by John Carr
After another few seconds, Diettinger keyed his own response pad as well. He had forgotten about the Damaris. After receiving the acknowledgment of his signal from Traffic Control, he sat back and looked around the bridge once more. Other than himself, only his first officer, Second Rank Althene Adame, appeared to have recovered from the Jump Lag. She was watching him impassively, and as she turned back to her station, he wondered how long she had been doing so. Looking past her arm, he saw that the cover of her own response pad was opened.
“Ah, well” he said to himself. He began to signal the various command stations to check in.
II
Fomoria eased into orbit with Damaris trailing seventeen miles behind. Several orbiting dry docks were already matching velocities to refuel and rearm both vessels. The warships were receiving priority treatment because they were the only Jump-capable Sauron vessels in the Home System; everything else had been committed to the battle at Tanith.
Ahead of the dry docks, a formation of cargo shuttles were on an intercept course with the Fomoria; Diettinger’s Communications officer identified them:”Medical supply shuttles, First Rank. They are here to offload the borloi seized at Tanith.”
Diettinger had almost forgotten that his original mission at Tanith had been to secure the Imperial planet’s yearly harvest of the powerful narcotic drug borloi; the only known substance potent enough to anesthetize a Sauron for surgery. Well; no doubt we’ll be needing it in the weeks to come...
“Confirm their signal and stabilize orbital velocity. Notify all bays to begin zero-G cargo transfer.”
Communications Rank frowned at a new signal. “Additional signal incoming, First Rank.” He patched the signal through to the panel in Diettinger’s acceleration couch.
“Vessel First Rank Galen Diettinger,” the face on Diettinger’s screen looked familiar, “You are to report for immediate debriefing by Sauron High Command. A shuttle is en route to your projected position; ETA, seventy-four minutes from this mark.”
Diettinger’s staff would not be summoned, since Saurons relied on the ability of commanders to assimilate and assess information from their subordinates before reporting to superiors. In their quest to breed a superior human genotype, the Saurons had thus achieved one small triumph for humanity; they had virtually eliminated bureaucrats.
“Affirm. Action by the Damaris under Vessel First Rank Emory was crucial to the success of our mission; shall I send one of Fomoria’s shuttles to collect her for the debriefing?”
“Negative, Vessel First Rank Diettinger. Separate arrangements have been made for Vessel First Rank Emory. You will proceed immediately to the rendezvous, now seventy-three minutes from this mark.”
The signal was abruptly cut off, and Diettinger realized why the face had looked familiar. Engaged on all fronts, with every battle a struggle for survival, Sauron’s most precious military assets were now her Cyborg Super Soldiers; yet the person speaking to him in the name of the High Command had been a Cyborg.
What the devil are they doing here? he asked himself. And by what authority are they speaking for the High Council?
Fomoria was in the grips of a boarding action, and she was losing. Fully two dozen shuttles were standing off her bows awaiting their turn to dock, while another dozen were already clustered around her gaping bays as teams of Saurons worked furiously to off-load the precious borloi. Seventy minutes had passed since the Cyborg had notified him of his summons to the debriefing, and now Diettinger stood in the airlock of Hangar Bay Four while a borloi-laden cargo shuttle eased away from its moorings. The shuttle banked to starboard and fell away toward the atmosphere below, revealing the cutter which was coming for him on its final approach. The cutter sliced past the cargo shuttle and missed colliding with it by two meters.
“Looks like a fair pilot for you today, First Rank.” Fighter Rank Stahler commented dryly. Today’s duty officer at the hangar, Stahler was an excellent pilot in his own right.
Diettinger consulted his parietal-implant chronometer, as the cutter’s three landing skids touched down simultaneously - it had been exactly seventy-four minutes - and grunted an acknowledgment of Stahler’s appraisal. He didn’t wonder why such a gifted individual wasn’t serving on the line; any Sauron pilot was capable of such simple coordination. It was the accuracy within hundredths of a second that made him uneasy. The moment he entered the cutter, his suspicion was confirmed.
