Antares Crucible

by Warwick Gibson

  It had all the trappings of an election-year wingding, sighed Cordez. The stakes, though, were infinitely higher than in the charades of human politics.

  “The changes the Druanii have suggested for our Javelins are at the limit of our technology,” he said, once the opening ceremonies were out of the way.

  “In fact two of the necessary components are beyond our ability to make – a type of black hole radiation that creates an intense localized gravitational field, and a Kerlian radiation environment that reduces the attraction between atoms to zero. The Druanii have agreed to provide us with factories that will make the components, and then we just have to bolt them into place.

  “Even this is not without its problems. The Druanii use a nanotechnology way ahead of ours, and since we can’t be sure of the effect their nanobes will have in our environment, we will need to isolate the factories from our technology.

  “Once we’ve got things underway, we’ll offload resources in a safe area, and the factories will access the materials when our freighters are not there. The manufactured components will be scrubbed for worker bytes at the factory, and again by us at an isolated station on the way here.

  “The Druanii will monitor the factories and deal with any problems they find.”

  Cordez paused, and almost smiled. His departmental heads were managing to contain themselves. They must have a thousand questions about the new technology, but they wanted to see what else he had to say first. They would be calming themselves with the knowledge they’d get the details as soon as the meeting was over.

  “That’s all good news,” continued Cordez, “but the rest is more of a mixed bag.

  “We don’t know how long it will take to improve the Javelins, or how long we’ve got. The Invardii, and their new dogs of war the Buccra, could launch a major attack on us at any time and disrupt the process.

  “I’ve also offered to upgrade the Sumerian warships, since their heavy industry isn’t yet up to the task after the damage inflicted on their planets. Changing the motherships over, though, may prove impossible in the short time we have.”

  He checked his notes, and changed to a different topic.

  “The Druanii will be present at the attack on the Invardii city. I’m sorry but they wouldn’t give me more specific details than that. On the downside they won’t help us protect the planetary systems of the Alliance. If they do that it will null and void the treaty we want to use to get the Invardii to retreat to their original boundaries.

  “We will also be getting some help from the Druanii protectorates against the Invardii city. This will probably be more in spirit than in real fighting power, but it’s great to think other races will risk their lives in this cause. They see the need to go up against races that are self-obsessed as much as we do.

  “The changes in the Javelins will make them completely new ships to fly. One of the greatest changes will be in the tactics the Javelins will have to employ in future. It will mean a real change in thinking for Battrod and the Hud pilots under him.”

  He paused to look directly at Battrod, who acknowledged him with a nod.

  “Since the Buccra weaponry cuts straight through the Druanii shields,” continued Cordez, “were going to jettison the shields to make room for the new technology going into the Javelins. We also think we know how to neutralize the Reaper ship shields, but there’s nothing definite on that as yet.

  “Whatever we do, it’s clear future battles will be fought offensively, with speed, tactics and weaponry. They will no longer be fought defensively, relying mainly on shields.

  “The death toll will be greater, on both sides, but at least the war will be over more quickly. There won’t be the slow losses by attrition that we have now, and we think the changes will even the odds in our favor. The battle at Uruk went against us in a ratio of nine ships to one, and we have to do better than that.”

  Cordez paused, and turned to look around the room, so that he included everyone in his level gaze.

  “The main thing, though, is that we have to make every minute from now on count. I know this is nothing new for you, but we’re coming down to the last days we have to prepare. Everything depends on what happens in the next few weeks, and I’m counting on you.”

  He smiled. “No pressure, people.”

  There was a long silence.

  “We could put 30 hours in each day,” said John MacEwart, head of armaments, his face deadpan. “Get a lot more done that way.”

  There were some exasperated chuckles.

  “Someone explain the maths to him,” said Finch, smiling along with the others.

  It was good to release the tension in the room, but it didn’t change the fact that this would be the most important few weeks of their lives. Everyone in the Alliance was depending on them. There was nothing more to report, and Cordez closed the meeting.

