THE PRICE OF ADMIRALTY

Battlecruiser Alamo: Book 1

Richard Tongue

Battlecruiser Alamo #1: The Price of Admiralty

Copyright © 2013 by Richard Tongue, All Rights Reserved

First Kindle Edition: June 2013

Cover By Keith Draws

All characters and events portrayed within this ebook are fictitious; any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

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With Thanks To: Kenneth Bailey, Joel Benford, Mark Berryman, Jon Clivaz, Peter Long

Editorial Assistance Provided By Peter Long

We have fed our sea for a thousand years

And she calls us, still unfed,

Though there's never a wave of all her waves

But marks our English dead:

We have strawed our best to the weed's unrest,

To the shark and the sheering gull.

If blood be the price of admiralty,

Lord God, we ha' paid in full!

There's never a flood goes shoreward now

But lifts a keel we manned;

There's never an ebb goes seaward now

But drops our dead on the sand --

But slinks our dead on the sands forlore,

From the Ducies to the Swin.

If blood be the price of admiralty,

If blood be the price of admiralty,

Lord God, we ha' paid it in!

We must feed our sea for a thousand years,

For that is our doom and pride,

As it was when they sailed with the ~Golden Hind~,

Or the wreck that struck last tide --

Or the wreck that lies on the spouting reef

Where the ghastly blue-lights flare.

If blood be the price of admiralty,

If blood be the price of admiralty,

If blood be the price of admiralty,

Lord God, we ha' bought it fair!

Except from 'The Song of the Dead', Rudyard Kipling

Chapter 1

The view through the upper dome never ceased to amaze Marshall, no matter how often he visited the Mariner Station's Officer's Club. During the war, the dome had always been covered by protective shielding, as much to reassure the patrons as anything else, but he'd always thought that the view was worth the risk.

He looked down at his watch; most of the station staff would be on shift at the moment, but the place was still surprisingly crowded. The Club was always a popular destination with visiting ships. Looking at his new uniform, he began to feel conspicuous surrounded by groups of people wearing the rusty red of the Martian Space Service, the uniform he had been wearing himself just a fortnight ago.

Clustered by the bar were a rowdy group of young officers wearing the sky-blue of the Callisto Orbital Patrol; opting to avoid a potential confrontation he instead made his way over to a far corner of the room, gesturing in a forlorn bid to attract the attention of one of the waiters.

The room was decorated with the spoils of eight years of war; shrapnel from an assortment of damaged or destroyed UN vessels, the flag that was taken down when the station was originally captured, odd bits and pieces scattered around making for a somewhat eclectic display of past glories.

As ever, his attention was drawn to the far wall around the door, the long list of names of those based out of the station who fell in the course of the Interplanetary War. He didn't need to look closely; he had it memorized. His father was six from the left, nineteen down, one of far too many with 'Missing In Action' listed next to their names.

A babble of attention caused him to look over to the elevator; a striking woman strode out wearing casually cut civilian clothes, but filling them out in a way that attracted quite a few of the younger officers. Marshall smiled and shook his head, waving his hand loosely in the air. If someone wearing the uniform of the new Triplanetary Fleet was causing a stir, a civilian in the Club seemed to have caused a bigger one. Sidling past a couple of ambitious Second Lieutenants, presumably on their first deep-space deployment, she slid down into a chair opposite Marshall, her request for a waiter answered rather more quickly.

"What'll it be, Danny?" She looked him up and down, a slightly disapproving frown drifting onto her face.

He smiled, "It hasn't been that long, has it?"

She looked back up at the waiter. "Large vodka for my friend, and I'll have a non-reconstituted whiskey."

The waiter's eyes opened wide at the second order. "Are you sure, ma'am?"

She nodded, looking back over at Marshall, "I'm on an expense account, might as well take full advantage while I can."

The waiter snapped a look between the two of them, nodded, and made his way over to the bar. Marshall regarded his companion more carefully; long brown hair carefully positioned to not drift in variable gravity, a dress that somehow she was still managing to wear like a uniform, and the faint trace of red in her left eye that testified that it was not the one she was born with. He settled back in his chair, clasping his hands together.

"It must be three years since our paths last crossed. When the Wright was out Ceres-way on those exercises you were covering."

"If you only dragged me out here to reminisce, I might work on getting annoyed." She shook her head again, "What the hell is that you are wearing, anyway. Looks like you are on your way to a business meeting, not sitting on the bridge of a starship."

He looked down at the black jacket, three silver rings emblazoned on his sleeves, a pair of golden wings sown above his chest pocket. "New Triplanetary duty uniform. Issued this morning. I rather like the cut, has a nice formal air to it. Not like those old wartime jumpsuits."

She looked around the room. "You seem to be the only one here wearing it."

"We're still new."

"I suppose I should congratulate you on getting a command." She frowned. "Not that I expect you'll have it for long. You don't think that this Triplanetary Fleet of yours is going to last, do you?"

The drinks arrived at the table, and Marshall took a sip out of his, gagging a little at the harsh metallic taste. No matter how good, the reconstituted drinks could never even come close to matching the real thing. Sometimes he contemplated giving them up altogether, but those aberrations passed quickly.

"I'm a fighter pilot that's already been flying on a waiver for two years. Brass told me that I'd have to find something else this cycle. What choice did I have, Deadeye? "

"It's a big enough fleet, isn't it?"

Marshall took another drink, and shook his head. "Not for me. Not with the two carriers being placed in reserve. I ought to be up for Operations Officer on one of them right now, working my way up to command, maybe in ten years or so. Without that, I'll spend the rest of my career either down at Port Lowell or up at Deimos."

"Or out here."

He laughed, a trace of bitterness entering his voice. "Only for a couple of years. Last Defense Review recommended this station be closed down. Apparently it can be replaced with a frigate." He spat the last word. "I don't think there are more than a dozen people in active service in the Space Service who went up for a transfer to Triplanetary. It was a safe enough bet, but somehow I didn't believe they'd give me a command." He paused for a second shaking his head, "You should have heard the lecture General Harper gave me when I put my application in."

She smiled. "So, congratulations then. At least you get one last swan-song. Seems silly, though. You've been complaining about being stuck at Captain for years. You finally make Major, and then you end up as a Lieutenant-Captain. Whatever one of those is."

"Don't ask me where they dug the ranks up. I think the only requirement was that they sounded as different as possible from any other service." The two of them laughed, both taking longer sips of their drinks.

"Why am I here, Danny?"

He pulled a datapad out of his jacket pocket, and slid it across the table. She looked at it, disbelief flashing across her face, then grabbed it. "This can't be what I think it is." She waved the offending item in the air to gesture her points.

"First Lieutenant Caine," Marshall began in the most formal-sounding voice he could muster, "I am officially informing you that your commission has been reactivated, with the option of a transfer to the Triplanetary Fleet. Naturally, Mars not being in a state of war, you are at liberty to decline, but this would mean the suspension of your reserve status."

She slammed the pad down on the table with sufficient force to cause Marshall to worry that he might need to get a new one. "What the hell do you want me for?"

Marshall looked out at the stars, glistening through the transparent dome. "I'm under no illusions about what I'm going to face when I get on board the Alamo, Deadeye. Most of the Martian personnel are reservists who probably haven't been on a ship in years."

"Like me. Danny, I haven't worn a uniform since the war. And what is this – Tactical Officer? I'm a fighter pilot."

"You had the best mind in the squadron. If you'd stayed in, you'd have made Captain ahead of me and we both know it."

She sat at the table, fuming. "What about the rest of the crew?"

"Callisto didn't give their people the luxury of choice. They just assigned whoever they didn't want who was serving on the ships that were being transferred over. As for the mob from the Titan Militia – well, at least they're all volunteers, and they've probably been on ships recently, but almost all of their experience will have been on merchant ships, and in-system at that. Not to mention the collection of green recruits I've been given. I need at least one crewmen I know and can count on. Someone I can trust. That's you."

"What makes me so special?" She took another deep swig of her drink.

"You were my wingman for three years. I need you to cover my back again. More, we're going interstellar. Our mandate prohibits us from operating within Sol System. Not one serviceman in ten has been out there, but you've knocked around the local systems a bit writing those travel pieces of yours. You know the territory a damn sight better than anyone else I can find."

Caine shook her head. "This forces the issue, Danny. I don't like it much."

"Will you do it?"

She sat back in her chair. "Never mind the career bull. You've got the credentials to get a damn good flying job as a civilian. Or you could retrain as a frigate jockey. It might take a little longer, but your record is more than good enough to make it stick. So what do you really want?"

Marshall stood up, his chair rattling against the ground, and made his way over to the dome, Caine following him over. He ran his hand against the wall, feeling the bitter cold on his hand, as he looked up at the stars.

"I didn't see the stars that often when I was a kid, back in Sheffield. Too much light pollution. I remember when we emigrated I spent hours just staring out of the viewports, trying to catch up on what I had missed out on. Look at them, Deadeye. Alamo is an FTL ship, and our mission is going to take us out there. Flying the flag, seeing what lies beyond the known. I flew fighters because that's what they needed me to do. Not because it's what I wanted to do."

"Isn't the Force keeping a few battlecruisers?"

"Only for hopping between here and Proxima. If I want to see what's out at the Perimeter, or hell, beyond, then there's only one fleet I can join that gives me that opportunity. I might have a crew that's mostly been press-ganged, I might have a ship that's twenty years old, and I might have all the politicians trying to pull me back, but I'm going out there, Deadeye. They're not going to stop me this time."

She perched on the top of a chair, her legs swinging back and forth. "Is this about your father?"

Marshall turned his head to face her. "Is it so wrong for me to want to follow in his footsteps?"

"That depends if you are going to follow him, or blaze your own trail."

"I want this, Deadeye. More than I've wanted anything in my life. I can't really explain why, even."

"At least you're still honest with me. Aside from the opportunity to once again risk life and limb in the service of my planet – forgive me, it's all three of them this time – what exactly am I getting out of this arrangement again? Aside the pitiful service paycheck?"

He looked back out at the stars, then turned again to his friend, "I need you, Deadeye. Badly. A hundred and twenty lives are about to rest on my shoulders, three crews trying to work together for the first time, either untrained, resentful, or worn-out. I need one person I can count on, out there in the dark."

"You can't use me as a crutch, Danny."

"Better that than fall over. There's too much at stake." She glanced aside for a moment, and Marshall continued, "Think of the adventure. I've read your articles, seen your documentaries. You're running out of places a publisher can send you. The Fleet has a longer reach."

"Might be a few books in it, I suppose." She tipped her head back, looking up at the stars again, "Besides, you aren't going to take no for an answer, are you?"

"No."

"Then I accept. Sir." She chuckled, "That's going to take some getting used to."

Chapter 2

Marshall continued to tap his fingers down on his borrowed desk. Once again the soon-to-be-former commander of Alamo had refused his request to come on board and inspect his new command. He'd spent most of the afternoon going over the Patrol's regulations, trying to find any requirement for him to be allowed on board, but no such regulation existed. The practice of the incoming commanding officer being granted a tour of the ship by his predecessor was one of the oldest in both services, but it seemed that Flight Commander Zubinsky had decided not to extend him that courtesy.

He began to mentally compose another letter, pondering how to word it more strongly, mindful of the fact that in three days he would be assuming command in any case, but then called up another list, and found his name listed near the top. He did have security access to Alamo, even if the captain wouldn't allow him on board. Shrugging out of his uniform jacket, he threw it loosely onto his chair, logged off his terminal, and stepped out of his office, being careful to lock it behind him.

A few second thoughts briefly passed through his mind as he walked around the outer ring of the station. It was busy; the duty shifts were changing over, and the corridor was full of rusty red. He paused at a viewport, looking at a flare in the distance, a transport ship decelerating to dock. Probably carrying some of his crew.

His real attention was beyond, and he slid his hand across the window to magnify it, looking at it for about the hundredth time. He saw a long cylinder, three spokes reaching out to the outer, inhabited areas of the ship, the laser cannon running down the long spoke of the vessel parallel to the FTL drive, the whole ship slowly rotating on its axis. Brief flashes of light from the superconductor ring wrapped around the central core, evidence of some work being done on the powerful energy grid. Shuttles queuing up to transfer personnel and equipment back and forth from the station, probably taking everything not absolutely necessary to ship operations back to Callisto, tankers topping up the internal fuel store with Helium-3, enough for four hendecaspace transits.

He knew that Zubinsky had fought an impressive, albeit doomed rearguard action to try and retain Alamo, even as the ship shaped its way out to Mariner, and had complete sympathy for him – but he couldn't wait any longer to take a look at his first command. His pace quickening, he continued out to the docking ring, moving past the military bays to the few civilian berths.

Half a dozen shuttles were docked, but no-one seemed to be about. A noise drew him further down the corridor, where he saw a few prefabricated tables scattered around an abandoned workshop, a vending machine precariously propped against the wall, and what he presumed to be pilots lounging around, drinking one concoction or another.

"I need a ride. Anyone interested?" Marshall said, looking around hopefully. None of the pilots seemed to have paid him any attention, but one over in the corner, a slight, nimble woman who barely seemed old enough to have her license, ill-kept auburn hair dropping down over the back of a battered old leather jacket that probably was on its fourth or fifth owner, stood up and looked at him, finishing the can she was drinking.

"Where to?" She had the usual twang of a Martian accent, but with a slightly odd mix to it that he couldn't quite work out.

"Over to Alamo. Part of the crew transfer."

"Got any papers?"

Marshall frowned slightly, then shook his head. "If I did, I'd be at one of the military shuttles. I've got clearance to board, though. All signed, sealed and approved."

She shrugged. "I'll get you there, and hang around to get you back. If they chuck you out of an airlock, I charge extra for daring rescue missions."

"I'll keep that in mind."

With a half-reluctance, she stood up and made her way casually over to the most decrepit looking of the shuttles, nimbly working the airlock controls. The inside was a mess of food wrappers, spare parts and disposable datapads, but the pilot's chair and console seemed well-kept enough. He just hoped that the working systems of the ship were better maintained than its dubious passenger facilities. The pilot seemed to sense his concern, and craned her head back.

"No refunds, bud."

"Not looking for one. What's your name, anyway? In case I need it for the accident report."

She turned back to her console and started flicking switches; with a jolt the airlock separated and they began to float free, a touch of thruster speeding them away from the station. "Funny. Name's Margaret Orlova. Buy me enough drinks and flowers and you can call me Maggie," she said, grinning.

Marshall strapped himself carefully to one of the passenger seats, pushing some of the clutter out of the way, noting that one of the straps seemed rather frayed. "Daniel Marshall. When was the last time this shuttle got serviced?"

"By some tinkerer from the station? Yahweh knows, I wouldn't trust those morons to service a coffeepot. Based on what I paid, probably before the war. Handle all of that myself." She started to tap thrusters with a nonchalance that indicated long experience, then kicked the engines into full, sending Marshall rocking back into his couch. He looked over at some of the readings – they were well within the prohibited radius of the station.

"Why isn't Dock Control calling?"

"You want to fly, Danny?" She ran the thruster up all the way, locking it down into automatic control for the last course adjustments. "I've thrown us up into the standard approach pattern from the upper docks. Makes it look like we're in the normal approach queue. So many ships coming and going right now that the Deck Officer's just waving them through."

Marshall shook his head. "Why do I think you've been out there already?"

She laughed. "Not that I'd tell a stranger. But I feel sorry for the poor sucker they hired to command that flying scrapyard. Word got round that anything on her is up for grabs. Half the pilots down in Harry's spent most of the off-watch going back and forth with bits and pieces from their contingency stores."

"What?"

She locked down her console and turned her chair around to face him. "What's it to you? I figured you were just another scavenger."

He rubbed his hand through his hair, "I'm the poor sucker. I was sneaking on board to take a look over her before I took formal command." Marshall frowned his way through her peals of laughter. "It's not funny. I was hoping for at least some professionalism, not a gang of sore losers salting the earth."

"Salting the earth?"

"Forget it. Do me a favor, though – when you get back, pass the word that the good times are over."

"No fun."

The shuttle spun around, slamming on its engines again to slow down, drifting back into the standard approach pattern. He pushed his way forward into the cockpit to get a better look at the ship; the young shuttle pilot made no move to stop him, evidently recognizing the look on his face.

He could just about make out a couple of space-suited figures on the outer hull repainting the ship's name, switching the 'C' to a 'T'. TSS ALAMO. Whatever the difficulties, it was his ship. He felt a surge of pride build up inside him as he looked over its lines, fixing them in his head. The hours he'd spent pouring over the blueprints on his way out from Mars didn't equal a single second of this experience, of actually looking at the ship he was to command.

"Coming into dock, Captain Danny, better strap in."

He looked over at her, shaking his head, "Don't call me that. I'm trying to keep a low profile. That's why I'm not wearing a uniform."

She laughed again. "No-one out of uniform has a shirt that well-creased. Tell you what, I'm in a generous mood. Couple of spare jackets over in the equipment locker, see if one fits you. No extra charge. Just dump it back when you get thrown out."

The shuttle crashed gently against the side of the ship, then bounced away, prompting a brief fusillade of swearing from Orlova. The docking latches engaged on the second try, and he heard the hissing of atmosphere filling the airlock, and felt himself getting heavy again in Alamo's rotational gravity. The locker had a pair of jackets in it – along with a small avalanche of junk which left some rather odd stains on his trousers. The oldest one of them seemed to fit; it was festooned with a collection of old mission patches from the pioneering days – Apollo, Artemis, even the Zeus III mission. Orlova looked him up and down.

"Kinda suits you, Captain Danny."

"Thanks. Hang around here for a bit. I'll let you know when I'm ready to come back."

"Good luck with your sneaky infiltration of your own ship." She shook her head, smiling. At least someone seemed to be enjoying this.

Marshall emerged from the airlock to find a state not much better than the shuttle he had just left. Crates of equipment were littering the corridor, a couple of bored-looking crewmen in Patrol Blue ticking them on and off a series of manifests. Some of them were labeled 'Triplanetary Fleet', but a depressing majority seemed to be labeled for 'Callisto Transfer'. Not a promising start.

Neither of the crewmen paid any attention to him as he scanned his ident card past the access scanner, then made his way into the unattended elevator. He tried to think of an inconspicuous place to start – and the hangar deck was an obvious one. According to the specifications, Alamo came with a flight of six fighters. He didn't have any fighter pilots assigned yet, but if he was going to keep his flight pay, then he was going to have to become familiar with them. The elevator whisked down a pair of decks, then along the long axis of the ship.

It opened onto an almost empty deck. All six of the launch racks were bare, some of the equipment stripped right down. Only a pair of shuttles remained, resting on their elevator airlocks. A group of maintenance personnel seemed to be playing darts in a corner of the ship, while an officer sat perched on a chair reading a datapad – presumably the same deck officer that was overseeing the disbursement of his equipment stores. Ignoring him for the moment, he made his way to the work gang in the corner, trying his best not to let the anger he was beginning to feel show too much.

"You guys the deck gang?" Marshall began, looking around.

A ruddy-faced man wearing the insignia of a Flight Sergeant turned and grunted, "Need anything?"

"Just looking around. What happened to the fighters?"

"Got flown out last night for transfer back home. Why, you a pilot?"

"I was. Wanted to take a look at them."

The sergeant reached down to an odd-smelling purple bottle and waved it in front of Marshall, a few drops frothing out over the side. "Sorry you missed 'em. Fancy a drink? I'm celebrating."

"Yeah!" cheered a couple of the others.

"Celebrating?"

"A promotion." Scorn laced his words. "Apparently the Patrol doesn't want me any more, so I'm going from being a Flight Sergeant to a Petty Officer."

"Nothing petty about you, Diego!" one of the other crewmen yelled.

"You're staying on, then?"

Diego spat at the deck, then smudged it in with his boot. "Doesn't seem like I have much choice. Sure you won't have that drink?"

"Got to get back. Maybe next time, huh."

"Sure."

Marshall walked back to the elevator, shaking his head; the gang had already gone back to their previous revelry. As he stepped into the elevator he pulled out his datapad, scanning down the list of names. Shuttle Maintenance Technician, Petty Officer Diego Ramirez. Twelve years service in the Patrol, three Combat Stripes, one of them post-war, which was a fairly rare thing. Precisely the sort of senior crewmen he was desperately going to need, but if all the 'recruits' from the Patrol felt like that, he'd probably rather leave dock with only half a crew.

He looked over the list of destinations again, and shaking his head, punched in for the engineering deck. The elevator sped its way through the ship, down to the far end, as far as could safely be traversed without getting into special gear.

The doors opened, and he looked around the massive room. Three decks high, separated by mesh partitions, a couple of dozen workstations for various duties ranging from simple telltales to the complicated waldoes that were the only way of operating in the reactor while it was in use. Hatches that led to access points throughout the ship, all of them too dangerous to permanently occupy but of potential critical value for damage control. His attention was quickly drawn to the rear, a huge hologram of the ship showing the status of every system, and the position of every engineering technician.

Most of the crewmen appeared to be paying him no heed, focused totally on their own duties, but a couple of officers in the corner had noticed the scruffily-dressed Marshall entering the room. One was a tall, dark-haired officer who somehow managed to make his blue jumpsuit seem smart, a trace of contempt shown on his severe face, the other a weary-looking blonde who had obviously recently been working around the clock, her round face set in what appeared to be a permanent frown. They looked at each other, and the man made his way over to Marshall, looking him up and down with a disapproving air.

"Are you lost?"

Marshall shook his head. "Just having a look around." After all, it wasn't a lie.

"I suggest you look around somewhere else. This is a security area."

"Very well, mister..."

"Flight Officer Dietz. And that is the last question I will answer. If you do not leave at once I will have you removed."

Shrugging, Marshall stepped back into the elevator, shaking his head as the doors closed behind him. The name sounded familiar, and he scanned down his crew list again to confirm his suspicions – the attached headshot confirmed it. Wilhelm Dietz, currently Flight Officer, shortly to become a Lieutenant of the Triplanetary Fleet. Operations Officer, which was his current position. Another one of the Patrol's draftees, though at least this one seemed to care about his job.

It occurred to him that ordinarily, an officer would make an effort to find out what he could about a new commanding officer, and that would include finding out what the man looked like. That he had not taken the effort to find out either meant that he was such a stickler for protocol that he had opted not to take such steps, or that he simply didn't care.

This little raid of his was beginning to feel like a bad idea. He was aching to have a look at the bridge, but the security there would be ten times tighter than in the engineering sections. Weapons Control would be the same, but perhaps Astrogation would be a different story.

The elevator didn't go directly there this time, instead depositing him in a corridor in the lower decks, close to the sensor housing. Alamo – like the other ships of her class – had originally been designed as a long-range FTL survey ship, before the war led to a change in plans. Most of the gear was left intact, though, and he was right in the bowels of it. The door opened to reveal an almost empty room, a broad-shouldered man with skin as dark as space hunched over a control console – and wearing a Triplanetary uniform. Closing down his workstation, the man turned and stood to attention.

"You must be Captain Marshall." He had a deep, rich voice that actually sounded vaguely welcoming.

Marshall hastily went through his crew list in his head, "Senior Lieutenant Mulenga?"

The astrogator smiled and curtly nodded his head, gesturing around the room. "I thought I would familiarize myself with the equipment on this vessel. I presume you met the same response as myself when asking for access?"

"I'm afraid so. I get the impression that Flight Commander Zubinsky does not like me very much."

"You have stolen his ship from him. A ship upon which he has served for seven years, as Executive Officer and then Commander. Were he handing it over to a fellow officer of his service, I suspect it would be different; but he had another year to go on his tour before the Patrol elected to abruptly terminate it."

"If I were in his shoes, I hope I would behave with greater courtesy."

Mulenga raised his eyebrows and smiled, "I will remind you of that if you ever find yourself in a similar situation."

Pausing for a moment to glance around, Marshall looked at his subordinate's attire. "I see that you've put on your new uniform."

"As have you – at least, most of it."

"I didn't want to be conspicuous."

"Probably a sensible precaution. Is it wrong of me to be wearing it, Captain?"

Marshall shook his head. "Not at all. It's something of a relief."

"The Militia wants the Triplanetary Fleet to succeed, Captain. I have spoken with many of the personnel that are being transferred to your command. You should know that they are all volunteers, all fully aware of what is expected of them. While I suspect you will find that they are not accustomed to military protocols, their enthusiasm should not be a problem."

"I'm happy to hear that at least a third of my crew wants to be here. And you?"

"I volunteered, as did the others. I should inform you know that I am somewhat surprised at my position as your Second Officer." A frown was growing on the astrogator's face, he seemed to want to be looking at anyone other than Marshall. "I have never been in any command position, nor have I sought such an assignment."

"I presume you understand that this places me in a rather difficult position."

"Not at all, sir. I will fulfill all my duties to the best of my ability. I also understand that politically, Titan must have a senior officer in the command structure. I simply wish to make my career goals clear to my commanding officer from the outset of our working relationship. I always believe in honesty with my superiors."

On the face of it, this was an extremely admirable viewpoint that Marshall could not disagree with; it was the ideal subordinate that was willing to admit even his weaknesses to his senior officers. Understandably this was a somewhat rare trait to find. Nevertheless, such an attitude in an officer who could quite easily end up commanding Alamo – and when any circumstances that might lead to that would likely be critical – was something to be concerned about.

"I'll try to keep that in mind, Lieutenant. I appreciate your candor."

The door chimed; Marshall and Mulenga turned to face it as it opened to reveal a frowning officer wearing the three gold rings of a Flight Commander in the Patrol, the ceiling lights shining on his bald head, accompanied by a pair of fairly burly looking crewmen who had sidearms in their hands. The two Triplanetary officers looked at each other before looking back at the trio.

"Major Marshall?" said the officer.

"Lieutenant-Captain, if you don't mind. This is my Second Officer, Senior Lieutenant Mulenga."

"I don't care what you call yourselves. Come with me."

Chapter 3

The corridor seemed interminably long this time, with Commander Zubinsky walking in front of Marshall and the security guard behind, still holding his pistol pointed at the young Captain. Mulenga had been taken in a different direction, probably to the detention cells, he mused.

They walked past a few crewmen on their way to the elevator, all of whom would doubtless shortly be gossiping about this around the ship. The three of them stepped into the elevator; Zubinsky pushed for the bridge. At least he was going to get to see it.

"Is this really necessary, Commander?"

Zubinsky narrowed his eyes. "Two people have infiltrated my ship and penetrated security areas. What would you do?"

"I would have had the courtesy to provide my successor with a tour of the ship when politely requested. Thereby not getting into this silly situation in the first place."

The guard looked slightly uncertain at this; his sidearm wavered slightly. Marshall turned to him, looking down at the pistol nestled in his hand.

"Put that stupid thing away, spaceman. What's your name?"

The guard looked nervously at Zubinsky who nodded curtly in reply. "Astronaut Second Class Cole, sir."

"You staying on?"

"Yes, sir," he gulped.

"If I ever order you to do something this stupid, remind me about this. And put that gun away before you hurt someone."

The doors slid open before Zubinsky could protest any further, and Marshall got his first look at the bridge. Naturally he had seen pictures of it, even looked around a holographic replica, but nothing could prepare him for the real thing.

Three consoles in front of the viewscreen for Guidance, Communications and Sensors, others at the rear for Engineering, Operations, Weapons and Astrogation. Displays on either side showing the status of the ship, others showing a variety of views of the surrounding space.

At the heart of it all, the captain's chair with its command console. He'd seen them a hundred times, even sat in them on a few occasions – but this one was his. At least, it soon would be. Though its current occupant, the blonde from the engineering deck, looked as if that prospect was the worst imaginable.

"Captain on the Deck!" she called, and every crewman stood to attention at their consoles. All of them turned and looked at their new commander being brought onto the bridge at gunpoint; finally the sheepish Cole holstered his weapon.

"My office, Major," said Zubinsky, making his way over to a door at the rear, in between the aft consoles. Marshall looked around at the displays, not seeming to hear him. Cole tapped him on the shoulder, gesturing at the door, and he nodded in reply, making his way into the room.

It was a mirror of the man who sat in it; artwork displayed along the wall, a box with a row of medals carefully polished, and the flag of Callisto on a pole behind his chair. The desk was neat, not a single stylus out of place, a collection of specialist datapads arrayed in a rack. A holovid of a woman flickered on the wall behind him, obviously slightly out of phase.

"My intention is to contact your superior and initiate court-martial proceedings, Major. Have you anything to say?"

Marshall took a step forward, the door sliding shut behind him, and dropped into the chair opposite the fuming Zubinsky, his patience beginning to wear thin.

"I had full security access, as did the officer you have presumably thrown into the brig. I don't know if you think that this is going to prevent Alamo being transferred, but it won't work. At best you have me for a breach of protocol – but then, when you failed to accede to my request to come on board, you violated that."

"This is my ship, Major..."

"Lieutenant-Captain. You seem to keep forgetting that. Commander."

Zubinsky's neck began to redden. "In three days you can wander about this ship as much as you want. Until then it remains the property of the Callisto Orbital Patrol, and I will caution you not to forget that. You may be right in that talking to your superiors would be an exercise in futility, but I can and will have you escorted back to the disreputable junk-pile that brought you here. And I do intend to lay charges against the shuttle pilot."

Marshall stood up, slamming his hands down on the desk, giving him the brief satisfaction of knocking the stylus out of alignment.

"Just a damn minute, she was operating under my instructions as a civilian contractor. You can't lay charges against her for that."

"Someone needs to teach you – Lieutenant-Captain – that actions have consequences."

"Do that and I'll..."

The argument was cut off by a hail from the bridge. Zubinsky stabbed a button on the desk, and a view of the crewman at the communications station appeared on the wall. "Commander here. What is it, Weitzman?"

"Incoming communication from Mariner Station, sir." The young crewman looked white as a sheet. "Captain's eyes only."

A smile spread across Zubinsky's face, and Marshall felt his stomach growing queasy. He was just getting used to the idea that he was going to be commanding this ship. Evidently his unease showed, as Zubinsky's smile grew still further. The Flight Commander turned up to Marshall.

"It appears I need some privacy, Lieutenant-Captain. I'll have Astronaut Cole show you to the airlock."

"No, Commander," Weitzman interrupted, obviously bracing himself. "The message is for Lieutenant-Captain Marshall. Top priority from Commodore Tramiel."

The smile vanished in a split-second, and Zubinsky shot a look up at Marshall – who tried with only limited success not to display his relief. "Confirm that!" he barked into the speaker.

"I have done, sir," the crewman said. "Twice. The message is listed urgent, sir."

Marshall looked down at the seated officer, "It seems I need to use your office, Flight Commander. If you would be so good as to wait on the bridge, I'll let you know as soon as I am finished."

Zubinsky shot to his feet, staring at him with cold fury in his eyes. For a few seconds Marshall actually thought that the Commander would refuse, order him off the ship anyway, but common sense finally reared its head, and he nodded walking around his desk to the door.

"Rest assured that as soon as you have finished your little chat, you will be leaving my ship, Lieutenant-Captain. If I have my way you will not be returning."

"Thank you for the loan of my office, Flight Commander," he said, trying to keep the sarcasm as veiled as possible. Ignoring the daggers being thrown from his predecessor's eyes, Marshall sealed the door and sat down at the desk, punching an authorization code to accept the transmission with a small smile.

That proved insufficient; the machine wanted a DNA sample for full verification. Either Zubinsky had programmed the machine to be annoying, or this was important. He winced at the sharp pain of a needle jabbing into his palm, rubbing at the spot as the face of the Commodore appeared on the screen.

Commodore Tramiel had been in space for forty years, and age had done nothing to improve his looks or disposition. Officers only survived under his command by doing the absolute best – anything other than perfection would earn a scathing rebuke and a swift transfer to the worst posts available. No real surprise that the Service had managed to get him transferred to the Triplanetary Fleet – but Marshall considered it was the Fleet's gain.

He began in his gruff voice, "What are you doing on Alamo, Marshall? I thought Zubinsky was blocking you from getting on board."

"I decided to take matters into my own hands, sir. Especially when I found out that it was happy hour on Alamo's stores and every outfitter and quartermaster on the station had been invited."

"I see.” He paused, looking off-screen, then continued, “I have some bad news for you, Danny."

First name. That was bad news. He hadn't called Marshall by his first name since he'd called the Academy to notify him that his father's ship had been listed as missing.

"What is it, sir?"

The Commodore took a deep breath before starting. "I just finished talking to the Combined Chiefs of Staff. Alamo's departure has been moved up. You are to assume command immediately, and proceed at the earliest opportunity – but in any event less than twelve hours – for Lalande 21185."

"Twelve hours? Sir, I don't have most of my crew..."

"The Kepler arrived not an hour ago with the balance of your crew from Titan, and most of your Martian personnel are already here at the station."

Marshall looked around the office, before turning back to face his superior. "Commodore, tell me the truth. Is this really urgent, or is this politics? Because if it is urgent, I will find a way, some way, to get this done. But otherwise tell the politicians to go to hell. It was going to be hard enough to put this crew together in two weeks, never mind twelve hours."

"Cornucopia Mining had a three-ship expedition out at Lalande to explore the possibility of using its asteroid belt. They were a month overdue, but rather than report it to us, they sent another ship, the Yukon, to take a look. That one arrived back at Callisto this morning, half its crew dead and shot to pieces, claiming that a hostile fleet had attacked them."

"Christ. Still doesn't explain the urgency though. Those crews will be just as captured – or dead – in a week from now."

"The Patrol's talking about delaying the transfer of Thermopylae and sending it out there for a look. Never mind that it is a trio of Martian vessels that have gone missing, they're out to score some points."

Marshall jerked up from his seat, half-shouting, "That's a violation of the Triplanetary Fleet Charter. Everything outside Sol is meant to be our responsibility."

"And if we falter in this first time, we might never get another chance."

"Damn politicians," he spat out the last word.

The Commodore nodded, "My sentiments precisely, Captain. I'm transmitting your orders now, to you and to Zubinsky. If he tries to block you, feel free to refer him to me." The old man paused ominously, looked down at his desk for a moment, then back up at Marshall.

"This is important, Danny. Damned important. We're hanging onto the Fleet by our fingernails right now. Only enough funding for a year of operations to test the concept. If we're going to make it work, we need a success. This is exactly the sort of mission that the Triplanetary Fleet was established for."

He raised his hand, interrupting Marshall before he could reply, "I know you were in it for the exploration, and that's important too. But getting the largest asteroid mining corporation on side? That could make all the difference come budget time. Make this one good, Danny. We're counting on you. Mariner out."

The screen went dead, but Marshall continued to stare at it for a moment. No pressure, just the future of the entire fleet resting on the success of a single ship with a crew of misfits and rejects, sent out to combat unknown forces in a system no-one had been to for a decade. He smiled, then looked down at the desk for a specific button. He found it, tapped it down, and rested back in his chair. This one he had to get right.

"Attention all stations. This is Lieutenant-Captain Marshall. By authority of the Combined Chiefs of Staff, as of this time and date," he paused for a heartbeat, "I am assuming command of this vessel. The watch officer will note the change of command in the log. As of this moment, Alamo is a constituent element of the Triplanetary Deep Space Fleet.”

“All officers and men who are to remain on board will report to their duty stations immediately. Those of you who are returning to Callisto are thanked for their service up to this point, and will disembark during this watch. Senior Lieutenant Mulenga, Lieutenant Dietz, Senior Lieutenant," he paused again for a second while he desperately attempted to remember his Executive's last name, "Zakharova to report to the Captain's office immediately for priority briefing. That is all."

He punched again for the duty communications technician, ignoring the urgent buzzing – then pounding – from the door. The flustered looking face of Weitzman appeared on the monitor.

"Weitzman, you're staying, correct?"

"Yes, er, sir."

Marshall smiled. "You're going to have a busy day, Spaceman." He had to fight to stop himself calling the technician Corporal. If he couldn't keep the new ranks straight, no-one else would either.

"First of all I want you to contact the Kepler and have them come alongside to transfer the crew they have for us. With a little luck they won't have offloaded at the station yet. And put me through to the ship's commanding officer as soon as you can – I need to poach a deck officer from him."

The original plans had him retaining the current deck officer, but the last thing Marshall wanted was a man who would hock his stores – or worse, not care when others were doing it around him. The pounding on the door was getting louder.

"Then contact Mariner Station and have them put out an alert for all Alamo crewmen to report on board immediately. All leave canceled, that sort of thing. Clear?"

The young man looked from left to right, as if attempting to find an escape route from his current situation, but he nodded, "Aye, sir."

"I'll have a lot more people for you to contact, so you'd better stand-by. I don't think you've got a relief until, ah," he looked down his crew roster, "Spaceman Muttai reports on board."

"No problem, sir."

"Good." The pounding was getting worse to the point that he could hear it through the pickup. He signed off, then opened the door to reveal a furious Zubinsky standing in the threshold.

"Flight Commander, I presume you have read the order from the Combined Chiefs?"

"You bastard," the older man spat at him.

"I haven't got time to work out what that means." Marshall looked down at the desk and started calling up personnel charts.

"I'll tell you what it means..."

Marshall sighed, slammed his hands down flat on the desk, and stood up. "I don't have time for this, Commander. Twelve hours from now I need to be shaping for Lalande 21185 on a high-priority rescue mission. When I had two weeks, I had some leeway to deal with your bullshit, but I simply don't have the time to play your stupid games. Not when there are hundreds of lives at stake."

Zubinsky's hackles almost visibly fell. Marshall continued, "I know it hurts to lose your command, but it's over, Zubinsky. Now I need you to organize the transfer of the crew that are remaining in the Patrol to Mariner Station with their possessions within the next few hours. I've got a lot of crewmen coming on board, and I'm going to have enough chaos without all of them underfoot."

The older man's eyes narrowed, "What about transfer protocols? Don't you want my men to show yours around?"

"What sort of a handover can they do in twelve hours? We'll have to do this one on the fly."

Zubinsky nodded. "Very well, I will see it is done." He turned to walk out of the office, then looked back at Marshall, "I'll be back to get my things in a little while. Captain, this ship has been my home for seven years. Take care of her."

The door slid shut behind him, leaving Marshall alone in his office.

Chapter 4

Lalande 21185 had a briefing pack that was long on scientific technobabble but depressingly short on the things he actually needed to know. He'd already dumped the information on planetary orbits into the tactical systems in the hopes that Caine would be able to make something useful out of it, but the systems on the blasted-up Yukon had provided far too little information on the identity of the attackers and their courses.

He went back over the list of previous expeditions again. First scouting run by UNSS Discovery back in '98, one of the first systems visited by an FTL vessel, then a second, more detailed survey that was co-sponsored by a corporate conglomerate based on the Lunar Republic in '23. A few occasional visits by ever-smaller prospecting companies hoping to find something that the majors had overlooked, the occasional visit by one side or another during the War, but nothing since then.

As for the system itself, nothing impressive. One fairly large asteroid belt, but nowhere near as rich as Proxima, just a gas giant with a barely habitable moon and a lot of airless rocks. Jupiter, if it were seven light-years away.

He folded his screen back down into the desk, running through the information in his head again. A system that no-one had bothered occupying or seriously exploiting, or even visited for years. Just another one of the dozens of solar systems in range of humanity that didn't have a habitable planet or easy-to-get-at resources, or even an alien race to provide some interest. A couple of visits and file away for potential future use, that future being somewhat ill-defined.

Why Cornucopia might be interested in using the system was another question entirely, and not one that was listed anywhere in the briefing pack on the original expedition, just something about resource exploitation. It smacked of desperation, the ever-expanding search for new and exclusive mining territories.

Marshall looked back at his watch; almost time for his first full staff meeting. Hopefully it would be less frosty than his first meeting with his new Executive Officer – just thinking about that gave him a brief chill.

Almost on cue, the door to his office chimed. He pushed the contact to open the door; it slid open to reveal a brief burst of activity on the bridge, and the blonde-haired Senior Lieutenant Zakharova standing in the door.

She'd managed to find the time to change into her Triplanetary uniform now, but it was obvious from her demeanor that she didn't find any particular joy in wearing it. She stood at parade rest in front of his desk, with a look boiling on insolence.

Marshall waved a hand in the direction of a chair, "Take a seat, Lieutenant. Something come up?"

Zakharova ignored the proffered chair, continuing to stand. "I thought it might be productive for us to talk prior to the staff meeting, Com...Captain."

"Don't worry about slipping too much, Lieutenant. As long as you make the effort. It's going to take us all a little while to get used to the new administrative structure."

"About that. I've just been informed that Sub-Lieutenant Santana is to be replaced with an officer from the Kepler. He had an excellent service record under Commander Zubinsky, and I would like to know why you did this without at least consulting me."

Sighing, Marshall replied, "As the commander of this vessel, Lieutenant, I am not obligated to 'consult' you about anything I do not choose to talk to you about. Frankly I threw him off the ship because the mechanism does not exist for me to court-martial him yet, and I don't think we need the bad press at the start of the voyage. The ship got robbed blind while he was too busy sulking in a rapidly emptying hangar deck; I'd rather have an officer who wants to be here. Or, frankly, no officer at all. Which brings me to my next point."

Confusion flashed across her face. "Sir?"

"You, Lieutenant Zakharova. I checked twice; you actually requested transfer to the Triplanetary Fleet. Yet you seem as if you have no desire to be here. With everything in such a state of flux, if you wish to instead return to Callisto, I feel sure that the Patrol will take you back at your previous rank. I'll even have a word with a few people to smooth the path for you."

She sat down on the chair with a careful poise, and placed her hands on the deck. "I had no great love for Commander Zubinsky, Captain. But I wanted his job, and I worked hard to get it."

Marshall scratched his jaw, replying, "You think that we should switch places?"

"I honestly do not believe that you are as qualified as I to command this vessel. Your career has primarily been spent flying fighters, your command experience of larger ships is extremely limited. I have been Executive Officer of Alamo for three years. I cannot help but attribute this decision to the political move to have two commanding officers from each constituent planet of the Triplanetary Confederation."

It took him a moment to formulate a reasonable reply. Oddly, Marshall didn't find himself particularly angry by his deputy's comments; to an extent he could understand her frustration.

 "Lieutenant, I appreciate your candor. Your experience on this ship makes you potentially an extremely valuable member of my command team."

"Potentially?" she said with a harsh tone in her voice.

"Let me finish. I have no intention of stepping down in your favor. I can assure you that I would not have taken this assignment if I was not confident that I could carry it out."

She leaned forward on the desk. "That doesn't mean you are the best man for the job."

"Lieutenant, the situation is as it is. You can take it one of two ways. Either you can sit at your station and stew, doing the minimum and earning a series of service reports that will reflect your poor attitude – and I assure you, will rapidly lead to you being transferred from this ship – or you can impress me and your superiors in the fleet sufficiently that when the next command becomes available, you are the natural choice for the job."

"Jam tomorrow?"

"Damn it, Lieutenant, you know all this yourself. At least you should. You want a command of your own, prove you are up to the job."

Zakharova stood, pushing the chair back with her legs. "I will consider what you have said."

"Good." He paused. "And one more thing, Lieutenant. This is the first and last time you question my ability to command this ship, whether in public or private. Or you'll end up walking home. Am I clear?"

"Perfectly, Command...Captain." She walked out of the room, the door sliding shut behind her. Marshall called up her personnel record again, going over it for the third time that day. Based on that, and on her difficulties at dealing with the situation, well, Caine should probably be sitting in the Executive's spot right now.

Still, her record seemed good. Joined in the last year of the war, couple of decorations, steady progression through the ranks of the Patrol. Good grades in Staff College. On paper, she was a reasonable choice, and her anger had at least a little merit.

He transferred his note files down to the briefing room, and made his way onto the bridge. Every station had two or three people clustered around it while the crewmen inherited from the Patrol briefed their new colleagues on the foibles of the individual systems. With change of watch in just a couple of hours, and Alamo scheduled to break system in less than nine, it was going to be a serious push to get everything completed in time.

The watch officer belatedly noticed Marshall's presence on the bridge and stood up at attention, almost knocking his Titanian counterpart flying. The Patrol contingent all followed suit, as did some of the Martians – but none of the Militia did anything except look slightly puzzled.

"At ease, Cellini," Marshall said to the watch officer. "I think for the moment we'd better skip some of the formalities. We're fighting time."

"Aye, sir." Cellini sounded slightly hurt. "Sorry, sir."

"Not a problem, Sub-Lieutenant." The dark-skinned Titanian standing next to him looked slightly amused, and Marshall turned his attentions to him. "Do you have a problem, Sub-Lieutenant Kibaki?"

