Birthright: Battle for the Confederation- Reprisal Read online

  He walked briskly to the railing at the front of the raised command platform and looked out over the crewmembers working in the room, realizing he needed to do something. He reached out to the small computer terminal intended for his use that was built into the top of the polished metal surface and keyed a switch, activating the C3 speaker system.

  “Everyone, it’s time.” It was impossible to not know that fact, since there were no fewer than half a dozen countdown timers at various places in the room showing the minutes and seconds to the Delos System jump. “Captain Elco made a great speech earlier about our responsibilities and expectations for this attack, and I’m not going to try to top that,” he said with the smallest of grins, seeing a few in return. “Let’s just make sure we don’t let him down.”

  He released the button and turned to head back to his instrument panel and chair, though he couldn’t understand the need to put a chair at the position. As if anyone could ever casually sit through a fight while working in a room like this.

  Upon officially being tasked with running C3, he had asked the senior officer, his aide and officer in charge of the space when not at combat stations, if he could have the chair removed, and the woman had grinned knowingly. Feeling like he had not heard the punchline to a joke everyone else had shared, he had asked what the woman knew that he didn’t. She had replied that XO Marks had also had the chair removed, but they had put it back for Loren, since technically it was part of the standard equipment package and defacing military property was generally frowned upon. Loren had smiled, too, and told her to find the chair a home where it wouldn’t get in anybody’s way. The chair was now gone, and the instrument panel was raised to a comfortable height for Loren to use while standing.

  Chapter 7

  Mithus and Von sat across the table from Senator Dennix and Ples Damar, waiting in silence in the main room of the Senator’s safehouse. While the main floor of the building was filled with dusty crates and disused equipment to fool any casual observer, the upstairs was where the Senator did all his work. The building itself may have been run down, but seemingly out-of-place high tech gadgets stood out from among the refuse and debris.

  The morning sun was just creeping over the horizon, bringing a warm orange glow to the sky that would soon fade to the clear blue of most oxygen-rich worlds. Mithus watched through partially closed shutters the natural wonder, stream-of-consciousness thinking letting all sorts of odd thoughts play through his mind. It was his own way of clearing his head; if he let his mind wander now, it should be clear when the time came for total concentration. The most out of place thought he’d had this morning was inspired by the beautiful, silent sunrise, too early for the sleepy inhabitants of the city to break nature’s spell. This planet could care less what was about to happen to the people that would fight and die today. The sun would come up and shine bright upon the battles that would rage across the surface. Eventually, night would fall, and tomorrow morning, the sun would once again rise, feeling no pity or remorse for what had happened on the surface the previous day. Mithus smiled. He often liked to wonder what inanimate objects would say about what the living creatures did to each other.

  Since their waiting room was on the second floor of the warehouse-style building, leaving some shutters opened just a bit was a safe enough move. He supposed that completely blocking any chance of a visual of the inside of the building was safest, but also wanted the civilians to feel the psychological impact of the sunrise. It signified a new day, a new challenge, the start of their rescue.

  They had sat in silence since breakfast, nobody much in the mood for small talk, and after a few attempts at meaningless jabber, the Senator had stopped trying. Von simply watched the computer monitors on the table for signs of intruders, and Mithus stood statue-like with his comm device in his hand as he watched out the windows. He knew it made the Senator and Damar nervous, and that was ok with him, too. They needed to have an appreciation for what was coming.

  Damar fished in his inside suit jacket pocket, producing a small but expensive communicator. Von reacted before Mithus could, snatching the device from Ples before the advisor had a chance to argue the point.

  “What are you doing?” Damar asked. “That’s my device!”

  “And why in the name of a half dozen gods would you risk turning that on and exposing us?” Von asked in a raised voice.

  “Because Mithus has one, and he looks to be ready to use it!” The advisor had stood up and was going face to face with Von, and though Damar wasn’t exactly dwarfed by the SAR operative, simple body language and the way they carried themselves left no doubt who was in charge of the situation. It would be foolish to assume that just because a special operative wasn’t a huge mass of rippling muscle that they were incapable of doing great bodily harm.

  Mithus spoke up, hoping to defuse Damar before Von was forced to render him as mere baggage on this operation. “My communicator is open to receive only. I will not be hearing any in-the-clear broadcasts, just a series of clicks and a few codewords.”

  “Then how will we know where and when to go?”

  “Well, when you hear the explosions and commotion, that would be the when part. As for where, we identified several sites before we started the mission. I listen for the code that tells us which place to go to,” he held the communicator up in the air between two fingers, waggling it a bit to make sure Damar was paying attention. Mithus said it in such an even manner that Damar was caught a bit off guard, spooled up as he was with Von’s appropriation of his communicator.

