Battle Cruiser
Page 40
I walked to his desk, eyed the chair in front of it, but rejected the idea of sitting there. He was standing, so I stayed on my feet as well.
Halsey, for his part, continued to gaze out the window down at Earth.
“Do you know why I called you up here today?” he asked.
The truth was I had no idea. But there were guesses in my mind.
“Because you wanted to give me a new mission, sir?”
He finally looked away from the viewport and faced me. “Your father’s spies are still the best. My compliments.”
“Oh no, sir,” I began, but he put a hand up to stop me.
“Don’t bother. I’m not offended. In fact, I now see your political connections as an asset to your command status and Star Guard in general.”
It grated on me to have him think my shrewd guess was due to spying, but I kept quiet with an effort of will. I’d learned over the course of my career it was very difficult to get an idea out of a superior’s mind once it was transfixed there, and that trying to do so might even entrench the thought more deeply.
“I didn’t summon you here just to give you something new to do,” he continued, turning back to the blazing glory of Earth again. “I also wanted to hear more about your self-assigned mission to Antarctica.”
“I made a full report, sir. The camera drones captured every moment, in fact.”
“Yes, of course. I saw plenty of snow and steel tubes. That’s not what I’m talking about. What I want to know is why you think the Stroj were placing Beta embryos at our poles in the first place?”
“Poles, sir?”
“Yes. Are your father’s agents slipping? We found another stash up at the North Pole.”
I hadn’t known this. Immediately, I began worrying about Zye’s reaction. “What’s the status of the tubes?”
“Hmm? I don’t know…I suppose we’ve got them in storage somewhere.”
“They’re safe?”
“Safe? I guess. They aren’t all that dangerous.”
He wasn’t getting my meaning. I was thinking about Zye, and how she saw them as helpless infants. I could tell they were nothing more than chunks of frozen meat to Admiral Halsey. I decided not to press the matter. I could look into it later.
“Anyway,” Halsey said, “why do you think they did it?”
“Perhaps they thought they could rebuild their invasion forces out in the rocks.”
“Nonsense. Space is plenty cold enough. No need to transport them down to Earth then back out there. No, the only reason the Stroj did this was to provide raw materials—to build more Stroj on Earth.”
I immediately saw his point. “Stands to reason,” I said.
“Glad you approve. The strange thing is that Betas could hardly be used as infiltrators, so why keep so many here?”
“You’re suggesting they were to be converted into troops?”
“Invasion troops, to be exact,” he said. “Commandos. The force would be too small to grab and hold territory, of course, but think of what they could do if they hit CENTCOM. A thousand Beta-based Stroj infantry, taking out our command center. Killing all our cadets.”
The thought was alarming. “Is there any evidence to suggest—” I began.
“Not directly, but it doesn’t really matter what their specific goals were. They obviously intended to create a force on Earth for ground operations. You know what that indicates to me?”
As he asked this, he looked me squarely in the eye.
“What, sir?” I asked.
“That they aren’t finished with us yet. They found their way here and mounted a sucker-punch operation, but they failed to take us out on the cheap. Now, we’re alerted. We’ll build up our defenses. They have to know that, but they’ll come back at us anyway. Eventually they’ll come out of the dark from somewhere, with greater strength.”
I found his thinking to be difficult to refute. Most of Earth’s populace was celebrating now, assuming the threat was over. They wanted to go back to their old ways, without looking up at the skies in fear. Those of us in the Guard, however, remained vigilant.
“You’re saying we must build up our fleet,” I said. “I’m in complete agreement there.”
“I’m saying more than that. I’m saying we can’t just sit here waiting around for the enemy to hit us. The next time, they might come at us with a hundred cruisers. We just don’t know. We have to find them, Sparhawk. We have to know what we’re up against.”
Finally, I was beginning to understand where he was going with this.
“The only ship we have that could go exploring is Defiant,” I said.
“That’s right.”
“But the battle cruiser is also our best defense.”
“At the moment, yes.”
We eyed one another. I shook my head. “CENTCOM won’t send Defiant into the blue. That sort of exploration hasn’t been approved since the Cataclysm.”
He brought up a single finger and waved it at me. “We’ll see about that. What I want to know is where you stand. Let’s say a year or two goes by, and we’ve got a dozen new destroyers and a strong set of missile bases ringing Earth. Would you be willing to command Defiant? To take her beyond the limits of our star system?”
For some reason, I immediately visualized the moment when my crew found an ER bridge into the unknown and dared to cross it.
Once a vessel started on such a path, there was no turning back. It was like stepping into an abyss—you just hoped that when you hit the bottom, there was something soft there to land upon.
My heart was pounding, and my eyes were shining. I knew the answer in my heart. I think we both did.
“Yes sir,” I said firmly. “I’d be willing to undertake such a mission.”
“That’s what I thought,” he said, turning back to the dazzling glow that was Earth. “Dismissed, Captain. We’ll talk further when the time is right.”
I left him there, and for the next hour I walked around the outer ring of Araminta Station in a daze.
It had been a century and half since Earthlings had left their home system. To do it again—I didn’t think that I’d ever wanted anything more.
The End
From the Author: Thanks Reader! I hope you enjoyed BATTLE CRUISER. If you liked the book and want to read more about this universe, please put up some stars and a review. Let me know what kind of mission you’d like to see William Sparhawk take on next.
Star Force and Undying Mercenaries fans should not worry! More books are coming soon.
-BVL
More SF Books by B. V. Larson:
STAR FORCE SERIES:
Swarm
Extinction
Rebellion
Conquest
Army of One (Novella)
Battle Station
Empire
Annihilation
Storm Assault
The Dead Sun
Outcast
Exile
Gauntlet
The Undying Mercenaries Series:
Steel World
Dust World
Tech World
Machine World
Death World
Visit BVLarson.com for more information.