Strength and Honor (24 page)

“We are Roman,” said Titus proudly.

“Y’all were Roman the first time round, and y’all needed help then.”

Titus admitted, “They’re not that smart this time.” He meant the gorgons, not the Romans. “They don’t turn our automatons on us. They don’t make it hard to breathe. They’re easier to kill.”

But the Hive learned. From each and every encounter. The new Hive would have learned quite a lot from the deaths of the gorgons of Thaleia.

“They’re all gone now,” said Titus. A loud unspoken
maybe
on the end of that. “There weren’t that many anyway. Not like last time. Someone said they didn’t have time to plant a lot of seeds.”

“Seeds?”

Titus shrugged. “They come out of the ground.”

“Hell of a thing to keep quiet,” said Farragut.

“We were afraid you’d invade,” Titus defended.

“I did that anyway.”

Titus seemed to remember then that John Farragut was the enemy. But he couldn’t seem to get the right hate up.

Before Farragut returned Titus to his fellow prisoners, he told him, “You’re right, you know. Heri should have got the arch.”

A journey of three days brought
Merrimack
back to Earth where she dropped off prisoners, picked up equipment, and walked some dogs.

The drone fighter raids over the U.S. had stopped immediately after the raid on Thaleia, so the skies were quiet.

TR Steele sat on the edge of a pier on the waterfront at sunset. Actually he was more like propped against the pier, his legs out in front of him at an angle, beer in hand.

Sun on his broad shoulders threw his very long shadow out before him.

He looked out to the water. A wide sky. Seagulls. Sails.

Sighted her off the port beam. A young female approaching up the sea strand. Loose build. Rangy walk. Tank top showed her wide shoulders. Shorts of girene green. Hard-toned legs. The only soft parts on her were what separated her from the boys.

She strolled to him. Let her head tilt. Her hair was loose. She guided a windblown lock to behind her ear. “Come here often, soldier?”

“Only when I’m taking time out from maiming children.” Roman propaganda had lodged under TR Steele’s skin, and stayed there crawling and biting.

“Romans talk,” she shrugged. “Their lips move but it still smells like it’s coming out the other end.” Steele snorted. A real woman of refinement, his Kerry Blue. Steele was uncomfortable around refinement. Kerry Blue always managed to say what he was not allowed to. “Thanks,” he said. Her take on it knocked things into perspective. A piper ran across the sand at the waterline on its little stilt legs. A gull squalled. Kerry Blue lifted her leg over his, like mounting a horse, to sit straddling him, face-to-face, hips to hips. Warm.

She propped her forearms atop his broad shoulders, her wrists crossed behind his head. Her fingers toyed with the short hairs behind his neck. Her brown eyes looked into his.

He gazed back. “What are you doing, Marine?”

Her body rocked a little.

“Sir? Nobody’s fooling anybody here.”

The rough palms of his big hands cradled her head, fingers laced in her hair. He had no idea what had become of the beer. He agreed, “No.”

“Just another man and another woman on the waterfront,” said Kerry looking round at the sunset couples. “We’re just harder than the civilians.”

“One of us is a lot harder.”

‘”Thomas?” His name in her voice set all his common sense free on holiday. “Can we go somewhere?” It was a career wrecker. Thomas Ryder Steele could not even spell career at the moment. He unwound her arms from round his neck, stood up, enclosed her hand in his to take her somewhere.

Lying on his back. Morning sun in the window of the little room. She’d fallen asleep on top of him. Steele with his arms wrapped round Kerry Blue. All the way around, to hold her, all of her, contain her, protect her. That could not happen. Kerry Blue would not be contained or protected.

She stirred.

She’d gotten maybe an hour’s sleep. He none. He did not want to lose a moment. He felt her breathing. She lifted her head. Her hair fell in her face. She focused on him. Smiled. “Hi.”

Her sleep-swollen face looked amazing. She. She. The heaven-break-open, lightning-strike, star-shattering sex had nothing to do with her skill, though God knew she had gobs of experience he never wanted to think about.

It was this woman he had lived with for several years now. Courageous in her own way. She would be screaming her head off in fear, but still fighting in the front line, right there for you.

Her muscles were cute, girl-hard under smooth skin. Scars flecked her arms and legs. She lived rough. She parked her chin on his sternum, eyes looking up at his face. “You still gonna be mean to me?”

