Valor's Stand

by Kal Spriggs

  “I dunno,” Ashiri shook her head. “Things have changed a lot these past few months.” Her expression turned pensive. “Admiral Drien brought in more of his people. A lot more, switching out pretty much the whole staff. I gather most of them have worked with him for decades, most recently at Headquarters, but other places, too. They're not like our other instructors.”

  “What?” I asked in surprise. Rear Admiral Fischer had been a big change-up. He'd brought in a lot of new people and it had felt like he'd changed things quite a bit. But from what my friend was saying, this was more profound.

  “They're a lot more hands-on. Kyle butted heads with a couple of them when they were trying to dictate his training plans--”

  “Wait, what?” I asked in surprise. The whole point of the Regiment of Cadets was so that we had the opportunities to plan things, to have positions of authority and responsibility.

  “He's not any more. Martin was the Regimental Commander. Word was that he told Admiral Drien that he was going to step down if he didn't get a chance to, you know, actually be the commander. I guess Admiral Drien told the instructors to back off a bit, but they're still looking over your shoulder all the time. And it's not about doing things the right way, sometimes, it's about doing things the way they want.”

  “Ugh,” I said. “That sucks.”

  Being a cadet officer was a chance to fail, yeah, but it was also a chance to learn. It sounded like things had changed rather more than I'd thought.

  “You told me about your encounter with Commander Leath,” Ashiri went on. “Him holding you up with a verbal debriefing so you nearly missed your ship? Well that's relatively minor. He's one of the worst. Veracruz from Tiger got relieved of her company command position because he gave her the wrong coordinates to have her defense forces respond to an attack during a drill and when she got there, the attack was on the other side of campus.”

  “Are you kidding me?” I asked in shock.

  “His official reasoning was that she should have had the 'foresight' to confirm the location, but unofficially, the word is that she'd been the one to ask the Regimental Commander to talk to Admiral Drien about interference and so...”

  I rocked back on my heels. “That's dirty.” I didn't know Veracruz all that well, she was on the ground-side track, so we didn't share many classes. But if she'd been relieved, then it would be in her record jacket. Our records went on after our graduation, after we were commissioned. This wouldn't just affect her ranking, it would affect her entire career.

  “Yeah, tell me about it,” Ashiri said. “A lot of cadet officers are just keeping their heads down, hoping this all kind of blows over, you know, like with last year.” She shot me a wink, “So if you want to go and get Admiral Drien to step down...”

  “Ha,” I told her. “Yeah right.” The whole mess with Rear Admiral Fischer had happened because he'd been in the pocket of Charterer Beckman. Only he'd had something of a conscience, so when he'd realized that she wasn't just playing political games, that she was up to something rather more serious, he'd offered to turn on her.

  He'd destroyed his career in the process. He'd testified about a number of corrupt activities he'd not just seen, but taken part in, on Charterer Beckman's behalf. There was no way that someone who'd admitted to taking bribes could remain in uniform. As far as I knew, he'd been forcibly retired and my grandmother had suggested he might even move off-world.

  Somehow I doubted that Admiral Drien would do anything similar. Besides, we're running out of Admirals as far as I know... It was a dry humor, but it was there all the same. My grandmother and Admiral Drien were two of Century's most senior officers in uniform. The President normally served as the head of the Militia, and President Jones had that role, but it was mostly ceremonial. The President designated a military staff to follow his orders. Admiral Quann was the Deputy Commander of the Militia. He was the equivalent rank to my grandmother and Admiral Drien. Admiral Drien, until recently, had been the Commander Active Militia Forces. I wasn't sure, but I thought that Rear Admiral McTighe, his former deputy, had taken that position.

  My grandmother had been the Commander Reserve Militia Forces, but she'd taken the assignment to the Centurions. Right now, her former deputy, Rear Admiral Laney had her place, but Kyle had mentioned that he was likely to retire due to medical issues. He had been on the first generation to get the longevity treatments and, like a number of those who'd gotten those life extension treatments, he was facing issues from improperly administered doses.

