SpecOps (Expeditionary Force Book 2) (10 page)

“Do we need to get out of here immediately, or not?”

“That, Joe, is a judgment call you need to make."

“Crap.” All decisions, ultimately, fell to the
commander. “Damn it. Major Simms, recall the landing party. Right now. Get them
back to the dropship and off the surface, as soon as possible, and tell them I
do not care what interesting sciency stuff they are doing down there. Pilot,
Skippy, I need jump options to get the
Dutchman
out of here, if needed.”

Through the glass wall, I could see Simms talking into
her microphone, she was shaking her head, then she looked at me. "Sir,
Captain Desai reports that her dropship is forty kilometers from the main site,
she landed there so four people could check out some outbuildings. She has
recalled the second landing party, and estimates she can retrieve those people
and be headed back to the main site in twenty five minutes. Colonel Chang told
her it will take forty minutes for his team to reach the evac site, he has some
people down in an access shaft far beneath the surface, they think they may
have found a section of the base that has not been looted."

"Damn it. While I commend Chang's initiative, his
timing is less than optimal. All right, signal Desai and Chang to move as
quickly as they can do so safely, I don't want someone getting into an
accident, and this becoming a rescue operation."

"Yes, sir." Simms acknowledged.

Adams stepped around the corner from the CIC to talk
with me. "We're bugging out of this system already, sir?"

What she didn't say, and I could see in her eyes, was
that here we had a confirmed Elder site, which we had not fully explored, and
that perhaps we were being hasty about abandoning it just because of some gas
floating above the planet. Another potential Elder site might not be any
better, and we'd be wasting this opportunity. "No, we're not leaving, not
yet. What we are doing is picking up our landing party so they won't be left
behind if we have to jump out of here. I let a large party go down there,
partly to gain experience, on the assumption this star system was safe,
uninhabited. Now we learn that this system may be a high traffic area, because
the planet below us is a gas station. We're going to pull back, and assess the
data. If the risk looks manageable, we will figure out a better way to explore
the site, with multiple options for quick evac." Looking back, it might
have been foolhardy of me to use an Elder site as an opportunity to give people
experience in armor suits on the surface of an airless moon. With both sides of
the war dedicating ships to searching for Elder sites, I should have selected a
less important place for training. What I should have done is ask Skippy to
suggest a completely uninteresting star system, and take the ship there for a
dedicated week of training. Extending the mission by a week would be a small
price to pay, for having pilots with experience landing dropships, and soldiers
and scientists gaining experience walking around and working in Kristang space
suits. This situation needed to be added to my list of opportunities for me to
learn from.

 Adams nodded slowly, looking at me carefully. She
still thought of me as a buck sergeant, and her instincts as an experienced
staff sergeant were to offer me gentle, nudging guidance in what she considered
the right direction. I knew what she was thinking; that I was so inexperienced
as a commander, I was afraid to take even reasonable risks. "Yes,
sir."

Maybe I was being hasty, too risk averse. The four
people in Desai's secondary landing party, who had been checking out structures
away from the main Elder base, were almost back to the dropship, I was watching
a video feed from the dropship. Four people, carefully loping across the rocky
surface of the moon, kicking up puffs of dust as they walked, bouncing lightly.
Damn, I envied them. Even though I had trained in a suit, trained in zero
gravity, low gravity, high gravity, in vacuum and simulated thick atmosphere,
all the training had taken place aboard the
Dutchman
. I wanted to walk
on the surface of a real moon, I wanted to feel like an astronaut. There I was,
commander of a starship, and at the moment, I envied three Indian soldiers and
one Australian scientist, who were striding confidently back to the-

“Uh oh! Joe, jump option Echo, right now.
Now
!”
Skippy shouted.

I nodded to the pilot, and she pressed the proper
button. In a flash, the
Flying
Dutchman
moved, the image on the
main bridge display changed from the surface of a moon, to the cloud tops of
the gas giant. Cloud tops, as in, it looked like we could reach out and touch
them. “Where are we?” I asked, alarmed. "What happened?"

