Dawn by Yoshiki Tanaka Page B

Joint Operational Headquarters called the Office of Records and Statistics, and no one distinguished themselves in combat there. But for Yang, it was rather pleasant to have a job where he could be around old records.
    However, simultaneous with his promotion to sublieutenant, Yang received orders for frontline duty. He departed for his new post as a staff officer for forces stationed in the territory of El Facil.
    “When one thing goes crazy, everything goes crazy,” the young lieutenant junior grade grumbled.
    Even though he had never once actively sought to become a soldier, here he was, wearing a black beret with a white five-pointed star mark, an ivory-white scarf tucked into the collar of his black jumper, black shoes, and slacks the same color as his scarf: an extremely functional military uniform.
    That year, in SE 788, the Battle of El Facil greatly accelerated the course of Sublieutenant Yang Wen-li’s life.
    The curtain rose on this battle with a scene of outrageous disgrace for the Free Planets Alliance’s navy. To the battle itself, both sides had dispatched in the neighborhood of a thousand vessels each, and after both sides had taken about 20 percent casualties, they had temporarily called it off. Yang did nothing during the engagement. All he did was sit in his station chair on the bridge of the flagship and watch the battle. He was not even asked for his opinion.
    However, as the alliance ships were beginning their return to base, they were unexpectedly attacked from behind. The Imperial Navy, while pretending that they too were returning to base, had executed a rapid reversal of course and charged against the Alliance Navy, which had relaxed its guard and shown them its flank.
    Spears of energy ripped through the blackness of space, and miniature novas flashed and vanished in an instant. The energies unleashed by destroyed vessels became a maelstrom, tossing other ships to and fro. Rear Admiral Lynch—the commander of the alliance fleet—must have panicked. Without trying to calm the confusion of his allies, his flagship fled back toward El Facil at full speed.
    Upon learning that their commander had turned tail, the alliance fleet naturally lost its will to fight, and the ships that had been waging isolated battles with the enemies close at hand began to peel off and run from the field of battle, one after another. Some of them chose their routes of retreat independently and fled from the El Facil territory altogether, while others followed their flagship and escaped to the planet of El Facil itself. Ships that were late in retreating faced one of two fates: annihilation or surrender. Nearly all of them chose surrender.
    Those surviving forces that had escaped to El Facil still numbered as many as two hundred vessels and fifty thousand soldiers, but the Imperial Navy afterward reinforced itself, building its forces up to three times that number, planning to leap at the chance to “liberate the El Facil territory from the clutches of the rebel forces” in one fell swoop. El Facil’s civilian population of three million cowered in the midst of this tense situation. It was already too late to stop El Facil from falling.
    The civilians came to negotiate with the military, seeking the creation and implementation of a plan for planetwide evacuation. The officer in charge who appeared before them was Sublieutenant Yang Wen-li.
    He was too young, and his rank was low. Was the military even taking them seriously? The civilians had their doubts, but Yang did a good job with everything he was supposed to do, even though he kept scratching his head in a way that didn’t inspire confidence. Amid the chaos of the impending imperial invasion, Yang procured civilian and military vessels and made preparations for the evacuation.
    Even if Yang had not been there, any competent military officer could have done that much. Yang apparently calmed the impatient civilians while awaiting the chance to depart.
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