Lieutenant Robert Nachtegall looked out across the underground acres of the High Command space docks and, though he'd seen the vast array of ships many times in the last several days, he still marveled at the number. There were streakbombers and fighters from the System Patrol, equivalent craft from the Belt, and also from the Belt, ancient but upgraded Hawk- and Mosquito-class ships that no doubt dated from the days of the War of Independence. In all there were over 200 ships occupying space in the docks, and of those, 134 that would actually engage the Phinon fleet, half of them mated skiffs.
Bob would pilot a streakbomber, yet again. He'd been given the lead ship. But it wasn't clear that meant anything more than that his ship would be the first to leave. And flying along with him would be Paula to pilot the skiff. He knew that she'd had a tremendous fight with Rick over her volunteering for such hazardous duty. Of course, given the situation, staying home in bed is just about as hazardous, he thought.
The ships would be leaving in less than two hours. Bob was already wearing his flight suit, but plenty of people had turned out to see them all off, and it was time to say his good-byes.
He spotted a group of oddly outfitted men, and decided they must be pilots from the Belt. Then he noticed that one of them was Reggie Dukes. Their nemesis from Jupiter had turned out to be an all-right kind of guy after all, and Bob was proud that his instinct to let the man board had worked out wellReggie had volunteered for skiff duty.
Someone clapped him on the shoulder from behind. Bob turned. The face was familiar, but . . . oh! "Captain Brinn. Of course. I heard you were on Luna."
"Not long now, Lieutenant," Brinn said. "Good luck."
"It's not long for you either I hear. Your liner breaks orbit only a few hours after the fleet leaves," Bob said.
"That's right. I'll survive this thing regardless. Somehow that isn't all that comforting," Brinn said. "But I hear Tau Ceti is nice this time of year."
Of the three spaceliners that had been outfitted with hyperdrives, Captain Brinn had been selected to command the ship headed for Tau Ceti. The liner would take along her usual crew, but filling the passenger slots would be scientists from both the Mars Terraforming Project and the Phinon Project, their families, and then others selected by lottery from Luna City.
If Bob's group was successful, then Brinn and his crew would still perform a valuable survey. If Bob's group failed. . . . At any rate, they'd be trans-Hague Limit and in hyperspace before the engagement with the Phinons took place. If no one from Earth showed up within a week of their arrival at Tau Ceti, they'd know there was no point in going back.
Bob noticed Sammi talking to an older couple near the dock entry doors. The woman was rather large and soft looking, and Bob decided she must be Sammi's friend Martha. Brinn moved on, but Bob was hesitant to go over and talk to Sammi. Despite the kiss in the hallway, that very evening he'd tried to contact her, but failed. This was the first he'd seen her since then. But then the decision was taken away from him for Sammi spotted him herself, flashed her famous smileHow long has it been since I've seen that?and waved for him to join them.
Sammi looked beautiful, as finely finished as he hadn't seen her since the day he had taken her to meet Chris for the first time. Something had changed inside her recently, he decided, and she was becoming her old self again. "Martha and Ted, this is Lieutenant Robert Nachtegall," she said as he joined them. "I've told you about Martha, Bob. We worked together on the Mars Terraforming Project. Ted is her husband," Sammi said, making introductions.
Ted just nodded but Martha said, "It's nice to finally meet you, Lieutenant. Sunshine has told me a lot about you. Too bad the circumstances couldn't be brighter."
Bob just shrugged and smiled. "But that's out of our hands, I'm afraid. But Sammi, why don't you go along on the liner? You still can, you know. You belonged to both Projects."
"You're not getting rid of me that easily," Sammi said, but if she had anything to add after that she didn't get a chance to say it because two other men suddenly called to her.
"Samantha! Hey, it's us, Mike and Terry." The two came over and each gave her a warm hug. After some chatter Sammi finally got around to introducing Bob.
"Mike and Terry were Steve's best friends," she said. "They were all suicide orbiteers together."
"That's right," Mike said. "And by the way, Sammi, thanks for sending that post along about how Steve really died. I'm glad we finally got to know the truth." Sammi had written down the account and sent it to all whom she thought would want to know once the secrecy about the Phinons was lifted.
"I wanted everyone to know," she said. "But what are you guys doing here anyway?"
