Raven's Children

by Sabrina Chase

  She wasn’t being insubordinate. She didn’t have enough intelligence to be insubordinate.

  “Then what are you trying to report?”

  She blinked again. “Signals. Um. The manual says signals from ammlom…‌anomalous locations should be reported immediately and investigated. But it’s just noise, sir. It doesn’t mean anything.”

  “Show me.” She whisked herself from view, and he got up wearily to follow her. Wernicki was one of the few at Lambert Base who knew she wasn’t up to standard. Unfortunately, the way she made up for it was by blind devotion to manuals and regulations. He was continually amazed at her ability to quote reams of text and remain completely ignorant of the meaning.

  At her console, Wernicki pointed at a display. “That’s where it’s coming from. But nobody goes there. This scow got in the debris field by mistake and the core went critical when they got hit and…‌um, they can still detect the radiation here at the station.”

  Ennis turned his attention to the signal analysis. Short, compressed bursts, with too much regularity in the components to be natural. He leaned over the control board and tried out a set of standard algorithms. Nothing useful happened. The signal remained incomprehensible.

  “Probably just a comm call.” Ennis turned his head. The second–‌in–‌command, Commander Voss, was observing them with a scornful expression on his face. “She’s found them before, since she doesn’t know how to filter out station noise.”

  Wernicki was hunched in her seat, looking scared and miserable.

  “It’s coming from a rock debris field three thousand kilometers from here. The signal is clearly artificial, compressed, but not using any of the standard methods,” Ennis said blandly, keeping his voice neutral. Voss would take even the hint of contradiction as an excuse to do something unpleasant to both himself and Wernicki.

  “So, you think it is criminal activity? You would know.”

  Voss had wasted no time in finding his connection to the prison planet Fimbul, and mentioned it whenever he could. Ennis fought to keep control of his temper, and failed.

  “I defer to your judgment. You would know better than I would.”

  Voss recoiled, and his eyes narrowed.

  “Oh…‌it’s pirates!” Wernicki blurted, completely oblivious to the undertones of the conversation. It succeeded in diverting Voss’s attention to her.

  “Pirates need ships to steal. There’s nothing there except radioactive scrap. Get back to work.”

  Wernicki cringed and turned back to her board. Her eyes bulged.

  “Sir! There’s another one! But it’s not in the same place.”

  The signal was different, too. Simple, choppy, and brief. Locator pulse. Something’s going on out there.

  Voss stared at the display, then glanced back at Ennis. “Since you think it’s so important, check it out. Take the twenty–‌three.”

  Thanks for the vote of confidence. The OPSIC–‌23 was an old sublight patrol boat, mostly famous for never having enough room for the required crew. It did, however, have guns. If you could get to them.

  “Come on. You’re running the comm board,” Ennis said to Wernicki.

  “But sir, I…‌ship, no manual….‌”

  “Your other option is to stay here and update Voss on our progress.”

  She paled. “Um.”

  Ennis picked up a commlink and started to jog toward the hangers. He felt the first swing of optimism since he’d been posted here. “Attention! Twenty–‌three crew, report on the double!”

  CHAPTER 3

  UNSCHEDULED ARRIVALS

  Ennis alternated between watching the comm board over Wernicki’s shoulder and the scanner console. It wasn’t that hard on the tiny flight deck.

  They were getting close to the location of the second signal. He’d ordered the ship as silent as possible, in the hopes of catching whoever it was by surprise.

  “I got something, sir!” the pilot said suddenly. “Two of 'em, though. Funny, I’m not getting any profile match.”

  Ennis had been expecting at least two ships—‌why else would there be signals? But the profile matching ought to be working. “Maybe you have the match percentage too high, Pereira. Are you getting anything at all, or is the match cycling?”

  “No sir. Comes up ‘No match, enter manufacturer to add profile.’”

  Even a new model of ship should pull up something. All the profiles for existing ships were in the system. A horrible thought occurred to him.

  “Do you have the crab profiles loaded on this ship?” He shouldn’t even have to ask, but on Lambert Base a lot got left out.

