Sub-lieutenant Cleopatra Allencourt put down the stack of paper copies on the wide shared working table as carefully as she could, trying avoid the numerous cups and saucers from shaking or jingling. She didn’t want to disturb Captain Joel Karstein’s report to Admiral Sélincourt and the rest of Reserve Fleet’s senior staff, the aforementioned captain standing in front of the admiral’s briefing room desk that stood separately from the main table with seating and inlaid computer stations for forty, most of which were occupied by squadron and division commanders plus their senior staff. Numerous other flag lieutenants and yeomen were standing at the ready or sitting on stools at the back of HMS Monarch’s flag briefing chamber. She hurriedly retreated back to her station after getting a short nod of thanks from Lieutenant Commander Rohanon, the recipient officer of the paper copies of a compilation and SAI-filtered compared sensor report from all of de Chevalier’s capital ships from the exercise battle nearly two weeks prior.

“Point is, My Lord,” Captain Karstein continued, almost visually making an effort to not wring his hands while talking, “at this rate of system attrition, Sluys’ stocks of replacement parts and even simple components like electrical wiring, fusion coolant tubes, and substitutions for worn-out gun locks and breech charge holders are running out dangerously quickly.”

“This sounds eerily like what Lord Lowe Hill so lovingly called in to compl- I mean pointed out to us just two days ago,” Admiral Locke said in a snide tone from where he sat at the table closest to Sélincourt’s desk.

“It’s not just that Sluys’ warehouses are running out, sir,” Karstein continued, seemingly unperturbed, “it’s the same story for the other orbital stations here on Amaranth as well. The only major shipbuilder that has any sort of experience making capital ships for the Royal Navy is the St Aurorienne Yard, but their last major contract was the Aurora class thirty-two years ago, and most of their laid-up stock of replacement parts has already been sold off to Trafalgar and Jutland. So I’ve have to indenture Reserve’s Quartermaster Office to order as many parts for our older Monarch and De Chandlier battleships as possible.”

Sélincourt groaned, took off his white visored cap and put it on the desk, rubbed his temples, before boring his fierce ice-blue eyes into poor Post-captain Paul Browning, Reserve Fleet’s Quartermaster-Captain, who swallowed. At some point in the Royal Auroran Navy’s six and a half century history, someone had mixed up the naval and army ranks of “quartermaster”, and modern members of the Royal Navy quartermaster divisions were logistics experts, where in previous times they had been navigators and cartographers. Browning half-rose from his chair about two-thirds down the length of the table, and rested his hands on the tabletop.

“Regarding that My Lord, we’ve had serious issues getting said parts delivered to us. As Karstein said, most original replacement parts for the Aurora class BBs have already been shipped to other main logistics and operational hubs. And while getting parts for our Monarch ships is ‘simply’ tricky due to the old age of the hulls, there are simply no original stocks for the De Chandliers.”

“Did no one consider this before we were assigned as the Service’s primary training formation?” de Chevalier asked incredulously, taking notes on a datapad as the extended State of the Fleet briefing continued into its third hour. With regular intervals, steward’s mates would enter through the automated hatches to wordlessly dispose of dirty porcelain cups, replace them with clean ones, and produce fresh cans of coffee and tea for the officers, as well as trays of snacks and sandwiches. Captain Karstein turned half-around to look at her.

“Begging your pardon, Ma’am, that’s an unofficial title at best. And as such no provision was made for the increased tempo of exercises, and the accumulated wear and tear on our ships. It’s not a problem for the newer ships of the fleet, but I don’t have to remind you, sirs and madams, that Reserve is an eclectic mix of ships, and that is putting it mildly.”

“You can say that again,” Admiral Sarkissian grumbled, his arms crossed over his bulky chest, “our line of battle is made up of everything from De Chandliers ostensibly slated for the breakers yards, to fifty year old Monarchs, to a couple of Auroras on post-repair shakedowns.”

“Don’t get me started on the battlecruisers,” Juliette Hunter-Jones commented from the other side of the table, slowly caressing her red-green wingviper, Lex, who was napping in her lap, “we’re walking the entire scale from antiquated barely-past-test-bed Tigers, to Prince Consorts, to Hectors to brand new, straight out of the yards and still shaking down and commissioning Courageous ships. Trying to maintain something approaching a cohesive battle plan with such wildly differing combat capabilities within the same formation is a damn Herculean, if not Sisyphean feat.”

