[sputnikwriter]

Hi there, this is something I've had floating around Fanfiction.net for a bit now, and having recently discovered this place I thought I'd post it here, seeing as how this is kinda the speciality.
So, for your consideration I present Dreadnought Chapter 01

The two men sat across from each other at a table placed to give the best view out of the floor-to-ceiling windows.  The blue glow from the world far below fell softly into the room, far brighter than the bar’s own dim lighting.  Stars dotted the heavens, filling the whole sky before a diaphanous nebula which hung like a painted backdrop behind it all.  Three hundred years ago humanity could only dream of having a such a view, yet the two men sat before it never gave it a second glance.

The older of the two, tall, wiry yet capable, grey hair cut regulation short in a manner which suggested he‘d had the same hairstyle most of his life, took a long draught from the glass set before him.  Luyten beer, known throughout the galaxy as the drink that fuelled a thousand fights.  Of course this didn’t worry the drinker, he was no stranger to drunken bar brawls.  He never set out to start a fight, they just seemed to happen, at least that was what he told the man sat across from him.  The beer he had consumed so far appeared not to have affected his bearing other than giving him a slight hint of perspiration on his forehead and a barely noticeable redness rimming his steely grey eyes.

The other drinker was enjoying something a little less explosive.  He sat straight in his seat, the tan uniform he was wearing pressed sharp, the wings on his chest marking him out as a Terran pilot, the several rows of bars below them marking him out as a hero and, more importantly, a survivor.  A casual observer would have seen the similarities between the two drinkers, the one in the uniform looking younger, his face less lined, the hair a little longer and jet black with a hint of grey at the temples.  Slightly closer examination would have revealed faint scarring on the right side of his face.  In the right eye there could occasionally be seen something like iridescence over the grey iris - if the light fell on it right and if viewed from the correct angle - that would bring to mind the rainbow patterns of oil on water. 

The casual observer might have taken them for father and son, and a second later had this impression confirmed when the elder spoke.

“Son, it kills me to see you drinking that piss-weak stuff.”

The son smiled for a second, his mind clearly elsewhere.

“I don’t think newly promoted Lieutenant Commanders are allowed to meet Fleet Admirals smelling of Fight Starter, dad.  It might make them regret giving me one of their precious squadrons.”

Dad snorted derisorily.

“I remember when ‘Fireball’ Adams was a snivelling Ensign who managed to crash his crate into the hangar door on his first jag.  You shouldn’t let too much brass dazzle you.  I shudder to think I’ve raised an arse kisser.”

“Given I spent the last two years watching a shipyard from behind a desk, no amount of arse kissing was too great to get me in the air again.”

“If you wanted to fly so bad you could’ve come back to work for me.”

Now it was the pilot’s turn to snort.

“We’ve had this discussion before, dad.  There are few things worse than flying a desk, and one of them is pounding a fifty-year-old freighter to bits on the Polaris run.”

“Oh well if that’s how you feel…”

“C’mon dad you know what I mean.  I joined up ‘cos…  Well, y’know.” He waved his hands vaguely.  This was a well worn argument between the two of them.  It never seemed to make sense to the younger man, his father had been a pilot before signing up with the Merchant Fleet.  He was a highly decorated veteran of the Great War, he’d seen action across half the galaxy before quitting aged twenty-five and enrolling in the damned Pony Express.  He could never grasp how anyone could volunteer to drive what amounted to a glorified target in times of war and a tedious, rusty tugboat the rest of the time.  Perpetually puzzled at his father’s bloody-mindedness, he pulled a cigarette out a carton in his breast pocket and lit it with a solid silver lighter.  Orange flame flared for a second, dancing across the image of a rearing lion embossed on the side of it.

“You don’t mind smelling of smoke though.”

The pilot gave another brief laugh, smoke blowing around his head.

“Nobody ever got a UTF from smoking too much.”  He offered another cigarette to his father.  “Never stopped you either.”

The older man accepted the proffered cigarette with a grunt and lit it with his own lighter.

“Well, these things are the least of your worries when an alien species wants to wipe you out.”

“Yeah.”

