by Chris Bunch
"The decree will end the persecution of these innocent beings. A decree that will strike a moral blow against my greatest enemy.
"A decree that will recognize what has been so painfully obvious these many millennia. I have watched over you and your ancestors for long years. I have fed you. Clothed you. Given you the means to prosper in peace."
The Emperor's head dropped. "Ah," he said, "sometimes I am so weary…"
"Hail the Holy Emperor!" Baseeker shrieked. "Hail, O Great Good Lord."
The other cultists took up the cry: "Hail the Holy Emperor! Praise Him. Praise Him!"
Kenna gave Walsh an elbow poke. Then another. Walsh's eyes unglazed. "Praise Him!" shouted Kenna. Another nudge into Walsh. "Praise Him!" he shouted again.
Walsh gave him a dumb grin. "Praise Him!" he shouted. "Praise Him."
Out in the crowd of representatives, Nikolayevich and the others were suddenly very much aware that beings very close to them were watching.
Nikolayevich almost choked, knowing that his lover's tusk was not the only bloody message delivered this day.
"Hail the Holy Emperor," Nikolayevich chanted. A moment later hundreds of other voices joined in. "Praise Him! Praise Him!"
The Emperor smiled and spread his hands. Then he wheeled around and swept off the platform with his contingent.
He rushed down the aisle, nodding here and there as he went. Even in his speed, Poyndex could see that he was savoring the shouts of "Hail the Holy Emperor!"
Poyndex was the last out. He could hear the Speaker's hammer coming down. Then his cry: "In the matter of PB 600323—titled, Declaration of the Eternal Emperor's Godhood… how do you say, gentlebeings?
"All for approval say Yea."
And the thunder came back: "Yea!"
Poyndex didn't bother sticking around for the "nays."
Chapter Eighteen
"NOTHING?" FLEET ADMIRAL Madoera glowered to the com watch officer. He refrained from adding, "Again?"
"Nossir. The Neosho reports no transmissions on any freq from any planet in the system. All unnatural EM bands are clean. And no sign of any ships, either, hostile or friendly.
"I had it make a double-sweep. We're picking up a lot of crap from that radio star, so I wanted to make sure before reporting."
"Right. File a preliminary report to Prime that Intel blew it again. No Sten, no nothing. We'll take the task force through on a high pass just to confirm."
"Sir… we won't be able to transmit until we're clear of the star ourselves. All long-range com links are blanketed."
"It doesn't matter. We'll report fully after we clear the system. Not that this'll be a surprise…"
He stopped before adding "… to those clots who think they're Intelligence."
Madoera's task force had spent too many ship-days and months chasing will-o'-the-wisp sea stories about the elusive traitor around their assigned galactic AOR to be surprised. In Madoera's estimation, this new Internal Security that'd replaced Mercury Corps wasn't capable of pouring pee out of a boot if the instructions had been printed on its heel.
None of the Alpha One-rated stories had turned out to be true. Either Sten had never been there, Sten had passed through rapidly a long time ago, or some unknown ships had been reported in a particular cluster and assumptions made they were rebel.
Why, he wondered, didn't IS realize all of the stories were almost certainly a crock, since every system his fleet had been punted toward was dead, abandoned, or a backwater. Just like this one. It didn't even have a name—and its only coordinates were from a charter radio pulsar, NP0406Y32.
Maybe he should name the damned thing. Poyndex, perhaps.
Right. And face a loyalty board when he got back to Prime. Although at the moment he didn't think he was ever going to see civilization again. He and his sailors and marine infantry would waste their substance and years pooping around the hinterlands until one day somebody discovered this Sten had died of old age and they could all go home. Or maybe they'd just lose the task force's fiches in toto, and the fleet would wander on, until the Last Donald, like some sort of Flying Duchess, or however the legend went.
Hell.
Madoera slammed out of the daycabin onto his flagship's bridge. He glanced at one wallscreen that showed the system, a scatter of burned worlds too close to the radio pulsar, whose image—virtual, of course, as was everything else on the screen—flashed near the screen's top. He reached over a watch officer's shoulder, and tapped three pads.
