Warspite

(Ark Royal, Book IV)

Christopher G. Nuttall

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Cover by Justin Adams

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Cover Blurb

Peace is not freedom.  Peace is merely the absence of war.

The First Interstellar War is over, but the Royal Navy still has plenty of work to do.  As Earth struggles to recover from the bombardment, Captain John Naiser is placed in command of HMS Warspite - an experimental heavy cruiser - and ordered to escort a squadron of colony ships to a star system of immense strategic importance.  

But as the crew struggle to survive hundreds of light years from Earth, they find themselves dealing with the legacy of the war ... and a threat which may sow the seeds of renewed conflict, or a deadly civil war that will rip the human sphere apart.

[Like my other self-published Kindle books, The Trafalgar Gambit is DRM-free.  You may reformat it as you choose.  There is a large sample of the text – and my other books – on my site: chrishanger.net.  Try before you buy.]

Author’s Note

It will probably surprise most readers to see a fourth book of Ark Royal, as the titular ship died quite spectacularly at the end of The Trafalgar Gambit.  Warspite is set in the era immediately following the First Interstellar War, which was detailed in the first three Ark Royal books.  I’ve done my best to allow new readers to jump right into the series without actually needing to read the first three, but I would recommend reading them first to gain an understanding of the background.

As always, I am indebted to my beta readers, to whom this book is dedicated.

Thanks for reading!

Chris

Prologue

Published In British Space Review, 2207

Sir.

Although Commodore Biotin and Admiral Fredrik raise excellent points concerning the philosophical implications of other forms of intelligent life (aside from us and the Tadpoles), they are hardly the prime subject of interest to the readers of British Space Review.  Not to put too fine a point on it, we are concerned with the outcome of the First Interstellar War and its implications for the future development of both the Royal Navy and the United Kingdom.

Prior to the Battle of Vera Cruz, naval thinkers anticipated facing a human enemy, rather than an outside context villain.  The Royal Navy was shaped in line with lessons learnt through studying American-Chinese skirmishes and war games conducted by the major spacefaring powers.  However, when we were actually faced with a serious war, our doctrine proved to be largely insufficient.  The disaster at New Russia, if nothing else, proved that our imagination when it came to alien threats was definitely inadequate.  Indeed, were it not for the freak circumstances that kept Ark Royal in service, we would have lost the war.  As it was, Ark Royal was able to buy us time to react to the new threat.

However, the outcome of the war leaves us with a multitude of urgent questions, all concerning the government and defence of the human race.  It is not my place to speculate on any of the proposals to turn the Earth Defence Organisation into a real government, but I must note that history suggests that any attempt to embrace a single government for much of the human race is doomed to failure.  The Troubles – and the Age of Unrest – were largely caused by such attempts.  Therefore, we must assume that the Royal Navy, while working closely with allies such as the Americans and French, will have to prepare for the future alone.  This will not be an easy task.

We started the First Interstellar War with fifteen fleet carriers, not including Ark Royal.  Ten of those carriers, a significant proportion of our budget, were lost in the fighting, along with forty-seven smaller warships and an undisclosed number of support and replenishment vessels.  The Royal Navy has refused to declassify the precise number of starfighters and their pilots lost in the war, but outside observers have concluded that eighty percent of the pre-war establishment died in the first year of the war.  These loss figures, which are comparable with those suffered by the other major spacefaring powers, are truly horrific.  

This leaves us with a major problem.  We must rebuild the fleet, at the same time as recovering from the damage inflicted on our country by the Battle of Earth and mustering as many freighters as possible to transfer settlers from Earth to Britannia.  Failing to do so, despite the hideous costs involved, will merely render us weak and vulnerable, against both a recurrence of the war and conflict against our fellow humans.  I hardly need remind the reader that many nations have suffered badly as a result of the war and some of them blame the whole conflict on us.  Indeed, the troubles suffered by the Russians in regaining control of New Russia, following the Tadpole withdrawal from the system, suggest that a whole new series of inter-human conflicts may be about to begin.

And there is a further threat.  Prior to the Battle of Vera Cruz, we believed ourselves to be unique in the universe, the sole intelligent race.  This belief has been resoundingly shattered by the war.  We cannot afford to rule out the possibility that other races may be out there in the darkness – and that some of them will pose a threat.  Or, for that matter, that we will be hemmed in by alien-occupied stars and find ourselves with no further space for expansion.  

Therefore, sirs, we must turn our attention to the task of rebuilding the Royal Navy, integrating Tadpole-derived technology and ensuring the security of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Britannia.  

Yours

Admiral Sir Joseph Porter (Ret.)

***
“Mary,” Lieutenant Higgins said, as he entered the compartment.   “We have completed our latest transit along the tramlines.”

Mary turned to the handsome young officer and beamed.  “Thank you, Joe,” she said, warmly.  “It’s always good to know when we can relax.”

Seated at the opposite side of the compartment, Gillian McDougal sighed.  Mary was five years younger than herself, a beautiful girl fresh out of university who had married her husband just days before he had departed on the Cromwell Mission.  They’d thought – just as Gillian and her husband had thought – that they would be separated for less than a month before the secondary personnel were allowed to board ship for the distant colony world.  But then the war had begun and a month-long separation had swelled into four years.  Mary hadn't wasted time finding a new lover to warm her bed.

Not that I could really blame her, Gillian thought, as Higgins led the dark-haired girl out of the compartment.  She barely knew her husband before she tied the knot.

It had seemed an adventure, once upon a time.  They would move from Earth to Cromwell; a whole new world, a human-compatible planet utterly untouched by any mortal hands.  There, they would set up their own farms or businesses, which – because they would be in on the ground floor – would lead rapidly to wealth and power.  Not a few new scions of the aristocracy had been created after the settlement of Britannia, Gillian’s husband had noted when they’d put their names down for the colony mission.  Success on Cromwell would ensure that his children had a chance to truly make something of themselves.  It was why he had insisted on leaving first, even if it meant leaving his wife and daughters behind for a month or two.  He had been adamant it was the only way to ensure they staked a proper claim.

But a month had become two months, and then a year, and then several years ...

Mary had asked, more than once, why Gillian had remained loyal to her husband.  It was the 23rd Century, after all, and marriages rarely lasted longer than it took for the children to grow to adulthood and flee the nest.  And her husband was literally thousands of light years away, growing plants on a distant world.  Gillian had considered it, then pointed out sharply that she genuinely loved her husband, even if they were apart.  They’d made memories together ...

She shook her head at the thought, then turned her attention to the datapad in front of her, barely reading the words.  After so long, they were practically engraved in her mind; the complete records of the first survey party to visit Cromwell and certify the world safe for human habitation.  Cromwell was everything Earth was not, even now; a safe environment, free of higher-order forms of life ... and two-legged predators who would chase after her daughters, even before they entered their teens.  It was a chance to build a new home, she knew, even though it would mean a great deal of hard work.  But a doctor trained in emergency and colonial medicine could practically write her own ticket.

A dull quiver ran through the ship and she looked up, startled.  Vesper was a large colonist-carrier, not a warship.  The passage had been smooth, save for the uncomfortable sensation of passing through the tramlines.  There had been nothing save for an endless thrumming from the ship’s drives since they’d boarded the vessel.  For it to quiver ...

“Your attention please,” the captain said.  “Please return to your quarters and strap yourselves down.  I say again, please return to your quarters and strap yourselves down.”

The hatch opened, revealing a surprised-looking Mary in a dishevelled state.  “What’s happening?”

“Your lips are swollen,” Gillian said, bitchily.  It helped override her growing alarm.  “What are you going to do when Brian” – her husband – “finds out about your affairs?”

Mary glared at her.  “And who is going to tell him?”

“Every last person on the secondary lists knows you’ve been fucking around,” Gillian pointed out, as sweetly as she could.  “There’s nowhere to go on Cromwell ...”

Another quiver ran through the ship, followed by a bang that shook the bulkheads.  Alarms started to sound moments later; Gillian had barely stood when the emergency airlocks slammed down, sealing the relaxation compartment off from the rest of the ship.  It took her a long moment to realise that it was the hull breach alarm, warning that – somehow, somewhere – there was a gash in the hull.  The ship’s atmosphere was pouring out into interstellar space.

Mary screamed.  “What ... what was that?”

“Remain calm,” Gillian ordered.  The maps she’d seen of the tramline network were not encouraging.  They were an unimaginable distance from anyone who might have been able and willing to help them.  “Panic is the enemy right now.”

“Your attention please,” the captain’s voice said.  “This vessel is about to be boarded.”

Gillian felt her mouth drop open.  Boarded?  Boarded by whom?  Space pirates existed in dull entertainment programs, not real life.  And which nation would risk war with the United Kingdom by attacking one of its colony ships?  But they were so far from Earth, she realised dully, that it was quite likely that the ship’s ultimate fate would never be known.

“Remain calm,” the captain ordered.  “There is no immediate danger.”

Gillian gritted her teeth.  Mary looked at her, sharply.

“What do we do?”

“We pray,” Gillian said.  “There’s nothing else we can do.”

Mary looked disbelieving, but Gillian only nodded.  They had no weapons, save for a handful of hunting rifles stowed in the hold.  Even if the crew had been able to get them out in time before the pirates – or whoever they were – boarded the ship, they would not be able to offer any meaningful resistance.  Vesper couldn't hope to outrun or outfight even a small warship.

She cursed under her breath, then returned to her seat.  All she could do was wait and see what happened ... and pray that her daughters survived.  Unless a miracle happened, she knew they were unlikely to see Cromwell, ever again.  And her husband ...

Closing her eyes, she settled down to wait.

Chapter One

London wasn't what it used to be.

Captain John Naiser stood in Trafalgar Square and looked towards the War Memorial, placed below Nelson’s ever-watchful eye.  It was nothing more than a piece of the Ark Royal’s hull, salvaged from the wreckage of the once-mighty ship, but it had a special meaning for the men and women of the Royal Navy.  He took a step closer, ignoring the handful of children clustered around the memorials, until he could see the faint edges of the names engraved into the metal.  There were far too many names listed of those who had died during the war.

He looked for a specific name, but it wasn't visible.  The Royal Navy had lost over ten thousand officers and men in the war, a loss that had crippled the post-war navy.  Each of the names were too small to make out with the naked eye, carved out of the metal by cutting lasers guided by computers carefully programmed to include each and every known casualty of the war.  There was no point in looking for the names of those who had served on HMS Canopus, still less his friend and lover.  He took one final look, then forced himself to turn away.  There was no point in dwelling on the past.

