Steven Kent - The Clone Republic

“How did he do that?” Lee asked.

Nobody shhhhed Lee that time. We all wondered the same thing.

Thurston began pouring out a steady stream of commands.

“Have the Grant send out bombers,” Thurston said. “We need to finish those carriers before the rest of their fleet can regroup.”

“Hail the nearest frigate,” Thurston said. “Tell the captain that we require assistance.”

“Only one?” the communications officer asked.

“One will suffice,” Thurston said.

Until that moment, I had not noticed the toll that the al-Sadat ’s cannons had taken on the Inner Fleet’s fighters. They began their assault with 140 Harriers; now fewer than 50 of those fighters remained. As I tried to count the fighters, two large flashes lit up a far corner of the map. Thurston’s bombers made short work of the trapped carriers.

“Excellent,” Thurston said. I still expected his voice to crack. It didn’t. “Recall the attack wings to the Washington and the Grant .”

Thurston’s fighters broke off their attack as Klyber’s ships stuttered back to their end of the field. “They’re running!” the communications officer yelled, no longer trying to conceal his excitement. “They’re leaving their fighter escort stranded!”

“It would seem so,” Admiral Thurston said.

I stopped to consider the tides of this battle. The Central Fleet had begun the fight with thirteen fighter carriers, sixty-five frigates, and nine hundred fighter craft. The fleet still had eleven carriers. According to the scorecard at the base of the holographic display, Thurston had destroyed more than three hundred of Klyber’s fighters.

The war was won. I waited for Thurston to send his ships in for a final assault, but he sat silently watching his battle map.

“Admiral, the Central Fleet is preparing to evacuate,” a deck officer said.

“Yes, it is,” Thurston said.

“Shall we attack?”

“No. Let them go.”

A stunned silence filled the auditorium. Moments later, a door near Thurston’s mock helm slid open, and Admiral Klyber, flanked by several aides, stormed in. “You allowed my fleet to escape, Admiral Thurston?”

“Yes, sir,” Thurston said.

“Explain yourself,” Klyber demanded.

Robert Thurston sighed. “In its current configuration, the Inner SC Fleet is designed to win battles, Admiral, not wars.”

“You had my fleet at your mercy,” Klyber snapped. “You should have finished us.”

“If we pressed the attack, we would have joined you in a battle of attrition—my twelve carriers against your eleven,” Thurston said. “If we went in for the kill, I would have lost ships unnecessarily.”

Klyber smiled. “Sensible decision, Admiral. How would you reconfigure the fleet?” Klyber sounded interested, but there was something dangerous about the way he stared at Thurston. Sharp teeth hid behind his smile.

“Fighters and frigates are excellent ships for repelling enemy attacks,” Thurston said. “Having neutralized one-third of your fighters, I would need battleships and destroyers to finish your fleet.”

The simulation took place in the largest briefing room on the Kamehameha , an auditorium capable of seating three thousand people that was only used for important occasions. A more-than-capacity crowd had packed in. Once the seats were filled, lines of people squeezed in along the walls. We had come for theater-in-the-round.

Klyber asked several more questions. When he finished, Thurston’s three-man crew stood up from behind their computer consoles and applauded. Klyber and his aides clapped as well. Soon the theater erupted in applause.

Our new fleet commander nodded to his crew and walked briskly from the stage. He strode out of the auditorium without so much as a sideward glance. The applause, however, continued.

If his legend was to be believed, Klyber had never lost a combat simulation, not even as a freshman cadet. Of course, good records have a way of becoming unblemished when there is little chance of verification. Whether or not he was truly undefeated, prior to that match, Bryce Klyber was generally considered unbeatable in simulated space battles.

Over the next three weeks, the seemingly tireless Robert Thurston visited all twenty-five carriers in the Scutum-Crux Fleet. He took on all but one of the captains in simulated battles. (Captain Dickey Friggs of the St. Ignatius complained of fatigue and said he was in no condition for a fight.) The simulations always ended quickly and decisively, with Thurston on top.

Admiral Klyber’s campaign to legitimize Robert Thurston succeeded in every corner of the fleet except one. Walking toward Bryce Klyber’s office on what would turn out to be my last visit, I saw signs of open disdain toward the new fleet commander.

Everywhere else in the fleet they called him Admiral Thurston; but on the command deck, he was “Bobby, boy genius” or sometimes simply “the boy.” In the time that I spent waiting to meet Admiral Klyber, I heard jokes about “the boy’s” voice changing, his testicles dropping during battle, and a pretty good one-liner about him offering spiked milk and cookies to his officers so that they would let him stay up past his bedtime.

Sitting in the waiting room, I listened to the bits of humor in silence. What kind of jokes did they tell about clones? And another question—If Thurston hadn’t wowed these people with his strategic skills, what would impress them?

The door to Admiral Klyber’s office slid open, and he entered the doorway. “Corporal Harris,” he said.

As I followed Klyber into his office, I heard an aide whisper, “The admiral’s pet clone.” It took real effort to pretend I had not heard it.

“Your mercenary friend is making quite a name for himself,” Klyber said, as we crossed his office. “Freeman is walking a very fine line. He does a lot of piecework in this arm. According to the local authorities, some of his clients are worse than the hoodlums he brings in.”

Klyber sat down behind his desk. I looked over his shoulder for a moment and stared out the viewport behind him. The Kamehameha had entered an odd phase of its orbit. I could not see Terraneau, just the blanket of space and an occasional frigate.

“Sit down, Corporal,” Klyber said, pointing toward one of the chairs before his desk. As I took my seat, he asked, “What do you think of Rear Admiral Thurston?”

“He knows his way around a combat simulation,” I said.

“I’ve never seen the like,” Klyber agreed. “I hear there is a rumor going around that I let Thurston win. I would never stage a loss, not even to improve fleet morale. I don’t see how my losing could possibly boost morale.”

“No, sir,” I said. I had not heard that rumor, and I doubted that anybody outside SC Command had. Rumors like that only existed among ass-kissing officers vying for a promotion. As far as I could tell, Thurston’s victories had gone a long way toward improving ship morale.

Once the topic shifted to Thurston, Klyber spoke in short bursts. He leaned over his desk as he spoke, then sat back in his chair and drummed his fingers on the armrests of his chair when I answered his questions.

“That was a very unorthodox move, leaving a capital ship unguarded during a fighter attack. Moves like that can cost an entire battle.”

“Did he tell you how he knew where to send the Washington and the Grant , sir?” I asked.

“Yes,” said Klyber, sounding aggravated. “Yes, he did. He said that my flash attack meant that I wanted to put him in a defensive posture. He said my opening attack was either the wasteful move of an amateur strategist or an obvious attempt to herd an enemy out of position. The cocky little prick told one of my aides that he gave me the benefit of the doubt.”