The Gathering Storm (The New Federation Book 4)

by Chris Hechtl

  “True,” Berney said with a nod, taking up that narrative from the admiral. “We won't write them off just yet. Unfortunately, we don't know about the ships that were sent to reinforce the raiders either though. Should we send more ships while we can? Send a full squadron of tin cans and small ships and hit the enemy in B101a1?”

  “That would make life interesting for the Feds,” Sedrick said slowly as he gamed it out. “They'd call for help from Protodon. If Second Fleet has one of those damn ansibles with them, they might stop and then send a detachment back to clear their six,” he said. “If we did it right, we could get our people in and out.”

  “How? They'd run into any detachment Second Fleet sent, remember?” Berney asked.

  “Yes, that would happen if we ordered them to fall back. I'm thinking we don't do that. We send them in and then order them to jump high. If they go to B-94e1, then they can jump that chain to Senka and continue to strike at the enemy's rear. Or they can retreat into Sigma and double back to the Empire that way.”

  “If they did either of those things, we'd lose them for good. It would take a year or more for them to get back to the empire by Sigma.”

  “Closer to two,” Jeremy stated. As the staff navigational officer, he was the one who would know that. “That is, if they didn't run into any enemy resistance along the way, had sufficient supplies to jump, and could find refueling points along the way home.”

  “What if they did fall back? Hit and then fade back to B-97a, pummel any ships that come out of jump, and then fall back to B-97b? They'd have to race to get to DD01ns I admit,” Myron stated. “I don't like losing those ships permanently, even if most of them are light screening elements.”

  “They won't have the legs to outrun anything the Feds send after them,” Jeremy warned.

  “None of our ships do.”

  “True. They could also be cut off in DD01ns.”

  “First, send a courier and tin can to scout DD01ns. We should have done that before. That's a lapse on my part,” Cyrano ordered. A few of the faces around the table grimaced ever so slightly. “I know you'd like to send that squadron of frigates, right?” he turned to Myron. Myron shook his head. “No?”

  “No. Anything less than a tin can would get eaten alive by the Feds and would be too slow. They wouldn't keep up, and if the force kept their speed down to accommodate them, they'd be overrun.”

  “So, it has to be cruisers and tin cans. I don't like losing either of them. We're getting better at using them in the fleet defense roll,” Berney said.

  “Against simulated fire and fighters maybe. We both know the enemy can tear them apart over time,” Jeremy pointed out.

  “Enough of that. I think we do need to send a squadron,” Admiral De Gaulte said.

  “Would Commodore Rabideau take it?” Berney mused.

  “He would if I ordered him to. We'd have to send a fleet train with him and do this fast to make sure the enemy isn't in DD01ns to cut him off. Even then, they could show up at any time.”

  “They are taking their time marching on us. I'm not sure why.”

  “Caution,” Jeremy said, smiling thinly. “They got the better of us in the last engagement, but we taught them caution in the first,” he said. A few heads nodded at that. Berney briefly smiled at the memory of that victory.

  “I'm not looking a gift horse in the mouth. If they'll give us the time, let's use it. Find the ships that are best suited and get them resupplied and underway in twenty-four hours,” Admiral De Gaulte said.

  “Four and four?” Berney asked. He had taken over as operations officer as well since Cyrano had been so picky at filling Catherine's shoes with anyone else.

  “And two supply ships. One collier and a tanker. I hate losing any of them,” the admiral said with a reluctant nod.

  “The tanker I think is okay. The colliers are damn important to move material here,” Berney mused. “It might take more than twenty-four hours to get the collier stocked and in position. We don't have them lying around.”

  “Get on it now.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  “Also,” Admiral De Gaulte rose and paced the room before he paused and looked out the simulated window. “Send a warning with the copy of Widow's Playmate's log to Garth and the Empire. I am going to cut orders for every ship in Garth that is destroyer class or bigger to get here.”

  “Yes, sir,” Berney replied. There was a palatable sense of relief at that announcement.

