“It looks like those old ships are flying circles around you boys,” says an Army officer. It is easy for him to talk. His forces aren’t expected to guard open space.
“You cannot possibly expect us to patrol every inch of space,” Don says, now sounding defensive.
“We’ve got a bigger problem than that,” says Smith. “Whatever fleet this is, it has an uncanny awareness of our movements.”
Earthdate: March 16, 2512 A.D. City: Honolulu; Planet: Earth; Galactic Position: Orion Arm The last time I flew into Hawaii, I was a young sergeant in the Marines on leave. I played like a kid, swam in the ocean like a kid, and had a meaningless romance with a girl whom I could only describe as ornamental. Within a month of returning to duty, I landed on Little Man. After seeing the massacre on Little Man, I would never be a boy again. Looking back, I see my stay in Hawaii as the last chapter in my youth.
I did not fly directly from the Dry Docks to Earth. As a Liberator, I was not allowed to enter the Orion Arm and I did not want to take the chance of attracting attention.
Having a self-broadcasting ship allowed me to bypass the broadcast network and Mars security. I broadcasted myself to the “dark side” of the solar system, the spot exactly opposite Mars in its orbit. That left me with nearly one hundred million miles to fly to reach Earth—twenty hours of travel at the Starliner’s top non-atmospheric speed was five million miles per hour.
Even more hours of flying awaited me once I entered Earth’s atmosphere. The Starliner had a top speed of three thousand miles per hour in atmospheric conditions. The Mach 3 speed limit was a convention imposed throughout the Unified Authority.
“Harris, you there?” Ray Freeman’s voice sounded on my mediaLink.
“Yeah. I’m here,” I said. I had been watching the summit and was lost in the politics of it. Hearing Freeman’s voice brought me back to the real world. “Are you in Hawaii yet?”
“Not yet.”
“When you went to Little Man, were you hunting Mogats?” Freeman asked.
“That’s what they told us,” I said. “This about your family?”
“What do you think the Navy will do if they find neo-Baptists there?”
“It’s a valuable planet,” I said. “There aren’t many planets capable of sustaining life without engineering. At the very least they will consider them squatters. How many people are there?”
“About one hundred,” Freeman said.
“That’s tiny. The Navy may not even notice them,” I said.
“They noticed them,” Freeman said. “My father contacted me. He said that they’re sending a carrier to review the situation.”
“Know which one?” I asked.
“The Grant, I think. Does it matter?”
“It might if it’s the Grant. Remember Vince Lee?” Vince was my best friend when I was a Marine. I had not talked with him since going AWOL. “He’s an officer on the Grant.”
“Lee?” Freeman said, not making a connection.
“You tried to kill him once,” I said. “You paid him a few bucks to wear my helmet without telling him there was an assassin looking for me.”
“Yeah,” Freeman said.
“He’s a fair man,” I said. “I’ve met the captain of that ship, too …Pollard. Both good men. They’ll give your father a fair shake. They might tell them to leave, but they won’t be harsh about it. Hell, once they know the colony doesn’t pose a threat, they may choose to ignore it. How long ago did they make contact?”
“A day or two.”
“Well, they won’t get there anytime soon. It takes a long time to travel to Little Man. The nearest broadcast disc is several days away.”
Freeman and I spoke for a few more minutes, then he signed off. I leaned back in my chair to watch more of the summit. I had ninety-five million miles to go, time was on my side.
“The GC Fleet’s movements show an increasing amount of sophistication,” General Smith says as a new set of circles appear on the screen behind him. “In the radar reading from Central Norma, they appear to have been testing their ability to broadcast. That was the first reading that we took. The ships broadcasted in, they remained perfectly still for eight minutes, and they left. From what we can tell, they remained just long enough to generate the power they needed to broadcast out.”
“Eight minutes between broadcasts?” Klyber asks, unconsciously using a voice that is just loud enough to catch everyone’s attention. “That hardly seems possible.”
“Bryce?” Smith asks. “Did you say something?”
“The broadcast generators on those ships should take fifteen minutes to build up enough energy for a broadcast,” Klyber says. He looks and sounds deeply concerned. Seeing this, I wonder how long it takes the Doctrinaire to charge up and broadcast.
“You will recall the intercepted message—‘alterations complete,’” says General Smith. “We believe they have updated their equipment.”
“What’s the problem, Admiral Klyber?” Huang calls. He is sitting directly across from Klyber; now the two officers face each other. “How long does it take the generators on the
Doctrinaire to power up for a broadcast?”
The floor of the summit goes silent. The atmosphere of that great chamber suddenly becomes a vacuum of sound. Bryce Klyber turns his narrow, bony head toward Che Huang. Klyber is a fleet admiral, the highest-ranking man in the Unified Authority Navy, but Admiral Che Huang is the secretary of the Navy and a member of the Joint Chiefs. Klyber has powerful friends on Capitol Hill. Huang has the backing of the Pentagon. Neither man is about to back down.
“The Doctrinaire ?” General Smith asks. Smith clearly has no clue what Huang is talking about.
“Admiral Klyber has been developing a self-broadcasting fighter carrier,” Huang says in a voice that is both arrogant and bored. “Haven’t heard of it, Alex? Don’t feel bad. It’s Klyber’s little secret. He’s been building it with funding from his pals on the Linear Committee.”
“Is that true?” General Smith asks.
If there is one thing that senior officers do not like, it is being left out of the loop. This feeds into their paranoia and leaves them feeling ambushed. Anger and astonishment show on General Alex Smith’s face. Triumph shows on Huang’s.
“Of course it’s true,” says Huang. “This is Bryce Klyber. He has a long record of calling on friends in high places to skirt regulations. This is the same officer who made the Liberator clones …one of which is in this very facility.”
The room remains silent.
“I’m prepared to discuss the Doctrinaire ,” Klyber says. Then he turns to Huang and adds, “And after that, perhaps we should discuss your furtive cloning projects.”
Che Huang turns stark white, but for only a moment, and then he turns blood red. He slams his fist on the table but says nothing.
“May I take the floor?” Klyber asks. Not until General Smith nods and leaves the dais does the well-cultivated Bryce Klyber leave his place at the table. Klyber is urbane, discreet, and circumspect in his approach. Across the table, Huang is so angry he can barely stay in his chair. He fidgets and his hands are clenched into fists.
