Black Ops (Expeditionary Force Book 4)

by Craig Alanson

  “Great,” I said. What I thought to myself was that we had yet another freakin’ thing to worry about. When this current mission was over, I was going to raid Major Simms’ secret stash of bourbon and get drunk for a week, at least. “Is there any downside to us telling the Jeraptha about the Thuranin’s plan to hit them?”

  “Downside? Mmm, no. No, I can’t think of any. I’m not the strategic military genius here, Joe. That’s supposed to be your job. But I can’t think of any downside to giving the Jeraptha advanced warning of an attack. Chotek, if you are holding out hope of eventually becoming allies of the Ruhar and Jeraptha, then giving the Jeraptha this intel would be a nice gesture.”

  That last remark sold Hans Chotek on the idea. “I agree. Very well, Mr. Skippy, do your awesome magic and send the intel to the Jeraptha.”

  “My pleasure,” Skippy said happily, without even bothering to throw a casual insult at our mission commander. My guess was, Chotek was learning how to flatter Skippy.

  It was only much later we realized that giving the Jeraptha a warning about the attack was a terrible, awful, no good idea.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Communications Specialist First Class Hanst Bo of the Jeraptha’s 98th Fleet nearly choked when he read the header of the decrypted message. Hoping no one had noticed, he put the message in a temporary holding folder, and pulled up the original, encrypted transmission. It had been carried by a fast packet ship, one of the small ships dedicated to delivering messages from Fleet Headquarters to the various units and bases across the far-flung territory of the Jeraptha. Their already expansive territory had recently grown substantially, through resounding defeats the Jeraptha Home Fleet had inflected on the Thuranin.

  Having priority messages delivered by a fast packet ship was not anything unusual. What was unusual was this message designated itself as Flash Gold traffic; the highest Fleet priority. But when Hanst Bo had initially scanned the flood of messages transmitted by the packet ship as soon as it had jumped in, the summary file had not listed any of the messages as Flash Gold, or Flash at all. Or, he thought none of the messages had been listed as Flash, because when he went back to the original summary file and ran it through the decryption process, there was a message blinking boldly at the top, demanding immediate attention.

  How could he have missed that?! Bo shivered, and not just because the Communications chamber had air conditioning that seemed to be powered directly from a fusion reactor. Swallowing hard, Bo ran the Flash message through the decryption again, silently hoping it had not, in fact, been designated as Flash Gold by Fleet HQ. While he waited agonizing seconds for the multi-layered decryption process to complete, he reminded himself to remain and act calm, including making sure his antennas did not droop suspiciously.

  His console ‘binged’ when the decryption was complete, which by itself was odd. The first time he had run the message through decryption, the computer took longer, even seeming to have trouble reading the file. This second time, the decryption algorithm move at lightning speed. When Bo saw the ‘Flash Gold’ designation at the top, and that it was addressed directly to the Admiral of Blue Squadron, 98th Fleet, Bo tore the flimsy message slip out of its slot and dashed out the door, his four legs scrambling to find purchase on the ship’s deck. When he rounded a corner and reached a straight stretch of passageway, he reared up on his back two legs and raced as fast as he could, using his two front legs only for balance. “Make way! Make way!” He shouted.

  Admiral Tashallo of the Jeraptha Blue Squadron, 98th Fleet, was engaged in casual conversation with the captains of his flagship and the three other battleships under his command. The five had enjoyed a sumptuous meal provided by the admiral’s staff, an event which occurred every fifteen days whenever the Fleet was in port. Sometimes more frequently, depending on the admiral’s mood, which depended on his luck with the wagers he loved to participate in. When there was not a battle looming to be wagered upon, Tashallo arranged for ships to race each other, or for two stealthed ships to hunt each other. It was good practice for the crews, it was good for morale within the 98th, and it provided decent action for a fleet mostly assigned to dull garrison duty.