  :::{)(}:::

  “I'm not going to lie to you, Antuan; it's not going to be an easy mission. Some might see it as a suicide mission. I don't. If anyone could pull it off, I know it would be you,” Cyrano said.

  “Laying it on a bit thick there aren't you, Admiral?” Commodore Rabideau asked dryly. He was not happy about trading in his battle cruiser flagship for a heavy cruiser. But he could understand Cyrano's reasoning for keeping the BCs in Dead Drop.

  “I'm serious.”

  “And I know you are bullshitting me, but I'll let it slide. You are in a crack. Hell, the empire is. Just sitting here on picket duty has told me that much. And you're right to want us to get underway within hours; we don't know when the enemy will take DD01ns. Once they do, we'll be cut off. I won't dare come back here.”

  “You don't think you can slip past them?”

  “Honestly, no,” the commodore replied with a shake of his head. He hated the twelve-minute time delay between exchanges and not because he was impatient. It gave him too much time to think about the plan and how much could go wrong. “I'm going to need to suck those support ships and any captured ships I get dry to have a hope in hell of getting back to civilization.”

  “I know,” Cyrano replied quietly.

  “But hell, I'll do it. We all have to die sometime. I'd like to take some of the bastards with me. And this way it buys you some time. It'll cut off the B-97b jump line though. Don't try to get cute with it again.”

  “I know. But I think it's worth the risk if it delays them another few months.”

  “Me too, which is the other reason I'm doing it. Okay. I see you've got the rest of the ships en route to me now,” he said, checking the scope. Six ships had been highlighted as coming to his picket force. One was a tanker.” We need that collier though.”

  “Berney is on it now. She should leave in about ten hours. You'll have her in a couple days.”

  “Then that gives me that time to get my people up to speed. I'll upload my plans to you so you can have Myron do a rough assessment of our odds and update it with future intel Sedrick gets.”

  “Thanks,” Cyrano replied with a nod. “Out.”

  “Out,” the commodore replied.

  :::{)(}:::

  Garth

  Glennis shook her head at the latest report from Agnes. According to the yard dogs, the yard was near saturation despite the recent round of drafts they'd had moved to the yard. She knew the draftees would take a bit of time to get up to speed and that they would have accidents, but apparently, Agnes did too and had cautioned her on overoptimism. She had a point; the locals were not trained for space work. They were throwing people into suits with only a couple hours of training. They had burned through dozens of EVA techs before one of Agnes' people had insisted they set up simple nets in certain areas and work the new techs in slower to get them acclimated to working in space.

  The good news was—she had fresh reinforcements to play with—another squadron of cruisers had arrived, and this one was fortunately up to speed and didn't need a refit. They had even had some training as a cohesive unit and their senior officers had trained them on the route to Garth as well.

  The bad news was a bit more telling; her husband had sent her missives about the emperor. Despite his speeches, the emperor was still dragging his heels on sending reinforcements. His latest antic was to reorganize the ships that the navy wanted to send. He'd wanted specific ships with specific names to promote the Empire's power and prestige. That had meant shuffling assignment
s and then the reorganized dreadnought squadron had been forced to go through a series of working-up exercises to get the kinks out and learn coordination. But, she was happy to know that they would be leaving within a month of that message.

  That might be a spot of good news, but she was a bit doubtful of the timing. After all, his last message had said the same thing.

  The fear in the Empire had started to tamp down once the population had realized the Feds weren't coming over the horizon immediately. Apparently, Princess Ramichov was still beating the war drum with some effect, but it was muted by her father.

  She ran a finger along one side of her nose. Ordinarily she and others would use the division in house Ramichov to their own purposes. Now, she just wanted them to get their act together. Surely Pyotr saw the danger? According to Frank's report, he'd certainly ranted and raved about the lost battles often enough! He'd been so full of rage … she scowled. Could her own diversions, however minor, be why he was so paranoid at sending Cyrano reinforcements?

