by Bruce Bethke
Antonio Aguila raised a finger. "Lord Haversham took ill earlier this morning. I am authorized to act in his place." He allowed himself a slight smile, showing a glint of white teeth. "I assume you are referring to the New German Unity?"
"NDE troops are attacking Port Aldrin right now!" von Hayek shouted. "Call your dogs off, Wu, or tear that peace treaty into shreds! We'll blow the launchers!"
The chairman raised his hands. "I assure you, Governor, I will investigate this matter immediately and take the facts to the Security Council. If the NDE has indeed taken it upon itself to attack Port Aldrin, rest assured they will suffer appropriate sanctions. I do hope you are not in any immediate personal danger?"
The governor shook his mane of white hair. "Of course not. But that's not the issue. Once again Earth forces are violating the sovereignty of the Free State, and we will not stand for it! This time you've gone too far, and your little charade doesn't fool me at all!"
When neither Wu nor Aguila dignified his outburst with a response, von Hayek continued, his voice much calmer. "You have ten minutes to call those troops off. I don't care whether they're yours or the NDE's. Either way, if they don't leave Port Aldrin within ten minutes, you can consider yourselves at full war with us."
Von Hayek slammed a fist down on the comm console and terminated the conversation.
"He is intelligent," Chairman Wu commented after the screen went dark. "But he is worried."
"Not worried enough," said Aguila. "He's not at Port Aldrin."
"What do you mean? Our intelligence very clearly placed him and the rest of the council there."
"No. You heard him speak. Did he sound like a man who's got half a battalion of soldiers on his doorstep? He's somewhere else. They've fooled us, Wu, and our big surprise strike is missing the target." He stood up to leave and bowed slightly. "With your permission, though, I believe I can soon find out where he is."
"How?"
"I'll bet Haversham knows," snarled Aguila. "And I'll rip his spine out with my teeth if I have to, but I'll get the truth from him."
Undisclosed Location
26 November 2069
11:45 A.M. EST
"Ah, Antonio. I was wondering when you might get around to visiting me." Although his face was badly bruised and caked with dried blood from the NDE beating, Haversham's voice was as light and cheerful as ever. He was bound harshly to the steel-framed hospital bed and his arms were restrained, but he clearly continued to keep the traditional stiff upper lip.
When Aguila didn't answer, Haversham went on. "All the same, I must say: a 'medical emergency?' And then you had me whisked away to this ghastly private Lubyanka? Really, how ... Soviet. I expected something far more creative out of you and Graf."
Aguila looked down at him with contempt and hatred, his well-formed face almost glowing with barely suppressed fury. The rage in his black eyes made him look like an avenging devil returned to Earth to pay back an evil tenfold.
"It wasn't enough for you, Edward, was it? It wasn't enough to be a living anachronism, a fossil from an earlier age. You wanted to restore the old system, return to the time when insignificant little nations like yours raped and pillaged the rest of the world!"
"You can't prove anything," Haversham said mildly. "There's simply nothing to prove. I never conspired with any of the Lunar leaders. I never even had any contact with them."
"But I know you, Edward! Your very thoughts condemn you! I see how you look about you and sneer, thinking you're superior to everyone and everything else. And with your outdated ideology, you and von Hayek are simply two sides of the same coin!"
"Liberte, egalite, fraternite," Haversham said ironically. "Your problem, lad, is that you simply can't bear the thought that others might not share your priorities or your values. The people of the Moon simply want to be left alone, and you can't even allow them that right."
"That right does not exist! They have a duty to the rest of the world."
"I understand. The group is all, and there are only duties for the individual, never rights. It's the same old dream, Antonio, cloaked in different terms. But it has never worked, and it never will. That's the problem you face, Antonio. Because at the root of your system is simply raw force, and some people will never submit. You'll have to kill them, and in doing so, you will become the very monster that you claim so much to hate. Open your eyes, my dear boy. You're not a bitter little child in Chile anymore. Stop thinking like one."
"Enough!" Aguila was barely containing his anger now. "Where is the lunar leadership? I know you know where they are! They're not at Port Aldrin, so where are they?"
