by Ian Douglas
The shuttle was half buried in the destroyer's flank now, its cargo hatch well inside the bigger ship. Power was out, so the rebels used hand cranks to winch the cargo hatch open, then spilled out into the Imperial ship, picking their way through the wreckage, weapons at the ready. By the time Dev and the others made their way back to the shuttle's cargo deck, most of the rebels had already debarked.
Dev, Simone, and Lara found weapons for themselves, then followed.
Omigato was no longer aboard the Tokitukaze.
As the battle had erupted in the Babel dome, his analogue had informed him of a discrepancy. Nakamura's shuttle was reported to be en route to Babylon—but Nakamura himself was still in Winchester, consulting with Nagai. The orders bore his personal ID authorization, but it had taken only a moment to call Nakamura personally and verify that he had most emphatically not issued orders for his secretary or his mistress to take his shuttle to Babylon.
That had been enough for Omigato, who immediately transferred his operations to HEMILCOM's war room, buried within Babylon's tangle of habs and synchorbit facilities. With most of Tokitukaze's officers and crew scattered through Babylon or Shippurport, it made more sense to manage the battle from HEMILCOM's headquarters than from the destroyer.
In the meantime, he'd ordered Tokitukaze to go to General Quarters and given the command to destroy the incoming shuttle, which was almost certainly a diversionary raiding force, quite possibly a suicide attack, planned to pull his attention from the rebel attack on Babel.
''Intruders are reported aboard the Tokitukaze, my Lord," a voice said in his mind. "Efforts are being made to contain them. . . ."
And as he received bad news from his command ship, he was receiving worse from the officers floating weightless in the war room with him. He scowled at the war room's holographic display, as Taisa Theo Ramachandra, a staff tactician, gestured toward the miniature figures struggling across the Babel dome plaza. "Our forces have lost central Babel." he said. "With no room to maneuver, with conflicting and confusing orders about whether or not to open fire on civilians—"
"Never mind the professional critique of our blunders so far, Captain," Omigato said in Japanese. Everyone present spoke the language. "Tell me what we can do now?"
Ramachandra gestured, and the holoscene's scale changed. It showed now the Babel Plateau, one hundred meters above the chalk-white sea cliffs and rocks and the almost primitive village of Gulfport. The monorail line threaded through jungle to north and south. South lay the fortress complex at Nimrod; farther south still lay the suspected rebel encampment at Emden.
"We have Guard units raiding Emden now," Ramachandra said, his face and voice both expressionless. "They report capturing small amounts of equipment, a few deserters, but little of importance. It appears that the entire rebel force has been mobilized to coincide with the demonstrations inside the city.
"The First Chiron has been reinforced at Nimrod. A battalion of your Obake Regiment is en route via ascraft transport from Winchester and will arrive at Babel within two hours." Blue rectangles of light flickered and shifted on the three-D map as red numerals counted off the elapsed time.
"It is our belief that nothing can be done to save Babel," Chusa Barton added. His image was present as a holographic image; the man himself was with his troops on the planet. "Our assets within the city itself were too meager. However, we believe that the rebel military must come out of the city to defend it."
White rectangles flowed from the cluster of city domes, taking up positions south of the city, between Babel and Nimrod. They were clearly outnumbered by the Guard forces already near the city. As the ascraft arrived from Winchester, grounding on the defenders' flank and spilling nearly a full regiment of marine warstriders and armored infantry, the rebel forces were forced into a tighter and tighter pocket, pressed on two sides by government forces, with the sea cliffs to their left and the city dome at their back.
"If they do not?" Omigato growled.
"Then we assault the city, my Lord," Ramachandra said. "We take heavy casualties, but the city is wrecked, and, at conservative estimates, half of the population is killed." He paused, letting his words sink in. "Consider. The rebels depend for their existence on the goodwill and support of the local citizenry. Intelligence says that the civilian population has already sustained several hundred casualties in the fighting in the Babel city square. The rebels will not dare risk their local support. Their best strategy would be to leave the city in an attempt to gain freedom of maneuver."
