Loralynn Kennakris 3: Asylum (4 page)

After weeks of close, hectic, coffee-and-dim-sum-fueled, round-the-clock work at Outbound Station, where security could be even more tightly controlled than at Pleiades Sector HQ on Nedaema, and supported by private
sub rosa
diplomacy on the part of the former Speaker and retired Terran grand senator, Rafael Huron IV, who enjoyed close ties with the Karelian government, a plan was submitted to CNO, sealed, in a gold-striped cover, consisting of untraceable hardcopy, two centimeters thick.

A final meeting on the massive dreadnought LSS
Ardennes
, the flagship of Admiral Joss PrenTalien, Pleiades Sector’s commander in chief, lasted deep into the graveyard watch. In attendance were Colonel Yeager; Commander Wesselby; Admiral PrenTalien, whose forces would carry out the plan; Admiral Zahir, from whose sector the plan would be launched; and Fleet Admiral Westover, who was officially not within a hundred and fifty light-years.

The plan was approved and life became, if anything, less enviable for all involved as the deadline imposed by the date Halith would rollover their IFF systems loomed large. Colonel Yeager picked her flight crews with special care. Most were colonials, four of whom had lost their families in the conquest of Crucis Sector. Three were Karelian SOFOR teams, who were let in on the ‘fun’ as a
quid pro quo
for their cooperation, and eight were almost certainly smugglers before the war had swept them into the military. None were married or had any living immediate family.

All knew it was a reckless venture, and the chances of a homecoming were vanishingly small. Simulations predicted that they could expect only ten to twelve of the starclippers to survive the transit. There was a one-third chance less than half would. Further, the efficacy of the forged IFF systems could not be tested. The exact capabilities of the surveillance systems around Haslar itself were unknown. Their exit, if they made it that far, was by guess and by God. Yet none of them would have given up the chance to ‘ride the Elephant’—as CEF mariners put it—for anything else in this world, or the next.

The operation got underway beneath stygian cover. Fleet commands were not notified. Even Third Fleet’s CO, Vice Admiral Hamish Burton, did not learn of the operation until TF 34 was due to arrive at Outbound Station, and was then required to submit to the indignity of being held incommunicado with all the other station personnel, under strict orders from Admiral PrenTalien.

Astoundingly, things went off without a hitch, and
Trafalgar
was even able to make rendezvous seventy-two hours early, allowing them to advance the timeline by that much. This stroke of good fortune was explained by the participants according to their lights: the Karelians credited the good offices of Saint Helen, a young woman who’d helped save Karelia during an invasion by Syrdar centuries before. The smugglers attributed it to the god who looks after fools and drunkards. What Christina Yeager or Trin Wesselby might have thought, they did not share.

Three Terran months and seven days after Colonel Yeager had proposed the idea, and two months and fourteen days after Trin Wesselby had found a way to make it work, the eighteen starclippers took off, bound for Haslar, and TF 34 set course for Miranda, little guessing what lay in store there.

Huron got up and refilled his cup. The slightly narrow-eyed look he wore as he rose from his seat, gave Kris an inkling of just how much she was missing.

“So—for the
most
part—that’s it,” Kris probed, echoing his last comment.

“That’s it,” repeated Huron, fooling no one, least of all Kris. Seeing he wasn’t going to budge on this one, she changed the subject.

“Okay. Then what about the big dance we just had? Can you fill me in? Or do I have to go all 20-Questions on that too?”

They collectively assured her she did not. Kris’s experience of the battle had been limited to her squadron being scrambled as soon as they dropped into normal space, boosting out to engage the forces of a Dom carrier and then spending the rest of her PM mixing it up in one of the worst dogfights anyone had ever seen. Two and a half days in sickbay—that half-day, she’d been unconscious for—had not done much to enlighten her.

Now her flight mates—on firmer ground where there was no danger of trespassing on official secrets—were eager to supply this lack. The result was a little disjointed, and at one point Krieger and Tole got into a spirited debate about exactly which ships engaged IHS
Revanche
, and whether the fatal salvos had been fired by the battlecruiser LSS
Intrepid
or the heavy cruiser LSS
Arizona
(the former command of
Trafalgar’s
captain), leading to raised voices and veiled imputations of disloyalty.

