“Do bears shit in the woods?” Van asked.
“Yeah,” Sandy said, wrapping the towel around herself and stepping out. “Now, Captain, if you will give me a few seconds alone, I’ll make myself presentable.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the man said and fled her presence.
Sandy found fresh underwear and a ship suit quickly. After pulling them on she slide her feet into a pair of slippers that could pass for acceptable wear aboard ship and entered her day quarters.
Van Velder, her Chief of Staff was waiting for her with Mondi Ashigara, her Ops Chief. Admiral Miyoshi, commander of the 2nd Fleet whose ships she’d dragooned for this walk about, observed from the main screen. Likely, his two task force commanders in orbit monitored the meeting, ready to jump if Sandy hollered frog. Over the next minute or two they were joined by Penny, her Intel Chief with her ever silent cat shadow, as well as Jacques and Amanda for no better reason than they came and Sandy valued their judgement.
Sandy began the meeting with as blunt a statement as she could muster. “So, do we haul up our skirts and run for home?”
That got surprised looks, which her advisors traded with each other before Van asked, “Is that what you want, Admiral?”
“The scientists would really like some time to research this planet,” Jacques said, softly.
“No doubt,” Sandy agreed. “Alternately, do we keep our eyes on the front door, do some messing around in the dirt downside, and run as soon as we see evidence of a threat developing? Admiral Miyoshi, how fast can the transports boogie out of here.”
“They are officially rated at 3.5 gees acceleration. How reliable that rating is, I do not know. I do know that most of the routes out here require at least three gees. The transports have been well maintained. I think we can trust them to keep up with the battlecruisers.”
“So, we can stay here a while knowing that we can get out of Dodge City fast if the tax collector shows up.”
“And we’ve got our pickets out,” Van said, “so we should have a pretty good idea of when they will show up, if they do try.”
“Just a point,” Penny put in. “We know this was a fast mover. We also know the hostiles know how to hit jumps fast. Apparently, this one did. Remember, we’re fighting on their home turf. Likely over their old home. They may well have jumps plotted that could put them here using a lot fewer than five jumps.”
“Can your Mimzy identify some of those long jumps?” Van asked.
“Yes,” came from the small jewel in the center of a collar at Penny’s neck. “A ship, doing three gees could jump into this system from four different long double jumps.”
“Could we outpost those four systems?” Mondi asked.
“The four starting systems are too far beyond our present network,” Mimzy said. “Also, the speed of light would delay any message from those systems. The message would likely get here long after the aliens did.”
“And the jump between here and there?” Sandy asked.
“A message from there, assuming the alien ships crossed the system at a high gee acceleration and decelerated enough to hit the jump at 500,000 kilometers would give us about an hour to two hours warning, depending on the system.”
“What if we posted fast ships in the next system in where they could get a message from the system the aliens have intruded upon and get their asses in here faster?” Admiral Miyoshi asked.
Mimzy took the issue under consideration for only a second. “Two of the next systems have fuzzy jumps nearby that would allow one of our ships to get back here a day ahead of the intruders. The other two systems don’t have that option, but we know how to get more out of the traditional jumps than they do. Our picket would be back at least four hours ahead of them.”
“Still,” Sandy said, thinking out loud, “they’d be hitting this system at 500,000 kilometers an hour. We’d have a hell of a time getting out of their way.”
“Assuming we let them in the system,” Admiral Miyoshi said, grinning. “If I anchor a task force of sixteen of my battlecruisers 150,000 clicks from the jumps, we could shoot up a lot of fast movers before they knew what hit them.”
“And if they come through with a door knocker?” Penny said. The last batch of wolf packs had constructed huge seven or eight hundred-thousand-ton monster ships, heavily clad in ice and stone to ablate away the damaging heat of laser hits. No human has yet tried to knock out one of them, but one of the reasons to put beam weapons of the fortresses Guardian and Defender was so they could punch through those monster’s armor.
The room fell silent at that questions.
“Could one of those monsters get up to that fast a speed?” Miyoshi asked.
“Aren’t the door knockers short on reactors?” Jacques put in.
“Right,” Penny said. “To avoid self-immolation when the lasers get into the chewy middle, the aliens gave those monsters half the reactors of one of their battleships. You’re right, they’d have a hell of a time getting one of those up to any sort of fast speed. The same with their mother ships. I guess all we have to worry about is the fast-moving cruisers and maybe battleships.”
“We have never seen battleships at more than two gees,” Mimzy said, “and that fwas not for very long. I think this attack force will come in slow and give us plenty of warning, or come in fast with thin skinned targets.”
Sandy found herself scowling at Penny’s computer. “Targets,” was an attitude a human had. Is that what I want from a computer?
Clearly, that was what she was getting.
“Admiral Miyoshi, deploy your remaining two task forces, one at each jump. As the other task force comes back from outposting the jumps, have them join the Victory down here and we’ll provide close cover. Jacques, get Professor Labao on the line. Tell him he can start the dirtside research projects. However, be forewarned we may need everyone up here real fast. If they can’t drop what they’ve got and run for a lift out, maybe they better not go down.”
“That’s what I’ll tell him.”
