“Miss Meredyth has some data for you.” Andie hands him a tablet; he shades the screen with his hand, skims the information there. “Do you agree?”
William reads the tablet again, then offers it to Rina. “I'm sorry, Commander, but I don't.”
Rina folds her arms. Behind her, the soldier with the shotgun takes aim at the van. The man standing at Rina's side draws his pistols. “Take another look,” Rina says.
He shakes his head. “I don't know what you want, Rina.”
A gunshot echoes across the heat-blasted ground; the bullet buries itself into the cracked pavement at William's feet. “You will be respectful!” the soldier snaps.
William hands the tablet to Andie, then puts his hands behind his back. He carries his pistol there only because it has to be somewhere. He hopes Rina doesn't remember that. “Fine,” he says. “Miss Meredyth, please tell me what you want me to say.”
Her smile grows nastier, if that's possible. “You want to say that my data are right. You want to say that the Demetrius Colony is going to divert course one hundred kilometers to the east.”
He catches Andie out of the corner of his eye. She gives the minutest possible nod. “All right,” William says. “I'll recommend we move.”
“A wise decision.” Rina's soldiers point their weapons back at the ground and William's party backs up, climbing into the van. Andie moves the shifter and they back away; she waits for more than 200 meters to pass before she turns the wheel and points them toward the colony.
Not a word is said by anyone.
* * * *
The commodore refuses to bend—"We won't let them chase us off again,” he says over the colony's radio network; “we won't let them steal our water!” William hates himself for his own pragmatism: he knows the decision is correct; he knows the Demetrius Colony needs water; he knows it would be a colossal mistake to pass up a storm like this, one that could quench their thirst—and their children's thirst—for months.
Despite the twisting fear in his stomach, six hours after the meeting with the Jairasu—with Rina—William is piloting a small, fast car with a trio of submachine guns mounted to the rear. In the passenger seat is another young gunner, a girl named Shanna with skin even darker than Rina's, her hair intricately braided, blood-red beads woven into the rows. Her hands are steady on the gunnery controls.
William's car is one of dozens, a phalanx of small vehicles, gunships, and even two cruisers bearing heavy artillery, powerful enough to seriously inconvenience even large ships. It's the biggest show of force William's ever seen, by the Demetrius Colony or any other.
The gunner offers William a dense, wood-colored bar. “Thanks,” he says. It tastes like it looks, but it'll keep his energy up. He follows it with a swallow from his canteen, a tall metal bottle with a liter of water inside. “Not your first time out?”
She shakes her head. “I'm part of the gunnery maintenance crew on the Jekyll,” she says. “Never been in one of these little cars, but I know plenty about guns.”
“Good. I really don't want to get killed out here.”
Shanna's teeth aren't as bright as Rina's, but her dark eyes shine in the light of the setting sun. “Keep us out of the way of the other guys,” she tells him, “and I'll do the rest.”
William's car is on the fringes of the phalanx. He knows Andie is on the bridge of the Mighty Mississippi; as one of the biggest ships in the colony, it serves as one of several communication hubs. She'll be safer there anyway. As safe as anywhere, he amends mentally; the commodore refused to move the colony, despite the Jairasu threat—Rina's threat—and the storm will come soon. Already huge puffy clouds have moved in, and William's models predict that the first of the rains will start soon.
“It's a damn waste,” he says softly, gripping the wheel.
“The water?”
“Yes.”
Shanna nods. “Maybe that's their plan.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Jairasu are pretty much one huge ship, right?”
“Pretty much.”
“So they'll probably just send in their gunships and protect the main vessel. All we have to do is hold them off until the storm ends.”
William gives her a tiny, tight smile. “That doesn't make me feel any better.”
“Sorry, sir.”
“Don't call me ‘sir.’ “
“You're the boss.”
