Adapt and Overcome (The Maxwell Saga) (10 page)

“
Yes, it is. The Group of 100 chartered LMV
Mauritania
to come here. She’s more like an ultra-luxurious private yacht than a liner. Over seventy of them are aboard, many with their wives and children too. They’re treating this as an investment opportunity, their annual general meeting and a holiday, all thrown into one. Their families are spending time sight-seeing on the planet every day, enjoying themselves while the business meetings go on. Most go back aboard at night.”

“Nice, if you can afford it
. All right, show us where to take the shuttles, and we’ll get to work.”

~ ~ ~

Steve led Brooks and Abha into the house. “Abha, I’ve given you the only bedroom with an en-suite bathroom. It’s through there. Brooks and I will share the other bathroom. That’s your bedroom there, buddy.” He nodded towards a door.

“Thanks. I’ll change into civilian clothes,
then I need a cup of coffee.”

“I’ll start it brewing.”

Steve set the coffee-maker going, then changed into a casual shirt, trousers and sandals. He went back into the kitchen just as Abha emerged from her room. She walked over to him and into his arms, hugging him fiercely, resting her head on his chest.

“I’ve missed you,
Abha,” he said softly as he held her gently, stroking her back.

“I’ve missed you too.
What the heck are you doing to me, Steve? I’ve known you less than two months, but I can’t stop thinking about you.”

“I’m glad to hear it.
I have the same problem. Messages via dispatch vessel are all very well, but there’s a lot to be said for having you near me.”

She smiled as she raised her face to his.
They kissed gently.

Brooks coughed gently as he came into the kitchen. They broke their embrace, but he held up a hand and grinned. “Don’t stop on my account! As
Abha’s boss, I ask just one thing. For the love of Mike, don’t do anything in public where others can see you! If you want to hold each other like that, do it in here. You’re just close enough to each other in the chain of command that someone could start yammering about Fleet Regulations.
I
know it’s not a problem, but it would put me between a rock and a hard place if I had to take official notice of it.”

“I’ll be
careful, Brooks,” Steve assured him.

“And I will too,”
Abha agreed.

“Thanks.” Brooks took a mug from a cupboard and poured himself some coffee. “
What’s scheduled for the next couple of days?”

“Nothing much.
I knew you’d want to prepare for Friday morning’s exercise, so I asked Colonel Houmayoun to leave you space and time to get organized and begin assessing the Rolla NCO’s who’ve had preliminary training. Once the exercise is over, I reckon you’ll be in a better position to make your own plans.”

“Sounds good to me.”
He stretched luxuriously. “It’s great to be planetside again. I don’t mind space travel, but the taste and smell of canned air is never as good as the real stuff, and vat-grown orbital rations never seem as tasty as regular food. Speaking of food, what are we having for supper? Are you cooking?” His voice was hopeful.

“If you’re hungry enough – and
only
if you’re hungry enough – I want to introduce you to a steakhouse a few blocks away. They cook in the South American tradition of Old Home Earth; great big skewers of different meats grilled over coals, which they carry from table to table and keep carving onto your plate as long as you’re hungry. It’s like turning on a meat faucet! That’s why I say you’ve got to be hungry. If you’re not, you won’t be able to take full advantage of it.”

Brooks drew himself up haughtily. “I take that as a personal challenge, I’ll have you know!”

Abha grinned. “There’s probably something in Fleet Regulations about it being conduct unbecoming an officer to stuff ourselves until we burst.”

Steve and Brooks spoke as one.
“Spoilsport!”

“Men!”

~ ~ ~

Steve walked slowly from the changing-room, his spacesuit loose against his body, its protective external covering rustling and rubbing against itself as he moved. He held his
plasglass helmet under his left arm. As he entered the brightly-lit hangar his chest panel beeped, confirming that the suit’s self-test routines had found all joints and connections to be spaceworthy.

“Good morning, Sir,” Master Sergeant
Ioannou greeted him, offering a mug of steaming coffee. Despite their powerful artificial muscles and tendons, the fingers of his battle armor held the vessel gently, without crushing it. “This’ll wake you up properly.”

