They Shall Not Pass (The Empire's Corps Book 12)

by Christopher Nuttall

  “Commodore,” Melaka said. His voice sounded strained. He’d be lucky to survive long enough to be purged, if Admiral Singh took the planet. “I believe we have guests.”

  “It looks that way,” Mandy agreed. “Admiral Singh has arrived in force.”

  Melaka looked pained. “There's no mistake?”

  “Not unless there's someone else with seven battleships,” Mandy said. “We’re too far from the enemy ships to get a positive ID, but it’s hard to imagine who else they could be.”

  “Understood,” Melaka said. He didn't sound pleased. “I assume you intend to follow Plan Theta?”

  “It gives us the greatest chance of carrying out our mission and scoring a few hits,” Mandy confirmed. “There’s no choice.”

  She didn't blame him for sounding annoyed. Plan Theta might have suited the Commonwealth, but it left the local defenders badly exposed. She would have raised more doubts about the whole plan if she hadn't known that standing in defence of Corinthian would be a good way to get her entire command wiped out. Hell, it was what she intended to do to Admiral Singh.

  “Very well,” Melaka said. “I’m ordering the evacuation ships to depart in three hours, mark. I don’t want to take chances.”

  Mandy nodded, even though she knew it was ballsy of him to order the evacuation without permission from his political superiors. They would probably complain, pointing out that Admiral Singh couldn't possibly reach Corinthian for a further three hours. But leaving then would give the ships the best chance of hiding within the inky darkness of interplanetary space, as they made their slow way towards the phase limit. Admiral Singh wouldn't have a chance to hunt them down before it was too late.

  “Very good, sir,” she said. “And good luck.”

  “You too,” Melaka said.

  His face vanished from the display. Mandy nodded to herself, then looked at her XO.

  “The alpha crews are to rest for five hours,” she ordered. Even if Singh did redline her drives, her crew should have enough time to rest before going into battle. “Order the beta crews to take control and watch the sensor nodes. The enemy might well have sneaked ships into the system ahead of time.”

  “Yes, Captain,” the XO said.

  ***

  The howling alarm brought Ed out of bed, one hand groping for the sidearm he kept on the bedside cabinet. He’d have preferred to bed down with the CEF, but the planetary government had insisted on him sleeping in their underground command bunker, deep underneath Freedom City. He forced himself to relax, lowering the sidearm, as he glanced at the terminal. The blinking alert confirmed that the enemy had reached the system, but it would be at least six hours before they attacked the planet.

  He put the sidearm back on the table, then hastily dressed before returning the sidearm to its holster and hurrying out the door. The bunker was cold, dark and claustrophobic; surprisingly, the government hadn't bothered to spend money on making it slightly more liveable, even though government ministers would be the ones staying there. For once, he wasn't sure that he approved. Men had been known to go crazy when trapped in similar environments, even elite soldiers. He wouldn't have gambled on retaining his own sanity indefinitely if he’d been trapped in the bunker.

  At least they can still go to the surface, he thought, as he walked into the war room. But that may be about to change.

  There were no guards so far underground, merely a handful of operators sitting in front of consoles, chatting rapidly into their headsets. He frowned in surprise; he could see the logic, but it still struck him as insecure. Putting the thought aside, he looked up. A giant holographic display hung in the air, showing an ever-expanding red sphere that marked the point where the enemy ships had first been detected. Admiral Singh could be anywhere within that sphere, he knew, but he would have been surprised if she wasn't driving on Corinthian as fast as possible. She would almost certainly assume she’d lost the element of surprise as soon as she’d crossed the phase limit.

  Unless her plan depends on us not detecting her, he thought. She might choose to believe she hasn't been detected ...

  “Colonel,” a female voice said. He turned to see President Danielle Chambers, her dark eyes shadowed. “It has begun?”

  “Yes, Madam President,” Ed said. He’d worked with her long enough to develop a keen respect for her mind, although he would have preferred someone with extensive military experience. “The enemy fleet has been detected.”

  Danielle sagged, very slightly. “I would have preferred for you to have been wrong,” she said, as she led the way into a smaller conference room. Another holographic display, the twin of the one behind them, dominated the compartment. “Nothing is ever going to be the same again.”

  Ed nodded, shortly. He understood how she felt, even though he had come to believe that change was the sole universal constant. The Grand Senate had tried to freeze the Empire in stasis, only to watch helplessly as their mighty civilisation started to crumble into rubble, unleashing chaos and war in its wake. Danielle had rebuilt her entire planet, after Admiral Singh had fled. The thought of losing everything she’d built had to be nightmarish.

  And I wouldn't be too pleased at the thought of enemy boots on Avalon, he thought. It was a bitter thought. He’d once had no home, save for the Marine Corps; now, Avalon was his home. Even if we drove them off, we’d have to rebuild the entire planet.

  “Tell me,” Danielle said. “Is there any way to know just how long it will be before the planet comes under attack?”