  MacEwart, Carlos Paula, and a team of hull designers met Cordez later in the day. It was difficult to get time with the man at the center of the Alliance war effort, but what they were suggesting was so outrageous Cordez saw them straight away.

  “Some months ago we were thinking of building a type of warship that could take the Reaper ships on at their own game,” said Carlos. “One that could survive the thermonuclear gases of binary stars, and the outer layers of suns, where the Invardii live and work.”

  “But that wasn’t practical, not in the time frame we had, or in sufficient numbers of ships to make a difference,” continued one of the research assistants with him.

  “However,” said John MacEwart, “we could build one of these ships in time for the attack on the Invardii city.”

  Cordez looked at the lumpy, doughnut shaped blueprint in front of him. If the Prometheus hull designers said it would work, he would believe them. It was supposed to be an inside out fusion reactor, keeping the inside of the ship at an acceptable temperature. Intense electromagnetic shields surrounding the torus would keep the plasma mayhem of the Antares sun at bay.

  “We can adjust the electromagnetic fields to suck plasma in from one side of the torus and spit it out the other,” said the other research assistant. “It wouldn’t be capable of stardrive, and probably no more than twenty percent of the speed of light against the resistance in the red giant’s surface layers.”

  “We’re lucky Antares is so diffuse,” she continued, “or we wouldn’t even get that.”

  “Since the ship would have to be launched into Antares some distance from the Invardii city,” said Carlos, “it would probably take as much as a week to get to the city.

  “We’re fortunate the plasma inside the sun will provide all the energy the ship will need.”

  “It would be a cow of a thing to fly,” said MacEwart, “even with the best computers we’ve got. The power in the electromagnetic shields would be way too high to be finely adjusted for flying the ship.

  “Someone would have to be on their toes every second for a week while flying in, and we don’t know how much longer after that, depending on how the battle for the city goes.”

  “But what’s the point of it?” said Cordez at last.

  MacEwart’s eyes lit up.

  “It could take out the city cooling system, from inside the sun.”

  Cordez’ eyes narrowed. He should have thought of that. He must be losing his grip. Taking out the city’s cooling system could be an ace card in an otherwise patchy hand. It would force the city out of the sun, and that would even the odds.

  Who could he send to fly this suicide machine into a red super giant star, all on its own, to attack a supercity from behind?

  He thought of Fedic, and then discarded him as a pilot. He wasn’t a hundred percent right from his self-imposed mission to Mentuk, and it was taking him longer to get back into shape after each mission – both physically and mentally. Cordez shook his head. Fedic was wearing himself out in service to the Alliance.

  There were others who could go, and they were almost as good. They didn’t have the e
xperience, or the flair, that the master had. But they would go if he asked them, and they would do a good job.

  MacEwart saw Cordez pondering these things, and guessed the nature of his thoughts.

  “Fedic has already volunteered,” he said.

  “It was him who gave us the idea,” said Carlos Paula. “He came to us one day and asked if we had anything that would fly through a sun. We had shelved the torus idea, but we dragged it out to show him. He gave us some ideas on how to make it fly better, and then he told us to give it a high priority.

  “This is the result.”

  Cordez was silent. He didn’t want to send his old friend on a mission like this, but if Fedic was determined to go he would have little chance of stopping him.

  He hung his head for a moment.

  “Build me this ship,” he said at last, and left the room.

  When he found Fedic, the stealth operative was keeping his fitness up. His opponents were shadowy figures created by the program he had set up in the gym computer. Cordez watched as Fedic worked his way through a series of computer-generated attacks with impeccable defenses. He never seemed to tire, and he never seemed to sweat.

  Cordez was pretty sure Fedic’s skin had been modified so it didn’t sweat – sweat made your hands slippery and got in your eyes – but his tirelessness would be due to an extraordinary life of disciplined activity.

  Fedic finished a series of responses, and came over to join him.

