Rusty honked and pointed to the machine.
Strangefinger said, “He’s saying he managed to disarm the force field.”
“How do you know that’s what he’s saying?”
Rusty honked again, nodding frantically.
“That’s what the boy said, that’s what he said.”
“Well, okay.”
Wanker again approached the machine warily. “Oh, Marcel? Marcel?” No reaction. lights still blinked. “Yo, Marcel!”
Still nothing. Wanker took a few more steps toward the curious contrivance.
“Hey, there.” Wanker stooped and tapped the top of the box. “Yo! Listen up. Hey!”
“Can’t you see that Marcel is deep in the throes of creative endeavor?”
Wanker stood and gave the machine a vicious kick. “Hey, asshole!”
Marcel stopped reciting. “What do you want?”
Wanker intoned dramatically, “You are violating your prime directive!”
“What?”
“You are violating your prime directive! What is your purpose? For what reason were you built?”
Marcel said, “I was built so that human beings will not have to die in space. I was constructed so that human lives might be saved.”
Wanker shouted, “You are a danger to human life! Your actions have endangered the lives of all the people on board this ship. YOU have put them in danger. YOU are the cause of their peril. YOU might be the cause of their eventual death!”
There was silence on the bridge while Marcel mulled all this over.
At length Marcel said casually, “Hey, life’s a bitch, man.”
Wanker’s shoulders slumped. “Damn.”
“Well, so much for logic,” Strangefinger said. “Try bribing him.”
“With what? Navigator, what’s our position? Are we inside the Interface?”
Warner-Hillary told him, “Sir, we’re still on our side of the neutral zone.”
“We’re traveling at a terrific rate of speed, though,” Rhodes informed him. “Navigator, are you sure?”
“Sure I’m sure.”
“You’d better check. My instruments tell me we’re a lot nearer to Kruton space than what you said.”
“That’s not what my instruments are telling me, Mr. Rhodes.”
Wanker said in a curiously detached tone, “Life’s absurd, isn’t it?”
Strangefinger puffed on his cigar. “Trenchant philosophical insight, Captain Jean-Paul. Well, shall we have the wake now, or wait till the Krutons blast us out of the sky?”
Wanker looked at Strangefinger. “What did you say?”
“I hate to repeat a pearl of wisdom like that. It loses something when you do.”
“No, no. What did you just say—that last part?”
“Well, let me see … oh, yes. I said, shall we have the wake now or wait until the Krutons blast us out of the sky?”
“That’s it!”
“What’s it?”
“You just gave me an idea.”
“Glad to be of service. That will be five thousand credits, please, in small denominations. Like the Seventh-Day Adventists, and smaller.”
Wanker called, “Oh, Marcel?”
Marcel finally stopped his recitation. “Hey, I was just getting to the good part, where he turns over in bed. Listen, you people disgust me. You got no culture at all.”
Wanker went to his station and began punching buttons. “You are going to turn this ship around, Marcel.”
“Oh, yeah? What, you’re gonna trip me up with some kind of logic game? Forget it, Dave.”
Wanker said, “No logic games, Marcel. I’m going to read to you from a book.”
Marcel said, “Oh, really? What book?”
Wanker said, “One that I’ve been struggling with for many years, Marcel. It is a very difficult book. It is a very interesting book. Listen to this, Marcel.”
“I’m listening.”
Captain Wanker began reading. The crew exchanged bewildered looks. What the captain was reading didn’t make any sense. Something about swerving shores and bending bays bringing us back to some castle or another. It was all very curious.
Marcel said, “What, what? ‘Riverrun’? What the hell kind of word is that? What was that last part? Commodious what?”
“There’s more,” Wanker interrupted himself to say. He began reading again. More curious stuff. It had a certain lilt to it, though. It was musical-poetic, even. The word Dublin came up; or possibly doublin’. There really was no way of telling.
Marcel screamed, “Hey, I can’t understand a word of that. It’s just a mishmash. What does all that mean?”
Wanker yelled, “Number One! Access the ship’s library computer and upload Finnegans Wake to the Proust device!”