“Thank you, Master Sergeant – although I don’t know what’s ‘good’ about zero-four-hundred on a chilly Friday morning!” Steve accepted the mug gratefully in his gloved hands and sipped it, the hot fluid sending a shiver down his spine to match its progress down his gullet.
“Aah!
I see you make coffee in the finest traditions of the Fleet.”

“That’s right, Sir; thick enough to stand a spoon upright in it, and strong enough to strip paint from the bulkheads.” They grinned at each other.

“Is everyone ready for our dog-and-pony show?”

“Yes, Sir.
I’ve made sure all weapons are fitted with exercise projectors, and no-one’s carrying live ammo. The shuttles are carrying their normal reserve of a unit of fire for half a platoon, of course, but that’s sealed in their lockers – Warrant Officer Labuschagne and I double-checked that. The shuttles are serviced and ready to go. We’ll look our best for the vidcams, Sir.”

Brooks and
Abha joined them, accepting the mugs of coffee Ioannou held out to them. Muttering their thanks, they drank as eagerly as Steve had done moments before. Both were wearing armor, their helmets clipped to their chest harnesses. The bulk of the armor swelled them to more than twice their normal size.

While Brooks spoke with the Master Sergeant, Steve turned to
Abha. “I just can’t get over the strangeness of it, seeing you in that hulking great suit of armor,” he said in a low voice. “I mean, you’re slim, trim and athletic, but in that thing you look absolutely bloated!”

She took another sip of her coffee. “
Maybe, but now I’m ten times stronger, faster and more agile than any unarmored person – including you!” She stuck out her tongue at him, and he laughed.

“Yes. Don’t hit me while you’re in armor, please. I’m on your side, remember!”

Brooks finished talking to Ioannou, and stepped aside while the Master Sergeant called the instructors and their Rolla understudies into formation. Brooks accepted his salute, stood the unit at ease, and looked around at each member as he spoke.

“Good morning, everyone.”
He waited for the chorus of muttered replies to tail off into silence. “We’re about to show the rest of Rolla’s Planetary Self-Defense Force how to conduct an opposed assault. You all know the plan. Just remember, despite the fact that Hill 37 will be ‘defended’ by a company from Rolla’s armored battalion, they’re not really our enemies. Try not to fold, spindle or mutilate any of them! Training them will be easier if they’re still alive!” His sally drew laughter from the Marines and Rolla NCO’s.

Brooks waited for silence. “We didn’t brief you about this earlier, to preserve operational security; but we’re going to climb to low orbit and sneak up on Hill 37 from an unexpected direction. Rolla’s Orbital Control presently requires a Spacer to command or supervise maneuvers outside atmosphere. We’re working to change that policy, because qualified Marines or PSDF personnel should be allowed to do so as well, but that hasn’t yet been implemented. Fortunately, Senior Lieutenant Maxwell is a Spacer
. To keep OrbCon happy, he’ll command our formation during the space portion of our flight. I’ll reassume command for the remainder of the exercise once we descend into atmosphere again. Lieutenant, would you please explain what we’re going to do?”

Steve stepped forward. “Hill 37 is a hundred kilometers north of us. We’re going to head south for about fifty kilometers until we reach the
Garabun Hills, flying low to stay under radar coverage, and using all our active and passive stealth systems. We don’t want the ‘enemy’ to know where we are. When we reach the hills, they’ll dissipate the exhaust noise from our reaction thrusters, making it hard for even sonic detectors to track us. We’ll duck through the valleys for a few clicks, then climb straight up to low orbit, turn around, go over the top of Hill 37 well above the defenders’ detection range, then descend and sneak in behind them. They’ll be expecting us to attack from the south, so we’ll fake ’em out.” There was a buzz of approval from the Marines and Rolla’s NCO’s, and several smiles of anticipation.

Brooks took over again. “Our exercise
callsign will be Outpost, so the shuttles will be Outpost One, Two and Three. Senior Lieutenant Maxwell will command Shuttle One for the first part of our journey, using the callsign Outpost One-One. First Lieutenant Sashna will be with him to command the ground contingent aboard his shuttle once the exercise commences. As my second-in-command, her personal callsign will be Outpost Six-Two. I’ll be in Shuttle Two, personal callsign Outpost Six, as the overall commander of this exercise. Warrant Officer Labuschagne will command Shuttle Three, callsign Outpost Three-One. Master Sergeant Ioannou will be with him. The rest of you already know your exercise callsigns. Make sure your armor’s internal systems have updated their networks accordingly.

