The rest of  the  fleet will be held in  a
secondary support role or open action on other fronts as diversions."
     "That still  would  leave a minimum  of fifteen hundred strike craft on
five carriers coming straight at Earth, not to mention what looks like close
to a hundred escort ships," Zitek replied. "And just  how many fighters will
we have to meet this?"
     "We can have five carriers fully  on line within two weeks, with  forty
one escorts, carrying a total of six hundred and eighty-nine strike craft."
     "Just five?"
     "Actually,  only two are on  line  and fully operational at the moment,
Geoff said shaking his head.
     "With crews working around the  clock and cutting a  lot of corners,  I
expect  to  see three more carriers ready to join the fleet by the  time the
Kilrathi  penetrate into Confederation space. It'll be forty-five days, more
like sixty, before our remaining carriers will be on line again."
     "Jamison  was  brilliant  pushing  that deactivation  through,"  Grecko
snapped and Geoff could only nod his head in agreement.
     The political arena with Jamison standing in  the center was now one of
absolute  chaos.  Less than twenty-four hours ago  ъodham had announced  the
existence of the Kilrathi super carriers and the  assumption  that Earth had
been directly  targeted for attack.  He then called  for  the  Confederation
Senate to renounce the armistice and to mobilize  for  a renewal of the war,
closing with his resignation as president. Minutes  later the vice president
was  sworn  in  and delivered a  sharp rousing  speech, demanding  that  the
Kilrathi open their  border  for full inspection of  the new fleet  or  face
offensive action.  It was all a  bluff on Quinson's  part, but  it at  least
sounded good. The Confederation had been thrown into a state of panic by the
announcement, with every holo reporter scrambling to put  their spin on  the
issue,  which ranged from "we've  been stabbed in the back  by the Cats," to
"the evil military was pushing for a war." The situation was further stirred
up by the Kilrathi reply that the bombing of headquarters and the attempt on
the Emperor's life were part of a military coup by pro-war officers and that
they were totally innocent of any wrong-doing.
     At first Geoff had naively assumed that this had closed the  deal, that
the Senate would vote for war and that the new president's  declaration of a
full military emergency would be observed.
     Jamison had  triggered near chaos instead. First she refused to resign,
even though Quinson  had appointed a new Foreign Minister. Next  she accused
the  military of conspiring to renew  the war,  a position that the Kilrathi
were pumping out through their propaganda agencies.
     The result  was that the Senate  had  still not declared war, wavering,
some  even  adopting the  Kilrathi  line, and demanding  that  the  military
unilaterally disarm.
     Quinson had stood firm, however, evoking  executive right to  order the
military  to mobilize for emergency action. The one restraint, however,  was
that such  an emergency did  not give the fleet  the right to take offensive
action.  Tolwyn had actually fallen  into  a  shouting match with the senate
military committee over  that point, wanting to  free  his two light escorts
that were operational for a spoiling and recon raid into Kilrathi space, but
he had been held back.
     Sometimes it really bites to be in the military," Polowski snapped from
the back  of the room.  "I'd just love to get Jamison onboard  my ship  as a
forward turret gunner's  mate when we charge those carriers and let  her see
what  her peace loving friends have done while  we slept,"  and there  was a
chorus of approval.
     Geoff held up his hand for silence.
     "ъemember, we  are the  military.  Civilian politics is outside of  our
control and like it or not that's  a tradition we must observe. It's our job
to defend the Confederation from  the attack we all know is  coming, and I'm
counting on you to give it everything you have.  Some really  big damn fools
got  us into  this fix. The hell with  them, push them out of your  minds. I
want you to focus on the billions  of innocent people who will be under  the
Kilrathi antimatter bombs and the survivors who will face their knives if we
fail. The existence of the human race now hangs in the balance
     He paused for a moment. The words had come  out of  him, not planned at
all. In any other setting he felt they would  have  sounded worn. But it was
the simple truth: the actual existence of his entire species rested in their
hands. One  wrong move on his part and it  might all be over with. All of it
gone forever, two thousand years of England gone, a  cold  silence of death,
of extinction.
     I can't dwell on  this, he realized. It'll drive me insane  if I do, so
stay focused on the job and nothing else.
     He switched the holo screen  to a map of the inner core  of planets and
the jump lines leading out to the frontier.
