EMPIRE: Warlord (EMPIRE SERIES Book 5)

by Richard F. Weyand

  Espinoza considered Denny’s rather incredible claims. Then again, there was that Gratitude of the Throne. With that list of accomplishments, she could well believe he had come to the attention of the Emperor himself.

  “That was nice work on the ECM for the Espinoza Maneuver, Mr. Denny. You turned that around in days. I think you set the world record for Imperial Navy technical response to a problem.”

  “Thank you, Ma’am. Yes, Admiral Leicester and Admiral Cernik stressed to me the importance of a timely solution, and we turned it around in three days. They had actually given us four days, but we had looked into the idea previously and had a head start.”

  Denny caught her eyes and grew more serious.

  “We knew time was of the essence, Admiral. We knew what was at stake.”

  Espinoza re-evaluated Denny again. Clearly he mixed it up with the highest levels of the Navy brass. Just as clearly, he understood the importance of prevailing against the Alliance in those initial attacks.

  “All right, Mr. Denny. Let’s move on to the hyperspace attack software. What is the motivation for a change at this time? Late changes in software packages make me nervous.”

  “Yes, Admiral. Understood. In the hyperspace attacks Admiral Shvets carried out against the Alliance forces during the attack on Estvia, the performance of the hyperspace attack software was disappointing. Kill ratios in the initial attacks were approximately six percent, and they fell as the attacks carried on and the opposition forces began to anticipate the software’s strategy.

  “This was against Alliance crews, in their home-built warships. The expectation was the performance against more-capable DP warships with better-trained DP crews, if it were to come to that, would be even less satisfactory. The Emperor asked me if we couldn’t come up with an enhanced hyperspace attack software to address these issues.”

  “The Emperor asked you, Mr. Denny?”

  “Yes, Ma’am. I occasionally receive project assignments directly from the Emperor. As in this case.”

  Espinoza re-evaluated yet again. Receiving assignments directly from the Emperor? And yet.... There was something in Denny’s speech cadences, something just a little off. As if English hadn’t been his first language. And there was a distinct lower-class edge to it. There was something. Something from her own past.

  Then she had it.

  “Las calles son malas,” Espinoza said.

  Kim raised an eyebrow at the non-sequitur, but Denny answered immediately.

  “Pero soy más malo.”

  “We’ve both come a long way from Extremadura Province, Mr. Denny.”

  “Yes, Ma’am. I changed my name when I left, whereas you didn’t.”

  Espinoza nodded. She knew full well what it was like to grow up in the barrios of one of the Empire’s poorest provinces. Desperate to catch up, she had pushed herself hard, and ultimately passed her less-driven colleagues. Clearly Mr. Denny – whatever his birth name was – had done the same in engineering perhaps twenty years later.

  “Back to the software, Mr. Denny. What changes have you made?”

  “The first change was to make the software less rigid in its target fixation, Admiral. When the previous software version began its attack run, and the target began dodging, the picket ship might not be able to follow the dodge. In normal space, the acceleration of the picket ship would allow it to track the much more sluggish target, but in hyperspace that advantage was erased. This was clear from our analysis of the sensor recordings from the surviving picket ships of Admiral Shvets’s attacks. So the first thing we did was to program the new software to acquire a different target if the original target successfully dodged. This was to address the low effectiveness in the initial attacks.

  “The second change was to vary the attack run itself. The original program runs a specific set of attack maneuvers. After surviving the first attack or two, the Alliance crews were able to anticipate the picket ships’ likely response to a maneuver. For this new version of the software, we have multiple variations of responses, and the software casts a pseudo-random number to pick which response to make to an enemy maneuver. Prior experience is no longer valuable in evading the attack. This was to address the reduction in effectiveness of the attacks we saw as they proceeded as well as their initial low effectiveness.”

  “How was this new version of the software tested, Mr. Denny?”

