by Doug Farren
“Be cautious Mr. President,” Bruanoe replied. “Earth is progressing down a path that will ultimately lead to its self destruction. Unless your race can put aside its differences and unite to become the Human race, sooner or later war will break out and your planet will be laid to waste.”
A much calmer Admiral Hayes said, “Since you are being so open and honest with us—would you be willing to tell me if you know the location of our off-planet shipyard?”
Buranoe gestured to Mernaga who replied, “It wasn’t too difficult to find. When we discovered an area of space that was surrounded by a dense sensor web we knew it had to be the shipyard. Yes, we know where it is.”
Admiral Hayes looked down at the table apparently interested in the design of the pattern in the wood. “We call it Olympus. You may as well get the name right on your charts.”
President Trent stood up signaling an end to the meeting. Mernaga and Buranoe followed suit. The President extended his hand towards Buranoe who took it. “I hope to never have to meet like this again,” Trent said. “Perhaps from this point on we can be more open with each other concerning such matters.”
As Mernaga and Hayes shook hands Mernaga asked, “Would you mind telling me how you found the recorder?”
Hayes chuckled to himself then replied, “Dumb luck actually. One of our freighters accidentally hit the docking arm of a space station and punctured a small hole in the hull. A worker found the recorder while repairing the damage to the hull. We inspected all of our ships and found several more of them. Is it really a standard security recorder?”
“Yes. They are quite popular since they can record many days of video or months of individual pictures.”
As they released their grip on one another the Admiral replied, “I hate to say this Commander but, from one military commander to another, congratulations on a job well done.”
Mernaga played the Admiral’s last remark over and over in his head during the trip back to the spaceport. Once aboard the shuttle, Buranoe noticed that Mernaga’s thoughts were elsewhere and asked, “Something bothering you Base Commander?”
“These Humans continue to amaze me. One minute we were facing each other across the table as if we were mortal enemies ready to go to war. Less than five minutes later Admiral Hayes is congratulating me for discovering the location of their shipyard.”
“They are an odd race.”
“Unstable would be a better term.”
* * * * *
“Do you really believe them?” Admiral Hayes asked as he settled into the overstuffed, century-old, leather chair in the President’s private sitting room.
“Oddly enough, yes I do,” the President replied as he sunk into a matching chair. He took a long sip from his drink then continued, “But I’m still glad that we will be building a small base not far from theirs. What’s the situation with the Chinese and the UAN?”
“Not much has changed since my last report. It has become obvious that the UAN have benefited from the theft of the Hammerhead fighter and the Chinese are none too pleased about it. Our intelligence shows continued improvement in the UAN’s shielding and weapons technologies while the Chinese continue to fall farther and farther behind.”
“I’m a bit worried about the Chinese. They’ve been stepping up production of their fighter fleet for weeks and three of their cruisers have departed orbit for destinations unknown. Rumor has it that they have been doing some behind-the-scenes negotiating with the UAN in an attempt to gain access to the technology from the Hammerhead.”
“Yep—and from what I’ve been told they’ve not had any luck either. The Arabs have been trying to up the Chinese for years and now that they have the advantage they’re not likely to let go of it.”
“That’s what I’m worried about. When the Chinese and the Arabs were pretty much evenly matched, they were more likely to gang up together against us. The situation was tense but controllable and one we are familiar with. Now that the Arabs have a decided technological advantage over the Chinese the situation has changed.”
“You think the UAN will attack the Chinese?”
“Or the Chinese will preemptively strike the UAN. Do you think there’s anything we can do to diffuse the tension? I happen to agree with Buranoe concerning our current situation. If things keep up the way they are now somebody is going to lose their cool and we will have a war on our hands.”
The admiral swirled his drink around in his glass, the ice making little tinkling noises. “Short of becoming communists or embracing Islam, I can’t see any way out of this.”
“I don’t see any of this ending very well,” President Trent replied and drained his glass. He got up to refill it with Russian Vodka, his preferred poison.
The admiral held his glass up to the light and looked through the amber colored whiskey. “You know,” he said in the tone of voice that said what he was about to say should be taken lightly. “We still hold a significant advantage in weapons and shield technology over both the Chinese and the UAN. We also have more ships—for the moment. We could simply eliminate the threat and get this over with right now.”
The bottle of vodka hit the bar top with a loud clunk making several nearby glasses clink together. “And throw the entire world into a state of war? No! We would only be confirming what the Consortium thinks is going to happen. You can’t prevent a war by starting one.”
The admiral drained his glass and stood up. “In that case, the best I can do is to keep our forces ready for the day that somebody else starts the war. Because, unless something changes, somebody will eventually pull the trigger. Good night Mr. President.”
“Keep the troops ready admiral. I pray that your prediction does not come true. Good night.”
31
Arms Race
===============================================
===== March, 2066 (Terran calendar) =====
===============================================
“You are absolutely certain of this?” President Trent exclaimed.
