His eyes darted toward the weapon. That moment was all she needed.
Katja’s left hand lashed out, through his blocks and up against his nose. Cartilage crackled under her palm strike and his head snapped back. Her right hand followed through, knuckles hammering into his exposed throat.
When his powerful arm knocked both of her hands away, she stepped back, limbs burning from the impact. He staggered, strained coughs wheezing from his partially collapsed windpipe. His feet shuffled against the pavement, his whole body sagging against an unseen weight. She crouched, arms up in a guard, waiting.
He stumbled back, eyes still on her. She ducked down and retrieved her pistol, bringing it to bear once more.
The distance between them had opened too much for quantum-flux to be precise and she finally disabled it with a long wink, focusing her mental energy on interrogating the various artificial devices she knew were implanted in him. The standard Terran ID in his chest looked legitimate, but there was nothing normal about the enhancements in his limbs or his skull. She pressed harder, and met a wall of sophisticated, elegant encryption. She knew well what that meant.
“Not this time, Centauri,” she said quietly.
She pulled the trigger twice.
His body crashed backward, the special slugs bursting on impact to scatter microscopic bullets in a flash of intense heat. The wide cone of tiny projectiles cut a swathe of destruction through the body, but rapidly lost momentum. As the Centauri spy tumbled backward in a heap, no exit wounds clouded his back and no blood seeped from the cauterized entry point.
Katja scanned the parking lot for movement or witnesses. All was quiet. She holstered her weapon and activated her visual recorder, then crouched down over the Centauri, her vision drifting over him as she captured images of his face. In the pain of death his features had lost their youthfulness, and in the new, cold clarity she guessed he was actually as old as she was.
It was time to disappear. Grabbing the body, she dragged it across the cold pavement and heaved it into the dark bushes. Pocketing the recorder she wrapped her coat tightly around her, hands holding it closed for quick access to the weapons within. She walked across the parking lot to the street and away from the bustling pub. As she did, she reached out with the Cloud to watch for any alarms, or for personal devices suddenly moving rapidly as their carriers pursued her. No one reacted to her departure.
Yet he’d been communicating with someone nearby, which meant there was at least one more Centauri agent in the vicinity. Perhaps the mysterious Target Three, the invisible leader of this misguided group of civilians. If she was an enemy agent, it would certainly explain why she was impossible to pin down on the Terran security nets.
Turning back, Katja forced herself to calm down, using all her senses to search the dark parking lot and the heaving pub. Nothing unusual stood out, though no doubt her enemy knew exactly where she was. This wasn’t a good tactical situation.
Her secondary retrieval point was three blocks away, and she forced herself to walk at a brisk pace, rather than break into the run her adrenalin screamed at her to employ. She took deep breaths of the cold air, in through her nose and out through her mouth, sending oxygen to her brain and forcing her heart to slow and her body to throttle down.
Was it luck that had handed her a Centauri agent, or was it something more dangerous? He’d latched onto her almost immediately, and appeared to have anticipated her movement to the parking lot. It would have been difficult indeed to have picked him out amid all the electronic noise of the pub—yet had he somehow recognized her?
Had she just been sloppy, or had she been expected?
While the mission was a success, Katja felt a cold pit in her gut to match the wind against her face.
4
When he’d been just a subbie, Jack hadn’t garnered much attention aboard ship. Crew members had slipped past him in the passageways with nary a glance, and the other officers had carried on conversations right over him. Ever since his promotion to lieutenant, however, people had started to notice him.
“Morning, sir,” the umpteenth crew member said, hurrying past him. The ship was preparing for departure for another patrol in one of the colonies. Everyone was focused, but Jack was still just trying to learn his way around his new vessel.
The flats of the cruiser Admiral Bowen were wider than those of a destroyer, and people didn’t actually have to turn sideways to pass each other. The bulkheads were a dull gray, interspersed with the black glass of computer interfaces and the crowded alcoves containing damage control equipment. Jack glanced down at the nearest rack of halon backpacks, designed for firefighters to don if the ship’s atmo-purge system failed and a fire had to be fought by hand.
