by David Drake
Adele reviewed the ship’s spaces as they rose toward orbit. Normally that would not have been part of her duties.
All was well. Both rigging watches would go out on the hull to set the sails for the first time after lift-off. Port watch was in its bunks; starboard was at stations in the corridors where pull-out handgrips allowed them to anchor themselves against changes in thrust. This morning Woetjans—Van Arp—had shifted all the Sissies to the starboard watch.
The High Drive motors started raggedly, for a moment adding their greater impetus to that of the plasma thrusters. The thrusters cut out to save reaction mass. The High Drives pushed the vessel along far more efficiently than thrusters, but in an atmosphere anti-matter which was exhausted without recombining would erode the motors themselves.
The normal altitude for switching propulsion on a habitable planet was about a hundred thousand feet, but there were many variables. The relative abundance of reaction mass and the relative wear state of the drive and thruster nozzles were generally factors, but the captain’s whim might matter even more.
Thrusters vibrated in a deep note like heavy pumps. High Drive motors had a buzzing discharge like that of power hacksaws in steel; many people found the latter even more unpleasant. Adele worked through either. So long as she had a task in hand, nothing made a great difference.
“Preparing to enter Ithaca orbit,” Morseth announced.
Adele set a green tell-tale on the corner of Tovera’s flat-plate display to alert her, then locked Commander Braun’s console adjacent to her own. On a two-way link she said, “Commander, this is not a joke. The ship has been captured by agents of the Tarbell government.”
“What?” said Braun. He touched the latch plate of the drawer holding his pistol and seemed surprised that it didn’t open. Only then did he turn to look at Adele, holding the control wands of her data unit.
“Commander, don’t move,” Adele said. This was one of the times that she wished she could project emotion better; people hear emotion rather than words, even if the words are the difference between life and death. “If you move, you’ll die.”
“I don’t need a gun to take care of you!” Braun said as he rose from his couch with his arms extending toward Adele. Tovera shot him through the temple. Wisps of hair flew. As Braun fell, Tovera shot him twice more through the back of the neck.
The High Drive shut off. Braun’s corpse hit the deck, then bounced upward as the Upholder entered free-fall. Tovera was using a small pistol rather than the sub-machine gun which she preferred: a pistol for self-protection wouldn’t raise eyebrows in a slightly built woman shipping in a starship’s crew, but a sub-machine gun would have been hard to explain. The snap of the shots seemed to have gone unnoticed amid the High Drive’s snarl.
Adele locked the port watch in their compartments, then idled all the bridge consoles except for her own. On the general push she said, “All hands. This ship has become an element of the Tarbell Stars navy. So long as everyone stays calm—”
The gunner’s mate had replaced the arrested Gunner. He stood up. He was an Ithaca native and young for his new rating.
Hale fired at him, trying for a head shot and missing. Her pellet disintegrated on the ceiling near one of the loudspeakers. Tovera shot the fellow twice through the top of his breastbone. He drifted upward. Two small blood splotches spurted toward the port bulkhead, driven by arterial pressure.
“Do not resist or you will die!” Adele said, hoping she sounded threatening or at least more threatening than she had managed so far. “No one needs to be harmed!”
Daniel sailed in through the bridge hatch while it was still cycling open at Adele’s command. He touched the back of the missileer’s console to correct his direction and gripped the command console, braking himself to a halt.
Hogg entered the bridge more like a boulder rolling downhill than as an acrobat like his master. He’s not any more agile in free-fall than I am, Adele thought. On the other hand, Hogg would have been intimidating even without the knuckle-duster knife in his right hand.
“Captain Morseth,” Daniel said; Adele piped the words on the general channel so that everyone aboard the cruiser would hear it. “I have to ask you to vacate the console. My name is Daniel Leary and I’m taking command the Upholder.”
Captain Morseth stood up. His face quivered like a frightened blancmange.
