Ahead the vault-like entrance undissolved from the vagueness of evening under clouds. He took a last long look over his shoulder, then ascended the wide steps to the doors.
A guard’s face appeared in the small holotank. “Yah?”
“It’s Jim Buser. Open up.”
That snapped him awake, as Jim had known it would. “Don’t move, sir! Just be a minute!”
It was considerably less, and when the alloy slab swung open a full squad of guards jumped out to ‘escort’ him in. Minutes later he entered Astawa’s office alone. The purple was installed behind his desk, but his chelae writhed in agitation.
Jim went over to the wall bar and poured a double scotch. “Care for a coke? Your inscrutability is slipping.”
“No, thank you.”
Jim settled into a chair. “Okay, erupt.”
“If you wished to take an excurrrsion, why didn’t you tell me?”
“I’m valuable property, remember. Would you have let me?”
“With prrroperrr securrrity, yes.”
“I didn’t want a paramilitary mission, just a stroll.”
“Forrr what purrrpose?”
“To smell the air.”
“If that’s what you humans call poetic communication, I find it bemusing.”
“Tough shit.”
Astawa leaned forward. “Forrr my rrrecorrrds, would you mind telling me how you left without my knowledge?”
“Not at all. I stole a day worker’s ident card. He looked enough like me to get me by the entrance guards with the five PM herd.” ‘Stole’ sounded better than ‘rented.’
“You disturrrb me,” Astawa rumbled.
“Por qua?”
“My superrriorrrs have had much to say to me lately. The rrratings on yourrr ’casts arrre phenomenal. But they arrre stirrring, urrr, turrrbulant rrreactions frrrom official sourrrces.”
“Hardly surprising. BFD.”
“It has been suggested that you, urrr, rrreduce the intensity of yourrr ’casts.”
Jim took a deep breath. “It took me many years of eating corporate feces to reach the level where no one tells me how to do my job. I don’t need GalNews—I can get work anywhere.”
“Of courrrse. But rrrememberrr: If you become blatant they’ll pull yourrr plug.”
“When have I ever been blatant? By the way, are the military shuttles still running up to Orbital Command?”
“Yes. They arrre prrrotected by the satellites forrr now.”
“Can you swing me a ride up there? I want to do some special ’casts from the trenches.”
Astawa was silent for many seconds. “Technically it prrresents little difficulty. The Goverrrnment would apprrreciate the prrropaganda value. But of courrrse I can’t allow it.”
“Think of the ratings. Also think of your career if you seriously annoy me.”
“You must know it’s extrrremely unlikely Orrrbital Command will surrrvive the coming attack. If I werrre to lose you, GalNews would deal even more harrrshly with me.”
“You just might be surprised about that.”
“Why do you want to die?”
“I plan on getting out before the blowup.”
“You may not be able to.”
“Want to put down some action on it? I’m a survivor type.”
“I wonderrr if you’rrre lying just to me orrr to yourrrself as well.”
“Huh?”
“Yourrr notion indicates suicidal tendencies. It saddens me to see atavistic guilt erase a grrreat gift.”
“You’re crazy.”
“Perrrhaps. Perrrhaps I underrrstand neitherrr one of us. Arrre you surrre you want to do this?”
“Yeah.”
“Then perrrhaps you arrre called. I’ll arrrange it. Afterrr I have that coke.”
“Orbital Command looks like a produce can left spinning in space after some cosmic picnic. Ninety-six meters long and forty-five in diameter, it looks tiny compared to the six freighter/warships poised around it.
“Yet in reality the giants are all-but-toothless, while Orbital Command carries a potent sting: a laser fusion reactor that powers a proton battery at each end. In addition there are two torp launchers, and four electrostatic accelerator batteries for anti-torp defense.
“Normally a thirty-eight person crew operates in three shifts, but in view of the near-certainty of destruction, only two skeleton crews remain. They are all volunteers.
“From the ports space appears empty and safe, but Admiral Maple tells me the Shikarans are plain in his scopes. Four cruisers are guarding the distant waiting transports. The remaining twenty have formed an attack wedge and are beginning to close…”
The ceiling glowed dull orange. Hidden speakers uttered Dagorland tribal tones—great hollow notes that couldn’t quite be called music but served a similar purpose. Admiral Young lay on his metal bunk in the cabin that was his only home, laminated with the accumulation of three decades in space.
What would a real home be like? Security? A place to retreat to? This wasn’t it. The bulkheads were transparent to the wavelengths of tension radiating from the ship around him. Unable to hide all these years, he had calloused.
But not enough.
He stood his watches stoically, the hatred of his crew an open festering wound. But better they should hate him than themselves.
His stomach was in constant fury. The pills would hold him together. But the pain was just background static for guilt, guilt amplified by the loneliness of command. His existence was all small, tight compartments and narrow corridors, like the ships he commanded.
Buser and his damned ’casts! Under the deceptive objectivity the man constantly intimated things that made the admiral want to yell, to argue, to punch out the holovision tank. Things he pushed out of his mind but that kept bobbing back.
There was an out, maybe. Technically speaking.
Only it had a toll gate across it. An old man with a grinning skull-face stood in the shadows, bone hand extended palm up.
