Passage at Arms (23 page)

It’s an Old Earth strain that has adapted to Canaan, becoming a vigorous, fecund beast in the transition. Left unchecked, it can pit metal and foul atmosphere with its odor and spores. Though more nuisance than threat, it becomes dangerous if it reaches sensitive printed circuitry. The heat and humidity of Climb encourage explosive growth. Climber people hate it with an unreasoning passion. They invest it with a symbolic value I don’t understand.

“Who won the pool?” I ask as I enter Ops, still having found no sign of Fearless.

Blank faces turn my way. These men are busy with mold and mourning, too.

Laramie catches on. “Baake, in Weapons. The little shit-head.”

Rose nods glumly, head bobbing on a pull-string. He says, “He only bought one goddamned slip. To get us to quit bothering him. Ain’t that a bite in the ass?”

“Better get him to teach you his system,” Yanevich suggests, with a heaviness that implies this scene has been played before. “You only need one when it’s the right one.”

“Useless goddamned electric moron.” Rose kicks the main computer. “You screwed me out of a month’s pay, you know that? What the fuck good are you if you can’t figure out...”

Laramie and Throdahl bait him half-heartedly. Others join in. They start to show some spirit.

It’s a distraction, the cut-low game. Not an amusement anymore. They go at it viciously, but no tempers flare. They’re too drained to get mad.

Throdahl’s comm gear pings gently. The games die. Work stops. Everyone stares at the radioman.

We’re lying dead in space beside the instelled beacon. The rest of the squadron is parsecs away. We assume that we’ll be ordered to catch up.

Command has other ideas. Only now does Fisherman tell me we’ve been awaiting special orders.

That little ping brings the Commander swinging down from his cabin, an ape in a metal jungle. “Code book,” he calls ahead. Chief Nicastro produces the key he wears on a chain around his neck. He opens a small locker. The closure is symbolic. The box is hardly more than foil. A screwdriver could break it open.

The Chief takes out a loose-leaf book and pack of color-coded plastic cards banded with magnetic stripes.

“Card four, Chief,” the Commander says after a glance at the pattern on Throdahl’s screen. He slides the card into a slot. Throdahl thumbs through the code book. He uses a grease pencil to decode on the screen itself.

Only the initial and final groups translate: COMMANDER’S EYES ONLY and ACKNOWLEDGE.

Muttering, the Old Man scribbles the text groups in his notebook, clambers back to his hideout. Shortly, a thunderous, “Jesus fucking Christ with a wooden leg!” rips through the compartment. Pale faces turn upward. “Throdahl, send the acknowledge. Mr. Yanevich, tell Mr. Varese to establish a lock connect with the beacon.”

The beacon begins feeding a sector status update while he’s talking. Our chase, kill, and escape has kept us out of the biggest Climber operation of the war.

The convoy that took so long to gather at Thompson’s System is on the move. Second Fleet pecked at it and let it get away. In his grandiose way, Tannian has declared that none of those empty hulls will survive his attentions. One hundred twelve and one twenty are the estimates. Thirty-four Climbers are in the hunt. Every ship in three squadrons. Except ours and Johnson’s.

“Shee-it,” Nicastro says softly. “That’s one hell of a big iron herd.” His eyes are wide and frightened.

“Bet that escort figure goes up fast,” Yanevich says.

“Hell. With that many Climbers they should take the escort first.”

“Smells Eke a trap to me,” I say. “With bait Tannian couldn’t resist.”

The fighting hasn’t yet begun. Our brethren are still maneuvering into attack positions.

At first I think the Commander is upset because he’s been ordered into the cauldron, too. Wrong. The sense of that is too clear. Instead, our orders are bizarre.

The Old Man explains over coffee, in the wardroom, with all officers present.

“Gentlemen, we’ve been chosen, because of our superb record, to initiate a new era of Climber warfare.” There’s an ironic cast to his smile. He taps a flimsy. “Don’t look at me. I didn’t make it up. I’m just telling you what it says here. We’re supposed to take advantage of the brawl back yonder.” He jerks his head as if in a specific direction.

He doesn’t pass the message around. He holds to the eyes-only rule. “A hint or two here that they had this planned all along. It’s why we were off chasing that Leviathan. Johnson was supposed to go in with us.”

“For Christ’s sake,” I mutter. “What the hell is it?”