“Meaner.”

He ran his palms down her back. Her skin was slightly damp.

He had thought (and that would teach him to try thinking!) that once he gave in, the need would be finished. Get it out of his system. He’d been wrong seven times now. And deep down he’d known it. He had tried so hard to resist. Because now he was—knew he would be—utterly lost. There was no getting over this woman, ever.

And she. What did she think? He brushed a grain of sleep out of the corner of her eye. Her eyelashes caressed his thumb. He said, “The rat on you around ship is that you haven’t been yourself lately.” She knew what he was talking about. She tugged on his blond chest hairs. “Been holding out,” said Kerry.

“Never heard you could do that.”

“Never nothing worth holding out for.”

What he wanted to hear. Amazed to actually hear it. Made him want to go out and bring down a buffalo or something with his bare hands.

“Was I worth it?”

“Oh, yeah.”

She nipped his nose and got up to take another shower.

He listened to her patter around in there. Could get used to hearing that every morning. He ought to marry her. For a lot of reasons. Mostly because he wanted to.

Not that it would allow her to splash around in his shower on board
Merrimack.
They still could not get caught together.

He couldn’t ask her to marry him. She could laugh. Oh, you thought? How could you be so dumb?

Chilled him to the bone to think she might not be as serious as he was. She got what she was holding out for. All done? Game over?

He called into the bath, kept his voice nonchalant: “Ever been to Vegas?”

“I got no money! What am I gonna do in Vegas?”

We could walk down the glittery streets, stroll by a tacky chapel and hope she says, “Hey, Thomas, let’s get married.” A sudden signal on Steele’s com broke the perfect morning. He had turned that damn thing off.

The com turned itself on, as it could in dire emergency.

And then there was Kerry Blue dashing out of the shower, dripping wet, grabbing up her clothes, calling down abominations. Her com was awake too. Spacecraft One had been shot down. President Johnson was dead.

18

^H
OW COULD THAT HAPPEN!”
Farragut tried to keep his voice down, talking to his admiral.

Admiral Mishindi on video from Base Carolina looked haggard. He shook his head, completely in sympathy with Captain Farragut. “Tranquility Base got pounded last week. The President decided she had to make an appearance on the Moon for morale. It was unscheduled. Quiet. No media. We had Secret Service thick as Hive around her. Everything was fine until she tried to come back to Earth. Rome had someone on Tranquility.”

“A mole!” Farragut cried, astonished.

“A deep seeded mole. Just when we think we got them all.” Mishindi pushed his lower jaw forward, frustrated past words. “The mole obtained the field codes for Spacecraft One. And all those Roman warships we stranded at Fort Ike? Those dropped out of FTL right here. They opened fire on the President’s ship.
All
of them, including your old friend, the
Horatius.
The President did not have a prayer. Not a solitary prayer.”

“Did we get the mole?”

Mishindi closed his eyes and nodded grim satisfaction. “Our people on Tranquility showed great restraint in taking him alive. I cannot guarantee that his interrogation will strictly abide by convention.”

“Where are the Roman warships now?”

“Oh, they’re still here. Punching the hell out of Washington.The state, not DC. Ground defenses are taking hell.
Monitor, Wolfhound,
and
Rio Grande
are already there.
Merrimack
is to engage the Roman warships as soon as you get your people aboard.”

Farragut knew there were a lot of military bases in Washington, but: “Why Washington?”

“Fault lines. It’s a disaster, John. Rome’s not even targeting the military bases. Those are too well shielded. And they’re not shooting at the cities, which would be an obvious crime. They’re shooting into Puget Sound, which is not as obvious but still criminal. Tacoma, Whidbey Island, and Seattle are built on top of shallow faults. The shallow ones make the surface rock.”

Gypsy already had
Merrimack
curving shots around the horizon, tagging Roman ships over Washington, and shooting missiles out to chase the tags.

As soon as Colonel Steele reported on board,
Merrimack
charged in to take an interceptor position over Seattle.

The Swifts were bottled up in the hangars, their force fields inadequate against the kind of firepower let loose in the brawl over Washington. The Marines were all at their gun blisters.

