Martial Law 1: Patriotic Treason (40 page)

“I know,” Jade said. Her voice softened slightly. “I was going to be one of the women going to them this time.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. I seemed to be apologising a lot while talking to her. “We saved you from that…”

“For a while,” Jade said. She grinned suddenly, a grin with no humour in it. “I’ve been infected with a particularly nasty sexually-transmitted disease. If we lost the fight, I’d have gone willingly and fucked as many of them as I could, just to see them rot away within the year. I’m immune to it myself, of course.”

I shook my head in awe. I couldn’t understand how someone could think of such a plan, and how someone else could tamely accept her fate as part of a desperate operation. It was the work of a desperate mindset, one that saw no other choice, but to sacrifice some of the young women of his planet to make the plan work. It was beyond my comprehension. Not even Heinlein had gone so far, although there had been whores who had killed and mutilated their customers.

“This is the Cabinet,” Jade explained, as we entered a larger cavern. “I believe they want to thank you personally.”

The discussion didn’t take very long. I think they were a little surprised that the Captain himself hadn’t come, although I explained that the Captain was busy supervising the repairs to the ship. The Engineer had decided that several components needed replacing and had decided to do it while we were at rest. The Captain had agreed and also decided that it would be a good exercise for the Ensigns, although for once I wasn't going to be supervising them. Lieutenant Carolyn Lauderdale would do that almost as well as I could. She had a good touch with the Ensigns as well – and, even though it pained me to admit it, she might even have been better than me.

“I believe that the Captain will visit as soon as possible,” I said, at the end. “However, with a pirate ship in the area, he wishes to make sure that his starship is ready for battle before he leaves her.”

“Quite understandable,” the President agreed. There were undercurrents I didn’t understand. The Cabinet might even be considering seeking a closer relationship with the UN and I didn’t have the heart, or the nerve, to explain to them that that might be a dreadful mistake. The pirates were limited by what they could carry away, but the UN would reshape their society and absorb it into their system. Even if that weren't the case, the UN would have real problems stationing a task force out here permanently. If Bellefonte had rated as a serious concern, the planet would have been brought into the UN’s system of garrisons and governors a long time ago. “Your crew will, of course, be welcome for shore leave at any time. We have some quite fantastic sights for you to see, if you would like.”

That, as I had expected, turned out to be largely impossible, although Carolyn agreed to escort the Ensigns on a pair of brief excursions into the asteroid and down to the planet. I was tempted to go, but there was too much work for a First Lieutenant to do, not least writing my share of the report on the engagement. I was tempted just to write ‘we won’ or some thing along the same lines, but the Admirals in the UNPF High Command would demand at least seven pages, in triplicate. I hadn’t realised how much paperwork had to be completed for each missile we had fired, let alone everything else. It was a mystery how we were supposed to get anything done.

“You can just copy the paperwork from one missile and use it for the others,” the Captain pointed out, when I finally took it to him. I’d made a private resolution that if our plan succeeded I was going to cut all of the paperwork down as much as possible. I could see the value in accounting to each missile, but surely I didn’t have to do so much paperwork for each of them. “No one ever looks at it anyway.”

“Thank you, sir,” I said, seriously. That made it a lot easier. Even the vast UNPF bureaucracy would have had problems trying to absorb all of the paperwork. Yianni might well discover that Engineering had tons of paperwork of its own. I wondered about giving the Ensigns a taste of my paperwork, and then decided that horsewhipping them would be kinder. “I’ll see to it at once.”

We spent another five days in the system. The Engineer’s determination to have everything checked out before another encounter with the pirate ship, or even to use some of his copious selection of spare parts, meant that we had to go through everything. The Captain didn’t discourage him; indeed, I rather think that he encouraged him. I couldn’t fault him for that. If I’d learnt one thing in my career, it was that components rarely lasted half as long as they were guaranteed to last. The Engineer even dismantled the shuttles and carefully replaced all of their components as well. It was an insane level of attention to detail.

“I’ll have to pay Bellefonte a visit before we depart,” the Captain said, finally. It had been a week of watching and waiting for the pirates, but they hadn’t shown themselves. It was possible that they had emerged from the wormhole somewhere in the outer system and were waiting for us to leave, but there was no way to find them. A powered-down ship was impossible to differentiate from a harmless asteroid, unless we carried out a visual inspection, and they could hide indefinitely. “If they do show themselves, get after them at once. Don’t wait for orders.”

“Aye, sir,” I said.

I returned to the bridge to take command as the Captain’s shuttle departed. It was easy enough to have the Ensigns run basic tracking exercises on the shuttle, checking and rechecking the shuttle’s course to ensure that it docked safely at the asteroid. We’d tried to teach them the skill without having something real to practice on, but the Captain had firmly believed that the best experience came by doing. I couldn’t disagree with his logic…after all, look where it had gotten me.

”Lieutenant,” Yianni said, suddenly, “I’m picking up a power fluctuation from the Captain’s shuttle!”

I came to my feet quickly. “Report,” I ordered. The icon representing the Captain’s shuttle was beginning to flash alarmingly. I brought up the visual feed and saw it spin out of control. There was no way that that was a standard manoeuvre, or even a pilot showing off. It was bad enough to threaten the internal compensator. “What’s happening…?”

Before my eyes, the shuttle came apart and exploded in a ball of plasma.

Chapter Thirty-Two

The UNPF’s problem – one of its many problems – is that it is unable to guarantee a suitable supply of components for its starships. Each manufactory is given quite unreasonable quotas for production and, if it fails to meet them, is penalised heavily. The net result is that corners are cut everywhere and defective components are very common. Sometimes, when not discovered in time, the results are lethal.

-Thomas Anderson. An Unbiased Look at the UNPF. Baen Historical Press, 2500.

