Chapter 6
When you feel exhausted and beaten, that is not the time to stop. When you find yourself questioning if there is a reason to get out of bed, that is the time to stand up and move! Test and maintain your body, every day, no matter how much you would rather not. I guarantee that you will feel better after you do.
Vanessa gritted her teeth against the pain of the bruises covering her body and finished tying the laces of her athletic shoes. She stood and looked in the mirror of the fitness facility's locker room. Her blue PT shorts and heather gray gym shirt, proudly emblazoned with the letters 'UN SPACY' across the chest, fully exposed her cybernetic limbs. Her arm and leg were recharged and reconditioned, smooth and glossy pale blue, and they both looked much more refreshed than the rest of her body did. But she was here. She had never forgotten Miriya Sterling's words from long ago. Her shattered body had been rebuilt as much by her friend, physical trainer, and flight instructor, as it had been by the surgeons and by Dr. Lang's team of technicians.
For most of her life, she had never felt strong. Then she received the cybernetics, not entirely at her own choosing. Their superhuman strength had frightened her, but Miriya had demanded that she master them, and master her own body. She had pushed Vanessa to the realization that she was already strong, and had a responsibility to use that strength. Vanessa never missed a physical training session, and kept her flight officer certification current. She worked regularly with the unarmed combat instructors, though none of them challenged her the way Miriya had, and none of them knew quite what to make of her cybernetic enhancements. The discipline Miriya had instilled in her sustained her now. Taking one last deep breath, Vanessa grabbed a towel and left the locker room.
The Jeanne d'Arc's fitness facilities were vast, with weight lifting and treadmill rooms, unarmed combat rings, playing areas for a number of sports, an Olympic sized swimming pool, and an extensive running track that snaked through multiple decks. When battlestations sounded, the running course was used for the movement of munitions carts and full detachments of Marines. It was the running course that Vanessa decided to begin with, and as she finished her stretches and began her first lap, she noted the resumption of ship-board routine. On a ship as large and heavily crewed as the Jeanne d'Arc, no one would ever be able to tell how terrible the previous day had been. She wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing, but as she exercised her body, she at least felt some of the tension and unease she'd been carrying begin to relax.
She completed her first circuit at an easy pace, paying little attention to the handful of other runners that passed by her in the relatively wide corridor. The exercise was soothing to her, as she ran under illumination designed to approximate daylight, along bulkheads and ceilings painted a soft sky blue. The deck was covered in a textured, rubbery surface that felt good under her feet, and her body was beginning to warm to the task. Just as she started her second lap, she could hear the slap of footfalls on the deck approaching from behind her.
"If I didn't know better," a saucy voice suddenly said at her right shoulder, "I might think that a certain captain was avoiding her XO."
"May." Vanessa smiled sheepishly and looked over at her friend. Allison was dressed in identical PT gear, and from the lack of any signs of sweat or flushed features, she had just started running. "Came to find your wayward commanding officer?"
May shook her head admonishingly. "I'll have to call it dereliction of duty," she said playfully, and then turned a concerned gaze on her captain. "I know yesterday was bad. You could have talked to me, instead of leaving me to sort out everything I could learn from Jose and the After Action Report."
Vanessa sighed, guilt welling up in her chest. Bron was the love of her life, and she and Lisa were deeply connected on so many levels that she didn't have the words to describe what they meant to each other, but May was indisputably her best friend.
"I'm sorry. Yesterday was a bad one. I don't quite know how I feel yet, and I wasn't sure I was ready to talk last night."
May turned a skeptical eye on Vanessa, who tossed her head. "Alright, alright. I had an episode last night. I'm also afraid of how I feel, and I didn't want to talk about it," Vanessa admitted.
"All the more reason you should have come to me." May said sweetly. "You know, a little trust goes a long way."
"Not you too!" Vanessa huffed.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"I've been told that my problem is that I don't trust anyone. Or maybe that I don't trust what we're doing here."
