Imperium Restored, page 11
“Greedy,” she said.
Sula gave a shiver. “Nasty thing,” she said. “We should clean up the blood.”
Mazankosi licked her finger experimentally. “Hard to get rid of it all,” she said.
There was a scrub brush in Sula’s hand. She dropped to her knees on the green, spongy ground. The scent of blood seemed to clog the back of Sula’s throat. With both hands she began scrubbing, bristles tearing at the mossy vegetation. The blood had soaked deep into the ground, and there was a lot of it. More vine tendrils snaked toward her.
“Poor Earthgirl,” said a voice. Sula looked up sharply, and found Caro Sula standing by Mazankosi’s side. Looking at Caro was like looking into a mirror: the same emerald eyes, the same porcelain complexion, the same silver-gilt hair.
“Earthgirl always gets the dirty jobs,” Caro said. “Why is that?”
“Greedy,” said Mazankosi. She licked her finger again.
Sula returned to her scrubbing. Her breath grated in her throat.
Blood dripped from the bristles of Sula’s brush, welled up between her fingers. “Where’s it all coming from?” she asked.
“Someone’s heart, I suppose,” said Mazankosi. Sula looked up and saw that Mazankosi’s pale blue eyes were now a darker, more intense blue, like chips of sapphire. As blue as Lamey’s eyes.
“Earthgirl’s heart got broken,” Caro said. “The blood might be hers.”
“No,” said Mazankosi. “It’s her friend’s.”
“Which friend?”
“There are so many to choose from,” said Mazankosi. “And they all ended up bleeding.” She spoke with the voice of Gareth Martinez.
One of the vines wrapped around Sula’s wrist. She could see the vine pulsing as it drew blood through the piercing thorns.
Sula could feel cold horror crawling up her spine, a scream rising in her throat . . .
“My lady! A message, Lady Fleetcom!”
Sula stared up into the face of Ricci, her signals lieutenant.
“Yes?” she said, and hoped she hadn’t been screaming.
“You’ve been asleep,” Ricci said. “Sen-thar has sent another message.” His soothing baritone had never been more welcome.
The dream and its terrors withdrew slowly from Sula’s mind, and she suspected that the dream’s thorns were still firmly implanted in her psyche, and that she’d revisit the nightmare world ere long. She took a long, deliberate breath against the heavy gravity.
“Thank you,” she said. “Let’s see the message.”
Sen-thar appeared on the display. Nictating membranes half-covered his golden eyes.
“Lady Sula,” he said. “My staff has been analyzing your rather impressive armada, and we have come to realize that there is no First Battleship Squadron. The drive signatures are those of large transports. Other ships would seem to be smaller civilian ships, and a large percentage of your ships are decoys. We can confirm only two drive signatures as belonging to actual warships.” The nictating membranes rolled off his eyes. “Perhaps you should surrender to me, Lady Sula. Or at least get out of my way. End message.”
As the orange end-stamp filled the screen, silence reigned in the small beige room.
Bluff called, Sula thought. But there were more bluffs within the bluff.
She looked at the chronometer and saw that it would still be eleven hours before the two forces met at a hypothetical point in empty space. Of course, the encounter would be over before any such meeting took place.
Yet there was no time like the present to make her point.
“Message to all ships,” she said. “Prepare for Ghost Tactics. Commence standard pattern centered on Pride of Parkhurst six minutes from now—mark.” Then she felt the corners of her lips turn up in what she was confident was a self-satisfied, knowing smile. “Splendid and Mentor, prepare to release missiles.”
The six minutes sped by on the chronometer, and then Sula felt a tug on her inner ear as Splendid shifted course and began to move in accordance with the unpredictable patterns of Ghost Tactics. She looked at her displays and saw the other ships begin to slot themselves into the pattern, and she knew that the weapons stations on Splendid and Mentor were busying themselves shifting the decoys into place. The pattern was centered on Pride of Parkhurst because Parkhurst was masquerading as the flagship, and the others would be doing their best to protect it.
And what would the enemy see? That the Ninth Division was neither offering to surrender nor get out of the way, but was prepared for combat.
Sula waited to see whether any of her command botched the shift into the Ghost Tactics pattern and saw they were performing well enough—it was necessary only to follow a formula, after all, and even a civilian pilot could do that.
“Message to Splendid and Mentor,” she said. “Commence releasing missiles. Form the missiles into a defensive halo.”
At which point missiles began appearing on the displays, hundreds of them—fired not from the warships’ batteries, but apparently from Parkhurst and the other two giant transports that formed the purely notional Battleship Squadron One.
She could only imagine the horror that would flood Sen-thar’s mind as he saw the long strings of missile flares racing from the ships he had just denounced as mere transports. In Sula’s imagination, he recoiled from the display while shouting, like a villain in a melodrama, “What witchery is this?”
My witchery, Sula answered silently. And you have no idea how the magic was done.
The transports had not a single working missile tube. The missiles had been fired by Splendid and Mentor on the other side of the wormhole gate—they’d depleted their magazines by half—and then the missiles had been marshaled into small squadrons that rode alongside the big transports, like satellites orbiting their primaries. The missiles had duplicated the big ships’ maneuvers, and Sula was reasonably confident their much smaller drive flares would have been invisible against the vast blaze of the transports’ massive drives.
