TFS Theseus: The Terran Fleet Command Saga – Book 2

by Tori Harris

  — Lieutenant Jacks had been about to order one of his men to take down the chairwoman with what would have (hopefully) been a nonlethal shot from his pulse rifle. Doing so always involved significant risk for the target, however, so upon seeing the HQSEC commander’s attempt to disarm her peacefully, he had delayed his order momentarily.

  — Master Sergeant Rios, believing that Crull was more likely to open fire with every passing second and knowing that there was insufficient time to issue orders to one of the five Marines near the pavilion, raised his own weapon, selecting the “plasma channel” setting as he prepared to fire.

  — Admiral Naftur, sensing the very beginning of the minute series of muscle contractions he knew would inevitably lead to Crull firing her rifle, moved with a quickness well beyond the capabilities of his Human companions. Springing powerfully to one side, he shouldered Admiral Sexton out of the path of the incoming directed energy bolt before the weapon had even discharged.

  Thanks entirely to Naftur’s quick response, Crull’s shot missed Admiral Sexton entirely, tearing instead through the Wek admiral’s chest and nicking the aortic arch above his heart. The compressed bolt of plasma continued its path of destruction until its lethal cargo of energy had been expended, finally dissipating just before it had passed completely through his body to exit his back.

  Less than one second later, Rios’ pulse rifle fired a beam of directed energy, striking Crull squarely in the center of her chest. The beam, while doing no damage on its own, created an invisible channel of ionized air between the weapon and her body, acting like a virtual wire. Sensing that a conductive path now existed between itself and its target, the rifle released a lower energy form of plasma — amounting to a fist-sized ball of lightning — which covered the distance to its target at just shy of the speed of light. Upon impact, the chairwoman’s nervous system was temporarily disrupted, causing an instantaneous loss of consciousness. Already moving to disarm Crull after she had opened fire, the HQSEC commander at her side grabbed the rifle even as her lifeless body dropped to the ground. Uninterested in suffering the same fate, he immediately threw down the weapon and willingly joined Crull and the rest of his troops face down on the frost-covered grass.

  TFS Theseus

  (Above TFC Headquarters campus)

  “Savage 1, Theseus-Actual.”

  Although there had been frustratingly little Prescott could do to alter the events transpiring on the ground, the confrontation with the HQSEC troops had led him to forgo the landing cycle altogether and instead move the destroyer close enough to reestablish communications with his two squads of Marines. The ship now hovered at the lowest altitude Ensign Fisher had deemed safe — her looming bulk a dark shadow in the fog that seemed to stretch to the horizon in both directions.

  “Savage 1 here, Captain,” Lieutenant Jacks responded, happy to hear Prescott’s voice again. “Sir, we have a medical emergency. Admiral Naftur is critically wounded and requires immediate evac. We have a corpsman working to stabilize him, but he’s lost a lot of blood.”

  “Understood. We need you to get him loaded into one of your Gurkhas and onboard Theseus as quickly as possible. Once you finish with Naftur, I need you to get Admiral Sexton access to a comlink.”

  “Aye, sir. Jacks out.”

  There were a number of trauma units just minutes away in the assault shuttle, but none of them were any better equipped than the medical bay aboard the Theseus. More importantly, the warship had the added benefit of Doctor Jiao Chen, who was — by virtue of having been assigned to TFS Ingenuity when their species was first encountered — arguably the world’s leading authority on Wek anatomy and physiology.

  “Doctor Chen, bridge,” Prescott announced.

  “This is Doctor Chen. What can I do for you, Captain Prescott?” she replied, clearly in the middle of something. Although he always enjoyed working with the chief of his ship’s medical staff, Prescott often noted the contrast between his conversations with her and other members of the crew. Had he already become accustomed to an underlying level of deference that she, unlike most everyone else onboard, did not feel obliged to offer? He certainly hoped not, but Chen was a civilian after all, and a world-class surgeon to boot — an elite among an elite class of doctors to be sure — a class not generally known for their deference to others.

