Ngoverse V.4.0-"Cold Wind"

[Cannonshop]

Paradiso, Inarcs Archonette, October 11, 3075...

"No." Elizabeth Ngo crossed her arms. "Don't be an idiot, Tamari-those ex-Clan personnel are staying right the ****** where they are, or maybe transferring to worlds with high-post-infection survivor counts. Bringing anyone from Zeta here is stupid and suicidal."

"You married one!!" Tamari LaRue scoffed, "How dangerous-"

"I'm dying." Liz stated, "It's pretty easy when you're already dying.  I know Peter shared my medical files with you-experimental treatments to mitigate symptoms doesn't equate to a cure-I can live with him, because I'm already dead for all intents and purposes-but Nathan stays home when I travel because he keeps the Falcons on Kowloon and the other bases from leaving their posts and risking un-exposed civilians.  Did you not ****** get it when their own Clan abjured them? They're still contagious."

"I know you haven't had it, and you've been sleeping with him."

Elizabeth sighed and did a classic facepalm.  "NO...the marriage is a political act, I had to use two doctors and a lab to get pregnant. Bringing my husband to Inarcs puts billions of Lyran citizens at risk. I won't do it.  I won't let your man Blackstone deploy the other Zeta survivors outside of strictly controlled areas for the same reason-the places they're at, are places that are already 'safe' for the people living there. IN a couple generations, they'll be interbred with the locals, and the problem won't exist-but for right now..."

"and their technicians?" LaRue said confrontationally.

"Are just as risky." Liz stated, "god dammit, LaRue, I know your guys want to pick my guys' brains, I even want them to myself-but any and all Clanner personnel who weren't born as Lyrans from Lyran Parents and taken bondsman are too risky to allow out of reserved areas."

"Areas that would rather you sat in this chair, than I." LaRue accused.

"areas which are, and remain, loyal to the Lyran Alliance." Liz shot back, "This situation is temporary but the quarantine is not...Even Adam Steiner will back me up on this, Tamari."

Tamari LaRue, Archonette of the Melissia Theater, sighed, "maybe you're right...I'll leave that be.  You have one of my relatives imprisoned."

"Are you prepared for the public to know why your younger brother and your cousin Keith are in cells on Winter and Arluna?" Liz asked in a quiet, dangerous tone, "because believe me, you pressure me on this, and I will stop sitting on the reporters over it.  You're already unpopular with the Lyran public, most of officialdom, and a good piece of the military, so you need to think about this before you say another word."

LaRue sighed, "There were misunderstandings-"

"They were stealing, Duchess." Liz snarled, "Stealing from the treasury, and blackmarketing military and relief supplies-actions that are on the face of them treasonous at best, you're very lucky they were caught on Winter and Arluna, and not on Kowloon-I would have Crucified them for that-we lost over fifty thousand people when those medicines disappeared from the supply line, and it's not even a damn debate how the diversion of those military goods impacted the war against the Blakists-one of the key reasons for the failure of the last coventry offensive, was that line units ran out of spare parts and ammunition."

"You have influence with MacAulliffe." LaRue said, "if you wanted the man dead, he would be dead."

"I may have some small influence on Baroness MacAulliffe." Liz allowed, "but she makes her own decisions now, she wants to hold him alive until his appeals are heard...is this his appeal? are you ready to comment for the public record that because this man Keith is your cousin, you're officially going to let blood ties be stronger than the rule of law-that you're okay with personal loyalties trumping duty? think carefully before you answer that."

LaRue glared at Elizabeth.  "Of...course...not." she said, "Fair trials."

"I don't have the option not to-Debbie's handling it." Liz stated, "are you prepared to carry out the sentence?"

Tamari's face fell, "yes." she said.

"Good.  I can tell OCB to stop digging for the next step in the chain then." Liz stated, "Do your duty, and the information we extracted from your brother and your cousin never needs to see the desk of an LIC investigator, and you never have to worry about a midnight visit from Lohengrin or Heimdall...now, If you will pardon me, Your Grace, I have a flight back to Kowloon to catch.  Alvin will be handling the department in my absence, with the very able assistance of Ms. Whyte."

Elizabeth gathered her coat from the chair, and put it on.  "Mind you, if you try that again, I might kill you myself." She said conversationally, "You wouldn't be the first arrogant substitute I've had to put down personally, you don't want to join that club."

"Are you threatening me?" LaRue demanded.

"You didn't bother recording, but no.  I don't make...threats.  Observations, sure, occasional, exceedingly rare promises? absolutely...but I never merely threaten." Liz told her, "except when it's more useful than direct action...remember, your Mercenary? works for the gal with the money first, unless he's absolute shit...I'll see you in a month when my vacation is over."

[mikecj]

Lohengrin vs Heimdall.  Not a pleasant choice. 

Wonder if those Zeta techs are helping with the tech base by remote?

[Giovanni Blasini]

Tagging for later orbital bombardment.

[Euphonium]

Tagging for later orbital bombardment.

Target lock acquired, sir!  ;)

[Dave Talley]

oooh new target aquired!

[DOC_Agren]

Ping

[Ajax_Wolf_Alpha]

Ping

Pong

[Cannonshop]

Folsum Cells, Arluna...

Keith LaRue-Adler stared at the cold, gray ferrocrete wall.  Instead of his normal attire of an expensive tailored suit, polished shoes, with a bit of red 'flash' handkerchief, he was wearing an orange and reflective-yellow paper jumpsuit with the word "Prisoner" stenciled on the back.

