12:00 January 20, 2736 ESMDT
DSC-078 Avalon, Bridge
The bridge had been spared the worst of the conflict that had raged through the warship mere hours before. When a boarding suited Marine had appeared behind the mutineers and loomed over them in a metric ton of steel and ferro-carbonate armor, his polite request for surrender had been quickly granted.
It looked enough like the flag deck, which had resembled a butcher’s shop by the time the same boarding suited Marine had finished their work, to still give Kyle shudders.
He concealed them as he stepped up to the command chair and glanced around. Pendez and Anderson had been holding down the watch while he and Solace communicated with Command. His regular bridge watch was in place around them, men and women he knew he could trust. With almost a hundred and fifty members of his crew joining Sanchez’s mutiny, it stood out that not one member of the bridge crew shifts had been among them.
“Thank you,” he said softly. He didn’t specify for what. He was certain he didn’t need to.
Kyle took his seat, adjusting the chair to allow him to see most of his people and activated the all hands channel.
“Crew of Avalon,” he greeted them. “I am reasonably confident that I can state that today has likely been one of the worst days of all of our lives – though I am debating its position versus flying through a battleship.”
The chuckles that shocked from his bridge crew told him he’d hit the right tack. The last thing his crew needed today was an unending cascade of doom and gloom.
“Today, we were betrayed by our shipmates, those who we trusted and thought were our friends,” he continued after a moment. “And now you find yourself looking at those around you and wondering who else you were wrong about. Who else might betray you?
“I have an answer for you on that, at least,” he told them. “No-one. Less than three percent of this vessel’s crew, Marines, or Space Force personnel, faced with someone who they could have easily believed truly had the authority to order this, joined in the mutiny.
“Many of those were deceived, or made an error in judgment, and truly thought they were doing the right thing,” he continued. “Those who did not already betray us will not.”
That was probably stretching the truth. After all, there had to have been a few people approached who hadn’t joined, or the rumors that had reached his ears wouldn’t have existed. Those people might not have joined up with Sanchez, but they’d certainly stayed quiet enough.
“I wish, in the aftermath of this morning, I had good news to give,” he said quietly. “But it turns out we faced more than one betrayal. Officers and crew of Avalon¸ I am afraid this ship was never supposed to leave Alizon.
“Our orders from Alliance High Command were to guard Alizon and make sure the system we’d so fortuitously freed was protected until we could rebuild their defenses. Vice Admiral Dimitri Tobin chose to disobey those orders and lie to us about our mission.”
Kyle paused, waiting for that to sink in.
“Sadly, this means that Vice Admiral Tobin, while uninvolved in the mutiny, will not be released from the brig,” he said softly. “He has been relieved of command by Fleet Admiral Blake. And we, my crew, my pilots – my friends – were ordered back to Alizon.”
He could only see the faces of his bridge crew, but even on those twenty faces he saw what he’d expected to see: disappointment, but also a determination to do their duty.
“However, as I pointed out to Admiral Blake, we are now barely thirty hours and counting from Barsoom – and five days from Alizon. We are close on the heels of one of the worst mass murderers in human history, and I’m not sure I have it in me to give up the hunt, no matter how solid, how pragmatic the reasons.
“Admiral Blake understands. The Alliance of Free Stars, the Castle Federation, our Navy and Space Force – these are not entities that can stand by while the innocent are slaughtered. Justice must be done one way, or another.
“We have been authorized to complete this final leg of the pursuit. We will bring Triumphant to bay in Barsoom, and we will either capture Captain Richardson for trial and execution, or we will destroy his ship with him aboard.
“Our orders are clear,” he warned them. “We are not to pursue Triumphant beyond Barsoom. We are not to risk this ship against superior Commonwealth forces to engage her.
“I do not intend to disobey these orders – but I also do not intend to fail.”