Another screen opened, this one showing just Madoera's task force. A heavy combat fleet—a tacship carrier/flagship, the Geomys Royal; a modern battleship, the Parma; two cruiser divisions, one with two heavies, the second with three light cruisers; and seven destroyers for a screen. A second crudiv was in support, with three light cruisers and four destroyers in its screen. His logistics tail was small—two supply ships and one tender, escorted by two destroyers.
A force to contend with. If he ever—and he privately thought never—could bring the rebels to battle, the action would be brief. But bloody, he was certain. Sten was misguided, but not stupid, and he and all of his fellows must know that if they surrendered they'd be merely prolonging their lifespan until a tribunal could be set up to try and execute them.
Knowing this, Madoera had issued as part of his standing orders instructions that if any rebel ships were encountered, extreme caution should be taken—they would certainly try any subterfuge or trick and fight to the last being. Certainly Madoera would do the same, if he ever slipped his shackles as badly as Sten.
Staring at the screen, Madoera wondered if there were any drills he hadn't run lately, or some highly obscure false emergency he could produce, just to keep his sailors from slacking off.
Clot it, he decided. It was bad enough they were hither-and-yonning so much. At least this time his swabs didn't need to think the old man was messing with them, as well as everyone else.
"In-system," the watch officer reported.
"Thank you, Sr. One pass. Double-diamond formation."
That, at least, would be a test of how well his navigators could handle a complex formation. Especially with the real external problem of trying to keep their coms open while that pulsar sent out its tsunamis of white noise in the background. Now, just hope there's no collision while they're doing it, which probably would get me a nice reassignment to some water world with real ships. With oars.
Madoera listened with half an ear to the chatter as his flag navigator issued orders for the fleet's exercise in synchronized "flying." He yawned.
The rebels attacked.
There was no warning—the two DD's on flank security simply ceased existing. Someone shouted an alarm, and ships blinked onto the Geomys Royal's screens. From "behind" the Imperial task force.
They must have known, Madoera realized, exactly what orbit the task force would set to approach this NP0406Y32, and followed them in.
The Imperial ships were at general quarters—but weapons stations were still at standby, and some missiles hadn't even been loaded in launch tubes. It had not made sense to chance damaging an expensive missile—or a more valuable crew-being—in another empty run.
A moment of panic, shouted down by Madoera and other officers throughout the task force. Steadiness returned—Madoera had turned his recruits into hardened professionals in long months of drill.
Numbers swirled across the screen showing the incoming attackers.
"Sir," a watch officer reported. "Six cruisers, estimated heavy, ten destroyers attacking."
"Thank you, Mister. I can prog that myself. What class? What origin?"
"Sir… the Jane's has no data," the woman said. "Unknown. Except—they're state-of-the-art design. Jane's offered the theory they're new construction."
Another wave of attackers appeared—this one from "below" the task force.
"Three battleships, seven cruisers, twenty destroyers incoming, sir. I have an ID, sir. On the battlewagons. Jane's has a make. Al
l three of them were designed and built by the Cal'gata. Pre-Tahn war. Jane's has them as mothballed and for sale. Five of the destroyers are Honjo origin, and we have a positive ED on one. The Aoife."
Sten. For certain.
Now where the hell was the Victory! The bastard would be masterminding his ambush from its bridge. If Madoera could ED Sten's flagship, perhaps a suicide run by a couple of DD's might take out the puppetmaster. It wasn't on any screen. In some ways, that was worse. It meant the rebellion and the rebel forces had grown to the point that its leader no longer needed to accompany his beings to battle.
"All stations," an antimissile tech monotoned. "We have a multiple Kali-class launch from hostiles… attempting to divert…"
"Fox stations. Shift to local control. Acquire and launch at will."
Madoera gnawed at his lip, calculating.
