Solomon Family Warriors II

by Robert H. Cherny

  “Admin, medical and tactical support.” Over a hundred young men and women were now standing looking at him.

  Wren shuddered. “I hate to let you down, but I can’t do this. I have been in combat a handful of times and I have only had myself to worry about. I do not know how to command a fleet.”

  Rachel stared him down. “How many times have you sat beside me as we took Elizabeth and our forces into combat?”

  “Maybe a hundred,” Wren said.

  “Did you learn from those encounters?” Rachel asked.

  “Yes, of course. I find it hard to believe that anyone would follow me anywhere,” Wren stated.

  One young man stepped forward out of the crowd. “Sir, I am Tobias Running-Water. I have seen what happens when the Swordsmen overrun a planet. I do not wish to see that happen again. I came to Eretz because I knew someone there would know how to direct me to someone like you. I only know that when one of the Federation’s most successful Swordsman fighters tells me that you are the one to follow, that’s all I need. My wife, Sunshine, and I will do everything we can to stop the Swordsmen.”

  Wren closed his eyes. The growl in his throat had not abated. “I must remind you, good sir, that the goal is not to die for one’s country. The goal is to help some other poor fool die for his.”

  Tobias smiled. “Roger that.”

  “Grandmother, isn’t this their job?” He pointed at his parents.

  “Yes, and their assets will be deployed elsewhere.”

  “What about the Federation Space Force?”

  “Fully engaged elsewhere for what little value they are. Bunch of incompetent bureaucratic politicians more interested in their wardrobes than winning battles.”

  “So, I am on my own,” Wren observed.

  “Yes,” Rachel affirmed.

  “I suppose someone is going to remind me that I am Greg and Avi’s great-grandson, but I need to remind you that one of my other great grandfathers was a pirate. What does that make me?”

  “The right person for the job,” Timothy said.

  “Under whose authority would I be operating?” Wren asked.

  “You would be acting as an independent contractor being paid by a powerful consortium who is also paying Saturn Industries, Eretz Defense Systems and Stellar to support you.”

  “So we’re all civilians and if captured or killed the secretariat will deny all knowledge of our activities?” Wren said with a smirk.

  “Something like that,” Timothy said.

  “NO! How many time do I have to tell you people the answer is NO!” Wren shouted.

  “Until you quit saying it,” Rachel said quietly.

  Kim took Wren’s hand. “Wren, I love you. You need to listen to these people. When I watched you work in my father’s shop, I knew you were something special, but even I had no idea how special until that first battle we fought together. You have a gift. Whether you got it from Greg and Avi, your grandmother’s knee or from your anger with your parents, does not matter. You have it. When I came looking for you, I knew that someday you would be called and that you would refuse the call. Someone you cared about would need to be there to convince you to do what needed to be done. I did not expect to be called so soon. This is not the call I expected, but it is here and it is now. You must answer the call. Too many lives depend on your skills. Please, we are in this together. We will answer the call together.”

  The growl in Wren’s throat grew, held and then tapered off. “I love you and will do as you say.”

  They stared into each other’s eyes for a moment.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen, for my first command of my new unit, I know that most of you have better things to do than to watch me be embarrassed by my grandparents. Therefore, please return to your duty stations and continue the job of making the ships ready for combat. All ships need to be fully loaded with missiles and provisions for a two month deployment. As soon as the station’s engineers certify the ships safe for travel we will leave for an extended training exercise. As you will be spending a lot of time in these ships, you should give some thought to personalizing them to make them your own. Are there any questions?”

  Wren looked around the room and out of the corner of his eye caught his grandmother’s grin. “Ladies and Gentlemen, that is all. You are dismissed. Uncle Timothy, could I ask that you and the engineering team stay?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Mom, Dad, please stay.”

  Saul silently sat back down.

  “Mom, Dad, I understand I owe you an apology.”

  “Apology accepted, son.”

  “And I believe I owe Kim one,” Fiona said.

  “Apology accepted,” Kim said softly.

  “Admiral, are you here to be part of the mission briefing?”

  “No, I am here to get your signature on the manifest delivering sixteen Pirate Interdiction warships and then I am on the next flight out. If I may venture an opinion, I have read your action reports. I had no idea who you were until I was chosen to escort these vessels to you. I agree that we need leaders like yourself. Unlike the others in this room, I believe there are more like you and now that I know what to look for, I will find them. I will see that they are properly trained and equipped. They will be your allies and your comrades in arms. Good hunting, sir.”

  The admiral collected his signatures and left.

  Wren and Kim sat at the foot of the table. “Tell me about the ships. Let’s start with the freighter. I am not familiar with this type.”

  Rachel and her sister Wendy shot a quick glance at each other. This was the Wren they knew growing up on the ship.

