Tales from the Service: A Lifeline in the Balance

2953-06-18 – Tales from the Service: A Lifeline in the Balance 

Obviously, stress on field commanders is a constant problem in wartime, and in no place is it higher than in detached commands far outside easy communication range with their superiors. Battles, campaigns, even the course of the whole war might hinge on the decision of a junior admiral or even a captain on a forward mission, and most of the men and women in these postings know it. 

The pressure, I am sorry to say, gets the better of some of them, sometimes. Stress will make lunatics of us all, given enough time. 

At first, the ad-hoc council of war went slowly. Admiral Markward instructed one of his aides to lay out a quick summary of the convoy’s situation for the benefit of the hauler skippers and the few others who had been detached when various things had happened, and then the admiral himself laid out his proposed course of action and a few of the advantages and disadvantages as he saw it.  

There were few questions; most of the officers present were hesitant to speak up, even when the obvious result of this course – namely, the failure to deliver supplies to Force 73 – was not mentioned among the drawbacks. Markward’s analysis focused on getting his force back to port safely at all costs, just as Captain Conrad Molnar had expected it would.  

Commander Weir broke the uneasy silence that fell after Markward was done talking. “Isn’t this course against our orders, sir?” She gestured to the aide controlling the holo-projector, who nodded and called up the orders matrix. “Seventh Fleet told us to make every effort to link up with Bosch.” 

“Every effort does not mean suicide, Commander.” Markward emphasized the young officer’s rank to an extreme degree that made the bile rise in Conrad’s throat; only a rear-echelon careerist like the admiral would think a full captain at the helm of a large transport was higher on the Navy pecking order than the more junior skipper of a brand-new fast destroyer. Other than the flag captain and Conrad himself, Dinah Weir was likely the most militarily significant subordinate the admiral had. 

“Taking a random-walk until the second rendezvous window is hardly suicidal, Admiral.” Conrad looked up toward the overheads. “Is the asssitant active in this compartment?” 

A bright, feminine voice answered instantly. “Absolutely, Captain Molnar. You can call me Orrie.” 

Conrad rolled his eyes; he could already tell he disliked Gray Oriolus’s assistant personality configuration. Even the more reserved tone of Bonnie, the assistant on his own Bonaven Kovo, was sometimes too chatty for his tastes. “Can you estimate the odds of an encounter if we random-walk through deep space to the second rendezvous, making only the minimum number of harvesting stops in star systems?” 

“Only very loosely, if that’s all right.” 

“Take your best shot.” Conrad looked across the table at Admiral Markward. Asking the computer system to do this analysis should have been the job of the admiral and his staff, but if they’d done this, none of the results had been shared in their summary. Markward, for his part, looked unperturbed; perhaps he had done this already as he should have, and the results favored his perspective. 

“Based on the Admiral’s current op-for predictive map, the chance of an encounter is thirty-one percent.” Orrie took over the display to show a few charts. “Modeling suggests the most likely encounter profile is a skirmish with forward scouts, followed by a converging attack from multiple enemy squadrons if we can’t lose them.” Now the display became a fast-moving tactical plot, showing three groups of four Incarnation heavy cruisers converging on the huddled symbols representing Convoy 7380. Against that firepower, obviously, an escort force with only a single heavy cruiser and two light cruisers could do nothing. 

“So perhaps one chance in three of being found by scouts, one in six of being wiped out.” Conrad nodded. Markward had absolutely done this before, and the system was using some of his parameters, otherwise, the chance of interception couldn’t possibly be scored above five percent. There was, after all, still no conclusive proof the enemy was on the convoy’s tail at all. “That’s better odds than most of our ships would have of coming out of a full-scale battle intact.” 

“But this is a supply force, Captain Molnar.” Admiral Markward lowered his voice until it was almost a hiss. “A logistics operation. One in six convoys lost on this route would be unacceptable to the fleet.” 

“So would Force 73 being laid up for lack of supplies.” Weir chimed in. “The stores our haulers are carrying won’t do anyone any good back at Sagittarius Gate.” 

“The fleet will turn the supplies around and send them back with a proper escort.” Markward shrugged and folded his arms. “The sooner we get back, the sooner that will happen.” 

“With all due respect, Admiral...” This was a new voice; Captain Haversham of Gray Oriolus, Markward’s flag captain, had finally chimed in. “We have no hard evidence that this escort force is insufficient. If we could at least sight our pursuers, it would help identify what the next convoy will be up against.” 

