"Hmph!" Khumalo snorted. "Be nice if that were true, Captain! But whether it is or not, I've still had to make some decisions—-difficult decisions—about where to employ the units I do have under command. Which is why the Lynx picket is as understrength as you undoubtedly noticed when you passed through. That's the one spot in our entire command area where we can count on rapid reinforcement from the home system if it hits the fan."
"I can see the logic, Sir," Terekhov said. Which was not, FitzGerald observed, the same thing as saying he agreed with it.
"Yes, well," Khumalo said, sorting through a pile of document chips on his desk, as if looking for something for his hands to do. After a moment, he restacked them neatly and looked back up at his guests.
"Thank you for the briefing, Captain Terekhov," he said. "I appreciate its thoroughness, and both your ship and your proven capabilities will be welcome, most welcome, here in Talbott. I'm afraid I'll be working you and your people hard, but I have every confidence in your ability to meet any challenge which might arise."
"Thank you, Sir," Terekhov murmured as he and FitzGerald rose at the obvious indication that their arrival interview was at an end.
"Captain Shoupe will see you out, Captain," Khumalo continued, rising to offer his hand once again in a farewell handshake. He shook hands with FitzGerald, as well, and smiled pleasantly.
"System President Lababibi has invited me to a political banquet in Thimble tomorrow evening, Captain," he said, as if in afterthought as he walked them to his cabin hatch. "Most of the Constitutional Convention's senior delegates will be there, and Baroness Medusa will also be attending. She's suggested that I bring some of my senior staffers and captains along with me, and I feel it's important for the Navy to make a good showing at these affairs, especially given our responsibilities and the force levels we have to work with. I trust you and some of your own officers will be able to attend?"
"We'd be honored to, Sir," Terekhov assured him.
"Good. Good! I'll look forward to seeing you there," Khumalo said, beaming as the hatch opened and the Marine sentry stationed outside it came to attention. "And now," he continued, "I'll leave you in Captain Shoupe's care. Good day, Captain. Commander."
The hatch slid shut again before Terekhov could say anything else, and he and FitzGerald were suddenly alone in the passage with Shoupe and the carefully expressionless sentry.
"This way, please, Sir." The chief of staff had a pleasant soprano voice, and her hand moved gracefully as she gestured down the passage.
"Thank you, Captain," Terekhov said, and the three of them set off towards Hercules' boat bays.
"The Admiral seems to be even more shorthanded than I'd expected from my briefings and orders," Terekhov observed as they stepped into one of the superdreadnought's lifts and the door closed behind them. His tone was pleasantly impersonal, that of someone who could have been simply making idle conversation, except for the fact that he'd waited until there were no other ears at all to hear it.
"Yes, he is," Shoupe replied after an almost imperceptible pause. She looked up at Terekhov, brown eyes meeting blue. "And I'm afraid he isn't quite as confident as he'd like to appear that there aren't additional political factors involved in the priority accorded to Talbott."
"I see," Terekhov said with a slight nod.
"At the moment, we have an almost impossible number of balls to keep in the air simultaneously," the chief of staff continued, "and I'm afraid the Admiral is feeling the strain, just a bit."
"I'm sure anyone would be, in his position," Terekhov replied.
"Yes. That's one reason—" The lift car reached its destination, and Shoupe cut off whatever she'd been about to say. She gave Terekhov a small smile, and stood back courteously for him to leave the car first.
Too bad, FitzGerald thought, as he followed her out in turn. She was about to say something interesting there. As in that old curse about living in "interesting" times.
* * *
"All right," Aivars Terekhov said, several hours later, laying his white beret on the conference table in his bridge briefing room and looking around it. Ansten FitzGerald, Ginger Lewis, Naomi Kaplan, and Captain Tadislaw Kaczmarczyk, the CO of Hexapuma's Marine detachment, looked back. Chief Agnelli had provided steaming cups of coffee or tea, as each guest preferred, and insulated carafes of both beverages sat on a tray in the center of the table.
