by Steve White
"Major Wang," Han's voice was cool, and Wang felt a stab of near hysterical mirth. There could be only one "captain" aboard a warship, yet it was typical of Li Han to remember a point of etiquette and give him his courtesy promotion at a time like this. She was the smallest person in Longbow's complement; she was also the largest.
"Yes, sir?" he said hoarsely, and his heart sank as he realized that when she ordered it he and his men would don their combat zoots and board Anderson, blasting down anything in their path. Not because of duty or Admiral Singh, but because Captain Li had ordered them to.
"You heard Admiral Singh, Major," Han said softly.
"Yes, sir."
"Report to the armory, Major." Wang's heart plummeted. "Draw combat gear for your men, then post guards on the boatbay and all auxiliary hatches. Nobody leaves this ship. Is that clear?"
"Sir?" Wang blinked. Guard the boatbay and hatches? Seal them? Then she wasn't . . . "Yes, sir!" Wang barked, and the salute he threw her would have done credit to the commandant of the Corps.
"Thank you, Major." Han broke the circuit, her face still calm, despite the sweat beading her hairline. She continued to ignore her bridge crew, forcing herself to remain oblivious of the holstered lasers riding at every hip as she touched another stud.
"This is the Captain," she said, ignoring the normal preambles of an all-hands announcement, and speakers throughout the ship rattled with her measured voice. "You know what's happening." She drew a deep breath. "Now I'll tell you what's going to happen in Longbow. We are not going to obey Admiral Singh's orders." She felt her bridge crew twitch in near convulsive reaction. "I am your commander. As a sworn officer of the Federation Navy, I have no choice but to obey my lawful superiors, just as you have none but to obey me. Yet some orders cannot be obeyed, and Admiral Singh's are such orders. I cannot order you to mutiny"—she used the word deliberately—"but understand this: the only way Longbow will assist in suppressing the outbreak aboard Anderson is by mutinying against me."
She paused, tasting the shock and confusion in some of her officers, the burning determination in others. She felt weak and shaken, as if her body were a hollow shell filled with air, and wanted desperately to lick her lips, but she didn't.
"I intend," she went on, her voice clear and strong, "to place this vessel at the service of the Kontravian Cluster. Any who disagree with that decision are free to leave. Report to Major Wang at the boatbay—without weapons. That is all."
She released the stud and turned her chair slowly, meeting Commander Tsing's eyes squarely before she let her gaze sweep her other officers. Every holster was sealed. No one spoke in encouragement or condemnation. That wasn't the Hangchow way, she thought almost whimsically. But there was a way to gauge their true feelings.
"Lieutenant Chu?"
"Yes, sir?" Her navigator sounded breathless, but there was snap in his voice.
"Lay off a course to place us between Anderson and the rest of the task force, Lieutenant Chu."
"Aye, aye, sir."
And that was all there was to it.
* * *
Commander Windrider watched Basilisk peel off the edge of the formation—and she was only the first. The monitor Prescott slid drunkenly aside as fighting wracked her command deck and navigation spaces before the drive could be cut. The destroyers and cruisers of the screen went berserk as their complements turned on one another, and garbled scraps of chatter told him the fighting had become general aboard Enwright, as well. Only one ship was under complete command. He watched his display as a single battle-cruiser shot out of the scrambling formation to hover between Anderson and her consorts. The data codes gave her identity, and her shields were up, her weapons on line.
"Alert! Alert!" A computer voice wailed, then choked off, replaced by Captain Hodah's voice, and Windrider smiled bitterly. There was no taped message for this madness.
"This is the Captain! All persons resisting their lawful superiors will cease immediately or face summary courts martial for mutiny! Marines will lay aft to the boatbay and prepare to board Anderson pursuant to the orders of Admiral Thomas Singh. Any person resisting execution of this order will be stopped. Marine officers are instructed to use weapons immediately in any case of resistance. This is a direct order—and your final warning!"
Windrider blanched. Hodah was a calm, humane man; for him to turn the Marines against his own people with a virtual license to kill—and to announce it for all to hear—must mean he felt the situation could get no worse. And what the hell had happened to Admiral Singh? Why wasn't he on the com?
