The Jovian Sweep (Asteroid Scrabble Book 1)

by Martin Bourne

  “Well, this time we shall make sure its turns our right, won’t we?”

  “Yes sir.”

  She stood straighter, and was once more a professional naval officer.

  Courage motioned towards the door. “You heading to your quarters?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “I’ll go with you part of the way then.” Courage locked the door on the way out. “What do you make of the new member of the team?”

  “Commander Prince? He seems bright enough.”

  “Yes, but it’s an added distraction that we could do without. I don’t have time to break this fellow in.”

  “Like you did with me?”

  She was smiling. He smiled back. “I didn’t need to break you in. You were good from the get go.”

  Her smile slowly faded. “Are we going to be good enough this time?”

  He paused. She deserved the truth. “I really don’t know Sal. This one is going to be tough. It might even be impossible. But at least we have a chance now.”

  Chapter 9.

  Light Depot Ship Belofte, in transit to the Outreach proving grounds.

  The sleeping arrangements on board Belofte were based on ‘dorm clusters’, bulbous self-contained sections that could be detached as lifeboats in the event of disaster. Each dorm cluster consisted of a dozen or so cabins arranged around a larger central common area with collective cleaning and sanitation facilities, together with some emergency life support. The cabins were tiny and rated for two, four or six individuals. Each held the relevant number of bunks, minute amounts of personal storage space, a collapsible table and the inevitable vidscreen. The double cabins were not all that much bigger and reserved for married couples anyway. The four and six ones were single gender occupancy. Josie and Celene were the first to arrive at their assigned four cabin.

  All the Depot Ships Josie had ever seen on holodramas had simple single or double occupancy sleeping tubes and much larger and better-equipped common areas, where people were expected to spend most of their free time. This saved valuable space while giving the illusion of there being much more. Belofte, however, was an old ship, made at a time when more traditional berthing was used. “Snug” would be a polite euphemism for their quarters. Of course none of this fazed Celene. They were on board a real Depot Ship for the very first time, and nothing was going to dampen her joy.

  “This is more like it, eh Josie?” said Celene, as she hauled a bag half her size onto a bunk. “We are on our way now! Training nearly over, no more classes, no more snide comments from has-been instructors. We have arrived girl! We’ll soon be out kicking Triangle butt!” With a grunt Celene swung onto the bunk and looked down at Josie, at which point her infectious grin melted like asteroid ice in the solar wind. “What’s the matter?”

  Josie repacked her tiny collection of personal possessions back into the adjacent bunk to Celene’s. “What’s the matter is that I’m not on my way yet. I’ve pretty much blown my exams so far.” She reached up and gripped the loose material on Celene’s upper arm, where a glowing silver cloak had already been inexpertly grafted on. “You got your billet. This guarantees it. There’s a shortage of good countermeasures warriors.”

  “Oh Jose I’m sorry! I didn’t think.” Celene jumped down and embraced her friend. “But don’t worry! There’s still the Sensors exam! There’s just as big a shortage of Sensors specialists.”

  “’Sensors’ is my worst subject. If I could barely scrape bronzes with Piloting and Countermeasures I don’t hold out much hope for a Silver Eye.”

  Celene hugged her again, tighter. “What about your appeal on the Piloting exam?”

  Josie disentangled from the hug. “It’s gone in, but I don’t hold out much hope.” She turned and began to unpack. “Maybe you were right about all those courses. Maybe I did spread myself too thin.”

  “But it was Hollins who suggested you did so many!” said Celene, beginning her own unpacking. “I remember you telling me about it just after basic training. He said you should go for as many majors as possible. He would have had you doing Gunnery if regulations allowed someone to do more than four majors.”

  “You’re not suggesting he deliberately sabotaged me are you?”

  Celene dropped a bundle of clothes onto her bunk. “Hey, I never thought of that! No, he wouldn’t, surely?”

