Drake’s Drum

(Ark Royal, Book XVII)

Christopher G. Nuttall

Book One: Ark Royal
Book Two: The Nelson Touch
Book Three: The Trafalgar Gambit
Book Four: Warspite
Book Five: A Savage War of Peace
Book Six: A Small Colonial War
Book Seven: Vanguard
Book Eight: Fear God And Dread Naught
Book Nine: We Lead
Book Ten: The Longest Day
Book Eleven: The Cruel Stars
Book Twelve: Invincible
Book Thirteen: Para Bellum
Book Fourteen: The Right of the Line
Book Fifteen: The Lion and the Unicorn
Book Sixteen: Fighting For The Crown
Book Seventeen: Drake’s Drum

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Cover by Justin Adams

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Cover Blurb

Humanity is on the ropes.  Despite military victories, the sheer grinding power of the alien virus is taking its toll.  The space navies are pushed to the limit, the colony worlds are fighting a desperate war against the infected, the economy is on the brink of utter collapse and Earth herself has come under attack.  But there is one ray of hope.  If a small force can penetrate to the heart of the alien empire and tear it apart, it might just win humanity enough time to save itself and win the war once and for all.

Captain Thomas Hammond of HMS Lion and Captain Mitch Campbell of HMS Unicorn were never friends, even before a very personal betrayal ripped them apart and turned them into enemies.  But now, pitted against an overwhelming foe, they must work together to save the human race ...

... Or their ships and crews will merely be the first of many to die.

Prologue

From: Admiral Paul Mason, Director of Alpha Black, Special Projects
To: Admiral Susan Onarina, CO Operation Lightning Strike

Susan,

Since your return to Earth after the successful completion of Operation Lightning Strike, my department has been studying the alien artefacts retrieved from Target One.  I say studying,  but the blunt truth is that we have drawn a blank.  The artefacts are apparently beyond our current level of understanding, to the point we have been unable to identify the materials used to construct them or to determine precisely how the field they generate affects either infected zombies or uninfected humans.  In desperation, we consulted with Tadpole and Fox specialists and they drew a blank too. The only detail we learned through their involvement was confirmation of our theory that the artefacts affect both intelligent races and their mechanical servants.   

Certain things can be said with a great deal of certainty.  To us, and other uninfected races, the artefacts are almost unfathomable.  They appear to be something strange, almost mythical; a handful of my team noted that the artefacts felt like something put together by a god, something that honestly does not belong on our plane of existence.  Other, more sober, specialists believe the effect to be artificially generated, in much the same way modulated sounds have been used to shape emotions and, in some cases, encourage or discourage certain types of behaviour.  The apparent application of the field to all known races is curious, given the differences between them, but a confirmed fact.  A handful of my researchers have even speculated that the artefacts are actively monitoring their surroundings, then tuning their field to influence newcomers as they enter their sphere of influence.  We have been unable to determine if this is actually true and, if so, if the artefacts are intelligent - in some sense - or simply operating under a preset program.  Our belief is that the field is designed to make it difficult for anyone to study the artefacts.

The effects on the infected, however, are very different.  We took the risk of inserting an infected zombie into the artefact chamber and the results were dramatic.  The viral matter within the host’s brain went, for want of a better word, comatose.  There was no sign of recovery until we removed the zombie from the sphere of influence, at which point the virus appeared to retake control.  Further research proved that we could flush the virus out of the victim’s system while it was comatose, although it was extremely difficult to save the victim afterwards.  We tested the artefacts on four zombies, all in Level IV or Level V stages of infection, and only one survived and regained his independence.  Two more died when we tried to flush the virus; the third was apparently too heavily infected to survive without the virus.  Our preliminary analysis suggests that the virus had simply destroyed too much of the host’s brain tissue.  Further investigation is underway, hampered by the condition of the body.  I’ll keep you updated.

Our belief is that the artefacts, positioned as they were on an infected world, effectively numbed the virus’s nervous system.  The virus should have been aware of their presence, as we would become aware of a needle being stuck in our flesh, but the artefacts might have produced an anaesthetic-style effect.  There was certainly no move to remove or destroy the artefacts from a distance, which should have been well within the virus’s capabilities.  We are uncertain, as yet, what it would actually take to destroy the artefacts, but the virus should have been able to hit them with KEWs or nukes.  We do not believe it tried.

Unfortunately, while the existence of the artefacts has many interesting implications for the future, we fear they may be of little immediate help.  The field they produce is very limited in range and we have been unable, so far, to determine how to take control.  Nor have we been able to duplicate the effect.  We are still working on the problem, and we have come up with some very interesting theories, but it may be decades - at best - before we have a practical breakthrough that leads to workable hardware.  The artefacts do not represent a silver bullet, I’m afraid, and it is imperative you bring this to the attention of the PM and government ministers.  (I have tried, but you know how little attention they pay to us boffins.)  We know very little about the artefacts and their builders.  We do not know where they live, nor their motives.  The idea they may be willing to help us is tempting, but little more than wishful thinking.  We cannot rely on it.

Therefore, as you have suggested, we must turn our attention to Operation Footfall.  It is my belief that, in the aftermath of Operation Lightning Strike, we have rocked the virus back on its heels.  I cannot believe, even with its warped (by our standards) economic and technical base, that losing the catapults, and then a handful heavily-industrialised worlds, did not hurt.  It may take the virus some time to notice, given its nature, but notice it will.  I believe that you are correct to say that we have a window of opportunity to put the boot in, before the virus rebalances itself and resumes the offensive.  We may not have a better opportunity to win the war, or at least secure the uninfected worlds and deny the virus the chance to spread any further.  

Accordingly, it is my very strong feeling that Operation Footfall should be launched as soon as possible.

Chapter One

Captain - Lord - Thomas Hammond prided himself on being calm and composed, whatever the situation.  It was a trait that had served him well throughout the years, as he joined the navy and commenced his slow yet steady climb towards flag rank.  He knew, given his birth and family connections, that he would become an admiral - inevitably - unless he screwed up so badly that even his family’s wealth and power were unable to keep the story from breaking into the media.  It had birthed a sense of patience that had made him calm and reliable, a safe pair of hands for the Royal Navy’s largest starships.  He knew he wasn’t flashy - he knew he wasn’t bold enough to stake everything on one throw of the dice - but it didn’t matter.  It wasn’t his job to take risks, merely to do his duty.

His calm fled as he stepped into his wife’s bedroom and stared.  She was on the bed, naked, with ... his thoughts seemed to slam to a complete stop as he spied Captain Mitch Campbell beside her.  No, inside her.  The sight was so ... so staggeringly insane that it was almost impossible to convince himself that what he saw was real.  Charlotte was an aristocrat, married to a naval officer ... she knew the sort of social opprobrium she could expect for betraying her husband, as well as her family.  Thomas knew their marriage hadn’t been the same over the last few years, as the stresses and strains of constant war and endless naval deployments had ground them both down, but ... he’d never expected her to find a lover.  Not like this.  To be caught in bed with her lover, in the family mansion, with a party going on below ...

“Get out!”  Charlotte’s voice rose, in anger and embarrassment.  “Get out!”

Thomas felt his face grow hot.  He’d never cheated on her.  He’d never ... and with a junior officer, with a man who was - technically - under Thomas’s command?  Red rage flared through him.  He was going to be a laughingstock.  He was going to be ... he clenched his fists, thinking of his daughters.  Their prospects were about to hit rock bottom because their mother couldn’t keep her ... he cut that thought off before it went any further, reaching desperately for his legendary calm.  He expected surprises on the bridge of a starship, from orders from home that made no sense to enemy starships materialising out of nowhere and opening fire before his ship had even registered their presence, but here ...?  He’d expected life to go on as it always had, in the centuries between the Troubles and the Third Interstellar War.  He had never thought ...

He clenched his fists.  It had been a long time since he’d fought hand-to-hand - he’d taken the required courses at the academy and then dropped it as soon as he could - but he wanted to smash Captain Campbell in the face.  How dare he?  How dare he?  Thomas’s thoughts ran in mad circles.  God!  He’d known the younger man was reckless, to the point Captain Campbell had buzzed an infected world purely for the hell of it, but he’d never dreamed the man would sleep with his wife!  Or that ... 

Thomas’s thoughts grew darker.  Sleeping with Charlotte was one thing, but doing it so publicly was quite another.  The cream of the cream were gathered downstairs, eating Thomas’s food and drinking Thomas’s wine.  It was just a matter of time before the tabloids broke the story.  His family had enough enemies to make damn sure of it.

Captain Campbell sat up, clearly bracing himself.  Thomas glared at him, too angry to feel intimidated.  The younger man had grown up on the wrong side of the tracks - his academic record was a mixture of genuine achievements and countless disciplinary reports - and he was one of the navy’s foremost unarmed combat experts ... Thomas wondered, with a flicker of bitter amusement, if Captain Campbell realised how badly he’d fucked up his career.  It was quite possible he hadn’t been thinking at all.  Campbell didn’t seem to give much of a damn about the future.  It was why the Royal Navy had never trusted him with a ship it couldn’t afford to lose.

Charlotte held up a hand.  “Thomas, I ...”

“Don’t hurt her,” Captain Campbell said.  “It was ...”

“Shut up.”  Thomas slapped the caller on the wall, ignoring his wife’s gasp of horror.  “Just ... shut up!”

The butler materialised behind him.  “My Lord?”

Thomas almost smiled at the man’s dry tones.  The butler had worked for Thomas - and his father before him - for decades, long enough to have seen everything.  He was loyal to the family ... Thomas cursed under his breath as it dawned on him that the remainder of the servants might be more loyal to Charlotte than himself.  It was Charlotte who’d run the household, supervising the staff even as she tended the family’s interests and business holdings.  And some of them had to have known what was going on.  The maids might have said something - would have said something - if they’d thought Charlotte hadn’t wanted it.  Paranoia washed through him.  If his wife had cheated on him once, so blatantly that there was no way word wasn’t going to get out, had she cheated on him a dozen times?  A hundred?  A thousand?  His heart sank.  She could have gotten away with a great deal, as long as she was discreet.  The staff knew who signed their payslips.  They’d keep their mouths firmly closed.

If only because they’d never be able to find another job if they were dismissed for talking to the gossipmongers, he thought.  No one would hire someone known for telling tales out of school.

“Escort Captain Campbell to his bedroom, see that he gets dressed and then evict him from the grounds,” Thomas ordered.  The nasty part of his mind was tempted to insist that Campbell be thrown out stark naked, but it would just make matters worse.  The mansion was quite some distance from the nearest town.  Campbell would have to use his wristcom to call a taxi and then ... Thomas didn’t give a damn.  The younger man could probably find a hotel or simply drive straight to the nearest spaceport.  “Now!”

“You can’t,” Charlotte said.  She clutched a pillow to her chest.  “Thomas ...”

“Escort him out,” Thomas ordered, ignoring his wife.  “And then go tell the guests the party is over.”

“Thomas,” Charlotte said.  “If you send them away ...”

“Shut up,” Thomas growled.  Charlotte had pulled out all the stops for the party, inviting guests from all over the country ... including some names who would not, normally, have been caught dead in the mansion.  She’d gone to all that trouble, striking deals with the rest of polite society, and then betrayed him?  She’d betrayed herself!  “Shut up!”  

The butler beckoned to Captain Campbell, who stood and marched out of the room with all the dignity he could muster.  Thomas would have laughed, if the situation hadn’t been so dire.  A naked man could hardly muster any dignity ... ice washed through him as he realised Charlotte had assigned Captain Campbell to a bedroom very close to her own, close enough to allow them to slip into each other’s room in the middle of the night.  How long had they been sleeping together?  They hadn’t even known each other for more than a year, perhaps ... they’d first met when he’d invited Captain Campbell to the mansion, after their first joint operation.  Or had they known each other for much longer?  Had they been laughing at him all along?  Thomas ground his teeth in fury.  He could have taken it calmly, he thought, if they’d been discreet.  It wouldn’t have been that hard.

He closed the door, hoping and praying the servants had the sense to get well clear of the bedroom.  They’d be heading downstairs, telling the guests the party had come to a sudden end ... it was going to be the talk of polite society, he knew, and not for a good reason.  The last time a party had been terminated, it had been when the Tadpoles attacked Earth.  And he’d been told that other parties had just gone on and on, even when the rocks were falling and thousands of people were dying.

His fists clenched, again.  Charlotte had betrayed him, betrayed their daughters, betrayed their entire family and their network of allies and clients ... he forced himself, carefully, to unclench his fists.  He couldn’t afford to give in to his anger, not now.  And yet, he needed answers.  He just wasn’t sure he wanted to hear them.

“Why?”  Thomas could hear his voice shake.  “Why ...?”

The words seemed to stick in his throat.  Why did you betray me?  Why did you betray me with him?  Why did you do it in such a public place?  Why ...?

Charlotte stood and glared.  “Because I was sick of staying here.”

Thomas stared.  “You were sick of staying here?”

“I have been your wife for an eternity,” Charlotte snapped.  He heard a wealth of pain and long-buried resentments in her voice.  “You left me behind, managing the estate, while you tended to your career.  You had a life of your own, while I raised your children and handled your estate ...”

“Our children,” Thomas replied.  A sudden flash of paranoia ran through him.  His daughters ... were they his?  Everyone said his girls had his eyes, but ... that could be just wishful thinking.  Elizabeth and Lucille had always taken more after Charlotte than himself.  He’d thought that was because they were girls, but ... what if they weren’t his?  What if ... he wanted to know and he didn’t want to and ... raw anger surged through him.  How could he trust her, ever again?  “And this is our estate.”

“No, it isn’t,” Charlotte corrected.  “It is your estate, held in trust for the girls.  I’m just a glorified manager.”

She leaned forward, dark eyes burning with unshed tears.  “I don’t ask for much, do I?  I just wanted you there, being ... being part of my life.  Instead, you just walked in and out of the mansion as if you ... as if you didn’t give a damn about me.”

Thomas glared back at her.  “You’re the one who wanted separate bedrooms,” he snarled.  “How many armies of lovers have you brought to this house?  How many?”

Charlotte flinched, as if he’d hit her.  “Just him.”

“Why him?”  Thomas heard his voice shake and gritted his teeth.  “Why him?”

It was hard to resist the impulse to grab Charlotte and shake her.  He knew Charlotte was about as civilian as they came, but even she - surely - should have understood the problem.  God knew there were countless soap operas where military wives lost everything through cheating on their husbands.  The government pumped them out constantly, hiring hack writers and worse actors to ram the point home time and time again.  Perhaps the propaganda had backfired.  It wouldn’t be the first time telling someone not to do something had encouraged them to do it.  There’d been no shortage of examples in his schooling and naval career of people breaking rules merely because they were there.

“Because he was there,” Charlotte said, echoing his thoughts.  “And because he’s everything you’re not.  Brave and bold and exciting and ...”

“And what?”  Thomas forced himself to take a step back.  It wasn’t easy.  “Do you think he can give you ... what?  Happiness?  A life of ... of what?”

He stared at her, trying to understand her thinking.  Captain Campbell had once told Thomas, a few months ago, that he was blind to his privilege, but it wasn’t true.  Thomas knew how lucky he’d been to be born into an aristocracy with real power.  He knew his path from birth to a command chair on a starship’s bridge, where every child wanted to be, had been smoothed by his family.  And Charlotte had been lucky, too.  She’d had the best of education, the best of opportunities ... she’d chosen to marry him, knowing that she’d be moving to his family estate and helping run the family.  She’d been good at it.  She had no reason to feel discontented.  She could even have had a discreet affair ...

... And yet, she’d set out to deliberately hurt him.

It was hard to keep his churning thoughts under control.  She’d had an affair ... but she’d been so indiscreet that the entire world would know the truth.  She was looking social death in the face.  She was ... he couldn’t believe it had been an accident.  Making love to Captain Campbell in the middle of a party, a gathering she’d planned, a gathering she was expected to coordinate ... she was mad.  She had to be.  She might as well have detonated a nuke under the family’s prospects.  Thomas knew, with a certainty that could not be denied, that word was already flashing through the datanet.  His enemies would make sure of it.  Of course they would.  And they’d gloat his wife had humiliated him in front of both his naval and aristocratic superiors.

“You could have done it in private,” he said.  His anger faded, to be replaced by a numbness that made it hard to think.  “You could have ...”

Charlotte crossed her arms under her breasts.  “What do you care?”

Thomas found himself lost for words.  It was the family.  It was their daughters.  It was a career and a life, and a position in society ... it was everything.  They were all at risk, thanks to Charlotte’s actions.  And ... he wanted to believe she was crazy, that it was a moment of insanity ... he needed to believe.  It was impossible.  It was ...

“I care about our life,” Thomas said weakly.  “And about the world ...”

“You don’t care about me,” Charlotte said.  “Or our children.  You just care about your career.”

