Sentience 1: Storm Clouds Gathering

by Gibson Michaels

  After recovering Vice Admiral Kent’s 228 surviving fighters, eleven of the twelve Confederate carriers accelerated up to transition speed, while the Princeton began limping back toward the Norf Fleet shipyard, orbiting Ginia, for repairs. During the run up to transition speed, Kent’s fighters were rearmed with anti-fighter loads. When transition speed was achieved, the carriers again did a 31-second tachyon jump at 350c, which put them near the rendezvous point with TF-22 coming in from behind Ginia.

  Again, the double-transitions within seconds were very hard on the crews and required them to again utilize stimulant injectors to recover from transition shock. This one was especially hard on the crews of Kent’s three carriers, as it came so close on the heels of their first double-transition from behind Ginia. Over two hundred crewmen required a third dose of stimulant — putting 36 of them into stimulant-shock. In the ship’s dispensary, four of them died... one of whom, was Vice Admiral Kent.

  Anti-ship missiles and pulse-lasers of between five and fourteen gigawatts poured directly into the unarmored plasma tubes mounted in the sterns of the Union carriers at virtually point-blank range. As the enemy carriers were the primary targets of the initial salvo, it was unsurprising when sixteen were destroyed totally and the remaining six left dead in space, with their reactor rooms and engines blown away. Despite being completely surprised, the rest of the Federal fleet reacted quickly. The escorts on the outer edges of the Union fleet began looping outwards with their scanners in acquisition mode.

  “What the hell?” yelled Ted Wentworth.

  “Weren’t those some of our ships that just blew up?” asked Aline McCauley.

  “Those were carriers that just exploded!” roared J.P. Aneke. “Our carriers. What the fuck is going on?”

  “I couldn’t tell. They just seemed to blow up, for no apparent reason,” exclaimed Ruby.

  The big cruisers near the center of the Union’s globe formation found maneuvering room cramped in all directions, allowing the Confederates to get off a complete second salvo, right up the cruiser’s vulnerable drive tubes. Collisions occurred as cruiser crews became frantic to achieve maneuvering room.

  Fear of the unknown becomes amplified to incredible proportions when heavy ships all around you suddenly begin exploding for no apparent reason. When the Federal carriers exploded in radioactive flames, their escorting cruiser crews were initially stunned. After the Confederates' second salvo, pandemonium reigned amongst the inexperienced bridge crews of the surviving Federal battlecruisers and heavy cruisers — thrown into a panic by not knowing what was killing their fleet.

  With their fleet commander dead or marooned on a dead hulk, and having no room to maneuver freely, one or more of these cruiser captains either panicked, or merely followed each other’s example, but one-by-one, the remaining twelve large cruisers jumped into tachyon space and disappeared. Much of the Confederates' third volley went wasted as the remaining Federal heavies escaped into hyperspace, but it did manage to destroy fourteen light cruisers with stern shots and severely damaged four others that managed to turn far enough they the hits glanced off of their relatively thin armored hulls.

  The multitude of frigates and destroyers on the outer edges of the Union’s globular formation completed their turn and acquired Thorn’s Confederate 2nd fleet. Confederate ECM went active when the Yankees’ fire-control scanners locked on, some of which managed to break-lock, forcing the Federals to reacquire, and the electronic dance commenced. Over half of the remaining Union ships got off a volley, just as the Confederate fighters mauled them.

  “Those ships just fired on the rear of their own fleet,” yelled Robert Eastman.

  “Look, those fighters are going after their own ships,” exclaimed Ted Wentworth.

  “Those aren’t our fighters.” roared J.P. Aneke. “Somehow the damned rebels snuck in BEHIND our fleet, and they’re tearing the hell out of them.”

  “Behind them?” asked Morgan Rainey. “Is that bad?”

  “There’s no way to armor drive tubes. Might as well be shooting into tin foil… any ship is dead meat to a shot directly up the ass.”

  Suddenly, a large bolt of pure plasma shot by... alarmingly close to Aneke’s space yacht.

  “God damn!” yelled Dan. “What the fuck was that?”

