by Jay Allan
“Not until everyone is aboard. You all came to get me, and I’ll be damned if we’re leaving anyone behind.” He knew it was foolish, at least in terms of overall danger assessment. The Hegemony was coming, and it brought the threat of death on a mass scale with it. He had to get away. He had to find a way to get the word out, to prepare the Confederation for what was coming. But none of that moved him…not until the last of the Marines had raced aboard, and he and Rogan stood alone, looking out over the tarmac at another column of assault vehicles racing into the spaceport.
He turned and grabbed onto Rogan’s arm, even as the Marine was holding onto him, and the two men raced up the ramp, onto Pegasus…and a chance of escape.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Grimaldi Base
Krakus System
Year 316 AC
“Sir…we have a ship emerging from the Wrangor transit point. It’s not on any schedule.” The officer’s voice carried only the slightest hint of concern. A military installation as important as Grimaldi Base never ignored any possible risk, but a single ship emerging from a transit point that led deeper into the Confederation, and away from any enemy, was unlikely to be a danger. Still, regulations were clear on the standard procedure.
“Order Force Beta to intercept. Send out a communique. Instruct the vessel to identify itself and power down to await inspection.” Admiral Clint Winters sat in the center of the base’s enormous control room. He’d inherited the command when Admiral Striker had returned to Megara after the war to assume his position as supreme naval commander. The sector Grimaldi guarded, which had seen so much fighting, had become quiet. So quiet, even, that Winters had found it almost nerve-wracking after six years of bloody war.
Grimaldi was enormous, the greatest construct in the Confederation, and by extension, the entire Rim…rivalled only by Megara’s massive Prime Base. The Confederation and the Union had faced each other as enemies for nearly a century, fighting four all-out wars and engaging in more than a few skirmishes and border disputes between those formal conflicts. Grimaldi was the nerve center of operations on the hostile border.
But that great headquarters was silent now, the huge fleets that had once surrounded it mostly gone, their ships decommissioned or sent to peacetime stations throughout the Confederation. The fighting had ceased—as had the dying, much to Winters’s relief—and he was left with nothing more important to do than argue with supply officers who shorted his logistics requests, and to deal with the occasional foul-up in communications and manifests. With the continuing peace, it looked as though things would stay that way for a long while. By all accounts, the Union was in dire shape, in no condition to lash out at the Confederation again. Not for some time.
“Yes, sir.” The communications officer relayed the orders, and a moment later he turned back toward Winters and advised the admiral that the force commander had acknowledged.
The admiral looked at the display, watching as a small symbol appeared right next to the transit point. It wasn’t the first unexpected ship that had come to Grimaldi, though such incidents were far from common occurrences. Operations and protocols around the base had relaxed somewhat with the coming of peace, but they remained the tightest in the Confederation, mostly because everyone involved understood the strategic importance of the base and system.
And they all knew Winters would tolerate only so much before the admiral, who was widely referred to as “the Sledgehammer” would come down hard on those responsible for any shirking of duty or sloppiness in operations.
Winters watched as the ships of Force Beta moved to intercept the newly arrived vessel…just in case. He looked at the display, thinking that “Force Beta” was a bit too grand a name for a light cruiser and two patrol ships. But the naval forces stationed at Grimaldi were a fraction of what had been there during the war, and the three battleships assigned to duty there were docked, in a partially inactive status.
He glanced back at his screen as scanner data began to flood in. Force Beta was more than enough to handle the new arrival in the unlikely event it had come to cause trouble. The ship was small, even tinier than the patrol ships in Beta.
What little worry Winters had diminished even further when the readings of the ship’s beacon came in. She was a Confederation light corvette, barely larger than a scoutship. Then, the name appeared on his screen.
Travers.
Winters had assumed the ship was carrying some officer or dignitary, perhaps even a Senator looking to get press by touring the great base…now that it was completely safe. It wouldn’t be the first time a communique with the scheduling of a trip like that had gone awry.
But something about the ship’s name troubled him.
He was about to ask his AI to look it up when it came to him
Travers had been assigned to the White Fleet.
Winters’s edginess returned, because he had no idea how or why the vessel was at Grimaldi when it should have been dozens of jumps away, with Tyler Barron and the exploration fleet.
“Confirm ID, Commander.” Winters’s tone was more serious than it had been before.
“Beacon confirmed, Admiral. The vessel is identifying itself as Travers.” A short pause. “Mass readings and basic shape and size all match the warbook entries for the vessel, sir.”
Winters nodded. “Advise Force Beta to…”
The admiral was interrupted by the sound of the comm system. A second later, the officer said, “Incoming message, Admiral.” A moment later: “Sir, it’s in Code Sigma-9…designated for your ears only.”
Winters was really on edge now. Sigma-9 was a wartime code, and any message using it now was unlikely to contain good news. He stood up, an abrupt move driven partially by the stress building up inside him. “I’ll take it in my office, Commander.”
