CHAPTER 21

“Shitty frigging around, we’ve been doing nothing but shadowing for four days now, when will we get some orders?” Captain Konstantinov fumed, and needlessly so. His crew largely ignored his outbursts, though they steered clear of him when they occurred. Four days? That was nothing to a submariner with Konstantinov’s years of experience. Perhaps it was the opportunity for finally putting those long years of waiting aside and getting into some real action. Whatever the reason Konstantinov prowled his space borne submarine with the impatience of a hungry tiger. The crew was used to their Captain’s quirks. They’d served with him aboard this very ship during the “Cold War” with the U.S. Navy. Yet now real war had come, and, they had three dozen Alliance “kills” to their credit. The Gagarin claimed thirty-four warships destroyed on her now infamous single ship attack on the Golkos-Seer’koh fleet, with Alliance help, and two stragglers from the massacre on the Golkos-Terran frontier. The crew took pride in the accomplishment, but there was an almost feverish certainty that Captain Konstantinov was eager for more.

Konstantinov puffed like a laboring train, pacing down the narrow aisles of his bridge trailing the cigarette smoke of his second pack of the day. He stopped at the central Conn where a cramped hologram dominated the bridges tactical displays. He checked the hologram each and every time he paced the bridge, but no matter the scowls and growls the Golkos-Seer’koh formations did not change. “Bloody hell,” he muttered again and again. The Alliance warships just sat there in space, three parsecs from the frontier, taking no notice of the Gagarin. No vessels emerged from the cocoon of overlapping firepower to attempt to chase him off, they simply ignored him. This as much as anything else infuriated the Siberian, and more than once he hailed the Alliance fleet with insults, trying in vain to gain any type of response. The Captain angrily slapped the rail of the hologram base. “Maybe a full spread into their belly will wake them, what do you say First Officer?”

Commander Vladimir Chernenko grimaced at the third suggestion of attack this day. Shaking his head he advised his Captain, “Our orders forbid any such provocation, Captain. Our mission, signed by Alexander himself, is at this point reconnaissance and nothing more.”

“Damn this wallowing in space!” Konstantinov cursed. The Captain prepared to vent his rage and frustration upon his First Officer, who prepared for it, again, without any outward sign of concern. In mid curse, however, the Communications Officer interrupted him.

“Broadband encrypted communications being received by the Alliance fleet, Captain,” she informed him.

“Well, can you decode it?” Konstantinov asked impatiently.

“It will take a few moments, Captain,” the officer responded.

“Well damn it comrade lieutenant don’t waste time talking to me then, get to it!” The Captain ordered.

“No need, Captain,” the First Officer informed him, “The Alliance fleet is coming up to power. They are on the move.”

“Excellent!” Konstantinov exclaimed, staring at the now moving formations of almost thirteen hundred Alliance warships. “Set up a secure real time link to Headquarters, and track those ships! I want a projected course as soon as possible!”

“They are about to make the jump into superluminal!” Chernenko informed the Captain.

“Stay with them, First Officer,” Konstantinov ordered.

Chernenko went to the helm where the ships pilots operated the modified control board. The board was actually quite similar to the original, though the functions of the familiar controls had changed. The submarine still flew as she once did, though in space now, not water. The First Officer watched the scans carefully, gauging his orders for course and speed according to the movements of the Golkos and the Seer’koh. Shadowing during the jump was extraordinarily difficult as even the minutest of errors could put them instantly millions of miles from their targets. True, there were other submarines lurking about the perimeters of the Alliance fleet, but Captain Konstantinov was not about to let someone else gain the upper hand in this game. Chernenko calculated his orders with the heat of his Captain’s eyes burning into his back. The scanners showed the power curves of the Alliance vessels, and Chernenko calmly matched them. Then just at the superluminal threshold he gave the order.

“Engage superluminal engines, maintain heading and elevation!” The superluminal shift occurred, bluing the star field into a momentary web of glowing strands and bright cores; a glimpse into the foundations of the structure of the universe. Then the star field reappeared. A central core of blue stars stood on their bow. Each and every moment a dozen stars would break out of the core turning white and then red as they rushed by. The central core of the Milky Way was still there, comfortably nestled in the lower right corner of the field. To the left the vast bulk of the Alliance fleet slowly fell back. Chernenko made a small adjustment to their speed, and the fleet stabilized in their viewers.

“Well done, First Officer, station keeping!” Konstantinov ordered.

“Station keeping!” The First Officer echoed.

“Navigator, plot their course and speed; where are they headed,” the Captain asked.

The Navigator barely glanced up from her table, her charts replaced with several laptop computers and a small version of the bridge’s hologram. The calculation was easy, but she checked it three times. The answer did not surprise her, but her voice still quivered perceptibly as she told her Captain, “Earth, they are headed for Earth. Estimated arrival thirty-one days.”

Konstantinov nodded, and his voice and expression grew in gravity. “A full month,” he mused. “They’re not in any hurry are they? At flank speed it should take them only three weeks. Undoubtedly they’re keeping good formation. You never know when those crazy Terrans will attack. Isn’t that so Overlord?” Konstantinov grinned and looked directly into the bridge camera, which was sending the live signal to Alexander’s headquarters. With a nod and a wink the Captain addressed Alexander directly.

“Captain Konstantinov and the Gagarin awaiting orders, Overlord; we are ready and waiting, and-how do you Americans say it-we are loaded for bear!”