“You always get pessimistic before the drop,” Foxtrot said. “Perhaps you should go back to having the shakes instead.”
“I got over them,” Gerald said. They shared a mute look of commiseration. “It was a hell of a lot easier when I wasn’t responsible for anyone but myself.”
***
Haydn kept his thoughts under tight control as he walked into the briefing room and took his place amongst the other officers. The company had spent the last two weeks practicing with the dumpsters, all too aware they couldn’t test the concept itself until they were actually dropped into the planetary atmosphere. Haydn had interrogated the handful of enemy survivors, the poor bastards who’d ridden the last set of dumpsters down to the surface, but they hadn’t been able to tell him very much. The dumpsters were safe until they weren’t.
And one of them broke up during flight, Haydn reminded himself. It was impossible to be sure, but the sensor records certainly suggested the dumpster hadn’t been struck by a missile or a shell. The people inside burned to a crisp well before their remains hit the surface.
Ice washed down his spine. He’d made dozens of drops, orbital and suborbital, in his career. They held no terrors for him. And yet, the dumpster concept bothered him more than he wanted to admit to anyone. They would be strapped inside, unable to move until they reached the ground ... unable, even, to take some time to recuperate before they had to get out and fight. Jumping from a shuttle in full armour would be a cakewalk, compared to dropping from orbit in a dumpster. He felt a flicker of unwilling respect for the corprats. They’d done pretty well, damn them. It helped that their grunts probably hadn’t been offered much of a choice.
Major-General Anderson took the podium. Silence fell.
“Havoc has returned from Onge,” Anderson said. “The intelligence she has collected has been uploaded to your datacores, allowing us to finalise our plans. We’ll be proceeding with a variant on Romeo-4.”
Kerri is back, Haydn thought. The thought brought a thrill, one he hastily suppressed. I won’t get to see her before all this is over.
A holographic image of a planet, zooming in on a giant city, appeared behind Anderson. “We have two objectives. First, we will be dropping the dumpsters right on top of the enemy aristocracy. Their leadership is based here, in a cluster of large mansions a relatively short distance from the megacity and the space elevator. If everything goes according to plan, we will be able to decapitate or capture the enemy leadership. If not, we will seize the megacity and the factories beyond while pushing the local population to revolt. Either the planet surrenders, or we ensure its masters can do no further damage.”
Haydn smiled. The plan was audacious, to say the least. It offered a reasonable chance for outright victory - if the enemy leadership could be convinced to order a surrender - while making life difficult for anyone who wanted to mount a counterattack. It wouldn’t be easy to get troops into the area without tearing up the landscape and risking the lives of their aristocracy, assuming - of course - there were troops on hand. He’d seen projections that suggested the enemy had sent most of their available forces to Hameau.
Nah, he thought, wryly. We couldn’t possibly get that lucky.
“Study the intelligence carefully,” Anderson said, “but remember there are gaps in our knowledge. There are things we don’t know. If you have doubts, raise them.”
An officer lifted a hand. “Can we punch a hole through the orbital defences?”
“We think so,” Anderson said. “It won’t be as big a hole as we might like, but there should be enough room to land troops on the surface. They’ll probably try to shift their orbital platforms to fire on us, but the fleet will be running interference.”
And if the area is crawling with aristos, they’ll hesitate to drop nukes on us, Haydn told himself. Even a clean tactical nuke would do a hell of a lot of damage. If nothing else, they won’t see this coming.
He frowned. That wasn’t true. The enemy had been the first to use dumpsters to land an entire division of troops. Sure, the concept had been discussed for centuries, but they’d been the first ones to actually try it. And if the fleet failed, if the defenders were not held hostage by human shields ...
We can do it, he told himself, firmly. He studied the data as it scrolled up in front of him, noting all the questions left unanswered. And once we capture the space elevator, we can take control of the entire planet.
