In a virtual reality briefing room housed on the command servers of the UNS Tannhauser, Adrian Vasco was getting his own share of bad news.
‘SPECTRECOM lost en’Jago’s crusade splinter in the Vadian Spiral,’ Chadwick, their EFFECT handler, said. She appeared to Vasco as a hologram via a hazy FTL link, a long line of data tracing its lineage via the GC mission station, the Fleet Comms Array, and ending thousands of lightyears away in EFFECT HQ in Trillian Square. At these distances, the fidelity on her VR doppelganger was patchy at best.
Vasco’s heart sank. Word from Fleet Intelligence Division was that Ascendancy crusade fleets were splitting into smaller and smaller units and preying on ungarrisoned UN worlds. The Gull Crest was particularly vulnerable. In astrographic terms, they were a stone’s throw from the coreward rim of Ascendancy space, and conversely many hundreds of lightyears from the nearest sizeable UN Fleet muster at Cobalta.
‘Any chatter for the Crest?’ he asked from across the table. His face did not betray the turmoil he felt. VIPER One had been given the Tannhauser, a rapid-intervention voidbreaker from old Fleet stock, but it would not hold up against even moderate Ascendancy aggression. The thought of skirmishing provari frigates taking pot shots at UN naval forces from entire systems away gave him chills. He hated being in space.
‘Constant, but it’s all constant,’ Chadwick said helplessly. ‘Can’t decipher half of it anyway. UNIS don’t have anywhere near the number of Provari speakers they need.’
‘Amen,’ Vasco muttered.
‘Sector deep space relays haven’t picked anything up, which should give you at least six hours’ clear time. Anything more than that is anyone’s guess. There’re some whispers of biological warfare in the works too, so keep taking the countervirals. You’ve had the latest?’
Vasco nodded.
Chadwick consulted her dossier, a holo hovering thirty centimetres above the table. ‘And you’ve got the latest iteration of the Roster?’
‘Yeah,’ Vasco nodded.
‘And you’ve got the operations order.’
‘Yeah.’
‘And the flash?’
Vasco paused. ‘What flash?’
Chadwick cleared her throat. ‘UN Sector Command isn’t coming for Ariadne. They served the Governor with notice this morning. The colonies won’t be defended.’
Vasco’s eyes widened, his professional veneer falling away. ‘You’re shitting me.’
Chadwick winced. ‘Can’t spare the ships, not at the moment. The Fleet is having a complete re-org under Ellisburg. “Strategic sacrifice”.’
‘This place is a powder keg,’ Vasco said, recalling his first reaction to the dossier on Ariadne. ‘They hate the UN. How do you think “strategic sacrifice” is going to go down when we swoop in and evacuate their best and brightest?’
‘No-one said this would be an easy job, Captain,’ Chadwick said, her expression hardening.
‘You’re looking at a civil war!’
Chadwick all but shrugged. Like many of those raised on the wealthier inner circle of old Veigis worlds, she harboured an innate contempt for the Outer Ring—undoubtedly exacerbated by talking-shop colonies like those on Ariadne which had moaned openly about UN rule for decades.
‘It’s not your concern,’ she said, and she was right.
‘Understood’, Vasco said. He wasn’t being ordered—or paid—to have a conscience.
‘If you need anything, keep it to yourself,’ Chadwick said, ending the meeting on an old joke.