The Venusian Gambit

by Michael J. Martinez

  His sketch complete and other notes compiled, Weatherby allowed himself a generous portion of wine before turning to his logbook to write his report on the engagement. But upon the once-blank page, a message awaited him.

  By order of His Royal Highness, George, Prince Regent and Prince of Wales, acting on behalf of His Majesty, George the Third, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, Etc.,

  The message was, in fact, in the midst of being inscribed back on Earth, likely at Edinburgh, where the Prince of Wales had retreated after the French took London, and King George III along with the city. Weatherby sighed a second time, for this would likely be a message of some importance and great inconvenience.

  A rap upon the cabin door was followed by the rapid entrance of Finch, who rarely waited for acknowledgement before entering. “You might be pleased to know that my original estimate was too high by at least ten or more, Tom. We managed to save more than I first thought. I—” Finch stopped as Weatherby’s face grew drawn and tense as he read the message as it was written, with the power of the Great Work of Alchemy spanning the distance between worlds.

  “Your damnable message papers will be the end of me, Finch,” Weatherby growled as he finished the message and slammed his logbook shut.

  Finch smirked as took the chair opposite Weatherby. “What now, then?” he asked as he accepted a glass of wine from the ever-mindful Gar’uk.. “I…oh…”

  “What?” Weatherby demanded.

  Finch looked away again, as if focusing on something else, then whispered quietly to himself.

  “Finch?”

  Looking even a bit more pale than before, Finch returned his attention to his commander and friend. “So sorry,” he replied, a bit of forced charm coming through. “Thought I forgot something below decks. What about my message papers?”

  “We’re to return to Edinburgh for ‘consultations,’” Weatherby said, his dismay and disgust evident. “And we’re to take three-fourths of our ships with us.”

  “Well…at least you received your orders after the French were defeated,” Finch allowed.

  Weatherby leaned back in his chair and took a prodigious swig of wine. “Let’s bloody well hope they don’t try again until Elizabeth Mercuris is reinforced. Damn these consultations! I cannot help but wonder what scheme Prince George has in mind to rescue England this time.”

  CHAPTER 3

  January 3, 2135

  Maria Diaz was all smiles as she propelled herself down the corridor of her latest command, the JSCS Hadfield. They had launched from Ride Station, JSC’s interplanetary launch hub, located at the second Earth-Sun Lagrange point. The DAEDALUS team had set up shop on Ride for the past two weeks, dumping a boatload of scientists back on Earth with very little notice. She knew the scientists had left important work behind, and probably a few experiments were shot to hell because of it, but her team needed time to prepare. There was, after all, a goddamn for-real alien invasion coming. Not exactly War of the Worlds, perhaps, but potentially far more insidious.

  Diaz was in her element. She wore the black jumpsuit that had been a second skin for most of her career, she was floating in zero-g, she was heading off into space to do something foolish and dangerous. Life was good.

  Mostly.

  She entered the Hadfield’s control and information center, or CIC—a kind of situation room just aft of the cockpit where all the piloting was done. Spacecraft needed far less actual piloting than atmospheric vessels; just point and go. But in this case, she wanted a warm body up there, because their quarry could suddenly get ideas.

  The Hadfield’s crew—all of whom were DAEDALUS team members—snapped to attention when she entered, giving her a little surge of pride. It never gets old. Even the civilians stopped what they were doing to hear the news.

  “Jimmy, secure the ship,” Diaz ordered.

  Capt. James Coogan of the U.K. Royal Air Force nodded and flipped on enough electronic countermeasures to ensure they could not be overheard—an extremely minute but non-zero chance. The fact that these would disrupt comms to and from the ship was sadly necessary. “Ship secured, ma’am.”

  Diaz shot the young officer a small smile. Jimmy’s red hair and round face made him look like an uppity, priggish teenager, but damn if he wasn’t a fine officer. He also happened to be frighteningly adept at obtaining information, getting shit organized and generally doing anything and everything Diaz asked. She got him promoted after Egypt, and she’d consider another bump up the ladder if he’d just stop calling her “ma’am” in that British way that sounded like “mum.”