  Rear Admiral Fischer had been on some kind of strategy and acquisitions planning assignment before he came to the Academy. As far as I knew, a Captain had taken that position. I knew there were a couple of other senior officers in the Militia, but I was under the impression that they were all either nearing retirement or already on the way out due to health issues like Rear Admiral Laney, or had spent so long behind desks that they weren't the best types to have in charge of potential combat units.

  Admiral Quann was too busy running the entire militia in day-to-day operations. He didn't have time to be the Academy Superintendent. I didn't know how the Admiral had handled the Reserves as well as the Academy. Part of me thought she must have clones of herself running around, just based off how well she'd pulled it off.

  I didn't think there was anyone who could take over, not with the experience to do the job, anyway. Though from the sounds of things, I don't know if Admiral Drien is doing the job...

  “Well,” I started to explain all that, “You see--”

  The ship shifted ever so slightly. “Emergence from strategic warp. Welcome to the Harmony System, Harmony Protectorate. All hands, prepare for arrival.”

  I gave a slight snort. Of course, the second I'd found something to distract myself, we'd arrived.

  ***

  Chapter 11: I Learn That I Have Much To Learn

  The Harmony Protectorate had been an independent cluster of four inhabited and about a dozen uninhabited systems inside the borders of Guard Space. They'd retained their independence through multiple conflicts with the culmor, at times they'd been on the very forefront of the war with the aliens. From everything I'd read, they'd been a pretty strong nation, with a ton of merchant ships, advanced technology, and factories and shipyards that supported their industry.

  Century hadn't heard any details about what exactly had happened there, but the Centurions had taken some kind of peacekeeping mission there, supporting a Guard Fleet Peacekeeping Task Force, which had moved in shortly after a coup.

  I started pulling in information on my implant as we arrived. The CPM Palmer's commander had allowed us to watch his sensors as we came in and I took the opportunity to learn what I could.

  The Harmony Protectorate Defense Force was fairly large. There were three dreadnought groups that I could see. Each battlegroup had a dreadnought, two or three battleships, and a host of escort ships. All of them were powered down, though they had active transponders identifying them. They were also in a parking orbit near the planet... and there was a large number of armed ships on the perimeter of that formation.

  I recognized the transponders of the Centurions. It was similar to Century Planetary Militia transponders, but also different, with an initial alpha-numeric that identified them as Chartered Mercenary Guild ships. I barely recognized the classes of vessels, though. The Centurions didn't use the standard Militia equipment, they used newer ships built on Hanet. The company served as both a training unit to give the Militia combat experience and as sort of an ace in the hole. If Century fell under attack, the Centurions could be activated as part of the Militia. Then they and their ships would return home and help defend the system.

  I looked up some of the other transponders on my implant. Hammer Squadron made up the next largest force. They were out of the MCA, and a glance at the notes on my implant told me that they were similar to the Centurions in purpose, though they made use of older destroyers and cruisers for the most part.

  Th
ere were about a dozen more different mercenary units that I saw, ranging from military transports for carrying troops to a single battlecruiser, the Tenacity, which seemed to have arrived relatively recently as it was just coming into orbit.

  “That looks like a mess,” I noted.

  “Tell me about it,” Ashiri shook her head next to me. Both of us were using our implants to watch. The Palmer was headed for the central ship of the Centurions, the Pentacane, if I read the transponder right. My grandmother's flagship.

  I tried to pull up a listing of the ship's armament, but I didn't have that data on my implant. In fact, I after a quick search, I didn't see information on any of the Centurions ships. It wasn't even listed as classified or anything, it just wasn't present and I couldn't find anything on it in the Palmer's network, either. How strange.

  The Pentacane was a big ship, bigger than any ships we had in orbit of Century. The sensors put it at just over six hundred meters in length and two hundred meters abeam. As we drew closer, I could make out the large doors along its central section, between the two rings of the warp drives. Zooming in on the visual sensors, I could also see heavy armored sections along its length... and no turrets. Some kind of carrier? It was a strange thought. Carriers were good for support roles, but they most often operated from the rear of any engagement, protected by other ships. I couldn't think of the Admiral commanding her flagship from the rear.

