Branegate (38 page)

“Maybe,” said Simon, “but not until I send my message to the Bishops on Kratola.”

They were guided to their berths among a dozen other ships hovering near Grand Portal, most of them awaiting clearance for transit to the other side. Most were likely bound for Kratola. The Bishops would soon know their presence, even without a demonstration of power. Simon was certain of that. The word of huge sums offered to portal workers would be overnight headlines. Once on the other side, merchant ships would flash the news of a police force from the colonies blocking the passage of military vessels. The Bishops might disbelieve, or react with force. Simon had come prepared for all of it.

It took three days for tugs to bring in a replacement generator. A little over half a mile in diameter, it looked like an orange bristling with half protruding coins of gold.

Word went out about the demonstration. Traffic was halted, but for the crews it was free time on The Wheel, and a promise of pockets stuffed with gold.

Nobody grumbled.

Three thousand men and women watched viewscreens and looked out the windows of lounges and bars as a strange looking ship moved in close to a generator at the nine o’clock position around Grand Portal. A pimple appeared on the nose of the ship and began to glow bright green, and then a long protuberance could be seen, a long whisker glowing even brighter, and near its end a patch of flickering light in space itself. The patch grew brighter and began to move, growing larger and larger as it headed straight for the generator and struck it. There was a brilliant flash, and the generator was gone. The cats-eye of Grand Portal flickered and rippled, and the clear lane in the middle of it was filled with swirling colors. No sane man would have dared to pilot a craft through it, even the veterans of lifetimes. The turbulence in the transit lane grew for an hour before reaching a steady, boiling state. The effect was even greater than Simon had anticipated, and was explained later when word came back that the generator had reappeared exactly on the other side of Grand Portal. With one side missing a stabilizer, and the other side with excess, the effect had been more than double expectations.

Simon was more than pleased, and sent a message to Anton about the results and also the money arrangements to be made. The Guppies in his flight had brought enough gold for only a down payment on what he’d promised, for he’d not anticipated the magnitude of the bribe. He knew full well that a Guppy would reach Anton before the speed-of-light message did. He planned to dispatch one of them soon.

First, he had to see if the Bishops would react. Things had gone easier than he’d anticipated so far, mostly because Janus was in charge of Grand Portal. No force was ever necessary with that man, as long as there was money to be had.

Grand Portal was closed to traffic for over a week, though a new generator was in place in only four days. When it was turned on, some stability returned, but not all of it. There was a tiny lane only shuttles and pickets could get through. One picket dared it, and a day later total stability was restored when the excess generator on the other side was turned off and removed.

It was the last simple thing that happened for Simon Ziel.

Grand Portal had been stable again for only a day when the picket that had been sent through returned at high speed. And within minutes, Janus called Simon.

“Better move quick to defend yourself, or get out of here, friend. The picket I sent through just got back, and the pilot says there are ten B-class ships bristling with missile pods and railguns on the other side. A couple of them were nearing portal for transit when the picket came through. You only have a few minutes.”

“I warned you about this, Janus.”

“I’d better not lose a single worker,” growled the man.

Simon broke contact, ordered his flight of Guppies into positions along the transit lane coming out of Grand Portal. Plenums were charged, Sniffers and Stingers deployed before they were even in position. There was a clear view down the transit lane, and the faint patch of black at its center. Transit itself took less than a minute, but anything coming through would be visible half that time.

He saw them coming far out, two large ships hurtling along in a line, several small escorts above and below them. The scenario had been discussed. Simon acted not by instinct, but by plan.

“Drop Novas! Target and destroy fighters! Project branegates to center on transit lane! Project!”

The transit lane coming out of Grand Portal exploded in bright green. Two large ships bristling with hull-mounted weapons burst out of Grand Portal and into green glow, from which they did not emerge. Several fighters avoided the branegates, veering out of the transit lane, firing missiles and railguns wildly as they maneuvered. Other fighters disappeared.

“Engage fighters! Wing one, send a Nova through Portal for reconnaissance and return!”

