Solbidyum Wars Saga 5: Desolation (24 page)

“I see, I think.  So in reality the distance the message actually travels is only a few millimeters even though the ships are light years apart.”

“Correct!”  Cantolla stated with a grin.  “Isn’t it brilliant?”

“Yes it is actually, how long will it take before we can get this device made and put on all the Federation ships?”

“We haven’t figured that out yet, but with the Cantolla gates being installed on more ships, we can move quicker between sectors, and it could happen quite fast.” she said.

“And by quite fast just what are we talking about?  Months?  Years?” I asked.

“Oh years for sure, but not more than the time it takes to fly from here to the furthest point in the Federation in our fastest GW propelled ship.”

“So you’re saying eight years or less?”  I said.

“Correct.”  She beamed, just as A’Lappe entered the room.

“Ah, Tibby, I’m glad you got down here so early this morning.  I was afraid you would be held up by everyone else wanting to meet with you first.”

“Actually, A’Lappe, you’ve provided me with a good excuse NOT to have to meet with some of them,” I replied, thinking of Dr. Hughes.

“Well whatever the reason, I’m glad you made it.  I see Cantolla has shown you the new communication device.  What do you think of it?”

“Well, if it works, I think it’s pretty great.”  I said.  “Do you have power consumption problems with this similar to the larger Cantolla gates?”

“It does require more power than a standard communication device, but the gates are microscopically small, so the power required is much less.  You could easily power one off a standard fusion power cell with very little energy drain,” A’Lappe responded.

“What about these larger gates you are talking about powering with the solbidnite?  What can you tell me about the solbidnite, and how much of it exists?"

A’Lappe grinned and blinked his large eyes.  “There is far more of it then there was of solbidyum, and it’s easier to collect.  It is much finer than solbidyum and is basically just a fine dust, almost like a small nebula cloud actually.  I think if the black hole had stayed together longer it would have produced solbidyum, but this one collapsed earlier and the process never completed.  A particle of solbidnite is not as powerful as a grain of solbidyum, but it still is many times more powerful than a 10X fusion reactor.  There is an ample supply of the stuff to fuel starships and Cantolla gates all over the Federation with solbidnite to spare.”

“Excellent, but for right now I think it wise we keep that a secret.  The last thing we need is for the Brotherhood to get news of this and get their hands on it to power their ships.

“I have something else I would like you to work on for me, A’Lappe,” I said as I pulled a data chip out of my pocket.  While I was on Desolation, I came up with an idea for a new design for a starship that would serve primarily as a carrier for fighters and patrol ships.  It would be smaller and more compact than one of the Federation’s giant starship, but would carry more fire power and troopers with far less government officials and diplomats aboard and almost no civilians at all.”  I handed him the data chip, “See what you can do with this design, will you?  I want you also to figure out a way these ships can be built in modules, possibly in several different locations with the main hull and propulsion system built all in one location.  Later those sections can be flown to the respective shipyards where the other modules have been constructed and they can be joined quickly.  I think if we can do that we can build these ships in one-quarter of the time it usually takes.”

A’Lappe took the chip and put it into a computer and began scanning the design.  “Fascinating,” he said.  “I like the functionality of it.  Yes, I think it can be done in modules like you suggest.  Let me work on it a few days, and I’ll see what I can do.  You do want this ship to have cloaking and RMFF capabilities, I assume?”

“Of course, A’Lappe, that goes without saying.  I would also suggest you power it with your new solbidnite, only I think we should build the reactor to look like a 10X reactor, that way if anyone sees it they won’t realize it’s not a 10X reactor.”

“You’re not afraid word will leak out from the crew about the new solbidnite reactor?”

“If we make it top secret and only a few people in engineering, and the higher-ranking officers know of it and are sworn to secrecy, we might be able to prevent anyone from finding out long enough to win this damn war.  It's unlikely they would be capable of capturing a major Cantolla gate if the gates are cloaked and their locations unknown, so they won’t know what powers them or how much power they require.  Is it possible to shield a Cantolla gate
with a RMFF?”

