The Black Ships (10 page)
Manhattan, New York
February 22
nd
, 2026
"
t sounds crazy.” Parnell gazed out the armored windows of the limo
at the pedestrians who ignored his motorcade. In most other cities, a motorcade
like this would garner attention and press but the denizens of this part of
Manhattan were more or less immune to the sight of yet another self-important
functionary being whisked in from the airport.
“Probably because it
is
crazy,” Sam
replied, his face showing his opinion of the designers at DARPA. “Jack, would
you climb into one of these capsules and drop onto an alien world with four
days of water?”
“My mom always told me that I should take
at least ten days of water if I was going to drop onto a hostile planet, and to
make sure I took a warm sweater,” Kitzhaber muttered as he looked through the
papers in his valise. He looked up at Sam. “You’re the big war hero,” he
accused. “Would
you
climb into one of those things?”
“If I was still in my twenties maybe.” Sam
grinned back. “Fighting is a young man’s game,” he explained. “The longer you
stay in it, the more you start to realize how mortal you are.” He tapped his
cheek. “Getting shot in the face has a way of knocking sense into a man.”
“So, how soon after the three carrier
groups are finished do we wait before starting on our own fleet?” Parnell cut
in. “If we don’t try to match the UN in space, we’re in trouble, but we don’t
want to risk being too obvious.”
Jack seemed to have put some thought into
that very question and he jumped in immediately. “I think we should be
completely obvious,” he began. “We come out with something like
what if the
current forces in space are not enough?
We should be building up our own
capabilities anyhow, just in case the UN defensive fleet is overwhelmed while
the response fleet is off fighting around Mars. Anyway, who the hell would want
to trust the UN to protect them?”
He looked at the two men sitting across
from him, seeing that they weren’t quite convinced. “Look, people expect us to
have secret programs and hidden agendas for world domination.” He paused for a
moment as a wry smile toyed with the corners of his mouth. “For all I know, you
probably do but it’s not the kind of thing you tell your press secretary
about.” The three men shared a laugh. “Anyway, if we do this openly, it draws
the teeth of the conspiracy theorists.”
The vehicle pulled off 1
st
Avenue, coming to a stop at the portico of the Secretariat building where the
men were ushered inside by Secret Service agents. Once inside, they headed
straight for the elevators, riding to the 38
th
floor. When the doors
opened, an aide was there waiting to conduct them to the Secretary General’s
office. He frowned momentarily at the two armed agents flanking Parnell before
leading the group down the hall where he opened the doors and announced them.
Parnell made the rounds, greeting the
assembled ambassadors who represented the major contributors. He reached the
small group of military officers and shook hands with Admiral Towers, the
commander of the response fleet. “Any relation to John Henry?” the president
asked.
“Sixth generation, Sir, but yes I am.”
Towers looked pleased to have his famous ancestor brought up by his president.
In all likelihood, Parnell knew more about John Henry Towers than his
descendant did. Jack had briefed the president on the admiral’s background
during the flight down from Washington.
“Fitting, don’t you think?” Parnell asked
the man. “John Henry was the first aviator to reach flag rank and now his
descendant will command the first carrier task force in space.” Tower’s
eyebrows raised in surprise at the knowledge displayed by a man he tended to
think of as a civilian. A surprised murmur ran through the small group of
officers as they absorbed the generational connection.
“Not that he was chosen because of that,”
the president added with a grin. “It was purely a matter of dedication and
stellar
performance!” He was rewarded with a few chuckles and a couple of outright
groans at this obviously lame attempt at humor. He saw one Chinese officer in
the group and knew what that meant. From the briefing photos, he knew the faces
of the three officers on the short list and this man would have been his own
first choice, despite Sam’s misgivings. He extended a hand. “Admiral Gao?”
Gao shook his hand. “Pleased to meet you,
Mr. President.”
Parnell was momentarily surprised by the
man’s flawless New England accent, even though he had read about his time in
Boston. “Strange old world isn’t it?” he asked. “A few years ago, the so-called
experts said we would be at each other’s throats by now and yet, here we are,
building an integrated military structure.”
Gao nodded. “When two groups do as much
business with each other as we do, quarrels happen,” he said simply as
Ambassador Zhu drifted over. “We have been shown that there are more important
things to worry about but, if we defeat the new enemy, how long will we
remember that it was done together?” He looked at his brother officers, seeing
solemn agreement on their faces.
It was always the curse of those who served
in uniform. People forgot the human cost of conflict far too easily. “My people
have a saying that was meant to apply to money but it has truth for this
situation as well,” Gao said. “Wealth does not pass three generations.”
“We have that as well,” said Towers in
surprise. “Except we say
shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations
.
I suppose it’s universal.”
“Perhaps that’s why our alien friends have
decided to attack us?” Parnell mused. “They may have had peace for a few
generations and now they’ve come looking for conquest and adventure.” He
grinned at the officers. “Perhaps when we finish with them on Mars, we should
pay them a visit on their own home world. Just to remind us that we have better
things to do than kill each other.”
The projection screen came on and Jess
stepped to the back of her seat. “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming.
Shall we begin with a presentation of our current progress?” Her question was
politely rhetorical and the attendees moved to their seats as a complicated
Gantt chart appeared on the screen. “For those of you who haven’t met him yet,
Frank Bender is our project manager,” she said as she sat. Bender nodded
absently at the assembled dignitaries as he leaned forward. He activated his
tablet, causing the main screen to display the latest progress report.