"It won't make any difference."
"Tell me!" Antonio looked over his shoulder towards the door and called out. "Dr. Schwartz, bring the equipment now, please." He turned back to Haversham. "You're an old man, Edward. You can't keep secrets from us. It'll take Schwartz only a few minutes to rip the truth from your mind."
"That won't be necessary, Antonio. I'll tell you where they are, but the information won't do you any good. There are factors at work here that go far beyond you, me, and von Hayek."
"Tell me anyhow!" As the younger man loomed threateningly over the frail figure on the bed, a nurse entered the room pushing a cart laden with syringes, vials, and other ominous-looking apparatus.
"Tycho," Haversham said sadly. "They're at Tycho."
"Thank you, Edward." Aguila knew instinctively that Haversham spoke the truth. Then he turned away from his former mentor and addressed the nurse. "Tell Dr. Schwartz that the truth serum is no longer necessary." He tapped a black vial. "Use this instead."
"Yes, sir," she replied without looking at him.
"Good-bye, Edward," Aguila said as he strode from the room without looking back.
Haversham smiled faintly and shook his head with regret. "Good-bye, you poor wretched boy," he whispered. "I had such high hopes for you."
Then he looked up at the nurse, who was studiously avoiding his gaze as she prepared a syringe. "Et tu, my dear? Though I should consider myself fortunate to be graced by so fair an Angel of Death. Might I enjoy the comfort of one cigarette? I do believe there are some in my briefcase." He gestured toward the other side of the room with his angular chin.
"Sorry," she said. "This is a smoke-free building."
Aboard UN Gunship SC-23v
26 November 2069
16:47 GMT
Chuck Houston surveyed his troops as the two gunships sped toward Port Aldrin. Although a single armored shuttle could have ferried the whole platoon down from the Schwarzkopf, Houston had chosen to use gunships instead. If his men had to shoot their way in, he reasoned it was best to go in with all the speed and firepower he could manage. It didn't look as if the landing zone would be contested however. The Loonies were already in a hand-to-hand fight for their lives; they weren't likely to be manning space defense stations. Houston wasn't worried about that.
The colonel was worried about was the morale of his platoon, though. These soldiers were from the New Guinean contingent; they were ill-trained, unfamiliar with the heavier Nonex battlesuits, and worst of all, unhappy at being thrown into a risky combat situation when they'd thought the war was over. Houston had hoped they'd be hyped up at the prospect of rescuing other UN soldiers, but most of them were simply alarmed at the prospect of facing the business end of the Blacksuits' railguns. Not that he could blame them for that, of course. He himself wasn't feeling too sanguine about surviving that possibility.
A beeping in his ears shook Houston from his worrisome thoughts, and he accepted the comm link before realizing it was a relayed link from Earth.
"Colonel Houston?"
"Roger. This is Houston," he answered. The voice sounded familiar, and he wondered who it was as he counted down the light-speed lag.
"General Daniels tells me you are heading for Port Aldrin to support the NDE forces attacking the rebels there. This is Antonio Aguila, acting chairman of the Committee on Lunar Development."
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The slick one, Houston thought. I knew that voice sounded familiar. "That's correct," he lied.
Light-speed lag.
"Your orders have been changed. The rebel leadership is at Tycho, not Port Aldrin. Change course for Tycho immediately and take Governor Pieter von Hayek at all costs. I don't care if you take him alive or dead, but take him. The only way to end this is to cut the head off the snake. Literally, if necessary."
"I understand, sir. But what about the UN prisoners being held at Port Aldrin?"
"The information we received about the hostages being held at Aldrin was from the same source that led us to believe the leadership was there too. At this point we don't know where the POWs are, but if you nail von Hayek, you'll be able to find out."
Houston nodded inside his helmet. For once, a politician was making sense. "Understood, sir. I'll have the pilots change course immediately. Will we have any backup?"
Light-speed lag.
"Of course. Our allies from the NDE have the situation at Aldrin under control, and I've already ordered Colonel Starkenburg to pull out as many troops as he can spare and send them to Tycho. He's promised one platoon immediately and another platoon ten minutes from now."