* * * *
The Jairasu gunships are big and fast, and, to make matters worse, they're maneuverable, too. “It's not fair,” William grumbles as he joins formation with six other cars. He feels the wheels skid on the mist-slicked ground as the cars strafe past Mars—the Jairasu gunships are all named for planets. So far, Neptune has been destroyed, a smoldering hulk taken out by the grenade-equipped vans in the Fourth Group. William's car is part of the Sixth Group; one of their number is already gone, a brief bloom of flame and then nothing but twisted metal and corpses. Overall the Jairasu are winning: the comm chatter coming through the door speakers confirms that. Six more cars and two gunships are gone forever from the Demetrius Colony, and one of the water carriers, the Farmer's Dell, was hulled early on and is probably still spilling the precious liquid.
The guns behind William chatter—Shanna twisting her controls and raking Mars. The Jairasu ship's huge gun barks once and an explosion forces the Sixth Group to scatter. Vehicles zip and twist around each other, trying to stay in formation, to concentrate their fire, but there's just too much coming from the remaining five Jairasu ships.
“What's that?”
“What's what?” William yanks the wheel hard to the left; the tires squeal, trying to get traction. He pumps the brake, which helps a little.
“Bearing 245 relative,” Shanna says. She adjusts her guns so she can look through the digitally augmented sight. “That's not good.”
William spares a glance at the repeater; Shanna's thrown her gunsight feed up onto it. “No,” William agrees, “that's not good.”
Orders are coming up on the repeater now: Fourth through Eighth Groups, intercept small craft. William checks his bearing, then presses hard on the accelerator. The engine whines; the speed display ticks upward as they get closer.
The approaching vehicles aren't cars; they're much smaller. Motorcycles, armed with what look like grenade launchers. The drivers are exposed, protected only by windscreens and helmets.
“Sixth Group!” It's the voice of Lieutenant Tenay, who's in command. “Pick your targets! Fire at will!”
William aims at a cluster of three motorcycles; Shanna presses her triggers and bullets spatter outward. Two of the bikes lose control—one of the drivers is flung into the path of a Sixth Group truck, cracking its windscreen as he bounces off—but the third manages to fire his own weapon. William decelerates, twisting the wheel, then drops into reverse gear and guns the engine.
The grenade explodes close enough that the heat washes over them. By the light of the blast, Shanna blows the motorcycle to bits.
All around them, the Demetrius groups have the Jairasu well overmatched—the bikes are fragile, and not well-balanced for fighting on wet ground—and, after Shanna dispatches two more, William takes a moment to check the tactical display.
“It's a trick!” He reorients their course and leaves the group behind. “Look!”
“But why send out vehicles that are so easy to kill?”
“Suicide fighters.” William swerves around a destroyed car. “Couple of hundred years ago, used when battles were fought in the air. Then, sixty years later, people strapped bombs to their bodies. Same principle.”
“But . . . who would sign up for that?”
“They probably didn't know.” William pushes the accelerator as hard as he can. His repeater shows new orders: abandon the bikes, lay down covering fire, return to Point Nine—the original staging line. “Looks like someone up there figured things out.”
Shanna's gun chatters; two lights on the tactical display blink out.
But up ahead are Mars and Saturn; they're shelling the Hamilton, the remaining cruiser in the battle group, but at least the Hamilton is still firing back.
The Sixth Group forms up. Shanna drops her seat flat so she can change out her ammunition, going from standard rounds to acid slugs. She sits up straight again, teeth bared. “Teach those bastards to destroy my friends,” she growls.
William isn't so sanguine about taking life. He knows he has to; he knows that, without the storm—which is going to flood this area in little more than ninety minutes—the colony might not last much longer. It doesn't make him any happier.
The gun stutters, the noise deeper; the slugs tear into the aft section of the Mars. As William shoots the car past it, he sees Shanna firing into its engine, her aim perfect. When the gun goes quiet and his ears readjust, he hears the difference in the sound of the Jairasu ship. “All vehicles, concentrate fire on Mars!” Tenay orders.
