Tony Daniel (58 page)

The sky is on fire, she thought. How can the sky burn?

“They’re rounding on us in fire-down, Bruc,” said Captain Philately. “They’re bringing their engines to bear.”

“Here comes the blast, Captain!”

San Filieu glanced over at Bruc. A stoic look had come over his face. His eyes were set, but she noticed that his lower lip trembled slightly.

“Stand by,” Bruc said. “Stand by . . .”

The blast from the
Jihad
’s engines hit. The
Montserrat
was rocked to its foundations, violently wrenched about—far worse than the original blow that had upset San Filieu’s meal. In the virtuality, there was nothing but panic. A glance into actuality told San Filieu an even more dire story. Bodies were flying about the bridge. It seemed to go on forever, as if a storm had hit and somehow gotten
inside
of a house. San Filieu covered her head with her hands and closed her eyes.

When the shaking had stopped and she looked up again, Captain Bruc was lying at her feet, the side of his face crushed in. She drew back with a gasp, then suddenly held herself rigid. “I will not lose it,” San Filieu said. “I will maintain.” Maintain. “Philately, take command of the ship!” she called out.

“Aye, aye, Admiral!” said Philately.

Back into virtuality.

“All troops to personnel catapults!” Philately said. “Torpedoes away!”

“Torpedoes away, Captain!”

“Where are they?”

“Seventeen klicks. Fifty degrees, one seventy-five right ascension.”

“Cannon to bear and close.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Damage?”

“We’ve . . . we’ve lost all but attitude control, Captain.”

“What?”

“All engines down, ma’am.”

“Don’t let them know, Philately,” said San Filieu. “Fire a torpedo to aft if you have to.”

Philately looked at San Filieu. There seemed to be new respect in her gaze, San Filieu, thought. “Aye, aye, Admiral,” she said. “Continue closing, helm.”

“Yes, Captain. “

“Give me a full report on those engines.”

“Captain . . . checking . . . we took a direct hit to the aft, ma’am,” said the engineering officer. “No one’s answering . . . everyone’s dead. Everyone is dead back there.”

“What about my ship?”

“Ma’am?”

“My
ship
! Is the rupture sealing?”

“Checking . . . yes, Captain. It is contained nine klicks to the rear of us.”

“Your rocks, Philately,” said San Filieu. “Throw them!”

“But, Admiral . . .”

“Catapult those rocks, Captain!”

“Aye, aye, Admiral. Rocks away.”

“Catapults activated. Rocks away!”

“Continue closing.”

“Aye, aye.”

Why did the little upstart question me, San Filieu thought. If only Bruc were here.

But he was, she realized, bleeding and dead at her feet only one reality away.

Sherman brought his ship about and so caught the
Montserrat
rock onslaught broadside. The ship shook violently. If he hadn’t strapped himself in in the actuality, his body might be a twisted ruin by now. But it was fine, he was fine.

“Damage?”

“All ruptures sealing. But we lost number one cannon, Colonel. Fifty-two casualties. Eighteen dead.”

“Damn,” Sherman said. “Bad luck, that turn. Close, Major.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Weapons to bear.”

“Torpedoes, sir!”

A white-hot streak through the space beside them.

“Diverted, Colonel.”

“Good. Close.”

“Fifteen klicks. Ten. Five.”

“Weapons, cease fire! Ready the troops!”

“Weapons cease fire, sir. Troops at the ready.”

Sherman took another long look at the
Montserrat
. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. The DIED troops were deploying into space.

“Too soon,” he whispered to the Met commander. “Too soon.”

“Theory, throw every rock we have at those soldiers!”

“Catapults activated. Rocks away!”

A streaming bloom of ring material flew from the
Boomerang
. It met the
Montserrat
’s troops face on and cut through them like a deadly blast of wind. Several of the rocks traveled on and pounded into
Montserrat
herself.

“Give me a troop estimate on them, Theory.”

“Sorting through the dead, sir . . . sorting . . . two thousand seven hundred live and functioning, Colonel.”

Less than two to one, thought Sherman. Not bad odds. Not nearly as bad as he’d feared.

They were lining up along the
Montserrat
’s axis, getting into position for the fastest deployment of the troops. And then they were there.

