System Failure

by Joe Zieja

  “Can we take on that Jupiterian force if we get everyone through the Un-Space point?”

  Zaz and Rholos looked at each other. It was the kind of look that said “Does this guy really not understand how screwed we are?” which, in turn, educated Rogers as to exactly how screwed they were. What he didn’t know, however, was why.

  “Sir,” Rholos said, her voice low, “we won’t have a chance to get the whole force through. We’ve got enough to deal with the pirates for now, yes, but it takes time to get our huge fleet through the gate. If the pirates were working for us, like they’re supposed to be doing, they might buy us enough time to bring everyone else through and take the fight to the Jupes. But, as things are . . .”

  “We’re all going to die,” Rogers said. “Got it.”

  “And here I thought we were getting better at all of that talk,” Belgrave called out.

  Rogers ignored him. So they’d managed to not get killed by the pirates in order to very nearly be able to not get killed by the Jupiterians. He wished he’d known that before he’d completely separated the Flagship from the rest of the fleet and started acting like he knew what he was doing.

  If they couldn’t get the pirates to play nicely, it was over.

  • • •

  Cynthia gritted her teeth. If she was going to be on a pirate ship, she might as well act like a pirate, right?

  There were no words bandied, no declarations of righteousness. Just a couple of crunching noises as Cynthia’s pistol connected with the side of Sjana’s head, followed by the sounds of surprise and many pistols being drawn. For a moment, Cynthia thought that this was it. She’d never see the Flagship again, never see the Viking or Rogers. But she was a marine; she knew how to read people better than that. Cynthia knew that not everyone on board felt the same way about this fight as their captain. And now that they didn’t have a captain . . .

  “Hey!” Hideko shouted, barreling onto the bridge. “You can’t—”

  Cynthia shot him in the chest, which seemed very pirate-like indeed.

  Now that they didn’t have a captain or a first mate, they could make the rational decision. Rather than stand and wait to be shot, however, Cynthia shoved Sjana’s body aside—a motion, she realized, she was rather practiced at—and sat down in the pilot’s seat.

  “Come on, you idiots!” Cynthia shouted. “Stop fighting the wrong fucking enemy and turn those guns toward the Jupiterians!”

  The crew didn’t cheer, exactly. They sort of mumbled agreeably and sat back down at their stations. Cynthia let out a deep breath and spun the chair around to face the console. Why was that button blinking?

  “And someone get me a manual on how to fly this thing!”

  • • •

  “Starman Brelle,” Rogers said as the world crumbled around him. “Hail Captain Devingo’s ship.” He swallowed. “Tell them I’m going to turn myself in—”

  “Uh, sir?” someone said. “The pirates have stopped shooting at us.”

  “—to a superstar once everyone hears my banjo playing!” Rogers finished. He waggled his fingers in front of him in either a rough approximation of a banjo picking roll or an attempt to tickle his own belly. Nobody seemed interested in making the distinction. “What’s going on out there? Why the sudden stop?”

  “Rogers? Rogers, are you there?” a voice was coming over the radio.

  “Who’s hailing us?” Rogers asked.

  Brelle punched some buttons on her console. “It looks like Devingo’s ship, sir.”

  “What do you want? Who is this? You don’t sound like Sjana at all.”

  A burst of static. Rogers thought that the line had cut out, because whoever was on the other end was answering in little clips of communication that didn’t make any sense.

  “. . . it’s not because . . . what? . . . no, I don’t know what that button . . . stop touching my hand or I’ll shoot you, too!”

  A disruptor pistol fired.

  “. . . well I warned him, didn’t I? Rogers, it’s Mailn. Sjana is, uh, napping. Can we blow up some Jupiterians now, or what?”

  Rogers sat back in his chair, feeling smug. He had been right. That was where Mailn had gone. Disregarding the fact that she was not only AWOL, but now technically a deserter during a time of war, which brought with it the death penalty, Rogers felt a huge weight lifted from his shoulders. They could work out the particulars later.

