“I don’t care. We’re going anyway” said Cmdr Dave Warner. He adjusted his strong frame in his Captain’s chair. “You’re wrong about Manger. He’ll make it. He’ll be there. I owe him that much.” Warner’s words trailed off as his focus shifted to the display screen where the cameras were showing the light playing off the reflective surfaces of the Hermes’ forward edge. ‘What a display’ thought Warner. It never ceased to impress…the transition effects as the Hermes entered warp speed.
The shift in focus wasn’t lost on Rihan. She knew when it was pointless to continue arguing with her commander. Dave Warner leaned his head closer and lowered his voice so the rest of the crew in the command centre wouldn’t hear. “We’ll be OK. Trust me!”
There was that word again “trust”. How many times had she been forced to trust Dave Warner? Wasn’t trust something you gave willingly or at least freely to another? Warner had a bad habit of demanding it from his crew. Yes he’d consult and seek her advice but so often lately he’d ignore that advice if it didn’t fit into his own plan. The autocrat in him was coming to the fore all too often since the opening of hostilities.
She could excuse much of it. Yes he had lost his wife and kids but we had all lost someone on New Hammersley. The pressures of command were many but this latest decision was in her opinion too big a risk to warrant. Here they were in a light frigate, designed for recon and surveillance, heading for a known hot spot with the intention of extracting a so called agent of uncertain loyalty and it was certainly open to debate as to whether this was consistent with their surveillance mission.
“If you say so, but I want my objections noted.” Her green eyes burned into Warner’s and he noted them alright. He knew he was burning up his brownie points at a prodigious rate. But he had to. There were things he could not share with his deputy, not at this stage anyway. He had to heed the call from Manger.
Warner extracted himself from his seat and made his way to his cabin. What he needed now was time to rest. He was exhausted.
Compared to the rest of the crew’s quarters his was spacious, but even so on a small ship like the Hermes, space was always at a premium and for a man who likes to have a lot of personal space around him Dave found his cabin… inadequate.
He unbuckled his sidearm and hung it over the chair in front of the small desk. His console was flashing at him advising him that there were a hundred and one things to do. He hit the sleep button. They could wait.
He took a shower in what amounted to a cylinder. He was a little taller than average and had a solid build. So he found the shower space cramped. Afterwards he wiped away the steam from the mirror. As he applied the toothpaste to his electric brush he observed the worry lines that were just creeping onto his forehead and wondered how much longer before he lost his rugged good looks. He brushed his dark thick hair and changed into his sleep wear, loose shorts and a t-shirt. He dimmed the lights. Sleep was beckoning. He got under the covers of his bed. ‘Well at least there’s no bunk on top’ he said to himself.
He closed his eyes and thought of his wife, Amy. He dismissed the guilt, kept the grief at bay and instead pictured her lovely face on the pillow back home. Oh how he loved that face. What great moments they had shared. ‘But there won’t be any more’ he thought. He felt the wave of sorrow welling up in him.
‘Gratitude’s the key, Dave’ he said to himself. ‘Yes it’s the key’. He knew that but still he needed to remind himself lest he sink into despair. Once again he kissed the image of her lovely face and slept.
Chapter 3. Hermes in warp to Alpha Phi 0130, 21 April
Dave woke at 1400 after only 6 hours. He tried to write a report but after the fourth draft decided against it all together. He dropped into the medbay to check up on Sue Chalker but she had already discharged herself.
He made an announcement to the crew about the disaster on Josker, the lost comrades and he accepted full responsibility. The last bit helped purge some of the emotion but he grabbed an early dinner and retired to his cabin straight after, leaving Rihan to organise the watch roster. At 2100 he fell asleep and this time it was a deep sleep.
In the wee hours of the morning he began to dream…. He was the witness back in his home in New Hammersley. The date time display on the fridge read 2015, 6 Jan 2512.
Amy Warner turned off the news program. All that talk of tension between the Federation and the Alliance just made her anxious anyway. ‘What are they thinking? We’re all human after all’ she thought as she rose from her seat and turned on the old coffee machine on the kitchen island.