Myrmidon: the Southern Highlands
Cory had landed the Fisher 14 on a high plain in Myrmidon’s far south. Daniel and Vesey brought the Upholder—they’d obviously have to rename her now—and the Princess Cecile down on either side of the merchant vessel.
Daniel had mustered the crew into groups of twenty in the lee of the cruiser, each with coolers of beer and water. That was small enough that he could talk to them without amplification, but large enough that he could expect to get through over four hundred spacers in an acceptable length of time.
The wind blew bits of coarse soil into Daniel’s face as he and Hogg walked toward the next section. It must have rained recently because the clumps of vegetation were in enthusiastic flower instead of huddling in woody tangles which tried to survive. There was probably an aquifer fed from the snowy mountains in the western distance, but it was too deep for the roots of these shrubs to penetrate.
Daniel had set no guards on the spacers. The Sissies and the former Upholders who had already signed on with the government were pulling normal maintenance on the two warships. The Fisher 14 was back under her own Pleasaunce captain, Faenz. He and his crew were taking a relaxed attitude to the circumstances.
“Hello, Hijiro,” Daniel said to a rigger he recognized by name among this twenty. “Sorry for the inconvenience but I decided it was better to keep the port watch locked down for a couple days till I could get here and explain things.”
“You don’t have to explain!” a heavily built technician said. His arms were tattooed from wrists to short sleeves, many of them including banners with the names of Fleet warships. “You’re a bloody pirate and that’s all there is to say!”
“I see where you’re coming from.…” A fragment of memory clicked into place at the right time; Daniel hadn’t had time to learn the names of the whole crew, though he had made an effort. “Sobol, isn’t it? I believe the matter is covered under the laws of war, though we won’t argue. The ship there—”
He pointed with his whole arm.
“—the Fisher 14 is ready to carry you and any of your fellows who want to leave to Danziger. You’ll have to make your own way back to Ithaca because Captain Faenz refuses to land on a rebel world. He’s a civilian simply hired for the job, but he’s not sure he’d be treated that way by the folks we captured the cruiser from.”
“Well, I want to go!” Sobol said, standing arms akimbo with his clenched fists on his hip bones. His arms were thickly muscled.
“Then so you shall,” said Daniel. “But you’ll listen for a moment first.’
He hawked phlegm and spat behind him. “Hijiro?” he said. “I’d be grateful for a mug of that lager.”
The little rigger grinned and refilled the mug he’d been drinking from. Daniel took a good swig from it. His throat really was dry—this was the seventh group he’d addressed; but it had also seemed like a good way to change the mood.
“The Tarbell government will pay you the same wages you’ve been earning from the rebels,” Daniel said. “Most of you will keep your ratings and watches. There’ll probably be a few transfers under your new officers, but I served alongside you long enough to know that this cruiser had a bloody good crew.”
“I’ve met worse riggers, too,” Hijiro said cheerfully. He was an able spacer, but Daniel had already decided that he was about to become a bosun’s mate—though not necessarily on the Upholder.
“Now, the rebels probably told you it was going to be a walkover when they moved against Peltry—” Daniel said.
“Well, they would, wouldn’t they?” called a man missing part of his left hand. Th
ey were getting into the spirit.
“Yes, they would,” Daniel said, “but a month ago it really did look like the rebels were the smart-money bet. I can tell you it wouldn’t have been a walkover, but when one side has a heavy cruiser and the other side had nothing bigger than a destroyer—well, that’s long odds, isn’t it?”
He grinned broadly. “It’s still long odds,” he said. “But it’s the other way now.”
There was general laughter. Even Sobol was grinning.
“Are you in command, then?” asked a tech, one of the few women in the Upholder’s crew. Daniel had seen her but didn’t know her name.
“I’m the head of the Navy of the Tarbell Stars,” Daniel said, nodding with approval of a good question. “I report to the Minister of War, Christopher Robin, whom I can tell you is good. We had our differences at first, but we knocked some of the edges off each other—”
Adele had done that, but this was a recruiting speech rather than a debriefing.
