Renegades (Expeditionary Force Book 7)

by Craig Alanson

  “Ayuh, that is good news. Plus, you know, now it won’t look suspicious that the first time the wormhole erupts like that is when the Maxolhx are here, because it has already done it. Can you program the module to do that again in, like, two months? Make it a lot less powerful the next time.”

  He was puzzled. “Those targets ships will not reach the Earth end of the wormhole in two months, Joe. They need a lot longer than that to get there, traveling the long way.”

  “I know that. Having the wormhole erupt multiple times will help sell the story that the thing is broken, and the Maxolhx just had epically bad luck to get in the way.”

  “Ah, got it. Finally, I will program it to erupt a third time, when the cover story says they are supposedly at the Earth end. Good idea, Joe. Hey, you know what? This mission has been fun. I love screwing with wormholes!”

  “Cool, glad you are happy. The module, power tap, neither of them were damaged?”

  “No, although it is a good thing we positioned the assembly as far away as we did.”

  We had a Maxolhx dropship, so we could plant a cover story in a relay station. We had pixies to communicate with and be granted access to a relay station so we could plant our cover story. We had a great, like, epic cover story that would ensure Earth would be free from aliens for the next couple hundred years. We had Earth’s wormhole on a timer to sell the cover story that a broken wormhole had destroyed or damaged the Maxolhx ships. We knew the exact route the target ships planned to use toward Earth, including pretty accurate timing until they went through the last wormhole. We knew, or Skippy was very confident, that the target ships would be sticking closely to their planned schedule, because they would be passing through territory controlled by the Rindhalu coalition and did not want to provoke any dangerous incidents. The planned schedule had been shared with the Rindhalu, who had not passed the info down their clients, so we could not have gotten the schedule from the Ruhar or Jeraptha or some source much easier than stealing pixies. Knowing that made me feel better, if we had gone through all the risk and effort to break into the pixie factory, and then learned the info we needed was available on the Ruhar version of Instagram, I would have been pissed.

  So, we had a lot of assets.

  We still did not have a plan for how our broken-down little former star carrier could destroy two powerful senior-species warships.

  Other than that, things were going just great.

  We, and by ‘we’ I mean every sentient being aboard the ship other than Skippy and Nagatha, had considered hundreds of plans, and none of them would work. Nagatha shot down some of our ideas before we could embarrass ourselves by asking Skippy; she knew enough about physics and the capabilities of Maxolhx ships to tell us why our ignorant notions were not practical. Avoiding yet another round of mockery from Skippy was good, still it somehow felt even more humiliating for Nagatha to kindly and gently but with a hint of mirth inform us over and over why one idea after another was not going to work. No offense to our ship’s resident AI, it felt like getting soundly beaten by a Triple-A baseball team rather than suffering an understandable defeat to a major-league club. Nagatha was super smart compared to any human, maybe compared to all of humanity combined. However, she was not Skippy, and in some cases, she thought an idea might have enough merit to pass it along to His Magnificence. Every time that happened, he mocked both us monkeys and Nagatha, which did not endear him to the crew. Mocking us was Ok, we were used to it. Mocking the AI he had unintentionally created was not cool, and he caught hell from the crew for being especially assholeish to Nagatha, which made him peevish and uncooperative.

  Like I said, things were going just great. We still had plenty of time before the target ships transited through the last wormhole in Ruhar space and began their long, lonely journey to the wormhole near Earth. We knew from their secret orders that the ships were instructed to at least pass through humanity’s home star system, to see what kind of mischief the Kristang there had gotten into. Interestingly, those ships had been instructed not to reveal their presence to beings on Earth, Skippy thought that order was for the purpose of ensuring the ships did not interfere with any evidence of bad behavior by the Kristang. If the ships detected the Kristang had violated any of The Rules, their government would pass the data to the Rindhalu along with an invitation for a joint investigation.

