by John Bowers
"Oh, just dandy, Johnny. I was hoping I'd get to see you. Your dad told me to be sure and tell you hello for him. And everyone on the flight line at Enterprises said the same thing. We're all real proud of you at home."
Johnny flushed as he anticipated the ribbing he would shortly take from the other crews.
"Thanks, Mr. Hatley," he said.
"Your dad also said to give you a message. He said —" Hatley frowned as he recalled the exact words. "He said to tell you that he hopes this will make up for some past history. That make any sense to you?"
Johnny felt an unexpected surge of emotion. He nodded slowly.
"It does. Tell him it's a big down payment."
"I'll tell him."
"It's been over a year since I flew one of these babies," Johnny said. "Any serious modifications since then?"
"Not many. It was a pretty solid design from the CAD chips. Want to take a tour?"
"You bet! Oh, by the way, this is Major Walters, my CO. And my gunner, Lieutenant Kvoorik." To the others, as they shook hands, he added, "Mr. Hatley is the chief line tech at LincEnt. He was my lifeline on the ground when I was testing this baby."
Hatley took Johnny into the cockpit of the nearest QF and spent a half-hour showing him some minor design changes and upgrades. Next he gave Onja equal time in the gun turret, showing her the improvements in design over the GalaxyFighter.
"Did you fight in the GF?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Ever take an EMP hit against your shields?"
Onja nodded.
"And how did the shields do?"
"They held, but they dropped to thirty or forty percent."
"So another EMP hit would've finished them, right?"
"Probably."
"Then you're going to love this." Hatley smiled conspiratorially. "This model converts EMP energy to shield energy. Your shields will actually increase in power after an EMP strike."
Onja stared at him in disbelief. "That's fantastic!" she gasped.
Hatley nodded. "It'll protect your fighter, but there is a drawback. Too many EMP hits can overload the shield regulator so that, when you fire your laser, the shield won't open. In other words, the Sirians can't get through the shields to hit you, but you're also unable to hit them." He shrugged. "We'll find a way around that, of course; it's damn near impossible to make it perfect, but at least the drawback is in your favor.
"We've also added some wing tubes. Instead of two, you now have six. You can unload your torpedoes three times faster than before.
"Another feature," he added. "In case of fatal damage to the fighter, the GF had the ability to eject during atmospheric flight, but not in space. This one can eject in either situation. Both the cockpit and gun turret are separate ejectable modules."
He pointed to a red handle inset into the turret roof.
"You can eject by voice command, but if your systems are fried, you can do it manually. The pilot also has one of these in the cockpit, up against the firewall; if you're wounded, he can eject you. The system will fire you at a ninety-degree angle for maximum escape clearance. You have up to a month of life support and a transponder beacon."
"The enemy can read transponders, too," Onja pointed out.
Hatley nodded. "You can shut it off if you need to. By default it's set to transmit, in case you're injured or unconscious.
"One more thing — if the pilot ejects, the gunner automatically ejects as well. Your pilot can't run out on you." He winked. "But Johnny wouldn't do that, would he?"
Onja turned her blue gaze on him.
"If you say so."
She wasn't smiling.
Sunday, 9 October, 0221 (PCC) — Denver, CO, Terra
Driven by a steady northwest gale that howled down off the jagged peaks of the great Rocky Mountains, an unseasonably early snow swirled out of the cold October darkness and formed drifts on the grounds of the Lincoln mansion. Inside the huge house the windows rattled from the icy gusts, a fire blazed cheerily on the stone hearth in the main hall.
Oliver Lincoln III muttered to himself as he paced around the foyer at the foot of the main staircase. Unaware that he was pacing, he scowled darkly and muttered obscenities to his butler, Sylvester Hobbs.
"I'm too goddamned old for this shit!" he declared to a silent, tolerant Hobbs. "I've been through this already! Look at me, Hobbs! Do I look like a young man? Hell, no, I don't! Jesus Christ! As if I don't have enough to worry about! What did I ever do to deserve this!"
Hobbs wisely remained silent, sitting in an antique wooden chair near the main door, sipping a glass of wine.
"Where the hell is that kid of Rosemary's? He's the one who should be here, not me! He runs around with a loose dick and I'm the one has to make all the arrangements. Jesus Christ!"
