The Sirens of Space (25 page)

“
Wouldn’t they be better off simply
replacing the whole system?” asked the Admiral commanding the
Hodges Outpost.

“
They’d have to rebid the project,”
explained Commodore Wright. “And it would probably take the better
part of a year before we could authorize a replacement.”

“
That’s insane!”

“
Those are the regulations,” Wright
smiled. “Unless we can prove a defect....”

“
A crashing computer isn’t a
defect?”

“
I just apply the rules,” she replied.
“I don’t try to defend them.”

“
And Cook?” asked Admiral
Clay.

“
Actually, the
d’Artagnan
is the only one of the bunch that is
anywhere close to being ready. Their computers are fully debugged,
their systems are all minimally functional, and Cook’s last report
suggested that they were almost done with an overhaul of every
engine coil on the ship.”

“
Still not starworthy,
though?”

“
No...but it’s just short of
miraculous that they’ve come as far as they have.”

“
I swear,” Clay said, “I was rooting
for him to pull it off.”

“
But the rules are quite specific...,”
Weatherlee began.

“
Yes, Winthrop,” Clay answered
wearily. “As we’ve already decided, without their certificates,
none of them will make Maneuvers.”

“
Exceptions would be— ”

“
No—we’ve been over that
before.”

Leaning back in his chair, Weatherlee took
small solace in winning his point. These days, it seemed he won
very few of them. And he seemed to win fewer with every passing
year.

Weatherlee leaned forward, his eyes
narrowing as he moved in for the kill. The Hawkins Massacre was
still grabbing headlines across the whole of Terra. Panic over the
alien menace had gripped Covington, and everyone was looking to the
Cosmic Guard to set things right. But this Board of Inquiry had
been cobbled together on the fly and he hadn’t expected the
proceedings to go quite so smoothly. In fact, he’d expected the
arrogant officer in front of him to try lying and squirming his way
around the facts. But the young officer’s answers were exactly what
the admiral had been trying to prove. Now, he could nail the little
bastard’s hide to the wall.

“
Let me make sure I
understand you, Lt. Commander Cook. Are you suggesting to this
Board of Inquiry that you—an officer of the Cosmic Guard, sworn to
uphold the law and protect civilians from whatever dangers space
might present— maneuvered your squadron in such a way as to make it
possible for the aliens to make good their escape.”

“
Actually, I’m not
suggesting anything at all, Admiral Weatherlee,” replied the young
officer. “I am telling this Board of Inquiry that I deliberately
interposed my ships between the aliens and their pursuers, to
prevent any further bloodshed. The fact that the aliens escaped
without anyone else getting killed means that I accomplished
exactly what I was trying to do.”

“
For what purpose?” asked
the presiding officer, leaning forward to hear the answer. Concern
creased his brown, and his kindly brown eyes seemed genuinely
puzzled.

“
Our standing orders
provide no guidance in dealing with aliens, Admiral Clay. Simply
put, the aliens are beyond our jurisdiction. Our laws regard space
as a common frontier that belongs to no one, and since they were
not Terran nationals, it seemed to me that we had no legal basis to
stop them. But beyond this—it was our first contact with an alien
race.”

“
They attacked a mining
camp and killed Terran civilians!” snapped Admiral Weatherlee. “And
you let them all get away.”

“
As I understand, it was a
rather bloody affair on both sides,” the young officer replied
calmly. “At the time, the spacers were claiming several of their
own had been killed and that the aliens they hadn’t managed to
finish off were getting away. I suspect that the terror and
surprise was mutual—and either side could well have started the
bloodbath. If we hadn’t let them leave, then the aliens first taste
of Terran hospitality would have been a massacre, followed by a
pursuit, followed by a second massacre—which, given the reception
they received at Hawkins Star, they’d probably have regarded as our
standard welcome.”

“
They killed Terran
civilians!”