"I'm not going to lecture you right now about trusting your peers, because I was right by your side for a lot of those betrayals in the past, and I understand," May said sympathetically. "But what's this about trusting what we're doing here? You're literally the poster child for the REF Pioneer Mission!"
Vanessa blushed. She had no idea how she had let Minmei talk her into not one but two photo sessions. If she'd known that the most widely distributed image for the REF's recruiting would be her face, she'd have looked for an escape route… like through an airlock. By now, everyone on Earth had seen Vanessa in her captain's uniform, gazing pensively at a glittering night sky, her cybernetic arm reaching to touch her fingertips to the cosmos. Based on their reactions to seeing it, Vanessa suspected that the words overlaid on the final image - 'To the Stars and Beyond…' - meant something to Minmei, Lisa, and Rick that they weren't telling her. May and Reyes still kept one of the posters on display in their quarters, just to mess with her. Vanessa shook off her embarrassment, and decided to just tell May what was bothering her, like she should have in the first place.
"Look, yesterday was far from the worst battle I've ever been through, I'm going to be fine as far as that goes. What I'm worried about is the next world. And the one after that. What if it turns out that what happened down there is going to be a pattern we see repeated across the Masters' empire? Dealing with confused and desperate rogue Zentraedi, and being forced to defend ourselves against them has been bad enough, but I signed onto the mission to discover new worlds and civilizations, not fight my way out of death traps, or catalogue genocide on a scale I could never have conceived of. What does that even do for Earth?"
The pair of them had ascended another deck, entering a long, straight section of corridor. May turned a serious look on Vanessa, "Captain, it isn't like you to get rattled like this. One planet is not a pattern."
"But it's not just one planet. What about the loss of the Washington's Task Force in that boobytrap? What about the rogue Zentraedi squadrons? Or Straza's report about the pirates encountered by the Guerrero? Or by the Tokugawa, all the way back in 2018? We haven't had a single peaceful First Contact in four years of searching for the Masters. And once we find them, it could be the start of a war that makes the Robotech War look like a minor skirmish."
"You never told me you thought the job would be easy."
"You know I don't mean it that way. I'm wondering if we're ever going to find what we hoped for out here. Or if we're just going to find more death."
"It doesn't matter what we find."
Vanessa stopped. May ran on a few steps, then slowed and turned around to face her.
"What do you mean 'it doesn't matter?'" Vanessa demanded, feeling a little annoyed now.
"I mean that we need to be out here, whether we're happy about what we find or not. The risk we put ourselves at by remaining complacent and vulnerable on Earth is far too high." May walked back and put her hands on her hips, her expression harsh. "You're the one who convinced me of that, Captain. Did you suddenly change your mind?"
May's question cut right through Vanessa's growing anger at being challenged. "No," she said after a moment. "No I haven't. I guess what I'm more worried about is what I'll see when I look in the mirror after the mission is complete."
May didn't have an immediate answer to that. She reached out and put her hand on Vanessa's arm. "You should remember that just because Bron isn't here doesn't mean you're alone. There are a lot of people who will support you, if you'll let them," she said softly.
Vanessa looked into her friend's eyes, paying no mind to a platoon of Marines trooping past them in their khaki and olive drab running gear. "You know it isn't that simple for me," she replied, "but I'll try."
"Well, a good way to start would be to promise me you're not going down to the next planet we visit without me. You clearly can't take care of yourself." The charming and infuriating smirk on May's face was one she had learned from her husband. Vanessa smiled and shook her head.
"Fine, I promise you can come down with me on the next one. Assuming there's actually anything to see," she added sourly. A retort was on May's lips when suddenly, another runner rudely barged past Vanessa, roughly jostling her shoulder.
"On your left!" an acid, sing-song voice belatedly warned.
Vanessa recovered her footing, and froze. No one had done something like that to her since… since…
Vanessa rolled painfully into a crouch, her hand, knee, and shin bleeding where she had tried to catch herself in the fall. Her cybernetics were unblemished, except for some grit and tar from the newly paved street, softened by the sun, that stuck to the smooth blue surfaces.
