Kings and Pawns
The main auditorium of Mars' Naval Academy was a crucible of light and shadow. Holographic projectors filled the domed ceiling with models of frigates, destroyers, and alien vessels dissected like cadavers. The cold voice of Tactician-Instructor Vex echoed off steel and stone.
"War is not won by firepower. Not anymore. It's won by minds—by those who know where to strike, when to hold, and who to sacrifice."
Kale Drayen sat in the fourth row, spine straight, eyes locked on the burning outline of a frigate mid-maneuver. It was the same class he'd seen burn on the news feed the night before.
The Saber-class. His future.
Ox leaned over. "Looks like we'll be commanding those soon."
Kale nodded, but his thoughts were elsewhere—already breaking apart the enemy ship displayed above them.
"Small forward profile, fast turning radius... but exposed thrusters."
Instructor Vex waved a hand. The projection shifted into a 3D battlefield simulation. Two human frigates were engaging a xeno interceptor—a sleek, insectile thing with undulating fins and a low electromagnetic profile.
The frigates died in under thirty seconds.
"Lesson one," Vex said coldly. "If you fight them like you fight each other, you will lose."
The cadets sat in silence.
"Your task," Vex continued, "is to craft a strategy where two Saber-class frigates can disable that interceptor in under a minute. You have forty-eight hours. Work in teams of three."
Eyes turned. Conversations began in hushed, hurried tones.
Kale stood up without waiting.
"I'm with Kora and Ox," he said flatly.
No one objected.
---
Later that night, in the corner of the simulation chamber, Kale and his team sat around a holotable. The alien ship shimmered above them, dancing just out of reach like a ghost.
"They have faster engines, better sensors, and plasma yields that pierce our standard armor," Kora muttered. "We're outclassed."
"No," Kale said. "We're just fighting their strengths. We need to make them fight ours."
Ox frowned. "Which is what, exactly?"
Kale walked around the model. "They rely on reactive maneuvers—automated and pilot-assisted. That interceptor operates like a dancer—fast, fluid, elegant."
He tapped a control. The simulation played back the human defeat in slow motion.
"So we don't chase it," he said. "We trap it. Herd it."
Kora's eyes widened. "Like a net."
Kale nodded. "Exactly. We use one frigate to simulate engine failure, force it to approach on a predictable vector. Then we dump debris—metal, fake mines, power signatures. Force its autopilot to over-correct."
Ox grinned. "And while it dodges the ghost mines, the second frigate decloaks and nails it from below."
"Not decloak," Kale corrected. "We use the ship's own wake to mask the second frigate's signature. It's not invisibility. It's misdirection."
Kora smiled. "Now that's evil."
Kale simply stared at the model. "It's necessary."
---
Day of the Strategy Trial
Cadets filled the sim control room as one team after another failed to down the alien interceptor. The fastest time so far was two minutes, thirty-two seconds. The instructors watched, unimpressed.
Then came Team Omega.
Kale stood behind the command interface, hands clasped behind his back. Ox and Kora took the helms of the virtual frigates. Their plan was executed with cold, practiced timing.
One frigate "limped" into the battle space, trailing sparks and emergency beacons. The alien ship closed in like a predator.
"Dump the field," Kale ordered.
Kora triggered the release. Chaff, metallic shards, and jamming pulses flooded the zone. The interceptor reacted instantly—swerving to avoid the mess.
It never saw the second ship coming.
A full plasma barrage lanced through its side. The simulation froze.
"Time: 56 seconds," announced the AI.
The room was dead silent.
Then came the applause. Some polite. Some surprised.
And some bitter.
Cassian Dorne, standing at the rear, scowled.
"He baited the AI," he muttered. "It's not a real pilot."
"Still beat the record," Lie Cadence replied.
"I'll crush him in the live sims."
---
Later That Night
The victory didn't go unnoticed.
Instructor Vex summoned Kale to his office.
"You understand command, Drayen," he said, fingers steepled. "Not just orders. But control. You read the field like a script you wrote yourself."
"Thank you, sir."
Vex stood, walked to the wide observation window where the Martian surface sprawled under the stars. "But there's more to command than winning. The best tacticians are also politicians, psychologists, monsters when they need to be."
Kale said nothing.
"Your classmates will start turning on you," Vex said. "They'll want to tear you down. Some will try to join you. Others will plan your fall."
