Solbidyum Wars Saga Book 1: Battle of the New Orleans

by Dale C. Musser

  I switched the view over to the Admiral and no sooner established connection then he began speaking. “Tibby, have you heard? The Brotherhood has taken the DUSTEN and are attacking in multiple locations at once here on Megelleon as well.”

  “Yes Admiral Regeny, Lt. Commander Wanoll was just apprising me of the situation.”

  “The Lt. Commander is safe?” Regeny said, “He’s not aboard the DUSTEN?”

  “No Sir, he’s aboard the NEW ORLEANS and quite safe, Captain Maxette was able to get a message to him just as the rebels were taking over. Commander Thimas is a member of the Brotherhood of Light it. It was he who released the rebel prisoners and aided them in their takeover of the DUSTEN. They have since been joined by the other rebels and the TASSAGORA.”

  “What the hell is going on, why are you getting this information before I am? Why in the blazes didn’t Lt. Commander Wanoll contact me first? Hell man you’re not even Federation military and you’ve gotten info I haven’t.” Regeny steamed.

  “Lt. Commander Wanoll contacted me because Captain Maxette ordered him to do so. The Captain wanted the Lt. Commander to ask me for my aid using the NEW ORLEANS” I answered.

  “Harrumph,” the Admiral steamed, “that least makes sense. I was just contacting you to make the same request along with all the men you have been training. You’re the only ones we can count on. It seems like even on my own staff has traitors.”

  “I have one suggestion for you Admiral,” I began, “I would suggest to you that you also come aboard the NEW ORLEANS. It’s the most secure ship in the Galaxy and the only one where everyone has been double screened and cleared. Right now you don’t know who around you, you can trust or even if your safe. You can run your operations from the NEW ORLEANS in safety and up close and personal to the enemy as well.”

  “Hmmm,” Regeny exhaled loudly, clearly overwhelmed by the recent events, .“You have a good point there, I’d not thought about that, but I’ll need some of my senior staff officers with me.”

  “Not a problem Admiral,” I said, “Just as long as everyone is aware that you all will have to undergo a mental screening when boarding the NEW ORLEANS.”

  “Everyone? Including me?” The Admiral squawked.

  “Yes Sir, even you.” I responded earnestly “No one, and I mean no one gets to board the NEW ORLEANS until Kala has personally screened them.” I replied. Admiral Regeny grinned, a twisted grin and said, “You’re a tough piece of meat Tibby, a smart tough piece of meat and I like the way you think. I agree. I’ll get my officers and fly up to the NEW ORLEANS.”

  “Admiral, I would prefer that you fly here to the estate first so Kala can screen you here. I would like you to have your ship hungered on the NEW ORLEANS, but it will have to drop its RMFF shield for you to get through and we need to be sure everyone on your ship is loyal because I do not want us getting blown out of space by a traitor on your ship when we drop our shields.”

  “Agreed, we’ll be at your Estate in about an hour.

  After talking to the Admiral I sent word to Marranalis to get all our security people and all the Federation troops at the Estate to the hangar area quickly for transfer to the NEW ORLEANS. He had already heard about the events on the news and didn’t ask any questions. Pulling all the security and troops from the Estate was going to leave it vulnerable to attack, but I didn’t think the rebels would try that as there was nothing there for them that they wanted. I made a quick call to Cantolla and told them to pack whatever equipment they had and get it to the hangar area immediately; we were moving to the New Orleans. I was shocked when arriving at the hangar area to find that the scientists were the first ones there. Cantolla, Dakko and Rivez all balked when they were told they would have to undergo screening before they could go to the NEW ORLEANS, but when faced with the alternative of staying on the surface and facing a possible attack they all relented and submitted to the process. The Admiral and his staff along with an entourage of troopers arrived in a corvette called the NIGHTBRIDGE. I had not seen a corvette before, a corvette being smaller than a frigate, but larger than a patrol ship, and didn’t know what it was until Marranalis explained it. Fortunately the hangar on the NEW ORLEANS was a large one and big enough for it and all the patrol ships we had assembled at the Estate. Kala quickly screened all those who had not previously been screened. Ten patrol ships, the Corvette and a small cargo ship all took flight in a rather sloppy formation and proceeded to the NEW ORLEANS.

