by Jay Allan
Their days as rats scurrying around in tunnels were over.
They were Marines again.
* * *
“We’ve sent the message, Andi…full orbital coverage.” Vig was nervous, that was clear, and Andi was, too. Exactly how much the stealth generator was able to hide them remained a question mark, but one that didn’t matter all that much just then. Not as long as Hermes was blasting out a high-powered comm signal with half the output of the ship’s reactor behind it.
“Any incoming contacts?” It was a pointless question. Her eyes had been as riveted to the display as anyone else’s. But anything was better just then than silence. Especially since she was determined to complete a second orbital pass before breaking out and making a run for it. She hadn’t come all this way, put her people in grave danger, to fail to get the message through. If Bryan Rogan—or any Marine who’d inherited his command—was still down there, she was damned sure going to get the communique to him.
“They’ve picked us up, Andi…I don’t think there’s much doubt about that. Looks like we got lucky, a little at least. They don’t have anything too close to our position, at least in terms of ships in orbit. Their response is a little lackluster, too. My bet is, someone in their command structure is going to hear about this before all is said and done.” A short pause, and a darker tone in his voice. “Those escorts are still coming on, though. Six minutes out, and they’re adjusting the vectors, coming at us dead on now. Whoever’s commanding those knows his shit.”
Andi nodded, and then she sighed softly. They were lucky the orbital command had been slow to react…and all the more so, because whoever was in command of those escorts had been on to Hermes for hours, lacking only an exact location to allow an attack. There was a strange satisfaction in realizing that gifted officers were sometimes ignored in more services than the Confederation navy.
“Keep transmitting for three more minutes…then, I’m going to want all power to the engines. We’re going to blast out of orbit at full strength…and I mean full. I want all safeties cut. Every watt the reactors produce is to go into those engines, understood?” That wasn’t going to help the stealth unit hide Hermes, of course, but she needed distance first. Planetary orbit was too constricted an area. There was no way her ship could hide there, not for very long. She needed more space, more empty, trackless void, if she was going to keep her ship hidden…and, that meant she had to run like hell first.
And, as fast as the Hegemony escorts were, Hermes was faster…especially with her reactor and engines on full overload.
She glanced down at her workstation, her eyes fixing on the small screen. She’d hoped, for an instant, she’d get some kind of acknowledgement, a response from Rogan that would tell her the mission, the dangers…and, very possibly, her death and those of her people…had not been for nothing. But, of course, there was nothing. It was beyond unlikely that Rogan, wherever he was, had sufficient power to drive a signal to orbit…and, even if he did, it would be unforgivably foolish, telegraphing his location to the enemy forces on the ground.
She would have to rely on belief…and somehow, in seeming opposition to her very nature, she did just that.
“One minute, Andi….”
“Everybody…strap in. Prepare for emergency maneuvers.” She reached down, tapped at the controls, putting her on shipwide comm. “All personnel, strap in or go to the most secure location possible. We’re breaking out of orbit in thirty seconds, and it’s going to be a rough ride.”
She turned halfway toward Vig’s station, when she saw a series of flashes on her screen. She knew immediately what was happening…one of the enemy orbital stations was coming into fire arc.
No…two of them.
She was out of time. The transmissions she’d gotten off already would have to be good enough.
“Break orbit…now! Full thrust!”
Vig turned to his station and moved his hands over the controls. Every wall and deck and bulkhead on Hermes shook and rattled. The ship’s reactor was pouring energy into the engine circuits, and Andi felt as though a wall of stone slammed into her body. Hermes had the most modern dampeners in service in any ship, but she could see the thrust readings from the corner of her eye…70g…80g…90g…and even her vessel’s compensation systems were overloaded at those levels.
Those g forces would have killed every man and woman in the crew in an instant, but the dampeners reduced the effect enough, leaving her people uncomfortable as hell, maybe with a few broken bones or nasty bruises, but not as piles of strawberry jam.
Still, despite the discomfort, she felt relief. Hermes was breaking orbit, making a run for it, and none of her pursuers would be able to match the acceleration driving her ship.
At least for as long as it lasts.
She knew the reactor and the engines wouldn’t hold out under the current level of abuse…but she didn’t need forever.
Give me four more minutes…
She was taking it on faith she could get her ship far enough from Megara, that the stealth unit would still function, that the enemy would look fruitlessly…at least until Rogan’s people distracted them, and Tyler and the fleet arrive.
She’d almost managed it…and then Hermes shook hard.
She didn’t know whether something had malfunctioned, or if her ship had taken a hit. And, she wasn’t sure it mattered.
The cruiser shuddered hard, and suddenly, the crushing pressure was gone. Completely gone.
Hermes was in freefall. That meant no thrust at all.
She looked down at the screen. Her readings showed the stealth unit still functioning, but without the engines, her ship was stuck on a straight-line course. A first-year Academy cadet could triangulate and narrow down Hermes’s location…and that assumed the damage wasn’t affecting the stealth field in some way the status monitors weren’t detecting.
