Troy Rising 2 - Citadel (35 page)

The alternative was a Myrmidon which was a great big gravitic target.

“Sir, we should go to EMCON,” the colonel said, closing his laptop. “Your cell?”

“Here,” the President said, handing it over. The First Family was on four more helicopters, scattered and heading southwest away from his position. “Well, there's one nice thing about the way that the Rangora make war.”

“Sir?” the colonel said.

“Peaceniks used to say that if the leaders were forced to fight, there wouldn't be any wars,” the President said. “Bang goes that theory.”

The Blackhawk was low and hammering it, nose down and dodging wires to stay below any radar.

Which just meant it was in the perfect position to be picked up by a cell phone.

“Oh My God! Jerri! It is! I could see him in the window! I'm sending you the vid
.
.
.”

SpaceCom had one thing right, the President was somewhere in the top of the list of targets.

What they had wrong was how close to the top. He was, in fact, the very top. With great big asterisks. The one part that Star Marshall Gi'Bucosof carried over from To'Jopeviq's report was the leadership structure of Terra and the various “tribes” war policy makers.

Sixteen missiles, already having crept inside the orbit of the moon, suddenly lit off their drives and hammered for Earth at 1000 gravities of acceleration.

There were, now, sixty-nine BDA clusters in orbit around Earth. By spherical geometry, any twenty-four of them could see a quadrant of Earth at any time. There were, in addition, two hundred more scattered in various tidally stable positions.

A total of thirty-eight BDA clusters could target the missiles, more than two each.

The problem being, the missiles weren't just going straight. Nor were they easy to detect. Shut down, with some time, they were easy to engage.

Full power and roaring? Ninety-three out of one hundred and forty-eight had made it through the gate defenses. These were missiles that were very very hard to kill. Gravitic, electronic and visual ghosts played out to either side as the missiles snaked in for the kill . . .

The President was in the gunner seat of the Blackhawk. Not the safest spot but it was the best view. If it was going to happen, he wanted to watch. So he saw the streak in the sky . . .

“God's grace be w . . .”

“What's the word from Earth?” Admiral Kinyon asked, gazing at the picture from the gate area.

“Twenty hits,” Commodore Pounders replied. “We lost the President, the Vice President, Speaker, Senate Majority, the British Prime Minister, the Russian Prime Minister and the Chinese Premier. The Premier was in Shenzhen so we don't know which was the target. The President, the Vice and the Brit Prime Minister all managed to get to relatively unpopulated areas before the strikes. They were definite decap strikes. The Russian PM was in Novy Birks. Toss-up again. Shenzhen, Gungzou, Calcutta, Bogotá . . . Long list.”

“US strikes?” the Admiral asked.

“Relatively few of the remaining cities got hit,” the commodore said. “Only four of sixteen got through the BDA net. The missiles were going for the leadership which was dispersed. If there hadn't been so many targeting on the President and the PM, we probably would have gotten them all. Strike in Louisville. That might have been, well, Louisville or because the Senate Majority leader was there.”

“Power transfer?”

“Smooth,” Pounders replied. “The Chief Justice is being flown to Ellington, Missouri. The Secretary of State's plane is grounded there. She's already up on TV.”

“They're trying to destroy us piecemeal,” the Admiral said.

“Well, sir,” Commodore Pounders said, looking out at the scattered wreckage. “I don't think we're so much trying as succeeding.”

“.
.
.
clear . . .”

“I'm getting a hypercom trans,” Dana said.

“Yeah,” Hartwell said, breathing deeply. “Coming up on hypercom power . . .”

“.
.
.
all clear,” Paris commed. “Repeat. Battle over. Rangora eliminated. All ships in area, all clear. Shuttle 438, all clear. 142nd, all clear
.
.
.”

Hartwell came up on full power and brought up the screens.

“Dammit!” Dana said. “Dammit to hell!”

“At least we stopped them,” Hartwell said, quietly. “Mostly.”

“Not that!” the coxswain said. “We just got this place cleaned up!”

“Thermal, Rammer,” Corporal Ramage commed. Getting the Staff Sergeant to assign him to Thirty-Six, again, had been a bit tough. But at least there was a Thirty-Six. “We are sealed and green.”

