“Yeah,” Brand said, “war’s a bitch.” He sat up, rubbing both hands across his face. “How are the remaining Gersons handling it?”
Maggie shrugged, back in control. “They’re not happy, as you can imagine. I’ve had to sedate a few, including Joli. I took the liberty of commandeering one of the staff lounges and having a direct feed piped in from battle ops, so that at least they can watch the battle sequence. I wasn’t going to do it, but one of the old-timers said she wanted to be able to tell cubs of later generations how their ancestors died for a good cause.”
Brand buried his face momentarily in one hand. “Are there going to be later generations, Mags?” he asked.
“If we don’t fight this battle and win it, there certainly won’t be,” she replied. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” he said, getting to his feet. “Just not in a hurry to send that ship out. Is Tashi on the bridge?”
“He is.” She set a hypospray against his wrist and triggered it before he could object. “That’s just a bit of stimulant. You should feel it in a few seconds.”
He could feel it already, a pleasant coolness spreading up his arm and through his body, clearing his brain like a wave of ice water. He drew a deep breath and let it out with a whoosh. His body was ready to cope, even if the task ahead was one of the most difficult he had ever had thrust his way.
“Okay,” he said. “Let’s go.”
Up on the bridge, Tashi gave way immediately as Brand and Maggie came out of the transit passage, though he crouched down beside the command chair as Brand took his seat.
“Mind if I stay?” Tashi asked. “I’ve done the setup. I’d like to be here for the resolution.”
For answer, Brand gestured for him to open one of the pull-out seats that allowed someone to sit on either side of the command chair. He opened the other one for Maggie. The tech support crew were glancing up from the command pit as Brand put on a headset and settled in, running his fingers over the control pad under his right hand and already calling up a readout under his left.
“All right, ladies and gentlemen, this is not a drill,” Brand said, flashing through a sequence of battle perspectives in the tank ahead and then narrowing on a red-lit view of the command cabin of the Buthelezi. “Hooth, this is Brand. Is everything to your satisfaction?”
The Gerson leader swiveled in his command chair and looked directly into the camera pickup. The red lighting softened the ursine lines of his muzzle and rounded ears and made him look far less alien than he did in person.
“We are well pleased, Commander,” Hooth’s translated voice said. “We cannot thank you enough for this opportunity to save both our race and our pride. May Harsha of the Battles smile on all our endeavors today.”
“A bit of Gerson theology,” Maggie murmured, close by Brand’s ear. “The first time it’s come out. God, we had so much to learn from them. And now there’s no time.”
With a gesture to desist, Brand made the camera pan around the Buthelezi’s control room. The other Gersons in sight were all mature males as well, some of them almost white-muzzled. As the camera panned back to Hooth, Brand raised a hand open-palmed in the universal gesture of friendship and farewell.
“Hail and farewell, Hooth,” he said, keeping his voice steady with an effort. “There may not be time when we enter normal space and launch you. You’re sure you want to go through with this?”
Hooth only nodded slowly, then touched a button that put the destroyer’s ID number on the screen instead of the view of the control room. Respecting their wish for privacy, Brand shifted his perspective to a view outside the Buthelezi, from near the security lock.
“How many?” he asked Maggie as he memorized every line of the doomed destroyer.
“Thirty-one, down from the usual forty,” she replied. “Faber was able to eliminate some of the normal crew positions. Other than Hooth, they’re the older ones, as you saw.”
“Does that leave you enough to work with?” he asked.
She shrugged. “It’s what I’ve got. It will have to be enough. We have the crew’s donations on ice, though. There isn’t a whole lot more we can do, for now.”
“Right.” He slapped his controls and put up a view of a perspective from the Hawking toward the beleaguered Emry planet. Out beyond the white-glowing horizon that was the Hawking’s reference point, scores of white and blue dots were scattered like diamonds against a field of void. And far beyond, the faintly green-glowing pip that was the Emry planet, surrounded by a reddish glow.
“Helm, do we have that course plotted in?”
