Annihilation (Star Force Series) (5 page)

“You have two days to build this thing, Commodore,” I said, jabbing my finger at the image on the screen. “After that, I’m flying out to see what’s heating up Yale’s oceans. I don’t care if the Lobsters answer us or not in the meantime. I don’t care if your ship, fighters and pilots aren’t ready yet. We’re leaving in two days.”

“But we don’t have the production capacity...” Miklos began, then trailed off. “Most of the factories and materials are back on Eden-8, sir. We can’t even fly them out here that soon.”

I could tell that my pronouncement had shocked him. He was a hard man to rattle, but I think I’d managed it this time.

“We have many of these components in storage,” I said. “You’ll use the stores aboard the battle station first, then build new elements second. If you have to strip a few pieces out of this station, I’ll approve it. The only thing you have to build fresh is the bones of the ship, and then do the assembly. I’ll talk to Sloan about that, don’t worry about him giving you the run-around. You’ll have his entire crew to help out. A thousand of them, suited up and ready to do the assembly by hand.”

Miklos raised his eyebrows at this offer of support and nodded. “May I ask a question, Colonel?”

“Certainly.”

“Why two days?”

“Number one, because I’ve calculated it can be done in that amount of time, if you work around the clock. Number two, because I already ordered a complement of ships to meet us here from the Helios ring garrison. We’ll form up a fleet and fly when they get here.”

“And the need for speed is…?”

“Because I don’t like what I’m seeing in the Thor system. I don’t like watching something strange happening just beyond our borders. I’m going to go out there and find out what it’s all about. And I’m flying two days from now.”

“Two days,” said Miklos, his eyes looking unfocussed. He nodded a moment later, then turned around and ran out of the command center.

Everyone on duty swiveled their heads in surprise. When a nanotized member of Star Force decides to really kick it into gear, it’s a startling thing to watch. One second he was standing and calmly deliberating over plans with me, and the next second he bounded over tables, pushed off from the ceiling twelve feet over our heads, then slammed down on his feet and sprinted to the doors. He surprised the doors themselves, even though they were made of fresh smart metal. He slipped through them the moment they flashed open widely enough to allow him to pass, folding his body and causing a spray of droplets like mercury to shower the beltway corridor beyond.

After that, he vanished from sight. The staff looked at me, but I turned back to the designs and ignored them. On the floor, droplets of silvery metal chased one another. They would eventually form veins of shimmering liquid then coalesce into a door again.

I smiled contentedly. I didn’t know where Miklos was going, or what he planned to do first. But I always like to see my people hustle.

-4-

Two days later, the fleet arrived. It amounted to half my complement of ships from the Helios ring garrison. No one really liked the idea of stripping ships from that border, as Earth had attacked us with a serious armada not long ago through that very ring. But that was the only ready supply of ships I had, so I had no choice.

The fleet was a small one. All told, there were less than a hundred vessels. Two thirds of them were smaller ships: ugly, stubby gunboats. Each of these were armed with a single heavy railgun that was the equivalent of a Macro cruiser’s belly turret. They had little armament other than that one heavy gun. The rest of the ships were Nano-type cruisers and destroyers.

Absent from the roster was one carrier. Miklos had not quite managed to pull it off yet.

“Sir, give me one more day,” he said.

I shook my head.

“No.”

I thought I’d said gently, but I could see he wasn’t happy. He was red-eyed and squinting from lack of sleep. He fought visibly not to have a public outburst, which would no doubt turn into a gush of curse-words thrown in my direction.

I watched him with interest. Miklos had never quite been in such a state of frustration, at least not that I’d seen. I chalked it up to the lack of sleep.

“You’ve done very well, but your best was not quite good enough,” I said. “Also, you need to get some rest, man. Part of an officer’s responsibility in my fleet is to maintain his readiness. All things in moderation, as they say.”

Miklos glowered at the screen, unable to lift his burning eyes up to me. I walked away to the big viewscreens on the walls. They were so high-resolution they looked like windows.

Outside the station sat a hulking shadow. It looked quite a bit like the carrier I’d designed in a ten minute stretch a few days earlier. But there were holes in it—in the hull. Not all the smart metal had been troweled over the exterior.

“Shame about the holes,” I said.

For some reason, this put Miklos over the edge. “For your information, Colonel,” he snapped, “those holes are
your
doing.”

I glanced back at him in surprise. “Really? How did I manage that?”

“By redesigning the ship with too thin of an exterior layer of smart metal. The ship was designed to use the thick hull as part of its structural integrity. We haven’t been able to compensate.”

I nodded and made a clucking sound. “Well, my design was only a starting point, really. You can adjust it.”

“We will,” Miklos said, “but there just wasn’t any time in the schedule for a redesign and correction.”

I frowned at the ship. Really, it was an impressive effort.

I felt myself bending. I didn’t like it, as bending wasn’t my way. To get things done, a leader had to establish the rules and stick to them. If people started getting the idea your deadlines were only
guidelines
—they would relax and nothing would get done. It was only human nature.

Still, I liked the idea of having this ship on the expedition into the Thor system. It would transform a thin force into a much stronger one. I’d begun to think of the carrier as a small mobile battle station, and the idea of having such a flying fortress to back me up was seductive.

“I’ll tell you what, Commodore. The task force will get underway now, but I’ll leave behind ten small ships. They will form your carrier’s escort. When your carrier is ready, send it out the Crustacean worlds after me.”

Miklos looked startled. “You want the ship to come in later? As a relief force?”

