The Sacred Stars (The Shadow Space Chronicles Book 4) Read online

  Lucius looked more than a little uncomfortable. Long before she'd even met Reese he had been Lucius's friend. It was through her brother that she and Reese met. Reese was charming, handsome, intelligent... and he only ever cared about himself, she thought bitterly.

  She could see the discomfort on her brother’s face and Alannis gave a sigh. “Alright... when I get back from this assignment, I'll take some time off, I'll spend some time with Anthony, okay? I'd do it now, but I've got to report in this afternoon.” She didn't mention that she'd asked for an early report time, partially out of excitement to get to her first assignment and partially because it gave her an excuse not to guilt-tripped by her brother.

  Besides, she thought, it's not like I even know how to be a parent. Her father had led a failed coup against Emperor Romulus II and her mother had committed suicide when she was only a few weeks old. She and Lucius had been raised by their grandmother.

  Alannis could tell that Lucius wasn't happy with her answer, but he didn't push her. There will be time later, she told herself, when Anthony is older, I can explain it all to him.

  Somehow, that didn't make her feel any better.

  ***

  Sanctuary Station, Faraday System

  United Colonies

  June 21, 2407

  “Sir,” Alannis said, “Ensign Giovanni reporting for duty.” She gave a crisp salute and then passed over her orders.”

  Captain Beeson returned the salute sharply. Despite the fact that he must have known she'd be reporting, he took the paper copy of her orders and examined them carefully. “Everything is in order,” he said and passed them back. “Chief Donnitz will want to in-process you, but I'd like you to tour the ship, first.” He looked over, “Lieutenant Perkins!”

  The tall, gaunt Lieutenant snapped to attention, “Sir?”

  “Please give the ensign a tour of the ship,” Captain Beeson said. He frowned then, “And if you see Lieutenant Commander Bowder, please introduce the XO to our new officer.”

  “Yes, sir,” Lieutenant Perkins said. He jerked his head at Alannis and then headed for the back hatch to the bridge. Alannis gave a parting salute to the commanding officer and then followed.

  “So,” Lieutenant Perkins said, “Find your way to the ship with no problems?” The Lieutenant seemed familiar for some reason. He had a twangy accent, most unlike the prim and proper Nova Roman or the core worlds. He was tall, taller even than her ex-husband, with closely cropped dark brown hair and dark brown eyes to match.

  “Yes, sir,” Alannis said. Sanctuary Station was the Fleet's new military station in orbit over the gas giant Sanctuary. Unlike the older Skydock Station in orbit over Faraday, the Department of War had designed the station purely for construction, repair, and docking of military ships. While some of the docks had been online and functional for over two years, much of the rest of the station still wasn't operational.

  The Constellation's berth lay at the very first of a long chain of military docks. Only two other ships shared the space, the Constellation's two sister ships, neither of which had been commissioned yet.

  Most of the system's other military traffic was in orbit over Faraday. In fact, other than the shipments of personnel for the new ships and deliveries of materials and supplies for the shipyard, there wasn't much of any activity around Sanctuary Station. I suppose that was some of the idea behind putting it out here, she thought, fewer prying eyes to see military secrets.

  She followed Lieutenant Perkins down the corridor. Everything had a new and shiny feel to it. The markings on the walls were crisp and sharp, the gray paint was clean, and there were no scuff-marks anywhere to be seen.

  “So,” Perkins said, “we actually finished our trial cruise and official acceptance two days ago. Until then we only had two thirds of our personnel complement. You're the first of our new officers to arrive, so you'll get the pick of the Ensign's quarters.”

  He turned down a corridor and then paused. “This is officer country. XO and Chief Engineer's quarters are fore and aft respectively. Further down the hall you've got the shared quarters for lieutenants... and then there at the end there's the Ensign and Midshipman quarters.” He hiked a thumb over his shoulder, “Captain's quarters are back towards the bridge.”

  Perkins continued on, “You saw the bridge, we have two engine rooms for our two reactors, forward and aft. Weapons control is broken down by forward and aft as well. You know about the new armament?”