“
We didn’t know who or
what they are. And, quite frankly, we still don’t know. But it
seemed to me that intervening in a way that separated the
combatants—all of the combatants—and allowed the aliens to leave in
peace gave us a better chance of sorting out the whole mess than
we’d have right now if we’d just blasted away at them. Simply
destroying them—which was the likely result of any attempt to stop
them—may well have resulted in an interstellar war with an alien
race of undetermined capabilities and intentions.”

Admiral Clay nodded. “So you decided,
entirely on your own....”

“
I had no time to radio
for instructions, Admiral Clay,” the young man said. “My squadron
was there only by chance, and we arrived just in time to see the
spacers closing in for the kill. My choice was to intervene, or to
stand aside and let the spacers take their revenge. I suppose, in
hindsight, staying out of it might have been the safer course as
far as the High Command is concerned, since asking for instructions
would have let me avoid taking any responsibility in the matter.
But letting our first contact with an alien race end in the
annihilation of their scouting party struck me as foolish in the
extreme—and the kind of foolishness that History would not treat
kindly. Even today, taking the safe way out would strike me as the
act of a coward. And if I had the same choice to make, I suspect
I’d act exactly the same way—though I’d probably deploy my squadron
a bit differently, now that I think of it.”

Sitting back in his chair, Weatherlee felt a
surge of satisfaction in proving his point. Later, when the Board
retired to deliberate, he found himself smoldering with rage at
what he was hearing. He’d done exactly what he set out to do. He’d
actually proven that the arrogant prick was a traitor. But now
everyone else seemed to regard it as a feather in the little snot’s
cap.

“
I’ll tell you what,”
laughed Porter Clay, the presiding officer on the Board of Inquiry
as he rocked back and forth in his chair, “I’ve had my eyes on that
kid ever since—actually, Winthrop, ever since that day in Covington
when he topped off your tactics seminar at the Academy.”

Clay slapped Weatherlee roughly across the
back, and the rest of the board burst into laughter. They’d all
been there. Every last one of them.

“
I’ll never forget it,”
roared Admiral Pendleton, and the rest of his colleagues started
reliving the entire episode. “But hell, Winnie—we passed you
anyway. It wasn’t your plan that was the problem, you know. You
just ran it into a goddamn buzz saw. The god-damndest one I’ve ever
seen. And from a student, yet!”

Weatherlee closed his eyes and tried his
best to push the experience out of his memory. “Even with all this
evidence...,” he began.

“
That kid is the most
brilliant young commander I’ve ever seen,” said Clay, looking
around the table. “And that decision of his took more balls than
any of us have shown in our entire careers—and God as my witness, I
think he made exactly the right call.
Damn
!—but his instincts are
remarkable. Hell, if it had been up to us we’d have spent two weeks
debating it—and we’d still have fucked the whole thing
up.

“
No,” Clay sighed, taking
a deep breath. “We don’t punish initiative in the Cosmic Guard, no
matter what the press or politicians have to say. I move that this
Board of Inquiry issue a statement calling on Covington to open
immediate talks with our neighbors before another similar
misunderstanding leads us to war. Then, we give that young man a
medal—promote him to full Commander—and give him a cruiser to hone
his skills. And you just watch: some day, he’s going to be the best
starship skipper in the whole damn fleet.”

“
The vote will not be
unanimous, Admiral Clay,” Weatherlee whispered intently.

“
No, Winthrop,” Clay
replied coldly, “I didn’t think it would be.”

DAYS RACED BY in a seamless blur, until one
day a week or so later found Cook alone in his office. The writing
on his viewscreen cast a soft glow on his face. Aside from the
screen, and the clock on his bedstand, a small lamp on a corner
table was the room’s only light. When things around him seemed too
hectic, Cook found it easier to concentrate that way. The time
pulse on the chronometer read 470 Hours; little more than five
cosmic hours remained in the current cosmic year. Time was racing
by and there was still much to do.

