Blockade

by Chris Hechtl

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  Jasmine smiled her thanks ever so briefly to her steward as she took the steaming cup of coffee. She would have preferred a cup of hot chocolate but at the moment coffee or any caffeinated beverage would do.

  She needed the boost. She needed anything she could get after two days on the bridge with just catnaps. She hadn't even had time for a quick shower. She was aware she was a bit sticky. She wasn't looking forward to time in her suit.

  The admiral had wisely held back one CEV’s wing for defense. The second had forged ahead to try to break up the enemy's cruisers the day before.

  It hadn't gone well. Not that they'd expected it to.

  Seven fighters had returned from the engagement. Just seven out of the majority of the wing. The furball had been particularly brutal, surprising given that the fighter pilots from the various cruisers were not line pilots. They'd still known their business. They had also matched the CEV’s wing in numbers, and that was one reason they'd fed so many of her countrymen into the furnace.

  “Alter course,” the admiral said, voice rough.

  “Sir?”

  “We're altering course for the Bd2r3 jump point. I'm signaling the first courier to run. We need to get out of here. There is no way we can survive jumping to Horath. The moment we slow down to try to jump we're done.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” Jasmine said quietly. She didn't like it but she understood. She also knew he had planned such a contingency in advance. Pillow talk sometimes brought such subjects up and into the open.

  Not that she liked it.

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  Admiral V'z'r'll was not on her flag bridge when the enemy altered course. But she was alerted in moments by her A.I. Before she'd gotten to her bridge, her force had altered course to pursue.

  And, from the look of the updating plot, the Winterspell CruRon had started their run to get ahead of the enemy force.

  “Ma'am, one of the couriers has jumped out,” her A.I. reported.

  She clacked her mandibles. “That means he's committed to this course of action. The other courier will remain and watch until he orders them out or he leaves.”

  “Ma'am, TF 5.2 has altered course. The Winterspell CruRon has done so already and has put on some speed. Numbers are fluctuating now,” CIC reported.

  She focused all four of her eyestalks on the main plot. She now regretted not taking a course through the inner system along the slingshot. It would have split the difference, but she'd instead taken a course direct for Horath anticipating a move in that direction.

  “Get the CAGs to plot a long-range strike and refuel mission package. I want it within two hours,” she ordered.

  “Aye aye, ma'am.”

  “This isn't finished yet. I want them toasted before they leave. Preferably burnt to a crisp,” she stated, signaling first-degree blood lust.

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  Four days later Captain Misipeki wasn't thrilled about his role in the plan. When he'd volunteered to be out as a blocker, he realized it had been a brash decision on his part. Most likely to make up for his stupid mouth. He was risking his command and his crew over it.

  But if it worked they'd get a piece of the damn enemy in a moment.

  “Fighters are coming in,” CIC warned.

  “Acknowledged,” he stated. His surviving fighters, all forty-one of them were already out there, lined up and ready to strike at the incoming fighter strike. It looked like the wing from the second CEV, which meant it was their last Sunday punch.

  Well, not counting the damn battle cruisers.

  “Cyber-attacks are ineffective,” the ship's A.I. reported.

  “Understood,” he murmured. “Keep trying.”

  “Oh, I am, and they are countering with their own attacks,” the A.I. stated.

  He nodded once but his eyes and mind were focused on the plot.

  The rest of TF 5.2 were three hours out. In fact, they were now launching their fighters against the enemy ships since the enemies were preoccupied with him and trying to clear a path. No doubt the enemy still had the fighters from their other ships held back for defense.

  Any time now,” he murmured just as the enemy fighter force cut engines and then altered course abruptly.

  “Sir …”

  “I see it,” he said.

  “A second force is about to hit the enemy's starboard flank,” CIC reported.

  He nodded as he watched his own fighters fire volleys of missiles into the retreating enemy fighters. The enemy fighters couldn't fully kill their inertia and turn around. They'd been forced to perform a loop and were therefore briefly in his fighter's engagement basket. And his fighters were taking a toll on them, wreaking havoc even at over a hundred thousand kilometers out.

  “Sir, the enemy ships are altering course and speed. They are leaving the slower ships behind and are making a flank run for the jump point,” CIC reported.

  “Every ship for themselves. Typical pirates,” the captain murmured with a nod. “Let's make sure they have a warm reception.”

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  Captain Fontain hissed in pain as the DCC tech tried to shift the bar off her pinned arm. She wasn't sure how she'd gotten like that; she remembered an explosion. She'd been out of her chair at the time, checking DCC's reports at the engineering station? It was all a bit hazy.

  The enemy's carrier strike had come in at the worst possible time. Iruke was dead, so were most of his staff. The enemy's strike had been widespread; the lightly-armored ships had just evaporated under the pounding. Only the two battle cruisers had survived to this point.

  “Just leave it,” she gasped out as he tried to shift the load.

  “We need a bottle jack in here to lift it or a grav lift. Or damn it, cut the grav in the compartment and I could push it off with a pinky,” the tech said.

