A Learning Experience 2: Hard Lessons

by Christopher G. Nuttall

  He shrugged. “But what we do know is that the plan for attacking Earth and bringing the Coalition to heel is a little more complex than we’d thought,” he added. “They’re planning to snatch a number of stars between the Varnar and Coalition space, which will force the Coalition to decide between surrendering or attacking the Tokomak directly. I think they’re actually convinced there won’t be any counterattacks; judging by their dispositions, they’re planning more of a parade than anything else.”

  “Arrogant,” Kevin observed.

  “When you’ve been absolute masters of the universe for the past four thousand years, perhaps you have some problems wrapping your head around the concept of someone daring to attack you,” Glass countered. “I think that’s their problem, Kevin.”

  He looked up at the giant starship, its white hull pitted with carbon scoring from where the human weapons had struck home. “On the face of it, that ship was in perfect condition,” Glass explained. “Every single undamaged compartment is ... well, perfect. The decks are scrubbed, the equipment is neatly stowed away and not a single component is out of place. I don’t think there was even a speck of dust anywhere outside the damaged compartments.”

  “Sounds like trying to satisfy a Drill Instructor,” Kevin said.

  He smiled at the memory. One of his uncles had had hundreds of horror stories about West Point, where it was impossible to clean a room to the standards of the Drill Instructors and a single speck of dust was grounds for having to clean the room over and over again. It was one of the reasons he had never seriously considered the military as a career.

  “I think so, yes,” Glass agreed. “I don’t think I’ve ever worked for someone so anal in my entire career and I’ve worked with editors who left my manuscripts covered in red ink.”

  “It was worth it in the end,” Kevin said.

  “Yes, but I didn't feel that way at the time,” Glass said. He shrugged again, then looked up at the ship. “On a more practical basis, however, the ship was rotting away at the seams. Her level of maintenance was very low, well below our standards – or, for that matter, the Varnar standards. I think part of the reason she didn't put up more of a fight was because some of her systems were cross-linked together and taking out one of them knocked out several more as well.”

  Kevin tried to imagine what Mongo – or Steve, or any Solar Union Captain – would have said to any junior officer stupid enough to interlink his systems more than strictly necessary, despite knowing the risks. It might have been safer for the junior officer to volunteer for the next suicide mission. Hitting one’s subordinates was not considered acceptable behaviour, but any court martial board would probably have voted to acquit. Risking a starship’s integrity just to save time would have been utterly unacceptable.

  “Idiots,” he said. “That wasn't a Horde ship. They designed this technology. Don’t they know ...”

  “I imagine they didn't have time,” Glass said. “Burnishing the hull alone would take days, perhaps weeks. There's a reference in their log to a potential visit by Great Old Ones, so the crew had to spend time cleaning and re-cleaning their ship. I think they probably started skipping on basic maintenance pretty damn quickly.”

  He looked up at the ship again, then back at Kevin. “Do you know how old the ship is?”

  Kevin shook his head. The Tokomak ship - Supreme Flower of the Delicate Evening, he reminded himself – had looked pristine before the battle. But then, starships didn't actually decay in space. The Galactics had no shortage of starships that had passed through twenty or more pairs of hands – or claws, or maniples – before humanity had purchased them for a song. There was no way to tell a starship’s age from its outside appearance.

  “Try two thousand years,” Glass said, coolly. “That ship was new when the Roman Empire was at its height.”

  “Fuck,” Kevin said, stunned. “You’re shitting me.”

  “I’m quite serious,” Glass said. “We found log entries dating back right to her maiden voyage. Extensive log entries. There’s another reason for the poor maintenance right there, Kevin. Her CO was expected to spend at least an hour a day filling out the ship’s log.”

  He shook his head. “The Tokomak built well,” he added, “but the ship needed maintenance and all she got was people covering up the flaws with new coats of paint. You know what she reminds me of?”

  “No,” Kevin said.

  “The Enterprise,” Glass said.

  Kevin frowned. “Our cruiser or Captain Picard’s ship?”

  Glass shot him a cross look. “The aircraft carrier,” he said. “I served on her before 9/11 – this was back when Slick Willy was in the White House. We looked good, Kevin, but we had very real problems. Half the Tomcats were cannibalised to keep the other half flying, among other issues. The Captain was doing what he could, but ... morale was in the pits, we were losing good people and not a one of us trusted the Commander-in-Chief. There was a stunningly hot Tomcat pilot who kept getting shit because half the crew thought she had only been allowed to fly because she was a woman ...”

  He shrugged. “This ship is just the same,” he added, “but they had a worse Captain. I found copies of requests for paint or internal decoration, not requests for spare parts or a larger crew. Hell, she was undermanned too. I think they’re having problems crewing their fleet.”

  Kevin remembered his thoughts on how the Solar Union might ossify and went cold. “Why?”

  “I don’t know,” Glass said. “It could be they're going through the whole ‘patriotism is a dirty word’ phase or it could be the sheer lack of promotion prospects. There are crew records that claim some of the crew served on her for over fifty years without promotion or hope of same, Kevin. How long would it be before human ships started shedding crew in great numbers?”