"I've had the opportunity to review the intelligence packet from Commander Chandler, Admiral Khumalo's intelligence officer," Terekhov continued, "and also the Admiral's rules of engagement and general orders for the Station. Now I'd like to go over them briefly with you."
Heads nodded, and he tipped his chair back slightly, nursing his own coffee cup in both hands.
"I suppose things always look a bit different to the people actually on the spot from the way they look to the folks back at headquarters," he began. "Given the fact that Admiral Khumalo's been out here ever since the Talbott Station was created, he's clearly in a better position to be aware of local conditions than anyone could be back in Manticore.
"Our primary tasks, as laid down in his general instructions, are first to maintain peace on and between the Cluster's planets. Second, he's charged with assisting the Spindle System government and Baroness Medusa's available Marines—which amount to only a single understrength battalion—in maintaining the security of the Constitutional Convention here on Flax. Our third priority is to suppress piracy and, of course, genetic slaving throughout the Cluster and to discourage . . . adventurism by any outside elements."
He paused for a moment, his eyes sweeping around the table, and there was no need for him to elaborate on just which "outside elements" Khumalo's general instructions might refer to.
"Fourth," he continued, "we're to assist local authorities in the suppression of any extralegal resistance to the annexation. Apparently the people who lost the vote are becoming increasingly vocal, and there are indications at least a few of them are about to step beyond mere verbal expressions of displeasure.
"Fifth, we already know our local charts are seriously inaccurate. The Admiral's assigned a high priority to updating our astrogation databases, both by collecting information from local pilots and merchant skippers and by conducting regular survey activities of our own.
"And, sixth and finally, we're to 'show the flag,' not simply inside the Cluster, but along its outer fringes, as well. Piracy here in the Cluster has never been as serious as in, say, Silesia, but there's always been some. The Admiral desires his ships to make their presence known along the arcs Nuncio-Celebrant-Pequod-Scarlet and Lynx-Montana-Tillerman, where he's set up standing patrol lines. On the one hand, we should serve as an advertisement of the advantages of membership in the Star Kingdom, and on the other, remind any larcenously inclined souls from outside it that Her Majesty would take their little pranks amiss."
He smiled thinly at their expressions.
"As you can see, this won't exactly be a relaxing pleasure cruise."
"That's one way to put it, Sir," Ginger Lewis observed after a moment. "Since you're discussing the Admiral's general instructions, may I assume we don't have any specific movement orders just yet?"
"You assume correctly, Ginger," Terekhov agreed with a nod. "When we do receive orders, however, I imagine we'll find ourselves moving around quite a bit. Looking over the ship list, it's obvious Hexapuma is the most powerful modern unit assigned to the Station. I don't see any way the Admiral can afford not to work us hard."
"I can see that, Sir," FitzGerald put in. "Still, if you'll pardon my saying so, I didn't hear anything in that specifically about the security of the terminus."
"No, you didn't," Terekhov agreed. "We have two separate problems. One is the security of the terminus; the other is the security of the rest of the Cluster. The fact that the terminus is an eight-day trip from Split, the closest system in the Cluster proper, even for a warship, doesn't make reconciling those responsibilities any easier."
/> His tone was level, his expression calm, yet for just a moment, FitzGerald thought he saw something else behind those blue eyes. Whatever it was, it disappeared as quickly as it had come—assuming it had ever been there in the first place—and Terekhov continued in the same dispassionate voice.
"From the economic, astrographic, and military perspectives, Lynx is the real strategic chokepoint of the cluster, as far as the Star Kingdom is concerned. But from the immediate political perspective, Spindle, where the Constitutional Convention is meeting, is at least equally critical. And, the need to maintain a visible presence in the Cluster's inhabited star systems is yet another magnet drawing our available strength away from Lynx. Under the circumstances, and bearing in mind that Lynx can be reinforced on short notice by Home Fleet, Admiral Khumalo's decided his short-term emphasis must be placed on supporting the political processes of the Constitutional Convention and assisting the local planetary governments."
