Admiral's Fall
Page 38
Sapphira stiffened, her gait slowing and then despite the subtle threats that they could be killed if they go, she steadfastly continued toward the exit.
“As you have said many times, Mr. Speaker,” she declared, stopping just outside the exit, “Tracto was only ever a provisional world. Now that we are no longer associated with this body, I am announcing a new tariff on all Trillium sales.”
“Like we need your fuel anymore,” sneered the Aegis Assemblyman.
The Assembly was ecstatic—they were going to live.
Assemblywoman Kern of the Anti-Droid Alliance rejoiced, vindicated at last. “Man not machine!” she chanted, surrounded by a swarm of happy followers.
Isaak Newton, having brokered a deal to keep all of them alive, nodded feeling quite satisfied at the results as he shook hands, pressing the flesh of the politicians from all over the Spine. The outraged Border Alliance, and a few holdouts from Sector 24, despite their outrage and unwillingness to celebrate with their peers, quite notably failed to stalk out of the Grand Assembly along with Sapphira.
Looking over, Isaak could see that Chat-Hammer was ill at ease and Kong Pao was just shaking his head.
All in all it was a good day.
Chapter 53: Defend the Spine!
After sending most of the survivors of the New Confederation Flotilla back to the fleet base at New Tau Ceti the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet chased after the Reclamation Fleet survivors advancing into Sector 26 for more than three weeks before a courier flashed into the star system with an urgent message.
“Do you think the Imperials slipped around behind us and advanced on New Tau Ceti?”asked Commodore Druid over the com-link.
“Doubtful,” I said with a frown, “it’s more likely bad news from back home in Sector 25, or other tries against our interests,” I added while the message was still decoding.
Then a pale-faced Chief of Staff Lisa Steiner was forwarding me a message directly from the Assembly and never had I wished quite so passionately to have been wrong.
“Bad news I take it?” asked Druid.
“Apparently the Empire has sent a battle fleet into the Spine. It’s already attacked Hart’s World and Capria, along with a number of other worlds,” I said bleakly while wondering how my home world had fared.
“Blasted Imperials,” Druid swore.
“For the moment it looks like our work here is done, Commodore,” I said grimly, “and I have no idea if or when we will be coming back.”
I now had to cancel the campaign which had just started to reach toward Sector 27’s border. The Reclamation Fleet had avoided battle so far but we’d broken their back in that last battle. With our numbers and large fuel reserves, I was certain I could have brought them to a final battle and completely destroyed Norfolk, given more time.
Sadly, time was one thing I no longer had.
“Message the fleet: the Empire has attacked the Spine with a battle fleet. We need to return home immediately,” I ordered.
If they could attack Capria, they could just as easily attack Tracto. It was imperative we rush back and defend the Spine from yet another Imperial fleet.
I just hoped we weren’t too late.
Chapter 54: The Sacrifice
On the way back home, another courier arrived with a new message. A different message: news of a complete and utter betrayal.
It seemed while we’d been liberating worlds from the Imperial jackboot, peace has broken out between the Spineward Sectors and the Empire.
I—and more importantly to my people, my career, at least as far as I could tell—had just been sacrificed on the altar of political expediency and I was being called back to face an official inquiry before the Grand Assembly.
I had been declared a war criminal and was expected to appear and answer for my crimes in front of not just the New Confederation, but the Empire and Old Confederation as well.
As could have been expected, Akantha was infuriated.
“With allies like these, what need have we for enemies?” she asked furiously.
Was I about to give up? Not hardly.
“I have a plan,” I said evenly. Actually, this was so far out of left field that it was taking me a moment to compensate, so I didn’t actually have a plan yet, but I would. Soon.
“Those spineless cowards,” Akantha raged.
“Indeed,” I said.
Someone must have sold out the location of the mobile government, and in the face of potential death the Grand Assembly had voted to betray the Spine and save themselves. Oh, and not incidentally throw me under the bus in the process.
Wonderful.
I didn’t know what I was going to do yet, but I was certain that when it came to me it was going to be a real doozy.
“Are you just going to sit there and take it?” demanded Akantha.
“First we have an Imperial fleet to defeat. After that we can decide slowly how to deal with the politicians,” I said, now having lost all faith in our elected leaders.
On one level, I couldn’t blame them. It was the job of the fleet to keep them and the civilians safe. On the other hand, I was supposed to be an ally—I had papers and everything, promising that this time they really-really-really promised to treat me fairly and wouldn’t throw me under the bus anymore.
I might as well take that paper to the toilet with me for all the good it was going to do me anywhere else.
Then I pushed all bitterness aside.
“We need to gather information. How big is this fleet? Has Admiral Manning already caved alongside the government, or can we join forces and push these blighters back out of the Spine? Also, we need to take a look and see just what these blighters have supposedly signed away if we’re going to muster an effective PR counterattack,” I said, assigning different tasks to my staff. “Let’s get cracking, people. The Empire waits for no man,” I said crisply.
“Aye aye, Sir,” replied my Chief of Staff.
