War of Alien Aggression 1 Hardway (5 page)

Cozen didn't ask
how
it survived. Ram said, "Too bad its battery doesn't have enough juice in it to start our reactor. We've also got plenty of explosives for the breaching charges. We could use the rest as grenades maybe to cover our approach." 

"That's going to be more dangerous than it's worth. Surprise will give us the cover we need."

Ram wanted to tell Cozen that if he thought they could board an alien ship with one gun and a handful of improvised swords, then he was absolutely mad. "Where did the swords come from?"

"Those were Dana Sellis' idea – pieces cut from
Gold Coast
and sharpened with the plasma-cutter."

"That hand-held plasma cutter still works?" Ram said. "I thought the tools all..."

"This one didn't discharge," Cozen said. "Like the knuckledragger."

"Any idea why?"

"Does it really matter?"

Ram waited a few seconds. "Are we really going in there with swords?"

"Would you rather go in completely unarmed?" That wasn't much of an answer and in the next second, Ram could see Cozen's eyes measuring his face and his knit brow. Cozen must have seen that he needed to hear more of the plan to be convinced they had any chance of success. "When the breaching charge blows through the hull," Cozen said, "it'll create a shock wave in the pressurized atmo inside. That's going to kill or incapacitate anything it hits. It's a small ship. They'll get hit with that wave and right after that, they'll lose atmo fast - too fast to get a suit on. Unless they're already suited up, they're going to be incapacitated."

"We should lead with explosives," Ram said, "and go compartment to compartment. It's the only safe way to do this."

Cozen sighed. "Once we get through the hull, I don't want to use any more explosives."

"What? Mr. Cozen, we only have one gun. Besides Mickey's
Itar
, swords are all the weaponry we've got." 

"That's all we'll need if we do this right." The tone of Cozen's voice said this wasn't a debate.

Ram could tell Harry Cozen wasn't a fool. And he didn't have a death-wish. He had too much to live for. If Cozen knew the alien ship was here and came here on purpose without company marines armed for an assault, then clearly he knew a lot more than he was letting on. Ram asked him how he knew the aliens even had a pressurized atmo in their ship.

"What...,' Cozen said. "You think they evolved in a vacuum, Mr. Devlin? Do you think they evolved in the black of interplanetary space? They probably have exosuits not too different from ours in function."

He walked towards the far side of the stern and around the corner to
Gold Coast
' starboard aft section where welded rungs went up the outside of the reactor module's hull. Ram followed him.  

Cozen grabbed the first rung of the ladder before he turned and said, "Chances are, Mr. Devlin, they have bodies and respire and maybe even eat food. It's natural to be curious about them, but don't let your curiosity stay your vengeful hand. Today, we don't care about their language or their customs or even their physiology any more than the knowledge of it can help us kill them. All that matters
today
is that they are biological entities and they can die. Just like us, Mr. Devlin."  

Moriah's spin brought the sun up so fast that you could watch the shadows of the ladder rungs move like second hands on a clock as Cozen climbed. Ram asked where he was going, but Cozen ignored him.

Ram followed him ten meters up the hull until he reached a section where it indented behind the rear nacelles. It was a narrow ledge to stand on with hull on four sides and Cozen had chosen it, Ram thought, because of the near impossibility of someone having line of sight to listen in on them up there. "What are the pilots saying about all this?" Cozen asked him.

"I don't understand."

"Our pilots," Cozen said. "Asa Biko and Kay D'Ambrosse. They have a lot of influence with the crew. Especially Asa Biko. What are they saying to each other about coming here and finding what we found? What do they think about it?"

Cozen sounded as if he was plotting a coup, but Ram told him the truth to see what he would do with it. "Nobody believes in coincidences like this where management is concerned. No, Mr. Cozen. You're the only one who knew where Moriah was and they're not so naive as to think you had no idea what was here. Nobody believes you just stumbled on this. They're convinced you knew the alien ship was here all along. They probably think you knew it's what crippled
Mohegan
." 

"Is that so?"

"It is," Ram said, and Cozen's eyes narrowed half a degree. "But...our pilots and miners are committed to survival. They'll do what they have to do."

