Destroyer (Expansion Wars Trilogy, Book 3) Read online

  "Fourth Fleet has assumed security of the inner system along with the few Orbital Authority ships actually in service," Chambliss went on. "I doubt any more thought was given to it other than a controller on duty saw a Black Fleet transponder and directed us into the formation the other Black Fleet ships were already in."

  "Maybe," Accari said. The young officer had inadvertently cultivated a few back-channel sources of intel and Fleet scuttlebutt due to his popularity with the ladies. Being privy to the machinations of the upper tiers of CENTCOM caused him to look for conspiracies and deeper meaning in even the most mundane orders that came down.

  The conversation lulled as people leaned back and enjoyed the last of their drinks while an instrumental style of music from Earth played softly over the speakers. For a brief moment Jackson could imagine he wasn't in the military and the men and women sitting around the table were just his friends, not his subordinates and certainly not people he might have to order to actions that could lead to their deaths.

  "Captain, we have an unidentified ship approaching off our starboard flank requesting permission to dock," the second watch com officer's voice came over the intercom harshly.

  "Interesting," Jackson said, pulling his collar right and refastening it. "I'm on my way."

  "Sir?" Chambliss asked.

  "I have my suspicions as to who this is," Jackson said. "Enjoy the rest of your evening; you're all still off-duty until first watch."

  Jackson stepped out of the hatchway and was unsurprised to see that Sergeant Barton was standing at parade rest along with the two regular Marine sentries. He nodded to his personal escort and pointed so that Barton would know he was indeed moving to the lifts and not just down the shallow set of steps to the head.

  "Emergency, Captain?" Barton asked.

  "Not yet, Sergeant," Jackson said. "But the night is young and the person I suspect is coming to see us rarely brings me good news."

  Barton's brow furrowed, but he remained silent. The lift quickly descended from the observation lounge near the top of the superstructure down to the secure command deck. The system required that Jackson enter a pass code before the doors would open for him.

  "Report!" Jackson said as he walked onto the bridge.

  "Sensor data of the ship is on the main display, sir, and the credentials match with a generic—"

  "CIS code," Jackson finished for the lieutenant commander from CIC that was manning the bridge. "I'm quite familiar with the ship, Lieutenant Commander. Coms, tell them they're clear to begin docking maneuvers and let Flight OPS know that we have visitors."

  "And Major Baer, sir?" the ensign at OPS asked.

  "Negative, Ensign," Jackson said. "I'll have Sergeant Barton with me and that will be sufficient."

  "Aye, sir."

  "Friends of yours, Captain?" Barton asked once they were alone in another lift car.

  "I suppose that technically he is," Jackson said. "At least I assume it's him given that only a few of those ships exist."

  By the time they reached the starboard airlock the lights were cycling from amber to green, letting them know that the Broadhead II had made hard dock and the pressure was equalized. Jackson peered into the short tunnel of the airlock to make sure it was whom he assumed it to be and was surprised that Agent Pike wasn't alone.

  "Shit," he muttered. "Barton, stand at attention and prepare to render honors to a flag officer."

  "Sir?"

  Jackson didn't bother explaining himself. He reached over and keyed in his command codes authorizing the main hatch to cycle. As soon as the hatch popped and began to swing open, Jackson stepped back and snapped to attention.

  "Attention on deck!" he barked. Barton automatically slammed his heels together and, since he was armed, rendered a salute as Agent Pike walked through.

  "For me?" he asked, putting both palms on his cheeks and feigning a surprised look.

  "Get out of the way, you fucking idiot," a voice growled from behind him. "And stand at ease, Jackson … I'm a goddamn civilian now."

  "At ease, Sergeant," Jackson said. "I'd heard you were retired now, Admiral. I still feel like you've earned that respect when stepping onto a Federation starship."

  "An odd sentiment coming from you, all things between us considered," Joseph Marcum said, coming forward and extending his hand. "She's a beautiful ship, Captain. Is there a place we can talk in private and maybe find a bottle of something or other that's usually banned on Fleet starships?"

