by John M. Ford
“No, Squadron Leader.” Vrenn was suddenly thinking of Ensign Merzhan’s look, and his words, and wondering if complete ignorance had really been there.
“That seems best. As much as we need diversion, the duel circle does not seem right, just now. And I do not know Ensign Kotkhe’s father; there are so many Admirals. ...” Kodon sat back, turning the tape over in his hands. “The ensign didn’t even scratch you, Cadet. How do you account for that?”
“I had the advantage of surprise, Squadron Leader.”
Kodon laughed. “Ah. Well, I can hardly assume that the other ensigns held him down for you.” He leaned over his desk again, held up the cassette as if weighing it. “Brawling aboard a ship under cruise is a violation of regulations, as is striking a superior officer ... but [79] injuries sustained during a lesson in personal combat are of course not actionable.”
“Combat lessons are usually given in the Officers’ Gym,” Kev said.
“It was occupied,” Kodon said. “I was using it.”
Kev said, “Of course, Captain.”
Kodon dropped the cassette. It struck a pair of doors on the desktop, which opened to swallow it, and closed on the flash of destroying light. “It simplifies matters enormously when honor claims are absent.”
Vrenn waited.
“Still, a disturbance was created, and Security was dispatched without cause. Commander Kev, I think you know what punishment is appropriate.” Kodon stood, and Kev. Salutes were exchanged, and the Squadron Leader disappeared into his inner cabin.
Kev, a portable terminal under his arm, walked to the desk. He brought the black panel up to working position, pressed keys. Green light flashed in his yellow eyes. “The Surgeon reports that Ensign Kotkhe will be unfit for duty for several days. Given your responsibility for this, your punishment detail will be to assume his duties aboard.”
“The Helm, Commander?”
“That is zan Kotkhe’s current duty.”
At times like this, Vrenn came close to denying the komerex zha: for the universe to be a game implied that it had knowable rules.
Kev looked at Vrenn. The look was very cool, very sharp. Vrenn had realized some time ago that Kev used his eyes as needles; he liked to watch others writhe, impaled on their points.
Finally the Executive said, “You seem to realize that you haven’t won anything. That’s good. It was necessary that the g’dayt-livered Kotkhe be replaced. You forced the Captain’s hand; don’t think he likes that. Just remember: he’s made you a Helmsman. He can make you raw protein if he wants.” Kev pushed more [80] keys on his console. In a quieter but no less threatening voice, he said “You’ll be breveted Ensign for the rest of the cruise ... or as long as you last. Don’t go changing your name yet. ...”
“I understand, Commander.”
Kev looked up sharply. In a wholly changed tone he said, “Yes ... it’s just possible that you do. But if you did plan this, Khemara, do not ever let anyone know it. Dismissed.”
Kodon’s Squadron hid, literally, behind a rock. The three cruisers, in Spearhead formation, hung behind a two-kilometer planetoid, shadowed from enemy sensing. A drone, too small to register at this range, orbited the rock, relaying image and data to the D4s.
“Keep the guns cold until I call for them,” Kodon said, not for the first time but without audible annoyance. “Zan Vrenn, watch the shadow.”
Vrenn’s console display showed a yellow-gridded sphere, the planetoid, and a larger blue arc, the electronic penumbra. “Margin seventy meters, firm,” Vrenn said.
“That’s good,” said the Captain. It was only acknowledgement, not approval. But it was good work, Vrenn knew: he was successfully holding the cruiser to a mark less than a third of its length away. Ensign Kotkhe had been out of Sickbay for ten days now, but this was the climax of the raid, and Ensign Vrenn had the helm.
The Communications Officer gestured. The drone operator touched a control, adjusting the satellite’s orbit: on the main display, a planet came into sharp focus, blue and brown and cloud-streaked. Keys were pressed, and data lines overlaid the visual, with a bright three-armed crosshair over the site of the Romulan groundport.
Tiny flecks appeared near the planet’s edge, and were annotated at once: “Cargo tugs,” the sensor [81] operator announced. Then: “Shuttle launches confirmed.”
Kodon watched the main board, scanned the repeater displays near the foot of his chair. “Helm signal 0.2 Warp,” he said, in the short syllables of Battle Language.
