The White Fleet (Blood on the Stars Book 7) Page 13

  “No, sir.” Denisov sounded confident…but Villieneuve could hear some edginess in his tone as well.

  Good. We don’t need another fool not taking this seriously enough.

  “We have significant People’s Army units available for the operation, however, transport is of greater concern. I believe we can send ten divisions to Barroux. More than that will be difficult, at least in the near term. Diverting additional vessels to carry more troops will damage our ability to keep your forces properly supplied, an endeavor which will be difficult enough without any added problems. I suspect it will take some time to truly pacify the planet, which puts an emphasis on our ability to keep your logistical line operating effectively.”

  “Understood, sir. I believe ten divisions of Foudre…of People’s Army forces…will be sufficient.” Denisov paused, clearly wanting to say something but unsure if he should.

  “Please, Admiral…speak your mind.”

  “Well, sir, I’m more concerned with the orbital battle. Barroux is a heavily-defended planet, sir, and…” Another pause. “…well, sir…the previous assaults do not appear to have significantly degraded the defense network. I can’t help but wonder if we will be able to concentrate sufficient forces for the attack, and I’m reluctant to proceed unless we are.”

  Villieneuve didn’t answer immediately. He wasn’t used to people questioning him, not even in the limited way Denisov just had. But he needed strong and capable subordinates now, not a pack of political appointees and cronies of the sort that had dominated the fleet before and during the war. “You are extremely insightful, Admiral,” he finally said. “No doubt, your fleet will face significant resistance. We will give you every ship that can be spared, which I believe will be sufficient force…but it is up to you to find a way to take out the orbital forces, and establish total space superiority prior to launching the ground assault.”

  “Yes, sir. I understand.” Villieneuve suspected the admiral did actually understand. Villieneuve was giving him every hull he could scrape up. The pacification of Barroux simply couldn’t wait any longer. The nascent but growing People’s Protectorate had done everything possible to prevent the rebellion there from spreading, but allowing a world to remain in open defiance of the new Union government was unsustainable. It would inspire other resistance, sooner or later…and at this point, more likely sooner. Unless Denisov made an example of them with such grim intensity that news of it spread farther and faster than word of the rebellion had.

  “You must not only defeat them, Admiral, and retake the planet. You must do so in a way that leaves a lasting impression…on the citizens of Barroux, of course, but also on those throughout the Union. Treason will not be tolerated.”

  “Yes, sir. I will…ah…I will do my best.”

  Villieneuve had selected Denisov because he believed the admiral had the tactical skill to carry out the mission. Now, he wondered if the man had the brutality it would take to exploit that victory.

  “I am sure you will, Admiral.” He glanced down at his desk. “Now, if you will both excuse me, I have quite a backlog of other matters to address. Admiral Turenne will discuss tactics and logistics with you at greater length. And timing as well. I’m afraid you will probably not have the amount of lead time you’d like. The invasion fleet will depart in five days.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  CFS Dauntless

  Zed-11 System

  Year 315 AC

  “We’re about to complete orbital insertion, Admiral. The planet definitely looks habitable, and the ruins in orbit appear to be more extensive that we’d anticipated from initial scans. Our best guess is, we’re looking at the remains of a series of space stations, destroyed long ago.”

  Barron sat and listened to Sara Eaton’s report. It was more or less a one-sided communication. Eaton’s advance guard was a full eight light minutes ahead of the main fleet, and sixteen minutes was one hell of an annoying lag time in any kind of a real conversation.

  “I’ve launched twenty spreads of probes as part of a comprehensive scan of the planet’s atmosphere and surface. Based on the debris in orbit and preliminary ground readings, it appears likely we’ve found a world that was once massively inhabited.”

  Eaton’s words carried a heavy meaning that was not lost on Barron. Whatever space stations—or the remains of them—her ships had found, it was a far greater concentration than had been discovered around any world in the Badlands. Much greater. Debris, at least on the scale Eaton had reported, meant the stations hadn’t been vaporized by massive nuclear and antimatter bombardments, and that exponentially increased the chance of finding usable old tech amid the ruins.

  It also meant this planet might have been a real imperial world, not just a fringe outpost. For all the post-Cataclysm success and prosperity of a planet like Megara, Barron didn’t let himself lose sight of the fact that all the inhabited worlds he knew of had once been part of the Rim, distant outposts so insignificant, they weren’t even worth the trouble to obliterate when humanity was destroying itself.

  There were as many legends as facts about the empire, but the thought of glimpsing the heights of power and technology mankind had attained before they’d thrown it away, was beyond exciting to him.

  “I’ve also ordered Captain Stockton to launch six squadrons to conduct sensor sweeps in orbit and around the planet, to back up the data from the drones. I will report in full as soon as I have additional findings. Eaton out.”

  Barron leaned back in his chair and rubbed his hand across his face. Eaton’s ships had traversed the system from the transit point without incident, so he didn’t see any reason for the rest of the fleet to hang back any longer. He turned toward Atara Travis. “Commander, let’s get Dauntless’s engines up and running, at 8g absolute thrust.” That was a modest rate of acceleration, at least in terms of the dampeners’ ability to absorb most of the resulting force.