“Throw the troops at them, Theory.” Sherman quickly switched to broadband on the knit. “Good luck, soldiers,” he said. “Kill the hell out of them.” Then he changed the channel back.

“Troops away, sir!”

The two groups of tiny specks flew toward one another. The ships were too close to attack one another without damaging themselves, or the troops. It was hand-to-hand destruction now, with only supporting fire from the ships.

Death on a human scale.

Kwame Neiderer shot through the vacuum, pulling fifteen gees. He and the other space-adapted were in the first wave. The pressure-suited reserve would be following behind at a more stately acceleration. He was in charge of ten soldiers, and was now answering to Lieutenant Boxset. But Boxset was a greenhorn, and Kwame knew that it was he, Kwame, whom the soldiers would look to, when they weren’t looking to their own asses.

What the hell, thought Kwame, all I can do is show them where to fire. Another two seconds, and they’d be in range. There were explosions all about him as the enemy’s positronic cannon pinpointed soldiers and fired full on them. A particularly nearby flash of soundless light, and Kwame had lost Tiempos and Cue. Damn. He had liked Cue.

“Let’s do it,” Lieutenant Boxset said to Kwame over the knit in a meek voice.

“Ready arms and ready grist,” Kwame called out over his prime’s knit band. He brought his own rifle up.

They were in range.

“Fire at will,” said Boxset.

The prime slammed into enemy lines, guns blazing. They were moving so fast, it was impossible to tell if they’d hit anyone. But to Kwame’s left, one of his soldiers and a Met soldier collided head-on. Both people exploded in a bloom of goo and blood.

“About face,” Kwame called out. “Use your rockets!”

He and the others fired off two arm rockets into the direction they were traveling, then the equal and opposite reaction brought him to a halt.

“Attitude adjustments, and at them!”

That was it for the orders. Now it was time to carry them out.

Kwame searched nearby space for a DIED soldier to kill, and found one almost immediately. The man was bringing a gun to bear on Kwame, but Kwame was quicker, and he blasted the man’s head off with a beam of positrons from his rifle.

Suddenly the knit was filled with backchatter, and Kwame blinked the volume down. He concentrated on finding a new target.

Fire from above, just missing him. Kwame looked up, found his assailant, and fired one of his two remaining arm rockets upward. It streaked away, homed in, and took out the threat. Kwame did a quick flip and checked all around him in space. Nobody seemed to have his number at the moment. Most of his prime was concentrated nearby.

“Forward,” Lieutenant Boxset called. They set their attitude controls to rearward and began to advance.

Another enemy wave, and another. Five of his own soldiers killed around him. Boxset and another lieutenant linked up, and then there were ten of them together again—advancing, always advancing. It seemed to go on for hours.

Kill.

Move forward.

Kill again.

Behind him, Kwame knew, a shell of fortifying material was constructing itself from the sprayed grist and the silicates brought from the
Boomerang
’s hold. Heavier artillery was being brought up to the fortress shield. But Kwame dared not look back.

Two more DIED soldiers he blasted. Firefights all around him. Then something pelting his face, and he covered up until it passed. It had been globules of frozen blood.

A blinding flash of light and Boxset was gone. He now worked for Lieutenant Chalk.

Then Kwame came up against something that resisted his moving forward. He turned his attitude jet up full throttle, but he could not move.

“Goddammit,” he said, and punched out. It felt as if his fist had connected with a brick wall.

Kwame looked up. Fifteen meters away was the hull of the
Montserrat
. He was connecting with the ship’s force-field envelope.

I’ll be damned, thought Kwame. We’re there.

“Bring up those bores!” Chalk called out. Kwame turned around and watched as two long rods were maneuvered toward his position. The tip of one of them almost touched him, and he had to duck to get out of the way.

“Watch it, soldier, that’s hot grist!”

Kwame flew away a few meters and came to hover next to Chalk.

“Take it through!” ordered Chalk. The bore operator started his machine, and the rod slowly slid through the e-m repulsion of the force field and moved inexorably toward the hull.

Then it was touching.

“Bomb down the shaft!” said Chalk.

