Chapter 011: Surprise

Sector 51 (also known as Alfheim) lies in the middle of the Inner Verge Oversector. It was initially colonized by a great number of political, religious, and sociological outcasts from the collapsing Solar Commonwealth. When the Frontier Rebellion changed into Unification Wars, the sector suddenly faced an unexpected threat.

Before the War of Purity began the process of the Commonwealth’s decline, Human Space was ravaged by another conflict, the Genetic Wars. Reaver, one of the most prominent genetic warlords, escaped after his defeat and found refuge in Sector 51, rebuilding his forces in a cluster of worlds in a safe distance from the hyperlane exit. The empire of his descendants remained hidden during the sector's official discovery and colonization.

When the 51st Fleet of the Commonwealth Navy finally collapsed, becoming pirates, mercenaries, or joining the local secessionist group, his descendants struck. The forces of the so-called Red Brotherhood were composed of entire legions of supersoldiers, each of them created through excessive cybernetic enhancement, decades of unethical genetic tampering, and simple brainwashing. With their opponents’ lack of unity and infighting, it seemed that nothing could stop the tide of horrors flooding the sector.

This lasted until the miracle occurred. A cluster of more established secessionist groups in the region (led by Beleriand, not yet an Empire) pooled their forces in a desperate attempt to halt the Brotherhood advance… and succeeded. The Battle for Gondolin-IV (sometimes known as the Miracle of Gondolin) ended with the almost complete annihilation of the Brotherhood’s fleet. However, this only meant a brief respite for the defenders, as the Brotherhood’s superior industrial power and endless reserves would soon reignite its conquests.

The Brotherhood was denied that chance. Before it could rebuild its fleets, all of its worlds were sterilized by extensive orbital bombardments. Remnants of its forces fled to Discord, from which they operate to this day.

Encyclopedia Galactica

Book 1, page 796

***

Six days had passed since the day that they were notified that the Guild’s fleet arrived in the system. Six days since - for some unexplained reason - Captain called them back from Texia-III. All crew members were to remain sealed in the Echo until the ship was ready for departure.

The ship felt like a prison overflowing with captives. Neither Christopher nor any of his subordinates had the slightest idea why the captain suddenly reversed his recruitment policy. All they knew was that recruits filled the corridors and halls of the Echo. Most of them had a much too idealized view of the Explorer’s Guild and its business.

Finding a place for them was one thing. Their presence was a logistics nightmare with which Christopher had no experience, though he suspected that at least some people from the quartermaster’s office went bald. Then, however, an issue of training came.

The Captain ordered accelerated training regimens. It was so bad, that after two-and-a-half months in the Explorer’s Guild Christopher became a teacher. Well, at least an assistant teacher; he was helping Chief Tiaa oversee large groups of trainees. He still didn’t feel ready for this.

This didn’t mean that Christopher’s own training halted for even a second. In fact, It actually took on a considerable boost in speed ever since the Captain called them back from Texia and his working shift got expanded to fourteen hours. This included at least eight hours of standard petty officer training, with the rest being divided between combat training, helping Tiaa, and practicing his sorcerer ability.

It made him notice differences, small signs of his body differing from what it used to be. For one, learning was easier, and even after ten hours of cramming, he could still focus on the text in front of him. More than that, even after lectures several hours long, his ability to keep his attention from straying remained steadfast.

Sooner or later though, his body had to run out of steam. After six days composed of nothing else but learning things and sleeping, he was reaching his limit.

“Man, you’re killing yourself.” Ryan’s words woke him up from a stupor. Did he fall asleep? “I mean, look at yourself in the mirror. You’re starting to resemble a zombie.” Nice to know they are still a cultural thing.

“I do not want to stop. I’m improving by leaps and bounds. I’m tired, that’s all.” I can still do this. Mostly because Tiriel’s existence is sparing me from the need to get food on my own.

“Okay. Why are you in such a hurry?” Ryan kept digging. Christopher’s timetable overload became an official topic of their little post-dinner talk. How did I let it change into ‘who leaves the table first has to clean the dishes’ situation?

“It’s complicated.” He didn’t want to talk about this.

“Let me clarify in his stead.” Tiriel enjoyed much more freedom, as she was ruled out from the dishwashing agreement due to being the resident cook. She was reading a book while sitting by the dinner table, her empty plate pushed aside. She spoke without pulling her eyes away from the book. “He feels bad because of the result of the Pristine Jewel mission. He felt cornered and inadequate, despite performing most admirably for his first mission. Because of that, he is now overworking himself in a desperate attempt to work out the non-existent deficiencies of his work performance.”

