The Nelson Touch

Chapter Nine

Major Charles Parnell couldn’t help but be impressed by USS Chesty Puller. Like most military warships she was as ugly as hell, yet that hardly mattered. She was designed to take thousands of American Marines into the teeth of enemy fire, land them on hostile ground and provide fire support to them until the enemy were firmly suppressed. Indeed, she made the transport ships used by the Royal Marines look tiny, although Charles wasn’t entirely sure she was a great idea. Her armour might be heavier than the armour protecting modern carriers, but it was nowhere near as heavy as Ark Royal’s.

“Welcome to my ship,” Major General Ross called. “It’s been a long time.”

Charles smiled and shook hands firmly with the Rhino. They’d met years ago, back during a joint operation in the Horn of Africa, yet another butcher and bolt. The Rhino had impressed him, once he’d overcome the bombast and realised there was a fine mind hidden under the heavyset expression. And he’d been quite happy to forget nationalism and work with others to hunt down terrorists, kidnappers and wreckers.

“It has indeed,” he said. “And now they’re sending you to war against aliens.”

“Hell of a thing,” the Rhino agreed. “None of us ever really planned for it.”

He waved a hand, indicating the colossal landing bay. Countless Marines and support staff moved from shuttle to shuttle, inspecting their loads or checking their drives. Others ran in circles around the bay, getting what exercise they could. Charles couldn’t help the flicker of envy — a ship dedicated to the Royal Marines would have been very helpful — but he still had his doubts about the concept.

“But you can see we’ve been adapting,” the Rhino boomed. “You see Mons Meg over there?”

Charles followed his gaze. A large weapon — it looked big enough to be a self-propelled gun — was mounted on tracks. As he watched, a handful of Marines carefully manoeuvred it into a shuttle, taking extreme care.

“It looks as though they expect the weapon to blow up at any moment,” he said.

“They do,” the Rhino said. “That’s one of the first strategic plasma cannons designed and produced for the Corps. It’s actually capable of engaging targets in low orbit from the ground, which should make life interesting for anyone trying to land on the planet. But the plasma containment field is very far from perfect.”

Charles snorted. “I bet the health and safety lot loved it!”

“Oh, they did,” the Rhino sneered. “They actually wanted to forbid its deployment to the Corps until we actually managed to improve the containment system. But they were overruled, because there’s a war underway and we need every advantage we can get. We’ve also got plasma cannons for deployment to replace antitank missiles and HVMs, but nothing man-portable just yet. We don’t know how the aliens do it.”

Charles nodded, remembering the alien weapons they’d captured from Alien-1 and the battlecruiser. They’d shot bursts of superheated plasma, enough to ensure a kill even if they only brushed their human targets. But humanity couldn’t duplicate the handheld weapons, not yet. It made him wonder just what else the aliens might have up their sleeves, if their technology was so much more advanced. Humanity was catching up, but would it catch up in time?

The Rhino snorted, again. “In any case, I will be leading the assault down to the ground, assuming there actually is an assault,” he said. “Once we take the ground, we will set up defences and wait for the aliens to come to us. We’ll give them quite a few nasty surprises when they do. If the fleet has to leave, we can still hold the planet.”

“They’ll just fry you from orbit,” Charles protested. Standard doctrine insisted that whoever ruled the high orbitals ruled the planet. It was certainly true that wrecker bases in the failed states in Africa and the Middle East were obliterated without warning, either by American or European military forces. “You’ll lose everyone.”

“Hardly,” the Rhino said. He nodded towards a handful of other plasma cannons. “We should be able to hold out for a time.”

He shrugged, mightily. “It all depends on the exact situation, of course,” he added. “At worst, we’ll merely loot their settlements and then fall back.”

Charles nodded. They’d been briefed extensively on the importance of recovering alien books as well as computers, something that might help the scientists unlock the secrets behind how the aliens communicated. The alien computers might have yielded some data, but nothing that would allow humans to actually talk to them. He’d been told that if they recovered something that served as a key to unlock the alien language there would be promotions all around. The scientists had to be getting desperate.

Maybe they think the aliens are just misunderstood, he thought. And they want to prove it before it’s too late.

“Their settlements may well be underwater,” Charles said. The aliens on Alien-1 had certainly been based underwater — and it was clear the aliens didn’t need to surface to breathe. “Can you handle that?”

“We have over two thousand armoured Marines,” the Rhino assured him. “We can certainly probe into their underwater domains, even if we can’t hold them permanently. But I’m rather hoping there will be a large underwater population.”

Charles blinked. “You are?”

“There might well be civilians there too,” the Rhino said. “Perhaps they can actually talk to us.”

“Maybe,” Charles said. The aliens they’d captured might have been military personnel — or they might have been civilian scientists. Without any way to actually talk to them it was impossible to tell. “But we should be very careful. So far, the aliens have largely refrained from atrocities.”

“True,” the Rhino said. He looked pensive for a long moment. “What does it say about us, Charles, when a bunch of aliens are more honourable foes than half of humanity?”

