Analog SFF, March 2006

by Dell Magazine Authors

  “Admiral, sir!” He glanced back to see the boy Martor saluting him from the doorway. “Sir, we've had to restrain Slew.”

  “What? The head carpenter? What's he done?”

  “Running around telling us to stop. Said it weren't natural to fight a battle this way.” The old Martor would have smirked while he reported something like this; this new version, his side still taped up where Chaison had removed a bullet, looked very serious as he held his salute.

  “Very good. Keep him out of our way until after the battle.” He turned back to the radar.

  “These vessels,” said Chaison, indicating some boxy shapes on the edge of the screen. “They're troop carriers, aren't they?”

  Travis nodded. “They've got the profile. No reason to send those on maneuvers. And they move like they're full.”

  The fleet had been driving in the direction of Slipstream. Venera's spies had been right, it was an invasion force. Of course, Chaison had known the spies’ reports were accurate—or he would never have undertaken this mad escapade. Somehow, though, seeing the ships and their heading made him furious with Falcon Formation for the first time. As though he hadn't really known at all.

  “More mines, sir. We can avoid the cloud this time, but they're going to disperse soon. It'll be harder to find a way around them next time.”

  “Hmmph.” The dreadnaught had not stopped when it realized Rook had mined the air ahead of it. To Chaison's astonishment and dismay, the huge vessel had simply plowed through the cloud, enduring a staccato barrage of explosions without apparent effect. It was not to be stopped that way; and if it kept going, sooner or later it would reach clear air, and Slipstream's advantage would diminish.

  So Chaison was targeting its engines. He'd emptied barrage after barrage of rockets into them but so far the dreadnaught hadn't slowed significantly. Having realized what was happening—if not how it was being done—Falcon was now mining the air around their ships. The mines were tuned to ignore impacts at less than fifty miles an hour, so the fleet continued to grind forward and maneuvering became harder and harder for Slipstream.

  “I want to stop the dreadnaught,” said Chaison, “but I want those troop carriers taken out as well. Without them there's no occupying force.” He gave the order to the semaphore team, who had reluctantly given up their flags and were cheerlessly using an electromagnetic signaling technique called “radio telegraph” that was based on Mahallan's radar. It let the Slipstream ships communicate instantly, with no interference from clouds.

  Travis glanced up at Chaison. “Bit of a surprise about Slew, isn't it?”

  Both men smiled—and Chaison was about to say something witty when the green light of a thousand tumbling flares burst through the portholes. The Rook had entered clear air.

  * * * *

  Hayden dove to the side careless of where he might end up. Free of doubt now, Venera's spymaster was relentless, economical in his movements, and expressionless as he pursued Hayden around the room.

  It didn't help that this place was so bare of ornament. The antechamber where the bike had been left had only a few hand-straps on the walls, ceiling, and floor, as well as some cabinets and shelves that didn't make good purchase. The key to a gravity-free sword fight was never to let yourself become stranded in mid-air—and in this place, that was not so easy. As they circled one another Hayden tried to ensure that he had one hand or foot on a strap or piece of furniture at all times. With blank wall at your back, all you could do was jump straight out, and the enemy would know in advance where you were going. And when you dove at your enemy, you made your whole body a missile but you also could not stop until you'd made contact with something; your opponent would attempt to ensure that the something was his sword blade.

  Carrier seemed unhurried. There was no indication that adrenalin powered him; it was more like he was going through a set of mechanical motions, cut, parry, dodge, cut. He would keep doing it until Hayden was dead.

  Hayden made for the door but Carrier anticipated him. They came together in the center of the room, thrusting with their sword-arms while reaching to try to catch sleeve or foot with the other hand. For frantic seconds they tumbled and then a thrust by Carrier took Hayden through the left bicep. He shouted at the jolt of pain.

  Carrier gave a grunt of satisfaction. Hayden tried to pull back but Carrier fluidly moved with him, keeping the blade embedded in flesh as Hayden cursed.

  Not so gracefully, Carrier flailed at a wall-strap with his other hand. He caught it—barely—and swung his sword, with Hayden attached, outward. Hayden knew he was seconds away from being placed motionless in mid-air, out of reach of the walls, at which point Carrier could bounce around and cut him to pieces at his leisure.