"Oh, how clumsy of me, Commander. I hope you aren't hurt," the cruel, gloating voice said.
"Rawlins?" Vanessa muttered in confusion. "Clyde? What are you..."
"Yep, that's me, Sergeant Clyde Rawlins, at your service." The young NCO sketched an insincere salute. "Surprised to see me?"
"Did you… do that on purpose?" Vanessa tried to wipe away the fine gravel that had ground into the scratches on her leg, and ended up smearing blood. The smell of tar was overpowering now.
"You need to be careful running alone, Commander," Rawlins admonished with mock concern. "Bad things can happen way out here."
"ATTENTION ON DECK!" May bawled in a voice no one who didn't know her well would have suspected the short, pert woman of possessing, and Vanessa immediately snapped back into the moment, her heart pounding, a metallic taste on her tongue. She took a deep breath. May wasn't looking at her, but further forward along the corridor. Twenty meters ahead, the entire platoon of Marines halted, about-faced, and came to attention, and a much shorter distance away, a junior officer of the UN Spacy stopped, and reluctantly turned around. Vanessa immediately recognized the woman by her shiny, waist-length mane of black hair, tightly bound in a ponytail.
She wouldn't! Vanessa thought. Surely even she knew better. But then, Ensign Penelope Aster faced her and May, confusion and irritation written across her features. That confusion quickly turned to a look of panic as the blood drained from her face. She stood to attention and saluted. Vanessa slowly returned the salute, already feeling herself recovering. She remained silent for a moment, allowing sweat to bead on Penelope's forehead, then nodded slightly to May, letting her take the lead.
"Just what was that supposed to be, Ensign!" May demanded angrily. Vanessa knew that her XO had been waiting a long time to put the prickly bridge technician in her place, and she was clearly relishing the moment.
Aster stiffened even more, if that was possible. "I- I apologize, ma'am! I didn't recognize either of you!"
"Didn't recognize us? Lack of awareness of your surroundings would seem to be a major defect in a sensors officer! Shall I send you to Chief Surgeon Mikade to have your eyes examined?"
Penelope gulped. "No ma'am, I just mean, I didn't expect that both of you would be here!"
"Oh? You mean you didn't expect to find a pair of old women like your XO and Captain actually exercising? Did you think it doesn't take any effort for us to maintain a healthy body condition? Or are you perhaps critiquing our physical appearance?"
The idea of them being old women was laughable, Vanessa was thirty-five, and May was thirty, but May didn't break character for even an instant, and the unfortunate younger woman's blanch deepened. Vanessa, feeling much better, fought to keep a smile off her face. Behind Penelope, their audience of Marines was still standing at perfect attention, but most of them were grinning openly.
"N-no ma'am! Your physical appearance is excellent! You're both um, very fit, and… attractive, and… and…" Penelope's voice stuttered to a stop, her face turning from pale to crimson in seconds. A predatory smile spread across May's face.
"I'm so glad to know our physical attributes meet with your approval. But I'm more interested in knowing why you thought it was appropriate to barge past anyone that way, when an entire platoon of Marines had no trouble going around us."
"I- that is-"
"Go on Ensign, let's hear it."
Penelope took a deep breath, then spoke as fast as she could.
"I-apologize-ma'am-I-was-trying-to-beat-my-personal-best-time-on-the-running-course-and-you-were-both-standing-in-the-middle-of-the-corridor-and-I-got-really-annoyed-and-decided-to-push-past-you-and-I-swear-I-didn't-recognize-you-I-didn't-think-about-your-arm-and-leg-Captain-because-you-keep-them-covered-on-the-bridge-not-that-I-have-any-problem-with-them-they-actually-look-really-good-and-I-promise-it-won't-happen-again-and-I'm-SORRY!"
For a moment, everyone simply stared in shock at the ensign as her plea ended in a hopeless wail, her eyes shut tight. Then the Marines were all seized with coughing fits that sounded suspiciously like suppressed laughter. Vanessa snorted once, before clamping iron control over her expression, and May shot her captain a grin over her shoulder before addressing the ensign again.
