Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (29 page)

Wolfe conceded the point with a firm nod. "Turning port, thirty degrees, increasing angle of attack to maximise the normal."

Armour was essentially a wall of metal. British tank commanders in the Second World War had learnt a manoeuvre called "tea time". They would position their forward armour so that incoming fire struck it at an angle. This not only increased the relative thickness of the armour, as incoming fire had more steel to penetrate, but also increased the chance of a ricochet.

The
Washington
was fighting accelerated balls of superheated plasma, but the principle remained the same. Striking the armour at an angle increased the area over which the heat dispersed, allowing it to radiate away faster. The charged hull of the Task Force Resolution cruisers would do the rest.

In theory. In practice, their hull was weakened in many areas and perforated in several. Standard orders for general quarters involved the ship's outer sections to be evacuated as much as possible. They had lost systems, supplies and air, but no people.

Not yet.

The ship tilted on its vertical axis relative to the Toralii. The pattern of fire that struck their ship changed; now it burned their flank, the white-hot streaks of Alliance fire scouring the side of his vessel, leaving long black scorch marks along its surface.

Long black marks were good. It meant the damage was contained to the armour and not the significantly weaker structure below. Still, despite that comforting knowledge, the sight of his beautiful, sleek ship damaged wounded him.

His ship was fighting, and that was the important thing. Battleships were safe in harbours, but that was not what battleships were for.

"The Broadswords are landing, Captain."

"Let me see them. Pronto."

The displays on his console changed, showing the tiny dots of the two surviving Broadswords limping home, red flares drifting from both of them, signals to the landing crew.

Red flares. Crew wounded.

"Commander Wolfe, dispatch additional trauma teams to the hangar bay and prepare to receive casualties."

A third dot joined the two. His display identified it as the Broadsword
Silk Jaguar
, their SAR bird.

"
Washington
actual to Broadsword
Silk Jaguar
. Report status."

A Boston-accented voice filled his headset, one of their few non-Israeli pilots. "
Washington
, this is
Silk Jaguar
. We have sustained moderate damage, but we're going to keep looking for any survivors."

"Found any yet?"

"None, sir." A fierce determination coloured his voice in a way that Anderson respected. "Not yet."

A thought occurred. "
Silk Jaguar
, stand by." He turned to Wolfe. "Commander, what's the status of the
Seth'arak
's stern?"

He checked his instruments. "Still spinning, sir. And still ballistic towards Velsharn."

Thoughts of salvage floated through his head. The ship represented a significant potential for technological gain but simultaneously a risk for the planet below. "Will it strike the colony?"

"No sir, not based on this trajectory. It looks like there will be some debris-fall, but the stern itself will come down somewhere in the northern oceans."

"Good. Who has the best firing solution on the wreckage?"

"We do, sir."

Anderson consulted his readouts then straightened his back. "Excellent. Have a missile volley either knock it out of orbit, or break it up into smaller chunks so they burn up in the atmosphere."

"Very good, sir," said Cole, his face lit up by the green glow of a radar screen. "Be advised, however, that the stern hull of the
Seth'arak
is launching escape pods. I count twelve pods in total, with significant thermal signatures. Thirteen now, sir."

"Lucky thirteen. Order the strike. Have the
Silk Jaguar
take care of any escape pods that are outside the blast radius. They shouldn't be too heavily armoured. The ship's guns should be able to deal with them. Mr. Cole, I want positive confirmation of those escape pods' destruction—I don't want the possibility of any Toralii Alliance making their way to the surface of Velsharn and integrating with the Telvan there."

"Yes sir." Cole began relaying orders to their SAR ship.

It was the right order. He'd kill them, every single last one of them, or they'd come back later with more ships and less arrogance and finish the job. No third option existed. No way could the encounter not end with the total annihilation of one party or the other.

"Belay the missile strike, Mr. Cole." Wolfe stepped closer to Anderson, lowering his voice so only he could hear. "Sir, don't you want to consider—"

"No." Anderson narrowed his eyes. "I am not considering having the
Silk Jaguar
move to the
Seth'arak
and picking up those survivors. In fact, I'm basically thinking the opposite of that."

"Understood. But why not? They might be a valuable source of intelligence—"

"There's nothing the Alliance can tell us that the Telvan can't." Anderson held up his hand to answer Wolfe's unspoken concern. "I understand what you're saying. The potential intelligence gains outweigh the need for revenge. You misunderstand my motives. I value intelligence, Commander, but I value other things, too. Things like communication. I am sending the Toralii a message."

"A message, sir?"

"Just like Robert E. Lee said. It is good that war is so terrible, lest we all become too fond of it. The Toralii Alliance needed to learn that lesson; they needed to lose
and hard. To not just remember the horrors of war but have them thrust in their face, reminded that while enforcing their will with endless victories is pleasant, a single mistake could turn the tables. They need to remember that a man can fight a thousand battles and live, but he need only lose one to die. They need to lose their fondness for blood."

"The correct thing to do, sir, is to capture those Toralii and give them a fair trial."

"How could we do that?" Anderson shook his head. "Find twelve jurors amongst our own? I doubt you could find twelve people who wouldn't want to shoot them themselves. I doubt a Telvan-run trial will be anything other than a foregone conclusion, and the Kel-Voran, well… I'm not sure they have a word in their language that translates to jury trial."

"They're assets," Wolfe argued. "If they prove to be useless, line them up against a wall and shoot them. But if we take the opinion that savagery will be met with savagery, then we risk alienating our Telvan allies. We harden the hearts of the Alliance even further against us. The Telvan were once part of the Alliance, but they split over cultural differences, such as how alien races are treated. Who knows how many other factions within the Alliance think the same way but aren't bold enough to make that leap yet? We just have to show them that we're not the monsters we're made out to be."

