by B. V. Larson
“Ral?” boomed Samson, making a cheerful clap with his big hands. “Why didn’t you say so, Captain? That’s great! Those little cat-girls are the best in the fleet. Dalton cries himself to sleep every night about having to leave them and go back to Earth.”
“Cat-girls?” Miller said, then he got it. He smirked at me, shaking his head. “Your girlfriend, the one in your reports… she came from that planet, didn’t she?”
I nodded noncommittally.
“I should have known,” he laughed. “You destroyed an Imperial ship, and you wangled some R&R. Damn! I was wrong to feel so tense about this meeting. My apologies, Blake. You really do know how to handle these fuzzies.”
Calling the Kher “fuzzies” was considered rude, but I didn’t correct him. After all, he and Samson had gleaned a completely wrong view of our situation.
I didn’t have the heart to tell them the truth.
=32=
Word got out soon enough…
We weren’t going to visit any pristine beaches or wild jungles, both of which were common on Ral from what I’d heard. We were going there instead to be sacrificed in a hopeless fight against an AI-driven warship.
Naturally, I didn’t present it that way to the crew. I explained we were an advanced force heading out to see what could be done to save the people of Ral.
Still, they were immediately concerned—even suspicious. They began to pepper me with questions about the exact details of our “mission” to Ral.
Evasion was my best defense. I claimed I didn’t know the exact situation. I referred them to past action reports, higher chains of command and anything else I could think of. Answers weren’t coming from me, but somewhere else. That was the central theme.
It worked, for the most part, but not everyone was convinced.
“This is bullshit, Leo,” Gwen said when she got me alone.
I’d already begun regretting making her my exec. Our close relationship of the past had left her tone overly personal now.
Heaving a sigh, I turned to her and made a decision.
“We have to talk, Gwen,” I said.
“We sure do. This mission is unreal. We can’t stop a Hunter! There’s no way.”
“That’s not the topic I was thinking of,” I said.
We were in my office, which doubled as a conference room off the main passage. We were only a few steps from the bridge, but it was enough privacy to allow open discussions.
“What then?” she asked, searching my face.
She’d always been good at figuring out what I was thinking. She was far better at reading people than I was. Was that because she cared more, or because her mind operated differently? I didn’t know, but the reality was undeniable.
“You’re mad at me, aren’t you?” she asked.
“Yeah, I am. I don’t think you understand what an XO is supposed to do. That’s my fault—I shouldn’t have promoted an untrained person to the post.”
She frowned. “Untrained? I’m a veteran. This is my second campaign, my second interstellar war.”
“I know. That’s not what I meant... You haven’t had any formal officer’s training, and it shows every day.”
“But this isn’t Earth. We’re part of the Rebel Fleet, not the U. S. Navy.”
“I know, but many of the people aboard are from a more formal military—Earth’s military. For purposes of morale-building, I’m trying to shift our conduct to follow a more traditional model.”
“Well then,” she said, “that’s something you should at least inform your XO about, isn’t it?”
I blinked. Damn—she had a point there. I was on the verge of firing her, and I think she knew that. But she had found some wiggle-room. I’d never even given her the chance to improve.
My own skills as a captain aboard a ship like this were weak as well, I had to admit. I knew a lot about space battles—possibly more than any human alive—but I didn’t know beans about running a ship and her crew.
“All right,” I said. “You’re still the XO. But you can’t call me Leo in front of anyone else. It’s captain, or sir. No more arguments, either. You can request a private word, or you can ask to make a suggestion. That’s it.”
Her face tightened, but she nodded. “All right. I’ll do it. I’ll sound just like Miller.”
“You don’t have to go that far.”
We both smiled, and we went back to the bridge. Miller looked at us both expectantly, but we said nothing to him. Turning back to his instruments, he shook his head slowly.
Did that mean he thought we’d been making out in there? Well, if so, he could screw himself. Sucking in a deep breath, I called out to him next.
“Miller? I’d like a private word, please.”
He walked after me into the conference room. Everyone on the bridge watched us go. They were all wondering what was going on, but I didn’t care.
“What’s this about, Blake?” he asked when the door was closed.
“Just that—right there,” I said. “You didn’t call me captain. As far as I can recall, you never have.”
He shrugged, but he didn’t deny it.
“You didn’t refer to me as ‘sir’ either, or anything else that would indicate you accept me as your superior officer.”
He still didn’t say anything.
“This has to change, Miller,” I said. “It’s bad for morale. I need you on my bridge as a functional member of this team. I don’t need obstruction and an obvious lack of respect.”
“Hold on,” he said, coming to life at last. “I’ve never obstructed your command. I’ve never countermanded an order, or argued with you in public.”
“But do you accept my authority?” I demanded. “The crew can sense that you don’t. We’ve already lost several people—and we’re probably going to lose more. I don’t want to lead people into battle who don’t even believe in me.”
“What are you proposing?” he asked.
“That you shape up. That you turn things around and start to treat me like I belong on this bridge. That you get over the loss of two friends, and your personal loss of command.”
“Is that all?” he asked in an amused tone.
