Chapter 18

'What happens after we board the Star Fortress?" The Governor asked.

Edward zoomed in on the image of Andre and pointed to a location, 'We can have Menil impact here.

It's an official residential area, and it could disable a large portion of the fleet members and replacements who are recuperating in Andre, but of course, the exact battle plan, since I have no experience in landing operations, will have to be left to the seniors in the military who are good at it."

'Well, ensuring control of Andre's Star Fortress while keeping it functional does require a long term solution." The Governor and Marshal, the controllers of power in the Free Federation put their heads together in front of the report while reading it and whispering.

Inside the officer's cabin aboard the Maso, Alphonse picked up his coffee and sipped it comfortably as General Wallich stared at the report in his hands frowning and nuzzling at times.

The general tossed the report aside and rubbed his sore eyes, 'Alphonse, you might as well tell me about it, there's too many words, it's hard on my eyes to read."

Alphonse choked on his coffee, he completely did not expect that his long thought about putting the long thought about battle plan in front of the general, but could not attract the other party's interest.

The general seemed to have read his thoughts and said with a smile, 'One's eyes are a bit blurry in one's old age."

'That's true."

Alphonse stabilized his mind and continued, 'As of now our battle plan is to use the planet Essoda to drag down the Federation's economy.

But there's no way the Federation hasn't noticed this, I advocate for a portion of the fleet to be drawn from the fleet to assist in the defense around Andre Star Fortress, after all, I have seen their camouflage techniques, and this time I'm afraid that they'll come up with a sneak attack."

'The entire star of Andre's Star Fortress is wrapped in Sherman metal, and the Nova-class main cannons will have little effect when they hit it.

Fortress cannons not to mention just the star level main cannons planetary level secondary cannons are several hundred, they may not be able to destroy Andre even if the entire fleet comes." The general scoffed at his statement.

'What if the shell was 11,751 billion billion tons?" Alphonse said, opening his star map and pointing to a dwarf planet wandering at the edge of the galaxy.

The General narrowed his eyes and trailed off to Alphonse, 'Alphonse, you mean, you're crazy, right?"

Awkwardly on the spot, the heat in his heart half-cooled, Alphonse forced himself to push down the urge to curse and patiently explained, 'Menil's Star is a dwarf planet about to be flung out of the galaxy.

It's entirely possible that the Federation could have had it shot at Fort Andre, and with a camouflaged fleet, and this superbolt, it's still possible to take Fort Andre."

'Well...Alphonse, that's a bit of a pie-in-the-sky idea, not to mention whether or not they could shoot the Menil over here, even if they did, our fleet and fortress cannons would be able to blast it into interstellar dust." The General said waving his hand.

Alphonse took one look at the General and saw that he was completely disinterested, he sighed and said, 'And please, General, hand over the plans."

The general spread his hands and made a look of indifference.

Placing the plan on a pile of papers he then said to Alphonse, 'Young man, I know you are excellent and eager to perform, but war should be in accordance with the common sense of war, don't waste your energy on imagining it, I will hand over the plan."

Alphonse saluted and walked out of the hatch, annoyed beyond belief, not because his plans were not being taken seriously, but because of the General's words, he said to himself, 'Common sense of war? Which war is common sense?"

Unconsciously he made his way to the starship's bio-bay, a hall created to maintain a sense of worldliness in the officers and men, filled with a variety of plants, the scent of flowers greeted him.

He sat down against a tree pulling out the file in his arms that had his brother's small footprints on it muttering, 'Brother, if you were in command of the attack on Andre's Star Fortress, how would you fight it?"

Edward Elina walked out of the conference room in the starport side by side, because the Governor was worried about Elina's health, the two of them were arranged to live and work in the low gravity area of the starport.

'I didn't realize the details of the plan would be so complicated." Edward said, 'What we thought at first was just too simple."

'It's great that you came up with the plan, it's the job of those staff officers to add the details." Elina didn't look up, calculating something on the controller.

'We've basically done all we can on this one, the rest is up to execution." Edward walked over to the drinks machine and ordered two coffees.