     "The  Kilrathi have three main  lines of approach, all of which finally
come in here," and he pointed  to a blue white star  from which  radiated  a
number of jump lines. "Here at  Sirius and the jump point behind Sirius  the
shortest  routes of jump lines come together  and then  from there  straight
back to Earth. By  the shortest route, jump line alpha, it's ten jump points
from Sirius  to the  frontier, four  back to Earth.  The next route, beta is
twelve jumps to the  frontier and delta  is thirteen.  All  the other routes
meander back and forth. For the Kilrathi I think they'll be so confident  of
their  strength, and  also concerned about not giving us time to rearm, that
they'll come straight on in.
     "I propose to meet them in front of Sirius."
     "Geoff, that abandons several hundred inhabited colonies further  out,"
Polowski said quietly, "my own home of Planet Warsaw being one of them."
     Tolwyn nodded.
     "There are eighteen major jump  points leading  across the frontier and
several dozen  other  jump  points running parallel or  zigzagging back  and
forth. Before  the armistice neither we nor the Kilrathi had the strength to
simply go charging in, saying the hell with our rear and leaping towards the
jugular. They  now  do.  We  lack the strength of a major counter strike and
even if we did have it, it'd be weeks before we could even begin to move it.
By then  it'll be too  late. In  addition they can  hold a  number  of their
standard fleet carriers in reserve as a reaction force to counter even light
escort raiders the way we  had been using them in the past. We have  to fall
back and concentrate what assets we have. If we try  a  forward defense they
might swing around us."
     "Why not an offensive, Geoff? Split them  off  the way we did at  Vukar
Tag," Grecko asked from the back of the room.
     "It won't work this time, sir. Even if we took what  we  had  right now
and shot it straight in, their older carriers acting as a reserve would stop
us cold,  while the new  fleet would just  continue  on  into Earth. Second,
they'd see it for  what it was, an  effort to  split their offensive. They'd
ignore it and still bore straight in. What we have  to do  is seek a meeting
engagement with  their main fleet and stop it, that's the only viable option
left open to us."
     "So what about my home planet?" Polowski asked
     Geoff paused for a moment. The cold hard word for it was "abandon"  but
he could not bring himself to say that, or even really admit it to himself.
     "Mike, the  Kilrathi have two ways to  run this offensive. The first is
to break through our forward defenses, then spread out and start ripping the
colonial  worlds to shreds.  Every day that they do that is one more day for
us  to rearm and they  know it. The second way is to come charging  straight
in,  figuring they can mop up the colonies at their  leisure after  the core
planets have been destroyed along with the fleet."
     "I'm betting on the second method. It's sound militarily and  it's what
we would do: kill the home world and inner planets and end the war. The only
advantage we can hope for  is to stand and defend  as close to our main base
as  possible,  thus  stretching  their line  of  communication while we  can
continue to pour into action whatever ships come on line at the last minute.
It is the one classic advantage of the  defensive the ability  to fall  back
upon your base of supplies, and it's our only hope."
     "Easy for you  to say," Mike replied.  "My entire family's out there on
Warsaw, two jumps from the frontier."
     "Can  you propose any  other  alternative  given  what we  have?" Geoff
asked, his  voice filled with a genuine  concern. He knew he couldn't simply
order men to abandon their homes and  families. They'd have to be willing to
do it with the hope of final victory and then rescue, no matter how slim the
chance.
     Mike looked down at his memo pad and then finally shook his head
     "You're right, Admiral, its the only way," and  there was a soft chorus
of agreement.
     "I  wish we could inform the  governors  and  presidents of the various
colonial  worlds of our  strategic plan,  though  for security reasons it is
obvious  we cannot. For that matter, gentlemen, no one outside  this room is
to have any knowledge of what our strategy is.
     "That'll give  precious little warning to  whichever worlds are  in the
way of the fleet," Zitek said. "Even if they're coming straight  on, they'll
still dispatch some cruisers on the way in to scorch the planets directly in
their path.  They'll have to, they can t afford to leave potential  bases in
their rear.  Nearly every one of those outer worlds has at least one base on
them, the major systems garrisoned with troops and orbital bases. They could
stand against raiders, but not against what they'll be throwing in."
