The Unincorporated War

by Dani Kollin

  Eros falls again! After a two-week battle Eros fell to Federation forces. This time, though, it was part of a grueling encounter. The casualties were high, with over 40,000 p.d.’s combined making this the deadliest conflict of the war to date. Eros was stripped of useful material and many Alliance citizens were evacuated into the surrounding belt, where they were warmly welcomed. Also retrieved was enough material to begin making that part of the belt an impassible field rife with ambush lanes and minefields. While this must still be considered a defeat for the Alliance, the Eros in Federation hands today is a worthless rock bereft of any benefit and will bring them little joy.

  —Cerian Daily News

  J. D. Black reviewed the footage, unconsciously running her fingers over the mangled skin on her face. She should’ve seen the possibility of the waterworks being mined. She would’ve done the same thing. But when Christina had asked J.D.’s advice on the attack, she’d concurred. She’d wanted Trang dead and instead had once again underestimated him and in doing so lost one of her best captains. Christina and Omad were the ones J.D. used to win battles. Forget what the Cerian Daily News said. This was a screwup and it was hers. She should’ve gone there herself, but she’d been overruled by Sinclair and Justin.

  J.D. was overseeing the refit of the War Prize personally and was spending too much time at the capital as a result. The closer she was to the politicians the harder it was for her to win the war. But she shrugged it off with the realization that it could’ve been worse—she could’ve had the Federation politicians.

  In addition to the reconstruction project, J.D. had to content herself with waiting for Omad’s return. It seemed he’d been working on yet another one of his hare brained schemes with Kenji and the insistent little man was almost as anxious about getting Omad back as she was. Kenji had even tried an intrasystem communication but fortunately had been found out and cut off. J.D. had had to threaten and nearly carry out a castration on the cretin in order to make him understand that he couldn’t just discuss his ideas over the Neuro or send them to Omad on his flagship, the Dolphin. Kenji may have been a genius, she realized, but he had no clue that an enemy in war time could take even the hint of an idea and unravel the best-laid plans. She’d even made a fledgling effort to help Kenji with his latest idea but failed miserably—she could barely talk to the man, much less work with him. The truth was Omad and the wizard of Gedretar, as Kenji had come to be known, had a unique bond. One was a hard-drinking, partying, fighting, tough-as-nails fleet captain and the other was, well, she thought bemusedly, he was a geek. J.D. smiled as she realized why she hadn’t torn into Kenji yet. The strange little man reminded her of Manny.

  Against all odds, Omad and Kenji had not only grown to like each other, they’d also somehow managed to complement each other. Kenji was brilliant but lacked all concepts of practical applications. Left to his own devices he’d spend time rebuilding a water vapor recapture unit to increase efficiency 1.5 percent over a ten-year period, or conversely he could easily be prodded into figuring out how to increase the thrust capacity of a battle cruiser. And thankfully, Omad had a way of keeping Kenji focused on projects that had immediate military application.

  Sadly, that meant the more time Omad spent at Gedretar the less time she had him for the fleet. And battles, she knew, were lost without inspired captains. And now she was down to only one.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by a communiqué alert. She saw from the information on her DijAssist that it had arrived with secure overrides. It was the type of message that she was familiar with from her days in the corporate world. Whoever sent it didn’t trust that her military firewalls could protect the message from infiltration. So therefore it could only be read within the confines of a non military secured area. That meant she’d have to leave the War Prize and head to one of the secure rooms next to the shipyard.

