The Double Spiral War Trilogy
Midway Between * Polar Fleet * Final Command
Warren C. Norwood
United Central Systems
Auxiliary Forces
Specialists
Planetary Forces
Space Forces
(12)
Admiral
(11) Marshall
Meister
Vice-Admiral
(10) Commander
Force Meister
Commander
(9) Vice-Marshall
Brig Meister
Vice-Commander
(8) Group Leader
Force Leader
Group Leader
(7) Attack Leader
Brig Leader
Sub-Group Leader
(6) Actual
Warden
Captain
(5) 2nd Actual
Volk Leader
Vice-Captain
(4) 3rd Actual
Chief
1st Volk
Lieutenant
(3) Miker
Petty Chief
2nd Volk
1st Lieutenant
(2) Timino
Enseeoh
Cell Leader
2nd Lieutenant
(1) Leo
Connor
Celler
3rd Lieutenant
Non-Officer
(17) Ax
Barman
Coord
(16) Attack Coord
Ringer
Range Coord
(15) 2nd Ax
Keyman
Boater
(14) Gunner
Locker
Boater 2nd
(13) Piper
Bunker
Boater 3rd
(12) Flager
2nd Bunker
Crewer (12 grades)
(11) Niner (9 Grades)
3rd Bunker
(10)
Ace (6 grades)
Yarder (4 grades)
Sondak
Planetary Forces
Flight Service (Corps)
Warrants/Specialists
Space Forces
(12) Commander-General
Pro-Avitor (never used)
Admiral
(11) General
Avitor
Fleet Admiral
(10) Post-General
Avitor Once
Post-Admiral
(9) Quarter-General
Avitor Duce
Quarter-Admiral
(8) Brigadier
Flight Leader
Commander
(7) Colonel
Co-Flight Leader
Post-Commander
(6) Captain
Pilot
Chief Warrant Officer-4
Captain
(5) Post-Captain
Fleet Pilot
CWO-3
Fleet Captain
(4) Co-Captain
Ship Pilot
CWO-2
Ship Captain
(3) Lieutenant
Rank Pilot
CWO-1
Quarter Captain
(2) Post-Lieutenant
Co-Pilot
Warrant Officer
Lieutenant
(1) Co-Lieutenant
Nav-Pilot
Ante-Warrant
Fleet Lieutenant
Non-Officer
(17) Sergeant
Fleet Tech
High Tech
(16) Post-Sergeant
Fleet Gunner
Tech
(15) Gun Sergeant
Flight Tech
Tech Help
(14) Tech Sergeant
Flight Gunner
Tech’s Mate
(13) Co-Sergeant
Ship Tech
Gun Tech
(12) Squader/Brevet Sergeant
Ship Gunner
Watch Leader
(11) Co-Squader
Rank Tech
Watch Help
(10) Trooper (8 grades)
Rank Gunner
Watch Mate (3 grades)
(7)
Gunner/Tech (7 grades)
Spacer (5 grades)
Chronology
NINETY-TWO YEARS AFTER THE SIGNING of the treaty that officially ended the Unification Wars, Earth sent forth the first two generation ships to seek new homes for mankind in the stars.
The Bohr and the Heisenberg together carried a total of three thousand seven hundred eighty-three pioneers and crew members. Each ship was powered by ten linked Hugh drives that eventually pushed them to a speed of one-point-four times the speed of light relative to Earth. At that speed their Benjamin drives took over, and they crossed Einstein’s Curve where relative speed could no longer be measured.
Two hundred forty-one ship years later, the descendants of those first pioneers celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of their landing on the planet they named Biery after the woman who led their forebears from Earth. Much to their mixed surprise and fear, that celebration was interrupted by the landing of an alien ship containing a race called the Oinaise. To everyone’s relief---including the Oinaise’s-the contact was peaceful.
Nine years later the Kobler calendar was established and set the date of the first landing as New Year 2500. The following chronology gives a brief listing of major events dated according to that calendar.
2530 ― First contact with the Oinaise.
2575 ― First pioneers arrive on Nordeen, the most Earthlike of any planet ever discovered in the galaxy.
2599 ― Approximate date the last generation ship left Earth, carrying fourteen thousand new-human pioneers, genetically altered people known as homo communis, whose major difference from homo sapiens was a greatly extended longevity.
2648 ― The anti-intellectualist riots.
2657 ― Beginning of the early expansionist movement seeking other planets and star systems suitable for human settlement
2664 ― Last known message from Earth indicating war, famine, and increasing chaos.
2681 ― A group of Nordeen’s brightest people call themselves homo electus and leave aboard the Mensch in search of what they hope will be a better home for the intellectually elite.
2723 ― The Gouldrive tested and proven. Marks the beginning of the Great Expansionist Movement, the settling of many independent systems, and the establishment of true interstellar trade. The phrase, “a planet for every clan,” became popular at this time. During the whole movement scientific research and technological progress were extremely limited.