“Roger, Rammer,” Thermal commed. “Welcome aboard. We're awaiting the rest of your guys loading.”

“Roger, EM,” Ramage replied.

There was a pause.

“Don't suppose you'd like to talk to the coxswain?”

Ramage gritted his teeth for a moment.

“Yes, EM, that would be a positive item.”

“Glad you're okay, Rammer,” Dana commed.

“I was sitting in Troy,” Ramage replied, trying not to sigh in relief. He hadn't had any duty reason to contact the coxswain and all non-duty communications were shut down while they were still at Condition One. He looked over at LCP Lasswell and raised a finger as if to count one. As in “You say one God damned word!”

Lassie, for once, actually looked serious and just shook his head in his helmet as if to say “Dude, not going to joke you on this one.” They had two more Marines with them, Father and Chaosman. They were just looking confused.

“How'd it go?” Ramage continued.

“Played dead,” Dana commed. “Looked like one more piece of scrap. And we just got this place sort of cleaned up!”

“Bad out there?”

“These guys are
.
.
.
were pretty big,” Dana commed. “And they blew the hell over everywhere!”

“It's okay, D
.
.
.
coxswain,” Ramage said, trying not to chuckle. He had the usual Marine approach to neatness which was not OCD because it was training. Dana, on the other hand, was OCD. “We'll get it cleaned up again.”

“What's this we stuff, jarhe
.
.
.
Gotta go. We're undocking.”

“Roger,” Ramage said.

“What was that all about?” PFC John “Father” Patricelli asked. He was a bit old to be a PFC, mostly because it was his fourth hitch. He'd mentioned that “Patri” was Latin for father and the name had stuck.

Ramage didn't answer and he looked at Lassie as if to say “One damned word.”

“The corporal and the coxswain are . . .” Lasswell said then stopped as if trying to find the right word.

“Involved?” Father said.

“That's the word,” Lassie said, gratefully.

“Ah.”

“You're screwing the cox?” Private John “Chaosman” Peterson asked.

“Lock it down, Private,” Ramage snarled.

“Uh, gung-ho, Corporal,” Peterson said.

“Chaosman, he's holding a laser,” Father said. “And I heard where during the battle the shuttles were out in the scrap-yard. Which meant his significant other was under fire while we were eating popcorn.”

“Oh,” Peterson said. “That had to suck.”

“Which was why he told you to lock it down,” Patricelli said. “So I'd suggest that you lock it down before there's an accident. Another accident.”

Chaosman's nick came from the fact that stuff just happened around him. And not in a good way. He was some sort of magnet for screw-ups. Which in EVA was not a good thing.

The first time he did his EVA qual, a brand-new, thoroughly-tested, navopak just up and quit. Full system failure which was pretty hard with triple redundancy. And it wouldn't come back up. There had been a massive short-circuit that essentially destroyed the pak. It was barely good for cannibalized parts.

Laser weapons were his particular bugaboo. Usually they just failed to fire at all. Worse, the safety occasionally just up and quit. He could not use a computer to save his life. His implants had had to be replaced. Twice. To top it all off, he had all the sense God gave a baby duck. Nobody was quite sure they wanted him around in space.

“Listen up, Marines,” Gunny Brimage commed. “The usual. Pick up the escape pods, line 'em up, move to the drop-off point when you're full. Difference this time being that they're Rangora. Which is why there's four of you. Rangora tend to be somewhat feistier than Horvath. Any of them get squirrelly, you are authorized to fire without warning. That is not permission to massacre your load. For general information, yes, we got hammered again. They threw a load of missiles at Earth. Most of them were intercepted. They were programmed for decapitation strikes. The President and the VP are dead.”

“Dammit,” Ramage muttered. “I liked that guy.”

“The SecState has already been sworn in as the Continuity Coordinator,” the Gunny continued. “Same as President for your purposes and as soon as the Senate votes she will be. We just keep fighting. All that being said, anyone who uses undue force on any of the prisoners will answer to me and then an Article Thirty-Two. That is all.”

“How'd they get the President?” Chaosman asked.

“They have very smart missiles,” Father said.

“Rammer,” Thermal commed. “First customer coming up.”