The pepper-haired man – who had to have been one of the oldest junior officers Marshall had ever seen – looked back and forth a bit, a smile stuck to his face. "All this formality seems rather silly, Captain. Never did anything like that in the Militia, and our ships still flew straight."

It was apparent from the looks on some of the other crewmen that this was a reasonably unpopular position; Marshall elected to nip it in the bud immediately. "You aren't in the Titan Militia anymore. The Triplanetary Fleet is going to do things a little differently. We've all got some adjustments to make."

When the elevator door closed, it was almost a relief. It sped down the decks, then to the far end of the ship. One thing that was immediately apparent was that the layout of Alamo was not particularly well-planned. Would have been much better to have the briefing room as close to the bridge as possible – but on the other hand, that might simply encourage a commander to spend all of his time having meetings with his senior staff.

He pulled out his datapad and started to flick through files once again, brushing up for the last time on what he was planning to do. He'd attended hundreds of meetings like this as a squadron leader or a department head, but this would be the first time he'd ever led one.

The door slid open, and he took a step out with his pad still in his hand, almost crashing into a petite, brown-haired, olive-skinned woman wearing the espatier variant of the Triplanetary uniform. She looked more like she was about to put on dance shoes than lead men into combat, but he attempted to keep his surprise to himself.

"Sorry, ah...", he looked at her sleeves, "Ensign. I didn't know we had our Espatier platoon on board yet."

"Ensign Esposito, sir. My first squad is on board now with most of our equipment; the rest is to follow."

Caine piped up from the back of the briefing room, "I ran into her in the armory, thought she should be invited to the meeting."

Marshall nodded. "Fine, Lieutenant. Take a seat, Ensign." Five officers sat around the table, and he took a few seconds to look at them whilst he was pretending to go over his notes.

Caine sat at the far end trying not to meet his eye-line, Zakharova next to her with her manner essentially unchanged from before. Mulenga, his astrogator, sitting on the other side, was a picture of calm serenity. Dietz sat still and alone, an empty chair between him and the rest of the officers. If it was possible to sit at attention, his Operations Officer seemed to have managed it. The door slid open, and a rather unkempt-looking officer walked in wearing work overalls, brushing dirty hands down his trousers.

"Sorry I'm late, I was working down in one of the FTL access junctions. We're having some problems with the secondary SMES relays."

Marshall did a double take. "Unless your personnel file is completely out of whack, you don't look much like Lieutenant Minh. She's got to be at least ten years older than you, for a start."

"Ah. Sorry about that. Captain – I mean Lieutenant Quinn, reporting for duty, sir. I'm your quantum mechanic."

Zakharova leaned forward in her chair. "Our what?"

"Chief engineer. Or Systems Officer. Whatever they're calling it." He slid into the vacant seat next to Dietz. "Soon as I got on board, I got dragged down into the bowels of the ship. Lots of good damaged stuff to play with down there." There was an odd gleam in his eyes while he talked; obviously he was in his element here.

"What happened to Minh?" Dietz asked.

"Broke her leg. Couple of hours ago. The Commodore called me up and arranged my transfer to take her place."

"Well, Lieutenant," Marshall began, "welcome to Alamo. I would have appreciated it if someone had notified me that my chief engineer had been changed at the last moment, but I can't fault you for immediately beginning your duties given the time constraints. Is the FTL operational?"

Quinn nodded, "It will be by the time you need it. I've got it off-line while my technicians switch over the relays. Once we get to where we're going I'll want to spend more time on it, though; that system's a bit of a canary."

"Canary?" Dietz's eyebrows were raised.

The unkempt engineer rubbed greasy hands down his trousers. "Warning of further problems to come. Whole system's going to need a complete overhaul." The prospect seemed to please the engineer no end.

"Not until we get back to Sol, Lieutenant. Hopefully our mission should be reasonably short," Marshall began. He started punching up displays, and a series of course computations appeared. "Our orders are to proceed to Lalande 21185 as soon as possible, in no more than nine hours from now. A three-freighter expedition is more than a month overdue, and a ship sent by their owners to investigate has come back in pieces, reportedly engaged by hostile forces."

There was a murmur around the table as the officers looked at each other. "Our mission is to determine the fate of the freighters, and rescue the crews and ships if at all possible. With so little information on what to expect, we're going to have to be ready for anything. Tactical, any ideas?"

Caine shook her head. "Not yet, sir."

"That is not acceptable," Zakharova said. "As Tactical Officer you are expected to do considerably better than 'not yet'."

"I've got no information to work with." Caine punched a couple of buttons, and a picture of the system emerged. "The data from the Yukon wasn't complete. All we know is that there is – or was, as Yukon was more than a week in hendecaspace – a ship out there that was capable of damaging but not destroying the freighter."

"That alone should tell us something," said Mulenga.

"I'm afraid it doesn't. They'd want to capture the freighter if at all possible. Likely they would have pulled their punches."

"Bases? Outposts?" Marshall asked.

"Unknown. No record of any commercial development in the system, nothing much abandoned there. I suspect one of the moons of the gas giant, simply because it would provide more places to hide, but that narrows it down to only forty or fifty possible sites. Assuming they haven't gone into the asteroid field."

"What are your recommendations?"

Caine looked around the table and shrugged her shoulders, "Head in ready for battle and put all sensors on full-active. With luck we might spot something before they can get any precautions on-line. I'll brief the duty sensor operator about what to look for."

"Very well. We'll emerge from FTL at full battle stations, or as near as we can get to it. Hopefully we'll have more time to prepare for a battle – and Mr. Mulenga, I'll expect you to immediately plot a reciprocal course back to Sol as soon as we arrive."

The astrogator nodded, "I will make that my top priority, Captain. Though of course we will have to remain in realspace for at least a week before returning, to avoid dimensional instability.”

A shiver ran through Marshall; occasionally during the war ships had been forced to make hendecaspace jumps without the usual gap, and the results had usually been disastrous. He looked around the table, again, sizing up the officers.

"Let me know the earliest time we can leave the system. Personnel status, Exec?"

She punched some buttons, and a roster appeared over the table. "Alamo is rated for eighteen officers and ninety-five enlisted; right now, excepting the Espatier force, we're running at fourteen and eighty. We can operate the ship, but I am naturally concerned that only about a third of our personnel are properly familiar with Alamo's systems."

"Further, there is the matter of integration. Three different crews working together is going to create complications," Dietz said. "I would suggest that we should adopt Patrol regulations and operational protocols. That would provide the minimum disruption to current operations, and would allow the current crew to more rapidly train up the others."

It would also, Marshall inwardly noted, put the Patrol part of the crew in the driver's seat, and effectively reduce any senior personnel from the other services to a permanent subordinate role. Likely himself included.

"I think not, Lieutenant. We are better served by attempting to adopt a synthesis of the best of the three services."

Dietz replied, "Aye, Captain. I was simply suggesting an expedient course of action."

"Exec, your absolute top priority is to get the crew ready for space. We can worry about the bells and whistles of service protocols once we have the fundamentals down. We've got plenty of senior enlisted on board, use them. Let's make the mistakes now so we don't make them later. What about the ship, Mr. Dietz?"

"My primary concern is our spares supply."

"I've got my boys working on repairing the stuff we're pulling out, but that only goes so far," Quinn interrupted.

After silencing the engineer with a look, Dietz continued, "It has been depleted by the withdrawal of supplies for Patrol facilities, as well as the unauthorized removal of equipment since we arrived at Mariner Station. As for ship systems, I am confident that with the exception of our FTL, they are currently operational within standard working parameters. I began a series of overhauls and upgrades on the basis that we would be at dock for two weeks, but these are correctable within the time alloted."

"Any luck getting more spares?"

"Sorry, skipper," Quinn said, "I already called Mariner's Q. Apparently they haven't got them, or haven't got the authority to release them. Most of them are probably in private warehouses anyway by now. Security doesn't seem to care either; probably been paid off."

Marshall rubbed his hand across his face. "And without them?"

"We get one battle. Then we get out some cabling and pull the pieces of the ship back home again," the engineer replied.

"I am forced to agree with the Lieutenant's assessment," Dietz added.

"Get me an inventory of everything that shouldn't have been taken, the 'unauthorized' material."

Dietz pushed a button, and a worryingly long list of parts appeared over the table. "I have already done so, Captain."

"Then I won't keep you any longer from your duties. We depart at 2330, station time. I want reports on the effectiveness of your departments by 0800 tomorrow, and I'll have one-on-ones with all of you while we are en route. Dismissed."

The officers stood to attention with varying degrees of success, and saluted. Marshall remained seated as they began to file out of the room; he gestured at Caine and Esposito to remain in their seats, waiting for the rest of the officers to leave. After the rest had departed to their duties, Zakharova hesitated at the door for a second before leaving with a sour expression.

"Ensign, how many of your troopers have you on board right now?"

A frown crept across her face. "Ten, sir. First Squad, my platoon sergeant, and myself."

"And you have all of your equipment?"

"Danny, what the hell have you got in mind this time?" Caine asked with a knowing smile.

"Ensign?"

"For the men I have, yes, sir." She glanced down at a datapad, “Both ship and surface weapons came on board with the troops. The rest is scheduled for around three hours from now.”

"Good." Marshall pushed a button on the desk, and Weitzman's face appeared on a side wall, engaged in discussion with a cluster of other crewmen who were out of the camera shot. It took a few seconds for the young communications tech to notice that he was being watched; as soon as he did, he turned up to face the screen.

"Sorry, sir. I was distracted."

"You're forgiven. I need a tight-beam communication to Mariner Station, to Harry's Bar."

"Harry's Bar?”

Caine was desperately trying not to break out in laughter, while Esposito and Weitzman simply looked baffled.

Marshall tried to adopt a 'don't-you-know-anything' tone to his voice, "Hangout for the civilian shuttle pilots in the under-ring. There must be a secured terminal around there somewhere. I want a person-to-person on a secured line to one Margaret Orlova. Top priority."

"Sir, you want me to open up a tight-beam encrypted transmission to a public terminal to talk to one of the tramp shuttle pilots? In a bar?"

"That's the idea, spaceman."

He sighed, "Just a moment, Captain. I'll see what I can do."

The monitor blinked out, and Marshall sat back in his chair, a couple of squeaks sounding from the base. The espatier officer still looked bemused by the whole situation, Caine was diplomatically looking at the wall. A couple of minutes passed; Marshall had his finger out to contact the bridge again, before a voice channel opened up with Weitzman's voice at the other end.

"Putting you through now, sir. I'm afraid I wasn't particularly discrete; I had security put out an urgent call for her to go to the nearest station house."

"Best you could do in the time, Weitzman. Good work."

The channel crackled for a minute; evidently one end or another was having some problems with their equipment. The voice at the other end came through loud and clear, causing Caine to finally crack and burst out laughing.

"Cap'n Danny! If you missed me that much, you could have come over. You've still got my jacket."

He sighed, "This is not a social call. I need you to do a job for me."

"You've got every other shuttle pilot hopping back and forth anyway. I was just about to make a run to the Kepler."

"I need you to come over here instead. I'll arrange for you to take a load of equipment. Make sure you come to one of the emergency docking bays, aft. Don't call dock control for access, go through Tactical instead – Lieutenant Caine."

"Work is work. You smuggling something in? If you are I want a cut."

"You told me that you knew about the equipment that has been stolen from Alamo. Specifically, I need to know where it is. At least the bulk of it."

The young pilot's tone suddenly became a lot more serious. "That's going to cost. No offense, Cap'n Danny, but it's going to make me a few enemies around here. Can't you just get new stuff?"

Marshall looked around the room, shaking his head. "Not in the time. If I can't get the equipment back, I'd have to risk going without, and that's too risky. How does ten thousand credits sound? And with a bit of luck, no-one will know you said a word. I'll have our people slap some pointless charge on you to cover this conversation."

There was a long minute of hesitation at the other end of the line, and uncertainty in her voice. "This that important?"

"Yeah."

"I'll be there in twenty minutes. Set up a secure link and I'll have the information with you before I land. I somehow get the feeling you want to borrow my ship as well..."

"Got to get my people over there in something."

"Triple rates. And one-way only, they can find their own way home. See you soon, Cap'n."

The line closed; Marshall quickly deleted the record of the conversation. The expression on the young espatier had gone from confusion to consternation as she had realized what he was about to ask her to do; Caine was becoming unreadable. Marshall elected to break the ice.

"Ensign, I want you to plan an operation to get back those stores. Assume that you will be using the personnel you have now, and that you will be departing in one hour."

"You want me to break into private property and steal equipment?"

Caine laughed again. "The Captain wants you to find a load of boxes with 'Alamo' stenciled on them and bring them home. I doubt the crooks will report you for stealing back stolen property. Even if they do, what're the security forces going to do? Arrest you for doing their job for them?"

"Sir..."

"I hate asking this, Ensign, but the safety of the ship isn't giving me much of a choice. One more thing – this mission does not leave this room until you get back. Lieutenant, I need you to handle the ship end of it. I suppose you can bring Weitzman in, but no-one else. Clear."

She nodded. "You don't know if anyone who sold the spares is still on-board." A statement, not a question. "I'll have a full investigation started – after the Ensign gets back."

"Dismissed, then. And good luck, Ensign."

The Ensign walked out of the room, looking slightly dejected at her first assignment. Caine remained in her seat, watching her leave the room; when the door closed, she rested her hands on the table. Marshall waited for a moment, then stood up, sitting on the table.

"Go on, Deadeye."

She looked up at him. "First of all, sorry for calling you Danny in front of the Ensign. Won't happen again."

Marshall arched his eyebrows. "You apologizing for breaking protocol? What do you really think?"

A pause. "The troopers will love it once she gets through telling them that they are using non-lethal force only. They tend to enjoy that sort of work. Lousy first day for the poor kid, though. She joins up for high adventure, and you give her a warehouse heist as her first mission."

"Can't all be death or glory."

"We both know that this is a dodgy thing to do. Under any normal circumstances I'd be advising against this. Not that these are particularly normal circumstances, but it potentially sets one hell of a precedent."

"Eight hours and fifty-eight minutes." Marshall looked back up from his watch.

Caine stood up, making her way over to the door. "I'll go and start cleaning up the paper trail from all of this. See you at the mess later?"

"I'll try and get down there in a bit."

She smiled. "Don't worry, Cap'n Danny. I'm sure it'll work out fine." Her laughter was cut off by the closing door.

Chapter 5

Ensign Esposito had chosen the quietest part of the ship she could immediately find to gather her squad together. There'd been quite a bit of grumbling at losing the opportunity to grab the best bunks for themselves, but their Lance-Sergeant, a grizzled old veteran named Hunter who had only joined the Triplanetary Espatier Corps because the Martian Marines were about to throw him on the scrapheap, had pointed out that it actually meant that they wouldn't spend the day carrying heavy boxes around.

They'd already stowed their plasma weapons in the armory, but most of their low-impact shipboard weapons were still in evidence, holstered on belts or hanging over shoulders; several of them were checking them over, making sure they hadn't been damaged in transit.

Orlova was lurking in the background, trying not to attract anyone's attention. Aside from a couple of catcalls, she had succeeded. Esposito counted under her breath for a minute, then dropped a pocket holoprojector on the ground, throwing up a schematic of the lower portions of Mariner Station.

"Listen up. Our new Captain's given us a job, and we've got damn little time to throw it together, so pay attention."

Hunter looked over at a scrappy young man at the back, a single stripe down his sleeve, his eyes wandering. "That means you, Wolfe. We may have let you graduate training early, but that does not give you speaking privileges!"

Esposito looked at her sergeant, wondering how he managed to lace his voice with such easy authority. She looked around the troopers in front of her – a nice mix of male and female cut-throats, all of them looking as if they could take on the universe before breakfast without breaking a sweat. Typical space marines, even if a lot of them looked as if shaving was a recently-acquired skill.

"Our orders are to retrieve an assortment of mission-critical components that were stolen from this ship over the last forty-eight hours. They are being stored in warehouse levels here, and here," she gestured at two spots on the map, buried in a maze of tunnels and corridors, "and presumably guarded by civilian security."

One of the troopers at the back raised her hand. "Yes, Riley?"

"Ma'am, you telling us that we're being ordered to move some crates around?"

Hunter shook his head, "You deaf, Corporal? We've being ordered to beat up some bad guys who stole our kit and get it back. We love this stuff. I'm guessing non-lethal weapons only on this operation, Ensign?"

Esposito nodded. One of the group at the back muttered something to the medic, Floyd. "What is it, Private McBride?" asked Esposito, trying to get a stern tone in her voice.

"I was just saying to Doc here that I can't go on this operation."

"Why would that be, Private?"

"Because my hands are lethal weapons, ma'am!"

A couple of the other espatiers on either side grabbed the hands in question, and some of the others applauded. "Easy enough to fix, Private," Esposito replied. "I know I've got a combat knife around here somewhere."

That set off another round of laughter from the men. The stony-faced squad Corporal, Clarke, frowned, "How are we being inserted?"

"Civilian transport shuttle will drop us off at the nearest dock. You'll have time on the way through to go over the route with the squad holoprojectors."

Orlova shook her head, and stood up, making her way over to the officer. "That's not going to be any good at all, Ensign. You basing those on the schematics in the system?"

"Yes."

"Those decks have been torn down about a dozen times since the station went operational back in the '20s. I doubt a single panel remains of the original corridors. All you'll do if you follow those projections is get yourselves lost."

The troopers mumbled, shifting around, evidently unhappy. Sergeant Hunter kicked the wall with his boot, sending a ringing noise running down the corridor, and somehow managed to give each of them their own personal glare at the same time.

"What do you suggest, pilot?" Esposito asked, frowning.

The young shuttle pilot looked around, slightly uncertain. "I can give you directions, I guess."

"We'd be better if you showed us the way. Obviously you know the area we're heading into rather too well."

Orlova sighed. "That wasn't the deal. I'll write down some directions for you on the flight over. Once we're there, you're on your own."

"What's the matter, kid? Scared of us big ugly marines?" yelled one of the troopers.

"Who wouldn't be scared of you, Henderson?" replied Hunter.

"My shuttle's parked aft of here. Plenty of space for all of your gear, you can take seats in the passenger compartment," said Orlova, ignoring the remark. "Don't touch any buttons, the crate's barely holding together as it is."

The troopers looked at each other, grumbling, and headed down to the nearest equipment lockers, shedding themselves of a truly impressive array of lethal items, before grousing their way down the corridor, led by the sergeant. Esposito stayed behind with Orlova, watching them.

"Force of nature, aren't they, Ensign?"

"That they are. Look, we really would be better off if you would come with us. Those schematics are useless enough as it is."

The pilot shook her head. "I can't risk it. You and your apes down there get to fly off in this big fancy ship once this mission of yours is over. I have to live here. Something I might not get to do for that long if certain people found out I told you were certain goods were stored."

"Pity."

The two of them followed the troopers down the corridor and into the airlock; none of them seemed to have noticed the accumulated junk scattered across the cabin, instead concentrating on getting themselves settled down as comfortably as possible. Paradise for a espatier – an assault run with no weapons to prepare, no tactics to memorize, no battle plan to discuss. Hunter looked like he was contemplating finding something suitably diverting to do, while Orlova and Esposito strapped themselves down in the forward couches. Without bothering with a warning, the pilot detached the shuttle from the side of the ship, using the spilled atmosphere in the airlock to provide the initial boost. Not waiting for a launch approval that was unlikely to come, she kicked the engines into full and punched in a course for the lower levels of Mariner Station, again making an attempt to look like a part of the normal traffic flow. She ostentatiously sat back in her chair, her feet up on her pilot's console, and relaxed.

"Is that it?" asked the Ensign.

"I can pull on levers and push buttons to make it look good if you want, but it won't make any difference. Old Man Newton is in the driver's seat right now, I'm just watching the computer."

Esposito looked nervously around the cabin, as if expecting one of the panels to explode at any moment. With an effort, she pushed aside some of the used food wrappers and hunched over a datapad, looking over some schematics. After tapping some directions onto a datapad for a few minutes, Orlova looked over at the ensign.

"What's that?"

"Personnel files on the squad."

"Ah." She waited for another minute or two. "Don't you know all that stuff already?"

Esposito sighed, put the pad away and turned to face the pilot. "Yes and no. I've read it, but...you don't get the idea how anything will actually go until you lead them into action. Not that I've ever done that before, and they all know it."

"Nervous, then."

"Not at all. I spent three years training down on Mars for this in ROTC. I know what I'm doing."

Orlova chuckled, shaking her head. "No you don't. That's exactly how I felt when I did my first solo. Confident as hell on the outside – had to be to talk the instructor into letting me take that shuttle up ahead of schedule. Inside I was a bundle of nerves. I'm still here, though, and I'm a damned good pilot, so something obviously worked."

The young espatier looked around, out at the stars. "If you are trying to say something..."

"Only that the only reason I know you are nervous is that I've been where you are. It doesn't show. Let that sergeant of yours do all the barking, that's what he's paid for. Just keep them all pointed in the right direction, and you'll be fine."

Esposito looked over at the pilot with a slightly quizzical look, before nodding. "I'll remember that. Thanks."

"We're coming into dock. Hold on."

The shuttle spun around on the thrusters, spilling powdered aluminum liberally, then the engines briefly flared dull red before dimming as the craft slowed down to a crawl, the station getting dangerously close.

A final tap on the thrusters – which yielded an interesting series of warning flashes that translated to 'are you sure you want to do this damn stupid thing' on Orlova's panel – and they dropped down a dozen levels to the airlock they were looking for. With a dangerously loud slam that rattled the entire ship, they docked.

Hunter was out of his seat first, running towards the airlock. With a single movement he overrode the safeties and opened both doors at once, peering out into the corridor to see if anyone was about. He looked back at his officer, who curtly nodded, then stepped back from the door.

"What the hell are you morons sitting about for! Tactical deployment by fire teams, get moving people!"

Four of them quickly ran out into the corridor, taking advantage of whatever cover they could find, but no-one was in sight. The second team ran out, heading in the opposite direction. A few hand signals later, and Hunter made his way back into the shuttle, looking from side to side.

"All clear, ma'am. Ready to move out."

"Right, let's go. You got your scout picked out?"

"Voldinski."

"Get her moving, and we'll follow in thirty seconds."

"Aye."

Esposito turned to the pilot, waving a mock salute. "I guess this is where we part company."

"Something like that. I'll hang around for a few minutes in case you run into any trouble right off the mat." Orlova tossed the pad with the directions over to Esposito, who snatched it out of the air.

"Thanks. See you around."

The group made their way down the corridor, leaving Orlova alone in her shuttle. Nice kid, she thought, if a little out of her depth. Maggie sat back in her chair, looking out at the stars for a moment, then reached underneath her couch, carefully pushing it in two different places with an outstretched hand.

With a pop, one of the hidden compartments opened out, and a pair of old pistols, heirlooms as much as anything else, spilled out under her chair. She flicked a magazine into each of them, and lay them down on her control console, just in case something went wrong.

The troopers made their way down the corridor, following the instructions hastily scrawled by Orlova on the flight over. After the initial deployment, Hunter had them form into slightly less obvious clumps, in a bid to make them seem less like an armed raiding party.

One corridor blended into another with a series of twists and turns, the flicker of the bio-luminescent lighting on the walls testifying to a failing series of systems, odd chemical tangs filling the air as they steadily marched towards their objective.

Up ahead, Voldinski raised her arm in the traditional gesture of a forward scout to stand still; she made her way quietly back to the group, pulling a datapad out of her pocket, her fingers dancing across the keys.

"Warehouse ahead. Two guards, one either side of door. Bored."

Hunter nodded, turning to the officer for approval before pulling a long, smooth, bamboo pipe out of his pocket with one hand, a worn leather pouch with the other. Clarke likewise pulled another blowgun out of his pocket, and both of them slipped off their shoes and quietly made their way forward to the corridor junction.

A confused look crossed Esposito's face; Lance-Corporal Riley gave her a cheeky thumbs-up and a smile in response, which did nothing to dispel her puzzlement. The two veterans reached the junction, and the corporal dropped to his knees, both of them raising the tubes to their mouths, sliding a dart into the end, carefully drawing in a deep breath. With a chopping motion from the sergeant, the two of them blew at the same instant, the darts flying through the air to land on their targets.

One of the two guards went down instantly; the other took a few seconds to go down, grabbing at his collar as if he was unable to breath. Hunter sped back to the waiting troops, gesturing them on to the door, while Corporal Clarke quickly checked over the two fallen guards, reliving them of the clips for their sidearms.

Esposito whispered to her sergeant, "What the hell was that?"

Hunter pulled the blowgun out of his pocket again, "Primitive but extremely effective at close range. Don't show up on a scanner, and the drug on the tip of the dart knocks you cold for hours. They don't cover them in Basic anymore since the officers took over."

"Got any more of them?"

"Couple of spares."

"Get some more. And I want at least two men in each squad trained in their use as soon as possible."

He raised his eyebrows, slightly surprised. "I'll make it happen, ma'am. Very easy to fabricate. I guess we've got some crates to move."

The squad filed in through the doors, a pair of troopers taking position on either side while the guards were dragged inside. Their trousers were close enough to uniform-issue to pass a cursory inspection, and their jackets fit the troopers reasonably well.

As she walked into the storeroom, Esposito pulled out the datapad with the required inventory and started scanning for the ident tags they were looking for. The room was huge, more than a hundred meters across, with racks scattered liberally around the room in what was probably someone's idea of order, crates scattered ten or twelve high around the room. The only sound was the whirring of air recirculators overhead not quite working properly.

"Hey, Sarge, look over here!" said Riley, pulling a box down from on top of a large stack. "This place is a god-damned treasure trove."

Hunter frowned for a moment, but Esposito shook her head, "Only take any crates that have 'Alamo' written on them or that match the tags I'm scanning for. We're going to have enough problems getting our own stuff home without dragging anything else with us."

The Sergeant looked a little disappointed, but nodded, "OK, you bastards. You heard the officer. Clarke, Flanagan, see if you can find something we can get this stuff out on. The rest of you start stacking crates, and I'd better not see you slipping anything else in our load!"

Sergeants were still renowned for their creative use of language, Esposito briefly mused. She was quite confident that anything of value that could easily be pocketed would be removed from the room upon their departure, and equally confident that none of it would ever be found.

While the troopers started to load crates, grumbling about the weight, she looked around the back of the room. A thin layer of dust covered some of the older containers, and she rubbed it from the label to get a proper look at it, squinting at the unfamiliar characters.

"Anyone speak Mandarin?" she yelled.

Voldinski put down the crate she was moving, slapping her hands against her side as she bounded over to the far side of the room, "My grandma was born in the Lunar Republic. What you got, ma'am?" Esposito gestured, and the private bent over to read it out, giving a long whistle, "Mark III Plasma Pistols, off Republic Spaceship Ma Kong. Date about two years ago."

"That's a lot better than the sidearms we've got back on the Alamo, ma'am," Hunter offered.

Esposito looked back and forth between the crate and the door. "Will our clips fit these sidearms?"

"Might have to do a little work with the energy interface, but I reckon our armorer can manage it," the sergeant replied.

"Grab 'em."

That opened the door for full-scale scavenging, of course, but it was probably worth it. The Lunar Republic had always had the edge on plasma weaponry, and they never exported their best kit. Getting those issued to the platoon could make all the difference at some point. The young officer looked around, and noted that the troopers were not even bothering to conceal their scavenging now, their pockets bulging at the seams.

"Got some grenades back here!", Clarke shouted. "Half-kiloton yield."

Esposito and Hunter looked at each other in shock, the sergeant reacting first. "You make god-damned sure that they aren't booby-trapped, Corporal. What the hell would someone be doing with weapons like that on a space station?"

"You sure, Clarke? Voldinski, take a look," the Ensign said. The private made her way over to the small box, reading the label and nodding. The crate made its way to the growing pile, with Esposito making a note to make sure that they were disarmed and stored very carefully in the armory when they got back.

"We're getting distracted now, Sergeant. How much left?"

Hunter peered at the pile and down at his datapad. "Two crates missing, but no sign of them. I make seventeen crates of Alamo stores and three more that we're interested enough in to take back with us."

"Three?"

"Riley found a crate of spices we probably ought to donate to the mess. Smart kid; obviously she's been exposed to ship rations before."

Esposito walked over to the door, where Clarke and McBride were starting to load the crates onto a pair of motorized trolleys. She looked over the dilapidated equipment and the worn tracks, then up at the corporal, who shrugged his shoulders with a 'best we could do' look on his face. Before she could speak, one of the two guard on the door ran into the room.

"Take cover!" he yelled, and the troopers threw themselves behind crates, pulling their tasers out of their pockets. A couple of them looked longingly at the plasma pistols on the trolley, but without clips they were nothing but small, expensive clubs. A pair of green blasts shot through the room, blowing out a pair of crates, sending shards of white-hot plastic raining down on the troopers.

"Plasma weapons? In a station? What the hell?" Riley yelled at no-one in particular.

The sergeant peered over the crate he was hiding behind, then yelled at the scout, "What did you see, trooper?"

"Six of them, in shock armor, with plasma rifles. Two of them took station in the corridor, the others heading for the doors."

Esposito looked at her sergeant, "What do you think?"

"I think we're screwed, and they knew we were coming."

"The pilot?" Esposito said.

"What do you think, ma'am?"

Corporal Clarke spat at the deck, "Might as well throw our damn tasers away!"

The ensign looked out over her first field command, and shook her head, "That's enough of that shit, Corporal! Maintain a suppressing fire. Might find an exposed spot."

"What's the point, Sarge?"

Hunter looked venom at his subordinate, who looked doubtful for a few seconds, then shook his head, pulled out the fist-sized taser and unleashed a couple of bolts, the rest of his squad following suit. Esposito looked futilely down at her communicator, but she knew that it was jammed before she even tried to contact Alamo. The sergeant gave a hollow laugh, then looked around at the squad, pointing to a few of the younger troopers to get into better cover.

Periodicly, green bolts shot through the air, none of them hitting the espatiers, but sending them all ducking down even further for cover. One touch by a plasma bolt would be enough to kill a man. A full hit, and it would be impossible to tell that a man was ever there.

"They've got us nicely pinned down, ma'am. Orders?"

"What are they waiting for?"

"Reinforcements, maybe? They'd have a bad time taking us all in hand-to-hand, and if they wanted us dead we'd be floating outside by now. Orders, ma'am?"

She looked around, desperately trying to find inspiration in the stuff lying on the deck. Briefly, the thought of using one of the grenades entered her mind, but it left just as quickly. Those were strictly for battlefield use only; blowing a hundred-meter gash in the station wouldn't improve their situation much.

Another bolt slammed dangerously close to the wall. If one of them hit the wrong place, then none of this would matter in any case – they were close enough to the outer hull that a misplaced blast would do more than enough damage. Her eye glanced on the trolleys, one of them half-loaded, the other still loading its cargo.

"Sergeant, can we run those trolleys remotely?"

The grizzled veteran grimaced, "That we can, ma'am." He peered over, then ducked down again as another pair of bolts blasted overhead. "But we'd have to get over there to set them to remote operation."

"So we've got a plan, all we need now is some sort of distraction."

Back in the shuttle, Orlova looked up at her two pistols again, and then back at the clock. It had been almost half an hour since the troopers left for the storeroom, and logically she should have left twenty minutes ago if she wasn't going to be distracted. Yet she kept thinking about that maze of corridors, kept thinking over her instructions again and again, thinking that they might have been insufficient to get them out again.

She looked back out at the stars again, reached up to an overhead compartment to pull a battered old cap out, and tucked her hair inside. The pistols went in a worn holster attached to a belt at least four sizes too big for her, holes ripped into the synth-leather. Almost imperceptible on the belt was the logo of the Martian Space Service, the faded lettering reading 'S. R. Orlov, 1st Lieutenant.'

Securing the hatch behind her, she ran through the corridors, taking short-cuts that would have been too confusing to explain, focused completely on what she might find ahead. A little voice in her head was telling her to run back to the shuttle and escape, to get out of there before the wrong sort of person saw her, but then she smelled a harsh tang in the air. Ozone. Electrical discharges up ahead, and big ones.

She raced further down the corridor, bringing herself to a skidding halt when she saw six men in the corridor outside the storeroom, all armed with dangerous-looking weapons and well protected from taser fire. While she watched, two of them rose and unleashed a pair of bolts into the room.

"Do what's right, Maggie," she muttered to herself under her breath, then pulled one of the pistols out of its holster, lined up on the shoulder of one of the guards, and pulled the trigger twice, the antique weapon jerking to the side after each shot.

Her target dropped to the ground, screaming, his gun rattling to the deck; without waiting for a reaction she ducked back behind the corridor, taking a quick look to see if anyone was following her. Three green bolts flew past her head, slamming into what was mercifully an interior wall, ripping gaping holes into the next compartment – suddenly alarms began to ring down the corridors, screaming of a security alert.

Hunter and Esposito looked at each other across the cover as they saw the gunman go down, and without even looking back the sergeant jumped over the crate and sprinted towards the trolley, weaving from side to side as another bolt tried to find its mark.

Purely on instinct, he ran his hand over the controls, flicking a pair of switches and tapping a button, before veering off and diving behind another crate, a second bolt right on his tail. There was a loud crash on the far side, a brief burst of whispered swearing, then a thumbs-up from the sergeant.

Grabbing her pad, Esposito tapped in a series of commands and sent the trolley running down the corridor. With another brief flash of insight, she snatched a piece of heavy-looking debris about the size of a fist and lobbed it at the enemy with all her strength, yelling, "Grenade!"

Orlova, outside, saw the tractor running towards the men, breaking their ranks. She took the opportunity for another couple of quick shots, seeing two of them limp off, then saw the remainder hurl themselves to the ground as a piece of debris landed in their midst. She shrugged, figuring that they obviously knew something she didn't. Taking the opportunity, she sprinted forward and grabbed one of the drooped weapons, pointing it at the men on the ground.

"Drop your weapons, damn it!" she yelled. Then to the troopers inside, "Get out with your stuff right now! Station security will be here any second!"

Clarke and Voldinski ran out, grabbed two more of the discarded weapons, covering the cowering cretins. The rest of the troopers bundled everything onto the two trolleys and started them down the corridor, heading back the way they came. Esposito was the last one out, looking Orlova up and down with a smile on your face.

"I thought we had parted company."

"You and that damn Captain of yours are going to give me a bad reputation. Come on, let's get the hell out of here before anyone else sees me."

"Which way to the loading docks?"

Orlova gave a half-laugh. "Follow me and we'll be back at my shuttle in five minutes."

Chapter 6

Ensign Esposito and Lance-Sergeant Hunter stood at attention in front of Marshall's desk, while Orlova slouched along a wall. The captain's office was silent enough to have heard a pin drop; he was still looking over the three reports they had submitted, along with the testimony culled by the remainder of the crew.

The door chimed, and opened to admit a furious-looking Senior Lieutenant Zakharova, who in three paces managed to take a position behind the captain, also standing at attention. Marshall looked up from the datapads, slid them to a side of the desk, and motioned for the assembled to take a seat, then sealed the door.

He tapped a button. "Weitzman, make sure we aren't disturbed until this meeting is over."

"Aye, sir."

He looked around at the four people, with a particular focus on the two espatiers. "To sum these reports, then. Four hours ago I ordered you, Ensign, to launch a covert raid to get back the spare parts that were stolen from this ship over the last forty-eight hours. It was understood that non-lethal weapons only would be used."

"No-one told me that!" Orlova interrupted, to be the subject of a withering look from Marshall.

"If I might continue. This low-impact mission started to unravel when your troopers began to engage in wholesale scavenging – yes, I saw the state of their pockets when they slumped back on board – and went further wrong when you came under fire from a group of thugs using plasma rifles.”

He looked down at the report for effect; he'd got this story memorized, then continued, “By the skin of your teeth, notably the intervention of Ms. Orlova and some impressive acrobatics from Lance-Sergeant Hunter, you somehow overpowered the opposition and got away. Leaving damage to the lower levels of the station that will cost a hell of a lot more than the parts you reclaimed were worth. Would that be a reasonable assessment?"

"Hell, Captain, the plasma pistols are more than worth it," the Sergeant said. "Sides, the Ensign did fine her first time out."

Esposito flashed a look at her sergeant, then back to Marshall. "We were led to expect only minimal resistance. Not fully-trained combat troops. I don't see if there is anything else that we could have done." She glanced at the sergeant again. "But if there is any blame to assign, then as the officer in charge it belongs with me. Though I note that we did accomplish the mission, and would appreciate if you take that into consideration when considering charges."

Marshall smiled, and shook his head, "Right answer, both of you. Don't worry, there's no consideration of charges here. I'm pretty sure that ordering such a mission would be a wild divergence from Triplanetary Fleet Regulations, if the Rules Committee had finished drawing them up yet. As for the scavenging – Sergeant, I want you to make sure that if they took anything that the ship will find useful that it makes its way into the stores."

Hunter looked at Esposito for a second, then back at Marshall, his face breaking out into a smile. "Already on it, Skipper."

Marshall noted that he'd managed to get promoted from 'Captain' to 'Skipper' in record time; evidently he was doing something right. The souring expression on his Executive Officer's face didn't bode well, though.

"As for the rest of it, what the hell happened? Ms. Orlova, any thoughts?"

She looked around the room, then made her way from the wall to perch on the side of Marshall's desk before replying, "For Yahweh's sake, call me Maggie. Sounds silly calling me 'Ms. Orlova'." She looked around at the others. "I heard on the grapevine that Alamo was being looked at as a happy hunting ground for scavengers. Most of them went down to that warehouse, I know that much. One of the shuttle pilots who they hired got drunk, made us all mad bragging about the big paycheck he'd got."

Marshall frowned, "Unusually big for smuggling?"

"Happens sometimes, usually means that some corporate type doesn't know what the black market's like out here. Doesn't pay to brag, though. Oporto found that out on his way home."

"What happened to him?" Esposito asked.

Orlova shrugged. "Someone knifed him and stole his cred-card. Probably had it hacked and the money transferred before the body had got cold. Doesn't pay to brag."

"And this is Triplanetary Fleet Headquarters," said Hunter. "Might want to send some more of my boys over there to clean the place up, skipper."

"I might convince the Commodore to take you up on that. For the moment it's still Martian-operated though, which means private contractors." He spat the last two words. "None of which ever go beyond the upper levels, at a guess. Doesn't answer the question, though. Who the hell stole our cargo?"

Zakharova folded her arms in impatience. "The Lunar Republic, obviously." Everyone in the room looked at her. "Isn't it obvious? Ensign, you found considerable quantities of restricted military-grade equipment in that storeroom. I find it hard to believe that petty thugs would have managed to get their hands on it. Some of the criminal syndicates operating out of Luna, on the other hand, would have the contracts to get their hands on them."

"What would they have against us?" Esposito asked.

"I see only two possibilities, none of which are particularly pleasant. Either one of the syndicates has some interest at Lalande 21185 and decided to stop us, or the Lunar Republic itself is in on this. Which could mean we are facing considerable fleet strength when we get out there."

She started to call up a roster of Lunar FTL-capable forces. It made for disturbingly extensive reading, certainly more than equal to current Triplanetary Forces.

"If it is the Loonies, then we might be biting off more than we can chew," Marshall said. "We might have to consider this more of a reconnaissance in force than an actual expedition."

"That might be sensible," the lieutenant agreed.

Esposito looked at her sergeant again, "I'll get the troopers re-familiarized with current Loonie tactical doctrines. If we're going to be facing them, then we'll have to have some idea what we would be up against."

"Good idea." Orlova interrupted them with peals of laughter. "Do you have something to add?" Marshall said.

The young pilot stood back up, making her way over to one of the viewscreens, calling up the inventory images of the recently acquired weapons from the armory. "You're all spinning some elaborate web of intrigue about the Lunar Republic trying to sabotage your very-important mission, whatever the hell it is."

"It seems a realistic possibility," Zakharova said.

"Not in a million years. If it was some sort of Lunar Intelligence deal, then the last thing you'd have found in that storeroom would be Loonie weapons. They'd have been Martian, or Terran, or someone else's. Anything to divert you from the scent. All you managed to do was find a load of arms smugglers." She called up the list of components. "Tons of this stuff could be used that way. Even parts for their shuttles, stuff like that."

Looking across at the young pilot with an air of disbelief, Zakharova said, "When did you go to Staff College, smuggler?" She turned back to Marshall, "Captain, we can't take the risk. This is exactly the sort of shell game the Loonies love to use."

Marshall nodded, and looked up at his Executive, whose face had become dispassionate again. "Sounds like you might be onto something. Ensign, there's no harm in updating your teams in Lunar operations, but make sure not to focus too tightly on them. Lieutenant Zakharova, I want you to work with Lieutenant Caine and our young friend here to explore the possibility she outlined, just in case. See if you can catch up any leads with Security, though I somehow doubt you'll get anywhere."

"I know a couple of people who might be able to help you there," Orlova offered, "but it's going to cost you."

"How much?"

"My passage out of here, for one thing. It's going to be far too hot on Mariner now, I'll have to move. My shuttle hasn't got the legs to make it to Mars, so if I might hitch a ride."

"That's the least we can do given the circumstances. Bring your shuttle into the bay for transport, and the Lieutenant can assign you a berth."

Zakharova looked as if the pilot was something she would otherwise be wiping off the bottom of her shoe, but her voice didn't betray any change of emotion, "Aye, sir."

"I think that's all for now, then. Dismissed."

Everyone but Orlova stood to attention and made their way to the door; Zakharova stopped at the threshold, turned back, and took a chair. Marshall looked to see that the others had left the room, then sealed the door once again.

"Something on your mind, Exec?"

"May I speak freely?"

"In this office, when it's just the two of us, always."

She nodded, pausing for a moment as if to collect her thoughts. "What do you think you were doing? You launched a hit-and-run raid with a damn Espatier Squad, most of whom skipped half of their basic training in the Fleet's hurry to get them out here, under an officer who last month was sitting in Syrtis Tech studying Sociodynamics!”

“You take your intelligence from a smuggler, then send them off in a shuttle that looks as if it might fall to pieces if you breathe on the wrong part of the hull. But sir, that isn't the worst of it, not by a long shot."

"And what would that be, Lieutenant?" Marshall's tone darkened.

"Why was the first I heard of it you calling me in here to sit in on what in all rights should have been the start of at least two court-martials? I had no opportunity to review the notes, no opportunity to look at the case – and damn it all, Captain," her scorn had returned with full fury when spitting out his rank, "as your Executive Officer I should be consulted on decisions such as this.”

She paused to take a breath, “I am fully aware that sometimes time and security restrictions would prevent that from happening, but I note that Lieutenant Caine was present at the meeting where you ordered the Ensign off on this damn fool stunt."

Marshall looked down at his desk, nodding. Zakharova continued, "Captain, I am well aware that you don't like me much, and that you trust me even less. But either I'm your Executive Officer, in which case I expect to be involved in the command process in preference to your old friends, or I'm off this ship, and you can give the job to your Lieutenant Caine. I deserve a damn sight better than to be treated with such total disregard, Captain."

He stood, and walked over to look out of the viewport, watching Mariner Station spin in the distance. "I was taught in Command School that a Captain can never admit that he's wrong. I guess I'm breaking the rules once again, because I'm going to admit that you are quite right. I should have had you in on that first meeting, I should have brought in your input, and I should have kept you updated."

Turning back to face his subordinate, he noted the surprise on her face. "I am the commanding officer of this ship, and mine will be the final decision. I won't always bring you in on command decisions; this is where the buck stops. But in this particular circumstance I should have kept you in the loop."

The lieutenant narrowed her eyes, "You're agreeing with me?"

"I'm guessing you were expecting to be packing your bags and transferring command codes to Lieutenant Caine about now."

She threw a thin smile at him. "Something like that, sir."

Marshall sat back at his desk. "I'll be honest, Lieutenant, I didn't know if I could trust you."

Her face turned red with anger, her knuckles white where she gripped the desk, "I will always take whatever action is necessary for the good of the ship. I assure you of that, Captain."

Nodding, he replied, "If that is so, then we can work together. There may well be something in your suspicions. At the very least we have evidence of a connection between the Lunar Republic and the thieves."

She frowned, the stress lines on her face deepening, visibly calmer, "It could all be just a coincidence, of course. And Ms. Orlova's explanation was logical enough."

"Nevertheless, I want a series of battle drills scheduled while we are on transit to Lalande 21185. And I don't see any particular harm in using a selection of Lunar ships as the 'threat vessels' for those simulations, do you?"

