Paradise (Expeditionary Force Book 3)

by Craig Alanson

  “Huh. Really?”

  “Really. Duh.”

  “Wow. I didn’t realize I was doing that. It bothers you a lot?”

  “Yes! I hate it!”

  “Cool,” I said with satisfaction. “Maybe I should speak really slowly sometimes when I don’t have an idea, just to mess with you.”

  “Joe? You do realize that I control things like our reactors, missile warheads, and the pile of nukes we have in a cargo bay? Such a nice ship you have here. It would be a shame if I lost the will to live and my concentration slipped, if you know what I mean.”

  “Got it. Do you want to hear my idea? This may be a false alarm; it is more of a question that may turn into a good idea.”

  “Ooooh! If this doesn’t develop into a brilliant idea, can I tease you unmercifully until the last star in the universe turns into a cold dark lump of neutrons?”

  “If that turns you on, Skippy, then go for it. You said the Thuranin created this newest type of relay stations from obsolete cruisers?”

  “Correct so far. I’m not detecting any brilliant idea yet, Joe.”

  “Wait for it. Was that class of cruisers simply old, or were they withdrawn from service for some reason?”

  “Joe, trivia night in the galley is Tuesday, not today. Who cares?”

  “Humor me, Skippy.”

  “Ugh,” he huffed, “fine. They were withdrawn from service before the end of their intended life, because of a structural weakness. That class of cruisers was made by stretching the hull of a very successful class of destroyer; the Thuranin figured that if the destroyer was good, a bigger destroyer would be even better. They were wrong. Those little green morons didn’t redesign the entire hull structure, they cut the destroyer in half and spliced in a section to accommodate more shield generators, additional maser cannons and missile tubes. After about thirty years, several of those cruisers were lost in combat because their shields failed in that spliced section. What the Thuranin failed to realize is that the additional shield generators changed the way impacts on the shields are distributed across the overall hull structure. The stresses tended to concentrate in one weak point. Ships were lost in battle because the hull buckles in that one area, and it disrupts power distribution inside the ship. The Thuranin didn’t realize that, because they are stupid, arrogant, hateful little green men. Also because they stole the cruiser’s design from the Jeraptha, but while the Jeraptha knew what they were doing, the Thuranin did not. Does that satisfy your idle curiosity, Joey?”

  “Almost,” I said happily. “When the cruiser hulls were converted into relay stations, did the Thuranin fix the design flaw?”

  “No, there wasn’t any reason to, dumdum. The hull weakness is only a problem for warships that engage in battle regularly. Over time, the strain of deflecting enemy fire causes stress cracks that have to be fixed. The Thuranin decided that fixing cracks in the hull structure every couple years wasn’t worth the expense, so they took the ships out of service. Why do you care? I’m asking in order to understand how your monkey-meat brain works, Joe.”

  “Another question, then. Why didn’t they just reinforce that part of the hull?”

  “To truly fix the problem would have required so much reinforcement that it would have degraded the ship’s performance. Again, why do you care?”

  “The relay stations have that same flaw, right? A hit in one place will disrupt power distribution inside the hull? Power that goes to defensive systems?”

  “Oh, no no no! No you don’t. It doesn’t count as a good monkey-brain idea if it doesn’t work, Joe. Yes, there is a weakness in the hull structure of relay stations. The Thuranin know that, so they added a minor amount of armor plating in that area. You can’t, I, uh, give me a moment. Huh. Well, that is interesting. Ok, yes, it is possible that a very, I mean, very precise hit in a particular area could still disrupt power distribution within the hull. The Thuranin didn’t bother to reconfigure their power cabling when the ships were converted to relay stations.”

  “Interesting,” I said slowly, again without realizing what I was doing.

  “No! Uh uh, Joey. Not this time. When I say a very precise hit, I mean it would have to be a maser beam striking an area about a half centimeter in diameter. And not a wimpy hand-held maser beam, we would have to use one of the Dutchman’s maser cannons. We can’t risk the Dutchman getting that close, and besides, the target is at an extremely awkward angle. The Dutchman would have to fire several times in order to cut away sections of machinery on the outside of the station’s hull, just to get at the target. After our first shot, the Thuranin would activate their energy shields, and those shields would disperse our maser beam. Also they would shoot back at our beat up pirate ship. So, no. No way can we do this.”

