SpecOps (Expeditionary Force Book 2)

  SpecOps

  Book 2 of Expeditionary Force

  By Craig Alanson

  Text copyright © 2016 Craig Alanson

  All Rights Reserved

  Contact the author at craigalanson@gmail.com

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Contents

  SpecOps

  Text copyright © 2016 Craig Alanson

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY THREE

  CHAPTER ONE

  The Flying Dutchman shuddered again, with sounds of groaning and the terrifying shriek of metal composites being torn apart. The displays on the bridge flickered, and the air was filled with alarm bells and klaxons from almost every system. "Skippy! Get us out of-"

  The ship shook violently again. "Direct hit on Number Four reactor," Skippy announced calmly, "reactor has lost containment. I am preparing it for ejection. Ejection system is offline. Pilot, portside thrusters full emergency thrust on my mark."

  "Ready," Desai acknowledged in as calm a voice as she could manage.

  "Mark. Go!" Skippy shouted.

  Whatever they were doing, it was more than the ship's already stressed artificial gravity and inertial compensation systems could handle, normally ship maneuvers were not felt at all by the crew. This time, I lurched in the command chair and had to hang on, as the ship was flung to the right. There was a shudder, actually a wave of ripples traveling along the ship's spine, accompanied by a deep harmonic groaning. No ship should ever make a sound like that.

  "Ah, damn it. Reactor Four is away, it impacted Reactor Two on the way out, shutting down Two now." Skippy's voice had a touch of strain to it. "Missiles inbound. Diverting all remaining power to jump drive capacitors. Hang on, this is going to be close."

  The main display indicated the jump drive was at a 38% charge, Skippy had told us that with the Dutchman trapped inside the Thuranin destroyer squadron's damping field, we needed a 42% charge for even a short jump, and that still carried a severe risk of rupturing the drive. If that happened, we would never know it, we'd simply be dead between one picosecond and another.

  The missile symbols on the display, seven of them, were coming in fast. Two of the symbols disappeared as I watched, destroyed by our ship's point defense particle beams. The other five missiles continued toward us, fast, fuzzing our sensors with their stealth fields and weaving as they bored in. One more missile destroyed. Four still moving fast.

  Jump drive at 40%.

  Too close.

  I turned the knob to release the plastic cover over the self-destruct button, and turned to look through the glass wall into the CIC compartment. "Colonel Chang."

  He nodded, and I saw him flip back the cover to the other self-destruct button, the confirmation. "Sir." He looked me straight in the eye, and saluted.

  I returned the salute. "Colonel Chang, we have been down a long, strange road together. It's been an honor serving with you." My left thumb hovered over the self-destruct button. The ship was dying anyway. This was my fault. How the hell had I gotten us into this mess?

  I'd better start at the beginning.

  My name is Joe Bishop, I’m a sergeant, temporarily holding the theater rank of colonel, in the United States Army. Neither rank matters much at the moment, since I’m aboard a stolen alien starship over a thousand lightyears from Earth. Believe it or not, the United Nations Expeditionary Force has put me in command of our ship, a Thuranin star carrier we unwisely named the Flying Dutchman. I have, I think, good common sense, and, everyone else would agree, a history of getting into trouble. Big trouble. And a history of getting out of trouble. If you ask me, I’ve been in the right places at the wrong time. My critics would say that I am one lucky son of a bitch. My mother is not a bitch, but other than that, they may have a point. Skippy, our ancient alien talking beer can combination mascot and artificial super intelligence, says there is no such thing as luck, that humans believe in luck because our dumb monkey-level linear thinking has no idea how the universe works.

  Whatever.

  When the Flying Dutchman went outbound through the wormhole near Earth, and Skippy shut down the wormhole behind us, I have to admit a tiny, tiny part of me was disappointed that the ship didn't immediately explode into a bazillion pieces. One of our cargo holds has a dozen tactical nukes from the American inventory, we only need one to vaporize the ship and erase all trace that humans were roaming the galaxy, but somebody had a coupon, or they were cheaper by the dozen at Nukes 'R Us or something, so we had eleven extras. No, they aren't available as last-minute birthday gifts, thanks for asking. When Skippy confirmed the wormhole had been shut down behind us, deactivated it this time, not merely temporarily disrupted its connection to the network or whatever, a tiny part of me hoped that UNEF had somehow snuck behind Skippy's back and set a nuke to explode right then.

  You ever been on a cliff or the balcony of a really tall building, and you look over the edge with butterflies in your stomach, and you're afraid of falling, but a tiny part of you wants to jump? A tiny part of you, that you're afraid you won't be able to control, wants to jump? You're afraid of being near the edge, because you think you might not be able to control yourself, that you might feel compelled to jump? I read somewhere that is because part of your brain can't stand the tension, and wants the tension to just go away, even if the solution kills you. No? Never had that happen to you? Hey, I'm afraid of heights, that's why I never signed up for Army parachute training. Flying in a Blackhawk helo with the door open hadn't bothered me much, as long as I could hear the engines howling above my head, I figured we'd be all right. Being on my parents' house roof stringing Christmas lights, now that kind of thing scared the hell out of me. Scared me enough that, every February I had argued with my mother against taking the lights down. Why go through the trouble of taking them down, I asked? Sure, most of the year our neighbors would grumble that the Bishop family were lazy procrastinators, but by October, maybe November, we'd begin to look like proactive geniuses. Right?