A strident buzzer shrilled, and his eyes widened. The passages outside fire control were depressurizing . . . and that could happen only if someone deliberately spilled atmosphere! God! The blast doors and armored bulkheads were slamming shut, sealing fire control even more tightly. With zero pressure beyond and atmosphere within, it would be impossible to open those doors from outside—and blasting them open would take hours . . . or a nuke. Had Hodah done it to keep mutineers away? Or had the mutineers done it to isolate fire control from the loyalists? But the deck plates still pulsed to the rhythm of the drives, so Hodah had secured the power plants, or slaved their controls to the bridge. Was the power gang alive, or breathing space? What was happening out there? Who controlled what in the lunatic asylum which had once been a capital ship?
One of his ratings jerked on his gauntlets and reached for his helmet, and Windrider stabbed him with an angry stare.
"Where do you think you're going, Bearclaw?"
"B—but, sir! Those are our friends out there! We've got to do something!" The missile tech was a product of Windrider's own world, an Amerind from Topaz, and his words tore at Windrider's soul. He felt sweat under the tooled leather band at his temples and remembered the scent of the evergreen tomash trees above his home.
"What you're going to do, Bearclaw," he said harshly, "is stand away from that hatch and sit down."
Bearclaw sat slowly, and his crewmates looked away in confusion. What was Windrider doing? Where did their own officer stand? The click of plastic and metal jerked their eyes back as he laid his laser on the console.
"No one enters or leaves this compartment without my permission," he grated. "No one. Is that understood?"
He met each of his subordinate's eyes in turn, pinning them with a brown, bitter glare until they nodded. Then he turned back to the targeting screens, sick at heart at what he'd just said, and sicker still at what he might yet have to do.
Red lights flared on status boards as whole computer sectors fell out of circuit. Shot out or cut, it made no difference to his own command station. They could cut the drives, they could cut the data net, they could blow the bridge to atoms; as long as Enwright had power, he controlled her weapons.
But what of it? He asked himself that with all the pent up bitterness and helplessness—and fear—which filled him. It had seemed so simple in the bull sessions. Nothing violent. Just a refusal to fire if the time came. Passive resistance. Not this! Never this mindless murder of fellow Navy men and women who were only doing their duty as best they understood it!
His battlephone beeped a priority code, and he punched a console key, shifting to a secure intraship battle channel. It was Hodah.
"Commander." The captain sounded harassed, but his voice was still crisp. "These damned mutineers must have planned this ahead of time. They've taken the armory and most of the Marines' quarters—we can't even get to the combat zoots, much less the boatbay! We still control the drive, and I think we still hold the power rooms, but I don't dare release the remotes to find out. I've confirmed the loss of auxiliary fire control and CIC, and all contact with flag bridge went out five minutes ago. We had a shoot-out in plotting, too, and there was a godawful explosion in datalink control right after we lost touch with flag bridge. I hold the command deck, and I've got armed Marines on the bridge elevators, but all I've got left up here for battle control is the auxiliary nav tank. Have you got all that?"
"Yes, sir." Windrider felt sweat matting his eyebrows.
"All right. It comes down to this, Commander," Hodah grated. "I can still move this ship, but that's all I can do. You're the only man who can target and fire her weapons. So tell me, Commander Windrider—are you prepared to do your duty?"
"My duty, Captain?" Windrider hesitated, his face ashen, then answered firmly. "Yes, sir. I'm prepared to do my duty."
"Then understand this, Commander," Hodah said softly. "Admiral Forsythe is dead, and Admiral Singh was apparently killed when they took out our flag bridge. Admiral Traynor may be dead; we've lost all contact with Vesuvius, so I have to assume she's either dead or a prisoner. I've got contact with Admiral Hale, but the mutineers have all the engineering spaces in El Chichon; he can't even maneuver. Admiral Ashigara apparently went over to the mutineers aboard Basilisk, so as near as I can figure it, Hale's the senior man left, and he's given me orders to terminate the fighting aboard Anderson—fast. Maybe we can bring the whole task force back to its senses if we get some Marines in there quickly. But Captain Li and Longbow are in the way, and they've threatened to destroy the first boat launched against Anderson. I've got two superdreadnoughts from Admiral Hale's group, and one attack transport is prepared to go in, but they can't launch until Longbow's neutralized . . . one way or the other." Windrider heard the pain in his voice and remembered the evening Captain Li had dined aboard as his guest. "I'm going to give Li one last chance to move aside," Hodah said quietly. "If she refuses . . . Then, Commander, it's all up to you and your team."