“Smaller ones can be shielded by the ships that house the generating hubs, but ones large enough for ships to pass through would need to have an RMFF shield for each hub.  You could, of course, do that as two of the three nodes must have a 10X fusion reactor and the third a solbidnite reactor or solbidyum reactor.  The solbidnite part of the gate is the only part that I personally would be concerned about," A’Lappe said.  "We'll also need to check and see if the RMFF function interferes with the creation of the gates.  It could impact how a gate works."

“Cantolla, what do you think?”  I asked.

“I would hate to see the technology fall into the hands of the Brotherhood,” Cantolla said, “even though I agree with A’Lappe that it’s not likely they would be able to figure it out because of the sympathetic particles.  Don’t forget it was because of information from your Earth’s science that we learned of them, and Ming is from Earth and is now with the Brotherhood.  Maybe some of the others, possibly scientists, from Earth have joined up with them as well, and they would recognize how they work and figure it out.”

Cantolla’s words startled me as I had not taken that thought into consideration.  While many of the people we rescued from Mars and the Moon had come to work for me, many had chosen not to and sought work elsewhere.  Some of them may well have been recruited by the Brotherhood for all we knew.

“Thank you both for your time,” I said as I started to head for the door.  “Keep up the good work.  I have some things I must attend to before I go to see Admiral Regeny.  Please excuse me.”

Once I exited the room, I contacted Padaran on my wrist com.  “Padaran, this is Tibby, do you have any information as to the whereabouts of the refugees we rescued from Mars and the Earth’s moon, who did not remain with us, and what they are doing?”

“Ah, no, Tibby, I don’t believe we do.  I’m sure if I check with those still here that some of them do.  Do you need the information?" he asked.

“We might,” I answered. “It’s possible that some of those who left may have joined the Brotherhood or gone to work for them, and we need to know how much scientific information they have.  You might want to pass any information you get to Wabussie at the FSO as well.”  Then another thought hit me.  “Do you know, did any of the Mars crew that we rescued, who are not working for me now, take their data cubes from Mars with them?”

“I’m sure if they left, they took them along.  It was their personal property,” he answered.

My heart sunk in my chest.  All the information that existed about sympathetic particles and quantum mechanics existed in those cubes, and the cubes could be replicated and copied.  By now, the Brotherhood could have thousands of the data cubes and all the information they needed to figure out a Cantolla gate.  The technology of the gates may not be as secure as we thought if one were captured.

“See what you can find out from those who are here,” I said. 

“Will do, Tibby.”  Padaran responded.  Marranalis may have picked Padaran for the task as the head of my security team because of his fighting skills and leadership ability, but there was more to being a security chief than just fighting and leadership.  Padaran was bright, but he was going to need to learn a lot more to do his job the way I needed it to be done.

I headed for the room where the Cantolla gate
was set for me to go to Megelleon and my meeting with the Admiral.

I wasn’t sure what to expect going through the Cantolla gate
.
  I sort of anticipated I would experience a mild sensation or perhaps a slight tingling or static electricity, but there was nothing.  It was like stepping through any door frame in any house or building, only one minute I was on the
NEW ORLEANS,
and the next I was in a small room with two troopers standing guard near Admiral Regeny’s office.  I no sooner stepped through the doorway than both troopers snapped to attention.  “At ease. men,” I stated as I stepped through.

“Welcome back Admiral,” one of the troopers said.  “Admiral Regeny is expecting you and said for you to go right in when you arrived.”

I was expecting Admiral Wabussie and the Rear Admiral Regeny as well as Lt. Commander Goncest to be in the room when I entered, but was caught off guard to also see Admiral Stonbersa as well as Leader Tonclin and a third man in a fleet admiral’s uniform whom I had never met, but I guessed might be Admiral Kophious. There was one other person in the room who I was even more surprised to see, Captain Slater of the Mars colony.  He was now dressed in a black mercenary uniform and was standing and talking with both Admirals Regeny and Stonbersa when I entered.

“Ah, Tibby,” Admiral Regeny began, “we were starting to wonder if you were sleeping-in this morning.”

