Chapter one, making plans.

(Dustin)

The floor plating beneath his feet vibrated, and he braced himself, as the frigates reactors sent power to the primary drive. For the relatively quick trip to the jump gate, they could use normal space engines instead of the ship's spacial distortion accelerator.

Dustin rolled his eyes at the pretentious name, wondering if Callie was involved in naming the jump drive? He smiled at that thought. His comm rang softly, his wrist vibrating. Dustin leaned against a mat grey bulkhead, stepping back to be out of voice range of the captain Disallow and his new partner Martin.

His comm vibrated again, the small shards of composite clinging to his wrist in the shape of an old-fashioned watch. He channel power from his reservoir to the device, answering the incoming call.

"Hello?" Dustin said wearily.

"Cal Dustin, this is Veronica. There is something I wish to discuss."Veronica said, her tone accusing. Dustin bit his lip, looking into the command-and-control center to the sensory display. The frigate, the spear of Nakieł, had about twenty minutes before it matched relative speed and was lined to take an outbound jump gate.

It was on the outer edge of his home star system and bridged over five thousand light years to fringes of the Gwark system. He glanced to the sensory display, noting several warships sending out active sensors, combing the area around the jump gate.

Five cargo ships were arrayed in a line, each parked about forty thousand miles from each other, waiting patiently to be scanned before they could pass inbound to Proxima.His junior officer Martin stood up from his couch to approach, his expression curious. He couldn't blame the kid. To those who haven't experienced war, it sounds exciting.

Dustin waved Martin away, noting the young man's excited grin. Dustin grimaced. An official call from his mother couldn't be good. She was probably calling to scold him again for not noticing Taniyas' plans to run away?

That would be throwing more fuel on this fire, as he blamed himself for Taniya running away. Or she was calling to ask him why he was planning on leaving Valia so soon?

He gave Martin an accusing glare. The young man smiled back at him innocently, giving away nothing. Well, this was expected, but still unwelcome. Having his mother's oversight on his upcoming mission was going to be a pain. He smiled, well, at least until he left Zrixia's home star system.

"Good evening Veronica, how can I help you?" Dustin asked calmly. If he was strictly professional, maybe he wouldn't say something out of anger at his mother.

"I know what you are planning." She said dryly. His heart skipped a beat, but he took in a deep, calming breath. How could she have guessed his plan already? Which one of his carefully selected crew was an informant?

He glanced up to captain Disallow, and then to the far too eager Martin. On second thought, he already knew who the informant was.

Dustin glared at the new partner, Martin, knowing the junior officer was assigned by his mother. We'll partner was a polite way to say punishment. He could swear his mother assigned him to the most insufferable young officer she could find.

The kid was freshly graduated through Devali training and was an absolute stickler for the rules, a complete opposite of Callie. He scowled, anger boiling in his chest at the thought of Callie. If not for Callie, Taniya wouldn't have run away! His foolish little sister could get herself killed by trusting Callie, and it would be all his fault..

No, that wasn't fair. Taniya had reason to trust Callie. It was his mother's fault for putting out a very top secret kill, or capture order in the very highest levels of the Devali. He let his mother's question hang, calming his boiling anger.

If not for his mother's proclamation, Taniya wouldn't have left. She wouldn't have fled to the Tallax systems to find Callie. So much for holding his calm and acting professional. Deep breaths, Dustin, he told himself. Yelling and Veronica wouldn't accomplish anything.

"What do you think of my plan?" Dustin asked, his mood soured. Ever since Veronica gave him that order to kill or capture Callie on sight he couldn't talk to his mother without getting angry."It's bold, and will catch the enemy off guard, but we need to discuss details." Veronica said sternly.

"Sorry Veronica, I was planning on telling you."Dustin grumbled. Well, he was planning on telling her, but not until he was already on his borrowed a stealthy frigate. He had planned on leaving a heavily encoded message on one of the sensory platforms or patrol ships before transferring through the jump gate.

That way, he wouldn't have to talk with his mother in person. Veronica sighed.

"We can discuss our lack of communication later. Now tell me the details of this plan. I want to know how to spin this to the emperor if it goes sour."Veronica said, tiredly.

Dustin scowled at Veronica's accusing tone. Well, after his massive blunder by letting Callie infiltrate the Devali, his mother was weary for good reason. That didn't make Veronica's distrust in him sting any less. He cracked a smile. Callie actually inspired his plan.

Despite his frustration for that insufferable woman, he still missed her company. His mother cleared her throat, startling Dustin. Oh yeah crap, she was still waiting for him to explain his plan to infiltrate and destroy a Slax shipyard.

"Wellll, funny story. You know how Callie tricked me and gained my trust?" Dustin asked with a wince. Yes, it was hard to own up to his mistake, but he knew he messed up.

"How could I forget?" Veronica said dryly. Dustin ignored her accusing tone and pressed on.

"Well, despite my dislike of her methods, Callie had some good ideas. Actually, it may have been Taniyas idea? Well, it may have been a combination. Knowing them, it was a combination of both their ideas. "Dustin mumbled, watching the timer to reach the jump gate ticking down.

"Stop stalling. What is this idea?" Veronica asked impatiently.

Dustin took in a deep breath, composing his thoughts into something that sounded believable. Damn, maybe he should have ignored the call? "I'm going to use my frigate to capture a civilian freighter bound for the Gwark system. We will pretend to be merchants to get into enemy space.

The slax has established a forward staging base to block access to several jump gates. I want to get around them and hit them hard."Dustin said.

As for why he was revealing his plans over a comm, that was simple. Comms didn't use something so basic as radio waves to transmit. Comms used the art, sending out pulses through the spacial medium. So far, as far as he knew, no one discovered how to intercept that form of communication. With that in mind, he continued.

