Passage at Arms (28 page)

With one weapon all but out and the others likely to degrade, our ability to shed heat is crippled. We can’t rely on radiator vanes alone if the pursuit closes in.

Teeter-totter, teeter-totter. Each time the situation shows promise, something ugly raises its head. Lately, it seems, life is a Jurassic swamp.

Sometimes things go from bad to worse without any intervening cause for optimism.

The Commander was right, Lieutenant Varese wrong. We should have made the transfer fly in Climb, and fuel levels be damned.

We fall foul of the other firm’s new tactical intelligence system. They’ve been seeding tiny, instelled probes near stars to catch sun-skippers. If the unit detects a Climber’s tachyon spray, it sends one tiny instel bleep.

The sharks, who have been casting about in confusion, turn their noses toward the scent of blood.

Fisherman gets a trace when the squirt goes out. “Commander, I’ve got something strange here. A millisecond trace.”

“Play it back.” A moment later, “Play it again. Make anything of it, First Watch Officer?”

“Never seen anything like it.”

“Junghaus, you’re the expert.”

“Sorry, sir. I don’t know. Never had anything like that in E-school. Maybe it’s natural.” There are natural tachyon sources. Some Hawking Holes are known to produce them in much the same fashion as a pulsar generates its beam.

“Maybe you should ask the writer,” Yanevich suggests.

“No point. Wasn’t a ship, was it? That’s what matters.”

“Maybe a Climber going up? Looks a little like that.”

“Shouldn’t be anybody in the neighborhood. Keep an eye on it, Junghaus.”

In ignorant bliss we settle gently into the soft dust of a lunar crater bottom, cycle down to minimum power, and prepare to possum for a few days. Sooner or later the other firm will go after livelier game. If they haven’t already.

The Old Man says, “Old Musgrave used a trick like this when he was in the Eight Ball.”

“Uhm?” The coffee is gone. Even the ersatz. We do our fencing over juice glasses now.

For several minutes he doesn’t say anything more. Then, “Found himself a little moon with a big hollow spot inside. Don’t ask me how. Used to duck in there, go norm, and power down. Drove the other firm crazy for a while.”

“What happened?”

“Went to the well too often. One day he showed up and that moon was a gravel cloud with a half-dozen destroyers inside.”

“They didn’t get him?”

“Not that time. Not in the Eight Ball.” He swallows some juice, chews his pipe. “He was a wily old trapdoor spider. He’d sit in there for a week sometimes, then jump out and get himself a red star. He took out more destroyers than any two men since.” Silence again.

“End of story?”

“Yep.”

“What’s the point?”

He shrugs. “You can’t keep doing the same thing?”

They’re crafty. They do nothing for hours. They make sure they have plenty of muscle before they move. We have twelve hours to loaf and get fat thinking we have it made.

Fisherman says, “Got something here, Commander.” He sounds puzzled.

I’ve been pestering Rose, trying to unravel a few strands of a misty personality. Without success. It’s Yanevich’s watch. He attends Junghaus.

“Playback.” We study it. “Same as before?”

“Not quite, sir. Lasted longer.”

“Curious.” Yanevich looks at me. I shrug. “Same point of origin?”

“Very close, sir.”

“Keep watching.” We go on about our business.

I go try to get Canzoneri to tell me about Rose.

Five minutes later Fisherman says, “Contact, Mr. Yanevich.”

We swarm round. No doubt what this is. An enemy ship. Two minutes of fast calculation extrapolates her course. “No problem,” Yanevich says. “She’s just checking the star.”

She gets in a sudden hurry to go somewhere. I sigh in relief. That was close.

Two hours later there’s another one. She hurries to join the first, which is now skipping around crazily the other side of the sun. Yanevich frowns thoughtfully but doesn’t sound the alarm.

“They act like they’re after somebody,” he says. “Junghaus, you sure you haven’t had any Climber traces?”

“No sir. Just those two bleeps.”

“You think somebody heard us come out of the sun and went up from norm?”

Fisherman shrugs. I say, “Those sprays don’t look anything like a ship.”

“I don’t like it,” Chief Nicastro says. “There’s a crowd gathering. We ought to sneak out before somebody trips over us.”

“How?” Westhause snaps. For the first time in months he doesn’t have more work than he can handle. The lack has him edgy.

“We’ll get you home to momma, Phil,” Canzoneri promises.