“Excuse me, sir.”
He looked up and saw one of Bowen’s resident sublieutenants approaching. Jack figured they were the same age, but he suddenly felt years older as he saw the subbie’s imploring expression.
“Sir, do you know when the departure briefing is?”
Seriously? Did this kid not know how to read a flex? Then Jack remembered how, not that long ago, he wouldn’t even have known what a “flex” was, or that there was such a thing as a departure brief.
“Oh-nine-hundred. On the bridge.”
“Thank you, sir.” The subbie hurried off.
Jack laughed to himself. Now that he’d reached the lofty rank of lieutenant, it seemed he had become the fount of all useful knowledge—and he was just the pilot on board.
This morning, however, his own quest for knowledge was taking him down to the engine room. Bowen had suffered damage to her starboard-side recovery system and no one in the hangar seemed to know if it was fully back on line. The equipment was all repaired, but power to some components remained intermittent. Jack figured a quick visit to engineering would solve the mystery.
Eventually he found the correct hatch and descended the steep set of stairs which the Fleet called a “ladder,” emerging into a machinery control room frantic with activity. At least half the consoles were manned, steady chatter into headsets punctuated by the odd shout. Getting the mighty cruiser’s systems powered up was no small task, but he sensed an edge of tension in the voices that didn’t fill him with confidence. He glanced at his watch.
Ninety minutes until scheduled departure.
He spotted a nearby petty officer, and approached.
“Morning, PO,” he said, “I need to confirm the readiness of the starboard recovery system.”
The middle-aged petty officer looked up sharply, then spotted Jack’s rank and swallowed down his instinctive response. Instead, he indicated toward a door on the forward bulkhead.
“Better talk to the chief, sir. He’s in the ADE with the departure officer.”
Jack nodded and walked forward, wondering idly who the departure officer was today. It was a tough job, running around the ship ensuring that all departments were ready, and having to report to the captain. As a pilot he was never trusted with such responsibility—only qualified bridge watchkeepers were burdened with that particular duty.
He stepped through into the accretion drive enclosure, the beating heart of the ship, though there was nothing much to see. Both accretion drives were hidden behind their massive containment units, and it didn’t take much imagination for Jack to sense the raw power barely contained behind the featureless tanks that towered on either side of him. A dull, nagging hum assailed his ears and he immediately grabbed for one of the sets of ear defenders hanging just inside the door.
As he walked along the grated catwalk between the accretion drives he could feel his entire body tingle. Beneath him, engineers scurried among a jungle of ancillary equipment. Above him, two more catwalks gave access to the containment tanks and still more equipment. Up ahead he saw a bank of control consoles around which the catwalk weaved, and over the mu
ted hum of the ADE, he heard raised voices. Slowing, he glanced around the consoles and saw two figures squared off at the central control station.
“This ship is departing her berth on schedule at ten-hundred,” Thomas Kane said, holding a tablet in his hand. “Yet you’re not filling me with confidence, Chief.” Thomas faced a tall, burly man who threatened to bulge out of his dark-blue coveralls. His round face was red under wisps of white hair and small eyes glared. Chief Petty Officer Ranson.
“Sir.” That word alone carried with it enough bile, venom, condescension, and outrage to send many a subbie running, but Jack wasn’t at all surprised to see Sublieutenant Kane stand his ground. “I’ve got an entire department scrambling to balance the feed between two accretion drives, because dockyard maintenance didn’t finish their job last week. I have four new engineers who still don’t know their asses from a circuit board, and we’re still cleaning up the mess in the starboard recovery system.”
Well, that answered Jack’s question, but he remained riveted in place.
“Chief.” That word from Thomas carried with it the heavy weight of resignation, fading tolerance, and a distinct lack of patience. “Your failure to plan ahead is not my problem. Stop whining at me and tell me if we’re going to be ready to depart on schedule or not.”
