To Honor You Call Us (Man of War)

by Honsinger, H. Paul

  The test pattern was soon replaced by the face of a human male with light hair, light eyes, a long, thin nose, and a small, pointy chin. He appeared to have an unadjusted age of about sixty, which meant he could be anywhere between 50 and 150. To the doctor’s trained eye, and to Max’s practically experienced one, the man appeared to be extremely nervous.

  “This is Fergus McKelvie, Master of the Ghiftee freighter Loch Linnhe. We request further verification of your identity before we consent to boarding.”

  “Captain McKelvie,” the doctor replied in an unaccustomed accent, presumably Romanovan, and with equally unaccustomed steel in his voice, “you will be boarded, whether you consent or not. This cutter is armed, and in these dangerous times my orders are to treat as hostile and to fire upon any vessel that does not heave to for inspection. I suspect that your owners would not appreciate having to tow your vessel to the nearest yard to replace the drive unit that I am prepared to vaporize five seconds from now.” Romanovan cutter captains did not ask nicely. They started with bluster and threats, then worked their way on up.

  “Cutter captain, you know that we can outrun you.”

  “Granted. But you cannot outrun my pulse cannon, sir. I will have your main sublight drive burned off before you can even get it run up to ‘flank,’” said the doctor as prompted by Max via headset.

  He turned his head to the right, where he had been told the Romanovans put the weapons console on their cutters and barked: “Armis dominum, para incendere.” As previously arranged, the stealth officer created the semblance of what would happen if a real cutter captain ordered his weapons officer to “prepare to fire.” He activated emulation emitters, giving off a power signature similar to that given off by a cutter’s pulse cannon being placed in Prefire Mode.

  There was no doubt that the deception fooled the freighter captain, as reflected in his expression of abject horror. In fact, he looked as though he were about to become physically ill.

  “No, no, no, no, NOOOO,” he nearly shrieked. “Don’t fire. That won’t be necessary. Not necessary at all.”

  He turned to his right. Still speaking Standard, he ordered in a panicked voice, “Null the drive, kill the field, prepare for boarding and inspection.”

  Back to the camera, he said, quaveringly, “Captain, we await your boarding party.”

  “Wise decision, Captain.” To his imaginary weapons officer, “Armis dominum, qui inrita ordinem.” And then to the camera, “Very well. Prepare to be boarded. Finum nuntiante.” In response to those orders, stealth killed the false pulse cannon emissions and Comms closed the channel.

  The instant the channel was closed, Max turned to Weapons. “Engage grappling field and put the freighter in docking position. Maneuvering, as soon as we get a firm lock, null the drive.”

  He hit the comm switch, “Major Kraft, you and your boarding party ready?”

  “Chomping at the bit, sir.” Max preferred not to think too carefully about what that would look like.

  “Mister Kurtz, escort the doctor. Make sure he gets to boarding hatch Charlie by the most direct route.” Max had no high opinion of Dr. Sahin’s ability to find quickly any part of the ship other than the Casualty Station, the wardroom, and his own quarters. Kurtz, who knew every corridor and access ladder like the back of his hand, led the garishly costumed doctor cum cutter captain out.

  “Major Kraft, the doctor is on his way. CIC out.”

  In less than three minutes, Sahin was standing in the boarding airlock, a compartment about seven meters square, near the boarding hatch with Major Kraft and eight Marines. Kraft and his men were all clad in crimson and gold uniforms similar to the doctor’s, but less ornate, and all carried the stainless steel, polymer-stocked, sawed-off shotguns, Sig-Sauer pattern sidearms, and short swords carried by boarding parties in the Romanovan Revenue and Inspection Service. The Marines seemed perfectly familiar with the weapons. As one Marine manipulated the controls, the boarding tube extended from the destroyer’s airlock to that of the freighter, a green light indicating that the tube was fully extended and pressurized. The party went into the tube, closing the hatch behind them.