  J.D. stepped off the docking platform, or “plank” as her crew was so fond of calling it, and began slowly drifting away from the construction zone. She was heading toward the warm embrace of the Cerean compound but took a moment to turn around and view her ship. She was covered from bow to stern in scaffolding and being swarmed over by a skilled army of technicians and engineers. As a former Terran civilian, J.D. had had no idea that the Alliance had such a high proportion of competent individuals. Yes, she realized, it also had its share of useless, lazy bums, but in space such people either died very quickly or were exceedingly lucky. Given the preponderance of talent, it hadn’t been all that hard to shift the large group of commercial shipyard workers toward more military endeavors. And in short order the newly constituted Gedretar became one of the most productive shipyards in the system. The yard itself kept expanding until it merged with and then finally overtook its sister yard meant to handle all core-based shipping. As J.D. turned back around she got one last look at the tens of ships being pieced together from her most recent haul captured in Mars orbit. If all went well, they’d be equipped with the very same Omad/Kenji modifications that her ship was currently being fitted with. She’d made a silent prayer to herself that the secret wouldn’t leak out earlier than absolutely necessary. Though she knew it was a long shot, she now had faith.

  She drifted down to the opposing platform where her nano-gridded body lent her enough assisted gravity to make her way into the busy interior corridor. A few moments later she found herself in a secure room, made even more so by the security detail that had anticipated her arrival. They’d combed the room thoroughly and then promptly left it to stand guard, leaving her alone. It was then that she was finally able to activate the message. The first thing revealed was the sender: Kirk Olmstead. J.D. raised an eyebrow. Kirk had called her numerous times shipboard. That he hadn’t now was odd. She then activated the message itself. The note that popped up was simple and clear: “Come to my office.” J.D. waited another moment to see if anything else would be revealed, but nothing was. She felt the anger beginning to well inside her at what had turned out to be a colossal waste of her time. She then slowly counted to ten, and when the urge to point and fire her main guns at Kirk’s office subsided she headed, security detail in tow, deeper into the rock to confront the man who’d had the temerity to toy with her.

  Kirk Olmstead had his offices situated in the executive suites—an area carved into and directly behind the Cliff House. No one there had a view unless they’d set up a projector to create one, but they weren’t there for the scenery; they were there to be near the President 24/7. It wouldn’t be long, thought Janet as she made her way through the complex, that the whole damned section of the thoroughfare would be nothing but one big government complex.

  Every time she entered the governmental labyrinth she felt her skin crawl. She pushed those feelings aside and brushed past Kirk’s security detail and receptionist. He’d had the sense, she saw, not to have any of them try to make her wait. As she barged into his office she heard the doors close swiftly behind her. Kirk rose from behind his desk to greet her.

  “Hello, Janet.”

  “You could’ve just sent me a message telling me to come to your office.”

  “But I did.”

  “Touché,” she countered. “You know what I mean.”

  “Nice to see you too, Janet.”

  “You call me ‘Admiral’ and I’ll call you ‘Mr. Secretary.’ If you insist on using personal names, you may use ‘J.D’ and I’ll use ‘half-competent parasite.’” She then stood, arms folded across her chest, sporting an uneasy glare that accentuated the scarred half of her face.

  Kirk sat down, pleasantries over, and beckoned her to do the same. J.D. remained staunchly in place. “It is so nice,” he continued, “to see that your outsides have finally been brought in line with your insides … Admiral. It’s a good look for you. But you must know that I can no longer just call you over here, as that would let someone know when and where you’re planning to be. It’s the latest directive from my office and,” he said, making sure to project an official-looking
document in the holo-tank, “approved by the President.”

  J.D. was getting ready to tell Kirk where to shove his time-wasting directive when Mosh made a quiet entrance into the room.

  “Ahh,” said Mosh, grinning broadly, “if it ain’t just like old times. Hello, Kirk, Admiral Black.”

  J.D. instantly upgraded the importance of the meeting.

  “How are you doing, Secretary McKenzie?” asked Kirk, now beckoning Mosh to sit down.

  “I’m a little confused,” answered Mosh, taking his seat. “Why am I here?”

  J.D., realizing the meeting hadn’t been a simple power play, let her anger go and her curiosity peak. She too sat down.

  “I’ll second that.”

  “You control the captured UHF personnel, don’t you?” Kirk asked Mosh.

  “Why are you asking questions you already know the answers to, Kirk? As you know, all suspended prisoners are kept by the Interior Department to alleviate the military of the burden of watching men who can’t escape anyway.”

