“We can ask them, afterwards,” Susan said. “Continue to sweep the system for surprises.”
“Signal from the flag,” Parkinson put in. “The task force is to adjust course to TPS-272-3 and prepare to destroy all enemy targets.”
Mason scowled. “He’s giving up a free shot at their hulls!”
“Stow that chatter,” Susan said, sharply. Mason had a point - but she doubted the aliens would be foolish enough to transit the tramline on the exact same vector. Why would they want to give the task force a chance to hammer them with impunity? “Helm, set course for the gas giant.”
“Aye, Captain,” Reed said. “We will enter firing range in seven hours, thirty-two minutes.”
“We could try to capture the cloudscoop, Captain,” Granger suggested. “It would give us a look at their tech.”
“If they’re foolish enough not to blow it up before the marines arrive,” Susan commented.
She scowled. It was definitely odd. Humanity had set up refuelling dumps in transfer systems during the early days of space exploration, but advances in drive technology had soon rendered them useless. Maybe the aliens were just being careful. A cloudscoop near an inhabited world would be a priority target for any raiding forces. Or maybe there was something in the system they were missing.
The display glimmered in front of her. She studied it carefully, but saw nothing. There could be an asteroid settlement - a whole string of asteroid settlements - yet as long as the settlers were careful there was no way they’d be detected. Her sensors were picking up enough asteroids to support millions of settlers ... there were people, back on Earth, who believed that one day the entire human race would live in space. Susan wasn't that attached to a planet - they were big targets that couldn't run away - but she rather doubted it unless technology advanced considerably. Asteroid settlements were terrifyingly vulnerable.
A flurry of red icons blinked into life on the display. Susan leaned forward as the enemy fleet snapped into existence, close enough to continue tracking the task force without exposing its hulls to human weapons. She silently complimented the alien shipmasters - they’d carried out a very tricky manoeuvre without apparent problems - and then glanced at Mason. He didn't look pleased.
“Enemy fleet settling into pursuit course,” Charlotte reported. “They’re still maintaining a safe distance from us.”
Susan rubbed her forehead. She was tired, too tired to remain in command. And yet, she didn't want to leave the bridge. Cold logic told her there would be plenty of warning before their shadows could open fire, if they decided to abandon the pursuit and attack, but she didn't really believe it. There could be a cloaked enemy fleet taking up an ambush position ahead of them.
“Mr. XO, you have the conn,” she said. “Alert me the moment the enemy ships move onto attack vector.”
“Aye, Captain,” Mason said. “I have the conn.”
Susan nodded, then rose and walked to the hatch. It hissed open, allowing her to step out into the corridor beyond. She wanted to sleep - she knew she should sleep - but instead she walked down the corridor, past the marine standing guard at the hatch to Officer Country and onwards to sickbay. A number of crewmen were lying on beds, others sitting on benches with wounds that weren't considered immediate problems. She waved them down when they made to stand, then hurried past them into the doctor’s office. Doctor Adam Chung looked tired, as if he were about to fall asleep on his feet. Susan didn't blame him.
“Doctor,” she said, quietly. “How bad is it?”
“Thirty-seven dead, five missing and presumed dead,” Chung said. Susan had always liked him. Like her, he was a mixed-race child in a world that didn't always accept them. But now, he sounded as tired as he looked. “Their bodies have not yet been recovered.”
And may never be found, Susan thought. If someone had been near the damaged hull plating, their body might have been vaporised - or sucked into space. And if that had happened, there wasn't a hope in hell of recovering the body. They’ll be drifting in space until the end of time.
She took a seat and motioned for the doctor to sit too. “And the wounded?”
“Forty-seven wounded, Captain,” Chung said. “Seven, perhaps eight of them will probably have to claim a medical discharge. We’ve done all we can for them - and we might have been able to do more, if we hadn't been overworked - but our best was insufficient. The remainder should be able to return to active duty within a couple of months, at most.”
Susan shuddered. Triage was one of the realities of military life. A doctor had to choose which patients to treat first - and put a lightly-wounded patient, the one with a better chance of survival, ahead of a badly-wounded patient. She understood the logic - there was no point in wasting limited supplies on someone who was likely to die anyway - but it didn't sit well with her. And she hoped, deep inside, that it never would.
At least they’re not going to die, she thought. They will live ...
She shook her head, bitterly. Modern medicine was a wonderful thing. She’d broken her arm as a child and the doctors had fixed it within a day. There were vaccines against tooth decay, treatments that could freeze her reproductive cycle and delay menopause indefinitely ... even medical procedures that could permanently change the colour of her skin! But it had its limits. If her crewmen couldn't be treated in time, they’d be doomed to spend the rest of their lives as cripples. And no matter how kindly they were treated, they’d never be independent again.
