The Price of Freedom

by William R. Forstchen

  Two Border Worlds fighters, a damaged Rapier and an early model Arrow, emerged from the jump point and oriented towards the carrier. Feedback discharged from point to point across the dish, matching the jump point's characteristic blue flare.

  He had heard rumors that secret experiments had been under way towards the end of the war that would allow cap ships to open small rifts in the jump points, rifts just large enough for fighters to pass through as a means of cross-system raiding. He was gratified that, for a change, the rumors had turned out to be true. The generators were one of the few improvements the last couple of years had seen. Most everything else seemed to have gone downhill.

  Four Rapiers, the Intrepid's Combat Area Patrol, broke from the vicinity of the carrier and angled towards them. The CAP would be very sensitive about strange fighters without proper IFF ID's operating in the vicinity of their mothership. The Rapiers' drive plumes brightened as the four ships touched their afterburners and angled towards them. "Unidentified Thunderbolt," the flight leader said, "drop your screens!"

  "I'd do it if I were you," Marshall warned him. "You're still running Fleet IFF transponder codes. The locals don't know you're friendly." Blair hurried to obey as Marshall contacted the carrier below.

  "Maniac to Intrepid control. I'm bringing in a recruit. Don't fire."

  "Roger," Blair heard a woman's voice respond in a throaty contralto that made him think of warm nights and inviting arms. She probably weighs a hundred-twenty kilos, he thought, but she's got a voice that could launch a thousand ships.

  "Fleet Thunderbolt Two-Seven-One," she said. "Identify yourself."

  Blair keyed his comm-panel. "Blair, Christopher, Colonel Space Forces Reserve." He paused, unable to resist adding a touch of sarcastic humor. "Or, at least I was, until about two minutes ago."

  There was a long pause on the other end.

  "Callsign?"

  He normally disliked his Kilrathi hero-name. It was too pretentious for his taste. There were times, though, when its fame came in handy. "Callsign Heart of the Tiger," he said.

  He took a certain malicious pleasure in hearing her sharp intake of breath. "Can anyone vouch for you?" she said.

  "Yeah," Maniac said, "me. He saved the frigates from his buddies. The frigate masters'll vouch for him, too."

  "Roger, umm… Colonel Tiger," she said, sounding a bit flustered. Her voice steadied as she reverted to duty. "Assume a standard reverse-course let-down approach," she said. "Our instrument-tractor system is down, so you'll have to do it on manual. Intrepid out."

  Blair smiled, wondering what she looked like. She must be pretty young, he thought, to get so tossed by his presence. He switched back to his main tactical channel, then cut to his short-range laser transmitter. "Who was that?"

  "That," Maniac said archly, "was Lieutenant Sosa, also known as Admiral Richards' girl Friday. She's filling in as the comm officer." He laughed. "She's a looker."

  "Oh, yeah?" Blair replied, playing the role of the randy pilot. "I think I'm going to like being a traitor."

  "Let's go back to the barn, Casanova," Maniac said dryly. He peeled his limping fighter away, leaving behind bits of burned armor and debris.

  Blair tucked in behind him. The four escorting Rapiers held station, close enough to react if Blair tried an attack, but not so close as to spook him. Maniac led the little group into the Intrepid's holding pattern, using broad turns that gave them a wide berth from the other fighters orbiting the carrier.

  Blair used the delay to study the flotilla. Most of the ships had a slightly moth-eaten look about them, together with the patchwork appearance of battle damage hastily repaired in space.

  Two fighters, a Rapier and a Saber, angled in and joined the queue over the carrier. Blair looked around at the firefly glows of the little ships as they swirled around, waiting their turns to land. Another cluster of fighters, this time Ferrets and what looked like a single Arrow, filtered through the jump point and aimed for the two fast transports.

  "What the hell are those?" he said.

  "What the hell are what?" Maniac replied.

  "The transports," Blair said. "It looks like they're taking on fighters."

  "They are," Maniac answered. "We're staging smaller ships, Ferrets mostly, and a few Rapiers, off them."

  "Those're too small to have launch tubes!"