A silence fell.  Both sensed this was neither the time nor the place to trade oft-told war stories.  They had before, over vast amounts of Luyten’s and even more of the potent firewater Dad distilled aboard his own ship.  Battles fought, bloody victories and crushing routs.  Friends lost…  Tears and laughter and roaring tales and the bond those who wore the tan uniform could find nowhere else.

The pilot took a sip of his own drink, mind wandering back to the memories of his war, seeing the same things going on behind his father’s eyes.  He waited patiently, at times like this, he knew who would be the one to break the silence.

“Huh.  Anyway, I can’t believe they gave you a squadron in the arse of the galaxy.”

They’d had this discussion too.

“Its peacetime Dad, you know as well as I do how slow promotion is.”  That wasn’t the only reason, but it was the only one the pilot was willing to discuss.  “I’m bloody lucky to get this posting as it is, so I’m not going to complain even if it is ten thousand light years from anywhere.”   

“The last survivor of the 70th.  The last man out of Capella,  The least you could’ve got is a squadron on a Hecate.”

“Nothing wrong with an Orion.”  The pilot took a hard drag on his cigarette.

“There was nothing wrong with them in the Great War.  But that was forty years ago.  There is a reason they use Orions to collapse jump nodes.”

A ten-year old memory surfaced in the pilot’s mind.  The two kilometre bulk of the Bastion vanishing in a cataclysmic explosion that had damn near blinded him and obliterated two of his squadmates in a tidal wave of coruscating blue fire.  He shook it off, feeling the chill of recollection let go of his spine.

“A squadron’s a squadron Dad, I would’ve taken a posting on a bloody Aten to get out of that office.  Besides, four years from now I could be up for ACO somewhere and then I can think about a command of my own.  Then you can finally realise your ambition of ramming a Fleet cruiser and not get hung for it.”

This wasn’t particularly funny, but his father seemed to find this hilarious.  He let out a loud laugh, only partially exacerbated by the five pints of Luyten’s he had consumed in the last ninety minutes.

“Like I’d wreck the Franklyn just to prove you Fleet boys can’t keep station for ****!”

The pilot let out a laugh himself.  It was an article of faith in both the military and civilian fleets that their opposite numbers couldn’t navigate their way out of a paper bag.  Any convoy was always enlivened by talk of how that damned Fleet/bloody Merchies had the station keeping skills of drunken cattle.   

The PA boomed into life.  Finn Greenash watched his son’s hand tighten around the glass he was holding.  He very much doubted that anyone else would have noticed, but then again he had known his son for thirty years.

“NOW HEAR THIS.  NOW HEAR THIS.  LAST CALL FOR GTT TRELAWNY.  ALL PERSONNEL FOR GTT TRELAWNY MAKE YOUR WAY TO DOCK TWO.  REPEAT, DOCK TWO.  THAT IS ALL.”

“That’s my ride,” the pilot said.  Stubbing out his cigarette and finishing his drink in two economical movements, he stood up quickly. 

“Break a leg, Kris,” Finn said, getting to his feet and sticking out his hand.  Lieutenant Commander Kristian “Maverick” Greenash looked at the proffered hand for a beat, then shook it briefly.  His father’s grip was firm, as always.  He used it often, negotiating cargo with the cutthroat merchants of the galaxy’s many backwaters.

“I’ll do you proud, Dad.”  He reached down to pick up his kit bag and slung it over one shoulder.

“Yeah, well.”  Finn looked away for a second and cleared his throat.  “Keep in touch.  You know what your mother gets like if you don’t wave her every day.”

“Every day is probably pushing it a bit.”

“Keep us posted anyway.  I’m never too busy to get a message from the last of the 70th.”

There it is again.

Greenash turned to go.

“No problem, Dad,” he said, then left the bar without a word, the cold blue glow of the world below them illuminating his back as he strode off.  Finn watched the tall figure until it vanished amongst the crowds of the busy promenade, then drained his beer and got up to order another.  He didn’t realise it, but that would be the last time he would ever see his son.

