Jim glanced at Rachel. She was withdrawn - almost catatonic. She had been that way since they left Stalingrad. Rachel had lost the love of her life, Dan Gibson. He had been in charge of the shipyard at Dekanna, repairing the EDF ships damaged in the Ashkelon War. She was taking it harder than anyone else.
Jim knew she was on a long, downhill slide to despair. He needed to find a way to break her out of it, bring her back to a place where she wanted to live.
“Rachel, would you take charge of assigning us to the battlecruisers, please? We need a couple of us on each ship to meet the survivors as they come aboard from the shuttles.”
Rachel looked at Jim sullenly. She gave one short nod, then her head went down again, staring at the table. Jim glanced at Rita, who smiled slightly. Rita was back in her normal aspect, the android body that looked remarkably like her old biological one.
Sometimes, when Rita was in her normal Human aspect, Jim forgot she was now a Goblin - although he had been abruptly reminded when they went to the surface. Before their first trip down to look for survivors, Rita had switched into the caterpillar-like Goblin aspect that could withstand nearly any environment.
The first time she did it, Jim had shuddered, turning his head away for a few moments while he got used to it.
Now I know how Alice in Wonderland felt, he had thought. Next, I’ll see the White Rabbit running by…
But the strangeness had quickly passed. After the second trip to the surface, Jim and the rest of them adapted to Rita’s ability to switch into different body aspects. It turned out to be quite handy - in her caterpillar aspect, she could lift tons of material, go nearly anyplace, and had senses that were ten times as sensitive as a normal Human. Rita had found dozens of survivors they would have missed with their Human senses alone.
Jim smiled across the table at his Goblin wife and continued.
“Once Rachel assigns you to a ship, work out your plan to greet the survivors as they come out of decon. Welcome them, show them around, help them get settled into the cargo bay dorms. Try to put a Human face on things to minimize their shock.”
Nods went around the table as everyone agreed. Jim saw Rachel raise her head slightly.
“Also, we need to start thinking about what to do next. The number of survivors diminishes every day. At some point, we’ll stop finding people. We should agree on how long we search, and what we do when we no longer find survivors.”
Tika spoke next. “Our AI models suggest that once we go for two weeks without finding a survivor, the chances of additional Humans being alive approaches zero.”
“Two weeks sounds reasonable to me,” said Jim. “How about the rest of you?”
“I’d like to add another week to that,” said Mark. “We should give it every possible chance.”
Jim looked around the table. Everyone seemed to be in agreement.
“It’s agreed, then. When we find no survivors for three consecutive weeks, we declare the rescue effort terminated and move on.”
“Move on to where?” wondered Rachel bitterly, the first time she had spoken all day. “Where can we go? Stalingrad? That’s not even a planet! How will we live? Do we all become Goblins like…”
Rachel stopped suddenly, glancing at Rita in embarrassment.
“I’m sorry, Rita. I didn’t mean that the way it came out…”
Rita winked at her, smiled. “No worries, Rachel. I understand.”
Rachel looked back at Jim. “But…what’s to become of us? Where will we go?”
“Our leadership has identified a planet in the Arm that is remarkably like Earth,” spoke Tika. “It’s eight hundred lights beyond Stalingrad. We think it will make a good home for Humans for the half-century or so it will take before Earth is habitable again.”
Kings Canyon National Park, California
Sol System
It took Zoe two weeks to realize she was going to live after all. All her hair had fallen out, and she had puked three to four times a day for two weeks. But finally the radiation sickness seemed to pass. She realized she might live. At least for a while. If she could find more food.
She started hunting, setting snares near the cabin for rabbits. She caught a few fish in the stream.
She was setting a snare nearby the cabin when she heard the whine of a shuttle passing over. It went by, turned, come back toward her. She had thought to run, hide from it - but the insignia on the side of it looked somehow familiar. She tried to remember where she had seen it before. Then it came to her. The insignia of the Earth Defense Force. The EDF. The fleet that was supposed to protect the Earth, but had clearly failed.
The shuttle landed in the meadow nearby, and the ramp lowered. Zoe walked toward it. And the strangest creature she had ever seen made its way down the ramp toward her. It was a huge jet-black caterpillar, six feet long, with at least twenty legs on each side. She froze, afraid to step forward or backwards, not knowing how to react. But before she could make a decision, a male Human stepped into view behind the caterpillar, waving at her.
“Hello!” he shouted. “How are you?”
Chapter Seven
Stalingrad System
Dyson Swarm
The bong, bong, bong of the General Alarm did not awaken Goblin Captain-Leader Bagi; for Bagi was not asleep. He had, however, powered down for a diagnostic and repair period, which - for a Goblin - was pretty much the same as sleep. And as he often did during these repair periods, he had accelerated his time sense by a factor of one thousand. Thus each hour in the real world went by for him in only 3.6 seconds. To his time sense, the universe was a movie being played one thousand times faster than normal.
But the General Alarm snapped him out of that state instantly. In fact, it snapped him back to one-half time; now the Universe went by at half speed, not only for him but for every Goblin on the cruiser Blue Quark.
