“Some would argue that it’s the Navy, as in the very Imperial Navy that’s about to invade us, and not the Fleet that’s been holding things together. While others would argue it’s organizations like the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet that are the reason everyone in this room, not to mention this Sector, are still breathing,” shot back the Captain.
“That’s enough.” McCruise’s voice cracked like a whip. The Captain looked at her mutinously. “I am not LeGodat and this is not the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet,” growled the Acting Commodore, “we stand by our brothers and sisters in uniform and hold faith with our oaths to the Confederation. Is that clear? If you want to sue the Grand Assembly in the courts for back pay, by all means file a brief and I’ll forward it for you at the first opportunity.”
“The Grand Assembly isn’t the entire Confederation, and Imperial Navy certainly isn’t the Confederation Fleet Sir!” shot back the Captain.
“The same way our ‘Grand Admiral’ who, by his very own actions, is no longer a part of our Fleet?” Synthia McCruise ground out. “My sympathy is there but it is decidedly not without limits, Captain,” she took a calming breath, “however because of the irregular nature of this command I won’t hold it against any man, woman or herm in the Reserve Squadron who requests relief or separation from service. If you find yourself unable to keep your sworn oath, Captain, then just say so and there’s the door,” she said gesturing before adding more sympathetically. “No one will hold it against you.”
“Why are you doing this, Sir? Our oath is to protect the Confederation from all enemies internal or external. If invading its own territory so that it can sell seven Sectors of the Spine to the Empire isn’t a violation of that charter, I don’t know what is. There have been no planetary, sector or regional votes in the Spine to join the Empire, so how is the Grand Assembly not acting out the very definition our charter has for a domestic enemy of the people, Commodore McCruise?” asked the Captain resolutely.
“That is borderline treason, Mister,” she snapped.
“A Confederation is not an Empire. A Confederation means each star system and Sector has individual sovereignty! A federation-based federal authority might trump local sovereignty, but we’re Confederal, Sir—there’s a difference!”
“You’re splitting hairs now, Captain. Lock it down,” she ordered.
“They can’t do this,” he said hotly and rising to his feet, “it’s wrong, it’s immoral and it's grounds, under the charter we are sworn to uphold, for legal rebellion.”
“That’s your interpretation—one made without all the facts at hand—” started McCruise.
“Facts we’ve been denied! How hard would it be to send a courier to this starbase? But no! We don’t get so much as a mail run back here, instead they sent an invasion fleet!” cried the Captain.
“Marines,” McCruise leaned forward and activated her com-channel to call in security before turning back to the Captain. “As I was saying, we don’t know all the facts. More importantly, I regret that it has come to this,” McCruise said as the door behind her opened and a pair of marines entered the room, “as I said before: I sympathize with anyone who cannot continue in service under these conditions, and won’t hold their honest beliefs against them so long as they do not rise above belief and into actions which, in turn, rise to the level of mutiny against this command. As the current system commander, I cannot allow the chain of command be compromised. I hope you understand,” she finished firmly.
“I understand that you’ve lost touch with reality,” Far-Bright snapped.
“Sergeant, please remove the Captain from my office and confine him to quarters for a 24 hour period. There will be a temporary hold and no incoming or outgoing messages from him during this time,” ordered McCruise.
“You can’t do this, Synthia. Our own people won’t sit still for it,” protested the Captain as a Marine appeared on either side of her.
“This way please, Sir,” said the Marine Sergeant as each woman taking hold of one of his arms.
“I agree with you that a number of our people won’t, perhaps even a large number,” McCruise said sadly before squaring her shoulders, “which is why I have to make sure this split is as peaceful as possible. I won’t have a blood bath where sister turns against brother and friends against each other. I won’t allow it.”
“We’ve spilt too much blood to just hand Easy Haven back over to those Imperial butchers, Synthia,” pleaded the Captain. “You know what they’ll do to this Sector. History is replete with examples of Imperial ‘pacification’ efforts.”
“Those actions were mostly against uncivilized barbarians,” Synthia dismissed. “I can’t imagine Confederation Observers allowing things to go that far,” she shook her head with certainty, “I don’t see that happening but by the same token I completely disagree with you on one thing. You seem to think taking a stand like this, with the ‘Grand’ Admiral, will work. It won’t,” she said harshly, “you can’t fight mega governments from the outside. I’ll concede that someone has to hold them accountable for what they’ve done, for what they’re doing even right now, but that can’t happen if you’re part of some two bit rebellion destined to be crushed!”
“You don’t know that! Almost every battle the Little Admiral fought has been against the odds but we’re still here, Commodore,” Far-Bright passionately rejected.
“Seven Sectors against fourteen, and an additional thirteen Imperial provinces—each of them anywhere from half again to almost twice the size of a Confederation Sector?” she shook her head in disappointment. “There’s no way to win that. The only way to get justice for the Spine is to hold the politicians back in the core accountable for what they’ve done is from ‘inside’ the system. And as far as I’m concerned, you and the others that think like you, while noble in sentiment, are just going to get a lot of good women killed fighting a foe you don’t even realize you can’t beat.”
