Birthright: Battle for the Confederation- Turmoil (9 page)

Now, once again in
command of a cruiser, she was just as determined as ever to prove herself and
avenge her ship's loss.

"That's the
last of them, then?" Rese asked as she glanced at the targeting
information on a wall display above the weapons officer's head.

"Yes,
Captain," was the quick reply.  "We've launched our entire compliment
of mobile sensor platforms in a spherical formation around this system, with a
few extras along the most likely avenues of approach.  It should give us about
an hour's warning of an inbound Priman force, since they'll have to drop out of
hyperspace just inside the probes' detection area because of all the gravity
wells around here.  Once at sublight speeds, they can only go so fast, and
we'll know what their plan of attack is."

"Good work,
Lieutenant," Rese said as she left the Qualin officer behind.  She
commended him on his way of thinking; he'd spoken about the attack as if it was
going to happen and seemed to assume it was on the way.  He was in the right
mindset, because she knew one had to always assume the worst from the Primans.

Now, if she only had
a few destroyers to use as pickets that she could push even further out, she'd
really have something.  Oh well, you fight a war with what you have.  There was
also the old saying: You can wish in one hand and defecate in the other; which
one do you think will fill up first?

She stopped wishing
for more ships and got back to studying the star charts and spacelanes in the
Lemurian solar system.

Representative
Ravine sat hunched over the work table in her sparse quarters aboard Captain
Vol's ship.  As a Representative, especially one who would someday become
Commander, she could have demanded more luxurious quarters, but had strived to
remain as grounded and unattached as possible.  She'd watched the former
Commander, the now-Representative Velk, as he'd led her people in the opening
days of the war and tried to emulate many of his mannerisms, among them a level
of austerity.  She felt it focused her more on the issues at hand.  There were
troubling rumors about Velk's early dismissal from the role of Commander, but
even at her status she wasn't privy to much more information than that. 
Someday she'd be able to sate her curiosity, but not now.

She pored over data
pads, maps, intelligence reports, and ship dispositions.  After examining her
target list, she'd decided on the next location to check off her list; a small
system called Lemuria.  It was out of the way, but supported several high-tech
industries that she felt would be worth investigating.  She'd even gone so far
as to alert the Keepers to send a ship so they could acquire the technology
upon their conquest of the place. 

After discussing her
plans with Captain Vol, he'd suggested they send in a scout or two to recon the
system.  Their task force itself would be delayed by three days as they waited
for more ships to join them.  In addition to the garrison force of two cruisers
and a constellation of satellites the'd left over each pacified planet, they'd
lost three to outright destruction and another four to damage in their tour of
conquest over the course of five planets, a number Ravine considered to be an
exceptionally low price to pay.  After demonstrating that they were in control
of the orbital altitudes over a planet, the Primans made a simple declaration:
for the time being, the people would be allowed to carry on as before, plus or
minus any conditions or equipment/technology they'd seen fit to regulate.  If
the people continued to behave until more forces arrived, they would be treated
well enough.  If the equipment left in orbit to monitor the planet discovered
anything threatening, retribution would be swift and painful. 

Her people had tens
of millions of their number, just waiting to get off the decrepit motherships
and onto the Enkarran planets they'd hastily cleared out; they'd spent so long
in the void planning for this day that her people had no shortage of willing
fighters.  Thus, even such a lowly task as manning an observation assignment
over a third-rate conquered planet caused no real personnel issues; there were
always volunteers.  The hangup was actually ships, and while they'd set up
their own shipyards and taken over several others, capital ship production
still lagged behind need and personnel.  Thus, she'd been promised more ships
which would bring her up to twelve vessels, but she'd have to wait for them.

Not that she wished
for conflict that would winnow down her people's numbers, but she did secretly
relish the idea of a trying battle, a fight that would truly test her and the
captain.  Perhaps these Lemurians would put up a better struggle once they
realized what they could look forward to.