Huron quelled the debate at this point, pointing out that neither man had been anywhere near the light carrier at the moment she exploded, and somewhat chastened, they continued the narrative, helped along by occasional editorial commentary from N’Komo. What Kris came to understand from it all was this:

Recovering their fighters from Kalervo Station, they’d jumped back to Miranda and stumbled upon a major engagement in progress. Unbeknownst to them, Halith had launched an operation against Miranda, using the Duke Albrecht Fleet’s Center Force supported by two divisions of the Kerberos fleet, which escorted a large invasion flotilla. Without breaking comms silence, Lo Gai came down the flank of the Halith fleet with all his characteristic energy, caught
Count Ivanov
just as she was preparing to launch a strike and handled the big carrier cruelly. In doing so, he turned his bored and antsy pilots loose, and they took their collective frustrations out on
Prince Valens’
fighter group.

Then Lo Gai, trusting that Admiral Murphy had things in hand, turned himself loose as well, inviting
Retribution
to join in the lark. She and
Nike
were the two fastest battlecruisers in the CEF, and they descended on the invasion force with all the fury of their namesakes. The Halith commander had made the fateful decision to bring maximum strike power to the battle in hopes of gaining a quick victory against Seventh Fleet’s overmatched TF 72, leaving only a single destroyer squadron to cover the flotilla.

Handed this golden opportunity, Sir Phillip did what he loved best—demolishing one destroyer with his long guns—while Lo Gai disabled another with missile strikes, then lay alongside at pistol shot and reduced it to hot fragments with rapid salvos from his 12-inch surge guns. The remainder of the squadron, shocked and awed, broke ignominiously and ran for their lives. Well satisfied to let them go, Lo Gai and Sir Phillip ranged at large among the thin-skinned invasion transports, having (according to Krieger’s report) “the time of their lives.”

Later, members of the crew would compete to describe the action. ‘Wolves among the sheep’ was heard from those whose martial prowess outstripped their literary talents, but one lieutenant opined that it was like “the lions shall lay down with the lambs—and eat them.” Those who eschewed such flights, however, said it best: it was simply slaughter.

The Halith commander, belatedly noting the extinction of the force that was the
raison d’etre
for the whole operation, detached part of his main body in a vain attempt to rescue what was left. All he got for his pains was an education in the inadvisability of dividing his fleet while engaged and the foolhardiness of pursuing a battlecruiser that could outrun his torpedoes and was armed with 14-inch chase mounts.

In the end, the Halith fleet was forced to withdraw, having lost a light carrier, a heavy cruiser, and four destroyers and all their transports, with a battleship and a fleet carrier badly battered, and another carrier’s fighter group decimated. On the CEF side of the ledger,
Trafalgar
came away somewhat clawed, while
Camperdown
and
Blenheim
were lost along with the heavy cruiser
Jellicoe
.
Ramillies
would be months getting back into fighting trim, the battlecruiser
Defiant
and the heavy cruiser
Essex
had been roughed up, though not seriously, and two destroyers,
Bellona
and
Actaeon
had taken moderate damage.

If sober analysis had diminished the box score—it had been confidently reported that
Count Ivanov
was too severely damaged to make the exit jump, easing the loss of
Camperdown
until the error was found out—this was taken in stride, though not without a few pungent observations. (
Trafalgar’s
bosun was heard to say, “They may have lugged her home, but that bitch will never swim again. My word on it.”) They knew they’d taken a beating—by a count of losses in the main battle, they’d arguably suffered another defeat—but such numbers were not the whole story, not by very long chalks.

They were full of a deep, if sorrowing, pride in
Blenheim
. Beset by two battleships and a heavy cruiser, she’d fought gallantly until mortally wounded, and if she had taken only the cruiser with her, neither
Condorcet
nor
Desailles
—the latter, a limping cripple—would soon forget the beating she gave them.
Prince Valens’
surviving fighter pilots would no doubt think twice about tangling with
Trafalgar
when they met her again (the initially reported exchange ratio of a phenomenal seven to one had been reduced in the official reckoning to a more modest, but still impressive, five to one), and above all they’d held the field, thwarted a major invasion, and sent a superior Halith force slinking away wounded and whimpering.