"Well, Miss Aster, contrition is a good first step, but I do think you could stand to learn a lesson about respect and protocol aboard ship. What do you think, Captain? A few double shifts in the mess hall might do the trick. Or maybe she could help degrease the Lightnings that are undergoing maintenance during her off hours?"
Vanessa took a moment to think about it, watching their fastidious ensign's pale features take on a green tinge.
"Hmm. Possibly, but I don't want to lead anyone to think that we don't respect the people who already do those very necessary tasks by treating them as a punishment. I might have another idea. As her superiors, we should be helping the ensign to improve herself and succeed at her goals." Vanessa looked the younger woman up and down. She was young, and appeared reasonably fit, well toned, long-limbed, with a build reminiscent of a doe, or maybe a gazelle. But Vanessa doubted she pushed herself the way a soldier keeping their body in a condition to fight on the battlefield would.
"Miss Aster," Vanessa said coolly. "You are going to accompany the XO and I for our entire PT session. We're going to help you beat your personal best time on the running course. And in the swimming pool. And your personal best lift in the weight room. And your best performance on the unarmed combat training mat after that. If you don't reach your goals today, you'll continue to train with us until you do. And the entire time, you will conduct yourself as befits an REF officer."
Penelope's dark, long-lashed eyes, which had begun to grow hopeful at Vanessa's first words, filled with horror.
Vanessa stepped out of the shower stall, vigorously rubbing her towel over her cybernetic arm to soak up the water droplets it was expelling in a fine mist. It was inconvenient, but she wasn't about to remove her limbs in the fitness area locker room. At the other end of the long center bench, out of earshot, Ensign Aster was slowly, painfully dressing herself in the day's duty uniform. At the near end of the bench, May was seated, nonchalantly toweling her curly brown hair dry. Vanessa grabbed her duffle from her locker and joined her friend.
"So, are you as tired as I am?" Vanessa wondered.
"At least," May replied. "You know I don't spend as much time on unarmed combat as you do. I've collected more than my share of bruises today." Then she looked over her shoulder at their companion for the morning. Ensign Aster was just then fumbling with the collar on her uniform. The ensign cast one more terrified glance at her superiors and retreated from the room. "Totally worth it," May added slyly.
"Absolutely. I… had fun," Vanessa admitted. May looked shocked, and then smiled.
"Well, well. Stern and inspiring Captain Leeds actually allowed herself to have fun. Jose is not going to believe me."
"I have fun!" Vanessa protested, stung.
"No, you don't," May said, suddenly serious. "Not for a long time."
Vanessa didn't answer right away, instead dropping her soaked towel on the tiled floor and taking the extra one from around her shoulders. She concentrated on drying her leg now, thinking about what May had said. On the SDF-1, she had fun with her fellow bridge technicians all of the time, in spite of the war going on. The banter and teasing on the bridge had come easily whenever Captain Gloval wasn't on watch, and even when he was present, most of the time it felt more like having a kindly great uncle supervising the young women. When the stress of long shifts and the terror of battle became too much for Vanessa, Sammie, and Kim, Macross city was always waiting as a refuge and distraction, offering dancing, cafes, and shopping.
On Earth, even after losing Sammie and Kim to Khyron's final strike on the SDF-1, she still had Bron, Rico, Konda, and Mary. It was hard not to have fun around them, and when they were not on duty, May and Reyes easily fit in with the others. Every once in a while, Minmei would free up time in her own busy touring and production schedule to sweep into their lives and carry them off on some escapade. It had been a lot of fun… and it had been three years since Vanessa found time for anything like that. She set the towel aside and looked left to right. She and May were alone.
"What am I doing, Allison?"
"Leading and inspiring all of us. Holding the REF and the Pioneer Mission to its principles and goals. Keeping us all safe," May answered without hesitation.