  The Admiral and his staff were quickly provided accommodation more than adequate to their needs and with a full crew aboard that were trained to dealing with passenger demands things went relatively smoothly. Plenty of supplies were aboard and with synthesizers we had sufficient food and other resources. The ship had several conference rooms and we chose one of the larger ones as a war room. Obviously Galetils must have envisioned running some of his businesses from the ship because adjacent to the conference room were many smaller rooms suitable for offices. The Admiral was so pleased with the arrangement and I feared that when the time came I was going to have a hard time getting him off the ship. We were just getting settled in for a meeting in the conference room when an urgent message came in for Admiral Regeny. “Put it on the screen,” Regeny said.

  A rather disheveled looking Major appeared on the screen, in the background was smoke and debris, “Admiral,” the Major began breaking protocol by not waiting for acknowledgement “Thank the stars you are safe, the headquarters here at the base have been attacked, your personal office and those of your aids were completely destroyed. A rather large raiding party hit the complex, they breached the vaults and got into the last one where the Solbidyum was stored. Sir, it’s gone! The Solbidyum is gone! I fear the rebels have it!” The Major was practically hysterical at this point and he kept running his fingers through his disheveled hair. His eyes appeared bloodshot, like he hadn’t slept in days or he had been crying moments before starting the vid.

  “The Solbidyum is gone you say? That is serious news,” the Admiral Regeny said just a bit too calmly for something so valuable to the Federation, he seemed only mildly interested but let the Major continue. “Yes sir, it looks like the Rebels have it. “

  “And I’m assuming that the media has already been there and have filed their reports saying just that?” The Admiral said questioningly.

  “Yes sir, I’m afraid they have,” the Major said, “the news is saying that you and your staff are presumed to be dead and the Solbidyum is gone.”

  “What’s the situation there with the troops, how may wounded and how many killed?” Regeny asked.

  “Casualty reports are still coming in, but it looks like we took a pretty hard hit, my guess is that we lost about thirty percent of the defensive forces here, another twenty percent have been injured so we only have about fifty percent fit for action. The rebels also got away with about a dozen more ships.” The Major replied.

  “What’s the situation at the Capitol, are the Leaders alright?” Admiral Regeny asked.

  “Yes, both are safe, but Leader Turaine is heading off world to Teahkins in hopes of soothing the situation there. In case of another attack, the two leaders will be separated so they cannot both be killed. Both Leaders sent word for you and the high command to do as you see best, assuming that you had survived the attack.

  “Alright Major, get things back into shape there, we need fully functional intact units, move people about if you have to but I need as many fully active units as we can get. So far as I know all the action has been here at the main Federation base, none of the bases elsewhere on the planet have seen anything like this. Bases on the other planets have not had any hits so far that we know of. I’ll personally contact them telling them to send reinforcements, unfortunately, none of our other starships or frigates are in the system and it will take days before we can get any more. I need to tell the other bases to only send troopers that have been given psychological scans a second time. I then want to conduct another test upon their a
rrival. We’ll also have the test facilitators scanned by three sources and have observers for those test, we need to seal up these leaks in security immediately.”

  “Yes sir, but what about the Solbidyum!?” the Major exclaimed.

  “Let me worry about the Solbidyum, right now you have your orders.” And with that the Admiral, ended the conversation.