  “All right, listen up,” Diaz said. “Just got off the horn with President Weathers. The Chinese finally signed off with us boarding Tienlong as a humanitarian mission. Creative way of saving face. That means Operation Bear Trap is a go. We’re up in 30 minutes, unless Tienlong gets some ideas. Jimmy, status report.”

  The room darkened and the dozen souls inside turned toward the holoprojection in the center. Earth hovered off to one side, with the Moon close by. Ride Station was 1.5 million kilometers away from Earth. There were three other dots as well. The first was Hadfield, heading off toward Mars’ orbit. The second was Tienlong, coming in fast from Saturn. And the third was Armstrong, and it looked to Diaz that Shaila Jain was hitting the gas at just the right time.

  “Tienlong has yet to alter speed or course,” Coogan said. “She’s slated to make Earth orbit in about 15 hours, but we’re hoping we can do something about that. Armstrong has reported a couple of very small burns in the last hour, which ought to position her right alongside Tienlong in approximately 25 minutes.”

  Diaz frowned; it wasn’t as though she begrudged Shaila the chance to rescue Stephane—if he could be rescued. But there were two others on that ship, and in addition to being outnumbered, Diaz knew that Shaila was stressed, physically and mentally, by the loss of Stephane. Shaila was a thorough professional, no doubt about it, but Diaz knew that if it were her wife aboard that ship, she’d tear through that ship with a chainsaw to save her.

  “Can we get there first, Baines?”

  From the cockpit, U.S. Air Force Capt. Elliot Baines—fully rigged in VR hologear—chimed in. “Calculating new burn now. And…yes, General. We’ll need a full burn in…four seconds.”

  “Do it.”

  The Hadfield’s engines roared to life, pushing the little ship a little faster into space—and closer to Tienlong. “ETA now 21 minutes, General,” Baines reported after the engines died down.

  “And that pushes up our timing, Gerald. How we doing?” Diaz asked the African man sitting at an impressive array of controls and holodisplays. Before him, a series of dots ringed the Earth-Moon system, and a number of lines proceeded from these dots toward Tienlong.

  Dr. Gerald Ayim, former scientist for the Total-Suez conglom and one of a bare handful of people who understood the quantum physics behind the extradimensional incursions over the past few years, moved his fingers across his virtual control panel, and a number of lights began to glow. “BlueNet is responding. We have full control of the satellite array. Ready to release the energy at your command, General.”

  Diaz gave him a nod, which he returned with an absent-minded smile as he further adjusted and attuned the BlueNet array of satellites. BlueNet was originally designed to detect Cherenkov radiation—a specific and harmless type of light that served as a tell-tale sign of extradimensional incursion on Mars. Six months ago, when Ayim was working for Harry Yu and their experiment went to shit, Ayim and his late colleague Evan Greene managed to stem the runaway interdimensional energies by using the BlueNet array to redirect them.

  The hope here was that BlueNet could do it again. Armstrong had reported hundreds of thousands of minute Cherenkov readings in the icy rubble that had been Enceladus—rubble that Tienlong then drifted through. By all appearances, Tienlong had collected whatever was giving off the Cherenkov radiation and was bringing it—or them—
to Earth.

  “All right, so we fire up BlueNet to draw off the energy from whatever’s on board Tienlong. Next up, we get our team aboard. Baines handles the maneuvering and docking. And then we let Major Parrish take over. Report, Major.”

  To Diaz’ right, a wiry, androgynous looking man gave her a wolfish smile. “Boarding team is ready,” Canadian Marine Maj. Geoff Parrish said. “Point-focused microwaves to start, and if that doesn’t slow them down, we have soft rounds.”

  Diaz nodded, though she couldn’t bring herself to return the smile; she liked Stephane Durand too much for that. The point-focused microwave emitters could drop a horse for well over a minute, and the average human was stunned unconscious for a good fifteen to twenty minutes. But Diaz wasn’t taking chances; the soft rounds would definitely penetrate human flesh, but wouldn’t breach Tienlong’s hull. “I want prisoners, Major. Target soft rounds accordingly. Lethal force only as a last resort.”

