December 17th, 2261. 03:00. Lyrae A System onboard the CNS Des Moines, Captain’s Quarters
Kory Shephard’s quarters were cleaner than the regulations required. It was unlikely that any dust was in the room. He was sitting back in his chair having a conversation with Admiral Timothy Dufresne, their wing commander. It was rare but not unheard of to have a one-on-one conversation with such a high-ranking officer. But it seemed his conversation wasn’t having the presumed effect on the admiral.
“Admiral, he was arrested in Tau Ceti yet he avoided any disciplinary actions.”
The newly-promoted Admiral Timothy Dufresne smiled, “You are quite well aware that the arrest was improper and by a corrupt, now jailed, former cop.”
“I have it on good authority that a written warning on his file would stick and is appropriate for being part of a fight on shore leave.”
“Tell me, commander, what would his defense be?” the admiral grinned, “Because we know he will request an official hearing on that. Could you successfully defend your warning despite an unlawful arrest?”
“My contact and I believe it’d be a toss-up,” Kory said with little confidence in his voice, “What about the Alpha Centauri incident? He killed a man in cold blood.”
“That’s stretching it a bit, Kory. He killed a man, but it was in the defense of another. The decedent had a knife, had drawn it, and was about ready to attack a woman who we later found out was his ex-wife. John happened to be next to the woman and reacted swiftly to the attack. People that try that kind of thing near John have frighteningly short lifespans.”
“He also got into three fights. Two of which resulted in people going to the hospital for serious injuries.”
The admiral grinned, “All three were preying on members of your crew. Your ship has a guardian angel of sorts.”
“More like a grim reaper.”
“That is also applicable. I am a bit surprised. I had presumed that you would’ve found his contributions beneficial to the crew.”
“I don’t care for him personally. Professionally he’ll do anything I tell him to. Except become an engineer, he refuses to do that and Deniz does not want to train him how to think like one.”
The admiral leaned back in his chair, “What is it really?”
“Admiral, he doesn’t have the discipline to be a good captain. It is without question he’s the smartest person I’ve ever served with, but his violent streak will get a ship killed,” Kory shook his head, “He’s not the right kind of person we want in command.”
“Ah, there it is. The answer within the answer. He’s a peasant thus he doesn’t deserve a captaincy.”
“Sir, the military is better off with the elite in charge.”
“Five years ago, I would’ve agreed with that statement wholeheartedly. Now though?” Timothy let the statement hang, “We need people like him to inject fresh ideas into the leadership ranks.”
“What fresh ideas? He hasn’t…”
“Come now Kory, don’t go there. You are better than that. He solved that little wargame that you and your father love to give to new officers. How many times have there been successes to it?”
“Two, though one doesn’t count because it involved committing a war crime,” Kory was resting his head against his fist as he stared at the surface of his desk, “Which John naturally had thought of as a possible solution to the scenario.”
“Kory, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but your father’s views on warfare are frankly old and stale. The Navy owes him a debt of gratitude for all he’s done. His tactics were, and are, legendary. But his style of warfare doesn’t work anymore. He’s never adapted his strategies to the new paradigm we face. The enemy knows how to counter his actions.”
“My father is ten times the man Lief is.”
“The jury is still out on Lief. But even you can’t dismiss everything you’ve seen. He finds a way to succeed at any challenge placed in front of him. Give him forty more years and it’ll be interesting to see how your father and he compare.”
Kory looked up at the viewscreen, “Sir, my father still wants to serve honorably. Why is Admiral Stuart insisting on his retirement?”
“Your father has commanded eight engagements with Alliance forces. And has been soundly defeated in all eight encounters. The enemy knows how he’s going to react and therefore ships under his command are at risk. He was relieved of his command this morning. It was an inglorious end, but sadly a necessary one.”
Kory sighed, “And you think making officers like Lief and his ilk captains will improve our fighting capabilities?”
Dufresne leaned into his desk, “I may be over telling you on certain things, but the Naval shrinks cannot get a read on him. He knows exactly how they interpret questions. Naturally, they receive contradictory statements to their questions. He plays wargames on a different level than anyone else, which you experienced first-hand.”
“Sir…” Kory was going to say something but was interrupted.