“No,” I said. “If you can’t make these changes, I’m removing you from bridge duty immediately. Make your choice, Miller.”
He frowned. “You’d be crazy to do that. You need me—the ship needs me. I’m one of the few trained experts you have aboard.”
“I know that. That’s why I’m asking for a change, rather than just reassigning you out of hand. If you can pull it together and stop moping, we’ll all have a better chance of surviving.”
He was quiet for a second before speaking. “This is the kind of talk you just gave Gwen, isn’t it? You brought her in here to kick her in the butt.”
“That’s right. She promised to make changes. What are you going to do?”
“You’d really remove me? Even as we’re flying into enemy territory?”
“If I must.”
“An ultimatum…” he said thoughtfully. “Well, I have to admit, I didn’t think you had the balls, Blake. But you clearly do…” he faltered and studied the deck.
I didn’t speak, I just kept staring at him and waiting for his answer.
“All right,” he said at last. “I’ll admit, I’ve been less than fully accepting of the current arrangement. In the meantime, you’ve surprised me with your competence. I’ve seen you in action, and you’ve demonstrated a natural ability to command a starship in battle.”
“But you still think you could do better?” I asked him.
“Yes, possibly, but I can’t call you incompetent. I’ll reform my behavior.”
“Good!” I said, shooting out my hand. “I’m glad we got this nonsense behind us.”
Slowly, he lifted his to grasp mine. I pumped my arm hard, and he was rocked on his feet. Despite the fact he’d been given a sym, it hadn’t altered his musculature much yet. It hadn’t had time to harden up his grip.
Grinning hugely, I nodded and welcomed him onto my team all over again. He gave me a flickering smile in return.
“Will I be the XO again?” he asked.
“Not today. Gwen claims she can do better, and I owe her a chance to show me. We’ll see who earns their ranks. In the meantime, I’m moving you up to Ensign first class. Look at your lapels.”
He did, and his eyes widened. There were now two golden lines on his shoulders.
“You can do that?” he asked. “Any time you want to?”
“My sym can alter your rank, yes, because I’m two ranks higher than you and in your direct chain of command. I submitted status point awards for everyone based on performance after our recent battle. You’ve earned advancement, and it suits your level of experience.”
“But who has approval over you?”
“Shaw, Ursahn, and Admiral Fex—in that order.
“Interesting…” he said. “So many things about this military are streamlined. Most Earthly navies would require many steps to achieve rank in the field.”
“We aren’t in an Earthly navy, Miller.”
“So you keep saying. Is there anything else, Captain?”
“No, dismissed.”
He walked out, and I followed. I felt better about my command staff, and I hoped they’d follow up on their promises over the coming days.
We had a lot of grim challenges ahead of us.
=33=
Ursahn didn’t drag her feet. She prepared to make the jump to the Ral system less than twelve hours after Fex had given us our suicidal assignment.
“Captain?” I asked her via my sym as her ship began to form the rip in space-time. We were right behind Killer, trailing in her wake. “Should we be phasing when we arrive?”
She answered with her typical fatalism. Ever since we’d been given this task, she seemed to have lost hope.
“Blake, you must choose your own approach to death. Shall you gently nuzzle her? Or rage and fight? It matters only to you and your crew.”
Her answer didn’t please me. I knew that many of the Rebel Kher had a death-wish of sorts. They often came from worlds that had been destroyed by the Imperials, and they didn’t much care if they lived or died.
But they usually had a strong sense of honor and duty. They did things because that’s how they were supposed to be done. Their goal was to make their mark in time and space, as best they could.
Being destroyed for sport like animals in a wilderness had brought on this attitude among the Rebels, in my opinion. It bordered on defeatism in my book, and I couldn’t let it go.
“Listen, Ursahn,” I said to her, “I find your tactics unacceptably vague. I will therefore offer some of my own. First, after you open the breach, I suggest you don’t go through it. Allow me to cross through and scout. I’ll return before the rift closes.”
She didn’t answer immediately, and the rift formed. It quickly grew to fill our visual field.
“That does not comply with our orders,” she said at last.
“Yes it does!” I insisted. “We’ve been told to do the impossible, but there were no instructions as to how to carry that order out.”
“No, because it’s hopeless.”
“Then let me have my way. It is in accordance with my honor and duty to Earth.”
That stopped her.
“Captain?” Chang said in surprise. “Killer is veering off. She’s not going into the rift.”
“He’s right, sir,” Dalton said. “What should I do?”
“Go through. Miller, hit the phasing system.”
Ursahn called again as we passed from this system into the next. “Good travels. If you don’t return before the rift closes, I will create another and march through it to join you in the afterlife.”
That was all she said, but it was enough. She hadn’t privately transmitted her final farewell, but instead had broadcast it. The audio and her drooping, somber presence appeared on every screen aboard my ship.
Gwen spun around in her seat and stared at me with wide eyes.
“She’s sent us to die?”
“No,” I said. “She’s just a little fatalistic. She talks like that all the time. You remember, don’t you XO?”
She looked stunned for a second, then nodded. “Of course.”
“We’re entering the rift, sir,” Dalton said.