The first day, he'd been shouting threats and demands.  The rest of the cellblock was empty, so the only ears to hear him belonged to a pair of suited Elementals.

It got tiring after a while-and he wondered if the clanners in their sealed armor-sealed, that is, for his protection, not theirs, even heard him.

The only breaks so far, were visits from the Auditors, whose arrival meant a short walk to a room filled with recording devices, and hours spent going over every facet of data in the case placed against him.  First, it was the Theater auditors, later they were joined by a youngish man with black-and-red streaks of vein all over his face.

Most of those sessions were nearly silent.   Sometimes, the silence in those sessions lasted for hours.

This mornings had been one of those.  A Coast Guards officer, laying holos of dead people on the table.  She'd been relatively young-looking, maybe thirty-five or forty, without the tattoos that would mark a Rockjack, but wearing the suit of the space-service portion.  She'd laid out the images, sat back, and waited for him to speak.

"What are these?" he'd asked.

"Your victims.  Some of them." she told him, "Graves Registration didn't have time to snap holos of all of them.  The diversion of that shipment? These are the people who paid for it-a representative sampling, something for you to consider."

"I...I don't understand." he said, shaking his head.

"These weren't in the zone." she told him, "These are people-Lyran people...your people, our people. The route information you sold to your contact? it was their goods he was stealing.  In this case, antibiotics."

She pulled another sheaf out, and laid it on the table, on top of the images of starved civilians.

"Ever been to Coventry?" she asked conversationally.

"Not since I graduated from CMA..." he said, "back in the forties..."

"class of '44, yeah." she laid out recon images, and a stack of casualty reports.

"what's this?" he demanded.

"Your Cousin Joseph's work...which you enabled." she told him, "as an accessory, you share his guilt."

"but This?? You can't pin this on me!"

"Every kroner you diverted has an impact." she stated blandly, "each shipment delayed costs blood, not just money-we are at war, Mister Adler-LaRue. Your cousins held access to too much, because the Lyran State is at war. Every Pfennig and Kroner and C-bill diverted from it's legitimate course has an impact-Graft, we all know,was part of doing business back when all we had to worry about, were the Clans."

"But-"

"But it's Treason, sir." she stated, "we have enough evidence to link you, your Cousin Joseph, and several members of the LaRue and Blackstone households to Treason. White collar criminals, Sir, never seem to grasp what the impact of their actions are-to me, it's worse than when a welfare-island thug robs a corner store and shoots the proprietor-you didn't rob one family of their livelihood, you've cost the lives of thousands."

She gathered the paperwork and imagery, and leaned forward.  "My name is Commodore Anh Cu'ong, and I will be your prosecutor, I thought you should understand exactly the gravity of the charges against you prior to facing your Tribunal...we are still looking for a qualified person willing to accept the role of your defense counsel.  we may have to import someone from Inarcs, since your family's counsel can't travel to Arluna for obvious reasons."

that had been sixteen hours ago.

The blank Ferrocrete was covered in images-in his mind.

Joseph couldn't come, of course, because he was a co-defendant being held on Winter.

[Cannonshop]

Baronial suite, 'Guv'mint-house'-(Government House), Folsum, Arluna....

"...resettlement of the Oxford Valley may be delayed, the cleanup from the fires has revealed a lot of hazardous material intruded into the local biosphere."  Captain Nguyen stated.

"How bad?" Debra asked.

"bad." he told her, "the surveys we finished show carcinogen levels in ground water, rampant mutations in plant and animal life, heavy metals intrusion to the aquifers, the valley's only missing radioactive contamination to be another Dinh Diep scar.  I'm going to suggest that the area isn't safe for human habitation now, or at any time in the foreseeable future."

"Jonas?" she turned to the Elemental who commanded much of Arluna's groundside militia.

"I have to agree with Captain Nguyen's assessment." Jonas told her, "Our scientists reviewed his people's survey data-the Oxford Valley is, with present capacities, unrecoverable, a slag pile, and unsafe for any human habitation...however, it is confirmed free of virus spoor now."

Debra frowned, "Any recommendations?" she asked.

"Linda thinks it is possible to recover the area with the right equipment." He told her, "HOWEVER-that equipment is in short supply, most of it is being detailed to support recovery on worlds hit by thermonuclear, chemical, or biological weapons deployed by the Word of Blake and their puppets."

"Call Liz." Pol said quietly, "you were going to anyway, she either knows someone you can talk to about the gear, or can find a startup interested in ecological restoration she can bankroll the necessary equipment to do the job."

"AH would lahk to handl this'n ourselfs if we kin." Debra snapped, "Runin' t'her ever'tahm we gots a prollem is th'rong ansah."

"She's the finance minister and she's been pushing 'bootstrap' projects all over the theater..." Jonas reminded her, "It is Merchant's work and Scientist work-and Elizabeth Ngo is a very, very, efficient Merchant with a distinct interest in science.  It is not a shard against honour to use what is made freely available."

"Ah will discuss et with her at th' weddin', but ah want othah options." Debra grouched.

Pol checked his watch, "Um, speaking of that...Jonas and I have an appointment with your Fiance in two hours..?"

"Keep him outa trouble." she said, "Ah guess this meetin' is ovah anyhows."

[worktroll]

Barhopping with Elementals ...

[mikecj]

Could be done literally.

I think Joseph & Keith have a potential work-release program in the Oxford Valley...

[Grognard]

target coordinates set and locked in...

