by David Weber
Her mind went back over the past, terrible two weeks that had started so wonderfully. She and Earnest had had the medic's official report; they'd actually been discussing ways to finagle their assignments so she could take her maternity leave at home on New Covenant when the scrambled transmission came over the relay net. An entire Battle Fleet task force-not just a battlegroup, a task force-taken by its own personnel. Casualties had been heavy, and the few ships which remained loyal had been hunted down and captured or destroyed before they got far. But not before they got their courier drones away.
Commodore Prien had been a fool. Naomi's eyes stung as she remembered the kindly old man, a Heart Worlder who couldn't believe his own squadron might follow suit. He'd actually broadcast his decision to return to base immediately . . . and why. He should have known what would happen-and it had happened within hours. Desperate men and women had met, and the Fringers among his crews had risen against him.
But not all of them. No, not all of them. The meetings had been too clandestine, too hurried. Everything had been improvised by isolated groups, trusting no one outside their own little band. Not until the first mutineer drew his weapon could anyone know who stood where outside whatever tiny group they'd discussed it with, and the loyalists had fought back furiously. The carnage had been more savage than she would have believed possible; there were laser scars on the bulkheads around her, and the victorious mutineers had barely half the personnel they theoretically needed.
And when the fighting ended, Naomi found Earnest sprawled over his fire control panel, laser in hand, and two dead mutineers before him.
She had barely been able to read the funeral service through her tears. Had he known they were on different sides? Would he have fought beside her if he'd known? Or would his stubborn sense of duty, the courage she loved so much, still have ranged them against one another?
She didn't know. She couldn't know, for Earnest had died, and she had inherited command of a heavy cruiser . . . and even Elder Haberman would never be able to convince her that God could forgive her.
Not that the Elder would have the chance, she thought mordantly, glancing at the nav tank. She would have the opportunity to plead her case before the Lord herself all too soon, for the pulsing pattern of the nav beacons was clear in the tank, and her astrogator turned to her.
"Thirty seconds to transit, Captain," he said quietly.
"Very well," Naomi nodded curtly. "Carry on."
"Aye, aye, sir."
And so it was official. Toshiba wasn't going to relent.
* * *
"We have no choice," Captain Victor Toshiba had told his "captains." "We're too deep in Innerworld space. We'd never make it to the Fringe if we just ran, and we've burned all our other bridges. We all know why we did it, but that doesn't matter. We're all of us-every one of us-mutineers."
He'd scanned his subordinates' faces, reading their despair, but his eyes were determined as he went grimly on.
"We're walking dead, ladies and gentlemen. Face it. Accept it and use it, because we're just as dead whether we spend our lives profitably or not. There's one, and only one, thing we can do for the Fringe now." His finger had stabbed the crazy quilt of warp lines in his nav tank. "Galloway's World. That's what we can give the Fringe . . . by taking it away from the Federation!"
Naomi had stared at him in horror, yet she was his senior "captain."
"But, sir," she'd said softly, "we don't begin to have the strength to seize Galloway's World. Surely you're not suggesting . . . ?"
"That's precisely what I am suggesting," Toshiba had said coldly. "We can gut the shipyards if we get in unchallenged. It's gone too far to stop now. It's war, Commander, war between the Fringe and the Innerworlds, and we both know who holds the industrial trumps. Can we stand by while the Corporate Worlds beat our people to death? No! We're going to hurt them-hurt them now and hurt them badly. We're going to buy time for our people, the one way we can." He'd paused, as if steeling his own nerve. "The only way: a nuclear strike on Galloway's World."
Naomi had wanted to vomit. They were the TFN, sworn to defend humanity against mass murder! And yet, wrong as he was, he might also be right. They were doomed, and they owed their people a chance. She remembered the winter wind howling around the dome on New Covenant and knew she could kill to defend the civilians of her world. But could she kill other civilians for them? She'd looked up and her lips had parted, but Toshiba's voice had marched on ruthlessly, forestalling her objections.