“Roger,” Rammer commed. “Make sure your door is locked down. Chaosman, Lassie,” he continued, pointing to opposite forward corners of the cargo bay. “Weapons hot. Father, you're with me. When they're in the cargo bay, they take off their helmets and leave them in a pile. If they get froggy, Thermal
.
.
.
?”

“You want me to remote the doors or pump down?”

“Pump down,” Ramage commed. “They should have the same anoxia reaction as humans. And if they don't, nobody survives hard vac.”

“They are coming,” Captain Bacajezh said.

Bacajezh was as surprised as the cook with whom he shared the escape pod at his survival.

The SAPL beam had hit just abaft his position in the CIC. The beam had, to his continued surprise and shock, cut through faster than thought. One moment the shields were holding, the next the compartment was open to vacuum. And his ship was being torn apart by missiles.

There was an escape pod bay a short distance from the bridge. He'd made sure everyone that was mobile was out and followed. He was more or less blown into the last escape pod and he didn't really remember much after that until he regained consciousness looking into the face of a concerned junior enlisted.

After that there was not much to do but wait. The enemy was jamming hypercom channels so the pods could not communicate. But from time to time he could spot small boats moving among the debris so they were probably picking up survivors. If they were killing them he'd have seen the pods in view popping like vab pods.

He'd adjusted the trajectory of the pod and could also see the battlestation looming over the battlefield. They were far enough away that it was relatively small, the size of his thumb when he held it out at arm's length. But given that this was space, that was beyond massive.

“It will be well,” Bacajezh said. “Just submit to them. I understand that humans treat their prisoners fairly well.”

“Yes, captain,” the cook said, nervously. He was not presenting the image of the fierce Rangora warrior but, after all, he was a cook.

One of the small boats locked onto the pod with gravity grapnels and pulled the escape hatch up to its airlock. The airlock was open but wouldn't mate, it was far too small. One of the humans, armed with a laser rifle, leaned over and looked through the porthole in the hatch. Then he dialed out the pressure and opened the hatch.

Bacajezh climbed out at a gesture from the rifle and entered the, small, airlock. There was barely room for the two humans and two Rangora. The pod was released to drift, the hatch shut and the airlock dialed up to pressure. Very efficient. The only loss was the air of the pod and the humans apparently had all the air they could use.

He ducked through the inner hatch when it was opened and was unsurprised to find seven survivors sitting at the rear of the cargo compartment. What was fairly unnerving was that they were all helmetless.

“Take off the helmet,” his radio chimed in fluent Rangora. He looked to his side and one of the, puny, humans was gesturing with his left hand at a pile of same on the port side of the boat.

They might be puny, but he recognized the signs of a ground fighter with much experience of his weapons. Every movement was sharp, clear. And there was no particular point in fighting with that damned battlestation looming over all. He took off his helmet and added it to the pile.

“Captain!”

The speaker was a junior officer he barely recognized, someone from tactics.

“Jaushom,” Bacajezh said, sitting down next to the lieutenant.

“No talking,” the human's helmet barked. The voice was, again, fluent Rangora. Which gave the captain a very interesting bit of intelligence he wished had been in his briefing.

Most implant translation systems were rather robotic and had poor word choice and inflection. It took a very advanced implant system, more advanced than Rangoran, to give a clear, eloquent, translation that sounded like a natural speaker.

These human ground fighters, presumably their lowest value enlisted, were using Glatun quality implants.

And that explained missiles that cut through Rangora screens like butter and targeting that was so powerful and precise it was far beyond what the Terrans should have. Even the rifles had the look of a modification of a Glatun design.

The Glatuns had released their military technology to the Terrans before the embargo.

He was unsure if High Command knew that. There are various reasons they might have sacrificed his task force with that knowledge. But if they did not, it was intelligence beyond price.

It also did not bode well for taking this system.

“Captain Bacajezh,” the human said. The voice was coming from a speaker on his collar and he didn't open his mouth when he spoke. “I am pleased that you survived.”

“I am sure you are,” Bacajezh said. He didn't bother to try to use his own system to speak Terran. The human's implant would translate better than his own very expensive personalized set. “Captain Saeshon Bacajezh. Four-One-Eight-Seven-Six-Three-Nine-Four.”