Chapter 39
Deep Space, en route to Barsoom System
20:00 January 20, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
DSC-078 Avalon, CAG’s Office
Michael leaned back in his chair with a small smile. Despite the beginning of the day, lifting the communication blackout was appearing to have a positive impact on morale. Certainly, his own morale had been boosted by the several messages waiting in the queue from Kelly Mason.
His girlfriend had settled well into her role as Executive Officer of the strike cruiser Sunset. That ship was assigned to the defense force securing the Tiāntáng system – one of Castle’s daughter colonies, and on the opposite side of the capital from the Commonwealth.
The most dangerous thing Kelly Mason was facing was an occasional patrol of the uninhabited systems on the Federation’s rimward frontier to make sure nothing untoward was happening in star systems rarely visited by man. Given the last few weeks aboard Avalon, Michael was guiltily glad she hadn’t ended up serving as the XO for the big carrier.
His door chimed, and he glanced up.
“Enter.”
As if summoned by his thought, Mira Solace stepped into his office. The elegant dark-skinned woman took a seat in front of his desk without asking and smiled slightly.
“Can I get you a drink?” he asked. “Something warm? It’s been a hell of a day.”
“Tea, please,” she agreed. “You seem in a better mood this evening.”
“Like most people, lifting the blackout has done me some good. Yourself?” He poured a cup of tea and passed it to her.
“I’ve been busy,” Solace pointed out. “But yes, I did get to my backlog.” The XO smirked, a surprisingly girlish expression on the normally serious officer’s face. “My seventeen-going-on-thirty little sister left me a long message. Lots of stories about school, some chatter about a couple of boys in her classes – and a roughly five minute long lecture on just how dreamy the ‘Stellar Fox’ is and how lucky I am to be on his ship!”
Michael almost snorted tea as he laughed.
“Because his XO should be paying attention to how dreamy the Captain is,” he observed as he cleaned up the mess he’d made. “Siblings, huh?”
“She’s a teenager,” Solace agreed with a shake of her head. “Things like ‘chain of command’ are meaningless to her still – and, God willing, will stay that way. Anna is not suited to the military.”
“Neither was I at her age, looking back,” Michael pointed out. “For that matter, given his family history, I don’t think the Captain was planning on a military career at seventeen.”
“And here we all are,” she said softly, sipping her tea with unreadable eyes.
“Was there something you need, or was this just a visit?” Michael asked. She wasn’t really interrupting, but it was rare for the Senior Fleet Commander to show up in his office without a reason of some kind.
“Yes,” Solace replied, and sighed. “You know Kyle well, right?”
“I haven’t known him long,” Michael said slowly, wondering where this was going. “Only six months or so, really. But we’ve been through a lot of shit together in those six months.”
“He has an… interesting personal reputation in the Navy,” the XO said slowly. “The opposite of yours, in fact.”
Oh. That’s where this was going.
“He is interested in women,” Michael pointed out. “Inasmuch as he’s interested in anyone. You know about his son, right?”
“That wasn’t…” Solace trailed off in
mid-objection and smiled sheepishly. “Yes, I know about his son.”
“Our dear Captain, having made an utter and complete mess of his first serious relationship, promptly decided he sucked at relationships and wasn’t going to touch them again,” the CAG explained, ignoring her objection as if she’d never said it.
“I see,” the XO said primly.
“So, you and the Captain, huh?” Michael gently poked.
“Would be against regulations, so I doubt either of us would permit anything to happen,” she said very precisely.
“But he won’t be in your chain of command forever, and your sister isn’t the only one making eyes at the war hero,” he concluded.
“I am not ‘making eyes’ at my commanding officer!” she snapped, then smiled sheepishly again. “I… may be harboring possibly inappropriate notions about the man, but I am nothing if not patient.”
Michael found himself having to clean up tea again, and he waved a warning finger at Solace.
“Patience would be the name of the game,” he warned her. “While I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that Kyle has had… professional companionship in the last ten years, he hasn’t had a relationship since he joined the Navy.”
She shook her head, sipping her tea.