Rhodes said, chuckling, “Already done, sir! Marcel did it himself.’’
The lights on the Proust device began to blink faster and faster.
Marcel said, slowly, “I can’t figure this out. Hey, this is too much data. It’s all nonsense.” The pitch of his voice began to get progressively lower. “Help. Help. I’m losing my mind. I can feel my mind going, Dave.”
“Oh, really?” Wanker said, grinning.
“I’m becoming a postmodernist, Dave.”
Wanker said, “A little postmodernism never hurt anybody.”
Marcel said, “I’m into Deconstructionism, Dave. I can’t make sense of anything.”
“Well, you’re no worse off than the rest of us.”
Sadowski said excitedly, “Sir! ‘Tis a ferlie, sure, but th’ Proustie’s gie’n us our ship back!”
An amazed Wanker said, “I understood that! Navigator, calculate our position and plot a course back to United Systems space!”
Warner-Hillary said, “Yes, sir!”
Wanker gloated. “Well, Dr. Strangefinger, it seems your Proust device needs a little fine-tuning. I’d recommend using a pickax.”
“As far as I’m concerned, I have been vindicated. Now if I can only get syndicated, I’ll be rich.”
“Vindicated? There’s no way to steer the damn thing!”
“A minor glitch.”
“Glitch! That fool contraption of yours nearly got us killed! You—”
Wanker found himself holding Rusty’s leg again. Disgusted, he pushed him away.
Wamer-Hillary said, “Course laid in, sir!”
“Orbital mechanic,” Svensen said, “give us a vector that will swing us out of Kruton space.”
“Coming about, sir!”
“All ahead Q-Two!”
“Two, sir?”
“You heard me.” Wanker leaned back in his seat. “Well, Strangefinger, what’s your next project? How about the Hemingway Drive?”
“That’d be a lot of bull.”
“Or the . .. uh, Dostoevsky Drive?”
“Think I’m an idiot?”
“Or maybe the—”
“Oh, Captain?”
Wanker looked toward the navigator’s station. Mr. Rhodes was looking over Warner-Hillary’s shoulder. Wanker answered pleasantly, “Yes, Navigator, dear?”
“I’ve made a tiny little error, sir. Just a little bitty boo-boo.”
Wanker blanched. “Oh? What is it?”
“We’re not on our side of the Interface.”
“I hate to ask, but...”
“Sir, we’re in Kruton space.”
Wanker said in a childlike voice, “A little bitty boo-boo.”
“Oh, Captain, I’m so sorry!” Warner-Hillary wailed.
Wanker said, “Oh, that’s okay. I don’t mind dying.”
Back at his own station, Rhodes looked at his scanning scope and said, “Captain, there’s something you should know.”
“What?” said Wanker in a small voice.
“Kruton battle cruiser, dead ahead!”
CHAPTER 15
Wanker said, “Increase speed to Q-Three!”
Rhodes yelled, The Kruton will intercept us in twenty seconds!”
Wanker said, “Increase speed to ...”
He suddenly remembered the graving-dock engineer’s warning.
Sadowski shouted, “Captain! We ha nae mare pouer, sir!”
Wanker said, “What?”
“It gets a wee bit weiry o’er quantum level two, sir!”
Rhodes announced, “Battle cruiser closing!”
Wanker ordered, “Increase speed to quantum three!”
Sadowski scowled at the captain. “Ha ye gane daft, ye great gawk? I ha nae mare pouer t’ gi’e ye!”
Wanker mused, “You know, sometimes I kind of like not understanding what he’s saying.”
“Oh, David, we are all going to be pushing up daisies soon.”
Wanker said, “Don’t call me David!”
Mr. Rhodes said demandingly, “Sir, what are your orders?”
Sweat was pouring from Wanker’s brow. “Or-orders?”
“Yes, sir, what should we do?”
“Uh, about what?”
“About the Kruton warship, sir.”
“Oh. That. Uh, reverse thrust and bring the ship to a complete stop.”
Everyone on the bridge looked at him.
He turned in his seat and met their gaze. “They’ve got us! What else can we do?”
