Patriotic Treason

Chapter Thirty-Four

Devastator felt much as I remembered, I decided, as Lieutenant Anna Ossipavo escorted us to the conference room. The monitor was largely unchanged. I was surprised that Anna had remained onboard as a Lieutenant, but apparently Captain Shalenko had requested that she continue to serve him. I understood why now. A good First Lieutenant was rarer than gold. Muna was shaping up well. I only hoped that I had served Captain Harriman half as well.

The conference room was bigger than I remembered, although as a Junior Lieutenant I hadn’t had much opportunity to spend time in it. It held a table, a large display screen and a handful of chairs, three of which were occupied. I recognised Captain Shalenko and his Political Officer, but the third man was unknown to me. He was a grey man in a grey suit, without any insignia at all. I guessed that that meant that he was either important or someone pretending to be important.

Captain Shalenko rose to his feet as I entered and I realised, for the first time, that he was wearing a Commodore’s rank bars. I saluted him at once, which he brushed aside and shook my hand firmly. He looked older than I remembered, with more grey hair and a longer beard, but his grip was still strong.

“Welcome onboard, Commodore,” he said, with a faint grin. I understood. I might have been a fellow Captain now, but I could never be addressed as Captain onboard his ship. Even so, he was apparently a Commodore…and a Captain as well. “Congratulations on the promotion, John, even if it did come at a cost.”

“Thank you, sir,” I said, slightly puzzled. If he were a Commodore, how could he be a Captain as well? “I understand that congratulations are in order for you as well, sir.”

“Maybe so,” Shalenko agreed. He tapped his bars thoughtfully. “They agreed to bump Anna up to Captain pro tem, but I don’t know if these will be permanent yet.” He looked up as two more men entered the conference room. “Ah, Captain Hardwick.”

Captain Hardwick was a man whose expression just dared me to make a joke about his name. He looked more like a Marine than a starship commanding officer, but there was no mistaking the Captain’s rank bars he wore, or the name of his ship on his lapel. George Robertson wasn’t a name I recognised, but I knew the cruiser by reputation. She had a good history for hunting pirates and resistance starships.

“Alex,” Hardwick said, nodding to him. His rank pins below his rank bars showed that he had been a Captain for seven years, either being denied promotion or having refused it when it was offered. Either one could be the case. I had heard of Captains who had died on their ships after refusing transfer, despite injuries and age. I understood now I’d become a commanding officer myself. “And you must be John.”

His tone was neutral. Still, his time in grade made him senior to me. “Yes, sir,” I said, shaking his hand.

“I was sorry to hear about Percival,” Hardwick continued. “It was probably how he would have wanted to go, but he deserved better than that. I trust that you held a proper ceremony for him afterwards?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

Hardwick grinned. “You don’t have to call me sir,” he reminded me. “You can even call me Gary if you like.”

The grey man cleared his throat. “If you don’t mind, we are operating under a time limit here,” he said. “Could we place the social interaction at the end of the meeting?”

“Of course, sir,” Shalenko said. “John, Gary, all of you, please would you be seated?”

I sat down. I had hoped that Deborah Tyler — a woman the entire crew had come to detest in less than a week — would sit away from me, but she sat down next to me with all the inevitability of Christmas, or death and taxes. I’d been as polite to her as I could, even fawning on her, but inwardly I couldn’t wait to have her blown out of the airlock. She was nothing more than a one-woman morale destroyer. If we could have turned her voice into a weapon, the UN would have been invincible.

The grey man took control of the display and brought up an image of a blue-green planet I recognised instantly. Heinlein was very like Earth, apart from the fact that the ratio of land to sea was practically reversed. The handful of seas on the planet’s surface were effectively massive lakes. It was an unusual occurrence, at least in the four hundred or so Earth-like worlds that the UN had surveyed, and I suspected that there were geologists still trying to account for it. It didn’t matter to me in any case. I was more interested in knowing why we had been summoned to the monitor.

“The planet Heinlein,” the grey man said. His tone hadn’t changed at all, but there wasn’t the slightest doubt in the room that he was in charge. I wondered, absently, who he actually was and who he worked for. Could he be Intelligence, or some other department? “I understand that you all served there at one point in your careers.”

“Yes, sir,” Shalenko said. I recalled my own tour on Heinlein with mixed feelings. I hadn’t enjoyed the planet at all, but at the same time Heinlein had proved to me just how evil the system was, and why it had to be fought. Dead children swam in front of my eyes. The irony was that Heinlein had taught me how to build a cell structure and use it to strike a blow at the heart of the UN’s power. “John served there under me. Gary served there a year later as part of the asteroid-patrolling squadrons.”

I eyed Captain Hardwick with new respect. The battles in Heinlein’s asteroid belts had been brief bloody affairs with quarter neither asked nor given. The UN had lost several cruisers — which should have been invincible to all, but major warships — to the asteroid miners and had resorted to destroying any habitable asteroid that didn’t surrender at once. Even so, the war had raged on for months… and, according to the Brotherhood, was still going on.

“Yes, sir,” Captain Hardwick said. “We patrolled for five months before we took enough damage to force us back to Earth for repairs. If that missile had detonated closer…well, I wouldn’t be here to talk to you today.”

“Thank you,” the grey man said. He stroked his chin. “What you are about to hear is considered classified material. Discussing this information with anyone outside this circle will be regarded as a breech in security regulations and punished by life exile to Bounty. If any of you require a briefing on the relevant security protocols, please say so now.”

There was a pause. “Good,” he said, finally. When I’d been confirmed as Captain, I’d studied the Official Secrets Regulations carefully. “The war on Heinlein has taken a turn not exactly to our advantage.”

I smiled inwardly. I’d read Heinlein’s history of Earth — more interesting than the bland pap I’d been taught in school — and I knew where that line came from. I wondered if the UN had finally decided to admit defeat, except I knew the United Nations. They would hardly be trying to prepare an invasion of Williamson’s World if, at the same time, they were going to withdraw from Heinlein. Unless…

I thought about Devastator’s capabilities and felt my blood run cold.

“You may all have heard rumours about the recent sabotage campaign mounted against Peace Force starships and installations by workers who came from Heinlein,” the grey man continued. “The effects of the sabotage have been much more serious than we appreciated at the time. Although we didn’t lose any starships directly, two cruisers suffered reactor overloads and ended up having to be towed to the shipyards for reconstruction. Other ships had problems ranging from the amusing to the serious — including the recent death of Captain Harriman.

“This has been merged with an ongoing offensive mounted against Infantry troops on the ground,” he added. “Attacks against peacekeeping forces have risen tenfold in the past five months, backed up by a growing campaign mounted against spacecraft and installations in orbit. Some of them have been direct assaults by the remaining Heinlein starships, others have been sneaker, while some are clearly the results of sabotage. General Hoover’s attempts to use industrial facilities in the Heinlein System for supplying his basic requirements have backfired. We nearly lost a starship due to a particularly cunning piece of sabotage.”

I frowned as I listened. The United Nations wasn’t known for being so honest with its own people and I felt it boded ill. “Certain decisions have been taken,” the grey man concluded. “It has been decided to force the Heinlein Government to the table, by any means necessary.”

That, I decided as the silence grew longer, might not be possible. I hadn’t understood all the implications of Heinlein’s Government, but one I did understand — in hindsight — was that most of the Citizen’s Council would have escaped the destruction of their building, simply by not being there at the time. They preferred to use electronic communications systems and most of the people swept up by the Infantry had been nothing, but harmless workers. The UN had declared the Government captured, however, and no one had dared to disagree, openly.

The grey man looked at Shalenko. “Your orders are simple,” he said. “You are to take Devastator, with the two cruisers for escort, to Heinlein and destroy Valentine.”

I kept my face blank, somehow. Valentine was the second-largest city on Heinlein, although it would have vanished without trace in any of Earth’s crumbling metropolises. It had a population of over five hundred thousand if I recalled correctly — tiny compared to Earth’s population — and most of them had been penned inside the city by the Infantry, after the invasion. They’d resisted, of course, and the city had rapidly become a no-go area. I’d expected that the Infantry would have finally pacified it, but apparently they’d had other considerations. I wondered how many reporters had gone inside the ‘secure’ city and lived to tell the tale.

“Valentine has been picked for several reasons,” the grey man said, when we said nothing. “It is large enough to make our point, yet it is not worth preserving from our point of view. It makes the most sense as a target.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The UN had forsworn nuclear weapons on planetary surfaces for years. How could they break the strongest taboo the human race had? Even without that taboo, Heinlein had definitely built nukes of its own before the invasion. What was to stop them launching them against the UN’s Infantry? How much damage could they wreck if they took the gloves off.

“Devastator is certainly capable of destroying the city,” Shalenko said, dispassionately. I wanted to scream at him to stop, but it would only have destroyed my career for nothing. “I do not understand, however, why you require Devastator. Any cruiser or even a gunboat could destroy a whole city.”

“Devastator has something of a reputation on Heinlein,” the grey man said. “Besides, there are other considerations. The use of nuclear weapons is strongly prohibited on a planet’s surface without direct orders from the General Assembly and other starships might have problems overriding the safety systems built into their missiles. A monitor is designed for planetary bombardment.”

He stood up. “I trust that no one has any questions?” He asked. I was too stunned to speak. “You are cleared to depart Sol this evening and return as soon as you have completed your mission.”

“Thank you, sir,” Shalenko said. The grey man swept out of the hatch, which hissed closed behind him. “As Commodore, I will be commander of the mission. The George Robertson will provide our forward escort and scout, while the Jacques Delors will bring up the rear. We can expect the Heinlein Resistance to go all-out to stop us if they suspect our purpose, so we will maintain strict silence on our goals until we enter Heinlein orbit.”

“I protest,” Hardwick said. “I’m sure that none of my crew have links to Heinlein.”

“I merely wish to prevent any leaks before we have completed the mission,” Shalenko said. His words were so calm and composed that I almost forgot the horror lurking behind them. We were going to butcher the population of an entire city. We were going to slaughter hundreds of thousands of innocents who had done nothing to deserve to die. We were even going to be killing UN Infantry who were trying to secure the city. I would have bet good money that they wouldn’t be warned in advance. “We will depart at 2200 precisely. Dismissed!”

He held up a hand as we turned to leave. “John, I want a word with you,” he added, before I could escape. “Remain behind.”