“To that point, My Lord,” Karstein continued after clearing his throat, not comfortable with the interruption, but also not wanting to cut through the admirals’ comments, “Sluys’ own maintenance and shipyard personnel are woefully unable to keep all of the ships at even close to high combat readiness levels. In some cases, like for most of the De Chandliers, had this been any other fleet, they would have been shut down and shipped off for major refits. And I only have two-thousand mechanics with EVA qualification, and they’re working around the clock just to patch the worst of the damage.”

“What damage are we talking about, really?” Sir Andrew Yoshizawa asked innocently, or perhaps in order to force the captain to state it for the benefit for the minutes drone, Sélincourt couldn’t tell.

“It all boils down to wear and tear on the main hulls, Sir,” the Officer Commanding Shipyard answered, "the De Chandliers, Tigers and some of the Monarchs exceeded their hull life expectancy years ago, and despite some hull lifetime prolong refits, that was still just akin to pissing oneself to keep warm, ah, begging the present company’s pardon.”

Karstein looked a bit sheepish for a moment, forgetting his audience for a moment, but Sélincourt simply shrugged and motioned for him to keep going.

“The resulting damage is mostly structural in origin; on the inside of the hulls, this mostly manifests as dislocations in critical joints such as inner belt and bulkhead fittings, critical moving parts like magazine loaders and winches, fusion reactor and Misaki bottle fastenings and the like. On the outer hull, the stress of acceleration, transitioning through the Light Way for literally tens of thousands of hours over the course of the ship’s lifetime has caused similar issues, accumulated over years and years. Reactive armour is no longer fitted properly to the hull, bits and bobs like phase arrays, communications disks, laser signal masts, all can come loose. That’s before getting to the engines, which as a standing RN regulation must undergo a complete diagnostic and mechanical overhaul every five standard years. And with this high tempo of fleet-wide exercises, all these problems are piling up at an alarmingly exponential rate, to the point where even hiring civilian orbital mechanics and engineers aren’t enough to cover the windfall.”

Admiral Sélincourt sighed, almost groaned really, and put his cap back on, running a gloved hand over his black and silver hair to slick it back first.

“Thank you very much for your report, Captain Karstein, and thank your boys and girls for their continued efforts out there. I’m not expecting miracles from you all; just slap our ships back together with as much titanium plate, elbow grease and spit as you can.”

“With all due respect, My Lord,” the OC Shipyards said with not a trace of humour in his voice, “you kind of are asking for a miracle in the case of a few of these ships. If we could at least strip the Beecham or the Kharnaya for spare parts, that would go a long way to help fix the rest of the De Chandliers…”

“You know as well as I do, Captain,” Sélincourt countered, a hint of irritation colouring his tone but it wasn’t directed at Karstein, “that all warships of the Royal Navy ultimately fall under the economic purview of His Majesty’s Government and Parliament. They’re not DIY garage skycar projects that can be stripped for useful bits, we are talking about warships carrying a frightful array of modern weapons, filled with advanced technology, and crewed by thousands of dedicated officers and men. Until ordered otherwise, Reserve Fleet will continue to maintain these ships to the best of our ability, to the ultimate purpose of preparing them and their crews for armed conflict.”

Captain Karstein sniffed, clearly unhappy with the answer but understanding it nonetheless, and he saluted, before leaving the briefing room through the automated hatch.

“I do not envy that man,” Brendan Locke said after the captain had left, “I don’t think I’d even wish my worst enemy his current position and predicament.”

“Quite,” Rear Admiral of the Red Dame Cecilia Arsenault commented from further down the table, while refilling her cup with Nilgiri, “especially considering we’ve got more ships coming in the next few weeks, courtesy of Royal Harrow finishing their backlogs in preparation for the final push to complete the Vanguards.”

Cecilia Arsenault was wiry and tall, with long and straight raven-coloured hair, and her grey eyes tracked like targeting lasers as she raised her cup to her thin lips to sip politely from her tea. Like most of the squadron and division commanders in Reserve Fleet, Sélincourt had never met or talked to Arsenault before; indeed, among the senior staff he’d only previously spoken to Baron Locke and Commodore Pavel Fletcher, temporary commander of one of Reserve’s light cruiser flotillas. Alistair wasn’t even sure which of the Auroran worlds Arsenault was from, but there was some air of uplands Cymran about her, despite her accent being a perfect Auroran received pronunciation. That was the drawback of a formation like Reserve Fleet in its current role as a training formation; it was a constant revolving door of personnel, both officers and men, with fresh drafts of relatively recently graduated ratings and ensigns rubbing shoulders with other ranks with literally decades of experience.

