Fermi's War Page 6

  "Only if they have an Alamo patch on their uniform."

  "That's quite an inflexible view to take, Captain."

  Nodding his head, he replied, "Perhaps. But I'm afraid it's one taught to me by bitter experience."

  Chapter 7

  Astrogation had rarely been as crowded as it was now; Marshall, Cunningham, Warren and Mulenga were all squeezed into the small room, looking up at the holographic monitors, watching Alamo fight a simulated battle with a Republic battlecruiser. Six fighter trails flashed ahead of the ship on divergent courses, dashing around following orders from the two flight leaders; one group had been assigned to the 'enemy', the other, consisting of the trainee pilots, was fighting for Alamo.

  Not that any of this was actually taking place; Dietz was commanding Alamo in the simulated attack from the bridge, after Caine – who had designed the simulation – had ruled that Marshall was a 'casualty'. The fight was going well; Alamo had managed to get several good hits in, and Marshall had tried to resist the urge to cheer. Warren was somewhat less content, grimacing at the projected course patterns of the fighters.

  "Those fighters need to spread out more, John. Right now they are sitting ducks to a fratricide attack by a couple of missiles."

  "That's Lieutenant, Mr. Warren. Tactical doctrine calls for them to maintain an optimum firing position."

  Almost as if they had heard Warren, the three rookies suddenly flew into three different directions, their tracks forming a lop-sided diamond crossing around the enemy vessel on two sides. Warren smiled, punching Marshall on the shoulder, while Cunningham placed a headset next to his mouth.

  "Raven Flight, return to previous course as instructed."

  "Belay that," Marshall said, turning to Cunningham. "For the purposes of this exercise, they're on their own, Lieutenant. If they make any mistakes they will just have to live with them. Or not, as the case may be."

  The trio of fighters arced around the battlecruiser, spending their fuel with abandon to get into a firing position; this left Alamo unexpectedly exposed, and the ship began to suffer as a wave of missiles flew in. On the bridge, Dietz was having to decide whether to defend against the missiles or the fighters; he elected for the latter, focusing his attention on the target least likely to suffer from the countermeasures packages, spending a pair of missiles that knocked two of the incoming vessels out of the battle, though at a cost of suffering an impact on Alamo's midsection that caused more than a dozen simulated casualties.

  Cunningham shook his head, fuming, but the three forward fighters were pushing home an attack of their own on the enemy battlecruiser, scoring three hits, but themselves falling out of the battle, the subject of concentrated countermeasures attack. They had managed to disable the enemy's laser power relays, and Alamo finally had an advantage, punching a hole in its forward section and following up with another wave of missiles, slipping into a new course to throw off the trajectory of the single remaining fighter. Acknowledging defeat, the computer altered the course of the enemy vessel as it attempted to flee, but Alamo managed a shot into its engines, causing critical damage; with a white flash, the enemy surrendered, and the simulation came to an end.

  Marshall tapped for the bridge, "Excellent work, Lieutenant, to you and all crew for your victory in the battle simulation. Have all department heads submit reports and assessments by 0900 tomorrow to my office, we'll have a follow-up meeting at 1300. Pass the word to all hands for an excellent success."

  "A good, clean action," Mulenga said. "Alamo's performance has improved considerably since Ragnarok."

  Cunningham picked up his headset again, "Raven Flight are to report to me immediately, and you'd better have an excellent explanation for your performance in that battle and your failure to follow flight procedure."

  Shaking his head, Warren replied, "Come on, they helped win the battle when they took out those laser relays. Gave Alamo a big advantage."

  "We don't fight battles based on blind luck and mindless acts of meaningless heroism. They didn't obey the rules I laid down. Evidently they still have an awful lot to learn. I can't certify them as flight ready."

  Frowning, Marshall said, "That could present us with problems. We're scheduled into Shakespeare tomorrow, they're out of time for their training. They seem technically competent enough to me."

  "Not to me, and I'm the one responsible for them," Cunningham said.