“I should be here too,” Deborah protested. “My orders clearly state…”

“And my orders clearly state that I am in complete control of every aspect of this mission,” Shalenko barked, so loudly that Deborah jumped. “My First Lieutenant will escort you to the mess, where you may eat if you wish, or to the airlock if you wish to return to the Jacques Delors ahead of its Captain. Leave.”

Deborah threw him a glance that could have killed and stalked out, head held high. I doubted that she’d gone very far — she was probably lurking outside the hatch, waiting for me and trying to listen through the solid metal — but at least she was gone.

“Political officers are always such a bore,” Shalenko commented, when we were alone together. I remembered the rumours that he and his political officer were lovers, but I didn’t believe them. The thought of Ellen Nakamura having anything to do with love… the mind couldn’t stand it. “I imagine that you have concerns, John?”

“Yes, sir,” I said, grimly. “We’re considering mass murder!”

“We’ve done more that consider it,” Shalenko said. “I checked that man’s credentials very carefully. He’s not just a messenger boy, John, but someone with very strong links right to the top. The message he passed on might have been signed by the General Assembly, but everyone who’s anyone in power agreed to it first. They knew the risks and accepted them for everyone else.”

I stared at him. “But, sir…”

He held up a hand. “There’s no more time, John,” he said. There was a finality in his tone that quelled protests more than even a royal chewing-out. “I prevented you from throwing your career away over this before, but this situation is different. The UN itself is in desperate waters and needs time to recover before the war is truly lost. I believe that there were even groups calling for nothing less than the complete eradication of Heinlein… and not a few other planets into the bargain.”

His eyes bored into mine. “If you insist on protesting this decision, I won’t be able to protect you any longer,” he added. “No one, not even Admiral Rutherford himself, will be able to prevent you from being summarily tried, convicted, stripped of rank and executed. They’re desperate, John. If you protest, you’ll lose everything and it will happen anyway!”

I looked at him. “Do they deserve it?”

“Does anyone?” Shalenko asked. “All I know is that if something doesn’t happen to break the logjam soon, the entire United Nations will come crashing down. The good we do will vanish along with the bad. The colonies will rebuild and seek to wage war on Earth, or maybe even on each other. The rule of law will be completely destroyed. We need to end the war on terms we can accept, or we all lose.”

I wanted to protest anyway, but he was right. I had to remain silent and wait for the right time to move. I wanted to move now, but we weren’t ready. A failure, with so many ships left untouched, would mean our swift annihilation. We needed more time. That time would be bought at the cost of hundreds of thousands of lives.

“I understand, sir,” I said, finally.

“Good,” Shalenko said. He smiled, softly. “Captain Harriman would be proud of you.”

“He wouldn’t,” I said, bitterly. I knew it was the truth. Captain Harriman had never bullied any of the grey colonies, or even acted like he was the lord of the universe around the colonists. He would never have agreed to kill thousands of innocents just because the unnecessary war was being lost. “He’d spit on me if he were here.”

Chapter Thirty-Five

As soon as I returned to my ship, and escaped Deborah’s incessant demands to know what I had been discussing with my former commander, I held a meeting with the Senior Chief and the Master Sergeant. I broke several different regulations — at this rate, the UN was going to have problems deciding exactly what they were going to shoot me for — and explained exactly what we’d been ordered to do. I had hoped that either or both of them would be able to suggest a way out, but neither of them could think of anything. We hadn’t made contact with all the Marine units yet and if we failed to take the starships, our plan would probably fail. A battle in Earth orbit might be disastrous.

“I know how you feel,” the Senior Chief said, “but there’s no choice. All you can do is avenge them later.”

I found myself considering all kinds of drastic actions, but nothing seemed likely to work. I checked through the communications my fellow plotters had sent, looking for signs of hope, but the only optimistic thing I saw came, ironically, from the plan to invade Williamson’s World. The UN was scraping the barrel to draw up so many starships, but it allowed us a chance to get our own people onboard before the official launch date for the invasion. I couldn’t understand why, if things were so bad, the UN was launching another invasion, let alone announcing the ETA in advance. I wondered if they’d done that for Heinlein and if that explained the reception we’d had, but in the end it didn’t matter. The invasion was not going to be launched if I had anything to say about it.

My dark mood found expression in inspecting the starship before we departed Earth and opened the wormhole. I inspected everywhere a First Lieutenant might be expected to cut corners and found, much to my relief, that Muna had been doing a good job. We were fit for exploration, or a battle, or even murdering hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians. Muna was also handling the training of the Ensigns and I watched through the surveillance systems as she and the Senior Chief put them through the retch gas treatment. Their faces looked pale and wan when they emerged and I hoped they drew the right lesson from their experience. They couldn’t trust anything on the starship, even something as simple as a spacesuit. It made me wonder what we’d do if a new Ensign was smart enough to check the telltales first. Probably give them a dose of the gas anyway.

I took my command chair on the bridge — it felt like mine now, rather that something I’d stolen from its rightful owner — and watched as we opened a wormhole and fled into the pocket dimension. It was tempting to decide to turn renegade now, but we were so close to launching our coup that there was little point. Captain — Commodore — Shalenko had been right. The population of Valentine were going to die anyway. I could at least make sure that they didn’t die in vain.

“Wormhole sealed, Captain,” the Pilot reported. System Command had offered me a new Pilot, but I’d decided to stick with the one I’d inherited. He knew the Jacques Delors and how it handled and a newcomer would have had to relearn everything. “Jump Drive powering down now.”

“Thank you,” I said, tapping my console to check the readouts. We were sliding down a long tube heading towards our destination — or at least that was how I envisaged it — and now there was no turning back. No starship had ever tried to leave the wormhole early and lived to tell the tale. “First Lieutenant, you have the bridge.”

I spent the next three weeks studying my own starship, obsessing over each and every detail. The Engineer shared my obsession and tolerated my intrusions into his domain, watching over his shoulder as he checked each of the replacement spare parts carefully, just in case there was another bout of sabotage. I was particularly worried about the sealed components and encouraged the Engineer to reject any that didn’t meet his high standards, but some of them couldn’t be tested until they were locked in place. It was yet another illustration of how far the rot had settled into the system. The UN couldn’t even punish the workers too harshly, for fear they’d commit suicide or try to escape. The non-conscript workers weren’t much better. They had no real incentive to perform well.

And, unfortunately, I had to endure Deborah’s presence. She seemed to feel that she should eat dinner with me at least once a week and kept inviting herself to my cabin. I had wondered, as absurd as it seemed, if she were making a play for me, but if she intended any seduction it was a political one, rather than a personal one. I hadn’t realised just how deeply she believed in the entire concept of the United Nations, yet she was still able to justify mass murder to herself. I wasn’t going to allow her to realise that I meant the UN great harm, but still… I wanted to strangle her physically. It was less than she deserved.

“The traitors who set up Heinlein were trying to prevent their sons and daughters from being enfolded in the tender arms of the United Nations and its commitment to ensure that all enjoyed an above-average style of living,” she informed me, one day. I hadn’t realised until I’d worked on logistics how impossible an ‘above average’ style of living for everyone was. “They refused to pay their dues to society and chose, instead, to steal from the patrimony of The People.”

I could just hear the capital letters thudding into place. I was never sure how seriously she took the shit she was sprouting, but I knew that far too many people believed every word. I’d also seen worlds that worked differently to the UN. Even Terra Nova, with its endless ongoing civil war, had a higher standard of living than most of Earth. That might change if the war raged on and the UN pulled out, but for the moment… I remembered my last visit home, back before I’d boarded Devastator, and shuddered. In hindsight…

The UN had promised people the world. It had promised desperate people that if the UN took control of every aspect of their lives, it would create a paradise on Earth. It had promised to soak the rich to feed the poor, but no matter how much they’d leeched away, it had never been enough. They had taxed businesses out of existence, throwing thousands more unemployed onto the streets, who then had to go on welfare themselves. If that wasn’t enough, they created regulation after regulation, and used that as an excuse to throw more people out of work…they’d even defined objecting to the system as a sign of mental illness and sent anyone who complained to hospital, preventively. Soon, no one dared to object, even in private. Anyone could be a police spy.

And none of it had mattered. The rich had paid vast bribes to be left alone, or had integrated themselves into the developing society. The poor had found that their cities were crumbling away anyway, no matter how much they were told that their lives had improved. And the bureaucrats? They’d discovered that under the system they had created, however accidentally, they had more power than they had ever dreamed possible. Something had to break.

I silently toasted Heinlein with my wine glass. Deborah smiled. She thought I was toasting her.

An hour before we entered the Heinlein System, I ordered the Jacques Delors to yellow alert and inspected every inch of the starship, again. If the UN was ready to tell us that the situation was so bad, the odds were that it was actually much worse. I’d already had drills running throughout the trip, but now I ran through a final set of drills and then ordered everyone to get something to eat. We might be emerging into the midst of a battlefield.

“Wormhole opening, sir,” the Pilot said. Captain Harriman had allowed me to take the helm back when we’d reached Terra Nova, but I couldn’t afford to have an untested Ensign at the helm now. If the Resistance knew what we had come to do, they’d hold nothing back. If they took out Devastator… the UN would have to either send another monitor or alter a missile warhead for use against ground targets. “Emerging… now!”

The display lit up as our sensors started to probe nearby space. Captain Shalenko had picked the wormhole coordinates himself and included them in sealed orders, so it was probably impossible for the Heinlein Resistance to locate us, but they knew — if they knew about us — where we had to go. They could have their remaining starships hiding near the planet. Powered down, they would be barely detectable except at very close range.

“Red Alert,” I ordered. The crew raced to battle stations at once. “Tactical?”

“No enemy starships detected,” Muna said, from her position. Her voice was calm and very composed, but she didn’t know what we had come here to do. “I am picking up a data download from UNS Peacekeeper.”

“Update our records,” I ordered. Peacekeeper was a heavy cruiser of the class before ours. It had been extensively upgraded to continue to serve, but even so, it had weaknesses. I knew that the Resistance had destroyed other ships of the same class. “Communications?”

“I am picking up a direct link from Devastator and George Robertson,” Sally said. I’d placed her on communications, mainly because I needed a trusted officer there. I was relieved to see that she’d gotten along well with Muna, although I knew it had to hurt. Everyone else in our class had made Lieutenant, at least, by now…and Roger was commanding the Kofi Annan. His Admiral Uncle must have pulled more than few strings to set that up. “The Commodore is ordering us to follow him in.”

“Pilot, keep us at medium separation range,” I ordered. There was no real chance of accidentally ramming the monitor, although part of me seriously considered opening fire and hang the consequences. “Tactical, keep watching for enemy starships.”

