"How far?" she said to Orlova.
"I wouldn't dare say, Deadeye."
Rubbing her eye, Caine said, "More than a mile at least, and in an odd direction. I don't think they'll be able to find us down here."
"Let's make camp for the night, then. I think we'd better do without a fire."
"Agreed." Caine looked up, a smile breaking out over her face. "Maggie, look over there! On the horizon!"
Just barely in sight, they could see a series of jagged brown peaks stabbing up from the ground, thin clouds dancing around the highest peaks, stretching all the way across the horizon. They'd found the Mountains of the Moon.
Chapter 22
For the hundredth time, Marshall looked down at the datapad, scrolling through the report that Harper had cobbled together at his insistence. His officers started to drift into the briefing room one after another, most of them in various stages of exhaustion; the ship had been working round the clock for the last three days in a bid to break through the orbital defenses. Even Dietz had bags around his eyes, and Quinn looked as if he was going to fall asleep in his chair. Taking a quick drink of water, Marshall transferred the data from the pad to the holoprojector.
"Spaceman Harper has been working for the last couple of days on breaking through the satellites' firewall," he began.
"Didn't she go rogue and hide down in the lower levels?" Dixon said. "I saw an espatier squad going after her."
Marshall raised his hand, "True. Nevertheless, her sins are forgiven." He paused for effect, then smiled, "She found a hole."
The table began to wake up; Quinn's eyes jolted open and he leaned forward, scanning the data. Cunningham looked around the table, shaking his head, as he reached the end of the report.
"Sir, can we trust this? We're not speaking of the most reliable crewman on the ship."
Laughing, Marshall replied, "She's a complete pain in the ass, Lieutenant, but she does know her stuff. She'll be riding Alamo in with us, so her life is on the line as well. I trust her."
"Ten minutes!" Quinn yelled, shaking his head.
"Ah, you've spotted the problem. The satellites are protected by a regenerating, adaptive firewall." He leaned forward on the table, linking his fingers. "We get one shot at this, and it lasts for six hundred and twelve seconds, plus however long it takes for the defense systems to activate."
"Thirty-one seconds," Dietz said.
"What the hell can we do in ten minutes?" Dixon said. "By the time Alamo got into orbit, we'd be under fire."
Esposito nodded, "The shuttles wouldn't get through in the time, sir. But the whole platoon will gladly volunteer to make the attempt."
Shaking his head, Marshall replied, "You're quite right, Lieutenant. Alamo couldn't settle into orbit in the required time period. We're not going to."
Confused looks passed around the table, "Then, sir, what use is this discovery?" Dietz asked the question on all of their lips.
Turning to Quinn, Marshall asked, "What's the status of our ballute, Mr. Quinn?"
Frowning, the engineer glanced down at his datapad for a second, then replied, "Fine, sir. Still packed up."
Dixon's eyes had lit up. She'd got it. He continued to look at Quinn, continuing, "Next question, Lieutenant. You're the best qualified here to judge this one. Based on your knowledge of Alamo's design and the capabilities of the engines...how would Alamo handle in atmosphere."
"What?" Cunningham yelled. "Captain, you aren't seriously considering this."
Quinn's eyes had glazed over. Marshall replied, "I am indeed." He looked around the table, then punched in a hastily computed course. "If we put Alamo on the right trajectory, we can be into the atmosphere in ten minutes. The particle beams are useless in atmosphere, we know that much. Lieutenant Dixon, can you launch the shuttles and fighters in this sort of maneuver?"
"Not during the plasma sheath phase of re-entry."
"Afterward?"
"How low are we going to go?" Cunningham asked, his eyes wide.
Marshall looked around the table again, "Fifty thousand feet. Low enough to be through the worst parts of re-entry."
"Fifty thousand feet!"
"We can do it, sir," Dixon said. "The fighters will need boosters to get back up again, but we've got them in store."
Esposito nodded, "It'll wreck the elevator airlocks, I guess, but they can be fixed."
