He spotted her look, however, and lifted his hand and slowly, carefully flexed it.
“I am healing, Captain LaMonte,” he told her. “I am perhaps in better shape than I look.” He took a moment to study her in turn. “You look good. Command agrees with you. As does marriage, I hear.”
“It does. Both of those,” she said, stumbling over her words. She then half-forced a chuckle as she glanced around the room.
“My apologies, gentlemen, Julia,” Damien said levelly. “Captain LaMonte and I are old friends; it’s been a while but I don’t believe we have time to reacquaint ourselves.” He gestured her to an empty seat.
“The console is loaded with the data you sent us,” he told her. “Why don’t you walk us through what you found?”
Kelly nodded and swallowed as she took a seat. A glass of water floated its way over to her elbow from the sideboard, and she gave Damien a reproving look. He shrugged innocently.
When she’d first met him, he’d rarely openly used magic for minor effects. Sherwood had a tradition of Mages being low-key, and he’d been trained in that practice. She guessed that his broken hands didn’t leave him much choice anymore.
“We arrived in the Santiago System roughly five days after Lord Montgomery did,” she told them as she pulled up the data. “They’d clearly heavily reinforced their position there, in terms of both ships and ground troops. Our best guess is that these ships”—she haloed the two transports in orbit of Novo Lar—“are troop transports.”
“Built on the same hull as their warships, as we suspected,” Admiral Medici noted as they studied the ships. “We were correct that the Republic seems to be mass-producing as many components as they can.”
“Our intelligence suggests that there are now roughly a hundred thousand Republican troops on Novo Lar alone,” Kelly continued a moment later. “It sounded like most of the fighting was done. Certainly, the local government didn’t have the forces to withstand an invasion of that magnitude.”
“No one would,” the woman on the screen replied. “We’re pretty typical here, and the entire Ardennes Planetary Army is only about thirty thousand men and women. Even with control of the orbitals, we couldn’t stand off a hundred thousand soldiers.”
“The naval situation is worse,” Kelly told them all. She haloed each identified group as she spoke. “When we arrived in Santiago, there was a carrier group positioned above Novo Lar. We didn’t get as detailed a look at them as we’d like, but several vessels did appear to be damaged. I’d guess that was the carrier group that clashed with Lord Montgomery.
“A second carrier group arrived in-system while we were making our initial scouting pass, and when we scouted the cloudscoop, we found two more.”
“Twenty-three starships, all told,” Medici concluded.
“Plus the ships that just evacuated Ardennes,” Montgomery added. “Twenty-eight warships.” He met Kelly’s eyes.
“You think they’re coming here.” It wasn’t really a question.
“I don’t see anywhere else they could be gathering that kind of force to strike at,” she told him. “My guess would be five carriers, eight battleships, fifteen cruisers. Eight hundred million tons or more.”
“Where did they get the Mages for this kind of fleet?” Medici asked. “The maneuvers they’ve made suggest multiple Mages per warship. Even if this is their entire jump-capable fleet…”
“It almost certainly is not,” Montgomery said sharply. “I think, ladies, gentlemen, that we must accept the fact that the Republic has cracked the holy grail of technology research from the last few centuries: they now not only have a technological interstellar communicator but some form of technological jump drive.”
“Given the Republic’s maneuvers, I’d guess we’re looking at one or two more groups on the offensive at minimum, and two to four held back for defense,” Cruyssen concluded.
“If they’re bringing half of their damn fleet to Ardennes, what do we do?” the woman on the screen asked. “Neither I nor Governor Riordan will ask the Martian Navy to die pointlessly for us.”
Kelly wished someone had bothered to introduce her. The woman seemed to be playing the same game she was—no matter what else happened here, Damien Montgomery couldn’t be allowed to die pointlessly here.
“Julia…” Montgomery sighed. “My apologies. Kelly LaMonte, this is Julia Amiri, Ardennes’s Minister for Defense. Also a former Secret Service Agent who headed my detail for two years.”