“Aye, sir,” one of the stations replied as a new schematic came up in the holotank with a white-flashing light in the midst of red and blue ones. “Insertion at the point indicated should give us very close to three minutes to get the Buthelezi away and even launch some SBs that have just returned to rearm to provide a diversion, if everything goes according to plan.”
“What is the chance we will drop back in an acceptable location?” the station’s commander demanded of his chief navigation officer. If they dropped back too close, there was a chance of the Hawking’s warp drive interacting with one of the Ichton ships. The result would be a spectacular explosion and total disaster.
“There is no way to tell, sir,” the Khalian replied honestly. “We’ve never done anything like this before. But my instincts say we will.”
“What’s the risk to the Hawking?” Brand then asked the gunnery chief.
“Less than losing Emry, sir,” the tall Perdidan lieutenant answered with the typical bluntness of his culture. “We can pretarget the plasma cannons and missile tubes in a general way, and even let loose with the laser belts, once we’re there. Give cover fire, until the Buthelezi’s far enough away for us to warp out again.”
“Fleet standing by?”
“Aye, sir,” came another voice. “We’ve got both battle plans ready to go, depending on your orders.”
“Very well.” Brand keyed a switch on his console. “All sections, rig for battle stations. Sound general quarters. This is not a drill. Emergency services, stand by. All sections, report.”
His words produced action that set off alarm signals all over the ship. The winking lights on a tote board up on his left told of stations securing, section by section. The civilians aboard were not going to be happy, but it couldn’t be helped.
“Stand by, Helm,” he said as the last of the lights lit to green. “Prepare to go hyperspace on my mark—now!”
He felt the ship leap to his command, the jarring shudder of megatons of matter being wrenched into another dimension, the accompanying surge of vertigo that was the body’s way of acknowledging that shift of existence. All the exterior screens had gone to white, for a ship in hyperspace jump was blind and deaf.
He found himself almost holding his breath as he counted out the mere seconds that the jump would last, for the battle zone he had selected was only light-seconds from where they had begun.
The ship wrenched again, and they were back in normal space. Instantly the screens lit back to life, reading out new data. Not more than a few hundred kilometers away, three of the oak leaf-shaped Ichton mother ships were hanging in formation amid a cloud of lesser escort ships, the disk of the Emry planet huge behind them. A tally to his right told of the destroyer bay already opening to let the Buthelezi into space.
The Hawking shuddered as the two massive plasma cannons at either pole began firing toward the Ichton ships, dozens of small, swift fighters now streaming out of the Hawking’s fighter bays to engage the enemy. As the missile tubes laid down covering fire, the belts of laser cannons also opened up, picking off Ichton escort vessels and splashing harmlessly off the strong shields of the three mother ships, now turning ponderously to head away from the growing battle.
Soon the Buthelezi was physically clear, though not yet clear of the Hawking’s mag fields if the latter attempted to warp out. Brand ceased fire in the Buthelezi’s direction as she moved out, al
ready heading straight for the mother ships, picking up speed as she launched her own covering screen of missiles to clear a path before her. Other Ichton ships were being drawn to the mother ships’ defense, several light cruisers and a dreadnought, which suddenly diverted when it noticed the Hawking and began closing fast.
“How long until we can warp?” Brand demanded, watching the dreadnought close. “Get that guy.”
The Hawking adjusted attitude and the massive spinal-mounted plasma cannons spoke, sending bolt after bolt against the dreadnought’s shields. Brand could see its shields starting to overload, but would it be in time? More Ichton ships were aware of the Hawking’s presence now, turning increasing firepower upon her. Beyond, the Buthelezi was almost clear of the Hawking’s shields. Any second now—
“Helm, go hyperspace at will,” he said. “Helm, you’re cutting this awfully close—”
The wrench of the hyperdrive kicking in coincided almost exactly with the shield overload on the approaching dreadnought. As the ship steadied into hyperspace, Brand was sure they must have taken some damage. Alarm lights blinking on several of his tote boards confirmed it.
