Riding the Red Horse (34 page)

“Ma’am,” I said.

“What’s up, Morrow? Everything to your satisfaction? All in line with the premium standards of the Aerospace Navy?” Her question had a hard edge to it, and I remembered some of the blistering rebukes the skipper had laid upon her as we struggled to get underway.

“I’m not in the Aerospace Navy anymore, XO. I think I should probably judge things according to wet Navy standards instead, don’t you think?”

Jones nodded. “Probably, but transition is hard, and we tend to fall back on what we already know, rather than what we should know. Speak up, ASO. What do you think?”

I paused and slumped. Turning, I looked over at the
Edwards
, lit in red and shadow by the setting sun behind us. “I think there’s something wrong. I think there’s a big difference between that ship and this one, and everyone knows it, but no one will address it.”

She smiled. “Oh, goodie. Let’s hear your sage outsider wisdom on where we poor wet Navy types get it all wrong.”

I shook my head. “Listen, ma’am, I can guess why everyone is being stand-off-ish with me, why they look at me and make assumptions, but you have got to give me a chance. Do I look at everything through a prism of where I’ve come from? Of course, everyone does that at first…but it would be a mistake to think I’m not actively trying to reshape that prism. I’m not…I’m not what others are. Okay? So, can I ask for a fair hearing before you hang me?”

She stared at
Edwards
for a while herself before responding. Eventually, she answered. “I don’t mean to have a chip on my shoulder, Josh, but it’s there after years of being looked down on for being a proud member of a service whose glory days are behind it. All my career, the service has been regarded as a haven for the rejects and the also-rans. So maybe I’ve grown to expect some unfortunate things. It's like a cancer. It starts out as something small, a tiny thing you either don’t notice or disregard, like a switch thrown into the wrong position. Or it’s something as simple as dashed expectations. Despite your best intentions, the cancer grows. It grows and metastasizes until it infects and poisons everything. There was once a fine, hopeful officer in command of this ship, a slightly older Josh-Morrow-type of officer. Now…”

Jones stepped away from the lifelines. “You’re going to have to make a choice about what kind of officer you’re going to be, but you’re a fool if you think you’re totally in charge of that decision-making process.”

The XO walked down the weatherdecks, away from me, and I went into the ship, both to get back to my drones and to stop looking at the other, better-run, happier ship.

The war in space came to Earth while no one was looking.

The
Griggs
and the
Edwards
had spent a week and a half underway, exercising in the Indian Ocean and making a round-trip transit through the Straits of Malacca and Singapore, establishing our presence and showing off the US flag to all the nations and ships using the waterway. During that time, I had seen a number of things, some which improved my outlook, and some which lent credence to the skipper’s dismal view of reality.

In the plus column, my people had begun speaking to me. They still did not fully trust me, harboring a deep resentment similar to that carried by the XO, but I made a concerted effort to look at everything they did with a fresh set of eyes, to not judge them too harshly if it seemed like the Aerospace Navy could have done the same thing better or more efficiently (even if in many cases, that was exactly what I had been thinking). As they opened up, so did a few of the other officers and crew. It began to seem as if I could make a valued life here.

Then you had the minus column. I looked up what CDR Larkin had told me, and ocean-going traffic was way, way down. The US maintained the heaviest forces in the area with ships in both Singapore and Penang, but if one looked at the loadouts and capabilities, you could tell they were not designed for heavy or sustained combat. China was only a few days’ transit away, but we were not built up to any sort of posture to face them should that become necessary. And it would likely never become necessary. China did not put so much as a patrol boat in the straits, and judging from internet traffic about our presence, we were largely regarded as a joke, the last desperate spasms of nationalism and empire. I would not be satisfying honor and continuing the fight for my lost brethren on this front.

I could see why the captain drank.

Thus, as the
Griggs
and the
Edwards
pulled out of the Malaccan Strait and bore right to return to Penang, I considered whether I should spend my remaining time in the wet Navy embracing it or deriding it. Thinking deeply, I stood upon the starboard weatherdecks and watched as the green, lush strip of land upon the horizon grew larger, heedless of any danger. And that’s when danger struck.

