While the navy crew ran around trying to get the ship battle-ready – well, to be fair, the Triton was already battle-ready – I strapped into my seat and accessed the holographic displays that told me what was going on outside the battleship.
Several of the Destroyers in the enemy fleet had moved forward to open fire on the four Poseidon-class battleships, to no avail. Artillery struck the shields and detonated harmlessly, unable to penetrate the barriers. A few stray missiles exploded against the Bulwark-class shield boats' force field, but didn't do any damage to the vessels under their aegis.
"Who's firing?!" Admiral Allen was yelling at someone off-screen, the communication link still on. Neither party had severed it, so caught up by the sudden attack. "Order Victory, Endeavor, and Dauntless to stop firing, damn it! Who the hell gave the order to fire? All ships are to pull back! Stop firing!"
There was a lot of background noise as the communications officer relayed the admiral's command. However, the three Destroyers continued pummeling our fleet, evidently not heeding their commander's orders.
We weren't going to take this lying down, of course.
"All ships, open fire. Target the three Destroyers firing upon our fleet." Admiral Howard Hai ordered without any hesitation. The weapons officers were already targeting the three Destroyers, reticules highlighting them in red over massive holographic displays.
"What about the other ships, sir?" Captain Stephen Chow asked.
"Leave them for now. We'll see how they react after we sink three of their ships. If they still want to fight after this, then we'll blow them to smithereens."
"Aye, sir. We'll eliminate the assailants first."
The task was made easier with advanced artificial intelligences helping the seamen aim at the vessels. They performed thousands of calculations within seconds, taking into account wind speed, temperature, atmosphere and many other factors. The A.I even outlined possible evasive maneuvers of the target ships. This allowed for the seamen to fire upon their chosen targets with impeccable accuracy.
It wasn't just the crew aboard the Triton. Throughout the fleet, all our ships were taking aim, the plasma railguns and turrets shifting with a roar as they whirred about to fix upon the three Destroyers. Within seconds, they bellowed boomingly and streaks of azure-white arced across the air. Superheated matter smashed into the slowly retreating Destroyers and obliterated them.
It was overkill. Fortunately, the fleet A.I. had linked all the vessels together and prevented every ship from firing all at once. The A.I. allowed us unparalleled coordination, so we didn't have to worry about accidentally shooting someone else's target and could fire with maximum efficiency and spread.
From my seat, I watched the wrecks of the three Destroyers sink beneath the sea. What was left of them, anyway. Plasma was highly destructive – they literally disintegrated large chunks of the ships and blew them to almost nothingness.
"Those idiots!" Admiral Allen was raging on the other side of the com. "I told them to stop shooting! What the fuck were they doing?"
Someone off-screen said something and Allen continued to fume.
"I couldn't care less if the President himself gave those orders! I'm in command here! If they disobey my orders, it's mutiny!"
He then shook his head looking dismayed. I didn't have to read his mind to know what he was thinking. He was mourning the loss of his men and women. Each Destroyer was crewed by at least a few dozen people, sometimes even a hundred. All those hundreds of lives lost in an instant, just because the captains of those escort ships decided to open fire in foreign waters.
"What will you do now?" Admiral Hai asked. Allen glanced up sharply, as if realizing that the communication channel was still open. He had been so engrossed with trying to solve the problem that he wasn't aware that we didn't close the channel.
"Retreat," Allen said after a few moments of thinking deeply. "There is nothing more we can do here."
"Thank you. I appreciate it." Hai hesitated for a moment. "Of course, if you pull out of our waters, it would be ideal for me. But what's going to happen to you? I'm assuming you are doing this on your own accord, without waiting for your president's orders."
"Hmph." Allen snorted. "If the president still wants to play this game of chicken, he can go fuck himself. I'm not playing around with my men's lives. I already lost three ships because of some politician's idiocy. Apparently those captains received instructions from someone above me to open fire. Those morons aren't on the ground, they don't know what's transpiring here, yet they want to play armchair commander and try to control the situation. Do they think this is a real time strategy game or something?"
"I understand, and I sympathize." Hai was watching the enemy fleet circle about and leave, their engines leaving huge plumes of steam. "But you have to answer to those politicians, don't you?"
"Yeah. But I'll let them know the reality of war…and how it is utter stupidity to try and fight now." Allen grimaced. "As much as I hate it, your destruction of three of my Destroyers will serve as a wakeup call. Three ships, sunk in seconds. And despite them having the drop on you, they did no damage whatsoever. Those shields of yours are way too powerful. If we continue to fight, my fleet will be massacred. There is no other way to put it. I will show those assholes the video recordings as many times as I need."