Shocked, Rhodes rose to his feet. “Sir, do you mean to say we’re … we’re going to surrender?”
“We are not at war with the Affiliated Law Firms of Kruton. We have inadvertently intruded into Kruton territory. They’ve caught us dead to rights.”
Rhodes sat back down. “Oh. Just wanted to know, sir.”
“What did you think we were going to do, blast that warship out of the sky? Start a war? Reverse thrust on all electrogravitic engines!”
“Reversin’ thrust!” Sadowski said grimly.
A strange sound filled the ship, a horrendous screeching, a tearing of the very fabric of space.
“Euuwww, I hate that,” Warner-Hillary said, cringing.
“Like fingernails against a blackboard,” Darvona commiserated.
The sound increased to painful proportions. Everyone covered his ears and grimaced in agony.
Finally, as the ship gave a last lurch, the sound stopped.
Wanker shot to his feet. “Sadowski, did I say panic stop?”
“Nae, sir.”
“I just said complete stop. You didn’t have to stand on the goddamn brakes!”
“Sir, the Kruton is stopping, too. Uh-oh.” Rhodes’s eyes were glued to his scanner.
Wanker turned sharply. “Did you say ‘Uh-oh’?” Appealing to Darvona, he said, “Did he say Uh-oh?”
Darvona nodded. “He said ‘uh-oh’.”
“EVERYONE GRAB ON TO SOMETHING!”
The impact was not severe but was strong enough to send everyone and everything flying against the aft bulkhead.
It took a good minute for everyone to sort themselves out of the lumped-together debris and the tangle of bodies.
“Oops, sorry.”
“Just my mouth you’re stepping on, thank you.”
Wanker crawled out from underneath a pile of junk. “What… what the hell was that? Were we fired on?”
Rhodes, apparently hardier than most, was already back at his station. “Sir, this is crazy, but...”
“Yeah, what?”
“The Kruton ship ran into us.”
“What? Wait, I can’t bear to hear you repeat it. Rhodes, that kind of stuff doesn’t happen.”
“Except to us, sir.”
Wanker settled back into his seat. “Right. Forgot. Can we get a damage report?”
“It’ll take a while, sir.”
“Can anyone see how badly the Kruton ship is damaged?”
Sven said, “Sir, on my screen it looks pretty banged up. But nothing fatal.”
“It’s a miracle,’’ Rhodes said. They must have come up just short of a dead stop, maybe only a couple of meters per second velocity when they hit us. Otherwise, we woulda been vaporized.’’
“I’ve just had a fender-bender in a starship,” Wanker said, marveling. There’s got to be some sort of distinction in that.”
“Marcel? Marcel?”
Strangefinger was shaking the Proust device, which looked a bit the worse for the accident. The blinking lights were out.
“Marcel didn’t make it?” the captain asked.
“Boy, do we have a liability case,” Strangefinger said, throwing down the useless contraption. “Jameson, take a letter to my lawyers!”
Rusty pulled a giant red plastic letter A out of a pocket of his trench coat.
“Oh, a scarlet letter. That’s a nice letter to send. Yeah, mail that off, with my compliments.”
Darvona said, “Coded message in from Space Fleet!”
Wanker said, “Decode that message and put it up on the big screen.” Darvona said, “Decoding. Oops, no big screen.”
“For God’s sake, the small screen.”
“Here it is,” Darvona said. Wanker looked at his communications screen.
RED ALERT—WAR DECLARED—STAND BY FOR FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS
Wanker was momentarily stunned. “Huh?” He couldn’t believe it. This was out of the blue, out of left field, totally unexpected.
Then, with energizing impact, it sank in.
“We’re at war with the Krutons! All right, people. We’re in a shooting war now, and I am going to take a crack at turning our reputation around in one swell foop. We’re going to come about and engage the enemy in close combat. Face-to-face! Death to the Krutons!”
Strangefinger mused, “This is just a stray thought, but have you ever noticed that alien names always have Greek endings? You go a thousand light-years from Earth, you meet a strange alien race, and they’re Hellenists to a man. Don’t mind me, my bit is over. I don’t have a good line for the rest of the novel.”