[headdie]

inb4plot/grammar/spelling Nazis

That was a nice read, cant wait for the next instalment

[Retsof]

This definitely looks promising, I'll be keeping an eye on this.

[IronBeer]

inb4plot/grammar/spelling Nazis

No major errors stuck out to me.

Nice writing, I'm interested to see where you go with this.

[Colonol Dekker]

I'd like a luyten fight starter.

[sputnikwriter]

A luyten fight starter is the fs universe equivalent of Stella Artois, and not that lameass 4% stuff either.  There's a reason its called 'Wife Beater'

[Colonol Dekker]

I call it "Nelson" or "Sarah Michelle" personally

Please continue writing......Nao.

[CommanderDJ]

I'm going to be nitpicky because in all honesty this is great.

They had before, over vast amounts of Luyten’s and...

There, and in other places, I believe Luyten's should be Luytens. You're talking about plurals, so the apostrophe doesn't belong.

But like I said, I'm nitpicking because there aren't any big flaws. I actually really like it. Keep going!

[Luis Dias]

Good stuff. Waiting for next fix

[sputnikwriter]

'Ow do?  Here is Chapter 2 of Dreadnought for your viewing pleasure.


Greenash stepped though the hatch of the Elysium transport Trelawny, followed a short passageway into the passenger area and found a seat towards the front.  Most Elysiums were like this now, rows and rows of uncomfortable steel seating to hold as many cattle-class passengers as possible on their voyage to other worlds.  It paid to never forget the GTA never put comfort above expense if it could possibly avoid it.

He shoved his kitbag underneath the seat that was to be his for the next ten hours for the long haul to the Wolf 359 system and the 12th Fleet Headquarters.  He sat down, put his head back, and closed his eyes.

God, I hate transports.

In a fighter, you could fight back, and if worse came to the worse, you could get out of the way.  Sat on a transport, however, gave him the creeps.  He tried not to think of those convoys in the war, those men sitting there like paralysed ducks just waiting for the bang.  That was one of the reasons why he would never go back to work for his father on the ancient GTFr Franklyn.

Never mind the GTVA had been at peace for ten years.  A sitting duck was still a sitting duck in war or in peacetime.

The PA system chimed into life, and the pilot’s voice, slightly distorted by static, rang out.

“This is Ensign Laszlo, we depart for Wolf 359 in three minutes.  All crew begin final pre-flight checks. Out.”

Final pre-flight checks.  On a crate with rockets. Yeah right.  Greenash had test-flown the new, two billion credit Erebus stealth bomber during his time at Subach-Innes.  An old wingman from his time with the 64th Raptors had left the service and was getting soft as a civvy behind a desk at Nankam Aeronautics had taken advantage of the close links between the two corporations, and had called in Greenash to give the Erebus prototype a thorough workout.  Kris has jumped at the chance, anything to break the monotony of  reviewing mind-numbing weapons specs for up to twelve hours a day.

Now that, that had needed pre-flight checks.  Nearly half an hours worth in fact.  Never mind that he had nearly died in the Erebus - when the prototype’s stealth capability had been proved all too well as a Deimos corvette had totally failed to notice the bomber on its sensors and nearly run Greenash down - it had nothing to do with the design.

He was busily grumbling to himself in this manner when he was aware of a kitbag thumping down to the deck next to him.  He opened one eye to look and saw another pilot sitting down beside him.  He opened his other eye when he realised that the pilot was female and attractive enough to merit a proper look.  Intra-pilot relations were frowned upon in the military but it couldn’t stop a man from dreaming.

Trying not to make it obvious his eyes took in the short brown hair tied back in the sensible ponytail, the slim face with the intense, dark gaze, the short, lean figure.  Worth a second glance, he thought, she somehow managed to overcome the obvious anti-sex appeal of the tan GTVA uniform and trip several switches in his inner caveman.

The second glance revealed the two pips designating the rank of Lieutenant, the pilot wings, the impressive row of medal bars including NTF Victory Star, the Nebula Victory Star and the DFC and bar.  He was surprised.  She barely looked old enough to have suited up for the last war, never mind fly through most of it.

