Ep.#11 - A Rock and a Hard Place (The Frontiers Saga - Part 2: Rogue Castes) Read online

  Table Of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Frontiers Saga Part 2: Rogue Castes

  Episode #11: A Rock and a Hard Place

  Copyright © 2019 by Ryk Brown All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to locales, events, business establishments, or actual persons—living or dead—is entirely coincidental.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The cavernous hall was filled with the voices of countless caste leaders as they argued incessantly over the fate of their empire. The past few months had been difficult, and tempers within the halls of the Jung leadership were nearly as high as those of the public at large.

  A gavel struck the metal plate on Kor-Dom Borrol’s podium several times as he tried in vain to quiet the raucous debates threatening to escalate out of control at any moment. “Silence!” he demanded as he continued to pound away. “SILENCE!”

  Although the level of discourse diminished greatly, the room was still far from quiet. Kor-Dom Borrol knew it would have to suffice. Pressing matters were to be decided. “The time has come!” he demanded. “The people of the empire demand action!”

  “The Tonba-Hon-Venar must be invoked!” Dom Zorakh bellowed from the gallery.

  “You are out of order!” Dom Jung-Torret objected from the leadership table.

  “Tonba-Hon-Venar!” several others shouted in support of Lord Zorakh.

  “We cannot stand against the Terran jump ships!” Dom Dais argued. “They will pick our fleet apart, disappearing before we can retaliate.”

  “Your confidence in our forces is truly inspiring,” Dom Immoritt quipped, obviously annoyed by the isolationist’s remarks.

  “I speak the truth!” Dom Dais insisted.

  “The only truth you present is your own ignorance of our fleet’s abilities,” Dom Immoritt retorted.

  “Can you defeat the Terran fleet?” Kor-Dom Borrol challenged.

  “It is possible,” Dom Immoritt insisted. “We have four times their number.”

  “But our battle platforms have all been destroyed!” Dom Jung-Torret reminded them, siding with Dom Dais.

  “Not all,” Dom Immoritt replied, a wry smile on his face.

  “Explain yourself, Dom Immoritt,” Kor-Dom Borrol instructed.

  “We have kept three platforms in hiding,” Dom Immoritt explained. “Since the destruction of Zhu-Anok.”

  “Why have you not told us of this sooner?” Kor-Dom Borrol demanded to know.

  “Fleet operations are the purview of Jung-Mogan caste,” Dom Jung-Mogan reminded Kor-Dom Borrol in a most indignant manner. “We are neither required nor compelled to report on the movement of every ship to any other caste…not even the Borrol caste,” he added with a menacing gaze.

  “The platforms were on the outer rim when Zhu-Anok was destroyed,” Dom Kirton explained, jumping in to defuse the confrontation between Dom Jung-Mogan and Kor-Dom Borrol. “They were moved toward Sol a few months later, as soon as word reached them. Their route was circuitous, as one might expect, but all three ships are currently only a few months from striking distance of Sol.”

  “You’re saying we have battle platforms inside Alliance space?” Kor-Dom Borrol questioned.

  “I assure you, they are still well outside the Sol Alliance boundaries.”

  “Three battle platforms are not enough!” Dom Dais argued.

  “Again, you demonstrate your ignorance,” Dom Jung-Mogan seethed. “We still have more than eighty warships, twenty of which are battleships. The Sol Alliance has a single capital ship, a few hundred gunships, and a handful of destroyers.”

  “I ask you again, Dom Jung-Mogan,” Kor-Dom Borrol repeated, appearing impatient, “can you defeat the Sol Alliance?”

  Dom Jung-Mogan looked at the faces of the leadership council. “There will be losses…many losses. If we attack, they will target our worlds. Millions will die, perhaps billions. It will make the Day of Blood look like a spring festival. However, their jump weapons are useless if they do not know where their targets are located. We must be constantly on the move. We must be unpredictable. By doing so, we force them to face us head-to-head, to fight it out.”

  “But their jump drives…”

  “I am tired of your fear of the Terran jump drive,” Dom Jung-Mogan said as he waved his hand dismissively. “With but a few modifications, we can do the same with our FTL drive. The only difference is the range and in battle, that advantage withers.”

  “But they have the Aurora,” Dom Dais pointed out.

  “I often wonder just how you rose to the head of your caste,” Dom Jung-Mogan said, eying the leader of the Dais caste with disfavor.

  “Your insults fall on deaf ears,” Dom Dais replied, looking away from his adversary.

  “This bickering must come to an end,” Kor-Dom Borrol insisted. “The people are crying out for vengeance.” He looked at Dom Jung-Mogan once again. “Can you defeat them?”

  “Call for the Tonba-Hon-Venar, and our forces will bring the Sol Alliance to their knees,” Dom Jung-Mogan promised confidently.

  “We vote now!” another Dom demanded. Within seconds, his sentiment was echoed by nearly everyone in the great hall.