  "Damn it, they did the job, didn't they? Not as well as they might, but well enough," Warren said.

  "All three of them died."

  Glancing up at Marshall, Warren looked back and said, "That happens in war, especially if you are riding fire. All of us know the score."

  Cunningham walked past Marshall, over to Warren, looking down at him, "I will not certify any pilot as being fit for duty, no matter how potentially mundane, when I consider that they are not qualified for an assignment. Evidently they need considerable remedial training on basic combat tactics."

  "I'd lead them into battle if it came to it," Warren replied.

  "Fortunately I am the one in charge."

  Shaking his head, Marshall said, "No. I am. I agree with Lieutenant Warren. While somewhat over-exuberant, I didn't see any sign that they were not fit and ready for at least limited duty. It isn't as if they won't always have a senior officer commanding them in any case."

  "Are you ordering me to declare them fit for duty?"

  "I would instead like a formal report within the next two hours telling me in detail why they aren't, according to the specific flight training requirements outlined under Triplanetary Fleet Regulations. Run them through the standard proficiency tests and get the scores, and if they are satisfactory, fly them. Unless you have clear and specific grounds as to why they shouldn't fly."

  "This is a mistake."

  “Then it is my mistake, Lieutenant,” Marshall replied, stressing Cunningham's rank.

  Warren stepped forward, "I'll gladly have them in Raven Flight."

  "Honestly, that sounds about right," Cunningham said, before exhaling sharply. "I don't agree with this decision, but you are the senior officer present, so I will obey it. But Mr. Warren, flight duty assignments are my prerogative, and I will assign these pilots only to whatever duties I see fit." He turned to Marshall. "If you will excuse me, I have some tests to administer."

  The wing commander stalked out of the room, not waiting to be dismissed, the doors sliding shut behind him. Warren shook his head, looking up at Marshall, while Mulenga stood silently in the corner, carefully returning his equipment to its usual configurations.

  "Keep an eye on them, Teddy. Not too closely, but keep an eye."

  "I will, Danny. I meant what I said."

  Smiling, Marshall clapped him on the shoulder, replying, "I know you did. It is his call, though. For the moment."

  "As long as you're the one calling the shots from the bridge, I'm happy enough, skipper. By your leave?"

  "On your way, Teddy. I'll catch up with you later."

  Marshall looked at the door for a moment as the exuberant pilot departed, then turned back to Mulenga, who was still working at his consoles. He stood there silently for a moment before the astrogator turned to him, a pensive look on his face.

  "Can I help you, sir?"

  "Eh?"

  A grin rising to the surface, Mulenga stopped working and sat on a chair, turning to face the captain before continuing, "You don't tend to loiter without good reason. If you are reluctant to broach the topic, then I will – you have concerns about Senior Lieutenant Cunningham."

  Marshall nodded, "His attitude isn't great, but I can live with that. There's more to it than that."

  "Your instincts as a commander suggest that there is a problem. Would that be a fair assessment?"

  "Yes, it would."

  "You served under him during the war, didn't you?"

  "He commanded the attack wing on the Wright. He was a Major, I a Third Lieutenant at the time." Marshall chuckled, continuing, "He t
ore a strip off me after my first combat action, complained that I'd taken too many risks. I spent most of the next few days fuming before Deadeye pulled me out of my shell."

  "Was he right?"

  "At the time, I didn't think so. I know that I would do again what I did that day, though I don't know whether or not that makes me a bad officer. That's the least of it, though."

  Nodding, Mulenga agreed, "You are not the type of person to hold a grudge over a small matter like that for this long."

  "Second Vesta was three weeks later," Marshall said, his eyes distant for a moment, as if a long way away.

  "The biggest defeat of the war."

  "We came within an inch of losing the war in a single engagement. The largest fighter battle of the entire war, and probably ever. Ninety-five fighters launching from three carriers, just on our side. More on the other. You should have seen it. All those ships in attack formation, all charging at an enemy. None of us thought for a moment that we were going to lose. Then the enemy fleet, those damn techjammers they were bringing into battle for the first time."