Omigato nodded slowly. "Yes. I understand. In any case, whether they stay in the city or come out on the plain, they have no choice but to stand and die."
"Exactly, my Lord."
"What of this so-called Declaration of Reason?" a Guard general wanted to know. "It had a . . . an unusually powerful effect on the mincies. More than might have been expected."
"A stunt, nothing more." Omigato said with a confidence he did not quite feel. With the others, he had watched the three-D newscasts of the mob action after Prem's transmission had been overridden. The sight of a warstrider toppled by the crowd was . . . unnerving. "A propaganda ploy," he continued. "I believe the American military once referred to it as 'winning hearts and minds.' "
"We may have trouble with the local population if we lose their, ah, hearts and minds," Barton pointed out. "Especially since we have already lost our space support."
Omigato's blood ran cold at the implied insult. Almost, his hand went to the laser holstered at his side, but he forced himself to relax. Barton was a gaijin, a Hegemony barbarian, nothing more. He could not be expected to understand. Besides, he was forty thousand kilometers away, and any threat of force here and now would be childish, an admission of weakness.
The war room had gone death-silent at Barton's words, with every person present waiting to see Omigato's reaction. He surprised them by smiling.
"Regarding the Tokitukaze, gentlemen," he said slowly, "the vessel has sustained heavy damage and should not interfere with our operations here. Two additional Imperial warships, the Gekko and the Shusui, are en route from the outer system at this moment, with full complements of marines and sufficient firepower to destroy the raiders . . . and to support our operations on Eridu.
"As for Eriduan 'hearts and minds,' I urge you to leave that to the Imperial forces. By the time we finish here, every member of the population will be a devout supporter of the Hegemony and of the Emperor."
He did not add the obvious corollary: Or they will be dead.
Chapter 31
And what are the principles of combat? Control the high ground, don't let the enemy on your flank. Mobility, security, surprise. Fight because your warrior brothers stand to left and right. Such are the constants of human warfare, unchanged in six millennia.
—Kokorodo: Discipline of Warriors
leyasu Sutsumi
C.E. 2529
A laser bolt scored the bulkhead behind Dev's head with a hissing snap and he ducked, unable to return fire because of the press of armored men ahead. The fight aboard the Tokitukaze had none of the elegance of a classic warstrider battle on open ground but was a cramped, ugly slugfest between two groups of men almost totally blind to each others' forces and positions. A grenade exploded ahead, and Dev heard someone scream.
They'd burned their way into the main port passageway, crowding into the ship's labyrinth of internal corridors. The ship's own self-repair systems had sealed the breach behind them before much atmosphere had been lost, but not before most of the invaders were aboard and moving toward the bridge.
The sounds of combat up ahead were louder now, more raucous, more confused. There was another explosion . . . and then an abrupt silence more unnerving than the crackling and hammering of combat had been. Dev pressed forward . . .
. . . and stepped through forced-open doors leading to the ship's bridge. It was a large, circular compartment with a low overhead, hazy with smoke and ringed with three-meter cylinders canted
back from the central pit at forty-five-degree angles. Only a handful of the linkage tubes were occupied. Dev saw, and the rebels were holding three disarmed marine guards at gunpoint. Two more lay broken on the deck.
Dev took a quick glance around the bridge, identified the manual link console, and dropped his palm onto the interface panel. A second later, the pattern of lights glowing in the console's black acrylic surface shifted, greens becoming reds, and then the ship operators were waking up, unjacking, stumbling uncertainly from their tubes and into the waiting arms of the rebels.
Dev pointed to one young-looking Japanese officer. "Kancho deska?" he demanded. Kancho was one of several Nihongo words meaning "captain"—specifically, the CO of a warship. "Are you the commander of this warship?"
The man bowed stiffly. "Hai!" His rank tabs indicated he was a shosa, a naval lieutenant commander, probably third or fourth officer of the ship.