Chapter Thirteen
Indeed, the law of supply and demand is one of the most fundamental rules of basic economics. If supply goes up in line with demand, prices remain even; if supply goes up and demand remains stable, prices fall; if supply falls and demand remains stable, prices rise. This is so basic, so elementary, that it is rarely taught or discussed in schools, which perhaps explains why the empire ran into so much trouble in its final years. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
- Professor Leo Caesius, The Rise and Fall of Interstellar Capitalism
“She’s as near to ready as she’ll ever be,” Commander Halibut said.
Kerri stood on Hammerblow’s bridge and eyed her consoles thoughtfully. The engineers had done well, replacing enough of the ship’s datanet to allow them to control her from a specially-rigged shuttlecraft attached to her rear docking port. The jury-rigged network wouldn’t survive, once enemy missiles started burning holes in the battlecruiser’s hull, but it should last long enough to give her a chance to do real damage. It was just a shame she couldn’t get into point-blank range before opening fire. There were so many sensor stations orbiting Onge that she knew a cloaked ship would be detected and blown away before it had a chance to react.
And they wouldn’t be fooled by any fake IFF codes, she mused. The enemy CO had managed to wipe those from the datanet. Even if they’d been captured, the enemy defenders knew the battlecruiser had been captured. They wouldn’t let her into firing range without asking some very tough questions. We’ll just have to take the hard way through the defences.
She glanced at her subordinate. “Did you pack the missiles into the hull?”
“Yes, Captain,” Commander Halibut said, patiently. “She’ll be firing double salvoes until she shoots herself dry or gets blown to atoms. It’s a shame to lose all those missiles, but I don’t see any choice.”
“No,” Kerri agreed. She’d met enough beancounters who’d refused to supply weapons and ammunition on the grounds it would screw up their bureaucratic accounting. The corps was a great deal smarter about it. There was no point in holding back the missiles if they might make the difference between victory or defeat. “Did you fix the targeting sensors?”
“We did our best,” Commander Halibut said. “If we lose the network, Captain, she’ll fire on anything that looks remotely threatening. The dumpsters should be safe ...”
“I hope you’re right,” Kerri said. Accidents happened, even if everyone took the right precautions. She knew that all too well. “The remainder of the fleet will keep a safe distance from the assault force.”
She frowned. The Imperial Navy would never have agreed to the plan. But then, the Imperial Navy had been a deeply conservative organisation led by admirals who’d been in their second or third centuries. Kerri understood the value of institutional knowledge, but there were limits. She’d heard reports that many of those admirals had been murdered by their subordinates after Earthfall. She understood precisely how those subordinates felt.
“The engineers will be leaving shortly,” Commander Halibut informed her. “The remainder of the crew will head down to the shuttle and get set up. We’ll be ready to jump ship when they start throwing brickbats at us.”
“Don’t try to be a hero,” Kerri said. She was tempted to take command herself, even though she had a responsibility to the squadron. “Just jump ship and go ballistic. We’ll pick you up afterwards.”
“Understood.” Commander Halibut smiled, thinly. “Can I call myself Captain while I’m in command?”
“Sure.”
Kerri smiled back. “Just remember you don’t have to go down with the ship.”
She turned away, unwilling to allow her doubts to show on her face. The battlecruiser offended her sensibilities - Hammerblow cost too much and offered too little in return - but sending the ship to her death still bothered her. Kerri doubted the corps would have bothered to repair the ship and put her back into service, but still ... she shook her head. If they won, it would be worth the cost; if they lost, it wouldn’t matter. They would have too many other problems.
Commander Halibut remained on the bridge, installing the final software and testing it before the battlecruiser was thrown back into the fire. Kerri headed to the shuttle hatch, looking around at the damaged and stripped corridors. The spooks had searched the ship from top to bottom, looking for anything that could offer insight into enemy thinking, while the engineers had removed everything of value. She smiled, humourlessly, as she recalled the report. The sweep had found a cache of porn, but little else. Hammerblow’s interior had been too closely monitored to allow the crew to develop any rebellious tendencies.