"In atmosphere, Alamo's going to handle like a falling meteor, Captain," Cunningham said. "This is a step too far."
"It's the only chance we've got. I doubt any mythical team of experts is going to do much better than Harper without investment that the Combined Chiefs won't be able to put in. We're getting our people back, and we're going to find out what the hell is going on down there."
"What about the missiles?"
"I'm not worried about them. If they're anti-planet, they'll struggle to target us, and even then, we should be able to hit them with conventional countermeasures."
"It'll work," Quinn said, looking up from his calculations.
A beaming smile growing on his face, Marshall said, "Excellent, Mr. Quinn."
The engineer held up a hand, "We're going to take damage. Lots of it. And it is risky – but I think we can pull it off. Alamo's tough enough on paper."
"The ship has done aerobraking before," Dietz said. "An analogous maneuver."
"Except that aerobraking doesn't go down anything like this low."
Mulenga reached over for the datapad, "May I have a look at your calculations, sir?"
"By all means." Marshall slid it over to the astrogator, who started to pour over it. "Mr. Dietz, time to weigh in."
The executive officer was silent for a long minute, musing in his head. The table grew silent, waiting for him to speak; Marshall knew that, Captain or not, he wasn't going to pull this off without the support of all of his senior officers. Dietz looked up – and smiled.
"If Mr. Quinn says the ship can handle it, I'm inclined to agree. The maneuver is risky, but acceptable."
"I don't believe I'm hearing this," Cunningham replied. "You're putting the entire ship's complement at stake to rescue three crewmen – who wouldn't dream of asking their shipmates to take such a risk."
Marshall placed his hands down on the table. "Mr. Cunningham, your objections are noted. However, the decision is mine. And it's made. Who do you recommend fly the ship for the pass?"
Shaking his head, he replied, "Ryder."
"No, sir," Quinn said. "I'll need to do it."
Dixon looked at him, frowning, "You?"
His face snapped towards her, "I've been flying these ships since I was a kid. I know Alamo better than anyone on board, I know where her structure can take extra stresses and I know what parts must be protected. I've flown aerobrakes before." He looked around the table, "Captain, you need me at guidance control for this one. With all respects to Sub-Lieutenant Ryder."
"Quinn, you'll be needed at flight engineering," Marshall said.
"No, sir, I won't. Any of the duty flight engineers is more than capable of keeping the ship together through the dive. You're going to need me afterward to bundle it all back together again, but if you want the ship to get back into space again, I need to be at the controls."
"Maybe we could test this in the simulators," Mulenga said, but Quinn violently shook his head.
"How do we program them? This is an unprecedented maneuver, and we don't have anything like enough information about the planet to make it accurate. That's why you're going to need someone who can improvise at the helm."
Marshall looked at the young engineer's earnest eyes, then said, "Are you sure you can do this, Mr. Quinn?"
"Yes, sir." Dixon was looking at him strangely, as if sizing him up for the first time; the engineer was oblivious to the attention, too focused on the task at hand.
Nodding, he said to the table, "Mr. Quinn will take guidance control for the mission. We'll need to spend the next two days getting the ship ready, but I expect you
all to get at least eight hours sleep in the day before the dive. That's an order; if I have to get Doctor Duquesne to hand out pills, I will."
"We'll need work teams on the hull. I think we'd better kill rotation now, we can use the spacedock's frames to save a lot of work."
"Make it happen as soon as this meeting is over."
"Yes, sir."
"I know that not all of you agree with this course of action. If anyone wants to register an official protest, I shall record it in my log, and I will not hold it against you."
No-one said a word. He looked at Cunningham, waiting for him to speak, to make one last spirited defense of his position, but he shook his head, looking down at the desk. Dietz was quiet, and Mulenga was still poking over the datapad, refining the course a little more tightly. Finally it was the astrogator who broke the silence.
"I'll have to object, sir," he said, holding up the datapad. "We'll bottom out at forty-seven thousand feet."
Laughter echoed around the table. "Let's make the magic happen, then. Dismissed. Dietz, Cunningham, Mulenga, please remain for a moment."