"Kancho deska?" Bondevik demanded, giving the initial ka sound a slightly different intonation, and the Nihonjin officer went rigid, fists clenched, face red. The way Bondevik had pronounced it, the question had become "Are you an enema?"
The other rebels laughed, and Dev had to shout to restore order. "Okay, enough, people! Leave them alone." He waved a gloved hand toward one side of the bridge. "Bondevik, Nicholson, Schneider. DeVreis! Those tubes over there are weapons links. Langley. Gomez, Tewari, and Koenig! Over there, those four tubes. They'll be engineering. We need shipboard power stat, and a lock-in to make sure no one cuts us off from an auxiliary bridge. Karposci, you're on security, any of those tubes over there. Anders, take helm. That one. Dagousset, find any terminal and go to work on the ship's AI. All of you now, jack in and get hot."
As the first group made for the link capsules, he turned, a little clumsily in his armor and the light gravity. "Belenko. How hard were we hurt coming in?"
"Eight killed, sir," a young rebel said. "Three wounded pretty bad. Michaels is with 'em now."
Dev winced. Eleven lost already out of his assault force of thirty.
"Okay. You, Abrams, and Kanavsky. Search and secure the prisoners. Use one of the compartments aft of the bridge. The rest of you, spread out through this deck. Roadblocks at the corridor intersections. We don't know how many bad guys are still aboard, and they're going to be gunning for us as soon as they figure out what the hell's going on. Okay? All clear? Jack it!"
The Tokitukaze was already powered up, with the first steps for switching to internal power preparatory to casting off already completed. The biggest danger the boarders faced was that someone in auxiliary control would isolate them from the ship's computer, leaving them high, dry, and helpless, but Dev was gambling on the fact that auxiliary bridges were rarely manned when a vessel was in port, and it took time to power them up and link them in with the ship's command systems. He watched for a moment, as men and women squeezed into the bridge link capsules, before removing his helmet and gloves, selecting a capsule for himself, and climbing in.
It was the tube the young shosa had been using, the one designated for the officer of the watch. He plugged the jacks into his sockets, touched the palm interface, and became the Tokitukaze.
Power thrilled through his being, power and purpose and a reason for living. He could sense the entire length of the huge warship, feel the damage in his side where the shuttle had rammed home. His view forward was blocked by the embrace of the Shippurport docking shroud, but behind it he could see the lights of Babylon spread across the sky like pearls on a string, and beyond that, suspended in space against the background stars, the cloud-wreathed, red-gold-violet glory of Eridu.
"Cameron on-line," he announced, the routines of his old ship-conning days returning with effortless familiarity. "Coordinate through me."
"Captain . . ." DeVreis said.
"Whatcha got, Paul?"
"Looks like two targets, inbound under free-fall at one hundred three thousand kilometers, bearing two-one-one, neg five-three. Power plant readings suggest approximate Kumano-class. They're hustling."
Kumanos. Frigates, massing perhaps fifty thousand tons each. Smaller than the Tokitukaze, but undamaged and more maneuverable. They would be trouble. "ETA?"
"If they maintain course and don't cut in their thrusters . . . make it eighteen minutes, Captain."
Almost a hundred kilometers per second. They were hustling.
"Weapons status?"
"Nicholson here. The spinal mount's shot, and the main dorsal gigawatt laser's off-line. Power failures in twenty-two percent of the megawatt point defense lasers. We have three other gigawatt turrets powered and green, though. Missile systems check out green, loaded, and ready."
"Good. Keep tracking. See what you can do about the PDLs."
Lara Anders cut into the network. "I'm reading green on all conventional thruster and maneuvering systems. We're go for release."
"Roger on that," Koenig added. "Looks like ship's systems have taken care of all leakage. ATM is steady at point nine-eight bar."
"Power coming up in the fusor packs," Onkar Tewari, an Earth-born Hindi, announced. "Cryo-H are secure and at full pressure."
Good. The collision had not vented their reaction mass into space.
