TCS ST. HELENS; PRIMARY
FLIGHT DECK
THE TINGVALLIR SYSTEM, ROAN QUADRANT, SOL SECTOR
2673.072; 1216 HOURS (CST)
Eisen stepped out of the shuttle onto the immense flight deck of the St. Helens and looked around him. A grinning figure was walking toward him, arm extended. Eisen smiled as he recognized the figure.
It was Ted Rollins.
"Mister Rollins!" Eisen extended his hand to shake Rollins’. "Long time no see! You’ve done well for yourself, I see. Commander aboard such a ship is no small achievement."
Rollins chuckled, lowering his hand from their firm handshake. "The attack on the St. Helens was quite masterful, sir!"
Eisen cocked a curious eyebrow. "Oh?"
"The way you ambushed us as soon as we started our engine test run—beautiful, sir! The crew never saw it coming."
Eisen grunted an acknowledgement. Charles’ tip about the skeletally-crewed St. Helens’ engine test run from Sirius to the Tingvallir System had paid off big time. A burst transmission to the two jump point-off Border Worlds’ Telamon System had called in squadrons of Avengers, Vindicators, and even a wing of captured Bearcats, who lay in wait for the unsuspecting supercarrier. The detachment of Marines that had boarded the St. Helens finalized the capture operation only minutes ago.
"Well, I’ll be happy to take comm position now that you’re aboard, sir," Rollins said. He seemed awfully chipper for an officer whose ship had just been captured by the enemy. "I’ve been saving her especially for you!"
Eisen grinned, but he didn’t fully understand what Rollins meant. "How’s that, Mister Rollins?" he asked.
Radio slightly raised both his hands, a sly grin on his face. "I had a feeling you were coming sir. I’ve been monitoring some radio traffic. Found out there was a lot of strange stuff: unidentified codings, heavier than the normal big Brass stuff, that’s for sure."
Eisen couldn’t help but laugh. Rollins had always been a bit paranoid, as more than a few members of the old Victory could attest to, but this time he had been right.
"But I had just been appointed to the St. Helens," Rollins continued, casually waving his arms in a manner all-too familiar to Eisen, "so I kept my mouth shut. I deleted the files, and convinced myself it was just my usual imagination running wild."
"Anyway, when I heard you, and of course the all-mighty Colonel Blair, had defected to the Border Worlds, then, sir, I just knew there was something fishy going on." Radio spoke in such a heartfelt tone that it touched Eisen. The younger man’s honest faith and trust in him was obvious. "Started decoding some of the new transmissions I picked up. They were talking a lot about you, sir. Two days ago, turned out they knew you were headed toward Proxima Superbase. That message had been hastily sent—it used an easy-to-crack code."
Eisen sighed. Farao Station, of course. Word travels surprisingly fast, he thought. Whoever’s behind this has his or her ‘helping hands’ everywhere.
"Figured you could use some help," Rollins continued. "Some power, so to speak, sir! So I convinced my superiors to allow to take this ship on an—hint, hint, wink, wink—‘engine test run’ to the Tingvallir System. Close enough to the Border Worlds to make Confed sweat, but far enough to keep them at ease. Still close enough, I hoped, to let you guys do your stuff. Made up some crap about needing another shakedown cruise. Left the same day and just arrived this mornin’... just in time!"
Eisen chuckled. What a guy, he thought. "Well, Mister Rollins, welcome aboard the BWS St. Helens. You’re on a Border Worlds ship now, son."
"Given the circumstances, sir, that’s fine by me. You’ll be glad to know," Rollins remarked, "I didn’t lie to all of my superiors. Mere mention of your name to some of the officers... the ones I knew I could trust... it cut a lot of the proverbial red tape, sir!"
Eisen was moved, and he warmly pat Rollins on the back. "Guess I still have a few friends at Confed HQ..." he said emotionally.
TCS ST. HELENS; CAPTAIN’S
CABIN
1246 HOURS (CST)
William Eisen was astounded—this was the biggest captain’s cabin he had ever seen. "It’s amazing, Rollins," he gasped, as he put his briefcase on the large desk in the center of the enormous space.
