Their Last Full Measure

by Christopher Nuttall

  The enemy gunboats sputtered fire at the missiles as they passed, then hurled themselves on the human fleet. Hoshiko watched, dispassionately, as they were picked off one by one, only a handful lasting long enough to launch missiles towards their targets. The gunboats caused more damage by distracting her point defence, she noted grimly. The aliens might not have planned it that way - it was impossible to tell - but if they had it was a brilliant move. She’d barely had time to reorganise her positions before the enemy opened fire. The gunboats had knocked all her planning for a loop.

  “The enemy gunboats have been obliterated,” Yolanda reported. “But they inflicted minor damage on a dozen ships.”

  “That’s not what I’m worried about,” Hoshiko said. “The enemy missiles will pose a greater threat.”

  She glanced at her console, wondering if they dared jump into FTL - again - and leave the missiles eating their dust. But the gravity shadows were already too strong for her to risk the jump. Her fleet would be scattered, if it wasn’t left helplessly floating in space with burned-out drives. She tapped orders, slowing their advance in a bid to open the range just a little. The Tokomak couldn’t evade, unless they wanted a swarm of unpowered missiles flying towards their homeworld. She felt an ugly sensation in her gut as she calculated the odds. It was wrong to use an entire planet as a shield ...

  Her eyes narrowed as her missiles lanced into the teeth of the enemy defences, ignoring smaller targets in favour of the giant battleships. The Tokomak point defence was stronger than ever before, although it was clear the fleet wasn’t operating as a single coordinated entity. She wondered, idly, why they hadn’t bothered to overcome that weakness - it was a serious weakness, if they lost the command ships - and then dismissed the thought as enemy ships started to explode. The command networks fragmented shortly afterwards, although not as much as she’d hoped. Whoever was in command was smart enough to plan for losing a handful of command and coordination ships.

  Which is no great surprise, she told herself. They know they can take heavy losses.

  “Enemy missiles are entering our point defence range now,” Yolanda said. “All units are engaging ... now.”

  Hoshiko forced herself to relax as the tidal wave of missiles crashed against her defences. The Tokomak had launched ECM drones of their own, although - thankfully - the technology was well understood and it was easy, by and large, to dismiss most of the illusions as nothing more than sensor ghosts. Hundreds - thousands - of missiles fell to her point defence, the datanet weaving her ships into a single seamless entity. She smiled coldly, wondering if the Tokomak envied her crews. They’d fought a stream of battles against overwhelming odds, while the Tokomak had practiced exercises that might as well be parades. There had been no surprises, no doubts about who would win ... her lips quirked. It was no way to prepare for war.

  Her humour soured as hundreds of missiles broke through her defences and fell upon her ships. Yolanda started to recite a list of damaged or destroyed vessels, until Hoshiko growled at her to shut up. She didn’t need to know how many of her friends had died in the last few moments, how many people she didn’t know would never see home again ... she saw an icon vanish from the display, the simple image hiding the reality of a starship being torn apart by explosions, of a crew trying desperately to get into the lifepods before it was too late. Defiant shuddered as she launched another spread of missiles, intent on hitting the enemy again and again before it was too late. The orbital fortresses were getting in on the act now, hurling missiles towards her fleet even though her ships were out of range. It might not matter. Their missiles would burn out well before they reached her, but they’d stay on the same course until they plunged into her defences or were lost in space ...

  “Continue firing,” she ordered. “Don’t give them a moment to relax.”

  “Aye, Admiral.”

  ***

  Neola told herself, firmly, that she could take more losses than the humans. She wasn’t sure that was true, not any longer, but she wanted - she needed - to believe it. The humans had been devilishly clever, picking off a handful of her command ships and then smashing their isolated charges before they could link into another subnet. It didn’t help that she was having to route some of her targeting networks through the nearest fortress, relying on their sensors to help coordinate her ships as human weapons picked off her sensor platforms or blinded her sensor nodes. The civilian ships, damn them, just weren’t ready for war. She’d already caught a handful of ungrateful bastards trying to sneak off before they could do something useful like soak up a missile or two. The humans had to run out of ammunition eventually, didn’t they?

  She cursed as the second wave of human missiles lanced into her formation. Too many of her ships were isolated ... the only saving grace was that the humans were concentrating on breaking up her networks and destroying her battleships rather than smashing starships that were suddenly fighting on their own. She saw two more battleships explode in quick succession, one of them taking a command subunit with it. She snapped orders, cursing the idiots who’d designed the command and control system. It had never occurred to them that she might need to bind her whole fleet into a single unit. They hadn’t even installed programming to make it possible.

  After the war, there will be a reckoning, she told herself. The rings had already taken glancing hits from pieces of debris. Everyone on the ground would see flashes from the battle, pieces of debris burning as they plummeted towards the ground. No one would stand in her way as she purged the bureaucrats, burnt the red tape and revitalised her people, even if she had to make them perform at gunpoint. We will fix things, once and for all, and then we will impose order on the rest of the galaxy.

  “Continue firing,” she ordered. The human fleet was weakening. She was sure of it. “Do not let them get away.”

