Barbarians at the Gates

Chapter Twenty-Two

FNS Magnificent, Boskone System, 4095

“He has grown up a bit, hasn’t he?”

Marius nodded as he poured glasses of wine. If there was one advantage to being—officially, at least—in the Senate’s favor, it was that he was regularly sent gifts by people hoping to ingratiate themselves with him. Marius simply took them, distributed some of them to people who needed the gifts more than him, and never acknowledged any of it, hoping that the senders would get tired of wasting their money. So far, it hadn’t worked. They’d sent very good wine, though.

“He has,” he agreed, as he passed Admiral Mason his glass. He took his seat and tried to relax, even though it was difficult knowing that there was a hostile enemy fleet on the other side of the Asimov Point. Both sides had sent through recon drones from time to time, but neither had followed them up with a full-scale offensive…and nothing less would settle the issue. The defenses on Admiral Justinian’s side of the Asimov Point were formidable. Even if Marius succeeded in breaking through with his fleet, he’d be bled white. “And I noticed that he was a little wary of you.”

“Young upstart,” Mason said without heat. “I guess that the whole incident at Terra Nova convinced most of us oldsters to give him a ship.”

Marius snorted. Mason was fifty years old and, going by some of the pre-war standards, young for his current rank. He wouldn’t have been given Task Force Kidd at all, were it not for the fact that he needed fleet command experience to be promoted higher. Marius expected him to do well, if only because getting in, hitting the target and getting out again were skills that fighter pilots excelled in. Mason hadn’t flown a fighter in years—his leg had had to be replaced after an accident that had nearly killed him—but he still had the guts and determination that had taken him into the cockpit.

“He’s brave,” Marius said after another swallow of wine. “He’ll do well, so don’t attempt to relieve him without a very good cause.”

“Your young protégé,” Mason said dryly. “Why did you assign him to this operation? Midway is a good ship, perfect for the mission, but she’s hardly essential.”

“Everyone needs to learn by doing,” Marius said. “They told us at the Academy that it was sink or swim time. Didn’t they tell you something like that on Mars?”

Mason shrugged.

“I’m surprised you gave me Golden Hind,” he said. “Didn’t the Admiralty want you to keep her out of danger?”

“She’s ideal for the mission,” Marius said, scowling. “And I really cannot spare any of the fleet carriers I have to join you. The Admiralty keeps making noises about transferring some of my superdreadnaughts to face one of the other warlords and that would invite attack from Justinian if he realizes we’ve been weakened. I’d bet you anything you want to put forward that he has his spies in this system, watching us.”

He scowled again. The Core Worlds were the greatest nexus of industrial power in the known universe, but gearing up to produce a vastly-expanded military took time and money. He hadn’t heard much from the Senate, yet there were stories about production issues and work slowdowns that had been largely kept out of the media. Admiral Justinian had been preparing his own industrial base for ten years, and was still building it up. If the war lasted too long, God alone knew how many other warlords would be deploying their own industrial production nodes.

But then, the Bainbridge Protocols had ensured that every system had at least the basics in industrial production. That was something that had come back to bite the Federation on the behind. Hard.

“Losing her would be a public relations catastrophe,” Mason said darkly. “You know that operations are not predictable.”

“No,” Marius agreed. Golden Hind was a star carrier, identical to Enterprise…and, just like her sister, was neither a fleet carrier nor a superdreadnaught. Using her as a mobile base for a raiding party made far more sense than risking her in battle, even though losing her would not amuse the Senate, or the Admiralty either. “I expect you to do as you see fit. I wish I could come with you, but…”

“I know exactly how you feel.” Mason drained his wine and stood up, placing the empty glass on the small table. “I’ll uplink my operational plans once my staff and I have drawn them up, admiral. And I won’t relieve your young officer. Besides, most of the task force will be operating independently during the operation.”

“I know,” Marius said. Realistically, losing the entire task force—even Golden Hind—wouldn’t affect the balance of power that much. The media, however, would go mad and demand answers—and he would shift from public hero to villain very quickly. “Good luck, admiral. Depart as soon as you are ready to go.”

Marius settled back into the sofa as the hatch closed behind Mason. He didn’t want to admit it, but he envied the man. Mason was going to be doing something, rather than floating near an Asimov Point that might at any moment disgorge an attacking fleet with blood in its eye. Marius had learned at the Academy about a politician who’d fancied himself a general; he’d arranged, perhaps by coincidence, that powerful armored forces would be drawn up on the border, facing his enemies. Eventually, the enemies had—like civilians living on a dormant volcano—started to grow used to the threat and to discount it. And then, when his enemy was lured into dangerous complacency, the politician-general had struck—and won.

Of course, if he’d folded his cards then, rather than choose to continue the war, he might have reshaped the world in his image.