Heinlein’s orbit looked, if anything, more crowded than it had back when we’d invaded. There were more remote orbital weapons platforms glaring down at the planet, backed up by a handful of starships. I suspected, although there was no way to know for sure, that most of the starships had been recalled to serve in the fleet destined for Williamson’s World, or maybe anti-piracy escorts. The UNPF just wasn’t building enough starships to replace its losses. Even if all the colonies surrendered tomorrow, the UN would still have problems garrisoning them all and rebuilding the interstellar communications network. It didn’t bode well for the future.

I found myself looking at the remains of Heinlein’s orbital shipyards, feeling more than a twinge of envy. If we’d had those working at full capacity, we’d have enough freighters to rebuild the transport network, but the workers wouldn’t work for the UN. Even if Heinlein managed to escape the suffocating clutches of the UN, it would still have to concentrate on building warships, rather than pulling the isolated colonies back together. If the UN fell apart — if we failed — a new interstellar dark age was almost inevitable.

“System Command welcomes us into the system and has cleared us for orbital entry,” Sally said, suddenly. I doubted that System Command was that keen to see us, not if they knew what we had come to do. I felt, again, the insane urge to throw caution to the winds and open fire, but what good would it do? We were within range of those mighty orbital batteries. “They’re asking just what we’re doing here.”

So they don’t know, I thought, coldly. “Ignore it,” I ordered. “If the Commodore wants to explain our presence, he will do so.”

Nothing rose to bar our way as we settled into orbit. I relaxed slightly on the bridge and called up the data download on my console. It was worse than I had realised. Entire tracts of the planet were, to all intents and purposes, completely out of control. Valentine was occupied by the resistance now and any UN Infantry unit that went into of the city never came out again. The orbital weapons platforms were firing every day, and yet… the situation still worsened. The UN had to be out of its collective mind! It had this on its hands and yet it wanted to invade another world?

“The Commodore is informing us to watch for surprises,” Sally said. “The Devastator is about to fire.” She stopped. I could see the question forming in her mind before she pushed it down. “They’re firing.”

I looked up at the display. The monitor had never fired a nuclear planet-bombarding missile while I’d been onboard and I was curious, despite myself. It streaked away from the starship and raced down into the planet’s atmosphere. I watched its trajectory and thought about intercepting it first, but the George Robertson and the orbital weapons platforms would turn on us at once. It reached Valentine and detonated high over the city. The flash would be visible from orbit.

“My God,” Sally said. “Sir, I…”

“As you were, Ensign,” Muna snapped. There was no real anger in her tone. She was as shocked as the rest of us. There was no live feed from the city, but my imagination could fill in the details from the records we’d been shown of the cities on Earth that had died under nuclear attack. Heinlein built good buildings and it was possible that some of them would survive, but the population would be almost wiped out. I wanted to see, to rub my own eyes in what had happened, but there was no point. “Captain…?”

“Leave it,” I growled. I knew that the Heinlein Resistance wasn’t going to let this go unpunished. “Sally, raise the Commodore.”

“He’s already signalling us,” Sally said. “We’re to escort the Devastator to a safe distance from the planet and then cover her as she heads home, before following her ourselves.”

“Understood,” I said, bitterly. When the remainder of the crew heard about this, they’d either be angry, or delighted. Deborah’s speeches had focused on how monstrous Heinlein’s residents were for weeks and I was starting to understand why. If the enemy were to be dehumanised, the UN could do anything they liked to them and the population at home would cheer. “Helm, take us out, following the monitor.”

Nothing happened as we reached the wormhole coordinates and watched Devastator vanish behind a closing event horizon, but I was morbidly certain that thousands of unfriendly eyes were watching us from a safe distance. Intelligence couldn’t even tell us how many starships the Heinlein Resistance had left, but they believed that there were at least five separate starships still active. Four more had been reported destroyed in encounters with the UNPF. If they massed all five together, they might have a chance to take out Devastator before we could stop them.

“Devastator’s gone, sir,” Muna said, finally.

“Yes,” I said. I’d been lost in my own thoughts… and on the bridge. I was glad that Deborah wasn’t there. She might have noticed… no, I was giving her too much credit. “Helm, set course for home. We have a long voyage ahead of us.”

I spent the remainder of the flight home wondering what form Heinlein’s revenge would take. They couldn’t — wouldn’t — allow that to pass, I was sure. I had to launch my own plan quickly, in hopes of preventing a greater disaster, but I couldn’t prevent them from launching their counterattack. I tried to figure out some way of contacting the Heinlein Resistance, but I could think of nothing. After what had just happened, I wouldn’t be surprised to find myself on their hit list, with a price on my head. They’d be out for my blood.

The grey man accepted our report without demur when we reached Earth. They must have had a press report ready already, for they were filling the airwaves before we even reached Orbit Nine. I read the first two stories — recognising the name of one of the reporters who had travelled on the Devastator, years ago — and then threw the datapad across the room. He wrote about what we’d done, but somehow he almost managed to make it sound justified. It was enough to make me feel sick.

“We have most of the people we need contacted and ready to move at your command,” the Master Sergeant said, that evening. “We could move now, but I’d prefer to wait at least another week. EarthStar One is going to be the real problem.”

I nodded. EarthStar One controlled all of the defences in Earth orbit. It also didn’t allow any UNPF personnel to serve permanently on the base. It was controlled by a very secretive, very loyal organisation, who were paid well for their loyalty. Roger might have gone to serve there if he hadn’t passed the Academy entrance exams. We had to knock it out, yet it wouldn’t be easy, even with the entire fleet under our control. We studied the problem and came up with the only solution.

Two days later, the Heinlein Resistance struck back.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Problems, I had come to realise, only happened when I was off the bridge. Captain Harriman had probably felt the same way. They found me in my cabin, or inspecting part of the ship, or even in the head. I was never on the bridge when something went badly wrong, but I was always in touch through my terminal. I could reach the bridge very quickly if I was needed.

“Report,” I snapped, as I strode onto the bridge. The crew didn’t turn to salute me as I entered, something that proved that the situation was serious. “Number One, what’s happening?”

“System Command has declared a Code Red One alert,” Muna said, from the tactical console. I felt my face freeze for a second. Code Red One meant a direct attack on Earth itself, nothing less. I couldn’t believe it. Who would dare to attack Earth? I remembered what we’d done at Heinlein and shivered. I knew one answer to that question. “I have placed the ship on alert in response.”

“Confirmed,” I said. It was good thinking, even though I knew that there were Captains who would have been horrified at any display of initiative by their crews. I’d learned better from a master teacher. “Status report?”

“The ship is at battle stations and at your command,” Muna said. “System Command has not yet updated their original warning.”

I scowled. The defenders of the planet would receive a direct download from EarthStar One, the coordinating entity, instead of using their own systems. Years ago, that had made sense, but now, with advances in technology, it was useless. I keyed my access code into my console and brought up what little we had. Gravimetric sensors had detected wormholes opening close to the planet, dangerously close, but nothing had apparently emerged. That didn’t bode well.

“Engineering, this is the Captain,” I said. “Power up the drive and prepare for combat operations. Pilot, seal the link to Orbit Nine and prepare to cast off.”

“Yes, sir,” the Pilot said. Two of the Ensigns had been running drills when the alarm sounded and they now stood by his console, unsure of what to do. I knew just how they felt. I felt the same way too. “Airlock release in twenty seconds.”

I scowled inwardly. That wasn’t fast enough. If the enemy had planned to take out Orbit Nine, they might well have taken us out as well…and that would have been a disaster. If, of course, there actually was an enemy out there. System Command could be jumping at shadows, or perhaps it was all a drill. I hadn’t known System Command to be imaginative enough to run drills, but perhaps some new officer had been promoted into a position of power and…no, I’d have heard of that. The sensors might well be having flights of fancy.

“Take us to one hundred kilometres separation as soon as the airlock is clear,” I ordered, tightly. That would be far away enough to use our weapons without fear of accidentally harming Orbit Nine. We needed those stations, desperately. It didn’t help that the UN had accidentally stranded thousands of involuntary colonists in the upper levels of the orbital towers and the orbiting asteroids because the transporting situation had become dire. I’d heard rumours of riots and Marines being sent in to crack heads, but nothing concrete. “Tactical?”

“Nothing new across the board,” Muna said. “I’m picking up no trace of hostile activity.”

I brooded as the Pilot took us away from Orbit Nine. Could it be a trap intended to catch us? It was possible, yet why would they put us on alert? I could open a wormhole and escape now, along with half the starships orbiting Earth, if I decided to move. We might even be able to launch our coup and succeed, even now. I looked at the firepower orbiting Earth, the twenty-seven starships and hundreds of orbital installations, and frowned again. No one in their right mind would want to challenge those defences, surely?

That’s not very bright, I reproved myself, irritated. You’re planning to challenge those defences, idiot.

I looked back at the iron representing EarthStar One, surrounded by enough smaller icons to make up a galaxy, and wondered just what was going on over there. The alert had sounded, and yet no one was issuing further orders, or even telling us to stand down and relax. The Admirals were probably arguing over what was going on and wondering if it was nothing, but a glitch in the scanners. Someone was probably going to get the blame…

“Wormholes,” Muna snapped. “Multiple wormholes!”

The display flickered to life as three wormholes opened on the other side of the planet. We couldn’t pick them up directly, but we could see them through the live feed from the orbital defences. Three Heinlein Resistance starships flew out of the wormholes, drive fields already powering up, and drove down towards the planet. I watched in dismay, nothing their acceleration rates — faster than anything UN starships could pull — before orders finally started to come in from System Command. We were to remain where we were, on patrol. Other starships would have the honour of engaging the intruders.

“My God,” the Pilot said, from his console. “I want one of them.”

I couldn’t disagree with him. Starship acceleration rates decrease sharply as the mass of the starship rises. The battleships the UN had wasted time and money building moved like wallowing hogs… and Devastator and her sisters weren’t much better. The nimble cruisers were still the mainstays of the fleet, and yet the Heinlein starships seemed to have them effortlessly outclassed. If I hadn’t read the reports carefully, and recognised the weaknesses inherent in their designs, I would have known that nemesis was looming.

