The Long-Range War

by Christopher Nuttall

  Apsidal was, she conceded ruefully, an impressive system. It had been settled for thousands of years, more than long enough for every world and most of the asteroids to be settled or exploited. Thousands of freighters moved through the system, making their way towards the gravity points or Apsidal itself; dozens of warships patrolled the system, as if they were expecting trouble at any moment. She wasn’t surprised to discover that there were four battlestations guarding the gravity point to Mokpo. The Tokomak would almost certainly be funnelling ships through the naval base at N-Gann, three transits up the chain. They wouldn’t want anyone interfering with that.

  They haven't managed to get the majority of their fleet here, she noted, as she steered around the gravity point. There were another five squadrons of starships on guard duty, but they were a mere handful compared to the enemy fleet. She guessed they’d been hastily rushed to Apsidal from N-Gann once the enemy had started putting their plan together. But they’re doing everything in their power to make it work.

  A chill ran down her spine. Her subroutines were silently calculating the possibilities, throwing up a dozen different simulations. None of them were very cheerful. She’d been told, time and time again, that the enemy could trade a hundred starships for every human ship and come out ahead, but she hadn’t really believed it. Now ... now she believed it. The Tokomak ruled a massive empire, with the resources to match, while humanity had a pitiful handful of colonies and a tiny number of allies. How could they hope to prevail?

  Advanced technology and better tactics, she told herself, setting her course towards the planet itself. We can make them bleed until they think better of it.

  She allowed herself a moment of frustration. She’d seen the projections. If they’d had fifty more years to prepare, fifty years to build up the fleet, the Tokomak wouldn’t have stood a chance. Advanced weapons, advanced drives ... perhaps even an FTL communications system ... humanity’s tech advantage would have been too great for them to overcome. They would have been tribal warriors, blissfully unaware of machine guns until they charged their enemies and were mown down in their thousands. But instead, the Tokomak had started the war too soon. She couldn’t help wondering if that was deliberate.

  Apsidal slowly grew in her awareness until it dominated her mind. The world was nothing but city. It was surrounded by a giant ring - she thought it looked like a donut - that was connected to the surface by six orbital towers. She wasn't sure if she should be impressed by the sheer size of the construction or horrified by the risk. If the ring shattered and fell out of orbit, the entire planet would be rendered uninhabitable. Billions of lives would be lost, billions more would be forced to flee. Her awareness passed over the multitude of orbital defence platforms, industrial nodes and fabricators. Apsidal was an industrial powerhouse and it showed. She suspected the entire system was slowly being turned into a support base for the Tokomak war machine.

  Good thing we’re about to come take the system away, she thought, as more and more data flowed into her sensors for later analysis. There were surprisingly few radio transmissions. Apsidal seemed to be less chatty than Earth, even though the entire population of Sol would have vanished without trace on the ancient world. Perhaps they used lasers, or hardwired connectors, or ... perhaps they weren't allowed to talk. Restrictive societies did everything in their power to keep their people from talking freely. They wouldn't want someone to start plotting a revolt.

  She watched Apsidal for nearly an hour, studying the planetary defences carefully, then started to inspect the remainder of the system. A couple of other worlds - they looked to have been very similar to Mars, once upon a time - had high populations too, although they didn’t seem to be particularly industrialised. The gas giants were surrounded by so many cloudscoops that it looked as if they were on the verge of being drained dry. Her lips twitched in amusement. Gas giants were so incredibly vast that it would take thousands of years to literally siphon away every last bit of gas. She’d once read a proposal to put FTL drives on a planet and turn it into a giant starship, but the drives would have to be gigantic and the power requirements incomprehensibly high. She doubted it would ever be anything other than a theory.

  Although it would have its amusing side, she thought, wryly. What would the Tokomak think if we start hurling planets at them?

  She dismissed the thought as she turned back towards the gravity point. There was no clue that anyone had seen her, but it looked as though the pace of starships through the gravity point was starting to pick up. The gap between starship transits had narrowed to three minutes. Hameeda paused, well clear of the gravity point, and watched the battlestations suspiciously. Were they trying to make life difficult for her? Or were they merely trying to get more starships through the gravity point? There was no way to be sure.

  Not that it matters, she told herself. Whatever they have in mind, it has been quite effective in slowing me down.

  She waited as long as she dared - nearly an hour - but the transit pace didn’t change. Her sensors picked up a handful of transmissions between the battlestations and transiting freighters, yet none of them seemed particularly suspicious. She considered waiting longer, but she knew the admiral was depending on her. Gritting her teeth, she followed the next freighter towards the gravity point and transited back to Garza. Her awareness filled with new freighters. An entire convoy of ships was waiting to make the jump.

  Crap, she thought, as she hastily moved out of the way. What are they doing here?