“No sir,” I said, “Am I late?”

“No, no, you’re quite on time.  I think everyone else arrived early in anticipation of your arrival.

“Tibby, I think you know most everyone here other than for Fleet Admiral Kophious.  Kophious, I’d like you to meet Tibby.  He will be your senior officer and while he will head up the first fleet he will also be over all the fleets as well,  As commander of the third fleet you will report and answer to both Tibby and myself.”

Kophious was a tall stick-thin man with a slight stoop in his shoulders.   He had a long-drawn face with a square chin and sad looking eyes that were subdued by the bright smile on his face.  “Admiral Tibby,” he said, “it is a great honor to meet you at last.  I have been following your adventures since you arrived in the Federation.  I cannot tell you how honored I am to be working in your command.”

“Admiral,” I said as I acknowledged him in return.  “I am also glad to meet you as well, though I regret you have me at a disadvantage as you clearly know more about me than I about you.  However, both Admiral Regeny and Admiral Wabussie speak highly of you, and I respect their opinions.”

I turned to Leader Tonclin, “Honorable Leader Tonclin, it is good to see you again.  I was unaware that you would be present at this meeting.”

“Pah!  None of these honorifics necessary behind closed doors, Tibby,” Tonclin squeaked in his high-pitched voice.  “Our friendship is too close for such things.”

“Admiral Regeny has been telling me of some of what you went through the past several months.  Congratulations to both you and Kalana with the twins.  I understand you named one of them after First Citizen Luinella.  I am sure she would have been deeply honored. ”

“Yes”, I said, “Lunnie is her aunt.”

“Oh,” Tonclin said, “I apologize, as I had forgotten that Kalana and Luinella were sisters.  My, oh my, two First Citizens from the same family and one of them the bond-mate of another First Citizen.  History is so amazing.”

“Gentlemen, if we can all be seated.  I think we should begin.  Please be seated,” Admiral Regeny said.

There was a round table in the room and small place cards with each of our names on them indicating where we were to sit.  I was to the left of Admiral Regeny, and his aide, Lt. Commander Goncest, was to his right.  Admiral Stonbersa was to my left, followed by Admiral Kophious.  Admiral Wabussie was next to Lt. Commander Goncest, and Leader Tonclin, followed by Slater who sat at the opposite side of the table from Regeny and me.

“I’ve invited Leader Tonclin here today because I feel that we need to keep the Leaders in full awareness of what is going on and what the Federation military is doing.  I believe most of you know Captain Slater, who is sitting next to the Leader.  While he holds no official rank or position in the Federation military, we have brought him in as a consultant who, like Tibby, is familiar with military history and tactics from the planet Earth.  When Tibby went missing, we relied heavily on Slater to assist us in battle plans and also in trying to guess what the Brotherhood might do.  Just before Roritat and the Brotherhood made their attack on the Senate, they broke Ming out of prison solely to profit from his military knowledge; there is no one in this room who is better qualified to know and understand Ming's tactics than Slater.  Captain Slater has already given us great assistance in reorganizing our fighting units, and in new methods of combat and training that I believe will enhance our fighting abilities against the Brotherhood.

“Since the events of nearly a year ago when Roritat initiated his attack on the Senate we have been trying to determine what the status is of the Federation at the moment.  Due to the years it has taken for us to communicate with remote planets, much has happened that we were unaware of, and we still do not know the full extent of.  Our latest tally is that over 380 planets in the Federation have been taken over by the Brotherhood; these are all outlying planets, so the news has been slow getting to us.  We are certain there are more planets that are now under Brotherhood domination which we have not heard of yet, and their actual number may be in the thousands.  From what we know so far, most of the planets lie in three different clusters equally spaced along the edge of the Federation.  This makes it difficult for us to try to address any one sector at a time, because if we do we leave the other two and the center of the Federation unprotected, with our current undersized armed forces.  Leader Tonclin assures me, the Senate and Federation leadership fully support us, and massive funding is available for us to enlarge the fleet and increase our armed forces.  However, we are years behind in having sufficient forces to meet the current challenge.