  Commander Velk sat safely away in his headquarters on Callidor. He felt like a coward, hiding on an occupied planet deep behind their own lines. He should have been out leading his soldiers in their attack against the Confederation, but the Council had suggested (and a suggestion from the Council is not truly a friendly request, but more of a compulsion to see things their way) that he stay on Callidor. Everyone in decision making positions knew that the Primans had no real stake in Delos, and letting the planet fall back into Confederation hands was something they were comfortable with. They had penetrated so far into the galaxy that maintaining Delos was a liability in any case; they had accomplished their goal of destabilizing the government by capturing the elected officials. If they had killed them outright, the reaction would have no doubt been more adverse. Additionally, not only did they have prominent, living hostages to bargain with at a future date, but the fact that the people were still alive would cause confusion about what to do to replace them.

  In any case, Velk had written off Delos. They would fight the Confeds to a standstill, destroy their Naval HQ, and appear to try and stop the rescue of their Senator, who would somehow miraculously return to Confed space, taking his advisor Ples Damar with them. Then the Primans would quietly withdraw from Delos, and move on in their push to take back their galaxy while their pet Senator spoke of cooperation on their behalf. There was no point wasting more of their time with the place.

  He watched the status board of the Delos System affixed to a wall in his offices. He had a select number of staff on hand, including his Representatives, Tash and Dag. Terir had stayed on Delos to be the voice of Commander Velk during and after the attack. By some twist of fate, the day/night cycles of Delos and Callidor were almost perfectly aligned at the moment. He looked out of his window at the rising sun, wondering if the scene looked the same in the atmosphere of Delos. No matter. His people had been without sunrises for so long that ignoring it was easy enough to do when required.

  Velk looked at the screen, waiting for the message to begin. They were waiting on a call from Representative Terir on Delos, giving his daily briefing on the state of their defenses there.

  “Good morning, Commander, Representatives,” the message began, audio only for a few seconds as they waited a second or two for the encryption gear to unscramble the signal for Velk.

  “Good morning, Representative Terir,” answered Velk. “What news of our attack on Confed HQ and the
ir rescue force?” Velk dispensed with the pleasantries, letting his frustration with his subordinates show for their lack of ability to get him reliable information on the Confederation fleets.

  “Commander, we are assembling our fleet for the attack now. As you know, we have roughly one hundred capital ships marked for this engagement. It will be more then enough to finally wipe out the Confederation Naval Headquarters and a rescue force. Since we also know that their rescue attempt for the Senator will happen any time now, we hope that this assault might also draw their rescue force into the system before they are fully prepared once they see the attack on their HQ commencing. We still have not located any massed fleets, but our intelligence reports do identify a number of Confed vessels that have disappeared in the last week, most likely for use in the assault. To that end, we will be holding forty large ships in reserve on the other side of the system from their naval base. If we can draw them here to defend their facility, we will flank and attack their force. If they do not show up, we annihilate their headquarters and shipyards. Either way, we are in control of the situation.”

  Terir’s confidence showed, and Velk approved. It was good for a leader to be confident in his people and plans, just so long as that leader didn’t cross the line into arrogance or inflexibility.

  While Loren was weighing his decision to take on the role of XO, Merritt and Cory had found a few minutes to be together before the assault. Their squadrons were ready, and the assembled pilots were waiting for their cue in the countdown sequence to occupy their fighters.

  Cory’s office in the Warbirds’ hangar area was not the most romantic or intimate space, and she kept it one hundred percent business- no photos, no personal touches like furniture or art. But for the few minutes they had, there was no other place in the galaxy Merritt would rather have been.

  They sat on a small couch together, her head on his shoulder, his head resting on top of hers. It was a tiny bit awkward because she was as tall as him, but neither cared. They sat there, her hand in his, fingers interlaced.

  “You ever think maybe somehow this could magically be the last battle we have to fight?” Cory asked.

  “I try to be a realist. I wish it could end, but I know better. It’s just people’s nature. They want what others have, and if they think they can take it by force, they’re going to try. We just have to show the Primans we want our homes more than they do.”

  “I just hope we live long enough to see the last Priman ship scuttled into the Delos System’s sun.”

  There was a brief silence as Merritt tried to compose an idea that had been floating around in his head, meaningful but intangible, often defying his efforts to describe. It was something that was hard to put into words, more a feeling or a belief than a statement, but he had to try.

  “You know, I’ll admit to you one thing I won’t tell anyone else. I’m not frozen with fear of dying. Well, of course I’d rather not, you understand, but I can accept that sometimes that’s just the way it’s going to be. What I fear is dying before I can make a difference. What if I could do something to really help end this war? What if there’s something great that I was supposed to contribute, but I got killed before I could accomplish it? Think of how many great pilots, generals, admirals, were killed before they had their chance to lead. I hope I’m not in that category.”

  “I’d settle for you just staying alive, you know,” Cory replied, lifting her head up to look him in the eyes, her own twinkling a bit in that special way that made Merritt feel at home and at peace.