She looked back to the kids’ bedroom and was grateful they were finally asleep. Her fingers strummed the bench top impatiently. How she wished they could replace this ancient machine. But her husband, Dave, wouldn’t hear of it. She smiled as she recalled him defending the machine with his body when she proposed getting rid of it.
She poured out the flat white and had to admit that the coffee did taste nice, though she knew Dave’s claim was essentially sentimental. She stood there sipping her coffee, looking out through the big windows at the spaceport from where he had taken off only two weeks ago. ‘Has it only been two weeks’ she said to herself. How she wished he were here now, standing behind her with his arms around her. She tilted her head as she had done so often in the past and could almost feel him kissing the nape of her neck, tenderly blowing air past her ear and nibbling her lobe.
She caressed her lobe. It was not the same. She knew this longing would only get stronger before he came back to her in two months’ time.
But she reminded herself that she was not alone. All her friends were in the same boat for this was a Fleet town, the biggest base in the Far Reaches. Polaris, where she was born, was a long way away and Earth, the so called centre of human civilisation that she had never seen, was much further still.
A shuttle was coming in to land at the spaceport. She saw its landing lights directed at one of the many runways and pads. Another was taking off nearby.
She remembered their last farewell. Dave looked resplendent in his uniform. He looked torn as he kissed her. She knew why. She knew they were soul mates and that he loved his children but he was also a man of duty and he loved his first independent command. The Hermes looked sleek that evening under the spaceport floodlights. She had held it together as they parted but oh, how she cried as she put the kids in the car.
‘He could be warping into some nearby star system right now’ she thought.
“Craft warping into sector echo niner” hailed Sgt Gene Radcliff of the New Hammersley spaceport Control “identify yourself.” Gene was trying hard to focus with all the background noise from within the control tower. Combined, the twelve fellow controllers and shift supervisor made a lot of noise.
“Craft warping into sector echo niner identify yourself” hailed Gene. Gene waited impatiently. Her eyes were on the clock. Standard operating procedures called for her to issue a warning if they did not comply within one minute of warping in. There had been a push to reduce this time but the civvy fleets complained that a lot of their craft still took a minute before they got their comms back on line after coming out of warp.
“Craft warping into sector echo niner this is a warning. Identify yourself immediately or you will be considered hostile.” Gene hit the alert control which activated a flashing light above her station and the supervisor came over.
“Give them another warning Gene” said 1st Lt Teddy Xi. “What type of craft is this? Hey Jack, what type of craft is this?”
“Strange. Unknown boss” said Cpl Jack Milan.
“Craft warping into sector echo niner this is your final warning” hailed Gene.
“What do you mean unknown?” asked Teddy
“Oh shit missiles launched” yelled out Gene. “I count 20, no 24 incoming.
“Fuck!” said Teddy. “Tag ‘em Gene” barked Teddy. “Bravo this is Control weapons release. Bravo 1 engage Bogey 1. Bravo 2 and 3 engage runners. NOW!”
&nbs
p; Teddy leaned over Gene and hit the emergency warning control. Sirens went off all over the spaceport and across the bay at the marine base.
But Amy, behind her sealed windows, heard nothing. She did see the surface to space batteries fire, but she put that down to yet another practice. She used the tip of her tongue to wipe away the last of the coffee from her top lip, turned and placed the cup on the bench. The intense flash of light filled the room. The reflection from the fridge blinded her. Instinctively she ran to the kid’s bedroom. She didn’t make it.
“AMY! AMY!” cried out Dave. He sat bolt upright in his bed aboard the Hermes. His chest was heaving and he reached out with his hand. He felt for his communicator on the side table, turned his head to scrutinise it and saw that the time was 0130 hours on the 21st of April 2512. The dashboard on the console told him the ships status ‘in warp to Alpha Phi’.
His breathing was coming under control now.
“Shit it’s just a dream, just a dream.”
