We get the signal; we’ll be docking with the Callisto in a few minutes. Passengers everywhere are putting things away. I’m looking forward to this; it’s been too long since I was deployed in space. I’m a deep space operator, and I’ve always felt the call to fly to distant worlds.
Ah, space travel…
I’ve never been to Mercury or Venus. It’ll be nice to see new worlds and new civilizations…maybe they won’t even be shooting at me this time.
* * *
As I’m walking down the corridors of the Callisto, it immediately becomes apparent that this is nothing like my old ship, the Admiral Weston. It’s not only bigger and more modern, it’s roomier and way more comfortable.
In the early days of space travel, ships were always in freefall. Corridors were tight and packed, and exposed tubes and pipes ran everywhere. The air was cold and dry, when there even was breathable air. Since then, our spaceships have gotten more livable, more comfortable, and civilized, until now they’re bordering on decadent.
There’s a reason I used to dismiss the claims of other planets that our ships were too confortable. I was serving on older ships. The Callisto has all the amenities you could get on base. With actual shops, bars, sports centers, and nearly everything else, it really is a small mobile city in space. Care has been taken to make it look nice on the inside, too. Instead of spartan paneled walls lined with screens and hold bars, there’s genuine gene-spliced wood paneling and pieces of locally made art here and there.
The ship’s thrust provides a comfortable three gravities, and there’s not even a detectable rumble from the engines as she’s underway. Even a space station has a faint sense of Coriolis effect, letting you know it’s spin gravity; here, it feels just like home. Fore is up and aft is down, so the whole ship is like a gigantic arcology tower racing through space.
The huge size of the super-carrier was necessary to carry Cherub frames twice the size of Guardians. With a carrier twice the size, the internal volume is huge. While a lot of that went to more powerful reactors and engines, there was still a lot left over. That space and power also allows us to have armor befitting a dreadnought, as well as internal magazine and the storage capacity a freighter would love…and still there’s a lot of space left over.
The ship feels roomy. Sure, there’s lots of people going about their business in a quick and efficient fashion, but I don’t have to crowd past anyone as I walk the halls, there’s no jam-ups, and it’s easy to move around. Some hallways have one or two people in them at the most. It turns out that a ship that’s twice the size and has eight times the internal volume just doesn’t need eight times the crew. So we end up with a ship where everyone has so much space, it doesn’t really seem like the Navy anymore.
I get to my cabin in Officer’s Country and open the hatch.
Oh…
Well, my new officer’s cabin is over twice the size of my box-like affair back on the Weston. Gene-spliced wood paneling, multiple pieces of morphic furniture, and a hand-painted picture of the Callisto orbiting Jupiter fill the main area. I’ve even got a separate bath-shower, closet, and sleeping nook. When did I warrant a captain’s accommodations?
I check the data logs.
Nope, my cabin isn’t anything special for someone of my rank. Everyone’s got more space and better accommodations.
What are we, Venusians? We’ve got to watch this; we might get as soft and decadent as the other services claim we are. I’m going to make sure my people are busy, and they need a lot of training anyway, since they’re straight out of Combat Flight School.
I sit down at my desk and get to work. There’s simulation time to set up, as well as additional duties for everyone to become familiar with. I note with pleasure that Commander Rackham has already scheduled several live flights and patrols while we’re underway to help get everyone ready. Next, I want to get rid of as much data-work and bureaucracy as I can. I want my people spending their time training, not filling out forms.
When I’m finished, I’m surprised at how many hours it took. Well, at least that’s done. Now I settle in for a message home, and then I’ll grab some sleep in my far-too spacious cabin…
…not that I’m going to complain or anything.
* * *
It’s time to review our frame artificial intelligences.
Each exo-frame towers over me and the staff working on them in the frame bay. They stand motionless and stoic, as the guardians they are, waiting for the time for action. With their ability to communicate with me via holo-simulacra or cybernetic virtual reality, we could meet in any time or place. They don’t even really view the frames they’re loaded into as their bodies, more like the vehicles they happen to be piloting at the moment. Whoever they happen to be interacting with, wherever that is, happens to be their frame of reference at any moment. They don’t see physical location or presence the same way we humans do. So, meeting with them in person isn’t really necessary.
Except it is.
The AIs piloting these frames are all professionals and volunteers. They could live for thousands of years—no one knows just how long such an intelligence can exist. More, each of them has a timeframe accelerated thousands of times faster than ours, so a year is like a millennium. They have all that potential lifetime ahead of them and could do anything they wanted—but they’re here, fighting alongside us.
Basic respect requires I see them in person.
Talon now has his “nose art” displayed on his glacis. It’s a huge set of talons from a bird of prey clutching a cartoonish spider-shaped cyborg with horrified red eyes. We’re getting along a lot better in simulated combat, and I’m looking forward to how we do in further maneuvers.
Jack Martin is flying with “Ox,” another new frame AI like mine. He’s represented by an angry looking bull’s head smoking a cigar. Jack gave him that name because he insisted his frame is more bull-headed than he is. I find it hard to believe.