The children headed back towards the teacher standing at the edge of the square, their faces pinched and worn compared to the children he remembered from his own childhood.  They knew what it was like to be hungry, he knew, and what it was like to lose everything in one afternoon.  God alone knew how many of them were war orphans, fostered out to whoever was willing to take in a child after their parents had been killed, or how many had seen nightmares as they struggled for survival.  Three years after the end of the First Interstellar War, large parts of the population were still traumatised.

He drew in a breath, then started to walk down towards the Ministry of Defence.  Most of the once-white buildings looked torn and faded, damaged badly by the giant waves and endless rainfall that had swept over London.  Even crossing the Thames was an adventure these days, after the waves had knocked down all the bridges.  The Royal Marines had established pontoon bridges in the early days of the recovery, and the Royal Engineers had added a handful of more solid structures, but there was nothing as reassuring as the bridges he’d once known.  It would be years before the city recovered from the attack on Earth – and decades, perhaps, before the population recovered from the war.

A line of young men, wearing the muddy-brown overalls of the Civil Reconstruction Corps, marched past him, swinging their tools in a manner that reminded him of soldiers carrying rifles.  They’d been lucky – or unlucky, depending – to escape military conscription in the years following the war, instead being detailed to work on civil recovery projects.  John felt a moment of envy for their simple lives, even though he knew they had little true freedom.  But then, everyone in Britain was required to play a role in rebuilding the country.  The reserves of manpower represented by the civilian population could not be allowed to go untapped.

He smiled to himself as the workers were followed by a handful of young women, old enough to be out on the streets on their own, but young enough to escape their own conscription into the CRC.  Half of them already looked pregnant, having worked out that pregnancy was the one sure way to avoid being subsumed into serving their country.  They hadn't realised, the cynical side of his mind noted, that they were also serving Great Britain by providing children – or, for that matter, that raising a child would take far more than two years of compulsory service in the CRC.  But it might not matter.  If they were reluctant to raise the children, after giving birth, the children could be passed to foster parents for adoption.  

“Hey, spacer,” one of the girls called.  “You want to go for a drink?”

John shook his head.  Colin and he had often hit the bars of Soho, chatting up young men and trying to take one or more of them home for the night, back when they’d been young and foolish and the very concept of alien life nothing more than a figment of human imagination.  And now Colin was dead and there were days when John found it hard to raise his head from the pillow and do his duty.  

The thought made him scowl, bitterly.  He wasn’t the only one to be badly affected by the war.  Two weeks ago, he’d heard that one of his old classmates – it bothered him profusely that he didn't remember the man’s name – had put a gun in his mouth and killed himself, blowing his brains over the compartment.  He wasn't the only ex-military officer to kill himself in the wake of the war, either through survivor’s guilt or the simple realisation that nothing would ever be the same again.  

He sighed as he turned the corner and walked up to the line of armed soldiers on duty.  The sight of soldiers in the capital, wearing battledress uniforms rather than ceremonial garb, had once been an unpleasant surprise.  Now, with Britain practically under martial law, it was depressingly common.  The Royal Horse Guards had been a firm and highly-visible presence on the streets since the Battle of Earth.  There were days when John wondered if anything would be the same again.

Of course it won’t, he told himself, sharply.  We’re no longer alone.

Five years ago, the human race had known it was alone in the universe.  A hundred Earth-like planets had been discovered, with none of them possessing any life forms larger or more interesting than a dog.  Earth had seemed unique in giving birth to an intelligent race ...

... And then humanity had encountered the Tadpoles.  And, if a single elderly carrier had been scrapped, the Tadpoles would have won the war.  Instead, they’d been held, barely.  And then, when the peace talks had finally concluded, the human race had looked out on a universe that was fundamentally different.  They were no longer alone in the universe and, perhaps, it was only a matter of time until they encountered a third intelligent race.

And who knows, he asked himself, what will happen then?

The guard stepped forward as John reached the security fence.  He didn't quite point his rifle at John’s chest, but the threat was clearly there.  London had learned hard lessons about security in the days following the attack on Earth.  The food riots and outright panic had made the task of recovery far harder.

“Papers, please, sir,” the guard said.

John reached into his uniform jacket and produced his ID card, then the printed letter inviting him to the Ministry of Defence.  The letter had been short and to the point, but he had been unable to avoid a thrill of excitement after two weeks on Earth.  Paper letters were rarely sent unless he was being summoned for promotion, a new command – or disciplinary action.  And he knew he'd done nothing to warrant being hauled up in front of the First Space Lord for a bollocking.  That would be the task of his immediate superior.

“You’ll be met inside the building by a guide,” the guard said, after scrutinising the papers and checking with the building’s datanet.  “Remember not to stray from the path, sir.”

“I know,” John said.  Being arrested by the military police and spending the night in the guardhouse wouldn't be fun.  “Are there any problems I should know about?”

“Couple of reports of bandits in the Restricted Zones, but nothing too serious,” the guard said.  He stepped backwards and waved John into the building.  “Good luck, sir.”

John smiled, then stepped though the gate into the Ministry of Defence.  It was the largest military building in London, apart from the barracks serving the army regiments based in the capital, now that command and control facilities had been moved to secret locations or Nelson Base, hanging in high orbit over the city.  Inside, it was decorated with giant paintings showing scenes from British military history, culminating in a painting entitled The Last Flight of Ark Royal.  It was surprisingly good, compared to some of the others.

“Captain Naiser,” a female voice said.  “I'm Commander Stephanie Underwood.  If you will come with me ...?”

John nodded, then allowed the young woman to lead him through a network of corridors.  Outside the entry lobby, it was surprisingly bare, as if the walls had been stripped of paintings and all other forms of decoration.  It was political, he guessed, as Commander Underwood paused in front of a large pair of doors.  The Ministry of Defence couldn’t afford to be living it up when a fifth of the British population was still living in shoddy prefabricated accommodation scattered around the countryside.

“The First Space Lord,” Commander Underwood said.

“Sir,” John said, stepping into the office.  It was as barren as the rest of the building, save for a large holographic display floating over the Admiral’s desk.  “Reporting as ordered.”

“Take a seat, Captain,” Admiral Percy Finnegan said.  He returned John’s salute with one of his own.  “It's been a while.”

John sat, resting his hands in his lap.  Finnegan had commanded HMS Victorious during the war, where he’d had the dubious pleasure of saving John’s life when his carrier had responded to the report of an attack on Bluebell.  John had met him twice, once for a debriefing and once for a transfer from starfighter piloting to mainline command track.  Both meetings had been short, formal and largely unemotional.

“I was reading through your file,” Finnegan said, as he sat down and placed his elbows on his desk.  The show of informality didn't help John to relax.  “It’s quite an interesting read.”

“Thank you, sir,” John said.

“Born twenty-three years ago, in London,” Finnegan continued.  “Parents largely absentee; you were practically brought up in boarding school.  Joined the Cadet Corps at fourteen, then switched to the Space Cadets at fifteen.  Your instructor spoke highly of you and cleared the way for you to enter the Starfighter Training Centre at eighteen.  You were involved in an ... incident the week before graduation and were accordingly assigned to HMS Canopus, rather than a posting on a fleet carrier.”

John stiffened.  The ... incident ... had seemed a good idea at the time.

“You served on Canopus for five months before the Battle of Bluebell, where you were the sole survivor.  Your heroics during the battle won you the Victoria Cross.  You were asked to return to the Training Centre to share your experience, but instead you requested a switch to command track.  May I ask why?”

There was no point, John knew, in pretending to be mystified by the question.  

“Colin and I were ... close,” he said.  “We were wingmates, sir.  When he died, I decided not to fly starfighters anymore.”

“Indeed,” Finnegan said.  He took a long breath.  “You were appointed First Lieutenant on HMS Rosemount, as she required a CAG at short notice.  I might add that you weren't expected to keep that position indefinitely.  Captain Preston, however, chose you to succeed Commander Beasley when he was promoted to take command of HMS Jackson.  You served as his XO until you were transferred to HMS Spartan.  Again, you were quite young for the post.”

“Yes, sir,” John said.

“But you would be far from the only officer to be promoted rapidly,” Finnegan concluded, shortly.  He met John’s eyes.  “Your failure to follow a conventional career path would, under other circumstances, limit your chances of advancement.  As it happens, however, we have a posting for you.”

John kept his face expressionless with an effort.  The Royal Navy needed all the trained manpower it could get, after so many officers and men had been killed in the war.  In truth, he’d expected to be assigned to the Luna Academy or the Starfighter Training Centre years ago.  He would have hated it, but it might be the best place for him to go.  The recruits needed someone with genuine experience to ensure they knew what they needed to know.

“This isn't an easy time for the Navy,” Finnegan continued.  “We no longer have enough hulls to meet our commitments, even without having to refit a number of pre-war designs with alien-derived technology.  Worse, several second-rank human powers are now in a position to challenge us, because they didn't take such a beating in the war – and then there’s the threat of renewed conflict with the Tadpoles.  Accordingly, we’re having to rush a stopgap design of starship into service.”

John felt a sudden burst of hope as the First Space Lord tapped his console and a holographic image of a starship appeared in front of him.  She was larger than a frigate, he noted, although she would still be dwarfed by a fleet carrier.  Oddly, she looked smoother and sleeker than the more mundane craft the Royal Navy deployed.  He couldn't help being reminded of some of the alien ships he’d seen during the war.

“The Warspite class is a hodgepodge of human and alien technology,” Finnegan informed him.  “They’re armed with a mixture of weaponry, carry alien-grade jump drives and are generally faster and more manoeuvrable than any previous design.  On the other hand, the mixture of technology has already led to teething troubles and kinks in the design, which we don’t have time to work out before pressing the ships into deployment.  We’re that short of hulls.  Unfortunately, they also require non-standard commanders.”

That made sense, John was sure.  The starship’s combination of human and alien technology might daunt a commander with more experience of human starships.  He’d have less to unlearn than someone who followed the standard command track to high rank.  And besides, if the data at the bottom of the display was accurate, the starship would handle more like a starfighter than any pre-war starship.  He was sure, now, that he would assume command of one of the new ships.  The thought of the challenge made him smile.

