Vanguard

by Jack Campbell

  • • •

  Scatha had, of course, started planting sensors where they could watch behind the foothills. Mele led a raid in the WinG again, keeping a cautious eye out for the second warbird to lift while they located and destroyed Scatha’s remote sensors. They fled again in the WinG before Scatha could send a force to attack them.

  Scatha planted more sensors the next day. Mele led another raid to destroy those.

  Scatha planted more sensors. This time, not everyone who came on the WinG got back on it to leave. But with the sensors gone again, Scatha had no way of knowing that.

  • • •

  Mele lay as still as she could along the reverse slope of one of the hills. Scatha’s base was out of sight on the other side, but sensors planted on the hilltops by Mele’s team the night before offered a view of a patrol headed this way.

  The patrol had ten soldiers in it. All in battle armor. Two were lugging sensor packs in addition to their normal loads. They were spread out in the proper dispersed formation for a combat patrol, but the way they trudged along didn’t speak of high morale or alertness. Behind them, their base was marked by two large craters full of slag where the power plant and the antiorbital weapon had been. Another smaller crater marked the former site of their command bunker.

  With Glenlyon’s satellites back in place to maintain constant watch from above, Mele knew that large patrols were being sent out every day, wearing down the limited Scathan garrison. And Scatha’s soldiers had done this particular task twice already, replacing sensors destroyed by the same raiders who had trashed much of their base. They would replace the sensors a third time, and knew they would do it again as many more times as necessary while their commanders played a game of who-is-more-stubborn with the enemy. But at least while they were out here on the open plain, they didn’t have to worry about being attacked by surprise.

  Mele sighed, imagining herself among that patrol. It was far too easy to guess what they were feeling and thinking.

  The latest data from the satellite had also shown the warbird being worked on, panels removed, systems being replaced. The malware bombs must have torn apart a lot of the warbird’s equipment. It shouldn’t be rising anytime soon.

  She checked the status of the mortars that had been brought in last night and placed behind the hills. Mortar tubes had been very easy to manufacture. The projectiles had been a little harder but nothing really complicated. And the firing calculations had been extremely easy for engineers to program into the control pad that Mele held.

  The sensors that her team had planted fed through that control pad as well. A large red outline marked the firing zone that the mortars were set for. No matter what path Scatha’s patrol took to the hills, she would know when they were within the firing zone.

  Mele gestured to her small team, spread out on either side of her, giving a warning sign. Obi grinned. Grant nodded in reply.

  Scatha’s patrol began walking into the firing zone as Mele tapped to update the mortars’ firing solution.

  Mele waited until they were all inside the red lines, then tapped the firing command.

  The eight mortar tubes chuffed behind her, their rounds rising over the tops of the hills and plummeting down toward the patrol.

  This close, with mortars firing on a low trajectory, there wasn’t much warning time. The patrol’s battle armor spotted the incoming rounds, of course. With no time to run, all ten soldiers dropped onto their bellies for the only protection available out in the open.

  The mortar rounds fell until they were five meters above the patrol, then their warheads detonated, blasting out downward-focused cones of shrapnel.

  Mele was already running, her own eight-person team following as she topped the hill and ran down toward the patrol. She saw the mortar rounds detonate, the dirt around the patrol puffing up as the deadly fragments hit at velocities sufficient to penetrate the back of Brahma-made battle armor.

  It seemed to take far too long to reach the remains of the patrol. Mele started grabbing pulse rifles and grenades that the Scatha patrol no longer had any use for, passing them to her team as they caught up.

  Then they ran again, back toward the hills, the sensors on the hills warning that soldiers were boiling out of Scatha’s camp.

  Mele brought out the command pad and sent another firing signal.

  Eight more mortar tubes chuffed behind the hills in a staggered volley, throwing their rounds much farther than the first eight. The rounds began exploding close to the base, driving back the retaliatory pursuit.