“Just how we’re going to crew another full heavy cruiser squadron,” Locke sighed, picking up Arsenault’s baton, “is beyond me. We barely have enough crew to man our current order of battle to a minimum level of acceptable efficiency.”

“You forget, sir,” Anaïs de Chevalier commented, “these are Flight-II County class ships as well. Their ideal complement is around eighteen hundred souls, and if the past is any indicator, they’ll arrive at Amaranth with barely a fourth of that.”

“How are we going to find enough people to man these new cruisers then?” Sarkissian asked, reaching for a datapad to find the fleet personnel rosters, “could we perhaps replace some of the battleships’ gunnery crews with Royal Marines?”

Sir Andrew Yoshizawa snorted half in humour, half in frustration.

“Sir, we only have seven battalions in total stretched across a fleet of over a hundred vessels. That’s not even enough to provide each battleship with a composite company, much less relegate them to gunnery duties. We’d free up just north of five-thousand personnel, but I’d imagine we’d have just about every Marine officer from captain up protesting loudly, and Lord Sélincourt would probably be expecting a very angry e-letter from the Adjutant-General in due order once he learns of it.”

Alistair liked Sir Andrew Yoshizawa, a Nova Caledonian with sand-brown hair and a tightly groomed pencil moustache, the Post-captain who had temporarily been assigned as de Chevalier’s flag captain was a no-nonsense officer that still managed to be serious and witty at the same time. It helped that the man was a report producing machine, and a very capable delegator of personnel and tasks.

“How is the mood amongst the men anyway, Commodore Ramakrishnan?” Sélincourt asked, and the Chief Medical Officer Fleet, Commodore Niall Ramakrishnan slipped a hand under his white cap to scratch his bald head.

“I’m afraid I have to express some concerns that sound quite a bit like what Captain Karstein just voiced. It actually ties into the current discussion as well, believe it or not. Over the course of these past two months, Reserve has arranged no less than eight fleet-wide exercises, using close to the full complement of the entire station and all its combatants, and that is not counting individual ship or division drills, as well as gunnery and handling exercises. Just as this takes a toll on the ships themselves, so does it take a toll on the ships’ men and women. The amount of officers and men on sick leave is up by close to twenty per cent, there have been numerous cases of injuries sustained during exercises, some pretty grievous, including a first rating getting his right hand smashed to pieces when it was jammed in a railgun breech loader lock. He has been invalided for the time being whilst the Sluys’ medical centre prepares a prosthetic, and should he choose to remain in the Service, he should be back in service within the month.”

“Ghastly business,” Hunter-Jones said with an accompanying grimace, “such a thing shouldn’t be happening on a King’s ship, especially during peace time.”

“That’s just it, Ma’am,” Ramakrishnan continued, “at this rate we’re pushing men and materiel much harder than they’re supposed to be pushed. Human error due to overworking is inevitable in this sort of environment, when we’re running drills every week.”

“But this was the mandate given us from the Admiralty, we’ve all read our deployment orders drafted by the Department of Personnel and the Department of Planning,” Rear Admiral of the Red Caroline Grosvenor, Sélincourt’s own Chief of Staff observed, standing as she was by the admiral’s desk, taking notes on her datapad. Alistair had been more than a little miffed that he had been denied the usual privilege of a station commander to pick his own chief of staff, but Caroline Grosvenor from Alistair’s own native New Devon on the Auroran continent of Arcadia had made a favourable impression from day one. The medium height blonde, which reminded Alistair of his daughter’s friend Alexandra Barham in many ways, had seemingly limitless energy, and would continually surprise Sélincourt with just how many administrative balls she was able to juggle at the same time, while also being supremely capable at managing the huge fleet staff, including the numerous squadron staffs on top of her usual duties.

“It’s not an ideal situation,” she continued, “and we’re sorely underequipped and undermanned, but the First Lord Admiral’s orders were clear. We’re to be the practical exam for the newly enlisted, so to speak, and the tactical innovators for the future. Am I wrong in saying that?”

“You’re not wrong, Grosvenor,” Yoshizawa said, “but this is far from an ideal situation. Reserve is a mess of a fleet with a motley assortment of crew from all stages in their careers, and an even more motley collection of ships, the vast majority of which are slated to be retired. There’s a reason it’s commonly referred to as ‘Mothball Fleet’, because we have at least thirty capital ships that are slated for the shipbreakers in the next few years.”