"None at all, Captain. I'll see it's done." She turned and walked out of the room. Marshall looked around the bare office, realizing that he had been sitting in it for hours with his bag on the floor, and not yet unpacked. He opened out a side pocket and slid a thin picture out of it, a framed holograph of a man who looked like a somewhat older version of him. Engraved underneath it was, 'Major William Marshall, MSS Hercules'.

He fixed it to the wall, locking its magnetic clamps down, then stared at the picture. He looked for copies of the worry lines he was sure were in his face, tried to find a glimmer of indecision in his expression, but couldn't find anything. He couldn't blame the Patrolmen for their doubts, not when he was feeling them himself.

"I just hope I'm not screwing this up too much, Dad." He turned back to start unpacking another pocket, stacking a couple of cases on the desk, then looked back out at the stars again.

Chapter 7

The bridge was a hive of activity, Marshall attempting to conceal his enthusiasm as he waited for the clock to count down the seconds until their departure. It was surprising how many people had managed to find excuses to be around; Caine was at the Tactical station, ostensibly monitoring defensive system preparations, and Zakharova had stolen the Watch Officer's station, relegating the recently arrived Sub-Lieutenant Kibaki to hanging around by the forward stations, looking over consoles and pretending to be busy. Mulenga at least had an excuse to be up at the astrogation station, running his plot of the path to Lalande 21185 for about the twentieth time, hopefully coming up with the same answer each time.

In a bid to look busy, Marshall scanned through the report his Exec had handed to him a few moments before. It read more like a massive personality clash than a bid to determine the identity of the group that had stolen Alamo's spares; to be fair, they didn't have much material to work with.

The potential conclusions seemed to range from a Lunar Republic plot to lure the ship into a trap to a couple of unfortunate gunrunners caught by surprise; he dropped the pad into his lap, shaking his head. Caine rose, walking to stand behind Marshall's chair.

"This is all a bit low key, isn't it," she said.

He craned his neck up to look at her, "What do you mean?"

"First launch of a Triplanetary ship? There should be flags, salutes, a bottle of champagne smashed against the hull. A speech from the President of the Confederation. Instead we're sneaking out like thieves in the night."

Marshall chuckled, "You sound disappointed."

"We're missing out on what by all rights should have been a hell of a party."

"Sure. Lots of dignitaries making interminable speeches and hogging the canapes. You'd have been trying to sneak out after half an hour."

She smiled, "Hey, a party's a party."

Marshall tapped a button on its workstation. "Bridge to Engineering."

"Quinn here, skipper," the tinny voice echoed through the speaker.

"Is our FTL drive fully operational again?"

"Purring like a kitten, boss." Marshall looked up at Caine, who smiled and shook her head. "We're all set to go down here."

He turned to face his Exec, "Lieutenant Zakharova, is the ship ready for deep space?"

After a quick glance down her status board, she replied, "All stations report condition green. Ready for deep space, Captain."

He took a deep breath, then turned to the communications station; Weitzman was still on duty. "Spaceman, signal Mariner Station docking control and request permission to depart."

The young technician turned and smiled, "Aye, sir," before returning to his station.

"Sub-Lieutenant Franklin," he address the officer sitting at the Guidance station, "prepare a least-time course to take us to the point of gravitational stability."

"Aye, aye, Captain," she replied, hunching over her station – though Marshall knew full well that she'd had that course prepared for hours. He'd sat at stations like that often enough to know the usual pastime when at station-keeping – plotting courses to somewhere more interesting. "Course computed and ready, sir."

"We have departure clearance, Captain," Weitzman said.

Marshall sat back in his chair, smiling. "Sub-Lieutenant, by all means, take us out."

She manipulated a series of controls, and the feel of the gravity changed as the ship began to slowly accelerate, the rotation dampened automatically as the engines took over gravity provision.

The biggest headache of long-duration space travel; half the crew would be quietly swallowing their garn pills in the next few minutes. With a couple of button presses, a holographic projection of the ship appeared in front of Marshall, slowly beginning to move down a long red line towards a final point. The captain turned his head back to look at the astrogation station.

"Lieutenant Mulenga, are you ready?" The Titanian officer turned, nodded once, then returned to his station. Marshall turned back to face the viewscreen, continuing, "Then the call is yours, Lieutenant."

The only evidence that the ship was moving at all was Mariner Station slowly moving away in the background. A countdown clock began to run, Mulenga counting down to his planned transition to hendecaspace.

Without realizing it, Marshall began to tense up as the minutes ran down, the bridge crew working around him. He'd never realized just how much and how little the captain actually did; a part of him wanted to push Franklin out of the way and take over Guidance Operations himself. Not really the right thing to do, though. For a second, he contemplated going back to his office, or heading down to the mess deck or his quarters – quarters that aside from slinging a couple of bags into, he had yet to visit.

"Attention all stations," Mulenga called from the astrogation station, "FTL transition in one minute. Stand by."

No time to leave his chair now. He looked out at the viewscreen again, the attention of everyone in the room somehow focused on it. Even Zakharova, who must have done transitions on this ship a dozen times in the past, seemed enraptured. Thirty seconds to go, then twenty. The clock continued to inexorably count down, until there was a brief, blinding flash of Cerenkov blue, and the stars disappeared as the viewscreen clicked off. No-one could look at hendecaspace and remain sane.

"Transition successful, Captain," Mulenga reported. "Emergence at Lalande 21185 in nine days, ten hours."

"Thank you, Lieutenant. Excellent work, everyone," Marshall said.

Zakharova stood up, then looked down at her watch. "Sub-Lieutenant Kibaki, I rather think that Alpha Watch has been on duty long enough. Signal for shift change at midnight."

The graying sub-lieutenant looked disappointed; he'd only been on board for a couple of hours. His technicians, on the other hand, had mostly been on duty throughout the entire preparation for departure and more besides; Weitzman looked as if he was ready to fall asleep in his seat now the pressure was off. "Aye, Lieutenant."

Marshall likewise stood up, looking around the bridge, "I think I'm going to go and get something to eat. Care to join me, Lieutenant?" He turned to his exec, who shook her head.

"I've still got a lot of paperwork to catch up on, Captain. Perhaps next time."

Somehow Marshall got the idea that despite their recent detente, 'next time' might be quite a while away. He walked into the elevator, pausing briefly as Caine dashed in to join him, then stabbed a button for the mess deck. The elevator began its passage back down the length of the ship.

"I really get the idea that she doesn't like you, Danny."

"Noticed that, huh? We had a little talk, thought we might be making some progress."

"Then you assigned her to work with our surprise mystery guest. You should have heard Quinn when he saw that shuttle."

He smiled, "Look of a kid with a new toy to play with?"

"More like the kid about to disassemble his father's vidphone."

The doors opened, and the pair walked over to the food dispensers, grabbing a plastic tray. The menu selection was the usual rudimentary mix of foods; Marshall selected for 'Chicken' and Caine for 'Pork'; that the resultant slabs of meat looked almost identical didn't come as any real surprise. The deck was fairly empty, only a few of the tables occupied. Marshall frowned as he looked around the room.

"Problem, skipper?"

"We've somehow managed to get segregated seating. Martians in one corner, Titanians in another, the Patrol mob over there."

She shrugged. "Only to be expected. No-one knows each other yet." She looked at him again. "Relax, it's just going to take time. Unless you want to institute some sort of a seating plan?"

Marshall launched at that, "That's what Colonel Duncan would have done. I swear that's about the only thing he didn't do."

"Wasn't he the one who tried to introduce mandatory musical theater?"

"His idea of occupying the crew on a long patrol. Crazy."

The two of them grabbed a central table, taking seats opposite each other. Marshall took a forkful of his carniculture-bred food, adopted the expected grimace, but was pleasantly surprised at the taste of the food. Strong odor of garlic, but not actually overpowering. And the sauce was actually edible, rather than just coming out of a packet. He looked up to see his counterpart similarly surprised.

"Should have joined the Patrol instead of the Service if this is the food they're serving."

"I'm enjoying this," Caine said, shaking her head in disbelief.

"Complements of the Triplanetary Espatier Corps," said Esposito, clutching a tray with her hands, hovering around the table. "Mind if I join you?"

"By all means," Marshall waved her towards a chair. "I didn't know you'd brought a dietary chemist with you?"

She smiled, "I didn't. One of my guys found a crate of spice and herb concentrates, and thought it was wasted where it was."

"Man ought to get a medal," Caine said.

The three of them settled down to enjoy their dinner as the mess hall filled up; it seemed that everyone had been waiting for the ship to make the hendecaspace transition before coming down to eat. Most of them appeared to be pleasantly surprised by the food, but they continued to sit in their segregated stations.

"Interesting," Esposito said.

"What is?" Marshall replied.

The young espatier gestured around, "It's like a little sociodynamic experiment. Look over there – Dietz at the head of his table, everyone else lined up by rank. Then the group from Titan just clustered around randomly. Everyone's just dropping back into their old habits."

"That's what you were studying, wasn't it?" Caine said, chewing a chunk of nearly-pork.

She nodded, "Graduated three months ago. I did my thesis on early space colonization, and the blending of the different cultures into the Confederation. That's why I wanted to join the Triplanetary Fleet; we're going to put all of this into practice."

"Funny," Marshall said, "I thought we were in a combined military service, not conducting a sociological experiment."

Esposito opened her mouth for a second, looking nervously around, "I'm sorry, sir, I..."

Caine and Marshall exchange a quick glance before Marshall started to chuckle. "Relax, Ensign. I'm just pulling your leg. Commanding officer's prerogative."

"And one I remember you complaining about more than once," Caine volunteered.

"True. Are you concerned by this?" He gestured around the clumps of crewmen around the room with his fork, sending a sliver of meat flying onto the deck. "If this crew doesn't work together properly, we're sunk. I know there was some talk about staffing crews by planet, but it didn't make it past the Formation Committee. Not enough volunteers, for one thing."

"I don't think you can force it. You've already mixed up the duty rosters, which would have been my primary recommendation. Aside from that, I reckon you need a crisis. A battle would be excellent."

Caine's eyes bulged, "You want a battle?"

"Preferably one we win." She looked at the two of them, then broke out in laughter. "Sorry, I couldn't resist."

The three of them laughed together, when another figure appeared at the table. Marshall looked up to see Lieutenant Mulenga standing next to him, his tray full of assorted leaves and some sort of vile-smelling liquid.

"I was wondering if I might join the three of you."

"Certainly, Lieutenant," Marshall said. "I'd rather not have an all-Martian table. Too many of those in this hall as it is."

"To be expected. I must admit to being hungry; this is the first meal I have eaten since I was placed in detention."

Esposito almost choked taking a swig of her drink, "You were in detention?"

The dark-skinned astrogator nodded, "I have prepared a report for Sub-Lieutenant Tyler. I had several opportunities to make an escape during my incarceration. My recommendation would be that he makes increasing security in the detention block an early priority."

"You were sitting in a detention cell and your only thought was how to boost the security?" Caine asked.

"Certainly, Lieutenant. I knew that Captain Marshall would secure my release in relatively short order. I must say that the ship's cuisine has improved since then." He took another bite of salad. "This is excellent. My complements to the food processors."

"How did you two know each other, anyway?" Esposito asked, looking at Marshall and Caine.

"We flew together during the war. Tenth Interceptor, based out of Phobos for a couple of years. Fun times. By then it was dragging down to a series of skirmishes, all the big battles were over."

"Spent most of it listening to broadcasts from Vesta, waiting to hear that the war was over. By the end I swear half the pilots were spending more time sending out job applications than they were in the cockpit. Our Captain, I hasten to add, was not one of them."

Mulenga crunched through his salad, "I was on frigates during the war. Eight years and I managed to avoid any of the battles. Just one convoy run after another, hoping we'd have sufficient delta-v to avoid interception. I did manage a couple of hops out-system; those were rather more interesting."

"I've never even left Mars-space," Esposito said, wide-eyed.

"I never went any further than Barnard's Star," the astrogator said. "Two trips to Proxima, one to Alpha as well."

"Just a single hop to Proxima, a couple of years ago, for me," volunteered Marshall. "I'm the rookie here."

Caine took another forkful of her pork, looked around, and shrugged, "I kinda lost count. Proxima half a dozen times, I was based at UV Ceti for a while, Epsilon Eridani, Tau Ceti. If something was going on, I was either there or on my way."

"How did you manage all that?" asked Mulenga.

"Got into travel journalism. Wild new frontier stuff, mostly."

"Wait a minute, you were out at Carpenter Station?"

She nodded, knowing what was coming. "Eighteen months, embedded with the Triplanetary liaison boys. One of the netmags I was working for pulled some strings. That's when I did the two colonies, as well, though when you've seen one collection of prefabricated buildings, you've seen them all."

"Then..."

"Yes, I ran into a couple of non-humans. A Dysari info-trader turned up for a while, I got into some nice long conversations with them. Filmed a documentary about it."

The astrogator nodded, "I believe I have seen that one. A fascinating people."

Esposito eagerly leaned forward, "They are the ones who worship encoded memory, yes?"

Caine nodded. "Then a pair of Soslax corvettes visited for a while, but that was a lot more hush-hush. The war had only been over for five years at this point, the UN diplomats weren't exactly eager to let the rebels in on their secret meetings. Not that they came to anything, from what I heard. Certainly they never came back to the station."

"This is exactly why I'm out here," Marshall said, pushing his empty plate to the middle of the table. "We were just beginning to seriously start to push out from our system when the war broke out. Just beginning to see what's out there. Then we stopped, had our war, and we're beginning to get a bit insular. UN's focused on its new colonies – their Science Council hasn't funded any exploration for years. We've just been going to Proxima, Barnard's, occasionally Sirius, but nothing much beyond that."

"And if the Loonies are doing anything, they aren't telling," Caine added.

"There are some of the private companies, though? Like Cornucopia," said Esposito.

"None of them are funded to do much more than the occasional survey. Hell, take Cornucopia. Biggest Martian mining company, but losing those three ships would send them from bumper profits into a loss this year."

Mulenga nodded, a frown on his face, "I hate to be the one to remind you of this, Captain, but isn't that why we are out here?"

"The Triplanetary Fleet could do so much more than that. Part of our charter – we're not just organized for the defense of Triplanetary interests beyond Sol, we're here to push beyond the curtain and see what lies beyond. Once we get this Lalande business out of the way I'm hoping we can get approval for a long-range deep space run. We're set up to do it, and twenty years ago, that's what these ships were designed for."

"Would a scientific expedition not require scientists, Captain?" Mulenga said.

"If you don't have a doctorate in astrophysics, Lieutenant, I'm going to start getting downright nervous."

Cracking a smile, Mulenga replied, "Begin to get nervous if you wish, Captain. My doctorate is in cosmology."

"Close enough," Marshall replied, grinning. "Our young Ensign has a degree in sociodynamics, and by the sounds of it would love to take a crack at some aliens. Right, Ensign?"

She smiled bashfully, almost glowing with excitement, and Marshall continued. "I got the equivalent of a degree in military history at war college, and didn't you take some correspondence course, Deadeye?"

The astrogator and the espatier looked at each other when they heard Caine's nickname.

"Masters in Archeology."

"See? We might need topping up in a few places, but I think we've probably got what we need." He stood up from the table. "In any case, I have a week's paperwork waiting for me on my desk. I've no idea who I'm going to be sending it to, but by the time we get back undoubtedly they'll have come up with a plethora of administrative officers."

He turned, making his way for the door, waving a hand over his head as he left the room. The corridor to the elevator was almost empty, just a couple of crewmen also heading for the mess deck.

Idly, he wondered how many of his crew were actually on duty as the elevator sped up the decks to officer's country, making a mental note to check in with the bridge before he settled down to his paperwork. The doors opened, and a crewman was standing in the corridor, saluting as he walked past; Marshall returned the salute without a second thought.

Some flash of sixth sense led him to duck at that exact second; whether his peripheral vision had noticed something that his conscious mind had managed to overlook, or whether he had seen some sense of intent in the crewman's face, but it meant that the knife jabbed in his back missed his kidney by a matter of inches. Gasping in pain, he span around to try and land a blow on his assailant, his flailing arms missing as he tumbled to the deck, crimson blood gushing out across the floor.

Looming overhead, his attacker saw an advantage and reached up with his knife to strike a mortal blow, but with his last bit of strength Marshall twisted his legs underneath him, sending him crashing to the deck, the knife sliding across the floor. A pair of savage eyes looked up at him as the two of them dived for the blade; it was a few feet closer to Marshall, enough that he got his shaking hand around it first.

The crewman had risen to his knees, crouching, his hands ready to charge the young captain. Marshall's vision was beginning to dance, he was starting to feel numb as scythes of pain shattered across his body, but he retained just enough strength to lunge forward with the dagger, catching his assailant across the wrist, a spurt of blood arcing across his uniform. As he lay panting on the deck, his attacker down on the ground next to him, he reached for his communicator, jabbing his thumb on the emergency button before everything went black.

Chapter 8

Marshall's universe consisted of a haze of pain and a succession of seemingly random mechanical noises, with the occasional expression of concern from voices that should be familiar, but which his half-conscious state was ill-equipped to decipher. He gasped as the pain abruptly changed, suddenly getting closer to the surface before finally beginning to ebb and fade away.

"Captain Marshall?" an unfamiliar voice called out. "You can wake up now."

With an effort, he forced his eyes to open, then closed them again to a blinding white light. As he squinted, the light level seemed to dim, and he saw an auburn-haired woman leaning over him, some sort of unidentifiable equipment in her hand. He tried to sit up, but the pain returned again.

"Don't do anything stupid like try to run about. If you promise to behave and take your pills I might be able to release you to light duty." The woman turned to a communications console, continuing to talk. "This would have been a lot easier if you'd bothered to drop in for a physical when you reported on board."

The captain tried to pull himself up again, reaching for the arm of the bed. Rolling her eyes, the doctor grabbed a cushion, eased him forward and pushed it behind him, then passed him a glass containing some foul-smelling red liquid. Marshall's nose wrinkled over it as he took an experimental swig, gagging at the cloying, sweet taste.

"What the hell?"

"Special nutrient blend I came up with. I've been pumping it into you for the last week."

His eyes darted across to the doctor. "I've been here for a week?"

"Close enough. That was a nasty fight you were in. Still, should have seen the other guy. Well, you can, he's in the morgue."

Marshall's eyes dropped. He hadn't killed anyone since the war, and never face-to-face. The doctor noted his expression, saying with the nearest thing she could manage to a supportive voice, "It wasn't you. I fixed up his damage nice and quick, but there was some sort of mental block, a deep hypnotic down in his subconscious. When he realized he was caught, his functions just shut down."

"Now we've got no way of knowing who he was."

The door slid opened, and Caine walked in, snatching a chair from a locker and sliding it over to beside his bed.

"I'd have bought some grapes, but I don't think you could handle the processor's attempt in your current condition."

"I'm glad someone is still thinking of my welfare." He looked over at the doctor, who shrugged. "Any idea what happened?"

"Someone stabbed you in the back. We're still working on the rest of it. He was listed as a Titanian, but the examination revealed he was a Loonie. Documents were very good, but faked; Sub-Lieutenant Tyler checked the rest of the crew manifest and didn't find anything else suspicious."

"That's something."

"That's about all, though. The knife was out of one of the emergency supply set-ups, part of one of the contingency toolkits. He didn't have anything on him that was any sort of clue, nothing out of the ordinary. No communication logs before we left Mariner, but with all the milling around – hell, you sneaked on board, anyone else could have. Maggie told me how many shuttles were unofficially flying in and out."

Leaning up further in his bed, Marshall took another swig of his disgusting drink; disturbingly, he was beginning to find the taste acceptable.

"Next question. Why isn't my Exec telling me all this?"

Caine looked at the wall, and sighed, "Because she called a senior officer's meeting for, well, now. I'm playing hookie, but I'll need to get back there before everything goes completely to hell."

"That bad?"

She sighed. "We've been operating under the assumption that you weren't coming round. It was a damn close thing – there was some sort of neural poison on that blade. No idea where that came from, nothing's missing from the ship's chemical stores. There have been a few changes, and I know some of the Martian crew are getting a bit hacked off. They seem to be getting all the dud shifts. We're about to implement a shift change that'll make it permanent."

"Fine, a staff meeting is convenient. Get me a stick."

Caine looked at the doctor, who shook her head and moved back to the bed, "Don't be stupid, Captain. If you push it now, you'll be back here for weeks."

"Doctor Duquesne, if I don't resume command, by the sound of things it won't matter anyway."

She put her hands on her hips, shaking her head again, "I could relieve you on medical grounds."

"And think of all the paperwork you'll be stuck with."

Caine offered her arm, and Marshall experimentally tried to stand; he didn't collapse immediately, but struggled to get his other leg out of the bed. The doctor rolled her eyes, opened a locker and grabbed his uniform jacket.

"I hate you stupid fleet types. Always making my life harder. I'm inviting myself to this meeting as well, and if you start to run into problems I'm calling for a gurney."

Marshall looked over at her, nodding, "Deal, Doc. But don't make too much of a fuss of me in there, or someone will ask you to do something we're both going to regret."

"Don't get the idea I want your company around here. I like peace and quiet." She slid the jacket over his shoulders while Caine worked on the tie, pulling it into at least a passable knot. After a couple of minutes, Marshall was at least adequately dressed, and the three of them made their way into the corridor, each step yielding a grimace from the captain's twisted face. He turned to Caine.

"Had enough?" she said, looking at his face.

"Was Ensign Esposito invited to this meeting?"

She shook her head. "Lieutenants and above only. Apparently that's standard protocol in the Orbital Patrol."

Marshall pulled his communicator out of a pocket, activating it with an effort, "Ensign Esposito and Sub-Lieutenant Tyler, report to the briefing room on the double."

Not waiting for an answer, he limped into the elevator, sighing with relief as he leaned on the wall. Usually the rides seemed to take far too long; this one seemed to be over far too quickly, and the door opened on the lower deck, a couple of surprised-looking crewmen saluting as they saw the captain.

With an effort, he returned the salute, and shrugging off any assistance, started limping towards the briefing room. He could hear a loud argument inside as an unfamiliar officer ran down the corridor behind him.

"Ah, you must be Sub-Lieutenant Tyler. We didn't have a chance to meet before the incident."

The young, carrot-haired officer looked as if he hadn't yet got around to shaving; his face flushed red with guilt, "Sir, you can have my resignation. I've already prepared it."

"How could anyone have known what was going to happen, Sub-Lieutenant? What happened there is the past; it is what happens now that is important. Make sure it doesn't happen again."

Caine squinted at the young security officer, looking him up and down, "You seem vaguely familiar, Sub-Lieutenant. I couldn't quite put my finger on it earlier. Are you any relation of Maggie Tyler? Last time I saw her she was a Captain on the Curtiss."

He nodded, jerkily, "She made Major before dying at Second Vesta. My father fell in the same battle."

"Sorry, Sub-Lieutenant. I didn't know," Caine replied.

"That's fine, ma'am. It was a long time ago." He turned to the captain, "Can I have your permission to implement security procedures, sir? At the very least I want to assign you a permanent bodyguard, though I'll make it clear that they are to be discreet."

"Good start, but forget about the discreet part. I'd rather have people warned away completely than force one of your people into a daring last-minute rescue. Now, shall we go in? I'd really like to sit down."

"Oh, yes, sir." The young security officer opened the door, revealing minor pandemonium inside. Zakharova was on her feet, yelling at Esposito, who was standing over by the door. Mulenga was shaking his head, while Quinn had his head buried in a pile of datapads, muttering something to himself. It was Dietz who first noticed the captain half-staggering into the room, and bolted to attention.

"Captain on the deck!"

Mulenga rose with evident relief on his face, as did Esposito. Fury danced across Zakharova's features as Marshall made his way to the head of the table with precise steps, gesturing for her to move out of his place.

For a brief second he thought he was going to have to order Tyler to move her, but she finally nodded and strode to the other side of the table. He managed to sit down before his legs gave out from under him, and gestured everyone else to seat.

"Shouldn't you be in bed, Captain?" his Exec began, before turning to the doctor, "I understood, Doctor, that his condition was extremely serious."

"I can't help being amazing at my job, Lieutenant," Duquesne replied. "Nor can I refuse the orders of my commanding officer. When he tells me he's ready to attend a staff meeting, I am forced to agree."

She pointed at him, "You can declare him medically incompetent."

"I could, but I'm not going to."

Lieutenant Caine smiled, taking a drink of water from the desk. "Captain Marshall is here, he's fit, and he's in command."

"You are allowing your personal feelings for Captain Marshall to overcome your professional judgment."

Marshall looked daggers at Zakharova. "Lieutenant, this conversation is over. Now. If you wish to continue it then you can do so in your cabin, but I warn you, no-one will be there to listen."

Dietz nodded, "Unless judged medically unfit, the Captain is in command." He slid over a datapad. "My operations report, sir. Training has proceeded along the lines you directed, and though I consider we still have some weak spots, all key personnel are operating at required levels of competence."

"What's this I heard about a revised shift rotation?"

The operations officer looked at the executive officer, "I was instructed by the acting commander," it might have been Marshall's imagination, but there seemed a slight stress on the word 'acting', "to prepare a plan along the lines I suggested at our last meeting, with the staff separated according to their former services."

She nodded, "It would be the best way of improving crew efficiency. I have ordered that it will be implemented as of the next watch."

"My gunnery crews won't be, Lieutenant, I'll tell you that now. I've only just got them meshed, and we'd be missing some key people," Caine said.

"You are flirting dangerously close to insubordination, Ms. Caine."

"Really?" Caine said sweetly, then turned to face Marshall, "Am I being insubordinate, Captain?"

Before Zakharova could escalate the argument, Marshall slammed his hand on the desk, instantly regretting it as a bolt of pain stabbed up his shoulder. "That's enough, both of you." He turned to face Dietz, "I hope you haven't wasted too much time on that outline, Lieutenant, because I'm not implementing it. Inform the shift heads accordingly."

"Wait a minute," Zakharova began.

"Aye, sir," Dietz replied. A look passed between him and the executive officer that Marshall had trouble reading; he raised his hand to warn Caine not to gloat.

"Sir," Esposito said, breaking into the silence. "Before you arrived, Senior Lieutenant Zakharova placed me on report for coming to the meeting without her approval."

"I ordered her to be here, Lieutenant," Marshall said, looking at his furious Exec again. "And in future she will be attending all staff meetings. Our Espatier force is critical to ship operations."

"Patrol doctrine was to keep such meetings small, to senior officers only," Dietz said, his voice still calm and flat.

"I prefer to receive input from the widest possible range of sources before making my decisions, Lieutenant."

He nodded, "I will alter the invitation software accordingly. Are the Doctor and Sub-Lieutenant Tyler to be invited as well?"

"As if I'd have time for this nonsense. Some of us have work to do, Dietz," Duquesne said, hunching forward on the table.

"Mr. Tyler will attend all such meetings in his role as department head. I will yield to the Doctor's desires in this regard."

"I will see that it is done, Captain."

Marshall looked around the table, trying to read the room. Most of the officers seemed relieved that he was back in command; his doubts focused on the Patrol contingent. Zakharova looked as if she was contemplating mutiny, and as usual, Dietz was almost impossible to read. Quinn had returned to his technical journals, and Mulenga seemed relieved for another reason; as if a weight had been taken from his shoulders.

"I can catch up on the last week in individual meetings later on. And we will get to those one-on-ones at the same time, I haven't forgotten. Mr. Quinn, vessel status?"

The young engineer looked up from his datapads. "All fine, sir."

Caught slightly by surprise at the brevity of the report, Marshall asked, "That's it?"

"FTL drive working fine, reactors at full capability, weapons ready to go, sensors operating normally. Everything's fine."

Rolling his eyes, Marshall turned to his Exec. "What about the battle stations drills?"

"Poor, sir. Principally because of the difficulty faced by the Martian and Titanian crewmen in adapting to Patrol protocols."

Not again. "Lieutenant, I will remind you for I hope the final time that we are not in the Patrol. I consider that answer unacceptable." A voice in his head was telling him to give up, to pass the job to someone else. "You have four hours to provide a better solution within the restrictions I have established."

"I will assist, Lieutenant," Dietz offered. "I suspect a deficiency in our training programs."

Marshall nodded, looking at the two of them. "I want maximum war-fighting ability. Not adherence to protocols. Concentrate simply on the best possible performance on vessel systems. Lieutenant Caine, work with the two of them."

Watching her face fall, he started punching out a crew roster on his panel. "I note that Sub-Lieutenant Kibaki has some combat experience as well. Bring him in, Lieutenant," he addressed his Exec again, "to get the Titanian perspective."

She looked as if she was about to make another objection, but Marshall caught Dietz almost imperceptibly shaking his head. "Yes, sir. We will meet once our business here is concluded, and provide a report in four hours."

"There are still two days to our destination. Let's use them. Now, about the system itself. Lieutenant Mulenga?"

The astrogator nodded, and called up a complicated three-dimensional hologram of the system they were approaching, taking a battered laser pointer out of a pocket. "The system ahead has five planets and two asteroid belts; the latter is of little serious interest, being too far from the planetary system for easy access. As far as I can determine, there have never been any surveys."

He pressed a button, and a pair of course projections appeared. "The flight plan provided to us by Cornucopia Mining indicates that their survey team was planning to focus its attention on the outer moons of Gatewood, the superjovian gas giant closest to the star."

Quinn nodded, suddenly interested again, "Standard mining company practice."

"Indeed. They were also going to examine Ragnarok, one of Gatewood's moons." He pushed a button, and the map disappeared to reveal a white and blue moon, a sheet of ice broken only by the occasional gray and brown of a mountain range. "This moon has an oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere suitable for human habitation, as demonstrated by the original UN surveys."

Tyler looked around the moon, obviously nerving himself to speak, "Why wasn't it colonized?"

Mulenga replied, "Too cold. The moon is currently in a 'snowball' environmental pattern. The average surface temperature is minus twenty at the equator. No life forms aside from single-celled organisms in small colonies, though the survey indicated that there was extensive life before the moon entered its current phase."

"When Arcadia and Thalassa were discovered, the whole UN focus was switched to worlds where the temperature and gravity were more suitable," Marshall added. "That moon looks a little on the small side."

"Gravity is about two-thirds that of Earth. Suitable for long-term habitation, but not economically viable," the astrogator said.

"A habitable planet around a red dwarf star...," Quinn shook his head. "Hard to believe."

"Barely habitable, Lieutenant. Lalande is a fairly quiet M-type star, and the planet is in a near-permanent cold state, despite its proximity to the sun. Even then, if it was not orbiting a gas giant as well, it would not be viable." He punched another pair of buttons, bringing up some text, then continued, "The records indicate that the company was considering a small settlement on the moon for food production."

Caine whistled. "How much money did they have?" she said. "That's a bit beyond dropping in a few prospectors."

Marshall turned to face her. "Tactical projections?"

"We only know where the Yukon was attacked." She punched a series of buttons. "It came out at this point, behind Gatewood. Surveys indicated that that point had the greatest concentration of asteroids. There was someone waiting for them."

"What options are there?" Zakharova asked the astrogator.

"Realistically, only the two points of stability between Gatewood and Ragnarok. Any other point would require weeks of travel time to get to the scene of the battle. If you wish to transit to one of the more distant points, I will need to know immediately so that I can begin altering our hendecaspatial trajectory."

"No," Marshall shook his head.

"We might be arriving into a trap, Captain. If we jump further away it gives us more opportunities to evaluate the situation, not to mention more time to recharge our FTL if we need to make a speedy retreat," Zakharova insisted.

"And they still might have someone waiting for us, Lieutenant, and it would give them a chance to put together a larger force. Captain, they've got to have pickets at both of the emergence points. I'd rather fight one of them than both of them," Caine said.

"I agree. Lieutenant," Marshall addressed the astrogator, "plot our emergence at the same point as the Yukon. I want the ship to be at battle stations five minutes before emergence to give us plenty of time to prepare, everyone. We're not a prospecting freighter, we've got the teeth to bite back at whatever's waiting for us. Now the final topic of the meeting, my incapacitation."

Everyone looked at each other, as if thinking that someone was going to stand up with a bloody knife and confess to their crime. Caine gave Zakharova a look that suggested she was convinced of her guilt. Tyler simply blushed, aware that the focus was moving onto him. He coughed a couple of times, and nervously began to speak.

"My investigation has revealed little to preclude the possibility of a recurrence," he began. "Though I have now checked all of the personnel records to check for similar discrepancies and found nothing."

"I have likewise examined the records, Captain," Dietz offered.

"What steps did you take, Lieutenant?" Marshall asked Zakharova.

"Security personnel stationed at all key areas of the ships, as well as a standing patrol of the decks. Periodic surprise inspections of critical areas, all personnel warned to report any suspicious activity to myself."

"Sounds good. Covers all the bases." There seemed to be some surprise around the table at Marshall's approval.

Tyler looked down at the table, then back up, "My people are heavily overworked, sir. I've got them on double shifts..."

"Sometimes that is essential, Sub-Lieutenant," Zakharova said.

He looked sharply at the Exec, continuing, "...and they are beginning to lose their edge after six days. I'm concerned that the possibility of sabotage will only increase when we reach Lalande, and my men will need to be at their best."

Esposito suggested, "Why not use some of the espatiers?"

That produced a murmur around the room, "That's not exactly customary, Ensign," Marshall said.

Looking slightly uneasy, Tyler nodded, saying, "Either that, or I need about five people transferred to my department. We're not set up for this sort of constant patrol work."

Dietz shook his head, "That would leave us badly short-handed in critical departments, Captain. I am forced to agree with Ensign Esposito's suggestion."

Marshall turned to Esposito, "Do you have any objections to lending us a squad, Ensign?"

She looked around the room, "No, sir. Not if I can have them back if necessary."

"Very well. Assign third squad to the job. Mr. Tyler, I expect this to be a temporary measure."

"I hope so, sir."

"Very well, I think that covers everything. Dismissed."

The officers stood up, and started to file out of the room. Mulenga waited at the door as the rest filed past him, then turned to speak to the captain.

"I was contemplating the possibility that I might have to assume command, Captain. It was not one I relished."

Marshall leaned forward, "It was that bad?"

"Lieutenant Zakharova seems a good officer if supervised." He gestured at the captain's side. "I take it that you are not quite so fit as you appear."

"The Doctor assures me that I will be ready when we reach Lalande."

"I and many others will be relieved. May I ask a question?"

"Certainly."

"Did you arrange for the espatiers to be part of the security force because you have loyalty concerns?"

Marshall recoiled into his chair, "What?"

"You've answered my question. Worse things happened during the War, sir."

He nodded, recalling a few such incidents, "These things we need to put behind us, Lieutenant. I give you my word that nothing of that sort will ever take place on any ship I am commanding."

A rare smile crossed the astrogator's face as he rose, "I should resume my tactical arrangements. By your leave, sir?"

"Dismissed."

Chapter 9

The bridge lighting was dimmed, everyone's eyes focused on the viewscreen, waiting for realspace to appear once again. Marshall had ordered the battle station alarms turned off; no-one on the bridge needed any reminder of what was at stake. Caine was the only one speaking as she issued instructions to the gunnery crews below decks; Zakharova was once again sitting at the Watch Officer's station. Gamma Watch had come on shift a little early, half an hour ago – Marshall had wanted to have fresh crews at their stations in the event of a battle.

The watch officer, Sub-Lieutenant Ryder, hovered near the duty sensor technician; he vaguely remembered her as one of his students during his year at the Academy. A former Patrolman, Sub-Lieutenant Volkov, sat at Guidance, hands perched over the controls. He turned to see Quinn sitting at the Flight Engineer's station, the displaced crewman standing over him, pecking at buttons. A stabbing pain kept on shattering through his side; he'd insisted the doctor only provide the minimum level of pain relief. Too many drugs would have dulled his reflexes.

"Emergence in ten seconds," Mulenga's voice echoed from the loudspeaker; the astrogator had chosen to wait in the sensor suite in the lower decks to supervise the technicians. "Three seconds."

The viewscreen flicked on to see a familiar starfield; this close to Sol the stars weren't that far out of alignment, though the constellations looked rather odd. Everyone on the bridge held their breath as the tactical hologram popped up, the planets and moons in the courses already programmed into the computer, an expending red sphere indicating the area covered by their sensor scans. Five seconds, six seconds. When the alert siren sounded, it was almost a relief.

"Threat warning, Captain!" Ryder yelled. "One ship, frigate class, convergent course, energy spikes!"

"Ortega," Marshall addressed the communications technician, "warn that ship off, indicate that we are not here to open hostilities but will return fire. Caine, warm up our weapons systems, defensive systems hot, and get our radiators deployed."

"Already in works, skipper," Caine replied, while Ortega murmured into her microphone. A long black fan began to extend from the crew ring, stretching a quarter-mile into space as the laser began to power up.

Zakharova leaned over to Marshall, "We should attack now."

"We don't know it was them. We don't know who they are. You want to start a war?"

"Christ, energy spike!" Ryder turned to the viewscreen. "Missiles incoming, impact in thirty seconds!"

"Caine, countermeasures NOW! Volkov, execute evasive course."

Caine started jabbing buttons at her station, Volkov sat staring at the screen.

"Volkov, evasive course!" yelled Marshall. "Now, damn it!"

The young sub-lieutenant sat at his station, his eyes widening; Marshall was a heartbeat away from leaping forward to his station when he saw that Quinn had beaten him to it, tossing the frozen officer out of his chair and quickly manipulating controls.

"Executing random walk, Captain."

"Countermeasures deployed. Two missiles arcing away, another still heading for us," Caine reported.

Zakharova turned to face the tactical station. "Fire missile, course reverse parallel to the incoming track, safeties on."

"What?" Caine turned in her chair.

"Do it!" Marshall yelled. The missile leapt from its launch bay, rushing towards the incoming missile. The tracks briefly converged, then the enemy missile shifted direction, curving around for a second, its sensors confused by the proximity of the enemy missile. Caine stabbed down another series of jamming pulses, and the missile arced dead in space.

"Status of laser?" Marshall asked.

"Armed and ready, sir," Caine replied.

"Fire at will, laser and missiles. Mr. Quinn, continue evasive course."

Quinn looked down at his station, his face a mask of intense concentration as Ryder moved over to him. "Tactical, I'm giving you a firing window in one-five seconds. Coming around." The engineer gently ran his finger across a button on his console. "All hands, brace for variable-gravity acceleration."

Marshall looked intently at the viewscreen as the ship rocked, a salvo of missiles fired out of the ship's launch tubes. As Alamo rocked back and forth in space, her nose was pointed at the enemy target for a brief second, long enough for a lance of laser light to dance from the beam emitters to the enemy frigate. He felt slightly queasy and reached into his pocket for a tablet, cursing himself for not taking one earlier.

"Hit, sir! Abaft, I think I got one of her missile bays. Her countermeasures are still up, our missiles going wild." Caine looked down at her console, "Incoming salvo, deploying countermeasures."

Looking back at the captain, Quinn calmly asked, "Mind if I crank up the engines? We could use the acceleration."

"By all means, Lieutenant." Marshall looked at Volkov, sitting on the deck, as the officer began to jerk into life. He rose, rubbing his elbows, and headed back to the Guidance station as if to take over, ignored by the intent Quinn. Marshall shook his head, "Mr. Volkov, get below and report to the sickbay."

"Sir," Volkov began, only to be cut off by Marshall as the acceleration started to build, pushing the crew back into their seats.

"Go." He looked over at Ortega, "Any response to our messages?"

As Volkov left the bridge, the technician shook her head, "Negative, Captain. I've rotated frequencies and tried all spacefaring languages to be on the safe side."

"Keep trying." He looked at the incoming missile tracks. "Deadeye, some of those a looking a bit close..."

"Bastards have image lock now, most of our countermeasures are out. Quinn?" Caine asked.

"Haven't got the speed yet, still building," he replied.

"Fire off another salvo," Marshall said, "as soon as we have image lock." He tapped a button on his chair, "All decks, brace for impact." The missile tracks arced closer and closer despite the ship's constantly changing course. A rattling sound indicated that their second salvo had gotten away, beginning its steady progression to the closing target.

"Got an idea. Hold on!" Quinn yelled as he threw the ship into a hard turn with only seconds to go before impact, briefly flaring the drive up beyond safety limits, warnings sounding from the engineering console as indicators shot off the scale. The missile tracks winked out as the ship continued spinning around.

"Main engine system failure. Engineering reports under repair," the engineering technician reported.

"What the hell did you do, Quinn?" asked Zakharova.

"Flared the main drive at the missiles when they were on terminal track. They couldn't take the heat load. Of course I had to wait until they got close. Shouldn't take long to get the engines working again, and I still have thruster control. Tactical, want another laser shot?"

"I do indeed, Mr. Quinn," Caine replied. "You have the call."

Marshall tightly gripped the arms of his chair as he watched the tactical display, saw the enemy frigate still closing. It must have been waiting for them on picket duty; it still wasn't building up any speed advantage, though that would soon change with the main engine out.

No time for tactical plans in this battle – it was a matter of two ships toe to toe, the prize going to the ship with the sharpest crews. An estimated time for engine repair flashed onto his console; ten minutes. By that time the battle would likely have been decided either way.

"A hit, sir! Missile got him, upper hull. Coming up for the laser, now!" A beam of light danced between the ships on the tactical track, and Caine flashed a hunter's smile. "Got him again, sensor section."

"Sensors, does the warbook have an identification on the craft yet?"

The sensor technician shook her head. "Doesn't match any current warship configuration, sir."

"Check historical files, someone could be using an old design," Zakharova said. "Looks like it's turning tail."

The enemy ship had turned over, its drive flaring to full, heading directly for Gatewood. Caine unleashed another salvo of missiles as a parting gift, tracking out as the vessel burned away. Marshall looked down at the repair estimate, shaking his head, then waited for the enemy ship to get well out of combat range. Once it passed the million-mile mark, he tapped a button.

"Enemy in retreat; all decks, stand down battle stations." The lights changed again, and the bridge crew visibly relaxed in their seats as they switched from combat mode to damage control. Quinn yielded the Guidance station to Ryder, who moved into the chair with an easy familiarity as she switched the settings to her own personal mode. Marshall looked at the engineer.

"Lieutenant, where the hell did you learn to fly like that?"

"During the war, sir. I served as helmsman on the Gilgamesh for a couple of years."

Marshall looked across at Zakharova, then back at the engineer. "I thought you were twenty-six?"

"That's right, skipper."

"You'd have been about sixteen."

He nodded, "Yes, sir. Bit late by the time they'd found that out. I went back to school after the war. I should get below and try and speed up the repair crews, Captain."

"Run along, Mr. Quinn." The engineer sidled into the elevator. Marshall rose from his seat and headed over to Caine, looking down across the tactical station while Zakharova took damage reports.

"Assessment?"

"If they'd been laser-armed, we'd have been sunk. I'll get a team out to grab some missile components – at least those that Mr. Quinn didn't melt down to slag – and try and work out what they're using."

"They were pretty quick off the mark."

Caine looked across at the sensor station, "And there was one at each exit point. The other's shaping towards Gatewood."

"I presume you're thinking what I am?"

"That they have a base on the far side of the gas giant from us, and after some fancy aerobraking we won't have any idea where to look for them?"

Marshall nodded, and made his way back to his chair, pulling out his communicator, "Medical, give me a casualty report."

"Six so far, none serious. All of them zigged when the ship zagged. I'll get you a better report when I can."

"Thanks, Doc."

"Lieutenant Zakharova, ship status?"

She frowned as she continued to scan reports, "Mr. Quinn's enthusiastic maneuvering aside, we experienced no impacts. Some minor damage related to equipment stresses, nothing serious. We'll be back up to full combat readiness in a matter of minutes."

"Excellent," Marshall replied. He walked back over to the tactical hologram and waved his hands over the display of Ragnarok. Clearly visible were half a dozen small objects with orbits traced around the moon, orbits that seemed designed to nicely cover the whole planet.

"Sensors, what are those satellites over Ragnarok?"

The technician looked down a series of panels, "I'd guess combined met/comsats. Database makes them as similar to the ones deployed over Titan."

"Any EM activity from the moon?"

"No transmissions or sensors I can detect."

Caine looked over, "That doesn't mean anything, Spaceman. They could be using tight-beam transmissions and switched to passive sensors when we arrived in-system."

"Anything else in the system, sensors?"

The operator frowned for a moment, "Some evidence of work in the outermost moons of Gatewood. I'm picking up a couple of small ships, prospectors I think, and there are a couple of pin-point heat sources that are likely dome structures for mining installations. Nothing major, though; I've seen bigger operations on single asteroids back home, not set up throughout a system."

