Alarm of War

Fortitude goes to the ship’s captain and I will assume command of your Fleet. Do you understand me, Admiral?”

There was a long pause as Admiral Kaeser contemplated the ruin of his career and, worse, the fate of his Fleet in the hands of this blustering fool. But a lifetime of soldiering on despite poor commanding officers and terrible odds won out.

“Just so,” he replied icily, then turned and marched stiffly off the bridge.

“Captain…” Mello consulted his computer listing. “Captain Bauer?”

“Yes, Admiral,” Bauer replied stiffly.

“Have you left orbit around Cornwall?”

“Yes, Admiral. We left as soon as we received your transmission. We are approximately twenty five hours from your position at best military speed.”

“Good, get here as fast as you can. Where are your supply ships?”

“Two hours behind us, sir, per customary protocol.”

“Send them on ahead at full speed, Captain. We have urgent need of them here.”

Bauer looked uncomfortable, hesitant to deliver bad news. “Admiral, these are older model ships. They can barely keep up with our war ships at normal cruising speed; they cannot sustain best military speed for more than an hour, and at that only with risk to their engine plants. Under the best circumstances, the supply ships will arrive several hours after our main body of the Second Attack Fleet.”

Mello scowled. He had assumed that the Second Attack Fleet had received the next generation supply ships as well. No matter. “Get here as quickly as you can, Captain, and order your supply ships to make the best speed possible. The Victorians are escaping to the Refuge sector, and we must stop them. We have exhausted our munitions and some of my ships need repairs. We need those supply ships.”

Bauer wondered just what had happened to the First Attack Fleet’s supply ships, but kept the thought to himself.

“And Captain,” Mello said. “Make sure the supply ships are adequately guarded. The Vickies have patrols out. We think we destroyed them, but take no chances.”

“As you command, Admiral.”

Mello fell back into his chair, chaffing at the delay. If the Vickies somehow managed to escape, he would shoot Admiral Kaeser himself.

Grant Skiffington sat glumly in the captain’s chair. So Lisa Stein was right after all, the space around Cornwall was crawling with Dominion ships. He had counted fifty before he gave up in disgust. The Dominion had come in and must have kicked the hell out of the Home Fleet. Dominion now ruled the Victorian Sector.

“Captain,” Livy Wexler said from the sensors console.

Grant looked at her.

“I’ve been going over the sensor logs. Three things stick out. First, somebody used nuclear weapons on the surface of Cornwall. The drone couldn’t pinpoint it, but it appears to be near the royal palace.” The bridge crew exchanged worried glances. Grant felt the bottom fall out of his stomach. Too much was happening. Second Fleet destroyed, then the Dominion invasion of Victoria, and now an attack on Queen Beatrice’s palace?

“Second,” Livy continued, “the space stations are not there. Where Prometheus should be there is a very large debris field. It looks like there were a number of Dominion ships near the Prometheus and it blew up, taking the ships with it. From the radiation signature, somebody was using antimatter weapons.”

Grant frowned. “What about Atlas?”

Wexler shrugged. “It’s not there.”

“You mean it’s been destroyed?” he asked in confusion.

“No, there is no trace of debris. It’s gone.”

Now he was very confused. Gone? Atlas was huge. How did one of the largest man-made objects in history just get up and walk away? You’d need every tugboat in the Victorian fleet to- He closed his eyes. No, that couldn’t be right, could it?

“Livy, check the logs from the drone. Did it detect any tugboats in the area around Cornwall?”

Livy typed in her search command, studied the results. “Well, that’s strange, there should be tug boats all around that area, but you’re right, the drone didn’t spot any.” She looked up, frowning. “Surely you’re not suggesting that-” She looked dumfounded. “Where would they go? Darwin?”

Grant shook his head. “To get to Darwin, they would have had to go in the general direction of the wormhole to the Dominion, but we know that the Dominion must have been pouring war ships through that wormhole into Victoria. First Fleet couldn’t take the chance they’d run into a superior force. No, if anything, they’d run away from the DUC wormhole. Cape Breton, perhaps? Sybil Head?” But even as he asked, he knew neither was correct. Both were too far away, and neither was particularly friendly towards Queen Beatrice’s Administration. Years of bitter trade disputes had taken their toll.

“If it was me, I’d run for Refuge,” one of the bridge crew offered. There were several nods of agreement. And once Grant thought about it, he saw that it was the obvious choice. Refuge was bound to Victoria. Not too long ago, Victoria had saved the people on Refuge from extinction.

One hundred years earlier a virus had destroyed all of the consumable crops Refuge had planted, and turned what was already in storage to rotten mush. Within the space of thirty days, Refuge lost virtually all of its wheat, corn, barely, rice and vegetables. As the threat of immediate starvation loomed, King Adolf, Beatrice’s grandfather, came to the rescue. He sent thousands of freighters carrying foodstuffs. When Victorian’s own supply of foodstuffs ran low, he dipped into the Victorian treasury to buy more from the other Sectors.

Then he sent Victorian’s best agricultural scientists and agronomists to Refuge to trace the cause of the blight and eradicate it. And then, over the next ten years, Victoria supplied Refuge with enough seed stocks to restart the beleaguered planet’s agriculture program. A very grateful Council of Elders from Refuge had asked what Refuge could do to repay Adolf and Victoria for their efforts. Adolf had famously replied: “We are none of us alone. Today we have the honor of helping you, but the day will come when we in turn must ask your favor. We only ask that you remember us with kindness.”

The Council of Elders had replied by building a monument in the middle of a large park, with words carved a hundred feet high out of living rock:

“Refuge honors its debts.”

Grant nodded to himself. Then Livy Wexler caught his eye. “There is one more thing, Captain,” she said. “The last report from our recon drone showed the Dominion fleet around Cornwall is pulling out.”

“Let me guess,” Grant said. “They’re heading towards Refuge.”

Livy nodded.

“Okay, then,” Grant said briskly. “Contact the Galway and the Kent. Rig for full stealth and set a course for Refuge. Let’s see if we can find our misplaced space station.”

“And one more thing, Captain.” She leaned in closer and he thought she was going to whisper something about their night together. “After this meal, we’re out of food.”

“What?” Grant was bewildered. For the past several days he had worried about Tilleke commandoes, Dominion war ships and how to get back to Victoria, but he had never even considered something so prosaic as food. “How did that happen?”

Livy shrugged. “When we left Victoria for Tilleke, we only stocked a week’s worth of food. Everyone thought if we needed more we’d just get it from the supply ships. Then in some of the fighting part of the refrigeration system got knocked out and we lost most of what was left. Now we’ve got enough for one real meal, plus about another day or so of hard rations.

“Suffering Gods,” he said irritably. He ran a hand through his hair. Food? “Okay, check with Galway and Kent and see if they’ve got any to spare.” He shook his head. Food.

On the Space Station Atlas, Admiral Douthat was confronting a belligerent Captain Wicklow. Or rather, being confronted by him.

“What do you mean, mutineers?” Admiral Douthat looked incredulous.