Thomas was too tired to feel angry.  “You knew you were marrying a naval officer,” he said, numbness spreading through his mind.  Too much had happened, too quickly.  “You knew what it would mean for our life together.”

“Together?”  Charlotte snorted.  “How often have we been together in twenty-four years of marriage?”

She went on before Thomas could think of an answer.  “I have sacrificed my life, for yours.  I have given up all hope of a career of my own, to run your family interests.  I have placed the interests of my family - and yours - ahead of my own, to the point I agreed to a match I didn’t particularly want just to please the old biddies who think blood and breeding is so much more important than anything else.  I have given birth to two children and supervised every aspect of their lives, from supporting their schooling to fighting for them when they needed me to drop everything and help and ...”

The resentment in her voice was almost palpable.  “And what have I gotten out of it?  Nothing!”

“You have a life far beyond the ordinary,” Thomas pointed out.  He waved at the nearest wall, covered in paintings of distant ancestors.  “Do you think Captain Campbell’s sister” - he couldn’t remember if the bastard had a sister, but the point stood - “wouldn’t swap places with you in a heartbeat?”

Charlotte ignored him.  “I have served you faithfully ever since we got married,” she said, coldly.  “The children are adults now.  I want a life of my own.”

Thomas found himself lost for words.  If she’d wanted a divorce ... it wasn’t that uncommon, when children reached adulthood.  Charlotte had had the very best of medical care, along with everything else.  She was looking at another fifty years of reasonable health, barring accidents.  He wouldn’t have begrudged her a separation, if she’d wanted to go.  He wouldn’t have tried to keep her on the estate.  God knew, they’d planned for his career to end when he reached flag rank ...

She stood and reached for her clothes.  “I’m leaving,” she said.  “Don’t try to stop me.”

Thomas sat on the bed, his thoughts churning.  Charlotte wasn’t penniless.  She had a dowry as well as a salary, paid to her personally as part of a tax rationalisation scheme.  He assumed she had savings, although he wasn’t entirely sure it was true.  She’d certainly crammed her bedroom and adjoining chambers with expensive coats, handbags and jewellery.  Her relatives might try to cut her off from the trust fund, when they realised what had happened, but ... Thomas didn’t think they’d succeed.  There’d be too much opposition from everyone with the sense to realise just what sort of precedent they’d set for the rest of the aristocracy.  

His heart sank as he watched Charlotte zipping up her fur coat.  She looked like a stranger, not the woman he’d married.  Pain gnawed, deep inside; pain and anger at the betrayal.  She could have talked to him.  She could have made a life for herself, if she’d been discreet.  No one would have cared, if she’d been ... he shook his head.  He knew, without having to check, that the guests were already wittering to their relatives.  The news would be all the way around the world before breakfast.  He said nothing as Charlotte pressed the buzzer, ordering the servants to bring the car around to the main entrance.  He could have cancelled the order, but ... what would have been the point?

Charlotte didn’t even look at him as she stalked out.  Thomas felt a flicker of anger, mingled with a bitter numbness.  Too much had changed, too quickly, for him to feel much of anything.  And yet ...he wanted to scream and shout and lash out at Captain Campbell for seducing his wife.  Thomas couldn’t believe the younger man was innocent.  He should have had the sense to say no.

Bastard, Thomas thought.  What the hell were you thinking?

Chapter Two

Captain Mitch Campbell knew, without false modesty, that he was brave and bold and willing to risk his life - and everything else - on one throw of the dice.  His childhood had taught him there was nothing to be gained by waiting, that patience was not always a virtue.  He’d grown up in a place where everything could be taken from you in the blink of an eye, where seizing every opportunity that came your way was pretty much the order of the day.  The idea of waiting one’s turn was absurd.  One’s turn would never come unless one reached for it.

His heart was still pounding as the taxi carried him towards the nearest town, a dear little place that he’d seen in passing when he’d been driven to the mansion.  It looked like a town from three centuries ago, the halcyon days when Britain ruled the waves and the sun never set on the British Empire.  And, like those days, it was a veneer that masked an ugly reality.  They might be held up as long-gone wonderlands, before liberals and socialists and weak-chinned men had ruined everything, but Mitch knew better.  The British Empire had rested on the exploitation of the subject races, eating its own seed corn instead of thinking about the future; the modern-day town had been designed to follow a pattern, rather than developing naturally into a genuine settlement.  He wondered, as the taxi passed into the town and stopped in front of the hotel, if it was little more than a giant theme park.  Victorian and Edwardian nostalgia had been part of the post-Troubles world for far too long.

He paid the taxi driver, then walked into the hotel and pressed his military ID against the scanner.  The average hotel chain would make room for a military officer or, if it couldn’t clear space for him, find another room somewhere in the town.  Mitch didn’t really care, as long as it was somewhere he could sleep.  It had been a long day, even before Captain Hammond had caught Mitch in bed with his wife.  He suppressed an urge to giggle as the machine bleeped, an urge that would probably land him in more trouble.  Sleeping with a superior officer’s wife was probably a court-martial offense.  If it wasn’t, it soon would be.

His feet ached as he made his way up the stairs and down the corridor to the room.  The hotel was surprisingly automated, given its location.  There would be maids and a bellhop, unless he was mistaken, but they wouldn’t show themselves until morning.  He pushed open the door and stepped into the room, looking around with relief.  It was small and snug, but he’d slept in worse places.  He dumped his bag on the bed, silently congratulating himself for not bringing more than a simple knapsack.  Captain Hammond had promised him he’d be able to source whatever he needed at the mansion.

And you slept with his wife, Mitch reminded himself.  He didn’t like you before.  What do you think he’ll think of you now?

The thought mocked him as he undressed and stepped into the shower.  It was hard not to feel a twinge of guilt for leaving Charlotte with her husband, even though he knew there’d been no choice.  There was no way he could have picked a fight with the butler, not without making things far too easy for Captain Hammond.  The man could have pressed assault charges ... no, he could have had the manservants take Mitch into custody and hold him until the police arrived.  The fix would have been in, well before Mitch posted bail.  Leaving had been the only logical option.  And yet, he’d had to leave Charlotte behind.  He cursed under his breath, torn between anger and a certain awareness it had been his fault.  He hadn’t had to let her seduce him.  He should have known it would end badly.

He closed his eyes as water sluiced over his body, washing away the signs of their lovemaking.  It hadn’t been the first time he’d been caught in a compromising position - he’d spent most of his free time since puberty trying to get laid - but it was certainly the most outrageous.  An angry father or brother was nothing compared to a cuckolded husband, a husband tied to the most powerful families in the land.  Mitch scowled as he scrubbed himself down, all too aware he would have to fight or lose everything.  And yet, he didn’t know how to fight.  Captain Hammond was probably already calling the Admiralty, loudly demanding Mitch be reassigned to an asteroid mining complex in the middle of nowhere.  The Royal Navy wasn’t short on dead-end postings to send officers who couldn’t be summarily dismissed ...

Fuck, Mitch thought.  He clenched his fists as he turned off the water, then dried himself with a towel.  What the fuck do I do now?

He wrapped the towel around himself, stepped back into the bedroom and stopped.  Dead.  Charlotte was sitting on the bed, waiting for him.  She wore a long fur coat that probably cost as much as a gunboat, perhaps more.  A pair of heavy bags sat by the door.  Mitch stared at her, awareness coming in fits and starts.  He’d never really expected to see her again, not after they’d been caught.  Captain Hammond would have all the excuse he needed to seek a divorce.  Cheating on one’s husband was bad under any circumstances, but cheating on a serving officer was the worst ...

“Mitch.”  Charlotte smiled at him.  “It’s good to see you again.”

Mitch gaped at her.  “How did you ...?”

“Find you?”  Charlotte smiled.  “It wasn’t that hard.  You used your military ID to book the room.  I had no trouble tracing it.”

“Right,” Mitch repeated.  “No trouble.”

He stared.  Charlotte had never been his usual type - she was older, for a start, with a body that suggested she was permanently on the verge of letting herself go.  Normally, he admitted in the privacy of his own mind, he would never have paid more than a second’s attention to her.  And yet, there was something about her that called to him.  She was a confident woman, in touch with her own sexuality ... someone who knew what she wanted and was willing to do whatever she had to do to get it.  She’d made the first move.  Mitch acknowledged to himself, if no one else, that it was one hell of a turn-on.

And yet, she’d followed him.

“What?”  He swallowed and started again.  “What happened?  I mean ... what happened after I left?”

“Thomas and I exchanged harsh words,” Charlotte said.  “A lot of old resentments came bubbling up.  We ... snapped and snarled at each other.  We ... eventually, I left.  I came to find you.”

Mitch nodded, torn between a certain pleasure she’d come to him and a gnawing fear his life was about to turn upside down.  Charlotte had cheated on her husband.  He feared it was just a matter of time before she cheated on him too.  And yet, he found it hard to believe that of her.  He had no doubt there had been a lot of old resentments, between her and her husband.  A person wouldn’t cheat on their partner unless the marriage had been on the rocks for years ... perhaps decades.  Mitch cursed under his breath.  Charlotte could have had a discreet affair with him, or anyone, without doing something her husband couldn’t overlook.  Why ...?

He put it into words.  “Why did you let us get caught?”

Charlotte frowned.  “Because ...”

He saw a wealth of emotion wash across her face.  He thought he understood.  Common sense was often pushed aside, when someone wanted to just lash out at the object of their resentment.  He’d seen men take horrible beatings - or worse - just to hurt someone they hated.  Charlotte might have arranged for them to be caught, without admitting - even to herself - that that was what she was doing.  Letting her husband catch them would have brought all the buried resentments into the light, without ...

“We need a plan,” Charlotte said.  “Right now, the tabloids are already catching wind of what’s happened.”

Mitch blinked.  “Do you really think they’ll care?”

“They will,” Charlotte said.  “They dedicated several dozen articles to the dress I wore to the Queen’s Gala, last year.  A complete waste of electrons, you might think, but they did it.  Countless society commenters babbled nonsense about how my dress showed support for this political faction or that political faction ... some complete pervert even had the nerve to suggest I was hinting I was pregnant, again, because I showed some cleavage.  And if they made a mountain out of that molehill, what do you think they’ll make of this?”

She smiled, rather coldly.  “It will be a big scandal.  Everyone will want a say in how it goes - the less involved they are, the more they’ll want it.  They’ll think having their say will make them important.  By this time tomorrow, there will be a hundred different narratives of the story, ranging from nearly-true bullshit to complete bullshit.  People who want a distraction from their own affairs will promote the story, in hopes it’ll consume all the attention; people who want to conceal awkward facts and bad news will use the story to hide it.  You and I - and Thomas - are about to be at the centre of the greatest scandal since Princess Felicity was caught in bed with two of her maids.”

“Oh.”  Mitch felt his heart sink.  “Was that story actually true?”

Charlotte shrugged.  “You’d be surprised how much never makes it into the tabloids,” she said.  “Lots of secrets never see the light of day.  Point is, I’m the wife of a wealthy and powerful nobleman and you’re a famous naval hero.  They’ll seek to destroy your reputation, in order to discredit you, but that’ll be difficult because of all the time they spent boosting it in the first place.  That gives us time to go on the offensive.  We need to push back hard before Thomas manages to get the narrative on his side.   Once that happens ...”

Mitch grinned.  “It’s like a military campaign, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”  Charlotte smiled back.  “Our objective will be to make it impossible for them to crush us.  If we can get the power of public opinion on our side, we will be untouchable.”

Mitch considered it for a long moment.  Like most military officers, he detested reporters even though he admitted they had their uses.  He’d certainly been quite willing to hire PR experts to put his name before the public, in a desperate bid to ensure he was ranked with Nelson, Cunningham and Theodore Smith.  And yet ... he shook his head in frustration.  He’d gotten caught in a trap.  His only real options were to play the game to the bitter end, all too aware of the risks of losing, or surrender and hope he’d merely be exiled somewhere light-years from civilisation.  There was no way in hell he was going to surrender his command.  If fighting was their only hope, he’d fight.

“I see,” he said.  He knew he should worry about the future - he certainly had no idea if they even had a future - but training and inclination told him to deal with the immediate problem first.  Advanced planning was the Admiralty’s job, not his ... his lips quirked at the thought.  The REMFs weren’t that good at their jobs.  Their track record was pathetic.  “So ... where do we begin?”

“I’ve already spoken to my contacts,” Charlotte said. She stood and began to disrobe.  “They’ll be putting out stories already, shaping the media battleground for our interviews tomorrow.  And then we keep running until we get what we want.”

Mitch felt himself stiffen as she removed her underwear.  “And what do we want?”

“You want to keep your command, I assume,” Charlotte said.  “Right?”

“Yes.”

“Yes,” Charlotte echoed.  “And I want to secure my place in society.”

Mitch doubted it would be easy.  Charlotte had cheated on her husband.  Even if she was allied with a bona fide naval hero ... it wasn’t the sort of thing society would forgive and forget.  And yet ... he frowned, remembering what he’d read when he’d looked Thomas and Charlotte Hammond up in Who’s Who.  They were wealthy and powerful enough to bend society to their will, if they worked at it.  Charlotte might believe she could come out of the storm with wealth, influence and power intact.  He had no idea if she was right.

He met her eyes.  “You could have organised a separation without all this” - he waved a hand around the room - “strife.”

“I have been married to him for centuries,” Charlotte said.  She knelt and pulled his towel away.  “During that time, I have handled the family affairs while he spent his time flying starships around the cosmos.  I controlled the estates.  I controlled our industrial interests.  I handled the land distribution.  I made sure our daughters had a quality education, then were presented at court when they reached the right age ... I did all that for him, all of it.  And he couldn’t even be bothered to stay with me.”

Her hand gripped his manhood.  “I want something for myself, just once,” she said.  “Is that wrong?”

Mitch had no time to think about it as they made love, with a passion and vigour that surprised him.  Charlotte seemed a different person, determined to lose herself in passion.  He wasn’t sure, as he opened his eyes the following morning, quite when they’d slipped into the bed and had sex there.  His body ached, in a good way.  The events of the previous night seemed almost dreamlike.  If Charlotte hadn’t been lying beside him, snoring loudly, he would have wondered if it had all been a dream.  His wristcom - placed by the side of the bed - was blinking.  Someone had sent him a message.  No, hundreds of messages.

He sat upright and reached for the device, opening his secure mailbox with his thumbprint.  A stream of message headers flashed in front of his eyes, each one requesting - sometimes demanding - an interview.  There wasn’t anything from the Admiralty, something he couldn’t help finding a little ominous.   The Admiralty wasn’t known for moving quickly - it delegated such tasks to its junior flag officers - but he’d expected Captain Hammond to start lighting a fire under their collective behinds.  On paper, Captain Hammond was a mere starship commander; in practice, his aristocratic title and connections gave him one hell of a lot of clout.  And yet, he’d never used it.  Mitch guessed Charlotte had been the one who’d handled such matters.

Charlotte groaned and sat up.  “What time is it?”

“Ten in the morning, give or take a few minutes,” Mitch said.  They had been busy, last night.  Normally, he woke up early even if he was on leave.  “Do you want to see what this place does for breakfast?”

“There’ll be somewhere in town that delivers,” Charlotte said.  Her bare breasts bobbled as she pushed herself up, shakily.  “Get something sent up here, if this place doesn’t run to room service.”

“It probably doesn’t,” Mitch said.  He was surprised she thought food could be delivered, although he supposed he shouldn’t have been.  This far from the big cities, the risk of viral contamination was minimal.  He keyed the room terminal and was unsurprised to discover there was no room service.  “Do you want to order anything in particular?”

“Anything,” Charlotte said.  “I’m not feeling fussy.”

She stumbled into the bathroom.  Mitch watched her naked behind until she closed the door, then keyed his wristcom to search for a suitable local restaurant.  The online menus were surprisingly detailed, as were the charges.  He gritted his teeth as he ordered a handful of pastries and coffee.  The hotel hadn’t so much as bothered to install a coffeemaker, let alone a kettle and fridge.  There wasn’t even a minibar.  It struck him, suddenly, that Charlotte was slumming it.  She might decide to go back to her husband, and her comfortable life, for lack of servants.  The thought made him smile.  Captain Hammond wasn’t likely to take her back.

Charlotte emerged, moving with a complete lack of concern about her nakedness.  Mitch found himself staring as she picked up her wristcom and terminal, then started tapping on them without even bothering to get dressed.  He hoped no one could see her, through the terminal’s camera ... he knew, from grim experience, how easy it was to give someone an eyeful.  He’d made that mistake himself, as a young man.  Someone tapped on the door.  Charlotte didn’t seem inclined to move as Mitch opened the door just enough to collect the pastries, then pay the delivery man.  Mitch hoped the younger man hadn’t seen anything of interest.

“We’ll hit the noon media cycle,” Charlotte said, as she took a pastry and bit into it with every evidence of enjoyment.  “I’ve already got a dozen interviews lined up.”

