The Insurrection

"I have the con, Exec," she told Sung, sliding into the command chair.

"Aye, aye, sir." The short, slender commander stepped quickly back behind the chair, waiting.

"Mister Chu, how long to warp?" "Approximately forty-three standard hours, sir." "Very, good." She swung her chair toward the exec. "Commander Sung." "Yes, sir?" He looked nervous. That was a good sign. "It's been a while since our last comprehensive drills," she said calmly.

"Don't you think we might spend a few hours brushing the rust off?." Sung Chung-hui had dreaded this moment.

He glanced at Tsing, but the former exec seemed thoroughly fascinated by the display on the main plot.

No help there. He drew a deep breath.

"Whenever you wish, sir." "Then sound general quarters, Exec," Han said, and Sung breathed a silent prayer as he pressed the button.

The word, Han thought as she worked up lather, was "horrible." She raised her face to the shower spray and the wat4r dragged at her long hair. It really wasn't all that bad, considering, but war left no room for "considering." With nukes flying around your ears, there were only adeo quate erews--comr dead ones. She remembered the fine-tuned instrument she and Tsing had made of Longbow before the mutiny and shook her head, but the present arthritic uncertainty wasn't Sung's fault. He hadn't had time to work up the new drafts, and he'd actually done quite well in the time he'd been given.

She finished rinsing and reached for a towel.

She and Sung were going to be unpopular over the next few days. At least she'd managed to hang on to most of her point defense crewsthat was about the only department which had performed with a flourish--but damage control was terrible and engineering was no better. She couldn't fault Sung's initial concentration on gu

She wrapped the towel around herself sarong fashion and sat before her terminal. It was Sung's job to bring the crew up to her standards. Under the iron-bound traditions of the service, her abili, even her right, to interfere with handling of the problem was limited. But she was also captain. The ultimate responsibility was hers, and she and Sung both knew how new to his duties he was. She could stretch the point a bit, she decided, without convincing him he'd lost her trust.

She punched up the intraship memo system slowly, considering how to begin. Her fingers poised over the keys, then moved.

To: COULDR Sung C.

From: CMDR Li H., CO TRNS LONGBOW RE: Exercises conducted this date Drills conducted by all departments indicate only point defense and maneuvering perso

Engineering performance was far below acceptable standards, and general crew performance leaves much to be desired.

I therefore suggest: (a) series of intensive exercises of all hands in...

The words appeared with machine-like speed as Longbow's drive pushed the ship ever closer to battle, and Commodore Li Han, wet hair plastered to her bare shoulders, felt her mind reaching out to meet the test to come. Han sniffed at Tsing's pipe smoke. Few spacers smoked, and she hated cigarette smoke, but though disshe would never admit it, she rather liked the smell of Tsing's pipe blend. Not that liking it kept her from scolding him over the filthy habit in private.

"Well, Chang," she said finally, "could this crew zip its own shoes without supervision?" "Just about, sir." Tsing blew a beautiful smoke ring and glanced at Sung, "Just about." Sung's face fell, and Han shook her head reproachfully at Tsing.

"Actually, Exec," she said, "I think you've done very INSUBRECTION well. There" are still a few rough spots, but all in all, we've got one of the most efficient ship's companies I've seen." "Fhank you, sir!" Sung's face lit with pleasure.

"And just in time, too," she went on. She touched a button and a hologram of the local warp lines appeared above the table.

"We'll make transit to Lassa in about an hour, gentlemen," she said calmly. "Eighty-one hours after that, we'll be ready to fire probes through into Aklumar for a last minute report." "Yes, sir." Tsing passed the stem of his pipe through the warp line between Lassa and Aklumar.

"That ought to be an interesting trip." "Not as "interesting" as the one to Cimmaron," Han reminded him. "It had better not be, anyway!" She tapped the table gently, then turned a calm face to Sung. "Chung-hui, I asld you to join us because I'm going to depend heavily on you and Chang. I'll have to coordinate the battlegroup and fight Longbow, as well, and I can't do it unless you both understand exactly what I plan. You'll both have to exercise a lot of discretion in what you report to me and what you act upon yourvs, so I want us to have a very clear mutual understanding of the operation.

Fair enough?" "Yes, sir." "Good. Then here's the first point; we're going into Cimmaron before Commodore Petrovna because the Rump data base won't list us as a command ship." Sung nodded; Longbow hadn't been a command ship the last time the Rump saw her. "On the other hand, our datalink has cost us two capital missile launchers, so we'll hold back our external ordnance when the others launch. We'll use the racks to hide our lack of internal launchers, because if they realize we're the command ship they'll go for us with everything they've got." "Yes, sir. I understand." "Good. Second, I want everything on line when we warp into Aklumar, no matter what the probes show. I hope we won't find anything to worry about -comwe don't need a Second Battle of Aklumar." This time both Sung and Tsing nodded.

Aklumar had witnessed the climactic engagement of the First Interstellar War, but the last thing they wanted was a clash to alert Cimmaron.

"But," she went on, "if I were commanding Cimmaron there'd be at least a picket at Aklumar to watch for exactly what we hope to do.

And if there is--was she brought up a schematic of the Aklumar warp junction his--comhe'll be right here." She touched the image. "Placed to dash down the warp line as soon as we enter sca

We'll form a three-ship data group with two of them and clear the way for the rest of the task force." "Unless," Tsing observed with the mild air of a man who'd made the same point before, "they've posted a light carrier, sir. A couple of long-range recon fighters on patrol, and we'll never get close enough." "We've been over that, Chang, and I stfil don't expect it, not with so much of Frontier Fleet coming 9ver. They'd never risk a fleet or assault carrier on picket duty, and all the lights were in Frontier Fleet. They can't have many of them left." "You're probably right, sir, but it's my job to point out problems. And here's another: they might use a scout cruiser of their own." "If they go by The Book, that's exactly what they'll do," Han agreed, "but they can't have many of them, either. If they do, the whole ops plan goes out the lock anyway. If they're cloaking, the probes won't spot them and they'll have just as good a chance to hide from us as we have to hide from them. Which gives them the advantage, of course, since their whole job is to run away while we try to locate and destroy them. But there's only one way to find out, isn't there?" "You might ask Admiral Ashigara to send in a squadron of fighters to check it, sir," Sung suggested hesitantly.

INSV-AAECTO con"I inight," Han agreed dryly, "ff fighters carried any ECM." "Sorry, sir. I should have thought of that." Sung sounded abashed.

"Don't worry about it." Han smiled. "But we're going to have to deal with this ourselves, so be certain plotting and gu