Shane Greensport’s copilot is named “Archer,” who bears an image of an idealized human with a compound bow at full pull. He’s an experienced AI, and he acquired the name a while ago based on his score in targeting drones. A patient and professional pilot.
Larry Jacobs has a new AI named “Lightning.” His cartoon shows a fat yellow lightning bolt hitting an explosion, with shocked cartoon eyes in the middle of the blast. They make a fast and capable team together, with nearly flawless execution. I suspect the reason for the name was Larry’s near death in a Jovian lightning storm. It’s a way to face it and deal with it.
Eric Donner is flying with “Sammy” again. The two almost died in the Battle of Mars, and both had to be rebuilt, yet they volunteered to come back out here again.
These four frames are piloted by my flight leaders. These frame AIs are just as much my pilots as the human beings in my squadron. They deserve respect and recognition. I had something prepared to say, but now I just don’t really know.
What do I say?
Just be short, honest, and to the point, Mike. “I wanted to thank you all in person.” That was awkward. “Any of you could have gone on and done nearly anything—yet you’re all here. That says a lot about your character.” I clear my throat. This is awkward; I feel like I’m talking to furniture. “Well, if any of you needs to speak with me, please feel free.”
“Thank you, sir,” Talon replies, “though it really isn’t necessary to come down to the frame hangar in order to talk with us. We can communicate at any time and in any place via electronic avatar.”
I nod. Sure, I know that, but still.
“I shall certainly contact you if needed, sir,” Archer chimes in, and Lightning follows suit.
“I’m looking forward to engaging the enemy, personally,” Ox rumbles.
Naturally, “Mad Dog’s” frame is totally eager for a fight.
“Thank you for meeting with us, sir.” Sammy’s frame nods respectfully. “The others may not fully understand what you’re doing, but I do. My perspect
ive is somewhat different. When I was critically damaged in the Battle of Mars, mental imprints from Lieutenant Donner were critical to rebuilding my core. Likewise, I was able to assist the cyber-neurosurgeons to restore many of my pilot’s memories.”
Well, that’s kind of disturbing…
“No doubt you find this somewhat disturbing, sir,” he continues. “Still, I find it provides an expanded understanding of the human perspective.”
“Uh, thank you, Sammy.” Well, maybe this helped. I still can’t help but feel there’s an unbridgeable gulf between the two vital sets of personnel of my squadron. “That will be all, then.”
I wonder about the upcoming flight training as I leave the hangar. Maybe a lot of the rough edges will come off as we practice.
* * *
Launch time.
I’m locked into my frame and flight suit, along with everyone else in my squadron. All of us are loaded into the same launch gun, as it will only be my squadron out on maneuvers this time. The big launchers on the Callisto have a rotary carousel capable of holding 25 exo-frames. Once we’re in the launch magazine, all the launch guns working together can scramble the entire wing in less than half a minute.
We’ll start launching…
Now.
Boom!
The acceleration is just at the edge of blackout, even with my augmented systems, but it’s only for an instant. If this were an actual attack, we’d need to break away from the main ship in the instant before enemy missiles arrive. Talon and I hit the engines as soon as we’re clear, breaking to the side, releasing countermeasures dust and jamming drones. Even while that’s happening, the others of my flight are launching out the front of the Callisto, one by one.
In seconds, the whole flight is out around the Callisto, maneuvering and providing an anti-missile screen. Coverage is good; I don’t see any gaps.
Now our escorting cruiser takes part in the exercise, firing a number of targeting drones into a designated space. Those drones are able to accelerate and maneuver faster than a frame and are armed with their own low-power training lasers. To make things worse, they’ve got anti-scan stealth coatings, jamming drones, and dazzlers with them, and all this is taking place in sensor-scattering countermeasures dust. Finally, since this is an escort training mission, we’ve got areas we’re forbidden to fire into, simulating the locations of the vessels we’re supposed to be protecting during our live fire exercise.
I give the signal, and we’re off, on the way to intercept them before they can take out their targets. We link our tight-beam communications and fly out as one.
Time kind of disappears as my augments accelerate my perception, and I merge my awareness with my AI. My x-ray lances go to rapid fire, taking out targets as soon as I’m aware of them, and I unleash patterns of MIRV aerospace missiles to intercept their likely moves. Targets are disappearing fast, but not fast enough.
I send out my orders and receive data though the network, almost as impulses rather than full commands. Flashes of awareness from the other frames, bits of sensor data, and urgent reports merge together to form an awareness of the battlespace beyond what my sensors can reveal. An instinctive feel of the movement of the target drones coalesces, and I can see that they’re going to go…
There!
I give the command as an impulse. My squadron instantly responds as a single force, cutting off the target drones and trapping them in an inescapable web of lasers and SPG mines.
Now, there’s only a few targets left. The stragglers scatter, trying to get past us somehow and take out any of their remaining targets. We split up into flights and elements to hunt them down.
Soon enough, there’s none of them left.
“Not bad, everyone. Not bad at all,” I send. “We’ll have to work a little more on how fast we do clean-up—there’s no telling how much time we’d have between attack waves—but not bad.”