2774 ― News reaches Nordeen from the so-called homo electus’s first contact with the alien Verfen, a reclusive race inhabiting a cluster of star systems near galaxy’s center.
2784 ― First contact with the crab-like, methane-breathing Castorians.
2846 ― Discovery of Cloise.
2862 ― Foundation of Sondak, a loose federation of fifty eight sparsely inhabited planetary systems. Homo electus demanded and received recognition as a separate human race as the price of joining the federation.
2893 ― Foundation of the misnamed United Central Systems, twenty-seven planetary systems inhabited mostly by homo communis. The establishment of the U.C.S. marked the end of the Great Expansionist Movement.
3021 ― The first galactic war between Sondak and the U.C.S.
3024 ― The U.C.S., unable to match Sondak’s capacity for producing the tools of war, sued for peace. After extended negotiations during which the fighting continued, the U.C.S. promised to pay heavy economic reparations to Sondak and the independent systems, and also agreed not to produce new war materials for one hundred years. Neither promise was kept.
3029 ― Seemi
ngly spontaneous civil disorder broke out on several planets populated mostly by the fair-skinned, racially distinct, politically fractious pikeans. Although called by some the Pikean Civil War, the dissidents had neither the numbers nor the equipment to fight a true war, and consequently were forced to leave their home planets. Many of them chose to go to systems controlled by the U.C.S., where they quickly aligned themselves with the political factions that supported a new war with Sondak.
3033 ― The Cczwyck Skirmish occurred when U.C.S. Admiral Nance made an officially unauthorized attempt to take control of that independent system just as a Sondak border squadron was making a courtesy visit. There was no serious fighting, but the political repercussions caused the U.C.S. to accelerate its secret rearmament program; caused Sondak to increase its economic pressures on the U.C.S. and also on the independent systems that refused to join the confederation; and caused Cczwyck to become more isolationist.
3034 ― 3042-Sporadic raids on U.C.S.-chartered freighters by unknown agents were blamed on Sondak despite fierce diplomatic denials and a total lack of evidence.
3038 ― Long-range plans began in the U.C.S. for a new war against Sondak
3046 ― The so-called “Double-Spiral War began with raids on ten isolated Sondak systems and several independent systems. During the year the U.C.S. captured the independent systems of Fernandez, Cczwyck, the water planets of Thayne-G, the three systems in the Ivy Chain, and Ca-Ryn. The aliens of Oina and Cloise found themselves drawn unwillingly toward participation in the war. Matthews system, strategically located midway between Sondak and the U. C. S., was the target of an attack and invasion planned and directed by U.C.S. Commander Frye Charltos. The attack failed due to the planning of Sondak Admiral Josiah Gilbert, with the help of Admirals Pajandcan and Dawson, and a great deal of luck. The system was saved, but with a great loss of ships and personnel on both sides. Matthews system’s principal planet, Reckynop, was rendered a watery ruin by U. C. S. neutronic missiles that exploded over its poles and melted its icecaps. However, the battle for Matthews was considered a victory for Sondak.
3047 ― The year opens with the launching of new U.C.S. subspace hunter-killers-the hunks. Sondak’s forces on Sutton strongly resist the U. C. S. occupation force and with the aid of a newly reformed Polar Fleet defeat the U.C.S. there and in a space battle for the Satterfield system. The prototype for Sondak’s Ultimate Weapon is deliberately lost, and the aliens begin bargaining for a neutral alliance.
3048 ― U.C.S. Admiral Frye Charltos and Bridgeforce declare a victory at Satterfield and commence planning for a final series of strikes against Sondak, while Sondak’s Admiral Gilbert and General Schopper begin their plans for a counteroffensive.
Midway Between
The Double Spiral War
Volume One
1
FRYE CHARLTOS READ THE BATTLE REPORTS with harshly conflicting emotions. So far the surprise attacks had worked almost exactly as he had planned. He should be pleased. Yesterday he would have been. Yesterday Doctor Nise had not called him with the final news. Yesterday there was still hope that Vinita might be cured of her disease. Yesterday was gone.
Today the combined task force of the United Central Systems had attacked six of Sondak’s most outlying planets and destroyed most of their peripheral fleet. Today war had started between the two spirals of the galaxy, a war which Frye Charltos had been advocating and planning for years. Today was the beginning of freedom for the U.C.S.
Today was the beginning of the end for Vinita.
Frye shut off his microspooler. Leaning back in his chair, he closed his eyes and folded his long pliant hands in his lap. As he thought about Vinita, he unconsciously clenched his fingers until they were locked in a rigid hammer of tan flesh which pounded softly against his thighs.
Vinita had tried to prepare him for this. She had known in some deep, interior way that she was dying. With that knowledge had come a peace that angered him almost as much as her disease did. To Frye it seemed as though she were giving up, refusing to fight this tragedy any longer. But Vinita had countered it by saying it was better to live with the truth than to hide from it.
