(INS Evanesco, orbiting Askao VII, Mining colony in Imperial Space, currently held by True Empress Merida’s faction)
On the bridge of the Evanesco, a light cruiser in Empress Merida’s Loyalist faction, Lieutenant Romanov checked out the readings on his screen. As Officer of the Watch, he was responsible for making sure the ship ran smoothly, even though it was the middle of the night, ship’s time. Fortunately, things rarely happened at 2 AM.
Indeed, everything was normal. Well, as normal as things got when one was on a warship in the middle of a civil war where the Empress was attempting to win the throne from her usurper brother and you were patrolling the resource worlds watching for any incursion from the Usurper’s faction. Normal was relative like that.
In the year since the War of Succession had started, the lines had pretty much stabilized. The bulk of the Empire was trapped behind the lines of the Usurper, along with seven tenths of the Imperial Navy, including the majority of the superdreadnoughts and other heavy ships. However, the Empress’s forces had had one advantage. Many of the escorts, the corvettes and frigates, as well as the carriers and escort carriers that carried the majority of the Empire’s fighter force had joined the Loyalist faction. They could not win in a slugging match with the Usurper’s forces, but the Usurper was unable to press the advantage, because they lacked sufficient screening forces. And they could not devote too much force to attacking the Empress, because of the threats from the Confederacy and the Ihm Imperium, who rightly saw that if the Usurper was allowed to reign unopposed, it would plunge Known Space into war once more.
Ensign Morris called out from the sensor station. “Sir! We are detecting unscheduled tachyon disruptions! Seven, ten, twenty-eight ships emerging from transition drive at the heliopause!”
Romanov cursed, and activated the ship’s communications system. “Captain to the bridge! Captain to the bridge!”
“Sir! We are getting reports from the long-range probes in that section! They are Imperial Navy vessels!”
The captain burst onto the bridge, still getting dressed as she did so. “Report!”
Reading from his tactical screen Romanov answered, “Twenty-seven unscheduled arrivals from Transition, all Imperial warships. We are counting ten superdreadnoughts, twelve battlecruisers, and five frigates!”
Captain Cartier cursed in her native French. She was young for such a posting, but she was the senior officer in the system by rank, having earned her stripes in combat, fighting against X’thari. “Alert the fleet! Battle stations! How many ships do we have in system?”
“Twelve, Captain, including the Evanesco. Two light cruisers, four frigates, and seven corvettes. Captain, we cannot defeat the enemy forces with what we have here!”
“Comms! Get Captain Muldoon on the Zinnia! Tell him to enter hyperspace. Full speed to the heliopause, away from the enemy fleet. Once at transition distance, he is to proceed immediately to Mar Sara, and warn the Empress. I am sending you a file, for him to send with the report.”
“Captain! Enemy fleet is advancing towards Askao VII!”
“Zinnia acknowledges, Captain. Her captain isn’t happy, but will comply.”
Cartier nodded. “Issue an evacuation order for the civilians in system. Anyone who has a ship capable of hyperspace is to leave immediately. Our ships won’t be able to buy more than a few moments with a fleet like that.”
Romanov looked up. “Captain, there is another option. It is probably insane to even consider it, but it is our only hope of hurting those bastards, and maybe giving them enough of a pause to keep them off the planet until the civilians can escape.”
Romanov quickly explained his plan. In Captain Cartier’s considered opinion, formed by almost fifteen years in the service of the Empire as part of the Imperial Navy, and backed by what an extensive education in the nature of space warfare, it was, truly, completely, and irrevocably insane, and any person even suggesting such a plan was insane for even considering it. However, it was their best chance for giving the civilians a chance to escape, so insanity won the day.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
(INS Zinnia)
Captain Robert Muldoon watched on the bridge of his corvette. He was disobeying a direct order by not transitioning immediately, but he made that call. He couldn’t just run on the rest of the squadron and not report their fates. Hell, he didn’t much appreciate the idea of running at all, but Captain Cartier was correct, the Fleet needed to know this battle group was out there. He stayed, running silently, so that he could report on their capabilities.
It was a lopsided group, to be sure. There were too few screening elements or escorts. In a standard setting, a group of thirty Navy ships would have something like two squadrons of seven corvettes each, a squadron of frigates, two to three each of light, heavy, and battle cruisers, or perhaps light battleships, and only two or three superdreadnoughts or carriers. The big ships had incredible firepower and their main batteries could destroy smaller ships at great range, but without the escorts to screen for fighters, missiles, and other weapons, they were vulnerable to attack, if enough power could be brought to bear.
It reminded him of what happened in the history books, when politicians who didn’t know anything about naval battles insisted on building massive blue water battleship, because they were a point of pride for the people, only to have those ships destroyed by packs of smaller submarines or swarms of fighters from carriers. There was a reason the Imperial Navy used escorts, after all!