Without any warning, both
Griggs
’ Close-In Weapons Systems lasers aimed upwards and began snapping off dozens of shots per second from their bottomless magazines. Invisible high-UV radiance speared upward along a multitude of vectors from our two emplacements, made evident by a sound like a buzzsaw and the minute flashes of air heated to incandescence. I looked astern and saw similar flashes of light from the forward and aft superstructures on the
Edwards
.

I searched the sky, mind boggling, with no idea what we were shooting at. Globes of light and streams of smoke blossomed in the skies overhead, with the streams transitioning from fast, straight lines to slow, chaotic curls as whatever they had been broke up under the assault of our lasers. All the streams originated from the northeast.

I hobbled aft as fast as I could to the closest watertight door. Around us, ships outside the cone of our influence erupted in gouts of flame and debris as hypersonic glide warheads found their targets. I scanned the skies for any attacking aircraft, but there was nothing but the HGWs themselves. That was telling. The Chinese used suppressed-ballistics missiles, capable of hurling an HGW half-way around the world from the mainland.

I noticed something else, too. Some ships seemed to remain untouched as other ships took multiple hits. Were these ships just lucky so far, or were they specifically not targeted? A theory began to form in my head.

Reaching the door, I felt the vibration of the deck increase and we heeled hard to port, as the ship turned to starboard and accelerated to flank speed through the water. I fled inside and sealed the door behind me. Men and women rushed to their battlestations to the accompaniment of the General Quarters alarm. I hobbled toward the bridge, both to stand watch as Conning Officer again, and to share my observations with the command.

As soon as I stepped on station, I saw the XO was there in battle dress, looking at a conferencing screen. The screen showed the faces of the CO, the Tactical Action Officer, and representatives from Engineering, Damage Control, and Intelligence. They were all talking, but I ran up and interrupted even as I struggled into battle dress myself. “XO! Sorry, ma’am, but it looks like all the Chinese-flagged vessels are escaping attack.”

Jones’ face flashed a bit of annoyance, but she nodded. “Yes, Josh. Thanks. The same thing occurred to us.”

Larkin spoke from the screen. “We’re closing with the nearest Chinese merchant now. The People’s Liberation Army Navy doesn’t have any vessels or aircraft in this area. If they’re targeting off of surface transponder data read by satellites in orbit, their targeting resolution may be too mushy to risk going after us if we get in close to the ships they’re sparing.”

The XO nodded. “We’ve beaten back the first wave of suppressed-ballistic HGW attacks and we’ve started to extend the dome of our protection to the other non-Chinese vessels around us as well. We haven’t had to resort to our store of anti-air or anti-orbit missiles, so the quiver is essentially full. If they were intending to break the planet-wide armistice, they really wasted the element of surprise by launching out of mainland China first. Our early warning nets info’d us in plenty of time to get the CIWS beamers up. Not the smartest move.”

I narrowed my eyes as a thought occurred to me. “Or they really wanted us focused on the skies instead of somewhere else.”

I had barely finished speaking when fate deemed that to be the moment when USS
Jefferson Edwards
exploded with light and fury. The trimaran destroyer on our quarter erupted from the water, ripped in half by an expanding sphere of white water and actinic flame. As a deafening boom swept over the waves, her starboard outrigger ama tore free and flipped end over end, almost hitting the
Griggs
. We all stared in horror to the two flaming, broken halves, searching for life-rafts or any sign that some of her crew might have survived the horrific blast.

I could not bear to watch the flames; it was too close to the experience I half-remembered from the death of the
Pensacola
. Instead, I looked in her turbulent wake, at where she had come from. That’s when I saw it: a low, curved shape in the water, writhing organically, though the sensor blister atop it proved it was no organism. I watched it survey the wreckage of the
Edwards
, then turn toward us and dive.

The required commands were fresh in my mind from just having learned about them. I screamed them now, even though I had not yet formally taken the conn. “Left hard rudder! All waterjets ahead flank three! Launch acoustic countermeasures and kinetic shields astern! Stand-by for super-cav evasion!”

