Lieutenant (16 page)

If practical
.  That didn’t sound nearly as definite as I’d have liked. But it was the only game in town. “Roger,” I replied. “Zombie signing off.”

34

Most of us needed a little time to prepare for the bug-out, but because I’d just returned from meeting Snow after his attack I was pretty much ready to go. All I had to do was snatch up the datachip I’d been using as an improvised Station log and then top off my blaster’s magazine. After that I had time to kill while waiting for the others.

So I spent it watching the unfolding battle as
Javelin
took on the Imperial cruisers, which belatedly chose to charge. They might well have gotten away with it in a node-cluster as tight as Zombie, save that
Javelin
shot extremely well. This made perfect sense, when I thought about it. The battle-cruiser was built to sail in harm’s way with no protection other than her firepower and speed—her armor wasn’t much thicker than that of a destroyer. So it was in the navy’s clear interest to assign her the best, most talented gunners and engineers in the fleet. One thing, however, deeply puzzled me. Instead of decelerating for all she was worth and holding her enemies at arm’s length for as long as possible, the Royal raider played directly into the Imperial strengths by charging right back at them! Though she got away with it—the cruisers went up one-two-three once the range grew short enough—it was an inexplicable tactic. Why in the world would any battlecruiser captain with so many as two functional neural synapses do a stupid thing like that?

I thought about the wording of the message I’d received—we’d be picked up
if practical
. Then at long last two and two added up properly in my mind and I realized there’d be no long, slow counterattack to hold Zombie Station and wipe out the Imperial landing force after all. Because there was only one scenario under which
Javelin’s
tactics made sense…

…and that was if at least a fair-sized chunk of the Imperial Main Battle fleet were hard on her heels, just on the other side of the node!

Bare minutes ago, the sudden appearance of a friendly vessel in the system had changed everything for us. And now everything was changing again. This time it was the wheels in my own head that were spinning out of control and getting nowhere. Of
course
they hadn’t been able to tell us, not with the faintest possibility the Imperials might be listening in. Had our enemies known, they’d have tried to cut off the battlecruiser’s escape instead of throwing their ships away in a futile headlong attack. But the information was crucial—time was far more precious than I’d imagined.

What should I do? And how?

The first thing I decided was that sitting down in Tunnel Zero wasn’t getting any of us anywhere. “Set the cores to collapse,” I ordered the chief. “On a ten-minute delay.”

“But sir!” he protested.  “That’s not how—“

“I know,” I interrupted him. “Do it anyway.” The reason no one had ever collapsed the engines before was that doing so would consume most of the asteroid that was the Station’s core, and there weren’t any others nearby to start fresh on. So it was standard procedure to set booby-traps instead, such well-thought-out ones that they weren’t worth messing with when resistance ended. Without the rock’s protective bulk there could be no effective battlestation here. Since the Station interdicted only Imperial trade routes our side was the only one with something to lose if the place were never rebuilt. But there’d been enough death and suffering here for the rest of time, I decided. Besides, the collapse was bound to kill who knew how many Imperial marines. And as a final sweetener, the destruct sequence would serve as just about the most potent distraction possible. 

I watched as the chief began keying in the destruct codes, then activated the radio in my suit. “Fremont?”

“Yes, sir?” He sounded terribly frightened, which was perfectly understandable.

“I don’t see anything on the cameras anywhere near you,” I explained, my voice as soft and calm as I could make it. “And I have reason to believe the Imperials are about to retreat, if they haven’t begun already. So most likely you’re not going to run into any trouble.”

The relief was obvious in his voice. “Yes, sir.”

“I want you to go to the air duct in Tunnel One where it meets Radial A. Make sure no one’s around that we might’ve missed on the cameras, then have someone cover you while you take off the grille and remove the filter. Got it?”

“Sir… I mean ‘Yes, sir’. But why?”

