to the floor. “Damn it all!”
Sharon stepped inside, one eyebrow raised. “Are you all right, My Lord?”
“Just ... frustrated,” Tiberius said. “Why is it that every time we find a solution to one problem it brings another couple of problems in its wake?”
“There is no such thing as a perfect solution,” Sharon said. “And people tend to react to what you do.”
Tiberius placed his head in his hands. Morrison needed to be prepared for war, so they’d appointed someone with an unprecedented amount of authority – and now they had to worry about his reaction to their decisions. Home Fleet needed to be prepared for war – and now they had to be careful how they treated their clients, for fear of rebellion or even just accidentally destroying the patronage networks. Earth needed to be secured against the underground – and now everything had slowed down to allow security checks to take place, just when they needed to ramp up industrial production. And they had to clean out corruption ... while knowing the officers they needed to keep were also the ones they needed to remove.
“It's too much,” he said, bitterly. “Is there any way we can actually win?”
“Admiral Wachter might pull off a victory,” Sharon pointed out. “And besides, just how badly has the underground hurt you?”
Tiberius considered it. They'd been hurt – but they’d been embarrassed more than hurt. All of the major families had been targeted, which made it harder for them to point fingers at Tiberius in particular ...
He shook his head. Normally, they could just pick up the pieces and rebuild. But now they had to do several thin
gs at once, in the midst of a war. He had no idea how the Empire had managed to do it during the First Interstellar War. But then, the Empire had been new then, barely established. It had taken years for the rot to set in.
But he had to deal with the rot.
“Badly enough,” he said. “Perhaps we should offer more colony incentives.”
“Perhaps you should relax,” Sharon said. “You’re taking too much on yourself.”
“And if I rely on others, they’ll try to steal the family out from under me,” Tiberius countered. He shook his head. “Call a pleasure slave, then hold my calls. I’ll try to relax for an hour.”
But he knew, no matter how much he tried to forget, reality wouldn't go away.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“The combat drill was a success, Commodore.”
Commodore Sahrye Yamani nodded. The battlecruiser squadron had only been hers for a month, following Admiral Wachter’s decision to remove the squadron’s former commander for gross incompetence, neglect and corruption. Sahrye hadn't expected her promotion – she had no senior patron – but she didn't intend to let the Admiral down. Besides, he’d told her that she would keep the squadron if she did well.
“Get me the full results,” she ordered. “And single out the gunnery crews that performed well.”
She smiled. If there was any advantage to lurking in interstellar space, three light years from the nearest inhabited world, it was the chance to drill her ships without the Admiral looking over her shoulder. The squadron had performed dreadfully in the first live-fire exercises held at Morrison, but Sahrye intended to ensure that next time would be different. They might do well enough to ensure that their crews weren't reshuffled again by the Admiral.
The thought dampened her mood as she scanned the reports. She hadn't been a very good Captain, she had to admit; she’d allowed her ship’s standards to decay badly. Indeed, if there had been a potential replacement, she suspected she would have joined the squadron’s former Commodore on Morrison, cooling her heels as she waited for judgement. And, without the patronage that her former CO had enjoyed, it was unlikely she would ever see command again.
But Admiral Wachter had given her a chance. She didn't intend to waste it.
“Not too bad,” she decided, after she had finished. Targeting accuracy had improved remarkably, after two officers had been summarily demoted and a third had been escorted off the ship in chains. He’d been running a bullying ring that had forced crewmen to turn half their salaries to him ... and Sahrye hadn't even noticed. “We should be able to do better in the next fleet exercise.”
“Yes, Commodore,” her XO agreed. Sahrye was in the position of having to both command her ship and the entire squadron, if only because her former XO had been ordered to take command of another battlecruiser. Her crew weren't quite used to it yet. “Missile reloading was only simulated, but reloading rates were improved too.”
“Let us hope they work that way in real life,” Sahrye said. She’d concentrated too much on simulations, which were never entirely exact. “In fact ...”
She paused as a console chimed. “Commodore, a courier has just arrived from Parallax,” the communications officer said. “They’re under attack.”
“The Admiral called it,” Sahrye said. He’d noted that Parallax would almost certainly be targeted as the rebel juggernaut made its way towards Morrison. “Sound battlestations, then power up the flicker drive. It's time to go to war.”
***
Parallax was an odd system, by anyone definition. It was a binary star system, with a small rocky planet that sat precisely at the barycentre between the two stars. According to the report Colin had scanned while planning the offensive, the corporation that owned the system had speculated that the planet had actually been moved into place by an alien race, although there was apparently no real evidence. Reading between the lines, Colin suspected that the whole story had been concocted to secure additional funding from the Empire. Rumours of advanced alien technology were sure to interest potential investors.
“I’m picking up no sign of anything larger than a gunboat,” the sensor officer said. “They’re scrambling now.”
Colin nodded, thoughtfully. Parallax was a corporate industrial node and starship repair yard, little else. There was no point in fighting for the world, not when there were more valuable targets in the Empire. He certainly didn't intend to occupy it, not when the system couldn't be held indefinitely. All he wanted to do was destroy the facilities and pull out.