  "If you don't want to talk about it..."

  "I should. We were back to kamikaze tactics, pilots ramming their ships to get the rest of their squadrons through the screen. I was in the lead formation, Warren had ended up on my wing, against orders.” He chuckled at the memory, then his face grew serious. “I saw a gap, and managed to break through. Three out of twelve survived that wild ride long enough to press an attack home on the Sean MacEoin. When that ship went up, I thought we might have pulled off a win after all. But it wasn't to be. They'd broken through everywhere; Lilienthal was a flaming ruin, and poor Langley was in pieces. We managed to fight our way back to Wright, somehow. Ten days of full speed before the UN forces finally gave up the chase, and another fortnight slowly working our way back to Mars."

  Silence filled the room; Marshall sat in his chair, looking at the deck.

  "What about Lieutenant Cunningham?" Mulenga asked.

  "He tore a strip off me when we landed. I was going to get court-martialed, I'd abandoned my post, actions that led to the deaths of the rest of the squadron – only Warren and I made it home. Commodore – General, he was then – Tramiel broke it up. We were about ten seconds away from a fistfight. Hell, from my point of view we'd scored the only big gain of the battle."

  "I presume the court-martial never happened?"

  Marshall laughed, hollowly, saying, "After that big a loss? There were so many holes in the organization charts, so many senior pilots had been lost. I don't think the fighter arm ever really did recover. The Tenth got transferred to the Billy Mitchell not long after that, different wing commander, and I got promoted from Third to First Lieutenant over the next couple of weeks. I went from being the greenest rookie in the squadron to being a flight leader, and maybe I saw the view from the other side of the fence."

  "You were commanding a wing yourself by the end of the war."

  "I'd run into Cunningham occasionally, conferences and briefings, that sort of thing. He ended up a Colonel, a group commander, but we weren't ever in the same command after that. I think he resented it, that he still thinks he was right."

  "It's affecting him a lot more than it is you, as far as I can see."

  "Thank you for that, my friend."

  Mulenga smiled, and shrugged his shoulders, "I only say what I see. For your greater problem, though, I can see where you have concerns. I ask this simply to clarify how you feel; is this affecting your judgment?"

  "Aside from trying to stop him coming on board in the first place, I don't think so."

  "You need to have this conversation with him. You realize that, of course."

  Marshall stood up, walking over to the holographic display, "I'm aware of that. It isn't that easy, though. I've got to wait until I've got something bigger to go on than this; up to now all we have is a simple difference of opinion, and he's not disobeying any orders I'm giving him. I can't fault him for that."

  Mulenga moved behind him, saying, "We both know that this situation needs to be resolved before there is a crisis. With a Republic frigate on the way, anything could happen when we reach the Uranian sub-system."

  "I know."

  The two of them looked at the course projection of the frigate, slowly curving in towards Uranus, just behind Alamo. One more uncertain factor in a situation that was already complicated enough. He looked at the ship, curving in, and turned to the astrogator again.

  "Do you think my being here makes this worse?"

  "Because you bested them at Ragnarok?" He frowned, then replied, "Perhaps, but no other ship in the fleet would have acted any differently, Captain. You did what you had to do. Besides, haven't you heard the news?"

  Mulenga punched a pair of buttons on his console, and the chart of the Solar System faded out, to be replaced with a projection of interstellar space. Pale blue lines reached out to UV Ceti, and beyond to Tau Ceti and Epsilon Eridani, indicating the United Nations Interstellar Trust Territory, a fancy name for a burgeoning empire. White indicated the neutral mining territories of Proxima, Barnard's Star, Wolf 359, and Sirius, and Triplanetary red connected with Lalande 21185, the ice world of Ragnarok now a part of their sphere of influence. Tapping another button, Wolf 359 changed from white to Republic green, and a line leaped out towards Procyon.

  "They've grabbed Wolf 359?" Marshall said, eyes open.

  "Technically the star was unclaimed, and mostly exploited by the Republic in any case. They have gone out of their way to make it clear that other powers still have mining rights, as long as they obtain the relevant permissions..."