  ***

  Sub-Level Mop Grash knew, without false modesty, that he was one of the most highly-educated people ever to leave his homeworld. He’d studied for years in the schools, then universities, to graduate with a degree in cosmic studies that should have had applications in the real world. But he also knew - he’d learnt the hard way - that the jobs he thought he could seek were only open to Tokomak. The thought of a non-Tokomak claiming one of those jobs was unthinkable, as far as they were concerned. Grash had been given an unspoken choice between menial work on one of the orbital fortresses, doing jobs the Tokomak didn’t want to do for themselves, or sinking into the ever-growing underclass of permanent residents who were either ignored or kicked by their Tokomak superiors whenever they happened to meet. Grash hadn’t liked either option, but no one had cared when he’d asked to go home. He wasn’t even sure why they’d bothered to educate him if they had no use for him afterwards.

  He pushed his trolley into the fortress command centre, trying not to look as if he understood the giant holographic displays and illusions flickering in and out of existence. The Tokomak thought he was nothing more than a dumb animal, a creature that had somehow managed to learn to walk upright without mastering the rudiments of civilisation. Grash didn’t pretend to understand that - he assumed the Tokomak had access to his university transcripts - but he had no qualms about taking advantage. It was astonishing what someone would say in front of you if they thought you were an idiot who couldn’t even speak the language. Didn’t they remember they’d forced his entire race to speak their tongue?

  The human ships were clearly visible on the displays, handing out a pounding to the defenders. Grash hid his amusement as he reached into his trolley, his hand clutching the chemically-propelled weapon he’d built for himself. It hadn’t been easy, but the Tokomak were blind to the loopholes in their security network. He couldn’t use the fabricators to make something they’d recognise as a weapon, yet ... they didn’t seem to realise he could produce the components to build the weapon himself. And he’d been quite a worker in his younger days. It had been quite easy to put the weapon together once he’d heard the report
s. It was time for a little revenge.

  His eyes swept the compartment, picking out five Tokomak operators working their consoles and a lone commanding officer, reclining in a chair. Grash had no doubt he was already planning five volumes of war memoirs, in which he claimed to have won the war single-handedly despite the Empress’s meddling. He’d read a couple of books that passed for literature amongst his so-called superiors and he honestly didn’t understand how anyone - including the Tokomak themselves - could get through the first chapters. They’d been so boring they could drain the life out of mating season itself.

  He smiled at the thought, then pointed the gun at the commander and fired. The gunshot was louder than he’d expected in the compartment, the commander jerking before collapsing to the deck. The operators spun around, gaping at him. They were so surprised that it took them several seconds to realise that he was holding a gun, that he was pointing it at them. He didn’t hesitate. He shot them all, one by one, then sealed the hatch. He wasn’t sure if the onboard sensors would have noticed the shots or not, but someone would be along sooner or later. He didn’t have much time.

  Pushing the trolley into the middle of the compartment, he poured one container of cleaning fluids into another and then hurried to the main console as the mixture started to bubble. The operators hadn’t had a chance to lock the system before he’d shot them. He breathed a prayer of thanks to gods he’d largely forgotten - any sort of pagan worship was strictly forbidden on Tokomak Prime, where it was seen as primitive superstition - and then opened the system. The Tokomak hadn’t realised he could experiment with their simulators too. He didn’t pretend to understand the system, but he could shut it down. And he did.

  Someone banged on the hatch. Grash turned, in time to see white mist rising from the trolley. Anyone who fired a plasma weapon in the compartment wouldn’t live to regret it. He smirked, then put his pistol to his head. He’d always known he wouldn’t last long enough to be interrogated. Suicide was bad, but falling into the hands of Internal Security was worse. He’d heard the rumours. They’d rip his mind to shreds and then throw whatever was left of him into the sun.

  “You bastards,” he said. The hammering was growing louder. It wouldn’t be long before someone thought to get a cutter. They’d regret that, if they lived. “Goodbye.”

  Quite calmly, he pulled the trigger.

  ***

  Neola cursed as a chunk of the datanet simply collapsed. “Report!”

  “We lost the connection to Fortress Four,” an aide said. “The communications links just collapsed!”

  “Reboot them,” Neola snapped. Her mind raced. What had happened? Fortress Four had narrowly survived two hammers that would have smashed it to atoms if they’d connected, but ... it hadn’t taken any damage at all. The fortress was still intact, glowing peacefully on her display. There was no hint of any enemy action. “And get a report ...”

  “Empress!” Another aide, panic in his voice. “There’s an uprising on Fortress Nine!”

  “An uprising?” Neola swung around to glare at him. “Who’s uprising?”

  “The servitors,” the aide said. “They went mad and attacked their masters! There’s fighting on the rings and ...”

  Neola barely heard him. There was a huge population of guest-workers, of servants and slaves and transients who’d somehow made their way to Tokomak Prime and found themselves unable to leave again. The rings were so vast that there was room for millions of unwelcome guests, as long as they stayed out of the way. She had no idea how they survived, but she didn’t much care. She’d thought ... she hit the console in frustration. She’d ordered her subordinates to move all non-Tokomak off the fortresses!