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Tales from the Service: The Frayed Lifeline

2953-06-11 – Tales from the Service: The Frayed Lifeline 

The operations of Force 73 were supposed to be free of any logistics tail. Obviously, this was optimistic. Even as the force was en route to its theater of operations, Fleet headquarters was planning how to best send critical supplies and reinforcements to Captain Bosch that Kyaroh systems are unable to provide. 

I have little information about how many times Force 73 has been resupplied in the months it has been on station, but apparently at least one convoy successfully made the trip and returned safely, and at least one attempt was made which failed, though without loss of the convoy. 

Convoy 7380, the most recent sent in that direction, just returned to Sagittarius Gate after a journey of nearly two months. Apparently, there was significant tension in its command structure. This account presents one side of that conflict, though I am sure the other side would present these events quite differently. 

Captain Conrad Molnar struggled to restrain the helpless anger burning in his breast. Rear Admiral Markward was still droning on about insurmountable difficulties, but Conrad heard none of it after the announcement in passing that Convoy 7380 was going to abandon its mission and turn back toward Sagittarius Gate. 

Conrad and some of the other captains had privately discussed their concerns early in the voyage. Markward, an old hand at Navy logistics operations with little frontline experience, had proven himself rather mismatched to the task he’d been assigned. Incarnation forces had so far failed to intercept his command, but that hadn’t stopped the admiral from sending the whole force on a random-walk escape pattern the moment forward scouts reported enemy signal traffic in the next system ahead. 

That had been nearly a week ago. Now, 7380 was behind schedule and off course, far from the planned route between Sagittarious Gate and Kyaroh space. There had never been any sign of pursuers, of course, but Markward remained convinced that he’d narrowly avoided a trap and that a fleet of enemy cruisers was hot on their heels. Conrad and the other escort captains had been trying to nudge their commander back toward the mission objective for most of that time, without success.  

Markward’s concerns were unfortunately not entirely unreasonable. Seventh Fleet headquarters had sent down intelligence reports just before their departure that suggested the enemy was aware of the best convoy routes which could be used to supply and reinforce Force 73 in Kyaroh space. Apparently, the admiral had spun these reports into dread certainty that he was leading a force into a trap long before the forward scouting element picked up enemy signals, and there was some possibility he was right about that. Clipping Force 73’s lifeline, tenuous as it was, would go a long way to shoring up the Incarnation’s failing prospects in this war. 

Dinah Weir, skipper of one of the new destroyers assigned to the convoy, evidently could hold her frustration no longer. She cleared her throat and raised one bronze-skinned hand. “Excuse me, Admiral. Did I hear correctly a moment ago that we are scrubbing the mission? Without a council of war?” 

Weir had a point; though it was not required by regulation, momentous command decisions made with little time pressure were traditionally discussed at a council of war attended by ship captains. Conrad, as skipper of the light cruiser Bonaven Kovo, would never have been omitted from such a council, as his ship was second only to the flagship in capability and had not been separated from the main body for the whole of the misbegotten escape run. 

Markward, knocked off his usual rambling procedural tone by the interruption, looked up from his slate, his thick eyebrows diving together into a momentary scowl. “We are too far behind schedule to make the first rendezvous window, Commander Weir.” He tapped the conference table. “If we loiter until the second, we risk being discovered and destroyed.” 

Conrad opened his mouth to observe that in all wartime operations, a convoy risked being discovered and destroyed, but shut it again. Rank insubordination would do no-one any good.  

Weir, though, was undeterred. “Which is why a council of war is warranted, Admiral, to be sure we do not have any safe means of making the second rendezvous.” 

They had those means, of course; the convoy could spend a few extra days zig-zagging unpredictably across the intervening space to avoid loitering too long in any one place, as was common practice for any force that had just broken off contact with the enemy and did not wish to re-engage. Everyone in the room knew that would be suggested at any council, Markward included. 

“Your concern is noted, Commander.” Markward gestured to his adjutant. “It will be duly recorded in the minutes and included in my report.” 

Conrad sighed and squared his shoulders; he’d seen one too many of Markward’s lengthy, unreadable reports to trust that higher command would understand this decision to be Markward’s alone. “Admiral, could we hold that council now? If only as a formality. All the necessary commanders are present.” 

Heads nodded all around the table. For once, Conrad was glad of Markward’s insistence on having every commander shuttle over to the flagship for the daily briefing. The objection would be so much easier to shrug off on a vid-call. 

The admiral glanced around, eyes narrowing. He was cornered for the moment, but Conrad knew he and Weir would suffer later for their objections. "If there are no objections, we will table the usual agenda and proceed as suggested by Captain Molnar.” 