“—and I can guarantee the Ministry’s full support.”
Daniel paused and smiled broadly. “In theory Robin reports to President Menandros,” he said. “I don’t guess anybody needs to hear my opinion of politicians, right? Regardless, I’m pretty sure the president won’t try to get in the way.”
There was more laughter. While Daniel waited for it to die down, he saw a glint of movement in the vegetation beyond the area which the cruiser’s thrusters had burned off. It was a ripple of light which when he focused resolved into a flattened snake-like flyer with diaphanous wings and tail. It disappeared again into the brush.
Adele has probably downloaded natural history data on Myrmidon, but I’ve been too busy to think about it.
For a moment Daniel imagined a life in which he had leisure to really study the wonderful, unique life forms of the planets he visited. Then he smiled again at the waiting spacers and said, “There’s one more thing. Some of you have probably heard that my crews have been lucky with prize money. If you haven’t heard that, talk to anybody who’s served with me.”
“How do you figure there’d be prize money now?” Sobol said. “Cruisers don’t make prizes!”
“Pretty much true,” Daniel said, nodding agreement. “But this cruiser is a prize, and every spacer in her crew gets a share of what the government buys her in for. I’ve got the Minister’s word on that, and you’ve got my word as a Leary!”
The gabble that followed was positive but too startled to be really loud. The crew was trying to take in what they’d just heard.
“Every spacer?” the woman said.
“Every spacer who takes service with the Navy of the Tarbell Stars,” said Daniel emphatically. “The share-out will be according to standard RCN rates—which is the same as the Fleet’s if you came here by that door. I told you, the government’s friends have deep pockets.”
“And they’ve got you?” said Hijiro.
“Yes, they’ve got me,” Daniel said, nodding. “You’ve got me if you enroll with the government.”
He looked about the group again and said, “Now, any more questions?”
“How do we sign up?” asked a spacer who hadn’t spoken before.
Daniel pointed to the cruiser’s main hatch. “Right up there in the boarding hold,” he said. “Hale and Woetjans are set up at a table to enroll you. Ah, you may remember them as Garrett and van Arp. For now you’ll keep your original watch and berth, though there may be some sorting out after we arrive on Peltry.”
There was still beer in the mug Hijiro had handed him. Daniel sloshed some of it around his dry mouth, then swallowed.
“One more thing, fellow spacers,” he said. “You really are free to walk out of this whole business. Go over to the Fisher 14 and tell Captain Faenz that he’s to carry you back to Danziger. There’s no paperwork, no questions: just leave.”
Daniel finished the beer, gave the mug back to Hijiro. Spacers cheered as he and Hogg walked to the next group. The ones he’d been talking to headed in a straggling column toward the cruiser’s boarding hold. Hijiro was leading, but Sobol was in the line with the others.
“How much of a passenger list do you guess Faenz is going to have?” Hogg said as they walked together. “Not long, I’d say.”
Daniel was keeping an eye out for the flying creature he’d glimpsed, but it didn’t show itself again. He wouldn’t be able to make a real search before they lifted for Peltry, but at least he could see what the database had.
“There’s two officers who were born on rebel worlds whom I’m not willing to trust,” he said. “There’ll probably be a couple others as well. Even so, we’ve not only added a heavy cruiser to the fleet, it comes with a crew of prime spacers.”
All in all, this had been a very successful operation. But Daniel did wish that he could get a better view of that flying creature.
CHAPTER 22
Newtown Harbor on Peltry
Adele walked beside the Minister of War and General Bloemfontein as Daniel, leading with Admiral Quentin, made a broad gesture with his left hand. “Lady Mundy and gentlemen,” he said. “The cruiser Triomphante, the most recent addition to the Navy of the Tarbell Stars. She’ll win the war for us if we use her right.”
Bloemfontein was the head of the army; Quentin had been head of the navy before Daniel’s promotion. Adele had expected this briefing to be conducted in one of the Ministry’s conference rooms, but Daniel had decided that the quay alongside the just-captured cruiser would be better for their purpose.