“Good, I think,” Mitch said.  “What do you want us to tell them?”

“The truth,” Charlotte said.  “Our truth.  And make sure the story gets out before Thomas starts blabbing.”

Mitch glanced at the time.  “He could have been talking to the media for hours.”

“No, he won’t,” Charlotte corrected.  “He was - is - always very old fashioned about this sort of thing.  He relied on me to handle such matters for him.  He’ll need someone to take my place and ...”

She shook her head.  “We have an edge,” she insisted.  “And we cannot afford to give him time to collect himself and strike back.”

“Got it,” Mitch said.  “It’s just like a military operation.”

Chapter Three

“My Lord?”

Thomas stirred, unsure - just for a moment - where he actually was.  His memories were a jumbled mess.  He’d been at a party ... no, he’d hosted a party.  Charlotte and he had invited the great and the good and ... his eyes shot open as he remembered the rest of the night.  He’d caught his wife in bed with his subordinate, which would be quite bad enough, but it had been so public that there’d been no hope of quashing the scandal before it spread from one side of the country to the other.  He’d sent his guests home early ... he forced himself to sit up, rubbing sleep from his eyes.  There was no getting around the simple fact he was going to be at ground zero of a major scandal.

“Fuck,” he grumbled.  The butler was standing at the door, his face carefully blank.  “Bartleby?  What is it?”

“My Lord, there is a small army of reporters at the gates,” the butler said.  “What would you like us to do?”

Tell them to fuck off, Thomas thought.  Turn the hoses on them.  Send out the game-beaters with whips and flog them.

He cursed under his breath.  “Keep the gates closed,” he ordered, finally.  “They are not to be permitted entry.  Anyone who tries to get over the walls is to be held, pending the arrival of the police.  They are not to harass anyone on the grounds.  Is that understood?”

“Yes, My Lord,” the butler said.  “I’ll see to it at once.”

“Please,” Thomas said.  “And have some breakfast sent up here at once.”

Bartleby bowed once and withdrew, closing the door behind him.  Thomas stared at the blank wood, wondering how his life had come crashing down so quickly.  He’d thought Charlotte understood the demands of naval service.  He’d thought she understood that the navy was all that stood between the human race and a fate worse than death.  He’d thought ... he swallowed, hard, as he forced himself to stand.  There was no point in worrying about it now.  He needed to shower and eat something and then decide what to do.  Cold anger rushed through him as he stepped into the bathroom.  Charlotte could hardly deny adultery, not when there were so many witnesses.  She could be cut out of his life completely ...

He groaned as he realised the full scale of the brewing scandal.  There was no hope of keeping it quiet, which meant the case would be decided by the court of public opinion.  He could win the battle in the courtroom, but lose it in the streets.  Charlotte’s family would have to rally around her, just to ensure the safety of the rest of her clan.  And ... he scowled, remembering just how much Charlotte had done for him.  She could do a lot of damage if she sold his secrets to the highest bidder.  The thought mocked him as he showered, dried and dressed himself.  There really wasn’t any hope of keeping it quiet.

A maid stood by the table when he re-entered the bedroom, holding a tray of food.  Thomas eyed her narrowly, wondering if she was loyal to him ... or to Charlotte.  His wife had done most of the hiring, which meant the staff might believe she was their true mistress.  The maid might be her eyes and ears ... Thomas sighed inwardly, wondering if he was just being paranoid.  The maid was younger than his daughter.  She didn’t deserve to be swept into the midst of a political scandal.

“Thank you,” he said.  He couldn’t remember the girl’s name.  “I’ll ring when I’m done.”

The maid placed the tray on the table, bobbed a curtsy and retreated in a manner that suggested she wanted to flee.  Thomas didn’t really blame her.  It wasn’t easy serving one’s commanding officer, even when there were strict rules governing how the senior officers were supposed to relate to their juniors.  The maid had fewer protections, whatever might be said on paper.  Thomas had a distant uncle with a habit of trying to grope the maids and the bastard had pretty much gotten away with it.  He shook his head.  What did a man like that care about society’s feelings?

He sat at the table and removed the covering, then poured himself a mug of coffee and tucked into the kedgeree.  Someone had placed a copy of the morning newspaper beside the plate, a luxury when most newspapers were exclusively electronic, but he couldn’t force himself to open it until he felt almost human again.  His head pounded as he finished the first mug of coffee and poured himself another one, hand reaching for the terminal by the bedside.  The lead story was a lurid description of the previous night’s events.  Thomas wondered, idly, who’d given the reporter his information.  The bare facts were there, but buried in so much nonsense it was hard to believe anyone would take the story seriously.

Not that it matters, he thought, sourly.  There are people who’ll take anything seriously.

He forced himself to skim through the remaining newspaper stories, then the messages in his inbox.  The stories were all the same, to the point he wondered which of his enemies was calling the shots.  They certainly got the basic details correct.  The messages ranged from demands for interviews to updates from HMS Lion, readying herself for her next deployment.  Thomas hoped he’d be allowed to return to his ship.  His XO could go on leave instead, while Thomas took care of the repairs.  It wasn’t as if he couldn’t handle them himself.  He’d have to go through everything as soon as he returned anyway, just to make sure he knew what had been done in his absence.  A commanding officer’s job was never done.

There was a tap on the door.  Thomas looked up.  “Yes?”

A maid - a different maid - opened the door.  “Lady Elizabeth’s compliments, My Lord, and she hopes you’ll join her and Lady Lucille in the conservatory.”

Thomas sighed, inwardly.  “Please inform Her Ladyship that I will join them shortly,” he said.  “And ask Bartleby to attend upon me first.”

The maid curtsied and withdrew.  Thomas finished his coffee and stood, brushing down his shirt and trousers.  He’d have to see about leaving the estate and travelling to his ship ... he sighed, again, as he realised he’d have to make arrangements for Charlotte’s absence.  She really had done a lot for him ... he’d have to put matters in his eldest daughter’s hands and hope for the best, unless he resigned his commission and devoted himself to the estate.  He doubted that would go down well.  The House of Lords might refuse to seat him if the House of Commons threatened to impeach him for gross misconduct.  It would be another scandal at the worst possible time.

Bartleby stepped into the room.  “My Lord?”

“Contact Mr. Gleeson,” Thomas said.  “I want him here as soon as reasonably possible.”

“Yes, My Lord,” Bartleby said.  “That will be at least an hour, assuming he leaves at once.”

Thomas nodded.  “Encourage him to be here within two,” he said.  The nasty part of his mind was tempted to threaten to ditch the lawyer, if he didn’t get to the mansion within two hours.  “And inform me the moment he arrives.”

“Yes, My Lord.”

“And one other thing,” Thomas added.  “Inform the staff that” - he paused, unsure of the right words – “inform the staff that they are not to contact Lady Charlotte, or share anything with her without my prior permission.  If they do so, they will be sacked and blacklisted.  Is that clear?”

Bartleby showed no visible emotion.  “Quite clear, My Lord.”

“Good.”  Thomas nodded, curtly.  “You may go.  Send a maid to collect the tray.”

He headed to the door himself as soon as the butler left, making his way through the corridors to the conservatory.  The giant chamber had always been a refuge, even though he’d been worried when he’d realised one of his ancestors had imported plants from a dozen different worlds and planted them in his flowerbeds.  The permits to do that hadn’t come cheap.  Too many people had worried, back then, about what would happen if alien ecologies got loose on Earth.  Thomas didn’t blame them, although the worries had been overblown.  Earth’s biosphere was tougher than any other known world, save perhaps for the other planets that had birthed intelligent life.  The plants in the conservatory would die within weeks if the windows shattered, allowing them to mingle with the outside world.

“Dad,” Elizabeth said.  She sat on a bench, next to her younger sister.  “What happened?”

Thomas took a moment to study them both, unsure of what to say.  They’d both taken more after Charlotte than him, although there was enough of him in their faces for him to be sure they were his.  Not, he supposed, that there’d ever been any real doubt.  He and Charlotte had planned both pregnancies carefully, ensuring their unborn children received the very best start in life.  Neither of them had known humanity was about to run into an alien virus, bent on turning the entire galaxy into host bodies ...

“Your mother and I had a fight,” he said.  He wondered, suddenly, how much they already knew.  The maids weren’t scared of them.  Charlotte would never have let her daughters bully the maids.  They might never be friends - they couldn’t be - but they weren’t enemies either.  And that meant they might have gossiped ...  “She’s left us.”

He felt a pang of guilt at their shock.  Charlotte had been right to say he hadn’t spent anything like enough time with his daughters.  He’d missed just about every major event in their lives because of his career.  He hadn’t accompanied them to school, he hadn’t discussed their education with their teachers, he hadn’t watched with pride as they were formally presented to the Queen ... Charlotte had asked, once, if he’d even have time to walk them down the aisle when they married.  In hindsight, perhaps that had been a sign of trouble in their marriage.  It hadn't been him who’d gone to the headmistress and made the case for their younger daughter not being expelled ...

Elizabeth exchanged glances with Lucille.  “Dad, what happened?”

“It’s a long story,” Thomas said.  He didn’t want to discuss it.  Anger washed through him as he realised the girls would hear a distorted version of the truth, first from the maids and then from the media.  Charlotte could have been discreet ... he gritted his teeth.  God knew there were plenty of aristocratic matches that were marriages in name only.  He would have turned a blind eye ... probably.  “I ...

He found himself unable to speak.  The words refused to come.  He knew how to handle military operations, from attacking a planet to defending a convoy, but how could he address this problem?  What could he say?  He didn’t want to pour poison on their mother and ... no, that wasn’t true.  He did want to.  He just knew he shouldn’t.

“We have parted,” he said, finally.  “I want you two to know that, whatever happens, you are my daughters.  I wouldn’t trade you for the world.”

Lucille smiled.  “Does that mean we don’t have to go back to Hanover Towers?”

“I’m already out,” Elizabeth said, with all the smugness an older sibling could muster.  “You have only one more year to go ...”

“I could leave now,” Lucille said.  “Mum said I had to stay, but I don’t have to.”

“Yes, you do.”  Thomas forced himself to meet her eyes.  “If you leave early, you may not be able to find a career or land a good husband.”

Lucille stared back at him.  “And if I don’t want a husband?”

“Then you need a career,” Thomas pointed out, evenly.  “And besides, at Hanover Towers, you will be protected from the media.”

“Yeah, I saw the army outside,” Elizabeth said.  “Are they going to storm the walls?”

“I certainly hope not,” Thomas said.  “It would be ... awkward.”

Elizabeth looked downcast.  “Mum promised me that we could ... Dad, can I email her?  Call her?”

“Yes,” Thomas said.  It would be cruel to say no.  Besides, any military officer worthy of the name knew better than to give an order that wouldn’t be obeyed.  “Just be ... just be yourself.”

He sat back, bitterly frustrated.  There was so much he’d have to do, just to clear the decks before his next deployment.  He’d have to make sure Elizabeth was ready to take over managing the estate, at least on paper; he’d have to hire and vet managers to assist her, knowing that it would be all too easy for her to let them handle everything.  Charlotte had been meant to teach her how to run the estate, now that she’d graduated.  It wasn’t going to be easy to learn on the job.  Thomas considered, not for the first time, simply resigning his commission and taking the consequences.  His daughters - and his family - came first.

The door opened, behind him.  He turned to see Bartleby.  “Yes?”

“My Lord, Mr Gleeson has arrived and is waiting in the Green Room,” Bartleby said.  “He was apparently already en route.”

Thomas frowned.  It hadn’t been an hour since Bartleby had placed the call.  It couldn’t have been.  And that meant ... he stood and headed for the door, without a backwards glance.  His lawyer wouldn’t have been on the way, before he’d even been called, unless he’d thought he’d be needed.  Had he heard the story?  Or ... had Charlotte called him?  Thomas ground his teeth as he made his way down the corridor.  It was all a horrible, tangled mess.

He pasted a calm expression on his face as he stepped into the Green Room.  He’d never understood why it had that name - the only green thing in the room was a simple emerald vase - but it hardly mattered.  Some long-dead ancestor had turned it into a private discussion room, lining the walls with all sorts of equipment to make it difficult - if not impossible - to spy on the proceedings.  Thomas’s wristcom bleeped an alert as he closed the door behind him, warning him that it was cut off from the mansion’s private intranet, the civilian datanet and the military communications network.  Bartleby would call him, if something happened that required his urgent attention.  He knew it and yet ... he still felt trapped.

“My Lord,” Mr Gleeson said.  He was an older man, wearing a suit that had been fashionable well before his birth.  “I heard the news.  I assumed you’d wish to speak to me.”

Thomas nodded.  Gleeson - and his firm - had been the family lawyers since the Troubles had catapulted them back to prominence.  They were smart, well-connected and - above all - discreet.  Gleeson Senior had once told him, before his untimely death, that he felt old money was the best.  Thomas wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but it was the clearest possible sign - in his view - that the lawyers wouldn’t switch sides.  They’d destroy their own reputation if they tried.  Whatever clout Charlotte might have had with them would have vanished, the moment she left the family.

“My wife has committed adultery,” he said, bluntly.  It felt odd to put it into words.  “What are my options?”

Mr Gleeson leaned forward.  “How much are you prepared to spend to get rid of her?”

Thomas frowned.  “I ask again,” he said.  “What are my options?”

“You have several,” Mr Gleeson said.  “From a legal point of view, given the lack of doubt over what actually happened, you should have no trouble securing a divorce.  She cheated on you, as you said, and that is grounds to end a match.  However, you also have a very tangled family situation.  She brought a sizable amount of money, and a number of properties, to the marriage.  You would have to separate her possessions, and whatever wealth may have accumulated through them, in order to return them.  And that doesn’t include any custody issues.”

Thomas scowled.  “Lucille is seventeen,” he said.  “She’s hardly a child.”

“No,” Gleeson agreed.  “However, she is still underage.  It would complicate things.”

He paused.  “I think you would win, from a legal point of view.  She cannot deny her adultery, nor can she accuse you of being actively abusive.  That would destroy her case overnight, perhaps even leave her open to counter-charges.  However” - he held up a hand – “from a PR point of view, it would be a great deal harder.  It might be better to simply offer her a large sum of money to disappear.”

Thomas stared at him for a long moment.  “She humiliated me in front of the entire world and ... you expect me to just pay her off?”

“It might be better, in the long term.” Gleeson said.  “A protracted argument over which of the family assets are rightfully hers would result in a great deal of mud being hurled around the world.  So would a dispute over custody, which would put a great deal of stress on both of your children.  I know they’re adults, or close to it, but ... they would still be in some trouble.”

“And she could have avoided it if she’d been a little more discreet,” Thomas snapped.  “I think she isn’t going to take the money and run.”

He forced himself to think.  “Inform her lawyers that I want a divorce, on grounds of adultery,” he said.   He wanted to lash out at her.  He wanted it to hurt.  “And we can start calculating how much is rightfully hers.”

“She may not accept whatever offer you make,” Gleeson said.  “And public opinion may not be on your side.”

“Of course not,” Thomas snarled.  “It never is.”

He shook his head.  “Send word,” he ordered.  “I want the matter resolved as quickly as possible.”

Chapter Four

Admiral Lady Susan Onarina allowed herself a scowl as she studied the tablet, noting just how many important matters had been kicked off the front page and relegated to the rear of nearly every newspaper she followed.  The Hammond-Campbell scandal had been trending for the last few hours, pushing editors to ensure that everyone saw their breathless coverage before shoving it aside to get to the meat of the matter.  Susan found it hard to suppress the urge to call both Hammond and Campbell and give them both a chewing out, even though they were - technically - not under her command any longer.  People who played with fire - or the media - always got burnt.

And wind up smelling like roast shit, she thought, reflecting on something her father had said years ago.  He’d been asked to do an interview, after Susan became famous, but he’d flatly refused.  One cannot rely on the media to be honest about anything.

She lifted her head as the car turned the corner, making its way past a pair of military checkpoints and down towards Downing Street.  It felt as if there were more soldiers on the streets every time she visited, a situation that seemed certain to end in disaster.  The news from Jamaica - her father’s homeland - had made that clear.  The soldiers had shot infected zombies, then people they believed to be infected, then just people ... and then civil war had broken out, giving the infected all the time they needed to slip into position to infect the entire country.  She wanted to think it couldn’t happen in Britain, or America or France or one of the other major powers, but she feared it could.  There were so many armed men in position that a single cough might be enough to start something violent.  

Best not to worry about it, she thought.  The military might fear they were making things worse, by stationing armed guards around the centre of government, but the public needed reassurance.  It isn’t as if you can change it.