I held my temper. Sure, a disciplined human trooper would never have wasted my time with a question. But on the other hand, the more Fremont knew the better job he’d make of things. Most likely I should’ve explained in more detail to begin with. “We’re going to crawl out through the ductwork,” I explained. “All the way to the surface. Then we’re going to capture a landing craft, so that
Javelin
won’t have to slow down for us. The easier we make the pickup for her, the more likely we are to get out of this mess alive.”

35

Sure enough, the Imperials were in full retreat by the time I led my little force out of Tunnel Zero and back into the working parts of the Station. My last check of the cameras showed them pulling back almost everywhere except in a few isolated pockets where, I was willing to bet, they’d simply failed to get the word.

The air-ducts were plenty big enough for even a suited bunny, but our two humans had to strip down in order to fit. Even then it was tight, and we Rabbits had to continually hold up and wait for them. I could only hope we wouldn’t hit vacuum only partway out to the skin—the route I’d chosen was under full pressure when we left, but in combat that could change mighty quickly. While I’d delegated two bunnies to drag along the empty suits, they weren’t something that could be donned in an instant.

It was eerie, moving invisibly in such close proximity to the Imperials. We could clearly hear their barked orders in all directions as we silently floated through deck after deck. Or at least near-silently; the humans banged and bumped sometimes, unable to help themselves. When that happened, all I could do was grit my teeth and hope the Imperials were too preoccupied with everything else in their universe-gone-insane environment to take much notice of a few isolated thumps.

And so we made it all the way outboard to the Station’s marine billets without anyone detecting us. The barracks-area had been one of our lowest-priority areas during the cleanup, and we’d never quite gotten around to them. We knew from the cameras that there were eight or ten bodies floating in there. My guess was that the Imperials hadn’t given the area much thought either. Even if they had, most likely they’d opened the hatch, taken one whiff, and redogged the thing just as quickly as they could. In either event it was a good bet that we could exit the ductwork there without encountering the enemy. I took a moment to lift my visor and warn my unsuited comrades about what was coming their way, then hit the manual override button on the baffle that was sealing off the airway ahead of us. Visibly speaking, the air didn’t change any. But almost instantly both humans began retching and I knew that my navigation had been spot-on.

It took two, maybe three more long minutes to deal with the filter and grating from the back, then I was face to face with a long-dead orderly staring at me through empty eyesockets. Gently I shoved him out of the way, then made room for the humans to come through so they could get into their suits and back to breathing good air before they vomited up their toenails—by the sound of things, that was about all they still had left to lose. While they were recovering I made my way all the way to the back wall of the room, which was also the Station’s outer hull. And there, sure enough, was the emergency airlock the schematics had promised me.

Working quickly, I undogged the heavy anti-invasion bolts that made entering the Station there even more difficult than cutting through hullmetal and swung the door open. It’d hold either two humans or three Rabbits, I estimated. With meant about seven full cycles at half a minute apiece... “Come
on
!” I urged my troops. “Now! Now! Now!” Fremont was in the first load. “Take cover the moment you get through,” I ordered him. “Occupy us an area of hull we can hold. I’ll be with the last load.”

“Yes, sir!” he barked as the hatch slammed shut in his face.

Next were three more Rabbits, then after an endless time another three. By then the two humans had begun to recover a bit, so I sent them. They were just finishing up when suddenly the lights went out and I felt a wave of sickness flush through me. It was the core-Field down in the engine room, beginning to careen out of balance!

At first I smiled—I’d estimated we needed about a ten-minute delay before putting the engines to work ruining themselves, and felt rather pleased with myself over the accuracy of my calculations. But… I’d forgotten to account for the reaction of the Imperials! Suddenly the big wheel on the door at the far end of the barracks-hall began to spin, as our foes too began seeking a way out!

I didn’t know what to do at first—if I fired at them then they’d call for help and smother us by sheer numbers. But Nestor, bless him, moved without orders. With a mighty leap he flew down the hall, then jammed his blaster in the mechanism.

“Good!” I called out as the lock cycled and the next three Rabbits filed in. One was Snow, who still didn’t look good at all. But there was still no time for him—I slammed the door in his face and began the cycle again. “Stay right there, Nestor! Out of sight, by the edge. If they make it in here...”

