The Admiral looked at Sergeant Delgado for a moment and answered, "You think she has the nerves to handle the job?"
"I think she might," replied Sergeant Delgado.
"Then it's your decision. It's your defensive force, after all. This might be just what Tall needs anyway," Dave responded. "I like your plan. You've covered the key points and taken care of morale or panic areas. As of now, put your plan in action. Make sure that all cadets are fully armed. I mean besides their sidearms. See to it that they have heavy weapons available where they'll be of benefit."
"Now, sir? Are we expecting this to really happen?" she asked despite what George told her before. She turned towards George and said, "You weren't kidding about any of this, were you?" Her face was a little paler when she looked back at Dave. She could see from Dave's own expression that he was deadly serious and was entrusting the security of the planet to her.
Dave said, "The moment that hostilities start up, you and all other instructors who held officer ranks will revert to them. I shouldn't think that there will be anymore questions, but I'm open to any you might have, regardless."
Maria replied, "Uh, no sir. I'll have the cadets moved within the hour. They'll be in their defensive positions by supper."
Dave stated, "That sounds reasonable. Good luck to you, Sergeant Delgado, and to your cadets."
***
Sergeant Rendall took the pilot's chair and strapped himself in. What he had in mind to do was just short of sheer lunacy. No one was supposed to pilot a space station except for minor corrections. It wasn't supposed to be a fighting ship.
Sylvia came onto the bridge and stood to the side out of the way. She was off duty for the time being and well-rested. She could afford to spend an hour or two watching Sergeant Rendall pilot the space station. She wondered why he was strapping himself in. Then the announcement came over the internal speakers for everything to be secured for emergency maneuvers. Sylvia looked around quickly, spotted a wall strap not in use, and hurriedly moved to it. She stood flat against the wall and then pulled the body length strap across her to latch automatically on the other side of her body.
A minute or two later, the countdown started. Then Rendall snapped into action as his hands danced across the controls, tearing the Beulah Station out of its orbit and into deeper space for maneuvers Sylvia didn't know were possible for it to do. There was no warning of any changes in gravity as the station, shaped much like a wheel with a hub and spokes, went in different directions without any reason seeming to underlie them.
Captain Shirley Sorenson had noticed Ensign Barter come onto the bridge. She could tell that Dave had been right in sending her to the station. Shirley remembered how forlorn Barter appeared the day before when she reported in. A space station wasn't exactly the place that an officer wanted to be assigned to. There was virtually no opportunity to distinguish one's self and earn promotions. Getting assigned to a space station was one of the shortest assignments in the Navy for that reason. Otherwise, too much good talent would be wasted. It was also normally reserved for officers who graduated from the academy in the last ten percent of their class.
Shirley waited for the sergeant to turn to her after an hour and a half of grueling maneuvers that even made her stomach queazy feeling. He was smiling. Obviously, he was satisfied with what he would be able to make the station do when the crunch came.
"Ensign Barter, would you mind taking the piloting controls?" Shirley asked.
Sylvia looked at Captain Sorenson before slowly releasing the strap that held her body against the bulkhead during the maneuvers. "Yes ma'am," she replied, trying to keep her eagerness from betraying her too much.
Sergeant Rendall was already out of the pilot's chair and taking over another seat from a crewman next to it. He could handle that task and still coach the ensign in what he wanted her to learn.
Sylvia went over and sat down. She buckled herself in and looked over at the sergeant.
Rendall said, "Okay, ensign, I've got a couple of maneuvers to have you perform. The first one I call the Wobble Shift. It's the one where you probably weren't sure where in hell your stomach was at. I know that I didn't know where mine was and I was driving."
There was some muted laughter around the bridge.
"Okay, everyone, keep it quiet while they train!" Shirley said sharply as a reminder for them to not interrupt the lesson.
***
Susan sat with the other fighter commanders. She was giving them a lecture and discussion of her own theories on fighter combat that she was encouraged to pursue at the academy. She didn't tell any of them that some of the ideas were hers and some the commandant's. She just presented them as evolving theory from the academy for them to digest and then talk about.
Susan said, "This is the Pinball Tactic. With the old, small, four crew member scouts, you had small weapons with lots of speed. There weren't too many places where you could use those weapons to any advantage against a large, armored, enemy ship. That's why they were mostly used as perimeter scouts for the squadron. Now we've got fighters that are larger though still flown by only four crew members. Our fighters pack five times the punch of the old scouts and every bit as much speed, plus a little. Now our weapons can penetrate the hulls where they're armored so that we can actually participate in the battles. With the fighters came the new carriers so that we could fight in huge waves to keep the enemy constantly tied up. With the old scouts, the pilot normally swept around to the rear of the enemy ship and tried for a T-shot on the engines where there weren't any defenses. However, that also meant that the scouts took a chance on getting roasted. We don't have to sweep wide and then come in from the back anymore. Now we can use this approach to first attack one ship and then, as we turn away from it to avoid a collision, bank towards another enemy ship."
"But why? That just keeps us in their firing range."
