Selected Stories: Volume 1

by Kevin J. Anderson

  He would assume he had enough firepower to level the alien base, then return to cheers and parades. The problem was, blasting the Sluggo monster to pieces wouldn’t help, because it was already in pieces. The alien swarm was fundamentally composed of countless individual units bound together by some kind of common telepathy.

  Admiral Haldane had not been interested in hearing any suggestions from a scrawny piece of cannon fodder, though.

  Knowing the sub intended to engage the invaders’ base, Paulson had watched the meager intel as it came in, preparing himself for the worst, since the admiral’s previous engagements had not turned out well—especially not for the “escape hatch” volunteers. The waiting was maddening.

  The other volunteers in the rec room amused themselves by playing ping-pong or engaging in interactive games. None of them bothered to become friends, sure that any one of them could be called to duty and dispatched at any time.

  Paulson could feel them looking at him with pity. Admiral Haldane’s track record, and his recklessness (which Haldane tried to characterize as bravery), was no secret. Right now, he was leading his battle sub to the monstrous horde. Paulson hoped for the best, but he didn’t get his wish.

  This time, when the conduit in his head activated, he knew exactly what was going on—and he was ready.

  He braced himself during the transition, and when he gazed out through a different set of eyes, this time he wasn’t in a safe sick bay, nor was he being evac’d from a battlefield.

  Instead, he saw several slithering, eel-like creatures with round hungry-mouths and white diamond-like teeth. They squirmed forward along the deck, bursting onto the bridge, or command deck, or whatever it was called on a submarine. The alarms were deafening, as were the shouts of the Prospector’s crew. Uniformed men and women made their last stand and fought the Sluggos, stomping and hammering, using any possible weapon. The sub’s captain had a handgun and shot into the soft masses, and they exploded like snot-filled water balloons. Some bullets whanged and ricocheted off the bulkheads, making the other crewmen duck.

  Through the main port, Paulson saw only a solid writhing mass of interlinked Sluggo bodies, as if someone had placed the worm aliens into a trash compactor and smashed them up against the Prospector.

  Paulson only had a second to assess the situation. More Sluggos slid through the hatch onto the bridge; twenty were already making their way to the controls. Two bloodied seamen threw themselves against the bulkhead door, ramming their shoulders and pushing the heavy metal hatch into its jamb, slicing two Sluggos in half.

  The captain, the XO, the weapons officer, the fire-control officer, the sonar tech—all of them were completely disregarding Paulson. He had an idea, but he needed their help, and their attention. “Captain, give me a situation report,” he barked, surprised at the sound of his own voice.

  The startled captain turned to look at him. “You’re not the admiral—you’re just cannon fodder.”

  “We’re all cannon fodder, but I’m wearing the uniform. I’ve got the rank, I have the authority … and I have an idea. What’s our weapons situation? Tell me what’s happened and where we are.”

  “We’re up a creek without a paddle,” the XO cried. “Megatorps gone, and our hull is completely engulfed by Sluggos. At least four hull breaches, and the aliens are swarming through all the decks.”

  The engineering officer wiped sweat from her forehead. “Structural failure imminent, sir. Catastrophic hull collapse in three minutes.” Her voice was hoarse. “Or less.”

  “I predicted the megatorpedoes would be ineffective,” he said.

  “I wish you’d been in the admiral’s body before we got in this mess, then,” the captain said.

  Paulson didn’t want to argue. “Do we still have sonar?”

  The sonar tech climbed back to his feet, held onto the anchored chair. “Sonar didn’t do any good, sir.”

  Paulson believed they’d been misinterpreting the results. The Sluggo monster didn’t know how to become invisible to the sonar pings; rather, the massive organism had actually broken apart and then recoalesced.

  “I want a sonar burst, the loudest boom you can make, Mr. Lieutenant—Ensign … sorry, I don’t know your rank.”

  “My rate,” said the sonar tech.

  “Does the sonar work or not?” Paulson snapped. From the design specs, he knew the Prospector had been built as a survey vessel, with a full complement of sonar mapping gear.