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Tales from the Service: Cowardice in Mourning

2953-06-04 – Tales from the Service: Cowardice in Mourning 

As several commentors have pointed out, I absolutely have toned down the profanity in this account before publishing it. As a Marine sergeant, our contributor is an artist with profanity, but this colorful and evocative language would not meet the Cosmic Background editorial standards. You will have to re-introduce it in your imagination, if you are familiar with the standard issue vocabulary of a Marine non-com. 

Sergeant Cole Morita scowled at the two men blocking his way. According to the regs, and according to the spirit of the Marines, what they were telling him didn’t change a thing, but in the world outside, people would expect a man in mourning to be given some lenity for an act which had, in the grand scheme of things, done little damage.  

The spirit of the Corps had, as was inevitable, been eroded somewhat as the Marines had expanded for wartime service. Physical and psychological standards for entry were theoretically as strong as ever, and Cole didn’t doubt that they remained high, but the wartime recruits were missing something else – the willingness to submit to the honored traditions of a service with a contiguous history going back almost a thousand years.  

Allscher and Stepanov, like most of the men in the unit, were wartime recruits. They weren’t devoting their lives to the Corps, they were doing a few years to protect the government and Admiralty which had existed for a fraction of the history of the Confederated Marines in a time of need.  

No doubt, this was a challenge the Marines had weathered before, and would again. Certainly Cole would have to put the Mark into the files of all three no matter what happened today. The existence of the Mark was no secret, even to recruits, and it served to tell the Corps who among the wartime surge was not fit to carry the traditions of the service into the conditions of peacetime. From a civilian perspective, what the men were doing to protect their comrade was admirable, so it would only make sense to send them out into the civilian world as soon as practical after the war ended. 

Allscher and Stepanov seemed to take Cole’s hesitation for a reconsideration of his anger based on this new data, and relaxed their posture somewhat. “Now that we’ve cleared the air, Sarge, we won’t keep you.” Allscher saluted once more and sidled away from the hatch. Stepanov followed suit a moment later. 

Cole nodded to both of them, then went in. Olivers was there, sitting on his bunk with his head in his hands, with a few other men standing protectively around him. Everyone saluted their sergeant, as they were expected to, but the tension was as thick as nutrient paste. Cole sized them up, noting their names off in his head. They would all need the Mark. 

After several seconds of tense silence, Cole cleared his throat. “Private Olivers, I am putting you in for emergency discharge.” He fixed his eyes on several of those standing between himself and the bereaved man. “Gather your things and report to the passenger berths on the double. The Fleet will get you home as soon as it can.” 

For a long moment, nobody moved, then Olivers himself shot upright as if yanked by invisible strings and saluted. “Yes, Sergeant.” His red-rimmed eyes met Cole’s, and he seemed to think this an act of mercy. From a civilian perspective, it certainly was, but Cole was only getting started.  

The man tottered around for a moment, gathering his slate and his kit bag, then he trotted out past Allscher and Stepanov. Nobody said another word until the hatch had closed behind him. 

Several Marines started to talk at that moment, but Cole held up a hand, and they all returned to attention in an instant. 

“As for the rest of you.” Cole turned on Olivers’s friends. “I could have you all court martialed and thrown out of the Corps.” He leveled a finger at Stepanov. “If you lot knew he was too damaged to have his hindquarters busted the same way he always did without blowing a valve, it was sheer cowardice to let him stay on duty. He needed to be on leave the minute after that damned message came in.” Cole turned to make eye contact with everyone, one by one. “Heaven help us if we’d had a combat op today. Or do I need to send you all to scrubbing plating until you remember your basic training?” 

“A unit is only as strong as its weakest component, Sarge.” There was a note in Allscher’s voice that might have been resignation, or even sorrow. “A company’s components are its troopers. And I am that weakest component.” 

“So you’re not all utterly irredeemable.” Cole turned to Allscher. “Today, you all thought Olivers was the weakest link. But he might have been the damned strongest one. Because he did something. You all just sat on your hands and waited to see what would happen.” 

Most of the troopers started studying the deck plating below their feet, wondering perhaps how long they’d be scrubbing it before they regained their sergeant’s trust. 

Cole let the silence drive the point into their heads for almost a minute before he continued, tapping the bandage on his arm. “If he’d gotten incredibly lucky and killed me or put me out of action, the Lieutenant would be well within his rights to throw you all out an airlock. As it is, I might still recommend it. If you can’t do the right thing for the unit when it’s damned uncomfortable, how can you call yourselves Marines?” 