  “No,” Ed said. “It depends on just how quickly she makes her approach.”

  He studied the display for a long moment, mentally untangling the angles and vectors drawn out by the plotting computers. “She could be here in less than six hours, Madam President, or she could be here in nine or ten. I doubt it will be any longer.”

  “Unless she wants to devastate the cloudscoops,” Danielle said. “That would cripple our economy.”

  “Not for long,” Ed said. He glanced up as the door opened, allowing General Hampton to enter the compartment, “We can rebuild cloudscoops quickly these days.”

  “She’d need to take the planet first,” Hampton said. “It's the only way she’d be able to convince the crews to surrender.”

  Ed shrugged. In truth, there was little particularly innovative about Commonwealth-designed cloudscoops. The Empire’s colossal - and hugely expensive - designs were a matter of law and custom, not practicality. Someone had probably paid the Grand Senate a colossal bribe to ensure that cheaper designs were banned, on grounds of public safety. It had helped give the designers a stranglehold over the economy. Indeed, he would be surprised if Wolfbane wasn't already duplicating them.

  Danielle looked at Hampton. “What’s happening up there?”

  “The population is ready, what’s left of it,” Hampton said. “I’ve started moving the remaining vital personnel to the shuttles for the last flight out, then sending non-combatants to the shelters well away from the war zone. They should be safe there. There's nothing to attract Admiral Singh’s attention.”

  And let’s hope he’s right, Ed thought. It was generally agreed that planetary governments couldn't be allowed to use their populations as human shields - putting a defence station in the middle of a city would draw fire, no matter how many innocents were nearby - but Admiral Singh would have to be insane to start bombarding civilians at random. If she does, we can do the same to her.

  He scowled at the thought as Hampton continued to outline the precautions the planetary government was now putting into effect. People died in war, he knew; it was a reality that no one, no matter how well-meaning, could escape. And yet, he had never liked the idea of indiscriminate mass slaughter. The thought of unleashing nuclear weapons on Wolfbane was horrifying, but if Admiral Singh killed civilians at random he’d have no choice. They couldn't allow Admiral Singh to set a precedent ...

  We’d have to demand that they surrender her for punishment, he thought. Or our o
wn population would demand retaliation.

  “We are as close to ready as we ever will be,” Hampton concluded. “Colonel?”

  Ed looked up. “Yes, we should be ready,” he said. “Has the shield generator begun its power-up sequence?”

  “It has,” Hampton confirmed. “And we’ve given the entire quadrant as much protection as possible.”

  Unless they use nukes, Ed reminded himself. I wonder if the thought will cross Singh’s mind?

  He pushed the thought out of his mind. “Then we should be ready,” he said. “It won’t be long now.”

  “No one has done anything like this for hundreds of years,” Hampton said. “Are you confident?”

  Ed shrugged. He would bet on the marines over an army unit twice their size, but Hampton was right. No one had fought a full-scale war on a planetary surface for hundreds of years, even though the Slaughterhouse and the various infantry training centres had included intensive ground-based combat in their scenarios. There were too many things that could go wrong, from Admiral Singh refusing to play by the rules to the shield generator failing or the lines breaking at a crucial moment.

  But they’d covered all the bases they could.

  “I am as confident as I can be,” he said, truthfully. “And whatever else happens, we’ll give Admiral Singh something to remember.”

  ***

  Emmanuel was no stranger to human misery. He’d watched farms burned to ashes for daring to support the Crackers, then stared helplessly as bodies were carried out of blown-up buildings in Camelot and the other larger cities on Avalon. And then he’d gone to Lakshmibai, where the population had wallowed in squalor. He still had nightmares about starving children, denied food and water because of their caste, staring at him with big black eyes. And yet, there was something truly terrible about watching the final stages of the evacuation.

  Freedom City had practically become a ghost town over the last three weeks, as the trained manpower was shipped to orbit and non-essential personnel were transported to safe zones on the other side of the continent, but now things were changing rapidly. He walked down a shopping boulevard, where he’d picked up a handful of trinkets for his family back home, and shivered as he realised just how deserted it was. In the distance, he could see industrial workers being loaded onto buses, ready to start the trip out of the city. Who knew if they would ever be able to return?

  He swallowed as he peered into abandoned restaurants, the chairs piled on the tables, the food counters wiped clean and dry. There was no point in going in - people had been shot on suspicion of looting - but he made sure to get a number of pictures before restarting his walk towards the defence lines. A burst of chatter made him jump, one hand reaching for the pistol at his belt, before he realised that a radio had turned on, broadcasting an emergency bulletin into the empty shopping mall. He was the only person in earshot.

  And this place is going to be devastated, he thought, as he reached the end of the road. It will never be the same again.