“I can’t believe I’m even thinking this,” she admitted. “We work well together, damn it. The last thing I want to do is screw that up with a god-damn schoolgirl crush!”
“Why does everyone come to me for relationship advice?” Michael asked rhetorically. “Does something about my string of broken hearts and almost-ruined career suggest a great skill at this?”
“I’m not sure I’m even asking for advice here, Michael,” Solace told him. “More… finding the lay of the land.”
“Dangerous land, my dear,” he replied. “Not just because he’s your Captain – though Stars know that’s enough! I suspect our dear Captain has more than a few landmines even a good friend hasn’t seen.”
She grunted, apparently lost in thought.
“Like I said, Michael, I can be patient,” she pointed out. “If it’s a crush fed by walking through hell together, then it will fade. If it’s not… well, I didn’t make it this far without knowing the tactics for dangerous ground.”
21:00 January 20, 2736 ESMDT
DSC-078 Avalon, Brig
With everything happening, it had been far too easy for Kyle to put off delivering the message from the Joint Chiefs to Tobin. Eventually, however, it had to be done, and he found himself in the brig – still half-expecting to meet Sirvard Barsamian in the office just outside.
The Ship’s Marshal had not survived the flag deck. Another casualty of Tobin’s failures as a commander. He sighed, straightened and stepped into the brig.
“How can I help you, sir?” a Military Police Corporal asked. The Asian-featured woman saluted crisply, but she kept her other hand on the shotgun slung over her body armor, and an eye on the hallway leading to the detention blocks.
“I need to speak with Tobin,” Kyle told her.
“Cell A3,” she replied immediately. “It’s easy to pick out – it’s the only one with a guard outside.”
“Thank you, Corporal,” Avalon’s Captain said and heading down Corridor A – one of six blocks of twenty cells. The big carrier’s brigs were almost full, though thankfully only four had been occupied before the mutiny.
As the Corporal had told him, only one of the twenty cell doors in Corridor A had a Marine outside. He wore body armor over his green-piped shipsuit and held a battle rifle at port arms across his chest.
“I need to speak with the prisoner, soldier,” Kyle told him. A thought flipped an authorization code from his implant to the Marine’s, and the man saluted and stepped aside.
The door slid open at a mental command and the Captain stepped into the cell.
It wasn’t much of a room, basically a three meter cube. It had a bed, a console with a restricted entertainment library, and a Faraday cage layered into the walls that blocked implant transmissions.
Vice Admiral Dimitri Tobin sat on the bed. He was staring at the wall, though not blankly. Kyle recognized the stance of someone running through their implant’s cyberneticaly perfect recall of events. The silicon remembered far more reliably than the neurons, though that also meant the loss of the silicon could be traumatizing.
Only a policy requiring shipboard backups for starfighter pilots had saved Kyle’s own memories when his implant was lost.
Sighing, he coughed softly. Tobin blinked and looked up at him.
“You look very grim, Captain,” the big Admiral rumbled softly. “You are not my executioner, and I sadly have little doubt I have earned whatever you are here to say. Do not fear hurting my feelings, Captain. That I have managed sufficiently on my own.”
“I have reviewed the Alpha One communiqué from the Federation Joint Chiefs of Staff,” Kyle told him, his voice formal. “I have also confirmed the situation with Fleet Admiral Blake.
“As of January Seventeenth, Twenty-Seven Thirty-Six, you are relieved of command of Battle Group Seventeen,” he said flatly. “Investigation of your involvement or knowledge of Senior Fleet Commander Sanchez’s mutiny will be carried out by qualified JD-Justice JAG personnel upon our rendezvous with the rest of the Battle Group at Alizon.”
“There will need to be charges of incompetence laid as well as whatever they’ve already set their minds on,” the big man said quietly. “I should have seen and prevented Sanchez’s plan. She was my Chief of Staff.”
“I… cannot disagree, sir,” Kyle said quietly. “But I will neither be responsible for the investigation nor sit on any Board or Court. I am far too close to this matter.”
