Valor's Stand

by Kal Spriggs

  “Uh,” I hadn't really considered that. Part of my brain shied away from the very idea of kids. If I were to have any, though, I could admit I wanted them to be Kyle's and mine. “The Armstrong family goes way back and I'm...” I swallowed a bit. “I might be the only one to carry the name at this point.” Technically my cousins Mel and Rawn were alive, but who knew if they'd even have kids of their own, or if they'd be able to live their lives in the open.

  As for my brother, well, I had yet to hear anything from him. If he'd somehow made it off Drakkus, he hadn't found a way home.

  “As long as they're our kids, I think I could live with them having your family name,” he said.

  “I like the sound of that,” I smiled at him.

  We didn't know where we'd be in a few months. We didn't know if the culmor had a fleet already on the way. We didn't know if Admiral Drien was going to have us arrested and dragged off to some secret jail. We knew almost nothing. But we at least had each other.

  I reached out, resting my hand on his shoulder. For now, that was enough.

  ***

  “Flight Control, this is Sand Dragon One Four Four, I am negative on anything in my area,” I reported, barely fighting back a yawn. I'd been flying for almost four hours, leading my squadron of Firebolts along the designated patrol patterns. We'd intercepted a couple of merchant ships, but for the past few hours, things had been dreadfully slow.

  “Confirm, Sand Dragon One Four Four,” Flight Control answered. They'd done away with our callsigns and while we got away with using them internal to our squadrons, they'd leveled punishments on cadets for using their callsigns on command frequencies. It was one of those things that I found particularly nasty of Admiral Drien and his people. It took away that little bit of individuality we had.

  I listened with part of my attention as they went through the other patrols in and around Century. They were just about to end the check-in, when someone came one the net, “Flight Control, this is Ogre One Four One,” I recognized Thorpe's thick voice, his transmission fuzzy at this distance, “I have one ship on my scopes, range is pretty long, can you confirm?” On my implant, I pulled up his position: he was on the far side of Century, the direction of the Dalite Hegemony. And on the far side of them, a couple hundred light-years and a few tiny colonies away, is the Culmor Empire.

  “Ogre One Four One, we confirm. We see the drive field, looks to be cruiser class. Can you check it out?”

  “Roger,” he announced. A moment later, he came back on the net, “Flight Control, I'm being sent a transmission, they're asking me to relay. They don't seem to want to stick around and...” he trailed off. When he spoke again, his voice was tight with tension, “Transmission received, they've jumped away already. Should I send it?”

  What the hock? Was it a Dalite ship? Or someone else? Why would a cruiser come into the system and barely wait for its drive coils to bleed off energy before jumping out again?

  “Send the transmission,” Flight Control ordered.

  “I repeat, this is the IDHS Gahlakuri, please record and relay this transmission to all ships. We will not remain in the system. Dalite has fallen. A Culmor Empire driveship appeared in orbit approximately three days ago, with upwards of thirty cruisers. They destroyed most of our space-based defenses and crippled the majority of our forces. After they reduced our space forces, three more driveships emerged on the edge of the system and they sent in transports. Dalite High Command signaled their unconditional surrender to the aliens. My ship is heavily damaged, my weapons are offline. I brought warning by the directive of Senior Captain Jular, who is the senior surviving officer of the Imperial Dalite Hegemony. Please relay to all friendly ships. The culmor are attacking in force. Warning has been sent to Nitro, Hunt, and Darwin. I am turning for Expo and seeking aid there from the Guard. Captain Johbyari out.”

  I heard someone in my squadron swear. Four driveships. Most of the scenarios we'd gone through had been against one or even two. Thirty heavy cruisers in that first wave. The culmination of the Three Day War had been a fight against a single heavy cruiser, a light cruiser, and their escorts.

  My head hurt trying to do the math on how much firepower that could include.

  Dalite surrendered. The idea shocked me. They'd been the local bully for decades, the sometimes friend, sometimes foe that had steadily expanded the space under their control. They'd taken over Fresca back before the Three Day War.

  And now, their entire fleet was gone, all but three or four ships, from the sounds of things.