  “In two phases, Admiral. In the first, we ran the new software against the Alliance warships’ actual responses as recorded by the surviving picket ships from Admiral Shvets’s attacks. When we wrote the initial hyperspace attack software package, there was no combat experience or recordings available to analyze.

  “In the second phase, we ran the new software against live Imperial Navy crews, in simulated warships. That is, we had current Imperial Navy personnel operating in VR as with actual ships, but the ships they were operating were Imperial Navy simulators. When we wrote the original hyperspace attack software, we did not yet have the relationship with the Imperial Navy we have now, and access to Imperial Navy crews was not available.”

  “The second phase simulations were done with experienced Imperial Navy crews, Mr. Denny? Actual warship crews?”

  “Yes, Ma’am. Current warship crews from across the Imperial Navy. Including some of your own crews, Ma’am.”

  “Some of my own crews, Mr. Denny?”

  “Yes, Admiral. All Imperial Navy crews are required to perform regular simulation training. We inserted our testing into the simulation training regimen.”

  “I see. And how did the picket ships do against Imperial Navy crews, Mr. Denny?”

  “The new hyperspace attack software logged an average fifty-three percent success rate on the first attacks, and that average held through repeated attacks on the same crews.”

  “With Imperial Navy crews, in current-generation warships?”

  “Yes, Ma’am. The crews found the picket ship attacks maddening.”

  “That’s very impressive, Mr. Denny.”

  “Thank you, Ma’am.”

  Espinoza consulted her notes, then turned to her chief of staff.

  “Do you have any questions, Jay?”

  “No, Ma’am. You covered off my list.”

  “Excellent. Well, Mr. Denny. Thank you so much for meeting with me.”

  “No problem at all, Ma’am. Good hunting.”

  “Thank you Mr. Denny. Vaya con Dios.”

  “Usted también, Señora.”

  After they dropped out of the VR channel, Kim had a question for Espinoza.

  “What was all that about, Ma’am? What did you say to him?”

  “After we had talked a while, I picked up on a minor oddity in his speech cadences. It triggered some memories from my childhood. So I gave him an old macho street challenge from Extremadura Province, in the Catalonia Sector. ‘The streets are bad.’ And he gave me the standard response, ‘But I am badder.’ He was a street thug, Jay, and he clawed his way out of the barrio. He’s probably as good with a switchblade as he is with his engineering tools. I wouldn’t be surprised if he still carries one. And now he takes project assignments direct from the Emperor. Imagine that.”

  “He’s young enough to have been able to get a scholarship on merit, after Ilithyia I changed the rules.”

  “Whereas you and I are old enough we had to go into the Navy. Admission to the Imperial Navy Academy was always based on merit.”

  “And the new software, Ma’am?”

  “Let’s go ahead and upgrade all the picket ships, Jay. I’m more than satisfied with those testing numbers, and running the tests against our own crews makes it more than just some laboratory experiment. Much more. That’s what I was most worried about. That it was done in a vacuum, and not well tested.”

  “Very well, Ma’am.”

  More Dominoes

  Queen Jingda of Jasmine and Captain Mark Roberts of the Captaincy of Midlothia appeared in the VR channel together. Dunham was waiting for them.


  “Your Highness. Captain. Thank you for meeting with me. Let’s all be seated.”

  Dunham waved to the three leather club chairs that were the only feature of his favored meeting room, and all three sat down.

  “I wanted to share something with you both. We have seen a force of warships space out of the Democracy of Planets and begin turning our flank to the galactic north of Estvia and Garland.”

  “There is nothing to the galactic north of Estvia and Garland, Your Majesty,” Queen Jingda said.

  “That is correct, Your Highness. There is nothing out there but empty space. The DP fleet is maneuvering past us to come out on our farside. Jasmine and Midlothia are the two most northward nations on our farside.”

  “How big is this fleet, Your Majesty?” Roberts asked.

  “Our mass readings make it one hundred thousand warships of all types, Captain. That is why we assume they are DP warships. The DP is unlikely to miss noting such a large fleet in its space, and the DP is where it spaced from.”