It was clearly a victory, and anyone with sense would see it so. Yes, there could be an unlearned civilian here and there who, wringing his hands over the losses, might conclude otherwise, but anyone who had been keeping up with current events would disagree.

“So what’s the word?” Kris pushed the bowl away—the stuff had begun to pall halfway through the recitation—and looked from one expectant face to another. It was as if telling the battle over again had whetted their appetite for more.

“Rearm, refit.” Huron spoke for the group. “Try to rope in some replacements.” Here he was probably referring to the marines lost with
Blenheim
. “Check the next slot on the dance card.”

“Any guess as to where?”

Huron swirled the cold coffee left in his cup and decided it wasn’t worth it. “Not here.”

As usual, Huron proved to be a true prophet. Six days later found
Trafalgar’s
entire fighter group waiting in the Number 4 hanger, their customary meeting space when the whole group assembled, while Commander Sonovia Harmon,
Trafalgar’s
Director of Strike and Reconnaissance Operations (less formally, the DSRO or fighter boss), mounted the temporary dais to stand at the briefing lectern and call her ninety-four flight officers to attention.

Sonovia Harmon was not an especially prepossessing woman. At sixty-five, age had thickened her already stocky frame and squared the line of her jaw, which had always been a tad heavy, and her short dark hair was shot through with gray, enlivened only by a silver forelock. She wore her unconcern for her physical appearance with a certain solid, quiet pride and off duty, when her high wide forehead was not furrowed by the concerns of her job, she might have been taken for a prosperous midlevel manager of a modest but thriving business enterprise, a kindly aunt, or even a senior librarian. Few, if any, would have taken her at first glance for a fighter pilot who had ended her flying days fifth on the CEF’s active kills list, two places behind Rafe Huron and one ahead of Geoff N’Komo. (Newly joined ensigns who were inclined to privately call her “Auntie Harmon” or “Granny Harmon” for her gray hair and strict ways were thus quickly and vigorously disabused of their erroneous opinions.)

That was at the conclusion of the last war, and the events of the ongoing one had moved her down the list by a few notches—Huron had since displaced Captain Vire in the top slot and N’Komo stood at number five, ahead of a cluster of young aces who constantly reshuffled the Top 20, which now included Kris, who’d jumped into nineteenth position by virtue of her recent victories. Today, however, she looked every inch the top ace as she acknowledged her officers’ salute and told them crisply to be seated.

As they complied, she gave them with her version of a smile. “By now most of you will have already guessed that our labors in Cygnus are coming to an end. It’s time to go home.”

Within the CEF,
home
was a rather elastic term, short of a bronze box (earning one was said to be “taking up permanent residence”), but in this case, it referred to Outbound Station, which resided in a star system near the outer edge of the Hydra Border Zone, and guarded the vital junction at Wogan’s Reef. The station consisted of three small planetesimals, conjoined by an impressive array of manmade works. The largest of these bodies was roughly the size of Deimos, while the second was a Ceres-class asteroid. The first, designated Outbound Alpha, was home to the station’s dockyards, storage and work spaces. Outbound Beta held the station’s offices and habitations. The third, Outbound Charlie (
Chuck
to the mariners), was a mere rock that trailed the others like a scorned younger sibling, but was arguably the most important of the three, for it housed the station’s large automated refueling facilities.

As stations went, Outbound was among the more popular postings. Although remote, it shared the system with Crystal City, a fanciful edifice built in the years immediately after the last war as a commerce hub. The original owners’ plans were even more fanciful than the architecture, and when they went bankrupt, Crystal City was sold piecemeal to those concerns that have made a long practice of supplying military bases with the creature comforts their personnel needed.

In consequence, many mariners preferred the more exotic, untroubled and candid offerings of the City’s establishments (or as some preferred to frame it: more licentious, wanton, abandoned and dissolute) to the highly refined, regulated and
civilized
attractions of Nedaema, a full five days away in the Pleiades.

TF 34 had been long from these attractions and the temptations Epona could offer—which were quite a bit ruder, it being a frontier planet, as well as overburdened by the recent large influx of military personnel—did not really measure up. So Harmon’s officers received this confirmation of their hopes with a good deal of private satisfaction.

