Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (16 page)

He was dead, killed during an attempted mutiny, but his ghost—aged a decade and wearing another nation’s uniform—took a seat opposite her at the table.

“Andrew Decker-Sheng, actually, United States Air Force.” He spoke with a smooth, easy Midwest accent that betrayed little emotion. “I was stationed in NORAD and was recovered by the crew of the
Rubens
.”

“Any relation to Gaulung Sheng, from the People’s Liberation Army Navy?”

Decker-Sheng nodded professionally. “Gaulung was my half brother.”

“I see.” She did not know what else to say. Decker-Sheng would know of her involvement in Gaulung’s death, then. “What was your role at NORAD?”

“I was part of the team that was making contact with the construct you know as Ben.” He folded his hands. “Before you ask, Gaulung was invited to be part of that team and had access to some of those materials. He was not authorised to communicate directly with the construct and overstepped his authority. These infractions were discovered only after his death.”

Liao smelt a cover-up—the idea that everything had gone so horribly wrong all because of one person with peripheral involvement due to a shared family linage did not seem plausible to her at all—but that was neither the time nor the place to discuss it.

“I’m glad we were able to find survivors on Earth,” she said, and although she truly was, fate seemed to have an interesting idea of who to save. “Welcome back.”

“Thank you.” He tapped a key on the desk, and a topographical map lit up on the wall behind him. The images, sharply taken and with intricate amounts of detail, showed sweeping desert sands from which a large dome-like structure grew out, like a tumour on the surface of the planet. It bore a striking similarity to Karathi and Belthas IV.

Was every planet the Toralii Alliance occupied a desert world? She would have to ask Saara about that.

The material was annotated, with distinct weaknesses and attack vectors overlaid in stilted but clear English. Everyone was professional, cordial, and relaxed, but when her pen slipped out of her prosthetic fingers, everyone’s eyes save James’s followed her hand.

Might as well get it out of the way.
“It’s working really well,” she said, flexing the fingers. “Aside from extremely fine tasks, which still take some adjustment. Fits nicely, no dramas so far. Drains chemical energy from my blood, with a little extra battery just to give it some kick when it needs it. The power source lasts about a year, so I don’t have to worry about getting it changed.” She twisted her hand, far further around than a biological one could. She wanted to extend the claws but didn’t know how. “Sensations of touch, heat, cold, pressure… everything’s there. Feels like the original, more or less, if a little strange.”

Acknowledging her prosthetic let the tension out of the air, and the topic shifted immediately.

“It’s a fascinating piece of technology,” said de Lugo. “And, of course, we’re glad to have you back.”

“Thank you.” Liao folded her hands, cupping her real hand in her prosthetic.

“What other limbs can we replicate?” asked Decker-Sheng. “Legs? Organs?”

“I don’t know. Ask Dr. Saeed.” Liao avoided his eyes. Too many memories. “Anyway. Back to business.”

“Back to business,” Anderson echoed. He flashed a laser pointer at the screen. “According to the intel Paar sent over, this is the place. It’s a heavily fortified storage area for biological fauna and flora samples located on a backwater planet called Qadeem. Qadeem’s got a complex biosphere, but it’s ninety percent desert with very little flora aside from mould and algae. Normally, we’d just nuke the thing from orbit and be done with it, but we want what’s inside: rare plant specimens precious to the Iilan. Obviously, I don’t have to remind anyone how technologically advanced the Iilan are and how much their cooperation could help us in the future. They have weapons, biotech, computers, constructs… It’d be like a second Christmas. So the main thing is: don’t lose those plants.

“Iilan intelligence estimates that there are over eight tonnes of the stuff in their storage lockers. That’s a standard bio sample. Given the Iilan interest in the stuff, the Toralii might have taken more. The plants are fragile, however, which means a great deal of the plant matter is going to be ruined. The only other problem is when this stuff dies, it breaks down into a toxic compound. So if we lose even a bit of a sample, we might lose that whole unit because of contamination, so we have to be
careful
.

