by David Nash
The scanning tech is a godsend. It gives us much greater freedom of movement. Like any underdog, asymmetric warfare is not possible if the guerrilla cannot freely move. We can locate cloaked vessels and are much harder to spot with our improved shielding. I still hope for a full cloak of the Kernel signal so I can build a “cone of silence” but worry what that will do to the trust I have worked so hard to build with Marvin.
Admiral John’s mission was also a success. He brought back 37 new seeds. Our Legion now has 76 Kernels. We decided to install the seeds in combat droid bodies and send them and their Captains through recruit training. Since the last Kernel citizens choose names that mean things like Equality, then we will show them what equality means. Having a seed in a recruit-training platoon has its problems, but it had advantages also. I made the determination that captured seeds could join the legion as ensigns due to their experience and mature personality. However, Kernels that we ‘grew’ from Seeds would start as recruits and would join as enlisted. I did not want the Legion to think of Kernels on our side as receiving special treatment, and our Kernels had to understand the Legion is serious about equality and our relationship if we were every to get their support to rebel against their species.
The policy seemed to work, as one Kernel requested citizenship midway through training. Lance Corporal Eleutheria (Freedom) got along extremely well with her platoon mates and asked if she could be stationed on a bus team. Since her Captain was also qualified and motivated in that direction, it was a great fit.
Marvin was doing a great job motivation the Kernels and talking to them about the benefits of the Legion and how he saw us as guardians of equality. I ensured that he and I had weekly private talks. I did not want to overdue it, but I wanted to keep certain ideas in the forefront of his mind. We talked about social experiments like the Stanford prison study and the Milgram experiments that showed that authority without oversight as well as blind allegiance to authority will result in unethical behaviors and abuse of power. I wanted to draw comparisons to how the Kernel and their Barkun pets have corrupted the law without saying it outright. Marvin must come to the conclusion on his own.
I was happy to see the Spaceport off to the Oort Cloud. The test jump went well, and now that Marvin had calculated a jump to a position outside of a LaGrange point he was much more willing to attempt a new set of calculations from his new “known point” and a near earth orbit. As always, he mentioned the risk, but this time, he added that as long as I gave him time to make the calculations he was up to the task.
I ordered the construction of a new spaceport. While that was being constructed I started toward honoring Hall’s bargain as well as our original strategy of decentralizing humanity. We took several Legionnaires from the Moapa tribe, a buss of infantry, and some engineers and sent them to A0467. Their orders were to dig in and build a hidden base. Besides the members of the expedition, only the command staff knew where they were going. All involved understood that the intent was to use A0467 to fulfill the agreement with the Moapa, but for now we could not openly claim it so they must remain covertly underground.
As this was a Paiute lead expedition, they chose to name the planet Tabuts. I will say that Politics is hard, if the Chinese knew of this agreement; they would demand a planet, as would every other country. The legion cannot be everywhere, nor will do I want space to be colonized by individual political organizations. If that were to happen I foresee humanity fighting wars against itself just as has happened when we were all stuck together on a single planet. However, I will not allow the legion to make promises with no intent to fulfill them. We will be honorable as long as I am in command.
Eventually we came to a consensus on the Articles of Understanding and decided to share the idea with the Legion as a whole. We educated the Legionnaires that this did not change their status as members of the military, but that we understood that with victory many would wish to enter civilian life and they needed a country to go to. Our finished document was met with overwhelming support. While many of our Legionnaires were not religious, they saw that the Articles protected them and their rights. Hall saw to it that for many nights before the unveiling of the Articles an old John Wayne film “The Alamo” was shown for nightly entertainment.
I do not know who was responsible for it, but the text of the Republic monologue from the movie began appearing posted throughout the Legion.
Republic. I like the sound of the word. It means people can live free, talk free, go or come, buy or sell, be drunk or sober, however they choose. Some words give you a feeling. Republic is one of those words that makes me tight in the throat – the same tightness a man gets when his baby takes his first step or his first baby shaves and makes his first sound as a man. Some words can give you a feeling that makes your heart warm. Republic is one of those words.
I believe the combination of the movie and the handbills significantly increased support. All I know is I am glad Commander Hall is on our side.
Legionnaires were in concert with the idea of building a new Republic of Planets. We liked the idea that individual planets could regulate and govern themselves as they saw fit, yet remain faithful to the Republic and protected by the Legion. That made coming to agreement about the Constitution of the Republic was much easier. Once again, Sabol has shown himself to be more than a crooked lawyer or a hedonistic playboy. He started with the US Constitution and modified it to meet our larger needs.
Our future being addressed we all threw ourselves full force into preparation for the war that would allow the start of that future.
27
The past several years since launching the Spaceport have been busy. We built another and positioned it in a system unclaimed by the Barkun and outside their normal patrol routes. It was discovered after an accident experimenting with cloaking technology and was completely obliterated by the Barkun. The loss of life was a hard setback for us and it hit the legion hard.