These new frames are astonishingly fast in combat. I’ll have to watch that. It would be too easy to lose track with all this speed, power, and vast sensory input. Still, I think we’ve got a pretty good squadron here, and we’d actually have a chance if we came up against a proper Saturnine force.
* * *
Let’s see what messages I’ve got from home.
We’re at that brief, golden moment where the ship stops accelerating in preparation for the turn and burn to decelerate toward our destination. Since we always have to be varying our maneuvers to stay safe from long-range beam or relativistic weapons, that means we only get a few moments when we can actually talk.
I relax in my all-too-spacious cabin and bring up the holo-projector.
The news from home helps me deal with life out here in space. My sister’s doing well in medical school, and it looks like she’s got a promising career ahead of her. My family is moving—going to a smaller place, now that their rambunctious kids are finally out. Good news all around.
I fill them all in on what’s been going on—training up new people, getting used to new frames, and all that. Since we don’t actually know what’s going to happen at Vesta, I don’t really have a lot of news for them.
Speaking of news, let’s see what’s been going on…
An attractive blonde Terran woman has her face set in a serious expression. “As we have seen, the situation on Terra continues to be unstable. No general agreement between the various factions on Earth has been reached, and the fighting continues. As long as outside interests like Luna and Jupiter continue to interfere with domestic politics, an actual settlement between native Terran interests remains unlikely.”
Yeah, well, as much as I’d like the Terrans to get back together again, they can also continue on as separate nations. They did it for thousands of years before spaceflight; they can do it again. As long as they don’t become a satellite state of Saturn’s plan to turn everyone into their drones, I don’t care. Frankly, I’d just like to see our people be able to come home from there.
“We have an update on a case regarding a persistent fugitive from justice—” My picture pops up. It’s not my best image but will do to identify me. “Lieutenant Michael Vance of the Jovian Navy was wanted for war crimes by the Interplanetary Court…”
Right. So Saturn is still burned about what happened at Eros and needs someone to blame. Their attack on a civilian asteroid via nanotech was exposed, and they were embarrassed, so they lashed out. Since I was the guy who happened to intercept their agent, they blame me. I should have figured they wouldn’t let this drop.
“—since he has refused to appear personally in court, and the Jovian Republic has refused to extradite him, he has been tried in absentia.”
Wait! That’s illegal, even for the Interplanetary Court. Of course, Jupiter and her allies withdrew from the Court when the war broke out and that left…Saturn and its puppets in control of the whole thing.
“He has been found guilty of numerous war-crimes, including mass murder and state terrorism. The sentence is death, to be carried out by—”
What?
“—since the Jovian Republic has refused to cooperate, deputies of the Interplanetary Court, as well as signatory worlds, are empowered to carry out such sentence immediately and without warning. Further, in the interest of interplanetary peace and justice, private contractors will also be employed, and there is a substantial reward for those who assist in carrying out the cause of interplanetary justice.”
So they’ve resorted to assassins. Saturn couldn’t win in the battlespace, so they’re perverting the course of justice and using assassins to terrorize anyone who would dare to stand against them.
How do I deal with this? I know how to fight in a frame, in power armor, or even with my bare hands in space, air, land, or sea. But this is different. Now, an attack could come from anywhere, anytime…from anyone. How do I trust or let my guard down? Is my family in danger—or my wife?
With questions whirling in my head, I get a call from Commander Rackham.
Bad news
travels fast, it seems.
* * *
The commander is quiet and composed, but I’ve never seen him angrier. His laser-blue eyes radiate a focused fury that means bad things for whoever they finally light up. Good thing that whoever isn’t me.
I’m sitting across from him at his desk, with an offered cup of coffee steadily growing cold as its rising vapors curl and twist on the way up.
“So, now they’re hiring assassins,” he finally says.
“Yes, sir, I’m afraid they are.”
He pauses in thought for a moment, then he asks, “What do you want to do?”
“Sir?”
“Are you willing and able to carry out your duties under these circumstances?”
I’m stunned into silence for a moment, then I reply, “Of course, sir!” It’s not like they’ll stop trying to kill me if I quit, will they?
“Good.” He takes a breath. “We’re keeping you active. You’ll be out there, doing your duty like usual. We aren’t going to hide you away or sequester you. You’ll still have all the protection the task force has, and we’ll heighten shipboard security, but you’ll still be seen visibly carrying out your duty.”
I nod. Good to know I won’t spend the rest of my life hiding in a hole somewhere. Really, if they can force me to hide in a locked room, they’ll have effectively put me in jail anyway.
“We can’t afford to hide you away,” he continues. “It’s not just that we need every able pilot; it’s also about the message we’re sending. If they can threaten our pilots and force them to hide, they can get us to pull out and quit, one by one. So we can’t do that, even if it means more people trying to kill you.”
“I understand, sir. I’ve had people shooting at me before.”
“This will be different.” He fixes me with that gaze. “You won’t just be facing death in battlespace, it could now come from anywhere, at any time. It’s an altogether different kind of stress—” he pauses as if remembering some distant tragedy, “—and you’ll have to be ready for it.”
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