Free Fleet Box Set 1

by Michael Chatfield

  “Bregend’s battle cruiser is back to fighting condition. Some buyers have come to Chaleel and are spreading the word that there is a fleet fighting the Syndicate. AIH is getting better with each day. There is a steady stream of trainees from both systems going to Parnmal. One course of Commandos has been completed, eight hundred and fifty-six new Commandos. Henry is itching to go and see them, but he’s been training the Commandos here rigorously.

  “There is also an additional near two thousand ship personnel.

  “As for ships, well, everything that is not in Parnmal or strapped to Hachiro’s hull is in working order. Parnmal has added an additional two destroyers and one corvette to Cheerleader’s forces.”

  Rick had got on a transport and was walking onto the bridge when Resilient finished. He winked at Marleen as he took the commander’s chair and Kawaga took Rick’s usual spot. “I’m going to need a full report on the ships and the Commandos. In Sol then moving back to Parnmal.” Rick’s screens became populated with information and he forgot whatever complaining he’d done and got sucked in.

  ***

  Henry watched as the VIPs moved through the station on one section of his HUD and on another, he watched the squad ahead of him breech the scrapped destroyer, moving into it in a concentrated flow.

  He checked over his Commandos. Pride filled him. The Avarians who had come as Salchar’s unofficial guard were a driven bunch and sucked up every piece of information that they could get on warfare. They’d quickly become an integral part of the Commandos, writing the name Ninja on their gear, the name that Salchar had given them when they’d first rose from the ground around the Commandos.

  Felix and Min Hae were still figuring out how their natural sensor-absorbing bodies worked and Henry had turned his mind to other things, like bigger Mechas.

  On this operation, he’d gotten a full squad of Avarians outfitted with Mechas and trained up. The Avarians had to okay the operation to have their spine cut open. Though, this time they were knocked out instead of going through the whole ordeal awake.

  The new Mechas could take more punishment, had larger reactors, more firepower, and were much bigger. Even with that, the Avarians had added extra armor plating to some of their fronts. Those who liked their bead cannons more had a basic metal plate in front of them, which could suck up damage as they hosed the enemy, their HUD giving them an overlay through their impressive layers.

  Those who favored their swords had added armor at points they found to be weak, or somewhere that would be exposed in a fight, meaning their backs were more heavily armored.

  So far, the modifications had done nothing but improve their abilities, so Henry saw no reason to not allow it. Not one Mecha was the same, but then again, no one person was the same. The only things that were uniform was where the Hellfire manual lock was located, where the external medical pack was held, and the data pad resting on the Mecha’s lower back.

  Henry rolled his shoulders, the armored exterior barely moving as the armor’s expanded exoskeleton rested near his chin, much like an American football player’s pads acted.

  Although none of his Commandos’ Mechas were uniform in appearance, it only seemed to add to their deadly perception. The Mechas hissed and groaned as they moved; their boots hammered into the deck in a rhythm that would scare the most experienced fighter.

  They sounded like death come a knocking and looked like rugby players with their massive bodies. Their eyes held that same challenging stare as rugby players, daring people to try to stop them.

  “I’m surprised with how quickly they’ve learned.” Dave Smith, the man called himself. He was one of the close quarters experts Henry had accepted. Dave didn’t want anyone knowing his real name and Rick accepted that. His resume was impressive, with his tours as a Green Beret. Christopher Giles was the other expert. He was from the SAS. Between them, they had taken the mostly trained Commandos and polished their skills. Henry wished he could test them against the professionals of Earth.

  “We have to learn everything on the fly. Anything they learn from you guys means that they survive longer. Space is a cold bitch. There isn’t room for idiots out there,” Henry said, his tone hard. Many people didn’t deserve to learn those lessons firsthand.

  “Yeah, space really is the Darwin eliminator,” Rick said.

  Henry nodded. “Now, I know you both have part-time employment with the Free Fleet as contractors, but how would you like to take on the position as trainers? We need people with your knowledge, passing it onto our Commandos.”

  “What would that entail?” Smith asked.

  “We train you up on our systems, get you to proper Commando standard, then you teach our trainees how to be the best they can be.”

  “Though, you don’t have that many recruits coming in from Earth,” Giles said, “and they won’t be done for another five months.”

  Henry looked to them, a grin on his face. “Trust me, you’ll be working a lot quicker than in five months. You won’t be in the Sol system necessarily. We have another group of Special Forces trainers at work in a different system I would like you to get acquainted with; go over your stuff there and come up with a better training plan than the one we ripped from the Syndicate.”

  Both Giles and Smith looked interested as Henry looked away. “Just think about it. Oh, and you would, of course, get anti-aging treatments so you would be at peak performance.” Just try to say no. He hid his grin as he concentrated on his HUD feeds again. Wish I was in there instead of watching it, Henry grumbled as Commandos entered the stripped engineering department of the destroyer from four different locations. The Commandos inside gave a good fight, but they were swarmed quickly.

  Need to work on defending, Henry thought.