“They’re pragmatic,” Charles said. “They go after our worlds, we go after their worlds and both races lose billions of people. But if they win the war, they can commit genocide afterwards at leisure — or simply keep us trapped on the ground. Maybe they just don’t want us expanding any further, so they started the war.”

The Rhino shrugged and slapped him on the back. “It doesn’t matter why they started the war,” he said. “All that matters is winning it.”

He paused, then produced a sheet of paper from his belt. “Now, training schedules,” he said, briskly. “The Russians and Chinese have sent ground forces, as have the French. You’ll be taking part in the briefings, I assume?”

Charles nodded. As one of the few officers to actually set foot on an alien world, his insights would be invaluable. But they’d never seen a major alien world. The intelligence officers had warred over the question of just how many defences the aliens would construct around a world they had to defend. Would they have major ground-based plasma cannons, capable of engaging ships in orbit, or would they prefer to station weapons in orbit? There were strong cases for both arguments and everywhere in between.

“It will be my pleasure,” Charles said. He was looking forward to working with the Rhino again, even though he’d never met the other commanding officers. “Shall we go?”

“So you forgot your uniform trousers and one of your bras,” Kurt said. The rook — a pilot who reminded him uncomfortably of Penny — flushed bright red. “You’ll be pleased to know that the supply officer can and will provide, but your salary is deducted one hundred pounds to pay for it.”

The pilot winced as the other rooks sniggered. Kurt felt a flicker of sympathy which he ruthlessly suppressed. Attention to detail was important in flying — a pilot who forgot her uniform one day might forget to check her weapons and flying systems before launch the next. One hundred pounds was steep — the Royal Navy had a very good deal with its suppliers — but it would teach her a lesson. Besides, the remainder would be poured into the squadron R&R fund.

He turned his attention to the next pilot, who’d been snickering uncontrollably. “Perhaps you would like to explain, rook, precisely why you failed to pack both of your shirts?”

The rook stopped laughing. “I…”

“Let me guess,” Kurt said, cutting him off. “You thought you could avoid wearing a shirt and pack something else instead?”

He sighed. The excuse had been popular during his training and probably dated far further back than the human race had been flying in space. But it was still stupid.

“You’ll be charged seventy-five pounds,” Kurt informed him, sternly. “And what did you pack in their place?”

“Nothing,” the rook said. “I…”

Kurt glowered at him, then allowed his voice to become mocking. “You didn’t even manage to smuggle a naughty outfit onboard?”

He moved onto Charles Augustus, who was standing beside his bunk, and checked the terminal. Augustus didn’t seem to have reported anything to the supply officer, which suggested he’d actually managed to pack his bag properly or he’d tried to avoid reporting anything missing in the hopes it would be missed in the inspection. Kurt motioned for the young man to open his bag, then checked everything against the master list. Nothing seemed to be missing, nor was there anything illicit. It was suspiciously perfect.

“You seem to have managed to pack,” Kurt growled. “And how did you do it without being taught?”

“I asked one of the older pilots,” Augustus said. He held Kurt’s eyes without flinching, which was interesting. No matter how confident pilots were, rooks rarely stood up to their superiors. “He taught me how to do it, then warned me to be careful I didn’t miss anything.”

“Good for him,” Kurt said.

He moved on to the next pilot, then the next. Three more were missing essential items, two of them had brought other items of clothing with them, despite being told it was against regulations. He could see the impulse to bring sexy underwear, even though relations between pilots in the same squadrons were strictly forbidden, but what sort of idiot would feel that a complete set of civilian clothes were suitable? They were hardly going to attend a coming-out ball in the heart of London.

“Well,” he said, when the inspection was finally finished. “This doesn’t bode well for the future, does it?”

He allowed himself to glare at the pilots who’d had to request items from the supply officer, then sighed out loud. “You need to learn to pay close attention to detail,” he said. “I suggest, very strongly, that you learn.”

Turning, he marched out of the compartment, leaving Wing Commander Paton to lecture the pilots who’d slipped up, badly. Outside, he met Rose and Commander Amelia Williams, who nodded shortly to him. He wasn’t quite sure what to make of the XO, but she seemed competent and didn’t seem inclined to mess around with his responsibilities. That alone was enough to endear her to him.

“We found only a small amount of illicit goods,” Amelia said. “Either they didn’t have the opportunity to find much at Sin City or they had more sense than we expected.”

“That’s a relief,” Kurt said, as he followed them into a small room. It was also odd. The last time he’d been to Sin City, he’d had to avoid the attentions of hundreds of sellers, all of whom seemed to think he had money to burn. “Anything particularly dangerous?”

“Just this,” Rose said, picking up a headband from the table. “We don’t know who it belonged to.”