I welcomed the distraction. The ship shivered and we left normal space. Reality as everyone knew it ceased, and a new reality began.
The transition was brief, but memorable. Hammerhead shook and creaked audibly.
When we broke through on the far side, we were already phased-out.
“Sensors, what have we got?” I demanded.
“Data is coming in now, Captain,” Chang said. “But it’s a little slow.”
We waited tensely until we had a sketchy layout of the Ral system at last. It matched our databanks, but several worlds on the outskirts of the system were missing. Icy chunks that passed for planets, and even a small, gassy giant—they were all gone.
“Where did the mass go?” Miller asked, studying the data. “Captain, this is odd. The system is actually missing mass.”
“Explain,” I said. I felt good that he was calling me “captain” at last, but somehow I couldn’t get too happy about it under the current circumstances.
“Normally,” Chang jumped in, “mass is transformed from one form or location to another. A ship might become scrap, for instance, or even be vaporized by a strong enough strike. But the total mass is virtually the same, whether a body is a solid, liquid or gaseous.”
“Yeah…” I said, “so this thing doesn’t just destroy worlds, it consumes them.”
“There are rings of asteroids and debris in each planet’s orbit—but some of the mass is still missing.”
“Have you spotted the Hunter yet?” I asked.
They soon managed to locate the enemy. It was chewing on the fourth world in the system, counting from the outside inward—to the sun. The fourth world was a rocky planet, something like Mars back home.
“It’s hard to spot while we’re phasing,” Miller said, “because it looks like it’s merged with the target world.”
“I see…” I studied the sketchy graphics that were coming in from our sensors and Abrams lab analysis software. “The planet does look misshapen. This divot here, with the lump in the middle of it?”
“That’s a surface crater the size of Antarctica,” Miller said, sounding impressed. “It’s in there, chewing on it.”
I looked at him, grasping the scale of the enemy. “The Hunter is that big?”
“Captain,” Chang said. “I’ve got some estimates coming in. Fex hadn’t shared much data with us previously.”
“Give me your best guess.”
“The target Hunter is approximately one hundred sixty miles long. It’s ovoid in shape, with several tube-like extensions. These appear to break down the victim mass and remove it from local space.”
My crew fell silent. We’d never faced anything like this before.
“Theories,” I said, “what’s it doing with all that mass?”
“Some of it is probably being digested to energize and rebuild damaged sub-systems,” Chang suggested.
“It’s feeding,” Gwen said. “Like a parasite. Burrowing and digesting whole worlds. An automated mining system gone mad.”
“Reminds me of a giant tick,” Samson offered. “A parasite. We have to destroy it, Captain. Imagine one of these things reaching Earth.”
It was a terrifying thought. I returned to my command chair, and I contacted Abrams for his opinion.
“What do you want me to say?” he asked. “It’s amazing. It’s beautiful. It’s perfect, in a way.”
“So you want to marry this thing, is that it, Doc?” I demanded. “Give me something I can use.”
“Come out of phasing for a minute or two. I need better data.”
After hesitating a few seconds, I gave the order.
&n
bsp; Miller looked at me like I was crazy, but he didn’t object openly.
“Phasing system shutting down, Captain,” he said.
We all watched the screen, and the rift behind us. We weren’t moving fast, so we knew we could turn around and run if we had to.
The planet-killer didn’t react right away. That wasn’t surprising, as we were several light-minutes away. It would take time for our visual presence to be detected—assuming it would take notice of us at all.
“How much time have I got on the rift, Chang?”
“Another nine minutes. Ursahn must be boosting it to keep it open.”
“Keep an eye on it,” I ordered.
Abrams sucked up data and computer time on the main data core in enormous portions. I watched him, but I let him do it. This was our big chance, and I didn’t want to waste it.
“The Hunter is doing something, Captain,” Miller warned.
I looked up, and I was immediately startled. “Is it breaking apart?” I asked.
“No…” Chang said. “Those protrusions must be smaller ships—or very large missiles. They’re leaving the victim world’s thin atmosphere now… They’re in space, achieving escape velocity and beyond.”
It wasn’t hard to plot the course of these objects as they left the Hunter. It soon became obvious the enemy had seen us and launched several objects toward us. Whatever they were, I was certain they weren’t friendly.
“Should I engage the phasing system, sir?” Miller asked.
“No,” I said. “We’ll keep pinging away at it, feeding Abrams everything we can. Dalton, turn us around and creep toward the rift. At the seven-minute mark, hit the gas and get us out of here.”
Dalton seemed both relieved and concerned at my orders. We came about sharply and retreated. I watched the rift growing in my forward view.
Using my sym’s perception and interpretation systems, I reached out to zoom toward the big Hunter.
Up close, it was even more startling than it looked from a distance. Stony soil, lakes, a greenish-gray slime of life—they’d all slid down into that crater it had dug.
A maelstrom of dust, feathery clouds and smoke swirled around the monster as it fed. Up close, it looked more like a spiny crab to me than anything else. It didn’t have legs—not exactly, but it had rows of churning arms around its circumference, which dug into the crust of the planet and tore the heart from the land.
