Aneka Jansen 6: The Lowest Depths of Shame

by Niall Teasdale

  ‘Clearly,’ Al replied. ‘We are separate entities and always have been.’

  ‘Your mind isn’t mine, even if you can hear me thinking. There’s no reason to think of it as odd…’

  ‘Unfortunately, irrational concerns are more difficult to dismiss than erroneous, rational ones.’

  ‘Yeah…’

  There was silence for quite a long time, though ‘quite a long time’ was relative within the confines of their shared thought-space. Aneka had actually taken two steps before she said, ‘They’re going to keep trying to persuade us to do it until we do.’

  ‘Ella in particular. Cassandra has my drone to distract her. The novelty is still there. Ella has the novelty to come.’

  ‘Ah, but she knows if she nags too much I’ll dig my heels in. She’ll be subtle.’

  ‘Subtle for Ella.’

  ‘Yeah, that,’ Aneka replied, grimacing.

  Winter and War were in the ops room, their eyes on a display of the Lonar system. The three were meeting because they were going to go over the sensor data and transmit recommendations through to the drones. When the fleet arrived, those would be transmitted to the Argus along with the latest information on the Herosian deployment. Even with the communications system the AIs had, there was a sixteen-hour transmission lag from Shadataga to Lonar, so they needed to get their message through soon.

  ‘The Herosians had four of the Gathor-class frigates in-system,’ War was saying as Aneka entered. ‘As surmised, they have been unable to repair them.’

  ‘Gathor?’ Aneka asked.

  ‘That was what the Herosians were calling those cloaked frigates,’ Winter supplied. ‘They were the best bits of equipment they managed to build, and the only ones they knew enough about that they might have got them functional again. We didn’t think they would, but it was possible.’

  ‘And the rest of their forces? I read the reports. Comms are still down and they’ve had about twenty-five per cent of their fleet make a run for it.’

  War nodded. ‘They are now at a significant disadvantage, but they hold surface facilities which could be difficult to recapture.’

  ‘Show me,’ Aneka said.

  Lonar was a nice enough world, it seemed. Or it had been until the Herosians had blown several holes in the surface. There were three main settlements, but the primary one, the one the Herosians were most heavily occupying, was based around the starport, which was fairly heavily fortified. Bombardment would not only leave the world without a functional means of landing ships, but would likely result in heavy civilian casualties.

  ‘It’s risky,’ Aneka said, ‘but if the Guardians are willing to try it… Send in troops to isolate the starport and set up wide-area jamming to block the sensor systems. Then they use drop pods to land a contingent of Guardians inside the port. The armour they have can stand up to more punishment and those force rifles are nasty. Believe me on this, I know. They should be able to take out the defences enough to let the Jenlay Marines in. Especially if we can figure out precise landing positions and they can hit them.’

  ‘That would require considerable precision,’ War said, her tone thoughtful.

  ‘Yeah, but these are Yrimtan’s crack troops we’re talking about here.’

  Marker lights appeared on four locations on the schematic of the city, all within the central, walled off spaceport.

  ‘These four positions are close enough to the main gateways to be accessible,’ War said, ‘but far enough away that the goal will not be immediately obvious. I suggest we run simulations to refine them, but they appear to be the best points of ingress.’

  ‘Then I suggest we get on with it,’ Winter said. ‘I want this dispatched within the next eight hours.’

  LV-101 Argus, 5.5.530 FSC.

  Notification of their exit from warp came through as a minor footnote in the data feeds Philip Norden was processing as they approached Lonar. It did result, approximately three seconds later, in additional data feeds streaming in from an external source. These were added seamlessly to the collection of sensor readings they had been collecting for the past thirty minutes; it would not do to have the Jenlay, or most of the Jenlay, know where that additional, highly detailed, information was coming from. They believed the Argus was some sort of wonder ship, so selling them on the idea that everything was coming from the logistics and command vessel was a trivial matter of not saying anything.