Quinn was the first out of the room, bolting for the door with Dixon in hot pursuit; the fighter pilot was trying to catch up with him and having some difficulty. Esposito was obviously already running tactical plans through her head. Only the three Senior Lieutenants remained seated at their desks, looking at the captain.
"There is one final point that we need to cover, gentlemen," he said. "I want Alamo stripped of all non-essential personnel before the dive. Mr. Dietz, I'll want a report on exactly who that is by 0800 this morning so we can get ready. Before we leave, you will assume command of those personnel on the spacedock."
"No, sir."
His eyes narrowed, "No?"
"I am not non-essential personnel, sir, and will be required on the bridge of Alamo during the mission."
Shaking his head, Marshall turned to Cunningham, "Given Mr. Dietz's reluctance, you will assume command of the personnel on the spacedock."
"You aren't going in without me, Captain. With Caine on the surface, someone has to man Tactical."
"Ryder can do it, Lieutenant."
"No."
Mulenga raised a hand, "I'll save you the bother, sir. I'm not staying behind either. I don't even have a logical reason for it; I'm just not going to stay behind on this one. If there was a mission-critical duty on the spacedock, one of us would agree to it."
"But we're not going to hide on the spacedock while you risk your lives," Cunningham said. "Whatever I think about this plan – and I'll be honest, I think a lot – I'm not missing out on this."
Dietz looked at the other two, "I venture to suggest that no-one in Alamo's complement will consider themselves non-essential, either. They will all want to go, and I believe they should be permitted that option."
"I could make this a direct order, Mr. Dietz."
"Not if you don't want to be bogged down with a court-martial tomorrow, sir," Cunningham replied.
Shaking his head, Marshall said, "I'm saddled with the craziest senior officers in the service. And I've never been prouder of that. Dismissed."
The three of them rose as one, saluted, and began to file out of the room. Cunningham paused at the door, looking back at Marshall sitting at the desk, waiting for the other two to get out of earshot. He hesitated for a minute, shaking his head.
"I'll say this for you, Danny. I'm saddled with the craziest captain in the service, but I think he's one of the best. And..."
"As I've said before, I need someone to question me."
Smiling, the operations officer replied, "I'll make sure to do it at every opportunity," and ducked out of the room, the door sliding shut behind him. Marshall looked down at his rough mission plan again, notations and recommended tweaks already popping up on the ship's datanet. He shook his head at it, wondering what he would have said if a commander of his had proposed a plan like this, then started to ponder the enormity of what he was proposing.
He punched up a picture of the planet again, now with Alamo's projected course plotted on it in red, the lowest point directly over the mission objective. A clock was counting down, forty-seven hours remaining until the ship was committed. Grinning, he turned off the holoprojection, grabbed the datapad, and took another drink of water, leaving the empty cup on the table as he walked out of the room.
Chapter 23
Orlova lay back, looking up at the stars; she could just make out the pin-points of the satellites orbiting overhead, and beyond, a larger point of light – Alamo. As much as finding her father had meant to her, she longed to be back up on that ship, free to roam the stars once again. That, and she had a sharp piece of stone jabbing into her back that she was trying to lever out of the ground with a hand. Her father walked over to her, leaving Elvira sleeping just by the mouth of the cave.
"That ship of yours means a lot to you, doesn't it."
"Didn't Hercules mean as much to you?" she replied, still looking up.
He nodded, "I got used to it after a while. Those first couple of years were hard, very hard. Hardest was knowing that I had left you behind, that you were going to grow up without me." He smiled. "It looks like you managed fine without me, though."
She shook her head, "I got here by a very strange road, Papa. You wouldn't recognize me a year ago. Just a tramp shuttle pilot."
"I know. Deadeye told me about it; I think she thought I would not approve."
"Would you?"
He placed his hand on her shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze, "Maggie, whatever path you choose to walk is fine with me. I won't deny that when I saw you in uniform, my heart skipped a beat. But I would have been proud of whatever you did. Tell me," he said, puffing himself up with mock sternness, "were you the best tramp shuttle pilot?"