Rollins smiled as he took a data-chip out of his breast pocket, "On here there’s a compilation of everything you want to know about this ship: the strengths, the weaknesses, statistical information, the works."
Eisen turned his head, and nodded in appreciation. "Thank you, Mister Rollins." He couldn’t help but turn around to marvel at his amazing cabin again.
"Enjoy, sir!" With that, Rollins made his way to the door.
"Wait a minute, Rollins!" Eisen turned around to face Rollins, who stopped and turned back.
"That’s right! You had a knack for decoding!" Eisen said, nodding.
"That’s right sir!" said Rollins. He made no effort to disguise his arrogance. "Hey, I’m the best."
Eisen smiled. "Then I’m sure you can decode this."
Eisen opened his briefcase, and got out some of the data-chips. "These are the freshest Confed coded transmissions I have..." He handed them to Rollins.
Rollins’ smile vanished. "But sir, three full chips... This is a lot of data, and if it’s as heavily coded as the stuff I’ve seen... that may take weeks. Months, even."
"Oh," Eisen said. He tried to hide his disappointment to no avail. "Well, see how far you get and... just do your best, son." That’s all I can ask of any man.
"I’ll do that, sir." As Rollins again made way for the door, Eisen remembered something. Those two Excalibur-class fighters he encountered just after the jump to Proxima... They took a jump point to the Axius System. But Axius is a barren, unpopulated system, consisting mostly of desert planets. Why would anyone go there? On the other hand, it would be the perfect place for...
"Just a minute, Mister Rollins," Eisen called, stopping Rollins in his tracks yet again. "Why don’t you limit your decoding to all comm traffic from and to the Axius System."
Rollins’ face lit up, as if a weight had just been taken off his shoulders. "Sure, sir!" he replied, "That’ll shorten the job... well, significantly! I’ll get right on it." He made a swift salute and left the cabin.
Eisen was left alone in his spacious cabin, smiling.
BWS ST. HELENS; BRIDGE
THE PROXIMA SYSTEM, DOUGLAS QUADRANT, VEGA SECTOR
2673.074; 1911 HOURS (CST)
Eisen stood from his command chair. He stared in awe at the bridge around him, something he found himself doing often in the past two and a half days. The words "high-tech" and "state-of-the-art" always seemed to come to mind when overlooking the colossal space spread out before him. He had been on board the supercarrier nearly three days, but he still wasn’t quite used to his hypermodern surroundings.
"Captain," the ensign at communications called to him. It was Lauren McKnight, who had taken over for Rollins while he was still locked up in his cabin, bashing away at those coded transmissions. "Incoming message from Admiral Dannalas."
Eisen lowered himself into the captain’s seat, and made a small nod to the young ensign. She pressed a few buttons and immediately a hovering, life size hologram of Admiral Dannalas’ face appeared in front of him. This no longer startled Eisen as it had the first time Charles has contacted him aboard the St. Helens, but it didn’t cease to amaze him.
"Hello, Bill! Congratulations on the successful capture op. I hear the ship’s pretty much on-line and ready to go," the hologram spoke. Eisen nodded, smiling.
"The techs you sent me say a lot of corners were cut, Charles. But I’m... overjoyed she’s finally ready to go."
"What about Commander Rollins, cracking at that comm traffic?" Charles inquired. "How’s he doing?"
Eisen frowned slightly. "Well, he’s having a harder time than he thought. He says he can’t tell me anything concrete yet, but he keeps telling me he’s on the verge of a breakthrough."
"I suggest you take the St. Helens out of the docks and prepare for the jump back to Sirius, Bill. If Ted Rollins manages to get more information, send it to me before you make the jump to Sol. It’ll no doubt help me convince my friends on the Admiralty Court and in the Assembly."
"Will comply, Admiral," Eisen responded with a quick salute.
Smiling warmly, Charles replied, "Bill, it’s been great seeing you again... even though the circumstances weren’t exactly ideal. When this is all over, why don’t you head back here sometime and we’ll chat about old times, eh?"
