Well-Traveled Rhodes (Kinsella Universe Book 6)

by Gina Marie Wylie

  “Yeah, I knew that. Who would figure that I'd get zapped at the range I was zapped up. Beginner's luck, I hope.”

  “Luck?” Cindy said, appearing from her simulator. “I don't think so. XO's have a natural ability to hit what they aim at. Gunny Hodges has been teaching me Kentucky windage.” She mimed firing a pistol and blowing the smoke away from the barrel.

  Ian laughed. “Want to try that on me?”

  “It would be like dynamiting fish in a barrel,” Cindy told him.

  It was all Tam could do to keep a straight face. So it would!

  “Oh, maybe not.”

  “Then, you're on. You beat me and you can have my ice cream ration for a week. I get yours if I'm 'lucky' again.”

  Tam grimaced. Evidently she'd created a monster. She wasn't going to get a piece of Ian after all.

  “That's a bet, XO!”

  They headed off to their machines and Lieutenant Jedburgh laughed. “Tam, how can Ian tie his own shoes? I've never met anyone dimmer! Just why does he think she's the XO and he's just crew?”

  “I have no idea. I really did think I'd do better. Ian is going to have a very bad experience.”

  “And you can't tell me what she's going to do?”

  “You know the answer to that. Training sims are top secret. We can't talk about them. I will tell you two things that will inform whether or not you want to challenge the XO yourself. Check her sim rating... and contemplate the last week.”

  “You said she'd never been in a simulator before?” he said. Then his eyes bulged as he accessed the ratings.

  “Ah yes! It's true, there are sims and there are sims. Good grief! Ian is an idiot!”

  “Before you start thinking smugly about how clever you are, remember I gave you a hint -- and Cindy was the one who gave me a hint. None of us had the wit to check without it being handed to us on a platter.”

  “You'd almost think those people running the war might actually know what they are doing,” he laughed. “It's a comforting thought.”

  The door to Ian's simulator opened and he came out red-faced. “I never even saw the shot that got me.”

  “Before you go breaking the rules,” Cindy said as she joined them. “You will want to brush up on a couple of new concepts. First, IFF while under High Fan. Second, millisecond-jumping Blue missiles.”

  “Is that fair?” Ian asked, a little angry. “Using a weapon we know nothing about?”

  “Lieutenant, you're a weapons officer aboard the Pixie. If you don't know about them, you are derelict in your duty. If you don't practice with them, you're merely incompetent. This ship is armed with those weapons.”

  Captain Hall appeared. “I believe you're right, XO. Make sure to remind Chief Shinzu that we need to exercise the crew in the new weapons.”

  Tam grimaced. Who would have thought a Fleet ship's captain and XO would have forgotten to call emergency drills? Admiral Gull had been surprisingly mild in his punishment. “You simply have to report back that at the end of this quarter -- that's three weeks -- that you're current on your drills for the quarter. Piece of cake!”

  Of course, it wasn't a piece of cake, as they were nearly twenty-five drills behind. Instead of two a week, they were doing two a day. And Captain Hall made it clear that they were going to exceed the Fleet's readiness requirements. Life was exciting!

  Actually, as they bored through space, life steadily got more and more boring. Tam found time weighing heavily. She helped Cindy with her math, ran sims over and over again with her friend -- and most others of the crew. She did beat Cindy now and again in sims. The thing was though, she'd get used to Cindy's tactics -- and then Cindy would come up with something new and unexpected and she'd have to adapt. She came up with new things as well, but not nearly as often as Cindy.

  Days turned to weeks, the weeks to months. It was six months from Adobe to where they would enter their patrol area, although there was always a chance they'd stumble on an alien ship before that.

  They were going to pass two light days from where the first large battle of First Rome had been fought. Everyone was nervous, knowing that the aliens had tried to ambush Rome and only the genius of Hannah Sawyer had kept that from happening. They had their own genius, but it was definitely hard for everyone.

