Tramp Wars: The Enemy

by Larry Roberts

  The Supreme Admiral had returned the solute then sat back looking at the Captain as the Vice Admiral spoke. He stared at her for several minutes as they took the two seats facing him, then finally spoke. “Four hours ago I thought we were winning the battle for the French system even though the attacks were rapidly increasing and then the damn Frenchy’s lost the Empyreal Communications sat in the system and according to the Vice Admiral and this report; you predicted that act and everything else that has happened over the last 9 months. A report you wrote a year ago.”

  Picking up a tablet sheet laying on his desk he looked at the Vice Admiral. “Thanks to you being a butt. I finally picked up her report after the Comm station went down like you said she had said it would Edwards.” Reading from the reports summation. “The pirates will infiltrate the system with hundreds of innocent looking armed transports. Initiate several pirate attacks around the system luring the defending squadrons into isolated attacks with seaming much success against the pirates but with high casualties until the Galactic Communications station is destroyed. Then large groups of apparently innocent civilian transports between the isolated squadrons far from reinforcements will turn into well-armed pirates that include battleships that decimate the isolated defending squadrons. This will be repeated until the defending forces are weak enough for the pirates to easily take the system for looting. Taking and establishing a permanent base will happen later after the system has had time to finish collapsing and a few surviving refugee ships they allow to escape have spread the word about pirate attacks and looting and not an invasion.” The Admiral shook his head. “I won’t waste time reading all the details that you manage to nail down perfectly since you did wright it.”

  Looking up at the Captain. “And you list a dozen systems across the Outback that you can prove this has happened to already. Though you say it has happened to most of the Outback systems over the last 600 years. You say that the pirate forces are well organized with Battleships camouflaged as transports along with heavily armored and armed transports held back until the Comm station is destroyed so the rest of the universe thinks the incompetent defenders simply let the system fall to a few pirates.” Shaking his head no. “Star Systems have been growing week and falling out of communications and into the void for hundreds of years but now you want to blame some unseen and never before heard of enemy that gathers hundreds of pirates that spend half their time warring amongst themselves, together to cooperate. Only making specific pre-planned attacks while hiding their true numbers following some kind of master plan every time a star system stops transmitting? You sound like some conspiracy nut Captain.”

  The Captain looked over at the seated Admiral. “Yes sir. That is my job. It has taken me years of study to put together the information from refugees and pirate stories printed in articles and letters and news clips and even view tube flashes and E-mails. It turns out pirates love to boast to each other about their exploits. You just have to sift through the crap and pay attention and realize when hundreds of pirates talk about the same facts and stories across a hundred star systems, some truth lies at the bottom of all the talk. Even if it is mostly in alien languages. And yes I understand 34 alien languages. Some better than others. The main one seems to be Galactic 7. An ancient language that believe it or not, is the language of the enemy that took out the Empires manufacturing Core worlds a thousand years ago and plunged a million planets into the Dark ages until they learned to build Starships again.”

  The Admiral pulled out a dish of little round slightly flattened multi colored candies with a couple of little squiggled "M's" on top from a drawer and placed it on his desk then popped a few into his mouth and started talking as he chewed. “I still would have thought your study report was lucky crap Captain until I noticed one of the last reports that came with the mass information dump from the French comm station just before it went silent. It was a report of one of the squadrons chasing a fleeing pirate ship on the fringe of the system that was suddenly attacked by some 50 ships that it had discovered hiding behind a moon. Suffering heavy casualties in the battle against heavily armed ships resembling cruisers and even a couple of battleships. With the surviving ships making it back heavily damaged to the planets defense station just before the Comm went dead. The attacking ships matched the drive signatures of transports that had entered the system days and weeks before as innocent trade transports. Transports that I had listed in my meeting with our Parliament only last week. Telling them of the French Fleets great successes in de-pirating the French State’s Trade Route Transport lanes, using the old destroyers and cruisers we had given them.”

  Slapping the report down onto his desk, the Supreme Admiral of the English Navy shook his head. “Now rereading the reports I realize that most of the incoming transports coming in from the Out Back have appeared in groups as you said. All of them roughly squadron sized. If all the rest of the transports that have entered the system over the last month from the Outback are pirates with battleships, the French are screwed and I am probably out of a job. Now tell me since you are the expert. Are all those transport ships really Pirates?”