"Lotto winners," Terry said. "Both of us. Must be fate."
A klaxon sounded and Ted gave Martha a nudge. "That's for us, dear. The shuttle up to our liner. We'd better get moving." There were some more hurried good-byes and farewells, more hugs and some kisses, and then after a few moments, just Bob and Sammi standing together.
"Where are the others?" Sammi asked. "Chris? Rick? Nikki? And how has she been lately?"
"Chris and Rick should be along soon. Nikki was still depressed last I saw her. She wanted to volunteer for skiff duty. But Knoedler wouldn't let her and said he needed her to come with him to Mercury. God only knows why. Even Chris doesn't know. But the colonel apparently has at least one other card up his sleeve. Either that or he suddenly turned coward."
"You don't believe that?"
"Nah. Not the colonel. Anyway, Nikki was spitting flames when they left yesterday. That by itself may have been the best thing for her," Bob said. Then he spotted their friends across the dock and waved. "There's Rick and Paula," he said.
The two watched as Rick and Paula, holding hands, made their way around and over the cables and equipment snaking through and cluttering the docks. "How did Rick take it when Paula said she was going to volunteer as skiff pilot?"
"You knew about that? Rick went through the roof but he didn't have an adequate argument to change her mind. Then I suppose she batted her eyes and a few other things and he shut up about it."
"I'm sorry I ever called her `Miss Bouncy-wouncy,' " Sammi said. "I don't think I could have volunteered for that job."
"Sammi. Hi!" Rick said. "I'm glad you're staying at the High Command."
"I had some good-byes to say. And even though my work is done, where else was I going to watch from? I hear you did volunteer, Paula."
"Nothing like looking at the stars to clear your thinking," Paula replied. Bob didn't know what the two women were referring to, and he didn't ask.
Then Rick asked earnestly, "She's going with you, right, Bob? Paula is riding out in your ship?"
Sammi raised an eyebrow at that, Bob noticed, and he smiled inside. "That's right. I owe you, Rick. You saved my ass. I'll do my best to keep Paula's out of trouble."
"Well, what a fine couple of cavemen you two are," Paula observed. "Samantha, will you make sure Rick doesn't hurt himself while I'm gone?"
"Why certainly," Sammi said, picking up the jest. "And I'll make sure he eats well and dresses himself properly, too."
"I've never found gallows humor funny," Rick said, but then he put his arm around Paula and held her to him tight.
They were all quiet for a moment, not knowing what else to say, when Sammi spotted the one man most dear to them all. "There's Chris," she said.
Dykstra was standing by the entrance to the docks, walking stick held firmly, solidly planted on the floor just in front of him. Bob remembered how Dykstra had looked in his apartment all those months ago when he'd sent them off on their illegal mission to capture some Phinons. Like a king at court, he'd looked then, confident that his cause was just and his views the right ones. Bob wondered what the old genius was thinking at this moment, for the activity at the docks would not be taking place right now had it not been for him. Nor would there have been any hope for survival from the approaching onslaught had the great man not been with them.
And Bob remembered the morning when he'd picked Dykstra up at his home in the mountains and whisked him here to the High Command, recalled the struggles they'd gone through together against the small-mindedness of Major Moore, the triumph of Dykstra when he'd puzzled out the workings of the Phinon hyperdrive, the joy in the man as he'd helped assemble the Hyperlight at the Capitol Products black docks.
This is Dykstra's war, Bob thought. Without him, there would have been no war, just a few months of extermination.
Dykstra spotted Sammi's wave and strode over to them. "My friends," he said. "We've come a long way these past months, haven't we?"
"A long way we could not have come without you," Rick said. "You're the whole reason we're all here now," he continued, Rick's words paralleling Bob's thoughts. "Without the hyperdrive, and the new drive, and your understanding of the Phinons, we'd just be ducks in a pond, waiting for the buckshot."
"But we still don't know if it's enough, Rick. Don't forget that," Dykstra said.
"He's right though, Chris. Without you, we'd be witnessing the end of humanity right now," Sammi chimed in.
"You're all embarrassing me," he said. "Without all of you, without your faith and courage, despite anything I could do we'd still all be dead. Strip away all the technology, all the fancy gadgets and brilliant strategies. In the end what will save us are our best qualities, our self-sacrificing, our love for each other. These are things about which the Phinons know nothing. I want you all to remember that these next few days.
