Fear God and Dread Naught (25 page)

“There’s a simpler explanation,” Glass said.  “We believe the aliens have some form of FTL communications.  If they had a spy ship hidden somewhere within Sol, Captain, they wouldn't find it too hard to warn their superiors that the task force was on the way.”

“If they can do that,” Yegorovich said, “they might well win the war.”

Susan considered it, despite her tiredness.  If the aliens
had
been watching Earth, they might well have seen the task force depart.  Hell, the alien spy might have been
following
the task force, shadowing it until there was no mistaking its destination.  A chill ran down her spine as she considered the implications.  It was a revolutionary shift in the balance of power, if Glass was right.  The alien high command wouldn't need to wait weeks or months for news to come back from the front.  They’d know - instantly - what had happened and what needed to be done.

And they’d be able to dispatch reinforcements at once
, she thought. 
They might not even have considered invading Unity and opening up the chain until we started to move reinforcements to the planet
.

Her imagination filled in the details.  The alien high command, trying hard to bring its forces to bear against the Tadpoles, suddenly learning that an allied fleet was on its way to Unity ... and moving forces to block their way.  Hell, there was no reason to take the risk of placing a scout ship in Sol itself ... the enemy ship could be easily hidden within any of the systems the task force had crossed during the voyage.  If
she’d
had such a system,
she
wouldn't have hesitated to picket every system between Earth and her target.  The aliens might just have had real-time data on the task force’s progress, giving them plenty of time to mount a response.

“The situation is not hopeless,” Harper said, sharply.  “And I do not believe that
anyone
would betray us to the aliens.”

Yegorovich snorted, but didn't continue the argument.

Harper looked at Henry.  “Did your experts pick up anything ... unusual?”

“Nothing,” Henry said.  “We didn't have time to seed space with hundreds of passive listening platforms, as we planned, but battle and post-battle analysis, so far, hasn't turned up any clues about how their FTL communicators actually
work
.”

“They may not have been using them,” Glass mused.  “There was only one major enemy force.”

“That’s true, Captain,” Henry said.  “For the moment, I’m afraid the boffins are still stumped.”

“They’ll be looking into it back home,” Yegorovich said.

“We won’t know about it,” Henry reminded him.  “Even if they crack the secret, they won't tell us.”

“Probably not,” Harper agreed.  “All we can do is hope that the
next
battle offers us more data.”

He cleared his throat.  “Overall, we did well,” he said.  “And we did give them a bloody nose.”

“Yes,” Yegorovich said.  “But they gave us a beating too.”

“We will repair our ships,” Harper said.  “And then we will go on the offensive.”

Susan sighed, inwardly, as Harper closed the conference, the holographic images popping out of existence one by one.  It was hard to feel optimistic when tiredness was dragging her down, hard to think clearly when her brain just wanted sleep.  There were drugs she could take, she knew, but they tended to come with bad side effects.  She rubbed her eyes as the last image vanished, then blinked in surprise as she recalled that Prince Henry was still in the  compartment.  She’d honestly forgotten.

“Your Excellency,” she said.  “What can I do for you?”

“Some of the experts were wondering why we made no attempt to transmit the First Contact Package,” Henry said.  He spoke with the air of a man asking a question to which he already knew the answer.  “They’d like a comment from you.”

“They caught us with our pants down,” Susan reminded him, dryly.  If nothing else, it had been a sharp lesson in just how good the aliens
were
at sneaking around.  “And we had no time to do anything, but fight and run.”

She met his eyes.  “Just how deeply
are
they in denial?”

“They’re academics,” Henry said, without heat.  “They don’t really understand the way the human mind works, certainly outside their little bubble.  There’s no way that they can really grasp, at an instinctive level, that aliens aren't just humans in funny outfits and dumb prosthetics glued to their foreheads.”

He shrugged.  “Most of the ones who were with me on Tadpole Prime know better, of course,” he added.  “But they have a habit of believing that the newcomers are just like the Tadpoles, rather than a whole new culture -
two
whole new cultures - in their own right.”

Susan nodded in agreement.  A specialist on Ancient Rome was hardly a specialist on Imperial Japan - and both of those powers were
human
.  Someone who had spent the last ten years studying the Tadpoles might not be able to escape his preconceptions, when asked to look at a whole new race.  But the academics who had no experience with non-human life might be even worse.

“I’ll keep an eye on them,” Henry added.  “I don’t think they’ll do anything stupid, but you never know.”

“We’ll see about transmitting the package when we return to Unity,” Susan said.  She doubted it would be possible, but there was no harm in trying.  The aliens might just respond, after a battle they had to find profoundly unsatisfying.  “Until then ... good luck.”

Henry nodded, then drained his mug.  “Get some sleep,” he advised.  He gave her a tired smile as he rose and headed for the hatch.  “We’re going to be here for a while, aren't we?”

Susan nodded.  She watched him leave, then eyed the washroom longingly for a long moment before lying down on the sofa and forcing herself to relax.  A few hours of rest wouldn't kill her, her treacherous mind insisted ... Mason had everything in hand.  She could snatch some time to herself before returning to the bridge.  And then ...