  “Retain your patrol routes, all One Four patrol squadrons,” Flight Control ordered.

  Yeah, the Culmor Empire could be right behind that cruiser.

  Well, from what I understood, the efficiencies involved in using a much bigger drive field on a driveship rather than smaller ones on multiple smaller vessels meant that the Culmor Empire's entire force could have beaten them here, if they'd headed this way directly. But that wasn't their normal tactics. When they conquered systems and planets, they most often seized all the planets along their path, most often destroying or capturing any military facilities and gassing the populations of colonies.

  I didn't know if Dalite's surrender had been honored. Up until the War of Persecution, the aliens had neither offered nor accepted surrenders... of course, neither had humanity.

  The culmor might well have exterminated the entire populace. How many people on Dalite, I wondered, three billion? Were they all dead?

  Was my homeworld next?

  Even if the answer was no, then I knew it wouldn't be long. The Culmor knew about Century. They'd raided before. There weren't that many inhabited worlds on the Periphery. That was due in part to the infrequence of decent planets in this region of stars and the relative scarcity of stars themselves. Out past Erewhon, the stars got fewer and fewer, to a sort of interstellar void, with only a handful of stars in that gulf.

  Up towards the Culmor Empire, there were only a handful of colonies spread across several hundred light-years. There had been Dalite and Fresca, but both systems were only three light-years apart. To the side of Dalite was the tiny mining colony in the Nitro System, which had a population of only a few hundred thousand. They didn't even have any kind of military force, just a commerce patrol that also acted as local search and rescue and law enforcement. Closer to the Culmor Empire, there had been Rowan, Sandman, and Purgatory. I had to assume those three were gone: captured or wiped out. None of the systems had been heavily populated. Rowan had been relatively untouched, other than a few small towns. Sandman was a murky, dark world, in orbit of a red dwarf star, whose light barely illuminated the planet. They'd been settled as a waypoint, a stopping place for various trade ships working their way around the Archangel Anomally. Purgatory had been the site of a science colony, studying its star, which was in its death throes.

  All of them gone, no doubt.

  We were next. I felt a curious sense of calm sweep over me. It was as if I had been waiting for this. It was almost a relief. I wouldn't have to worry about graduating. I wouldn't have to worry about Admiral Drien. All my other problems faded away. Century had no other defenders. We were it. We would stand.

  ***

  “I wish they'd just get it over with,” Ashiri snarled as she bounced a ball off the wall impatiently. She wore her flight gear. So did I. Almost all the first and second class cadets had taken to doing that, even the ones not assigned to squadrons. We patrolled in our flight suits, we ate and slept in our flight suits, just as we'd taken to sleeping on cots here in the launch bunker. It wouldn't save much time, but even a minute or two might make the difference between getting them off the ground and dying on the ground.

  Admiral Drien had dug up dozens of additional fighters, a variety of makes and models, and had half the staff and many of the junior cadets working day and night to get them operational. I didn't know what good another hundred or so obsolete fighters would do, but we would have them, sometime in the next few hours.
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br />   “Maybe they're consolidating on Dalite,” I answered, annoyed by the clack of the ball hitting the wall and the slam of her catching it. I didn't know where she'd picked up the nervous habit, but I sort of wished she'd do it somewhere else. “You know, taking over a planet probably takes some attention, even if they do surrender.”

  She caught the ball and looked over at me, her eyes narrow, “You think they didn't just gas the place?”

  I shrugged, “Alexander told me that most of the population of Dalite lives underground. So gassing it probably wasn't the best option.”

  “You know what I mean,” Ashiri grunted in frustration. “Kinetic strikes, poison gas, biologicals... it all means extermination. You think they honored the surrender?”

  “How should I know?” I asked, irritated by the question. “Sure, maybe? More likely if they stood down all their ground forces, I'd guess.”

  “Hmmm,” Ashiri considered it. “So there's a chance we don't all die. Maybe the only ones who die are the ones who can fight. Maybe even if they kill us, our families can survive.” She shot a guilty look at me, “Sorry.”