Loren and Renner sat
in silence in the immense kitchen of the Governor's mansion eating a light
lunch.  They'd adopted a routine over the last week; some sort of weapons or
personal training in the morning, lunch somewhere convenient followed by an
afternoon of going over intelligence data and reviewing what their superiors
were able to accomplish the night before.  After that, it was the inevitable
state dinner followed by a late night shuttle run back up to Avenger for the
night.

Loren and his
counterpart had a comfortable understanding; they were of much the same mind
where it came to fighting the Primans.  Even if their governments didn't agree,
they made the effort to keep those two issues as separate as they could
considering their jobs.

"This sandwich
is outstanding," Loren said as soon as he'd swallowed his bite, and he
meant it.  Some combination of the dressing and the meat of an indigenous
Lemurian quadruped, it was delicious, filling, and to Loren's relief
surprisingly healthy.

Renner smiled.  
"Well, you can thank the Governor, I suppose.  We raided his kitchen,
after all.  Though I guess if this war goes sour I could get a new job as a
short-order cook."  He took a thoughtful bite of his own sandwich.

Loren, lunch
finished, wiped the corners of his mouth and pushed his plate across the huge
wooden prep table they were sitting at.  He reached into the inside pocket of
his leather flight jacket (an affectation he as XO was not going to give up
willingly, even though he wasn't on flight status anymore) and pulled out a
data pad, keying it to life.

"Well, the fun
part is over," Loren said sadly, looking longingly at the crumbs on his
plate.  "Guess it's back to business."  He scrolled through the data
downloaded to the device over the last few hours so he could summarize for
Renner.  "Let's see; no new Priman activity around here, but it looks like
they've been pulling ships from a few occupied systems near here over the last
few days.  No sign of them anywhere else yet, so that could be cause for
screaming and panic."  He continued on, eyes darting around the screen as
Renner finished, got up and moved both of their plates to the cleaning machine. 
"No real new offensive movements on their part, either, so it could quite
possibly mean they're getting ready for something."

"Wonderful,"
Renner replied deadpan as he resumed his place on the barstool-height chair
next to Loren.  "It's the anticipation that makes it all
worthwhile."  He used his thumbnail to pick at a spot on the edge of the
counter where the wood of the butcherblock had begun to split; the building had
been one of the first structures built when Lemuria had been settled, and the
Governor's Mansion had been lovingly preserved.

"You
know," Renner began slowly, "word is out among the people that the
Primans might come sniffing.  There's nothing substantiated, of course, but you
know how rumors and bad news spreads."

"Faster than a
sexually transmitted disease when the Navy comes to town," Loren said with
a smile.

Renner chuckled and
saluted, then continued.  "People have been asking if we're running an
evac for the civilians.  A few of the companies have already started packing up
shop and planning to leave temporarily.  The big defense firm that's working on
that experimental Priman-detecting gear is sticking around, though I guess I
don't know if that's a good thing."

"You might want
to suggest they get the hell out before the Primans arrive," Loren
admitted. 

"In any
case," Renner continued, "I've been asked to quietly take you up on
the offer.  The powers that be are hoping to provide the service but keep from
making a big press release and dealing with the fallout for a few days yet, but
we'd like to accept your offer of transport."

Loren nodded
seriously.  He couldn't fully understand what it must feel like to be fleeing
his home, but as someone whose entire planet had been infected with a Priman
plague, he definitely empathized with the man.  "I'll call the captain as
soon as we're done here.  We could have them on the surface loading people in
six hours."

"Thank
you."              

Captain Rese gave a
nod of approval as she watched the maneuvers taking place.  The Lemurians only
had a half dozen serviceable destroyers, and she'd be willing to take on three
of them at a time in her ship.  The destroyers only mounted five laser
batteries each with no torpedo armament, and her cruiser's eight laser
batteries were more powerful, plus she had four torpedo tubes to add to the
mix.  Still, she wouldn't turn away the help, and they were definitely
willing.  They'd even sent up a squadron of twelve fighters, a less capable
export version of Confed's own Talon.