She took one last look at the tablet and sighed.  Captain Campbell and his lover had gone on the offensive, filling the datanet with stories about their love, while Captain Hammond was taking the slightly more sedate path of filing for divorce.  Public opinion looked to be slanting towards Captain Campbell, although it was hard to be sure.  He was a naval hero, as the papers openly admitted, but he had also aided and abetted an act of adultery.  Susan had the nasty feeling no one was going to come out of the affair looking good ... she shook her head.  Banging their heads together wouldn’t accomplish much, beyond making her feel better, but ... it might teach them a lesson.  Their boat was sinking fast and, instead of bailing out the water, they were actively drilling holes in the bottom.

And the media will turn on them eventually, she reminded herself, as the car pulled to a halt outside Ten Downing Street.  They’ll rue the day they threw fresh meat at a pack of charging hyenas.

She picked up her briefcase as a policeman helped her out of the car, then stepped through the door into Downing Street.  The days when someone could just walk into the building were long gone.  She gritted her teeth as the guards took blood samples, then tested her clothes and breath for signs of alien biological matter.  The virus was bizarre by human standards, with a mentality that was completely alien, but it couldn’t be underestimated.  They still didn’t know how it had managed to get so many zombies onto the planet before the security forces had cracked down, let alone remain undetected for so long.  She feared they might never be able to lift the state of emergency.  God alone knew how much damage it was doing to the economy.

“Admiral,” Samuel Hallow said.  “Welcome back.”

Susan nodded as she shook the civil servant’s hand.  She didn’t remember him, but it wasn’t surprising.  The Prime Minister rotated assistants on a regular basis, making sure he never got too comfortable with any of them.  Susan didn’t understand the logic, but it was his choice.  She would sooner deal with one person, someone she knew well enough to trust they could make decisions if necessary.  But it wasn’t her office.

She retrieved her briefcase, then followed him up the stairs.  The interior looked duller than she recalled, a grim reminder that most of Downing Street’s functions had been outsourced to a government command centre somewhere to the west of London.  Susan hadn’t been told the full details - no one who might be captured and infected had been trusted with information that could lead to the bunker’s discovery - but she’d heard enough to read between the lines.  The Deputy PM would be there, along with the heir to the throne and enough trained and experienced personnel to run the country if something happened to London.  It was quite possible.  The virus might tire of probing the defences and try to use a nuke instead ...

The thought faded as she was shown into the Prime Minister’s office.  Prime Minister Arthur Harrison rose to greet her, holding out a hand.  Susan shook it tightly, then sat on the proffered chair.  A young woman in a simple black outfit delivered a tray of tea and biscuits, then retreated as silently as she’d come.  Susan knew the maid probably held a higher security clearance than she did, even if the maid wasn’t assigned to any specific departments.  No one could afford to overlook the help.  The maid had a pair of ears and the wit to use them.

“Susan,” Harrison said.  “Thank you for coming.”

“Thank you, sir,” Susan said.  The PM’s accent had always put her teeth on edge - he reminded her of the snooty girls she’d known at school - but he’d never been anything other than good to her.  He was certainly a lot more respectful than some of her fellow officers.  “I’m glad you found the time to see me.”

“If much less time than I would have wished,” Harrison said.  He sat back in his chair, sipping his tea.  “I understand you wanted to brief me personally?”

Translation, get on with it, Susan thought, with a flicker of humour.  It hadn’t been easy to convince the PM to see her, even after the successful completion of Operation Lightning Strike.  She wasn’t blind to the political dimension, nor to the fact they’d come within bare seconds of total disaster.  I’m lucky he agreed to meet me in the first place.

She opened her briefcase, removed a datachip and inserted it into an isolated terminal.  A starchart appeared over the table, each star covered with tactical icons.  Earth and the surrounding systems appeared to be crammed with starships and defence platforms.  Susan knew better.  There were vast reaches of interplanetary space that were completely undefended.  It would be easy for the virus to get a fleet into striking distance without being intercepted.  The Tadpoles had done it, back during the First Interstellar War.  Earth had yet to recover from that disaster.

“Operation Lightning Strike succeeded better than I dared hope,” she said.  “First, we captured and then destroyed the alien catapults.  It is unlikely the virus can afford to replace them in a hurry.  In any case, we don’t have any indications it is currently rebuilding and powering them up.  Second, we hammered a number of infected worlds with both conventional weapons and biobombs.  We believe we took a serious chunk out of the virus’s infrastructure.”

“It can rebuild,” Harrison pointed out.  “And reallocate resources to patch the cracks in the supply chain before it rebuilds the destroyed shipyards.”

“Yes,” Susan agreed.  The virus would probably have an easier time of it than its human enemies.  It didn’t have to worry about international rivalries, or jockeying to secure one’s place in the post-war world.  “However, even under the worst-case scenario, it will take months - if not years - for it to regain its balance.”

She paused, keying the terminal to display the next image.  “Third, we acquired a more detailed understanding of infected space.  In particular, HMS Unicorn stumbled across a far more industrialised world.  We’ve given it the provisional title of Virus Prime.  Given the sheer number of industrial stations surrounding the system’s planets, we think it is one of - if not the - major industrial nodes.  It may even be the virus’s original homeworld.  Prime Minister, we believe that - if we can take the system out - we can finally start putting an end to the war.”

The Prime Minister studied the image for a long moment.  “Are you sure this world is as vital to the enemy as you believe?”

“No, sir,” Susan said.  There was nothing to be gained by suggesting otherwise.  “However, the sheer size of the system is clear proof of its importance.  We also believe that the alien fleets that nearly trapped us, two systems short of New Washington, were deployed from Virus Prime.  At the very least, taking the system out will make it even harder for the virus to rebalance itself.”

“Point,” Harrison said.  His eyes never left the display.  “It doesn’t look like an easy target.”

“It isn’t,” Susan conceded.  “Unicorn didn’t have enough time to carry out a full planetary survey, Prime Minister, but she logged the presence of hundreds of orbital weapons platforms, thousands of remote platforms, dozens of ground-based defence installations and enough mobile units to pose a serious threat to Earth.  It wouldn’t be an easy system to crack even if we deployed every starship in human service, and our allies, to the mission.  I think it wouldn’t be easy to even get a BioBomb into the planet’s atmosphere.”

Harrison frowned.  “But wouldn’t that work?  If the system is as heavily infected as the others, surely the counter-virus would spread rapidly?”

“Yes, but we think they would isolate their space-based installations from the world below,” Susan said.  “We’d kill billions of host-bodies without really damaging the system’s ability to make war.”

“That would be awkward,” the prime minster observed.  “Do you think it can be done?”

“My staff and I have been drawing up a concept under the provisional title of Operation Footfall,” Susan said.  “Given the sheer size of the system, we think the virus will feel compelled to defend it ... perhaps even to the point of recalling ships from the border systems to stand in its defence.  That alone would be of great value to us, as we need to resupply and reinforce a dozen systems before the virus breaks through and continues the offensive against Earth.”

She tapped the terminal, switching the display.  “The first part of the plan focuses on a small task force, centred on HMS Lion.  They will enter the system, set up a base within the asteroid field and commence bombarding the planet with ballistic projectiles.  The virus will have to either come after our ships, allowing them a chance to weaken the enemy fleets with missile and gunboat combinations, or let us rain rocks on their homeworld with impunity.  The odds against us scoring a hit are pretty high, but we only have to be lucky once.

“In the meantime, we will assemble a fleet here” - she pointed to New Washington - “and proceed up the chain to the alien homeworld.  We will use decoys to lure their fleet out of position, using the flicker network to coordinate a pincer movement, and then move in for the kill.  If we can destroy their remaining mobile units, we can close in on their homeworld and bury it in kinetic projectiles.  It will take time, Prime Minister, but we believe it can be done.”

Susan allowed herself a tight smile.  “If Virus Prime is the last of their major industrial nodes, Prime Minister, the war will be effectively won.  If it is not, we will still have grievously weakened them, buying time to continue working on new weapons while readying ourselves for the final offensive.”

“And then the second final offensive,” Harrison said, essaying a weak joke.  “Admiral, how sure are you of any of this?”

“As sure as we can be,” Susan said.  “With all due respect, Prime Minister, there are always unknowns surrounding any military operation.  A great deal of our assessments are based on hard data, but far from complete data.  We think we have a rough idea of how many ships the virus has left, yet ... we just don’t know.  We’ve done what we can to avoid wishful thinking, but ... for all we know, we’re still scratching the surface of a much bigger volume of occupied space.  The virus may regard us as little more than a painful irritant, as we regarded Ulster during the Troubles.  Unpleasant, but not exactly a lethal threat.”

“Except we designed and deployed BioBombs,” Harrison mused.  “Biological weapons have always been regarded as an obscenity.  Even the virus must regard the BioBombs as a major threat.”

“We hope so, sir,” Susan said.  “We think the virus is actually starting to expend more resources on planetary defence.  There were more remote sensor platforms, as well as defences, around the worlds attacked during Lightning Strike and Virus Prime is clearly heavily defended.  Our best projections suggest it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to sneak a missile through their defences, even on a wholly-ballistic trajectory.  We have been looking at ways to do it anyway, but anything likely to reach the atmosphere is almost certain to burn up before it can deploy the counter-virus.  If nothing else, we have taught it a lesson.”

“Good.”  Harrison looked up at her.  “What about the alien tech?”

“The latest reports suggest we cannot hope to duplicate it, not yet,” Susan said.  “The knowledge gap is just too wide.  We simply don’t know how they do what they do.  We might as well send a modern-day carrier back to the Troubles and expect our ancestors to instantly understand and duplicate it.”

“We know a great deal about how the universe works,” Harrison said, dryly.  “I suppose it’s a reminder that there is always something more to learn.”

“Yes, sir,” Susan said.  “Our ancestors didn’t know about drive fields, or artificial gravity, or the tramlines.  They had the concept of starfighter carriers, but not the ability to actually build them.  It would take them years to understand what they were seeing, if they could even do that.  The gap might be too wide.”

She rubbed her forehead.  She’d heard a theory, once, that there were limits to how much change a person - or a society - could embrace.  The Troubles might have stemmed from change after change, with society never being allowed to take a breath and absorb the last change before the next change appeared.  Her ancestors might have agreed, when they’d moved from being African tribesmen to suddenly becoming slaves in a much wider world ... she wondered, idly, what the Britain of 2050 would make of a modern-day carrier.  Would they accept the advanced technology?  Or the news of alien life and alien wars?  Or ...

The Prime Minister cleared his throat.  “I assume you have provided complete copies of your assessments?”

“Yes, sir.”  Susan popped the datachip out of the terminal and passed it to him.  “That’s everything, from preliminary post-battle assessments to the final reports.”

“I can authorise our role in the operation,” Harrison said.  “What I cannot do is speak for the other Great Powers.  They’ll need to be consulted, if we want them to lend us ships for the operation.  They may hesitate to gamble on another thrust into enemy territory.”

Susan took a breath.  “Sir, there is no way we’ll win this war by standing on the defensive.”

“Not until we develop a vaccine,” the Prime Minister agreed.  He paused, thoughtfully.  “Here’s another question, one you should perhaps consider.  The race that built the artefacts you found might well have also created the virus.  They might have designed it as a weapon and then built the artefacts to keep it under control.”

“It’s a possibility,” Susan agreed.  “The idea crossed our minds, but there simply isn’t enough data to say.  The virus doesn’t appear to be under anyone’s control.  The artefacts neutralise the virus, but only within a few metres of the artefacts themselves.  So far, we haven’t been able to scale up the effect either.  It’s a mystery, sir, one we may never solve.”

“A society capable of building those ... things ... isn’t going to vanish completely,” the Prime Minister said.  “Where have they gone?”

“Unknown, sir,” Susan said.  She’d read a dozen papers suggesting everything from transcendence to simply being destroyed by someone more powerful than themselves.  Or the virus, if they’d made it.  “I can give you the speculation, but it is nothing more than wishful thinking.  It cannot be taken too seriously.”

And there were a bunch of people who claimed to have discovered alien artefacts on the edge of explored space, she thought, grimly.  It might be time to start taking those stories a little more seriously.

The Prime Minister nodded.  “Make your preparations, Admiral,” he said, a clear sign the discussion was over.  “I’ll discuss the matter with my advisors, then the rest of the Great Powers.  If they agree to go along with it, we can act as soon as possible.”

“There are other options,” Susan said.  She disliked the concepts - they struck her as sacrificing long-term gains for short-term advantage - but there might not be a choice.  The virus was powerful - and dangerously unpredictable.  “Even a handful of ships might keep the virus focused on home defence, giving us time to rebalance ourselves and resume the offensive.”

“We’ll see,” the Prime Minister said.  He made no sign, but the door opened.  “Good luck, Admiral.  Keep me informed.”

Susan stood.  “Yes, sir.”

Chapter Five

Mitch couldn’t help feeling under siege as they left the hotel long enough to go for dinner - at the most expensive place in town, naturally - before returning to spend the night together.  The hotel was surrounded by reporters, baying for stories like rioters bayed for blood.  It had been two days since the news had broken and, somehow, public interest had yet to fade.  It was hard not to feel slightly ridiculous, as if they’d walked through the looking glass into a very different world.  Mitch had never even considered being at the centre of a national scandal before he’d found himself in one.  

Absurd, he thought.  It felt decidedly unreal.  Maybe I’ll just wake up and it’ll be all a dream.

He checked his wristcom automatically as soon as they reached their room, but there was nothing beyond a hundred requests for yet more exclusive interviews.  Mitch suspected it was a curious definition of exclusive, given that clips from their earlier interviews had been pirated almost as soon as the interviews had gone live and had been widely shared across the datanet.  It would have been easy to remove them, suggesting - to a suspicious mind - that they’d been simply given to the pirates.  Charlotte seemed to be having the time of her life, steering the ship of public opinion to her chosen destination.  Mitch was tempted to just hold on tight and enjoy the ride.

His lips tightened.  The Admiralty hadn’t contacted him, something that bothered him on a very primal level.  There were no messages from his superior officers, nothing beyond standard updates from his XO on Unicorn.  The ship was ready to depart again, apparently.  It was probably just a matter of time before they received orders to leave ... Mitch wondered, suddenly, if Captain Hammond was burning the midnight oil, trying to get Mitch removed from his command chair.  It wouldn’t be easy.  Charlotte’s PR team had worked overtime to present Mitch as a naval hero, hinting that Mitch - and Mitch alone - had kept Operation Lightning Strike from turning into a complete disaster.  It wasn’t entirely untrue.  The cynical side of Mitch’s mind noted that had to be a first.

Charlotte waved her hand in front of his face.  “Do you have time for one more interview?”

Mitch blinked, then checked the time.  It was only seven in the evening.  He’d thought it was later.  Much later.  Long duty shifts were hardly unknown to him - like most naval personnel, he’d long-since mastered the art of catnapping whenever he had a chance - but moving from interview studio to the next, time and time again, was uniquely draining.  He knew what his XO would say, if she was looking over his shoulder.  His lips quirked at the thought.  Commander Staci Templeton wanted more command experience for herself and sending her captain to his bunk was one way to get it ...

She might get the formal promotion sooner rather than later, thanks to this, he thought, sourly.  And who knows how that will play out?

He glanced at Charlotte.  It had been a long day for her too, yet somehow she managed to look cool, collected and strikingly glamorous.  She looked like a creature from another world, a fairy princess ... Mitch shook his head in amusement.  It was strange to watch her put on her mask, with as much skill and care as a commanding officer preparing himself before stepping onto the bridge and taking command.  Mitch had never really cared about how aristocrats presented themselves to the world, but ... he had the sudden feeling that Charlotte would have made a decent naval officer.  She had the same attention to detail, and the ability to present a calm face even if she was screaming on the inside, that the navy valued in its senior officers.  If things had been different, she could have gone far ...

“One final interview?”  Mitch tried not to groan.  Self-promotion was part of the job, when one’s family didn’t have a PR team to do the dirty work, but it was often tedious.  There was a fine line between talking about your achievements and bragging to the point everyone decided you were an ass.  “Just one?”

“Just one,” Charlotte confirmed.  “It’s with Monica Rotherham.”

Mitch nodded, thoughtfully.  He hadn’t known any of the society reporters he’d met over the last two days, men and women with an unhealthy interest in the aristocracy, but even he had heard of Monica Rotherham.  She was one of the country’s top independent reporters, crafting her own stories and uploading them onto the datanet.  Mitch was surprised she was interested in their story.  Her work was normally focused on serious matters, not discussing the aristocracy.  But then, her viewers had probably pushed her to address the issue.  He wondered, idly, if she intended to be friendly or hostile.  A handful of society reporters had been openly hostile to them.

“If we must,” he said.  “Where’ll we meet her?”

“Downstairs.”  Charlotte gave him a faint smile.  “The hotel kindly put a conference room at our disposal.”