[Cannonshop]

LCGS Grantsville, approaching Rally Point Victor (PXY1834Z)...

Cutters.  They're not big ships, they don't have long ranged drives, in fact they underperform in quite possibly every respect in terms of 'warship performance', lacking both docking collars and dropshuttle bays, and being limited to a 15LY jump range with a relatively small cargo capacity.

There are, however, benefits to having them. 

"No activity in the system, Cap."  Giao Pham's sensor operator was a Warrant officer who used to be a gunner's mate on a fox class. 

"Launch boats and set up the surveillance sats." Giao ordered, "Radioman, relay to the fleet, no hostiles detected thus far, inform the Arluna that we're moving to phase two."

For one, Cutters are generally quick-nearly as quick as a combat dropship, and their 'jump signature' is smaller than most proper, thirty-lightyear capable jumpships, much less the warships the old Hegemony used for these missions.

Assault shuttles-properly termed "Smallcraft" launched in pairs from the two forward bays.  Each was rigged for their purpose, in this case, deploying probes and sattelites in the system to detect incoming jump signatures, listen for encrypted radio chatter, or look for anything that might have been left waiting for someone to visit.

On the whole, this was no perfect system, but when matched up with proper fleet groups, such as Fox or Mjolnir-class vessels bringing assault droppers, vessels like the Sampan class provided a much needed form of reconaissance for the fleet, as well as some supplementary firepower, and especially, a 'surprise' factor.

The fifteen lightyear limit, meant that vessels like the Grantsville had to visit more stars between inhabited systems than modern ships of the fleet and line did, and those 'off routes' destinations were practically a highway network right past more traditional, better guarded, routes. 

routes the Word of Blake were using to move munitions, ships, and manpower through.

Officially, The Coast Guards began as a periphery-edge system militia on the Lyran world of Kowloon.  Their major business was antipiracy and counter-piracy, with a secondary mission related to guarding and securing the navigable waterways and coasts of Kowloon's major inhabited continents.   

Unofficially, the Coast Guard traces it's roots to a time before the Rim Worlds Republic, when Kowloon was an independent world scrambling to build a military under the threat of Rim Worlds expansion.  They hadn't built fast enough, but the organization simply went underground, living among Kowloon's then-sparsely inhabited, but economically critical, asteroid and cometary belts.  Under Lyran rule, the organization was formalized again-as a law enforcement agency, which it remained through three succession wars and the Clan Invasion before being yet again formalized as a naval branch-this time, a sub-branch of the Lyran Alliance Navy.

Giao, and the others in her squadron, were well outside their designated 'playpen', supporting LAAF units in another province, far from home, relying on modified Merchant class tenders to provide support after the Liberation of Tharkad.

"Sensor network established."  Kirkegaard, her Sensors man, announced.

"Radioman, inform the fleet, we have a network, flight, recall all Boats, and pull fighter cover to close-in." She ordered.

"Should I retract the sail, or can we wait on that, Cap?" Ops was the only other officer, a Lyran Naval type from Pandora named Stenwicke-he was technically her executive officer as well.

"Only if my core is fully charged and the batteries are topped off. When the move order is given, our next stop is Galatea, and I want this ship ready to fight when we get there." Giao said quietly.

"Aye Cap...keeping the sail charging."

"That's a good lad." she said, "Thirty-Eight, run checks on all weapons systems, level five diagnostics, Coral, I want a physical inventory of our onboard combat stores, it's going to be a little while before the Tender shows up with the rest of the cutter group, and I want a full get-list for them when they arrive, Doc? make sure the infirmary's ready in case we need it. Nav, I want plots for every possible insertion point in the Galatea system for the next sixty days-there's no telling where Collins will want to send us in, but given the Blakie presence, and the importance of Galatea strategically and politically, I'm sure he's gonna want exotic solutions-make sure we have some."

"Aye Cap."

Now, it's down to waiting.

[Cannonshop]

LCGS Brightsville, outer oort cloud, Galatea system...

The Blakists hadn't detected their emergence wave, and there was still a jump left on the LF batteries.  Like most Dirtyfeet, the Word of Blake's naval presence in the Galatea system was located at three points.

1. the Nadir point-a commercial station was now a WoB/Comguard base, part of the 'Blake Protectorate', telescope and audio indicated a full wing of fighters with at least a six ship reaction force of 'pocket warship' type dropships, all working off of a Star Lord class jumpship as tender.

2. The Zenith point, this was guarded by a pair of Warships after the last Lyran push to try and liberate the system, and again, several 'pocket warship' model assault droppers were visible-their drives hotter than civilian dropship drives or conventional military transport ships. 

3. The third concentration covered the close-orbitals of Galatea itself, with six-ship fighter squadrons cycling between the Vengeance-class carrier and ground bases, while clearly visible escort ships-again, assault droppers built, this time, on Triumph frames, held the lagrange points with the assistance of fighter cover and ground based missiles.

There was a fourth group-but it wasn't really a proper 'group'.  The Blakists and their allied mercenaries were running practice drills in the mid-and-outer system.

Commodore Bianh vu Dao studied the feeds from surveillance probes and calculated astrometric gravity effects based on the system's layout and the positioning of planets, moons, and asteroids, while her Radioman listened in on broadcast communications emnating from the planet, the garrisons, and the units in the system.

Every time she gamed the coming battle in her head, she found the battlegroup, and it's coast-guard auxiliary group, were in a bad position.

"Radioman, it's update time.  Hey, Celex, whatchoo think?"