  The last bus was already on its way, leaving him feeling isolated and alone, abandoned at the heart of a towering city. He shivered as he looked up, spotting the faint shimmer in the air as the force shield came online. He’d half-expected it to cut the skyscrapers in half, but it looked as though there was plenty of clearance between their roofs and the shield. He sucked in his breath, remembering what one of his contracts had said. Hundreds of thousands of people had worked hard for apartments in those skyscrapers, often going into debt just to make sure they had somewhere to live near their workspace. And now the skyscrapers were going to be torn apart by the fighting.

  There will be snipers and observation posts up there, he thought. And the enemy will respond by hitting them with shellfire, knocking them down to rubble.

  He keyed his recorder. “This is a city on the edge,” he said, quietly. He wasn't planning any live broadcasts, but he wanted to record his impressions before it was too late. “The civilians are gone, the government is in hiding. And now the defenders wait for the enemy to arrive.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Indeed, even Pradesh - a city located in a bottleneck, between two mountains that were impassable to a mechanized force - would not have survived an orbital bombardment. The locals might have gambled that the prospect - the certainty - of heavy civilian causalities would prevent a bombardment, but they would almost certainly have been wrong.

  - Professor Leo Caesius. The Role of Randomness In War.

  Admiral Rani Singh knew it was unprofessional, but she couldn't help feeling a kind of unholy glee as the Corinthian System slowly revealed its secrets to her. This was her system, the system she had captured early in her reign and turned into an industrial powerhouse; it pleased her, on so many levels, that the population had taken the ball she’d tossed them and run with it. Wolfbane, for all its virtues, was a balancing act, not a world guided by a single mind. Once the rebels were purged, Corinthian would be hers again.

  “Admiral,” the tactical officer said. “I’m picking up thirty-three warships orbiting Corinthian, backing up five heavy battlestations.”

  “Commonwealth ships, I assume,” Rani said. “Do we have any IDs?”

  She frowned as she contemplated the display. Whatever happened, she wouldn't make the mistake of assuming their tonnage indicated their firepower. The Commonwealth’s damned innovations had given their cruisers the same effective firepower as her battlecruisers. It was fortunate indeed that she’d been able to talk Governor Brown into starting the war. A few years delay and Wolfbane would have been effortlessly crushed. As it was, she knew she had to win quickly before it was too late.

  “No, Admiral,” the tactical officer said, finally. “Their drive signatures are indistinct at this distance.”

  Rani shrugged, unsurprised. “Bring the fleet to red alert,” she ordered, curtly. She’d chosen not to risk redlining her drives - two of her battleships were in poor states, despite her repair crews best efforts - and the enemy had had plenty of time to see her coming. “Launch tactical probes, then transmit the surrender demand.”

  She leaned forward as more and more detail appeared on the display. Corinthian’s rebel government had thrown a great many resources into building up their defence network, she noted, but their inexperience was showing. It looked good - and it would intimidate anyone without substantial firepower - yet it lacked the ability to keep her from hammering the defences into scrap metal. They should have concentrated on mobile firepower, she considered, as question marks appeared over the battlestations. It was unlikely their damned innovations would be enough to keep her from taking control of the high orbitals.

  And then they can surrender or get crushed, she thought, coldly. And I don’t care which.

  “Admiral,” the communications officer said. “There has been no response.”

  Rani glanced at the timer, then nodded. They were barely a light-minute from the planet; the defenders had had plenty of time to read her message and transmit a reply. She hadn't really expected one, even though the defenders had to know they were badly outgunned. Indeed, she’d only really sent it to convince the weak sisters on Wolfbane that she'd tried to be reasonable before opening fire. The morons had no idea what it took to actually fight and win a battle.

  “As expected,” she said, calmly. “Continue on our present course.”

  There was a long pause. “Admiral,” the tactical officer said, finally. “The enemy fleet is breaking orbit.”

  Rani felt a stab of disappointment, mixed with relief. The chance of catching a substantial enemy force and smashing it to rubble was not one to be discounted, but the Commonwealth Navy was a dangerous foe. Matched with the orbital battlestations, it might be capable of doing some real damage, even trapped against the planet. She was prepared to endure some losses to recover Corinthian, but there were limits. Her enemies wouldn't see the victories, only what they’d cost.

  “They’re angling for a long-range engagement,” the tactical office
r added. “Admiral?”

  “They’ll be right on the edge of our missile envelope,” Rani mused. She couldn't fault the enemy commander, even though the odds of either side inflicting much damage were very low. Indeed, the smart choice would be to grit her teeth and take the enemy fire without a response, conserving her missile loads for later targets. “Swing a handful of drones in their direction, then put the point defence on standby.”

  “Aye, Admiral,” the tactical officer said.

  ***

  “They’re not moving in pursuit,” the sensor officer reported.

  Mandy scowled. An inexperienced officer might have allowed her to lure him into a stern chase, giving her plenty of time to wear him down, but Admiral Singh was too smart for such a simple trick. Indeed, she’d been careful not to take her eye off the prize. Her fleet was progressing towards Corinthian, ignoring the Commonwealth ships.

  “Five minutes to engagement range,” the tactical officer said.