Admiral's Throne

by Luke Sky Wachter

  Especially when it came to people who exiled me whenever it was convenient, broke trade agreements left and right and then felt entirely justified in demanding my help whenever it suited them.

  “That’s different,” Akantha said, getting her back up.

  “We’re off topic. Are you aware my people have asked me to be their King?” I asked.

  Akantha’s mouth open and then she froze.

  “Right,” I said with a nod, “and before you make any more ill-advised threats, just let me point out first that my plan to help the Spine with this threat involves them paying us a great deal of money. Both with credits and in kind payments of goods and services that Capria, Gambit, the Fleet and I very much hope Tracto currently needs.”

  “King. Of Capria?” she asked, eyes wide before she recovered.

  “Apparently, old King James killed off all his rivals and then fled with a great deal of my homeworld’s wealth for his retirement plan,” I said, waggling my eyebrows.

  Her face turned into a mask and I could almost see the wheels turning.

  “How likely is it that he will attempt to return?” she asked.

  “Oh, he’ll only be content feathering his new nest until things quiet down and he thinks he can stage a comeback by averting a financial collapse, but assuming I accept their offer, I can work to ensure his temporary retirement becomes a permanent one,” I said.

  “Permanent, you say…?” she asked, eyes narrowing as she looked at me not entirely happily.

  I shrugged, really unable to care at the moment how my becoming immune to her threats by accepting an important position back home, namely the Crown, affected Akantha and her plans.

  “Well I’m not about to stand idly by while he tries to assassinate his way back to power, if the one he has to assassinate is me, now, am I?” I said drolly, “but let’s list off all the reasons he’d fail anyway. First off, any attempt by James to reclaim the throne, assuming I take it, wouldn’t work because you’ll gut him like a crab if he so much as shows his face in our general vicinity.”

  “Second, I’m not planning to go anywhere,” I continued, “that said, there will be a window of vulnerability,” I conceded. “It will take time to find him and move the proper assets into place to contain or eliminate him,” I said with a pained expression.

  I might not like it but there was one thing I was very much aware of; there could never be two Caprian Monarchs at the same time or at least not for very long. With a King and a Queen, a reconciliation of the type you would normally imagine might be possible but even in this day and age, two kings on side-by-side thrones would never fly.

  I didn’t like the thought of killing my political rivals and my personal experiences with imprisonment made that an unpalatable option as well.

  But the truth of the matter was, if I took the throne, James wouldn’t be able to help himself, he’d have to make a move to remove me, if only to save his own life. Even if I decided not to move against him, he’d never believe it. This was part of why a move to the Gorgon Front after I’d installed my own people on Capria would have a great deal of advantages, other than just saving innocent lives from the bugs those blackguards in the Empire had set loose on my homeworld.

  “You might want to hand that over to me. I can deal with your cousin James,” Akantha said after a moment.

  “You personally?” I asked with a frown.

  “I have people for that. They can be discreet,” she said dismissively and I didn’t have to wonder any longer; it was definitely a decisive olive branch. The only question was, should I accept?

  “I’m not sure I want to kill him but if we can agree to start with surveillance and only make a move if he tries to attack us or I give the order, I’m okay with you taking the lead,” I said after a moment.

  “Still squeamish I see,” she said.

  I looked at her with raised brow.

  “An insult, now, really?” I asked with a scowl.

  “That was not an insult. It’s one of your more endearing qualities actually,” she assured me.

  “Mmhmm,” I murmured skeptically.

  The silence after that last utterance extended.

  “So, what are your plans for helping these people?” she said finally, grudgingly.

  “You mean in addition to securing the services of half a million marines and the more than two million professional soldiers in the Caprian army?” I asked, just to twist the knife and drive home my point, “because that will crew a lot of warships and complete the task of turning the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet into a force to be reckoned with anywhere in the galaxy.”

  “No need to twist the knife; I take your point,” Akantha replied, sullenly, if I was any judge, “I can see if you become King, you’ll no longer need the warriors of Tracto for your lancer departments nearly as much as you did before.”

  I thought she was wrong or at least, not entirely right, since I wouldn’t trust my fleet in the hands of an all-Caprian spacer and marine or lancer crew anytime soon, but I definitely did not want to clarify that particular point with her right at the moment.

  “I like to keep things as diverse as possible,” was all I decided to say on that subject before switching topics, “according to the information given me by the representatives, Capria sold a great deal of warships to the Empire and King James ran away with the second half of the payment. No doubt he intended to use it as a bargaining chip to secure his pathway back to power, once the hue and cry over feeding his political opposition to the bugs died down,” I said and then continued darkly, “unfortunately for him, this just may be the crucial misstep that removes him from power.”

  “In other words, they want you to cover his debts,” she said flatly, “how much of the treasury are we talking about?”

  “The Caprian Shipyards are quite extensive and potentially a very lucrative long-term investment. Short term, I’m eyeing the military, specifically the marines, lancers and ground forces. They could be quite helpful both inside and outside of this sector,” I pointed out.