But the Usurper was short on escorts. Of the fleets that could be pulled from the borders, most of the escorts and carrier groups had gone with the Empress, while the Usurper gained the upper hand in capitol ships. If they allowed this to become a slugging match, it would be their doom, but if they could just maneuver…
Then he saw it. The scanners on the reconnaissance satellites watching the Usurper battle group were blinded by explosions across all wavelengths. When it was done, of twenty-seven enemy ships, seventeen remained, and the last of those was clearly crippled. There was no sign of the Loyalist fleet. Twenty-two ships destroyed in an instant of fire and light.
The entire bridge of the Zinnia was silent. One of the men, Muldoon didn’t know who, said, “What happened?”
He did not need to wait for the tactical officer to go over the sensor logs. Captain Muldoon knew what that meant. He’d seen it before, back in the last war, when the Imperial forces were on the verge of driving the Confederates off Planeta Nublar. He bowed his head, and muttered, “Clever girl.”
Looking to the rest of his crew, he announced. “Captain Cartier and her crews used their ships as battering rams, attacking the Usurper fleet with everything they had. All but two of the enemy battlecruisers have been wiped out, and one of those is missing the front third of its hull. That ship is going to the breakers, assuming it can even be towed out of this system. Remember them, men.”
“Captain! The Usurper ships have stopped, and are holding position!”
“Of course they are. They just lost a third of their force in an instant. They will be working through what has happened, and try to come up with a countermeasure. This kind of attack won’t work a second time, I assure you. But they are going to hesitate now, instead of rushing to attack. That will give the people on Askao VII more time to evacuate. Now, fire up the transition drive! We have to report this to the Admiral. We will need more ships if we’re to defeat this force without just ramming them.”
(Black Star Company private shipyard, Dimiya System)
“—and we are continuing to report on the Usurper assault on the world of Askao VII. The renewed offensive against the true Empress’s forces continues despite the loss of several ships after the defense fleet sacrificed themselves to delay the invasion long enough for civilian ships to flee.”
“However, only a small portion of the planet’s population was able to escape before the enemy fleet arrived in orbit of Askao. Civilian channels have been jammed, preventing the people on the surface from calling for help, but we were able to piggyback this transmission on military channels so the truth can get out.”
*explosions in background*
“The enemy has begun using mass drivers to propel asteroids at the habitation domes of the colony! It appears that they wish to exterminate the civilian population while leaving the industries intact! An evacuation order has been issued, and anyone who is able is moving to the shelters. We will continue to broadcast as long as we are able. This message is going out on all channels, set to translate into all languages. Do not let them deny what is happening here! Do not—”
*explosion, very close, and then static*
“What you have just heard was the last transmission we got from CNN reporter Alex Tr’bec on Askao VII, now confirmed to have been attacked and destroyed by forces loyal to the Usurper Emperor Travis. CNN has learned that the Bismark under Admiral Veit Scheiner was leading this assault. Before the attack, Askao VII was a thriving mining colony, with sixty thousand civilians, primarily working in the mining and terraforming industries. the first stages of terraforming already completed. Now, it is a lifeless rock once again. According to initial reports, there are only a handful of survivors, who took refuge in the industrial nodes. Imperial Marines stormed the nodes and executed everyone they found. There were no survivors.”
“Off! Turn that off.”
“Yes, Master.” Nondrin Caskhead turned off the viewscreen and looked back at the man who was his master. Had it only been a few months? He had made significant investments in the Jagloth system. Investments that were in the process of paying themselves off. In another year, maybe two, he would have been out of debt entirely. But the Legion ruined him. Everything was destroyed, the planet under perpetual quarantine. By selling himself into slavery, he had at least prevented his family from falling to a similar fate, or worse.
His master was not like most slave owners, he had to admit. For one thing, he was a Nomad, yet had somehow managed to lose a fight in the arena and yet win so much money he could scarcely believe it, all in a single afternoon. According to the news, the first thing he’d done was to purchase an old shipyard, and refurbish it. Then, to the surprise of everyone, he began buying up slaves like they were an endangered species. There were many people who were forced into debt slavery thanks to Jagloth. This Nomad bought all of them he could, many of them having technical or business skills that were useful to him. That was, after all, how Nondrin had come to be in charge of the Black Star yards.
Before, he had been selling himself into slavery because he had no hope, no recourse, and little else to lose, unless he fell to becoming some kind of criminal. And he couldn’t bring himself to do the truly nasty things that would be required of someone trying to break into one of the syndicates. Now, Nondrin had a purpose again, and a Master that made sure his people knew he respected them. Sure, they may be slaves, but he treated them as employees. That was something that he and his people could not forget.
Looking up from his commlink, his master, Captain Mollen, grinned, and said, “All right, Nondrin. Tell me how the work is going. Where are we at?”