  There was an additional note attached to the communications which Norden flipped open with a thought and scanned. It was a suggested attack plan based on data collected a couple of days earlier, but given that the source was Aneka Jansen and Shadataga’s chief weapons expert, he decided to give it considerable attention. As far as he could tell, the up-to-date sensor data from the probes and the Argus’ sensors was indicating no major change in deployment of the Herosian troops. Subject to their reaction to the incursion, the plan appeared to be a good one. And there was the fact that the Jenlay would likely approve given that it was Guardians who would be putting themselves at the most risk.

  ‘Rear Admiral Thackett,’ Norden said aloud a fraction of a second after his implant had opened the communications link to other man’s ship, ‘I have identified a plan of attack which should minimise civilian casualties.’

  Thackett’s face appeared, projected into Norden’s visual field. He was typical of upper-level Federation Navy officers having allowed himself to age a little while maintaining his looks. His hair had a hint of grey in it, which he felt gave him an air of authority, experience. Norden was well aware that he lacked the latter and was unsure of the former.

  ‘And that is?’

  ‘We need to eliminate the ships in orbit first. That should be relatively easy given our superiority in firepower.’

  Thackett nodded. ‘Forward frigates are already engaging,’ he said.

  This was impetuous and foolish without suitable backup, but nothing Norden had not expected, or noticed. He had already indicated that the Hand of God should move in to provide support.

  ‘With their air support gone, the Herosians will fortify the spaceport further and dig in. I will dispatch Guardian teams with broadband jamming equipment to back up your troops on the ground. Your men’s job will be to ensure the spaceport is contained and under pressure.’

  ‘That leaves the Herosians in charge of the starport…’

  ‘Until we drop Guardian assault teams in at locations I will have confirmed by then. They will open the main gates and your Marines will be able to walk straight in. My analysis of the Herosian mindset suggests capitulation if they no longer have a strong position and no way out.’

  Thackett barked out a laugh. ‘That sounds like the Herosians. All right, it sounds like a plan. Let’s do it.’

  Shadataga.

  ‘Shouldn’t we… go over to Ops or something?’ Ella suggested. She was fidgeting in her seat, nervous.

  ‘We won’t get telemetry through from Lonar until sixteen hours after the battle starts,’ Aneka replied calmly. ‘If they’re on schedule, that’ll be fifteen to seventeen hours from now.’

  ‘But…’

  ‘Read a book, decide you really would like to have sex, or I could take you to the gym and we can practise your judo, but there is nothing we can do before we get news through tomorrow.’

  ‘But…’ Ella stopped as Aneka glowered at her. ‘Okay,’ she said sullenly. ‘Let’s go to the gym. You can spot me some weights and then beat me up, and then maybe the endorphins will make me feel like some wrestling. I’ve got to do something to keep my mind off it.’

  Lonar.

  Watkis Mallroy was not having his best day. The combat suit the Navy had insisted he and his cameraman wore was heavy, and the helmet obscured his face too much. Worse, the Battle of Lonar was turning into a damp squib. There had been one frigate damaged taking down the orbital defences and the Herosians had retreated into the starport with its high, thick walls as soon as the troop transports had landed. Which was all good for
the Jenlay forces, but it made it hard to paint this as a valiant, difficult fight to liberate the captured world.

  Front Line News had landed a great exclusive when he had persuaded the Navy to let him ride along with the troops retaking the captured worlds. None of the other networks were there. Front Line would be the first with the reports and the syndication rights were going to make them all rich… Assuming, of course, that anything happened.

  He pointed toward a small group of figures in armour which was not the standard combat gear the Navy used. The darker blue, tightly fitted bodysuits belonged to the Old Earth forces, the ‘Guardians.’ Mallroy had hoped he would get to film on one of their ships, but had been politely but very firmly declined. There was nothing to stop him filming them in the field, however.

  Not that they seemed to be up to much. There were three of them assembling some sort of apparatus they had brought in in three parts. What it was and what it did remained a mystery, even when everything had been connected together and they stepped back, apparently satisfied with their work.

