by Kal Spriggs
"Lieutenant Giovanni, are you alright?" Captain Beeson's voice seemed to come from a long distance away.
Alannis's vision seemed to shift and her heart thudded against her ribs. For a second, she thought her chest was going to explode. Alannis stumbled to her knees, unable to talk, unable to breathe. Yet the pain, the aching throb helped her to focus, to clear her mind.
Why couldn't she be a psychic? It was as if she had never considered it... and even if she had, her mind had shied away, like some strange kind of compulsion...
Like someone programmed me... The thought shocked her, shook her to her core. She heard raised voices distantly, felt someone grab her by the shoulder, try to lift her to her feet.
The wall around her mind seemed to shatter at the same time as her adrenaline-rich lizard brain sensed a threat. She felt a wave of force explode away from her and she heard startled shouts. At the same time, Alannis felt powerful, more alive than she'd ever been... and then she realized that there was only one possible answer.
Her grandmother. The woman who had raised her. She must have locked Alannis's powers away so that she wouldn't use them. She would only have done that to protect her... and Alannis shied away from those abilities in response to that thought.
It was as if a door slammed shut. Alannis blinked at the ceiling, feeling dazed and oddly weak. She slowly sat up, feeling as if she'd aged fifty years in only a few seconds.
Captain Beeson's office was a mess, she saw. The chair and couch had both been shattered. Everything on the desk and end tables was either smashed against the wall or strewn across the floor. Captain Beeson picked himself off the floor from behind the desk, his hair wild and a bit of blood running down from his left nostril. A pair of corpsmen, both staring at her with wide eyes, were pushed back against the side walls. A distant part of her brain informed her that she must have done this, yet it seemed impossible. "Lieutenant?" Captain Beeson asked.
"Sir," Alannis replied, "I'm fine, sir, sorry about the mess." She cleared her throat, "I, uh, don't know that I can provide any assistance in that task you asked of me... but I'm willing to try."
Captain Beeson stared at her for a moment, then he waved at the two medical techs, "You're dismissed, gentlemen."
He waited for them to leave, "I take it... well, I'm not really sure how to take what just happened, but it acts as some form of confirmation. I'll judge from your behavior that it's something of a surprise to you?"
Alannis slowly rose to her feet, putting most of her weight on the nearest end table. "Yes, sir, you... you could day that." Her mind shied away from the realization, even now. That was something of a protection, she realized. Without that, she didn't know what she might do, how she could control this ability... and if she even dared trying to learn to control it. "I don't know that I can do what you've asked... but I'll try."
"Understood, Lieutenant. In that case, perhaps you should clean yourself up and head to the bridge?"
Alannis looked down and realized that she'd inadvertently ripped parts of her uniform, she put up a hand and realized that her hair, carefully braided, was unkempt and wild. She dabbed at her face and her hand came away with blood. My god, she thought, I must look terrible.
"Yes, sir," she heard herself speak, not really certain how she kept her voice so level, "I'll get right on it."
***
Captain Bowder, who at this time thought of himself that way in order to better play the role, read the message from Senior Captain Beeson with interest. The message was eerily close to what Admiral Collae had told him to anticipate... enough so that he suspected that Admiral Collae must be behind this change of plans.
Which should be reassuring, he thought, but at this point I've still got a battle to fight.
His XO cleared his throat, "Sir, should I brief the crew?"
"Yes, Lieutenant Commander," Captain Bowder smiled. "My apologies, I was just considering some of the implications. We'll go to combat readiness on arrival at Luyten’s Star. After we arrive, we'll await the jump coordinates from the Constellation." That in itself wasn't irregular. The surprising bit was the time that they were supposed to wait. They were already behind and Captain Bowder had run a navigation simulation based off their projected arrival. There was every chance that they'd arrive too late to change the outcome at Kapteyn's Star as it was. Updating their navigational plot based off their exact location should be a matter of minutes for the distance of their journey.
