The Tanith Gambit

by Dietmar Wehr

  “Yes, Your Majesty. You are correct. The status of those ships has not changed since we spoke on the phone.”

  “What assets do we have in orbit right now?”

  “Champion, Guardian and Paladin are in orbit and on alert status. Our other ships on the ground are in the process of getting their crews back to the ships. Since the two Tanith ships kept their crews onboard all the time, they’re ready to lift off right now but are awaiting orders. I have both Captains Valkanhayn and Karffard on open video channels if you wish to speak to them.”

  “Very good, Captain. When Admirals Shefter and Bargham get here, I’ll confer with them and a decision will be made as to when we tip our hand and launch our grounded ships. Have we picked up any transmissions of any kind from those hostile ships?”

  “No, Your Majesty. If they’re communicating amongst themselves, they’re being very careful about how they’re doing it.” Simon was about to say something when he noticed Captain Sagnac tilting his head to one side and looking away momentarily. Clearly the Captain was listening to a message from the communication device in his ear. After a few seconds, Sagnac said,

  “I’ve just been informed that the aircar carrying Admirals Shefter and Bargham, has now arrived and both admirals are on their way to the elevator.”

  “That’s good. In that case, Captain, you can return to your station. Please arrange for status change announcements to be piped into this room so that the admirals and I can hear what’s happening.” The Captain saluted and quickly left the room. After what seemed like a long time, Admirals Shefter and Bargham walked into the conference room. Shefter looked worried but surprisingly, Bargham didn’t. He appeared to be calm and confident. Simon hoped that wasn’t just a front. Both men had been kept up to date on the situation status during their flight in. Just as they were in the process of saluting, all three men heard the Status Board chime to indicate that something had changed. Looking at the Board, Simon quickly saw that the ten ships were now indeed accelerating towards Marduk. Estimated time of arrival in near Marduk orbit if they started decelerating halfway would be just under 100 minutes. Simon returned the salutes and said,

  “It seems they’ve gotten tired of waiting for us to do something. Please remind me of our tactical options at this point, Admiral Shefter.” Shefter took notice of the fact that the Prince-Protector hadn’t invited either admiral to take a seat around the conference table. Well, if the Sovereign Head of State wanted to hold a meeting standing up, that was His privilege.

  “Certainly, Your Majesty. As you know, we’ve gamed out this precise scenario dozens of times in simulations and there are basically three approaches that are available to us, given what appears to be our numerical superiority with 14 ships to their ten. The least risky option in the short run, is to launch our ships as soon as their crews are aboard, which the hostiles will detect. Realizing that they’re outnumbered, they would be able to reverse course and escape back out beyond the no-jump zone before our ships could get into firing range. If they then jump away, we would have effectively driven them off with no losses of our own but with none on their side either and there is always the possibility that they might come back again with even more ships.” Shefter looked over at Bargham who nodded agreement.

  “The least risky of the remaining two options are to allow the hostile force to penetrate deep enough into the no-jump zone so that our ships can bring them to battle no matter what they try to do. That means a space battle which I would expect us to win but at this point, it would be difficult to estimate how many of our ships would be damaged or destroyed and how many of our crews would be killed or injured. We may end up needing those damaged and destroyed ships in the future. The third option is the most risky from the point of view of potential collateral damage. We allow the hostile force to decelerate into near Marduk space and we engage them there. There is no real advantage to our side from doing that and we’d be running the risk of hostile strikes on the planet by missiles fired either intentionally at it or by anti-ship strikes that miss their intended targets and hit the planet by mistake. With that in mind, can Admiral Bargham and I assume that a near orbit engagement is not acceptable?” Simon nodded.

  “Yes, I agree. There’s no point in running that risk when we don’t have to.” He paused and both admirals waited. Finally he said,

  “Admiral Bargham. I want as few of those hostile ships to escape as possible. Capture them if you can but not if it means risking further losses of your ships and crews. If the only way to prevent their escape is to destroy them, then by all means do so. Having said that….it would be very useful to know who they are and where they’re from so perhaps I should amend my instructions with the added priority that at least one hostile ship should be captured if at all possible.”

  “I understand, Your Majesty. Unless you have other orders for me, I’d like your permission to head to the spaceport and board my flagship now.” Simon looked at Shefter.

  “I have nothing further for you, Admiral. You may go unless Admiral Shefter has something he wishes to say first.”

  “Thank you, Your Majesty.” Turning to Bargham, Shefter said.

  “Your ships can lift off at your discretion, Sam. Keep an open channel to us here of course. I’ll try not to become a back seat driver. Good luck and good hunting.” Bargham said nothing. Instead he saluted Simon first, then Shefter and left the room. Simon looked at Shefter who said.

  “I know that you have some doubts about Admiral Bargham, Your Majesty, but I have complete confidence in his judgement. He knows what has to be done and how best to do it.”Simon said nothing but nodded. He walked over to the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the main Operations Center and the huge Status Board. The icon representing the hostile ships was just about to cross the boundary of the no-jump zone. Bentrik turned to Shefter and said,

  “I wish I knew for certain that these are Prince Viktor’s Space Vikings, that Prince Lucas warned us about. The timing would be just about right.” Shefter nodded.