They weren’t even allowed to keep diaries, Kerri thought. The corps had always encouraged its people to keep a record of what they’d been thinking at the time, although she’d rarely recorded her innermost thoughts. The Onge didn’t seem to allow its people to keep even harmless logs. They didn’t give their people any freedom at all.
She shuddered as she peered into a deserted cabin - it had belonged to the commissioner, who’d apparently had the power to override the admiral and the captain on their own ship - and then clambered into the shuttle. The pilot closed the hatch behind her, disengaging from the doomed battlecruiser and heading back to Havoc. Kerri felt a guilty pang as she looked at the transports, worker bees buzzing around them as they made the final preparations. Haydn was over there, readying himself for the drop into enemy territory. She was tempted to go see him ... she shook her head. She’d be put in front of a court-martial and probably dishonourably discharged if she tried. Their relationship wasn’t quite illicit - she wasn’t a full-fledged marine - but it would certainly be an abuse of her position. It wasn’t as if everyone could do it.
After this, everyone needs some shore leave, she thought. And we’d better get it before we go back to war again.
***
“Captain,” Rifleman Frederick Palin called. “I have a sudden urge to take sick leave.”
Haydn snorted. No one was very happy about the dumpsters, although the younger marines saw them as a chance to do something new and to hell with the risk. The older ones were smart enough to calculate the odds and have second thoughts. He didn’t blame them for grumbling. He wanted to grumble, too.
“The medics will give you two painkillers and send you straight back here,” he said. “You’d be better off staying where you are.”
“They’ll give him the anal probe instead,” Rifleman Gillian Moulder said. “I think he’s got something stuck up his ass.”
“I’m sure it’ll come shooting out when we hit atmosphere,” Palin said. “I think ...”
“That’s enough,” Haydn said, firmly. Marines had always joked when they were on the verge of going into battle, but ... there were limits. “You can apply for your sick leave later.”
He felt a chill as he walked through the immense dumpster. It was nothing like a shuttle. The interior was crammed with scaffolding, cradling the tanks and other vehicles until the time came to open the hatches and drive onto enemy soil. The tank crews were positioned next to their vehicles, checking and rechecking the straps time and time again. Haydn understood. If a tank came loose and started flying around inside the dumpster, a lot of marines were going to be injured or killed. Beyond them, electronic warfare crews were powering up their gadgets, testing them and powering them down again. They couldn’t afford a failure on the surface.
The chill grew stronger as he walked past a platoon of marines writing or recording their final messages to their friends and families. They knew, as well as he did, that there was a very good chance those messages would never be delivered. The corps had scooped up as many relatives as it could, in the desperate bid to abandon the known boot camps and barracks before it was too late, but thousands of people had simply vanished without trace. They’d died on Earth or one of the innermost Core Worlds, worlds that had gone straight down into violent civil war. Or ...
He looked at the metal bulkhead, wondering if the Onge Corporation had scooped some of them up. It was quite possible. Marines came from every background, including engineering. Some of them had been quietly recruited for Safehouse and other concealed bases, others ... others had been left alone until Earthfall. Had they been snatched by the Onge? It was definitely possible. They might have more friends than they thought on the planet ahead
But no way to be sure, he thought, as he turned and headed back to the command platoon. We certainly can’t count on it.
“Captain,” Command Sergeant Mayberry said. “The company is present and accounted for.”
Haydn nodded. He’d have preferred more time to train, particularly with the newcomers from the 3rd Marine Division, but they’d make do with what they had. They didn’t have a choice. He clambered into the webbing and secured himself, then unhooked his datapad and brought up the files on the LZ. It was no surprise the official files were worse than useless. They insisted the LZ was nothing but forest. Havoc’s long-range scans revealed otherwise.
And we have to be very careful how we storm the mansions, he told himself. We simply cannot afford to kill the only people who can surrender.
