Location: Alcubierre Launcher, New Lancashire, United Commonwealth of Colonies

“Roger that, Food For Thought, you are clear to transition. Thank you for visiting New Lancashire. STC, out.” The operator sitting at the center of the Launcher’s Space Traffic Control Command Center cut the line, but watched the plot on his holo carefully.

Food For Thought was a one-hundred-and-seventy-five-thousand ton cargo vessel from Mackintosh Shipping Conglomerate, so the operator’s cheery attitude had a little to do with the ship belonging to the Prime Minister of the Commonwealth. Standing orders from RADM Nelson were to be extra warm and fuzzy to Mackintosh and Gold ships.

The icon on the operator’s holo blinked out of existence as the ship was thrown off into space faster than the speed of light. “Good transition.” The operator reported to the Chief Petty Officer he was assigned under.

Space Traffic Control was a joint military-civilian operation. It made it a little uncomfortable for civilians to be integrated into the military bureaucracy, and for the soldiers and spacers to be subjected to the soft management styles of civilian superiors. It changed both parties, and they generally had a little trouble getting their bearings when they left the job…if they left it. It was a good job for civvies and a good assignment for spacers, so turnover and reassignment wasn’t too often.

“Who’s next in the queue?” The CPO asked as he studied his own holo. The Fleet NCO’s was more comprehensive, and had a threat component aspect monitoring a few light minutes out from the Launcher. The operator’s view was of the Launcher itself and the inbound and outbound lanes.

“Next up is EUS Versailles: a Euro courier boat, three-thousand tons, crew of eight, weapons compliment is one missile tube and one one-hundred terawatt frontal energy cannon, cargo is personal mail and sensitive but unclassified military communications. Their manifest destination is Neu-Thüringen. Requesting commander approval for access to SALN.”

Secure Alliance Launcher Network access was needed for the European Union ship to transition from a Commonwealth controlled system to an EU system. The QE coordinates of Launchers were highly guarded state secrets, which made travel between them difficult. The SALN was the answer to that problem.

“Command approval,” the CPO transmitted a few minutes later after getting the Launcher CO to sign off on the transfer. “Commencing sensor scan.”

All ships going in and out of the system by way of the Launcher were given a cursory active scan. The Launcher was a great place to do it because ships were passing within the fifty-kilometer prongs of the launcher. In astronomical distances, that was practically right on top of each other.

It wasn’t a catchall, but if people were hiding something the scan had a decent chance of picking up on it. In person scans could be done by boarding parties from the Fleet’s ships, or on the ground by the local cops or MPs.

“Scan completed. Tell Versailles they’re good to go.” The CPO paid close attention to the operator’s handling of this transition.

Through SALN the operator got the QE coordinates for the EU Launcher in Neu-Thüringen. An encrypted burst was sent to the courier ship. After a few minutes, the ship toggled back that they were good to go.

“Thank you for the hospitality, New Lancashire.” The captain of the little boat sent back. It had the robotic tone of a translator unit.

Unlike the Commonwealth, whose primary language was English due to three of the four major powers at the starfarring nation’s founding being English speaking, the EU was a nation of many different languages. Most people in the EU tried to learn as many languages as they could, but with the old United Kingdom’s influence falling by the wayside hundreds of years ago, English was about fourth on the priority list of the educational institutions behind German, French, and Spanish. Most Commonwealth citizens were comfortable with only English and Spanish, but that just didn’t cut it in their economic and military ally of half a millennia.

“Versailles is away.” The operator reported as the EU ship disappeared from his plot.

“Hold outbound traffic.” The CPO instructed. “We’ve got a military inbound scheduled in fifteen minutes. It should be CWS Fortitude returning from repairs.”

“Roger that.” The operator sent out the message to halt traffic. He got the standard amount of grumbling back, but the spacers traveling between the stars on the Commonwealth network knew not to rock the boat when the military needed priority.

The ripple in time and space indicating an Alcubierre exit appeared right where it was supposed to in the Launcher’s inbound lane. The operator checked the ripple for the telltale signs and found the estimations matched a ship of Fortitude’s weight class. Now all they had to do was wait.

Three minutes later, eight minutes before Fortitude’s arrival, the lights in the STC Command Center dropped to red and a claxon started wailing.

“Unscheduled arrival! ETA six minutes!” The CPO was on his feet smashing his hand into alert buttons. “Set Condition Two!”

Launchers didn’t have calls to battlestations like warships. They had defensive conditions to prepare the Launchers to repel boarders and ready their defensive options. Condition Two was the second most severe. It got the Launcher’s marine contingent into armor and assembled. It also got all of the defensive railguns and point defense lasers online and integrated with STC. There were a lot of those on the large structure. It started painting the area around the Launcher with enough active sensors that they could tell the flavor of a spacer’s shit on a mining ship within five thousand kilometers. Lastly, it sent an alert to the Fleet. Unfortunately, those warships were two dozen million miles away right now, and even at full speed ahead it was take a while to reach the Launcher.

However, the crew of Fortitude’s sister ship, Liberty, was on picket duty around the Launcher less than two hundred and fifty thousand kilometers away, and it’s targeting systems were going hot.

Two modern cruisers wasn’t a bad defensive force this far out in the Outer Rim, but if this was a big Blockie push to counter the frequent Commonwealth strikes, the two ships wouldn’t be enough.

was what was on everyone’s mind, but no one had time to consider the possibilities.

Condition-Two wasn’t fully set when Fortitude appeared out of nowhere. The ship had transferred to sub-light but retained a decent amount of acceleration. At such close distances, the communication between Fortitude, Liberty, and the Launcher was nearly instantaneous. The crew of STC watched as the five-hundred-meter long warship rotated on its access and dove below the system’s elliptical. Collision alarms rang in the STC as Fortitude came within a few dozen kilometers of the outbound ships that had scattered after receiving the Launcher’s Condition-Two alert.

“Oh my God.” The operator was studying the ripple in space of the unexpected arrival. What he was seeing made him want to piss himself.

He sent the results of the scan to the CPO whose face went pale at the information. “Not possible. Do it again!” The CPO demanded.

The operator didn’t blame him, but numbers didn’t lie. The tonnage the ripple projected out massed the entire defensive Fleet in the system. The operator sent the same numbers back to the CPO, who was already on the horn with the people that mattered. Again, all they could do was wait.

The operator wiped his sweaty palms on his smartcloth pants over and over again. It didn’t seem to help, and as the large timer on the wall steadily wound down, it got even worse.

“Condition-Two set.” The report came through.

The OIC of the Launcher was in the command center now, and all he had to do was press a button for them to go to Condition-One, which meant they would open fire on the enemy and deploy their troops.

“Arrival in ten…nine…”

The operator gulped and looked at the small holo of his wife he kept on his desk.

“…six…five…four…”

He ran his fingers through it and prayed to every god in the pantheon of humanity that he got to see her again.

“…two…one…transition…”

The enemy appeared and everyone froze.

“Holy shit!”