"Put CruDiv One on a direct attack against the BBs," he ordered. "And punch a line through to the Neosho. Order it to avoid battle and break for open space and report. Captain, get your tacships out there."
"Yessir."
"Sir… the Neosho is not answering. And we have no sign of Neosho onscreen."
He hadn't even seen the destroyer get killed.
Madoera thought hard. "All right, then. Put CruDiv Support out, wide on a flank. Get the supply elements in with the main fleet. And tell the Parma—"
"Signal from Parma, sir. Four hits. CIC wiped out. All weapons stations under local command. Drive regulation lost. Ship being conned from engine room."
Another screen showed a third swarm coming in at the task force.
Someone shrilled, "Where'd they get—"
Snapped retort: "Silence at your station, Mister! Report as you've been trained!"
Madoera kept his calm. Closed his eyes, and let his mind battlechamber.
"Do you have contact with CruDiv Two?"
"Affirm. Staticky. A lot of interference from the pulsar."
"Order them to avoid battle. Withdraw past Parma, past Geomys Royal, and set an erratic orbit clear of action. Do not engage the rebels. Do not attempt to stay in contact with the task force."
"Message sent, sir. Will comply."
"All right. Captain. We're going to circle the wagons…"
Madoera ordered the remnants of his task force—a crippled battleship, his flagship, and the rest—to take a globe formation, with erratic orbiting to keep them from being targets. He issued no change in orders to the two heavy cruisers he'd sent on a flanking attack.
He'd lose them, but perhaps they might serve to confuse the rebels, at least long enough for Madoera to begin some sort of breakout.
"Sir," a talker said. "Contact from the Aleksyev. It reports—"
The Geomys Royal shuddered as a missile impacted. Metal and men screamed. Flashdark/light as primary lighting went down, and a secondary circuit cut in. Nausea swept through Madoera's guts as the McLean generators went off and he free-fell, then they came back on—but "down" was what had been to the side seconds ago.
"All stations, report damage…"
The Aoife, at full drive, closed on the "center" of the battlefield. Berhal Waldman stood behind his deck officer, not feeling his fingers trying to dig into the steel back of the chair.
His destroyer was at the front of the vee. The other four ships were also Honjo—officers and men who had mutinied to take their ships to join the rebels. They were actually regular volunteers. And all of them had sworn to avenge the Aisling.
"All units, all units," Waldman ordered. "Weapons systems slaved to my ship… on command… now."
The ships obeyed. Then, "All stations, ready to launch."
"Very good. Target… enemy battleship. Goblin… half drive. Launch!"
Medium-range antiship missiles exploded from their tubes toward the Parma.
"Target… enemy battleship," Berhal Waldman said. He ignored his weapons officer—she hadn't been on the Aoife when its sister ship was obliterated. This was his party. "Kali launch. One tube per ship. Kali officers… maintain contact with your missiles… launch!"
The Imperial battleship seethed flame as its antimissile batteries and lasers went after the incoming missiles from the Honjo destroyers. In the dazzle, TA systems confused the monstrous shipkilling Kalis with the smaller Goblins, and did not correctly assign priorities.
One Goblin got through and knocked out two weapons stations—and forty men—on the Parma. And then both Kalis struck. The Parma blew in half, half again, and then into fragments.
The Honjo turned for the Geomys Royal.
On Madoera's main screen, Imperial units were blanking—or else transmitting DAMAGE/OUT OF BATTLE signals to the Geomys Royal.
That was enough. Fleet Admiral Madoera lifted a mike, and broadcast en clair.
"All Imperial units… all Imperial units. This is Admiral Madoera. All units break contact. Repeat, break contact. Set individual orbits, emergency power, for base. That is an order."
He dropped the microphone.
"Captain, contact your tac squadrons. I want them to hold the rebels to the last. This is an all-units rearguard action. We must—"
"Missile closing… closing… negative diversion… negative acquisition… impact!"
The Goblin struck about two hundred meters behind the Geomys Royal's bridge. Just behind the missile was a Kali. The Kali operator saw opportunity, and sent her bird directly into the fireball, counted once, and manually detonated.
