In such a system a king was impractical and unwanted, but the American people and even the world had owed this savior a debt and the title of King of American would be granted to the self-deposed monarch by Constitutional Amendment.
Life on Earth had after twenty years of suffering slowly returned to normal only to once more be thrown into upheaval by invasion from outer space. The Voroosh or Reds as they would be called due to their reddish scales, had stolen interstellar drives and advanced weapons from the diminutive Kazad race who they had made their slaves. They had quickly defeated the disorganized military forces of the Earth and had enslaved the human world.
Once more the King of America and his family would resist such slavery and would lead a rebellion against these new foes. In a few short years Earth’s soldiers led by the King’s eldest son, who was often called “the Black Prince” would defeat the Voroosh.
Their defeat was in part due to the aid of Kazad, who had genetically altered many captured human soldiers making them stronger and faster than anything people had seen before. These supermen or altered had led a revolt on a Vorooshin slave world, fighting their way out of the gladiatorial death games and escaping by stealing a starship. With the aid of the Kazad they then had managed to capture a newly made Kazad battle cruiser called the Black Star. With this powerful ship they had defeated the Vorooshin ships and finally liberated Earth.
The grateful people of Earth bestowed the title of Emperor on the reluctant King of America and with his guidance they had set up a world government based on democracy. The threat from space had made the people set aside many of their differences to finally unite. Once the democratic system of the Confederation had reached a level of maturity and stability the Emperor had again stepped down turning power over to an elected Prime Minister and the Confederation Senate.
In saddened outrage the people of Earth and many governmental leaders, who were fearful of tyranny, insisted that he retain emergency wartime powers and a legislative veto - one that he had since never used.
As Earth settled into peace they also prepared for war. The Emperor quoting George Washington insisted that taxes be used to create a larger space defense fleet. This continued the already blustering space industry, which the emperor’s family had the lion’s share of control and profits from.
For the next fifty years the colonization of new worlds had become a boom industry with every nation, corporation and religious group quickly becoming involved. Everyone was either buying or hiring ships to explore space in search of profitable and inhabitable worlds. Such a fleet as what the emperor had proposed was a necessity, but only half the number of warships were actually constructed. Most had been built and financed by the Emperor’s own company, the Ameri-Corporation.
These ships were in Earth’s service, but were technically still owned by the King of America. Many corporations, nations and even religious groups had also financed the building of starships to protect their various interests. Still, when trouble came they were outnumbered at least four to one.
Luckily, humans were ever improving their technology and after thousands of years of warfare they had well developed ideas of weapons and military tactics.
The matriarchal Karduan society had been slaves to the Voroosh for over a hundred years. The once passive and culturally religious people had been transformed into competing matriarchal houses, each trying to please their reptile masters usually at the expense of their fellow Blues.
Once the Reds had been defeated and removed to their home world, the Kazad’s urged the Karduans, who were now left in charge of this vast empire of worlds, to rebuild their shattered society. After a hundred years of slavery, death games and inter-house fighting the once united and peaceful Karduan people easily fell into civil war.
Their almost fifty years of fighting had been based on the Vorooshin sword system, “The Patar” a narrow thrust and cut blade. When the Karduans had finally ended their bloody civil war they proceeded to explore and expand their new empire of star systems. Probing and destroying Earth’s deep outposts gave them a feel for their next enemy … mankind.
The Karduans had had an overwhelming number of ships, but they had never faced an enemy with thousands of years of battle experience and a long history of warfare. Earth’s fleets had been numerically smaller, but it had several important factors that had turned back the larger Karduan Armada.
The Emperor’s fleet had possessed fighters, missiles and nukes, all of which the Kardies were unfamiliar with and unprepared for. In their earlier encounters they had attacked and defeated lightly armed merchant ships and had been expecting a much easier conquest.
The Karduans were also still basing most of their technologies on Vorooshin or stolen Kazad science. They hadn’t the history of either conflict or past scientific progression to draw on. The largest Earth ships had gigantic particle cannons built into their vast super structures.
These powerful weapons could render a ship in two with a single shot. But now the enemy’s largest ships were being made with spinal cannons as well as taking maser systems from human ships that had been captured or salvaged from battle.
Now some thing more was needed, a new weapon or perhaps an old one that had been lost?
Chapter Nine
“Lt. Stanton, get your tanks, your men and gather up anything and everything that we could possibly use. Ensign Steven wipe the computer systems and then you and Mister Jansen will pull out that maser system. Then go to the main bridge and either destroy or remove the one there,” Mike Collins ordered as his tired men continued to grin at him before they leaped into action.
“What about me boss?” Thornton asked.
“Get down to engineering, tell them to shut everything down and lock out all remaining systems but leave the fusion drive and thruster controls online.”
His men quickly got about their tasks while he worked to hide his battered ship and save his first real command. He set a course for the Randori to take her out of the system on her barely functional fusion drive, thrusters and good old momentum. Mike knew she was too bad off to repair and it was a “Cappillo Miracle” that she hadn’t already blown up. He also didn’t want her found by the enemy. It would take the Q-ship at least a month or more on limited fusion drive, thrusters and inertia to get to the edge of the solar system and into deep space. Once out of the system no one would find her except him, that is if they ever got a chance to salvage her.