He lay back down on the pillow, reminded himself that he had to be up early. Tomorrow was going to be another big day. He closed his eyes. A moment later there she was, Amy, his soul mate. A tear rolled down from the corner of his eye onto the pillow.
Chapter 4. Hermes 0900, 21 April
1st Lt Rihan Kabel was a beautiful woman looking wary. Her almond shaped green eyes were waiting for Warner’s arrival. She had fair and smooth complexion, though it looked a little warm under the strong lights in the briefing room. Her long auburn hair with its natural soft curl was done up tight in a ponytail. She had a voluptuous figure of average height but it was honed with daily exercise. Right now her long graceful hands were on her hips. She meant business.
Commander Warner had requested a conference with the ops staff, which on a small vessel like the Hermes, amounted to her and 2nd Lt Chase Hanlon, who was the Ops Officer and also with Chief Pug Sterkze, who led the small marine detachment. Pug’s inclusion was ominous but necessary. Rihan resolved to limit the commitment of any personnel to the immediate security of any landing point. She did not want another Josker on her hands.
The loss of Haskins and his team on Josker still played heavily on her mind. She knew she should have been more forceful and insisted on the alternate LZ. They all had learnt a lot from that mission.
Chase Hanlon shifted his lean body on the seat as he turned his head to acknowledge Warner’s entry. With only two years of experience since graduating from Fleet Academy he knew he was the green horn on the ship’s officer roster. But he also knew that his near top of the class achievements marked him for fast promotion. His father’s pull accounted for the rest. But it was his request to join a recon ship. Anything to prove he was his own man. His father hadn’t liked it one bit. But there wasn’t a lot he could do once the Hermes had departed for the Far Reaches.
Chase liked Warner. He was smart like himself, a lateral as well as a vertical thinker. There was a lot he could learn from his commander. Warner was also a risk taker. After Josker, though, the jury was still out on whether the risks had been adequately calculated. While his confidence in Warner had taken a hit he knew that in war shit happens to even the best. So he was still prepared to give the commander his due.
“Good morning Sir.” Chase added with a smile that sat easy with his youthful looks. He brushed back a lock of his light brown hair. It would keep falling down and he would keep brushing it back throughout the course of the day. He had a wide, almost rectangular face with a wide smile to go with it.
Pug nodded his head. He was a stocky fellow with a powerful chest that years of hard physical service had developed. He had never been the best looking man in a room and at his more mature years never would. But Pug did have a nice smile when he chose to use it, though that was not that often these days.
“Top of the day to you too, Chase. Rihan…Pug…thanks for coming.” Warner sat down aware that there were still bridges to be rebuilt but also aware that there was precious little time in which to do that. But something had to be said now.
“I know we should do a full debrief of Josker, determine what worked and why things turned to shit at the end. But we don’t have time for that right now. Our ETA is just hours away and we have another op to plan. Mistakes were made by a number of people but ultimately the loss of Haskin and his team is down to me. That was my call to use LZ Alpha. I shouldn’t have listened to Rugel. It won’t happen again.”
“Why then are we still chasing Manger?” Rihan cut in. “He can’t be trusted. For all we know he set us up on Josker.”
“You don’t know that. All my experience with Manger says otherwise.”
“Just because you shared active duty with him five years ago, doesn’t tell us anything about where his loyalties lie now.” Rihan wasn’t going to do this but Warner had left the door open and she wasn’t about to let it pass. “He’s been in the Far Reaches for three years now. His sister was on Josker. For all we know he’s decided to hang his star on their tree rather than ours.”
“Maybe but I can’t see him siding with them after what they did to his family. They were on New Hammersley when it was hit just like mine, just like yours, just like so many others. That would take a ruthlessness that even Manger doesn’t have.”
“We’ve all lost someone but that doesn’t mean we’re all out to get revenge. Please Sir, open your eyes. Who else would have betrayed us on Josker? Who else had the opportunity and the capacity? The only people who knew about our mission were on this ship, Admiral Yomoto at Polaris Fleet HQ and Manger.”
