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Entry #18
Lagrange Point, Tyrfing V
Tyrfing, Terran Hegemony
19:00 20 January 2767

“Not that I’m complaining, but why exactly are you riding with me for this operation?” I ask Corvus as we arrive in our target system.

“I figure you need adult supervision. Do you have any idea how badly that stunt you pulled in lieu of a speech could have gone?”

I’m not jumping in on top of the regular jump points this time, so it’ll take a few moments for anyone to realise I’m here. Meanwhile I’m sending datalinks signals to where each M-5 and M-3 I spot is going to be once my signal arrives. Tyrfing V’s Lagrange point isn’t usually close enough to the actual planet of Tyrfing (the second out from the star if anyone cares) that it’s got a permanent guard force. It’s less than two days transit from Tyrfing at this time of year though and apparently no one warned the Republicans to picket it. What a shame.

“It could have been quite embarrassing.” I admit. “However, even if I never attended the PR classes that most SLDF soldiers received, I do have the textbooks on record. I have a reputation for pulling out music in battle, it was widely commented on in New Dallas’ media, so my pulling out another twentieth century rock song wasn’t too much of a surprise.”

The M-5s are ordered to make for the Tyrfing’s most reliable pirate point and secure it until I can arrive. I don’t want any gatecrashing Republican ships, although there shouldn’t be many around – the Battle of New Dallas would have killed off most of the warships in the region.

“And if you got painted as some kind of crazy rogue AI…?”

“That’s happening anyway, Taylor. If I’d gone full military professional then the focus would be on my being a warship and by definition threatening. Singing shifts the focus a little away from that, towards my being a person. In the long run, that’s safer for me.”

The M-3s have slight different orders. More to the point, they have different targets. A nice safe distance from me, they pointed their noses at Republican dropships and their turrets at any aerospace fighters or drone fighters in range. Then they lit up their drives and the weapons in the turrets.

Unlike their larger cousins, Voidseekers and their more primitive cousins were generally commanded by human personnel from dropship command ships like the Howdahs mounted on my collars and it was virtually certain that some of those had fallen into the wrong hands. Given that I’ve used my own Voidseeker Strikers to carry nukes, I’d prefer that they aren’t allowed to do that to me – or more immediately to the M-5s I’m here to recruit.

Five of the six M-96C dropships I could see were die before they show any sign of even knowing they’re under attack. Twelve other dropships – three Titans, a Dictator, seven Avengers and a Condor are destroyed just as quickly. The one M-3 that had missed its target is destroyed a few moments later in nuclear fire, validating my concern.

It doesn’t do the fighters any good, since one of the M-5s turns enough to launch bring one of its autocannon turrets to bear. The explosion that marks the destruction of the last command ship is smaller than the one that destroyed the M-3 but it’s just as final.

“This won’t be as easy next time.”

“Probably not,” agrees Corvus. “Enemies tend to obstruct plans – it’s why we call them ‘the enemy’.”
I’ve got sixty of the Caspars under my control. I still have spare command links for the M-3s but I can’t take any of them with me unless I discard the pair of dropships carrying navigational crews for the M-5 drones. None of my little fleet can carry dropships except me.

“So will you be transferring to the HAF?” I ask Corvus.

“Bite your tongue, Tommy. I’m not convinced it’s a good idea… even if most of my regiment volunteered to transfer.”

That must be painful. “Well, they are Royal troops and they’ve had a first-hand look at what happens when the First Lords sends off the Hegemony’s protection.”

“What I’m not convinced of is the idea that it’ll stop the next First Lord from sending the Hegemony Armed Forces all over the place, just the same way the SLDF gets shifted,” she points out.

“There aren’t many social factors more powerful than human stupidity,” I agree blandly. “Still, each safeguard reduces the chances of such catastrophic stupidity. Besides, it assumes that the First Lord’s authority will always be wielded by the Director-General. At least until Amanda Cameron is of age, that’s probably not going to be the case.”

“Then you aren’t going to push Clay to act as Regent?”

“Not in terms of the Star League. It’s too large a job – Kerensky’s very able, after all, and he didn’t manage it. John Davion is a reasonably good choice to raise Amanda and he doesn’t have any close male relatives in the age range that they’re likely to end up married to her. Titus Clay has the political and military experience to govern more than just New Dallas, but he doesn’t have the international prestige to lead the Star League Council. The only reason the rest of the Council will even let him sit is the alternative.”

“Which is Kerensky! Why not him?”