'Aren't you going to think about what happens later?" Elina wasn't about to take the coffee he handed her, nor did she look up at him.

Edward froze and asked, 'Later? What's later?"

Elina looked up with an angry face and said, 'Getting married!"

Edward slapped his head, since he stepped on the Luchelle to go on the expedition, the continuous battles and thinking made him forget about this matter, he said somewhat apologetically, 'After this matter is over!"

'Got it."

A month later, Edward stood on the large ground of the planet Menil, looking at the third thruster in the huge deep pit, a sight as deep and dark as that pupil of a giant.

'Heh heh! I'm coming." Elina's excited voice came over the communicator.

Edward looked back and watched as Elina slowly drifted towards him, aided by the thrusters of her multi-purpose uniform.

'Had enough fun?" He chuckled.

'Had enough fun, to explain it to you, there are six sets of thrusters, each three thousand meters in diameter, which can produce an extreme thrust of three hundred million billion tons, up to thirteen percent of the speed of light for the relative velocity of the planet Menil.

In addition to the propulsion section in front of you, there is also the underground steering section, the underground two thousand meters was built into a vase shape, can be adjusted plus or minus sixty degrees of direction.

The control section has been commissioned and is now waiting for Menil's Star to move into the proper orbital position."

As Edward listened to her report and watched her demonstration, he felt a sense of springtime, relaxing his heart that had been tense for more than a month.

Meanwhile, on Star Fort Andre, Alphonse was nervously deploying what was only a portion of his cruisers.

'Here, here and this position are the key positions." He pointed to several locations on the star map and spoke to Jan.

'Ugh, fifteen cruisers and splitting them into three, they took your advice but only gave you an empty shelf." Jan said with some indignation.

'It's still for the general's sake that they can accept the proposal, so our main objective is to replenish the fleet with the star fort's scouting dead spots." Alphonse said, marking two more dots on the star map.

'But the detection radar power won't reach if we only have cruisers." Yang said.

'There's no way around it, we'll just have to do the best we can." Alphonse finished, turned off the star map and threw it over, saying, 'Lay out the plan as it is, and hopefully it will have a little effect."

'Aye! Sir!" Jan saluted and exited the hatch, leaving Alphonse alone in deep thought.

A few days later, Edward participated in the Special Operations Department's combat meeting, and since the previous meetings discussed the need to retain the star fort's functions after breaking in and capturing it, the Federation ultimately gave the task of capturing Andre's star fort to the Special Operations Department instead of the Marines.

Edward cleared his throat and spoke, 'Operational requirements, first take control of the starfort's weapons systems and communications systems, then use the fortress cannons to deter the enemy, and second use broadcast level communications to force the enemy to retreat back to the starbridge, come on, everyone, take the floor."

Edward walked out of the Special Operations Department all relaxed, all plans had been discussed and everyone was motivated to carry out the mobilization deployments, which made him go back in with nothing to do.

'Edward, in another week Menil's Star will be in position for the operation, should we get the special operations team there first?" Elina's voice came over the intercom.

'It's already been arranged, about two hundred additional technicians are needed for the temporary maneuvering of the starfort after the occupation, I've asked them to select the personnel to report to you." Edward said as he walked away.

'I'm going too." Elina spoke up.

'Stop it, this is going to be different than the last few times, before you couldn't beat them and you could still run, this time there's nowhere to run." Edward didn't want Elina to risk her life from the bottom of his heart.

'Then you're not allowed to go either!" Elina said, 'Either both or neither."

'Oops, the final decision to land 5,000 special ops personnel was made and it wasn't my turn, I just wanted to go and the Governor wouldn't let me, he told me to stay on the Rifleman and take command." Edward said, pushed open the door of his cabin, military cap thrown lying on the bed.

'Ugh! I still want to go." Elina said resentfully, the usual thrill seeker was still looking forward to taking part in the attack.

'Don't even think about it, stay by my side, after all, you'll be needed to direct the track corrections." Edward said, pulling a book from the shelf and flipping it open to read.

'Edward, after the wedding why don't you accompany me on a trip to the Centauri Cantilever, I'd like to see the ruins as a honeymoon." Elina said.