  “Admiral Rugali Naftur has been hit by pulse rifle fire and is gravely injured. He will be arriving on the flight deck momentarily via shuttle.”

  “I’ve already spoken with the Marine corpsman who has been working with the admiral and we are prepping for surgery now,” she replied, obviously anxious to finish the conversation and attend to the urgent business at hand. “If she is not too traumatized, I would like Doctor Turlaka to scrub in.”

  “Doctor Turlaka,” he repeated. “I had completely forgotten that she is a former surgeon. I’m confident she will do so if she is able.”

  “She’s not just a surgeon, Captain, she’s a Wek cardiothoracic surgeon. Her help may mean the difference between saving him and not.”

  “Understood, Doctor. I cannot stress to you enough the importance of Admiral Naftur’s survival. All of our lives may literally depend on it.”

  “Rest assured that every patient is treated as if that were the case, Captain. Chen out.”

  Prescott sighed deeply as he turned to look at his XO. “I’m afraid things may have just gotten quite a bit more complicated.”

  “If anyone can save him, Jiao Chen is the right doc for the job,” she replied with more confidence than she felt at the moment.

  “If she doesn’t, our options for handling the situation with the Resistance task force may be reduced to a very short list.”

  “Captain,” Lieutenant Dubashi announced, “I have Admiral Sexton, sir — audio only.”

  “Put him through, please.”

  After a brief delay, a chime indicated that an active comm channel had been established and encrypted. Hearing nothing for several seconds, Prescott spoke up first. “Admiral Sexton, Prescott here. Are you receiving us, sir?”

  There were some muffled sounds on the channel, followed shortly thereafter by the Commander in Chief’s voice. “Sorry about that, Captain. Things are still a bit chaotic down here at the moment.”

  “How can we help, Admiral?”

  “Well, first and foremost, provide your medical staff whatever resources they require to save Admiral Naftur. You can be anywhere on the planet in a matter of minutes, if need be. You have absolute authority to bypass whatever rules you need to in order to make that happen.”

  “Will do, sir. I’ve already spoken to Doctor Chen. She believes having Ambassador Turlaka assist her in the surgery may tip the balance in their favor. Do you believe she will be too traumatized to do so?”

  “Traumatized? No I wouldn’t say that. I pretty much had to tackle her to keep her from shredding Chairwoman Crull to ribbons. She’s on her way up to you now and I’m sure she will do whatever is required to help.”

  “What is the situation with the Leadership Council?”

  “Frankly, I have no idea. Right before speaking to you, I drafted a priority message to be hand-delivered to Lisbeth Kistler and Samuel Christenson — two Council members I know and trust. I attempted to summarize the situation and offered to surrender myself into their custody if that is indeed the will of the Council. If that happens, I expect Admiral White will be taking over as Commander in Chief.”

  “I can’t imagine it will come to that, sir. Don’t you think Crull was operating pretty much on her own at this point?”

  “To an extent, yes. Then again, the Council has approved some very unusual orders over the past couple of weeks. Speaking of that, while I still have the authority to do so, I have declared the Headquarters campus an active emergency operations area until things are back under control. Until you depart, I want Theseus sitting right over the center of the facility to make that fact abundantly clear. There will be a full battalion of Marines taking o
ver security here by the end of the day. In fact, I expect the first elements to begin arriving in less than fifteen minutes. I’ll release your Marines from guard duty as soon as their replacements arrive.”

  “Understood, sir. Hopefully, that will provide Doctor Chen enough time to determine if she needs anything else.”

  “It will have to be enough time, Captain. We cannot afford to delay the reconnaissance mission out to Location Dagger any longer than absolutely necessary. As soon as you are finished with me, update Admiral Patterson and let him know you’ll be prepared to depart shortly.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “And say a prayer for Admiral Naftur. He already saved my life today. If he pulls through this, I hope you can provide him the opportunity to save us all.”

