Bayley, Barrington J - Novel 10 (10 page)

 
          
"Any chance of regaining contact?"
Archier asked
his DAO. The officer shook his head.

 
          
The
Command Room was now useless, unable to receive the fleet's sensory webwork
that had made combat space possible. "Then we shall have to open the old
bridge," Archier decided. "Let's get up there quick."

 
          
"It
might be a bit of a job getting through," Arctus remarked. "There's a
big party going on on decks thirty to thirty-five."

 
          
'Well,
have the bridge opened ready for our arrival."

 
          
"Excellent
work, Turret Fourteen!" Gruwert exploded suddenly. "They got
him!"

 
          
"Congratulations,"
Archier said absently. He stepped down from the throne and led his half dozen
officers out of the Command Room and to the nearby travelator. Once inside the
capacious compartment they soared up to deck twenty-nine, the site of
Standard Bearer's
old-style bridge,
without difficulty— Archier had been afraid someone would have tampered with
the switches, depositing any unwary transship traveller in the midst of the
celebrations; it was a common trick. On debouching from the travelator,
however, it became evident the party had strayed outside its stated bounds. On
a deck of coloured glass, old-young women danced with extravagantly costumed
young men, forming a vivid, swirling crowd. Strictly speaking their presence
was out of order; this was a working area of the ship, though disused. Varihued
smokes drifted through the air, making Archier feel intoxicated. Someone had
mixed a powerful combination of incenses.

 
          
"Make
way, make way!" Gruwert shouted angrily. "You are obstructing
Imperial security!"

 
          
He
charged into the dancing throng with head bent, coarsely butting people aside.
The others followed through the path he cleared. Archier recalled being invited
to the party himself—as Admiral, he was formally invited to all the more
organised occasions on the flagship—and realized it had been arranged before
the fact of a coming battle became known. Not that it would have made much
difference. A fair proportion of the flagship's population was scarcely aware
of the Fleet's official business. Many might not even have heard yet that
there was a major space battle in progress.

 
          
The
harried, desperate-looking face of a capuchin monkey greeted them at the door
to the bridge.
Archier felt momentary pity, knowing how much
some of the more sensitive animals suffered emotionally at times of stress.
The capuchin pressed a key to the plate of the door, which slid aside. They
hurried in through an opening wide enough to take them all together.

 
          
The
monkey scurried after Archier. "Is the battle lost then, sir?" it
whispered.

 
          
"No, of course not," Archier soothed.
"I'm
sure we are winning, though not as quickly as I would like."

 
          
The
bridge had an old-fashioned appearance, its working area horseshoe-shaped and
lined with waist-high instrument and display boards. Above these were large,
curved vid-windows that served the same purpose, though in a less sophisticated
way, as the pool and the combat space of the Command Room. Archier lost no time
in unlocking the boards. He knew it would take a few minutes to set up a
network parallel to the one he had just lost, by calling up the redundant
communicators. Meantime, the fleet was fighting without overall command.

 
          
The
monkey had forgotten to lock the door behind him. People were coming in, high
on incense. A withered-cheeked girl in a shimmering spectrum dress that
converted infrared to visible tones flung herself on Archier as he stood at his
board, clamping her chin on his shoulder and draping an arm about him. Her
intense perfume engulfed him.

 
          
"Oh,
Admiral, is it true we're having a space battle? That's terrific, isn't it?
Let's see the action, Admiral!"

 
          
As
if he had instantly obeyed her request, the expanse of vid-window over the
board came to life. Outlined large against blackness was the long form of a
ship in glittering silver and gold, not by its natural colour but as a result
of the colour coding the system used to assist human vision. The vessel was a
passenger liner, its outer surface spoiled by crudely emplaced weapons. Because
the vid screen gave the impression of being a direct window onto space, the
enemy ship seemed no more than yards away.

 
          
"Who's
paging this image?" he barked at his FMO, unable, for the moment, to make
sense of the information glyphs on his board.

 
          
"It's
ours,"
she screeched at him.
"Distance, ten light-minutes!"

 
          
With
a start he realized the rebel had crept up on them while he had been making the
transfer from the Command Room. But at that moment the Escorian exploded,
throwing out gouts and sprays in dazzling—and harmonious—colours. The girl
clinging to him
cooed
and
aahed
in his ear, her appreciation
echoed in
wows
and
oohs
by her friends who had also gathered
to watch. Archier had to admit the show was pretty.

 
          
"Well
done Turrets Eight, Fourteen and Twenty-Three," Gruwert grunted.
"They picked him up and fired at will," he explained to Archier.

 
          
"That's
the stuff to give 'em!" the party girl shouted. She giggled, stroking
Archier's neck.

 
          
"Let's
have some more of it!" yelled a swaying young man behind her. "Come'n
see
, everybody!"

 
          
Then,
with shocking unexpectedness, a dull, prolonged roar sounded through the
bridge. It seemed to come from somewhere aft. It was followed by a jarring,
undulatory vibration that made the floor of the bridge oscillate up and down.