  And they probably asked themselves who was going to clean their feet for them, she thought, sourly. And then they classed all the guests as essential workers.

  “Order Internal Security to deal with them,” she said. The intelligence service had failed, if it had missed all signs of a revolt being planned. The bastards could redeem themselves with brutality. It was all they knew how to do. “Reroute all communications and control networks through the fleet. We’ll continue to close the range.”

  She ignored their surprise. The rebellion wasn’t important, not now. If she won, she’d crush them; if she lost, she’d be dead. The humans could have the pleasure of dealing with useless pieces of alien flesh that really should have been moved on long ago. Perhaps she’d order the ring depressurised, after the battle. That would deal with the scum once and for all. The bodies could be fed into the recyclers and turned into something useful.

  “Aye, Empress.”

  Neola forced herself to relax as the battleship quivered, launching yet another wave of missiles towards the human fleet. The two fleets were converging rapidly now, losses mounting on both sides. There was no way either of them could retreat, not now. They were so short of manoeuvring room that they had to fight the battle to be bitter end. She watched a pair of hammers take out one of the gravity well projectors, smashing it and its carrier beyond all hope of repair. Perhaps the humans wanted to retreat. But they were pressing further into the real gravity shadow, trapping themselves.

  And they can’t do anything about that, she thought. Unless they were willing to blow up the entire planet ...

  “Empress,” an aide shouted. Panic spread as a missile slammed into the battleship’s shields. “We just picked up an emergency transmission from the gravity point. It’s under attack!”

  Neola felt her blood turn to ice. The two human fleets had finally met. And that meant ...

  “Increase speed,” she snarled. She’d lost too much to give up and surrender now. “We’ll finish this before their second fleet can arrive.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Hameeda swore as a sensor pulse swept over the LinkShip ... and locked on.

  “Shit,” she said. She was dimly aware of Piece sitting on the bridge, but most of her awareness was elsewhere. “Hold on.”

  Her awareness expanded with terrifying speed. The gravity point was surrounded by layer after layer of automated weapons platforms and orbital fortresses. There were no mines, as far as she could tell, but they didn’t seem to need them. The automated platforms were already targeting the LinkShip, locking energy weapons onto her hull. At such close range, practically point-blank range, they could hardly miss.

  She rolled over, throwing the LinkShip into a series of evasive patterns as the weapons platforms opened fire. Alerts flashed up in front of her, warning her that only a handful of hits would be required to batter down her shields and blow her to atoms. The LinkShip had strong shields, for a relatively small ship, but they couldn’t compete with a battleship’s defences. She launched a handful of sensor decoys, flipping her cloaking device on and off as the enemy fire grew closer. The platforms should have trouble, even at such close range, telling which sensor contact was the real ship.

  Not that it matters, she thought, grimly. They have enough firepower to target all of the possible contacts.

  She prepped and launched the drone, then threw the LinkShip towards the edge of the gravity point and the looming fortresses. The fortresses opened fire, filling space with plasma bolts as they tried to target her. She selected hammers and fired half of her remaining load at the nearest fortresses, trying to deal them a lethal blow before Admiral Teller punched through the gravity point. The fortresses realised the danger and switched their targeting to the hammers instead, creating a problem no one had realised until it was too late. The targeted fortresses couldn’t take out the hammers with point defence - the gravity well dragging the hammers forward soaked up all incoming fire - but the nearby fortresses could and did. They didn’t have to shoot through a gravity well ... she launched another pair of hammers, then evaded yet another round of incoming fire. Behind her, the gravity point exploded with light.

  “Magnificent,” Piece breathed.

  Hameeda barely heard him. The first wave of alien-crewed freighters, crammed
to the gunwales with antimatter, barely lasted a second before they destroyed themselves in an eye-tearing series of explosions. The automated weapons platforms were caught in the blast and vaporised, the waves of superhot plasma roaring out and cascading against the fortresses themselves. For a terrible moment, Hameeda thought - as her sensors howled in protest - that they’d literally snuffed out the gravity point itself. It took her longer than it should have done to reboot the sensors and confirm the twist in time and space was still there. Admiral Teller would have had some problems continuing the assault without it.

  She sucked in her breath as the second wave of alien rebels punched through the gravity point, their ships jumping in unison. A handful interpenetrated and died, their deaths barely noticeable compared to the earlier explosions; the remainder opened fire without waiting to orientate themselves, launching salvo after salvo of missiles towards the remaining fortresses. The fortresses returned fire, sweeping the gravity point even as the third wave of alien rebels appeared, but it was clear they were on the verge of being overwhelmed. Hameeda’s lips quirked as she saw a trio of alien ships make a suicide run on the nearest fortress, one surviving long enough to slam into the fortress’s shields and trigger an explosion that wiped both the fortress and starship from existence. Admiral Teller hadn’t liked the plan, when the alien rebels had brought it to him, but he’d reluctantly agreed to try it. The rebels appeared to have been right. The Tokomak simply weren’t prepared for a savage assault, with no regard for losses.