“Don’t worry, Joe, we’re safely above the atmosphere
despite what it looks like, we jumped into an area with an intense magnetic
field, and I’ve engaged stealth. Two Kristang ships jumped in near the planet,
we were on the other side of the moon, I believe we jumped quickly enough that
they did not detect the gamma ray signature of our jump out. We’re now over the
planet’s horizon, that should have shielded our jump in from being seen also.
The Kristang, overall, have crappy sensors on their ships, they have
concentrated on upgrading weapons technology at the expense of sensors, which is
a mistake the stupid lizards have been making for a very long time, they never
learn. Hmm, two more Kristang ships have jumped in. Two, three, five more.
That’s seven Kristang ships, a typical task force."

"What type of ships?"

"It looks like, I'm checking the data as it comes
in, one battlecruiser, two cruisers, two destroyers, a troop transport and a
support ship."

“Can they see us?”

“No. No way, Joe. Our Thuranin stealth field, plus my
own awesome enhancements, are quite effectively shielding us from the laughably
useless sensors the lizards have. We are also encased in the planet’s magnetic
field, which distorts the sensor fields of the Kristang. So, no, they do not
know we are here.”

“What about the landing party? Have the Kristang seen
them?”

“No, not that I am able to determine from Kristang
ship to ship transmissions, the lizards do not appear to have any interest in
the Elder site, that confirms my suspicion that multiple species have picked
over that site, over many years. Just before we jumped, I signaled the landing
party that enemy ships are in system, Captain Desai will have detected their
inbound jump signatures. I am sure she has engaged the dropship’s stealth field
and maintained communications security, and that Colonel Chang has concealed
his team within the Elder facility. Our sensors are no longer able to detect
the dropship, which leads me to believe it is effectively stealthed. Unless
either Desai or Chang break discipline, something that would greatly surprise
me, even given what little I know of them, the Kristang will not learn of their
presence on the surface there.”

Relieved for the moment, I took in a deep breath and
let it out slowly, like a yoga thing, except that I’d never taken a yoga class.
My sister had been big into yoga for a while. “Fine, great. The critical
factor, then, is, how much oxygen does the landing party have?”

“There are two critical factors, Joe," he
corrected me. "How much oxygen the landing party has in their suits, and
how long the Kristang intend to remain here? Assuming Colonel Chang orders the
landing party to lay down, rest, and conserve oxygen, they should have enough
in their suits for thirty two hours. Considering that they will need to walk
back out to the dropship, and during that time they will be increasing their
oxygen usage, thirty hours is the practical limit. As to the Kristang, from
their communications, I have determined they are in this system because they
were dropped off by a Thuranin star carrier that is going in a different
direction, and they are waiting to be picked up by a different star carrier in
thirty six hours. The Kristang are here to practice fleet maneuvers, and for a
refueling exercise. The support ship is capable of extracting fuel from the
atmosphere of a gas giant planet, its tanks are now almost full, so it will not
be going through the actual fuel extraction and refining entire process, which
typically takes six to eight days for the Kristang. For this exercise, the
support ship will only practice lowering its refueling line into the atmosphere
and maintaining a stable position in orbit. The other ships will be conducting
war game exercises, I do not have the details, as they have not been included
in ship to ship transmissions."

“Thirty six hours? That’s too late, uh, wait, if
they’re going to be picked up by the Thuranin, though, they’d want to be at the
rendezvous point plenty ahead of time?” For our landing party, I wanted plenty
of cushion on their oxygen supply.

“Absolutely. The Thuranin have zero patience for
stragglers, their star carriers do not wait for anyone, sometimes including
other Thuranin ships. They have been known to leave behind Kristang ships that
have been as little as ten minutes late to a rendezvous. I expect the Kristang
will want to be certain to arrive at the rendezvous point at least four hours
ahead of time, so they should depart here ten or twelve hours ahead of
time."

I made a long, low whistle of dismay. "Whoooo,
that is cutting it very close. Thirty hours of oxygen for the landing team, and
the Kristang will be here for another twenty four to twenty six hours?"

"The math is brutal, yes."

"Can we get a message to the landing party?"

