Aneka sighed. ‘I’m afraid so.’
BC-101 Hand of God.
The last of the Guardian team responsible for the drop into Lonar Starport came into Tasker’s office in a wheelchair. He was a fairly handsome young man, though his looks were marred by the heavy bruising around the left side of his face.
‘I wasn’t sure you’d include me in this, Captain,’ Jared said as his chair wheeled him toward her desk.
‘Oh? And why is that?’
‘Well, you said to come back in one piece and I’m a bit broken.’
Jared’s medical records passed across Tasker’s vision. Three broken ribs, compound fracture of the left femur, radial fracture of the right humerus… ‘How long before you’re up and about?’
‘Techs are saying five days in this chair and another five to ten on a support exoskeleton, but I’ll be fully functional before we get to Beryum.’
‘Well,’ Tasker said, placing a small, red cylinder on the desk in front of her, ‘I think you can be forgiven for getting yourself smashed up, seeing as you did save three civilian lives at the risk of your own. That should help with the pain. Class three, difficult to get, but well worth it…’ He was looking embarrassed and she stopped, frowning. ‘Problem?’
‘I, uh, I don’t use them, Captain. There was a problem with my port and I couldn’t, and I started noticing the world was actually better without, and…’
Tasker picked up the cyber-drug slug and dropped it into her desk drawer. Then she leaned back in her seat, steepling her fingers and narrowing her eyes at him.
‘You present me with a problem, Mister Warren,’ she said.
‘Sorry, Captain.’
‘At least it’s a pleasant problem and not the usual kind. All the reports from the mission indicated you performed well. Actually, above average for your squad. You saved three people’s lives. But the reward I had planned is not a reward. We’re recommending you for a medal, but that seems distinctly impersonal. Ten to fifteen days…’
‘Sorry?’
‘When you’re cleared for active duty, I want you to report to my quarters and we’ll see whether I can’t reward you some other way.’ She knew she had hit the nail on the head when his cheeks flushed. It was only fair: to the victor go the spoils, and he had been quite the victor down on Lonar. ‘Get lots of rest,’ she advised him. ‘You’ll need it.’
Lonar, 21.5.530 FSC.
Midshipman Barnes Dolan was of the opinion that the victors of the Second Battle of Lonar should not be tasked with clerical work, especially when it was making sure the bodies of the Herosians on ice in Lonar City’s hospital morgue were catalogued. It was something to do with the Federation Articles of War, and even if the Federation no longer really existed, his superiors had decided that the rules had to be followed. So here he was taking scans of Herosians, though they all looked the same as far as he was concerned, and checking for identification or, failing that, identifying marks.
Dolan was not sure how you could tell, but he had been assured he could put down ‘gender: male’ for all of them. Herosian women did not fight, and they were highly unlikely to have moved out to a contested world this soon after its capture. If they had they would have been shipped back home again when their technology started breaking. So, Dolan put down ‘male’ in the gender box for his current subject.
Actually, this one probably was. He was a beefy specimen, for a Herosian anyway, with a lot of heavy muscle in the upper body. Dolan wondered if that meant he got females, though from the little he knew of Herosian society, the fact that this one was here suggested not. He did have some neat jewellery: golden bands of metal were stretched around his biceps.
Dolan looked at them. Gold. It might not have helped this guy get the girls, but it might help Dolan to and it was certainly not helping anyone now…
The Midshipman shrugged and began easing one of the bands down the corpse’s arm. To the victors go the spoils, right?
Part Two: The Sound of Trumpets
Shadataga, 9.7.530 FSC.
‘There’s no way around it, they’re dug in like ticks.’ Aneka squeezed the bridge of her nose and then wondered why, given that her body did not ever suffer from fatigue. ‘The only way this is going to happen is hand-to-hand fighting through the mines.’
‘A narcotic gas pumped through the ventilation system…’ War began.
‘Would be an excellent solution,’ Winter interrupted, ‘if they had one. And they would need a lot of it, and even then there would be a need to go in to visually confirm that the Herosians were down.’ She sighed. ‘Aneka is right. There is no clever strategy which can solve this problem, and no technological solution we can bring to bear in time.’