“0.2 Warp read,” Vrenn said.
“Show mag 8,” said the Captain.
The picture on the screen swelled, sparkling as the sensors reached their limit of resolution. The image still clearly showed the Romulan shuttles rolling over, to dock with warp-drive tugs already in orbit above the port.
The schematic display drew in four yellow crescents: Warbirds moving into convoy positions.
Kodon said, “Helm, action. Affirm, action.”
“Acting,” Vrenn said, and pushed for thrust. The planetoid fell away, the target world dawning above it.
“Weapons preheat,” Kodon ordered. “Shields attack standard.” Each command was no longer than a single word, the acknowledgements just snaps of the tongue.
“Warp 0.2,” Vrenn said.
“Squadron—” Kodon said, on relay to all the ships, and his next word was the same hi plain or Battle language: “Kill!”
They fell on the Warbirds from ahead and above, out of the danger cone from their plasma guns. Rom lasers, warp-accelerated into the delta frequencies, stabbed up, to detune against shields. Triplet disrupters knifed down, blue light sweeping across the enemy ships’ wings. Two Fingers severed a Romulan warp engine neatly; its other fire missed by meters. Death Hand cut almost entirely through a Warbird’s wing, and tore its spine open, splashing fire and debris.
“Precision fire,” Kodon said. “Helm, coordinate.”
“Affirm,” the Weapons officer said. “Affirm,” Vrenn said, eyes on three different data displays at once. There was no vision to spare for the controls: now his hands had to know the task.
[82] They did. Blue Fire scraped by a Warbird barely twice its length away, and cut both warp nacelles away in a stroke. The flat Rom hull, unable to maneuver or even self-destruct, wavered and began to tumble.
“Stern tractors,” said the Squadron Leader.
“Locked.” The beams pulled the crippled Rom away from the planet, slinging it on a slow curve toward deep space; the prize would still be there when they were ready to claim it.
“Five more coming, Squadron Leader,” the sensor operator said, then, in a tighter voice, “Correction, ten more.” He dropped out of Battle Language. “They must have been hiding in—”
“Show it,” Kodon said.
Finger-fives of Warbirds were swinging into high strike-fractionals above the planet’s east and west horizons. The Klingons were caught between,
Vrenn thought suddenly of white and black pieces on a square-gridded board: but this was no time for the image, and he shoved it away.
“Helm, Warp 0.3. Keep us well sublight, this close to the planet. Vector.” Kodon stroked a finger on his armrest controls, drawing the path he wanted on Vrenn’s display. It was not an escape vector. “Weapons, free fire,” the Squadron Leader said, then, “Zan Kandel, reopen the Captains’ Link.”
Blue Fire caught plasma to starboard, and shook as the harmonics leaked through; Vrenn drifted off Kodon’s line, by a hair, for a moment, then brought the ship back again. It was not responding normally: Vrenn scanned his readouts, found the power graphs dropping.
“Engineer—”
“You’ll have to share with the deflectors,” the Engineer said, as another bolt hit the cruiser. Power fell again. The Engineer turned. “Squadron Leader, commit?”
“Power to shields and weapons,” Kodon said, clipped and very calm. “We still fight.”
[83] When Koth of the Vengeance said something like that, his Bridge cr
ew usually raised a cheer. No one started one now.
Three Warbirds were in a precise, right-angled formation just below Blue Fire. Disrupters tore one open: trailing hot junk, it slid narrowly past another and dipped into air. There was a cometary flash. The remaining Romulans kept their formation.
“This admiral is an idiot,” Kodon said. “He’s got the ships, and he must have had a warning, but he is still an idiot.”
On the screen ahead, Romulan ships were bracketing Death Hand, ahead, on the wings, behind. Death Hand fired back and did not miss—it was hardly possible at such ranges—but the number of Roms tipped the balance. A plasma bolt struck the Klingon cruiser’s hangar deck from the rear, and detonated inside: there was a jet of incandescent gas from the dorsal vent.
Kandel on Communications said, “Squadron Leader, the Force Leader wants to know if you intend to land his Marines.”
“Can’t he see we’re expected?” Kodon stared at Death Hand ahead, dying. “What shield shall I drop to transport him down?” Kodon’s teeth showed. “Just tell him we are engaged, and that he is to stand by.”