“Have fun on leave, Kerry Blue?” Ranza said as Kerry swung into her gun seat. As if the rest of her team had been waiting for her.

Kerry took up the controls and started shooting at missile ports of enemy ships.

“Yeah, I did.” Her hair was still damp. “You’re it!” she crowed as she nailed a missile just emerging from its chute. “You’re it!” Got two.

Dak craned his head around. “What got into Blue?”

“I’m saving the world,” said Kerry Blue.

There was no lack of targets. They were just all very very fast, and the big ones were shielded. Targeting was all by instrument. Visually all you saw were the flashes in the dark above, the gray clouds of smoke rising from the blue planet below. The tactical plot looked like a three-dimensional scribble. The Marines had only two orders: stop the enemy from shooting at the ground, and shoot the enemy.

“So who’s in charge now?” said Kerry. “Not Sampson Reed?”

“Well, uh-yuh,” said Cole Darby. “That is how the chain of command works.”

“Sampson Reed?”

The chin. Himself. A great shock of thick honey-colored hair, pearly white teeth, vast slab of dimpled chin, lantern jaw, mind like large curd cottage cheese.

“Why weren’t we escorting Spacecraft One?” said Carly. Then, to a target, “Gotcha!”

“She had Secret Service.”

“When’s the last time you saw the Secret Service take out a Roman ship of war?” said Cain. “She shoulda had
us.”

“They said the head of state should not be a legitimate target,” said Darby. And to his target, “Oh, come on, stand still.”

“Who’s they? They who?” said Cain Salvador. “What p-brane said that? And please say it wasn’t Vice President—I mean President Reed.”

“It was. He did,” said Darb. “Oh, for—! I hit you, you Roman ace in the hole! Stop moving!”

“Spacecraft One was a military transport!” said Cain. “MARISSA JOHNSON WAS THE COMMANDER IN CHIEF OF THE UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES!”

That kind of sort of made her a military target.

“Yes,” said Darb. “I’m just telling you what our new Commander in Chief said.”

“We’re doomed,” said Dak. “Yep.” Kerry sang out, “You’re it!” and another, “You’re it!” Carly: “Ho,
chica!”
She bumped forearms with Kerry Blue.

“Gotta be the R and R,” said Dak. “I want me some R and R.”

Carly leaned over to Kerry. “Was he that good?”

Kerry jerked, startled. Prickling fear tingled her throat.

Carly knew? Kerry Blue turned her head to stare at Carly’s foxy grin. Kerry could see that Carly knew
what,
but Carly didn’t know
who
with. Carly had recognized the Look. Left Kerry nowhere to hide but behind the truth. “Uh, yeah. He was that good.”

“Civilian?” Ranza was in it now.

“No.” Kerry tried to concentrate hard on a target. Said quickly, “Can’t talk about it. He’s wrong branch of the service. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.”

Wasn’t quite a lie. Carly and Ranza let her off with sly winks.

Kerry’s face felt to be some color of flame. Needed to shoot at a target.

And suddenly there weren’t any. “Hey! Where’d they go?” She stood up in her seat. Dak declared his instruments had gone dead.

But nothing was wrong with the instruments. The Romans were just gone.

Middle of the melee, all the enemy ships vanished.

They had jumped to FTL and did not reappear.

Merrimack
jumped to FTL to pursue, but lost the Romans in the scrambled trails leading off from the heavily traveled space between Earth and the Moon. A ship in space could not do battle with an enemy who won’t stand.
Merrimack
returned to orbit Earth, waiting for the enemy to come back.

They didn’t.

The reason behind the disappearing act came later, with the news that the League of Earth Nations had stepped in. The Roman attacks on the shallow American faults had caused tremblers in Canada, Japan, and the Pacific Rim. The LEN demanded Rome stop its attacks at once or consider itself at war with all of Earth and her colonies. And Rome did cease fire. Even apologized to the LEN, excluding the U.S. per se.

Rome offered to send in planetary engineers to settle the tremblers. Rome had colonized many a restless world. Roman engineers could calculate where to drill vents to bleed off pressure under the Earth’s crust and control the movement of the disturbed plates.

The Romans only caused such chaos because they were capable of undoing much of it. Romans had always been as gifted at building as they were at destroying. They could put the world back better than they found it. Only let them come in to fix it, they asked.