     Geoff  nodded grimly.  It meant that millions in the outer worlds might
die. He  could  only  hope that those  who  could get out of the  way would,
heading to remote areas of their world to wait out the attack. At least most
of  the worlds were sparsely populated,  with a lot of room to  hide. In the
early  days of the war the  outer  regions,  except for the Landreich on the
flank of  the Confederation, had been devastated, and billions had died. The
region had yet to recover.  It wasn't  until Sirius  was reached  inside the
area  never touched  by the  war,  that  the  major inhabited  regions  were
located.
     He could only hope  they had dug their shelters  deep enough to survive
bombardment.
     "So  the colonies  are  a  write off?"  Duke  asked quietly,  obviously
wanting to make the fact absolutely clear.
     "Local  guard units will be given  the discretion  to stay, but I  want
everything here for the major  showdown," and he pointed  at Sirius, hanging
in the middle of the holo. "Sirius is where the decision will be made."
     "What about the Landreich and Kruger?" Polowski asked.
     "I'll ask them for help  and  for the release  of the escorts we signed
over to them,  but I doubt old Kruger will  be  amused that once again we're
pulling a withdrawal due to strategic necessity."
     He could well imagine the explosion  that  would  be created  when  the
burst signal reached Kruger on that one.
     "Gentlemen, I want the fleet fully loaded and ready to move within four
days."
     The men looked at him incredulously.
     "Geoff,  it'll  be  eight, more  like  ten days  before  we get all our
personnel back in aboard ship," Zitek replied. "Even our active carriers had
half  their  crews on  leave.  Some  of  them  are  at  the far  end of  the
Confederation."
     "You'll find a  clause in  Emergency  decree 394A  that  allows for the
drafting of emergency replacements off civilian ships, and retired personnel
if need be for the duration of the emergency. Use it, shanghai your crews if
necessary, but  I  want full ship's  complements inside of ninety-six hours.
Now  let's get to work." The admirals and  Marine  officers filed out of the
room. Geoff looked back down at his memo pad, ready to feed in a long series
of orders. Looking up he saw that Duke had stayed behind.
     "Something's wrong, isn't it?" Geoff said, sensing that there  was  bad
news coming.
     Duke nodded.
     "I just got a signal in the clear from Kruger."
     "Go on."
     "He  told us and I quote  Сyou  created this mess, you  solve it. Go to
hell.' "
     Geoff chuckled sadly.
     "Doesn't  the  damn  fool  realize,"  Grecko  snapped,  "that   if  the
Confederation goes down, the Cats will turn on him next?"
     "If  he comes to help  us,  he'll get hit from  the rear.  It's the old
classic  problem  of  frontier militia  being  called  up to  serve with the
regulars Ч do you leave your homes open to attack  by marching off somewhere
else?"
     Geoff paused, realizing that there was something else to the message.
     "You're holding something back, Duke, what is it?"
     "He also reported, in the clear, that Tarawa  has failed  to return and
is assumed lost."
     Geoff remained standing, staring straight at Duke.
     "Damn this war to hell."

     Eyes wide with excitement and with the thrill of the hunt,  the Emperor
turned to face his grandson.
     "Magnificent, simply magnificent," he growled, turning back to look out
the  forward view port of  the cruiser that now served as the Imperial ship.
Less than a kilometer away, the Kilrathi Fifth Fleet of the  Claw  passed by
in review.  The light frigates,  corvettes  and three  destroyer  groups had
already passed. The last of the heavy cruisers was just passing to port  and
now the first of the new carriers, Hagku'ka, came into view.
     Every fighter  had been launched  and moved in  formation ahead of  the
carrier,  three  and  a  half  eighties  of  fighters  arrayed  in  eight  V
formations. The  bow  of  the  carrier  came into view, the heavy  durasteel
forward  edge  studded with quad mounted mass driver guns  and  anti-torpedo
launch tubes. Three launch decks, one on either side and one  topside opened
into the vast interior of the ship,  which was  mostly comprised of the huge
hangar bays, workshops, and armament storage areas needed for the fighters.