A minute later, the gunship is destroyed.
* * * *
Only Jupiter and Pluto manage to escape the Demetrius battle groups, though as it departs, Pluto is struck by a huge bomb, fired from the remains of the Hamilton, and it goes up in a reddish-orange gout of flame. No one cheers; the losses to the colony are too great for that.
William and Shanna read the screen as they form up: two cruisers, a water-carrier, five gunships, twenty-three smaller vehicles, more than six hundred people. William feels sick; Shanna seems subdued, playing with one of her braids. “We won, though. We'll get the water.”
“I don't know if I'd call it a win,” William says. He checks his heads-up display: they have enough fuel to continue patrolling for another two hours. “How's your supply?”
“We're good,” she says. “Plenty of ammo.”
“That's reassuring.” William doesn't feel reassured, though.
Rain patters gently on the now-closed roof of the car. Shanna opens her window and cups her hand, then brings the water to her mouth. “Amazing,” she says. “Absolutely amazing.”
William doesn't say anything, just drinks a little from his canteen. Something's not right: everything he's heard about the Jairasu makes him doubt that the battle's truly over. The last colony to stand and fight against them is now a graveyard of dead ships along what used to be the banks of the Hudson River. That colony wasn't as big as Demetrius, but they weren't pushovers, either. And still the Jairasu made short work of them.
Still, without more than a vague feeling, William can't do anything but follow his patrol route and wait for the storm.
Which, at least, comes right on schedule. The wind picks up somewhat, and just after that, the pattering on the roof and windscreen becomes a downpour. William activates the wipers, but they don't help much; between the darkness and the rain, he finds himself navigating by the tactical display.
“I hope the container ships are getting this,” Shanna says. “It's unbelievable.”
William nods. “I'm sure they're doing what they're supposed to.” His eyes are still on the tactical display. “That's odd.”
“What?”
“Look.” He points to something on the edge of the infrared sensor's range. “What do you think that is?”
Shanna shrugs. “Probably the part of the ground that's not getting rained on.”
“I don't think so. The storm is small, but not that small.” He keys in to Lieutenant Tenay's frequency. “Sir,” he says, ignoring his dislike of protocol, “take a look at bearing 258 relative; can you request they boost the scanner?”
“In this mess? Portis, you must be nuts; nothing works when there's this much interference.”
“There's something out there,” William says. “I'm sure of it.”
He can picture the lieutenant shaking his head. “All our firepower is deployed along that side anyway. If something's coming, we'll catch it.”
William closes the channel. “Do you still have the acid slugs loaded?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“We're going to figure out what that thing is.”
“Lieu—” She pauses when she sees his expression. “Look, it's not our job, and if we break formation for no reason—”
“Then get out,” he tells her. His hand goes to the shifter. “Say the word and I'll let you off. No questions. I'll take the blame if there's any to be had.”
Shanna makes an amused sound deep in her throat. “Who's going to protect your ass if I jump ship?” She smiles. “Let's go.”
William checks the tactical display, and when there's an opening, he pulls the car out of formation and aims for 258 relative. The lieutenant's voice starts calling for him over the speakers, first as if there might be something wrong, but then more angrily.
Shanna turns the comm down to a low murmur, almost lost among the sounds of the storm. The lightning has started, occasional flashes punctuated by booms of thunder. The first one makes Shanna jump in her seat, but she recovers. “That never gets old.”
William spares her a small grin, but that's all he can offer. He switches from tactical to infrared sensors, watching for the surviving gunship.
It's not there. Nothing's there but a huge heat blob that worries him more with every passing second.
“We didn't drive them off,” William says. “I know that much. No one drives off the Jairasu.” He focuses the infrared scanner: plenty of heat, and the telltale purple areas that indicate engine compartments. “They're out there,” he says. “And they're moving.”
“Then why are we still here? Call the lieutenant!”