He turned his attention back to the other woman, Amiri.
“We have taken steps and organized deployments,” he told her. “Yes, the enemy is bringing a larger force than our worst projections, but remember that the larger the force they’re bringing, the longer it will take to organize.”
“That doesn’t buy us much,” Medici noted.
“We have reinforcements coming, people. If the Republic will give us the time we need, they’ll learn the Protectorate is far from defenseless.”
“Are you really going to get enough to stand off this?” Kelly asked, gesturing at the estimates she now had on the hologram. “That’s not a single task group, Damien. That’s half the Republic’s fleet. They’re coming for Ardennes…but they’re also coming for you. For the First Hand.”
“I know,” he admitted. “And it doesn’t matter. You’re all correct,” he continued with a familiar wry grin. “In the cold logic of war, we should withdraw. Concentrate more ships, assemble a full squadron of battleships before we clash with the Republic on this level.
“But the cold logic of war does not speak to the duties inherent in the name of our nation. We are the Protectorate of the Mage-King of Mars.”
His words were fierce and Kelly looked around the room. Her ex-boyfriend had everyone’s attention.
“We could retreat. Perhaps we should retreat. But I cannot. We need Ardennes as a beachhead to strike back at the Republic, but even more than that, we need it as a symbol. We need to show the people of the Protectorate that there are lines that we will not retreat from. That we will not yield them into the hands of their enemies without resistance.
“So far, this war has gone the Republic’s way. That ends here. We gather the reinforcements I have called for, we assemble our fleet, and we meet the Republic’s best with our best. We may still have to yield Ardennes; I won’t pretend otherwise.
“But we will not yield one more system without a fight. Not Ardennes, not anywhere else.”
Kelly sighed, but she was nodding along with everyone else. She knew when she’d lost an argument.
39
Roslyn watched the orbiting fleet with something close to awe. She’d seen battleships before—well, a battleship, making a close pass of the Tau Ceti Academy to show off to the cadets—but there was something more to seeing those behemoths of steel and firepower and knowing they were there to fight.
There were a lot of ships in Ardennes now. Peacemaker and Pax Marcianus were the most noticeable, but cruisers were nothing to sneer at. Neither were the multiple squadrons of destroyers, including Stand in Righteousness.
She’d half-expected to be replaced when Mage-Admiral Medici had arrived, but she remained aboard Stand as the tactical officer. Someone had faith in her abilities. It was probably Commander Katz and Captain Kulkarni.
It certainly wasn’t Roslyn!
For the fourth time in the last hour, she checked in on the sensor network scattered around the star system. Destroyers escorted sublight convoys between Ardennes and the other planets in the system, most importantly the gas giant hosting the Transmuter facility and the Navy logistics base.
She’d have been surprised to see anything different or unexpected, but she was all too aware of how junior and unprepared for her current job she was.
“Still obsessively checking for threats?” Katz asked, the Commander having apparently drifted in while she wasn’t looking.
“It’s part of the job, isn’t it?” Roslyn asked carefully as she turned in her
seat to look at the black woman. “Making sure no one sneaks up on us?”
The Commander chuckled.
“And even paranoiacs have real enemies,” she agreed. “You’ve spotted the problem before everyone at least once too often for me to dismiss your instincts, Lieutenant. What’s itching at the back of your neck?”
Roslyn considered that thoughtfully, yanking on a loose bang as she studied her console and the tactical display.
“The logistics depot, I think,” she admitted. “Every warship we have requires antimatter. We’re keeping everyone fueled, but our main stockpile is out there with the Transmuter station—and a grand total of three destroyers.”
“I agree,” Katz said. “It’s our biggest vulnerability, but I haven’t seen a solution to it yet. Do you?”
“Because the brand-new Lieutenant is going to see what everyone else missed, huh?” Roslyn asked with a chuckle of her own.
“You never know,” the older woman replied. “Sometimes, it takes a new set of eyes to see what everyone else missed. So, any thoughts?”