     Internal bulkheads had been double layered, compartmentalizing the ship
so that even  if the forward  end was  shattered all the way back amidships,
the aft half could continue to  fight.  Three  belts of armor sealed off the
outside of the ship from the interior so that if a torpedo did penetrate the
phase shielding and  outer  layer  of armor, its  detonation would not burst
into the  vulnerable inner  decks and fuel  storage  areas. Sealed  internal
access shafts even allowed for the  transfer of  fighters  from one  bay  to
another for launching if a bay opening were shut down. Just aft of  amidship
three more launch bays were mounted pointing aft, in  the same configuration
as  the forward half of the ship. The six Yatug class engines were  actually
buried  inside  the  ship,  wrapped  in heavy  armor,  their  exhaust  vents
tunneling through thirty meters  of ship  before reaching  open space. If  a
spread of  missiles were closing from astern, the engines could be throttled
off and  the exhaust  vents slammed  shut, the missiles impacting impotently
against heavy durasteel. The shields  could then be retracted, or if need be
blown clear and the engines unharmed, fired back up.
     The  first carrier  passed,  followed by  four  more  and  the  Emperor
watched, speechless. So this was the culmination of years of secret planning
and the stripping of the best resources of the Empire. All for this, a fleet
of ships  unlike anything  ever before seen in  this sector of the universe.
When the war with the humans was done, such ships  could  even stand against
the Mantu, if they should dare to return.
     "Grandson, with this fleet victory is ours."
     "ъemember, my  Emperor,  the  fleet  is but half the size  we planned,"
Thrakhath said cautiously. "Victory should not be counted until the blood of
the prey is in one's mouth."
     The Emperor nodded, realizing that his  enthusiasm  had taken  hold too
deeply. He was still shaken by the murder attempt. It had been his  dream to
see at least one ceremony of Sivar in the burned ruins of Earth, for he knew
that it would not be much longer before his ancestors finally called.
     "Bring  me victory,"  the Emperor finally said, "that is all I ask. You
should take  Earth in time for Sivar, we'll celebrate it there. Be sure that
it is ready for my arrival."
     "Yes, my Emperor."
     "And as for Jukaga, have you found anything more?"
     "Three have  died under the question,  none have spoken. His path seems
to be  secured.  If  we put  him directly to  the  question, the other  clan
leaders would again object. That path is closed as well."
     "Then take him with you on this expedition," the Emperor said quietly.
     "Grandfather?"
     "You heard me.  I've  summoned him  to this ship,  he  is  in  the next
chamber. He is to go with you.
     "He is head of spies, it is not his role to be a fleet warrior."
     "He is a clan leader, a post of honor with the fleet he can not refuse.
I think you will know what to do with him once battle is joined."
     "It might be dangerous having him with us," the Prince replied.
     "You will find a way," and the Emperor turned, motioning for a guard to
open the door into a side chamber.

     * * * * *

     Baron  Jukaga entered, looking around cautiously. When  summoned to the
cruiser he had not known what to expect, and now the moment had come
     "Arise, my Baron. Was not the sight of our fleet wondrous?"
     Jukaga stood up again.
     "Wondrous."
     "And what of the Confederation government?"
     "Their senate still debates. It was reported however  that two carriers
sortied  from their main base above their moon with a third to soon  follow,
and that the shipyards are working full time to prepare those in drydock for
launching as well. Even though their government debates, their new president
is  acting  quickly,  with declaration  of war or without. There  have  been
forays by the Landreich into our territory, but no deep penetrations."
     "I cannot  even  begin  to  comprehend how  they function, the  Emperor
replied.
     Jukaga nodded as if in agreement.
     And that is why you never won, you old fool, he thought coldly.
     "I have a new assignment for you, Baron."
     He waited, tense and expectant.
     "You go with  the  fleet to speak to their leaders one more time before
we strike."
     The Baron  nodded.  Would they simply arrange  "an accident?"  That now
seemed to be the path.
     "I am  master  of  spies,  my  Emperor.  Would not one  of your warrior
leaders be more appropriate?"
     "You know this species  of  prey the  best. It is  your voice that they
know, let them hear it  one more time before we strike. You seemed disturbed
by  our ultimate  plans, let us  see if you can convince  them to submit and
thus save this species you seem to like so much."
     He looked around the room, which was filled with the leaders of the new
fleet. He was trapped and could not refuse.
     "As you command it, my Emperor."
     The Emperor turned away back to his grandson.
     "Your plan is set, then?"
     "Yes, my Emperor.  The fleet will  head towards the  frontier at  flank
speed. ъefueling  tankers  will accompany them so that  we  may move swiftly
without need of deploying  fuel  scoops. The Second Fleet of the Claw,  with
four  of our older carrier