by TR Cameron
“If this was strictly a military matter, my friend, I might have the latitude to side with you. However, as this is a holy war sanctioned by the gods, we must follow their will. They call for full destruction; not an economical, efficient, surgical strike into the heart, but an apocalypse to remove the enemy from the universe.”
“We’ll accomplish the same, whether we take out the bases in a line or return later for the ones left behind. It’s my opinion, as leader of the military, that this is the best plan,” Drovaa intoned with full confidence.
“I disagree, most vehemently,” Kraada argued in a voice as cold as space.
“It’s unfortunate for you, then, that you’re only a religious leader. Remember, friend,” he drew out the word, turning it into its opposite, “I earned my position, and the emperor appointed me to it.”
“What will you tell them?”
“Pardon?”
“What will you tell your people, and the populace at large, when the churches proclaim that the military has chosen not to follow the mandates of the gods? Do you believe the people’s loyalty is to the military? Do you believe, even, that the officers you rely upon the most are more loyal than faithful? Can you be sure? Since there’s so much uncertainty, I assume you plan to give a stirring message to explain the discrepancy.”
“I’ll tell them to follow orders if they’re in my chain of command, Hierarch. The people aren’t my concern. They’re your concern, and the emperor’s. My job is to win this war, and I’ll do so in the most efficient and effective way possible.”
Kraada shook his head. “My friend, you know better. If you force me to bring this before the emperor, he’ll be very concerned about what the people think. In his eyes, I’m already tainted for pushing the current invasion strategy. Why then would you seek to change it now? You have minimal risk, and maximum upside.”
“Perhaps, I’m not in favor of how you’ve used this opportunity to increase your own importance, Hierarch. Perhaps, your subtle positioning to increase the relevance of the church hasn’t gone unnoticed. Perhaps, there’s more of a groundswell against such maneuvering than you perceive. Perhaps, it even rises to the level of the throne. Do you really wish to push and find out?” Drovaa’s eyes locked with his own.
“My decisions are informed by what I believe the gods would want, Drovaa. Your pedestrian fixation on gaining and maintaining power during this mortal phase of our existence is an affront to them. Your concerns are unreasonable, and more importantly, irrelevant. I stated, and I restate, scripture requires the complete eradication of these humans. The most effective way to accomplish this, in accordance with the teachings of the Dhadas, is to destroy each base in spatial order, until their last refuge is their home planet, where we will eliminate them completely.” Kraada grew agitated as he spoke and bolted from his chair, raising his voice and his arms, pointing at Drovaa, “I ask you, who are you to put your petty worldly issues before the will of the gods, Marshal Drovaa?”
Without waiting for a response, Kraada stormed from the room.
HOURS LATER, Kraada sat at his ornate desk in the cathedral, writing notes in longhand for his next sermon. He struggled to focus on the words of the gods, and his sentences kept returning to issues of secular concern—namely the way the military and political leadership were failing to persecute his holy war properly.
He cursed and drew a line through the words he’d just written. Not my holy war, the gods’ holy war.
He threw the pen down in disgust. Leaning back, he let his gaze climb skyward, but anger prevented meditative retreat. With a growl, Kraada stood and walked to the nearby cabinet, pouring a tall drink of amber liquor. The first sip burned a welcome as it worked its way down his throat. Returning to the desk, he wadded up his notes from the past hours and pitched them into the fireplace. As he contemplated their fiery destruction, a gentle knock sounded on the door.
“Enter.”
One of his newer attendants shuffled into the room with his eyes downcast. Kraada regretted the need that dispatched the man’s predecessor to serve as the religious officer on the Ruby Rain. It always took the new ones some time to realize Kraada didn’t appreciate false gestures of humility, but only rewarded those who showed their beliefs through concrete actions. He knew the man would wait in silence, no matter how important the task, until Kraada recognized him. Definitely something to break him of.
“Blessings upon you, Coriien. I presume you have some new information for me?”
“Yes, Hierarch.” His voice trembled, and his hunched over posture spoke of submission and bad news.
“Out with it. In this cathedral, we rarely kill the messenger.”
“Yes, Hierarch.” He stumbled over the words, and the trembling grew more pronounced. “The emperor has refused your request for an audience, Hierarch.”
Kraada froze while anger built inside. “Very well. Please send in my majordomo. Go now.”
He sipped deliberately, stilling his mind and pushing down the righteous fury he longed to liberate. Kraada stood unmoving until his chief aide and majordomo, Daariel, slipped into the room.
“Your will, Hierarch?”
“Several things. First, deliver a missive to the emperor inviting him to attend services here in the cathedral at the end of the next eight-day. Full trappings and respects on the invitation. Second, in two days, send the same to Drovaa Jat. Only the required trappings and respects. Third, prepare to send a message by courier to Indraat Vray aboard the Ruby Rain in enemy space. Speed is of the essence, but use only trusted individuals. This message must remain secret. Finally, alert the librarian to my imminent arrival, and direct any of my attendants who aren’t occupied to report to the library. There’s important research to do.”
