Federation Reborn 2: Pirate Rage (95 page)

The news of their return was immediately broadcast through the ansible network to Antigua and Pyrax.

Admiral Irons' staff processed the initial report and then handed it to the admiral. He read it carefully and then nodded. “Good. They did good. I'm not happy about any possible loss of civilian life from that bombardment, but you can't make an omelet without breaking some eggs I suppose. We'll deal with the fallout if it comes. And they did a good job running down those two ships and scouting for any more. None found so that jump chain is clean. Good.”

“Yes, sir. So we can move forces in whenever we wish, sir,” Commander Turner replied. “I believe we have some forces en route?”

“To Hidoshi's World, the
Chester Puller
convoy. They jumped for Hidoshi's World four days ago,” Sprite filled in, projecting their planned itinerary. There were two full brigades of troops in the troop convoy, plus escorts and tenders filled with their supplies as well as supplies for the planet.

The commander nodded. “Aye, sir, ma'am,” he said to both officers.

“Don't get any ideas, Commander,” Irons said, eying him. “They will be going through a rough patch in Hidoshi's World as it is. Shipping them over to Destria is a bit much.”

“It depends on what they run into in Hidoshi's World,” the commander reminded him.

“True. But don't get your hopes up,” the admiral warned.

“No, sir. About the two transports …”

The admiral snorted. “Ideas?”

“Well, I thought about sending them up to Kathy's World to pick up people, you know, stop at Richalu and stuff along the way and then when she's filled up make a turn southwest to go to Agnosta. But they have horrible speed.”

“That they do.”

“So … should we send them to Pyrax for refit, sir? Then send them to Agnosta to help facilitate the speedy movement of troops and equipment?” the Ops commander suggested slyly.

Sprite chuckled as the admiral eyed the innocent looking young man. Finally, he nodded. “Write the orders if Admiral Subert hasn't already. Remind him the prize crews will need liberty and will need to be replaced on the two cruisers.”

“Aye, sir. I think they are scheduled for a return as well for their standard rotation,” Turner said with a frown. “Should they escort the ships all the way in or …”

The admiral shook his head. “No. Let them make their best speed. If they try to hold it down to what those two transports can handle, they will take three times as long.”

“Aye, sir. I understand they were trying to do something about that with the engineering compliments but it was limited.”

“They don't have the admiral on board to work miracles,” Sprite said with a grin in her voice. He turned to her, looked at her for a long moment, then sniffed in disdain.

“Hopefully they can squeeze some more speed out. I know they stripped off the ship's officers and noncoms and drafted the former slaves to help run the ships, sir. But it's still going to be rough,” Turner warned. “It's a long way from B100 omega to Pyrax under those conditions, with a minimum Marine team on each ship to keep an eye on the Horathians.”

“I know,” the admiral said with a grimace. “Write an email to Admiral Subert.
Recommend
,” he held up his index finger in warning as he stressed the last word. “ … Recommend he order the ships to draw parts and volunteers from the replacement picket to help fill out their vacancies. Understood?”

“Aye, sir,” Turner said, jotting the email out quickly.

Chapter
55

A familiar ship jumped into the Pyrax star system at the B101a jump point and squawked an IFF to the watching fortresses and ships standing guard there.

Almost instantly word of
Caroline's
return winged across the solar system and invariable found its way through the ansible to Admiral Irons' office. Schedules were abandoned as all work screeched to a halt to hear the news.

Invariably the work slowdown made its way to the media. A few people talked out of turn, and that let the media know that something was going on. Since the star system was unnamed, Knox News dismissed it in initially, heaping praise on the navy for going out of its way to bring in lost star systems.

That ended when news spread of the delegation on board
Caroline
. The attempts to interview them were met with a list of individuals with their ranks. When the media noted two flag officers listed, that raised some eyebrows and more questions.

Admiral Irons put a hold on a press release until he had more information. He was still processing what limited information they had gotten and fresh updates were being sent regularly as the light cruiser sailed inward to the naval complex.

The news was good. Very good he noted as he read the digest.

Bek and Nuevo had been officially found … and both star systems were not only intact, they had functional advanced civilizations to go right along with them. Bek had a full military but had lacked the keys to build modern equipment to keep them up-to-date with modern hardware. They had a full space navy, but it was all sublight. They had a few civilian survivors from the Xeno war. All of them were ancient; they'd played Peter Pan time skipping with stasis pods to stay alive and help guide the star system's industry and research.

According to the report, the jump chain had remained untouched by the Xenos during the Xeno war. The rapids were apparently too much for them to handle, or they'd left the star systems to die on the vine. Apparently they were also too much for the ships Bek had attempted to send into the Federation to find out what was going on. The last one had been lost thirty years after their last contact with the Federation. After that the local governments had decreed that their remaining ships wouldn't be risked.