"Now, may I see your ship, Lieutenant?"
"Certainly," Bob said, and they all started walking toward the berth where the ship that Bob and Paula would take to their battle stood waiting.
"By the way, where's Arie?" Sammi asked.
"Ah, our little friend has had his own little enclave built for him in the tracking room, courtesy of the colonel. He'll be able to listen to the Phinon chatter quite comfortably there. I just left him there a few minutes ago. He was, er, customizing his environment."
" `Customizing'?" Bob asked.
"Installing a squirrel cage, oh yes," Dykstra said.
They arrived at the berth. Emblazoned across the bow of the streakbomber was the name Hyperlight II. "I figured I'd better stick with a winner," Bob told them.
"I can't tell from here," Dykstra said, looking up at the skiff attached to the top of the bigger ship. "Did you also get to name your ship, Paula?"
"Pops," she said.
"He'd like that," Bob said.
Another klaxon sounded, this one keener and shriller, and it was the signal for the pilots to report to their ships. As if taking it as his cue, Dykstra said, "This time the only words I have for any of you is, `See you later.' " With that he walked away.
Rick and Paula wandered around to the other side of the ship to say good-bye, and Bob was left with Sammi beside him. Bob found himself at a loss for anything to say, and was actually wondering if this time he was going to get another kiss or maybe just a punch on the shoulder. At least she's here, he thought.
"I have not been fair to you, Robert," Sammi said, and she put her arms loosely upon his shoulders, lightly clasping her hands behind his neck. Reflexively he put his hands around her waist. "We have a lot to talk about when you return."
"Sammi, you don't owe me any explanations, any apologies," Bob said.
"I may owe the entire human race an apology when you get back," she said.
"I'm sure your genanites will work."
"So am I."
"Then I don't understand" he began, but she put her finger to his lips. Then she pulled him closer and kissed him in a way that put even the hallway encounter to shame.
Rick and Paula had been waiting for them to finish, Bob realized, as his lips broke from Sammi's. Then there were a few hugs and some handshakes, and Sammi and Rick walked out of the docks, and he and Paula watched them go.
"Poke yourself in the eye, Bob?" Paula asked. "They're looking a little moist."
He didn't answer, just turned and walked up the ramp into the Hyperlight II.
Twelve hours after the last of the fleet had departed the docks, Dykstra returned there, and walked slowly across the empty floor. Cane in hand, he headed for the laboratory they'd constructed for him in a corner of the expanse when the alien drive unit had been brought to Luna from the battle at Slingshot. It was still there, or at least parts of it, still clinging to the inside of the crumpled shell. The unit had no more secrets to offer up, but Dykstra wanted to see it again for it reminded him of a time only months yet forever ago when he knew his work meant something.
He knew it was silly, but he still felt guilty about how little "real" work he'd done since returning from Earth. He'd made some progress on the problem of transmitting radio signals FTL from a stationary source outside the Hague Limit, and could probably have had a working model ready to test by now if he'd only been free of the constant interruptions that had come after his return.
But then, they were important interruptions.
And then there was the entire theory of hyperdrive and hyperphysics to work out rigorously. So much of what had so far been accomplished still existed only in his head. He really had to get it down into some more permanent, yet intelligible to ordinary minds, form. For hyperphysics had turned out to be more than just a "few new wrinkles" in Dykstra Field Theoryhe could see that now. At the turn of the 20th century, relativity and quantum mechanics had overturned the views of the 19th century, and even Maxwell's work had been modified. To be noted, though, were the objections of that incomprehensible genius Tesla, who thought everyone had gone off on the wrong track. By the turn of the 21st century, Tesla's concerns had been borne out. The work of Kirk, Spencer, and Phipps had turned up anomalies in both electromagnetism and gravitational theory, and it had been left to Dykstra to sort it all out and introduce the new paradigm that would rule physics through the century.
But I never thought I'd have to do it all again at the dawn of the 22nd century, Dykstra thought. Yes, so much work to do. Or that could be done, if there was a point to it.
Upon entering the lab, his gaze turned to the crumpled can that was the shell of the Phinon hyperdrive motor; a motor he now knew was not the product of genius, but of a billion years of evolution. "Lucky for us I figured out your secrets in a few months," he told the motor, but it seemed unimpressed. The lab had been stripped of equipment months ago, a shell now as hollow as the motor itself, and Dykstra stayed there only a few minutes.