  “Not long,” Kevin said. The Solar Union was a meritocracy. If a crewman proved himself capable, there would be promotion, right up the line. But if promotion dragged, and if there were opportunities outside the fleet, it was unlikely that anyone would feel inclined to put his life on the line for the Solar Union. Fleet crewmen were people too. “The old DHS had that problem right up until it collapsed under its own weight.”

  He shook his head at the bitter memory, then pushed it aside. Perhaps the DHS – and America – would have recovered if the Solar Union hadn’t come into existence. There had already been feedback trends, even though he suspected Washington wouldn't have agreed to reform without serious pressure from a largely inert population. Instead, everyone who wanted to live free had emigrated to outer space, leaving behind the people who depended on the government to take care of them ...

  And that, he thought, might explain why the government never managed to master even unrestricted alien technology.

  “Overall, I am most unimpressed,” Glass said. “I will present a copy of my formal report before the Council in a week, as requested, but we have a definite advantage. Hell, the Varnar would have a definite advantage. They, at least, had to learn to adapt to keep fighting the war. The Tokomak haven't had to check their security arrangements for over a thousand years. I think they're in for a nasty shock when the war begins.”

  “It's already begun,” Kevin said, nodding upwards. “And they have a lot of ships.”

  “Yeah,” Glass said. “We’ve downloaded specifications from the datacores we captured, Kevin. Their battleships aren't too bad, at least on the surface. God alone knows how badly they’ve been maintained.”

  “It would be unwise to count on it,” Kevin said. “Perhaps we could monitor their arrival at Hades and see how well they manage to enter orbit.”

  Glass looked doubtful. “I don’t think they could screw that up,” he said. “Any fool can get a ship into orbit.”

  “You need to spend more time at Sparta,” Kevin said. “Every last screw-up that can be screwed-up has been committed there, time and time again.”

  He smiled at the memory of the blooper reel Mongo had once shown him �
� even though it hadn't really been that funny – then sobered. “Overall,” he asked, “what do you think our chances are?”

  “If we had equal numbers to them, we’d be laughing all the way to their homeworld,” Glass said, frankly. “As it is, they have a distressing number of everything from directed energy weapons to missile launchers. If they decided to soak up the losses and just keep coming, Kevin, we’d be fucked. And if they ever realise just how advanced we will be in a few decades, they will throw a million ships at Earth just to exterminate us from existence.”

  Kevin frowned. “Are we that close to beating them?”

  Glass snorted. “How long was it, on Earth, between the invention of the internet and the explosion of electronic society? How long was it before we started using the internet for anything, apart from sharing intellectual thoughts and defence data? How long was it before large chunks of the internet became nothing more than tits, asses and cocks?”

  “Not long,” Kevin said. He was old enough to remember the arcade machines he’d played as a child ... and then the versions of Windows that had opened up a whole new world. “But this is different?”

  “No, it isn't,” Glass said. “This is ... well, this is Harry Potter.”

  He went on before Kevin could say a word. “Right now, on the datanet, there are billions upon billions of pieces of Harry Potter fan-fiction, everything from text stories to homemade movies. The franchise has expanded so rapidly, with so many people involved in creating new versions of the universe, that it’s hard to say what is truly canon any longer. Point is – there was a colossal flowering of intellectual activity based on a single seven-book series.”

  “I never figured you for a Harry Potter fan,” Kevin said.

  “There wasn't an author alive at the time who wouldn't have given his soul for such publicity,” Glass pointed out, dryly. “And besides, these days, science-fiction has hit something of a roadblock.”

  Kevin understood. Universes like Babylon 5 and Star Trek and even Doctor Who had been proven to be impractical, as well as non-existent. The march of technology – alien technology – had damaged science-fiction quite badly, while fantasy had grown and prospered. Steve would probably have muttered something about liberals encouraging pie-in-the-sky dreaming, but Kevin had a feeling the decline of science-fiction was caused by something more fundamental. It was simply harder to suspend one’s belief when one knew very well that the universe simply didn't allow time travel.

  Glass coughed, loudly. “We’re doing the same with alien technology,” he continued. “Right now, we have countless ideas for new uses – uses they never considered – making their way through society. It won’t be long before there will be newer ideas, based on the previous set of new ideas, and even newer ideas based on those. The datanet allows countless ideas to be considered; the high level of education in the Solar Union allows our versions of Bill Gates and Roger Pearlman to flourish and actually make their ideas into reality. They simply don’t have any way to compete against us, once we start pulling ahead. I don’t think their leadership is remotely capable of grasping the fact it needs a less immobile society even to begin to meet our challenge.”

  “Probably not,” Kevin agreed. From what he’d heard, the Tokomak birthrate was very low and the youngsters spent most of their time enjoying themselves, rather than trying to rise in the ranks. But why should they try when they knew it was impossible? “How long do we have, then, before we are invincible?”

