Mission to Sector ZZ1219 Read online

  MISSION TO SECTOR ZZ 1219

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  MISSION TO SECTOR ZZ 1219

  By Jerry D. Young

  Published by Creative Texts Publishers

  PO Box 50

  Barto, PA 19504

  www.creativetexts.com

  Copyright 2018 by Jerry D. Young

  All rights reserved

  Cover photos used by license.

  Design copyright 2018 Creative Texts Publishers, LLC

  This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by United States of America copyright law.

  The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual names, persons, businesses, and incidents is strictly coincidental. Locations are used only in the general sense and do not represent the real place in actuality.

  Kindle Edition

  MISSION TO SECTOR ZZ-1219

  JERRY D. YOUNG

  Prolog

  -

  “Gunderson! Disengage! Disengage! Re-group! Don’t…”

  It was too late. Gunderson’s F-321 Fleet Space Fighter disintegrated.

  “Bogeys are dispersing, Captain! Should we pursue?”

  “Negative, Claymore Three. Negative. Claymore Flight form on me. Claymore Five, hustle it up. You are way out of position. You just saw what happens out here when you leave formation. Now close up!”

  The radios stayed silent after the Captain’s harsh order. The four remaining F-321 combat craft of Claymore Flight maneuvered into a tight formation with the sleek Dominator Attack Craft flown by Captain William Butler in the lead.

  It was a subdued group that met for the debriefing.

  “Look, Cap,” said Charlie, “you took out three of them before Gunderson got pulled away…”

  “Captain,” called out a harried looking Spaceman Two-Stripe rating, “Ops wants you on deck, on the double. Supposed to let Lieutenant Chambers handle the debrief.”

  “Now what?” muttered the Captain. “Very well, Spaceman. Tell the Commander I will be right there. Charlie, take over. And I don’t consider losing Gunderson as worth getting three of them.”

  “Bill, I did not mean…”

  “I know, Charlie, I know. Look, go over protective formations and cover fire with everyone again. No telling how long this is going to take.”

  Charlie nodded and Captain Butler followed the Spaceman rating, still talking on his communicator.

  He had left the flight helmet with Charlie to put in his gear bag to bring to the Officer’s quarters later, but he did not take time to change out of the flight suit. Even in the flight suit the Captain presented a striking sight as he entered the operations center for the Confederation Space Navy base.

  His tall frame was lean, without an ounce of excess fat. His face showed some signs of his near exhaustion, but only to those that knew him very well. To everyone else, the wide spread blue eyes and sardonic smile on his face spoke only his determination to make the sector safe from whoever was making the attacks on not only military and merchant fleet targets, but civilian targets as well.

  His sharp salute put a slight smile on Base Commander Vice-Admiral Calhoun’s face. “At ease, Captain.” The smile faded. “I heard we lost another craft and pilot.”

  “Yes, sir. Gunderson. Just a kid. Got too eager. He is…was…good. If he had been in a decent combat craft, he would probably still be alive and the Ecronians would be down at least one, if not two, raiders.”

  The Commander frowned. “Captain, you know the Governor has stated emphatically that we are dealing with pirates, not Ecronians.”

  “Yes, sir,” Captain Butler said, rather sharply, drawing another deep frown from his commander. “But we both know that some of the activity is not pirates. It is Ecronian.”

  “I do not know that, and neither do you. It would behoove you, Captain, to keep those kinds of comments completely to yourself.”

  “Yes, sir,” replied the Captain. “The Spaceman said my presence was requested.”

  Brusque now, the Commander said, “Yes. Apparently one of your requests for equipment has been approved by the Governor.”

  “She going to let us have toilet paper for the enlisted quarters?” popped out before Butler could prevent it.

  “That will be enough, Captain!” Commander Calhoun said.

  “Yes, sir. My apologies, sir.”

  “I don’t want your apologies, Captain. I want and expect the performance of your duties as directed, without comments.”

  Stiffly Captain Butler responded, “Yes, Sir!”

  “Now,” Commander Calhoun continued, as he led the way toward his office, “you are to receive two Triple Seven combat craft and an experienced pilot to train your squadron on them.”

  “Yes, sir,” Butler replied. Two craft to replace the fifteen they had lost the last year. The Triple Seven was a newer model combat craft than the F-321, but he knew it had significant weaknesses for the type of action it would see in the sector.

  It was useless, even counterproductive, to voice the thoughts, so he kept them to himself. Instead, he asked, “When can we expect delivery, Sir? And do you know who is being sent to do the training? McCormick was an ace in the Triple Seven during the Transition Campaign.”

  “I don’t know who it is, but I do know it’s not McCormick. He was pulled Earthside to assist in the Transition. As to when they are to be here, assuming the pirates don’t take out the trader’s ship, delivery should be in less than three weeks, last report I had.”

  “Yes, sir. Next week, Sir. Is that all Sir?”