  “Departing crew, assemble at the airlock,” the Palmer's deck officer announced.

  Ashiri and I shouldered our bags and stepped out into the corridor. The other passengers were similarly moving out. I could have continued to watch on my implant, splitting off some of my attention, but I wasn't sure if I'd learn much of anything that way.

  Docking happened fairly quickly and within a few minutes, we shuffled over onto the other ship. I presented my orders to the Deck Officer of the Pentacane and saluted. He scanned me onto the ship, returned the salute, and I got out of the way of the next crewman coming aboard.

  The air on the ship smelled fresher, without the funk of too many people crammed into too tight of a space. As the last of the new crew came aboard, departing crew shuffled past the Deck Officer and onto the Palmer. After the last of the transfer was complete, they closed the hatch and I heard the clanks of docking clamps releasing. “They're headed back already, sir?” I asked in surprise. I had thought there would be a longer break, that maybe I'd have time to finally draft a proper message to Kyle.

  The Deck Officer looked up from his datapad to shoot me a frown, “They're on the clock, Cadet. We've got some priority information dispatches that have to go back to Century.”

  I straightened under his gaze, “Sir.” Ashiri straightened to attention next to me as well.

  He waved at me and Ashiri to relax, “Questions are fine, Cadet. That's how we all learn.” He glanced at his datapad for a moment, “You two are both assigned to the Drake squadrons with auxiliary details as well.”

  “Sir?” I replied, not really sure if that was a question or a statement. I had no idea what a Drake was.

  He flashed me a smile, “No worries, Cadet. You aren't expected to know everything. Things are a bit different out here. You two wait here, I've got to send our other crew to their destinations.”

  He pulled several of the enlisted crew to the side and sent them off with a Sergeant. A moment later, I heard the klaxon to signal another ship was docking. A moment later, he sent the rest of the incoming crew onto the shuttle that had just docked. Only after the shuttle undocked did he come back to us.

  “Alright, that squares things away. You two follow me, right?”

  We fell into step behind him as he led the way. The docking area didn't connect to a corridor, instead, the hatch opened out into a hangar bay. It was a huge open space, with four meters from the deck to the overhead. All the same, it felt cramped. A huge craft took up most of the space, with several more in a row beyond it. They were big, tough looking fighters. “Drakes,” the Deck Officer jerked his thumb at the large fighters. “We'll get you flying one in a few days. Modern systems, great birds.”

  I didn't have the capacity to answer. I was trying to take in the craft's size. They were half again longer than the old Firebolt Mark V's I'd flown, and twice as tall. They didn't have the powerful thrusters of the Firebolts, either, so they weren't designed to operate in atmosphere at all, I'd guess. They had maneuvering thrusters, but they were sleek and flush against the hulls. Those long, teardrop shapes were unmistakably designed to fill their warp envelopes to the max. I wondered what kind of weapons they mounted.

  “This way,” the Deck Officer led us past the big fighter and then through another hatch. This was a workshop, I saw, and there were a half dozen crew at work fabricating parts and doing maintenance on bits of equipment. The Pentacane didn't seem to have corridors like most of the ships I'd worked on. Every compartment opened up into the next, through a series of armored hatches.

  “The Pentacane is an old Warrior-class assault carrier,” The Deck Officer spoke as we continued onward. “She's got nothing in the way of primary weapons, just a good number of point defense guns to keep fighters and warp missiles off her. Our main armament is the Drakes, we can carry one squadron in the hangars and a second squadron attached to the hull.”

  “Attached to the hull?” Ashiri and I both asked in shock. Normally being outside the hull of a ship traveling in warp was a bad thing. The warp field itself produced a lot of harsh radiation, and the radiation screens on most ships was an extension of the ship's armor. Anything outside the hull was likely to be cooked. Literally.

  “The ship's been retrofitted with radiation screen extensions, it pushes the screens about five meters out from the hull, rather than one or two,” he answered without missing a beat. “It means we can hook up fighters on the hull, crews can bunk in the ship, and we can take a whole lot of firepower with us wherever we go.”