“We have analysts that are still reviewing his academy wargames. Ten new maneuvers have been shared with all our fleets. Kory, John led some corvettes into a counterattack against a battleship and carrier. And won. Could you have done the same?”
“No. The tactics I would have used didn’t work,” Kory sounded dejected at his answer.
“Look. You are scheduled to be back in Manchester in three weeks. My apologies for extending your stay and for giving you the bad news about your father. I really wish the latter could have been done differently. As to the former, we need your eyes in enemy territory for a little while longer. If it’s any consolation son, by mid-January Lief won’t be your responsibility anymore.”
“Understood sir. Thank you for the conversation.”
03:30 CNS Des Moines – CNC
John was leaning back in his chair and reviewing the latest attack in their conflict with the Alliance. A shift in command had clearly taken place because the Third Fleet was succeeding now, despite being on a streak of losses. They had successfully repulsed several attack wings and even routed a few of them. Alliance attacks were effectively stymied over the last twenty-four hours.
“Good god, who was the fucking potato that was in command for the Alliance here?” John’s eyes hurt watching the disorganized mess.
“Look here,” Eileen said, “They were arranged in such a way to defend against our standard fleet alignment.”
With that comment, John surmised what he thought had happened. Their captain’s father was no longer in charge of the Third Fleet’s tactics or movements. The string of losses had stopped. Fourth and Fifth Fleets had also changed tactics and found success in repelling offending fleets.
“In a span of eighteen hours we’ve taken out the same number of ships as they had up to this point,” John said from his chair, “If this trend continues, we’ll be sued for peace by the new year.”
“John, did you ever read the Admiral’s books?” Beth asked.
“I did last night before I went to sleep. He doesn’t explicitly say we do x, y, or z. But it’s strongly implied that certain things happen. Then he makes a two-dimensional reference to how a movement might happen. Then say that it gets noticeably more complicated in the void. Because of that pesky axis addition.”
“Sounds like you enjoyed the light reading,” Billy rolled his eyes.
“It’s old hat now, but he did bring a very unique viewpoint to the art of war. The problem is once he perfected those movements, he never really tried to evolve his methods to match the newer class ships.”
Hugo then walked in and headed straight for the central holographic display, “Alright, got some new information and things to test out.”
John swung his chair over and looked at the information, “That’s a pretty typical Alliance battleship squadron.”
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Hugo grinned, “Thanks for pointing out the obvious Lieutenant. What else can you tell me about it?”
“Older ship classes. Last war old it appears. Two battlecruisers, eight cruisers, sixteen frigates and destroyers, and what’s that, twenty corvettes?” John was squinting at the image.
“Twenty-six. Add in around two hundred drones and fighters too between the capital ships,” Beth added.
“Correct,” Hugo was smiling, “So, the question now is why is the alliance fielding several of these fleets?”
Billy leaned forward in his chair, “Woah, are they running out of modern ships?”
“No, based on intelligence reports we’ve destroyed less than seven percent of their fleet. Another three percent or so is damaged enough to have fallen back for repairs,” John was staring at the holographic image.
“Do we know if there was a draft of sorts in Alliance territory? Maybe they are bringing these older ships to act as buffers between their modern ships?”
“Truth be told we don’t know why. But there are at least eight fleets of these ships roaming out there,” Hugo said.
“Have we engaged any yet?” John asked.
“Yes, why?” Hugo looked over at John with a puzzled look on his face.
“Let’s play the battle back. We can test to see, at least for the ones involved in fighting whether or not the handling of their ships is up to par with the rest of their navy.”
“Good call,” Hugo smiled then pointed at Beth.
“Already on it, sir. The playback is now at ten times speed.”
The battle played out. The new enemy fleet was highlighted with an orange outline. Their movements were in sync with the fleet prior to the attack. But during the attack they surged forward, they were acting as the front wave, allowing their newer ships to provide long-distance firepower.
The enemy ships were eventually driven to a fighting retreat. Two older cruisers and a newer model were destroyed on their side. Confederate losses involved several corvettes, which meant the Confederate Navy would now need to change its tactics once more. The smaller ships were getting overwhelmed with missiles, even if they could overlap their anti-missile defenses, they simply weren’t strong enough to repulse the amount of incoming fire.
They viewed three other battles with similar results. Confederate forces bore the brunt of losses numerically, but it was all smaller ships. In gross tonnage, the Alliance fleets had lost significantly more.