“However,” the commander continued, announcing the inevitable cloud that accompanied this silver lining, “some of you will have the honor and privilege of remaining here and continuing to support Seventh Fleet.” They all knew TF 34’s other fleet carrier, LSS
Salamis
—
Big Sal
, as she was affectionately known—had been detached to Seventh in partial recompense for the loss of
Camperdown
and the damage to
Ramillies
, but the breaking up of
Trafalgar’s
fighter group came as a surprise.

“That’s you, Kideki,” she continued, singling out a short muscular man in the second row, Huron’s junior squadron leader, “and you, Tschosik,” nodding to a tall lean belter, a friend of N’Komo’s, who led one the strike wing’s squadrons. “You’ll get the details of your new assignments this PM and transfer in the next day-cycle.”

“Huron,”—she caught his eye where he sat in the front row—“this is going to fall most heavily on you, as you’re already light.” That was something of an understatement. Recon wings only had three squadrons where strike wings had four, so this reduced his strength by a third from its normal complement. But since his wing had not been at full strength in months, it was actually closer to forty percent. “We’re doing our best to get you some help.
Bellerophon
has been pulled off blockade duty at Callindra 69 and they’ve
promised
us another light carrier, as well.” Harmon had no need to gesture for him to detect the air-quotes around the word
promised
. An Admiralty promise and six bits would get you a lukewarm cup of coffee in any canteen you cared to mention. “I’m confident you’ll find a way to keep up the good work in the meantime.”

N’Komo’s sideways half-grin from two places down wished him
good luck
with that.

“Now that we have the domestic concerns settled, I’m sure you’re all wondering what we’re going to do for an encore.” Here Commander Harmon stepped away from the lectern. “You know the state the Doms went home in.” She did not elaborate. Unlike many fighter bosses, Commander Harmon abjured anatomical similes and scatological metaphors. But in contrast to the lighthearted introduction, her expression was deadly serious.

“We have just received some new information. What I am about to say is not to leave this room. Most especially those of you transferring to Big Sal shall make no mention of it. Nor shall you ask about—or even speculate on—the source.” Pausing to see that this sunk in, and assuring herself that it had, the commander went on: “This is in regards to the Tuonela Op”—the sighing noise of a collective inhalation at that—“which you lately helped carry out. Because you took the freight there, it’s been decided to inform you of what we’ve been able to learn of the results. The target was not Syrdar, as was supposed at the time. The strike was delivered against Haslar itself. It was a qualified success.” The last sentence kept the group from breaking into a cheer, as Harmon had known it would.

“It appears that a dozen or so of our ships survived. They were able to attack the dock facilities and launch—” She paused again to wait for calm to reassert itself. “Launch a ground strike. Damage was minimal.” The group settled further. “All we can assess is significant damage to one destroyer and minor damage to a cruiser. The ground strike did not appear to hit anything of value. As far as we know, all our ships were able to escape the system. There is no further info on them.”

Now that mood in the room had cooled, she proceeded to the heart of the matter—or as near to it as she was allowed. “That a couple of ships were dinged is not the significance of this strike. Not at all.”

She had the room silent now. “We’ve hit Halith where it really counts—where they never thought it possible.” Indeed, their sources indicated that shock had reigned supreme at Supreme Staff HQ for the better part of three days, and Grand Marshal Van Diemens, Chief of the Supreme Staff, and Grand Admiral Osterman had left hurriedly to brief the Proconsuls personally. What was more, the Halith analysts had been completely flummoxed by where the starclippers came from. They appeared to believe—incredibly enough—that the CEF had somehow managed to get a carrier somewhere within Halith space, launch the ships, and then exit without a trace. There were even suggestions that the Supreme Staff was worried the CEF might attempt a suicide attack by sending hyper-accelerated ships into the planet itself.

How ONI—or CDI or whoever—had managed to learn all this, Commander Harmon had no idea. The message had not arrived through normal channels, and Captain RyKirt had briefed her personally. They were the only two people on the ship who knew these details, and she was not at liberty to divulge them. Instead, she kept to the brief script she and RyKirt had worked out.

“What matters is that we’ve lit a fire under the Doms that they have no idea how to put out. That works to our advantage. Our goal was to sting them into acting impulsively, before they’re ready, and it appears we’ve succeeded. Now we have to brace for whatever they throw at us and hit back harder.

