by Ken Pence
Andrew looked around the room at his stalwart friends and colleagues. “We have to start the next phase. We need to distribute weapons, intelligence and ships. The ERF ships will support Admiral Kyger. I will retain command over the confiscated ships for the time being though I am sure that will become an issue. This will be the last time we will be together as a team. I am proud to have served with you,” he said and raised a glass. “To missing comrades…”
Glasses were raised around the room, “To missing comrades,” was spoken in a heart-felt lament.
Reinforcements
Admiral Brad Kyger was lamenting his losses also. He didn’t know how his force would be able to defend Earth or anywhere else if an attack materialized. He had lost ships at Mintaka, Sheliak, and Zeta Persei. His virgin fleet of six hundred ships had been whittled down. The Allung planetoids at each of the systems had destroyed many before they were consumed. He regretted leaving so many ships at Saiph but what was done was done. His two hundred cruisers were now down to 53. Many of the ships had to be left in-system to combine surviving crewmembers, treat the wounded and repair what they could. He had a little more than one hundred jump-capable ships. He didn’t have troops to scour the enemy ships he had knocked out even.
He was jolted out of his reflection with an urgent call and the battle stations alert, “Admiral. One hundred plus ships have just jumped into the system. There are three Allung planetoids and a number of battleship class. They all appear to be Allung design.”
Oh God, he thought…his worst nightmare. “Jumped?” he asked and his heart missed a beat knowing they could jump to the undefended Earth now too.
“Yes, sir. Wait, sir. They are broadcasting ERF codes and have stopped advancing. I have contact with Captain Andrew Williams, sir. He says he is in command of the ERF Auxillary Fleet. There is two minute light minute delay but he is headed this way, sir to update you. Do you wish to reply?” asked the communications rating.
“Tell him I will keep the coffee and croissants hot while waiting for him.” Thank God, he thought. Maybe I don’t regret leaving those troops at Saiph after all.
***
Andrew was given the royal treatment upon coming aboard. Officers and crew stopped what they were doing to watch him as he was escorted to the Admiral. Captain Williams was wearing some type of urban gray uniform with a subdued patch and a beret. The crew grinned ear to ear when they saw him as the communications and scan crews leaked word about the strange support fleet that arrived.
He was ushered into the small conference room with the admiral and the flagship’s captain and exec. Andrew looked isolated as he came in and saluted. Admiral Kyger was a bit taken aback by the uniform but crisply returned the salute and asked Captain Williams to sit.
“I take it you are here as Captain Williams and not as Andrew, then…” Admiral Kyger said.
“Yes, sir. I was forced to relieve Captain Wright of command and take total command of the force at Saiph. I also formed a small fleet with commissioned locals, into an auxiliary fleet, under my command. I left Captain Darby in charge of the ERF ships at Saiph,” he stated.
“I want to hear everything. We are beaten up pretty bad. I have one hundred ships and many of them have partial crews. Locals?” asked Kyger.
“Yes, sir. I have 2,500 progeny – reconstituted Lee Post-like clones and over five hundred superbly trained freed slaves. Most of the latter are Toi like Xilatoi but they have had four or more months of intensive training under Captain Darby’s cadre. We use them for boarding operations after we disable the Allung ships,” Andrew said.
“Good grief, Andrew – I mean Captain. How many ships have you had to board? We have many here we would like to board but don’t have the manpower. We just keep them under our guns.”
“That’s why we’re here Admiral. We dropped off new weapons and boarding parties at Mintaka and Sheliak already. We upgraded the slicers and they are self controlling. We have the maintenance and override codes for you. We have dropped them to the troops at the previous sites and my progeny are sweeping the Allung ships for you as there are bound to be enemy survivors. Here is an intelligence training file on the Allung Brotherhood. It is current as of two days ago and tells the strengths and dispositions of all the Allung,” Andrew stated with a straight face.
“What? You got them to talk? How in the world…” Admiral Kyger said and stopped after seeing the expression on Andrew’s face.
“The females got them to talk. Here is a training cylinder for you to duplicate and distribute,” Andrew said as he handed over the cylinder. “You’ll find their hierarchy and political infrastructure very enlightening. We also have several metric tons of lamlee for you.”
“Tons of lamlee…How many prisoners do you still have? Tons?” Andrew asked.
“Saiph was the Allung Commodity Reserve where they kept all their valuables. They also had a technology repository but that was damaged. We are investigating some possibilities for us but we’re not quite there yet. We only have two Allung still alive,” he said.
Andrew paused and looked straight at Andrew for a few seconds. Admiral Kyger then turned to his staff and sent them out of the room. He said nothing as they left and then turned to Andrew. “I take it you intend to retain control of your force…I might have trouble moving under an unknown anyway. What do you want to talk to me about? I didn’t read that wrong did I?” Brad asked.
