was past saving.
Moments later, it was the turn of the third and last wave of Hammer ships to fire. Their first salvo destroyed Terranova’s six space battle stations. The huge mass, immensely thick armor, and multilayered missile and laser defenses of the stations were no match for an overwhelming flood of hardened fusion warheads detonating in waves until the stations had been irradiated into blackened submission. Terranova stood alone, and only ground- based antiballistic missiles and satellite-mounted lasers were standing in the way of the oncoming Hammer attack.
With Terranova’s space battle stations silenced, the Hammer ships launched a second salvo, their hybrid solid fuel/pinchspace generator engines accelerating the missiles at more than 200 g. Seconds later, thousands of Eaglehawk missiles dropped onto Terranova at more than a million kph. Seconds before they were ripped apart by Terranova’s upper atmosphere, fusion warheads began to explode directly over Terranova’s major cities. Two minutes later a third salvo followed. Two minutes after that, a fourth. Then a fifth. Finally the sixth, seventh, and eighth salvos were on their way, but this time the missiles had been throttled right back to ensure that they could survive entry into Terranova’s atmosphere. These missiles would be ground bursts targeted on every known high- value target on Terranova, starting with Foundation, its capital. A handful of missiles were kept back until the end. Their target was Terranova’s oceans. The missiles plunged deep into the sea before detonating to drive tsunamis into Terranova’s low-lying coasts and columns of ionized, superheated steam high into the air.
Two minutes before they would be locked into Terranova’s gravity well, the Hammer ships, swatting aside the incoming missile and rail-gun attacks with contemptuous ease, jumped.
It had taken less than twenty minutes to destroy an entire planet and most of the ships tasked with its defense. Terranova no longer was habitable by humans or by any other species known to humankind. Now it was a shattered, charred, radioactive ruin of a planet. Its atmosphere was a seething, roiling mass of flame-shot cloud punctured by huge black hammerheads climbing out of the murk into nearspace as ground bursts drove millions of tons of earth and water kilometers into the air.
Terranova was finished.
Leaving the shattered wrecks of their casualties behind, surrounded by swarms of lifepods, the rest of the Hammer ships jumped out of Terranova nearspace. There was a long, long silence as every spacer in the combat information center absorbed the awful sight of Terranova writhing in agony, a planet dying a slow and terrible death. “Holy Mother,” Michael muttered. Even though it was only a simulation, he felt sick.
The soft voice of the AI running the COMEX broke the silence with the pointless observation that the exercise was over.
Flanked on either side by
“How dare you? How dare you humiliate me like that! By God, Fellsworth, I’m going to break you for this; you can depend on it. And I know it’s not only you. I know you had that arrogant, self-serving shit Helfort do the legwork. That makes it a conspiracy, Fellsworth,” she screeched furiously, “a conspiracy against your legally appointed captain. I can put you away for twenty years and that little worm Helfort and the rest of your lickspittle team if I want.”
“Sir-”
The executive officer’s attempt to intervene was stillborn; Constanza cut him off with an angry wave of the arm. “No, Commander Morrissen. I do not want to hear from you. I wouldn’t be surprised to find that you’re part of this.”
She turned back to Fellsworth. “Well, it won’t work. I’m taking formal action against you, Fellsworth. Conspiracy. I’m charging you with conspiracy to mutiny. That’ll do it. You are confined to your cabin. Morrissen, get the provost marshal in here. I want the ship to see this woman in custody. I want them to see what happens to people who conspire against me.”
“Sir!” The executive officer’s voice was thick with protest.
“Be quiet, Morrissen! I won’t tell you again.”
“No, sir, I will not be quiet,” the executive officer replied firmly. “I should not have to remind you that under Fleet regulations I have a duty to speak.”
“Sir!” Commander Pasquale waded into the fray. Constanza’s appalling behavior-her intemperate language, her arrogant disregard for subordinates, her refusal to take counsel-went against everything she believed in. “I must tell you, sir,” she protested, “that you have no choice but to hear Commander Morrissen out. Fleet regu-”
Constanza’s face was a cruelly contorted mask of vicious, uncontrolled anger. “Shut the fuck up, Commander Pasquale, or I’ll have you arrested as well.”
Pasquale could only gape at Constanza in amazement. Captains did not swear at commanders-well, not in front of witnesses at any rate.
The executive officer put his hand on Pasquale’s arm; he shook his head. This was his fight. Morrissen tried again. “Sir, I really must-”
One last thin shred of sanity forced Constanza to take control of herself. “Go on, then. If you must,” she muttered bad-temperedly.
“Sir. I have to tell you you are making a very serious mistake. An officer who does her duty cannot be conspiring to mutiny. Fellsworth was doing her duty, and I will attest to that fact when asked.”
“So will I, sir,” Pasquale interjected.
The executive officer plowed on. He wished Pasquale would stay out of it. A first-shot commander, Pasquale was young, talented, and ambitious. She had a career ahead of her; as for him, he was beginning to be pretty damn sure he did not. “So, under the circumstances, I think-”
Constanza lost it. In seconds, she was incandescent with rage; her voice crackled with uncontrolled fury. “Think! Think? I don’t care what you think, Morrissen. I don’t give a damn what you think.” She paused for a second, noticeably struggling to get her voice under control. “Listen to me, all of you. . ah, wait!”
The door opened to admit Lieutenant Armstrong,
“Armstrong!”
Armstrong, a thin, wiry man with the watchful eyes of a policeman, looked puzzled. Something bad was happening here, that much was obvious, but it was clear he had no idea what. “You wanted me, sir?”
Constanza waved him in. “I do. First, I want you to witness the order I am about to give.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good.” She turned back to look her second in command right in the eye. “Commander Morrissen! I am giving you a direct order to take Lieutenant Commander Fellsworth here into custody pending the completion of investigations into the charges I will be laying against her. She is to be confined to her cabin under close arrest until further notice. Now, Commander, is there any part of that order you did not understand?”
Morrissen shook his head; he knew when he was beaten.
“No, sir. I understand,” he muttered unhappily.
“Good,” Constanza crowed triumphantly. “Now that that’s out of the way, I am also giving you a direct order to take Junior Lieutenant Helfort into close custody. He is to be confined to his cabin under guard until further notice. Now, Commander,” she declared looking right into his eyes. “Did you understand that?”
“I understood the order, sir,” Morrissen replied dejectedly. This was turning into a clusterfuck of serious proportions, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.
“Pleased to hear it. So good of you to comply.” Her voice dripped sarcasm. “Now get on with it. Dismissed!”
Morrissen tried one more time. Pasquale tried one more time. Their protests were to no avail as Armstrong took Fellsworth by the arm and led her out of the captain’s office.
Michael was in the wardroom, deep in the middle of a subdued discussion of the morning’s extraordinary events with Aaron Stone, when a quiet voice interrupted.
“Helfort. Come with me.” It was the provost marshal. The man’s tone was quiet but firm.
“Yes, sir. What’s up?” Michael asked, climbing to his feet.