John did notice something, “Rate of fire was sub-optimal as were the tactics used in combat. I don’t think we’re dealing with veterans or even full crews on these ships. But they aren’t being commanded or manned by fresh scrubs off the streets either.”
Hugo leaned against a console, “So we can presume they are there to act as a primary buffer and provide additional firepower for their modern navy.”
“Does this mean the Alliance is escalating the conflict, sir?” Eileen said as she reviewed the battlecruiser wings, “It seems like they are throwing everything at us now?”
“It sure seems like it,” Hugo said, “But the truth of the matter is we haven’t received any intel supporting that claim.”
“I don’t think it’s an escalation per se,” John said from his workstation.
“Explain,” Eileen spun around in her chair.
“It’s force projection. They are basically going into systems saying, ‘We have more ships here, back off.’”
“Then it’s a dick measuring contest,” Billy said with a laugh, “That’s not a winning strategy.”
“The problem is our fleets escalating in kind,” Hugo said calmly, “It’s only going to take a spark and we’re going to have a fire of epic proportions.”
John continued looking at the make-up of the cruiser and battle cruiser fleets. Something just felt wrong about them. But he wasn’t sure what it was.
“Don’t suppose we have any intel on the movements of these attack wings?”
Hugo smiled, “And that is why we’re changing our destination to the Lambda Bootis system. Once the rest of the wing gets to us we’ll jump there in a couple of hours. We need more intel.”
Beth groaned, “Does that mean we’re getting extended?”
Hugo smiled, “That’s a negative. The second stealth wing is getting ready to launch. If all goes to schedule, they will be launching next week. Second and Third Fleets are also prepping second wings to help out with the intelligence gathering.”
“Can you forward our engine problems ahead to those ship engineer’s so they can check their hardware thoroughly before being crippled like we were?” John said sarcastically as he began to compile the fleet movements that they did have intel on.
“Deniz was very clear on that point,” Hugo smiled, “Well, that’s all I had. Keep on scanning and compiling data until we jump.”
10:30 CNS Des Moines – Rec Room
John and Billy were sitting down on the large couch in front of the main screen in the rec room. Several enlisted crewmembers were sitting at the tables behind the couch. Beth and Eileen were sharing the loveseat and looked annoyed that they were there.
“Why do I have to watch this?” Eileen asked once again.
“I mean, if you want to drill and study, have at it,” John said sarcastically.
“But we were going to play a game of chess or read in the corner,” Beth said quietly.
“Yeah, those chairs were taken,” Billy said.
“Why do I have to watch football? It’s a stupid sport,” Eileen couldn’t get over her general annoyance.
“Because it’s time for football?” John looked over at her and had a quizzical look on his face, “Besides, the NFL is playing today because there aren’t any college games this weekend. More importantly, I get to watch my Vikings play those fuckfaces from Green Bay.”
One of the enlisted crew smirked and said, “How many titles do you have?”
John turned around and looked at the smartass petty officer, “Doesn’t matter. We’re winning today.”
Billy started to laugh, “I don’t have a dog in this race, but I just want to watch a game before I go to bed. That we get a live one is fucking amazing.”
Beth sighed, “This would be tolerable to watch if they weren’t all roided out hulks.”
Billy laughed, “So you can be sexist. Nice!”
The general banter continued throughout the first quarter of the game. The Vikings did Viking things, unfortunately. A pick-six on the first offensive play of the game was followed up by the dumb decision to run it out of the endzone from eight yards deep. Great teams don’t do things like this, the Vikings may have the best record in the league this year, their only loss was six weeks ago in Green Bay, but they had a knack for stupidity like this.
Despite the awful start, the score was only 7-3 when the first quarter ended. And better yet, the Vikings had the ball and were pushing down the field methodically. Billy honestly didn’t care about either team, he was a Raiders fan through and through, but he actually enjoyed watching the Vikings because of the chaotic messes they had a propensity to create.
“Man, how can you watch your team week in and week out. It’s just so damned exhausting,” Billy said which elicited some laughter behind them.
“Fucking hell. A pick-six on the first damn play of the game,” John threw his hands up in the air as he was still annoyed at how the game started, “He was basically screaming to the safety, ‘I’M GOING TO THROW IT RIGHT THERE.’”