Kurt sighed as he took it. The headband directly simulated the pleasure centres in a person’s brain, allowing them to forget their troubles in a wash of orgasmic pleasure. It was definitely safer than drugs, legal or illegal, and it had few physical effects, but the mental addiction could be impossible to break. Once, he’d tried it as a teenager, then thrown it away in horror at just what it had done. A few more doses, he knew, and he would have done anything for another one. The last he’d heard, the girlfriend who had introduced him to the experience had been sent to a mental hospital. She could easily be dead by now.

“We’ll know if someone is addicted soon enough,” he said. Symptoms would appear within a day or so, hopefully before they actually tried to fly a starfighter. It would play merry hell with his training schedule if they had to force everyone to wait until someone either showed signs of withdrawal or nothing happened within two to three days. “Maybe they didn’t have time to become addicted.”

He sighed. The last group of pilots might have included some of the dregs of the service, but at least they hadn’t been complete newcomers.

“We’ll have to hope,” he said. “What else did we find?”

He cast an eye over the small pile. There were several small bottles of alcohol — they’d go into the R&R collection — a small handful of unidentified pills that had to be illicit drugs and a number of datachips. Probably pornography, Kurt decided, and probably something not entirely acceptable in polite company. He picked up the chip, toyed with inspecting it, then dropped it into the disposer. Moments later, the drugs and all of the datachips had been destroyed.

“Check the bottles, then put them in the shared stockpile,” he ordered Rose. “As long as these are the only problems we should be fine.”

“I can’t say I’m impressed,” the XO said. “There should be punishment duties at the very least.”

Kurt eyed her, stung. “Commander,” he said, “these are young and stupid rooks, not experienced pilots. Mistakes — and attempts to parse out the limits of the rules — are fairly standard for them.”

“Between them,” the XO said, “they have been forced to pay out over a thousand pounds, merely to replace items of clothing they forgot to bring. I don’t think it bodes well for discipline.”

The hell of it, Kurt knew, was that he agreed with her. It didn’t bode well for discipline, particularly in the cramped confines of a carrier’s pilot barracks. But, at the same time, he knew that most of the newcomers had barely enough training to get through the intensive course. They’d certainly not been taught anything past piloting, perhaps in the hopes they’d pick it up while on deployment, and it showed. By God, it showed.

“They have only had three months of training, Commander,” he said, carefully. “I believe we will have plenty of time to teach them how to comport themselves as proper crewmen as well as pilots.”

“I hope you’re right,” the XO said. “Have you completed the inspections?”

Kurt nodded, once.

“The Captain wishes to speak with you, as soon as convenient,” the XO said. “I suggest you go now.”

“Yes, Commander,” Kurt said. He’d been in the Navy long enough to know that when the Captain called, you went at once, unless there was a genuinely life-threatening emergency underway. And there wasn’t one now. “I’ll go see him at once.”

James was working his way through yet another set of paperwork when the hatch buzzed, informing him that someone was waiting outside. He hit the switch to open the hatch, then pushed the handful of terminals to one side as Wing Commander Schneider entered the small compartment. The Wing Commander looked tired, even though he’d had several days of leave between his last assignment and the return to Ark Royal. But there was no time to consider the problem now.

“I’m sorry for summoning you,” he said, as he motioned for the CAG to sit down. He was gloomily aware that his voice sounded awkward. “But there is a topic I have to discuss.”

“Yes, sir,” Schneider said, sitting down.

James frowned. The CAG sounded… guilty. Perhaps he thought James was going to blame him for the poor inspection results, particularly as Schneider had been one of the instructors at the Academy. But James had no intention of throwing the blame around so unpleasantly, not when he remembered being a young and stupid graduate himself. He’d had some wild times in Sin City too.

“You have a pilot assigned to your command,” James said, carefully. He wished he could just tell Schneider the truth, but it would make it harder for him to give a honest answer. “I believe you also taught him at the Academy. His name is Charles Augustus.”

Schneider looked puzzled, yet oddly relieved. “Sir?”

“I need to know your impressions of him,” James said. “What do you make of him?”

He cursed, inwardly, as Schneider considered. The CAG was far from stupid — and it was rare for a starship’s commanding officer to take any interest in a single junior crewman, unless the crewman had done something very good or very bad. He would deduce that there was some reason for the interest and do… what? The Royal Navy was generally very good at preventing predators from rising to positions of power, but there had been some failures…

“He’s certainly capable,” Schneider said, finally. “Smart, motivated, rarely makes the same mistake twice… and one of the very few not to forget anything when the rooks were shipped from the Academy to the Old Lady. But he has a chip on his shoulder about something, sir, and I don’t know about what. His file is curiously light.”

James groaned, inwardly. A light file suggested a false name; indeed, a complete false identity. And that meant that people very high up in the Admiralty had signed off on creating the identify for Charles Augustus. It wouldn’t be hard to deduce his true identity from the simple lack of many other prospective candidates.

“I expect you to keep an eye on him,” James said, finally. “But you are not to discuss this with him at all. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, sir,” Schneider said. “Can I discuss it with the Wing Commanders?”

“His, perhaps,” James said. “No one else. No one else at all.”