The memory of his own twenty-year old self jumping out of Capella ten seconds ahead of the supernova shockwave surfaced unbidden in his mind, as it often did.  He shook it off, took out another cigarette and lit it with the swiftness and economy of a true nicotine addict.  Bad times.

A voice from next to him interrupted his dark thoughts.

“Got a light, sir?”

Greenash read the nametag.  Marin.  The accent was pure Aquilae; deliberate and precise.

“Sure.”  He flicked open the lighter beneath the cigarette Marin had placed between her lips.  The light flared again over the rearing lion.  If she noticed this memorial to the darkest day of his life, she didn’t say anything.  He had to remind himself that the 70th weren’t the only squadron wiped out in those dark days of the Second Shivan Incursion.  But then again, they were the only squadron wiped out with him in it.

Marin took a drag on the cigarette and blew out a plume of blue smoke.

“So where you headed?”  Greenash asked, realising it was his duty as senior officer to get the conversation going.

“Wolf 359, sir.  I’m being posted to the Dreadnought from Beta Aquilae."

“What squadron?”

“39th Tyrants Heavy Assault.”

Sometimes, Greenash thought, coincidences can be the nicest things.  He jammed the cigarette in the corner of his mouth and stuck out a hand.

“Pleased to meet you,” he said.  “Lieutenant Commander Kris Greenash, new commanding officer of the 39th Tyrants Heavy Assault Squadron.”

Marin took his hand and shook it.

“Lef-tenant Jeni Marin. Good to meet you too, sir.  What takes you to the far side of the galaxy?”

“First posting after two years R&D at Subach-Innes.”

“Sounds like hell,” Marin replied.  Greenash was happy to see how ready she was to abandon formality in exchange for friendliness.  They were both moving from posts in the central systems to a station in the backwaters of GTVA territory.  From what he heard from officers who had similar assignments, discipline was a bit looser so far from the rigid bureaucracy of the Security Council.  It was quite hard to forge anything more than cordial relationships with a bunch of miners and frontier colonists, so out on the edge of space you had to make friends where you could.

“I can’t pretend it was what I signed up for.  Reading tech-specs for fourteen hours a day doesn’t exactly compare with blasting a cruiser into the next life.  But you gotta serve your time on the way up the ladder.”

“Oh, you’re looking to be future Fleet Marshal, then?”  This question was delivered with a hint of humour, but Greenash could spot a question within a question.  His subordinate was probing gently to make sure that the 39th weren’t just another, brief irritating step on his march to power.  It wasn’t, he could never treat a command in such a manner, but every pilot had had at one point or another, a superior officer who would much rather have some nice comfortable billet far from the front lines in some quiet, warm office.

“Not for a while yet,” he replied.  “So what gives us the pleasure of your company?”

“You don’t know sir?  Haven’t you read my personnel file yet?”

“Command, in their wisdom, decided to have the squadron’s files waiting for me on the Dreadnought.  I haven’t seen them yet.  This whole thing has gone through so fast I’ve not had any prep time.”

“You do know we fly Herc Twos, right?”

“Hah, yes.  I managed to catch up with our battle record when I got the posting.  It’s a fairly impressive read.  The 39th weren’t always stuck at the far end of the galaxy.  In fact they were based at Vega until they lost eighty percent of their pilots in Capella and Command decided to pull them off the front line, and they’ve never gone back.”

Greenash looked at Marin’s expression.  It said, Yessir, I read the briefing too, Sir, but that was one thing you could never say to a superior officer’s face.

“That’s Command for you, sir” she said instead.

Greenash was just figuring out how to change the subject when another figure wearing a brown hooded robe shuffled over to them, took one look at their uniforms, then began declaiming in a deep and doom-laden voice.

“Repent Sinners!”

Both pilots sighed.  A Child of Shiva, just the thing to brighten up anybody’s day.  Greenash stood up and looked the rake-thin zealot squarely in the eye.

“Get lost son before I report you to the cops,” he said firmly, trying to keep the weariness out of his voice.  The Child, who looked about twenty-five at a guess, seemed unconcerned about the threat and spoke again, loudly enough to cause everyone else on deck to look up.