She'd run an ambush
exercise, setting Cobalt and all of Avenger's fighters against all six Lemurian
destroyers and their twelve fighters.  Avenger had supplied a squadron of
Talons and a squadron of Intruders, and since the Primans didn't have any
equivalent to the Intruder as of yet, the bigger attack fighters were
instructed to fight with their cannons; no simulated torpedo runs.

The ambush was going
well; the Lemurians had split their forces and lied in wait, reactors barely
warm, along the general flight path Rese had proclaimed she'd be using.  It was
the most likely attack corridor for the Primans to use, so she figured they
might as well practice as close to the real thing as possible.  The other three
destroyers had been pinging like mad with their active sensors, trying to
detect Cobalt's emissions profile and then subtly shepherd her towards the
destroyers who were ready to pounce. 

Rese had decided to
follow along, because if she'd been a Priman, with their much harder to detect
ships, she would probably have tried to coast in undetected as well.  Soon
after, the 'cold' Lemurian destroyers had run up their drives and charged at
Cobalt, which was now caught in a pincer between forces fore and aft.  It was a
well-planned maneuver.  She still had a few cards to play, however.

"Helm,"
she commanded, "hard to port, ninety degree heading change."  She
heard the crewwoman repeat her commands as she complied, but Rese's attention
was already on the viewscreen by her captain's chair.  "Captain
Sosus," she said to the image of Cory on the screen, the picture of
eagerness, a coiled spring ready to pop.  "You're free to engage; separate
by taking a ninety degree heading change to starboard.  Let's gang up on the
destroyers behind us, shall we?"

"Living the
dream," Cory replied with a smile and signed off. 

"Helm,"
Rese called again, "as soon as the destroyers stabilize on our new course,
begin a minimum radius turn back to our port; we're going to engage the
destroyers that were chasing us."

"Aye,
Captain."

Captain Rese
smiled.  It wasn't quite as rewarding as blowing up Primans, but there were
definitely worse ways to spend an afternoon.

"Ready to break
on my mark," Cory commanded over the comm net.  As the CAG, she was in
charge of both Avenger
’
s squadrons,
though in a few seconds she'd hand off control of the Vipers and their twelve
Talon fighters to Commander Merritt Elder.  Merritt planned to further split
into two elements of six, with Commander Web Exeter taking the other half dozen. 
Cory had decided to keep her Intruders together even though this was a wargame
designed to aid the Lemurians more than the Confeds.  In a real battle, her
Intruders would always stick together, for their Quick Strike torpedoes held
the greatest advantage when launched in large numbers.  Even though they
weren't simulating those weapons today, she still wanted her pilots to train
the way they fought; close together, supporting their wingmen.

"Mark!"
she called, and all twenty-four fighters scattered in a chaotic but beautifully
choreographed motion.  Twelve Intruders went for the first destroyer, while six
Talons each headed for the other two destroyers.

"The captain of
that cruiser is a crazy person going head-to-head with us like that,"
muttered the XO of the Lemurian destroyer
Watcher
to her captain. 

"Well, she
needs to even the odds quickly," the captain replied without taking her
eyes off the main tactical plot on the forward viewscreen.  "Making a
raking pass down our sides puts her in our crosshairs, but I do believe we as
the first ship and Captain Still in the last ship will bear the brunt of
extended fire."  Captain Lacer knew her ship was outgunned and that only
by working together could they achieve victory.  However, her ships had to
survive the opening salvos to make good on that plan.  "She's got her fighters
ready to pounce as well."

"Maneuvers?"
asked the XO.

"Definitely,"
replied the captain.  She turned to look at the helmsman, only a few steps away
on the much smaller bridge of the destroyer in comparison to the Confederation
cruiser.  "Helm, plot orders for all three ships in our element and send
on my mark.  Take us nose-up eighty degrees, second ship down eighty degrees,
last ship port eighty degrees.  Concentrate fire on engines and weapons
batteries; all six of us will regroup for pursuit and protection."