Indigo Squad (29 page)

“CIC to shuttle,” said the Jotun. “Minimum time to return to hangar?”

“8…”

“Three seconds, sir,” said Finfth.

“7…”

“Do it!”

Enough external sensor feeds were being fed into the screens that wrapped around the CIC that they all saw Finfth slam his Lysander through the morass of Marines on his way back home. Loyal Marines were still trying to get inside. Some of those who had entered the shuttle hadn’t yet secured themselves and were thrown back out into space.

At the same time, the reserve captain opened the hangar door to space. This time, though, she ramped up the charge on the hangar deck so the occupants weren’t blown away again.

“6…” said Dock, his voice faltering. He must be seeing the same pictures and wondering what this meant for him.

No one spoke in CIC. It was heartbreaking to watch good men and women die. Then Indiya’s heart hardened as the shuttle passed through the frozen corpses of the ship’s crew who had been caught unprepared in the hangar when the doors opened to space. There were so many… what had gone wrong?

“5…”

Loobie didn’t need to be told what she should do next; she activated the thrust stations alert. Audio visual and scent alarms would be screaming throughout
Beowulf
for everyone to secure themselves.

“We’re in,” said Finfth.

“4…” Dock’s voice held a tremor.

“Closing hangar doors,” said Loobie.

“What are you going to do, sir?” asked Indiya.

“Me? Nothing,” said the reserve captain.

“3…”

“Time for you humans to decide.”

“2…”

Indiya’s mind was filled with images of the frozen crew out there, stiff-limbed in the void. It felt as if whatever they won out of this, the price had already been paid in blood. Now it was time to collect the tragic reward.

“Enemy lasers firing at full power,” said Loobie. “Targeting starboard beam.”

“Evading,” said Indiya, though she didn’t know why she wasted her breath, unless talking was a way of distracting herself from what she was about to do. She started slewing the ship around so that its stern faced
Themistocles
. By turning her starboard beam away from the rebel ship, the enemy lasers would have to seek new targets on the hull. All sections of the hull were equally well armoured except for the exhaust port of the main engine. The port was as small as could be engineered, but was completely unarmored.

Indiya was dimly aware that the speed at which she was turning around was slamming anyone not yet secured hard against bulkheads. She was breaking bones. But she pushed away any concerns, committed now to the damage control display at the top-right of her screen.

The enemy laser batteries were scoring clawmarks along the side of the ship but the acute angle she was forcing on the enemy meant the claws couldn’t yet catch a hold and rip open the hull.

She watched the impact point of the laser beams creep aft. One of them momentarily flickered in power – must have caught a battlesuit in its path, super-heating the Marine inside until meat and metal exploded.

But that didn’t matter now because the laser beams had reached the heavy shielding around the main engine exhaust. If they reached the exhaust port, it would all be over in an instant.

Indiya couldn’t let that happen. She activated the main engines. Four-g thrust.

Finfth had once proudly explained to Indiya how he thought the zero-point engine worked. If you stripped away the coolant tanks and electrical charging units, the heart of the engine was a dull black box, about two meters in cross-section and four meters long. Unless the ship was bruising the outer atmosphere of a planet, or passing through debris, the engine produced no plumes of flame or exhaust gases. In the visible spectrum there was nothing to see whatsoever.

The miracle that the unassuming black box was quietly performing was to mine minuscule variations in the quantum foam.

The deep void appeared to be empty and lifeless from the macro level of human experience, but dig down to the quantum level and it was a churning foam of random vibrations. It only appeared to be devoid of form because the maelstrom of activity exactly canceled itself out over tiny quantum timescales. The net result was – nothing.
Void.

But the zero-point engine was fast enough to hook into the temporary imbalances, polarizing them to harness only those thrusting in the desired direction – directly away from the engine exhaust port.

Quantum tunneling stitched the foam together to that the engine effectively extended into a cone aft of the ship. The more acceleration required by the pilot, the larger the cone of effect provided by the engine. At
Beowulf’s
maximum acceleration of 18g, the engine cone extended 3000 meters.

