“Kris, we're getting the
Hornet
's take,” Nelly reported. “The boffins are already working on it. I've got my kids on it as well.”
“All of them?” Kris said. “Even Dada?”
“Yes, Kris. And Cara knows about our situation. She's been peeking through the front door of the Forward Lounge for the last ten minutes.”
Sure enough, the two swinging doors into the lounge were showing a crack. Cara was lying on her belly, furtively watching them.
“We
have
to get that child a battle station.” Kris sighed.
“Really!” Cara said, jumping to her feet.
“In the scullery,” the colonel grumbled.
“I can do more than that,” Cara insisted.
Kris stared at the overhead; to the best of her knowledge, there were no standard operating procedures for getting into a war with space aliens. The Navy had a standard answer to almost everything else imaginable, but not this.
A hasty review of her actions did not make her proud. She'd bobbled her start out of the gate. She should have thought to go to General Quarters immediately, and not needed Jack to remind her. The order and counterorder to the
Mercury
were more of an embarrassment than a mistake. Still, what she'd done since felt right.
“Okay, folks, let's get organized. Phil, bring the
Hornet
down to join the fleet.
Hermes
, come alongside the
Wasp
and take aboard our gizmo for peeking into the next system. No, hold it. That won't work,” Kris caught herself. “The
Hornet
was doing fifty thousand klicks per hour, and the periscope only shows you what's in the closest system.
“
Hermes
, get the coordinates from Commander Taussig and jack yourself up to maximum gees and duck back into his last system. I'd like a report on whether anything is behind him.”
“Do you think that's smart?” Admiral Krätz asked.
“We can either sit here wondering if hostiles are going to come charging through that jump point or we can go look,” Kris snapped.
“Or we can get up speed and get out of here ourselves,” the Greenfeld officer suggested.
Kris did a quick and silent survey of the people whose opinion she valued. None of them looked interested in hiding under the bed.
“As I've said many times before, Admiral, you are free to do what you wish with your battle squadron. I reserve the right to do with PatRon 10 what I choose. Nelly, see that
Hermes
gets under way for a fast run into
Hornet
's last system of call and return.”
“Could you at least see that the
Hermes
's computers are rigged for destruction,” Admiral Channing said. “I would suggest that we all prepare our navigational systems to assure that if we fall in battle. our enemy will be unable to extract navigational information from our wreckage. That ship that attacked the
Wasp
certainly made sure that we could draw nothing from its databases.”
“That sounds defeatist,” was Admiral Krätz's observation.
“It's only defeatist until somebody defeats us. Then it sounds pretty smart,” Admiral KÅta said. “I'll have my division heads draw up a list of what should be rigged for complete destruction. We'll also put it on a fail-safe to make sure we don't have any accidents.”
“I'll also have the remaining two courier ships see that all reaction tanks are topped off,” Kris said. “We may need to run for it in a hurry.”
KRIS, SHOULD WE TELL THE OTHER ADMIRALS WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT THE FUZZY JUMPS? IF WE HAVE TO LEAD THEM INTO ONE OF THEM TO GET AWAY FROM THE ALIENS, IT MIGHT HELP IF THEY KNEW WHAT WE WERE DOING BEFOREHAND.
THAT COULD WELL BE A SMART MOVE, NELLY, BUT IT ALSO MEANS GIVING AWAY SOMETHING I'M NOT SURE I WANT TO GIVE. I'D RATHER KEEP THAT ACE UP MY SLEEVE FOR A WHILE LONGER.
WE MAY NEED THOSE FUZZY JUMPS, KRIS, TO GET OUT OF A BIG MESS.
NELLY, WE DON'T KNOW IF THE ALIENS ALREADY KNOW ABOUT THE FUZZY JUMPS. AND IF THEY DON'T, I DON'T WANT TO LET THEM SEE US VANISH INTO SPACE THAT HOLDS NO SUCH OPTION TO THEM.
