Solbidyum Wars Saga 5: Desolation (44 page)

“I spoke with Leader Tonclin about this matter, and something is being worked on at this moment.  Should everything check out, private funding will be made available to both your planets for the building of the shipyard here in the form of a loan at zero percent interest.  You would be paying the loan back out of the profits the shipyard makes, so you would not need to raise taxes or drain your planets' treasuries.  In addition, it will create thousands of jobs, as well as support many local businesses on your planets,” I said and then added, “Economically there is no real risk to you, but there is a definite advantage if you agree to our proposal.”

Once again, both men put their heads together and whispered energetically.  Finally, they both turned to us smiling and Flottoeft said, “We would like to have a day to discuss this with our governments, might we give you an answer tomorrow at noon?”

“I looked at Kala and winked so that neither Flotteft nor Girtofto could see.  She looked at me with a slight smile and then said to the two representatives,. “I think that would be acceptable.  We will expect your response tomorrow at noon.  Thank you,” and with that, the meeting was ended.

No sooner were the representatives out of sight and hearing than Kala turned to me and said, “Tib, why do I get the feeling that this ’private funding’ is coming from your personal coffers?”

“Gee, Kala, I don’t know why you would have that feeling,” I replied, acting like I had no idea what she was talking about.

“Ha,” Kala said, “I knew it!  You volunteered to put up the money when you found out it would take months or years for the Senate to reach a decision on the matter.  I have to admit, it was smart of you to make the offer at no interest, so no one can claim a conflict of interest on your part.”

“Well, it’s not officially been approved yet.  Leader Tonclin is having it researched at the moment to make sure no Federation rules will be violated by this if we do it.”

“How soon will he know?” Kala asked.

“Hopefully by tomorrow noon; I’m pretty sure that Kendrop and Gochian will accept the deal.  You might want to get someone to start drawing up papers of agreement for everyone to sign.”

On arrival at our suite, we discovered that Jenira had returned with the twins.  I was still intrigued that while Jenira didn’t speak, the twins seemed to understand her and even tried to mimic some of her signs.

“Have you noticed that both Lunnie and Reidecor try to mimic Jenira’s signs rather than trying to speak?” I asked.

“I don’t think it’s that they don’t try to speak. I think it’s more likely that their ability to speak develops slower than their physical dexterity.  Both Lunnie and Reidecor sign “No” but neither one of them says it even though they understand what it means.  Besides, it’s still early for them to be learning to talk.  The closest either of them gets to a word is Lunnie with her “bop” when she hits you on the nose.  Reidecor just makes noises and laughs.”

On seeing us, Jenira asked if Kala was home for the rest of the day or if she would be leaving again.  Kala asked her if there was something Jenira needed to do and she nervously replied that she “
sort of had plans, but that if needed
” she would be able to stay.  Kala looked at me and grinned and said to Jenira that she was pretty sure one of us would be home the rest of the day and that she was free to go.  Jenira practically ran out of the room.

“Do you think she has a date with Padaran?” I asked.

“Judging by the nervousness, and look in her eye, when she ran out of here it must be something like that,” Kala chuckled.

I looked down to find Reidecor standing at my feet holding two parts of a toy up to me.  “What do you need, son,” I asked.  “You want that put together?”  I took the pieces and screwed them together in a locked position and handed them to Reidecor.  He examined the pieces a minute and then unscrewed them and handed them back with a big smile.  “Oh I see,” I said, “this is some sort of a game.”  For the next couple of minutes, I put the toy together and Reidecor took it apart.  I looked across the room to see Kala and Lunnie sitting on the floor and Kala playing with Lunnie with a small doll.  It was the first doll I had seen since I had been in the federation or at least that I was aware of seeing.  Kala was busy dressing the dolls and Lunnie would take them as soon as Kala finished and undress them again.

“Mother said that when my sister was small she was always undressing her dolls like this.” Kala said casually.  “I always wanted my dolls clothed.  What were you like as a boy, Tib?  Were you like Reidecor, taking things apart?”