  ***

  The operating room aboard TFS Theseus was truly state of the art, which in many ways implied that it was at least a decade ahead of most of those in planet-side hospitals. Here, the very latest in Pelaran-enhanced robotics was coupled with one of the most powerful AIs available anywhere in the world. Even with all of this technology at their disposal, however, many of the most delicate procedures — including the repair of Admiral Naftur’s aorta — still came down to the skilled hands of a gifted surgeon. While Doctors Chen and Turlaka worked, the OR’s dedicated gravitic and environmental conditioning systems would prevent even the destroyer’s most aggressive maneuvers or impacts to her hull from affecting what was taking place on the operating table. Indeed, as long as the ship stayed generally in one piece, there would be no transient G-forces, no interruptions in power, not the slightest tremor.

  “The captain wanted to make sure we planned on doing our best work with Admiral Naftur,” Chen said, shaking her head and smiling behind her surgical mask. “Hopefully I managed to get across how offensive that was without being too snippy.”

  “I’m sure he meant well,” Turlaka replied. “Oh … hold … clamp right there, please.”

  “I got it. I’m very happy you’re here, Doctor. I might have been able to pull this off alone, but …” Chen paused, breathing deeply. “I’m just very glad you’re here.”

  “I can’t imagine I’d be anywhere else,” she chuckled, “but I’m more than a little rusty, as you can see. Please keep a close watch on what I’m doing.”

  “Nonsense, you’re doing beautiful work. Unfortunately, there’s a lot of work here to do. I’m still not entirely happy with some of what I’m seeing,” Chen commented as she once again paused to allow the sterile field to be cleared of blood. “They have offered to acquire any additional equipment or help we might need, but I honestly don’t know of anything we don’t already have … can you think of anything?”

  “Some music might help,” Turlaka replied, “but otherwise I agree. We should have everything we need.”

  Nurse,” Chen announced, “please let the bridge know that Admiral Naftur is in surgery and stable, for the moment. I don’t believe we will require any additional equipment or assistance, but the procedure is likely to take a couple of hours.”

  “Yes, Doctor,” the OR nurse replied as she turned to leave the room.

  “AI, Chen. Please provide us with some Bach. The Brandenburg Concerto Number Three should do nicely.” The room was instantly filled with the sound of the London Symphony Orchestra. The music was reproduced with such astounding clarity that it actually caused her to pause momentarily. “Wow,” she remarked, “that sounds fantastic.”

  “It’s perfect. Thank you,” Turlaka replied. “As to Captain Prescott’s comments, I have to admit to feeling a little of that sentiment myself. I can’t go into detail, so please don’t ask me to elaborate, but I don’t mind telling you that Rugali is a very dear and influential man. In fact, I think it’s safe to say that both of our worlds are relying heavily on him at the moment. We simply cannot allow ourselves to lose him.”

  As the AI finished translating Doctor Turlaka’s last sentence, Doctor Chen glanced up to look her Wek colleague directly in the eyes. No pressure, though, she thought wryly.

  Chapter 18

  TFS Navajo

  (Combat Information Center)

  "Contact!" the young commander announced loudly from the holographic display in the center of the room.

  For the past couple of hours, Admiral Patterson had been dividing his attention between ongoing preparations for the mission to Location Dagger and the rapidly evolving situation at Terran Fleet Command Headquarters. Since the successful comm beacon deployments near the Resistance rally point, his morning had deteriorated under the weight of a steady stream of bad news. What he dreaded hearing most, however, was the worst case scenario — the unexpected arrival of a large force of Resistance ships that would immediately shower the Earth with weapons of mass destruction before he had any hope of mounting a defense. On hearing the commander’s announcement, he rose quickly from his Command console and made his way back to the holo table.

  “Just one, Commander?” Patterson asked anxiously.