"Your assessment?"

"Sir?"

"What do you think, spaceman?"

There was a pause for a second while the operator looked over his instruments again, "I'd say this is a recently-launched operation. No abandoned installations, no warning beacons, nothing like that. Maybe only a few months old."

Marshall nodded, then turned back to the watch officer. "Ms. Ryder, as soon as main engines are on-line, plot a course to Ragnarok that puts us in an orbit that intersects those satellites. Communications, open up a tight-beam to every satellite. Announce our arrival and identity, indicate that I want to speak to someone in the colony's administration at the first opportunity." He raised his hand, "Make sure that it is quite clear that we will not initiate hostilities."

Zakharova looked up from her workstation, "What about the missing freighters?"

"One thing at a time, Lieutenant. If we can get a face-to-face meeting with whoever is down on the surface, that could give us a starting ground for negotiation."

She gestured towards the frigates, "And them? We could launch a probe to track them."

"And have it shot down by a long-range missile?" Marshall shook his head. "We'll have to worry about them later on."

"What if the colony – if that's what it is – won't meet with us?"

"That's what the Espatiers are on board for, Lieutenant." He walked into the elevator, Zakharova holding open the door, following him through before it could close. As the doors slid shut, he saw Caine flashing him a look of sympathy as she settled into the captain's chair. His side had started to ache again; the adrenaline of the battle had provided some temporary relief.

"Sub-Lieutenant Volkov," she began.

"I thought this would come up. He's off the bridge, Lieutenant. He froze in a battle situation."

Her eyes narrowed, "Doesn't he deserve a second chance?"

Marshall sighed, "With a hundred lives resting on his reactions? There are eight other people on board qualified to take that station; for the present, there's no harm in Ryder commanding the watch from the guidance station. Realistically a senior officer is always going to be on the bridge while we are orbiting Ragnarok anyway."

She shook her head, "And, of course, she's a Martian."

"That has nothing to do with it, Lieutenant. If Ryder had frozen, she'd be off the bridge. Or any other officer."

There was a pause. "What do you want me to do with him?"

"Right now, talk to him. I shouldn't have to tell you this. Make sure medical gives him a full check-up to make sure he hasn't got anything wrong with him, sit him in front of the psychoanalyzer. You want to see him back on the bridge? Give me a reason to trust him again, Lieutenant. Right now I can't take that risk."

The door opened at one of the maintenance levels, Zakharova stepped out, walking briskly down the corridor. Marshall called after her, "Everyone gets one shot, Lieutenant. If they miss, we can't dare give them another." She turned her head for a second, then continued walking down the corridor as the door closed.

Chapter 10

"We're settling into orbit, sir," Sub-Lieutenant Franklin said from the guidance station, briefly turning her head to look at her commander. Ragnarok loomed large in the viewscreen, looking colder and bleaker in real life than it had in the computer-generated representation earlier.

"Still no sign of any response to our communications?" Marshall asked.

Weitzman shook his head, "Not a peep, sir. Now we're getting this close, I can pick up the odd trace of tight-beam from them, but not enough to read."

The watch officer, Sub-Lieutenant Kibaki – for once permitted to sit at his station with the remainder of the senior staff below decks, frowned as he looked at his terminal, "Captain, we could place ourselves in between two of those satellites with little difficulty, pick up some of those signals. I've prepared a course for – er – Ragnarokosynchronous orbit that would intercept the transmissions."

Marshall raised an eyebrow at the Titanian, "Ragnarokosynchronous?"

The gray-haired officer grinned, "I've been wanting to use that one since we got here, Captain."

"They'd just stop using that satellite. We'd learn nothing and perhaps invite unwanted hostility."

The elevator doors opened, Mulenga emerging with a datapad held in his hand, walking over to the captain's chair. He looked at the viewscreen, shaking his head, then passed the datapad to Marshall, who began to scan through it.

"Sensor reports on the planet. Physically it matches the last survey reasonably closely, but there are some odd variations that seem to explain each other."

"You'll have to explain that, Lieutenant," a puzzled look crossing Marshall's face.

"The levels of carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide and the like have significantly increased. More volcanic activity as well, and the temperature has already risen a couple of degrees from the averages reported by the previous survey. We're watching the beginnings of an attempt to terraform this planet, Captain."

Marshall grimaced at the prospect. The attempts to terraform Mars, without the consent of the colonists already living on the planet, had been one of the sore spots that had led to the outbreak of war; the only legacy of those days was a disrupted weather system that was still brewing up dust storms years later, and the growth of some genemodded plants that were proving to be extremely resistant to extermination.

"Can they do it?"

"Possibly. Such happened on Earth on three separate occasions without – so far was we know – any intelligent intervention. The geological processes are well-understood; the introduction into the atmosphere of greenhouse gases analogous to that undertaken on Earth in the 19th and 20th centuries would do the job."

"The result?"

Mulenga regarded the world on the viewscreen, shaking his head, "I would hope that those behind this work would know that more throughly than I, Captain. Potentially, this planetary sub-system is in the Goldilocks Zone, but whether you would end up with a suitable world for large-scale colonization is another question entirely. In any event, it would be centuries before the work was completed."

Marshall scanned further down the datapad, skimming past the physical data to the later sections of the report, "What about signs of life?"

"Several heat sources indicating sites of settlement, clustered in the equatorial belt on areas of geologic stability." He walked over to the holographic display and started to manipulate controls, incorporating the results of his scans. "All of them appear to be within two hundred miles of each other. We read each settlement to consist of a large dome, similar to those used in early Lunar and Martian colonization back in the last century."

"For heating rather than retaining atmosphere, presumably."

"Exactly. No roads as such, but plenty of evidence of artificial passes through mountains and the like, probably created with kinetic warheads. A couple of strips that would be suitable as spaceports."

Marshall rose, walked around the hologram, waving his hands to focus on the inhabited portion of Ragnarok. "And the lack of signals?"

"Communication could be handled by tight-beam via the satellites, or via underground cables. We adopted similar measures during the war, though nowhere near as extensively."

"Population?"

"No less than five thousand, no more than eighty thousand."

Marshall turned to look at the astrogator, saying, "That's a pretty wide variance, Lieutenant."

"I have no data on population density." He regarded the map carefully. "My judgment – but this is just based on my own thoughts, not actual data – is that it would tend to the upper ranges of that estimate."

"How could a colony that size grow up in twenty years?" Kibaki pondered from his station. "It took Titan fifty years to get to a hundred thousand, and Mars about the same amount of time. Could the earlier survey readings have been faked?"

"I don't see how, Sub-Lieutenant," Mulenga replied. "They come from too many different sources. Nor could a presence in the system have been hidden for very long."

Marshall looked back at the hologram again, then over at the viewscreen. "I'm going down there."

"I don't think that would be wise."

The captain turned, frowning, "Diplomatically, I should make first contact with them."

"Leaving Mad Zack in the captain's seat," Kibaki muttered.

Storming over to the watch officer's seat, Marshall turned his chair around to face him, almost sending him falling out onto the deck, "You are speaking about the Executive Officer of this ship, Sub-Lieutenant."

Kibaki looked up at him, "Sorry, sir. I spoke without thought."

"Three extra watches might convince you to consider your words more carefully. Report to Sub-Lieutenant Ryder as Guidance on Alpha shift for the next three days."

"Yes, sir." Worryingly, the Titanian didn't seem to have changed his mind overly much. The elevator doors opened, Dietz and Caine stepping out. Caine moved over to the Tactical station, Dietz over to look at the hologram, then turned to face the captain.

"You wanted to see me, sir?" Caine looked over at the two, slightly suspicious; Marshall was reasonably sure that Dietz hadn't noticed.

"Mr. Dietz, we need to start thinking about locating those two frigates," Marshall began. "The only probes we have on board are much too slow not to be shot down."

Dietz looked over at the sensor station, "We lost contact after they entered the atmosphere of Gatewood, correct, spaceman?" The technician nodded, and he continued, "Work with astrogation to provide a best-guess track of their possible arcs of escape. While they may be somewhere behind the gas giant, there will be a somewhat limited collection of somewheres to search."

"That'll help, Dietz, but I don't want to leave Ragnarok orbit unless we don't have any choice."

The operations officer ran his hand across his chin, nodding, "Then I suggest that Mr. Quinn be assigned to mate as much as he can of the sensor apparatus of two probes into a pair of missiles adapted for long-range autonomous operation. One can be used to swing around the rear side of Gatewood, the other can act as a communications relay."

Mulenga's eyes widened, "That's a very extensive modification, Captain."

Dietz turned to look at the astrogator, then back at Marshall, "The Chief Engineer may be somewhat unorthodox, but I do not question his competence to perform such work."

"Nor do I, Lieutenant. Go down and brief Mr. Quinn. Mr. Mulenga?"

"Sir?"

"You'd better lend one of your better technicians to assist Quinn's team with the work, and then both of you can start the process of patching it into our systems. Launch them as soon as they are ready, and naturally – please make that as soon as possible."

The two officers nodded, Dietz saying, "Aye, sir."

Marshall turned away from them, walking towards his office. As he passed Kibaki, he turned to the still sullen junior officer, "Have Ensign Esposito report to my office on the double, Sub-Lieutenant. You have the bridge."

"Aye, aye, Captain," he replied, paging the espatier through his console. Marshall continued to walk into his office, the door sliding open; Caine rose from her station, following him. The door closed behind her as Marshall sat behind his desk.

"What's up, Deadeye?" he said.

"You're going down there. Don't say anything, I can see the look all over your face."

"I need to negotiate with the planetary leadership. It has to be the commanding officer."

She gestured at his side, "That still bothering you?"

"Not much. Our doctor knows her trade pretty well."

Leaning over the desk, Caine shook her head, "You'd better hope so. You're going to get yourself killed if you carry on like this."

Marshall leaned back in his chair, "I'll have a squad of espatiers to look after me, old friend."

"Less of the 'old'."

"What more do you want, Deadeye? I've got to lead from the front, it's all I know."

"Ensign Esposito might be a bit on the young side, but she's the obvious choice to lead a contact team here. Once she makes contact with whoever is in charge down there you can go down yourself. For all you know, that shuttle might land into the middle of a trap. Getting yourself taken hostage will make a bad situation worse. We still haven't identified the freighters yet."

The captain sighed, "Most likely they've been hidden on the far side of Gatewood. Hopefully one of Dietz's Deadly Probes will find them."

"Another thing. If you go down, then Senior Lieutenant Zakharova is in command once again."

A frown covered Marshall's face. "She is second in command of this ship. I just gave the watch officer extra duty for calling her names in front of me on the bridge."

"This isn't the bridge. This is you and I in your office. I don't trust her. I don't trust Dietz. They were thick as thieves while you were incapacitated; Mulenga and I were totally out of the loop."

"He told me he was concerned that he'd have to take over."

Caine stood up, pacing around the room, looking out of the viewport at Ragnarok turning below. "We thought about it. Almost everything she was doing seemed designed to antagonize the non-Callistan members of the crew, Danny. Her people were getting the best watches, lecturing everyone else on what to do. She's out to make this ship Patrol in all but name, with herself in the captain's seat."

"I don't know if I want to hear where this is going."

She turned, her hair sweeping around her neck with the abrupt movement, "Danny, this is me, remember. You said you wanted your wingman again, right? Well here I am. She's trouble. If you get captured, I don't trust that she'd make the right decision. Nor do most of the crew."

"So what do you suggest? Do you want her job?"

"Mulenga is next in line. The crew like him, and will follow him."

"One problem. He doesn't want to lead."

"He'd do it if necessary. You go down to the surface – after Esposito's troopers have cleared the way for you, I hasten to add – then you've got to take her with you."

Marshall shook his head, smiling, "What would you do? If you were sitting here?"

"Resign in your favor." The two of them laughed, as she continued, "One other suggestion; send Maggie down as shuttle pilot. You'll probably have to give her some sort of rank, but she's been hanging around a lot with Esposito."

"And?"

"You read the reports on that heist on Mariner? They seem to work well together in a crisis. This is gut instinct, here."

Marshall slid across a pad from his desk with a contract to join the Triplanetary Fleet on it, "I had the same thought."

Caine smiled, scanning the file, "Tell you what; I'll take this down to her. I might be able to persuade her more effectively than you can."

"Perhaps so."

"And you'll stay up here this time?"

"This first time," he paused for a moment, "yes."

She smiled, "Of course, I'd have fewer objections if you sent Zakharova."

"Don't tempt me."

Caine shook her head as she walked out of the office, datapad in hand. Marshall contemplated the surface of Ragnarok, strange and alien, orbiting below. That was exactly the sort of thing he'd signed up for in the first place, and aside from the objections of hopefully-paranoid Tactical Officers, he was damned if he was going to let anything stand in his way.

Chapter 11

Orlova walked towards the unfamiliar shuttle, frowning at its lines, looking with care at its twin delta wings. She tugged on her uniform, scratching herself on her leg, trying in vain to make herself more comfortable in the plain worksuit.

Around her, a group of maintenance technicians were finishing up her pre-flight checks, topping up the fuel tanks and running some final inspections of the hull. Normally, that would have been her job, and a few glances at the on-board computers would probably have sufficed.

Loud footsteps raced up behind her, and she heard a cough. After she'd ignored it for a minute, she felt a tap on her shoulder, and turned to see a slight young man with a bashful look on his face.

"Are you Spaceman Orlova?" he asked, his voice quiet.

"I might be. Who are you?"

"Spaceman Second Class Khachaturian. I'm assigned as your observer."

She put her hands on her hips, "What are you meant to observe? Me?"

His head jerked from left to right; a couple of the maintenance techs had stopped their work and were looking at the conversation, "Sensors, systems, that sort of thing."

"Do you have a real name? If I call you by that gobbledygook you just spouted at me, we'd crash by the time I asked you to do anything."

"A real name?"

Esposito walked up behind him, a smile curling on her face. "She means your first name, spaceman."

The nervous technician turned, hand jerking into a salute, "Sevan, ma'am."

"Right," Orlova said, "Get in and start your observing. I'll be up in a minute." She shook her head as she watched him amble up the ladder, narrowly missing catching his head on the door. "Who thought I needed a watchdog?"

"I think it's standard practice. My gang on board?"

"Hunter's got them all ready to go. They seem eager to be going on a proper mission this time."

The officer looked up at the shuttle, "They might be less eager when they learn that we're not supposed to be attacking anyone. Unless, of course, we get attacked. The Captain just briefed me."

"How is Cap'n Danny?"

She frowned, "Now that you're wearing a uniform, you might have to be a bit more careful throwing that around."

"Don't remind me. Caine conned me into this get-up; as soon as we get back to Sol I'm getting out of it."

"I'm sure that'll be popular with the troops. Remind me to have my camera ready."

Orlova laughed, "I tend to charge for that sort of a show, Gabi. What does our glorious leader want us to do?"

"Land, look around, try and find someone for him to talk to. A take me to your leader mission."

The pilot shook her head, "We've been calling them for two days. They don't seem eager to speak to us."

"I'm sure we'll find someone when we get down. You do know where you're going, right?" A tone of mock concern was creeping into her voice.

"Just over the uninhabitable mountains of certain doom to the only spot of bare ground we could find long enough to take the shuttle." Orlova patted the side of the hull, "I just hope someone gives us landing instructions."

Esposito walked over to the passenger airlock, a foot on the lower rung of the ladder, before turning around to face the pilot, "I just hope no-one down there has surface-to-air missiles and an eager trigger finger. Let's hope we both get what we want."

Orlova grinned at the young officer, then scrambled up the ladder and into the crew compartment, swinging into the pilot's seat and sliding her control key into her console. The controls moved about, sliding into her preferred positions, though with some changes to adjust for the larger surface area.

The shuttle might not be the one she was used to – and one day she really needed to get around to giving it a name – but at least she'd know where the throttle was. Khachaturian was leaning over her shoulder.

"Something interesting?"

"That's a really non-standard configuration. Do you find it works?"

She shot him an exasperated look, then turned back to the controls, strapping herself in, "Why don't you get us launch clearance and we can find out."

"Don't you want to familiarize yourself with the configuration?"

She sighed, "Are you wanting to fly this thing? I'm happy to get out and watch. Just make the damn call."

He looked nervously around the cockpit, then put a headset on, tapping a button, "Launch control, this is Shuttle One, requesting launch clearance."

A voice echoed over the speaker; evidently Khachaturian hadn't plugged the headset in properly. "Shuttle One, this is launch control. Activating airlock lift now."

There was a loud grinding noise from all around them as the shuttle dropped into the launch airlock. Orlova casually flicked switches and pushed buttons, a series of lights flashed green, while the top hatch slid shut above them. Another noise, this time the whisper of air being withdrawn from the surrounding space, slowly fading to nothing as the pressure dropped to zero.

The observer looked at Orlova, "External atmosphere exhausted."

She looked back, shaking her head, "Our relationship is going to go a lot better if you speak only when spoken to. Open lower lock."

He pulled a switch, and the shuttle imperceptibly began to drop, the stars beginning to creep up the bottom of the viewscreen. With a gentle touch of the thrusters, the shuttle slowly began to corkscrew out of the launch bay, until it was pointing in the desired direction. She reached over for the throttle to engage the main engine, while Khachaturian tried to conceal his fear; he did gesture to the proximity indicator warning light, still glaring red.

"Don't worry, we'll have that indicator dark in a few seconds." She kicked the throttle into high gear, sending Alamo receding into the distance as her orbit changed. Tapping out a series of instructions on the navigational systems, a line appeared on the viewscreen ahead along with a series of recommended engine firings for orbital descent, the numbers on which kept changing back and forth as she maintained the engine burn.

"Shouldn't we stop now? We're going to enter atmosphere a thousand miles from where we need to be."

Orlova looked again at the observer, who was beginning to turn an amusing shade of white, "I thought we'd agreed you weren't going to speak? Anyway, our job on this mission is to attract attention, right? Burning a thousand mile trail of flame in the sky should do that nicely."

"A thousand miles of flame?"

"Kusemek, a figure of speech! Now get onto that sensor station of yours and start observing. And get on the communicators and start asking for landing instructions. If I'm going to smash into some clown on the runway it would be nice to get some advance warning."

The shuttle began to waver back and forth as it entered the upper atmosphere; Orlova killed the engine, letting Ragnarok's gravity do the rest of the work. Flames licked around the site of the heat shield as the density outside increased, the speed indicator started to drop as she was pushed back into her couch by the deceleration.

"We're two gravities above safe levels!" Khachaturian yelled.

"Define safe!" Orlova replied, her hands on the controls, adjusting the angle of descent to gain speed again. Jagged mountains rose up underneath the shuttle, tens of thousands of feet high; the viewscreen winked out, replaced by an image of the terrain generated by the sensor systems. This time she followed the advice of the computer, kicking the engine back on again at low power to speed them over another mountain range.

"Two hundred miles to go. We're passing over the first settlements."

"Get a good look with the scanners."

The observer's eyes widened, "I need to call the ship."

"Why, want to complain about me?" the pilot smiled.

"I've found one of the freighters. On the surface, part dismantled."

She looked over at image he'd taken of the settlement, magnified to the limit, then looked up, nodding. "Make the call. Then start looking out for the rest of them." She reached over, grabbing a handset, "I'll start calling the ground."

The handset plugged in, Orlova pulled back further on the throttle, twisting the nose to point towards the runway ahead, as she flicked the viewscreen back on. The autopilot was completely useless on this world until they had a proper baseline reading of the atmospheric conditions.

"This is Margaret Orlova, of the Triplanetary Fleet. We're coming down on your runway; if you don't want us to crash into something it would be polite to give us instructions."

A tap to set the message to repeat until they got a reply. She pulled up a little, spilling speed to come in for a proper landing approach, then veered slightly to the left to line up properly.

"Shuttle, this is Demon's Port. You're cleared to land," a thin voice with a pronounced drawl spoke over the speaker, causing her to grin. "Landing authorities will be standing by when you come down. Do not leave your shuttle until authorized. Is that understood?"

"Loud and clear, Demon's Port. Will comply and be on the ground in a couple of minutes."

A swipe of her palm brought the landing gear down and locked it home, another couple of taps dropped the flaps and slowed the shuttle still further. Finally she was over hardened plasticrete rather than loose rock, and with a careful nudge, the shuttle smoothly slid onto the runway, brakes carefully engaging as Orlova killed the engines and guided it gently to a stop with the maneuvering thrusters. She looked over to Khachaturian.

"Tell Alamo we're down safely." She popped open her seat restraints and stood up, pushing a series of buttons to lock the controls.

Khachaturian glared up at her, "What password are you using?"

She continued with her post-flight, replying, "How good are you at resisting torture?"

"Torture?"

"Probably better I don't give you the password." She opened a commlink to the passenger deck, "Everyone fine back there?"

"Better than your co-pilot, I think," Esposito replied with a grin. "We heard you talking with ground control."

"How do you want to handle it? Now we're on the deck it's your show."

There was a brief pause while she considered, "Let's keep my gang in the can for the moment. Pop the crew hatch and see what they've got; if it looks fine then proceed from there."

"Here they come now."

A trio of men wearing red jumpsuits were walking towards the shuttle; two of them were armed, pistols hanging on belts, the other seemed to be holding an older-model chemical sniffer, checking to make sure there were no damaging residues from the landing. After he gave a thumbs up, one of them pulled out a communicator.

"You can open up now."

Orlova pulled on a cold-weather jacket and a pair of gloves, stuffing a hat onto her head. Her instruments were warning her that it was a fairly pleasant summer day on Ragnarok; the temperature was a positively balmy fourteen below. She cracked the outer hatch, gasping a little at the cold air rushing into the cabin, swung herself down and started to descend the ladder, dropping the last couple of feet onto the ground.

"Margaret Orlova, at your service," she said to the trio.

The three of them looked at each other; the one with the sniffer decided to speak, "Welcome to Ragnarok. I'm going to have to ask you to come with me to security processing. Our orders are that any uninvited arrivals are to be interned."

She shook her head, "So simply topping up the fuel tanks and blasting off isn't an option?"

"I'm afraid not. Miss Orlova, if you and your co-pilot would disembark?"

"You are aware that I have a battlecruiser in orbit?"

"No doubt the Governor will be pleased to have a hostage to their good intentions."

Evidently Esposito had decided that enough was enough; besides, she owed Orlova for the rescue on Mariner. The passenger hatch cracked open to reveal four plasma rifles pointing out at the trio. At a gesture, the two with sidearms threw them to the ground; Orlova ducked down and retrieved them.

"I should probably have mentioned that I had a squad of espatiers on board," the pilot said. "You never did introduce yourselves?"

With a downcast expression on his face, the leader nodded, "Fine, you have the drop on us. I'm Garrold. The others are Rogers and McGee. I'm one of the landing supervisors, and we have our own security force on hand who will be here in a few minutes. If you want to take off, I suppose I can't stop you, but our planetary defense grid will have something to say about whether or not you get back into orbit."

"What the hell is with this crap?" Esposito asked, "What have we done to you?"

Garrold replied, "I don't make the orders, just carry them out." He gestured over to the far side of the runway; a cloud of dust was beginning to emerge. "Here come my reinforcements."

Orlova looked at Esposito, who gestured over to the side of the runway, where there were a series of large rocks. "Perfect cover."

"What about the shuttle?" asked the pilot.

"Hopefully they won't shoot at it if we're over there." The officer banged on the side of the hull, "Out we get, troopers! Take up defensive cover and stand by to repel attack." She stuffed a headset on, "Alamo, this is Esposito. We're about to come under attack from ground troopers. Informed that a planetary defense network will give us problems taking off again. If you have any orders, now would be nice."

Marshall's voice came through loud and clear, "Give 'em hell, Ensign."

Hunter smiled, and gestured his men towards the rocks, "That's the sort of order a sergeant likes to hear. First team, over there. Second team, move into support. Riley, pass around the grenades."

"Negative," Esposito said, "We're going to need this runway."

"Do we have a plan?" said Orlova.

"Captain said to give them hell. That sounds about right."

"Can we win?"

"Not a question we've ever asked," Hunter said, "because we always do."

The troopers formed up quickly into two packs of four, Hunter, Esposito and Orlova with the forward group, Khachaturian still in the shuttle. In the distance, they could now make up a pair of improvised armored transports, plating obviously bolted on wherever possible, rumbling their way down the runway towards the shuttle. Riley pointed up, shouting something incoherent; a pair of contrails overhead suggested that they might have airborne based company shortly.

"When do we fire, Ensign?" Hunter asked.

She paused for a second that seemed to last for several lifetimes. This wasn't like the ambush on Mariner. That was her reacting to an attack. This time she was going to be ordering murder. For one last time she looked at the approaching vehicles, then turned to face her men.

"Fire when you get a good shot!"

Pointless suggesting to shoot to disable with a plasma weapon. Wolfe fired the first shot, a green bolt that wildly few off-target, landing in a snowdrift by the side of the runway with a loud crack.

Voldinski managed to get a burst that caught one of the ATVs in the forward tread, sending it briefly jerking out of control before it lurched to a stop, a dozen men jumping out of the three hatches and throwing themselves face down in the snow, rifles at the ready. The second vehicle slowly moved forward, crunching underfoot; Flanagan jumped to her feet to unleash a shot, only to fall to the ground herself before she could fire, her body jerking as crimson blood spilled out of a hole in her temple.

"Medic!" Hunter unnecessarily yelled; Floyd was already down by her side, medikit open on his lap, trying vainly to stop the bleeding. Wolfe, screaming in rage, ran forward, only to be gunned down by a series of shots, leaving his body lying in the open.

Esposito yelled, "Volley fire! Take those bastards down!" and a succession of plasma bolts flew forward, scattering around their targets but leaving two of the guards bloody wrecks on the ground. She heard a noise behind and turned, to see behind her the source of the contrails, a hover-fighter about to unleash a fusillade of shots on her squad. "Take cover! Air attack!"

A hail of bullets ran down between the running troopers. With an angry tell, Riley fired a quick shot at the fighter, rolling nimbly in and out of cover, but the aircraft managed to evade the shot. The squad was pinned down, each trapped in their own individual scrap of cover, as the enemy forces began to crawl forward under suppressing fire from the surviving APV. Hunter looked around, trying to find a way out of the trap they had found themselves in.

"Do you guys always do last stands?" Orlova asked, firing a wild shot from her antique sidearm.

"You're catching us on a bad week. Usually the odds are far worse," replied Hunter. He raised his hand slightly, the rest of his fire team looking, then gave a sharp chopping motion. Four shots fired as one, lancing towards the rearmost APV, all of them catching on the armor.

Critically, one of them managed to score a hit directly on the power pack, and the explosion tore through the enemy troopers huddled close by, leaving them a collection of screaming remains, one on the outskirts desperately weeping in the snow, his skin charred black as he gasped in agony. The remainder looked around, obviously outnumbered, and all came to the same conclusion, huddling deep into the ground, waiting to see who won the battle.

"Just the fighter now, Serge!" Riley yelled. Suddenly, they felt a blast of searing heat on their backs; they turned to watch an assortment of metal shards falling to the ground, smoke rising from a newly formed crater on the far side of the runway. Esposito nodded towards Hunter, who signaled Riley to take her team forward; the remainder of the enemies raised their hands in surrender.

"What the hell?" said Esposito; Orlova gestured over to a figure on the distance waving his arm about, the long tube of a shoulder mounted missile launcher on his back. The figure began to run over towards them, Hunter cautiously keeping him covered. Riley made her way over to the trio.

"We took out all the officers, ma'am," he reported. "The rest just know that their orders were to capture us and put us in a transport for Janszoon. That's the capital."

"Anyone else out there we need to worry about?" Hunter asked, looking out at the approaching figure.

"No-one here, Sarge. A few support staff down in the control tower, but they're unarmed."

The figure turned out to be an old man with straggly gray hair, who smiled through a gap in his teeth as he looked across the surrendered soldiers, then held out his hand to Hunter.

"John William Forbes, at your service."

Hunter looked across at Esposito, slightly embarrassed, but firmly shook the old man's hand, "Lance-Sergeant Hunter, Triplanetary Espatier Corps." He gestured across, "This is my commanding officer, Ensign Esposito."

The man frowned, as if uncertain what to make of the information, but shrugged and offered her his hand, "Guess things are different out there than they are down here. We're pressed for time, Ensign."

Floyd looked over from his patient, "Ensign, Flanagan's in a bad way, Wolfe's much worse. I can't do much for them here, they need proper medical attention."

"Anything from Alamo?"

Shaking her head, Orlova replied, "Not a thing. They must have thrown up some sort of jamming field."

Esposito turned urgently to Forbes, "Can you get these men to a hospital?"

"I can't. My gang saw your ship coming down, reckon half the continent did, and I thought you might need some help." There was a second explosion from the other side of the runway; he jerked his head in its direction. "That means that my buddies have taken out the air defense in the area. You can take off."

Hunter looked at Esposito, who shook her head. "We're not going anywhere without information."

"Governor'll have more troops out here before you can say suicide run. Unless you've got a lot of reinforcements, I can't hang around for long."

"Give us the short version," Orlova said.

Forbes looked at her sharply, then nodded, "We're rebels, lads. Fighting the dark tyranny of the Governor who is selling us off as chattel work slaves to the highest bidder. Now if your Triplanetary people will provide us with help, we'll be only too glad to accept. We need all the help we can get."

"What'd you think, ma'am?" Hunter said.

"I think we'd better get our wounded onto the shuttle and get it back to Alamo ASAP. Floyd should go with them to keep them alive for the trip and report to the Captain." She turned to Forbes, "You have your first help, Mr. Forbes. A squad of Espatiers are at your disposal."

"Es-what-iers?"

"Space marines, to you," Hunter said.

Forbes looked around at the horizon, as if expecting it to be dark with enemy aircraft within an instant. "We've got a camp not that far from here I can take you to. Going to be hard to get you back if this goes wrong."

Esposito turned to Orlova, "Get them back, Maggie."

The pilot nodded, and gestured to Khachaturian to bring out a stretcher. First Flanagan, carefully placed across three couches as comfortably as possible, then Wolfe, who jerked spasmodically as they gently loaded him into the shuttle's medical berth. Floyd shook his head at the Private's condition, injecting him with a shot from the medikit with a doubtful look.

"Khachaturian?"

The observer ran over, "Yes?"

"You've had basic pilot training, right?"

He looked doubtful. "I have."

"Good. You're taking these casualties back to Alamo. Esposito's going to need every hand she can get down here, and I'll do more good than I will up on Alamo."

"I don't think you should do that."

She waved her pistol around, dangerously, "The alternative is that we see if the shuttle can make its way back to Alamo entirely on autopilot. What do you think?"

He looked at the pistol, shaking his head, "That I should fly the shuttle back to Alamo. Let me tell you something – you are crazy, and I intend to report as much when I get back."

"Fine. They can send the military police down here for me, we'll probably need the reinforcements. Go."

Khachaturian climbed the ladder into the crew compartment and sealed the airlock behind him; Orlova raced back to the cluster of troopers by the side of the runway and watched the shuttle take off, Esposito shaking her head and grinning when the pilot rejoined them. Hunter gestured to one of the abandoned plasma rifles; Orlova grabbed it and hefted its weight, returning her pistol to her holster. With a loud bang, the main engines engaged, sending the shuttle speeding down the runway and up, curving over the mountains to put as much distance from the air defense grid as possible.

"Don't they need you back up there?" Esposito said.

"I'll take the next one. You might need another daring rescue."

Forbes shook his head again, muttering something under his breath, then turned to Hunter. "Come on, this way. It's a long walk."

"Aren't they always?" Riley said.

Chapter 12

A pair of stretchers, attended by espatiers, were standing back in the shuttle bay; alarms sounded as the elevator airlock engaged, bringing the shuttle up to deck level. Before it had even finished rising, Doctor Duquesne was rushing to the passenger lock, slamming her fist down on the emergency release; Marshall was right behind her, gagging at the smell of charred flesh and blood that erupted from the inside.

Private Floyd was holding a fluid bag over Flanagan; a uniform jacket had been gently placed over Wolfe's head during the flight up, and at a look from the captain, Floyd shook his head, looking down at the deck. A pair of espatiers loaded Flanagan onto a stretcher, pushing it down the corridor as Duquesne looked at the gravely wounded trooper.

"Do your best, Doc," Floyd said, turning to face Marshall as the stretcher slid gently into the elevator.

"Wolfe?" Marshall said.

The private hesitated, "He died before we'd got out of the atmosphere. Wounds were just too bad. I'm sorry, sir."

"You did everything you could, and he died in the line of duty. There are worse ways to go. Where's everyone else?"

The crew airlock opened, and Khachaturian scrambled out onto the deck, snapping a salute. "That mad woman stayed behind on Ragnarok, Captain. You should have seen her, I've got a list of flight safety violations a mile long!"

Ignoring the ranting sensor technician, Marshall looked at the medic, who nodded, "Ensign Esposito and the rest of the squad stayed on the surface. We'd made contact with a group that appear to be engaged in a conflict with the Ragnarok government, and she believed that it was the best way of obtaining the information we need."

"Any instructions for a pick-up?"

"I did not receive any, sir. Certainly the runway we landed at cannot be risked again, it was obviously a trap."

"What about Orlova? She needs to have her flight rating stripped immediately," Khachaturian said.

"Spaceman?" Marshall said, "Shut up. Go file your report, I'll see that receives all the attention it deserves."

Khachaturian saluted again, then made his way over to a nearby terminal; no doubt he'd be receiving a more politely worded series of complaints by the time he returned to his office.

"Request permission to return to surface, sir. If Khachaturian won't go, I am prepared to take a risk with the shuttle's autopilot," Floyd said.

Corporal Stiles, who with Esposito and Hunter on the planet was now the commander of the ship's espatier force, walked over to the medic, clapping him on the back. "Second and Third Squads are ready, willing and able to join First Squad on the surface, sir."

"Request denied." The captain looked at the two men. "I appreciate the gesture, but at this point I can't take the risk of deploying through a potentially lethal defense grid. Besides, I'm likely going to need you for other duties on Alamo. Stiles?"

The Corporal stood to attention, "Sir?"

"Any good field engineers in your squad?"

He nodded, "Yes, sir. Lance-Corporal Candero is the platoon's best tinkerer."

"I want the two of you suited up for a trip out to one of those orbiting satellite. If they're going to give us problems, I think it is time for us to give them some. Have Candero take a look at some schematics, and tell him I want him to make the biggest mess he can on my instructions."

"Aye, aye, sir!" Stiles' face lit up as he made his way down the corridor. Marshall pulled out a communicator, calling the bridge.

"Cellini here, sir," the voice of the beta shift watch officer replied.

"Change our orbital track, Sub-Lieutenant. I want us within a quarter-mile of one of the satellites, as fast as possible."

"Aye, Captain. Implementing now."

"Good. I'll be up in a minute."

He walked into the now-clear elevator, tapping the button for the bridge, leaning up against the wall. The doors opened two levels down, and Dietz strode in, his hands clasped behind his back, nodding curtly at the captain as he tapped for the bridge.

"I have been reviewing the reports of the shuttle team, Captain. It seems to present something of a problem."

"You are a master of understatement, Mr. Dietz."

The ship began to gently vibrate, the gravity changing slightly. "We are changing course, sir?"

"I intend to intercept one of those satellites if the planetary government fails to respond. Time to take off the gloves, Lieutenant, when they start launching unprovoked attacks on our people."

Dietz nodded. "I was on my way to report to you that the missiles are ready for launch. Engineer Quinn and I have given them a final inspection, and they should complete the mission as directed."

"Excellent."

The doors slid open onto the bridge; Cellini stood to attention, calling out, "Captain on the bridge."

"As you were, Sub-Lieutenant. Mr. Dietz, you may launch our modified missiles when ready."

Marshall walked over to the captain's chair, looking briefly around the bridge before settling down, his gaze fixed on Ragnarok slowly revolving below. Dietz hunched over the Tactical station, then looked up.

"Ready to fire, sir."

"Fire."

One after another, the missiles fired out of the forward launch tube, racing away from the moon on their prearranged course behind Ragnarok. Marshall tracked their departure with satisfaction for a brief second, then frowned as first one, then the second winked out.

"Sensors, verify missile track."

The sensor technician hunched over his console, adjusting controls and shaking his head, "The missiles are still there, sir, and they managed to get to escape velocity, but it looks like both their engines died shortly afterward. I can't get any telemetry from the missiles, but visually nothing else seems to be wrong.

"Mr. Dietz?"

"Checking, Captain." He looked over the console for a moment. "It seems that a spurious signal was sent from the ship's communications array two-point-one seconds before the missiles went dead. Logged from Lieutenant Caine's quarters."

Marshall did a double take, then sat back in his chair, tapping a button, "Sub-Lieutenant Tyler, please proceed to Lieutenant Caine's quarters on the double."

"Sir?"

"On the double, Tyler. Details to follow." He changed frequencies, "Lieutenant Caine, report."

His only reply was a cough and a couple of grunts, followed by a sleepy, "What's up, Captain?"

"Are you asleep?"

"I was until you woke me up. Is there a problem?"

He paused for a second, "We just launched our tracking missiles, but they failed shortly after we fired them. According to the computer, the command to deactivate them came from your quarters."

"Danny, I've been asleep for three hours at least. Nodded off reading a book. I give you my word."

Dietz walked over to stand beside Marshall, "Sir, Lieutenant Caine must be investigated by security. I will handle the command supervision if you wish."

He looked up at the operations officer, nodding. He didn't like the idea for a moment, but there could be no hint of partiality. "Very well. I personally rate that the fact the computer trace was so easy is suspicious in itself."

"I agree, sir. I will conduct my investigation bearing that possibility in mind."

"Make it quick, Dietz."

"Yes, sir." Dietz nodded, curtly, then turned and made his way off the bridge. Marshall frowned for a second, stood up and headed into his office.

"Cellini, you have the bridge. Contact me when we get to interception point with the satellite."

"We're not going after the missiles, sir? Right now it would be straightforward to retrieve them."

He shook his head, frowning, "No, Sub-Lieutenant. We'd have to break orbit, and we'd be off station for hours. Nor do I want to use our only remaining shuttle. We're going to have to try a different approach."

Marshall walked into his office, the door sliding shut behind him, as he sat down in his chair. He called up the personnel records of Caine, though he was already familiar with most of them. They'd served together for the majority of the war, a proven flight team moving from one posting to the next. Nothing suspicious.

Of course, anyone decent would take that into account, and make sure that there was nothing in the records that could cause attention. He shook his head, then turned the record off. The road he was on led to nothing but paranoia; obviously someone was out to isolate him.

He called up the tactical display again. Dietz's plan had been a good one, possibly too good. There were a lot of ways that missiles could be tampered with, and the inventory was low enough that it wasn't a trick he wanted to repeat. Two ships could evade one using Gatewood to hide behind for as long as they wanted, potentially, even if he broke orbit.

He started to scan through the records of the rest of the senior staff again, going over them to see if there was anything that might be revealing, but knew even as he was doing it that it was a waste of time. Records could be altered and manipulated too easily; short of returning to Sol he couldn't check any of the information anyway.

"Cellini here, Captain. We've reached the satellite."

"Good. Tell Corporal Stiles to go out and have some fun pulling out circuits."

"Yes, sir."

Figure that they'd be watching Alamo from the surface, and would already be thinking that they were planning to do something to one of the satellites. A minute or so for them to work out where the two spacesuited espatiers were going, a little longer for them to notify higher authority, and he'd find out exactly what their threshold of non-communication was. If it meant taking out the entire satellite constellation, that sounded fine at this point. About the least that Wolfe deserved. He kept his eye on the clock, and almost on cue, the communicator chirped again.

"Cellini again. We're getting a tight-beam message from the ground, addressed to this ship."

"Are we now? Call Stiles and tell him to hold off for a moment, but he is to remain on station, then patch the call through to my office."

"Yes, sir. Patching you through now."

A face resolved itself on the screen opposite his desk, one that screamed military. The close-cropped haircut, a suit that was worn as if it might have been a uniform. Cold blue eyes obviously prying for a weakness.

Marshall began, "I am Lieutenant-Captain Daniel Marshall, commanding Triplanetary Spaceship Alamo. To whom am I speaking, please?"

"Isaac Hall, Governor-General of Ragnarok Colony. I formally protest your sabotage of our satellite, and the landing of your combat team on my planet."

Interesting that he regarded the planet as his, Marshall thought. "No sabotage has been conducted, Governor. My team is simply conducting a safety inspection. As for the landing, that was a single shuttlecraft bearing my representative to meet with your government, and they were met by a group of people who set out to arrest them."

"A misunderstanding, Lieutenant-Captain, nothing more."

"Indeed. One of my men is dead as a result of your misunderstanding, Governor, and I believe you experienced casualties as well. For which I express my sympathy."

The Governor's face hardened. "I must ask you to retrieve your people and leave orbit. I am willing to guarantee safe passage for one of your shuttles to land."

"I am not a diplomat, Governor, but a soldier. So you will forgive me for being blunt – but I have no intention of turning over another group of potential hostages to you. My mission is to investigate the disappearance of three freighters in this system, as well as an unprovoked attack by forces based in this system on a vessel that was previously sent to investigate. We ourselves have come under attack since our arrival."

"Are you denying us our rights to defend ourselves? This is a sovereign system, Lieutenant-Captain, and although my orbital defenses do not permit me to shoot you down, I will use all force necessary."

Folding his hands on the table, Marshall attempted to soften his tone, "And if you try that, I will destroy all of your communications satellites before leaving the system. Governor, if you were truly threatened by these vessels, then the Triplanetary Confederation will simply wish to repatriate the crews. If you wish to bring them up on criminal charges, then it is your planet, and your jurisdiction, but I would require a representative to attend the trials."

The governor frowned, as if thinking it over, "It is I suppose possible that we got off on the wrong foot, Lieutenant-Captain. Perhaps if we were to meet to discuss our mutual problems, some sort of arrangement could be made."

Knowing precisely what was coming, Marshall moved to preempt him, "I would be only too happy to accommodate you on board, Governor.  As well as a limited number of advisers, two, say?"

"Agreed." The frown suggested that this was a man who was used to getting his own way. "I will arrive in eight hours from now, and provide full details to your staff of the required protocols for my arrival."

"I will see that they are followed." An honor guard would protect the ship as much as it would protect the Governor. "In eight hours, then, Alamo out." He closed the channel before the Governor could reply.

Chapter 13

The squad trudged through the deepening snow, the wind steadily increasing, tearing down from the mountains and ripping at the hoods on their jackets. Forbes was maintaining a brisk pace, periodically pulling a navipad out of his pocket, poking at it, and adjusting their path accordingly.

There had been no sign of pursuit, no sign that anyone was chasing them, and with the wind rising to an impending storm, it seemed unlikely that anyone would come after them now. Potentially, they wouldn't have to – the temperature was dropping fast, and everyone was beginning to feel the bitter cold. The rest of Forbes' men had gone a different way; he'd not volunteered what they were doing.

Forbes waved an arm in the air, then pointed to the north-east; Esposito squinted, but could see nothing but a bare patch of rock, but their guide had increased his pace to a jog, so the squad followed suit, Orlova swearing in four languages under her breath. A bright flash of light shone out of the rock when they grew closer, a hatch thrown back to reveal a hole carved into the ground, the light so bright that none of them could see what was at the bottom.

"Down you go! Hot tucker waiting for you when you get into the hutch," Forbes said, and the beginnings of a blizzard compelled them all to obey, one by one scrambling down the old, rusty ladder for at least fifty feet to emerge in the cabin of an old shuttle, the fixtures and equipment ripped out to turn it into a metal cave, seat material thrown out on the floor to serve as makeshift bedding, a few computer consoles displaying flickering maps of the area, a rack on the wall holding a dozen of the old rifles they'd been using, ammunition clips carelessly tossed onto a shelf.

A couple of people sat at the back, a bald man as black as night itself, and a boy with a faint straggly beard, their eyes narrowed as they held pistols in their hands, looking at the newcomers; both were wearing what looked like home-made winter camouflage painted onto storm jackets.

"Home sweet home, cobbers," Forbes said. He turned to the pair, making a thumbs-up gesture, "They're on our side. Put on some coffee and a few ration packs."

"We've got our own; don't want to deplete your stocks," Riley said, pulling a couple of foil packs out of a pocket.

Esposito looked at him, then back at Forbes, "I think we'd all take the coffee, though."