  The Captain retorted disgustedly. "It takes years for trade routes to be reestablished and build up to that many transports going through a system. You really thought all you had to do for the French was give them a few combat ships and kill a few pirates and real civilian transports would flood back to their system? Even though no reduction in trade through our system (the only other surviving rout through the dead zone), has been noticed. Nor has there been much of an increase in the ships going through the systems toward the Empire from the French system. At least that have reached the surrounding inhabited stars that have to be passed through to get to the Core worlds. It is obvious that the ones that have gone inward to the next systems but no farther, are picket ships placed to slowdown and worn the pirates if a relief fleet suddenly shows up so they can decide if they want to fight or run and come back another day. Probably depending on how far along the destruction of the French defense fleet and looting has progressed. ”

  Chuckling sickly as she shook her head ‘no’ in disbelief. "Yes Admiral. I am afraid that 98% of the 300 plus transports you have boasted about in the French system to Parliament along with the 200 additional ships just arriving in the system that we know of since, are Pirates with a good 10 percent and possibly 20% captured military ships disguised as transports and the French are screwed. If you bothered to notice, most were staying as far away from the France planet and any authorities as possible making supposed deliveries to moons and asteroid mining and manufacturing stations and habitats. Just a little odd hint any moron should have seen.”

  “Watch your tongue Captain before your disrespect gets you canned.” The Vice Admiral warned.

  Captain Summers smiled sadly. “My apologies Admiral. It is a time honored ploy for Pirates to look like innocent transports only to come alive to attack from hiding and by surprise. Half their crew’s love to brag about surprising destroyers, cruisers and even the occasional battleship before they could do anything to stop them. At least you learned the lesson at the cost of the French. I doubt if they will learn it in time since the records show most systems keep sending their ships after the pirates singly or in squadrons to be slaughtered long after their comm station is knocked out, until they have no ships lift to defend the home planet. But then the ones that do realize it is a mass attack and pull back to defend their home planet only last a few days or even weeks longer at most since they don’t usually have more than a handful of battleships left by then if they had any to begin with since no one needs battleships to fight lowly pirates with only up armed transports. But it does cost the pirates a hell of a lot more time and ships damaged and destroyed. But then they get all that back and more looting the planets. It has happened thousands of times over the last 500 years since one of the Empires first Star Ships produced after the collapse traveled all the way to the enemy’s surviving home system after our
last surviving fleet wiped out every industrial world they had in retaliation 500 years before and gave the enemy the secret of Starflight trying to be magnanimous and show them how we just want to be peace loving friends. Don’t feel bad Admiral. The French aren’t the first and won’t be the last to lose their ships and their planet to stupidity.”

  “Don’t feel bad Captain?” The Supreme Admiral turned red as he started to puff up but took a deep breath shaking his head. “Those French Ships you are righting off so lightly, were English ships and have half English mainline and reserve crews on them. To help train and operate the ships efficiently until the French crews could take over. Not to mention our reserve fleet to clear out the pirates to begin with. As for it being out ancient enemy I am going to need a lot more proof about that. I should demote you for not telling me this before.”

  “Sorry Admiral but I almost got court-martialed trying to warn you against sending them.”

  Jumping up with his big overstuffed chair sliding back into the visible wall of stars as he stared at the Captain obviously fighting his temper. He finally turned around facing the map and started pacing back and forth studying the big holographic map from several different angles. “Even if I launched every ship we have in the system to help them, the fleet would take 3 weeks to loop down this Crossing, across the rim of the void and dust clouds to go back up their Crossing to the French State. Too late to do much more but protect a few surviving systems and keep the planets from being completely looted. That is if they are not wiped out as well with the 5 to one odds against them in the French system itself if the Pirates are as strong as you say they are and still there by then.”

  Shaking his head, the Supreme 5 Star Admiral of the English Empire State could only stare at the French State’s cluster of stars in despair. "I just lost all our reserves and our last Allie in that crossing against a new enemy that outnumbers the Home Fleet 10 to one and now after winning the war in this crossing I have over 50 star systems to protect instead of only 23 and a Parliament determined to reduce our fleet size to fewer ships than we had before the war.”

  Shaking his head as he looked down at his desk. “Now I almost wish we had not won that damn war and acquired so many new systems. Especially with the fleet being cut back to a fraction of the size it was to win that war. It evidentially turns out that it was good for us to have a ruthless buffer state between us and the Pirates in the outback. I read your report about why the Russians were running so many patrols along the outback. Damn them for keeping so many secrets. Heavily taxing our cargo ships was only part of it. Tell me Captain; are you positive that it was pirates that were taking our cargo ships and not the Russians? Are the pirates really responsible for the war we just won?" The Admiral turned to the halo map. "Did winning that war cost us the big war with the Outback pirates. A war we did not even know we were fighting until now."

  Looking at the Captain staring back at him. “Well, most of us didn’t know.”

  “Yes Admiral. Analyzing the enemy is still my job and I am very good at it, even when the results are not to high commands expectations. It is hard to see the hordes of hyenas and snakes skulking and slithering around the legs of the Tiger. It is human nature to concentrate on the bright flashy roaring carnivore with huge fangs and long claws towering above the filth trying to survive, when the hyena’s and snakes are the real enemy’s.”

