To Honor You Call Us (46 page)

“I know that.  But we are stealthy enough that we can sneak into the system unobserved, see what’s going on, and then sneak right back out with no one the wiser.  I just want to watch.  Every instinct is telling me that this is important.”

“How can anything involving that system be important?  The Pfelung are just another alien neutral power in the Free Corridor, and a fairly minor one at that.”

“They’re more important than you think.  Sure, their Navy isn’t nearly the size of ours, or even the Romanovans, but it is nothing to disregard, either.  The Pfelung Association contains eleven systems: there’s Pfelung itself which is more populous than Earth and has a higher industrial capacity, and then they have ten other worlds, all very populous and productive, imagine ten worlds all like Alphacen or Bravo, with a strong industrial base and most with shipyards capable of producing warships.  And, their Navy is substantial—enough to make up three or four well-rounded battle groups.  They’ve got four carriers, seven heavy Battlecruisers, and about two dozen Cruisers, and more than fifty Frigates and Destroyers, plus some truly amazing battle stations to cover their jump points.  If you know something of Earth History, think of Switzerland, a small independent Neutral power more than strong enough to be safe from invasion.   

“And, there’s one more thing to remember about their Navy.  They have, by far, the best fighter pilots in the known galaxy.”

Sahin laughed.  “Surely not.  The idea is almost comical.  I have never seen a species that looked less likely to be able to pilot nimble little fighter ships in my life.  The adults must weigh a hundred and seventy kilos if they weigh a gram, lumbering about on those great limbs of theirs, they can scarcely move unless they are in the water, and even then they are slow and ponderous.”

“And, yet, they are undoubtedly the best.  They make the Blue Angels look like drunk Greenies flying Gemini space capsules.  It’s the smaller, nimble adolescents who fly the fighters, not the lumbering adults you are used to seeing.  In the wild, they had the job of defending both the young and the little hatchlings from predators.  A lot like bottle nosed dolphins on Earth:  a meter and a half long, about fifty kilos, accustomed to moving in a three-dimensional environment, fast, agile, incredibly brave on a fundamental and instinctual level.  Natural fighter pilots.  A squadron of them could mop the deck with the fighter wings from two Fleet Carriers and maybe a third, easy.  I’d love to have them as allies.”

“Sure, that would be a help.  No doubt.”

“But, that doesn’t touch the real issue with the Pfelung.  It isn’t evident from most maps, but they stand on the best invasion route from Krag space toward the Core Systems.  It’s all in the jump points.  The way the jump points lie, if the Krag take Pfelung itself, then they can just jump around the current lines of defense and plunge right into the heart of our space.  If they do that, they can cut off the main body of our fleet from its source of fuel and provisions, outflank and destroy it, and they’re free to turn to the Core Systems.  To make things worse, the forces sent to do it would have a clear, straight line of communications and supply back to Krag space.  Complete disaster.  The war would effectively be over.  It would still take years for the Krag to work their way through each system and move up their heavy forces jump by jump, but we would have no hope of stopping them.”

“But, surely, adequate provision has been made for this eventuality.”

“The Pfelung themselves can read a star projection as well as anyone.  They know they’re on a natural invasion route and they have no wish to be invaded.  So, the jump point into their system that the Krag would use is covered by the most powerful battle station in Known Space.  I can’t pronounce the name in their language, but it means ‘That Which Cannot Be Moved.’  It’s got twenty, count-em, twenty pulse cannon, powered by half a dozen huge fusion reactors.  Two thousand, five hundred gigawatt rating.  Each.  Nothing could get past it.  Even if you could push a dozen
Battleaxe
class Battleships through the jump without any warning, the Pfelung would have space wiped clean of the lot in under a minute.  Plus, they have most of their not-inconsiderable fleet patrolling the outskirts of their system to deal with anything of the limited size and power that could come up on them from the outside using compression drive.