“Transmit a demand that they evacuate their orbital facilities,” he ordered. “And tell them that we will leave their installations on the ground intact if the orbital stations are evacuated without a fight.”
“Yes, sir,” the communications officer said.
Colin watched grimly as the superdreadnaughts moved closer to their targets. The gunboats had to know they were no match for his fleet, so why were they trying to fight? Did they intend to place honour before reason – or did they think they were dead anyway? Parallax wasn't an Earth-like world. If Colin broke his word and bombarded the facilities, anyone who survived the bombardment would suffocate when their suits ran out of air.
“Gunboats entering missile range in twenty seconds,” the tactical officer reported.
“Prepare to fire,” Colin ordered. He silently cursed the gunboat commanders under his breath. They had about as much hope against his fleet as a snowball had in hell, but they were still preparing to fight anyway. “I want them swept away with the first volley ...”
“Intrusion,” the sensor officer snapped. “Multiple contacts, flickering in right on top of us!”
Colin fought down the urge to swear. They’d walked right into a trap. The enemy had guessed their target – or one of their targets – and prepared an ambush. He watched as the display solidified, revealing a squadron of Imperial Navy battlecruisers. Hardly a threat to his force, but powerful enough to do some damage before they were destroyed.
“Bring us about,” he ordered, as the battlecruisers advanced towards his fleet. They’d jumped in at high speed; their crews had to be vomiting on the decks by now. “Lock missiles on target, prepare to fire as soon as they enter range.”
***
Sahrye winced in pain. Her stomach hurt; she’d dry-heaved violently as soon as they'd come out of the jump. Some of her crew had been even less lucky, according to the reports; they'd been stunned by the jump and had to be transported to sickbay. Two of her bridge crew had even fainted. Silently, she blessed her foresight in having their reliefs standing by. She’d anticipated the dangers of jumping at such high speed.
“One superdreadnaught squadron, thirty-seven smaller ships,” the sensor officer said. Her voice sounded raspy, but she’d managed to stay at her post. “I can't pick up any cloaked ships.”
Sahrye understood her puzzlement. The rebels had more than one superdreadnaught squadron under their command, so where were the others? But then, no one would have anticipated needing more than one squadron to smash the installations orbiting Parallax. Hell, one squadron was overkill. The remainder of the rebel fleet might be hitting other worlds right now ...
She pushed the nagging worry aside. “Lock weapons on target,” she croaked. Her throat hurt when she tried to speak, but she forced herself to get the words out. “Prepare to fire.”
They hadn't pulled the jump off perfectly, but no one ever did outside simulations. They’d materialised just outside missile range, on an angle that would bring them into missile range quickly without actually heading directly into the teeth of enemy fire. Sahrye loved her battlecruisers, but she had no illusions about how long they would last if it came down to a direct missile exchange with a squadron of superdreadnaughts. And if they closed to energy range they’d be atomised within seconds.
“Entering missile range now,” the tactical officer reported. He sounded perfectly fine, damn him. “Commodore?”
“Fire at will,” Sahrye ordered. “All ships,
fire at will.”
The battlecruiser shuddered as she emptied her external racks, followed by a massive broadside from her port missile tubes. Moments later, the ship flipped over and fired a second broadside from her starboard tubes. Sahrye watched, grimly, as missiles roared towards their targets, the two closest enemy superdreadnaughts. They might not be enough to actually damage their targets, but they'd sure as hell know they'd been kissed.
“Enemy ships are returning fire,” the tactical officer said.
Sahrye gritted her teeth. Each superdreadnaught mounted more internal tubes than her entire squadron and they’d spat out enough missiles to wipe her ships out several times over. They weren't happy to be ambushed, she guessed. Thankfully, the Admiral wasn't expecting her to produce a victory, merely give the rebels a fright. And they’d definitely succeeded at that!
“Angle us away from them and launch decoys,” she ordered. They had no business being anywhere near such firepower. “And flicker us out the moment the drive has recharged. Don't wait for orders, just do it.”
“Aye, Captain,” the tactical officer said.
***
“Reorder the formation,” Colin ordered. “Move the smaller ships up to block the enemy missiles.”
He watched, as dispassionately as he could, as the missile swarm bore down on his ships. By chance or careful planning, the loyalists had gotten the drop on him – and if they’d brought another superdreadnaught squadron or two along, it might well have proven disastrous. As it was, he had a chance to test his new point defence doctrine before encountering the Morrison Fleet.
The point defence network went active the moment the missiles entered engagement range, tracking each and every missile and assigning it a priority. Thankfully, this particular group of loyalists hadn't thought of trying to strip away his smaller ships first – but then, they didn't have the firepower to stand and fight. Instead, his smaller ships concentrated on protecting their larger cousins instead of protecting themselves. One by one, the missiles flickered and vanished from the display.
Democracy's Right: Book 02 - Democracy's Might Page 21