  “We can send out a ping as loud as bad rap music coming from a car stereo.”

  “Then let’s hope it sounds as annoying as that.”

  As the sonar tech scrambled with his controls, Paulson yelled to the communications officer, “Send a message throughout the ship … the sub, or whatever. Close all compartment doors, seal off the bulkheads. We need to separate the clusters of Sluggos.” He had noticed that after the crew sealed the door to the bridge deck, the individual worm creatures were less lively, more disoriented, and without a driving goal. “We need to divide and conquer. The Sluggos are a conglomerate organism. If you separate the pieces, the pieces are no longer intelligent.”

  The sonar tech removed his ears. “Here we go.” He activated a loud pulse that thrummed out. The response was immediate and startling.

  The Sluggo mass surrounding the Prospector shivered and broke apart like flies taking flight from a pile of manure. At the main port, Paulson saw hundreds of the things peel off from where they’d been compacted against the view port, and they scattered away from the sub. Even the Sluggos inside the command deck were dazed from the sonar blast, which gave other crew enough time to stomp on them and pop their body sacs.

  “Another ping! Keep it up!” Paulson shouted.

  The tech stared wide-eyed at the controls. “Did you see that?”

  Paulson ran over and grabbed him. “Keep pinging! The sonar disrupts whatever binds them together into a collective organism. It may be our only chance!”

  The tech launched another loud boom, and most of the remaining Sluggos drifted away from the sub’s hull like flakes of dandruff.

  “I can keep pinging all day!” the tech yelled excitedly.

  “You may have to do that. Call the engine room—see if that freed our propellers so we can get the heck out of here.”

  “They’re called screws, sir,” said the engineer.

  The reactor room called up to the bridge. “We’re free—and the reactor’s running at peak. I’m going to burn off some of our excess by setting off at top speed.”

  While studying so many reports, Paulson had tried to determine what held the Sluggos together like a million brain cells in a single coordinated organism. Now he was grinning. “Keep hitting them with sonar blasts, and they won’t give us any more trouble. Our pulses are scrambling the single intelligent creature into countless unintelligent cells. They won’t be able to reassemble into anything big enough to threaten us.”

  Now that the main port was clear, Paulson could see the ocean around him. He saw the wreckage strewn on the sea floor, the components and debris the Sluggos had used as a structural framework. The megatorps had indeed destroyed the base at least, but if the big structures were held together by conglomerated Sluggos, the aliens could just rebuild as soon as the individual worm-things settled down. By then, though, the Prospector would be far away. So long as the sonar pulses kept scrambling the Sluggo mass, the sub could move unimpeded.

  Another sonar boom resounded through the water. The sea around them was a boiling swarm, but the scrambled creatures didn’t attack the sub. Inside, the crew were rapidly dispatching the Sluggos one at a time.

  “Blow all ballast,” Paulson ordered in his loudest command voice, then turned to the captain and whispered, “That’s the best way to get us to the surface, isn’t it?”

  The sub’s captain turned to look at him with a dawning respect. “Indeed, Admiral. I’ll take it from here, sir. You’ve already saved the day.”

  “You may have saved the huma
n race,” the XO added.

  The captain ordered, “Put us on the ceiling!” He nodded at Paulson. “You might want to hold onto something.”

  Soon, the Prospector breached the surface like a humpback whale. It was a short but exciting ride, and for the first time Paulson felt excited about being part of the Earth Planetary Navy. On the scope, the seas were peaceful and Sluggo-free.

  “Our comm systems are damaged,” the XO said. “Can’t send anybody the good news until we make repairs.”

  “Then we have to get back to port and report,” Paulson said, glad to be getting out of this with his skin intact. “We’re going to live to fight another day.”

  XI

  From the main press podium at the La Diego Earth Navy base, Admiral Bruce Haldane wore his formal uniform again, the one that had been re-re-tailored to fit Paulson Kenz’s scrawny body. It was his body now, a permanent swap now that the Prospector had been lost. But he could always upgrade. He had already sent out a call to the recruitment offices and among the current sailors. Thanks to the Sluggo threat, new recruits were being drafted by the tens of thousands, processed as quickly as was bureaucratically possible. Certainly, with so many choices available, there must be someone better qualified than this wet-noodle bookworm.