Glenn Wilson, director of the EDMs intelligence branch, nodded his head in acknowledgment. “Yes sir. Our contacts inside the UAN were right and the probe's data confirms it. The UAN has successfully tested a faster than light drive and a defense shield that is nearly as good as ours. This pretty much proves that they are the ones responsible for the theft of the fighter from Tycho base.”
“How old is this intelligence?”
“About four weeks,” Admiral Hayes replied. “The test was conducted near a UAN base in system H-14. We were unbelievably lucky in getting the kind of advanced notice we did, otherwise we could never have planted a surveillance probe in that system in time to record their tests. It took us another four weeks to extract the probe and beam the data to Earth.”
President Trent shook his head and pushed the paper version of the report to one side. “How about UAN weapon systems. Any improvements there?”
Glenn leaned back in his chair and intertwined his fingers like he was preparing to pray. “The probe did pick up the EM signature of some sort of weapons fire but the ship was at the extreme edge of its sensor range. No significant data concerning the test was obtained. Our intelligence, however, does seem to indicate that the UAN has also made some significant advances in weapons design.”
“No mention of the sledgehammer I hope,” the President stated.
“None.”
The President turned toward Anita to emphasize his next point. “Good. Let's keep it that way. As far as we have been able to determine, not even the Consortium possesses a weapon like the sledgehammer.”
“No need to worry gentlemen,” Anita replied. “All sledgehammers are built on Olympus in an almost entirely automated factory. Those few technicians who perform the final assembly have no idea what it is they are building. The weapons are encased in a sensor-proof enclosure and sealed. Nobody except the very few trained service technicians can gain access to the weapon's internals. Our security is very ti
ght and I intend to keep it that way.”
“The bottom line then,” the President summarized. “Is that the UAN will soon be fielding ships with upgraded capabilities approaching ours except for the sledgehammer. Is this correct?”
There were nods around the table. Admiral Hayes sipped his water and idly remarked, “The Chinese must be furious.”
The President nodded his head in agreement then said, “What can you tell us about that situation Bill? Better yet, for Anita's benefit, give us a brief history just to make sure we are all up to speed.”
“By all means, Mr. President. As you may recall, several years ago an attempt was made to capture one of our cruisers. This event clearly indicated that China and the UAN were working together to gain access to advanced weapons technology. Seven months later, the Hammerhead fighter was stolen and landed in UAN territory.
“Months of intelligence gathering and in-depth background checks of the people involved eventually yielded a theory indicating that the two maintenance technicians were Chinese operatives while the ship's weapons officer had ties to the UAN. This also indicated some sort of agreement between China and the UAN.
“A couple of months after the Hammerhead incident we began to notice a change in the relationship between the Chinese government and the UAN. On the surface, it looked like business as usual but underneath things were heating up. There are confirmed reports of at least two incidents involving Chinese commandos inside UAN countries. Both incidents occurred near top security military research centers. It is our belief that the UAN double-crossed the Chinese and kept the stolen fighter to themselves. The Chinese were attempting to recover parts of the fighter by force.”
“Interesting,” Anita replied. “I'm surprised this sort of information has not been leaked to the public.”
“It is common knowledge among the upper levels of the intelligence community,” Glenn added. “The Arabs obviously would not want this to become public knowledge. The Chinese also want to keep this information secret because of their initial involvement and embarrassment over being double-crossed. The Defense Ministry would prefer to keep a lid on it because making it public would expose our failure to detect the foreign spies in our midst.”
“So everyone knows but nobody talks about it.”
“Precisely.”
Anita glanced around the table with an inquiring look on her face. “I would like to thank you gentlemen for including me in this discussion, but I'm curious as to why. I'm not a member of the intelligence community nor am I a government official. Why am I here?”
The President glanced at the admiral. “Admiral, you specifically asked for Anita's presence at this meeting. She has a valid point and I also want an answer to her question.”
“This,” the admiral picked up the report and shook it in the air to emphasize what he was referring to. “is very bad news.” The report hit the table with an audible thump. “Until now, the superiority of our ships has been unquestionable. Because of this, the EDM has been able to keep China and the UAN in check. Any aggression by any other nation would be negated by the superior firepower of the EDM ships now in orbit and everyone knows it.”
“But now the Arabs think they have achieved equality with the EDM,” Mr. Wilson took up the narrative. They may decide to challenge our ships whereas in the past such a challenge was unthinkable.”
“I still have not heard a good explanation as to why I am here,” Anita reiterated.
“We don't want to reveal the existence of the sledgehammer to the Consortium,” Hayes responded. “As such, we need to find some way to boost the military capability of the EDM fleet and do so in a way that can be demonstrated to the other nations so that they would think twice about challenging us. Your company builds our ships. We either need more ships built, or we need to find a way to make them better.”
