Threshold of Victory

by Stephen J. Orion

  “The Blood Iron are what they are because the violence of this war cut away everything that was superfluous until only the tip of the spear remained. That is what is to be learnt from a dead squad mate.

  “Your Undying?’ He shook his head. “You effectively have forty years experience on any of them, and you always will. Even if you didn’t, none of them will ever be as good as you. Two of them are good enough to become aces if they survive to develop their talent, but I’m all but certain one of them won’t. Two or three others are probably skilled enough to survive the war if they’re lucky and the others? Bracket, Fury, Edge, Wraith? This will probably be the last star system they ever see. If you want them to see the end of the war, the best thing you can do is send them home.”

  “Like you sent your wife home?”

  There was a whip-like crack as the gloves and several knuckles delivered a stinging blow to Phillip’s cheek. Recovering quickly, he bit his lip and glared at the man standing over him.

  “She,” Cormento said coldly, “has a different lesson for you. It doesn’t matter how good you are Mr. Phillips. It doesn’t matter what you do or think. People in your squadron are going to die. Dwell on that, and perhaps you’ll at least be an adult next time we meet.”

  The Colonel departed stiffly, and for a long-time Phillips glared at the door after him.

  “May you endure, till all others fall,” he said.

  And he didn’t mean it as a blessing.

  Chapter III

  Three of diamonds

  Constellation Carrier CNS Arcadia

  Battlegroup Olympian

  Grimball Local Sector, Bryson System

  20 April 2315

  “Four of clubs?” Tarek guessed uncertainly.

  The man at the other end of the table flipped the card over: it was the king of hearts. Implacably he drew another card from the deck and placed it face down next to the last one.

  Just when Tarek’s brig time was at risk of getting boring, two living legends from Blood Iron Squadron had pulled him from his cell into a very grey and bland interrogation room. Colonel Cormento, with his hard features and stern bearing, fit into the space like they were a matching set. Lieutenant Commander Quell, on the other hand, seemed incredibly out of place, like finding a centrefold model working in a tax accountancy.

  Tarek, of course, had the chair of the interrogee, but he wasn’t being questioned, or not exactly. All that adorned the steel table separating him from the Colonel was a black folder, fifty-two playing cards, and a pair of pilot’s gloves. The Colonel had shared only that he would be taking a basic precognition test and then immediately started getting him to guess cards.

  “Um… seven of diamonds,” Tarek hazarded.

  Cormento turned the card over: nine of spades.

  Tarek sighed and sat back in his chair. They’d gone through a quarter of the deck and he’d only gotten one right, and that he put down to the law of averages. If either the stoic Colonel or the elegant Quell had any feelings on his lack of success, they kept it from their faces.

  “The thing is,” Cormento said, his first words since the cards had started flipping, “I know you can do this. I watched you do it in the holos from Box Grid. The problem seems to be that you don’t know you can.”

  Tarek said nothing. Internally, his respect for the commander of the Blood Iron was at war with the growing feeling that the man sitting opposite him was just slightly crazy. Colonel I think some of your plates may have fallen off the trolley – wasn’t the sort of thing you said when you were already in the brig.

  “It might help you to know that there is significant evidence that a number of the Constellation Navy’s best pilots have exhibited varying degrees of precognitive ability. What little is known suggests that certain triggers have to be present to encourage the manifestation of this ability. In particular, the fear for one’s life has been a successful trigger in ninety percent of instances.”

  As he spoke, Cormento pulled a piece of paper from the black folder and placed it on the table facing Tarek. The pilot read it silently, his blood chilling before he got past the very direct and immediate heading.

  Execution Order.

  His eyes jumped to the end, where Cormento’s signature was joined by that of Vice Admiral Kerdana who headed up the entire battlegroup. More than enough authority to legitimise the page before him.

  When Tarek looked up, Quell was still leaning against wall, but her sidearm was out and pointed at him in an almost off-handed way. Her eyes were icy cold, however; and he had no doubt that she would pull the trigger if the Colonel told her too.

