Kris Longknife's Relief: Grand Admiral Santiago on Alwa Station

by Mike Shepherd

  “Yeah,” Sandy said, wondering how long she would have held her fire while trying to get an enemy to surrender as they kept on their path to attack those she was sworn to defend.

  “Enough about that. Folks, talk to me about this frat house.”

  “Their cruisers may be able to accelerate faster than their battleships, but they don’t have enough crew protection. If they do go to three gees, everyone on board is going to get flattened,” Jacques said.

  “That’s good tactical information,” Sandy agreed. “I’m more interested in what the age and sex break down of the crew says about intent.”

  That brought a pause as her advisors thought about the data.

  Penny finally broke the silence. “Our fleet is younger than most. The battlecruisers’s crews are a good five or more years younger than the average cruiser’s crew. Our command structure is younger because battlecruisers still only have commanders as skippers, and most of them have been deep selected both for lieutenant commander and commander. The same for most of the crew. Still, our Sailors are a good two years, on average, older than that cruiser’s alien watch standers. Of course, we’ve had Kris Longknife to provide adult supervision, so to speak, and now we have you, Admiral.”

  “I hope that’s a compliment,” Sandy said.

  Penny grinned, “Sort of, ma’am. What I’m getting at, is that this alien crew is really young. Their command team is all male and not that much older than the kids below decks. The women didn’t look to be in any position to mellow all that testosterone.”

  “No. Just to serve it,” Amanda said. “On their backs, it would appear.”

  Sandy nodded agreement.

  “A lot of young warriors running wild,” Admiral Perswah said softly.

  Sandy eyed her.

  Jacques nodded agreement. “Could we have young braves, from a warrior culture, who have seen their elders whipped bad and watched the old folks crawl away with their tail between their legs to lick their wounds? There are plenty of examples of young guys charging off on their own to start a fight, out to show their elders that they can do what they are too scared to do.”

  “What about the battleships?” Amanda asked.

  “They nibbled at our defense, and ran away. This bunch took a bite out of our outer perimeter, then charged deep into our sphere of influence before setting a course out of here. We caught them before they could make it home to brag about what they had done.”

  “Kids with more guts than smarts, trying to count coup on us and get bragging rights,” Sandy said. “That’s good and bad,” she concluded.

  “Why, ma’am?” Penny asked.

  “It tells us the main force of the wolf pack is still holding back. That’s good. But it also tells us that the overeager kids with more guts than brains are demanding and being permitted to try to knock us around a bit. This one ducked in fast, they tried to run, but we caught them. The next one might duck in further. Try to go all the way to Alwa.”

  “So, Admiral, what do we do?” Penny asked.

  “We need those better sentinels so we know who’s coming for us. We need to keep them active, so we can get messages back here faster, and we need a rapid reaction force. Not down here, but standing by the jumps. I’m thinking we need to put together not just some fortresses to guard our jumps, but make them big enough to give comfort to a squadron, maybe a task group of two squadrons.”

  The four of them nodded agreement with that plan.

  “Penny, I’m going to need a couple of meetings today. I want to get with my Chief of Staff and Ops Chief about setting up this new guard group. I’ll need Admiral Kitano and the other fleet commanders, including Benson. Once we’ve got a general sketch of what we want to do and will need, I’ll need to talk to Pipra. Abby as well. Penny, is your Mimzy passing along all this information to Abby’s Mata Hari?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Tell her to pass along this rough sketch of our plan so they can take a look at what it would take to support sixteen battlecruisers close to each of the jumps.”

  Sandy stood. The others stood with her. “Folks, I think things have gotten interesting again.”

  “God save us from living in interesting times,” Amanda said.

  They all said “Amen” to that. Even the cat.

  13

  Thirty minutes later, Sandy had her key staff seated around an expanded table. Van Velder, her Chief of Staff, was at her right elbow, Penny and her computer Mimzy were at her left with her silent shadow cat. Around the table were Sandy’s Ops Chief, Mondi Ashigara, and admirals Benson, Kitano, Hawkings, Bethea, and Miyoshi.

  Sandy quickly outlined what they’d discovered about the alien cruiser and their need to defend the jump points.

  “That’s going to mean a total redo of . . .” Admiral Benson started.

  Sandy cut him off. “I’ve got a meeting with Pipra and Abby set for later. You’re all invited to sit in. We will discuss the challenges this will make for the production people then. Right now, I want military options to solve a military problem. Nothing else.”

  The table fell silent.

  Penny finally spoke. “We’ve defended the jump points before. Mimzy, show Admiral Santiago how the Bird class held the jump points against speedsters.”

  A hologram appeared over the table. Three small battlecruisers, maybe frigates, swung around each other in a three-pointed star. The ships were slightly off kilter; rather than the spindle and ship forming a straight line, the ships were about five degrees off.

  “This arrangement of unarmored frigates stood alerts at each jump. The arrangement allowed at least one ship’s aft battery and another ship's bow lasers to take on a ship shooting out of the jump. Every thirty days or so we switched out the ships and brought them back for maintenance and crew rest. The spin only provided half a gravity and the Coriolis force can drive you crazy. Based on this temporary fix, I’d recommend something with a much larger diameter. If you want to base a fast reaction force at these forts, you really need a bigger wheel.”