“I am seeing an entirely different side of you,” Eileen said over Beth’s giggles, “And this, not the game, is worth the price of admission.”
The game came back from commercials. John grinned as he shook his head at Eileen’s comment. The commentators were rambling on and on about how the Viking's run game had effectively been shut off making them one-dimensional. The first and second downs were short pass plays that led to them being two yards away from a first down.
“Bet they try to be cute and run a reverse or something,” John said as he was fidgeting with his feet.
“Nah, QB sneak, sir. Stopped inches short,” the same smartass petty officer said.
John tilted his head, “Yeah I can see that happening too.”
The talking stopped when the ball was snapped. The petty officer’s assumption looked right when the quarterback took a step forward, causing the defensive backs to crash in. But the quarterback stopped and turned to the far side of the field.
To John, time stopped when the quarterback stopped. The first down was made, there was no need to get cut with the play. But then the quarterback threw the ball. His eyes bulged. They had the damn first down but we're going to run a trick play on fourth and inches. John held his breath as the quarterback threw the ball to a wide-open receiver.
John leaped out of the sofa when they caught and tucked the ball away.
“GO GO GO GO,” John was yelling, “TOUCHDOWN!!!!!!”
“Settle down, god you are a spaz,” Beth said rolling her eyes.
“What the absolute fuck,” the petty officer was shaking his head.
“God damn this team makes everything ten times harder than it ought to be,” John said as he sat down, “WOOOH!”
“That was a ballsy play call,” another crewmember said behind them.
“Good thing this room is soundproof,” Eileen was shaking her head.
“Come on lieutenant. This doesn’t get your blood pumping?” John looked over at her.
“I still don’t get football.”
“Sir, did you play football in school?” the smartass took a drink after asking his question.
John turned to look back at them from the couch, “Nah, I graduated when I was eleven.”
“Now that’s bullshit,” Eileen spat out.
Hugo then walked into the room and spied the open space on the couch. He walked straight to the couch and sat down. Then giggled stupidly as he rubbed John’s and Billy’s knees. Both men shoved his arms off of them. They both noticed the dumb look on his face.
John shook his head, “It’s true. I was a Naval Intelligence desk agent for like four years. Took that much begging to let me go out in the field.”
“Also bullshit,” Billy coughed.
“Why are you lying about that?” Beth asked.
John looked at Hugo, “You seriously not going to help me out here?”
“Do I have to? I’m off duty,” Hugo grinned but eventually acquiesced, “Fine fine. The fine young third lieutenant was smart as hell and graduated early. Mistakes were made that led him into intelligence. Suppose other mistakes led him here, right?”
“More or less,” John then looked back at the petty officer, “Would’ve been fun to get a chance to play though.”
“So that’s why you told me you’d take care of things,” Billy said nonchalantly.
The junior CNC officers just looked at Billy. He mouthed ‘what’ to them like he didn’t understand their dumbfounded looks. John shook his head and focused back on the game. Billy would not let that go without an answer.
“Seriously though. Did you know or have some code to get us out of that?”
Beth groaned audibly, “He meant he’s street smart enough to have gotten us out of that situation entirely.”
Hugo laughed, “Yeah, you really should have listened to him.”
“Thank you, sir,” Billy said as he was careful to roll his eyes out of sight, “That is helpful advice now.”
“You are most welcome,” Hugo then turned to John, “I had no idea that I had a fellow Viking fan onboard. It warms my heart that there’s at least one more person that hates their team with a similar passion to me. And that also explains your foul mood the shift after the last Packers’ game.”
“You know it, sir. Nothing like having a team that’s been around the league for three hundred years and still doesn’t have a bloody title.”
“How is that even possible. Fifty-three trips and counting,” the smartass was literally shocked as he said that figure, “FIFTY-THREE trips to the big game.”
The crowd would spend the rest of the game discussing that. Unfortunately, no answers could be accepted. Beyond bad coaching, playing, poor matchups, and more. Pretty much anything that could go wrong, has gone wrong for the Vikings in the big game.
But tonight, tonight they would dominate their most dreaded and hated conference foe. They would eventually run away with a win by nearly four touchdowns. John would go to bed with a giant smile on his face. It was the little things in life that made it worth living. And watching the Packers lose a game was definitely one of those things.