  The 98th was responsible for defense of the Glark star system where the Blue Squadron was based, a star system that provided fuel and warship servicing facilities for a quarter of the sector. The system had one habitable planet, though the people who live there and crews who took shore leave on that world, considered the term ‘habitable’ to be somewhat questionable. The planet had been a boiling hell when the Jeraptha first took control of the star system. The planet’s gravity was thirty two percent greater than was normal for the Jeraptha. The thick carbon dioxide atmosphere had trapped heat, making the surface hot enough to boil water even at the poles. Because the planet rotated so slowly, one side faced the star long enough to almost melt soft metals. Over thousands of years, Jeraptha engineers had worked to make the world habitable. They had seeded the thick clouds with algae that ate the carbon dioxide and released free oxygen. They speeded up the planet’s rotation and reduced the surface gravity, by flinging parts of the planet’s core into space using enormous railguns. Now, according to the planetary government, it was a delightful garden world, a wonderful place to live and enjoy shore leave. Except for the equator, where it was still hot enough to fry the proteins of a Jeraptha brain. And except for that burnt metallic smell that filled the air whenever the winds blew from the equator.

  The planet had been made habitable because of the other assets the system possessed. An extensive asteroid field, rich in metals and other elements that were rare in other systems. Two gas giant planets with weak magnetic fields and small moons, which were ideal conditions for extracting fuel. The Jeraptha had constructed permanent fuel collection facilities based on small moons that had been towed into low orbits. And the largest gas giant had four large spacedocks to provide heavy servicing of warships, spacedocks that were almost capable of building a small warship from raw materials extracted from easily-mined asteroids.

  All the assets in the system paled in comparison to its location; the star was near the center of three strategically important wormholes, two of which were clusters of wormholes. The five Fleets of the Blue Squadron all relied on the star system for supplies, maintenance and repairs, and staging. Admiral Tashallo’s 98th Fleet had drawn the unlucky duty of acting as the Home Guard force for the Glark system. Acting as a garrison force was boring and provided hardly action, and Tashallo couldn’t wait until he could bid on a better assignment.

  Communications Specialist First Class Hanst Bo burst in on the admiral and four senior captains. “Admiral, begging your indulgence, we just received a Flash Gold message. Fleet Intelligence has discovered an imminent threat to the Glark system.”

  Rather than being alarmed, Tashallo was annoyed. “Of course, our Fleet Intelligence group is never wrong,” Tashallo’s antenna shook with mirth, and the command staff broke into gales of laughter.

  “Fleet Intelligence is offering sixty to one odds on this,” Bo read quietly.

  “Sixty to one?” Tashallo gasped. Then he tilted his head and rolled his eyes dramatically. “How many points are they taking?” he asked with a chuckle. Sixty to one was unheard of, unprecedented coming from Fleet Intelligence. Those indecisive desk jockeys never offered more than five to four odds on their predictions of enemy intentions. And they always insisted on taking points.

  “None, Admiral. No points,” Bo replied after checking the message twice.

  “Let me see that,” Tashallo demanded, snatching the flimsy message slip from the subensign’s hand. When the admiral touched the slip, additional information became available, scrolling up from the bottom.

  What he read made him gasp and his antenna stand straight up.

  The 98th Fleet was equipped for strong defense of valuable static targets; that is why Tashallo’s force included five heavy but relatively slow and short-range battleships. With five battleships supplementing
the Strategic Defense satellites in the system, any attack by the Thuranin, Bosphuraq or a combination of the two would need to commit two entire fleets to an attack, and the enemy had never wanted to pay that steep a price. The purpose of the 98th Fleet was not to do anything by itself; it was to take away the enemy’s incentive to do something.

  The Flash Gold message stated the enemy had decided to pay the price of hitting the Glark system. Two Thuranin fleets were on their way; they would strike soon. Fortunately, Fleet Intelligence somehow knew exactly when, where and how the Thuranin planned to strike. Tashallo’s mind considered all his options quickly; that is why he had risen to the rank of admiral. “Captain Dahmen, signal that fast packet to proceed to this ship at best speed, I need to borrow it to confer with Admiral Sashell. Get the 98th ready to move out; load the battleships onto star carriers. We can’t afford to have slow ships delaying us.”

