Jackson breathed in slowly and deeply, enjoying the almost sickly sweet smell of Kentucky in early summer. It had taken the humans that had remained behind on Earth centuries to rethink their stewardship of the planet and make a concerted effort to employ the new technologies available to not only live with less impact but to reverse much of the damage caused by the carelessness of the early industrial era.
Unlike the planet that people fled in droves during the first great exodus to the colony planets, the Earth of the mid-twenty-fifth century had become a model of sustainability. Most notable were the powerful seawater fusion reactors that provided clean, safe, and cheap power to every corner of the globe. With the abundance of clean electricity, they’d been able to not only clean up the first world but bring sanitation and technology to the third world.
In many ways Jackson was still awed at how quickly the planet and her people were able to right the ship. By the time the third great world war was winding down, things looked quite grim for humanity. The world’s mighty superpowers were on the brink of ruin, there was widespread economic depression, and an increasingly toxic environment was having an alarming impact on birthrates. Many academics felt that humanity was in its twilight, as no obvious answers presented themselves and a war-weary population seemed to have little will left to try and salvage what was left of their civilization.
The Tsuyo Corporation had tried to spark the world’s imagination with the announced discovery of an alien spacecraft and the subsequent adaptation of its propulsion system onto a manned, human vessel, but it was to no avail. Shockingly, people reacted to the news of the alien ship, the first firm proof of extraterrestrial life, with the same apathy they applied to every other aspect of their lives. The launch of the Carl Sagan came and went to the disinterest of billions. Years later, when the mission had been deemed an expensive and embarrassing failure, Tsuyo quietly began making plans to explore and colonize the handful of suitable planets their automated probes had discovered.
For generations anyone with any education, skill, or even just hope for a better future fled a broken and battered Earth for the promise of a new start for themselves and their families. Those that remained behind watched the lifters haul away their fellow humans with a collective sigh and a shrug as if to say, “What’s the point?”
“It’s so green and vibrant,” Davis said. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but every image or vid I’ve seen of Earth depicted a post-apocalyptic wasteland.”
“I’ve seen those same images,” Jackson shrugged. “Honestly, by the time I was born we were already on the trailing end of what we call the Resurgence. The air and water were clean and society had mostly picked itself up and was moving forward again.”
“So why stay so isolated?” she asked as they walked towards the terminal. “Why didn’t Earth petition the Confederacy for membership?”
“Pride,” Jackson said, unsure why he felt so defensive about the question. “This planet is the birthplace of humanity. To go crawling to the Confederacy and beg membership of the very people who had abandoned us in the first place was never a popular proposal. Earthers aren’t necessarily cheerful isolationists, but most of us just aren’t willing to let go of the old resentments.”
“And you?”
“I’m a bit more pragmatic,” Jackson said. “I understand the motivations of those first waves of colonists. I also had only wanted one thing for my life and that was to go to space and travel between the stars. Since the Sol Defense Force never ventures out past Saturn, the obvious answer was to try and snag one of the slots to the Academy that Fleet set aside each year for Earthers.”
“But it’s always been a struggle, being from here,” she said.
“Nothing worthwhile comes without sacrifice,” Jackson said with a forced smile. “I don’t regret my decision to leave.”
They walked the rest of the way to the transit hub in silence. Jackson wasn’t sure if it was the casual way in which she now addressed him, the stylish civilian attire, or the fact that she insisted on walking so close to him that their hands would sometimes brush together, but he was becoming suddenly aware that Jillian Davis was a very beautiful young woman. He was also quite aware at how inappropriate things had become between them in the short time since leaving Geneva, but he wasn’t sure how to address it without embarrassing her. As her proximity wasn’t especially unpleasant, nor was he in uniform, he decided to let it slide for the time being.