Then I thought things through. He’d stuffed his blaster in the mechanism, which left him pretty much helpless. “You take over here,” I ordered Vollie, one of my reformed slacker-bunnies. “When everyone else is through, join the last load.” Then I leapt after my undersized aide.

36

By the time I arrived at the entryway, the Imperials out in the corridor were backed up and clamoring for a way out. This area was well forward of the primary bulkhead and therefore wouldn’t be involved in the engine collapse—that was why the troops were bunked here in the first place. Our enemies were well and truly panicked, however, and perhaps a dozen were piled up pounding on the jammed wheel. My guess was that they hadn’t a clue there were Royalists on the other side—after all it was dark, they’d only ever seen a handful of us since invading, and the air was still full of drifting corpses.

I looked back at my last few Rabbits—one more load, and Nestor and I would be the only two left. But the door wasn’t armored, and one of the Imperials was unwrapping a demolition charge…

Finally the last three Rabbits climbed into the lock. “Stay close!” I ordered Nestor, who nodded in reply from behind wide, terrified eyes. Without a moment to lose I drew my weapon, jerked myself back flush against the wall…

…and yanked Nestor's weapon free, allowing the Imperials to come bursting through in an uncoordinated mass, rotating and flipping head-over-heels six ways from Sunday. A good friend and marine had once advised me to set my blaster to ‘wide-beam, full power’ when entering into zero-gee combat, and if anything the Imperial model I was carrying was even more potent than its Royal equivalent. I didn’t even aim, just waved it at the Imperials and squeezed the trigger one, two, three times. Each discharge seemed a titanic explosion in such confined quarters; I couldn’t miss such a tightly-packed mass. The firefight was bloody, brutal and short. Best of all it was totally one-sided, my side being the winning one.

I tossed the exhausted weapon away, then ducked low and leapt into the mass of fresh corpses. It was the best thing I could think of to do, with my primary weapon now empty. I still had my Sword, and that was best employed in the closest quarters possible. I was unlucky, however. Somehow, by a miracle one of the Imperials hadn’t been scratched. He raised his gun and I swung my blade, though I knew with sick certainty that I was beaten. Then, out of nowhere, a single laser-bolt slammed home into the Imperial’s faceplate and the enemy marine went limp.

“Sir!” Nestor called out from just behind me. “I got him, sir! I
got
him!”

“You certainly did!” I answered, my heart still racing and my sphincter squeezed extra-tight. We’d never found time to give the ex-cabin boy any more than the most rudimentary of training, yet he’d just saved my life. Perhaps
all
of our lives. I panted once, twice, three times trying to overcome the terror-reaction that still gripped me. Finally I grabbed a dead marine, this one a decomposing Royal that’d drifted close, and used him as a pushoff point to zoom back to the still-open hatchway. It closed easily enough, and this time I made sure it was firmly locked. Then I looted myself a fresh blaster as well. “Come on,” I urged Nestor once I was done, after taking a few seconds to hug him close in the lapine fashion. “Let’s go find the others before they forget about us.”

The last thing I ever saw inside Zombie Station was a roomful of hopeless, floating corpses, this time mostly kitted out in Imperial gear.

37

Fremont had done a good job choosing us a secure area; the moment Nestor and I were through he waved us to cover behind a large rock that eons ago had agglomerated itself onto the original asteroid’s stony surface. It provided a nice overhang so that it was only open to assault from one direction, and he’d already posted three flank guards—left, right, and overhead. Even better, one of them was our engineering petty officer—in other words he’d amplified on my instructions and then ordered about a human accordingly. My already high opinion of Fremont rose—apparently he’d been hitting the tactical manuals as well as the technical ones that’d taught him his primary jobs. And his self-confidence must be growing daily. “Sir!” he said over our radio link. “We should wait right here—it’s
perfect
!”

It certainly would’ve been, I grudgingly agreed, if
Javelin
really was going to have all the time she needed for a nice leisurely pickup. “I’ll look things over,” I temporized, taking advantage of a series of handholds to scale the little outcrop.