by Ian Whates
Now, I was thinking so hard about that, I almost, almost missed something that he said.
But I didn’t. “Wait wait wait – you made it back to the Moon?”
He lifted up his arms, as if to say, I’m here aren’t I?
“Galaxies have their own shape, you know. As unique as a finger print. Once the divine shape of the Milky Way appeared in my sights, I had plenty of time to get the calculations just right: When to exit the time trench. Light speed is a lot of momentum to burn off, you know. The craft had to decelerate slowly, over hundreds of years.
“But I timed it perfectly, no unnecessary orbits of the Galaxy. My ship went straight into an easy low lunar orbit on the dark side of the Moon.”
I looked at him with delight. He had gambled on a journey of millions years and he had proved Jenny’s theory right. Space-time was and is... curved.
But there was no pride in his eyes. He wasn’t even looking at me. And then I caught up, with what he was trying to tell me: The dark side of the moon.
And I knew.
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want him to say anything either. Inside I was willing him, just finish your story there. But he didn’t. It was as if he had to keep talking.
“Like I said, I had plenty of time to get my calculations just right. I could choose when to leave my time trough. And so I thought, why not just pick up where I left off, and go find Jenny around the time we argued?
“My ship crested over the penumbra between the light and the dark side of the Moon. And there, in my flight path, was a hopper.
“Of course, I took evasive action. I swerved right like you’re supposed to, the Law of Aviation and all that.
“But this time, she swerved left. And we collided.
“My transport ship, my freighter, the proof that her life’s work was correct, was the thing that killed her. Again.”
He let out this long, exhausted breath, as if he’d been punctured. And I couldn’t speak either. I felt heavy and it just seemed a great challenge to even lift my chest to breath, let alone move my mouth.
But then, the noise of the tannoy rained into the space between us. My shuttle to Jupiter-Ganymede was finally ready for boarding. And the recorded voice apologised for the delay.
So, well, what could I do? I stood up.
And he didn’t. Different flight, I guess.
I offered my hand. “What will you do now?” I said. “Are you going back to Earth?”
And suddenly, he was bolt upright on his seat again, and he gripped my hand.
“No” he said. “I’m planning another trip.”
Arm Every Woman
Nik Abnett
“I don’t like it,” said Valys, entering transit-prep.
“You don’t like anything,” Storper replied.
The two squad commanders were old friends, and their banter eased tensions before a deployment.
“What don’t you like this rotation?” asked Commander Kluk, joining in the fun.
“I don’t like Narbrot,” said Valys.
“Nobody likes Narbrot,” said Storper.
“Say it louder, I don’t think everybody heard you,” said Kluk.
“You think we care?” asked Valys.
“About as much as you care about anything,” said Kluk, peeling off towards the rank of perluo showers to the left and laughing all the way.
But Valys wasn’t laughing.
They stripped, showered, passed through the airlock and left the steading behind.
Wachman took the seat in the transit liburna next to Valys.
“Who didn’t make weight?” asked Valys. “Narbrot?”
“No,” said Wachman, “Rokas, 50.05 kays, but I’m up to 42 kays and I’m strong now.”
Valys checked out the tiny frame in its stained paper suit, nodded and said, “Pity it wasn’t Narbrot. Rokas is getting too old to make weight. You’ll do.”
Wachman beamed.
The harness check light blinked red, and two seconds later the liburna was in the air over Continent Tres.
Most of the soldiers on the flight had been deployed on dozens of rotations. As soon as the harness check light stopped blinking they closed their eyes and slept. Young and eager, fresh from training, Wachman had managed to hit weight; Narbrot was new too, embarking on a second rotation, and nervous as hell, not least because of the attitudes of the others. Narbrot sat beside squad commander Pupka in the other carrier bay of the liburna.
“I hit weight and height, and I passed fitness and weapons training. I’m one of you now, why can’t you people accept it?” asked Narbrot.
“Because you’re not one of us,” said Pupka. “It’s been five hundred years, and you’re the first. We know there’ll be more, but right now we don’t know you, and we don’t like you being forced on us.”
“And what am I supposed to do about that?” asked Narbrot.
“You’re supposed to live with it,” said Pupka, “and do your job.”
Light levels fell in the transit bays over the next eleven minutes, the over/under for a combat soldier to fall asleep. After that they were in total darkness. Light cost joules, and every joule was counted against their steading’s tally. There were only the sounds of the ship’s engines, constantly adjusting to optimise fuel consumption, and the rhythmic breathing of the sleeping soldiers.
The last twenty minutes of the flight were given over to gearing up in the sepio-suits, ready for combat. The height and weight of each combatant was recorded during transit-prep and the suits assigned accordingly. All the soldiers had their favourite sepio-suits. Some preferred more strength in certain areas, more flexibility, more or fewer armoured panels, better optics or tech information; some preferred mask rebreathers some preferred tubes. Every suit was unique, each one hand-built, rebuilt and maintained with a care that bordered on obsession. Many were centuries old.
The lights came up in the transit bays and the harness check light blinked green. Wachman’s eyes were the first to open.