As Mike worked to secure his broken ship his comm. link went off.
“Lt. Collins, we’ve reached the Cody and there are seven survivors,” Gunny Masters reported. Both of them knew what that meant as the Cody had a crew complement of twenty.
“What about Commander Hutton?”
“He is alive but he has lost both of his legs,” The old NCO reported with a heavy heart.
“Is he stable?” Mike asked hoping that his former teacher and fellow warrior would survive.
“His personal medical kit’s computer kicked in when it detected his injuries and pumped him full of pain killers and Heal-X Three.”
“All right, get them and anything that we can use and head over to the carrier,” Collins said and added, “I’ll bring the men that I have here on the Mover and we’ll take control of her. Any Karduan prisoners will be taken to the Blue freighter which we will be calling the San Quinten.”
Masters grinned, “I like the name.”
“Right, I see you on the Nathaniel Green,” Mike replied as he cut off the signal and got back to work.
Two hours later found Lt. Collins and his remaining men crammed into the Mover. He would have sworn that the cargo shuttle was bigger but his crew had done a great job grabbing everything they could. Missiles, small arms, food, repair robots and droids as well as other supplies were all crammed on board.
Their dead had been collected and bagged. They had already been taken over to the San Quinten and would be given proper funeral after they were safe.
Lt. Stanton a
nd his marines were going to fly their grav tanks over to the carrier after she came into a closer range. The damaged tanks along with any damaged star fighters and any wreckage of fighters would be recovered at a later time - that is if they had time.
Things were going well and the small crew of the Raven turned out to be a big help once they got started. They added their ship’s shuttle to the mission of transporting goods off the Randori, collecting life pods and Karduan prisoners. They had a computerized medical station and auto surgical unit onboard as well as a young doctor. Many of their worst wounded were taken to Raven for treatment and evaluation including a protesting Cmdr. Hutton. The good commander was arguing that he could still help even without legs and said to just put him in a chair at a bridge station.
Leaving the Randori was hard for the young officer. It was his first real and solo command but the old girl was just too badly damaged to repair quickly or even escape with. Pulling away in the cargo shuttle he made them stop and turn back so he could get a good look at the damage.
The Q-ship only had three remaining turrets and surprisingly one of them was the permanent fixed turret mounted top side. The fighter bay’s entry port on E-deck was crushed. She had lost her her starboards bender and maneuver drive cores, her port bender drive looked like it took repeated energy weapon and missile hits. Her bow was blunted and looked like an old boxer’s nose. Every thing between her stern and aft had blast marks and hull ruptures so much so that she reminded him of a piece of Swiss cheese. All of her structural reinforcements and internal armoring had worked and she had weathered the fight but at a cost.
“She was a good ship, Mike,” Rufo said standing behind him as they looked out from the pilot’s station.
“Yeah, I don’t like leaving her but we don’t have much choice,” he replied rubbing the stubble of his face with his hand before taking the controls and piloting the shuttle away.
Turning the shuttle back on course he headed for the carrier as eight LN-28 Wasp fighters joined him four to each side. The Shaker was just landing in the carrier main bay when the Mover came in behind her. The armored shuttle’s turret rotated in a 360-degree circle looking for targets or Blue ladies that wanted to continue to resist but only found human and Karduan males waiting for them.
There were thirteen human crewmen standing on the flight deck along with seven Karduan males. All of them were in space suits and each had some kind of weapon held in their hands. Most of the humans had heavy tools and one even had a narrow looking white sword. The Blue males all had gauss rifles which were slung behind their backs.
Despite this the Shaker’s turret suddenly stopped rotating and targeted them. Several of the nearby humans waved their hands signaling for them not to fire and some of them stepped in front of their Karduan compatriots to protect them with their bodies.
“Confederation armored shuttle hold your fire, I say again do not fire! These Blues are our friends!” a desperate voice said across the comm. link.
“Roger that,” Gunny Masters called back and ordered the turret rotated in another direction.
The Mover and Shaker shuttles both dropped their rear ramps at almost the same time. Marines and Werewolf Commandos quickly exited the crafts with both groups armed to the teeth and looking for a fight.
Mike and his command staff followed his shuttle's group as they spread out to move in a more tactical wedge formation.
Walking past them he headed right for the man holding the long white sword.
“I’m Lt. Michael Collins, former captain of the Imperial Q-ship Randori,” he said introducing himself and then asked, “Who is in charge?”
“Sir, I’m the only officer, Ensign Daniel Binkley of the New Briton Defense Force,” he said snapping to attention and saluting like an English officer with his palm out, all the while he juggled the sword with his other hand.
Mike returned his salute and then offered him his hand but the young ensign mistook his gesture and handed him the sword. He took the sword and transferred it to his left hand and again offered his right hand to shake.
“Sorry sir,” the Ensign said taking his hand as his clipped English accent reminding him of his friend Alistair.
