That’s enough
to get about one hundred and forty thousand of the Klassekians away
,
thought the Rear Admiral, looking over the manifests that were now coming over
the com.
And no troops aboard the transports.
That really was good
news. With the arrival of an earlier convoy the troop total had risen to a
full division of Imperial Army light infantry, as well as two full brigades of
Marines. He really didn’t need any more soldiers, who would just have to be
transported out when the time came to leave. He needed hulls to transport
refugees out to either of the two safe havens.
The day before
he had watched as the
Lusitania
and her three escorts had left on
another high speed run to
Bolthole
, following a week behind a hyper VI
convoy with thirty-five thousand natives in cryo. So far eighty thousand had
been sent to
Bolthole,
along with a hundred and thirty thousand to the
base habitats. And they had three more months before the star blew, and six
more after that before the radiation wave hit the system.
We might just be
able to get another half a million out before that happens
, he thought,
shaking his head as that picture lodged in his mind.
If this had been
a system within the Empire they would have been able to evacuate all the
billions on the planet in the given time. It might have been tight, but tens
of thousands of ships would have been involved.
Or would they?
The
Empire had already lost over ten billion killed, the Republic a little more,
while New Moscow had suffered over ninety-five percent casualties. Would it
have really had enough to spare to save even a core world?
All we can do
is to keep trying
, thought Nguyen, knowing that saving some of the aliens
was better than letting them all die. Not that it would make him feel any
better about it, when it did happen.
* * *
Lusitania
plowed
through hyper VII at point nine four light, her three escorts keeping up close
and personal as she moved along. This time the frozen forms aboard had been
tested by nanites, and it was thought there would be no recurrence of the last
trip’s explosion. The atmosphere aboard ship was much more relaxed as everyone
anticipated a smooth passage to the drop-off point.
Little did they
know, but an alien presence was tracking them in VI, noting their position,
Their course and their speed. The alien ship might not be able to intercept
them, as it could not jump into the higher level of hyper. But, with the aid
of its brethren up and down the course it could calculate a destination, and
keep the others of its kind appraised of the course. So that when one did come
along in their highest traversable dimension, they could do something about it.
Chapter Twenty-one
Some people still have an
irrational fear of space travel, especially voyaging through the dimensions of
hyperspace. That is quite alright, as far as society is concerned. There is
plenty to do and see on the planet that person happens to be on. It is not our
job to cure them of this phobia, as long as they continue otherwise to function
normally.
Dr. LaSean Sperkaklas, Central
Hospital, Capitulum.
Nguyen cursed as
he read the report about further attacks over the last week, most of them aimed
at the more vulnerable soldiers, police and civilians of the Klassekians, and
those mostly Tsarzorians. There had been one attack against an Imperial Marine
unit. As usual, the attack had not gone the way the terrorists had wished.
Three suits had been damaged, with one Marine injured, at a cost of over eighty
Klassekian guerillas.
And the number
of attacks was less than last week
, thought the Admiral, trying to find
some golden lining to the continued resistance. And that was true. In the
month since they had taken out Zzarr’s command post, and what they hoped was
the leader of Honish himself, the attacks had fallen off, as well as becoming
more disjointed. But they hadn’t stopped as had been hoped. The cell
structure of the terrorists, guerillas, what have you, was too robust, and they
hadn’t folded.
All they do
is hurt themselves
, thought the Admiral, looking at some three dimensional
pictures taken of one of the attacks, on a school, killing over two hundred
children, as well as fifty teachers and staff. His own troops, these Imperial
Army light infantry, had responded and taken out forty some of the terrorists
before they could do more damage. And still he felt guilty that his people
hadn’t gotten there sooner, even if the native police couldn’t have responded
in double that time.
“Admiral,” came
a call on the com. “You may want to see this.”
The Admiral
cursed again, knowing that those words meant that he damned sure didn’t want to
see whatever was on the newscast. Duty demanded that he did watch, so he
acknowledged the buzzing in his link and brought up the vid.
The scene was of
a large smoking building, sheets of flame shooting up the upper floors. A
replay came on, showing a commercial airliner slamming into the building. The
Admiral was sure that he had seen this before, or at least one very much like
it.
They’re using
that one again
, he thought, calling up an overlay of the Tsarzor continent
and all of its commercial air traffic. And the blinking icons of six large
airliners that were not on their predicted paths.
“Send out a com
on the standard air traffic freqs,” he ordered. “All aircraft not on their
required flight paths are to return to them immediately, or they will be shot
down.”