We made it home to Penang. That’s about the only good thing we managed.

My orders had been heeded by our nerve-shot helmsman and bridge crew, despite my not assuming the conn, and we just survived the Chinese orca’s attack which occurred only moments later. The more distant super-cavitating, rocket-propelled torpedoes of their initial spread were led astray by our maneuvers and countermeasures. The other kill-shots were caught up in the razor filament nets that we spread behind us as kinetic shields, detonating early or collapsing as their enveloping layers of drag-free steam were breached.

By the time the manta-shaped Autonomous Underwater Ranged Combat Assembly (AURCA or orca for short) was back in position to re-attack, we had interposed a Chinese freighter between it and ourselves. Unable to complete its attack on us without endangering one of the ships it was apparently instructed to spare, the orca departed. We kept the freighter from abandoning us as we retreated by keeping both our decimeter railguns trained on its bridge.

The XO shook my hand after we tied up at our old pier. The skipper said nothing and left the ship immediately.

It took a while to reconstruct things after that first battle, to figure out how and why the world had changed. But we had a pretty fair grasp of the situation by the time we all settled down and could gather in the wardroom later. The captain’s seat at the head of the table remained empty, so the XO laid it all out for us instead.

“And that’s where we are,” she said. “The outer planets, belt, and orbitals we’ve been contending with the Chinese for are largely at a stalemate or in recovery mode, so Earth’s own resources matter again. The longer these strategic waterways remain either under Chinese control or denied to us, the worse the economic position is for the US and our allies. The longer they stay on top, the more of our “friends” will leave us behind and set up shop with China. We are looking at the irreversible decline and economic subjugation of our nation. What has long been threatened is now coming to pass. Our orders are clear: re-open and secure the Strait of Malacca to US traffic and prevent Chinese traffic from transiting. If we don’t act now, we will be relegated to becoming a footnote in history.”

Someone from around the table spoke low, but loud enough to be heard. “And if we do act now, we’ll be relegated to becoming a reef like the
Jefferson Edwards
and half the ships in Singapore.”

Jones slammed the table with her fist. “That’s enough of that! This is a do-able mission, people. The Chinese navy has been in decline for as long as ours has. These suppressed-ballistic profile HGWs and these orca undersea drones are a new twist on sea control and denial, but they’re nothing we can’t defend against if we put our minds to it. TAOs, take control of your watch teams and start developing courses of action to get us back on top. Chief Engineer, I want that plant gone over head to toe and put back into fighting trim. We must be able to rely on it. Lieutenant Morrow, I need to see you in private.”

My curiosity perked up at that, but I had no idea what she could want. Everyone broke up and I walked over to her seat at the wardroom table. She motioned me close and I leaned down.

“Josh, we need the skipper.”

“I don’t exactly have him in my back pocket, XO.”

She smiled. “I think you can probably guess where he is. And you're both spacers, right? Maybe he'll listen to you.”

“You think he’ll listen to me? XO, you told me yourself, I am him, a few years removed. What makes you think I won’t just end up in the room right next door?”

She shook her head. “I don’t think that’s exactly what I meant. But know this: those years, along with senses of empathy and duty which you have and he doesn’t, make all the difference. You’re not the skipper, Josh, but if anyone can draw him back, it’s you.”

One short robo-tuk ride and a gauntlet of courtesans later, I found myself in front of the door to the skipper’s favored room at the brothel. I knocked and someone opened the door from within. The same girl was there, naked, with her long hair trying and failing to conceal her nicer bits from view. She let loose another rapid stream of angry Mandarin, but it was wasted on me.

“Sorry, I can’t understand and I don’t care. Give us a minute, would you?”

She stopped and frowned. “Okay.” She pulled her silk robe from a hook behind the door, slipped it on, and stalked out. I walked in and shut the door behind me.

Commander Brett Larkin stood next to the bed, staring at me. He wore a floral silk robe like the girl, but it was less fetching upon him. It did not help that he held a bottle of rotgut scotch already three quarters empty, nor that he swayed noticeably upon his feet. He held the bottle out as an offering. “Aerospace Navy, united till the end?”