  My mother never fell for that argument. The Christmas lights were always down by Super Bowl weekend.

  In this case it wasn't heights I was afraid of, my fear was of the unknown, of being responsible for all the people aboard the ship, and, if one of my screw-ups meant our enemies discovered humans had stolen a Thuranin star carrier, of me being responsible for the destruction of humanity. If the Dutchman had exploded beyond my control, I wouldn't have to be concerned about my inevitable screw-ups.

  UNEF hadn't set a nuke to explode, or they did, and Skippy of course discovered their plan and stopped it. It would have been easier for everyone if the Dutchman had become a rapidly expanding sphere of subatomic particles. Either way, we were still alive
and I had to continue the mission as planned. Darn.

  If the Dutchman had exploded, it would have killed seventy people. Our new not-so-Merry Band of Pirates was fifty eight military personnel, and a dozen civilian scientists. This time, we were semi-officially a Merry Band of Pirates, everyone had on their uniform the paramecium-with-eyepatch logo that Skippy designed for us. Even the scientists were given a patch on their official mission jackets, so far I hadn’t seen many of the scientists wearing those jackets, and I wasn’t going to make an issue of it. Scientists, civilians, didn’t worry me. What did concern me is that, this time, the military units assigned to the Dutchman were from SpecOps units; elite special forces troops and hotshot pilots.

  By the way, when I left Earth the first time, I'd been current on military slang, at least, US military slang. On Camp Alpha and later on Paradise, we'd called the United Nations Expeditionary Force 'UNEF', pronounced You-Neff. That's what people on Earth called it before we left, but after that, governments had wanted to emphasize the glorious contributions of their own armed forces to fighting the horrible Ruhar, so they'd stopped mentioning the 'UN' part of 'UNEF' and just called us the Expeditionary Force, or ExFor. The name Exfor sounded cool, and it stuck. A bit later, when people and their governments began to regret the alliance with the Kristang, the governments in UNEF tried to emphasize again the United Nations part, as if the governments that were part of UNEF had no responsibility for what had happened. By that time, it was too late, 'ExFor' had stuck in the public's mind.

  The mission was technically under the command of the United Nations Expeditionary Force Special Operations Command directorate. Yeah, that's a mouthful to say. And in reality, I was in command all by myself, because as soon as the Dutchman jumped away from Earth orbit, we were on our own. If things went well, UNEF SOCOM would take credit. If things went sideways, they would heap the blame on me. That's the way it works.

  When Special Operations Command assigned our crew, I first called the new Merry Band of Pirates 'SOCOM', then I quickly learned all the cool kids used the term 'SpecOps', pronounced like Speck Opps. Although when I, a soldier who had never been in a special operations unit, tried to be a cool kid by saying SpecOps, I got some weird looks. I was learning.

  Let me explain about SpecOps, or special forces, troops. My knowledge comes from observing, and certainly not from experience. Whether they are US Navy SEALs, US Army Rangers, British SAS or in any other military service on Earth, SpecOps soldiers are all bad-asses, and they know it. Getting into special forces units requires incredible commitment to meet tough physical standards, and much more importantly, mental toughness.

  You know those guys, or girls, in high school or even before that, who already knew exactly what they wanted to do in life? They were completely focused, in great physical shape, getting up at 5AM for swimming or hockey practice or running or lifting weights before school. They got good grades, studied hard, never slacked off, the adults always liked them. They were great athletes, intense even in practices. Most importantly, they were serious, serious about life, even as young teenagers, at a time when most of us were drifting along or flailing through life, having no idea what we wanted. Those guys and girls? They are where SpecOps troops come from. They're better than most of us, certainly better than me. I am a reasonably dedicated soldier, proud to wear the uniform. No way could I qualify for special forces. The physical stuff I could train myself up to do, I'm pretty sure. The difference is, I would never want to train that hard. I don't have the internal discipline, or the drive, to work that hard, I simply don't have enough desire to do it. I greatly admire the people who do make that level of commitment, and I'm glad I don't have to.

  Special forces are the best of the best, and the Dutchman got the best people from Special Operations commands of the five nations in UNEF. I couldn't imagine the competition that had gone on for slots aboard the Dutchman, the only thing I was sure of is that I would never have qualified.

  Our new merry band of pirates completely intimidated me. They were tougher than me, smarter than me, more dedicated, more driven, better soldiers and human beings in almost every way I could think of. And I was in command of these super humans. Me. I wasn't worthy. They knew it. I knew it.

  Part of being officially in command of an actual UNEF mission, instead of being the do-it-yourself leader of a pirate ship, was the mountains of official paperwork, even if paper had been replaced by iPads. I hated it, I had never been good at dealing with boring details. "Joe," Skippy said to me while I was in my office the day after we left the wormhole behind, trying to deal with the tedious administrative details of being a commander. "I have a question for you. Technically, a complaint."

