A King Word And a Gun

by Yuri Hamaganov

  Here is the Queen, walking along the sluice crossing and entering the axle deck, and then New Louisiana bursts into a single welcoming roar. But Olga almost doesn’t hear this; she reduces the sound channel to a minimum, just watching the woman she has admired since childhood. And now she sees her, and not like the emaciated refugees around her. Voronov has the rare opportunity to look at Elizabeth from the standpoint of an equal who has earned this equality in battle, like the paratroopers of Andrei.

  “Listen! Listen! Listen!”

  The roar of the crowd instantly subsides; it becomes so quiet that the Queen's voice is heard without amplifiers.

  “Hello, people, I greet you all in your new home. Now, when there is hunger and death all around, we all need a home where we can rest and gather your thoughts. But don’t relax; right now, at this moment, the whole solar system is fighting, and our brothers and sisters are dying for us. Be prepared—Boddicker will never forget his defeat. He doesn’t like it when his prey is taken away.

  “The Nazis will soon return, and then you will have to defend your new home. I can’t always be around. The soldiers of the Red Dawn will help you, but the main burden of the battles and losses will fall on your shoulders. Be ready and firm in your intentions. We have nowhere to retreat; we can only go forward and up, so let’s go, all together! Ahead of you lie heavy fights and heavy losses, and you must meet them boldly, with your heads held high. Be ready to fight, be ready to die for your comrades, if necessary, and reject all cowardice and confusion. Remember, in days of chaos, cowards and weaklings die first, and only the brave have a chance to win! We repulsed the attack of the Nazis; now it's time to strike back. Be ready. Today I will call many of you into my army. Today we had a local conflict; a big war is coming tomorrow! Fight to the victorious end!”

  At this point, Elizabeth’s speech ends, and her officers continue. They have to work hard—they need to turn the crowds of unorganized refugees into a disciplined army as soon as possible, one that is capable of resisting Boddicker’s soldiers. Their first task is to find those people whose skills will be useful in the military industry, and immediately sending them to other, secret colonies, where the Red Dawn makes weapons and repairs its ships.

  They then must recruit volunteers in the assault units: the popularity of the Queen is higher than it has ever been, and a helluva lot of people want to join her army. They must organize for these volunteers training courses for young fighters, build up assault companies, and send them to battle. And there is a great deal of other urgent and important work, so characteristic of widespread wars, when you need every soldier and every worker. But Olga won’t see all this titanic work; she, like the other Bolsheviks, has her own part to play in the conflict that is gaining momentum.

  “Hello, comrades, I greet you!” Queen Elizabeth meets the crew in the English Club; once the New Louisiana aristocrats met here, and now the commander of the Red Dawn and the Bolsheviks will discuss the future together. But according to the old tradition, the beginning of negotiations is preceded by a personal greeting with each of the Allies, and Olga can shake Elizabeth’s hand, exchanging a short greeting. Such happiness is definitely worth another battle against the pirates and a close nuclear explosion.

  “Sergeant Olga Voronov.”

  “Elizabeth.”

  Olga looks into the face of the one whom she has admired for many years. She tries to remember this moment in every detail: the Queen's elegant palm, strong as Lobo’s claw, her half-smile, and her eyes of heavenly blue—as innocent and deep as Jenna Donovan's eyes.

  “And now, comrades, I propose to begin. We have a lot of work to do.”

  The Bolsheviks and the Red Dawn officers sit in deep leather armchairs, and bottles of whiskey and cognac from the cellars of New Louisiana appear on the table. Elizabeth lights up a Cuban cigar, and Klimov, following an old habit, is taking a drag from a Belomor cigarette. In the semi-darkness, a three-dimensional map of the Free Zone is revealed.

  Victor, one of Elizabeth’s close associates, gives a report on the course of the hostilities that are burning throughout the boundless space from Mercury to the giant planets.