  “It’s not the same as live combat,” he said, doing something with a thin, flexible band covering his chest.

  “Heat sink,” he said as he adjusted the band, in response to Cordez’ unspoken question. “Dumps heat into Prometheus life support. Otherwise I’d burn up after a while.”

  Fedic listened quietly as Cordez explained that he didn’t have to go on this last mission. Cordez didn’t mind finding someone else to pilot the torus ship through the outer layers of Antares.

  “How do you know the things you know?” said Fedic, abruptly.

  Cordez was surprised at the change of subject.

  “You often make decisions that turn out to be the right calls, but I know you don’t always have the information to back it up.”

  Cordez thought about the things the Druanii had recently revealed to him. Fedic didn’t give him the time to decide whether he would share that information or not.

  “You know what I’m talking about, I can see it,” he said. “So you’ll believe me when I say that every mission I went on, I always knew I’d come back.”

  He paused, and took a deep breath.

  “And that’s how I know I won’t be coming back this time.”

  “Why go then?” exploded Cordez. “If you know?”

  “Because it would be worse if I didn’t go,” said Fedic, flatly. “Maybe I wouldn’t die if I stayed here at Prometheus, but it feels . . . wrong . . . of me to use my knowledge of the future to change it.

  “I think something is trying to tell me I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t go, maybe it’s worse than that. I don’t know.”

  His voice hardened. “But I’ve made the choice, and I’m sticking to it.”

  Cordez was silent for a long time, wrestling with his feelings. In the end his respect for the man, and what he had achieved for the Alliance, overcame his sadness at the thought of losing an old friend.

  He clasped Fedic’s hand, and then put his other arm around Fedic’s shoulder and pulled him close for a moment. Fedic allowed him the familiarity.

  Not another word passed between them.

  Cordez turned and left.

  PART SEVEN: COUNTING DOWN

  CHAPTER 25

  ________________

  When the Buccra warships made their attack on the Sumerian government at Rok’H’Rok, it was sudden, it was well organized, and it was mercilessly executed.

  The bulk of the Sumerian deep space Navy was now stationed away from the barren mineral moon, where repairs and maintenance could be more effectively carried out. Much of it was also delegated to routine ‘show the flag’ patrols around the remaining Sumerian colonies. In these circumstances the Sumerian government was helpless before the Buccra invasion.

  ParapSanni watched the slaughter above the moon impassively, the thin slits of his eyes showing his extreme displeasure. PraktuParBrahmad, the governor of Rok’H’Rok, had asked for the Sumerian warships to be released from their impossible task protecting the moon early on, and ParapSanni had agreed. The Buccra warships, however, had hunted the warships down all the same. Very few had made it into the safety of stardrive.

  The 3D animation in front of him, detailing the moon and the forces around it, showed 21 Buccra warships in formation above the planet. They had complete control of the cratered, desolate surface. The main body of Sumerian warships had been alerted to the situation by sub space radio, but they were half a day away at maximum speed.

  ParapSanni’s Second, ConosSanni, had been leading the defense of Rok’H’Rok from one of the warships, and ParapSanni didn’t know if his Second had made it into stardrive. He pushed those thoughts out of his mind for now. This moon was the seat of the Sumerian government, and the center of the Sumerian empire. He would defend it!

  The Buccra warships broke formation and spread across the surface of the moon, searching for signs of Sumerian habitation. A number congregated over the prominent mountain range on the side of the moon facing the gas giant Orcreti.

  ParapSanni gripped the edges of the table more tightly. It looked like the Buccra had found the main spaceport, even though it was well hidden at the bottom of a deep crater in the mountains.

  He switched one of the wall screens to images of the spaceport. An orderly evacuation was already underway. Shuttles laden with Sumerian staff were pulling out of the hangar area and onto the maglev system that ringed the moon deep underground.

