Chronicles of Athena Lee 6 Imperial Subversion (7 page)

Lieutenant Roy Hinkley, call sign ‘Professor’, was new to the squadron. He had graduated at the top of his class at the academy. This posting was his dream job. The thought of an actual battle was scary, but not as scary as his new wingman. She was the scariest woman he had ever met.

Commander Mary Ann Summers, call sign Nevada, was not entirely happy about being stuck with the Newb, especially in this battle. She needed all her wits about her, not watching a kid. The pair of fighters to starboard were a little too close for her comfort. “Hey, ‘Wet Willie’, get that hunk of junk you fly out of my airspace!”

“Come on, Nevada, cut me some slack you know I hate that name!”

“It doesn’t matter what you think and you know it. If you wanted a different name you should have picked a different spot. Face it you got caught with your pants down. Be glad that is all we chose to call you. You did have those two blonds dressed as..”

“All right you knuckleheads calm it down! We’re coming up on the break zone. Remember to accelerate to attack speed, that means you ‘Professor!’ Be careful of those destroyers, they may be old but they’re configured as anti-fighter ships, don’t get too close to them. OK, Valkyries, Break and attack!”

The group of 14 fighters broke into pairs and dove at the oncoming Imperial fighters. The invading ships were not the newer Navy fighters but older Red Falcons. These were the fighters that the Sky Sharks had been designed to kill!

___

Minerva watched her battle screens as the fighters from both sides battled across the space lanes between her station and the invader’s ships. For the moment her fighters were winning. The Imperial forces had already lost one of the half squadrons. While the the fight had raged here, by the planet, Imperial shuttles had broken through to the shipyard. Chief Tad and most of his techs had barely made it to safety. Imperial Marines destroyed the shipyard with a tactical Nuke! Something has to give here. She could not allow them to do the same thing to this station. Studying the placement of the enemy destroyers something ‘ticked’ the back of her brain. She was missing something here. She was about to call her sister and ask for her perspective when she was interrupted.

“Ma’am, we are detecting several large masses inbound to our position from beyond the enemy fleet.”

“What do our sensors say?”

“Results are inconclusive Ma’am. They say it could be more ships, we just aren’t sure.”

“Contact the science division on the planet, have them scan with their long range equipment, and tell them to hurry! We have a battle to fight up here!”

___

Commander ‘Skinny’ Mulligan watched closely as his pilots swept the field of Imperial fighters. His newbie pilot was shaping up to be a good fit with the unit. But those enemy destroyers were starting to make him nervous. They kept crisscrossing in front of the battle line. It was almost as if they were hiding something. Pursing his lips in thought he started to nod his head. That might work, he thought to himself. He keyed his communicator and relayed a message to command.

“Major? Ma’am! We have a message from Commander Mulligan. He thinks that those Imperial destroyers are hiding something. He wants to try and find out what is back there. He is asking permission to try.”

Minerva shook her head, that man was insane. “Tell him it’s approved, but he better survive and come home - he still owes me 20 credits!”

Commander Mulligan signaled his wingman to pull back. The maneuver he was going to try was risky, - he might not make it and only wanted to risk one fighter. He smiled at the response he got from command. Min must have figured out what he was about to do. One thing that pilots do is sit around and talk about maneuvers or tricks that might be cool to try. Lot’s and lot’s of Vids to pull crazy ass stunts from, too. But, there was one that was so insane that no one had the ‘balls’ to try. It was ironic that he was about to try a ‘Falcon maneuver’ against an enemy formation that included Falcons and flew for an ‘Empire’.

Engaging all his thrusters at once the Commander shot forward almost out of control. He had been watching the destroyers and they had a set pattern that they were moving in. The ship he was aiming for was due to circle around behind the fleet. As his ship neared its top speed he was on a Kamikaze course for the bridge of the ship. Counter-fire flashes were bursting all around his ship as he entered the range of the destroyer’s guns. The firing became intense as his course was tracked by the enemy. The commander began to jink left and right to avoid the laser fire.

“Now comes the tricky part,” Skinny thought to himself. As he jinked left he slammed on his starboard thrusters. The sudden jerk added to his acceleration, throwing his ship sideways straight at the destroyer. Barely flying his ship in a sideways flat spin, his mostly out of control ship was on a collision course. At the last moment he pulled up and disappeared off the destroyers sensors.

Inside the destroyer the bridge crew was freaking out! “What happened? Track that ship!”

“What! Gone? Gone where? There is no way a ship that small has a cloaking device. Find it!”

Skinny silently did a little dance in his cockpit. It actually worked! If he survived this he would be a legend. Hopefully, one of the other ships wouldn’t spot his fighter sitting behind the destroyer’s forward laser battery.

Chapter 11

Damn those Wardens! In their zeal to protect our secrets they may have damned us all! Senator Colman sat fuming in his office. He had to admit that his now former assistant, Julius had been a liability. Breaking ‘Rule Two’ without approval was never a good idea. If only Julius had come to him. Oh, well. Time to move on. His new assistant was even more of an idiot than what’s-his-name. Where in the Hell does personnel get these fools? The message that he had received was that the Cabal had taken over the job of eliminating those rebellious leaders in the Hong Kong system. With luck this whole mess can be swept under the rug without too much fuss.

The Senator had a deja vu moment. The sound of running feet could be heard outside his door. A sharp rap was followed by a head and shoulders peeking into his office. “Sir, are you busy? I can come back.”