  "They don't," Maniac confirmed, "they just kind of push their birds out the back and let them fend for themselves. They lose one occasionally." He clucked his tongue. "They do shuttle runs, picking up fresh birds and pilots when we get low, and transfer 'em over here to fill in our losses. They'll eventually empty out. Then they'll go back to the boneyards and pick up more rehabbed ships and the latest graduates of what they call flight school." He frowned. "Most of the rookies don't last long, or so I'm told."

  Blair stared at the transports, appalled at the waste. "Half-baked pilots in obsolete craft—that's crazy."

  "Welcome to the lunatic fringe," Maniac replied dryly "The Border Worlds don't have the numbers the Fleet does, so they have to get more creative more quickly to keep going. A lot of what they're doing gets pilots killed, but it does allow a magnum launch of more than six birds."

  Blair winced at the acid in Maniacs voice.

  The Intrepid loomed close. The ship had been badly damaged. The entire top level of its superstructure, containing the bridge, control systems, and crew berths, looked to nave been totally demolished. Several sections of the hull had been opened and peeled away, revealing blackened frames that jutted like clawing fingers into space.

  One of the three drive cones was dark, its only emission a white plume that trailed from below one side. Several weapons emplacements on the stern quarter had been damaged, as had the main communications array. A cluster of pressure-suited figures with cutting torches worked at cutting away piece of fallen machinery that had collapsed across one point-defense turret.

  "What the hell happened?" Blair asked.

  "I'm told," Maniac said, "that the Intrepid had a run-in with a pod of Confed fighters backed by a pair of cruisers, the TCS Achilles and the Dornier. They fought a running battle through three systems. The Achilles is no more."

  The Achilles, sister ship of the Agamemnon, was one of the Fleet's most powerful heavy cruisers. Three hundred and fifty good people dead on the Fleet side alone, and God only knew how many more Border Worlders. The Border Worlds must have paid a heavy price for killing the cruiser.

  The communications officer hailed them, her honeyed voice clear in spite of the interference. "Intrepid to Thunderbolt Two-Seven-One. You are authorized to begin visual landing sequence. Be advised, the beam tracking system and tractor traps are down. Good luck."

  Blair cleared his throat. He hadn't done a real eyes-only landing in a decade, and that had been in a fighter a lot more maneuverable than the Thunderbolt. He wasn't terribly fond of the T-Bolt, derisively known as the "lead sled," in the first place.

  His fuel gauge read less than half-full and returning to the Lexington wasn't an option. He took a deep breath, held it a moment, then blew it out in a long whistle.

  The situation felt like one of the old training simulator scenarios involving bizarre, unrealistic situations like the complete failure of failsafe systems like carrier deck landing systems or communications arrays.

  Blair held to what he thought was the proper approach angle, a little steeper than he would have used in an Arrow or Hellcat, but also much slower. He kept his rate of descent steady, and repeatedly checked his range to target. It reeled off numbers with impressive speed. He slowed the ship again and dropped his landing gear. The tell-tale indicated that it had locked down. Well, Chris, he said to himself, here goes nothing. The deck grew rapidly, rushing up to meet him.

  He chopped his throttles all the way back, cutting his drives and depending on momentum to carry him through the force curtain that kept the ships atmosphere inside. The deck came up quickly, too quickly. He flared his approach out at the las
t second, easing his control yoke back to raise the nose. He swore softly as the back wheels hit and bounced. The fighters characteristics had changed the moment he'd hit the atmosphere and the ships artificial gravity. He'd forgotten to compensate for the lift his wings provided when in atmosphere.

  He hit his navigation thrusters, trying to bleed off speed before he plowed into an obstacle. Open space beckoned at the far end of the open bay, the stars twinkling in the force curtain's haze. If worse came to worst, he could boost his speed and touch-and-go, passing completely through the bay and launching out the other side to try the landing again. He'd catch hell for it, perhaps even get shot at, but it was a better option than slapping twenty plus metric tons into the flight deck or bay walls.

  He reached for the throttle control, ready to ram it to the stops. The first of the trap cables, designed to protect fighters in the front part of the launch deck, caught the Thunderbolt's nose gear.