  Glass smirked. “Give us fifty years and they wouldn't be able to touch us,” he said. “Right now, though, we only have samples of some of the more interesting pieces of technology, weapons that will blow them right out of space. It won’t be an easy war.”

  “But at least we will have a fighting chance,” Kevin said. “Let me know if you have any reason to change your conclusions.”

  “I will,” Glass said. He sighed, then nodded towards the ship. “I believe the ship isn't likely to hold any surprises, Kevin. They’re not much more advanced than the lesser Galactics.”

  “And the Varnar might be moving ahead of their masters,” Kevin mused. “I wonder if we could do something with that ...”

  “Let them know?” Glass said. “They must resent their position, particularly as they’ve been fighting the proxy war for generations.”

  “We could,” Kevin said. “Or we could offer to broker a honest peace, after we beat the Tokomak.”

  He paused. “If we beat the Tokomak.”

  “And if we don't,” Glass said, “we need other plans.”

  “They’re underway,” Kevin said. “Do you have a contingency plan for evacuating this base?”

  “Yep,” Glass assured him. He didn't go into details. “We can get everyone out in a hurry, if necessary.”

  “Let us hope so,” Kevin said. He rose to his feet. “I have to get back to Ceres, unfortunately.”

  Glass lifted his eyebrows. “You don’t want a tour of Flower?”

  “I can't afford contempt,” Kevin admitted. “I’m already too unimpressed by what we’ve seen for my own good. By any reasonable standard, the Taliban should have been no match for us and they still managed to give us a few nasty surprises. They thought themselves the masters of the universe too.”

  “Point taken,” Glass said. He rose, too. “But, from a technical point of view, that ship is crap. We would have shot the Captain and half of the crew by now for gross dereliction of duty. But, for them, looking good is better than being good. You know what we found in the databanks? Flight patterns for formation flying.”

  Kevin stared. “Starships flying in formation?”

  “Yes,” Glass said. “It would have looked good, too. But one single accident and ...”

  “Bang,” Kevin finished.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Rioting broke out between Hindus and Muslims in Northern India over the issue of a number of Hindu converts to Islam. The Hindus claim that the converts were kidnapped, raped and then forced to convert; the Muslims claim the converts were looking for a better life and submitted to Allah willingly. Whatever the truth, as of last report, there were over two hundred dead in the streets ...

  -Solar News Network, Year 53

  “You wanted to see me, Commander?”

  “I did, Ensign,” Commander Gregory said. “Come into my office.”

  Yolanda stepped inside, a little nervously. She'd never visited the Commander’s office before, but Ensign Fisher had been summoned to face Commander Gregory a week ago and had emerged looking pale and worn. Yolanda guessed he’d been given a heavy chewing-out to rival anything they’d been given at Sparta, all the worse because they were on a real starship. But he’d refused to talk about it to any of them.

  “Take a seat, Ensign,” Commander Gregory said. She smiled with genuine amusement as Yolanda sat down. “You’re not in any trouble, so relax.”

  “Thank you, Commander,” Yolanda said.

  She’d hastily been reviewing her actions over the past week, trying to decide what she might have done that had attracted the Commander’s attention. But there had been nothing. She forced herself to relax, fighting down the temptation to run a tranquilising program through her implants. The Commander would tell her what she had in mind soon enough.

  “You are aware, of course, that you became a full citizen of the Solar Union the moment you graduated from Sparta?” Commander Gregory said. “You have your Citizenship Certificate?”

  Yolanda nodded, puzzled. She didn't trust herself to speak.

  “You will not, of course, have registered as a resident of any canton,” Commander Gregory continued. “Do you understand the difference?”

  “Yes, Commander,” Yolanda said, thinking back to citizenship lessons. “I can vote in overall referendums and elections, but not in a single canton.”

  “Close enough,” Commander Gregory said. “You simply haven’t been resident of anywhere long enough to register as a citizen.”

  She paused, then
went on. “Your name – and the names of the crew – were added to the local canton’s register of non-resident citizens,” she explained. “Fortunately – or unfortunately – your name came up when they were selecting a jury. You are expected to present yourself at the courthouse tomorrow, unless you choose to decline the honour.”

  Yolanda opened her mouth, but Commander Gregory held up a hand to keep her from speaking.

  “I should warn you,” Commander Gregory said, “that it will look very bad if you do decline the honour. You are a citizen, after all, and citizens are expected to take part in the democratic process. There’s no reasonable excuse – we’re not due to leave for a week – so I strongly advise you to accept the honour and serve on the jury.”

  “That doesn’t seem fair,” Yolanda observed.

  “Life is rarely fair, in any sense of the word,” Commander Gregory pointed out, rather tartly. “The Solar Union expects some degree of participation, as I said. There are too many people with too many memories of what happens when people refuse to take part in the democratic process. I have checked your record and have been unable to come up with any reasonable excuse that would stand the test of time. You are not involved with any of the suspects, nor do you have any stake in the asteroid’s political structure. I think you can reasonably be expected to be neutral.”