Back out on the floor of the docks, he looked across past the rows of empty berths to the few craft that still remained, though they were only shuttles and hoppers for point-to-point trips on the Moon. All of the ships were gone, the closest evidence of the great Exodus from Earth that had taken place much the same way as the desertion of Jupiter had. But this time it was clear that fleeing to other planets was hardly a guarantee of safety. Most ships headed for the Belt, the one place it would take the Phinons a long time to clean out, but also a place where few of the refugees would be able to hold out. It took the right kind of equipment to sustain life on a rock.
As he walked toward the shuttles (for no reason other than that they were there), Dykstra's mind again turned toward work. Since his stay in the hospital, he had confirmed in his mind that his best idea for a super weaponmore like a Doomsday weaponwould work. This was something best characterized as a "Dykstra field Tesla coil" sort of thing which could be made large enough to cause the Hague Limit to expand and contract in resonance with it.
He could make the sun explode that way.
That would hardly help us now though, would it? Still, he could envision some future where detonating stars might be useful for cleaning Phinons out of the surrounding Oort clouds.
Or other humans out of star systems.
Even if we survive the Phinons, can we survive human nature? Still, surviving means that Samantha's genanites will have done their job, so we may never have to face Phinons ever again. Come to think of it, as long as we infect them, even if humanity dies out, at least their "reign of terror" in the galaxy will come to an end. Maybe then some other race will have a chance to inherit the stars. He thought about all those conjectured civilizations (when he was a boy it had been assumed there were millions of them) that might have made it to the stars, only to be cut to pieces just as they were taking their first steps.
The nature of the Phinons had finally explained the Fermi Paradox.
"Paula, it's showtime," Bob said. Without a word she got up from the copilot's seat and went into the middeck. She suited up and then climbed through the special docking ring that allowed passage into the mated skiff. Only after she was in place did she say anything.
"Ready, Lieutenant. Bring us up close."
It had been a quiet flight for the two of them, and probably for most of the pairs in the other streakbombers. The ships had taken a day and a half to fly out and turn back so that they could come up on the lead ships of the Phinon fleet from behind. During the trip, both Bob and Paula had been lost in their own thoughts except for those times when they had to look over the data feeds they were getting from Luna and the observation and tracking ships.
After Jupiter, the Phinon fleet had gradually turned around in a large arc and the ships were now headed toward Earth from high above the ecliptic. Bob and Paula were encountering them less than an astronomical unit from Earth. Bob's streakbomber was one of those ships equipped with the new drive immediately following Dykstra's confrontational meeting with Knoedler. Paula's skiff was powered only by a standard fusion drivethere had not been time to convert the skiffs over. Still, if all went according to plan, her fusion engine would be enough.
"We'll be right alongside our target in three minutes," Bob said. He was looking at the Phinon ship out the bubble, her image shimmering slightly from the effects of the Dykstra shield surrounding the Hyperlight II. The ship was an ugly, evil-looking thing, bulbous with odd curves and sharp projections sticking out. The expeditionary force that had encountered the fleet before it went to Jupiter had found that the Phinons did not fire until fired upon, and would not break ranks no matter what. As Bob pulled alongside, matching velocity only a few hundred meters away from the alien ship, he could almost feel a reflex in his hand trying to reach for the fire button on the weapons array. Yeah, I could kill this one. His shields aren't even up yet. Then what? Only another million plus to go.
"You're on, Paula."
He felt a slight nudge and heard a faint clang as the skiff separated from the Hyperlight II. Slowly, Paula closed with the Phinon ship. She was less than a hundred meters away before the alien vessel turned on its shields. "Well, I really didn't think they'd leave them off the whole time," Paula radioed back. "That would have been too easy."
The Pops continued toward the ship.
Bob switched radio channels for a moment, listening to the Phinon ship-to-ship. They were talking up a storm. I wonder what they're saying, he thought. Too bad the only translator is light-minutes away. She'll be back before Arie could tell me what they're talking about.
"Fine-tuning to Phinon shield frequency now," Paula said, her voice breaking through the Phinon chatter since her frequency had priority.