There was a chime at the hatch. Marius sent a command through his implants; the hatch hissed open, revealing Commander Raistlin. Marius wasn’t too happy with the thought of having a permanent aide, as he’d always been more comfortable with a tactical staff. But Fleet Admirals were always assigned aides. Marius’ case had been unusual, though, as most senior officers above the rank of captain arranged aides for themselves—but he had to admit that Raistlin had thus far been very helpful. If only he didn’t keep updating his superior on matters that were for junior eyes.

“I have the latest reports from Commodore Tsing,” Raistlin said. He was always polite, but his manner conveyed an undertone of informality that reminded Marius of his exalted family. “He says that his squadron should be back in formation in three days at the latest.”

“Good,” Marius said.

Tsing’s squadron—the One Hundred and Twenty-Third Superdreadnaught Squadron—was largely composed of new ships from the Jupiter Yards, but they’d been having teething problems since before they’d arrived and joined his command. Their engineers had reported that someone had skimped on the shielding, requiring several days of difficult and expensive repair. At least they’d managed to move a mobile dock and fabricator into the system—with the Senate complaining hugely about the cost, of course—and they hadn’t had to send the ships back to the nearest Fleet Yard.

“Has there been any update from Commodore Lopez?” Marius asked.

“No, sir,” Raistlin said. “His last update was at 0700. Since then, his squadron has not reported in to the flagship.”

Marius stroked his chin while remembering that Lopez he hadn’t been given orders to report in regularly. “Never mind, then. If there is no other business, I suggest that you hit your rack and get some sleep. We’re going to have a long and busy day tomorrow.”

He smiled while Raistlin saluted and left the cabin, but frowned as soon as Raistlin was gone. The commander’s very presence was odd. He was good enough at his job, but it was clear that he hadn’t wanted the position. And considering his father’s political connections should’ve assured that Raistlin would’ve been able to get him transferred to a better position, it was even odder that Raistlin was here.

Raistlin’s father was a powerful Senator. The Admiralty wouldn’t pick a fight with him over something as minor as his son’s position. A powerful Senator could cause a great deal of harm if he decided to attack the Navy…

He dropped that train of thought, then activated his implants and uploaded a very specific code into the room’s processor. The hatch sealed with an audible clunk, and the monitors were turned off. No one else on the ship, apart from her captain, could deactivate the monitors at will; indeed, few were even aware they existed. It would only have upset the crew if they’d known that everything they did was recorded.

Once he’d performed a quick sweep for bugs, he unlocked the drawer in which he’d put the private datachip with his thumbprint, and then opened and removed both the datachip and a private terminal. Keeping a private system wasn’t exactly against regulations, as it was tricky to enforce, but it would certainly raise eyebrows if anyone knew he had it.

Just as well they don’t, then, he thought.

He inserted the secure chip into the terminal and waited impatiently while the machine checked it, then demanded his ID codes and retinal patterns. Annoyed, Marius supplied them while, wondering what could be worth this level of security. The datachip unlocked, accessed its opening file and displayed it automatically. A holographic image of Professor Kratman appeared in front of him.

“Good morning, Marius,” Kratman said. He looked older than the last time Marius had seen him, although that could just be due to the tiny image. “Or is it evening where you are? I have no way of knowing, of course, but I like to think that it’s morning there, too. You’ll be pleased to hear that the latest crop of Academy graduates is coming along very well, although I may have to cut a few of them for the crime of not thinking about the subject matter. One of my more successful students is carrying this chip.”

Marius frowned. The Professor was rarely so chatty. It had to be bad news.

“Bad news first,” Kratman said, as if echoing Marius’s thoughts. “The expanded training camps for new crewmen aren’t producing anything like enough crew for the new construction. Now that the Naval Reserve has opened up all of their facilities, I fear that we may be looking at a shortfall in the required numbers of new crew. The ones we trained before the war—or should I say wars now, I wonder?—were the ones who actually wanted the positions, and we could weed through them at will. The expanded training camps are actually taking recruits we wouldn’t have taken at all, back in the old days.”

He shrugged. “It isn’t a new problem, son. Earth’s educational establishment has been producing ignorant kids for centuries. Kids who have the drive to learn can access the information they need, but no one kicks them in the ass and tells them to get moving. And most of them opt for easy courses and credentials before leaving school at eighteen and going on the dole and producing a few more stupid kids. Anyone smart enough to actually make something of himself is smart enough to emigrate—and God knows that anyone capable of doing that on Earth will be a success even on a hell-world. Mostly, the ones we have would normally become couch potatoes or gangsters—and die young.

