Extremis (73 page)

“Huh. Sounds like they were looking in the mirror, rather than looking at us.” Juan’s remark earned him a quick smile from Cap.

Harry’s face was uncharacteristically earnest as he leaned forward. “Look, in the end, Cap’s right. The only way to minimize civilian casualties is to seize the Baldies’ cee-four nexus and then start a general guerrilla strike against all their assets. If we can create an interval of chaos in their defenses, that should open a window for the Fleet—and it will show them that Baldy control is being actively contested. There’s a good chance they would send forces down into friendly areas, rather than directly assaulting—or leveling—our cities.”

Roon frowned. “That’s still a lot of bodies you’re talking about piling up, Harry. Hey, are you an officer now?” The joke didn’t go over as well as Kelakos had obviously hoped—particularly with the officers. McGee didn’t mind it that much. Officer or not, he remained an NCO at heart.

Chong showed no appreciation for Kelakos’s jibe at officers, but that didn’t stop him from agreeing with the sergeant’s central point. “Yes, it will indeed be a lot of bodies. And I think we might be able to avoid that if we try taking the Arduan leadership hostage, rather than decapitating it. We might be able to briefly paralyze the militants by threatening to kill their Council of Twenty, unless they agree to a parley. Meanwhile, our Fleet continues to land forces. We wouldn’t need to delay the Baldies very long for this tactic to work. Even an hour’s hesitation as they consider their options could turn the tide.”

“Except you won’t get even one minute’s hesitation,” interjected Jen. “Look, I’m going to say this one more time.” She laid aside her handkerchief and leaned forward to go nose to nose with Harry Li. “If the Baldies believe their Council has become a liability, they will destroy it themselves. Without flinching.”

“From what you’ve told us,” observed Cap, “it sounds like the
Destoshaz
radicals are thinking about it already.”

“Exactly. And if they do stage a coup, it won’t be politically motivated—not in the way we think of it. They’ll do it because they feel that the Council is jeopardizing the survival of their race. And when they kill the Council, it won’t be with the thought that they are permanently annihilating those leaders. It’s more like they’re sending them to stand in the corner because they were making trouble. They’re not gone for good, just for now. They’ll be alive again later. Heck, maybe they will all be reincarnated together. I can just see it. They’ll all have a reunion, laughing over how they were silly enough to kill and assassinate each other when they first arrived on Bellerophon.”

The eyes of the Marines surrounding her were wide with a mixture of bafflement, amusement, and horror. “For real?” asked Juan Kapinski.

“For real,” affirmed Jen. “This is the core of what I keep trying to tell you, and why they find it as hard to understand us as we find it hard to understand them. The communication stuff—the speech versus
selnarm
—that’s easy. That’s just mechanics. The real difference is in what
we
mean when we use the words ‘life’ and ‘death,’ and what
they
mean. For the Arduans, ‘death’ is not an absolute term or condition, so neither is ‘life.’ They don’t have anything as profound and absolute as our self-preservation reflex. Their only analogous reflex is a desperate urgency to ensure the safety of their race, because if their race dies, then so do they—for good. So if you take their leaders hostage, and send the message ‘Capitulate or we will kill them,’ the Arduans would be as likely to send a bomb down your throat as ignore you—but they won’t negotiate. They won’t even consider it.”

Harry Li sat back; Cap frowned deeply; Chong rested his chin in his hand and seemed to be staring into an infinite nothingness located about a foot in front of his face.

Roon Kelakos shifted uncomfortably. “So, Ms. Peitchkov, are you telling us that we should just attack Punt City—straight on?”

“No, that won’t help, either. If they’re threatened, the Arduans will call in a missile strike on the very edge—maybe inside—their own perimeter.”

“So we sit on our hands and let the Fleet kill us with their pre-invasion bombardment?” Juan was aghast.

“God, no—look, I’m not saying I support that alternative, either. I don’t. I’m just saying that the plans you’ve proposed so far won’t work.”

McGee ran a hand down her back. “We know that’s what you’re trying to tell us, Jen. But we’re going to need a plan—awful or not—soon. If we don’t have one to propose, then Heide will come up with one of his own, and that’s sure to be a disaster. He’s talking about a general uprising. All cities, all at once, civilians in the streets, led by the Resistance.”