"What about you, Mr. Devlin? Do
you
think I knew the alien ship was here on Moriah?" 

Ram didn't tell Cozen the truth. He said what Asa Biko had said. "Maybe you knew they were here, Mr. Cozen, and maybe you didn't, but it doesn't change what we're going to have to do to get off this rock." From the way Cozen looked at him, Ram thought maybe Cozen knew those weren't his words. The next ones were. "I've read plenty of history. This is how wars start."

"This war has already started." Cozen said it without pause like he'd thought long and hard about it already. He sighed into his helmet mic. "It's already begun. But given the
scope
of the conflict unfolding, I imagine, Mr. Devlin, you're going to tell me that you actually want to walk up to that alien ship with open arms and empty hands and say, 'We come in peace'. But it's not just your life you'll be risking if you do that. To maximize our chances of a successful assault we'll need the element of surprise. Walk out there and try to make friends with them and you'll just get killed. And you'll blow our advantage. In case you haven't been keeping score, they've shot at us already. Twice." 

Ram had been keeping score, but he still wasn't convinced Humanity been attacked – not by aliens. "For all we know, Mr. Cozen, the microwave beam that sabotaged our systems was an attempt at communication. We need more proof about their hostile intentions before we assume anything. I'd like t-"

"Are you not convinced we were attacked, Mr. Devlin?" Ram closed his mouth and willed his face to blank itself and become inscrutable and reveal nothing. Cozen must have taken Ram's silence for an affirmation of his doubt. "If you find yourself questioning what's happened here and the necessity of what's
about
to happen on this rock... if you have doubts... then you'd better keep them to yourself. You don't want to go spreading those doubts around," he said. "Not if you care about your people. If you want your crew to survive today's assault, and I know you do, then you're not going to share any ideas you've got in your head about the necessity of making peace with the ETs. Do that, and you'll rob our people of their most valuable weapon." 

"Surprise?"

"No, Mr. Devlin – righteousness."

"Mr. Cozen..."

"Righteousness, Mr. Devlin." Cozen said it a second time with more emphasis as if this time, Ram would hear the word for true and understand. He didn't. Cozen said it again, "Righteousness. Confidence and true belief that their actions are justified, necessary, and in line with the moral code much of our planet still accepts as divine will. Righteousness. They're going to need it for this assault. If they go into a fight questioning themselves, full of hesitation and doubt or remorse, unwilling to kill until there's none of the enemy left, then they're going to lose. If you spread your doubt among this crew, then you will cut their chances of survival in half. Maybe more. They believe in this fight and you're not going to take that away from them, Mr. Devlin. You're not going to share your doubts. You're not going to do that because you care about your people. It's one of the things I like about you."  

Ram quickly decided what Cozen really liked about him was how he was to manipulate
because
he cared about his people.  

Harry Cozen looked out into space with his eyes focused to infinity. He said, "Don't disappoint me, Mr. Devlin. Get over the bad taste of what we have to do because in a few minutes, I expect you to do it." 

*****

In the reactor section's cramped control room Ram desperately tried to find some other way off that rock. He calculated the strength of the reactor chamber walls and whether or not they'd withstand the strain if focused explosive charges were used to send the explosion inward at a tiny pile of fissionable material. There was a chance he could use the pressure to create the x-rays needed for the secondary reaction. There was a much better chance that it would simply explode.

Ram heard the double-beep of another suit being added to his line of sight comms channel when Mickey Wells came into the reactor room. She stood against the bulkhead. Then, she leaned back against it and let herself slide down it just like she used to slide down the wall of her little box apartment when she got home from doing a 'job'. She'd slide all the way down until she was sitting on the floor and stay like that for a long time.

"Looks like you did okay." She said, "You always were a fast learner."

He thought he knew Mickey, but when he looked at her face through the helmet, Ram couldn't hold in the disdainful exhalation. It said more than he'd wanted to. If he was right about Cozen, then did she help him do it? Did she help Cozen when he reached out and killed
Mohegan?
Did Mickey help him fake the attack on
Gold Coast
that marooned them here on Moriah the same way? And if she was part of Cozen's lies, then why? Why for god's sake? Why start a war?  

