The Sword and the Plough (2 page)

“Right Burrows, I want you to attack me in
any way you think fit.”

The recruit looked decidedly unhappy. “I
couldn’t, ma’am,” he protested. “I’d murder you.”

The lieutenant’s reply was blunt. She spun
suddenly and unleashed a powerful sidekick that sent the young man
hurtling backwards. He smashed into several of his fellows,
scattering them like nine-pins.

“Get him up!” the lieutenant ordered
brusquely.

The ninepins stood and lifted their champion
to his feet. But he could not stand alone. He hung in their grasp,
his wind gone.

Lieutenant York swung round. Her scan
pinpointed another.

“
Y
ou
! Name!”

“Tong, ma’am!’

“Right Tong, attack me!”

The young man advanced warily onto the mat.
He was well muscled, and intended to use his strength to pinion the
lieutenant and thereby end the match. His almond shaped eyes from
his ancient Asian ancestry computed the distance to his adversary.
He slid a cautious step forward.

The lieutenant smiled, her look deceptively
coy and demure.

“Come on,” she said tauntingly. “I’m not
going to hurt you.”

She advanced a pace. The recruit reacted
quickly to close the gap and pin her tight.

The young woman seemed overwhelmed at his
sudden impetus and fell back, appearing to lose her balance. But as
she did so, she thrust a foot into the recruit’s midriff and rolled
backwards beneath him, her leg catapulting him forward over her
head. It was a textbook throw, but the speed and sureness of it
took the recruit and onlookers by surprise.

In almost the same instant, the lieutenant
was up and astride the dazed recruit, his head firm in her grasp
and – had she so wished – his neck broken before he knew
it.

“Bravo! Bravo!” The captain and staff
sergeant were applauding the match, their Cheshire grins stretching
from ear to ear.

Lieutenant York acknowledged with the
slightest dip of her head.

“
Over there we have Captain De Vries,” she
said. “He will train you in the use of a light-bolt rifle until it
becomes like an extension of your own limbs, and as instinctive.
Standing next to him, is Staff Sergeant Fofana, our man in charge
of communications.

“Staff Sergeant, shouldn’t you be
eavesdropping in on military gossip somewhere?”

Sergeant Fofana grinned, his white teeth
gleaming. “Yes ma’am, and I have been so occupied.”

He waved an electronic notepad at her and
came over. “A
deep space
call coming in from the planet Megran for you, ma’am, at
0700 hours – a Megran General, General York, to speak to
you.”

Lieutenant York frowned. “My father – are
you sure? I wonder what he wants. I haven’t spoken to that old
bully for years.”

She turned back to her task, her brow still
wrinkled.

She pointed a finger. “Right
you!
Name?”

“Schumacher, ma’am!”

“Attack me, Schumacher!”

Planet MEGRAN
– Military Space
Docks – Orbit 10

Greenwich date: January 29,
2175
– 06:15
hours

Colonel Orlov, Commander in chief of the
Megran military space- ports, shuffled forward nervously to the
iron safety railing. He was not one for heights. From there, he
could look down into the three large hangars of the orbiting
space-dock from the vantage point of the dock’s bridge. The
space-dock was a gigantic silver orb, 900 metres in diameter, its
orbit, some 1200 kilometres above the planet.

The hum and clatter of machinery rose up to
meet him.

The colonel was near sixty and gliding toward
retirement. His main ambition now was to do as little work as
possible. His corpulent belly and podgy red face were clear
testament to the life he currently preferred to live.

“Well, Tamati, you certainly seem to have
everything in order. Yours is always the best run facility I have
and the most thorough.”

The colonel brushed a few imaginary flecks
off his dark green uniform. The damned material seemed to attract
every tad of lint wherever he went.

Tamati Rehu, the dock supervisor, nodded.
“Thank you, Colonel Orlov, we do our best.”