  Reaching the other end after only about seven meters, the same Marine hit another switch. A red light indicating that there was an excessive pressure difference between the freighter and the boarding tube switched to amber, indicating that the pressure was being equalized, in this case by opening a valve admitting air into the tube from a tank of high-pressure reserve air installed in the tube’s extension hardware for that purpose. A countdown clock appeared on the control console, initially showing 0:45, meaning that the equalization process would take 45 seconds. The doctor whispered something to Kraft. The major’s eyes hardened.

  One Marine, a private, elbowed a lance corporal, who presumably knew marginally more than he, and said, “Sven, why do we got to keep up the play acting? We’ve got them grapped. They’re not going anywheres.”

  “’Cause, they might really be Ghiftee neutrals, that’s why. If they are, we don’t want them to know they were boarded by a Union ship, as it might create an interstellar in-sye-dent, that’s why. If they are, we can just say they passed inspection, cast off, and send them on their merry way, none’s the wiser, that’s why.”

  Kraft turned to his men. “Remember, men. Don’t say a word unless you have to. Keep your eyes open and be ready for anything, but don’t shoot unless we are attacked first or you hear me give the order. But don’t be surprised if there are Krag on that ship. All right. Just a few seconds.”

  The counter reached zero, and the hatch on the freighter opened with a slight hiss, admitting the boarding party to an airlock. The hatch closed behind them; the airlock mechanism verified that there was adequate pressure in the chamber; and the inner hatch opened. Five Marines stormed through the opening, shotguns held high and fanned out in a rough semicircle in what looked to be a corridor, rather narrower than those on the destroyer. Seeing nothing any more threatening than Captain McKelvie standing in the corridor and sweating nervously, one of them sang out, “Securos.”

  Kraft, the doctor, and the rest of the Marines entered the corridor, with Kraft, who was apparently uniformed as some sort of officer, and the doctor coming to the fore. The doctor stood before the captain, who bowed to him formally. The doctor returned the bow, just a hair less deeply, and said, “Captain, kindly take us to the bridge.”

  He then turned to a group of five Marines who were standing a little apart from the others and said, “Quaere navis.” Search the ship. The remaining four Marines, Kraft, and the doctor followed Captain McKelvie forward. As soon as the captain was out of sight, one of the five Marines in the first group produced a handheld scanner from his equipment belt, pushed a few buttons, glared narrowly at the display, pressed a few more buttons, glowered at the device’s tiny screen, pulled his percom out of a pocket in his uniform, and pressed a few keys on it in a preestablished sequence.

  Tiny ear buds placed deep in the ear canals of the doctor and Major Kraft softly beeped. The two men shared a glance just as they stepped onto the freighter’s bridge where, in addition to the captain, there were three men at various stations.

  “Captain, your documentation, please,” Sahin asked.

  The captain pulled a blue cube, measuring about one centimeter on each side, out of a tiny compartment in the Commander’s Station and handed it to the doctor, who inserted it in what was dummied up to look like a standard Romanovan ID Cube reader. The reader told him that the Romanovan device that this reader purported to be would have shown the cube to contain the genuine Ghiftee Ship’s Registry, Space Frame Inspection Certificate, Engine Inspection Certificate, Environmental Systems Sufficiency and Operability Certificate, Safety Equipment Inspection Certificate, Galley Health Inspection Certificate, flight plan, cargo manifest, and personnel manifest for Ghiftee Cargo Vessel Loch Linnhe. It also told him, because the circuitry was from a state-of-the-art Union Naval ID Cube Reader, that the cube was a sophi
sticated forgery, probably of Krag manufacture. He ejected the cube from his reader and put it in a small pocket on his tunic, just the right size for holding a few ID cubes.

  “And your personal ID, if you please.” The captain reached into his tunic and produced a green cube, the same size as the blue one. The doctor’s scanner showed this cube to be forged as well. Even the man’s name was probably made up. “It says here, Captain, that you are a native of Ghifta Prima.”

  “Yes. Born and raised.”

  Ghifta Prima was only the fifth extra solar planet settled by humans. The colonization expedition was put together by an idealistic dreamer named Solomon Ghift who drew colonists from, quite literally, every nation on Earth. And because Standard had not yet become standard and they spoke hundreds of languages, he made every one of them learn Esperanto, a language still spoken as a cradle tongue by all that world’s natives.

