A Learning Experience 2: Hard Lessons (33 page)

“Good work, everyone,” Robbins said.  Her voice was alarmingly quiet, nothing like any of the Drill Instructors.  But then, she had more than earned their respect.  “You could have moved quicker in the latter half of the exercise, but you’ve done well.”

Martin nodded.  The computer hacking protocols had failed – according to the random chance written into parts of the simulation – and the Marines had had to fall out of the ship, leaving a nuclear warhead behind.  It wasn’t a tactic he would have cared to try, if there had been any alternative, but there had been none.

“BRUTE should have moved faster,” he said.  “We could have had the ship if they hadn't had the wit to separate the infected datacore from their datanet.”

“I moved as fast as possible,” the AI’s voice said, stiffly.  “The simulation was simply not devised to give me a chance to subvert the ship before it was too late.”

“We cannot expect to simply take over every ship,” Robbins said, firmly.  “The Galactics may not have AIs, but they do understand the dangers of hacking software and other electronic weapons.  Their precautions may work better in combat than in the simulations.”

“Their datacores are cranky and old,” BRUTE added.  “Some of them crumble at an AIs mere touch.”

Martin looked up towards the ceiling, where he imagined BRUTE to be.  “Why?  Why don’t they use AIs themselves?”

“They may have had a bad experience with AIs in the past,” BRUTE said, “and thus designed their systems to completely preclude the possibility of spontaneously generating an AI of their own.  Or they may simply be masters of bad or no maintenance.  The computer cores on the captured starships should have been replaced regularly and weren't.  Even with Galactic-level tolerance engineered into the design, they were on the verge of collapse even before we captured them.”

“Poor bastards,” Robbins muttered.

Martin found himself caught between agreeing with her and being irked at her attitude.  He knew just how much starships depended on computers, how absolutely impossible it was to use FTL drives without computers monitoring the gravity flux and compensating for any shifts if necessary.  Navigating home, too, would be difficult without the computers.  But, on the other hand, anything that wrecked a Tokomak starship before it had a chance to engage the human fleet was a good thing.  The Tokomak were throwing overwhelming force at Earth.  If they lost a few ships because of their poor maintenance ... well, that was their problem, wasn't it? 
He
certainly wasn't going to complain.

“Dismissed,” Robbins said.  “Report back here in six hours if the alert doesn't sound before then.”

The Marines saluted, then walked out the door.  Martin headed out of Marine Country and up through the network of corridors towards Officer Country, wondering when – precisely –
Freedom
had become home.  He knew everyone on the ship, from the Captain himself to the lowliest crewman, without having to resort to his implants.  And it was ...
safe
.  There was no need to constantly watch his back, at least when he wasn't exercising and drilling with the other Marines.  The ship was home in a way the ghetto never could have been.

He tapped on Yolanda’s hatch and smiled as it opened, then stepped inside.  Yolanda was lying on her bunk, while her roommate was absent.

“Simone has been dating a girl in engineering,” Yolanda explained, as she sat up.  “So we agreed we’d vacate the cabin in a couple of hours for them to have their fun.”

“Oh,” Martin said.  He started to pull off his shirt, then grinned.  “We’d better be quick, then.”

“You’re always quick,” Yolanda said, sticking out her tongue.

“It’s the implants,” Martin said, as he removed his trousers.  “Whoever would have thought the most common use for implants was
sex
?”

Yolanda smirked.  “The same people who took cameras and used them to take naughty photos, the same people who used camcorders to make naughty movies, the same people who used the internet to share pornography with everyone ...”

“Oh, shut up,” Martin said.  He climbed onto the bunk, then began to unbutton her shirt, revealing her breasts.  “Sex is a natural part of human existence.”

Yolanda kissed his lips, then pulled him towards her.

Afterwards, they held each other tightly, knowing that time was running out.  Martin looked down at her and wondered, absently, just how they fitted together.  Yolanda wasn't the kind of girl he’d expected to have a relationship with ... and he would have bet half of his salary that he wasn't the kind of boy she’d planned to date.  But the thought of abandoning her was unthinkable.

“Yes,” Yolanda mused.  “Those implants do come in handy, don’t they?”

Martin elbowed her.  “Are you feeling all right?”

“I feel better now,” Yolanda said.  “And it helps, being completely separate from my past life.  And thank you too, for being different.”

“You’re different too,” Martin said, although he understood.  Stereotypes were far too prevalent on Earth, if only because there was no shortage of idiots who tried to live up – or down – to them.  “And thank you.”

He kissed her, then checked his implants for the time.  They didn't really have time for another round before they had to vacate the quarters ... and there was nowhere else to go for some privacy.  The Captain had been less than happy to discover a pair of crewmen making out in one of the intership tubes, a few weeks ago ...

Moments later, the alarms sounded.

“Shit,” Yolanda said, springing to her feet.  “They’re nearly here!”

Chapter Thirty-Three

War graves in Arlington Cemetery were desecrated yesterday by what is believed to be a Jihadist Group.  Arabic graffiti was painted over the tombstones, while several graves were uprooted and the various war memorials were defaced.  The President attempted to downplay the incident at a press conference, but widespread public anger may force him to take a different path.

