The Lion and the Unicorn

by Christopher G. Nuttall

  He frowned as he studied the empty display. He’d had too much time to brood on what they’d been ordered to do. They were, at best, going to kill hundreds of thousands of humans. He’d read the files very carefully, noting the questions that had been glossed over or simply left unasked. The researchers claimed the victims would return to themselves, but Thomas couldn’t believe it. They’d ensured the poor bastards had all the medical treatment the navy could provide. There was no way Lion and her squadron could offer the same to the infected colonists. They couldn’t even begin to do it.

  And that means we’re sentencing the colonists to death, he thought. And yet, they were dead the moment they became infected.

  He shuddered. He was all too aware the universe was not fair. One could do everything right, and morally, and still lose. There were limits to the practical, limits to what could be done … there was no way they could provide even a fraction of the medical care an infected colony would need. Sometimes, there was no good answer. And yet, it felt as if he were rationalising genocide. The great naval heroes of past generations would roll over in their graves. Britain had gone to war to stop genocides. Now … they were going to commit … mass murder, if not genocide. The difference really didn’t matter.

  The logic was clear. He’d gone over it again and again. There was no choice. But he couldn’t begin to accept it.

  He forced himself to sit and study the reports. They’d spent the last three weeks working on endless simulations, drilling and exercising their way through a hundred different variants on what might happen when they reached their destination. Thomas had forced them to go through everything from complete success to utter failure, torn between the grim understanding they needed to succeed and unexpressed hope they might fail. He didn’t want to kill so many people, no matter how it was rationalised … he cursed himself as he pushed the reports aside. He was still brooding. He’d be brooding until he knew for sure what he’d done.

  “Captain.” Sibley spoke with low urgency. “Long-range sensors are picking up a starship on attack vector.”

  Thomas tensed as a red icon flickered into existence. “ID?”

  “None as yet,” Sibley reported. “But she really shouldn’t be out here.”

  “Not if she was friendly,” Thomas agreed. The reports stated there’d been no recon missions up the chain for the last six months. If the incoming ship was human, she would have either tried to contact them or simply maintained her distance. “Red alert.”

  He leaned forward, silently calculating the vectors as the enemy ship glided towards them. She’d caught a sniff of something, but what? She didn’t look heavy enough to take on a battlecruiser, let alone the rest of the squadron. His eyes narrowed as he surveyed the vast deserts of interplanetary space between the tramlines. The virus could have concealed a sensor platform somewhere near the tramline, a platform that had picked up their transit and sent an alert further up the chain. Or the squadron might simply have gotten very unlucky. He didn’t have enough ships to waste time looking for a platform that might not even exist.

  She’s not going to come close enough to let us blow her away, he thought, grimly. And if we launch the gunboats to take her down, we’d be signalling our presence to anyone lurking under cloak.

  “Signal Unicorn,” he ordered. “She’s to sneak around the enemy and engage when she breaks off.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Cook said.

  Thomas leaned back in his chair, forcing himself to wait. The enemy ship was an unknown quantity, but he was fairly sure her sensors couldn’t be any better than his own. Assuming so, she’d get close enough to see Lion clearly in twenty minutes - he considered, then dismissed, the idea of altering course - and then break off, if her commander had the sense God gave a snail. He scowled as it occurred to him the virus might not give much of a damn about the ship. She might try to ram the battlecruiser instead.

  “Tactical, establish and maintain passive sensor locks,” he ordered, curtly. “If she ramps up her drives and comes at us, fire at will.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Sibley said.

  Thomas felt sweat prickling down his back as the enemy ship drew closer. They’d been seen, but did they know they’d been seen? And were there other ships following in her wake? His eyes tracked Unicorn’s presumed position as the scout circled around the rear of the enemy ship, ready to engage her when - if - she backed off. Thomas would almost have preferred to run into a full-sized battle squadron, even if he’d had no choice but to retreat. At least he would have known what he was facing.

  And they clearly got a sniff of us at some point, he thought. How much did they see?

  “They’re reducing speed,” Sibley reported. “I think they’re trying to sneak right up to us.”

  “We’ll engage them just before they enter sprint-mode range,” Thomas said. The enemy ship was behaving rationally. It made him suspicious. “We need to take her out with the first salvo.”

  Sibley sounded doubtful. “Aye, sir.”

  Thomas nodded in sour understanding. They’d have to fire enough missiles to be sure of overwhelming the enemy’s point defence, a difficult task when they had no idea just how much point defence the enemy craft actually mounted. The analysts had thrown up a set of possible answers, but there was no way to know which one was accurate. They could be completely wrong and he wouldn’t know until the alien craft opened fire. The only upside, as far as he could tell, was that the enemy ship couldn’t carry enough missiles to do serious harm to Lion. She’d have to ram the battlecruiser if she wanted to take her out.

  Which she might, Thomas reminded himself. The range steadily closed. They’d come out ahead if they succeeded.

  “Captain, I think they’re coming about,” Sibley said. The vectors changed, again. “They’re preparing to sneak out again.”