  Captain Summers looked down at the deck for a few seconds and then smiled. "Admiral, I seem to remember a program started during the war to blaze trails from England to the other crossing arms. If they have made any progress at all, you can send the fleet’s new Fast Battle Cruisers you have sitting in the civilian space port twiddling their thumbs and sunning themselves, (because they are too damn big and new and shiny to do patrol work), straight across the voids and dust clouds to the French home system alone without any escorts or support ships to slow them down. The Battlecruisers have the speed to get there in a couple of days, the Sensors to detect and go around the most dangerous sections, the Sweeps to clear the smaller particles from their path and the Shields to protect them from what the sweeps miss. They just may be able to make it there in time. Even if the transit takes three or four days, they may be able to save the planet from being looted and most of the real civilian transports from being taken until the fleet arrives around the normal trade routes up and down the arms.”

  Both Admirals stared at her as she spoke.

  Suddenly getting a glint in her eyes she slapped her forehead with the palm of her hands, then raised them to the overhead as she looked up. “Talking about a moron. I am sorry sir, but I almost forgot. While the pirates usually destroy the Comm Transmitters to isolate the systems and word from getting out, they usually ignore receivers simply as a waste of time. You can send the French and your reserve fleet orders to mass their forces into a defense that may last long enough for our 12 Fast Battle Cruisers to reinforce them.” Raising her eyebrows looking at the Admiral. “It is worth a try sir.”

  The Supreme Admiral of the Realm's, mouth had dropped open as she had talked. Closing and opening his mouth several times as the Supreme Admiral kept trying to speak but couldn’t figure out what he wanted to say first if anything to such a wildly ludicrous idea. He finally swallowed and said. “You want me to risk our newest, fastest and biggest gunned Battle Cruisers in a head long rush across the most dangerous space in the universe by themselves in an attempt to save the French?” The Admiral jerked around to look at the map. “At 40 to one odds once they got there, if you are right about the numbers of pirates attacking the system, the Battle cruisers would be slaughtered in a head to head fight simply from overwhelming numbers. I am not going to send…”

  The Supreme Admiral stared over at the French system in the map thinking. Then turned and plopped down into his chair and started tapping on his desk and suddenly several incomplete segmented lines appeared running across the void from England to several of the French systems and crossing lanes. “No two surveys have been able to scout the same rout twice with all the damn meandering crap between the arms. With a good 20% of the scouts never being heard from again forcing them to cut the effort.

  Taking a hand full of the chocolate candies from the bowl on his desk and plopping them one at a time into his mouth, munching on them for a good minute before he started talking again. “But then the Battlecruisers were designed to be fast with the speed and maneuverability to take on the monster enemy Nova Battle Ships 10 times their size. It was a shame that enough where not commissioned before the end of the war to really test them in combat. Actually, the 12 of them acting in say two or three coordinated fast attack squadrons making coordinated lightning attacks on the pirate battle ships from long range safely out of the enemy’s gun range and then speeding away before the pirates can mass enough ships to seriously threaten them, just might work. If nothing else it would bloody the new Battle Cruiser design and reveal any faults now before they are really needed to defend England since the damn politicians are determined to retire all our battleships. And like you said. It just may buy us enough time to get the rest of the Home Fleet there.”

  Turning to look at the star map again. “Especially since we have spent the last 15 years scouting, surveying and mapping routes across that Godstar forsaken hell to the French system's crossing finger with all the losses. If we send dust sweepers along to clear a corridor so the fleet can follow the Battle Cruisers since they are going to all that trouble to actually run the new rout to clear up all the discrepancies that have cropped up between the scouted surveys. The Battlecruisers are the only ships big and powerful enough to do that in less than a year.” Turning to the Captain. “No, the standard sweeps would still take the best part of a year to clear a 10,000 mile wide corridor if it could even be done in that damn maelstrom. But the Battle Starbases are designed to take fleets across deep space between transit lanes and can sweep a corridor just big enough for the fleet in only a few days (the second biggest Secret in the Engl
ish military).”

  Chuckling to himself. "So much for the Prime Minister, Senate and House of Commons bitching about the Battlecruisers and Battle Starbases being a waste of money to maintain after the war. They may just turn out to be worth their weight in gold if they survive the crossing and the Pirates." Typing on his desk again. “Damn, we only have one Battle Starbase in the system not already in cold storage but luckily it has just arrived around the Reserve Storage moon’s orbit and still has part of her crew aboard.”

  The Supreme Admiral spent the next half hour issuing orders to immediately launch the Battle Cruiser Fleet sitting at the planets new Space Port as well as a message to the French to mass their fleet and hunker down and ignore distress calls from the outlying system that was already lost. The hardest part turned out to be getting orders issued for the Battle Starbase Black Dwarf, (that had just arrived in the system for mothballing), back out of the Reserve decommissioned status and back into the fleet to follow the battle Cruisers. Then with the majority of the Black Dwarf's crew already transferred off of it to the demobilizing decks on the England’s Orbital Defense station, they needed to be reprocessed and transported back out to the big miles long ship. Not to mention the hundreds of cargo ship loads of supplies and weapons that would have to be transported back aboard as it headed out of the system.