“So, there’s no way past them.  Crossing interstellar space on compression drive, the Krag have too far to go.  Any force with enough firepower to break through the Pfelung fleet and defensive installations would be so large and slow that it would be spotted two months out.  The Pfelung would subject it to continual hit and run attrition attacks for the whole two months and wear them down to nothing.  Any force fast enough to cross the distance before it’s spotted and attacked wouldn’t have the necessary firepower.  And, if the Krag try to get around that problem by jumping into the system, when they fail to send the right IFF, That Which Cannot Be Moved pounds them to dust before they can squeak.  There’s just no way in.” 

“Like Gibraltar.”

“Hmm?”  Max’s attention, having wandered off to turn over the problem in his mind, snapped back.

“Gibraltar.  I’m quite certain you must have heard of it.  It was a British fortress guarding a strategically important maritime choke point at the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea on Earth, formerly known as the Pillars of Her—“

“Oh my God!”  Max suddenly felt as though his stomach had been filled with cold lead.  The deck seemed to move under his feet.

“You interrupted me,” Sahin said petulantly.  “I was about to give voice to something I know of your sphere of expertise.”

“I’m sorry, Bram,” he said, his voice quiet but intense.  “But what you said just now, ‘Gibraltar.’  I’ve just had the most horrible thought.  Sweet Jesus, I can’t believe this.  Have you ever heard of the ‘Gibraltar of the East’?”

“No, I cannot say that I have.”  He finally got that something serious was going on.

“Singapore.  That’s got to be what they’re up to,” he said to himself.  Then, to Sahin, “Singapore was a British base on an island at the tip of the Malay Peninsula:   the ‘Gibraltar of the East,’ supposedly impregnable.  Two shore batteries, brilliantly made 380 millimeter guns, expertly served, vast supply of ammunition, protected by reasonably good troops under a competent commander.  It was an impossible nut to crack from the sea.  Yet, the Japanese took it with ease early in Earth’s Second World War.”

“But, if it was so impregnable, how did the Japanese take it?”

“They attacked from the land.”

Chapter
22

06:09Z Hours 9 February 2315:  The Battle of Pfelung

Max was frustrated.  Frustrated enough to punch holes through bulkheads, chew through reactor shielding, and insult a fully grown Vaach’s Forest Cadre hunting buddies to his face.  No, he was more frustrated than that.  He could see the whole thing.  He could see it clear as his hand in front of his face.  He knew exactly what the Krag were doing, as well as when, where, and how they were going to do it.  He knew that if they did it, it would be an unmitigated catastrophe for the human race and for just about everyone else in this part of the galaxy.

And there didn’t seem to be a damn thing he could do about it.

Comms had tried all the Pfelung voice and data channels, but the main Pfelung Out-System Communications Relay and Exchange had automatically rejected the incoming signal because it came from a Union warship and, under their strict neutrality laws, the Pfelung did not communicate with the warships of any of the belligerent powers in the current war.  Comms tried spoofing the OSCoRE by changing the Source Origination Code for the signal to make it appear that it did not come from a Union warship, but the Pfelung computer had already associated the ship’s location in space with the original code and saw through the ruse.  Comms tried bypassing the OSCoRE by signaling some of the larger entities on the planet that had their own comm networks and channels, but all had rejected the signal as soon as the recipient figured out who the sender was.  A very helpful female with the Pfelung Astronomical, Astrophysical, Astrometric, and Astrocartographic Administration had, however, suggested that the communication should be directed through standard diplomatic channels.  A snide remark involving the letters “as” started to suggest itself to Max, but he was too angry to allow it to form completely in his mind.