“We have the first escort module scheduled
to come off the line in Portugal in roughly four weeks,” said the big man. “The
first two heavy-lift airships will launch the end of this week and the third
will be a month later. We’ll get them busy moving raw materials and weapons to
the transfer yard and shift them over to module pickups as needed.”
He opened one of the progress bars on the
screen and a sub-chart popped up. “The two airship models needed to get
all this into orbit will take roughly three months before the first set are
operational.” He switched the display to a split screen showing company
profiles. “Four companies are currently under contract to provide airships and
we are looking for more but, frankly, there just aren’t that many airship
manufacturers out there that can even begin to imagine what we need.”
“How many airships do you really need?”
asked the German Ambassador. He knew the staff at Zeppelin would like to know
what to expect.
Frank brought up a spreadsheet. “Sorry I
didn’t have time to tidy this up,” he said as he scrolled over to the left.
“We’ve calculated that we need to do just a little over a thousand lifts for
each
carrier group.” He typed in a ‘5’ in one cell and a ‘4’ beneath it before
putting a quick formula below the two numbers, referencing them as well as the
total module per fleet estimate.
“If each company builds one set of
airships,” he said as he hit the enter key. “We would need two thousand three
hundred and seventy days to lift one fleet into orbit. That’s based on a nine
day round trip for each pair of airships. This is definitely our current
bottleneck.”
There were a few sounds of dismay at this
revelation but most simply looked at Frank with grim determination. They
realized they were hearing the worst case scenario. Parnell turned from the
screen to face Bender. “Frank, how many sets of airships do you feel we need?”
Frank’s fingers tapped the pad, overwriting
the number ‘4’ to a ‘40’ as he spoke. “If we want the first fleet lifted within
a year, we need forty operational pairs. That’s forty ships to reach the
transfer stations at a forty-kilometer altitude and forty to go from there to
Low-Earth-Orbit.” He paused for a moment as if considering whether to reveal
bad news and then resumed speaking. “Keep in mind that we will only have eight
operational pairs by mid-summer. In all likelihood, we won’t have three fleets
lifted and assembled for another three and a half years.”
He sat back as the room erupted in turmoil.
After a few moments of frenzied side discussion and shouted argument, Jess
reigned in the chaos. “Ladies and gentlemen,” she began forcefully from the
head of the table. “I believe the first question we should answer at this point
is how to employ the first fleet: should we launch a strike at Mars as soon as
we have sufficient force or should we wait until all three carrier groups are
operational?”
She watched as Parnell held back from the
general argument that ensued. When it became clear that the same arguments were
now being chewed over for a third time, she took control back. “You have been very
quiet on this matter, Mr. President. Perhaps the United States would like to
weigh in on the subject?”
Parnell smiled at Jess as he replied. “I’m
not much of a fighter except where votes are concerned,” he said to a few
chuckles from around the table. “But we have proven, professional fighters here
with us.” He indicated the small group of senior officers who sat at the table
with their respective ambassadors. “It would be foolish in the extreme for
politicians to decide on this matter without seeking their advice. Admiral?” He
turned to face Powers.
The anger that had been building on the
officer’s face began to fade as he realized that disaster might yet be averted.
“What is our first priority?” he demanded as he glared around the room.
“Driving the aliens away from Mars, I
should think,” replied the British ambassador. Most of the representatives
nodded in agreement.
“Protecting Earth,” said Gao.
“Exactly,” Powers cocked an eyebrow at the
Brit. “Won’t do us a damn bit of good to go racing off to Mars if a second
alien force shows up here and starts slinging asteroids at our cities.” He
leaned forward and poked a finger at the table. “We keep one fleet here in
orbit from now on,” he stated forcefully. “One foot on the ground at all times
or we fall down.” Leaning back, he gave a curt nod to Gao who inclined his head
slightly in return.
“I don’t think there can be any
disagreement with the points as put forward by our fleet commanders,” Jess
said. “Our next order of business should be to determine just how quickly we
will have the means to fight in our own backyard. Frank?”
Bender must not have expected to be dragged
back into the discussion because it took him a moment to frame an answer. “We
plan to have the modules for two frigates and a cruiser lifted into orbit by
early December of this year. The first frigate will start going up in July and
will be operational by early October, the following two ships will be ready in
January and March of next year.”
“So we can start putting up a fight in
eight months?” Towers asked. He looked over at Gao. “There might just be hope
for us after all.”
“Shouldn’t we address the elephant in the
room?” The German ambassador rose from his chair and walked over to a large
wall screen where images of the enemy facility were displayed.
“Only one elephant?” A French officer
raised an eloquent eyebrow. “Quelle chance! This is a relief…” A low chuckle
ran around the table.
A nod from the German. “Just so. I pick one
from the herd, but it has been nagging at me.” He waved at the screen. “Why
come all the way to our solar system and attack Mars? Why not come straight to
Earth?”
“An advance base, perhaps?” A British
captain suggested.
“But their ships should be base enough,”
Towers grumbled. “We have nothing in orbit that can even scratch their paint.”
“Taking orbit is one thing,” Gao asserted,
“Taking the planet, against billions of citizens, is quite another.”
Towers nodded in acknowledgement. He opened
his mouth to speak but was cut off.
“Insufficient force.” Frank said bitterly.
He looked around the room. “A document from this building listed three reasons
for the failure of my father’s mission and his eventual death. The first
was insufficient force, the second was restrictive mission parameters and the
third was overextension.”
He nodded to the screen on the wall. “They
may well be working to overcome restrictions placed on them by an incompetent
administration.” He couldn’t stay seated any longer. He got up and joined the
German, looking at the screen.