  “Alright, Sergeant Mailn, tell everyone to get the hell away from the Un-Space point and get moving toward the Jupiterians right now. Let’s buy as much time as we can while the rest of the fleet pours in. Conserve your ammunition, fly around in circles, hit and fade, or whatever. That’s a thing, right?” He looked at Zaz.

  “Confirming that’s a thing, sir,” Zaz said, giving him a thumbs-up.

  “Right. Go do that.”

  “You got it, boss,” Mailn said, and the comms cut out.

  Several people on the bridge who had heard the conversation clapped, cheering.

  “Don’t get too cocky,” Rogers said. “This just went from impossible to possible.”

  “Way to rally the troops, sir,” Belgrave said.

  “Shut up. Everyone in the war room ready for this? What’s going on down there?”

  “Ready,” Krell said.

  “Captain Rogers, I took a moment to cross-check some signals with my fleet,” Premiere Thrumeaux said over the comms. “From what they’re telling me, it’s not just that the Galaxy Eater isn’t here. There’s no evidence of the Galaxy Eater ever being here at all. There would be distortions, emissions . . . but there’s nothing.”

  “I’m confirming the same thing,” General Krell said.

  Keffoule was silent.

  “What’s the matter, Grand Marshal?” Rogers said. “Are you disappointed that your psychic mathematician was wrong?” He laughed bitterly and turned to Deet. “I know you’re probably pretty excited about this.”

  “Yes, Rogers,” Deet said. “I am beyond thrilled that we have made a trip halfway across the galaxy and nearly gotten ourselves killed just so I could point out that someone I hate is wrong.”

  Rogers paused for a moment. “Are you getting better at sarcasm?”

  Deet beeped and cocked his head a little bit, as though some actuator in his neck had gone a little weird.

  “No. That was a truthful statement. I’m confused as to why you asked me this question. I hate that [EXPLETIVE] guy and place great value on his humiliation.”

  Rogers cleared his throat. “Okay, yeah, sure. Fine. Do me a favor and go get the Viking and tell her to track the Astromologer down. I’ll need a bruiser.”

  “I thought she was your secretary?” Deet asked.

  “Uh,” Rogers said, “I’m pretty sure I rescinded that order. Look, just go do it, okay? She doesn’t pick up the comms when she sees I’m calling. Tell her she might get the chance to hit someone and it’ll cheer her up.”

  “Fine,” Deet said, and ambled toward the exit of the bridge. “Have a great time winning the war while I’m gone.”

  “. . . Sarcasm again, or no?”

  “Rogers, I am genuinely wishing you good fortune. I am a little upset that you would think I would do otherwise.”

  “Uh, right,” Rogers said. “Well, everyone else who isn’t confusing me, let’s blow up some Jupiterians.”

  • • •

  It only took another ten minutes before the full brunt of the Jupiterian ambush hit them. Rholos explained to Rogers that there must have been some miscalculation on the Jupiterians’ part, since they started much too far away in the battlespace to cause effective damage before the Joint Force could regroup. She didn’t offer any speculation as to why the Jupes made the blunder, but Rogers was just thankful they’d made it. The Jupiterians had clearly known the composition of Rogers’ force, and had the advantage of surprise. Without the tactical error of too much distance, Rogers didn’t know if they would have had a chance.

  All of that was pretty high-level
analysis, sure, but that’s what Zaz and Rholos had told him, and he assumed, perhaps naively, that they were good at their jobs.

  “I knew there was a spy,” Rogers said. “And it’s probably you, Belgrave.”

  “It’s not me,” Belgrave said with no more surprise than if he’d been accused of blinking.

  “We’ll find out later,” Rogers said. “But I’m still saying it’s probably you.”

  “It’s not.”

  “Whatever. I want to talk to the Astromologer, too.”

  “He’s probably the spy,” Belgrave suggested.

  “Nope,” Rogers said. “I think it’s you.”

  The bridge was alive with the sounds of combat; people yelled at each other with fervor and an enthusiasm that was egged on by the fear of shortly being dead. Rogers felt a little lost; most of the battle plans were being enacted by independent commanders of the different squadrons within the different fleets, further distilled by the fact that he had three other commanders aboard directing their own forces. Zaz and Rholos did most of the minutiae, and only asked Rogers questions when they needed his input.