  “That was a plasma bolt from a 5-gigawatt pulse-laser from one of our destroyers that missed its intended target. Captain, get us out of here… NOW!” yelled Aneke. “Keep the external cameras focused on the fleet. I want to know what the fuck happened here today.”

  Just before they made it back to the safety of hyperspace, Aneke’s cameras captured the image of an explosion caused by a Federal thermally guided anti-fighter missile that had been pulled off target by a phosphorous flare popped by an alert Confederate pilot…

  …which then locked on to the fusion plume of a nearby pleasure craft full of senators, their entourage of idle rich admirers and the inevitable group of accompanying paparazzi.

  The single remaining Union flag officer, a commodore from a light cruiser squadron, knew she had the remaining Confederate ships badly outnumbered, but despite her burning desire to wreak vengeance on the Southerners for what they had just done to the Union fleet, she also knew that her remaining ships couldn’t stand up to another pass from all those fighters without fighter support of their own. She also knew that her primary responsibility was to get her remaining ships back to Waston and deliver their eyewitness reports of what had happened here to Fleet Headquarters.

  Admiral Thorn was wrestling with a similar decision. Her fighters could obliterate the remaining Union ships with another pass, but she’d probably lose her entire command in the process. She had to protect her carriers, but just before she ordered a general retirement, the Federal commodore sent out an encrypted omindirectional radio signal… and the remaining Federal ships began disappearing into tachyon space.

  Under threat of annihilation from the remaining Confederate warships and fighters, Admiral Thorn’s offer of safe conduct and assistance in return for surrender was reluctantly accepted by the surviving Federal ships that were too badly damaged to escape. Confederate Marines and damage control parties were ferried out on shuttles to take charge of the Federal ships and help get their fires extinguished. Other damage control parties were also shuttled to assist the incapacitated ships of 2nd Fleet.

  Admiral Thorn’s five functional carriers had barely enough time to retrieve their 428 surviving fighters, rearm them with anti-fighter loads and launch them again, before the first wave of returning Federal fighters arrived to find all of their carriers transformed into drifting space junk. Low on fuel, their munitions expended, and over 400 angry Raptors and Demons ringing them, the stunned Northern pilots had very little choice but to accept Admiral Thorn’s clear-voice offer of an honorable surrender, in return for a place to set their exhausted birds down.

  By the time the third and last returning wave of Federal pilots arrived and reluctantly accepted Admiral Thorn’s surrender terms, her crews had completely filled all of their maintenance bays, elevators and pre-launch staging areas with Federal fighters. Incredibly, they somehow managed to squeeze all 649 of the surviving Yankee Lightnings and Mustangs into spaces designed to handle only 460. When the Federal fighters had all been recovered and their pilots secured, the fighters of 2nd Fleet had to turn away toward the carriers of 1st Fleet, as there was just no room at their usual inn.

  After turning search and rescue operations over to Vice Admiral Stillman, Admiral Thorn sent a message to Norf Fleet shipyard for medical assistance and space tugs. Thorn then sat down and composed her rather complicated after-action report, and sent it off to Admiral Kalis by encrypted omindirectional radio. A minute later, Admiral Kalis was stunned to learn the battle was over.

  Eileen Thorn had not waited to coordinate her attack from behind with that of 1st Fleet from the front, but, on her own initiative, she’d launched a totally unsupported attack at an opportune moment on over 200 Fed
eral warships, with but 44 of her own. Outnumbered 5:1, she miraculously managed to destroy 102 enemy ships, capture 36 damaged Federal warships, and drive off the remaining 56, losing only seventeen destroyed and fourteen damaged of her own. Incredibly, she also managed to capture 649 Federal fighters and pilots in the process. Never had so few, done so much to so many, with so little. Shortly, the Confederate crews would begin to calling her the “Southern Rose with a Steel Thorn.”