Bob watched. This was the worst part. There was a shimmering ring around the interface of the two shields as Paula eased the Pops through.
"I'm in!" she said. "How are we coordinated with the others?"
It took Bob thirty seconds to find out. It was important that all the ships perform the Wirasinghe Maneuver near simultaneously lest the Phinons talk to each other. Though the Phinon ships had yet to respond to them, no one, Bob included, thought this would continue once the first biomine was detonated. "Eighty percent of us are in position," Bob told her. "I'm waiting for the coordinating signal. There! Twelve seconds, mark."
Twelve seconds later, like a wasp streaking in for a sting, the Pops dove for the Phinon ship, engine flaring, tractor beams on. It took only seconds to attach, place the mine, then spring back off, engine flaring again.
"Did it, dammit!" Paula cried.
Bob saw three flashes. The first was the blaze from Paula's drive. The second was the explosion of the biomine on the hull of the Phinon ship.
The third was the brilliant glare from the X-ray laser that suddenly lanced up from the Phinon craft and hit the Pops.
"They know our ships are there, oh yes," Hague said. His listening post was getting direct feeds from an observation craft less than a light-minute from the attack, but it still required more than four more minutes for the information to make it to the Moon. With all the Phinon ships communicating at once, it was necessary for the observation craft to pick and choose which to listen to.
Hague was just reporting the gist.
"Well, if there was such a thing as absolute time, I could say our skiffs should be attaching their mines right about now," said some officer Dykstra couldn't pick out down on the floor of the tracking center. He, Rick, and Sammi were watching near Hague's station, from the elevated deck that half circled the room.
But we do have absolute time, now, Dykstra thought. He really did have to get started on a hyperphysics text. Well, maybe I can wait another few hours, when we find out if the Earth is still going to be here.
"I hate this," Sammi said. "I hate this waiting." She was holding onto the rail, hard. Dykstra noticed her white knuckles.
"Me, too," Rick said. "Arie, are any of them talking about using weapons?" Because of his relationship with the savant, Rick was the one designated to interface between Hague and the High Command officers.
"Oh no," he answered. "No, no, not at all. No one has fired on them. They're unconcerned. Yes, unconcerned, oh yes."
"Bet they won't be when the first mine goes off," Rick said.
"Paula! Paula! Paula!" Bob screamed into the comm. His hands played over the weapons board. He had the lasers at full and the weapons array ready to deal destruction. He could see the Pops. She was tumbling but still in one piecethe skiff's Dykstra shields had held against the laser strike.
Mostly held.
"Still breathing," Paula said, though it sounded to Bob like she was out of breath. "Shields held. Still tuned . . . slipped right through their . . . sonavabitchen . . . shields. Engine's dead . . . though."
"I'll get them!" Bob said and his hand reached to fire. And stopped.
I can't. Dammit! I can't. They need to be infected and . . . Shit! Instead he maneuvered the Hyperlight II between the skiff and the Phinon ship. They hadn't fired again, not since the one shot at Paula. But this way, Bob's ship would shadow Paula's in case they did resume firing.
Even then, he couldn't shoot back.
"Paula, what kind of shape are you in?"
"Rick never . . . had any . . . complaints."
"Shit. What's your physical condition, I mean." Still, he couldn't help smiling at her grit.
"I just took a . . . blow to my tummy when . . . the laser hit. Knocked the . . . wind out."
"Okay. I'm going to lock the skiff to my bow with the docking tractor. Think you can stand two gees for a while?"
"Yes."
Slowly, slowly, Bob brought the Hyperlight II close to the tumbling skiff. He kept one eye on his rear monitor, praying that the Phinon ship behind him would continue its docile ways. "Turn off your shields, Paula." She did. The docking tractor consisted of two collimated but independent beams. Bob's ship's computer rapidly figured out how to use them to slow the tumbling of the Pops.
"Great. You're stabilized. Put your shields back up and tune to mine."
There was a delay. "Paula?"
"Damn things won't go back on."
"The mines have gone off, oh yes," Hague reported.
"Confirmed. Thirty-eight of the skiffs were able to get their mines in place and detonated," came another announcement over the PA.
"Oh no, oh no. The spiders are mad, oh yes. Going to attack now, oh yes. Oh no."
"Reports of X-ray laser fire coming from multiple sites."