Valys stood, threw the bolts on an under-seat locker, and glanced at Wachman.
“What are you waiting for, soldier? Get that riscus open and check your sepio.”
“Yes, Valys,” said Wachman, finally releasing the harness and scrambling to catch up.
“Cunno!” swore Valys, examining the suit in the riscus.
“Something else not to like?” asked Kluk from further up the bay.
“Not my sepio,” said Valys. “Who got P503?”
No one answered.
“Just suit up,” said Kluk. “P503 isn’t your sepio. It’s the luck of the draw.”
“Someone else’s luck,” said Valys. If it was Narbrot’s luck there’d be trouble.
Thankfully, Wachman’s suit wasn’t P503.
“What are you looking at soldier?” asked Valys.
“Nothing,” said Wachman.
“Suit up,” said Valys.
“Yes, Valys,” said Wachman unpacking sepio E309.
Everything was designed and built to conserve or optimise resources, and resources were scarce, recycled, re-used or won in combat. The transit bays were small because the ships were small, designed to use the minimum of materials, and they were sparsely furnished to keep the liburnae light, to burn the minimum of fuel. Everything counted against the steading in the tally.
The sepio-suits were the same. They had been made to fit combat soldiers within a limited range of body sizes: small body sizes between 140 and 150 centos tall, and between 42 and 50 kays in weight. They had been made of the lightest, but strongest and most durable materials so that they could be used indefinitely. Sepio-suits were the Holy Grail. They were salvaged at almost any cost. The tally of building a new suit could starve a steading into extinction.
Wachman geared up, all the time thinking about the suit and its value.
The lights in the transit bays flashed on and off for four beats, and the combat soldiers took their seats. Narbrot, always with something to prove, was am
ong the first. Wachman remained standing, pulling at a neck seal. Valys reached out far enough for Wachman to lean in, and snapped the seal into position as the harness check light began to blink red. Wachman sat, and Valys grabbed the harness pin and shoved it into the matching slot in Wachman’s left hand. They were locked in as the liburna made it’s juddering descent.
“Speed it up next time, soldier,” said Valys.
Wachman was speechless and white-faced with fear.
Battlefield Caepina, Continent Quintus. They had flown west, into daylight, and the flight home would be shorter than the flight out, for those who made it back. There was a tally for casualties, too. Everything had a cost.
Battle lines had been drawn across the globe repeatedly through the second millennium for political, economic and ethical reasons. In the second half of the third millennium it was about resources. The all-out global wars of the twentieth century had been costly, mostly in terms of lives lost and cities razed. The Arms Race, the Space Race, the Cold War, the Age of Avarice and the failure of the Second Industrial Revolution had done the rest.
The few, the small, the fit fought for their steadings, their nations and their continents, and they fought for survival. Schedules were drawn up for which regiment from which steading would travel to which battlefield to meet the enemy on its home ground. The duration of each engagement was fixed, and the outcome was determined by the tally. Battles killed soldiers; the tally killed everyone.
“Audentes fortuna iuvat!” said Pupka as the liburna landed.
“Not with this adversary,” said Valys, the first to stand clear of the seats to form a rank in the aisle of the ship. “Luck’s got nothing to do with it, and clever will win out over bold.”
“You know where we are?” asked Wachman.
“Caepina,” said Valys. “We’re going up against the Five. They follow orders, but they don’t think.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“Then you’d better work it out fast,” said Valys over one shoulder as the transit doors opened for the cohort to disembark.
Caepina was a square of undulating land fifteen hundred metres across, sodden with grey mud, under a pall of hard, yellowish rain. Mounds of earth had been thrown up in places, and sections of wall and boarding had been erected for cover. Foxholes and short sections of trench, hurriedly clawed out of the earth by frantic combatants during previous skirmishes, were dotted across the field. They had filled with a mixture of fetid water and the body fluids of the injured and dead. Every battleground was ring fenced; too many resources would be lost in clean-up and would count in the tally, so battlefields were not sanitised.
Soldiers relied on their suits and rebreathers to ward off germs, bacteria and diseases; steaders relied on the transit airlocks and perluo showers to keep the filth out of the steadings.
The Tres formed into squads, and prepared to take up their positions at the north end of the ground as per the instructions being fed into their sepio-suits, audio and/or visual. Valys, Pupka and Eicas were to lead squads on the right flank with Storper, Kluk and Yoff on the left.
The ever-silent Glinsky would take point on the frontal assault. Rokas had experience and leadership qualities but was out, so Broslavsky, Glinsky’s number two, took Rokas’ position up front.
The pack was shuffled, and the two rookies landed on the right flank, Wachman with Valys and Narbrot with Pupka.
“Tactical clarification,” said Valys using the suit’s throat mic.
“Two probationary combatants, Wachman and Narbrot on the same flank: clarify,” said Valys.
“Cunno,” said Valys.
“What was that about?” asked Pupka. “You don’t like fresh blood?”
“Not all in one place,” said Valys.
“Maybe it’s for luck,” sneered Pupka. “Or maybe tactical is just being clever.”