  “We got the basic set, but it takes too long to run. Besides, they never show up here.” Pereira caught Ennis’s fulminating glare and gulped. “Running now, sir.” He paused while the data ran, then relaxed. “No match this time either.”

  Suspicious, Ennis looked over his shoulder at the scan display. Now it read “No exact match—‌add supplemental data?”

  Not an exact match, but enough of one the scanner thought it belonged in the crab profile data. Those aren’t our ships.

  “Guns live,” he snapped at the pilot. “Yoshi, damn you, wake up! Get to your position!”

  The gunner started up from his slouch, looking bewildered, then scrambled to bring his weapons online. Ennis was already halfway out of his seat and reaching for the handholds to swing up to the top gun console.

  “Sir! But….‌”

  “Assume the unknown ships are crabs until you get proof otherwise. Wernicki, get ready to send a burst back to base telling them we are engaging one or possibly two crab ships, but wait for my order to send, got that?”

  “Visual on scope, sir!” called Pereira.

  Ennis pulled up the visual feed on the tiny display, cursing under his breath at the grainy picture. They got closer and he cursed again, louder, seeing the dark, spiny hull of the ship ahead of them. He wasn’t surprised the scanner hadn’t made a match; the ship wasn’t like any configuration he’d seen before. But he could still tell who it was. Crabs. Why here, why now?

  “Enemy ship,” he said tersely. He heard sounds of fear and consternation below. “Full acceleration to engage. Yoshi, Pereira—‌wait for my command to fire.” There was no need to waste ammunition this far out. The big crab ship apparently hadn’t detected them yet.

  Ennis frowned. The crabs should have seen them by now; at least they always had before when human ships were this close. Maybe his silent measures had worked, or maybe they were just lucky. The second, smaller ship was still out of visual range, headed away from the station and toward the big ship. The big ship was large enough to be web–‌capable, which meant he had to prevent it from going into drive or they could get more uninvited guests.

  “It’s changing course! And accelerating!” Pereira shouted. “They’ve seen us!”

  “Keep the intercept!”

  On the visual feed, Ennis saw the big ship move straight for the smaller one, a course that cut directly in front of the OPSIC–‌23. Ennis fumbled for the arming switch. It’s trying to pick up the scout before going into drive!

  “Gun one!” he yelled, and fired. The range was extreme, but he didn’t have much choice. The crab ship was going to run rather than fight, and he couldn’t let it get away. “Wernicki, send that message!”

  His first few shots were wide, as he’d expected. The crab ship jerked and swerved erratically, but remained on course. When it returned fire, the targeting was nowhere near the OPSIC–‌23.

  Something wasn’t right They could shoot better than that. What if it was a trap?

  “Close in ten kilometers and hold,” he ordered.

  “Confirm hold at one zero k?” Pereira replied, sounding confused.

  “One zero, and watch your board for more ships! Wernicki, keep sending updates.” He checked the range, grimaced. “Yoshi, fire at will.”

  “All right!” came an enthusiastic yell.

  “Get a lock first!” E
nnis shouted as the ship shuddered with recoil. If we only had some missiles on this tub…‌

  He was firing steadily now, every time he got a lock. One shot connected, solid. Yoshi clipped part of the outer structure, then he and Ennis both got major hits. The big crab ship was no longer able to maneuver, and the small ship was barely half a kilometer away.

  No sign of a trap. The threat to Lambert Station had been dealt with. The realization dawned on him that now he had a damaged crab ship, a ship that could be captured. Much more useful to Fleet than a destroyed one.

  “Hold your fire!” Ennis shouted, but it was too late. Yoshi had already let loose a salvo that ripped into the wounded crab ship. A moment later a flash blazed over the video feed, followed by a second explosion as the smaller ship was caught in the blast.

  “I got 'em, sir! I got 'em!”

  Ennis sighed, running a hand over his face and trying to keep his frustration and disappointment from showing. He didn’t want to take the victory away from his substandard crew; it was amazing they had pulled it off at all. It wasn’t to be expected they could handle a sudden change in objectives, especially since this had probably been their first live fight. “Yes. You certainly did.”