“No,” Andrew said. “Here’s the map of current Allung positions. There are a lot of small bases and outposts 2,000 light years across. They ran into a wall about 1,500 years ago – they ran into the Ylee who stopped them cold. When we finish this, I intend to take the progeny and the Toi to investigate. What I wanted to talk to you about is the numbers. I had all my people work on them and it looks like the Allung had a lot more ships then we have seen. We – together – must have put 1,000 of their ships out of commission. Unfortunately our numbers crunching shows they may have another 1,000 ships at their disposal.”
Admiral Kyger’s face blanched. “One thousand more…and they are massing for an attack on Earth,” he said in an astonished voice. “How can we hope to defeat them?” Brad said with a coffee cup halfway to his mouth.
“Those new slicers are our best bet. We are headed to Earth, with your permission, to begin rush production. We are also manufacturing at Saiph but we are running out of ship drives to use. We need more manufacturing capacity like we have at Earth. We need your help but I’m not even sure a rear admiral has enough pull,” Andrew said.
Brad chuckled, took a sip of his cold coffee, made a face and set it down. “They promoted me to Vice Admiral. I guess they thought Rear Admiral Lower half sounded bad. They said I skipped a rank due to my extensive time in grade – counting the accelerated time. With that – I may as well do this…You are now promoted to Commodore of the ERF Auxillary,” Brad said and reached beside his seat and pulled out some Jack Black and, after getting a fresh cup of coffee, poured in a generous amount. “Here’s to you commodore. We’ll get this done. What other technology did you develop?”
“Commodore…didn’t know our Navy used that rank?” he said.
“ERF Navy didn’t but the auxillary can. That lower half crap needs to go – new military – new rules. We make it – we write it. Our tradition. Tell me about new tech that might save our ass. How good are these new slicers?
“They are outstanding. Shiv has them set up to disable Allung ships according to their class and how they are fighting. They transmit slave collar unlock codes when they are stationary and doing mini-jumps through ships. They target the planetoids first and then the smaller ships. We lose a few through lucky hits but they are damn hard to hit and keep jumping through the ships until we order them to stop or all the targets are destroyed. The field neutralizers are easier to make and they are small. They are vulnerable as they begin to penetrate a field but if they target the neutralizers than the slicers just cut them up.”
Andrew continued, “The l
aser can be reprogrammed to fire in trios and hit moving targets. Your ships can be reprogrammed to automatically turn away from laser fire, making it harder to penetrate one of our ships,” he said handing Vice Admiral Brad Kyger two memory modules. “Here are the Allung plans for the coming decade and all their tactical maps and shared codes. The second module has the upgrade programming and manuals for all the new weaponry. I have one hundred progeny standing by to brief and train your people. They will follow your orders and you don’t need to feed them or anything – just treat them like you would a valued employee,” Andrew said.
“Andrew, you rained on my parade when you told me about those 1,000 ships but you gave me some hope with the new weapons. I will get right on it. I will send a summary of the new auxiliary force we started out here and get you an official sanction from on high. How will we tell these progeny apart?” Brad asked.
“I thought that was going to be a big problem too but they are a bit different to start with according to their background. They then picked up the characteristics of the men and women they were associated with – their features are all a bit different. It’s disconcerting at first but you are damn glad to have them around when the going gets tough. They can die but they can repair injuries. Massive trauma tends to change their personalities a bit but we’ve never seen anything bad. They’ve been damn loyal and friggin’ brave in what they do. They are the ones that tackle free space walks and do all the boarding operations.”
“I was worried about that and was going to ask. Sounds good…Do you think their loyalty will last?” Brad asked.
“As long as we treat them as intelligent beings – they will treat us the same. I recommend that we give them Earth citizenship after service,” Andrew said. “They have already sworn loyalty to the ERF Auxiliary.”
“Then I see no problem and will add that addendum to my latest reports. We are heading there now. You coming with us?” he asked.
“Yes sir. We need to start those manufacturing operations,” Andrew said. “Having several thousand new troops with us should have an illuminating effect on the politicians also…especially when they learn there are one thousand enemy ships planning to destroy and enslave the survivors.”
“You are learning,” Brad said taking a refreshing sip of his laced coffee.
***
The jump to Earth was anti-climatic. Earth was vastly unaware of what was going on outside its purview. The recognition of the progency as Earth citizens brought an uproar. Politicians railed about aliens in our midst. The counter propaganda by the World Government showed MemDex videos of the progeny fighting the Allung. The repeated uncensored broadcasts of the battles between the ES and ERF forces were interlaced with videos of our troops and progeny ripped apart. Never before was there a war when every recovered person or body part attached to a MemDex could be accessed.
Family could see what happened to their kin. The Earth public saw the thousands and thousands of dead slaves. The videos were edited to show the myriad species enslaved and some from Desiree’s interrogations with the Allung as they talked with pride about their history. They talked about mass genocide of many species and laughter about turning them into servants doing their bidding and not letting them breed after killing all their children.
Those last videos did it. The religious fanatics stayed at it with their narrow minded Christian or Moslem theology but no one paid them any attention. Their extreme views brought about the largest drop in religious contributions in a hundred years. Politicians relying on the support from the pulpit were marked for removal from office at any subsequent election. The ERF support swelled, as did the number of volunteers to the Earth Regulatory Force.