Mitch rolled his eyes.  The hotel had lost a number of paying guests when the story broke and reporters started blockading the entrances, shouting questions at everyone trying to enter or leave the building.  It didn’t matter, to them, that most of the guests didn’t have the slightest idea what was going on.  A couple of guests had amused themselves by giving completely nonsensical answers - Mitch had been amused to see a gossip page proudly proclaiming him to be a distant descendent of the House of Stuart, which wasn’t remotely true - but the rest considered it a nuisance.  He was mildly surprised the hotel hadn’t asked them to move somewhere else.  Charlotte was shelling out cash at a terrifying rate, but it would - eventually - come to an end.  The guests might not return after the media circus left town.

Charlotte fussed around him as he changed into his dress uniform - she’d purchased one from London and had it shipped north, then tailored to him - and checked his appearance in the mirror.  It was commonly believed naval dress uniforms had been designed by sadists - they were hot and uncomfortable, designed for form over function - but he had to admit he looked good.  The medals on his breast were copies of the originals - he’d left them with his family when he’d assumed command of Unicorn - yet he had every right to wear them.  The reporters could look up the records, if they wished.  He wondered, idly, if any of the bastards would accuse him of being a Walt.  That would put the cat among the pigeons.

And give me grounds to sue, he thought, snidely.  We’ll probably need the money.

He composed himself, as best as he could, as he followed Charlotte down the stairwell and into the tiny business section.  The hotel apparently hosted corporate meetings that, for one reason or another, couldn’t be held in the bigger cities, but not enough to justify devoting an entire floor to the job.  The conference room was clearly designed for multiple roles, the wooden walls concealing everything from a display projector to a minibar and fridge.  The lights were bright enough to make Mitch feel exposed, even though he knew there was no physical danger.  He’d spent too much of his career sneaking up on bigger ships, enemy starships that could blow his ship to atoms if they got a clear shot, to be entirely happy about being in the open.  It struck him, as Monica Rotherham rose from her chair and held out a hand, that that was precisely what they were doing.  Charlotte was trying to land the killer blow before her husband - her estranged husband - could divorce her, cutting her off from her children and family resources.  It was just a matter of time.

“Captain Campbell,” Monica Rotherham said.  She was a tall woman with long dark hair that reached all the way down to her rear, wearing clothes that hinted at her shape without actually revealing anything below the neckline.  “It’s a pleasure to meet you at last.”

“Thank you,” Mitch said.  As far as he knew, Monica Rotherham had never expressed an interest in meeting him.  “It was a pleasure to receive your request for an interview.”

“Quite.”  Monica waved them to a chair.  “It’s been two weeks since the completion of Operation Lightning Strike.  Since your return, there has been a great deal of debate over the mission’s outcome.  Some people have even argued that the mission was a failure.  Do you agree with that assessment?”

Mitch took a moment to consider his answer.  He wasn’t fool enough to assume they weren’t being recorded.  There were no obvious cameras in the room, but that was meaningless.  The jewels in Monica Rotherham’s hair could easily conceal a dozen pickups ... hell, it would be very easy to conceal a tiny camera within the light fixtures or wooden panelling.  Mitch had never been a spook, but he’d attended cautionary briefings before visiting foreign parts.  The counterintelligence officer who’d given the briefing had been a paranoid sod, but he’d made his point.  It was very easy to say - or do - the wrong thing and have it come back to haunt you.

The Admiralty won’t thank me for contradicting the official line, he thought, wryly.  And, for once, the official line isn’t that inaccurate.

He took a breath.  “The operation succeeded in its objectives,” he said, firmly.  “The fleet defeated an enemy attempt to outflank our defences, smashed a handful of enemy targets and made its escape from enemy territory. By any reasonable standards, it was a successful operation.”

“The fleet was nearly ambushed and destroyed by the enemy ships,” Monica said.  She sounded calm and composed, but Mitch could hear an edge in her voice.  “Do you not feel the operation came very close to disaster?”

Yes, Mitch thought.  It was true.  True enough, at least.  And yet we escaped disaster by the skin of our teeth.

He leaned forward.  “War, if I may resort to cliché, is a democracy.  The enemy gets a vote too.  We knew, from the moment we jumped into enemy territory, that they would do everything in their power to destroy us.  They certainly gave it their very best shot.  It was just not enough to defeat us.  The operation was a success, in that it hit the enemy where it hurts and then allowed us to escape their ships and make it back to New Washington.  It was not a disaster.”

“It could have been a disaster,” Monica pointed out.  “There are people who believe the operation should never have been attempted.”

Mitch had to smile.  “And who are they?”

Monica smiled back.  “People.”

“People,” Mitch repeated.  

He felt a flicker of irritation.  It was easy enough to take criticism from his fellow naval officers, people who’d been there and done that, but not from anonymous civilians who simply didn’t understand the realities of naval combat.  Their opinions were worthless.  The operation had been extensively wargamed, prior to departure, then thoroughly analysed by people who actually knew what they were doing.  An opinion from someone who didn’t was worse than useless.

“Risk, in the words of a very famous captain, is our business,” Mitch said.  “There are always risks inherent in anything, from asking a girl out on a date to leading a fleet of warships straight into the teeth of enemy defences.  You do all you can to mitigate the risk and it still threatens to overwhelm you.  The girl may laugh in your face and tell you she wouldn’t date you if you were the last man on Earth.  The enemy defences might be stronger than you thought and chew your ships to ribbons.  Every operation carries the risk of failure, from a retreat in the face of superior force to complete disaster.  The fact remains that this operation was a success.  We got in, we hurt the enemy, we got out again.”

“And we are all very grateful,” Monica said.  “How do you feel, as a naval hero, about the government’s current policy?”

“It is generally a good policy,” Mitch said.  It was true.  Besides, even if he had disagreed, it would be unwise to say so in public.  People would raise eyebrows if he so much as spoke a word of doubt.  “The virus cannot be allowed to get into bombardment range of our homeworld.”

Monica nodded.  “Do you believe there is a risk?  Do you think Earth might come under attack?”

Mitch hesitated.  The virus had been reluctant to drop weapons of mass destruction on planetary targets.  It made sense - the virus wanted to infest the entire biosphere, which wouldn’t be possible if it reduced a planet to radioactive ruins - but he was all too aware that policy might have changed.  The virus needed to teach the human race a lesson, after BioBombs had been deployed against its worlds.  It was impossible to say for sure, but Mitch feared it was just a matter of time before the virus hit back hard.  And that was something he couldn’t say publicly either.

“The risk is ever-present,” he said.  “All we can do is try to mitigate it.”

The interview went on and on, with questions ranging from the sensible to the thoroughly bizarre.  Mitch had the oddest feeling that Monica Rotherham was merely marking time until she edited the recordings into something more palatable, then uploaded them onto the datanet.  There would be limits to how much creative editing she could do - Charlotte had made it clear she was recording the interview herself as well - but ... Mitch hoped his support of naval policy would win him some support.  By the time it was finished, he was tired and drained and barely had the energy to shake her hand before they returned to their bedroom and went to bed.  He was too tired to make love.

But it was no surprise, the following morning, to discover a recall message in his inbox.

“The Admiralty wants me in London,” he said, tightly.  “I think they saw the interview.”

“You looked good,” Charlotte assured him.  “When do they want you?”

“This afternoon,” Mitch said.  “We’ll have to take the monorail.”

Charlotte snorted.  “I’ll hire a hopper,” she said.  “We’ll be back in Central London before you know it.”

Mitch blinked.  “You’re coming?”

“I have lawyers to see,” Charlotte said.  “And a few other things, too.”

She waved a hand at the walls.  “I can’t stay here, can I?”

“No,” Mitch agreed.  “I guess you can’t.”

***

“It is vitally important that we concentrate our efforts on both defending our homeworld and building up the forces to take the war deeper into enemy space,” Captain Campbell said.  His image looked perfect, the very picture of a resolute naval hero.  “We must never lose sight of our enemy’s nature.  We cannot come to terms with a force that is literally incapable of recognising our right to exist as independent, uninfected people.  The virus must be destroyed or it will destroy us.”

Thomas growled as he watched the interview.  It was bad enough watching his family life being splashed across the society gossip rags, but that was containable.  He could afford to play a waiting game, to watch them carefully and pounce the moment they said something actionable.  But this?  An interview with Monica Rotherham was a step into the mainstream media, a step towards enlisting the entire country against him.  Thomas felt his fingers clench around the tumbler, silently cursing himself for pouring the glass.  He’d never realised just how much Charlotte resented him until now.  If she’d talked to him ...

“It is true an extensive program of naval construction will be expensive,” Captain Campbell said.  “But it is cheaper than surrendering ourselves to infection.”

“Fuck,” Thomas swore.  He wondered, sourly, if the Admiralty would rein Captain Campbell in before it was too late.  Some prick who’d never commanded a starship in his entire life would probably argue that the whole affair worked in the navy’s favour, that Captain Campbell was arguing for higher budgets and more naval construction and everything else the Admiralty wanted.  Or needed.  “Fuck it!”

He turned off the viewscreen and paced his office.  It had been Charlotte’s office, in her role as estate and business manager.  It might belong to him, and legally entailed so he had to pass it and the mansion down to his eldest child, but he’d always considered it hers.  It felt as if he was trespassing, as if he was intruding somewhere he shouldn’t ... he clenched his teeth in bitter frustration.  If Charlotte had talked to him, they could have worked something out.  It would have hurt, but it could have been done.  She could have had a covert lover and ... he wouldn’t have cared, as long as it stayed private.  He really wouldn’t have cared.

Yes, you would, his thoughts mocked.

His wristcom bleeped.  He pressed his finger against the scanner, then scowled as the secure message decrypted itself.  He was being recalled, to London.  He wondered, idly, if it was a new deployment or if someone intended to read him the riot act.  His stomach burned as he called the butler to make arrangements, then left the room.  He’d worry about his estate later, when things settled down.  If the navy wanted to send him back to space, ahead of time ...

It’ll be better than hanging around here, he told himself.  He hadn’t done much in the last two days, beyond giving orders to the lawyers and spending time with his daughters.  He’d been too depressed to muster the energy to go riding, walk the estate, or even pay a call on his neighbours.  And it’ll buy time for everyone to forget what happened here.

Chapter Six

It felt weird, Gunboat Pilot Richard Tobias Gurnard thought, to be returning to HMS Lion without Marigold.  His girlfriend had had to attend a medical clinic for a check-up before she boarded a shuttle herself and, in the navy’s infinite wisdom, it had ordered Tobias to take an earlier shuttle instead of waiting for her.  Tobias had tried to argue, but the dispatcher had told him to shut up and get onto the shuttle in time or be forced to explain the delay to a very unsympathetic commanding officer.  Tobias thought, as the shuttle made its steady way towards the battlecruiser, that the dispatcher was one of the staff officers who considered the gunboat program to be nothing more than a waste of government money ... and the gunboat pilots geeks and nerds pretending to be naval officers.  He’d never realised just how difficult it had been to get the program into production, even though the concept had proved itself right from the start, until he’d spent four days going through the mission logs and explaining, in great detail, what had worked and what hadn’t.

Which was a pain in the ass, he thought, as a dull thump echoed though the shuttle.  The staff officers made it clear they didn’t trust my judgement.

He sighed as he stood, collected his carryall and made his way to the hatch.  The gunboat program had recruited pilots who hadn’t applied to the Luna Academy, pilots who’d never dreamed of being officers, enlisted men or starfighter pilots.  Tobias knew - his instructors had never made any bones about it - that the policy wasn’t entirely good-hearted.  It was true he’d had less to unlearn than a regular spacer, but it was also true that he and his comrades were expendable.  The Royal Navy would sooner lose an entire squadron of gunboats than a single starship.  Tobias could understand the math - gunboats were relatively cheap, to the point they could be churned out in vast numbers - but he didn’t like it.  He supposed it would be a little easier to take if he hadn’t been one of the gunboat pilots in question.

The gravity flickered, just slightly, as he boarded HMS Lion.  UV lights burned down on him, his skin tingling under the glare.  A pair of suited marines, faces hidden behind tinted masks, blocked his way.  Tobias held out an arm, allowing them to press a bioscanner against his bare skin.  He didn’t blame them for being paranoid.  There’d been a spate of viral outbreaks right across the world in the last few days.  Hell, Tobias himself had been far too close to one only a few short months ago.  The government still didn’t know how that outbreak had even started, let alone how it had spread so far without triggering alarms.

Tobias sighed, inwardly.  He’d spent some of his leave on the dark web, the network of computer servers and hidden datanet sites that was - supposedly - a gateway into a very different view of the world.  There’d been a great deal of speculation, from a modern-day Benedict Arnold - someone working for the virus, willingly - to a government plot to keep the public under control.  That, Tobias reflected, would have been a great deal more convincing before he’d joined the navy.  The government, he’d learnt, was too inefficient to conceive of such a plot, let alone carry it out. Simple incompetence was much more likely, if boring.  No one was interested in logic and reason when they could argue the world was controlled by lizard-people instead.

The marines nodded and waved him through the hatch.  Tobias allowed himself a sigh of relief.  He wanted to believe he wasn’t infected, but it was impossible to say for sure.  A zombie who hadn’t yet realised he was a zombie would spread the infection far and wide, in perfect innocence.  The hatch closed, leaving the marines waiting for the next set of crewmen.  Tobias didn’t envy them.  If a zombie went active when his true nature was exposed, the marines would be its first victims.

He felt oddly unsure of himself as he made his way down the corridor to Gunboat Country and stepped through the hatch.  The compartments were completely empty.  The majority of the squadron had been killed during Operation Lightning Strike, the remainder being reassigned to different ships and squadrons.  Tobias was surprised he and Marigold hadn’t been reassigned too.  The idea that he represented a priceless resource was hard to swallow - not least because he was also considered expendable - but there was some truth in it.  He’d spent far too long detailing everything that had happened to him, ever since the fleet had set out.  He knew he was damn lucky to be alive.

His heart twisted as he stepped into the sleeping compartment and placed his carryall on the nearest bunk.  The bedding had been nicely made up by the caretaker crew, somewhat to his surprise, but it was so blandly done that he knew he was the first person to set foot in the compartment.  There were no more pilots ... the silly part of his mind wondered if he was going to be the only pilot.  It was possible, in theory, for a single pilot to fly and fight a gunboat, but in practice ... he shook his head.  It wasn’t something anyone would do if there was any other choice.

He sat on the bunk and keyed his wristcom.  The orders that had sent him hurrying back to the ship were clearly visible, but there was nothing else.  The navy was very fond of making its personnel run from place to place, then wait for hours before they received the next set of orders.  He snorted at the thought as he brought up the latest set of gunboat manuals and scanned through them, looking for changes.  His name wasn’t anywhere on the latest manuals, he was sure, but he’d helped write them.  Thankfully, whoever had taken his rambling comments and smoothed them out had done a good job.  The manual was neither loaded with naval technobabble nor crammed with bullshit that made it impossible to read properly.  But none of it was really new.

I could probably make use of the simulators, he thought.  No one would complain if I spent the next hour training for war.

He heard a hatch open and looked up as footsteps echoed down the corridor.  They sounded oddly familiar ... the gunboat CAG?  Or one of the old pilots, someone who might be reassigned to the ship?  Or Marigold?  He shook his head at the thought.  Marigold moved quietly, as quietly as a mouse.  The newcomer walked as if he didn’t have a care in the world, as if ... Tobias kept his face impassive as Corporal Colin Lancaster stepped into view.  His heart clenched, torn between old and new feelings that made little sense.  Colin had been a bully, then ... it was hard to say.  They weren’t quite friends, yet they weren’t enemies either.  It helped, he supposed, that they’d each saved each other’s life.

I could have killed him, he thought, numbly.  It would have been easy to make it look like an accident.  So many missiles and beams had been flying about, during the first major engagement, that no one would have thought twice about it.  And he could just have left me to die.

“Tobias,” Colin said.  “Did you have a good leave?”

“It was ... interesting,” Tobias said, neutrally.  “I had to spend a chunk of it at the Admiralty.”

“Ouch,” Colin said.  “I had to spend some time in Portsmouth, explaining to all and sundry what happened when we added an alien to the roster.”

Tobias raised his eyebrows.  “How did it go?  I mean ... really?”

Colin said nothing for a long moment.  “After some weeks on the job, it was easy to forget he wasn’t human,” he said.  “But there were ... issues ... that need to be addressed.  I don’t know if they’ll allow him to rejoin us, let alone invite more Vesy to join the marines.  It might be better for them to have their own units.  The logistics would be a great deal easier.”

“Even though they can eat our food,” Tobias said.  He was surprised Colin was capable of putting together such an argument.  He’d never struck Tobias as being particularly reasonable.  He had always been the kind of person who’d pick on someone for the colour of their skin or their genitals or ... Tobias decided the asshole he’d known had grown up a little.  “Or were there other issues?”

“I think the issues would need to be uncovered, then fixed,” Colin said.  “There was nothing easy about it.”