  “Wow,” I looked at Ashiri. I'd known that pushing the field out was possible, I'd never thought of the implication of carrying fighters on the outside of the ship, though. It would be hard to rearm them, I was sure, but they probably took up far less space than the squadron inside the docking bays. They could rotate them out, too, rearm one squadron at a time...

  “Guard Fleet has started doing that on some of their newer ships, Drakkus Empire too,” The Deck Officer said that last bit with no little venom. “We just got the Pentacane retrofitted two years back, it's worked pretty well so far.”

  “You've been with the Centurions for two years?” Ashiri asked in surprise. “I thought they only did year-long assignments to rotate crew through?”

  He flashed her a smile, “Yeah, that's most of the positions. They keep a few of us on permanent party, mostly those of us lucky enough to run afoul of politics.” He made a face. “Sorry, I shouldn't talk about that.”

  Politics? I wondered.

  “And here's your quarters,” The Deck Officer finished. “Drop your bags here, we don't have time for much else.”

  We did so, then followed him through another set of compartments. We went through the crew mess, “This is the pilot's mess, you'll meet your squadron commander later,” he noted. Then we went through a series of storage sections, “Whole spine of the ship is stowage, fighter parts, munitions, supplies. You could run the whole task force's operations for sixty days just on what this ship carries.”

  Then we came into a command section. We went through several compartments where crew were manning sensors, communications, and other terminals. Finally, we came to the bridge. A stern looking woman sat in the command chair. She raised an eyebrow as the Deck Officer came up. “Ma'am,” he announced, “Cadet First Class Armstrong and Cadet Second Class Takenata.”

  “Admiral's expecting them,” she nodded. Her weathered face showed decades of sun and a lifetime of experience. Her name tag read Montoya. “Their squadron commander will be up in a few. Thanks Lieutenant Hurst.”

  “Ma'am,” H
e gave her a salute, she returned it, and he departed.

  “The Admiral is in her flag bridge. She wanted to greet you two in person, for some reason I can't imagine,” Captain Montoya told us, her voice dry. “Cadet Second Class Takenata, how about you take a seat in the auxiliary comms terminal there and give Cadet First Class Armstrong a minute or two with her grandmother?”

  Ashiri nodded crisply, “Ma'am.”

  I flushed a bit, feeling as if I were getting special treatment. Then again, perhaps in this case, since I had a lot to tell her, it would be alright.

  I stepped through the hatch and into the Admiral's flag bridge. It wasn't much different in outward appearance to the bridge. Some part of me wondered that the two were side by side. I would have imagined that made for more of a risk. Then again, I suppose any hit that made it through the Pentacane's warp drive field, heavy armor, and multiple decks down to the center of the ship... well, it probably didn't matter where the two compartments were located in that case.

  The Admiral was standing, staring at another display. I could see her expression was totally focused, a woman was spoke over a transmission and I could just make out her voice, though I couldn't see her face from this angle, “...will comply. We'll send down our commander, Captain Amiss, to link up with the Peacekeeper Task Force Commander as requested.”

  “Roger,” another voice answered. “We'll let Commodore Creed know to expect you. Hammer Squadron, out.”

  The Admiral stepped back from the display as the transmission terminated. She let out a deep breath, though if it was in relief or irritation I couldn't tell. A moment later, she looked over in my direction. “Cadet First Class Armstrong. Welcome aboard.” She gestured in the direction of a hatch, “My office, please.”

  “Ma'am,” I nodded in reply and followed her inside.

  As the hatch closed behind me, I gave her a sharp salute, “Cadet First Class Armstrong, reporting, ma'am.”

  She returned the salute. “At ease.” Then, to my surprise, she stepped forward and gave me a hug. It was a quick squeeze, but for a moment, we weren't just two military members, we were family. I hugged her back tightly, then on some felt signal, we released the embrace and she stepped back. Her eyes were a bit misty as she looked me over. “Looking good, girl.”