“At our current rate of construction and commissioning,” Artem Sarkissian countered, “I think those plans might be put on hold. Word from NavInt is that the Greens are about to launch their new Ethelred class battleships soon.”

“They’re no match for our Vanguards, surely,” Lieutenant Commander Lorenzo Vaugeois, de Chevalier’s Staff Operations Officer, interjected.

“The Vanguards are a million tonnes heavier than our own Warriors, and correct me if I’m wrong, but the Alliance doesn’t even have slips in their shipyards large enough to construct and maintain ships the size of our Warriors.”

“True, insofar as to the limit of their shipyards and the discrepancy between capabilities,” Hunter-Jones replied, ushering Lex down to the deck as it had woken up and getting a bit antsy, so it started to humour itself by running something akin to a slalom between the legs of the standing yeomen and flag lieutenants.

“But you’re forgetting that while Royal Harrow is nearing the completion of eighteen Vanguards, the Greens have two more battleship classes under construction, while the Admiralty is going a-beggar to Parliament for funding… Let’s just say that if the current trend in the Commons and the Lords continue, we can say goodbye to new capital ships for the foreseeable future.”

“I’m sick and tired of looking at polls at this point,” Brendan Locke complained, fiddling with his visored cap, “no matter how you cut it, popular opinion is split straight down the middle, and many Social Liberals and even a few Royalists are jumping the good ship ‘HMS Credible Deterrence’ in favour of ‘HMS Naïve Détante’.”

“Please, let’s not have this conversation again,” de Chevalier groaned.

“Unfortunately, Sirs and Madams,” Grosvenor said after clearing her throat, “there is one more matter we have to address before we adjourn this meeting. Namely, the cutting of expenditure, as so eloquently suggested by Lord Lowe Hill in his latest missive.”

More than a few groans, sighs, and muttered words answered her, but Grosvenor continued undeterred, and flicked a report from her datapad to the inlaid 3D projector in the briefing room table, and a huge spread sheet filled the room. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, Sélincourt rose from his chair and felt something uncomfortable shift in his lower back, but managed to avoid grimacing. He cleared his throat before clasping his hands behind his back.

“I don’t think I need to repeat verbatim what the honourable Second Lord Admiral said in his letter regarding this station’s training expenditure, so instead let us take a look at some numbers from this last exercise. For the record, this was the fleet-wide mock battle with Rear Admiral de Chevalier leading BLUFOR and Vice Admiral Hunter-Jones leading OPFOR fifteen standard days ago. A total of one-hundred and fourteen vessels took part in the exercise, including the entirety of Reserve’s line of battle and cruiser complement –sans some battleships and battlecruisers docked for maintenance and repair–, the total number of personnel involved amounting to something in the region of one-hundred and sixty-five thousand all told.”

“Which is half of the personnel we really should have to effectively crew all those platforms,” Brendan Locke said bitterly, but Sélincourt continued as if he hadn’t heard the admiral’s comment.

“According to shipboard munitions logs, the combined fleet fired a total of one point six million dummy shells, and launched close to twelve thousand Starling and Waxwing drones. That is, to put it in layman’s terms, a damn whole lot of metal that your lads and lasses threw out there into space. And that’s what causing Lowe Hill and Department of Planning such headache, because we –and I say ‘we’, because I am your commanding officer and I approved of this training regimen– have over the course of these past two months spent the equivalent of half of Home Fleet’s annual training budget. Most of that is expended armament, non-scheduled hull and internals repair, extra training pay for the fleet’s crews, and of course fuel expenses.”

More than a few had sucked in their breath as Sélincourt had said the numbers out loud; the cost of the military drones launched would alone amount to the material cost of two new destroyers, and though many would be recovered by pinnaces and collector drones, the majority would be written off as expenditures and after a time would ignite their own pressurised fission cores, ostensibly to avoid being captured by any foreign powers. But Lieutenant Commander David Rohanon tapped the report Sub-lieutenant Allencourt had put before him in a knowing manner, and eyes focused upon him.

“Not trying to be the Devil’s Advocate, Milord,” he said, trying his very best to not straighten in his chair as the Marquess of Sélincourt focused his glacier-hue eyes on his own green-brown ones, “but without launching; though I guess ‘spending’ could also work as an appropriate verb, that many drones, BLUFOR would never have recognised Hunter-Jones’ battlecruisers for what they truly were.”