From the bunk in his cabin where his normal android body lay at the moment, Bagi switched to his warbody on the bridge. The short, squat cube of his warbody had no need of a pressure suit or other protective gear. Welded to the deck, it would take a direct hit on that heavily armored cube to harm Bagi.
In a matter of seconds, Bagi ran through a series of internal displays that would have taken a Human a good five minutes to analyze. He had no need of a holotank; all he had to do was issue a mental command and the entire bridge became transparent, allowing him to look directly at the enemy. He magnified the image and took a good look.
Thirty-six Stree warships had entered the Stalingrad system at the mass limit, 14.77 AU from the central star - and one-quarter AU from Bagi’s current position as Commander of the Goblin Home Guard.
Bagi decided immediately this was not a full-on attack; the Stree force was too small. Thirty-six Stree ships would not have much of an impact on the Goblin defense. Even the sixteen ships of his cruiser squadron could fend them off if they were allowed to operate at full capability.
But he would not be able to do that; he must operate at only 70% of his normal capability - for now. The Leaders had stipulated the Goblin Navy’s true capability must remain hidden until the full Stree invasion force appeared. It was an attempt to deceive the Stree. The Goblin leadership felt any slight advantage would help, once the true battle started.
“This is just a reconnaissance in force,” Bagi called to his bridge crew over the internal comm link. “They’ll probe us, test our weapons and maneuverability, then withdraw. Order the squadron to assume formation Delta-Four. Set all operating systems to run at 70%, including the missiles. Lock and load.”
“Aye, sir,” he heard his bridge crew call. “All systems set to 70% of normal capability. Locked and loaded. The ship is fully ready for battle.”
Bagi knew that running at 70% of normal would give him a disadvantage fighting the Stree. But his battle sense fired anyway.
One deck below, Bagi’s inert android body suddenly smiled, a transient echo of his feelings on the distant bridge.
“In range i
n forty-four minutes,” called his Tac Officer. “All ships operating at 70% capacity. All ships ready for action.”
Come on, you Stree bastards, Bagi thought. I’d like to have a word with you.
***
Stree Sub-Commodore Gellen watched the Goblin force come at his formation head-on. Eight thousand klicks wide, the Goblin squadron rushing to meet him consisted of two cubes, side by side. Each cube contained eight wedge-shaped cruisers bristling with point defense cannon and lasers. Each flat-black Goblin cruiser showed eight missile tubes in front, pointed straight at him. He knew there were other missile tubes in the rear of each cruiser, which could fire another six missiles to turn and come directly at him.
So Gellen knew that in less than one minute, 224 missiles would come out of that formation directly at his Stree ships.
“Well, they’re not shy,” he remarked to his XO.
“They are an abomination,” interrupted the Guardian Officer, Sub-Prophet Miwod. “They are not even alive. They are garbage.”
“Garbage that can kill us, Sub-Prophet,” Gellen said mildly. “I would advise you to tighten your combat harness a bit. Things are about to get interesting.”
“Bah. I do not fear these unholy machines,” Miwod responded. But Gellen noticed Miwod reach down and pull up the straps on his combat harness to tighten it.
Gellen smiled. Guardian Officers were a necessary evil. In his book, the Fleet would be better off without the zealous monks who spouted religious dogma on the bridge of every Stree ship.
But to say that out loud…well, death would be swift and sure. He had once served under a captain who thoughtlessly uttered such a dangerous comment in the heat of battle. After the Guardian Officer forced the ship’s crew to eject that captain into space as an object lesson, Gellen had been promoted to fill the empty spot. The lesson had been clear.
But I could certainly do without his inane comments that bear no relation to reality.
“Incoming! 224 missiles as expected! Point defense armed. Thirty seconds to impact!”
“Fire at will, Tac,” Gellen spoke, quietly but firmly enough to be sure he was heard. He felt his cruiser buck as his own volley of fourteen missiles launched simultaneous with the rest of his squadron.
“Twenty seconds to impact! Point defense active!” called his Tac Officer.
Gellen leaned back in his chair, forcing his muscles to relax. It was all up to the Tac Officer and the point defense cannon now. There was no more strategy to consider. He watched, detached, almost like an outside observer, as the Goblin missiles came on. The chatter and vibration of the point defense cannon began, a sound so familiar to him.
For some strange reason, he realized that the sound settled him, put him in a kind of peace. It was the sound of his job, his work. The high point of his profession. The measure of his quality as a commander.
The point defense intensified, vibrating the entire ship. As a Goblin missile penetrated through the cannon fire and smashed into his cruiser, knocking him sideways against the combat harness holding him in place, a ghost of a smile touched Gellen’s lips.
Stalingrad System
Dyson Swarm
“Incoming, 448 missiles, point defense activated,” called Bagi’s Tactical Officer.
It was redundant to make the call - Bagi could see the incoming missiles in his Augmented Reality - AR. But it was a time-honored tradition to make the calls anyway, in case the Captain’s AR fluctuated or disappeared during battle.
As expected, Bagi thought. Their ships have the same number of missile tubes as us, but they have twice as many ships. My reinforcements are still ten minutes away; I imagine this battle will be over before they get here.