  There is a long list of Reich bases and ships that have been destroyed or captured: Boddicker's allies, subjected to crushing blows and withdrawn from the game; the rich private colonies occupied by the Dawn in the declared nationalization. Caravans of nationalized vessels, left to the Asteroid Belt for water ice, building materials, and precious metals; the space industry, transferred to the military rails; transportation of millions of refugees to new places of residence; and much more that has happened in the last 24 hours.

  “What are the losses?”

  “Significant.”

  Reflecting the first blow, Boddicker immediately organized a counteroffensive. Here and there, fights broke out, both sides bearing losses in warships and personnel, but the most terrible blows fell on civilians. Quickly realizing that now the refugees and residents of ruined colonies would give reinforcements for the Red Dawn, Boddicker is making them pay for that. Many overcrowded colonies and arks of refugees have been subjected to total destruction and looting. Often, they have been shot for no apparent reason, with one sole purpose—to call the Dawn into an open battle, which the Reich will lead, fully using its advantage in strength. Boddicker expects a protracted war, reasonably counting on his numerical superiority; he can easily afford to fight Elizabeth, exchanging a ship for a ship, a soldier for a soldier, a colony for a colony. And the more civilians who die in this undeclared war, the better for the Nazis; they are determined to destroy Elizabeth's popular support with blood, hunger, and fear.

  “As you can see, comrades, the last twenty-four hours have been dearly paid for all of us, and while everything goes well here in New Louisiana, in other places, the blood flows like a river. Over the past twenty-four hours, the number of dead civilians has exceeded the total losses in the Stalingrad Battle. And all of them are my losses, for it was I who declared war on Boddicker, and it is I who expect to raise the entire Free Zone against him, uniting intimidated and starving people in the fight against a common enemy. I don’t regret what has been done; we all knew what we must do, and what the Nazis are capable of. But we must end these atrocities as soon as possible. And Boddicker is confidently dragging us into a protracted war, offering to fight for every colony and ship. Playing by his rules, we will definitely be defeated, so we must urgently overturn the gambling table. What do you say, Comrade Captain?”

  Olga listens to Elizabeth's habitual slightly hoarse voice, trying to imagine the full scale of the space war; in comparison, her former experience with colonial conflicts and covert operations seems to be insignificant. Now everything depends on the words of the Captain, but Klimov doesn’t hurry to respond, weighing in his hand a glass of cognac.

  “The Union and the Supernova Corporation—what is their participation in what is happening?”

  “The Union is preserving their promised neutrality, but, of course, they withdrew most of the fleet from their bases to combat positions. However, Comrade Klimov, you already knew that.” Elizabeth takes a new puff, releasing a wide smoke ring. “As for the Supernova Corporation, everything there is much more complicated. We have already had several skirmishes with them, although, in general, this isn’t a war yet. I say that it’s not yet a war because I’m well aware of Boddicker's connections with the high ranks of the space capitalists. Five days ago, the Fuhrer again met with Jenna Donovan, the personal envoy of Chairman Eisenberg. What exactly they negotiated is unknown, but we can say with certainty that Boddicker turned to his allies for help in the fight against me. And he can succeed; they like me much less than him; after all, the Fuhrer has never threatened private capital with nationalization.”

  “Yes, but at the moment, their military pact hasn’t yet been formed, Supernova is still being restored after the civil war, and not all the big capitalists are eager to get involved in a new fight. We need to use this forced pause.
”

  Klimov turns off the map of the Free Zone, displaying a schematic image of the cluster at the L2 point, better known as Tartar.

  “This is where we have to strike, and we must strike as soon as possible, before the secret agreement between the Reich and Supernova has entered into full force and they fall on us from both sides. We don’t have much time, maybe two to three days, at best a week; we have to take advantage of it. One strong and precise blow to the very center, to the den of the beast, as our ancestors said. We can’t attack Tartar from the outside, so we have to attack it from the inside—get into the L2 cluster and hit the Citadel. The main target is Richard Jones Boddicker and his closest henchmen, as well as the main industrial facilities of Tartar.”