  "My office, Admiral," Jackson said. "This way."

  The motley procession wound its way through the ship until they ended up outside the hatchway of Jackson's office on the command deck. Barton automatically took his post and stood ramrod straight, staring straight ahead.

  "Is there someplace he can go?" Marcum jerked a thumb towards Pike.

  "He?" Pike protested mildly.

  "Pike, if you go up to the observation lounge you'll likely catch my senior staff still in the middle of raiding the ship's wine stash," Jackson said. "Sergeant Barton, please call ahead and let the sentries know that someone that looks like a homeless rambler will be attending Captain's Mess a bit late."

  "Funny," Pike said sourly and walked off towards the bank of lifts. Jackson had no doubt the agent already knew how to get around in a starship whose design had just entered service.

  "I'll admit, Captain, this is not the reception I expected to receive from you given the fact there aren't any stars on my collar anymore," Marcum said once the hatch sealed behind him. Jackson took his seat and exhaled loudly, looking up at the ceiling. "I half-expected you to cycle the airlock when you saw who it was and let the air out a bit for me and that unbelievably annoying CIS spook."

  "Admiral … I know there has been friction between us, but it was for legitimate reasons," Jackson said after a moment. "When I pulled the Ares out of formation and took her on my own in direct defiance of your explicit orders, I could have been rightly prosecuted. I know that political powers had also forced you to bring me back in what I can only assume was a PR stunt when the war took a bad turn.

  "I still respect the job you did during the Phage War in spite of everything. All the minutia aside, I'm not sure anybody else could have wrangled the numbered fleets together and coordinated the later stages of the war the way you did. I don't dislike you personally, but I was often frustrated by what I assumed was your tendency to put political considerations above what was best for Starfleet."

  "Fair enough," Marcum said, also taking a long moment before speaking. "I suppose when I take an honest look at why I've been so disgusted with you during your career is that part of me wished I had still been like you. I can't honestly say I'd have had the balls to take a single ship looking for that Phage core mind or transition an obsolete assault carrier deep into an enemy-held system without my escort … but there was a time when I would have.

  "Before I get into why I had that fucking lunatic Pike bring me out here as a last favor cashed in, I want you to know that it was never personal, even if I might have made it seem like it was. I respect you as an officer and as a man … now before this gets too sappy and we start crying on each other's shoulders about our childhoods, how about you break out some of that sweet Kentucky bourbon I know you have in that desk and I'll tell you what's happening right now over the capital."

  Admiral Wright was sitting in her office, preparing her notes for a presentation she was making to the Parliamentary Subcommittee on Fleet Readiness regarding the strength and availability of Black Fleet assets, when the door swung open with a bang.

  "Do come in, Admiral." Celesta glared up at Admiral Pitt. Behind him she could see her admin staff fretting and looking in nervously after Pitt had apparently plowed through their protests to get to her office.

  "Sorry," Pitt said absently before swinging the door shut. "Did Pike load this place up with all the usual anti-detection goodies?"

  "I beg your pardon, sir?"

  "You know … all the CIS gadgets to m
ake sure your office can't be monitored directly or remotely?" Pitt asked. "Yes or no, Wright."

  "This office is secure," Celesta said evasively. "Can I assume there are some developments with our Ushin friends?"

  "No … well, probably," Pitt said with a shake of his head. "But I'm here about something else: The Columbiana System was attacked by the Specter. This is all very preliminary and highly classified but I have no doubt that it'll be coming your way."

  "You're not kidding, are you?" Celesta sank back into her seat, her face ashen. Columbiana was the seat of power for the New America enclave and possibly the Federation's most important industrial base. "Losses?"

  "The Forge was completely taken out," Pitt said. "It was that pre-process feeder—"

  "I'm aware of what the Forge is—was—Admiral."

  "And it likely would have gotten a free shot at the two shipyards there too if it wasn't for your protégé, Captain Barrett," Pitt finished.

