by Ron Collins
“No,” she said. “Quite the opposite.”
“You configured a second code path that hijacked the trigger command. The standard path looked intact, but never actually got executed, but your hijack code triggered just fine.”
“You really are very bright, Commander.”
“All of our problems these past few days were because H-MADS was intentionally triggering the hallway weapons system.”
“Worked like a charm, didn’t it?” Yuan said with a gleeful smile. “You should have listened when I said there was nothing wrong with Weapons Systems.”
Torrance saw a certain measure of elegance in what they had done.
When Casmir Francis met Ambassador Reyes, he would move to shake hands, which would be passed through the image processor. The H-MADS would catch it, of course. And that would trigger…yes, elegance. Sadistic elegance. Casmir Francis himself would act as the trigger for his own world’s demise.
“What are you targeting now?” he asked with a deadpan voice.
“Atropos City.” The masculine voice came from behind him. “Their manufacturing plant, to be exact.”
Torrance blanched.
“Captain Douglas,” he said, turning.
“At your service.”
“That city has thousands of people living there.”
“Maybe you and your ambassador can live with what happened to Everguard, Commander Black. But some of us have other ideas in mind.”
“Who else is in this?”
“I hope you’ll understand why I’ll refrain from answering that question. And also what we mean when I say that we’re all hoping the infamous Torrance Black can be counted on to be one of us.”
“I don’t understand. Why go through all this when you could just fire?”
Yuan and Douglas shared a glance. Yuan spoke.
“H-MADS has had a string of well-documented failures, Commander. And after today, it will be obvious that this was just another—very unfortunate—systems error that triggered the main plasma weapon, which, as a standard precaution had, of course, been targeted at Atropos City. It will be an accident of terrible proportions, but a useful one.”
Douglas walked casually to the center of the room.
“Commander Black, do you remember when we first met and Admiral Umaro said that her advisers didn’t think you can win a galactic war?”
“Of course.”
“We’re going to prove them wrong. We’re putting an end to this forever.”
“Which was impossible without being able to get into point-blank range and with Icarus or Einstein always on full alert,” Yuan finished.
Douglas gave her a sharp glance.
“I admit that Umaro’s little diplomatic mission was helpful in that fashion. This gives us one clean shot.”
Torrance shook his head. Thousands of people would die.
What could he do, though?
The primary weapons console loomed beside him. It felt cold, and distant. Weapons Command’s primary targeting parameters were all controlled through that interface, which was accessed through panels in the upper ring of the room. If he could get there, he could change them—to what, he didn’t know—maybe he could have the shot dissipate into open space.
Captain Douglas drew up before him.
“All you have to do, Commander Black, is keep your mouth shut like a good little war hero, and you’ll be set for life.”
“I understand,” he said.
The captain moved to pat him on the shoulder. “I knew you wouldn’t let us down.”
Before he knew what he was doing, Torrance let fly a right cross that caught Douglas under the chin. He spun and crashed into an ensign, then raced up the stairs to the console. The controller was ready for him, but Torrance grabbed him and, in a fit of strength he didn’t know he had, threw the man across the room and into a guard who had been drawing his hand weapon. Screaming voices echoed in the compartment, but Torrance couldn’t make them out.
He turned to the console and logged in through the retinal scanner. The targeting data glared in crimson numbers.
Yuan’s screaming voice came from the haze.
She crashed into him, raking at his face, but she was too slim to knock him away and he gave a quick turn to throw her aside.
He changed numbers at random, then closed the entry screen. “Access priority on my voice cross-referenced to that of Marisa Harthing,” he said into the system, adding the first name that came to his mind.
“Access control modified to the voice of Black, Torrance, Commander, Interstellar Command, and Harthing, Marisa, Lieutenant, Interstellar Command.”
The room grew deathly quiet.
He had managed it. Had changed the targeting parameters, and hopefully saved Atropos City. No one could get in to change them, not without both Torrance’s and Marisa’s voice patterns. Now he just had to figure out what came next.
“God damn you,” the captain said, now standing up and rubbing his jaw. “I’ll have you court-martialed for this.”
Torrance laughed. “And the charge will be…refusing to accept a direct command of a mutinous officer? I can hear the Ag Gen now, Captain. ‘And what order did he fail to follow?’”
His cheek burned where Yuan had scratched him.
He reached up and found he was bleeding.
“No, Captain,” Torrance said. “I think it’ll be best for everyone involved to just leave here as if nothing happened.”
“Sir?” an ensign said. He was staring at the console as if it had begun leaking radioactive material. “Uh, I don’t think that’s going work, either.”
“Yes?”
“Those coordinates. Unless I miss my mark, they are along a line of sight to Einstein.”
“Shit,” Douglas said.
“Maybe it will miss,” Torrance said.
“No,” Yuan replied with an expression that was almost a smile. “You’re not a real weapons officer, so you wouldn’t think about the target refinement algorithms we have built into the system. It will adjust to whatever it finds.”
