Nine
December 2251

Tarbos

“All we can do, for now, is wage a hit and run campaign.  We have but two advantages.  According to the prisoners that the privateer brought into New Albion, they don’t know where Earth is, and they don’t know about the shipyards on Halifax.  So, hopefully, we can build more ships without them knowing where they’re coming from.  At least not right away.”

“Admiral Gauss,” one Senator stood up.  Gauss’ eyes narrowed; it was “Lord” James Galloway from Corinthia, leader of the appeasement lobby.  “Might I ask who it is that’s going to pay for all these ships?”

“The free worlds of the Confederacy will pay for them, I presume, Senator,” Gauss replied, deliberately refusing to use the term “Lord.”  Galloway preferred the latter form of address, which to Gauss was reason enough to refuse it.  “Our survival is at stake, sir.”

“Indeed it is, Admiral.  The sovereignty of our worlds is at stake.  Our financial well-being is at stake.”

“Senator,” President Cochet chimed in from her place at the front of the Senate Briefing center.  “One world has already been occupied.  Maybe you think that the Grugell will be content to stop there, but I don’t believe they will.  Now, Senator, will you allow the Admiral to finish his briefing?”

Galloway sat down, frowning, and smarting internally from the browbeating delivered by the President. 

At the front of the high-ceilinged chamber, Admiral Gauss allowed himself a tight, crisp grin.  “As I was saying, at the moment we have the Orleans almost ready to put back to space; the Mountain View is in a parking orbit in an undisclosed location, along with the cruisers Cairo and Dallas.  The frigates Reuben James and Bob Pritchard are in another location, within a day’s travel of the Mountain View task group.  I have the destroyers MacKee and Perry on the way from Earth now to join Task Force One.  The rest of the Navy’s frigates and destroyers are being deployed to protect Earth, Tarbos and Halifax.”

A Senator in the front row waved her hand.  “Why those three planets?”

“That’s where the shipyards are, ma’am,” Gauss replied.  “We need to build more ships.  We can’t afford to lose that capacity.  The Seattle, a twin to the Orleans, will be coming off the ways at the Halifax orbital yard in another six weeks, and there are more ships already in the planning stages.”

The Senator frowned but didn’t offer any comment.  Gauss belatedly recognized her as the junior Senator from New Albion, stranded now on Tarbos for the duration – or maybe forever, unless the Navy could take the planet back.

“When will you be ready to put back to space, Admiral?”  Gauss blinked; President Cochet hadn’t said much during the briefing, her verbal slap to the Senator from Corinthia notwithstanding.

“Forty-eight hours, ma’am.  I’ll move my flag back aboard the Mountain View at eight-hundred Friday morning, and I expect to leave the system by noon.”

“Good.”  President Cochet turned her attention back to her notes.

“That, ladies and gentlemen, concludes my briefing.”  There was a rumble of conversation, and the sound of chairs being pushed back.  Captain Jensen helped Gauss gather his notes and holo-projector, and the two officers left the room.

“There hasn’t been a formal declaration of war yet, Jerry.”

“No, sir, there hasn’t.”

“The vote is tomorrow.  No matter what I said back there, we can’t put to space without that.”

“No sir.”

“Cross your fingers, Jerry.  Either we go find them out there, or they’ll find us here.  And they already know how to get here.”

New Albion

Springtime on New Albion’s large southern continent, eighty kilometers north of the capital city Glengarry, and the prairie flowers set the grasslands alive with a riot of color.

But Jason MacFeeters’ band of guerrillas had no time for enjoying the view.

The Bent Fork River ran south out of the Crow Ridge Mountains towards Glengarry, and in the stretch before MacFeeters now, the river ran through a rather deep valley.  MacFeeters was dug into a narrow hole in the side of the valley wall, covered with a light lid of plastic covered with sod; the hole he occupied was of the type known as a “spider-hole,” for reasons MacFeeters had never known.  But he knew how to employ the tactic, and he had shared that knowledge with the eight other members of his militia group now dug into similar holes to his left, right and front.

A whirring sound was growing slowly louder.  Approaching from the south, from the abandoned city, a Grugell scout vehicle was approaching the valley, using the river as a transit reference.  MacFeeters had noted that the Grugell occupation force tended to use waterways to navigate in undeveloped terrain.  Today he would make that a costly habit.

Crouched in the stuffy hole, he shifted sweaty hands on a portable heat-seeking missile.  Three of his guerrillas held similar units, another a light machine gun, while the rest held hunting rifles much like the Ordnance Specialties 500K that leaned against the side of MacFeeters’ hole.

A click came over the short-range radio headset MacFeeters wore under his narrow garrison cap.  He lifted the front edge of the spider hole cover, very slightly, and stole a look.  The gleaming silver insect-shape of the scout was floating into view, slowly, making its way up the valley, turning from side to side as it scanned the valley walls.

“Hold your fire,” MacFeeters whispered into his throat mike.

The plan was simple.  MacFeeters would fire first; the rest of the precious missiles would remain unlaunched unless the first failed to bring the scout down.  Peering out of the hole, MacFeeters let the scout move closer.

It was a warm day.  The spider-hole smelled of dirt, plant roots, and sweat.  A trickle of sweat ran into the guerrilla leader’s eyes, and he wiped it away with the back of his hand.  His heart was hammering in his chest, but he forced himself to wait just a few seconds longer…

“Execute!”  At the barked command, nine spider-holes popped open.  MacFeeters stood up, his head and shoulders out of the hole.  The scout turned slightly at the movement, but before the Grugell could react, MacFeeters shouldered the launcher, depressed the launch stud, and dropped back into the hole, leaving the empty launcher on the ground outside.

The missile screeched towards the scout, covering the hundred-meter distance in less than a second.  It impacted on one of the insect-leg drive units and detonated, knocking the scout craft spinning wildly to the valley floor.

A volley of rifle shots brought MacFeeters up and out of his hole, his rifle in his hands.  The scout was lying broken and smoking a couple hundred meters away.  Rifle fire crackled from the opposite side of the valley; MacFeeters could already see three alien invaders down in the grass near the wreck. 

His eye was drawn to a slight movement.  A Grugell peered cautiously from a hatch in the side of the wrecked scout.  The guerrilla leader dropped to one knee, brought his rifle up, sighted carefully through the scope, and fired one round.  The alien collapsed into the spring wildflowers.

“Move in, be careful, be quick,” MacFeeters announced into the throat mike.

Ten minutes later the wreck was stripped of anything useful and portable.  By the time another scout craft flew up the valley in response to the distress call, the guerilla band had faded into the endless prairie, taking six Grugell plasma rifles and two packs of explosives with them.

The Shade Tree

Tarbos again at last, Captain Jean Barrett thought to herself.  The pale blue and white orb of the Confederate capital world was growing slowly large on the main screen as the Shade Tree decelerated slowly in to their assigned trajectory.  A berth in the Navy’s orbital dock awaited the ship, and the bars and hotels of Mountain View awaited Barrett’s leave-hungry crew.

And a Senator, the Senator who made the Shade Tree’s excursions profitable, was waiting to speak to Jean Barrett.

There were plans to make, supplies to buy, and two crewmembers to hire to replace the two who’d announced their intentions to join the Navy.  Fortunately, Indira Krishnavarna wasn’t one of them.

And out there on the edge of Confederate space, there was a planet to take back, and Captain Barrett had a feeling that the Privateer SS Shade Tree would play a part in that. In fact, she looked forward to it.

To see more of Animal’s writing, visit his page at Crimson Dragon Publishing or Amazon.