The meeting ended. The people filtered out. Sandy sat at her conference table. “Computer, ask Mimzy to get me a star map of this system and those we’ve picketed five out.”
It appeared. At no extra charge, Mimzy included four lines showing the fast-moving approach. Further study showed all of them were triple jumps, starting well away, hitting that jump fast, then hitting the closer unpicketed jump faster, before decelerating to hit the picketed jump for the home system.
“What will be their speed when they jump into our system?” Sandy asked.
“Depending on the jump series they use and whether they hit the jump at its top or bottom speed, they could be going at anything from 200,000 to 350,000 kilometers an hour,” Mimzy responded from Sandy’s own computer.
“That would give us some time to nail them as they come through,” Sandy said.
“Eight battlecruisers can put out a lot of energy,” Mimzy noted, “and if the hostiles really are thin skinned fast movers, it could be a disaster for them.”
“And Kris Longknife has shown them one disaster after another,” Sandy muttered to herself.
“Yes she has,” Mimzy agreed. “One would think they would learn.”
“One would, wouldn’t one?” Sandy said, thinking all the time that the aliens had showed they could learn. Only they weren’t learning how to surrender. No, they were learning what they needed to do to kill the vermin. What new trick would she soon be facing?
21
Thirty-two battlecruisers broke out of their moorings, broke out of orbit and headed for the two jump points. The Victory was left with the Ruby and the Opal standing by ready to defend the transports, as if they’d need any protection here in orbit. Quite a few longboats had been left behind to make quick work of unloading the freighters and getting the scientists where they wanted to set up shop.
One large team was going over the pyramid in a lot more depth than a fine-toothed comb would provide. Lasers had cut one nicely arched
breeze way, five meters tall and ten meters wide at the bottom, into the pit of horror. A second one, on the other side of the blasted tunnel was started as soon as the first was finished.
Daylight and fresh air was definitely being let in.
Small, 13 mm anti-aircraft lasers had worked fine for cutting two meters by one meter slabs of glass out of the glassy plain in front of the pyramid. The murdered decapods were interred in the ground below, then the glass slab was replaced with a RIP carved into it. It took a lot of work, but the Marines seemed content with the assignment.
It kept them dirtside and they got a beer ration every night.
A second large contingent of scientists were conducting a dig at the site of what they thought was the most recently destroyed town. It was located on the coast, nestled on a neck of land between a broad river and the bay.
This place had not been hit with atomics, but rather appeared to have been blasted with lasers from orbit. Much of the site was under glass, but there were enough places around the periphery that had been missed that the archeologists were confident they would find building. Maybe even machinery.
To speed this dig, what with everyone glancing over their shoulders as they worked, several teams that had planned to dig elsewhere agreed to concentrate there.
Dirt flew, sometimes with back hoes. Sometimes with shovels. Sometimes with trowels or brushes. Whatever the situation allowed or called for, got used.
Even some of the Marines were added to the dig after they buried the three thousand six hundred and twelve slaughtered aliens.
The archaeologists had some really nice beers in their canteens.
The sociologists were sprinkling the planet with swarms of drone controlling tiny data gatherers. Most looked like flying bugs. However, if it looked like the locals might occupy a campsite for a while, hoppers were sent in to find a quiet place and vanish into the woodwork. Or dirt. Or whatever.
Of special interest was the area around the glass plain with the pyramid. A dozen small hunter gatherer groups were spotted, many still wearing the rags of ship uniforms. Linguists set out to study their languages while sociologists endeavored to comprehend the underlying social ties that held the group together in order to better understand ship life. These twelve were the only groups that still seemed to remember what ships were like.
During the last visit, a team of sociologists was set upon by a local tribe and held hostage. This visit, no one wanted to get too close to anyone with a sharp rock.
No surprise to anyone, no local would come within a hundred kilometers of the destroyed town.
The zenobiologists finished their initial analysis of the chamber of horrors beneath the pyramid and began to lift its contents up to the freighters and transports in orbit. Each ship got an equal number of the plastic cubes as well as samples of all the skulls. Indeed, in order to make sure that some samples got back to human space even if disaster befell this expedition, all seventeen of the battlecruisers that came to be in orbit got a sample of every one of the 412 skulls plus a decapod’s body.
As professor Labao said, this was a priceless and irreplaceable collection of comparative evolution. It could not be lost; some samples had to survive, no matter what.
Sandy considered it her job to make sure the “what” did not get a chance to matter.
Of course, when the “what” made themselves known, it was not at all the way she’d expected.
22
“Admiral, we’ve got a report in,” Sensors reported on net.
“Where away?” Sandy replied, allowing herself the full use of tradition.
There was a brief pause before the lieutenant said, in a puzzled voice. “Not where we were expecting, ma’am.”
“Give me a star map,” Sandy ordered.
The map Mimzy had shown Sandy appeared above her desk. It showed the four fast approaches that Penny’s computer had identified. The red flashing system was one of the outer layer five pickets.
“The picket buoy identified twenty reactors entering the system. It’s programmed to swap with the other buoy and get this message off. The replacement buoy is ordered to survey the system for a half hour, then swap again and get a second message off. They’ll do that until they swap out and the new count is no different from the old count.”