  Everyone in the room was rather quiet and just a bit more as ease than I would have expected under the situation. I could see that Kala was totally mystified by their casual appearance and her mouth was practically hanging open. The Admiral turned to me “Tibby I want to thank you, if you had not suggested that we move our headquarters here to the NEW ORLEANS we probably all would be dead right now. That was quick thinking on your part. We’re going to have to prepare a statement for the news. Lt. Commander Wabussie, could you see to having the Federation logo plaque removed from the staff room on the NIGHTBRIDGE and brought here. I think this conference room provides an image of power and control that will help dispel many of the doubts and fears the public may have right now. We will display the Federation Symbol prominently behind us and it will look like we are in some official headquarters and not hiding in a bunker someplace.”

  “Yes sir,” Wabussie said and got up and left the room.

  “One thing concerns me,” I said, “the FOI doesn’t seem to be supplying you with any sound information. Have you considered the possibility that the FOI has been compromised with individuals from the Brotherhood, have any of the FOI people been tested?”

  “Good question Tibby,” the Admiral said, “I’ve been asking myself the same thing. I do not like the answers I seem to be coming up with, for now I think it best we leave the FOI out of the loop and assume they are compromised.”

  “Major Kalana, you seem to be concerned, what’s troubling you,” Regeny asked.

  Kala shook her head slightly as though to clear her thoughts and said. “Well sir, it just that no one here seems to be concerned about the missing Solbidyum, shouldn’t we be taking action to recover it?”

  “Who said the Solbidyum was missing?” Regeny asked.

  “The Major at the base said, and you, well you never did say much now that I think of it.” Kala responded. “Just where is the Solbidyum Admiral?”

  “Why don’t you ask Tibby? I think he’s already figured out that answer.” Regeny answered.

  Kala turned and looked at me questioningly, eye brows furrowed in a frown.

  “It’s here Kala,” I said soothingly, “on the NIGHTBRIDGE in the hangar. It will only be there until they can transfer it into a hold here on the NEW ORLEANS. This is the safest and most logical place to keep it.”

  “Right you are Tibby” Admiral Regeny said. “When I heard about the DUSTEN falling and the growing attacks on the Federation headquarters I knew it was only a matter of time before the vaults were penetrated and the Solbidyum taken. It was obvious that there was little time remaining and when Tibby offered for me and my staff to operate safely from the NEW ORLEANS it dawned on me that this was the safest place to hide the Solbidyum. Right now the rebels have no idea where we are or where the Solbidyum is. The longer we keep it that way the more control we will have over the situation and it buys us time to figure out what we are going to do to rescue the DUSTEN. They will know we left the headquarters in the NIGHTBRIDGE by now, but they have no idea where the NIGHTBRIDGE is. We’re in hiding just like they are, but sooner or later they will figure out that we are hiding in the NEW ORLEANS and come after us. Luckily, this ship can out run them and from what Captain Maxette and Lt. Commander Wanoll have told me, they say it has a working RMFF on it and it is impenetrable. They may be able to find us but they can’t get in.”

  “Actually sir,” I began, “they may not be able to find us either, even if we stay right here.”

  “I don’t understand,” Regeny retorted.

  “We discovered that when we used the RMFF our nav system didn’t function. Kerabac believed this to be due to the magnetic field and decided to try using an optical navigation system, not as powerful but adequate for short range navigation. In the process of playing around with this he accidently discovered that if an energy beam of a certain frequency is beamed from the ship to the inside of the RMFF it cloaks the ship. We’ve set up a control system that is keyed to senior crew members only so the system can’t be activated by anyone but a senior officer on the NEW ORLEANS. Even if the ship were captured they would not be able to operate it even if they knew of what all it can do. The same holds true for the RMFF.” Every member of Regeny’s staff was now sitting forward in their chairs with looks of total amazement on their faces.

  “But what of radar and other sensors, won’t they still see the NEW ORLEANS?” Regeny asked.

  “No the RMFF prevents that as well,” I said “as far as they would observe we simply are not there.”