Death Hand killed one of her harriers. “Weapons, that one,” Kodon said, stabbing a finger, and Blue Fire poured its namesake into another Rom. “Flat-thinker!” Kodon snarled, and as the Rom blew up there was finally a cheer on the Bridge.
The word closed the circuit in Vrenn’s mind. It explained the lockstep formations, the flat-plane attacks, the way Death Hand had been surrounded. Now, if there was time to make any use of the knowledge—“Squadron Leader, a thought,” Vrenn said.
“Squadron Leader,” Ensign Kandel cut in, “Death Hand sends intent to abandon and destruct.”
There was a pause. A Captain did not abandon until the gravest extreme.
[84] But not yet, Vrenn thought, not just yet—
“Affirmed,” Kodon said. “Only a fool fights in a burning house.” Then, with what seemed to Vrenn an infinite slowness, Kodon turned to him. “Proceed, zan Vrenn.”
“Squadron Leader, I know the rom zha, latrunculo—”
“He wants to play games,” the drone operator said.
Vrenn did not stop. “—which is played on squares, on a flat board. Pieces kill by pinning enemies between themselves—” Vrenn knew there was no time to explain the game, the thoughts behind it; Kodon must see. Vrenn pointed at the main display: the alignments of Warbirds and D4s were as clear to him as the naked stars around them all. If there were some way to show square references upon the triangular grid of the display ... perhaps Kandel could. ...
Kodon turned away. Vrenn felt eyes on him from all directions, felt the shame he had sworn under naked stars he would never know again, felt death in his liver.
“I know of the game,” Kodon said. “It is a fair observation. ... So, if this is the sort of idiot the Rom Admiral is, Thought Ensign Vrenn, what shall we do to him?”
“There is a single piece in latrunculo,” Vrenn said, speaking almost faster than thought, “with the ability to leap over others, like a Flier of klin zha. Other pieces must be concentrated against the Centurion. ...”
Kodon laughed loudly. “Signal to Death Hand, priority! Drop shields and transport, and separate, I say once more separate; hold destruct.”
“Helmsman—” A line appeared on Vrenn’s display. Vrenn took Blue Fire to Warp 0.5 and skimmed the cruiser over a Warbird, almost close enough to touch.
The Rom moved.
“Number 3 shield down.”
“Troop transporters energized to receive,” the engineer said, and the power graphs dove as a wave of Death Hand’s Marines were beamed aboard Blue Fire.
[85] Blue Fire jumped two more Warbirds, taking only token shots at them. Then, as Warbirds turned in place, a shudder went through Death Hand at the center of the enemy cluster: there was a brilliant ring of light at the junction of the cruiser’s narrow forward boom with her broad main wing. The two structures parted, and the boom began to crawl forward on impulse drive.
The Roms hesitated, turned again inward.
“Number 4 shield down, 5 up.”
“Transients in the signal,” the Engineer said, his hands running over controls. Power curves spiked, and warnings flashed yellow. He said “We’ve got some scramble cases.”
“Affirm,” Kodon said.
Marine no-ranks did not have personal transporter operators watching for them.
Blue Fire glided on toward Death Hand, directly toward it. Vrenn watched as his boards showed tighter and tighter tolerances, less maneuver power as the mass transports stole it from engines.
“Transport arc’s changing again,” the Weapons officer said. “5 shield down, 6 up.”
“Transients clearing from the signal,” the Engineer said, as the two ships closed.
“Signal to Death Hand,” Kodon said. “Invitation to Naval officers aboard.”
Moments later the main display lit with a picture of Death Hand’s bridge. Smoke obscured the scene. The Captain’s left arm was tucked inside his sash. Behind him, someone was lying dead across a sparking console.
“Your invitation received,” the Captain said. “My Ensigns are transporting now. I hope they find much glory with you.”
“I am certain,” Kodon said.
For the first time since the battle began, Vrenn thought about the damage to Blue Fire: who might be dead on the lower decks. But he had less time for such thoughts by the second. The two cruisers were less than [86] a thousand meters apart, on collision course. An alarm screamed; Vrenn snapped it off.
He shifted power between port and starboard engines: Blue Fire began to roll.
