by Rick Shelley
“You mean it isn’t?” Cordamon asked.
The verbal jousting went on for several minutes, but neither man had his heart in it. The words were right, but there was no feeling to them, no inflection. The men were like actors who had played the same roles for far too many years. They sounded tired.
Alfie was the first to flop on his bunk. He closed his eyes and let out a long, slow breath. His eyes didn’t stay shut long, though. He stared at the ceiling, as near the light as he could. Too bloody many ghosts in my head, he thought. Images, memories. Mates who had died; strangers who had died, some wearing the same uniform that Alfie did, others in Federation battledress. Not all of the killing and dying had been at a comfortable distance. Enemies had died at less than arm’s length … and friends had died in those arms. Bright light kept the ghosts away—or hid them. The hollow feeling in Alfie’s stomach had nothing to do with hunger. Except when he was in combat, that feeling was present nearly all the time that he was awake, sober, and not too occupied to notice. Maybe I ought to see somebody about it, he thought. Maybe they can give me something to keep them away. But he had never been able to force himself to follow through on those frequent thoughts. It would mean opening up.
Will Cordamon sat on the edge of his bunk and unlaced his shoes. The detachment had not embarked wearing combat gear—for a change. Their departure had been low-key. The shuttles had even started off as if they were only going to one of the training ranges southeast of Westminster. It wasn’t until the landers were well away from the city thatthey had altered heading and burned for orbit and rendezvous with Avon. There had been no public announcements, no fanfare. Of course, that was almost routine for the commando.
After getting his shoes off, Will sat slumped on the edge of the bunk, too tired—mentally, not physically—to flop sideways onto the mattress and get comfortable. No amount of sleep seemed sufficient to correct this exhaustion. Will stared at Alfie, waiting for him to blink. But he didn’t, not for the longest time.
“How many times?” Will asked after several minutes.
That brought a blink to Alfie’s eyes. He turned his head a little toward Will. “How many times what?”
“How many campaigns have we had? I can’t recall. I can’t pick them apart in my head any more.”
Alfie blinked several more times in rapid succession. “At least six,” he said after considerable thought. “It seems like more, but I’m sure of at least six. Why?”
“I don’t know. Maybe because I couldn’t recall them all.”
“I don’t remember places, just the faces,” Alfie said. “Mates who bought the farm.”
“Yeah.”
“I think the only smart one was Tory,” Alfie said. “He got out of this show in one piece. Cushy training job, home to the wife and kids every night, nothing to worry about but passing inspections and making sure the lads learn their lessons.”
“He’s got a third kid on the way now,” Will said. “I saw him, just a few days ago. We nattered on for a bit.”
“If I could find a lass who’d have me, I’d be tempted to go the same route.” Alfie closed his eyes. The ghosts had suddenly become less threatening than the conversation.
Captain Louisa Barlowe was the third skipper that HMS Avon had had since its conversion to commando transport. An auxiliary frigate normally drew junior captains. As soonas they gained a little experience and seniority, they moved on to other ships or to staff duties ashore. A year was a long tour for a skipper aboard Avon. Captain Barlowe’s immediate predecessor had remained less than eight months before he was transferred to one of the new Warfield-class light cruisers.
Barlowe was a petite woman who kept her cosmetic age at thirty. People who had known her for long said that she had always done that. She had been in the Royal Navy for eighteen years, and there were no flaws in her record.
She and her executive officer sat on one side of the chart table in Avon’s 2CC (secondary command center), which had backup controls mirroring those on the bridge, in case the ship’s primary command center was put out of commission. Across the table were the three officers of the 2nd Marine Commando. Avon had just completed its first Q-space transit of the mission. The ship was back in normal space, eight light-years from Buckingham.
“I don’t envy you your assignment, Captain Spencer,” Barlowe said. They had just finished reading their sealed orders for the mission. “Camerein has been nothing but grief for us in this war—three ships lost without a trace.”
“That was back in the early days, Captain Barlowe,” David said, “before we knew we had a war on our hands, and before you navy people started ducking in and out of Q-space like you were simply walking from one room to the next.”
Louisa smiled. “Which is why I didn’t say anything about not envying my own assignment. We’ve always got a nice, safe place to go to in case of trouble. You and your lads don’t.”
“We have our tricks. With a little luck, we’ll be in and out before the Feddies know that we’re around. I like that part of it. Get out before the invasion if we can.”
“You’ll have five days. But we’re not to set you on the ground anywhere close to your target.”
David shrugged. “That’s easy enough to understand. If we come a cropper, they don’t want us to give away thelocation, just in case His Highness is still there. We don’t let the Feddies know that we think that particular spot is important.”
“Seems a bit far-fetched to me,” Louisa said. “I mean, after seven years?”
“This whole go is far-fetched. But they just give us our orders. They don’t ask us what we think of them.”
Barlowe keyed in a sequence on the chart table’s console and a holographic projection of Camerein appeared above it, thirty-two inches in diameter, rotating slowly. As she continued to work the keyboard, a red dot appeared on one continent, and a pink circle drew itself around the dot.