The squad sat on the cold floor, bundling up their coats as makeshift cushions, Orlova poking around at one of the computer consoles while Forbes started passing around tin mugs filled with a hot brown liquid that was at least a passable imitation of coffee. The other two rebels ducked through a hatch, taking some of the food with them.

"This is one of the old transit shuttles," she said. "I saw one of these in the Aerospace Museum."

Forbes nodded, "She crashed during the establishment of the colony. Big smash-up, engines torn out. We found her and thought she'd make a good little base."

"Must have been a big job to bury her," Hunter said, a tone of respect in his voice.

"Used a crevasse, filled it up and put in the shaft. Hardest part was making sure the Governor's goons didn't find out about it."

Folding her legs under her, Esposito took a sip of coffee then rested her mug on the floor. "We've got a hell of a lot of questions, Mr. Forbes."

He looked at her, slightly irritated, "I suppose I'd better start thinking up some answers. I'll want some questions answered as well, though."

"To begin with – there is no record of any colony established here. The UN survey twenty-three years ago reported this world was uninhabited."

He snorted, "The UN's still around? That who you are with?"

She looked at Hunter, then turned back to Forbes. "I am the commander of the Espatier forces of Alamo, a spaceship in the Triplanetary Fleet."

"I still don't buy that first part. You've got to be twenty-two. What about your husband?"

Hunter sighed, looked around, then stood up, "I'm getting tired of you carrying on with this bullshit about our commander. My lads are getting tired of it as well."

"Sergeant," Esposito said, "sit down." Hunter sat down, and Esposito caught the subtle wink that he threw her; nicely played.

Forbes, looking slightly chastened, continued, "So this Triplanetary thing? Earth and who?"

"Mars, Callisto and Titan. The Triplanetary Confederation was formed when the outer colonies rebelled against the United Nations in 2149. The war lasted for eight years; needless to say, we won."

"No shit!" His face brightened. "Then you aren't from Earth or those bastards from the Moon?"

Orlova looked sharply at Esposito, "You know about the Lunar Republic?"

"We fled from those bastards. At least, their ancestors."

"It might be better if you fill us in on some background," Esposito said.

He took a deep swig of coffee, then pulled a flask out of a pocket on the inside of his jacket and tipped some of its contents in, stirring them around with a gnarled, weather-beaten finger. "I was born in 2043, in a place called Coober Pedy in the Australasian Republic."

"That's more than a century ago!" Riley said, her eyes widening.

"Yeah, but I slept through most of it. I grew up wanting to explore the wild black younger, so ended up in ASRI as a shuttle jockey. Our tech boys had spotted Ragnarok swinging around this star, and we decided to take a crack at it right after the Indo-Pakistan nukewar."

Esposito shook her head, "You planned an interstellar expedition in, what, 2067? Right before the Third World War?"

"Mars Colony was only ten years old back then," Orlova said. "If you aren't giving us a load of crap, you've got guts."

He snorted, taking another swig of his augmented coffee. "Obviously you survived, but take a look at where we were back then. Earth in the middle of a mass extinction, half a dozen wars going on and it looked like China and the Yanks were about to finally start the Big One. Mars and the Moon? Hell, the Chinese had snatched Luna back in '55, so that was out, and Mars was a few domes and no air to breathe. Here we figured we might have a chance."

Orlova shook her head. "I'm not buying it. FTL was decades away back then, and you'd have taken centuries to get there. Even given that you might have managed to sleep through the trip in cryogenic suspension, you'd still be traveling now."

The old man stood up, pushed her roughly away from the computer screen she was standing near and began to call up a schematic, thumping the display with his hand. "That's what let us do it in eighty years rather than eight hundred. We didn't have FTL, but we did have STL."

Esposito rose, looking over at the screen, "That looks like an early model of the Evans Drive. But there's some stuff missing, none of the dimensional compensators, the realspace navigational array?"

"We called it the Quantum Skip Drive. We couldn't get there quickly, but we could get here. The ships were copies of the ones EuroFed were building for the Callisto Project – which I guess worked, given where you say you are from. Let us do the trip in little bunny hops, bouncing around the dimensions. I don't understand how the drive worked, but I didn't have to."

"How long did the trip take, subjective?" Orlova asked.

"Two years. More than was planned. We couldn't get the break-out right, never did manage it. There were ten thousand of us, all but a hundred in sleep for the trip. Rest was minimal livestock, seeds, that sort of thing. Some fabbers to build basic colony materials."

"Enough to colonize a whole world," Hunter said, awed.

"Just about, cobber. Made landing twenty years ago, first batch of us woken up for the ride. We'd expected to see other humans here before us if anyone had survived. When no-one showed up, we figured the worst had happened, dug in, and started building."

"How did you get from that to blowing up aircraft?" Riley asked, draining the last dregs of her coffee.

"Flight Crew decided not to give up power, that's why. Had an election when they made the final jump into the system, elected Captain Namato 'Governor-General of Ragnarok', then broke it to the passengers a few at a time as they woke them up. Didn't seem to matter for the first few years, but as time went on, things seemed just to settle. There was always an excuse not to have an election, and Old Nammy was always a nice enough guy that no-one really pushed for it."

"What happened to push you over the edge?" Esposito asked, obviously fascinated.

Forbes signed, walking to the far side of the room, his hands behind his back. "He died, there was a big funeral, and we all started to figure that there was going to be an election, that things would start getting back to what they were back home. Didn't happen. Isaac Hall took over; he was the old Security Chief. Suddenly those who'd been calling for an election, for a say in how our world was run, we were all just anarchists and agitators to be ignored. They spread us around the outer settlements, put us out of the way. Once he'd done that, he sold us down the river."

"Sold you?"

"Five years back, a couple of years after he'd taken power, a ship comes into orbit. So I heard later. Turned out we had a rich asteroid field they wanted to mine, they wanted to buy food, oxygen, water. Usual space stuff. All of a sudden the terraforming project is 'too expensive' and everything goes to manufacturing stuff for the off-worlders. Not that we're getting anything back from it; Hall and his goons are sitting on a big pile of cash with all the luxuries that can be shipped out, and the ration keeps getting cut."

He heard a call from the other compartment and walked through the door, closing it behind him. The troopers looked around at each other, Orlova looking over some of the equipment again and Esposito pulling out her datapad, looking through some of her historical files.

"This shuttle checks out, anyway. The equipment's a century old, but it isn't a century old. If you follow," Orlova said.

"Is the story plausible, ma'am?" Riley asked.

"It could be. There are a lot of gaps in the records of that era. The planetary datanet went down, and stayed down for years. Most of Australia got nuked when they put up a fight to the Sino-Japanese invasion; the continent's mostly a wasteland today. More than a billion dead by war, plague, god knows what else."

"It sounds a lot like what the East Africans did out at Titan," Orlova said. "Throw everything into one big fleet and hope for the best."

"Or the Koreans at Mercury, and look how that went wrong," Hunter agreed.

Esposito nodded, continuing, "Something like six out of ten ships never made it. I'm sure that somewhere buried in the records we'd find an account of a lost group of Australasian transport ships, with a notation that they went off course soon after leaving Earth orbit."

The door opened again; Forbes and the bald man walked out of the rear room, in the middle of a conversation that seemed rapidly turning into an argument. Forbes was carrying a bowl filled with a surprisingly rather appealing broth, smelling of real meat. Orlova looked at the ration pack she was about to open and grimaced; a few of the troopers were quietly sliding their packs back into pockets and bags.

"They're going to run out," the newcomer said. "All of them. Get enough cash to set themselves up for life and leave us all stranded here."

"Good!" Forbes slammed his fist on the table, sending the empty mugs clattering. "Let the rats run out, then we can build the world we want without them. I just want them gone, and whether we put them all up against a wall or someone sells them tickets back to Earth, I don't give a shit."

Esposito frowned, looked up at the newcomer, and shook her head. "Have you any idea where they are from?"

"The Lunar Republic. Descendants of the damn bastards who drove us off Earth in the first place." He placed the bowl on table, dunked a battered mug into it and took a deep drink. "Go on, it'll do you more good than the plastic crap in those pouches of yours."

"Still willing to help us?" Forbes said. "They big bad guys back at Sol?"

Esposito looked at Hunter, both smiling, and the sergeant replied, "I can assure you, sir, that we are bigger and badder."

The officer continued, "We need to contact our ship. I'd like to bring the rest of our men down, and co-ordinate space-based support."

"You think your Captain will go along with all of this? What brought you out here, anyway?"

She pondered for a brief second, before deciding to leave out a few of the details. "We sent an expedition here to survey the system; it's been twenty years, after all, and we were thinking about expanding out this way. It vanished, a follow-up ship was attacked by a pair of frigates, and they sent us in to find out what was going on."

"Three ships missing, was it?" the newcomer asked.

"Yes."

He looked at Forbes, who nodded, and said, "Three ships arrived in orbit a few months ago. I don't know what happened, but I do know that all three ships were brought down, their crews put into detention. Probably going to try and barter them back."

Hunter looked at Esposito. "How did you find that out?" asked the officer.

"One of them got away. He's in a hidey-hole a few miles away."

The sergeant stood up, "We need to speak to him."

Both of the rebels looked at each other, then Forbes climbed to his feet. "Look, we've fought together in battle, so I get the idea that you are the good guys. He's being tried in a couple of days by the Free Parliament. If guilty, he'll be sentenced to exposure."

Esposito rose, standing behind the Sergeant. "We need to speak to this man. Now."

Chapter 14

Marshall looked at the two officers standing in front of him; Dietz on the left and Tyler on the right, then back down at the report they had submitted. The door chimed; he tapped for admittance and an angry-looking Zakharova burst in, shooting a look of daggers at Tyler before taking a place standing behind the captain.

"What you are telling me, gentlemen, is that you came to no specific conclusions," Marshall said.

Zakharova slammed a datapad on the desk, "I don't know what report you read, Captain, but I can see quite clearly that Lieutenant Caine must immediately be relieved of duty and placed under detention, pending court-martial proceedings."

Tyler reddened, gulped for a second, then shook his head, "As Security Chief, I do not consider any such action warranted at this time. The only evidence we have is circumstantial; there is no definite proof that Lieutenant Caine was behind the sabotage of the missiles."

"Nor is there anything to disqualify her," Dietz added. "She is one of half a dozen people, myself included, who had the technical expertise and the security clearance required for such work."

"The others?"

"Mr. Quinn was on duty on the Engineering Deck, and both computer techs were with him. Half a dozen witnesses and work logs indicating where they were working at the time," Tyler said.

"Work logs can be faked, Sub-Lieutenant. Did you investigate that possibility?" Zakharova said, rounding on the young officer.

Marshall looked up at his executive officer, "You are suggesting a conspiracy involving almost the entire Engineering staff. I rather suspect that we would have other evidence of sabotage by now if that were the case."

"Lieutenant Caine is the most likely suspect," Zakharova said, a tone of finality in her voice.

"Perhaps. But I am not taking any further action at this time, Lieutenant."

She slammed her fist on the table, "If she was from Callisto, by now she'd be in the brig under guard! You are letting your own personal bias getting in the way of commanding this ship, and I intend to make a formal record in the log to that effect."

Dietz and Tyler looked at each other; Marshall rose to his feet. "You are at liberty to do so, Lieutenant, but by god you can do so elsewhere. You are contributing exactly nothing to these proceedings. Dismissed."

Zakharova shot a look at Dietz, who shook his head. She threw a last glare at Marshall that would have curdled any milk in the room, then spun on her heels and walked out. Dietz for a second looked as if he was considering following her, but thought better of it and remained.

"Recommendations, Mr. Dietz," Marshall said, breaking the silence.

"All sensitive systems should require authorization by two senior officers instead of one until we have caught the saboteur. Computer access should be monitored."

"Mr. Tyler, anything to add?"

"No sir. I agree with Mr. Dietz's recommendations."

Marshall nodded, "I don't think the extra security is doing any good at this point; you might as well stand your men down after the honor guard ceremony, Mr. Tyler. Have the espatiers return to their normal training schedule."

"Yes, sir," he replied, looking doubtful.

"Make sure that all security precautions are enhanced, Mr. Dietz. Get that done forthwith. How extensive is the priority list?"

Dietz pulled a pad out of a pocket and slid his hand across it, reading from a list, "All officers ranked Lieutenant and higher, and Sub-Lieutenants Kibaki, Cellini and Ryder. The three watch officers."

"Very well. Go and see to it, Mr. Dietz." The operations officer stood to attention, then left the room. Tyler turned to follow him, but was stopped by a hand from Marshall.

"Please remain a moment, Sub-Lieutenant. Take a seat."

Nervously, he took the preferred seat. Marshall was again struck by how young he was; he'd barely completed his training at the Lacus Solis before being transferred out here, and a little cut on his cheek suggested that shaving was not one of his specialties.

"Sir, I am aware that my performance in this matter thus far has been sub-par..."

Marshall cut him off, "Are you? I'm not. You have a stripped-bare department that is structured essentially to keep law and order on this vessel, one that is not designed on the assumption that there is a cabal of saboteurs on board."

"Thank you, sir. But sabotage is still happening, and I can't seem to get a grip on stopping it."

"I am not the saboteur, Mr. Tyler. I can assure you of that. However, I want you to start work on the assumptions that anyone else on this ship might be, including the entire senior staff."

"Including Lieutenant Caine?"

The captain bristled slightly, "Absolutely. No matter what Lieutenant Zakharova thinks, I am capable of a professional level of behavior regarding those I have served with before."

"My log will show no such bias, sir. And you are perfectly at liberty to use it, or myself, as evidence should it come to any investigation into your actions during this mission."

"Let's hope that it doesn't come to that, Sub-Lieutenant. I want a plan to catch the saboteur. Don't use the computers, and consult no-one other than myself. Assume that you can only trust me for the present, unless you are absolutely certain of your staff. I want something by this time tomorrow, Mr. Tyler."

Tyler stood to attention and saluted, "Yes, sir. I'll see what I can come up with."

"Dismissed."

For a few moments, Marshall sat in his office, pondering, looking out at the stars in search of the inspiration he was lacking. Slightly different to anything he had ever seen before, the constellations twisted and bent in numerous small ways, thin wisps of Gatewood's atmosphere beginning to come into view as the ship slowly rotated around Ragnarok.

Everything was pointing to a pattern he didn't like; enough politicians back home disliked the idea of a unified military that they might subtly try to sabotage him, and even what happened to the missiles was perhaps in the outer limits of plausibility; but two weeks ago, someone had tried to gun him down outside his own quarters. Whatever was happening was a long way beyond mere politics.

His hand reached for a battered leather-bound copy of 'On War' resting on his desk, flapped open to a marked page, his grandfather's scrawl covering the margins. The old maxim; war as simply an extension of politics.

He walked out of his office, hastily moving through the bridge, noting briefly how quickly that had become a routine, taking a salute from Cellini and Ryder in the middle of their shift changeover, then stepped into the elevator. Cellini placed his fingerprint on a datapad and hustled after him, getting in just as the doors closed, stumbling slightly into him.

"Sorry, Captain," he said.

"In a hurry, Sub-Lieutenant?" Marshall said with a smile.

He blushed, shaking his head, "I, er..."

"Don't worry. Sometimes I had off-duty activities that I didn't want to burden my commander with either. As long as it doesn't affect the ship's routine."

"Nothing like that, sir!" he insisted. "We've got a poker game scheduled. I mean, some of the other junior officers and I, sir."

"I see." The door opened on the upper habitation deck; Cellini saluted and stepped up, making his way down the corridor. Either he was a good liar, or junior officers lived less interesting lives than they used to, Marshall mused.

The door slid open again on the lower deck, senior officer's country, though aside from the carpet being a different color it looked almost the same as the deck above. He walked to the third door along, and tapped the buzzer under the name, 'Caine, LT. L.'. He rang twice before the door slid open.

She'd obviously had more time to arrange her quarters than he had; most of his possessions were stuffed in bags around the room or under his bed. The usual arrangement of uniforms on an open hangar, medal case on the wall, but he walked over to one of the two display cases filled with exotic knick-knacks – everything from a piece of Plutonian rock to the last remains of a race long-dead. He pointed at a strange stone, an intricate pattern of lines carved into the rock forming a symbol that made his eyes itch slightly looking at it.

"This one's new, isn't it?"

Caine, lounging on the bed, shook her head. "Found on an abandoned Toltac mine at Proxima. So said the guy who sold it to me, anyway. Don't tell me you're just hear to talk about my collection, not after the day I've had."

"Damn it, Deadeye, what choice did I have."

"None at all. I know that. But it's downright humiliating to be questioned about a crime by the man who probably caused it!" Her voice was loud enough that anyone walking outside would hear it; Marshall looked nervously from side to side.

"I'm standing right here. Stop shouting." He paused for a second, then continued, "So you suspect Dietz?"

"He had the expertise to do it, the security access, and he'd set someone up to make it look suspicious."

"Too obvious. I don't buy it." Marshall perched himself on the edge of the bed. "While I'd naturally have to undertake an inquiry, they would have known that it would show that the only evidence was circumstantial, not enough to convict on."

She shook her head again, "That wouldn't stop some commanders we've shipped with in the past."

"I'm not 'some commander'. At least, I damn well hope not."

Caine sat up, sending her hair cascading down her back. "Are you concerned about being viewed as biased because of our friendship? You realize that right now Zakharova is probably saying that we're sleeping together, or something stupid like that?"

Marshall laughed. "I don't pretend to know what that woman is thinking. I only know that I've given her enough rope; once we get back to Sol I'm going to be hunting for a new Exec. Always leaps to the obvious conclusion first, always pushes her point too far. Even Dietz didn't push to have you arrested."

"He didn't?" She raised an eyebrow. "Interesting. I trust him less than I do her. They're spending a lot of time together. Hell, most of the Patrol types are too damn clannish. The Martians and the Titanians seem to be working together better."

"All reservists, not surprising. I don't think there are more than half a dozen of our Martian contingent who were in uniform a month ago. Not counting our boys-with-guns."

She sat up on the bed, folding her legs under her. "What are you going to do, Lieutenant-Captain Marshall? There are two frigates loose somewhere out of sight, three freighter crews we now know damn well are stuck on the surface of Ragnarok, not to mention an espatier squad, a colony that popped up out of nowhere, and you can't trust anyone on board."

"Except you."

"There you go again. You're not suspicious enough, Danny. I could be a plant, this could all be a big double-bluff."

He frowned in mock seriousness, "Are you a spy, Deadeye?"

"Of course not, but that's not the point."

"This all seemed a lot easier ten years ago, when we were bitching in the Rec Room about Colonel Zinowitz, or Major Cunningham." He walked over to the far side of the room, looking at the rows of medals, most of them the same that he had in his office. "We were going to set the solar system to rights, Deadeye, and when we got commands of our own, we were going to do a damn sight better than they ever did."

She stood behind him, placing her hand on his shoulder, "Time to deliver, Danny. Never mind what you are going to do. What do you want to do?"

He turned to face her, a wry smile on his face, "Get all of our people off the surface, knock out those two frigates, and make this Triplanetary Fleet stick long enough to make it actually mean something. Oh, and chuck Zakharova out of the nearest airlock with 'pain in the ass' stapled to her butt."

Both of them laughed at that. "The Governor will be coming up in about an hour, Danny. What are you going to tell him?"

"I intend to speak softly, and carry a big stick. Which I will beat him over the head with if necessary. We're going to get our people back, whatever it takes." He looked over at Caine again, then over to the uniforms on her rack. "Best look out your dress uniform, Deadeye. Our guest wants all the pomp and ceremony he can get."

Chapter 15

Corporal Stiles and his men made no attempt to suppress the looks of contempt on their faces as they formed the honor guard for the Governor's shuttle. Sirens sounded as the elevator airlock began its work, air hissing into the compartment below.

The officers stood in formation, unfamiliar dress uniforms itching in a dozen places, while a pair of maintenance technicians stood about in the background, with special instructions to get as much information from the shuttle as possible whilst they were servicing it; Quinn had spent considerable time arguing that he should be one of the 'technicians' assigned to the job – whether it was simply an excuse not to have to wear dress uniform or whether it was eagerness to have a look at unfamiliar new equipment, Marshall couldn't say.

The first impression of the shuttle when it rose up into the bay was age; the swept wings, curled back over the airlock in a raked formation that made it look like a bird-of-prey about to swoop onto a target was impressive, but behind the times. The paint was discolored in several places – something that would make no difference to the handling of the shuttle, or the safety of its systems, but which would not be the case with modern metallic blends. With a loud grind, the shuttle's airlock began to open, and there was a faint – and not pleasant – odor from inside, evidently the tang of the shuttle's air purifiers not quite being up to the job.

Striding down the ramp was a figure out of a history book; a khaki uniform topped off with a tall, red, domed helmet, a feather carefully placed at the top. The Governor looked around at the assembled guard, and with a quick look from Zakharova, the guard snapped to attention. A pair of aides stepped out of the shuttle, both similarly impeccably dressed, and the Governor walked up to Marshall, his eyes burrowing in as if they were trying to find a weakness to exploit.

"Welcome to the Triplanetary Starship Alamo, Governor." Marshall held out his hand; the Governor looked down for a brief second and took it, shaking with a firm grip.

"It's a pleasure to be on board, Captain. You appear to keep a well-disciplined ship."

"May I introduce my senior officers?"

"By all means."

Marshall walked the Governor down the ranks, introducing each in turn, taking careful note of any reaction by either the Governor or the officer involved, but none made any sign of recognition. Such a discovery would have been useful; he made a note to review the camera footage later on, in case he'd managed to miss anything. There was somehow a sense from the Governor that he was going through the motions, that the pomp and ceremony he had insisted upon was simply in order to prove a point.

"Governor, perhaps you would be interested in a brief tour of Alamo?"

He shook his head, "I think we have rather pressing business to discuss, Captain, do you not agree? Though I feel certain that my aides would benefit from such a tour?"

And be recording every nut and bolt in the ship, no doubt, Marshall thought. "Delighted. Lieutenant Zakharova, if you would conduct these two gentlemen on a tour of the ship?"

She looked venom at him, obviously frustrated about being left out of the meeting, but it was not lost on Marshall that the Governor was making sure that he was alone as well. He looked at the aides to see how they felt, catching a quick glimpse from one to the other that suggested that all was not well in their world. Marshall directed him into the elevator, and they silently rode up to the bridge. In a carefully choreographed, move, Ryder stood to attention as the elevator doors opened, the remainder of the crew joining her.

"As you were, Sub-Lieutenant," Marshall said, and the crew returned to their posts. "This way, Governor."

The office doors slid closed, and the Governor sat down, looking out over Ragnarok with a familiar air. "Spaceships have certainly come a long way since we left Earth, Captain. My complements on your technical skill."

Alamo, of course, was more than two decades old, but Marshall wasn't about to let that show. "Thank you, Governor. Would you like something to drink?"

"Nothing, thank you. I suggest we immediately proceed to the matter at hand."

Pulling a datapad out of a draw, Marshall handed it to the Governor. The picture on the screen was the freighter hull the shuttle had photographed during its landing run; Khachaturian had managed some excellent shots. "I believe you have something belonging to us, Governor. Am I to presume that the other two ships are similarly being broken for parts on your world?"

"You can presume that three ships that entered orbit without permission and acted in a menacing manner, sufficient that our planetary defense apparatus had to be utilized to contain a clear threat to our sovereignty, have been disposed with in a manner that is for the ultimate benefit of the people I am responsible for."

"No-one is recording us, Governor. If all of your responses are so long-winded, I venture that we might be here for some time." Silence filled the room for a moment, and Marshall pushed home. "Where is your defense apparatus now?"

A flicker of uncertainty shot across his face, before he replied, "Safe, behind Gatewood."

"Two frigates. Of an unknown type. You have no significant space-based infrastructure, Governor, so how are you supporting those ships? Not to mention the mining operations being undertaken on your outer moons."

"I don't think that I am here to answer your questions, Captain," the Governor said, mustering some bluster.

"I want my people back, and I suspect that Cornucopia Mining will want compensation for their ships," Marshall said, folding his arms. "What do you want?"

The Governor stood up, walking over to the viewport in three long strides, looking out over the moon, contemplating it for a moment. "I am responsible for twenty-three thousand human beings, Captain, half of them under eighteen. Can you imagine what that feels like, what that means? They are totally dependent on the decisions I make next, the consequences of the choices I make. What do I want, Captain? I want them to be safe, well-fed, and healthy. Those are the limits of my ambitions."

And ego, Marshall silently added. He turned in his chair, saying, "I can understand the salvage value of the freighters to a small colony like this. What about the crews?"

"Understand my position. Ragnarok is self-sufficient – just, but we still lack so many of the necessities. We're out to build a new home for humanity out here, Captain. So rest assured that I bear neither you nor your Triplanetary Confederation any ill-will."

"What is it you want?"

"I will return your people, Captain Marshall. But I will require a hundred million Triplanetary Credits as reparation payments. Which, of course, we would he happy to spend with some of your corporations."

That would about cover the cost of two Alamos, and then some left over; he replied, "That amount of money is out of the question. More than a million per crewmember?"

"I am prepared to negotiate. Perhaps you would rather provide goods in kind instead of currency? I have a list of the materials we would be willing to accept on such a basis." He slid over a paper printout, the ink slightly smudged. Marshall quickly scanned it, and placed it on one side of the desk.

"On what basis do you demand reparations, Governor? Our people were here on a prospecting expedition, nothing more."

The Governor's eyes darted around the office. "We are not all masters of our souls, Captain. They were here to exploit my people, to employ them as a servile labor force to support their theft of the resources in our system. Someday we will need them, will want to develop those worlds to support our own industries. That won't happen if someone else has sucked them all dry."

"Dreams of the future, Governor?"

"The near future, I hope. I was an officer on a starship myself once, and I like to think that my daughter might have a similar opportunity, even if it is denied to me."

Rising, Marshall walked around the office to the Triplanetary flag, black and green, draped over a flagpole in a corner. He ran his hand down the material, then turned to face his honored guest. "There is perhaps an alternative that you might not have considered."

"Believe me when I say that my staff and I have considered all of the alternatives open to us at this point."

"Join the Triplanetary Confederation as an Associated State."

His ears twitched for an instant. "What would that mean?"

"Full access to technological advances; your shuttle suggests that you are somewhat behind the times. Education and economic aid packages to support you, a say in the running of a multi-planet alliance. Defense against any possible enemies," Marshall noticed the Governor's eyes widening at that, "and assistance in the exploitation of your own resources."

"What do you get out such a munificent deal?"

"Plenty, Governor! An outpost in interstellar space, our corporations would have new markets for their products – but with safeguards to ensure your people are not taken advantage of."

The Governor slammed his hand on the wall, "The same old story, eh! Join us, and we will make you great! We left Earth to escape just that sort of threat, Captain, because we saw that everything was beginning to fall apart. We want to provide a safe haven to ensure that mankind will survive, and joining with an entangling alliance will not serve that end. I said as much to the Cabal when they made the same offer, and I said the same to the Republic. We might be able to make a deal, Captain, but it must be on our terms, not on yours."

Marshall's eyes suddenly widened. The Republic – obviously the Lunar Republic had been out here at some point in recent history. The Cabal, on the other hand, was another story...that was something completely new. A part of him ached to ask the Governor what he meant, who the Cabal was, but both the diplomat and soldier in him overrode the explorer, determined not to expose any potential weaknesses to his opponent.

"I'm sorry you feel that way, Governor, and I suspect that you will not accept our assurances that we are better than the other groups you have mentioned."

The Governor nodded, "You would not have risen so far in your system unless you believed with all your heart that it was the better; I accept that, but cannot share your bias."

"I will consider your offer, Governor, but my orders do not extend to making such sums available in exchange for the recovery of the crewmen. I might have some options for flexibility on the ships; if you simply returned the freighter crews to me, then I would happily leave the system."

"Unfortunately I do not believe that you have given me any options I have the freedom to consider. I regret our meeting in this way, Captain, very much." He made his way over to the door. "Perhaps I might accept that offer of a tour now, rather than return home immediately. I'd forgotten how much I missed standing on the deck of a spaceship."

The light in his face when he said those words was familiar enough to Marshall that he was not inclined to disagree. "I shall arrange for Sub-Lieutenant Ryder to have you escorted to join your aides. I fear I have duties that require my urgent attention."

The Governor smiled understandingly, "You want me out of the way while you consult your key staff. Understood, Captain, and very diplomatic of you."

Marshall made the necessary arrangements, and waited a moment for the Governor to leave the room. His first instinct was to call Caine, seek her advice; but he had a whole staff of officers to choose from, and one in particular seemed unusually appropriate.

"Lieutenant Dietz, please report to my office immediately."

He waited for a moment, pouring himself a cup of coffee which proved to be just as much of an onslaught on his tastebuds as normal, looking up at his father's picture. Back on Hercules, Major Marshall never had to deal with any such diplomatic shenanigans as this; it was just a question of finding the best place to ambush an unwary UN transport, or to hide from an enemy convoy when it blazed through a system. The occasional raid on an enemy outpost for fun and variety when they thought they could get away with it. Lieutenant-Captain Marshall had to live with a more complicated world.

The door opened, and Dietz walked in, taking a seat. The uniform seemed almost as if it had been made for him; of all the officers on the ship, he was the only one who looked at least moderately comfortable in it. Marshall finally shrugged off the restrictive jacket and draped it over the back of his chair.

"Feel free to make yourself comfortable, Lieutenant."

"Are you anticipating an extended meeting, Captain?"

Smiling, Marshall replied, "Two minutes in this straightjacket counts as extended to me. I'd like your opinion of this." He slid the printout across the table; Dietz leaned over, quickly scanning it, then pulling out his datapad and calling up a few files. It was almost half a cup of lousy coffee before he looked up again.

"Interesting list. I note that there are several items on it that we could fabricate quite easily on board."

"So why aren't they doing it on the surface?"

The lieutenant waved the list in the air, "Possibly they lack access to such technology. Do you believe that the Triplanetary government will agree to provide such items?"

"As an aid package, maybe, but in exchange for hostages? Not in a million years, and I wouldn't want to be a member of a fleet that did. Pay a ransom once, and you are stuck with the precedent forever. We've got a lot of scattered outposts around Sol System that could be taken advantage of in this way."

Dietz nodded in his usual curt manner. "I agree, Captain. It is not an example that we dare set. I presume you have considered that we have the advantage of a potential hostage on board?"

"That won't get our people back, and there's plenty of things they could do with that shuttle in the bay if they wanted to. Either on some sort of time-delay, a dead-man's switch, or a trigger from the ground. I'd rather knock out their satellite network, and yet," Marshall tapped his desk, "I don't think we have that option either, not now."

"Why not? I agree with you regarding the Governor," Marshall was beginning to feel as if his subordinate was testing him, "but the satellites would seem a sensible target."

"Look at that list again. That tells me the colony's on a knife-edge. I don't want to be the one responsible for its failure; and with twenty thousand and more on Ragnarok...tell me, Dietz, is there anything like enough capacity to get them to somewhere else? We'd have a hard enough time doing an evacuation that big in Sol with conventional-drive vessels."

Pondering for a second, Dietz replied, "The United Nations has such capability with its Cabral-class colony ships. It would take three such vessels, of course, and the cost would be enormous, economically and politically. Otherwise, I suspect we would be tying up every publicly and privately owned FTL-capable ship in the Confederation for months, at best. Of course, we would have no obligation other than the moral to solve such a crisis."

"I'm not walking away from a disaster, Mr. Dietz."

"I was speculating whether or not the Cabinet would see things the same way, or for that matter the Combined Chiefs of Staff."

He pondered that one for a minute, and shook his head. "The Chiefs might go for it – a good way to get some nice public relations for minimal risk. Lots of pictures of happy children and grateful parents; I was in on the evacuation of that anarchist compound on Eureka, and we spent more time talking to journalists than we did down at the settlement. I don't want it to get to that point."

"So our actions must be carefully judged to ensure that we do no harm to the colony that would force an evacuation. I would suggest you enter that as an official mission parameter in the logs, in the event of your incapacitation."

"Noted. I also note that such a parameter does not exclude launching another raid to find and release the prisoners."

"Counting the shuttle that is on loan from Spaceman Orlova, we have only capacity to take off thirty people at a time."

Marshall nodded, "Which means that we'd have to make at least two, possibly three trips, assuming we use all the remaining espatiers. That's a long time to hold an airhead.”

"First we have to find them, Captain. It's a large planet, and their installations are all based on the same template; hence they are similar enough that we would detect few features from orbit."

"If we get communications with the planet for a moment, that needs to be passed on to Ensign Esposito as a top priority – make sure all of the duty communications technicians know to pass that along. In the meanwhile, see what you can do with pattern analysis of traffic."

Dietz frowned, "That could take some time with such a small population."

"Then we'd best get started now. Dismissed, Lieutenant."

The officer nodded, stood to attention, and left the room. Marshall called up an image of the planet's surface, picked up during the most recent pass. Not much detail was visible in the inhabited area; a heavy blizzard was setting in, and the cloud cover provided almost total obscurity. He looked at his watch; likely the Governor would be requesting to stay for dinner based on the weather below. More work undone, more time spent in his heavy number ones. Still, he couldn't begrudge the Governor. No way he'd want to travel in conditions like that.

Chapter 16

The biting wind tore through Orlova's cold-weather jacket; for the fiftieth time she was regretting her decision to go along with Esposito when she insisted on immediately leaving to speak with the Free Parliament on behalf of the freighter crews. Forbes had required considerable convincing to leave the warm interior of the shuttle, only relenting when Hunter insisted on going along as well.

Visibility was getting dangerously close to zero; flurries of snow danced around Orlova's feet, the mask strapped in front of her mouth seeming a poor shield from the weather. Loops of cabling connected the four people together, Forbes hunched over his old navicomputer, trying to keep his way in the storm.

When they had set out, he had claimed that it was just a couple of hours' walking distance, but it seemed like they had been struggling across the landscape for almost forever, trudging their way through an endless wilderness of white. That Esposito seemed to be having no problem with the forced march was slightly annoying.

Being cold was a reasonably new experience for Orlova; life in a collection of colonies and spaceships had meant that room temperature, with the occasional sauna, was the limit of her experience. Her teeth chattered, involuntarily, and she reached down to adjust the temperature control on her jacket, finding for the fifth time that the elements were at maximum, but trying to turn the dial slightly further to the right in the faint hope that an additional trace of energy could still be squeezed out of the system.

It was her feet that were the worst; they felt like two blocks of ice, sliding across the ground, numb. When Forbes had said that it was a five mile walk; hell, she could do that on a treadmill without breaking a serious sweat, but this was different. Treadmills didn't have sharp rocks, didn't slope up and down, and she didn't have to keep making detours to stay out of sight.

Nor was the view particularly spectacular, even when there was some visibility to enjoy it. Ragnarok might be an excellent site to choose for a now-redundant last refuge for mankind, but as a tourist site it didn't have very much to commend it. Nothing but endless white with the occasional rocky outcrop, and tall, snow covered mountains in the distance. Forbes had said something about the area being a sheet of ice a mile deep, as had once existed on Earth, but to her – ice was something that was found in cubes at the bottom of a drink.

Finally, Forbes raised his hand and chopped it up and down twice; Orlova could just make out a red light on the horizon, a beam pointed in their direction. The quartet trudged their way through the snow, their tracks immediately covered by the growing blizzard. No danger of any Government fliers spotting them, no danger of them even venturing from their bases in this weather.

The light grew larger and larger as they closed in, and a series of loud, shrill whistles began to sound, blasting through the roar of the wind. As they approached, a door opened, and a trio of men wearing camouflage, carrying rifles that were barely more advanced than the one Forbes had slung across his back, walked out into the snow, helping them into the domed building. One of them had a pair of pips crudely drawn onto each shoulder, the others each had a single v-stripe on their arms.

Pips was the first one to speak, clapping Forbes on the back, "What the devil is an old-time rock smasher doing out in a blizzard? Thought you would know better." With his mask off, pips was a young redhead with pale skin that had obviously rarely seen sunlight, the beginnings of a mustache on the top of his lip.

Forbes grunted in reply, then gestured around, "These three are from the Triplanetary mob, Clive. Same as that freighter crewmen you have here."

"Oh?" Clive replied, beginning to reach for his pistol – meeting a similar response from Esposito and Hunter.

"Relax, you idiot. They're on our side. I watched them shoot up a group of guardsmen out at the landing field, one of the Governor's clowns tried to arrest them on landing," Forbes said. "Now how about some hot coffee, mate?"

"That can wait a bit," Esposito said. "Are you in charge here?"

"Me? I'm just a humble Lieutenant, ma'am." He turned to Hunter, "How can we help you?"

With a sigh, Esposito continued, "I am Ensign Esposito, from the Triplanetary Starship Alamo currently orbiting your planet, and in command of the landing force." He gestured at the others, "This is Spaceman Orlova, my shuttle pilot, and Lance-Sergeant Hunter, my senior NCO."

Clive's eyebrows raised; clearly this was something he wasn't used to. "You'll have to forgive me, Ensign. We don't tend to have women in our militia. I'm First Lieutenant Clive Grainger, second-in-command of our garrison here at Fort Sterling."

"I'd like to see the crewmen you have at this facility, as soon as possible. I understand that he is being put on trial? What for?"

The young lieutenant looked extremely uncomfortable, looking at Forbes who shrugged in response. "That might be difficult to arrange, ma'am."

"Indeed?" The door opened, and a tall, powerfully-built gray-haired man wearing a neat khaki uniform walked in, a crossed sword-and-baton on each shoulder. The three soldiers stood to attention, while Forbes looked on with an air of indifference. Esposito turned and saluted.

"May I present Ensign Esposito of the Triplanetary Fleet, General?" Clive said. "Ensign, this is General Haynes, the commander of the resistance, and Acting Prime Minister of the Free Parliament."

Haynes turned to the lieutenant, "I'm capable of introducing myself, Clive. Why don't you and your guys take Forbes down to the pub while I take our guests from space into my office for a chat? That suit you, Ensign?"

Esposito nodded, "That's what I came here for, sir."

The general gestured towards a door, leading the way down a long curving corridor that seemed to extend around most of the perimeter of the dome, keeping up a running commentary throughout,

"Officially, this is a research installation for genetically modified crops – which means that visitors are extremely discouraged. That research got stopped months back, though, wasn't working out, but we never let the Governor know. Serves as an excellent base for us, and is defended well enough that we could give anyone a bloody nose if they were stupid enough to try something."

"Have you been attacked?" Orlova asked, looking around the room.

"Not yet, but that ass of a Governor's building up the nerve to try something like that. Trouble is that we still have a lot of valuable research materials that we'd be able to bargain with if it came to the crunch, and he's not going to want to risk losing them in a full-scale firefight. Both of us have too damn much to lose."

The group walked into the general's office; he gestured them towards spartan plastic chairs while he made his way over to a cabinet, pouring four generous drinks out of a bottle, then sealing it up with great care. He passed the plastic cups around, took a quick sip, sighed, and sat behind his desk, resting his elbows on its surface in a relaxed posture.

"I'm afraid I was listening in to the conversation you were having with the lieutenant. He'll be a good officer when he grows up, I reckon, but a bit stiff these days. If Bill Forbes says that you are on our side, I'm going to believe him, hard as it sounds, and I reckon I'm even willing to let you speak to your crewman, but I have a horrible feeling that I'm going to end up disappointing you."

"In what way, sir?" Esposito asked.

"You're going to want to take him back up to that ship of yours, and I don't think I can let that happen."

Orlova took a sip of the drink, and gagged a little; she didn't think that it deserved the loving attention that had been provided to it by the general. "Why not? What charges have you against him?"

The general's face reddened, and he looked out of the small window at his office as the storm began to fade. "It isn't a question of charges, as it goes. More a question of politics."

"Politics?" Esposito asked, her hand reaching down slightly towards her holster.

The door slid open, and three men – led by the lieutenant – stepped in, each carrying rather deadly looking modern plasma rifles, all of them of a make similar to the weapons they had found on Mariner Station, manufactured in the Lunar Republic. Esposito and Hunter reached down quickly for their pistols before thinking better of it, and instead let them remain in their holsters.

"General, I must point out that our ship is in orbit, and that it has sufficient space-to-ground capability to give you a very bad day when they find out where we are," Esposito said.

"I'm afraid that I don't believe that your commander would put you at such risk. Orbital weaponry is excellent strategically, and even in some battlefield situations, but it lacks finesse. Besides, we have ships up there as well that are more than capable of handling your Alamo."

Orlova smiled, "You don't know our commander. He'll do what it takes to get us back."

The general slid a datapad across the desk towards the young pilot, shaking his head. "I hate to contradict a lady, but I have a full file on your Flight Commander Zubinsky right here. He seems like a good officer, but too rigid, too by-the-book to take risks like that."

Zubinsky? Orlova just about managed to keep any emotion from her face, but she noticed a flicker from Hunter that hopefully passed by the general unawares. "You might have read him wrong," she replied. "I haven't known him to be like that at all."

"What do you intend to do with us? Firing squad?" Hunter asked. "And what about the rest of the squad?"

"By now they have all been placed under lockdown in the crashed shuttle. You three will be placed into detention with your countryman, until you can be transferred to the Luzhou. None of you will be mistreated, as far as I am concerned you are prisoners of war."

"Don't get the idea that we want to do this," Lieutenant Grainger said. "Under the terms of our agreement with the Lunar Republic, we have to transfer any non-nationals to their jurisdiction as soon as possible. They'll take you back to Sol, and then as soon as the situation here is resolved and a democratic government re-instituted, you will be repatriated back to your homeworld."

"I see," said Esposito. "I formally protest on the behalf of the Triplanetary government this action; I will also indicate that we will make every attempt to escape at the first opportunity."

The general shook his head, "Textbook, Ensign, but it is twenty miles from here to the nearest settlement, if you knew where it is."

"One question," said Orlova, "If I may, General?"

The old man nodded, sadly, "I suppose it's the least I can do."

"Why is the planetary government holding the rest of the crewmen hostage?"

"Extortion. The Governor's hoping that he can get enough money from your government to pay for some bread and circuses for the people."

Grainger added, "Bastards only got those crews by blind luck anyway." The general stopped him with a glare.

Draining her drink in on gulp, Orlova rose, the guns trained on her, "Shall we get on with it, then? If you are going to throw us in the cells. Or are you planning on forcing us to drink more of this swill?"

"In my day, young woman, junior enlisted types were seen and not heard. If I were your commanding officer I would put you on report." He gave Esposito a look.

"You putting me on report, Ensign?" Orlova said, looking over at the officer.

"Oh, I would always expect that you would always treat any officer with the respect he deserves."

Hunter laughed at that, attracting a glare from the two rebel officers. "I think our meeting is over. Grainger, have them escorted to the holding cells. Give them a meal; might as well have them well-fed for the journey."

With a nod, Grainger rose his gun, pointing it at the door. Hunter and Esposito left their unfinished drinks in the office as they filed out of the room, their weapons taken from their holsters as they went out into the corridor. As the door closed, they could hear the general pouring himself another drink.

They were escorted around a long corridor, decorated with murals painted on the wall, all of them showing stylized landscapes of a future, transformed Ragnarok – jungles and forests, sandy beaches dominated by Gatewood hanging in the sky. Such a world was centuries away. The last three murals were unfinished, though a small boy was busily working on one of them, painting in seabirds arcing over an inviting ocean, waves crashing over the rocks.

The lieutenant pointed his gun at a door, and the trio walked in, a series of bolts slamming home behind them to restrain them. Sitting on a plastic chair in the corner was a man wearing a spacer's jumpsuit, a shaggy brown beard on his face; he looked up at them with pity in his eyes.

"So, they bagged you three as well, then. I'm Jennings, Second Mate on the Bill Barker. At least, I was until those damn Loonies splashed us." He looked at them again, frowning. "What company are you with?"

Esposito looked around at the others, then back at Jennings, "I'm not with any company, Mr. Jennings. I am Ensign Esposito, Triplanetary Espatier Corps. This is Lance-Sergeant Hunter, and Spaceman Orlova."

The crewman rose to his feet, slapping Hunter on the shoulder, "The cavalry's here, then! Fantastic! Are you here to spring me, or have you managed to negotiate my release? We need to get everyone else out, as fast as we can, and we need to get moving too."

"I regret, Mr. Jennings, that we are prisoners as well," Esposito said, watching the man's face turn from a grin to a scowl. He sat back down on his chair.

"Useless, then."

Orlova sat down on another chair, "Hardly. What happened? We've yet to get the full story from anyone."