Sula closed her eyes and tried to relax into her acceleration couch. She felt a tug on her inner ear as Splendid performed a small shift in its trajectory, to make it harder for the enemy to score a hit with beam weapons. The apparent missile launches were her last bluff, and if Sen-thar didn’t surrender, she would have to fight at a severe disadvantage.
She would, she thought, make use of the fact that Sen-thar’s ships were shooting toward her and would overtake and pass Division Nine unless they did some very hard decelerations. She’d form all those missiles that now orbited Division Nine into several waves and send them ducking and dodging toward Sen-thar. The first wave of missiles would fall victim to antiproton beams and countermissiles, but their hot expanding fireballs would overlap and provide an opaque radio wall between Sen-thar’s and Sula’s ships until the fireballs expanded and cooled. Neither side would be able to see the other, but Sen-thar would be flying into the fireballs, and Sula would be flying away. Sen-thar wouldn’t see the next set of missiles coming, and his defenses would have less and less time to acquire targets—and every time they destroyed an attacking missile, they would only add to the radio confusion that blinded them.
In the end, Sula thought, she’d need only three hits—and each hit would weaken the enemy’s defenses and make the next hit more likely.
She thought she’d stand a fair chance of winning the fight, and if not, she’d have to be satisfied with the knowledge that she’d frightened the hell out of the enemy—though of course the satisfaction would hardly last, because she and her division would be wiped out.
Everything dies, she reminded herself. Nothing matters.
Time passed, and Sula drowsed, worked out battle plans, and drowsed again. She looked at the chronometer and decided it was about time to send the crews to general quarters.
“My lady,” said Ricci. “Another message from Sen-thar.”
Sula’s heart gave a surge. The message would be surrender or defiance. It all came down to this moment.
“Let’s see it,” she said.
Sen-thar appeared. He’d changed from the fatigues jumpsuit into full dress, buttons and rank badges glittering. His expression was so fierce, golden eyes glaring, that Sula’s spirits sank. Battle after all.
“Lady Sula,” he said. “After a conference with my captains, we concluded that our only hope of avoiding unnecessary loss of life is to accept your offer of surrender. We trust that your offer of honorable treatment is genuine, and we now await your orders. End message.”
The flag officer’s station burst into cheers and laughter, which—as the message had been sent in the clear—was no doubt being echoed in every command and communications room in Division Nine.
Conference with my captains, Sula thought, and grinned. Committees almost inevitably chose the least bold course, and Sen-thar had been clever enough to make sure the responsibility for the decision to surrender was spread out among his fellow captains.
Which wouldn’t prevent any of them from execution if the Zanshaa government got its hands on them.
After the celebration in the flag officer’s station died away, Sula composed herself to reply.
“Captain Sen-thar,” she said. “I hope this moment signals the beginning of a true partnership to rebuild the empire. Kindly fire your entire supply of missiles in a neutral direction and set them to explode at a safe distance. Be aware that we will be counting every single missile and every single explosion.
“Prepare also to receive shuttles that will transport new crews to your vessels, and which will take you to your new quarters. I shall look forward to making your acquaintance, and that of your officers. Message ends.”
And now, Sula thought, she had to make all that happen.
While fountains of missiles raced from the Lai-own ships to blaze in the darkness like a vast array of fireworks, she arranged to send experienced crew to each of the enemy vessels, along with a much larger number of recruits. Two lieutenants from Splendid, and one from Mentor, would now be appointed acting captains.
She also sent armed members of the military constabulary, including a squad under the command of Macnamara, to make certain that order was maintained and that her commands were obeyed.
Splendid and Mentor would retrieve their own missiles only after the enemy ships were securely under Sula’s control.
Officers, she decided, would be held in captivity on the Pride of Parkhurst, and the enlisted evenly split between the other two big transports. She arranged that in whatever quarters they were housed, there would be sufficient guards to keep them from mischief.
And then it occurred to Sula that she should probably tell her superiors what had happened. The crew of the wormhole station would have reported back through Zarafan on whatever they had seen, but they were observers, not participants, and it was time to make her triumph official.
She sent her report to Michi Chen, who would doubtless forward it to Wei Jian if Jian had managed to win the contest over who would command the forces of the Restoration. Sula sent it by way of the Fourth Fleet flagship and used the command cipher, which would allow Gareth Martinez to read the message as he forwarded it on, so that he could inform the Fourth Fleet of her victory.
“Lady Fleetcom,” Sula said, “I am pleased to announce victory in the bloodless Second Battle of Colamote. Senior Captain Sen-thar surrendered his three heavy cruisers rather than face extinction by Battleship Squadron One and its formidable escorts. We now have three more warships to add to the forces of the Restoration. I will send crews aboard immediately and begin training and integration.”
She offered the camera a self-satisfied look. “The wormhole station to Antopone is still in enemy hands,” she said, “so a report is undoubtedly now on its way to Zanshaa. We can hope that news of the loss will cause the enemy to overreact and do something foolish. End message.”