Their two remaining starships had continued to ply the space between Bek and Nuevo for nearly six centuries, keeping the two star systems in contact with one another as well as doing some anemic trading along the way. Those two ships lost speed over time as parts wore out however, slowly dropping into the lower octaves and hyper bands to keep functional.

They had done what they could to keep the ships up and had used many of their components as templates to recreate lost manufacturing arts. The ships had kept up the contact and trade until one had been lost with all hands. The last had been judged unfit to continue the jumps so she had been reluctantly retired and mothballed in Bek 122 years ago.

Bek's space industry he had invested in while in the star system had been leveled when their replicators had gone off-line a century after the loss of contact with the Federation. They'd fought the decline by relearning ancient methods of construction and fabrication as much as they could, anticipating the need for such lost arts. One of the civilian sleepers had been a historian; she had worked tirelessly to resurrect the various processes involved with just what she had in her files and her own organic memory. The files, however, had been more of a guide, telling them something was possible, but not the steps involved. It had been a very slow tortuous process to rebuild as much as they had.

Up until a century ago, their sublight ships had lacked force emitters. A push by the administration in Bek at the time had been geared at education and research to redress the balance they saw between what they had once had and where they were at the time. They knew it was possible, had the general idea, so it might seem like they had reinvented the wheel but they had eventually gotten some things done. The emitters were crude but functional.

That unfortunately had led to a redressing as a new administration had come into power. They had wanted to rebuild the fleet with the force emitters and other fruits of the researchers. Researchers had moved from pure research into development. Money had also flowed into the coffers of the yard to build new ships while the old ones were stood down and mothballed or scrapped. Eventually research had dwindled to a trickle once more. But they had the basics down.

They had been stumped by hyperdrives and some core hyper technology however. Their tech was crude by modern standards, but serviceable the admiral judged. More importantly every piece could be replaced since they had so few modern hulls or pieces of equipment left in their inventory. Their skill sets were unknown, but they had a massive space workforce to tap. Retraining would be key, but he knew that could be managed.

More importantly the yard he'd started was still there. The framework, the complexes, it was there and more. They'd built on his initial start. The industrial replicators had been scrapped, but the complexes they'd been housed in were still available. Something could be done to fix that he thought with a nod.

He turned to the people. According to the initial reports, they had a strong work ethic. They were proud of their heritage and keen to rebuild, to find out what they'd lost and absorb it, learn from it.

Throughout the rebuild and long patient wait for someone to finally come, they had clung to the ideals of the Federation. They were quite proud of that. So was he.

When
Caroline
had left to return to Pyrax, she carried a delegation of twenty people, ten of which were naval and marine officers. On their return they had sidetracked to Nuevo where they had made contact there and picked up another delegation before they had returned home. It had been a tad crowded on the light cruiser, but they'd made it work.

“Are you going forward with the release?” Sprite asked. “I know you wanted to keep Bek as an ace in the hole, both for their safety and to give you time to get them sorted out. It doesn't look like that's going to happen. Interviews are already being scheduled with the delegates,” she warned.

“We'll release it. We're going to have to fully seize control of B101a1 beyond the basic picket,” he said. She nodded. “I'm just glad they both are willing and eager to sign on the dotted line without any hemming and hawing or wrangling over comma placement,” the admiral said.

“And that they have a functioning shipyard and navy is a nice touch. The shipyard was expected, but the navy?” Sprite shook her head. “How are we going to handle that?”

“I'm still wrestling with it. Obviously everyone is going to have to be brought up to speed.”

“They swore the Federation oath, Admiral. They don't have implants or geriatric treatments … modern health care is somewhat laughable,” Sprite said.

The admiral grunted. “I'm not thrilled about inducting Vice Admiral Sienkov and Rear Admiral Zekowitz into our ranks so easily. For one thing both of them outrank Phil.”

“Well, Zekowitz does by date of rank I believe,” Sprite said. “So …”

“So, I'm not sure how we're going to handle this one. Gingerly, with long arms might be wise. But I don't know if we have the time for it.”

“I know. Oops, the news just hit that they have joined up and have a yard and navy, Admiral. I think we better get into this. We can't get ahead of it, but we do need to do some damage control,” Sprite warned.

The admiral nodded. “Get with the press secretary. Acting,” he grimaced.

“ … And I just got a request from Admiral Subert. Apparently your lack of certain cabinet postings reached the ears of the new flag officers. Sienkov is near retirement; it's why he took the mission. He also has an interest in intelligence.”