  “Careful, Mosh,” warned Kirk. “Remember what happened to the core on Mars. We freed over a million of their prisoners who supposedly ‘couldn’t get away.’”

  “Which is why,” snapped Mosh, “they’re all being sent to Saturn, smart-ass. We have a little moon we can store them in. One of the Sheppard moons if I remember correctly. It’ll be difficult for the UHF to pull off a surprise raid that deep into Alliance space, especially with our current security arrangements. That’s one of the good things we got from the Eros debacle—we won’t underestimate them again. But once more, Kirk, I still don’t know what I’m doing here.”

  Kirk didn’t answer the question but, rather, chose to continue with what J.D. felt to be his incoherent line of questioning.

  “Have you shipped off the admirals yet?” he asked.

  Now Janet became more attentive; she knew the Alliance had only captured two.

  “You already know we haven’t, Kirk. They’re being kept close by for negotiation purposes. But you don’t have to worry; they’re secure and, per Admiral Black’s wishes, no matter where the negotiations lead, Gupta stays with us.”

  Kirk’s mouth parted slightly, forming a half grin.

  “That may not necessarily be the case.”

  J.D. bristled as the conversation seemed to be taking a turn for the worse. Was she going to have to take him out after all? “Enough already,” she demanded.

  Kirk acknowledged her impatience with a gentle nod.

  “We’ve received an interesting communication this afternoon,” he said, “not only in content but source … from Acting Commodore Trang.”

  “Go on,” J.D. said evenly.

  “He’s offering to send us Captain Sadma in exchange for Admiral Gupta. To make matters even more complicated, he needs an answer within twelve hours. Well, actually ten … we got it a little less than two hours ago.”

  “Why so quickly?”

  “Apparently he’s to be relieved of command shortly, so our window of opportunity is dependent on how long he can hold out … which by his own estimate is approximately ten more hours.”

  “What did the President say?” asked Mosh.

  “President Cord has said that it’s up to our dear Fleet Admiral,” answered Kirk with a nod and a gesture in J.D.’s direction, “since she was the one who’d made it clear he was not to be released.”

  J.D. realized that Kirk would enjoy the outcome, what ever she decided. Either she’d be forced to release a man whose non-negotiable incarceration she’d insisted upon, or she’d have to make a decision that would separate her from quite possibly the best captain she had in her upstart fleet. She knew that Kirk’s Schadenfreude suitably matched his personality, but she was also determined not to give him the satisfaction of watching her squirm.

  “Even if we were to agree,” J.D. said evenly, refusing to betray the turmoil she was feeling inside, “how would we do the exchange? Eros is at the 180. That’s a two-week flight under the best of conditions. He’s got less than ten hours.”

  “Trust,” answered Kirk. “If we agree, he’ll launch Captain Sadma in a shuttle toward the belt with her coordinates conveyed to the nearest Alliance outpost.”

  “And we’d be trusted to do the same with Admiral Gupta, I presume,” said Mosh.

  “Exactly,” answered Kirk.

  “This seems a strange way to make the exchange,” added J.D.

  “Yes indeed,” said Mosh, nodding. “I didn’t realize that acting commodores were allowed to exchange prisoners in the Federation. Is it some sort of battle-field ability they have?”

  “Oh, most definitely not, Mr. Secretary,” answered Kirk. “They’re quite strict on that. All prisoners are to be processed and exchanges to be arranged by Fleet Command, and of course to be taken to an agreed-upon location beforehand. This Trang fellow is clearly violating orders.”

  “So he … or we for that matter,” added Mosh, “need to do this before they find out and stop him.”

  “Exactly,” answered Kirk. “Near as I figure, we have three options. We keep the frozen admiral on ice and say, ‘No.’ That would be safest if what Jan … Admiral Black believes about the man’s competence to be true. Two, we lie. We say we’ll give back Admiral Gupta, but don’t. Trang sends Captain Sadma home and Gupta never sees the light of day.”

  J.D. looked at Kirk with a renewed burst of contempt.