Finnegan shrugged.  “They have considerably more range than a frigate,” he explained, as the holographic display twisted to show the starship’s interior.  “Thanks to some of the alien technology, she can even draw fuel from a gas giant if necessary, although she lacks the machine shops and other onboard replenishment systems of a carrier.  In short, she should be ideal for both escort missions, showing the flag and coping with limited problems without needing a major fleet deployment.

“You will assume command of HMS Warspite,” he concluded.  “We already have a task for her, Captain.  You will not have a proper period to settle in to your new command.”

John nodded, unsurprised.  The meeting wouldn't have been organised so rapidly if the Royal Navy hadn’t needed to get Warspite into operational service as quickly as possible.  It was likely to be a major headache if the ship was as untested as the First Space Lord was suggesting, if only because of the risk of failing components.  There had to be a reason for the haste.

But he would assume command!  It didn't matter what Finnegan wanted him to do.  All that mattered was that he would be commander of a starship, master under God.  It would be the peak of his post-war career.

“We’ve been probing through the new tramlines,” the First Space Lord said, unaware of John’s inner thoughts.  “We’ve had some successes in locating newer ways to travel through human space which will, I suspect, cause a major economic boom once the technology is commonly available.  Two months ago, however, a survey ship located a star system on the edge of explored space that possesses no less than seven tramlines, three of them alien-grade.  One of them is directly linked to the Cromwell Colony.”

“Founded just before the war, if I remember correctly,” John said, slowly.  There had been a political argument over the British claim to the world, with several second-rank powers asserting that it should be theirs, damn it!  Britain already had one major star system and several minor ones.  “They were untouched by the fighting, I take it?”

“They weren't touched directly,” the First Space Lord confirmed, “but there were delays in getting supplies and new colonists out to them.  They’re not our concern, though.  You will take your ship and a small flotilla of starships to Pegasus, the newly-discovered system, and lay claim to it in the name of the British Crown.  Someone else might try to get there first.”

“Possession being nine-tenths of the law,” John commented.  There were endless arguments over who should claim systems with life-bearing worlds, but systems with several tramlines could be equally important.  Control over shipping lanes would give the system’s owner a fair source of revenue in its own right – assuming, of course, they could make their will felt.  “I assume the system hasn't been formally claimed?”

“It won’t be, until we have an established presence there,” the First Space Lord warned.  “I would prefer to avoid a challenge from one of the other powers over ownership.”

He stood up.  “Your formal orders are here,” he said, holding out a datachip.  “You will travel to Warspite and assume command at once.  I expect you and the flotilla to be ready to leave within the week, barring accidents.  You will not find it an easy task.”

“I will not let you down,” John assured him, as he took the datachip.  There would be more than just his formal orders on the chip, he was sure.  He could expect details of everything from his new command to her crew roster.  “Thank you, sir.”

“Thank me when you come back,” Finnegan said.  His voice hardened as he rose to his feet and held out his hand.  “Not before.”

Chapter Two

“Lots of ships flying through local space right now,” the shuttle pilot observed, in a strong cockney accent.  “You know how hard it was to get a permit to fly you to Hamilton?”

John snorted.  “Devilishly easy?”

The pilot laughed.  “Just about,” he said.  “But it wasn't easy, you know.”

“Tell me,” John said.  “Does anyone actually fall for that line?”

“Depends who I’m flying,” the pilot admitted.  “Experienced spacers snigger, while inexperienced dirty-feet worry about colliding with an asteroid.”

John made a show of rolling his eyes.  Space was vast.  He had a greater chance of winning the lottery - without actually entering - than accidentally hitting an asteroid.  The entire Royal Navy could fly through the asteroid belt in tight formation without running a serious risk of striking an asteroid.  It only ever happened in bad movies and worse television shows.  But then, he had to admit, so much that would have been deemed impossible had happened in the last few years.  Humanity had gone to war with an alien race, for one.  Why not an asteroid impact?

He looked at the pilot and smiled.  “Reservist?”

“Used to drive cabs in London for a living,” the pilot confirmed.  “Then I was called back to the war, because the last shuttle driver had to go fly starfighters for a living.  My wife says it keeps me away from the camps.”

“Probably a good thing,” John agreed.  “Is she staying in the camps?”

“Nah,” the pilot said.  “She’s got a place in Doncaster now, thankfully.  My oldest son was in a Reconstruction Brigade, while my daughter and younger son are at boarding school on Luna.  I think they both want to follow me into space.”

John nodded, then turned his attention to the near-space display.  Earth was surrounded by orbital defence stations, shipyards and settled asteroids, while hundreds of starships made their way to and from humanity’s homeworld.  Two-thirds of the ships, he saw, were colonist-carriers, transporting as many humans from Earth to various colony worlds as possible.  Earth had been bombarded during the war and millions of humans had died.  No one wanted to risk losing so much of the human race again.

“I’ve been on one of those ships,” the pilot observed.  “I wouldn't go on one again for love or money.”

“The colonist-carriers?”  John asked.  “Why?”

“They cut corners,” the pilot said.  “Lots of corners.  I think the Chinese actually lost a couple last month, if you believe all the rumours.  The ships just aren’t safe.”

“Risk is our business,” John said, quoting the motto of the British Survey Service.  “If we took no risks, we’d still be stuck on Earth.”

“There’s a difference between taking calculated risks and taking stupid risks,” the pilot countered, with a wink.  “Sooner or later, one of the corners they cut is going to catch up with them and a colonist-carrier will be lost.  And then all hell will break loose.”

He was right, John knew.  Civilian settlers hadn't signed up to take risks.  There were always uncertainties surrounding space transport - all the more so now that humanity knew that hostile aliens existed - but the risks should be cut as much as possible.  But he also knew there was no alternative.  The colony worlds needed to be expanded as much as possible before humanity ran into the next threat.  Or started fighting amongst itself again.

Which isn't entirely impossible, he thought, coldly.  The bombardment did a great deal of damage to our planetary security net.

“The Indians are building their own carriers now,” the pilot added, as they headed further away from Earth.  “I hear tell that they learned from our experiences.”

“They probably did,” John agreed.  Learning from someone else’s mistakes was cheaper than learning from your own.  “Armoured hulls, plasma weapons and mass drivers?”

“Looks that way,” the pilot added.  “But then, everyone is also saying that the carrier has had her day.”

“People say a lot of things,” John said.  It was an old debate, sharpened by the outcome of the war.  Did the development of rapid-fire plasma weapons ensure that starfighters were no longer relevant ... or would other advances make them harder to target in future?  There was no way to know until the human race went back to war.  “But not all of them are right.”

He leaned forward, studying the display.  The Indians weren’t the only ones pouring resources into rebuilding their naval power.  Near-Earth space was crammed with shipyards: American, French, Chinese and even Russian, as well as the British installations.  Newer shipyards were springing up too as second-rank powers, seeing an opportunity to join the first-rank powers, worked frantically to build up their own fleets.  It was a good thing, he told himself, even though he worried about the future.  If humanity hadn’t invested so much money and resources into its pre-war build-up, the war would have been over very quickly and the human race would have lost.

“I suppose not,” the pilot said.  “Time will tell, won’t it?”

“Yeah,” John agreed.  “It always does.”

Slowly, HMS Hamilton came into visual range.  As always, it looked like a handful of half-built starships, surrounded by pods and industrial modules, but it was clear, just from a glance, that the shipbuilding tempo was increasing rapidly.  A dozen carriers hovered in the midst of the shipyard, their skeletal hulls illuminated by spotlights mounted on the industrial pods.  It would be at least another two years, John knew, before they were completed, then put through their paces and declared ready for deployment.  Until then, the Royal Navy would be dangerously weak.

So are the other human powers, he reminded himself, firmly.  We’re all weak.

A pair of starfighters flashed past as they approached the shipyard, weapons at the ready.  John watched them go, feeling a hint of wistfulness.  It had been years since he’d flown a starfighter and he knew it was unlikely he would ever fly one again, unless he managed to take command of a carrier.  Starfighter pilots enjoyed freedoms unknown to the rest of the Navy, although they came with a price.  Over eighty percent of the Royal Navy’s pilots had died in the war.

“Show-offs,” the pilot grumbled.  “They could have stayed safely away while they checked our IFF codes.”

John shrugged.  Starfighter pilots loved to show off.  Besides, it was much easier to perform a visual check at close range.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said.  “The Navy wouldn't have assigned careless bastards to here, of all places.”

“Ruddy cheek,” the pilot said.  “Do they think we’re terrorists?”

“I doubt it,” John said.  “But they do have to be careful.”

He winced at the thought.  International terrorism had been sharply reduced towards the end of the Age of Unrest, although some cynics claimed that levels of terrorist activity were still higher than they’d been before the Troubles.  But terrorist activity had been on the rise since the Battle of Earth, as the homeless or the dispossessed lashed out at those they blamed for their torments.  Most of it had been small-scale, more like pinpricks than anything else, but it could easily grow worse.  A terrorist taking control of an orbital freighter and crashing it into the planet below was everyone’s worst nightmare.

“And here we are,” the pilot announced.  He put on a more formal tone as HMS Warspite came into view.  “Your new command, sir.”

John leaned forward, drinking in the sight.  Warspite was definitely sleeker than the pre-war frigates and cruisers the human navies had used to picket systems and escort the giant fleet carriers, but her dark hull was studded with weapons and sensor blisters.  She looked almost like a flattened arrowhead, he decided, her dark armour providing protection against everything short of heavy plasma cannons or laser warheads.  Or a direct nuclear hit.

“I can take us around her, if you like,” the pilot offered.  “Let you see her from prow to stern.”

“Please,” John said.

He pressed his face against the porthole as the pilot took them on a gentle circle of the starship’s hull.  Her prow was a weapon, he noted; they’d placed a heavy plasma cannon there, right at the tip of the arrowhead.   Two Marine shuttles were docked below her hull, half-shielded by armour plates.  The designers had clearly expected that the ship would need to deploy her Marines as rapidly as possible.  At the rear, her drive nodes looked bigger and more powerful than anything he would have expected on a ship of her class.  But then, they were built with alien technology, he reminded himself.  They might not look like standard human designs.

“Take us to the shuttlebay,” he said, finally.  “And tell them that I don’t want a greeting party.”

“Aye, sir,” the pilot said.  The shuttle yawed slightly, then headed right for the gaping hatch in the vessel’s hull.  “But they may alert the XO anyway.”