“Captain Slater believes the Brotherhood will try to expand these three areas they control with the idea of moving in toward the center, slowly eating away at the core until there is nothing left.  The only real hope we have is to be able to contain them until we have a large enough fleet and adequate troops to wipe them out.  Information the FSO has uncovered tends to support Slater’s assessment.  Can you give us any more information on this, Wabussie?”

Admiral Wabussie had been staring down at the table while the Admiral had been talking, now he suddenly sat up and said, “The latest data our FSO agents have been able to provide suggests that the number of worlds already taken by the Brotherhood is over two thousand.”  There was a gasp in the room when he said this.  “We have some survivors who escaped from the Dunbar System.  They just arrived two days ago and report that the Brotherhood took the system months earlier and pretty much laid waste to the planet.  Once they landed, they killed anyone who opposed them, and those that surrendered were put to work as forced labor raising plants for drug production and building new ships and war machinery.

“They also indicated that the Brotherhood has adapted the old-style slave collars and is now using them to control conscripts pressed into military units to fight for them.  Anyone not obeying commands is given horrendous shocks, even to the point of death.  The Brotherhood are using drugs condition the conscripts mindless fighting machines.  In addition, many of family members of the conscripts are being held as slaves, and they troops are being told that if they do not do as told, their family members will be tortured and killed in the most horrible means imaginable.  The escapees said that the conscript troops being trained are little more than front line fodder in the Brotherhood’s minds, and they are sent in masses to attack with no regard for lives on either side.  Women and children captured were being loaded on ships and taken elsewhere to be sold as slaves.

“We learned something else that I think is of importance.  From all the data we have received, we are relatively certain now there is only one Tottalax ship helping the Brotherhood, and we suspect it possibly is the only one the Tottalax has like it.  As far as we know no one has ever seen any other Tottalax ship outside their home system.”

I interrupted, “Do we know where the Tottalax home world is?”

“Not yet,” Wabussie answered, “but all the indications are it is in the nebula where you followed their ship after you encountered them at Earth.  All the records we have of traders encountering them were near that nebula, and all of them make it sound like it’s the same ship that is joining with the Brotherhood in their attacks.  The Brotherhood relies on them heavily to defeat the defensive forces of the planets they have occupied thus far.”

“So if we can take out that ship, we might be able to stop their advances,” I said, “and I think I have an idea how to do that, but I need to talk with A’Lappe about it.”

“Also,” Wabussie added, “from transmissions we’ve intercepted between Brotherhood ships it seems that Roritat has put Ming in command of battle planning and he is responsible of their attacking forces as well.  Ming isn’t liked much from what we can tell, but he is feared, and no one voices any objections about his orders around him.”

“That sounds like Ming.  I don’t think anyone really likes him.  I hope he is as big a pain to Roritat as he was for everyone else,” I responded.

“Tibby, now that you’re in command of the fleets, I want you to take the
DUSTEN
as your flag ship; you have worked with Wanoll before, he is the ship’s captain, and I know you both respect each other.  Tell me where would you like to proceed from here?”  Regeny asked.

“We need to get more men trained as quickly as possible, and more ships built. That's a number-one priority. More ships, mostly smaller ships; I’ve spoken with A’Lappe about a new design I would like to see to replace the huge starships we currently are using.  With the advent of the Cantolla gates, large starships are no longer required, and in fact, may be more of a liability than an asset.  We’re going to need to get Cantolla gates
set up at as many locations as we can, as quickly as possible.  That is going to require our getting specialized ships built, and crews trained for the tasks. 

“The Brotherhood seems to have us outflanked and outnumbered with ships, but we still have superior weaponry and are better trained.  If we can get the Cantolla gates situated in the right locations, we can shift large numbers of troops and ships from one side the galaxy to the other instantly, thwarting the plans of the Brotherhood to attack from different points, dividing our resources to combat them.  Time is our enemy here, so we must move as quickly as possible.  Fortunately for us, even though the enemy now has a DCS system that they have captured, they have no idea how it works, and it will take them a bit of time to figure out, I hope.  The RMFF is another matter; with the capture of the
HAPRIN
it means that the Brotherhood now has an RMFF, a cloaking mechanism, and a 10X reactor they can study and copy, but that will take a while, allowing us a small envelope of time to prepare with Cantolla gates.”