"We were sent into the system to conduct surveys of Ragnarok and the outer moons; the company crews with us were red-hot about setting up a base of operations out here, and when they spotted the satellite networks and what we thought were a pair of space stations, we headed right in, despite Captain Moraine's protests. Damn stupid. We should have kept at least one ship back. How did you find out about us, anyway?"

"Cornucopia sent in another ship to see what had happened. When it came back shot to pieces, they called for us."

"Huh. Well, we broke into orbit, started signaling, wanted to negotiate with the planetary leaders for basing rights, purchase of foodstuffs, that sort of thing. I mean, there's the support network for a big mining operation. Our sensor crews saw that there was some work taking place out in the trojans already, so we even figured we might be able to buy someone out, purchase the data we were looking for."

"Let me guess, those 'space stations' opened fire on you," Orlova said, shaking her head in disbelief.

Jennings nodded, "Yeah. We were hit first, skipper ordered all hands to the escape pods. He tried to bring the ship down – we had a marginal capacity to land on low-gravity worlds. Don't think he made it, though."

"We saw a crash-landed freighter when we were coming in," Hunter said, "I guess he didn't quite pull it off."

"He deserved a damn sight better than that. The Felix Pedro got pummeled and the crew made for the pods, the London surrendered. At least, I guess so – we never saw any of the crew, but the guys from the Pedro said that it was captured intact. When we got down on the deck, we were all rounded up pretty quickly. Good thing to, it's damn cold down here."

"I'd noticed," Orlova said, sardonically.

"Then we found out that we'd been captured by the other side. The Government boys denied knowing anything about a battle in orbit, certainly denied that they were operating any frigates, but took us to a holding area. We soon worked out that it was a prison camp, though they treated us well enough."

"Do you know where that camp was?" Esposito asked anxiously.

"I could find it on a map easily enough. I had three weeks to get to know the landmarks. We all decided that one of us should try and make a break for it, and I drew the short straw. I don't know what we were hoping for exactly, though we'd got the idea from some of the guards that there were rebels out in the hills. Took some doing, but I broke out one night. They weren't expecting it."

"Then you managed to hook up with the rebels, only to find out that they were the ones who had shot you down in the first place," Orlova said. "How long have you been here?"

"Three days. I was told that it would be four before I was transferred to one of the frigates upstairs, they must have an FTL tender out there or something, because we're being taken to Luna. I know this much – the crews aren't just Loonies up there, but they've got Rockies up there as well."

"Rockies?" Hunter asked, lines of confusion in his forehead.

"Ragnarokites, whatever you want to call them. I've heard some of the guards asking for transfers up there. I get the impression its a big team effort."

Esposito sighed, "With the Lunar Republic backing a rebel group in order to knock the government out of power and put their stooges in place. Then when other ships come out here they find an outpost belonging to the Republic, all signed, sealed and delivered. I wonder if they know what they are getting themselves in to?"

"They don't. At least, I don't think most of them do. They all seem to think that they'll have a free and fair government that will re-start the terraforming project," Jennings said.

"We've got to get out of here, get word of this back to Alamo," Esposito said. "We need a communications relay."

"First of all, we need to get out of this cell," Orlova said. "Anyone got any ideas?"

Hunter patted one of his pockets, revealing the outline of a long cylinder, and smiled.

Chapter 17

The observation deck was all but empty; Alamo was well into the night shift, and the majority of the crew were asleep, the remainder at their posts, waiting for trouble. Marshall stood in front of the viewport, watching a pair of moons slowly transiting Gatewood, passing under its thin, fragile ring.

Beyond, Lalande was rising over the huge gas giant, the dull orange glare providing little in the way of warmth through the millions of miles of space. His thoughts were on the far side of the gas giant; they'd have some warning if the frigates appeared. Enough for him to decide whether to fight a battle in orbit or a battle at the transit point to hendecaspace.

A datapad dangling in his hands held what little the sensor operator had been able to discern during the brief encounter on their arrival into the system; it was sufficient to worry him, but not enough to allow him to resolve his fears. He barely heard the door sliding open behind him, just registering the figure of Mulenga walking up to his side.

"Isn't it an astounding sight, Captain. A gravitational dance with dozens of partners acting as one."

Marshall turned to his astrogator, shaking his head, "I never thought of it like that before."

Mulenga paused. "You are seeking enlightenment, up here? Most commanders I've served with find a place to meditate with their thoughts before a battle, or a decision. After a time the rest of the crew learn when they are required to avoid such places and give their leader a chance to collect himself."

"I should probably be in my office, or up on the bridge, rather than monopolizing the best view on the ship."

"That is a Captain's prerogative, at times.” He paused. “At some point those two frigates are going to arch over Gatewood, closing for battle. It is as inevitable as Ragnarok's passage around the planet."

"Then I have to decide whether to fight or flee, leaving behind ten of my crew and the people I was sent here to rescue."

The astrogator smiled, clapped him on the shoulder, and said, "I venture you have already made your decision, then."

Marshall gestured out towards the gas giant. "They can cover both egress points at will. One ship here, one to the nearest egress point." He tapped the datapad. "One thing we did get from the battle is the knowledge that they have an acceleration advantage. All the simulations say that they can concentrate force on us whenever they choose to do so."

"The answer?"

The captain smiled, "He has only one move that makes any tactical sense – to attempt to engage a joint action, using his increased speed. He'll do it with a pincer movement, so I must break orbit and attack. If I can knock out one of the frigates before they can join forces, then we have a chance. Of course, my counterpart knows that. He will also know that after that battle, his remaining frigate would likely be able to defeat me."

"So your answer – is no answer at all."

"It is a chance, Lieutenant. And right now it's all I can think of. Short of breaking now and retreating from the system. With people on the ground, I can't do that either."

Mulenga looked to the side, gesturing at Ragnarok, hanging in space. "You are considering this as a tactical problem. There is a strategic goal you need to consider."

"What is that?"

"Ragnarok. Have you thought about what happens after our mission, even if we win?"

The young captain pondered for a second, rubbing his hand across his chin, "If I'm honest, no. I dangled Triplanetary membership in front of the Governor as an option, but he rejected it out of hand. Which I expected."

"Down there is a colony that at present lacks the means to defend itself, but which – simply by virtue of its existence – is a valuable resource. A perfect support system for mining the moons of Gatewood, or even the trojan points. How much would that save any company, Captain?"

Marshall nodded, "That's why Russia and EuroFed colonized Callisto in the first place. Hell, it's what made Mars economically self-sufficient."

"The difference being that those were citizens. The colonists at Callisto were citizens of the European Federation, or the Russian Union; those of Mars were citizens of the United States, Canada, Britain...they had the rights and privileges of citizens. That isn't the parallel that you should be considering. What do you think would happen if the Lunar Republic, or the United Nations moved in? Or even one of our own MegaCorps, unsupervised?"

"Probably they'd annex the planet, tie the government down with 'assistance' treaties and contracts that would be impossibly one-way, and the colonists would end up working for minimal wages in their domes, sending food and supplies up to the corporations." He sighed. "Probably? Certainly."

"The end result would be effective slavery, Captain. Followed, I suspect, by revolution, but the bloodshed would be catastrophic. Such has happened before. My people, back on Earth, were 'colonized' by the British. We too were a 'resource' that could support mining operations, could make others wealthy. Eventually the British left, and we tried to get a start for independence, to determine our own destiny once again."

The astrogator was speaking with a passion that Marshall hadn't seen in the man before. "Then we struggled. There were famines, plagues, resource shortages such as those down there. Some of our leaders were corrupt, but others thought that survival was better than freedom."

"If I remember my history correctly, then the Chinese and Indians moved in."

Mulenga nodded. "In a century we had lost our freedom again, and worse; we found ourselves fighting each other during the African Wars, fighting over which far-off land would rule us." He looked out over the stars, "Our flight to Titan was not simply to escape the Third World War, it was a determination that this should never happen again, that our people should be able to guide their own destiny on their own terms, now and forever. I see the same cycle beginning on Ragnarok, Captain, and I implore you to prevent it."

Marshall turned, walking across the room to look at Ragnarok, slowly rotating beside the ship, a white jewel hanging in space. A new potential home for mankind, possibly another Earth one day. He turned back to face Mulenga, still standing in the middle of the room.

"I'm going to do my absolute best, Lieutenant. If we can get them in the Confederation, then perhaps we might be able to stop your cycle from beginning." He turned back to the starfield. "Right now I don't have any idea how I'm going to make that happen, but we're not breaking orbit until we have."

"Is the Confederation any better, Captain?"

"You noted the difference yourself. If they are citizens, they can't be exploited by corporations. Not without us getting in the way. And we might be able to help them build that new world of theirs."

Mulenga coughed a couple of times, then replied, "I hope you are right. I just wish they could have the opportunity to carve their own path. It would have been interesting to see what they could have accomplished in another century."

Marshall nodded, and found himself gasping a couple of times. He walked across to the life support telltales, flicking a couple of switches. "All green. Something's off with the mix, though."

"I was thinking the same thing, sir."

"Better clear the room, I'll report it to Engineering and get someone up here." He took another breath, rasping a bit. "Need to warn them to put respirators on."

He walked up to the door, Mulenga behind him, but it failed to open as he approached. He waved his hand across the motion sensor, but nothing happened, then jabbed his finger on the emergency release. Mulenga looked urgently at him, then pulled his communicator out of his belt, tapping for the bridge, but only static replied. Marshall snatched it away, tapped it again, and reached for his own, stabbing down hard on the emergency button. Silence filled the room; his didn't even have any static.

"Nothing. Someone must have knocked out the internal comm system," the astrogator said.

"That's the least of our problems," Marshall said, panting. "Oxygen content's far too low." He went over to the room's emergency kit, popping open the door to find it open. A slashed spacesuit, and a gap where a dozen respirators ought to be hanging. "They did a damn thorough job, whoever they were." He reached down at the suit, then shook his head, "They even took out the carbon dioxide filters."

Mulenga raced back to the telltales, tapping at the controls, "All the telemetry's been turned off, set to maintenance cycle. No-one on the bridge will know what's happening. I can't override it, not until the cycle ends."

"By then it will be too late. I don't think we have more than a few minutes," Marshall said, dropping to the deck. "Conserve the oxygen, we've got to think." His brain was beginning to spin, the lack of oxygen seeping away his rational thought processes. Everything began to blur out. Mulenga was lying on the deck, muttering to himself, tossing his head back and forth. Even in his dazed state, he realized that he probably only had a few seconds of thought left to him before he dropped into a stupor.

He lethargically looked around the room, staggered to his feet, then lurched across the room towards the life support telltales, pulling his communicator out of his belt. With a strength born of desperation, he smashed the communicator into the console, once, then twice. There were a series of resounding smashes as the monitor broke, plastiglass dropping to the floor, leaving an open space behind, and he thrust the communicator in, gasping from the electric shock. He dropped down to the deck, scratching himself on the shards, and began focusing simply on breathing, trying to stay as still as possible.

The lack of oxygen began to affect him, the room began to dance around him. Lights began to flash from nowhere, disappearing just as quickly, but there was no sense of panic, no alarm. The temptation to simply fall asleep was strong, so strong, but he tried to fight it, knowing somehow that to give in to the weariness would mean that he would never wake up.

All he could hear was the rasping sound of his breath, as he tried to suck the last remaining molecules of air out of the room, desperately fighting for a few last seconds of life. There was no sound from the astrogator; with a last effort, Marshall turned himself to face the stars, focusing on them as the last remnants of his consciousness ebbed away.

There was a sound, a whooshing noise, then voices, as if they were far away, but figures were swimming over him. One put something over his mouth, and suddenly he could breathe deeply. Rich oxygen filled his lungs as he took breath after breath, then he reached down to try and push himself up.

"I've called a medic, sir," the voice said, resolving itself into a vaguely familiar face.

"That you, Khachaturian?" Marshall asked in between breaths.

"Lieutenant Quinn sent me up to take a look at the monitors when they stopped working. I had to break in."

A memory crept into his mind, "Mulenga?"

"He's fine, sir. Corporal Stiles is with him; he helped me get into the room. I don't think I could have managed it by myself."

"You did fine, Spaceman. Help me up, and then call Sub-Lieutenant Tyler here."

Confusion crept across the face of the young crewman, "I've got medical and engineering teams on the way, sir."

"And we need Security in on this as well." He looked over at the still unconscious astrogator, and continued, "Someone just tried to murder two people. This was no accident."

Chapter 18

The four prisoners sat in their cell; it had seemed like hours since they had been escorted there, the only interruption a quartet of combat rations pushed through the door. They'd eaten them more out of a sense of duty than any enthusiasm. Without even a window, and with none of their watches synchronized to planetary time, they had no way of telling whether it was dusk or dawn.

"Are we breaking out, then?" Orlova asked, breaking the silence.

"We looked around the cell, and there was no way out. No-one's come in, either," said Hunter. "If you can walk through walls, why'd you wait this long to bust us out."

Esposito smiled, then turned to the pilot, "Our best chance is when they come to take us to the shuttle." She frowned, then continued, "How they'll get us past Alamo without them finding out, I don't know."

"They won't even try," Orlova replied.

"You think they'll just shoot us?" Jennings asked, fear creeping into his voice.

She shook her head. "It won't be a shuttle, a fast transport. Probably go around the planet and blast towards Gatewood, gaining some distance before the ship picks it up. If they're threatened, then they have four hostages aboard, and they must have figured that Captain Zubinsky," Orlova was careful to maintain the out-of-date intelligence that their captors had, "wouldn't push it. Alamo couldn't outrun them if they got some speed up anyway, and they only need to hook up with a tender at some point to top up."

There was a loud bang on the door, and the bolts began to rattle, until only one was left. "We're coming in, with two guns pointed at the door. We'll shoot if there is any trouble." The voice sounded like Grainger. "Respond with understanding."

Hunter looked longingly at the space beside the door, but Esposito shook her head and gestured for them to stand beside the wall. "We're at the back of the room, Lieutenant," she replied.

The door opened in two jerks, and Grainger gestured for them to leave. The group headed out into the corridor, walking the long way around, covered at all times by a pair of dangerous-looking guards. After they had gone a few dozen paces, Forbes walked up, carrying four pairs of magnetic manacles.

Without saying a word, he pulled Esposito's hands behind her back, and clamped the manacles home. While she watched him do the same with Jennings, she tried to twist her hands, and much to her surprise, they moved. Hoping no-one had noticed, she moved back into position, biding her time.

"They're all tied up, Clive."

"You really should call me by my rank while I'm on duty," Grainger replied. "You coming with us, then?"

The old prospector waved a package, "Got some messages for Group Captain Parry."

Esposito looked at Hunter; the sergeant shrugged a little, a gesture that suggested that his bonds were loose as well. Either the manacles weren't working right, or they had a friend helping them out. The guards pointed their guns towards a door, cold air seeping out around it; the door opened to reveal a landing pad inside the compound, snow heaped around, the wind whipping at their faces. Inside, a sleek transit shuttle, unmistakably a Lunar Republic fast courier, was sitting, its pilot climbing into the cockpit.

"Nice ship," Orlova said.

"You'll get a chance to admire it for a while. In flight," Grainger said, as he climbed into the pilot's cabin, taking the co-pilot's seat. Forbes moved forward, opening the door to the rear compartment, and the guards gestured them in, the last to climb into the passenger section and take their seats, being careful to keep their guns in reach while Forbes strapped everyone down, taking the jump seat for himself. There was a loud roar from underneath them, thrusters firing to push them to altitude before the main engines engaged. A few seconds of that, and all of them were pushed back into their seats as the acceleration began.

"Sergeant?" Esposito said.

"Yes, ma'am?" Hunter replied, turning his head.

"Now!"

In unison, the two of them snapped open their bonds and engaged the emergency release; there were several instants where the guards might have taken a shot, but they both hesitated; using those weapons in a confined space was generally a poor idea, particularly where a pressure hull was the target in the event of a miss.

While Esposito lunged down to the rear of the cabin, Hunter slipped his blowgun out of his pocket, sending one of the guards into instant unconsciousness with a swift blow. Esposito hit the other one on the chin, with Forbes crashing his fist down hard on the back of his neck, knocking him to the deck.

"So you are on our side? I did wonder," Esposito said.

Orlova had struggled loose of her bonds, and raced over to the emergency lock. "You want out, we have to hurry." She pulled open the compartment, and started to pass out parachutes.

"Are you mad? We've got to be passing the speed of sound by now?" A loud bang confirmed Hunter's suspicions.

"We can't get into the pilot's cabin from here, but he can do fun things to us like turn off the life support." There was a loud bang from outside. "I've activated the emergency release. Just strap in the parachute and prepare for the ride of a life!"

Without waiting for the others, she followed her own advice, clipping the parachute to a bracket above the airlock door. Four more clicks came home, and she slammed her fist on the manual override, opening both doors at once. The cord swung her down the long pole that had extended along the outside of the shuttle, catapulting her fifty feet from the door as the shuttle continued to fly away. The mechanism catapulted the others close to her, though close was relative in these circumstances. They'd probably end up miles apart, but at least they were free.

She looked down, seeing Ragnarok laid out beneath her; their breakout had taken only a few seconds, but in that time they'd crossed almost the entire length of the inhabited part of the moon. The chute would open at a safe altitude; right now she was in free fall, the ground very slowly rising to meet her.

Free diving had been a popular sport while she'd been taking flight training on Mars; there it was very different, with a special light spacesuit, and parachutes augmented by a rocket rig that kicked on for the last stages of descent. None of that was needed here, though the biting cold was beginning to affect her.

The seconds raced by as she fell further and further, until finally the canopy opened, drone chute first to stabilize her, then the main chute to guide her to the final descent. As she'd relied on, these had been adapted for the local conditions, and a survival bag dropped down underneath her on a cord, released as part of the mechanism.

She wrapped her hands around the two control straps, looking for other canopies as they opened nearby; this was going to be her best opportunity to find the others. She could only make out one, out to the north of her, and she started to carefully guide herself in that direction, making the moves as conservatively as she could.

Trying to remember the training she'd had, she braced herself for the fall, bending her knees slightly. With a brief stab of pain, she hit the ground, rolling onto her side to absorb the shock of the impact, then hurriedly separating her canopy. Her first thought was to rush towards her survival bag, tearing out the cold-weather gear and pulling it on over her uniform, then slapping the heating elements on.

She looked up, and spotted the other canopy a few hundred yards to the south; grabbing the bag, she quickly made her way towards it, anxious to make sure that at least one of her comrades had come through that intact. The odds had been rather poorer than she had made out back on the shuttle.

The shuttle! She looked up, and the contrail was still burning up; the pilot had committed to at least a suborbital hop, probably hoping to evade Alamo then come back around. By now he'd have warned the planetary authorities that they had escaped, which meant there was a chance that the ship had some idea of their current whereabouts. She heard the crack as the person landed, then headed to see a grimacing Forbes lying on the ground, rolled onto his back, gasping for breath.

"I've got you covered, Forbes," Orlova said with as much force as she could muster. "Just stay there until the others arrive."

He looked up at her, and laughed, a sound that echoed around the rocks. They'd landed in a small valley, rocks poking through the snow, the translucent ice slippery underfoot. "You've got no-one covered, darlin'. Give an old man a hand up, will ya?"

She started to laugh as well, bracing herself against a rock as she offered him a hand. With a grunt, he pulled himself up, while Orlova disengaged his parachute, the wind immediately tossing it to a side into a tangle of knots and cords.

"You still in one piece?" she asked.

"I think my stomach's about a thousand feet up, but yeah. That was one hell of a ride." He slowly moved over to his survival pack, pulled out a jacket and gloves and placed them on. "I saw a couple of other canopies over there," he gestured with a free hand, "so I suggest we go see."

The two of them climbed to the side of the valley, and saw a trio of figures slowly making their way towards them; two of them seemed to be helping the third, and there was a splatter of red against the white snow.

"Damn, that's going to slow us down," Forbes said.

Orlova waved her hand, and started to make her way down the other side of the hill in long, loping bounds, Forbes following behind. As she drew closer, she saw that it was Esposito and Hunter helping Jennings, who looked more embarrassed than hurt. They set the crewman down on the ground, panting for breath.

"Maggie, don't do that again!" Esposito said.

"I figured you must have done some jump training at some point," Orlova said. "Sorry, Jennings."

Jennings grunted, "My own stupid fault."

Esposito turned to Forbes, "An explanation would be nice. Not that I'm complaining, but if I'm going to trust you, I'd better know why."

"I didn't think they'd arrest you. I thought they'd try and get you on side, and that you might offer us a better deal than the Loonies. I know that we're being played by them – hell, Haynes knows it too, he just didn't think he had a choice at the time. The Loonies turned us from a gang of rogues into a fighting force, but the price is too damn high."

Jennings shivered in the cold, "What do we do next, Ensign?"

"Our top priority is a communications relay so we can contact Alamo. Then we need to see what we can do about the rest of the squad, and the prisoners."

Forbes shook his head, "Forget the squad for the moment. That shuttle's a hundred miles away. I know a safe house about three miles out, got some transport for the sergeant. The young hothead here," he waved a thumb at Orlova, "can come with me if you like, then I'll send someone for the rest of you."

"No tricks, this time?"

The prospector looked up at the sky, gesturing at the shuttle's slowly dissipating contrail, "I could have screwed you up just by staying in the warm, couldn't I? Why would I betray you now?"

"You've got a point."

Chapter 19

The senior staff were sitting around the table in the briefing room, looking at each other with poorly-disguised suspicion, a mood that the two espatiers standing at attention by the door did nothing to foster. Caine was fixated on Zakharova and Dietz; the former was returning the look, jotting down notes on a datapad.

The room had two empty chairs; Esposito, still down on the moon's surface, and Marshall. No-one spoke; it wasn't necessary. That much hostility didn't need words to communicate. Finally, the door slid open and Marshall walked in, the espatiers saluting as he passed. He returned the salute and stopped on the threshold.

"I thought the custom was for junior officers," he stressed the word junior, "to stand to attention when the commanding officer enters the room in a non-critical situation?"

Dietz and Caine got to their feet first, followed by Mulenga. Zakharova was the last, flashing an insolent look at him as she rose. Without a word, Marshall walked around the room and sat down in his chair, looking around at his officers.

"Be seated." He turned to his security officer, "Mr. Tyler, I gather from this report that you have still failed to determine the identity of the person who tried to kill myself and Senior Lieutenant Mulenga three hours ago?"

The young officer's face flushed red, and he nodded, "I'm sorry, sir."

"Mr. Quinn, have you any thoughts on the subject?"

Quinn looked up from a datapad he was busily browsing, and looked around the table. "Whoever did it had familiarity with the ship's systems, they knew the quirks and foibles of the ship."

"This ship does not have foibles, Lieutenant," Dietz said, a harsh tone in his voice."

Marshall shot him a look, then turned back to his engineer, "Continue, please, Mr. Quinn."

"As I was saying, they knew the ins and outs of the ship, and they had engineering clearance. That narrows it down to about twenty people, including all of us in this room."

Zakharova sneered, "That narrows it down to a fifth of the ship's company. Brilliant."

"Ordinarily I could narrow it down for you using workstation logs and the like, but someone managed to throw a scrambler program into the work logs." The engineer pushed the datapad he was looking at across the table to the Executive Officer. "I'm sure the computer techs would greatly value your input, Lieutenant. We've spent most of the last three hours trying to unravel it."

The engineer had done a good job of masking his sarcasm; Marshall could hardly detect it, "Don't we have safeguards on our systems?"

"Those are non-critical systems. They're only really used to assess workstation use profiles for maintenance scheduling. Not much of our protection is focused there."

"Then I suggest, Lieutenant, that you implement increased protection. Do your job rather than talking about it," Zakharova said, the sneer growing across her face as if she had won a point in a game.

Anger seeped into Quinn's tone as he stood up, his chair sliding back across the floor. "Where the hell do you want me to take software protection from? Tactical systems or life support? We have a finite amount of processing power, Lieutenant, and there are reasons why it is concentrated where it is. Damn it, it isn't even on the same network, it's dumped down in the file access sub-net."

"That's enough, Lieutenant. Consider yourself...," Zakharova began.

"That is it!" Marshall yelled, slamming his hands on the desk hard enough to shake the objects on it. "You are both senior officers. If you can't act that way, get out of here. Your transfer will be waiting for you in your cabin."

Quinn looked down at the table, shaking his head, and said in a quiet voice, "I'm sorry, Captain." Words rather carefully chosen.

"My apologies, Captain." Zakharova looked as if she was about to add another remark, but instead chose to keep her silence.

"This isn't exactly the first mission I'd wanted. If the saboteurs were out to cause maximum disruption to this ship, then by putting us all at each other's throats, they have succeeded."

Caine nodded, "It's spreading across the crew, as well. I'm catching people making all sorts of remarks when they don't think anyone is listening. Enough that if I acted on them half our personnel would be on report." She looked around the table. "If we push our security restrictions any tighter, then everything is just going to get worse. Look at us, we're supposed to be senior officers setting a good example to the rest of the crew."

"Increased security is pointless at this time," Dietz said. "There are no guarantees that the crewmen implementing the security procedures are not themselves responsible for the sabotage."

Tyler bristled at that. "If you have any allegations relating to my staff, I'd like to hear them."

"I have no specific allegations to make against any crewman, or I would have already made them."

Marshall raised his hand, "I agree with Mr. Dietz."

"What do they want?" Mulenga asked, almost to himself.

"To wreck the mission, obviously," Zakharova responded. "Knocking out enough of the senior staff would do that, not to mention damaging the ship."

"Specifically, though? Most of their actions are not designed to do anything other than inspire terror and cause us to implement greater security precautions. That's having a bad effect on our efficiency."

"You think that it's a diversion from something else? A terror campaign?"

The astrogator nodded, "That is precisely my analysis. The saboteurs are trying to goad us into either leaving the system, or weaken us for an encounter with the frigates."

Marshall stood up, walking over to the wall, then turned to face the room. "Your assessment, Lieutenant Caine?"

That did not please his executive officer; she glared red at not being immediately consulted. Caine smiled a little at her discomfort, then replied, "I think I agree. And I know what you are about to say."

Zakharova, almost through gritted teeth, turned in her chair to face Marshall, "For those of us who are not benefited with such insight into your thoughts?"

"All special security precautions are to be discontinued. Mr. Quinn? Mr. Dietz?"

The two officers looked at each other; Dietz replied, "Sir?"

"I want you to deploy extra assets to preventative maintenance. Let's treat this as a systems problem rather than a security problem, try and get ahead of the game a little. Focus your attention on critical ship and combat operations. I'd like a report on my desk within the hour."

"You'll have it, sir," Quinn replied. "What about our work on the administrative sub-net?"

"Is that critical under the criteria I just established, Lieutenant?"

The engineer smiled, and shook his head, "No, sir. I'll take the spooks off it for the moment."

"You just intend to ignore the sabotage, sir?" Tyler asked, looking nervously around for support, and not finding it.

Marshall shook his head, "By no means; that remains your primary goal. But I'm standing down the espatiers. Put your people on investigation rather than prevention. We've managed to yield the saboteurs the initiative, and that's going to change."

He looked around the room. "I am aware that there is a likelihood that at least one of the people in this room is working to disrupt this mission. I hope I've just given you a bad day. For the record, I will state that if anyone should come forward, even to confess, then I will make formal note of that in my log with a recommendation to clemency." He looked around the room again, running his gaze past Caine, Quinn and Tyler. "To those of you who are loyal, then I stress this – we all need to work together, or the bad guys win. Whoever they are."

A quiet affirmative chorus echoed around the room, and Marshall nodded. "I'm not going to make you all shake hands or anything, don't worry. Dismissed." He paused for a second. "Lieutenants Quinn and Zakharova, please stay a moment."

The officers filed out of the room; Dietz paused for a second by Zakharova, as if about to say something, but instead nodded his head and continued walking. As the doors slid shut, Marshall pulled a datapad out of his pocket, placing it squarely on the table in front of him. He turned to face Quinn.

"Lieutenant, you've been wearing a uniform of one sort or another since you were fifteen."

"Fifteen?" Zakharova turned to the engineer, who shrugged in response.

"Forged birth certificate. By the time they found out I was sixteen, and we were at war," Quinn replied.

"Regardless of the, er, unconventional method by which you got into the military, you've been in uniform long enough to know better than to act like that." Zakharova looked smugly across at the engineer, who was staring down at the desk. "I don't expect a repeat performance, Mr. Quinn. Is that clear?"

He mumbled, "Yes, sir. I'm sorry to have let you down."

"See that it doesn't happen again. Dismissed, Mr. Quinn."

The engineer rose, turned and walked out in a single motion, looking at the floor the whole time. Zakharova watched him walk out of the room, then turned to face Marshall, dropping her hands face down onto the table.

"I don't know if that's enough," she began, "I think Lieutenant Dietz ought to be assigned to keep a closer eye on him."

"Lieutenant, I did not ask you to remain to consult you about Mr. Quinn. I'm afraid we need to have a conversation."

She frowned, "What about?"

"If his behavior was poor, yours was a hundred times worse. And it isn't the first time."

"My job is to watch your back, Captain, to make sure that poor performance is corrected, and to make sure that you don't make any fatal mistakes and blunders."

Marshall's eyes widened at her arrogance. "Lieutenant, I think we have very different beliefs as to the role of an Executive Officer. Even so, I certainly don't see attempts to belittle officers as part of the duties you have laid out."

"Noted for future reference."

"I wouldn't worry about that." He slid the datapad over to her. "I have formally requested that you be transferred as soon as we reach Sol. I'd already made that decision prior to this meeting."

She rose to her feet, walking towards him, her hands waving dangerously in the air, "Because I'm not one of your Martian lapdogs, is that it?"

"Because I don't think you are a particularly good officer."

His words seemed to hit her like a hammer-blow, and she sat down in a chair. Yet there was something wrong about the reaction, as if she was doing it because she believed Marshall would expect it. She looked up, and in a small voice, replied, "I see."

"If you wish to be relieved now, then Senior Lieutenant Mulenga can assume your responsibilities for the duration of this mission."

She shook her head, "If I have the choice, sir, then I would rather continue until we get back to Mariner Station." She paused. "I will, of course, formally protest this action as soon as we get back."

"That is your prerogative. Dismissed." Marshall looked down at the datapad, then back up at the still-seated Zakharova. "Dismissed, Lieutenant."

Without a further word, she rose, saluted, and walked out of the room; the doors slid open to reveal Caine standing in the doorway. The two women exchanged stares for a second, then Zakharova laughed, muttered something under her breath, and stalked off down the corridor. Caine slid through the doors and dropped into a seat opposite Marshall, waiting for him to speak. After a long pause, she decided to break the ice.

"Your second-in-command seems rather unhappy."

"I just told her that I've put in for her transfer when we get back."

She sighed, "And what makes you think they'll accept it?"

Marshall's face dropped, and he looked from side to side, "What do you mean?"

"She was assigned for political reasons, Danny. What happens if they tell you that you are going to have to live with her?"

"I can't. I won't. This isn't personal, Deadeye, she's a menace!"

Caine shook her head, sighing, "You are probably right. I suspect that the Commodore will go along with it, and Mulenga can move up.  You're going to have to be more careful, though, Danny. You don't get to cherry pick the officers you work with. Oh, the odd one or two, maybe, and certainly you can put in requests – but sometimes you have to work with what you've got. This might be one of those times."

"Message received, Deadeye."

"I hope so." She smiled, "You might be surprised to know this, but some of us on the senior staff are hoping you'll break in as a half-decent skipper."

He shook his head, smiling back. "Talking about me behind my back? Isn't that against regulations?"

"Probably."

Marshall's communicator chirped; he pulled it out of his belt. "Captain here. Go ahead."

"Kibaki here, sir. We've been monitoring something strange taking place on the surface. A shuttle, by the looks of it an in-system type, launched from one of the dome settlements. It reached about twenty thousand feet, then the passengers all bailed out. Emergency escape."

"Did you get a bearing on where they landed?"

"We got them right down to the ground, sir." There was some noise, shouting in the background. "Wait one, Captain."

Marshall waited for a few seconds, looking at Caine. He was just about to call up when the communicator sounded again, this time with the watch officer shouting, "Sir! A ship just jumped into the system. Reads as a Lunar Republic fast transport."

He looked at Caine, who began typing specifications into the computer. A hologram of a ship, long and sleek with twin rings fore and aft, appeared over the desk.

"Course and speed, Sub-Lieutenant, though I think I can probably take a guess," Marshall replied.

"Directly for Ragnarok. Our estimates have them arriving in orbit in around six hours, but Sub-Lieutenant Franklin has suggested that they might break directly for the surface. This type of vessel has the capability."

"Standby, Sub-Lieutenant." Marshall closed the channel, and turned to Caine. "We can't let them land."

"We can't legally stop them. Not without starting a major incident."

"I need an option better than that."

She leaned forward, "Are you willing to start an incident over this?"

"The real question is whether they are, isn't it? They've got to be sending in supplies, maybe even troops." He pointed at schematics rolling down beside the hologram. "That ship can put fifty tons of cargo down on the ground. It was designed as a blockade runner."

"We can intercept it." Caine sighed. "What if it is carrying weapons? What can we do about it?"

"I'm certainly not just going to let it land." He thumbed the communicator back on again, "Sub-Lieutenant, try and contact that ship. Request that they come into an orbit that matches our own, and indicate that I urgently wish to meet with their captain."

"Aye, sir."

Marshall closed the communicator, then turned to face his tactical officer, "I know damn well what they are up to, Deadeye. They want control of this system one way or the other. Heck, those weapons we found on Mariner Station were probably intended to be shipped here; enough Republic transports use it to supply on their way out to the Belt that they could sneak in a few cargoes."

She smiled. "Smuggling."

"What?"

"That's our justification for the stop-and-search. Suspicion that the Lunar Republic is smuggling cargoes out of Mariner Station. We've already got plenty of evidence sitting in our armory – those grenades."

"I think you'd better make sure that they are officially logged in our manifest under the proper category. Get Tyler in on it, have him break out the regulations immediately, and have Corporal Stiles make his men ready to conduct it."

Caine paused, looking at the hologram, "What if we don't find anything?"

"Then we apologize and let them go on their way." He smiled, "I don't think that will happen, though."

She nodded, reached over, and squeezed his arm, smiling. Marshall started to punch in tactical schematics from their intelligence files, looking over the performance specifications of the ship. No arms or armor to speak of, taking it down in a firefight would be easy if they could slow it sufficiently. He called up to the bridge again.

"Kibaki here."

"Have Sub-Lieutenant Franklin plot a course that will give us a window within firing range of the incoming ship, but I don't want it implemented until it is impossible for the Republic transport to evade us."

"Firing range?"

"Firing range, if you please, Sub-Lieutenant. Then patch me through to the enemy ship; I want this message repeated at them until we get a reply."

He could hear the watch officer gulping, a trace of nerves in his voice. "I'm recording you now, sir."

"This is Lieutenant-Captain Marshall, commander of Triplanetary Starship Alamo. I hereby serve notice that you are under suspicion of smuggling illegal cargoes from Mariner Station, and under the terms of the Treaty of Vesta, I am formally instructing you to match orbits with Alamo and prepare for a customs inspection."

"Message dispatched, sir."

Marshall waited for a moment, mentally working out how long it would take to get a response to his message. Caine sat silently, plotting points of vulnerability for the gunnery controls. A few seconds later than he had expected, Kibaki piped the reply down.

A strong female voice came through the speaker. "This is Lieutenant Commander Xun Chu, of Transport Zhulong. We do not recognize the Treaty of Vesta as having any validity outside Sol System, and therefore decline your request for an inspection. Our intention is to land on Ragnarok, and I strongly suggest that you do not interfere with the business of our government."

Stabbing down a button, Marshall replied, "This is Lieutenant-Captain Marshall. The treaty violations took place in Sol System, therefore under the terms of the Treaty of Vesta, I have a right to inspect your ship. I am happy for third-party arbitration, but I must deny you permission to land until it is resolved."

Another wait, counting down the seconds until the reply, "We have no intention of yielding to your sophistry. If you wish, I will transmit our manifest for your inspection, but I refuse permission for your personnel to come on board. I warn you; any attempt to board us will be resisted."

"I think that's all that I'm going to get," Marshall said to Caine, shutting down the communicator.

"She's not going to volunteer for inspection; too much to hide. What about the frigates?"

He shook his head, "They couldn't get here before the freighter. My guess is that they will turn up when it tries to leave, unless we threaten it."

"Are you trying to force the issue?"

"One way or another." He looked down at the panel, sighing.

"What?"

"Couldn't the ship have arrived before the staff meeting?" He paged the senior staff to return to the briefing room, shaking his head.

Chapter 20

Forbes and Orlova had trudged through the snow for what felt like hours, before at last a small, battered old support dome, the red paint long since blasted off by the wind, came into view at the top of a mountain. There was a truck parked next to it, one that had obviously seen better days, linked by cables to a charging station. As they moved from snow to rock their feet found a path, and they followed it up to the door, where Forbes bashed for admittance.

"You lazy bastard, open up!" he yelled.

The door opened to reveal an old woman wearing a faded leather coat, four rings around each sleeve. She looked at the two of them and shook her head, before opening the door wider to let them in. Inside was a cozy little room, a few chairs scattered about with an electric fire in the middle of the room, an old-fashioned terminal in the middle of a desk piled high with reproduced books, a well-used fabricator sitting in the corner by a worn bed.

"Storm's bringing in some odd critters tonight, Forbes." She squinted at Orlova. "Who's this one? Bit young for you, isn't she?"

Forbes looked back out into the storm, "I need to borrow your truck, Granny. I've got some friends out there who need a pick-up."

The old woman sighed, "I expect you'll be wanting them to stay here, as well. Can't an old woman be left here in peace to enjoy her retirement?" She pulled some keys out of a pocket and tossed them to the prospector. "Go on, but watch yourself, and don't get picked up by the Governor's men. I want that truck back."

"You'll get it. Have the coffee on for when I get back." He ran out the door, banging it closed behind him, leaving the two of them facing each other inside.

"Now, who do I have here? Don't worry, I won't bite. Not with these teeth."

Orlova smiled, then replied, "Call me Maggie. I'm a shuttle pilot."

The old woman smiled, gestured her to a chair, and headed over to a cupboard in the corner, pulling out mugs and boxes. "Would you believe I was one back in the day? I'm Coop. Sandra was my name, but my wing-mates always called me Coop. Or Granny, but if you call me that I'll do nasty things to your soul."

"You were a flier? Back when this place was first settled?"

Coop poured hot water into the mugs from a dispenser, dashing in powder to make an unidentifiable but welcoming aroma. "Young woman, I flew in the Australasian Air Force before I left Earth." For a second her eyes were somewhere else. "That was a long time ago, of course. More than a century, I understand. I suppose the fighters I used to fly are all in museums now. They should probably put me in there with them."

She passed a steam-smothered mug to Orlova, who took it carefully by the handle before taking a sip of the warm contents. "Are you aware of what is happening out there?"

"I know that you aren't from this planet. You're from the starship, aren't you? The Alamo?" Surprise dashed across Orlova's face, followed by concern; Coop raised her hand, "Relax, kid. You can't make any bigger a mess of things than anyone else is. What with the Governor on one side and the General on the other. I just hope that Forbes has finally worked out that he can't trust anyone."

"How did you know about Alamo?"

Coop waved at the terminal, "Got myself a tap on the fiber-optic network. This dome's right about one of the primary links, they set it up as a maintenance and supply point. I moved in when they moved out, and a couple of them were friends of mine who 'forgot' to take out the check relay."

Orlova's eyes darted towards the terminal. "Coop, I've got to have access to it. Got to. We're on a mission."

"Everyone always is, my young friend." She sighed, resting her hands on her lap. "What is yours?"

"Rescue a group of Triplanetary citizens that the Governor's holding. He's trying to sell them back to us. What's your mission?"

"Good question. I want all the bullshit to stop. Two stubborn old men are tearing at each other over the future of this planet, and neither of them can see that all they are doing is tearing it apart. That old fool Isaac can't get past stuff about self-sufficiency and planetary sovereignty, and that pip-squeak Haynes – who seems to have promoted himself from Major to General when no-one else was looking – is nutso on the democratic process. With the Loonies happily playing both sides against each other."

Gesturing at the rings on Coop's jacket, Orlova asked, "What rank were you? Back in the Air Force?"

The old woman smiled, "I was – hell, I still am, we're all still in the reserve, a Group Captain. Though we've only got two shuttles and neither of them work right, so we haven't actually got any air for me to command. Just a few low-level jobs, VTOL crates. Back in the day I'd have made jokes about flying truck drivers in the bar, now I guess they are all that's left of the RAAF."

"What about the two frigates?"

"Lunar Republic dragged them in. Theoretically they are under command of 'General' Haynes, but in practice I don't think they'd go far without the Republic's men saying so. Those bastards have a ship coming in soon. Few hours."

"What sort of ship?"

"Fast blockade runner. More arms for the General's rebels, most likely. Arrogant blow-hard. I don't think he realizes that he's just dancing to their tune."

"Can you show me where and when? A schematic of the landing field?"

"Sure." She looked at the pilot. "What rank did you say you were again?"

"Coop," Orlova replied, "I can safely say that I am the highest-ranking member of the Triplanetary Fleet in this room." She looked at the information running across the screen, and frowned, "That certainly doesn't mean I'm not going to need help to work out how we're going to pull off this operation."

"I think I can remember enough from War College to give you a hand. Move over."

For the next hour, the two of them poured over diagrams on the monitor, talking tactics and strategy, their drinks hastily swigged in between words. They became so wrapped up in their scheming that they hardly noticed when the door burst open again, Forbes and Hunter carrying Jennings in a fireman's lift between them, Esposito following behind. Coop quickly snatched a medikit out of one of her cupboards and tossed it to Forbes, who began to work on the injured man's leg. Once she was certain that he was being taken care of, Esposito walked over to Orlova, still engrossed in her work.

"What's that?"

The young pilot looked up, "I think I've found us some leverage. A transport's coming in to land from the Republic, carrying weapons. If we could grab it and hold it, then we could likely at least barter them for the return of our people."

"This sounds pretty desperate, Maggie."

"We're down to you, me and the Sergeant sitting in a dome. I don't know what else we can do. Any communications relay capable of transmitting up to orbit is going to be even harder to get at. This way we're hitting the rebels, not the professionals."

Esposito raised an eyebrow, "Just the three of us?"

"Nine. There are six troopers still in that shuttle, and we could just about get there, rescue the squad, and reach the landing strip in time. I've worked out the route here." She held up a data crystal. "It'll work, Gabi."

The ensign sighed, looking around the room. "We don't even have any weapons."

Coop looked up from the leg as she finished applying the bandages, "Sure we do. Draw under the terminal, Maggie."

Orlova pulled at the draw, and her eyes widened as she looked inside. A dozen assorted handguns of various degrees of lethality, clips of ammunition, even a couple of low-light scopes. Esposito carefully took one of the heavier guns out and checked it over, quickly dismantling it and sliding it back together with a satisfying crack. Hunter picked up a pair of them, looking them over with a practiced eye, and put one in his holster, another tucked into his belt.

"So, we're armed. How long have we got?"

"We need to leave in ten minutes if we're going to make this work."

Grunting with pain, Jennings pushed himself up, saying, "Ensign, this needs to work. My shipmates need rescuing, and this looks like the only way to make it happen."

Esposito looked at the crewman, gasping in pain on the floor, then across at the eager Orlova, already with a gun in her hand, and Hunter, looking out of the window with a crooked smile. Forbes was grinning with glee at the prospect, and walked over to the draw.

"I know the boys they've got guarding them. Most of them, anyway. I reckon I can make them listen to me, and we might even get some reinforcements out of the deal." He pulled out a pistol and a clip, sliding it home with practiced ease. "Most of the outland types aren't that happy about working with the Loonies anyway. Haynes has 'em all fired up with stuff he can't deliver."

"Hallelujah, Flight Lieutenant Forbes sees the light at last," Coop said.

"I didn't know you were an officer," Orlova said, frowning. "One private surrounded by officers and sergeants? It isn't fair."

Esposito smiled, clapping her on the shoulder, "You aren't like any private I've ever met, if that's any consolation." She looked around the room. "Here's how it's going to work, then. We're going to go with Orlova's plan. Coop, someone needs to stay with Jennings, and..."

Before she could finish her sentence, there was a loud crack by her ear; she turned to see a neat hole in the wall.

"You were saying, Ensign?" Coop said.

Jennings laughed on the ground, shaking his head, "Leave me a flask of whatever passes for coffee on this rock and I'll be fine for the day."

