Fleet Elements

by Walter Jon Williams

  “You should be opening a bottle of champagne,” Sula said. “We’ve just won the greatest victory in the annals of the Fleet.”

  He looked at his display. “It could also be argued that we suffered the Fleet’s second-greatest defeat,” he said. “A hundred and seventy-five ships! That’s seventy percent lost. And we’ll lose more in the next few days, as we find which of the damaged ships have to be written off.”

  “We’ve still got enough force to take Zanshaa,” Sula said, “and then we’re in charge, and the people who started this will pay.”

  “They’d better,” Martinez said. He was grim, a little muscle twitching along his jawline.

  Sula looked at Martinez and felt a soft surprise. By now she’d expected him to be all ego, preening and celebrating his own genius, but instead he was somber, near-overwhelmed by the tally of the dead.

  “Shall I give you my report?” she asked.

  “Certainly.”

  She gave it, including the fact she’d sent a message to Harzapid, and as she recited facts and statistics from memory her eyes drifted again to the Torminel grapplers, their bodies caught in attitudes of strain and struggle, their eyes blazing with fury and their lips drawn back to reveal snarling teeth. Frozen in enmity, straining through an eternal opposition.

  Martinez listened in silence, his eyes fixed on something a hundred paces away.

  Sula finished, and there was a moment of silence. “Any questions?” she asked.

  His eyes went to her. “No, thank you. That was very thorough—and thank you for sending the report to Lady Michi. I should have done it myself, of course.”

  She stood. “I’ll leave, then, unless you have instructions for me.”

  He offered a faint smile. “I don’t, but next time I forget to do something, I’m sure you’ll step into the breach.”

  Martinez rose and walked around his desk to show her to the door. Her skin prickled with his nearness. Sula waited, hesitant, suddenly aware that for some time she had been listening for something, some throb of a violin or a chant of a derivoo, some whisper from a distant world. He paused by her, puzzled perhaps.

  “Must I do everything?” she murmured and hooked a hand behind Martinez’s neck and drew his lips down to hers. He didn’t seem surprised at all. His arms went around her, and his kiss was devouring and ferocious.

  At last she heard what she had been listening for, the triumphant cry of a derivoo that turned her blood to scorching fire. She thought of the cool surfaces of porcelain, the red sunrise over the Sea of Marmara, warships dying in fire.

  There didn’t seem to be a lot of point in talking. He half carried her to his sleeping cabin, and there they tore at their clothing, tumbled onto the bed, and coupled in silent fury.

  How long has it been? Sula wondered. How many years?

  Too many. She peaked a second before Martinez did, and from that elation of heart and body she came back to the world slowly. Martinez lay gasping in her arms. She felt a surge of triumph, as if she’d just won a second war.

  “I want you to know,” she said as she looked into his eyes, “that this time I’m not running away.”

  He took a moment to absorb this. “Yes,” he said. “It’s like you said. We’ll be in charge, and then we’ll make the rules to suit ourselves.”

  She kissed his jawline, and then her senses widened to take in the room, the dim light, the tangled bedclothes, the pictures of Martinez’s family obscuring the Torminel pornography. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Terza.

  If this fails, she thought, if he wrecks this somehow, I’ll enjoy telling Terza all about it.

  Another tide of triumph rose in her, and she could barely restrain herself from laughing aloud.

  Martinez raised his head and cocked one eyebrow. “What’s so amusing?”

  Sula draped an arm across her forehead, cutting off Terza from view. “The whole fleet is waiting for orders,” she said, “and here we are, making them wait.”

  He kissed her shoulder. “They can wait a little longer.”

  “I think the first thing you should do,” she said, “is compose a message of congratulations to the Fourth Fleet. You need to tell them how brave and brilliant they were.” She moved her arm from over her eyes and looked at him. “Unless you’d rather I did it.”

  “No.” He sighed. “I’ll do it right away. But I hope you’ll join me for supper.”

  “Oh yes,” she said. She could see Terza’s portrait over his shoulder. “Yes, I will.”