With that question drifting in the air, Cole waved them all to at-ease and strode out of the barracks, still seething. As soon as he got to the lift, he sent a quick a message to the Navy accommodations liaison explaining Olivers’s situation, then pulled up the personnel files for the unit and started adding Marks. 

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Tales from the Service: Bloodshed in Mourning

2953-05-28 – Tales from the Service: Bloodshed in Mourning 

There are risks to being in the service beyond those of enemy fire and operational accidents, though we do not think of them most of the time. So many millions of our men and women in the combat area are leaving behind loved ones and missing moments with them, and there may never be a time to make up for what was lost. 

Sergeant Cole Morita scowled at the medtech working on his arm, in hopes of spurring the mousy little man into finishing faster. As a twelve-year veteran of the Confederated Marines, he was no stranger to the inside of a medbay, of course, but the longer he was stuck sitting on the slab having his arm sewed up, the longer justice was delayed. 

“Is this going to take much longer?” Cole growled, after an interminable period where the medtech didn’t seem to be doing anything. He was under local anaesthetic, of course, so he couldn’t feel exactly what was being done, nor could he quite see the spot where he’d been cut. 

“Almost done, Sergeant.” The tech’s high-pitched, wheedling voice matched his appearance all too well. “Hold still.” 

Cole grunted. In the line of duty, he’d been blown up twice, badly burnt once, shot four times with projectiles and once with a laser, and broken five bones, but this was the first of his many scars that he could not accept with the usual magnanimity of a Marine losing a few pints of blood in the line of duty. This time, he’d been cut up by one of his own, with the Marines’ own signature weapon of last resort. 

Knife-fighting was a specialty of his service since before the days of powered armor, back when the Colonial Marines were as much enforcers of the Terran Sphere’s dominion over the outlying colonies as they were protectors of those colonies from marauders and alien threats. A Marine learned to fight with the titanium combat knife known as the Nine before he learned anything about suits or guns, and each of them well understood that a knife fight was a desperate struggle to the death where a simple brawl was not. 

This meant that in the Marines, to even brandish a knife at a comrade was understood as intent to kill. Not even guns, which could be rendered safe for simulated firefights, were treated quite the same way. The only safety on a Marine’s Nine was the Marine himself. 

The Marine who’d taken his Nine to Cole was the eternal troublemaker Ambrose Olivers, which would come as a surprise to almost any sergeant in the Corps. The unit troublemaker or joker issued to every company by ancient tradition was constantly getting disciplinary duty for some idiotic prank or other, but violence against a superior was nothing to joke about, and even a prankster knew not to cross the line between disciplinary and seditious. 

At last, the med-tech set down his gadgets and cleared his throat. “All right, Sergeant. You’re free to go, but you’re off the duty roster. Try not to put weight on this arm for about two days while the nanites stitch up your muscle.” 

Cole grunted. The medtech’s warning, as usual, was filed with other suggestions made by support personnel in his mental trash receptacle. He had business with Olivers that might require the use of the injured arm, and if that landed him back in the medbay, so be it. 

As soon as he was off the slab and heading out the door, Cole pulled up the company roster on his wristcuff and checked for Olivers’s location. He expected to find the murderous Marine in the brig on deck four, but the ship’s computer reported that he was with the rest of the company in their barracks suite on deck six. The altercation had happened just outside the mess hall, also on deck six, and several of their comrades had dragged them apart and hustled Olivers out of Cole’s sight while others delivered their sergeant to the medbay. Why had the other Marines not delivered Olivers into custody? 

The short lift ride down to deck six provided enough time for Cole’s rage to extend to every Marine who had seen the attack. Every one of them was complicit if they were protecting Olivers. Every one would be busted back down to base rank and would be scrubbing deck plating until Judgement Day if he had anything to say in the matter, which of course he did. 

Two Marines were standing in front of the barracks when Cole arrived. Both of them should have stood aside when they saw the dark look in his face, but they squared their shoulders and barred his way. 

“Let me past.” Cole leveled his gaze on Corporal Allscher, the more senior of the pair. “That is an order, Marine.” 

“Once you know the score, Sarge.” Allscher met Cole’s eyes, though he flinched in evident discomfort. “We want you to go easy on Olivers, sir.” 

“The man pulled a knife on his sergeant.” Cole took another step forward, until he was almost chest to chest with the other man. “That’s the only score that matters, Corporal.” 

It was the other man, Stepanov, who answered. “He just got a message from home, sir. His wife and son died in an aircar accident last week. When you busted his behind at chow, we all knew he was going to lose it.” 

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