He dismissed the majordomo and pulled out the text to encode his message to Indraat. The content of the communication demanded he not write it in the clear, so he spent several minutes mentally composing it. Kraada meditated upon the words for most of the next hour, seeking any hint from the gods that he traveled the right path, or that he was in danger of going astray.
No such blessing or warning was forthcoming, and he finally took his pen in hand and scratched the coded information into the parchment.
Dearest niece,
The gods demand a great service of us, and I will require your greatest efforts to fulfill their requirements and deliver upon their promise. Specifically, I need you to…
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Cross was late meeting the others due to the exhausting length of his final briefing. All nonessential personnel had been evacuated over the past several days, and it would soon be time for the Washington to leave the sector. Despite the decision to eliminate patrols, the admirals were sending a few ships to scout the sectors between the last starbase and this one, and his ship was in the first rotation. Cross found the whole situation fairly unpalatable But as much as he wanted to jam the aliens’ teeth right down their throats, the UAL wasn’t ready to take the battle to the enemy.
It was hurry up and wait. Just like everything else in the military. Long stretches of boredom punctuated by sheer terror.
He knew that he was lucky to have the time to spend with friends and comrades. Although the Washington’s crew had regular shore leave rotations, getting his core group on the same schedule for even two hours was a challenge.
The bar was mostly empty. Only a skeleton staff remained, and aside from a set of sailors in the corner, his friends were the only customers present. It looked and felt wrong. Abandoning a perfectly good starbase wasn’t something his brain was ready to accept.
He sat down, taking the seat in between Dima and Kate. A low-alcohol beer was delivered a moment later. “Seriously?”
Jannik replied, “Seriously. It’s a damn shame. What with all the ship crews going back on duty, they packed away the good stuff and slithered on out of here, leaving us this kids’ drink.”
“The life of a naval officer is so hard,” Cross quipped.
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“True story,” agreed Kate.
He turned to Dima. “When are you shipping out?”
“This is the final item on my agenda. The Beijing will head out for patrol shortly before the Washington is scheduled to depart.”
“It’s been a nice break in the battle, however short and however frustrating the cause,” Cross said.
Jannik agreed, “You’ve got to take them where you can get them, my boy.”
Cross started to raise his kids’ beverage in a toast, when the doors to the establishment banged open. Two Marines with growly expressions vectored toward them.
Grabbing chairs, they sat on opposite corners of the table. They regarded the others without speaking.
“Okay, I’ll bite.” Cross looked at the gunnery sergeants. “What is it you’d like? Just come down for a couple drinks before we leave?”
“Hardly,” Rhys St. John’s clipped accent stretched the word, grating on Cross’s ears. To be fair, most of what St. John did grated on one part of Cross’s anatomy or another.
“We have an idea,” Cynthia Murphy continued, “and I think Red’s going to love it. Commander Cross, you’ll hate it.”
“Intriguing,” Dima said. “Is this something that’s best discussed in my absence?”
“Not at all,” St. John resumed speaking. “Kate shared the need to gain more intelligence on the enemy, and it just so happens that this is one of those areas in which Sinner and I are,” he paused glancing at Murphy before he finished, “shall we say, experienced.”
Murphy nodded in agreement.
“This ought to be good,” said Cross and Jannik simultaneously, with differing inflections. He scowled at his chief engineer.
“Oh, believe me, it is,” Murphy said. “So, everyone agrees that somehow the winged bastards are following us through our tunnels. The booby-traps were a great first response. Now that we’re taking different paths, though, it seems logical to assume that the aliens will spread out the trackers prior to committing their full force.”
“That’s where we have an opportunity,” St. John took over smoothly from his partner. “If we lure one of their tracking ships into following our signal, we can ambush them. If a couple other ships join us by a circuitous route so they avoid tracking, we could find ourselves in a sector where we hold a numerical advantage when the trackers arrive. At that point, we lay in all the signal jamming we can—”
“Although there’s no guarantee that’ll work of course,” Cynthia interrupted.
“—then either eliminate one and board one, or board both of them. We hit them hard and fast, get into their computers and download the data, and then destroy both so that the enemy is unaware of the theft.”
The four naval officers looked at the two Marines, too astonished to speak.
“I hate it,” said Cross.
“I love it,” said Kate.
“It’s certainly more reliable than interrogation,” the gravelly voice of the AAN’s representative at the table offered, “although you should consider prisoners just to keep all options open.”
“Now hold on a second,” Cross began, only to be interrupted by Murphy before he could continue.
“The Washington would be in minimal danger. The only real risks are more ships than we expect or a delay in our reinforcements.”
“Or that the trackers will self-destruct, taking us with them,” Jannik added.
“Or that they won’t come at all, but that’s just a loss of time,” St. John finished.
Kate looked at Murphy. “How certain are you that we can identify the computer access, board their ship, steal their data, and get away without being noticed?” Kate’s voice was a mix of concern and excitement.