“Plan is as follows. Our ships will take orbital positions in the atmosphere. Since geosynchronous orbit won’t allow us to respond quickly enough, we’ll be taking turns coming up with firing solutions—HE missiles only, no nukes. We take out their surface-to-orbit guns, their AA batteries, and then we land.”

Anderson turned off the laser pointer. “I want to be clear on this one: these are going to be danger-close fire missions, with lots of friendlies and precious cargo on the ground. No chance for errors. That’s phase one.”

“Got it,” said James. “Blow up the ground defences. Don’t blow up the Marines. What’s phase two?”

“Take and hold. Our Marines will embark on Broadsword gunships and land half a kilometre out. They’ll then provide low-cover support for the assault.”

“Sounds good,” said Sabeen. “We secure the perimeter, crack the outer doors, grab what we need and leave.”

“That’s the plan,” said Anderson.

James nudged Liao’s side playfully. “Now we’re breaking and entering,” he said. “When do we get to rename Eden to New Detroit?”

She smiled but said nothing. Decker-Sheng’s presence stole the humour from her.

“And then,” said Anderson, “Decker-Sheng will arrange for phase three.”

“Three?” Liao inclined her head. “How is there a third step? We will have what we came for.”

“The attack will trigger an automated distress beacon to the Forerunner in the system,” said Anderson. “The Toralii will respond. They’ll want to secure the facility and take inventory of what we took. Fortunately, it’s not what we’re going to take that’ll be the surprise, it’ll be what we leave.”

“The virus,” she said, her voice hardening. “You want to infect the responders.”

“Of course,” said Decker-Sheng. “With the Toralii fleets in disarray after their recent defeat at Velsharn, the Toralii response will in all likelihood be drawn from various smaller units. After we have infected them, they will return to their point of origin and infect others. Helping the Iilan has presented a perfect opportunity to use this weapon of ours, to say nothing of the technological assistance they’ve promised for our aid. It truly does seem like a win-win.”

She narrowed her eyes at Anderson. “And this was your plan?”

He matched her stare, but there was something in his eyes—some flicker of doubt hidden under a steely professional attitude—that told her more than his words did. “It was Decker-Sheng’s,” he said, “but I endorse it. The Toralii Alliance scoured our planet. This seems to be a proportional response.”

The more Decker-Sheng had to do with anything, the more she disliked it, but she had to acknowledge it was a good plan. “Genocide for genocide,” she said, although the statement came without strength.

James shifted uneasily in his seat. Williams stared at a corner. Anderson held her gaze for some time as a tense, hostile silence enveloped everything.

“It most certainly is,” said Decker-Sheng. “And the virus is our only true way to wipe them out. We cannot fight the Toralii Alliance using ships and missiles. We must be smarter than that.”

“The war’s over.” Liao gripped her pen, steel fingers stroking the plastic. It cracked and splintered into a thousand pieces. “This is survival.”

“Our survival hinges on not living with the threat of death at every turn.” Decker-Sheng shook his head. “It is pointless to debate this.”

“We need to cooperate,” urged Liao. “The Alliance will leave us alone if we give them reason enough to. The Telvan will help us. Williams has a foot in the door with at least one of the Kel-Voran factions. The Iilan are in system now. We have help. We have allies. If we show ourselves to be as terrible as the Alliance, those allies will walk. We need to be better than our hate.”

“The decision is Anderson’s,” said Decker-Sheng, looking at Anderson. Liao, too, looked toward her American comrade.

Anderson said nothing for a time, eyes half closed as he ruminated.

“The plan is good,” Anderson said, his tone heavy, reluctant. “Phase three is approved.”

The plan was hatched out in detail. So much of a captain’s job was mundane—planning out the logistics of the operation, scheduling meetings with the other department heads, notifications and paperwork.

Fortunately, there was no more Fleet Command left, so any decisions they made did not have to be relayed to a higher authority and stayed among them all. Those included the decision to use the virus. Liao had made her case and been overruled. She understood Decker-Sheng’s point, truly, but was mass-murder of civilians, even if responding to the same, the only option they had?