  “Very well,” Kor-Dom Borrol agreed, banging his gavel on the metal plate, on the corner of his podium. “Let the vote begin!” He turned to Dom Jung-Mogan. “Dom Jung-Mogan, for the Tonba-Hon-Venar, how say you?”

  Dom Jung-Mogan rose to his feet, his cape spilling down behind him. He pulled at his uniform jacket as he took a breath. “The Jung-Mogan caste calls for the Tonba-Hon-Venar!”

  Cheers rang out as the first vote in favor of war was cast. Kor-Dom Borrol, again, slammed the head of his gavel down hard, trying to gain control of the room. There were still twenty-six more castes to be polled.

  * * *

  Captain Madrid paced the width of the Manamu’s bridge as she waited for her crew to be ready for their first test jump. They had spent the last two weeks in refit, during which dozens of technicians, most of them from Rakuen, crawled about her ship, much to the chagrin of her chief engineer.

  “We should have full charge in all banks in ninety seconds,” her first officer reported.

  “What about bank thirteen?” the captain wondered.

  “They managed to settle it down,” Vemados assured her. “It hasn’t fluctuated more than one percent in the last ten minutes.”

  “Any explanation as to what was causing the problem?” she wondered.

  “Yes, but not one that I understood,” Vemados admitted.

  “The first jump is only one hundred light years,” Ewan, her chief engineer, reminded her, “so we
don’t even need all sixteen energy banks.”

  “Only one hundred light years,” Garland moaned from the Manamu’s helm. “Has anyone here done the math? A one-hundredth-of-a-degree variance off our course would result in a…”

  “We’ve done the math, thanks,” Captain Madrid interrupted her nervous pilot.

  “I can assure you that there is nothing to fear,” Mister Esari insisted. “The gen-four emitters have individual fail-safes. If any two adjacent emitters develop problems in the final moments prior to the jump event, they send out a signal that causes the entire system to abort before the release of energy.”

  “And this, too, is a new feature that has yet to be tested,” the pilot commented.

  “We have conducted numerous computer simulations on the system,” Mister Esari assured him.

  “Then why are we even testing it?” Garland asked.

  “All new systems must eventually be validated by actual testing,” Mister Esari insisted.

  “Why not test them with a drone?”

  “Enough, Garland,” Captain Madrid chided.

  “The system requires considerably more energy than any drone could generate,” Mister Esari explained. “The Manamu has large enough bays to accommodate the additional energy storage banks and the mini-ZPEDS to charge them.”

  “He knows,” Sheba told Mister Esari. “He’s just being difficult.”

  “Banks are fully charged,” Vemados announced.

  “All systems show ready for the first jump,” Ewan reported from the engineering station.

  Captain Madrid looked at Mister Esari. “One hundred light years?”

  “That is correct, Captain.”

  “Eesh,” Garland said, only half to himself.

  “In order to complete the validation testing as expeditiously as possible, it is necessary to conduct three tests, each at the maximum range of the energy transfer threshold for one, two, and three sets of energy banks,” Mister Esari began.

  “Please, don’t,” Garland interrupted. “Let’s just get it over with.”

  “He’s a ‘pull the bandage off quickly’ kind of guy,” Captain Madrid explained.

  “I see,” Mister Esari replied, turning back to his console. “Whenever you are ready.”

  “How’s our jump line, Tobi?” the captain inquired.

  “Clear out to max sensor range,” her sensor officer replied.

  “Mister Kreuz, if you please,” the captain invited.

  “If I please, then we don’t jump,” Garland muttered as he entered one hundred light years as the jump distance. He paused a moment, waiting for the jump navigation computers to finish their calculations. When the ready indicator flashed, he reluctantly announced, “One hundred light years, plotted and ready, Captain.”

  “Very well,” Sheba replied. She took a deep breath and added, “Execute the jump.”

  Garland also took a deep breath, placed his finger on the jump button, closed his eyes, and executed the jump.

  The Manamu’s small bridge flashed with blue-white light. For a brief moment, Sheba allowed herself to ponder all the ways the jump could go terribly wrong. Space was vast and relatively empty, but it wasn’t completely empty. Stars, planets, asteroids big and small…any one of which, when collided with, could destroy them, shields or no shields. Surprisingly, it wasn’t the larger objects that worried her. Such objects had known orbits, and their positions could be calculated by her ship’s jump navigation computers with incredible accuracy. It was the smaller objects, the ones too large to be stopped by their shields but too small to be detected, tracked, or their position predicted. Those were the ones that nagged at her every time her ship jumped.

  Over the years, she had learned to ignore the risk. After all, there was little she could do about it. That risk had been there long before; the invention of the jump drive had only magnified it. Besides, if they did collide with something, they would never know it. Death would be instantaneous.

  At least…she hoped.

  The flash subsided, and they were still there.

  “Position?” Sheba asked.

  “Nav com is recalculating our position,” Garland replied, still anticipating disaster.