Anderson closed his eyes, inhaled, and then opened them again. "I've always valued your council, John. You're talking sense. What would you recommend?"

"Send the
Silk Jaguar
to pick them up. See what we can learn from them. If they're belligerent, gas them and dump the corpses into space. On the off chance they're helpful, they could be useful further down the line." Wolfe leaned in a little closer. "Sir, every option we can give ourselves for the future is worth any amount of petty slaughter. So far, we've been plumb out of options as a rule. I'd like to change that." He moved his head back, adopting a more formal tone and posture. "What are your orders, sir?"

Anderson tumbled an idea in his head, over and over, then touched his headset. "
Silk Jaguar
, this is
Washington
actual. Change of plan."

Operations

TFR
Tehran

Space above Velsharn

Commander Farah Sabeen stared at her instruments as another wave of fire washed over them.

"Hull temperature on the forward section is now at 600 Kelvin, ma'am." Junior Lieutenant Veisi read from a scrolling damage report screen. "The Toralii are shifting fire away from the Telvan, the
Madrid
, and the
Washington
and toward us."

"Toward us?" A cursory examination of her command console illustrated what she already knew to be true. The hull temperature was rising rapidly. If it reached 1,200 Kelvin, the alloy that made up the hull of the
Triumph
class cruisers such as the
Tehran
would break down and liquefy. "Why us?"

"No idea, ma'am. Perhaps they are simply focusing their fire. Two of their cruisers are in flames, and a third is no longer firing. Counting the Telvan, we now outnumber them."

She liked that, even as the rumble of impacting weapons fire all around them intensified. It was a sign of their growing desperation.

"Our hull can't dissipate that kind of energy. So we move. Make heading zero-six-two mark one-one-niner, ahead full, total defensive. Present our bow to them, minimise our profile, move into low orbit, and get behind Velsharn. Use the planet's mass as our shield."

"Commander," said Commander Bagheri, "That will leave the
Beijing
exposed."

So it would. That could not be. The colony had to survive. "Belay that. Remain stationary. Place us between the Alliance fleet and the colony. Lower us into the upper atmosphere. I want to cast our shadow as wide over the colony as possible."

"It won't be possible to protect them from everything," said Bagheri. "The Alliance is too spread out. Some shots will get through."

"It will be enough. Enough to give the people on the surface a fighting chance."

"We will need to present our topside to the Alliance fleet. We will be vulnerable."

"We will," said Sabeen.

"Our hull will not be able to sustain prolonged firepower of that intensity for long."

"It won't."
 

"
Insha'Allah
. This is our fate, then." Bagheri gestured to their helmsmen. "Take us into the upper atmosphere. It'll boost our thermal dissipation profile."

The ship sank into the upper atmosphere as superheated plasma fell all around them. It fell like rain, splattering off their upper superstructure and pounding on the metal hull.

"950 Kelvin, Commander!" Red warning lights flashed on Veisi's console.

"Status report on the Alliance fleet?"

Bagheri touched his console. "The fires on vessels two and four appear to have been extinguished. They're drifting out of formation, and I'm reading a significant amount of debris and escape pods. Hard to tell which is which. Two more vessels are aflame, and over half their fleet have suffered damage of some kind. Sensors are imprecise at this distance, but it appears as though the full Telvan fleet has arrived."

"It's not enough." Sabeen clenched her fist, digging her nails into her palm. "
Insha'Allah
, we need to give the Telvan more time."

"One or two worldshatter blasts and we're done for," said Bagheri. "Why haven't they fired yet?"

Silence reigned in Operations for a brief moment. None could answer that question, until Veisi spoke up. "I think I know why."

"You have answers for me, Lieutenant?"

"Yes, ma'am. I've been tracking the uses of the worldshatter devices. They're primarily spent against the Telvan ships, but they're using a different configuration that we're used to. The Alliance, when they glassed Earth, was using beams with a wide angle—but these ones are narrow, focused. They're designed to puncture through armour. Through ships' hulls."

"Okay," Sabeen said, instinctively glancing up above her as more fire rained down on them. "Get to the point."

"The Alliance was using wide-beams on our ships, but narrow on the Telvan. But they fired a narrow beam at the
Beijing
. Apart from that, though, they've been firing them only at the Telvan. They've fired their weapons, and they did it early. They're down to plasma now." Veisi smiled a wide, triumphant smile. "They didn't save anything. They're afraid of us."

"Good." Sabeen meant it, too. "They should be more afraid before day's out."

"1,075 Kelvin," warned Bagheri. "The upper fore structure cannot take much more of this!"

Then it was time. "Rotate the ship on the lateral axis. Spin us over and present our underside. Time the manoeuvre between volleys if we can."

Veisi's confused look reflected her thoughts. It was a forlorn hope to try to do such a thing. The aliens were firing on weapons free, each ship producing as much directed plasma as they could, and they did not fire in distinct volleys. Their decision would expose the ground teams to fire.

"It will buy them more time," Sabeen said, gritting her teeth as the words escaped. "We cannot protect them further if we are dead."

Veisi touched his console, and the ship began to move as artificial gravity fought with the lingering tendrils of Velsharn's actual pull. The
Tehran
slowly twisted around, upside down.

Tiny streaks of fire raced past them, and Sabeen's heart was in her throat as tiny pinpricks of light flickered below them, ringing the
Beijing
in fire.