****
Admiral Joseph Marcum replayed the message one more time before leaning back in his plush leather seat and rubbing his temples with the heels of his hands. He’d always considered himself a good officer. The kind that was willing to do what was right even if it meant sacrificing everything he’d worked for. But after watching Jackson Wolfe practically single-handedly usurp half the fleet in order to make a stand for what was right, he had to concede that he’d become the very thing he’d always hated: a politician masquerading as a military officer. The sad part was that it had happened without him even noticing it.
He was sitting in his well-appointed office aboard the TCS Amsterdam, a Dreadnought-class battleship, the biggest and baddest thing to ever come out of a Terran shipyard. The mammoth warship was sitting in between the Earth and the Moon while the rest of her squadron had taken up a high orbit over Mars in order to keep the traffic over the blue planet to a minimum.
The latest com drone to buzz through the Solar System had delivered a lengthy message for him from Confederate President McKellar, who was still safely in a bunker on a planet they were calling the Ark. The President was typically pompous, absurdly out of touch, and managed to display a lack of understanding about their current situation that was simply breathtaking. Marcum had to assume that McKellar wasn’t actually a stupid man, he did manage to get himself elected to the highest office in the Confederacy after all, but the fact that he still considered himself to be “in charge” was laughable.
Haven was gone. A smoldering, irregularly shaped ruin spinning through space without enough mass left to even stay in its original orbit. With its loss went any remaining stability within the Terran Confederacy. The more powerful enclaves like New America and Britannia were now declaring their independence, while envoys from the smaller enclaves were now filtering into the Solar System like lost sheep just looking for some sort of direction.
“The man is a complete fucking moron,” Marcum muttered to himself. McKellar had sent a directive that he marshal any forces remaining from Wolfe’s “ill-conceived” effort in Nuovo Patria, take the senior captain into custody, and return to the Ark where they would regroup and discuss their strategy going forward. Marcum was still technically serving as CENTCOM Chief of Staff, but with no Haven, no Jericho Station, and no CENTCOM to speak of he had to wonder what power that title even commanded anymore. What he did know, however, was that any effort to arrest Jackson Wolfe would not only result in further harming a completely demoralized force but may well serve as the spark for a compete mutiny within the ranks. He wasn’t even all that confident that his own captain aboard the Amsterdam wouldn’t shoot him in the head if he tried to order an intercept of the Ares.
“Orderly! Have our JAG rep haul ass to my office,” he stabbed at the intercom button on his desk.
“At once, Admiral!”
He’d been on the wrong side of every major decision since the Phage had first appeared in the Xi’an System. It was a trend that he very much would like to correct.
****
“So you don’t remember anything leading up to the evacuation of the Blue Jacket?” Davis asked.
“Just some fragmented imagery,” Jackson said, sitting down next to her on a bench that overlooked the Ohio River. “The neurologists tell me that anything I remember is likely something my brain is fabricating to try and fill in the gaps, since the head trauma would have made it virtually impossible for my short term memory to transfer to long term. To be honest, maybe it’s best I don’t remember.”
>
“Why do you say that?” she asked, sounding oddly hurt.
“The decision to ram the ship into that Alpha was one I made out of utter desperation,” he said, eyeing her sidelong, confused by her reaction. “I think that if I vividly remembered everything leading up to the impact it could adversely affect my ability to command now, cause me to second guess every decision.”
“I see,” she said, now looking uncomfortable.
“You seem like you have something on your mind that wants to get out, Lieutenant,” Jacksons said, intentionally addressing her by rank to remind himself that there was a line that could not be crossed.
“Perhaps now isn’t the best time to—” the strident alert tone of Jackson’s comlink interrupted her.
“This is Wolfe,” Jackson said, slipping the earpiece in. “Understood, we’ll be at the pickup location in approximately ninety minutes. Wolfe out.”
“Bad news?” Davis asked, standing and composing herself.
“Fleet-wide emergency recall,” Jackson nodded. “A shuttle will pick us up at the airport here in Louisville and take us directly to the Ares. The order came in from Admiral Marcum. What was it you were saying?”