“Did you not just hear me?” The thick muscles in Ranson’s neck bulged dangerously.
“Yeah, you’re busy. So’s everyone. So am I—so stop wasting my time. This ship is departing in eighty-five minutes, and if you’re not capable of making that happen, I’ll find someone who is.”
Ranson stepped forward, moving his considerable bulk right into Thomas’s space. “You cause one bit of disruption down here, Subbie, and I’ll go straight to the captain.”
Thomas didn’t budge, looking up to meet the chief’s eyes.
“You won’t need to, because I’ll have already done so and been given permission to come back here and arrest you.”
Ranson took half a step back, his expression shifting into a sneer.
“This isn’t the Corps, sir.”
“You’re right. If it was, I’d have already shot you.” The pistol at Thomas’s hip was still holstered, but his hand rested easily only inches away. Even from his perch, Jack could feel the cold certainty of Thomas’s words.
So, apparently, could Chief Petty Officer Ranson. He stepped further back, dropping his gaze.
“We’ll be ready, sir, but I’ll have to skip the departure briefing.”
“I’ll send the captain your regrets.”
Thomas turned abruptly and strode aft. Jack jumped backward to clear a path. Rounding the consoles, Thomas spotted him and smiled.
“Helping out with flash-up operations, sir?” Being called “sir” by Thomas Kane was almost as disconcerting as realizing how close the ship had just come to needing a new engineering chief. Jack fumbled to find the words as he fell in step behind Thomas.
“Ah, I was just down here looking to see if they’d sorted the problems with the starboard recovery system, but I found the answer.”
“The port system is fully operational,” Thomas called back over his shoulder, “so starboard isn’t essential for departure. They’ll have it fixed prior to us reaching the jump gate.”
He was right, Jack realized, just like always. He wondered how many other crew members had made the mistake of doubting this enigmatic Corps sublieutenant.
* * *
Life in the Fleet was more or less the same, no matter what ship you were on. In the two years since finishing flight school Jack had served on most classes, from tiny fast-attack craft to hulking invasion ships, and while Admiral Bowen was his first cruiser, he hadn’t needed much time to settle in.
The Hawk maintenance crew was friendly and efficient. His three fellow pilots were decent folk, although they each held the rank of ship’s petty officer, which meant that they didn’t hang out in the wardroom with Jack and the other officers. Only one of them had actually been a pilot before the war started—the other two had been senior technicians who had recently completed pilot training.
The officers themselves were the usual collection of hard-nosed, perpetually tired line officers with a few support officers thrown in just for irritation. The small herd of subbies were driven hard by the lieutenants and mostly kept to themselves in Club Sub, the four-bunk mess deck they called home.
As captain, Commander Hu remained a distant figure, but in their few interactions Jack had gained every confidence that Bowen was in good hands. Hu seemed very grounded, with none of the political aspirations which all too often seemed to affect a captain’s thinking.
By contrast the executive officer, Lieutenant Perry, was new to the ship and apparently new to his role as XO. Jack had never once seen him in a good mood. To Jack he represented the growing number of mid-career officers being rapidly advanced due to the casualties of this war.
And then there was Thomas.
As the sole strike officer on board, he naturally stood apart from the rest of the wardroom, even though he chose to wear the blue coveralls of the Fleet rather than the green of the Corps. Among the fifteen officers on board, Thomas was quite possibly the oldest, making his rank of sublieutenant all the more odd. Most of the crew assumed he’d been commissioned from the ranks and thus gave him a wide, respectful berth. As the senior sublieutenant he carried the amusing honorific “Bull Sub” and was in charge of the herd, but his relationship with the other officers was more complex.