  “Where …,” she licked her salty lips and tried again. “Where are we with engineering?” she croaked out.

  “The fires are mostly out. The explosion was from the stern magazine, ma'am; it went off, something just let go, most likely due to the fires back there,” the tech said, looking to the side. “We've lost our sublight engines and most of our power.”

  “We're not going anywhere, ma'am,” the XO said, coming over to them. “At least, not any time soon,” he said as he came over to them. “I thought you were dead,” he said softly.

  She stared at him for a long moment. He shook his head again then reached out and grabbed the bar to prop himself up. The shift made her hiss in pain. Yup, her arm was definitely broken.

  “Cut our weapons. Signal we surrender,” she gasped out after a moment. She panted heavily as she tried to deal with the pain.

  “I already did, ma'am. They said they will send someone as soon as they get sorted out on their end,” he said. He smiled. In the final moments of the battle, they'd managed to tear the ever living hell out of the cruiser squadron ahead of them. Pity they didn't know just how much damage they'd inflicted.

  Well, they'd find out eventually. Probably in an internment camp. “Looks like the war is over for us. Yippy,” the captain said as a tech with a bottle jack arrived to pry the piece of metal off of her arm. “Hurrah for us,” she said weakly.

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  The last courier watched the battle unfold and then jumped for Horath. The crew's morale was rock bottom after quietly watching the picket force get torn to shreds.

  Chapter 47

  Antigua

  Vice President Jeff Randall thought his job as governor had been tough. Getting sworn in had been hectic but easy. So had been his implant update, though he was still getting used to having a dumb A.I. in his implants as his chief of staff.

  He was finding out being the VP was different as he continued to settle in. He was one heartbeat away from the presidency, which meant he had to keep up-to-date at all times. He was a member of the cabinet which was a new experience.

  He was also president of the Senate, which meant s
itting in during debates and such. For the most part, the Senate was handled internally though.

  So, in other words he was close to power without having much. And he was dealing with a lot of politics. He'd learned to navigate the halls of power as he learned them without truly committing to any one cause or group.

  He wished John would open up with him a bit more though. He still had a ways to go with playing catchup with the secret projects going on around the Federation. Just finding out the true location of Lemnos had been an eye-opening experience for him. The risks involved with having it so close to Antigua weren't worth it in his mind. Fortunately, it was now a moot point given the facilities recent destruction.

  Two things he did enjoy was his free time with his family and his time to read. He had to spend the bulk of his time in space, but when the Senate wasn't in session and he didn't need to put in face time for the cabinet, he spent as much time as he could on the ground with her and the kids. And he enjoyed seeing the kids growing up.

  From time to time he still missed out on running things on his homeworld though.

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  Admiral Subert listened in to the discussion. Many great minds had assembled again to discuss the enemy. One such topic was their psychology.

  Sometimes he wondered if it was worth it. Too many of the eggheads were letting their own thoughts color their experiences rather than basing things on known data. In other words, they were talking out of their anal orifices.

  It was interesting that there were classes being taught in Antigua and Anvil, college courses on the psychology of the predator with an entire subset section on the psychology of pirates and piracy. The latest exploration was of Horath in particular. Many wanted to understand the inner workings of just what made them a people and how they could function as a society.

  It was a given that they were functional—sadistic, sociopathic, some psychotic. On level with a serial killer but able to appear nice and calm and functional. Was that a public mask? Were there layers? How did someone normal survive in such a culture of death and destruction? Nature versus nurture? Peer pressure was a new thing working its way into the discussions, explorations on how a normal person could be led into such a life. Indoctrination and propaganda were also factors of course.

  The history of Horath was apparently steeped in blood. They had been mercenaries, thieves, pirates, and just about everything else since practically the founding of the planet. It was surprising to him that no one had found out just how deep their abyss went during the Federation.

  He remembered a history course on how such things could happen to normal people. It made a sick sort of sense. They didn't torture people; at least according to their most recent models, the rank and file didn't. But they did celebrate and embrace the bloodlust to some degree, finding an outlet in high-end sports and gladiator games.

  The idea that an entire society could function like that for centuries, even a millennia or more was appalling. Their lack of empathy … he shook his head. It made him wonder about the sanity of even trying to rationally deal with them once the war was concluded.

  Was peace even possible? Could they ever trust a Horathian at their back? Ever?

  He wanted to focus on the exploration of Konohagakure and any links to the Assassin's guild but two comments stuck out. They were in a debate between Captain Teague, participating through the ansible and a commander. They were talking about how effective the Empire would be under Catherine Ramichov's leadership.

  "Could she even survive to become empress? With her family? It is like a family of sharks," the commander stated.

  “Well, you know what they say, the female is deadlier than the male,” Captain Teague stated.

  “Yeah, because the male underestimates them and lowers their guard,” the commander snorted.

  Given the number of times he knew some males had been married, that was true, Phil thought.

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  Jory checked the feed from the Terrahertz Spectrometer. The device projected a non-visible laser light to scan a spectral body or object much like an X-ray. The process was nondestructive and had no radiation. The device had a pair of emitters with receivers on top of a cart. Fine tuning them tended to be a pain in the ass sometimes, especially if someone inadvertently bumped something out of alignment even by a micron.