  "Barrett? Ah, yes … the Aludra Star is there for the final testing of his new assault carrier tactical concept," Celesta said. "I don't suppose he got lucky and took out the Specter?"

  "Didn't land a single shot," Pitt said. "But, I'm hearing that there's another highly classified after-action report that says Tsuyo had a secret research platform along the system boundary in Columbiana and that the shipyard attack was a diversion. The lab was hit while all the attention was on the other side of the system … total loss."

  "This is not a coincidence," Celesta said. "Two top secret research stations in a row that I didn't even know about? Where the hell is this thing getting its intel?"

  "I couldn't even begin to guess," Pitt said. "That sort of information would likely be circulated outside of our circle. Fleet doesn't need to know—." He was cut off as both of their comlinks began chirping simultaneously.

  "If you got the same message I did we've got about ten minutes to get down to Deck 32 for a briefing by the new CENTCOM Chief of Staff," Celesta said.

  "I did," Pitt said. "We'll have to continue this later."

  As Celesta walked beside Admiral Pitt, each of them trailed by their personal staff, she thought about what it meant that the Specter was changing tactics and hitting Fleet research outposts. The obvious answer was that it was after the newest Terran technology to either develop a defense or to integrate it into its own mishmash of dissimilar hardware, but that was unlikely for a few reasons. More realistically, Celesta thought that it was a tactic to deny the Federation any further major advances in ship design or weaponry.

  These research stations were lightly guarded, isolated, and staffed almost entirely by civilians. They were soft targets that had major impacts when taken out. What worried her most was that there was no way in hell this ship was just finding these installations by bumbling around within Terran space. The only way to get that sort of detailed information was from the inside … she just hoped that it was effective espionage and that they hadn't been betrayed by their own. The fact the Specter was flying unimpeded through Federation space and popping up in systems it shouldn’t even know existed was terrifying. Maybe they'd get lucky and the briefing she was being called to was to order the Nemesis mission reactivated.

  "If everyone is here, we'll get started," Fleet Admiral Dax Longworth, CENTCOM Chief of Staff, said from the podium. "Marines, please close and lock the doors."

  Admiral Longworth was a physically unimposing man. Short, bald, and with an odd stoop to his shoulders that gave him a timid, almost fearful appearance. He wasn't from the operational side of Starfleet so most of the flag officers in the room for the briefing that had come up the ranks serving aboard starships had never met or heard of him. He'd been in Logistics Command for most of his career where he'd served with distinction, but most of the officers in the room were highly skeptical that his experience over there would count for much when it came to managing the entire Federation military.

  "I've been asked by the President himself to come up here and give you an update on what's happening with the Ushin delegation parked in this system," Longworth said once the doors had swung shut. "We have representatives from each numbered fleet here as well as Merchant Fleet and cleared civilian liaisons from firms that do business near the Frontier.

  "To keep this short and sweet: The Darshik have surrendered. Not to us, but to the Ushin. As many of you might know, the Darshik are actually a politically ideological offshoot of Ushin society, but they're the same species. Things have gotten so bad on the Darshik planets from the constant state of war that the populations are starving, the economies are in ruin, and the regional governments are looking at a full rebellion if they don't do something.

  "Two of the three planets sent emissaries to the Ushin and offered a complete and unconditional surrender in exchange for aid. The third planet is controlled by a warlord that is usually aboard a Darshik ship we've codenamed Specter. This planet has not surrendered, but they're in much the same poor shape as the other two and the citizens there are desperate for Ushin help.

  "The President feels this is now a problem that will quickly solve itself without any need for an intervention by us. He is recommending to Parliament that we withdraw military support from the Ushin and begin anew with diplomatic efforts. Without the logistical support of his bases on the other two planets, we feel confident that the Specter poses no real risk to the Federation and that the resources it would take to hunt him down could be put to better use here."

  "Apparently the Juwel fiasco took more out of them than we thought," Pitt whispered to Celesta as Longworth began taking questions from the attendees.

