Admiral Who? (A Spineward Sectors Novel:) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1: Changing of the Guard

  Chapter 2: The Engineer

  Chapter 3: What to do?

  Chapter 4: Meetings, warrants, and warrant officers

  Chapter 5: First Among Officers

  Chapter 6: Drills and Rabbits

  Chapter 7: Nothing To Fear But Fear Itself?

  Chapter 8: Time To Get Changed

  Chapter 9: A Change Of Wardrobe

  Chapter 10: For the Prize

  Chapter 11: ‘Tis a Minerale’

  Chapter 12: Distress Call

  Chapter 13: Rallying the troops

  Chapter 14: Pirates

  Chapter 15: Tis-a-Pickle!

  Chapter 16: An Improbable Success

  Chapter 17: A Nice Cruise

  Chapter 18: An Outraged Engineer

  Chapter 19: The Relief Effort

  Chapter 20: A Lesson In Piracy

  Chapter 21: A bad Transition

  Chapter 22: Aches and Pains

  Chapter 23: Bugs!

  Chapter 24: The Great Fall

  Chapter 25: Hate At First Sight

  Chapter 26: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

  Chapter 27: The Bearer of bad news

  Chapter 28: A Sword, Some Food and a Family Visit!

  Chapter 29: Given a Job

  Chapter 30: The Banquet

  Chapter 31: To the Surface

  Chapter 32: First Impressions

  Chapter 33: A Challenge or Two

  Chapter 34: Settlement and a Dispute

  Chapter 35: A Rude Awakening and Arrivals

  Chapter 36: Let's make a trade

  Chapter 37: To depart or not to depart

  Chapter 1: Departure and Arrival

  Chapter 2: Around The Bridge

  Chapter 3: Not So Easy

  Chapter 4: Strategy Session

  Chapter 5: Into the Fray!

  Chapter 6: The Paring Knife

  Chapter 7: Down in the Turret Pits and then Back to the Bridge

  Chapter 8: Boarding Action

  Admiral Who? - A Spineward Sectors Novel: Book One

  by Luke Sky Wachter

  v1.01

  Re-edited 9-20-2012

  Copyright © 2012 by Joshua Wachter

  All rights reserved.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. All resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental. Respect my electronic rights because the money you save today will be the book I can't afford to write for you tomorrow.

  For my son Luke, who always believes.

  First thanks go out to my brother without whom this book could have taken years to take a readable format and see Amazon e-print. Thanks are also in order for Mira from the Jim Butcher website and everyone at Baen's Bar who commented and helped make this story as good as it is. You've all been wonderful, guys.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1: Changing of the Guard

  Chapter 2: The Engineer

  Chapter 3: What to do?

  Chapter 4: Meetings, warrants, and warrant officers

  Chapter 5: First Among Officers

  Chapter 6: Drills and Rabbits

  Chapter 7: Nothing To Fear But Fear Itself?

  Chapter 8: Time To Get Changed

  Chapter 9: A Change Of Wardrobe

  Chapter 10: For the Prize

  Chapter 11: ‘Tis a Minerale’

  Chapter 12: Distress Call

  Chapter 13: Rallying the troops

  Chapter 14: Pirates

  Chapter 15: Tis-a-Pickle!

  Chapter 16: An Improbable Success

  Chapter 17: A Nice Cruise

  Chapter 18: An Outraged Engineer

  Chapter 19: The Relief Effort

  Chapter 20: A Lesson In Piracy

  Chapter 21: A bad Transition

  Chapter 22: Aches and Pains

  Chapter 23: Bugs!

  Chapter 24: The Great Fall

  Chapter 25: Hate At First Sight

  Chapter 26: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

  Chapter 27: The Bearer of bad news

  Chapter 28: A Sword, Some Food and a Family Visit!

  Chapter 29: Given a Job

  Chapter 30: The Banquet

  Chapter 31: To the Surface

  Chapter 32: First Impressions

  Chapter 33: A Challenge or Two

  Chapter 34: Settlement and a Dispute

  Chapter 35: A Rude Awakening and Arrivals

  Chapter 36: Let's make a trade

  Chapter 37: To depart or not to depart

  Admiral’s Gambit Preview

  Chapter 1: Departure and Arrival

  Chapter 2: Around The Bridge

  Chapter 3: Not So Easy

  Chapter 4: Strategy Session

  Chapter 5: Into the Fray!

  Chapter 6: The Paring Knife

  Chapter 7: Down in the Turret Pits and then Back to the Bridge

  Chapter 8: Boarding Action

  Chapter 1: Changing of the Guard

  My name is Jason Montagne Vekna, Governor of Planetary Body Harpoon, Vice Admiral in the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet, a Prince-Cadet of House Montagne, and a sometimes-struggling college student. And this is the story of the craziest week of my life.