He winced, inwardly. They weren’t fighting fanatics. The corprats were trained and well-equipped, but they didn’t have the fanatical urge to keep fighting after the war was clearly lost. They would surrender, he thought, when they realised that further resistance was pointless. He suspected the brass had sent back the former POWs to make it clear there was a life after surrender. Fanatics often told their followers that they’d be killed - or tortured, raped and then killed - when they were captured. The bastards did it to keep the poor buggers fighting while they ran for the hills.
Bastards, he thought. And if they keep fighting, we’ll tear their world to pieces.
Command Sergeant Mayberry webbed himself up beside Haydn. “This should be interesting.”
“May you live in interesting times,” Haydn agreed. He’d always lived in interesting times. Some historian was going to turn the mission into a holographic educational program ... probably cleaned up, with all the swearing replaced by bleeps or nonsensical words. He wondered if the man would bother to read the actual reports before he started to put together his sanitised version. “Remember, we aim to take prisoners first.”
He leaned back against the webbing. The top brass had put together a picture of the enemy command structure, but there were too many gaps for his peace of mind. The spooks hadn’t known anything like enough before Earthfall messed up what little they did know. They insisted that Grand Senator Onge was dead, but refused to say how they knew. Haydn groaned, inwardly. He’d feel better when they were on the surface. Until then ...
“Get some sleep, sir,” Mayberry advised. He closed his eyes. “We’ll be there shortly.”
“I know,” Haydn said. He checked his timer. Ten hours. Probably. Experience had taught him it was only an estimate and probably not a very good one at that. “You get some sleep, too.”
***
“The squadron is ready to depart,” Lieutenant Holmes said. “They’re just awaiting your order.”
Major-General Anderson stood in the MEU’s CIC, feeling an unsettling guilt gnawing at his thoughts. It was traditional for marine commanders to lead their men from the front or as close to it as possible. He’d landed on Hameau as soon as possible, then commanded the campaign from a command vehicle as close to the trenches as his bodyguards would allow. He knew he’d be landing on Onge, eventually, but ... he wished he was accompanying the first wave. Foxtrot could
handle his duties and, if worse came to worst, take command of the retreat.
His eyes lingered on the display. Fifty-seven starships, lined up in a formation that looked shockingly unprofessional. Anderson didn’t care, as long as it did its job. The lead squadron held position at the front of the fleet, spearheaded by the battlecruiser and a handful of other captured ships. And, behind them, the transports ... he felt another pang of guilt. He should be there, riding the dumpsters down to the planet. He owed it to his men to face the same risks.
“Good,” he said, finally. “Are the drones ready to go?”
“Yes, sir,” Holmes said. She indicated the display. “They’ll be deployed as soon as we reach the system.”
Anderson nodded. It was a shame there was no hope of making a stealthy arrival, as they’d done at Hameau, but the planet was surrounded by extensive sensor arrays. They’d have to drop out of phase space a long way from the limit to be sure of remaining undetected, something that would add weeks to their transit time. He could see some advantages, but the risks were just too high. The enemy would have a chance to reconcentrate their fleet and start looking for Safehouse.
They’ve probably deduced a few things about Safehouse’s location, Anderson thought. He’d done it himself, as a mental exercise. It was cheating, in a sense, because he’d already known the answer ... and yet, he was grimly aware an enemy analyst might draw the same general conclusions. Searching the entire galaxy was impossible, but isolating a few hundred possible targets and keeping them under covert observation was doable. Barely. We can’t afford to give them time to recover.
His heart quailed at what he was about to do. It would be easy to wait for orders. It would be easy to pass the question up to his ultimate superior, the Commandant himself. He understood, now, why so many beancounters couldn’t make decisions to save their lives, even when they had so little at stake. They could lose everything if they made the wrong call. It was easier and safer to pass the buck to their superiors, who would - of course - feel the same way. And they didn’t have to worry about the future of the entire galaxy.
The Halls of Montezuma Page 13