  The celebration slowed to a halt.

  “Um. Sir. I…‌thought we wanted to get them?” Wernicki ventured. Her forehead wrinkled with confusion, rapidly changing to distress.

  “Absolutely,” Ennis said, before she asked if the crabs were still the enemy. “We had to protect the station, but if we could have done that without destroying the crab ship it would have been even better. We’ve blown up a lot of crab ships in this war, but we’ve never captured one intact.” And they’d come so close…‌

  He didn’t mention his attempt at capture to Voss, who was panicked and imagining the crab fleet arriving any minute when they got him on the comm. Voss ordered the 23 to remain on patrol as well as sending the OPSIC–‌98 to join them. They searched for hours, assisted by some local craft, but nobody found any sign of more crabs. Only wreckage.

  At least the 98 had enough crew for shifts. Pereira was getting so tired Ennis wasn’t sure he could dock safely.

  None of it made sense. In all his time fighting the crabs, Ennis never heard of an encounter like this one. Stupid tactics, lousy gunnery, and a suicidal attempt to rescue the scout ship. If the crab ship hadn’t turned back, it could have easily escaped into webspace. It seemed…‌amateur.

  “That scow driver wants to talk to you, sir,” Wernicki said drowsily.

  “Yeah, go ahead.”

  “So whaddya want’s ta do wit all these junks, eh? I not keeping them nothing, you gotta say where they go.” The scow driver sounded peeved. “What’sa pay, pickin’ up crab scraps?”

  “Eternal glory and the praise of all humanity,” Ennis snapped before he could stop himself. Yes, he was tired. Wernicki spluttered with astonished laughter. “Take it in to one of the hangars.” By the time both ships were docked again he’d figure out somewhere else to keep it. He brightened. They wouldn’t be able to play pookball if he kept it there. “Submit a time bill to the quartermaster; we’ll get you paid somehow.”

  The driver muttered something that might have been thanks but probably wasn’t, and closed the connection.

  “What are you going to do with all the pieces, sir? Do you think they’ll have anything useful?” Wernicki asked.

  “I hope so.” He wasn’t sure what he was going to do; wasn’t sure why he’d commandeered the scow to pick up the wreckage of the crab ship. Maybe he was just trying to annoy Voss.

  His mind drifted, tired, reliving the brief combat. Noting all the anomalous actions. Hours later, Garner’s voice came on his earclip. She must have sobered up enough to take charge.

  “Ennis. Bring your people in and get them rested. Those damn crabs aren’t going to show up now.”

  When he finally got back to the base hangar, he made his way over to the pile of fragments the scow had unloaded. Even though he was so tired he could barely move he spent an hour poring over them—‌some pieces no longer than his arm, one almost the length of a fighter. They’d only recovered a portion of the whole ship.

  One piece he recognized as a part of the hull. The texture of the skin was almost organic in appearance, the spines and struts fractal in pattern. Like branches.

  A violation of that pattern snagged his gaze and he frowned, looking closer. The structure looked like a gun, but it didn’t fit. He stood stiffly and moved to the far end of the piece of wreckage, sighting down the length of it. The gun was out of true, possibly because of the explosion—‌but why was it in the wrong place?

  He looked more carefully at the gun itself, and found the answer at the very base where it mounted to the hull. The material there was subtly different in appearance from the hull—‌coarse, and lighter in color.

  They added those guns later. And not very well. Ennis suddenly wondered if the crew had likewise been a bodge job. Remembering the crab ship’s strange behavior, he was convinced of it. They’d been fighting the crab equivalent of Wernicki. No wonder it had been so easy. These crabs hadn’t understood about the harsh realities of battle. They’d tried to rescue a comrade even though it had ended up getting all of them killed.

  They hadn’t been like that before, and he hadn’t heard of any fights like this one either. Did that mean the crabs were running out of real troops? It had been easier killing them when they were vicious, competent, and dangerous. This just made him feel depressed.