“Hold position,” I ordered. The enemy were racing right into the teeth of our defences. I doubted that they would be doing something so stupid unless they had a plan of some kind. The Heinlein Resistance wasn’t composed of fanatics from New Kabul or Living God. They wouldn’t throw their lives away for nothing. “Keep a close eye on them and…”

I smiled inwardly as starships moved to intercept, only to be greeted with a spread of missiles from each of the interlopers. The starships twisted, spun effortlessly in space, and launched a second salvo, just before opening fresh wormholes and vanishing into them. I listened to the communications between the UN starships as they struggled to take out as many of the incoming missiles as possible, discovering for themselves how devious the Heinlein weapons-makers were. Some of the missiles had standard nuclear warheads, others had multiple missiles concealed inside the mother missile and several had specialist warheads. A bomb-pumped laser warhead gave several UN cruisers a hard time. Two more detonated near an orbital weapons platform and wiped it out of existence.

“They’re going to be back,” I said, when Muna glanced at me. I was sure of it. They wouldn’t have caused so much trouble for nothing. All they had to do was wormhole in, launch a few missiles, and vanish again, tying Earth’s defenders up in knots. They’d get away with it too. As long as they used a certain amount of caution, they’d be bound to avoid being targeted and killed. “Set our lasers on proximity trigger and power up the jump drive. Engineering?”

The Engineer sounded grim when he answered. “Yes, sir?”

“Keep the Jump Drive at maximum readiness,” I said, shortly. He argued, of course. Keeping the Jump Drive powered up like that would place a serious amount of wear and tear on the components, perhaps even risking a burnout. It might even have been what the Heinlein Resistance hoped to achieve. If they knew that their compatriots had been sabotaging our starships, they might intend to force us to burn out the components and lost starships to the yards. Could they coordinate their plans like that?

I shook my head. It didn’t seem possible. “Three new targets,” Muna said, into the silence. “Three new starships, coming in directly towards Orbit One!”

“They’re probably not new starships,” I said. The UN had been reporting that the Heinlein Resistance either had no starships or hundreds of starships, but I knew it wasn’t the former and if it had been the latter, the UN Invasion Force would never have reached Heinlein alive. They’d have been dictating terms to us, not the other way around. “Ten gets you twenty they’re the same starships with slightly altered drive patterns.”

Muna scowled down at her console. “No bet,” she said, finally. “They’re firing!”

The next hour brought us all to the verge of collapse. The attack seemed endless; they jumped in, fired off a few salvos of missiles, and jumped out again. Only a couple of starships were damaged — a dozen gunboats were destroyed — but the crews were rapidly reaching the end of their endurance. If it hadn’t been for Captain Harriman’s — and mine — insistence on endless drills, we’d have been in the same boat. As it was, we were stretched to the limit. The attacks seemed largely pointless to the Admirals — I could hear some of their chatter over the communications network — but I could see the point, all right. They intended to wear us all down and then launch their final blow.

I keyed my intercom tiredly. “Chef, have coffee served to the men on duty, including the bridge,” I ordered. Captain Harriman had banned food and drink from his bridge, except on Last Night, but I knew there was little choice. I felt tired and drained and knew that the rest of the crew probably felt the same way too. “Make up several pots of your extra-strong coffee and have it served up here.”

My gaze swept to the Ensigns. “You two go help him,” I ordered. They looked relieved to have something to do, even if it were something simple. I had a mad impulse to put one of them on the helm and the other on tactical, but pushed it back down into my mind. They weren’t ready for that, with the possible exception of Sally. Hell, she’d have been perfect, if she had Lieutenant’s rank. “Tell the remaining Ensigns to assist as well.”

They left the bridge without looking back, much to my mild surprise. When I’d been an Ensign, I had been involved in battles, but that had been a happier, more innocent time. The young officers who’d come onto my starship after I assumed command might be the last Ensigns to graduate, even if my plan didn’t work. How long could the UN maintain this kind of military effort?

“Coffee?” Muna asked, very quietly. “Do you really want hot drink on the bridge?”

I looked at her. Her black skin was shining with sweat. “I don’t think we have a choice,” I said, grimly. I envied, just for a moment, the Marines. They didn’t have to worry about battles in space. They could continue to study the plans of EarthStar One in peace. “We’re not in a good state here.”

“Neither are they,” Muna said. I watched as another missile burst open to reveal a shower of smaller missiles, which raced towards their target. “They might be in just as bad a state as we are…”

She broke off as the hatch opened and the Chef entered with a small tray of coffee in spacer’s mugs. I’d hated them when I’d first seen them — they reassembled nothing more than baby beakers — but I could see the value now. If we dropped them on the deck, they wouldn’t break and splash hot coffee everywhere. I imagined that that would be quite a distraction for my crew.

“Here you are, sir,” he said, passing me a beaker. I took it with great dignity and waited until everyone else had one before taking the first sip. It was hot enough to burn my tongue and foul enough to be used to power the starship, but it shocked me awake. Spacer’s Coffee is renowned for being the worst in the universe, which didn’t stop it from becoming the favourite drink on starships. “I’ll brew up more as soon as I return to the gallery.”

“Good,” I said, warmly. I placed the beaker down and turned back to the display. “Pilot…”

“Wormhole,” Muna snapped. “They’re coming in much closer.”

I swore. They were coming in far too close. “Fire if you get a lock,” I snapped. “Pilot, take us on a pursuit course.”

The display updated rapidly, but I was already far ahead of it. If we were lucky, we’d get a solid chance to hit them…and we had to take it. They weren’t coming right at us, but if they actually wanted to hit anything, they’d have to pass through our field of fire. My own best guess was that they would open up a wormhole and vanish as soon as they saw us, but we’d at least have a chance of hitting them…

“They’re evading,” the Pilot said.

“And firing,” Muna added. I tensed, expecting to come under attack, but the display told a different story. “They’re firing on EarthStar One!”

Impossible, I thought. Could we be that lucky?

The answer was no, it seemed. The missiles were faster than UN-standard missiles, but not as fast as the simulated missiles we practiced against in the exercise drills, and it seemed that EarthStar One’s defenders had kept up with their own drills. The missiles were swatted out of space before they even got close enough to try for a proximity kill. The Heinlein starship twisted, threw a salvo of missiles at us, and then vanished back into the wormhole.

“Pilot, jump us out of here,” I snapped. The missiles were far too close to hope that the point defence could take them out. A moment later, we fell into our own wormhole. This time, the trip took seconds. “Report!”

“We’ve evaded the missiles,” Muna said, calmly. I felt her presence steadying me and wished, absurdly, that I knew her better. We’d lived together as Cadets and Ensigns, yet I felt I didn’t know her at all. “They’re trying to find new targets before they burn out, but unless they have some completely new drive system it’s unlikely they’ll find anything.”

She broke off, and then snarled a curse in a language I didn’t recognise. “Captain,” she said, “you’d better take a look at this.”

I looked. It was the live feed from the orbital defences. “Shit,” I hissed. “What happened?”

“They hit Asteroid One,” Muna said. “The death toll…”

She broke off. Asteroid One was more than just another asteroid; it was living history. It had been the first asteroid to be moved back to Earth orbit and mined for raw materials, before it had been mined out and converted into the first asteroid colony, high over Earth. It had been the playground of the rich and famous for years before the UN took it over and turned it into residences for people too important to live down on Earth among the scrum. Now…

I breathed another curse under my breath. Asteroid One had been settled before the UN had instigated rigorous safety checks — not that anything had gone wrong, at least for over three hundred years — and it hadn’t been designed to take nuclear hits at close range. The bombs had broken through the rock and atmosphere was streaming out, which would have been bad enough, but the spin was now tearing the asteroid apart. As the damage mounted up, the situation only became worse; the asteroid was shattering in slow motion. I made a silent bet with myself that it wouldn’t be more than an hour before it shattered completely…and I was damn sure that everyone onboard was dead.

“They’re gone,” Muna said, finally. “They did what they came to do.”

I kept the ship at red alert for another hour, but there were no more attacks and I breathed a sigh of relief. The Heinlein Resistance were making a point of their own, one that fitted in with their nature. They’d gone after some of the UN’s leaders and killed them. I wondered if we could use the chaos to aid our own operations. We’d have to move as soon as possible…

“Leave it until Wednesday,” the Senior Chief advised, when I met with him and the Master Sergeant in the evening. I didn’t know if I could wait two days, but they were right. We had to make the final preparations now. “That will give them time to get the power struggle underway. None of the big bosses will be watching what’s happening in orbit until it’s too late.”

I hoped he was right, but I sent the messages anyway. If the UN Security Division knew what was afoot, they’d have time to act, but we’d be ready. Two days…a lot could happen in two days, even with all our planning. If we failed to take EarthStar One quickly, we were going to have to abandon the second part of the plan. I just wished I knew if they knew…

Two days, I reminded myself, thinking of Kitty. Two days…

“I shouldn’t worry too much,” the Master Sergeant added. He started to speak in rhyme. “He either fears his fate too much, or his deserts are small, that puts it not unto the touch, to win or lose it all.”

I shrugged. I was betting everything.

But then, so was he.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

The shuttlebay was packed with all of the Marines and their equipment. My starship was firmly behind me, if nothing else, and while I had issued firearms to everyone in the know, I probably wouldn’t need the Marines onboard. They had their own mission. I’d listened to the bitching and had been relieved to hear that most of it focused around the use of a common shuttle, rather than one of their assault boats. The Master Sergeant had overruled the objector by pointing out that an assault boat near EarthStar One would be a red flag for the defenders; indeed, the only way we could get a shuttle there was through my request for an urgent interview with Admiral Rutherford. By the time the defenders realised that they were under attack, it should already be too late.

“Don’t worry,” the Master Sergeant said, shaking my hand. “You just make sure you live up to your promises, understand?”

I nodded. The Master Sergeant had had his own price for joining me and I fully intended to pay it. The thought of operating without political supervision was intoxicating, but…I looked down at my timer and winced inwardly. Thirty minutes before Zero Hour. Even now, my friends and allies would be gathering their forces, preparing to seize control of the starships and mutiny against their commanding officers. I hoped that everything went to plan. We had most of the Marines on our side, but those who weren’t with us, or those we couldn’t risk contacting, were a dangerous unknown factor. I might have to convince them to play with us, or force them into surrendering. I hoped it wouldn’t be the latter. The Master Sergeant wouldn’t take it calmly.

“I will,” I promised. “Don’t fuck up, all right?”

He snorted. “An asteroid crammed with worthless paper-pushers who’ll shit themselves when they see us carrying weapons,” he said, with a grin. I wasn’t so confident. He was taking twenty-one Marines to assault a target that had no less than two thousand personnel and, despite his confidence, I feared that something would go wrong, right at the worst possible moment. “Don’t tell me my job, Captain. You tend to your knitting and I’ll tend to mine.”