  Chapter 17

  “Well,” Martinez said. “We’ve won, but we’ve lost a lot of friends. You can read all that in the updated report I sent an hour ago.”

  He looked into the camera and imagined Terza gracefully reclined on a sofa in her brown uniform, her dark eyes focused on the screen, and wondering if her husband had changed somehow, and if so what changed him.

  “Tell Chai-chai to send me pictures of trees, or birds, or clouds,” he said. “Anything but space and planets and warships.” He gave the camera—gave Terza—what he concluded was a helpless look. “I’m too busy to send a longer message,” he said. “But I wanted to send you something . . . Just from me to you.”

  He ended the message and was thankful he no longer had to try to project sincerity to a camera.

  Martinez hadn’t exaggerated when he said that he was fully occupied, but his mental image of Terza faded slowly. Displays glowed in his desk and on the walls. Tables, facts, statistics, and reports whirled in his mind, alongside the faces and names of those who had been lost. It seemed as if Death had made a point of stalking his friends and subordinates.

  No less than four of his officers on the old Illustrious had been killed. Fulvia Kazakov, his first lieutenant; his third lieutenant Ahmad Husayn; his sixth officer Juliette Corbigny; and his former signals lieutenant Lady Ida Lee, all promoted to command of their own warships, and now dead along with their crews.

  Ismir Falana of his Courage, Garcia of the old Corona. Garcia had never had any luck, having been captured on the first day of the Naxid War, and then finally achieved command rank only to die in her first engagement.

  Carmody had not been a great friend, and was certainly no genius, but he’d been a courageous officer, and Martinez was sorry to lose him. Lady Starkey was gone—Martinez didn’t know her well, but she and Nikki Severin had established a reputation as the lovebirds of the Fleet, and Martinez knew that Severin must be crushed.

  Ari Abacha, his old friend, had been in command of Striker, now severely damaged and tumbling off into the void. Martinez had little hope for his survival, or that of his crew.

  Lord Jeremy Foote, perhaps unfortunately, was still among the living.

  Martinez had sent the triumphant message to his command that Sula had suggested, and he’d told the Fourth Fleet just how brilliant and courageous they’d been. By the time he was done speaking, he realized he’d meant every word of it.

  Martinez swallowed the last of his coffee, bitter and cold. His cook Marivic Mangahas had delivered the coffee herself, since Alikhan was unavailable. His requests for updates on Alikhan’s condition had been so frequent that the doctor had finally told him—quite sharply—that if there were any change in Alikhan’s status, she’d send him an alert. With that he had to be content.

  His sleeve display flashed with a message from Santana. “Captain Abacha wishes to report to you in person.”

  His heart gave a surprised surge. “Yes,” he responded, and Ari Abacha’s image appeared on his sleeve. Abacha wore a vac suit with the helmet off, and there was a feverish gleam in his eyes. Martinez transferred the image onto his desk display.

  “By the all, Gare,” Abacha said. “I’ve had adventures!”

  Abacha didn’t look as if his adventures had been particularly trying. His hair had a glossy sheen, his mustache was perfectly groomed, and his chocolate skin was without bruise or blemish. But then he had a hairdresser on his staff, as well as a personal bartender, so perhaps he�
�d been tidied and relaxed before he sent his message.

  “Are you on Striker?” Martinez asked.

  Abacha continued to grin at him for a while—he was three light-seconds away—and then Abacha’s eyes widened. “Striker’s lost, Gare,” he said. “Depressurized, and a maneuvering thruster jammed full on, so we were pitching end over end. The other thrusters were knocked out and we were out of control and useless, so I ordered everyone who could get to a shuttle to evacuate. Gee forces would have been ferocious fore and aft, and the only crew to get away were in the central part.”

  “We didn’t get a report.”

  Another six seconds passed before the answer came. “Communications melted in the blast, my friend!” A hand came into the frame holding a cocktail glass, and Abacha took it. He took a hearty swig, then turned back to the camera. “We had two shuttles and my own personal cutter. One of the shuttles was slag, but I got most of the survivors into one, and when they launched I got on board the cutter with whoever was left.” He took another swig. “But we couldn’t get the blasted thing to work! We had no navigators, no pilots, no engine techs—they were all on the other shuttle! The shuttle tumbled as badly as Striker, and we couldn’t correct!”