  On their way to the last wormhole in Ruhar space, the ships had a strict schedule. After transiting through that wormhole, the task force commander had freedom to adjust course for refueling or to explore as she saw fit, within reason. For our purpose of destroying those ships, we needed to hit them before they plunged through that last wormhole, and we lost advanced knowledge of where and when they would be.

  Technically, we did not have almost twenty days to act. The beat-up Flying Dutchman could not travel as quickly as the high-tech Maxolhx ships, so we had to decide where to attack them and take a wormhole short cut to get there. Without having a plan for how to attack those ships, we could not decide where to attempt intercepting them.

  For my part, I tried everything that had worked for me in past to dream up a good plan. This time, nothing worked. Lifting weights or running in the gym, taking a shift in the galley, practicing flight maneuvers in a simulator or a real dropship while the ship recharged for a jump, none of those trusty techniques provided inspiration for a plan.

  We were running out of time. Each morning, Skippy woke me up by cheerily informing me how few days we had remaining. He took special glee in telling me about prime ambush spots the target ships had flown past, reducing our options further.

  Since my stupid brain was not doing anything useful, I went to my office to grind my way through a task I hated; writing mission summary reports. Why the Army required me to document everything we did, significant or not, I did not understand. Whenever we returned to Earth, I was subjected to endless questions that would not have been necessary if the officials would simply read the freakin’ report. My reports were not the only source of information about our activities, Simms and Smythe and every other officer aboard the ship had their own reports to file, and many of the engineering team kept logs or diaries or whatever you want to call them. Technically, we were renegade pirates so I did not have to write reports, but since I was hoping to be reinstated, I followed the regulations.

  Because I like to think of myself as an honest person, and because the Army and UNEF and whoever would catch me if I fudged or even glossed over the harsh truth, and mostly because Skippy would gleefully rat me out anyway, I stuck as close to the truth as I could recall in my reports. That meant being brutally honest about the many things did not work as well as the rare things that went according to plan. It also meant I explained in detail why we had to do things a certain way, because I knew the audience on Earth would second-guess every decision I made. Like, for example, I explained why, to make a cavern we could jump a dropship into with relative safety, we had to-

  “Holy shit,” I breathed, gasping so hard I kind of choked. “Skippy!”

  “Oh,” his avatar was groaning while it glowed into life. “What is it this time? I have stopped eavesdropping on your conversations with Nagatha, because I prefer to be surprised- when I say ‘surprised’ I mean ‘amused’- by whatever idiotic, ignorant and blatantly uninformed idea you wish to waste my time with. Really, Joe, you and your barrel of monkeys are not even putting effort into dreaming up a plan to entertain me, your ideas are so lame. It feels like you have given up and are just phoning it in-”

  “Uh huh, yeah, monkeys are worthless blah blah blah. Listen-”

  “You dare interrupt me,” his avatar jammed its tiny hands on its hips in indignation. “Yet all you do is agree that your species is so dumb that-”

  “I’ll take a raincheck on your scorn, Ok? You need to hear this, this plan will work.”

  “Riiiiiiight.” He winked and gave me an ironic thumbs up. “Your confidence is based on the hundreds of other failed ideas you also though
t would work?”

  “Those ideas had the fatal flaw of being thought up by a monkey. This one is your idea, Oh Magnificent One.”

  “Um, what?” He sputtered. “When did I gave you an idea? If I did, then of course it is a pure stroke of genius, so I can’t-”

  “You didn’t exactly give this idea to me, it is more like something you warned me never, ever to do.”

  “Huh. I warned you not to do whatever this is, yet you now think it is a great idea?”

  “Yup.” I picked up a tennis ball, tossed it to bounce off the wall and right through his avatar on the desk back to me. He hated when I did that, it was my way of getting back at him for being rude to Nagatha. “It is a great idea.”

  “Ok,” he crossed his arms. “This I have to hear.”

