“I see,” the Empress said.
“I’ve started rerouting supplies, for the moment,” General Wooleen said. “It should impede their attempts to take advantage of the chaos they’ve caused. But ... we have to be careful for the next few weeks. Our incursions into the ring will have to slow.”
“No,” the Empress said. “Vent the ring.”
General Wooleen frowned. “That’s technologically impossible,” he said. They’d had that discussion already. “There’s no way to vent the entire ring.”
The Empress’s face darkened. “Keep our troops in suits,” she said. “As they go further into the unsecured sectors, have them open airlocks and vent the air. Tear the airlocks open so they can't be sealed. We’ll vent the entire ring piece by piece until they surrender.”
“That will kill everyone on the ring,” General Wooleen protested.
“Everyone who isn’t wearing a suit,” the Empress corrected. “Do it.”
General Wooleen hesitated. The humans would probably survive. His forces had captured samples of their combat armour. It was certainly capable of keeping its wearer alive in an airless environment. And his forces were protected too. But everyone else? There were millions of aliens on the ring. The Empress had just sentenced them all to death.
“They may surrender, once they realise what we’re doing,” he said, finally. “But venting the entire ring will take years.”
“Then get started now,” the Empress said. “We have got to regain control of the trade routes, General. They’re our path to Earth.”
***
If she was forced to be honest, Shelia Frankenberg had never liked aliens. There was something about them that bothered her, even though she’d grown up in a universe where humanity was very far from alone. It wasn't something she could put into words, either; she didn't hate aliens, she didn’t fear them ... she simply didn’t like them. Her head found it hard to accept that the aliens were living creatures in their own right. It was a joke, she’d thought when she’d received the assignment, that she’d been posted to Civil Affairs. How was she meant to cope with aliens?
And yet, she had to admit that she was finding it a more interesting task than she’d expected. The aliens were aliens ... and yet, they had points in common with humans. Younger males and females who wanted to fight, older mothers and fathers who feared for their lives ... children who needed medical help and mothers desperate to do whatever it took to get that help. Aliens might be alien - there was a species that was composed of intelligent males and unintelligent females and another that was precisely the opposite - but they were very human too. It was odd to reflect that the differences might be a matter of culture as much as biology.
She looked around the refugee camp, feeling a grim sense of satisfaction at just how well things were working out. The aliens had been moved from the upper levels when the invasion began, the military-age aliens joining the various militias while everyone else hid in the lower levels. It was a fantastic logistical challenge - the aliens had hundreds of dietary requirements that she found it nearly impossible to meet - but they’d made it. The aliens would be safe ...
The floor vibrated under her feet. She tensed. They should be quite some distance from the front lines, let alone the nearest invader base, but the Tokomak had developed a habit of throwing thrusting attacks down the corridors at random over the last few days. Another distant explosion shook the complex, followed by a faint hiss. She frowned, wondering just what was happening. And then a third explosion echoed down the corridor.
Alerts flashed up in front of her eyes as she grabbed for her mask. They were blowing the airlocks, smashing their way down to the refugee camp. The atmosphere was already starting to stream out of the ring, wind brushing against her skin as it rushed towards the breach. She stared in horror, then started to bark orders at the refugees. There was another airlock, further into the ring. They had to get out before it sealed itself, automatically. There was no way they could open it once it had closed.
The air pressure dropped rapidly. She breathed through her mask, but she could see aliens, young and old, suddenly gasping for breath. There simply weren’t enough masks for all of them. Her staff pushed the aliens towards the hatch, but it was already too late. She saw an alien toddler, a child who’d only taken his first steps a day or two ago, totter to the floor and die. His mother screamed for help, but there was nothing anyone could do. Shelia’s mask refused to come free, even when she pulled at it. It wasn’t designed to be easy to remove.
They’re killing everyone, she thought, as she pushed and prodded the handful of survivors towards the hatch. It was already closing, crushing a pair of aliens as it slammed closed. A moment later, even the survivors began to die. All she could do was watch in horror as they breathed their last. They killed everyone.
She keyed her terminal, trying to send a report. But the cold was already seeping into her fingers. The chamber was in vacuum. She knew she needed a spacesuit - even a shipsuit would do - but she didn’t have one. There weren’t any within the chamber ...
I’m sorry, she thought. She was too realistic to hold out any hope for survival. She was going to die here. I’m sorry ...
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“So, the enemy is concentrating on rushing supplies to Apsidal,” Hoshiko said. She looked at the two intelligence officers, who had arrived in person, and Captain Hameeda’s holographic image. “Have they made any attempt to fortify any of the systems between Apsidal and Winglet?”
“No, Admiral,” Conner said. “They’ve deployed warships, but no fixed defences.”
“Yet,” Jeanette added. “They could lay vast minefields too.”
“Which we would have no trouble sweeping away,” Conner said.