  “Thank you, Captain, that’s the best explanation I’ve heard of your temporary fix. Okay, what do we need now?

  “If we just intended to put a fast reaction force out there, we could just do that,” Admiral Benson said. “Anchor twelve battlecruisers near the jump, have them swing around each other and swap out with another twelve every couple of weeks or so.”

  “We could, but I’m thinking of this as a fort,” Sandy said. “I’d like it armed and dangerous. Say 22-inch lasers to pop anything that came through. Maybe the beam guns. You say the ships are banged up bad. Why not park them out there and put a major 24-inch hurt on any battleship or mother ship that tries to force the jump?”

  Admiral Kitano nodded. “Assuming we get more beam ships from the other side of the galaxy, I’d be a lot happier if we just parked those hulks and concentrated on keeping the reactors and beam guns working.

  “How large a diameter do we need for this fort?” Sandy asked.

  “You can get rough, simulated gravity in a cylinder-shaped station that is as little as a hundred meters in diameter,” Mimzy said from Penny’s neck.

  “We need something bigger than that if we’re going to dock battlecruisers to them,” Amber said. “A hundred meter diameter can is moving too fast for a battlecruiser to catch the hook and be reeled into a pier. I’ve docked a battlecruiser, and a spinning station as big around as Canopus is not that easy to catch.”

  “Maybe we need to step back and look at this a bit more analytically,” Sandy said. “We’re talking about a space station that can effectively dock ships with sufficient support and housekeeping facilities to keep the ships fit and ready to deploy at a moment’s notice. Second, we want a platform to support 22-inch lasers. Third, we want a platform to support beam weapons. Last, we need a platform that can move if the jump does. Can we do all four of these?”

  “The lasers and beam weapons don’t fit together well,” Admiral Bethea said. “The 22
-inch lasers have a range of 200,000 kilometers. The beam weapons have a . . . well, I don’t know if anyone knows their maximum range. Still, the 22-inch lasers need to be within a light second of a target. The beam weapon can be set up further back a few light seconds where it’s safer. Moving a space station is not something you want to do all that much, but if we want to guard a jump, you got to move with it if it moves. Does anyone else besides me see a conflict among all these requirements?”

  “If the admiral won’t hit me up beside the head,” Admiral Benson said, “we really can’t afford to build more than one station or fort or whatever out there without really messing up the flow of goods down here.”

  Sandy nodded. “You’re right Ben, one station. Its main goal is to support the twelve assigned battlecruisers that are in one hour alert status.”

  “It will need more piers than six for your battlecruisers,” the Chief of Staff put in. “You’ll need docks for one or two repair ships. A couple of freighters. Twelve sounds good right now. Sixteen might sound better next month. I know this may appear like design creep, but we need to have enough to provide serious housekeeping support for this force and the five thousand sailors aboard those ships. Sixty-four hundred if we go to two complete squadrons.”

  “Twelve battlecruisers was enough of a reaction force this time,” Sandy pointed out.

  “Our target had three jumps with two possible outcomes, Ma’am. We sent out six sections of two. Will the next situation be the same size?”

  “If we keep letting matters creep, we’d be basing a fleet out there?” Kitano snapped.

  “Maybe someday we’ll wish we had?” the Chief of Staff said, not backing down.

  Sandy shook her head. “Benson, what does sixteen verses twenty-four ships cost us?”

  “If I may put in,” came from Mimzy. “If we settle for a station half the diameter of Canopus Station, with half the circumference, we can have four piers every two kilometers. A sixteen ship station is two to three kilometers long. A twenty-four ship station is five kilometers long. That assumes we dock a squadron by divisions, two ships to a pier, filling the forward side of the pier first, then the trailing side last.”

  “A sphere three verses five kilometers long,” Sandy said.

  “But the tin can may be the cheapest part of the station,” Benson pointed out.

  “You’re saying we need to ask the production gurus before we trim our station?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Okay, that’s ships, what about guns?”

  “We need to have the station within 22-inch laser range of the jump,” Amber said. “The beam weapons will pack a hell of a punch at that range, but the aliens will be withing range of the station with their newer lasers too damn quick.”

  “But we have to be able to take out fast moving suicide boats or even cruisers before they get too far into the system,” Bethea pointed out.”

  “Whatever we do with the beam ships,” Ben put in, “we’ll need to segregate their Smart Metal from our own locally produced Smart Metal. There may be another complication if we use titanium extrusions for much of the station structures and decking.”

  “You think this will have to be a hybrid structure?” Sandy asked.

  “I don’t want to get into someone else’s rice bowl, but if we want these things quick and don’t want to completely wreck the economy out here, yeah, I think we’re going to have to make them a patchwork design,” the commander of Sandy’s base force said.

  “Thank you all. I think we have defined our requirements. Penny, could you have Mimzy tell Mata Hari to ask Abby if she and Pipra could drop in sooner rather than later.”

  “They are already on their way,” Mimzy said primly. “I may have been keeping them informed of what would be required of them.”