But what do you think he should be doing? FitzGerald wondered. Not that he even considered asking the question aloud.
"I can see why you wanted Naomi and Tad sitting in on this, Sir," Lewis said after a moment. "I'm not too clear on why I'm here, though."
"First, because you're my senior officer, after Ansten," Terekhov replied. "And, second, because unless I miss my guess, we're going to be pushing the ship's systems hard, without much in the way of outside support. Admiral Khumalo has three depot ships—four, counting the one stationed here—to support all of his units. At the moment, the others are assigned to Prairie, Montana, and Scarlet, to provide the maximum coverage for his patrol units. There are also ammunition ships at Montana and Prairie. Aside from that, however, we'll be essentially on our own for both maintenance and general logistics.
"Naomi is obviously going to be deeply involved if—or perhaps I should say when—we encounter pirates or slavers. And Tadislaw's Marines are going to be at least as busy, even assuming we weren't going to run into any need to deploy planet-side detachments. Which, I might add, I'm quite certain we are going to find ourselves doing. But the bottom line is that everyone else aboard the ship depends on Engineering. If we suffer a major maintenance casualty, it's going to make a huge hole in Admiral Khumalo's available strength. So," he smiled suddenly, "I basically wanted you sitting in on this so I could tighten the screws on your sense of responsibility!"
"Gee, thanks, Sir," Lewis retorted with a smile of her own.
"Don't mention it. It's known as motivation enhancement." Several people chuckled, and Terekhov let his chair come fully back upright.
"It's obviously too early to be thinking in anything but the most general terms," he said in a more serious tone. "The one thing we can depend on is that Murphy will surprise us, no matter how much effort we put into preparing for his inevitable appearance. When that happens, our ability to cope with the surprise is going to depend on our agility and flexibility. That's one of the primary reasons I asked all of you to attend this meeting. I intend to conduct a general briefing for all department heads within the next day or so. But you people's departments are going to carry the largest share of the burden, so I wanted to give each of you an early heads-up and take the opportunity for all of us to try bouncing some preliminary ideas off of one another.
"For example, Major Kaczmarczyk, it's occurred to me that the nature of the developing political situation here in the Cluster is likely to require intervention by the Station's Marines. That means you and your people, as far as Hexapuma is concerned."
"Yes, Sir." Kaczmarczyk was a short, solid, compact man in his late thirties with brown, bristle-cut hair and a neatly groomed mustache. He seemed just a little detached from the naval officers seated around the table with him, but his oddly colored amber-green eyes were very direct as he looked back at his captain.
"I foresee a very broad spectrum of missions for you, Major," Terekhov continued, "and the nature of the political equation is going to require a certain deftness. There may very well be situations in which a hammer is what will be required, although I'm sure everyone would prefer to avoid that. But there will also be situations in which your people are going to be required to perform more as policemen than as combat troops. I realize it's difficult to switch back and forth between those roles, and that the training and mindsets they require are to some extent mutually contradictory. There's nothing we can do about that, unfortunately, so I want you to concentrate on prepping your people to operate in small, independent units at need. I'll try to avoid chopping you up into penny-packets, but I can't promise that you won't find yourself detaching individual squads."
"I've got good noncoms, Sir," Kaczmarczyk said. "But I don't have a whole lot of warm bodies, and some of those I do have are pretty green."
"Point taken," Terekhov agreed.
The renewed war and the sudden huge increase in the Star Kingdom's territory had combined with the Navy's new construction policies to force changes in the size of the Marine detachments which Manticoran warships embarked. Traditionally, the RMN had assigned companies to light cruisers, and full battalions—including their attached heavy weapons companies—to capital ships. Heavy cruisers and battlecruisers had embarked "short" battalions: regular battalions with the heavy weapons companies detached.