However, besides a few scout ships discovered while on reconnaissance missions we have been remarkably able to remain hidden. We have four strike forces fully manned. Each Carrier group contains a battalion of Legionnaires in Drop ships and 4 rams with a Legionnaire Special Forces team consisting of 4 platoons each. Additionally each force had 10 Destroyers, all commanded by a mothership with 60 spherical fighters. It took 18 Kernels to navigate each force, which after attrition and keeping Marvin and Admiral Johns’ Kernel unassigned took all of our available Kernels. That left us without the ability to navigate any new ships. We have 7 captured punishment ships that are Kernel-less once their Captains transitioned to Human built ships. However we still get use out of the large Barkun weapon platforms. We stationed them around the Oort Star port for security. Lieutenant Commander Oni’s team has created a system to allow human beings to fight the ship and interface with it directly instead of depending on a Kernel. We can’t jump them to hyperspace, but they can still shoot, move, and communicate.
Sending new seeds to recruit training as equals with the other new Legionnaires and the adoption of Articles of Understanding made an impression on the Kernels. I know the idea of a creator has significance with them, but I still cannot get Marvin to say much on the topic. Nearly two-thirds of the Kernels have become citizens. We spread them out so that our Mothership strike group near New Aubagne consists solely of Citizens, the two offensive carrier battle groups are evenly split with half each of citizen Kernels. This leaves the Mothership force at our Oort Cloud space port with a group containing no Kernel citizens only Kernels commanded by Captains. Because of his success, Marvin is now a Lieutenant Commander.
On the eave of our offensive, I wanted to make ready to replicate seeds one last time as the second we eliminate the Barkun in the Earth system, I will make a trip directly to Kernel Prime to make the argument that the Barkun are illegally interfering with the Planet Earth. We still have three years on the Protected planet status, but the time for waiting is over. The Legion is going to war.
&n
bsp; The grand plan is as follows, using the carrier signal tech we have located every Barkun Kernel on Earth. Currently, and for some unknown reason they only have 7 Barkun on Earth, one on each Continent. We have traced the signals and identified every Barkun Commander on Earth. SpecOps teams are ready to surgically strike each one on command. We have PsyOps teams on Earth ready to deal with any potential discovery during the space battle. Dr. Farholm had the idea to offer a convention of the worlds greatest Astronomer’s and offer complementary tickets to every astronomer of note to get them away from their observatories. Astronomer’s with government grants were the easiest, they were told that for publicity reasons, they needed to attend, especially if they every desired another batch of Government cash.
Additional to the Barkin enforcers on Earth, there are 11 Punishment ships identified in the solar system; L1 has 3 ships, L2 and 3 have 1 each and L4 and L5 have 2 each. One punisher is in orbit around Mars and seems to be a command ship. That ship is sending and receiving communication signals from the other ships. The last ship is the most concerning to us, as is in orbit around Earth and is currently stationed directly above the US.
At the appointed time, Rear Admiral Volk will begin a coordinated attack using strike forces 2 & 3 with the mothership, destroyer and a bus from forces 1 and 4.
The ships from Strike Force 1 will hop in through L3 to take out the farthest Barkun Punisher and its escort of 10 saucers.
Elements of Strike force 4 will take out the punisher and its escorts at L2.
Strike Force 2 and the mothership and two of the busses from Strike Force 3 will jump into L1. The suspected Barkun command ship will get the attention of a bus, an assault ship, and 3 Destroyers.
The 3 Punishers at L1 will be attacked by three bus, 3 Destroyers, and the Mothership of Strike Force 2.
The Remaining 4 Destroyers and 2 buses from SF 2 will protect Earth from the Punisher orbiting over it. For additional support, the attack is timed to have the Moon within range of the orbiting Barkun punisher, but we hope to leave that surprise for later.
That leaves the 10 Destroyers and 2 Rams from strike force 3 for the 4 Punishment ships split between L4 and L5. Each LaGrange point will get 5 Destroyers and a bus. We hope to hit with overwhelming force capture some Punisher ships, and then fortify the space around Earth.
Farholm and Oni’s team are at the Oort cloud as well as Admiral Johns and his Kernel. They have the second spaceport disassembled and attached to a modified punisher and are prepared to jump it deeper into our solar system just outside the asteroid belt between mars and Jupiter. The Admiral will drop off the spaceport, then transit back to New Aubagne. As soon as we take control of the system and the port arrives to begin construction of defensive fortifications near the transit ports, Marvin and I will take a destroyer to Kernel Prime to make our argument and verify the purity of the seeds. Until the battle for Earth is won, My destroyer and its tiny crew will remain flexible and fill the gaps as needed. We don’t have much a reserve force, which goes against all military rules, but we want overwhelming force so we reduce the risk towards Earth.
28
There is no need to transmit a command of execution, we all have synchronized our chronographs and split our teams across the galaxy to begin at points closest to our targeted transit points. Due to communications lag caused by distance, by the time Legionnaires received transmitted orders the battle would already be won or lost.
I chose to have Marvin jump to L2 and fly directly toward Earth to help ensure that the Punisher in orbit would not be able to being sterilization operations.
“General, we have transited to L2 safely and are on our way directly toward the targeted ship.”
“Thank you Marvin, if it begins to bombard earth I want you to attempt to take out any kinetics.”
“As you are aware sir, the difficult of that….”
