Chapter 16

Former High Bureaucrat Cillort watched in extreme dissatisfaction the various reports of his carefully planned bomb attacks on Vreekoos. Due to the Court of the High Table summoning the head of Magna Media to testify and knowing that lying was impossible with the AIs scanning (unlike the general population) he’d had to trigger his attacks early to avoid arrest. As a result many of his actual targets were not in the vicinity of the bombs and so his plan had not been as successful as he hoped. That he had murdered over a million people mattered little to him. It was the over one hundred targets he’d missed, plus the Imperial security measures in place over the various ImpSec lodgements, that had seen the Empire recover in days, rather than binary cycles, that angered him.

Perhaps, he thought, he should have just ignored that sanctimonious shlecker of a Cure and left him alone, despite his infuriating ability to raise the morale of the subjects as well as the popularity of that sow, Amantil. It wasn’t that her popularity would have saved her. But no, he’d calculated that the newsies could bring him down, which in retrospect was foolish of him as what records he had, showed nothing in this Cure’s past for him to be worried about when facing the media. Still, water under the bridge etc...

“Your orders, Serenissimo?” Admiral Spake asked.

“Move us into position to interdict Trialis and cut off the food supply to Vreekoos,” he replied.

“Done,” Spake replied after a few transmitted orders were given out by his com channel and the shipboard AIs.

“Fleet status?”

“Despite hurrying up the schedule, we have a full complement of arms and all maintenance is complete. I’ve arranged our disposition to observe those whose loyalty to a renewed Empire may be somewhat ... shaky. But so far, other than grumbling amongst the higher command, there’s little else to watch for as the Imperial Force Ground Attack units are still in ignorance of what has transpired.”

“Keep it that way until we have a few easy victories. I suspect a good few of the Commanders will come around if only to be on the winning side.”

“That is my suspicion also. Though Amantil has the greater forces, she is also fighting the Vraik and having to monitor the Gershon border to prevent our allies from joining us,” Spake replied.

“Yes, we temporarily at least outnumber her where it counts,” Cillort nodded. “So let’s take advantage of it and raze Trialis to the ground.”

Trialis was an Imperial agri-planet in that it had a small population and was mostly mechanised to produce the various yeast based products Vreekoos used to tailor the varieties of food that were consumed by most of the population.

It was not recognised by ImpSec as a strategic target because it was only a minor planet and was reckoned loyal to the Empire and Empress. But that was based on a rationale that was more to do with insurrection or revolt, not an attack by a hostile fleet.

Fortunately Fleet Intelligence (FleetInt) had a different rationale, unknown to ImpSec or indeed Admiral Spake, who had no need to know of the Empire’s internal defence plans. He mostly led the Third Fleet on the boundaries of the Xillith Rationalty, a weird, often hostile, alien realm with a small but powerful fleet with some very ingenious high tech to make up for their lack of numbers. They aggressively patrolled the accepted border of the Imperium (the term used for the area the Empire covered), probing for weaknesses and launching occasional raids on any Imperial vessels they thought might be getting a bit close. That Spake’s Third Fleet had abandoned the border area had already been noted by the Rationalty and cautious probes were being sent forward to scout out the borders.

FleetInt though had recognised the Achilles heel that was Vreekoos’ food supply and had covertly armed the orbital space station as well as having a courier vessel on permanent standby in deep space monitoring the planet. It was this vessel that detected the Third Fleet and immediately warned Trialis and then XDed it for Vreekoos to warn the Home Fleet.

“Do we give them warning?” Spake asked.

“No, just destroy the station and then all planetary production plants. Let Vreekoos starve as Amantil struggles to keep order,” Cillort sneered.

The Third Fleet, under strict emissions control (emcon), emerged from XD space almost on top of Trialis and prepared to fire, only to find the space station had opened fire upon them the instant they had emerged and before they could bring their shields, which prevented travel in XD space, online. As salvoes go, it was puny by Imperial standards and also the Third Fleet’s, but, at that distance against unshielded ships, it was deadly. Three dreadnaughts were crippled along with the destruction of several corvettes, destroyers, cruisers and a fleet carrier. During the chaos caused by the unexpected strike, several ships darted out of formation and made a break for freedom, fourteen of them, mostly light cruisers, surviving to make the jump to XD space as the overwatch dreadnaught took out the remaining seven with ease.

By this time the station had fired another salvo at the Third Fleet, though their shields were now up and other than minor damage to a fleet tender there were no further surprises. For the station though, they knew they were doomed. Only a skeletal staff of volunteers remained and they let loose the last of their missiles as the retribution of the Third Fleet reached out to slash the station into large flaming chunks and destabilise its orbit, causing it to fall towards the planet and crash into the single ocean. Several life pods were launched, but all were taken out by the Third Fleet’s beam weapons.