Allen then turned grim.
"Well, I won't deny that those morons will be looking for a scapegoat. They'll probably fire me or force me into early retirement. They will replace me with someone else and come again…until they get what they want."
"The energy shields?" I asked with a scowl. "Like I said, they can buy them from me. But if they continue to send a fleet here or pulling stunts like this, they can forget about it."
"That's right." Allen frowned. "That's what I don't understand. I was reporting your willingness to sell your shield technology to them, but for some stupid reason, instead of falling back, those three idiots opened fire. They claimed that they were ordered by politicians to do so. But why the hell would they…?"
Then he swore loudly.
"I see. Those politicians…they sacrificed those ships and their crew in order to test out the capabilities of your energy shields. They wanted to see for themselves just how powerful your shields are and whether it was worth the expense. They didn't care if I lost a few hundred good, loyal men and women if they did so. They only cared about seeing the strength of your shields for themselves, and calculate the value from firsthand reports."
He turned around and slammed his fist into a console. "Those bloodsucking bastards! I'll sue them for murder if I have to!"
"There's also another possibility." This time it was Hai. Everyone turned to him, and the admiral shrugged. "I don't think it was a coincidence that the Destroyers opened fire shortly after you reported that Mr. Shen is willing to negotiate business with your country. In fact, I believe that they opened fire precisely because they learned that he was on this ship. Otherwise it's too much of a coincidence. We've been facing off each other at sea for so long now…several months, in fact. So why did they choose now, of all time, to attack?"
"Huh? But why would they kill the one person who owns the patent to the shield generator technology?" Allen was bewildered. "That makes no fucking sense!"
"Not to you, perhaps." Hai allowed. "So this implies that you have no idea what your country's Central Intelligence is doing."
"Huh? Central Intelligence? What do they have to do with anything?" Allen looked confused. I didn't blame him. The military was a different branch – they were as separate from Central Intelligence as possible. If anything, the soldiers held the spies in scorn and disdain, often condemning them as sneaky cowards.
"A couple of months ago, a few agents from your country's Central Intelligence infiltrated our nation and tried to assassinate Mr. Shen. A few times, I might add. They were ultimately unsuccessful, and we managed to eliminate them and apprehended one of them. Unfortunately, we were unable to capture the leader, Michael Miller, alive. He was killed during a gunfight. However, we have Kevin Kan in custody. He is the only survivor among the Central Intelligence agents sent here."
Allen stared at Hai blankly. The names meant nothing to him and he clearly had not heard about anything with regards to them and assassinations.
"I see," he finally said. He shook his head and rolled his eyes. "Those morons are always sneaking around and doing stupid stuff. Glad their idiocy finally caught up with them."
He then turned to address me. "Sorry, little buddy. I probably can't apologize on behalf of my country because…you know, those idiots at the top probably aren't sorry at all. However, I will personally apologize to you for all the trouble my country has caused you. For what it's worth, I'm glad they failed and you're still alive."
"Uh, thanks."
"Stay safe. I'll see what I can do on my end…hopefully, I'll convince the higher-ups the stupidity of going to war." Allen scratched his head. "But the people in power tend to be either corrupted or idiots…or both."
"We'll figure something out," I promised. Allen smiled and saluted.
"Good luck, kid. We'll meet again, I hope."
Then he was gone. I watched the foreign fleet disappear into the distance, sailing back toward their home country.
"Are you really going to sell the shield technology to them?" Hai asked me skeptically. I shrugged.
"Most likely I will. Honestly, there's no use monopolizing it. They will eventually figure a way to develop their own shield technology. At least if I sell the generators to them, I can control somewhat the number of generators they will be receiving, the rate of production on their side, and ensure they get the older, obsolete models while keeping the more advanced one for ourselves. Plus we will be draining them economically since the money they spend on my generators will go to Hua Xia. With those resources, I can create more advanced weapons and defensive technology."
"I see."
Admiral Howard Hai didn't look convinced, but I wasn't obligated to persuade him. The shield generator technology was mine, and so I could do whatever I wanted with it…as long as it didn't conflict with the national interest.
Honestly, though, I wasn't a patriot, so this didn't matter to me as much as achieving global peace. Country A was one thing, but if Hua Xia monopolized everything, there was the danger that some tyrannical dictator would take over and try to conquer the world.
I couldn't let that happen, no matter what.