  “Impressive,” Admiral Regeny said, “this certainly puts an entirely new perspective on things. We can sneak right up to the DUSTEN, and… and…”

  “Yes, and what? An attack on the DUSTEN is not possible, yet. There are too many innocent lives aboard that ship. More thought must go into a rescue plan.” I said. “We can’t blow the ship up with 10,000 mostly innocent people aboard. You can’t leave this ship to get over there because we’d have to drop the RMFF to do so and they would blow us to bits if we did. We could take out the patrol ships and the TASSAGORA, but what would that accomplish you? They still would have the DUSTEN holding a large number of their troops, and thousands of hostages.”

  “It seems like you have already given this some thought Tibby, so would you advise us doing?”

  “First you make your announcement to the Federation saying that you and the High Command are all safe. Inform them that your security team learned of the eminent attack shortly before it happened and that you and the High Command moved to a secure secret command center. Mention that upon knowing of the imminent attacks, you also saw it fit to relocate the Solbidyum. None of this is a lie, but if you say it right it will look like you have intelligence sources and resources in place that give you control of the situation, we must continue to give off the image that the Federation still has the upper hand. Once you have done that, I suggest we cloak and remain cloaked for further protection. We can then move to a viewing position of the DUSTEN and the TASSAGORA and observe the surrounding ships movements. I believe that if we are patent, the rebels will unknowingly lead us to their headquarters. Due to the fact that we are invisible and able to follow these ships, once we take out their base they will automatically assume they have a Federation spy in the Brotherhood. I suspect when the rebels see the news cast they will think we already have spies in their midst and will begin a witch hunt looking for them, they won’t use standard communications because they will fear we can monitor them somehow so they will use a shuttle or patrol ship to carry messages to and from their headquarters to be safe. Once we find their headquarters we destroy both the ship and the base, make a vid of it, show it on the news with an announcement that your spy’s infiltrated the Brotherhood and that is how you located their base. That should get the rebels concerned and not trusting their own; some may even defect hoping to get off easy by bargaining information for freedom or their lives. Once their high command is out of commission we will move on the DUSTEN and the ships around it.

  “Damn Tibby, I think I should just retire and let you run the Federation military. All right everyone, you heard what he said, let’s make it happen!”

  While the High command officers and the Admiral prepared his presentation for the news Kala and I went looking for Lunnie and Reidecor on the TRITYTE. I was shocked to find the TRITYTE dark and dead, no power at all. Plus the cable for powering the RMFF from the TRITYTE was missing. Just as I was starting to panic Lunnie and Reidecor came strolling toward the ship with their arms about each other.

  “Hey Tibby, sis… how you two doing?” Lunnie said smiling.

  “What happened to th
e power on the TRITYTE?” I asked, choosing to ignore Lunnie’s question.

  “Oh, that, you said to look into removing the Solbidyum reactor from the TRITYTE and after I found the reactor plans in the ship’s computer and built one, I installed it like you said. Tibby you will never find it in a million years. Anyway, I needed to test it so while we were in orbit over the Estate I moved the core into the new reactor to test it, works like a charm. But I’ve not had a chance to move it back because of all the action that broke out shortly thereafter.”

  “So right now the NEW ORLEANS’s RMFF is running off the new reactor you installed and not off the TRITYTE?” I asked in amazement.

  “Yep, guess you could say that.”

  “Lunnie were I not madly attached to your sister I would kiss you right now!” I burst out in pure amazement as I embraced her in a tight, almost bone crushing hug. Then I felt my cheeks quickly turn red as the others laughed and I quickly let go. “Go ahead and kiss her Tibby, maybe that will shut her up for a while. I don’t think your kissing her on this occasion counts for anything but a reward for a job well done.” So I took Lunnie in my arms and gave her a huge kiss, when I stepped back she said. ”WOW sis, you said he was a good kisser, but I didn’t think he was this good, say does this mean that I can come and sleep with the two of you now?” To which Kala, Reidecor and I said in unison “NO!”

  “So just where is the reactor,” I asked Lunnie.