The head belonged to Lloyd Yule, his new aide. “What is it?” His new aide just stood there with his mouth open. “Spit it out, man! I’m busy here. What. Is. It?”

“Sorry, Sir. I just got word that the Colonial office is sending a delegation to the Hong Kong system.”

“What! Who authorized those idiots to do something like that?”

“The Imperial Speaker sent them sir. He said that ‘they should not be forced to join something that they did not believe in.’ The Colonial council backed him up on it.”

“Call that idiot Harry Dun and tell him to un-back it. He is a Cabal member, for the seal’s sake. He knows better than to support something like this!”

“Sir, Senator Dun was in a skiing accident last week, remember? He is in a coma in the Medical ward.”

“Damn it to hell! That was something that Jul..I mean your predecessor was supposed to keep me informed about. OK, OK. What are they sending to those rebels?”

“Our man at the Fleet office said a small unit, Task Force 13 was sent. I checked the name against our records. Task Force 13 is one of our newer Battle Cruisers, the EOH Victorious, and four destroyers. Admiral Emily Kane is on board along with a delegation from the Colonial office and the Imperial Senate.”

“They sent Kane to the Hong Kong system? Great, just Frakking Great! Contact the Wardens and inform them of the actions of the Imperial Speaker. I know that Fleet sent a Task Force to observe, but we may need to take action if Kane is involved in this mess.”

“Sir? About the Wardens…”

“Not you too, they are not that, scary. You have done nothing wrong, you are just delivering a message. They will not kill you for that!” His aide was just standing there. “Well, get moving! Don’t waste anymore time, Go!”

“Sir, wait, about the Wardens. I found a communication on my system from your office to Task Force 25.”

“I believe that was the group sent to observe the actions of these ‘rebels.’ What of it?”

“The Navy sent them orders to observe, but this office changed them, under orders of the Cabal. It has YOUR signature on it, Sir.”

“What! Say that again!” The portly Senator stood up from his chair and stomped over to his now cowering aide. He grabbed the little pest and dragged him out to his workstation. “Show me! I need to see it for myself!”

His aide called up the message on the screen. There it was, plain as day, orders to disrupt the conference and arrest or kill the leaders under any circumstances. His name and that of his office was in the authorization. By Gods and the Sacred Seal! This was a disaster. That Idiot! If Julius wasn’t dead he would kill him again! This could mean both war and doom for the Cabal. There was zero reason that the inner circle would not believe that he did not do this! He turned to the his new aide. “Quick find out whatever you can about Task Force 25. All I know is that Commodore Vakulinchuk is the commander. Find out! NOW!”

The Senator sat behind his desk with his face in his hands. How? How can one man screw everything up so badly? Maybe his family had a small chance to survive. He pulled out a hidden communicator from inside a locked drawer in his desk. He called his wife of 25 years. “Hi, honey. No this is not my comm unit. I needed to ‘borrow’ one. We were talking about that trip you wanted to take the other day.” She started to ask what trip, he cut her off. “You remember the one, you said that you wanted to go and visit those cousins of yours on ‘Mars.’ I was wrong when I said not to go. Why don’t you take the kids and go this weekend. I bought you new luggage as a surprise. If you look in the storage room you will see them, they are blue. Honey, I love you. I need to get back to work. Yes, we will talk later. Bye.”

Hopefully they would be gone when and if he got home tonight. He had left careful instructions inside the new luggage, along with as much hard currency he could come up with. It was one of his many contingency plans.

Chapter 12

Moments seem like hours in the middle of a battle. At least that’s what Major Minerva Lee was feeling at this moment. Her planetary fighters were still engaging the enemy. Most of the Imperial fighters had been destroyed, but their destroyer force was now joining the battle. Those ships were configured to kill fighters, and she ordered her fighters out of there. That crazy Rus bastard was up to something, she just knew it.

“Communications, have you heard anything from Commander Mulligan yet?” Min was beginning to get worried for the cocky flight commander.

“No, Ma’am. He is overdue for contacting us.”

“Let me know the minute he makes contact.”

Min studied her battle plot. Those carriers were near useless without pilots or fighters. Why had the enemy left them on his front line? His frigates had more of a punch battle-wise than those destroyers. There WAS something the enemy wanted hidden. Until the James Cook got here she didn’t have much in the way of offensive weaponry. Maybe she needed to ‘poke the bear’ some more and make him angry.

“George, activate the Alpha freighter, have them act as if they are fleeing the battle zone. Let’s see what the Imperials do. Tell the Alpha’s Captain that he is to start deploying mines as soon as he makes contact with the enemy fleet. I want five and ten minute delayed intervals on those mines.”

“Excellent Ma’am. I will get right on it.” She watched her XO walk off. He would make a good ship commander, he just needed to loosen up a little. Now she just needed to hear from her old friend. Where are you Skinny Mulligan?

___

Commander Mulligan was freaking out! The destroyer he had landed on had continued its patrol after searching for his ship. Skinny had watched from his powered down fighter as the destroyer traveled around the two large carriers and into the space behind them. Over a dozen space tugs were gathered there. They had been pulling in small asteroids and rogue meteors. It looked like they intended to target the planet with kinetic strikes! He had to get word of this back to Command. But if he powered up now, he was dead, they would lock on to him for sure. He watched through his view screens as the destroyer started to loop back around to the front of the formation. He would have one chance to get away. This was not a Vid, the ships did not just dump their trash to let him hide in the debris, not in real life. Taking a chance he slowly powered up his communication system and sent a message.