  More data flowed into her sensors. Analysis subroutines scanned the data and offered tentative conclusions. It looked as though one of the really big interstellar corporations had dispatched a convoy to Garza. No wonder the battlestations had allowed the transit rate to speed up. The Galactic corporations were even less understanding of interstellar realities than their human counterparts. They’d be more annoyed about bureaucratic regulations slowing down the convoy, even if the regulations were - for once - quite sensible - than the risk of losing a handful of ships. She was surprised they hadn't demanded that their ships were allowed to jump through in pairs.

  Perhaps the crews refused, she thought. A human-run corporation would know better than to issue orders that would be disobeyed, but would the Galactics? They seemed to believe they could bend the universe to their will. Any trained spacer would know that the odds of surviving a multiple jump are poor. Who’d sign up for the chance to commit suicide?

  She slipped back into FTL and headed away from the gravity point, heading back to the fleet. The mission had been a success by any reasonable definition, although she was sure the admiral wouldn't be pleased. She’d have to decide between forcing the system, which would give the Tokomak a chance to bleed her before their main fleet even arrived, or pulling back and picketing Garza instead. That would be a serious problem. The Tokomak could simply bypass the system and, by using one of the other gravity points, head straight for Earth.

  Mission elapsed time, thirty-two hours, she thought, as she removed her helmet and forced herself to stand. Her body was covered in sweat. It didn’t feel anything like so long.

  She staggered into the shower, signalling the automated systems to turn on the water, and sighed in relief as warm water cascaded down. It was all she could do to slowly undress and dump her shipsuit in the basket for cleaning. Her fingers felt brittle, as if she’d forgotten how to use them. She could direct the ship’s waldos to do anything - or use precisely-modulated gravity fields to do more delicate work - but it was all she could do force her fingers to work properly. Perhaps she was just too tired.

  Maybe I should put myself in a sensory tank, she considered, as she used a ship’s field to dry herself. A new shipsuit floated into the compartment and hovered in the air, waiting for her to put it on. My body would be held in suspension while I controlled the ship.

  Hameeda sighed. She doubted she’d be allowed to do anything of the sort. The scientists had considered it important that she remembered she was human
, even though she’d bonded herself to a datanet. No partner, male or female, would ever be so intimate with her. They would never share her thoughts. And they would go, in time, while the datanet would remain.

  A chime ran through the ship. They were dropping out of FTL. Hameeda hastily grabbed the clean shipsuit and put it on, then ordered the datanet to transmit everything they’d detected to the flagship. Admiral Stuart’s intelligence staff would want to go through everything, even though the analysis subroutines had already drawn a number of conclusions. Hameeda wondered, idly, if they were testing her and her ship as much as they were planning an assault on the enemy position. The Solar Union wouldn't commit to building a whole fleet of LinkShips unless they were certain the concept was workable.

  Admiral Stuart’s hologram requested permission to enter the ship. Hameeda granted it with a sigh. She wasn’t in the mood for talking. Her body felt drained, even though her implants had taken care of her while she’d been en rapport with the datanet. She needed a solid eight hours sleep before she could consider herself fit for duty. But she was starting to think she wasn't going to get it.

  “Captain,” Admiral Stuart said. “Good work.”

  “Thank you,” Hameeda said. A cruiser or destroyer could have scouted the system, but not sneaked through the gravity point. The admiral would have had to send a modified freighter if she hadn't had the LinkShip, raising the spectre of the ship being inspected before it was allowed to proceed into the system. “I trust the data is useful.”

  “It has some worrying implications,” Admiral Stuart said. “But yes, it has helped us plan our assault.”

  Hameeda nodded. “When are we going to move?”

  “As soon as the towlines are connected,” Admiral Stuart said. “Are you up for a return visit?”

  “I need some sleep,” Hameeda admitted. “But I will be ready soon.”

  “Then get some rest now,” Admiral Stuart ordered. “You need it. And Captain ...”

  “Yes, Admiral?”

  “Well done.”

  Chapter Eight

  “Admiral,” Yolanda said. “The towlines are connected. We are ready to depart on your command.”

  Hoshiko nodded. If there was one thing she’d learnt in her career, particularly during her assignment to the Martina Sector, it was that it was better to move as fast as possible once one had decided to use force. The Galactics tended to be slower than humanity at reacting to bad news - although that was starting to change - but it was dangerous to give them time to go on alert and rally their forces. Better to hit them as hard as possible, then press the advantage before they had a chance to get back on their feet.

  And most of my officers agreed, she thought, crossly. She wasn’t used to being diplomatic when it came to issuing orders, let alone debating tactics, and she was still annoyed that some of her subordinates seemed to expect her to consult them before she made up her mind. But then, they had been independent commanders before their squadrons had been folded into her fleet. She wouldn't have been too happy if someone had done that to her ships. We have to take the offensive.

  “Remind the officers that it is important that we secure the gravity point as quickly as possible,” Hoshiko said. “The enemy freighters aren’t important as long as we block their path to the gravity point.”

  “Aye, Admiral.”