‘Why has this place held out?’ Aneka asked. ‘Lonar was easy, Marchant was almost deserted. How come Beryum is being held onto?’
‘The clan which took it, the T’Shanthis, have gone through a bad patch in both politics and commerce. They were lucky to get the chance to take Beryum, and they have no intention of letting it slip from them. Of course, they don’t realise that more or less every clan out there is having a “bad hair day” at the moment.’
Aneka raised an eyebrow. ‘Bad hair day?’
‘I always felt it was a very descriptive phrase. You know it looks wrong, strands keep falling in your eyes and annoying you…’
‘My sister spent a lot of time studying Earth culture,’ War said. ‘Perhaps a little too much, but it was her purpose.’
‘I don’t hear you quoting…’ Aneka said.
‘Actually,’ War went on, ‘I was always rather fond of your Albert Einstein. “I know not what weapons the next war will be fought with, but the one after will be fought with sticks and stones.” Wrong, as it turned out, but only by degree.’
Aneka gave a cough. ‘So I guess we just get the probes to update the Argus on the latest Herosian deployment and hope for the best?’
‘Unfortunately, yes. At this distance it’ll take over a day for the message to get there. I’ll send the orders now.’
‘There is another matter I wanted your opinion on,’ Winter said, her brow furrowed. ‘Have you been reading the reports coming in from my New Earth avatars?’
‘Not all of them. You’ve got a super-computer to run on, I have to make do with less expansive equipment.’
‘I understood we made your breasts larger,’ War said, confused, and then added, ‘Sorry, I was distracted for a second,’ when she realised what they were talking about.
Aneka bit her lips.
Winter shook her head and went on. ‘There is a discrepancy in the media reports of both Lonar and Marchant compared to the data we have collected ourselves. Norden indicated approximately eleven hundred Herosian prisoners taken on Lonar. The number being reported from New Earth is closer to six hundred. There were no reporters with the fleet on Marchant, but the official news reports indicate that a battleship and three cruisers were destroyed retaking the planet.’
‘There were two frigates and a cargo ship!’
‘It seems someone is overplaying the resistance the Herosians are presenting. There was a disabled Gathor frigate at Marchant as well. That was taken aboard a transport vessel the Dokar forces brought along and has now left the system.’
‘Someone wants the tech. I guess they would… Do we know who “they” are?’
‘Currently, no. Someone in the Jenlay infrastructure. The Navy seems most likely.’
‘Huh. Well, if they’re trying to play up the Herosians as a current threat rather than a past one, Beryum is going to be a help.’
‘Unfortunately, it will.’
LV-101 Argus, 11.7.530 FSC.
‘Any clever plans for this one?’ Thackett had obviously seen enough of the data coming in through the Argus to know it was not going to be as easy as Beryum had been.
‘No, Rear Admiral,’ Norden replied. ‘Not unless an unforeseen opening presents itself. Their orbital forces are not especially strong, but they are
well fortified in underground positions. Heavy bombardment will result in excessive civilian casualties. We need to secure orbital and air superiority, and then it’s a matter for the ground troops.’
‘Old fashioned war then. Let’s get on with it.’
Norden watched as ship deployment orders came through from the Admiral Goroy, the battleship Thackett was using as his command post. The attack pattern was conservative, but acceptable. Two squadrons were dispatched on a flanking posture, and the remainder would go in direct. Norden might have employed more aggressive tactics under the circumstances, but he could not especially fault the Rear Admiral; every commander had his preferred methodologies. Though…
The strategist shook his head and focussed on the task at hand. Thackett had lost a frigate going in early against a weaker force at Lonar. Perhaps he was simply learning from his mistakes.
Beryum.
Mizzy lay huddled in her blanket trying to warm herself up after washing with water that was barely above freezing. At least they had been given beds. They were metal-framed and the mattresses were thin, but they kept them off the ground. Deena had said it was probably to stop so many of them getting sick and there had been fewer people having to be taken out to the hospital in the last couple of weeks.