Kodon said to the other Captain, “And your Executive?”
“Dead,” Death Hand’s Captain said. “And I, of course ...”
“This need not be said,” said Kodon. “Kill Roms, with your Black Ship, Kadi.”
The other Captain grinned. “Not these Roms. They’re too stupid. After this death, no more for them. ...” His lips pulled back from his teeth, and his arm spasmed; blood soaked through the sash. The picture broke up.
Blue Fire slipped sidewise through the gap between the parts of Death Hand. Roms still surrounded them, some still firing into the dead ship’s hulk.
“Naval officers aboard,” the Engineer said. “Ready to receive second Marine unit.”
“Squadron Leader,” Communications said, “They’re breaking formation.”
Vrenn heard, registered, ignored: He was the ship now, seeking out the one gap in the formation of Roms they never would have thought to cover: how can two ships be in the same place at once?
Kodon looked up from his foot repeaters. “So, not all their Captains are such fools as their Admiral. ... Cancel transport. Signal Code TAZHAT. Action!”
“Acting,” said all voices on the bridge.
The planet whirled over on the display as Vrenn, clear at last of Death Hand, brought the ship about. Yellow lines cut across his displays, then green ones, then a blue. Vrenn pushed for thrust, the first set of levers, then the second.
Blue Fire engaged warp drive, and the stars blazed violet, and black, and were past.
“Flash wave aft,” said the Communications officer.
[87] “Shield 6—” said Weapons, and a rumble through the decks finished the statement for her.
“Power,” Vrenn said, and the Engineer gave it to him. Blue Fire reached Warp 2, and the rumble died away: the ship had just outrun the sphere of photons and debris that was everything left of Death Hand. And of the Roms around it.
“Kai!” Kodon cried out. Vrenn felt proud, then embarrassed: it surely must be Captain Kadi that the Squadron leader hailed.
Then Kodon said, “Navigator, course for the nearest outpost. Dronesman, trail one to flash. Communications, have Two Fingers home on the drone signal.”
Kandel said, “Sir, the cargo ships—”
“Dust, like all good Roms,” Kodon said, quiet but intense. “I am not now interested in prizes. I want an answer, and I
do not think it is to be found back there.”
“Squadron Leader, shall I signal to the Fleet—”
“Signal them anything and I’ll have your throat out!”
So that, Vrenn thought, is what a real threat from Kodon sounds like.
After a moment, Kodon spoke again, in his normal tone. “Engineer, raise the heat and moisture on quarters decks; we’re going to be hungry but we might as well be comfortable. And I want Warp 4 power as soon as possible.” He got out of his chair. “Kurrozh, you have the conn. Vrenn, you will come with me.”
Vrenn stood, not knowing what to think and so trying to think nothing. It was an old trick to threaten the one and punish the other: this had an intensified effect on both subjects. He could not think of what he had done wrong, but knew far better than to be reassured by that.
And then he knew too well what he had done: he had suggested a strategy to a Squadron Leader during battle, and worse, the strategy had worked.
But then, as Vrenn followed Kodon to the lift, he saw one of the Bridge crew flash him the spread fingers [88] of the Captain’s Star, and then another, and another. And he knew, then, that he would have his ship, even if it flew in the Black Fleet.
The ensign’s tunic was torn, and smelled of smoke. He slung his bag on to the empty bed, sat down hard, and saluted with a bandaged hand. “Kelag, Death Hand,” he said.
“Kai Death Hand,” Vrenn said. “Vrenn—” He paused. “Brevet Lieutenant.”
“Vrenn ... ?” Kelag looked at Vrenn’s rank badges. “But you’re an ensign?”
“Brevet Ensign.”
Kelag shook his head. His eyelids were drooping. “I don’t understand. What’d you ...”
“I was Blue Fire’s helmsman. I am, I mean.”
“Oh,” said Ensign Kelag, awake at once. “Kai Vrenn. Kai Blue Fire.”
Vrenn nodded. “That was Ruzhe’s bed,” he said. “He was aft, in Engineering.”
“Bad battle.”
“He got through the battle all right ... but when they were working on getting the power back up, some tubes blew. It was intercooler gas. Almost plasma, they said. Anyway, there hasn’t been time to clear out his things.”