“Winning is not all important. At the end of the day our job is to hold the line, not hand it over to the very sort of people we’re supposed to protect the citizens against. Sometimes a captain goes down with his ship,” said the Captain, “LeGodat would have understood that! You don’t know if we’d lose or not. Just look at our battle with the Reclamation Fleet we’ve faced long odds beside the Little Admiral and won in the past. ”
“A pyrrhic victory if ever I saw one, and I won’t have it! Let me repeat myself: I am not LeGodat. That’s it. I’m done arguing with you,” McCruise said face hardening, “I am not a dictator. I won’t stop any man or woman from following the dictates of her conscience when she’s taking a stand on principle and honor. You and the others like you will be given every chance to link up with the Grand Admiral,” she paused, “by way of a resupply ship. While I think more people will agree with my position after everything’s been properly explained, and without the dissenting voices of firebrands like yourself to egg them on to their deaths, I repeat that this command will not fall to internal strife or internecine activities. Now take him away,” she said to the Marines.
The politicians who’ve screwed over the Reserve Squadron and seven Sectors of the Confederation, the Sectors of the Spine, will have their day of reckoning, McCruise added with silent determination.
It was a sad day when that was the best she, the commander of a fortified star system, could offer the citizens of the border Sectors the Confederation Fleet was sworn to protect. Although she wouldn’t admit it aloud, part of her wanted to go broadside to broadside with the Imperials and their Confederation, boot-licking lackeys.
Maybe if LeGodat had still been alive she would have chosen to fight the good fight, even knowing the inevitability of defeat, to keep faith with her brothers in arms. But he was gone and might never come back.
Yes, Montagne had, despite some high body counts, managed to pull off several stunningly risky victories but even he lost his fair share of battles along the way. But she knew she was right: when you fought mega government
s you couldn’t afford to lose even one battle. Defeat one fleet and they’d just send three more in its place, and another two after that, until you were crushed. On that level tactics and élan failed in the face of the brutal reality of the numbers game, and there was a reason no one bucked the mega governments. At least not successfully.
She was ready to die for her people, but only if it would do some good. In her judgment, this wouldn’t. Now was the time to salvage what she could and pull back. It was a bitter pill to swallow, abandoning Easy Haven and the Wolf-9 complex, but all she could do was save her people and try to build up a position back in the heartland sectors that would allow her to hold the politicians to account…some day.
That last battle for Easy Haven hadn’t just broken Wolf-9 and destroyed the bulk of their active fleet. It had killed thousands of her fellow officers and crew. The Starbase today was a pale shadow of what it had been in it’s prime. If she’d had five years, heck even just two more years to rebuild…but she didn’t. The Empire was here now and there was no getting around that.
Montagne was just going to have to play the hand he was dealt, the same as the rest of them. She wouldn’t fire on a former ally given the choice—which was why it was time to wrap things up here and pull out.
Chapter 18: Imperial Destroyer Squadrons
“Striker Prime this is Striker Six-C, no sign of local militia forces at this time. Will continue to monitor the situation,” reported the communications officer of Striker Six.
“Striker Six this is Striker Actual,” a new voice asked over the com-channel, “any local freighter activity?”
“Thirteen freighter transits were detected over a three day period, Actual,” the Communication Officer reported.
“Good work, Striker Six, and you are to proceed to the next destination on the list,” Striker Actual ordered.
“Thank you, Striker Prime,” the Communication’s officer on Striker Six said respectfully, “Striker Six out.”
As Striker Six charged her jump engines and faded away, Striker Prime performed a high scan sweep of the star system while charging its engines before engaging their hyper drive.
Point transferring into a new star system, the Imperial Destroyer appeared well outside Sensor range.
“Silent running enabled, Sir,” reported the Destroyer flagship’s Electronic Warfare officer.
“What do we have on the scan, Chief Rutledge?” asked the Commodore, sitting in the Captain’s Chair, after waiting for several minutes as the tactical plot populated.
“I’m reading over five hundred intra-system signatures, ranging from shuttles to non-hyper capable freighters, as well as three dozen interstellar freighters at their main orbital space station or moving to and from the hyper limit,” reported the Chief.
“Somewhat on the light side for an inner system wouldn’t you say?” the Commodore said disapprovingly. “What’s the name of this star system?”
“Aegis, sir,” the Chief reported crisply.
“What have you got so far on the military front?”
“Two Battleships are in orbit of the system primary, hanging close to their orbital shipyard to do double duty protecting the planet and the yards,” reported Rutledge. “Two Cruiser squadrons posted on Sentinel duty outside of the hyper limit with engines constantly charging. Over fifty lighter warships pulling convoy duty for the star freighters and in-system traffic, as well as three squadrons of Destroyers maneuvering around the system on what look like random hunter killer sweeps, looking for stealthed warships.”
“Definitely on the lighter side for an Inner System. Pathetic,” the Commodore gave his damning judgment.
“I’m not so sure about that,” said the ship’s Executive Officer, “this is the Rim, after all. Both the traffic ranges and warship numbers match Imperial best estimates in the database.”