“Deal,” I said, watching as the Marines filed onboard the shuttle, pushing and jostling at each other. I couldn’t understand that either. They were going off to die in a cause few of them believed could work…and they were laughing! One of them was telling a filthy joke about two whores he’d met at Luna City, a mother and daughter team, and the others were just about wetting themselves laughing. “Good luck, Erwin.”

“I taught you well,” the Master Sergeant said. “You’ll do fine.”

A moment later, he boarded the craft and I turned and left the shuttlebay, before watching them depart. Realistically, we’d been committed as soon as I’d started to reach out to my former classmates and ask them to join, but now…now I felt committed. I knew what I had to do now, before all hell broke loose in orbit, and I touched the pistol at my belt. It felt clunky and reassuring in my hand.

The shuttlebay doors hissed closed and I walked back towards Officer Country. By now, the Lieutenants and crewmen who were in the know would have secured their assigned compartments, preventing any spies from reporting to their superiors. I’d run enough drills, even counter-boarding drills, to keep them from realising that this was anything else, until it was far too late. I just had to deal with a particular loose end myself. It wasn’t something that I could trust to others.

I swung past the communications room and inspected the three crewmen on duty carefully. Crewmen were not normally allowed to carry weapons without special permission — something that I was counting on for the other starships — but the Master Sergeant had trained them and the Senior Chief was sure that they were trustworthy. I locked the communications console anyway and restricted the ship to internal communications only. A warning now could do terrible harm to our cause.

Heinlein’s books had taught me how to proceed. I’d built up cells on each of the starships in orbit, the ones assembled for the invasion of Williamson’s World. I’d determined that that invasion would never be launched, although it was quite possible that the plans had been shelved for the foreseeable future anyway. The cells would, in turn, infect the trustworthy crewmembers on the starships — with hardly any links to me — and prepare to seize control. Heinlein’s attack on Earth worked in our favour. There was so much confusion that no one would notice anything out of the ordinary until it was too late, I hoped. Orders had been streaming out of EarthStar One for days now, only to be countermanded seconds later, much to my relief. Devastator had been ordered to prepare for a flight to Heinlein — perhaps to retaliate for the retaliation — and I’d feared they would order us to accompany her, before I was ready to make my own move. It would have disrupted my plans considerably.

I glanced down at the timer one final time and stepped into Officer Country. I’d been in this particular cabin before, back when Jason Montgomerie had been Political Officer, but I had tried to avoid it ever since Deborah had taken up the position. In theory, a Captain had the right to inspect any part of his ship, but in practice not even a Captain would dare to irritate the Political Officer that much. Jason’s collection of expensive wines had gone with him, presumably helping to console him for the loss of his position, and I had no idea what Deborah had moved in herself. I keyed the door chime and braced myself as the hatch hissed open. This wasn’t going to be pleasant.

“Captain,” Deborah said, looking up from a datapad. There was a faintly mocking tone in her voice. “What a pleasant surprise.”

“Doubtless,” I said. I judged that no one had given her any advance warning at all. It shouldn’t have been possible — everyone who knew in advance had had ample opportunity to do far worse than tell her — but who knew how the human mind worked? Some of the men who’d ordered the carnage on Heinlein liked spending time with their wives, mistresses and children. They were even kind to dumb animals. “Do you have a moment?”

She smiled in triumph. “I always have a moment for…what?”

Her face went deathly pale as I drew my pistol and pointed it directly at her head. She’d probably never even seen a gun before she’d taken up service with the UNPF, let alone had one pointed at her. The Master Sergeant’s drills had included threats to shoot us or pistol-whip us if we didn’t learn fast, but no one dared use those methods with ordinary infantrymen. They might even sue the UNPF for their treatment if they found that they’d been tested beyond their means. Deborah probably believed the nonsense the UN used as anti-gun propaganda.

“Stand up,” I snapped. An unpleasant smell told me that she’d wet herself in shock. I saw an argument forming in her mind and gestured with the muzzle. “On your feet, now!”

She obeyed, shaking. A large dark stain marked her uniform. She’d had it expertly tailored for some reason beyond my comprehension and it was now ruined. Her staff would probably have to tell her that it was now unusable and that she would have to buy a new one. I pitied them. Jason had had no servants, but Deborah had brought two maids with her, and both of them had shown signs of mistreatment. The Doctor had told me, in confidence, that Deborah seemed to enjoy hurting them.

“Do as you’re told and you won’t be harmed,” I said, softly. I wanted to scare her — I wanted to hurt her — but I pushed that aside. “Turn around and face the wall. Place your hands on your head, now!”

I stepped forward as she complied, pulling out the small pair of handcuffs I’d recovered from the Master Sergeant before he left on his mission. A moment later, I’d snapped them on her wrists and sent her falling to the deck. I doubted that she could escape, but just to be sure I pulled out a small needle and injected her with a heavy sedative. I’d considered killing her at once, but we might need her later, although I doubted it. Besides, we could always kill her later.

“Bitch,” I muttered, as she collapsed into a heap. The sedative was normally used for serious injuries or accidents where there was only a limited supply of oxygen. She’d be out for days unless someone injected her with the antidote. “Just stay there and…”

“No,” a new voice said. “You stay there.”

“Muna,” I snapped, irritated. I spoke harshly to cover my shock. How the hell had she gotten behind me? I must be growing old. The Master Sergeant would laugh his head off. So would everyone else, for that matter. “What are you…?”

I turned. She was pointing a laser pistol directly at my head. “Don’t lift your pistol,” she said, her voice deadly calm, although her hands were shaking. “Please, Captain; put it down on the deck, gently.”

There was no choice, but to comply, I realised. “Muna,” I said, softly. “You don’t understand…”

“I think I do,” Muna said, coldly. “You came here to put her out of commission, but you didn’t kill her. You sent the Marines away on some mission for you personally. You’re either planning to go renegade or you have something more ambitious in mind.” She saw my expression. “Captain…what are you planning?”

I sighed. “Listen,” I said, far too aware of the laser pistol in her hand. There was no dodging a laser beam and it would be lethal if it passed through my head. The Master Sergeant’s words of contempt for the weapon echoed through my mind and I almost smiled. It didn’t matter how crappy a weapon was if it were being used by someone who knew what they were doing, did it? “This war is going to destroy us all.”

“Maybe,” Muna said. Her voice seemed to grow even colder. “And yet you’re planning…what?”

“We can take the starships and Earth’s defences,” I said, carefully. I wanted — needed — to convince her. “We can force the United Nations to come to terms with the colonies…for God’s sake, Muna, how long do you think it will be before we are ordered to destroy an entire planet? How long do you think it will be before Heinlein hits Earth hard enough to kill the entire population?”

“I don’t care,” Muna hissed. There was a bitterness in her tone, something emerging from her veneer of discipline. I’d never seen her lose control before. “You’re committing treason!”

“Why does treason never prosper?” I asked. I had to reach her somehow. “Because if it prosper, none dare call it treason! How many have to die before you will act?”

“You don’t understand,” she said. “What do I care if the whole damned population of Earth dies? What do you know about my past? I was born into a tribe that thought I was nothing because I was a baby girl! I was sold to my first husband when I was seven! Raiders killed my husband when I was nine and they took me as a whore — oh, but I was no longer virgin by then. My husband took me at once and what did he care how badly I was hurt? They used me and abused me until I ran to the UN Compound and they took me in. They were the only people who helped me!”

I saw tears in her eyes. “Pierre didn’t try to use me; he didn’t try to rape me. He had me checked by the doctors and…I could never have children! My husband had seen to it that I would never give him the healthy boys he craved. The raiders hadn’t cared what happened to me. They kept me on and taught me how to read and write, and then he called in a favour and got me a place at the Academy. The United fucking Nations saved my life. If I’d stayed there, I’d be dead by now, or wishing I was.”

Her hand trembled, but she held the pistol steady. “I believe in the United Nations,” she snapped. “What do I care how many people suffer? I just wish they’d destroy the cursed place I was born and seed the land with salt!”

I found myself looking for words and failed. I hadn’t known — I had never realised — just how bad Muna’s life had been. I had thought I’d known, but I hadn’t understood, even though the Senior Chief had hinted at it…God, it felt like centuries ago. I couldn’t believe it. She was going to kill me and everything would come to nothing. Kitty would take over, I hoped, but I’d never see it. Would we win, or would we merely prolong the war?

“It won’t make any difference,” I said, slowly. “Muna, we can do something to avenge you…”

“What would it matter?” Muna demanded. “Could you give me back everything I’ve lost? I have no family, but the United Nations. I have no chance of ever having children of my own. I have nothing!” Her voice hardened. “I’ll wake her up and use her to get the warning out. The UN will react in time to prevent your forces from taking EarthStar One” — she saw my surprise, for she smiled — “oh come on, John, where else would you send them? I can nip everything in the bud.”

“You won’t,” I said, with absolute confidence. It no longer mattered anyway. “You’ll just cause a civil war instead of a quick and relatively bloodless takeover…”

“So what?” She asked, and pointed the gun directly at my forehead. I tensed and prepared to spring aside, even though I knew it would be futile. I even considered trying to jump her. “John, goodbye…”

She crumpled to the ground. I threw myself to one side a second later, but nothing leapt at me. I saw her body on the ground and, standing behind her, Sally, holding a stunner in one hand. I was never so relieved to see anyone in my entire life. I almost laughed aloud in relief.

“I thought that you’d been delayed,” Sally said, dryly. She bent down and checked Muna’s body, not gently. “I never thought that she would betray you like that.”

I ran my hand though my hair. “Never mind that at the moment,” I said, grimly. “She’s young and strong, so she’ll be out of it for only another half hour at the most. Get a pair of crewmen and put them both in the brig, separate cells, and make sure that neither of them are carrying anything dangerous. Once that’s done, join me on the bridge.”

“Yes, sir,” Sally said. She turned and left the cabin, but paused in the hatchway. “What did she say to you anyway?”

“Never mind,” I said, shaking my head. There would be time to deal with Muna later. I didn’t want to kill her, or sent her to Botany. There had to be another option, somehow. I checked my timer and frowned. The first mutinies should have begun by now. “You go deal with he, and then meet me on the bridge.”

I’d envisaged telling Muna the truth after securing Deborah, but now I’d just have to wing it. Lieutenant Carolyn Lauderdale, a member of the conspiracy, had been left in command of the bridge and she smiled in relief when she saw me. I was just as relieved to see her. I’d been having nightmarish visions of security forces on the bridge leading my people away in chains, but everything was normal.