  “It will take a few moments,” Mister Esari warned. “Your jump-nav com was not expecting such a drastic change in position after a single jump.”

  “Position verified,” Garland interrupted, a hint of pride in his tone. “We are currently twenty-seven light years from the Porus system.” He turned to his captain, a look of disbelief on his face. “Precisely one hundred light years from the Rogen system.”

  “You just conducted the longest controlled jump in history, Mister Kreuz,” Captain Madrid congratulated, also smiling.

  * * *

  “The installation of mark three plasma cannons on the Glendanon has been completed,” Cameron reported to the senior staff gathered in the Aurora’s command briefing room. “She now has a total of four mark three turrets, as well as point-defenses, and a pair of jump missile launchers.”

  “What about the Weatherly?” Nathan asked from the head of the conference table.

  “Both of the Weatherly’s jump missile launchers will be operational in a few days.”

  “Excellent,” Nathan replied. He looked to Vladimir next. “How is our jump drive upgrade going, Commander?”

  “We have completed the upgrade of the power transfer trunks and are now working on the individual runs to each emitter,” Vladimir reported from the opposite end of the conference table.

  “Aren’t you getting a little ahead of yourself?” Cameron wondered.

  “I was instructed to proceed with…”

  “It was my idea,” Nathan interrupted, taking Cameron’s focus off their chief engineer.

  He was successful; Cameron’s building ire was evident by the look she flashed him.

  “For expediency’s sake,” Nathan added, seemingly unconcerned with his first officer’s anger.

  “Wouldn’t it be wiser to wait until all testing has been completed?” Cameron suggested.

  “The Manamu successfully jumped to a distance of three hundred light years during her first validation flight,” Abby reported. “The power-handling requirements given to Commander Kamenetskiy were based on the emitter’s maximum power-handling capabilities and provided plenty of buffer. The majority of the work will be in reprogramming the Aurora’s jump navigation and control systems to deal with the increased range and its greater power requirements.”

  “Even if the new emitters are capable of jumping twice the distance anticipated, the new power distribution system will be able to handle the load,” Vladimir promised. “As ordered, we have made it quite robust, as well as building in considerable redundancy.”

  “How long until the long-range jump system is operational?” Nathan inquired.

  “That depends on how quickly we get the new emitters,” Vladimir replied.

  “Validation testing should conclude tomorrow,” Abby explained. “We will start mass production in a few days, and we should have enough emitters for your first array two days later.”

  “Then, two weeks; perhaps, three,” Vladimir surmised. “Assuming validation testing does not reveal any problems,” he added, taking the opportunity to jab at Abby.

  “It will not,” Abby insisted, unaffected by his remark.

  “Very well,” Nathan said. “Moving on, then. Jump missiles?”

  “Mass production has begun in two plants on Rakuen and one on Neramese,” Cameron reported. “A second plant on Neramese will become operational in a few days. The first missiles won’t begin rolling off the assembly lines for nearly a week, but once they do, we expect the four facilities to produce one missile per day, each, for a total of four missiles per day.”

  “That will take some time to reach satisfactory levels,” N
athan said, concerned.

  “Two more plants are under construction on each world,” Cameron added, “So within a couple weeks, the production rate will double.”

  “What about the surface-based jump missile launchers?” Nathan asked.

  “By utilizing the same design as the Orochi and beefing up the hydraulics to operate in a gravity environment, we were able to speed up production,” Deliza announced with pride. “More than twenty of them have already been assembled and are being installed on both Rakuen and Neramese.”

  “In equal numbers, I assume,” Nathan said.

  “Of course,” Deliza assured him. “They should be ready by the time new jump missiles start rolling out of the factories.”

  “Good work,” Nathan congratulated.

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “Speaking of the Orochi,” Cameron interjected, “the sixth ship is launching today and the seventh a few days from now. We should have all of them operational within a few weeks.”

  “Then it sounds like the Rogen system’s ability to defend itself is coming along nicely,” General Telles opined. “If the Aurora is able to transit between the Pentaurus cluster and the Rogen system at will, and without delay, then we will be free to press the attack and turn the tide of this conflict.”

  “Let’s hope,” Nathan agreed. He looked at the faces around the table. “Anything else to report?” he asked, noticing a distressed expression on Lieutenant Commander Shinoda’s face. “Lieutenant Commander?”

  Lieutenant Commander Shinoda sighed. “There is some unsettling intelligence.”

  “Let’s hear it,” Nathan urged.

  “Operatives on Takara report that General Hesson, Lord Dusahn’s senior military advisor, has been absent for six days, now. The timing of his absence coincides with our attack on Rama.”

  “Maybe he was taken ill, or something?” Cameron suggested.

  “He has been spotted at restaurants, parks, even shopping,” Lieutenant Commander Shinoda added. “He appears to be healthy.”

  “A vacation?” Vladimir suggested.

  “In the middle of a war?” Nathan retorted. “Unlikely.”