  Dunham waved to the blank wall next to him and a map appeared. On it, a portion of the original hypertrace showed, from just inside the DP, out into the void, then turning around Estvia. It continued on, running almost to the Estvia-Garland border.

  “Will you confront them, Your Majesty?”

  “No, Captain. They are well outside Sintaran space. Unless they make a move toward or into Sintaran space, moving against them would be an act of war. I have no desire to provoke the Democracy of Planets. There’s been quite enough war already.”

  Queen Jingda raised on eyebrow.

  “Is that an invitation to annexation, Your Majesty?”

  Dunham spread his hands on the chair arms and put them back down.

  “You could take it that way, Your Highness. I have no desire to provoke a war with the Democracy of Planets, though they seem to be jockeying for one. At the same time, I would rather they not have an outpost on my farside. It spreads my forces.”

  “If this fleet were to make a move into Sintaran territory, You Majesty, would you be in a position to defeat it?”

  “Yes, Captain. I do not know they will not turn and invade Garland, which would require a response. I am positioning forces to respond to the threat.”

  “Which forces would also be in a position to defend, say, a Jasmine Sector or a Midlothia Sector of the Sintaran Empire.”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  Roberts nodded.

  “Very well, Your Majesty,” Queen Jingda said. “We appreciate the information.”

  Queen Jingda and Captain Roberts met immediately after their meeting with the Sintaran Emperor.

  “The information is quite troubling,” Queen Jingda said. “If it is true.”

  “Before our meeting with him, I asked several other people with whom I’ve maintained a relationship over the years. There is no record of this Emperor lying. About anything.”

  “So you think it is true, Captain?”

  “I would give it high odds, Your Highness.”

  Queen Jingda shook her head sadly.

  “We have no defense that can oppose such a force, Captain. We have barely sixty thousand serviceable warships at this point. And those individually are no match for DP-built ships.”

  “And we have fewer than that, Your Highness,” Roberts said. “This incoming force seems particularly well-sized to make it clear to whichever of us is the target that no defense is possible.”

  “There may be one way to confirm the truth in time, Captain. We have some long-range hyperspace scanners out past the edge of our space, in the void. But they have seen nothing yet. A hyperspace wake that large would, I would think, be visible from pretty far away.”

  “And if your long-range scans see such a wake coming, Your Highness? Then what do we do?”

  “Indeed, Captain. That is the question.”

  The JNS Thorny Rose was a Jasmine picket ship stationed to the outer reaches. Her captain was Lieutenant Commander Patricia Dunn.

  Dunn had the reputation of being a hard-nose about almost anything. It was rumored she once dropped a sailor off at a commercial space station with steerage fare home because he was more harm than good to the crew, and then went the entire tour short-handed.

  Her crews would all say she was the strictest ship’s captain any of them had ever spaced under. They would also say they were never more proud of a ship than the Thorny Rose. ‘I served on the Thorny Rose,’ would be their first brag in any long list.

  It was inevitable some people called Dunn herself the Thorny Rose. Not to her face, of course.

  Her position on being posted to the outer reaches was simple. ‘If it were easy, anyone could do it. It’s not, so they sent us.’

  They were in normal space, coming up on their turn in hyper, when Dunn received new orders. Two-hour shifts, silent running. And, where they normally scanned a complete circle along the verge between human-settled space and the void, they were now asked to scan in just one direction: Earthward, five degrees above the galactic lens, into the void itself.

  “All hands. Orders change. Two hours, silent running. Make your trips to the head and snacks and all that now, everybody. No moving around, no talking, no eating, no head once we’re in hyperspace. Prepare engines for 0.4 gravities.”

  They had refueled, and they were currently spacing at 0.8 gravities for crew comfort. They would cut that back, to reduce the engine noise and vibration that otherwise would add fog and fuzz to their scans.

  When the other ship on picket duty dropped back into normal space, the Thorny Rose cut her engines back to 0.4g and entered the hypergate of the small projector ship that was the third element of their picket station.