  “Mimzy?” Penny said.

  “This will just save you having to brief them and they know what you’ve tried and rejected.”

  “You and I, as well as Mata and Abby will have to talk about this later,” Penny growled.

  “Yes, ma’am,” almost sounded contrite.

  A penitential computer. What will Alwa Station come up with next?

  14

  Pipra and Abby arrived about the time the Navy folks had served themselves from a coffee urn and plate of sandwiches that magically showed up. The two production people headed straight for the coffee.

  “Would you mind if we brought the Colonials in on this? Consumer goods may, possibly, take it in the neck.”

  “That will slow us down,” Sandy said. “What with you already up to speed.”

  “Not really,” Abby said. “While you’all were talking, we were all kind of listening in.”

  Sandy found herself over a barrel. She couldn’t argue against what they’d done, but, she did not like being put over this barrel. And, damn it, security mattered!

  She scowled at Penny’s neck. “Mimzy, I ought to slap you in the brig and feed you on stale bread and water.”

  “Actually,” Abby drawled, “it was Mata Hari who brought the others into the conversation. She is, after all, a spy by nature.”

  “But of course,” Abby’s computer answered, actually sounding French for the first time since Sandy had met it. Her. Whatever.

  The main screen in Sandy’s day quarters opened up, showing the conference table at Government House. In her own quarters, the main conference table reoriented itself to be end to end with the other table, turning the meeting into one big conference.

  Sandy settled down at the head of the table with her Navy types at either elbow. Abby and Pipra took the chairs next to the screen, putting themselves between the Navy and the Colonials. Ada, the First Minister sat at the head of the other table surrounded by her own key staff. There were some very dour looks on their faces.

  Ada started the meeting. “We know what you discovered from that captured alien cruiser. We have no basis to disagree with any of your conclusions. They concern defense, and they are yours to make. We understand the need to both deploy a quick reaction force near each jump and to defend the jump against any intruders. Our only concern is the cost and how much it will disrupt our budding economy. Economies when you toss in the birds.”

  Ada paused to take a deep breath and let it out in a sigh. “I expect that we will also bear the burden of informing the birds that there may be some delay in delivering their rent payments.”

  Now it was Sandy’s turn to nod. “We understand your concerns. You understand our concerns. Hopefully, we can figure out a way to maximize the benefit and minimize the down sides of our situation. However, we must adjust to the changing threat picture.”

  “Before you two start arguing over the why and wherefore,” Abby put in, “please let me show you what we have in mind and how much it will cost.”

  A holograph of a cylinder appeared, floating above the table. A second one floated over the Colonial conference table.

  “All of Nelly’s kids have been working non-stop on this puppy, even my niece’s Dada got dragooned into this project,” Abby said. “This is a rough sketch, but we think we’ve got most of the basics here.”

  The cylinder expanded to cover most of the table. It was easy to see twelve piers scattered in three groups of four. Two battlecruisers were moored to each pier. The station rotated along its long axis and spun slowly around its middle, letting everyone get a good look at it from every angle.”

  “The bow, or the stern, depending on where we’re going, is the most interesting part,” Mata Hari said. The long cylinder compressed until only one end of the station was in view.

  “We lengthened the station by about a kilometer,” the computer said. “This end will contain the armament, and be pointed at the jump at all times. However, it also contains the plasma reactors needed to generate the electricity that the three beam cannons and two hundred and forty 22-inch lasers will need. If we set the engines up on the other end, that plasma would have to be contained in long superconducting electro-mag
netic conduits to get the plasma to the other end of the ship. We consider that too risky.”

  Seven kilometers or better of super-heated plasma conduits didn’t sound like a good idea to Sandy either.

  “Instead, using the miracle of Smart Metal, and the near a million tons of the stuff we can salvage from the three the Beam ships for each fortress, we propose to create the necessary rocket engines at the end closest to the reactors. Once we have the station in place, we’ll create station keeping jets and use the Smart Metal in the engines to provide a thin coating along the outside of the station. That coating will serve to seal any leaks as well as provide a secondary radiator to transfer heat from the lasers out into space. Please note, we also have major radiators forward, closer to the lasers, to also cool them.”

  Sandy eyed the large “wings” spreading out at the front of the station. “Won’t they be a hazard to navigation? They look awful close to the forward piers.”

  “They won’t be when the radiators are withdrawn,” Mimzy said, and the “wings” folded up to a quarter their size.

  “It would take a blind ship driver to hit them when they’re that small,” Amber observed.

  “The beam cannons will be located in a triangle about a thousand meters from the center of the station,” Mata Hari continued. “That should give enough gravity for the workers supporting them. The two hundred and forty lasers are spaced evenly around the 4.7 kilometer circumference of the station in what we’re referring to as the gun deck.”

  “That’s double the spacing the lasers have on a battlecruiser,” Mimzy said. “Battlecruisers also have a top and bottom gun deck, with six or four to each deck, fore and aft. In theory, we could add a second gun deck with another two hundred and forty lasers as well as half the spacing and double the number again.”

  “That’s almost a thousand lasers,” Sandy said, half in awe, half marveling at what kind of hell that would be when it fired.