First Strike

by Christopher Nuttall

  The reporters insisted on stopping often to interview more people, but many simply refused to talk and hurried onwards. One friendly alien was happy to lecture the reporters on why they should convert to the one true faith, yet despite some of the reporters listening patiently he refused to be drawn on current affairs. Adrienne rolled her eyes as the Galactics stalked off in frustration. How could anyone claim to have the one true faith when Earth alone had produced hundreds of different religions? The Cats had never developed a religion of their own – some of them regarded that as a sign they were superior to the younger races, who needed the comfort of belief in something greater than themselves – but they’d cataloged literally millions of religions as they’d shaped interstellar society. Some human researchers claimed that religions that shared similar messages actually worshipped the same god, if known by different names, and that comparing the different messages would allow them to build a picture of their true faith. So far, as far as Adrienne knew, their research had been inconclusive. Some religions were incomprehensible to human minds. Others had more in common with polytheistic religions than the monotheistic religions that dominated Earth.

  They reached one of the Funk neighbourhoods and street activity dropped away to almost nothing. The handful of Funks in the street slipped away from the reporters, hiding in the shadows before they could be seen and interviewed. Adrienne was aware of unblinking red eyes watching them from windows, even though when she looked around she could see nothing. A patrol of Marines were walking down the middle of the street, looking hugely intimidating in their combat armor. Their suits had been set to display images, rather than automatically camouflaging themselves to match the local environment. One Marine looked alarmingly like a creature from Greek mythology. Others looked as if they were tribal warriors marching out to war.

  “Most of them are hiding,” Barbie whispered. Even she seemed subdued by their surroundings. “They don’t think that we will protect them if the entire city rises up and comes baying for their blood. I’m not even sure that we have the manpower to protect them if the shit hits the fan.”

  Adrienne shivered. Humanity had gotten some good press from saving the Funks from being lynched, but the Hegemony had been spreading stories of human-organised massacres and outright terror strikes mounted against helpless civilians. There was little truth in the stories – and few of them were placed in context – yet some of the Galactics believed them, either because they trusted the Hegemony or because they disliked the upstart humans. A race rebelling against the division of their space by the Commune set an unfortunate precedent for the Galactics. Some of them were likely to hope that the Hegemony won rapidly, cheaply and totally.

  The latter, at least, wasn't going to happen. Adrienne had heard rumours that covert operations teams were already preparing humanity’s revenge if Earth should happen to be destroyed. Taking a well-defended planet wasn’t easy, but destroying one was simplicity itself. The Galactics would be horrified if humanity destroyed a life-bearing world, yet if humanity lost the war it was likely that the human race would be beyond caring.

  The damage caused by the fighting drew the attention of the reporters, who bombarded their minders with questions. One large city block had been destroyed by a KEW after the Funks had turned it into a firing position to launch HVMs at the oncoming shuttle, killing the missile crews and a number of civilians. Some of the Funks had promptly claimed that over a thousand civilians had been killed in the attack, although few of the reporters believed their statements. Even the dumbest reporter could look at the damage and wonder how a thousand people could have fit into the city block. The bodies had been removed and buried by the Marines, once they’d filmed and cataloged the entire site for future inspection. No one had attempted to claim the bodies for proper treatment, in line with the Funk customs.

  Other buildings had been attacked by angry mobs, some of them composed of lesser Funks angry at their superiors. The Funks seemed to jump on any sign of weakness, perhaps driven by their belief that only the toughest deserved to lead. Their Empress, if some of the reports were accurate, had little compunction about ordering mass punishment if she felt that her position was threatened. The Funks did seem to lack the sadism that had infected many human despots, but the ruthlessness of their leaders would have made Stalin blanch. But it was the only way to keep in power.

  “And so the tour goes on,” Barbie muttered. “Do you still want to visit another city?”

  Ward had insisted that she did, but Adrienne wasn't so sure. Many of the other cities were dangerous, perhaps more dangerous than human cities in the middle of a war zone. Some of the Galactic reporters were trusting in their media credentials to protect them, others – more careful – were demanding Marine escorts as they roamed the streets. So far, the Marines were stalling. They didn't want to expose Marines to insurgent attack and yet they knew that they had to keep on the right side of the Galactic media. If there was a right side...

  “Only if escorted,” she said, finally. The Federation had a policy against paying ransom to recover its people. Instead, its considerable resources were deployed to extract revenge. It had worked on Earth – the Federation had crushed piracy with savage force – but it might be harder on Garston. “I’m very attached to my life.”

  Barbie smiled. “So am I,” she said. “I wouldn't want to go anywhere on this planet without an armed escort.”

  * * *

  “So we’re not going to be able to move onwards for at least a week,” Tobias said, slowly. Ideally, he would have preferred to move onwards at once, but they had to attend to Garston and ensure that the fleet train had resupplied his fleet. At least they had been joined by a new cruiser, Cochrane, bringing his fleet up to its full complement of cruisers. In theory, each of humanity’s cruisers was equal to a superdreadnought, although Tobias suspected that the real picture wasn't that rosy. “And then we press onwards to Hammerfall.”