“It will wait, Captain,” she said crisply.
“Then let’s get moving,” he stood. “The shuttle is already on its way.”
Chapter 4
“Report.”
“We’ve been told to stand by for a command-level briefing from the Amsterdam, sir.” Lieutenant Commander Barrett stood and vacated the command seat as Jackson walked onto the bridge of the Ares.
“Any word on what it’s all about, official or otherwise?” Jackson asked as he walked around the bridge to take a quick look at all the stations.
“Negative, sir,” Barrett said. “I reached out to see if anyone knew anything on the back channels, but the rumor mill is shockingly quiet on this one.”
“That fact alone is terrifying beyond all fucking measure,” Master Chief Green said from the hatchway. The salty chief’s massive arms were crossed over his chest and he wore his usual scowl as spacers scurried about to prepare the Ares for any potential orders that came down during the briefing.
“I don’t suppose the enlisted intel network was any more successful than Lieutenant Commander Barrett’s friends?”
“Not a peep, Captain,” Chief Green said. “Whatever this is about, the admiral is keeping a tight lid on it. I might have heard from an unsubstantiated source that he had the entire legal section aboard the Amsterdam working for twenty hours straight on something before ordering the recall.”
“Interesting,” Jackson said, not bothering to ask how the hell the master chief had contacts aboard a warship whose very existence was a highly classified secret until very recently.
“Captain, word from the Amsterdam is that Admiral Marcum will address the fleet within the next hour,” Lieutenant Keller said from the com station. “I’m being told to have all hands standing by.”
“Very good, Lieutenant.” Jackson sat in his seat, cringing inwardly at the residual warmth left by Barrett. “Send out the word to all sections: keep working but be ready to get in front of a monitor within a moment’s notice.”
“Aye, sir.”
****
“I will keep this brief as we all have a lot of work to do,” Fleet Admiral Joseph Marcum said to the camera lens sitting in front of his desk. “I am recording and broadcasting this command level briefing from the TCS Amsterdam and it will be distributed to every corner of Terran space via the com drone network.
“As per the charter that the Terran Starfleet and all of CENTCOM operates under, I am exercising my right as Chief of Staff to declare a state of dire emergency and supersede all previous postings, orders, and assignments until said emergency is reduced in threat or eliminated.” He leaned back and slid the paper he’d been reading from aside.
“All of you know what’s been happening on the Frontier and that the Phage have gone on the offensive and destroyed Haven and Jericho Station. It is now obvious that this enemy is not content to harass our borders and intends to hit us, hard, wherever it can. It is also obvious, at least to me, that with our elected leadership in tatters it falls on us to mount any sort of meaningful defense.
“We’ve been given a real chance in the form of an ally with extensive intelligence on the enemy that has allowed us to begin forming a plan that will take the fight to them. Greater details will be forthcoming in later technical briefs and specific orders. For right now, all you need to know is that, in following within the letter of the law, I am temporarily restructuring Starfleet in order to provide our command and control greater agility. In short: all Terran warships are now on detached duty to Seventh Fleet and will operate within those parameters. You heard me correctly. We are all Black Fleet now.
“Specific orders are attached to this message, but they all say more or less the same thing. Every CO needs to get his or her ship prepped and steaming for New Sierra at best possible speed. I will forego the motivational speech at the end of this brief because you all have a lot of work to do. Marcum out.”
****
“The admiral isn’t fucking around with this one,” Chief Green said, the first one on the bridge of the Ares to find his voice.
“Does he really have the authority to do that?” Barrett asked.
“Yes,” Davis said even as she read from the CENTCOM operational charter. “He’s stretched the meaning a bit, but he’s exercising a clause that’s never been used since the restructuring of Starfleet over a century ago.”
“Captain, there’s a private com channel request coming in for you from the Amsterdam,” Keller said.