“How dare you stand in the way of the Great Cleansing!  The Destroyers will send you to burn in Hell if you resist their Great Plan!”

The Children of Shiva had risen to prominence after the sealing off of Capella, at first amongst the two hundred million refugees of that destroyed system, but later had spread their message throughout the colonised systems.  The basic backbone to the semi-religious doggerel they spouted was that the Shivans were the unstoppable vanguard of some all-conquering God and that civilisation was destined for destruction.  So the logic ran that the best thing to do was, metaphorically, lie back and wait for the Rapture – the faster to get to Heaven, of course – and that anybody trying to stop the Destroyers was on a fast track to Hell.  This obviously made members of the military prime targets for these unhinged lunatics, although the Children had gotten into the habit of wandering around civilian-run installations promising eternal damnation to everyone in earshot.

The problem – as the psych outline that had been distributed to every man and woman in the GTVA had detailed at great and depressing length – was that the belief system of the Children of Shiva held great appeal to a generation who had watched an alien species decimate a whole fleet of the GTVA and then, as a sort of afterthought, destroy a star.  It could seem at times that the Shivans were unstoppable, and to a certain type of mind it was better to just give up than stand and fight.

Anyone still in uniform was hoped to fall into that second camp.

Forty-two years ago the Vasudans had a similar problem which had manifested itself as the Hammer of Light, which had ended up with the better part of a PVN Battle Group at their disposal.  So far the Children of Shiva had contented themselves with wailing and preaching, and the Security Council were doing their best to ensure it stayed that way.  The last thing the still-rebuilding GTVA needed was another NTF-style rebellion.

All this passed through Greenash’s mind one second before the Child pulled aside a fold of his robe and drew out a pistol and pointed it directly at the pilot’s forehead.

Time slowed, and Greenash’s mind focused on stupid little details.  Like how the pistol was an ancient Subach-Innes model.  The GTP 3-01A, in fact.  He noticed how the barrel was pitted with rust.  How the Child’s hand was defiantly not shaking, which worried him more than he could say.  It was one thing being held up at gunpoint by someone who was more scared of the gun they were holding than you were, it was quite another when you potential killer is afraid of nothing except a vengeful God.

“The Destroyers have instructed us to aid them in their mission to Cleanse the galaxy,” the Child intoned in a way that made Greenash feel nostalgic about the mad-eyed ravings of a minute before.  “I am only too happy to send you to Hell for them.”

Greenash was unarmed, and like all pilots had the most basic of training in hand-to-hand combat.  But, again like all pilots, his reflexes and decision-making skills were unsurpassed, plus growing up with his father in some of the roughest bars the galaxy had to offer meant he could handle himself should the need arise.

In one swift moment he kicked out with a standard-issue boot into the Child’s shin.  The man’s arms waved about frantically as he struggled to regain his balance, and as they did so Marin appeared out of nowhere and twisted his gun hand around behind his back.  The pistol dropped from his grip and skittered across the deck.  Greenash then smashed the Child on the back of the head with his elbow and knocked the zealot to the ground.  Between the pair of them, the two pilots pinned the brown-robed disciple to the ground, Marin twisting his arm painfully whenever he made an attempt to struggle free.  Greenash looked up to see one of the crew of the Trelawny run up to them.

“Get on the comm. with security.  Tell ‘em we need a squad to pick up this headcase.”

The crewman saluted.

“Yessir,” he said.

“Quick as you like sailor,” Greenash quipped.

As the crewman dashed off to the flight deck, Greenash turned to look at Marin, who was busily twisting the Child’s arm through an angle it was definitely not designed for.  She flashed a quick grin before giving a vicious little jerk which quite put a stop to the struggling loon.

“I think we’ve given him something else more important to worry about than the Shivans, sir.”

[Luis Dias]

Thumbs up! I'm hooked!

[jr2]

* jr2 likes.

[headdie]

Very good, and a funny ending, keep it up.

[IronBeer]

Keep 'em coming! A plausible, well-written personal narrative of the Post-Capellan Alliance- I love it!