He smiles that grim shipboard smile. “We’re going to scrub the Rathgeber installations. Right when the other team needs diem most.”

Puzzled silence. Makes a strange strategic sense. With Rathgeber’s backing the hunter-killers will have a field day, finding thirty-four Climbers in one small sector.

“Didn’t we just get out of there?” I ask, more to break the silence than because I want to know.

“Sure. We were a couple of days away. Still are, on another leg of a triangle.” He muses, “Rathgeber. Named for Eustaces Rathgeber, fourteenth President of Commonweal Presidium. Brought Old Earth into Confederation. Only moon of Lambda Vesta One, a super-Jovian, sole planet of Lambda Vesta.” He smiles weakly.

“Been doing my homework. For what it’s worth, the base started out as a research station. Navy took over when the research outfit lost its grant. The other firm picked it up during their first sweep.”

The wardroom echoes, “But...” like a single-stroke engine having trouble getting started. The Commander ignores us.

“We’ll hyper in to just outside detection limits. That and the other intelligence data we’ll need will be assembled aboard the beacon. They have a printer. Then we Climb and move in. We go down, tear the place apart, and run like hell.”

“What the fuck kind of idiot scheme is that?” Piniaz demands. “Rathgeber? We use our missiles up, we won’t have anything to shoot back with while we’re getting away. Hell, they’ve got fifty hunters ported there.”

“Sixty-four.”

“So how the hell do we get out?”

No one questions our ability to get in, or to smash the base. It’s not a plum ripe for picking. I’ve been there. It’s tough.

“Maybe Command doesn’t care about that,” Yanevich says.

“Nobody will be home but base personnel,” the Commander counters. “This convoy operation will draw them off. Tannian isn’t stupid. He figures it’s a trap. So we give them what they want, then scrub Rathgeber so they can’t take advantage. Hell, everybody’s always saying it’d be a rabbit shoot out here if it weren’t for Rathgeber.”

It makes sense. The strategic sort of sense, where a chess player sacrifices a pawn to take a bishop. Rathgeber’s loss would hurt the other team bad, just as we’d be bad hurt if Canaan went.

The Old Man continues, “I think the Admiral is counting on us to pull the escort off the convoy.”

“Hitting them with rabbit punches,” Bradley mumbles. He and I lean against a bulkhead, staring down at the in-group. Threaten here, threaten there, make them drop their game plan.”

“Right out of the book.”

He shrugs.

The Old Man says, “Our problem will be ground and orbital defenses. Intelligence is supposed to give us what we need, but how good will the data be? Those clowns can’t figure what side of their ass goes in back. Anybody ever been to Rathgeber?”

I wave a reluctant finger. “Yeah. A two-day stopover six years ago. I can’t tell you much.”

“What about defenses? You were gunnery.”

“They’ll have beefed them up.”

“You look them over? How’s their reaction time? They won’t have messed with detection and fire control.”

“What do I know?”

“What size launch window can we expect? Can we do it in one pass? Will we have to keep bouncing up and down?’

“I spent my time getting snookered. What I saw looked standard. Human decision factor. You’ll get seven seconds for your first pass. After that you only get the time it takes them to aim.”

“Very unprofessional. You should’ve anticipated. Isn’t that what they taught us? Never mind. I forgive you.”

I stare at the Commander. Why has he accepted a mission he doesn’t like? He has the right to refuse.

No one suggests that.

They bitch about Command’s insane strategies but always go along.

“Mr. Westhause, program the fly. We’ll take hyper as soon as all the data comes through.” He steeples his fingers before his face. “Till tomorrow, gentlemen. Bring some thoughts. I want to be in and out before this convoy thing blows up. Our friends are counting on us.”

I smile grimly. He really hopes we get an extended leave out of this.

Is Marie in his thoughts? He hasn’t mentioned her for a long time.

Wonder what she did after we left. By now she must think we’re done. Our squadron is overdue. Command knows we’re alive, but they don’t keep civilians posted.

Varese keeps fidgeting. He decides to tell us what’s on his mind. “We’ve been out a long time, Commander. We’re way down on hydrogen and CT.”

“Mr. Westhause, see if there’s a water beacon on our way.”

We haven’t spent much time under pursuit, but daily Climb routine draws steadily on our CT. Normal hydrogen is less of a problem. Some beacons maintain water tanks for in-patrol refueling.

