The Shadow of Cincinnatus

by Nuttall, Christopher

  We should mine the Asimov Points, he thought, although he knew it would be largely pointless, only dangerous to independent freighters. Give them something to worry about as they make their way to Boston.

  But the Admiral wouldn’t allow it. The minefields could and would be swept, unless they were covered by fortresses and mobile units, and there were nowhere near enough of either to allow Taurus to receive its own battlefleet. It would only delay the Outsiders, not deter them altogether. The only real way to stop them, or at least force the bastards to divert more strength to their convoy escorts, was to ambush them as they made their way towards the front...

  “Captain,” the sensor officer said. “I’m picking up ships transiting Point Beta!”

  “Show me,” Scott snapped, rising to his feet and striding over to the officer’s console. It felt strange to sit on a bridge and know it was his, but there was no time to enjoy it. “What do we have?”

  A line of red icons emerged from the Asimov Point and settled down into a standard formation. “Twelve freighters,” the sensor officer said, “and a single battlecruiser.”

  Scott felt his eyes narrow. Standard Federation Navy doctrine – and there was no sign the Outsiders disagreed – called for lighter units to escort convoys, although there hadn’t been a major war on when that doctrine had been devised. Smaller units were more flexible than battlecruisers, he knew, and less likely to be needed elsewhere. Were the Outsiders merely trying to kill two birds with one stone by using the battlecruiser as an escort while it made its way to the front, he asked himself, or were they up to something else? Could it be a trap of some kind?

  Or, he asked himself, are they shipping something so important they detailed a whole battlecruiser as escort?

  “The freighters,” he said. “Is there anything odd about them?”

  “They appear to be standard Polaris-class bulk freighters,” the sensor officer said. “I can’t get a read on their drive fields to ID them properly, sir.”

  And that might well be meaningless, Scott thought. If they liberated the ships from us, they might well have fiddled with the drive fields to make identifying them from a distance impossible.

  He peered down at the screen, thinking hard. The Polaris-class freighters were common; maybe not the most common freighters in the galaxy, but there were certainly hundreds of thousands of them plying the spaceways. But they had their flaws, he recalled from his Academy days; they were rarely used by anyone outside the larger shipping firms. They needed a proper orbital station, complete with heavy-lift shuttles, to unload, making them utterly cost-ineffective for anyone else. The independent shippers, and those who tended to stage-one colony worlds, considered them little better than junk.

  But they could be turned into Q-ships, or troop transports, with a little effort...and that might explain the enemy battlecruiser.

  “Move us into firing position,” he ordered, as he watched the enemy ships. The Outsiders weren’t wasting time, he noted with abstract admiration; as soon as they assembled, they started to head towards Point Charlie. Federation Navy officers could hardly have done as well. “And prepare to flush everything towards the freighters.”

  The tactical officer glanced up. “Sir?”

  “There’s no point in a missile duel with that big bastard,” Scott said. “All we can do is get our blows in and then vanish into the darkness.”

  The thought didn’t please him. Assault cruisers had been designed for sneak attacks, not going head-to-head with battlecruisers. There were times when he suspected the real reason he’d been given Spartan was because she was expendable. The Federation Navy had built her and her sisters when they’d been trying to fill holes in their line of battle, after all. They might have their advantages, but they didn’t have the throw weight to compete with anything larger than a medium cruiser. Their only hope was to land the first punch and then vanish.

  Unless the battlecruiser’s crew isn’t alert, he told himself, but one look at the display suggested otherwise. The cruiser was sweeping space carefully, not ambling along as if it didn’t have a care in the world. They were as alert as any crew could reasonably hope to be, if they weren’t at red alert. Scott would have been impressed if they hadn’t been the enemy.