  Desperately Hayden let go of his own sword, grabbed the blade of Carrier's, and pushed. The metal slid out of his skin, dotting the air with blood, and then Carrier yanked it out of his grasp, slicing Hayden's fingers open to the bone. Hayden writhed out of the way of the backhanded cut that followed. He tried to snatch his own sword out of the air but it had drifted too far away. He saw then that he really was stranded, two meters from the nearest hand-hold.

  Carrier sneered and stood up from the wall-strap, which he'd hooked with his foot. Hayden twisted around again and managed to kick the older man in the face. As Carrier cursed and spat blood, Hayden very slowly drifted across the room.

  Carrier dove past him again with a vicious slash. Hayden did as Katcheran had drilled him to do: he rolled into a ball in the air and presented his feet to the blade. The sword chopped right through the tough leather but a cut foot wasn't going to kill him. And the pressure of the blow put him closer to the bike.

  His sword twinkled as it turned on the far side of the room. Carrier perched at the inner door now, and was carefully lining up his next jump. This time he would thrust rather than cut, Hayden knew; there would be no evading the blow.

  He stretched out, reaching for the bike. Carrier laughed. “Even if you can reach that what are you going to do?” he asked. “Throw it at me? Bounce somewhere? I'll never let you get your sword, you know.”

  Hayden's taut fingers brushed the curving metal of the bike. And Carrier jumped.

  * * * *

  “Full about!” Chaison dove for the portholes, missed his grip, and banged his chin on the wall. He pressed his face up against the glass, staring out at vast sensual curves of green-lit cloud. He still had the advantage here, because the dozens of flares drifting out of the cloudbanks lit only a small volume; and the plan had counted on the fact that there were many smaller clouds dotting the edge of Winter. His ships could dive through them with impunity. But while the six battered, obsolete Slipstream vessels still had an advantage of speed and maneuverability here, it wouldn't be enough. Falcon simply had too many ships.

  The Rook pivoted in mid-course, air tearing at its hull, and Chaison strained to catch a glimpse of what was behind her. Lurid tumbles of cloud; arms and arches of vapor. And emerging from it only one other ship, so far.

  “All batteries, target that ship! Don't give it a chance to sound!”

  Too late. Even as the first rockets lurched towards the distant cruiser, a faint echo of its clear-air signal came to Chaison's ears. He cursed. “Take it out!” The noise of battle would prevent most of the other vessels from hearing that lone horn—but if only one picked it up, it would repeat it, and so would every other one that heard. Soon the clouds would be ringing with the signal that open air had been found.

  He went back to the radar display. The shadow of Falcon Formation's giant ship still lay some miles inside the cloud, and it was slowing. “All ships: put everything into stopping the dreadnaught. Release parachute nets ahead of it, mine the air—anything!”

  —Hammering sound of bullets hitting the hull. Sudden flame of a missile veering past. He heard the Rook's own machine gunners opening up at something. “Put us back in the cloud deck,” Chaison commanded as he regained his chair.

  The ship
took a hit before they managed to escape into the mist. There was chaos over the speaking tube for about a minute, then an all-clear. Chaison frowned at the indiscipline, but most of his attention was on the radar.

  They had arrived at this battle late. Daybreak was little more than an hour away. By the time Falcon's suns were glowing full, Venera would have had Mahallan switch Candesce's defensive systems back on.

  During this long night of dark maneuvering, Slipstream had thrown the Falcon Formation fleet into disarray, had wiped out its bikes and smaller vessels, and scored crippling blows on a number of mid-sized ships. The troop carriers appeared damaged as well. But that was all—and it was nothing.

  If they didn't score a decisive blow to Falcon's invasion plans in the next minutes, the whole mission would have been for nothing.

  “Sir!” It was the radar man. “We—I think we've lost a ship.”

  Chaison looked where he was pointing. One of the fast-moving dots on the screens had broken in two pieces. As he watched the pieces subdivided and disintegrated. The dots dissolved into smudges on the screens.