“Firstly, he has a war to fight. Secondly, Kenyon Marik and Robert Steiner weren’t on the Council last time. They both hate him.”

“Then who can lead the Star League? John Davion? He’s Amanda’s guardian…”

“That would make sense, but human stupidity… more specifically ambition and suspicion… it’s too much power. He already controls Amanda’s upbringing which could leave him with the same influence over her that Amaris had over her father. I can’t see Clay letting him infiltrate the Hegemony the same way, but the Regent has to be someone who can counter-balance him and someone who can work with Kerensky.”

“Who do you have in mind?”

“It’s too early to say… the worst case scenario is that the Council deadlocks over the issue. That would delight Amaris: the Star League would slide into a general civil war and that could make liberating the Hegemony almost impossible.”

“God, you’re a depressing person, Tommy. Is this all that you think about?”

“Not at all. Sometimes I spend hours thinking about meals I’m going to eat. Or my sex life. Oh wait, I don’t have either of those.” And thus they’re considerably on my mind. The grass is always greener.

Corvus rolls her eyes. “Ah. So you’re a teenager. It all becomes clear.”

Marry Amanda to Jinjiro!

I'm sure House Kurita will tolerate another Mad Cameron... if they get to control this one.

Entry #19
Lagrange Point, New Dallas,
Terran Hegemony
14:00 23 January 2767

The skies of New Dallas are a good deal busier than I expected – almost a dozen SLDF IFFs are apparent. At first I think a squadron has arrived from the garrisons in the Free Worlds League or Lyran Commonwealth have arrived, but then I spot SLS Caph and all becomes clear.

The Star League Defense Force’s leadership might not have anticipated Amaris’ coup but they did have a contingency for Terra being for some reason cut off or unavailable. A large part of that were the three ‘command’ battleships that led First Fleet and two counter-parts in Second Fleet. SLS McKenna’s Pride was already acting as the Commanding General’s HQ somewhere in the Periphery; SLS Enterprise was presumably still acting as a flagship / playpen for the First Lord; and SLS Caph (and possibly her sister, SLS New Earth) was acting as a local command centre for the Hegemony.

Admiral McTiernan, or one of his colleagues, must have learned that New Dallas was holding out and rushed here to reinforce it.

It’s a tense moment as I and the Caspars jumping in after me are under the guns of a dozen mis-matched warships… tension rising as it becomes clear that we have a substantial numerical advantage.

“SLS Caph, New Dallas Control, this is SLS Praetorian returning with escort.” I’m also sending the fairly complicated security codes that confirm I’m not a subverted Texas-class battleship playing Trojan Horse. We’d had to set up entirely new ones since Amaris probably had all of the standard SLDF codes well before the Coup, thanks to a certain blabbermouthed First Lord.

“Acknowledged, Praetorian,” the centre of New Dallas’s orbital defense grid acknowledges. “You’re expected, please bring the Caspars into geo-stationary orbits so we can get technical crews to them.”

“Will comply, New Dallas. Any chance of a top-up of my tanks? I’m running a little low on hydrogen.”

“I’ll pass that on.”

While I might keep a few Caspars for escorts, the vast majority need to stay here. New Dallas gives Amaris an immediate enemy to focus upon, so it’s reasonably likely he’ll attack once he had gathered sufficient forces to do so. That, of course, diverts them from other purposes, but it’s not a fight I’d like New Dallas to lose. Sixty or seventy M-5 drones will make it too tough a nut to crack without an all out effort. If a few squadrons of the SLDF arrive then it’ll be too tough full stop.

By my reckoning, three systems – in the right places – like this will create a road all the way to Terra.

“It’s a good plan,” Corvus agrees when I comment on this. “But it’s got the same weakness that left your drones useless during Amaris’ Coup. If we lose the SDS control centres, we don’t have the defenses. And how many control centres do we have?”

“Two,” I admit. “The one here and me. That’s why we need reinforcements from the rest of the SDLF.”

Speaking of which, I was getting a signal now from the Caph.

“So we meet again,” McTiernan greeted me. “You’ve been busy.”

“I get bored easily and the Devil makes work for idle hands.”

He shook his head. “I’ve had a couple of long conversations about you recently. I think I need to know exactly what you’re up to. Just what orders are you operating under?”

“My orders were to evacuate the First Lord and his family – which has, I hope, been accomplished.”

He nods. “Admiral Mroczkiewicz can’t stay in touch without an HPG but he should have reached the Federated Suns by now. Amanda Cameron will be as safe as the First Prince can make her.”