  Cormento took another card and placed it on the table face down. “All or nothing, Sergeant. Don’t guess, tell me what this card is.”

  A thousand thoughts rose through Tarek’s mind as he stared at the card. What would it feel like? Did the Captain know about this? Could he do anything if he did? Would he?

  Finally, Tarek looked up at Cormento and an odd sense of certainty settled on him. The man had come here chasing something and, however extreme his methods of seeking proof might be, he wasn’t about to throw away someone who might possess this rare ability, even if all evidence suggested otherwise.

  “You won’t do it,” Tarek told him certainly.

  Several moments passed.

  Quell pushed off the wall and levelled the weapon at Tarek in a proper two handed grip. “Sir?” she asked.

  Heavy seconds continued to pass, one after another. Cormento stared flatly at Tarek. The Sergeant stared back. Quell adjusted her grip.

  “Well played,” the Colonel said finally, snatching the sheet up and placing it back into the folder before collecting his gloves and the deck of cards. He rose to his feet. “Thank you for your time, Flight Sergeant. We shall allow you to return to your duties.”

  Quell holstered her pistol with a shrug and the two moved towards the door. It was at that moment that Tarek realised the Colonel had left the last card on the table. Tarek’s hand hovered in the air over it. There had been several seconds before he’d figured out that the Colonel was lying. Several seconds that he’d thought he’d end up having to bet his life on a single guess. Several seconds during which he would have guessed the jack of clubs.

  He flipped the card over.

  “Three of diamonds,” Cormento read coming back to the desk.

  Before Tarek could say anything, the Colonel had reached into his folder and pulled out a hardcopy booklet which he placed on the table. Pilots’ Guide to Harnessing Precognitive Potential: draft 7. The commissioning line was marked with the seal of the Council of Peers.

  “There’s so much we don’t know,” the Colonel said. “And most of the pilots who’ve demonstrated potential are… well let’s just say it’s a tremendous advantage, but that doesn’t mean invulnerability. Regardless, you should read this and learn what you can, apply what you can. I’ll be watching.”

  Pulling his gloves on, the Colonel started back towards the door.

  “Wait.” Tarek picked up the card and held it out towards him. “I thought it was the jack of clubs.”

  “An unremarkable failure,” Cormento said stopping in the doorway and turning to face him. “Unremarkable compared with the fact you knew, with enough certainty to bet your life on it, that a man you’ve never meant was not going to have you shot. Even in the presence of a fully legitimate execution order.”

  Tarek looked at the Colonel closer, somehow seeing him for the first time since he’d come through the door. Not crazy, but calculating, calculating every angle.

  “Keep the card, between us, it will be the jack of clubs because there will be a day when you can turn over any card, open any door, enter any fight, and know what awaits you beyond.” He tipped his hand in half salute. “I look forward to that day.”

  ****

  Constellation Carrier CNS Arcadia

  Battlegroup Immortal

  Grimball Local Sector, Bryson System

  20 April 2315


  “Commander, you’re not going to believe this,” Hanagan was already saying as he burst into the squadron’s berths.

  Adai Ucoo was quick to shimmy her chair away from Phillips, but she was still immediately conscious of how it must look. A deserted room, two chairs one against another at the singular corner table. Letting her fringe fall over her face, the Exodite shifted still further away.

  As always, Phillips was utterly unflappable, rising smoothly to greet the pilot. “Good news then, Lieutenant?”

  Hanagan paused, eyeing them both for a moment before pressing a small item into Phillips’ hands. Ucoo didn’t get a very good look at it, but then she didn’t need too.

  It was a data stick no bigger than her little finger. It was suspended on a chain and wrapped in a piece of paper with a hand-written code on it. She recognised it immediately because every pilot had a data stick like it hanging around their neck and a code like the one on the page memorised in their head. The launch key and passcode for a star fighter.

