by M. D. Cooper
“Uh…how am I going to keep track of that?” Garth asked.
Heather shrugged. “You’re going to have to devise a system of some sort. I suggest using a computer; I hear they are good at maintaining lists.”
Rika smiled as she rose and examined the scan data that Ona was putting on the main display. She was most interested in the Nietzschean fleet activity around Sepe’s largest gas giant, a planet named ‘Crag’.
Over a hundred warships were in orbit around Crag, while another two hundred were docked, or in the process of docking, at several stations in orbit of Crag’s moons. A trail of another fifty ships were stretched from the nearest jump point to the gas giant, and a few vessels were moving further insystem, toward the single terraformed world that lay just over one AU from the class G star.
“Civvies aren’t too keen on their new friends,” Garth commented, pointing at the thousands of ships that were steering clear of Crag, many of which appeared to be shifting to outsystem vectors.
“Look at all those military ships, though,” Heather said, pointing at the light green indicators on the display. “Looks like Sepe’s military has a thousand ships at their disposal. Maybe more. You’d think they’d just tell the Niets to shove off.”
“Don’t forget,” Alice spoke up for the first time. “This is a vassal state, and who knows what the Niets told them. Probably not that they just had their asses whipped by the ISF and their allies. For all the locals know, these are just a few ships that need refit, and a larger force is right behind them.”
“They might not be able to hold up against these Niets, anyway,” Chief Ona said as she pushed more data onto the main holo. “The Seppies don’t seem to have a lot of firepower. Looks like their space force is set up for police actions.”
“ ‘Seppies’?” Borden asked as he approached the display. “I like that.”
“Point for Ona,” Heather intoned in her best sports announcer’s voice.
Rika agreed with Ona’s assessment on the locals’ fleet strength. “SOP for Nietzschean vassal systems. Don’t let them have anything they could actually use to resist the Niets. Keep them dependent on the empire for protection.”
“The ships on our back are ready to detach, Captain,” Chief Garth announced, emphasizing his use of Heather’s title.
“They’re clear to do so,” Heather replied. “Release all locks.”
Rika felt a sense of relief as the other four ships in Rika’s Fury, a name she secretly liked, released their clamps and eased away from the Fury Lance.
“Idents squawking?” Rika asked.
“Sure are, Colonel,” Ona replied. “So far as anyone listening knows, we’re the Empire’s Glory, and the Republic and Undaunted are using their new names as well. Asora and Capital have activated stealth systems, falling back to ghost us.”
“Very good, Chief,” Rika replied.
Although unlikely, it was possible that some of the Nietzschean ships arriving in the Sepe System may have realized Rika’s five ships had been fighting for the wrong side back in Albany. Rather than run the risk of the enemy spotting their ruse, Rika had adopted the names and idents of five other Nietzschean vessels that had survived the battle intact.
The other four ships were easy to mask, but the Fury Lance had been harder. Most of the dreadnoughts had been destroyed early on, which meant that Rika’s choice had been forcibly narrowed down to Empire’s Glory, or Constantine’s Might. She had ultimately selected the one that was less grating. At least she could pretend that ‘empire’ was referencing some place other than Nietzschea.
“Well, we’re 22 AU out from Crag,” Rika said as she returned to her seat. “Looking at six hours or more before anyone reaches out to us. Get us on a vector for the planet, and we’ll see what they tell us when we get closer.”
Rika nodded as she surveyed the Sepe system. “Good. We’re gonna need all the help we can get to pull this off.”
“We’re being hailed,” Ona said, her tone dry as she glanced back at Rika.
“Seriously?”
Ona pushed the scan data onto the main display. “Looks like a destroyer that just dumped out of the DL. They’re about three light seconds starboard.”
Rika pulled up the hail data, an audio stream. “Huh, someone named Major Reg. He’s asking for Colonel Muenos by name.”
“The Nietzschean captain of this ship?” Alice asked. “Seventy thousand of their ships hit Albany, and we meet up with a survivor who knew this bird’s captain by name?”
Borden shrugged. “Or he just looked it up and isn’t big on formality.”
“Well,” Rika said as she rose once more. “I guess now is as good a time as any to see how well I can play the part of the colonel. Niki?”
Rika nodded, and gestured for Ona to open the stream before she began to speak.
“This is Colonel Muenos of the Empire’s Glory. It’s good to hear from you, Major. Glad you got out of that shit-show in one piece.”
As Rika spoke, the image of a Nietzschean officer appeared before her, a tall man with broad shoulders and a heavy brow.
“You too, Muenos, I thought they took out your engines, but it looks like you got them up and running again.”
“Was a close thing,” Rika replied, glad that they’d taken the time to score the Fury Lance’s port engine cowling before departing the Albany System. “They thought we were disabled, but we managed to run our grav engines whenever we were occluded from the bulk of their force. We managed to drift out of the battlespace, and when we had a good window, we made a run for it. Picked up some stragglers on the way out, too.”