Guppy IV
was rocked by impact or explosion. Fighters and Novas swarmed like insects outside. One missile heading straight for Simon’s canopy was intercepted by another, and exploded, Debris rattled off the nose of the ship, and Stinger whipped wildly for a moment, like an antenna caught in strong wind.

A Nova fled back through Grand Portal, and in seconds a fighter chased after it. Fire flashed as missiles struck small craft, vaporizing them, but in only a few minutes the dogfights were over. Only three small craft remained. All of them were Novas.

“That’s it. We’re closing Grand Portal. Take out generators at one, four and eight o’clock!”

The remaining Novas hovered in the transit lane while the Guppies charged plenums and moved close in to three of the four stabilizing field generators around the edges of Grand Portal. A Nova rushed out of it shortly before they were in position. Simon gave the order to discharge, and there were four bright flashes of green.

Grand Portal boiled in chaos, and suddenly Janus was screaming into Simon’s ear.

“Damn you, damn you, damn you!”

“Just think of the money, Janus,” said Simon, and broke contact with him.

Two Nova craft and their pilots were gone. One Guppy had been damaged by railgun fire, its drop bay open to vacuum, but otherwise fully operational. Simon sent it to find Anton and tell him what had happened, including the financial settlement with Janus and his people. Three Novas went along for the ride in the vacuum of normal and folded space.

Grand Portal was now under Simon’s control. When Janus was calm again he could arrange for three generators to be brought in, and traffic would eventually flow through the brane again. The invasion fleet would have a way to get home, if Simon allowed it, but privately he didn’t want that to happen. Privately, he hoped that the military power of The Bishops would be destroyed by Anton, once and for all, in a place far from him, and the colonies would be left free of their influence forever.

CHAPTER 42

J
ohn Haight did not wait for Gan to attack Galena. He only needed justification for his own attack, and it came soon enough. It was a month after Trae and Myra had sailed off to fight a war near the galactic core.

Rasim still had his spies in place. His embassy had been closed, the staff fled only hours before Khalil’s troops had moved in early morning hours to arrest them. Rasim had declared a formal break in diplomatic relations, and Khalil had retaliated with accusations of espionage and sabotage. Now he’d assembled a drop force of thousands for deployment in several ships to Galena. A highly placed source in the palace indicated an attack was eminent, would be explained publicly not as an occupation, but a return of democracy to Galena.

John intended to take out Khalil’s ships before they could leave the ground, and settle an ancient debt with the man. He was not just a soldier of The Church, now, not just a bodyguard or surrogate father. He was, in every sense, Leonid Zylak, just as Petyr had also been in another life. He was accepted in the role of the man because Meza and the other powers in Zylak Industries knew it was truth. They’d explained his true identity to the pilots who would serve under him. John had met with them, explained their mission was not just to destroy the military of an aggressive, imperialistic planet. It would also wrest power from a zealot whose colleagues had usurped a peaceful government on the home world of all the colonies, and wanted to do the same to Elderon, Galena, Gan and all their neighbors. The pilots cheered, and cheered again when he said he’d be right there with them when they smashed Khalil’s military to a bleeding pulp on the ground.

His force was a single Guppy, and twenty-five Novas. They flew together in normal space without jumps, a journey of two days. John flew in Guppy, a seat reserved for him in engineering, where he could watch and direct action on the ground. He had time to wonder about Trae and his encounter with the invasion fleet, whether or not they could be turned around with a show of force, or would have to be destroyed. The mission to Grand Portal was a holding action, and not likely to spark fighting; Simon only had to show the force he could bring against the portal to shut down commerce. But Trae and Myra could be in real danger.

In the quiet blackness of interplanetary space, John Haight thought of his early days on Kratola, before the time he and the missionary Leonid Zylak had become one person, a time when a young priest simply named John had rooted out and killed zealots of a fringe element seeking to transform The Church into a political force. They wanted to rule the planet in the name of The Source. And a man named Azar Khalil, a high Bishop, had been near the center of it even then.

Khalil was still alive, and now John would finally kill him, if all went according to plan.