  “Couldn’t you call for help?”

  Seconds ticked by, and then Abacha sighed. “We couldn’t get the signals console to work.”

  Martinez stared at him. “Ari,” he said, “when we were together at the Commandery, you were a communications specialist.”

  Abacha looked offended when the response reached him. “Gare,” he said, “I can communicate with signals perfectly well, but that doesn’t mean I’m a mechanic.”

  “So where are you now?”

  Abacha didn’t wait for the question to reach him, but started his story anyway. “The shuttle sent out a distress signal, and Staunch picked them up. Then Staunch looked for us and found us, so now I’m a guest of Captain Hui. We’re going on now toward Striker, in hopes we can rescue any crew remaining.” He bit his lip. “It’s going to be tricky trying to stabilize Striker, though.”

  “Remind the captain how we and Sula rescued Blitsharts,” Martinez told him.

  When this reached Abacha, he took a few seconds to puzzle his answer. “Harder to do with a couple of big ships,” Abacha said, “but we’ll manage what we can.” He finished his cocktail and held out the glass for a refill.

  “Best of luck,” Martinez said. “Give my regards to Captain Hui.”

  “I will, Gare.” A bright smile creased his face. “Say, she’s quite the looker, isn’t she?”

  “I suppose she is.”

  “Let’s have drinks soon, hey?”

  “Certainly. End message.”

  The orange end-stamp filled the screen. Martinez shook his head. Apparently Ari Abacha was unchanged by war, battle, and the loss of his ship. All he looked forward to was the next cocktail party, or the next pretty face.

  Martinez found himself envying Abacha’s simplicity.

  There was a knock on his office door, and the next pretty face entered. At the sight of Sula he felt his blood surge, and the breath caught in his throat. He rose, and Sula closed the door behind her, then took off her uniform cap and tossed it casually onto his desk. Slowly, in the half-gravity, it landed on his coffeepot and hung on the spout. Her lips twitched in amusement.

  “Forgive me for not saluting,” she said and stepped close to kiss him. Her fragrance—lilac-scented soap—spun in his senses. Their arms went around each other. The kiss was like a slow-motion explosion in his head.

  Somewhere in the deep recesses of his mind, he was aware of a throb of sadness. He knew that this was going to hurt people, people he cared about; but the person he cared most about—the woman he’d wanted from the first second, ten or more years ago—was in his arms, and all other considerations had shattered into fragments at the first touch of her lips.

  After a few moments, they both had to come up for air. “I’ve asked Mangahas to prepare supper for two,” he said. “So shall we eat now, or would you rather—”

  “I’m starving,” Sula said.

  They went to the dining room and sat at the narrow end of the wedge-shaped table. Martinez used his sleeve display to tell Santana to contact him with only the most urgent communications and put the rest in his queue. Mangahas bustled out to pour Martinez’s wine, and to ask Sula what she wanted to drink. “Can you manage lemonade?” Sula asked.

  “Certainly, my lady.”

  Mangahas bustled out again, and Martinez paused a moment to view the woman seated next to him. Her brilliant green eyes looked at him with a degree of speculation, as if she hadn’t quite worked him out yet. For his own part, Martinez felt perfectly transparent.

  “We should share Macnamara,” Sula said, and the thought was so unexpected that it took Martinez aback. Sula cackled. “Not that way,” Sula said. “Honestly, you are too easy.”

  “Apparently I am.”

  “Until you can replace Alikhan,” Sula said, “Macnamara can serve at table, brush your uniforms, disinfect your vac suit, and polish your silver buttons.”

  “Isn’t he doing all that for you?”

  “He and Spence are underemployed. I like doing things myself.” She cocked an eyebrow at him. “You’ve never been without servants, have you?”

  “No, I haven’t,” Martinez said, then corrected himself. “Well, at the Nelson Academy our dormitory complex shared one old retired rigger who kept things clean and picked up after us.”