“How much?” the admiral whispered over and over into the diffuse orangeness.
Over and over the grating jaws replied.
Everything. Not just the flesh. The arate too. The carefully sculpted totem of a life of service. His afterlife. What remained would be a black thing, gnawing at his rest.
A chime sounded. He rolled over and slapped the com button. “Yes?”
Captain Disad’s voice filled the cabin. “The purple fleet is moving on Orbital Command, sir. This looks like it.”
“I’ll be right up.”
“This is Jim Buser, with a special report I quite frankly didn’t expect to be making, from my present location.
“Farmers, townspeople, purples in their hives—throughout the night hemisphere Greenworlders stood under the night sky and watched the new lights flickering there.
“The Hive attack came sooner than expected, but Admiral Maple was prepared with a strategy long-planned. A desperate strategy.
“Normally the defense satellites are spaced evenly to protect every part of the world. But he gambled on the standard attack technique of eliminating Orbital Command first. Under the guise of inspection missions, he had his orbital tenders replace many of the distant satellites with mockups and bring the real ones back. As the Hive cruisers closed in, they were placed in picket positions around Orbital Command.
“Out to meet the attack wedge moved the six Greenworld ships in a spear formation. Sailing into the brunt of the Hive formation was also unconventional, but the purples recovered and quickly annihilated the two lead ships. This was part of the admiral’s plan—both ships were crewless automatics, and in dying filled the immediate volume with cargo bays of radar jinglejangles. Into the confusion accelerated the remaining ships. Purple fire destroyed one, but three managed to ram and die with Hive cruisers. A grim trade, but one that Admiral Maple and the three skeleton crews were willing to make.
“So only seventeen cruisers assaulted Orbital Command. They had acc
urate calculations of its firepower, and expected to overrun it. But their expectations were rudely disappointed. They met a wall of fire augmented by the satellites. Only eleven cruisers were able to withdraw after the furious four minute battle.
“Orbital Command suffered damage, but is still in business. The picket satellites have been returned to their proper orbits so the purples can’t exploit that weakness.
“It’s a great victory—one that should remind the Federation of its own great victories long ago; the Last Defense, Pollock’s Out and so on. Here aboard Orbital Command, though, there is little hope. The tricks saved them from only the first attack. The cruisers will return soon. And circumspectly. There can be no more surprises…”
Jim leaped out of his bunk at the raucous code-red alarm. He was fully dressed—everyone aboard slept that way during a code yellow, and looked and smelled it. He ran along empty corridors, and jumped into a bounce tube that shot him up to the control deck sheltered in the station’s core.
He stepped diffidently into the CD, slid into his observation chair, buckled in and switched on his holocorder. The crew was already at its duty posts. Four hunched over fire control boards, their heads lost in sensor cones. Four were likewise engrossed in systems maintenance and repair boards. Two were at the satellite consoles. One was doing double duty covering the com and scanner systems. In the middle of this cramped activity paced Admiral Maple. He was barely thirty, and his crew younger still, but they didn’t look young any more.
The new uniforms had been junked for T-shirts and pants. Three months ago they had been crewing aboard the freighters which no longer existed.
Jim kept his mouth shut. His position was precarious. They could talk to him—the admiral was reasonably loquacious in his few free moments. But his presence wasn’t universally acclaimed, and if he intruded at the wrong time it was conceivable that he might be shot out of hand. It was that kind of situation.
The admiral walked over. His expression was, as always, controlled. “You should have taken the last shuttle down.”
“I notice you didn’t have me put off.”
“Motivations are pretty murky around here right now.”
“Like mine, for example?” Jim chuckled. “Maybe I succumbed to the hypnotic allure of my own words. I know a guy who thinks I’m suicidal. Or maybe I’m a hero, like you and your crew.”
Admiral Maple gestured toward the busy men and women. “After we’ve filtered through you, we become heroes. Jane there shoots syntho-morph so her hands don’t shake. Ali and Gertrude are having an affair unappreciated by either’s spouse. Joe hates aliens. Me, I’m a classic manic-depressive.”
“You’re all here.”
“Yes, there is that, isn’t there.”
“T-minus-thirty seconds to range!” the Scanner Officer shouted.
Jim watched himself vanish instantly from the admiral’s thoughts as the latter returned to his command chair in a single stride and strapped in. “Battle stations! Depressurization alert—evacuate Levels A, B and C. E-systems in. Straps tight.”
So it began. As always, Jim had trouble tuning into the reality of it. He had seen all sorts of battles, all sorts of death. But here were no guns, no soldiers, no blood. Just lights moving in tanks. Digital readouts. Displays. From such he had to decipher what was happening.
What little fear that broke through the intellectual insulation was muted by the knowledge that here there would be no pain, just lights out; anger dominated. But both feelings went on the back burner for the duration. He had work to do.
He eyed the main tank. Eleven red dots were swinging toward a white dot on a parabolic course. They apparently planned to fire en passant, repeat as needed.
“Fire Control, your circuits override. Fire at will. Scanner priority feeds to the war boards.”
“Repair drones dispersed and standing by.”