“Darlin’,” she said, “this is what we do.”
AN HOUR LATER, most of the operational details were nailed down. Cross treated the session as a thought exercise, not committed but willing to listen.
“I still think boarding both would be the better idea,” Murphy argued.
“No,” Kate said, “too risky.”
“We’ll accept that risk.”
Cross interrupted, “It’s not just you. It’s the ships in the area. We can probably disable one without destroying it, but doing that while also holding off another one could get people who don’t need to be killed, dead.” Cross was adamant on that point.
“Fine.” Murphy crossed her arms and leaned back. “We will just board the one, then.”
“One it is,” Kate said.
“Yep, one,” Jannik said.
“Definitely one,” St. John said, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth.
“One,” Dima added.
“Don’t think I don’t see what you’re doing here,” Cross said. After a few seconds of expectant silence, he gave in, “Okay, one.”
“We’ve got our part all figured out,” St. John said. “How do you propose to handle your side of things?”
Cross looked over at Dima, sure he’d have suggestions. Dima ran both hands through his gray hair, his eyes slightly unfocused. “Probably the best plan is for all the ships involved in this operation to depart on the same heading. That should increase the likelihood of the Xroeshyn following.”
“It would certainly be human nature to do so,” Cross said. “Is it wrong to assume the aliens will react in ways that seem logical to us?”
Kate shook her head. “So far, their maneuvers have suggested a similar view on strategy and tactics conditioned by their own technologies and abilities. I think it’s a safe bet.”
Dima nodded. “So, good. Then, in the target sector, one ship should be visible and all the others hidden.”
“So, the enemy doesn’t turn and run,” Cross filled in. “Again, agreed.” He thought for a second. “I can see how this plan will work against one enemy ship or two enemy ships. What is the contingency if more than that arrive?”
“Run like hell,” Jannik supplied.
Dima nodded in agreement. “It’ll look like a normal transit operation if the ship runs when the tracker arrives. That will allow us to try the same trick again.”
“How many ships can the AAN commit, Dima? My admirals won’t support this, so the Washington is all I can bring to the table.”
“I believe I can supply two, as I have ordered my squadron to patrol in pairs. I will arrange to have the Osaka and his escort in hiding.”
“So, the Washington gets to be the bait in this trap?” Cross didn’t much like that part of the plan.
“Of course, it does, my friend. Haven’t you long accused us of being cowardly tricksters? It’s only fitting that we should be the nasty surprise that awaits our unwelcome guests.”
Cross felt himself grow hot, and the laughter around the table confirmed he was blushing.
“It’s okay, Cross. We’ve said the same things about you. Change takes time, but we, here, have taken one more giant leap toward a true partnership.”
“As long as we don’t let the admirals interfere.”
“Perish the thought.”
“Is the love fest over?” Kate stood and stretched. “Given that our departure is in just over eight hours, the command crew of the Washington, DC needs to return to quarters.” Laughter was the universal response, and the others rose to depart as well.
One last look was exchanged as they stood around the table. Marines and sailors, Union and Alliance. They’d become a team in truth. Hands were shaken, and in one case, a memory chip filled with all the UAL research on the Xroeshyn was transferred unseen from Kate to Dima.
Then they were apart once more, splitting off to do their own parts to bring down the invaders.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Several days later, the Washington was conducting slow patrols around what Cross called the Tiger Trap. He pretended not to hear that the bridge crew’s name for it: The Bird Trap.
Even though his was the only consistent UAL ship in the sector, he’d convinced several others to detour through, creating a pattern
toward this destination. He hoped it would be enough to draw the Xroeshyn trackers. Ultimately, the whole plan was based on hope.
Worst case, he was patrolling an important but not vitally important area—doing a job that needed to be done, anyway. Best case, it would turn into much more than a time for his crew to run training drills.
Cross and Kate were working alternating twelve-hour blocks, overlapping Claire Martin’s command watch by four hours each. Martin served as executive officer during the crossover. The bridge officers knew the stakes, and none complained at the change in procedure.
He had a complaint though. He was bored and frustrated with waiting for the Xroeshyn ships to arrive. He was just about to order yet another cup of coffee to keep the monotony from rendering him unconscious when Lieutenant Jacobs’s voice jarred him back to the present, “Incoming, 190 by 42 high.”
“Helm, come about to 190 degrees, 42 high.” As the Washington repositioned, Cross saw the ripple of a tunnel entrance opening. Two tracking ships transitioned out of it. He opened his mouth to sound the attack when a sleek Xroeshyn gunship emerged. His brain froze at this unplanned-for contingency. Their strategy was prepared to address two trackers or two of each ship type, fighting in the first case and running in the second. But with only one gunship…
Cross activated the ship-wide channel. “Battle stations. Repeat. Battle stations.” Throughout the Washington, standby mode changed to full combat mode with crew members locking themselves down and readying equipment. “Communication, signal the Osaka: Trackers are yours.” Lieutenant Ana Fitzpatrick nodded.