[sputnikwriter]

'Ey up.  This is Chapter 03 of Dreadnought. Enjoy.
"Alpha One, cover the Dreadnought!"

"Copy Command!"

Lieutenant Jimmy Grant - callsign Sundown - craned his neck around and spotted the second wave of Nephilim bombers that had gotten within missile range of the Dreadnought without his noticing. His felt his chest constrict as the oddly asymmetrical Shivan ships launched a volley of heavy bombs.

"All fighters!" he yelled over the squadron communications circuit. "Take out Cancer wing! Go, now!"

Without waiting for a reply he engaged the afterburner of his Hercules Mark Two heavy assault fighter and put it on an intercept course for the bombs. The Herc powered across the vacuum of space at top speed, but it was no interceptor. If only the 85th Squadron hadn't been wiped out in the previous jag; twelve lightning quick Perseus fighters would make his job a thousand times easier...

The gunners on the destroyer had done well. The Nephilims had launched a salvo of eight bombs and the Dreadnought had shot down five, but they couldn't get all of them and Grant urged more speed out of his lumbering fighter. But it wasn't enough.

He was just coming within weapons' range of the incoming bombs when the first one struck the hull of the Dreadnought and exploded. The trailing pair ploughed through the shockwave and impacted simultaneously three seconds later. The massive destroyer rocked in space, flames and debris trailing out a gaping hole that had been torn in her hull.

"This is the Dreadnought. That last salvo destroyed our engines! Alpha One, give us closer cover while we evaluate the damage."

"Copy, Dreadnought. All fighters close in to one thousand metres of the Dreadnought. Do it! Now! Now! Now!"

He finished off the last of the Nephilims with a twin swarm of Tornado missiles, feeling a twitch of satisfaction as the ugly black and red ship burst apart in a festive fireball, then turned his Herc back towards the crippled destroyer.

Grant was now forced into a desperate gamble to trade time for space. Reducing the defence perimeter to one klick would mean that each Terran fighter would have less space to cover, but would also leave the Shivans practically unharrassed until they got into missile range.

It started well. His Alpha wing gobbled up two new wings of Nahema bombers in double quick time. The pair of cruisers and the corvette that were galloping to the rescue were just a couple of minutes away. They could do this.

And then, then it all went wrong. His First Officer, Lieutenant Mick 'Bear' Gregan leading Beta wing, sang out a warning of two wings of deadly Mara fighters. The quick, powerful craft first let loose a swarm of missiles at the stranded Dreadnought, then boiled over the destroyer and fell upon Beta wing. As the massive Orion class destroyer signalled that her weapons subsystem had been knocked out the four Hercs were quickly overwhelmed and pulverised.

Grant looked on with horror as his most experienced pilot and nearly half of his remaining fighters were annihilated in a matter of moments. Beta wing had taken out two Maras before falling, but his squadron was now outnumbered three to one.

Relief was ninety seconds away.

He ordered two of his remaining pilots - Punk and Slider - to take care of the bombers and set the surviving pair - Longshot and Emperor - to follow him against the Maras. He quickly tucked in behind one of the alien fighters, watched the missile reticule gain a lock and blew it away with the last of his Tornadoes. Another thirty seconds ticked by and he began to think that they could hold on.

Another two wings of Maras jumped in, and that sealed the fate of his squadron and the Dreadnought. His comm system was overloaded as the anguished screams of his pilots filled the airwaves. His eyes became as wide as saucers as the Hercules fighters were dispatched almost as one, reduced to nothing more than fiery trails across the sky. Blank horror filled his mind and he never even noticed the shrill tone in his helmet as the Shivans got missile lock on his fighter and four of them fired simultaneously.

The volley of missiles sliced through his shields and reduced his hull to vapour. The last thing he saw before white light obliterated his vision was the majestic sight of the mighty Dreadnought being blown in half, a thunderous blue shockwave reducing the flagship of the 12th Fleet to ashes and white-hot steel...

-

Commander Malian Fryatt watched the images being projected on the big screen before him impassively, only the ashtray crammed with cigarette butts betrayed his true feelings. In the seat next to him the Petty Officer running the simulation initiated the wake-up protocol that would bring the ten pilots of the 39th Squadron out of the program and back to the real world.