Laramie calls, “That’s what he’s afraid of, Chief. He’s had time to think it over.”

I smile. Someone still has a sense of humor.

“Laramie...” Nicastro starts into the inner circle, thinks better of it, wheels on the first Watch Officer. “At least go standby on annihilation, sir.”

The neutrino detector starts stuttering, clickety-clack, clickety-clack, like a typewriter under the ministrations of a cautious two-fingered typist.

“Missiles detonating.” Nicastro says it with a force suggesting he’s just confirmed a suspicion the rest of us are too dull to comprehend.

“I’ve got another one,” Fisherman announces.

“Picraux, wake the Commander.”

Nicastro nods glumly. This one will whip past less than a million kilometers out. The Chief would die happy if she blew us to ions.

More typewriter noise. It dies a little as Brown reduces the neutrino detector’s sensitivity.

“They’re really putting it on somebody.”

“Here comes number four,” I say, catching the first ghostly feather before Fisherman does.

“Carmon^better activate the tank.” Yanevich pokes me with a finger. “Pass the word to Mr. Piniaz to wake everybody up. Picraux. While you’re up there, shake everybody out.”

When it’s no drill and there’s time, general quarters can be handled in a civilized manner.

Brown reduces the detector’s sensitivity again.

“Another one,” Fisherman says.

“Any pattern yet, Carmon?”

“Not warm yet, sir.”

“Move it, man. Engineering, stand by to shift to annihilation.”

The Commander swings down through the jungle gym. “What have you got, First Watch Officer?” He’s so calm that I, lingering near the Weapons hatch, get a flutter in the stomach. The cooler he is, the more grave the situation. He’s always been that way.

“Looks like we’re camped in the middle of the other firm’s company picnic.”

The Commander listens impassively while Yanevich brings him up to date. “Junghaus, roll that second sighting at your slowest tape speed. On the First Watch Officer’s screen. Loop it.”

“What’re we looking for?” Yanevich asks.

“Code groupings.”

The typist is a fast learner. His clickety-clack has become a fast rattle. Brown cuts the sensitivity again.

“Poor bastards have had it,” Rose says. “Their point is taking everything but the sink. Must not be able to move.”

Better they than me, I think, the stomach flutters threatening to mature into panic. And, hey, what does the Old Man mean, code groupings?

“We ought to haul ass while we have the chance,” Nicastro grumbles, trying his luck with the Commander.

“Two more,” Fisherman announces.

“Three,” I say, leaning over his shoulder. “Here’s a big one over here.”

The Commander turns. “Carmon?”

The display tank sparkles to life.

“Damn! Brown. Turn that thing all the way back up.”

Clickety-clack nearly deafens us.

Floating red jewels appear where none ought to be, telling a tale none of us want to hear. We’ve been englobed. The trans-solar show is a distraction.

“Oh, shit!” someone says, almost reverently.

They aren’t certain of our whereabouts. The moon is well off center of their globe.

“Commander.” Chief Canzoneri beckons. The Old Man goes to look over his shoulder. After a moment, he grunts.

He says, “They’re beating the piss out of an asteroid. Must be nice to have missiles to waste.” He strolls toward Fisherman, his face almost beatific. “Fooled us, didn’t they?” he tells me. “Wasted a few missiles and locked the door while we sat here grinning.”

The distant firing ends.

The Old Man stares steadily at the craft Fisherman has in detection.

Yanevich mumbles, “They reckon we’ve got it figured up now and didn’t panic.” There’s agony in his eyes when he meets Nicastro’s gaze.

Varese, you prick. I could choke you.

The swiftest reaction would’ve done us no good. They’ve had half a day to tighten the net. What the hell can we do?

I don’t like being scared.

The Old Man takes a pen from his pocket. He taps the end against his teeth, then against one of the feathers on Fisherman’s screen. “It’s him.”

Fisherman stares dumbly. He grows more and more pallid. Sweat beads on his upper lip. He murmurs, “The Executioner.”

“Uhm. Back from his holiday with Second Fleet. I’ll take the conn, Mr. Yanevich.”

“Commander has the conn.” Yanevich doesn’t conceal his relief.

I want to say something, to ask something. I can’t. My gaze is fixed on that tachyon spray. The Executioner. The other firm’s big man. Their number one life-taker. They want us bad.