Tamati, too, was nearing sixty, but his
tall frame still looked lean and strong. His warm brown skin tone
spoke of a heritage from the Polynesian Triangle of Old Earth. As a
supervisor, Tamati wore the
white-collar
worker attire of white jacket, black
trousers and black shoes. The dozens of
blue-collar
workers, who bustled like ants
at their tasks on the decks below, wore blue overalls with yellow
safety panels, and steel-toe-capped black boots. Red safety helmets
guarded their heads.

“And how’s the family, Tamati?” Colonel Orlov
enquired. “I hear you’re a grandfather now.”

“Yes sir, I am, twice over. But you’ll know
it’s been some weeks now since I’ve had a chance to see any of my
family, including my grandchildren.”

The colonel nodded. “True, Tamati, true –
and I appreciate that. I know it’s been a rush job.”

“
What
is
all the flap, if I might ask, sir?”

“I’m afraid I can’t answer that, Tamati. It’s
not that I don’t want to, but I can’t. Nobody is telling me either.
We’ll both just have to wait and see.”

Tamati Rehu shrugged. “Oh well, anyway, I
guess it’s the battleship you want to know about, sir.” He pointed.
“You can see her from up there.”

The dock supervisor led the way to the
portside windows of the space-dock’s bridge.

“There she is sir, a real picture.”

Like a giant skyscraper lying on its side,
its multitudinous portholes mirroring the raw morning sun, the
battle grey Megran battleship hung in orbit. Heavy hawsers held her
in place, and a dozen or so air-bridges afforded passage to her.
Despite the huge build of the dock, she was too large to fit inside
any of the hangars.

She was four hundred metres in length, from
her squared off stern to her blunt bullet nosed bow. She could
muster five times the firepower of the next warship in the
line.

Designed in the latter years of King Henry
IX’s reign, as the ultimate safeguard against the resurgence of
piracy, the battleship class comprised the most powerful warships
aloft. But the high costof their construction had limited their
numbers, so that in the twenty-two years of the design’s existence
only four of the huge, heavily armed vessels had ever been
built.

Of these, two were in mothballs in the Earth
fleet, one had been lost in the measureless reaches of space, and
the fourth was on station on Megran, the furthermost planet of the
Earth Commonwealth of Planets.

Colonel Orlov nodded thoughtfully. “Ah, she
is as you say, Tamati, a picture. I take it there’s nothing amiss
with the old girl?”

Tamati Rehu hesitated. “No sir,” he said
finally. “Nothing we could find at any rate.”

The colonel frowned. “You sound cautious,
Tamati. What are you
not
telling me?”

“
Ah – nothing really, sir,” the dock
supervisor said carefully. “But she’s well into middle-age now, as
space ships go. She’s getting tired. Our scanners can’t see into
her… into her
soul
.”

For an instant, Tamati gazed past the
colonel. There was nothing to look at but the boundless black of
space. But he wasn’t looking at that. A reverence for the
supernatural beliefs of his ancestors still resided strong in his
blood.

“
As superstitious as ever, eh, Tamati?”
Colonel Orlov said with a chuckle. “However, fortunately we
don’t
have to see into
her soul. Governor Ferdinand asked if she was fit for duty, and all
our equipment says that she is. I take it that’s correct?” Tamati
Rehu nodded. “Good! Then that’s all that we’re responsible
for.”

The colonel looked out at the ageing
battleship again. “Ah good,
I see you’ve changed her name
to
Prince Ferdinand
as instructed.”

“
Yes, and that’s another thing, sir,” the
dock supervisor replied huffily. “I don’t like it one bit. You
don’t change a ship’s name just like that.
Queen
Elizabeth V
is what her
name was and what it should be still. She’s borne that name proudly
since the coronation. She was the young queen’s gift to the
governor on that occasion, and the change of name shows a certain
disrespect. On top of that, changing a ship’s name is unlucky.
Prince Ferdinand should have thought of that as well before he gave
the order.”