"But who am I now, far away from so many of the people I love? Doubting myself and my mission?"
May reached over and took her hand. Vanessa was cold, and May's fingers were so warm they almost felt like they were burning her. "You've always doubted yourself. You had to be dragged kicking and screaming into leadership, remember? As for doubting the mission? I think it's natural to have doubts when we've been at it this long. We all knew from the start that this could become a multi-generational mission, so finding one of the Masters' worlds was a major step forward for us, and it was followed by a nasty shock. But we've overcome worse together, and you're more resilient than you think. Be honest with me. You feel better now than when you started the day, don't you?"
"I do. A lot better, actually. I'm still worried about what's to come."
"You always worry about that," May said, lightly punching Vanessa's arm.
"I didn't used to. I mean, not during the war."
"You're the Captain now, of course you're worried! It goes with the rank. But you have a good ship, a good crew, and a fantastic XO. You're CAG is ok too. When he's not being insufferably smug." Vanessa chuckled, and May smiled. "See? It's going to be alright. So, is there anything else on your mind, dear Captain?"
You truly hate them, don't you? The Masters? Priest's words came back to Vanessa, unbidden, and her thoughts recoiled. That's not who I am! She pushed those feelings to the back of her mind, and shook her head.
"Just that I'm going to need you every morning from now on, to get Ensign Aster into proper shape."
May groaned. "Fitness is all well and good, but when you finally let me reprimand her properly, I didn't expect you to adopt her as a pet project."
"I didn't plan to, it just felt right at the time. She's got a lot of talent. Maybe she just needs some personal attention and a healthy dose of discipline."
"Fine," May agreed with a sigh, though she was still smiling. "I said I'd help, so I will. It'll be fun to spend more time with you outside of staff meetings and bridge watches anyway."
"Yes, I think it will be fun for us. And learning some humility will be good for her."
It was only after another week of uneventful veritech and destroyer patrols that Admiral Mbande would consider allowing a closer approach of any of the derelict spacecraft and orbitals drifting through the system. In the meantime, Vanessa carried out the sad duty of holding the funerals for the fallen crew, pilots, and Marines. Grief and doubts continued to thread through her thoughts, but for the sake of her crew, she projected steadiness and resolve, as Captain Gloval always had. Not long after, reports began to filter in from other REF ships, confirming Vanessa's suspicions. More tomb worlds. The Heke's task force discovered a planet scoured of life by biological attack. The decision was quickly made to not even attempt a landing. Guerrero, commanded by Vanessa's friend and former subordinate, Straza Pentiet, stumbled on a world that had been bombarded by energy beams until its surface was transformed into a lumpy mass of brittle glass, leaving behind no traces of its original inhabitants. If any new clues were to be found, they would be found by Task Force 2.
At last, Mbande allowed Vanessa and Reyes to plan several close flybys of derelict vessels, and after those proved safe, a boarding of one of the Zentraedi frigates by Lightning battloids. With the ship's Protoculture generators cut away, there was no expectation of any survivors, even in stasis, and this proved to be the case. The task of moving through the derelict, battle-damaged ship was a grim one, but it did yield access to the ship's main databanks, which were freed by specialized salvage and recovery craft and brought back to one of the Jeanne d'Arc's bays. There, a team of Robotech engineers and cryptographers began the laborious, week-long task of powering up the giant scaled electronics, and cracking the security around the data encoded within.