Deena had had a cough for the last month, and Mizzy had caught it a week later. Neither had said anything to the guards because sometimes the people who left the cave did not come back. Mizzy’s cough was not getting better, and she knew Deena was worried about it, so she tried very hard not to cough, but it was difficult when she was cold.
The bed moved. ‘Something’s happening,’ Deena whispered from outside the blankets. ‘The guards are running about.’
Mizzy pulled the blankets back and looked up at the older girl. ‘Is someone coming?’
Deena reached out a hand and stroked the little blonde’s hair. ‘I don’t know, hun. Just be ready.’
‘What for?’
‘Anything.’
BC-101 Hand of God.
The primary beam, a one-hundred-gigajoule gamma-ray laser, sliced through the hull of its target. Fuel tanks exploded and the ruined frigate began a lazy tumble. The Hand’s computers projected a deorbit over the southern pole in six hours. Tasker made a note to send a shuttle out to check for survivors.
‘Hand of God reporting last Herosian vessel down,’ she said aloud for the benefit of the Jenlay contingent.
‘Prepare for ground invasion,’ Thackett’s voice said. ‘Anti-aircraft fire to begin on my mark.’
‘We’re getting radio transmissions from the surface.’ Tasker did not recognise the voice, but it came from one of the Jenlay ships. ‘Repeated statement that they will take extreme measures if we don’t withdraw.’
A flurry of thoughts passed across the Hand’s internal network. Ground batteries below were opening fire. There were three squadrons of fighters in the air, more preparing for launch. Point defence fire was being initiated from all Old Earth vessels. No one could detect the transmissions the Jenlay ship was reporting.
‘Open fire,’ Thackett ordered.
Tasker’s visuals showed missile tracks heading for the airborne craft below. Seventeen seconds to interception. Point defence had taken out the ones coming up…
‘Continued radio traffic,’ the same voice reported. ‘They demand we back off.’
‘Or what?’ Thackett growled. ‘They’re going to shout at us harder?’
Missile detonations. Sixty-one per cent estimated kill rate. Tasker dispatched an order to her ground force leaders indicating they should prepare for launch. And then chaos consumed the fleet’s communications.
‘Detonations,’ someone reported.
‘Two detonations. Nuclear!’
Figures flashed across Tasker’s field of vision. Two nuclear detonations a couple of kilometres outside the city. Estimated yield twenty-five kilotonnes. More precise locations appeared. The mines…
Beryum.
When the cavern began to shake, Deena grabbed Mizzy from the bed and pushed her under the frame.
‘Stay there,’ the lanky girl said.
‘What about you?’ Mizzy called back as Deena turned away.
‘Have to get the others under cover.’
Mizzy curled into a tight ball as she heard small rocks hitting the floor of the cavern. She was not sure exactly what was going on, but she was sure it was not good and that she wanted Deena in with her, under cover, and away from the falling ceiling.
There was another sound, deeper and more resonant, from somewhere above them. It sounded a bit like the explosions Mizzy had heard when the Herosians had first come, but it went on for longer and it had to be louder because of all the rock above their heads.
Screaming started as something big hit the floor of the cavern. One of the voices sounded like Deena.
Mizzy’s screams joined the others as something heavy slammed into her bed, buckling the frame.
LV-101 Argus.
Norden was momentarily stunned. None of his simulations, none of his research, had indicated that the Herosians would commit suicide rather than allow the planet to fall into Jenlay hands. But there it was. Two warheads had been detonated near the mining facilities.
The data was indicating surface blasts. Nuclear mines or standalone devices. Had one of the anti-aircraft missiles triggered them? But, no, the delay was too significant. It seemed that they had been a response to the continued attack. There had been the reports of radio broadcasts…
Analysis would have to wait. The surface damage was significant and there would be extensive disruption of the mine tunnels. It was known that civilians were working in the mines and hostages were being held down there. Radioactive fallout was already dispersing across a wide area. The city was likely safe; it was domed due to the cold, thinly oxygenated atmosphere. Data was still lacking detail after the explosions, but the dome seemed intact.