“Oh, and Lisa,” I said.
“Yes, Sir?” she asked.
“I think it’s time to dust off that battle footage and launch the PR blitz we were talking about earlier. There’s no time like the present,” I said pointedly.
“The people need to know what’s really going on,” she agreed.
Chapter 55: The PR Campaign
Still not having a great handle on the trillium requirements for extended jumping such a large fleet it took us two days and two point transfers to jump home. Or whatever they call it when you don’t actually leave an inertial sump behind you when you jump.
Our first jump was to New Tau Ceti, where we dropped off those survivors of the Confederation Flotilla assigned to Sector 26 that hadn’t fled the battle under Bluetooth's orders.
The stop at New Tau Ceti wasn’t just in order to preserve our hyper fuel or drop off flotilla survivors, it was also so we could gather information and save our homes from annihilation if the Empire hadn’t already attacked it.
If they were already at Tracto, one day more or less wasn’t going to matter. But if they were still on the way we could hopefully intercept them en route.
The news, when we received it, was not heartening.
“It’s confirmed,” I said, wadding up the flimsy and tossing it in the recycle bin, “only it’s not just one fleet...now it’s two.”
“Long odds, but not insurmountable,” Commodore Laurent eventually advised, allowing enough time to pass before speaking so that he didn’t risk an eruption.
I eyed him. “By itself no,” I agreed, “but when you factor in a second Confederation fleet camped outside the mobile governmental headquarters, the odds…”
“Did those boys at Argos slip the noose Admiral Manning put round about them?” queried Commodore Druid, chiming in at this gathering of my top officers.
I shook my head silently.
“It’s a new fleet. Sent by the Old Confederation,” Akantha interjected, foot tapping on the floor and shooting a sidelong look my way as she spoke.
“Silence. And I like to think I’d have heard something by now if he was putting up some kind of active resistance or even thinking about it,” I said flatly. “As it is, I have the sneaking suspicion that since peace has allegedly broken out in the Spine for the first time in five years and the New Confederation has accepted terms, he has decided to follow the lead of the new government.”
“At the low-low price of your reputation, career, freedom and possibly life—and this fleet being left out there swinging in the wind, Admiral,” said Druid face hard.
“I think someone has very badly underestimated the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet,” agreed Laurent, sharing a look of mutual anger with Commodore Druid.
“Do we even know how things stand in the rest of the Sector?” Spalding coughed into his hand and then gave his chest a thump. “Sorry, fighting off a touch of a cold. I fell into a bacterial vat in Environmental, and despite the happy pills Medical was handing out it’s not quite gone yet. Mainly I’m wondering how things stand back home in Capria and Tracto,” clarified the old Engineer after a long ramble.
“Tracto still stands,” Akantha breathed a sigh of relief as she relayed the results. Then she frowned icily, “At least as of last report. The Battle Fleet didn’t even try to hit us.”
She would never say it, but I could see how worried she’d been at the thought of Argos and Messene being attacked again.
“Capria, Hart and a number of less populated worlds, but not Tracto or Gambit,” I said.
“Well we are a mite out of the way, and you know,” Spalding said, taking a bite out of a doughnut and then wiping some crumbs off his shirt and onto the floor, “it’s kind of hard to threaten a man when you’ve already bombed his home and killed his family.”
“You think they left us alone as a threat?” I asked sharply, all the more determined now to evacuate Gambit and relocate our secret rebel base to an entirely new location. Tracto was definitely in more of a pickle.
It was all well and good to make like a guerrilla fighter and hang out in the blackness of space around an uncharted star while you rebuilt, but what about the people that didn’t evacuate with you? The men and women who stayed behind… I doubted Akantha’s mom Sapphira would just up and leave, either with or without her people, for instance.
“You don’t?” Spalding asked with surprise. “Because whether or not the blighters intended it that way to begin with, it's sure looking that way now. We’ve got a place we have to defend and they’ve got us heavily outnumbered.”
I drummed my fingers on the table. “You’re right,” I said.
“We lost a lot of our system defense infrastructure putting the period on the end of Senator Cornwallis’s invasion, Sir. The factories are working round the clock to replace it all, but these things take time and beyond a certain point it’s a case of diminishing returns that also cut directly into local consumption,” advised Commodore Laurent.
“We’re just going to have to do the best we can and hope Tracto wasn’t too busy building grav-carts, hover cars and luxury goods to get its defenses back up while we were out here fighting for its survival,” I said.
“I think my people are too sensible to do something like that,” Akantha warned.
I shot her a consoling look.
“It’s not Tracto-ans I’m worried about. It’s the Belters and Caprian transplants. We’re not used to being on a war footing,” I said.
The MSP officers around the table gave me odd looks.
“What is it?” I asked.
“I don’t think you’re giving our people back home enough credit,” said Chief Lesner, breaking the silence.
“The Chief Gunner’s right,” said Laurent and Druid nodded in agreement, “I’m not a native of your home world, Sir, but I tend to agree with my colleagues. No one’s just been sitting around twiddling their thumbs in peace since the Imperial Withdrawal. Life hasn’t been easy, but from my experience your civilians seem to have their heads screwed on straight.”