“I really don’t remember,” I said, “I do remember my grandmother once saying I took my grandfather’s lawn mower apart with tools I found in the garage.  I was about 8 or 9 at the time.  I honestly don’t remember it, and I don’t think I really took it all apart.  I think I may have just removed a few parts.  I doubt I would have been strong enough to take the whole thing apart.”

While I was talking, Lunnie succeeded in undressing another of her dolls and held it up for me to see.

“It certainly seems our children have developed the skill for taking things apart,” I said as I noticed Lunnie had now decapitated one of her dolls and was holding the two pieces up to me to put them together.

The following day was the day I had scheduled to meet with the fleet commanders.  Rather than have them come to the
DUSTEN
, I decided we should meet on Admiral Kophious’ flagship, the
GRANHAUER,
with the Third Fleet, as this would provide me an opportunity to see how prepared they were to deal with the Brotherhood in a major engagement.  I was impressed with what I saw; Kophious was a
by the book
man, and everything was spotless and efficient.  His crew was attentive to detail and performed their tasks with a skill and discipline that only came from a long and continued practice.

Once we had settled in the conference room, and foccee had been set out for everyone, I asked for an update on activities in the sector.

“Things have been abnormally quiet as far as detectable communications between the Brotherhood ships,” Kophious reported.  ”However, our cloaked scout ships that we have doing recognizance in the old sector, that once was part of the Federation, are reporting a lot of ship activity.  There are a number of troop transports and corvettes that have parked themselves at worlds under Brotherhood control along the border, and they just seem to be sitting there waiting.”

“That would support our idea that this sector is in line for their next major offensive.  We need to keep an eye on those ships, and once they start moving we need to be ready for action.

“What can you tell me about the large Cantolla gate that is being set up here in your sector, Admiral?” I asked.

Kophious smiled, “My crew just finished it up last night, and we’re all ready to test it.  I had them hold off until you arrived so you could see the results for yourself.”

“I think it would be good if Cantolla were here on this end and A’Lappe on the other to witness this and to make sure all is in order,” I said.

“We’ve already seen to that.  Cantolla is down in our lab waiting my signal to turn the unit on at this end and then A’Lappe will give orders to the patrol ship at his end to move through the gate,” Kophious replied.

“Well, what are we waiting for then?  Let’s see if this thing works.”

Kophious activated a vid screen and then called to Cantolla via his com link and told her to go ahead and activate the system.  On the screen, we could see the three patrol ships that each formed the nodes for the Cantolla gate.  Suddenly, the stars inside the invisible frame formed by the three ships changed, and we could see a fourth patrol ship nearly centered inside the frame.  The ship moved slowly in our direction until it was obvious that it was past the node ships, when a message came through from Cantolla in the lab.  “Admiral, the ship is through the gate and now is in Sector 3.  The transition was a success.”  A round of cheers went up around the table, but it was soon cut short by Cantolla’s voice coming over the com.  “Sir, we have a problem.  The patrol ship’s navigation system seems to have been damaged in the transition, as it is unable to orient itself and is lost.”

“Excuse me, Cantolla,” I interrupted, “but I seem to recall that when we first used the RMFF on the
NEW ORLEANS
that it knocked out the navigation system, and I recall Kerabac and A’Lappe explaining to me how the system operated on the detection of gravity signatures and other signals from stars to position itself.  As a ship flies, the computer tracks and adjusts based on these star signatures to determine location, when you move through a gate, wouldn’t that change abruptly and confuse the computer?  I mean, all its reference points are gone, and now it has to start searching through its data bases to find several stars it recognizes and then recalculate where it is.”

“You’re right, Tibby,” Cantolla said, “if I have the crew on the patrol ships identify the nearest star for the computer, it should be able to almost instantly find other nearby known stars and re-establish its location.  Hold on a moment.”  There was a pause of about five minutes and then Cantolla came back, “It worked.  Once they identified the nearest star for the computer, it instantly reset itself and now is functioning properly.  I’ll get with A’Lappe and see if we can’t figure out some way to automate that so the ships' computers will do it automatically in the future.”

