Traditions of Courage (Grimm's War Book 7) by Jeffery H. Haskell

Author:Jeffery H. Haskell [Haskell, Jeffery H.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Aethon Books
Published: 2024-06-04T00:00:00+00:00

Mike Armold had only left his flag bridge to sleep since the disaster of their orbital insertion. The fact that he’d destroyed ninety percent of the enemy forces in the battle for orbit did nothing to comfort him. The Guild man who ran the ground operation, General Finlay, was dead. He’d lost one of his cruisers and sent the other off to get help. The three support ships that should have arrived with logistics support hadn’t. His only clue was that one of them had sent a distress call.

Worse, the ground force commander wouldn’t update him, or even speak to him. Mike knew that there was something going on beyond the usual Guild operations. If Finlay were still alive, he would have filled him in. There had to be something he could do to assist, though.

“Joshua, can you try calling the ground again? Sitting up here waiting isn’t doing anyone any good.”

His XO didn’t look his way but acknowledged the order by simply passing it on to the comms station. Arnold didn’t complain about the lack of decorum. He should have, but that time was back when he had taken command. Now he was a flag admiral without a flag. Nine hundred crew aboard the Revenge, and he was the most expendable. Mike Arnold had never contemplated suicide before, but at that moment, he felt utterly and hopelessly useless. Worse, he knew that upon his return to Guild space, death was the likely outcome for his failure.

It’s not like anyone would miss me.

Arnold shook those thoughts away. There had to be something he could do to turn the situation around. Pulling up his orders, he read them carefully, aloud, one more time.

“Assist ground forces, control orbit, bomb the military bases, leave the civilian population alone.”

An idea began to form. There was a lot of leeway in control orbit. The forces on the ground hadn’t responded to his requests, and he was forbidden from bombing the planet… What if he took the ship out to a farther orbit to look around? Battleships were massive—terrible at fighting smaller ships—but they were all but indestructible unless they were fighting other battleships. He really had nothing to fear from a dozen destroyers, let alone four.

“Joshua, let the bridge know I want to take the ship out to…” He looked at the map displayed on his MFD. “Three million klicks, and orbit the planet from there.”

His XO turned to look at him, for once. “Orbit at three million klicks, sir? That’s not an orbit, that’s⁠—”

“An orbit.” Mike interrupted him. “Once there, I want to go full active on all sensors. Understood?”

Joshua’s confusion left Mike feeling unsure of what he was doing. However, doing something was better than doing nothing. He knew that from years of Guild work.

“Understood, sir.”

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