He grinned, suddenly.  “Have you heard the gossip?”

Tobias frowned.  He didn’t follow gossip.  And yet, it had been hard to miss the story shaking the world.  “The gossip about George Mole running away with Ivan Braithwaite?”

“What?”  Colin stared.  “What is that?”

“The stars of Starship Wars,” Tobias said.  He would have been surprised if Colin had ever heard of it.  Starship Wars, a rip-off of Cosmic Wars which had been a rip-off of Star Wars, had been decidedly uncool when they’d been kids.  “Mole dumped his wife and ran off with a male co-star.”

“No, no,” Colin said.  “About the Captain.  And his wife.  And Captain Campbell.”

Tobias shook his head.  “No, why?”

“Well, the official story is that Captain Campbell ran off with Captain Hammond’s wife,” Colin said.  He grinned, mischievously.  “But the unofficial version of the story is that they were having threesomes, or that the two men became lovers, or the whole story is just something to distract the proles from the budget announcement next week.”

“Oh.”  Tobias shook his head.  He never paid any attention to society gossip.  Captain Hammond and his family were so far above him they might as well be on the moon.  “Does it really matter?”

“It might, if we have to sail in partnership again,” Colin pointed out.  “You think they can be adults about it?”

Tobias winced.  He’d seen his fair share of adults acting like children.  Hell, their children had shown a great deal more maturity.  And ... he had to admit he’d acted poorly as well, when he’d discovered Colin was on the same starship.  He’d believed, in his panic, that Colin had done it deliberately, that he’d been intent on chasing Tobias across interstellar distances.  It had been hard to comprehend, let alone admit to himself, that it had been a coincidence.  The navy had neither known nor cared about their prior relationship.  Why should it?

He considered the point for a long moment.  He’d met Captain Campbell once and hadn’t enjoyed the experience.  The captain hadn’t been unpleasant, but he’d come across as the kind of person who enjoyed a charmed life.  Dashingly handsome, endlessly successful with the ladies, a tactical genius and master at self-promotion who would keep climbing the ladder until they made a new rank just so they could promote him into it.  He was the sort of person Tobias had learnt to loathe, as a child.  The sort of person who would happily destroy a marriage just so he could get laid.

You don’t know him that well, Tobias reminded himself.  For all you know, he’s kind to his mother and always helps old ladies cross the road.

Colin cleared his throat.  “Well?”

“I’m sure they’ll be fine,” Tobias said.  He made a mental note to do his best to avoid learning the details, although he was sure he’d hear about them anyway.  “And it isn’t our problem, is it?”

“No,” Colin said.  “But it could affect our mission and ...”

“And it is well above your pay grade,” a new voice said.  “You’re far too close to speaking ill of a pair of superior officers.”

Colin jumped and spun around, falling into a combat crouch before relaxing.  Tobias peered past him and saw Colonel Richard Bagehot leaning on the hatch.  The gunboat CAG looked bone-tired, as if he’d just spent the last few hours in a cockpit - or, more likely, an endless conference that went around and around in circles, with no one willing or able to take control and actually make some decisions.  Tobias had heard enough about them to know he didn’t want to become a staff officer himself, even though he had real experience.  He intended to serve his term and get out.  Marigold and he could move to the asteroids or a distant system and leave the past behind.

“Sir,” Colin said.  “We were merely ...”

“You have duties to attend to,” Bagehot said, firmly.  “I need to speak to Tobias.”

Colin nodded, saluted and left the compartment.  Tobias watched him go, then looked at Bagehot.  The older man entered the compartment and sat on one of the bunks, resting his hands on his lap.  Tobias had grumbled about losing some of his leave to brief the senior officers, but Bagehot might have lost all of his leave.  The navy was supposed to make sure they took it, yet ... there was a war on.  The needs of the country came first.

“A word of advice,” Bagehot said.  “Gossiping about one’s superior officers is a good way to wind up in hot water.”

“Yes, sir,” Tobias said.  It was hard not to be irritated.  It wasn’t him who’d brought the subject up.  “I’m sorry, sir.”

Bagehot shrugged.  “Do you know why you were recalled early?”

“No, sir,” Tobias said.  “I had the impression we had two more days of leave.”

“The navy needs you,” Bagehot said.  “You’re going to take over as squadron commander.”

Tobias frowned.  “Does it come with a pay raise?”

“And a hefty increase in responsibility,” Bagehot said.  He grinned, humourlessly.  “You’ll be leading the squadron from the front.  I considered suggesting you take my place, but we’re far too short of experienced pilots.  Your maggots will need to see you set a good example by taking the lead.  Of course, this could end badly.”

“Yeah.”  Tobias didn’t need to calculate the odds.  There weren’t many gunboat pilots who’d survived so many encounters with the enemy.  It was strange to realise he had more experience than many of the starfighter pilots he’d loathed and envied as a young man.  In fact ... he frowned as something occurred to him.  “Why not Marigold?”

“As a commanding officer?”  Bagehot shrugged.  “She’s a pilot, not a gunner.  We thought it would make sense for you to take the lead, rather than her.  We also may want to move you sideways, into my role, if things work out well.  In that case, she’ll take your role.”

Tobias hesitated.  “Sir ... I don’t know how to command.”

“You are an experienced pilot, compared to the newcomers,” Bagehot said.  “They’ll look up to you.  All you have to do is build on it.  Make it clear you know how to handle yourself, and that your advice is good advice, and they will follow you anywhere.  And don’t show fear.  They can smell it.”

“Sir ...”  Tobias winced.  “I hope that’s a joke.”

“They’re not monsters,” Bagehot assured him.  “Most of them are just like you were, a few short months ago.”

“I’m doomed.”  Tobias wasn’t sure he was joking.  “If I fuck up ...”

Bagehot met his eyes.  “There isn’t a single commanding officer worthy of the name who hasn’t fucked up, once or twice,” he said.  “You’ll make mistakes.  Some of them will be bad ones.  Some of them will be court-martial offences.  Others ... you learn from them and move on.  I don’t blame you for being nervous.  But you cannot allow fear to bring you down.”

Tobias made a face.  Fear had been a constant companion, ever since he’d realised he was right at the bottom of the social hierarchy.  He’d been picked on by Colin and his cronies, time and time again, but he’d also been picked on by the kids who were picked on themselves.  He’d been at the bottom.  There’d been no one for him to pick on ... he knew he should be relieved he hadn’t become a shithead, like so many others, but it was hard not to resent it, too.  It had been so hard to force himself to do anything ...

... And yet, he’d built a career for himself.  He knew his endeavours didn’t have to end in failure.  He didn’t have to wallow in his own resentments until they curdled and turned to poison.  He didn’t have to ...

A thought struck him.  “How green are they?”

“They’ve had the modified training program, which was based on experience from Thunder Child and Lightning Strike, but they’ve never seen real action,” Bagehot said.  “They’re just like you were when the test squadron was taking shape.  You’ll understand them, Tobias.  I thought, often enough, that I didn’t understand you and your comrades.”

“Because we weren’t typical military recruits,” Tobias said.  “Right?”

“Right,” Bagehot said.  “The average starfighter cadet is a cocky ass who needs to have his ass beaten, repeatedly, before we can risk putting him in a cockpit.  There’s no shortage of fools who think that dressing like that twat from Stellar Star and snapping off witty one-liners is a substitute for training and experience.  But the gunboat pilots were drawn from a very different spectrum of society.  They didn’t need to be broken down.  They needed to be built up.”

He reached out and clapped Tobias’s shoulder.  “You know what your people need,” he added.  “All you have to do is do it.”

Tobias nodded.  “I’ll do my best, sir.”

“Good,” Bagehot said.  His lips curved into a humourless smile.  “Just don’t picture them in their underwear.  That never helps.”

“And now I’m not going to get that out of my mind,” Tobias said, with a grimace.  “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” Bagehot said.  “Good luck.”

Chapter Seven

Mitch had expected, when he arrived at the Admiralty and passed through a series of increasingly intrusive security checkpoints, to be shown directly into a briefing hall.  The last operation had involved hundreds of ships from a dozen nations - as well as humanity’s alien allies - and the early briefings had been more like giant rallies than anything else.  Now ... he tensed, feeling his heart start to pound as he was escorted into Admiral Onarina’s office.  The admiral wasn’t alone.  Captain Hammond was seated facing her.  His eyes narrowed as he looked at Mitch.  From anyone else, it would have been a glare.

“Be seated,” Admiral Onarina ordered.  Her voice was calm, perfectly composed.  She looked as if she’d spent the last few hours running tactical exercises.  “We have much to discuss.”

Mitch sat, resting his hands on his lap.  He’d expected some kind of response from the Admiralty after the interview had gone live, even though he’d toed the party line.  The navy had encouraged him to promote himself as a hero, expecting him to also do his level best to convince the public that the Royal Navy knew what it was doing.  Mitch privately considered it a hard sell, even though the navy hadn’t done badly.  There were just too many loudmouths who didn’t know what they were talking about, but never let it get in their way as they fought for public attention.  He would sooner listen to Captain Hammond’s dry tones than a naval expert who hadn’t so much as stepped onboard a warship, let alone taken her into battle.

Admiral Onarina looked from Mitch to Captain Hammond and back again.  “We have much to discuss,” she said, coolly.  “But there is one topic we have to cover first.”

She leaned forward.  “I understand you’ve had ... issues,” she said, with a hint of very British understatement.  “The newspapers are taking sides, as is most of the general public.  I don’t give a damn.  I expect the two of you to put your differences aside and work together as professional naval officers, or the two of you will be removed from your posts and placed on the bench.  Do I make myself clear?”

“Admiral,” Captain Hammond said.  “I ...”

“Do I make myself clear?”  Admiral Onarina’s voice hardened.  “I don’t care about your problems.  I don’t care about your issues.  I neither know nor care about the truth.  You signed up to protect and defend the country and you will do it or you will be put on half-pay for the rest of eternity.  No fighting each other on the country’s time!  Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, Admiral,” Mitch said.

Captain Hammond shot him a sharp look.  “Yes, Admiral.”

“Good.”  Admiral Onarina tapped a hidden console.  A holographic star system appeared over her desk.  “Captain Campbell will recall this system, of course.  We’ve designated it Virus Prime.”

“And it might be the virus’s homeworld,” Mitch said.  “Or at least a very powerful industrial node.”

“There’s no doubt about that, I’m afraid,” Admiral Onarina said.  Tactical icons flowed around the holographic planets.  “The system is perhaps the most heavily-defended collection of worlds in known space.  If you tried to convince the beancounters to build so many fortresses orbiting Earth ...”

It would give them a heart attack, Mitch finished, silently.  The sheer level of orbital firepower was staggering, even by the virus’s standards.  There were so many remote platforms that it was easy to believe someone could just walk around the entire planet, simply by jumping from platform to platform.  The cost would be as far beyond us as building a Dyson Sphere.

“My staff and I have drawn up a plan to attack and reduce the system, provisionally entitled Operation Footfall,” Admiral Onarina informed them.  “The GATO Council is currently debating the concept, trying to determine how many ships can be detached from home defence duties and reassigned for the offensive.  It isn’t going to be easy.  Despite the success of Operation Lightning Strike” - she shot Mitch a sharp-edged smile - “losses were quite heavy.  It may take weeks, if not months, before GATO is convinced to gamble again.”

“Admiral,” Mitch said.  “If we give the virus time to get back on its feet ...”

“I am well aware of the risks,” Admiral Onarina said, cutting him off.  “However, the virus remains a powerful threat and, as I believe you were kind enough to remind the world, has a motive for trying to lay waste to our planets instead of merely infecting them.  GATO believes it is just a matter of time before we face retaliatory action.  The virus doesn’t think like us, it is true.  But if we were attacked with such force, we would seek to strike back as hard as possible.  We dare not assume the virus doesn’t agree with us on this, if nothing else.”

Mitch let out a breath.  Every instinct he possessed was screaming for the human race to go on the offensive, to put the boot in before the virus managed to pull itself together and launch a counterattack.  He was all too aware that the only good enemy was a dead one ... and yet, he was also aware that Admiral Onarina, an experienced officer in her own right, would be doing everything in her power to speed things up.  GATO would talk and talk and talk, until the window of opportunity slammed shut.  And if he was any judge, it was then they’d be ordered to try to make the operation work.

“The Prime Minister and the War Cabinet have authorised the navy to move ahead with preparations for both Footfall-I and Footfall-II,” Admiral Onarina continued.  “Captain Hammond - who will be breveted to Commodore for the duration - will assume command of Footfall-I.  Captain Campbell will serve as his second.  Like I said” - her dark eyes hardened - “I expect you to work together.  Or else.”

“Admiral,” Captain Hammond said.  “I really don’t think ...”

“I wasn’t offering you a choice,” the Admiral said, icily.  Her tone brooked no contradiction.  “I need you.  The navy needs you.  And if you cannot leave your personal issues behind, when you are called back to the flag, you can leave your resignations at the desk.  Is that clear?”

Mitch nodded, forcing himself to think.  The operation had clearly been in the planning stage well before the scandal had broken.  He was an expert at throwing operations together on the fly, but never with more than a handful of ships under his command.  Deploying a far larger fleet required weeks of planning, if only to get the logistics sorted out so the ships didn’t run out of supplies light-years from home.  But now ... he wondered, suddenly, if someone from the Admiralty hadn’t backed the operation in hopes of getting both him and his rival away from Earth.  It would certainly buy time for everyone to take a deep breath and calm down.

“I can handle it,” Captain Hammond said.

“Good.”  Admiral Onarina altered the display.  “Your formal mission outlines and operational orders, such as they are at this point, have already been uploaded to your inboxes, but the basics are fairly simple.  Lion, Unicorn and a handful of support ships are to lay siege to the system.  You are to snipe their facilities from interplanetary space, hurl missiles and rocks into the teeth of their defences and wear them down.  Ideally, you are to insert biological weapons into the planetary atmosphere, in hopes of killing the virus’s collective awareness.  You are to force them to put planetary defence first.  If they come after you, and they will, you are to harry their ships with long-range missile fire and deploy drones to make them waste their time chasing ghosts.

“In the meantime, we will be putting together a fleet to crush the world and its mobile defenders once and for all.  And, if we’re lucky, it will be the first step towards ending the war.”

“Apart from the infected worlds,” Captain Hammond said.  “We may never be able to free them.”

“No,” Admiral Onarina agreed.  “But if we can trap the virus on a planetary surface, we can and we will hold it down long enough to find a vaccine - or a permanent cure.  If we can free the zombies ...”

Mitch nodded in grim understanding.  There were millions - perhaps billions - of humans who’d been infected, who’d been infected long enough for the virus to gnaw into their brains and effectively kill them.  The minds were already dead.  Their bodies wouldn’t live long without the virus.  And if the virus was removed ... he shuddered, trying not to think about the death toll.  It was a grim reminder that human navies had failed to protect their populations.  The final death toll might be more than anyone could bear.

And if we slaughter every last member of their host races, he thought, we’ll have committed genocide several times over.

“It sounds like a workable plan,” Captain Hammond said.  “What assets will be placed under my command?”

“We’re still putting the squadron together,” Admiral Onarina said. “It looks as if you’ll have six destroyers, plus twelve bulk freighters crammed with supplies and perhaps a mobile asteroid factory.  And, thanks to the RockRats, a secret weapon.”

Mitch smiled.  “A planet-killer?”

“In a manner of speaking,” Admiral Onarina said.  She tapped a switch, revealing a device that looked like an old-style rocket booster.  “There’s a highly-technical name for this, but the RockRats just call it the pusher.  It’s a rather unusual variant on a standard drive field node.”

Captain Hammond leaned forward.  “What does it do?”

“We’ve been trying to find a way to improve upon drive field performance for decades,” Admiral Onarina said.  “The catch, as you know, is that we have to balance the speed with the compensator or the crew would be smashed against the far bulkheads as soon as they turned on the drive.  The pusher imparts a vast amount of speed in a very short space of time, at the cost of overwhelming the compensator and becoming very difficult to steer.  In a sense, unlike normal drive fields, the velocity remains constant even when the drive field is deactivated. “

“But you couldn’t put it on a starship.”  Mitch felt a flicker of glee.  “You could put it on a missile!”

“Or on an asteroid,” Admiral Onarina said.  “You can review the technical specs at your leisure, but you can basically put it on an asteroid, shove it at the target at a sizable percentage of the speed of light and take the pusher off again.  By the time it slips into enemy missile range, it’ll just be a hunk of rock.  And they’ll have to blow it apart because they won’t have time to try to nudge it away from their homeworld.”

“Assuming it is their homeworld,” Captain Hammond said.

“Yes.”  Admiral Onarina grinned.  “I won’t pretend this is a silver bullet, captains.  It has its limitations.  The NGW project believes it can work through the problems and start putting pusher-type drives on missiles, which will reshape the face of warfare.  Again.  But, for the moment, it’ll force the enemy to concentrate on home defence.”