Vanessa, Admiral Mbande, and Doctor Priest could have reviewed the results of the decryption efforts from the comfort of a conference room, but, by unspoken agreement, they each arrived in the heavily secured bay shortly after receiving the report that the last layer of encryption had been defeated. The databank towering over them was a device as tall as a three story house, cylindrical in shape, with a jutting upper structure like a sharply angular mushroom. The device was swathed in dozens of interface and power cables hooked up to a handful of exterior interface ports, and many more internal ones that the engineers had accessed by carefully removing sections of heavy armor plates using plasma torches. It looked like a swarm of metallic snakes were attempting to throttle it. Peeking between cables were hundreds of winking indicator lights, like orange, blue, and green will-o'-the-wisps, lending an eerie atmosphere to the echoing bay. A modified destroid, one of the old Spartans that the engineers favored for its relatively dexterous robotic gauntlets, was poised over the Zentraedi scaled main control panel. Vanessa and the others stood at a ring of micronian scaled work stations a hundred meters away, behind portable armor barriers. The dozens of interface cables spanned the gap in a spaghetti tangle. Every ten meters or so, a set of adapters was fitted, sequentially shrinking the cables that started at almost forty-five centimeters across, until they were small enough to connect to the REF's machines.
Vanessa shivered against the near freezing temperatures of the bay. A dozen industrial sized refrigeration units hummed away in the corners, keeping the enormous yet delicate computer core cold, and she could see her own breath steaming as she waited on the final preparations. The seated systems technician tapped out a few last keystrokes and then spoke to Doctor Priest without looking away from his monitor, his glasses reflecting bright blue and hiding his eyes. "We're ready, sir."
Priest looked to Vanessa for approval. She glanced at Admiral Mbande, a silent, somber presence in her black uniform coat. The admiral simply folded her arms and watched.
"Proceed, Doctor," Vanessa ordered.
The destroid reached out a forefinger as big around as a modest sized tree trunk, and entered a final command on the databank's console. Nothing spectacular happened. Vanessa thought, at the most, that she might have felt the hairs on her arm briefly stand on end. But a second later, characters sprang into life on the large monitor mounted above and to the left of the technician's workstation. There was a translation below the Zentraedi text, although Vanessa didn't need it.
Ship's Log
IZS Traventiez
Tou-Redir Class Frigate TRF3598413
674th Reconnaissance Squadron
1533rd Battle Fleet
Commissioned ICY1036 at Factory Satellite 724
All Hail the Masters
Everyone released a breath. Aside from the potential dangers of cracking a hostile computer system, there had been no guarantee that the data hadn't been corrupted by battle damage, or erased by the ship's crew. The technician bent to his work again.
"The files seem intact. There's a lot of data here. The ship appears to be over a hundred years old. Going to take a while to sift through it all."
"The final logs will do, for now, starting with the ones immediately after the Grand Fleet folded to Earth," Vanessa said.
"Yes ma'am."
In a few moments, they had the story of the frigate's final days, in its captain's own words. The man who spoke was square of jaw and grim of countenance, his dark hair was shorn close, like a monk's tonsure, and his steely eyes stared at them from the screen.
{It has been six weeks since the Grand Fleet folded en masse at the orders of Supreme Commander Dolza. Six weeks since our squadron was ignominiously left behind for lack of sufficient Protoculture reserves to make the long-distance space fold. With the nearest fleet depots already stripped of supplies, we have completed a series of short fold jumps to Factory Satellite 934. Today however, we arrived to find that the Factory Satellite was scuttled by remote signal, and the system has been abandoned by its garrison squadron. As with the other posts we visited, the communications relay networks are offline, and do not respond to our reactivation signals. We can find no explanation for any of this…}
"Why would the Masters do that?" Vanessa wondered. "That's a colossal waste of equipment."
"Scorched Earth," Mbande said. "Without the Grand Fleet, the Masters lacked the forces to hold and defend all of those facilities, which makes them a liability. They might have fallen into the hands of their enemies, or even just subordinates whose loyalty is questionable. A single factory satellite has enough manufacturing capability to dominate a whole sector, and can even clone fresh crews. The Factory Satellite we seized and brought to Earth was notable for its large defense fleet."
At the next pertinent entry, the captain's aspect was haunted.
{The mutinous ships, about one third of the squadron, have been destroyed or put to flight. I have grave misgivings about our orders, but it has been four months, and we have yet to resupply or make contact with higher command. With power reserves and systems decaying every day, I see no alternative to our commander's plan to fold to the nearest colony planet of the Empire, and seek aid, regardless of the violation of doctrine.}
Priest shook his head. "I don't understand. They were in an emergency. Why would the idea of contacting civilians cause so much disagreement that there would be a mutiny and a battle?"