Anita leaned back in her chair, placed her thumbs under her chin, and steepled her index fingers on the bridge of her nose. After a few seconds of thought she said, “Olympus is running at capacity now. To build more ships would require more workers meaning more supply runs. It would also mean more money to fund the construction.
“From what my engineers have told me, we are pushing the limits on stardrive technology at the moment. We are working on improving the effectiveness of our shields. I can look into trying to speed that project up.
“Weapons are an entirely different matter. The only weapon AST builds is the sledgehammer. If you want to equip your ships with more advanced weapons, you're going to have to get the subcontractors that supply those weapons to make them better.”
The President stood up and the others in the room followed suit. “I will ask the World President about increased funding. In the meantime, please do your best with what you have Mrs. Kauffman.”
Anita used the company suborbital transport to quickly return her to San Diego. Jay noticed she was in a depressed mood the moment she walked through the door. “Trouble in Washington?”
Anita kicked her shoes off and headed for the bar. “People never learn,” she replied pouring a generous portion of scotch into a glass with two ice cubes in it.
Jay approached her from behind and encircled her waist. He planted a light kiss on her neck. “Care to talk about it?”
Anita swirled the liquor around in the glass then drained it in a single motion. “There was a time when I could see the logic in keeping advanced weapons technology to ourselves,” she replied turning around in Jays arms. “But where does it stop?”
“I'm not sure I follow,” Jay replied confused.
“The UAN has tested a ship that has a stardrive equal to ours and a shield almost as capable. It's pretty obvious that they are the ones behind the theft of the Hammerhead from the Armstrong station. Washington wants to keep our military superiority intact and I've been asked to increase the ability of our ships to compensate.”
Jay dropped his arms and shook his head. “An arms race. I see what you mean. What did you tell them?”
“What else could I say! I told them we would do the best we could to improve our ships. I don't want nations hostile to the United States to possess superior weapons technology.”
Jay opened his arms and Anita responded. The two hugged for a moment then Jay said, “I know how you feel Anita. On the one hand, you want your country to be top dog, yet on the other hand you realize that this can only lead to an arms race. Flip the coin and you feel like you're betraying your country if you don't help. Flip it again and you feel like you are betraying the Human race and leading it down a path of destruction. You can't flip that coin and have it land on its edge my love.”
Anita suddenly felt like a dead weight against Jay. “I'm tired Jay. Let's go to bed.”
Without argument and without any further conversation the couple made their way to their bedroom where Jay helped Anita fall into a troubled sleep. Jay lay awake for nearly an hour thinking. Like Anita, he had to come to grips with where his loyalties lie. In the end, he decided to do his job and trust in the future. He had faith in humanity even though it looked like the current path it was taking was wrong.
32
Escalation
===============================================
===== August, 2066 (Terran calendar) =====
===============================================
“Captain! I am detecting three large vessels on an approach vector. They have just dropped out of stardrive. ETA two hours seventeen minutes.”
“Can you identify them?”
“Drive wake signature analysis indicates the ships are Human each with a mass of approximately 120 kilotons. I am detecting no IDS at this time.”
The captain of the UAN cruiser punched a command into his console and the large display at the front of the bridge shifted to show the tactical situation map. Three red dots indicating the location of the unknown ships could be seen near the outer edges of the system. No supplies or colonists were due to arrive for several more days.
The lack of an identification signal was also disturbing.
The cruiser had been sent to verify the security of an uninhabited, unclaimed world upon which the UAN planned to establish an outpost. They had been in orbit for only three hours. “Send out a universal hail requesting identification and intent.” the captain ordered.
“Receiving a reply sir,” came the response a moment later.
“Transfer to my console.”
After a brief delay an English-speaking voice said, “UAN cruiser. This is Randolph Hansen aboard the HMS Impervious. We are escorting two civilian ships to the forth planet where they intend on setting up a heavy metal mining operation. May I inquire as to your purpose in this system?”
“This is Captain Ibrahim Mohammed Al Tayb commanding the UAS Sawari. We are here to secure this system for colonization by the United Arab Nations. Please do not attempt to enter the orbit of the forth planet.”
“Come now captain. You know as well as I that no single nation can lay claim to any world. In fact, according to the Consortium treaties, no single race can lay claim to this world. I am sure that there is plenty of room on this planet for the both of us.”
The UAN captain had a dilemma on his hands. He had been given strict orders to secure the entire system for use by the UAN. But the captain of the other ship was also correct and legally there was nothing that could be done to prevent the British ship from orbiting. It might have been a different matter had the UAN colonists already arrived. Orders, however, were orders and he had to try his best to follow them.
“Captain Hansen, due to the tension between your nation and mine, perhaps it would be prudent for you to choose another planet within this system. There are three ships full of colonists and supplies due to arrive within the next few days. I would hate to see problems develop between our two groups of civilians.”