  “They’re only lucrative if you can hold onto it and that’s not what I asked. I wanted to know how much it’s going to cost us,” Akantha said stiffly, “I would also be cautious of over-utilizing warriors with questionable loyalties. Your homeworld has changed hands so many times because its military is not firmly behind any one candidate.”

  I waved a hand.

  “Like I haven’t had to deal with mutiny after potential mutiny with my Lancers Tractoan ‘war-band’?” I asked dismissively. I figured the more I balanced my Tractoan lancers out with other non-Tractoan lancers and marines the more stable my grip on power and the more comfortable I would be. Particularly since these last two years had seen my non-Tractoan personnel cut to the proverbial bone.

  Akantha pursed her lips but ultimately decided to stay silent.

  “The fact is that with Capria’s industrial base, latent shipyards,” I paused to correct myself, “or if this latest information is true, very active shipyards, and the military forces in its SDF, I could make significant improvements to our situation here.”

  “As I said before, it sounds like an advantageous situation for you but only if we can hold it,” she said with an unhappy frown.

  I didn’t fail to note the equivocation but decided not to touch on it just yet. Let her stew for a while. I’d been forced to eat her space waste and smile for years so it was gratifying, if not particularly nice, to be the one dishing it out for a change. Akantha, my beloved Hold-Mistress, was just going to have to adapt to our new reality, a reality in which she and her people were relegated to more of a convenience and a backup plan than my sole source of support.

  “Considering the current strength of their fleet and that I’m being invited in by their own government, no one on Capria can stop me once I’m crowned. It would take the entire population turned against me to make the situation there untenable and I’m not about to let that happen,”
I said with confidence; these last two years in exile had been more than just a slow-down period in my life and a chance to play with the kiddos. It had been a wakeup call.

  After being betrayed by Isaak and the New Confederation, I was filled with anger and frustration and unable to do anything. The unfairness of it all had been overwhelming.

  Only after I’d walked out of it alive and after a significant period of time to reflect on the beach and decompress, had I come to realize that I’d been more battle-fatigued from the constant stress of dealing with attacks, wars, assassination attempts, invasion and mutinies than I’d realized. The answer I’d eventually found was not to throw away my ideals in the name of revenge but to instead recognize there were times when they told you to go to Hades, that you just had to walk away. No matter how much you wanted to stay and help save lives.

  I’d been forced to remember that as a Montagne, I’d rarely if ever got a fair shake in my entire life. I could either live with that or walk down a dark road of anger and hate.

  I didn’t have to be a punching bag either. Despite the anger I still felt, I knew what was right and what was wrong; if I forgot or got out of line, I had plenty of people around me that I trusted to set me straight.

  At the same time, I was forced to concede expecting political support or accolades from the people for tirelessly working to save their lives was a fools’ game and I hadn’t exactly done a great job before the Sector 26 Campaign of getting my message out there.

  “I’m more worried about the Empire than I am Capria, although that’s risky,” Akantha said, bringing my attention back to the here and now where it needed to be.

  “The Empire…. is a risk,” I admitted, disturbed by the reality they were still too big to move against directly, “but considering the Spine is back in the loving arms of the old Confederation, I don’t see them as too much of a problem, honestly. If they take action in the Spine, then of course we’ll respond but since we’re not a province, there’s only so much they can do.”

  “Maybe my imagination is bigger than yours, Jason,” Akantha said sternly, “but I can imagine quite a bit that they could do, starting with a spoiling raid against anyone that helps you. They did exile you after all. Which doesn’t even take these latest bug attacks into question.”

  “Point,” I admitted.

  “My question is; where is the old Confederation in all this?” Akantha said angrily, “they send you into exile, fine, that just means you have more time for us but now they need your Fleet to save the Spine from the demon bugs. Why?” she demanded, “why isn’t the Confederation settling everything like they’re supposed to? Why did the Regional Authority call you unless this is some kind of trap? For that matter, where are the rest of the Fleets in the Sector 25 and the Spineward Sectors in general?”

  “Apparently, the Regional Assembly urged its member worlds to unilaterally disarm in order to decrease tensions with the Empire,” I sneered, “and after receiving relief convoys to put their worlds back to rights, many of the local SDF’s were only too happy to turn the job of dealing with threats outside their home-space back over to the Confederation Fleet. To give the demon his due, many of those worlds then focused on rebuilding local infrastructure, interstellar trade and their economies. Mostly.”

  “Again, where is the Confederation Fleet, that they’re forced to fall back on a man they exiled for protection?” she asked coldly.

  “As I understand it, both from our own intelligence reports and what Kong Pao and others said, each Sector was assigned a Confederation Flotilla to patrol for piracy and put the local warlords out of business but they are out of position for these sorts of attacks and to be honest, they don’t have the numbers they need to do the job,” I sighed.

  “So why haven’t the Flotilla Commanders call in the main Confederation Fleet!?” Akantha said with irritation.