“My orders are that the shuttles not approach that resort any closer than sixty miles. The dot is the resort. The circle is the sixty-mile radius. Our data are eight years old, so we can’t count on clearings being in the same places. We won’t be able to pick an LZ for the landers until they’re on their way in.
“That entire continent is virtually empty of people,” she continued. “There are, or were, perhaps a half dozen other resorts, all small, scattered along the coast, all in the tropical region, on either side of the continent. The only real town is at the far northern end of the landmass, seven hundred miles from your target. There are no roads. Two mountain chains lie across the line, and at least four substantial rivers. This Commonwealth Excelsior must be the most isolated inhabited spot on any settled world in the galaxy.”
“The way we look at things, the isolation is a definite plus,” David said. “There’s no reason for the Feddies to show any interest. That’s why it’s just possible that His Highness is still there and safe. That town is no worry of ours. We’ll just let the shuttles pick us up as soon as we complete our mission.”
“But if something happens to us, you could have one long walk,” Barlowe said.
Spencer shrugged. “We could always wait for the restof the regiment to arrive, let them worry about collecting us.”
“We’ll try to avoid that.” Barlowe straightened up. “We’ll time our arrival to put you on the ground just after first light. I’d prefer to do the landing in the dark, but since we don’t know what we’re going to find in the way of an LZ, I don’t want to rely totally on night scopes. It’s far too easy to get false readings in a shuttle, especially during a hot landing.”
“We’d prefer the dark as well, less chance of discovery.”
Louisa studied the projection, then shook her head. “My charge is to get your lads on the ground safely, and it’s much too dicey in the dark. We can’t very well pop out the day before to do a recce. That would lose us any bit of surprise.”
“I wasn’t trying to change your mind, Captain. I do appreciate the problem. I m
ight make one suggestion, though. First light might not be the best alternative. Since the population centers are on the far side of the world, something closer to midday might be safer. While it’s the middle of the night on the other continent. If there’s nothing on this one the Feddies should be interested in, they just might not be giving it full attention.”
Avon’s skipper took time to consider that, then glanced at her executive officer, who nodded. “It might work that way, Captain,” he said. “The Feddies probably aren’t going to be looking all that hard at the secondary continent. And the middle of the day? Who invades at lunchtime?”
“Very well, we’ll work it that way,” Captain Barlowe said with a decisive nod. “As soon as the navigator gives me the figures, I’ll let you know the final schedule, Captain.”
Part 2
4
(X-DAY)
A heavy odor hung around the shuttle—a mixture of ozone; superheated metals, composites, and lubricants; and other ingredients. The skin of the shuttle remained warm, but it was no longer hot enough to burn the hands that touched it. The shuttle’s nose had plowed into the ground. The exposed passenger deck, where the hull had broken open, was an easy step up from the ground.
“Careful, sir,” Vepper warned as Prince George started to climb up into the lander. “Those edges look extremely sharp.”
“Yes, Vepper,” George said, trying to keep annoyance out of his voice with less success than usual. “I can see that.”
The odors were stronger inside the shuttle, and more pungent. George needed only one glance to learn another component of the stench.
“There are dead people in here. I see twelve bodies. We’ll have to check each of them, to make certain.” He turned to look at the others. Jeige had already climbed into the compartment. Shadda was just stepping up. The others waited their turns.
“Probably dead crew up front as well.” George moved away from the gash in the side of the fuselage. The deck was angled steeply. Forward and starboard were down. It was difficult to move without sliding or falling.
Military men, of course, George thought as he checked the two who were closest to him. Royal Marines, from the battledress. Both men were dead. They had flash burns in addition to whatever other injuries they had sustained. One man’s neck had obviously been broken. The head lolled over limply.
“There must have been a fire in the cabin,” Shadda said. He backed away from the man he had just examined. He had touched the side of the man’s neck, feeling for a pulse, and charred skin had come away on Shadda’s fingers. For a moment, the acting manager of the Commonwealth Excelsior thought that he would vomit. Bile rose in his throat as he brushed the dead skin off against his trousers. The bits of flesh stuck, did not come off easily, but he worked at it until they were all gone. Then he moved farther along the aisle, looking at each man but not touching. There was no need. These men were all quite obviously dead.
Prince George had not moved from the first two men he had approached. “It looks as if they were injured before the fire, before the crash,” he said, a hint almost of wonder in his voice. “We must have missed something.” Looking around, he could see more traces of a flash fire on the bulkheads. The fire could have been nothing more than that, a quick flash that had singed but did little more. “This man appears to have been shot.” He pointed at a bloody wound on the chest of one dead Marine. There was a bandage half peeled away from the hole.
“They were perhaps trying to escape from something?” Jeige suggested. I know about escape. He moved close to the prince and looked down. “That is definitely from a bullet, a very large-caliber bullet, not the sort of thing an infantryman would have.”