  “It's fine,” I told her. I didn't have a family on the planet, not anymore. And she didn't know that my brother might still be alive or that my cousins still were. I felt guilty about not telling her, but it was information that the Admiral had ordered me to keep secret, so I wasn't about to share it.

  “We're not going to die,” I told my best friend. And I realized that I believed it. Somehow, I felt sure that no matter what happened over the next few days, we weren't going to die.

  “I heard there have been some more arrests,” Ashiri noted, shooting me a look. “Disappearances too... ship captains of merchant ships, mostly. Kyle told us that his dad noticed a pickup of traffic leaving the system.”

  “I bet there's a lot of people leaving,” I snorted. “Probably anyone with the money and assets to buy a spot on a ship.” I bit my lip though at the reminder about Kyle's dad. He'd been relieved by Admiral Drien from his command of his destroyer, and assigned to a supply transport, instead. It was a huge demotion and Kyle said that his dad was seriously thinking about just giving up.

  “Yeah, there's a lot of that, sure, but this is ships leaving from the military docking areas. Civilian ships,” Ashiri said it neutrally.

  “I didn't catch that,” I frowned. I'd been a little distracted when we'd been talking to Kyle, a few hours earlier. Mostly I'd been thinking through all the preparations we had to do to get our squadron turned around and ready to fight after the patrol. “Why from the military docking areas?”

  “I don't know, but I'd bet there's less visibility there,” Ashiri told me. “Maybe they could move people with less interest. Important people, leadership. Their families.”

  I considered it, “You think they're evacuating Admiral Drien's family? The families of his people?” I didn't care if they were monitoring us at this point. I doubted Admiral Drien would care what any of his cannon-fodder pilots thought, not facing this threat.

  “Maybe the Charter Council, too, or at least the ones who support him,” Ashiri nodded. “Not families like mine, of course.” She said it bitterly. I couldn't blame her. Her family had come from Ten Sisters, given up everything to come to Century, hoping it would be a new, free home for them. Look how that turned out.

  I considered that. It made a certain level of sense. “You think they're arresting civilians who own ships, confiscating the ships, and then loading their own families aboard.” I bit my lip, “Probably loading up cargoes worth the most value, like precious metals.”

  “Yeah,” Ashiri nodded.

  I sat back. My friend went back to bouncing her ball. No wonder she was nervous. If that was what Admiral Drien was doing, then it meant he didn't have any faith in actually being able to defend the planet. And unfortunately, it seemed to fit with what he'd been doing.

  There was really only one way to find out if there was any truth to it.

  I created a private network with my implant and then sent out an invitation, dropping into the neutral green grassy field under the crystal clear blue sky. I waited.

  I didn't have to wait long. Sashi appeared, “Jiden, there's a lot of risk in contacting me like this,” She glared at me.

  “You know things are a little busy right now, I somehow doubt that anyone's going to notice you're talking to me. If they are, just tell them I had a question on how to integrate some of the other fighters into my squadron given the different maneuver characteristics.”

  Sashi glared at me, “Telling me to violate the honor codes?”

  “No,” I told her, “I really am wondering how to integrate a Starslider, a Firebolt Mark II, and a pair of Prowlers into my over-sized squadron when we've never run any kind of training with that sort of thing.”

  “Oh,” Sashi blinked. “Yeah, that makes sense.” She considered it a moment, “Oh, I see. Plans was supposed to send out that the other fighters are to replace for anticipated losses.” She stumbled over those words, not that I blamed her. Those “anticipated losses” were people we'd trained and worked with for years. “We don't have the launch capacity to get them all into orbit in one set of launches, anyway. If we have to sustain the fight, we'll do combat landings, refuel and refit, and get the reinforced squadrons back in the air. I'll make sure Plans pushes that out.”

  “Ah,” I said. Given the number of extra craft, Admiral Drien or whoever had pushed this to her expected severe casualties.

  “Okay, so now that you've answered that, is your grandfather evacuating his family and close personal friends on seized civilian transports out of the military docks on Century Station?”

