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ARRONAX STOOD CLOSE to the large wall display that was showing a visual inspection of the battlecruiser’s battered hull.
“Well?” He didn’t bother to look at Khegan.
“Dreadnought’s crew are in bad shape. Eleven out of the fifty-seven complement are dead, including the Captain. Everyone else suffered some injuries, mostly concussion and broken bones, when the ship was hit with multiple fission blasts. How they managed to repair the rearward-facing L-drive units so that they could decelerate and get the ship back here is frankly beyond my understanding. I think they all should get commendations for—”
“Never mind the crew,” snapped Arronax. “What kind of shape is the ship in?” If he had been looking at the Admiral when he said those words, he would have seen a flash of anger cross the officer’s face.
“Dreadnought’s armor prevented her from being totally destroyed, but in her present condition, she’s not combat worthy. All her missile tubes were jammed when the hull buckled under the pressure from the enemy warheads. Enough laser turrets survived to fight off a second, smaller missile volley, and that’s a minor miracle in itself. Several major systems were damaged or overloaded.”
“How long to repair her?” interjected Arronax.
“I’m not even certain that the hull deformations can be repaired. Those damaged sections might have to be cut out and completely rebuilt. All I can tell you now, Chancellor, is that Dreadnought won’t be available for any combat operations for a period of time that’ll be measured in months, not weeks.”
“And the Captain is dead?”
“Yes, Chancellor.”
“At least that’ll save me the trouble of having him court-martialled for incompetence. He was your pick, you know. How could he have let his ship be caught in a missile crossfire like that? His replacement had better not fuck up too or his won’t be the only head that gets cut off.” Arronax looked around at Khegan. “Are you getting the message, Admiral?”
“Yes, Chancellor.”
Arronax returned his gaze to the display. “How long until the second battlecruiser is finished?”
“She’s scheduled to leave the shipyard in one hundred forty-four days, Chancellor.”
“Not anymore,” said Arronax with conviction. “One hundred days. She had better be ready in one hundred days, or there’ll be hell to pay. You tell that to the people responsible for that ship.”
“Yes, Chancellor.”
“All right, I’ve seen enough.” He turned away from the display and walked back to his desk. “You’re dismissed, Admiral.”
Five days later:
Juliani smiled as he listened to the secret recordings of several ground force officers suspected of being more loyal to Larson than to the planetary government. They had just condemned themselves to conviction for conspiracy to commit treason—if he revealed their treachery to the President—but that would be a waste of good cannon fodder. He was certain he could convince them of his support for Larson if they staged a coup resulting in Gaviglio’s death. Brandenburg was sure to resist the coup attempt with her Security forces, and with a little luck, she’d be taken out too. But even if she wasn’t killed, the Constitution required the Cabinet to vote on Gaviglio’s replacement, and Juliani already had enough dirt on enough Cabinet members to ensure that he would be voted the next President. He checked the computer system to locate the senior Larson officer’s location and headed for the door. He’d waited long enough for this opportunity.
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TERRANOVA WALKED UP to the tactical station and looked at the display for a few seconds before speaking.
“How close were we able to get?” he asked in a low voice. His Tactical Officer responded in the same low tone.
“The drone was inside the moon’s orbit at its closest approach. Almost a third of the way to Earth.”
“That close, eh? And it still wasn’t detected. Amazing. So, what do we now know?”
The TO manipulated his console, and the main display zoomed in to show a computer-generated image of several orbiting shipyards.
“Three of the five orbiting yards were visible on the drone’s pass. These two,” he pointed to the display, “appear to have hulls inside that are a lot bigger than a frigate. The one on the left could be a freighter, but the one on the right is definitely a battlecruiser. We’re unable to confirm if it’s the same one that attacked Corona or a completely different one, but the dimensions and overall configuration are the same.”
“Could they have built a new one that quickly?” asked Terranova.
The TO shrugged. “I don’t see how, but that doesn’t mean it couldn’t have been done. Are we still going to target all three yards, Commander?”
“Damn right we are and the other two as well, but I’d sure like to know what’s in them first. Can we get the drone around for a look at them?”
“Yessir. The drone’s trajectory will carry it around the planet while those two yards continue in their orbits. We should get some data about them on the next scheduled data dump in about thirty-five minutes.”
“Fine. Call me when we have those images. Then we’ll put together an attack plan.”
When the images were finally available, Terranova nodded with satisfaction. All five shipyards appeared to be working on one or more projects and destroying them all would be a huge blow to whatever mad schemes the Chancellor was cooking up in that feverish brain of his. It only took five minutes of consultations with the TO to come up with a missile fire plan that would hit each shipyard with a minimum of two missiles, but the yard with the battlecruiser would get six missiles, and those six would not detonate at the same time. It was too bad the kinetic-energy drone prototype wasn’t ready in time. Terranova had decided that if they couldn’t blow the damn thing to pieces, then they might be able to use a series of well-timed detonations to push the hull into a descending orbit that would result in it crashing back on Earth. With the plan finalized and the drones programmed, he gave the order to launch the drones. It would take almost an hour for them to reach their firing points. He had made sure that the Troiano was far enough out from Earth that it wouldn’t be detected either by radar or by reflected sunlight. The recon drone would be able to spot the detonations and relay that data to Troiano. Until then, there was nothing else Terranova could do except wait.
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KHEGAN YAWNED AS HE left his office. It had been another very long day. He couldn’t remember the last time he had gotten home while it was still daylight. He decided to make one quick check of the situation in Operations before heading home. His first impression upon entering was that everything was normal. The background chatter of personnel at their consoles seemed to be routine in nature. The main display did not show any red icons, and the Duty Officer was leaning against his desk with a cup of something in his hand. He quickly put it down and stood to attention when he saw Khegan coming toward him.