  “So when Colonel Cormento and Commander Quell left, it turns out they forgot one of their ships. Apparently it’s a spare, and they want you to have it.”

  Hanagan had an expression like a dog that had just retrieved a stick, but Phillips was uncharacteristically silent, his eyes fixed on the gift like he wasn’t sure what to do with it.

  “A Sabrecat, in our squadron,” the pilot continued and, keen to demonstrate what he’d just learned from Errant, he added: “family perks, eh Commander?”

  “I guess so,” Phillips said mechanically. “Thank you for bringing this to me.”

  “Yeah I… no problem,” Hanagan said.

  Ucoo could almost see him deflate.

  “The commander got some bad news earlier,” Ucoo said, keeping her voice soft in case the half-truth sounded too insincere. “It’s a wonderful gift but… the timing isn’t great.”

  “Oh… oh I’m sorry.” The pilot looked from her back to Phillips. “If I can do anything…”

  “No,” Phillips forced a smile. “No it’s really not that big of a deal. But thank you, and for this.” He held up the data stick once more.

  “Hey don’t mention it,” Hanagan gave him a pat on the shoulder than turned back and shook an excited fist. “I can’t wait to see it in action, man. You’re gonna love it. I promise.”

  “No doubt,” Phillips answered.

  “Well… goodnight.”

  Finally the squadron’s 2IC left, and Phillips sank back into his chair, his eyes fixed on the launch key.

  “You know we actually used to get along… or at least we could talk. Then he gets my mother killed and thinks I’m going to be some kind of replacement for her.” Phillips said. “I won’t join the Blood Iron, so he wants me in their plane, in their colours.” He sighed. “I won’t fly this thing.”

  Ucoo carefully took his hands and placed them between both of hers. “Yes you will,” she told him gently, “because while this squadron is a long way from earning wings like that, you aren’t.”

  “You guys are better than you think,” he said raising his gaze to meet her eyes. “And besides, my abilities have nothing to do with why he gave this to me.”

  “And that doesn’t matter. What matters is what you will do with it.” She looked at the desk for inspiration, but it was austere except for a jar of pens and pencils. “Think of it this way, if something happened, something bad, and the difference between you being able to stop it, or not, came down to whether you were using this ship, could you ever forgive yourself?”

  Phillips turned the key over in his hands. “That’s a point. It’s horribly unfair, but it’s a point.”

  Ucoo stood, leaned in and kissed him on the forehead. “I will fix this, I promise.”

  Stepping back, she smiled whimsically and left the room.

  ****

  Considering her rank, Lieutenant Rease had been to more than her fair share of high-level operational briefings. Time after time she found herself being labelled an attaché to some major or another so she could make a CO look good, sometimes with insightful advice, and sometimes just by being shown off. I have the Luperca in my battalion, what have you got?

  Today’s she was attaché to Major Yelsin, the senior commander from the recovered Box Grid garrison and also, technically, a captain. Captain Yelsin was currently a major only because he was on board a ship and received an unofficial, and unpaid, promotion to prevent the confusion of a ship having more than one captain. Of course, the Navy made no sense to Rease because the Arcadia’s captain was really a colonel, and though that was three ranks higher, no one would ever insult him by calling him such a thing.

  What made today’s operational briefing unique in Rease’s experience was that it was about the campaign in space, not the one on the ground. As such, she was struggling to figure out where she and her team were expected to fit in. If an enemy cruiser group was carrying out a flanking action, you couldn’t exactly sortie an arcom company to go send them packing.

  “Currently our forces are in a stand-off against the enemy,” Commander Lyle explained. “While we have successfully held them back from Bryson II, we lack the decisive strength margin to either destroy them or push them from the system.”

  Commander Lyle was the Arcadia’s senior intelligence officer, and while he wore a slightly sinister black storm coat, it couldn’t darken his somewhat jolly look, enhanced tremendously by white hair and a snowy beard. Every time the briefing got boring, Rease found herself envisioning him in a red suit, attempting to look stern as he gave out intelligence packages from his Christmas sleigh.