I pursed my lips. Maybe they were right. I just knew that every time I started to rely on someone they eventually disappointed me. At least they did if they were outside this fleet—and the goings on inside this fleet was no sunshine and lollipops.
“Well, be that as it may, we’ll know the state of play at Tracto inside of,” I looked down at my wrist, “eighteen hours. That gives us time to put a few things in motion before getting a good night’s sleep,” I said with a grim smile.
“What are you cooking up in that noggin of yours, Admiral?” Spalding snorted, giving me a look.
“The Fleet will be going back to Tracto, but a handful of ships will be staying behind. Mainly Light Cruisers because of their legs and survivability; they’re larger than most system patrol ships and their ability to survive extended deployments unattended by anything resembling a fleet train could prove more useful as a detachment,” I said.
“Are you thinking of some kind of deep strike force?” Commodore Druid asked with concern.
“In a way,” I replied.
Reaching over to my slate, I pulled up a series of files and linked the device to the holo-projector.
“Working at my direction, Lieutenant Commander Steiner and a select team have been working on a little project. I was made to realize that up to this point we have been badly failing on the PR front. It’s not that the things we have done are not commendable but rather that we, or rather I, have allowed the enemy to dictate the narrative,” I said grimly, “This project is a strike in the dark to try and change that. I no longer think that simply by doing good deeds everywhere we go that the people of the Spine will begin to appreciate us for our good works. Which is why we have a plan to get out in front of it,” as soon as I was done speaking, the first episode in the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet documentary began to play.
It started with still shots of a few of our most famous and deadly looking ships, before switching over to quick personal interviews with the crew. Then a holo-projection of our most recent campaign began to play, starting with a system overview of the Empire’s invasion of the Spine before zooming into the opening confrontations.
Druid looked appalled.
“You intend to release classified information to the public? How much of the actual battle has been redacted? If the enemy gets their hands on our sensor footage they can back into our actual capabilities and blind spots. Not to mention releasing something like this is highly illegal!” said the Commodore.
“It would be illegal if we weren’t an allied power,” I said calmly.
“Maybe our latest battles don’t fall under any sort of classification or top secret level clearance, considering as how you or the Lady could declassify anything we’ve done in the name of Gambit or Tracto,” Laurent allowed, “anything before that…”
“We’ve always acted in good faith, but the New Confederation spread rumors and lies about this fleet. They ultimately betrayed us to our enemies, while as far as I’m aware the Old Confederation never once acknowledged we were part of their fleet in the entire five years since the Imperial withdrawal,” I said.
There was a tense silence.
“I didn’t know you felt that way,” said Commodore Druid before adding a, “Sir.”
“Because I didn’t until recently,” I said flatly.
“Sunlight is the best disinfectant,” Spalding opined, “so long as you don’t get burned. The government doesn’t like whistleblowers,” he finished with a warning, “been known to put a few of those blokes in prison and throw away the key. Why, I’ve heard of floating dungeon ships that flitter from one uninhabited star system to the next and no one not even the crew of the ship, much less the prisoners, knows where they are or where they’re going.”
“That’s a risk I’m willing to run considering, several of the alternatives appear a lot worse. It’s time to cut throu
gh the lies and go directly to the people,” I said.
“You’re the Admiral,” said Laurent.
“You’re the fleet commander,” Druid muttered.
“The New Confederation wants to throw us under the hover-bus as its final act before dissolving the Assembly? We’re going to flood the waves with news that the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet has just finished liberating Sector 26 and call for governmental support in liberating 27 as well,” I said coldly. “I’ll admit I was hesitant before because it’s not exactly a winning hand, but after consulting with Akantha and my Chief of Staff, and now all of you, I think it’s the best play at waking up the populace,” I added. “After all of the sacrifices the spacers of the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet have made for the people of the Spine, it’s important they know what we’ve done for them and for us to know where they stand.”
“Where the people stand?” Druid’s brows shot up. “I hope you’re not implying that they should be held accountable for the actions of a few politicians with guns to their heads—with guns to the head of everyone in the Spine, for that matter.”
“I don’t blame anyone for someone else’s actions. Unless they endorsed it knowing full well what they were doing, and even then I’m not like some dictator or king of old,” I said.
“That’s a relief to hear, Sir,” Laurent said cautiously, “it doesn’t take a genius to understand we’ve been left out in the proverbial cold as of right now. Not to mention the way the Assembly and people of Central mistreated you and your wife.”
“For all of our spacers from Capria, let me make a few thing clear: I am not going to go on some pogrom because my feelings were hurt and we were left to die at the hands of the Empire. The people of the Spine are free to do whatever they want,” I said flatly. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to fight tooth and nail to get the truth out there and hope for the better nature of men to shine through gaining us a ground swell of support right when we need it. What it does mean is that I’m not about to lay down and die just because it’s convenient. Jason Montagne and the MSP lay down and die for no one,” I said.