  “No.” Josie twirled her hair with a finger. “I'm beginning to think he’s capable of it, but there’d just be too much chance of getting caught.”

  “The other instructors you mean? True. Hey…I just had another thought!”

  “Keep going, you’re on a roll.”

  “Ha hah - no, look…you’re doing four, right? What about Systems Engineering?”

  Josie wrinkled her face. “I enjoy doing Systems Engineering. I think I’ll do ok in it. The problem is that if I do well, or at least better than my other courses, it’ll likely mean a non-flight billet.”

  Celene frowned. “How do you figure that?”

  Josie closed the tiny personal space locker. “Well, only the biggest and most powerful drones even have a need for a dedicated Systems Engineer. And they're valuable, and scarce. They only get the most experienced crews. It’s hardly likely anyone's going to assign a newly qualified link warrior to a SAIF or a Warlord, no matter how theoretically good I am. So even if I got a Silver Circuit Board - slag even if I got a Gold one – I’d probably end up in the tech sheds scrubbing micro meteor scars off drones for the next five years.”

  Even Celene struggled to find a positive spin to that. “Well,” she said at last, “you’ll just have to pass the Sensors exam then. If you get a Silver Eye, you’re bound to get a billet. And I got my Silver Cloak. We might be in the same squadron! They might even billet us together on the same drone crew! That would be great.”

  It was difficult to be downcast in Celene’s presence for long. Josie smiled and gripped her friend’s arm. “Yes it would be, wouldn’t it?”

  Celene grinned, and then her face fell. “Oh no.”

  “What’s the matter?” Josie turned. Constance and Lilybeth were at the door.

  ********************************************************************************

  Josie had checked up on Belofte’s entry in the Warbook as soon as she had heard they were to be deployed, but most of the cadets had been so excited about the prospect of being on a real Depot Ship that they hadn’t bothered. Josie had been suspicious from the start. It stood to reason that Belofte must be generally militarily unimportant. Why else would she be lugging Cadets to the Outreach Proving Grounds, deep within Virtue space and well away from the main fighting lines? And the most likely reason she was unimportant was that she was obsolete - too old and too small for regular combat operations. It followed logically that if she was old and small she would be cramped and generally lacking in facilities. And so it proved to be.

  Belofte’s shortcomings were a function of the ongoing struggle with the Triangle League. The League was second in size only to the Confederation in the “middle system” of the asteroid belts. There was always going to be a certain amount of rivalry. Tensions has steadily increased with squabbles over trade and “turf”. For all that, few on either side had expected that the disagreements would be settled by force. The start of active fighting had been most unexpected.

  Like so many wars in so many centuries, it had lasted far longer than even the most pessimistic had predicted. Military experts had been unanimous in declaring that the issue would be quickly settled by a single huge trial of strength somewhere in the Great Rift, the relatively small area of space that lay directly between the two powers. One side would lose and subside; the other would get to the top of the heap and strut for a while. That was what had happened in every other space conflict that Humanity had indulged in, and even the majority of the ground based ones on Old Earth. Even the First Great Belt war had lasted barely four months.

  What the experts had overlooked was just how evenly matched the two allianc
es were. Their economies and militaries were of comparable size, their body politics equally greedy and stubborn. It didn’t help that advances in communications were outstripping those in propulsion technology. Fast link connections meant engagements were being fought at longer ranges than ever before. That made it much easier for the weaker side to disengage before they were crushed, and much harder for the stronger one to press home any advantage. The result was that although the predicted big battle had duly happened, out in the Great Rift, it had decided nothing. Both sides had retired to refit, reequip and try again, with the same result. Since then, there had been many battles, some large and some small, but none had been decisive.