Susan answered, "Not really. Think about it. You're going to be directly between two enemy ships. Presuming that you're jigging and twisting your fighter to avoid hits, where are those enemy misses going to go?"
"At the other ship!" the other commander remarked.
She responded, "Exactly right! The longer you stay between two of their ships, the more likely that they'll either stop shooting at you or cause damage to themselves, making your job that much easier."
"What else did they develop at the academy?"
Susan said, "Okay, I guess you understand that one. The next one is for an enemy line formation…"
***
The conference room door opened revealing a uniformed woman who stuck her head inside and said, "We just received a coded message. The message is 'Birthday Greetings,' sir."
Dave said, "George, you better get going then. That's Val's message to us that the Malakins are staging their forces. We'll know soon enough if they intend to attack. Good luck to you and Maria on your missions."
Captain George Clark looked sadly for a moment at the sealed orders he kept with him at all times since receiving them, despite his sudden reversion to officer rank. The code words he had already read in the attached instructions and then destroyed immediately after memorizing were the same. He hurriedly left the room and then the academy grounds. He would then make his way to the shipyards where he would board the Rust Bucket and lift off from Beulah. Once in space, he would open the rest of his orders.
Maria was right behind him in exiting the admiral's office. She had important preparations to make for an unwanted war. War with the Malakins seemed even more imminent now that George was actually on his expected, yet unhoped for mission.
***
Dave was pleased with Sergeant Delgado's assessment of Ensign Tall. Likely, the woman would benefit from being in charge of one of the combat teams. He didn't mind suggesting Nape to her after confirming that she hadn't considered him yet. After all, Nape was only a second year cadet. Dave went through his own computer notes checking the latest intelligence report. He hadn't told either sergeant t
hat the same code words came with a message for him and a few other high ranking officers. The rest of the message indicated that a wave of enemy warships was actually on its way. Neither of them needed to know that as yet. They couldn't do a thing about it even if they did know. And a slip of what they knew to the wrong people could cause a panic.
Admiral Oden reflected back to the newest alien life form, the third found in his lifetime and anyone else's life for that matter. The first encounter with another race was a textbook example of what to do and how to do it right. The Blues were both good neighbors and traders with humans. It was even rumored that they were biologically compatible, though nothing yet in that had happened as yet to anyone's knowledge. The Blues were very much like humans in temperament and personality. They even understood human humor and were hungry for all they could get. There were so many comedians touring on the Blue world, clubs on worlds within the Union of Planets were advertising higher rates than usual just to compete with the incomes being earned by comedians on Leuion. The only problem for comedians was that they had to perform naked if they accepted a tour on the Blue's home world, Leuion.
That wasn't at all that difficult for many of the comedians to accept, either. One of the human inhabited worlds, Echo, was similar in behavior to Leuion for two reasons. One, it possessed a climate that was hot the entire year through. The second was more of a sociological nature. Echo's first civilian populace was originally composed of two groups that combined their fortunes in order to have a true sanctuary from public persecution that still lingered on within the Union when Echo was first terraformed. Despite their differences, the nudists and swingers each gave the other something they wanted in order to make the alliance work. They made both public nudity and public sex totally legal. For anyone other than the military, it was illegal to wear clothing there.
Then there was also Edun to consider. Edun was another nude world in the Union, established much later by nudists only. However, it wasn't similar in public behavior to the swinger's attitude so prevalent on Echo. Still, it was viewed quite favorably by the Leuions as Edun didn't permit clothing for anyone on its surface, even the military.
The second race was approached the same way by diplomats, but they came out like hornets from their nest. Dave remembered them too well. He captured the only Ape-oids during that war. Dave was also the man at the top of the Ape-oids' war criminal list during the truce, solely because of the military defeats he gave them as a mere captain of a ship and then of a squadron. He started his service in the Navy as a temporarily commissioned ensign at the start of the war, drafted when his ship was drafted by the Navy. From that point, he worked his way up in a Navy he was initially ashamed of for its inability to stand and fight. He had much to do with changing that image and forcing the Ape-oids into a truce. When the Ape-oids broke the truce, as Dave predicted they would and even when he predicted they would, he was drafted back into the Navy, given a regular commission, and a mission to end the war. Dave did precisely that. The Ape-oids quickly surrendered after realizing that their sneak attack failed and that they were even more vulnerable. As a result, the Ape-oids had been limited to possessing small gun ships to protect their freighters from pirate attacks while their entire naval force was dismantled under close supervision. Their portion of space was still respected by the Union and there still wasn't any trade between the two. The Ape-oids traded only among themselves in their area of space to anyone's knowledge. Regular unannounced inspections were the only incursions made by the Navy to insure that the Ape-oids weren't busy rebuilding a new navy. Dave, though, was fairly certain that the Ape-oids were doing that very thing. However, until one of the inspections turned up evidence proving the suspicions that he and others held, there was really nothing that anyone could do.
Now the Union had a third neighbor to deal with. Diplomats had been sent there as well. Their first reports were dismal, despite being able to make an initial peaceful contact with the Malakins. At least, Dave knew what the Malakins looked like which was better than they did at first against the Ape-oids. Humankind didn't even know what an Ape-oid looked like until they found a dead body inside a destroyed Ape-oid warship after the Battle of Three Star.