He leaned back and re-read his message to
Fleet Headquarters:

CGS 2001 <>

POSITION: SB 114, 43-110901/a2/15.6e

COMM REQ CODE III cc:142-9994.7:

TO: EastFleetHQ/IshCom/FtAdmPMClay/

FROM: CaptRCook/

SECURITY: Standard/

PREFIX: Admiral Clay-Special Request/

FLAGS: yellow1;yellow2;green3/

RE: Maneuvers Eligibility

Preliminary repairs are nearing completion,
but final adjustments will extend into cc:143; I estimate readiness
for final inspection at 143-0150, and anticipate departure for
shakedown cruise approximately ten days later, at 143-0250.

With regular maneuvers scheduled for
143-1250,
d’Artagnan
will have a full cosmic month after
departure to make all adjustments necessary to ready herself for
maneuvers. Since the next scheduled exercises are set for 143-6250,
the inspection deadline of 143-0000 will result in our
ineligibility for maneuvers through the near future, unless the
time requirement is waived.

Therefore, I request that you extend the
eligibility deadline for my ship, allowing us to qualify for the
first-half exercises. Other rookie ships, including all of the
Challengers
, may fall into the same category, and would
likely appreciate similar consideration.

Capt R Cook//

Cook pressed the transmit button, sending
his request to Admiral Clay. He stretched his limbs as far as he
could, and after a few false starts he reached for the vidphone. He
was already starting to relax; he was sure he had made the right
decision. As he entered the number, he chided himself for leaving
everything until the last moment.

* * *

The bridge
hatch opened
with an airy whoosh, though none could spare the time or attention
to see who it was. Asteroids dotted the viewer, and twin enemy
cruisers a-flank the ship were firing almost at will. Even the
tyros, most of whom had not touched the controls all day, were on
the edge of their seats.

“
Incoming fire!”

“
Helm, slow to sublight, quarter-power
and hard about.”

“
Direct hit amidships, Mr. Ashton.
Shields are holding but weakened, at 60 percent power.”

“
Divert power to midship shields,
prepare to blank the aft guns. Helm, prepare to increase
speed.”

Jeremy stole a glance toward the entrance.
It was the captain. For the first time that Jeremy could recall,
Cook was wearing standard blues instead of his ratty fatigues.
Jeremy felt blood rushing to his head, but couldn’t afford the
luxury of worry.

“
Starboard shield amain.”

“
Enemy cruiser coming tight about;
number two is looping wide.”

“
Increase speed to C-2; prepare to
fire remaining guns.”

“
Enemy slowing to C-1; range, ten
klicks.”

“
Incoming fire!”

“
Fire starboard guns!”

“
Shields are buckling. Heavy damage to
enemy shields; second cruiser approaching to port, now passing
athwart to starboard.”

“
Incoming fire!”

“
Fire all remaining guns!”

“
Missed him, Mr. Ashton.”

“
Starboard shield is gone, Mr.
Ashton.”

“
Damn!” Jeremy hit his armrest with a
balled fist and turned to face Cook. He wanted to say something,
mumble some inane words that he didn’t really believe about how
much better things were going and how quickly they were improving.
To his surprise, Cook motioned for him to step from the
chair.

Wordlessly, a smiling Cook assumed the
vacant captain’s chair, swiveling from side to side as the
simulator continued unabated. Jeremy quietly turned to assume the
systems station from Dexter. Suddenly the bridge looked and felt
different, crackling with anticipation, yet relaxed as a still
night before a summer storm. The screen still showed the enemy
cruisers closing for the kill, but the frenetic tension that
gripped the bridge during the simulation had vanished, replaced by
curiosity about what the captain had in store for them.

“
Mr. Ashton,” the captain, his voice
quiet, but firm. “Replay the last simulation from two minutes
before your last ‘Hard About.’ ”

“
We’ve never scored a ninety,
Captain,” Jeremy said. “I doubt we even— ”