The pilot did not turn to greet him; gray eyes flickered to the mirror mounted over the viewscreen,” Vessel First Rank Galen Diettinger,” the Cyborg declared; it was an identification, not a question or even an acknowledgment.
Diettinger nodded, buckling the acceleration couch seat belt; the cutter was lifting, backing out of the hangar bay even before the hatch had sealed.
“Secure your acceleration straps, Vessel First Rank Diettinger,” the Cyborg instructed him.
Diettinger looked up, his one good eye locking with the mirrored gaze of the pilot. Cyborgs had never before been assigned pilot-duty to carry Sauron-norms; their much greater high-G tolerance made them incompatible with non-Cyborg passengers, to say the least. But Diettinger had not risen so far nor lived so long without a healthy prudence, and he strapped himself in with the high-G restraints. Securely.
They want to talk to me right away, I see. The weight of the acceleration began pressing him into the chair. There can’t have been any news, of the outcome of the battle at Tanith, not yet. Faster-than-light travel had made man an interstellar species, but nothing could transmit his messages faster than he himself could physically carry them. No matter how disastrous such news might be... Diettinger had no doubt that Morgenthau’s refusal to withdraw from Tanith space in the face of overwhelming Imperial naval superiority was even now creating at best a military fiasco; at worst, it was sealing the fate of the Homeworld itself.
They will not like what I have to tell them.
The sensation of his own weight increased; years in space, and in high-G combat, told him they had passed the seven-G point. No human norm had ever remained conscious past ten gravities, no Sauron norm past twelve. Cyborgs nodded off at eighteen. Diettinger had no inclination to prove anything to his pilot; he willingly let himself drift into the void as the cutter passed twelve-point-five-gravities.
It still troubled him greatly that it was a Cyborg who now chauffeured him planetside; his last thought before oblivion was that Cyborg shuttle pilots meant that the High Command was either humbling the Super Soldiers (no bad thing given their already-growing influence over all Sauron policy) or that they had become utterly dependent on them - a very bad thing indeed.
Eleven
Diettinger stood facing the nine members of the Sauron High Command: all of whom appeared to be in good spirits, all of whom were evidently convinced that Diettinger would bring them news of an impending decisive victory in the long war against the Empire; and three of whom - despite years of governmental assurances that they would never be allowed to partake in policy decisions - were Cyborgs.
“Welcome, Vessel First Rank Galen Diettinger,” the First Citizen and head of the High Command greeted him. “Be seated. You are commander of the Sauron Heavy Cruiser Fomoria, which, accompanied by the Sauron Battleship Damaris under the command of Vessel First Rank Mara Emory, returned today from a major engagement in the Empire’s Tanith System.”
“That is correct, First Citizen.”
The First Citizen glanced down at his data screen set into the surface of the table before him. “Your mission at Tanith was to secure for our medical branch several metric tons of the natural narcotic borloi; in this mission you were successful, incidentally capturing an Imperial battle cruiser - the Canada - which was sacrificed in an ensuing engagement to destroy an Imperial Battleship, the Aleksandr Nevsky”
“Yes, First Citizen.” Diettinger had barely completed his report on the engagement and submitted it before his summons; Alderson Jumps were instantaneous, but traveling to and from Jump Points
was an often roundabout process which could take hours, weeks or even months. Fomoria and Damaris had been in combat in the Tanith System less than twelve days ago.
“You spoke with Fleet First Rank Morgenthau upon his arrival with the flag battleship Sauron and the First Fleet; your report indicates that he is currently engaging the last intact full-strength fleet of the Empire at this moment.”
“I cannot claim to know it is the last Imperial fleet of such strength, First Citizen. I can only state that upon leaving Tanith space, the Sauron task force was about to be attacked by over three hundred capital ships of the Empire. I have not seen so large an Imperial force in fifteen years.
The First Citizen broached the ghost of a smile; “Nor are you likely to, ever again,” he said, looking up. He frowned. “What happened to your eye?”