Colonel Orlov laughed. “Tamati, I understand
your feelings, but they don’t count in this instance.”

“
Yes sir, well maybe they don’t,” Tamati
Rehu replied with an indignant snort. “But there’s a lot more out
there than we know. However, it’s not superstition that’s going to
make the young queen angry, sir. You just do
not
paint her name off one of her
ships without permission. Like her father before her, she does not
take insult kindly. The governor should be aware of
that.”

Colonel Orlov nodded. “I grant you that,
Tamati, but fortunately for us that is Prince Ferdinand’s worry –
not ours.

“
Now, if you’ll just give me the chit, I’ll
sign the ship back to her commander – Commander
Riddick.”

Planet EARTH
– Military Apartments –
27
^th
floor

Greenwich date: January 29, 2175 – 06:30
hours

Captain Usha Sinha eased off the duvet and
lowered her feet quietly to the bedroom floor. Her husband did not
wake. She could hear his deep, husky breathing in the hush of the
early morn. In the next room, her two children would also be
sleeping.

She would have to wake them all soon. They
would want to wish her luck for the ordeal she had to face today as
she sought promotion to Commander – her interview with the board of
admirals. She drew her strength from her family and would need to
call upon that before she left.

An image of a she-wolf sprang to mind –
lips curled back and sharp fangs bared – protecting her own. She
smiled grimly to herself. But today the reverse would be true.
Today, her family would be with her in spirit – protecting her. She
would not be alone.

Usha moved silently, testing her memories
and instincts of their apartment against the dark. It was like the
simulated battle conditions space-ship crews trained under; ship
against ship in the black of space – power plants hit, life support
down to danger level, captain and crew focused on the emerald glow
of the
sphere,
the 4DTWS – the
four dimensional, tactics and
weapons system,
its
nanosecond responses their only hope to survive...

Her captain’s uniform was lying on the bed in
their spare room along the hall; the room they kept for guests and
family when they came to stay.

The trim red uniform of the queen’s fleet
suited her lovely copper coloured skin and long raven hair. This
morning, she would face six such uniforms, but uniforms with much
more gold braid than her own – six red uniforms and six inscrutable
faces, and not another female in sight anywhere.

Two black eyes stared back from the mirror as
she brushed her shoulder length hair. Her classical oval face, with
its innate beauty, glowed golden in the glare of the solar powered
lights. She practised a smile in the mirror, but only the red mouth
came to life, not the eyes.

“Usha,” Her husband’s voice said quietly
behind her. “Have no concerns. You will stun them with your beauty,
my darling.”

Usha smiled at his reflection. His dark eyes
were sparkling.

“
I doubt that,” she replied softly. “The
queen’s top officers are beyond such considerations. But the fact
that I am a
woman
will not pass their notice.”

“Perhaps not,” her husband answered. “But
neither are they fools. Women have proved themselves in every field
of endeavour for generations now. And they will have your
capabilities in black and white in front of them.

“
Captain Usha Sinha – sixteen years service
in the Queen’s Fleet. Five years exemplary service as captain of
one of Her Majesty’s cruisers; twice chosen to command escort ship
to the royal vessel; triple A rating
Deep Space
Strategy
trials, unequalled
by any other officer since the course began.

“I rest my case. What more do they need?”

“
Nothing more, if they had my husband’s
faith.” She turned, took her husband’s hands and drew him to her.
“But they want
men
as commanders in the good queen’s fleet.” She placed a
finger on his lips as he went to speak. “No, they have never said
so,” she resumed softly, “But I have seen it in their faces and
heard it behind everything they say. It has always been
so.”

Her husband placed his hands lightly around
her waist.

“
Well, they have trained you to
fight
, and fight
to
win
, my
darling. So, give it back to them as hard as you can.
Commander
Sinha – it is
what you have always wanted. It is what you deserve.”

Captain Sinha kissed her husband lightly on
the lips in reply.