The Old Man grins at me. “Relax. He’s not infallible. Beat him patrol before last. And Johnson, she had the hex sign on him.”

I feel awfully cold. I’m shivering.

“Engineering, bring CT systems to full readiness.”

This is a state of readiness midway between standby and actual shifting. It’s seldom used because it’s such a strain on personnel. Apparently the Commander does appreciate the fuel problem.

“All hands. Take care of your personals,” he says. “General quarters shortly.” He sounds like a father calming a three-year-old with nightmares.

I’m so nervous my bladder and bowels won’t evacuate. I stand staring at the display tank. A dozen rubies inhabit it now. Flight would be suicidal. Amazing that they’d devote so much strength to one Climber.

We have to stay put and outfox them.

Outfox the Executioner? His reputation is justified. He can’t help but find us...

“Mr. Westhause, bring up the data for Tau and Omicron.”

“Got it already, Commander.”

“Good. Program for Tau with just enough hyper to give it away. Once we’re up, zag toward Omicron, then put us back inside this rock.”

“It’s mostly water ice, Commander, with a little surface dust. There seems to be a real rock surface several thousand meters down, though.”

“Whatever. I trust you’ve resolved its orbitals? Can you hold us deep enough to shield the point?”

“I think so, sir.”

“Can you or can’t you?”

“I can, sir. I will. Might have to run high Bevs to get the cross section down so we don’t take core heat if we go deep.”

“This rock isn’t that big. But keep gravity in mind. Don’t let it upset your calculations.”

“Maybe we shouldn’t go down more than a couple klicks. Just deep enough to escape their weaponry.”

“Can you hold it that fine?”

“I did on Rathgeber. Finer.”

“On Rathgeber you had a century’s worth of orbital data. Go down twenty-five. Hell. Make it fifty, just to be safe. They might try to blast us out.”

They’re doing this out loud to let the men know there’s a plan. It’s an act. I try not listen. It doesn’t sound like much. I check the time. Still got a chance to piss before strap-in.

The alarm sounds. “To your stations. They’ve found us. Missiles incoming. Prepare for Climb. Lift off, Mr. Westhause.”

The lighting fades to near extinction as the drives go from minimum to maximum power.

“Vent heat, max,” Yanevich orders.

Back in Weapons now, I commence firing. My unit survives, though not without protest. The air gets colder and colder. The hyper alarm howls. I push my bug plugs into my ears.

“Secure the gravity system, Mr. Bradley,” the Commander orders. “Secure all visibility lighting.”

What? We’re going through this in the dark? I feel the caress of panic. Blind panic. That’s a joke.

“Climb.”

The visibility lights aren’t necessary. The glow of Climb, complemented by the luminescence of the idiot lights, provides adequate illumination. So. A little more Climb endurance won.

The Commander shuts down systems till it seems nothing but the Climb system remains on-line. Internal temperature is so low frost forms on non-radiant surfaces and men exhale fog into their clasped hands.

The first salvo arrives and delivers enough applied cross-sectional kinetic energy to rattle bones and brains. I gasp for breath, fight a lost bug back into my right ear.

Down in the basement Varese is frenetically trying to catch up on a million little tasks he let slide during ready. The last hint of refinement has fled him. His cussing isn’t inventive, just strong enough to crisp the paint off every surface within three kilometers.

The Commander continues securing systems. Even all defectors and radios, which, normally, would be maintained at a warm idle.

Piniaz taps my shoulder. “Shut her down,” he says. “Then go kill the cannon.” His dark face makes him hard to read. As if catching my thoughts, he whispers, “I think he’s going a little far. We ought to be ready to slash and bite if we have to do down.”

“Yeah.” It’ll take time to bring everything back to ready. Frightened, I close the systems down.

Up in Ops Yanevich and the Old Man are running and rerunning Fisherman’s tapes, assembling the details of a cautionary message to the rest of the Fleet.

Six hours. For every second of them the Climber has whispered and stirred in response to forces acting on her Hawking point. Twice the Commander has ordered us deeper into the moon. We’re down nearly three hundred kilometers. We’re running a hundred Bev, the most I’ve ever seen, giving our point a diameter smaller than that of a hydrogen atom. We’re gulping CT fuel-----

Yet we’re being buffeted. Continuously. I don’t know what they’re doing up there, but... the whole surface has to be boiling, throwing trillions of tons of lunar matter into space.