John had to smile.  He’d been told, once, that the way to see if the XO was popular among the crew was to order them not to alert the XO that the captain was boarding - and see if someone alerted her anyway.  At the time, he hadn't been sure what to make of it.  Now, with years of experience as an XO under his belt, he thought he understood.  The Captain was meant to be unapproachable, but the XO was there to take care of the crew.

“It doesn't matter,” he said.  “I just don’t want to waste everyone’s time by forcing them to greet me.”

A dull tremor ran through the shuttle as Warspite’s gravity field asserted itself over the shuttle’s onboard generator.  John braced himself as the shuttle came to a halt, then settled down on the deck and landed with a dull thump.  He felt dizzy, just for a second, a sensation that faded away so quickly it was easy to believe he’d imagined it.  The boffins swore blind that it was imaginary, but nine out of ten spacers reported it regularly.

“Good luck, sir,” the pilot said.  “Come back safely.”

John threw him a sharp glance, then picked up his duffle, slung it over his shoulder and stepped out of the hatch.  Warm air struck his face at once, carrying with it the fresh smell of a starship newly out of the yards.  It wouldn't be long before the presence of two hundred crewmen altered the ship’s smell, but for the moment it smelt clean.  He took a long breath, then turned to face the flags painted on the bulkhead.  The Union Jack, as always, reminded him of home.  

He saluted, then turned to face the airlock as it hissed open, revealing two people.  One of them was surprisingly young for her rank, wearing a commander’s uniform with an alarming lack of service pips; the other was older and darker, wearing an engineer’s overall.  John was surprised to realise that he recognised him; Mike Johnston had served as Chief Engineer on HMS Rosemount before being reassigned to the Next Generation Weapons program on Britannia.

“Captain,” the commander said.  She hesitated, then saluted imperfectly.  “I’m Commander Juliet Watson, your XO.  Welcome onboard HMS Warspite.”

John felt an icy chill of suspicion - directed at the First Space Lord - as he studied Juliet Watson.  She was young, around twenty-five, and her salute wasn't the only imperfect thing about her.  Her dark hair was far too long to suit regulations, her uniform looked as if she didn't quite know how to dress herself and the lack of service pips suggested that Warspite was her first operational deployment.  It made no sense.  He’d had to fight a promotions board all the way to become a line officer, even after the Battle of Bluebell.  Had someone seen fit to promote Commander Watson because she had links to the aristocracy?  It was possible, but he honestly couldn't recall any aristocratic family with that name - or anything closely related to it.

“Thank you, Commander,” he said, finally.  Maybe appearances were deceiving.  “And you, Mike.  You’re looking well.”

Was it his imagination, he asked himself, or did Johnston look relieved to see him?  The burly engineer had a reputation for working hard, then drinking and fighting hard; thankfully, he'd never been enough of a drunkard to appear on duty still worse for wear.  Some people, like the late lamented Admiral Smith, might have been able to get away with it.  An engineering officer who turned up for duty drunk would be lucky if his commander didn't shove him out of the nearest airlock and swear blind it had been a terrible accident.

“Thank you, sir,” Johnston said.  “It’s good to see you again.”

Juliet looked from one to the other.  “You know each other?”

“Served together on Rosemount,” Johnston said, immediately.  “It was an exciting deployment.”

“Very exciting,” John agreed, carefully.  Something was definitely not right.  “Please would you show me round the ship, then I will formally assume command.”

Juliet beamed.  “It will be my pleasure,” she said.  She nodded to Johnston, then turned to lead the way through the airlock.  “If you’ll come with me ...?”

John followed her, glancing from side to side as they entered a long passageway.  Half of the inspection hatches were open, revealing various components; a dozen engineering crewmen, some of them obviously borrowed from the shipyard, were working to install dozens of other components before the ship left the yard for good.  Juliet moved with easy confidence through the passageway, then stopped in front of a large hatch.  It hissed open, revealing a giant engineering compartment.

“This is Main Engineering,” Juliet said, cheerfully.  “As you can see, we actually have three fusion reactors powering the ship, although we could operate quite effectively on just one of them.  The third reactor is intended to power our weapons array; naturally, if necessary, we can switch from reactor to reactor, should we require additional power.  Our drive fields are actually more sophisticated than anything else known to exist, giving us a speed advantage of twenty percent over the next-fastest human ship.  I think we will stack up well against alien technology too, should we meet a Tadpole starship.”

John frowned.  “Do you think they won’t be advancing too?”

“I imagine they will be trying to figure out how to mix and match their technology with ours, just as we are doing with theirs,” Juliet said.  She waved a hand towards a large control panel, then smiled at him.  “However, we have an advantage, I believe.  Our R&D efforts were given quite a jolt when they showed up, while they enjoyed their technological superiority for far too long.”

She took a breath, then continued.  “Of course, the real objects of interest are the modified Puller Drives,” she said.  “Right now, we can access the longer tramlines without worrying about blowing the drive systems, but I believe that is only the tip of the iceberg.  Imagine being able to jump from system to system without a tramline.  That’s the promise of our research, Captain.  We might be able to banish the tramlines once and for all.”

“It would be great, if it were possible,” John mused.

“Theoretically, it is possible,” Juliet assured him.  “And one day, it will be practically possible too.”

John couldn't help a sinking feeling in his stomach as Juliet led him on a tour of the rest of the ship.  The crew seemed calm and professional, but Juliet herself was far from professional.  He was starting to have a feeling that the First Space Lord had had motivations of his own for assigning John to Warspite.  A non-standard commander, he’d said.  Maybe it was because the crew was non-standard too.  John had met officers who would summarily have relieved Juliet of duty by now, just for forgetting to call them sir.

He pushed the thought to one side as they stepped onto the bridge.  Like the rest of the ship, it exuded a sense of newness, of just having come out of the yard.  The consoles looked shiny, the command chair looked as if no one had sat in it since it had been installed and the deck plates were shiny.  He took a step forward, then glanced back at the rear bulkhead, where the ship’s dedication plaque was placed.  Warspite’s motto - belli dura despicio - was clearly written below the list of officers who had attended the ship’s formal commissioning.

“I despise the hard knocks of war,” he muttered.

“We have to be careful not to be hit,” Juliet said, suddenly serious.  “A single mass driver strike could smash us, no matter how much armour we nail to the hull.”

John nodded.  Once, mass drivers had been practically outlawed by international agreement.  Now, everyone was building mass drivers, after seeing just how effective they had been against the Tadpoles.  A single kinetic strike would be enough to wreck almost any starship, save for a giant armoured carrier.  And even a carrier would require years of work before she could return to duty.

He sat down in his command chair, then drew the sheet of paper the First Space Lord had given him from his jacket.  “Now hear this,” he said.  “From the First Space Lord to Captain John Naiser, VC.  You are ordered to take command of HMS Warspite ...”

“I stand relieved,” Juliet said, when he had finished.

She didn't seem annoyed at losing command, something that bothered John more than he cared to admit.  He’d never known an officer who hadn't been a little irked at losing command, save perhaps for young midshipmen who’d been plunged into the fire.  No one reached command rank without being ambitious and confident in his abilities.  But Juliet had shown no reaction at all.

“Continue as you were,” John ordered.  It was high time he got to the bottom of this, before he tripped over an unexpected surprise.  “I need to speak to Engineer Johnston in my cabin, then go through the ship’s files.”

“Of course, sir,” Juliet said.  

Chapter Three

“CO wants to see you, Percy,” Captain Kimball said.  “You been up to anything I don’t know about?”

Corporal Percy Schneider shook himself awake.  “I don't think so, sir,” he said, as he hastily checked his uniform.  “What does he think I did?”

“I don’t know,” Kimball said.  “But you’d better hurry.  He didn't look to be in a good mood.”

He’s never in a good mood, Percy thought, as he swung his legs over the side of the cot and stood.  Colonel Hawkins - his men called him the Hawk when they thought he wasn't listening - wasn't a bad sort, but he had grown stricter in the years since the Battle of Earth, when he'd lost his wife and two small children.  Percy, who’d lost both of his parents to the war, found it hard to blame him.  There were days when he wished he had died instead of his father or mother.

He checked his appearance, then strode out of the barracks and down towards the CO’s office.  Quite why the higher-ups had thought to put 47 Commando in Redford Barracks, Edinburgh, mystified him, although he had to admit it was good for leave.  Wearing a Royal Marine uniform was a guarantee that one didn't have to spend the night alone, even if a third of the country wore one uniform or another.  The CO was based in a large redbrick building, guarded by a pair of armed soldiers.  They nodded to Percy as he approached, then stepped aside to allow him to enter.  Thanks to his father, he was the most recognisable soldier on the base.

Colonel Hawkins didn't hold with luxury, Percy noted with approval as he was shown into the office.  A simple folding table, a field-grade terminal and a pistol were the only things in the room, save for a small drinks machine.  Percy came to a halt in front of the desk, then saluted.  Hawkins looked up, then returned the salute.

“At ease,” he said.  He looked Percy up and down, then sighed.  “Is that At Ease for you, Corporal?”

“Yes, sir,” Percy said, stiffly.

Hawkins shrugged.  “Your father’s heroics ensured you could apply for a place in the Academy, if you wanted,” he said.  “Instead, you joined the Royal Marines.  Was there a reason for that, Corporal?”

“I wanted to prove myself, sir,” Percy said.  

It was more than that, he knew.  He’d been drafted into a disaster recovery unit shortly after the aliens had attacked Earth, where he’d seen Royal Marines spearheading the effort to save as many people from floods and tidal waves as they could.  The Marines had impressed him in a way his father, the starfighter pilot, never had.  And so, when the time had come to apply for military service, he’d volunteered for the Royal Marines.

“And so you have,” Hawkins said.  “You came second in your class, then you spent six months on Mars, two months on wet-navy duty and four more months here.  Which one did you find most interesting?”

“Mars, sir,” Percy said.  “It was a fascinating environment.”

“Glad to hear it,” Hawkins said.  “You know Corporal Tailor?  He came down with a particularly nasty stomach flu only two days ago.  I was hoping it would respond to medical treatment, but ... well, the doctors say it will be several weeks before he’s fit for duty once again.”

Percy frowned.  “Something biological, sir?”

“It could be, although the medics think otherwise,” Hawkins said.  “He probably just went out on the town and ate something unhealthy before returning to base.  Or he picked it up in one of the reclamation zones.”

“Perhaps, sir,” Percy said.  The bombardment had left thousands of festering dead bodies in its wake.  Disease had swiftly followed, despite modern medical treatment.  “I’m sure he will recover.”