***
The production of slicers and field neutralizers had gone from a trickle to a torrent. They were produced by the thousands and were emplaced from Earth orbit outward to the orbit of Mars and inward as far as the orbit of Venus. Crews were sent to Mintaka, Sheliak, and Zeta Persei to speed the recovery and retrofitting of Allung ships. Often the ships had pockets of Allung that were eliminated. It was ironic that the ships they attacked us with would be responsible for defending the Earth.
The Exploration Service was amazed at the intelligence data and training cylinder that were provided them by the ERF. They barely had gotten learning machine duplicators from Earth before we were bringing them tons of lamlee (we didn’t tell them how much we recovered) and hundreds of duplicates of the history and strategy of the Allung – all in Trade. The interrogations would have more lasting effect on the Allung than any battle. They had lost thousands of troops to the Allung and seeing their ancient enemy brought to ruin was extremely gratifying.
***
LeiLei and Shiv were struggling with the confiscated weapon from Saiph. They’d reached a conclusion that it couldn’t possibly do anything when Rett came by. He had seen how the multi-dimensional math worked. He thought some of the notes looked familiar and sure enough, the math was identical. He rarely showed excitement but maybe being around these humans and the way the jumped to conclusions was rubbing off.
“Hah!” he exclaimed in imitation of Joel’s exclamations. “This device produces a particle wave front that acts like the front screen of a slicer. Look,” he said pointing at the arrangement of internal components. “Isn’t this like a drive configuration but it isn’t in line. It projects a thin wedge of particles at over 700 lights and those transport any matter forward until the layer of particles breaks up. That is why a normal drive field is no obstacle for it. We can duplicate this and shoot through any ship near us. It would be a good idea to investigate two things,” Rett said as LeiLei and Shiv stared at him in anticipation. “We need to learn how to duplicate these quickly and we need to figure a way to defend against them.”
Shiv bobbed her body up and down in affirmation. LeiLei nodded.
***
The manufacture of the beamers, as they soon became known, went much easier than any defense. The defense would take another epiphany like Rett’s with the beamer. They could not figure a way to protect against beamers. That epiphany would take a casual question from Ling.
***
Tod was explaining to Ling. “The slicers are just large versions of the beamers. Beamers project a section of particles that act like a shield on a slicer where the slicer pushes a field at seven hundred lights or faster. The beamers project those particles at 700 lights. The field crosses multidimensional boundaries and we can jump across those other dimensions or push matter across those dimensions.”
“How far does the beam go?” she asked.
“We theorize that the beam stops when the particle front breaks up,” Tod said.
“Can’t you do something to make the particle front break up before it penetrates?” Ling asked.
“That’s an interesting idea Ling,” Tod said trying to imagine how the beam created its area of particles and then project them forward.
Tod thought about her comment the rest of the afternoon. Maybe if we project a field that spreads out down the sides of a ship. Then we pulse it at GHz frequencies. That might work but it would have to be a powerful field…maybe with repeaters…maybe a phased array down the sides. It would be tedious and expensive but it might be done. How about a surface of lamlee while thinking about a phased array designed to project an interfering field? That would probably work, he thought. That’s what I’ll try.
Jumping to Conclusions
Master Arbitrator Cetosme was approaching the Gralon 3 system. He had his ships form up behind the shield ships when they were forty light years away from the system. Some of the personnel were new and they could not coordinate multiple ship movements well. He had them turn on the front shields and they started fairly close together. They would need to be precise with this large of a group if they were to hide the approach. He was not going to give the defenders time to rally. He wanted a clean victory to show his prowess to the council.
The accident occurred when they jumped to sp
eed. The ships jumped to speed at the same time but the lower left ship drifted behind the ship above and came forward and the front shield touched the rear of the shield ship above it. There was a brief flash and the top ship had disappeared. Cetosme had the ships stop immediately and had the recording he was making of the event brought to him. He had been recording his triumph. He had the slave play back the recording. It was disconcerting but he asked the slave to slow down the replay.
They could see the lower ship touch and saw the flash. He saw the Gralon star and then many other stars when they played it back at ultrahigh speed.
Cetosme was stunned. The upper ship had jumped instantly. Those devices in front might hide their approach but what if there was a shield in the rear also. Cetosme had a frigate take a shield frame from the front of another frigate and attach it to rear. Now the frigate had a shield in the front and back. He had them turn toward their home port and set their speed at 698 lights like the last accidental transition. He was videoing from several angles this time and when they launched at 698 lights there was a large flash and some debris from the shield.
A review of the video showed their home base star and many more past it. He wondered what would happen if they transitioned at top speed. He had another frigate rig a rear shield and had them try at their top speed near 1,400 lights. This event had no flash but the ship disappeared. Eight hours later, the frigate appeared several light seconds from them. Cetosme debriefed the crew, promoted the commander on the spot to senior Arbitrator and everyone else on the ship up one grade.