  “No, it is not.” Commander Calhoun sat down behind his desk and looked up at Captain Butler. “I would suggest you improve your attitude toward Governor Myers. She has requested you to be her escort at the Inaugural Ball.”

  “Sir, with all due respect,” Captain Butler quickly said, “she simply had her appointment as sector governor re-approved. This inaugural ball is not appropriate. If someone must attend as her escort, it should be Admiral Wainshaw, as Base Commander.”

  “Not only did she request you personally, Captain, but General Wainshaw and I are both married and will be attending with our wives.”

  “I respectfully decline the invitation, sir,” Captain Butler replied, standing at attention before the desk.

  “It is not an invitation, Captain. You will be at the Governor’s Mansion, two days prior to the ball for protocol instruction. You will be ready to escort the Governor, wearing your dress uniform three hours prior to the scheduled start of the ball. Do I make myself clear, Captain?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Very good. You are dismissed.” It was more a wave of the hand than a salute that sent Captain Butler out of the Commander’s office. The captain saluted, turned sharply on his heel, and marched out.

  When he met up with Charlie in the BOQ, the Bachelor Officers Quarters, where the unmarried Officers lived if they did not have their own accommodations, Charlie could tell his friend was even less happy than usual. He gave a low whistle when he heard the explanation. “Come on, Bill, drop planetside and go in to Smokey’s with us. It will do you good to have a night out.”

  “Charlie, I’m patrolling with Scimitar Squadron tomorrow. I need to get some rest.”

  “You can’t fly every mission with every squadron, Bill,” Charlie said quietly. />
  “I know, I know… But the guys are so inexperienced. We’re losing them faster than they can send them out here.”

  Captain Butler ran his hands through his rather shaggy, light brown hair. “Okay, Okay. I’ll go in with you for a little while. But don’t get insulted if I don’t drink.”

  “Just getting you off this base for a few hours will do you good. There’s supposed to be a real live female type singer at Smokey’s now.”

  “You say that like it’s a good thing, Charlie. You do remember the last time he brought in live… uh… talent…”

  Charlie laughed. “Still, she was female. There aren’t that many of them out here, you know. You may be a confirmed bachelor, but I’d kind of like to find a nice…”

  Captain Butler shook his head went into the bathroom to shower, cutting off what Charlie wanted to find.

  Bill let the hot water beat down on his head, neck, shoulders, and back, trying to ease the tension. He was weary beyond anything he had felt during the entire initial wars, and then the Transition Campaigns. And the Confederation was ostensibly at peace.

  Another patrol under his leadership had engaged the enemy, losing members of the squadron to better equipment and training. And, even knowing he fought harder and better than the enemy and his own pilots, and that they held off the force again, he still felt the pain of losing people, knowing that things will be the same the next day. And the day after that. And the day after that…

  Only his personal craft that had shipped out with him, a state-of-the-art Dominator, had kept things from being worse. He smiled ever so slightly, remembering when he had gone to the Scanlon Galactic plant to pick it up.

  One of his assignments near the end of the war had been serving with the military development group working with Scanlon Galactic in the development of the new craft, before being assigned to the Governor’s sector, ZZ-1219.

  He had made some good friends in the corporation, and with some of the Quartermaster’s Corps people also working on the project. Captain Butler was very well liked and respected, so had been able to not only take the test bed Dominator with him, but managed, still, to get a few limited special resupply items through outside channels.

  “Maybe the Triple Sevens will make a difference,” he thought, though was not really counting on it.

  Eyes closed, he thought back to those earlier days in his career. Having started in the Triumvirate military forces as a raw Spaceman No-Stripe recruit, he had advanced quickly, his intelligence and drive allowing him to excel at every task assigned during his training. His first attempt in the flight simulator caught the attention of the Commander of the Training Academy.

  His experiences as a youth working with his father in the Earth Asteroid Belt, piloting jumpers for his father’s mining company, had served him well for the military space forces. He was already a Lieutenant JG in the Fighter Wing of one of the Triumvirate’s huge System Defense Carrier groups, serving on the main carrier itself, when the Ecronians made their first incursion into Earth controlled space.

  The fights were long and bloody, but the Triumvirate was able to fight the Ecronians first to a draw and then enough to drive them out of the area completely.

  But even though the military Triumvirate’s rule had been fairly benevolent, almost from day one, and had successfully fought off the worst danger Earth had ever faced, the long war had turned many of the citizens more than a bit anti-military.

  The military Triumvirate had always been intended as a short-term solution to earlier problems, with promises and other assurances that the military would see to it that honest, open elections were held at some point.

  It would be up to the citizens to decide on the form of government they wanted permanently, and then to elect those that would be a part of it. So, not long after it was clear that the Ecronians had actually fled, the process of changing over to a civilian government from the Triumvirate began.

  Not everyone was as in favor of that plan as others. Always fighting on the side of the Triumvirate and the future official government, now Lieutenant Commander William ‘Telstar’ Butler made even more of a name for himself during the initial steps of changing forms of government, and then the Transition Campaigns right after the Constitutional Confederation was formed and officially took over.