Hoshiko held up a hand. “Captain Hameeda, conduct a final survey of N-Gann,” she ordered, briskly. “I’ll be moving the fleet to a point just outside detection range. You can link up with us there, then prepare for your role in our offensive.”
“Aye, Admiral,” Hameeda said. “I can depart immediately.”
Without your guests, Hoshiko added. But I need to debrief them both before deciding if I want them to stay on your ship.
“We’ll see you in a couple of days,” she said, out loud. “And don’t get spotted.”
“Aye, Admiral.” Hameeda held her hand up in salute. “Be seeing you.”
Her image vanished. Hoshiko let out a breath, then looked at Jeanette. “Your report?”
“Captain Hameeda was not best pleased by our presence, at least at first,” Jeanette said, bluntly. “She was ... she reacted more like a person might to an unwanted houseguest, rather than a pair of fellow naval officers. I think she found it easier to deal with us - me, at least - over the intercom. She was polite enough, but her body language made it clear that she didn’t want us there.”
“She found it easier to deal with you over the intercom?” Hoshiko leaned forward. “Can you clarify that for me?”
Jeanette smiled, thinly. “Shaun took her to bed.”
Conner coloured. “She took me to bed,” he said. “We had about four days together during the flight from Winglet to Galen.”
Hoshiko cocked her head. “And how was it?”
Jeanette snickered. Conner’s blush deepened. “It was ... fairly normal, if that’s what you’re asking,” he said. “She didn’t seem to want anything more than a brief sexual relationship, Admiral. I think she was merely satisfying her hormones rather than looking for a long-term partner. She ... treated me more like a sex robot than an actual person.”
“I’m sure you enjoyed yourself,” Jeanette said.
Conner glared at her. “I did,” he said. “But that isn’t the point.”
“And what is the point?” Jeanette asked. “Were you planning to spend the rest of your days on her ship? Or ... or what?”
“Enough,” Hoshiko said. The conversation was strikingly inappropriate, but it was one she had to have. “What is your assess
ment of her mental condition?”
Jeanette and Conner looked at each other, then came to an unspoken agreement that Conner should speak first. “Overall, I’d say she was fairly stable ... just distant. I think she has a lot more in common with a merchant spacer, rather than a military officer; she’s quite aware, on a very basic level, that everyone who enters her life will do so on a temporary basis. I don’t think she feels she needs a strong connection with anyone else.”
“But a merchant spacer would still have a crew,” Hoshiko pointed out.
“Yes, Admiral,” Conner said. “But anyone from outside the group would be a transient, by the nature of things. Unless the spacer actually got married.”
Jeanette leaned forward. “She’s very capable and very competent,” she said. “At the same time, she’s also abrasive and not - in my opinion - a good team player. That said, given the shortage of people willing to bond with a LinkShip, we may have to take what we can get. I don’t know if she has quite realised just how long she’s going to be bonded to that ship.”
Hoshiko leaned forward. “And do you think she knew that you had orders to assess her mental state?”
“We were unable to add anything to the reconnaissance mission,” Conner said. “Yes, Admiral. I’d say she knows what you had in mind.”
“Unless she thought the Admiral was providing her with a sex robot,” Jeanette teased.
Hoshiko slapped the table. “I want a full report by the end of the day,” she said, feeling her temper snap. “Do you have any other observations - serious observations - that I should consider now.”
“I don’t believe that her sanity is starting to slip, Admiral,” Jeanette said, finally. “However, her naval discipline is starting to slip. Talking to her, Admiral ... half the time I feel like I’m talking to a civilian pretending to be a military officer. That’s not uncommon in places where discipline has become lax, Admiral, but it's worrying on a front-line starship.”
“She has no one to practice on,” Hoshiko mused. God knew she hadn't been as disciplined as she should have been when she was a junior officer. The family name had gotten her out of more scrapes than she cared to admit. “I see your point.”
She studied her hands for a long moment, then looked up. “Dismissed,” she said. “I’ll read your reports later.”
The two intelligence officers hurried out the hatch. Hoshiko shook her head slowly, wondering if she’d done the right thing. Hameeda had needed some form of human contact, although it was evident that she’d needed it more than Hoshiko - or Hameeda herself - had realised. Jeanette might be as abrasive as Hameeda herself, but she wasn't a poor judge of character. Hameeda’s naval discipline had been steadily wearing down.
But she really doesn't have anyone to practice on, Hoshiko thought. No one will kick her ass or issue demerits if she slips up.
The buzzer rang. “Open.”
She looked up as Yolanda stepped into the room. “Admiral?”
“Yes,” Hoshiko said, resisting the urge to point out that Yolanda could see her clearly. Who else would be in the compartment? “Is the fleet ready to move?”
“Yes, Admiral,” Yolanda said. “We’ve redistributed the weapons loads to make sure that everyone has enough ammunition for the engagement.”