“Ballsy, Colonel, though that’s why you’re conning that ‘nought. You take any of them out before they got you?”
Rika had studied every move the Empire’s Glory had made in the battle near Pyra, and nodded confidently. “Yeah, one before they disabled us, then we took out a Scipian cruiser that tried to pursue us out of the system.”
Reg shook his head in disbelief. “Scipians…Silstrand? Who are we fighting, Muenos? There were hull configurations I didn’t even recognize in that fight—the ones broadcasting ISF and TSF idents. I’ve never seen anything like them.”
Rika nodded. “And those super-carriers they had were not something we were prepared to deal with.”
Major Reg lowered his voice, as though the enemy might be listening. “I spotted a really interesting ship during the battle, the ISS Andromeda. We didn’t have much to do on the flight to Sepe here, so I had my crew spend time running ship profiles through the databases, trying to see what we could learn.”
“Did you figure anything out?” Rika asked, lowering her voice as well, hoping it would keep the major talking.
“Colonel, you’ll never believe it. The profile is a bit different, but there was an ISS Andromeda at that dust-up in Bollam’s World about twenty years back. So I looked up the other ships, and check this out.”
Two ships appeared before Rika. One was the I2, and the other she recognized quite easily—the Intrepid.
Rika worked her face into an incredulous scowl, hoping Niki translated it well to Muenos’s visage. “Major Reg, are you saying that we just fought some sort of alliance headed by those ancient colonists that passed through Bollam’s World?”
“You know what our orders were better than I.” Major Reg shook his head. “But I do know a high-value target was a woman named Admiral Richards. If memory serves, there was a Richards who served as the XO on that colony ship.”
Rika nodded in agreement. “Way too much to be a coincidence. Explains why command sent such a massive fleet to Albany. They must have been expecting a strong response.”
“Colonel, don’t you see what they did? They gambled our lives away. Don’
t you recall how those colonists beat the fleets at Bollam’s World?”
“Colonel, I mean no disrespect to the empire.” Major Reg spoke slowly, appearing to choose his words carefully. “But why would they send us in there to capture Admiral Richards, knowing they had picobombs?”
“Well, on initial deployment there was just one ISF ship, and we used the Septhian and Theban traitors to take it out,” Rika replied, hoping those details were common knowledge. “Our forces weren’t committed until the system was secure.”
“I suppose.” Major Reg didn’t seem convinced.
“What’s your ship’s status, Major,” Rika asked, hoping to change the subject. As much as she was interested in how the Nietzschean rank and file felt about their commanders, the longer they speculated, the more likely she was to get caught up on a missing detail.
“We’re limping in. Lost some crew when one of our bays got hit with beamfire, but we’ve patched things up. I guess we’re all headed for Crag. Feeds say we’re massing there for a burn on the system.”
“That’s the word,” Rika replied, keeping her tone nonchalant. “We’ll have to refit first, though, too many of these ships are a mess.”
“Well, that’s why the plan is to strike their garrisons at Crag and seize the local’s ships. Burn their system with their own craft.”
“Efficiency is its own reward,” Rika replied, citing a common catchphrase in Nietzschea.
“You speak the truth, Colonel Muenos,” Major Reg nodded. “Looks like we have a two-day trip down to Crag. Are you up for a rematch? I’m pretty sure you said you wanted to go double or nothing on our last game.”
“I’d like nothing more, Major, but I have a lot of work to do here. We’re still trying to get our port engine back to optimal efficiency. Once we burn Sepe to ash, and are on our way, I’ll take you up on that offer.”
Major Reg nodded. “I understand. Just looking for a bit of normalcy.”
“Understood, Major. I’d best get back to my duties. Let me know if you need anything.”
“Of course, Colonel. Protea out.”
“Empire’s Glory out.”
Rika turned to her bridge crew, raising her eyebrows.
Niki spoke up first.
Leslie shook her head. “There’s a lot of comm chatter, Rika, but it’s all innocuous. Well, the public stuff is; there’s encrypted comm traffic about the refit and repair at Crag, but nothing about striking the garrisons….”
“Keep scouring for it. Either we’ve missed it, or Major Reg just played me.”
“Why are all the majors we deal with major asshats?” Heather asked. “Seriously, it’s like a major issue.”
“Majorly,” Leslie chuckled.
“I get the feeling that Reg is going to be a major issue,” Rika said with a grin, eliciting a groan from Alice. “OK, I guess punny humor isn’t my thing.”
LEGS
STELLAR DATE: 09.19.8949 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Fury Lance, Approaching Crag
REGION: Sepe System (Independent)
Rika sat in the main galley, wolfing down a plate of bacon provided by the I2’s generous provisioning department, when Leslie and Scarcliff sat opposite her.
“You know,” Scarcliff said as he skewered a slice of bacon with his fork and lifted it for closer examination. “Anyone can build a massive starship, or show up with forty thousand warships and crush the Niets. Whatever. But going into war with bacon? Enough bacon to share? Now that is a civilization.”