Jack munched away at dinner at the crowded wardroom table, listening idly to the usual banter between his peers, but without taking part. The XO was at the head of the table, eyes down as he wearily shoveled in food, but a spirited discussion had broken out between the anti-stealth warfare director, Lieutenant John Micah, and the supply officer, Lieutenant Ashley Kaneen. Jack gathered that they’d attended the Astral College together, but their friendly debate seemed focused on the inanities of line versus support rivalries.
“Hey, Shades,” Sublieutenant Wi Chen piped in at Jack’s side, “why don’t we just get right to it. Between you and Pay, who’s senior?”
John paused, glanced at Micah, then smiled indulgently. He was newly qualified in his anti-stealth director role, and he enjoyed the nickname “Shades” as Bowen’s hunter of the shadowy stealth ships.
“That’s actually a good question. Ashley and I were promoted at the same time, so no advantage there. So really your answer comes from whether we’re in battle or not.”
“How so?” Chen asked.
“Think back to your ship organization req, subbie. In the functional organization, Ashley’s a head of department and I’m just a director, so I bow before her.”
Jack was intrigued by that. He was the head of Bowen’s flight department—did that make him senior to most of the line officers?
“But in the fighting organization, the line of command goes down through the bridge watchkeepers. So if something happened to the captain and the XO, if you’ll pardon me, sir”— John nodded to Lieutenant Perry at the head—“then the senior watchkeeper takes command.” He glanced up and down the table, populated mostly by subbies and non-line officers. “So if we here at this table were the only officers left alive, then I’d be in command.”
“Not quite,” Perry commented.
“Sir?”
“You forgot about Sublieutenant Kane.”
John laughed. “My apologies. The line of command goes captain—XO—bull sub. Then the rest of us scrap it out below that.” He gestured down the table to where Thomas was eating in silence. “My respects, Mr. Kane.”
Amid the scattered laughter the XO put down his utensils.
“No,” Perry said firmly. “In battle the line of command descends through all command-qualified officers first, then through the qualified bridge watchkeepers.”
Silence descended. John cast a puzzled look up the table.
“Yes, sir, that’s true…”
“And Sublieutena
nt Kane is, according to official records at least, command qualified.”
Jack watched as half a dozen pairs of eyes whipped around to stare at his old colleague. Thomas didn’t look up, trapping the last vegetables on his plate and popping them into his mouth. The XO returned to his meal with a scowl.
The silence extended into awkwardness.
“So what you’re saying, Shades,” Jack jumped in loudly, “is that most of the time Ashley can kick your ass all she wants.”
John forced a laugh and turned his eyes back to the supply officer.
“Pretty much, Jack. I’d say that’s par for the course.”
The table conversation picked up again on other topics, and Jack forced himself to join in, getting the discussion moving as far away from lines of command as possible.
* * *
Jack stared at the clock on his cabin bulkhead for a third time. He’d almost managed his regulation eight hours of rest after the last sortie, and had intended this morning to get some admin done. Yet somehow he was due at the pre-flight briefing in ten minutes.
Slipping on his boots, he grabbed the warbags from their netting on the back of the cabin door. The emergency vacuum suit folded down easily into a pouch on the belt, next to the power unit and emergency beacon, but the helmet couldn’t be compressed so he clipped it to his hip.
The flats were quiet. Now that Bowen was through the jump gate and patrolling Valhallan space, the crew were focused on their grueling watch routine, and few spent their off-time anywhere other than the mess decks. The stealth threat level was low, so gravity was still activated, but the cruiser was maintaining a constant ASW picket with her four Hawks. Very wise, Jack thought. Stealth ships were known to get very close to inattentive warships, and the first warning would be the detection of a gravi-torpedo seconds from impact.
Still, the captain had ordered that at least some training continue, and today that meant one of the subbies was riding in the Hawk for ASW familiarization. Jack walked aft from his cabin and knocked on the door of Club Sub. He opened the door, bracing for the smell typical of a junior officer mess. To his surprise, he was greeted by a pleasant, clean fragrance and a huddle of subbies gathered on the pair of couches just forward of the bunks.
March of War Page 4