  Still, the escape hatch had worked, and Haldane was relieved to be safe again. He vowed to carry on the fight for Earth.…

  As soon as he had transferred out of his body aboard the battle sub, he found himself in the recreation hall along with the other lazy slobs who took the easy way out, all those young men who were too afraid to face down the voracious Sluggos as Haldane had done—several times.

  Settling into the bookworm’s body, he brushed himself off, glared at the rest of the volunteers, and marched to the guarded door, demanding to be taken to base headquarters. Medical monitors would have picked up the transfer signal, so they would come to investigate before long, but he needed to meet with the advisory board, issue his report, and add his new information to the growing backlog of data. Someday, his experiences might allow teams of human geniuses to discover some small weakness in the aliens.

  And he also had to make his announcement, putting forth a brave face for the people of Earth.

  At first, the guards didn’t want to let him out of the rec hall/prison. They looked at Paulson’s scrawny body and regarded him with skepticism.

  “I am Admiral Haldane, I tell you! Let me loose, I have to make my report.”

  The guards raised their eyebrows. “Sure, you are. And you expect us to just release you without confirmation?”

  “I’m me, dammit! That’s all the confirmation you should need.” Haldane realized that he would have to correct this flaw in the system.

  One of the other volunteers looked up from a suspended game of ping-pong. “That one’s been acting awfully strange. Could be an adverse reaction to the conduit surgery.”

  The others nodded. “I wouldn’t believe him.”

  These cowardly slackers didn’t respect him! “This is nonsense!” Haldane shouted at the guard. “I outrank you. I’m your admiral!”

  “I heard him talking,” said another volunteer. “He said he was going to escape and find a black-market surgeon who would pop out a plug for a fee.”

  The lazy bastards were setting him up! Haldane was furious.

  Finally, a signal from medical command informed the guards that Haldane’s transfer protocol had been activated, and that the escape hatch swap had been successful. He gave an annoyed huff toward the slovenly volunteers who thought it was all a joke, then he stormed out. This was an emergency, not a minute to lose!

  Ever since the Prospector’s launch, all of Earth was waiting to hear the news. They expected to learn that the invaders had been annihilated, their base destroyed, and any other Sluggos from the Sluggo planet would see that the Earth Planetary Navy was nothing to mess around with.

  When he delivered his speech in his weakling body, though—not the one that had departed aboard the battle sub—he could see dismay ripple through the crowd. They’d already figured out that the mission had failed, that the Sluggos were still a threat … and they assumed that the Prospector had been lost with all hands. That much was obvious, because otherwise the admiral would never have used his last-ditch escape plan.

  The captain of the submarine would have gone down with his ship, as expected, but a war hero like Bruce Haldane had survived to rouse the troops, to inspire the populace and honor the sacrifices of those who had fallen in battle, as well as to advise the EPN’s tactical experts.

  Standing at the podium, he activated the loudspeaker systems. His words pounded out across the gathered crowd. “You may not recognize me, but I am Admiral Bruce Haldane. And I have just come from the embattled submarine Prospector. With fifty megatorpedoes, we wrought terrible damage to the alien base, but the Sluggo retaliation was swift and overwhelming. They engulfed the sub, and I … I regret the loss of all hands.”

  He cleared his throat. “A list of all names will be made available to you in subsequent press packets.” He lifted his chin and kept his tone stoic. “However, even failures are instructive. We believed that a megatorp bombardment was our best possible hope, but now we’ll just have to try something else. Maybe undersea nuclear saturation. It’s worth a try.”

  He drew a breath. “Let us pause for a moment of silence to honor all those who sacrificed themselves aboard the Prospector.” He closed his eyes, bowed his head—and then an actual signal from the Prospector spoiled the moment.

  The excited announcement broke through on the loudspeakers. The media reporters were abuzz. The battle sub had survived after all, had surfaced intact and was now making its way at best speed back to land!