“So am I,” Hawkins said.  “However, it leaves me with a problem.  Tailor was assigned to Warspite, the latest cruiser.  She was intended to take two sections of Royal Marines on her deployment.  Naturally, Tailor will be unable to make her departure date.”

“Yes, sir,” Percy said.  There were strict procedures in place for handling injuries or illnesses among the Royal Marines.  The affected Marine would be taken off the duty roster until fully recovered, then slotted in wherever possible.  It wasn't something he cared to think about, not really.  Leaving his mates behind wouldn’t be easy.  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Not as sorry as you will be,” Hawkins predicted.  “I’d like to assign you to cover the slot.”

Percy blinked.  “Me, sir?”

“You,” Hawkins confirmed.  “You have the right qualifications for the role.  Lieutenant Darryl Hadfield has overall command, with Hastings as CO of Section 1.  You’ll take Section 2.  I don’t think I need to tell you, Corporal, that this could make your career.”

“No, sir,” Percy said.  

He considered it, briefly.  Serving on a starship, even as third-in-command of the Marine detachment, would put his name to the top of the list for further deployments.  It wouldn’t be quite the same as serving on the ground, but ... but it would be fun.  Besides, he wasn't blind to the hidden implications either.  If he refused the assignment, it was unlikely he’d be offered another one.

“You’ll catch a shuttle from Turnstile Spaceport tomorrow,” Hawkins said.  He tapped his terminal, removed a datachip and passed it to Percy.  “Report to the RAF hanger at 1300 for your flight, taking with you a standard deployment bag.  Everything else is already on the ship, waiting for you.  Tailor’s personal possessions can be stored until his return to active service.”

He smiled.  “Get your stuff out of the barracks, then consider yourself on leave until 1300 tomorrow,” he added.  “I’m afraid we can't offer the standard week of intercourse and intoxication, but this did happen at short notice.”

“I understand, sir,” Percy said.  “And thank you.”

“We shall see,” Hawkins said.  “Have a good one.”

Percy saluted, then turned and strode out of the office, unsure if he’d been given a stroke of good fortune or bad.  On one hand, as he’d noted, there would be certain promotion if he didn't screw up, but on the other hand it would bring him closer to his father.  And, in truth, he wasn't sure if he could handle it.  His father had been a hero.  How could Percy hope to live up to Kurt Schneider?

He walked back into the barracks and opened the drawer under his cot, removing a spare set of clothes, a handful of pictures of his family and his spare pistol.  It wasn't entirely permitted to keep a spare weapon - all weapons had to be accounted for - but the old sweats had taught him it was a wise precaution.  They’d served in hellholes like North Africa or the Middle East, where a situation could go from peaceful to extremely dangerous in the wink of an eye, and having a spare weapon often made the difference between life and death.  Placing them all in his duffle bag, he took one last look around the barracks and smiled to himself.  He would miss it.

The communications lounge was right next door, crammed with videophones, computers and privacy shields, just to give the talkers the illusion that no one could hear a word they were saying.  Percy sat down in front of the nearest computer, then linked into the datanet and entered a planetary contact code.  There was a long pause, then his sister’s face appeared in front of him.

“Percy,” she said.  “Are you alright?”

“Penny,” Percy said.  “I’ve been reassigned.”

“To Antarctica?”  Penny asked.  “Was that because of my expose of someone pinching supplies from the refugee camps?”

“I don’t think so,” Percy said.  He honestly didn't understand why his sister had chosen to become a reporter, rather than something useful, but he respected her choice.  “I’ve been assigned to a starship.  I won’t be back for several months, at least.”

“Shit,” Penny said.  “You’ll miss your birthday.”

“I’ll just have a party when we get back,” Percy said.  He hadn't been looking forward to his birthday, but it was the least of his concerns right now.  “I hope you’ll be alright while I’m gone.”

Penny stuck out her tongue.  “I’m old enough to take care of myself,” she reminded him, snidely.  “Worry about Nora.  Or Jane.  Or Alisa.  Or ... what was the name of the last girl you were dating?”

“Those were last year,” Percy said, embarrassed.  “I'm dating Canella now.  And I think Jane thought I was going to inherit a bucket-load of money.”

“Gold-digger,” Penny muttered.  They’d been paid compensation for their father’s death - and they were the sole beneficiaries of his life insurance policy - but money was worth less now than it had been five years ago.  “Take care of yourself, all right?”

“I will,” Percy assured her.  It had been three years since they’d fled their home, ahead of a tidal wave of water, but the memory still chilled him to the bone.  They’d come close to being killed more than once, first by the aliens and then by their fellow humans.  “And you too, Penny.”

He closed the connection, then tapped another contact code into the computer.  There was a long pause, then a pretty brown-skinned face appeared in the display.  “Percy!”

“Canella,” Percy said.  They’d been dating, on and off, for three months, but he wasn’t sure that either of them were serious.  “Can you take the afternoon off work?”

“I can ask my manager,” Canella said.  “Is this important?”

“Yes,” Percy said.  “It’s very important.”

He waited for her to ask her manager and get back to him, knowing that she had no choice.  There were few jobs available these days, at least for people without practical skills, and Canella - she’d studied sociology in university - had been lucky to get the one she had.  If her boss said no, she’d have to turn Percy down.  The risk of losing her job and being reassigned to a labour battalion was too great.

“He says yes, but I won’t be paid for it,” Canella said, when she returned.  “Where do you want to meet?”

“Lombardi’s,” Percy said.  “I know it’s expensive, but I can pay.”

They exchanged goodbyes, then he closed the connection and walked out of the building, down towards the gates.  They were guarded by armed soldiers - there had been shootings near other barracks, although Edinburgh was largely peaceful - who glanced sharply at him as he signed himself out, then took one last look at the barracks before starting the walk into town.  After running up and down Brecon as part of his training, he was hardly likely to wait for a bus into the centre of Edinburgh.  It wasn't that long a walk.

Edinburgh had been lucky, he reminded himself, as he approached the centre of the city.  It had been shielded from the tidal waves, which had spared the city the damage inflicted on London, Glasgow, Cardiff and many others.  But the rainstorms had inflicted considerable damage of their own, flooding vast parts of the city while the population looked for shelter or tried to steer the water away from their homes.  Princess Street Gardens had become a loch once again, while the castle looked decidedly weather-beaten, even under the bright sunlight.  And, like everywhere else, teams of labour units were struggling to cope with the damage.

But at least they didn't abandon the city, he thought, remembering Cardiff.  The city had been effectively deemed unsalvageable and abandoned.  Edinburgh will return to her glory soon enough.

He smiled as he saw Canella, standing outside Lombardi’s and waiting for him.  She waved to him, then kissed him as soon as he was close enough to kiss.  Percy kissed her back, feeling like a heel.  There was no way to escape the fact that he was going to tell her that he was leaving, that he wouldn't be back for months.  Stronger relationships than theirs had been torn apart by the demands of deployments.  He knew, all too well, that his parents had been on the verge of splitting up before the aliens attacked and his mother had been lost.  His father had died shortly afterwards.

“Percy,” she said.  Her eyes narrowed for a split second when she saw his duffle.  “You’re looking good.”

“It’s the uniform,” Percy said.  “It makes me look taller.  And you’re looking beautiful.”

Canella smiled as he looked her up and down.  Her dark brown skin, dark hair and long brown legs contrasted oddly with her uniform, but she still looked gorgeous.  He tried not to think about the night he’d carefully unbuttoned her blouse, the night they’d made love for the first time.  Penny would have laughed - she knew he’d gone through a dozen girlfriends - but there was something about Canella that made her more than just a one night stand.  It was why he had gone out with her, again and again and again.

The waiter showed them both to a booth in the far corner, then waited until they ordered pizza and drinks.  Percy declined the offer of wine, choosing instead to stick with fresh orange and lemonade.  Canella eyed him in surprise - Percy might never have been a boozer, yet he’d always taken alcohol before - but said nothing.  She’d admitted, once, that she’d seen too many people drunk out of their minds.

“Well,” she said.  “This is a surprise, isn't it?”

Percy nodded, looking down at the table.  “I didn't know I would be free this afternoon,” he said, finally.  He’d faced people shooting at him with greater aplomb.  “There’s something I have to tell you.”

Canella frowned.  “What?”

“I’ve been reassigned,” Percy said, softly.  “I’m going to be on a starship for the next six months, at least.  Probably longer.  I may not even be able to return to Edinburgh.”

“I ... see,” Canella said.  Her face was impassive, but her lower lip was wobbling.  “You won’t be seeing me again?”

“I don’t know,” Percy warned.  “Shipboard duty isn't the same as duty on the ground.  Here, I had a night off each week; on ship, there won’t be any nights off until we return to Earth.  It may be a long time until you see me again.”

He swallowed.  “If you don’t want to wait for me,” he added, “you don’t have to wait.”

“I knew it might happen,” Canella said.  “But I didn’t think it would be this soon.”

“Me neither,” Percy said.  “I wasn't given a choice.”

“I think you would have taken it even if you had been offered a choice,” Canella said, flatly.  “No matter how much you deny it, there’s a part of you that wants to just get stuck in and ... well, get on with your job.  I always liked that about you.”

The waiter returned, carrying a steaming plate of pizza, before Percy could think of a reply.  Instead, he cut up the pizza, passed Canella a piece, then dug into his own slice.  It tasted far better than the rations he’d been fed at the barracks, although he had to admit, if he were being honest, that he’d tasted better pizza.  Lombardi’s seemed to get by on social cachet rather than quality.  The chicken tasted plain, the tomato was thin and the cheese barely there.

Canella finished her piece of pizza, then looked up and held his eyes.  “Do you want to see me again?”

“I would like to,” Percy said, honestly.  “But I would understand ...”

“If I find someone else in the meantime, I will tell you,” Canella said.  “And you do the same.”

She sighed, then changed the subject.  “My manager is planning to hire a couple of new girls,” she added.  “I guess he got tired of harassing the last two hires.”

Percy winced.  “Are you going to warn them?”

“They’ll need the jobs,” Canella said, bitterly.  “These days, anyone who bitches or complains can expect to leave employment for good, shortly afterwards.  I don’t think I want to spend the rest of my working life picking up shit from the ground.”

