The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twentieth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

  “If you were qualified for any systems, I’d put you to work.”

  An excellent reason to remain unqualified. “And what would you have me do?”

  “At this point?” Petoskey shrugged. Then he frowned, and jerked his head toward the intelligence team’s radio room. “Was that true? About—?”

  “This is not the place,” Max said firmly. Illusion was not reality; the crew pretended not to hear Petoskey speak, but they’d repeat every word that came from his mouth.

  “I hate the Adareans, I want you to know that,” Petoskey said. “Anything to do with the Adareans, I hate, and I’ll have none of it aboard my ship. So if there’s any danger, even from one of the intelligence men—”

  “There will be no danger,” Max asserted firmly. “It is my job to make certain of that.”

  “See to it, Lieutenant.”

  “I will.” Max was surprised. That qualified as the most direct command any captain had given him during his tenure as a political officer.

  Petoskey returned an almost respectful nod. Max was about to suggest a later discussion when Lukinov shouted from the hatch.

  “Captain. You might want to listen to this. We tried to raise you on the com, but it’s not working.”

  Petoskey slipped his feet free and followed the intelligence officer. Max invited himself and swam along.

  Inside the listening room, Reedy stood—or floated—at a long desk, wearing headphones and making notes on the translation in her palm-pad. Burdick had a truck battery surgi-taped to a table wedged in the tiny room’s rounded corner. Wires ran from it to an open panel on the main concomsole, and Burdick connected others. He looked up from his work and grinned as they came into the hatch. “Gotta love the electrician’s mates,” he said. “They’ve got everything.”

  Lukinov laughed and handed headphones to Petoskey. “Wait until you hear this.”

  Petoskey slipped the earpieces into place. “I don’t understand Chinese,” he said after a minute. “Always sounds like an out-of-tune guitar to me.”

  Lukinov’s smile widened. “But it’s voices, not code, don’t you see? The level of encryption was like cheap glue.” He made a knife-opening-a-letter gesture with his hands.

  “Good work. What have you learned so far?”

  Lukinov leaned over Reedy’s shoulder to look at her palm-pad. “Corporate security research ship. Spongedivers.”

  Petoskey nodded. “Bunch of scientists and part-time soldiers. Soft, but great tech. Way beyond ours. It’s a safe bet their battery arrays don’t go down when they fly mute. Lefty says there’s another one parked out by the wormhole.”

  Lukinov confirmed this. “We know it because the radio tech is talking to his girlfriend over on the other ship.”

  Burdick snickered, and Petoskey muttered “Mixed crews” with all the venom of a curse. He glared at Reedy so hard his eyes must have burned a hole in the ensign’s head. The young woman looked up. “Yes, sir?” she asked.

  “I didn’t speak to you,” Petoskey snapped.

  Mixed crews were part of the Revolution, a way to double manpower—so to speak—in the military forces and give Jesusalem a chance to catch up. So far it was only in the officer corps, and even there it hadn’t been received well. Some men, like Vance at the Academy, openly tried to discourage it despite the government’s commitment.

  Lukinov held the back of Reedy’s seat to keep from drifting toward the ceiling. “The inbound ship’s called the Deng Xiaopeng. Why does that name sound familiar?”

  Petoskey shrugged. “Means nothing to me.”

  If they didn’t know, then Max would give them an answer. He cleared his throat. “I believe that Deng Xiaopeng was one of Napoleon’s generals.”

  Lukinov curled his mouth skeptically.

  “That doesn’t sound right,” said Petoskey.

  “I’m quite certain of it,” said Max, bracing himself between the wall and floor at angle sideways to the others. “Confusion to the enemy.”

  “Always,” replied Petoskey, apparently happy to find something he could agree with. “Always.”

  Max lay on the bunk in his cabin waiting for the clock to tick over to morning. Two days after the spongedivers had been sighted, his thoughts still careened weightlessly off the small walls. The presence of the ship from Outback complicated the ship’s mission and his. Meanwhile, he was cut off from his superiors, unable to guess which goal they wanted him to pursue now. Or goals, as the case more likely was. So he was on his own again. Forced to decide for himself.