  “Exercise done,” Henry announced as the objectives of the destroyer were taken and the Commandos had moved into defensive positions. “You know the deal. Run maintenance on your Mechas. Shower and food. Meet me in mess four.” Henry made for the nearest air lock, using the newly added thrusters to get himself inside as Giles and Smith followed.

  They went over a few points as they walked back to a secondary armory. With the Resilient inhabited with VIPs, Salchar didn’t want to have Mechas running around, making them nervous. Rick was about to exit his Mecha when the alarms sounded.

  Perfect Timing

  I was taking the delegates from Earth onto the bridge, whole stations covered to protect their secrets, when I saw a reporter try to sneak away.

  “Verlu, corridor D34,” I said.

  The commander accepted the order. A light of recognition turned on inside the HUD; it was called greening up. Another modification that came from the Commandos, making communications easier.

  The tour had gone without a hitch. I’d guided the VIPs through the station, giving plenty of good photo opportunities for the VIPs and introduced them to people from different races as reporters interviewed the Free Fleet personnel, who really sold the Free Fleet.

  Two birds with one stone. I wondered about the trouble it had been to clear the path we were taking of anything that could be of military value.

  I toured them through the ship, showing them the shuttle bays then a few corridors to the bridge, taking a circuitous route to confuse the reporters and VIPs.

  Many of them were awed by the sheer size of the bridge. Most of them were probably still comparing it to the size of a super carrier, not something that could fit ten or so of them inside its hull.

  Rick, who was in the command chair, gave a few greetings but was focused on his work. He gave a few smiles out to world leaders who persisted in wanting to bug him.

  We made our way on another circuitous route to the shuttle bay, where food and drinks were waiting, as well as the paper and digital copies that would hold the signatures of Earth as it joined the Free Fleet’s protection.

  “Battle stations! Emergence of Syndicate forces. All personnel are to move to battle stations and await further orders.”

  M
y smile disappeared and the nation leaders and reporters looked around in confusion as Rick came over the system-wide emergency band.

  “Send them and their people back to Earth with a warning of what’s happening,” I said to Calerd, who waved that he’d got his orders and went to corralling the world leaders.

  I ran to the nearest transport, pulling out my data pad as the transport whisked me off to the deck my room was on. As soon as it stopped, I tucked my data pad away and sprinted for my room, yelling for people to get out of my way. The thundering masses of my protection detail punctuated my words.

  In a few minutes, I was in my room, and in another few, I was strapped into my Mecha. My helmet clamped shut as I got onto the command channel. “REPORT!” I yelled. I cranked my servos up to the upper limits of their power. My protection detail fell in around me as we raced through the Resilient, personnel being warned of our approach as our boots hammered the deck.

  “Fleet emerging from the Eridani jump point. Resilient’s additional reactor is online and Eddie is initiating the fourth. He doesn’t believe the first and second will hold out. Three and five are out completely. The Kuruvians are already sending transmissions via tight beam laser to the incoming ship, trying to inform the Sarenmenti and Kuruvians aboard,” Rick said.

  “Good. I want all weapons brought online, including those just installed. I want the station to concentrate on laser arrays for PD. Have Heston bring forth his forces, ready to disperse and cover Earth’s targeted side while taking out missiles. Send all of our defensive platforms to him. They will be the last line of defense for the Earth.”

  I opened the channel to all of my ship commanders. “I want detailed reports on your readiness within ten minutes.” They greened up on my HUD, acknowledgment they’d gotten the message as I entered the blast doors.

  Everyone was focused on their work as I strode to my seat, my eyes focused on the plotted Syndicate forces. We only had a basic reading from their emergence profile. The gravitational background noise they created as they entered the system showed me not only where they had emerged, but also that the skill level of the oncoming ships was not the best, and that they’d used their capacitors instead of their wormhole generators.

  I took my seat. Its comfortable formfitting cushions hid the weight that rested on my shoulders as I read reports and plotted the fleet’s movements till it would come into contact with the new arrivals.

  ***

  Min Hae tried to not think of the information that Monk was reading as he worked on the side project he and Felix had going on, trying to see which technologies worked together. The new PDS systems had been a great success, but Min Hae and his people were pulling information out at an extraordinary rate. It seemed that everything they found, Felix could adapt to something.

  I swear, he’s going to fill up that yard he’s got. Min Hae thought about the semi-secret development yard that had been holed out of Parnmal. It was the birthplace of both eclipse freighters, upgrades across the fleet, and whatever crazy things Felix could make.

  Felix and Min Hae had settled into their positions on Parnmal station with ease. Min Hae and his people went through every piece of information that the Free Fleet possessed. They were compiling it and trying to glean secrets, ideas, or anything from it to give to the right departments.

  Usually, that department was Felix’s research, development, and production.

  The information that Resilient had supplied made Felix lend Min Hae most of his big thinkers, so Min Hae was having a hard time getting through the main part of his job—gathering intelligence. It was so easy to sift through the reams of information and tease out new connections instead of trying to build up new sources to gather information from.

  That was, until forty-five minutes ago, when one of his analysts cracked the cipher that the Syndicate was using for orders given by its leadership.

  “Damn.” Monk sighed calmly. Min Hae had called the commander of Parnmal to come into his quiet office and read the report they’d been given from Hachiro’s memory cores.