  “Yes, sir.” Travis turned and leaned down over her own comm unit, passing Barron’s order to her nav station. Barron remembered Travis relaying such commands without the comm unit before, but the new Dauntless was just too big for that, and the nav team was halfway across the cavernous control center.

  “Captain Eaton…fleet order. All ships are to match Dauntless’s course and velocity. Maintain fleet formation. We’re going in.” Barron had transferred Sara Eaton’s sister to Dauntless to act as his primary aide. It was a move that had come with a significant promotion, and one that had been motivated primarily by his great respect for Sara, at least at first. But Barron had come to appreciate Sonya Eaton’s abilities…and her even manner and cool demeanor. She’d adapted well to being a part of Barron’s team, and she didn’t seem to resent that, in many ways, Atara Travis already functioned as his aide, in addition to her duties as Dauntless’s captain. Eaton just filled in the blanks wherever she was needed, stepping aside when Barron and Travis worked together, as they did so fluidly, and taking the fleet duties onto herself when they fell to her.

  “Yes, Admiral.” Eaton tapped her headset, connecting her to the fleet comm line, and she relayed Barron’s orders.

  Barron sat quietly for a minute, his eyes fixed on the main display. Sara Eaton was relaying preliminary scanner information, and he was getting his first actual view of the planet, along with early readings on things like atmosphere, climate, geography. It looked like a hospitable world, right in the middle of the habitable range. In fact, based on what he could see, the planet seemed like it might be a virtual paradise.

  He glanced over at the data on the orbital debris. There were some very large chunks, fifty meters or more in length, that looked very much like pieces of orbital platforms. In their own way, they were as exciting as the planet itself. Wind and weather were hard on artifacts on the ground, but items floating in space were likely to be well preserved. This planet was the true start of the fleet’s mission, the first real find. But, even as he imagined how much farther his people could press on, he realized those chu
nks of floating debris alone could very well include enough old tech to radically advance civilization back home.

  And, depending what the Confederation government decided to do, particularly regarding the interpretation of international law, what his people found here could radically alter the balance of power. Such a thing would be dire if the advantage fell to a power like the Union—or even, possibly, to his Alliance allies—but a Confederation with an overwhelming technological advantage could keep the peace, impose a Pax Confederica on the entire sector. He imagined a future without the wars that had plagued his people and their neighbors for centuries.

  He shook his head. He wondered if the Senate would break the treaty, keep anything he found for the Confederation’s use alone. They would have to do that if the Confederation was to safeguard the peace.

  And then he wondered if he was being naïve, if a Confederation suddenly in possession of overwhelming strength would indeed be a force for good and peace. Or, if such power would corrupt all it touched, as history showed such things usually did.

  * * *

  “We’re getting fresh readings now, Commodore.”

  Eaton turned her head toward the tactical officer’s station. She expected data…a lot of it. She’d launched a massive number of drones—too many, she’d thought after the fact. Her overreaction was normal enough, considering that the fleet had encountered two more scanning devices on their way to the planet, both situated adjacent to transit points, but the expedition had limited supplies and no way to replenish them anytime soon. She’d have to be more careful in her logistics going forward.

  “Feed it to the main display, Commander. And to my screen.”

  “Yes, Commodore.”

  Eaton watched as a wave of information scrolled down the screen, numbers, charts and tables, images. The planet looked pleasant enough, a blue globe streaked with stringy white clouds, not much different in appearance than Megara.

  The display was showing various views of the planet, transmitted from the drones. The lead spread was just entering the atmosphere. The scanning devices were not equipped for atmospheric operations, which made descending somewhat of a suicide mission for the robotic probes.

  The images on the screen were dark at first, but then there was light, a blue sky that looked inviting and hospitable. The transmission became a little less stable as the probes penetrated deeper into the atmosphere, and the heat began to affect their instrumentation.

  The long-range cameras aboard were starting to pick up ground images. The probes were still fifteen kilometers from the ground, but now, Eaton and her people were looking at images of vast forests, and great oceans that extended out of sight.

  The picture on the display became fuzzier. She knew the probes would disintegrate in a few seconds, and she focused, staring intently at the deteriorating image. She was still staring when the display went dark, but even after the transmission terminated, she sat dead still, her eyes fixed on the dark screen.

  She’d seen something…

  And, from the expressions she saw on the bridge, and the tense silence in the air, she wasn’t the only one.

  “I want that last few seconds replayed, Commander. Full AI enhancement…and run at one-tenth normal speed.”

  “Yes, Commodore.”

  She watched intently as the projection returned to the screen. The camera was moving over a large valley, and then up and over one of the flanking hillsides.

  And there it was.

  “Freeze projection.”

  “Yes, Commodore.”

  She stared at the screen. Repulse’s bridge was silent, every set of eyes fixed along with Eaton’s.

  It was a city…or, at least, what was left of one. There were chunks of metal jutting upward, and vast fields of rubble. It had once been a massive metropolis, that much was clear, even larger than Troyus City on Megara.