“You’re forgetting Rugel.” Warner responded with a stare that bore into Rihan like a laser.
“You’ve got to be kidding. Why on earth would Rugel betray his own group? That doesn’t make sense at all. It makes less sense than Manger. Rugel’s been trying to rally resistance on Josker for three months now. He organised the attack on the space port.”
“Which was a disaster.” Warner interjected.
“Yeah just like our little op!” Rihan’s dander was up. She knew she needed to watch herself here, especially in front of the others, but the frustration was rising fast now.
“So we don’t have a monopoly on mistakes. That still doesn’t dismiss the possibility that Rugel could have betrayed us or for that matter Manger or Yomoto.”
“Sir, I don’t think we can seriously consider the Admiral.” Chase hesitantly motioned.
Warner turned to Chase. “Look we’re a long way out from base. It takes days for signals to go back and forth, especially if we’re warping. Who knows what could have happened and what Fleet deem to be necessary. Yes it’s extremely unlikely but it is a possibility.” Then easing himself back into his seat Warner addressed the group at large, “We’re often operating in the dark and have to rely on our own judgements here with imperfect intel. Let’s leave it at this. Until we get some more intel Manger, Rugel and Yomoto are all suspects.”
Sensing the pause Pug Sterkze’s deep voice entered the fray. “Aren’t we forgetting about the possibility that someone on this ship could have betrayed us?”
“No, there is no evidence of any unauthorised transmissions from Hermes. I had Kiralenko do an audit last night.” Rihan chimed in.
“But do we trust Kiralenko” responded Pug.
“Rihan, double check the transmissions yourself and don’t forget to check for any deletions.” Warner directed. “And get back to me before lunch. OK we don’t have much time. So let’s focus on what we need to do later today.”
“Chase I want you to come up with some options for inserting a small team near Tindel. I’m the only one who knows Manger so I will lead the insertion team. Rihan you will be in command of the ship. It will be your call on any extraction. For the team we’ll need a demolition expert and a tech specialist as well as four cool-headed marines. Pug, you need to choose the team. I realise you’re down to only two squads and normally we would retain one on board and another at the LZ. But you’ll have to go light on the on-board squad.�
�
“Contingencies, Sir?” Chase piped up. “In case we’re bounced when we come out of warp.”
“Good point, Chase. We’re coming out on the dark side of the moon. So we should be masked from planet side sensors. I doubt if they have the resources to mount an early warning station on the dark side but they could have a ship on patrol. Chase, what do we know about the likely enemy ships in the area?”
“Last reports indicate they have a small flotilla of corvettes, three or four operating across this sector. We can deal with them. But the Wasp Group could potentially intervene - unlikely, but possible. If Manger, I mean whoever betrayed us, is onto our next move, then it could get there before us. And a carrier group is going to eat us for breakfast.”
“Agreed. So we warp back to Klaster, wait and re-enter in two days’ time.”
“Are you still just going to head straight for the RV (rendezvous) with Manger?” Rihan queried. “I reckon you should hold up short of the RV and check out the area first.”
“If we had the time I would. But once we touch down we must assume detection and that the enemy will respond with the Wasp. They’ll be here within 24 hours and we need to be long gone. That doesn’t leave much time for reconnaissance.”
“Why are we dancing to Manger’s tune?” Rihan countered. “Why don’t we find a way to leave him a message at the RV saying we’ll be back at X time. Then we warp back to Klaster and return to a place and at a time of our choosing. We can even leave an operative on the ground to keep the RV under surveillance.”
“No we don’t have time for that. Manger will smell a rat and bug out.”
“Then at least send someone else in first to suss out the RV.”
“Yes, but they won’t know what he looks like and, if they aren’t careful, they will just draw attention to us.”
Pug, with deep reassuring voice, chimed in “Chalker could do it, Sir. We could fit her up with remote sensors so you could hear and see everything she does.”
The Awakening: Book 1 of Warner's World Page 2