"What's the first platoon's ETA at Tycho?"
"According to General Daniels's estimate, they're fourteen minutes behind you. We can't afford to wait for them, though. There's also an ATFOR platoon being sent down from the Schwarzkopf, but they'll be twenty minutes behind."
"Understood, sir." Houston didn't at all like the haphazard nature of this operation, but he wasn't paid for his opinion, he was paid to get the job done. He understood that the appearance of even a small unit in the right place at the right time could turn the tide of a battle, and sometimes a war. But he also knew that such maneuvers were usually hard on the men in that particular unit. "We'll be there. Just tell those damned reinforcement pilots to keep the pedal to the metal."
Surprised, Aguila laughed shortly. "I will do that, Colonel. We're keeping a link open to General Daniels, so please keep us informed."
"Yes, sir."
On the relay, there was no audible click, but somehow Houston knew that the voice in his helmet was gone. After giving the new orders to the pilot of his gunship, he told the pilot of the other ship to set up a comm relay so he could address the troops on both gunships at once.
"I've got good news and bad news," he told his men. "The good news is, we're not gonna fight the Blacksuits after all. The bad news is, our prisoners aren't at Aldrin. It turns out the Loonie leaders are at Tycho, and we figure they know where our POWs are, so we're gonna get old man von Hayek and beat the information out of him."
There was a brief cheer, which heartened Houston, although he suspected it was due to the prospect of not having to face the NDE rather than to the chance to bring the war to a close. But it was a start. Settling back against the cabin wall, he called up a 3D map of Tycho on his display and began to work out a plan of attack.
Port Aldrin
26 November 2069
In the Fog of Battle
"Where's Stahl?" Bunny asked as they fell back toward the center of the dome. Only five of them were still together: Dalton, Britt, Jeff, Josef, and Bunny. "I saw Oshikatta go down. Did anyone see what happened to Stahl?"
"He got hit," said Britt, sounding short of breath. "Too much shrapnel and his shields went."
"Dammit!" Bunny swore. "We should have fallen back as soon as I saw how many there were. Now we don't have the damn grenade launcher. We'll have to try to ambush a heavy squad and steal one from them."
"No," said Josef, holding up his hand. Since they'd begun to fall back, he'd been silent. Now Dalton realized the colonel had been in communication with someone else the whole time.
"We've got to go to Tycho," Josef said. "Somehow the dirts've figured out that my father's there, and they're sending gunships. We've got to get to the transports."
"We can't do that," protested Jeff. "There are people here who need our protection. The militia will get slaughtered without us!"
"Shut up, boy," replied Britt. "Without the governor, we have no reason to keep fighting." "But there's regulars at Tycho."
Before the argument between Jeff and Godfrey could erupt into a full-fledged conflict, Josef spoke up.
"This isn't a matter for discussion. CenCom says a whole company of NDE Blacksuits has broken off of the attack and is being loaded back onto transports. One of the ships has taken off and is on a heading that may be ... Yep, they're heading for Tycho too."
Josef slowed down to a fast walk, and the others followed suit. "Tycho's gonna need all the help we can give them. Now, which way is the transport room?" He looked around.
"Oh, damn!" he exclaimed when Dalton pointed back toward where they'd lost Oshikatta and Stahl to the Black-suits. "It would have to be that way."
Dalton ducked another burst from a Blacksuit's railgun. He almost laughed aloud as he recalled how naive he'd been just three weeks before. Back then, wandering alone through the corridors of Grimaldi, he'd been sure he was as scared as any human could possibly get. Ha! He snorted bitterly as he responded to the Blacksuit with a burst of his own.
In comparison with this, Grimaldi hadn't been so bad. There he'd just been wondering if there were troops around the corner, whereas now he knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that there were. Not to mention the fact that these same troops had kicked butt on his squad not fifteen minutes before. He fired again, a longer burst this time, and howled with glee as the blacksuit finally fell.