Mitch nodded, considering the options.  No planet-bound industrial society could survive a mid-sized asteroid striking the surface.  The devastation would be so intense that even orbital installations wouldn’t be safe.  He’d have to read the technical specs to confirm the device lived up to its promise - it wouldn’t be the first time something had worked in the lab, but not in the field - yet if it did it would change everything.  He frowned as a thought struck him.  There had to be some way to take advantage of the technology, some way to cripple the enemy ...

Read the technical specs, he reminded himself.  And then see if you can actually make it work.

“Your ships have been given priority for repair and reloading,” Admiral Onarina said.  “I want you and your squadron ready to depart within two weeks.  You’ll take with you enough short-term flicker stations to allow us to remain in contact and keep you posted on developments with Footfall-II.  In the event of GATO deciding against the operation, you may have to take out Virus Prime yourself.”

She looked at Captain Hammond.  “I won’t attempt to determine your deployments for you, Commodore,” she cautioned, “but I meant what I said.  I expect you to be professional.  Kill each other on your own time.”

“Yes, Admiral,” Captain Hammond said, curtly.

“Captain Campbell, remain behind,” Admiral Onarina ordered.  “Captain Hammond, we’ll speak before departure.”

Captain Hammond stood.  “Yes, Admiral.”

Mitch said nothing as he heard Captain Hammond leave the room, closing the door behind him.  God alone knew what his rival was thinking.  He hadn’t expected to be summoned to the Admiralty, let alone to be put in command of an operation that could make or break the war.  Mitch wondered, idly, what sort of high-level discussions there’d been over the last few days.  Charlotte had insisted the scandal would be allowed to continue, if only to give the government a chance to bury bad news.  Mitch had seen enough of how the government operated to suspect she was right.

“Captain,” Admiral Onarina said.  “Do you know what they used to call me?”

Mitch frowned, caught by surprise.  “No, Admiral.”

“The Nubian,” Admiral Onarina said.  “I was famous, for my service on Vanguard, and the media loved me.  They had an odd way of showing it.  They talked endlessly about the colour of my skin, praising me and my family and insisting, in a manner calculated to speak to their own prejudices, that I was a credit to my race.  Never mind my father came from Jamaica.  Never mind that I’d been born and bred in Britain.  Never mind ...”

She shook her head.  “The media builds heroes, Mitch.  It can tear them down just as easily.  One moment, they were hailing me for winning battles; the next, they were making snide remarks about the size of my breasts or whining that I’d cut my hair into a decidedly mannish style.  I went from being the greatest of the great to a low-born guttersnipe who should be grateful for what she was given, then fuck off before the public tired of her.”

Mitch was genuinely shocked.  “Admiral ...”

Admiral Onarina held up a hand.  “The media doesn’t give a damn about you.  Or me.  Or Captain Hammond and his estranged wife.  Their approval and outrage are always feigned.  The Morning Mule spent years complaining about my time on the Admiralty Board, then published a series of stories suggesting I’m a direct descent of Lord Nelson himself after Operation Lightning Strike.  Give them a few weeks and they’ll be suggesting I step aside to let someone younger have a go.”

Her lips twisted.  “You’d be better off with a racist bastard who makes horrible jokes about the colour of your skin than someone who has no convictions at all.  They’ll build you up, when it is convenient, and then tear you down when the winds change.  Don’t expect them to love you.  They don’t love you and they don’t hate you.  They’ll do whatever they think they have to do to get their stories published.”

“I see,” Mitch said.

“I doubt it.”  Admiral Onarina met his eyes.  “Right now, you’re basking in their praise.  You and your” - her eyes narrowed - “lover are enjoying their plaudits.  But that will change soon enough.  You’ll go from hero to zero so fast your head will spin.”

She sighed.  “You want my advice?  During the mission, spend some time thinking about what you really want to do.  Stay with her?  You’ll have very little privacy if you do.  Or run far away, perhaps taking her with you?  She might not want to go.”

Mitch said nothing for a long moment.  “I don’t want to lose my ship.”

“And you’ve made a bunch of enemies, thanks to you not keeping your pants on,” Admiral Onarina snapped.  “Would it have been that hard to find a discreet hotel?”

Her voice softened, slightly.  “I know, naval service puts one hell of a strain on personal relationships.  I’ve lost partners who ... who couldn’t take long separations either.  I don’t know what’s going through Lady Charlotte’s head and I don’t much care.  The aristocratic world has no room for me, even after I was admitted to the Order of the Garter.  I don’t care about the scandal.  What I care about is winning the war.”

She met his eyes.  “I want you to be clear on this, and I will say it to Captain Hammond too, as many times as I must.  I don’t care about your problems.   I expect you to work together long enough to deliver victory.  If I can get Footfall-II launched, we might win the war - or at least eliminate the threat to our worlds.  That is the priority.  Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Admiral,” Mitch said.  He didn’t know what to say.  Admiral Onarina was his hero.  The thought of someone saying such things about her made him want to hunt down the reporter, drag him into the nearest alleyway and beat him to death.  There wasn’t a jury in the world that would convict him.  “I ... why were they so horrid to you?  You saved an entire fleet!”

“It isn’t about me,” Admiral Onarina said.  “And it isn’t about you either.  It’s about selling garbage to the general public.  They’ll kiss your ass one day and kick it the next, whichever sells.  Go back to your ship tomorrow and concentrate on your job.  If the two of you want to build a life together, you can do it after the war.”

Her eyes hardened.  “And remember,” she added darkly, “those who play with fire often get burned.”

Chapter Eight

Thomas had heard, once, that Lord Nelson had forced his wife to host a dinner with Lord and Lady Hamilton, when Lady Hamilton had been Nelson’s mistress and Lord Hamilton apparently turning a blind eye.  It had struck him, at the time, as an unbelievably cruel thing to do even by the standards of the Napoleonic Era.  And dangerous too, when Lord Hamilton could have sued Nelson or worse ... he gritted his teeth as he strode through the Admiralty, wondering just what had got into the admiral.  He’d heard the operation was being planned, but ...

She probably wants to get both of us off-world before the scandal gets any worse, he thought, sourly.  She might even be right.

The thought gnawed at him as he stopped in the lobby and ordered a car to take him to the spaceport.  There was nothing to be gained by going back home, not since he’d received his marching orders.  The Admiralty wouldn’t be amused if he didn’t report for duty on time.  He waited for the driver to bring the car around to the door, then climbed in and activated his terminal as the car glided away from the complex.  He’d have to call his daughter and tell her she was in charge of the estate, at least until he returned home.  He hoped Charlotte wouldn’t try to return.  It would be awkward, to say the least, if their daughter had to tell her mother she wasn’t welcome.

He scowled at the display as the latest email from the lawyer popped up in front of him.  He had a fairly solid case, the man insisted, but the court of public opinion was in full session.  It wasn’t hard to see what Charlotte was doing - smearing Thomas in a bid to distract attention from her own behaviour - but there was nothing they could do, save for waiting it out.  The public would lose interest sooner or later, perhaps sooner now both Thomas and Captain Campbell were leaving Earth.  Thomas gritted his teeth.  Charlotte could take the settlement and fuck off, as far as he was concerned.  She could do whatever she liked, as long as it was a long way from him.

His heart clenched.  He’d ... he hadn’t really loved her, not in the sense of grand passion and midnight flights to Gretna Green and all the other clichés of romance novels and flicks throughout the ages, but ... she’d been part of his life.  She’d shared his home, his bed ... they’d raised two daughters together.  She wasn’t love, but ... she was comfortable.  No, she’d been comfortable.  He scowled as he remembered what she’d said, in their final argument.  He’d thought she was happy with the arrangement.  He’d missed the signs suggesting she wasn’t even remotely happy.  And that meant ...

I could send Captain Campbell to his death, he thought.  It slipped into his mind as though the devil himself had whispered the suggestion, an idea so horrific and yet so tempting that he couldn’t simply dismiss it at once.  He would be in command, when the squadron departed.  It would be easy to send Unicorn into danger, into certain death ... he shook his head in horror.  There were over fifty spacers on the frigate.  I can’t send them all to their deaths.

The thought mocked him as the car sped past the barricades, and the lines of reporters laying siege to the Admiralty, and slipped onto the road to the motorway.  There were shuttles leaving regularly from Heathrow Spaceport to Nelson Base.  He’d have no trouble boarding one, then arranging a flight from Nelson Base to the Hamilton Shipyards.  There were supply runs going back and forth all the time.  Thomas forced himself to sit back and relax as the car raced on.  There would be a complete lack of formality - and no reception, when he reached his ship - but he didn’t care.  He’d never needed a formal ceremony to welcome him to his command.

London looked ... faded, somehow.  The city had barely recovered from the First Interstellar War when the virus had taken root on Earth.  Half the shops had closed down, perhaps permanently.  Clusters of wealthy and powerful people - and their partners and mistresses - moved along the streets, keeping their distance from the others.  Charlotte would have been one of them once, welcoming people she wanted to favour and cutting everyone else dead.  She’d have a hard time adjusting to life as a divorced woman.  She’d still have her title - she couldn’t be stripped of that, as long as her daughters remained alive - but she wouldn’t have the wealth and power that came with it.  Thomas wondered, idly, if Charlotte was hoping he’d die in interstellar space.  It would be interesting, from a legal point of view, if he died before they were formally divorced.  It would certainly make a great deal of money for the lawyers.  

Thomas put the thought out of his head as the car raced through the checkpoints, slipped into the roads leading up to the spaceport and stopped in front of the military terminal.  There were fewer visible civilians, almost all colonists leaving the planet in hope of a better or more secure life.  In theory, it was easier to defend an asteroid colony against infection.  In practice, a nuke would crack the asteroid open like an egg.  And no one was quite sure how the RockRats had managed to lose a pair of asteroids to creeping infection.  Thomas suspected - and he knew MI6 shared his suspicions - that someone had been careless at the worst possible time.  The grey market that dominated most of the asteroid belt didn’t welcome questions, let alone biological sampling.  Who knew what’d happen to the blood and DNA records?

He thanked the driver, then walked through the checkpoint and into the terminal.  The staff checked his card, booked him on a shuttle leaving in thirty minutes and directed him into the officers’ lounge.  Thomas ordered a mug of tea, then sat down to wait.  It wouldn’t be that long, unless he got bumped.  If someone turned up with priority orders, they’d be put ahead of him.  He snorted as he keyed his wristcom and started to read his orders properly.  The admiral might have been keen to get them off-world as quickly as possible, but she hadn’t bothered to cut them priority orders.  It might have been difficult to explain.  Operation Lightning Strike had come too close to disaster for the admiral to feel completely secure in her position.  Her allies wouldn’t go out on a limb for her.  Thomas rolled his eyes.  There was never any shortage of bastards willing to put the boot in, when their target looked vulnerable.

Wankers, he thought, as he drank his tea.  You can’t trust anyone these days.

The shuttle departed on schedule, taking him to Nelson Base.  Thomas passed the time downloading the newest briefings from the datacores and skimming them, one by one.  It was hard to be sure - political infighting had been worse than usual, after the fleet had made it back from Lightning Strike - but it looked as if GATO wasn’t keen on sending another force deep into enemy space.  There were just too many vulnerable stars, too many planets and their populations open to attack.  Thomas understood the logic - it wasn’t as if the worlds could be liberated, at a later date - but it was still frustrating.  The virus was steadily grinding them down.  They wouldn’t win by standing on the defensive.  They’d just give the virus all the time it needed to muster the force to crush them and effectively exterminate the human race.

He passed through a series of checkpoints on Nelson Base - two more than he remembered from his last visit - and boarded a shuttle to the Hamilton Yards.  The pilot offered to take him there directly, as the senior officer on the flight, but Thomas declined.  There was no need to hurry.  Besides, someone might take note and use it against him in the court of public opinion.  And who knew what’d happen then?  Great Britain respected her aristocrats, he’d learnt as a child, but she also watched for signs of entitlement and arrogance.  An aristocrat who misused his rank and title was not likely to be popular, or to command any public support if he wanted a political career.

Perhaps I should go into politics, he thought.  It was an unpleasant concept - he wanted to stay on the bridge as long as possible - but he knew it might be his duty.  He’d seen the elephant, unlike far too many politicians.  They’d find it harder to cut the naval budget if I was on the committee.

He sighed, closing his eyes in a fruitless bid for sleep.  His stomach churned with anger.  His life had turned upside down, leaving him a laughingstock.  And he had to work with the asshole who’d slept with his wife ... not, Thomas had to admit, that it had been anything but consensual.  Charlotte could have summoned help in an instant, just by saying the right words, if Captain Campbell had tried to rape her.  She certainly hadn’t tried to claim she’d been forced into bed when he’d caught them ...

She wanted to hurt me, Thomas reflected, bitterly.  In hindsight, the signs had been all too clear.  The indicators had been blinking red.  And that was why she let herself be caught.

***

Tobias had heard, long ago, about something called imposter syndrome.  It was the belief that one did not hold the title one held, that one didn’t have the objective right to call oneself ... whatever.  He had never really understood it, if only because he’d never really had a position of power.  He’d never been a Prefect, let alone Head Boy.  The idea was laughable.  He couldn’t have made anyone do anything.  And yet ...

He felt like a fraud as he stood in the briefing compartment and watched the younger pilots flow into the room.  They looked so ... so young, so innocent.  It was hard to believe the oldest of them was actually two years older than Tobias, not when they didn’t even have their space legs yet.  Tobias glanced at Marigold, seated at the rear of the compartment, and felt another flicker of guilt.  It should have been her in command of the squadron.  She had as much experience as him, with slightly more composure.  It should have been her.  

And yet, she didn’t object when she was told I’d take command, Tobias thought.  His girlfriend had returned to the ship twelve hours ago, barely long enough for them to catch up before the maggots arrived.  What does she know that I don’t?

It was hard not to turn and run - the urge was overpowering - as he surveyed the newcomers.  Twelve pilots, men and women, wearing uniforms so fresh and clean they looked neater than dress uniforms.  They looked childish ... Tobias had the sudden urge to check their records, to make absolutely sure they were of legal age.  It was rare for anyone to join the navy before they turned eighteen, although he’d heard there were a handful of academy cadets who’d joined at sixteen and graduated at nineteen.  He felt old, despite his own youth.  He’d seen and done things ... he shook his head.  The maggots would catch up soon.  Too soon.

He cleared his throat, then kicked himself an instant later.  It made him sound weak.  And yet, they quietened down and looked at him with ... respect?  Tobias had the uneasy sense someone was playing a joke on him, a very nasty joke.  The only time anyone had pretended to like him at school was when they’d been trying to lull him into a false sense of security, to make him stick his head into the noose - metaphorically speaking - before they closed the trap’s jaws.  Tobias told himself, firmly, that the navy wasn’t a badly-run school.  He could rely on the captain and command staff to back him up if the shit hit the fan.

“Welcome onboard,” he said.  His voice sounded odd, even to himself.  He wished he’d had more time to practice.  Marigold would have listened to him repeat the speech time and time again, patiently correcting him until he had it down pat.  “For those of you who don’t know me, I am Tobias Gurnard, Squadron CO.  I was one of the first pilots to join the gunboat program and take a gunboat into action against enemy ships.  My experiences, and those of my comrades, helped to shape your training sessions.  You have the great advantage of learning from our experiences.”

He forced himself to keep his voice steady.  “I don’t know how much you were told, beforehand, about life on a starship.  HMS Lion is currently preparing to depart.  You - we - will spend most of our time in Gunboat Country, when we’re not taking our gunboats out on live-fire training exercises.  Our days will be filled with simulated engagements, followed by post-battle discussions and assessments of what went right - and wrong.  We will try to get all the mistakes out of the way in the simulators, before we take our craft into battle.  We can learn from our mistakes, in the simulators, without anyone actually getting killed.”

His words hung in the air for a long moment.  “Three other things to bear in mind,” he added, after a moment.  “Before departure, I expect you to remain in Gunboat Country unless you are specifically asked to go elsewhere.  You are not trained starship personnel, and you will simply get in the way while the crew prepares the ship for departure.  There will be time to explore the rest of the ship later, once we are under way.  Second, if you haven’t already done so, I suggest you write your wills before we cross the tramline.  There is no guarantee you’ll survive your first mission.  You need to bear that in mind.”

He kicked himself, mentally, as he saw their faces pale.  He’d told himself that the engagements weren’t quite real often enough, before he’d finally come to terms with the reality of his new life.  He’d done it to keep his fears under control ... he cursed under his breath.  He’d yanked away their illusions as surely as Colin had yanked away his towel, back in the bad old days ...