  “The good news is the Maulers also have insufficient strength to push us out of the system, and their tactics favour frontal assaults which, in the current conditions, are likely to be inconclusive.”

  Insufficient strength was not a term Rease had ever considered applying to a Mauler, but apparently that didn’t matter when you were in your big steel boat lobbing explosives into their big steel boat.

  The briefing continued, and Commander Lyle got into the nitty gritty behind terms like inconclusive and current conditions which left Rease plenty of time to peruse the other executive officers for likely candidates to pull Santa Lyle’s sleigh. The Captain, with his sharp goatee would have to be Blitzen, who to Rease’s mind always seemed a little too badass to be a reindeer, like he’d off Santa and take over the gig for himself given half a chance.

  “…likely to attempt further moves on the planet…”

  CAG Jenson was a stiff, that ruled out Cupid, Dancer and Prancer, probably Comet too. Wait, Donner, perfect. Donner was the sort of reindeer whose suits only came in tan or grey.

  “…Superior fighter to capital vessel ratio…”

  By the time Commander Lyle finally handed over to the Captain for the specific assignments Rease had six of the nine reindeer figured out

  “Thank you, Commander,” Pierman said, taking his place next to the holodeck that dominated the war room. “The Arcadia has been given three core assignments. Firstly we will be providing the standard ten craft every other watch for the fleet Combat Air Patrol.

  “Secondly we will provide up to twenty fighters for Operation Catchphrase. Catchphrase is detailed in your packets, but the objective is to get the damaged CNS Tartarus from the fleet to the nearest hyperspace shore so it can return to port. We will be employing a small-scale escort for the ship initially, but there is a possibility, indeed a hope, that the Maulers will send some warships to attack it.

  “In this eventuality, we will provide additional fighter cover for warships the fleet dispatches to intercept this attack.”

  Rease was starting to switch off again – all very exciting if you were a pilot, but her arcom wouldn’t be providing escort or blowing up any Mauler ships. Before she could get back to examining the problem of whether Rudolf really counted as a canon reindeer, the Captain’s next words brought the meeting sharply back in to focus.

  “The final assignment for
Arcadia is to launch a strategic nuclear assault against Box Grid, including damage assessment.”

  It was all Rease could do to stay in her seat through the rest of the briefing. The various ship section reports were universally unexciting and couldn’t dislodge her mind from the one critical point. They were going to blow up all evidence of what had happened on Box Grid. Removing any chance to answer the questions that she had thought Jolly Saint Lyle and his team of black coats should already be demanding answers to.

  When the briefing finished, Rease loitered until everyone had left and then followed Commander Lyle back into his office, a room not coincidentally adjoined to the ship’s war room.

  The IO’s office was several degrees cooler than the rest of the ship, and it was cluttered with data slates, holocharts and plain old reams of paper reports. The moment he entered the Commander crossed the room and took a seat at his desk, shifting through charts and striking in rapid entries on his terminal.

  “Lieutenant Rease,” he greeted without pausing from what he was doing. “You’re the type of anomaly every intelligence office hopes to go their entire career without encountering.”

  The Lieutenant didn’t have an off-the-cuff answer for that, being mostly caught flat footed by the fact this jolly looking man hadn’t outwardly seemed to even notice her enter the room behind him.

  “Fortunately, I like anomalies, when they’re on our side at least. Heuristic prediction is never one hundred percent accurate, and it’s the exceptional individuals who fill the gaps left by what we can’t anticipate.” He smiled warmly but still didn’t look up from what he was doing. “You don’t want us to nuke Box Grid then, do you?”

  “I… no sir. Not yet.”

  “Good. And why not?”

  “Box Grid looks alright from orbit, but when you get there it stops making sense. The buildings were almost all empty, no furnishings, no luxuries. The construction standard is ridiculously low, anytime a Mauler even leans against a wall it collapses. It would be like us making our houses out of tin foil.”