  “Again, from what I’ve been hearing,” I stressed, “most of the current Confederation Fleet budget is tied up in the Wall Initiative. The remaining Fleet, minus a few roving patrol fleets is still in mothballs, so they’ve had to use the funding for the Wall to base a Flotilla in at least one Starbase per sector. Right now, the Confederation Fleet is looking at six months to a year to pull more ships out of mothballs and then weeks or months again in transit time to get them here. By the time that happens, dozens of worlds could have been eaten to the bedrock,” I said bleakly.

  “This is insane,” Akantha said, thrusting a finger down on the table, “unilateral disarmament? The old Confederation can’t be bothered to provide more than a small anti-pirate flotilla? In regions that have recently been conquered by warlords! What kind of ruler does this!?”

  “The old Confederation, apparently,” I said unhappily, “to be fair, they sent a rather large fleet to settle things that first year after we were kicked out of Sector 25, but by the second year, they’d decided to break it up into flotilla-sized packets and roving patrols to guard the individual sectors of the Spine.”

  “All of which means you have to risk your life, your fleet, and our wealth all because they decided to be cheap,” she frowned in contemplation, “to be honest, I’m not sure how much we should trust your reports,” Akantha added.

  “How so?” I asked.

  “Oh I’m not saying everything’s a lie but how many worlds were devastated after Rim Fleet withdrew and during the various invasions by the Reclamation Fleet, Droids and Pirate Warlords?” she asked suspiciously, “you can’t tell me each and every world everywhere in seven sectors of space failed to rebuild their Defense Fleets.”

  She had a good point.

  “It wouldn’t surprise me if they downplayed that angle considering the dozens of worlds per sector that obviously listened to their lies and failed to rebuild their SDF’s. More, I suspect those worlds that did rebuild intend to keep their SDF’s home to actually defend the world they were built to protect. No one wants to send away the warships they constructed at considerable cost, leaving their homeworld open to bug attacks, in order to defend worlds that couldn’t be bothered to make the necessary sacrifices to defend themselves,” I finally said.

  “Explain to me how any of this benefits us?” she said flatly.

  “To start any world that wants my help is going to bleed credits for our services,” I said.

  “And if they refuse to pay?” she challenged.

  I lifted a brow.

  “You know how it works. We don’t have the treasure to pay you, Admiral Montagne. People are dying, Admiral! Why don’t you just save us for free and we’ll call it good all things considering? Then if you try to walk away, they call you a tyrant,” she said, temper rising.

  “And if one doesn’t pay, pretty soon no one pays and they call me a chump behind closed doors,” I said with a sigh, “yes I’ve learned that lesson very well, Akantha.” While it was good to see her passionate about something other than fighting with me, I didn’t see the point of continuing down this road.

  “It’s good to see you’re at least starting to recognize how things work and appear to be taking steps to shore up your weakness for helping people without anything in return,” she said suspiciously.

  “Listen, I have the Jump Spindles and I’m willing to take payment in kind. We could always use more factory complexes, for one,” I shrugged, adding, “orbital smelters, sensor arrays or even fixed defenses would all work just fine. I’m going to make it clear on the front end my help comes at a cost, and hand them a bill before we do anything in their star system, along with a rider stating we will take payment in kind if they won’t pay us up front in credits. Then when they try to stiff us on the bill, I’ll just move into orbit and haul away large structures no one would normally think could be taken without being disassembled,” I said with a wolfish grin.

  “I know you. Whatever you say, you’re still too kindhearted,” Akantha warned.

  “I’m not taking no for an answer. If they refuse our help, fine, if th
ey accept it, they’ll pay,” I said making a chopping motion with my hand.

  “Now, what about this other notion of yours,” Akantha said after a minute, “why are we involving ourselves in a place so very far away from Tracto and Sector 25 that I’ve never even heard of it?”

  “Proof,” I said.

  “What?” she asked.

  “There’s more to it but that’s what it all boils down to. Saving lives and stopping genocide is something we’ll try to do along the way but at the end of the day, it’s about getting proof,” I said.

  “Yes, but proof of what?” she asked.

  My eyes turned as cold as space ice and I flipped a hand palm up.

  “The Empire thinks it can exile me, invade our worlds with impunity and generally do whatever they want but it’s high time they learned that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction,” I curled the fingers of my hand into a fist in a crushing motion, “which is why I intend to go over there, kick some imperial teeth in and in the process, hopefully prove once and for all that humanity is not alone in this galaxy,” I said with a gleam in my eye.

  “What does that even mean? Does it really matter if there are more alien races out there? I mean we already have the droids and the uplifts and a lot of even stranger things all over there on the Omicron,” Akantha pointed out.

  “If new Sundered visitors from the Gorgon Front can be believed, the Empire of Man has not only consistently lied to the public and deceived all of humanity about the truth of life in this galaxy, but they’ve gone a step further and actively attempted to destroy it root and branch,” I said.

  “Proving them wrong and showcasing their genocidal attacks on defenseless alien worlds will do more to damage their credibility and curb their growing power in the galaxy than shooting up a thousand of their starships,” I said, already imagining it, “once the galactic community realizes they’ve been lied to and we confirm what’s been going on underneath their noses all this while, the outrage will be monumental.”