Commander Fryatt was the Dreadnought's ACO, or Air Control Officer, and he was in overall command of all fighters, bombers and miscellaneous support craft of the 12th Fleet's flagship. It was his job to organise and deploy the ship's air wing in peace and war and what he had just seen did not make him happy. If that simulation had been real he, and ten thousand other men and women, would be dead. This was the third time in two weeks they had run this exact simulation and Sundown had failed to defend the Dreadnought all three times, and on two of those occasions the entire squadron had been wiped out.

It was getting problematic.

Sundown had joined the squadron not long after it had been rebuilt during the aftermath of Capella, and had risen to be its First Officer under Lieutenant Commander Kahfner, who had just been promoted to ACO on a destroyer in the 11th Fleet. Sunrise had probably assumed he was going to be given the squadron, and he had been given a nasty surprise last month when the posting order for one Lieutenant Commander Kristian Greenash had filtered down from command - New Commanding Officer of the 39th Heavy Assault Squadron. He and another officer had been transferred to the Tyrants, and it seemed nobody in the 39th was happy.

But Fryatt knew that they would just have to deal with it. The simple fact was in the ten pilots currently in the 39th only one - 'Bear' Gregan - had had any actual combat experience, and his personnel jacket contained several after-action reports and letters of censure from senior officers - plus some unproven but persistent rumours regarding an association with the NTF - that prevented him from attaining any actual command post. The rest of the squadron had all joined the GTVA post-Capella, and never fired a shot in anger. Of course they had all been rigorously trained, but as good as the computer simulations had become over the years, they were nothing like the real thing.

Fryatt had been with the 39th when they had been decimated during the war. He knew the feeling of combat, the scream of lasers, the thunder of missiles, the crackle of flak and the howl of beam weapons. He knew the fear which did its utmost to rob you of your courage and your sanity. He knew friends lost, to the Shivans, to the NTF and the crippling condition of shellshock. You had to have been in the ****, or you just didn't know. It couldn't be simulated, or replicated, reproduced, or faked. The horror of combat was something you felt in your blood and your heart, and while simulations could hone your reflexes or sharpen your eye, it couldn't test how you would cope in that ultimate crucible of death.

Which was why the GTVA liked to give command positions to that rarest of breeds, the veterans. There weren't many. Losses in the war had been staggering, and the drop out rate in the years following had been almost as severe. No matter how you looked at it, the Alliance had been soundly thrashed in 2367, and many of the surviving pilots and crew had decided to cash in their chips while they still could. This made experienced personnel worth their weight in gold, and he was astonished this Commander Greenash had been stuck at Subach-Innes for two years before Command had finally decided to give him a squadron.

Must've pissed off the wrong person, Fryatt mused as the pilots of the 39th filed out of the simulation suite and into the small briefing room where they would watch a replay of the mission and have their performance analysed and critiqued. Malian expected to do a great deal of criticising. Losing a virtual destroyer three times in a row was going to put a big black mark in Sundown's log book.

The pilots took their seats by rank, the senior officers sat at the front; the newly-minted Pilot Ensigns sat at the back like naughty schoolchildren. They didn't look very happy, but given that they had all just been virtually killed he didn't expect them to. He trailed into the briefing room with a handheld pad in his hand, and stood formally before the pilots. The atmosphere was poisonous; he could practically taste mutiny in the air. He reflected that Command had really screwed up with this squadron.

Sundown leaned back in his seat and tapped a slow rhythm out of the slim console before him. The Lieutenant's grandparents had been from Sol, from the Pan-Asian Federation to be precise, and the dark look he gave the ACO owed a great deal to that ancestry. Fryatt ignored it, and instead pressed a button on his pad, and the simulation replay began, displayed on the wall-sized screen behind him.

"Right then," he began, "listen up..."