“Beyond that I’m supposed to defend the Star League.”

“That’s reassuring.” McTiernan pauses. “No, it isn’t, because that’s not what your actions suggest. Setting up a new Director-General and recreating the Hegemony Armed Forces doesn’t support the Star League – it undermines it!”

I suppose, looked at from some angles he may have a point.

“I’m not sure I understand your position, Vice Admiral,” I respond politely. “It is quite possible that I have overlooked consequences of my actions however. Please could you explain your reasoning?”

“I don’t suppose that it’s occurred to you that your Director-General may decide he wants to hold onto power once the new First Lord is of age? Or that your Hegemony Armed Forces represent a schism right through the centre of the SLDF?”

“In reverse order, Admiral, the schism has always been there – and because the Hegemony is left entirely dependent upon the SLDF for protection, there is a tendency to see them as simply the HAF writ large. What remains of the Royal regiments and Divisions may find themselves more trusted, not less, if their ranks are opened to those whose loyalty is predicated upon more than planet of origin.”

“On your first point, Amanda Cameron is currently a figurehead since there is no conceivable way that she can rule her own life, much less the Star League. Therefore whoever leads in her name will have to contend with Amaris who has been elected Director-General in his own right.”

That bombshell, which I’d picked out of the publically available data on Tyrfing’s planetary computer network, leaves McTiernan gasping for breath with pure outrage. I’d been surprised myself. Amaris had moved faster than I’d expected.

“Given Amaris his due as an adversary, he is an exceptional politican. While it’s highly unlikely that the election was more than a sham the fact remains that the populace of the Terran Hegemony can, will and have been presented with him as their rightful Director-General – something that trumps an unelected infant and whatever éminence grise that issues their own orders in her name.”

“But an elected official of what - to the best of my knowledge and I must sadly to suspect to be the best of yours - is the only world of the Hegemony free of Amaris’ imperial ambitions is another matter. He can contend with Amaris as a political equal which will be necessary if we are to convince any fraction of the Hegemony’s populace to give a damn one way or another. It’s not as if Richard owned their hearts so why would they fight for his child’s guardians over someone who makes the trains run on time?”

The Admiral raises his hands. “Enough. It’s clear you’re more a politician than I am – I’m almost surprised you didn’t seek office yourself. You didn’t say anything about him standing down when Amanda comes of age.”

“I have no mandate for that.” I watch his face redden. “And given she won’t be of age until 2783 – by which time he’ll be in his eighties – I think it can wait until we’re sure Amaris isn’t around to contend against either of them.”

Would it be possible to have a summary of the different drones? I am a bit lost when you speak of each one.

Entry #20
Lagrange Point, New Dallas,
Terran Hegemony
14:30 23 January 2767

“The First Lord must be Director-General!” protests McTiernan.

“Given Richard Cameron as an example of a teenage ruler for the Hegemony and the Star League, that may not be a precedent that the either will wish to follow. Amanda Cameron is alive to be a candidate and I hope she will prove a more promising heir than her father but if she has an incumbent to learn from – even if she has to unseat him in the end – then she may be something less of a disaster.”

“God, you are as cold as ice. You’re laying the seeds of another bloody civil war, you maniacal machine.”

“You give me too much credit,” I correct him. “House Cameron and the other Great Houses managed that quite a while ago. I merely wish to see that the Star League does not choke upon the harvest. Otherwise the civil war you speak of will be between factions of the High Council, each seeking to name their own candidate for the First Lord’s throne. A war between two candidates may be winnable for one or the other… I am less sanguine about a five-sided one.”

“Are you out of your metal mind!”

My icon’s eyes aim themselves directly at McTiernan’s. “Tell me, hand upon heart, that you don’t believe that Takiro Kurita wouldn’t die smiling if he saw his son on Richard’s throne… or that Kenyon Marik doesn’t want it for himself. I may be doing Liao, Steiner and Davion too much credit in not citing the same ambition in them. A Cameron heir is the one thread keeping them from laying claim.”

“Then why are you undermining that claim!? The SLDF has to stand together in her support.”

“Nothing I can conceivably do would make the claim of a two year old less frail than it already is. All I can do is try to buy the time for her to grow up and make what arrangements I can to encourage competence. If she can prove the latter and claim the Hegemony then she can sit in the Council as equal to the reigning Lords. That is our only long term hope and if the Hegemony crumbles then she won’t be able to do even that.”