Eisen grinned coyly. He had planned on spending some time with his wife, Felicia, on Earth, maybe meeting his newborn grandchild. Still, it was more than worth his while to make the time for his old friend. "I’d love that, Charlie. You can count on it. St. Helens out."
Eisen nodded to McKnight and Admiral Dannalas’ face faded and disappeared.
"Helmsman," Eisen said to the young man at the helm, "Prepare to pull her out of the dock."
"Aye, sir!" the helmsman confirmed as he began to press a few buttons.
A piercing hissing sound enveloped the bridge, indicating the separation from the dock, followed by the barely audible buzz that indicated the start-up of the engines. The helmsman pushed the rudder-controls forward and slowly but steadily the St. Helens started to drift out of the gigantic metal furnace of the space-dock and into the immense vacuum of space...
Eisen rose from his seat and saw the colossal girders that made up the dock gently drift by. It was an awe-inspiring sight, even for a man who had been on the bridge of a carrier for the most of his life.
Eisen and several of the bridge crew almost fell over as the St. Helens shook heavily. The engine buzz faded away, and Eisen saw red warning lights light up everywhere on the bridge, but then immediately darken again.
What the devil...?
Eisen looked sharply in the direction of the helmsman.
"Not my fault sir," the helmsman replied hastily, "The engines just... hiccupped..."
"Hiccupped?" Eisen questioned. The young man shrugged nervously, his face full of guilt, but Eisen knew it wasn’t his fault. He calmed down, dropped himself into his command chair, and rolled his eyes.
He sighed. "If this thing can’t even properly pull out of the dock..."
The helmsman turned around, back to the rudder, and, while pressing the buttons, he said, "Re-adjusting course, sir. Continuing out of the docks." And, indeed, the buzz of the engines swelled up and the installation started to drift by again. After only a few moments, the supercarrier was completely free of the docks.
Lauren McKnight sharply turned her head. "Minimal damage, sir. Flight deck needs some minor repairs. Shields holding." She turned back, but suddenly appeared to be shocked at what she saw on her radar screen. "What the...?"
Eisen saw her shocked look and jumped up from his seat. "What’s wrong, Ensign McKnight?"
"Sir, three fighters de-cloaking near the base... unmarked ships. Sir, they look unlike anything I’ve seen before. Look..."
The young ensign pointed at her VDU screen and Eisen leaned over the railing that separated the main bridge from the additional stations to see the ships as Lauren looked at him in astonishment. Then Eisen saw them, too.
Unmarked, streamlined, with dread-inspiring design and vicious-looking scoop intakes. The tight formation in which the three ships were flying, not to mention the very sight of them, brought only one word to William Eisen’s mind: death.
He knew launching fighters to counter wasn’t possible—the flight deck had just been damaged. "Move us toward those things and arm turrets," Eisen ordered. "Fire as soon as we’re in range." The bridge crew replied almost in unison, "Yessir!"
In the corner of Eisen’s eye, turbolift doors on the other side of the bridge opened, and Rollins stormed out. "What’s happening?" he cried out.
Eisen pointed at the comm screen silently but Rollins only had to look through the main viewport. There, the fighters became visible as the St. Helens drew closer. "Dragons..." Eisen heard him whisper. But Eisen didn’t care to know what he meant. Not now.
As the supercarrier neared the unmarked fighters, the view showed the superbase spitting out its own fighters, Hellcat-class, like mad.
The two enemy fighters at the flanks of the formation broke off to engage. They opened fire. Mercilessly they spat a withering hail of what appeared to be tachyon fire at the oncoming Hellcats. Within a few seconds, five of the Hellcats were no more than dissipating balls of flaming gas and shattered debris.
Meanwhile, the fighter in the middle skillfully dodged the ongoing Hellcat attacks and continued onward toward the base.
Biting his lip in frustration, Eisen looked at the color-coded radar in the lower corner of the main viewport. Still not in range.