“An aircraft cannon, perhaps?” George said. “That entrance wound is a half inch in diameter.”
“They must have been on the ground,” Jeige said, “trying to escape when something happened to the shuttle as well.”
“Perhaps the lander was also damaged on the ground,” Shadda said. “It tried to reach escape velocity but lost power.”
“Why hasn’t their ship sent another shuttle to check on them?” Marie Caffre asked. She was outside, looking in, with her husband next to her. “There’s been time and more for that. You’d think they’d want to find out if there were any survivors.”
“Maybe their ship was disabled as well,” Vepper said. He was farther outside, behind the Caffres. Only a direct order from the prince could have induced him to enter that shuttle.
“Yes, their ship might have been disabled,” George said, not thinking about the words until they were out. Their ship might have been disabled.
For a time, the people from the hotel all forgot about the bodies and the wreckage. As if their reactions had been choreographed, each started to look around at the others. At first, none of the faces showed any change of emotion. The Windsor’s words needed time to sink in, even for him.
“Their ship might have been disabled,” he repeated, separating the words carefully. He blinked twice, slowly, then looked around again, meeting the gaze of each of the others in turn. “It might even have been destroyed.”
The implications were clear. Each of them had lashed considerable hope to the evidence that there was at least one starship—hopefully, but not necessarily, a friendly ship—in orbit over Camerein. After seven years of isolation, any discovery would be welcome. Not a threat. But if there had been only one ship, and if it had been disabled or destroyed, then they were no better off than before.
“We’d better see what else we can learn here,” Jeige said.
• • •
While the others, except for Shadda, continued to examine the dozen men in the shuttle’s passenger compartment—not just checking for survivors but emptying pockets, looking for identification or anything that might indicate what ship, what world they were from—George moved forward and “climbed” the three steps to the flight deck. The way the shuttle had angled in at impact, the top and bottom of the stairs were almost at the same level. The door to the flight deck was jammed. The prince nearly fell from his awkward stance on the stairs as he finally managed to pry it open.
There were no signs of fire on the flight deck. The crash damage was more severe, though. The cockpit windows had been smashed, popped out of their frames, and parts of the bulkheads had crumpled inward. Both crewmen were still strapped into their seats. One pilot was clearly dead. His shoulder straps had snapped, impaling him on the control stick. But the other pilot was still alive—barely. He opened his eyes a little when George touched his shoulder, and mumbled one word: “People.” Then the eyes drooped shut again.
“People,” George repeated. He reached for the side of the flyer’s neck, to assure himself that there was still a pulse. The beat was as faint as the one word the pilot had managed to speak before he lost consciousness. George turned his head toward the hatch leading to the troop compartment and lifted his voice just a little to say, “Vepper!”
“Sir?” It took a moment for Holford to reach the prince.
“This man is alive but badly injured,” George said. He moved aside to give his aide access. Vepper had extensive training in first aid, part of the preparation for his position as George’s companion. He examined the survivor, then looked up and around.
“We’d best get him laid out on the floor, sir.”
George nodded. Vepper unbuckled the pilot’s safety harness, and they got him stretched out on his back along the center of the flight deck. Several of the others were standing where they could look in from the passenger compartment.
No one spoke. They merely watched, and wondered if the man would survive long enough to answer their questions.
Vepper opened the front of the man’s coveralls to do a more thorough examination. “There’s a first aid kit in our bug,” he said without looking up. “Somebody bring it. Quickly!”
“What do you think, Vepper?” George asked after Shadda left to get the medical gear.
“If we had a trauma
tube here, there’d be no problem,” Vepper said. “But we don’t. And I didn’t see one among the gear in the back, either.”
“Can we get him back to the tube at the hotel?”
“We’ll have to try.” Vepper’s voice made it clear that he didn’t hold much hope that the flyer would survive the trip. “I’ll see if I can stabilize him. But that’s a long and uncomfortable trek in a safari bug, even if we get a dozen med-patches on him.”
“Here’s the first aid kit!” Shadda was breathless as he slid the case across the floor toward Vepper.
“You need my help for this?” George asked.
“Not just now, sir,” Vepper said, already rummaging through the kit for the items he needed.
“Sing out if you do.” George returned to the front of the flight deck. He went through the pockets of the dead pilot, then turned his attention to the shuttle’s controls and gauges. There was no power at all, not even for the radios.
There’s no way here to contact anyone, George thought. He knew that it had been a vain hope. Even before leaving the hotel, he had never considered the possibility that they might find the shuttle in any condition to fly, but he had hoped—in a childish, waiting-for-Christmas fashion—that they might be able to contact the shuttle’s mother ship and find out just what had been going on in the years of their isolation.
If he does live, we’ve merely added another exile to our number. George turned and spent a few seconds watching Vepper and the wounded flyer. Vepper was working with every appearance of competence, seeking each point of injury and applying medical patches with their analgesics and molecular repair units. But the pilot showed no obvious signs of life, no promise of recovery, even temporary.