Christopher tried to say something in his defense. All he accomplished was opening his mouth and staring at Tiriel.

“You’re part-timing as a psychologist?” Ryan asked, with a barely concealed grin on his face.

“I stayed after mass to consult Lieutenant Commander Innocent about a certain person’s case that began worrying me.” Her eyes departed from the book and landed on still shocked Christopher. “Of course, if a certain person listened to my suggestion and didn’t stay up late yesterday, playing video games instead of resting, I wouldn’t have to start the current talk. Because the situation would still be on a bearable level.” The look on her face was one of pure mockery.

“Wait, wait, wait. It’s not like thi…”

Tiriel interrupted his frantic attempt to stop the talk from proceeding in a dangerous direction. “It is. But it was manageable while you were under normal strain. When your work extended from eight hours to fourteen, your self-learning session in the free time began taking its toll. Add not listening to me and staying late to play games with Tendrik, and that’s the result.” Her expression was stalwart and unyielding. “I have six younger siblings, don’t even try to outtalk me on this.”

“But… we had to defeat that boss!” Under her unwavering stare, he folded. ”All right, I admit. Staying late was a horrible idea. You were right. I repeat, you were right.”

“Great. Time for voting. Who supports forbidding Christopher to self-learn in the free time, when he should rest?” Ryan and Tiriel raised their hands before Christopher could protest.

“There are only three of us here. You don’t have the quorum.” Christopher replied, trying to play it off jokingly.

“I know. That’s why I asked Tendrik, Nekia, and Kivanna earlier. So it’s 5:1, AND I have a quorum.” Wait, she planned this?! How did she… “And if you play the ‘it’s not democracy’ card, we have sufficient numerical superiority to accomplish our goal with physical violence.” … I’m speechless. Especially as it’s a noble from an empire who is using democracy against me. “Listen and get it through your thick skull. Whatever the thing we came upon was, your decisions saved our lives. Lots of people in your place would have chosen wrongly and gotten us all killed. What’s more, even before that, you were doing great for your first field operation as a petty officer.”

“All I did was relay the words of the Guide, I told you that.” He didn’t make a single decision on his own during the crisis.

“Yes, but you listened to it, rather than to Commander Drathari.” This time it was Ryan who spoke. “Sure, that cave-in would have forced us to make that dive, but you’ve made the correct decision before you knew that it would take place. Add what you did during the boarding, and you get a well-played mission.”

They are right, aren’t they?

“All right, you MIGHT be right. I’ll try to relax more in my free time. Plus eight hours of sleep a day, I promi…” An untimely appearance of a new priority message interrupted him. Though in this case, it was a priority video recording.

An image of captain Keller suddenly took over most of his view.

“This is Captain Keller, commanding officer of this fine vessel.” He looked proud while saying this. “I’m about to make a very important announcement. Within a few hours, a small squadron of Explorer’s Guild vessels will join us. During our unfortunate encounter with the Pristine Jewel, we came upon signs of a third party’s presence.” The Captain continued. “We currently suspect that a hostile group of unknown nature is operating within the sector. We will look for them, with the help of our reinforcements.” Ok, this is sounding surprisingly militant. Weren’t we pretty much scavengers?

“For the next two days, we will travel together in a tight formation in the middle of the star system.” Captain went on. “Which means no threats that can surprise us. Because of that, according to standard procedures of such an operation, we will allow the movement of people between the ships of the fleet. Shuttles will fly between the ships periodically, so if you want to sample foreign cuisine, video-games, and books, or meet new people, you can do it!”

To Christopher, it sounded like a fascinating thing to do. Then again, not like he had a lot of spare time to make such trips. Maybe if I ask Chief Tiaa, she’ll give me a day off?

“However, there is a minor issue I have to mention.” Oh, great. I have bad feelings about it. “I have received a letter concerning the soon-to-be-open tourist destinations.” He made a step towards the side. Someone off-camera gave him an A4 size paper.

“This letter is signed by Commander Drathari, Lieutenant Commander Innocent, Lieutenant Commander Athalia, Lieutenant Commander Fouquet, Lieutenant Commander Yegorov… well, I’ll just sum it up to all section chiefs, many lower-ranked officers, and Chief Petty Officer Sistonen. It is a unanimity that even I, the captain of this ship, will not go against.”

