Rumors of Glory (The System States Rebellion Book 1) (9 page)

Someone whistled in amazement, and Trojan nodded in
agreement. A spherical ship almost a kilometer in diameter would be an
awe-inspiring sight.

“Excuse me, Captain, but I have to wonder how practical a
ship that size will actually be. It’ll be too heavy to land, won’t it?” asked
Trojan.

“That’s correct, sir. Both the 700-meter and
900-meter-class transports will not land. They’ll hover on anti-gravity, and
they’ll be loaded and unloaded via anti-gravity vehicles that will enter and
leave through openings in the sides.”

“I presume that these transports will be used to land
troops and tanks on hostile planets. What kind of defenses will they have?”
asked Trojan.

“The lower half will have a ring of 200 mm cannon for
air-to-ground fire, and the hull will have a thin coating of neutron armor.”

“That means they’ll have to be built in orbit, right?”

“The lower half can be built on the ground. It’ll then be
able to lift itself into orbit where the upper half and the armor will be
added, sir.”

“And what volume of cargo will the 900-meter ship be able
to carry?” asked Trojan.

The Captain checked his notes. “One hundred thousand
infantry, plus enough supplies and ammo to last them for two months, plus a
thousand anti-gravity personnel/cargo carriers and tanks, sir.”

Trojan smiled and shook his head in amazement. One of
those ships could carry every infantryman the Army had right now, with room to
spare. “One last question about transports, Captain. How long will it take to
build one of these ships?”

“Oracle estimates the first one will take two years.
After that, construction time should drop to about 18 months.”

“The war will be over by the time these things are
built.”

Trojan didn’t see who spoke, but it didn’t matter. “No it
won’t,” he said. “If Oracle thinks we’ll need them, then you can be sure the
war will go on long enough to build them and to use them. Continue, Captain.”

“Yes, sir. With regards to warships, Oracle is
recommending a series of ship classes, all spherical, because that maximizes
internal volume. The 20 new patrol cruisers that have already been authorized
can be upgraded with counter-missiles and point defense, but Oracle is not
recommending building any more 300- meter cruisers. Instead, the recommendation
is for a larger, 400- meter diameter ship, which is classified as a light
cruiser. Oracle is predicting that the SSU will engage in commerce raiding with
their captured patrol cruisers, plus new ships built to the same design. If
that’s the case, then the new 400-meter light cruisers could be used to escort
freighters and will be able to outfight the smaller raiders. In order to keep
their acceleration high, the light cruisers won’t have neutron armor, but the
next class will. A 500-meter diameter heavy cruiser will be able to support the
landing of troops, as well as go toe-to-toe with anything the enemy has that’s
heavier than their patrol cruisers. These are ships that we can start building
right now on Earth, but development of the Franklin Tri-system infrastructure
will have to be finished before it becomes practical to build any of this next
class.” The holographic image of the heavy cruiser was replaced by a larger and
more menacing-looking ship.

“This is Oracle’s battleship with a 700-meter diameter
and relatively thick neutron armor. This ship is designed to carry a much
larger anti-ship missile. The new missile is expected to have an acceleration
of 610Gs and a powered range of twice that of our standard anti-ship missile.
In addition, the battleship will have room for two battalions of marines and
enough assault shuttles to carry them all.” It was clear from the Officer’s
pause that he was finished.

“Can these new missiles be incorporated into the heavy
cruiser as well, Captain?” asked Trojan.

“They take up so much room that a heavy cruiser would
only be able to fire a small volley, with limited ability to reload. Going from
500 to 700 meters in diameter increases the internal volume by a factor of
roughly 2.5 times. That’s what allows the battleship to be able to fire a large
volley of the new missiles with plenty of reloads, sir.”

“Yes, I understand. Thank you, Captain. It looks like
Oracle is going to give you Navy boys and girls some interesting toys to play
with. We Army types are happy to stick with anti-grav tanks. Okay, let’s move
on to the next item on the agenda.”

Day 56/2540

Captain Soroya was in his cabin and just finishing up the
paperwork for their last stop when the intercom buzzed.

“Soroya here,” he said.

“Bridge here, Skipper. Sorry to bother you, but our bow
radar is picking up another ship. No transponder ID, and they haven’t answered
our hail so far. They’re about 55K klicks ahead of us, and we’re catching up
fast.”

A chill went up Soroya’s spine. The Company had warned
its ship captains to be alert for commerce raiders from the new Union. Ships
didn’t turn off their transponders without a damned good reason, and right now
commerce raiding was about the only reason Soroya could think of.

“Okay, forget the forward acceleration. Cut the engines,
pitch us over 90 degrees, and go to full acceleration. Let’s try to keep as
much distance from this ship as we can. While you’re doing that, send a message
back to Alizon advising them of our situation and asking for any help they can
give us. I’ll be back on the Bridge as fast as I can.” With the intercom off,
he looked down at his hands and saw that they were trembling.
I’m just a
civilian freighter skipper for God’s sakes. I don’t want to get involved in
this civil war. God, I hope they don’t shove us out the airlock if they take
this ship!