"Hell, yes."
"Then I am satisfied with that. You will have to take me on a ride when we get away from here, show me your skills."
Leaning on an elbow, she turned to lie on her side, "I will." She looked down at the ground, then back up at him, "Papa, how did you get used to it? To live on one world only?"
"Elvira helped. But I had it easier than you would; I was born on Earth. Home for me was a little village on the Lena River. This is somewhat warmer, but I grew to adulthood surrounded by nature. You are a child of space, of the stars; I don't think you were on the same world for more than a year at a time before we moved you from one place to the next."
"I spent most of the war on Mars. Hated it."
"Perhaps we did you a disservice. A person should have roots; they earth you." He shook his head, "I sense you are beginning to form some of your own, though. The uniform will provide them as well. Just remember that there will be a time when you have to take it off, and have something else to fall back on."
She turned, lying on her back again, shuffling around to make herself more comfortable, "What will you do when we knock out the satellites? Go home?"
"After all these years, this is home. My customers would suffer without my services behind the bar, and there is Elvira to consider. I might visit, go and see the old places again, but this I think is where I belong now. That isn't the whole story, though."
"Oh?"
Orlov puffed himself up again, standing a little taller, a little prouder, "I remain a Captain in the Martian Space Service. What I believe you call a Senior Lieutenant." He shook his head, "Strange rank structure. Nevertheless, I have never been relieved of my duty, nor would I wish to be."
"You'll stay in the service?"
"I will go where I am needed. I venture your Lieutenant-Captain Marshall might have need of my services for a time; even if he doesn't, the war we spark off today will not end overnight. I will be needed again." He grinned, a flash of youth appearing on his face, "I must admit that the thought of piloting a starship one last time has a certain appeal, as well."
"Mind if I admit something?"
"You didn't like it."
She shook her head,
"Couldn't get used to it. Not after flying fighters and shuttles. I think I'm a small ship pilot at heart."
"Nothing wrong with that. The part of me that wants you to live to your thirtieth birthday is glad you didn't stay in that part of the service."
"That's not why I left. I felt...I felt that I was needed elsewhere."
"Commanding a ship of your own?" he said with a twinkle in his eye. He raised a hand, "Don't deny it; every young officer thinks about it all the time."
"Perhaps."
"You'd make a good Captain. I've seen you in action. You scare me to death; and that's a good trait for a Captain to have." The two of them broke down to chuckles; he took a swig of his canteen, water dribbling down into his beard.
"So, Elvira? How did you meet?"
"Oh, nothing special. I spent quite a bit of time in the outlands when I first got here, trying to dodge the Legion until they got bored of looking for the crashed shuttle pilot. Her father was a good friend to me in those first days; he was killed in an accident in my first year here. She was on her own, so I decided that I would honor his memory by looking after her." He chuckled, "One thing rather led to another. Though ultimately it was her idea; we finally got married two years ago."
"After you'd been declared legally dead back home."
He shrugged, "I wasn't in a position to argue about it, was I? Besides..."
"You were getting a divorce before you left. Mother showed me the papers when I turned sixteen."
His eyes widening, he shook his head, "I would have hoped that she would treat the memory of the dead rather better. We were always different people, Maggie; that isn't a crime."
"She committed enough of those as it was."
"As did you, I suspect."
"Only some smuggling. And nothing particularly nasty, I only took gray-market stuff. Computer chips, minor drugs, that sort of thing. I had to make a living somehow after Mother took off with her latest lover," she said, crouching down. He smiled in reply, patting her on the shoulder.
"I understand, my dear." He chuckled, "You are talking about the terror of the Mariner Run, remember. Getting that amnesty when I volunteered was...useful, to say the least. I don't miss those days, though. It was just a job to me. Nothing more or less than that; it was easy to think of it that way. Perhaps I fancied that I was poking at the tyranny of the UN, even back then."
Victory or Death Page 18