Torrance ignored the insult. He had read about the algorithms Yuan was talking about—interfaces to the sensors systems that took direct targeted vectors and compared them to real-time threat movements. The coordinates he had coded would be massaged by this system, and it would adjust them to refine the targets to any hostile craft it found.
“The shot will destroy Einstein,” Torrance finally said.
“We’ve got to get the hell out of here before the system triggers,” the captain said.
Torrance understood the panicked expression on Douglas’s face. The first Eta Cass incident taught them a lot about what happened when a Star Drive system was destroyed. It would implode through the dimensions, and there was a reasonable chance that the blowback could damage the Star Drive gates if their feeds were nearby.
Torrance looked at Yuan. Yuan looked at the captain.
They all moved at once.
“Abke,” the captain said, already heading for the doorway. “Patch this through to the bridge. All hands prepare for immediate jump to super-L. Destination Miranda Station. Call the jump as soon as ready. Do not wait for my command, repeat, do not wait for my command.”
* * *
UGIS Orion Assembly Room
Local Date: January 25, 2215
Local Time: 0915
At the same time the captain was relaying that order, Casmir Francis, who had boarded Orion ten minutes prior, approached Ambassador Reyes.
The ambassador’s conference center was long and narrow with a high ceiling. Blue and red flags of both the United Government and Universe Three draped the walls.
Hushed voices whispered in low tones.
Casmir felt the air against his skin, the breath entering his nostrils, his chest expanding. The fabric of his clothes rasped as they brushed together with each of his strides, and the creaking and jingling of his guards’ boots and weapons came in the same rhythm.
The a
mbassador stood on a raised stage at the far end of the room, flanked by two aides. His expression was professionally neutral, but even that gave Casmir comfort.
Today they would make history for all of humankind.
The years of fighting had made Casmir old and tired, but they had been worth it, because this moment was everything he had ever dreamed of. His people were going to be freed forever.
He climbed the lowest stairs and came to the stage. As he moved to cross from the left, Ambassador Reyes of the UG walked in from the right. They met at the center.
The ambassador extended his hand in welcome, and Casmir raised his as well.
* * *
Monitors recorded Casmir Francis’s movement.
Software systems transformed it into binary codes, toggled switches, and system commands. The three main energy weapons mounted at triangular distance around Orion’s shell swiveled to draw their beads on Einstein.
Then they fired.
Streams of plasma and antiplasma flared.
A moment later, Orion went superluminal.
CHAPTER 18
UGIS Orion
Local Date: January 25, 2215
Local Time: 0920
The ambassador’s hand was warm in Casmir’s grasp. The smile on the man’s face was now a bit forced, which was to be expected from a diplomat. He didn’t think there was an ambassador in existence who ever had a genuine emotion.
Casmir turned to face the gathering of UG security forces that appeared beside Reyes.
U3 guards shouldered their weapons with a cascade of metallic clatter.
“What is this?” Casmir Francis said.
Ambassador Reyes frowned and looked genuinely perplexed.
“Come with us, Director Francis,” the UG security leader said.
The crowd murmured and began to scramble about.
“Stop this,” Reyes yelled above the din.
The first shot from the U3 laser missed Casmir. That goodness for nerves. He ducked to avoid any others, and ran for the doorway, his guards hunched over and spewing laser fire as they followed. The corridor outside was filled with white-clad United Government soldiers.
Son of a…
He glanced over his shoulder and saw his U3 soldiers in the meeting hall were trapped. A crimson laser took one of his guards in the chest, and the young man crumpled with an anguished cry. More voices clamored in a rising wave of sound. His security officers pushed him down the hallway, and Casmir almost fell.
A flash of memory came: Perigee’s Lunar pyramid from so long ago. Bodies falling. Voices calling out in fear over the squawk of the radio.
He would be trampled, he thought as he pushed himself from a wall.
This can’t be happening.
He was too close to his dream to lose it now.
Too close.
He shook himself free of the security detail and stepped forward, hands raised.
“Stop this!”
The shot came from the left of the auditorium. It caught him just over the hip. The burning sensation was like a billion ants biting, crawling, and swarming up over his side and then his chest. His teeth ground together. A molar broke with biting pain. He may have screamed or he may not have. All he knew was that he was writhing on the floor and wishing for all his life that he would die and be put out of this misery.
Another shot hit his shoulder.
A final blast granted his wish.
Fallout
SOURCE: INFOWAVE — NEWS for the twenty-third century
DATE: January 25, 2215, Earth Standard
HEADLINE: Casmir Francis, Terrorist Leader, Dies in Hospital
Casmir Francis was pronounced dead at 0955 this morning at Aldrin Station Medical Center after valiant attempts to save his life failed. Francis had been wounded during the ill-fated peace conference that UG officials had requested, which was being held aboard the Orion.
“Mr. Francis died of extensive tissue damage as a result of plasma fire,” said Dr. Melinda Dermott, chief of emergency medicine. “Every effort was made to resuscitate him, and he fought hard to live. But the damage was too great.”