"Not from here at the moment, but in roughly two
hours, we and the moon will be in position to send a tight-beam burst
transmission, with minimal risk of detection by the Kristang. Unless, of
course, there is a Kristang ship between us and the moon at the time."

"We're going to wait, sir?" Simms asked
skeptically.

"Skippy, what are our chances of taking on seven Kristang
ships? Five warships, right," I asked hopefully, "we don't count the
troop transport or the support ship?"

"Do not ignore those two lesser combatants,
Colonel Joe, they are equipped with missiles and masers, and four of the troop
transport's dropships also carry missiles. The Kristang could hurt us badly in
a fight, a star carrier's best defense is to run away. I do not like the odds
of us engaging seven ships. There is also the problem that other Kristang
ships, I do not yet have a count, are waiting at the edge of this star system.
They could quickly be brought in as reinforcements."

"This isn't a simple standup fight," I
explained to Simms, "we would be vulnerable while we're standing still to
recover the landing party. And as soon as the Kristang see what we're doing,
they for sure will target the landing party, we won't be able to protect them.
We wait. We send a signal to the landing party in about two hours, and we wait
for the Kristang to go away. It sucks, but that's what we do, we wait."

We waited. It did suck. Right at the two hour and
three minute mark, we shot a communications maser toward the moon, advising the
landing party about the situation, the rough timelines for us to recover them,
and ordering them not risk sending a reply. Then we waited some more, a lot
more.

After my duty shift on the bridge was over, I
surrendered the chair to Sergeant Adams. Part of me wanted to stay in the chair
for the full twenty six hours, to not miss a second while my crew stretched out
their dwindling oxygen supply. The crew I had ordered to the surface, and put
in danger, the crew I was responsible for. Needing something to do, I went to
the gym and ran on a treadmill, headphones on and not in a mood for chit chat,
other people in the gym left me alone. Following an hour of sweating on the
treadmill, I took a shower, got a snack from the galley, and went to my office.
Skippy pinged me through my zPhone, that meant he wanted to talk privately.
Putting in my zPhone earpiece, I said "Hey, Skippy, more bad news?"

"Since 'news' is by definition new information,
there is no news. The situation has not changed."

From the display on my iPad, I knew that already. It
still felt good to have Skippy verify what I was seeing. "All right,
what's up?"

"This is a conversation perhaps best conducted in
private, Joe."

"Ah. Got it." I pinged the CIC crew, to let
them know I was going to my cabin. Once there, I closed the door behind me, and
sat down on the bed. The crew knew not to disturb me in my cabin, without
calling me first. "What is it?"

"Joe, I know this will not be a pleasant
conversation."

"Let me guess, you're going to tell me that I
need to consider abandoning Chang's team, in order to continue the
mission."

"Um, yes?" His voice carried genuine surprise.

"Sacrifice a few soldiers, to preserve most of
the crew, and the ship."

"Uh huh," he said slowly. "I'm kind of
at a loss for words here, Joe, I was prepared for a long argument, and now I
got nothing."

"Don't be an ass, Skippy. You think I haven't
considered that I may have to do that? Sit here silently, while the clock runs
out on their oxygen supply, and they choke to death? I have considered that,
I'm the commander. That means I have to put the mission first. It sucks, it
absolutely sucks, I hate it. I'm the commander, it's my job. You think about
this; we're out here for you, this is your mission, we're risking our lives for
you."

"Whoa. That's BS. You're putting all the burden
on me, and you're wrong. Yeah, I need you not to risk the ship. You humans need
to make sure other species do not discover that you are roaming around the
galaxy."

Damn, I had actually hurt his feelings. "That
came out kind of harsh, Skippy, I didn't mean it that way. You saved our
planet, and we have a deal, and I'm going to keep to that deal, even if it
costs lives. I want
you
to understand that."

"I do understand it, Joe."

"Good. I have thought about this a lot, Skippy.
If we don't have a realistic chance to recover the landing party without undue
risks to the ship, then I am simply going to face the facts. It's plain and
simple, Skippy, I can't afford to get emotional about command decisions. So,
yes, I have already decided we will abandon Chang's team, if we have to. Let's
hope it doesn't come to that."

