She kept her senses on the alert. A hundred kilometers out, she spotted the first attack, a wave of six ships coming in high from the north. And when the others were fighting them off, she saw the second wing, rising one at a time from the dark cleft canyon of a river far below. "Straight ahead and low!" she said over the ship-to-ship communicator. "This is the main body!"
"Gold three, four, five, six, and seven, engage!" Helene ordered. "Nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, give them support!"
The Gold team swooped down like hawks. Asteria counted ten enemy ships down on the deck. Six overhead…there were still nine to account for. Not behind, not ahead…not above or below. The trainer pulsed data to her as the trainers wheeled and fired their laser markers at each other: "Saber seventeen disabled. Saber nineteen destroyed. Gold three, 12 percent damage, life support marginal. Saber two disabled."
"Here they come," Asteria said. "The last nine: high and dead ahead."
"Gold twenty-four and twenty-five, stay with the troop carrier," Helene ordered. "Everyone else, come with me!"
Below, the trainers that had been downed were skimming off on autopilot, their human pilots unable to affect them now. Three of the Gold ships had been destroyed or damaged so badly they were out of the battle, but on the other hand, fourteen of the Sabers had been put out of commission. The Sabers had only eleven left. Still, even one would be enough—if the pilot's aim was true. "Heads up!" snapped Asteria. "Get him, get him!"
That fantastic 360-degree vision flooded her head, showing her everything that was happening. The lead Saber ship had rolled out of combat and was diving down on the transport. Pako Zanthem, an Aristo boy whose nerve seemed cold as liquid nitrogen, rose to meet it—but almost at once Asteria's trainer said, "Gold twentyfour pilot killed," and Zanthem's ship dived away.
The belt cut in, boosting her awareness, speeding her reaction so that time slowed down. Asteria warped her own trainer up to face the threat. She yawed, letting the enemy laser bursts beam past harmlessly, then focused on its leading edge, where the pilot's head would be. The Saber ship did a tricky bank, but she stuck with it and fired her weapons. "Saber one downed," Asteria's trainer told her. She spun to get back to the transporter they were protecting, and then she saw another enemy ship closing fast.
She pounced on it and fired; a half-second later it fired back; and the trainer announced, "Saber four navigation disabled. No score on Saber four's firing." Adrenaline course through her as she rose again—
Then it was all over. Just like that. The voice of a controller said, "Well done, Gold. Decision by massacre. All trainers return to base."
She felt the heightened awareness drain away as the formation peeled off to retrace its course. The belt's effect faded, leaving her feeling empty.
After the return to the Academy and the debriefing, Asteria found Dai watching two other mock battles in the barracks holoroom. "This real time?" she asked, sitting next to him.
"Virtual but close. There's his highness." Dai pointed at a pair of shimmering silver arrowheads that appeared to glide a few centimeters over the screen. "Silver's attacking, trying to break through the Indigo lines to destroy a power grid. The main battle's over there. Kayser faked being hit—don't know why, but the controller didn't call it so nobody would be fooled—and dropped back, then swung around. His wingman's Gull. The Indigo defense is pretty tight…and there are four ships orbiting the grid center—that's the yellow beacon across the way."
"What's Lord Mastral up to?" another cadet asked.
"He's got something planned," another one said. "He's tricky."
"Silver's breaking through!" someone else yelled.
"Going to cost them, though. There goes Silver four…and six."
The two hit craft dimmed out as the AI took over and flew them away from the battle. Asteria didn't even spare them a glance—she was staring at the wide-circling Kayser and Gull. What were they doing?
And then she saw it: they were losing altitude rapidly, dropping right down to the deck. "He's going for the river," she said.
The virtual map showed the broad break in the jungle canopy formed by the winding river course. Sure enough, both Kayser and Gull dropped down.
"They can't be more than a meter above the water," someone said. "That's crazy. They could smash."
The silvery arrows were streaks now, racing along, following the course of the river—which would bring them to within a kilometer or two of the yellow target. The remaining Silver ships had broken into individual fights with Indigo counterparts now, still fifty kilometers short of the goal. The Indigo ships were winning; they outnumbered the surviving Silver craft by a margin of three or four.
"Kayser's going to get through!" Dai cried.
The streaking Silver craft soared out of the river channel, pulled a hard right, and bore in on the target. The four defending Indigo ships had climbed to a high altitude—to try to glimpse the far-off fight, Asteria guessed. One of the defending pilots, Indigo twenty, finally spied the intruders and yelped a warning.
But too late. Gull swept in first, firing at the target. The AI reported damage: 40 percent. Fifty. Fifty-five. Then Gull had flashed past the beacon, and two of the furious Indigo pilots peeled off to blast him, which they did without much trouble.
The other two could not get within range of Kayser in time. He was at maximum speed, and he fired his weapons even before he could possibly have locked on target. He was either good or lucky, because the AI began registering hits: the target was down by fifty-seven percent, sixty, sixty-five, seventy-five, ninety…destroyed. The cadets whooped in surprise and admiration.