  “I believe that’s exactly who they are, Your Majesty. Marduk isn’t experiencing tensions with any other Civilized World and no one else would risk leaving their planet defenseless by deploying that many ships all at once.”

  “I’m not as certain as you are, Admiral. There’s been enough time for news of our civil war to reach the other Civilized Worlds, especially Aton and they might see us in the same light that Prince Viktor seems to have, which is as a weakened, vulnerable and therefore tempting target of opportunity. If it wasn’t for Prince Lucas’s Plan C and his willingness to share captured ships with us, we’d be looking at a catastrophe right now. Thank God that the Malverton shipyard’s going to be back into operation soon. Even with the reduced capacity, that will still give us two military shipyards. I’d be happier if we had at least three but the government’s finances are stretched to the limit as it is.” He paused and looked at the Status Board. Looking back at Shefter, he said,

  “We have to find out for certain who those people are. If they’re Space Vikings, then I want plans for a strike force, which will combine a retaliatory mission with our version of Prince Lucas’s Plan C. We hit Xochtil and then keep an ambush force there to pick off incoming Viking ships. In fact….” Bentrik crossed his arms in front of him and looked down at the floor. Shefter said nothing. When Bentrik looked back up, he had the kind of expression that Shefter had come to dread. It was the kind of expression that the Prince-Protector sometimes had when he was about to expand his own powers as not just the nominal but also the de facto Head of State. “The attack on Xochtil will not just be a raid to neutralize Prince Viktor. I want the plan to include the mission to pick Xochtil itself clean of all equipment and materials, so that it can’t be used as a Viking Base again. At the same time, we’ll use the captured equipment to expand our own shipyard capacity either at Malverton or another location. Setting up and manning that extra shipyard capacity will still cost a lot but if we can sell one or two capt
ured ships to Isis or Baldur or even Ithavoll for platinum or gold, that will cover the extra cost and the ships we sell will be replaced with newly captured ships from Xochtil. How soon can you have a draft plan ready for me to review, Admiral?” Shefter considered his answer and then replied,

  “Two weeks, Your Majesty?” Bentrik was tempted to demand a draft in one week but then relented. He knew from personal experience as a Commodore, that military operations in other star systems were logistically complicated affairs and keeping a long term ambush force at Xochtil manned and supplied with crews sent out at regular intervals to man captured ships, would require careful planning to make it work.

  “Alright. Two weeks. It doesn’t have to be polished with a lot of detail. The basic components will be sufficient for now.”

  “You’ll have it, Your Majesty.” Bentrik nodded and looked back at the Status Board. The hostile ships were now in the no-jump zone and their speed was increasing by a 6G acceleration rate.He wondered how those ships would react when they saw the defending fleet expand from three ships to 14 on their radar screens. He sat down in the plush chair at the head of the oval shaped table and indicated that Shefter could sit down as well. Now all they had to do was wait.

  Admiral Bargham was relieved that the SDC had air transport that could get him to the spaceport quickly. As the VIP aircar reached its transonic cruising speed, Bargham established communication with his flagship, Dreadnought, which was waiting for him at the spaceport. Dreadnought’s Captain assured Bargham that the ship was now fully manned and could lift off at any time. Bargham made sure that Dreadnought’s Captain passed the word to the other ships, that no one was to lift off until they received orders to do so from Bargham personally. As the Captain signed off to carry out Bargham’s orders, the admiral leaned back in his seat and took a deep breath. This was the kind of moment that all flag officers dreamt of. Leading a fleet of ships into battle with a high probability of victory but he had to make sure that he didn’t screw up. Whatever happened, he had to keep his ships between those hostile vessels and the planet. Everything else, even the Prince-Protector’s command to capture at least one vessel had to be a lower priority.

  After what seemed like half an hour but in fact was only five minutes, the aircar landed at the foot of Dreadnought’s boarding ramp. Bargham was pleased to see that a squad of marines led by a junior naval officer, were waiting at the ramp for him. He would have been extremely annoyed if the Captain was waiting for him at a time like this when the Captain should be on his Bridge ready to lift off at a moment’s notice. As he exited the vehicle, he took a good look at the spaceport. With eleven ships on the ground, the view, even at night, was impressive. It was easy to pick out the ex-viking ships that were clearly larger than the standard navy cruisers but even those were huge by any normal standard with the smaller light cruiser’s 1,000 foot diameter making it as tall as a 100 story building. As he approached the ramp, the marine escort and naval officer snapped to attention and saluted. Bargham returned the salutes and practically jogged up the ramp. A small part of his ego took note of the fact that he wasn’t the only one breathing heavily when they reached the top of the ramp and entered the ship. After dismissing the marine honor guard, it turned out that the junior officer, whose name tag Bargham didn’t bother to look at, was expected back on the Bridge, which was on the same level as the Flag Bridge. As Bargham entered the Flag Bridge, he was surprised at how noisy it was. It seemed that everyone was talking to someone on a com channel or vid screen. Bargham quickly got himself settled in his Command Station chair and while he was buckling himself in, he scanned the main Tactical Display screen. The hostile ships had accelerated for almost 11 minutes now and their speed was up to 23.5 miles per second. Because they had started accelerating from virtually a dead stop, they had only covered approximately 7,500 miles so far but as their speed increased, the distance covered would go up dramatically. Bargham switched his view to the smaller screens that ringed his Command Station and which now showed the images of the eleven Captains of his ships on the ground plus the three Captains of the High Guard ships, that were now hovering in stationary position over the starport at orbital altitude. There was also another screen that was connected to Space Defense Command but Admiral Shefter wasn’t sitting in its field of vision yet. It was time to brief the Captains.