  ‘Gopi,’ Mallroy muttered. ‘This is going to make damn boring television.’

  BC-101 Hand of God.

  ‘Ground teams report all jammers in place.’ The report passed through Charlene Tasker’s mind amid a dozen other indications of ship status and current deployment positions, but she latched onto it and sent out instructions to the technicians in charge of remote operating devices.

  The initial activation sequence would randomly interfere with the frequencies the Herosians were using for communications. After a few minutes they would get intermittent blocking of radar. At that point the drop pods would be launched. Full jamming would kick in as the pods hit the upper atmosphere. If Norden was right, the Herosians would be panicking by then.

  ‘Drop pods, status?’ she asked, another thought cast into the ship’s network.

  ‘All pods report ready,’ came the reply.

  ‘Launch in two minutes, forty-six seconds.’

  ‘Aye, Captain.’

  Tasker paused for a second and then added, ‘You people come back from this in the same number of pieces that you go down. That’s an order, but I’ll personally thank each and every one of you if you do.’

  This time the ‘Aye, Captain’ was a chorus from the entire assault team.

  Lonar.

  ‘What was that? Tell me you got that? Are they bombing the port?’

  ‘I got it,’ the cameraman said. ‘No explosions. Probably drop pods.’

  Mallroy glared at the wall of the starport. They were dropping pods behind those walls. There was going to be fighting behind those walls. And he was on the wrong gaisu side!

  ~~~

  Jared Warren landed smoothly on bent knees, rolled off to his right, came up to one knee already aware of the three potential targets in the open area his pod had landed in and which of those his squad mates had already tagged, and opened fire on the last of them. A Herosian in body armour was slammed backward into the wall he was standing beside as the force pulse hit him and, from the way he fell afterward, he was not getting up.

  ‘Clear,’ he thought.

  ‘All clear,’ his sergeant’s voice replied. ‘Reporting down and clear. All right, vector sixty-seven degrees, ninety-seven metres to objective. Move.’

  Jared was on his feet and moving almost before the thought had processed. His in-vision displays identified an unfriendly and he shifted aim and fired on the run. Like all his teammates, he was on neural accelerators for the assault; the drugs increased the flow of data between implants and brain, heightened perceptions, and generally made you a faster, more efficient soldier. But Jared had been off the cyber drugs his fellows used for the past couple of months due to a glitch in his chip port. That had been fixed weeks ago, but the break had made him realise that he was spending half his life as a zombie. Somehow it made the effect of the accelerators seem more… well, more. He felt like he could take on the world, but most importantly he felt sharp. Really sharp.

  And there was the other thing, the reason he wanted to be all he could be on this mission. The Captain had said she would thank them all personally when they got back. Ever since coming off the cyber drugs, Jared Warren had noticed a few things which he had not noticed before. There were sounds in the ship at night which had gone unnoticed, scents in the purified air which had seemed inconsequential. He had found the sensation of taking a shower, the feeling of warm rain falling on his skin, to be quite an amazing thing. And he had noticed that Captain Charley Tasker was one hell of a woman.

  Of course, he conceded, as he punched a guard through a window with a force pulse, she might not have meant what he had been imagining she meant by the statement. She was, after all, their Captain and she had to maintain a degree of separation from her people. It was only sensible since she might have to send them out on missions like this one. But he could still fantasise about it, couldn’t he? Nothing wrong with a bit of fantasy. Especially when it was having no effect on his ability to hit every target he aimed at.

  LV-101 Argus.

  There was a squadron of fighters moving east from one of the other cities. Norden noted it and identified them as targets for the Jenlay air-superiority units to deal with. They should not present a problem.

