Free The Clone Redemption by Steven L. Kent Page B

officer, and Yamashiro’s decisions were the law.
    â€œWe need to divide the fleet. If our ships travel as a pack, an attack on one ship could destroy us all,” said Takahashi. He looked at Yokoi and Takeda for support, but they did not meet his gaze. Takeda, an older man with white hair along his temples, stared down at the table. Yokoi now stared up at Yamashiro, ignoring the rest of the room.
    â€œLone ships lose battles that fleets might win,” said Miyamoto.
    Yamashiro grunted his approval. He did not smile, though.
    You used to smile, Takahashi thought. Back in the days before the aliens and the Mogats, you used to smile. Yamashiro Yoshi had been a politician back then, before he appointed himself admiral of the fleet.
    Having spent the last three years searching Bode’s Galaxy, the Japanese sailors had no way of knowing that the Avatari had returned to the Milky Way. The last outdated intelligence they heard was that the Unified Authority had won the battle for New Copenhagen, and the aliens had left the galaxy. They did not know that the Avatari had returned and incinerated New Copenhagen and Olympus Kri. They did not know that the Unified Authority had abandoned its military clones and that the clones declared a civil war.
    â€œNow that we have destroyed A-361-F, the next closest planet is A-361-D,” said Yamashiro.
    â€œWhat about A-361-E?” asked Yokoi.
    The name of the solar system was Bode Galaxy A-361. A-361-F, the planet Illych and his SEALs destroyed, was the outermost planet in the system. A-361-E was the next planet in terms of distance from the center of the solar system.
    â€œIt’s on the opposite end of the solar system,” said Yamashiro.
    â€œAdmiral, why bother with the outer planets at all? We should bypass the outer planets and attack the planets closest to the star,” said Takeda. “The aliens will be on the planet that is the same distance from this star as Earth is from the sun.”
    â€œThat’s quite a gamble,” said Admiral Yamashiro. “Why should we take such a risk?”
    â€œWhen the aliens entered the Milky Way, they only attacked the planets we ourselves would inhabit.”
    Miyamoto leaned forward so he could face Takeda. The old warhorse and the officer with the background in engineering, they were opposites and adversaries at every meeting. Takeda was slender, dapper, a man in his fifties with an interest in science. Miyamoto, who trained in the traditional arts of Judo and Iaido , was squat and powerful. His uniform barely fit over his massive shoulders, chest, and neck.
    Miyamoto said, “The Avatari are miners, Takeda-san. They do not populate the planets, they conquer, they mine. Though a man would want to collect the content of a gold mine, he would not necessarily want to live in it.
    â€œIf we proceed to an inner planet, and they have bases on A-361-E or A-361-D, we could find ourselves attacked from every side.”
    â€œAll the more reason to split up the fleet,” said Takahashi. “If we send one ship to each planet, we can search the solar system in a single day.”
    Miyamoto clapped his hands, and said, “An excellent idea. We send one battleship to each of the remaining planets; and when one of them does not return, we will know where the aliens are hiding.”
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    As the meeting ended, Yamashiro cornered Takeda Gunpei, the only one of the captains with a background in engineering. He fixed Takeda with a businesslike glare, and the two men sat silently as the other officers filed out of the room.
    â€œWhen that pod exploded, was it as powerful as a nuclear bomb?” asked Yamashiro. He claimed no understanding of science or engineering. His background was in politics.
    Before joining the Japanese Fleet, Takeda, who was nearly as old as the admiral, had worked as a professor of space travel and engineering. Now he slipped comfortably back into the role of the teacher. He