He walked across the control room toward the small hallway that led to his private office, the very room from which Van Striker had directed the latter stages of the war. His pace was normal at first, but as he moved out of sight of the control room staff, it quickened. Something was wrong, he was almost sure of that. And the sooner he knew what it was, the better.
He slipped inside the office and sat behind the desk, tapping the comm unit as he did. “On my line, Commander.” He was alone in the room, but he scooped up the headset anyway and pulled it on.
“Yes, sir. Coming through now.”
Winters sat at his desk, motionless, listening to the message, and his tension grew with every word. The vessel was indeed Travers, and it had set out the previous year with the White Fleet. The recorded message sent to Winters was from none other than Tyler Barron himself.
Barron’s words were grim, and as he listened, Winters’ confusion about the presence of the patrol ship turned slowly to clarity. Travers had returned, with a small number of other vessels, including Dauntless. They had come to warn the Confederation of the White Fleet’s discovery…not a cache of old tech or detailed histories of the old empire, but instead other survivors of the Cataclysm—likely billions of them—spread across an interstellar polity that was, by all indications, truly vast in scope.
A nation called the Hegemony, and led by an elite utterly convinced of their own genetic superiority, and their natural right to rule over all others. A new enemy, more advanced and far more dangerous than the Union or any of the other Rim nations.
Winters might have found the whole thing difficult to believe, had it not been Barron himself on the message. He knew the famous admiral well, and the two had fought together during much of the war. He took Tyler Barron’s word as indisputable truth.
He sat for a long while after the message finished, trying to truly understand what he’d been told, and the implications of it all. The war had ended two years before, and for all he tried to maintain a constant sense of readiness, no one had expected any chance of new hostilities, not for a decade or more. The Union was, by all accounts, in a desperate state. With the Alliance an ally, there was no other power on the
Rim strong enough to threaten the Confederation. And, until a few moments earlier, Winters had been sure all the humans left alive in the galaxy were on the Rim.
He had to act…immediately. That meant he had to tell his people what was happening. Barron had advised that the enemy was likely to hit Dannith first if and when they reached Confederation space, and he’d requested that Winters do whatever he could to support the defense of the frontier world.
Now, he looked down at his desk and wondered just what he could do. He did have ships stationed at Grimaldi, a reasonable fleet by peacetime patrol standards…but not what he’d want to lead against a new enemy so deadly they could send Tyler Barron racing back to the Confederation to shout out the warning.
But there was no choice. The once imposing fleet that had won the war was scattered all across the Confederation. Grimaldi had the single largest concentration of military strength, but it would take months to gather a true battle fleet. With any luck, there would be time…but Barron had been clear that he had no idea how long it would be before enemy forces struck.
Winters leaned back and sighed. He was tired…he’d been about to go off duty when Travers transited into the system. But rest was nowhere on the horizon for him, not now. First, he had to send out his own alerts to every major naval base in the Confederation. Barron had said he was en route to Megara to warn Admiral Striker and the Senate. Winters didn’t know what other messages Barron had been able to send, and he wasn’t going to take any chances.
He reached down to the comm unit, setting it to his aide’s comm line. “Liane, I need you in my office…immediately.” He’d just sent his aide off duty, no more than an hour before. He felt bad about calling her back, but this was the first real emergency any of them had faced since the end of the war.
“On my way, Admiral.” She was clearly trying to hide the grogginess in her voice, and she came close to success, but not quite close enough. At least not to escape Winters’s fine perception.
“Very well, Commander…and I’m sorry to wake you, but it’s important.” He closed the line, relieving her of the need to deny that he’d disturbed her sleep.
He looked down at his desk, trying to decide where to start. He had communiques to send, orders to issue…a fleet to organize. He’d already decided he would assemble the strongest fleet he could from the ships posted to the station. And he would lead it to Dannith himself, setting up the best defense he could until reinforcements arrived.
He was focused, hard edged, grim…and shaken. Deeply.
The reality of what he’d been told was still setting in, and as it did, the darkness enveloping him became denser. Barron had sounded almost unnerved in his message. And anything that could shake up Tyler Barron was enough to make Winters’s stomach do flops.
Chapter Thirty-Three
CFS Dauntless
High Orbit
Troyus City, Planet Megara, Olyus III
Year 316 AC
“Fire!” Atara put everything she had into holding her voice steady, banishing the fear, the regret, the trepidation from her tone as she uttered the single word. Ordering Dauntless to fire on a fellow Confederation ship was the hardest thing she’d ever had to do, and despite the intense effort she’d put into targeting the shot where it would have the smallest impact on Stafford’s crew—while still crippling the smaller vessel—she’d barely managed to actually issue the command.
Now she would see if her people obeyed it.
She listened as Cumberland repeated the command. At least the tactical officer was with her. That was a good sign…either it was an indication that the crew would indeed trust her enough to side with her on this, or at the very least, a sign that she wouldn’t have to face the resulting mutiny alone.
She pushed aside the failed gallows humor and looked straight ahead, trying not to let herself look around to gauge the expressions of the faces all around her, the cold stares she could almost feel burning into her back. Her people didn’t need to see her looking uncertain, not now.
