Barbarians at the Gates (65 page)

“How do they benefit from keeping the birth rate high?”

“They can skim money off the programs to take care of the kids,” McGillivray explained.

He took a breath. “The Conservative Faction wants things to remain exactly as they are,” he said. “They won’t support change for that reason alone. The Socialists believe that they have a duty to help and support people—whether the people actually want it or not—and insist on providing free food and other social programs to the poor. Both factions will block any attempt to actually deal with the problem—and both factions are unwilling to admit that the problem is likely to explode, sooner rather than later.

“We need an emperor to cut through the Gordian knot before the entire Federation comes apart,” he concluded. “Whatever support we can give you—or I, as a Grand Senator, can give you—is yours. All you have to do is declare yourself emperor and take Earth. The Federation will give you a chance.”

“And what if my decision to declare myself emperor isn’t accepted?” Marius frowned.

“Then we’re no worse off than before,” McGillivray pointed out. “The political lassitude that allows the Senate to rule without challenge—to push through useless or actively harmful programs—will work in your favor. You will have a chance, admiral, and I believe that you will succeed.”

“If we win,” Marius pointed out. “We’re not going to challenge the Gateway, Senator, but we will have to face Home Fleet. Or has the Brotherhood subverted the fleet?”

“No,” McGillivray admitted. “We have some people with the fleet, but not enough to subvert it.”

Marius wasn’t surprised. If the Brotherhood
had
managed to subvert Home Fleet, they wouldn’t have needed Marius and the Grand Fleet. It wasn’t good news, however; Home Fleet didn’t have the experience of the Grand Fleet, but it possessed nearly as much firepower and, if combined with Earth’s orbital defenses, would be a very tough customer.

Marius nodded.

“I understand,” he said. He looked into the Senator’s eyes. “I have to consult with my wife and...advisors. The Marines will escort you to a cabin; I suggest you stay there, at least for the time. Feelings are running high at the moment.”

* * *

“I think it’s a good idea,” Tiffany said, once Marius had outlined the gist of McGillivray’s explanation. “You’d make a good emperor.”

“I don’t want the job,” Marius protested. His dead arm felt heavy as he sat down on the sofa beside his wife. Doctor Yu had told him that his vat-grown arm wasn’t ready for grafting yet and he had no choice but to endure. “It’s a trap.”

“I think that not wanting the job is the first qualification for the job,” Tiffany countered. “And for that matter, I don’t want to be an empress, either. But what does that have to do with anything?” She turned to look up at him. “High Society would accept an emperor, even though they wouldn’t accept an admiral. It also neatly separates your rule from military rule, as an emperor wouldn’t be a
direct
military ruler. He’d be commander-in-chief, yet a civilian...”

Marius scowled. “Only for ten years,” he said firmly. “We take power, fix the problems on Earth and the Core Worlds, make sure that all worlds are represented in the Senate, and then we resign.”

“You’d have a hell of a time as an ex-Emperor,” Tiffany pointed out. “Where would you go?”

“I’d have the Survey Service reactivated,” Marius said. “I’d write myself a commission as my last official act and go beyond the Rim.”

“I hope it’s that easy,” Tiffany said. She smiled sadly.

Marius smiled back.

“We have to win the coming battle,” he reminded her. “Let’s not count our crowns until they’re on our heads, shall we?”

* * *

Grand Admiral Featherstone’s voice was very calm. Too calm.

“He’s on his way here.”

Grand Senator The Honorable Carlton Brockington prided himself on remaining calm and collected under pressure, even during Admiral Justinian’s attack on Earth. It was, he felt, the very essence of the Conservative Faction. If they refused to panic and considered everything carefully, they could decide how to act—or if they should act at all. Even so, he felt a tremor of panic run through his mind.

“Who’s on his way here?” Grand Senator Alison Wallisch asked Featherstone impatiently. He had been a bipartisan appointment, a man who had never commanded a starship, let alone an entire battle fleet; he’d been appointed because he didn’t have a single disloyal bone in his body. “Who?”

“Admiral Drake, My Lady,” Featherstone said. His hands nervously rubbed together as he spoke. “I received a transmission from the fortresses covering Gotham. Starships positively identified as belonging to the Grand Fleet transited into the system and boarded the fortresses. The last transmission stated that Marine boarding parties were securing the fortresses and that resistance was futile. Admiral Drake forced them to surrender without firing a shot.”

Calm
, Carlton told himself. “They didn’t even try to engage him?”

“The Grand Fleet possesses enough firepower to punch through anywhere short of the Gateway,” Featherstone explained. “The fortress commander decided not to sacrifice his men in a futile attempt to delay him.”

“But...but this is disastrous,” Alison said. Her eyes were wide with panic. “What does he
want
?”

“We tried to kill him,” Carlton reminded her dryly. “What do you
think
he wants?”

Featherstone looked blank. “I believe that he will be here within two weeks, perhaps less,” he said. “It depends on the course he takes to reach Earth and if he intends to try to punch through the Gateway. I think...”

“You have to stop him,” Alison snarled. Her voice was breaking in fear. “The entire Federation is at stake, admiral! We have to stop him!”

“We could try to negotiate,” Featherstone said seriously. “Or...”

“There’s no point in trying to talk to the bastard,” Alison hissed. “He’s going to kill us all unless we kill him first!”

Carlton tapped the table and Alison, wonder of wonders, fell silent.

“Admiral, can Home Fleet stop the Grand Fleet?”

Featherstone might not have been a military expert, but he knew the right answer.

“Absolutely, sir,” he said. “Combined with the defenses around the Gateway, there will be more than enough firepower to stop him dead in his tracks.”

“Excellent,” Carlton said. He looked over at Alison. “We can stop one last rebellious admiral, and then we will have won the war.”