“Seems they were expecting us.” Cillort stated the obvious to the Admiral standing at his side whilst the bridge crew frantically tried to co-ordinate manoeuvres, damage control and close-in defence measures.

“Yes, our intelligence failed us,” Spake admitted.

“Loss of effectiveness?”

“Only three percent, but too many more surprises like this will hurt. The Empire can replace its losses far more easily than we can.”

“I see,” Cillort nodded. “Carry on with the mission and we can discuss further objectives later.”

“By your command, Serenissimo.”

Because of the warning, most of Trialis’ population were in deep shelters or evacuated to the thousands of small islands in the planet’s multiple small seas. However the devastation rained down on the planet by the Third Fleet was extensive and many innocent lives were lost, particularly in the shelters, which the Third Fleet went out of its way to target. Just when many were fearing the worst though, the barrage lightened and stopped. What orbital scanning equipment was left showed most of the Third Fleet withdrawing in haste, causing a few cheers amongst the survivors as they waited to see their fate.

“Detecting XD emanations!” a sensor operator warned. “Multiple emanations, fleet sized!”

“Disperse attack groupings, bring us around to face them!” Spake commanded.

“Is this wise?” Cillort asked mildly.

“If they drop in too close we’ll have them like the station had us. Too far and we can meet them or retreat depending on their numbers,” Spake replied.

“Ah, very wise,” Cillort nodded.

“Thank you, Serenissimo.”

What came out of XD space though were over a hundred, small, barely XD capable, craft who were unshielded but which immediately launched thousands of XD scramblers at random. This was enough to confuse the Third Fleet’s sensor net and allow the Home Fleet to drop out of XD space and drive at full speed towards the Third Fleet.

“Target the scramblers!” Spake almost screamed. “Get us a gap to escape! All small craft try to clear us some room!”

Both fleets launched a massive strike against each other with the Dreadnaughts and battleships keeping up the salvoes whilst the smaller craft turned to interception and close-in defence. Some of the Empire’s mightiest ships were torn apart in the initial strikes whilst others took horrendous damage. Yet Spake’s plan worked and the bulk of the Third Fleet were able to escape into XD space, covered by their small craft, who paid a terrible price in doing so.

“Cure David,” an AI announced. “You are to proceed to the Starport and immediately shuttle up to join the Medical Carrier Softwing.”

“How long can they give me?”

“Immediately. It is most urgent.”

“On my way. Let my wife know where I’m going, please?”

“Message sent.”

There were hundreds of shuttles taking off when I got to the Starport and I was swiftly assigned to one, recognising several Healers including Cass and Ciolis.

“Any idea what’s going on? I was ordered to just turn up as I was,” I enquired.

“I think we got drafted,” Ciolis replied.

“Oh damn,” I replied mildly as the shuttle took off.

Yes, I was drafted, though we weren’t to hear of why until we merged into XD space and learned of the battle for Trialis. All of the medic ‘volunteers’ were called forward to the shuttle bays, the only area in the ship large enough to hold us all. We were then addressed by Senior Healer Norant, the head medic on the ship.

“I realise this is probably inconvenient for you all, but thank you for answering the Empress’ call,” she began. “In a day we will enter the orbit of the planet Trialis where a battle was fought between the Home Fleet and the renegade Third Fleet. Casualties are unknown at this point, but are probably very high. We do know the Third Fleet bombarded the planet before joining battle with the Home Fleet. We also know the Home Fleet won. The Fleet Medic Vessel Gust sent out a plea for help as they are becoming overwhelmed by the casualties in the first major conflict between two large fleets in the Empire’s history.”

“What type of casualties?” I asked after raising my arm and getting an acknowledgement to speak.

“Vacuum decompression, burns, flash blindness, impact and crush wounds from the Fleet battle. The planet? We simply do not know. They were hit hard as the Third Fleet apparently deliberately went after the shelters rather than the automated production plants,” Norant replied.

“Are we to aid Fleet or Planet?” Cass asked after raising her arm.

“Planet, mostly. Though you may very well need to work with Fleet Healers on some of the more extreme injuries, hence our request for Cures.”

“Possible return of the Third Fleet?” Ciolis asked.

“Unknown, but unlikely. They lost a lot of the auxiliary components of their Fleet, but can bring in more from the planets they control. However we do know the Trialis space station damaged three Dreadnaughts that were unable to merge back into XD space, one of which surrendered. That’s a big loss for them as the Home Fleet destroyed four others in their initial strike and now outnumbers them by fifteen to nine in that department.”

“Well, I for one do not wish to take part in this pitiful charitable venture,” came a loud unannounced braying voice that I recognised as one of my fellow Cures.

“Oh, but you will,” Norant replied with a vicious smile. ‘AI, discipline him.”

There was a scream as the Cure collapsed due to a neural pain pulse from the ship’s AI, leaving him writhing on the floor a lot longer than the normal length of time given by an AI.