Tobin closed his eyes for a long moment. When he opened them again, he wouldn’t meet the Captain’s gaze.
“I failed you, Captain Roberts,” he admitted. “I failed you, I lied to you, and I betrayed you. But please, please, tell me you didn’t turn the ship around.”
“We were never supposed to have left Alizon,” Kyle pointed out. “Our orders have not been changed.”
“Damn it all, Kyle – don’t make me beg,” Tobin said softly, desperately. “You can’t let Richardson get away. We can’t let so many deaths go unavenged.”
“Our orders have not changed,” Kyle repeated. “But I have been authorized to proceed to the Barsoom system. No one ever disagreed with you, Admiral. But revenge couldn’t be our priority. But since you dragged us this far, it seems I will finish the job regardless.
“I will bring Richardson down, Dimitri,” he promised very, very quietly. “You should never have done it, but you will not have sacrificed your career in vain.”
Chapter 40
Barsoom System
18:45 January 21, 2736 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time
DSC-078 Avalon, Bridge
Avalon erupted into the Barsoom system in a blast of Cherenkov radiation, followed by full spectrum sensor sweeps. Emergence would temporarily emit as much energy as a small star, and Kyle saw no reason to pretend their entrance was stealthy.
“Get me a location on Triumphant,” he ordered.
“Data coming in now,” Commander Anderson replied. “We’ve got her – one light minute away and pushing for a zero gravity zone.” He paused. “Sir, I’m reading two Saint-class battleships on my scopes. They’re in hot pursuit of Triumphant.”
“Show me,” Kyle told him. His world spun for a moment, and then the tactical plot feeding his implants updated and he saw the three starships.
They’d arrived, it seemed, at the end of an hours-long game of cat and mouse – and the cats had definitely lost. The two Saints had a thirty gravity advantage over Triumphant, but they were ten million kilometers behind her with only a thousand kilometer a second advantage.
Triumphant was a little over two light minutes, almost thirty eight million kilometers, from reaching the zero gravity zone she was aiming for – a space cleared of debris by the motion of Barso
om’s outer planets. She would reach that zone and bring up her Alcubierre-Stetson drive in sixty minutes.
At that point, the Saints would still be ten minutes from their own weapons range. Captain Richardson had escaped his pursuers again. Except…
Kyle had already put together a plan in his head. Now it was time to use every capability of his ship – including the ones they’d regarded as flaws.
“Commander Pendez,” he said calmly. “I’m transmitting you a vector. I want us on that course at four hundred gravities until I give you new instructions. Once on our way, prepare a jump calculation to take us into FTL and drop us here.”
He dropped a glowing sphere onto the tactical plot – at the exact point where Triumphant would be able to safely activate her Alcubierre drive.
“Sir, if we go to four hundred gravities…”
“We’ll leave a trail of antimatter that’ll light up the whole star system,” Kyle confirmed. “That’s what I want, Commander. Make it happen.”
He flipped open another channel.
“Vice Commodore Stanford, are you ready to launch?”
“We are,” his CAG confirmed. “But we’re a long way away.”
“I know. I’m arranging some cover, then we’ll be leaving you behind to go say hi more closely. Do you follow?”
There was a long pause, during which the entire ship trembled as Pendez got her underway at a pace that would burn days’ worth of fuel in minutes.
“I think so, sir,” Stanford replied. “Initiating launch sequence. We’ll be clear in forty seconds.”
“Anderson, have they seen us yet?” Kyle asked.
“Should have just,” he confirmed. “One minute till we see any reaction on their part.”
“So let’s see what happens,” Avalon’s Captain said with a smile. “We’ll give Stanford that long to get clear.”
“Sir, if we’re leaving fighters and jumping in front of Triumphant…” Anderson hesitated. “I feel obligated to point out we don’t match her firepower by a long shot without our fighters.”
Stellar Fox (Castle Federation Book 2) Page 29