“Where are the Karduans and how many men do you have?” Mike asked now that the pleasantries were over.
“We have them locked in the brig and two of my men are on guard but we only have hand tools to fight with,” he said “Oh and I have a total of fifteen men and seven Karduans who want to join us.”
Mike nodded and called over Chac-Ras and Cappillo.
“We have Blue males already fighting with us,” Mike explained “Specialist Chac-Ras will speak with your Karduans but they need to be disarmed until we are sure they are on our side.”
“Sir, I can give you my word that they are our friends,” he said sounding rather defiant.
Collins paused and looked at him for a minute. He then switched the white sword which he now recognized as a Vorooshin Patar to his right hand. The blade was white, narrow and light. It had a cuff that extended over the user’s wrist which he thought would limit your movements but protected your arm. It was also very light and he suddenly realized that it was probably made of Kazad trititanium. These swords were sharp, nearly indestructible and very sought after.
“Ensign, I’m sure your word is good but I do not really know you or your friends yet,” the senior lieutenant said as a matter of fact. “So, until we are sure of your Karduans they will be disarmed. Is that clear?”
“Aye Sir, but under protest,” he said in defiance.
“Noted,” he quickly replied and asked, “Now where did you get this sword?”
“From the Ship Mistress, sir. She had it in her quarters and I found it while I was searching them for the collar release codes,” Binkley explained “I needed a weapon and the sword seemed a good choice but you deserve it, sir. We’d still be prisoners and slaves if you hadn’t beaten all of those ships.
“You saw that?”
“Yes sir, I was on bridge during the battle.”
Mike nodded and looked away from the young ensign and his men.
“Gunny, secure the prisoners and start a ship wide search for explosives and any tampering. Take some of the Green Machine’s men with you as guides.”
“Aye sir, we’ll give her the once over twice,” Masters answered walking past them to speak to the enlisted crewmen standing further back.
Turning back, he looked to the young officer and the two men standing behind him.
“We need to get this ship ready to receive fighters, repaired and under way in the next six hours,” Mike informed and glanced to Rufo by his side. “This is Lt. Cappillo, my engineering officer. If you have an engineer or any engineer’s mates, please have them lend him a hand.”
“Yes sir,” he replied and turned away and called out, “Fraser!”
An older bearded man hurried over.
“Aye sir,” he said a deep Scottish accent clearly being heard by all.
“This is Chief Petty Officer Robert Fraser,” he introduced, “He is my ranking engineer.”
“Good! Rufo get your team down to engineering, assess the damage and the time it will take to make repairs. Also get those slave collars off of our new friends.”
“You got it boss,” Cappillo said with a big grin as he walked away waving for the Scot to follow him.
Mike could have sworn he heard his Italian engineer ask the CPO if he liked whiskey.
“Ensign, I want you to take me to the bridge but first we need to get these shuttles unloaded and their supplies and ordinance stowed. Do you have a Flight Boss? I have eight Wasp fighters waiting to land,” Lt. Collins said.
“Yes sir, CPO George Remly,” he said signaling with his hand for the other non-commissioned officer to come forward.
Remly was young looking with bright red hair.
“Sir,” he said with a middle class English accent.
“Chief, I have eight Wasps and two shuttles full
of ordinance that we need to stow and or land. My surviving flight crewmen are on the San Quintin and won’t be here to help until we send the shuttles back for them.”
The Chief Petty Officer made a sour face and looked to his ensign as if to say - Sir, do we take orders from him?
Mike saw the look and cut off any further conversation or arguments.
“Let me make this perfectly clear, I’m taking command of this ship. The Nathaniel Green is now a Confederation ship and you are all Confederation servicemen. If you want to refuse to serve or would like to argue with me in any way, I will have you removed from this vessel and transferred to a holding cell on the San Quintin,” he said staring them both down. “Do I make myself perfectly clear?”
“Aye Sir!” they both said at the same time.
“Good! Now Chief get to it!” he ordered being both physically tired as well as tired of wasting time.
CPO Remly did just that and jumped to it calling to some of his milling men to lend a hand with the shuttles’ cargos.
“Ensign Binkley, please show me and my command staff to your bridge,” he said in a lowered voice.
“Yes sir!” the New Briton officer quickly replied and headed towards the airlock.
As he led them through the escort carrier they could see that it had been through a total refit. The interior walls had armor panels added to them and everything seemed new. It had a traditional crew quarters including a wing that was labelled as the “Goat Locker” which was just for the ship’s Chief Petty Officers. The term came from the age of sailing when real goats would live with the chief pretty officers and were used to produce fresh milk for the men and consume the ship’s garbage.
Reaching the central lift, they took it to the bridge where they found that no one was manning the controls.
Mike glanced at the ensign by his side.
“We needed everyone to help with rounding up the Blues,” he quickly explained looking a little embarrassed.
Lt. Thornton pushed past the ensign and hurried over to the helm station.
“She is on auto pilot and is at stations keeping,” he informed sounding relieved.
Wolf's Run: The Chase of War (Star Wolf Sqaudron Book 2) Page 34