Diettinger relayed that he had lost his left eye to a desperate act of defiance by the human-norm commander of the Canada, Captain William Adderly.
The First Citizen stared at him for a moment, then continued. “Do you know why Fleet First Rank Morgenthau ordered Damans to return to Sauron with you?”
“At the time he gave the order, the Sauron First Fleet of approximately two hundred ships was more than sufficient for the conquest of Tanith; it wasn’t until Fomoria and Damaris were almost at the Jump Point that the Imperial reinforcements began to arrive. Vessel First Rank Emory requested permission for Damaris to rejoin the First Fleet at Tanith, but Fleet First Rank Morgenthau refused to allow her to do so.” Because he is a lunatic and a fool, Diettinger wanted to add, then reconsidered. “I believe he kept the Damaris as an escort for the Fomoria to ensure the borloi made it back here, First Citizen.” De Mortuis, nihil nisi bonum, Diettinger thought.
The First Citizen nodded, reading again from the screen, but Diettinger saw that two of the Cyborgs were speaking quietly to one another, while the third watched him intently.
“Very well, Vessel First Rank Diettinger.” The First Citizen looked up. “Your confirmation of the arrival intact of the Sauron First Fleet at Tanith, as well as that of the Empire’s Home Fleet and the subsequent engagement of those two forces is duly noted. You are hereby promoted to Fleet First Rank; formal notification of same to all stations will follow within twenty-seven hours. Upon their return from Tanith, you will relieve Fleet First Rank Morgenthau and assume command of the First Fleet, after which you will begin re-organization of that force for the invasion of the Imperial capital world of Sparta. This operation will commence no later than - ”
“Excuse me, First Citizen,” Diettinger was leaning forward in his chair, unable to mask his disbelief. “The Imperial Home Fleet - if that’s what it was - now attacking our First Fleet at Tanith consists of over three hundred ships.”
“Yes, we’re aware of that, Diettinger,” the First Citizen’s tone was warning. “Matched against the Sauron First Fleet of two hundred twelve vessels. Our analysis shows that upon suffering forty percent casualties, the Imperials will be forced to break-off combat to maintain a fleet-in-being for the defense of Sparta, while we will have suffered losses between twenty-seven and fifty-four percent. Remaining ships of our First Fleet will be augmented by Sauron vessels now being recalled for that purpose, providing you with a force of approximately one hundred-ninety to two hundred-fifty ships for the final assault on and subsequent invasion of Sparta.”
Diettinger looked from one face to the next; each regarded him with the faintly bemused and ultimately condescending expressions of people who have just heard an adult admit he did not understand that one and one equals two.
“First Citizen. Members of the High Command,” Diettinger said, as he tried to organize his thoughts; he had been prepared for almost anything but this. “I have attempted to make it clear in my report that we have badly misjudged the human norms’ commitment to victory in this war. It is my firm belief that no amount of losses will force the Imperials to break-off from their engagement of our First Fleet at Tanith, that nothing short of the obliteration of our fleet - or theirs - will end that battle, and that given the numerical superiority of the Imperial Home Fleet in that battle, together with the determination of the human norms and the overconfidence of our own commanders, such an obliteration of our First Fleet, is, in fact, inevitable. Most especially if all our commanders are as sure of the effect of Imperial losses as this Council seems to be.”
The First Citizen leaned back in his chair, the mood in the room reflecting his posture of courteous contempt. Having at first embraced him as a commander returning victorious and destined for greater glory, the entire High Command was now withdrawing from Diettinger.
“Fleet First Rank Diettinger,” the First Citizen spoke slowly, almost kindly, “Surely you are aware that until your experience at Tanith, neither human norms nor Saurons have ever pursued victory at such suicidal cost on any large scale during the entire course of this war?”
Diettinger tried to keep the shock from his face.”First Citizen,” he almost stammered, turning to address the High Command officer seated to the First Citizen’s right: “First Soldier; every great general in history has done - must do - exactly that with his troops eventually! And the time for the Imperials to do so is now. At Tanith.”