What Finfth couldn’t even begin to explain was how the quantum tunneling stitched the cone and the ship together in a momentum continuum, which meant every push mined from the quantum fluctuation added the same momentum to the ship’s forward movement. Each nudge was infinitesimally small, but with a cone extending hundreds of meters out of the engine port, the count of these tiny asymmetries in the fabric of the universe was greater than the number of molecules on every planet in the galaxy.

The result, to the frozen corpse of Chief Petty Officer Deflector, caught inside the engine cone, was a 0.8 meter tunnel bored through her torso and upper thighs. The fleshy wall of the resulting tube flash heated enough to send her head and legs flying apart.

The effect on
Themistocles
was serious from the beginning. The cone extending from
Beowulf’s
engine punched a 0.9 meter tunnel through the ship, igniting the air around the cone instantly.

A few seconds later and
Beowulf
had moved far enough that the cone had widened to extend out to a third of
Themistocles
. What had started as a fire grew into a miniature supernova. For a few seconds,
Themistocles
became the brightest thing in the heavens, before swiftly cooling into a dark cloud of debris.

But by then,
Beowulf
was already far away.

They had won, but no one cheered.

It was time to count the bodies.

With the most urgent casualties already carried off to the medical stations, the wounded survivors lay in the low-g on the deck of the hangar, outnumbered by the broken corpses heaped up against the opposite bulkhead. Arun was administering field aid to a wounded spacer when Loobie’s voice came over the general ship address system, ordering himself, Xin and Springer to the CIC by order of the reserve captain.

Arun finished administering the med-patches before answering his summons, covering most of the distance using his suit to fly alone through the deployment tubes, telling Athena to take care not to knock into anyone.

He wished Xin and Springer were with him. He’d seen both alive and well since the shuttle had returned, but didn’t know where they were now.

“Stand by the main comm station,” the reserve captain ordered him when he arrived in CIC.

Arun looked around. The circular CIC deck held many thrust-hardened stations. Xin and Springer were there too, keeping a healthy distance apart, both shrugging, as clueless as him. Indiya was at one station. At least she was there in the flesh, but her mind seemed lost in shock.

Loobie was the only one to acknowledge him with confidence. From her station she beckoned him with a nod of her head, and he hurried over to stand beside her.

“Leading Spacer Lubricant,” said the reserve captain in her own voice, “open comms with Detroit.”

“Yes, sir.” Loobie adjusted a few controls. “
Beowulf
calling Detroit Base.”

They could all see the comm system status reported in the main viewscreen that wrapped around the circular CIC deck. Comm handshaking reported a connection to Detroit, but there was no reply.

Loobie repeated the hail.

Still nothing.

“Keep going,” urged the reserve captain.

“Why? In case every Marine in Detroit had to duck out to visit the head?
There's no way they would leave the FTL comm station unattended
.

Arun kept his thoughts to himself, and was glad he did a few moments later when a reply came through.

“Beowulf
? This is Detroit,” came a human voice. “What’s your status? Over.”

They all looked to the reserve captain for her reply.

“I’m exhausted,” she said to Arun. “That’s why I summoned you, McEwan. To speak for us.”

Arun felt weak, his limbs shook.
Was this fear, or my destiny taking me over?

“Beowulf
retaken after mutiny,” he said, his voice firming with each word he spoke. “
Themistocles
destroyed. We are currently on course back to Tranquility System.”

“Thank Horden’s frakking danglies. Sorry…” The Marine in Detroit paused. “Oh, I believe you. You’d hardly lie. It’s all gone to drent here. System defense flotillas came out for the rebels, blasted Tranquility’s surface. A plague has wiped out every Jotun. The rebel Marine spearhead was small but backed by overwhelming Hardit numbers. Millions of the ugly monkeys. Beta City is taken. We’re still holding out at Detroit.”

“Sir, we’re six months away from you.”

“Sir? Sir! Have you been breathing thruster fumes? I’m just a frakking dirtball corporal. Sorry, err… sergeant? But, that doesn’t mean it’s hopeless. The warships and rebel Marines have gone out-system, towing the warboats with them. Six months? Yes! Now we know you’re coming… we’ve something to hold out for. Now that we’re only facing the Hardits, just one battalion of Marines could make a real difference.”