"I—understand the situation, sir," Windrider whispered.
"Good. Switch to the intership channels, Commander. I want Captain Li to hear us if I have to pass you orders."
"Yes, sir." Windrider shifted channels and ran his fingers over the cool plastic console, feeling the latent destruction and understanding Hodah's pain too well, for Windrider, too, knew Li Han's reputation.
* * *
Han stared into her com screen at Simon Hodah's worried, angry face, reading the fear and fury in his eyes and wondering if he saw the pain in hers. His mouth was a slashed wound and his voice was harsh.
"Captain Li, you are in violation of the Articles of War. You will surrender your command and person at once, pursuant to the orders of Vice Admiral Eric Hale. You will heave to and await my boarding party. Officers designated by myself will relieve you of command and place you under close arrest to await trial. This is a direct order, logged and taped. You may authenticate with Admiral Hale."
"Captain Hodah," Han said softly to her old friend, "I must respectfully refuse your order."
"You have no authority to refuse!" Even the rage in Hodah's voice couldn't hide the pleading under his fury. "Now cut your shields and get out of my way, Captain, or by the living God, I'll blow you apart!"
Han looked around her bridge crew. Every set of shoulders was tense, every face knotted with tension, but not a voice protested as she turned back to her superior officer. God, she was proud of them! Yet her heart ached at matching their courage against their own fellows. It was such a waste—such a tragic, stupid waste—yet all of them were caught in the conflicting webs of duty, loyalty, and trust. Did her people suspect how much strength she drew from them? Or did they think they drew theirs from her?
She glanced down at her plot almost idly, watching data codes flash as weapons and tracking systems came alive aboard the trio of capital ships, and the deadly threat of those weapons was her reality. Her mind flickered over her life, remembering the things she'd done, recalling those she'd meant to do. How would her father react to this? What of the children she'd always known she would someday bear?
She raised her eyes once more to Simon's. She knew him so well. He would fire—indeed, she would leave him no option—and when Enwright and the superdreadnoughts fired, Longbow would die. No battle-cruiser ever built could survive that concentration of fire at this range.
She hadn't anticipated when she handpicked her crew that she had chosen them only to die with her, yet Hodah's margin for error was razor thin. Longbow's destruction would clear the path to Anderson, but it was a deadly expedient which might well recoil upon him, for it would give every mutineer his options, spell out the full, deadly consequences of resistance. It might awe them into surrender, but she thought not.
Her face was calm as the death of her ship and crew looked back at her from Hodah's eyes. It was unfair. It was cruel. Yet in a sense, it was also the sublime completion of her life. She drew a deep breath, hoping no one would notice.
"Go to hell, sir," she said very gently.
* * *
The deck shivered as Enwright moved deliberately towards the slim, defiant Longbow, and the Corporate World-crewed superdreadnoughts Nanda Devi and Pentelikon moved in beside her, shields glowing. The transport Chief Joseph slid in behind them, but she was unimportant in the confrontation of Goliaths, and Windrider's fingers flew over his own console even as his mind tried to reject the firing setup he was creating. Horror froze his subordinates into shocked, speechless immobility as the target codes appeared on their monitors, and he heard Han's reply and waited in a private hell for the words he knew must come.
"Fire Control!" Hodah's voice pounded in his brain.
"Yes, sir?" He was astounded he could sound so calm.
"Lock on all weapons. Prepare to fire at my command."
"Aye, aye, sir. Locking on now."