“The General –“

“Aleksandr Kerensky is no doubt a fine officer but he is one man. He cannot lead the SLDF and rule the Hegemony. He himself understands that or he wouldn’t have tried to resign when he was appointed as Richard’s regent. And of the two roles, it is as Commanding General that he does the best service now. He and Clay, working together, can win this. Without that kind of support, even if he overthrows Amaris in the end, I can see only the devastation of the Hegemony and the reduction of the SLDF to a hollow shell of itself.”

“You’re wrong.”

I pause, that seems sufficient to express my disagreement. When he fails to fill the silence, I prod him: “Please expand on your argument, Vice Admiral.”

“Amaris doesn’t have the resources to fight off the SLDF.”

“Nor did the rebels in the Periphery, but they’ve managed to hurt us pretty badly. How familiar are you with the losses over the last couple of years.”

“That’s entirely different,” he asserts. “They had surprise and they’re fighting like bandits. Besides, losses aren’t too steep.”

“I’m afraid you’re wrong,” I corrected him. “Naval losses have been affordable, but ground forces have been very steep indeed. In excess of twenty-five percent of the committed forces as of my information and that isn’t entirely up to date. The Rim Worlders are not foolish enough to attempt to fight the SLDF under the Ares Conventions: they’ll fight dirty, hard and in places where the SLDF may hesitate to use its full force. Like cities, for example.”

“If Amaris can win over the Hegemony’s population then the SLDF is going to have to fight its way into every major city on more than a hundred worlds. Check your history or ask General Kataga: city-fights are among the most brutal and bloody of battles. And if there’s anything worse than that it’s a siege: you know better than I how many Castle Brians fell into the hands of Republican troops.”

“Kerensky…”

“He’s not a magical wand, Vice Admiral. I can perhaps neutralize most of the SDS drones, but the SLDF’s fighting in the Periphery has dwarfed the Reunification War and that was the most terrible war in human history. And now they have to commit to a second such war either with little to no time to recover – or after giving Amaris time to entrench. Neither of those is going to reduce casualties. It’s why I’m hoping that the bulk of the fighting for this year can fall on the Eighth and Eleventh Armies – they’ve not been through the wringer like most of the SLDF.”

McTiernan draws himself up. “Are you done?”

“You have the floor.” I have been going on a bit.

“What I was trying to say before you interrupted is that General Kerensky isn’t just the Commanding General, he’s also the Protector of the Star League. He is its rightful leader in the absence of the a First Lord.” Not, by implication, a jumped up toaster. “If you claim to be loyal to the Star League, you should be loyal to him.”

“Yeah, there’s a little logical flaw in your argument.”

“Really?”

“By that logic, when there is a First Lord, I should be loyal to them.”

“That’s hardly a flaw!”

“Did you ever meet Richard Cameron? Tell me with a straight face that loyalty to him, personally, served the Star League well?”

“…what alternatives did we have?”

The unspoken elephant in the conversation is called Ikolor Fredasa. Almost forty years previously he’d conspired to overthrow Jonathon Cameron, a plot that had failed when his proposed alternate First Lord proved loyal to her brother. An event that was probably a large part of the reason for my existence.

But Fredasa’s treason had been idealistic: Jonathon Cameron was unfit to rule and ironically his sister became his effective regent anyway.

“A question that we must now explore,” I tell him quietly. “Kerensky is half a thousand light years away… he may not even know yet what has happened although he should soon. We, and Clay and others like us must decide now what we are fighting not just against… but for. And if that frightens you, Admiral, it terrifies me.”

Entry #21
Lagrange Point, New Dallas,
Terran Hegemony
14:00 27 January 2767

I’m considering another run for more Caspars – although it will be a few more days before I have a full drive charge – when alarms go off across New Dallas and its immediately surroundings.

Jump signatures – and a whole heaping lot of them – are being picked up from deep in-system.

While Lagrange points are formed by planets and stars as well as planets and their moons, most people don’t use them – they’re not significantly more convenient than the Nadir and Zenith points most of the time and they’re still pirate points, with all the risk inherent in that.

For that very reason they’re not usually closely guarded and the New Dallas system is so small…

The last of the Caspars has been handed off the New Dallas control feeds so I form up with the regular warships rather than with a flock of drones. Between my battered broadsides and those of the Caph anything that tries to punch into this squadron is going to be in for a nasty time of it.

The wordless tension stretches out…

And then fades as recognizable IFFs and selected codes from those sent to functional HPGs outside the Hegemony are identified.

“Someone’s lit a fire under their aft quarters,” I observe on the command channel. “They must have commandeered every merchantman they could find to get them here by command circuits.”