  Reports from the ground indicated that the port’s gates would be breached in five minutes, thirty-two seconds with a fifteen-second variance. The Herosians were actually putting up less of a fight than expected. He packaged this observation and dropped it into the folder of reports which would be sent back to Shadataga when this was done with. If things continued to go well, he would add a personal note congratulating Miss Jansen on her plan. The element of surprise it presented had been the key, he decided: the Herosians would not have considered doing anything like this, and he did not think the Jenlay would either. That was why it was working so well.

  He had met her once, Aneka Jansen, the woman who had freed them from the yoke of Manu Dei. It had been brief, but she had seemed far different from the tyrant she had removed, despite looking very like her. She had complimented him on his ability to think on a strategic level, claiming her own talents were tactical. He would really have to point out that her capabilities were clearly broader than she thought they were.

  FNb Admiral Banfry.

  ‘All aircraft downed, Captain,’ Judy Leeforth announced.

  ‘Like shooting fish in a barrel,’ Ape Gibbons replied a little sourly. ‘Any sign of anything else in the region?’

  ‘Sensors are clean. Then again, we didn’t see them until they got airborne. There might be something else hiding.’

  ‘Begin running a high-resolution tactical scan. Might as well do something useful. If nothing else it’ll catalogue the surface damage the Herosians did.’

  Leeforth’s fingers flicked across a keyboard, relaying instructions to the sensor operators. ‘After New Earth, I’d have thought you’d be happy this one was easy,’ she said.

  ‘When it’s done I’ll be happy. Easy makes me nervous. I keep wondering when the other shoe will drop.’

  ‘Not today, sir,’ Leeforth replied. She sounded very confident about it. ‘Your cabin tonight?’ she added, apparently as an afterthought.

  ‘Assuming you’re right,’ Ape said, ‘my cabin tonight.’

  Lonar.

  The gates were open and the Jenlay troops were marching in as though they had saved the day. Jared watched them file past, riding armoured transports and waving their laser rifles triumphantly. It was, he thought, a little pathetic.

  He turned and spotted the reporter they had been told about talking to camera with the troops as a backdrop. Whatever the man was saying was inaudible, but Jared was conscious enough of Jenlay media to suspect that he was playing up the effort the Marines had made.

  Continuing his sweep, he spotted a door opening in one of the nearby buildings. A woman with two children clutching at her skirt appeared, smiling as the troops filed past. That, Jared thought, shou
ld be what the idiot with the camera should be filming. These were the people they were here to liberate. They deserved to have their story told.

  Still, the position was not secure, even if the Jenlay thought it was. Jared started across the road toward the open door intent on getting them back inside, and that was when the alert flicked through his implant from one of his teammates. He could not see the gunman on the wall, but he knew exactly where he was and where he was aiming. Jared bolted for the door, the woman’s smile turning toward surprise as the dark figure with the rifle bore down on her. She let out a yelp as he pushed her back, and then he grabbed the doorframe, bracing himself a fraction of a second before the grenade smashed into his back, bounced back, and exploded.

  6.5.530 FSC.

  Ella’s eyes flicked open at the touch of Aneka’s fingers. For an instant she had no idea where she was as the nightmare she had been lost in dragged at her mind. Then reality reasserted itself: she was on Shadataga, not Eshebbon, and there were no monsters at the door.

  ‘You okay?’ Aneka asked, concern in her voice.

  ‘Just a nightmare.’

  Aneka nodded. ‘Well… we’ve had reports coming in from the drones for the last couple of hours.’

  ‘Why didn’t you wake me?!’ Ella squeaked, sitting up.

  ‘There wasn’t much point until we knew what was happening. It was pretty much a walk-in. Very few casualties on either side. What there were were almost entirely Herosian.’

  ‘Almost?’

  ‘People get hurt in battles, Ella.’

  ‘Yes… I know. Well, this is good, right? We got Lonar back without too much damage.’

  ‘Yes, this one was easy, and War and Winter say that Marchant has been just about deserted by the Herosians, so that one should be even easier, but Beryum… It was disputed, right? Whoever is holding it seems to have decided to keep holding it.’

  ‘Oh. How long before the fleet gets there?’

  ‘It’s a thirty-nine-day flight.’

  ‘More waiting?’