"Joe, occasionally I am confronted with the fact
that you are not only the good-natured dope who I joke around with. I am
reminded that you shot down two Whales in cold blood, killing almost a thousand
sentient beings. And that under your command, we jumped fourteen Kristang
starships inside a planet, killing their entire crews. That doesn't include the
seventy eight Thuranin of their ship's original crew. Or the Kristang who died
when you nuked that asteroid."

"Your point is what?" Occasionally, I was
reminded that Skippy was an AI built by a civilization so far advanced, they
would consider humans to be bugs, at best. He acted friendly to us, and we
needed him to continue to be friendly. My most important job was not commanding
the ship, not leading the crew, not making critical decisions. The most
important thing I did aboard the
Dutchman
was making sure Skippy enjoyed
having us around. If Skippy ever got bored with insulting me and busting my
balls, we would be in trouble. Odd as it is to think about it, my relationship
with that arrogant little shithead was humanity's greatest asset.

"My point, I guess, is that I came into this
discussion assuming I needed to force you to consider an agonizing decision,
and you had already done that. I underestimated you."

"Thank you, Skippy."

"Of course, most of the time, when I think I'm
underestimating you, it turns out I estimated way too high, because you're such
a doofus."

"And, thanks for reminding me what an asshole you
really are."

"Oh, no problem, Joe, any time."

Around seven hours in, I was again in my office, doing
busywork that kept me from hovering around the bridge and distracting the duty
crew. Skippy interrupted my thoughts with more bad news. "Hmm, Joe, I just
learned a possibly interesting tidbit about this task force. The commander is
the third son of high-tier clan leader, he took command of the task force only
recently, and the fleet naturally gave him cast-offs from other task forces. As
such, he jumped his task force in here for training exercises, to whip his new
ships into shape. He is very concerned that his task force will be embarrassed
during a major clan-wide fleet wargame that is scheduled for next month. With
much of the next month taken up in travel time, this is his best opportunity
for training."

"Damn it," I cursed. "That means he's
going to push the time limit, stay here running exercises right to the
deadline." That's what I said, because that's what I would do, if I was
suddenly in command of a second-hand task force.

"My thoughts exactly. There are other Kristang
ships out at the edge of this star system, he took his task force here, so they
can train away from watching eyes. From what I have seen, the commander's fears
about the ships he was given are entirely justified; these ships are poorly
maintained, their crew are inexperienced, and morale is terrible. Thus far, the
ships maneuver clumsily, respond slowly to orders, and their navigators do not
seem to understand left from right. It does not help that this task force
commander is, even for a Kristang, a major hard-ass. It almost makes me feel
sympathetic for the crews under his command."

"Yeah," I said with a frown.
"Almost."

At the eighteen hour, thirty two minute mark, I was
once more in my office when Skippy called. Sleep, although a good idea, had
been elusive, I'd laid down on my bed and tried to get some rest for an hour,
until I gave up and realized there was no way I could peacefully slumber while
the landing party, while my people, were running out of oxygen. So, I'd gone to
my office to study flight training manuals.  "Joe! One of those cruisers
just jumped into low orbit of that moon, on the opposite side from the Elder
base. We didn't have any warning; it was suddenly there. Four dropships are
proceeding down to the surface."

I fairly jumped around the desk and into the corridor.
"Did you inform the bridge?"

"Yes, of course I did, Joe. Major Simms is the
current duty officer."

From my office to the bridge was less than twenty
seconds, that's why I'd selected a tiny closet as my office. Close enough so I
could get there quickly, far enough away and around a corner, so the bridge and
CIC crews didn't feel I was hovering over their shoulders every minute. When I
got there, Simms was already sliding out of the command chair for me. "All
we know is, a cruiser jumped in, with no warning, and launched four dropships
straight down. On their current course and speed, we estimate they will arrive
at the Elder base in twenty seven minutes."

Twenty seven minutes. Because the
Dutchman
could jump there within seconds, we didn't need to act immediately. We could
evaluate the situation, and consider our options. I was about to order Captain
Desai to the bridge, I wanted our most experienced pilot at the controls if we
had to go into combat. Then I remembered Desai wasn't aboard the ship, she was
in a dropship, in stealth, on that moon. This situation was bad, all bad.
"Is there any sign that the Kristang know about the landing party?" I
asked the obvious question. Why else would that cruiser have jumped into orbit
there, and launched four dropships?