  Inside the box, lasers and receivers were serviced by fiber optics and molecular electronics. Two lasers on either side with receivers scanned the object sample and showed its thickness and what the object was made out of on a series of graphs.

  Coupled with more advanced scanning methods, it gave them a thorough examination of any object. In his case the latest sample of armor material. He needed to know the composition to make sure they were getting the mix right with the nanotech layering. Something was off though; he could tell from the carbon scorching on the outer panel. That told him something was definitely hinky somewhere.

  Finding out where they'd gone wrong was something he wasn't looking forward to doing. They'd have to do an in-depth molecular comparison and a breakdown right down to nanoseconds. Feeding that data into the computer models would refine things a bit. But the brass wanted the new armor sorted out before his newest design was unfrozen. Which meant he'd decided to get his hands dirty and take a look.

  He figured if he breathed down enough necks someone would get the lead out and figure out what was wrong sooner rather than later.

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  Professor Eldor was practically bouncing as he heard about the news. He couldn't help but rush to see his old friend. Professor Gwildor wasn't in his office; he was in fact in his computer lab.

  When Eldor entered Gwildor was engrossed in a simulation. Charts floated around the room. A three-dimensional simulation of a hyperspace wave form was playing out on the main holographic display. The lights were dim; Eldor nearly tripped on some trash on the floor. The trash can was overflowing with food containers. It stank too.

  "You really need to get a student or someone to clean that," he grumbled, staring at the mess.

  "I can't. Can't have anyone in here without clearance," Gwildor said, stubby fingers dancing as he manipulated figures in a complex math equation.

  "And yet you leave the door unlocked," Eldor said with an exasperated shake of his head.

  "I did?" Gwildor said as he finished his train of thought and sent the equation off for the computer to proof it. "Wait, you are here?" he said, turning and looking shocked. He looked at the door. "How did you get in?"

  "You left it unlocked like I said," Eldor said with a mournful shake of his head at his colleague’s absent mindedness. "Something juicy I take it?"

  "Eh?"

  "To get you all riled up. That," Eldor said pointing to the equation.

  "Oh, eh, I can't talk about it," Gwidlor said impatiently waving a hand to obscure it.

  "Well!"

  "It's not you silly! It has classified data in it, and I'm under silly restrictions," Gwildor said.

  "Well, that's different," Eldor said, settling down again.

  "You came with news?"

  "Yes," Eldor said, grabbing a bag and shaking it out to change the trash. It was really beneath him, but the smell was getting to him. He saw the twinkle of amusement in his old friend's eyes but ignored it. "Aristacas," he stated.

  "Aristacas?" Gwildor asked, wrinkling his bulbus nose.

  "Aristacas! As in the ancient Greek scientist who discovered the diameter of the Earth's moon!"

  "And this concerns me why?" Gwildor asked, stroking his nose.

  "Your blood sugar must be low! Didn't you see the news?"

  "No."

  Eldor tisked tisked and rolled his eyes. "The pirates have been capturing ships for centuries. Some were put into use. The navy, our navy, set up a blockade in Garth, New Horizon, and Finagle. Well, they caught many ships, all sorts of ships. And one is Aristacas. She arrived in Garth a short time ago."

  "A ship named after
a scientist?"

  "Exactly! A science vessel! Actually she's a Ghasg ship. Rather rare, apparently at some point in her past she had changed hands and had dropped in value to the point a university had picked her up. They renamed her and outfitted her as a science vessel."

  Gwildor stared at him.

  "And, and! … and, there is another ship in Pi! Liobat let that one slip when they let us know about this ship. That's two ships!"

  Two science vessels?" It was an embarrassment of riches compared to the desert they'd just gone through.

  "Yes! Neither are what we'd consider tip top shape, but beggars can't be choosers. A hull is a hull! Both ships will need complete refits; the government is going to help there. How much I don't know. Manning the ships and finding funding though …," Eldor shook his head.

  "But we've got ships."

  "Eventually. When they get here," Eldor said. "But we're going to need the time to get the funding lined up. Not to mention the equipment, crew, who will be on it, what missions …"

  Gwildor's eyes gleamed as he rubbed his hands happily together. "Oh, boy, are we going to have some fun soon!"

  "Yup," Eldor said, slapping him on the shoulder with a grin.

  -~~~///^\~~~-

  Matilda poked her virtual head in and was amused to note she wasn't the only one attending virtually. Every time the admiral put in a surprise guest appearance, word invariably got around like lightning. Anyone on campus who could spare the time sat in virtually, sucking up bandwidth.

  They'd had to set up a pair of dedicated mirrors just to let those not on campus at the Academy attend the lecture. Even officers in the fleet were attending or at least downloading the lecture.

  Admiral Irons current topic was about the Kenjutsu master, Miyamoto Musashi. He only barely touched on the famous Book of Five Spheres, but he did emphasize that the samurai had been a Japanese military strategist like Sun Tzu.