Fleet of the Damned (10 page)

"Too bad, Commander. I can see you now. You'll be the only flight-qualified base nursery officer in the Empire."

Sten blew foam. "Keep talking, you two. I always believe junior officers should have a chance to speak for themselves.

"Just remember… on graduation day, I want to see those salutes snap! With all eight legs!"

Sten discovered he had an ability he did not even know existed, although he had come to realize that Ida, the Mantis Section's pilot, must have had a great deal of it. The ability might be described as as mechanical spatial awareness. The same unconscious perceptions that kept Sten from banging into tables as he walked extended to the ships he was learning to fly. Somehow he "felt" where the ship's nose was, and how far to either side the airfoils, if any, extended.

Sten never scraped the sides of an entry port on launch or landing. But there was the day that he learned his new ability had definite limits.

The class had just begun flying heavy assault transports, the huge assemblages that carried the cone-and-capsule launchers used in a planetary attack. Aesthetically, the transport looked like a merchantman with terminal bloats. Sten hated the brute. The situation wasn't improved by the fact that the control room of the ship was buried in the transport's midsection. But Sten hid his dislike and wallowed the barge around obediently.

At the end of the day the students were ordered to dock their ships. The maneuver was very simple: lift the ship on antigrav, reverse the Yukawa drive, and move the transport into its equally monstrous hangar. There were more than adequate rear-vision screens, and a robot followme sat on tracks to mark the center of the hangar.

But somehow Sten lost his bearings—and the Empire lost a hangar.

Very slowly and majestically the transport ground into one hangar wall. Equally majestically, the hangar roof crumpled on top of the ship.

There was no damage to the heavily armored transport. But Sten had to sit for six hours while they cleared the rubble off the ship, listening to a long dissertation from the instructor pilot about his flying abilities. And his fellow trainees made sure it was a very long time before Sten was allowed to forget.

CHAPTER TWENTY

S
ten loved the brutal little tacships. He was in the distinct minority.

The tacships, which varied from single- to twenty-man crews were multiple-mission craft, used for short-range scouting, lightning single-strike attacks, ground strikes, and, in the event of a major action, as the fleet's first wave of skirmishers—much the same missions that Sten the soldier was most comfortable with.

That did not logically justify liking them. They were overpowered, highly maneuverable—to the point of being skittish—weapons platforms.

A ship may be designed with many things in mind, but eventually compromises must be made. Since no compromises were made for speed/maneuvering/hitting, that also meant that comfort and armor were nonexistent in a tacship.

Sten loved bringing a ship in-atmosphere, hands and feet dancing on the control as he went from AM2 to Yukawa, bringing the ship out of its howling dive close enough to the surface to experience ground-rush, nap-of-the-earth flying under electronic horizons. He loved being able to hang in space and slowly maneuver in on a hulking battleship without being observed, to touch the launch button and see the battlewagon "explode" on his screen as the simulator recorded and translated the mock attack into "experience." He delighted in being able to tuck a tacship into almost any shelter, hiding from a flight of searching destroyers.

His classmates thought that while all this was fun, it was also a way to guarantee a very short, if possibly glorious, military career.

"Whyinhell do you think I got into flight school anyway?" Bishop told Sten. "About the third landing I made with the Guard I figured out those bastards were trying to kill me. And I mean the ones on
my
side. You're a slow study, Commander. No wonder they made you a clottin' officer."

Sten, however, may have loved the tacships too well. A few weeks before graduation, he was interviewed by the school's commandant and half a dozen of the senior instructors. Halfway through the interview, Sten got the idea that they were interested in Sten becoming an instructor.

Sten turned green. He wanted a rear echelon job like he wanted a genital transplant. And being an IP was too damned dangerous, between the reservists, the archaic, and the inexperienced. But it did not appear as if Sten would be consulted.

For once Sh'aarl't and Bishop honestly commiserated with Sten instead of harassing him. Being an IP was a fate—not worse than death but pretty similar.

Sten's fears were correct. He had been selected to remain at Flight Training School as an instructor. Orders had even been cut at naval personnel.

But somehow those orders were canceled before they reached Sten. Other, quite specific orders were dictated—from, as the covering fax to the school's commandant said, "highest levels."

The commandant protested—until someone advised him that those "highest levels" were on Prime World itself!

***

The biggest difference between the army and the navy, Sten thought, was that the navy was a lot more polite.

Army orders bluntly grabbed a crunchie and told him where to be and what to do and when to do it. Or else.

Naval orders, on the other hand…

You, Commander Sten, are requested and ordered, at the pleasure of the Eternal Emperor, to take charge of Tac-Div Y47L, now being commissioned at the Imperial Port of Soward.

You are further requested and ordered to proceed with TacDiv Y47L for duties which shall be assigned to you in and around the Caltor System.

You will report to and serve under Fleet Admiral X. R. van Doorman, 23rd Fleet.

More detailed instructions will be provided you at a later date.

Saved. Saved by the God of Many Names.

Sten paused only long enough to find out that the Caltor System was part of the Fringe Worlds, which would put him very close to the Tahn and where the action would start, before he whooped in joy and went looking for his friends.

He was going to kiss Sh'aarl't.

Hell, he felt good enough to kiss Bishop.

Graduation from Phase Two was very different from the last day in Selection.

The graduates threw the chief IP into the school's fountain. When the school commandant protested mildly, they threw him in as well.

The two elderly officers sat in the armpit-deep purple-dyed water and watched the cavorting around them. Finally the commandant turned to his chief.

"You would think, after all these years, that they could find
something
more original to do than just pitch us here again."

The chief IP was busily wringing out his hat and didn't answer.