“Bomb away, sir,” said the bore operator. “We’ve got a plant.” Then, a moment later, “Activation code bounceback. We’re in communication with the antimatter trigger.”

Chalk put both hands to his head, as if he couldn’t believe what he was looking at. He was silent, but his mouth was moving. Kwame realized that he was communicating the news up the command chain.

And then, they just stayed there. Minutes passed. The battle flashed and burned around them, but the three of them seemed to exist in an envelope of calm.

I could go to sleep, Kwame thought. But then I’d miss everything.

In the midst of fire and destruction, Kwame waited patiently to see how it would all turn out.

San Filieu paced about the bridge. At one point, she almost slipped in Bruc’s blood and fell down, but she caught herself and managed only to stain the top of her boot.

“Admiral, we have to make a decision,” said Captain Philately. “Sensors have confirmed the bore.”

“No,” said San Filieu. “No.”

“Admiral, they have given us three minutes.”

“He won’t forgive this,” said San Filieu. “He won’t forgive me.”

She finally sat down in her command chair and tugged at the strands of her hair that had come undone. Her hand came away and she realized that she’d pulled too hard. A hank of her black locks was in her fingers. She stared at it intently, twisting and worrying it.

“Admiral?”

“I won’t surrender. I will not give up this ship.”

“Admiral, they have us.”

“I will not.”

By all rights, she should contact Amés immediately and request instructions. But she couldn’t do it, couldn’t face him.

This was the end. He wasn’t going to punish her. He wasn’t going to torture her.

He was going to execute her.

Of that, San Filieu was certain. The king, she had failed the king. How could she have done this? What had she missed? On New Catalonia, all was in ruins. She was married to a younger man who despised her. On Mercury, her bed would grow cold. And here . . . here, in this godforsaken hellhole. This waste. All was lost.

It was impossible. This did not happen to Carmen San Filieu. Carmen San Filieu maneuvered her way to victory. She won. She watched others writhe at her victory.

Amés was going to tear her from her very skin
.

“I can’t let him,” San Filieu said. “I can’t let him do that.”

There had to be a way. There had to be a way to save face.
He was going to cut away her face
. There had to be. The grist matrix. It was here. Aboard the
Montserrat
. If the matrix were destroyed there was no way that Amés could get to her. If the matrix were destroyed, all the converts and aspects would die with it. That was one way to shut down a LAP.

On Mercury, she sat up in bed among twisted satin sheets, biting her tongue to keep from screaming.

In New Catalonia, she dropped a pitcher of water and it shattered at her feet. Busquets looked at her with contempt.

“It’s a bluff,” she said on the
Montserrat
.

“But Admiral,” said Philately. “We have confirmed it. They have bored through the shields and placed antimatter charges.”

“It’s some sort of bluff.”

Philately walked up to San Filieu and made her meet her eyes. “Admiral, it is not,” she said.

San Filieu did not reply.

“Admiral . . . Admiral, we are receiving communications. I am putting it on the speakers, ma’am,” Philately said.

“
Montserrat,
this is Colonel Roger Sherman of the
Boomerang
. You have fifteen seconds to surrender. It is not necessary to be destroyed. Listen to me, whoever you are: I will do this unless you surrender. Ten seconds. I implore you,
Montserrat
commander. Five seconds. For the love of God!
Montserrat? Montserrat?
”

San Filieu whimpered. The strands of her hair broke in her hands.

“
Montserrat,
the charge has been activated,” said the voice. “In ten minutes, your isotropic damping will be overcome and a blast stronger than a nuclear weapon will rip apart your ship. If you have any means to evacuate, I suggest you use it. Save your souls. I am sorry. Sherman out.”

San Filieu thought she might go to her cabin now. There was still some good wine left. Good red wine, if the bottle hadn’t broken. If so, she might swallow the glass.

She stood up. Captain Philately was in front of her, again looking her directly in the eyes.

San Filieu realized that this was probably all Philately’s fault, after all. It wasn’t fair that Bruc had been the one to die.

“I am going to save you the anguish of the wait, Admiral,” Philately said.

“What? Captain, I don’t have time for you now.”

Philately leveled a particle pistol at San Filieu.

“Philately,” San Filieu said. “You idiot.”