"Mayday, Mayday. This is Colonel von Hayek. We need support in section two, level three, corridor seventeen, just past the intersection with corridor N. This is a priority one. Repeat: priority one." Von Hayek was broadcasting across the spectrum, not caring if the invaders heard him. If he and his commandos stayed here much longer, they'd be dead anyway.
"Colonel? Come in, Colonel. This is Lieutenant Smirnov, Aldrin Militia, Beta Company. We're down five halls from you, to the west. I can hear a firefight going on ahead of us. Is that you, Colonel?"
"Right, Lieutenant. Now, here's the deal. We have to get down hall seventeen, but these two squads of Blacksuits are blocking our way. Can you create a diversion?"
"Yes, sir. We'll hit them from behind, and you can get past while we keep them occupied."
"Crude, but it'll work. How many men do you have?"
"Two squads, sir. We've even got a couple ACRs, sir."
Dear God, thought Josef. Nothing but ACRs against Blacksuits with railguns. They'll get slaughtered. "Okay, Lieutenant. When we hear you hit them, we'll move. But keep your heads down and your butts covered. They'll have you outgunned." Josef knew he was about to condone something that would haunt him for the rest of his life, but he also knew where his duty lay, and so he was forced to content himself with the brief warning.
At his first opportunity, he darted across the corridor to the alcove where Bunny knelt, firing her captured railgun methodically down the smoky hallway. It was hard to see any farther ahead than five or six meters, even with infrared boost, but the occasional shield flare cut through the gloom and told him that at least some of the Blacksuits were still in position.
"The militia will be cut to pieces!" Bunny protested after he told her of his plan.
"Not in time. It'll only take us two minutes to burn our way past the Blacksuits. The NDR will need more time than that to shut down two squads of militia."
"Is it really that important for us to get to Tycho?"
"If we don't get there, everything's over and the NDE wins. I assure you, it's that important!"
"All right." As Bunny spoke, they both heard shouts and screams coming from down the hallway.
"Do it right now, Colonel," the voice of Lieutenant Smirnov shrieked on the broad band.
"Go, dammit, go!" Bunny shouted, as Von Hayek led the sprint down the hallway. Not all the Blacksuits had turned to deal with the new threat from their left, but enough had, and
Britt and Josef cut down two strikers with searing plasma gobbets before the Blacksuits even realized the commandos were advancing.
A large Blacksuit raised his weapon and fired a burst at Bunny, catching her square in the chest. Blue light exploded around her, and she fell as her shields ablated, but just before they collapsed before the furious metal onslaught, Dalton blew the Blacksuit into pieces with the launcher he'd just picked up. He had emptied it, and he didn't have any more grenades, so he cast it aside as he extended a hand to Bunny, fumbling at his back for his ACR as he helped her up.
"Grab your weapon later. Just run," she screamed at him, and together they ran down the corridor as railguns chattered and lasers illuminated the hallway with neon streaks of green and red. As they ran, they saw to their right the militia in rapid retreat, forced back before the fury of the German counterattack.
We got through, but at what cost? Bunny thought. "Stop," she ordered Dalton once they were clear of the immediate combat zone. She unsnapped his ACR from his oxy tanks, handed it to him, and then slapped him on the rear. "Do you know where the transports are?"
"Around that corner, then a left and a left."
Knowing Dalton's general tendency to be unobservant in matters directional, Bunny worried that they were lost, but for once his memory was correct, and they reached the transport room just as the lights dimmed and began flashing red.
"Oxygen's down," said Dalton. "Seal your suit."
"It is sealed, you moron." She pressed the access button. "Dammit, the door's locked."
"No problem." Dalton grinned and pulled out his new norton with a flourish worthy of an Old West gunfighter. Slipping it into the slot, he set happily to work.
"Um, Dalton ..."
"Hang on. I've almost got it." The numbers flashed by his display at speeds too fast to read, but the patterns were starting to emerge and repeat as the virus sorted out the correct access code. "Just a few more digits."
"Okay," Bunny said as she leveled her railgun at the approaching Blacksuits. "But you might want to hurry it up just a bit."