  Deet, who had come back to the bridge just after the first shots had been fired, informed Rogers that the Viking wasn’t interested in doing anything for him. When he’d told her she might get the chance to hit someone, however, she’d suddenly become interested. The last Deet had seen of her, she’d been wearing a pair of brass knuckles and actually rolling up both of her sleeves.

  “Rogers, your facial temperature seems to have risen significantly. Are you feeling unwell?”

  “I’m fine,” Rogers said, his voice not cracking even a little bit. The image of the Viking burned in his heart like the plasma blasts that were raining down on his fleet. He thought perhaps this was not the appropriate time to be thinking of romance, but he also thought that perhaps this might be the last chance he would ever have to show the Viking he wasn’t a complete idiot. Of course she didn’t want a secretarial position; she was a Viking. And Vikings raped and pillaged.

  Obviously he couldn’t have her do that for him, but there was an important analogy here. He didn’t need Mailn to tell him that either, which he thought might be an indication of personal growth. He made a note to delve more into that introspective thought later.III

  “Have we finished the high-level battlespace analysis?” Rogers asked. “The whole fleet is through now, aren’t they?”

  “Yes, sir,” Rholos said. She walked over to him, frowning.

  “That doesn’t look like the face of someone who is about to win a war,” Rogers said quietly.

  “I’m not sure it is, sir,” she said. “The Jupiterians’ force is enormous. Not only did they seem to know that we were coming, they seemed to know what we were bringing and when we’d be here. Several ships that should be combat ready are reporting that they are unable to engage in combat until they deal with internal ship malfunctions. Our readiness dropped fifteen percent as soon as they all came through Un-Space.”

  “What?” Rogers asked. That was a huge portion of his force! “Why the hell are they reporting that now?”

  “It only just started to occur,” Rholos said. “That’s why I think they knew the timing of our attack.”

  Rogers squinted. “How does ships malfunctioning mean that they knew our timing?”

  “Well, on the Valiant and the Destiny, all the toilets were made by Snaggardir’s, sir. They’re currently flooding the ships with sewage.”

  “That’s really gross.”

  “And on the Terminus, all the door actuators were made by Snaggardir’s, so they keep closing on people. The infirmary is flooded with people with broken limbs.”

  “Great,” Rogers said. So they’d definitely known when the joint force was coming and had triggered their weird machine inconveniences to fire off at the same time. He turned to Deet. “Do we have a lot of Snaggardir’s equipment on board the Flagship? Other than you, I mean.”

  “I am not a piece of equipment,” Deet said. “And I’ll scan as well as I can, but it might be difficult to cross-reference all the known subsidiary corporations and then run the serial numbers of every single piece of equipment on the Flagship to see what parts were assembled by whom and where.”

  “Alright,” Rogers said. “You get started on that and then—”

  “And . . . done,” Deet said.

  Rogers stared at him.

  “What?” Deet asked. “You humans are the ones with the distorted view of time. I was trying to explain this to Hart the other day.”

  “Right,” Rogers said. “Uh, what did you find?”

  “We’re surprisingly clean. The Flagship was built by General McBoe-Locklass.”

  “Is that a person?”

  “No,” Deet said. “A conglomerate of several Old Earth companies. The only thing that seems to have been sourced from Snaggardir’s on the ship is the cleaning equipment.”

  “Oh,” Rogers said. “That’s not so bad. Can you shut any of it down?”

  “Oh my god!” someone screamed from the other side of the bridge. “Oh my god it’s got me, someone please help, it’s trying to kill me aaarrrggghhh!”

  Everyone turned to see what the commotion was about, Rogers jumping out of his chair and, for some reason, reaching for his disruptor pistol. This was odd because not only was he not wearing a pistol, but there was absolutely no chance of him doing anything useful with it if he had been.