  “It is their sector capital for this region,” Commander Sooraya Qadir agreed. “ONI claims that they have at least one squadron of superdreadnoughts based there, along with a hundred smaller ships. We could attempt to outflank it, but as long as those ships are in our rear…”

  “They’d be a clear threat,” Tobias said. After the terrifying risk of sending the gunboats to Heavenly Gate, hitting Hammerfall seemed comparatively mild. They were already at war with the Hegemony, after all. “We couldn't afford to risk them heading to Earth.”

  He studied the star chart for a long moment. ONI had been trying to monitor the progress of Hegemony reinforcements ever since the war had begun, but it was difficult to track starships by monitoring their transmissions. Human intelligence specialists were among the best in the universe, capable of decrypting Hegemony transmissions at astonishing speed, yet it was often surprisingly difficult to pull useful intelligence out of them. The Hegemony hadn’t managed to get organised in the wake of the Battle of Terra Nova – they were still worried about their flanks – but it wouldn't be long before Hammerfall was heavily reinforced. If he waited too long, their position might be impregnable.

  And the last thing he needed was heavy losses.

  “Order the recon ships to start monitoring the system,” he ordered. Humanity had been using civilian ships, right up until the moment that the Hegemony had ordered all civilian ships out of their military-dominated systems. Maybe they’d realised that the humans were using some of them to spy, or maybe they were trying to convince the other Galactics to intervene. The reports from Center claimed that the Hegemony wasn't seriously looking for help – they still believed they could take humanity on their own – but they might have changed their minds. It wouldn't be the first time ONI had managed to get something wrong.

  He looked back at the display. By any standard, Hammerfall was heavily defended, yet he’d been considering possible ways to take it long before the war had begun. There was an Achilles heel in their defences. All they had to do was survive long enough to use it. />
  “And then contact Formidable,” he added. Pulling her in was a risk, but it was necessary. “I want her to rendezvous with us at Point Alpha. We’re going to need the gunboats for this operation.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Kauirik had been a mistake, one of the rare worlds where the terraforming process had gone badly wrong. The atmosphere was still breathable, but the planet was hot and covered in vegetation that had adapted itself to the new environment. After attempting to fix the problem, the original terraforming team had given up and abandoned the settlement rights to the first race that wanted to claim it. The Hegemony had annexed the world two hundred years ago, after realising that it could support a colony. Most of the Hegemony’s dissidents had been expelled to Kauirik if they'd been too important or well-connected to be simply executed.

  There were few defences and no starships in orbit around Kauirik, which rendered it impotent in the war, hardly worth the attention of the human fleet. Lady Dalsha had gambled on that, after hiring a civilian ship to take her from Garston before the human commander thought better of simply letting her go. It would have taken too long to reach the homeworld to report in person, at least before the humans struck Hammerfall or bypassed it in their drive towards the Empress. And besides, it might be safer for her personally not to be near the Empress when she read her report.

  The Association had never been able to perfect the tachyon-burst transmissions that made up the backbone of the interstellar communications network. It was difficult, and extremely power-intensive, to hold a two-way conversation over several light-years, leaving most races and corporations dependent upon recorded and compressed messages. The Great Lady overseeing the planet had agreed to let her use the communications node for a two-way message, even if it would drain her planet’s power reserves. Lady Dalsha had told her enough to make her certain that the last thing she wanted was to get involved with the war – or the process of breaking the news to the Empress. She was unlikely to prove forgiving to the person who had lost five superdreadnoughts.

  Even with her clan roots, calling the Empress directly was never easy and she had to wade through a series of functionaries who wanted to know why she was calling. Information was power in court, and entire careers had been made or broken because someone had gotten a crucial piece of intelligence before their rivals. Lady Dalsha patiently insisted that she had to talk to the Empress personally, ploughing her way through functionary after functionary. At least none of them quite had the nerve to cut her off. The Empress would have heard about Terra Nova by now, even if the Hegemony didn't have any sensor records from the battle. No one wanted the blame for preventing the sole known survivor access to the Empress.

  Eventually, the Empress’s face materialised in front of her. The image was unstable, flickering apart into bursts of static before reforming, but the voice channel was stable and the line should be fairly secure. Nothing was guaranteed in a universe where most of the Galactics waged subtle war against one another, and yet there was no other choice. She had to make her report to the Empress.

  Protocol dictated a full prostration before the Empress, but the Empress held up one clawed hand before she could even begin the ritual. The protocols were a part of society, a reminder that the Empress – as supreme mistress of the Hegemony – held the power of life and death over her subjects, but this Empress was known for disdaining them. Lady Dalsha privately admired her willingness to avoid protocol, if only because an Empress who started to believe that she really was all-powerful would likely be assassinated sooner rather than later.

  “We have heard disturbing reports,” the Empress said. “The humans have declared war upon our Hegemony. They have claimed that they have smashed your squadron. We charge you now to speak truly. What happened at the human colony world?”