"What in the name of god..." McKnight suddenly gasped. "Captain, look!" Eisen bowed over the Ensign and looked at her small VDU screen. She was pointing at a clear close-up view of the middle fighter, as a small, round object appeared to be falling from its underside, and gently whirled towards the superbase.
"Enlarge image, put in on the main viewer," Eisen ordered, loud and clear.
The image popped up on the main view screen, just above the viewport. The whirling object appeared to be a thin, convex-shaped disk. Eisen had seen one of those before.
Then he remembered where: the Kilrathi D.R. log. The entire Kilrathi convoy was blown up by such a disk!
"Good god..." was the only thing Eisen managed to say as the viewer followed the disk’s path as it latched onto the superbase exterior. Its shimmering and slight vibrations were followed by an incredible rumble that seemed to shake even the St. Helens, which, in turn, was followed by a giant, ferocious, surface flash, then an incredible release of energy that caused the mighty St. Helens to shake violently.
The helmsman pulled the rudder to adjust as a white flash of light enveloped the supercarrier’s bridge, and when it was over and everyone could safely open their eyes again, the flaming, skeletal wreckage whirled clealy into view. The Proxima Superbase. Gone.
Just like that.
The horrified bridge crew stood frozen. Eisen blankly stared at the large screen as he saw the unmarked fighters hurl a few more shots against the few remaining Hellcats that hadn’t been destroyed by the explosion, then Eisen saw them turn around, blast afterburners, and cloak.
A small shuttle emerged from the flaming bulk of the superbase that was still mostly in one piece. At that same moment, the stony face of the Proxima base comm officer appeared on screen.
Eisen’s eyes grew wide with rage as the man’s cold voice boomed over the bridge, "Your pathetic quest for those worthless Border Worlds have now caused the death of thousands of innocent Confederation civilians, Captain Eisen. Give up while you still can, before anyone else gets hurt."
Enraged, Eisen slammed his fist against the railing. Almost on cue, the comm screen went blank, as Eisen saw the shuttle disappear into a remote jump point.
The captain’s rage turned into dismay. Helping hands everywhere, he thought, and he hung his head. A blanket of silence fell over the bridge of the St. Helens, with the buzz of the engine the only thing audible.
It was Ted Rollins that broke the silence. "That disk is called a Flashpak. A devastatingly powerful new weapon developed especially for use by the ‘Black Lance.’"
Eisen turned to Rollins, fighting his tears, suppressing the thought of all those innocent people that had been so needlessly killed. And thoughts of his friend, Charles...
"Black Lance? Rollins, what are you talking about?" Silently, Rollins took a data chip out of his breastpocket, and, holding it between thumb and index-finger, slightly waved it back and forth.
"That data I was decoding... it’s all in there. Told you I was on the verge of breakthrough, didn’t I?" Rollins smiled a bit, but it was a very laconical smile. "The Black Lance are a secret force of elite pilots, flying advanced craft, with advanced weapons," he continued on serious tone. "They’re allegedly humanity’s first line of defense against future enemies. In reality, however, they’re the ones put behind all the escalations in the Border Worlds. Its got the Black Projects division of Confed written all over it. For some reason, they want to wage an all out war..."
Rollins moved towards the comm officer’s station. "And you’ll never guess who their Confed sugardaddy is."
He inserted the disk in the comm station’s main terminal, pressed a few buttons, and a green image popped up on the comm screen. Impatiently, Eisen bowed over the comm screen. A wire frame image of what was apparently a ‘flashpak’ was rotating on it.
But Rollins’ index finger was pointing at some text at the bottom of the small screen. Eisen squinted, and could read, TESTING AUTHORIZATION: ADMIRAL GEOFFREY TOLWYN.
"Good lord..." was all Eisen could think to say. His mind was running rampant with conflicting emotions.
Rollins nodded knowingly. "It was him all along..." he said.
Eisen was shocked.. Slowly, he moved back to his seat, lowered himself, and sighed, staring blankly through the viewport into space...