"No," Skippy answered, "there were no
such communications before that cruiser jumped, and the cruiser and its four
dropships are maintaining communications silence. It is, however, impossible
for us to assure that we can monitor every single transmission between those
ships. If they are using a tight-beam maser to communicate between ships, the
Dutchman's
sensors have less than a fifty percent chance to intercept the message."

"I'm going to assume they know, somehow they
know, about the landing party. It's the only thing that makes sense. Our
options are, what? We jump in, launch missiles at that cruiser, and hit those
dropships with the maser cannon." I pondered the main display, playing
with the controls on the arm of the command chair; I'd gotten pretty good at
manipulating the display. From our position, we had line of sight to the moon,
the orbits of the moon and the
Dutchman
mean the moon was going behind
the planet within forty minutes. The cruiser was a dot on the display, it was
visible, but was headed behind the moon in less than five minutes. Because we
weren't using the
Dutchman's
sensor field, we had to rely on passive
sensors to detect the enemy ships. Most importantly, four dots on the display
were the Kristang dropships, I zoomed in the view, and it revealed two large
troop transports and two gunships. The dropships had pulled out of their steep
dive from orbit, and were flying low, hugging the airless terrain. An icon on
the display indicated that the ship's sensors were estimating the position of
the dropships. At such distance, and with our sensors dealing with interference
from the planet's magnetic field, detecting the dropships was intermittent.
"Or, hey, how close to the moon's surface can we jump in? We need to
shrink the distance Desai needs to get back aboard. Star carriers aren't
designed to operate in a gravity well, that moon's gravity can't be a problem,
right? Can we-"

"Colonel Joe," Skippy interrupted me,
"we have another option that you should strongly consider; doing nothing
for now, and waiting. I don't think this is a real assault against the landing
party. If they knew humans are down there, their other ships would be deployed
to support the assault force. They are not at the moment; the other ships are
operating independently."

"You think this is an exercise also?" That
surprised me. It also didn't make much sense. The planet had a dozen moons,
having a Kristang cruiser jump into orbit of the one moon where we had a
landing party stranded was too much of a coincidence.

"Yes, I believe it is another exercise. Based on
limited data, yes," Skippy said confidently. "This appears to be one
Kristang ship practicing an assault drop."

"How sure are you about that, Skippy?" I
needed him to be very confident. If the Kristang dropships landed at the Elder
site and their soldiers went inside, it would not matter whether their original
purpose was an exercise or an assault, they were likely to find our landing
party. And then there would certainly be a fight for real.

"Fairly. Hmmm, perhaps that did not give the
impression I intended to convey. To be more accurate, there is a 92%
probability that this is an exercise, and that the Kristang do not know
anything about the presence of our landing party. I can show you, if you like,
how a Kristang task force would deploy to support and assault drop; this task
force is not positioned to assist that one cruiser. Also, those four dropships
have not engaged stealth, that is also unusual. The lack of stealth is a strong
indicator that this is not a true combat situation for the Kristang. If their
intention is to attack our landing party, the tactics of that task force are
truly incompetent."

"92% is good, Skippy, except it only tells me
part of what I need to know. If part of the exercise includes those dropships
landing at the Elder site, and Kristang soldiers going into the Elder site, we
will need to intervene."

"Oh," Skippy sounded disappointed.
"Hmm. I hadn't considered that. We could be forced into combat, even if
that is not currently the intention of the Kristang."

"Uh huh. Also, those other ships are several
light minutes away, our information on their positions and what they are doing
is out of date by that much," I pointed out. That was a problem with our
fancy displays; they made you unconsciously assume the data was all in
real-time and it wasn't. In space combat, almost everything had a time lag of
at least several seconds. When I was in Army basic training, we had to use old
fashioned paper maps, in addition to computer displays, tablets and GPS
equipment. Paper maps made you realize the whole time that a marker showing an
enemy's position, was only as good as how old that data was. We could use some
of that mindset out here now.