  “So, then you would speak the Esperanto.”

  “Yes, of course. Do you?”

  “No. Not really.” The captain was relieved at this news, although he tried not to show it. “I do, however, know enough to share this little joke with you. Via patro estas malpura kovarda.” At that, the doctor laughed loudly and slapped the man on the shoulder. The captain laughed with equal gusto, proving what the doctor suspected based on the faked ID cube, that this man was not a Ghiftee. If he were, after all, he would not have laughed when the doctor told him, “Your father is a dirty coward.”

  The doctor ejected the captain’s ID cube and handed the reader to one of the Marines, abruptly ceasing his laughter. He then elaborately dropped the cube on the deck, affected an exaggerated shrug of apology, and suddenly stomped it with the heel of his right boot, shattering the cube into ten thousand tiny, glittering shards. Before the captain could even gasp his shock, Sahin had shattered the second cube in the same manner. “You are no more a Ghiftee than I am Solomon Ghift. Marines, arrest them.”

  “Marines? You’re Union!” the captain exclaimed, reaching into an equipment bin, grabbing something, and pulling the object free. Suddenly Sahin’s sword flashed out and he brought it down, edge first, on the captain’s arm, slicing neatly through the man’s uniform sleeve, but not breaking the skin.

  “This sword, as you can see, my dear sir, has a keen edge.” As did Dr. Sahin’s voice. “And if you do not want me to perform a nonsurgical amputation of that arm, you will drop whatever is in your hand and put both hands, slowly, where I can see them.”

  “You’d best do it, mate,” said one of the Marines. “If he’s even a hair slow on the sword, this shotgun will do you just fine.” The other Marines covered the remaining bridge crew with their shotguns, carefully positioning themselves so that no one was in anyone else’s line of fire.

  “Truss ’em, men,” said Kraft. Covering each other in series, the Marines produced wrist ties and cinched the crewmen’s wrists behind their backs. When this task was accomplished, Kraft pulled out his percom, strapped it to his wrist, and pushed the call button. “Aft party, status.”

  “We’ve got two men in Engineering and one Krag that was holed up in a cargo bin,” said a Marine from the other group. “It used its sword to express its objections to being taken captive, so I had to blow its arm off with a shotgun. Tell the doctor that I put the stump in a tourniquet and I’ve saved the loose arm. It’s still flopping something fierce—don’t know whether he’ll want to try to reattach it, hang it on his wall, or give it to his girlfriend to wear as a stole, but I’ve got it wrapped up.

  “The two humans are uninjured—they’re trussed up nice and neat. Two interesting discoveries, though. First, there was a helluva bomb bolted to the main reactor—set to blow if tampered with or if the ship was hit by weapons fire. Dokate disarmed it, and we jettisoned the explosive. Second, we found their cargo. You’ll never believe it, sir. It’s gold. Tons and tons of it.”

  * * *

  CHAPTER 17

  * * *

  10:44Z Hours, 29 January 2315

  Max and Dr. Sahin were sharing a relaxing, if not perfectly flavorful, dinner in Max’s day cabin. The evening’s menu included a spicy vegetable soup, undoubtedly made with frozen vegetables, followed by an even spicier meat and vegetable goulash (the fewer questions asked about the meat, the better), freshly baked bread (flour, baking powder, powdered eggs, and so on, were compact and easily stored for long periods, so there was always fresh bread on a well-ordered warship), mashed potatoes (dried, reconstituted), green beans (canned), and lemon pound cake for dessert (what goes for bread also goes for cake). All washed down, in Max’s case, with the better than fair, but not quite good, ship’s beer (every ship brewed its own beer unless the CO2 scrubbers were malfunctioning) and capped by the ubiquitous naval fuel, Navy coffee—hot, strong, and black. Dr. Sahin drank fruit juice (reconstituted from freeze-dried powder) with his dinner but shared coffee with Max.

  Having finished the meal, the men moved to the day cabin’s sitting area, where both men sipped their coffee and enjoyed a second slice of the really quite creditable pound cake.

  Dr. Sahin had eaten only about half as much as Max, but he had just emitted a long, loud belch and seemed utterly satisfied with the fare. “The victuals on board this vessel are certainly better than they were on Travis Station.”