  “Sir?” Captain Dahmen burned with curiosity to know what the message slip stated was such a terrible threat that Tashallo wanted the 98th moved out of the star system the fleet was designed to defend. Battleships could be accommodated on the docking platforms of a star carrier, but a single battleship took up two or three platforms by itself, and while burdened with the massive bulk of a battleship a star carrier could only transport two or three other ships. “Should we wait for confirmation? What if Fleet Intelligence is wrong?” If the intel was wrong and Tashallo pulled the 98th away from the Glark system, the critical facilities there would have their defenses cut in half.

  “Dahmen, those credit-pinching thieves at Fleet Intelligence are offering sixty to one odds this information is accurate, and they’re not asking for any points. It is more likely Glark’s star will go supernova tomorrow, than this info to be wrong. I don’t know how, but Fleet Intelligence stumbled across a gold mine, and I’m going to act on it. Get me a dropship; I need to get aboard that fast packet immediately.”

  Nine hours later, the fast packet carrying Admiral Tashallo emerged from jump close to the flagship of Admiral Sashell’s 67th Fleet. Breaking all safety protocols, a dropship brought Tashallo aboard the battlecruiser You Want a Piece of This? and the two admirals quickly read through the extensive data in the Flash Gold message. “I agree,” Sashell said when he was able to recover his wits from the shock of the astonishing message. The idea of the Thuranin rolling the dice to attack the critical Blue Squadron facilities at Glark was not what shocked Sashell; the Thuranin were known to be desperate after their recent military setbacks. Sashell would have bet against the Thuranin launching a major offensive operation in the sector for at least three months. With a pained wince, Sashell remembered he had wagered against such a Thuranin offense, though he could not remember the exact terms of the wager. As soon as he and Tashallo were done talking, he needed to speak with the 67th Fleet’s Action Officer, the woman responsible for recording wagers and setting odds. “This is a tempting opportunity to hit the Thuranin hard, make their little green noses bloody. Fleet Intelligence would not have sent this,” he flapped the flimsy slip in the air, “unless they knew it is solid gold. Sixty to one sounds good, but I will not be betting against them,” Sashell chuckled, and Tashallo joined him.

  The decision was thus made; Tashallo slightly outranked Sashell due to more time as an admiral, although they operated independent commands. Keeping in mind the different strengths and capabilities of their two fleets, the two admirals quickly made a plan, dividing the three enemy targets between them after a reasonable and expected amount of argument. The fast packet ship was then dispatched back to Fleet HQ, carrying a request for validation of the Flash Gold message, and the intentions of the 67th and 98th Fleets to counter the enemy’s attack.

  Then the two admirals got down to the more important business of handicapping the wagers between themselves, and between their two fleets. Shortly after Tashallo returned to his flagship, a second fast packet ship was dispatched, this one carrying messages far more important than keeping Fleet HQ informed of the activities of two powerful Fleets of the Blue Squadron. Every Jeraptha in the two Fleets who could scrape together or borrow a single credit, had bet the limit on the results of the upcoming battle, and the second packet ship carried records of those wagers. Also official records of the wager Admirals Tashallo and Sashell had made with each other, their side bets, and every side bet of the entire crew, no matter how odd. One example was a wager between the chief navigator and second engineering officer of a battlecruiser, on which type of Thuranin ship would be the first to fall victim to the battlecruiser’s big railguns. Any such wager needed to be recorded by the ship’s Action Officer, and sent to be registered at Fleet HQ.

  No one in either Fleet could resist such juicy action. And not a single person bet against Fleet Intelligence. Sixty to one! That message rang throughout the hull of every ship in the two fleets, astonishing everyone who heard it. More than one wager was recorded that Fleet Intelligence must have discovered practical time travel; a way to see into the future. And more than one witty Jeraptha had commented that, even if Fleet Intelligence could see flawlessly into the future, of course those gutless cowards only offered sixty to one odds.