  Eight light years -- seven days -- from the system, they detected a ship ahead of them, heading off at an angle. They noted it and kept going. The alien ship continued on its way, without any sign of having seen Pixie.

  The aliens in the system did react, however, when they were at their closest approach to the system. Two ships lit off fans and started chasing them.

  Pixie had run faultlessly for months; still, you paid a lot more attention to details knowing that your life span would shorten to a matter of hours if they had to come off fan.

  Tam knew that Captain Hall and Cindy had conferred. She was pretty sure that they had something in the works if that happened, but she wasn't sure because they never talked about it.

  Pixie was ten percent faster than the two alien ships. They had started at a distance of two light days. Each day they traveled, Pixie gained a light month on the pursuit. During the second day, one of the pursuers dropped from High Fan and fired two High Fan seekers at Pixie and turned back.

  The missiles were faster than the aliens, but still slower than Pixie. Three days later their detectors were clear.

  Captain Hall was forthright. “Yes, we don't believe they can see us now. I invite anyone to do the orbital geometry. We are, at most, four light months ahead of the closest pursuing ship, and three and a half ahead of the homers. All of the homers anyone has seen before would now be out of fuel.

  “I don't want to risk this ship on guesses and 'what used to be.' We have a low intrinsic; we will assume that their detectors are now equal to ours in range. The worst case is that their homers are three and a half light months back. That's three hours or so. If we drop from High Fan, reorient and go back to High Fan, unless we change course less than 90 degrees -- in about an hour they'll be able to see us again.

  “I don't want them to see us. They'll see us again later, and they are sure to figure out what we're doing -- but I'd rather it be later rather than sooner... and we will never, ever give them a clue about what we'll do next. So, we'll be another two days on this vector, before we change.

  “XO.”

  Cindy addressed the assembled crew. “We just went by the system the aliens met First Rome at. Our next course change is going to take us a bit further out, into an area where there are no stars. The aliens are fond of silent pickets -- we will have no idea if one will spot us, and if they do how they'll be able to get a message back to their leadership.

  “Our next cut will be a bulls-eye pass through the system that Hannah Sawyer died at. It is not something we told command, but Captain Hall, Ensign Roeser and I have all agreed -- we're going to drop off a modified Blue homing missile as we go through the bulls-eye. It will passively acquire the gas giant and what we think is the true colony... and we will blow out something in the orbital infrastructure.

  “It will be a reminder to them that the war isn't over. Rome, on the egress from First Rome, was hotly pursued for a considerable distance. I think it is safe to assume they will do the same thing here.” She grinned. “We have agreed to particular IFF signals if we're being chased to alert Commodore Heisenberg along our course if she should attempt an ambush or not.”

  She looked around. “Our third cut will not be into the area that Second Rome visited -- it will be at an angle off into the area where we think more of their important systems lie.

  “The third cut is the money cut. We'll pass through a minor cluster of three dozen systems. We've planned on spending a hundred and twenty days along that line, out to a void where there's a twenty-light year bubble without systems. Come what may, we'll reorient there, if we've had to go that far, and come back through a secondary, smaller cluster that may or may not be occupied.”

  Cindy l
ooked at them. “That cut, from end to end, will be upwards of a hundred and eighty days, and may run as many as two hundred and forty. There are no systems along that exit route, although there are several small M-class dwarfs that are close to it. When we're even with it, we'll drop from fans and make our first egress course change. There will be others.”

  “I thought we'd be out two years,” Tam observed.

  “Lieutenant Rhodes, this question is mine. It was up to two years. If we don't have enough to justify a return, we'll take another cut. None of us will like that one. It will be six months out, six or seven months back and another six months back to Adobe. After that, for most of us, another four or so months back to Earth.” She nodded at Cindy. “XO here will be too old for Fleet Academy by then.” There were a few smiles.

  Later Tam asked Cindy, “Everything is going to plan?”