  “Show me,” I pointed to my tablet. “Show me this weak spot.”

  He did. It truly was an awkward place. The Thuranin were not fools, they knew about the weakness so they had installed armor around it. The only way to get at the weak spot was where cables to a relay antenna came through the armor plating, and to get at that spot, a maser would have to be fired almost parallel to the station’s hull. A person in an armor suit might be able to get there, but a hand-held maser didn’t have the power we needed.

  “See?” Skippy asked gleefully. “To disrupt their power, we need to hit that weak spot with ship’s power, and there’s no way to do that. Unless you know of a way to bend a maser beam. Or to shrink the Dutchman to the size of a dropship.”

  “You can’t warp spacetime so the maser beam will curve?” I asked hopefully.

  “Yes I can,” he chuckled. “I can’t curve the beam enough to make a difference, dumdum.”

  “Understood, Skippy. You disappoint us once again.”

  “What? You ass, I-”

  “That was a joke. Do you want to hear my idea?”

  “Probably not,” he sighed.

  I told him anyway.

  “Joe, I hate you more than words can say. In order to describe how very much I hate you, I needed to create a new language that I call ‘Cursive’, because I use it to curse at you inside my brain. If you understood this language, you would be impressed.”

  “I love you too, Skippy. Will my idea work?”

  He gave a heavy sigh. “We will find out one way or the other.”

  We arrived at our planned hold point twelve lighthours from our target, and spent eight hours passively scanning the area to assure there were no nasty surprises waiting for us. Skippy confirmed the relay station was alone and operating normally. Of course, if there was a stealthed ship guarding the station, we would have to be a lot closer to detect it. Too close. Chotek finally gave us the go ahead, and the Flying Dutchman jumped in to one of the designated data exchange points near the relay station. Instead of Skippy’s usual superprecise jump, he deliberately brought us in off-target so it would look like a typical Thuranin jump. The ship was also pointed straight at the station; from the station’s angle they hopefully couldn’t immediately tell how extensively modified our star carrier was. “Transmitting signal now,” Skippy announced, and Captain Desai looked at me, one of her fingers poised on the button to initiate an emergency jump away if the relay station didn’t acknowledge properly.

  “Ok, we’re good,” Skippy said, and we all breathed a sigh of relief. “I grumbled about what a pain in the ass this secrecy stuff is, and the communications officer on the station agreed with me. They bought our story, Joe. They acknowledge that we will be sending two dropships over, and they are opening docking bay doors now.”

  “Excellent. Launch the package,” I ordered, and in the CIC, Chang gave me a thumbs up.

  “Package is away,” he confirmed.

  Our own docking bay doors slid aside, and two dropships stuffed with SpecOps troops and combots launched slowly, moving with unnecessary caution. For the operation, we wanted to give the impression that we were in no hurry. Also, we needed to give the special package time to get into position. The gentle maneu
vers of the dropships helped protect the people inside, who were strapped into webbing with no other cushioning at all.

  The dropships proceeded cautiously across the gulf between the ship and the station, with the dropships blinking lights and broadcasting the proper IFF transponder codes like the innocent transports that they were not.

  The package had been attached to the outside of the Dutchman before we jumped, launching it simply involved releasing clamps and with a gentle push, it was away. The package was my idea; it consisted of a jetpack, a stealth field generator and one end of a microwormhole. The other end of the microwormhole was wrapped around the muzzle of a maser cannon on the Dutchman’s aft end. As the pair of dropships approached the station’s open docking bay, Skippy flew the package close to the spot where the station’s original cruiser hull had been spliced. With two dropships approaching, the station had dialed back its sensor field to avoid interfering with the navigation sensors of the dropships. The station’s weakened sensor field gave the Thuranin no chance to detect the tiny residual signature of our package until it was in position.