  “Really? I’d have thought that the food on a station would be better than on ship. Stations get more frequent resupply, from more sources. The variety should be better, at any rate.”

  “I haven’t been on board ship long enough to develop an opinion regarding variety, but the food here is more flavorful than on the station. Station food was abundant but unspeakably bland.”

  “That won’t be a problem here. I’ve got some genuine Cajuns back in the galley. Even when the dishes aren’t traditionally Cajun, they’re going to have more flavor than you’re used to getting from naval cooking. My experience in the Navy is that the cuisine is influenced primarily by that of the Midwest of North America and the Southeast of Great Britain.”

  “Vast, desolate culinary wastelands,” said Dr. Sahin, shaking his head.

  “Meat and potatoes and overcooked vegetables.”

  “I’m going to enjoy this posting. I have not eaten this well in years. My only concern on board ship is encountering swine flesh without knowing it.”

  “Not a problem. Nearly a quarter of the Navy is Muslim, so pork is not a part of the naval diet, with the exception of bacon and ham, which are always served separately and with alternative dishes available.” Then he put two and two together. “Doctor? I didn’t know you were Muslim.”

  “I have made no secret of it.”

  Max made a dismissive gesture. “No matter. You know the old saying, ‘We were birthed by a hundred faiths, but the Navy is father to us all.’ Speaking of secrets, I was wondering how you knew there were Krag on that freighter. Major Kraft told me that you whispered in his ear, before any sensor readings were taken, that you were almost certain that there were Krag aboard.”

  “That? That was a perfectly elementary deduction. When the boarding tube mated to the freighter boarding hatch, it took forty-five seconds for the pressure to equalize, and I felt in my eardrums that air was being pumped into the tube rather than being allowed to escape. That meant that the air pressure on the freighter was about 30 percent higher than the pressure used on this ship, which is the naval standard—mean sea level pressure on Earth, which is just over one hundred kilopascals. Ghiftee ships are normally equalized for sea level pressure on Ghifta Prima, which is ninety-eight kilopascals. So, if that freighter were a Ghiftee ship, we should have bled a little pressure, not packed in nearly a third more. Further, I know that the Krag insist that all ships that have even one of their kind on board run at their standard pressure, which is 135 kilopascals, just over a third more than what we use. So, I suspected Krag.”

  “I am impressed, Doctor. I am also impressed that you had the ship’s armorer sharpen that ceremonial sword the metal shop made for you.�
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  “Not precisely correct. The armorer, at my request, made it from the same alloy as the ship’s boarding cutlasses and put a fine edge on it from the outset. Accordingly, whereas the sword is in the form of a ceremonial blade it is, in reality, a true weapon. A wolf in sheep’s clothing, as it were. My people have used swords for two thousand years and never abandoned the tradition. I am very comfortable with them. I would not carry one if it were not a real weapon.”

  “Very wise, Doctor. Now, how’s your Krag patient?”

  “He will do very well, Allah willing.” Max cringed inwardly at the doctor’s use of the pronoun “he” for the Krag, but did not correct him. The official naval protocol was to refer to all Krag, regardless of gender, by the impersonal pronoun “it” rather than “he” or “she.” Max supposed it was to dehumanize them. Based on his personal experiences with the species, Max didn’t need a pronoun to do that.

  “They are a remarkably resilient species. I stem cell–cultured the necessary soft tissue and bone and used them to reattach the severed limb. It now has circulation, sensation, and movement, and should recover about 95 percent of its former usefulness. I’m keeping him unconscious for now, as the nerve regeneration is still taking place and it’s a very painful process. He should be ready to be reawakened in a day or so, and then he can converse with our friend from the UMID.” He pronounced the customary acronym for the Union Military Intelligence Directorate so that it rhymed with “humid.”

  “Ah, him. I’ve never liked those guys. They always keep to themselves, sitting in their quarters spying on you by using their high-level access to surf through every database and sensor feed on the ship, until you get a prisoner. Then they come out of their hole and monopolize the interrogation process with it and never tell you what they learn.”