“Scan for life signs,” I snapped, against all logic. He couldn’t be dead. He just couldn’t be dead. “What happened?”

“No life signs detected,” Yianni said. She sounded as shaken as I was. “The shuttle has been completely destroyed.”

I keyed my console. “Engineer, Pilot, I want you to find out what happened to the shuttle,” I ordered. The Captain was dead and that made me Captain, but I couldn’t assume command just yet. I should declare myself Captain at once, according to regulations, yet it would have felt like a betrayal. How could I usurp Captain Harriman? “Yianni, did the station open fire?”

“Negative,” Yianni said, firmly. I checked my console and she was correct. There was no trace of a missile or a laser cannon being fired. “They’re asking us what happened!”

“Tell them that there was an accident on the shuttle and that we’ll talk to them as soon as possible,” I ordered, rising from my chair. “Launch the second shuttle…no, belay that order. Have the Engineer check out a work party and send them EVA to recover anything they can.”

“Aye, sir,” Yianni said.

The hatch opened and Jason Montgomerie came onto the bridge. “I just heard,” he said. “Can we talk in your cabin?”

He tried to lead me into the Captain’s cabin, but I refused. The Captain’s cabin was mine now, but I couldn’t go inside. It felt as if I would be violating his privacy. I couldn’t bear to do that. It would have been cutting the last link with the man I had admired and sought to emulate.

“You have to assume command,” he said, as soon as the hatch hissed closed. “You’re the First Lieutenant and you have to declare yourself Captain, now, to continue the line of authority. The ship needs a Captain.”

“I can’t,” I protested, grimly. It dawned on me that he, or the Senior Chief, might think that I had sabotaged the shuttle personally, just to get rid of the Captain. I hadn’t, but how were they to know that? “Sir, I…”

“You’re the Captain,” he said. There was no give in his tone at all. “You get to call me Jason.”

He held up a hand before I could continue. “Captain Harriman accepted your transfer request knowing that you would be First Lieutenant and his direct successor if anything happened to him,” he continued. “I approved your transfer with the same understanding. You are the senior officer of this ship and therefore command devolves upon you.”

I wanted to argue, but how could I? “The Captain won’t think any less of you for acting according to regulations and declaring yourself Captain,” he concluded. “You don’t have any real choice and you know it. Please, John, don’t make this any harder than it already is.”

“I understand,” I said. I hadn’t realised that Jason, sot that he was, had cared deeply for the Captain. They’d been friends, despite their different positions, something that would have horrified their superiors back home if they’d realised the truth. He might have seemed a drunkard, but I suspected that that hadn’t hampered his position. “Please give me some time…”

“There isn’t much time,” Jason said, standing up. “You know the regulations as well as I do.”

“Yes,” I said. The UNPF had so many regulations that no one could memorise them all, but that particular section was studied thoroughly at the Academy. In the event of the Captain being killed in the line of duty, or being relived of duty according to regulations, command will devolve upon the senior officer in the chain of command. That officer will assume the rank of Captain and return the starship to the nearest fleet base, where a full inquiry will be held. “I understand.”

The hatch hissed closed behind him and I swore, inwardly. There would have to be an inquiry when we returned to Earth and that might expose my own plans. I didn’t even know what had happened back on Earth. It was quite possible that the security forces had uncovered one of my friends and were working to round up everyone involved with my conspiracy. I could take the ship renegade, but what would that gain me, but a lifetime on the run? It would just turn me into another pirate. I say there for an hour before the hatch chimed again.

“Come,” I called. The hatch hissed open, revealing the Engineer and the Senior Chief. The Engineer was holding a blackened component in his hand. I stared at it, puzzled. It might have been something at one time, but now it was just a melted mass. “What’s that?”

“The thing that killed the Captain,” the Engineer said, grimly. His voice was very bitter. “This is a standard-issue fuel injector system for the shuttle. I studied the telemetry from the shuttle just before it exploded and deduced that one of these components must have failed.”

He put it down on my table and I examined it. It meant nothing to me. “I see,” I said, remembering the extensive checks that the Captain had ordered. “Why wasn't the damaged component located before we installed it onto the shuttle?”

“They’re sealed components,” the Engineer explained. He nodded towards the burned-out unit. “I opened two other components and inspected them carefully. They were both flawed – I suspect that someone designed it that way deliberately – and when the shuttle ramped up to full power…well, there was an overload reaction and the fuel tank eventually exploded.”

“Shit,” I said, bitterly. “Are they all flawed?”

“The case of components came to us from Ceres, sealed,” the Engineer said. I didn’t miss the implications. Ceres had a bad reputation even among the UNPF. It was the home of hundreds of conscripted workers, among other things, and produced far too many vital components. Something that would damage a starship might well destroy a shuttle, if it were loaded onboard and used in innocence. “The ones I checked are badly flawed.”

He pointed a stubby finger at the unit he’d brought. “I took that one down to the machine shop and simulated a shuttle drive being activated,” he added. “The result was what you see before you. I have no doubt that that would destroy an active shuttle.”

I swore. “What about the other shuttle?” I asked. “Can we be sure that it’s safe?”

“We can’t,” the Senior Chief said. He scowled. “I’ve ordered the components pulled out and replaced by our final components from the previous shipping, but we’d still be taking a chance. What happens if there are other sabotaged components?”

“It would depend on where they are,” the Engineer said, slowly. “The worst that could happen to the starship itself would be a runaway fusion reaction, which would burn out one of the fusion reactors, but if we lost even two of them.”

“We’d lose our ability to go FTL,” I concluded. There were three fusion reactors on the Jacques Delors and we needed at least two of them to power up the Jump Drive and open a wormhole. Even having main power to the remainder of the ship wouldn’t help us if we had to crawl back to Earth at STL speeds.