  “Any idea who that was?” Chaison asked into the sudden silence. He scowled at the display. The damn fools flirted with a mine cloud.

  There was silence in the bridge; the men glanced at one another. “Back to the dreadnaught,” Chaison commanded. “I want the cutters packed with explosives—warheads, bullets, everything we've got. Rockets haven't had much effect on it, so we're going to ram something bigger down its throat.”

  And if those don't work, we'll make the Rook itself into a missile.

  * * * *

  Carrier jumped.

  Hayden grabbed the seam of the bike's saddle and pulled as hard as he could.

  The cargo net he'd stuffed under the saddle flowered into the air and he spun as best he could, throwing it at Carrier. The spymaster shouted and tried to evade it but he was in mid-leap now and there was nothing he could do. Tangled, swearing furiously, he bounced off the bike and back into the air.

  Hayden planted both feet on the metal and pushed. The dive took him across the length of the room and he plucked his sword out of the air before spinning and kicking off from the far wall. Carrier was struggling to free his sword from the net; his awkward parry went bad and suddenly he was staring down at Hayden's sword, which stuck out of his chest.

  “Wh—” He tried to reach up; failed, and looked in Hayden's eyes. Carrier was trying to speak.

  “Don't talk to me,” said Hayden. “The one you need to explain yourself isn't here. You'll see him soon enough.” He let go of the sword, turned, and jumped back to the bike. Reaching around the exhaust vent, he caught a loop of the thin cable he'd stashed there before they had left the Rook. He pulled out the loop and began to unreel it.

  When he was sure Lyle Carrier was dead he unwove the net from around him, and attached the cord to it. Then he moved to the door and looked for the first of the packages he'd ordered Candesce to provide.

  * * * *

  Aubri Mahallan was acting very nervous, and it was driving Venera crazy. After the tenth time that the woman bounced a circuit around the room, Venera said, “Is there something you need to do?”

  Mahallan shook her head, becoming very still. “No. Nothing.”

  “Then settle down. It's not your husband who's in the middle of a battle right now. Your man's just down the hall.”

  “He's not my man,” said Aubri quickly.

  Venera raised an eyebrow. “Oh? He thinks he is.”

  Now Mahallan looked uncomfortable; as far as Venera was concerned, that was a definite improvement.

  “You don't think the waiting gets to me?” continued Venera. She crossed her arms, glancing once at the indicator device she had stashed in her bag by one wall. It still glowed steadily. As long as it was on, Chaison retained his advantage; so in a sense, its light was her lifeline to him. But she would have to shut it down soon, when dawn came.

  “I'm not you,” said Aubri, scowling. “I've done a great deal for your little project, Venera. Have you ever asked yourself what I'm going to get out of all this?”

  She shrugged. “You never asked for anything, did you? Which is odd, except that you're an exile for whom everywhere is the same ... But why not take Hayden Griffin? He's a fine catch for someone from the servant classes. Is that your problem with him? That he's not one of your own kind?”

  “You wouldn't understand,” said Mahallan.

  Venera laughed. “On more than one occasion I've been told that my problem is that I do understand people, I just don't feel for them. Which is probably true. But you're right, I don't get it. We've completed our project, you're free and as rich as you want to be. In just a few minutes you can switch the sun's defenses back on, and then all you have to do is take your money and your man and go enjoy yourself. What could be simpler?”

  Mahallan looked startled. “Is it time already?”

  Venera checked her pocket watch. “Getting there.”

  “Okay.” Aubri smiled; it seemed a bit forced to Venera. Mahallan glided over to the wish mirror. “I'll get ready to shut it down, then,” she said brightly.

  “All right.” Venera watched her, keeping her face neutral. As the strange outsider woman gazed into the mirror, Venera let herself drift over to her bag. She made sure that she could see the glow of her indicator, and Mahallan, without turning her head.

  Just in case, she loosened the scabbard of her sword.

  * * * *

  The dreadnaught was tangled in parachutes and trailed debris in a long smoking beard of rope and timber. Its engines were tangled knots of metal belching black smoke into the air. Its rudders were useless flags.

  There were no significant holes in its hull.