Standard diplomatic channels.  Brilliant.  Only, as part of their strict neutrality, the Pfelung would not allow the Union to maintain an Embassy or a Consulate or even so much as a GT & T branch office in their space.  When the Pfelung say “strict neutrality,” they aren’t kidding.  Accordingly, “standard diplomatic channels” would consist of (1) a message from the
Cumberland
across a thousand light years using the Union Navy Military Communications Interstellar Relay System directed to the Naval Diplomatic Liaison in Norfolk on Earth, which the Navy would relay to (2) the Pfelung Interest Section of the Union Foreign Ministry in Geneva on Earth, who would (3) relay the message to the Tri-Nin Embassy to the Union in New York, who would (4) pass the message along through the civilian Joint Intersystem Voice and Data Communications System (JIVDCS) to the Tri-Nin Foreign Ministry on the capital world of the Benevolent Sisterhood of the Tri-Nin Matriarchs and their Associated Males, Tri-Ninjupuq, about four hundred light years from Earth, after which it would (5) make its way across seven hundred light years using the JIVDCS to the “Terran Interest Correspondent Officer” in the Tri-Nin Embassy to the Political and Economic Association of Pfelung Worlds on Pfelung, who would, (6) refer the message to the Pfelung Commissariat for Communications With Creatures Who Live Beyond the Waters (more commonly referred to as their Foreign Ministry), who would, at long last, (7) hand the communication off to the Pfelung Comprehensive Authority for the Harmonious Swimming Together of the Warriors, their equivalent of the Union Joint Chiefs of Staff.  Even using the highest priority channels, and assuming the officials involved acted instantaneously (as if
that
would ever happen), the shortest possible transmission time for a message to travel one way along that route was three days, fourteen hours, fifty two minutes, and nineteen seconds. 

The Krag would be halfway to Bravo by then.

But, Max was not above bypassing official channels.  In fact, he was not above it even slightly.  He had low level, unofficial contacts with virtually every military establishment in Known Space.  Except, of course, with the Pfelung.  So, he had Comms and his Back Room root through every database and sigint intercept for every known Pfelung voice channel, comm frequency, data network, or any other means by which someone could get any sort of voice message, electronic mail message, text message, digital image protocol facsimile message, video call, tachyon semaphore, or carrier pigeon with a jet pack and a pressure suit through to the Pfelung Comprehensive Authority for the Harmonious Swimming Together of the Warriors to let them know that their continued survival as a species was in jeopardy.  

All to no avail.  Naturally, Max had notified Admiral Hornmeyer who had undoubtedly within seconds gotten a Priority Flash dispatch off to the Chief of Naval Operations who, in turn, as soon as he got the message in about fourteen hours, would frantically throw as many forces as he could in the path of the anticipated Krag thrust.  But, it didn’t take a Vice Admiral in Strategic Plans to know that it would be far too little, and vastly too late.  It would be like what the Earth Confederation did to the Asaket in 2244 or, here’s a better analogy, what the Germans did to the French in 1940.  Disaster.  The place to stop the Krag was at Pfelung, not Tarsind, or Virkandum or, God forbid, Wolf 359.

And, don’t even ask.  Task Force Tango Delta was more than ten days away.

Having no help to send, Max was going himself.  In his one, puny Destroyer.  To stop the whole Krag Navy.  It was suicide, with the added drama of bringing 215 men and boys along for company.

Speaking of suicide, having jumped into the closest nearby system, the
Cumberland
was courting destruction from within by pushing its compression drive beyond the “red line” to propel the ship at the lunatic velocity of 2200 c, about 80 c beyond the vessel’s rated maximum.  Lieutenant Brown made his obligatory, ritual protest, but took one look at Max’s face and decided not to press the matter.  The Engineer was unable to make further impassioned pleas on behalf of his engines; he was too intensely occupied with trying to keep them from blowing up and the ship from flying apart.  Even at this speed, the two light years between Zoleft and Pfelung was nearly an eight hour trip.  The ship could not jump into the system because, unless Max could convince them not to fire in a great burning hurry, the Pfelung defensive installations covering the jump point would vaporize his destroyer in a few seconds. 

“Captain,” Garcia said, formally, “As the ship’s Legal Compliance Officer, it is my duty to inform you that we will be crossing into Pfelung territorial space in approximately two minutes and that doing so will be in express contravention of our orders.  I will be required to note that fact in my log.”

“Understood, XO.  And will your log also show a protest of my action?”  Garcia had the right to log an official protest of any action he thought to be illegal or outside of the commander’s authority.

“No, sir.  It will show that the action was taken with my full concurrence and support.”  Then, so that only Max could hear.  “If we live through this, I’ll stand right beside you at the Court Martial.”