"Oliver." Rosemary Lincoln had entered the room, and Lincoln stopped, staring at her. "It's going to be all right. This sort of thing happens every day. You're putting yourself through all this for nothing."
"You think so? How do you know? He's your son! Why isn't he here now?"
"Do you suppose it has something to do with the fact that he's off fighting a war?" Rosemary was long accustomed to her husband's tirades. "Besides which, no one ever bothered to tell him he's about to become a father."
"Yeah, well, that wasn't my idea. Angela cooked up that little conspiracy, and you supported her. I had nothing to do with it!"
"That's not true, Oliver! You were a party to it from the beginning. And stop pacing like that. You look ridiculous."
Oliver walked to the window and looked out at the swirling blizzard, still scowling.
"Jesus Christ!" he muttered.
A woman in a white uniform came down the stairs then, stopped at the bottom step, and smiled happily.
"Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln?"
Oliver spun away from the window, anxiety in his eyes. Rosemary unconsciously clasped her hands.
"What is it, Doctor?" Lincoln demanded. "Is everything —"
"Everything is perfect," the midwife smiled. "It's a boy, and he's fine."
Rosemary let her out breath with a rush, smiling. Lincoln did the same.
"Angie?"
"She's fine. You can go up now. She's a little tired, but everyone is awake."
Lincoln smiled hugely in relief, stood there a second as if in indecision.
"Congratulations, sir," Hobbs said. He was standing now, his hand extended. Lincoln grasped it powerfully, almost shaking the smaller man off his feet.
"Thank you, Hobbs! It's a boy!"
Angela was propped up in bed when the Lincolns entered. A nurse was in the room, but everything had been cleaned up and she was just watching. Angela smiled tiredly as the two visitors approached her bed to gaze in wonder at the pink bundle feeding at her breast.
"He's a boy," she whispered happily.
"It's a boy," Lincoln repeated.
"How are you, dear?" Rosemary asked, touching the girl's cheek.
"I'm fine. It was mostly just hard work. I'm tired, but I'm fine."
They turned their attention to the baby. He looked pretty much like most other babies, mostly red and wrinkled. Silky strands of dark hair were plastered to his pink skull. He smelled like vernix and amniotic fluid.
"Looks just like John," Lincoln observed with certainty.
"How can you tell, Oliver?" Rosemary chided. "He's only a few minutes old."
"Don't you see the resemblance? He's a dead ringer!"
"He's beautiful, Angela!" Rosemary said softly.
"What're you gonna name him?" Oliver wanted to know.
"He's a Lincoln," Angela smiled. "So he'll be Johnny, Jr."
Lincoln shook his head firmly. "No juniors in this family. Johnny the Second."
"Okay. Johnny Lincoln II."
"I hope he won't be as headstrong as his dad."
Angela smiled again. "I sort of hope he is."
Lincoln shook his head. "Well, we're gonna raise this one right. I just hope the goddamned wa
r is over before he grows up!"
Rosemary nodded fervently. "Amen!" she whispered.
Chapter 22
Lunar Base 9, Luna
Onja Kvoorik stepped out of the shower and stood under the dryer, toweling her hair. Another routine patrol today with no action. She'd been with the 213 for three weeks, and nothing to show for it.
She shut off the dryer and stepped into the bedroom to get dressed. To her surprise, she heard Johnny's voice in the anteroom — usually he ran to Denise immediately after evening mess. Glancing through the doorway, she saw him sitting at the terminal, dictating a letter.
"… really sorry I won't be home for Christmas this year, but I'm not the only one. Some of these people haven't been home in two or three years, and no one knows when we'll get liberty.
"Mom, I really appreciate all the v-chips you send. It gets pretty crazy around here sometimes, but I do get homesick now and then. It really helps to be able to see your face and hear your voice. You have no idea how much.
"Mom, I better go now; they told us to keep these v-chips under a hundred megs so we don't hog up the transmissions. I love you, Mom, and I miss you. I'll write again when I can."
Onja backed away from the door and opened the wardrobe, staring at her uniforms without seeing them. She heard Johnny shut down the terminal and get to his feet. Without a word to her, he left the suite.
Onja lowered her head, feeling the sting of tears.
I love you, Mom, and I miss you.