  The smile dropped under Diaz’ gaze, as did the gung-ho attitude. “Yes, General,” Parrish replied.

  “All right, places everybody, this is not a drill,” Diaz said loudly. “Alert stations in ten minutes. I’ll be in my quarters. Jimmy, you have the conn.”

  Diaz spun around and propelled herself out of the CIC. Her quarters were less than a meter into the corridor, and they were a Spartan affair if there ever was one. But she had secure comms, and privacy. On a shuttle like Hadfield, that would have to do.

  She slid into a chair, put on her lap belt, and fired up the comm on her tiny desk, aiming it at Armstrong. “Jain, this is Diaz. Come in, over.”

  A moment later, Shaila’s face came to holographic life over the desktop. In all honesty, Diaz was pleasantly surprised at how the acting captain of Armstrong looked. Sure, there were some bags under her eyes, a few new worry lines on her dusky-skinned face. But her black hair was regulation, her uniform spotless. And there was some steel in her eyes that came across even through the hologram.

  “Jain here, General. Go ahead….” Shaila’s voice drifted off. “Edinburgh?” she whispered.

  “Come again, Commander?” Diaz frowned.

  Shaila shook her head and straightened up. “Sorry, General. Stray thought there. Go ahead.”

  Diaz relented and gave her a small smile. “Trying to beat us there, kid?”

  Shaila shook her head. “No, ma’am. I simply wanted to be sure we had adequate time for docking before arrival. We’re a lot bigger than Hadfield, ma’am.”

  It was, of course, a valid point. Except for the fact that Shaila literally played chicken with Tienlong when the two ships first arrived at the Saturn system, then manually piloted the ship through the goddamn rings in order to avoid collision. Docking with a ship at the same course and speed was child’s play in comparison. And to Diaz, the response seemed a little too canned, the kind of quick reply a teenager gives when they came up with the perfect excuse for staying out late.

  “Well, sorry, but we’ll end up there first. I’ll be sure to take the ventral airlock so you can have the starboard-side lock,” Diaz said. “I’ll have two members of the boarding team greet you there. You’ll form up with them as Fire Team Two under Parrish. Clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Shaila said, sounding slightly disappointed.

  Diaz knew why. “Once you’re off your boat, you’re not in command anymore. Parrish is the boarding team officer, and you’ll report to him. Mess with that, and even though I love you dearly, girl, I will bust your ass down to ensign, fourth class.”

  Shaila smiled. “There’s no fourth class in the Royal Navy, General.”

  “There will be when I’m done,” Diaz replied. “Don’t worry, Shay. We’re going to get him out alive. And we’re going to figure out how to help him.”

  Shaila gave a curt nod and swallowed hard. “Thank you, ma’am. Appreciate that.”

  “Good. When we give the signal, keep your comms open. Remember, full pressure suits until we’re damn sure that ship’s decontaminated. Get a move on, skipper.”

  “Roger that. Armstrong out.”

  Shaila’s face winked out, and Diaz leaned back in her chair a bit. They’d chatted on and off during the Armstrong’s trip home; Shaila had refused all comms with anyone remotely attached to psych or medical, but Diaz had been able to get through to her on and off—with the help of psych off-camera, of course. It wasn’t in her portfolio, per se, but Shaila was as much a friend as a subordinate, and they had shared something utterly amazing and historic on Mars. Few people could really relate to each other as they could.

  “CIC to Diaz, two minutes to BlueNet range,” Coogan reported over the intercom.

  Diaz unbuckled from her chair and floated back out, around the corner and into the CIC. “All right then,” she said. “Let’s get this party started. Gerald, ramp it up.”

  “Yes, General,” Ayim replied. “Initializing energy transfer sequence. I—”

  Coogan interrupted loudly. “Tienlong’s changing course! Heading now 180 mark 6, pulling away—and into Armstrong’s path!”

  Diaz vaulted across the room to Coogan’s holodisplay. “Shit. Open a comm to Armstrong.”

  “She’s already calling, ma’am,” Coogan replied. “Go ahead, Armstrong.”