  “Well, not entirely. We thought they'd react more forcefully. It shouldn't take a genius to realize what we're out here fishing for.”

  “Sometimes they seem to forget we can detect them on High Fan.”

  Cindy was sarcastic. “I do believe the fact we'll not drop from High Fan where they can see us will give that away.”

  Six weeks later they hit the five ring of the bulls-eye system. That just happened to be a light minute from the gas giant. It was quick; only computer could have tracked it. One instant the Blue missile wasn't rational, the next it was. It had a predesignated target area and was looking right at it.

  “It's too bad we'll never know if we hit anything,” Cindy said.

  “Well, anything that would have given us the information would have given them information. It's better this way. Blue missiles have a twenty kiloton nuke packed up against the laser, which is surrounded by the electronics. A few milliseconds after the laser fires, the nuke fires,” Tin Tin explained. “We wouldn't want them finding a Blue.”

  Captain Hall, all things said and done, was jubilant. She turned to Tin Tin. “Sensors, what have they thrown at us?”

  “It's like what they did for Rome. There are in excess of a thousand tracks chasing us. At least a fifth of those are ships. There are more targets going to fan all the time.”

  After two weeks things weren't looking good. Some of the alien ships had pursued at suicidal percentages of max power and paid for it. Some though, plus some of the missiles, hadn't paid for it and while slowly losing ground, it wasn't slowly enough.

  “Tin Tin, I'm not going to drop a message beacon for the commodore,” Captain Hall told the former commander. “I do think she'll get the picture of the thundering herd by herself.

  He spoke his thoughts, though. “I hope the commodore isn't stupid. This isn't the time or place for a bar fight.”

  “I think she'll take one look and back off,” Captain Hall told him. “You've explained the bar fight metaphor and I agree. But one thing the folks in the bushes have to be aware of -- they don't want to be on the wrong side of the numbers.”

  “She's stubborn, but I can't imagine she's dim,” Tin Tin told her.

  “In three days we'll be two hours ahead of the closest missile. We'll drop from fans then, reorient and head in the general direction of where we wanted to start the next cut.”

  “They'll be able to catch up, some,” Cindy pointed out.

  “Yes, but we're going to be headed into nowhere; there's nothing significant down that heading for a hundred and fifty light years. I'm hoping they'll quit and go home,” the captain told Cindy.

  Cindy had heard often that plans never survive contact with the enemy. She'd never actually had a plan completely bust, and was totally unprepared for what Captain Hall's simple maneuver created.

  Tin Tin was bleak. “They are all in the process of reorienting. The good news is that there are only five targets I'm sure are missiles, leaving thirteen ships.

  “The butter-side is serious. Half of the ships making the course correction have gone to a hundred percent of max power. They are going to pull ahead of us unless we want to risk ourselves. We may be on this course a very long time, Captain.”

  Cindy didn't say anything, but pulled up star charts of where they were heading. “A hundred and fifty-five light years ahead there is a dwarf red cluster. Other than that, we don't get within twenty light years of a star. I just don't understand this. They can't possibly stay ahead of us at those power percentages.”

  Tin Tin snorted. “Trying to figure out what your opponent is up to in a sim, XO, is always exciting. Trying to do it for an alien is even more exciting still.”

  After a week, the last of the missiles was gone from the sensors. The number of ships trailing them had dropped to six and only one ship survived ahead of them. The second week on the new course left the sensors clear.

  “Captain, I confirm that none of the tracks are within range. I propose we drop from High Fan, reorient for our next cut -- and then wait. As soon as we detect a ship we'll go to High Fans... but we should stay clear of their sensor sensitivity,” Tin Tin reported.

  “XO, make it so!” Captain Hall commanded Cindy. She did what had to be done. A week later they changed course again and three weeks after that they were running down the groove of their next cut.

  *** ** ***

  One day, not long after, Cindy sat down on Tam's bunk, something she just about never had done before. “Tell me, Tam. Tell me true. Are you chasing me?”