"I know there are bound to be heavy casualties-civilian casualties. The Jamieson Archipelago is the most densely populated area of the whole planet. Only an idiot could think you can nuke a target like that and not kill civilians; only a liar would tell you you could.
"But I also know what we're defending-and so do you! Our own homes, our own societies . . . the kind of societies that let humans be people, not just well-fed, two-legged domestic animals producing for Corporate World masters!"
His vehemence had shaken them all, and Naomi had felt her resistance waver. Then he'd paused and looked at them sadly. When he resumed, his voice was very soft.
"I know what you're thinking. Do we have the right to do this, even in self-defense? I don't know how you'll answer that, but I know how I will. They say a flower will grow toward sunlight even through ceramacrete, and perhaps they're right. But . . . what if everything is covered with ceramacrete? What if the flower finally breaks through, but there's no one left who can recognize a flower when he sees one?"
Naomi had bent over her hands, feeling his eyes on the crown of her head as his will beat against her, and realized how pivotal her own decision was. They'd endured one mutiny-perhaps they had another in them yet. But the first had cost her too much. Whatever God demanded of her, it couldn't be another spasm of the bloodshed which had taken Earnest. Her head remained bent, her eyes locked on her fingers, and the moment for rebellion passed.
"We've got a good chance of pulling it off," Toshiba had said softly as Naomi silently withdrew her opposition. "No one knows we've mutinied. We can put into Galloway's World for new orders, carry out the strike, and run. It's even possible"-he'd tried to sound as if he meant it-"some of us may get home. We're fast and well-armed; we may be able to split up and avoid action. But"-his voice had grown somber once more-"that's not what's important. Whether we can get away or not, we have to do it."
And every rebellious officer in his cabin had nodded silently.
"Transit in five seconds," Astrogation said softly. "Four . . . Three . . . Two . . . One . . . Transit!"
Naomi flinched as the indescribable surge of warp transit gripped her. She knew it was impossible, but in that instant she thought she felt the child within her. Thank God Doc Sevridge had understood. Losing her command would have left her a mere spectator, and no matter what her private purgatory, she had to do something. So he'd wiped the pregnancy report from the data banks with a tired smile.
"Might's well carry mutiny to its logical conclusion," he'd said. . . .
"I have a challenge, Captain!" The voice in Naomi's implant jerked her back to the present. "Standard query for ID and purpose."
"Stand by, Gunnery," she said through dry lips, watching the warp point forts on her tactical display. "Commodore Toshiba will roll the tape any minute now. Then we'll know." Her anxious eyes moved to a secondary screen as the carefully crafted composite of Prien's recorded messages went out over the com channels. It was good, she thought distantly. The electronics boys had done a bang-up job. But was it good enough?
". . . so after the fighting," the dead commodore said from the screen, "we patched up our damage and headed here. Commodore Jacob Prien, Tenth Cruiser Squadron, Frontier Fleet, awaiting orders."
"Good report, Commodore. Excellent!" The florid-faced admiral in the reception screen had a strong Fisk accent. "We had some trouble here, too, when the news first hit, but the local reservists turned the trick. We've got our heel on the scum now, and we're keeping it
there! Shape your course for Skywatch Three. They'll have new orders cut by the time you get there."
"Aye, aye, sir," the recorded composite said. "Commodore Prien, out."
"And thank God for that," someone muttered as the admiral disappeared.
Naomi heard but didn't respond. If God were truly kind, that fathead would have been suspicious. They would have had to fight or flee well clear of the planet. She knew she could die happily in a ship-to-ship action, and she found that she'd been secretly hoping for just that.
She watched the plot as Kongo led the squadron in-system. Revenge and Oslabya fell in astern, followed by Naomi's own ship and then the two DDs. It all looked harmlessly normal, but Pommern's battle board glowed a steady scarlet. All but the shields. They still blinked green and amber, for to raise them would raise questions, as well.
The hours dragged endlessly past, Galloway's World looming slowly before them, and Naomi considered the bitter irony which brought Pommern back to the yards which had birthed her in a terrible act of matricide. No one down there would spare a thought for the holocaust lurking in the belly of her ship, she thought bitterly. Fleet missiles were to protect them, not kill them.