“Damage Control, give me status reports,” he demanded. “Can you sustain return warp?”
Mercifully, the responses coming in confirmed that damage thus far was slight. But meanwhile, they were deaf and blind to the fate of the Buthelezi. He glanced again at the helmsman, aware that this was a slightly longer jump, calculated to bring them out almost directly opposite from where they had first departed. The ship wrenched again, and they were back in normal space.
Frantically he searched for the display that would show the Buthelezi going after the mother ships. An automatic touch of the correct button transferred it to the holotank.
Even as he watched, two red dots flared and disappeared. The screens on one of the mother ships were glowing brighter, edging into blue—
“Go, Hooth!” Brand found himself whispering, one clenched fist pounding gently on the display screen in his chair arm. “Get the bastards!”
As if in answer to his prayer, the screens flared into violet and then white incandescence. A cheer went up among the bridge staff as the screen cleared and the mother ship was gone. Already the Buthelezi was forging on toward the next mother ship—and hordes of smaller Ichton escorts were converging on the attacker.
“No,” Brand whispered. “Let him get another one. Helm, stand by to reengage.”
“Commander?”
“Pick me a spot nearby, and be ready to engage!” Brand snapped. “Prepare to redirect every ship we’ve got, to follow through. Hooth is opening us a window. Let’s use the chance he’s buying us at such a cost.”
He could see the screens on the Buthelezi starting to overload now. The red dots were converging on the beleaguered Fleet destroyer. Soon it would be too late to turn it into a miniature sun. If Hooth waited too long—
Suddenly the entire screen lit up in a gigantic wash of brilliant white light. The tank sensors stopped down immediately to damp the glare, but for just a few seconds circuits overloaded and the entire tank went dark. As a murmur of consternation whispered among the bridge staff, emergency circuits kicked in and the tank relit. It took a second to reorient.
As the image steadied, one thing became immediately clear. The Buthelezi was gone, but so were both the remaining mother ships and nearly every Ichton escort that had been on the screen.
“Well done, Hooth!” Brand whispered, almost in awe of what the Gerson had accomplished. “All right, Helm. Let’s make it count for something. Is the Fleet ready to shift?”
“Aye, sir.”
“Then go FTL—now.”
In the weeks and months to come, the battle for Emry would be cited as one of the greatest Fleet victories in the war against the Ichtons. Commander Anton Brand’s bold move in taking the Stephen Hawking directly into battle was questioned in command circles, but no one could question the result. The Hawking sustained heavy damage, especially in the civilian sectors, but the back of the Ichton fleet was broken. Of the five remaining mother ships either on the surface or in orbit around the Emry planet, only one escaped, with a ragtag escort of less than a dozen small ships. Losses in the rest of the Alliance fleet were minimal: one destroyer and perhaps a score of fighters.
But that this had been made possible by the bravery and self-sacrifice of the Gerson crew of the Buthelezi, no one could deny. Later that evening, when the battle was over and the worst of the emergencies were under control, deep in space, where the Hawking had withdrawn to lick her wounds, Brand went down to the room where the rest of the Gersons were waiting. Maggie Conroy came with him, still blood-spattered from dealing with the injured.
Utter silence settled over the room as Brand came in. The last fifty-three Gersons in the universe slowly stood as Brand moved among them, the low mutters of their comments unintelligible by Brand’s translator. They quieted as he turned to survey them, fifty-three pairs of black shoe-button eyes fixed on him in hope and fear.
“You—saw what happened today,” Brand said quietly, gesturing toward the large viewscreen across one wall, now blank. “I’m not certain you understood what you saw, but the Emry planet has been saved. Not only that, but the Ichton fleet was routed and mostly destroyed. We know of only one mother ship that got away, along with a very small number of escorts.”
He paused to glance at his feet and draw a fortifying breath.