That’s what you get for believing in anything…
She felt a wave of disappointment, even fear…but at least she’d completed her mission. Escaping, getting back afterwards…that had always been optional.
* * *
“Send these nav orders…and, I’ll personally shoot the commander who doesn’t have his ship in position on time.” Garara’s commander had been hunched over his workstation, his eyes staring at every bit of incoming scanner data, trying to get a fix on the enemy whose presence was no longer a theory. He’d already been almost certain the enemy ship he sought was in Megara orbit…and then moments later, he got reports of an unidentified comm signal.
It made perfect sense. The ship he sought had come to deliver some kind of message. Whether it was directed at some kind of resistance force, or at the population at large, he didn’t know. And he didn’t care. That wasn’t his problem.
The ship itself was.
He’d tracked the vessel, chased it, and if his superiors had been more willing to listen, he might have intercepted it before it reached Megara. That was all in the past, though. Only one thing still mattered to him.
That ship wasn’t getting away. Not if he could help it.
He heard the whine of Garara’s engines blasting hard, his ship following the nav orders he’d just issued. His first instinct had been to head into Megara orbit himself, moving right to the source of the transmission…but then he changed his mind.
Whoever was in that ship knew what they were doing. They were clearly there to send a communique of some kind, but they would also know a signal that strong was like a beacon pointing to the vessel.
Which means that ship will pull out of orbit as soon as the message is finished.
But where would they go? And, could he track it?
“Commander, the transmission has terminated.”
“Full scanners…all ships. Concentrate on the source of the transmission and all points within ten thousand kilometers.” It was time. The enemy would be breaking orbit, making a run for somewhere it could hide.”
Tiergan stared at the screen, looking for
signs of movement, detection of mass, energy trails…anything at all.
He saw the orbital platform open fire. A dozen shots, at least…and then a wave of energy erupted, less than fifty kilometers from the transmission location.
A hit?
There was nothing else it could be. The orbital platform had fired a barrage in the direction of the transmission signal…and it had hit something.
The station’s fire continued, but there were no additional hits, at least none he could detect. But there was something, a faint trail, so light he couldn’t be sure it was real.
But he knew, somehow, that it was.
His hands raced across his workstation, zooming in on what he thought was a trail of particles from the fleeing ship. If that wasn’t a trail left behind by the enemy ship, if the vessel was still in orbit, or heading off in another direction, he was going to lose it entirely, but he was ready to bet he was right.
It was the best thing he had to go on. He flipped a control, sending the nav data he’d just completed to the comm station. “Quinquaron…I want these coordinates transmitted to all ships at once…and to fleet command.” He was far from sure command would pay him any more heed than it had before, though he suspected the sudden realization that some unidentified ship had managed to get all the way to Megara orbit unchecked might make a difference.
But he didn’t need fleet command. He could only guess at the size and power of the mystery ship, but he was sure he had enough firepower to handle it himself.
He just needed to find it.
“Forward batteries…prepare to open fire.” He was refining his targeting data, plotting a firing solution based on his best guess of the enemy’s location. The trail was fading. He wasn’t sure if the enemy had repaired whatever damage was causing the leak, or if clearing the gravitational pull of Megara had cut the stress on the ship enough to staunch the flow of charged particles. Whatever it was, he was running out of time. He didn’t know exactly where the enemy ship was, not with the kind of accuracy reliable fire locks required. He just had to bombard the general area and hope for the best.
He pressed a series of buttons, sending the targeting data down to fire control. Then he looked up, eyes fixed on the forward display.
“Open fire.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Hall of the People
Liberte City
Planet Montmirail, Ghassara IV
Union Year 224 (320 AC)
“I’m sorry, Minister…but I just cannot have this discussion with you.” Kerevsky stood up, a jerky and abrupt move that communicated his discomfort even more than his tone had. “If you will excuse me…”
“Please, Ambassador…sit.” Sandrine Ciara looked across the small table that sat between her chair and the sofa where the Confederation ambassador had been sitting until a few seconds before. “I will endeavor to keep my speech a bit more…circumspect.” She knew she’d pushed too hard, too fast. But Kerevsky’s report on the situation at the front—as redacted and massaged as she was sure it had to be—had scared the hell out of her. She’d come to believe the Hegemony was a deadly threat to the whole Rim, and she was convinced she had to find a way to get the Union involved—beyond Denisov’s already committed fleet. She’d left the last meeting in Villieneuve’s office trying hard not to shake visibly, or let on that her tunic was pasted to her back by sweat. She wasn’t sure if it was the data on the Hegemony forces that terrified her the most, or Villieneuve’s apparent lack of concern.
Kerevsky had painted a picture of near doom and defeat, and his descriptions of the enemy forces and their capabilities had left no doubt in her mind that they would sweep through any forces defending the Union, almost as though they weren’t there. Any chance to defeat the enemy, to send them retreating back out of the Rim, would be on the current front, at Craydon or Megara, and it would take everything the Rim had. If the Union didn’t send what help it could, and the enemy crushed the Confederation, she and Villieneuve would have signed the death warrant for their people.