He couldn’t believe it. True, he had never liked Tolwyn, particularly after the admiral had usurped his command of the Victory for the testing of the Behemoth at the end of Kilrathi War, but this? Why? From the McAuliffe engagement of 2634 on, most recently in Operation Goliath, Tolwyn had been a true Confed legend, a hero. The man who got things done. What had been going on in the man’s misguided mind these past years? This Eisen could never have expected. On a whim, he wondered how Blair would react.
Then Eisen realized. It was a realization that put a hint of a smile across his face. Chris knows by now. He’s such a smart boy... I’m sure he knows...
Then it hit Eisen like a ton of bricks.
Tolwyn! Tolwyn is in command of the Vesuvius, and he’s headed to the frontier! And if Blair has indeed found out about him already, the Intrepid is in terrible danger!
Eisen veered up from his seat, but kept staring blankly through the viewport, except for a short glance at Rollins, who had taken the comm seat as Ensign McKnight moved slightly to the side.
"Rollins, get my voice on the St. Helens’ intercom!" he ordered resolutely.
Rollins immediately complied, pressing a few buttons. "They’re all yours, sir!"
Eisen adjusted his pose, and he stood firmly, almost in attention, as he gave the crew his message:
"To all men and women of the St. Helens: Proxima Superbase has been destroyed." Eisen paused for a short moment and let out a little sigh. He glanced and noticed the entire bridge crew had turned to face him. But Eisen continued staring into space. "I know many of you had friends, even families there, I know you feel grief and loss.
"But I must ask you to swallow the anger and pain. For we have a task, an important one. If we don’t stop those who wish to start a war at the frontier, millions more will die. Our task is to save the lives of the innocent civilians that are at stake."
"My dear men and women of the St. Helens, the fate of mankind... rests with you."
After those dramatic words, Eisen nodded to Rollins, who promptly cut off the communication. "So, are we going to Sol, head to the Assembly..." Rollins asked. Eisen shook his head.
"I’m afraid it’s too late for that, Mister Rollins. The Assembly votes on the declaration of war... today."
With balanced determination, he added, "But if we can stop Tolwyn in his tracks... it’s our only hope. Colonel Blair and the others aboard the Intrepid are, in all likelihood, in grave danger as we speak.
"We must head for the ‘Axius’ System," he said. "That’s pretty much our only lead right now."
The helmsman turned to Eisen. "At top speed we’ll reach the Axius jump point in about twenty minutes sir!" he said.
"Do it, helmsman," Eisen confirmed, and the helmsman nodded, turning back to the rudder, "Inputting coordinates for jump..."
The captain felt the ship picking up speed as the engine buzz grew slightly louder.
Eisen thought for a moment, then turned to Ensign McKnight, who was standing next to Rollins at the comm. "Ensign McKnight, there’s a data-chip in the desk-computer in my cabin. It contains the statistics, strengths and weaknesses of this vessel. Very useful, since these stats are identical to those of the Vesuvius, the supercarrier Tolwyn is commanding. Please, go and get it for me."
The Ensign stood up, made a brief salute and headed for the elevator. As Eisen watched the elevator doors close, he said, smiling, "Well, mister Rollins, your knack for handling data has been a great help."
But as he turned to face Rollins he saw the cocky comm officer was all but smiling. "I sure hope we make it through that jump in one piece, sir. The St. Helens isn’t really ready for jumping..."
Eisen let out a little sigh, but he was still smiling.
"Well, Mister Rollins," he replied, returning his stare through the large viewport out into space, as he saw the bright light of the jump point shimmer in the distance, "there’s always hope..."
SOL STATION; SENIOR OBSERVATION
LOUNGE
THE SOL SYSTEM, TERRA QUADRANT, SOL SECTOR
2681.018; 1909 HOURS (CST)
It had been eight years since the ordeal on the frontier and the sentencing—and subsequent suicide—of Space Marshal Geoffrey Tolwyn. The Union of Border Worlds was recognized by their once-again Confederation allies, the Black Lance had vanished, and the Kilrathi Assembly of Clans were still bickering about within their own borders.