  “Yes, Admiral. Looks like a single, so far. The range is just over nine million kilometers — thirty light seconds or so. It popped up pretty close to one of our surveillance drones, so confidence in the data is high at this point. We should have video shortly …”

  The display had quickly been reconfigured to provide an all-encompassing view of the battlespace surrounding the Navajo out to a distance roughly double that of the new contact. As usual, the admiral’s formation of Fleet assets in and near Earth orbit were displayed as blue icons designating them as friendly units. At Patterson’s insistence, the Guardian spacecraft, having still not proven itself as a “friendly” in his opinion, but also not openly hostile, was represented by a purple icon. Finally, the unknown contact — which the AI had now classified as a destroyer due to its size — was displayed with a yellow icon, which now flashed to indicate that a live video stream was available.

  Leaning over the table, Patterson selected the new contact’s icon, and with a simple gesture indicated that he wished to see the video feed on one of the large view screens nearby. What he saw, while not entirely unexpected, was of grave concern given the proximity of the Guardian spacecraft. Almost immediately thereafter, the Navajo’s AI came to the same conclusion as the admiral, updating the identifying text block displayed next to the contact and changing its icon to blue.

  After a week-long journey at her maximum speed from Gliese 667, the Gresav had arrived in the Sol system.

  TFS Theseus

  (Initial climb to orbit)

  With all her personnel back onboard, and having finally been cleared for departure by both Admiral Sexton and the two surgeons working diligently to save Admiral Naftur’s life in the medical bay, TFS Theseus rotated her bow silently to the east and began her first climb to orbit.

  “All systems in the green, Captain. Both standard and C-Drive transitions are available. C-Jump range 99.3 light years and stable. Denver Air Route Traffic Control has cleared us for an unrestricted climb from our current location and we are clear of all traffic,” Dubashi reported from the Communications console, still adjusting to some extent to doing double duty as both comm officer and navigator.

  “Thank you, Lieutenant,” Prescott replied. “Ensign Fisher, as usual, it’s your show. Please keep in mind what’s going on in Medical. In theory, what the ship is doing shouldn’t affect the operating room, but let’s do our best not to test those systems, if we can help it.”

  “Aye, Captain. Standard climb underway. The AI has a number of pre-established performance profiles set up as part of our so-called ‘abbreviated shake-down cruise.’ This specific one isn’t all that aggressive, though. We will briefly achieve .002 c, but it shouldn’t cause a problem for the grav systems. ETA to our rendezvous with the Navajo is just under three minutes.”

  “Understood. Discontinue immediately if we start to feel any lag in the dampeners.”

  “Aye, sir. Will do.”

  Since Admiral Naftur had been brought on b
oard, an uncharacteristically somber mood had taken hold on Theseus’ bridge. Her first climb to orbit, which would normally have been a time of nervous excitement coupled with a fair amount of apprehension, instead took on an air of the routine. While still very much engaged in their work and performing their duties in expert fashion, the members of the bridge crew said little, each one a study in introspection as they dealt with the uncertainty of the situation in their own way.

  “How do you expect Admiral Patterson will alter the mission to Location Dagger?” Reynolds finally asked, looking for anything to lighten the increasingly oppressive mood.

  “I doubt he will change a thing,” Prescott said. “We may not have Admiral Naftur’s help, but Patterson is not one to tell his commanders precisely how they are supposed to accomplish a mission.”

  “And the mission hasn’t really changed …”

  “No, not really. He’ll expect us to attempt to make contact with the Resistance commander, if possible. If we don’t have Naftur available, which seems likely at this point, perhaps Ambassador Turlaka can fill that role. Failing that …”

  “Failing that, we execute the ‘force’ component of our ‘reconnaissance in force.’”

  “Maybe so, but I think the bottom line is that it’s going to be up to us to assess the situation and determine the best course of action based on what we find.”

  “Contact,” Lieutenant Lau announced from Tactical 2. “Unknown contact, range: nine million kilometers. The AI is classifying it as a destroyer-size vessel.”

  “Did our sensors pick it up, or are we getting it from the Fleet data feed?” Prescott asked.

  “It’s about thirty light seconds out, so it’s an NRD surveillance drone contact so far, but I suspect our own sensors will pick it up shortly.”

  “Ah, well, if it’s a surveillance drone contact, we should have video shortly.”