  The physical separation of link warriors and war drones had kept losses of military personnel very low, and civilian casualties were almost unknown. Both sides avoided indiscriminate bombardment of asteroids, if only because they feared retaliation. Nonetheless, the cost in resources of those early clashes had been immense. Military analysts had run the figures through their computers and come to the conclusion that direct attacks had become too costly. Raids and probes had become the order of the day. Mobility became more important as assaults came to rely ever more on manoeuvre and surprise. Strategy concentrated on overwhelming isolated squadrons and disrupting enemy trade routes and political influence. The war zone had consequently expanded dramatically, and the demand for more Depot Ships and drones had grown with it.

  With every vessel desperately needed, Belofte’s refit times had been severely cut back. In fact refits for the entire fleet had been reduced - it was simply not cost-effective to take Depot Ships out of service for weeks or even months on end in the middle of a shooting war, particularly one where a “final decisive battle” was still thought to be possible. All the emphasis was on new build. What dockyard space and time remained for refits went to the more modern ships, where upgrades could be accomplished quickly and easily, and would be less limited by outdated designs. Put simply, Belofte was too valuable to be withdrawn from service or scrapped, but not valuable enough for time and money to be spent on modernising her.

  At the time of her construction some half-century ago Belofte’s flight bays could handle what then seemed the vast number of a hundred war drones. But as time passed and the drones inexorably grew in size and sophistication, the number she could carry steadily fell. Bluntly, the war drones and their crews got larger, but Belofte did not. With tinkering and jury rigging Belofte could handle the more advanced electronics of the new designs, but the size and mass problem was unsolvable. There were only so many ways of adjusting the storage areas, and even if more drones could be crammed in, the increased mass reduced Belofte’s already modest acceleration rate. The old Depot Ship would struggle to handle fifty standard sized war drones now, and even fewer of the new heavy designs. The latest Depot Ships routinely operated triple that number - some of the big Triangle League ones even more.

  So Belofte struggled on, the contribution she could make to the war effort steadily declining as the date of her launch receded ever further into the past. She was now reduced to training and support duties, shuttling replacement personnel and war drones to her larger and more powerful successors.

  To those cadets with stars in their eyes, like Celene, Belofte came as a shock. There had been the initial thrill of being called to assume launching stations for the first time ever, strapping themselves in and waiting tensely for the sudden burst of rapid acceleration, noticeable even through the inertial dampeners. Most of the cadets had never left home before, and the sight of Courage asteroid receding rapidly behind them was all very exciting. After that though, the mundane monotony of shipboard life soon began to take hold. It wasn’t just the accommodation. All of Belofte’s systems were dated and generally broke down a lot. The fittings were worn, many of the lights fizzed when they came on, and alarming groans issued from the pipework. Belofte was an old ship, but more importantly she felt like an old ship. Weary. Tawdry. And she smelled. Badly.

  All ships, stations and colonies had a distinctive odour. They were, after all, enclosed artificial environments. The atmospheric mix was maintained by computer controlled life support systems. They constantly filtered air and adjusted its composition, according to a myriad number of usually guessed variables. And they worked very well. Mostly. The Life Support computers responded very quickly to unexpected changes, like a sudden influx of more people. But they could never eliminate all of the subtle traces, in fractions of parts per million, that made up that indefinable feature called smell. To Josie Callisto had always had a vaguely bitter cinnamon taste. Away from the dockyards Courage Asteroid air was cleaner, with a vaguely minty tang.

  Belofte was particularly pungent. An odd mix of sweat, machine oil, dust and what could only be described as age. It lingered in the back of the throat as an aftertaste that took you constantly by surprise. It was easy to forget about the odour when you were busy, on a training course or a giggly peer group gossiping in one of the dorm social areas. But eventually there would be a break in concentration, or a pause in the conversation, and the Belofte smell would be back, tickling at the taste buds, a constant and unpleasant reminder of the deficiencies of an old and tired spaceship.