  She was amused. “That’s pretty much the definition of a servant, you know.”

  “Yes, well.” Martinez cleared his throat. “He wasn’t my servant, that’s my point.” He smiled at her. “I do know how to hang up clothes, you know. Fold shirts neatly. I’ve been known to wash a cup now and again.”

  “Clearly a man of great accomplishment.”

  He looked at her. “I thought about making the bed,” he said, “but I decided to leave it in its current disorder. Maybe I wanted to preserve a recent memory.”

  Her green eyes sparkled. “Or make new ones.”

  “Yes,” he said. “That, too.”

  Mangahas entered with Sula’s lemonade. “I can bring in the soup, if you’re ready,” she said.

  “Lady Sula is starving,” Martinez said.

  What Mangahas produced wasn’t soup, exactly, but a small bowl of rice congee with crispy chicken and ginger. Sula ate with zest, and Martinez enjoyed watching her unalloyed pleasure in the meal.

  He didn’t eat more than a few spoonfuls. Desire for the woman next to him seemed to have dulled his other appetites.

  The congee was followed by a dish of pickled vegetables, and then by pork. “What is this sauce?” Sula asked.

  “Adobo,” Martinez said. “We have it on Laredo, but I hardly see it away from home.”

  “Did you teach Mangahas your family recipe?”

  “I don’t know any family recipes.”

  Sula returned her attention to her plate. “Well, it’s delicious, wherever she learned it.”

  Dessert was a custard with candied taswa fruit. Sula spooned into it with eyes glittering. Martinez finished his second glass of wine and thanked Mangahas.

  Mangahas left the decanter of wine, refreshed Sula’s lemonade, and carried the dirty dishes away. Martinez decided he needed no more wine and put the stopper in the decanter.

  His greatest victory. The shocking loss of friends and colleagues. Alikhan fallen. Sula in his arms. And all in just a few hours.

  Sula looked at him. “Tell me about Laredo,” she said.

  He considered the request. “It’s a whole world. Rather a large subject.”

  “Tell me about your bit of it, then.”

  So he did. His ambitious father finding new ways to make new fortunes. His dreamy, romantic mother who named her children from characters out of novels. The shaded country house on the Rio Hondo with its verandas and the stable of Lord Martinez’s antique automobiles. The imposing town
house on a tree-lined square. The lake house. The ocean house. The big sailing yacht, the smaller motorboat. His older brother, his three younger sisters.

  “Was Roland always so . . .” Sula hesitated. “So Roland?”

  “Pretty much. He was so far above me that I was always surprised when he paid me any attention, let alone a compliment.”

  “And your sisters?”

  “They were a pack of chattering little girls when I left Laredo, and when I met them in Zanshaa, they were formidable young women. It was quite a surprise.”

  “And they outnumbered you.”

  “That was intimidating.” He glanced at her “And your childhood? You were on Zanshaa?” And immediately Martinez kicked himself, because he knew her childhood had ended when her parents were executed, flayed alive for defrauding the government.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I wasn’t thinking.”

  “That’s all right,” Sula said. “I don’t remember much about that time.”

  For good reason, he thought, and then his sleeve display chimed. It was Santana, and since Santana had been told not to disturb him unless the message was urgent, Martinez was obliged to accept it. He told Santana to put the signal through, and his sleeve display lit with the image of Captain Hui, Ari Abacha’s host.

  “Lord Fleetcom,” she said, “I’ve caught up to Striker, and I regret to report that no rescue seems possible. The ship is not only pitching, it’s yawing and rolling as well. I’m surprised it’s still in one piece. I can’t grapple to Striker without matching her motion, and pitching like that would make most of my ship uninhabitable, and the odds are high that there would be a collision and my own ship would suffer damage.” Hui looked into the camera and visibly steeled herself. “I’d like to request permission to destroy Striker with a missile.”

  “Does Captain Abacha concur?”

  After the six-second delay, Hui responded. “He doesn’t want to have a part in destroying his ship. But he hasn’t objected.”

  Martinez couldn’t blame him. He wouldn’t have wanted to give the order destroying any of his earlier commands, either.