“How soon can we start bringing more ships through?” I asked Cantolla.

“A’Lappe and I would like to have about a day to check everything out and make sure there are no problems we’ve missed, but after that I think you should be able to start moving ships through it right away.”

“Good!  Gentlemen,” I said, addressing everyone in the room, “I think we may just be able to give the Brotherhood a huge and shocking surprise when they arrive here.”

Over the next three days, hundreds of ships were sent through the Cantolla gates from Sector 1 and situated in strategic locations in Sector 3 near where we anticipated the Brotherhood offensive would begin.  Back at Kendrop and Gochian an agreement had been reached, and advisers from Nibaria were on hand to assist them in setting up a repair facility to refurbish and repair the
HAPRIN
.  The
NEW ORLEANS
was still speeding its way toward Mars to set up Cantolla gates there for the androids to make their transition, and I had given orders to Kerabac that as soon as the gates were set up, he was to go to Earth’s Moon and set up Cantolla gates there for the transfer of prisoners.

I was just about to believe we had misjudged Ming’s intent to attack in Sector 3, when the word came in from one of the patrol ships that enemy ships were assembling near one of the planets currently under Brotherhood control.  A few hours later a second patrol ship in yet another area reported Brotherhood ships assembling there as well, and then to our shock, a third patrol ship called in reporting a third collection of ships assembling at yet another location.  A quick check of the star charts indicated that the spot in the middle of all their assembly points was the planet Spellhes, a rich and densely populated world located in a keystone position in Sector 3.  If the Brotherhood were to gain control of this world, they would have a strong grip on over half that sector, and it could ultimately result in the Federation having to abandon the entire sector.  From where most of our ships were currently located in that area, it would take us about the same amount of time as the Brotherhood to reach Splelhes.  Our advantage would be that they didn’t know we were in the area.

“Admiral Kophious, get your ships to Spellhes at maximum speed.  I want all ships to remain cloaked and ready for action.  I’m going to bring the
DUSTEN
over from Sector 2.  I want Admiral Stonbersa to stay in Sector 1, but I am asking him to order the starship
SALNA
from Sector 1 to join us here.  Cantolla and A’Lappe just managed to get their large gate up and operating today.  I want to deploy as many of our mirage fighters and patrol ships out there as we can.  We’ll wait until the Brotherhood has dispatched most of their patrol ships, transports and what mirage fighters they have before we open fire.  When we do, we need to focus on the hangars; their shields will be down while they launch, and if we hit them hard from several ships firing at once we can do severe damage to their hangars before they can get their RMFF’s up.  After that, they won’t be capable of launching any more ships, and they won’t be able to retrieve any, either. 

We'll need the starships to block fire from their starships against the planet, but that means we will be close enough to concentrate fire on their hangar areas.  I do not believe all of their smaller ships have cloaking devices yet, so we’ll focus our fighters and patrol ships targeting those.  They don't have fusion reactors powerful enough to power their RMFF’s, so any ship they haven’t acquired from the Federation will not have shielding.  We need to do as much damage to them as we can.”

“Shouldn’t we alert the people on Spellhes what is going on?”  Kophious asked?

“I wish we could,” I answered, “but I’m pretty sure the Brotherhood has operatives on Spellhes, who would alert them of the trap before they ever got close to the planet.  No, I’m afraid we need to keep this as quiet as possible, as long as we can.  I want Ming and his cohorts to get burned really hard on this attack.  Maybe it will scare them off for a while.  We need to wreak as much havoc on them as we can, and then all at once reveal our ships for just about 15 seconds, long enough so they can see the extent of ships we have here and then quickly cloak again and rip back into them.  Who knows, maybe we’ll scare them enough that they will mutiny and hang Ming and Roritat.”