  “Uh oh, Joe. The Thuranin have noticed an odd sensor reading near our package. So far, they are investigating it as a power fluctuation in the antenna in that area. I am helping feed their delusion by telling them we are picking up garbled transmissions from that antenna, and we are working together to diagnose the issue. But I suggest we move soon. Real soon.”

  “Are the dropships secured?” I asked anxiously.

  “Both are in the docking bay,” Chang reported, “one is down and secured, the other will be in ten seconds.”

  Ten seconds was too long to wait, we absolutely needed surprise. “Colonel Chang,” I ordered, “weapons free.”

  Chang pressed a preprogrammed button, and our maser cannon fired through the microwormhole. Pumping that much energy through a wormhole less than a nanometer in diameter caused it to collapse and damaged our maser cannon. It also made a very precise hit on the exact weak spot of the station’s structure, and severely disrupted power feeds inside the station. Other than emergency power, the forward half of the station that contained the docking bay and the core compartment with the station’s AI was plunged into darkness. From one of the dropships, Skippy reported that the Thuranin were scrambling to reconfigure the power flow, then the Dutchman jumped away just as the station fired a maser cannon at us.

  The station disappeared in the blink of an eye, and the ship emerged twelve lightminutes away. Far enough for safety, too far away to be of any help to the assault team.

  Sitting in my command chair, feeling useless. I hated it.

  United States Marine Corps Staff Sergeant Margaret Adams had been given the honor of joining the Merry Band of Pirates SpecOps raid on the Thuranin relay station, despite the fact that she had not qualified for the Marine Raiders special forces. It was a dubious honor for her, because her role in the plan was not to operate a combot or fire a rifle. Her assigned task was to remain with the rear guard, while carrying a smartass shiny beer can in a backpack strapped to her Kristang armored suit. “Hey, Sarge Marge,” said a voice in her helmet speakers, “can you be a little more careful? All this bouncing around is bad for my delicate constitution. I’m getting seasick back here.”

  Crouched with her back to a bulkhead behind a corridor junction which the SpecOps team had just cleared of enemy resistance, she slammed her back into the bulkhead. “Oops, sorry there, Skippster,” she said without humor.

  “Ok, Ok, I get the message,” he grumbled. “Combat isn’t the place for humor.”

  “No it is not.” Adams knew that Skippy joking with her was his way of relieving her stress, but she didn’t want her stress relieved. She wanted her stress, wanted to harness the energy it gave her. And talking with her was not distracting Skippy from talking individually with each person on the SpecOps team. Guiding them, warning of the enemy’s location and intentions, fuzzing or blanking out enemy sensors, even taking direct control of armored suits and jerking people out of the way if they were about to be hit by enemy fire. And if enemy fire did penetrate their suits, Skippy managed the suit’s self-repair and emergency medical functions. He was also worming his way into the station’s functions section by section as they advanced; opening or closing blast doors, messing with the artificial gravity and even causing the overload of a power conduit that killed two Thuranin and disabled three of their combots. Skippy was doing all that, plus making jokes with Adams, and he was probably not anywhere near testing the limits of his capabilities. “Are you bored, Skippy?” She asked.

  “Yeah, kind of. Don’t worry about me, I’m keeping myself busy composing new insults for Joe. You’ll like these, they’re good ones! For example, how about- Oooh, sorry about that! Not you, Marge, I was talking to a Thuranin. I just crushed one of those little green fuckers by slamming a blast door as it was going through. Hmm, interesting. Unlike chickens, Thuranin don’t run around after their heads are cut off. These Thuranin aren’t as much of a challenge as I expected, Marge. Boy, you screw with their plan for static defense and they just fall apart.”

  “We have two dead already, Skippy,” Adams gritted her teeth. One of the dead was responsible for the red droplets that spattered the front of her suit. Adams had been right behind that French paratrooper when he took a combot rocket to the chest; Skippy had not been able to jerk him away in time.