"I hate this," Sammi said.
"I'm getting a report that some of the other Phinon ships are firing," Bob told Paula. "But if I'm going to save you, I have to drop my shields for a few seconds and let you in. Stand by."
"Can I be valiant and suggest you leave me behind?"
"Sure. Ain't going to do it, though. I'm closing at one meter per second. Ready. Set. Shields down!" It would take six seconds. He counted them in his head. He was up to four the second time when the ship turned the shields back on at the proper instant.
BAM! A Phinon missile slammed into the Hyperlight II on the port side.
"Shee-it! Where did that come from? Paula, you okay?"
"Yes. And damn lucky. Let's cut a trail, Bob. Now."
"Have to get the skiff secured first. Looks like that missile came from one of the ships back in the pack. Don't see any more incoming. Our Phinon still hasn't done anything. Okay, we're mated. Two gees till we're safe," he said, running the drive up even as he was speaking. "We'll get you back aboard once we're a safe distance away."
"Are there any reports yet about Phinon ships turning aside?" Paula asked, an extra hint of strain in her voice. Two gees after being hurt was no picnic.
"Not yet," Bob told her.
"Then there is no safe distance away."
"Arie, are the bugs working? Are they talking about it? What's going on?" Sammi finally burst out.
Dykstra put his hand on her shoulder. "They may not say anything, Samantha," he said. "The unaffected ones in each ship might simply stand frozen while they watch the others die. We didn't have another Phinon handy to watch at your demonstration."
"I know, Chris. I'm sorry. It's just . . ."
"I know," he said.
"Bob? I lied. I'm not in good shape at all." They'd only been pulling two gees for a matter of minutes.
"What?" Bob responded. "Dammit, Paula, you're already a goddamn hero. Are you trying for martyr, too?" Bob reduced the acceleration to one gravity. "How is that? Can you hold out?"
"Much better. Thanks. And only time will tell. But just how far away from the fleet do we have to be before you'll feel safe?"
The other side of the galaxy comes to mind, he thought. "The cross-section of the armada is about the same as the diameter of Luna's orbit. They seem to adjust it based on the size of the system they're attacking. I was hoping we could be a full diameter away, but if you're in that bad shape, we could risk an EVA now. And are you going to be able to come over, or do I have to go and get you? Be honest this time!"
"You'll have to come get me," she said a few moments later. "But I can stand a gee for a couple hours. I think. Any more reports you can fill me in on?"
"There was sporadic laser fire and missile release when the mines were set off. We lost at least ten ships, the monitoring crew says. Hasn't been"
"Screw that shit!" Paula snapped back. "I set that mine off more than fifteen minutes ago. Half that crew should be bean bag chairs by now. Have any of the ships turned away?"
"Message for you from Colonel Knoedler, Dr. Dykstra," the courier said, thrusting a private viewer cube into his hand. "He left instructions that you should scan it immediately."
"Oh. Thank you," Dykstra said. The courier left.
Neither Rick nor Sammi seemed to have noticed that the young man had even been there. They were intent on the main screen, as was everyone else in the room, for any sign that the affected Phinon ships were going to flee. Hague had reported an initial flurry of chatter flying among the attacked ships in the first moments of the release of the genanites, but that spike had decayed to no chatter at all in only moments. "Oh yes, they know they're sick, yes," was what Hague had reported, but nothing else in the last ten minutes.
Dykstra lifted the viewer to his eyes and brushed the "on" stud with his finger, then remembered to put the earpiece in place. A holodisplay of the inner Solar System appeared. An arrow pointed to Mercury. Another pointed to a panoply of bright specks that was the Belt. A thick cream line represented the Phinon attack. An arrow at the bottom pointed in the direction of where Earth-Luna, not shown, would be.
There were a lot of silver lines going from Mercury to the Belt, then making sharp turns and intersecting the Phinon line along much of its length.
Dykstra was distracted by Sammi. "I failed," she said. "It's been long enough. They should be turning. They're still coming. I failed." Rick moved over to her and put his arm around her.
"Ensign, what are all those fast little specks moving up the screen?" Dykstra caught an admiral down on the main floor asking. "Some problem with the screen?"
"No sir," the ensign answered. "The screen is fine. But I don't know what the specks are."