He turned back, eyes sharp. "Be ready."
---
[Private Comm Message – Encrypted
> FROM: Admiral Revas
TO: Instructor Vex
"Monitor Drayen closely. His scores match red flag patterns we saw in Operation Onyx. Genius, but prone to isolation. We don't need another 'Magnus' situation. If he continues to outperform, prepare him for the Orion Program trials."
"And keep him in the dark. For now."]
Mars Naval Academy - Cadet Barracks, Late Night
The barracks were dimly lit, a few cadets murmuring to one another in the glow of datapads. Kale sat at the edge of his bunk, staring at the debrief report from the simulation. A victory was supposed to feel satisfying.
It didn't.
He tapped the display. The AI had flagged his command style under "abnormal tactical deviation." Vex wasn't lying — they were watching him closely now. He knew he couldn't afford to slip.
Kora walked over, a protein bar in one hand and a curious look on her face.
"You're still up? It was a perfect run, Kale."
Kale turned the screen off. "It wasn't perfect. The second ship's firing angle was slightly off. If that interceptor had been 0.3 seconds faster, we would've missed the kill."
Ox flopped into a chair nearby. "That's the kind of thinking that'll get us all ulcers before graduation."
"Or keep us alive after," Kale said.
Kora took a bite. "Still… you're becoming something around here. Some of the second-years are talking. Even the CA's guys."
That caught Kale's attention.
"Which ones?"
"Lie Cadence for one," Kora said, voice lowered. "He's been watching you. And not with admiration."
"He's smart," Ox added. "Ruthless too. Son of a Fleet Governor."
"I know," Kale said softly. "I looked up his family. Their colony block voted to cut rations for the Martian fringe zones last year."
Ox raised a brow. "So?"
"So that means he's exactly the kind of person who will kill you in a war game if it means getting one step higher. And the brass will reward him for it."
The silence hung heavy.
Ox finally broke it. "Then we do it first."
Kale looked at him. "We're not killers."
"No," Ox said. "But we will be, won't we?"
---
Meanwhile — Outer Orbit, Fracture System
The void rippled near the event horizon of a blackened moon as another alien assault began.
Two human destroyers patrolled near a crumbling mining colony — relics of humanity's failed expansion effort. What remained was a shattered husk and a warning beacon that blinked red into empty space.
Then, the xenos came.
Like liquid obsidian, their ships emerged from void folds, sleek and pulsating with bio-energy. These weren't the light interceptors from training sims. These were Carver-class slicers, with hulls that morphed mid-flight.
The human destroyers tried to respond, but their systems began to short — ionized static disrupting their targeting computers.
Then came the harpoons.
Bladed cables tore through armor like paper, embedding into the spinal columns of both destroyers. Pulse charges followed. The vessels ignited from the inside out.
The colony beacon's final message transmitted one word:
"Overrun."
---
Back at the Academy – War Room, Day After
Instructor Vex displayed the feed from the Fracture System. Most cadets couldn't look directly at it. The human screams—muted though they were—still echoed in the recording.
"This is what you face," Vex growled. "Not scores. Not simulations. Reality."
Kale clenched his jaw.
Even Lie Cadence didn't smirk today.
"You'll be deployed in real fleet formations by the end of this year," Vex continued. "And when you are, remember what you saw. Every decision you make as an officer will cost lives. The only question is — will the cost be worth it?"
Kale's gaze was locked on the screen.
They'd come into this war blind, reacting, flailing, struggling just to survive. He wouldn't stay reactive forever.
He needed more than instinct.
He needed leverage.
---
Later – Cadet Lounge
Kale found himself alone with a datapad, poring over technical schematics of xeno craft, watching every feed he could access.
He catalogued them. Named the movement patterns. Compared radiation profiles. And as he did, something began to form in his mind — a map. A mental index of alien behavior.
He whispered to himself. "You move like insects, but you kill like machines. Who built you?"
His finger hovered over a locked file — one sealed under officer-grade clearance. A kill log from a classified incident off the asteroid belt.
He needed access.
And he knew where he might get it.
---
[Quote of the Chapter:
> "No captain can do very wrong if he places his ship alongside that of the enemy."
— Admiral Horatio Nelson
---
Quote of the Chapter:
> "The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting."
— Sun Tzu.]