She closed her eyes.  A moment later, she was sound asleep.

Chapter Twenty-Five

“Captain,” Charlotte said.  “I just picked up a flash from Platform #45.  We have five enemy ships entering the system from Tramline Two.”

Susan looked up.  The repairs had taken nearly ten days, but
Vanguard
was as close to combat-ready as she’d ever be, without a proper shipyard.  Her crew was
very
well trained, after the last series of battles.  Replacing a point defence weapon or a sensor blister was the work of an hour or two. 
New York
had taken heavier punishment - she had a nasty feeling that the aliens
had
realised that she was the flagship - but the Americans were confident that she'd be ready to return to battle in two more days.

“Interesting,” she mused.  If they’d been human ships, she would have assumed that they knew nothing about the situation ahead of them, but that assumption might not hold true for the aliens.  “Can you give me a breakdown?”

“Two carriers, two cruisers and one starship that might just be a frigate,” Charlotte said, carefully.  Her fingers danced across the console, teasing data from the records.  “The platform didn't get a clear look at her.”

Two carriers
, Susan mused. 
We could take two carriers
.

“Raise the flag,” she ordered.  Admiral Harper would have to make the final call, but she couldn't see why he would refuse her permission to engage.  “And then plot an intercept course.”

She considered possible options as she waited for Admiral Harper to reply.  The alien starfighters were flying CSPs around their carriers, which meant that sneaking up on them was almost certainly impossible.  And, even though the carriers massed nearly twice as much as
Vanguard
, their acceleration curves would almost certainly be sharper.  If the aliens detected
Vanguard
sneaking up on them, they’d reverse course while dispatching their starfighters to harry the battleship ...

Doing unto us as we did unto them
, she thought, as Admiral Harper’s face popped into existence in front of her. 
And that would definitely be annoying
.

“Captain,” Admiral Harper said.  “You believe we should engage?”

“Yes, sir,” Susan said.  “Two carriers - insufficient escorts.  We won’t get a better shot at them.”

“True,” Admiral Harper agreed.  “Do you have a plan?”

“Loan me the two carriers and I will,” Susan said.  It would mean giving the honour of victory to the carriers and their pilots, but she didn't mind.  Depriving the aliens of two carriers was more important than outscoring the Russians or the French.  “If we can't sneak up on them, we might at least give them a nasty fright.”

“Of course, Captain,” Harper said.  “They will scream for help, of course.”

Susan nodded.  She’d already considered the possibility.  “With all due respect, Admiral, we still won’t get a better shot at them,” she said.  “And they may well have figured out that we didn't jump down the other tramline by now too.”

“Point,” Harper agreed.  “I’ll assign the carriers to you.  And good luck.”

“Thank you, sir,” Susan said.

Harper’s face vanished from the display.  Susan took a moment to tap her console, organising her thoughts before sending the planned engagement vectors to the two carriers.  It would require some fancy timing, but if they messed it up they could fall back and the enemy would never know that the carriers had been there.  She half-expected the carrier commanders to object to her assignments yet, to her surprise, they made no objection.  But then, she
was
offering them a clear shot at the enemy ships.

“Take us out,” she ordered, finally.  “Make sure the cloak doesn't slip or the whole exercise will be worse than useless.”

She leaned back in her command chair as
Vanguard
came to life, her drives slowly propelling her away from the RV point.  There was no way to be
entirely
sure of where the aliens were, not yet, but as long as they had no reason to take evasive action they’d remain on a least-time course to Unity.  Their damned FTL communications system gave them too many advantages, she reflected sourly.  She'd sell her soul for a system that allowed her to manipulate her forces in real-time.

The REMFs would love it
, she thought, darkly. 
They’d be able to tell us what to do from a safe distance
.

She wondered, absently, if the aliens had the same problem.  She’d read the reports from the researchers - more speculation than hard facts - only to decide that there was just too little for anyone to go on.  And yet, the more she thought about it, the more she
knew
they were missing something important.  A master couldn't give orders, surely, without slaves who understood his language?  Slavery simply didn't work very well in an age of high technology, although there were parts of Earth where it had been making a comeback for years.  A slave in an advanced factory had too many options for making his masters miserable.  Or had the aliens somehow solved that problem?

If they can talk to one race, they can talk to more
, she told herself. 
And yet, they didn't even try to open communications with us
.

“Captain,” Charlotte said, an hour later.  “I’m picking up the alien carriers on passive sensors, within the projected cone.”

“
Very
within the projected cone,” Susan said.  She would have been impressed if it hadn't been clear that the aliens had maintained a least-time course to the tramline.  If nothing else, it added weight to the theory that the aliens had put the invasion force they’d sent to Unity together in a hurry.  “Are they maintaining an active sensor watch?”

“No, Captain,” Charlotte said.  “But they
are
maintaining a constant CSP.”

“Good,” Susan said. 