  Scatha had mortars, too, the sort of professional military gear that could cause a lot of trouble. At extreme range, they could just hit the front edge of the hills. Mele’s command pad chirped to warn that those mortars had fired, aiming to hit her retreating team. “Even numbers, drop the packs!” she yelled to the rest of the team. “Everyone count to five, then run to your left!”

  The even-numbered members of the team shrugged off their backpacks, Mele barely waiting until the last one was down before hitting a third command that detonated them. Charges bounded a short distance upward around the team and exploded, throwing out clouds of full-spectrum chaff designed to blind sensors.

  Unfortunately, the chaff also made it very hard to see as Mele led her team through the dense fog that was only slowly settling as everyone ran off to the side of their earlier path. Mele heard mortar rounds detonating behind her as Scatha’s barrage went off blindly in the chaff.

  Another warning. Mele squinted at her control pad as the team ran through thinning chaff. Scatha had fired again, but this time was aiming at the mortar launch sites behind the hill. That was a by-the-books move, to take out the enemy’s artillery, but how had they managed the extra range? They must have used vehicles to rapidly move some of their mortars out into the area outside the base enough to gain the extra range. They couldn’t leave the mortars out there very long, exposed to whatever trick Glenlyon might hit them with next, but for the moment, Scatha’s commanders were mad enough to risk it so they could get in some shots at Mele’s force.

  But Mele breathed a sigh of relief. Scatha had no way of knowing that Glenlyon’s weapons were cheap single-use mortar tubes, and that all had expended their loads. The barrage would be wasted.

  Getting up the slope and through low places in the hills took all the endurance that Mele had. She kept pausing, though, to make sure every member of her team was still moving.

  Another warning. More Scatha rounds incoming, this time targeted on the team again. “Odd numbers, drop your packs, everyone jog right on the count of five!”

  Once again they stumbled through clouds of chaff, this time uphill.

  Coming out of the chaff, Mele only counted seven following her. “Grant! Lead everyone to the pickup point! I’ve already called the WinG!”

  Without waiting for a reply, she plunged back into the cloud, moving slowly enough to search around her.

  Mele found Obi lying where she had caught the edge of a mortar blast, one leg a bleeding ruin. Mele knelt to strap a tourniquet on Obi’s thigh, took a deep breath, then got under her, rose with Obi draped over her shoulders, and moved at the best pace she could into the hills.

  The WinG, which had been waiting just over the horizon, was already sliding to a halt near where the rest of the team waited. Scatha was firing individual mortar rounds blindly over the hills, raising the risk that a round might fall close enough to the WinG to target it. As Mele approached, Grant ordered the others into the WinG and ran back to help Mele carry Obi.

  The WinG was already starting to move again when Mele and Grant shoved Obi through the hatch and climbed in after her.

  A doctor had volunteered to come along this time. She had them carry Obi to the WinG’s emergency bed, while the craft shuddered along the ground and rose a meter into the air, leaving behind Scatha’s mortar barrage.

  Mele
collapsed into a seat nearby as the doctor and the emergency bed’s equipment worked to save Obi. Grant took the seat next to her, sweating heavily and breathing hard. “I’m getting too old for this,” Grant said.

  “You and me both,” Mele gasped.

  Eventually, the doctor stepped back, rubbing her eyes. “She should live. The leg is gone, though.”

  “Can you grow her a new one?” Mele asked.

  “Maybe. There are still some bugs with that technology. If we can’t make it work, there are prosthetics that are almost indistinguishable from the real thing.” The doctor sat down, too. “She’s not going to be doing this kind of work again anytime soon, though.”

  “Thanks, Doc.”

  “It could have been a lot worse,” Grant said.

  “Next time it probably will be,” Mele said.

  Chapter 13

  Carmen stopped at the door to her room, tired out from another long day of pretending to be an unofficial representative sent from Old Earth to save the new colonies. She wondered at what point a false story became real because enough people believed in it.