And some of dad’s friends had real problems, Susan reminded herself. And so did some of the people I knew after the flooding.
“Try and do everything you can for them,” she said. “Is there anything we can do?”
“I'm considering freezing them,” Chung said, flatly. “But that procedure carries its own risks.”
Susan nodded. A couple of primitive starships - starships only by courtesy, really - had been launched on interstellar colonisation missions before the first tramline had been discovered, their crews frozen in cryogenic suspension. They’d been recovered later - much later - when they’d reached their destination, but the procedure had killed nearly two-thirds of the would-be colonists. And many of the survivors had mental problems that had plagued them for the rest of their lives.
They claim to have improved the process since, she thought. But it’s very much a last resort.
“Make sure you explain the risks to them,” she ordered. “And if they are reluctant to undergo the procedure, don’t force it on them.”
“Of course, Captain,” Chung said. He sounded a little offended at the implication he would have forced the procedure on anyone. “They will know the risks before we put them on ice.”
“Good,” Susan said. She rubbed her forehead, feeling a nasty headache building behind her eyes. “And I’m sorry.”
“Don't worry about it,” Chung said. “We all have problems.”
He pointed a finger at her. “And I would suggest you slept,” he added. “If you stay awake, you’re not going to be any good to anyone.”
“I keep being told that,” Susan said. She rose. “Keep me informed, please.”
She walked out of the office and moved from bed to bed, exchanging a handful of words with the crewmen who’d been wounded. A number had been sedated; others looked to be in good cheer, even as they contemplated the prospect of life as a cripple. Susan couldn't help being reminded of some of her father’s friends, the men who’d fought and bled for a country that hadn’t been sure if it wanted to accept them. They’d had the same hearty air of cheerfulness even as the world turned against them.
And they were all good people, she thought, as she glanced down at one of the sedated crewmen. Something had taken his legs, leaving his lower body a broken mess. He’d been incredibly lucky to survive long enough to reach sickbay - and now he would have to remain sedated until a new pair of legs could be grown for him. They didn't deserve to suffer.
She pushed the maudlin thought out of her mind as she left sickbay and re
turned to her Ready Room. One of the harsh truths of life in the military - one civilians should have learned too, after the Bombardment - was that life wasn't fair. War chewed people up and spat them out, civilians as well as soldiers. Part of the reason she’d gone into the navy, if she were forced to be honest with herself, was that there was less collateral damage in space. But in a universe where aliens might decide to solve the human problem with planet-wide bombardment, she wasn't sure if that really held true.
Her sofa looked tempting as she entered the compartment, but she checked the tactical display before lying down for a brief nap. There hadn't been any major change, save for the disappearance of the alien arsenal ships. The alien CO had probably sent them to be reloaded, knowing they were useless without their missiles. Susan cursed under her breath, then walked over to the sofa and lay down. If she was lucky, she’d be able to get a few hours of sleep before she had to go back to the bridge.
Sure, her conscience reminded her. And what about all the wounded crewmen? And the ones who died under your command?
Susan gritted her teeth, her body feeling almost too tired to sleep. She cared about her crew, cared about them in a way Captain Blake had never cared. But then, he'd been too busy trying to hide his own loss of nerve to show any empathy to the men and women under his command. It was hard to feel any sympathy for him. He'd known he wasn’t suited to remain in the command chair, yet he’d stayed ...
And nearly got the entire fleet destroyed, Susan thought.
She pushed the thought away, angrily. There was nothing she could do for the dead, let alone the wounded. They couldn't even hold a formal ceremony to remember the dead until after they completed the operation! And the wounded would have to cope ... she knew, deep inside, that many of them would be carrying their scars, physical and mental, for the rest of their lives. Maybe some of them would be able to live a normal life ...
They knew the job was dangerous when they took it, she told herself, savagely.
It didn't help.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Susan didn't feel any better, six hours later, when she stepped back onto the bridge to discover that the situation hadn't changed. The task force was nearing the gas giant, the enemy fleet was still maintaining its distance and there was no sign of any other enemy starships in the system. She glanced at the reports from the long-range probes and frowned, not particularly reassured, when they continued to insist that the fleet was closing in on a cloudscoop and asteroid mining facility of indeterminate purpose.
There must be something else here, she thought. But what?
A series of messages from Admiral Harper popped up in front of her when she sat on the command chair. She flicked her way through them, silently cataloguing the ones of immediate use and filing the others away for later examination. Harper planned to execute a breakaway operation after inspecting and destroying the alien facility, then head directly for Tramline Two and onwards to Unity. The aliens would still have a chance to get there first - there was nothing they could do about that - but at least the task force would have an opportunity to make repairs.