“Report,” I said, as calmly as I could. “Have we picked up any coded pulses yet?”

“Only from three cruisers,” Carolyn said, grimly. I winced inwardly, although I knew that seven minutes wasn’t really long enough to secure a ship, even with the Marines cooperating. The three cruisers that had secretly identified themselves as under our control had had the bridge crew thoroughly subverted. The others would take longer to secure. “Captain?”

“We wait,” I said, coldly. The icon for EarthStar One hung in the display, taunting me. Was it under our control, or had something gone badly wrong? I felt a feeling in the pit of my stomach I couldn’t quite explain. “Concentrate on…”

“Captain, I’m picking up a message from the Marines,” Geoffrey Murchison reported, quickly. “They’re saying…”

“Put them on,” I snapped. There was no need to worry about secrecy any longer. “Erwin, this is John.”

“John, they had troops in place waiting for something,” the Master Sergeant said. I could hear shooting in the background and cursed under my breath. Even Marines couldn’t take the entire station against armed opposition. There were only twenty-one of them, after all. “They’ve got us pinned down.”

I swore again. If they failed, it had all been for nothing.

“Erwin,” I said. I found myself grasping for words again. I’d thrown their lives away — for nothing. “I’m sorry…”

“Stow it,” he snapped. “Just make damn sure that all of this is worthwhile.”

The connection broke. A moment later, the icon representing EarthStar One flickered… and vanished.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

“They took a nuke,” I realised, in shock. I’d known that the Marines carried scuttling charges for captured freighters, just in case the crews decided to try and take them back, but the Master Sergeant hadn’t mentioned taking one along with him to me. I hadn’t thought that one would be necessary, but he’d obviously had different ideas. Had he known that suicide was the only solution…or had he merely planned for all eventualities? “Why did they even have troops onboard?”

“It must have been the Heinlein assault,” Sally said, stepping onto the bridge. If anyone thought it was odd that a mere Ensign was addressing a Captain in such a manner, they said nothing. “If that panicked the people on EarthStar One, they might well have uploaded more security forces without telling anyone.”

And twenty-one good men died in the blast, I thought, coldly. The Master Sergeant’s sacrifice had bought us the time we needed, but at a fearful cost. Earth’s mighty defences were useless now, at least until we could board them and replace their control processors, and we would have a free hand, as long as nothing went badly wrong. I glanced down at the display and saw that seven starships had definitely fallen into our hands, along with two of the troop transports. The Marine transports were already on their way from Mars, but we couldn’t trust the Infantry. Luckily, most of them would be in stasis tubes and wouldn’t know that anything had changed until it was far too late.

“Captain, I’m picking up signals from the orbital asteroids and two of the starships,” Lieutenant Samantha Kennedy said. “I think the cat is definitely out of the bag now.”

“Put them on,” I said.

“This is Sanders, Captain Sanders,” a voice said. It was the sound of despair. “The Marines have taken the ship and are breaking into my cabin. They’re mutinying against…”

The voice vanished, only to be replaced by another one. “There’s a battle going on at the airlocks,” it said. This one was young and female, an Ensign who had forgotten everything, even basic communications protocols. “The Captain is dead! They killed the Captain!”

“Armed Marines are boarding the asteroid and cuffing my men,” someone else said. This one was old and cynical. The Marines had to secure the orbital asteroids before someone got any clever ideas about trying to reassume control of the orbital defences. “They’re killing anyone who tries to resist!”

“This is Devastator,” a familiar voice said. I recognised my former Captain and winced inwardly. I’d wanted the monitor to threaten Earth if necessary, but he would have been one of the few Captains to survive. Devastator hadn’t had a large cell of rebels, just because the Captain inspired loyalty. “I have four mutineers in custody, I repeat, I have four mutineers in custody. I believe that this is not an isolated event and a security alert should be declared at once.”

“Too late,” I hissed, savagely. The quick-reaction force in orbit consisted of the Marines, the Marines I’d already subverted. They wouldn’t respond to orders from the ground, but by the time the UN realised that that was the time, valuable time would be lost. They’d then send up troops in shuttles or the orbital towers, although the latter would be fearfully slow, but by then we’d have control of all the starships, one way or the other. We’d even control the upper levels of the orbital towers.

“We had six people onboard Devastator,” the Senior Chief said. He shouldn’t have been on the bridge at all, but again, no one objected. “Two of them must have been killed in the crossfire.”

“This is Captain Traduce,” another voice said. “I am barricaded in my cabin, but the mutineers have taken control of the bridge and the engineering compartment. The Marines are joining the rebels, I repeat…”

The signal vanished in another wash of static and two more starships declared that they were secure. I keyed my console, sending the orders I’d prepared already, ordering them to prepare to move out to the asteroid belt if necessary. The Marines I’d sent there would have destroyed the UN garrisons by now and the workers would be rebelling, given half a chance. I’d seen it years ago. Earth no longer supplied the UNPF with anything. It all came from the asteroids. Earth’s vaunted industry couldn’t even meet Earth’s needs, let alone anyone else’s requirements.

“Colin, watch out,” someone said. “They’re behind you and…”

It broke off in a scream. “This is UN General Command,” a harsher voice said, yet it was tinged with fear and uncertainty. “This is a general broadcast to all starships. Report your status at once. I repeat, report your status at once.”

“Ignore it,” I ordered, imagining the chaos down on the surface. The politicians would be trying to come to grips with the crisis, unaware that things were already outside their control. I was tempted to broadcast fake information to mislead them, but there was little point. Earth’s power to intervene was almost non-existent. They were probably regretting having disbanded the heavy ground-based laser cannons by now. “Samantha, how many starships are with us now?”

“Twenty-one,” Samantha said. “The Al Gore is drifting out of control and we lost all contact with her two minutes ago.”

“That was one of the ships without subverted Marines,” the Senior Chief muttered in my ear. “If there was a fire fight on the bridge, or damage to the control systems…”

I nodded. “We’ll have to try to recover her later,” I said. The cruiser wasn’t about to fall into the atmosphere and add to Earth’s woes. If worst came to worst, I’d fire on her myself, but it shouldn’t be necessary. The ship wasn’t leaking atmosphere and the crew should be able to remain alive long enough to be rescued, unless they’d killed each other by now. For once, I breathed a silent prayer of thanks for the UN’s obsessive concern with safety. The loyalists would find it hard to pump out the atmosphere and kill my people. “Can you get a link to Trygve Lie?”

Samantha winked at me — she knew my relationship with Kitty — but she opened the link without demur. “Kitty, this is John,” I said, quickly. The battleship was always going to be the hardest target — in fact, in hindsight, I should have tried to prepare a suicide charge for that ship as well. We’d never have been able to smuggle a nuke though the sensors, but there were other ways. “Report!”

Kitty sounded tired when she spoke to me. “I’ve got good news and bad news,” she said. I forgave her the breach of protocol. If she were still alive, we hadn’t failed. Not yet…and the more starships that fell under our control, the more certain our victory. “The good news is that we have control of the ship. The bad news is that there was a laser fight in several compartments and we don’t have any weapons until we can rig bypasses. We don’t even have point defence.”

I swore. Battleship or not, expensive waste of resources or the ultimate weapon of intimidation, the starship was completely defenceless without weapons. A handful of nuclear strikes would take out a battleship, same as any other starship, and while the battleship mounted heavy point defence weapons, they couldn’t use them without the control systems. Intentionally or otherwise, the UN had scored a goal.

“Understood,” I said, finally. There was no point in crying over spilt milk. “Can you still move the ship?”

“Yes,” Kitty said. “The bridge is a mess, but we’ve moved operations down to the CIC and we can still use the drives.”

“Good enough,” I said. “Power up the Jump Drive and jump out to the asteroids. There’s no point in keeping you here if you can’t fight. Make repairs as quickly as you can and then return.”

“Yes, sir,” Kitty said. Her voice softened slightly. “Good luck, John.”

I looked down at the display as the battleship started to manoeuvre out of the planet’s gravity well, ignoring increasingly frantic messages from the ground. We had twenty-one starships under our direct control now, with the others still disputed… apart from Devastator. I’d expected Captain Shalenko to be trying to take action, but instead the monitor was just sitting there, waiting. The torrent of messages from the asteroids was slowing down as my people secured control. He had to be going out of his mind with worry…or perhaps he was waiting to see who came out on top.

They probably think that one of their senior officers has launched a coup, I thought, with a flicker of amusement. The upper levels didn’t realise — they didn’t really believe — that people less fortunate than they had been had minds and souls, or even the ability to use them. The thought of a mutiny from the lower decks was beyond their comprehension and, in every case, their paranoia had worked against them. If every member of the crew on each starship had been armed, the results would have been unpleasant. The chaos would probably have cost us our chance at a bloodless victory.

I looked down at the messages and smiled. They’d been trying to call me directly, but they were also calling others. I wondered if they’d realised that I was in command of the rebellion, but it looked as if they were desperately trying to contact anyone. I studied the relay systems, trying to see what Captain Shalenko was saying to them, but Devastator appeared to be silent. He had to be using tight-beam lasers to communicate with the ground.

“I think its time,” the Senior Chief said. “John, are you ready?”

I tensed. “Yes,” I said, slowly. “Open a general channel, wide broadcast.”

“Channel opening,” Samantha said. That had been one of the tricks I’d picked up from Heinlein. I wouldn’t just be addressing the UN General Command on the ground, or the uncommitted across the solar system, but everyone. They would all hear what I had to say. “You may speak when ready.”

I took a breath. “This is Captain John Walker,” I said. “As of now, we have secured control of Earth’s orbital defences and most of the starships orbiting the planet. The United Nation’s ability to dictate terms to the Colonies, or even Luna Base, has been neutralised. This action is not something we take willingly, but it is action that we must take. The war between Earth and the Colonies is beyond victory. It can only end in defeat.

“Ask yourself this, if you doubt me,” I continued. “Why have conditions on Earth steadily worsened, despite the UN’s promise of booty from the Colonies? Why have we — the officers and men of the UNPF — been expended endlessly in a war that they told us would be won in weeks, perhaps days? Why was Heinlein’s Resistance able to strike at the very heart of Earth itself, creating a sight that no one could miss in the sky? Why should we serve as enforcers to a group of politicians too stupid to see the writing on the wall?