“I more or less expected this, Lieutenant,” Jackson stood up. “Send it to my office.”
“Aye, sir.”
****
“That was quite a surprise, Admiral,” Jackson said once the channel had been established and the encryption routine was stabilized.
“I’m taking a page out of your book, Wolfe,” Marcum growled. “I figured I’d see if taking direct, shocking action will garner me the same sort of luck you’ve enjoyed.”
“I see,” Jackson said noncommittally.
“Now here’s where it gets serious,” Marcum went on. “I don’t expect every ship to follow their new order. Most COs were put in place due to political connections within the individual enclaves, and their loyalties likely will remain there. I also don’t expect President McKellar to take this lying down. He still thinks that he’s in control of the Confederacy despite the fact everyone is running down whatever rabbit hole they can find to hide, and he may issue some countermanding order as Commander in Chief.”
“Doesn’t your order supersede his authority for the time being?” Jackson asked.
“Technically,” Marcum shrugged, an odd-looking gesture when combined with the video interference of the encryption. “But we both know I’m working with a legal loophole that was never closed all those years ago. Realistically, the best I can expect is that the ships that survived the Battle of Nuovo Patria may be all that will show up to the rally point.”
“I’m also assuming we can add Colonel Blake’s strike force to that mix,” Jackson said.
“I’m counting on it,” Marcum nodded. “We’re breaking orbit and heading for the jump point now. I’d like the Ares to stay and make sure the colonel doesn’t get detained by CN Security.”
“Understood,” Jackson said. “The rest of the Ninth is loitering in the outer system. I’ll send Captain Wright orders and get them moving to New Sierra immediately.”
“Good, good,” Marcum said distractedly as he looked off screen. “This feels like the endgame, Captain. Whatever we do next … we better get it right.”
“Agreed, Admiral,” Jackson said. The channel closed and he typed out his orders to the rest of his squadron while reflecting on what had just happened. He could only shake his head in disbelief. Against all odds, Admiral Marcum had restored Jackson’s fa
ith in him.
Chapter 5
“I need to see the colonel, please.”
“And you are?” the CN Security trooper sneered.
“Aston Lynch. Personal aide to Senator Augustus Wellington.” Lynch flashed his ID. “Senator Wellington is one of the surviving members of the Confederate Senate and, so far, is most pleased at how the Council of Nations here on Earth has treated his friend and guest. Now please step aside.”
“I’ll need to run this up—”
“I’ve been as accommodating as I can be, given the circumstances,” Lynch said. “Is the colonel a prisoner?”
“No.”
“Has he committed some crime here on Earth you intend to charge him with?”
“No.”
“You do realize there are six Dreadnought-class battleships in the Solar System right now, each of their captains sworn to carry out the political will of the Confederate government?” Lynch asked, smiling indulgently.
“You can’t possibly mean to threaten us—”
“Step aside. Now!” Lynch barked. The outburst had the desired effect and Lynch was able to shoulder between the two guards and get to the door of Colonel Blake’s quarters. He knocked twice and was ushered in before either guard could try to physically restrain him or call up to their superiors.
“Agent Pike,” Colonel Blake said calmly. “I take it there have been some developments since last we spoke?”
“You could say that,” Pike said. “While I’m sure your slick Vruahn hardware has already decrypted the transmission, it will take CN Security just a bit longer to figure out what’s going on. I’m afraid they might get desperate and do something foolish.”
“You’re referring to the transmission from the TCS Amsterdam?” Blake asked.
“You’re going to have to tell me what sort of bug they put in you that is able to evade every scanner we have,” Pike said in disgust. “But yes, Admiral Marcum has essentially declared the civilian authority over the Terran Confederate Armed Forces null and void and is massing the fleet near one of our largest depots. The aftershocks from his creative interpretation of the Charter are likely to send politicians into fits, both on Earth and in the enclaves.”
Counterstrike (Black Fleet Trilogy, Book 3) Page 3