William shakes his head. “We can't. Look.” He clicks the tuning knob on the comm unit: static on all the channels. “It's a white-noise field. We have them too, but if we use them, we can't communicate either.” He flips to a lower-frequency band; the carrier signal is mercifully clear. He presses the transmit button, then repeats the same three-letter combination over and over.
“Will we get a reply?”
“No. This band is transmit-only from here. But hopefully they'll get the message.”
Shanna puts her sights on. “Move us closer. I'll try to slow them down.”
“With that gun? Really?”
She nods. “Just do it. We're out here; we have to do something!”
William swings the car out wide and comes around behind the flagship. As he gets closer, he realizes just how enormous it is, and how fast it's going. Somehow the monstrosity is moving at a steady 130-an-hour, and in this weather, the smaller wheels of the car have a difficult time keeping up. But he manages to come alongside one of the gigantic tires, pushing the engine as hard as he can. Several displays are red-lined by the time he gets close enough to one of the hundreds of wheels keeping the Jairasu flagship moving.
Shanna takes aim. Fires.
Fires again.
And again.
William has to back off the accelerator before the engine overheats. The car starts falling back. Its lights hit the wheel that Shanna shot: it's pitted where the chemical has eaten into it, but the ship itself hasn't slowed down at all.
Shanna tosses her sights on the dashboard in front of her. He can see tears in her eyes. “They're going to kill everyone,” she says. “They're going to destroy our ships and no one will be able to do anything.”
“They're heading straight into the colony's teeth. They'll at least be able to slow them down, or get out of the way—”
“You don't really believe that, do you?”
William doesn't. The very thought of the biggest, most powerful ship known to be roaming the western hemisphere, moving at this speed? They'll never see it coming.
* * * *
William manages to coax enough out of the engine to almost catch back up to the Jairasu before the massive liner slams into the heart of the Demetrius Colony. The smaller ships are maneuverable enough to get out of the way, but the tactical display shows that the core vessels have no chance.
Shanna and William watch as the lights blink out from the display. Supreme Illusion falls fir
st. Then Strongman Jack and Coburn. Two of the water-carriers are next, and then William's heart stops.
The Mighty Mississipi is gone.
* * * *
The Jairasu leave long before the storm ends. By morning it's rained itself out and William and Shanna, who abandoned their car to join the rescue effort, are able to see the destruction.
“My God,” she whispers, clutching William's hand. “My God, look at it!”
He can barely stand to. The water glistening on every broken surface will be evaporated away soon. His brain fills in the broad swath of missing ships: at least twenty are lost, probably destroyed, and there must be thousands dead.
Last night, the two of them tried to find the Mighty Mississippi, but the big ship has disappeared. As the sun starts to rise, he sees marks on the ground heading eastward: something huge was pulled against its will.
William practically drags Shanna to an abandoned car and slams it into gear, following the direction of the scorch marks. Four kilometers away, he finds the forward half of the Mighty Mississippi, her turbines sheared away. There's ruins a few hundred meters back, probably where the engine compartment blew up. William slams on the brakes, the car screeching to a halt, and jumps out. He and Shanna sprint across the already-steaming ground to the broadsided, broken ship.
“Andie!” he shouts. “Andie!”
He sees the bridge, its canopy peeling away from the upper deck. “Andie!”
“Who's there?” It's a male voice. “William, is that you?”
It's Captain Marshall. “Where's Andie?”
A long pause. “She's trapped,” the captain yells down. “Call for help! Quickly, before—”
Metal shrieks. The entire bridge pulls away from the ship and crashes to the ground. An instant later, a small explosion blows a wave of heat in William's direction.
Shanna grabs him before he can run into the burning wreckage. “They're dead,” she says, her grip vise-tight as he tries to pull away. “Damn it, William, she's dead!”
Though he fights Shanna as she pulls him back to the car, he knows he'll never see Andie again.
Asimov's SF, July 2011 Page 12