Dai gave Asteria a rolling-eyed look of disgust. "He couldn't have scored hits from that far out. Kayser cheated somehow."
"Sometimes you get lucky," Asteria said, but privately she suspected that Dai was right.
* * *
Both the Bolts and the Freaks survived the next day's War Games and were slated to play against each other on the third day. Team Silver also hung in, scheduled to play Team Purple. Before they met up for their briefings, Dai saw Asteria briefly. "Don't kill me if you can help it," he said with a grin. "And listen: whoever wins today, we have to kick some Aristo tail tomorrow, right?"
"Right," agreed Asteria. She was keyed up, but as it turned out the games weren't much of a challenge: Gold and Red teams were to seek each other out with long-range sensors blinded, and fight a battle of attrition. The last team to have at least one flyable ship would be the winner. Helene rose as soon as the rules had been explained and said, "Okay, let's go. I want a modified V spread. Locke, take port edge, and Meddows, be her wingman; I'll take the starboard edge, and I want Wian as wingman. Fedders, you're point…" She went on to specify their positions. They would fly in a wedge formation, with the center ships more widely spaced, the ones toward either side tightening the distance. That would allow some concentration of fire if they should happen across the enemy suddenly.
Asteria and the others didn't know anything about Team Red's formation, just that they were hunting Dai and the other Freaks over a vast square with sides a thousand kilometers long. With their long-range sensors inactive, they could detect them only from about thirty to forty klicks away. They took to the air, formed up, reached the battle area, and followed Helene's directions. They were going to cut the square on the diagonal, with everyone, but particularly those on either end of the line, straining to spot the enemy formation.
All at once, someone said, "This is Gold seven. They're behind us!"
"I see them," Helene snapped. "Coming in fast. Break apart, choose your opponent, and engage!"
Asteria looped her ship around, rolling as she came up on the outside of the formation, and then sped back along the same track she had been following. The Reds were there, five thousand meters higher than the Gold squadron, but so far they had not spotted the attackers. "I've got Red one," Asteria said as the others called their targets. The Red pilots rolled out of formation, diving to
meet the challengers. Asteria fired, rolled, halflooped again. Under the rules of the game, the teams could not hear each other's communications. When Asteria zipped past a red ship, though, her enhanced senses registered the number on the fuselage: six. That was Dai.
He was good, and he had already warped into a tight turn to bring his weapons to bear on her—though she doubted he had any idea that she was his target. To him, she was an enemy ship—that was all.
She pulled up steeply and circled over into a loop. He stuck behind her, but their speed was too high for him to target accurately. Dai's lasers couldn't find her. At the crest of the loop, Asteria reversed her thrust, feeling an intense build of G forces as her ship decelerated.
Caught off-guard, Dai flashed past her, and she immediately resumed thrust. Now she was behind him; he had become the target. He began a series of over-and-over rolls, making it all but impossible to lock in on him. But not for Asteria, not when she was wearing her belt. In her sights, the Red ship seemed to move slowly, almost gracefully.
"Sorry, Dai," she murmured. Then she blasted him.
Two quick shots. The AI called, "Red six out!"—and Asteria went into a power dive and locked onto Red eight which was pursuing Helene.
Then she was hit, her ship judged disabled, and she relaxed as the autopilot flew her back to the hangar. She listened to the short remnant of the battle. At the end, Gold had five remaining ships; the Red squadron had been wiped out.
After the debriefing, a mock-angry Dai confronted her in the hall. "You weren't supposed to kill me," he said, unable to suppress a grin.
"I tried to bring you down with major damages," Asteria said innocently. "But I guess my concentration slipped. I—"
They turned a corner and almost collided with a man in the uniform of a commander. "A. F. Locke?" he asked.
"I—yes, that's me," Asteria said. The man's face looked grim. She had a sinking feeling that nothing good was going to come out of his mouth.
He handed her a dataslip. "Report to Vice Admiral Chen's office to answer charges," he said. "On the double."
* * *
Asteria stood at stiff attention before the Vice Admiral's desk. A stern-looking man in his forties stood beside Chen. He had frosty blue eyes and wore the uniform of a rear admiral. He did not introduce himself, nor did Chen immediately mention him. "Congratulations on your successes in the games," she said perfunctorily.
"Thank you, Commandant," Asteria replied.
She glanced at the visiting rear admiral and then said, "Locke, you are a legacy cadet, are you not?"
Why was Chen asking her that? She knew all about Asteria's father. "Yes, I am, Commandant," she said. "My father was an Academy graduate. A warrant officer."
"Who served aboard the Adastra," Chen added.
"Yes, Commandant. That's right."
Chen swiveled in her chair. "Admiral Vodros, do you wish to withdraw the charge?"
"I do not!" the man snapped, his voice rough and angry. "The girl is here under false pretenses."