  “Tienlong is now 17 minutes from us, Hadfield,” Shaila reported. “Permission to proceed with boarding, over.”

  “Hold on, Armstrong,” Diaz said, turning toward the Hadfield’s cockpit. “Baines, intercept course, now, and burn hard. Gimme an ETA.”

  Everyone aboard Hadfield felt the slight pull of gravity as the engines fired once more. “Looks like…22 minutes now, General. Best we got if we’re going to ease up on her,” Baines reported.

  “Gerald?”

  “Recalculating,” the scientist said. “Now coming into BlueNet range in….25 minutes.”

  “What?” Diaz thundered. “How the fuck is that possible?”

  Ayim looked at Diaz, petrified at the outburst. “I’m sorry, General! There is one satellite in the array that has been malfunctioning for weeks. They seemed to know exactly where to go. Now I have to maneuver to compensate.”

  Diaz wheeled around to Coogan. “Jimmy?”

  The young officer grokked her meaning instantly. “We’re not detecting sensors from them, ma’am. There’s a fair amount of transmissions out here, so we’ll need to check their comm logs to see if they somehow got warning.”

  That was, of course, the biggest fear Diaz and her DAEDALUS team had. It appeared the Chinese were infected—or possessed, depending—while still on Earth. Did Tienlong have any Earthbound allies left? Would they try to help? And how? Guiding the ship away from BlueNet was a good start.

  “Are they still on a course for Earth?”

  Coogan’s eyes darted over his holographic data again. “Barely. And I don’t think they have any more fuel. This was their last play, I think, ma’am.”

  “All right. Armstrong, you still there?” Diaz asked.

  “Roger, Hadfield.”

  “Jain, you’re docking first. I want you to secure your docking port, but do not go further until we arrive and send a fire team to you. Are we clear?” Tell me we’re fucking clear, kid.

  “Yes, General,” Jain replied. “We’ll secure our port and await your arrival.”

  Diaz looked into the holomonitor, watching the beads of light representing Armstrong, Tienlong and Hadfield converge. “Roger. Keep the line open.”

  All she could do now was pray that those aboard Tienlong—whomever they were now, and whatever their plans were, didn’t have too many more surprises in store.

  May 3, 1809

  There were a scant few souls walking along Broad Street, despite the delightful spring weather and the late-afternoon hour, when there were few courses scheduled among Oxford’s scattered colleges. The march of philosophical inquiry and the education of young men were of paramount importance, of course, but principals and tutors desired their afternoon tea just as much as any other Englishmen. />
  Yet despite the possibilities of the day, the hour and the weather, there was a decided lack of actual tea in Oxford these days, for it was that the Royal Navy found itself blockading the very nation it served—now occupied by Napoleon’s forces.

  And that, more than the lack of tea, and certainly more than the educational ambitions of the students remaining at Oxford, was the reason few were upon the streets. The patrols of French soldiers garrisoned throughout Oxfordshire were headquartered here, and those patrols primarily consisted of Napoleon’s Corps Éternel—those soldiers alchemically reanimated after their untimely passing to serve the nouveau régime.

  So it was, then, that one young tutor walked purposefully through the near-abandoned streets, passing only a spare few students and a carriage or two. A column of blue-coated soldiers marched down Catte Street, but he paid them no mind, for it was a common enough shortcut between Broad and High Street. However, he turned to watch them go on past Hertford College, where he taught, for it would not be meet for them to become overly curious as to goings on there.

  Especially when the goings on at the Bodleian Library—conveniently enough, across Catte Street from his very lodging—were far more interesting of late.

  Satisfied that Hertford held no interest for the French this day, the young man continued on, entering the King’s Arms public house. He smiled to the tavern keeper, who gave a broad wave in return—and a short, curt nod. There was no one to worry about within. All was well, and his compatriots awaited him down the stairs.

  The tutor smiled slightly and took the glass of wine left for him upon the countertop, then proceeded to the back of the room, opening the door leading downward to the cellars. A faint glow from a small room therein gave him light enough, and he entered to find he was the very last to arrive.