  Or, could it be that he was going to write off Dead Drop and Garth? Let them fall, keep the home fleet together and at home and then fight back? Crush the Federation offense in the home star system?

  She closed her eyes and hoped and prayed that wouldn't be the case.

  :::{)(}:::

  Dead Drop

  The arrival of the 7th battle cruiser squadron and other reinforcements was a welcome sight to all, including Captain Abernly. The Seventh Squadron, plus her screen and fleet train, were the largest and most powerful reinforcements to date. It said someone was finally paying attention to the danger. The arrival of some Gather Fleet ships that had been recently refitted and even drilled by Commodore Coughlin was also a welcome sight.

  Many in the senior staff reacted with relief at the sight, even though they had misgivings about the new flag officer in their midst. The commodore was well known as an unimaginative sort who had her lips firmly placed around the emperor's ass. It was rumored that she'd even slept with the emperor once, though anyone who'd met the woman would have immediately discounted it. She wasn't well acquainted in the looks department.

  She might be unimaginative and a stickler for protocol, but she was an effective drillmaster. But it also made a few wonder about Commodore Rabideau and the recent deployment of the DD01ns picket. Commodore Rabideau had started to show a glimmer of imagination and cunning. He would need that if he was going to survive his mission.

  For Admiral De Gaulte's part, he was grateful that Admiral Cartwright was trying to squeeze additional reinforcements their way. According to Melwin's missives, they were running into all sorts of resistance from the emperor and his cronies while also running into teething issues with getting the fleet refitted. The larger capital ships were the worst since they were the largest and therefore the most labor and material intensive.

  He had issued orders for all of the incoming ships to have their battle cruisers stripped of fighters. Even with all of them on Nimitz, he was still coming up short there. But it was a good sign of things to come, as was the CEV Audacious that was with the Seventh. To top that off, several of the fighter pilots from the battle cruisers had served on carriers in the past. He'd also reassigned half of the boat bay personnel from the battle cruises and other ships who had worked on those fighters to the ground and space instillations to help Captain Abernly's people keep the shuttles up and running.

  Lords of space knew they could use the help he thought darkly.

  “Right now, I hate to say it, but the emperor is as much the enemy as the damn Feds. If he'd give us the ships and weapons to do the job, we could stop them cold and roll them up,” Jeremy ventured.

  Sedrick glowered at him. He shrugged. “I can't help but say it. You know it's true.”

  “That doesn't mean you say it, not out loud,” Berney scolded. Jeremy glanced at him and then grimaced.

  “Sorry, sir.”

  “You should be. We'll figure it out.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Chapter 42

  Bek

  Admiral Toronto snarled the luck as his Command fortress went on high alert. He had been concerned about rebels in the area. His sensors were picking up ghosts in the outer dark, but they were too long-range and too faint to nail down.

  He couldn't send out a detachment to run them down; he couldn't trust his people to come back. He was doing all he could to keep everything together but just barely it seemed. The worse the news was from the inner system, the harder it became and the more he questioned why he even bothered.

  Which was why when the unexpected arrival happened, it surprised them all. Ilmarinen was long overdue. Initially he thought she'd finally returned, but then the plot stabilized and his assessment changed in an instant.

  "Sir, there is more than one ship detected. They jumped in two light minutes, call it eighteen million kilometers outside the outer shell," his chief of staff reported as he arrived on the command deck.

  :::{)(}:::

  “Standing down from hyperspace,” the helmsman reported.

  “Keep a charge on that hyper-capacitor bank, Chief,” Captain Astro XXXXIV ordered. “We may still need them.”

  “Let's hope not. It will take at least a minute to charge,” Lieutenant Commander Brillow Platten said softly. Brillow was a Neodog like his captain, but he was a Neopitbull.

  “We're broadcasting our IFF as instructed,” the comm rating said, a beat before the ship's A.I.

  “Good,” the captain replied.

  “We've established contact with the other ships. Network protocols have been established,” Lieutenant JG Butley stated.