With Khalil gone, peace would eventually come to Gan; the people had had a small taste of democracy, and would know how to win it again. But what of Kratola, truly his home world, and now under the thumbs of The Bishops? Even if the invasion fleet were destroyed, nothing would change for the people of Kratola. Their thoughts and lives would still be ruled by a handful of zealots who hid behind the teachings of The Source to keep power.

He was still thinking about this when the blue and green orb of Gan was large in his viewscreen. There was no time to pause, Gan’s scanners were even now sweeping over them. John ordered the Nova fighters to go straight in from a thousand miles out, in two waves of ten and fifteen. With a time interval of only one minute between them, they would first target and destroy all fighter craft on or off the ground, then drop heavy ordinance on the transport ships there. Azar’s palace was a secondary target. So close to the time of intended attack on Galena, the big ships might even now be loading drop troops.

The Nova formations streaked away towards Gan, and were soon glowing spots in its atmosphere. John ordered a test of Guppy’s branegate projection as routine, in case any ships got off ground and managed to get above the atmosphere. Sniffer and Stinger were deployed, and the plenum charged for two minutes. The Nova squadrons were nearing ground when John’s Guppy opened a branegate, and he was trying to watch two screens at once. One of the screens nearly blinded him.

In practice runs with Guppy’s crew, John Haight had seen the projection of several branegates: spectacular, brilliant flashes of rich green, then the characteristic cat’s-eye pattern of a tunnel to another universe. But this time, as the branegate was just forming, a terrible rush of yellow flame spewed out of it. The hull temperature went up so fast that within seconds John could feel heat radiating from the walls. His pilot reacted instinctively, and shut down the gate by cutting off trickle current to Stinger.

“By The Source, what was
that?
”

“Star on the other side, sir,” said the pilot. “We were pulling flaming gas from its atmosphere. I can try again in another spot, but the result will likely be the same for thousands of miles around here.

“Can we use the branegate in that circumstance?”

“Sure can, sir. Just have to be quick about it. We’ve done it before, sir.”

All so routine to the pilot, perhaps, but not to John Haight, and then a sudden thought occurred to him.

It was a sign, a sign from The Source of all wisdom and love, a sign to a soldier of His Church.

He watched the Nova fighters come in low over a large port with a few buildings and a hundred square miles of tarmac. Dozens of small fighter craft were in neat rows there, and tiny, insect specks were pilots scurrying to reach them. Before his eyes, three fighter craft lifted off, only three. Missiles streaked towards them, and they were orange clouds of burning vapor. The view on the screen shuddered from the vibration of railgun fire. Missiles were a criss-cross network of white vapor trails and sudden bursts of flame.

Beyond the fighter craft and far out on the tarmac sat a dozen B-class transports in the process of loading, long lines of troops spiraling out from them and scattering as the Nova attack came in. The view on the screen shuddered again. Flame and smoke belched from the ground below. John switched channels rapidly to follow the action from several aircraft cameras as the Novas swooped low over the field. The first wave had left the grounded fighters a smoking ruin, but four had managed to get off the ground. They chased the attacking Novas without even noticing the incoming second wave, and were shot out of the air before they could acquire targets.

Soldiers scattered, and ran for their lives towards buildings half a mile away. One transport blew, spreading a ring of flaming fuel that caught and incinerated many of them. The first wave moved on towards the palace only a minute away. The presidential banner in gold and blue was flying high on its mast as the front of the building erupted in smoke and flame under railgun fire. First wave nosed up and climbed for home, their ordinance exhausted.

Wave two left no grounded fighter untouched, and destroyed seven of the transports for certain. The tarmac was now covered with billowing clouds of black smoke, and kills could only be verified by fireballs bursting through it. When they reached the palace, the front of the building was blown away, and they emptied their railguns into the interior. Swerving away and preparing to climb, the camera on one Nova caught sight of a shuttle lifting off behind the palace and climbing rapidly upwards. Weapons empty, the pilot had presence of mind to move closer to the shuttle for a look. The shuttle was civilian, but emblazoned on its hull was the blue and gold starburst of Gan’s president.