  The memory was sudden and vivid. Moire Cameron sitting on a crate in the mercenaries' launch bay after she had singlehandedly destroyed a crab carrier. Her eyes deep with a sadness that had surprised him at the time, but now he felt the same. Why were the crabs attacking them with such suicidal desperation? Why were they attacking at all? After all these years, they still didn’t even know how the war had started. Was killing every last crab the only way to stop it?

  I wonder who it is we’re really fighting.

  ¤ ¤ ¤

  Moire held Alan close as something slammed into their crate. “Almost over now,” she whispered into his ear, holding him tight. Now she’d find out if she’d been right to trust Montero’s work. She could never be sure when his mind was in the same dimension as his body.

  They had fixed the scanner. Now they just had to fool the autoloader, and they didn’t have the luxury of doing it at a distance. They’d guessed the existence of the autoloader from the digital tags on the crates. It made sense; Toren would prefer that the crew not know what they were shipping out. Then there was the curious ease with which Alan had escaped. She’d gambled nobody had been there to see him. Only automatic machinery that wouldn’t notice anything wrong. And now, the automatic machinery didn’t care that one crate still remained on the ship.

  The sounds echoed and died. She checked with the second spycrawler, wedged near the cargo door. It was dark, and nothing was moving.

  “Right. Looks like we’re alone. Get your gear on, kid. We don’t have a lot of time.” The spycrawler that she’d parked on the bridge had captured some useful information. The two pilots were the only people on board. One of them, a woman, was not happy about that since they had to do everything. More importantly, Speedi–‌Web III would be leaving eighteen hours after arriving at the deep space facility, a completely isolated station. Three hours had already elapsed with the unloading, but now they could finally get moving.

  It had been awkward living in the crate. It was even more awkward for two full–‌grown people to put on heat–‌mask gear at the same time, in a hurry. As soon as she could, Moire popped the cover of the crate and slid out stiffly, luxuriating in the space and freedom. The air, too. It wasn’t quite as…‌thick as it had been in the crate. She started pulling out equipment, wincing when her sore muscles made themselves felt. Alan stepped out and stood close beside her.

  “If I give you the pistol now, do you promise not to shoot unless I say so?” she whispered.
>
  He nodded, a sharp, jerky motion. She couldn’t see his whole face through the heat–‌mask hood but his eyes were wide, staring out the open door to the station beyond.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Bad place.” He was vibrating with fear. If she’d had any doubts about this being the right place, they were gone. Alan clearly recognized it.

  He was also petrified with fright. “Maybe you should stay here for a little while,” she said finally, turning away to the door. They didn’t have enough time for her to wait for him to calm down. “I’ll come back.”

  “No.” In a flash, he had a tight hold on her arm. Whatever he was frightened of, he was more afraid of being alone.

  “It isn’t like before,” she said softly, her mouth by his ear. “You aren’t wearing the cuff anymore. You have a gun. Besides, we are going to do everything so they don’t know we’re here. Right?”

  He looked down. He wasn’t shaking so much. “Leave soon,” he whispered.

  “That’s the idea,” Moire whispered back, prying his hand away with effort. She picked up the little spycrawler from its hiding place and scootched it across the threshold into the station.

  As she had feared, there were vid pickups. Two of them, keeping watch on the cargo door. The corridor was bare and sterile; no people, no signs or even equipment. Just the track overhead for the cargo hauler.

  She heard a faint hum and looked up. The track was vibrating. Moire gestured Alan back, and they crouched down in the shadows of the hold. Through the spycrawler’s eyes she saw something large coming down the corridor. As the thing got closer, she could see it was some sort of large crate.

  Of course. Now that the hold was empty, they could load new cargo. The crate came closer, swaying heavily. It followed the track into the cargo bay and the autoloader clicked and whirred, dropping the crate with a clang in a far corner.

  Where were they coming from? Moire snatched the spycrawler from the doorway. There was a direct road, if she could get to it.

  “When the hook comes by, lift me up!” she whispered to Alan, who looked puzzled but willing.