No, it was almost as if they were plotting an entirely new course... which would either imply some kind of issue with the Constellation's navigation system... or something.
He wasn't certain he liked the "something" that it implied.
Still, he would go along with it... at least, until the nebulous offer that Admiral Collae had made coalesced into something more concrete. After all, appearances had to be maintained.
***
Minder felt fear, real fear, for the first time in a very long time as he considered the message that his daughter had sent him. He'd stepped out of a planning session in his guise as the human leader of his nation. Of course, the other humans had seen it as a potential opportunity, a chance to bend the planning in their favor... but that worked towards his goals too. The more they plotted against each other, the less of a threat they became. It was when they worked together that they became problems. He sent a response to his daughter as his escort fell in around him, their eyes watchful as he walked the corridors of his bastion of power. We are certain?
The report from the human Collae appears to be accurate, she replied. If so, Reese Leone's forces will attack the Centauri blockade soon, far sooner than we projected. The United Colonies, Admiral Collae, and the Shogunate human factions will depart to intercept soon.
He considered the factor of the human Alannis Giovanni being psychic. That made her presence in the Kapteyn's Star system far too great a hazard. The human Reese Leone would be dangerous. She could be a lethal problem.
Send Sidewinder, he projected, tell him to destroy any human ships that attempt to dock with the Enforcer Platform. Above all, his mission is to kill Reese Leone and Alannis Giovanni and to reestablish the blockade. But order him to conserve his forces… we cannot replace many of his ships without drawing attention. The fleet he'd built in secret had required a great deal of effort over the past couple of decades, in part due to some of the oversight within the system.
His people had worked around that, but this was their reserve force pressed into service after Hunter's defeat by the last Enforcer Station. Above all, if he feels he can accomplish his mission and avoid further casualties, he is to withdraw.
Yes, father, his daughter sent back.
Minder paused and stared out the windows at his city. They weren't real windows, not with the security requirements that buried his quarters in the heart of a massive structure. Minder rarely ventured outside. Yet something about the view, about vision itself, fascinated him. As a people, his species had never possessed visual senses... except for his kind. They had perfect psychic senses, vision was imperfect, flawed. Human eyes saw and processed the raw visual detail and as they did so, human brains assembled those details into something that looked like what they expected.
Minder saw the parallels to his current situation. He'd become so focused upon the details, upon what he expected. This information, out of the blue, made him uneasy. Minder had to order Sidewinder to attack. He had to counter this threat... did his human opponents realize that?
***
The Constellation arrived at Luyten’s Star and Alannis took a deep breath as she sat down at the navigation station. Some part of her noticed that Admiral Collae’s ships sat waiting and she spared a moment’s thought to wonder how it was he’d arrived here with such perfect timing.
Still, she didn’t have time for more consideration of that. She brought up the interface and as she did, she reached towards the place in her mind that she intrinsically shied away from. It was an odd experience, a
lmost as if she were sticking some part of her brain into painfully-cold ice water... or like she'd been reunited with a forgotten childhood friend... who'd been dead for the past thirty years.
Yet that connection seemed to expand her consciousness, especially as she examined the star charts. She focused on those diagrams and then they were no longer a mere representation... she could see, could feel the stars and the achingly empty void around them. She could feel the tenuous path between Kapteyn's Star and Luyten’s Star... and as she focused, she could see irregularities to that course, regions where there were shorter, more direct paths.
She pushed harder and she typed numbers into the navigational computer even as she adjusted by feel and touch alone. It wasn't what she'd done at Akris. It wasn't what Kandergain had done at Faraday, she felt. This was just minor tweaks, just enough to shave a few minutes or hours.
She felt sweat bead her forehead and the headache began to return twice as strong. The ice-water inside her mind seemed to become fire. She could do more, she sensed, she could go deeper...