  But, tired as she was, Carmen went to check on Lochan Nakamura.

  He was still up, blinking wearily at her. “Hi. Is everything okay?”

  “Close enough,” Carmen said. “Why are you still awake?”

  “Going over everything we could find out about Warrior Class destroyers from the databases on Kosatka. I’m not the only person who’s been doing that since the news came in from Lares and apparently the same guys tried to do the same to Kosatka.” Lochan waved her to a seat, shaking his head. “You won’t believe one of the theories that’s going around.”

  Carmen sat down on the couch, yawning. “Try me.”

  “Did you know that in the later phases of testing the jump drives ships were sent out on long voyages? Multistar jumps as far as they could go before they had to turn back for fuel and food.” Lochan gave her a look that conveyed he was telling her the truth. “Two of the ships sent out were Warrior Class destroyers. One of those came back. The other one, which should have jumped to stars in this general region of space, disappeared. It never returned, so eventually the ship was written off as having been lost in an accident. But there isn’t any record of wreckage having been found drifting in any star systems or on any planets.”

  “So it got stuck in jump space? That’s awful. What does that—” Carmen stared at him. “Are you serious? People think it’s a ghost ship?”

  “No,” Lochan said. “The theory being floated is that the ship was captured by aliens, and now they’re using it to hit human colonies encroaching on their space.”

  She laughed. She couldn’t help it. “The intelligent aliens we still haven’t found any trace of? They are out here, still unseen, and using an old human warship to attack us? Wouldn’t they have ships of their own?”

  “Presumably,” Lochan said. “But if they are hiding from us, using one of our own ships would maintain their secrecy.” He raised a restraining palm toward Carmen. “I’m not believing this. I’m just telling you what other people are saying. But it’s impossible to refute at this point because the mystery ship didn’t communicate at all, and of course we couldn’t see inside it to see who the crew was.”

  Carmen leaned back on the sofa, gazing at the ceiling. “That would be comforting, wouldn’t it? The idea that the perpetrators of the atrocity at Lares weren’t human. Unfortunately, humans have proven themselves capable of worse things than what happened at Lares. And Glenlyon has also been attacked, in their case undeniably by another human-colonized star system.”

  “Yeah, but why would Scatha have hit star systems this far from it? Apulu isn’t that far off, and that Red you captured thinks the ones who hired her might have been from Apulu. If it was humans, Apulu is our number one suspect. That would make two human-colonized star systems out here that are making trouble for their neighbors.”

  “Kosatka wants me to accompany a delegation heading to Earth,” Carmen said. “There is a ship here that we can hop a ride on, then get further transportation as we go up toward the Old Colonies. They want to make sure we get the best deal we can on some former Earth Fleet warships.”

  Lochan looked at her in surprise, then nodded. “I can understand that. Are you going?”

  “Yes. How do you feel about that?”

  “Hell, Carmen, why do I have a say?”

  “Because we’re a team,” Carmen said. “We’ve been a team here on Kosatka, and we’ve done a good job as a team. But Kosatka would like you to stay here while I go back.”

  “You can handle Earth, can’t you?” Lochan asked. “I’ll take care of Kosatka until you get back. Besides, it’s about time for another younger woman to show up, tell me I make a great friend, and shove a weapon into my hand.”

  “Aren’t you afraid that the commander of Glenlyon’s ground forces wouldn’t like that?” Carmen teased, relieved that Lochan would be all right with her being gone for a while.

  “Mele Darcy?” Lochan laughed. “Wasn’t that amazing news? No, I’m lucky to have Mele as a friend, and I just hope she’s not taking on too much for her. You get back to Earth long enough to make sure Kosatka gets its hands on some decent firepower, then come back here and we’ll continue trying to save the galaxy.”

  “I’ll watch out for aliens,” Carmen said.

  • • •

  Mele Darcy had long ago given up on the idea of sleeping through the night. But it was still irritating to be rousted from sleep after midnight for a very important errand. Much worse was how little she wanted to carry out this particular errand.