“We welcome any such effort by the human norms now there to take such action,” one of the Cyborgs interrupted. “Such fatalism will lead them into an action against our fleet at Tanith which, even if victorious, must be regarded by any measure as Pyrrhic.”
“For whom?” Diettinger tried to interject, but was ignored.
Instead, another of the Cyborgs added in the near-identical voice of his crèche: “Such bloodshed suffered by the Empire will promulgate tremendous public outcry in their Parliament against the war, precipitating demands for a negotiated settlement.”
“Which has been acceptable to us all along,” another High Command member concluded. Diettinger recognized him as the High Command’s Socio-Ops expert.”The mere threat of our invasion fleet will force them into a settlement. Immediately after which, in the period of released tensions such a settlement will bring about in the Empire, our invasion fleet will strike at Sparta. The statistical models, which confirm the accuracy of this projection of events, have been verified in over one million computational analyses.”
Diettinger was silent. Their plan was a bad joke; no one, qualified to sit on the High Command, could possibly regard it as even remotely plausible. He would try once more: “First Citizen, officers of the High Command; under no circumstances will the Imperial Fleet allow any significant portion of our First Fleet to escape Tanith. Whatever ships we have available at this moment should be regarded as the only vessels we can rely on having for what will be, in a very short time, a concerted attack by all remaining Imperial forces upon the Sauron Homeworld. I therefore, respectfully, request that the High Command implement immediate fortifications of Sauron System in accordance with expectation of a massive - massive - invasion force.”
The members of the High Command looked at one another briefly, the First Citizen turning back finally to Diettinger with a sadly patronizing expression.”Thank you, Vessel First Rank Diettinger. Your request is noted. You may return to your ship.” He looked down at his screen again, then back up briefly to add: “And have that eye regenerated at once.”
Diettinger left the conference hall in the grip of an overwhelming sense of unreality. As he strode through the corridors of the capitol, his mind worked furiously: the only explanation for the behavior of the High Command was an utter conviction on their part that the war had been planned so perfectly that any impending disaster was but the razor edge of an ultimate victory. Diettinger could not suppress a snort of laughter, and waved back a concerned pair of staffers who turned to stare at him, frown, then go about their business. To even conceive of such a rationalization, he thought, amused, is proof that self-delusion is a contagious disease.
Checking in with Second Rank, Diettinger learned that the off-loading of the borloi from
Fomoria’s holds had been completed, and that the ship was now being moved to space dock for repair and replenishment. Diettinger checked his personal chronometer implant against his ship’s time; barely three hundred hours had elapsed since Fomoria had Jumped from Tanith System, evading the onslaught of the Imperial fleet.
By now, he thought, the fleets at Tanith are engaging one another. The battle is raging, and the fate of Sauron is being decided.
And here he was, charged with composing an invasion force for the conquest of the Imperial capital of Sparta!
Abruptly, Diettinger laughed. Unbidden, his mind had simply shut out the absurdity of his current dilemma, and presented him with a clear course of action.
“Second Rank,” he told her after a pause, “I have matters to attend to planetside; I will be back aboard Fomoria within thirty-six hours. You have the conn until that time.”
Diettinger waited until Second Rank had acknowledged and recorded his off-ship status. He terminated the connection before Second Rank could inquire as to his whereabouts for the next day-and-a-half. It was a minor breach of procedure, but there were people Diettinger had to see, and he did not want to be disturbed while doing so. It had been too long.
Diettinger’s next call was for an appointment with the regeneration therapists. A central hospital staffer told him that their workload was extremely light this week, and he could come in any time to begin regeneration therapy; no appointment was necessary. Given the current political climate evinced by the mood of the High Council - and the presence and influence of Cyborgs being seated on it - Diettinger was not foolish enough to predict the imminent arrival of several hundred thousand casualties from Tanith, and decided it could wait.
Instead he called for immediate air transport to Amberlea, one of the cities on Sauron’s southern continent. Entering his personal codes brought instant accommodation and an assurance that ground transport would be waiting for him outside the capitol’s west gate to deliver him to the flight center.