"I think we need more ships." the Rockjack Ops officer had her own boat until Tharkad.

"Tru'nough, How should we do it without more ships?" Bianh asked.

"Depends-we don't have enough to break the whole defense, even with the Arluna and the Fylgia, but we can probably raid them hard and shake their nerve with a fast sweep against the Zenith point."

"Not the Nadir or Lagrange?" Bianh asked.

Celex shook her head, "Lose minimum two cutters against those groups if everything goes pure ore.  nothing's gone pure ore since that deep base hit in '71...this is going to be a slugging match for sure."

"what about if we have the heavies with us?"

"Better odds if we hit the warships at the zenith first-thing." Celex noted, "They're big assets and they're mobile-the smaller vessels have to travel newtonian to respond, hit the mobility assets first, then in-system jump-transit to the other point and hit the defense there-nukes for the pockets, smallbore cap for the fighters, chew it up, then burn for the planet, with our fighters covering our fleeing asses...then the heavies have a chance-it draws everyone out of position...but then, there's still those droppers and fighters drilling in the outer system, they can move to reinforce the planet, or even the Nadir point while we're tied up with the Blakist heavies, and if we go for a Lagrange insertion first, they'll have time to bring everything inward.  Any way you slice it, we're going to lose cutters and maybe a warship-and then, there's the possibility of a Blakie reaction force within shouting range with their HPG."

[Cannonshop]

LAS "Barncord", Tramp-class Tender, Staging area PXY1833Z[/i]

"Captain Minh, a moment?"  Nicole minh turned at the voice.

"Precentor-Martial Davion..." she muttered, staring.

"Steiner-Davion, actually." Victor said with a wry look.

"What do I owe the pleasure?" she asked.

"Your commission was with Kowloon, correct?" Victor asked, "I mean, before the Coast Guard was activated as an LAAF sub-unit."

"Yeah...do I need to have my CO present for this, sir?" Nicole asked, "You seem to have ditched your liason escorts and you're poking around on a fleet tender instead of sitting on your shiny warship, You've seen the inside of my cutter, and I don't think I rate a visit from a former royal highness."

"I have a special mission for you-it's kind of important." Victor told her, "but it's not something I could talk about with-"

"With Comstar present." She said.  "So it's covert, and something they aren't going to be happy with unless it succeeds."

Victor nodded, "yeah, exactly."

"Sir, you know how it's supposed to work-you contact Collins, he contacts me." she pointed out, "Chain of command, so it's dirty work...what kind of dirty work, and if it's too shady, I will tell you to pound it up your tackhole with a hulldriver."

"Not that shady...but you're originally from Heller Burrow out in the Sol-Oort, right?"

"OH, ****** you for finding that out, I'm not going back." she snapped.

 "I need someone to contact the Metis Coalition...covertly." Victor told her, "SOmeone to bring them into the war-on our side."

She stared at him, "are you out of your breaching mind, sir?  Metis is isolationist, Mister Precentor-Martial, but they're still stuck dealing with Blakie ROM overseers one, and two, I'm wanted there-I'll be sucking vacuum before I get a chance to ****** say hello.  What in the name of god do you think drives someone to steal a ship and run to the edge of human space to play pirate for three years before being captured?" she growled, "Do you even know what I did? why it makes this a really, really bad idea?"

"I don't know what you did, no." Victor told her, adding, "If necessary, I'll ask Collins to make it an order."

"Mother ******!  you stubborn little ******, you'd do it too...well, you're going to have to do it that way, I will not put myself in that position without orders-I owe the Coasties, they stopped me from having to eat a rotting corpse in a dead prison, They gave me back my honour and a chance for real relationships again..but I wont' do it for you, or your hypercharismatic buddy Stone."

"I'll speak to Collins, if necessary, I'll speak to Li as well." Victor told her, "We need this, Minh, it's important."

He left the way he came, and she stared out the ports at her ship.  that son of a bitch...

[Paladin1]

See, this is why you should never let Clan Merchants run the concession stand.  I had to Trial for my popcorn, paid extra for it, didn't get any butter and the show has already started.  :-[

[Cannonshop]

See, this is why you should never let Clan Merchants run the concession stand.  I had to Trial for my popcorn, paid extra for it, didn't get any butter and the show has already started.  :-[

dammit, you're going to make me feel like throwing in a huge number of links (1 for each preceding story, 1 per reference to Sarna/Battlecorps' public pages) just so people can keep up-and I can't even keep up with a task of that magnitude! (so I'm not doing it, nyaaah.)

Short form  for new arrivals is:

We're smack-daub in the Jihad, which is largely progressing exactly the way it did in the Canon, but with a few changes:

1. The Arluna Flu (FGC 3062 game from almost ten years ago): a contagion accidentally released that spread to 13 planets in the Melissia Theater named (rather creatively) after the first world it brought low-Arluna.  This resulted in an extended multi-system quarantine and set off small ripples regarding the Falcon incursion and the Jihad.

2. Elizabeth Ngo's Kowloon.  The version in this 'verse is a hybrid of some of the better ideas from versions 1,2, and 3 of the Ngoverse stories, along with better elements from the FGC.

3. Obviously, this series focuses more on the political and space/aerospace/Naval aspects than previous versions of the setting, I'm also dipping into more sources for elements.  Partially to keep the 'general' story of the Jihad flowing the right way.  as a result, Navies on all sides are a leetle bit bigger than they were in Canon, and in this setting, only morons and Davions think of Ramming with their multibillion/trillion C-bill warships as a viable tactic.   Nukes against space? yeah, everyone's using them to some extent.