He is about to say something we won’t like, isn’t he?

“According to this letter…” Captain continued, presenting the paper in front of the camera before reading its contents. “... because of several moral, ethical, religious and security reasons, all crew members who leave Echo and visit other ships of the fleet, will be considered deserters and shot on sight after their return.” Wait, what?

Even the captain seemed surprised with what he just said, as he hesitated and looked accusingly at someone not visible at the camera. Then he threw the paper away and shifted his attention back to the people listening to the message.

“Ok, so that might have been a bit too much.” What an understatement! “But there will be sanctions. Religious, administrative, or just very creative. In our wonderful Confederation, you can find good people, neutral people, bad people, and really bad people. Other than us, our fleet is composed of bad people, but I can tolerate it as long as we are operating against really bad people. However, I do not want any bad influences on my ship.”

“Eh, there goes my foreign cuisine.” Ryan mumbled in the backdrop. Tiriel said nothing, but Christopher was almost certain that she agreed with the engineer.

“According to the regulations of the Guild I cannot prohibit you leaving the ship, but I CAN promise you that some people aboard might react adversely to you doing so.” Isn’t that just open coercion? How does that fit the rules?! “Also, the less welcoming you will be towards any visitors, the better. Unleash your inner xenophobes! And have a pleasant day.” Captain disappeared from their view.

“Oh, so do you have any idea what the heck just happened?” Christopher asked, only to see his two companions shake their heads. “Great. So, the captain is turning even weirder no…” Another message came up on his view. This time a text one. And much more welcome.

“Hey, I just got a day off! The one right before the Hyperspace jump.” With an annotation from Tiaa to not use it for sightseeing. She sounds damn serious about it. What the hell’s wrong with those ships?!

“You too?” Tiriel replied. Seconds later they discovered that Ryan got a day off as well. Huh.

If Tendrik has a free day too, then we might beat that goddamn boss this time!

***

Captain Keller rarely had to be a chessmaster, but he was great at being one. When it came to scheming and planning, only Lith could match him aboard the Echo. That is unless the medic’s skills rusted overtime or his growing paranoia changed his brain into a paste.

He had almost two months to assemble the general contour of the plan. Then a week to ensure that it took into account the composition of the incoming fleet. He spent the last two days of that week making sure that all pawns would be where they should be.

He deliberately didn’t tell Lena that defeating Yunqi’s task force wouldn’t be enough. Hao was almost surely under their true enemy’s influence, and Captain Keller had to unearth evidence for that. Achieving that demanded a physical presence aboard the enemy ships. Thinking about how to accomplish that was the roughest part of the captain’s creative process.

The first point of the plan was to secure the Echo. His overly embellished transmission reached the relief forces and was taken as a sign of his ‘typical holier-than-thou attitude’. It cut down the number of potential enemies aboard the Echo, making the initial phase much smoother.

However, as always, not everything worked out as planned, which was inevitable. No plan survives contact with the enemy.

There were still hostiles aboard his cruiser when the ship entered hyperspace but worse, a small delegation of them was on the bridge. From his seat, he could see one of the Hastati’s officers talking with Lena Drathari about some trivial things. Officially, that man was the ship’s quartermaster. However, Captain Keller wasn’t senile enough to not recognize a marine pretending to be a noncombatant. Several more infiltrators were around, all of them carrying concealed weapons that they weren’t supposed to possess aboard the Echo.

Hao Yunqi had made quite a ruthless plan. Captain Keller deciphered it swiftly. These soldiers were there to detain him and everyone else on the bridge. Caught in-between the fleet (that could destroy entire outer sections of the Echo at will with their artillery) and the armed infiltrator team, Captain Keller was sure to surrender.

Absolute nonsense. They should have just annihilated us with the initial salvo. But Yunqi wants to interrogate me to make sure we didn’t tell anyone on Texia that he is in the pockets of the Confederation of Mankind’s secular equivalent of the Devil. They are just asking to get hammered, aren’t they?

Two seconds after the entire task force entered Hyperspace, The Captain activated several programs that Innocent and Fouquet had prepared for him earlier. Each of them had a specific job. Some of them were fundamental to the plan, others were optional but could help the Echo a lot. The first of them detonated several explosives set throughout the ship’s surface. Including its primary communication array - though not close enough to damage it.

