by Ian Douglas
“What’s weird or arcane about the Knights?” she demanded.
He dropped his gaze to her left little finger, and saw the white-silver of a ring. Not all Knights were enlisted personnel.
“It’s just entertainment,” he told her. “You have to understand, I see all religions as a kind of game. Made-up worlds with their own rules and backgrounds, promoting fantasy as entertainment and a means of purging emotional baggage.”
“The Knights of the Corps are not a religion,” she said firmly. “Or a game.”
“If you say so.” He shrugged, unconvinced. “It doesn’t bother me one way or another. I don’t care how you spend your free time…or who Bollan prays to. Just so long as both of you are present and functioning in reality, this reality, when it counts.”
On the viewall, they could see now another ship, a huge one, docked against the upper surface of the ring. Since the Lunar Ring didn’t orbit the Moon, gravity was in full force here, drawing the Night’s Edge in at just a hair under one-sixth G. The carrier was drifting down on her repulsors, which twisted local gravity around to her benefit. A docking cradle was opening alongside the far larger ship already on the Ring. Garwe recognized the other vessel as a megatransport, a heavy hauler capable of carrying a full division, some sixteen thousand Marines. His implant link brought up the huge vessel’s name: Major Samuel Nicholas.
He plugged the name into his implant, pulling down a block of data from the platoon net’s data base. “Son of a bitch,” he said.
“What?” Amendes asked.
“Samuel Nicholas. The first Marine.”
“Who?”
He pointed. “That transport. It’s named after the very first Marine in history. The very first commission issued by the Continental Naval Service, under the direction of the Second Continental Congress. Fifth of November, 1775 Old Style. The Year One of the Corps. Samuel Nicholas was commissioned as ‘Captain of Marines.’ First thing he did was set up shop in the Tun Tavern in Philadelphia.”
Amendes shook her head, confused. “Wait. What’s Philadelphia?”
“One of the sunken cities on the old U.S. coast. Damn it, Amendes, it’s where the Corps was born! And Nicholas was the first of us all!”
“Okay, so that fat-ass transport is named after an old Marine. They do that, you know.”
“Maria, you have no soul. The man commanded the first landing by the Continental Marines on an enemy beach—at Nassau. He was promoted to major, and became the very first Commandant of the Marine Corps. The man is a Corps legend!”
“That’s nice, Garrick. I wonder what she’s here for?”
“What do you mean?”
“Look for yourself. A docking bay just opened in the main dorsal fairing of that monster. I think it’s going to swallow us. I think that monster may be our next ride.”
“Fuck. You’re right.”
A minnow to the Nicholas whale, the carrier Night’s Edge descended into the cavernous opening of the larger vessel’s main docking bay.
Marine Transport Major Samuel Nicholas
Lunar Ring
Sol System
1825 hours, GMT
“Attention on deck!”
“As you were!” Garroway snapped as he strode through the entranceway into the Ops Center. A half-dozen enlisted Marines standing guard at the high-arched doorway relaxed.
Beyond, the compartment, huge by most shipboard standards, had been set aside as the planning and mission control center for the upcoming deployment. Waiting for him in the circular rows of seats inside were his own command staff, Admiral Aron Pol Ranser and his staff, and a small army of politicians—representatives and star lords of the Associative government.
“General Garroway,” Admiral Ranser said. “Welcome to your headquarters.”
Garroway glanced up at the three-dimensional illumination of the Galaxy suspended in space above the room, a thickly planted forest of stars. A two-thousand-light-year sphere at the center glowed brighter than the rest, representing the Core Detonation.
“Thank you, Admiral. My command constellation has been reviewing plans for our deployment into the Core. Since our principal need right now is hard intel on what we can expect at the Great Annihilator, I’d like to discuss with you some of our Fleet options.”
“Ah…yes,” Ranser said. Garroway caught his sideways glance at several of the star lords nearby, their forms almost lost in the intense glow of their formal dress coronas. “That may be a bit premature at this point, General.”
Garroway nailed him with a hard stare. Ranser was a squat, heavyset man with gene-altered irises in his eyes that made them look huge and polished-obsidian black. At the moment, those eyes were looking everywhere except directly at Garroway.
“Indeed.” Garroway had the cold feeling that the metaphorical rug was about to be jerked out from under him. There was something about the almost embarrassed atmosphere of the compartment. “Tell me.”
“We have been discussing the unique opportunity we have here with your Marines awake and again on-line,” one of the star lords said. He…no, it was a she…she rose from her seat and stepped forward, between Ranser and Garroway.
Garroway pulled an ID down from the local net, scanning quickly through the data as it dropped into his mind. Her name, he saw, was Tavia Costa, and she represented the Homo superioris population on Earth’s Moon.
“And what opportunity would that be, my Lord?” he asked.
“You and your…people come highly recommended, General. A number of us within the Associative Council of Lords are interested in how your Marines really perform.”
“I don’t think I like the sound of that.”
Costa gave him a cold and appraising look. “And what, General, does what you like or not like have to do with the matter?”
“You sound like you want to test us somehow.”
“In a manner of speaking, yes.”