  He cursed the Grand Senate under his breath. If the numbers had been even, if the Outsiders had faced the Federation on even terms, he had a feeling the Federation would have lost by now. The Outsiders were far more motivated; they had grudges to pay off and family to protect, unlike the Federation Navy’s officers. Even now, with one of their own ruling the Federation and the old patronage networks shattered, the Federation Navy was demoralized and unsure of itself. But the successful defense of Boston – so far – might convince the older officers that they had a chance to win...

  Assuming we get more supplies shipped forward, he thought. Before he’d been promoted, he’d seen enough to know the Federation Navy was being pushed to the limits, simply reinforcing the forces at Boston. The Outsiders had done too much damage too quickly and the Federation had reeled under the blows. And then perhaps we can take the offensive.

  The console chimed. “Captain,” the sensor officer said, “they will enter firing range in twenty minutes.”

  “Hold us here,” Scott ordered. It was the moment of truth. Drives and weapons stepped down, there should be nothing to betray their presence to the prowling battlecruiser. But if the enemy had pulled off an unanticipated advance...he pushed the thought aside, then watched as the battlecruiser swept closer. “Stand by all weapons and drives...”

  The battlecruiser’s sensors swept over them, then faded into the distance. Scott let out a breath, although he knew better than to relax completely. If he’d been in command of the battlecruiser and picked up traces of a cloaked ship, he might have held his fire until they were practically at point-blank range, obliterating the cloaked ship before she even knew she was under attack. But instead, the battlecruiser proceeded onwards. Behind her, the line of freighters came on.

  Pity there’s no time to take them intact, Scott thought. It was probably futile anyway. The Outsiders fought desperately to avoid being taken prisoner, thanks to the Grand Senate’s treatment of prisoners in the last war. Only a handful had fallen into Federation hands, mainly through being knocked out or stunned before they had a chance to kill themselves. Given half a chance, Outsider crews activated antimatter scuttling charges and blew themselves up, rather than surrender. It was a major headache for ONI, which needed prisoners desperately...

  Maybe they have a point, Scott thought. Being ONI’s test subject would not be a pleasant experience.

  He glanced over at the sensor officer. “Can you pick out anything new about them?”

  “No, sir,” the sensor officer said. “They’re fully-laden, but nothing else.”

  Pity they don’t advertize their cargo on their hulls, Scott thought, with a flash of amusement. It would make this so much easier.

  He cleared his throat. “Lock weapons on the freighters,” he ordered. He waited for the tactical officer’s nod. “Fire!”

  Spartan shuddered as she flushed her external racks, then her internal tubes. At the same time, her cloaking device dropped, revealing her to enemy sensors. Scott watched the enemy battlecruiser – it was probably his imagination, but he could have sworn the enemy ship jumped – as his ship opened fire. Despite his surprise, the enemy CO reacted quickly and swung his ship around. But he wasn’t moving in pursuit.

  “Bring up the drives,” Scott snapped. “Get us out of here!”

  The enemy battlecruiser flickered on the display, then unleashed a spread of missiles. Scott watched, perplexed; the enemy might have fired at extreme range, even for them, but they could have fired a far larger barrage if they’d wanted to. Instead of pursuing his ship, the enemy CO was attempting to cover the freighters. But he’d been caught badly out of position and there was no time to get back into place. One by one, the freighters died as the missiles slammed home
. There were no survivors.

  Scott gritted his teeth. The enemy CO must have realized it was futile quickly, because he altered course and drove his ship right towards Spartan. His missiles were already closing in rapidly, leaving the assault cruiser at severe risk of being crippled. Scott braced himself as his point defense weapons opened fire, sweeping most of the missiles out of space. A handful managed to get close enough to detonate, but two wasted themselves on decoys. The remainder slammed into the ship’s shields, shaking the entire ship.

  “Rear shields down fifty-seven percent,” the tactical officer reported. “No major damage.”

  “Take us back to Point Alpha,” Scott ordered. The enemy CO was clearly out for blood. There was no point in allowing a long stern chase, when it would give the enemy CO all the time he needed to take Spartan apart. “And send a standard alert message to reinforcements.”

