Ekological Chimera
patreon
Chapter 7 - Reinforcements
🕑 Added 2024-09-18 19:16:28 +0000 UTCAshwood startled awake as an alarm blared inside his head. He instinctively reached for his gun on the nightstand while looking around the tiny room. The cabin held only a bed, a work desk along with a chair and a small bathroom. The walls were made of steel and the cabin held sparse decorations. Finding no one else, he let go of the gun before checking the vitals of his soldiers.
Everyone seemed fine. Only then did it occur to him to simply check the alarm itself. Still in bed, he sighed before doing just that.
The reason for his unexpected awakening turned out to be a high-priority message from Song. Apparently, two ships had warped in an hour ago.
The Colonel didn’t know whether to be more annoyed that his sleep got interrupted or that Song waited an entire hour before notifying him.
Grumbling, he quickly dressed and armed himself, before exiting his cabin. He dismissed the two soldiers that guarded it, as he kept everything important on himself anyway, and started making his way towards the bridge through the lit corridors.
There was no real night and day cycle on the ship, only two shifts, so the corridors were as busy as always. That is to say, not much. No one bothered him as he walked. He arrived in a better mood, happy to finally hand over the entire mess to someone else.
His good cheer lasted only until he set foot on the bridge, instantly noticing that something wasn’t right. Many of the officers whispered amongst each other, most of them outright ignoring their duties.
He glanced at Captain Song. She sat in the captain’s seat, alone. As he approached her, a few of the bridge crew noticed him and kept shooting him glances, disturbing the Colonel further.
Before he reached her, Ashwood sent an alert to his soldiers. Just in case.
“What’s this about, Captain? And who did they send to take over?” He spoke, frowning at Song.
The Captain turned her head to face him, speaking in monotone, “It just so happens that those two questions have the same answer, Colonel.”
Ashwood stared at her, tense and annoyed.
Finally, when she realized that he didn’t plan on responding, she elaborated, “They sent General Shepard, along with two more battlecruisers.”
Colonel Ashwood would have frowned even harder, were it possible. He had never met the General personally, but her unorthodox hair color made her rather memorable. As far as he knew, there wasn’t anything about the General that should elicit a reaction like this from the crew or Song.
Shepard could be considered neutral, though she nominally supported the humanist faction. Song probably would have preferred an officer more firmly on her side, but someone like Shepard was undoubtedly the better choice.
“That doesn’t explain anything, Captain,” Ashwood responded.
The Captain nodded, “It is rather simple,” Song paused, “She is dead.”
Ashwood massaged the bridge of his nose, “The warp? She was around seventy or so, right?”
Experiencing a warp jump tended to be quite dangerous for older people or for those with certain medical conditions. Longevity treatments and regular exercise helped immensely, so the danger to the General couldn’t have been too significant, but that was life. After all, someone had to die so people could make statistics about the insignificance of the danger.
Captain Song gave him a funny look, “No, she got shot in the head.”
An uncomfortable silence descended, as Song stared at the Colonel, the suspicion obvious in her eyes. He regretted leaving the two guards behind.
“Oh,” Ashwood responded eventually, “Who did it?”
“No one, according to Sterope’s crew,” Song said.
“Explain,” Ashwood commanded, annoyed at her cryptic answers.
Either unaware or uncaring of his feelings, Song spoke unhurriedly, “According to the ship’s doctor, Shepard died only a few minutes after Sterope exited warp.”
That made sense. Exiting warp tended to throw many of the ship’s instruments out of order, both making the ship vulnerable to attacks and creating some internal chaos as many systems tended to malfunction. Ideal timing for an assassination.
“They found her in a locked cabin and with no one and nothing on the cameras. An escape pod launched soon after, but none of the crew are missing,” Song continued.
The Colonel did his best to keep his expression still. It seemed that his guess about the importance of Eigos had been right on the mark. He supposed the General might not have been as neutral as he had thought.
“Someone tampered with the cameras and then launched a pod as a misdirection?” He said.
Song squinted at him, “Perhaps.”
She definitely suspected Athena. Perhaps not too difficult of a guess, especially if she knew the General’s possible true leanings. Athena was also the go-to person to accuse in any incident involving unknown or advanced technology.
Well, within reason. He doubted anyone thought Athena created those energy shields, for instance.
Song’s suspicion was probably justified this time. It made the Colonel uncomfortable. If Athena had truly made such an overt move, it could only mean one thing. The war would start soon. Ashwood stood behind his beliefs, but he had hoped for the transition to be bloodless.
Unfortunately, that decision was firmly in the hands of people like Song. People who would never willingly surrender their power, especially to someone not human.
Ashwood would have to accelerate his plans, if possible. Seizing control of Alcyone without proper preparation would only lead to a bloodbath.