  Admiral Haldane straightened his cap, squared his shoulders, and forced a smile. “Oh … well, then. This is wonderful news.”

  XII

  An escort of EPN destroyers met the Prospector as it approached the La Diego harbor. People gathered on public docks to welcome the victorious vessel with remarkable fanfare. The cheers from the crowd were deafening.

  When Admiral Haldane went to greet them as part of a formal reception party, he was all smiles and pride.

  In the days it had taken the battle sub to return, the Prospector’s crew had become heroes. No further Sluggo attacks or even sightings had been reported. The sub’s captain had transmitted that they had only escaped by using the “sonar defense suggestion” of “Admiral Kenz” to great success, and they believed they had found a way to eliminate the alien invaders once and for all.

  “Admiral Kenz” indeed! Haldane fumed inwardly.

  As the Prospector docked and Admiral Haldane stepped out to greet them, the captain and the XO disembarked with an altogether too smug looking seaman-recruit Paulson Kenz. The sailors looked battered and bruised, their uniforms tattered. Haldane thought their disheveled appearance was strictly for dramatic effect, because even after the Sluggos had swarmed through the decks, the officers and crew must have had a clean change of clothes aboard.

  Haldane said, “I’m so pleased you all made it.” He waited for the sub’s captain to salute, and the man did so, but reluctantly, keeping his eyes fixated on the admiral’s insignia rather than his face. “We welcome your return home, and we look forward to your report about the end of the engagement.”

  The XO blurted out, “Our report will include how you abandoned us, Admiral Haldane—how you took us into danger with reckless disregard for the lives of the Prospector’s officers and crew.”

  Haldane was shocked. “I led an attack that had a reasonable probability of success, but it didn’t work. Such are the fortunes of war.”

  “Excuse me,” said the sub’s captain, “but Admiral Kenz said he advised against your method from the outset, but you refused to listen to his advice.”

  “His advice?” Haldane spluttered. “Admiral Kenz? He’s just a recruit, cannon fodder! I’m the real admiral!”

  “As far as I’m co
ncerned, you relinquished that title when you abandoned the ship and crew.” The captain cleared his throat. “Sir.”

  “I was required to survive,” Haldane said. “I waited until the last possible moment, when there was no hope for survival. I saw no other way.”

  “And yet …” The XO nodded at Paulson Kenz. “After you fled for your life, this untried seaman-recruit assessed the situation, solved the problem, saved all our lives, and defeated the Sluggos—in about two minutes. I believe that’s called a battlefield promotion, sir.”

  With a sinking sensation in his gut, Haldane realized that all of this was being recorded and transmitted live.

  In the familiar strong and handsome body, Paulson Kenz said, “I’ve even worked out a way that we can use continuous sonar for complete victory. You see, each pulse scrambles the Sluggo hive mind, breaks it apart. If we bring in numerous subs and keep hammering them with sonar so that the individual creatures cannot recoalesce, then we can use nets or tanks as a harvesting system. If we winnow down the individual Sluggos so that no more than a hundred or so can gather in any single place, the group intelligence won’t come back. Divide and conquer. It may take time, but we can simply whittle them away until there are no more Sluggos left.”

  “Thank you for that interesting suggestion, recruit.” Haldane put all the scorn he could possibly muster into his voice. “We’ll have our experts take it under advisement. For now, it’s best if we initiate the transfer protocol again, swap back so you can have your original body, and I’ll make my announcements and appearances in—”

  Paulson raised his head. “Sorry, sir, but as you informed me, it’s a one-way transfer protocol. We’ll have to reinstall and surgically reset the conduits, but there’s no time to go through that now. I need to present my findings to the command advisory board. There’s a war on, you know.”

  The captain and the XO ignored Haldane and looked at Kenz. “What are your orders, Admiral?”

  Paulson looked flustered. “Well, we need the submarine fixed up and cleaned, for one thing. Then we have to discuss how to implement my sonar strategy so we get rid of the Sluggos.”