Tarnished Knight

by Jack Campbell

  “It is time to announce our true colors,” Iceni said to the others on the bridge before she triggered her own comm controls to broadcast. This time, she deactivated the avatar so that everyone would see her true appearance.

  “People of the Kane Star System, this is President Iceni of the independent star system of Midway. Midway has thrown off the yoke of the Syndicate Worlds and no longer answers to the CEOs of the weak, corrupt, and incompetent government on Prime. As the Syndicate Worlds crumbles, it is time for the star systems of this region to join together for mutual protection and support, so we can follow those courses of action in our best interests rather than the orders of distant masters who represent a failed approach. Distant rulers who would take our wealth, demand our obedience in all things, and give nothing in return. Only we can defend ourselves. Only we can ensure the safety of our homes.

  “The ISS at Midway has been wiped out. We are no longer forced to bow to the snakes. I urge you to join us. My flotilla will support your struggle. To any who still wish to follow the decrees issued by the dead hand of the Syndicate Worlds, I tell you not to seek to hinder our movements or actions. We will fight, and we will win. For the people, Iceni, out.”

  She turned to Marphissa. “Contact the other flotilla again. You personally. I want them to hear from someone else in a mobile forces command role talking directly to them.”

  “Yes, Madam President.” Marphissa sat silent for several seconds, then activated her own comms. “Warships of the Kane flotilla, this is Kommodor Marphissa of the Midway flotilla. Join with us to defend this region against aggression and disorder, join with us to defend all that we hold dear. We truly fight for our people now. If you choose not to join with forces of the independent star system of Midway, you must avoid any fight with us, or we will annihilate you. For the people, Marphissa, out.”

  The messages were going out at the speed of light, but it would take them a while to reach their destinations. “In about half an hour, when our messages reach the other flotilla, all hell is going to start breaking loose in this star system,” Marphissa predicted.

  “I wish I could see the reaction on the second planet when the messages get there,” Iceni replied. “The important thing is that it will take an hour and a half for my message to reach that planet, and another hour and a half for any response from the planetary authorities to reach the warships in the other flotilla. They’ll have nearly three hours to make up their own minds on what to do before they receive orders from their bosses on the second planet.”

  There was nothing left to do then but sit and watch. Iceni didn’t want to be distracted when something finally did happen, so she avoided the urge to pull up some work documents or a novel or a twitch-and-move game and instead just stared at her display. She discovered that hitting one command produced an expanding sphere image that represented the message she had sent, spreading at the speed of light through the star system. On a display covering such a wide area, the bubble appeared to move slowly but steadily, sweeping across installations, planets, warships, and merchant ships. Iceni got a kick out of seeing when her message actually arrived at each location.

  But she wouldn’t have any idea what their reactions would be until the light from those movements reached her. Iceni found she could activate reaction bubbles, showing how long it would take her to see such activity, but the swarm of expanding bubbles quickly merged into a welter of foam in which it was too hard to make out individual expansion waves. She wiped out that option, couldn’t seem to locate a simpler one, and glowered at the display. I will not be one of those clueless CEOs who can’t carry out simple functions without some lowest-level untrained worker showing me how to enter the commands. I’ll just work it out in my head. Thirty light-minutes to the other flotilla. That means thirty minutes until they received the messages from us, during which time we get three light-minutes closer to them at point one light speed. Then the light showing their reaction needs to come back to us, which will take . . . about twenty-five, twenty-six minutes as we keep closing on them. Close to an hour, even if those other warships react immediately.

  Space is too damned big.

  * * *

  “VECTOR changes on the other flotilla.”

  The announcement by the maneuvering specialist jerked Iceni out of the light nap she had dropped into without realizing it. Blinking away sleep, she tried to make out the movement on her display.

  “Coming around toward an intercept on us,” Marphissa commented. “We’ll have to see where they steady out, but I’d bet that they’re coming toward us.”

  “But why are they coming toward us?” Iceni demanded. Everything had once been easy. If they were Alliance warships and they came toward you, it meant they wanted to fight. If they were Syndicate warships, they wanted to join up. But now Alliance warships might be friendly, Syndicate warships were likely to be hostile, and she didn’t even know who these warships were answering to, let alone if they were readying for a fight. “Kommodor Marphissa, if we have not heard anything from that other flotilla within the next five minutes, you are to inform them that we will destroy them as soon as they enter weapons range.”

  “The Kane flotilla is steadying out at point one light speed, on a direct intercept with us,” the maneuvering watch reported. “Time to contact, two hours and twenty-one minutes.”

  “Still no battleship,” Iceni muttered.

  “They may not have one,” Marphissa said.

  “Then why do they want to keep us away from that gas giant?”

  The warning went out, but still no reply. Iceni sat watching the distance close, her irritation rising with every second that passed without any communication from the other flotilla. Even if they say they want to join us now, I think I’ll still order them to be blown away.

  “Incoming message.” The comms specialist paused. “It’s not from the flotilla.”

  “Show me,” Iceni ordered.