“You're saying it would go a long way to put him in charge of intelligence? Or in the cabinet posting?” the admiral asked carefully. “That's a jump, Sprite! I don't even know the man!”

“One way to find out. He'd have to go on reserves to take the posting. He could also sit at the joint chief's table since he's the second highest ranking officer in the Federation now.”

“That we know of,” the admiral sighed. “Okay.”

“That was quick,” Sprite said suspiciously, eying him.

“Horse trading,” he replied with a shrug. “Protector, your thoughts?”

“I don't have many, Admiral, not on this subject,” the A.I. replied. Ever since the assassination attempt, Admiral Irons had gone out of his way to draw the A.I. out a bit more to feel him out and see how he was doing. “The appointment might be wise considering Bek's importance in the scheme of things. And he does have the necessary military training … though I question the intelligence angle since Bek was cut off.”

“True, what did they have to work with?” Sprite asked.

“True,” the admiral echoed.

They had no water dwellers among their ranks, but they did have a diverse population in each star system despite the occasional winnowing plague over the centuries. The delegation's officer contingents, the ten from Bek and the two from Nuevo, were a cross representation of those species. He wondered briefly if any of the species thought to be extinct were among them? It would be nice if they found another Malekian or other species.

“I wonder how deep the shock waves will go,” Sprite mused.

“I'm more concerned about when inevitably word gets out to the Horathians,” Protector replied.

“I think is a gold star in our ledger,” the admiral said rising to his feet, “and not just because of what they've got and have accomplished. That's all icing on the cake. I want people to know that we're not going anywhere. And …,” he smiled as he picked up his jacket and shrugged it on. “Sometimes Hail Marys pay off.” Admiral Irons said with a grin.

---<>))))

The reaction from the Bek and Nuevo delegates in Pyrax was a mix of surprise as well as dismay that the Federation was gone but admiration of determination to rebuild. “What took so long?” Admiral Zekowitz demanded. “Surely they were better off than we were!”

“Apparently not,” Moira Sema, Lieutenant Governor of Bek and senior civilian delegate replied dryly. “I talked with a few people while we were en route. They all said the same thing, they lost the keys to the replicators too. Admiral Irons is the lynchpin. He was what they were waiting for. With him, all this became possible once more.”

“Damn,” Admiral Zekowitz murmured, looking at the yard and industrial complexes. “So they weren't kidding when they said they've built this in what, ten years?” he whistled in appreciation.

“So, he was the key to our keeping what tech we've got, and this? It is indeed hard to believe,” Moira replied.

“Believe it. I've never met the man but my great-great-great something or other grandfather did. He's … impressive,” the rear admiral said, looking at her reflection in the window briefly.

“Good to know,” Moira replied, tucking the little tidbit away. She ran her fingers through her close cropped blue hair. It was a dominant trait her family had. That, a gift for piloting, and a weird interest in eye jewelry.

The rear admiral turned to her. “Are you still going to press Irons to become secretary of state? You realize it might be too soon, right?”

She shrugged the thought off. “Why not? I've done fine as lieutenant governor but Bill isn't ready to step down anytime soon and you and I both know it. So, I can … broaden my horizons.” She smiled coyly. He snorted.

“You've always looked onward and outward. Never really happy about the limited political spectrum. Always pushing to get the hyperdrive tech sorted out so we could go back to trading with Nuevo.”

“True,” Moira replied. “And now we've got that. And with a bit of work we'll send back an ansible and a full tech kit to rebuild, to bring Bek up to Federation standards.”

“I know. I can't wait. It sucks though that we're going to be here and not there to see it.”

“I don't see it that way,” Moira replied with a small smile as she played with her fingertips. “I see it as being able to see the galaxy. To be there, at the beginning to help get it going again. We've been doing it in Bek for centuries; it's time we show them what a little Yankee stubbornness and ingenuity can do,” she said firmly.

“You go, girl,” he said softly.

…And secretary of state will let me jump into the political arena nicely. A little threat of dragging our feet in signing on might get me it if persuasion doesn't, Moira thought. And once I've got it, I'll be set for a nice term to grow into the position near the seat of power while being exposed to the ins and outs on one side and the actual voters on the other before I take on bigger and better things, she thought as the admiral departed.

---<>))))

The more he looked at it, the more the works of the Bek people had impressed him. They had a lot of warships in space. All sublight of course and many of them were corvettes or destroyers.

But there were cruisers too. Cruisers and one battleship, which was the flagship of their fleet. That alone impressed him. It made it plain to him that they were ripe to jump into the arena. And judging from the reactions he'd gotten from the delegates when he'd probed them about Horath, they were eager as well.

Which meant he was going to have to move forward with his contingency plan. And that meant breaking the news to Phil, which wasn't a pleasant task he thought.