“Unfortunately, a lot of other good people died in today’s battle. But I can tell you that the bravest of them all were your Gerson loved ones who went out of here to avenge the death of your planet and put their lives on the line to save another race from a like fate. I stand in awe of what Hooth and the others did today. I want you to know that the Alliance appreciates the sacrifice they made. We will not forget.”
He could not go on at that point, but one of the Gerson females came closer with a cub in tow, ducking her head in commiseration. Through the dull numbness of his grief, Brand realized that it was Joli, Hooth’s mate.
“We will not forget either, Commander Brand,” she said, the nasal growl of her actual voice coming through the translator as a pleasant alto. “And we will not forget what you and the Healer Maggie have made possible. We came to the Alliance convinced that our race was doomed to extinction, but you have given us hope that the Gerson might become a people once again.”
Maggie pursed her lips. “It’s a long shot, Joli. I told you that when we started.”
Joli’s bear-jaws trembled, the shoe-button eyes moist with tears.
“It was a ‘long shot,’ what Hooth and the others attempted to do,” she said. “But they succeeded. And we shall succeed. We shall do it in their memory. You will see, when peace is restored.”
She turned away at that, heavy shoulders shuddering in the ursine equivalent of weeping, and Brand had never felt so helpless. He was turning too when the Gerson cub came close enough to put its furry paw in his hand, turning liquid black eyes to his. It said nothing, but no words were needed. This was why the Alliance had fought today. Not for this particular Gerson cub, but for all the young of all the races under threat of annihilation by the Ichton. Brand supposed that the Ichtons might offer the same argument—that their expansion had to do with the young of their race. But the Ichtons must be taught moderation. There was room in the universe for all beings, if each race learned to respect the right of others to exist.
There would be more mere battles to see which side could kill the most of their opponents, but ultimately communication must be established to make the Ichtons understand. As Brand stroked a hand gently across the Gerson cub’s head, he decided that perhaps all of today’s sacrifices had been worthwhile, if that message eventually got through.
BEQUEST
The battle of Emry was a tactical success. The Ichton fleet was shattered and the Emry home world saved. On another level it had been a painfully Pyrrhic victory. The Fleet had suffered losses that more than balanced
out all the reinforcements they had received so far. Further, many of the surviving warships were far from combat worthy. The Hawking itself had suffered major damage on virtually all levels. Over three hundred crewmen and civilians had died when a force of thirty Ichton fighters had made suicidal plunges at the battlestation. Six had broken through the defenses and smashed through the hull. Worse yet, one of the massive plasma cannon was disabled and couldn’t be repaired without parts only available in the Alliance.
Two weeks later Commander Brand called a meeting of the Squam, Emry, and other allied commanders. Anton Brand had to admit that what remained of their combined forces could not win another such battle. He also presented new intelligence showing that the Ichtons were massing another fleet off the ruins of the Gerson home world. This new fleet was already half again larger than the one they had just defeated. Brand had requested more reinforcements, but there was a limit to what the Alliance, surrounded by potentially hostile neighbors, could spare. Nor was he sure the Senate would much longer support a losing cause.
Intelligence was still erratic. They had no idea how many worlds the Ichtons controlled. Nor if they were even facing the bulk of the invader’s forces. The insectoids could well have a dozen more fleets farther up the spiral arm than these had disgorged from. Emry was now too devastated to supply any of the parts or metals needed for repairs. They would have to move the Hawking and her fleet close to another intact world and hope the Ichtons did not return to Emry before they had accumulated sufficient strength to meet them.
The Hawking had arrived three years earlier hoping to create a military solution to the threat. The idea had then been to make it too costly for the Ichtons to continue their rampage. They had since achieved, at best, mixed results. Of the three races the battlestation had come to assist, two had virtually ceased to exist and the home world of the third lay in ruins.
Although they had completely destroyed one Ichton armada at great cost, the only visible result was that another larger fleet was forming as they spoke. The conclusion was painfully obvious. Any purely military solution was impossible. They could hurt the Ichtons, but were losing a war of attrition. Another approach was needed.
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