The first klaxon sounded.
Wachman breathed in hard through the nasal tube, mouth closed, lips so pale they were almost blue. Valys glanced over.
“Don’t vomit, soldier.”
“No, Valys,” said Wachman.
Valys faced front and gestured with firm arm movements, relaying orders from tactical to combatants without audio feed.
Eight squads of Tres took up their positions on the field. The soldiers gestured or spoke words of encouragement to each other and braced for the fight. Narbrot placed a firm hand on Wachman’s shoulder, made eye-contact and smiled. They were both rookies, maybe they could be friends. Wachman’s eyes broke contact first.
The second klaxon sounded.
Battle was joined.
The clock began to count down.
The sepio-suits with visual displays flashed digital information onto helmet visors. The rest gave audio information, cutting out the squad chatter. Clear hand signals were critical.
“Close combat, people,” said Broslavsky.
“Just how we like it,” said Eicas.
Valys’ eyes darted in Wachman’s direction.
“On my shoulder, Wachman.”
Wachman moved up close to Valys, who mimed a deep breath. Wachman followed suit, and then breathed twice more.
“Stay close, soldier,” said Valys.
Wachman nodded.
Valys’ squad moved fast, advancing and flanking right, keeping low to the ground, eyes scanning the mud underfoot and the structures that loomed ahead of them.
“It’ll be fast,” said Valys, for Wachman’s benefit. “Fast and brutal. What are you carrying?”
“Tube-fed, medium-calibre,” said Wachman.
“Select single shot, hot rounds,” said Valys. “You want clean kills.”
“But the tally,” said Wachman.
“Auto’s wasteful up-close and useless in heavy atmospherics. Trust me, and don’t get trigger happy, soldier. Leave the shooting to the others.”
“Yes, Valys,” said Wachman, thumbing the selector on the weapon.
Low energy auto-fire started to sheet in across the thousand metres between the Three and the Five, casting dull, diffuse light through the torrential rain, misting it as the acidic precipitation robbed the rounds of any threat.
Five fought by the book. They’d opened their tally.
Valys hand-signalled the adjustment, and said, “Breathe Wachman. Your rebreather’s double-timing.”
“Yes, Valys,” said Wachman, forcing out a slow breath.
More low energy auto-fire died in the rain, and more instructions were relayed from tactical. The flanking squads had advanced more than five hundred metres onto the battlefield without firing a single shot. Most of the trenches and foxholes were at the centre of the field, east of their position, and they were more than fifty metres from the nearest earthworks. A small section of rubble, raised as a defensive wall stood fifteen metres east of their position, but they were advancing away from it.
Light flared in Wachman’s eyes, fizzled there and died. A shove in the back took the soldier down.
The round had impacted with Wachman’s visor, but had registered nothing more damaging than shock in its victim.
Wachman’s head and shoulders came out of the grey mud, which slid off the resistant surfaces of the sepio-suit. No harm. No foul.
“Move it, soldier,” said Valys. “Keep low.”
The entire squad continued forward, crawling through the oozing filth on elbows and insteps, their suits taking the extra strain of the increased physical effort.
Further to the right, Pupka’s
squad continued to pace out the ground, knees soft, backs arched, and still further out Eicas’ squad had adopted a hunched jog, so that the right flank was like a swinging arm. Storper’s, Kluk’s and Yoff’s squads matched formation on the left flank.
Glinsky’s and Broslavsky’s squads were holding back. Their attack would come fast and late.
Quintus moved as a single regiment, five hundred soldiers marching en masse towards the centre of the battlefield. They had the home advantage. They knew every foxhole and trench, every cubic cento of mud, every chunk and shard of rubble, every scrap of board and every glob of sod in every piece of cover. They followed orders and they had the confidence of the voices in their ears and the scrolling numbers on their visor displays. They had suits and they had weapons, and the tally was not their concern.
Orders were to lay down fire, so Five laid down fire. They could not see the enemy through the rain and the mist created by the low energy auto-fire, but they didn’t need to see Three to fire on them. They didn’t need to wonder why there was no return of fire. They didn’t need to think at all; command did their thinking for them.
Narbrot reflex-shot. The target was low and side-on, but the shape was distinct, emerging from the hard vertical of a board, rising a metre out of the ground, two hundred metres away. Three’s tally was opened.
The hot-shot round felled the soldier. The body dropped silently. Narbrot didn’t hear the wet impact as the corpse hit the ground, but its squadmates responded fast and hard, turning their weapons on Pupka’s squad and blanketing it with fire.
“Drop. Take Cover. Hold position,” said Pupka.
Narbrot glanced at the squad commander, but got no answering look. There had been no order to fire. No one liked Narbrot, and now no one trusted Narbrot.
“Cunno!” said Valys. “Too soon.”
Valys’ squad dropped their bellies to the ground and aimed their weapons.
“Hold fire!” commanded Valys, raising a hand above shoulder height to signal the command.
Wachman’s face dropped into the mud, nestling against the trigger guard. The rebreather of E309 clicked hard.