  Hoshiko took a breath. “Pass fleet command to Commodore Harding, then order the freighters to take us into FTL,” she added. “It’s time.”

  A jerk ran through the starship, followed by a queasy sensation that refused to fade. Hoshiko gritted her teeth, telling herself - firmly - that the sensation would be gone in less than twenty minutes, when they dropped out of FTL. The freighter towing Defiant through FTL didn’t have a modern drive. Her designers had copied the Tokomak design, ensuring that no watching sensors noted anything odd about her. She certainly didn't look like a human-designed ship, not from a distance. Hoshiko could put up with her inefficiencies for that.

  They also designed their ships for easy conversion, she reminded herself. A ship designed for humans would be incomparably vast for some races and incredibly cramped for others.

  She put the thought aside as the timer started to count down the seconds to emergence. The watching sensors would see them coming, of course, but all they would see were a handful of freighters. They wouldn’t see the warships behind them until it was far too late. And yet, if the station reacted quickly, they could get a drone through the gravity point before Hoshiko could move to stop them. Too many things could go wrong.

  Stop doubting, she thought. You’re committed now.

  She leaned back in her chair and concentrated on projecting an impression of being calm and composed. Her staff were moving with cool professionalism, but there was a sharp edge in the air that she knew all too well. It was the first time they were going into battle against a real enemy, rather than computer-generated simulations; it was the first time they were at real risk of dying, if something went badly wrong. Hoshiko had come to terms with her own mortality long ago, back when she’d gone to the academy, but she knew that others refused to believe they could die until it was too late. She wondered, suddenly, how many of her staff had uploaded brainprints into computer matrixes, trying to ensure that something of themselves would live on. It struck Hoshiko as silly, but the younger generation saw no difference between a biological person and a brainprint. There were even people who claimed that, one day, everyone would live in computers.

  “Two minutes to emergence, Admiral,” Yolanda said.

  “Prepare to engage,” Hoshiko ordered. “Stand by to engage.”

  She braced herself. Commodore Harding would be following their progress. He’d take the remainder of the fleet into FTL the moment he saw them vanish from his sensors. Her reinforcements would arrive within twenty minutes. And yet, she was worried. She knew, all too well, just how many things could go wrong. There was too much complexity worked into her battle plan for her to have much faith in it.

  A shudder ran through the ship. The display blanked, then filled with fearsome speed. A station, hundreds of freighters and a gravity point ... just as the LinkShip had reported. The station’s automated defences started to come online, only to be blown away as Hoshiko’s ships opened fire. A freighter that had been inching towards the gravity point veered away, snapping into FTL with commendable speed. Hoshiko made a silent bet with herself, as other freighters vanished too, that their commanders were from the younger races. They tended to react quicker.

  “Seize the gravity point,” she snapped. “And signal the remaining freighters to stand down or be destroyed.”

  The squadron lunged forward, just as a freighter appeared in the gravity point. It had no time to react before a missile struck her amidships and blew her into an expanding ball of superheated plasma. Hoshiko felt a flicker of pity, combined with a grim awareness that they couldn’t risk letting the defences on the far side be alerted. And yet, the sudden pause in transits from Garza would alarm them. Someone would poke their head through soon enough to see what had happened. And when they didn’t return ...

  “Admiral, the station is surrendering,” Yolanda said. “The remainder of the freighters are running.”

  “Noted,” Hoshiko said. The station was a fourth-order concern at the moment. It had no defences, nothing to keep her from blowing it to dust if the whim struck her. “Is the squadron ready to deploy assault pods?”

  “Yes, Admiral,” Yolanda said. “The squadron is standing by.”

  Hoshiko sucked in her breath. Admiral Webster and his team, most of whom had been science-fiction writers before science-fiction had been outdated by real-life alien contact and space war, had devised a relatively simple approach to assaulting gravity points. Indeed, it was so simple that she was surprised the Tokomak or one of their rivals hadn't invented it themselves, although their technology had been rather more primitive in those days. The assault pods were really nothing more than missile pods
with a single-use jump drive attached, allowing them to make transit through a gravity point. A number would interpenetrate and be destroyed, of course, but they were expendable. Hoshiko had no qualms about using them to save lives.

  “Signal all ships,” she ordered. “Launch the assault pods.”

  Defiant shuddered as she emptied her external racks. The other ships followed suit, hurling the assault pods towards the gravity point. Hoshiko leaned forward, watching avidly, as the assault pods reached the gravity point and started to vanish. There was no attempt at stealth - the scientists had warned that there was no way to keep the enemy from detecting them - but it might take the Tokomak several minutes to react. They simply wouldn't know what the pods were until they released their deadly contents.

  And there will be hundreds of missiles suddenly bearing down on their targets, Hoshiko thought. That will make their lives more interesting.

  She glanced at the timer, then nodded. “Order the squadron to advance, as planned,” she said. The long-range sensors were showing the remainder of the fleet, ten minutes away. “Take us through the gravity point in quick succession.”