  Thomas nodded, tartly. It wasn’t completely bad. The enemy ship was presumably too far from other enemy ships to signal them through lasers, rather than radio. If the enemy ships were closer, the scout could have kept them informed without risking detection. Instead … he forced himself to think. Unicorn was supposed to be in position to snare the scout, but there was no way to be sure Captain Campbell could take the alien ship. Thomas knew Lion could, if he was prepared to expend the missiles. It was doable, yet it would be far too revealing. The virus might not understand how many ships were coming their way. Thomas didn’t want to let it know.

  “Stand ready to assist Unicorn,” he ordered. He briefly considered trying to capture the alien ship, then dismissed the idea. It wasn’t worth the risk. “And continue to monitor the enemy ship’s position.”

  His eyes moved to the long-range sensor display. The system was a barren wasteland. The primary star was orbited by a handful of comets and little else. If there were any humans within the system, they were keeping their heads firmly down. Thomas didn’t blame them. The only people who’d settle such a system willingly were people who wanted to stay away from other people. They’d be trying to stay off the sensors even before the virus started a whole new war.

  And hope Campbell can stop her before she makes her report, Thomas thought. We really don’t want to let them know we’re coming.

  ***

  Mitch allowed himself a cold smile as Unicorn slowly crept up on the enemy ship. It felt wrong to get so close without being detected - and he knew it was quite possible that they had been, that the alien ship was playing an elaborate game of bluff and counter-bluff - but the enemy ship had other problems. By his rough calculations, judging by the approach vector, she’d picked up Lion … and possibly Lion alone. She’d be somewhere else if she’d picked up the entire squadron.

  And probably trying to scream for help, he added, silently. The enemy ship wasn’t beaming messages in all directions, as far as his sensors could determine, but that might be meaningless. The absence of leakage didn’t prove anything. She could be signalling her comrades through lasers, if she wasn’t using tight-beam transmitters. She does
n’t know what she’s found.

  “Captain,” Staci said. “She’s starting to back away from Lion.”

  “She must have gotten a clear look at her,” Mitch said. He’d done his fair share of investigating sensor contacts, back when he’d been on Pelican. Sometimes, the emissions were nothing more than random energy fluctuations. Sometimes, they were an entire fleet of enemy ships bearing down. The enemy CO - assuming the virus even had a CO - must have had the fright of his life. “Helm, hold us here. Tactical, prepare to engage.”

  “Aye, sir,” Staci said.

  “And fire at once if they scan us,” Mitch added. Unicorn was doing her best to pretend to be a hole in space - she was fully cloaked, with her emissions dialled down as far as they’d go - but the range was narrowing sharply. The risk of being accidentally rammed was still pretty low - both starships were tiny on an interplanetary scale - yet the risk of detection was continuing to rise. “Don’t wait for orders.”

  He braced himself, silently counting down the seconds. They had to hit the enemy ship when it entered the red zone, when the missiles could reach the enemy ship before she could bring up her point defence or return fire. He shivered, feeling alive for the first time in weeks. If the enemy ship reacted quickly, or if she knew Unicorn was there, she might be able to get her retaliation in first. Her point defence might already be on alert. She’d be deprived of her active sensors, at least until she brought them up, but it wouldn’t matter. They’d have no trouble tracking the missiles as they roared towards their target.

  We should have dropped a mine behind us, he thought, ruefully. If we’d known which course she intended to follow …

  “Fire when she reaches Point Alpha,” he said. “And stand by to repel attack.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Staci said. “Firing in ten … nine …”

  The display flashed red. “They see us,” she snapped. “Firing … now!”

  Unicorn shuddered as she emptied her external pods towards the enemy. Mitch leaned forward, watching with grim approval as his crew performed admirably. They’d drilled so extensively they could practically perform their duties in their sleep. The point defence snapped to alert, ready to take out any missiles before they could reach attack range. It was risky - they might be detected by any other prowling enemy ships - but, if they were lucky, the enemy would think Unicorn was alone. They wouldn’t know about the remainder of the squadron.

  As long as the first ship doesn’t manage to get off a signal, he thought, as the missiles started to slam home. The enemy ship hadn’t fired a single shot. She has time to scream for help …

  He smiled, feeling a flash of cold pleasure as the enemy ship staggered under his fire. Laser warheads stabbed deep into her hull, tearing the ship apart. Contact nukes detonated within the hull, completing her destruction. Mitch breathed a sigh of relief as the enemy ship exploded, the final missiles flying into the ball of expanding plasma and vaporising. He smiled, despite himself. Some jobsworth back home was going to get on his case about wasting missiles, he just knew it. Hopefully, Captain Hammond would back him up. They couldn’t afford to take chances.

  His eyes moved to Staci. “Did she get a message off?”

  “Unknown, sir,” Staci said. “But we didn’t pick up any omnidirectional signals.”

  Mitch nodded, briefly. The odds were in their favour, but not as much as he would have wished. And anyone watching from a distance would have seen the brief one-sided engagement. He stared at the display, wondering if there was anything out there. The Royal Navy wanted to picket each and every known system, but it simply didn’t have the ships and crews to spare. The virus might have the same problem.

  Sure, his thoughts mocked. And they might have so many ships they can afford to picket every system between their core systems and ours.