  An enormous explosion destroyed the shelf of rock in front of the main door moments later, and buckled the massive structure inward. Air began to escape from the hangar, and the remaining Sumerians started to run for the shuttles. ParapSanni watched them bound across the hanger floor in the strange, giant leaps of Sumerians when their reserves of adrenaline kicked in.

  He switched back to the 3D animation, and saw Buccra warships descending into the crater in the mountains. On the wall screen he saw the main door of the spaceport now blown across the hanger, and the last of the escaping Sumerians waver and fall as the air supply vanished into the vacuum outside. Others in safety suits rushed across with rescue gear, and bundled the fallen on board the last of the shuttles. The shuttles were pressurized, and had their own air supply. The maglev system worked best when the shuttles traveled through the tunnels in a vacuum.

  Another enormous explosion took place on the surface, closer to ParapSanni and the Great Hall this time. The tremor passed under his feet, and the bedrock behind the sealed coating of the wall rang with an eerie moan. The Great Hall had been reinforced against any imaginable attack, and ParapSanni hoped the Par’Lock engineers were right about that. He gave orders for all personnel not directly engaged in defensive action to make their way to him in the Great Hall.

  PraktuParBrahmad appeared on one of the wall screens, his right hand upraised beside his head, in a formal sign that might best be translated as a request to be allowed to ‘teach respect’. ParapSanni raised his right hand in acknowledgment, and switched one of the wall screens to a feed still working outside the spaceport. He focused it on the mouth of the crater, far above.

  Doors rolled back into the surrounding cliffs, and he could see the flashes as powerful plasma cannons released a hail of writhing, super-hot plasma. The projectiles hit the descending Buccra warships, knocking them off course. The primordial matter clung to the ships until the plasma eventually cooled, and bled off into space. ParapSanni had watched the first armada attack on Uruk, and he remembered the effectiveness of the plasma cannons then.

  One of the Buccra warships was an early casualt
y. Blinded by concentrated plasma fire it tried to climb out of a bombing run into the crater and scraped across the surrounding peaks. It took too much damage on the jagged rock, and ended up blowing itself apart. ParapSanni felt a little better when he saw that.

  Another warship dropped out of the fight. It was damaged by the plasma cannons, it seemed, beyond repair. Then the tide turned in favor of the Buccra warships, as ParapSanni had known it would. Their powerful weapons picked out the plasma cannons, one by one, and destroyed them.

  ParapSanni looked out on the Great Hall through the clear partition of polished crystal at the end of his private offices. It was slowly filling with Sumerians. Those involved in the machinery of government came first, because they were closest. The ones from the mining sites would be last.

  Some might find a hiding place on the furthest reaches of the mineral moon, weighing the chances of being discovered against the risk of trying to make it to the Great Hall. There was nothing else ParapSanni could do now except wait out the Buccra attack. That was something the Sumerian empire knew how to do – its people would endure.

  A sub space link beside his desk lit up with a call. ParapSanni clipped a linguist earpiece into place beside his large, bullet-shaped head. It could be one of his governors, but it was most likely to be Cordez, now he knew of the attack.

  “Greetings, Supreme among the Eight,” said Cordez.

  ParapSanni acknowledged the call and sat down, in the strange, ungainly way the Sumerians did. He needed to feel part of the Alliance right now, and the call had come at just the right time to ease his mind.

  “Prometheus has a force of Javelins about three hours out from Rok’H’Rok, heading your way,” said Cordez, getting straight to the point.

  “They’re carrying some new, untried weapons, so this will be a great opportunity to try them out on the Buccra. Some of them are carrying sub space missiles as well, but our scientists think the Buccra will have developed shields against sub space attacks by now.”

  ParapSanni voiced his thanks. It was a great encouragement to him to know that help was on the way. He turned back to one of the wall screens in front of him, to see the largest of the mining sites being destroyed. At least the Buccra hadn’t yet found the underground maglev system that connected the admin center, the Great Hall, the living areas, and the second spaceport on the other side of the moon.