Her mind hit the wall again and this time it was too much. She shuddered and clenched her hands into fists. Her entire body quivered and she realized that she didn't have voluntary control over herself. For a terrifying moment, she thought she'd pushed too hard, that she was going to die... yet the seizure passed. The involuntary twitches and spasms slowed and she slumped into the seat, aware of the stares from the others on the bridge.
Alannis realized she'd torn open the inside of her cheek, she tasted blood as she licked her lips.
"Well..." she started to say.
The navigational computer chimed and an indicator lit up on the display: Course Plotted: Travel Time Ninety Eight Hours, Thirty Nine Minutes.
Captain Beeson spoke, "Lieutenant Meyers, transfer the data to the other ships and signal them to initiate the jump using Lieutenant Giovanni's plotted course, we jump in thirty seconds."
Alannis just slumped deeper into the chair, too wrung out to think, to move. Some part of her wondered what she was, what she might be capable of... but most of her just hoped that she'd done the right thing. Had she pushed herself hard enough? Had she managed to give them the time they needed?
She'd saved them just over four hours... would that be enough?
***
Chapter XVI
Kapteyn’s Star
Centauri Confederation
March 5, 2410
Senior Captain Semyon Varlamov of the battlecruiser Orlan sipped at his coffee and wished that he had something a little stronger.
He'd stayed up later than he had planned and he had drunk far more than he intended. Part of that was his fault, but part of that was the party that his senior officers had thrown him as a sort of going away gift.
He knew that some of their motivation for that party was because they knew he'd write them better evaluations. Just as his XO had slipped women aboard the ship from the planet for 'recreation' for the crew. Both the party and the women had been violations of the quarantine, but Varlamov knew that it was unlikely that anyone would complain.
The officers of the blockade viewed this assignment as a sort of purgatory. They were here as punishment, blockading a world without the means to build ships. They destroyed the occasional artifact smuggler or treasure hunter who tried to slip in and out of the system. Their enlisted crews were made up of criminals and whatever scum that the Confederation Fleet could send and their ships were the oldest, worst maintained, and were often single-production vessels.
The Orlan was a perfect example. Captain Varlamov had received this assignment because his girlfriend had gone public and pressed charges of abuse on him. While he'd settled things out of court, the Fleet had sent him out here to avoid the bad publicity. The bitch ruined my career, he thought sullenly, even when I go back, there's no way that my patrons will back further promotion.
His XO had problems with both drugs, gambling, and women. Even in a military where such things were considered acceptable when kept out of public view, Niki Galovich had exceeded what was considered allowable. His navigation officer was probably mentally retarded, but as the youngest son of Admiral Konstantin, he had a guaranteed officer slot and would continue to be promoted. The rest of his officers fit into those parameters, either black sheep who received this assignment as penance or incompetents who had been sent out here where they couldn't do any further damage.
The Orlan was a single-production vessel, the first of a line of vessels that would never see further production. Originally designed to be the new flagship of future Centauri Confederation Fleets, the Orlan was a large battlecruiser, nearly the size of a battleship. It had been designed to do everything well, with high acceleration, improved maneuverability, heavy weapons, advanced stealth systems, and extensive command and control systems.
The problem was, the shipyard workers who built the ship were either drunk or hungover when they assembled half the systems. Also, some of the claims of the designers were a bit... exaggerated. The Orlan's hull was stealthy... for a battlecruiser. At least, until it went to full acceleration from its massive drives. And all those stealth systems drew power away from its defense screen, which was far weaker than any other ship of its size. It was very, very fast, with higher accelerations and better maneuverability than most light cruisers... but the weapons systems that had been theoretically possible had not panned out. Instead, the Orlan mounted available weapons as a 'stop-gap' measure. That stop-gap had lasted ten years and any further development in the program had apparently been scrapped, the funding pushed over to some admiral's slush fund.