When he re-entered the Bridge, his XO looked at him with
real fear in his eyes. “They’ve transmitted a message to us. They want us to
resume our previous vector, or they’ll fire on us!”

“Who ARE they?” demanded Soroya.

“Their ship’s the Valley Forge.”

“But that’s a Navy ship!” exclaimed Soroya.

“Apparently not anymore,” said the XO. He looked down at
the console in front of him and activated a switch.

“—demand one last time that you return to your previous
vector. You have 30 seconds. If you fail to comply, we’ll fire a missile at
you. This is your last warning!”

Soroya looked around the Bridge at his people. They were
all looking at him with expressions of fear. The Company representative had
told all the Captains to run from SSU ships no matter what, but the asshole wearing
the expensive business suit who had told them that wasn’t here.
Fuck him!
thought
Soroya.

“Put us back on our old vector, XO, and pray that these
bastards don’t mind taking prisoners.”

Seventy-seven days later, Drake stepped off MB102’s ramp
and stopped to savor standing on solid ground again. The eight days on/two days
off schedule was starting to wear him down. Two days on the ground after eight
days cooped up in a missile boat just wasn’t enough R&R. He understood the
reasons for it. The Navy was expanding so fast that experienced ship personnel
were hard to come by. The training programs were going as fast as they could
without compromising quality too much. In the meantime, the shipyards were
delivering another missile boat every four weeks now. But instead of only
deploying half or two-thirds at any one time, the Old Man ordered 80% of the
missile boat force kept in orbit all the time, with fractions rounded up. To
make matters worse, as the senior missile boat skipper, Drake was automatically
also the leader for the whole squadron. That meant that he had to not only con
his own boat but also keep a sharp eye on the others at the same time. But not
for the next two days.

He looked around for the ground vehicle that was supposed
to carry him and his crew back to the Operations building for debriefing. When
he finally did see it, he also saw the CSO’s limo preceding it.
Is the Old
Man really coming out to see me?
he wondered. When the limo stopped a few
meters in front of him, the back door swung open, and Janicot’s Aide leaned
forward.

“No debriefing this time, Commander. The Admiral wants to
see you right away.”

Now what?
He nodded and turned
to tell his crew to go on without him. With the good-byes out of the way, he
stepped into the limo and tried not to hit the Aide with any of his gear as he
let himself fall into the plush seat.

“Any idea why the Old—, the Admiral wants to see me,
Lieutenant?”

She smiled and said, “I have a suspicion, but I can’t and
won’t tell you what it is, Commander. Sorry.”

As the limo accelerated, Drake looked out the one-way
window at the two large spherical shapes in the distance. One was the Valley
Forge, and the other was her first captured freighter. He saw vehicles around
the base of both ships. He hoped he wasn’t going to be put in command of the
freighter. Not only would that be a step backwards as far as his career was
concerned but it would also be damned boring. Orbiting Sparta endlessly in a
missile boat was boring too, but at least if the FEDs attacked, he’d be able to
shoot back. He had no illusions about freighters being safe during this war. If
the SSU could prey on Federation freighters, the FED Navy could do the same
thing to SSU freighters. He was certain that it would be just a matter of time
before they got around to that, and when they did, they would very likely
destroy the enemy freighters outright. The plan was to use missile boats to
escort freighters out beyond the hyperzone boundary when each planet could
spare one or two from maintaining its own defense.

When he and the Aide arrived at Janicot’s Office, he left
his gear in the outer office. Janicot waved him in and pointed to one of two
chairs sitting opposite his desk. As usual, Drake didn’t bother saluting. The
Old Man had let it be known that proper protocol wasn’t high on his list of
priorities.

“I’m not going to beat around the bush, Commander. We
both have other things to do. You have two days of R&R to start, and I have
a shitload of paperwork to get through before I get to go home tonight. The
Yorktown has been officially declared missing in action. That means we’re down
one cruiser, and if we want to maintain our timetable for capturing freighters,
we’re going to have to keep our few remaining cruisers in the field longer. As
you know, Valley Forge has just arrived back. Her skipper is being reassigned
to command a cruiser based at Hekla. They’re short of experienced people. The
ship’s crew deserves some time off too, but I’ve got another crew for Valley
Forge, and I still need another CO. You’re it, Commander. Come back day after
tomorrow and take command of that cruiser. Any questions?”

“What about my missile boat squadron, sir? Who’s going to
lead that?”