“Yes. In some ways this improves the plan. We can head out with the vanguard at top speed and render any assistance we can. Then your carrier group will follow to a safely established position. This way, the ship won’t slow down the entire fleet. If you finish tomorrow, it will come in two days behind us. That’s not too long to wait for the support.”

I glanced at him again. The transformation in his mood was obvious and dramatic. The light of hope had returned to his dark eyes.

“You will get that support, sir,” he said. “But did you say
carriers
, as in the plural form…?”

“Yes,” I said. “I’m impressed by the design, and the versatility is there, at least on the planning boards. I want two of them. Stay here after the first one is done and finish a second. Don’t let anyone sit on their hands here at the station. Double-shifts for everyone.”

I heard a few groans from the staffers, but pretended I hadn’t noticed.

“You’ll stay here,” I continued, “When you finish the second ship, send it with another fighter wing stripped from the battle station to the Helios ring garrison. That will make up for having their strength reduced so significantly. You’ll stay in-system even after the ships are built. In my absence, you’ll be in charge of defending our colonies.”

Miklos nodded rapidly. “I can do that, sir.”

I almost laughed. Given the chance to build a second of his beloved carriers, all his plans to rave at me had instantly faded. I had to admire his dedication to Fleet. He was passionate about his forces.

“Uh, who should command the first carrier, sir?” he asked a moment later.

“Give it to Captain Sarin. She’s a senior officer, and she’s in line for a new ship.”

Captain Jasmine Sarin had an interesting history, which was intertwined with my own. She and I had worked together from the very start of Star Force, and we’d become—close. Too close for my girlfriend Sandra’s comfort.

Sarin had left my service and joined Crow last year, thereby gaining a promotion to the rank of Admiral. But she’d soon seen the error of her ways and returned to my banner with the reduced rank of Captain. As of today, I had her captaining a destroyer with a crew of only six. I knew she’d see the new captaincy as a promotion, one which I thought she’d earned.

Captain Sarin was informed of the change in plans and requested a private channel with me. I took the call in my stateroom aboard the cruiser
Lazaro
, which was to serve as my command ship for this mission. The small fleet was just getting underway. Sending through a few ships at a time, we wriggled through the ring and glided into the Thor system.

“Colonel Riggs?”

“Hello Jasmine.”

“I just got the news from Miklos. Thank you very much! I won’t disappoint you, sir.”

Her pretty face appeared on my screen, her image updating a few seconds behind her voice due to transmission relays and other propagation delays. My cruiser was in the Thor system now, accelerating away from the ring toward the gas giant the Crustacean moons circled. Jasmine was still back on Welter Station.

“I know you won’t, Captain,” I said. “That ship is ugly and slow, but she’s powerful.”

Jasmine was as pretty as ever. Dark hair, dark eyes, perfect nose and lips. I’d been taken with her since the first time I’d met her. She was slight and quiet, but tougher than she looked. And she was always, always competent.

“Any special orders for me, Colonel?”

“Yes,” I said, “get that ship finished and get out to Thor as soon as you can. If possible, take over the task of playing assembly-boss from Miklos. He’s not taking proper care of himself.”

“Uh, isn’t he just doing what you asked him to do, Colonel?”

“A man’s got to learn to pace himself.”

“But, Colonel, if you order a man to do something and give him an impossible schedule, he’s going to overwork himself. Surely you can see that.”

I frowned at the screen. “You want me to take responsibility for the man’s condition? I guess I may have accidentally over-motivated him—if such a thing is possible. But in any case, he needs a few hours off.”

“I’ll see what I can do, sir,” she said. I thought I heard a small sigh escape her.

“Very good. Riggs out.”

* * *

A day later, we were half-way to the Crustacean homeworlds. Happy news came in from Welter Station: the carrier was finished. Miklos reported this to me with obvious pride. I thanked him, praised his efforts, then ordered him to build the second one immediately.

“And get some sleep, man. You look like hell.”

“Yes, sir.”

When I broke the connection, I found Sandra standing behind me with her arms crossed. My immediate thought was: she’s found out about my giving the carrier to Jasmine, and knew I was bringing her along on this mission.

She did looked annoyed, but not openly pissed. This was a fine line in her expressions. I decided to play it cool.

“Hey honey, how about we get some chow down at the wardroom? This cruiser has the best food in the fleet. I ordered up a supply of frozen air-swimmers from Eden-8 just for you.”

Her expression softened, but her arms stayed crossed. “Dinner now?” she asked. “We’re only hours away from planetfall.”

I shook my head. “Plenty of time. Nothing’s shooting at us yet.”

“I wanted to talk to you about something first.”

There it was, I thought. It was the Jasmine-thing. It had to be. Jealousy was a prime-motivator on Sandra’s hierarchy of emotions. It outweighed hunger every time.

“I want to ask you about Miklos,” she said. “I think you’ve been working him too hard.”

I blinked. This was an unexpected but welcome turn of conversation. I began to smile. “He’s been driving himself too hard lately, I agree with that. I just told Jasmine—ah, Captain Sarin—to take over the construction effort from him.”

“He’s been driving himself because you ordered him to do it, Kyle,” Sandra admonished me. “You can’t tell people to work harder and at the same time tell them to take breaks.”

“I just want people to do their best,” I said. “They often don’t take into account the need for balance in order to achieve that.”

“What it sounds like to them is a set of contradictory orders.”

I shrugged. “How about those air-swimmers? They’re great when broiled. I’ll have the cook dip them in butter and garlic.”

“Okay,” she said, weakening.

I stood up and took her arm. We headed toward the exit when I got an idea. I bent and kissed her. She kissed me back. We stopped and didn’t take another step toward the door for a while. Somehow, we’d begun making out.

“What happened to dinner?” she asked.