  "Which will steadily get harder and harder, of course."

  "...but it is Procyon they are after. The statement they released this morning – I expect a detailed communique on this is waiting for you up in your office – indicated that they are planning to settle Procyon III."

  "If Ragnarok was bad..."

  Mulenga looked up at the chart again, "The planet might be one huge desert, but over time, there may be ways to resolve that – and it has the advantage that there is very little native life on the planet. An imported ecology will do well."

  "This is their response to Ragnarok, isn't it. A contingency plan, if that operation failed."

  "It would seem likely. This will be a side-show to them, potentially a way for their military to regain face. That would be true for whichever ship the fleet had sent out here, except with you, there is an advantage."

  "And that is?" Marshall leaned on the counter, looking up at the map.

  "They know you have beaten them before. They will be wary of you, and that is both a strength – and a weakness."

  Chapter 8

  Shakespeare Station was old, and it showed. A slowly revolving wheel around a steady central core, the equipment on the outer rim was obviously obsolete; here and there were signs that hull plating had been repaired with modern alloys, communications antenna replaced with a model that didn't quite look as if it fit correctly.

  It was almost incongruous to see the gleaming freighter holding position on the far side of the station, a new-build vessel with the flag of the People's Syndicalist Federation proudly emblazoned on the side. Carefully playing the thrusters, Franklin pulled Alamo up alongside as the rest of the bridge watched, before turning to Marshall, sitting in his command chair.

  "We have station keeping, sir. All systems nominal."

  "Good work, Sub-Lieutenant. Mr. Dietz?"

  Dietz had borrowed the watch officer's chair; idly, Marshall pondered whether he should see if Quinn could squeeze a third chair into the bridge. Ryder was stuck hovering around the sensor station.

  "Yes, Captain?"

  "Start preparing for fuel transfer, liaise with the dockmaster. I want to move out at 0900 ship time."

  "Aye, sir. There have been a few requests for leave on the station from some of the crew."

  "Hmm," Marshall pondered for a moment. "I don't see any reason why not. We'll be
here for a good sixteen hours; if they want to sample the presumably limited fleshpots of the station they might as well. No more than sixteen, though, on a first-come-first-served basis. And all back on board by 0800."

  "Very good, sir."

  "Sir?" Weitzman turned to him. "The station commander would like to speak with you."

  "Put him on."

  The image of a gray-haired man appeared on the screen, wearing a battered Belt uniform but with Triplanetary insignia pinned to the shoulders, an odd compromise of styles.

  "Lieutenant-Captain Marshall; we haven't met face-to-face before," the captain began, introducing himself.

  "Lieutenant-Major Akimoto. It's a pleasure to meet you, Captain, but I would very much like to meet you in person immediately. I know you must be anxious to ship out, but I would like to invite you and a couple of your senior officers to dinner. I have an interesting tactical problem that I would like to discuss with you."

  With a potentially hostile frigate only a few days behind, Marshall could guess what that was. He also noted the conditions – he and two other officers; he didn't think it worth pressing the matter.

  "I would be delighted. I understand one of my countrymen is on board."

  "Lieutenant Shirase, my operations officer."

  "He would be most welcome as one of your party."

  "Certainly."

  "I will see you shortly, then. In half an hour?" Marshall looked up at the clock; it was pretty late, local time, at that.

  "Until then, Lieutenant-Major."

  As the channel closed, Dietz turned to face him, puzzlement showing on his face.

  "I take it you wish me to page Lieutenants Caine and Shirase?"

  "Tactical and Operations, a reasonable mix. Have them get their dress uniforms – and send someone down for mine as well – and meet me at the launch bay in five minutes. Have any shuttle pilots requested leave?"

  "No, but Sub-Lieutenant Orlova has."

  "She can fly us over then. Any espatiers who have asked for a night on the station should be given it as well, I'd like them present just in case. This is sounding a little strange. Have whoever is senior keep in touch with me, just in case."