‘All teams switch to hazard suits,’ Thackett was ordering. ‘I want men on the ground in less than thirty minutes! Vashma damn them! What were they thinking?’
Norden said nothing in reply. He was busy coordinating the launch of drop ships to the planet’s surface. There were still going to be Herosians down there, and it seemed they were far more desperate than had been estimated. The fight was far from over, and it was going to be hard.
Shadataga, 12.7.530 FSC.
‘I’m… not sure I believe what I’m seeing,’ Gillian stated.
Ella was just staring, wide-eyed, at the operations room display. Most of the others were watching in silence. Aneka had closed her eyes, but she was still getting raw data displayed behind her eyelids, which seemed to soften the impact a little, but still managed to get across the probable level of destruction.
‘This is not a normal reaction for Herosians,’ Evolution stated. ‘Summer was the real expert on their behaviour, and I’m not sure all his reports can be classed as impartial, but no reading of their mindset I have suggests this kind of action under these circumstances.’
Winter was nodding. ‘I think we need to go over the sensor records for the period before the detonations.’
‘All those people…’ Ella whispered.
Aneka opened her eyes and wrapped an arm around Ella’s shoulders. ‘There’s nothing we can do for them, love,’ she said. ‘It’s up to the people out there.’
‘I know,’ Ella replied. ‘It’s just… I can’t watch this. Not when I can’t do anything.’
Nodding, Aneka steered her out toward the door. The data feeds continued in her mind, detailing the devastation on Beryum. There was nothing she could do either, but she felt she had to watch. Something about all of it felt wrong and she wanted to know what.
Beryum.
Jared edged through the wreckage-strewn interior of the building on alert. His suit’s sensors were watching for the data transmitters the Jenlay had embedded in them, but he was not getting much luck with that. The Herosians had, of course, had theirs deactiva
ted, otherwise spotting the remaining aliens would have been a lot easier and Jared would not have been on such high alert.
Except it felt like a waste of effort. The Jenlay commanders were insisting that there were still Herosians hiding out in the buildings, but none of the Guardian squads had encountered them. There were bodies, plenty of those, but nothing on its feet.
It was better than being on the mine clearance operation, however, so he was not exactly unhappy about being dispatched to the city. The Argus’ factory facilities had been used to build equipment to clear fallen rock. Largely that had come down to microbots built for digging. The tiny robots could shift tonnes of dirt, shoring up as they went, far more safely than traditional tunnelling mechanisms, but it still took time. Since it was going to be hours before they could move into the mines, spare troops had been moved up to the city.
Not that they had seemed welcome. The Jenlay had appeared reluctant to let them in, and they had been assigned to clearing habitation blocks which, as best as Jared could tell anyway, had already been cleared.
A flash from his HUD caught his attention and he turned into an apartment on his right. His suit had picked up an identity transponder and was decrypting the bio-monitor readouts as he narrowed in on it. Low blood pressure, thready, weak pulse, but whoever it was they were alive. He found her as a name flashed past: Tuft, Donna. She was lying in a pool of blood, but not all of it was hers. Beside her lay a dead Herosian in combat gear, killed by a laser hit to the side of the head. Someone had killed the Herosian and not noticed the woman?
Jared sent out a request for immediate medical assistance to his location and a notification to the rest of his squad that he had a survivor he was securing. Then he checked the rest of the apartment, but there were no more aliens, and no sign of any real conflict aside from the two casualties.
It was as the medics were arriving that Jared realised that there was also nothing in the way of weapons in the room.
13.7.530 FSC.
Ape Gibbons watched as bodies were carried out of the mine. He had insisted on coming down to the planet, despite the protestations of his XO and Thackett who seemed to think that surface activities were none of his concern. So he was down on the planet and regretting every moment of it.
Aneka Jansen 6: The Lowest Depths of Shame Page 6