  “Gentlemen…the Prince-Protector has made his wishes in this matter known to me. Our mission is to capture at least one hostile ship, more if we can do so with minimal incremental losses of ships and crew and to destroy the rest. All of you, including our welcome allies from Tanith, have participated in simulations of just this kind of attack. You know that in order to prevent these attackers from escaping back beyond the no-jump zone, we have to let them get deep enough to be able to intercept them before they can get away. Therefore, we’ll maintain our present position for approximately another 23 minutes. At that point, they’ll be roughly a quarter of the way in and if they try to decelerate to a full stop and then accelerate back the way they came, we’ll catch up to them before they can jump away. I want you to brief your crews so they know what to expect. The Prince-Protector and Admiral Shefter are watching us from Space Defense Command and I don’t intend to disappoint them. I know that all of you…” Bargham made a point of looking directly at the screens showing Captains Valkanhayn and Karffard, “…will follow my orders to the letter. Keep these com channels open at all times. Any questions?” Surprisingly there were none, not even from Valkanhayn and Karffard. No doubt the training and simulations during the last few weeks had already answered any questions. Bargham sighed as he realized that the next 23 minutes would be the longest of his life.

  With the admiral’s briefing over, Boake muted his microphone so that Bargham wouldn’t hear anything he said to his own people. He could still hear if the admiral said something. As he looked around the Bridge, he mentally congratulated himself for the nth time for agreeing to give up the Space Scourge and take command of the Star Knight. Even after his old ship had been repaired, it was still an old ship while the Star Knight was newer and in much better overall condition. His current crew were an improvement too. He’d convinced the best of his old crew to join him in becoming part of the Royal Tanith Navy and the new people were, with a few minor exceptions, more competent and less pain in the ass, than the old crewmen who refused to abandon their Space Viking past and who were now amusing themselves in that howling wilderness of an island. Looking back at Admiral Bargham’s image on the screen, Boake smiled. Bargham had turned out to be an okay sort considering how pretentious most Marduk officers and government types were. Sure Bargham had his misconceptions about Space Viking neo-barbarians but he and Alvyn Karffard had made an extra effort to cooperate and seemed to have earned Bargham’s grudging respect. Boake hoped that Bargham would remember his agreement to let Star Knight and Red Thunder operate as a unit under Valkanhayn’s command if operating separately from the main body of ships. Boake wondered if he knew some of the captains of the incoming ships. In all his years of raiding as a Space Viking, he never thought he’d be fighting them someday. Boake became a Space Viking because it had seemed like an easy way to get rich but it wasn’t long before he discovered that most Space Vikings never got rich enough to retire. By the time he figured that out, it was easier to continue on than it was to start a new career. When he became the Captain and part owner of his own ship, he thought he might finally join the ranks of successful Captains but bad luck combined with poor decisions resulting from votes taken by the crew ended in disappointing raids and a demoralizing hand-to-mouth existence. Teaming up with that scum Garvin Spasso was a testament to how desperate he’d become by then. Thank whatever gods, that watch over Space Vikings, that he and Spasso had crossed paths with Lucas Trask and Otto Harkaman. Not only had he regained his self-respect, but he also had a respectable way to make a decent living with a good future to look forward too, as long as he didn’t get himself killed in this or any other battle
.

  And speaking of battles, this one would be something new for him and his crew. Oh sure, he’d commanded the Space Scourge in the first Battle of Marduk against multiple ships and the raid on Beowulf had involved multiple spacecraft even if they weren’t capable of hyperjumps but this looming engagement was an altogether different beast. Navies from Civilized Worlds fought fleet-to-fleet battles like this, not Space Vikings. Boake admitted to himself that he was nervous about it. Not afraid but worried that he might embarrass Prince Lucas by not performing up to the same standard as the other Marduk Captains. And yes, he was honest enough to admit that there was the prospect of death too, although he wasn’t nearly as scared as he was during the raid on Beowulf. He checked the chronometer. Less than ten minutes to go to lift off. Time went fast when you’re reminiscing about past mistakes and triumphs. He realized that he hadn’t barked a command in quite a while. Great Satan, he had an image to uphold!

  “What does a mere Captain have to do to get a coffee around here?” he yelled. Even though his Bridge crew tried to hide it, Boake could still see some of them smile. If the Captain was his usual cantankerous self, how serious could the upcoming battle really be?