  “I suppose I could aim low and just try to survive; I could try and do that for you. But only because you asked nicely and I really like you.” He grinned at her and leaned over to kiss her gently. She returned the kiss, her hand reaching up behind his head to pull his lips tighter against hers.

  Finally they parted, and they realized they had to let the moment pass as they assumed their roles once again as leaders.

  Cory stopped at the door and turned to him, grabbing both his hands in hers.

  “You’re the reason I fight, you know, and the reason I come back.”

  “I know. I love you, too.” He squeezed her hands. “And I expect you to be here when I get back.”

  “Same to you, or you’re in big trouble.”

  “I know better than to disappoint you.”

  Representative Terir looked out at the skyline of Delos through the panoramic windows of his office. It was such a Confederation thing to do; claiming a stylish office as a symbol of his status. Such a foreign concept to a Priman, who expected little more than a small drab space whose power was vested not in the condition of the place itself, but with the title and more importantly the responsibility that went with it.

  Still, he would miss the trappings of human-style power just a bit, he was willing to concede. What was the point of all that sacrifice and hard work if nothing else distinguished you from the masses? Why strive to better yourself and work harder than the rest if, in the end, you ended up with the exact same thing as everyone else? It was a synthesis of cultures that he thought might bear some looking into. After all, if the Primans gave these beings their lives through the modification of their DNA, did not the ideas those beings generate have a Priman origin? Would the Primans have developed similar trappings and rewards if they’d had a place to call their own for all those centuries? Should personal ambition and achievement not be rewarded?

  Speaking of ambition and achievement, the inability to see farther ahead than just a simple invasion was one of the reasons himself and several Council members were concerned about Commander Velk. Terir knew, for example, about the secret DNA decoding/weaponization program going on in the Callidor System. He had learned of the project designed to illustrate to this galaxy’s residents the fact that they shared DNA with the Primans. He also thought that Velk’s refusal to deploy the DNA weapon, or even prepare it for mobilization, was a mistake that didn’t take into account any forward thinking. To not even consider using the weapon was shortsighted and assumed the Primans would always be in tactical control of the situation.

  This was why, against standing orders to leave the research alone, Terir had arranged to obtain a finalized sample of the weapon from the labs on Callidor. On Delos, all evidence of the weapon was being destroyed, and while the irreplaceable research and production would be safe enough in their hidden lab in the Callidor system, he felt a personal responsibility to see the research continued and safeguarded. Of course, getting the sample without Velk’s knowledge had been no easy task, but he had learned a few things from his time among the residents of this galaxy, among them the habit of self preservation, promising and granting favors, and cultivating distrust of others who could someday be his competition.

  He aimlessly walked the office one last time, fully aware that he’d never occupy this space again. He was due at the spaceport in fifteen minutes, scheduled to be on a transport that would have him on the outskirts of the system to oversee the attack on Confederation HQ and report to Commander Velk. He carried a small attaché case, containing a few items he’d acquired while on Delos, in addition of course to the DNA weapon sample. Yes, he would miss his office here. But then again, that simply meant he’d have the opportunity to obtain a better office somewhere else.

  Deep in space beyond the Delos System, anchored around waypoints that the Confederation Navy had used for decades as part of naval exercises, was the first wave of the Delos assault. It consisted of no less than a dozen Crusader class ships, split into two divisions of six each.

  Loren, as usual these days, stood at the command podium in Avenger’s C3, watching the vessels of the fleet position themselves. It was going to be a tricky plan that would require precise timing and the ability to adapt to several possible starting conditions in the Delos System, but the basics were the same no matter what.

  The Third Fleet, along with large portions of two other fleets that were simply regarded as part of the Third, would attack the Delos System he
ading towards the planet itself along the elliptic plane. Based on sketchy reconnaissance from Fleet Headquarters, they should expect to see Priman capital ships in defense of the system as well as to possibly lead an eventual assault on Confed Fleet HQ itself. With any luck, the Third would draw the Primans into an engagement. With some more luck, they would also draw the Primans toward Fleet HQ for a special surprise that had been prepared for them.

  While this was happening, the Crusader element that Avenger was a part of would run in from the other side of the system, slightly above the elliptic and from the general vicinity of Confed HQ. From there, the Crusaders would conduct a stealth run-in on the edges of the Priman fleet, followed up by torpedo launches and turbolaser volleys on their way back out of range.

  When the time was right, the surprise from Confed HQ would appear, and several of the Crusaders would rendezvous with the Marine Assault Ships and their other escorts while the rest rejoined the main body of the Ninth. The Assault Ships, having already disgorged their dozens of assault dropships, would stand back and await their time to head in to the planet.

  Meanwhile, the dropships themselves, along with a battleship escort and plenty of fighter cover, would head for the planet and their insertion. Concurrently, the Ninth Fleet would appear en masse to deal with the Centurion battle stations and perhaps the flanks of the Priman fleet. They would hopefully keep the close-in Priman forces occupied and off the backs of the landing force.