Novablink… and there was empty space where the Geomys Royal—and Fleet Admiral Madoera—had been.
The survivors of the Imperial task force—one heavy cruiser, one light cruiser, three destroyers, and the fleet tender—fled at emergency drive. Their orbit would sweep them very close to the radio pulsar, then out, deep into the emptiness between the stars.
This was one sector from which the rebels had not attacked.
It was where Sten, and the Victory, waited.
"All tacships," Captain Preston broadcast, "we have six Imperial ships in-sector. All units, acquire data from central computer. Under squadron command: Attack. Repeat, attack."
Hannelore La Ciotat and her fellow assassins with silk scarves went in for the kill.
Sten watched from the bridge of the Victory until the last Imperial indicator had vanished. His face was a mask. Just as had happened with the Caligula, beings who wore the same uniform Sten had worn, beings he might have served with or under or drank with in gin joints, were dead.
Kilgour's face was equally blank.
"All—" Preston hesitated, then continued. "—enemy elements destroyed."
"Very well. Phase Two."
And Sten's forces would not be permitted to ride clear of the battlefield, eyes averted from the slaughter.
Forty transports, provided by the Zaginows and the Cal'gata, swept the system. Ten Bhor armed merchant ships went with them. They hunted down any fragment of any Imperial ship they could pick up onscreen. The fragments were either further destroyed by demolition teams crossing to the wreckage and setting charges, or, if they were larger, the armed auxiliaries blasted them with Goblins or lasers.
It wasn't necessary, at least, to kill any survivors they found. Not that there were many. Space war is no more merciful than naval battles far from land.
Any Imperials picked up would be given medical treatment and then transported, with uninjured survivors, to a planet at the fringes of the Lupus Cluster. Food, shelter, and continuing medical supplies and treatment would be provided on this forgotten, rather Eden-like world.
But that was all, until the war ended and either Sten or the Emperor was victorious. No mail, no notification to the survivors' families or friends.
Because the purpose of this long roundelay, back to the spoof in the dead system of Ystrn, was for an entire Imperial fleet to vanish.
Sten had deliberately chosen the area near NP0406Y32 for his plan's payoff. Any initial reports of his attack would be blocked by the pulsar. His strategy had worked perfectly.
>
Twenty-six warships, their admiral, and crew had disappeared.
Without a trace.
That would send a shiver through even the bravest warrior's soul.
And just as Ystrn had created the stage for this battle, NP0406Y32 would create a larger arena.
The essay purported to be a speech made by the Eternal Emperor at the graduating ceremony for one of the Empire's most prestigious naval academies, and was reprinted in Fleet Proceedings. In the speech the Emperor announced that these were parlous times the newly commissioned officers would face, but that they were also times of greatness. And as always, those who led from the front would be noted and rewarded.
The second item was buried near the end of the Imperial Times, a fiche no one in his right mind ever consulted for pleasure, but to check on the promotions, awards, and transfers of all Imperial officers.
Seven admirals had decided to take early retirement. All seven, analysts discovered, were respected—but all seven believed in the principle of leadership through battle analysis and ratiocination rather than noble posturing from the missile-torn bridge of a battleship.
The next item was the commissioning of a new superbattleship, the Durer. It had been especially honored by being picked by the Eternal Emperor himself as a command ship. Command ship, the analyst noted. Not yacht or personal transport.
All these smallish items were published in specialized fiches.
A larger item was the lead story in the Imperial Times. A mass assemblage of the Imperial battle fleets was ordered, on a most tight schedule. There would be barely six E-months for combat elements to ready themselves.
The last was big and public, however. With full fanfare, it was announced the Eternal Emperor had been requested by Fleet Admiral Anders and the rest of the Imperial General Staff to provide them with his centuries of wisdom and experience to extirpate the last, lingering traces of the bandit Sten.
The rebels had winkled the Emperor out of his bunker.
Now he was vulnerable.