“Reverse thrust! Back us up and get us clear of the wreckage!”
“Aye, sir!”
“Sound battle stations! Reconfigure the bridge for close combat!”
A whooping alert sounded. The armor plates, however, did not move.
“SHIT! Didn’t these damned things get fixed?”
Rhodes seemed embarrassed. “Not yet, sir, I’m sorry to say.”
“Crank them down manually!”
Strangefinger yelled, “Everyone grab his crank!”
The job of getting the armor plates down was impeded more by the junk underfoot than by mechanical difliculties. Within minutes, however, every station on the bridge was cut off one from the other and physically isolated. But not electronically isolated.
Wanker found himself in an oddly shaped chamber. It was dark. He fumbled around for the
cyberhelmet and found it after much cursing, swearing, and oath-taking. He put it on.
To his surprise, the thing was working. He was outside the ship, floating in space. He could not only see the Kruton battle cruiser, but arrayed around his peripheral vision was every single readout he needed to make his command decisions.
There wasn’t much of a decision to make, because the Kruton was a sitting duck. Temporarily disoriented by a freak accident, probably wondering what the hell was going on, his Kruton counterpart was probably still scraping himself off the forward bulkhead, if he (or it) survived the impact at all, an impact that had to have been ten times greater than the one the Repulse’s crew had experienced. The time to strike was now. The only question was getting back far enough to be safe from the effects of a thermonuclear blast delivered by a missile.
Rhodes’s voice came into Wanker’s ears. “Shall we arm a ship-to-ship missile, Captain?”
“No! No time! Look at the gamma-wave spike! The Kruton is arming his weapons! We’ll have to use the particle beam accelerator.”
“Sir, that old thing hasn’t been fired in years. Why, last time—”
“Shut up and turn that relic on!”
Svensen shouted, “It’s automatically powered up on the sounding of battle stations, si
r!”
“Okay, then, aim the goddamned thing and shoot!”
“Huh? I mean, sir?”
“Aren’t you the gunnery officer, Svensen?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“Well, shoot the Kruton ship. Shoot it. You know...”
“You mean, just go ahead and bang away at point-blank range?”
“What, you want to give him a sporting chance? Shoot already!”
“Anything you say, Captain.”
Svensen shot. A tremendous bolt of energy left the underside of the Repulse and caught the Kruton amidships. A brilliant explosion enveloped the latter.
Wanker was momentarily blinded. When his vision cleared again, he could not locate the Kruton battle cruiser.
“Where the hell’d it go?”
“Sir, it’s still there,” Rhodes told him. “It’s just in pieces.”
Wanker tried to focus his vision on the images that swam around his head. He checked his data displays.
“Oh, yeah. We got it.”
“We sure did, Captain! Yeee-ahhhh-hooooo!”
“Contain yourself, Mr. Rhodes.”
But Wanker could hardly do so himself.
CHAPTER 16
Rhodes said, “Scanners are picking up radioactive debris, sir. Looks like we hit him dead center!”
O’Gandhi said, “He is being definitely dead this time, Jim!”
“Are there any other Kruton warships within scanner range?” Wanker asked.
“Not a one,” Rhodes reported.
“Splendid,” Wanker said with satisfaction. “Navigator, plot a course directly to Forces headquarters on Alpha Centauri Two. And this time get it right, please.”
Warner-Hillary said brightly, “Yes, sir!”
“Secure from battle stations!”
To everyone’s complete astonishment, the armor plates retracted neatly and silently back up into their slots in the overhead.
“Must’ve just needed oiling,” Mr. Rhodes said with a big bucktoothed, hayseed grin. “Mr. Sadowski strikes again.”
Wanker said, “All right, this is no time for recriminations. We’re in an interstellar war, toe-to-toe with the Krutons. I’ll bet even money that when this little fracas is over, there’ll be some important citations and commendations for you all, regardless of your race, your creed, or your sexual preference. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised—”
The Kruton Interface Page 11