  A window opened to show a junior officer standing on what was clearly the bridge of a battleship. If the sub-CEO on the mobile forces facility had shown only normal levels of stress, this executive was clearly in far worse straits. His uniform showed signs of having been worn for days or weeks, his face was lean in a way that evoked thoughts of very limited rations, and his eyes held an almost feverish intensity. “This is Sub-Executive Kontos, acting commander of the mobile forces unit B-78, to . . . to . . . President Iceni.” Kontos paused to lick his lips and clear his throat as if speaking distinctly was an effort.

  “A subexecutive commanding a battleship?” Marphissa commented. “Has that ever happened?”

  “During battles, when a crew was almost wiped out,” Iceni replied.

  Kontos started speaking again. “We are barricaded within the primary citadels. We are the . . . survivors of the outfitting crew. Myself and . . . a number of line workers. We control the bridge, engineering, and the primary fire-control center.” Kontos was clearly doing his best to recite a correct report but occasionally stumbled over the words. “We . . . have been able to hold out because of the internal armor and the . . . antimutiny defenses.”

  “Who are you holding out against?” Iceni mumbled angrily.

  “The ISS,” Kontos said, as if answering her question. “We . . . don’t know how many. They overran some locations . . . My last order received was to . . . seal ourselves inside critical control areas and . . . wait for relief. We have not heard anything since . . . except demands . . . from the ISS . . . that we surrender. External comms have . . . been . . . blocked, but we managed a work-around in time to . . . hear your message.”

  “The snakes have taken over here,” Marphissa said, her voice hardening.

  “That explains it all, doesn’t it?” Iceni said. “The snakes wiped out the officers and who knows how much of the crews on those warships. The only thing I don’t understand is why they didn’t ord
er CEO Janusa to assist them.”

  “Perhaps they actually knew who you were despite the avatar and have known you were playing them. If you’d gone to the second planet and docked our warships at one of their facilities for resupply, we might have been overwhelmed by boarding parties before we could get away.”

  “Oh, damn. You’re likely right. That’s where they’d have access to enough personnel to do that.”

  “We request assistance,” Sub-Executive Kontos asked. His voice cracked on the last word, and Kontos sagged a moment before straightening to attention again. “We know they’re bringing . . . breaching gear strong enough to get into the citadels. Request . . . assistance.”

  The message began to repeat, then abruptly cut off.

  “The snakes found their work-around and blocked it,” Marphissa commented.

  “Sub-CEO—” The operations specialist caught herself. “Kommodor, we’ve been tracking a freighter moving at a good clip toward that gas giant. It fit the profile of a rush resupply mission, so we haven’t paid much attention to it, but it might be bringing the breaching gear for the snakes.”

  “As well as more snakes, no doubt. Can we get there before it does?” Marphissa asked.

  “It will beat us by about ten minutes if we hold our vector.”

  Iceni nodded slowly. We charge in at best speed, brake hard, blow away that freighter, and get our ground forces on that battleship. Simple. As well as incredibly complicated to carry out.

  “It could be a trap,” Marphissa cautioned. “To get us in there close to the battleship. If its armament is operational, we could sustain enough damage that the flotilla here could finish us off.”

  “It could be,” Iceni agreed. “But if so, that subexecutive is the best actor I’ve ever seen. Certainly a lot better than ‘CEO Reynard’ or ‘Sub-CEO Petrov.’ Are you bringing up a possibility, or do you believe this is a trap?”

  Marphissa sat watching her display for a moment before answering. “Only a possibility. If it were a trap, they could have sent us a message from Sub-Executive Kontos a long time ago to see what we would do. I think the snakes had been willing to starve out the survivors from the outfitting crew. That would cause less damage to the battleship than breaking into the antimutiny citadels. When we showed up, the snakes knew they had to get the breaching equipment there and crack open the bridge. But because we came in this quickly and straight for the gas giant, they haven’t had enough time.”

  “Then let’s go save Sub-Executive Kontos and his brave line workers, Kommodor.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  “SUB-EXECUTIVE Kontos, this is President Iceni. We are on our way to relieve you. Hold out as long as you can. We wiped out the snakes at Midway, and we will do the same here. If you manage to get comms working again, keep us apprised of your status.” Odds were that Kontos wouldn’t be able to receive her message, let alone reply, but if they could hear any of it that might inspire the surviving crew to hold out long enough.

  Marphissa raised one finger toward her display. “How do we take down the other flotilla quickly enough to get our ground forces to that battleship? We don’t have enough of a firepower advantage to knock out all of those other warships in a single pass.”

  “We’re not going to try.” Iceni settled back in her seat, feeling a surge of confidence. She had viewed the records of Black Jack’s battles over and over again in the last few months, trying to spot patterns, and suddenly one of those patterns had come clear to her. Whenever possible, Black Jack had avoided doing what his opponent wanted. It seemed so simple a thing. If the enemy wanted you to attack in such a way at such a place, then if you could you did something else. That hadn’t been how war had been fought for . . . how long? Kill the enemy, destroy the enemy’s forces, slam head-to-head until one side gave way. That’s how it had been since those who knew how to fight in other ways had died in the first decades of the war, those they had partly trained dying soon afterward. But Black Jack had come from that earlier time. And he never did what his opponents wanted.