“That’s true, Milord,” Commodore Keyhan Sobhani commented from close to the end of the briefing room table, having spent most of the past few weeks alternating between going through the battle logs, running it back with his staff, and choosing to remain resolutely silent in fleet briefings, but now he made his presence known.

“Heroic was the most advanced of all flotilla leaders of the entire BLUFOR fleet, and we barely had a glimpse at the presumed light cruiser formation before our ABSCOR and AIC SAIs recognised the output ECW signals, stealth-bound as they were, and determined them to most likely belong to a full battlecruiser division.”

“Well, it wasn’t that easy for my crew either,” Hunter-Jones interjected, running a hand through her long blonde hair, “Miss de Chevalier had posted quite the attentive screen to hold her fleet’s flank, and for that I applaud her foresight. Plus that drone screen, my good God, that was annoying to obfuscate our way past.”

“I knew you were about to try some trickery, Juliette,” Anäis responded with a smile that was just barely on the right side of polite.

“Point is, My Lord,” Lieutenant Commander Rohanon continued as if he hadn’t just been interrupted by officers several proverbial light years ahead of him in rank, “despite the fact that BLUFOR launched the vast majority of the reconnaissance and electronic warfare drones during this last exercise, we learned very little from their feedback during actual combat manoeuvres. The Courageous class battlecruisers, to put it simply, played around our field of vision in the battlespace, and their own electronic warfare suites practically blinded the older systems of RN ships and systems not even thirty years old.”

“See, I told you we should be suing DYNACO,” Brendan Locke commented with a sarcastic smile on his face, which Sélincourt didn’t much appreciate and after one disparaging glance from the fleet admiral, Locke’s demeanour sobered up and he slouched back into his chair.

“Will you be able to recreate that sort of effect on an actual battlefield, Miss Hunter-Jones?” Alistair asked the junior vice-admiral, and she shrugged, whilst smiling.

“My Lord, you’ve read my service record, and you know I’m a battlecruiser captain through-and-through. At Solus when New Acre lost her arm, I was running circles around the Solusian orbital forts with my cruisers. And it is true what the Lieutenant Commander is saying, the Admiralty and the orbital shipyards are cramming so much new technology into both new and old hulls that we as King William Naval Academy graduates from even a few decades ago cannot really comprehend what is going on technically…”

“Speak for yourself,” Anaïs de Chevalier muttered under her breath, trying her best to mask the biting comment by pretending to sip from her mostly empty tea cup.

“I see where you’re coming from,” Sélincourt interjected, having picked up on de Chevalier’s snide remark, and also Hunter-Jones arrogant boast. The admirals Sarkissian and Locke looked at him to provide some sage advice, whilst the rest of the staff was just pining to return to their ships and stations.

“I am aware that we have been at this for quite a few hours at this point,” Lord Sélincourt said after clearing his throat and with sharp finger-movements he flicked the holographic spread sheet off the main briefing chamber projector; “and we really would benefit from a good eight hours rest. But, I want another formation ready for training exercises for tomorrow twelve-hundred Zulu hours; form a combined formation from all your units and give me the order of battle before eleven-hundred hours tonight.”

Sub-lieutenant Cleopatra Allencourt, as Lord Sélincourt’s flag lieutenant had learned over the past few months to read his expressions, and his body language now very clearly read “I’m fucking done”, and she stepped forward from the white-painted bulkhead wall.

“This briefing is adjourned, My Lords and Ladies,” she said in perfect Received Pronunciation Auroran, “and the Fleet Admiral will approach you for further details, if such is required. On behalf of My Lord, thank you all for your diligence.”

There were mutterings of both relief and concern as the close to seventy naval personnel filed out of HMS Monarch’s flag briefing chamber, but Sélincourt remained behind, and slumped back into his upholstered chair. Cleopatra Allencourt started to walk back into the chamber, when she realised Alistair was booting up the long-distance e-letter service. As he pulled the briefing room desk microphone closer to himself, he cleared his throat. Cleopatra was a dutiful Flag Lieutenant, and as such wouldn’t leave her charge alone unless she had been specifically discharged. But when Admiral of the White Alistair Carlisle, Marquess de Sélincourt started to relay a message to his teenage daughter Adea, hoping she was still getting good grades and doing well in her chosen University varsity sports, Cleopatra just smiled knowingly and shut the hatch behind her. There would be time for the Fleet later.