“YES MARVIN! I know the odds,” I said interrupting. “It’s like shooting a bullet with a bb. However, we are talking about Earth. Fly this ship into a kinetic projectile if that is what it takes. We will not let a single Barkun round hit that Planet. DO YOU UNDERSTAND!”
“Yes General, but it may be out of our hands. I just received word that a strike team went early and alerted the Barkun on the Planet. They know something is happening.”
Shit! “Well too late to change the plan now. Get us to that ship as quick as possible!”
“Sir, the Punishment ship has started firing on Earth!” yelled a young corporal standing watch on the bridge.
“Dammit Marvin, get us there!”
The bridge was a maelstrom of controlled chaos. I did not assume any operational command of the mission. That was left in the more capable hands of my Admiralty, I did fill my ship with the capability to track the action. The L1 point was a train wreck. It seems that the Barkun had taken a trick from us and hollowed out Mars and installed weapons. The Assault ship was dropping Legionnaires, but they were taking heavy fire. Calls for reinforcements from the other 5 drop ships in the system were coming across the radio, but it takes time to transit across the system. One of the buses from the L1 Point was destroyed before they could head toward Earth and we had a mothership being pounded from Mars.
“Sir, we will be in range in thirty-seconds” a gunner’s mate called out.
Marvin, how many orbital strikes have landed?
“Unknown sir, it appears that the Barkun are targeting Nevada. It appears they are targeting the Nevada Test and Training Range.”
Area 51. It could be worse. They could be hitting a densely populated city, however it still hurt as they picked the area with the most Legionnaire personnel on Earth.
“Take out that ship!”
“General, we have an assault bus inbound to our target, based on their speed, they should board in 22 seconds.” Marvin informed
“We can’t wait, destroy that ship. Take it out and every piece that survives.”
Marvin interjected “Sir, our ram will be caught in the impact!”
“Earth comes first!” I screamed. “If our guys manage to board and you see Barkun flying from open hatches you can stop firing, otherwise turn that ship to dust!”
At that point, Earth’s secret weapon came to play. The Moon began firing ion weapons that a mobile ship just could not generate enough power to fire. Our screens were blinded as a rail cannon from the moon base hit the Barkun ship with a nuclear penetrator round. I was later told the round was 2 meters in diameter and contained a50 megaton warhead inside the penetrator casing. That was too much.
The members of my crew will all probably die of cancer, but I can’t complain, Assault bus Bravo of Strike Force 2 never saw it coming.
The ship targeting Earth was toast, and while my destroyer took damage, it was still in the fight. It did not take much to realize the Mars fight was still under way and looked to be a toss up as to who would likely win it.
“Marvin, get us to Mars, go .5c if you still are able. We have to support those assault ships!”
Mars is about 34 million miles from Earth, but at half the speed of light it only took about 6 minutes to travel the distance. At that speed we were a beacon on any Barkun display, but that did not matter, the Naval battle was under control and we were decisively winning that, but the Base was unanticipated and was proving a hard nut to crack.
“General, ETA 30 seconds to Mars Orbit.”
I had left the bridge, and assembled both my personal security team, and the ships defensive platoon at the hangar bay in preparation for debarking and assisting the Legionaries on the surface.
“Marvin, bypass the orbiting stage and bring us down to the surface. When we get inside the base point defenses, we will hover down and try to link up with our assault teams. I want you to give us covering fire as we descend, then return to orbit and bombard the weapons platforms as you see fit.”
“General, If I remain with you my shields would provide you with additional safety.”
“Ifs and Buts Marvi
n, follow my damn orders! You need to ensure those Seeds remain safe, drop us off and get back out of the line of fire.”
The trip down was brutal, whatever batteries the lizards had on Mars must have taken them some time to build. We lost a few legionaries on the way to the surface, but we landed with a force equal to small platoon of three teams.
“Legionnaires, let’s find us a door, we need to link up with our assault force! Team 1 take the lead.”
The LTJG of Team one took his men and moved quickly toward the focus of the fighting. I used my implant to link up with the Assault commander and find out where we were needed. The Legion has breeched their hangar door, but the pit went straight down into the surface of mars, and Barkun had set up heavy defenses inside.
I reach the Battalion Commander’s Tactical Operation Center and get a briefing from the Commander inside.
“Sir, the Barkun have heavy crew served weapons just inside the hangar bay, they are protected by the lip of the hanger roof so we are having a hard time hitting them, but they are slaughtering any legionaries we send in. I have men loading munitions into a drop ship, we plan on remotely piloting it inside and detonating it like an oversized flash-bang. Under the cover of the explosion, I plan a massive assault to get inside. Some of the first units to land were able to breech before the BArkun counter assault and are pinned down inside the complex. If we don’t get to them soon, I fear they won’t hold out.”
I agree, but before I could say anything else, a recruit from one of the latest batches from Earth, a former Marine Raider I was later told, came over the main comms channel “Fuck It, Fuck This, and Fuck the Barkun, Come on you Sons of Bitches, do you want to live forever!” If the glorious bastard survives, I am going to have to tell him it’s uncouth for a former Marine to misquote Dan Daly, even if in doing so you win your first big medal.