The Malakins had an exoskeleton, were three-fingered, and were of similar height to human adults. The Malakins molted until adulthood and seemed to remind most people of insects. Malakins had limited head movement and seemed to always travel about in threes. When the Union proposed exchanging one ambassador, the Malakins insisted on three.
The Malakin Empire consisted of three known inhabited planets. The Malakin home world was a planet much lighter in gravity. The system around its sun had only three inhabited planets and its home world had three natural satellites as well. Dave felt very sure that three was an important number to the Malakins. He expected to use that knowledge in any conflict, especially the one that now seemed imminent. What knowledge Dave had about the other side's military forces was that their ships were all much bigger. Dave attributed that to their lesser gravity. It was infinitely easier to build and launch a large space craft from a planet with a light gravity than from one with a heavier gravity force. Still, he and other leaders didn't have any true count on the Malakin forces and were constantly updating their facts and then multiplying by three. Already, that number exceeded what the entire Union Navy possessed in ships. Dave knew that new shipbuilding was already underway for more warships for the Union Navy based on their intelligence and the Malakin demands that humans back up their territorial borders to Beulah. However, Dave knew he'd have to face the initial onslaught with nothing more than what the Union Navy already had.
The Malakins were demanding that the Union give up the portions of space beyond Beulah, which included two member planets long inhabited by humans and a third that was mined. The diplomats seemed unable to convince the Malakins that the Union wasn't going to give in to them simply because the Malakins declared a border based on their own system of measurement and, again, their rules of three, not to mention that the Malakins had no knowledge of those planets until humans told them of their existence. The negotiations had been going on for over a year now. Each day those negotiations seemed to be grinding down more and more with new ultimatums issued by the Malakins at the start of each meeting.
When the first ultimatums appeared, one cadet was quietly sent off undercover while his death was announced. On the Malakin home world, he was disguised as a Malakin outcast, a homeless individual who was typically shunned and left alone by the normal Malakins who usually travelled in threes. Consequently, he could wander around freely and gather information without too much danger. It hadn't been hard finding a discarded exoskeleton after one of the general moltings or to pattern a disguise after it. Dave had suggested using a cadet since a cadet wouldn't be fettered by too much indoctrination into Navy procedures and could disappear better than an officer. Also, Val wasn't yet an official member of the Navy since all the cadet ensigns were really applicants who wouldn't become officers officially until graduation. That would give the Union an out, in case Val was discovered early and exposed. He couldn't be pointed at as a military spy since he technically wasn't in the military, yet.
Since Val was considered dead, the military's action of giving him a commission was a moot point. With an attack appearing imminent, Dave hadn't opposed the commissioning based on the grounds that a team was being sent to extract him and their diplomats. The Rust Bucket was now on its way to Malak as a diplomatic courier. The Malakins, if they did discover the Rust Bucket on her roundabout route, couldn't shoot at her yet without revealing their attack plans. Under the diplomatic immunity agreements already negotiated, they couldn't even ask her to stop or board her. With her long range sensors and great speed, it was doubtful if they could even catch her, let alone get close enough in planetary space to engage her in combat until she got near to Malak. That was probably the only time that the Rust Bucket would be vulnerable.
***
Ge
orge looked at his sealed orders as soon as the Rust Bucket was in space. The crew was undergoing standard battle stations drills and test firing their weapons. It was an all Pennyweight Shipping Company crew. They were extremely skilled at fighting by themselves against one, two, and even three pirate ships at a time. The fact that the Rust Bucket had only needed minor repairs after the Ape-oids War and only standard maintenance since then attested to their ability.
He read through the single sheet of paper from the Navy and then spoke with Captain Marsha Marble. "Okay, Marsha. Here's the drift. We're to take the scenic route just within our sensor range of the shortest route between Malak and Beulah. The Navy wants us to try to keep out of sight and move at top speed. We don't stop for anything until we get to Malak. Once we get there, we're to pick up the diplomatic mission and one other man who'll be in disguise until the last possible moment."
"No problem, Captain Clark. We can do that. Anything else?" she asked.
George said, "After we pick them up, we're to hightail it back to our side by any route we want to take, preferably a safe, roundabout route. The Union wants these people back alive to bring us up to speed on how we should expect these hombres to behave."
Marsha was already giving orders to the navigator who was passing them on as a course to Frank, her pilot. There was virtually no difference felt in the movement of the ship as Frank threw the Rust Bucket into top speed on a course that would get them to Malak within days. It was too bad the return couldn't be as direct since to do so would put them in the middle of heavy combat and jeopardize the whole mission.
***
Mike tended to his duties vigorously and attentively. He was trying to make up somewhat for his poor showing at the academy. The academy didn't graduate drunks and he just missed becoming one. He listened to the intercom as it announced an officer's meeting in the on board dining facility. He hurriedly left his section and made his way forward.
Attack Butterfly (Rust Bucket Universe) Page 3