  The fighter slid sideways along the angled cable, showering sparks on the deck, before it shuddered to a halt and finally tipped over onto one wing. Blair winced at the crunch noise the stabilizer and outer weapon's hardpoint made as the fighters weight settled.

  He popped his canopy, whipped his helmet off, and swore sulphurously as he shut down the engines and internal power. The fuel-feed turbines whined down, exchanging their high-pitched whir for a lower pitched whuffing sound. He dropped his helmet on the yoke and looked around, checking for signs of fire.

  Old, cool smoke hazed the inside of the bay. About half the illumination strips were out, either dead or shattered, and the launch deck showed definite signs of battle damage. A cacophony of loudhailers, shouts, and noises of the crowded deck washed over him. A motley-looking ground crew sprinted for the fallen Thunderbolt.

  "Clear that piece of junk!" the loudhailer boomed. "We got more fighters inbound!"

  Small lift cranes and tractors scuttled from sockets along the bays walls to the stranded Thunderbolt. One ground crew frantically wrapped a cable around the crumpled wing while another released the arrestor line and recoiled it for later use. The crane operator lowered her hook to the wing crew, snagged the cable, and hauled the fighter upright. Blair heard the squeak and creak as the T-bolt came upright then tipped back onto its gear. It rocked back and forth, squeaking as the hydraulic cylinders in the gear took the changing loads.

  He saw fuel spilling from the ruptured wing tank and pointed. One crew member, a little quicker than the others, grabbed a bag of absorbent material from the back of the lift and liberally spread it over the spill. The tractor hooked up to the Thunderbolt's bent front gear and tugged it out of the landing area. The area was barely clear before a Rapier with an engine fire came in on a steep approach.

  The pilot held the damaged fighter together long enough to execute a wobbly three-point landing, then slewed sideways in a shower of sparks.

  Blair heard something burst under the sidewards strain.

  The canopy popped open as the pilot cut her one working drive to keep from playing the exhaust stream over the ground crews huddled behind crash barriers on either side j{ the deck. She taxied off the landing targets and into the recovery area, leaving behind a trail of synthetic rubber. Flames burst out over the Rapiers upper hull. Fire crews swarmed over the ship, plying the engine with slurried foam while the pilot slid to the ground.

  Blair had the impression of a young woman with one side of her face covered in blood. She walked away from the burning Rapier, her head down, ignoring the corpsman vvho tried to staunch the blood flowing down her face and neck.

  Blair coughed a little as Maniac walked up to him, his helmet hanging from his flight suit. "What the hell's wrong with the air in here?" he said, waving his hands in front Df his face. "If it were any thicker, you could serve it on toast."

  "The soot and smoke from the fires overwhelmed the scrubbers and air filtration units," Maniac answered. They're trying to rig some electrostatics to clean it, but they're shorthanded and it ain't a priority. The damage control chief told me they're too busy trying to keep the carbon monoxide and toxins down to manageable levels to have to worry about how they're gonna clean a hundred thousand cubic meters of air." He looked meaningfully around. "I'm told it would be simpler just to do a whole air exchange, but that would require a refit. Which would require taking us off-line, which they can't afford to do." Maniac laughed without humor and gestured around him at the smoky air. "Don't worry. This stuffs going to thin Dut on its own. We're leaking atmosphere like a sieve."

  Blair, aware of the fatigue that gnawed at him, glanced around the darkened bay. "Where do I bunk in?"

  Marshall led him over to a table where a rating poured coffee and issued blankets. Maniac picked up two cups and gestured for Blair to get a blanket. He pointed with his chin towards a curtained-off area in one particularly dark corner of the bay. "There you go," he said, "pilots' quarters."

  "That's it?" Blair asked, dumbfounded.

  "Yeah," Maniac answered. "The Achilles' fighters took out the living quarters topside, along with everything else above Deck Three." He shrugged. "At least we've got plenty of room."

  "How's that?" Blair asked.

  "A third of the crew was in quarters when they got hit."

  Blair closed his eyes.