Leslie shook her head. “I think you have a skewed view. Think of how many livestock farms the ISF homeworld must have. Place must stiiiiink.”
“I doubt it,” Rika countered. “Not a lot of people live there, it’s probably—oh. You’re kidding.”
Leslie slid a piece of bacon into her mouth, smirking as she chewed slowly.
“You ready for what comes next?” Scarcliff asked Rika.
Rika chuckled softly and shook her head. “No, not even a little bit. Just the thought of putting on a Nietzschean uniform makes my skin crawl. At least we found that hidden comm channel the Niets were using. Without that, we’d be blind to half of what’s going on.”
“Which it can actually do now—our skin crawling, not being blind,” Leslie grinned as she held out her arm and caused the skin to appear to ripple and flow down her arm.
“Wow,” Scarcliff raised an eyebrow. “You’ve been practicing. I can barely get mine to keep a consistent color.”
“You know there are suggestion lockout settings, right?” Rika asked. “Set a config and then lock out changes until you manually clear the lock.”
“Huh,” Scarcliff grunted. “Where?”
“In the defaults and overrides section of the MK99 configuration,” Leslie said around a mouthful of waffle.
“OK,” Scarcliff fixed Rika with a keen-eyed stare. “Subject-matter-changing aside, have you practiced?”
“Practiced what?” Rika asked. “Being a Nietzschean? I don’t think I need to. I just have to be an uptight asshole and act like I own everything around me.”
“Not what I mean,” Scarcliff shook his head. “I’m talking about walking in your girly legs.”
Leslie cocked her head to the side and eyed Scarcliff. “Out of curiosity, what do you guys call your natural-looking legs?”
Scarcliff shrugged. “Manly legs, of course.”
“How come we have ‘girly legs’, and you have ‘manly legs’?” Rika asked, brows raised as she lifted her cup of coffee for a sip.
“Simple,” Scarcliff replied. “It’s all about syllables. ‘Womanly’ legs is three syllables long, but ‘girly’ legs is just two. Path of least resistance. For men, our two-syllable options aren’t as good. ‘Boyly’ legs sounds like we’ve got a skin condition, and ‘guyly’ legs is just dumb.”
“Guess what?” Leslie asked, her expression unreadable.
A look of worry crossed Scarcliff’s face. “Dammit.”
“You got it. We’re all going to call your natural legs ‘guyly’ now.”
Scarcliff shrugged. “There aren’t nearly as many women as men in the company, doubt we’ll even notice.”
Leslie’s tail rose up and tickled Scarcliff’s ear. “Exactly. Mechs are the only place you’re going to see a dearth of women. You sure you want to piss us off with stuff like ‘girly legs’?”
“Cut it out, Leslie,” Scarcliff batted her tail away.
“Hey! Captain! Careful with the good luck charm,” Crunch called out from two tables over.
Scarcliff rolled his eyes and muttered, “How is it that I get up to Captain, and Crunch shows me even less respect?”
“Probably because he got booted up to Sergeant,” Rika said, turning to shoot Crunch a quelling glare, which he pointedly ignored.
“Doesn’t matter about the women, anyway,” Scarcliff added after a moment. “They’re all angling for Shoshin.”
Leslie grinned as she glanced toward where Corporal Shoshin sat silently with his squadmates. The mech’s face still bore no mouth—just two lens-covered eyes that stared impassively at everything around him.
“Can you blame them?” she asked wistfully. “He’s so freakin’ mysterious.”
“Don’t let Barne see you eyeing Shoshin up,” Scarcliff said with a soft chuckle.
“Seriously, Scars? Barne is constantly trying to dig himself out of the shithole for something he did or said. I could sleep with half the
battalion and still come out higher in the balance of right and wrong.”
“You two win the award for the most complicated relationship ever,” Rika said to Leslie before finishing her coffee and rising. “But now you’ve got me all worried, Scarcliff. I’d better practice with my girly legs. I don’t want to fall on my ass when I walk out onto the docks.”
Scarcliff chuckled. “Well, you’d be doing a good impersonation of a Niet, if you did.”
Rika flicked a bacon crumb off her plate at the captain before turning and walking out of the galley, depositing her plate in the ‘cycler on the way.
A few minutes later, Rika was back in her quarters, staring at the natural limbs sitting in their rack. She’d not worn any of them since the first try-on with Finaeus.
It wasn’t that she was actively avoiding them…
OK, I’ve been actively avoiding them. Nothing for it, now.
She placed her gun-arm and mech arm in the rack and disconnected them, shaking them loose from the magnetic catches. Stepping to the left, Rika slid her arms into the natural limbs and let them slot into place before slowly lifting them into the air.
“Shit,” she whispered. “It looks so weird…”
“Did you put him up to all that back in the galley?” Rika asked, giving her head an incredulous shake.
“I never knew you were so manipulative.”
Niki laughed.
“That is not comforting, Niki.”
“By paying off my team to coerce me?”
Niki laughed.