“There is a…problem, General Garroway,” another s-Human said. Her bio identified her as Lelan Valoc, and she was the Star Lord representative for s-Humans within something called the Solar Cloud. “Many of us do not feel the Xul pose the threat some of our colleagues believe them to be. But we’re facing a number of situations that threaten the integrity of the Associative. Those of our military forces already deployed have had less than stellar success in handling some of these crises. Perhaps your Marines can do better.”
“It was my understanding that we were to fight the Xul.”
“Your understanding, General, is that you work for us. The legitimate government of the Galactic Associative.”
Garroway opened his mouth for a sharp reply, then closed it again. His legal position, he realized suddenly, was precarious. His allegiance had been sworn, almost nine centuries ago, to the Commonwealth of Humankind and, through that government body to the ancient United States of America. Presumably, the Galactic Associative was the legal lineal descendent of the Commonwealth…but was it? As he understood it, the Associative included Earth and some thousands of other worlds colonized by humans, but included some millions of other worlds inhabited by things that were people only in the most generous use of the word. Even these two s-Humans standing before him looked alien, with their grotesquely elongated skulls, mahogany skin, and gold cat’s eyes, enigmatic and unreadable.
Homo sapiens superioris. What the hell made them so superioris, anyway? Something about the very idea made him bristle, urged him to dig in his heels and refuse to be drawn along.
But until he was certain of his legal standing—and of the legal standing of the Marines under his command—he was going to keep his mouth shut, he decided. He and his people were alone here, adrift in time, over eight centuries removed from the government that had put them here. The Third Marines were counting on him, damn it. The present government could easily relieve him of command…and then he’d have no say about what happened to his people.
And Garroway was not about to let that happen.
“Sir.
I acknowledge that the Associative government is giving me my orders,” Garroway said after an awkward hesitation. “And I will carry out those orders to the best of my ability.”
“We were certain of that fact, General,” Valoc said. Her voice was deep, as deep as a man’s, and carried with it undertones that added an almost hypnotic quality to the words. “The old Marines have the reputation for loyalty, and a supreme, almost superhuman devotion to duty.”
She’s trying to flatter me, Garroway thought. She’s trying to manipulate me by appealing to my emotions.
“No flattery is intended, General,” Costa said. “Not in the sense you’re thinking.”
That startled him. Damn! Was she reading his mind? Or was she merely employing a shrewd understanding of human psychology?
“Just what is it you expect my people to do?” Garroway asked. “I will say this first. The Marine Third Division is my command, and my responsibility. My people. I reserve the right to refuse orders that seem suicidal or pointless.”
Pointless, he thought, was stretching things just a bit. No military structure could survive if the people being ordered to fight could refuse those orders simply because they didn’t like them. At no time in history could any fighting man have claimed that he perfectly understood the minds of the people giving him orders…especially when, as was the case with the United States and the later Commonwealth, those orders ultimately were being given by civilian governments.
It was unlikely that the Marines who’d stormed Belleau Wood had fully understood the details, the point of the orders they’d been given. Same for the Third MarDiv Marines who’d waded ashore at Guam, slogged through the black volcanic sand of Iwo Jima…or who’d fought to liberate the human dumu-gir of Enduri/Ishtar two centuries later.
Marines fought to win…and they fought for their buddies, their fellow Marines.
Costa waved her hand, and an image appeared in the air in front of her, a three-dimensional star map showing a ragged cloud of stars and gleaming nebulae. “The Greater Magellanic Cloud,” she said, as the image began to expand, the viewpoint plunging into the swarm of suns. “A satellite galaxy of our own Milky Way. These…” A tight knot of stars lit up green. “…are the Tavros-Endymion Cluster, twenty-five worlds first opened by the Associative Colonial Administration 215 years ago.”
“The Magellanic Clouds?” Garroway said, surprised. “You have colonies all the way out there?”
“Yes. About 165,000 light years out.”
“Why? I mean…aren’t there enough worlds for you here in the home Galaxy?”
“Worlds, yes. In abundance, and we build our own when we wish. But the Associative seeks…associates. Other sentient life. Other, alien points of view. Trade partners. Information.”
“It is also another step in the creation of the Galactic CAS,” Valoc told him. “That is a Complex—”
“A Complex Adaptive System,” Garroway said, nodding. He remembered the discussion with his Temporal Liaison Officer when he’d come out of cybe-hibe. “I know. Like what the Xul have.”
Valoc’s face twisted slightly, though it was hard to tell if she was showing disapproval or some other, more subtle emotion. “Not like the Xul,” she said. “The Galactic CAS has intelligent purpose, a direction.”
“What purpose?”
“I wouldn’t expect a primitive to understand that,” Valoc said.
“Lelan!” Costa said, placing a hand on the other s-Human’s arm. “Compassion!”
Valoc turned and glared at Costa. For several seconds, they stared at each other, and Garroway got the feeling that they were communicating with each other, silently and very quickly. Had Homo superioris been designed with true telepathic abilities? Or was this simply a function of their cerebral implants, brain-to-brain radio on a band to which others had no access?
“You’ll have to forgive my friend, General,” Costa said after a moment. “She doesn’t often work with Normals.”