  “Sexually? No, I'm not. Honestly, I don't know what I want, but it's not you.”

  Cindy sighed. “That's good. You and I are alike that way. I have no idea what I want. But -- it's not you.”

  “We're friends, Cindy. History is replete with examples of military commanders who had loyal, faithful sidekicks who could do their bidding. That's me.”

  “Even if, more often than not, they were the senior's hatchet man?”

  “Talk to Ian about that. He still is angry about the sim with you. He thinks you took advantage of him.”

  “Tam, you win a good percentage of the time against me -- when you're pretty sure what I'm going to do, it's a crap shoot.”

  “It is that.”

  “I beat Ian every single time.”

  “You beat the others frequently, but not every time. Cindy, I'm not the XO. But, if it was up to me, Ian would have new duties when we return home.”

  Cindy sighed. “I made that recommendation two weeks ago.”

  “Cindy, you're a kind and gentle person -- except when it comes to the aliens... or anyone up against you in a sim. You don't have to apologize.”

  “He's your friend.”

  “He is. So? There are a half dozen people better at killing aliens aboard Pixie. One of them should have his job. I'm no different than anyone else on Pixie. I want to do my job -- and then go home.”

  Tam saw Cindy look away. “Oh, XO...”

  “We couldn't let it continue, Tam.”

  “I suppose this is the worst part of command,” Tam said after a few seconds.

  Cindy shook her head. “No. The worst part of command is when you send them out -- and they don't come back.”

  Tam squeezed Cindy's shoulder, but let the matter rest. The next day everyone knew Ian had been relieved for cause, and was now Chief Shinzu's assistant in engineering.

  A few days later, Ian confronted Tam. “You and everyone else are walking on eggshells around me. Stop it.”

  “Ian...”

  “I thought I was doing what I wanted. I sucked at it. I have, I'm told, no killer instinct. I know people like the XO and you count that as a fault... but I don't. Now I'm going to be working on something I enjoy. I can live with that.”

  “Ian, one of the differences between dirty-feet and Rim Runners is that they play the hand they were dealt and don't whine. None of us wish you ill; none of us wish you anything but the best...”

  “Just so long as I don't do it around you.”

  “Ian, Pixie is our ship. Lose it and we die. Lose it and maybe the Federation dies. No one faults you for what
you'd rather do... nor that you tried to do something much more difficult. Rim Runners respect people trying to rise above their heritage. What they -- and the rest of us on the crew -- don't like are people who settle for second best.”

  “I could live with being second best; Tin Tin is far better at it that I am, so is Alis McVae.”

  *** ** ***

  The first two weeks of the cut was well away from any stars, and, for that matter, any plausible commerce routes the aliens might have. After that, though, everyone kept their eyes on the sensors, expecting to see alien ships.

  Once, in the time that Cindy would normally be sleeping, Tam found her at her desk, furiously working math problems.

  “You're not going to be very alert on watch tonight, XO,” Tam told Cindy, half in jest.

  “I was sleeping a bit ago and I dreamed about all those ships and missiles chasing us again. It was like they were points on a graph and I was trying to use calculus to determine something important about them -- I blush to say, I can't remember what.

  “What I could remember in my dream, was working through things, coming up with ideas for other approaches. I woke up and decided I'd write down some of my dream.”

  Cindy shook her head. “I don't know what sex is like, not really. But after a few minutes I had some sort of experience -- I'm not sure how to describe it. I was looking at what I'd written and I realized I was writing down theorems for algebra, geometry and calculus. Deriving things, so to speak.”

  The two of them traded grins at the mild joke. “Ever since then I've been going by leaps and bounds. I understand calculus now. It's so beautiful! I never imagined math could be like this! Everything I learned in school is there -- all the formulas are relationships. It all makes sense. I can work backwards and show the math to derive the fundamental relationships that until now were equations we were expected to learn by rote, with no explanation.”