“We either need to commit to protecting the station or accept that we’re writing it off,” the young Mage said slowly. “Three destroyers won’t make any difference to the fate of the logistics base or the Transmuter station. But they could provide enough missile defense to change the fate of the fleet when the Republic comes for us.”
“From a strict tactical perspective, you’re right,” Katz agreed. “And believe me, Lieutenant, everyone up to Admiral Medici realizes it. Hell, I don’t know how much tactics and strategy training the Hand has, but I’d be surprised if even Montgomery doesn’t realize those destroyers aren’t going to achieve anything there.
“Tactics, however, aren’t the only thing in play. There are twenty-two Mages aboard that Transmuter station. Seventeen of them are convicted criminals serving sentences of various lengths, but the others are volunteers and even the prisoners are far from expendable. There are another two-hundred-odd people on that station, and about three thousand across the rest of the logistics base.
“We owe them protection.” Katz shook her head. “We can’t provide them with anything effective, but we need to make the effort. So, we send what we can spare and keep the fleet ready to jump to their relief if necessary.”
“They’re a…political gesture?” Roslyn asked.
“Basically. They’re also a tripwire, there to protect the logistics base from long-range fire while the fleet moves in.” The Commander sighed. “It’s a terrible job, but make no mistake: those men and women know what their job is.”
“Die protecting civilians until the rest of us get there?” Roslyn replied, a bit more bitterness slipping into her tone than she meant.
“Exactly,” her boss told her gently. “To a certain extent, Lieutenant, that’s the job of this entire fleet now. I’ve been told there are reinforcements coming, but I’m guessing the RIN is reinforcing as well. It’s a race, Chambers.
“And if the Republic wins, then it falls to us to die standing to honor His Majesty’s word.”
Roslyn found herself staring at a different screen, the one showing Ardennes itself orbiting beneath them.
“I guess if we couldn’t take the joke, we shouldn’t have signed up,” she breathed. It was an old quote from a book she’d read as part of her studies at the Academy.
“Nobody ever said the joke was going to be funny.”
What was frustrating for Roslyn, at least, was that they had no idea if the Republic was watching them. Seven operatives had been found across the fleet. If any of them had had an FTL communicator, it had been destroyed before they were taken.
At least only four of them had suicided. There were three prisoners being held on the surface. The tendency of Republic spies to suicide—or be suicided—on capture made Roslyn sick.
Every tactical officer in orbit of Ardennes was digging through their sensor data, trying to find any hint, any sign of an FTL communication. It was entirely possible that there wasn’t even a recognizable signal when the thing was in use, which only added to Roslyn’s frustration.
Technology wasn’t supposed to feel more arcane and mysterious than her magic, after all.
Something flickered on her screen and she checked it. For a moment, she thought she had something—and then the computer cheerfully informed her that the meteor she’d detected was recorded in Ardennes’s databases.
Roslyn was about to move on when a thought struck her and she double-checked the data. Yes…the meteor was exactly where it was supposed to be, but the reflection was wrong. She wasn’t getting reflected light from the star.
She was getting reflected light from somewhere else…somewhere behind the distant second gas giant that went mostly ignored due to its size and distance.
And not just light.
“Commander Katz,” she said aloud. “I think we’ve got a jump flare.”
“Jump flares aren’t usually an I think, Lieutenant,” Katz pointed out—but she stepped over to look over Roslyn’s shoulder anyway.
“This meteor is supposed to be here,” Roslyn told her superior. “But look at the light pattern. It’s reflecting light from here.” She haloed a region of space behind the smaller gas giant. “And there’s just enough Cherenkov radiation left for me to flag it as a possible jump.”
“And if someone wanted to be sneaky and get a look at what we’re up to, that’s exactly where they’d jump in, isn’t it?” the Commander murmured. “I agree. Well done, Lieutenant.”