4. LCGS= "Lyran Coast Guard Ship", this is a Ngoverse-specific fictional designation for vessels sponsored/crewed by Kowloon's Coast Guard Militia, that hve been 'activated' to serve the Lyran Alliance Armed Forces.  The entire Coast Guard was co-opted by the LAAF sometime in 3066 or 67, when the contagion was hot and it was unsafe for regular LAAF units to risk exposure in the Quarantine zone.  (Liz made the mistake of moving mountains to try and help her neighbours, so Peter said, "Thank you very much for the complete org-chart and layout of a new service, we'll take over now,-just keep making more.")

Definition: Cutter

A "Cutter" is a jump-capable gunboat, typically under 100K tons, armed with cheap Capital Weapons and subcapitals.  Cutters use Primitive tech jumpdrives and closely resemble pre-dreadnought designs.  The intended role was local patrols close to a home system and anti-piracy reaction forces that utilize in-system jumps, doing what "Real" Coast Guard ships do, only faster than a dropship can manage a transit.

These models incorporate some advances in tech;LF batteries and Black Boxes.

in the setting, the lower-tech requirements for "Primitive" drives makes them cheap, in comparison with standard core ships and actual warships, though they can serve similar purposes to the latter, however these vessels lack most of the capabilities that would be considered necessary by most Inner Sphere and Clan navies, they do have a few tactical advantages that are being leveraged in THIS story;

1. very small emergence signature-this makes them harder than normal to detect, particularly at range.
2. LCGS vessels are equipped with Black Box communications tech, along with Lyran fleet units, and presumably Fedsuns as well.  This means the cutters can coordinate across a star-system, or with assets outside of a star-system, without having WoB listening in on the HPG network.  Encryption is still in use, however, because it's stupid not to encrypt your strategic-level commo.  Cutters are NOT capable of supporting the equipment for a mobile HPG.  Their power requirements alone make that impossible.
3. The fifteen LY jump limit on the drive means stopping in 'unmonitored' systems a lot.  So far, in the setting, this has already netted benefits, since those 'unmonitored' systems are also the best or only covert routes in the Inner Sphere.  LCG ships have already managed to disrupt many convoys of Blakist support assets, uncovered logistics points, etc.  In terms of the war, effectively hampering enemy operations by dint of being places they 'shouldn't'.
4. Did I mention they're cheap?  Still more expensive than a four-pack of Overlord A3's, but compared to the price of a Mako or Fox, or even a Zech, they're dirt-cheap for the capability, and easy to produce since they use existing, obselete or no-longer-licensed equipment married to established systems.

The first real "Fleet Action" saw a significant number of the block-1 cutters destroyed-but that's what happens when you take on a Farragut escorting a convoy carrying Pocket Warships.  Communication and the ability to coordinate didn't leave the enemy in a good spot when proper LAAF fleet elements were able to jump in.  The battle of Kowloon led to immediate doctrine changes in the Coast Guard, and to refinements of the Cutter design to compensate for 'real world performance' requirements.

With a good crew, the average of 3 PWS to 1 Cutter is about how well a cutter can do.  4 is pushing it, 5 and you need a wingman.

They run in 'Squadrons' of four.  For extended range operations, with a 'Tender' vessel, usually Merchant, Tramp, or some other common design hauling dropship tanker-vessels and cargo vessels loaded with munitions on ready pallets.

[Daryk]

Are the cutters ever going to get NL/55s?  The extra range would probably be worth the tonnage...

[croaker]

Are the cutters ever going to get NL/55s?  The extra range would probably be worth the tonnage...

They're pretty tight on space as it is, as I recall. I'm not sure there's -room- to shoehorn that in.

ETA: Yeah. Ran the numbers. There just isn't room for '55s. MAYBE 45's. You could squeeze 55's in if you drop one of them, go to one on each flank and one nose, and keep 35's on the aft quarters. But there just isn't room to really play around with that kind of thing.

[Cannonshop]

LCGS Nueva Pueblo, Midnight, ship's time.

"I guess I just don't 'get it', Cap."  "Seether" Sithers was a Rockjack, which made her like a sort of 'cousin'.  "First you had me do the nav-calc for the Coventry and that was weird enough-you're one of the best jump calculators I've ever seen..."

"You needed the practice." Nicole commented, carefully squeezing the mixing ball in the small ship's galley.

"Yeah, then, you make a big deal out of being a Dirtyfoot around the Heinies as if your habits weren't marker-flagging you as a 'Jack or at least a shipper." Seether added, "So of course they're going to dig in a little bit.  I'm kinda surprised you're from one of the Sol Belts though."

Nicole grunted and added a four gram tube of B-12 to her drinkmeal bulb.  "Yeah, and here I thought I was so goddam careful-is there a direction to this?"

"So...you're offered a chance to head back where you come from-and you don't want to go?" Seether demanded, "Seriously-we're like stone-age compared to the Sol-Belts!"

"I don't want to go back there." Nicole told her navigator.

"But WHY?" Seether asked, "Seriously-you don't come off like a nutjob most of the time, what did you do that was so bad?"

Nicole sighed.  "Fukit, you want to know? fine...once upon a time, there was this kid right? lived in a nice, quiet burrow, good marks in quals, online buddies list as long as your arm...this kid's parents, they had a mineral concern and it was doing well, feeding into a larger manufacturing group, they were pulling profits like you've never seen in the Kowloon belts-real money...but this kid, this kid was different.  Brothers and sisters all wanted to just keep spreading in the belt, feeding into the machine, got it?"