  “So, cut the snake's head off with one quick, precise blow.” Elizabeth moves forward, gazing intently into the eyes of Captain. “Holy Cosmos, it’s a tempting offer to win the war with one desperate raid. But it won’t be easy to do so, comrades, far from easy. I propose that we take a closer look at the upcoming battlefield; there is something to see.”

  The map of the Tartar cluster is expanding, now occupying the entire English club.

  “So, there is the garbage cluster L2, once known as the Big Dump, now universally known as Tartar. I know that you have visited these lands during short-term military operations and have a general idea of that we will have to face. But nevertheless, let me share my opinion on this matter, the opinion of a person who has lived in Tartar for more than ten years.”

  The Queen lights a new cigar, leans back against the high armchair, and covers her eyes, as if remembering something.

  “The diameter of the main cluster today is more than ten thousand kilometers. Remember, there is no solid layer of debris. Small clusters, or, as they are called, reefs, drift in a random order, and their number will constantly increase as we move to the center of the mass. If earlier, when the Dump belonged to Lord Isaac, the clusters were completely spontaneous, then Boddicker introduced a certain order in this permanent chaos. The scattered garbage is gathered together and forms different types of reefs, leading to permanent orbits. Of such rubbish reefs, natural and artificial, there are millions, plus larger fragments: asteroids, broken ships, corpses of old colonies closer to the center, and so on. All this forms a constantly moving sphere: Tartar is like a hollow planet, where the first false layer is followed by second, then followed by a third, and so on ad infinitum. And somewhere in the center of this garbage planet, our old friend Boddicker lives, and it won’t be easy to catch him, no matter how badly we want to.”

  Olga recalls the most recent visit to Tartar, when the Bolsheviks repulsed the convoy of water tankers, remembering the garbage reefs and clouds of debris that covered the stars and the camouflaged cannons and minefields. But that was just a gateway—the real Tartar started much deeper.

  “It is a fake planet, the mass of which is in fact negligible, but the dimensions are huge: massive voids, alternating with garbage reefs and clouds of debris—that's what Tartar is. It seems friable and fragile, like a snowball, but this impression is deceptive; shooting Tartar from the outside means wasting your shells in vain. Clouds of small debris will scatter a laser beam of any power, and garbage reefs will become an insurmountable obstacle to shells. I often observed this in my youth when the Fuhrer’s rivals attacked us. Shells and bombs collide with the external reefs and blast them to shreds, but they don’t cause any damage to the central parts of the sphere. Armor piercing shells can go farther, piercing layer by layer, but they lose speed long before the core is reached. Even hydrogen bombs are useless—in a vacuum, the blast wave is weak. Some reefs in the epicenter of the explosion evaporate, and there is no more damage on the next layer. Of course, if we had a couple hundred such bombs, we could try to smoke Boddicker, but no one will give us enough bombs. Thus, we won’t solve our problems by attacking from outside Tartar.”

  Illustrating her words, the Queen shared with the crew secret information: her memory about the battles for Tartar that had periodically raged in zone L2 since the ascension of Boddicker. Olga carefully studies the chronicle of space battles and landing operations that thundered long before her birth, making sure that Elizabeth’s words were right. In the entire solar system, there is no other such battlefield where a maneuvers and strikes are hampered by so many objects at once: next to Tartar, the Asteroid Belt seems to be a pure interstellar vacuum. However, clouds of debris and rubbish reefs only hinder the enemies of Tartar, who don’t know the peculiarities of the garbage cluster. But the pirates decades ago penetrated deep inside the artificial planet, thoroughly studied the features of their home, and learned how to use them as an important advantage in combat.

  “I know what you’re thinking about, comrades: a guided long-range nuclear torpedo that would pass imperceptibly to Tartar and penetrate into the cluster, past the clouds and debris, deepening further until reaches the core and hits the Citadel. This is a good plan, I won’t argue with that, and during the wars for Tartar, which I remember well, our enemies did this several times, causing us considerable damage. Tracking a single torpedo is much more difficult than tracking an entire enemy squadron; it has a good chance of penetrating unnoticed deep into the cluster and getting to the core. We lost three of our bases with all their personnel this way. But that was thirty years ago, and the old wounds weren’t wasted. Tartar is now readier than before for the possible appearance of torpedoes.”