“I understand,” Percy said.  He worried, sometimes, about his sister.  Would she be harassed by her superiors?  Or told she had a choice between sleeping with her boss or losing her job?  But then, Penny did have connections.  A wise leech would go hassle someone else.  “But you deserve better.”

“I used to think I had a good job waiting for me,” Canella said.  “I should have gone into psychology.  Lots of demand for psychologists these days.  The entire country has been traumatised.”

“Tell me about it,” Percy said.  The tidal waves had been bad, but the refugee camp had been worse.  Law and order had broken down completely.  “We’re still having nightmares of the day we were forced to run for our lives.”

They finished the pizza, then Canella led him back to her flat and grabbed him as soon as the door was closed.  “I don’t want to think about the future now,” she breathed, as she started to undo his uniform trousers.  “And I don’t want you to think about the future either.”

“I won’t,” Percy promised.  He pulled open her blouse, allowing her breasts to bobble free and dance invitingly in front of him.  His tongue seemed to slip out of his mouth of its own accord, licking at her dangling nipple.  “I’ll just make love to you.”

They spent the rest of the day in bed together, then went out to eat dinner before returning to bed and sleeping until early morning.  Percy climbed out of bed at 0600 - life in the Royal Marines had taught him when to rise - poured two cups of coffee and then carried one of them back to Canella.  She thanked him for it, sleepily, then closed her eyes again.  Percy looked down at her for a long moment, then showered and dressed.  She was still fast asleep when he returned.

Feeling like a bastard, he kissed her on the cheek and then left, closing the door carefully behind him.  

Chapter Four

“Thank you for coming to see me, Mike,” John said.

“I was under the impression I didn't have a choice,” Johnston said.  The Chief Engineer settled down into a chair, facing John’s desk.  “You are my commanding officer, sir.”

John couldn't disagree.  A request from a starship’s commander was an order, however phrased.  Mike Johnston and he might have served together before - he was counting on that, for the discussion they had to have - but he was still Warspite’s commanding officer.  He couldn't afford to get too close to the crew.

He waited until Midshipwoman Jodie Powell had poured them both tea, then retreated into a side compartment, before leaning forward and fixing the older man with a gimlet stare.

“I need you to be frank, Mike,” he said, flatly.  “This discussion is completely off the record.”

“Yes, sir,” Johnston said.

“The XO,” John said.  “How did she get the job?  Because I can't believe we’re that short of experienced officers who could take the post.”

Johnston sighed.  “Permission to speak freely, sir?”

“Already granted,” John said, irritated.

“Politics,” Johnston said.  “And technical expertise.”

He sighed and sipped his tea.  “I was assigned to the NGW program shortly after you left Rosemount,” he said.  “Commander Watson was the departmental head of one of the program’s subdivisions.  And, to be fair, she is an absolute genius.  Not many people can look at human technology, then alien technology, and see how they might be made to work together.  Commander Watson can and does.  Indeed, I believe she was behind the modifications made to Ark Royal that allowed her to launch Operation Nelson.”

“That’s very good for her,” John said.  “But how did she wind up as XO of a starship?”

“Politics, again,” Johnston said.  “Commander Watson was assigned to the Warspite program before it had a proper name.  She did most of the early design work; my contribution was largely turning it into practical hardware.  Admiral Soskice - the overall head of NGW - gave her a formal rank because otherwise the shipyard staff wouldn't listen to her.  You know what bastards they can be, at times.”

“I know,” John said.  “But XO ...?”

“I’m getting to that,” Johnston said.  “She remained in place as they put the ship together, allowing her to solve new problems as they cropped up.  Eventually, when Warspite was formally commissioned, Admiral Soskice  ensured she would be the vessel’s XO, despite not having any formal military experience.  I don’t think anyone in the Second Space Lord’s office thought this was inappropriate, at least until it was too late.  Admiral Soskice  would probably react badly if his selection was removed without due cause.”

“Fuck,” John said.  “She’s inexperienced.  And everyone will know she’s inexperienced.”

“Yes, sir,” Johnston said.

John fought down the temptation to put his head in his hands.  “Let me guess,” he said, crossly.  “There have been problems already.”

“Some,” Johnston admitted.  “Myself and Howard - Lieutenant-Commander Howard - took care of them.  Mostly, she’s liked by the crew, which is fortunate.  She’s a very poor disciplinarian.”

“Lucky for her,” John said.  He didn't know many people who would have willingly tangled with Johnston.  “A non-standard commander, he said.  A commander who was willing to do the work of an XO, he meant.”

“Sir?”

“Never mind,” John said.  “Give it to me, now.  What are the other problems with the ship?”

“Mostly, some minor teething problems,” Johnston said.  “However, I do have concerns about the integration of human and alien technology.  It has a nasty habit of setting up power curves that could cause real problems, if allowed to run on for too long.  And then there’s the prospect of accidentally overwhelming the compensators if we push the drives too hard ...”

“Turning us into strawberry jam before we know we’re in trouble,” John said.  He’d seen recordings of what happened to a starship’s crew when the compensators failed.  “Is that likely to happen?”

“I wish I knew,” Johnston said.  He looked down at his hands.  “Frankly, sir, the whole project is moving forward much too fast.  Apart from a handful of people like Commander Watson, we don’t really understand what we’re doing.”

“Hardly anyone understands how a drive field works,” John pointed out.

“I do,” Johnston said.  “But I don’t understand precisely how the alien tech integrates with human tech.  And that’s what bothers me.”

He shook his head, then looked up.  “There are other issues,” he said.  “Our main gun is a long-range plasma cannon, an experimental model.  It works fine in simulations and live-fire drills, but it’s never been tested in combat conditions.  I have a feeling that any half-way competent sensor crew will see us taking aim before we fire.  Then there’s the missile tubes, which have been redesigned twice to accommodate the other changes, and the short-range plasma weapons, which have a tendency to overheat and explode.”

“Shit,” John said.  “And our armour?”

“Improved, but still nowhere near as strong as I would like,” Johnston said.  “I don’t think we will be able to stand up to a hit from a comparable plasma weapon.”

“Understood,” John said.  “One final question, then.  Are we likely to meet our departure date?”

“Almost certainly,” Johnston said.  “Commander Watson is good at sorting out minor hiccups, as long as they don’t involve dealing with personnel.  The real test, of course, will come when we jump through the tramline and see what happens.”

“Wonderful,” John said, sardonically.  “Do you have any other concerns I should know?”

“Not as yet,” Johnston said.  He smiled.  “My complaints aside, sir, Warspite is a good little ship.  Once we manage to sort out the teething problems, we should be fine.”

“I hope you’re right,” John said.  “You will inform me if there are any problems with Commander Watson?”

“Yes, sir,” Johnston said, although he looked uncomfortable.  Asking a junior officer to spy on a senior rarely ended well for anyone.  “I would advise you to read through the official notes, but also the additions Commander Watson and I have been making.  Trying to ensure that every change was documented wasn't an easy job either.”

“It never is,” John agreed.  “I shall be hosting a dinner for the crew in two days, I think.  You will be attending?”

“Of course I will, sir,” Johnston said.  “Unless the ship blows up first, in which case I shall be eating dinner in heaven instead.”

John snorted.  “Are there any other issues?”

“Some grumbling about reduced shore leave,” Johnston said.  “The departure date was pushed up twice, sir.  Crewmen who were planning holidays had to cancel them at short notice.”

“Odd,” John mused.  “The First Space Lord only gave me the command a few hours ago.”

“They may have intended to give you more time to come to grips with the ship.” Johnston said.  “Or maybe they’re just jerking us around for the hell of it.”

“Sounds plausible,” John said.  “I’ll organise a couple of shuttle flights to Sin City II at the end of the week, I think.  It will give the crew a chance to blow off some steam before the shit hits the fan.”

“Seems like a good idea,” Johnston said.  “Mind you, I don't think Sin City II is quite as good as Sin City I.”

“But more moral,” John said.  “And besides, half of the spacers won’t know the difference.”

He smiled at the thought.  Sin City had been destroyed by the Tadpoles during their attack on Earth, earning them the undying hatred of almost every spacer in the system.  The new Sin City was owned and operated by a consortium of the major spacefaring powers, taking advantage of the situation to close the loopholes that had allowed Sin City to exist.  It still held beer, prostitutes and VR chambers, but most of the more problematic entertainments had been removed.

“True, I suppose,” Johnston said.  “Did you have fun in Soho?”

“It’s not what it used to be,” John admitted.  “Most of the bars are closed now, sadly.  I think quite a few of the community moved out to an asteroid, where they will be safer from alien attacks.”

He shook his head as he recalled some of the times Colin and he had shared in Soho, then dismissed the memory.  Colin was dead.  There was no point in dwelling on a dead man.

“Safe is relative,” Johnston said.  “I heard that several ships were sent out to establish a new human homeworld.  How safe do you think they are?”

“Safer than here, I expect,” John said.

He smiled, then finished his tea.  “Are you still dating Sofia?”

“She decided she preferred to stay with a pretty boy from Luna One,” Johnston said, without heat.  “I can live without her.”

“Quite right,” John said.  “We’ll speak later, I think.”

Johnston nodded, then rose to his feet, saluted and walked out the compartment.  John watched him go, then looked around his cabin-office.  It was larger than the space he’d been assigned on his last shipboard berth, although that was saying nothing.  HMS Spartan had been a frigate, with most of her hull volume occupied by engines and weapons.  The crew had had barely enough room to swing a cat.  Warspite was over three times her size, yet even the CO got little more than an office, a bedroom and a tiny washroom.  The only decoration was an oil painting of HMS Warspite, the superdreadnaught that had served in the Second World War, firing her guns towards an unseen threat.  But, on the plus side, his cabin was right next to the bridge.

Midshipwoman Powell tapped on the hatch, then opened it and peered in.  “Would you like some more tea, sir?”

“Yes, please,” John said.  “And a ration bar or two, if you could manage it.”

He chewed on the bar as he opened his terminal and started to read through the endless series of notes, incident reports and screeds written by various designers to the Admiralty.  John had never actually served in the Admiralty, but he’d been an XO long enough to understand when several Admirals were actually fighting a private war over funding, pet projects and - at base - their vision of the Royal Navy’s future.  Commander Watson might have no inkling of the titanic power struggles her superior had been fighting, but that hadn't stopped her being at the centre of one of them.  No wonder she had been left in a slot she was manifestly unsuited to handle ... and no wonder the First Space Lord, sensing trouble, had arranged for Warspite to receive a commanding officer who wouldn't make a fuss, just quietly handle her XO duties as well as his own.  

