“Well, that’s silly of you, but I won’t get into a debate,” Herzer said, frowning. “However, if that’s your cost, you’re in. As his assistant. I don’t suppose the fact that he’s going to be independently wealthy from this mission has anything to do with it?”
“Not a bit,” Linda said, firmly. “I’ll admit that now that I know he’s still alive, and around, means I may just attach myself to him like a limpet. But that’s because of who he is. I’d gladly support him rather than the other way around. But I’m damned well going to do my best to make sure he doesn’t fade into obscurity again. A laborer!” she added in a bitter tone.
“I understand your point,” Herzer said, smiling. “I’ll get you moved to permanent quarters. Which are, frankly, just as bad as these. Training starts day after tomorrow. Tomorrow you’ll be processed for your positions, meet some of the rest of the team, things like that. We’ll be training hard; we don’t have much time.”
“Welcome to Icarus Base, I’m Commander Herzer Herrick,” Herzer said, looking out at the group. Everyone had been issued coveralls in the color of their field — red for pilots, green for computer techs and blue for engineering — and had almost automatically gathered into their specialties. He noticed that Linda was snugged right up against Geo Keating and the two, with Evan listening, had been engaged in a low-voiced conversation right up until he mounted the dais.
“I’d do the whole ‘thank you’ thing,” Herzer continued. “But each of you is here for your own reasons, some of you for the money, some for the good of mankind as you see it, and some for… odder reasons,” he finished, looking at Joie and Linda. Fitting Joie, who was a seven-foot-tall woman with fully functional wings, had been a challenge. He could just imagine what it was going to be like getting her into a space suit. “But you’ve all agreed to the mission so let’s talk about that for a minute.”
He flipped up the cover on the easel to a simple map of the ship.
“When I got this mission dumped in my lap, I had a hard time figuring out what the attack point should be,” he admitted. “The obvious balance point seems to be the control room. However, shuttles can be overridden and manually piloted. So you can’t ensure control of the fuel supply from the control room. The ship, itself, however, is unimportant. What is important is the fuel. Who controls the flow of the fuel, wins. The mission, therefore, will be twofold. The shuttles can be demobilized by removal of critical components, notably the helium injectors for their fusion plants. Spare injectors are located in Maintenance,” he added, pointing to a point on the upper third ring. “Initial action will be to secure one or more shuttles, depending upon who lands where, then to secure Maintenance. Once Maintenance, and the injectors, are secure, we will begin taking and sabotaging the rest of the shuttles. Up to five shuttles will be maintained to supply the Coalition plants with fuel and bring up reinforcements and remove wounded. In addition, if personnel permit, the engine room will be secured and control room systems will be destabilized by control of secondary nodes,” he finished, pointing first to engine room and then to points on the ship.
“I anticipate that New Destiny will attempt to retake the shuttles when they determine our plan,” he said, shrugging. “We’ll work to cluster the shuttles near Maintenance and hold them. However, if we have control of one functional shuttle, and New Destiny has none, I’ll be happy. We can resupply and reinforce indefinitely; they’ll be stuck.”
“What about teleport?” one of the female pilots asked.
“One of the first questions I asked,” Herzer said with a grin. “The ship never comes inside lunar orbit and porting out that far is unstable. As to porting within the ship, Councilwoman Travante will be accompanying us and will enforce a teleport block. It will only hold for us, but we anticipate a New Destiny Key-holder being on their side and so we’ll probably be blocked as well.
“I’d like to talk a bit about mission concept,” Herzer continued. “Each of the techs will be assigned to a strike team. You will be present to give engineering and computer support while on the ship. Strike team members will be minimally trained in shipboard systems but they’re primarily going to be training in space combat, which is going to occupy their time and more. Each of the team commanders will be responsible for attainment of a specific goal and will call for your support when necessary. You’ll begin training with your teams in the latter part of the program. A ‘good fit’ will probably be essential but the bottom line is that the team leader, who will be a Blood Lord officer or NCO, will be in command. That chain runs up to me and then, in very rare cases, to Councilwoman Travante. If there are differences at the team level, try to keep them at the team level. If you cannot handle your team commander in training, we’ll try to find a better fit. But you need to try to fit, first. I’ve had much the same conversation with the team commanders, by the way.
“Pilots, your team commander is Joie,” he said, gesturing at the bird-woman. “Joie is a former intel agent. Do not let her soft side fool you, if you piss her off she will beat the crap out of you. If you’ve ever been hit by a goose wing you know what I mean.”
There was a chuckle at that and the pilots, who had been more or less ignoring the bird-woman in their midst, now looked at her with interest. Joie gave Herzer a cold look and then went back to her normal expression of calculated indifference.
“Evan Mayerle,” Herzer continued, pointing at Evan. “Stand up, Evan. Evan Mayerle will be in charge of the engineers and engineering questions. Courtney Boehlke will be in charge of the computer techs and computer issues. That’s for pre-mission support and on the mission if there’s a question you can’t answer. And if Evan or Courtney can’t answer it, we’ll kick it through the whole group.
“Pre-mission items. We’re going to be training a lot and we’re going to be training here. I know that the quality of the quarters and chow are… well, they suck,” he said, pausing for the chuckles. “I’m working on the chow. There’s not much we’ll be able to do about the facilities. We’ll only be here for about a month and a half and most of the time all you’ll want is a rack anyway. If any of you have the time and energy to improve your quarters, feel free within the materials available.
“Last point before I start taking the billion and one questions.” He flipped a cover off the easel and pointed to a simple representation of the solar system.
“The refueling ship is actually headed out from the region of the Sun right now, having slingshotted around Mercury. Our intercept point will be in this region,” he added, pointing to an area off-set from the Moon. “The celestial designation system that the ship uses was developed in the twenty-third century, when there was a good bit of space travel, and is extremely helio-centric, or so I’m told. The people more familiar with space can explain it better than I can, but the intercept point will be east of the Sun and west of the Moon.”
“Herzer,” Edmund said, walking through the door. It was after midnight and Herzer was knee deep in paperwork. “If I told you once, I told you a thousand times, all work and no play…”
“Then you should have given me a different mission,” Herzer said, tossing down his fountain pen and squirting ink all over the paper. “Crap! Now I’m going to have to redo those!”
“You ever heard of ‘staff,’ boy?” Edmund asked. “You should be signing them, not doing the write-ups.”
“When I get one, I’ll use it,” Herzer pointed out. “Nobody thought to check what sort of casualties there were in the staff. Most of these are requests for personnel. I’m doing it until I get a facilities commander; Carson was handling both loads but he had time to set it up.”