“Very good, Tac. Fend off as many as you can.”
Bagi watched as one of his own missiles leaked through the enemy defense and smashed into a Stree cruiser, knocking it up and to one side. The rest of his first volley was swatted away by the Stree point defense, exploding harmlessly and filling the void with debris.
“Incoming, impact in five seconds.”
Bagi knew his squadron’s point defense could never swat away the number of enemy missiles coming at them. They would be hit, and hard. Just before the impact, a random thought went through Bagi’s mind.
The cleanup crews will have their hands full tomorrow getting all this shrapnel rounded up. Glad I don’t have that job.
Then the Blue Quark jolted as a terrific noise assaulted his hearing. His AR blinked, went out, returned, and stabilized.
“Damage report, please,” called Bagi.
“Two missiles hit us in the bow, low but just above the belly armor. Three front missile tubes out of action.”
Could have been worse.
“Fire at will, Tac. Give ‘em hell.”
“Aye, sir. Firing second volley.”
Stalingrad System
Dyson Swarm
Ten minutes later, Gellen had all the information he wanted about the Goblin defenses. He had watched in satisfaction as his task force damaged four Goblin cruisers. Two of his cruisers had suffered moderate damage, including his own, but all of his ships could still fly and shoot.
The Goblin cruiser squadron had passed through his formation at speed, firing as they went through, and started turnover to come back at him. Gellen knew he could continue on into their system if he wished, attacking some of the nearby Dyson structures. And he very much wanted to do that.
But another five squadrons of Goblin cruisers, and two of battlecruisers, were moving to intercept him. The nearest Goblin cruiser squadron was only five minutes away now. If he got tangled up with them, he might be delayed until the other Goblin formations caught up to him. And that would be suicide.
“We’ve got the information we came for,” he called to his bridge crew. “Let’s get out of here. Vector X14 and put the boot to it.”
“Aye, Skipper,” called his XO, gesturing to the Nav officer.
“What? No!” yelled Miwod. The Guardian Officer spluttered in rage. “You leave now when we have missiles left to fire? We must expend all our ammunition! We cannot return to Stree with unfired missiles! It is cowardice!”
Gellen looked at the Guardian in amazement.
How can anyone who claims to be a Naval officer know so little about how to fight?
“Sub-Prophet Miwod, I am glad to stay here and expend all remaining missiles if that is your command. However, we will all be dead within twenty minutes if we do so. Please quickly give us the Last Rites so that we may die in peace.”
Miwod looked at Gellen stupidly. The confusion on his face showed he was paralyzed in fear. He clearly failed to comprehend the situation. Gellen waited for another five seconds, but Miwod was still frozen, unable to process the information he had been given.
With a sigh, Gellen waved at the XO. “Take us out of here, XO. Vector X14 and quickly!”
Gellen felt a little residual Coriolis force as the cruiser nosed up, taking a line away from the ecliptic and out of the system. The carefully calculated escape vector would take them away from the onrushing Goblin ships and allow them to disengage and leave the system unharmed. Gellen felt the g-force come on, pushing him down into his seat as they accelerated beyond the ability of the compensators. As the perceived force approached 8g and continued to rise, he heard a groan from Guardian Officer Miwod.
Good. Maybe that will keep the idiot bastard’s mouth shut…
Surface of Venus
Sol System
Outside the mountain, Rauti stared at the mess in front of him. The Stree had wiped out his installation on Venus. Undoubtedly, they had also destroyed the tether fixtures in orbit; and probably the barely-started Dyson shell as well.
Rauti was pissed.
The Stree will think we’re all dead. Which is fine with me, because I’m going to build a little surprise for them. To hell with terraforming this planet. I’ll turn every resource I have, every microbot, every tool, to one purpose. I’ve got the resources of
a whole planet to use.
Rauti knew what he had in mind to do was a violation of the Goblin Commandments. But he was going to do it anyway.
The universe had changed. Rauti didn’t think the Commandments made a difference anymore. And certainly not to him, stranded on Venus.
If the Stree attacked us here, that means they are also attacking Stalingrad. I have no communication with Stalingrad, but I’m sure their backs are to the wall. The Stree would never dare attack me here unless they were sure of defeating us. The survival of our species is on the line.
And there’s also Clause Eighteen of the Goblin Commandments…
Rauti smiled.
Thou shalt not let the species die.
He thought through his plan. It would work, of that he was sure. He wasn’t sure how long it would take, but he didn’t care. If it took a month, or six months, or a year, he would take this fight back to the Stree.
Chapter Eight
Earth
Sol System
Five weeks later, the Humans at Earth gave up the rescue effort. They had found and rescued 21,146 Human survivors. Most of them were in bad shape; burned by thermal heat from the bombs, savaged by radiation, bandaged, broken, dying of thirst or starvation.
The Goblins had started a round-robin shuttle of survivors back to Stalingrad. Every few days, another battlecruiser departed for the Goblin home system, with makeshift dorms in the cargo hold packed to capacity with survivors. At the same time, an empty battlecruiser appeared to take its place.
Remnants: Broken Galaxy Book Five Page 5