  Nothing new about that, he thought ruefully.

  He released the straps and pushed off for the door to take a tour of the ship. He paused for a moment, then grabbed his cap, and tugged it down tight on his head. If he made it a formal tour of the ship, it might draw out his traitor.

  When he opened the door, he saw another one cracked open down the corridor. Lieutenant Rucker peeked out and gestured for Max to come inside. Max checked to see that no one was in the hall and slipped into the room.

  The blond young man closed the door too fast and it slammed shut. He noticed Max’s cap and saluted with perfect etiquette before producing an envelope. “I was hoping to catch you,” he said. “This is from Commander Gordet.”

  Max took the multi-tool from his pocket and flicked out the miniature knife to slice open the seal. He studied the sheet inside. Gordet had written down the codes for the safe that held the captain’s secret orders. Interesting. Max wondered if Rucker had made a copy for himself. “Did Gordet say anything specific?”

  “He said to tell you that if we were to engage the Outback ship in combat and anything unfortunate were to happen to the captain, you would have his full cooperation and support.”

  “So what did he tell the captain?”

  Rucker looked at the wall, opened his mouth, closed it again. He was not a quick liar.

  Max gave him an avuncular clap on the shoulder. “You can tell me, Lieutenant. I’ll find out anyway.”

  Rucker gulped, still refusing to meet Max’s eyes. “He told the captain that, um, if we were to engage the other ship in combat, and anything unfortunate were to happen to you, he’d make sure it was all clear in the records.”

  So Gordet was indecisive, trying to play both sides at once. That was a hard game. The Commander had no gift for it either. “What’s your opinion of Gordet?” probed Max.

  “He’s a good officer. I’m proud to serve under him.”

  Rather standard response, deserving of Max’s withering stare. This time Rucker’s eyes did meet his.

  “But, um, he’s still mad about losing his cabin to you, sir. He doesn’t like bunking with the junior officers.”

  “He’ll get over it,” said Max. “Just remind him that Lukinov is bunking with Burdick, eh?” He gestured at Rucker to open the door. Rucker looked both ways down the corridor, motioned that it was clear, and Max went on his way.

  He headed topside, pulling himself hand over hand up the narrow shaft. When he exited the tube he found Kulakov conducting an emergency training drill in the forward compartments. Stick-its posted to all the surfaces indicated the type and extent of combat damage. Crews in full space gear performed “repairs” while the chief petty officer graded their performance.

  “You’re dead,” shouted Kulakov, grabbing a man by his collar and pulling him out of the exercise. “You forgot that you’re a vacuum cleaner!”

  “But sir, I’m suited up properly.” His voice sounded injured, even distorted slightly by the microphone.

  “But you’re not plugged in,” Kulakov said, tapping the stick-it on the wall. “That’s open to the outside, and without your tether you’re nothing more now than a very small meteor moving away from the ship! What are the rest of you looking at?”

  He glanced over his shoulder, saw Max, and froze. The crews stopped their exercise.

  “You just spaced another crewman,” said Max, tilting his head toward a man who’d backed into the wall. “Carry on.” />
  He turned away without waiting for Kulakov’s salute. He didn’t know why he had such an effect on that man, but now he was thinking he should look into it.

  He proceeded through several twisting corridors, designed to slow and confuse boarding parties headed for the bridge, and passed the gym. He needed exercise. The weightlessness was already starting to get to him. But he decided to worry about that later.

  He paused when he came to the missile room.

  The Black Forest.

  That was the crew’s nickname for it. Four polished black columns rose four uninterrupted stories—tubes for nuclear missiles, back when this ship was intended to fight the same kind of dirty war waged by the Adareans. It was the largest open space in the entire ship. When the grav was on, the men exercised by running laps, up one set of stairs, across the catwalk, down the other, around the tubes, and up again.

  Max went out onto the catwalk, climbed up on the railing, and jumped.

  If one could truly jump in zero-gee, that was. He pushed himself toward the floor and prayed that the grav didn’t come on unexpectedly. On the way down he noticed someone who feared just that possibility making their way up the stairs.