“So who is in charge? And send me the new orders,” Ashwood changed the subject.
Captain Song gave him a deadpan look, “You are.”
The Colonel sighed. He expected it, yet he didn’t feel comfortable carrying such a big responsibility on his shoulders.
A colonel generally commanded 4-5 ships, so a general would have technically been overkill, were the stakes not so high. With a general already on board, there wasn’t a reason for more high-ranking personnel to be present. After all, people like that didn’t grow on trees and the forces the Republic could send to such a faraway system were limited.
Though two cruisers were far from that limit.
“Right. Attach the crew manifests of the new ships when you send over the orders. What is the other one called?”
“TRS Pleione,” Song said, as she fiddled with the display in front of her.
Soon after the files arrived, allowing Ashwood to check the situation for himself. The orders were as he suspected, a command to acquire the technology at all costs, though still preferably through legal means. Bombing a bunch of iron age primitives wasn’t good PR, of course.
The attached report about the General’s death interested him more, though he ended up disappointed after quickly skimming it. Song had more or less covered the main points and there wasn’t anything else of note.
The crew manifest turned out to be the most interesting of the bunch. He knew neither Captain Vasili, Captain Black nor any of the other officers listed, but he had data provided by Athena to fall back on. She had taken great pains to document the opinions of the vast majority of military personnel held in regard to her, for obvious reasons.
As a relatively high-ranking member of her faction, Ashwood had access to some of it. Not anything illegal or truly secret, as he was public in his support, but still enough to be useful.
He used his neural implants to quickly compare the files, getting a quick picture of the allegiances of all the newcomers.
The Colonel suppressed a smile as his actions immediately bore fruit. He could see that all the incoming officers supported the anti-AI faction, often vocally. Athena’s opponents clearly understood the importance of Eigos as well, which didn’t surprise him.
The grunts were a different story. Unlike the officers, the military at large lacked proper data about their political leanings as any direct investigation would be unconstitutional. That left only one option. To sift through truly gigantic amounts of data and painstakingly piece the sentiments of millions of soldiers together. A daunting task even for Athena and an impossible one for the military. Fortunately, the super-AI had not wasted the decades of peace.
Thanks to all that work, the Colonel could see that the vast majority of low-ranking personnel on TRS Sterope greatly favoured his side. He couldn’t even imagine the insane amount of work that must have gone into getting so many of Athena’s supporters onboard Sterope without arousing suspicion.
It almost guaranteed that their people controlled Sterope. The support of the rank and file was usually quite passive and so hardly enough, which meant that their presence would be pointless without other backing.
Ashwood didn’t have the authorization to know any of the deep cover agents, but he knew that they existed and that their numbers were not inconsequential. It wouldn’t be at all surprising if a good chunk of Sterope’s officers supported Athena.
That’d also more or less explain the mystery of General Shepard’s death. Athena might have a bit of a technological lead over their opponents, but that didn’t mean her people could just seize military systems willy-nilly.
There might even be some of the Soma Aspis on board. He held some rather complex feelings towards the elite cyborgs, yet he couldn’t deny that their presence would be a great boon.
Dismissing the files, Ashwood once again turned to Song, “All right, everything seems to be in order. Send a message to Captain Black and Vasili to prepare for battle, Captain.”
The new orders left the Colonel in a precarious position. He had to go back to Eigos, yet leaving Song and her crew alone was a recipe for disaster. However, he also had to bring more men planetside as a precaution. They would be needed should things go sideways.
Or more accurately, when.
He could split his people, of course. Unfortunately, even though he held the rank of colonel, Alcyone only held a battalion or so of his soldiers. The reason for that was very simple. The average battlecruiser could not carry more, leaving him with only a few hundred soldiers on hand.
That made the prospect of splitting them dangerous. Song was far from defenceless.
“Of course, Colonel. When are you heading planetside?” Captain Song said, still scrutinizing Ashwood.
The Colonel did not feel at all enthusiastic about leaving Alcyone for Eigos. Yet he had little choice. The General’s death must have put Song on high alert. Unless he had severely misjudged Song’s intelligence, striking now would be a terrible mistake.
Not to mention that he had not yet received any additional instructions from Athena, though they almost certainly existed. Likely carried by some of Sterope’s crew. Unfortunately, the ships were still too far away for anything but the ship’s main communication arrays. Sending secret messages through those would be way too audacious.
Which only left one course of action. To follow orders and trust in Athena.
“Now. There is no reason to delay,” Ashwood responded.
Not one he could justify to her, at least.
“How many shuttles should we get ready?” Song asked.
Ashwood narrowed his eyes. A perfectly reasonable question to pose, but he could not help but feel paranoid.
His eyes glazed over as he examined Alcyone’s crew manifest and internal defences, before making his decision.
“All of them.”