  The trick was to keep busy, but that was not easy. After the initial adrenalin rush of boarding and settling into quarters, the cadets quickly found that there was very little for them to do on board. A third of the ship was off limits and the drone bays made up a good chunk of the rest of the available area. Personal space was limited and communal space not much better. The few recreation rooms were tiny and only offered staid vidgames and holodramas, the kind of thing that could be accessed anywhere in the Confederation.

  Of course there were training simulators, ones the cadets were expected to use too, but time on them was carefully scheduled. There were only so many simulators, and a lot of cadets. Besides, there were strict restrictions on the amount of time Cadets could be on them. Nobody wanted to risk their callow, inexperienced brains getting premature link fatigue.

  It soon became clear they would have to make their own entertainment. As they were navy, partying was the obvious solution, usually themed. The first party was an impromptu launch celebration. After that there were birthday parties, costume parties, “Founding day” parties; a “transit past Llamba asteroid” party - even a “couldn’t think of a reason” party. Food was only rationed on nutritional and calorific quantity, not type, so could be maximised for partying needs. Consumption of alcohol was socially frowned on and strictly regulated, but that only added to its appeal. Ingenious minds soon found ways around the restrictions. No one had ever found a way of stopping sailors from acquiring illicit drink.

  There was also the upcoming Sensors examination to study for, but when Josie pointed this out to Celene one evening her friend tartly pointed out that “a girl could only put up with so much of that” before prancing out, a mass of frizzy glittery pink, to one of the impromptu soirees being held almost nightly in the male dorms. Josie, with her more staid Callistoan upbringing, could very easily put up without it. Trivial socialising, fending off unwanted advances and a hangover in the morning did not appeal. Besides, she had two sets of examinations to prepare for - she had Systems Engineering after Sensors.

  She desperately needed to get at least one good qualification. She hadn’t technically failed Piloting or Countermeasures. Bronzes were passes. It was just that squadrons in need of new link warriors would naturally pick those with the best qualifications first. And although gold awards were uncommon, there was no shortage of warriors with silvers.

  Besides, she got paid more for each qualification she maintained.

  The thought of money brought another internal groan. Her debt bond was already immense. Her pay as a trainee link warrior barely covered her living expenses, never mind the tuition and the interest payments on her existing bonds. The debt grew every month. Scrimping and saving merely slowed down the rate at which it increased. Her mother coul
dn't help - she was barely keeping her own head above water. And it was going to be expensive to keep in touch now Josie was off Courage.

  She desperately needed to start earning some serious money. But if she couldn’t get a billet there would be no flight pay and only small bonuses. She wouldn’t be earning enough to pay off her debts. She wouldn’t even be able to afford to leave the navy. She’d be trapped, eking out a miserable existence on some backwater rock with no chance of glory and little hope of promotion or even reassignment.

  And she had been billeted with Constance.

  Fortunately the woman was an even bigger party animal than Celene. She was hardly ever in the dorm and eventually tired of needling Josie when she was. Josie sighed at her frustrations, and tried to go over her notes, but her dark mood made it difficult to concentrate. She needed a break to stretch her limbs and clear her head. The dorm cluster was almost deserted. Just a few subdued lights burned here and there. An unknown cadet whistled tunelessly in a shower. She slipped out and wandered the corridors aimlessly, trying to drive the credit signs out of her head.

  At a rec room she found a group of cadets gossiping. Constance was amongst them, and immediately favoured her with a condescending smirk. Josie saw her begin to stand, her mouth begin to open. She couldn’t face that now. She saw a utility door and instinctively opened it and went through. She heard peals of laughter as it closed behind her and she scrambled down a long, circular flight of stairs.

  That woman would try anyone’s patience.

  She looked around at the bottom of the stairwell. There was no door, just an opening into a largish room crowded with machinery. It was poorly lit, slightly cold, and somehow subdued. The distinctive Belofte odour was more prevalent. She stumbled between and around rows and tumbled columns of metal, circuits and wiring. Dotted around were chunks of drones, broken chairs, even the shell of a vending machine. What was this place? Some kind of scrapyard?