“Yes,” Sandy said. She knew that. She’d approved the instructions. Still, she let the young woman tell her. No doubt, she figured admirals were too busy to remember details.
“Keep me appraised,” Sandy said. “Computer, get my key staff in here for a pow wow.”
Three minutes later, Sandy had her Chief of Staff and Ops Chief around her conference table with Sandy, Purswah, Jacques and Amanda. Admiral Miyoshi had gone with one of this task forces to cover Jump Point Beta. At the time, it looked to be the most likely entry point for an alien strike group.
“Mimzy, what can you tell me about this jump?” Sandy asked.
“It is the first of five jumps that will bring a slow-moving force to this system,” the computer said. “However, if the aliens entered the system at fifty thousand kilometers an hour and accelerated at one gee, they might jump to a C layer system, not the one I’d projected for a slow passage, then decelerate through that system and enter ours at 60,000 to 100,000 kph from Jump Point Alpha.
“And if they’re only accelerating at one gee for most of the trip?” Sandy asked.
“They could be a major strike force. Cruisers and battleships,” Penny said with a warning in each word.
“Door knockers?” Van, the Chief of Staff asked.
“Yep,” Penny said.
“Oh hell,” Mondi breathed.
“Should we order the scientists to pack it in and get ready to make a run for it?” Jacques asked.
“It’s too soon,” Sandy said. “We only have a report of twenty reactors in the Picket Line Five system. I’ll know more in half an hour.”
“So we wait,” Amanda said.
“Yes,” was Sandy’s answer.
“Would it be out of line for me to order up a cup of that wonderful Navy coffee?” Amanda asked her admiral.
“Penny, would you have Mimzy do the honor?”
“Gladly, ma’am.”
“And sandwiches,” Jacques added. “I missed breakfast.”
Penny glanced Sandy’s way and she nodded. A moment later a table and coffee pot slid out of the bulkhead opposite where Sandy sat. It was soon joined by a stack of sandwiches. It being close to lunch, the meeting broke up while the attendees scavenged the offerings like hungry vultures.
“Planning great battles makes me hungry,” Mondi said.
“When have you planned a great battle?” Van asked.
“I think this is the first one. No wonder I’m hungry.”
Admiral Perswah removed the meat from two sandwiches and munched it gingerly while eyeing the star chart. Sandy wondered what it must seem like to a wet water admiral.
They all settled back at their places at the conference table. Both Van and Mondi had a distant cast to their eyes as if they were seeing something far way or that had not yet happened. Amanda and Jacques just eyed their sandwiches or studied their coffee. Penny had that look she had when she and Mimzy were deep in consultation.
On Sandy’s desk, an old-fashioned clock ticked out the seconds calmly. Meticulously. Relentlessly.
“The updated report is coming in,” Mimzy said, snapping them all back to the here and now. She likely knew more, but she said nothing. Sandy chose not to goad her.
“The updated report is coming in,” the Sensor duty officer echoed a moment later. “This is from one of the fully updated pickets. It has more information about the reactors. We’re now looking at 4,800 large reactors, likely for battleships, though we don’t have a perfect match against any that we’ve seen before. There are 240 that match with some we do know and another 180 that are smaller, say cruiser size.”
There was a pause before the lieutenant went on. “The 240 reactors match agai
nst some of the door knockers we spotted leaving System X after the battle.”
Sandy eyed Penny. The young captain was studying the overhead with unfocused eyes. “The door knockers had half the reactors of a battleship,” she said, thoughtfully. “We figured that was to reduce the chances of one reactor losing containment and the plasma setting off the next reactor. Likely that gives them twelve door knockers. Figure a hundred and twenty battleships and ninety cruisers.”
“Do you think all of them can maintain the one gee acceleration?” Sandy asked.
“When you were chasing after them, they managed two gees for quite a while. That means they can cross the systems faster, accelerating and decelerating before hitting the jump at exactly the speed they need.”
“I guess I better alert the boffins below to start packing it in,” Jacques said.
“Hold your horses a minute,” Sandy said, then thought better, “Jacques, instead, ask the diggers below how much time they need to finish up.”
Jacques raised his eyebrows to Sandy, but shrugged and began to silently commune with his computer, Marie, another one of Nelly’s brood.
While he was elsewhere, Sandy turned back to Penny. “Talk to me about this force. A hundred and twenty battleships. How does that compare to a full wolf pack?”
“Wolf packs range anywhere from a hundred to two hundred battleships. Cruisers are a new addition, so we’re not sure what a normal pack would have. Door knockers are anyone’s guess. I’d say we’ve got anywhere from half a wolf pack to damn near a complete one.”
“But no mother ship,” Sandy asked for clarity.
“No. Getting one of those moon size monsters moving must be a bitch. We’ve never seen one of them do much more than .75 of a gee under normal conditions. Once, when Kris had one of them on the ropes and running for all it was worth, it only managed to get up to 1.25 gees and it didn’t hold it for long. It fell off quickly to 1.1 gee, then less than a gee.”
Kris Longknife's Relief: Grand Admiral Santiago on Alwa Station Page 13