Tobias pushed the thought to the back of his mind.  “Third, I don’t expect you to like each other.  You did not train together as a group.  Some of you will have become friends, or more than friends, during your time at the academy.  Others are currently in a room full of strangers.  I do not expect you to like each other, as I said, but I expect you to respect each other.  We are all in this together, as we are regularly reminded on the nightly news.  Show a little consideration.  Respect property.  Don’t hog the washrooms.  And so on.”

He paused, significantly.  “Naval regulations are a little vague on sexual relationships between starfighter and gunboat pilots.  The general feeling is that pilots live fast and die young, so officers often turn a blind eye to relationships as long as they don’t cross any serious lines.  There’s a bunch of legalese about it, if you read the regulations, but it all boils down to a flat ban on relationships between people of different ranks.  You are not allowed to have a sexual relationship with someone higher or lower than you in the chain of command.

“I don’t care what you do on your time off, but I expect you to be professional when you’re on duty.  If you can’t handle that, in this environment, I’ll arrange for you and your partner to be separated.  Don’t try me on this.  We cannot afford suggestions the gunboat pilots are more interested in fucking than fighting.”

Even though it’s true, Tobias added, as the newcomers chuckled.  It’s certainly true for starfighter pilots.

He made a show of checking his wristcom.  “If you haven’t already claimed your bunks and freshened up, go do it now,” he said.  “Report to the simulators at 1430.  We’ll start running through the basics, to make sure we’re all on the same page, and then we’ll move into the more advanced simulations.  And if we’re lucky, we’ll be able to take our gunboats out for a spin in a few days.  Any questions?”

A newcomer held up his hand.  “Sir?  When are we leaving the shipyard?”

Tobias blinked.  Sir?  “As far as I know, our orders have not been finalised.  I’ve been told to have the squadron ready for deployment in a fortnight.  That could mean anything from a hard deadline for departure to wishful thinking on someone’s part.   We will, for the moment, treat it as a hard deadline.  It is quite possible we’ll be told to leave early.”

He cleared his throat.  “No more questions?  Dismissed.”

The compartment emptied, leaving Tobias and Marigold alone.  He glanced at her.  “How did I do?”

“Well ...”  Marigold pretended to think about it.  “I think you did fine.  It helps that this is their first shipboard deployment.  They’ll start questioning you more once they get used to being onboard ship.”

“Thanks,” Tobias said, sourly.  “Any words of advice?”

“Don’t let them catch us in the privacy tubes,” Marigold said.  She grinned at him.  “You do realise you outrank me now?”

Tobias blanched.  “Uh ... technically ...”

Marigold snorted.  “Try using that excuse on the CO,” she said.  “See what it gets you.”

“A kick up the backside, probably,” Tobias said.  He headed to the hatch.  “Come on.  We’ll set up the simulators, then put them through their paces.”

And make sure they lose a battle, just to teach them a lesson before the missiles really start flying, he thought.  He remembered some of his own experiences and cringed.  If they go into battle overconfident, they won’t come out again.

Chapter Nine

It had been a struggle, Charlotte had said, to book a hotel room in central London.  It wasn’t that she couldn’t afford it - she could - but the hotel managers had been reluctant to appear to take sides in the ongoing public divorce.  Mitch feared, reading between the lines, that the various managers would have denied her completely if he hadn’t been sharing the room.  He was a naval hero, after all, and it would have been very bad publicly if they’d turned him away.  But he wasn’t sure that would have been enough to allow them to keep the room if Captain Hammond and his allies started pressuring the hotels to kick them out.

They lay on the bed, spooned together.  Mitch had returned to the hotel as soon as the admiral had dismissed him, where they’d spent the last hour making love.  It astonished him just how adventurous Charlotte was, although he supposed it made a certain kind of sense.  She was not only old enough to know what she wanted, she was also throwing off the shackles of her former life.  Mitch wasn’t sure there’d been many shackles, sexually speaking, but it didn’t matter.  He knew he’d have to make his way back to his ship soon enough.

And the admiral made it clear I’d better return victorious, he thought, grimly.  It was easy to laugh at the admiral’s warnings, but ... looking at the media coverage, he was inclined to think she might be right.  The media had made him.  It could tear him down just as easily. If I fail, I’ll be torn down in an instant.

Charlotte shifted, her bare breasts pressing against his back as she moved.  Mitch felt himself stiffen, again.  It felt odd to be so ... taken ... with her, with anyone, and yet he knew he’d be heading back to space within a few hours.  There wouldn’t be any sex on Unicorn.  The frigate didn’t have room for an artfully-disguised captain’s woman, even if he’d thought he’d get away with it.  There’d been an admiral who’d kept his wife on his flagship, an incident that had turned into a major scandal when it had finally burst into the light.  Mitch smiled at the thought.  Captain Hammond was probably wishing he’d kept his wife on his ship now, too.

“I wish you could stay,” Charlotte said.  She straddled him.  “Life will be dull without you.”

“You’ll find it easier to get a separation if you’re just arguing with his lawyers,” Mitch pointed out.  “And you’ll be able to spend more time with your daughters.”

Charlotte nodded, tartly.  Mitch wondered, not for the first time, if there was anything binding them together beyond lust and shared adversity.  What sort of future did they have, if he returned in glory?  Would Charlotte be happy to be the wife of a naval hero?  She’d already been the wife of a naval hero.  Mitch had no illusions about Captain Hammond’s shortcomings, and his excessive caution when faced with a chance to really hurt the enemy, but there was no doubting his competence.  Would she stay with him?  Or would she slip off into the countryside and forget him?  He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

His thoughts fled as Charlotte pressed down on him, breasts bouncing as she rode him like a pony.  Mitch felt himself moving in time, hands reaching up to play with her breasts as she moved faster and faster.  Little mewling noises escaped her lips as she leaned down to kiss him, an instant before he exploded.  She smiled, rolled off and stood, heading for the shower.  Mitch followed.  There’d be time to play in the water before he had to take his leave.

“I might run for parliament,” Charlotte said, as she turned the water on and stepped inside.  “My local MP is standing down this summer and the chairman of the local party owes me a favour or two.  Do you think I’d convince people to vote for me?”

Mitch frowned.  “I thought you needed to give up your title if you wanted to run for office.”

“Only if I wanted a seat on the cabinet,” Charlotte corrected him.  Water ran down her body and pooled around her feet.  “If I just wanted to be an MP, I wouldn’t have to give anything up.”

“Good luck,” Mitch said.  “Just remember to vote for higher naval budgets.”

Charlotte’s face darkened.  “That’ll be a hard sell,” she said.  “Right now, we’re eating our seed corn just to meet the demands of the war.  People are tired of it.”

“They’ll be a great deal more tired of being zombies, when the virus infects the entire planet,” Mitch pointed out.  “Or they would be, if zombies could think.”

Charlotte nodded, pressing against him so they both got wet.  “I take your point,” she said.  “But there are limits to what we can do.”

Mitch kept his thoughts to himself.  Charlotte wanted something for herself ... a seat in parliament?  It would be an interesting campaign.  On one hand, she’d cheated on her husband; on the other, she was the lover of a naval hero.  The local party would be unsure if it should support her or tell her to join the other party.  Mitch had heard stories about local parties, particularly ones in rural areas.  They were effectively single party counties, to the point the old rotten boroughs had practically been resurrected.  Charlotte might just have enough influence to ride roughshod over all opposition.

Unless her husband takes a public stand against her, he thought.  That should make for an interesting time.

He pushed the thought out of his head as he stepped out of the shower, dried himself and changed into a basic uniform.  One advantage of the whole affair, he supposed, was that he had relatively little baggage with him.  Charlotte had urged him to make a visit to London’s famous tailors, to place orders for clothes he didn’t need and probably couldn’t afford, but he’d been insistent on carrying as little as possible.  She could afford a private aircraft to carry her back home, wherever it was now.  Mitch knew he didn’t dare get into bad habits.

“I’ll see you when you return,” Charlotte said.  “Don’t let Thomas get you killed.”

Mitch scowled as he called a cab.  Captain Hammond could send Mitch and his ship into danger ... the Board of Inquiry would be suspicious if something happened to Unicorn, under the circumstances, but it was possible Captain Hammond could avoid any blame for the incident.  Mitch would just have to check his orders carefully, pushing his authority to the limit to avoid certain death.  It wasn’t as if he had to slavishly follow every order he was given.  By long custom, a captain had wide latitude to determine how best to complete his mission.

“I’ll be back,” he promised.  “Good luck.”

Charlotte nodded and gave him a quick kiss, just before the terminal bleeped.  There was rarely any need to wait for more than a few minutes for a cab in London.  Mitch picked up his bag, kissed her one final time and headed down to the lobby.  The bellhop held the door open as he stepped outside, his face completely unreadable.  Mitch frowned, feeling uncomfortable.  If he’d grown up in a world where servants bowed and scraped and did everything he wanted, would he be deeply weird too?

The very rich are different from you and me, he thought, wryly.  And it isn’t just because they have more money.

Mitch put the thought out of his mind as the cab glided onto the street.  There was no point in dwelling on Charlotte, and their affair, now he was on his way back to his ship.  His terminal bleeped, reporting it had received messages from the Admiralty.  Mitch scanned his orders quickly, then read them more carefully to be sure he’d hit the high points.  The Admiralty was pulling out all the stops to make sure Mitch - and Captain Hammond - were dispatched on their mission as soon as possible.  Mitch understood, all too well.  The Admiralty was caught in a bind.  If the Admiralty sought to punish one or both of the captains, there would be political and public outrage.  And yet, the Admiralty couldn’t have them hanging around the solar system either.  Getting them both out of the system as quickly as possible was the best of a bad set of options.

But it’s still pretty damn bad, Mitch thought.  They must be pissed.

The cab reached the spaceport, allowing him to jump onboard a shuttle heading directly to the Hamilton Yards.  He was aware of eyes following him as he was shown to the craft, spacers torn between admiration for his deeds and contempt for his role in the affair.  Mitch had always sought the limelight, but ... he wondered, as he boarded the shuttle, if he’d made a mistake.  It was one thing to play to the media as a naval hero with a genuine record of success.  It was quite another to help a woman cheat on her husband and start the scandal of the century.  If he’d known she intended to use him to hurt her husband ... a grin spread across his face as he remembered his first time in her bed.  He suspected he would have done it anyway.

He spent the flight reading through the technical specs, noting how military technology had advanced.  Again.  It was odd to realise that Unicorn might be obsolete even before the tactical concepts behind her had truly matured, although he was fairly certain his ship would never be scrapped.  There was no shortage of work for smaller ships ... he wondered, suddenly, if Captain Hammond would have the patience to wait until the frigate could be downgraded to patrol duties, ensuring the end of Mitch’s career without ever doing anything too overt that might get the public on his side.  It would be a great deal more satisfying than a demented Uriah Gambit and much less likely to lead to a court-martial and the hangman’s noose.

And he might think of it too, Mitch thought.  It certainly plays into his strengths.

He dismissed the thought as HMS Unicorn finally came into view.  The frigate looked crude, compared to some of the more elegant civilian ships that plied the spacelanes in happier times, but she had a certain presence that never failed to thrill.  He drank in the details as the shuttle glided closer, until the frigate - tiny compared to a fleet carrier - dominated the porthole, then collected his carryall and made his way to the hatch.  A low thud ran through the shuttle as it docked, the hatch opening to reveal a pair of suited men.  Mitch allowed them to test his blood without protest.  They were only following orders.  There was nothing to be gained by reprimanding them.

“Welcome home, Captain,” one of them said.  “The XO requests your presence in your cabin.”

Mitch blinked.  His cabin was also his office - there were no ready rooms on tiny Unicorn - and his XO had every right to use it, but it was still a surprise.  He’d been sure to send Commander Staci Templeton a message, informing her he was returning to the ship.  They would have to have a long talk, just to make sure he knew everything that had happened in his absence ... Mitch felt a sudden pang of guilt.  He hadn’t been keeping up with her messages and he was fairly sure she knew it.  He’d known better.  God knew his stint as an XO had been marred by a captain who hadn’t paid attention to his officers.

He walked through the ship, silently noting the open hatches as the crew readied the frigate for departure.  A handful of crewmen were strangers, newly assigned to his ship.  Mitch made a mental note to find time to speak to them, just to impress upon the newcomers that the frigate’s crew was a family.  There was no room for anyone unwilling or unable to pull his weight.  The newcomers saluted as he passed, a clear sign they’d never served on a frigate before.  Their commanders didn’t demand salutes, not when there was work to be done.  The formalities were saved for visits from flag officers and reporters.

The hatch hissed open, allowing him to step into his cabin.  It was the largest personal compartment on the ship, although it was barely large enough to swing a cat.  His XO - a tall woman with short dark hair and a fiery disposition - sat at the desk.  She stood as he entered, her face grim.  Mitch felt his heart sink.  If something had happened that required his personal attention ... no, he knew that wasn’t the problem.  Staci would have sent him an urgent message if there was something she couldn’t handle.

“Captain,” Staci said.  “Permission to speak freely?”

Mitch frowned as he dropped his carryall on the bunk.  Staci always spoke freely.  It wasn’t a trait that had won her many friends, not on the bigger ships, but it was something he’d come to value.  Mitch had a high opinion of himself, like all frigate commanders, yet he was all too aware he could make mistakes.  Better to have Staci question his decisions - in private - than to lose his ship and crew.  And yet ... why was she asking?  She knew she could speak freely.

“Yes,” he said, flatly.

“With all due respect, Captain,” Staci said, “what the hell were you thinking?”

She went on before Mitch could think of an answer.  “I know, being on leave is a chance to leave the uniform behind and ... and have fun,” she snapped.  “But being caught in bed with a fellow officer’s wife?  Are you out of your mind?”

“No,” Mitch said.  “I ...”

“Captain, the media will tear you apart,” Staci said, cutting him off.  “And if you and your career survive that, the Admiralty will finish the job.  What the hell were you thinking?”

Mitch felt a hot flash of anger, which he forced himself to suppress.  “I thought ...”

He hadn’t thought, he acknowledged ruefully.  It would have been easy enough to turn Charlotte down.  It wasn’t as if he hadn’t known she was the wife of a fellow officer.  It wasn’t as though he couldn’t have insisted they kept it discreet, that they only met in hotels with a reputation for privacy.  Hell, it wasn’t as if he’d been desperate.  He wasn’t short of female company.  He could have visited the red-light district or travelled to Sin City.  It would have been a quick transaction, not something that would come back to bite him.

Staci met his eyes.  “Yes, I get it.  I know how it feels to want something.  I know how it feels to go without.  But do you think Captain Hammond is going to let this pass?  Do you think all the other captains are just going to ... let you anywhere near their wives?  You are going to be involved in the worst scandal ... no, you’re already involved.  And your career is going to hit an asteroid at near-light speed.”

“I know,” Mitch said.  “But I ...”

“You’re not sixteen,” Staci said.  “Did you really have to let your small head do the thinking for you?”

Mitch flushed.  “Staci, I ...”

“You could have gone to Sin City and paid for a simulation of the aristocratic life,” Staci pointed out.  “Or you could have just kept it discreet.  Instead, you’ve started a fight you can’t win.”

“I have to fight,” Mitch said.  “If I don’t, my career goes straight into the crapper.”

“And if you do, your career goes straight into the crapper anyway,” Staci countered.  “Is she really so fantastically stunning that you lost the ability to think straight?”

She shrugged.  “She’s a dangerously reckless aristocrat who just wants to have fun.  I guess the two of you are pretty well matched.”

“Thanks,” Mitch said, sourly.

Staci smiled, humourlessly.  “I get it.  I really do.  But you’re going to spend the rest of your life paying for this mistake.  The minute you expose yourself, someone is going to ram a sword into your career and that will be the end.  I doubt your mistress gives much of a damn about you and, even if she does, she doesn’t have the clout to save you.  You might find yourself on an asteroid mining colony, once the shooting stops.  Or simply discharged as part of the post-war military rationalisation.”

“That’s why I have to fight,” Mitch said.  “If I keep my name in front of the public ...”

“This would be the same public that often shuns women who cheat on military husbands?”  Staci snorted.  “I seem to recall some poor bitch getting stripped naked, shaved bald and kicked out of her job for fucking another woman.  Do you really think Lady Whatever will be able to keep her reputation?  Her husband is already preparing to divorce her.”

Mitch winced.  “She’ll be fine.”

“I doubt you will be,” Staci said.  “Do you think she loves you?  Or that she thinks of you as anything more than a glorified sexbot?”

She met Mitch’s eyes.  “Captain, you’re in an untenable position,” she said.  “And that is the blunt truth.”

“We’ll see,” Mitch said.  He hoped she was wrong, but feared she was right.  “Now, what’s been happening since I left the ship?”

“The crew has been bombarded with interview requests,” Staci said, flatly.  “I’ve told them to keep their mouths shut, for the moment, but you should speak to them too.  At the very least, you should reassure them their careers are not in danger.”

“Understood,” Mitch said.  “Now, how soon until we can leave the system?”