  When the Thorny Rose dropped back out of hyperspace two hours later, Dunn was expressive.

  “Damn, people, that was nicely done. You almost bored me to death out there. I didn’t tell you not to breathe.”

  Everybody aboard ship – all twelve of the crew – swelled at that. And they all had another bar story to tell about the Thorny Rose herself.

  The Thorny Rose transmitted her scans to Jasmine Fleet Headquarters.

  When Queen Jasmine and Captain Mark Roberts met again, two days after the last time, Queen Jasmine was somber.

  “We got excellent scans of the void to galactic north of Garland, Captain. We lucked out in that one of our best picket crews was on station. They did a high-resolution scan on that area and saw them.”

  “They saw the DP fleet, Your Highness?”

  “They saw a very large hyperspace wake a long way off, Captain, exactly where Emperor Trajan said they were. Their scan matched the scan he shared with us exactly, given the time difference. And given that time difference, they’re headed this way.”

  “Damn.”

  Roberts looked down at his hands, clasped in front of him, for several long minutes. Queen Jasmine waited. He sighed, and looked up at her.

  “Now what do we do, Your Highness? I have preferred not to annex to Sintar if it could be avoided, but occupation by the Democracy of Planets is considerably further down my wish list.”

  “Indeed, Captain. In my case, it means the end of the Jin dynasty. Yet I find the prospect of equal status within the Empire to be preferable to the status of a vassal state under the benevolent auspices of the Democracy of Planets.”

  It was her turn to sigh.

  “Sometimes one is forced to hard choices, Captain, and the options are not of one’s choosing.”

  Roberts nodded.

  “And yet, if you look at the map of human space, Your Highness, and how it has evolved in the last year, year and a half, it seems inevitable. It is also obvious Sintar and the Democracy of Planets are headed for a showdown. It is less obvious to me how that turns out.”

  “I believe Emperor Trajan will win that struggle, if the DP forces it on him, Captain. He is a wily one, and is not to be trifled with.”

  When Queen Jingda and Captain Mark Roberts asked for a second meeting w
ith the Emperor, orders went out from Imperial Navy Headquarters Sintar. Fleet Admiral Espinoza read them aloud to her chief of staff, Admiral Kim.

  “‘Prepare to space within hours to the relief of Jasmine and Midlothia, by attacking and destroying the DP fleet turning your flank.’ Well, that’s pretty clear, Jay.”

  “Yes, Ma’am. It’s a good thing they’ve been keeping us informed. We’re all supplied and ready to space.”

  “Did all the formations get to their forward-deployed positions?”

  “Yes, Ma’am.”

  “And the picket ship software has all been upgraded?”

  “Yes, Ma’am.”

  “Excellent. Excellent.”

  “Your Highness. Captain. It’s good to see you again. Let’s be seated,” Dunham said with a wave to the three club chairs in his VR meeting room.

  They were all seated before Queen Jingda spoke.

  “I wish I could say the same, Your Majesty. We have confirmed the presence of a large force approaching us from the galactic north of Garland. As you warned us.”

  “You have very good scanning to have picked them up at that distance, Your Highness.

  “It’s easier if one knows where to look, Your Majesty, and my most capable scanning ships were on station. Still, without your warning, we would have been unaware of them for quite some time yet.”

  Dunham simply nodded. They asked for the meeting. He would let them tell him what they wanted.

  “Which leaves us with limited options, Your Majesty,” Roberts said. “We cannot, even together, fight off such a force. And being unwilling and unequal additions to the Democracy of Planets is unappealing. So we must ask you, would you be willing to annex Midlothia and Jasmine into the Sintaran Empire, on the same terms as you extended to your other recent, um, acquisitions?”

  “Absolutely, Captain. I would not have the Empire be fractured with divisions of status, between nobility and commoner, between this province and that province. All are equal.”

  “Including yourself, Your Majesty?” Queen Jingda asked with a raised eyebrow.