  Much larger.

  There were lines extending out from the perimeter, looking very much like the remains of some kind of monorail or other transit system. Nature had since encroached, and vines and other plant growth had wrapped around the ruins.

  For an instant, she’d imagined that the city had simply been abandoned, perhaps even as part of an exodus from the entire planet. But, as she looked at the still image, the truth because all too apparent.

  The city had been destroyed by some kind of attack, almost certainly one with thermonuclear—or even antimatter—weapons. All that remained were scattered remnants, and blasted and broken wreckage of buildings.

  She glanced at the numbers on the screen below the images, the calculations the AI had made and displayed. The city had been immense. It must have been the home to tens of millions of people at one time.

  And someone came here and obliterated it. Killed all those people.

  She tried to imagine the attack. The sheer terror of the city’s inhabitants. The fury and hatred that had driven someone to incinerate so many millions.

  She’d heard the Cataclysm spoken of her entire life, but she’d never really considered what that word truly meant.

  Until now.

  * * *

  Jake Stockton tapped his controls, altering his vector a few degrees to port. His fighters really didn’t have much to do, and the situation certainly didn’t call for his presence. But, he’d taken advantage of the monumental nature of the find to lead the patrol himself.

  His fighters had done some recon duty earlier, but that had mostly been overkill on Commodore Eaton’s part. The Lightnings were designed primarily for combat, and for routine scouting duties. The probes had scanners ten times as powerful, as well as the ability to detect all sorts of things a fighter couldn’t.

  The current mission was, if possible, even more useless. Eaton had dispatched search teams to comb through the orbital wreckage. There was a lot of excitement in the fleet about what kinds of old tech they would discover. Almost every spacer in the fleet had been at the Bottleneck, had faced death fighting against an old tech artifact. And, as far as anything had been documented, no one had ever found anything as extensive as the apparent remains of the planet’s space stations.

  He looked down at the tactical screen, checking on the rest of the patrol. He’d been running the rookies hard since the fleet left Megara, but now he had only veteran pilots with him. Flying around so close to a planet and in and out of orbit was tricky, and the last thing he wanted to see was some green flyer slam into one of the chunks of debris.

  Everybody was where they were supposed to be. That was no surprise. The pilots on duty now had an average of six enemy kills in the war. They could handle a bunch of floating ruins.

  Stockton twisted his body, trying to stretch as well as he could. Years of service had taught him the best ways to stay loose in a Lightning, but the hard truth was, there really weren’t any good ways. That was a lesson he’d learned on the long-range probe missions he’d done. Pilots who complained to him about long scouting runs tended to get a lecture on just what it felt like to be in a cockpit for days without a break.

  “This is team alpha, contacting command.”

  Stockton looked down at his control panel. Repulse was on the far side of the planet, and its orbit wouldn’t bring it back around for another few minutes. That meant Stockton was “command,” at least for the moment.

  “This is fighter leader, team alpha. I’m the closest thing to ‘command’ you’ve got right now, so report.” Sara Eaton was a cautious officer. She’d brought Repulse into orbit alone, leaving the rest of the advance guard about fifty thousand kilometers out. That wasn’t far at all in terms of space travel, but it was a bit out of reach of a space suit’s low-powered comm unit.

  Of course, if she was really cautious, she’d have kept her flagship back and sent in one of the other vessels…

  “Sir…something is strange here. These are definitely chunks of some kind of station, and they’re in pretty decent shape too, but…”

  “But what?”

  “We
ll…there doesn’t seem to be anything of, well, of value, sir.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We’ve been through three sections, and it’s the same everywhere. There are places that seem like they were work areas. We’ve even found a few workstations with their chairs still in place.” The voice went silent for a moment. “There’s nothing in any of them, sir.”

  “In any of them?”

  “No insides. There are workstations, but there’s no circuitry inside, no computer equipment. Just what looks like empty cabinets where that stuff would be.”

  “Could it all have been destroyed? Something blew these stations apart after all.”

  “And left the cases intact? We’ve got whole panels and consoles, hardly damaged at all…but they’re completely empty.”

  Stockton froze in his cockpit. “Are you saying someone removed them all? Manually?”

  “It sure looks that way, sir. We’ve only been in three of these, but I’m awfully curious to see what the others have found. Maybe this section was under maintenance or something when it was destroyed.”

  “Maybe,” Stockton said, not believing it for an instant. “Keep searching…and report back whatever you find.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He reached out and punched up the data on Repulse’s location. Another fourteen minutes before the ship would be in direct line of sight.

  No, that’s too long. Commodore Eaton needs to hear this. Now.

  He grabbed the throttle, firing up his thrusters, and tapped his finger against the small comm keypad. “Beta team, do you read?” He was going to get all the information he could…and get it to Eaton now.

  “Beta team here, sir.”

  “I need a full report. What have you found?”

  He hadn’t expected to discover much on this journey, but now he didn’t know. He had no idea what to expect.

  No idea what they were up against out here.