She forced herself to wait as Mason and Granger returned to the bridge, looking disgustingly fresh after two or three hours of sleep. Susan reminded herself to keep an eye on the tactical officer - she’d had even less sleep than Susan herself - then motioned for Mason to take his console as the task force closed in on its target. She wondered, despite herself, just what the aliens were thinking. Logically, they had to know that their facility was doomed.
“Captain,” Charlotte said. “I’m picking up multiple shuttles heading away from the cloudscoop.”
Susan frowned. “An evacuation?”
“It looks like it,” Charlotte said. “The shuttles are heading on a wide course that will keep them well away from us.”
“Trained workers,” Mason noted. “They have to be.”
“Yes,” Susan said.
She wondered, as the shuttles fled the alien facilities, if Yegorovich would demand the right to give chase. From a coldly logical point of view, slaughtering trained workers - workers the aliens would need years to replace - made perfect sense. It would deal a minor blow to the alien industrial base, at least until the aliens trained new manpower. But from an emotional point of view, slaughtering fleeing aliens - who might well be civilians - was a horrific act, one that might make it harder to convince the aliens to talk peace. She knew, all too well, that humans would not react kindly to such an act.
But we don't know if that’s true of them, she thought. And we don’t know what they’re really doing in this system.
“Signal from the flag,” Parkinson said. “New York intends to engage the alien facilities with mass drivers. The remainder of the task force is to stand ready to offer support.”
Susan nodded. “Keep us on course,” she ordered. If the shadowing aliens had ever intended to save their facilities, they’d had their chance. “And be ready for anything.”
She watched, grimly, as New York opened fire, spewing out a stream of projectiles towards the alien facilities. A warship would have seen them coming and evaded, but the facilities probably had nothing more than station-keeping thrusters. She frowned as a handful of point defence units sprang to life, picking off a dozen projectiles, only to be smashed out of existence by the remainder. Moments later, there was nothing left of either facility, save for a handful of pieces of debris falling into the gas giant’s atmosphere.
“Targets destroyed,” Granger said. “I say again, targets destroyed.”
Susan looked at the main display. “Any sign of new alien activity?”
“None,” Granger said. “The system appears to be quiet.”
Susan exchanged a glance with Mason, then shrugged. If there was something hidden in the system, they weren't going to find it. Ideally, a couple of stealthed pickets could remain and keep an eye out for alien activity, but the task force didn't have any ships to spare. She eyed the shuttles, still fleeing as fast as they could, then dismissed them. The alien shadows could pick them up, after the breakaway.
“Signal from the flag,” Parkinson said. “All ships are to proceed to Point Break, then prepare for evasive manoeuvres.”
“Acknowledge,” Susan ordered. “Helm, do you have the updated course heading?”
“Aye, Captain,” Reed said. “It isn't very challenging.”
“As long as you don’t leak,” Mason pointed out. “One sniff of our presence and the entire exercise will be worse than useless.”
“It wouldn't be that bad,” Susan said. “Merely ... annoying.”
She waited, patiently, as the task force picked up speed, rushing away from the gas giant at a speed that would have been unimaginable, only a century ago. The aliens would have their chance to get to Unity first - there was no escaping that, unless they found a way to destroy the shadowing force before heading for Unity themselves. All they could do - all they could hope to do - was buy some extra time.
And it may be for nothing, anyway, she thought. What if they did send additional forces to Unity?
“Signal from the flag,” Parkinson said. “The task force is to begin diversionary operations on their mark.”
“See to it,” Susan ordered. The enemy fleet still had a solid lock on their hulls, but that was about to be shaken. And yet, would it be shaken enough? “Are the drones deployed?”
“Aye, Captain,” Granger said. “The drones are in place.”
They’ll tumble to this, sooner or later, Susan told herself. Human ECM seemed better than alien ECM, although there was no way to be entirely sure. And they’ll certainly try to duplicate our systems for themselves.
“Signal from the flag,” Parkinson said. “Diversionary operations are to begin in ten seconds.”
“Do it,” Susan said. She leant forward, bracing herself. “And stand ready to cloak.”
“Running diversionary operations now,” Granger said. “The drones are active; I say again, the drones are a
ctive.”
“Take us into cloak,” Susan ordered. She glanced at the fleet display to make sure that the laser communications links were in place. “Now.”
The lights dimmed, briefly. “Cloak engaged, Captain,” Granger said. “The drones have taken our place.”
Susan nodded, slowly. If the alien sensors were no better than humanity’s sensors, they wouldn't have seen anything beyond a burst of distortion. They should have missed the drones going active at the same time the task force cloaked ... if everything went according to plan, the aliens would continue to chase the drones, unaware that their real targets had slipped away.
We could use this to surprise them, she thought. She’d had a few ideas along those lines, during the tactical brainstorming session. But they might be watching for us.
“Signal from the flag, Captain,” Parkinson said. “The task force is to breakaway and head directly for Tramline Two.”
Fear God and Dread Naught Page 33