“It sounds like you and Captain Slater think along the same lines.”  Admiral Regeny added.  “He also believes we need to update our fleet with the additions of some newer designed ships, only he is coming from the other end, looking at troop landing craft, surface transports, and assault weapons. We’ve already gotten approval for funding, and we have designs that he has put together with the help of Captains Marranalis and Sokaia.

“I’m assuming since both Admiral Stonbersa, and Admiral Kophious are here that they have Cantolla gates on their ships that allow them to be here and get back to their ships quickly.”  I said, “A’Lappe and Cantolla have come up with an even new and better communication device than the DCS system, and I want to see them installed on all our star ships, frigates, and corvettes as soon as possible.  They are small enough that they can be moved through the Cantolla gates on your ships and distributed to the other ships in your fleets accordingly.  We won’t place them on patrol ships or fighters just yet as they are assigned to task groups and get all their orders from them.”

“I’m going to expect daily reports from each Fleet, and I expect to have an in-person meeting with both Stonbersa and Kophious every week as well, and at least one of those meetings each month I would like if you could be in attendance,” I said, turning to Admiral Regeny.

“I think that can be arranged,” Regeny stated with a grin.

The meeting continued with each Admiral reporting on the numbers of ships to their fleet and their troop levels.  Since I didn’t know how many ships were going to be in my fleet or what the levels of men were in my complement, Admiral Regeny filled me in.  The meeting went well into the evening before it adjourned.  Just as we were about to wrap things up, Admiral Regeny asked, “Does anyone have anything they would like to ask or say before we adjourn?”

“Yes, Admiral, I’d like to request that you reassign Marranalis back to me as quickly as possible.” 

Regeny chuckled, “I wondered how long it would be before you made that request.  He and Captain Slater have done a spectacular job of training our troops and setting up training programs, but I think now they have both accomplished their tasks and others can take over for them.  I’ll see to it that Marranalis gets his orders to return to your command immediately, though it may take a few days for him to get things into order before he shows up.  Slater will be circulating around between here and all of your flagships as events dictate to help give any insights he might have concerning battle plans against the Brotherhood.  I expect, Tibby, that you will be doing much the same as needed.

“Now if there is nothing else?”

“Excuse me Admiral Regeny,” Leader Tonclin spoke up, “If I might have a moment, there are a few things I would like to say.”

“Certainly Leader Tonclin,” Regeny said with a slight nod.

“On behalf of the Federation, I would like to express how glad we are to have you back Tibby.  Your absence from us was a matter of great distress from the highest levels of the Federation down to the lowest.  You have become a focal point for our Federation, and as such, a symbol of all we hope for.  We are strengthened by your return.

“I’m also pleased to let you all know that now that Roritat is gone, the Senate is in total agreement to assist you in every way in rebuilding our military, and all efforts will be made to provide the necessary funding required to do so.  Lastly, let me say how extremely proud we are of all of you.  You represent our best hopes in defending against and defeating the Brotherhood.  May the stars be with you.”

Once the meeting had adjourned, I found myself surrounded by everyone, and they all wanted to welcome me back and hear details of what had transpired after Kala and I crashed on Desolation.  Leader Tonclin was elated to learn about the birth of Reidecor and Lunnie and insisted that on his next visit, he must personally bestow on them his blessing.  Kala later informed me this was some special honor, as typically Nibarians never gave blessings to anyone outside their personal family, unless they considered them as a part of their family.  Tonclin also reminded me that his daughter Chanina was of age to go out into the galaxy as an adult and that she still wished to serve on the
NEW ORLEANS
as an apprentice navigator.  It made my head swim to realize that so much time had gone by since Chanina was an adolescent and gotten lost on the
NEW ORLEANS
.  Could four and a half years really have passed since then?