“Acknowledged,”
said the Com Officer, and a moment later that message was being transmitted on
every standard and emergency frequency used by aircraft on the planet, in every
language.
Nguyen watched
the holo carefully for the next few minutes, watching as three of the
airliners, who were only marginally off course, turned back onto their proper
paths. And three didn’t.
“Shoot those
three down,” ordered the Admiral in a flat voice, knowing that even if he was
ordering the destruction of three hijacked airplanes, he was also dooming at
least five hundred civilians to a sure death.
One laser shot
each was all it took. The craft were moving at no more than nine hundred
kilometers an hour, with nothing in the way of defenses or countermeasures.
The lasers came down from ships in orbit, with clear tracks and nothing to get
in the way of the beams. It took no more than a fraction of a second’s exposure
from a weapon made to burn its way through strong electromag fields and tough
armor to blast through thin aluminum. Each of the three airliners converted
into balls of fire shooting thousands of pieces of fuselage into the air. The
passengers and the people who had taken over the planes didn’t even have time
to know they were hit, transitioning from living to dead too fast for their
nervous systems to register the journey.
“I want to know
how those people got weapons on board those aircraft,” shouted the Admiral to
his security section. “And then I want us to get the equipment and people in
place to keep it from happening again.”
Un-fucking-believable
,
he thought, all of those deaths already weighing on him. Killing terrorists
didn’t bother him in the least. Killing innocents did, and he was tired of
having to order those deaths, even if he had just prevented up to ten thousand
more fatalities when those airliners were crashed into crowded skyscrapers or
malls.
I almost
can’t wait for that damned star to blow, so this assignment will be over with
.
Unbeliever or not, the Admiral considered that an evil thought, wishing
destruction on sentient beings just so things would be more convenient for
him. Even if those people were doomed to die anyway, no matter what he did.
* * *
“And you’re sure
that’s where we need to be?” asked Captain Gertrude Hasslehoff of her
Navigator, Lt. Commander Benji McManus.
“No, ma’am,”
admitted the young, mahogany skinned officer. “There really is no way to tell
for sure. But according to all the navigational formulas I have run our
positional data through, that should be Klassek’s star. Or at least the
gravity shadow of it. And here is Gromor, or Hrrottha, what we call
Big
Bastard.
This trio over here corresponds to the Q-423ZX formation of
bright young stars. You know, the one with the octopus shaped nebula. Which
would mean this has to be the star we’re looking for.”
Hasslehoff sat
there for a moment, thinking. They had used gravity shadows and their correspondence
to real stars to navigate hyper dimensions for a thousand years. It was a time
honored technique, proven over and over again. That was part of the problem.
No one had ever navigated this kind of space before, and what had worked so
well in hyper might just be a lie in this dimension.
“What’s the
correspondence to regular space?” That was also an important question. As far
as they knew, light speed was still the limit in this dimension. But they were
not sure of the correspondence between this space and the normal space that
they were used to. Hyper I had a 9.8 to 1 correspondence, meaning for every
light year traversed in hyper I they moved a corresponding 9.8 light years in
normal space. And the correspondence increased by a factor of four for each
level up, until in hyper VII they were moving over forty thousand light years
in normal space for every light year in the higher dimension.
“I’m not
positive, ma’am. If I had to guess, I would say somewhere between IV and V.”
“So we’re
looking at, what?” asked the Captain, doing the math quickly in her head.
“Between a month and three months to get there?”
“That seems
about right, ma’am.”
“We’ll, we don’t
have anything better to do,” Hasslehoff said with a smile. “And I don’t see us
coming up with some kind of magic translation device to get us back to normal
space before we run out of antimatter.” They had already tried multiple times
to translate both to normal space and the various dimensions of hyper with
their generator. Nothing happened, and they had come to the conclusion that
their hyperfield generator was not going to do shit in this dimension.
“We need to get
to the region of those artifacts to have a hope of getting back.”
And hope
that whatever transported us here, and teleported us out this far, is in the
mood to bring us back.
“Go ahead and plot our course to that shadow. As
soon as you have it in, contact me, and we’ll get under way.”
“Yes, ma’am,”
said the Navigator, getting up from his seat and turning to go.
“And Benji,” she
said, causing him to turn. “Good job. Now get us home.”
“Yes, ma’am,”
said the man with a wide smile. “Thank you.”
And now I
just have to hope this little jaunt actually gets us somewhere.
* * *
“Welcome aboard,
Dr. Phillipson,” said Captain Walther Huang as the scientist came out of the
shuttle which had delivered him to the
Lewis.
“We are at your service.”