Garroway’s eyebrows raised at that. “‘Normals?’ You mean Homo saps?”
“Unenhanced humans.”
“‘Primitives.’”
“Well…if you like.”
“So what the hell is the fascination of enhanced humans in the Greater Magellanic Cloud?”
“As Lelan said, it’s the most recent node within the general Associative CAS. We’ve encountered…a new species out there. Extremely old. Extremely powerful. Incredible minds.”
“Okay. So?”
“We call them the Tarantulae.”
For a moment, Garroway had an unsettling mental image of superintelligent giant spiders, but he dismissed it. The Greater Magellanic Cloud, he remembered, was the location of a vast interstellar cloud of dust, gas, and newborn stars called the Tarantula Nebula; likely, the Tarantulae had been named for their proximity to that cloud.
“And we’re at war with the Tarantulae?”
“Not quite. It’s the human colony there that’s causing the trouble.”
“I don’t understand.”
“We have been attempting to establish peaceful contact with the Tarantulae for almost a century now,” Valoc said. “Two months ago, the Associative colony in the Tavros-Endymion Cluster attacked a world in the Tarantulae Sphere and have occupied it. A human leader calling himself Emperor Dahl has proclaimed an independent state centered on the Endymion Stargate.”
“Your orders, General,” Costa told him, “are to seize that Stargate and the planetary system it occupies, holding it for an Associative battlefleet.”
“I…see. And what does Star Lord Rame think of this plan?” Garroway asked.
“Rame?” Valoc said. “Why should we ask him?”
“Star Lord Rame initiated the process by which you and your Marines have been recalled,” Costa told him, “but he is not the official in charge of you or your missions.”
“Your orders come from the Military Operations Bureau of the Associative Conclave,” Valoc said. “Lord Rame is a member of that bureau, but he does not have any of the responsibility for strategic planning.”
“And you two do?”
“Among several hundred others, General, yes.”
He decided he was going to have to study whatever downloads were available dealing with the current government, its hierarchy, and the chain of command within both the military and civilian sectors. He couldn’t assume that the same channels were in place that had been there eight hundred fifty years before.
“I will require,” he said slowly, “complete documentation, histories, and available intelligence data on the situation, my Lord.”
“You will have them,” Valoc said.
“And don’t look so glum!” Costa put in brightly. “The situation may not even require military intervention. Your arrival at the Endymion Stargate no doubt will be all that is required to restore proper order and Associative authority!”
“No doubt.”
But Garroway had every reason to doubt. Eight and a half centuries before, he’d learned that any time a civilian leader told him that a given operation would be easier than expected, it was almost certain, in fact, to be worse.
Often much worse.
He wondered how this unexpected detour on the way to the Galactic Core might go wrong.
9
0302.2229
Tranquility Promenade
Luna, Sol System
2010 hours, GMT
“Too bad Misek didn’t want to come down here,” Maria Amendes said, laughing. “He’d have enjoyed it, despite himself.”
“Hell, let him sulk back on the Major Nick,” Garwe replied. “All the more for us, right?”
“Bollan takes things too damned seriously,” Kadellan Wahrst said. “He needs to loosen up.”
It was five days after the arrival of the Night’s Edge at Luna Ring. Six of the Marines of Anchor Marine Strike Squadron 340 stood on the main concourse of the Tranquility Grand Promenade, a vast, domed enclosure ten kilometers across, set at the base of one of the p
rimary elevators coming down from the Lunar Ring. The War Dogs had been given liberty—probably their last fling ashore before the Nicholas boosted for the Larger Magellanic—and Garwe, Amendes, Wahrst, Mortin, Palin, and Namura had come down the elevator en masse, a shore party to see the sights, take in the local color, and take in some of the local intoxicants as well.
Half of the Promenade was partially submerged; outside the curved, moonglass walls, silt-laden waves broke against the transparency with a slow, almost sullen regularity. The lowland reaches of the Mare Tranquilitatis were submerged, now, with water as deep in places as half a kilometer. The sun was low on the eastern horizon, while a half-full Earth hung almost directly overhead. The sky was pale near the horizon, but shaded rapidly toward the zenith with a deep, vibrant ultramarine, almost black, with the brightest stars just visible despite the glare of sunrise. Luna’s atmosphere was still achingly thin, far too thin for unaugmented humans to breathe without pressure suits and masks. It was thick enough after several centuries, however, to moderate the temperature extremes somewhat, though the nights outside were still bitterly cold. In the distance, a dense fog was boiling off the ice skim that covered much of the sea after the long, two-week night.
Fred Namura stepped closer to the transparency, curious. He tapped at it. “Plastic?” he said. “How primitive! Haven’t these people ever heard of viewall technology?”
“Moonglass,” Amendes told him. “Glass made from the silica in the Lunar regolith.” When Namura stepped back suddenly, looking nervous, she laughed. “Don’t worry. It’s strong.”
“Yeah,” Garwe said. “Ordinary silica, when you melt it to make glass, has a lot of water in it. But this stuff has been baking in hard vacuum for a few billion years. Pure silica, with no water in the mix at all. It’s supposed to be stronger than steel.”