“What kind of name is Triomphante?” Quentin said. “Not a Tarbell name, certainly. I think we ought to change it immediately!”
Quentin was a peppery little man with a brush moustache and hair dyed a brighter red than it had probably been in his youth. He was a Peltry native and had spent thirty years in merchant service before Robin had put him in charge of the navy. Quentin hadn’t loudly objected to becoming subordinate to Captain Leary, but he wouldn’t have been human if he hadn’t felt some resentment.
“I chose the name, Quentin,” said the minister. “Leary pointed out to me that she was Triomphante when she was a Fleet warship. Through skullduggery she was sold out of service as the Gallissonniere. By going back to her real name we’re waving a flag at the crooks in the Alliance who sold out to the rebels.”
Adele had made a thorough search of the Ministry’s databases. She was sure that Robin didn’t know that General Krychek himself was working against the Tarbell Stars; Robin didn’t even know the name of the First Diocese commandant. Neither was Robin sure of the forces supporting the Tarbell government.
The Upholders and the Tarbells were both pawns in a struggle of bureaucrats. Adele wondered what would happen if Christopher Robin realized that he was being manipulated by the Third Diocese of the 5th Bureau rather than being supported by wealthy industrialists in both the Alliance and on Cinnabar.
Three antennas on the Triomphante’s spine and one on the starboard side toward the quay had been partially extended. Spacers and a number of dockyard personnel wearing orange tunics were crawled over them. Adele couldn’t be sure, but it appeared that they were working on the joints as well as the rigging.
Daniel had chosen this location to emphasize the Triomphante’s size and power. The cruiser was impressive from where they stood, even to Adele who had been close to larger ships during her RCN service. The two Tarbell aides gaped as they took in the massive hull, the triple missile launchers—three of the four sets were visible—and the turrets with paired 15-centimeter plasma cannon.
The turrets on the spine were raised and visible. The ventral pair were below the waterline and would have been retracted into the hull if the cruiser followed the practice Adele was familiar with on the Princess Cecile.
Christopher Robin was making a point of not displaying obvious amazement, but Adele thought he spoke in a reverent tone when he said, “Well, Leary…What do you consider the right way to use this warship?”
Daniel turned to face
the Minister, placing his arms akimbo. “By taking the fight to the enemy before they can respond to the change in circumstances,” he said. “The rebels and the parties backing them have put all their hopes in their cruiser, this cruiser; our cruiser as she is now. Take a look at her and think of how you would feel if she were leading the rebel fleet.”
“Well and good, Leary,” Robin said, frowning. “But what do we do with her?”
“We set up a temporary base on a moon of the fourth planet of the Ithaca system,” Daniel said. If they’d been in a proper conference room Adele would have provided a visual of the Ithaca system, but she didn’t suppose that would have changed anything. “The Triomphante will keep station while the destroyers and corvette attack all ships trying to land or take off. We’ll capture them if they surrender immediately but destroy them with gunfire if they try to get away.”
“Are you mad?” said Quentin.
“Nothing in the Ithaca System is habitable except Ithaca itself,” said Bloemfontein. “You can’t put a base on a moon, there’s either no atmosphere or methane.”
“We’ll use the Montcalm and Montclare as our temporary bases, living spaces for off-duty crew,” Daniel said to the army chief, ignoring Quentin’s blurted comment. “There’s liquid water on two of the methane moons, not drinkable but fine for reaction mass. The transports will carry extra potable water as well as food for a three month blockade. The rebels will cave before then. Remember, we’ll have completely cut them off from the rest of the universe.”
“That’s crazy,” Quentin said. From his tone that was his analysis rather than abuse; crudely put but a defensible position nonetheless. “The crews can’t take being packed into a transport hold for that long! They’ll all mutiny.”
Though she didn’t recall moving, Adele was seated on a bollard with her data unit in her lap. Proper use of the control wands required both hands, but they were enormously faster for an expert than any other input method.