Coop patted him on the shoulder, then turned back to the young officer, saying, "I know how to obey orders on the firing line, kid. I've been doing it since before you were born. Maggie's got a good plan, let's get on with it."

She passed around thermal flasks, one to each of them, and left two next to Jennings on the ground, putting a cushion behind his neck. The quintet went back out into the snow, and clambered aboard the old truck; it was a tight enough fit for the five of them, quite how ten of them would manage to ride it to the hangar was another question entirely. Forbes tried to get into the driver's seat, but Coop snatched the keys from him and sat down herself.

"My truck, I drive." She turned to face Esposito. "I'm a terrible back-seat driver. You ready?"

"Let's go."

The engine turned on with a loud purr, punctuated by the occasional alarming rattle, and the caterpillar tracks dug into the snow as they sped away from the dome, crunching snow and rock underfoot. Orlova looked at Esposito, giving her a thumbs up, then settled back to enjoy the ride. The truck lurched back and forth over the bleak landscape, punctuated by the occasional spell of comfort as they moved over flat ice.

It seemed that Coop was determined to give them as a rough a ride as possible, but the route was designed for both speed and secrecy; none of them wanted to engage in any sort of firefight. Even if they won, they'd lose precious minutes. At all costs, they needed to get to that landing field before the transport could arrive.

It then struck Orlova that there was a chance that everything they were doing was pointless; she looked over at Esposito, and her doubts obviously flashed across her face when the ensign responded.

"Relax, Maggie. I figured the same as you, that there's an excellent chance that Alamo will intercept them before they get down on the deck. If they don't, though, then they're going to be damn glad that we were on the ball here. What's the worst case? We've grabbed ourselves an airhead in the middle of nowhere and can get ourselves pulled out, or get the rest of the platoon down here to have a real try at rescuing those prisoners."

Coop tipped her head back towards Esposito, "What sort of a name is Alamo, anyway?"

"All the ships in her class were named after famous last stands. Thermopylae, Alamo, Camerone..."

"Doesn't that worry the hell out of anyone unfortunate enough to be stuck on one of those ships? Not exactly a good omen."

The espatier smiled, "All of them survived the war. Some of them in better shape than others, but they made it home in one piece."

Shaking her head, Coop returned her attention to the road, watching the HUD throw up the occasional warning when the gradients were getting too steep, or they were drifting off the planned route. Forbes was watching the horizon, his eyes glued to the windows, looking for signs of any pursuers, anything at all, and Esposito was watching the sky for contrails.

None of them spoke, all of them preparing mentally for the battle; periodically Orlova clicked on her commlink, but all she got was the same static that had blasted the air since shortly after they'd landed. This continued for half a bumpy, bruising hour until finally Coop killed the motor, bringing the truck to a juddering halt.

"This is where we get out. There's a ridge line just ahead that should give us good cover until we get to within a hundred yards of the old shuttle."

Esposito began to scramble out, but with her hand on the door she turned to Forbes, "Are you sure there is nothing in the way of surveillance this far out?"

He shook his head, replying, "If there was, I certainly didn't install it. We never had any of that stuff to spare. Mark One Eyeballs we had aplenty. Besides, the storms would have smashed them up unless we'd maintained them every few days."

She nodded and pulled the handle, met by the usual blast of cold air, then turned to the sergeant, "You'd better stay with the vehicle, just in case they try something stupid. You hear any problems, come running."

"Ensign, I should really be leading this one," the sergeant said, frowning.

"Just be ready if we need you."

The four of them piled out of the truck, and with as much silence as they could manage, walked up to the ridge line just ahead of the truck. Catching a quick glance over the top, Esposito saw a pair of men, armed with rifles, shuffling around outside the shuttle lock, trying to keep warm. Both them were familiar; the two who had been in the shuttle when they had been there before. She ducked back and leaned over to Forbes.

"How many did you say there were?"

"Just two. How many of them outside?"

"Two. Wouldn't they be inside if they could? Guarding the troopers?"

Forbes smiled. "I bet those apes screwed it up. They've just got your men bottled up, they probably never even tried to take them. What guns have they got?"

"Rifles like that," she replied, gesturing to Coop's weapon.

"That confirms it, then. They'd have got better guns if they could from your men. This is going to be easier than I thought."

The group made their way around the ridge, weapons at the ready, until they were close to the open ground. A straight run would be suicide, Forbes raised his hand and made a chopping motion, signaling the rest of them to duck low into the snow for cover. None of them were ready when he dropped his pistol to the ground, leaped over the ridge and started running down the hill, waving his hands.

They expected to hear a fusillade of shots, but they didn't come. Orlova broke first, taking a careful look to see what was happening; Forbes appeared to be slapping them on the back, joking with them, though she couldn't make out what they were saying. Coop was next to her, catching her by surprise, and grinned. Hoping that this wasn't simply another trap, Orlova and Esposito followed Forbes, though with their weapons out and ready, while Coop sat in cover with her rifle, ready to loose off a few shots on demand.

"Drop your weapons, all of them down now!" Esposito yelled. With little choice, the two guards handed their weapons to the prospector, who popped out the clips onto the ground.

"Anyone in there?" Orlova asked, waving her pistol menacingly in the air.

One of the two guards responded, "Just your men. We locked it down when we got the word from the General. Bill, you'd better have a damned good explanation for this."

"Simple, cobber. I'm sick of the General and the Governor." He waved his hand around. "They want to knock both of them out and see if we can get something that works instead. I don't know about you, but I'm sick of all the bullshit that passes for government around here."

Coop walked calmly into the fray, her rifle down at her side. The two guards seemed to instinctively stand to attention when she reached them; she smiled and waved her hand, and they relaxed slightly.

"Granny? What are you doing here?"

"What I should have done a long time ago, Akama. I'm poking my nose in where it doesn't belong. We're not asking you to help us, we're just asking you to stay out of our way."

Orlova added, "It'd be nice if you didn't tell anyone about this, either."

The two of them looked at each other, Akama sighing. "Fine. Forbes, if this turns out to be some sort of trick, you'll regret it."

"It's no trick," he replied, looking at his watch. "We're running behind schedule. That shuttle's due to come down in forty minutes, and we're going to need time to set up."

"Right," Esposito replied, cranking open the hatch and climbing down the ladder; a chorus of calls suggested that the troopers below would be only too eager to get out and see some action. Orlova looked across at the truck again, still wondering how they were going to fit ten people on it. She quietly made her way over to it and sat down; a few of them were going to have to ride outside, probably, and she wasn't going to be one of them. It was no surprise to her that Coop did likewise.

Chapter 21

Less than twenty minutes to go. Marshall watched the clock slowly count down the seconds until they changed their orbital trajectory for the intercept with the transport, and then eight and a half minutes after that, the moment of decision. A twelve-second window during which he might be forced to bring the Lunar ship down.

He weighed the consequences in his mind; the reason he was in his office rather than sitting on the bridge was that he didn't want it to show to the rest of the crew. While a Captain can be many things, he cannot be indecisive. Still, he considered that he probably needed to go onto the bridge; battle stations in five minutes to give everyone time to prepare for the battle he still hoped wouldn't happen.

The bridge was a hive of activity; a lot of people seemed to have found excuses to be up to watch the action. Zakharova, showing no signs that he had recently informed her that she was to be transferred, had once again usurped the watch officer's chair; Cellini was standing at Guidance next to Sub-Lieutenant Okello. Dietz was on the bridge, sitting at Tactical; Caine had been called away to deal with a problem with the radiator release. The elevator doors slid open; he turned to see Tyler walking out of them, accompanied by Khachaturian and Cole, all of them with ship-safe sidearms.

"I thought I'd ordered you to cease the additional security, Sub-Lieutenant."

Tyler looked around at his men, then back to Marshall, "Given the critical time, sir, I thought that it would be best not to take a risk. Khachaturian is one of my deputies, and he was off-duty anyway."

"Next time, let me know before you make a change to my orders. You might as well stay now that you are here."

The viewscreen displayed the plotted course; Mulenga had worked on it a dozen times to provide the best possible firing window, the least possible margin of error. The only way the transport could possibly evade Alamo would be to brake into an orbit, and once caught by Ragnarok's gravity, it would lose a lot of its maneuvering advantage. The confident way they had plotted the aerobrake worried Marshall a little; it suggested that they had done this before, enough times that they were willing to rely completely on the automatic systems.

With two minutes to countdown, he pulled out a datapad and started looking at a checklist. Glancing over at Dietz, he realized he hadn't had a report on the status of the radiators since Caine had gone down, and made his way over to the station to take a look at the systems display. At a first glance, he didn't see anything immediately wrong; Dietz was busily flicking switches and typing control commands, a frown on his face.

"Mr. Dietz, have you any idea what exactly is wrong with the radiators?"

The operations officer looked over his shoulder and replied, "Nothing on my console, sir. I've been looking at it for the last few minutes. Would you like me to page Lieutenant Caine?"

"Yes, at once." He sighed. "Don't tell me someone's got at our cautionary warning systems now. The last thing we want is to have engineers swarming all over the ship looking for problems that aren't there." As he turned to return to his seat, the lights momentarily flickered, and when they came on, Zakharova, Tyler, Cole and Khachaturian were pulling out handguns.

"Take cover!" Marshall yelled, taking his own advice as he threw himself behind his chair, a bullet cracking past his ear. Three more shots fired before he rolled over to see Tyler pointing a gun directly between his eyes. With a wry grin, he slowly rose his hands, scrambling to his feet.

"Tyler," he began, "tell me this is the worst-conceived security drill ever devised."

"I'm afraid not, Captain. Move over by the wall."

He looked around the room. Muttai was on the ground by his communications console, a slowly growing pool of blood showing that he had died at his post. Spinelli was moving over by the wall, clutching his shoulder as crimson oozed out into his uniform, and Okello was standing next to the guidance station, his hands raised in the air. Dietz was still sitting at Tactical; Marshall shot him a savage look then made his way over to the wall.

Zakharova walked up to him, hitting him in the arm with the butt of her pistol, "Stand still and do as you are told."

"I'm getting the medikit for Spinelli. One death was too many for this madness, two would be worse."

"Let him do it," Cole said, "They might as well be comfortable until the Swagman turns up."

Tyler muttered, "Stupid bloody name for a spaceship anyway."

Spinelli's wound wasn't particularly deep; the bullet had missed the artery and made more of a mess than anything else. Marshall quickly bandaged the entry and exit holes, then rubbed some contact analgesic to ease the pain; the sensor technician nodded, swallowing twice in succession, sweat pouring from his brow.

"You'll be fine, Spaceman," he said, before turning back to the bridge. Khachaturian had taken over the sensor console, Cellini sitting at guidance. The course that had been laboriously calculated had been removed from the screen.

"What next, Zakharova? As soon as the rest of the ship finds out about this, you are going to be in a world of trouble."

"I think not, Captain Marshall." She laced the rank with biting scorn. "What makes you think I only staged this little coup up here on the bridge? By now we should be in control of most of the key areas of the ship."

"How much are the Loonies paying you? Enough to betray your homes and families?"

Tyler sneered, and turned to Zakharova, "Can't I shut him up permanently? I'm tired of his bullshit."

Cole shook his head, "No. That's not going to happen. He was right, Muttai was one too many."

"We've committed no crime against our people, Captain," the former Exec replied. "I am a citizen of the People's Republic of Callisto, not of some Triplanetary melange. No interests of our people are being hindered; I won't weep if a Martian asteroid company goes bankrupt. Let the Loonies have this planet."

Marshall sighed, and shook his head, "So you get two birds with one stone. The Triplanetary Fleet is stillborn when its first mission goes wrong, and one of the biggest competitors of your national mining outfit gets knocked out. In return, the Lunar Republic gets twenty thousand slaves to service its new asteroid mines." He looked around the room. "Don't have any illusions about what you are doing here. These people will end up as indentured servants at best. But as long as your people back home aren't affected, I suppose that doesn't matter to you at all."

"Words, Captain. Just words. And I think we've heard quite enough of them." She sat down in the captain's chair, looking over the instruments, while Cole and Tyler kept the prisoners covered.

"How many of you are there, anyway? How many traitors on my ship?"

She shook her head, smiling, "It isn't your ship any more. And even if it were, I wouldn't tell you anything."

"Have I managed to hit a nerve? Is that what this is really about? That Alamo was given to me instead of you? Are you that petty?"

Grunting between clenched teeth, she pulled out her handgun, "Shut up, Captain."

"What have I got to lose? You'll have to kill me if you ever want to get home. Or perhaps I'll end up a slave down on the planet. I said it before, Zakharova, and I'll say it again right now – I think you are a terrible officer."

Dietz turned in his chair, rose, and made his way over to Tyler, "Tactical systems disabled."

"Disabled?" Zakharova leapt up from the chair and dashed over to the tactical station, looking over the readouts, then looked up at Dietz, "I wanted them deactivated, damn it. We might still need the internal systems."

Marshall looked accusingly at Dietz, smiling at the mistake, before noticing that the officer had crossed two of the fighters on his right hand, making sure that only he could see them. He tried not to betray any hint of what he was beginning to suspect, as Dietz leaned back over his station.

"It will take a few minutes to correct."

"Damn," Zakharova slammed a fist into the console, then walked over to the communications station. "I'll get in touch with our friends behind Gatewood, let them know that we have the ship secured. Cellini, once I've established the relay link, contact the Swagman and we'll work out an approach vector to transfer our prisoners. I want them off my ship."

She started to tap out a sequence on the panel, hitting send, while Cellini began to work. Dietz, without anyone noticing other than the prisoners, had made his way over to Cole, rose his hand, and hacked at the traitorous guard's wrist, sending his pistol knocking to the floor. Zakharova turned, shooting at the first target she saw, and Okello collapsed onto the deck; Marshall leapt towards Tyler, crashing against the security guard, using the medikit as a makeshift club, but the younger man cracked him around the shoulder with a flying arm, sending him crashing into the elevator, the doors opening behind him.

Spinelli dashed for the open doors as another pair of shots rang out; sparks flew across the bridge from damaged consoles, and the unmistakable ozone smell of an electrical short filled the air.

"Get into the elevator, Dietz, we've lost this one!" Marshall yelled, turning to the controls. With one leap, Dietz jumped into the elevator, and saw what Marshall didn't; Zakharova aiming her pistol at the small of the captain's back. The operations officer hurled himself into Marshall, sending him sprawling to the deck; the bullet fired as the door slid shut.

Blood spilled out across the deck; Dietz started to cough, red spittle trickling down from his mouth. Marshall carefully placed the operations officer onto the deck and threw the medikit down beside him. Spinelli tapped for the medical bay, jamming down the emergency button with his good hand.

"Damn it, Dietz, don't you dare die on me!"

The operations officer spluttered, "Couldn't warn you," he coughed, spending blood splattering on Marshall's uniform, "Tried to stop them." He coughed again, savagely, as Marshall looked at the hole in his chest, shaking his head.

"What if they control medical, sir?" Spinelli asked, looking at the dying man on the floor.

"Then we're screwed."

Dietz fell unconscious, slipping into shock, and Marshall hurled the useless medikit at the wall. It was designed only for first aid, minor wounds such as Spinelli's, not to deal with serious injuries. He willed the elevator along its run faster than he ever had before, and finally the doors opened into the sickbay corridor. A couple of espatiers were standing by the door, nervously holding their rifles.

"Whose side are you on?" Marshall yelled. "Give me a hand."

"Yours, sir!" The captain breathed a quiet sigh of relief as the two troopers ran forward, helping drag Dietz into the room. Duquesne was sitting at a console, talking over a commlink; as soon as she saw the wounded man she leapt towards the door, gasping as she saw the size of the wound.

"Get him onto the treatment bed. I'll operate immediately." She ran her hands under the sterilizing rays, then pulled out an instrument package from the storage locker.

"Doctor, tell me you aren't with them," Marshall said, grabbing her arm.

She looked down at Marshall's hand, then up at him. "I'd have let you die if I was. Now go stop the mutiny while I save this man's life. Caine's on her way up here."

Marshall looked at Duquesne for a heartbeat, then turned back into the corridor. Caine was just walking out of the elevator when he left the room, her eyes widened as she saw the blood on his jacket. He looked down, then shook his head.

"Not mine. Dietz."

"Dietz?"

He turned to the closed door, a puzzled look on his face, then replied, "He took a bullet for me. The bastard took a bullet for me. I don't even know why."

"I'll be sure to apologize to him later, but now we need to swap status reports."

"Zakharova has the bridge. Accompanied by Tyler, Cellini, Majewski, Cole and Khachaturian. A complete watch now she's got it secured. At least one frigate on the way, probably both. What about the rest of the ship?"

"The mutineers control life support, but the safety lockouts were engaged before they grabbed it, so we're fine for a half hour at least before they can unpick it. We hold the armory, engineering, and weapons control." She cracked her knuckles, then continued, "They probably shouldn't have tried to arrange for me to be down there when they staged this little coup."

He took her arm with his hand, "How many mutineers? Rough estimate?"

"None of the espatiers. About half of the Callistan contingent, a scattering of the Martian and Titanians. Probably about twenty in all."

"The other senior staff?"

"Emergency command and control is in Engineering. I've got everyone gathering down there. Come on." She turned for the elevator, while Marshall continued to look at the door. "You can't do anything for him now, Danny. We've got to get this ship back."

The door opened, and they scrambled in. The two troopers continued to stand by the door on guard. Both of them were careful not to step on the bloodstain left by Dietz on the deck, though neither of them were consciously aware of it.

"How the hell did his happen? I should have seen it."

"With the Exec and the Security Chief both in on it? Between them they had enough access to shut everyone out. I should have seen something as well, I'm supposed to be your damn Tactical Officer."

Marshall looked at the clock on the wall, and did a quick mental calculation. "We were supposed to be on alert ninety seconds ago. The interception maneuver has to happen in exactly twelve minutes."

"Twelve minutes to retake the ship?"

The doors opened to pandemonium. Corporal Stiles was arguing with Lieutenant Quinn in the far corner by the drive monitors, a gaggle of technicians were swarming about, and a pair of computer techs were swearing in five languages as they frantically typed into their workstations. Ryder was in a corner, patching together some sort of control system, and Mulenga was talking to Weitzman, pointing at a panel.

"Captain on the deck!" yelled Caine, and immediately Mulenga and Quinn broke off from their conversations, walking over to the elevator.

"We thought you'd had it on the bridge, skipper," Quinn said.

"Thanks to Mr. Dietz, I got away."

"Where is he?" Mulenga asked. Caine and Marshall looked at each other, and the astrogator's face dropped. "I see."

"Not dead, and if Duquesne has anything to say about it, he won't be." He looked around the remaining cluster of officers. "We have exactly eleven minutes and forty-two seconds to regain control of this ship. I need ideas, and I need them now."

Quinn looked around the room, "The bridge is the major problem at this point. My spooks are dueling with their spooks, but we've nailed enough processing power down here that we should win that particular battle, just a matter of time. They have the sensor decks, but we can remote link anything we need for the present; they've got life support, but right now it's useless to them. We still trying for the interception maneuver?"

"Damn right."

"We will need weapons control to make that work. Tactical systems have been deactivated, so the bridge doesn't have them, but neither do we," Mulenga said. "Mr. Quinn, can you get them back on-line, routed to an alternate station?"

"We still hold weapons control, so sure. I can make that a priority, skipper."

"Good. What about maneuvering?"

The engineer's face turned downcast, "That's going to be more difficult. Guidance systems route to the bridge at all times, and they've also got auxiliary systems control. Ryder's working on re-routing them to an alternate interface here using some of the simulator software, but we've having to trick the computer into thinking that the simulation is the reality. Or something like that."

Marshall nodded, "I'm assuming that their computer technicians are working to prevent just that."

"Yes, sir. Our best guesses have us regaining control in about ninety minutes."

"Too long."

Corporal Stiles walked over to the huddle of officers, and saluted. "I'm glad you made it out, Captain."

"I'm glad that none of your team turned traitor."

He grunted, then replied, "Not bloody likely, sir. I have an idea."

"By all means, Corporal, let's have it."

"We've simulated this before on other ships. There's an emergency airlock just behind the bridge, over the elevator access terminal."

Quinn nodded, "Before the last upgrade, there were a pair of escape pods mounted up there."

The corporal turned to the engineer, nodding his head impatiently, "Yes, but the actual airlock is still there, sir?"

"Yes."

"Then, Captain, I can lead a squad along the side of the ship. In nine minutes we can be in that airlock with enough force to take down the mutineers." He pulled a triangular-shaped box from his pocket. "A pair of these will tear a hole in the door without damaging the hull, or the equipment inside, if we get it right."

"That's crazy," Caine said. "All it would take would be a few short bursts on the maneuvering thrusters, and you'll be thrown off the side of the ship. A blast from the main engines and we'd never get you back again."

"My men are prepared to risk it, sir."

Mulenga rubbed his hand across his chin, "We could feed a dummy program into the sensors from one of the output feeds. Corporal, if I might borrow a few of your men, I could probably arrange such a diversion. It would not last for long, but long enough to give you time to complete your work."

"There's another snag. We'd not have enough time to get a flight crew up to the bridge to make the maneuver." Caine nodded, reluctantly, "It would get us back the ship, though. With control of the tactical systems from the bridge, we could have the mutineers confined in a matter of minutes."

"Another two deadlines right there," Quinn said, "if they get life support and tactical, then all of our plans are meaningless."

Marshall looked up at the clock, and smiled. "I can solve the flight crew problem. All we need is one man at guidance."

"I get the idea, but who? Franklin and Kibaki were in the living quarters, and we're cut off from that area of the ship," Caine said. "Ryder? Quinn?

The captain shook his head, "Ryder's staying here in case this goes wrong. Quinn has to supervise our tinkering down here if we're going to make any of this work." He smiled, and clapped Stiles on the shoulder, "I spent a year sitting at one of those consoles, I think I still know how they work. Let's get going, Corporal."

Chapter 22

It had been months since Marshall had last worn a spacesuit of any kind, during his annual emergency training, and that had been the lightweight flight suit worn in a fighter cockpit, designed more for agility and ease of use than protection. The armored space suit he was putting on under the supervision of Corporal Stiles was a completely different animal; armor was the only way of putting it. Multiple layers of material, double reinforced helmet with connectors to his rifle for a heads-up display, tactical information network linked to the other members of the squad. His boots rattled against the deck as he slowly walked to the airlock.

"Remember, normally when anyone does anything on the outer hull, we take the spin off for safety," Corporal Stiles said to the group. "This time we don't get to do that. So make sure you stay attached to the hull, and that you keep in mind that for the purposes of this walk, you're climbing rather than floating." He grinned. "And make sure you use the right hand-holds. I don't want the engineers claiming that you've broken anything."

Marshall reached the airlock door, his hand hovering over the release, waiting to hear the call that the sensor station had been captured. He looked down the corridor, saw a familiar body lying on the deck; Petty Officer Diego, a pistol still clutched in his hands. He spent a few seconds wondering whose side he had been on.

Seven minutes and counting; say ninety seconds to get into the bridge from the outer hull and engage the course. Odds were that Cellini would have wiped it from the bridge's navigational computer, but he had a data crystal in his pocket. All he had to do was slam it into the emergency control relay and hit three buttons, and they'd be on course. It didn't matter whether they'd recaptured full control of the ship in time for the intercept, just that the freighter captain believed they had.

A voice burst over his intercom, punctuated with the occasional crack of a bullet, "Mission accomplished, Captain. You are go to proceed." A scream echoed inside Marshall's helmet before the automatics could lower the volume, and Mulenga continued, "I'm not sure how long we can hold this position, though."

"Give me five clear minutes, Lieutenant. Hold the line."

He slapped his gauntleted hand down on the release button, and was bathed in light reflecting off Ragnarok's ice sheet as the door receded. Taking a deep breath, he cautiously moved onto the step outside, feeling a clunk on his back as Stiles attached a safety line to him.

In his youth, he'd done some mountaineering on Mars, but the gravity now was half again as heavy as it had been in those days, and he wasn't wearing full armor. Looking up at what seemed like an endless cliff, he shook his head, wondering what had possessed him to come up with this plan in the first place.

"After you, sir," Stiles said, evidently sensing his commander's doubts. With an uncertain hand, Marshall grabbed onto one of the hand-holds and pulled, then a second, then again. Dozens of links of hand-holds ran up the side of the ship for maintenance; if all was well, this would be as simple as climbing a long ladder. He heard the ringing of his boots on the hull, echoing through his boots. Strange to hear anything in space, but it was a reassuring sound.

In the back of his mind was a voice from his past, his EVA instructor cautioning him to clip onto to the ship at all times, a series of long and gruesome lectures ready for anyone who was careless enough to forget. He hadn't forgotten his safety harness; it was still swinging from his belt, drifting back and forth.

Five minutes – four and a half, now – was a woefully small time to reach the emergency airlock, even without taking precautions. One blast from the main engines, or worse a change to the rotation of the ship, and it wouldn't make much difference anyway. While the harnesses were strong enough for normal purposes, they wouldn't take anything like that heavy a load.

One minute down. Four and a half to go. They seemed to be making reasonable progress, but his neck movement was so restricted in his armor that he couldn't tell how the rest of the squad were doing, though the drag of the line behind him suggested that something was back there. He looked up at Ragnarok to distract his mind while he continued hand over hand up the side of the ship, looking again at the jagged black mountains braking through the solid ice sheets. Then the feeling on the line changed, going slightly limp.

"Zinowitz, watch out!" called an unfamiliar voice. Marshall stopped for a moment and turned around, cautiously keeping one hand and one foot steady on his rung. The trooper at the end of the chain had managed to miss his step and was drifting off the ship, further away with every second. The one above him was trying to grab at the line, but was dangerously close to losing his grip himself.

"I'm loose, Corp," Zinowitz yelled.

"Damn," Stiles said. "Hold on a minute, I'll come down. Winston, see what you can do."

Marshall shook his head, and reluctantly cut in, "Belay that, Corporal. Zinowitz, detach your cable. Make sure you stay within twenty meters of the hull with your thrusters. Once we get up top-side, make your way back in and report to Engineering."

"I could try and get back onto the hand-holds, sir."

"We don't have the time, Zinowitz. This is taking seconds we just don't have. Cut loose. That's an order."

Disappointment crackled over the speaker, "Aye, sir." With a carefully calculated tug, Zinowitz detached his safety line and began to drift away, reaching down to his thruster controls to hug close to the hull.

"Everyone take extra care. Three minutes and ten seconds left. We should do it if we hurry," Marshall said, continuing his climb. He could understand how the drifting trooper felt; he wouldn't have wanted to be left behind either, not at this stage, but there wasn't any choice if they were going to make that deadline. With a jerk, he saw his own foot slipping off the rung below, and clung tightly with his hands, swinging his foot back into place.

More climbing. The squad passed the primary antenna complex, timing their moves to dodge it as it swung around, automatically ranging from target to target. Every step required greater and greater effort, sweat was pouring from his brow and he felt the need to brush his hand across his forehead to wipe it off – he almost did it out of instinct. Up ahead, he saw a flickering red light, flashing on and off; the entrance to the emergency airlock. Redoubling his efforts, he scaled the remaining rungs, stepping out gratefully on to the lodge, locking himself into place.

His helmet communicator crackled again, "We've lost it! Having to fall back!" Mulenga yelled.

"Everyone strap in. Now." The squad rushed to follow his instructions as he tapped the release button. He didn't really expect a response, and he wasn't surprised. Less than five seconds warning; whoever was running the tactical station was obviously on the ball. Then it hit him suddenly.

"Engineering! They've got bridge tactical control back!"

"Christ. I'm on it, sir," Quinn's voice replied, distantly, "I think we...". The engineer's voice collapsed into a wave of static; they were jamming communications. He could still speak to the squad; the safety cord had a commlink built in.

"Candero," he called down to the squad's combat engineer, "get up here now. I need this lock broken."

The ship began to rock underneath him, back and forth, playing on the thrusters. Not enough to shake them loose, but enough to keep them secured. Marshall was about to order Candero to keep his position when the trooper detached himself from the ship and started to climb, hand over hand, trying to judge the movement of the ship before it happened.

It was a deadly guessing game to play, and with the squad secured to the ladder, he was pulling himself up by whatever hand-holds he could find, leaving a trail of damaged equipment in his wake. As he finally got up to Marshall's level, he began to slip, running out of secure footing; trusting in his safety cord lasting for long enough, Marshall let go, swinging down to grab the trooper by the arm, sending them both crashing into the side of the hull.

"If they didn't know before, they'll know we're here now," Stiles said, sotto voce.

"Ninety seconds, Candero. Get moving," Marshall said.

The trooper nodded, and pulled a pair of small boxes out of a pocket on the outside of his suit, carefully placing them on either side of the magnetic locks, then attacked a wire between the two. He leaned back, and started to count down from ten, while the rest of the squad waited impatiently.

When he reached zero, the door slid open, and Candero was the first inside, followed by Marshall and Stiles; in full armor, the small emergency lock could barely hold the three of them. The lock cycled, taking more seconds. Just two more minutes before he had to be hitting that button. They crowded into the nook above the elevator, Marshall reaching to activate the emergency release. Stiles grabbed his hand.

"Has to be me, Captain. Greatest risk is for the first man in, and you've got to enter that course change."

"Corporal," Marshall began, before being interrupted.

"You want to waste time arguing, sir?" Stiles grabbed the release and pulled open the cover, leaping in, immediately followed by Candero, then Marshall. Behind them, the airlock was cycling again, the first wave of their reinforcements on their way to join them. Even if they'd had the time to wait for them, there simply wasn't enough space for any more bodies in that crawlspace. They hefted their weapons, ready to burst in. Stiles tapped the emergency release, then swore when it failed to open.

"Time for my magic," Candero said, reaching into another pocket for a pair of shaped charges. As Stiles moved out of the way, the trooper said, "Looks like I get to go first, Corp."

This time there was no delay. With an immediate fizzing noise, a white line seemed to seep between the two charges, and with a small but satisfactory pop, the locking mechanism broke away and the doors slid open, to reveal a pair of alert guards in the form of Cole and Tyler, their sidearms at the ready, which they fired at the first shape to emerge from the door – Candero. The two of them were excellent shots, and extremely familiar with the weak spots in the suit armor.

With his final breath, the Lance-Corporal managed to collapse forward on top of them, sending them sprawling under the weight of the armor, crimson blood seeping out of two gaping holes in the side of his neck close to the helmet seal. Stiles leapt over the body, firing a pair of rounds at Cellini at the guidance control station, sending the traitorous helmsman collapsing over the console, his arms falling limp.

Marshall's first thought, besides getting to that guidance station, was for tactical, a carefully placed shot sending Khachaturian to meet his maker. A heartbeat later, Stiles fell to his side, clutching at his neck, gasping for breath, and Marshall leaned across to avenge his death, three shots sending Zakharova to the deck, spasming by the communications console.

The next group of espatiers were scrambling into the room, Private Blake throwing himself down by the dying Corporal, the contents of his medikit spilled on the deck as he attempted to save his life, the other two keeping Cole and Tyler covered. Retaking the bridge had taken less than twenty seconds. Marshall pushed Cellini's body out of the way and slid the data crystal into the guidance console in a single action, then started to implement the course. An error message flashed up on the screen and he closed his eyes, shaking his head as he sat at the console.

"What is it, sir?" One of the troopers turned his head to him while he placed Cole under restraint.

"We've missed the window, Ballantine. Nine damn seconds too late. We can't intercept the transport." He gestured towards the communications console. "If you've got them secured, put that basic training to use and get a flight crew up here, and medics for Stiles."

"Yes, sir." The private's face was downcast. Marshall smiled.

"Don't worry, Private. We took the bridge, and we'll have our ship back in a few minutes. We won the battle." As the private headed over to the console, Marshall muttered to himself, looking down at Candero's body on the deck, "But I think we might have lost the war."

Chapter 23

The squad marched across the snow, spread out in loose clumps into two fire teams making their way to preselected positions, Hunter taking point. Half a mile to the rear, the wrecked truck continued to smolder; it was only as the squad drew closer to the landing strip that Coop had stopped complaining about the 'vandals' who had ruined it.

The transport was to come down in a shallow crater, the ruins of a long-ago asteroid strike, surrounded by high peaks. A series of beacons had started to light as they approached, their red lights bathing the horizon in an eerie glow. There was less than an hour to darkness, and computer control or no, landing under dark conditions in an environment such as this was a risk that few pilots would take.

"Where are the rebels?" Esposito said, looking at Forbes to her left.

He looked around, "A couple of guys are probably already dug in down there. The rest will wait until the shuttle's down and move in – probably half a dozen trucks, I reckon. They'll want to get everything out before the Governor's forces arrive."

"And if they do?" Orlova asked.

The prospector chuckled, "Then our little war will probably be decided right here in one big battle. Both sides will be committing most of their effective forces to this one."

The espatiers took up their positions around the rim of the deep crater, being careful to mask their tracks as they walked, each fire team covering a different approach angle. None of their weapons were likely to be able to put much of a dent on the transport itself, except the grenades – and without a launcher, they were rather too hazardous to risk except as a last resort. Hunter looked around at the crater, shaking his head.

"This might all have been for nothing if Alamo managed to intercept it," he said, a trace of bitterness in his voice. At Esposito's raised eyebrow, he continued, "Not that I don't want the boys upstairs to have captured it, ma'am. It's just that since we came down here we've been taking shit from everyone, and I want to be the one dealing it out for a change."

His sentence was punctuated by a loud sonic boom, drawing all of their eyes to the sky. A thin contrail was spiraling down from the upper atmosphere, a small black dot at the far end of it. Esposito pulled out her binoculars, considered for a moment, then passed them over to Orlova. She carefully adjusted the magnification, and a wide grin began to creep across her face.

"Jackpot. One transport coming down, and it looks Republic to me," she said. "They're really tearing down. I'd say we've got company in about ten minutes."

Hunter and Forbes slapped each other on the back and readied their plasma rifles, siting in on the only way into the crater on the ground. As defensible a spot as it was, as good a landing site, it was also an excellent place to spring a trap. A faint rumbling started to sound, and five trucks came rumbling over the horizon at full speed.

A pair of figures emerged from the rocks, breaking cover, and ran out toward the trucks; Esposito was tempted to take a shot, but the transport could yet abort its landing if it saw that anything suspicious was taking place on the ground. Until it had landed, its engines turned off, there wasn't much they could do.

A series of bright flares flashed across the ground from the transport's engine as it pulsed towards a landing; at this point there was nothing the pilot could do to make the landing particularly stealthy, the only sensible goal being to make the touchdown as short as possible. The trucks waited outside the crater, not wanting to get caught in any exhaust from the final descent. A cluster of landing legs extended down, and landing jets began to fire, a gentle touch of thruster one way or another guiding it down to the flattest part of the landing site. Orlova caught herself nodding at the pilot's skill, and carefully looked over the lines of the ship.

A blockade runner, though technically called a 'Fast Transport' for military parlance, not a million miles away from the models the Martians used in the war to get needed elements in from the interstellar mining outposts. Where the flag of the Lunar Republic would normally be proudly displayed there was instead a black and red flag separated by a yellow stripe, a pair of stars on either side. She looked across at Forbes, puzzled.

"Our flag," Forbes said over the roar of the engine. Nodding, she turned back to watch the last stages of the landing, smoke and steam rising from the ground from the heat of the jets. Immediately after touchdown, with speed obviously gained from long experience, the trucks rolled forward and a series of hatches on the side opened up. Men began to spill out of the trucks and race towards the transport, crude breathing apparatus clamped to their faces to protect themselves from the shuttle's hot exhaust.

Esposito hefted her weapon once more, sighted one of the trucks, and yelled, "Let 'em have it!" She managed to get in the first shot, a green ball dancing across the sky, slamming into the rock near a cluster of men. Immediately the air was full of the crackle of plasma fire and the occasional rat-tat-tat of bullets from Coop's old machine gun. Bodies lay strewn on the ground, but the rebels quickly recovered from the surprise attack and threw themselves into cover, reaching for their own weapons to return fire. A fusillade of shots rang out from the ground, and from the yells it was obvious that some of the bullets had found their mark.

"We've got to finish this quickly, or the transport will just lift off," Esposito said, firing a burst to keep a particularly accurate rebel's head down.

"Not to mention that we're exposed like hell to a rear attack," the sergeant replied.

Order was rapidly disappearing from the battlefield; Esposito could see that one of the fire teams had been badly mauled, only firing the occasional plasma burst. She spotted a rocky outcrop a couple of dozen paces down the side of the crater wall; not enough cover to keep anyone hidden, but enough to give them some protection. More importantly, an excellent place to start a crossfire from.

Without any warning, she leapt out of her hiding place and started to sprint towards the outcrop, weaving from left to right. A torrent of shots rained down around her, blasting chunks out of the rocks. As she drew close to her target she slipped when a rock gave way underneath her, sending her falling to her side and the rocks tumbling down the war. By a miracle she was able to roll into position, grimacing slightly at a pain to her ankle. Another pair of shots sent a shower of pebbles dropping on her head; her return shot sent the shooter falling to the ground.

"No retreat now," Hunter muttered, looking across at Forbes. There was no trace of reluctance on the prospector's face as he fired shot after shot into the ground, though he had more of a tendency to pin them down than hit them. The sergeant looked over at Coop; the old woman was glancing down at her watch, then turned to him, smiling.

"Any second now."

"What?" Orlova replied.

The answer came when a trio of low-level fliers burst over the hill, roaring their engines and letting off a series of shots onto the rebels on the ground. One of them exploded a few seconds later, a smoke trail suggesting that someone had been quick off the mark with an anti-air missile. As the fire from the Triplanetary squad became erratic, limited to the occasional target of opportunity, Orlova ran over and grabbed Coop by the collar.

"What have you done?" she yelled.

"What Forbes suggested. I contacted the Governor and told him about the transport. Rather hoped he'd send in the cavalry."

Orlova staggered back; the lack of cover didn't seem to matter, with no-one on the ground paying any attention to the rim now. Hunter looked around, confused, moving his gun from target to target, as the pilot lifted her borrowed binoculars to her eyes, trying to work out what was going on.

"The transport's getting ready to move out," she said.

Clarke looked up at her from his vantage point, asking, "How the hell do you know that?"

"Common sense, Corporal." A pair of loud roars echoed across the crater, followed by a pair of explosions on the far wall. "I would in her place."

"Great."

"We came here to get that transport. The rest is just incidental." Orlova stood up, daring the fire, pointing at the transport. "Troopers, get that damn transport! That's an order!"

She fell down on the ground, Hunter's hand pulling her down by the belt. He looked into her face, his teeth bared, then over at the second fire team. Two of them were lining up shots on the transport's landing legs, and a pair of bolts raced down to the ground. The other troopers rapidly got the idea, pinning the vessel down, and one of the government fliers swooped around to take a pass at it, soaring dangerously close.

"Who the hell are you to be giving orders!" Hunter yelled.

"Relax, Sergeant, she's right. Someone had to do it," Coop said. "Let's get on with this."

Reluctantly, Hunter turned and fired a shot of his own; a direct hit, but the transport was too heavily armored for it to have any effect. Esposito had the idea, and tried to get a burst inside the ship as the hatches slid shut, but her timing was a few seconds too late, and the bolt was harmlessly absorbed. A bright flash heralded the end of a second flyer, debris scattering to the ground; the rebels appeared to be gaining the upper hand, and a cheer went up.

"It doesn't matter who wins at this point. If either side gets the weapons it'll be a bad day for us," Clarke said.

Orlova fired another shot, knocking out a machine gun a pair of rebels were attempting to set up, then turned to face the angry sergeant, "Got any other ideas, Sergeant? I'm about out."

"That's the problem with rookies. They always have the great ideas but don't have a clue about what it actually takes to carry them out." He looked across and grinned, continuing, "That's what sergeants are for. Watch."

A loud battle cry escaped from the sergeant's mouth as he leapt out of cover, half-running, half-falling down the hill. His gun was still sitting beside Orlova, and for a second she thought that he'd managed to forget it, before spotting that each hand held one of the grenades they'd obtained from the stores at Mariner Station – grenades that were probably meant to be part of the cargo on the transport. In a flash, she realized what he was about to do. Corporal Clarke silently watched at his old friend racing down the hill, firing a couple of shots over his head to give some covering fire.

"Everyone get down! Shield your eyes!" she yelled, hugging herself into a ball in the snow. Hunter made it half-way down the slope before a pair of bullets got him, one from each side. He just continued to grin, tossing the grenades underarm in the direction of the transport before collapsing on the ground, the gleam in his eyes slowly beginning to fade. The round bombs rolled quickly, bumping and leaping along, but his last throw had been a good one, and they rolled underneath the transport.

She felt the explosion rather than heard it; even through her clenched eyes she could see the flash, and the roar dulled out her hearing. Rubble fell across the ground, creating another series of craters around the original one. As soon as she dared, Orlova looked up; the sounds of gunfire were replaced by moaning and groaning from the bottom of the crater. The transport and its cargo was a burning wreck, a pillar of smoke rising up into the atmosphere. Up in the sky, a parachute had opened under a capsule. Evidently the transport's crew had decided that discretion was the better part of valor.

The last flyer had been right over the explosion; it took her a few minutes to see where it had crashed. Esposito waved a slightly scorched hand in the thumbs-up sign, and as far as she could see, none of the other espatiers had been killed or wounded. Emerging from cover, their weapons readied but not pointing at anything, the remains of the squad began to make their way into the crater floor.

Chapter 24

Ryder logged onto the guidance console as Marshall stood up, making his way over to the captain's chair. The troopers had taken out most of the bodies, loading them into the elevator to be taken down to the ship's morgue. Doctor Duquesne ran her hand over Stiles' face, shaking her head, and called for one of his men to take his body away. Blake looked almost in tears as he threw his medikit to the deck, picking up the late corporal's body. The elevator opened again, Weitzman, Spinelli and Caine moving to take stations around the bridge. Weitzman hesitated slightly before taking the communications station.

"Sir, if I had known for a second that they were planning anything like this...", the young crewman began.

Marshall raised his hand to stop him, replying, "I know, spaceman, I know. Thank you."

Nodding, Weitzman settled into the communications station. The bridge was a mess, half a dozen consoles ruined by bullet fire, blood splattered liberally across the deck plating and on the seats, a trickle of smoke from the electrical fire started during the original escape from the bridge. The course projection of the landing site of the freighter seemed to taunt him; he began work on possible courses to intercept the ship when it began its inevitable ascent. Caine looked over from the tactical station.

"Getting reports from all over the ship now, sir. All critical stations have been secured; Corporal Forrest is rounding up the last groups in the life support systems now. Once they found out the bridge had been recaptured, they gave up, though some of them are negotiating for terms of surrender."

"No terms. Just that they will get a fair trial when we get home," Marshall replied.

Caine nodded, "That's what I thought you'd say. Next piece of news is that we've got two frigates coming towards us from different sides of Gatewood, both on direct intercept courses, but with ranges that mean that either of them could neatly intercept us if we attempted to leave the system. They've got us nicely boxed, I've got to hand it to them."

"As soon as we've got the last of the mutineers secured and Quinn's had a chance to look at the damage they inflicted, I intend to break orbit. Any idea how long?"

"Interception in three and a half hours. Before I left engineering Quinn told me that he expects to declare us fit for space in ten minutes. I'll get Mulenga working on some course plots once he gets out of the sickbay." At Marshall's frown, she continued, "Nothing serious, just a bit of shrapnel."

Looking out at the moon slowly moving beneath them, he shook his head, "Anything else I need to know about?"

"I've got sensor tracks of the transport going right down to the ground. It landed about three minutes ago."

He stood up, making his way forward to guidance. "Ryder, I want you to adjust our orbit again. Keep us in a position where we can grab them, assuming they shape directly for the nearest system egress point. We might not be able to confiscate their cargo, but by damn we can question their crew."

"Holy hell!" Spinelli yelled from his console. "You've got to take a look at this, sir!" He punched a few buttons, and a zoomed-in picture of the moon appeared on the screen, a tall column of smoke rising from the inside of a crater.

Marshall's eyes widened, "What am I looking at, spaceman?"

"I was monitoring the transport when it blew up! There was some activity around it, but I couldn't make out anything much."

"Sir," Weitzman broke in, "I have a signal from the surface now. Ensign Esposito calling for you."

A chorus of cheers went up around the bridge, primarily from the espatiers; all of them seemed to have worked out what must have happened, and it was a welcome tonic after the events of the last hour. Shaking his head, Marshall grabbed a headset from the communications station and clamped it on.