  **********

  Being a member of Planetary Royalty has its perks, but it isn't all it's cracked up to be. The bright lights, flashing cameras and flashier titles usually just amount to nothing more than a glorified prison sentence. For instance, I had been granted the title and rank of Vice Admiral in the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet. Sounds great, right? If you looked at the official chain of command, you would see that I was the commander of an entire Fleet sent out to guard the borders of the Confederated Empire. In reality I commanded nothing at all, that was Imperial Rear Admiral Arnold Janeski's domain. And that was fine by me.

  I usually spent the majority of my time aboard ship working on Tabulated Planetary Service/Statistics reports, otherwise known as TPS/S. Homework, in other words, for my distance learning program which applied toward my degree in colonial administration. It was my dream to renounce my citizenship and become an administrator in a new frontier colony. I was never actually involved in fleet operations. The ‘fleet’ such as it was consisted of fewer than 20 ships and was spread out over 7 parsecs of space. We controlled our section of the border by performing routine patrols as individual units or at most penny packets of two ships.

  The only thing I controlled was the workstation and terminal in my stateroom. To make certain I understood my position in this fleet (as if I’d ever forget), the real Admiral had also stationed two Imperial Marine Jacks decked out in full power armor outside my door, as an honor guard. They escorted me wherever I went and were with me whenever I was outside my quarters. This was the only real place I had any privacy during the cruise.

  I was sitting at my workstation, pounding away on a particularly tricky problem of resource allocation for a new colony in the early stages of settlement, when Admiral Janeski’s voice sounded from the speakers in my cabin.

  “Governor Montagne to the Flag Bridge. Governor Montagne to the Flag Bridge immediately. This is the Admiral.” The speaker then cut off.

  I dropped the cup of tea I had been sipping as I jumped out of my seat, having heard my name on the ship-wide intercom for the first time I could recall. This couldn't be good, I thought.

  I was aboard the Lucky Clover as a face-saving piece of interstellar politics between the parliamentary government of my home world Capria and our good friends from the Empire. My planet was part of a vast Confederacy which had functionally merged with the Empire about fifty years ago to create the Confede
rated Empire. The Empire had ‘asked’ (a much gentler word than demanded) that the individual world states in our sector of the Confederacy second ships from our individual System Defense Fleets over to the Imperial Rim Fleet. We were supposed to help patrol the borders of the Confederated Empire while the regular units of the Imperial Fleet were siphoned away from Rim Fleet and assigned to a Battle Fleet on the other side of the Empire, where there was a real war raging with the Gorgon Alliance.

  But a battleship, even an outdated one represents a significant financial investment (not to mention its symbolic value), so Capria insisted on maintaining some measure of official control over it, even if it was just on paper. This is where my Vice Admiralty comes in.

  It might seem like it would be a prestigious position, but the ruling families of Capria disagreed. Since there was no real power or prestige to be found in such a role, there wasn't exactly a line forming around the corner with eager applicants.

  The job was eventually given to the Montagne Branch of the Royal Family, who quickly assigned the position to someone they felt best represented the spirit of the post. Someone who was not powerful enough to cause any real problems, yet high-profile enough to serve as a proper figurehead. Someone charismatic enough to step in front of the cameras when it was time for a press conference, but too inexperienced to really understand what was going on without a script in front of him. In other words, they volunteered me for the job.

  After gathering all of the bits and pieces of my ridiculous court attire, I bolted to the door and de-activated the locking mechanism. I planned to finish assembling and adjusting my wardrobe en route to the Flag Bridge. It was a poor idea to keep Admiral Janeski waiting.

  As soon as I cleared the doorway, the two Jacks grabbed a hold on either arm and despite my bewildered protest that I could easily walk under my own power, frog marched me down the corridor.

  My quarters were those of a former Flag Lieutenant’s and were on the same level as the Flag Bridge. So in almost no time I was through the first pair of reinforced bulkheads leading inside. The first set of pressure doors closed behind us and the second opened as I was unceremoniously pushed onto the Flag Bridge.

  Opening my mouth to protest this rough treatment, I took one look at the Admiral’s tight lipped face and snapped my teeth together with an audible click. Glancing down, I started buttoning my formal jacket, embarrassed at the disheveled appearance I presented in front of this most formidable Imperial Officer.

  “Governor Montagne,” he said, acknowledging my presence with a nod. “It seems we have a bit of a situation.”

  Admiral Janeski insisted on referring to me by my gubernatorial title, probably because he felt it best personified myself in his eyes. Sure, I was Governor of Planetary Body Harpoon. It's true. But the other truth about Harpoon is that it was nothing more than an irregular asteroid barely larger than this ship on an elliptical orbit. About a year ago, I discovered a pair of illegal miners operating there. After I went to the authorities, I couldn't even get a parliamentary court to rule that I should receive a portion of their profits (which would have then been used to offset the costs of my tuition), let alone evict them and their mining operation from the asteroid itself.