“I need a bloody secretary,” he muttered.  Paperwork was normally the XO’s responsibility, although the Captain had a fair share of it himself.  “And possibly a stiff drink.”

Cursing under his breath, he checked the personnel files.  Lieutenant-Commander Paul Howard had a good record, although he’d been a Midshipman during the war and only been promoted in its aftermath.  Unfortunately, the tactical department would require his full attention, so he couldn't be given some of Commander Watson’s duties and a promise of early promotion.  He briefly considered letting some of the paperwork slide, but he knew it would only cause more trouble later on.  The bureaucrats would whinge and moan and complain loudly to their superiors, who would demand explanations from John and his crew.

You haven’t filled out Form 644, Paragraph 7, he thought, ruefully.  What is your explanation for this?

I was bored, his own thoughts answered him.  Should I report for execution now or later?

His console chimed.  “Captain, this is Hemminge in Communications,” a voice said.  “The First Space Lord is calling you on a priority link.”

“Put him through,” John ordered.

He turned his attention to his terminal, as the First Space Lord’s face appeared in front of him.  

“Admiral,” he said, neutrally.

“Captain,” Admiral Finnegan said.  “I trust you are impressed with your new command?”

“Nothing I can’t handle,” John said, biting down several responses that came to mind, all of which would probably have earned him a court martial.  “I may be requesting additional personnel, sir, but I can handle the ship.”

“That’s good to hear,” Admiral Finnegan said.  “The other ships in your squadron are being assigned now.  I shall expect you to meet with their commanding officers once the formation is assembled.”

“Yes, sir,” John said, wondering just when he was meant to do it.  He wasn't sure he trusted Commander Watson to handle the ship in his absence.  “Sir, with all due respect, I do wonder at some of the personal assignments that have already been made.”

“Politics,” Admiral Finnegan said, bluntly.  “You’ll just have to live with it, Captain.  I don't have much room to manoeuvre.”

John sighed, wondering if Johnston and the First Space Lord had coordinated their conversations.  “Yes, sir,” he said.  “I can handle the ship.”

“That’s good to hear,” Admiral Finnegan said.  “And, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry for the problems you’re going to face.”

His image vanished.  John scowled at the console, then turned back to his datapad and hunted for a particular set of personnel files.  When they popped up in front of him, he was gratified to see that two of his first choices had not been assigned anywhere outside the personnel pool.  They were on leave at the moment, but the Royal Navy could recall anyone who wasn't actually retired, if it saw fit.  John keyed in a request to the Personnel Office, requesting that one of his two selections be recalled and reassigned to Warspite, then rose to his feet and stalked out onto the bridge.  Two officers were bent over the tactical console, running an exercise.  They turned around, then jumped to attention when they saw him.

“Captain,” one of them said.  “I’m Lieutenant-Commander Howard.  Welcome onboard.”

John looked him up and down, then nodded in approval.  Howard looked like a naval officer; he didn't have a single button out of place, while he wore two service pips and a campaign ribbon on his jacket.  His short brown hair was cut close to his scalp, like most spacers chose to wear their hair.  Long hair just got in the way on a starship.

“Pleased to meet you,” he said.  “What sort of exercise are you running?”

“Us against an alien battlecruiser,” Howard explained.  “We might actually have an advantage, but there are tactical problems in bringing the heavy plasma cannon to bear on any target.”

“We actually have to line up the whole ship to take aim,” John noted.  “And just powering up the cannon sends out telltale bursts of radiation.”

“It does,” Howard confirmed.  “So far, the only tactical doctrine we have for using it, sir, involves not powering the cannon up until we’re already engaging the enemy.  But that takes half of our firepower off the board before we've even started the fight.  The enemy might notice our weakness and close with us.”

“So we could only use it to get the first shot if we weren’t trying to hide,” John said.  He sat down in the command chair and keyed a switch, bringing up the tactical display.  “And if we were trying to sneak up on someone, our first broadside would be lame.”

“Yes, sir,” Howard said.

John frowned.  It was starting to look as though Warspite could either beat or outrun anything else in space.  The plasma cannon was a great idea, in theory, yet Howard and Johnston had already outlined some of the problems of using it in real life.  On the other hand, there were some definite possibilities ...

“We could still use it,” he said.  One idea had already occurred to him.  “Set up the tactical simulators for 1900, Mr. Howard.  We’ll start playing through some possibilities tonight.”

“Aye, sir,” Howard said.

John rose, then walked out of the hatch and through the ship, inspecting each and every compartment.  Most of them looked unfinished, although it was clear that all of the essential gear had already been installed and that Warspite shouldn't have any problems in meeting her scheduled departure date.  The real problem lay in the fact that most of the crew were inexperienced, despite the recent war.  But he was starting to get the impression that using crewmen who had served on more conventional starships to crew Warspite was asking for trouble.  

“Doctor Thomas Stewart,” a grim-faced man said, when he entered sickbay.  “I hope I will be seeing you soon for your physical.”

John groaned.  “I think you add half the steps to torture people,” he said.  It was evident he wasn't going to be developing a personal relationship with his ship’s doctor.  “And I did have a physical before I returned to Earth.”

“Never trust doctors who just want to verify you can return to Earth,” the doctor said, firmly.  “I shall expect to see you here before we depart, sir.”

“As you wish,” John said, with a sigh.  “Any problems in your department?”

“Half my staff hasn't arrived, but other than that everything is fine,” Stewart said.  “A couple of crewmen tried to malinger, so I sent them back to duty with a few well-chosen words and threats.  If you’re trying to fake an illness, you might as well do something that isn't easily verifiable.”

John frowned.  “Is that a major problem?”

“It certainly wasn't during the war,” Stewart said.  “I blame it on all the enhanced training programs we had after New Russia fell.  Lots of spacers out there who never had the full battery of tests, let alone the exhaustive training program we put together after years of experience.  Some of them really don’t want to be here, but don’t want to join a reconstruction battalion either.”

Or maybe it’s a form of protest, John thought.  Not, in the end, that it would have made any difference.  Military personnel weren't allowed to strike.  It will have to be dealt with.

“Thank you, doctor,” he said, out loud.  “I’m sure things will get better once we’re on a proper training and exercise roster.”

Chapter Five

It had been years since Percy had last visited Turnstile - Edinburgh - Spaceport.  It had been important then, as one of the gateways to the stars, but it had only expanded rapidly since the war.  Hundreds of thousands of people, emigrants heading to Britannia or one of the other settled worlds, waited patiently for the shuttles that would take them to the orbiting colonist-carriers, while work crews struggled desperately to expand the facilities to cope with the growing exodus.  Thousands of cars and other vehicles were parked outside and abandoned, being sifted through and towed away by reclamation squads.  Their former owners no longer needed them.

He showed his ID card at the desk, passed through a biometric screening and was then pointed into the military waiting compartment.  In stark contrast to the civilian departure lounges, it was almost empty; the handful of personnel chatting quietly to one another or trying to catch up on much-needed sleep.  Percy checked his terminal and noted the shuttle’s departure time, then sat down on a chair and closed his eyes.  He’d spent too long making love to his girlfriend, he noted ruefully as sleep overcame him, instead of catching up with his rest.  But then, it was unlikely there would be any chance to make love on Warspite.

It felt like bare seconds before someone shook him, gently.  Percy snapped awake, one hand grabbing for the concealed pistol, before he remembered where and when he was.  An older man was standing next to him, peering down at him with concerned grey eyes.  Percy couldn't help being reminded of his father, even though his father had never looked so ... dignified.  There was something about the newcomer that practically shouted father.  

“The shuttle is loading now, Corporal,” the newcomer said.  “You and I are the only passengers, I’m afraid.”

Percy stood and grabbed his duffle.  “Coming, sir,” he said.  The newcomer wasn't wearing any rank insignia, but he had an air of authority that pervaded his voice.  “You’re assigned to Warspite too?”

“Damned strange thing,” the newcomer said.  “One moment, I’m on leave; the next, someone calls me and tells me to get my ass up to Warspite pretty damn quick.  And to think I thought I wouldn't be flying more than a desk for the foreseeable future.”

He turned and strode towards the departure gate.  Percy followed him, noting absently that several of the soldiers had gone, while others had taken their place.  Perhaps there had been a slew of reassignments, he told himself, as they walked onto the tarmac.  The military only seemed efficient when compared to civilian life.  One officer falling sick at the wrong time could throw the entire schedule out of whack.

“I’m Philip,” the newcomer said.  He had to shout to be heard over the sound of a shuttle taking off and vanishing into the overcast sky.  “Philip Richards.”

“Percy Schneider,” Percy said.  “Yes, he was my father, thank you for asking.”

“There are worse fathers to have,” Richards said.  He didn't seem impressed at all, much to Percy’s relief.  “Mine wanted me to become a corporate rumour-monger and marry into aristocracy.  Then he overdosed on something and died horribly.  Or so I was told.”

A young female MP, standing outside the shuttle, checked their ID cards and then waved them into the boxy craft.  Percy wasn't surprised to discover that half of the seats had been taken out, nor that the space cleared by removing the seats had been filled with storage pallets, all destined for Warspite.  The military would hardly have wasted a shuttle flight on the pair of them, even if they did have to get to their destination as swiftly as possible.  Someone had probably noted that the shuttle was available to carry supplies and promptly delivered the supplies to the spaceport.

“Pick a seat, any seat,” Richards said.  “I don’t think there’s much choice.”

“And not much chance of a hot stewardess either,” Percy said, as he stuffed his duffle into an overhead compartment, then sat down beside the porthole.  As always, the seat was at least one size too small.  “Why were you assigned to Warspite?”

“Good question,” Richards said.  “And I would be much happier if I knew the answer.”

Percy raised his eyebrows.  “You don't know?”

“I was merely told that I was being reassigned,” Richards said.  “That’s the military life for you, son.  Love it or jump out an airlock.”

“I don’t know if I will re-up when my time expires,” Percy admitted.  It wasn't an easy thing to say.  Richards was clearly a natural lifer, a man who would stay in the Navy until it was time for mandatory retirement, while Percy had his doubts.  “I could find a patch of land on Britannia and settle down to farm.”

“They won’t run out of land in a hurry,” Richards said.  “But do you really want to farm?”