"Yeah..."

"Well, see, htere's this organization, 'Bureau of Terran Affairs', and they're like the government for the government this kid's parents voted to elect every couple years, and the Bureau, they wanted to keep a lid on everything-do what you want, but don't go too far away..."  Nicole plugged the heating tab in.  "...but this kid, this kid wanted to see everything, with me so far? Read about the adventures far, far away, stories about Pirates, and Traders and Adventurers, with me so far?"

"Yeah...I think so..."

"So one day, this kid gets into an argument with the other stakeholders.  By now, the kid in question, they're legally an adult, with a couple small stakes that weren't playing out and one that just hit big."  she continued, "Well, the debate got nasty, trolling on the web went to throwing viruses...and this kid, well, this kid went too far, and some people might have died."

"What...what did you do?"

"I wrote a virus that got out of control, and it killed the life support on someone's burrow." Nicole told him, "I violated the big rule-I sabotaged a lifesystem to win an argument-now that's not the worst thing."

"There's worse?"

"There's worse.  I stole a jump-capable ship." she said, "And I ran, instead of facing up to the law-that's like a beacon-transmitter screaming 'guilty!!'...now, I didn't just haul off and run-before I did it, I spent some of that money on some cosmetic alterations and language training-so I could hide, but you know what? the first time I go into a burrow, it's going to log my DNA-and then, people will know I'm back."

"Um...who'd you steal the ship from?" he asked.

"My parents." Nicole said, "I picked up a crew outside the Sol system, oen of the dive-ports out there, just hired them, and headed away from Sol as far and as fast as I could...I ended up taking jobs-some of them weren't exactly legal but hey, I probably murdered some people, so why not roll deeper in it, right? so my first crew, they mutinied, and I got to kill people for sure putting it down.  Second crew didn't mutiny-they just ****** up, which in turn meant I got caught by the Lyran Authorities in the Winter system...wehre they sentenced me to twenty years hard time for piracy-then the Flu hit, everyone including me got sick, I got 'better', but my cellmate? he didn't."

ping!

She disconnected the heater and sucked the brothy mix from a straw, "Which wasn't great, since 'everyone' included the guards with the keys, and the staff that cooked for the inmates.  I starved for over a week before I gave in-first, it was the rats.  Those kept me alive for the first two weeks, but they got smart, and started staying away-by then, the heating was out in the prison, so it was kind of a race between starving to death, and freezing to death.  Eating keeps your body temp up enough to keep you alive...when they found me, I was literally about to take a bite of my dead cellmate.  The Coasty Marines that were sweeping the prison checked my charge list-and offered me a meal, and a job.  Two months later, I had another ship, another crew, and a uniform." she said, "They never asked where I was from, or where I learned my skills."

"So...your secret should've been safe." Seether said.

"Yeah. I think one of the ex-prince's guys must've seen my wanted poster and tipped him off." Nicole stated, "Which means he's got a somebody who can go to Metis, that isn't me...they want this alliance to include the Belters, how much you want to lay down I'm being sent as payment?"

"If Li asks...are you gonna go?" Seether asked.

"I have to." Nicole said, "The Coast Guard gave me back my humanity.  Starvation so bad you'll eat a human being is something you don't ever forget, when someone saves you from it, there's a debt you can't pay with a rock the size of Jupiter...but I really, really hope Li tells his Princeness to go pound sand."

a beeping at the Radioman's station interrupted whatever Seether was about to say.

Nicole gently tapped WO Cunningham awake with one hand, and took the offprint with the other.

Attention to Orders:

LCGS Nueva Pueblo II and all personnel transferred TDY duty to Alliance Command report Precentor Martial Victor Steiner Davion for Classified mission to Coordinates 0/0/0.

Mission is Diplomatic, Details to be provided at in-person Brief to be conducted aboard Cameron-Class vessel Invisible Truth 0300 Hours Zulu, 28 October, 3067.

This order signed:

Admiral Alicia Li,
Commandant of the Coast Guard
Date 27 October, 3067, 1500 Hours Zulu.

Nicole groaned.  "Everybody up.  Helm, bring us around to docking position with the Invisible Truth."

"What about the ordinance load?"

"if we need it where we're going next, our mission has already failed." Nicole stated grimly.

[MechRat]

I don't think it's too far off the mark to say that the fecal matter is about to hit the rotating blades for Nicole and her crew...

[Warclaw]

"Yeah. I think one of the ex-prince's guys must've seen my wanted poster and tipped him off." Nicole stated, "Which means he's got a somebody who can go to Metis, that isn't me...they want this alliance to include the Belters, how much you want to lay down I'm being sent as payment?"

Ah, yeah..about that.   8)

While I understand the thinking, if I'm a Sol-Belter, I've just set Victor up in order to test his character.  So I ask for Nicole, ostensibly as a "repatriation" for trial.  If Victor gives her up, I get a wanted criminal back, AND I know just how much he can be trusted.  (Which is not at all.)  After all, if he'll betray/sacrifice one of his people, what will he do to a distant ally in the name of "Winning"?

If he refuses to give her up, it also says something about his loyalty.

[mikecj]

Metis hasn't broken its isolation since Kerensky pissed them off during Chieftain has it?

[Cannonshop]

Spider Moon CGNAS, Kowloon...

"What did I order you to do?" Elizabeth demanded, "Adam asked, and I followed through, what in hell was I following through on?"