"We are going to borrow a cargo ship, infiltrate the shipyard and cause some serious problems for the slax."Dustin said.

"It could work. Your Slaxian is adequate to come across as a native. However, Martin isn't so convincing. You will need to tell him to speak as little as possible."Veronica said. "I'm aware of that but thank you for the reminder."Dustin said, annoyed. What he didn't say was, can you just let me do my damned job!?

"Sorry about that, I will shut up now and trust you have everything in hand."Veronica said. Dustin paused for a moment, surprised at her words. Ever since the Callie incident, Trust between them was very minimal. Veronica wanted to capture or kill Callie, while Dustin wanted to turn her into an ally.

He got his answer as a super top secret kill order on Callie. Dustin scowled at that thought, his heart racing. His mother hadn't even told him in person! She knew his feelings for Callie and yet. Dustin bit his lip hard, pushing back his anger.

"Any word about T?" Dustin asked softly, wanting to change his train of thoughts.

"Aside from the video footage of her leaving on a civilian transport ship, we are uncertain. I can only spare minimal resources to look for her. All of our assets are tasked with more important things right now. And besides, I don't have time to deal with a runaway teenager right now. We are at war. If she wants to go after Callie, there isn't much I can do to find her."Veronica said calmly.

Anger filled him. It made sense. Her logic was sound. And yet, he was still resentful that his mother could distance herself from Taniya so easily. Hidden in that statement was a clear stance. He knew that if he left in search of Callie, his mother wouldn't treat him any differently than the other Devali in her command. He grit his teeth. This must be another one of his mother's famous lessons?

"Can you look into it? It wouldn't inconvenience our people to be on the lookout for Taniya."Dustin asked. Veronica sighed, sounding weary. "Alright, I will send out a very low priority alert. But we can't even inform the navy, there communications traffic is suspect to hacking by the Slax. We don't want them finding out my daughter is vulnerable."Veronica replied sourly.

"Thank you, mother."Dustin said. "Don't get your hopes up. Finding a runaway teenager is at the bottom of the list for our field agents. Besides, all of our people in the Tallax system are trying to prove that the Tallax are funding groups of pirates to raid the fringes."Veronica warned.

"Do we have any evidence so far?" Dustin asked curiously.

"There is rumour and speculation. We are tracking transfers of crowns, but whoever is funding these pirates is using shell cooperations."Veronica said, annoyed.

"Can you send me a data packet? I want to analyze the information myself. Maybe I can uncover something you haven't?" Dustin asked thoughtfully.

His comm pinged, and a download bar slowly filled as the file was received. "Thanks, I got the file, if I discover anything I will leave an encrypted message in a drop site."Dustin said.

On the ship's sensory display, the massive jump gate was drawing closer, its structure an ominous framework in the sensors. "I'm only a minute away from passing through the jump gate. We will be cutting off soon."Dustin said, mesmerized by the extremely complex framework of metals and rare composites of the jump gate.

"Very well. Make sure to leave updates on your mission.. And Dustin, be careful son."Veronica said, her tone softening for once. The connection to his mother cut off. He let out a relieved sigh. Dustin watched the jump gate closely, knowing it was already going through its startup sequence.

For the startup sequence, the ship was still ten thousand miles away, coasting towards the event horizon at one thousand miles a second.

Dustin knew the jump gate was technically always on, it was just not in their local space time. He watched the sensors, watching as the gate drew on both positive and negative energy in sequence, creating a rift that spanned thousands of light years.

He tensed, knowing that if the gated didn't stabilize they would need to burn hard to avoid colliding with the jump gates framework.

The frontal cone of the ship approached within three thousand miles of the jump gate. With a flash of light that was blinding, the jump gate stabilized. He let out a sigh of relief, and within two seconds, the ship enter the event horizon. He grit his teeth as they came out the other side of the gate, still traveling at the relatively slow speed of one thousand miles a second.

He sighed, releasing the death grip on the straps holding him to the wall. Now for the worst part. They would need about a week of using the ship's jump drive to cross interstellar space to reach the Gwark system. Well, that was if they didn't need to take that highly delicate tech offline to repair it.

Dustin watched as the ship's pilots input coordinates into the ship's computer and the ship hummed. He frowned at the inexcusable humming. There wasn't anything in interstellar space besides stray hydrogen atoms to crash into, but still the humming was grating.

Well, maybe he could recalibrate the ship's distortion field to fix that annoying humming in the ship's drive? He had about a week of boredom, with nothing better to do, so why not?

Besides, maybe it could give him some inspiration for his project to create a jump bridge? That was unlikely with something so basic as a jump drive, but you never knew. Speaking of a jump bridge. With the power output from the ship's fusion reactors, could he get the power required for his hypothetical jump gate?

Dustin did the math, his head spinning. Nope, the standard frigate had two fusion reactors, one to power the major systems, shields and weapons, the other for normal space engines. Not to mention a highly specialized reactor to create and fold space, warping the fabric of reality to travel relatively short distances.

He droned his fingers on his chin and shook his head. That was a lot of power already required for normal ship operation. For a bridge spanning two thousand light years, it would require over a thousand times the power. Not to mention the power to stabilize the hypothetical jump bridge long enough for the ship to be pulled through.

For a test, he would need to convince the navy to give him a dreadnaught class battleship. Then he would need to requisition at least seven highly specialized reactors to create a sufficiently powerful rift in space.

He bit his lip, puzzling over the idea. Well, he had a week to iron out the kinks, and maybe by then he could have a plan that his mother might agree to? He chuckled softly. Right... His mother would just give him a freaking dreadnaught, the most powerful class of ship in their fleet to experiment on.