  Max did a somersault, extending his legs to change his momentum and direction, pushed off one of the tubes, and bounced over to see who it was. He immediately regretted doing so. It was Sergeant Simco, commander of the combat troops.

  Every captain personally commanded a detachment of ground troops. It could be as big as a battalion in some cases, but for this voyage, with an entire crew of only 141, the number was limited to ten. Officially, they were along to repel boarders and provide combat assistance if needed. Unofficially, they were called troubleshooters. If crewmen gave the captain any trouble, it was the troopers’ job to shoot them.

  Simco would enjoy doing it too. He had more muscles than brains. But then nobody had that many brains.

  “Hello, Sergeant,” Max called.

  “Sir, that was nicely done.”

  “I didn’t have you pegged for the cautious type.”

  Simco shook his head. “I don’t like freefall unless I’ve got a parachute strapped to my back.”

  Typical groundhog response. “Are your men ready to board and take that Outback ship, Sergeant?”

  “Sir, I could do it all by myself. They’re women.”

  They both laughed, Simco snapped a perfect salute, and Max pushed off from the railing. When he landed on the bottom, he saw placards marked “Killshot” hanging on each of the four tubes. That meant they were loaded with live missiles, ready to launch. Something new since the last time he’d passed through the Black Forest. He saw handwriting scrawled across the bottom of the placards, and went up close to read it. A. G. W.

  Under the old government, the hastily thrown together Department of War had been called the Ministry of A Just God’s Wrath. Considering the success of the Adareans, the joke had been that the name was a typo and should have been called Adjust God’s Wrath. Some devout crewmen still had the same goal.

  On the lower level, Max continued to the aftmost portion of the ship, off limits to all crew except for Engineering and Senior officers. Only one sealed hatch allowed direct entrance to this section. Max found an off-duty electrician’s mate sitting there, watching a pocketvid. The faint sound of someone dying came from the tiny speaker.

  Max stopped in front of the crewman. “What are you watching?”

  The crewman looked up, startled. DePuy, that was his name. He jumped to his feet and went all the way to the ceiling. He saluted with one hand, while the thumb of the other flicked to the pause button. “It’s A Fire on the Land, sir. It’s about the Adarean nuking of New Nazareth.”

  “I’m familiar with it,” Max replied. Political Education approved all videos, practically ran the video business. “The bombing and the vid. Move aside and let me pass.”

  “Sorry, sir, the chief engineer said. ...”

  Max turned as cold as deep space. He reached under DePuy to open the hatch. “Move aside, crewman.”

  “The chief engineer gave me a direct order, sir!”

  “And I am giving you another direct order right now.” Damn it, thought Max, the man still hesitated. “Rejecting an order from your political officer is mutiny, Mr. DePuy. A year is a very long time to spend in the ship’s brig waiting for trial.”

  “Sir! A year is a very long time to serve under a chief officer who holds grudges, sir!”

  “If I have to repeat my order a third time, you will go to the brig.”

  DePuy pushed off from the wall. Though he seemed to seriously consider, for a split second, whether he wouldn’t rather be locked up than face Chevrier’s temper.

  Max went down the corridor and paused outside the starboard Battery Room. The hatch stood open on the two-story space. One of the battery arrays was completely disassembled and diagrammed on the wall, with the key processing chips circled in red. A small group of men, most of them stripped to their waists, crowded into the soft-walled clean room in the corner. A large duct ran up from it toward the ceiling, the motor struggling to draw air. A crewman looked up and tapped the chief engineer on the shoulder.

  “You!” Chevrier shouted as soon as he saw Max. “This is a restricted area! I want you out of my section right now!”

  “Nothing is off limits to me,” Max replied.