Arun said nothing. He couldn’t summon the will.

“What’s your strength?” asked Detroit.

How many? Arun felt cold. They were still counting survivors. Some would never fight again. Some had supported the rebels. His plan had been to remove the rebel leaders and force the rest of the Marines to see reason. Not to slaughter them all.

“I repeat, what is your strength,
Beowulf?
”

“We’ve 68 effectives.” Arun’s guess was good enough. Whether 68 or 78 wouldn’t make the slightest difference in the end.

A long silence came over the comm system. “Did I hear that right? You’re twice squad size? Is that all?”

Anger strengthened Arun’s backbone. That lizard in Detroit was laughing at his comrades. “Corporal,” he said acidly, “we are one enhanced squad, and not just any squad. We’re
Indigo Squad
.”

The corporal laughed. A harsh and hesitant sound that soon grew manic. “You’ve got spirit, pal. I’ll give you that. Shame you’ve nothing to back that up.”

“Even so, corporal, Indigo Squad has been through a lot and survived against impossible odds. We’re coming home. Like it or not.”

“Frakk! You’re not even an NCO are you? How old are you, kid?”

“Eighteen.”

“Figures.” The corporal gave a resigned sigh. “Have a good journey, son.” His dull voice declared that he’d already lost interest. “I’ll be waiting in hell. I expect I’ll meet you there soon after you get back to Tranquility.”

“Corporal, can you tell me current enemy deployment? Corporal?
Corporal?
”

“It’s no good, McEwan,” said Loobie, “Detroit has cut the connection.”

“Well, McEwan?” said the reserve captain, sounding weak as if all the cares of the universe weighed upon her shoulders. “Do we still go to Tranquility System?”

Why was the Jotun asking
him
? Arun had to fight from asking her that.

“Yes, sir,” he said, as calmly as he could.

“Very well,” replied the reserve captain. “Indiya, set course for Tranquility. I hope you live up to your promise, McEwan. You’ve six months to plan a reconquest of a planet with 68 Marines plus whatever help I can provide from my ship and crew. Can you do it?”

Arun didn’t hesitate. “That won’t be a problem, sir.”

A part of him even believed his own words. After all, as Springer kept telling him, he had a destiny to fulfill.

“We need Marine officers,” argued Hecht.

“So you keep saying, corporal,” said Arun. “We’ve no more Jotuns other than the reserve captain and she’s Navy.”

“
She
is also a little old to be running around in a gravity well shooting at things,” said the old Jotun.

Once again uncertainty rippled through the assembly of Marine NCOs, selected Navy crew, and Arun, all of whom had been summoned to meet in the captain’s cabin, a title that felt uncomfortable with the only Jotun on board insisting she would not take the mantle of captain.

To be consulted by a Navy officer was so far out of the Marines’ experience of harmonious protocol that the humans kept clamming up, instinctively waiting for an officer to speak on their behalf. But the reserve captain wasn’t willing to take that role.

“We’ll have to promote someone from Indigo Squad,” said Arun tentatively, checking for a reaction from the reserve captain. She gave none. “Sergeant Gupta is our senior NCO, or are you angling to be the one to set that precedent, Hecht?”

“Lieutenant Commander Wotun has already set that precedent,” said Gupta. “Ensign Fraser McEwan was once a good friend and loyal comrade of mine.”

“Yeah, and look at how well his promotion worked out!” said Hecht. “He’d only been an officer a few seconds before his brother shot him dead.”

“Let’s not fixate on my brother,” said Arun. “The ship’s crew has had human officers for years.”

“Yeah, right,” sneered Hecht. “Don’t make me laugh. Do you know what the Jotuns call this vessel?” He bowed at the reserve captain. “No disrespect intended to you or your crew, sir, but
Beowulf
is a
cardboard ship
. It’s there to puff up the fleet to look bigger than it really is. The White Knights don’t even regard it as a proper warship.”

The Jotun did not deny Hecht’s assertion about cardboard ships. They all knew it was true.

“How the frakk do you know so much about how the White Knights think?” said Majanita. “Come to think of, there’s been a lot of strange activity in your rack of late, Hecht. Have you been engaging in alien research?”