Going For Broke

[Omi]

"Luneville is practically a retirement home," spat LeBlanc, dismissing Marie's concerns with a wave of her hand. "It is a small miracle they manage to send daily reports at all, let alone asking them to secure that minefield. It has been dead space for so long that the Ministry of Defense cut funding for the whole system, and now look what has happened." As usual, the Grande Maréchale didn't bother raising her voice, but the iciness of her tone got her fury across well enough anyway. Heads would roll for this, but she would be damned before letting hers be one of them.

The rest of Marie's spiel she listened to in near-silence, her gaze drinking in both the movements of the figurines and the other woman outlining her plan directly. The Générale had not made many alterations, which was good for two reasons. The first was that she had made alterations at all - the kind of spineless individuals who simply nodded their head and murmured assent did not deserve to be around her command table. The plan of action had to be watertight, and it had to be overwhelmingly so. The second was that the amended plan struck her as more resilient to problems as her original one, which was even better. It was less of a blitzkrieg with a screening force in front of the Valors, of course, but there was a much smaller chance of plowing a ten-kilometer long starship straight into a minefield or similar ambush. They would have to adapt their tactics to compensate, because the focal point of their operation relied on taking the Maltese by surprise. If they were allowed any warning at all to assemble a defense fleet, their lack of intelligence would hamstring them. Ideally, whatever poor sod was in charge of Malta's defence wouldn't know a thing about the Navy's advance until they had already smashed the initial defenses aside.

"Very well, Marie," she said eventually, locking eyes with the junior officer. "Your recommendations are solid, and screening our Valors with their support fleet will preserve them for the thicker defences that undoubtedly lie beyond. It is imperative that we preserve our capital ships for future conflicts as well as the final stages of this campaign. We must inflict such a blow to the Maltese that they have no option but to capitulate - if push should come to shove, the Chant is equipped with cyclonic torpedoes to threaten Malta itself." Even as she said it, her fingers tightened on the tabletop. It was no small thing to threaten a world with bombardment, let alone the kind of apocalyptic hellfire that could crack continents wide open and scorch atmospheres clean from their worlds. "I have already had Director Pelletier briefed on ONIs role. The Directorate will deploy reconnaissance teams in close proximity to our main battle fleet, so we will have some warning of what lies ahead. It is not much, but it is the best we can do here. We are riding the edge of a knife here; all of us together. Every second we delay reduces our chances of success."

LeBlanc wanted to sigh, but she couldn't in front of the others. Instead, she just strode up the room to the other end of the table, turning again to regard the other pair with her jaw set. "If there is anything else, Général, Commandant, now is the time. We will be acting on the final version of these plans within twenty-four hours, so they must be distributed to the assembling battlegroups as soon as possible. I shouldn't think I need to impress further on you the urgency of our cause, so make it quick and make it concise. If there is nothing else, you are dismissed and will await the formal arrival of your finalised orders."

---