“And what if he wins the battle?” Alison didn’t look convinced.

“We’ll have to try to bargain with him.” Carlton shrugged. “Admiral Drake is an honorable man. It should be possible to come to some...arrangement with him.”

* * *

Two hours later, Carlton started to wonder if he’d been wrong. Somehow—and there was no way to know how—the news had leaked to the media despite his order of a complete media blackout. The news was spreading fast; the Senate had ordered the murder of the admiral—a popular hero—and the admiral was on his way for revenge.

The rumors were spreading even faster, ranging from the believable to the absurd. The admiral was dead and his wife was leading the fleet for revenge. The admiral had somehow come back to life and was a zombie, out for revenge. Aliens had invaded the Federation after the admiral’s death and the Senate was fleeing...there was no rhyme or reason to the rumors, but they were spreading right over the planet.

The riots started soon afterward.

The Senate Hall was heavily defended, of course, but the same couldn’t be said for most of Earth’s infrastructure. It wasn’t easy to maintain at the best of times; with an endless series of riots tearing it apart, entire city blocks lost light and heat and power. The police—backed up by the Federation Army and Internal Security troopers—found themselves under siege in their own bases.

When the riots were only a few hours old, the death toll had already passed two million people. How long would it be, Carlton asked himself, before the mob marched on the mansions that housed the political elite?

If we can only beat the admiral
, he thought,
we could still win...

A fleet, backed up by armed fortresses, is a powerful foe. Military doctrine, therefore, calls for isolating the fleet from the fortresses, by any means necessary.

-
Observations on the Navy
, 3987

Earth (Sol) System, 4098

Admiral Featherstone knew himself to be a coward. Deep inside, he was ashamed of his weakness, the weakness that had prevented him from graduating from Luna Academy and serving as a proper officer should. His well-connected family and his willingness to sell himself to the highest bidder had ensured a rapid rise to the top of the hierarchy, but he’d always remained in the background. He’d never commanded a fleet in combat and would never have had the chance if Admiral Justinian hadn’t destroyed Navy HQ. It had been sheer luck that Featherstone hadn’t been in the building at the time, and his promotion upward—filling a dead man’s shoes—had seemed wonderful at first. Everyone knew that Home Fleet never saw combat...well, it
had
seen combat during the first attack on Earth, but what were the chances of that happening again?

He fought hard to keep his expression blank as he sweated inside. Admiral Drake was on his way, with enough ships and experienced crews to take on Home Fleet and win. Featherstone had ordered reinforcements to be summoned as quickly as possible, but his most optimistic estimate was that any reinforcements would arrive in the system after Admiral Drake. Matters weren’t helped by Senators sending him messages at all hours of the day and night, demanding that he use his new position to further their interests. Home Fleet’s current position near the Gateway defenses was a result of one such instruction. Apparently, a number of highly-placed Senators had interests in the Gateway that needed to be guarded.

“Admiral,” a voice said. He turned to look at Commander Farrell, who had been assigned to him as an aide and general assistant. Featherstone knew that the younger man held him in contempt, but—so far—he had refrained from destroying the man’s career. “The survey satellites just picked up a large footprint at the edge of the mass limit.”

Featherstone cursed under his breath, silently damning all Senators to hell. Home Fleet was normally positioned at Titan Base, or near Earth itself, but instead they were caught near the Gateway forts. Featherstone was no tactical genius, yet even
he
knew that only an insane commander would tangle with those forts if there was any other choice. And the Senate had refused to allow him to position his ships near Earth, where they could fall back on the orbital defenses and boost their firepower by a factor of ten.

“Show me,” he ordered, looking up at the holographic tank. “I suppose there’s no chance that this could be a diversion?”

“Not unless they have a second fleet as large as the Grand Fleet,” the younger man said. His voice was calm and professional, yet Featherstone was sure he heard amusement lurking behind his tone. “They’re not even trying to hide.”

Featherstone took a breath. It had been years since he’d studied a display, and most of his lessons had been forgotten. There was no real-time data on the enemy fleet, but it was clearly heading right toward Earth, unless their commander decided to change course for some reason of his own. Featherstone doubted it. Earth was the key to the Solar System.

“Bring up our drives and plot an intercept course,” Featherstone ordered. At least he could now claim a military emergency as an excuse to avoid reading messages from irate Senators. Even
they
couldn’t argue with the Grand Fleet bearing down on them. “I want us underway as soon as possible.”

Even as he spoke, he knew it was going to be a tight shave.

* * *

“Launch probes,” Marius ordered. He was the only calm person in the compartment. The remainder of the crew knew they’d crossed a line when they’d followed him back to Earth. “I want a location on Home Fleet, now!”

He’d assumed all along that their journey would be detected and that warnings would be flashed to Earth. If he’d been commanding the defenses, he would have positioned Home Fleet roughly three or four light minutes from the mass limit and gone doggo, stepping down his emissions as much as possible. He knew that anyone who wanted to reach Earth in the shortest possible space of time would
have
to arrive from a certain direction, and there was no reason why someone else couldn’t draw the same conclusion. Marius had planned on encountering Home Fleet at once and he was mildly surprised, as the probes sped further and further away from the fleet, to find that Home Fleet appeared to be missing.

Earth’s Solar System was the most heavily industrialized in the Federation. Over a period of nearly two thousand years, asteroids had been converted into factories to supply a growing population with whatever it might need. Others had been melted down and turned into starships at the Jupiter Shipyards, or developed into habitats that held huge populations. The gas giants were surrounded by cloudscoop platforms that sucked up gas and converted it into fuel for fusion reactors. And thousands of civilian spacecraft thronged through the Solar System, transporting goods from all over the Federation to Earth. It was an awe-inspiring sight.