Hyperspace disallowed visual observation. For a precious few moments, Hao Yunqi was to think this unexpected sabotage caused an abrupt cessation of communication with the Echo. It was also supposed to be an act confusing enough to postpone the start of Yunqi’s attack.

Two seconds later, another program activated jammers that suppressed all wireless communication aboard the cruiser. One second after that, the third program sounded combat alert throughout the Echo. It was at this point that the infiltrator squad noticed that something was amiss.

Everyone present on the bridge pulled out their sidearms. Commander Drathari, however, was too close to the infiltrators to react in time - especially as the enemy closest to her was an experienced marine. The fake quartermaster grabbed her and put the barrel of his pistol next to her temple.

“Put your guns down, or she dies.” The man spouted the most cliche line ever.

They keep underestimating me, don’t they? All you have to do is pretend you are a loony surrounded with even more loonies, and suddenly nobody thinks you’re a threat. Might be the best deception I ever pulled, huh.

“You should have chosen a better hostage.” Captain pulled a trigger. Commander Drathari slumped towards the ground with a hole in her forehead, slipping away from the shocked marine’s grab. As if it was a signal, other members of the Echo’s crew present on the bridge opened fire.

The infiltrators were all professionals, but they couldn’t know that some lieutenants and petty officers present on the bridge were Echo’s marines who were significantly better at looking harmless. There were also more of them. The last nail to their coffin was the squad of Echo’s marines in full equipment that the captain had put on standby near the bridge. Once they arrived, the firefight ended quickly.

When the gunfire died down, the first phase of the plan was over. Paramedics stormed in - though too late for some crew members of the Echo. Unavoidable when the opponents were professionals.

“Lena, status report.” The captain said while sitting on his now bullet torn seat.

An image of Commander Drathari appeared on the main screen. She was staring at him with slight displeasure visible on her face.

Fifteen people on the bridge and they took the one and only remotely controlled humanoid drone as a hostage. Absolutely hilarious.

“You realize that if I wasn’t a disembodied consciousness residing in the ship’s network, shooting me in the head would seriously violate Guild’s regulations?” The Captain sighed. Even among the Virtual Line of transhumans, shooting someone in the face wasn’t the pinnacle of savoir vivre. Mockery was the least he had to expect after doing so. “Hao Yunqi made no moves save for raising shields. I think you surprised him. What now?”

“Power up the Godhammer. Particle shields on standby. Then hail Hercules.”

***

Rear Admiral Hao Yunqi was surprised. It was a natural human reaction to something unforeseen happening a few seconds before a well-planned operation would have commenced. Right before he was supposed to order his ships to target Echo, a powerful explosion tore apart the heavy cruiser’s communication array. Dozens of smaller explosions occurred throughout its hull.

It made little sense.

Did his patrons sneak a spy aboard the Echo? Their contact on Texia claimed they didn’t, but if one of them somehow succeeded… but why blow the ship up? Was Keller plotting something that had to be stopped in such a manner?

Some third-party? But who?.

The faces on the main screen were looking at him in silence, waiting for his decision. Captains of all cruisers of his little task force were there. All of them from the Explorer’s Guild, rather than being borrowed from local navies. All of them… enlightened.

Why can't we reach the strike team? They have transmitters, they should be able to…

“Admiral, we are being hailed by the Echo.” His communication officer interrupted his internal discussion.

What the…

Another face joined the ones on the screen. Keller. Yunqi disliked that man ever since his arrival to the subsector. Keller was crazy, didn’t understand how the hierarchy worked, and kept demanding things he had no right to receive. His absolute lack of discipline was the cherry on top of this cake of incompetence.

“Hello there!” Captain Keller waved towards the camera, looking annoyingly cheerful… despite his background being riddled with holes.

“Captain Keller.” The rear admiral did his best to look concerned and neutral. “What happ…” Captain didn’t let him finish his sentence.

“I’m here to inform you about two things.” Captain grinned and leaned towards the camera. “We just eliminated every single one of your infiltrators. Everyone aboard my cruiser that wasn’t part of its crew got a bullet or two. Your plan to have my ship disappear mysteriously in Hyperspace didn’t work.” So he found out. Great.

“You madman!” the rear admiral bellowed. He had a masquerade to uphold. “You murdered Guild’s personnel! Surrender immediately, or we will open fire on your ship!”