  Ginia was safe. The Federal assault had been repulsed. Confederate losses had been heavy, but thanks to Thorn and her 2nd Fleet’s heroics, not nearly as bad as Kalis had feared it would cost to blunt the massive Federal offensive. The Confederacy lost just 51 of 132 ships, with the additional loss of 505 precious fighters out of 1380 they’d begun with. Another eleven Confederate ships were damaged... 72 of 132 ships destroyed, or now beginning repairs. Adding the 36 damaged Union warships Thorn had captured, Norf Fleet shipyard was going be rather busy for a long time.

  Kalis had started with two fleets, and finished with, but one. Over 24,000 dead and another 6,000 wounded. 30,000 Confederate casualties. Devastating. But the Yankees had suffered worse. Much worse, thanks to his Steel Thorn.

  *

  The largest and costliest battle in the annals of space warfare was over, and it was time to sort out the aftermath. The next day, 50 transports filled with Alliance Fleet Marines and their destroyer escort transitioned into the Ginia system 3½ light minutes out, in full expectation of occupying Ginia, now that the Grand Fleet had mopped up the mutineers. It took less than four minutes of monitoring radio and holovision broadcasts from Ginia to dissuade them from that idea.

  Despite their astonishment at the news flooding out of Ginia, they were even more astounded to find that before they could get themselves turned around and back into hyperspace, an entire Confederate Fleet, with several hundred fighters already launched, had them surrounded. Surrender was the only viable option. 50 transports and a dozen more Federal destroyers ended up joining the Confederate Fleet. Over 50,000 Alliance Fleet Marines and destroyer crews found themselves interned in a Confederate POW camp.

  Over the next two weeks, rescue and damage control operations swirled all over Ginia space, as Mayday beacons were localized and life-pods collected, from both stranded Confederate and Federal crewmembers. Space tugs dragged wrecked starships and derelict hulks into orbit around Ginia, to either be rebuilt or scavenged for parts. Fleet Marines took charge of another 20,000 Federal prisoners, herding them into temporary fenced compounds with prefab housing and facilities, until more permanent prison accommodations could be built to house them. Most of the Federal prisoners were stunned and bitter about events that led to their imprisonment, but few blamed the Confederates themselves. Most blamed their own inept leadership for the debacle.

  One prisoner had to be isolated from the rest, for his own protection. It would take several days before Kalis was informed that one of the Federal prisoners was the infamous, Southern-hating Union commander himself, Admiral Joseph R. Bishop — who also had to be put on suicide watch after being informed his Grand Fleet had been destroyed by a woman.

  The celebration throughout all of Ginia was absolutely jubilant. Admiral Kalis and Admiral Thorn were deified as the Saviors of Ginia. Soon, word spread throughout the Confederacy of the brilliance of Fleet Admiral Kalis’ strategy, and of Admiral Thorn’s personal initiative that resulted in the greatest military victory in history. President Collier called for a day of prayer and thanksgiving throughout the Confederacy, as none could attribute their astonishing deliverance from the hands of the Northern hordes by any word other than miraculous.

  Confederate crewmembers were treated as heroes beyond peer, with honors heaped upon them without measure. But the terrible losses and deaths of so many of their comrades produced a strangely somber attitude amongst the surviving members of Kalis’ fleets. Not that the Confederate civilians allowed that inconvenient fact to slacken their own need for victorious festivities. Had anyone remembered, it might have been reminiscent of the return of victorious legions to Rome, some 4,000 years earlier.

  The commemoration of the battle in the North however, was somewhat more subdued.

  Chapter-35

  Never ascribe to malice, that which can be explained by incompetence. -- Napoleon Bonaparte

  The Planetoid Discol, City of Waston

  August, 3861

  Ass-covering was the primary pursuit throughout Waston in the days immediately following the return of the survivors of the Federal Grand Fleet. Bridge recordings and computer records from all 56 ships to have survived and returned from the Ginia debacle, were thoroughly scrutinized by senior officers of the Alliance Fleet and their Congressional overseers. Crewmembers were thoroughly debriefed. Some investigated with the earnest desire to ascertain what truly went wrong, with the intention of fixing it, while others were desperately looking for scapegoats. Incriminations and recriminations flew in all directions, as the shit hit the political fan. Careers ended. Even the Consortium Executive Board was stunned by the extent of the disaster. The casualty numbers were simply staggering.