“The warm-ups are over. You passed the dress rehearsal with flying colors. Now it’s time for the main event. We’ve been waiting a long time for this. When it comes, stay focused and keep your eyes firmly fixed on the main chance. Never underestimate the enemy, but remember you’re better pilots flying better birds, and you’re a damn-sight crazier. I have no doubt you will do your duty. That is it for today. May Fortune follow you all.” Her officers stood as one. “Dismiss.”

*     *     *

Lingering in the passageway after the others had dispersed, Huron was scanning their transit orders on his xel. It turned out they were making a detour to pick up some marine replacements at Tenebris, here in Cygnus. Last month, the CEF had launched its first major offensive of the war out of there, only to have it blow up spectacularly from the get-go. The whole thing had to be aborted, but not before a battalion of marines was almost wiped out at a place called Anandale. It’d been ugly from first to last, and he wondered if the replacements they’d be ferrying to Outbound were some of the survivors. If so, he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He closed the file and furled his xel as Kris jogged up.

“Hi, Kris”—giving her a welcoming nod.

“Hello, sir.” She touched her cap brim casually. Her arm was out of its sling and he knew from that AM’s medical reports they’d pulled the matrix from her broken ribs, which were healing nicely. Physical therapy for the SMS was much more involved, but overall, she was looking more bright eyed and bushy tailed than was usual for her.

Kris had grown from the Academy cadet of a year ago, and was almost unrecognizable from the girl he’d met the day she was pulled off the contract slaver
Harlot’s Ruse
: at once fierce, withdrawn and oddly magnetic—a collection of dangerous edges, beautifully assembled. Her personality had smoothed to the point where ordinary mortals could rub shoulders with her without coming away bleeding, but the new habits were still tenuous, and while there was no one he trusted more in a dogfight, in social situations the old, habitual inclination to shield her still leapt out at inopportune times and made things awkward.

He could admit privately (there being no place for it in the professional sphere) that he missed flying with her. By tradition, the SRF usually assigned the most junior member of the squadron to be the squadron leader’s wingman. So when Kris earned her combat wings, she’d flown with Huron for three months until Ensign Charles Dance had joined.

During the last war, Huron had flown mainly with Geoff N’Komo, making a famous duo to rival Jantony Banner’s partnership with Pavel Heink. But his connection with Kris was even stronger, as their tally of victories clearly showed. In the intensely focused purity of combat, the strengths of their relationship—an innate mutual comprehension that went deeper than consciousness, and a faith in each other’s abilities no odds could shake—were given full play, without the multilayered complications that so often (or so it seemed to him) would turn inward and bite when their lives weren’t on the line.

Carefully schooling these thoughts off his face, he answered her evident good humor with a smile.

“So what can I do for you?”

Kris glanced about as if checking who else was within earshot, and then asked in a low tone, “Is the game still on for tonight?”

“Yeah.” He paused. She was referring to the private weekly poker game he and N’Komo had established some months ago for select shipmates. (It was a tradition of longstanding with them, revived wherever they were stationed for a decent interval.) Membership was limited to six, always three men and three women. At present, the third man was Krieger and there were only two women: Ensign Sahyli ‘Shyli’ Casanova (she much preferred her nickname), a merrily minded young woman Kris had roomed with during her last months at the Academy; and Lieutenant Commander Leeza Cannero, who reminded Kris of an older version of another studymate, Minx, in face and form though not in character. The open seat had belonged to Lieutenant Dina Sexton, who’d lost parts both legs at Miranda, and was on her way to Verdun Military Hospital to have replacements cultured. (She was also going to get them to fix, or so she swore, a condition she termed ‘chronic height deficiency’.) Kris, learning of this a couple of days ago, had worked up the nerve to ask Huron if she could join in.

“Sure you still wanna do this?” he asked, gauging her expression.

“Absolutely.” Her tone was touch emphatic, in keeping with her new resolve to improve her social skills where she could. Becoming more social seemed like a good place to start.

Huron, noting the tone, also observed the accompanying smile. “Okay. Which ranks higher, a straight or a flush?”

“A flush,” she said confidently. Huron had given her a brief rundown on the theory of the game when she broached the subject last night and she’d checked the rules quickly on her xel. Gambling was unheard of on Parson’s Acre, the Outworlds colony where Kris was raised, and slavers generally preferred dice to cards.