Kerevsky’s report had told her one other thing, or, more precisely, it had removed any lingering doubts. She was scared to death by what she’d heard, and Kerevsky had obviously been shaken just in the telling…but Villieneuve was calm and cold, unmoved by anything that was said or seen. He’d met with her after Kerevsky had returned to his quarters, and she’d sat there, sure he would see the need to cooperate with the Confederation and the other Rim powers, at least temporarily. But she’d been stunned to see he’d discounted almost everything the ambassador had said. Kerevsky had brought evidence, scanning reports, video, endless analysis…but none of it had gotten anywhere with Villieneuve.
She’d nursed a fear for some time, thought about it in the dark of sleepless nights, wondered helplessly what she could do about it…but only at the moment had she been utterly certain.
Villieneuve was crazy…and that insanity was going to destroy the Union, and possibly the entire Rim. She had to get rid of him…and there was only one way to do that.
But how? He was defended around the clock. His protectors had watchers…and the watchers had watchers. Gaston Villieneuve had always been paranoid, suspicious of anyone and anything, and the loss of his sanity had only taken things to another level. No one was allowed near him with weapons, save his closest and most loyal guards. His food was thoroughly scanned before he touched it, the ventilation leading to his office and residence were closed systems, guarded constantly.
How could she kill him? How could she take steps to aid the fight against the Hegemony? She needed an ally, one she could trust. One who wouldn’t have incentives to betray her to Villieneuve. No matter how much she thought about it, how many options she reviewed, she’d only come up with one name.
Alexander Kerevsky. The only man on Montmirail who wasn’t beholden to Villieneuve, or too scared of the First Citizen to even consider a move against him.
She looked up at the Confed, trying to seem genuinely sorry. Still, for a few seconds, she thought he was going to leave. If he went to Villieneuve, she was as good as dead…which meant she couldn’t let him go. Her hand dropped, almost imperceptibly, to the small pistol she’d stashed under the seat cushion.
She didn’t want to kill Kerevsky…the consequences would be devastating, not the least to any prospect to bring Union forces into the war. But she didn’t want to end up staring down at the blood drain in a Sector Nine cell, either, and that was about the best she could hope for if Kerevsky shared the topic of their discussion with Villieneuve.
Then, she saw it. The slightest relaxation in Kerevsky’s posture. Her Sector Nine career had been a constant exercise watching people, reading them, manipulating them. She knew immediately that the ambassador was going to remain. At least for the moment.
“Minister Ciara, I understand the…difficulties you may face here. Certainly, from my point of view, I consider certain aspects of the Union state to be…problematic, though your perspective on such things no doubt differs from my own. But even if I agreed with you about what had to be done—and I am not saying I do—I have no authorization from my government to do anything save negotiate with the legitimate Union authorities.”
“I understand, Ambassador.” She paused. “Just to be clear, before we continue, I can assure you this room is secure. I have it swept regularly, and there are no recording devices of any kind.” That was a useless thing to say. Why would he believe you?
It was, however, true. She didn’t even have the AI recording the discussion, for her own use. It would have been far too risky.
“Again, Minister Ciara…there is nothing I can say here that I couldn’t say in session with the First Citizen. I am here only to advise you of the gravity of the threat we all face…not to interfere with any aspect of your government.”
“Do you want Union assistance in this war, Ambassador…beyond Admiral Denisov’s fleet, which must be rapidly deteriorating in combat readiness without access to Union parts and equipm
ent?” It was a blunt question, one that cut right to the heart of the matter. She knew the Confeds wanted Union aid, needed it…it was time to find out just how badly.
“Yes, Minister, of course. I have been clear about that, I believe, and candid as well, about the current state of the war. It is in your interests as well to see the Hegemony driven back through the Badlands. You know this, Minister, I know you do.”
“Yes, Ambassador…I do. I know it well, and if it was my decision, you would have the Union as an ally. Let us be honest with each other. I have no love for the Confederation…it has been my enemy as long as I’ve had conscious thought of such things. But I recognize the grave danger that plagues us all.” She paused, and decided not to say what she’d been about to say.
Then, she did it anyway.
“Gaston Villieneuve has lost his mind, Ambassador Kerevsky. That is not my propaganda, it is not a negotiating tool. It is the fact. You saw him, you heard his words. Not only is he not going to agree to aid your people…it is entirely possible he will refuse to allow you to leave. He treats you with full diplomatic honors now, but you have not seen his behavior of late. He is dangerously erratic. He is as likely to order you dragged out of his office in chains as host a luncheon in your honor. You are placing the success of your mission, perhaps the survival of your Confederation, on the whims of a madman.” Her insides were twisted into knots. She’d gone much, much farther than she’d planned to, and she’d put herself in grave danger doing it. If Kerevsky told Villieneuve a fraction of what she’d just said, she was finished…and likely not in a fast or pleasant way. But she knew there was no choice. Beneath her own lust for power and self-serving manipulation, she was loyal to the Union…and she didn’t want to see it destroyed, its people reduced to slaves of the Hegemony.
Some things were worth risking everything for.