“We all swore loyalty to the high ideals behind the Peace Force. We were told that the Peace Force existed to promote Peace and to enforce Peace. Have we succeeded in our mission? No! How can we succeed in our mission when the mere presence of the Peace Force is enough to destroy Peace? How can we succeed when our lords and masters take steps designed to expand the conflict and destroy the peace and tranquillity on dozens of worlds? How can we look in the mirror and call ourselves the Peace Force when we bring them war, famine, pestilence and death?”

I felt my resentments bubbling up. “But what does it matter what we do, if the political cause is right?” I asked. “What does it matter if we kill millions of innocents if the cause is right? The ends justify the means, right? We’re not robots, or computers to be programmed, even if far too many of us have allowed ourselves to believe their lies. We have minds and we can think for ourselves. How does it benefit Earth, or even the UN itself, if our very presence causes resentment and hatred? Are we murderers, so far fallen from grace that we can accept the destruction of an entire city of innocents by the weapons we are sworn to prevent being used? Are we monsters that we become passive observers as worlds are looted, women are raped and children are killed? Are we not compliant in their deeds? Are our hands not dripping red with blood?

“Look at the UN, look at the world and ask yourself one question. What is it we serve? We serve as their enforcers, stamping down on anyone who dares to question, while others grow worse under our protection. How many decent officers have been held back, or sent to isolated fuelling stations, for daring to question? How many sensible Captains have been overridden by their Political Officers, or humiliated on the bridge in front of their crews. What value is our service when it is based on lies? How many of us only took service to escape the conditions on Earth?

“The UN created the nightmare that now grips Earth,” I thundered. “Look at it! How does it match the version created by the UN’s propaganda machine? Have things gotten better? No — if anything, they’ve gotten much worse. Our families and friends choke to death on pollution and suffer under the rule of the gangs, or corrupt police officers, while the political class dine on fine foods and drink fine wines, unheeding of the screams for help below them.

“We’re not disloyal to Earth, or humanity! We are people who have decided that enough is enough! We are the people who are going to end the war and prevent the UN from crushing the life out of hundreds of worlds. We’re your comrades in arms, your fellow servicemen. Join us. You have nothing to lose, but your chains!”

I drew my hand across my throat and Samantha cut the channel. I was sweating heavily. I had never claimed to be a good speechwriter, and yet it had to come from the heart. The signal would be racing out across the solar system now, yet who would listen? The uncommitted in space might join us, or take advantage of the chaos to revolt against the UN, but what would happen on Earth itself? The UN had been breeding all initiative out of the population for centuries. Would they rebel, or would they shrug and return to their lives?

“I’m picking up a direct signal from the planet,” Samantha said. “It’s the Sec-Gen himself.”

“On screen,” I ordered. The Secretary-General looked pale and wan. He was grossly overweight and, despite the best treatments money and high status could by, was balding. He was sweating like the pig he reassembled. “Hello.”

The correct means of address was ‘Your Excellency,’ but I wasn’t in the mood to kowtow any longer. It would have betrayed everyone who had fought and died to get this far.

“Captain,” he said. His voice was probably intended to sound resolute, but it came out as more of a whine. “Captain, we can discuss this, perhaps even…”

“My terms are quite simple,” I said, cutting him off. “You will surrender control over the UNPF to me. You will declare the war with the Colonies at an end and formally accept that your jurisdiction ends outside Earth’s atmosphere. You will not attempt to subvert my command or interfere with us in any way.”

I stared at him coldly. “If you refuse to comply I will be forced to bombard Earth,” I added. I’d counted on Devastator, but even without her I could still drop precision KEW weapons. I could take out the entire UN and he knew it. “The war is over, you fat pig.”

Samantha broke the connection and we burst out laughing. No one had spoken to him like that since… oh, probably since he was born. I hadn’t been impressed with his appearance either. A more resolute man would probably have tried to stall long enough to put together a military option of some kind. As it was, I suspected he’d give in, sooner rather than later.

And Captain Shalenko was still out there, waiting.

I considered hailing him, but pushed the thought aside. Instead, I concentred on mopping up the remaining loyalists before they could become major problems. The newly-arrived Marine Transports were ordered to secure the orbital towers and shut down their massive elevators until everything was secure. The asteroids surrendered one by one and we secured the stores that had been prepared for invading Williamson’s World. I took a certain delight in ordering the beauecrats held prisoner and prepared for a return to the surface. The fleet I intended to build would have no place for their kind.

“Ah,” Sally said, suddenly. “Captain, I think we have a problem.”

“Show me,” I ordered. I should have known that everything was going far too well. Captain Harriman had taught me that if my plan had worked perfectly, it meant I was about to lose. I hadn’t understood the logic until much later. “What’s happening?”

A trio of wormholes formed near Earth. Two of the new arrivals were cruisers. The third…

The Kofi Annan.

Roger’s ship.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

“Sound Red Alert,” I ordered, keying the intercom. “All hands to battle stations. I repeat, all hands to battle stations.”

The massive battleship had emerged from the wormhole beyond the moon, but that wouldn’t prevent Roger from hearing chapter and verse from the Secretary-General, or even from Captain Shalenko. How would he react? Roger was smart enough to see the flaws in the system, but unlike me, he had strong ties to the ruling class. Years ago, I would probably have trusted him, but after Muna…I no longer knew who I could trust. What side would Roger be on?

“Captain,” Samantha said, “I’m picking up encrypted signals from Earth to the Kofi Annan. I think they’re trying to warn her Captain of what’s happening here?”

“Damn you, Roger,” I muttered. Either through planning or a horrendous stroke of bad luck, he was in a position to reverse most of what we’d done. It would still be bloody — and the UN’s self-confidence would have taken a ghastly set of blows — but he might still come out ahead. “What do you think you’re doing?”

I looked down at the display. Seventeen starships were in excellent condition, but a handful, including Kitty’s ship, were damaged. Kitty had jumped out to the asteroids and wouldn’t have the slightest idea that something had gone badly wrong at Earth. By the time she knew, it would all be over unless I sent a ship after her…and, even so, she would still have to repair her weapons before she could intervene.

“Contact the fleet,” I ordered. “Order them to form up on us, apart from the Gabriele. She is to fly directly to the asteroids and inform them of what’s happening here.”

“Aye, sir,” Samantha said. “They’re acknowledging.”

The Kofi Annan’s icon seemed to dominate the display. I considered hailing him and trying to talk sense into him, but I needed the time to form up my small fleet. It looked as if our first battle was going to be our last, unless Roger decided to switch sides as well. I’d welcome him. He might be related to some of the most corrupt and vernal men in existence, but there was no doubting his competence. He wouldn’t have been able to keep command of the battleship without it.

I watched the fleet forming up on my flag. We were hopelessly ill-prepared, I realised. We hadn’t had a chance to practice operating as a fleet yet, let alone anything else. Some of the ships still had crewmembers who didn’t know what was going on, perhaps even people preparing to retake the bridges. I thought of Muna and Deborah and scowled. At least I had my dissidents in the brig. Muna had deserved better, somehow. I hadn’t realised just how loyal she was to the UN.

“Link us into the fleet communications system,” I ordered, quietly. The downloads from the other starships wouldn’t tell me what I needed to know. No one had bothered to set up a system to monitor the process of a mutiny and coup, a serious oversight. If we won the coming fight, we’d have to update the systems…hell, we’d have a lot to do. I knew hundreds of sections that needed improvements. I could build a real fleet without having to worry about pleasing the UN any longer.

And if Roger won? I’d die a free man, at least.

“Aye, sir,” Samantha said. I skimmed through the downloads quickly, trying to read between the lines. It was hard to be sure, but most of the starships seemed to be under firm control. I saw one data line and smiled. Luna Base had declared for us and there seemed to be fighting in some of the settlements. I just hoped that Luna City survived. The crewmen would never forgive me if it were destroyed in the fighting and all the women were sucked out into space. “They’re standing by.”

She broke off. “Captain, the Kofi Annan is hailing us,” she said. “They want to talk.”

“On screen,” I ordered. Roger’s image appeared in front of me. He looked older than I remembered — it had been three years since I’d seen him on Heinlein — but he also looked surprisingly competent. He wore dress uniform on his own bridge and carried a pistol at his belt. “Roger.”

“John,” he replied. He sounded tired and wan. “I don’t know what you have in mind, but it won’t work.”

“It will,” I said, pretending a confidence I didn’t feel. The battleship might have been an expensive waste of resources under normal circumstances, but the unique battle we were about to fight would play to its strengths. We couldn’t let it break the siege of Earth or the UN would be able to regain control of the orbiting stations. It would still trigger a civil war within the war, but that wouldn’t be much of an improvement. “Do you know how close Earth came to destruction three days ago?”

“No,” Roger said, flatly. “John, what you’re doing is treason against the human race itself. You’re turning your guns on the hands that created you and turned you into an officer in the Peace Force. What will happen to Earth if the Colonies manage to break free while we’re fighting a civil war?”

Wars are never civil, part of my mind whispered. “Roger,” I said, “three days ago, a Heinlein starship took out Asteroid One, after we took out — murdered — an entire city on their planet.” I thought about how many of the Political Class had been killed in the attack and shivered. If they’d remained alive, they would have been good hostages. “What happens next time? Will they sneak something through the defences that will kill the entire planet? It’s technically possible. You and I both know that this war is beyond being won, but it can be lost. What happens if no one says stop and makes it stick? How many people do you want to die?”

I leaned forward. “Do you remember,” I asked, “when we were both Lieutenants on Heinlein? I asked you if the war was worthwhile and you said that it was. You were wrong and the war has now reached the point where they can slaughter civilians in vast quantities as well. The war will keep stretching our system until it breaks completely. Why not join us instead?”

“Because…what you’re doing may not create something better,” Roger said. It dawned on me that our debate was public. The entire system would be listening to us arguing. “You might create something worse. Even if you don’t want to be Emperor yourself, someone else will take what you have created and try to build an empire on a pile of skulls. You might even be right and the Colonies will take advantage of the pause to hit back at us. John, please, give up. I can plead for leniency.”

“No,” I said. “I won’t betray everyone who died.”

Roger’s image vanished from the display. “I’m picking up targeting sweeps from the battleship and one of the cruisers,” Lieutenant Carolyn Lauderdale reported. She’d taken the tactical console after Muna had been…indisposed. “They’re powering up their weapons and making it very obvious.”

“Perhaps hoping that we would surrender,” I said, darkly. What was the other cruiser doing? Was it in the midst of an internal power struggle, or was something else going on? “Load missile bays and lock weapons on target. Prepare to engage the enemy.”