  He glanced at the angry red icon and hoped like hell the enemy officer fell for it. The standard message was well known, both in and out of the Federation Navy. There would be no room for misinterpretation. He’d know that Scott was signalling for help, but would he know there was no one in the system – or on the other side of Point Alpha – to come to Scott’s assistance? The only way to find out was to try.

  “Missile separation,” the tactical officer reported.

  Scott blinked. Given enough time, the battlecruiser would overhaul Spartan and hammer his ship into scrap metal. There was no point in firing missiles at extreme range; hell, there was a good chance the missiles would burn themselves out long before they entered attack range and threw themselves against his shields. Was the commander so desperate to extract revenge, knowing his career had just gone down the sinkhole, or was he merely intent on punishing Spartan for her insolence? There might be some advantages, Scott had to concede, in ensuring Spartan never made it home.

  But you’ll know you lost the ships, Scott thought, darkly. And I bet your superiors will be even less forgiving than ours.

  He watched the missiles, as dispassionately as he could, fight to get into attack range. They were faster than any starship, but their drives were far more limited. Scott felt a flicker of relief as he realized most of the missiles didn’t have a hope of getting to his ship, despite their speed. The enemy CO had to be frustrated as hell.

  Or is it an alien commander? Scott asked himself. One of their allies?

  There was no way to know. The Federation would never have tolerated giving starships, let alone warships, to alien powers. But, given how much the Outsiders had done, it would be hard to decide what their leadership was actually being executed for. Scott might have been lukewarm on the subject of defending the Grand Senate – he’d seen how baleful an effect it had on the Navy – but he understood the importance of keeping aliens under tight control and supervision. Aliens just couldn’t be trusted.

  The thought made him smile. How are the Outsiders enjoying their allies now?

  “Coming up on the Asimov Point, sir,” the helmsman said.

  “Take us straight through,” Scott ordered. He keyed a switch on his console. “All hands, brace for violent transition; I say again, all hands brace for violent transition.”

  “Missile separation,” the tactical officer snapped.

  Oh, now you’re just throwing good money after bad, Scott thought, mockingly. I...

  Spartan hit the Asimov Point at speed. For a long moment, there was nothing...and then Scott’s stomach churned so violently he thought he was going to be sick. The noise – and smell – behind him told him that some of his crew hadn’t been so lucky. Transiting through an Asimov Point at anything above a slow crawl was not recommended, no matter the situation. Older crewmen were at particular risk of shock, followed by death. The cynic in him wondered if the rules had been written by older Admirals.

  “Transit complete, sir,” the helmsman said. He sounded badly shaken, but at least he’d kept his lunch where it belonged. “Our drive fields took a pasting.”

  “Take us away from the point, then cloak us,” Scott ordered. If the cloaking device had been disabled, and the enemy ship came after Spartan, they were dead. There would be no way to escape the battlecruiser’s grasp. “And shut down all non-essential equipment. We have to be a hole in space.”

  Seconds ticked by, slowly. There was no sign of the enemy ship.

  “Captain, this is sickbay,” Doctor Cullen said. He didn’t sound pleased. “I have seventeen crewmen here, all suffering from jump shock.”

  “Put them in stasis,” Scott ordered. It sounded heartless, but there was no time to worry about the crew, not now. “Are there any other problems?”

  “Not yet, but there will be,” the doctor said. “And you’ll have to pay to have the entire ship cleaned.”

  Scott heard someone chuckle behind him. It was hard not to swing his chair around and reprimand the mocker, even though he knew the doctor was right. Statistically, he knew, a violent transit would have at least half the crew throwing up, or slipping into jump shock. An IG inspection of his ship as it was, reeking like a pirate hulk, would probably have resulted in his immediate court martial. But there had been no choice.

  “The enemy ship hasn’t come through,” the sensor officer said. “They must think we have allies on this side.”