  “What happens to be the problem, Admiral?” I asked, suppressing a desire to run a hand through my hair and gulp through sheer force of will. When combined with the iron clad media training every royal of my home world is taught from birth, I somehow managed to abstain from any other unseemly behaviors as well. Our training was rigorous because we didn’t want to embarrass ourselves or the government in front of the public. Most especially the government that held our purse strings, but in this case my training did a good job of settling my flutters. I couldn’t imagine what problem could exist that the admiral would need my assistance with but I was willing to do my figurehead best and help out however I could.

  The Admiral ignored me and pulled out an official looking paper scroll covered with seals. Looking down at this he prepared to read.

  Quickly I schooled my features. This at least was something with which I was familiar. Receiving and listening to speeches from foreign dignitaries while maintaining an appropriately stoic and regal appearance had been one of the primary skills taught in royal finishing school. That and making our own speeches in return, of course. We weren’t really taught that much about the policies, politics or inner workings of the planetary government, nor did we have much say in such matters. Instead we were taught both how to and how not to behave in formal state functions and also how to receive and entertain important galactic visitors. We were really nothing more than the glorified butlers of our parliamentary government.

  “By order of Magnus Gaius Pontifex, Triumvir of the Empire, along with the advice and consent of the Imperial and Republican Senate, all ships, officers, personnel, and portable assets belonging to the Empire of Man, excepting only certain diplomatic envoys and delegations, are hereafter ordered to immediately withdraw from the Spine Ward Sectors of the Confederated Empire and redirected to those provinces along the Gorgon Alliance front as quickly as possible-”

  I leaned back, eyes widening. “What!” I burst out, unable to restrain myself. And not incidentally cutting the Admiral off midsentence. “You’re stripping the Spine of all Imperial assets? What about the Rim Fleet?”

  Fixing me with a thousand meter stare, and consequently freezing me in my tracks, he stopped the next words halfway up my throat. After a brief, but sufficiently reprimanding pause, the Admiral continued “This proclamation is not yet finished,” he grated between clenched teeth, his eyes boring holes through my skull as efficiently as any cutting torch.

  Realizing how badly I'd broken protocol by cutting off an Imperial Admiral reading an official proclamation from the Triumvirate of Man, I nodded despite the thousand questions still bubbling up inside me.

  The admiral cleared his throat and continued. “In addition all assets belonging to the Empire of Man, the Triumvirate and the Senate, which cannot be easily moved out of the indicated sectors but which represent a military or technological asset of importance are to be destroyed. Also,” he continued grimly, “all private Imperial citizens are urged, for their own protection, to abandon the Spine Ward sectors of Confederation Space. As Imperial fleet units and ground forces will no longer be able to offer an adequate level of protection from piracy and other acts of vandalism nor to provide any form of emergency service until further notice.”

  So saying he rolled up the proclamation and placed it back inside an official looking engraved wooden box.

  Swaying where I stood, I was completely stunned. This was a complete violation of the Union Treaty, which established the Confederated Empire, and permanently allied both the Confederation and the Empire for time and all eternity.

  “What about the Union Treaty…? What about the rights of the Spine Ward Sectors to Confederated Empire protection?” I stumbled out. “Aren’t we still a part of the Confederated Empire with the right to equal protection, under the United Space Sectors and Provinces Act?” I ground to a halt, my mouth opening and closing as the potential implications of the Rim Fleet withdrawing from this specific sector of space really started sinking in.

  The Admiral shook his head. “All of those are very interesting questions. Questions to which I’m sure you’ll eventually receive answers. But at this specific moment those are the wrong questions to be asking. What you should instead be asking, or at least considering, is what I’m going to do with all the imperial officers and personnel currently serving in this ad-hoc patrol fleet, and whether or not I am planning to turn the entire fleet toward Empire Space.”

  I blinked. The thought hadn’t even occurred to me. He could certainly do it, not only did he have the personnel to man the ships but he also had enough Imperial Marines to seize the vessels by force if necessary.

  “I can see you hadn’t thought about that yet.” Again he shook his head but this time his upper lip curled as well. “Tak
ing control of this fleet and moving it to the Empire would be no problem at all.” He snapped his fingers for emphasis and snorted, then shook his head in negation. “However I am no pirate and even if I were, this outdated fleet is hardly worth the effort. The cost of upgrading this poor excuse for a star fleet to battle-ready condition would make it hardly worth the effort.”

  “Fortunately for you, but unfortunately for this patrol fleet, that means that a short while from now you are going to be in full operational command of this fleet… such as it is.”

  Overwhelmed I gasped in dismay. Feeling lightheaded, I carefully walked over to the nearest work station on the Flag Bridge and collapsed into its form fitting chair. “There’s no way I can actually take command of this battleship, let alone act as a real Admiral for the entire fleet.” I exclaimed verbalizing the first thing to enter my brain.

  The Imperial Admiral shook his head dismissively. “You’ve no choice but to fulfill your duty. Political expediency may have placed you in ceremonial command of this patrol fleet, that’s true. Unskilled and unfit as you are, you’ll no doubt make a hash of it. However it is still your duty to carry out the stated will of this fleet’s collective governments and complete its mission and intended purpose before returning safely home.”