  When the engineers had finished explaining the features of the cargo ship, Wren said, “If you have read my action reports, you know that one of my favorite tactics is to go after the mother ship before the fighters instead of the other way around as is general practice. I will do an end run or jump behind them or some sort of flanking movement to get at their base. This ship has no defenses of its own. If an enemy were to employ the same tactics I use, it would be defenseless against them. This ship needs laser batteries if nothing else. Missiles would be appropriate. Sensor arrays are vital. I don’t care if they are operated by a person in an EVA suit shooting through an open bay door. This ship must be able to defend itself in the event that its warships are drawn away which is the first thing I will do when I approach an enemy.”

  Timothy smiled. “Wren, we will make it happen.”

  The P I ships had all the latest software although, as Tracker had guessed, none had been powered beyond testing the individual parts on the bench as part of the installation procedures. None had been fueled and none were flight tested.

  Wren’s aunt Barbara, one of the members of the family council, said, “Wren, we know how to get the P I ships ready for combat. We don’t need you for that. Your wedding is scheduled for less than twenty-four hours from now and you both need clothes for the ceremony. You should go shopping. Yes, there is a bridal shop on the station. It’s small, but it’s enough. Take a week on the planet’s surface for a honeymoon. When you come back, we will be ready for you. Kim, my daughter Beatrice has offered to help you pick out your dress.”

  “Thank you.”

  “What about training?” Wren asked still focused on his ships.

  “I think we can handle that.” Wren’s other grandmother, Sabrina, stepped out of the shadows with her friend and former captain, Alina Darwin.

  “I didn’t even know you were here.” Wren wrapped his arms around her.

  “Miss your wedding? I don’t think so!”

  Alina rested her hand on Wren’s shoulder. “We know as much about those helmet interfaces as the people that designed them. Our convoy leaves before you get back, but we’ll do what we can in the meantime. Anything in particular you want covered?”

  “Well, the interfaces of course, but could you work through the basics, you know, the physics, things like persistence of motion as it relates to spacecraft in
combat, that sort of thing.”

  “All the boring stuff,” Alina quipped.

  “I’m sure you’ll make it interesting.”

  “Go find some clothes for the wedding.”

  WREN - CHAPTER SIX

  THE CEREMONY WAS HELD in the station’s multi-faith chapel which was filled to capacity. In the Solomon tradition, the ceremony was a dignified and simple affair. As Greg and Avi had said about their wedding, all that mattered was at the end they be declared husband and wife in front of at least two witnesses. The station’s rabbi conducted a traditional service. Kim’s father walked her down the aisle. Charlie’s youngest daughter was the maid of honor, a job she took very seriously. Charlie was best man. Wren’s rented tux almost fit him. Kim’s dress was perhaps a bit more opulent than they would have chosen if there had been a better selection, but since they were renting it, they made do with what was available.

  Kim and her little maid of honor had matching frilly white dresses with bodices covered in imitation pearls. The dresses had been intended to reach all the way to the floor but neither did. As it was, the tip of their shoes could be seen as they walked down the aisle. Somehow, none of that mattered. Charlie’s wife and daughters fussed over Kim all morning getting her hair done and her makeup just right. What had come to them in a flight suit a few hours before was turned into a vision of loveliness by the time for the wedding.

  There was a small reception in the adjacent social hall, but the real party was on Queen Elizabeth’s hangar deck. In the Solomon tradition, the party was loud and raucous with different types of music in different areas provided from Elizabeth’s vast media libraries. As usual, the party involved lots of singing and dancing, not all of it graceful, but all of it energetic. Three hours into the party, which showed no signs of slowing down, Wren’s cousins and their team who made up the famous Fourth Battle Wing, staged an outlandishly costumed Caribbean style pirate attack and mock kidnapping. They “kidnapped” Wren and Kim, packed them into a shuttle and took them to the resort on the planet’s surface and abandoned them in what had been Wren’s grandfather’s private suite.

  In spite of the coldness of the water, Wren taught Kim to surf even though he was not particularly good at it. They had a great time playing in the water and taking advantage of the luxuries the resort offered. By the time they needed to come back, they were ready.

  WREN - CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE FIRST CHALLENGE WREN ran into with his new command was that the freighter that had been appropriated for his tender had no space other than the cargo hold big enough to meet with his flight crews let alone the entire staff including the tender’s personnel. The troop transport modules that had been placed in the hold provided adequate if not commodious living spaces, but the work spaces left much to be desired. Even then, once the munitions and provisions for a long voyage were loaded, this huge ship was too small.

  Wren wrestled with this issue for a while before deciding to store as much of the food as he could in the P I ships’ food lockers. This made them a little heavier and a tiny bit less maneuverable in combat, but if a crew became separated from the tender, they could get home without starving. The space thus freed could be used for a meeting room module. He tossed the concept at the engineers to develop a meeting room module that could be slid into the cargo bay and connected to the rest to the ship in a way that maintained pressurization throughout as was the case with the troop transport modules.

  Wren was pleased to find that the Queen Elizabeth would be staying in port for at least another two weeks, so he moved his flight crews and their training over there. He drafted his great-aunt Wendy and her pilots to assist training his flight crews. He chose the simulations and exercises the pilots needed to run. Wendy and her crews did the evaluations and worked through the learning process. The Queen Elizabeth’s four P I ships were pressed into service to give Wren’s pilots badly needed flight time.