  “Let us hope so,” Scott said. Spartan was in no condition for a fight, even against a tiny gunboat or destroyer. “But it is dangerous to come to a conclusion about what the enemy is thinking and then accepting it as gospel truth.”

  He forced himself to relax as reports flooded in from all over the ship. There would be weeks of repair – fortunately, none requiring a shipyard – before Spartan was fully operational once again. Quite a few crewmembers would probably require treatment for delayed jump shock once the tension of battlestations wore off and it came crashing home. But the mission had been a success; Spartan had destroyed all twelve freighters and left the enemy escort thoroughly humiliated. The Outsiders would have to replace whatever it was they’d lost before resuming their assault on Boston.

  And Admiral Garibaldi will be pleased, he thought. Very pleased indeed.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  It is a perverse irony that the lot of the average worker in the Federation grew worse after the destruction of the Imperialist Faction in the Grand Senate. The Conservatives were not, of course, intent on respecting workers’ rights; they saw to it that strikes, slow-downs and protests were banned. But it was the Liberal/Socialist Faction who did the most damage...

  -The Federation Navy in Retrospect, 4199

  Sol, 4100

  The funeral was a short one, but then they always were.

  Lucy Roster looked around as the manager’s speech came to an end, seeing her own tiredness and frustration reflected in so many eyes. She’d worked for years, battling the educational system on Earth, to earn a chance to actually start making a living for herself. And she’d been good, too. Working in a factory wasn’t for everyone, but she’d done well. Her children would have a chance to enter employment at an advanced level. They would certainly never grow up on Earth.

  But now all of that was threatened.

  She rubbed her eyes as the workers left the compartment, leaving the body behind. They’d all liked Gary King; he’d been one of those people with a talent for befriending everyone, no matter how reclusive or unpleasant they were. But he was dead now, killed in an accident, an accident everyone had known was inevitable since they started working sixteen-hour shifts, trying to produce as much as possible for the war. They’d cut so many corners, and taken on so many undertrained staff, that it was a minor miracle that Gary King had been the only one to die. And he’d been a trained worker!

  Cold hatred flared in her breast as she caught sight of a handful of interns, laughing and joking as they slipped away from the crowd. Bastards! They didn’t have the experience, let alone the training, to work in the factory complex, but the workers had been forced to take them on anyway and try to teach
them what to do. It was impossible! They didn’t have the grounding they needed to understand what they were doing – and, without that, all they could do was work by rote. And God help them if they ever ran into a problem they hadn’t trained to face...

  She saw her own reflection in the glass as she pushed open the door to the drinking hole and flinched. Her long hair was turning grey; her face, once pretty, was tired and worn. Her husband had barely seen her over the past three months; her children, no matter how much she loved them, had been sent to boarding school. Once, she’d worked a nine-hour day and gone home to be with them. Now, she spent her few sleeping hours at the factory, trying hard to relax before she had to go back to work.

  The other workers looked just as worn – and angry – as she felt. They were an odd lot, she’d discovered the day she first joined them; some looked tough, their muscles showing clearly against the tight uniforms, while others looked dignified and young. But they were a close-knit bunch, despite appearances, and they’d taken Gary’s death badly. She took a glass from the table and chugged it down in one gulp, gasping as the liquid hit her stomach. The still the workers operated within the factory might produce alcohol, but it tasted like paint stripper. And that would probably be better for her health.

  “I just heard from Gary’s wife,” John Rawson said. He was an older man, with a badly scarred face, but he was one of the kindest men Lucy had met. “There won’t be any insurance – or pension!”

  Lucy stared at him, suddenly completely sober despite the alcohol. “No pension!”

  She wasn’t the only one to be shocked. They’d been told, when they took on the job, that their relatives would be looked after, if something happened while they were working and they didn’t make it out. Building stardrives was not a safe occupation. And, as far as she’d known, the pension system had survived both the Justinian War and the destruction of the Grand Senate. Her children would be cared for if she died. It was the sole reason she’d stayed on the job, rather than emigrating to some colony world along the Rim.