-

Commander Fryatt sat in the office of Commander Famke Troy, the willowy First Officer of the GTD Dreadnought. The Commander had offered him a tumbler with a puddle of Serpentian whisky sloshing in it, and he'd accepted. He was exceptionally weary, for today had been a long and troubling day. The problem with the 39th Squadron did not look like it could be solved easily. It worried him that this situation had the potential to fester and rot at the heart of the flight deck, and it wasn't just the pilots who were in a foul mood. There were nearly fifty men and women in the 39th's ground crew and they were still all loyal to the two officers who had been with them since the reformation. They weren't happy either, which had manifested itself as sloppy maintenance work and launching times becoming longer and longer.

Both officers had been aware of the 39th's problem ever since it had reared its ugly head, and Fryatt was updating the First Officer on today's latest calamities. When he finished Troy poured a measure of whisky for herself and sat down behind her desk across from the ACO.

"Loyalty is all well and good," she said. "But I want those pilots following orders no matter who gives them. This is the GTVA, not some damned social club!"

"This isn't the first time the 'Combat First' policy has caused problems," Fryatt said quietly. "But I've never read about a case where it's been this acute."

"So we should have given the post to Lieutenant Grant then?"

"No." Fryatt's response was firm, and immediate. "Combat experience or not, he just isn't good enough to lead a squadron against the Shivans. In another fleet, nearer the core systems, he probably would not have even made First Officer. He's an exceptional pilot, but his decision making skills, tactical awareness and overall command qualities just aren't up to it." He took another swig of whisky. "I hate to say it. I mean I served with him for six years, we were friends until I got posted to Nankam Aero."

He paused for a second, unsure, conflicted.

"The hell of it, I can't really blame them for feeling like this. Sundown's been in the squadron since after Capella. That's ten years' service, and I hate to think this is as high as he'll get if he wants to fly. I suppose it just doesn't seem fair."

"I'm not worried about fair," Troy said coldly. "My first concern and the concern of the Captain is the combat effectiveness of this ship and her crew."

"Hmm. You know, Troy, I can see a time where we'll have to disband the squadron if Greenash can't whip them back into line."

"That's a worst case scenario, Mal. We want to avoid that."

"There's an understatement," Fryatt muttered. Troy gave a grunt of acknowledgement.

"How much does Greenash know about the situation?"

"Nada. We haven't told him anything, and Command knows nothing about it."

"Right. Well, we can fill him in after Admiral Adams has briefed him."

"It'll be one hell of a shock."

Troy smiled grimly.

"He fought in the war, Mal. He'll be used to shocks by now."  The First Officer leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes thoughtfully.  “What do you know about Greenash?” she asked finally.

“I’ve read his file, hell of a record in the war, and I’d heard about his rep from when he taught at OCS pilot school.  Top notch flier, I can’t believe it took him ten years to get a squadron, especially since Combat First was introduced.”

“Yes, I’ve heard Captain Mull told me he talked to Old Petrarch about this, turns out Greenash’s file doesn’t tell the whole story.  There’s stuff between the lines, after Capella in fact…”

“What?  The man’s in the Legion of Honour.  I was damn surprised he didn’t get a squadron right after we sealed off Capella.”

“This was after the mission to evacuate 3rd Fleet HQ,” Troy took a deep breath.  “Okay, Mal, this is strictly off the record, but when Greenash became the only survivor of the 70th, back on the Aquitaine talk started of LMF.”

“****,” Fryatt winced.  He took another slug of whisky while he tried to think of the repercussions of a pilot receiving the dreaded accusation of Lack of Moral Fibre.  “Anything ever come of it?” he asked.

“It took him ten years to get a squadron at the far side of the galaxy, what do you think?”

Fryatt raised his glass in acknowledgement, tossed back the last of the whisky and excused himself from the office. He had work to do.

[headdie]

I like how the characters are staring to pan out.

[Luis Dias]

Ender's game with a Freespace + middle-age crisis twist. I love it!

[sputnikwriter]

Ender's game with a Freespace + middle-age crisis twist. I love it!

It is? What the blinky heck is an ender's game?

[Luis Dias]

Google is your friend

[Retsof]

I like how this is shaping up.  I assume you will inform us where the LMF accusation came from?