  Lieutenant Rob Geary wasn’t at the apartment listed as his address, which didn’t surprise Mele. She suspected that Rob Geary hadn’t spent very much time in that apartment since being roped into command of Squall. Mele called up her official net interface, entered his locator code, then plugged it into the ground vehicle she was using.

  The vehicle stopped at an apartment complex. Mele got out, walked through the predawn stillness to the entry of the building, then followed the locator to Ninja’s address. She leaned on the doorbell.

  It took a few minutes before a bleary-eyed Ninja stuck her head out. “This had better be important.”

  “It is. Lieutenant Geary needs to get moving, fast.”

  “Why are you telling me?”

  “Don’t be cute, girlfriend. You forgot to hack his locator. It says he’s here.”

  Ninja sighed, nodded, and retreated. Mele waited impatiently until Rob Geary appeared at the door, showing every sign of having dressed rapidly. “What’s up?” he asked.

  “Big trouble has arrived in-system,” she said. “The council didn’t want to send word to you over the comm net because of worries about snoops. You’re needed on your ship. I’ll brief you on the way to the shuttle pad.”

  “Big trouble?” Rob Geary said.

  “Yeah.” Mele glanced toward Ninja. “Make it a proper good-bye.”

  He had some idea of what that implied, gazing at Mele for a long moment before turning to Ninja and holding her while he whispered in her ear.

  “Take care of yourself,” Ninja said. She and Rob Geary kissed, while Mele looked away and tried not to count the seconds ticking by.

  Farewells over, Rob followed Mele into the ground vehicle. She punched in the destination, then sat back, her eyes scanning the outside as the vehicle rolled through streets almost deserted at this hour.

  “Why did they send you?” Rob asked her.

  Mele didn’t take her eyes off the outside as she answered. “Based on the news you brought back from Kosatka, the council is worried that Scatha has slipped an assassin or two into Glenlyon. I’m your escort to the shuttle in the military sense as well as the guide sense.”

  “How bad is this?”

  She appreciated that he didn’t waste time
worrying about a possible assassin threat that she was already handling. “Two more ships showed up four and a half hours ago at one of the jump points. One is a freighter. The other is a warship. They’re not broadcasting ID, but the warship matches one in the Scatha databases we’ve captured. It’s a Sword Class destroyer.”

  “A destroyer?” Rob didn’t sound happy. “What are my orders? Did they tell you?”

  “Intercept and stop by any means necessary.” This time Mele did look away from the outside for a moment, catching his eye to reinforce her words. “The council is worried about what happened at Lares. They don’t want it happening here.”

  “Intercept and stop?” Rob Geary laughed softly, but he didn’t sound amused. “I can intercept, probably, but how the hell do I stop him? A Sword Class destroyer outguns and can outmaneuver the Squall. How do I beat a ship that is quicker and tougher than my own?”

  Mele shrugged. “If you can’t outgun them or outmaneuver them, then you have to outthink them.”

  “Sure. How do I do that?”

  “Sorry,” Mele said, not happy to be passing on such difficult orders to someone as decent as Rob Geary. “I mean that. I have no idea. Space combat is way outside my skill range. I’m sending some of my people up with you in case you get any boarding action. Grant Duncan’s in charge. He’s the best I can give you.”

  “Thanks.” Rob Geary stayed quiet for a little while as the vehicle rolled closer to the shuttle pad and silent, mostly dark buildings went by on either side. Mele kept her eyes on the passing structures and the streets. She had no idea who had thought of programming the heavy-construction designs to reflect a variety of architectural styles, but the result was that even though every brand-new building still looked brand-new, the overall impression of the city was of some age, as if it had been built over time as styles changed. Her gaze lingered on one building, imagining what would happen to it if a rock dropped from orbit by the Scatha warship impacted on that site.

  “Mele?” Rob said abruptly. “Would you do me a favor?”