“Relax, Jenkins,” said Khegan in a casual tone. “I just wanted a quick look at the Big Board before I head home. All quiet on the home front?”
“Yes, Admiral, ah, pretty quiet. One of our Skywatch sats thought it detected something moving across the stellar background, but the contact was intermittent, and no other sat confirmed the sighting.”
“Oh? When was that?”
“About ninety, ninety-five minutes ago I’d say.”
“I see.” Khegan continued looking at the display a few more seconds before nodding. “I’ll let you get back to your coffee, Captain. Good night.”
“Good night, Admiral.”
Just as Khegan was about to reach the entrance, the radar warning alarm sounded. He stopped, looked at the main display and gasped in shock. Red icons were appearing and multiplying, and they were moving very fast.
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ARRONAX DECIDED HE’D been in his office long enough and walked over to the large window overlooking the city. As he watched the flashing running lights of an aircraft move across the night sky, a flash of light so bright it hurt his eyes appeared and then faded over the course of a few seconds. He knew there was only one explanation for a flash like that: a nuclear explosion had just taken place in space. Even as he turned and ran for the elevator that would take him down to the Operations level, he wondered if he had just received a lethal dose of radiation. His bodyguards, who were standing watch in the hallway, had no idea why the Chancellor was running out of his office, heading in the direction of the elevator, but they knew they were supposed to stay close to him, so they started running too.
As Arronax entered the elevator, he turned and looked at the guards behind him. “Operations. We’re under space attack,” he said. The senior of the two guards lifted his right wrist to his mouth and began talking.
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KHEGAN HEARD SOMEONE shouting his name over the roar of background chatter and turned to see who it was. The Duty Officer was looking at him with a stunned expression.
“Admiral! We just got word! The Chancellor’s on his way down here now!”
Khegan felt the icy hand of fear grab his heart. All five orbiting shipyards had just been destroyed, and the battlecruiser Dreadnought—or what was left of it—was now tumbling in an unstable orbit, and there was nothing Khegan could do about it. He was certain that when the Chancellor learned of the disaster, he would lash out at whoever was within reach, and if his armed guards were with him, they wouldn’t hesitate to shoot the admiral if ordered to do so.
“Get a security team in here now!” yelled Khegan. The DO hurried away.
The security team entered from a side entrance at just about the same time as the Chancellor and six of his guards entered from the main entrance on the opposite side. The security reached Khegan first.
“Admiral?” said the team leader, a lieutenant.
Khegan turned to face him just long enough to say, “This could get ugly. Be ready.” He then turned back around to face the Chancellor.
“How dare you turn your back on me, Admiral! What the hell is happening? Are we under space attack?”
Khegan surprised himself by how calm his voice was. “We were under space attack by missiles travelling at C-fractional velocities. They came in so fast our defenses didn’t have time to react. All five shipyards have been destroyed, along with the ships that were under construction including the second battlecruiser. The Dreadnought wasn’t destroyed outright, but whatever’s left of it is tumbling out of control and will fall out of orbit in less than half an hour. There’s no way we can prevent it. The tumbling is too violent for us to be able to dock with it, and even if we could dock, the ship is too massive for a shuttle to be able to stabilize its orbit. We’re working on estimating the point of impact. As for the attack, it appears to be over, Chancellor.”
The Chancellor took a quick look at the main display, his face now pale with shock, before returning his gaze to the admiral. When he spoke, his voice trembled with pent up anger.
“This disaster is your responsibility, Admiral. I’ve tolerated your incompetence long enough.” He turned to one of his guards. “I want Admiral Khegan taken out to the back courtyard, lined up against a wall and shot!” The guard, his eyes now open wide, looked around at the rest of the guard detail for support before looking back at his boss with a look of fear.
Khegan spoke before the guard could respond verbally. “My security team will not allow that to happen, Chancellor. You’re overstepping your authority.”
Whatever Arronax was about to say was stopped when he heard the mechanical sound of a handgun being cocked coming from one of Khegan’s security team. A quick look at his own guards followed by a close look at the expressions of the admiral’s team confirmed his suspicion that the security team seemed to be willing to back up Admiral Khegan, while his guards were clearly nervous about a possible shooting confrontation. In hindsight, demanding the admiral’s execution here in front of his own security people had been a mistake. The better approach would have been to get the admiral away from his security and only then order his guards to shoot the bastard!
“I guess I did get carried away, Admiral,” he said in a much calmer voice. Clearly you don’t deserve to be executed, but just as clearly you can’t be allowed to remain as the senior military officer of the Navy. I do have the authority to relieve you of that post and I’m exercising that authority now. Since you’re no longer in command, you no longer have any business being here. My guards and I will escort you from the building.”
Khegan didn’t move. A quick check of the Chancellor’s guards showed that they seemed relieved that this confrontation was going to end without gunfire, but he wasn’t fooled by the Chancellor’s sudden bout of sanity. He’d seen the violent mood swings too often. If he went with the Chancellor and his people now, presumably without his security team, he was as certain as he could be that he wouldn’t make it home alive. Therefore, his only chance of survival was to use his security team while he still could.
“I do not accept your decision to relieve me of command. Your attempt to have me shot was not only beyond your authority, it was also illegal, and therefore I’m ordering my security team to place you under arrest. If your guards interfere, my people will use force, lethal force if necessary, to stop them.” He turned his head but kept his eyes on Arronax. “Lieutenant? Have your people disarm the Chancellor’s guards and then take the Chancellor into custody.”
For three heart-stopping seconds, there was no response, followed by a decisive, “Yes, sir! Chief Harness—”
The rest of the officer’s sentence was drowned out by Arronax’s shout. “KILL THEM ALL!” Arronax turned and, pushing one of his guards out of his way, started running for the exit. The sound of gunfire erupted behind him.