She wished, once again, for an FTL communications system of her own.  If all had gone according to plan,
Napoleon
and
Admiral Kuznetsov
had taken up position on the other side of the alien ships, ready to play their role in the operation.  But she wouldn't
know
they’d taken up position until she lured the alien starfighters out of position, giving them a clear shot at the carriers.  She didn't think that either of the commanders would screw up deliberately, but mistakes happened in wartime.  Whoever had convinced the politicians that the military machine was perfectly efficient had clearly been a masterful spin doctor.

And then the bastards started expecting miracles
, she thought, coldly. 
They didn't have a realistic idea of what we could do
.

She pushed the thought aside.  “Mr. Reed,” she said, calmly.  “Stand by to execute Spoof on my order.”

“Aye, Captain,” Reed said.  “Spoof protocols engaged and ready.”

Susan glanced at the timer.  If she waited, if she gave the carriers more time ... she ran the risk of losing her own position.  And that would introduce too many random variables into the operation.  She’d hoped, if nothing else, that the operation would test the theory that the aliens were thoroughly aggressive, as long as there was a chance of victory.  But if they missed their window ...”

“Activate spoof,” she ordered.  “Now.”

Vanguard
quivered as Reed flushed power through her drives.  From the outside, it should look like a major power fluctuation in the cloaking device, accidentally betraying her position to the enemy.  Susan imagined, just for a second, that the enemy carriers literally flinched before she started to bark orders.  If their attempt to sneak up on the aliens had failed so spectacularly, their best option was to try to catch the carriers before they could take evasive action.

The long seconds ticked away, then ...

“Enemy carriers are launching fighters,” Charlotte reported.

“Stand by point defence,” Susan ordered, coolly.  There were a
lot
of starfighters.  She made a mental note that intelligence’s estimate of just how many starfighters the aliens could fit into their carriers was badly inaccurate, then turned her attention to the display.  “Prepare to reverse course.”

“Aye, Captain,” Reed said.

Susan smiled, grimly.  So far, so good.  The aliens had launched their starfighters, as she’d expected; now, she had to give them a shot at a victory.  And then ... they’d only kept twenty or so starfighters for their own defence.  It didn't seem to have occurred to them that they were being lured out of place.

“Reverse course,” she ordered.

“Aye, Captain,” Reed said.  “Operation Run Rabbit Run is now underway.”

Susan shot a quelling look at the back of his head, then watched as the wall of alien starfighters closed in rapidly.  They presumably felt that a clear shot at a battleship was worth the risk, particularly after the hammering their battleships had taken at Unity.  She wondered, absently, just how quickly the aliens could repair their ships, then decided it wasn't an immediate concern.  All that mattered was surviving the next few minutes.

“Engage as soon as they enter weapons range,” she ordered, grimly.

“Aye, Captain,” Granger said.

The aliens fell on
Vanguard
like wolves on the flock.  Their starfighters might have been inferior, Susan noted, but they knew how to fly them. 
Vanguard
could pump out thousands of plasma bolts every second, yet only a handful of alien starfighters died before entering attack range and returning fire.  The only upside, as far as she could tell, was that the aliens didn't seem to have devised a torpedo-mounted bomb-pumped laser.  If
that
happened, the entire concept of interstellar war would be flipped over, once again.

Battleships will become unviable
, she thought. 
And even armoured carriers would become chancy
.

“Minor damage to the hull,” Finch reported.  “But they’re blowing holes in our point defence again.”

Susan nodded, unsurprised.  Weakening
Vanguard’s
point defence would be their first priority, certainly when they had to believe there was no way the battleship could escape wave after wave of tiny attackers.  And the damage
was
mounting up.  But if the timing was right ...

“Captain, the carriers have launched their fighters,” Charlotte reported.  “They’ll be engaging the enemy carriers in four minutes.”

Susan allowed herself a smile as the alien starfighters wheeled around.  There was no indecision, not this time.  The aliens would know that their carriers were suddenly naked and helpless as the human starfighters raced towards their targets.  And if they lost the carriers, they would be doomed.  There would be no hope of escaping before they ran out of life support and suffocated somewhere in deep space.

“Raise the carriers,” she ordered, grimly.  “Warn them to be ready for suicide attacks.”

She felt her smile grow wider as the alien starfighters raced away from
Vanguard
, too late to have a hope of saving their carriers.  They’d been lured out of place and now they’d have to pay for it.  If they’d been human, she would have urged the carriers to accept surrender, but there was no way to communicate with the alien pilots.  The alien carriers spat wave after wave of point defence towards the human craft, yet there was no way it could save them.  A single warhead detonating inside their launch tubes would be disastrous.

“Carrier One is under heavy attack,” Charlotte reported.  “She’s ...”

Her voice broke off.  “Scratch one flattop,” she said.  “I say again, scratch one flattop.”

Susan nodded.  The alien pilots were overloading their drives, but it still wasn’t enough.  She watched, vindictively, as the second carrier staggered to one side, then lost power completely as a chain of explosions wrecked her innards.  Somehow, miraculously, her hull survived, but Susan would have been astonished if any of her crew had.  Even if they
had
, there was no way they’d last long enough for help to arrive.