  “Quite. It looks like Commander Salchar’s forces will be outnumbered close to three to one, not including the station and with Commander Boot’s forces included.” Min Hae had changed in his time on Parnmal, becoming much more confident of himself and more guarded, especially with the information he knew and who he told it to.

  “Yes, but there is that if they survive.” Monk pointed to a list on the manifest.

  “Which by itself is more tonnage than the entire fleet and a good portion of the station in Sol system,” Min Hae said, clearly having doubts.

  Monk looked at the two lists of forces, nodding to himself. “He’ll do it,” he said, giving the data pad back to Min Hae.

  “Sir?”

  “Salchar will win, though at what cost, I do not know.”

  “Should we send him reinforcements?”

  “Cheerleader’s not expected back for another few days. The situation is similar in AIH and Chaleel systems. For now, we consolidate and be prepared if Salchar calls for us. Otherwise, they’re on their own. We also need to figure out a way to use the cipher to decode the Syndicate’s communications while not letting them catch on that we’ve done so.”

  Min Hae nodded. “Bletchley Park.”

  Monk looked at him with an odd expression.

  “In World War Two, people from Bletchley Park figured out the German code and cracked their messages. Now we’ve done the same. We must make sure that it doesn’t get out that we know the code.”

  “Indeed. Pass all information up to me as soon as you get it, and keep working on the package that Resilient pulled together. With our lack of people, we need to use every advantage we can find.”

  Min Hae nodded. “Yes, Commander.” Hopefully it’ll take my mind off the fact that Salchar and half of the fleet is fighting for their lives.

  “Salchar will win,” Monk said, whether to Min Hae or to himself, Min Hae didn’t know. Monk placed a hand on his shoulder in reassurance before heading back to the command center.

  “All right, we’ve got a lot of work to do and time is only running out,” Min Hae said. His squad’s worth of people who made up his intelligence department turned to their work.

  He wished that he was Felix, putting together machines and weapons that would give the Free Fleet an edge, like the planetary cannons and shield generators for Parnmal he was making.

  Salchar gave you a job, now it’s time to do it. He turned back to the intercepted messages and began decoding them.

  Time is Never On One’s Side

  “Have we got clearer readings on the incoming fleet from the remote sensor buoys?” I asked the sensor commander of the Resilient.

  “Getting rough images now. Putting on the screen. From the signature, it looks like they used their capacitors to make the jump.”

  “Idiots,” I snarled under my breath. But, hopefully, their stupidity would mean they didn’t realize what was going on until they were too far into the system. Then, without recharged capacitors or jump generators, they’d be incapable of jumping out of the system.

  “Combined Arms, have you got those reports yet?”

  “Yes, sending them to your station now,” Sook said.

  “Sending to you now, sir.”

  My staff had come a long way from the bunch of strangers trying to grasp just what in the hell they were doing. Now we were one team, trained with precision and speed, working to move the massive force that was the Free Fleet.

  In a corner of my HUD, I could see forces from ship’s crew, fighters, and Armored Marine Commandos that were supposed to be on ships and those that actually were on ships. Second by second, the numbers increased. My people were well trained and our time in Sol system had only improved their skills.

  I plotted rough vectors into the view screen connected to my seat as I talked. “Rick, we have all of these trainees—it’s about time we saw if they were any good. If a ship needs personnel, they are to pull from
the trainees. I do not believe that we will be having an engagement where we will be needing the Commandos to land.”

  Rick greened up on my screen. I could see out of the corner of my eye that he was already passing on my orders, as well as getting recruits funneled onto the Resilient. He truly was an extension of myself at this point.

  “Nav, I have a rough course, sending to you now. Refine and pass onto the rest of the fleet. Combined Arms, what do you think about the cruiser Star Thrasher?”

  “Commander Sung wants to prove himself, and I think his crew can get him to green status, but I think it’d be best if they stayed behind with the rearguard.”

  “I concur. Cut orders to that effect. They are to assist with PD of the Hachiro. If the station is badly damaged, they are to act as an escape vessel. Nav, do you have a course?”

  “I have the preliminary, doing the numbers, sir!”

  “Comms, Eddie.”

  “Commander?” Eddie said, his Southern drawl at a minimum.

  “Is that generator online? If not, I’ll leave the Resilient behind.”

  “Working on it. Need ten,” he said in a gruff manner. “We’re connecting directly to the Hachiro generators to kick start the fourth. There might be a momentary loss of power.” Eddie rolled over my lapse before he ended the channel. He had other things to do and so did I.

  “Signatures recognized by sensors. We have approximately thirty ships incoming; three are factories attached to an unidentified structure. One dreadnought, a class below the Resilient. Seven battle cruisers, three destroyers, seven cruisers, and fourteen corvettes. Thirty-two ships in total,” the sensor commander relayed to the entire fleet and station.

  “Shit.” I pulled up the table of my forces. I knew my forces by heart, but I was hoping that I could pull something together. They doubled us in ships, and quadrupled us in tonnage. Other than the Resilient, my next heaviest were two destroyers.

  The bridge was quiet as people digested the news but continued on, nevertheless.