"We've got about a platoon of marines coming at the front door," Anatol Karposci announced over the link network. "Plasma guns and rocket launchers. I think they mean business."
"Seal them off."
"Forward hatch is sealed. Boarding tube is released."
"I have the ship's AI on line," Simone reported. "I can't get at the codes for nuclear launch or the K-T drive, but we're jacked in on everything else."
"Easy feed," Dev said. He'd not expected to get the nukes. Those things were jealously guarded. And they wouldn't be needing to go faster than light. "Get to work on the mag grapples."
"Yes, sir."
That would be the tricky part. The magnetic grapples were not controlled from the ship but through the docking AI of Shippurport Approach Control. Simone would have to hack her way into the synchorbital facility's computer network to get them to release the ship.
"Captain? We have a demand from port security that we surrender and open the forward docking hatch."
Dev laughed. "Tell them we need Lord-high Omigato's permission for that. That'll keep 'em guessing."
He wondered if Omigato was still aboard the Tokitukaze. He doubted it. The Imperial daihyo would probably have gone where the action was as things broke loose on Eridu, buried somewhere in HEMILCOM's orbital fortress.
"Captain, this is Simone. I can't access the magnetic grapples—"
"Damn!"
"—but I can trigger the emergency explosive release."
"Outstanding! All stations! Report readiness for space."
"Engineering is go. Captain. Power up, thrusters standing by. You have maneuvering at your command."
"Weapons go. We're still tracking those bandits, now at one hundred one kay and closing."
"Maneuvering go."
"Affirmative. Okay, Simone. Do it. Now!"
An electrical signal flashed to explosive charges mounted at the base of each docking grapple. Soundlessly in vacuum, but with a dull, hollow thud that echoed through the passageways of the Tokitukaze, the charges detonated, releasing the destroyer's prow.
With nothing holding the ship, the centrifugal force of the synchorbital eased the Tokitukaze backward at a velocity of just over one meter per second. Koenig cut in the bow thrusters a moment later, and then they were falling free, clear of Shippuiport and dropping into the night.
Nearly three hours had passed since the wild fight in the main Babel dome. After securing the Towerdown, the sky-el base, and the communications center, Katya had led the remainder of the rebel force out through the main airlock and onto the city plain.
They were standing on a broad hill almost a kilometer south of the Towerdown dome, a ridge named Raeder's Hill after Eridu's first governor. The view was spectacular, one hundred meters above a violet sea.
The jungle circled in the distance, tangled and impenetrable save for the clear-cut slashes where monorails and roadways passed. At Katya's back, the sky-el speared the zenith, dwindling away overhead to a vanishing point lost somewhere in the depths of that green-blue sky.
Other rebel forces had been arriving all morning—from Gulfport, from Emden, from other outposts scattered across the equatorial zone, and even by monorail from as far away as Winchester and Boreal. Including the former Hegemony Guard warstriders that had come over to the rebel side, the Confederacy forces could muster thirty-three warstriders, plus something like eight hundred men with full combat armor, able to move and fight outside the city domes. Another two thousand, plus the thousands more of civilians who didn't even possess partial armor, waited inside the Babel domes, watching the overture to the coming battle.
"That was well done, Katya," a familiar voice said in her mind.
"General Sinclair! Where are you?"
An RS-64D Warlord ten meters in front of her turned and lightly raised its left arm. "Right here."
"But . . . you're not supposed—"
"Not supposed to risk my life?"
"The Network can't afford to lose you, sir."
"At this point, Katya, my living or dying won't make that much difference one way or the other. My analogue has been safely downloaded, just in case, and it knows all my contacts and codes. But now that the Declaration has been published, I'm just another striderjack."
"The Network needs a leader, General."
"The Confederation has all the leaders it will need. Right now, it needs men and women who aren't afraid to get their hands dirty. Right?"
Katya hesitated. "Yes, sir."
He shifted to the general command frequency. "Right, Alessandro! I'd like you on the right flank. Keeping an eye on the monorail."