  Alannis frowned, “I'd only heard rumors. The manuals aren't available even in secure systems yet.”

  “Well...” Lieutenant Perkins gave a wry grin over his shoulder, “that's probably because we're rewriting the manuals just about every day.” He ducked under a low pipe without looking and then led her down a ladder. She didn't know how he managed the tight confines of the ship without injury. She felt claustrophobic as they took a particularly narrow ladder. “The reason we're not taking the drop-lifts, by the way, is they're offline for calibration,” he said.

  “Oh,” Alannis said in reply. She rather hoped they'd locked down all the access doors to the shafts then, otherwise a crewman would be in for a rather big surprise when they stepped into open air and the gravity system didn't catch them.

  “This is forward weapon control,” Lieutenant Perkins said as they came into the chamber. It didn't look like much. The beam generators were four bulky pieces of equipment with piping and conduits coming off.

  “No, no, no, no!” A man shouted. “You stupid imbecile, this is a piece of equipment that generates and accelerates high energy exotic particles... do you really want to kill us all!?”

  Alannis turned and saw a short, balding man in civilian garb waving his hands in the air in front of an enlisted man. Alannis recognized Rory after a moment, the short, chubby engineer was some kind of expert on alien technology or something. Her brother had mentioned that he had him working on a variety of projects, apparently this was one.

  The Weapons Tech looked like he wanted to do nothing more than escape. “Uh, sir, I'm just doing maintenance...”

  “Just following orders, is it?” Rory demanded. “Do you think that will excuse you when you destroy not just this entire ship, but the station we're docked with!?”

  Almost on cue, Feliks, Rory's constant companion, stuck his head out of an open maintenance hatch. The tall, skinny engineer had a pair of glasses perched on his nose and he had a patient expression, “In all likelihood, what he has done would only destroy the forward end of the vessel.” His rough Centauri Confederation accent gave his calm, soft-spoken tone more weight.

  “Only? Only!?” Rory demanded. “I happen to currently be in the forward end of this vessel! And you didn't consider the consequences of the reversed polarity on the power junction... did you?”

  Feliks cocked his head as he considered that “No.”

  He pulled out his datapad even as Rory turned to face Lieutenant Perkins. “I demand that this man be fired immediately! He jeopardized the lives of the entire crew and especially the passengers!”

  “He means him,” Feliks said helpfully without looking up as he tapped at his datapad.

  “I am a nearly irreplaceable engineer with both incredible talent and unrivaled credentials,” Rory said.

  “What did Technical Specialist Spurlock do?” Lieutenant Perkins asked in a resigned tone.

  “What did he do... what didn't he do!” Rory waved his hands in the air. “He could have killed all of us!”

  “Rory,” Lieutenant Perkins said in a level voice, “No one on this ship was intentionally trying to kill you. If you would please explain to me what the issue is, I'll address it. If you keep having histrionics, I won't be able to fix the problem.”

  “You can't just fix this kind of thing,” Rory said. “He used the wrong torsional wrench on the power conduit bolts, which meant they were too tight. I'd give it a ninety percent--”

  “Hmm, fifty percent at most,” Feliks disagreed, still without looking up.
r />   “...seventy percent chance of those bolts shattering when the main weapon systems fired, which would have caused a power disruption to the main power junction. In turn, that would have overridden the particle generator's regulator and caused it to detonate like a bomb! He did that on all four of the beam generators!”

  “Ah!” Feliks said with satisfaction, “I found an error in your calculations!”

  “What?” Rory spun and ripped the datapad out of Feliks's hands. “That's nonsense, there's no way I made a mistake...” he trailed off. “Huh, what do you know? I guess I was off, by a factor of ten.” His voice held shock.

  “So it wouldn't destroy the ship?” Ensign Perkins asked.

  “Oh, no,” Rory waved a hand, “It would have vaporized the entire ship and station. That's fascinating, I'm already seeing some implications and possibilities to deliberately build some sort of exotic particle bomb...”