"Ensign, I'm assuming the huge ball of fire was your doing?"

The voice crackled up from the surface, "Yes, sir. We found out than an arms shipment was on its way to the rebels, and decided that we should intercept it. I must report that Sergeant Hunter and Private McBride died during the battle."

Softly, Marshall replied, "I'm afraid we've had some action up here as well, Ensign. Your people fought bravely and were instrumental in our regaining control of the ship, but there have been casualties."

"Regaining control of the ship?"

"Never mind that now. What is your situation down there?"

"We appear to have captured the head of the resistance, General Haynes, wounded but alive, and a lot of the Governor's men. Most of the Governor's mobile forces were taken out in the assault."

Shaking his head, the captain responded, "Are you telling me that you managed to knock out both sides in the conflict on the planet's surface?"

"Something like that, skipper. We should have no problem getting the crewmen back now, but have you got any further orders?"

He looked over at Caine, who frowned before replying, "Regime change. Instead of the Lunar Republic propping up a government down there, we've managed to do the job for them."

"Your thoughts?"

"We broke it, we've got to fix it."

"Hmm." He pondered for a second before replying, "How bad is it there?"

"We've got a lot of wounded, and need medical assistance. Any chance you could get a shuttle down?"

He paused again, "Ensign, I'm afraid we'll be breaking orbit in about ten minutes to engage the enemy frigates in battle. Whatever orders I give you will likely be subject to change following the results of that encounter."

"Sir, you need to know that the frigates are not the property of the planetary government, but are being operated by the rebels. The government getting the crewmen was simply an accident. The Lunar Republic provided the ships, but the rebels own them."

Marshall smiled for the first time that day. If the frigates were flew the flag of a rebel group, then the Republic could have no justification for complaint if Alamo was to take them down. The political problems were at last beginning to melt away; he felt a lot more comfortable dealing with the tactical issues. Not that they were minor, but at least he had the training to cope with them.

"Take care of the wounded as best you can. Inform the Governor that on our return to orbit I will be meeting with him on the planet's surface – find a suitable point that you can secure, just in case he has any further tricks up his sleeve. Make sure that the General doesn't have any nasty accidents either. If we're going to make any sort of a ceasefire hold, then both sides are going to have to participate, one way or another."

"Yes, sir."

"I presume there's nothing left of the transport?"

"Just an escape capsule, sir. I have it under guard, but no-one has left it yet."

"Fine. Make sure the site is secured. How many troopers have you got left?"

"Four, as well as a few people helping us from non-aligned forces."

He frowned before replying, "Sorry I can't get you any reinforcements. Do the best you can with what you have. With any luck Alamo will be returning to orbit in about five hours or so, with the rebels dealt with once and for all. Just make sure the Governor is at the meeting, and we might be able to finish this little war for good."

"Aye, sir."

"One more thing, Ensign. You and your people performed splendidly today. That will be prominently noted in my log entries. I want to make that clear."

"Thank you, sir. That's appreciated."

"See you shortly. Alamo out."

Marshall replaced the headset on the console, clapping Weitzman on the back before heading over to the elevator. Caine rose, blocking his passage, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Where are you going, skipper?"

"I need to speak with Tyler. Call down to Corporal Forrest's men and have them make him ready for me. There are some things I would like to know about what we're facing."

"Type 19 Frigates. I was just about to tell you – amazingly, when someone other than a mutineer is at the stations, the warbooks work fine."

"Old missile runners."

She smiled, "And ones we have good technical breakdowns on. They tried to sell Mars a few of them back in '62."

"Good. Get a tactical breakdown ready for the senior staff, or what's left of it, to review."

"On it. Now that you know that, do you really need to see Tyler?"

He stepped into the elevator, carefully over Dietz's bloodstain. "I need to know how far this one runs. You have the bridge; feel free to shape orbit when ready. Course to the nearest of the two frigates; I want to engage them one at a time if we can."

The doors closed behind him, leaving him with his thoughts. It had occurred to him that some of the mutineers might have decided to stay hidden in case it failed, to cause a few final acts of sabotage, but he dismissed that one. The fighting had been close enough that anyone Zakharova could have called upon would have been deployed. Stopping at the cargo deck, the elevator opened, and Marshall strode out into the corridor, signs of battle all around. A pair of espatiers saluted him as he approached.

"At ease. Tyler in there?"

"On his own, sir. He's been very quiet," one of them replied. "Do you want us in there with you?"

The captain placed his hand on the butt of a pistol jammed into a pocket, shaking his head, "That won't be necessary, Private. First sound of trouble, you'll come in and nail him. I suspect he knows that."

A loud clunk echoed across the wall as the door opened. Tyler was sitting in a corner of the room, in front of a few boxes; a bottle of water had been tossed in with him, unopened on the floor, and his hands were still bound by magnetic restraints. An angry bruise was forming on the side of his face; he looked up as the captain walked in, sneering at him.

"Come to gloat?"

Marshall shook his head, sitting on a box. "No."

He gestured at the gun, "Going to finish me off yourself? Those troopers of yours thought about it, I could see it in their eyes."

"I couldn't blame them if they had. Though I ordered them not to. You're going to face a trial, Tyler. The dead deserve it."

"We had you fooled, didn't we. You were so caught up with Zak that you didn't suspect anyone else might be involved."

"And yet here you are, sitting here in restraints." Marshall caught himself for a second, rubbing his hand across his chin before continuing, "I didn't come down here to bandy words with you."

"Then what did bring you down here?" Tyler replied, spitting on the deck.

"All of the records from the bridge, as well as testimony from a least half a dozen people, will be entered into the official records. Mutiny remains the only death sentence on the books. You are going to spend an awfully long time in prison, either way, and I hope you never have an inch of freedom again, but if you help me now, I might be willing to recommend clemency."

Tyler rose to his feet, leaning against the wall, and sneered again, "If you are going up against those two frigates, likely as not I'm a dead man anyway. Two against one, they'll have you for sure."

"It might not be as simple as that, and you know it." He paused for a second. "My report has the power to sway the court either to the death penalty or life imprisonment. Don't get the idea that anything else is on offer here, because it isn't."

Spitting on the floor again, Tyler replied, "What do you want to know? I'm sure you'll have guessed most of it by now."

"How far are those frigate crews going to go? Our surrender, the destruction of Alamo, what?"

"No witnesses. You got that part right. Everything's been messed up enough that they won't let anyone stay alive to tell about it."

"Is that the rebels, or your friends from the Lunar Republic?"

The reply was a burst of snorting laughter, "The rebels might think they're running the show, but they couldn't do a thing without us. They're a century out of date. You've got to deal with Republic crews, Marshall. They won't give in."

"The rebels think they are in charge, then?"

"Part of the act. Puppets work better that way."

"I see." A pause. "I get Zakharova. Frustrated officer, misguided patriotism, that sort of crap. You I don't get. Good service record, your parents both fought in the war. What went wrong in that brain of yours, Tyler?"

"My parents died so that one bunch of politicians could replace another." He laughed. "If I'm going to die the same way, then I'll be damned if I'll do it for service pay."

"Just for money, then. Not principles."

"Nothing personal," Tyler sneered. "Bad for business."

Marshall stood up and walked out of the room. He turned his head back, "I'll make that report, Tyler."

"Whatever you want."

The troopers saluted again as Marshall left the room; he pulled out his communicator and cursed when it didn't activate; presumably Quinn hadn't finished his repairs to the internal communication system. He tried the wall unit instead.

"Marshall to Weitzman. Put me through to Esposito again."

"Yes, sir."

There was a short wait, and a loud series of communication crackles, before he got a reply, "That was faster than I expected, sir."

"I've got another job for you, and it's damn important. It may well make the difference between life or death in the battle we'll be fighting."

Resolution filled the young officer's voice, "Whatever it is, Captain, we'll get it done for you."

"That General you captured, is he fit to talk?"

"I think so, sir."

"In exactly one hour and fifty-seven minutes after Alamo breaks orbit, I need him to issue a formal surrender. No guarantees, but it might swing the odds in our favor a little at a critical moment."

"One hour and...I don't understand, sir."

"That's fine, Ensign. Just make sure it happens. Alamo out."

Marshall closed down the communicator, paused for a moment, then stepped back into the elevator, the doors closing behind him. After speaking with Tyler, he felt like he needed to take shower.

Chapter 25

The smell from the crater was indescribable; Orlova was extremely grateful for her nose filters, but even they weren't keeping out all of it. Esposito, leaning on an improvised crutch, waved a hand towards her and she made her way down among the rubble, stepping over the casualties.

Slowly, some order was beginning to come out of the chaos; the espatiers were triaging the wounded based on their limited first-aid training, and a pair of trucks rumbling in the distance heralded medical relief on the way. General Haynes was sitting in a corner, his head buried in his hands; all of his dreams and hopes had been shattered when the transport blew up.

"What's the count, Gabi?" Orlova asked, military protocol still an alien language to her.

The young officer looked pained, and it wasn't because of her ankle, "Twenty-nine down here, and two of ours on the ridge line. Almost everyone down here was wounded to one degree or another." She waved her communicator. "Alamo's breaking orbit to hunt down those frigates; they'll be back in five hours."

"Wish I was up there."

"I think we've had enough fighting to last a while, don't you? In any case, we've got our marching orders. We need to get the Governor to a summit meeting with the Captain in some sort of defensible neutral ground."

Orlova gestured towards Coop, who was passing from wounded man to wounded man passing out painkillers, "What about her dome?"

"Hell of a place for a meeting to decide the future of an entire planet," Esposito said, sighing. "I suppose it's probably about as good as we're going to get. Until we get things straightened out walking into one of their main domes would simply be walking into a trap, and the bill to get out of it again would be bloody expensive on both sides."

"You OK?"

"No, I'm not. Apparently another nine of my men are dead up there on Alamo." She looked up in the sky, moisture beginning to appear in the corners of her eyes. "I thought this was going to be a magnificent adventure, Maggie. A chance to see strange new worlds at best, boring garrison duty at worst."

Putting her hands on her hips, the pilot replied, "That's enough. Snap out of it, right now."

"You're giving me an order?"

"If that's what it takes. Damn it, Gabi, you've done damn well down here. Look at what we did!"

"I am. That's the problem." She looked down at the ground, shaking her head.

"The war on the planet is over, Gabi! A civil war that had been waging for months that would have ended with this planet sold out to the Lunar Republic is done! Once Alamo pops off those two frigates, all we have to do is tie up the loose ends and the battle is over. These people – whether they knew it or not – died for the future of their homeworld."

Esposito started to walk away, heading towards the ridge line; Orlova followed her. "I didn't do anything. I never did anything. It was Hunter, or Clarke. Or you."

"That's your god-damned job! I don't know much about this military bullshit except what my dad told me, but even I know that officers command, NCOs do the job. You decide what must be done and they do it. That's how this game works. Fall apart now, and what have they fought for?"

"Half my command is dead, or close to it, Maggie."

Orlova's hand whirled through the air, slapping Esposito on the cheek. "Then damn it, do better next time! Don't give up and collapse into a bundle of tears and self-pity. All of them died doing their job, doing their duty, and doing exactly what they wanted to do. If you'd told them all that they were going to die before the fight they'd have still gone anyway. That's what marines – and hell, espatiers – do."

Rubbing her hand across her cheek where the red mark was still visible, she replied, "I could have you court-martialed for that."

"Feel free." The pilot turned away, then continued, "Don't we have some sort of a mission to complete for the Captain?"

The two trucks rumbled into the crater and stopped; half a dozen people wearing white coats jumped out and started making for the wounded while the drivers started to unload medical equipment. One of them stopped and saluted as another man, tall and wearing well-fitting winter camouflage, stepped out of the first truck, shaking his head. He spoke to one of the troopers, then made his way over to Esposito and Orlova.

"Are you in command of this nightmare?" he asked Esposito.

She looked him up and down, "Who wants to know?"

"The Governor of Ragnarok wants to know," he snarled. "Fifteen dead members of the Planetary Guard want to know, not to mention the dead rebels. What do you think you were doing?"

"My job. If you'd turned over the freighter crew when we arrived, Alamo would be on its way home right now and you could deal with this in your own way."

Looking around the devastation, he shook his head, "I ought to order them all shot, but it wouldn't bring back the dead. You do realize that the whole population is on a knife-edge right now. I've had to declare martial law just to keep essential services operating."

Coop seemed to prick her ears up at this, and began to make her way quietly over to the group, being careful to remain out of sight of the Governor.

"Damn it, if we'd let these weapons land, the rebels would have blown your butts off the planet. Then turned it over to the Lunar Republic on a silver platter. Would you have preferred that, Governor?" Orlova said. "Your people didn't seem to be getting the job done."

"What do you want, a medal and a parade?" He sighed, "This has just about tied up our critical care capacity. I really don't want to do this, but I need to request the use of your ship's medical facilities. I am aware that they are significantly more advanced than anything we have on Ragnarok.

The two of them looked at each other, before Esposito replied, "I'm afraid the medical facilities on Alamo aren't available. The ship has recently experienced battle damage leading to casualties."

His face downcast, the Governor nodded, "I see."

"My people will commit themselves to helping with the wounded in any way possible. I have a request for you myself."

He threw out a hollow laugh, then replied, "And what would that be?"

"Captain Marshall would like to meet with you on neutral soil in order to discuss the future of Ragnarok. He feels that there are urgent matters for you to discuss now that the rebellion is effectively over."

"You will forgive me for not being immediately willing to meet with your Captain. How about I just turn over the freighter crews and you get off this rock. If I had a choice, you'd all be under arrest right now, but I don't."

The Governor walked back to the truck, looking around at the casualties, dazed by the devastation, and sat in the cab. One of the drivers passed him a communicator, saying something quietly into his ear. Coop followed him, again cautiously, not deliberately attempting to be stealthy, but not attracting attention either. Orlova looked at Esposito.

"At least we get our people back," she said.

"Why do I still get the feeling that we've failed," Esposito replied. "Let's try the General. I'd like to accomplish at least half of my mission today."

Walking over to the far corner of the crater, they looked down at the old man, now weeping into his arms. He hadn't noticed their approach at all; Esposito hadn't bothered to put a guard on him, thinking that they had greater priorities to concern themselves with. Orlova tapped him on the shoulder, but he didn't respond, instead slowly rocking back and forward.

"General?" Esposito said. "We need to speak with you."

"Leave me alone. And don't call me General. I have no army now."

Orlova looked at Esposito, then sat down next to the General, "You still have two ships in orbit, General. We need to stop the bloodshed up there, or a lot more people are going to get killed."

"It's meaningless, don't you see? I knew that the Lunar Republic would have designs on Ragnarok, I knew that damn well. With a strong enough army and a people unified under a strong democratic government, we could have pushed them back again. Kept what was ours."

"Until you formally surrender, General, this war is going to go on," Esposito said.

Frowning for a moment, Orlova put her hand on his shoulder, "General, if it would help – surrender to us, not to the Governor. We can guarantee amnesty for any of your men that require it. Safe passage off the planet if they need it, in case you are afraid of reprisals. Citizenship in the Triplanetary Confederation." She paused for a moment, then finished, "A new life, General."

Esposito was flashing daggers at the pilot, but the General looked up at her, "I'd be giving them a chance, at least. Freedom instead of slavery. Their families?"

"Those as well, sir."

He looked up, and nodded. "I accept. Give me a minute to prepare, and I'll record a statement of surrender you can broadcast." He grabbed Orlova by the wrist, like a drowning man clutching a straw, "All I ever wanted was the best for my people, and for this world. Do you believe that? Do you?"

"I do, General. We'll be back in a moment."

She stood up, walking over to the side, Esposito hurriedly walking past her. "What the hell was that," she whispered. "We haven't got authorization for any of that, and you don't even know how many people he's talking about!"

"You saw the man. He needed an out, and we gave it to him. Most of his people will probably stay anyway; we're probably talking about an old man and his family."

"I suppose so. You could have asked."

Orlova hesitated for a second, "That was spur of the moment. It just seemed like the thing to do."

A loud cough surprised the two of them, and they turned to see the Governor standing behind them, his pomp returned, his driver standing next to him with his sidearm drawn. Coop was standing quietly behind him, her hand likewise on its weapon.

"Have you changed your mind about meeting the Captain, Governor?" Esposito asked.

"Our orbital monitors just reported that Alamo has moved out of orbit. Shaping towards one of the incoming rebel frigates. As I suspect that your ship is about to cease to be a factor in planetary affairs, I can now inform you that you are both under arrest."

Sighing, Orlova asked, "On what charges?"

"I'm sure we'll think of something. That's what lawyers are for, after all. And under the martial law declaration, it'll be a firing squad for the two of you. Don't think about trying to escape; my people have you well covered and protected."

"This is stupid," Coop said, breaking silence for the first time. "Isaac, you're just embarrassed that these people solved a problem that you couldn't. You can't run a colony like you did a ship. Nammy understood that."

"Stay out of this. This is official government business, and as I recall, you retired at that meeting."

"Because I didn't foresee what a disaster you'd end up being." Fury flashed across the Governor's face. "This needs ending, not escalating. Unless you want a Triplanetary task force turning up."

He turned back to Orlova and Esposito, "That won't happen. I hold too many trump cards."

"What rank are you, again?" Coop's question took the Governor by surprise.

"Wing Commander. I'm not the sort of person who promotes himself," he replied, gesturing at the General.

"And under the declaration of martial law, all reserve personnel are recalled to active duty."

An exasperated sigh, "Yes."

"Fine." She turned to the driver. "Put that stupid gun away, and tell anyone else on their way out here that our mission is disaster relief, not search and seizure. Get on the horn to wherever the freighter crews are being held and instruct they are released; if any of them are medical personnel I want them out here on the double."

The driver looked at the Governor, totally bemused.

"What the hell?"

"Simple, Wing Commander." She stressed the rank. "I retired a Group Captain. That trumps you. I'm not the damn fool who put the military in charge, but now that you have – nice and official – I'm back in uniform for the duration of this crisis. And yes, Ensign, I'm happy to meet with your Captain."

Quick on the uptake, Esposito nodded, replying, "As the representative of the Triplanetary government on Ragnarok, I recognize your authority as acting commander of this colony."

"Good. Nice and legal."

The Governor spluttered, "Damn it, Coop, this is stupid!"

"No. That would be a man who raises when he needs to fold." She turned to the driver, "Harper, for God's sake go and tell everyone what's happened. The whole network. Go on."

The driver thought for a moment, then ran back to the truck, picking up the communicator. The Governor looked shocked, shaking his head.

"Relax, Isaac. This way you aren't responsible for anything I do. And when I call an election – which I intend to do, just to shut up Haynes and his mob – you can feel free to run. You'll probably win."

He turned to the three women, shaking his head again, "I'm going to help with the wounded, if I'm now redundant here. None of you have heard the last of this. Coop, you might be able to make it stick for a little while, heaven alone knows I'm unpopular enough with the Council at the moment, but when the dust settles it'll be a different matter. I assure you of that."

As he stormed off, Coop turned to Esposito, "Alamo had better get back in one piece, and soon, or he'll be able to follow through. He lost most of his loyalists right here, and the rest of the Guard will just be glad that someone's giving orders that don't involve getting shot, but he is right. By tomorrow we could still all be facing that firing squad." She turned towards the wounded, "Let's see if we can get these people out of here before it gets too dark."

Orlova looked up as Coop and Esposito made their way back to the core of the battlefield. There was a single moving point of light in the sky, a thick trail behind it – Alamo's fusion trail as it broke orbit, visible even at this distance. There was nothing more they could do on Ragnarok. Everything was riding on the next five hours.

Chapter 26

With a loud crack, the datapad dropped down to the desk, bouncing back up towards him, and Marshall rubbed his eyes. Displayed on the pad were the schematics of the Type 19 Frigate, the vessel that they were rapidly approaching. He'd read the specifications so often that he thought he could probably build a Type 19 if needed.

Picking it up, he pulled himself out of his chair and pushed off towards the bridge, the doors opening as he slid through them. It was surprisingly quiet, the duty shift focusing on their tasks, strapped tightly into their chairs in preparation for the impending acceleration ships. Mulenga had wanted to be up in the astrogation station; it had taken a direct order to keep him below, to make sure that the acting second-in-command could take over if the bridge was knocked out.

"Any change, Spinelli?" Marshall asked as he strapped himself into the command deck.

The sensor technician looked slightly green as he replied, "No change in aspect, sir. Looks like they are going to let us come to them."

"Probably saving reaction mass for the battle. You alright?"

Gulping slightly, Spinelli replied, "Never was much of a fan of zero-gravity, sir. I've taken a couple of garn pills, should be fine in a moment."

"You ever been in a spinning ring when it got hit by a missile, Spaceman?"

"No, sir."

"I couldn't recommend the experience." He turned the chair to face Caine. "Tactical status?"

"All decks are at standby status, all crew at their posts or emergency stations. I've got the prisoners locked down with a squad to keep an eye on them, and the rest of the espatiers are at key stations across the ship in case something happens."

Almost on cue, the doors slid open and a pair of troopers glided in, deftly swinging themselves into the emergency harnesses on the wall. Marshall gave them a thumbs-up, and they grinned in reply; if everything went well they'd have the best seats in the house for the battle ahead. He tapped the communicator.

"Quinn, everything fine down in Engineering?"

"All good, sir. I ran all the checks I could given the time we had. She'll do you proud in the battle, skipper."

"I know."

Sliding the datapad into a pouch by the side of his chair, he paused to compose his thoughts for a second. He'd been in a lot of battles during the war, but never commanding anything bigger than a fighter squadron. This was a completely different experience, and he ached to have something to do, a console he could work. Anything to distract him from the waiting. He glanced around the bridge again, looking at his crew working, and jabbed a button on the side of his chair. Eight minutes and counting, so time for the last step.

"All decks, attention. Captain to crew, attention. We'll be in action in about eight minutes from now. I know these aren't ideal circumstances, but tens of thousands of people are depending on us to do our best, and I expect no less from each and every crewman on board. This is Alamo's first battle as a Triplanetary vessel. Let's make it the first of many victories. Good hunting. Captain out."

He sat back on his chair as sirens began to sound; the lights dimmed on the bridge slowly as the tactical displays flashed over the starfield, lines and numbers dancing across the viewscreen almost faster than he could read them, maneuvering options changing as the ship's options reduced to one. To engage the enemy. His status board slowly winked from amber to red, deck by deck, system by system, as the crew reported their readiness for action.

Caine looked up from her console, "All decks report clear for action. Missile tubes ready for launch, laser charged for firing. Electronic defense packages are deployed and ready."

"Thank you, Lieutenant." He looked up at the clock. "Let's have one last try at ending this. By now they should have notification that the rebels on the planet have surrendered."

"You think the ships will go along with it?" Ryder asked from the watch officer's station.

Marshall sighed, "Enough people have died already, Sub-Lieutenant. I'm not particularly anxious to increase that number. Mr. Weitzman, if you would open up a channel for me?"

The communications technician looked up at his board, and nodded, "I don't know whether they'll listen or not, sir, but I'm ready to send."

Summoning up his most commanding voice, Marshall began, "Alamo to Jolly Swagman." For about the tenth time, he shook his head at the name. Seemed so trivial for the first major Triplanetary Fleet engagement. "You will by now have received notification that your commander has surrendered to us. I call upon you to follow his example and disarm, proceeding into parking orbit around Ragnarok. You have two minutes to confirm."

Tapping a button, Ryder started a countdown on the viewscreen, tapping her fingers annoying on her console while she waited. Caine was constantly updating targeting solutions on the approaching frigate, all the time keeping an eye on the second ship. Their differing approach vectors had allowed Alamo to attack one ship at a time, but the other vessel would still be upon them soon. Possibly even soon enough to make a difference in the battle.

"Ninety seconds, Captain," Caine said. "Do I fire on the deadline?"

That one took some contemplation to consider. Five seconds for Marshall to decide that the safety of the ship came higher than winning a dubious moral high ground that the victory would probably automatically provide in any case.

"Affirmative, Lieutenant. Fire immediately the deadline expires if they have not signaled surrender." He turned to his left, "Ryder, note that officially in the log."

"Aye, sir." Ryder seemed awed by the situation; it seemed only a few weeks ago that she'd been a cadet listening to Marshall's lectures on fighter tactics back at the Academy. Now she was sitting at the console of a battlecruiser about to go to war. He briefly contemplated saying a few words to her, but realized that he'd have hated such a thing when he was a junior officer – which was recent enough that he could still remember how it felt.

"Thirty seconds, sir," Caine said, her eyes down on her station, fingers poised over the overrides. There had been more than enough time for the computers to plan their attack this time, not like their entry to the system, when it had all been done by the seat of their pants. There was still no substitute for a human, though, able to make last-minute corrections and changes.

"Weitzman, still nothing?" As he spoke, Marshall realized he was asking a redundant question; the communications technician was unlikely to keep such news to himself.

"Nothing, sir."

"Fifteen seconds," Caine said.

At the guidance control station, Franklin tapped a button. "Guidance to crew." Her voice was surprisingly steady. "All hands prepare for variable acceleration. That is all."

The clock ran down the final seconds, microseconds flying past as the time remaining dropped to single figures. The final part of the countdown seemed to take years, as the frigate moved closer and closer to them on an unalterable track. The firing window would last for less than two minutes; in that time it would all be over. Probably in half that time it would be over.

Almost with relief, Caine looked up, saying, "Energy spike, enemy missile section."

They'd fired with half a second left on the clock. "Return fire, all weapons, let 'em go! Countermeasures out!"

Franklin's hands gently played across the guidance station as the ship subtly tilted, giving the laser cannon a shot at the target that Caine had selected hours ago. The ship shook as a trio of missiles raced from the forward missile racks, more tracks appearing on the display ahead. A beam of light shot between the ships, visible for only a second.

"Damn it!" Caine yelled. "Missed primary target, impact was forward. I think the auxiliary maneuvering jets." She looked across at another panel. "Another energy spike from the ship, they've now got six missiles heading our way. Countermeasures deployed on both sides."

The tactical display, a few seconds ago a precise arrangement of courses and trajectories, now became an incomprehensible mess with weapon tracks arcing across each other, missiles from both sides gaining and losing their target tracks as a series of electronic assaults moved between the ships. Most of a space battle was invisible; to an outside observer it simply looked like two ships that were getting a little too close to each other for comfort. Alamo shook again.

"Trying some spin to throw off the missiles, sir," Franklin said.

"One of the first wave got through our inner screens! Terminal velocity!" Caine yelled.

Gripping his armrests in a futile gesture, Marshall calmly replied, "Hang on, everyone."

His whole world shook as the impact threw him forward. The sound of jagged metal leapt through the ship, and the screen began to spin as Alamo drifted off its course, tumbling end over end. The lights flickered for a second, emergency power flickering on, and a nasty tang began to filter into the room from the air ventilators. Franklin was slumped in her chair; one of her straps had burst, and blood was gushing from her forehead, dripping down onto her console. With a swift move, Ryder lunged forward to the station, carefully placing Franklin onto the deck.

"Ignatov! Damage report!" Marshall already knew something was wrong; his telltale screen had winked out.

Hurriedly, the flight engineer began to tap commands into his console, looking up a few seconds later. "That shot knocked out a lot of the primary data links between Bridge and Engineering. Six hull breaches, five of them stress fractures. Long-range sensors are out."

"Impact! Enemy ship impact! One missile astern, near their engine section," Caine called out. "I'm firing our next salvo now. Laser still charging for another shot. Next enemy wave is hitting our e-war screens now."

"Ship coming back under control now, sir," Ryder said.

"Negative. Keep her tumbling, make it look like we're worse off than we are. I want their damage assessments to be out."

The puzzled sub-lieutenant replied, "Aye, sir," and started to throw switches.

"Caine, I want you to position a shot for maximum lethality."

With a barking laugh, she replied, "We're not exactly throwing stage slaps now!"

"Get their bridge. One laser pulse. Throw the works at them. And make sure not to knock out their communications."

"Aye, sir. Ten seconds to laser charge. And, Christ, another missile coming in. Impact six seconds. Aft, I think. Third wave incoming."

Again, everything shook, but the shot was more distant that time. With an apologetic sputter, the ship's thrusters began to misfire, sending it lurching around; Ignatov was tapping buttons frantically, Caine swearing at the tactical computers as she tried to plot a laser track.

"Ryder," she yelled, "Get the ship aligned with the enemy in two seconds. You have the call."

Marshall knew exactly what sort of a job she was asking her to do. Half the maneuvering jets were out of action, atmosphere leaking out into space from all over the ship in random places, and the ship had to point exactly where Caine needed it for the microsecond long enough for the laser pulse to be delivered.

"Got it!" Ryder yelled, and the beam danced between the ships for the critical second – just long enough.

"Spot on target, Ryder!" Caine yelled, "Bridge hit! We bored a hole right through three decks. Laser's going to need longer to recharge, now, I'm having to reroute a lot of power feeds. Our second wave of missiles is pounding them now, two out of three that time."

"Impacts?"

"Aft missile silo, habitation deck. We have all three missiles from the third salvo coming in now, I think they're going to get through this time."

Ignatov shook his head, "I don't think we can take three more hits like the last two, sir. Damage reports are flooding in now."

"We got a third salvo ready?"

Caine looked up at her console, calmly. Too calmly, the calm of one who knew that the gallows were beckoning. "Ready in eight seconds."

"Fratricide them. Target them to blow up as close as possible to the enemy missiles."

"Aye!" A gleam began to leap back into her eyes as she frantically worked her console, trying to change the programming in time. The tactical display was looking a lot simpler now – just three dots slowly moving towards Alamo on slightly twisted courses. Marshall had seen this before, during the war; each group of missiles would be a bit smarter than the last, a bit better at getting through the electronic warfare packages. Eventually some of them would get through even the best system. These ones had learned quickly.

The ship rocked again, "Missiles away. Next salvo in twenty seconds, we've got some malfunctions in the loading systems. Hull breaches knocking out data links across the outside areas of the ship."

"Time to impact?"

"If this doesn't work, fifteen seconds. Targets look to be the landing bay, laser array, and us."

"Ignatev, at two seconds before impact, transfer all control systems to engineering."

The engineer nodded grimly, turning to his station. All other eyes were on the approaching missiles, three new tracks racing out from Alamo to meet them. Numbers ran down the screen still, then there was an explosion. Then another. Finally a third, and it felt as if everyone on the bridge was sighing in unison.

"Any more missiles incoming?"

Caine shook her head, "Negative. Based on their past performance, they should have fired seven seconds ago." A light flashed on her panel, "Our fourth salvo is now ready to fire."

"Hold. Weitzman, try them again. Warn them that I will pound them into rubble if they don't..."

The communications technician held up his hand, and Marshall stopped talking. "Sir, the acting commander of the Swagman has surrendered, in exchange for rescue and relief for her people."

Marshall's reply was drowned out by the chorus of cheers from every station; he found himself joining in himself without realizing it. The two troopers were punching each other in the arm like kids whose team had won the big game, and Ryder seemed to have broken down in tears at her station; he couldn't really blame her.

As the noise began to quiet down, he replied, "Tell them we'll have people on their way shortly." Turning to Caine, he continued, "What about the Ned Kelly?"

"The other ship has just stopped changing course. On their current trajectory they'll miss Ragnarok entirely. I'm picking up a lot of communications traffic between the two ships."

"How long before we know all is clear?"

"About a minute before they will be unable to enter firing range of us."

Taking advantage of the pause, he unbuckled and drifted across to the engineering console, looking over the red telltales and shaking his head.

"Anything fundamental, spaceman?"

Ignatev looked up, shaking his head, "I don't think so, sir. We might have problems getting back to battle stations again, though. Too much damage to data relays and the outer hull. Lieutenant Quinn wants to take the main reactor off line as soon as possible so he can start repairing some of the conduits."

"Tell him to hold off for a minute. We might still have another battle to face."

"I hope not, Captain."

Marshall drifted back to his chair, tapping another button, one that no commander ever wanted to use, "Medical, any sort of a report?"

"I'm busy down here. Short version, bad but could have been worse. Right now four dead. Probably more to follow."

"Thanks, Doc."

He gestured at one of the troopers, "While we have the time, get Franklin down to medical. I don't think we're going to get a house call today."

"Aye, sir." The trooper made his way over to the unconscious woman, carefully picking her up and stepping into the elevator.

"How long, Deadeye?"

Caine looked up at her station, then replied, "Twenty seconds. Captain, we've only got ten missiles left. Fabricators will take too long to make more. I don't know if we can even recharge the laser."

"Does that show?"

"Not at that range. I think if it came to it we might be able to break for the egress point, though."

Marshall shook his head, "We've spent too much blood here to do that."

"That's the price of admiralty, isn't it?"

"Huh?"

"Kipling."

He returned to his chair, strapping himself back in. If there was going to be another battle, he'd know in the next few seconds. The telltales were flashing back onto his console, some of the auto-repair sequencers kicking into life, but they tale they told was not a happy one. The last battle had been far too close, and a fight with an undamaged vessel might be too much. He sighed with relief when he heard a loud whoop from the communications console.

"I take it you have something to report, Mr. Weitzman?"

"They've thrown it in! Someone called Wing Commander Delprat just surrendered on behalf of all Ragnarok spacefaring forces. They're shaping for orbit now, spilling out their missiles."

Marshall tapped a button, "Captain to crew. All hands, stand down battle stations. Return to standby alert status until further notice. The enemy has surrendered – I say again, the enemy forces have surrendered." He turned to Caine, "You have the bridge, I'll be back in a moment."

Her face was all smiles as she replied, "Aye, sir."

He drifted into his office, looking up at the picture of his father on the wall staring down at him, then started to cry at his desk, a combination of relief and guilt overwhelming him. It would be nearer ten minutes before he returned to the bridge.

Chapter 27

Alamo's medical section was a lot less crowded than it had been two days ago. Most of the casualties were either back on light duty, confined to their quarters with instructions to rest, or set to become long-term residents of a medical facility when they returned to Sol. Marshall hovered over Dietz's bed, watching the monitors, as Duquesne approached, startling him with her hand on his shoulder.

"How is he, Doctor?"

"About as well as could be expected. He had the good fortune to get shot before business got brisk around here. I'd just finished surgery when the battle began."

"And?"

She looked up at the monitors again, "Touch and go for a little while, but I think he's going to be fine. I've got him in induced unconsciousness for a while, help him relax a little. Keeps the patients a lot quieter, less likely to discharge themselves."

"Long-term?"

"A pair of scars that will no doubt be excellent conversation pieces at parties, but aside from that? I think he'll be up and about by the time we get back to Mariner Station, on light duty at least."

He looked down at the man lying on the bed, slowly breathing in and out, tubes connected to him in half a dozen places, and then back up at the doctor, asking, "Has he regained consciousness?"

"I have to take him out a couple of times a day to take readings."

"Lucid?"

"Just about. Why?"

"Next time you do it, tell him that I've given him a battlefield promotion to Senior Lieutenant, and that I've officially put in for him to be my new Exec."

Her brow furrowed, eyes narrowing, "Why? Because he saved your life?"

"No. Tell him that as well." He looked back at Dietz for a second. "Keep me informed, Doc."

"Will do, skipper."

"Thanks."

He walked out of the medical bay, grateful that they had finally managed to get the habitation ring spinning again, past a couple of crewmen who were trying to clean some of the stains out of the walls. That was certainly a good sign – if Quinn had some people on clean-up duties, it meant that they were probably about ready to shape out of orbit. There was too much damage for them to repair it all out here, with no space-based support; Quinn's best guess had them stuck at Mariner for six weeks at least. An opportunity for a bit of leave, certainly much needed by the crew.

The elevator closed behind him as it whisked its way up to the bridge. The stain where Dietz's blood had spilled onto the floor was just a memory, but enough of a one that he still made sure to stand by the doors. It was going to be a long time before he got over that particular jinx. Twenty-one bodies in the ship's morgue never would; judging by the losses they had experienced, it almost felt as if they had lost the battle.

Striding out onto the bridge, Sub-Lieutenant Ryder nodded at him from the guidance control station, reaching the end of a twelve-hour shift; Franklin was still not fit for duty. Weitzman seemed to be having an argument with someone on the surface and had missed him completely, and Spinelli smiled as he approached, snapping a quick salute from his station with his good arm. Standing by the door of his office was a puzzled-looking Orlova.

"Captain, what's this about?"

"In my office, I think, Spaceman," he said, making his voice as formal as possible. He stepped into his office, sitting behind his desk, assuming that she was following him. Turning back, he saw her staring at the picture on the wall, almost transfixed, as the doors slid shut.

"What's that picture doing on your wall?" she asked.

Surprised, he looked up at it, and down to her, "It's the last holoimage I have of my father. Taken just before he went off on his last mission."

"On the MSS Hercules," she replied, almost whispering.

Frowning, he replied, "You've been looking up my personnel file."

"No. My own. My father was on the Hercules, a First Lieutenant. Alpha Watch Guidance Officer." She sat down in the chair, still looking up at the picture.

"Sergei Orlov. Missing in action. Good god, I must have looked at that name a dozen times on the memorial wall at Mariner."

She looked across at Marshall and shook her head, "I should have guessed the first time I saw you. You look a lot like him." She paused. "My father served with yours for two years. He'd just been promoted, went off for one last mission before being transferred down to Mars. I remember how much we'd been looking forward to having him home again."

"I'm sorry."

"It was a long time ago. But thank you."

Marshall smiled, "Remind me to introduce you to Commodore Tramiel sometime. He knows the stories of those days a lot better than I do; he'd have commanded your father for a while."

"I'll take you up on that, sir." She glanced up at the picture, then back at Marshall. "What was it you wanted to see me about?"

He slid a datapad across the desk to her, "These are the reports from your little escapade on Ragnarok. Filed by Ensign Esposito, Corporal Clarke, and myself, incidentally. There's even one from Group Captain, sorry, Acting Governor Cooper in there."

Glancing down for a second without reading, she looked up and replied, "I can guess what's in there."

"We could start with you disobeying orders and staying behind in the first place, but I personally loved the moment where you blew the airlock on a shuttle that had just gone transonic. The rest of the squad didn't know the risk they were running, but I've done that myself. There's the matter of you – an enlisted spaceman – negotiating a deal with a rebel leader on behalf of the Triplanetary Confederation without getting prior approval from a senior officer."

She arched an eyebrow, "You did the same thing. I read the briefing notes, and I'm not sure you were authorized to negotiate Ragnarok's incorporation into the Confederation as an Associated State."

"I'm the Captain. I get to make calls like that, and the Senate can either back me or fire me."

"They'd be bloody stupid to fire you."

He laughed, "Thanks for the vote of confidence, spaceman. The point I'm trying to make is that you are a terrible crewman. You disobey orders, you wildly exceed your authority, heck – at one point you assumed command of the squad during the assault on the shuttle."

Rising, she slammed her hands on the desk, "I did what was necessary."

"Sit down, spaceman. Consider that an order."

Reluctantly, she acceded, shaking her head with disbelief, "I'm sitting. Sir."

Smiling, he slid a second pad across the desk, and gestured towards it. She looked down at it, then up at him in surprise.

"What is this?"

"You're a terrible enlisted, spaceman. But I have a feeling that you are going to make one hell of an officer. Either I court-martial you or I commission you, so," he tapped a button on his desk, starting a recorder, "for outstanding service in the highest traditions of the Triplanetary Fleet, and the performance actions which were critical to both the success of this mission and the survival of TSS Alamo, I hereby grant Margaret Orlova a battlefield commission to the rank of Sub-Lieutenant, seniority effective as of four days ago." He turned the recorder off.

She looked back down at the pad, then up at him, "What was all that about?"

"Captains have to have their fun, Sub-Lieutenant. One day you might end up finding out what that's like. And you had to know why you were getting the promotion." He shrugged his shoulders before continuing, "Of course, you did enlist only for the duration of this mission, and I won't hold you to anything more. This can be a nice parting present if you want, or..."

"Or?"

"Turns out I have a position vacant for an Alpha Watch Guidance Officer. I'd planned on offering it to you in any case, but it seems even more appropriate in the circumstances, don't you think? You've got most of the training prereqs anyway; if you spend the trip back in the simulators you should be certified by the time we dock."

"What makes you think I'll make a better subordinate as a Sub-Lieutenant than I did as a Spaceman Second Class?"

He looked up at the picture on the wall again, then back at the young pilot, "Instinct. Without you this mission would have failed. All these reports highlight that. I rather suspect that if I didn't offer you a commission Esposito would be pulling strings to get you into the grunts. That's if Cooper didn't get you a job in the Ragnarok Aerospace Force."

"Nice to be wanted, I guess."

Marshall held out his hand, "Take the offer, Sub-Lieutenant. For old time's sake, if nothing else."

She looked up, smiled, and shook it, "You're probably going to regret this, you know. Sir."

"Probably, but I actually like to live in interesting times."

The door slid open, and Caine walked in, a smirk on her face as she saw the two of them holding hands across the desk. Leaning against a wall, she shook her head with mock outrage.

"Should I leave you two alone for a bit?"

"Don't be silly, Deadeye," Marshall replied.

"I take it you've had your fun with our newest officer?"

Orlova looked up at Caine, "Is he always like this?"

"Mostly. You'll get used to it – eventually."

Waving his hand at a stack of datapads on the side of his desk, "You know, I do have some work to do, ladies, if you want to take this elsewhere."

"Actually," Caine said, "I was asking if you were coming down to the wake. Coop – sorry, Acting Governor Cooper, sent up a couple of crates of, well, something, for the espatiers. There's quite a crowd gathering down on the landing bay. The paperwork can wait until we get into hendecaspace, can't it?"

"I suppose it can at that. Come on, let's go."

The three of them walked through the bridge to the elevator; Mulenga was already inside, a frown on his face. Marshall clapped him on the shoulder.

"If this is about the breakdown of discipline on the landing bay, I'm just going down to join in now. I'll warn the doctor to have some pep pills ready if we need them."

He shook his head. "No, it isn't that at all. I need to speak with you privately. It's important."

Shrugging, Marshall gestured towards his office. Orlova and Caine continued into the elevator, laughing and joking as it sped away. The astrogator looked extremely serious as he sat opposite Marshall, a series of printouts clutched in his hand.

"Where did you get those?" Marshall asked.

"I just got back from the surface. I was curious about the drive that the colony used to get out here; it seemed somewhat different to that used today. And decades earlier than the first reported hendecaspace drive research."

"Not much good, though. Eighty years to get eight and a half light years isn't exactly up to much unless you were desperate."

Mulenga shook his head, "They were unlucky. I ran some simulations through the computer. We know a lot more about hendecaspace now than they could possibly have known back then. Eighty years is about as slow as it was ever going to get. Three or four times faster was quite possible. One more thing – none of our ships can manage more than about nine light-years, but I don't think this drive has that restriction."

"Now that is interesting. Do you think we could apply the same principles to the systems we use?" Visions of thousands of stars opened up for exploration shot through Marshall's mind, before Mulenga dragged him back down to Earth.

"Perhaps, but that isn't the point. I almost missed it myself." He pushed the top printout across the desk, and Marshall glanced down at it. A long list of names.

"So? This is a hundred years old. All of them must be long-dead by now, if they didn't die in the war."

"Most of the researchers weren't Australasian, Captain."

"Your point?"

He jabbed a finger down on the paper, "These two were from the Central Asian Union, one from Greater South Africa, another from – Captain, there are representatives of at least half a dozen spacefaring powers on this list. Several of which did not participate in the solar system colonization that followed the war."

Marshall's eyes widened, and in a quiet voice he responded, "Lieutenant, are you suggesting that..."

"That Ragnarok might be the tip of a very large iceberg. There could be human colonies scattered across local space."

The captain rose from his chair, turned out to face the starfield, trying to locate near stars in the dark.

"I'd say you've given us a new mission, Lieutenant. If there are other Ragnaroks out there, then we need to find them. For our sake, and for theirs." He walked around the desk to the door, then back to the astrogator, "Let's go down to the party. You've just given us something more to celebrate."

Dozens of new worlds, societies that were lost to Earth decades ago to find. Not to mention the alien races that were out there to contact for the first time, the new discoveries to make. Suddenly all of it seemed closer than it ever had before. Marshall looked back out at the stars, and smiled, before turning and heading out to the bridge.

Thank you for reading 'The Price of Admiralty'. For information on future releases, please join the Battlecruiser Alamo Mailing List at http://eepurl.com/A9MdX for updates. If you enjoyed this book, please review it on the site where you purchased it.

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Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

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