  The mist ahead of it was brightening as it approached open, flare-lit air. Just a few hundred yards and it would be free of the nightmarish disadvantage of the clouds. Its enemy would no longer be invisible. One shot from the rifled ten-inch guns mounted along its sides and the smaller ships would be matchwood. All it needed was the sight-lines.

  As the Tormentor slid into position to unloose a salvo, the dreadnaught got its chance. The Slipstream ship had been relying on the veils of mist to let it do what it had done ten times already: stand off, hidden, and pummel the larger vessel before moving to another firing position. This time, though, the intervening clouds proved to be just a thin curtain and when it parted suddenly, the Tormentor was unluckily right in the way of a searchlight. The dreadnaught's gunners had been waiting for this.

  The first shell convulsed the cruiser with an internal explosion. The next broke it in half. Six more followed, pulverizing the twisting remains before the shockwave from the first blast had died out. The Tormentor and all its men were simply erased from the sky.

  Rockets continued to rain on the dreadnaught from other directions—but the gun crews were emboldened now and began firing wildly. If some of their own ships were close by, well, too bad; any sane Falcon Formation craft would be headed for that brightening in the clouds by now. Only the enemy would lurk in the darkness, and so into that darkness they fired.

  A lucky shell clipped the Unseen Hand's stern and blew its engines off. Its crew bailed out, flapping away with foot-wings, but the Hand's captain was old, mean-tempered Hieronymous Flosk. He drew a pistol and aimed it at the bridge door. “Any man who tries to leave, dies!” he bellowed. “We're going in! Man your posts, you cowards! Make your lives count for something!”

  The Hand still had steering and was doing over a hundred miles an hour. When it lunged out of the cloudbank the dreadnaught's gunners had only a few seconds to fire and the one shell that hit bounced off the cruiser's streamlined hull. Then the Unseen Hand slammed into the side of the great ship and exploded.

  In a zone of half mist, where towering banks of cloud interspersed with pockets of clarity, the dreadnaught shuddered and sighed to a stop.

  * * * *

  “Sir.” The radarman sounded puzzled. Chaison look
ed up from trying to catch the flailing straps of his seat belt. The whole ship was rattling now as their airspeed peeled away planks behind the open wound of the hangar doors. They had to reduce their velocity, but a few bikes and cutters were still pursuing.

  The radar man held up his chronometer. “Sir, it's daybreak in Falcon. The radar shouldn't be working anymore, but it's holding steady.”

  Chaison stared at him. What did this mean? Was Venera giving him a gift of extra time? Or had something gone wrong in Candesce?

  He might have radar for as long as he needed it ... or it might cut out at any second. It no longer mattered: daylight was here.

  The clouds were an abyss of pearl dotted with instants of black—men, burnt-out flares and wreckage only half-glimpsed as the Rook shot by them. And coalescing out of the writhing whiteness were the iron contours of the dreadnaught. The great ship seemed determined to keep a pall of night around itself; it had drawn a cloak of smoke and debris around its hull. With each broadside it let loose, the smoke thickened.

  “I bet they never thought of this,” Travis said, shaking his head. “Rockets take their exhaust with them when they go. But guns ... They're blinding themselves with smoke.”

  “It's a gift,” said Chaison. “Let's take it while it's offered.” He moved to the speaking tube. “Are the cutters loaded and ready? Good. Wait until I give the order and then let them fly.”

  The Rook spiraled around the motionless dreadnaught just ahead of cannonades of deadly fire. Chaison stared through the portholes, looking for any vulnerable spot through the wavering lines of tracer rounds that subdivided the air. Enemy bikes shot past, snarling like hornets, and the Rook bucked to some sort of impact.

  “Enemy closing from all directions, sir,” said the radar man. “It looks like they've got another of ours boxed in too ... I think it's the Arrest. I can't see the Severance, but they're still broadcasting.”

  “Bring us closer,” Chaison told the pilot. He'd seen what he was looking for—a triangular dent, yards wide, in the hull of the dreadnaught. The surrounding metal was scored and burnt; something bigger than a rocket had impacted there. He reached for the speaking tube—