Frye smiled slightly, and his hands relaxed for a moment. She had thrown his own words back at him. “Live with the truth,” he had told her when she finally understood after twenty years of marriage that he was first and foremost a soldier. “Live with the truth,” she had said before she went to Nise-Kim Center for the last-chance tests.
The truth. The truth was that Frye had never loved anyone in his whole life like he had loved Vinita. The truth was that he had promised to help her avoid the suffering she faced if these test results confirmed all the previous ones. The truth was that he had promised to kill his wife, and Frye Charltos did not want to live with the truth.
The microspoolers tiny bell binged rapidly; another set of battle reports had been received. Reluctantly Frye opened his eyes. One by one he blocked his emotions off from the immediate present in a way he had done so many times before. This was a great day for the U.C.S., and that was a larger truth than any personal tragedy he would ever face.
The eyes that read his microspooler were calm and professional. The brain that sorted and analyzed the reports concentrated solely on the task at hand. The voice that gave the orders into the lapelcom he wore was the stern, controlled voice of Joint Force Commander Frye ed’Laitin Charltos. But deep beneath the conscious levels of his mind, a husband cried for his wife in the dry tears of despair.
◊ ◊ ◊
Frenzy ruled in the Situation Room at Sondak’s military headquarters on Nordeen. Scattered reports and pieces of information were coming in from bases on planets in six systems, each report, each fragment of description seemingly worse than the one which preceded it.
“Who’s in charge here?” a harsh voice bellowed above the noise.
The sound level subsided like a landslide slowly coming to a halt. Suddenly a young captain looked up and saw General Mari standing just inside the door. “I am sir,” she said firmly with a salute from halfway across the room.
Other heads looked up, but when they saw Captain Gilbert turn away from the general, they went back to what they had been doing. The information flow did not stop just because a general walked into the room.
Trailed by two aides, General Mari strode quickly through the crowded room. Despite what appeared to be pandemonium when he had first entered the room, he could see little wasted effort as he made his way to the captain who had answered him. For the moment he would bite his tongue and find out what the hell was going on. Then he would chew that captain’s ass up one side and down the other.
“Sorry, sir,” Captain Gilbert said when the general was less than two steps away, “but I had to relay some information to BORFLEET Command before we lost our com-window.”
“How bad is it?” Mari asked.
“If all this is true, sir, and I can only assume it is, then it’s worse than bad. From the reports we have so far, I estimate that we have lost close to seventy-five percent of the Border Fleet either heavily damaged or totally destroyed.”
“The Ukes?”
“Four confirmed reports say yes. Half-a-set of others still to be confirmed suggest the same.”
“Damn. Damn, damn, damn. Who all have you notified?”
“Every major command and commander we could reach. We won’t have a com-window for Polar Fleet for another two days, so we sent the message through Mugtinez Relay. Should have acknowledgement in six hours or so.”
“What makes you think that they haven’t been hit also?”
Captain Gilbert barely blinked. “I haven’t had time for speculation, sir,” she lied. “I can barely deal with the information I’ve got rolling in on me.”
A com-tech demanded the captain’s attention, and while she was dealing with the problem, Mari took another look around the room. The total shock of what had happened still had not reached him. He had been one of the leading voices arguing th
at the U.C.S. would never risk going to war with Sondak. The Ukes were still too dependent on Sondak resources and technology, he had said. They were also too bound by their traditions and culture to enter another war without a long period of diplomatic protests and internal rationalizations.
That’s what Mari had argued, because that’s what he believed. Now all his beliefs were being proved wrong in the worst possible way.
As that thought struck home, the shock of understanding struck with it. Mari was galvanized by anger. “Captain,” he said just as Gilbert turned back to him, “I’ll be in the Command Center. You will update all the information as soon as you receive it, and send it there.”
“I’m already doing that, sir. Admiral Stonefield has been in the Command Center for the past hour.”
Mari was furious. “Why was he notified first?”
“Because he was in the building, sir.”
Without a word, General Mari turned and left the Situation Room. Captain Mica Gilbert watched him go without regret. All she needed was more top brass giving her orders and slowing down the work her understaffed crew was trying to get done. Moments later she was back in the middle of it, sorting through the new reports, giving new sets of instructions, and waiting for the one report that wasn’t due for another six hours. Her father, Admiral Josiah Gilbert, was the commander of Polar Fleet.
◊ ◊ ◊
Lucky Teeman stared in disbelief at the sight on his screens when his ship emerged from behind Ivan’s Sun. What he should have seen was a set of navigational signals forming a grid he could follow to Roberg. Instead, his navscreens showed wavy lines and his lightspeed communications receiver was clanging on four frequencies.
It didn’t make any sense, but Lucky had not come by his nickname casually. Luck, he had learned early in life, was making the best of every situation. He immediately reduced Greycloud’s speed and opened the first lightspeed communications channel. All he got was coded junk, so he switched to a second one. More of the same. The third channel yielded a voice babbling in a language Lucky didn’t recognize. What he heard on the fourth channel chilled him to the core of his trader’s heart.
Double Spiral War Trilogy Page 1