  “Signal Lion,” he ordered. “Copy our sensor records” - Lion would have her own, but it was good to compare notes - “and request orders.”

  “Aye, sir,” Midshipman Culver said.

  Mitch nodded as he settled back in his chair. There was no point in trying to pick up survivors or pieces of enemy tech. There just wasn’t enough left of the alien ship to make it worth the effort. And that meant they had to get back underway as quickly as possible. The virus might not have enough ships to picket everywhere, but it sure as hell would want to picket the border systems. A fleet on its way to Brasilia might keep going until it stabbed deep into the virus’s core worlds. The virus would do whatever it took to stop it. No interstellar power could possibly survive losing its heartlands.

  But we nuked Alien-One five years ago, he reminded himself. He’d seen the records. They’d been part of every mission briefing during the first two years of the war. And the virus kept coming anyway.

  He put the thought out of his head. “And pass a message to the crew,” he added. He knew better than to claim all the credit for himself. Every great naval hero had had a well-trained fleet and crew behind him. “Well done.”

  ***

  Thomas wasn’t blind to the implications of running into an alien starship here, between New Washington and Brasilia. The tramline chain might be inefficient, compared to a least-time course from New Washington to Alien-One, but it was an easy way to sneak through enemy defences and hit their homeworlds. The virus wouldn’t have relied on just one ship to monitor the approaches, which meant … what? He glared at the display, as if glaring would be enough to reveal cloaked ships or stealthed sensor platforms. How much had the enemy ship seen? How much had she managed to forward to her comrades before she’d been blown away? Thomas had no way to know.

  There were no signals detected before she was destroyed, he told himself. None of the ships had detected any enemy emissions, which implied they’d killed the alien ship before she could raise the alarm. And that means any watching eyes won’t know precisely what killed her.

  His mind raced, all too aware he was looking for excuses to call off the operation. He felt a surge of self-disgust, mingled with an emotion he didn’t want to face. Perhaps he was a coward, morally if not physically. Perhaps … he told himself, firmly, that it was unlikely the enemy ship had had a chance to report back. Any watching eyes would have seen Unicorn, but nothing else. If, of course, there were any.

  “Helm, alter course,” he ordered. He drew out a line on the display. It would add an extra three days to their transit time, if his calculations were correct, but reduce the odds of being detected if the enemy deployed additional ships to the system. “Tactical, deploy additional passive sensor platforms.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  “And send my congratulations to Unicorn,” Thomas added. Captain Campbell had done well. He deserved more than just congratulations, but right now they were all Thomas could offer. “Order them to rejoin the formation.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Cook said.

  Thomas forced himself to sit back in his chair and think. If there were other enemy ships in the system, the alert was probably already on its way back to the enemy high command. There was nothing he could do about it. What would they do? Deploy additional ships to the system? Or decide there was no point in searching for the human ships in a worthless system and go elsewhere? They’d be much better off if they deployed ships to defend Brasilia. A handful of additional starships would be more than enough to make the mission impossible.

  Although we could still try to deploy the BioBombs, he thought. The orders had been more than a little vague on precisely what he was supposed to do if he couldn’t take the high orbitals, although - reading between the lines - he was sure he was to do everything in his power to test the weapons on an enemy population. If nothing else, at least we’d know if we had an effective weapon.

  He frowned as a dull vibration echoed through the hull. They’d won the brief encounter, they’d won so completely the enemy hadn’t even managed to get a single shot off … so why did it feel like they’d lost?

  Because you don’t want to carry out your orders, he
told himself, sourly. And yet, you have no choice.

  Chapter Thirty

  “Transit complete, Captain,” Staci reported. “No enemy ships within detection range.”

  Mitch nodded. The remainder of the flight to Brasilia had been uneventful, which hadn’t stopped Captain Hammond from fretting every time they jumped through the tramlines into a new system. Mitch understood just how badly things would go wrong if the enemy detected them - again - but the odds of being detected were quite low. Altering course a couple of times, more or less at random, would throw off anyone who’d managed to get close enough to the squadron to secure a solid lock on the hulls.

  “Helm, take us towards the planet,” he ordered. The remaining facilities within the system were inconsequential, if the briefing notes were accurate. “Tactical, maintain a full passive sensor watch at all times.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Staci said.

  Mitch leaned back in his chair and watched as the display started to fill with icons. There were five starships, all destroyers, orbiting the planet itself. The orbital stations, established twenty years ago, were gone. Mitch hoped that meant they’d been set to self-destruct and abandoned, not that the enemy had blown them away when they’d invaded the system. The stations had been large enough for falling debris to represent a serious threat to the surface, assuming they hadn’t been blown up properly. Not, he suspected, that the colonists really cared. Right now, they were trapped in a permanent living death.

  He shuddered, wondering - not for the first time - just what it was like to be infected. No one had been truly saved, not after a few months of total infection. Were the zombies still aware, screaming inside their own minds at what their bodies were being made to do? Or did they simply go to sleep and never wake up? Mitch found the idea to be utterly horrific. He would sooner die, blowing his body to bits, rather than allow himself to be turned against his comrades. But the virus was apparently good at preventing suicide …