  Those wanting a return to military rule had been only a rather small portion of those that did not want the Confederation. There were many more issues and beliefs at stake, not all of which ever became common knowledge.

  By the time he became Captain, Bill had become very aware of some of them. And that even the Confederation had some issues that were not at all to his liking. Corruption seemed to be part and parcel to every human government that had ever existed, and this one was no exception.

  Though the transition was nearing completion, with local elected governing bodies in almost all sectors of the human inhabited Milky Way Galaxy, there were still a few on the very edges of the areas humans controlled that were still under the leadership and control of Triumvirate appointed Governors.

  On each Sector Capitol World, a planetside combination Space Navy & Space Marine, Global Army, and Civilian Space Merchant base supported the government, and with only a couple of exceptions, each Capital world boasted one or more Bastion High-Mass-Core Moon-Ship bases in orbit around the world with similar arrangements.

  Around many worlds, both Capitol Worlds and simply allied worlds, there were often several more of the Moon-Ship Bases. Some civilian, some corporate, some specialized military planetary defense bases. There also many Galactic Trader Family bases supporting the multitude of Galactic Trader Family Gravity-Wheel ships plying space, doing a significant portion of the commerce between systems and planets.

  Unfortunately, in Captain Butler’s opinion, Sector ZZ-1219 was one of those that had only the one small combination Moon-Ship base. The military parts were poorly equipped and staffed. Planetary defenses were essentially non-existent, with the exception of the lone Space Navy Space Fighter Wing attached to the base.

  The Space Fighter Wing was the most ill-equipped and staffed of all the units. And Captain Butler had begun to suspect it might be intentional. As unlikely as it sounded, he even wondered at times if the hand of the Sector’s current Civilian Governor, Governor Meyers, might be part of it.

  Many of the other outlying sectors, that had suffered Ecronian attacks and barely survived intact, had made sure such a thing would not happen again. And in doing so, with the patrols and readiness to take a fight to anyone, Ecronian or otherwise, to include the Pirates that had proliferated during the final days of the war and subsequent confusion of the transition, were maintained adequately at the very least, and often as well as the primary sectors.

  It was difficult to believe that any human would cooperate in any way with Ecronians, but the idea of an official of the Confederation would do so was almost unthinkable. Captain Butler, whenever the Governor entered his mind in relation to that, quickly put it out of his mind. It really was inconceivable.

  Hopefully.

  And there was mounting evidence of collusion between someone at some level in the government and at least one of the Pirate groups operating in the sector. In the early days of the rather precarious peace, Captain Butler had been dispatched to Sector ZZ-1219 to command the Fighter Wing, to help re-equip and improve it after the devastation it suffered fighting off the Ecronians.

  Despite the orders from High Command on Earth, Captain Butler had been stymied at every turn. It did not take him long to realize that both General Wainwright and Vice-Admiral Calhoun had been posted to Sector ZZ-1219 to get them away from any of the rebuilding of the military forces, where their lackluster command qualities could be a major problem.

  Both were well aware that High Command knew they were not very good officers. And, they knew they were in their last commands, and now even less willing to create any waves of any kind. Essentially rubberstamping any action Governor Meyers made. Both kept a
low profile, waiting for their commissions to end so they could head for Earth and a cushy retirement.

  With only mostly outdated Confederation military equipment available, and what seemed to be the lowest qualified personnel being transferred to the sector as replacements to those lost or leaving the service; the chances of Sector ZZ-1219 surviving intact another Ecronian incursion was slim, thought Captain Butler.

  With the High Command distracted by the central governments’ belief that extended war was inevitable, despite the recent peace agreement, and steps being taken to build up military forces, but so far only in areas that are most at risk, very little attention was paid to Sector ZZ-1219, since it did seem to be in good hands.

  Captain Butler had not even an inkling of the depth and breadth of the real plans being made in the sector by those that were keeping the sector weak as could be.

  Captain Butler shook his head, aware that he was not going to solve the problems of the sector in the shower, and turned off the water, ready to get dressed to go planetside with his friends and military companions.

  Captain Butler was still muttering to himself, “Live female singer! Sure. I’d have to see genetic test results to be sure of that; and calling her… it… whatever… a singer is like calling a… Geez! I can’t even think of a suitable bad comparison,” when he left Smokey’s to take a jumper back up to the base less than an hour after arriving.

  Chapter One

  -

  “How come you’re riding with us instead of that cruiser in orbit?” Sydney asked Johnny.

  Johnny did a quick scan of the instruments over Clyde’s and Sydney’s shoulders.

  “What cruiser?” Johnny asked, a tiny smile curving his lips.

  “That one over there,” Clyde said pointing to a spot of light near the planetary horizon.

  “See, here it is on radar,” Sydney said, indicating the computer display.

  “I don’t see a cruiser,” Johnny said, projecting himself backwards from the cockpit with a tiny motion of his hand against the bulkhead.