The Commodore scowled running a hand through his graying hair. “The Spineward Sectors are an armpit,” he scowled and then muttered, “it’s been too long since I’ve been outside the Provinces.”
“Ten years for me,” agreed the Chief, “you know things on the Front have to be going poorly if they’re dragging reservists like us out of retirement to go haring off on some Senator’s wild adventure, Commodore Trempkin.”
“That’s enough of that, Chief,” Trempkin said with a disapproving gaze.
“Sorry, Sir,” the Chief said with the sort of openly respectful tone of voice that indicated to an experienced officer that secretly the Chief was feeling anything but that emotion.
The harsh lines on the Commodore’s face deepened but he refrained from saying anything as the hull of the ship started to groan from the continued gravity strain placed on it from the inertial sump.
“Prepare to break free from the inertial well and continue with silent running on my mark,” said the Commodore.
“Aye, Sir,” the Helmsman said seriously.
“On it, Commodore,” drawled the EW Officer.
The Commodore let the EW’s tone of voice slide. The man was probably the best electronic warfare office in the Reserve Formation outside of the Command Carrier and maybe even including that.
“Continue monitoring system traffic and decrypting all encrypted traffic. We’ll stay here for at least eight hours, unless we discover something critical and then depart. Prepare to deploy a pair of stealth drones in our wake to monitor the system while we’re gone. This may be a poor excuse for an inner system but it’s one of the biggest threats this region has to offer, so stay sharp,” he said, leveling a somber gaze on the crew of the bridge. “Remember: Imperial Partisans of the Reclamation Fleet, whom you’ve all read about in the briefs, were defeated by a coalition of these same Spineward Sector locals. Before you start telling me how they weren’t regular navy or that, the majority of their ships were locally crewed—and let me remind that our partisans had a Command Carrier run by former active duty officers and an Imperial Admiral.”
The Commodore’s somber attitude started to infect the crew.
“Let me repeat: the Spineward Sectors, which were entirely comprised of locally-built third-rate warships, successfully repelled—no, not just repelled but destroyed—an Imperial Command Carrier run by former Imperial officers and carrying an Imperial-trained Admiral. This is the measure of their resolve,” said Commodore Trempkin, “how can we do any less? Do not underestimate them.”
“Aye aye, Commodore,” Chief Rutledge nodded, a steely glint to his eye as all around him officers and crew stiffened at their post.
“We rendezvous with the Hub in seven point seven hours. Stay sharp,” he instructed.
As the hours passed and the ship’s sensors continued to scan, the Commodore took a long look at the information as it came in.
Silently taking special note of the shipyard with the oversized Monitor currently being refitted, and the half dozen Battleship keels and hulls in varying stages of construction, he marked down the Aegis shipyard as a high priority target for future punitive strikes and spoiling raids.
If he’d come here in greater strength…he shrugged the notion off, putting it firmly out of his mind. He had specifically been dispersed so as not to be tempted into a raiding profile. This was an information gathering operation only—for now.
But as orbital fort after orbital fortress, hordes of gun turrets and orbital missile launchers were identified and several areas ideal for stealthed mine fields located he silently marked down the Aegis homeworld’s orbital industry and defense for destruction.
“Eight hours is up, Commodore,” reported the ship’s navigator, “we will reach the point of no return momentarily.
“I think we’ve got all we need from the system for now,” he said decisively, “continue to charge the engines and prepare to jump.”
Thirty minutes later they had jumped into a new system.
“Report!” ordered the Commodore.
“Friendlies spotted. No enemy or unidentified contacts at this time,” said the Lieutenant
Commander in charge of the Destroyer’s sensors.
“Excellent news. Identify our point of contact and establish a secure laser link,” he instructed.
Several minutes later, “Laser link established. Protocols exchanged, code keys register as valid…identity confirmed,” reported the Communications Officer turning to the Commodore with a nod, “they are who they say they are, Sir.”
“Proceed with data dump,” ordered the Commodore.
As soon as the data dump was completed the Destroyer began to charge its engines and proceeded to jump out of the star system. Continuing with its mission to scout out the various Core Worlds and key transit systems located throughout Sector 25. In days they would start their next plant to insert agents into those worlds via stealth shuttles.
Behind them, the Monitor spent the better part of a day charging its hyperdrive and then jumped back to the stealthed FTL relay buoy recently laid by an FTL Com-Stat carrier, to rapidly relay the latest intel directly back to the main fleet and Admiral Cornwallis.
Chapter 19: Receiving the Scout Reports
Cornwallis sat and reviewed the intelligence updates from the Admiral’s ready room on the flag bridge of the Mighty Punisher.
After he finished the report from Commodore Trempkin, the Senator drummed his fingers on the desk pensively.
“Trouble, Praetor?” his military chief of staff asked respectfully.
The Senator eyed the graying commodore enigmatically before flicking his fingers and sending the file directly to the other man’s slate. The Imperial officer scanned through the report before looking up.
“I don’t see the problem here,” the Commodore said quizzically, “the operation seems to be working successfully. Using a Monitor as the centralized gathering point of intelligence is a standard operating procedure for the navy.”
Admiral's Nemesis Part II Page 16