  Five minutes later, his avatar was looking more scared than merely skeptical. “Joe, there is a very good reason I warned you against ever even thinking about trying a whacky stunt like this.”

  “Uh huh. So, we shouldn’t do it?”

  “No! Yes. Oh, what the hell,” he threw up his arms, “why not? I am warning you,” he wagged a finger at me, “if this blows up in our faces, it will be all your fault.”

  “I’m good with that, Skippy. Hey, do you want to yell at me now for being a complete and utter moron?”

  “Why would I do that? It is so much more fun to yell at you after a disaster, when you are already hating yourself for being the biggest idiot who ever lived.”

  “True, and that is so much more rewarding for me too. But, if this stunt does fail, it will fail in spectacular fashion, and I won’t be around for you to yell at.”

  “Oooh, good point,” he pondered with his chin in one hand. “Ok, give me a moment, I’m thinking up some particularly juicy insults.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Deciding what data to put in the fake report had been kind of a chicken-and-egg problem. It was not practical for us to hang around a data relay station until the date when the lone, damaged Maxolhx ship supposedly stopped there on its way back from Earth. Plus, we needed to make the Earth wormhole have a violent reaction on a date that matched when that ‘accident’ was recorded in our fake report. Finding an extra wormhole controller, and a super-duper Elder battery to power it, had solved the problem of making the wormhole erupt on the date in the fake report, and the Flying Dutchman did not have to be there or even exist at that time. If our Frankenship was destroyed in the coming battle, our mission would still be successful and Earth would be safe, although the people of our home planet would not know that. All we needed to do was upload the cover story report to a relay station, on a timer to be released at a time when a damaged ship traveling back from Earth plausibly could have been there. And then, you know, actually kill two massively powerful senior-species warships.

  We approached the chosen data relay station by jumping in twenty lightminutes away, to scope out the place before committing to action. Skippy made our jump signature look like a Maxolhx light cruiser, a type of ship that often traveled alone. More importantly, light cruisers were the favorite ship for clandestine missions, so it would not be surprising if we had to jump away without contacting the relay station. That would not matter anyway.

  Except it did.

  “Uh oh, Joe. We got a problem.”

  “I do not like hearing about problems, Skippy. Someday, I might shoot the messenger.”

  “Not this time. There is a Maxolhx Fleet Auxiliary ship parked at that relay station. My guess is the station is undergoing a maintenance cycle, or an upgrade.”

  “Shit! You didn’t know about this?”

  “No, Joe,” he had gotten better at using sarcasm. “Shockingly, I did not download every possible yottabyte of data about mundane details of Maxolhx operations. I had to be specific with the data request back then, dumdum.”

  “Do you have any idea how long that ship will be there?”

  “Zero idea, Joe. We are twenty lightminutes away, so that ship could have departed already, or it might be there for another month. One thing is for certain; if we hang around here for long without contacting the relay station, that will look suspicious.”

  “Crap! Ok, Ok, you’re right. Sami, I mean,” I blushed, “Reed, Jump Option Charlie.”

  We jumped away and I thumped a fist into my forehead. Why could not one freakin’ thing ever be simple for us? “This sucks.”

  “Indeed it does, Joe,” Skippy agreed. “Time to put your thinking cap on, again.”

  “Sure, what the hell, why not? Uh, um, show me that map of possible routes from Earth to the home base for those Maxolhx ships. Not all possible routes, just the ones a crippled ship might likely take.”

  “This time, I might know what you are thinking,” Skippy announced happily. “Unfortunately, it won’t work. The most likely routes all go through this wormhole, here,” he highlighted that area on the display. “From that wormhole, the data relay station we just tried to contact is the only logical one for a crippled ship to contact. The other stations are too far away.”

  “Yeah, yeah, got that. Um, what if the ship did not go through that particular wormhole?”

  “Logically, the ship would have gone through that-”

  “Indulge me, please. Pretend that wormhole doesn’t exist.”

