Waverly spoke up. “Mind if I join you?”
“Sure, if you can get one of these on.”
Waverly looked at the Chief. “Will the helmets work over bandages?”
“They will. Let’s see, you’ll need about a size four.”
Stevens and Walters were looking hopefully at Trexler, and he sighed. “Are you guys checked out on the net?”
“Yes, sir!” they both answered at the same time.
While the Chief got them plugged in, Trexler said, “Ship.” His communicator started flashing and buzzing again. He put it to his mouth and said, “Trexler.”
“General transmission is not permitted in sick bay, Admiral. How may I be of service?”
“I’m coming into the net. I want a broad view of the Aldebaran system. Three others here in sick bay are coming in with me. They are restricted to communicating only with me. Otherwise, they have full access, provided it does not limit the activities in the operations center or the bridge.”
“Established, Admiral.”
Trexler pulled his helmet on. A few seconds later, he found himself positioned in the center of the system, right at the center of the sun. He looked outward, and many, many symbols denoting ships stood out far in the distance, too far away for him to distinguish the tags Sam Taylor and his staff had applied to them. A tiny planet came into view as he rotated his head to the left, and he zoomed in on Aldebaran I. There were a few friendly ships there, but no Rebel or Chessori ships, so he backed out and continued turning left until he’d made the whole circle. He sensed Waverly, Stevens, and Walters joining him.
He thought “strategic view,” and he was instantly looking down on the Aldebaran system, all of it spread out below him. He moved in closer, and ships and their tags came into clear focus.
He studied the view for a moment, and thought, “trajectories, Rebel wings only.” Individual ship symbols vanished, to be replaced by snowflake symbols that someone had used to designate wings of Rebel ships. He moved closer in to one snowflake, and it expanded to show twelve Rebel squadrons. He thought, “move to next wing.” The view shifted to another wing and moved in. Again, there were twelve squadrons. He repeated the process 39 more times to assure himself that all the Rebels had formed into wings.
He thought “display Empire ships assigned to attack this Rebel wing.” Two fast cruisers instantly sprang into view, but they were far from the attacking Rebel wing. He repeated the process of examining each wing. Each wing had at least two friendly ships assigned to it, and some had as many as six. Had he not known that some of the cruisers were fast, he would have thought Chandrajuski was holding many ships in reserve. In other cases, it was obvious which enemy wings he was setting up to attack, a consideration the Rebels could not miss. Was Chandrajuski tempting them to commit their reserves?
He had another thought, wondering if Chandrajuski had chosen to hide the fast ships. As he explored, he discovered that all the fast ships were, indeed, tucked in with slow ships that were assigned to completely different wings. Once the attack began, some of these fast ships would leave their group and hit a completely different target. The Rebels in some wings would be completely surprised.
It struck Trexler as a superb plan. Some squadrons would be hit hard, and the ones that weren’t hit hard would at least be probed to identify Chessori wings. Seeton’s ships, approaching from behind, were always paired, and though they would not be in position at the outset of the battle, they were good reserves. Trexler was certain those squadron commanders had been given instructions on how to attack, probably using paired cruisers. Though the strategy would be new to them, it was not difficult to execute with a little practice.
Waverly, Stevens, and Walters stayed with him through all of this, and because of the magic of the net, they understood what he was looking at and thinking about.
He zoomed out again and just looked at the whole situation for a long time, moving in and out, considering and contemplating. He found a few places where he might have done things a little differently, but he found no faults. He had no idea who was crewing each ship; to him the upcoming battle was reduced to symbols.
Waverly approached him some time later. “I think I’m getting the hang of the commands,” he said. “While you were studying the big picture, I tried something else. Want to have a look?”
“Sure, Jim.”
Waverly thought, “display only enemy ships that are not in wing formation.” Forty-five Rebel ships remained on the display.
“Highlight these ships, then add all Rebel wings to the display,” Waverly commanded. The wings returned, and clear to them from the display, each had another ship associated with it, sometimes off to the side, and sometimes behind, depending on the positions of the attacking Empire ships.
“If each squadron is a battalion, those single ships are your brigade commanders,” Waverly said.
“Except for the four spaced geometrically around the far perimeter of the system,” Trexler added thoughtfully.
“Exactly. They’re running the show.”
Trexler studied the display. “Those four look to me like they’re in position to make an immediate jump. It might not be possible to take them out, even with a fast ship.”
“Would they see a fast ship coming in from outside the system?”
“Hmm. I’m not sure.”
“There’s one more item, but I don’t want to discuss it on the net. I have no idea who has access to what we’re seeing and thinking. Are you willing to disconnect?”
“Sure.”
All four of them disconnected. Stevens and Walters looked dismayed. “Something on your mind, guys?” he asked.
They looked at each other, and Stevens spoke soberly. “It’s like the Normandy invasion, sir. A lot of people are going to die out there.”
Trexler nodded. “Most will die quickly, some will not. Cruisers are very hard to completely destroy. We’ll rescue the survivors if we can. For all of history, war has been a gruesome business. In this case, it’s all for a concept: you might call it right versus wrong; you might call it restoring the Empire; or you might call it saving Earth. All of those reasons work for me. The cause is just. It’s our job to end it as quickly as we can. You helped us along that path by clearing the Chessori from Orion III and Aldebaran I. Those were key battles, gentlemen, and they were giant strides toward reaching the finish line. The battle here will be another giant stride.”
“Provided we win, sir. It looks to me like we’re seriously outnumbered.”
“We are at the moment, but you were here yesterday when we discussed the reserves. Something you might not know is that a lot of our ships have significant advantages over the Rebel ships. Our fast ships are just what the name implies; they’re lots faster than the Rebel ships. Some of them also have more firepower and better shields. They’ll hit hard, and if the going gets too tough, they’ll bounce away and come back from a different angle. It will make a difference.”
He turned to Waverly. “What did you want to talk about?”
“I did another search, Ray. I asked the AI to display only friendly ships that are not assigned a target. There were a few near the planet. Out here, there were three.”
“Hmm. Were we one of them?”
“Yes. I presume one of the others was Chandrajuski’s flag ship. I’m guessing Admiral Taylor’s flag ship has been sent into action. I wouldn’t be surprised if Chandrajuski’s is sent in later.”
“And the other?”
“It was a fast frigate, way out on the edge of the system, just like the four Rebel command ships. The reason I didn’t want to announce it to one and all on the net is that I think it might be the Queen. Reba talked about her quite a bit, and from what I understand of her, she’s not one to sit out a major confrontation.”
“Hmm. You could be right, Jim. She committed her own personal squadron to Chandrajuski, and I’ve been wondering where she went that’s safe. Wherever she went, it would be in a fast ship, certainly. If she’s here, she can fast ship away any time she wants.” Then he sucked in his breath. “Maybe.”