He felt
Commander Harrison, his Exec, stiffen at his side as she laid eyes on the
astrophysicist from the Imperial University.
Huang wondered
again about the orders that had brought the scientist here. Of course the
Lewis
had better sensors than anything the research vessel Phillipson had come on
possessed. Better screens, armor, acceleration, top velocity. Everything
better suited to getting away and weathering the storm if anything happened.
“As long as I
get the cooperation I ask for, we will get along fine, Captain,” said the small
man, managing somehow to look down his nose at the taller officer.
“And this is my
Exec, Commander Stephanie Harrison,” continued Huang, gesturing to the woman.
“And this is
what happens when one fails to complete their doctorate, eh, Stephanie,” said
the man with a cold smile. “At least a naval officer doesn’t require as much
intelligence, eh.”
Harrison’s face
reddened, and Huang could tell she was holding in the retort she wanted to
make.
“Dr.
Phillipson,” said the Captain, staring into the eyes of the scientist. “We are
ordered to cooperate with you in your research of this pending supernova. We
are not ordered to act as your slaves or whipping boys. Whatever problems you
have with my Exec are between you and her, but I will not stand for having her
insulted in public.”
Especially since it appears that between the two of
you, she is the much more competent.
“And if I tell
your Admiral about your attitude?”
“You tell
Admiral Nguyen whatever you feel you must,” said Huang, actually putting his
face close to that of the scientist. “I am sure his reaction will surprise one
of us. And I don’t think it will be me.”
“Just show me to
my quarters, and find places for my assistants.”
“You and your
assistants will be bunking in one of the junior officers’ quarters, which will
give each of you a comfortable room, and a common area to meet in.”
The scientist
didn’t look like he was happy about that, but was obviously forcing himself to
not get into a shouting match in front of his assistants, who were also his
students. “Lead on, Captain.”
“Ms. Harrison
will show you to your quarters,” said Huang with a feeling of satisfaction,
particularly when he saw the reaction on the scientist’s face.
The next week
was a nightmare of demands. Move the ship closer, turn off the electromag
field, retune this or that sensor. Some were easy to fulfil, though a pain in
the ass for the crew involved.
At the end of
the first week Stephanie Harrison had come to the Captain, looking as if she
were on the verge of tears. Huang knew her as a tough and competent officer,
one of the best he had ever served with. She was also a compassionate and
caring woman, who was a wonder when it came to crew counseling.
“That bastard,”
she said as soon as she had entered Huang’s day cabin.
“What has he
done now?” he asked, not having to ask who she was talking about.
“I tried to
explain my hypothesis to him. Even offered to show him the math. And all he
could say was that, ‘math is not the proper province of small minds’. And then
one of his graduate students made remarks about plagiarizing the work of
others, and how someone who did so should be drummed out of academia.”
She sat there
for a moment, shaking with fury before she looked up at her commander. “You
know I didn’t steal anyone else’s work. That I couldn’t have taken someone
else’s intellectual labor as my own. It was that damned major professor of
Phillipson’s, the arrogant prick. And of course everyone believed him, and
wouldn’t even ask him to testify under a scan.”
“I’ve known you
long enough, Stephanie, to know you are one of the most honorable people I’ve
ever served with. I trust your hypothesis, and the math you derived it from,
as well. In case you didn’t notice, I’m keeping us beyond the hyper barrier,
no matter the demands of that jackass that I move closer to the star. So just
put up with him, keep your mouth shut, and whenever it gets to be too much, you
know where to come.”
“Thank you,
Captain,” she said, running a hand across her face to catch the few tears she
had let shed.
Later that day,
he was confronted by Phillipson once again.
“I demand that
you move the ship closer to the star. I can’t get the readings I need this far
out.”
“That’s why we
have probes all through the system, Doctor. If they get vaporized, no sweat
off of me.”
“But there is no
risk. Once the star goes into iron burning, just head back out at maximum acceleration
and pop into hyper.”
“According to my
Exec, we might not be able to get into hyper once the star blows. Maybe even
when it gets to the point of collapse, before the rebound.”
“And your Exec
doesn’t know what she’s talking about, Captain. I have a doctorate from
Imperial University, while she was dismissed for academic dishonesty.”
“And I do not
believe that, Phillipson,” said Huang in a growl. “I have known her a heck of
a lot longer than you, and, to be frank, I trust her a hell of a lot more.”
The scientist
stormed out of the day cabin at that, muttering about reports he was going to
file with the Command. Huang did not feel threatened. He knew the caliber of
the people placed over him, and was sure that Phillipson would not get the
response he was expecting.