She waited as the seconds passed. Dauntless’s gunnery teams were the fleet’s best, and their response times were normally almost undetectable. Now, as she counted five seconds, and then six, she felt her hopes fading away. They weren’t going to obey. She felt a flush of anger, but it quickly faded. She wasn’t even sure they should obey, or that she would in their shoes.
Then she heard something, or she thought she did. Dauntless’s great broadsides were usually clearly audible on the bridge, the combined force of so many guns firing reaching the control center in the form of a high-pitched whine. But with a single gun…she wasn’t sure if she’d heard the shot, or if she’d just imagined it.
Not until the display updated…and the damage assessment flowed onto her workstation screen. Dauntless’s gun had fired, and it had hit…just where she’d plotted. Stafford’s engines had been targeted, and as she watched, she saw the vessel’s power output dropping. She’d been hesitant to totally destroy the ship’s thrust capability, but the vessel was in high enough orbit to offset degradation with just its small positioning jets. If she’d targeted any farther forward, the hit would have impacted more of Stafford’s crew. She would have killed more Confederation comrades than necessary. As it was, she hoped she’d avoided inflicting any serious casualties, though she suspected that was mostly wishful thinking.
She’d delayed taking action for as long as she could, but she’d pushed things as far as they would go. She’d cut the jamming as planned, and almost immediately picked up Pegasus coming up from the surface. Andi’s ship had just lifted off, which meant they were behind schedule. And she’d delayed Stafford with words as long as she could.
“Commander, get me a line to Pegasus, now!”
“Yes, Captain…done.”
“Andi…this is Atara. You’ve got to give it everything that ship of yours has…because the shit is about to hit it good up here.”
With the jamming down, she could only imagine the communications flying back and forth, the confusion, the desperate calls to superior officers, asking what to do.
Requesting permission to fire on Dauntless.
“Sorry we’re late…couldn’t be helped. I’m pouring everything she’s got into the engines now. Give us six minutes.”
Atara knew that was fast, and she couldn’t imagine what Andi was doing to her ship to reach high orbit so quickly. But she wasn’t sure she could hold Dauntless in place that long…not without things escalating, without having to fire on more Confederation ships.
And if the orbital fortresses with arcs on Dauntless opened up…
“Commander, I want scanners at full power. And launch a spread of drones. If anything’s heading toward us, or if those forts are powering up their weapons grids, I want to know.”
“Yes, Captain.”
Atara was falling into her old routines from years of almost non-stop battle. But it was different this time. All she wanted was time for Pegasus to reach orbit and dock, and then to get the hell away from Megara without having to fight anyone else.
She knew they’d all have to come back eventually, that they couldn’t abandon the Confederation’s capital to whatever was happening there. But they needed time, to regroup…and to rally as much of the fleet as possible.
Atara was analytical. She tended to look forward, tearing things apart, figuring where they might go. But she tried to push that aside now, to ignore the impulses…because they told her something she didn’t want to see, didn’t even want to imagine. She’d fought in the Alliance Civil War, seen the Palatians killing each other, brother against brother, father against son. And now she feared she would see the same thing far closer to home.
The Confederation looked very much like it was sliding into its own civil war…and right when the Hegemony was likely searching for a route to the Rim and massing its fleets for invasion. It would be a catastrophe of epic proportions, and it had to be averted, whatever it took.
Getting Tyler and Gary
Holsten on board was the first step. They were both massively influential, each in his own way—Holsten quietly, along backchannels, and Barron as the grandson of the Confederation’s greatest hero, and a celebrated warrior in his own right. It would be far harder for whoever was behind the plot clearly underway to discredit Barron while he was out, able to speak for himself and defend against the clearly bogus accusations instead of held in a cell and kept silent.
That meant holding where she was—for five minutes now—whatever came at her.
Whatever she had to do.
* * *
“Oh my God…” Andi stared at the screen, stunned at what she saw. Dauntless was drifting along in orbit, surrounded by smaller ships…all of them firing at the battleship. As far as she could see, the battleship wasn’t shooting back. She understood Travis’s reluctance to open fire on Confederation vessels, but even a heavily armored ship like Dauntless could only endure so much fire. It was a break that nothing larger than small patrol vessels had arrived yet. The small guns of the escorts had a hard time penetrating Dauntless’s defenses, even at the short range of the orbital combat. But there was a cruiser approaching, too, and while no match for the great capital ship, its guns were a lot heavier than those of the smaller escorts. Even as Andi watched, she saw one of its turrets open fire and score a hit…and there was no doubt that one inflicted damage.
“There’s no way we’re going to make it through that, Andi.” It was Vig, sitting at his station next to hers. “Even one of those small patrol ships would blast us to atoms.”
“There’s nowhere else to go, Vig…unless you want to surrender. It’s straight through the maelstrom, or nowhere at all.” She knew she was talking big, but she was also aware that Vig was right. Pegasus didn’t have one chance in a hundred of reaching Dauntless, not with those warships out there.