“But this is the raw material we have to work with, so we need to turn them into crewmen. It isn’t an easy task. Nine-tenths of Earth’s population can’t even read! We’ve had to open up remedial training centers for the youngsters, and it really isn’t enough. They don’t understand anything we tell them beyond the very basics, if that. The hell of it is that this will dumb down the entire fleet once they graduate. Honestly, I’d be afraid to sail on a ship maintained by some of the so-called recruits. And believe me, most of the Core Worlds are in the same state. The really smart ones emigrated generations ago.

“Matters aren’t helped by the fact that the Senate has created a whole new series of security agencies,” he added. “One of my contacts warned me that there is a movement afoot to start assigning political officers to your ships—and fortresses, and training centers…basically, they will have vast powers to seek out and destroy anti-Federation elements. You can probably imagine that it won’t be long before their powers really start to expand. You need to be careful of this, Marius. The Senate is scared, and scared people do stupid things.”

He chuckled. “Speaking of the Senate, they’re still trying to find a bride for you. No, I don’t think that you or she will have much choice in the matter. It isn’t common for someone like yourself to marry into the political elite, but I think that some elements are determined to bind you strongly to them. It’s odd, though; I’ve been telling every cadet who will listen that the political elite is barely a tiny fraction of a percentage of the trillions of human beings, yet they still haven’t managed to find you a bride. If I had to guess, I’d say that they are either squabbling over who won’t have to marry you, or they are stalling. Probably the latter—but seriously, I suspect that it won’t be long before they produce someone and tell you to marry her. I’ve attached a list of possible brides, but there are no guarantees. Luckily, you don’t have to love the woman. You don’t even need to have sex with her, not to produce a kid or two. Pretty much all of High Society use artificial wombs these days.

“But back to the matter at hand. I’m afraid that there have been more…incidents at various construction yards than made it into the official reports. I wouldn’t have heard anything if I’d just been dependent on the standard chains of communication. Going from what I heard, there have been everything from dangerous accidents caused by poor workers to strikes and perhaps even outright sabotage. I don’t think that any of them are actually linked to the warlords, but it hasn’t helped the Senate’s sense of security. The last I heard, they were talking about sending in a military regiment and using force to impose order. I’m not convinced that that is going to work very well. If the workers are drawn from the same labor pool as the trainee crewmen, they’re just going to be fearful as well as ignorant.”

He stared down at his hands for a long moment. “I have heard through one of our mutual friends that Senator Chang Li has absconded from Earth. I had the pleasure of meeting her at one of the Academy’s inspection tours and she struck me as impressive, perhaps the smartest political figure I have ever met. Quite ineffectual, of course, and I suspect that her departure is linked to the current series of…problems. The last I heard, just before she left, the Senate was talking about conscripting workers from the out-worlds and putting them to work on the construction yards, perhaps even recruiting them for the fleet. You know how nervous they’ve been about colonials in the Navy since the Inheritance Wars. It will be a disaster if they try to conscript unwilling recruits in large numbers. The last thing we need is a second round of colonial wars. At least they’re not thinking about recruiting aliens.”

“Or perhaps they are,” he added, brow furrowing. “They’re working on recruiting a specialised unit, and the security is quite phenomenal. The unit may be composed of specially-trained people from Earth, or maybe aliens. It isn’t as if the Federation is short of aliens who would be interested in cracking human skulls for a living.”

The Professor looked up. “I promised myself that I’d send you some cheerful news, but we have a slight shortage of it,” he concluded. “There are rumors that at least three of the warlords are organizing themselves into a single unit—luckily, not an overwhelmingly powerful unit, but enough to be dangerous. And the Senate feels that it cannot rely on any senior officer, except you, perhaps. I’d be surprised if they trusted you completely. Watch your back.”

He grinned, adding: “And a military victory would be good, too. Good luck.”

His image vanished. Marius put the chip and his private terminal away, making sure to secure the drawer properly, then sat down again and thought about what he had been told. He’d rerun the message later, of course—it would run three times before it was automatically wiped from the chip—and read through the files the Professor had included, too, later at night when he’d not be disturbed. He wasn’t too interested in any prospective bride; he’d never married, and had never intended to marry. And yet, the Senate was tempting him with the ultimate prize. His descendants would be part of the political elite that ruled the Federation.

And yet…who was really running the show? It wasn’t hard to guess who Kratman worked for, besides the Federation Navy. His position was ideal for selecting and investigating prospective recruits. And he had access to information that a lowly professor, no matter how well-connected, should never have been able to access.

He keyed his intercom, unlocking the privacy shields. “Gary,” he said when he was linked to the CIC. “I want you to find Commodore Arunika, wherever she is. When you find her, tell her to report to me in my cabin. I need to see her as soon as possible.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Owen said. “Fleet Com shows her on the fleet carrier Helena Cain. She should be with you within an hour.”

“Thank you,” Marius said. “I’ll wait.”