  “Yes,” Felix replied, “the issue would be generation and containment due to the rapid decay of the exotic particles...”

  Lieutenant Perkins rolled his eyes and then signaled Tech Specialist Spurlock to come over. “Can you fix the problem?”

  “Yes, sir,” the young man said. He looked both painfully young and very nervous. “I caught the issue and I just tried to get them to calibrate the torsional wrench to the right level, sir.”

  “Right,” Lieutenant Perkins said. “Get it fixed and then get Petty Officer Pine to look it over.” He rubbed a hand down his face as the Tech Specialist hurried away. “Why did we get saddled with that pair...” he muttered, just loud enough that Alannis heard.

  She didn't say anything. The two engineers had begun a heated argument which involved much hand-waving and finger pointing. Thank God I'm not stuck in engineering with those two, she thought. She hoped to be assigned to the tactical department or at least the navigational department. With her scores, she figured either one would be a good fit.

  “Well,” Lieutenant Perkins said after a moment, “We'll just move on, I'll bring you past forward engineering next...”

  ***

  “Well,” Captain Daniel Beeson said, “what do you think of the new officers?”

  His Executive Officer sighed a bit as he sat back in his chair. “Lieutenant Busch seems pretty solid. I haven't had much of a chance to take the measure of any of our new ensigns yet... though I can't believe we got stuck with Giovanni.”

  “What do you mean by that?” Daniel asked. He'd served under Lucius Giovanni as his flag captain and in several other positions. He'd actually been excited to see the Emperor's little sister was going to join their crew, particularly after seeing her graduation scores from Faraday's Military Academy.

  “I'm certain we'll have some officers who should know better sucking up to her and heaven help us if she's the type to throw her civilian rank around,” Commander Bowder said.

  Daniel gave his XO a look, “Have you seen any sign of that so far?”

  “Well... no,” Commander Bowder responded. “But that's not to say it hasn't happened. I find it more than a little suspicious that she's got the scores she does without at least some favoritism. I mean, most officers can't help but think of her political connections and adjust their behavior.”

  Daniel considered his XO for a long moment. The officer was one of the Dreyfus Fleet personnel, one who had survived Admiral Dreyfus's attempted coup and who had been cleared of any involvement.

  While Admiral Dreyfus and his cabal of officers had organized a coup, the vast majority of the Dreyfus Fleet personnel had been in the dark about the conspiracy. The mutinous elements had thrown the entire fleet into disarray and left all too many good people dead. The survivors had fallen into one of three types in Daniel's experience. A small majority had simply never recovered from the betrayal. Most of them had left behind everything they knew in order to be a last defense for humanity. Admiral Dreyfus's betrayal had left them so bitter or disillusioned that many had simply left service.

  Then there were a small percentage who had emerged with a new outlook. They'd seen the cost of when ambition and selfishness became the motivation of leaders. Many of them were some of the most dedicated and most enthusiastic people in uniform that Daniel had served with. Lieutenant Michele Konetsky and others like her had truly come into their own during the Dreyfus Coup and the time afterward.

  The last type were like Bowder. They had come out of the Dreyfus Coup still with a desire to serve and protect humanity... but they'd had their idealism shaken to its core. It had left Richard Bowder with cynicism as his defining characteristic. Daniel Beeson had read Commander Bowder's personnel file. Commander Bowder's captain had been a member of the cabal, but when he'd ordered his crew to fire on loyalist ships, they'd mutinied. A quarter of Richard Bowder's fellow officers and crew had sided with their captain in a fight that had left a third of the crew dead. Commander Bowder had emerged as the senior surviving officer and he'd managed to lock down his ship and then use it to fire in support of other loyalist ships.

  In many ways, Daniel understood the other man's cynicism having lost so much himself.