  Lady Dalsha took a breath and started to explain, running through the entire battle from the first arrival of the impossible starships to her decision to surrender. The Empress’s red eyes watched Lady Dalsha, showing no sign of visible emotion as the entire story spilled out, followed finally by the human occupation of Garston and her release to catch a starship to the nearest colony world. Her brief description of the human weapons attracted the Empress’s attention, even though the Empress didn't quite seem to believe her. But who would have thought that the human race could advance so far, so fast?

  But maybe it did make sense, Lady Dalsha considered. The Cats had served as the source of most technology for the Galactics, but they’d been stagnating for thousands of years, content with what they’d had. Most of the other Galactics had concentrated on building up their own numbers rather than their research and development institutions, particularly those who believed that the Cats had taken technology as far as it could go. No genuinely new breakthrough had appeared in the Association for longer than the Hegemony had been in space. Unless, of course, the Cats had something they hadn't shared with anyone else.

  That was a common belief among those Galactics who still had faith in the founding race, who felt that the Cats would act if the galactic balance of power was seriously threatened. There was no disputing the fact that the Cats had been in space longer than anyone else and that they understood their own technology; it was possible that they had some super-weapons they’d held in reserve for the day the younger races rose up against their vision of order. But Lady Dalsha doubted it. No race with the ability to strangle the Hegemony in its cradle would have allowed them to grow so powerful. Even now, the Cats could have stopped the Hegemony in its tracks, if they had been able to summon the will to accept the casualties.

  And yet… maybe that was what Mentor had had in mind, when he’d equipped the humans with modern technology. Earth wouldn’t have been any more than a footnote if Mentor hadn't contacted the planet, nothing more than a slight pause while the Hegemony crushed all resistance and established a loyal government. His gamble had worked out perfectly, from that point of view. The Hegemony would have to crush humanity, or be crushed in turn, leaving whoever won the war badly weakened. It might have been exactly what he’d had in mind.

  “This is most disquieting,” the Empress said, finally. “Weapons that can shoot through shields, super-charged antimatter weapons, rotating shields… do you have any sensor records to support your statements?”

  “No,” Lady Dalsha admitted. The humans had been cooperative, but not that cooperative. “My ships were captured by the humans and their sensor records were wiped.”

  It was an open question how long it would take for the humans to repair the superdreadnoughts and press them into service. A Hegemony repair crew would take months, at least, to get the two ships ready to travel to a shipyard, and years to complete repairs. How long would the humans take? But then they might not even bother trying to repair the two ships. A contest between superdreadnoughts was one that the human race would lose.

  She watched the Empress mulling over possible thoughts. One thing was clear; there could be no peace, not until the human race was crushed. The Empress could not afford to show weakness, not if the tale of the battle had grown in the telling. By now, the Galactics were probably muttering that a single human destroyer took on an entire fleet of superdreadnoughts and wiped them all out. It didn't matter than anyone with a gram of sense would realise that story was an exaggeration. All that mattered was that it would weaken the Hegemony.

  And yet… the Hegemony’s position was not good as it was. Three powers, two of them as expansionist as the Hegemony, bordered its space. Even the third, the Tarn, were too powerful to be crushed in a quick and brutal campaign. Pulling ships away from the borders would be asking for trouble, while not redeploying their forces would mean that the humans would keep chopping away at the Hegemony until the entire state collapsed into civil war. It could not be allowed, but how could it be prevented. They’d badly underestimated the human race and the entire Hegemony was going to pay the price.

  “I cannot afford to lose you, not now,” the Empress said
finally. Lady Dalsha almost sagged with relief. Death didn’t bother her, not when compared to the possible punishments for losing an entire squadron of superdreadnoughts. “The new human weapons can be countered, one assumes. Or they would have flown a fleet of invincible starships to Homeworld and demanded surrender.”

  “There is no such thing as an invincible starship,” Lady Dalsha said, grimly. The Galactics had believed that the only thing that could stop a superdreadnought was another superdreadnought, at least until the human race had proved them wrong. “We can take out the human ships, if we refuse to panic. They can be beaten.”

  “I am ordering you to Hammerfall,” the Empress said. “I cannot give you command of the fleet there – too many scales will start to itch – but I can instruct the Great Lady in command to listen to your suggestions. The humans must deal with Hammerfall before they head further into the Hegemony, so we will meet them there.”

  One pair of clawed hands clicked together. “Unfortunately, raiders along the borders have been growing more active over the last two standard weeks,” she added. “Pulling small units away from the borderlands will only encourage them to continue their attacks. However, I have issued orders for the border fleets to release two squadrons of superdreadnoughts, which will be dispatched forward to reinforce Hammerfall. A number of other ships will be dispatched as they become available.”

  The Empress’s mouth lolled open in a long smile. “Do you have any recommendations for further operations?”

  Lady Dalsha considered. Reinforcing Hammerfall was sensible – and if the humans took the planet before the reinforcements arrived, the forces rushing towards it should be sufficient to retake the planet before the human fleet moved onwards. If they weren't… they might have to start pulling ships away from the borders anyway, no matter what happened with the other powers. The Hegemony would lose badly if the humans actually managed to win their war…