  “Sergeant Adams, you are an unaugmented species, without the advantage of any genetic engineering, other than what you accidentally accomplished by deciding who to mate with in the back seat of a Buick. You are attacking a group of cyborgs who have been fighting this war for thousands of years, on their territory, against their prepared defenses. When we first proposed to seize this station, I expected 90 casualties, if we got lucky. By my count, Major Smythe’s team is slaughtering them in impressive fashion. Damn! If you monkeys ever do get any real technology of your own and are able to tweak your cluttered genetic code, the rest of the galaxy had better watch their asses.”

  “Was that praise for humanity, Skippster?”

  “Shmaybe. I’ll deny it if you tell anyone.”

  “Of course.”

  “Uh oh. Time to move, Sarge Marge,” Skippy advised. “Take the corridor to the left.”

  Adams pushed away from the bulkhead. “Not straight ahead?” She pointed with her rifle to where the SpecOps team had advanced.

  “Um, no. There is a tiny bit of a problemo for you and the rear guard to deal with. Um, it would be good if you moved now. Like, now now now!”

  Without a word, Adams followed the special forces soldier in front of her, a Ranger Lieutenant Poole. Behind her was a Chinese ‘Night Tiger’ Lieutenant Kwan. Adams had trained with Poole and Kwan extensively; both of them had initially been disappointed to be assigned to the rear guard, until Major Smythe dryly pointed out that the assault operation would only be successful if they got Skippy past the thick shielding and into the station’s core. Poole and Kwan were charged with getting Adams or just Skippy into the core, even if everyone else had fallen in battle. Hearing that, the female US Army Ranger and the male Chinese Night Tiger had become a dedicated team with Adams, and Margaret Adams began to wish she had not volunteered for the mission. The two special forces soldiers trained her mercilessly, until the three of them were utterly exhausted but could anticipate each other’s moves without speaking. They also made it clear to Adams that her surviving the mission would be nice but not necessary. Poole had even practiced throwing Adams through doorways, using the Marine’s suited body as inert protection for Skippy.

  Margaret Adams took that as a huge compliment.

  “How tiny a problem?” Poole asked tersely while running down the corridor, flipping and spinning in her armored suit, her feet and hands barely touching the floor, walls and ceiling as she covered all approaches.

  “A big problem,” Major Smythe’s voice cut into the conversation. “Kwan, Poole, follow Skip-” his voice was drowned out by the buzzing
rattle of Kristang rifles and several explosions. “Follow Skippy’s instructions and move as fast as you can. We don’t have time to send combot support back to you.” Another loud explosion. “Go! Out.”

  “Ok, maybe not so tiny a problem,” Skippy admitted. “Two Thuranin evaded Smythe’s team, got around them in a parallel corridor. They have a pair of combots with them, and they’re going to a power junction to set off an overload. That would cause an explosion not large enough to destroy the station, but it would blow a hole in the hull and knock out the main transmitter. We wouldn’t be able to fix it, so that would destroy our whole purpose of boarding this station.”

  “Got it,” Kwan acknowledged. “I see it,” he said as Skippy’s map popped up in their visors. “Poole, you’re with me. Adams, you stay behind us.”

  “Affirmative,” Adams replied, checking for the hundredth time that her rifle’s safety was off. She had never fired a Kristang rifle in combat. During the asteroid raid of the Dutchman’s first mission, she had operated a combot, not worn an armored suit. The Kristang weapon felt strange, it buzzed more than barked, and its antirecoil mechanism reduced the kick. That made it easier to maintain aim at a target but it was less satisfying to fire, almost like using a rifle in a video game. She looked at the red splattered on the front of her suit and thought of the French paratrooper who had died in front of her. This was no video game.

  Skippy’s awesomely omnipotent vision and hearing through the station’s own sensors gave the three humans an advantage, and rendered the two Thuranin nearly blind. Nearly. Kwan and Poole knew where the two deadly combots were located, and where their two Thuranin operators were taking cover. Skippy could slightly fuzz the targeting sensors of the combots, but he could not give Kwan and Poole the ability to dodge a hail of bullets. And the cyborg nature of the Thuranin gave them a link to the combots as if they were part of their own bodies, allowing lightning-quick reactions.