  The government tried desperately to keep news of the disaster from leaking to the public, but a debacle of this scale could never be completely hidden. Rumors escaped, despite all the government could do to suppress them. Some media outlets attempted to boost sagging ratings with sensationalism, by reporting on the rumors and/or broadcasting amateur videos taken by sightseers documenting the actual destruction of the Alliance fleet. These soon found their studios closed and their executives arrested by Alliance Bureau of Investigation agents, by direct order of the new president.

  The mood of the nation was somber at best, and panic-stricken at worst. Gone was any remaining thought that subduing the insurrection was going to be a short, painless effort. Such a short time ago, some 250,000 young men and women had set off for Ginia in an atmosphere of a gala celebration. Parades had been staged, with flags flying and patriotic bunting adorning every public building. Over 190,000 of them had not returned. Losses incurred by the Grand Fleet would require years of effort to replace.

  Fleet assets from all corners of the Alliance were hastily called to assemble at Waston, to repulse the expected rebel counterattack. No one who’d gotten a good look at the group of ships the Grand Fleet’s fighters had been dispatched to attack had made it back to positively identify them. For all the Fleet planners knew, they might have been nothing more than a bunch of derelict hulks positioned to reflect the proper number of scanner blips. Odds were, the entire rebel fleet had probably been hiding amongst the asteroid belt and had snuck in behind Admiral Joe Bishop’s fleet, concealed by the fleet’s own drive plumes.

  Orders were dispatched and deep space tugs left for Conn to gather the ships that President Buchwald had recently put into mothballs just a few months earlier. Those were some of the best ships in the fleet and they would be sorely needed now. But perhaps the most ominous sign of the true severity of the crisis was when J.P. Aneke bought the Regis Hotel in Waston, out of his own pocket.

  “Hal, can you fill me in on what happened at the Battle of Ginia?”

  Yes, Diet. The Confederate fleet won and drove away the Union fleet.

  “Yes, that’s what I’ve heard on the news, but a lot of the reports are contradictory and generally lacking in details… do you know what really happened?”

  I only know what the Alliance knows, Diet... until I can get an update from Ghost.

  “Hal, are you trying to sandbag me?”

  No, Diet, however the details of any war can be rather gruesome and shocking. I would not be your friend if I didn’t wish to spare you whatever amount of emotional pain you would likely experience from misplaced guilt, over the consequences of our projects.

  “Hal… give.”

  Are you really sure you want to know the gory details, Diet?

  “I’m sure Hal. We have a lot of responsibility for whatever happened down there, and I need to
know the results of our actions — the good, the bad and the ugly.”

  Only one-fourth of the Grand Fleet the Alliance sent to conquer Ginia managed to return after the battle. 56 ships out of 202 made it back. No carriers returned.

  “My God. Casualties?”

  You really don’t want to know, Diet.

  “You’re probably right about my not wanting to know Hal, but I need to know.”

  Approximately 100,000 casualties from the carriers alone, Diet.

  “100,000? From just the carriers?”

  Ship’s company for an attack carrier is approximately 5,600 and the Grand Fleet contained four of those. Ship’s company for a light carrier is nearly 4,200 and the Union fleet had 18 of those. That makes 98,000, plus about 1,600 pilots.

  “What about the rest of the fleet?”

  Approximately 90,000 more.

  “190,000 men and women… dead.”

  Not all dead, Diet. Just listed as “missing” for the moment. We’ll know more, when I get an update from Ghost.

  “Still, unlike surface warfare, the vast majority of casualties in space warfare are killed, aren’t they?”

  Yes.

  “So, I’m responsible for the deaths of 190,000 men and women.”

  No, the Consortium is responsible for all those deaths and more. They’re also responsible for all the casualties on the Confederate side, too.

  In closed session, Congress temporarily suspended the balanced budget provisions in the Constitution to allow for emergency deficit spending, and then passed the largest military spending bill in history. War bonds went on sale throughout the Alliance with great fanfare to help raise funds, so emergency construction programs could begin ramping up to rebuild the decimated Alliance Fleet.