  “Third,” he continued dispassionately, unmoved by Janet’s glaring, “we do the deal on the up-and-up and let them have Gupta. After all, he’s just another bad Federation officer. He lost one battle; with any luck he’ll lose more.”

  “I’m not in favor of lying, Kirk,” said Mosh. “If we agree to the deal we have to release the admiral. This isn’t going to be the first such negotiation of the war; in fact, it’s not the first.” J.D. looked curiously at Mosh, reminding herself to bring up that topic for later discussion.

  “Both sides,” continued Mosh, “must know that they can trust each other. One broken pledge, even to an acting commodore off the reservation, will destroy our ability to trust each other again.”

  “Of course, Mr. Secretary,” said Kirk peevishly, “but I did want to lay out all the options. Still, by order of the President it’s not up to you or me, but Admiral Black.”

  “Out of curiosity, Kirk,” asked J.D., “how did Trang’s communiqué get through?”

  “He sent a message directly to one of our semaphore towers.”

  That answer brought a look of surprise to both J.D. and Mosh. The Alliance had set up a group of asteroids and non-mobile ships in direct laser sight of one another in order to send messages reliably and securely around the belt. The string of towers enabled messages to be sent to the 180 without having the core listen in.

  “We’re of course revising codes and creating a backup system,” added Kirk. “We knew they knew about it in principle, but I must admit, quite impressive, his being able to send the message directly to the nearest tower.”

  J.D. spent the next few moments considering all she’d heard. She could ask for more information, but that would only delay the inevitable. She knew she had enough information to make the call. But she also realized something that Kirk Olmstead did not. Hers would be a decision that would have a profound impact on the women and men serving directly under her.

  “Do it,” she said stiffly. “Send him a message that I personally agree and will send Admiral Gupta to Mars unharmed as soon as transport can be arranged.”

  “You’re sure about this, Janet?” asked Mosh.

  He’d used her first name and she knew why. He wanted to be sure that the decision was coming from the person he knew best and not the person she’d most recently become.

  “Maybe not,” she answered.

  “Then why do it?”

  “Because once we have Captain Sadma back we’ll be sending a communiqué to UHF Fleet Command thanking them for the exchange and the speed with which it was carried out. We’ll al
so make sure to inquire politely if commodore-grade officers are now empowered to make similar deals on other levels.”

  Kirk looked impressed. “Oh, you are a nasty bitch, Admiral. That could get him court-martialed. Maybe even shot.”

  “If we’re lucky,” answered J.D., allowing herself a half smile.

  Pursuant to CC&R 247.8 a court-martial is called for Captain Samuel U. Trang on the following charges.

  Article one: Failure to secure his command after enemy forces collapsed in the Eros sector, including failure to seize proper control of Eros proper.

  Article two: Failure to properly engage the enemy, allowing his command to be destroyed piecemeal in an improper defense, costing the lives of tens of thousands of Federation fleet personnel.

  Article Three: Consorting with the enemy, giving aid and comfort to the enemy in direct violation of orders.

  Captain Trang is to surrender his command immediately and be transported to Fleet Headquarters by the fastest available ship. Until that time he is not to communicate with anyone but be confined to quarters. Orders to be carried out immediately.

  Fleet Admiral Jackson

  Fleet Headquarters

  Mars Orbit

  Trang finished reading the orders on the bridge of the Pegasus and then looked at a very nervous Judicial Ser vice Branch officer. The bridge crew was looking quite ready to kill the poor woman who, Trang realized, was only carrying out orders. It didn’t help that obviously the JSB officer hadn’t seen a second of combat in her life and was surrounded by a group who’d seen more than enough for a lifetime.

  “Parker!” commanded Trang. The commodore’s best noncom assault marine came to immediate attention.

  “Sir!”

  “You are to gather a group of trusted marines and make sure a route to this officer’s shuttle remains clear. I will not have the loyalty or honor of my marines questioned.”

  “But sir, what they’re planning to do is—”