I FEAR THAT WE WILL HAVE SOME REALLY TOUGH DECISIONS AHEAD OF US, KRIS.
TRUST ME, NELLY, I KNOW THAT WE DO.
Jack cleared his throat. “Could I ask you, Commander, to rethink one of your recent orders?
“Jack, you're going all formal on me,” Kris said.
He shook his head. “I don't think we should send the
Hermes
out.”
“I'm afraid that I agree with your Marine,” Colonel Cortez said.
“Both of you don't think we need to know what's coming this way?” Kris said.
“We need to be able to kill anything that jumps through after the
Hornet
,” Jack said, “but no, Kris, I don't think we need to leave a bigger trail pointing at that jump point.”
“It would be nice to know if something is following him,” Kris said.
“Certainly,” the colonel agreed. “Is there any chance that your boffins might be able to get their jump-point periscope working so we could peek through?”
“Nelly, get Professor mFumbo,” Kris said.
“I'm busy,” he snapped a second later. “There are several approaches that might crack these images, but right now, none of them have worked.”
“Quick question, Professor,” Kris said. “So far the jump-point periscope has only succeeded in showing us the closest other side of the jump point. Any chance we could dial it around to show us some of the other systems connecting through the jump point?”
“Like the seven-hundred-light-year-away system that the
Hornet
just left?”
“Exactly, Professor.”
“Sorry. Not a chance. Our grasp on what we're doing is very tenuous, Your Highness. I see why you would want some selection in your view, but we can't offer it at this time. I don't know if we'll ever be able to give you that.”
“Thank you, Professor. You can get back to your other assignment.”
The link clicked dead.
“Okay, if we can't do that, could we bushwhack them as they enter our system at speed?” Jack asked.
“Like we think they have been doing our scout ships,” Ron said.
The admirals were still on-screen, but all had turned away to consult with their staffs.
“Admiral Krätz, you said that during the last war no one ever thought of stationing ships at the jump point and shooting up anything that came out.”
The Greenfeld officer turned away from his officers to face Kris. “Yes. You could never tell when a jump point might take it into its head to zig or zag. Far too dangerous for the ship. And much too exhausting to the crew of the ship to be floating in microgee for weeks at a time. The health of the crew requires that we tie up to a station for some gravity at regular intervals. That's also why we usually accelerate at one gee, young lady.”
“Admiral, I believe that the 18-inch lasers on your battleships now have triple the range of the guns we used back then. So you don't have to get real close to the jump point to clobber anything coming out of it. Your battle squadron is also not tied up to a space station pier just now, but . . .” Kris said, and waited for a light to dawn.
The admiral said several phrases in a language Kris didn't understand.
YOU WANT ME TO TRANSLATE, KRIS?
NO, NELLY. I SUSPECT I HAVE A PRETTY GOOD IDEA WHAT HE'S SAYING.
The admiral fell quiet, fixing Kris with a scowl. “ And I imagine that you want me to take my battle squadron over to that jump point and take station to engage anything that exits it.”
“It strikes me as a brilliant use of your invention.”
“I would rather evacuate this system.”
“I am not ready to leave.”
“Young woman, you have no respect for rank, or your elders.”
“I'm sorry you feel that way, sir, but I must represent the interests of the United Society as it is given me to see them. I have a ship not yet in from what is turning out to be a very hostile neighborhood of the galaxy. You are free to leave, sir. However, if you choose to stay, may I suggest that you take your four battleships over to where you may apply your 18-inch lasers to anything that exits Jump Point Delta.”
“That will take me farther away from the exit jump, Longknife.”
“For God's sakes, Georg,” Admiral Channing snapped. “If you don't want to do what needs doing, KÅta and I will take our ships over there. Though, Lord knows, you've got the biggest guns in the fleet.”
“I go. I go. Captain, send to BatRon 12, to keep the little Longknife girl happy, we will set up a prepared defense thirty thousand kilometers from Jump Point Dora. There. Are you happy?”