  “I bet we set a new record on that run, six weeks. That beat's Caroline's eleven-week record,” Commander Platten said smugly as the captain's channel opened up.

  “I'm just glad it's over,” Captain Perth said through the VID link, eyeing the fortress shell and ships on his own plot. They had jumped well outside the fortress shell to be safe. It seemed the mobile forces of Second Fleet were reacting to their presence as expected. The fact that they were still clearing for action despite their transmission of their IFF was not a good sign.

  He was glad he was in a heavy cruiser. He would miss Caroline, but she was too banged up for a mission like this. Not that he didn't wish to be anywhere else at the moment.

  :::{)(}:::

  Admiral Toronto realized the intruders had jumped short on purpose. Their arrival, well outside his weapons range, had neatly spiked Omar's plan to “accidentally” destroy the ships. He shook his head as the sense of failure set in. So, if they couldn't do it the quiet way, that meant they had to do it the messy way. Well, since he'd done it before with Ilmarinen …

  “Sir, two of the ships are battle cruisers; according to our adjusted war book, they are Newmann Mark II class ships. The other is a heavy cruiser, Resolution Mark II class. Their defenses are online.”

  “Damn it,” the Neogorilla muttered.

  “They are continuing to broadcast their IFF on all channels, sir,” a comm rating said in a painfully neutral voice.

  “New contact! Fresh bogies!” CIC interrupted.

  The admiral's head whipped around to the plot as fresh red icons blinked well beyond the first three.

  He was shocked when the fresh icons appeared in such numbers on the plot. “What the hell?” he demanded. There was no way that many ships could have come through the rapids. No way in hell.

  “Sir, the bogies. They … sir, its Fourth Fleet,” his chief of staff said as he looked up from his own repeater screens.

  “New contacts at bearing minus Y by fourteen million kilometers,” CIC reported.

  “Now what,” the admiral grumbled as things seemed to go from bad to worse. “Like a damn nightmare that won't end,” he muttered under his breath.

  “Sir, additional bogies have lit off their drive. We're getting IFF from them. They are from Third Fleet,” the same CIC tech reported very carefully. “They are on course to rendezvous with the
three starships.”

  “What, is this a party all of a sudden! You are telling me these people sat under stealth and we never even saw them?” he demanded, eyes wide in shock and anger.

  “Apparently not, sir.”

  “Damn it!” the ape snarled, swinging his cybernetic arm around hard enough to make more than one officer duck and step hastily back in alarm.

  :::{)(}:::

  “Bogies have just appeared out of hyperspace!” a CIC tech barked over the intercom. Odette lunged out of bed and then rushed into her skinsuit. She had split Fourth Fleet into two task forces and had detached her own to hide under stealth and monitor the jump point for just that situation. Her ships had been almost ready to give up the mission though; she was running short on fuel and supplies. Morale in the ships were reportedly mixed as well.

  She raced onto her flag bridge and threw herself into her chair. “SITREP?” she demanded.

  “Three ships just jumped in. Second Fleet and the fortress shell is going active. The bogies jumped in well short and are screaming their IFF. They are friendlies, the Admiral Butley, Stormkeeper, and Winterspell—two BCs and an HC respectively,” her chief of staff reported in a taunt voice.

  “They jumped well short of the jump zone. About two light minutes outside the outer shell, ma'am,” her staff navigator reported. “Call it about a light minute and a half from us,” he said.

  “Can we get to them in time to help?”

  “It'll be a race, ma'am. They are just sitting there broadcasting. Second Fleet is clearing for action. Correction, they are now getting underway. Based on our readings, CIC is plotting them as on an intercept course for the three ships.”

  “Are we really going to do this?” Toby asked. “They outnumber us two to one, ma'am. They've got plenty of fuel and supplies, plus the fortresses.”

  “Yes,” Odette replied. “Yes, we are. Send the signal for all ships to go to battle stations. Comm, lay a laser on the three ships.”