Jen blanched. “That’s insanity. It would be a bloodbath. The Arduans would just withdraw and—”

“—and blast every site of the uprising clean off the map.
Da
, Jennifer.” Danilenko nodded. “I have seen them do this. I know they will. But tell me, please—if none of our plans will work, what plan do you suggest? Because if we do not do something, then we will be bombed out of existence. Or Heide will send us all to our deaths in the bloodbath you predict. We must propose something ourselves, or one of these things will be done to us.”

Jen shook her head and looked pained. “I don’t know. I don’t—look, I’m not a soldier. I don’t think about plans and strategies. I don’t know about all your weapons and all your—”

“Jen.” McGee tugged her closer with the hand he had encircling her far shoulder. “Jen. It’s okay. No one is expecting you to be, or think like, a soldier. Maybe you could think about our problem a different way.”

“Oh, yeah? Like how?”

“Well”—McGee rubbed a soothing hand up and down her taut, wiry triceps—“don’t think about the situation in terms of weapons or strategies. Or even information. You’ve given us all the information about the Arduans and Punt that we could want. Even Heide is happy with what you and the other specialists have provided us. Our problem is that complete information isn’t getting us any closer to a workable plan. Because what all that information doesn’t tell us is this—how do we get leverage? What would make the Arduans pause, think about negotiating, or at least stop to talk? How do we influence them—in any way?”

Jennifer looked at McGee; at first her eyes were wondering, and then they were very, very glad. “Thank you, Sandro,” she said.

Cap cleared his throat. “Jen, I know that coming up with new ideas isn’t work that can be done on the clock. Ideas come when they come—or not at all. But here’s our reality. Heide is getting antsy. I think we have two weeks—maybe a month—before he decides upon a plan of action. He’ll probably try to implement it no less than a month after that.”

McGee watched Jen nod, even as she kept her eyes on his. “Thanks, Cap. Nice not to be working under pressure.” Cap made a vaguely apologetic rumbling sound, which Jen brushed away. “Not your fault, Cap. Don’t worry about it.” She turned and looked at the group. “Now, before we break up, do any of you have any other questions for me? Or any more surprises?”

McGee pressed her arm gently. “Uh—I have both.”

She turned back. “Both? A question and a surprise?”

McGee nodded.

“Well?” she said.

“Jen,” McGee said through a long swallow, “will you marry me?”

Jen laughed, disbelieving, then looked at him again—closely. Her mouth dropped open, and her eyes flickered across the pools of sewage and the ring of grimy Marine faces. Even Chong was smiling. She turned to McGee. “Will I marry you? Damn it, Tank McGee, you just try and stop me!”

It was probably the first time anyone had hugged, let alone passionately kissed, in the sewage backflow tankage room.

31

More Than Force

Our patience will achieve more than our force.
—Burke

TRNS
Taconic
, Allied Fleet, Demeter System

Ian Trevayne remembered his reaction, years before, on his first sight of TRNS
Taconic
. Now he could only chuckle as he recalled the awe he had felt at the first of the devastators as he watched the first of the superdevastators emerge from the newly dredged Hera warp point into the light of Demeter’s G5v sun.

“Twice the tonnage,” he heard Adrian M’Zangwe breathe. The voice of
Taconic
’s captain held decidedly mixed emotions.

Li Magda said nothing. But Trevayne knew her emotions were also complex.

They stood in the flag observation lounge of
Taconic
, which had once again become Trevayne’s flagship when he had returned to Demeter after the campaign against the Tangri was well enough in hand to entrust it to subordinates. Li Magda had also returned, for the same reason. Now Trevayne was about to transfer his flag once again.

“We probably ought to be going,” said Li Magda.

“Yes,” nodded Trevayne. “After all, we have a special visitor.”

They departed and went to the shuttle that would take them to TRNS
Li Han
.

* * *

Trevayne had never met Magda Petrovna Windrider. And he stayed in the background while she and Li Magda fell into each others’ arms. The older woman whispered words he could not hear into her goddaughter’s ear, and he caught sight of a glint of tears on Mags’s cheek.

After a time, they released each other, and Trevayne thought the moment right to step forward. “Welcome to Demeter, Admiral. It is an honor and a pleasure to meet you.”