  "Most of the crew just drop in place when they need sleep," Maniac said. Blair followed his gesture and saw several filthy crew members asleep on a tractor. Their ability to sleep in the middle of the bay's din spoke volumes about their fatigue. "This old girl's being held together with baling wire and prayer," Marshall continued. "Most of the crew are pulling eighteen-hour-plus days to keep her from coming apart."

  They walked over to the pilots' "quarters." Blair dropped his blanket on an unused patch of deck. He saw several unoccupied cots, but declined to take one. They looked to have been soaked in something he guessed was dried blood.

  "Now what?" he asked Maniac.

  "We go up to Operations," Maniac said. "They'll be thrilled to know you're aboard."

  Blair looked at Maniac, uncertain if he was being sarcastic. He said nothing as the major led him towards the stairs.

  "The lifts are down," Maniac supplied. "Most other luxuries, too. Only one APU is working, so the lights fade a lot. The rest of the reactors went offline when the portside engine room got hit." He smiled. "You've also had your last shower for a while."

  Maniac led Blair to a metal access tube and started climbing the steep stairway. "I'm impressed," Blair said to Maniacs back, "that you've managed to find your way around so quickly. You only defected yesterday."

  "It's a small ship," Marshall replied, his voice muffled by his body, "smaller now that a thirds been blown to hell. I managed to find all the important places: the chowhall, the bar, the head." He laughed. "Still haven't found the tail, though."

  Maniac led Blair up two more levels, each time passing through open dogging hatches. The hatches were held open with electromagnets and were designed to seal if atmospheric pressure dropped or changed radically. The obsolete system had never had the bugs fully ironed out. The hatches, each weighing half a metric ton, closed at odd moments, very occasionally crushing personnel underneath. He looked at each warily as they climbed.

  Maniac stopped at the third deck and opened the access door for Blair to step through. The air on this deck made the air below seem sweet by comparison. It reeked of burned conduit, plastics, bedding, and other, less wholesome smells. He felt its bite on the back of his throat as he inhaled. He coughed lightly as he tried to rid himself of the irritation.

  "You'll get used to it," Marshall said, his voice flat.

  They ducked back against the bulkhead as two sweaty and sooty crews scurried past. Some carried portable fire extinguishers, breathing apparatus, and tools. One grim-faced team carried stretchers, each with a single, savagely burned body. Blair turned away, gagging on the reek of scorched, decomposing flesh.

  He swallowed hard, grateful that he hadn't eaten breakfast
.

  "They're just now getting some of the bodies out," Maniac said, "but there're still fires burning for'ard." Marshall glanced down at one shrouded form, without expression. "Dust in the air handlers ignited when the top decks got hit A fireball flashed downward, into the workshops and crew spaces, igniting everything that would burn. They've been fighting fires for the last couple of days."-

  Blair furrowed his brow, trying to recall his damage control procedures. "Why don't they just suck the air out, or vent the areas into space?"

  "Can't," said a voice from behind him. He turned and saw a short woman wearing a shiny lieutenant colonel's insignia and bronzed pilots wings. She looked to be in her late twenties, and seemed very attractive, even though she was layered with soot and grease. She tipped her head back, meeting Blairs stare. One lock of black hair strayed from her tightly bound hair and into her eyes. She pulled it back with an impatient gesture.

  "The flash fire may have warped the sectional control valves," she said, her voice tough and frank. "We can't be certain we wouldn't lose what atmosphere we've got left." She gave him a thin-lipped, wintery grin. "Although that would take care of the fires."

  She extended her hand to him. "Tamara Farnsworth," she said, "Colonel Tamara Farnsworth." He shook her hand, surprised both by her grip and her forthrightness. He guessed she could hold her own with anyone, male or female, and look good doing it.

  "My callsign's Panther. I'm the acting Damage Control officer." The way she said "acting" made it plain to him that she was not doing the job out of love.

  A second officer joined them. He looked to be even younger than Farnsworth, closer to his mid-twenties. Blair stuck out his hand. "Chris Blair," he said, introducing himself. "Reserve Colonel… or at least I was until this morning." The officer's face tickled Blair's memory. They had met before.

  "Blair?" the second officer asked. "Colonel Blair—the Heart of the Tiger? That Blair?"

  Blair nodded carefully.