His fingers pressed the commit keys, and red lights glowed as weapon bays opened. Massive beam projectors snouted out and missiles slid into their launchers, backup rounds dropping silently into the loading trays. The ranked missiles riding the external racks woke to malevolent life, and sweat burned his eyes. He was sealed in a cage of ice and fire, for he was both a Fringer and a Federation officer. What was his duty? It mattered, and his uncertainty was agony as his hands hovered above the firing keys.
"Captain Li, this is your last chance!" Hodah snapped.
"Go ahead, Simon!" Li Han's voice was harsh at last, almost as if she were deliberately goading her old friend. "Fire and be damned!"
"Very well, Captain." Hodah's voice was as cold as space. "You leave me no choice. Fire Control, you have your orders. Open fire—now!"
Windrider's hands trembled on the deadly snakes of his firing keys and he blinked his eyes, fighting to focus. Longbow and the superdreadnoughts were virtually shield-to-shield, floating in his targeting screens at suicidal range, the battle-cruiser small and alone, frail despite her weight of armor and weapons. Visions and sounds filled his mind. Memories of his homeworld. The final parade at the Academy. Men and women he knew in the ships on his control screen. Men and women waiting to die when he touched those keys. All of them flashed through his mind, and his hands were paralyzed. He couldn't do it. God help him, he couldn't do it!
"Damn it, Windrider! Open fire!" Hodah roared, his own grief flogging his fury. "Do your duty, man!" The word "duty" flared in Windrider's mind like a bomb, and he jerked spastically.
"Aye, aye, sir," he said very softly, and his eyes flicked over the targeting codes, a professional double-checking his work even in his anguish. Then his fingers tensed, and Enwright's weapons spoke.
The world of the com channels shattered around him, battered by the roar of a hundred furious, denouncing voices and as many more that bellowed with triumph. A tide of destruction ripped from Enwright in a fury of beams and the impassioned streaks of missiles, and devastation rocked the vacuum as her weapons found their targets—Windrider's targets. Shields flared and died. Plating split, ruptured, disintegrated, vaporized. Atmosphere fumed from a gutted hull, and Jason Windrider clung to his sanity with bleeding fingernails while tears streamed down his cheeks and TFNS Nanda Devi died under his fire.
THE MARK OF CAIN
Naomi Hezikiah felt out of place in Pommern's command chair, for a heavy cruiser was not normally a lieutenant commander's billet, and even the thin Bible in the breast of her vac suit was
scant comfort as she contemplated what was about to happen.
She punched up communications, and a painfully young ensign answered her. Yet another sign of the times; it should have been at least a full lieutenant.
"Anything from the flagship, Harvey?"
"No, sir." The young black man shook his head in mild surprise. "Standing orders are to maintain com silence, sir," he reminded respectfully.
"I know." Naomi probed the ensign's face for any uncertainty and started to say more, but she'd set her hand to the plow, as Elder Haberman would say. To every thing there was a season . . . even to this, she supposed drearily. So she made herself smile, instead. "Carry on, Ensign."
"Aye, aye, sir," the com officer said, and the screen blanked.
Naomi leaned back and closed her eyes. All she wanted was to be back on cold, bleak New Covenant. But she couldn't be there—and after what had already happened . . . after what was about to happen . . . not even New Covenant would want her back. She remembered Abraham and prayed silently for God to send another ram before the blade fell. But he wouldn't.
Her mind went back over the past, terrible two weeks that had started so wonderfully. She and Earnest had had the medic's official report; they'd actually been discussing ways to finagle their assignments so she could take her maternity leave at home on New Covenant when the scrambled transmission came over the relay net. An entire Battle Fleet task force—not just a battlegroup, a task force—taken by its own personnel. Casualties had been heavy, and the few ships which remained loyal had been hunted down and captured or destroyed before they got far. But not before they got their courier drones away.
Commodore Prien had been a fool. Naomi's eyes stung as she remembered the kindly old man, a Heart Worlder who couldn't believe his own squadron might follow suit. He'd actually broadcast his decision to return to base immediately . . . and why. He should have known what would happen—and it had happened within hours. Desperate men and women had met, and the Fringers among his crews had risen against him.