For the first time since joining the Space Force, Onja reached into her space bag and withdrew a small ivory box. Setting it on her rack, she opened the lid and pressed a single button. A rainbow-hued hologram appeared, six inches high. Onja stared uncertainly at it for a moment, then slowly dropped to her knees.
Bowing her head, she made the Sign of the Cult for the first time since — when? — the night she'd last seen her father. She clasped her hands together and gazed at the glimmering goddess.
"Goddess Sophia," she whispered shakily. "Sophia the Wise, Sophia the Serene. Hear my prayer, the prayer of a child of the Temple. I have strayed from the Path of Rightness. I am far from the path dictated by your tears, but I have chosen this path only of necessity. What else can I do, Sophia? What possible other course do I have?"
Hot tears streamed down her cheeks; her lungs felt constricted.
"I have made a vow, Sophia. But I cannot honor it without your help. Please, hear my prayer! Show me your tears! Guide me back to the Path of Rightness! Give me the strength, the skill, the opportunity to honor my vow. Help me, I beg you! I am so afraid! So afraid!"
* * *
Orders came down for the 213 to begin carrier training. Although no carriers were yet in service, an old freighter, UFF Hamilton, had been converted to allow fighters to practice carrier operations. Manned by a skeleton crew, Hamilton occupied a parking orbit barely a thousand miles above Terra. The pilots of 213 spent a week shooting launches and landings while other squadrons flew combat patrols as usual.
Onja knew it was necessary duty, because they would have to be ready when the first carriers were commissioned, but she chafed at the lack of action. Her first duty to herself and the people she loved was to fight.
Sunday, 14 October, 0221 (PCC) — Orbital Maneuvers, Terra
Johnny was the fourth fighter in line to land, his section right behind him. His approach looked good. He'd been shooting landings for over a week and it was becoming routine, almost second nature. No accidents had occurred and only a couple of near misses, so things were progressing well.
Hamilton looked like nothing less than a big square cracker box as he approached from the stern, firing braking thrusters to reduce speed as the landing tunnel yawned larger in his view port. Up ahead, Capt. Santiago's ship disappeared into the tunnel; Johnny imagined the crewmen scrambling to get it out of the way before the next fighter arrived two minutes later. As training progressed, the lag time between landings would decrease; the goal was to recover one fighter every forty-five seconds.
Johnny fired retros again. He would land right after Major Walters.
"Attent:" the AI barked suddenly. "Incoming transmission from Luna 1. Emergency status."
"Input!" Johnny said breathlessly. "Relay to speaker!"
Text scrolled up his data screen even as the words filled his headset, and Johnny's blood pounded with excitement.
"ATTENTION ALL SPACECRAFT, LUNA 1 CONTROL. CODE SEQUENCE DELTA WHISKEY FIVE FIVE. LUNAR STATIONS HAVE DETECTED A MASSIVE INCOMING STRIKE, POSSIBLY FIVE THOUSAND SPACECRAFT, APPROACHING TERRA ORBIT FROM ZERO FOUR NINE OFFSET ZERO ZERO TWO. THIS IS A COMBAT ALERT. ALL NONCOMBAT VESSELS SEEK PORT IMMEDIATELY. ALL COMBAT SQUADRONS SCRAMBLE. THIS IS NOT A DRILL, REPEAT THIS IS NOT A DRILL."
The message went into a loop to repeat itself from the beginning and Johnny shut it off. His heart raced as he began issuing orders to his AI.
"Input: Abort carrier approach. Execute. Tobacco Road, Railsplitter! I'm canceling my approach. Request permission to seek targets of opportunity."
"Stand by, Railsplitter!" Walters began talking rapidly to his fighter crews and Johnny half listened as he twisted the QuasarFighter on its axis and dove under Hamilton toward the planet, which was still several minutes away.
"I'm arming weapons!" Onja said in a steel voice.
"Roger!" he responded. "Tobacco Road, Railsplitter. Repeat request to seek targets of opportunity."
"Stand by, Railsplitter!" Walters said in exasperation. "The squadron is all strung out …" He heard the strain in Walters's voice.
"My section is together, Major!" Johnny pleaded. "Request …"
"Goddammit! Go! But bring everybody back!"