“Each Marine instructor has been paired with a Rolla NCO, except for squad commanders. Marines, make sure you don’t charge off into the distance without your partner – they’re supposed to be learning from you, not trying to
locate you!” Laughter. “Rolla personnel, don’t be afraid to ask questions as circumstances allow. It’s not a good idea to do so when you’re under fire, even simulated fire,” – more laughter – “but take advantage of lulls in the action. Any questions?” There were none. “Very well. Assemble at your shuttles in ten minutes.”

Steve headed for his shuttle at once. He sat down at the Weapons Systems Operator’s console, activated it, accessed the traffic download from the Orbital Control Center, and scanned it carefully. There were two ships in known orbits. One was the Fleet depot ship for the destroyers on station. The other was LMV
Mauritania
, the luxury liner chartered by the visitors from the Group of 100. He smiled as he noted its presence. The delegation had dominated the headlines for days, their every move the subject of intense journalistic interest and speculation.

Most members of the Group and their families had chosen to return to
Mauritania
each night, rather than stay in local hotels. The liner had been given permission to ferry them to and from orbit using its own luxury shuttles, rather than forcing them to use the much slower and less comfortable Planetary Elevator. This had aroused resentful reaction from some columnists, clearly supporters of the previous administration, who’d categorized it as ‘elitist privilege’. Nevertheless, Steve understood why those concerned had made that decision. Not only was the liner’s accommodation far more luxurious than anything available on Rolla – for that matter, it was superior to most hotels in the entire settled galaxy – but security could be maintained far more easily aboard ship than planetside. That made eminently good sense for such wealthy individuals, most of whom had brought their own security personnel with them.

Both ships were in powered geostationary orbits on
either side of OrbCon and the Planetary Elevator platform. He noted idly that a third ship, a tramp freighter, was inbound from the system boundary. It would arrive at about the same time that the shuttles began their orbital maneuver, but its assigned orbit would not take it below twenty-five thousand kilometers from the surface. The shuttles wouldn’t exceed five hundred kilometers in altitude, so they wouldn’t have to worry about avoiding it.

He noted that both Fleet destroyers were missing from orbit, as was Rolla’s sole operational corvette. Accessing
OrbCon’s traffic log, he learned that a ship had arrived at the system boundary on the far side of Rolla’s star the previous day. He frowned. That was very unusual. Most ships planned their journey to emerge at the nearest point to their destination on the system boundary. Arriving so far away meant that the visitor would take at least twice as long to reach Rolla under slow intra-system drive.

According to
Orbcon’s daily log, early yesterday evening the new arrival’s drive emissions had suddenly ceased, followed by a radioed distress message requesting immediate assistance. Her transmissions had then ceased. LCS
Danube
, on patrol at the time, had reversed course and gone to full acceleration to reach the visitor, while LCS
Volga
and the corvette had left orbit to do likewise. All the ships were now more than a light-hour distant from Rolla. They had already begun braking, so as to arrive near the last known position of the visiting ship at a speed slow enough to search for and rendezvous with her. They’d have to locate her by radar, because with her gravitic drive and radio not operating, they wouldn’t be able to home on their emissions.

He looked up details of the ship in distress, and frowned again. Her beacon and distress call had been in the name of SS
Davao
, a tramp freighter from New Mindanao. A spaceship of that name was listed in the United Planets register of merchant vessels, but Orbcon’s logs didn’t record it as having previously visited Rolla. No gravitic drive emission signature was on file for the ship in the SPS database.
Why would a merchant spaceship from so far away be coming to a minor planet like this one?
, Steve wondered to himself.
No other ship from New Mindanao has ever visited here.
The distress message had also spoken of ‘passengers’, without specifying how many of them there were – which was why all three warships had gone to her aid, he realized. If there were many souls on board, a warship wouldn’t have enough room in her tightly-packed hull to accommodate them all if an evacuation became necessary.