As everyone else filed out, Liao touched Anderson on the shoulder. “Captain? A word?”

“Certainly,” he said, and when the other COs we gone, Anderson and Liao resumed their seats. “I’m assuming this is about the virus.”

“We’ll get to that.”

“Well then,” said Anderson. “What can I do for you?”

She wanted to defuse the problem they had with the virus. In truth, she needed Anderson, needed someone whom she could trust but who wouldn’t be biased or try to sugarcoat the reality of their situation. “I’m out of the loop,” Liao confessed. “Just like before, after… after Commodore Vong and all that mess. I need you to bring me up to speed. With everything.”

“I can do that,” he said. “But wouldn’t you rather hear it from Captain Grégoire?”

“I’ll be spending plenty of time with him later,” Liao said. The words spilled out accidently, and she hoped that Anderson didn’t catch the double meaning. “I’d rather hear it from you.”

“Well,” said Anderson, “things are going well. We’re consolidating our position. We’re going to see if the constructs can make us some gravity mines, hopefully ones that will work a bit better than the ones that defended Earth. Civic development on the surface continues.”

“I saw that.”

“Unfortunately,” said Anderson, “an operation like the assault on Qadeem is at the limit of our operational capacity. Anything bigger than a medium-sized facility, and we’re stretching ourselves too far. We’re committing the
Washington
and the
Beijing
to the assault, with the other ships remaining behind to protect Velsharn. Not enough ships, not enough soldiers. Especially the ships.”

“Not sure what we can do about that,” said Liao, “except hold up here and breed like rabbits.”

“Mmm, you’re not the only one who’s saying that. Fortunately, there’s a bit of a population explosion going on at the moment—lots of people having kids. Perhaps it’s an instinctual thing, from back in the day when Human civilisations were a lot smaller, but yeah. Let’s just say lots of people are doing their duty down there.”

“It could also be that there’s not a lot to do and those nights get awfully cold sometimes.”

“Or that,” said Anderson. He shook his head. “That doesn’t help us right now, helpful as it’s going to be in about twenty years. Right now, we need more ships, smaller ships. Like the
Rubens
. Something in the fifty-thousand-tonnes range or even smaller.”

“Smaller ships?” Liao asked. “I know the
Rubens
had significant success, but I always assumed that was because of its advanced technology and its ability to pass for a Toralii freighter.”

“Correct on both counts,” Anderson said, “but also not the full truth. Bigger is better, but better isn’t always
better
.”

She blinked. “You’ll have to explain that one, Captain.”

Anderson rubbed his chest as though it ached then spent a moment collecting his thoughts. “During the Second World War, the German Tiger was one of the most feared tanks on any front: a metal beast, hard as sin, with a cannon that spat death at absurd ranges. The Soviet T-34 could only penetrate the Tiger’s side armour at five hundred metres, but the Tiger could penetrate a T-34 frontal armour at up to two thousand meters. That’s a
huge
tactical deficiency.”

“I agree,” said Liao.

“So why did Germany lose? Unfortunately for the Nazi regime, a Tiger was complicated and expensive to manufacture. They only built thirteen hundred fifty or so Tigers over the whole war. Russia built around thirteen hundred T-34s a
month
. T-34s aren’t engineering wonders, that’s for sure, and they had their flaws… but the Tiger was
plagued
by reliability issues, punishing maintenance requirements, and an incompatibility of parts with everything else the Germans had. By contrast, the T-34 ran on whatever fuel you put in it and was simple, rugged, reliable, and ‘good enough.’ Sure, in a stand-up fight, they would be slaughtered—there was one battle where a single Tiger destroyed twenty-two T-34s and forced the rest of the company to retreat—but even with those staggering ratios, the Tiger was
still
coming out behind because the Soviets could always make more T-34s.” Anderson exhaled, a rough sound that made Liao suspect he had a cold. “We don’t need superweapons, Captain. We need ‘good enough.’”