"You've seen her file then." Li said.

"Yes, ******, Li, how can I make good decisions when my staff aren't telling me the whole truth?" Liz demanded, "for that matter, how can one of my people make good choices when you've got them brainwashed?"

"Did you read all of it?" Li asked, "We needed her functional and alive.  The psychological treatment was carefully targeted, Liz."

"You Erased her Memories!"

"Memories of what she did in that cell!"  Li argued back, "She couldn't live with it-nobody could live with that. anyway, it's impossible to actually erase memories-we suppressed it, gave her mind a chance to heal-Liz, we were starving for skilled spacers we could deploy in infected zones, and she's good."

"What happens if she starts remembering, Li?" Elizabeth demanded, "or if someone slips and she finds out the recovery team found her like that? That she wasn't just about to do that, that she'd been doing it for a week?"

"She won't." Li said, "Even if the memories surface, she'll reject them."

"What if Victor finds out, or Adam?" Liz countered, "HOw do you think his princeness is going to react to finding out the person he's sending to Metis actually succumbed while she was under the fever?"

"He won't."

"He found out about Metis." Liz countered, "you kept that from me and he found out."

Li sighed, "Liz...we've done this kind of work before.  Nicole Minh's mind will reject any memories from her delirium that surface as imaginings driven by her own insecurities.  I could present her with video evidence and she won't believe it because she doesn't want to.  Human beings have a bottomless capacity for self-deception, and we left enough of the real events intact that she will have the ability to refuse to believe the rest."

"and Adam?" Elizabeth asked.

"He already knows." Li told her, "I had medical brief him in when the Precentor Martial made his request three weeks ago."

"it never occurred to you to tell me first?" Liz demanded.

"You were on Inarcs, keeping Tammy LaRue from bankrupting the entire theater." Li stated, "It was need-to-know, you didn't need to until the the day before yesterday, when the Archon called you up to give the order."

"What other conditioned responses did you put in her?" Elizabeth growled, "did your people put any timebombs in that head I don't already know about?"

"No." Li told her duchess, "Generally when conditioning an agent, it's better to leave as few as possible and rely on the native personality, and when Medical handled Minh's case, we just wanted a functional ship captain, no other directives, besides, loyalty conditioning is long-term ineffective, I'll point to some of our field agents, but that would mean risking you knowing their identities."

"Li, this isn't the first time you've done something underhanded and not told me about it." Elizabeth sighed, "I'm going to go home, and spend the rest of this month with my kids. In the future, please, try to let me know before something like this goes off?"

"I do my best, Your Grace." Li told her.

"That's all I can ask...one more thing, the LaRue case."  Liz said.

"Yes?"

"Keep OCB working on it." Elizabeth ordered, "I'm about ninety percent sure Tammy set those boys up as her patsies, I want the whole network before we go to Adam with what we've found out."

"You've already got enough to have her tossed out-"

Liz shook her head, "I want her there for now." she said, "I'm not ready to let the Steiners know I might survive past middle-age, and I don't want the job-I just want enough leverage to keep her on the straight and narrow...or at least, somewhere closely approximating it.  Outside the Q-zone, my name is still pretty muddy, and we're chronically short of people who can do that job-as in having the ability, plus credibility with the worlds outside the quarantine-it's why Peter put her up in the first place, then forced her to take me on her cabinet."

[Giovanni Blasini]

Yikes.

[mikecj]

Once we don't need her, Tammy is going to fall very far, very fast.

[Cannonshop]

Briefing room, Comstar Warship Invisible Truth...

****** this.  Nicole's little inner voice was snarling.  "...your plan, it is stupid." she finally blurted out, "Stupid, stupid, stupid, and stupid.  You laid the arm on Admiral Li to drag me into this ****** idea of yours, and you're sending me into the one place in this universe that makes that cell on Winter look good, so we are not going with the stupid plan."

she reached into her pocket, and dragged out four datachits.  "We're going to use my plan instead." she tossed them on the table.  "I need every nonessential item stripped off my ship." she added, "anything that's not securely welded in place, that means emptying the storage magazines and the ready mags, removing the fighters, and downshipping gunnery and most of the fighter departments. The extra space is going to fuel, and consumables."

"You'll be defenseless out there-or close to it." Beresick commented.

"I'm taking a Cutter into the teeth of the Blake Protectorate." She snapped, "I'll be defenseless anyway, this just means my crew won't also be starving to death and we'll actually have enough fuel to make it there, and possibly escape back...and I won't be using your carefully-compromised approach route."

The Comstar personnel stopped what they were doing, and looked up.

"Compromised?" Victor asked.

"Comstar, Word of Blake-they've had you guys by the shorts since '58." she stated, "That tells me that you're moled right down to your dirtfeet underwear-we won't be using the route your navigation guys plotted, because, in spite of not wanting to go anywhere near Sol space, I'm going, and I have no intention of dying nobly or nobly being imprisoned because I nobly trusted people who've been compromised from the top-down since before I was born-the enemy reads your mail, they know your plans, you know it and I know it-I have no intention of being that easy to catch-and since it's orders from MY superiors that put me here-people I owe everything to, I have no intention of your Noble effort being wasted on a failed mission-we do it my way, or you get on the horn to Li and have her cancel the order."

"How will we know if you succeed?" Victor asked.