Dykstra returned to the viewer. Knoedler's voice had started a narration. "Chris, remember Slingshot?" he said.
Dykstra tore the viewer away from his eyes and looked at the screen again, then he went to the rail and called down. "Hey! The specks. Ensign, how fast are the specks moving?"
The man looked up, recognized his questioner, turned to the admiral, got a nod and answered. "They're all moving at very high fractions of the speed of light. If they're real, I mean."
Oh, they're real all right. "How many are there?"
"Looks like thousands, no, tens . . . hundreds of thousands," the confused ensign finally answered.
Dykstra reached out a hand and steadied himself against the rail. "Colonel, you brilliant son-of-a-bitch," he said.
Everyone heard.
"Tommy, looks like ninety-eight percent of the KKVs came through the Belt right on trajectory," Nikki Knoedler said to her new husband. It had been a rush wedding at the only close-to-Christian chapel near the Mercurian north pole, but the colonel had insisted and, depressed or not, Nikki had not forgotten that that was what she had wanted, too. At the moment they were aboard Knoedler's boat, which Nikki had renamed the Honeymoon before the craft had been shot out of the cannon at .42c.
That was twenty minutes ago.
The kinetic kill vehicles had gone on before them, thousands at a time, shot out of the cannon in multiple salvos on trajectories that would take them into a huge swath of the Belt. There, close approach orbits past asteroids with high powered tractor beam assists, coupled with the Dykstra-Hague impellers on each vehicle, had boosted their velocities up to over .8c, and bent their courses to intersect the column of the Phinon fleet.
Due to Knoedler's plan, the System Patrol had a scarcity of ships equipped with the new drive, but over 600,000 intelligent rocks to hurl at the alien attackers.
And hurl they had. The Honeymoon had followed last, but on a different, direct course to the fleet encounter. There with Nikki piloting, Knoedler himself was doing whatever fine-tuning was needed to maximize their assault.
"Good! Damn good as a matter of fact. God must be on our side," Colonel Tommy replied to his new wife. "Any evidence yet that they're turning aside? If Sammi's genanites don't do it, maybe losing half their fleet will."
"Been over fifteen minutes. Doesn't look like any of the lead ships have changed course," Nikki answered while staring at the scanner.
"Then I guess we have to save the day," Knoedler said. "You may apologize to me again for all the things you said to me when I ordered you to come with me to Mercury, wife."
"I'm sorry, Tommy. Call the High Command now?"
"Chris will have had his advance notice by now," Knoedler said. "It's time to tell the whole System what's about to happen. I mean, `happening.' They'll be seeing the first impacts before our message reaches them."
"Bob?"
Now what? the lieutenant thought. They'd only been at one gee for five minutes. "Yes?"
"I guess I'm bleeding worse than I thought," Paula said.
"God damn you, Paula!" he roared at her, but he cut the drive to zero. "We'll just coast with the shields up and hope we don't get any concentrated fire. I'm coming to get you. I'm suiting up, now."
A soft, "I'm sorry," issued from the speaker, but by then Bob was on the middeck putting on his power suit (upgraded to a deluxe model like Pops had worn). Bob was out the airlock and standing on the bow with his gripfields in less than a minute, and looking into Paula's skiff in less than two.
She looked like hell.
Somehow her seat had gotten crushed up against the control console, with her sandwiched in between. "You can't even get your suit helmet on, can you?" he observed.
"Maybe if I could feel my arms," she said.
That she hadn't died from the blast that disabled the skiff was a major miracle. That she hadn't died when they were under two gees was another minor one.
"Shit. I'm going to have to carry the skiff back to the docking ring so we can keep you under atmosphere, then cut you out once I'm back inside. We won't be able to use the drive though because you'll still be outside the compensation fields."
Through his comm he ordered the ship to deactivate the tractor beams, then grabbed the skiff and started the slow walk over the top of the Hyperlight II to the docking ring.
Bob thought he saw a brief spark of light out the corner of his eye off the port side. He looked that way and saw another. And another. "Paula, can you see out, toward where the Phinons are?"
"Yes. What are those flashes?"
"Beats me. But . . . shit. Looks like their ships are self-destructing. Maybe they're doing that instead of turning. Paula! I think we did it!" Too many sparkles and flashes were going off by now to even hope to count.
Looks like the end of a burning fuse, Bob thought.