-Solar News Network, Year 53

“They’re due in one hour,” Commander Gregory said, as Yolanda hurried onto the bridge and hastened towards her console.  “You don't need to run.”

Yolanda flushed and hastily sat down, wishing she could die of embarrassment.  Her nanotech would clean her up, she knew, but it was nothing like as good as a proper shower, perhaps one shared with Martin ... she pushed the thought aside and brought up the status display, cursing her timing.  If the enemy had waited for just one more hour ...

She plunged her mind into the sensors and shuddered, inwardly, as she saw the sheer scale of the enemy fleet.  There were so many gravimetric signatures approaching the Sol System – and the Solar Navy – that they were blurring together, making it impossible to determine precisely how many there were.  Perhaps their obsession with perfect formations had a point after all, she reasoned; random flight paths and positions would make it much harder to compensate for so many starships in FTL so close together at the same time.

“There are at least three hundred signatures,” she said, out loud.  “But I can't be sure.”

“It may make no difference, Lieutenant,” Commander Gregory said.  “Just relax and wait.”

Yolanda couldn't do either.  How could the human fleet be planning an ambush?  There was no way to engage starships in FTL, as far as she knew.  They might as well be on the other side of the galaxy for all the Tokomak would see of them.  But she had to assume that Admiral Stuart knew what he was doing ... gritting her teeth, she forced herself to continue to parse out the gravimetric signatures, trying to isolate as many separate starships as possible.

The minutes ticked away slowly, leaving her feeling more and more frustrated with every breath.  It just didn't make sense ... angrily, she called on her implants, dampening her feelings as much as possible.  But even with her emotions under control, her thoughts still chased themselves round and round in circles.  There was no way they could ambush the enemy fleet, was there?

“Signal from the flag,” Lieutenant Elves said.  “We are to move to a new position.”

“Make it so,” Captain Singh ordered.

Yolanda rolled her eyes – that joke had been old long before her mother had been born – but obeyed.  The human fleet was now spread out in a giant arc, surrounding the least-time course from Varnar to Earth.  But it still made absolutely no sense ... she worried at the thought as the captured freighters were moved forward, dumping their cargo of long-range missiles into space.  Even if the Varnar attacked the human fleet, the moment they saw the missiles they would drop back into FTL and retreat.  They couldn't be pinned in place, exposed to incoming fire ... could they? 

She stared down at the display, studying the handful of unmarked units.  What
were
they?

The seconds ticked down to zero.  On the display, the Tokomak fleet drew closer, travelling at many times the speed of light.  It was impossible for her to grasp just how far apart the fleets actually were, not when it seemed she could reach out and touch them.  And then ...

She blinked as waves of gravity – artificial gravity – started to pervade space.  Understanding followed, moments later.  No one, not even the Galactics, could go into FTL close to a large planetary mass.  Now, human technicians had created an artificial gravity well, right in front of the Tokomak fleet.  And they were about to run right into it ...

***

It was sheer luck that Neola was in the CIC when the entire starship shook violently, then crashed back into normal space.  Standard procedure was to spend time in FTL burnishing the inner hull or simply relaxing, not running endless drills.  If she hadn't been trying to set a good example, if she hadn't insisted that full watches be online at all times, the human ambush might have wrecked her entire fleet before she had a chance to react.

Even so, comprehending what had happened pushed her to the limit.

She had known the humans would detect her incoming fleet.  There was simply no way to mask a single gravimetric signature, let alone a giant haze of gravimetric distortion generated by hundreds of starships flying in close formation.  But she had never imagined anyone using an artificial gravity field to yank an entire fleet out of FTL.  She cursed under her breath as the datanet rapidly updated, warning her that nearly seventy battleships had crashed back to normal space so violently that their drives were permanently offline.  A light year from Sol, the closest star, they would take at least four years to reach somewhere safe ...

“Your Excellency,” the Admiral said.  “We are surrounded by human starships.  They are demanding our surrender.”

Neola fought down panic.  Some of her ships couldn't escape?  So what?  The humans wouldn't be able to escape either, not as long as they kept the artificial gravity field in place ... and they would have to, unless they wished her remaining FTL-capable ships to continue the advance on Earth.  They were prisoners of their own success ...

She studied the display, thoughtfully, allowing cold logic to banish panic.  There were over four hundred ships facing her, but most of them weren't warships.  Indeed, most of them were converted freighters.  And most of the
warships
were ancient designs.  There was no need to panic, not really.  The humans might pack a punch, but she still had the advantage.

“Advance forward to firing range,” she ordered, coolly.  Maybe some of her commanders would take the humans seriously, now.  “And chart out their gravity field.”

“The humans are opening fire,” the Admiral said.  “They’re launching missiles at us.”

For a moment, Neola couldn't grasp what she was seeing.  Everyone
knew
that missiles – long-range missiles – were useless in ship-to-ship engagements.  If the humans wanted to waste their firepower, who was she to stop them?  And yet, she knew they were up to something ...