"That's a roger, sir. Thank you, and happy hunting! Break! Section 3, Railsplitter. Form up on me and keep it tight, ten-mile separation. Sound off!"
"Railsplitter, Vintage Red, that's a roger!" Burgundy called.
"Stonewall, roger!"
"Polo, roger!"
"Okay, Section 3, keep off the air until we have something to say. Fix on me, arm your systems, and don't get lost. We're going hunting!"
* * *
In the turret, Onja was tracking the coordinates Luna 1 had given and couldn't believe her eyes. The blips were in clusters, ranging from ten to thirty in a group, all over the northern sky.
"I've got them, Johnny! There must be more than five thousand. Goddess Sophia, I've never seen anything like it!"
"Okay, vector me! Let's go!"
She fed him coordinates and ranges, Johnny kicked thrusters, and they streaked out over the northern pole, heading on an intercept course for the enemy.
"I hope to hell we're not the only ones out here," Johnny murmured a minute later.
"Don't worry about it!" she assured him. "You've got me, you don't need anyone else."
Johnny laughed, but his mouth was dry. He just hoped to hell she was as good as advertised. He'd have felt far more comfortable with Denise in back, but that option had been taken away by whatever REMF had given Lt. Kvoorik her blank check. Jesus! Why did she have to pick him?
At an altitude of eight hundred miles, they raced across Kamchatka, the Bering Straits, and crossed the western coastline of Canada just south of the Alaskan peninsula, closing at thirty miles a second on the enemy. It quickly became clear that the Sirians were intent only on atmospheric penetration — as the four QuasarFighters screamed toward them, not a single enemy broke off to intercept.
This is too easy, Johnny thought briefly. He saw twenty of them, now only six hundred miles ahead, angling down, almost deaf and dumb as they ignored the oncoming Federation fighters.
"Section 3, this is a hit and run; no dogfights. There's too many of them, and lots more where they came from."
Johnny's heart raced as the range dropped to three hundred miles and he picked them up on visual under magnification.
"Input: execute auto-evade as needed!" he said breathlessly.
"Ack."
It was a
gorgeous day over northern Canada, the continent clearly visible below with very little cloud cover. Johnny put his fighter into a gentle spiral that sent the sky spinning slowly, and as it did the turret above and behind him began to shudder against its pneumatic shock absorbers as the autocannon went into action. At the same time, two light torpedoes leapt from the firing tubes along the wings and flashed forward. For one brief second Johnny saw the enemy ships through his windscreen and then they were behind him, falling astern at incredible speed. The gun turret was still shivering; Onja had reversed and continued to fire to the rear.
Johnny caught his breath and forced himself to suck oxygen for a moment. In that one brief instant he'd recorded a retinal image of two enemy fighters flowering open under torpedo hits, and another disintegrating under the autocannon's shredding firepower. They had two for sure, probably three; only the AI would know how many others Onja had got in those five or six tragic seconds of combat.
Behind them, Billy Burgundy and his gunner were just hitting the formation, Jackson right on their heels, with Marcos bringing up the rear. By the time all four QFs had made their runs, the enemy squadron would be in sorry shape indeed.
As they cleared the scene and Onja ceased fire, Johnny was already searching for more targets. Hundreds of enemy formations were out here and he wanted to hit as many as possible before they could penetrate. Even a damaged ship couldn't penetrate safely; a perforated control surface on entry would turn a spacecraft into a flaming torch.
He spotted formations to the right, left, and straight ahead. He turned right ten degrees toward central Canada and continued in a gentle descent, still under thrust.
"This is Railsplitter, everybody still there?"
"Vintage Red, still here. We got one, Lieutenant!"
"Stonewall here!" Jackson loosed a rebel yell that ripped the paint off Johnny's cockpit. "Me and the missus got two of 'em!"
"This is Polo! We got two, too!"
"Next group in fifty seconds, looks like about fifteen of them, bearing triple-zero true. Everybody reload!" Johnny's initial jitters were gone, and he felt as calm as if he were about to wash his hovercar on a Sunday afternoon. "How you doing in the back seat, Lieutenant?"
Onja hadn't spoken since before the attack pass, but her attention was in the right place. She already had her trajectories laid in for the group ahead, her torpedo tubes reloaded, and the autocannon recharged.