That’s the Engineer mentality surfacing. It compels them to start having seizures when fuel stores reach a certain level of depletion. The disease is peculiar to the breed. They’ve got to have that fat margin. In die bombards they got antsy when down by 10 percent. At 20 percent they kept everyone awake dragging their fingernails over the commander’s door.

They want that margin “in case of emergency.”

Varese is less excitable than most Engineers.

“We won’t need much CT after we shake loose,” the Commander muses. “We’ll burn what’s left going home anyway. We can pick up more water anytime.”

Once a Climber concludes active patrol, she remains on annihilation till she has just enough left to sneak in to Canaan. Venting excess is too dangerous, especially near TerVeen.

A Climber is most vulnerable before CT fueling and after final CT consumption. Those are the times when she needs big brothers and sisters to look out for her. She’s just another warship then. A puny, fragile, lightly armed, slow, and easily destroyed warship. Vulnerability is why she has a mother take her out to Fuel Point.

Climbers aren’t sluggers. They’re guerrillas. In the open they’re easy meat.

Lieutenant Varese takes no reassurance from the Commander’s confidence. Engineers never do. A wide streak of pessimism is a must in the profession.

“Any more questions?”

There are. No one cares to broach them.

The Commander allows us to board the beacon. I go through the hatch just to see how those people live.

Holy shit! Fresh faces! Clean faces. Well-fed, smiling faces, with welcomes for the heroes of the universe. Gleaming, apple-cheeked babies. But no women, damn it.

We look like prisoners lately released from a medieval dungeon. Sallow, gaunt, filthy, wild of hair and eye, a little tentative and timid.

Damn! There really are other people...

Right now, the first few minutes, while we’re staring at the beacon crew, I feel a fresh wind blowing on our morale. It’s a cool gale driving away a poisonous smog. Some of the men grin, shake hands, clap backs.

There’s a shower! Rumor says there’s a shower! These boys must live like maharajahs. Crafty old me, I disguise myself as a great spacedog and con one of the lads into showing me the way. I’m first man there. Hot needles nibble and sting my crusty skin. I bellow tuneless refrains, luxuriate in the warmth, the massagelike effect.

“Hurry up in there, goddamnit! Sir.”

Shouldn’t be a pig, should I? There’s a line out there now. “One minute.” Grinning, I thunder out the “Outward Bound.” Several men threaten to make it a shower I’ll remember the rest of a very short life.

They have sinks, too. Several of them. Men line up there too, shaving. Don’t think I will, though. I’m used to mine now. Completes the spacedog disguise.

Tarjan Zntoins, a Missileman, begins hopping about in a parody of an old-time sailor’s hornpipe while his compartment mates honk and hoot, using their hands as instrumental accompaniment.

Not bad. Not bad at all.

The beacon is a one-time Star Line freighter. Big mother.

Only the quarters are in use these days. The crew of nine have been out here four months. They’re eager for fresh faces, too. Their long vigil is lonely, though never as harrowing as ours. Their tachyon man tells me he’s been in beacons since the beginning. He’s had only two contacts in all that time.

They’re overdue for relief. Three months is their usual stint. A converted luxury liner makes regular rounds, changing crews each three months. Something is happening, though. Command has withdrawn the liner.

They’re hungry for news. What’s going on? How come they’ve been extended? Poor bastards. In continuous contact with Command and kept constantly ignorant. I tell them I don’t know a thing.

Great guys, these people. They put on a spread. A meal fit for a king. Command didn’t skip the luxuries here.

The mess decks are small. We wolf our feast in shifts, dallying and stalling while our successors curse us for farting around.

One last trip to the can. Isn’t this great? No waiting. I take another look at my beard. I look like a real space pirate. Like Eric the Red, or somebody. I give it a big trim, to a nice point beneath my chin. There. Gives me the look of a pale devil. The girls will love it.

“Attention. Climber personnel. Return to your ship. Please return to your ship.”

The holiday is over. “Up yours, Nicastro,” I mutter.

On my way I stop by the beacon’s vegetable crate of an office, liberate a half ream of clean paper. I’m tired of keeping notes on scraps.

Command’s intelligence is astonishingly detailed. Tannian has had this raid in his trick bag a long time. The man is a little brighter than his detractors admit.

The orbital data for Rathgeber have been redefined to the microsecond and millimeter, finer than we need or can handle. We could make a setdown in null, using the data.