  "This guy still has one powerful starship, his own fleet of cruisers, and who knows what else besides the single planet," Celesta said. "He's not going away quietly."

  "No, he's not," Pitt agreed. "The question now becomes what horrific act of war will this asshole perpetrate next before leadership decides enough is enough."

  Celesta didn't answer. A handful of warships bent on doing as much damage as possible, and apparently with detailed knowledge of Terran space, was not something that could just be ignored. There were far more sensitive targets than there were Fleet assets to protect them. She feared Pitt was right: It was just a matter of time before the next attack, and this time it might not be some lightly manned research outpost.

  7

  The Tsuyo Corporation was an ancient entity, tracing its lineage directly back to a company of the same name on Earth that had first developed the warp drive and launched the very first interstellar exploration vehicles. It had been the only aerospace company that had remained after Earth's third great world war and had survived by combining the industrial might of a flagging United States and a resurgent Japan. Ironically, the world's two most tech-centric nations had produced something in their desperation that had ultimately doomed them both.

  Once warp-drive-equipped starships began flying colonists to newly discovered planets, the top fifteen percent of every generation left an overcrowded, polluted, and war-ravaged Earth for a new life. Earth's economy collapsed and within the span of a couple of centuries the birthplace of humanity was little more than a slum. It took the next one hundred and fifty years for the remaining citizens to reorganize themselves and repair the damage centuries of conflict and industry had caused. While Earth was now a lush, beautiful planet once again with a thriving economy, her people had never forgotten the centuries of insult and neglect. Even now Earth remained independent, aligning with neither the United Terran Federation nor the Eastern Star Alliance.

  Even though Tsuyo still maintained a strong presence on Earth, the fact that their machinery took humanity to the stars first meant the company had been able to establish certain controls on the technology to ensure their monopoly continued. Jillian Wolfe looked up in wonder as the speedy intrasystem yacht she was on dropped away from Tsuyo's newest pride and joy: the Amaterasu Habitat.

  Amaterasu was the largest man-made structure in space by a factor of at least five, d
warfing the second largest, the New Sierra Platform. Whereas New Sierra was still mostly exposed structural spars and spindly docking arms from its previous life as a heavy construction shipyard, Amaterasu was a solid, gracefully arching structure that lived in harmony with the spherical planet it orbited. The planet was a barren, rocky world in the Kirin System, a star system owned wholly by the Tsuyo Corporation that had no habitable worlds but did have above average concentrations of iron and other crucial elements in its three asteroid belts and the two smallest rocky worlds. It was also used as a semi-secret proving ground for various Tsuyo starship designs.

  "It's truly amazing, Mr. Hoshino," Jillian said as Amaterasu became smaller and less pronounced.

  "Thank you, Mrs. Wolfe," the Tsuyo liaison said with a bow. "She is our pride and joy, a true testament to Tsuyo's technical prowess."

  "You said something about this being just a stepping stone?" Jillian asked, feigning interest. To her, one orbital platform was much like any other even if it was enormous. She had been lassoed into a tour of the expansive facility while she was in the Kirin System surveying the outer asteroid belt as a possible training location. The small yacht she was in was a Fleet vessel that could comfortably fit its complement of twenty-two and had enough engine power to allow her to do a full survey of the system. What it didn't have was its own warp drive, so until the fleet carrier came back to pick them up, she was stuck playing host to a Tsuyo rep that seemed to have an unwholesome obsession with her husband.

  "Oh yes!" Hoshino said enthusiastically. Jillian cringed inwardly. It had been a polite question, but she could see that she'd just opened yet another floodgate.

  "Habitable planets are so statistically rare and terraforming has yet to prove a viable theory … at least within one or two generations," he continued. "We think a more practical method of exploiting a g-type main sequence star's energy in the habitable band is to simply build our own habitats. Amaterasu is still just a proof of concept despite being home to over four hundred thousand people right now. Larger interlocking, independent structures anchored within the orbit of planets like the one below could provide for billions ... perhaps even trillions."