  “Elizabeth, are you aware of the current capabilities of Boddiker’s defense?”

  “Yes, Comrade Klimov. I have a pretty good idea. After all, we regularly test their defenses, and all that has been achieved so far is the expense of a lot of money and the loss of a lot of good fighters without any result. Look carefully.”

  The Tartar model changes its configuration, transferring the Bolsheviks and Elizabeth to the border of the garbage cluster.

  “This is the Limb, Tartar's outer defensive radius. As far as I know, you’ve been there recently. Pay attention—the Limb is constantly expanding. Boddicker welcomes new garbage shipments to his empire, receiving a free source of resources. The process of expansion didn’t stop with the advent of Grond, although it has slowed down somewhat.”

  The scale increases, detailing the Limb: data collected from the spy satellites, which the Red Dawn regularly sends to enemy lands.

  “External garbage clouds, moving clockwise, serve as a natural cover for minefields and the first line of defense for laser cannons. Tracking the movement of clouds is very difficult. Automatic garbage trucks periodically change their trajectory so that the coordinates of the passage through the minefields are constantly changing, remaining unknown to the enemy. Here in the clouds are numerous radar and rangefinder posts, united with a common early warning system.”

  “If you will allow me, Miss Elizabeth, one question—how do they maintain a stable radio connection from the Limb to the core? There is metal debris everywhere; the signal must be very unclear,” Anastasia says. Olga is looking forward to the response; suppression of enemy communications in the forthcoming operation will fall on her.

  “That’s a good question, Comrade Melnikova. You'd better talk with Comrade Telman about this; he is our communications specialist. Briefly, I will say that because of constant interference, the pirates are forced to not trust much in the way of radio communication. Life in the dump has certain drawbacks. To guarantee the passage of the signal, they duplicate the radio channels with a complex network of signal lights, messenger robots, and even wired communication, as in the old days on Earth. I don’t know all the subtleties, but this system works reliably even in such extreme conditions. True, it has its own Achilles heel: the slow passage of the signal from the Limb to the core and back. We must turn this weakness in our favor. Go ahead.”

  The outer layers of clouds with masked minefields are left behind; the first large garbage reefs are approaching, behind which are the long-range guns, torpedo batteries, and light unmanned
ships.

  “Note the many false passes between the reefs; they are made specifically to deceive the guidance systems of torpedoes. If you get there, then there will be clouds and minefields behind you, and right ahead you will see garbage reefs drifting in a chaotic order. All is not as it appears though. Many light reefs are equipped with their own ion engines and can change their positions relative to one other, opening some fairways and closing others. False paths are everywhere, and they all lead into mine traps, attacked from all sides by lasers; getting caught in such a trap is a sure death sentence . . .”

  Elizabeth once again smiles at an old memory, then calmly continues.

  “Real fairways are very difficult to find; the pirates use a complex coding system. And even after we discover a real road into the depths of Tartar, there is no guarantee that we will be able to penetrate to the core without perishing along the way. In the fairway, we will be at the mercy of mines, nets, torpedoes, laser cannons—especially dangerous at a close distance—drones, and guard ships—everything possible to get rid of any uninvited guests. And we should pass along that road for almost five thousand kilometers, from the Limb to the core. Of course, we can destroy numerous bases and outposts even sooner, but the main goal is in the heart of Tartar: Boddicker settled in the center. Remember Winnie the Pooh and his best friend Piglet, who lived in the center of a house built in the center of a tree standing in the center of the forest? Well, here the principle is the same, and smoking this Piglet out of his house won’t be easy. Actually, even for just finding this house, without getting lost on the road, you deserve a medal, which would most likely be awarded posthumously. It’s better to forget about stable navigation inside Tartar.”

  “Is it all so bad?”

  Natasha, the Bolshevik’s navigator, carefully examines the internal structure of the garbage planet—finding the path to the Citadel will be laid on her.