 
          
The
Damage Assessment Officer called out from her board.
"Looks
like they had time to get off a missile!"

 
          
"Get
a report."

 
          
It
couldn't be a direct hit or they wouldn't still be here, Archier thought.
Probably the ship's defences had taken out the missile just before it struck,
but had been unable to prevent the warhead from detonating. It must have been
close: blast effects even of a fusion explosion did not travel far in space,
and the force shields would have warded off most of the radiant energy.

 
          
Anxiously
the DAO worked her board. Confirmation of Archier's thoughts appeared quickly
on the vid window above it. Scanning a section of
Standard Bearer's
external hull, it found a gaping ragged hole
through which a tangle of wreckage could be seen. Three decks seemed to have
been affected, seen blurrily through the emergency gel that was preventing the
escape of air.

 
          
'What's
the status of repair work?" Archier asked.

 
          
"At
the start of the current shift, the robot repair teams still hadn't given an
assurance of cooperation, sir," Arctus reminded him quietly. Archier
watched while the window switched to an internal location. They saw an incredible
scene: a gang of repair robots being driven along a broad corridor by enraged
pigs and dogs. The animals had guns strapped to the tops of their heads: one
robot, pausing to turn and protest, fell as a pink-glowing beam struck him
square in the thorax.

 
          
A
general-purpose corridor wagon, overladen with tools, bounced along behind the
yelping, squealing beasts. The DAO cut the scene, glancing to Archier.

 
          
"I
think we can take it repairs are proceeding, Admiral."

 
          
"Now
that's
the stuff to give them,"
Gruwert pronounced. His little eyes swivelled to those who had invaded the
bridge. "Get those layabouts out of here!" he snorted loudly.
"Go on, get out!"

 
          
The
partygoers shuffled uncertainly, the girl stepping back from Archier. They
seemed amazed by the behaviour of the animals on the vid-window. Likewise they
were not accustomed to having a second-class citizen address them so.

 
          
Archier
turned to face them.  "Perhaps you had better leave," he
suggested politely. "We have our hands rather full at the moment."

 
          
"Yes,
of course, Admiral," said a man, somewhat older than the others, after a
pause. "Sorry if we've got in the way."

 
          
He
ushered the others out with placatory motions. At the door he suddenly turned
round with a smile.

 
          
"Good
luck with the battle!" he said brightly.

 
          
The
capuchin monkey closed the door after him. By now the bridge had obtained
contact with the rest of the fleet. On the vid-windows, the current assessment
began to take shape.

 
          
The
combat region had again expanded during the interim when the flagship had been
unable to exercise control. Archier gave the order to contract the perimeter
once more, to give Ten-Fleet the advantage of its gun range. At the same time
he put a stop to the useless headlong flight.

 
          
But as the reports came in it became clear that the Escorians were
already beaten; had, in fact, been doomed from the start to be beaten.
Even with the partial success of their game plan—which had simply been to
prevent Ten-Fleet from employing any fanciful tactics—even when fighting ship
on ship or in small groups, even in the most favourable circumstances they
could find, the terrible Imperial guns, the sheer size and power of the
front-line-o'-warships that had emerged long ago out of Diadem, had taken their
toll on them. They had been wiped out by the score. And now, as Ten-Fleet began
yet again to gather itself together and take up one of the many geometrical
dispositions outlined in the manuals, the opposition's will to continue the
conflict broke. It must have become clear to the Escorian commanders that they
faced annihilation: those ships remaining—less than a third of the original
force, many of them battered or even crippled—received the order to flee. They
began to edge away from the area; then, like an exploding starburst, sped in
all directions.

 
          
Archier
put out a call;
pursue.
All surviving
rebels were to be hunted down and destroyed, unless they managed to surrender
first. In any case, it would now be necessary to distribute his ships all over
Escoria. There was the final stage of putting down rebellion to be dealt with.

 
          
Besides
which, he had an unfulfilled instruction: to find out about the weapon
prophesied by Oracle. Possibly the rebels' unexpected possession of feetol
cannon was what Oracle referred to ... but his duty remained to investigate the
matter exhaustively.

 
          
He
sighed. There was much
work ahead.
And
while Gruwert snuffled and squealed in exultation, the humans of the command
staff were subdued, as were the captains of other units that were appearing
briefly on the new network.

 
          
For
his Damage Assessment Officer was now collating the losses Ten-Fleet had
suffered. And they were heavy. Over a quarter of Archier's ships were gone, and
thirty more reported damage varying from superficial to serious.

 
          
The
Empire would not long sustain losses like these, he realized. Dolefully he
listened to the list of names the officer read out to him. Each of them was
like hearing of the death of a friend; but one gave him particular pause.

 
          
"What
was that again?" he queried.

 
          
"Lilac
Willow
,
sir.
She took a direct hit in the seventh minute. The rebel responsible was
subsequently destroyed."