  Twenty six hours after the Flash Gold message was received, the 98th Fleet disappeared in blinding flashes of gamma rays, as they sortied out to meet the Thuranin.

  The Flying Dutchman completed another jump, and our pirate ship was now hanging in deep interstellar space, waiting for the drive coils to charge up for another jump. We only needed two more jumps, to reach the uninhabited star system Skippy had chosen for creating a Q-ship from our two salvaged transports. His detailed examination of both ships had not changed his mind; we would only get one Q-ship from the two junkers we were carrying. He also warned me that an attack by a single armed transport ship would not be considered a credible threat by the Ruhar negotiation party; no Kristang clan would launch an attack that weak. That was a problem I would need to deal with, after I dealt with all the other problems.

  I had waited out the latest jump from my office, rather than hanging around the bridge and making the duty crew nervous. Me being in my office during a jump was my way of showing confidence in the Merry Band of Pirates. While being right around the corner in case anything went wrong and I was needed on the bridge.

  “Nailed it, Joe!” Skippy exulted, his avatar coming to life and holding up an index finger. “I’m number one, baby. We emerged from that jump within twenty six meters of the target, that is my best accuracy yet.”

  “That is amazing, Skippy,” I replied without bothering to refresh my memory of how far we had jumped. It was far, that’s all I needed to know.

  “Yup. And I did it even though I am somewhat distracted by my investigation of that AI canister.”

  “Oh, yeah.” He had not given me an update on his messing around with the dead AI since he first told me about it. “How’s that going?” I needed him to finish screwing around with that AI canister before he started work on building our Q-ship.

  “Mostly dull,” he admitted. “I have been careful like you asked, even though there is nothing in there that could harm me, duh. I did find something interesting, intriguing, even. You made me go slower than I wanted, otherwise I would have found it much soon-”

  “Found what?” Now he had my interest. I had asked him not to go poking around in dark corners by himself.

  No answer. And his avatar was frozen in place on my desktop.

  “Skippy? What is it? What did you find in there?” I tried to project amusement in my voice.

  Still no answer. And the avatar blinked out.

  “Skippy? Come on, I know you’re pissed at me for asking you to go slowly and be careful; sue me for caring about you. What did you find in there? Can you tell me, pretty please?” I added, in case his ego needed soothing.

  Nothing. Now I was trying to decide between being alarmed that something had happened to Skippy, or being pissed that he was ignoring me.

  I called Adams. Skippy liked her; sh
e didn’t take any crap from him, and he respected that. “Sergeant, could you contact Skippy for me? He’s giving me the silent treatment,” I explained.

  “Sir, I was just in the middle of a conversation with him, and he stopped talking,” she replied, confused.

  Oh shit.

  My blood ran cold; I used to think that was only an expression. “Nagatha?” I looked at the speaker in the ceiling, as if that would help. She didn’t answer. Pulling out my zPhone, I stared at it, realizing that I had no idea how to call Skippy or Nagatha. I had never actually called them; I spoke and they always answered. It wasn’t like either of them had a phone number, or an entry in my zPhone’s address list. “Nagatha? Skippy?”

  The lights flickered, and the familiar sounds of a working starship faded away. No air faintly hissing out of ducts, no bots rolling or crawling along the decks. And there was none of the subsonic rumbling sound that I associated with the reactors, even though the reactors were far away at the aft end of the star carrier’s still long spine.

  I dashed around the corner to the bridge, aware from my bouncing steps that the artificial gravity was fading. Plenty of sound was being generated there, all of it human voices in a state of alarm and confusion. Gustov Renaud was the duty officer in the command chair. “Colonel, we have lost power; all three reactors have executed emergency shutdown procedure,” he pointed to the main display, where the three reactors were outlined in blinking red on a schematic of the ship. “It appears we are running on backup power. We can’t contact Skippy.”