Janicot gave a brief laugh. “I think you mean MY missile
boat squadron, don’t you, Commander?” Without waiting for Drake to answer, he
continued speaking. “Davidson is the next most senior officer. He’ll take over
the squadron. I know you’ve grown attached to those boats and their crews, but
you knew this was going to happen sooner or later, didn’t you? We need to push
people into higher positions of responsibility fast if our Navy’s going to have
any chance of defending the Union. The personnel shortage is going to get even
worse once our own ship construction program starts delivering ships. As
bizarre as this sounds, it’s entirely possible that we’ll have ships sitting on
the spaceport doing nothing because we don’t have enough crews for them.”

When Drake was sure that he wasn’t about to interrupt the
Admiral, he said, “I’ve been thinking about that, sir. We have what…about 285
FED Navy and another 377 Army prisoners here?” Janicot nodded. “We know that on
Earth there are probably hundreds, maybe even thousands of Federation Navy and
Army personnel still wearing their uniform who are sympathetic to our cause,
but they had no way of getting to us once the shipping companies pulled their
freighters home. What if we sent a ship to a FED Navy base to transmit a
proposal for a swap? They get our prisoners back, which is one less thing for
us to worry about, and we get more experienced personnel as well.”

Janicot leaned back in his chair and said nothing for a while.
“I can see some practical difficulties in pulling off that kind of operation,
but there might be ways around them, and it’s worth looking at. I’ll run the
idea past the Chancellor and the Cabinet. If they like it, my staff will
explore ways to make it work. Any other ideas, Commander?”

“Not at the moment, sir.”

“Well if you do have some, let me know. I wish more
people were thinking up new ideas. Unless you have something else to discuss,
you’re dismissed, Commander.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Drake as he got up to leave.

As he left the outer office with his gear, the Aide
nodded to him and said, “Enjoy your TWO days of R&R, Commander.”

Drake laughed. The Aide’s emphasis on the number of days
was her way of sympathizing with him about the fact that it wasn’t two whole
days off. It was the rest of today, plus all of tomorrow, and then back on duty
bright and early the next day. And since today was already more than half over,
what he really had to work with was about 32 hours of free time, not 48.

                                                 * * *

Day 136/2540

Trojan found Admiral Chenko in his outer office. He
waited until the Admiral was finished speaking with his office staff.

“What can I do for you, General?” asked Chenko.

“I’d like to discuss the latest deployment orders with
you, sir.”

“Ah. No doubt you’re not happy about them. Okay, come
into my office and let’s talk about them.”

Chenko led the way and went straight for his desk chair.
Trojan took note of the fact that the Navy Chief did NOT invite him to sit
down. That was fine by him. He’d rather stand anyway.

“Okay, I think I know why you don’t like those deployment
orders, but go ahead and tell me anyway, General.”

“Thank you, sir. Oracle has told us that we need to use
our current fleet of patrol cruisers to show planets on the verge of joining
the SSU that we’re keeping an eye on them. If we don’t try to slow down the
growth in the SSU now, we’ll pay for that later. Holding our cruisers back in
order to launch a larger attack on Sparta is not only doomed to failure but
will actually speed up the growth of the SSU when planets sitting on the fence
see the Federation suffer a major military defeat.”

“Aren’t you jumping the gun there, General? The only
order I’ve issued to our ships is to come back to Earth for their crews to be
vetted by verifier sessions. And while another much larger attack on Sparta has
and is still being considered, no decision on that has been made. I will tell
you, though, that the Council would love to see another strike made on Sparta.
So it’s not only presumptuous of you to assume that the strike mission has been
approved but it’s also presumptuous and verging on insulting for you to assume
that an attack of that kind would fail. That is unless you possess naval
strategy experience I’m not aware of.”

Trojan understood that he was walking on thin ice now.
Pissing off the Chief of Naval Operations was not a good idea at any time.

“You’re correct, Admiral, that I don’t have any expertise
when it comes to naval strategy. I was not expressing my personal opinion, but
rather Oracle’s conclusions regarding the tradeoff between short-term risks and
long-term gain. The Navy people on our joint Army/Navy Planning Group agree
that our patrol cruisers are not designed for this kind of warfare, and future
expansion of the Navy depends on having the officers and crews on those
cruisers as the cadre that will train the new crews for the new ships. It’s
Oracle’s conclusion that we can’t afford to lose those trained crews this early
in the war, sir.”

“I see,” said Chenko, in a neutral and less annoyed
voice. “It’s comforting to know that an Army General doesn’t think he knows
more about naval strategy than I do. Now, as for Oracle’s assessment, I’m well
aware of what our patrol cruisers were designed to do and not do, and if it’s
any consolation to you, General, I did point out to some of the Council members
face-to-face that using these ships for another massed strike was risky. I
haven’t made up my mind yet if I’m for or against the idea. I will take your
comments into consideration, but at the end of the day, it may not matter what
I think if the Council decides to insist on the second strike.”

“I understand, sir. Thank you for taking the time to
listen to me.”