  “Oh for- Ugh. Fine. Here, this is what the star map looks like, in an alternate universe where that wormhole doesn’t exist and little Joey eats all his vegetables.”

  “I always eat my vegetables.”

  “Putting maple syrup on your Brussels sprouts so you can eat them doesn’t count.”

  “Maple syrup is delicious and loaded with antioxidants, according to the Maple Syrup Council,” I added, arguing with him on autopilot because I was studying the revised star map. “That route you have highlighted in orange, it is the least-risky path a crippled ship might fly, if the other wormhole wasn’t available?”

  “Yes,” he sniffed. “Could I point out the teensy weensy detail that the other wormhole is available?”

  “No, you may not.”

  “Ugh. This is the real world, Joe, without unicorns or Santa Claus. You are such a-”

  “That thing you did to the other wormholes, where you made them go crazy, you’re going to do the same thing to the wormhole you say the crippled ship should logically go through.”

  “Ok, um, can I ask why?”

  “Because, that ship already got burned by the wormhole near Earth acting strangely. The crew would not risk going through another funky wormhole, they would fly around it.”

  “Ok, Ok, hmmm, that make sense, damn it. Oooh, I hate you so much.”

  “Ayuh, can you do it?”

  “Yeah, I can do that.”

  “Outstanding.”

  “Joe, to be clear, screwing with wormholes is what got us into this mess. You are proposing that more screwing with wormholes is the answer?”

  “Ayuh. Screwing with them in the right way, for the right reason, is the answer.”

  “Much as I hate to say it, I agree with you. Of course, I agreed when you first suggested screwing with wormholes, and that was a freakin’ disaster for you monkeys, so-”

  “Yeah,” I was worried that my latest brilliant idea might turn out to be brilliant only in the short term, and doom for humanity in the long run. Unfortunately, as usual there wasn’t time to think long and hard about it, without making the short-term problem worse. “By going through the second-choice wormhole, what is the first relay station that ship would encounter?”

  “This one,” a blue light began blinking on the display. “To anticipate your next question, it also is an automated relay station.”

  “Nagatha, set course for that second-choice relay station, please.”

  “Yes, dear,” she responded cheerfully. “Should I mention that Skippy will need to change the fake report, to match the revised course the crippled ship supposedly flew?”

  “No, you do not need to remind me,” Skippy snapped. “I already did th
at.”

  “Really?” Nagatha’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “I looked at the report a moment ago, and it still showed-”

  “I meant, I am doing it now,” the beer can grumbled.

  “Of course, Skippy dear. We believe you.”

  “Oh shut up.”

  Planting the fake report was easier than downloading the flightplans from the first relay station we boarded, we already had a functional set of pixies that identified us as an authorized Maxolhx destroyer. That particular destroyer was of course not anywhere near that relay station, but Skippy would erase any trace of our presence. When I went aboard the relay station, my mouth was not even dry as dust like the first time, which demonstrated the confidence I had in our friendly local beer can. The whole procedure took less than an hour, and we had a bit of luck; that relay station had been upgraded four months before we arrived, and there was not another upgrade or even an inspection scheduled for another seven years. That was plenty of time for the station’s AI to deliver the cover story message, then erase all trace that Skippy had ever hacked into it. We got the job done quickly, and soon we jumped away to go screw with more wormholes to help sell the cover story.

  After that, my plan was to stop screwing around, and go kill a pair of unsuspecting ships.

  “Joe, I warned you never ever to do something like this,” Skippy protested.

  “Uh huh, you might have mentioned that once or twice or a million freakin’ times. Will you shut up about it, please? Will this work or not?”

  “I can confidently predict a solid, a solid shamybe. Well, maybe sort of a soft and squishy shmaybe, if you prefer the truth. Kind of a shmaybe that was once solid and had nice sharp edges, but is now worn away and falling apart like a sad little bar of soap that has spent waaaay too much time sitting on a shelf in your shower while you pleasure your-”