  Sashi blinked at me and I saw a flush climb her cheeks. “How dare you accuse--”

  “I'm not accusing anyone, I'm asking a question,” I told her. “There's a world of difference. And believe me, it's totally fine if someone has the ability and means to evacuate. But if your grandfather is using Planetary Militia resources to make sure that his people get evacuated, well...”

  Sashi's expression went blank. I had to hope that she was looking into things rather than just ordering someone to come arrest me. A moment later, her eyes went wide as she looked at me. “My mom... she's not answering my call, it goes straight to her mailbox. Same for my cousins. Nothing.” I saw her struggle a moment with it. “They might have evacuated on a merchant ship...”

  “There's lots of those,” I said neutrally. “But would they slip out without telling you if that was what they were doing?” Sashi looked away. “You have to see what this means, right? If your grandfather is evacuating select personnel in secret, he's not planning on holding out. He's planning on cutting and running.”

  “He would never...” Sashi began.

  I held up a hand, “It's what it looks like, Sashi. I'm not trying to get you to turn on him, I'm just trying to get you to see the big picture. What it means when I have eight additional fighters and pilots added to my squadron to replace 'anticipated losses.' What it means when your grandfather is evacuating key personnel, appropriating civilian ships to do it, and he didn't tell you.”

  Sashi flinched as I said that. “I'm going up in those fighters, same as you.”

  “Yeah,” I told her, “you are. Which tells us something else, right?”

  Sashi looked away. “What do you want me to do about it?”

  “I can't get a message out,” I told her. “I can't warn my grandmother about what your grandfather has been doing. The poisonings. The arrests. People disappearing. You could get a message out. Do that much for me... and tell me if Alexander is still alive.”

  She gave me a glare. “You don't ask for much, do you?” She made a face. “He's alive. I asked, I even went and saw him.” She made a face, “He wasn't exactly happy to see me. He's in a military prison at Duncan City.” She made a face, “My grandfather plans on releasing him when things calm down a bit.”

  “Thank you,” I told her. “The message?”


  “Give it to me, I'll make sure it goes out,” Sashi told me, her expression unhappy enough that I believed her.

  “Thanks,” I said. “Does this change anything between us?”

  Sashi shook her head. “If we survive this, if we win, you're still out. I've still got to support my family.”

  “If we survive this,” I shook my head. “Call me crazy, but I'm less worried about this than about what comes after.”

  Sashi gave me a surprised look. “Jiden...” She shook her head. “I've seen the simulations for two of those driveships. My grandfather even ran one with three. It was a slaughter. We can't fight them directly. A single T-Type cruiser can engage over thirty different fighters and missiles at the same time. They're going to kill us in the hundreds before we're even in range.”

  “So you're giving up?”

  Sashi leveled a glare on me. “I know what the deployment plan is. I know our target priorities. I know we can hit them hard. Hard enough they're not going to forget it. But yeah, Jiden. I've sort of made peace with the fact that I'm going to die.”

  I shook my head, “You're giving up too easily, then. There's a way through this. There has to be.”

  Sashi stared at me. For a moment, I saw something like hope stir in her eyes. Then, in the real world, I heard a klaxon begin to sound. I disconnected from the network, jumping to my feet next to Ashiri Takenata as we ran out the door and down the corridor, joining our boot steps with hundreds of other cadets as we rushed to our fighters.

  I recognized Hodges' voice over the intercom, “All units, this is not a drill, emergence of culmor driveship in orbit. All pilots to your fighters, all pilots to your fighters!”

  ***

  Chapter 23: Just About The Worst Feeling Ever

  I'd thought there wasn't much to compare to riding a rocket booster assist on a Firebolt running its thrusters to max as it rocketed its way into orbit.

  I'd been wrong. Having ships shoot at you while you ascended into orbit added a whole new level of terror. Gunfire, projectile explosives, mass driver rounds, and even lasers cut through the atmosphere. I could see fighters taking hits above and ahead of me. One, two, three... dozens of them, Pilots didn't have any room to evade or maneuver. We were launching right into the enemy fire and our flight paths had us locked all the way into orbit.