It struck her in a moment of blinding horror.  The long-range missiles weren't wasted, not when her fleet couldn't escape into FTL.  They were about to be ripped apart ... unless she reacted quickly.  None of their scenarios had envisaged being locked out of FTL; at worst, she’d always known she would be able to escape.  But she’d been wrong.

“Bring up the point defence,” she ordered.  For once, the routine formations they’d practiced would work in their favour.  “And launch our own long-range missiles back at them.”

The Admiral swing around.  “Your Excellency?”

“If we’re locked out of FTL, so are they,” Neola snapped.  She cursed her superiors under her breath.  Perhaps this entire disaster could have been averted if they’d encouraged the youngsters to develop an imagination.  “And we can hit them too.”

Moments later, her battleships started to spew missiles into space.

She watched, coldly and dispassionately, as the gravity field was slowly charted out in front of her.  A planetary gravity field was easy to track; it was a sphere, surrounding the planetary mass.  There were rarely any fluctuations in its strength that made life interesting for starships trying to cut their travel times to the bare minimum.  But the artificial gravity field looked hazy and imprecise, as if it had multiple sources ...

“Locate the generators,” she ordered.  Blowing apart an entire planet to escape the gravity field was excessive, even by Tokomak standards, but she could locate the gravity generators and destroy them.  “Once you have located them, destroy them.”

She watched, helplessly, as the waves of missiles descended on her ships.  Most of them were clearly of Tokomak origin, taken – she assumed – from Hades.  The Varnar had been right, she understood now, to point out that the entire plan had been badly flawed.  It had rested on the key assumption that the human race would be mesmerised by the sheer level of firepower arrayed against them and when that had been proven false, so had the plan.  The Tokomak had provided their enemies with the weapons to use against them.

Hundreds of missiles were swatted out of existence, but hundreds more made it through.  She cursed her own oversight even as she mentally praised her gunnery crews, who had improved a hundredfold in the weeks they’d spent drilling, after watching the Battle of Hades and how quickly a formerly-invincible squadron had been torn apart.  But there were just too many missiles ... she gritted her teeth as they started to slam into shields, weakening some and shattering others.  Far too many shield generators were too old and outdated to stand up to sudden blows.

“The enemy fleet is taking losses,” the Admiral reported.  “But they’re continuing the attack.”

***

Mongo hadn't been enthusiastic about the idea of hurling the Tokomak missiles right back at their designers.  There hadn't been time to take the warheads apart and make sure they didn't have any backdoors, which would have allowed the Tokomak the chance to turn them off before it was too late.  But he had to admit that the idea had worked surprisingly well, even though the Tokomak had promptly copied his idea and started to return fire.  Some of his older ships had already been destroyed by their missiles.

“Launch the hammers,” he ordered.  “And then follow up with the ECM drones.”

The gravity field shifted, suddenly.  “Report!”

“They took out one of the Zahn Generators,” Commander Wilson snapped.  “They’re actively searching for others.”

“Of course they are,” Mongo said. 

He smirked, then mentally tipped his hat to the Tokomak commander.  A human commander would have started to hunt for the gravity generators at once ... and, by their very nature, they were impossible to hide.  But, caught by surprise, he was moderately impressed the Tokomak commander had caught on so rapidly.  It wasn't something she would have known to expect.

But she should have, he reflected.  The Tokomak had practically
invented
gravity-related technology, even though they hadn't taken it to its logical extreme.  But then, some of the ideas human science-fiction had devised had proven surprisingly practical, when twinned with alien technology.  If the idea for boosting the sun’s gravity field ever proved workable, they could ensure that no alien ship could ever approach Earth without being forced to leave FTL a long way before its prime targets.

He dismissed the thought as the Hammers plunged towards their targets, wondering absently what the Tokomak made of them.  They would be easily detectable, but – by their very nature – hellishly hard to destroy.  If he’d had a few thousand of them, the battle would be over by now, yet there were only a handful on hand.

A few more years
, he thought,
and we would have utterly destroyed the fleet without taking a single casualty
.

The Hammers approached their targets ... and drew fire.  He watched with grim amusement as energy weapons flared out ... and vanished.  Moments later, the Hammers smashed home, crashing right
through
the enemy shields and into their hulls.  Several of them kept plunging onwards, others were caught and destroyed as their targets exploded.  The survivors altered course and started to hunt for new targets.

And they could have built Hammers for themselves, if they’d thought of the concept
, he thought. 
Instead, they let themselves ossify and decline
.

***

Neola watched in disbelief as twelve battleships died a fiery death, four of their killers escaping onwards, then turning around to seek new targets.  It was impossible ... she forced herself to put her emotions aside and reason it out logically.  What was she actually seeing?

“Microscopic black holes,” one of her officers said.  “They actually generated a self-sustaining gravity well.”

It made sense, Neola realised, coldly.  The humans had produced a black hole generator and loaded it on a missile.  Instead of a drive, the missile had plunged towards the black hole ... but as the black hole was always a set distance from the missile, it had effectively pulled itself onwards and onwards.  And it had swallowed everything in its path, from energy weapons fire to hull material.  The concept was far from impossible.  It was merely something the Tokomak had never bothered to develop for themselves.