"Because I'll come back." she told him, "If we fail, you might hear about it on the 'voice of gaia'...and once more, because I really despise you for doing this to me, and on behalf of every man who died because of your family spat,  ****** you very much...sir, and thank you so much for abdicating so that I can tell you exactly what I think without disrespecting a senior officer.  I have a ship to strip, jump off is in sixteen hours-have your envoy ready to go when it's time, or he can ****** walk to Sol."

After she left, Victor turned to Collins, "So...considering revising the disciplinary procedures?"

Admiral Michael Collins shook his head, "she didn't unload on me, or on any serving Lyran officer, Precentor Martial." he stated, "She unloaded on you...and I really can't say I disagree completely-a lot of good men on all sides died because you let Katherine run loose...and frankly, I think she might be spot-on about the presence of enemy informants in our ranks...fortunately, I, also, am not in her direct chain of command.  I'll send a note to Commodore vu Dao about her conduct."

"how is she as a captain?" Victor asked.

"You've seen her file-first engagements of the Jihad in the theater, a slew of operations, recon on Tharkad, she's good." he said, "really good-but Li seems to have a gift for finding really good people, and keeping them...I hate to think you might be wasting one of my a-team on a forlorn hope."

"I guess we'll find out." Victor said quietly. He didn't mention just how deeply those words hurt, there wasn't a need to talk about the nightmares, or the guilt he felt over what happened in the past.

but a spark of anger burned for having his face rubbed in it by someone made untouchable by the role they were asked to play regardless.

[mikecj]

Compromised indeed.  O0

The same way Victor compromised his moral authority.

[Cannonshop]

Elizabeth House, Nha Tranh...

"...he's remarkably good with the children." Emma Whyte commented, sipping a dark amber mixed drink on the swing.

In the yard, Nathan Roshak was surrounded by a gaggle of neighbourhood kids, holding them enraptured as he told them a story.

Liz turned the steaks on the grill.  "Yeah." She said absently, "He sees them more than I do, They see him more often than I do."

Emma looked up at her boss.  "I know the feeling-when Kelli was travelling with you all the time, I couldn't help feeling a little...jealous. I'm still a little resentful you have her on Inarcs working with your deputy, instead of here with me."

"I could cut you a ticket." Liz said, "I just can't have both of us on vacation at the same time."

"And who would watch the children?" Emma countered, "I know how it works, Liz, and I'm not Jealous so much anymore as just...wishing."

Liz pursed her lips, "So do I...wishing I could stay here, instead of having to be there, wishing it was like it was back in '60, all I had to worry about was wrapped in one system..."

"You were never settled down." Emma told her, "Kelli told me about the trouble you got into-the twenty hour workdays..."

"Work to be done." Liz told her, "I guess the reward for doing it well was inevitable-more work."

she turned over the Bratwurst, and scooted them closer to the flame's edge.

"...and so one day, an old woman came into the camp, and asked him to stop it-and he did."  Nathan finished.

"But what happened next?" Amanda asked.

"That's another story, for another afternoon.  Morgan has hidden something in the neighbourhood now," Nathan nodded at the large elemental, "...the one who finds it, gets a prize...but you only have about half an hour to figure out what it is, and where he hid it."

"Any Clues?" Patrick, Amanda's twin, asked.  Liz noted how very different her children were, despite sharing a birthday and a womb.  Patrick was much like his father-lean and going to be tall, a shock of pale hair over a serious face.  Amanda was dark-haired like her mother, and just as narrow as her father.

"Morgan?" Nathan shot the elemental a questioning look.

"Seek it not in a sea of green, nor in stones of gray, you will not find bound below, and it sees with perfect clarity." Morgan said, "That should be enough clues."

The kids spread out, filtering into the neighbourhood, or gathering in small groups to discuss the cryptic clue.

"Riddle games?" Elizabeth asked as her husband walked up to the barbecue.

"Sharpens the wit." He told her, "We could have gone with hide-and-seek, but I wanted some time with the adults..." He leaned to Liz and they kissed. "It is good to have you home." he told her.

Liz blushed, "Not in front of the grown-ups dear." she said, "They might get the wrong ideas."

"I already have several wrong ideas in mind for tonight." He announced, then exaggerated distraction, "Steak's almost done."

"Yeah, but the roasts aren't." Elizabeth said, "Not to mention-"

"Charlene is bringing the salad." Morgan announced, "She will be here in twenty minutes."

Liz cocked an eyebrow, "Last time it was Matilda." she commented.

"Mattie felt some time...apart was a good idea." Morgan stated, "I understand she has begun a live-in relationship with Abner Holland in Ia Drang.  Charlene has proved a...suitable..replacement-more suitable, anyway, than Mattie was."

"Morgan works too much." Nathan translated, "SO...he found someone as anal-retentive as himself, then lost her in favour of a woman who would be...um..."

"She is a freer spirit." Morgan asserted.

"Oh, slutty." Liz said, "Got it, no problems, and I won't hassle her about it."

"The relationship is only temporary." Morgan stated, "We agreed upon that beforehand..."

Liz reached into the ice-chest and threw a bottle at the elemental, "Drink your beer and don't gross me out with the details, Don Juan..."

"I always saw Morgan more as a Casanova myself.  He'd have a bit of difficulty fitting through windows..." Nathan cracked.

[Paladin1]

So, quick question here CS.  How long has it been since the Falcons were marooned on Kowloon?  I ask, because I want to get an idea of how quickly or how slowly they're adapting to life in the IS as, essentially, freeborns.

I seem to remember a bit about this being approximately 10 years after the Falcons first arrived, but am I right?