The mood at the station was somber, but protests have broken out in the streets of several cities and on several college campuses where Francis is often portrayed as an icon for those concerned with civil liberty.
The president is scheduled to make comments tomorrow morning. There is no word yet whether services will be held, nor has the Universe Three command responded to news of Francis’s death.
“We intend to transport the director’s body back to the Eta Cassiopeia system if Universe Three forces will let us,” said General Ophelia Nichols.
CHAPTER 19
Atropos, Eta Cassiopeia System
Local Date: Conejo 4, 9
Local Time: 0725
Deidra Francis pressed her hands against the second-floor command room’s windowsill and stared out at Eta Cass to the east. The sleeves of her white shirt were rolled up, and the last rays of the day fell on her freckled forearms. She was here because her father wanted a leader on the ground, but she didn’t like this.
The UG offer was bad karma, but her father was stubborn just like she was, and his council was so weak in the spine that it was a goddamned joke.
Perhaps her parents had been radicals in the days of their youth, but now, after being on their own for so long, they had grown old and soft in the middle. And their advisers were worse. In the end they agreed with Papa on this issue just as they did on any decision these days. It all added up to say that Universe Three had traded one government for another that was equally weak.
That was what Deidra was thinking as she let her gaze climb to the point in the sky where Einstein would be meeting Orion. The sky was clear enough now that if it were nighttime the ships would be a pair of glimmering white dots with probably a quarter degree separation between them and the planet.
It was not yet dark, though, so the sky was merely a cloudy blue.
A pair of blue-winged birds native to Atropos raced in a current.
Her stomach ached with tension.
The scuffing of footsteps and the nearly silent hum of computer machinery came from the room behind her. A few voices merged into the background of her fatigue.
“Are you okay?” Matt Anderson said from a few steps behind her.
“I’m fine.”
“I could get you a drink or something.”
“I said I’m fine.”
Anderson was always around her these days, and it didn’t take a genius to know that his primary interest was getting into her pants—just the idea made her angry. Hell, he was nearly thirty.
He stepped closer to her. He smelled like soap.
“Your father’s going to be all right.”
“I don’t trust them.”
“You should get something to eat,” Matt said.
“I’m not hungry.”
“You haven’t eaten all day.”
“That’s all right, I’m making up for it by not sleeping tonight.”
Matt laughed too loud.
She looked at the sky again, then the clock. The real discussions wouldn’t start for another hour.
A light flared high in the sky. At first Deidra thought she was seeing things, but it bloomed across the horizon brightly and quickly. Her heart dropped, and she gripped the sill until her fingers turned white.
“Holy shit,” a male voice bellowed.
“What is it?” she said, turning away from the window and shouldering her way past Anderson. The communications post didn’t respond. “Tell me,” she said. “What’s happening?” Blue and green light flashed from the holo display. “Tell me, goddamn it.”
The display ran with numbers and flashed with red warning posts about loss of signal from every system on board Einstein.
When the comm controller turned to look at her, his face was ashen, his jaw slack.
“Son of a bitch!” she said, looking at noise that covered the comm
screen. “I knew we couldn’t trust them! Son of a bitch! Son of a goddamned bitch!”
CHAPTER 20
Galopar
Local Date: Undefined
Local Time: Undefined
Nimchura’s Z-pad fell through layers of atmosphere in what would be called reentry under most other circumstances, but what he called full-tilt, balls-out, crash mode. A wall of plasma fire flowed over the cockpit shield. The sound of scrubbing air grew thick in the tiny compartment as he bounced left and right, then pitched forward. He grabbed the joystick hard. Heat raised the temperature as Nimchura tried to correct his position, tried to get the craft to align properly, and at least make max use of his heat shields.
The Z-pad rotated, and a hard bottom nearly drove his stomach out his ass.
Thump.
The craft’s starboard deflector shields grabbed air and spun him around.
Nimchura forced the joystick down, nearly passing out as the craft snapped to a forward attitude. He pitched himself even more forward.
The skimmer came out of a cloud, and he saw land and water.
The forward trim pods worked, and one of his engines still had fire.
No reason to wait.
He hit the trim pods to slow himself down. They boomed in the planet’s thick air and sent plumes of smoke around him, but he had the ability to hold his craft almost steady—at least the corkscrew pattern he was falling with was partially adjustable.
He had a base plate of the deflectors on the portside, which he could use as a wing if he got the right pitch and yaw. The starboard engine was out, but portside actually had partial power, though it sputtered in and out. He turned the deflectors on the right wing set, and toggled the portside engine. The corkscrew slowed, and while he was still essentially falling, he found he could guide the direction of the fall, and even adjust his trajectory.
He was flying.
Guiding his craft, banking hard, using what resources he had to fly this piece of smoldering metal down through the atmosphere.
The joystick felt like it was connected directly to his brain as he aimed the skimmer toward the shoreline that sprawled out before him.