  The panic was coming from a young ensign who had fallen over and was clutching at his leg frantically. At his feet, a Snaggardir’s brand automatic vacuum cleaner was slowly sucking in the bottom of his pant leg. It obviously couldn’t hold the capacity of the entire pair of pants, though, so it would spit out a bit of fabric and then roll it back in again, creating the impression that the device was humping the troop’s leg. Very slowly. While making vacuum motor noises.

  “Oh for . . . Can someone please unplug that?”

  A young starman, looking like he was experiencing suitable secondary embarrassment from his superior officer’s predicament, quietly leaned over and switched off the unit. The ensign curled up into a ball and wept.

  Rogers sat back down, his body experiencing so many things at once that he was having trouble registering it all. Should they try to make an organized retreat back through Un-Space? Without the pirates blocking them anymore, they had a clear line to get the hell out of here if they needed to. Pursuing a force through an Un-Space point was generally considered a poor idea, because the fleeing force could turn around and blast ships as they exited the Un-Space point on the other side.

  But if he ordered that, there would definitely be casualties as everyone filed back through the point and the Jupiterians picked off the end of the line. Since the Flagship was already the furthest from the point, that meant that the Flagship might be one of those picked off.

  Yet, if he stayed and fought, there was a chance of a catastrophic defeat. So, should he sacrifice part of the fleet to fight again another day, or engage and hope for a miracle?

  Rogers couldn’t make the decision alone. He brought up all of the other systems’ commanders on the comms and relayed the situation to them as expediently as he could:

  “We’re going to die a little, or die a lot. Which would you like?”

  “Nice,” Belgrave said.

  After relaying the information, along with what he understood to be his expert analysis of the situation—that is, merely repeating exactly what Rholos had told him—there was a moment of silence as everyone contemplated their options.

  Premiere Thrumeaux was the first to speak. In his mind’s eye, Rogers could see the woman standing at her battle station, her hand raised dramatically above her head.

  “In times like these, we must sometimes suspend our desires for personal safety, and instead—”

  “Right,” Rogers said. “You want to fight—I get it. Jupiterians are literally like five minutes away. Just yesses or nos for the rest of you, please.”

&nb
sp; “Yes, fight,” Keffoule said.

  “I will do whatever the Grand Marshal does. I could not bear to be seen as a coward in her eyes.”

  Rogers took a deep breath. He should have expected this. They were, after all, the top military leaders of their systems.

  Except they were all wrong! They were all going to die if they stayed. This was a stupid idea, and they needed to run, now.

  Rogers expressed this in words that may or may not have been frantic and/or pleading.

  “But we can make up for inferior numbers with brilliant strategies,” Krell said. “With our combined experience we can achieve a decisive victory over the enemy.”

  “Are you guys kidding me? I am literally the only person out of all of us who has actually fought a decisive space battle before.”

  “Excuse me,” Keffoule said, “I believe I was there when you fought with Zergan.”

  “Making up for kicking me in the face by trying to get part of your own damn fleet back, yes,” Rogers said. “So much experience there.”

  They bickered at him for a moment, but Rogers wasn’t listening. He was the commander here, or “first among equals” as Thrumeaux liked to remind him, but he could make the decision to leave if he wanted to. That damn weird feeling in the back of his head was beginning to nag at him again. He still didn’t know if he had a proper name for it. Was it a conscience? Was it duty? Was it the idea that he was part of something bigger than himself? He made a mental note to examine all of this later and come to some serious, deep conclusions.IV

  “Sir,” Rholos said. “We need to make a decision. Now.”

  Out the window, Rogers could see the Jupiterian fleet approaching with unnerving speed. A tremendous amount of metal was hurling toward him, and some of the ships were already firing unguided volleys in the hopes of catching some of Rogers’ ships as they moved into the envelope. What the hell was he supposed to do with this?

  His mouth was moving, but he wasn’t sure what he was going to say until after he heard Rholos echo the order back at him.

  “Send messages to HQ as soon as possible. Give them all of the intelligence we’ve collected about this zone, the ambush. Everything. Tell them we’re staying to fight.”