“Oh, just shut up, you stupid yakuza cosplayer.” Captain interrupted him. How dare he?! “I possess evidence that you are working for an organization exiled from the Confederation for numerous crimes against Mankind and violations of both the Icarus Accord and the Founding Charter. If your forces surrender, I’ll offer you a fair trial instead of a summary execution. Decide now.”

Rear Admiral Yunqi laughed. Captain Severus of Hastati and Captain Arthval of Agreement joined him. Captain Lebedev of Progress and Captain Faust of Nietzsche merely smirked.

“Someone lost his touch with reality.” Captain Lebedev was the first to speak. “You wish to fight against our entire task force at a distance this close? We are less than five kilometers apart from each other. With the amount of damage you received during the Pristine Jewel incident, you will at best damage one of our ships before the rest will annihilate you.”

The distance was beyond close. Most space battles were waged at a distance of at least five hundred thousand kilometers. Five kilometers? No chances of missing the target, no option for evading maneuvers. Armor could at best merely slow down a MAW round. However, the shields should give them precious few seconds. Its deployment took at least ten seconds - and Echo was yet to do so. The first salvo would have obliterated the cruiser, giving it no time to answer.

“Yes. I guess I should offer some arguments to support my statement.” Captain Keller looked unfazed by reality and the basic laws of physics governing ship battles. Has he truly gone insane? “I planned to use Nietzsche, but now that I think about it, your positioning and life philosophy make you the best target. Thank you for volunteering, Captain Lebedev.”

One second later Captain Sergey Lebedev disappeared from the screen. The small dot marked ‘Progress’ vanished from the tactical display.

What? What just…

The shockwave hit the Hercules. It wasn’t strong enough to damage anything, even on the hull’s surface. But the ship trembled slightly. This could mean only one thing. One terrifyingly impossible thing.

Captain Keller continued, with a wry smile on his face.

“Yes. I have just destroyed Progress. Too bad, such a nice ship.” Rear Admiral looked sideways, seeking confirmation… or a much more welcome denial. The terrified face of Hercules’ tactical officer told him everything he had to know. “I faked the damage reports. Sure, the damage during the meeting with NIGHTMARE TURQUOISE was substantial, but we repaired all of it during our stay in Texia. I command the full firepower of the Echo in its prime condition. Especially as the recent explosions were fake too.”

How?! I had all damage reports checked five times!

“One more thing.” Captain Keller continued. “Do you remember our first meeting? Right after I arrived in the subsector. I was giving you a report about the Echo’s capabilities?” The Rear Admiral nodded, trying to ignore the cold sweat. “I made a slight mistake. That plasma cannon in the middle of my upper deck’s main artillery towers? That’s actually a void cannon. I call it Godhammer. Cute name, isn’t it?”

No. No way.

“Well, I just used it to annihilate Progress.” Captain Keller continued his lecture. His smile was a mockery directed at them. Rear Admiral Yunqi’s hatred for that man kept growing with every second. “I love voidtechs. Godhammer has an absolute shit range of fire that makes it almost unusable in regular artillery exchanges. But at such a close distance? Neither armor nor your particle shields can even slow it down. And it melts an entire ship in milliseconds.”

“What do you want?” The Rear Admiral knew that it was the moment to fold. At least a bit. A Void Cannon wasn’t something they could fight against. On such an idiotically short distance that voidtech could one-shot a dreadnought. And, according to data he just received on his comm implant from the tactical officer, it truly was a Void Cannon.

“I’ve run a bit of a simulation before the battle.” Captain said, for the first moment in a while without a mocking smile. He was serious, for a change. “With Progress out of the picture, I will fire the Void Cannon twice before you destroy Echo. This means that if you open fire, exactly half of you are going to die. Without counting the destroyers, as they do not matter.”

The destroyers’ role on the battlefield was to reinforce missile defense and act as scouts. Even if they all lined themselves between Echo and Hercules, it wouldn’t be enough to defend against a Void Cannon.

Let’s hope that it will take the captains a while to notice that they just changed from useful help to people who saw too much. Then again, it doesn’t seem that Keller contacted them.

“Get to the point.” The Captain nodded, and for the first time in their common history, he did what Yunqi ordered him to do.

“Very well. I can destroy half of you. You can destroy me. While I can’t wait to see you destroyed, dying in the process doesn’t benefit me. I think that this is the correct time… for some diplomacy.”

Perfect. Looks like there is still a way to turn it around.