“Retired Admiral, to be precise—and please call me Magda, even though it could get confusing. I, too, am privileged to finally meet you, Admiral Trevayne—although in a sense I almost feel I know you already, if only from a distance, having studied you with great care during the…the…”

“The late unpleasantness,” Trevayne supplied.

“Which isn’t nearly as late for you as it is for the rest of us, is it?” The warm but sharp brown eyes in the quintessentially Russian face grew even sharper.

“You’re most understanding…Magda. As was she for whom this tremendous ship is so appropriately named.”

For a moment, they regarded each other in silence. And the last wisps of tension and awkwardness evaporated and were gone.

“Well,” Magda said briskly,
“you’re probably wondering why I came out here to the Bellerophon Arm—aside from wanting to see my goddaughter. And why I asked for this private meeting.”

“I admit to more than a little curiousity about it,” Trevayne acknowledged.

Magda regarded him levelly. “I hope to persuade you to delay your offensive into Charlotte.”

Trevayne met her eyes squarely. “You realize, of course, that the longer we delay, the longer the people of Bellerophon—all two hundred and thirty-five million of them, or however many of those are left by now—will have to continue to live under the Baldies’ occupation.”

“I’m only too aware of that. And yes, if you attack Charlotte, using existing Kasugawa generator applications, you may win through and shorten the war. But given the tactical problem you face—that you must first enter Charlotte with nothing larger than a supermonitor, before you can bring in the generator that will allow transit by devastators and superdevastators—the possibility also exists that you will fail, and by your failure lengthen the war.”

Trevayne didn’t reply directly, and his momentary silence was acknowledgment of the truth she spoke. “You said ‘using
existing
Kasugawa generator applications.’ Does that imply that there’s another kind?”

Magda nodded and briefly outlined the concept of supermonitor-concealed Kasugawa generators.

“So,” Trevayne said in tones of grim satisfaction, “we wouldn’t have to use our smaller ships to defend a helpless generator in the teeth of a counterattack by SDSs and hordes of their other craft.”

“And,” Li Magda added excitedly, “the Baldies’ tactical calculations are now based on that assumption. So this will catch them completely off balance.”

Trevayne gave a quick nod. “All right. We’ll wait until we have these new units. But in the meantime, we’ll use the generators we already have to continue dredging the warp lines we already control.” He rose eagerly to his feet and smiled at Magda. “Let’s get the staff together and work out the details while we have the benefit of having a recognized expert here!”

32

The Secret of All Victory

The secret of all victory lies in the organization of the non-obvious.
—Spengler

RFNS
Gallipoli
, Main Van, Further Rim Fleet, Odysseus System

Admiral Erica Krishmahnta looked around her bridge. “Are we ready?”

The eyes of her bridge personnel and section heads already told her what Yoshi Watanabe’s voice announced. “All sections report ready and awaiting the word, Admiral.”

Krishmahnta, eyes steady but heart racing with eagerness to finally—finally—give the Baldies a taste of their own medicine, leaned back in her chair and lowered the shock harness slowly into place over her slim torso.

“Captain Watanabe.”

“Yes, sir?”

“The word is given.”

RFNS
Excalibur
, Strike Group Sigma, Further Rim Fleet, Odysseus System

Leopold Kurzweil didn’t need to hear the incoming Fleet signal to know that, in an instant, everything had changed. One moment the bridge had been abuzz with last-second preparations, communiqués, quips: now it was utterly focused, silent except for the voice of the ship’s CO, Commodore von Tscharner.

“Mr. Wethermere,” the commodore said, turning to his temporary tactical officer, “this is your show from here on. For the duration of your special operations, I cede restricted command of this vessel. In accordance with the special terms set out by your orders from Admiral Krishmahnta, I say three times: you have the con expressly and only for coordinating the initial attack of Strike Group Sigma.”

Wethermere stood. “Sir, I say three times, I have the con, to the extent it may be relinquished to me by Admiral Krishmahnta’s special orders.”

“Very good, Commander. Now what?”

Wethermere smiled. “Sir, I will not be getting in your way any more—or any longer—than I have to. First we let the SBMHAWKs go in—and wait.”