The message was enciphered and shot away at the speed of light. “Message to all Division Nine,” she said. “Reduce deceleration to point eight gravities. Maintain a high state of alert in Command and on weapons stations, but others may continue their normal duties and take their meals on schedule.”
When the gravity eased, she tipped her cage forward and rose to her feet.
“Message from Fleetcom Martinez,” Viswan said. “It uses the command cipher, so you’ll have to decipher it yourself.”
Sula returned to her couch and slotted her command key into the signals display. The brief message was deciphered in only a few seconds.
I’ll look forward to your report, so I’ll know just how badly you thrashed them.
She played the message twice, and at the sight of Martinez she felt a flush prickle across her skin.
At least, for once, he had expressed confidence in her judgment.
She climbed out of her acceleration cage and set out for her quarters. It was time to celebrate, she thought, and in her pantry there was an interesting-looking bottle of brandy to help her do it.
A weird elation possessed Martinez as he trudged back to his quarters with his helmet under his arm. That morning’s exercise split the Fourth Fleet into two forces that battled each other, and for the first time Sula’s scheme to predict outcomes for ships using the Martinez Method had worked—for one side, though not the other.
Martinez had commanded the side that lost, but that didn’t bother him as much as it might. His own ship had been destroyed by virtual missiles relatively early in the exercise, which meant he spent the rest of the time watching the battle unfold. The enemy missiles seemed to know just where his own ships were bound even when they were concealed by the exploding radio blooms, and even though most of the missiles were destroyed, they just kept coming, so accurate that it was impossible to swat them all.
Ranssu Kangas, who commanded the other side, had won his first virtual victory and proved it was possible, after all, to predict where the Method was going to take the other side’s ships. The trick, of course, was to do it consistently, and so far the odds were not encouraging.
Yet Sula had pointed out that even wrong guesses produced data, and that the data could be employed in future exercises. And the fact that the predictions had worked once gave Martinez hope that they would work again.
At the thought of Sula, anxiety began to gnaw at his nerves with sharp little teeth. Whatever had happened in Colamote, he should be receiving word of it about now, if not from Sula, then from the wormhole station.
While he had been fighting his mock battle, she had been fighting a real one, and if it had gone against her, she would have been blasted into subatomic particles and scattered across the solar wind. He felt tension drawing a hard, fierce line across his shoulder blades.
Mpanza met Martinez in his quarters and helped him draw off the upper part of his vacuum suit. The lower part contained all the sanitary attachments, and Martinez removed those himself.
“I’m very sorry that we lost, my lord,” Mpanza said.
“I’m not,” Martinez said. “The way we lost was . . . illuminating.”
“Was it?” Mpanza’s eyebrows rose. “Well . . . that’s good, my lord.”
After wearing his vac suit, Martinez always washed away the scent of disinfectant and suit seals, so Mpanza helped Martinez into a dressing gown for his brief walk to the shower.
“What are our chances for the next round of the Fleet Quiz?” Martinez asked.
“Rigger Cusi is confident,” Mpanza said, “but he wishes someone on the team were more confident on history.”
“Much of our history seems to be fiction, anyway,” Martinez said. “Or covered up, like what happened to the Lorkin.”
Martinez had been trying to provide diversion for his crews, to make the seemingly endless time on shipboard less dull and depressing. His first attempts were all competitions—he knew the crews were competitive anyway, and already competed in the fleet exercises. The Fleet Quiz had just started, with each ship fielding a team of six enlisted, answering questions on music, popular entertainment, history, science, sports, and stars and planets of the empire. The questions were submitted by officers, then distributed randomly among the various ships.
So far, the first round had eliminated half the teams, and there would be a new round every three days until a winner was declared.
Other contests were in the planning stages. There would be a gymkhana for pinnace pilots, each pilot trying to put her fast, nimble little vessel through a complex series of maneuvers in the smallest amount of time. There would be competitions in board games and video games. A talent contest had been announced, but the first event wouldn’t take place for another five or six days, to give the talent a chance to rehearse.
There was talk of clearing away the tables and benches of the crews’ messes to allow room for a dancing competition.
Other suggestions had been made and were under consideration, though Martinez had no difficulty saying no to numerous requests for drinking contests. Let the recruits puke themselves on their own time.
Martinez walked toward the shower, then looked at the Torminels on the walls and grimaced. In the more public areas of his quarters the Torminels were wrestling, but in his bedroom the murals were frank pornography.
And then he had a better idea.
“What do you think of an art competition?” he said.
Mpanza looked at him in surprise.
“The winner gets to redecorate my quarters,” Martinez said.
Mpanza offered a thoughtful glance at the tangled Torminels on the walls. “Whoever wins could scarcely do worse,” he said.
“Exactly my thought.”
At that moment Martinez’s sleeve display gave a chirp, and he felt his anxiety leap. His tunic was hanging on a wall hook, and Martinez took two quick steps to it, then picked up the sleeve and triggered the display.
“Yes?” he said.
Banerjee’s grandmotherly face looked out at him. “Message from Lady Sula, my lord,” she said. “In the command cipher.”