  Daniel Beeson had joined Lucius Giovanni's crew as something of a lark, to thumb his nose at his father, the commander of Faraday Colony's Military Defense Forces. Yet when the Chxor had captured the planet, it meant Daniel was aboard the War Shrike and not on Faraday. Of his three brothers, two sisters, mother, father, assorted cousins, uncles and aunts who were all either in the military or closely affiliated, Daniel was the only surviving member of his family. If he hadn’t been aboard the War Shrike, he knew he’d be dead as well.

  Daniel had lost everything, but he had not given into despair. The Baron had been such a symbol of optimism and hope. Lucius Giovanni had never given up, never even faltered on his mission to liberate first Faraday, then Nova Roma and other worlds along the way.

  In the face of that, both working as an officer under him and now as a commander entrusted by Lucius to lead, Daniel simply couldn't contemplate giving in to cynicism or doubt. And while he could understand that Commander Bowder had, somewhat, it was certainly something that he was determined to prevent from undermining the morale of the rest of the crew.

  Daniel chose his words carefully, keeping Commander Bowder's past in mind, “I don't think that the Emperor would tolerate that kind of behavior, Commander. For that matter, I don't think that General Proscia would tolerate any favoritism at the Academy.”

  His XO grunted noncommittally. “Well, I certainly won't treat her any differently and I'll hammer anyone else who does, for that matter.”

  “That's what I'd expect of you,” Daniel said. “Now, what do you think about initial personnel assignments?”

  “Lieutenant Commander Voronkov already put claim to Ensign Medica,” Commander Bowder said. The Nova Roma ensign had branch specified for engineering. While they'd probably rotate him through some of the other departments for broadening, he was on the fast-track for engineering. Daniel wouldn't be surprised if the young man eventually transferred to Research and Development.

  “Ensign Shan I'd recommend for assisting Lieutenant Cassat at sensors. She's a little weak on her sensor scores, but there's no better way to improve than working at it every day,” Commander Bowder said. “Lieutenant Busch is already slotted for communications. I'd say we put Ensign Giovanni there.”

  “Comms?”

  “She's from high social status and it's an area where we can monitor her actual skills before moving her on,” Commander Bowder said. He shrugged, “If she can't pull her weight, it's better to find out sooner rather than later.”

  “Seems like something of a waste given her skills,” Daniel said cautiously. She had the highest rating of all their ensigns for weapons, telemetry, and already had her civilian certifications for navigation. Still, he was willing to entertain the trial run if it meant his XO felt better about her proficiency. “What about tactical department?”

  “I think Ensign Yamahito,” Commander Bowder s
aid. “Lieutenant Commander Douglass has Lieutenant Perkins for fire control and we should have Lieutenant Duchan on missile telemetry as soon as he reports. Yamahito has an acceptable rating for his telemetry, but I'd like to give him some real-world experience to go along with that.”

  “Okay,” Daniel nodded. “I can go with that.” They had a nice long cruise ahead of them to rotate their new officers around with plenty of time to break them all in, so he wasn't too concerned about finding just the right fit for everyone. Breaking them in, finding their strengths and weaknesses was the key part... and it wasn't something that would happen right away.

  “Has Lieutenant Thomas signed aboard yet?” Daniel asked. The Marine Lieutenant would fill out their officer component. Thomas had requested a late report date, his mother had suffered a fatal accident just two days earlier.

  “Not yet,” Commander Bowder said. “Possibly sometime in the next few days.”

  Daniel nodded. In truth, he wouldn't be surprised if the Marine didn't show before they departed. Daniel had lost his entire family during the Chxor occupation of Faraday, so he understood taking time for family. The last thing he wanted was for one of his officers to have something like that hanging over his head during the entire cruise.

  “Okay,” Daniel said. “We'll go with what you've suggested, for now. The latest on our deployment date is still seventy-two hours. Make certain Lieutenant Monteif has everything squared away as far as extra supplies and spares for the voyage.” Their quartermaster had been tasked with stocking them up for the long journey to the Hachiman Gu system. Since it would take them almost three months to get there, plus an indeterminate time there, and another three months on the return voyage, they would be gone at least seven months.