Sh'aarl't, Bishop, and Sten bade leaky farewells, vowing to write, to get together once a year, and all the rest of the bushwa service people promise and never do.

Sh'aarl't was still awaiting orders. Bishop's orders were exactly what he wanted—pushing a large, unarmed transport around the sky from one unknown and therefore peaceful system to another.

Sten wondered if he would ever see either of them again.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

T
here was no pomp and there was carefully no ceremony when Lady Atago transferred her command from the battleship
Forez
to the infinitely smaller
Zhenya
.

Admiral Deska had spent a good portion of his military career studying his superior. She despised the frills and displays of military recognition. All that she required was that one do exactly as she indicated without hesitation. She became very thoughtful about any icing upon that requirement.

Despite their size, the
Zhenya
and her sisterships were a major tech miracle for the Tahn. The design and development of the ships would have cost even the Imperial naval R&D staff a good percentage of its budget.

The
Zhenya
was intended for mine warfare of the most sophisticated kind, a type of combat that the Imperial Navy had given little attention.

It had been a very long time since the Empire had fought a war with an equal. Even the brutal Mueller Wars were, ultimately, a limited uprising. Mines were used in positional warfare to deny passage to the enemy or to provide stationary security for one's own positions. They could also be laid to interdict the enemy's own ship lanes. Mines simply hadn't seemed relevant to the navy strategists.

The other reason for the navy's lack of interest in mine warfare was its unromantic nature. A mine was a heavy clunk of metal that just sat there until something made it go bang, generally long after the minelayer had departed. Mine experts didn't wear long white scarves or get many hero medals, even though mines, in space, on land, or in water, were one of the most deadly and cost-efficient ways of destroying the enemy.

The Tahn were less interested in glamour than in any and every method of winning a war. The
Zhenya
was one of the keys to their future.

Sophisticated space mines, of a kind never seen before, could be laid with impossible speed by the
Zhenya
. Each mine was basically an atomic torpedo that was immediately alerted to any ship in its vicinity. A "friendly" ship would be transmitting on its Identification-Friend or Foe com line, and the mine would read the code and ignore that ship. An enemy ship or one not transmitting the current code to the mine would find a very different reaction. The mine—and any other mines within range—would activate and home on the enemy ship. With thousands of mines in any one field, even the most heavily armed Imperial battleship would be doomed.

The Tahn had also solved another problem. Space warfare, even one with established battle lines, was very mobile and its conditions changed rapidly. Retreating or attacking through one's own minefield could be lethal, even if the mine had identified the oncoming ship as friendly. It still was a large chunk of debris to encounter at speed. And if battle conditions changed, the minefield might have to be abandoned—it took a lot of time and caution to sweep a field and then re-lay it.

The
Zhenya
could retrieve and redeploy mines almost as fast as it could lay them. It was an interesting way to be able to create, define, or modify the field that the enemy would be forced to fight on—in theory.

The Zhenya-class ships had yet to be proved. In the Tahn's haste to add the ships to their combat fleets, there had been many failures—all ending with the deaths of the entire crew.

Deska was confident that all the problems with the
Zhenya
and her sister ships had been solved, but not so confident that he felt safe risking the Lady Atago's life. He explained this to her, and she listened with seeming interest. She thought for a moment.

"Assemble the crew," she said finally.

Although it was a small crew, gathered together they filled the
Zhenya's
mess hall. The Lady Atago waited quietly until everyone was available and then began to speak.

"Our task today," she said, "is to prove the worth of the
Zhenya
. On our success, much is dependent. You understand this, do you not?"

No one said a word. The audience barely breathed. But there was a stiffening of attention.

"Previous trials have ended in disappointment," she continued. "This is why I am with you today. If you die, I die. It is therefore required that every one of you perform his individual task to his supreme abilities."

She swept the room with her never changing eyes of absolute zero.

"It goes without saying," she hammered home, "that if there is a failure today, it would be best for any of you not to be among the few survivors."

She dropped her eyes and flicked at a crumb left on the otherwise spotless mess table in front of her. The crew was dismissed.

The drone tacship drove toward the
Zhenya
at full power. Between the robot and the minelayer hung a cluster of the newly developed mines. Lady Atago stood behind the mine control screen, watching closely.

"Report."

"All mines report incoming ship as friendly."

"Change the recognition code."

Sweat beaded one tech's forehead. It was at this point that the accidents had occurred. All too often, when the IFF code was changed, the mine either refused to attack a no-longer-friendly—according to the recognition code—ship or launched on every ship within range, including the minelayer.

This time the control board barely had time to report the change in status and register that the mine was reporting an enemy ship before six mine-missiles launched.

The drone tacship fired back with antiship missiles. Two of the mines were exploded.

The third mine hit the robot and tore out its hull. Less than a second later, a score more were hunting the debris. The rest made note of the kill and returned to station.

"Did the mines show any response to the drone's electronic countermeasures?" Atago asked.

The tech consulted a nearby screen. "Negative. All transmissions from the enemy were ignored once it had been identified."

The Lady Atago turned her attention from the screen to Admiral Deska. She allowed one perfect eyebrow to raise a millimeter.

"You may inform the council, Admiral," she said, "that we will begin full production."

A half hour later the flagship was once again the
Forez
.

Lady Atago went quietly back to her maps and battle plans.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

S
ten landed on Cavite, central world of the Caltor System, as a commander without a fleet.

Among the other shortcomings of the tacships was that their tiny supply holds limited their range. Their delicate engines also required far more frequent maintenance intervals than did most Imperial craft. So the four tacships that were to be Sten's command had been berthed in a freighter and now were somewhere between Soward and Cavite.