“Thank you very much,” Kris said, taking care to keep her tone as sincere as the law allowed.
Kris leaned back in her seat and thought seriously about ordering a drink. Clearly, it had been one of those days. She sighed and fought down the temptation, consoling herself with the thought that it couldn't get any worse than this.
“Ah, Kris.”
“Yes, Nelly.”
“The
Intrepid
just jumped in system. He says you really want to hear what he has to say.
Kris groaned, and just managed to avoid giving voice to something that would not have been very princesslike.
“Put him on. Admirals, you might want to hear this.”
28
“We found a new alien civilization,” the skipper of the
Intrepid
announced, breathless with joy. “I think we were there when they sent up their very first artificial satellite. I mean, there was nothing up in orbit, then there was this little thing going beep, beep, beep.”
“Did you get any pictures of these aliens?” Kris asked.
“Yes. They had radio and TV. Primitive sets. We had no trouble translating the pictures, but we have no idea what they were saying. Well, some. What passed for news had a lot on it about the satellite launch. At least, we think it did.”
“Please pass your data capture to the
Wasp
,” Kris said, keeping her voice even, but she sounded tired even to herself.
The captain seemed startled to have his news taken in with no more excitement than they were giving it. “Is something wrong?”
“The
Hornet
found what we think is a bug-eyed monster's mother ship. It's huge, and they look to be totally nasty.”
“Oh. Well, this
was
a voyage of discovery. Looks like we made quite a few good ones.”
“Excuse me, Captain,” Nelly put in. “Did you follow the course laid in by the boffins for your round-trip?”
“Yep. No surprises there. Five out, then four back. The bird people, that's what we're calling them. Their TV had an advertisement that seemed aimed at keeping eggs at just the right temperature for a perfect hatching, or that's what it looked like. Anyway, the bird people were on the third system out from here. They sure looked like the nicest people you could ask to meet.”
“Third system out,” Kris said. She'd heard that number before.
“Kris, we have a problem,” Nelly said softly.
On-screen, Admirals KÅta and Channing turned back from whatever they'd been doing to give the screen their full attention. A Greenfeld commander who had stayed attentive to the screen took a while to get Admiral Krätz's attention. He was none too happy to be disturbed.
“What now, Longknife?” he demanded.
“Nelly, please explain yourself,” Kris said.
A new window opened on the screen. It showed a huge swath of the Milky Way, five thousand by five thousand light-years square. Each of the four search sweeps showed as a long white loop. The
Wasp
had taken the rightmost sweep and showed the murdered planet as a flashing yellow datum. The
Fearless
had taken the left sweep and had nothing exciting to show for the trip.
The
Hornet
and
Intrepid
had the inside sectors. As luck would have it, they'd both started on the outside legs, farthest from each other. As they returned back, they swung inward.
Three jumps out, the
Hornet
's hot datum showed a flashing red. A short distance from it, in galactic terms, the
Intrepid
's datum showed a flashing green.
Nelly zoomed in on the two flashing star systems. Three short jumps connected them.
“I think we have a problem,” Kris said.
29
There are moments in your life when you know, even as you live and breathe them, that you will never be the same again. Kris had survived several such moments.
She knew about moments in the lives of her family members when they must have known that the future of their planet would never be the same. Grampa Al's decision to abandon politics after Eddy died was one of them. Father's decision to throw his hat in the ring for Prime Minister was another, despite Grampa Al's rage against it.
Kris had listened to their furious argument from her hiding place on the stairs. She'd seen these things done, if somewhat messily.
Kris had read of moments in Great-grampa Ray's and Trouble's lives when they must have known that the future of the entire human race would never be the same, depending on what they decided next.
As a teenager, Kris had dreamed of living just such a moment.
As a young woman, Kris was starting to get an idea of just how foolish her younger self had been.
A tiny voice inside Kris was laughing hysterically.
You got what you wished for, kid. God help you!
It was at moments like this that Kris wished she'd been raised to believe in the power of prayer.