  “Fuck your mother!” Chevrier thundered, shooting across the room and getting right in Max’s face. Chevrier’s eyes had dark circles around them like storm clouds, and red lines in the whites like tiny bolts of lightning. He probably hadn’t slept since the spongediver was spotted; no doubt he was also pumped up on Nova or its more legal equivalent from the dispensary. That would explain his heavy sweating. It couldn’t drip off him in the weightlessness, but had simply accumulated in a pool about a half inch deep that sloshed freely in the vicinity of his breastbone. Max noticed that the comet insignia was branded on Chevrier’s bare chest. The Revolutionary government had banned that tradition, but the branding irons still floated around some ships in the service. Chevrier was the type who had probably heated it up with a hand welder and branded himself. He jabbed a finger in the direction of the empty spot on Max’s left breast pocket. “You haven’t qualified for a single ship’s system,” he said, “and you sure as hell aren’t reactor qualified. Now get out of my section!”

  “You forgetting something, soldier?” Max asked, in as irritating a voice as he could manage.

  Chevrier laughed in disbelief. “I wish I could forget! I’ve got a major problem on my hands, a ship with no fucking backup power.”

  Max took a deep breath. “Did somebody break your arm, soldier?”

  Chevrier’s eyes flickered. He made a sloppy motion with his right hand in the general direction of his head. Had Mallove sent word in the other direction too? Did Chevrier know that Max was supposed to leave him alone?

  “Good. Give me a status report on the power situation.”

  The chief engineer inhaled deeply. “Screwed up and likely to stay that way. The crewman on duty panicked—he folded the wings and powered down the Casmir drive without disengaging the batteries first and fried half the chips. We are now trying to build new chips, atom by atom, but you need a grade A clean hood to do that. And our hood is about as tight and clean as an old whore.”

  Max had heard all this already, less vividly described, from the captain’s reports. “Go on.”

  “Normally, we could just switch over to the secondary array, but some blackhole of a genius gutted our portside Battery Room and replaced it with a salvaged groundside nuclear reactor so we can float through Adarean space disguised like background radiation in order to do God knows what.”

  “But you can switch communications, ship systems, propulsion, all that, over to the reactor, right?”

  That was the plan: dive into Adarean space, do one circuit around the sun running on the nukes while recording everything they could on the military and political communicat
ions channels, then head home again.

  “We’ve already done all that,” answered Chevrier, “but we can’t power up the Casmir drive with it. It’s strictly inner system, no diving.” He suddenly noticed the pool of sweat on his chest, went to flick it away, then stopped. “The Adareans won’t scan us if we’re running on nuclears, but they wouldn’t scan canvas sails either, so we might as well have used them instead. We’ve got to fix the main battery at some point.”

  “Can you bring the grav back online?”

  “Not safely, no, and not with the reactor. It’s a power hog. Too many things to go wrong.”

  “Lasers?”

  Chevrier ground his teeth. “You could talk to the captain, you know. He sends down here every damned hour for another report, asking the same exact damn questions.”

  “Lasers?” repeated Max firmly.

  “I recommended other options to the captain, but if you want to turn some Outback ship into space slag, I’ll give you enough power to do it. As long as you let me comb through the debris for spare parts once you’re done. Might be one way to get some decent equipment.”

  “Fair enough. How are your men holding up?”

  “They’re soldiers.” He pronounced the word very differently than Max had. “They do exactly what they’re told. Except for that worthless snot of a mate who apparently can’t even guard a fucking sealed hatch properly.”

  Max didn’t like the sound of that. Chevrier couldn’t keep pushing his men as hard as he pushed himself, or they’d start to break. “Your men are not machines—”

  “Hell they aren’t! A ship’s crew is one big machine and you’re a piece of grit in the silicone, a short in the wire. With you issuing orders outside the chain of command, the command splits. You either need to fit in or get the hell out of the machine!”

  Chevrier jabbed his finger at Max’s chest again to punctuate his statement. This time, he made contact with enough force to send the two men in opposite directions.

  It was clear that he didn’t mean to touch Max, and just as clear that he didn’t mean to back down. He glared at Max, daring him to make something of it. Aggressiveness was the main side effect of Nova. It built up until the men went supernova and burned out. On top of that, Chevrier also had that look some men got when things went very wrong. He couldn’t fix things so he wanted to smash them instead.