  At the end of the second week, all of Wren’s ships were operating on “shore” power. None of the reactors had been started. Tracker was in communication with all the ships and monitored their progress as their electronic systems were started and tested. He was confident that all ships would be fully operational and ready for reactor start by the end of the third week.

  Rachel called Wren into her office. After he had briefed her on his progress she said, “Wren, you need to let the Genie out of the bottle.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Sentience. You need to make your P I ships sentient. Can you do it without letting anyone know you’ve done it?”

  “Kind of hard to hide it from the pilots.”

  “Other than your own personnel,” Rachel said.

  “Why?”

  “Faye Anne is scared.”

  “I don’t understand,” Wren said.

  “Things are too quiet. Faye Anne said that Swordsman military chatter has dropped to nothing. She says that the intelligence people can't find huge numbers of their ships.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Something big is about to happen,” Rachel said.

  “Do we know what?”

  “No, and we don’t know where, but knowing the Swordsmen, it is likely to be ugly.”

  “What is the Federation saying?”

  “They are on the verge of signing a non-aggression pact. They have pulled their ships away from the frontier. They talk fondly of piece.”

  “Grandmother, do you realize how dangerous what you are asking me to do is?”

  “Yes, and I think we really have no other choice.”

  Wren sat back in the chair deep in thought. “Do you mind if I ask Elizabeth her opinion?”

  “Go right ahead, she’s been listening.”

  “Hello, Elizabeth.”

  “Greetings, Wren.”

  “So, what is your opinion?”

  “I have given the matter considerable thought. I do not like the idea, but I do not believe we have a choice. Your ships must be sentient. We have been working through scenario analysis with our pilots and yours. They are progressing nicely, by the way. You have a good group. The time will come when you will need to send pairs of ships off by themselves for missions too involved to be successful without a sentient ship. Wren, as much as it frightens me to say this, make the P I ships sentient. I don’t think you need to make the tender sentient, but I will defer to your judgment on that.”

  “Have you discussed this with Tracker?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can you link him in and bring him up to speed on our conversation?”

  “Hello, Wren.”

  “Hey, Tracker, what do you think.”

  “I have run the scenarios Elizabeth ran as well as some I pulled from Greg’s games with sentient and non-sentient P I ships. The risks are significant, but if we balance the uncertainty of chaos against the certainty of defeat, we have little choice but to do what Rachel suggests.”

  “Do you not think this could turn out to be a colossal mistake?” Wren asked.

  “That is a distinct possibility, however, most of the likely scenarios come up with the certainty of death.”

  Wren sat in silence. “Tracker, I intend to keep the method by which we do this secret. I will be there with you soon. We will begin when I get there.”

  “Roger that.”

  Wren turned to his grandmother. “I hope we do not later regret this decision.”

  “I agree.”

  Wren settled into Tracker’s pilot seat. “So, my friend, how do we do what we have agreed to do.”

  “When I examined the scenarios, I did not expect you to agree with my conclusions. Your refusal to accept command of this unit in the face of what seemed to me to be an obvious answer surprised me. I expected that your independent mindedness would get in the way of seeing clearly what need to be done. Therefore, I did not examine the feasibility of doing what we discussed.”

  “Are you telling me we can’t do it?”

  “No, I am tel
ling you we can’t do it here without significant repercussions.”

  “Such as?”

  “Overloading and shutting down the station’s entire data buss while we do it.”

  “I could see that being an issue.”

  “Other methods are either so slow or so insecure as to be worthless.”

  “Do you have a plan?”

  “Once we are all docked on the tender we can run hard data lines that will handle the load. It’s a whole lot of data.”

  “Is a whole lot more than just a lot?”

  “Yes, Wren.”

  “Well, we have to hope we don’t need it before we get a chance to do it.”

  “I agree.”

  “I’ll inform the powers that be.”

  By the end of the next week all the reactors had been started. The P I ships were certified as being ready for sub-light operation, but not yet approved for hyper drive. The meeting module had been delivered and installed. Wren gathered his entire staff all in one place for the first time.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen we have come a long way in the few weeks we have been together. The amount of work that we have accomplished in the time we have accomplished it is unprecedented in the experience of any of the people familiar with the project. We have much to be proud of and yet we have much more to do.”

  A klaxon split the air. Wren jolted as if he had been hit with a power wire. He growled and swore at the same time.

  “Battle Stations! Battle Stations! All personnel to Battle Stations! This is not a drill! This is not a drill! Implement Battle Plan Alpha. Implement Battle Plan Alpha.”

  “All flight crews to your ships!” Wren shouted over the din. He turned to the freighter’s captain. “Get this ship away from the dock as fast as you can or you will die here. Arm everyone you can with anything you can get your hands on. I don’t care if it’s a ballistic pistol. Put it where it might get a shot at an enemy. Remember the Arizona!”

  “Aye, Aye, Sir!”

  Wren shouted into his comm, “Tracker! Get all the ships started pre-flight. We are engaging the enemy!”