Free The Fall: Crimson Worlds IX by Jay Allan Page B

heavy units could reverse course.  Once the rest of the fleet was destroyed, he could hunt down the giant battlewagons at will.  He knew the two ships were awesomely powerful, but they wouldn’t stand a chance against his whole fleet.  Whatever the Martian commander was thinking, Liang was sure he had made a mistake, one that would cost him his fleet.
    He was tempted to zip everybody up and blast away at full thrust, closing the distance that much faster, but he didn’t want to fight the battle from the tanks.  The Martians were outnumbered, but they had a reputation for professionalism, and he wasn’t about to underestimate them.  He knew his crews were no match for the Martians man for man, and he wanted them at their best for the battle.  Naval commanders told themselves various things, but Liang knew that no crew ever made was as effective operating from the acceleration tanks, drugged up and half-crushed to death.
    “Admiral Liang, we are approaching launch range.”  Vladimir Lugarin’s voice was deep, his Russian accent thick.  Stark had mandated English as the language to be used on his fleet, but there were many crew members, Liang himself, who were native to other tongues.  Those who couldn’t speak English used portable AIs to translate, but Lugarin thought he spoke English better than he did, and his AI was rarely activated.
    “All ships prepare to launch externally-mounted ordnance.”  Liang spoke excellent English, like most of the elite classes in the CAC.  It was an idiosyncrasy of CAC culture.  The English-speaking Alliance had been the enemy for more than a century, and the United States and its allies before that.  Yet, despite the almost xenophobic ethos the CAC had developed, and the mandated respect for ethnically pure culture imposed on the masses, it remained the custom for the upper classes to learn other languages, particularly English.
    Lugarin worked his controls, sending the pre-fire orders to the ships of the fleet.  Weapons crews were entering final missile plots and preparing to launch their deadly ordnance.  In a few seconds, hundreds of gigatons of nuclear death would blast forth toward the Martian ships, and those vessels would respond with their own deadly volleys.
    “All vessels report ready to launch, Admiral.”
    Liang sat quietly for a few seconds, inhaling deeply.  He’d spent most of the past two years dreading his ultimate confrontation with Augustus Garret.  Liang had been the CAC’s senior admiral, the battle commander of its entire navy, but his inability to defeat the Alliance’s brilliant combat leader had cost him his rank and position…and almost his life.  Li An had promised him an unpleasant death as the price of his final failure, and Liang’s only escape had been to throw himself on the mercy of her nemesis, Gavin Stark.  He’d spent the years after in comfortable but total seclusion in Alliance Intelligence headquarters.
    At first he’d thought Stark kept him alive just to annoy Li An, but one day the master spy came to visit, and he offered Liang an opportunity to return to fleet command.  Liang jumped at the chance, but the realization that sooner or later he would have to face his old nemesis had weighed on him since.  Liang was an experienced commander, but he knew he couldn’t beat Garret, not without a massive superiority he was unlikely to have.  When he got the order to ready the fleet, he felt a flush of panic ripple through his body, but then he realized they were moving against the Martians and not Garret.
    Relieved of the burden of facing the brilliant Alliance admiral, he welcomed the chance at a battle to redeem his reputation.  Now he was back in the Sol system, facing the last major spacefleet other than his and Garret’s.  When it was destroyed, the Shadow Legions would be one step closer to total victory.  Liang wasn’t comfortable relying on Stark’s gratitude, but he was sure it was preferable to enduring his