Even as Katz was congratulating her, an alert flashed up on the screen. At least one other tactical officer had drawn the same conclusion—and, unlike a freshly promoted teenager, had had the confidence to send up the warning without checking it with a superior.
“Looks like we’re sending a couple of destroyers out to investigate,” Katz noted as new instructions ran over her screen. “Not us; looks like Bonnie Darling got the short straw again.” She patted Roslyn firmly on the shoulder.
“Keep those eyes peeled, Lieutenant. Your paranoia hasn’t led us wrong yet!”
40
“Well, the bad news is that they got a fantastic view of everything that’s in the system,” Medici told Damien over the video channel.
“And the good news is that our reinforcements aren’t here yet,” the Hand replied. “And the fact that they sent a scouting ship means it’s less likely they have an operating agent here with an FTL communicator.”
“Agreed,” the Admiral said. “And our destroyers chased them out, so they’ll probably realize they can’t pull that again.” Medici sighed. “I’ve positioned a net of sensor drones behind Cherbourg now, with Bonnie Darling of Sherwood out there to keep an eye on them.
“Cherbourg’s far enough out that they can’t threaten us by jumping behind it, but I’ll admit we assumed they already knew everything.”
Damien nodded.
“As did I, Admiral. I think that’s likely still a wise policy to operate under. I wouldn’t put it past a clever Republic Admiral to try and use a scout ship to make us feel safe. What kind of scout are we looking at?” he asked.
“What I would have expected before all of their new toys got revealed, to be honest,” Medici replied. “A refitted jump-courier. Nothing unusual beyond the sensor arrays that our ships picked up, so it’s quite possible she’s even still flying with Mages aboard.”
“We know they have at least some,” Damien said. “I don’t get it myself, but some people will always work for money—and the Republic certainly has that.”
“I can’t think of any particular way to take advantage of that scout sweep,” the Admiral told him. “You?”
“No. We know they were here; they know we’re here. We have to assume they’ll know when our reinforcements arrive—but if they don’t, that means they may move with less force than they’ll need when all is said and done.”
“I wish I didn’t have to rely on that,” Medici murmured. “What are we getting in terms
of reinforcements?”
Damien shook his head.
“Míngliàng, Sherwood, Condor, Amber and His Majesty have all confirmed that they’re sending more ships,” he told the other man. “Since we don’t currently trust our communication security, no one is giving me more details than that.”
His concerned voice earned him a disgruntled mewp from the floor. Persephone appeared from nowhere to headbutt his leg and he chuckled.
“My apologies, Admiral; my therapist says I’m being too grumpy.”
The Admiral laughed, breathing a sigh of relief.
“That cat is surprisingly good for all of us,” he told Damien. “We’re staring down the barrel of one hell of a Republican fleet, my lord. What happens if our reinforcements aren’t enough to make up the balance?”
“We fight,” Damien said firmly. “We fight on the assumption that we’ll have to retreat from the system, but we fight. I will not yield Ardennes without a battle, Mage-Admiral…but everyone who has told me to yield is correct that we cannot lose the forces we’re gathering here, either.
“But the easy victories for the Republic are over. We may not stop them here, though we will do all within our power to do so…but they will pay for Ardennes, Admiral. They will learn that they are not invulnerable.”
“And we will prove that to our people as well,” Medici agreed. “Too many of my officers are on the verge of running scared. We have yet to see a Republic capital ship fall. We’ve seen them run, but we haven’t seen them die.”
“I know. It will fall to us, Admiral, to change that.”
“I’m looking forward to it,” Medici said grimly. “Give that cat some pets for me, my lord. If she keeps you sane, you’ll be ahead of most of us.”
Helpful in many ways as Persephone was, Damien was still glad to have the ability to go to the flag deck to work away from the kitten. Different types of work for different spaces, of course. In his office, he did paperwork and spoke with people—two tasks that summed up the vast majority of his job as First Hand. On Duke of Magnificence’s flag deck, he helped run a fleet.
UnArcana Stars Page 24