"Did he do it, Mickey?"

"Do what?"

"Did he kill ten miners? Did he sabotage
Mohegan
and then
Gold Coast
and make it look like both junks were attacked?" 

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"C'mon Mickey, cut the crap. It's no coincidence what we found here. He planned this. The ETs could have just shot us. Why bother with cracking our systems to get the soft kill? No. Harry Cozen made that happen. He's using us. He's using us to start a
war
, Mickey. He's lying to us. He brought us here to do this. To attack that ship. He's the one who killed
Mohegan's
crew, not the ETs. He planned all this to maroon us here and get us to attack that ship." 

"That's ridiculous," she said. "Why the hell would he do that?"

"
I
don't goddamn know!" 

She asked it softly, but it was menacing. "Have you told anyone else about your theory?"

"The only reason nobody else is thinking it yet is they refuse to believe anyone would actually
do
what he did. But I believe it. I have some idea what he's capable of, Mickey. Is it true? Did you know when he did it? Did you help him?" 

"If you don't know the answer to that, then don't insult me with the question." The silence hung there in the vacuum until Mickey banged the back of her helmet against the bulkhead. She did it a few times and said, "Things don't always go the way he plans." Hearing that made the deck fall out from under Ram's feet. No matter how strongly you suspect something awful, finding out it's true is far worse. Before that, there was an infinitesimal chance you were wrong – a chance that all your fears were imagined. Now, you know it's true and you can't pretend it's not. Now, you've got to face it.

"Have you told anyone else?" she asked Ram again.

"Screw you, Mickey." His righteous anger made it easy to say.

"Have you
told
anyone?" 

"Did Harry Cozen send you in here to make sure I wasn't going to spread doubt and endanger us all?"

"No, Ram. I came on my own because there's things I had to say to you. And.. and I know there's things you wanted to say to me since I arrived."

He'd had things he needed to say to Mickey for a lot longer than that, things he'd ground his teeth on for years after she sent him away to Staas and the Academy, but he'd come to terms with those himself. "Look. Mickey... On the way here... Back in the tube before you shot up past me, all I wanted... All I was trying to say was 'thank you'. For... for not letting me starve. For teaching me to read. For everything I've got. For who I am. I know you could have left me where you found me. I know you didn't have to do what you did."

"I only took care of you for a few years, Ram. It wasn't a big deal."

"It was a big deal to me." Ram hated her for sending him away, but he'd never say she did him wrong. She paid sixteen years tuition, room, and board upfront. He'd never been hungry ever again. If it wasn't for her, then he'd probably have perished and if by some miracle he hadn't, then he'd probably be one of the hungry billions.

Mickey knew all that. She knew he knew it too. She smiled at Ram, and after it faded, she banged the back of her helmet against the bulkhead a couple of more times. "You remember what I had to do for money back then, right, Ram?" He nodded. Of course he remembered. Mickey used her guns to make money. She killed people. Gang hits. And he knew even back then that there weren't any other jobs for her except in space and if she didn't want to ditch him, then she had to use the only in-demand skills she had. It was that or they'd have both have ended up back in hell where she found him. "Look I don't want you to get the wrong idea, Ram. I'm not saying I wouldn't have done that anyway... just to survive. Even if I didn't have you to take care of, I still might have done that for work. I'm not saying I did it for you." But she did do it for him, though. Ram knew that. The way it worked out, she did. She hated it. But she still did it. That debt had always been on the books. It always would be.

"Mickey, I know it would have been easier without me. I bet you could have gone up the well into space and got other work more than once after you found me. But you didn't and I owe you e-"

She banged her helmet against the bulkhead again and again. "Ugh. Ram. Shut the hell
up
. I'm not saying this because I want you to thank me. I'm trying to tell you why...  No...no...
how
I did what I did... Because you need to know. What I'm trying to say is I couldn't have done it without
you
– without
you
to do it
for
. It was bad, doing it at all, and I know it wasn't just for you. I needed the money, too, but 'cause I was doing it for you... that's what made it... not okay, but...bearable. That's what let me do it and not hate myself. I
chose
to do something wrong. It was a choice I made and it helped make a bigger right."