And then, finally, Skywatch Three loomed close aboard of them, and she gritted her teeth, watching her board, waiting for what she knew must come.
It came. Command codes flashed over the data net from Kongo. The squadron's shields slammed up. Hetlasers swiveled in their bays. As one ship, drives and engines slaved to the flagship, they charged the orbiting fortress, minnows against its bulk. The external ordnance racks belched their deadly loads, joined by the internal launchers, and Naomi Hezikiah was a spectator as the Tenth Cruiser Squadron, TFN, blew Skywatch Three to half-vaporized rubble in less than thirty seconds.
The com channels went wild as incredulous loyalists realized what was happening. Naomi's battlephone hummed and whined as hastily tuned jammers came on line, fighting to shatter the squadron's datalink, but the cruisers drove onward, drives howling at max as they arrowed towards the planet.
The first defensive missiles lanced out to meet them, and Naomi watched her display as point defense stations spewed counter missiles against them and space burned with detonating warheads. They were fast on their feet, those gunners, but where were the beams?
"Communications seizure attempt!" her com officer shouted, and her battlephone shrieked into her mastoid for a fraction of a second before the filters damped the sound.
"Data net jammed," the ensign snapped.
"Independent targeting," Naomi ordered, feeling her shock frame tighten about her. You should be my husband, her brain screamed at the gunnery officer, but she strangled the thought as she scanned the battle plot. "Take those destroyers ahead of us. We have to hold them off the flag."
"Aye, aye, sir!"
Naomi found it easier to cling to her sanity as her ship's weapons moved independently at last, reaching out to rake the oncoming ships with hetlasers and missiles. Kongo's own ECM must be jamming the tincans' data net, for their point defense was late, and Pommern's fire tore the lead ship apart.
But missiles were getting through among the squadron as their own point defense stations went to independent control. She winced as a direct hit smashed at Pommern's outer shields. Kongo was taking hits, too, and so was Oslabya, but not so many as Revenge. Naomi watched the second cruiser shudder in torment as her shields went down and the first warhead ripped at her drive field and mangled her armor.
"Shields one through three down," Gunnery reported. "Incoming missiles tracking Kongo from astern, sir. There's somebody on our ass. Somebody big. Those are capital missiles."
"Understood," Naomi said coldly, and under her crisp surface, a little girl recited ancient words. "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death . . ."
She shook free of the thought. She'd wanted a ship-to-ship action; perhaps she had one.
"New course!" she snapped. "Bring us around on a reciprocal. Let the Commodore deal with those cans-we've got bigger fish to fry!"
Pommern snarled around in a tight turn. Even through the drive field, she felt the lateral motion as her ship fought inertia and momentum.
"Communications!" she barked. "Advise the Commodore of our heading and intent."
They steadied on course, and the author of the capital missile fire was before her.
"Battlecruiser at eleven light seconds!" Gunnery yelped. "Computer reads her as the Kris."
Naomi knew her well. She'd served on her as a lieutenant-an eternity ago. Homeported on the Yard, and no doubt as fanatically Corporate World as her own madmen were Fringer.
"Gunnery," she said softly, "there's your target. Maneuvering, I want a random evasion course and I want it now. We're up against some heavy metal; let's be where it isn't!"
The acknowledgments came, and she watched her missiles going out as the range closed. More capital missiles scorched in, but they were no longer targeted on Kongo. Kris had accepted Pommern's frail challenge.
"Kongo's opened fire on the planet, sir! Track looks good for the Taliaferro Yard!"
Naomi shut it out. She no longer wanted to think of the two cities clustered tight against the Taliaferro Yard, of the civilians with seconds to live. She no longer wanted to think of the mark of Cain she wore. She pressed one palm over the Bible in her vac suit and sealed her helmet as they entered laser range, and Pommern shook and quivered to the fury of missiles and counter missiles bursting around her hull.