  “Madam President?” Kommodor Marphissa waved at her display again. “We need to destroy that flotilla.”

  “No, we don’t. We need to defeat it. What do they want? To slow us down. To inflict damage on us. To keep us occupied long enough for the snakes to gain full control of that battleship. We won’t let them do any of those things.”

  Marphissa nodded in the manner of someone who wanted to acknowledge she understood what had been said but not necessarily what it meant. “What will we do instead?”

  “We will get past that oncoming flotilla without engaging it, brake our velocity far enough to release the shuttles carrying our ground forces assault team close to the battleship, then accelerate again and engage and defeat the other flotilla as it returns to fight us.”

  Another nod of partial understanding. “How will we do that, Madam President?”

  Iceni smiled. “I have established our goals and objectives, Kommodor. As you are the flotilla commander and experienced operator of mobile forces, I will leave it up to you to find the best means of accomplishing those goals and objectives.”

  “I . . . see.” Marphissa stared at her display for a little while. “Thank you for this opportunity to excel, Madam President.” Remarkably, not a bit of sarcasm came through when she said that.

  “I have every confidence in you, Kommodor.”

  Marphissa sat for long minutes, just looking at her display, saying nothing, her eyes intent. Finally, her hands moved, tracing out possible actions so that the ship’s maneuvering systems could produce predictions.

  “Kommodor?”

  Jerking out of her absorption in her planning, Marphissa turned an annoyed scowl on the operations specialist. “What is it?”

  “Kommodor,” the specialist said with a nervous swallow, “I was thinking, if the ISS is controlling the other flotilla’s mobile forces, and if they are running them on automatic controls because the officers are dead or under arrest, then those are the same automated systems as our own mobile units use.”

  “Your point?” Marphissa snapped.

  “If we run a simulation in which our automated systems are controlling the actions of the other flotilla, it will tell us what the automated systems on the other flotilla will actually do in response to anything. We can predict their reactions.”

  The annoyance dropped from Marphissa’s face. “That is an excellent observation. The limitations of simulations are always the inability to know what the other side will actually do, but in this case we could know that precisely. Set up the simulation.”

  “Yes, Kommodor!”

  Iceni leaned closer to Marphissa. “Why isn’t he a subexecutive? I mean, a ships officer or leytenant?”

  “I will look into that,” Marphissa replied.

  As the simulation went online in part of her display, Marphissa went back to work, her expression gradually going from tense to a sort of qualified satisfaction. “It can be done, Madam President. I will have to download commands to the other units in the flotilla to ensure the timing is right. The hardest part will be the braking maneuver to reach the battleship. That will stress our units the most.”

  “But we can do it? It is within the capabilities of our warships?”

  “Yeeessss.” The affirmative reply was drawn out enough, tentative enough, to inspire some worry.

  “Show me.” Iceni ran the plan through her display, watching the motions play out in accelerated time. Some of the maneuvers would push the strain on the warships very close to the red zone, where a ship would literally come apart under the stress, but none of them actually pushed into the red. In theory. In practice, the plan would create strains that might spike too high for individual units. “We’ll need to override the automated maneuvering safeties,” Iceni commented.

  “Yes, Madam President. The sa
feties wouldn’t let us do this.”

  Play it safe and lose, or risk it and have a chance of winning? Why was she here if she wasn’t willing to run risks? “Well done, Kommodor. I approve your plan. When do you intend downloading the plan to the rest of the flotilla?”

  “Eleven minutes prior to contact. We’re all within a light-second of each other, so that allows plenty of time for ship systems to accept the plan and be ready to execute it at ten minutes prior to contact.”

  “But not very much time for the commanders of those warships to realize what they’re going to do.” Iceni regarded the plan again. “That may be a good thing. If they have time to study this, they may start thinking and decide there’s mistakes.”

  “Even the Syndicate system couldn’t manage to get us to completely stop thinking,” Marphissa replied.

  “Some people never needed any encouragement to stop thinking, Kommodor, and some never started thinking at all. Send this to Colonel Rogero now, so he can prepare for loading his soldiers. We’ll be under some serious g-forces while his people are getting into the shuttles, and even with combat armor that will make things difficult for them.”

  * * *

  THREE light-minutes separated the two flotillas, each racing toward the other at point one light speed, for a combined closing rate of point two light speed. That meant fifteen minutes until the two forces came into very brief contact.

  Very brief, but long enough for their weapons to hurt the other.

  Iceni reviewed her flotilla’s readiness for at least the hundredth time in the last several minutes. Every unit at combat readiness state one, every weapon ready to fire, targeting systems locked on to the approaching flotilla. She had left her flotilla in the box formation, deciding that messing with that would be one change too many and probably more than she could handle anyway. Just because you may have figured out one thing about Black Jack doesn’t mean you’re anything close to being him.