“Core tight. Everything else is vacuum—gonna be a hell of a mess in the mess.”
“Lead target entering range.”
Vector lines appeared in the smaller tanks as the proton batteries began firing at their twelve second minimum cycle. Recoils jolted the compartment, making hollow thumping sounds. Torp launches were indicated in the tanks by blue dots moving in rapid lines.
Torps and proton beams were likewise targeting on them from the purples. ES guns were picking off the torps. The beams were either missing due to the extreme range or—
KRUUUUUMP! The straps almost cut him into segments. Alloy groaned under the application of the tinsnips of hell. His eyes closed, then opened in surprise that they were still able to.
The crew was battered and bloody but woozily still at work. Damage reports were flying around the CD.
One of the red dots went out, and the Fire Control crew cheered. Then the CD danced again. The air took on an acrid tang.
Several boards went dead, and the rest were covered with red lights. The red dots were swinging away from the white one.
“Outer hull integrity is zilch.”
“Losing coolant from EMZ2!”
“Patch it.”
“With what? Most of my drones are out!”
“Use what you have. Unless you want the heat turned way up in here.”
“The purples are vectoring into an ellipse. They’ll be back in one minute sixteen.”
“Fire Control report!”
“Proton Batteries B and D down. ES coverage out from nine to eleven o’clock. No torps left in Launcher Two. Forty-six percent underpower. Target computations slowed by point two—insufficient antennae. Other than that, we’re in lousy shape.”
“Patch and pray.”
Repair and regrouping went on frantically, but defeat hung over every word and action. Orbital Command had little left with which to fight. The next pass would be the last.
“Stand by. Here they come.”
Admiral Young slouched in his command chair, loose but ready. He was finally on top of the situation. Over the humps. Course laid in. The officers working around him hid behind masks, but he saw every thought. Captain Disad’s nervousness was laid bare.
“Eleven cruisers are definitely on the move, sir,” the Scanner Officer reported. “Looks like a more cautious tangent attack plan.”
“Squadron units requesting status updates, sir?” called out the Com Officer.
“Continue code yellow.”
Someone muttered something. Captain Disad took a long look around the control deck, then rose from his chair. His gaze, now firm, locked with the admiral’s.
Admiral Young felt good—which surprised the hell out of him. He didn’t even hold it against the crew. He understood.
“Sit down, Captain.”
Everyone who could turned to stare. All were wearing sidearms. So was he, but if it came to that it wouldn’t matter.
The captain froze where he was, fighting his own battle.
Admiral Young casually touched his com button and called for an all-ships channel. “This is Admiral Young. Code red. Battle stations. Out.”
Uncertainty punctured the tension in the compartment. Captain Disad slid back into his chair.
Alarms whooped faintly from other parts of the ship. The red bells hadn’t rung in earnest since the War. Champagne sparkling filled him, and the last vestigial doubts were gone.
“Orders, sir?” Captain Disad asked.
He spoke into the com as well. “All captains. I’m assuming emergency command responsibility under Section 2117A general regs. Record for future official proceedings. Reprogram all identity transponders for fictitious names—be imaginative. Com silence except for battle orders.” A thin disguise that would fool no one, but better than nothing.
He turned to the captain. “Plot and lay in an attack course.”
“We, er, have one loaded, sir.”
“I thought you might. See if you can read my mind some more. Where do we hit?”
The crew was joyously at work even as Captain Disad answered. “One needs nothing
but memory, sir. Who was your exec during the raid on Abruzzi?”
The admiral smiled. “It’s good to be back in the realm of military strategy. Proceed.”
FSS Jutland entered tachyon state at the same instant as its squadron mates. They crossed the interface and accelerated toward the solar system. Anxious minutes passed. They cheered as Orbital Command survived the first pass, knowing they would arrive in time. They decelerated at maximum thrust into the system, then shunted back to normal space drive. Not toward Orbital Command, but toward the Hive transports and their escorts.
“They know we’re here,” the admiral muttered. “Things should start happening.”
“Keep us between the transports and the near edge of the solar tachyon-negative zone,” Captain Disad cautioned the Helm Officer. “They may try to run for it.”
But the slow, lightly armed transports realized they were trapped. They maneuvered into a globular defensive formation, while the four cruiser escorts accelerated toward the squadron. Meanwhile the ten cruisers broke off their attack on Orbital Command and vectored out to intercept.
“The main force is six minutes nine away, sir,” Captain Disad reported. “If we haven’t succeeded by then— well, fourteen to eight aren’t odds to celebrate.”
The admiral nodded. The tension and fear in the compartment were old beloved companions. Sweat was a coolness on his brow. He called again for an all-ships channel. “Captains. This is Admiral Young. Tighten up the formation. We’re going through. No straying, no matter how tempting the target opportunity. Out.”
FSS Anctium took the point—he ached to be there himself, but flagships weren’t allowed to indulge in heroics. The four purples formed a barrier directly ahead.
“Are they going to ram us?” an officer wondered aloud.
It didn’t come to that. The purples began retreating, and the squadron closed the gap with increasing slowness. “So they want a running fire fight,” the admiral said.
There Will Be War Volume II Page 13