Granted, the fusion projectors that the ship mounted weren't pathetic, but they were underpowered for a ship of this size. The Orlan mounted five turrets of three projectors each. It would make an impressive volley and the ship's speed and armament was perfect for interception of the fast, small vessels that most of the blockade runners typically used.
Most of the rest of the blockade was the same, with the possible exceptions of Squadron Gamma. Their squadron commander, Captain Tutin, was a stick-in-the-mud, and Captain Varlamov had given him all the officers who took the rules and regulations too seriously.
"Quite a night, eh sir?" his XO asked.
Captain Varlamov leveled a look on the officer, but he couldn't maintain it for long. "Yes, it was." He shook his head, "The women you brought, they had very fine bodies... as long as you don't look at their faces." He shuddered a bit as he remembered the horrid scars that all the women sported across their faces, tracing up into their hair.
"Well, good thing we weren't staring at their faces, eh, Captain?" his XO leered. Despite himself, Semyon Varlamov chuckled. Indeed, they hadn't been much concerned with the women's faces.
He shook his head, "You've arranged for their departure?"
"I have," Commander Niki Galovich nodded. "Along with the recreational women we sent down below decks for the conscripts entertainment." He smirked a bit, "Though finding all of them might take some time, I gather the men are quite enamored."
Captain Varlamov snorted, "I'm certain. Just make sure that all of them depart. We don't want the ship's new commander to have any evidence that we bent the rules of the blockade."
His XO looked mildly offended, "Of course not, sir. At least, not until we find out his preferences."
Captain Varlamov rolled his eyes, "Just be certain--"
"Captain!" the sensor officer looked up, "we have a shadow space emergence, multiple ships on an inbound vector! They're right on top of Squadron Gamma!"
Varlamov frowned, "The supply convoy? But they're early, my relief isn't supposed to arrive for another twelve hours..."
"Negative, Captain," his sensor officer blanched as he stared at his display, "they're engaging!"
***
Captain Tutin checked his displays once more and nodded as he took his command chair. "Everything looks nominal, Commander Zhing-Gao," he nodded at his XO, "I have the conn."
"Ye
s, sir," his XO saluted. They'd continued their scheduled patrol and they were about to come up on their next maneuver, a precise schedule that allowed them to sweep the far side of the planet before any blockade runners had time to clear the engagement envelope. Captain Tutin always kept to the patrol route as per the standing orders.
Even if I am the only squadron commander to do so, he thought. The other squadrons mostly just remained close to the station and only ventured out when the remote sensors noticed an intruding vessel. All too often that meant the smugglers had time to escape.
Captain Tutin spared a glance at the main force of the blockade, clustered near Chin-Lee Station. Rumor had it that they'd had quite the going-away party for Senior Captain Varlamov. At least we'll be rid of him, Captain Tutin thought, even as he stroked the arm rest of his ship. The elderly Gemini-class cruiser had been old at the fall of Amalgamated Worlds. It was one of the oldest ships still in service, a light cruiser that was more akin to a destroyer by modern standards.
Even so, she was still the most powerful vessel in Gamma Squadron.
"Shadow space emergence, ten thousand kilometers distant!" his sensor officer called out, her voice thick with surprise. "Captain, we're being hit by targeting sensors!"
Captain Tutin realized in an instant that his precise, predictable course had doomed his ship and squadron, even as he realized that the other squadrons, sticking too close to the station, meant his ships had no support or backup.
It was too late to do anything, but Captain Tutin still did his duty, "Roll ship thirty degrees, orders to the squadron--"
He didn’t get a chance to finish.
***
Captain Reese Leone waited until all ships in his task force indicated they'd acquired their targets. As their indicators went green, he snapped, "Open fire."
The four cruisers and ten destroyers fired simultaneously from only ten thousand kilometers. The Forerunner destroyers each mounted two spinal mass drivers as well as a single heavy railgun turret. The four Independence cruisers also mounted the older but still powerful heavy railguns in a quad turret with two lighter turrets of gauss guns.