  "Ayuh. Write it on a piece of paper, and put it in the suggestion box."

  "We have a suggestion box?" He asked, sounding genuinely surprised.

  "Yup. It's in the closest black hole. Just drop it in, and wait."

  "Oh, ha, ha. Very funny, Joey."

  "A black hole will get you the same result as a suggestion box, so-"

  "All right, I get the message. Anyway, I was looking at the crew roster database on your iPad-"

  "Oh, man, don't remind me, please, I've got enough of this damned administrivia to deal with already."

  "This is an easy one, Joe. I noticed there's no entry for me in the crew roster. I'm not even listed as a passenger, and I'm clearly crucial to the proper operation of the ship. I should be listed as part of the crew."

  "I'm sorry, Skippy, I didn't know you cared." Damn, our super powerful alien AI was sensitive about the oddest things. He hated it when he was considered differently than any other sentient being aboard the ship. "You're right, that's my fault. I'll input your data right now. Oh, and I see you've already helpfully pulled up the input screen on my iPad for me. Did you save the report I spent the last twenty minutes writing?"

  "Yeah, like humanity needs to read that mindless drivel. I'd be doing monkeykind a favor by erasing that crap. Sure, it's, uh, saved."

  "It had better be, I already forgot what the hell I wrote in that report. First item in the crew roster is given name, so I'll input 'Skippy'. Second item is surname-"

  "The Magnificent."

  "Really?"

  "It is entirely appropriate, Joe."

  "Oh, uh huh, because that's what everyone calls you," I retorted sarcastically, rolling my eyes. Not wanting to argue with him, I typed in 'TheMagnificent'. "Next question is your rank, this file is designed for military personnel."

  "I'd like 'Grand Exalted Field Marshall El Supremo'."

  "Right, I'll type in 'Cub Scout'. Next question-"

  "Hey! You jerk-"

  "-is occupational specialty."

  "Oh, clearly it should be Lord God Controller of All Things."

  "I'll give you that one, that is spelled A, S, S, H, O, L, E. Next-"

  "Hey! You shithead, I should-"

  "Age?" I asked.

  "A couple million, at least. I think."

  "Mentally, you're a six year old, so that's what I typed in."

  "Joe, I just changed your rank in the personnel file to 'Big Poopyhead'." Skippy laughed.

  "Five year old. You're a five year old."

  "I guess that's fair," he admitted.

  "Sex? I'm going to select 'n/a' on that one for you," I said.

  "Joe, in your personnel file, I just updated Sex to 'Unlikely'."

  "This is not going well, Skippy."

  "You started it!"

  "That was mature. Four year old, then. Maybe Terrible Twos."

  "I give up," Skippy snorted. "Save the damned file and we'll call it even, Ok?"

  "No problem. We should do this more often, huh?"

  "Oh, shut up."

  I thought that was the end of it, until five minutes later, when Sergeant Adams called me. "Sir, I'm looking at the crew training roster, and Skippy is now listed as 'Asshole, First Class'?"

  "Oh, damn it," I hadn't thought anyone would look at the stupid ros
ter. "I'll change the darned thing."

  "No need, sir, it certainly describes him," Adams laughed.

  "That it does."

  "Also, the required training schedule under your name now lists 'potty training'. I thought you should know. Also it says you need to learn about the 'bird and the bees'."

  "Oh, crap. Skippy and I had a talk a few minutes ago, it looks like I need another one."

  "You think that's going to change anything?" She asked skeptically.

  "Not really."

  It wasn't only me, every one of the original Merry Band of Pirates was intimidated by our new all-star crew. The second night after we left the now-deactivated wormhole behind, I'd gone into the galley at 4AM, unable to sleep, wanting a cup of coffee and some human company. Before getting dressed, I checked my iPad for the Uniform of the Day, posted by Colonel Chang as the ship's executive officer. Most days, we wore cammies, and on Mondays, we would be wearing dress uniforms to dinner. Today was the standard summer service uniform, or whatever each country's military had as the equivalent. When I got to the galley, to my surprise, I found Lt Colonel Chang, Major Simms, Captain Giraud and Captain Desai sitting at a table, bleary-eyed and drinking coffee. After I poured a cup for myself, Sergeant Adams walked in, and I handed a cup to her.

  There we were, the six of us, alone in the galley. The six members of the original Merry Band of Pirates who were still aboard the ship. We'd been through so much together, so much we hadn't expected to survive, that I felt like hugging them all. I refrained, because Sergeant Adams would have punched me if I tried to hug her. Instead, I bumped fists with Adams, and handed her a cup of coffee.

  "This is a coincidence," I observed.

  "For you, sir, maybe," Adams replied, sitting down across from Giraud. "My duty shift starts in an hour."

  "Mine also." Simms said over a mouthful of coffee.

  "I couldn't sleep." Chang said simply.

  "Same here," I said. I sat down next to Desai and raised my cup for a toast. "To the original merry band of pirates. Especially those who didn't make it home."