“He turned up?”
“Apparently he's spent the last three months lecturing the Xandari on the new theory of the
quattuordecim drive. Traveling through fourteenth-dimensional space.”
Frowning, she replied, “Space doesn't have that many dimensions.”
“I know that, and you know that, but a lot of top scientists back on the Xandari homeworld don't. Anyway, he's coming up in a few minutes, and I've told him to plot a course for home via Testament Station. We can give the crew a little leave on the way home, and it wouldn't do any harm to show the flag.”
“Home,” she said. “It doesn't seem real, does it. Six jumps, maybe two months, and we're back at Thule.”
“I think technically we've completed the longest tour in Confederation history.” He beamed, and said, “We've broken them, Maggie. Even the most pessimistic projections don't give them more than two more battlecruisers, and they'll be scattered all over their territory. It might not have gone as we'd expected...”
“That's a bit of an understatement,” she interrupted.
“But we did everything we set out to do. Copernicus is taken, and we'll have a new defense network in position before we leave. The Neander and Koltoc fleets are going to wait here until reinforcements arrive, and between them the Xandari won't have a chance of getting through, even if they had any ships to do it with.”
“And then we go home,” Orlova said, shaking her head, “and someone follows your chain of logic to its ultimate conclusion. They're not a threat any more, so no need to send in the big space fleet.”
“Commodore Marshall won't think that way.”
“Assuming he makes the final decision,” she replied, closing her eyes, leaning back in her chair. There was a knock on the door, and she jerked up, her reverie broken.
“Who is it?” Nelyubov asked.
“Cooper.” The door opened, and he stepped in, arm in a hard cast, a stick in the other hand, Bradley standing behind him. “Can I see you, Captain? In private?”
“Of course,” she said, “Of course. I haven't had a chance to thank you...”
“No need,” he replied. “There are about a hundred people down on the surface who've earned your thanks a lot more than I have, but you'd have to hold a seance to pass it on.” With a deep breath, he added, “Including Lieutenant Cantrell.”
“We're both sorry about her death,” Nelyubov replied. “Especially given the circumstances.”
“She left a legacy,” Cooper replied. “And one that could give us a chance of bringing this war to an end. For good. Now.” Orlova glanced at Nelyubov, and he added, “The Xandari are broken. We'll never have a better chance. That was what she thought, and she's right. If we go back to the Confederation, they'll spend long enough arguing to give the Xandari a chance to rearm. We won this fight at a terrible cost, Captain, and I don't know if we could do it again.” Looking down at the deck, he added, “I don't think I could, anyway.”
“I agree with you,” she replied, “but we don't really have a choice. One ship can't finish them off by itself, and we've got to bring forward the reinforcements. Don't worry. I'm sure Commodore Marshall...”
Shaking her head, Bradley added, “Trust me, Captain, no one wants to go home and leave all this behind more than I do, but if we don't finish the job, they'll be back, and you know it. We're talking about a race that worships the concept of Total War. Did you see those intelligence projections? They could have three more battlecruisers in six months, a force that would be a tough nut to crack, especially holding a defensive position. We've just had proof of how difficult that is.”
“Granted,” Nelyubov said.
“Lisa had two pieces of information. The first is the location of the Xandari homeworld...”
“How the hell?” Orlova asked.
“Apparently she deduced it from evidence she pieced together during the occupation. The report's in your queue anyway, Captain, so you'll be seeing it for yourself in a few moments.” He grunted, and asked, “Can I sit down?”
“Sorry,” Nelyubov said, vacating his seat and gesturing for Cooper to take it. “I should have...”
“It's fine, sir,” Cooper said, easing into place. “Have either of you heard of the K-Bomb?”
“Never,” Nelyubov said, but Orlova's face paled.
“Something from the War. I heard rumors about it, but nothing concrete.”
“It's an orbital denial weapon, a big one. Bigger than anything ever detonated before.”
“Under the terms of the Treaty of Vesta, weapons like that are outlawed,” Nelyubov said.
“I don't think the Xandari would abide by that treaty even if they knew of it,” Orlova replied. “Cooper, what exactly are you proposing.”
Looking her in the eyes, he said, “You asked me what one ship can do, and Cantrell has answered your question. She had the schematics for the K-Bomb in her personal datafile...”
“What can it do, again?” Nelyubov asked.
“Render orbital space from the fringes of the atmosphere to stationary orbit impassible for more than a century,” Cooper said. He shook his head, and added, “You can only imagine what such a weapon would do to a spacefaring civilization. For our purposes, it gives us a way of fighting back against the Xandari. A weapon they can't counter.”
“Vice-Admiral Remek signed off on this plan,” Bradley said. “We've got official approval. And Alamo can get there and back with a single fuel load.”
“Do you have the slightest idea what you are asking?” Nelyubov half-shouted. “This ship was in enemy hands yesterday, and we don't know what sort of condition she's in. The crew's been through hell, and...”
“And if we don't do it,” Cooper said, “We'll have to go through it all over again. A lot of people have died here, sir, and I don't want their sacrifice to be thrown away because we're not willing to finish what we've started.” He turned to Orlova, and added, “I know what I am asking. Trust me, I know. But I also know how many times war has become inevitable because someone decided not to finish off an enemy.”
Orlova stood, turning back to the starfield, looking out at the display. Somewhere in the distance was Sol, and Mars orbiting it, the siren song of home calling her back across the light-years. She was tired, deep down to the bottom of her soul, and she longed to get away, to return to the safety of the Confederation, to hand these problems over to someone else.
And yet, somehow, she knew that Cooper was right. The Xandari might have been beaten here, but they would never rest until either they had fulfilled their mad dreams of conquest, or been defeated forever. Only if she could accomplish that would this mission truly be over. She looked at Nelyubov, sorrow in his face, then nodded, turning back to the others.
“Are you sure about all of this, Lieutenant?”
“I've gone over the files twice, ma'am. If she'd lived, she would be standing here right now outlining the same mission plan. I know the crew will volunteer to a man. They know what's at stake.”
Nodding, she replied, “Prepare a full briefing for a senior officer's meeting in an hour. Then talk to Mr. Quinn about the construction of the bomb. I don't want to get half-way there and find out we're missing something essential.”
“We're going?” Nelyubov asked. “We're really going to do this?”
“For those who died, if nothing else,” she said. “We're going to end this. Once and for all. We're going to stop them.” With a smile on her face, she added, “Then we can go home.”
TO BE CONCLUDED...
Thank you for reading 'Operation Damocles'. For information on future releases, please join the Battlecruiser Alamo Mailing List at http://eepurl.com/A9MdX for updates. If you enjoyed this book, please review it on the site where you purchased it.
The writer's blog is available at http://tinyurl.com/pjl96dj
The saga continues in B
attlecruiser Alamo: Final Orbit, available in November 2016...
Battlecruiser Alamo: Pyrrhic Victory Page 23