Other navies had embarked far smaller detachments, but prior to the Havenite Wars, the Manticoran Navy's primary responsibilities had been piracy suppression and peacekeeping operations. Blowing pirate cruisers out of space was a straightforward proposition, but the Navy had found that recapturing merchantmen which had been taken by pirates without killing off any surviving members of their original crews required something a bit more delicate than a laser head or a graser. The boarding parties tasked to go over and retake those ships were composed of Marines. So were the boarding parties sent to support Navy inspections of suspected slavers or smugglers. And so were the landing parties sent down in places like Silesia to deal with planet-side riots, attacks on Manticoran nationals, and natural disasters.
Unlike most other navies—including both the SLN and the Star Kingdom's own Grayson ally—Manticoran Marines were also integrated into damage control parties and assigned to man broadside weapons aboard the ships in which they served. Aboard Hexapuma, for example, Kaczmarczyk's personnel crewed half a dozen of the ship's grasers. RMN ships had been able to carry so many Marines because they weren't displacing naval ratings; they were performing the same functions as naval ratings.
But that practice required additional cross-training of the Marines. It took time to produce people who could proficiently perform the multiple tasks assigned to them, and it wasn't cheap. Which was one of the reasons even the RMN had been forced to rethink things a bit.
The increased automation which had allowed the Navy to drastically reduce its manpower (and life support) requirements and pack in additional firepower and defensive systems had been another. Maintaining the traditional size of the Marine detachments would have defeated much of that advantage. Which didn't even consider the fact that the Star Kingdom's sudden expansion required additional garrisons and peacekeeping forces which, particularly so close on the heels of major "peacetime" reductions in the roster strength of both the Navy and the Marines, had stretched the available supply of Marines to the breaking point. The troop strength of both the Marines and the Army was being increased as rapidly as possible, but manpower, not money or industrial capacity, had always been the Star Kingdom's Achilles' heel.
All of which explained why, instead of the four hundred and fifty-four men and women, in three companies, commanded by a major, assigned to a heavy cruiser under the "old" establishment, Captain Kaczmarczyk (who received the "courtesy promotion" to major aboard ship—since a warship could afford no confusion over who one meant when one said "Captain") had barely a hundred and forty in his single company. Even at that, they represented almost half of Hexapuma's total complement of three hundred and fifty-five.
"We'll just have to do the best we can," Terekh
ov continued. "I'm hoping that, for the most part, the local governments will be able to deal with their own internal problems. For one thing, if we get involved, we run the risk, as 'imperialist outsiders,' of escalating whatever ill feeling produced the problem in the first place. If they need to call on us at all, I'm hoping it will be either for intelligence support, using our recon systems, or for quick, hard, in-and-out strikes on specific targets.
"In line with that, Major, I'd like you and your intelligence officer to go over these briefs from Commander Chandler." He handed over a slim folio of record chips. "They're planet-by-planet analyses, based on the most recent data available from local law enforcement types. Of course, a lot of that data is probably out of date by now, given transit times, but it's still the best information available. I'd especially like you to look for—"
* * *
"Well, Loretta. What do you think of him?"
"I beg your pardon, Sir?" Captain Shoupe looked up from the data chips she'd been sliding into slots in a folio. She and the rest of the staff had just finished their regular daily report on the station's status, and it was early afternoon, shipboard time. Rear Admiral Khumalo always preferred to catch a short nap before dinner, and the other staffers had already departed.
"I asked what you think of him," Khumalo replied. The rear admiral stood with his back to her, gazing into the cool, glowing depths of one of his holo tapestries. "Captain Terekhov, of course."
"I haven't really had the opportunity to form an opinion of him, Sir," she said after a moment. "He seems pleasant enough."
"Yes, he does, doesn't he?" Khumalo said in a rather distant tone. "Still, he's not quite what I'd expected."
Shoupe said nothing. She simply stood there, waiting patiently. She'd been with Khumalo ever since the rear admiral had been sent out to Talbott, and, almost despite herself, she'd actually grown fond of him. He could be frustrating, vacillating, and vain, and he was definitely one of the Navy's "political" admirals. But he also worked long hours—one of the reasons he liked to catch naps in the afternoon—and whatever his other faults, he was truly determined to bring the annexation of the Cluster to a successful conclusion.