For William Eisen, life went on.
A distracted look on his face, Eisen took his glass of tequila and went to the viewports at the lounge’s end. Groups of other senior officers were clustered about the large room, all enthralled in small talk and idle chatter. Eisen knew he had friends in the lounge, but he was not in the mood for conversation.
"Admiral?"
Eisen whirled around at the sound of the familiar voice. He looked up from his glass of tequila to see none other than Commodore Christopher Blair. A hero in his own right, a damn good pilot, and a trusted friend. The man looked the same, save for the thick goatee he had grown. "Well I’ll be damned..." Eisen and Blair chuckled, then gave each other a brotherly hug.
"It’s good to see you again, sir," Blair greeted. "Glad you could make it to the launch. The official one, anyway."
If Eisen were still a captain, he mused, it would be him that would be calling Blair "sir." "I heard Senator Taggart talked you into his little design team a few years back, but I wasn’t sure if I believed it." Eisen remembered the bet he had made with the man after the Victory tour of duty, that he wasn’t through with flying. He hadn’t made the same bet after the Intrepid because something inside him said that the end of Blair’s days in the cockpit was in sight.
"It was a tough decision, having to choose between my flight instructor position at the Academy and dreaming up carriers for the Space Navy, but here I am."
"And there she is."
Outside the viewports of the lounge loomed the awesome sight of the TCS Midway. From where it was dry docked for the time being, Eisen could barely make out the massive vessel’s bold registry number: CVX-1.
"The Midway—the first megacarrier," Blair spoke. There was a smug undertone to his voice. "I’m proud of her."
"Did a fine job, son," Eisen complimented. "I was a little hesitant about the project at first, but your implementation of six launch bays was very inspired."
Blair chuckled. "Had it designed that way from experience. On the Tiger’s Claw, Concordia, Victory, and even the Intrepid, there was always the threat of a stray enemy fighter taking out our ability to launch ships just by taking out the launch bay. Now there’s six to deal with." He paused. "So how are things on the St. Helens?"
"Well, the Midway takes away the St. Helens’ rank of ‘largest carrier ever constructed,’ but she’s doing just fine." The Midway was 1,830 meters in length, after all, just a little under a hundred meters longer than the supercarrier St. Helens. The St. Helens still had nearly twice as many fighters in its complement, having some 400 in four fighter wings over the Midway’s 252 in three fighter wings. "Rollins is still scaring the crew. Hell, just this morning he was going on about some kind of power surge the Confed TCIS sensornet detected near Kilrah Prime. He was convinced it was some kind of wormhole, and that it could only mean one thing: an alien invasion."
Blair grinned, knowing all too well about Ted "Radio" Rollins.
"Mind if I join you, gentlemen?"
Eisen and Blair turned to see Captain Daniel Wilford, the commanding officer of the TCS Midway. During the Black Lance conflict, Wilford had been a vice admiral in the Border Worlds Union. While Eisen went to see Dannalas, Blair himself had periodically taken orders from him on the BWS Intrepid. Eisen and Wilford had been old Academy friends, though their differing assignments had split them up indefinitely and they had long since lost touch with each other. "Got yourself quite a ship, Danny," Eisen piped.
"Sure do," Wilford spoke, taking a sip of his fine wine. "Couldn’t believe they gave her to me, frankly, but I’m sure Blair’s recommendation to the Admiralty Court had more than a little to do with it."
As Blair and Wilford continued talking, Eisen looked back into the void, losing himself for a moment as he started past the Midway, at the stars, the moon of Earth, and Earth itself. In five hours the Midway would depart with full fanfare. Eisen would return to the St. Helens and go back to the supercarrier’s scheduled patrol of the Enigma Sector.
Yes, life went on for William Eisen. Sometimes it was good, sometimes it was bad, and sometimes it was bittersweet. But it went on. Left and right he was hearing that he should give it up, that he should retire after all of his decades of service. He wasn’t sure what driving force it was that made him get up every morning, but it was there. He knew it.
There was, after all, always hope.