“It’s hard to argue with success,” replies Clay.

Four destroyers and a cruiser aren’t much of a fleet, but these are known ships attached to naval depots in the nearer portions of the Free Worlds League. And shepherded by them are jumpship after jumpship, spreading their sails out behind them as dropships begin to form up for the run out to New Dallas.

According to the IFF squawks, we’ve been honoured by the arrival of the 100th Royal Mechanized Infantry Division, a small part of Eighth Army. Not precisely the cavalry but a very welcome sign of support from the rest of the Star League.

The 100th Royals are about half-way to us when another flood of jump signatures heralds the arrival of the losers in the race to reinforce us. Major General James McEvedy manages to hide his fulmination at being beaten to the post by Austin Scriver’s infantry, but I’m not personally inclined to complain about who got here first. Two Royal Divisions – McEvedy’s command is the 331st Royal BattleMech Division – render New Dallas as near to impregnable as we can reasonably hope for and their reason for the wait (letting the battlecruiser SLS Killiecrankie join their escort) is more than worthy.

“I’m not sure of the legality of your declaring yourself Director-General,” McEvedy grumbles at Clay once we’re able to confer by secure radio channel with the sudden influx of senior officers.

“It’s a little shaky,” Clay agrees. “But it’s Interim Director-General. What Amaris is apparently ignoring in his own so-called election is that the late First Lord had named his daughter as a successor. Under those circumstances, the High Council has no business trying to nominate anyone as Director-General. Until she’s of age, the President of the Terran Congress should act as Pro-Tem Director-General, but he’s in Amaris’ hands.”

“And the High Council is the same, I gather,” Scriver concludes. “A tricky situation. What does the New Dallas Congress think about this?”

“They’re in favour – although that may be because some of their leaders are campaigning to replace me as Planetary Governor.” On the screen, Clay holds up his hands. “Once we’ve liberated Terra and restored their Congress, I’ll gladly hand over to whoever is elected as President and he can appoint a new High Council.”

“Hmm. You say that now, but raising the Hegemony Armed Forces suggests that you’ve more permanent plans.”

“That’s public relations – and perhaps a little bit political. I’d imagine that if the Star League Council see the Hegemony Armed Forces building up they might be a little more inclined reinstate something along the lines of the Star League Protocols to limit the military forces maintained by Member-States. If it’s any reassurance, they’ll act as an Auxiliary Corps to the SLDF until the Hegemony is liberated.”

“That’ll help. Whoever you appoint it had better be ready to work with –“ for “- the General though.”

“I intend to ask his recommendation. It’s a shame General Stefannson didn’t make it out of the Citadel – he’d have been the obvious choice but… well.” Clay shrugs. “And I was in the SLDF myself, I remember how these things work. I suppose I can ask Praetorian to stand in until then. If anyone can be trusted to stand firm for the Cameron’s then he can.”

Okay, I proposed the HAF. I’m not exactly disinterested – although possibly I should have placed more weight upon McTiernan’s worry that Clay would appear to be building up a power base. Still, I hadn’t planned on leading them.

The spluttering at the suggestion rather indicates that I’m not considered command grade material.

“That singing battleship?”

“He could at least handle the paperwork,” Clay points out. “And he is on the line, you know.”

“My feelings, if you choose to accept them as existing, are not hurt, Director-General. It may, however, be more practical to consider our immediate strategy. I expect that it will take some weeks or months before further reinforcements can arrive but we may have the opportunity to liberate a second Hegemony world, which would extend our foothold as far as I believe to be defensible with the forces at hand.”

“That’s a bit ambitious, we won’t see anything else from Eleventh Army for most of a month,” admits McEvedy. “The East Hartford Division are mobilizing but the available shipping was disrupted getting us here.”

“The rest of III Corps will arrive a little sooner than that – benefit of being on the supply lines out to Canopus,” Scriver muses. “But that will be two to three weeks from now – can’t use command circuits to move warships and it would be insane to send them un-escorted.”

“Somehow I doubt that Praetorian is planning on waiting that long. How do you see our resources as sufficient for a planetary invasion. My best estimate is that Amaris must have at least twenty divisions deployed in the Hegemony right now. We have, at best, three.”

“That would agree with my own information, Admiral McTiernan. However, with over one hundred and forty planets to secure, Amaris has to disperse his forces while we can remain concentrated.”

“That’s a reasonable expectation. So where are you thinking of? Connaught perhaps? Or Bordon?”

“Not quite. I have a more… aggressive target in mind.”