Asteria felt cold. The man's eyes held no hint of compassion. "Commandant?" Asteria said softly to Vice Admiral Chen. "I don't understand."
"This is Rear Admiral Earl Vodros," Chen said. "He holds that the appointment under which you were admitted was intended for your cousin, Andre Locke, not for you."
"Sir," Asteria said, "my cousin is dead."
"You admit it, then," Vodros said, his eyes steady as lasers.
Vice Admiral Chen tapped her desk as if to gain their attention. She said to Vodros—but Asteria had the sense the words were for her benefit—"Admiral, it has been a long-standing Academy policy to accept the sons or daughters of any crewmember who was aboard the Adastra. If you press the courtmartial, I doubt very much that your charges will be upheld. Why not—"
"I stand on the code of military law," Vodros said.
"Then let's convene the panel immediately—"
"I will not be able to testify today," he interrupted coldly. "Tomorrow. At 1600 hours."
Chen said, "Very well, sir. Midshipman Locke, a court-martial has been called to look into your credentials and qualifications. You are confined to quarters until 1600 hours tomorrow. You may take your meals in the mess hall as usual."
Vodros cut in harshly, "Is she to be guarded?"
"Is there need of a guard, Midshipman?"
Asteria wondered if the pounding of her heart was audible to the two officers. "No, Commandant," she said.
"Dismissed. Go straight to your barracks, Locke."
"Aye."
She did an about-face and marched out, keeping her back straight. Inside she felt an almost physical pain.
She would not be able to fly in the match-up with Team Silver. Helene would be frantic.
Why did this have to happen? And why today of all days, after she had just proved herself in mock battle?
eleven
I'll tell you why," Dai growled that evening as they walked
back toward the barracks from the mess hall, his voice low but rough with anger. "It's very simple, really. The Earl Vodros is Yalas Kayser. Lord Mastral's uncle."
Asteria looked sideways at Dai. He stared straight ahead, his jaw clenched and his face angry. She touched his arm. "He's having me court-martialed so I can't fly against Kayser?"
Dai nodded sharply. "I told you about that family. Tricky." He took a deep breath and let it out in an exasperated sigh. "Don't worry, you're safe from washing out. The officers who serve as judges will be instructors, and everyone at the Academy knows about the Adastra rule."
"I'm not so sure about being safe," Asteria said gloomily. "Vodros seemed to think he had me."
Dai snorted. "If they refused you, they'd have to review the appointments of about a hundred others, half of them Aristos. It'll never happen. But what is Helene going to do? Field just twenty-four pilots?"
"No," Asteria said. "I read up on the rules for the War Games, and there's a way out. Come on, let's find her."
They located her in the common room, looking haggard and studying a tactics pulsebook. She laughed when Asteria told her she wouldn't be able to fly against Team Silver because she was facing a court-martial. "Come on," she said, her expression knowing. "You can't haze me."
"It's not a joke. It's true," Asteria said. "But you still have time—"
"You're serious, aren't you?" interrupted Helene.
"Yes! But it's not my—"
"What rule did you break to get tossed off the team?" Helene cried angrily. "You're the best pilot on the team, and without you, they'll smash us!"
"Listen," Asteria said, trying to remain calm. "I learned there's a provision for subs if there's an injury or unavoidable absence. It's okay. You can still have a full team. You can take Dai."
Helene frowned at him. "He's not as good as you."
"Thank you for your support," Dai said dryly. "Hey, find someone better. An Aristo, maybe."
Helen's face darkened. "It's not a class issue. I can't find someone good enough, not with this short notice. Maybe we could petition to have the court-martial delayed—
Asteria's face flushed. All at once she felt embarrassed. Here she was, costing her team the victory.
"Yeah, good luck with that." Dai said. "Oh, by the way, you might want to know that Rear Admiral the Earl Vodros himself is pressing the charges," he added, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
Helene turned pale. "He—he's—"
"I know who he is," Asteria said doggedly. "Look, take Dai. He's as good a pilot as I am, and he's studied Kayser's—I mean Lord Mastral's moves."
"Well…you are both Commoners," Helene said.
"I thought this wasn't about class. And that doesn't count in battle," Dai said, his own face turning red. "If anything, it gives me more reason to want to take him out."
"I didn't mean it that way. I guess it makes sense for a Commoner to replace a Commoner. All right, Dai, I'll transmit the request to the referees. If they approve, you're on the team. I w
as making Asteria Gold two for tomorrow, so that's your spot, second in command." She didn't look happy.
"Thanks," Dai said.
"Don't thank me; just don't foul up," snarled Helene. "Let's get the request in now." She sat at an AI unit and quickly entered the information. It took all of five minutes for the War Games administrator to transmit an approval back.
Asteria sighed. "That's that. I'd better get to my quarters. If they check my locater, I'd better be where they sent me." She walked toward the women's wing, and Dai walked with her as far as the door. He delayed her there for a moment, looking awkward and embarrassed.
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