I looked over at Samantha. “The primary target is the Kofi Annan,” I added. There was little point in trying to coordinate the battle. We’d have to wing it and hope. Luckily, there was only one battleship in Roger’s force. He’d have to be lucky and we’d have to be unlucky. How much did he know? If he knew about the asteroids, what would he do? “Inform all ships. When we open fire, they are to engage and fire at will.”

“Aye, sir,” Samantha said. “They’re acknowledging.”

Sally frowned from her console. “He always had a silver spoon in his mouth,” she hissed, with a bitterness I had come to realise had become part of her personality. “No wonder he won’t see sense and surrender, or even vanish with his battleship and turn renegade.”

I shrugged. The Kofi Annan wasn’t a cruiser. It needed a day in a shipyard for every day it spent on duty and it hadn’t been getting it. I studied the emissions thoughtfully, trying to see if there were any weaknesses we could exploit, but nothing suggested itself. Roger wouldn’t have skimped on the basic maintenance unless he had had no choice. Still, there would be no hope of keeping it running out in the Beyond. He didn’t have much choice. He either fought or surrendered. The Colonies wouldn’t help him.

“Enemy vessel now coming into range,” Carolyn reported. “I have weapons locked on target.”

“Hold fire,” I ordered, tersely. Perhaps we could prevent a fight. “Roger, what are you playing at…?”

“Missile separation,” Carolyn snapped. “They’ve opened fire.”

“All ships, fire at will,” I ordered, sharply. Carolyn’s hand fell on her console and we fired our first spread of missiles. Between all of the ships, we could fire over a hundred missiles per salvo. Roger would face his ship’s worst nightmare; repeated volley fire from multiple launch platforms. “Evade as required.”

Roger wasn’t playing games himself. He’d fired fifty missiles in his opening salvo and all, but ten were targeted on us. The missiles would be basic UN-standard, I suspected, instead of Heinlein-designed surprises, but that wouldn’t stop them being lethal if they touched home. We had a surprise ourselves; I had enough starships with me to produce a genuine point defence network, rather than merely each ship for itself. I watched as the missiles roared closer and smiled when they started to vanish, one by one.

“The Kofi Annan is picking up speed,” Sally reported, grimly. “Estimated ETA Earth orbit is twenty minutes.”

“Understood,” I said, shortly. The missiles were still falling to our lasers, but Roger had fired a second salvo and then a third. I ran through the calculations in my head. His point defence was just as good as ours — maybe better in some ways — and he had the power to back it up. We had to give him a ore complex problem to deal with, yet we couldn’t do that without risking our own point defence network breaking up. “Keep firing…”

I tapped my console, issuing orders to the other starships. At my command, four of them opened wormholes and jumped around the Kofi Annan, emerging dangerously close to the battleship. Before Roger could react — and I was sure that he would have his gunners on hair triggers, after Heinlein — they fired their missiles and reopened the wormholes, slipping away. Roger’s point defence found itself struggling to cope with newer targets coming in from different vectors and I smiled as one missile detonated against the drive field. My election vanished as I realised that the Kofi Annan was almost undamaged by the blast and was still firing.

Get into Earth orbit and regain control, I thought. That’s what they will have told him to do. Get back into Earth orbit and reclaim the orbital defences. How can I use that against him?

“Incoming missiles,” Carolyn snapped. “I doubt we can take all these down.”

“Pilot, jump us out,” I snapped. A wormhole enfolded us and we vanished, emerging far too close to the battleship for comfort. Carolyn fired another spread of missiles before we vanished again. I had a mental image of a powerful beast being tormented by coyotes or hyenas. Every time it turned to deal with one problem another jumped in and attacked the creature’s back. “Carolyn, continue firing!”

The position was untenable, I realised. We couldn’t coordinate our fire, so we could only harass the battleship, not destroy it. Roger knew that as well as we did, so all he had to do was keep moving towards Earth. We’d either have to stand and fight, or pull back and admit defeat. We scored two more hits on the battleship, but they weren’t coordinated and the battleship seemed undamaged. The dance was going to end in Roger’s victory by default.

I found myself grasping for possibilities. Could we recall Kitty in time to make a difference? She’d have come the moment she repaired her weapons systems, but she wasn’t here, which suggested that they still weren’t repaired. Without her battleship to counter the Kofi Annan, we couldn’t stand and fight. Would we have any choice? If we let them enter Earth orbit and drive us away, all of this would have been for nothing.

“Damn you, Roger,” I hissed. “I’m not going to let you end it all.”

“Captain,” Carolyn snapped. “A new wormhole is opening!”

I allowed myself a moment of hope. It might have been Kitty, but instead Devastator emerged from the wormhole. I stared in stark disbelief. Devastator was a monitor. She wasn’t designed for the line of battle. Captain Shalenko had had to have lost his mind. He couldn’t be planning to intervene, could he?

“Receiving a transmission,” Samantha said. “He says he’s sorry.”

Before my eyes, Devastator plunged towards Kofi Annan and crashed right into her. The media suggested that starships collided on a regular basis, but the truth was that even the most insanely incompetent pilot would have struggled to make two ships crash, unless it was deliberate. Even then, it would be hard, but Roger had unintentionally aided Devastator on her final cruise. The two starships exploded and vanished inside a massive fireball.

“Captain Yamamoto would like to surrender,” Samantha said. I barely heard her. I was still staring at the remains of a man I’d once called a friend, and a commanding officer who’d prevented me from throwing away my own career. What had gone through his mind in the final few minutes? Had Shalenko intended to kill himself, or had he realised that he had committed vast crimes and sought a means of redeeming himself. “Sir?”

“Accept the surrender,” I said, softly. “Check around with the other ships and find one that has an intact platoon of Marines and send them onboard to secure the ship. What about the other cruiser?”

“They’re apparently under the control of mutineers themselves,” Samantha said. I didn’t smile. We were mutineers as well, unless we won outright. Winners got to write the history books. “They’re asking to join us.”

“Find out who’s in charge and see if they’re one of us,” I said. “If not, find a second platoon of Marines and send them onboard, just in case.”

I looked down at the display. “And prepare to return to Earth,” I added. “This isn’t quite finished yet.”

A moment later, another wormhole materialised and Kitty’s starship appeared. I couldn’t stop myself from laughing. Five minutes sooner and Captain Shalenko wouldn’t have had to commit suicide to stop Roger and his battleship. I doubted we’d be building any more such ships ourselves. They were just resource hogs.

“It’s good to see you,” I said, once we’d filled her in on what had happened in her absence. She had been as surprised as we were to discover that Roger had returned to the system; had they known something, or had it just been a hideous coincidence? “What’s happening at the asteroids?”

“They’ve all declared for us,” Kitty said, seriously. I thought that she’d never looked more beautiful in her life. “There were some problems with some of the overseers, but the prisoners took care of them and threw most of the bastards into space. I think that most of them will want to go home, but they’ve agreed to support us as long as we need them.”

“That might be a long time,” I said. Even if we started training up proper engineers again, it would still take years to replace all the conscripted workers…but I owed them a debt of honour. I’d helped put some of them in the work camps and now I’d get them back home, even if it made my operations difficult. I relaxed slightly as it dawned on me that I’d won. We held the Peace Force — and I was going to rename it something else once everything else had been done — and Earth’s high orbitals. Yesterday, the UN had controlled hundreds of star systems and billions of people. Today, it only controlled one planet. They couldn’t get at us any longer. Given time, I was sure that each of the garrisons would be wiped out, even as we were clearing their baleful influence from the fleet. “Still…we can maintain the fleet now.”

I paused. “Sally,” I ordered, “stand to attention.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, standing up.

“By the power vested in me, I hereby promote you to Lieutenant,” I said, clearly. I’d wanted to do it ever since I’d become Captain, but now…who was going to disagree? Everyone knew that Sally had been badly treated by the UN and no one doubted her competence. It was a shame I couldn’t grant her seniority as well, but that would have pushed matters too far. It wouldn’t be long before she was assigned to a new starship where she would either rise or fall according to her merits.

I sat back down in the command chair. “Pilot, take us back to Earth,” I ordered. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. It was easy to be dramatic in the flush of victory. “It’s time to dictate terms to the United Nations and end the war for good.”

From: The End of the Nightmare. Standard Press, New Washington, 2567.

The end, when it came, came swiftly.

The UNPF coup in orbit above Earth broke the power of the UN completely. As then-Captain Walker sent messengers to the occupied planets, the remainder of the UNPF and the UN Infantry swung to his side. Walker’s message was clear. The occupations were going to come to an end, provided that the Infantry were allowed to withdraw in peace. Planets such as Heinlein respected the ceasefire and generally permitted the UN Infantry to withdraw to bases out in the countryside, while they waited for transport to be organised back to Earth. Others, such as Terra Nova or New Kabul, resumed their civil wars at once without waiting for the UN to withdraw, forcing the Infantry to establish safe zones for their forces. There was a certain irony that General LePic, whose hands had been tied by UN Regulations, was able to impose peace on Terra Nova without those regulations. Indeed, many disbanded Infantrymen chose to make their way to Terra Nova to join him.

But that would come later. The messengers convinced most of the remaining starships to join Captain Walker in rebellion against the UN. Many of the crews had been frustrated, or treated badly by their superiors, or even hadn’t been paid for their services. Around 70% of the UN’s starships and all of their support bases fell into Captain Walker’s hands, while a handful of loyalists either vanished off into the Beyond or attempted to turn pirate. Several other loyalist vessels attempted to attack Earth and break the blockade, but the repaired orbital defences — firmly in rebel hands — were able to beat them away from the planet. The longer the blockade held, the more planets and asteroids that broke away from the UN. Mars declared independence after a brief rebellion and most of the outer systems followed suit. The long war was over.

It was not a neat and tidy process. The issue of reparations for damage inflicted and punishment for war crimes continued to hang over the proceedings. Were the UN soldiers guilty of breaking any laws, or committing war crimes? Would they have been allowed to pass unpunished if they had followed orders? What was a war crime anyway? And that, of course, ignored war crimes committed by insurgents, who had often had little choice. The issues seemed insolvable.

And this still left, of course, the problem of peace. John Walker had never intended to run an empire of any kind, yet was there any other solution? Others feared his ambitions or his control of a fleet strongly loyal to him personally. It was towards this end that Walker summoned representatives from each of the inhabited planets, including Earth, to a grand summit at Unity, where such issues would be decided.