Iceni managed not to look amused. The problem is that he likes one mobile forces unit commander far too much, and she’s an enemy mobile forces unit commander. Would you kill me, Colonel Rogero, if Drakon ordered it and threatened to tell everyone about that if you didn’t? “Keep a very close eye on Colonel Rogero.”
“The ship’s systems will automatically alert you if Colonel Rogero comes within ten meters of you,” Marphissa said.
“Excellent.” On something as small as a heavy cruiser that might produce too many false alarms, but if so she could have the alert parameters changed. “Then there’s one other thing.” Iceni smiled to lower the tension. “General Drakon has suggested that I look at changing the rank titles within the mobile forces. That would make clear our break with the failed Syndicate system.”
Marphissa nodded. “No one has any love for the Syndicate command structure. We’re not working in business jobs. We’re mobile forces.”
“Exactly. I did not want to use the same titles that Drakon has adopted for his ground forces. You’re not ground forces.”
Marphissa nodded again, emphatically this time.
“I looked for a rank structure from earlier times, but not one that was the same as the Alliance now uses,” Iceni said. “I believe we need to avoid that as well.”
A third nod, very strong. “We are not a… minor subset of the Alliance.”
“I agree. Someday… well, here.” Iceni brought up a file and pivoted the display floating above her desk so that Marphissa could see it. “This is a rank structure that was once used in part of the Syndicate Worlds before all forces were unified under a single corporate system.”
Marphissa gazed at Iceni in disbelief. “The Syndicate Worlds once allowed local variations in how things were done?”
“It is hard to believe, isn’t it? That was more than a hundred and fifty years ago. These were star systems that, back then, had been absorbed into the Syndicate Worlds recently enough that they still retained some individuality.” “Absorbed” was a nice way to describe what had actually been a conquest without combat of a small group of star systems next to both Syndicate and Alliance space that had foolishly tried to stand apart from both powers. Neutrals had been low-hanging fruit in those days, and the Alliance had been eager to avoid outright fighting. If the idiots running the Syndicate Worlds hadn’t attacked the Alliance they might have been able, over time, to similarly acquire control of minor coalitions like the Rift Federation and the Callas Republic. Instead, both had ended up associating actively with the Alliance during the war. What will happen to their supposed independence now? Iceni wondered. Will the Alliance formally take them over? Surely, they wouldn’t just let them go back to acting on their own. I should ask Black Jack about that when his fleet returns. He must be the one making that decision.
Iceni raised her forefinger to point to parts of the display. “As flotilla commander, you will be Kommodor Marphissa. Depending on their seniority, their sub-CEO or executive rank, individual warship commanders will be Kapitan First, Second, or Third rank, and below that the lower executives and subexecutives will be Kapitan-Leytenant, then Leytenant, and Leytenant Second rank, and, finally, the most junior will be Ships Officers.”
“I think this change will be welcomed,” Marphissa said. “It’s good that it’s not the same as that of the Alliance and is also different from the structure put into place by General Drakon. The mobile forces, I mean the warships, will like being distinct in that way.”
“Is any part of the new rank structure unclear?” Iceni asked.
“Is there no rank above Kommodor?”
Iceni laughed. “You’re already worried about that? Atmiral.”
“Atmiral,” Marphissa murmured, as if trying on the title.
“We need a few more warships before there will be any call for an Atmiral, Kommodor Marphissa.”
They were thirty light-minutes from the jump point for Kane. Iceni, seated on the bridge of the heavy cruiser, turned to Marphissa. “Kommodor, take the flotilla to the jump point for Kane and order all units to be prepared for action upon exit at Kane.”
“Kane?” Marphissa asked, plainly having expected Taroa. “Is there an estimate of what we may face there?”
“I will brief you when we have entered jump.”
That left five hours at point one light speed. Iceni stayed on the bridge, watching her display where the warships, moving at about thirty thousand kilometers a second, crawled across the vast distances inside a star system. At the same velocity, a journey to the nearest star, Laka, would require nearly twenty-five years.
The old and proven jump technology would allow the flotilla to reach Kane in about six days, though, taking a shortcut through a still-poorly-understood dimension in which distances were much shorter.
As they finally approached the jump point, Marphissa looked at Iceni. “Permission to proceed with jump to Kane?”
“Permission granted. All units are to be at combat readiness status one when we exit at Kane.”
“Yes, Madam President.” Marphissa passed along those orders to the other warships with them, then ordered the jump.
Iceni felt the odd twisting as the endless bright stars against an eternity of black space vanished. In their place, the outside views now showed the monotonous, dull nothingness of jump space. Though human ships had been transiting jump space for centuries, it had never been explored because there was no known way to explore it. Ships could not deviate from their paths between the small areas in space called jump points where jump space could be accessed from normal space. Human sensors could detect nothing except the gray void.
And the lights. As Iceni watched, one of the mysterious lights of jump space bloomed ahead. No one had ever learned what those lights were, what caused them, or what they meant, if anything. There were rumors and superstitions, of course. When Iceni was in normal space or on a planet, she inwardly mocked those who thought the lights were signs of some powerful otherness watching humanity. But when in jump space, a region where no human really belonged, Iceni always felt a chill inside when she saw one, as if she were gazing on something whose face could not be comprehended by the human mind. At such times her father’s old stories of the living stars seemed to have extra force.
There was also no way to send messages between warships, or any means of communication with the regular universe. Secrets could not be compromised. “Kommodor, it is time to discuss our mission.”
To her credit, the new kommodor took the news without flinching. “A battleship?”
“Yes.”
Marphissa made an uncertain gesture. “This should be… interesting.”
“Yes,” Iceni repeated, hoping that it wouldn’t be too interesting.
Six days later, the heavy cruiser at full combat alert and Marphissa looking fiercely determined, the flotilla prepared to exit at Kane. “If the battleship is combat ready and anywhere near that jump point,” she commented to Iceni, “then the result will be a short battle indeed.”
“Are you ready to find out, Kommodor?” Iceni asked, trying to look and sound completely confident.
“Yes, Madam President.”
The gray nothingness of jump space was replaced by stars and blackness, Iceni struggling to overcome the effects of exiting jump so she could focus eyes and mind on her display and learn what awaited them at Kane.
Chapter Nine
Alarms sounded on the cruiser, targeting systems that hadn’t been impacted by the transition from jump space locking on to the large ship near the jump exit but waiting for human approval before they fired. Using tricks she had learned long ago, Iceni managed to fight off the disorientation caused by jump exit and grimly focused on her display.