Into the Black

“Yes, Ambassador Nacht. Don’t worry, we’ll get you to Loyalist space just fine. But my job is to cut Imperial supply lines along the way.”

“Hitting logistics hubs like the one at Barnard’s Star and the two military transports we’ve taken will seriously curtail shipping for this whole sector, forcing the Imperials to shift some of their focus away from the front.”

“Well, ideally, we’ll convince them to start forming convoys, stripping defenses to keep their supply lines intact. They’re already short on escort vessels, from what I understand.”

“Yes, I enslaved the crews of the two transports, and disabled tackers. They’ll now serve as our fleet train to help resupply us as we fight. Missiles don’t grow on trees, after all.”

“Yes, don’t worry, Ambassador, barring any surprises at Katcheka, we’ll be in Loyalist space soon enough, and you’ll be able to use the Gateway in the Macross system to get back to the Confederacy.”

“No, the Black Star Fleet will be remaining, though we might have reinforcements by that time. We’re going back into Imperial space, and we’re going to raise hell.”

“Good night, Ambassador.”

I turned from the comm unit where I had been having a private conversation with the Ambassador over on the Artemis. The ship was cramped, what with the Ambassador and his staff there, but for a half-knelfi diplomat, Ambassador Michael Nacht was definitely able to roll with the punches, so long as you weren’t disrespecting him. I hadn’t gotten the full story, but scuttlebutt was that his Psy Mastery skills were all in the upper 90s, if not maxed, and his level was over a hundred. He was damn powerful, and touchy about his Honor, but apparently not as ‘kill them all and let God sort them out’ as he used to be before he met his wife, Bethany Anne Nacht.

At any rate, those two were ambassadors in name only. I had a feeling that, with war coming, those two were going to find a way to get into the thick of things. They sounded like real fighters. Wasn’t my problem, though, since I’d be dropping them off once we got to Loyalist space.

We’d made several attacks since striking Barnard’s Star, where we’d captured several freighters. We had forced the crews of the freighters and the station into escape pods, sent the freighters on a pre-programed course to a rendezvous point just outside Imperial space where the civilian side of the Black Star Fleet had crews waiting to take them over, and then blew the station to hell. I left a standard message beacon at the site of the former station, broadcasting the ‘new British Empire’ crap, just to confuse the situation a bit more.

The other attacks mostly ended with ships getting blown to scrap, since one shot from an Assassin-class corvette was enough to take out any civilian freighter, but on one run we’d managed to catch a pair of Vernon-class Imperial Navy transports. Heavily armored, designed for getting troops and supplies from a fleet base to the fleet while on the attack, the Vernons were the backbone of the Navy’s logistics. We captured two of them, recovering a whole mess of goodies, including extra missiles and ammunition, mil-spec rifles and sidearms, and enough power armor for all our tactical teams. Oh, and crates of implants to help augment the troops.