"Indoctrination and control," Vanessa answered. "However much the Masters wished to treat them that way, the Zentraedi aren't obedient robots. Breetai's mutiny shows what could happen when Zentraedi were exposed to a human society. The Masters indoctrinated their soldiers to fear exposure to 'micronian' culture, and isolated them from the core planets of the Empire."
As the logs progressed, the Zentraedi became increasingly gaunt.
{The recyclers are running at twenty percent capacity, and we do not have the power to run more than half of the cryo-stasis tubes, so we cannot put more of our crew in hibernation to ease the crisis. The local government of Altrea continues to dither and equivocate, and will neither resupply us or allow our troops to land. They claim to have their own energy crisis, and they fear attack by their closest neighbors in this sector, from the planet Ohma. I had to deploy troopers to the launch bays this morning to stop a dozen crewmen from hijacking a shuttle and endangering the negotiations. If it is to be a merchant's bargain,} he added, his lip curling in distaste, {we only have one coin to offer. Violence. It will be for the Altreans to decide if they shall receive it, or aid us, and thus direct it elsewhere.}
"That's the final Captain's log, dated nine years ago," the technician said. "The ship went into battle and was crippled the next day."
Vanessa regarded the captain's stern, fatalistic expression one more time. How many Zentraedi commanders had faced similar situations during the ten years since the destruction of the Grand Fleet? How many identical clone brothers suffered identical fates?
"That was an ugly set of choices for the remaining Zentraedi to choose from," Priest observed. Vanessa nodded and looked at the Admiral. Mbande was quiet, even for her, eyes fixed on the captain's malnourished features. Vanessa suppressed a shudder and counted herself lucky that she had never shared in such privation.
"That will do, ensign. Begin pulling the combat logs. Admiral?"
Mbande turned a cool, controlled gaze on her. "Yes, Captain?"
"This information could prove useful, but we clearly need more. We should proceed with the boarding of the space station."
The admiral nodded and turned to an aide. "See that it is done. I'll return to the ops center after viewing the combat logs."
The combat logs proved to be a disappointment. By the time of the attack, the frigate Traventiez was barely functional. A fleet of fifty capital ships and escorts had folded into the system, but the Traventiez's sensors could provide little detail. The group definitely included a few ships armed with Reflex cannons, because three of them quickly vaporized the handful of Zentraedi ships and local defense platforms capable of putting up proper resistance. The rest of the ships fanned out and grappled the remaining Zentraedi ships, local merchant ships and space manufacturing and habitation modules. The Traventiez was swarmed by dozens of some type of drone service craft, not dissimilar in construction from the ships and space stations that they were attacking. They evaded the frigate's point defenses and methodically disabled its turrets, before finally cutting through the hull. Not long after. the recordings abruptly ended.
"I'm no tactician," Priest said, "but that seemed rather one sided to me."
"Indeed," Mbande agreed. "Almost as if the attackers had practiced before, and knew what kind of defenses they would be facing."
"I'm interested to know where they managed to secure ships with Reflex cannons. The sensor returns are fuzzy, but those looked like badly shielded Zentraedi gunships. The rest look like merchant ships refitted for combat, not too different from the ones they plundered and abandoned during their attack."
"If they kept this up for the last nine years, they may have despoiled this entire sector by now. I'll have my analysts go over everything in detail."
"I'll send Ensign Aster to help. She's been cataloging every derelict found so far. I'm sure that our teams boarding the space station-"
The bay's lighting tinted red, and the ship-wide combat alert sounded. "General Quarters, General Quarters! All hands to your battle stations!"
Vanessa's heart raced, recognizing the voice of her tactical officer, Lieutenant Commander Duy Liem.
"Reason for General Quarters: Defold reaction detected inside fleet perimeter!"
Next chapter… battle alert, the envoys, and The Collapse…