"Missiles away from Oslabya, sir! Tracking for the Yard!"
But Naomi's attention was riveted to her gunnery officer.
"Laser range!" he announced, and here it came. The deadly energy sleeted from the battlecruiser and howled around Pommern's hull.
"Second strike off from Kongo! Revenge launching now!" Naomi wasn't listening. She was watching her screens as her own lasers raved defiance at Kris. Pommern's gunnery had always been good, she thought sadly as armor vaporized on the battlecruiser. Better than any capital ship's in the Fleet, Earnest had always said.
"Oslabya: Code Omega!" communications reported. So Lieutenant Jolson's first command was no more. Well, he'd soon have company.
"Oh, dear God!" Naomi's eyes jerked toward her white-faced scanner rating. "Oslabya's missiles must've been under shipboard control, sir! They're going to a standard dispersion pattern!"
Naomi's heart chilled as she stabbed a quick look at Battle Two. It was true. With her computers out of the circuit, Oslabya's missiles were spreading to cover the target with maximum devastation, and what was supposed to be a precision strike had become an atrocity. They were only tactical nukes, but they'd land all over the Reservation and dependent housing. . . .
"Good hits on target." Gunnery's almost droning report jerked her eyes away from the horror unfolding on Battle Two. "She's streaming air, sir!"
And then Kris found the range.
Pommern screamed as the lasers raped her. Naomi had always known ships had souls-she felt it now, in her own soul, as the cruiser's armor puffed to vapor and vanished under the radiant energy.
"Forward launchers gone!" Gunnery's professional calm had disappeared. "Laser One destroyed!"
Naomi turned towards him, but she never completed her order. Kris found them again, her hetlasers knifing through armor and plating and flesh. Naomi gasped involuntarily as air screamed from the holed compartment and her suit puffed tight, and Pommern lurched as a drive room died, and then another. She was toothless and naked, but Kris was badly hurt herself, and the Jamieson Archipelago was a forest of poisonous mushrooms as Toshiba blasted the shipyards and the battlecruiser's crew's homes and families burned.
Naomi looked away from her looming executioner, her own eyes burning as Oslabya's missiles laid their artificial suns across the Navy base. How many were dying down there? How many whose husbands and wives and fathers and mothers wore the same uniform as she? Yet they were only a few more deaths against the civilians dying around the other yar
ds. How many would there be? A million? Two million? Three? Against that kind of devastation, what could a few thousand Navy dependents matter?
Kris slid alongside at point-blank range, and Naomi watched almost incuriously in an outside screen as the battlecruiser's surviving hetlasers swiveled across her ship. Kris poured fire into the gutted, mutinous cruiser.
Naomi had a tiny fraction of a second to see the end of her bridge explode into vaporized steel. Only a fraction of a second before the fury came for her-but long enough to feel the mark of Cain in her soul again and know that death would be sweet. . . .
DISASTER
"Mister Speaker," Simon Taliaferro said somberly, "I take little pleasure in being vindicated in such fashion." He looked around the Chamber of Worlds and shook his head sadly. "We should have known it would come, I suppose, when so many Fringe World delegates resigned their seats to protest the 'severity' of a decision far more merciful than just. Barbarism, Mister Speaker-the acts of little, frightened minds which must not be allowed to destroy all the Terran Federation stands for."
Oskar Dieter sat quietly, listening to the beautifully trained voice, and wished he possessed some of the same histrionic ability. But he didn't; all he could do was tell the truth, and where was the appeal of truth when lies were so convincingly presented?
"I ask you, Ladies and Gentlemen of the Assembly," Taliaferro went on, "where is the reason in this?" He waved his hard copy of the report which had originated this secret session. "Even if, as I do not for an instant believe, amalgamation is an unmeant threat to the Fringe Worlds' representation, is this the way to contest it? Where are the Fringe World delegates, ladies and gentlemen? Where are the petitions? We see none of them. Instead we see this!"
He crumpled the sheet of paper contemptuously, and Dieter winced as the theatrical gesture evoked a spatter of applause.