“Good,” Hoshiko said, although she knew they didn't have anything like enough ammunition for a long engagement. “And the plan?”
“The tactical plan has been uploaded to the datanet,” Yolanda said. “Some officers thought you were being too careful, but others thought you weren’t being careful enough.”
“Success has a thousand mothers,” Hoshiko misquoted. “Failure, that ugly little child, is a bastard orphan.”
She shrugged and brought up the last set of images from N-Gann. They were out of date by nearly six weeks, but she doubted the situation would have changed that much. The fixed defences were unlikely to have been improved, not when the local industrial base was churning out supplies to support the fleet. But a conventional attack against N-Gann would end badly even if her fleet was at full strength. It was the kind of system that could be put under siege, but probably not captured by a single blow.
Either that piece of military wisdom dies today, she thought grimly, or I condemn my fleet to utter destruction.
“If we knew what the enemy was doing ...”
She shook her head. She knew, in general terms, precisely what the enemy was doing. The Tokomak were moving vast quantities of supplies to Apsidal, preparing for a thrust into the Galactic Alliance’s heartland. She had no doubts about what would happen if the Tokomak arrived in strength. A number of races would immediately prostrate themselves before their former masters, begging for a mercy that would never come, while others would fight to the death. The Tokomak might just ignore them and drive on Sol. Once the Solar Union was gone, the rest of the Galactic Alliance was doomed.
Which means we must not fail here, she thought, as she stood. We must not fail.
“Ready the fleet,” she ordered, leading the way into the CIC. “We will depart for Point Tabasco at once.”
And hope they’re not watching for us, she added, silently. She’d tried to think of a way to get the fleet to N-Gann without being detected, but nothing had come to mind. They simply didn’t have enough freighters to tow the fleet into attack range. Besides, the Tokomak would probably be suspicious if they saw a hundred freighters heading towards the planet. Why not? They did it to us, after we did it to them.
She took her chair and watched as her staff put the giant fleet into motion. They moved with purpose, yet there was a ... despondency around them that worried her. The human fleet wasn’t used to defeat, certainly not on such a scale. They’d been outthought and outfought and only sheer luck had saved the fleet from certain destruction. And even so, they were trapped on the wrong side of a heavily-defended gravity point. Hoshiko knew they had also been given a chance to tip the scales back, in the other direction, but not everyone agreed with her. She’d been lucky not to be challenged by her officers.
And I might be, if this fails, she thought. And if there’s anyone left to do the challenging.
“Admiral,” Yolanda said. “The fleet is ready to depart.”
“Then give the order,” Hoshiko said. “Jump.”
***
Is it too much to ask, Hameeda asked herself, for some consistency?
She smiled at the thought, even though it wasn’t particularly amusing. She’d been unhappy to have guests on her ship, and she’d been relieved to teleport them to Defiant, but now she missed them? Or Conner, at least. The nights they’d spent together had been wonderful, even though she knew they couldn’t last. Conner was hardly likely to want to be permanently assigned to her ship, even if it meant sharing her bed.
And we’d probably get in trouble for dereliction of duty, Hameeda thought. Rank wasn’t that important on a small ship, as long as everyone knew the chain of command was still there, but dereliction of duty was a serious matter. Jeanette would rat us out to her superiors if we spent too long in bed together. I should probably have invested in the sexbot.
She snorted to herself as she pulled the neural helmet over her head. She could afford a sexbot, and no one would object if she had it transferred to her ship, but it wouldn't be real. It wouldn’t be a living breathing human. God knew there was a stigma attached to using sexbots, male or female, yet ... she dismissed the thought as the LinkShip entered the N-Gann System. She’d think about it later. Right now, it was time to make war.
Or at least to survey the system, she thought, as she dropped out of FTL near N-Gann itself and headed towards the planet. The Admiral will be making war.
The system seemed smaller, somehow, as she opened her awareness wide. There were still vast numbers of freighters moving around, some heading into interstellar space and others heading towards the planet, but the immense war fleet she’d seen the last time she’d visited was gone. Of course ... it had flown to Apsidal and invade
d the system. Her sensors noted several squadrons of capital ships maintaining position near N-Gann, but they were clearly only a supplement to the vast planetary defences. N-Gann had never been a particularly inhabitable world. The Tokomak had taken advantage of the lack of an indigenous population to raise some really scary defences.
But they do have a weak point, she thought, as she surveyed the planet. It just isn’t one that would be immediately obvious.
She glided slowly around N-Gann, noting the presence of nine battlestations orbiting underneath the ring. The Tokomak had taken a considerable risk emplacing them in low orbit, even though they had the technology to prevent disaster. She wondered if it was a sign of their arrogance, and their belief that the universe would bow to them, or a sign that they hadn't thought through what they were doing. Or both. She shrugged and directed her attention towards the vast orbital warehouses. It was hard to believe that they represented only a tiny fraction of the system’s warehousing capability.
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