Percy shrugged.  His father had been a investment banker when he hadn't been flying starfighters, but Percy had never cared for the life.  It hadn't done his mother any favours, he saw now in the cold light of hindsight, while Penny hadn't really handled it well either.  There was definitely something to be said for the simple life, even if it did mean hours of backbreaking labour on a farm.  Britannia was booming and those who got in on the ground floor, he’d been told, were certain to make a packet in later life.  And have something worthwhile to pass down to their children.

“I see doubts,” Richards said.  “Just make sure you know what you want before you commit yourself.”

“Thank you for your advice,” Percy said, waspishly.  “What did you do before someone sentenced you to fly a desk?”

“Senior Chief Crewman on Illustrious,” Richards said.  “I survive the war and they up and throw a desk at me.  It wasn’t fun, let me tell you.”

Percy blinked.  “Warspite needs a Senior Chief?”

“I have no idea,” Richards said.

They looked up as a young man wearing a pilot’s uniform stepped into the compartment and frowned at them.  “If I could have your attention please,” he said, “I will commence the safety briefing.”

“Don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t turn on the lights, don’t do anything I wouldn't do and don’t do half the things I would do either,” Richards said, loudly.  “Did I miss anything?”

The young man scowled, then went through a long safety lecture.  Percy tried to pay attention, but after the third repetition it grew harder to keep his mind fixed on the speaker’s droning voice.  One thing he had learned, in the Royal Marines, was that if something went wrong on a shuttle, it would probably be completely fatal.  There was no point in worrying about what to do if the shit hit the fan. 

“If you’re not close to life support gear,” his instructor had said, years ago, “bend over and kiss your ass goodbye.”

“Thank you for listening,” the co-pilot said finally.  “I hope you have a pleasant flight.”

“Definitely not a hot stewardess,” Richards said, once the co-pilot had left.  “How disappointing.”

Percy shrugged.  “I don’t think the military assigns pilots based on their hotness,” he said, although he had his doubts.  Penny had told him that their father had brought a pretty young pilot to the camp, after the Battle of Earth.  Percy wondered, sometimes, if their father had been having an affair.  “And besides, what hot pilot would want to fly an Earth-based shuttle?”

Richards smirked, then launched into a long and complicated story involving ten hot pilots, nine stewardesses and a dozen Royal Marines, all of whom had been trying to find out just how many people could fit into a shuttle.  It took Percy several moments to realise that Richards was trying to distract him from the shuttle’s takeoff, something that was hardly necessary.  But, as a Senior Chief Crewman, Richards would no doubt have supervised hundreds of young crewmen taking their first steps off-world.  Keeping them distracted from everything that could go wrong was part of his job.

“It sounds like a porn movie,” he said, when Richards finally came to an end.  “I think I might have seen it, once.”

“Everyone’s seen it,” Richards agreed.  “Do you know how many copies I had to confiscate while I was on duty?”

Percy snorted.  The Royal Marines weren't supposed to store porn on their military-issue terminals, but he’d yet to meet a Marine who actually obeyed that injunction.  Porn was one way to while away the time while on deployment, after all.  He still recalled the lecture his unit had received, during their first deployment, when one of the bootnecks had been careless about his giant porn stash.  The Sergeant had insisted, sharply, that nothing like that was ever to be left lying around where the senior officers had to take notice of it.  They might understand - they were bootnecks too - but they had to uphold standards.

“Hundreds,” he guessed.  It was amusing to know the regular crewmen had the same problem.  “Or thousands?”

“Around that,” Richards said.  “The war, at least, got people focused on our true reason for existence.”

Percy nodded, then turned his head and peered out of the porthole.  Earth was gone, replaced by a field of unblinking stars.  It had surprised him, once upon a time, to see the stars burning steadily in the inky darkness of space, but there was no atmosphere to produce the twinkling effect.  Now, he couldn’t help but realise just how tiny he was compared to the immense universe.  Even humanity’s growing domains covered only a tiny fraction of the galaxy.

And there are dangers out there, he thought, recalling his father’s final battle.  He still didn't know the full story - he knew no one who did, because the files had been carefully sealed - but he knew his father had died a hero.  Aliens out there, waiting to fight us.

He shuddered.  Five years ago, no one had believed in aliens.  Humanity had discovered over thirty Earth-like worlds and none of them had evolved anything more complex than a small dog-analogue.  Earth had seemed a lucky accident, the sole world to develop an intelligent race.  No one had seriously believed that there might be others, scattered across the stars, not until Vera Cruz.  And then the human race had been plunged into war.

“There might be other threats out there,” he mused.  “Other aliens with bad intentions.”

“There might,” Richards agreed.

Percy jumped.  He hadn't realised he’d spoken aloud.

“We can't really say for sure what we will encounter,” Richards offered, gently.  “All we can really do is make sure we’re ready for anything.”

“Which might boil down to being ready for nothing,” Percy said, crossly.  It had been years since a thoroughly embarrassing exercise in the Bristol Reclamation Zone had taught him and his fellow recruits to watch for all possible angles of attack.  They’d anticipated a land offensive and had been taken by surprise when the aggressor force dropped from the skies.  “I don’t think we can prepare for all possibilities.”

“True,” Richards agreed.  “We might run into the Bat Ships tomorrow and get blown into tiny pieces.”

“Oh,” Percy said.  “Do you believe the rumours?”

Richards shrugged.  “Spacers see all sorts of crazy things out in the darkness,” he said, simply.  “The Tadpoles were real, so the Bats might be real too.”

Percy had heard the story, but he also had his doubts.  Years ago, a starship exploring a newly-discovered star system had reported sighting a giant bat-like starship, hovering over a deserted world.  There had been no sensor recordings, not even visual images, and so most people had dismissed the whole encounter as a hoax cooked up by bored survey crewmen.  But a handful of other reports had come out of the woodwork since then, all sharing the same basic elements.  A bat-shaped ship, visible only to the naked eye.  

“Rumours,” he said.  “Maybe it’s just another UFO craze.”

“Maybe,” Richards said.  “But who believed in aliens before the Tadpoles arrived?”

They fell into a companionable silence as the shuttle raced towards its destination.  Percy reached into his duffle, found his terminal and glanced through - again - the set of orders he’d been issued by the CO.  Report to Lieutenant Darryl Hadfield, HMS Warspite.  Assume command of 2 Section.  Follow orders from superior authority.  As always, the orders were vague; the person on the spot was expected to handle the situation using his own initiative, rather than await orders from higher up the food chain.  Percy wasn't too surprised.  If someone had seen fit to assign twenty-one Royal Marines to Warspite, when they were needed on Earth, it suggested they expected trouble.

Or that we will be going far from civilised space, he thought, grimly.  Who knows what we might encounter so far down the tramlines?

“There she blows,” Richards said, suddenly.  “Take a look.”

Percy looked up.  The shuttle was approaching a starship - a cruiser, judging by the size - and heading towards a docking port.  Warspite was larger than he'd expected, her hull bristling with weapons and sensor blisters.  A unit number was blazed across her dark hull, with her name written underneath.  He sucked in his breath as the hull loomed closer, then braced himself.  A dull clang ran through the shuttle as it locked on to the airlock, followed by a hiss as the airlock opened.

“Come along,” Richards said, as the gravity field shimmered around them.  “We don’t want to be late.”

Percy nodded his thanks to the two pilots as he walked past them and through the airlock, into the ship.  A small work crew was already forming up outside the airlock, evidently ready to start moving supplies from the shuttle into the hold.  Beyond them, there was a young man wearing a Royal Marine battledress, optimised for starship deployment.  Percy walked past the work crews, stopped in front of the young man and saluted, smartly.

“Corporal Percy Schneider, reporting,” he said.

“Lieutenant Darryl Hadfield,” the young man said.  His voice was largely unaccented, but Percy had enough experience to be fairly sure Hadfield was from Wales.  Blue eyes flickered over Percy’s face and uniform, leaving him wishing he’d had time to freshen up.  “Come with me.”

He turned and marched down the corridor.  Percy followed him, quietly assessing his new commanding officer.  Hadfield was young, strong and clearly experienced, although he probably hadn't expected sole command of a deployment so early in his career.  But then, one habit the Royal Marines had eventually copied from the USMC was to have everyone start out as a groundpounder, then have promising young men turned into officers after they gained some real experience.  Hadfield was young, but he was still old enough to have seen real combat in the war.

“This is Marine Country,” Hadfield said, as they stepped through a hatch.  “You’ve served before, so I won’t bother to go over the specifics.  We follow standard procedures, save for the absence of a guard on the hatch.  I don’t have anyone to spare for the post.”

“Yes, sir,” Percy said.

“Nor do we have separate accommodation.” Hadfield continued.  “We have one barracks for all of us, one office for us to do our paperwork and one training compartment.  And we have to share exercise facilities with the crew, I'm afraid.  They’re as pleased about it as we are.”

Percy smiled as Hadfield led him into the office.  Starship crewmen and Royal Marines tended to keep themselves to themselves, even though they were both cooped up in the same starship.  The idea of sharing an exercise compartment with crewmen was irritating, although he knew it was hardly the end of the world.  There might be arguments, disagreements and fights, but it wouldn't be the worst thing he’d experienced.  The deployment on Mars would be hard to beat.

“We’re running constant training exercises, in and out of the ship,” Hadfield continued, as he sat down on one side of a metal table.  “You’ll take command of 2 Section at once, then bring them up to speed.  I’m not anticipating any need for a deployment, but I’m damned if we will be caught unprepared.”

“Yes, sir,” Percy agreed.  Taking command of a section he barely knew - he hadn't had time to do more than glance at the personnel files - would be a challenge.  “I won’t let you down.”

Hadfield keyed his terminal.  “Sergeant Peerce, report to my office,” he ordered.  “Danny has been in command of 2 Section until you arrived.  You’ll find him very helpful.”

Percy nodded, although he wasn't as sanguine as he tried to appear.  There were always tensions when one commanding officer was relieved by another, even when it had been planned in advance.  Sergeant Peerce might resent being replaced by someone fresh off the shuttle from Earth, even though Percy knew he’d earned his rank.  But then, one of the best pieces of advice he'd been given, back when he’d had the stripe pinned on his dress uniform, had been to listen to the senior NCOs.  They had forgotten more about making the unit work than he’d ever learned.

The hatch opened, revealing a short man with a stern face.  Not someone to cross, Percy realised, recalling the sergeant he’d met on the Royal Marine Insight Day.  The man had looked like a gym teacher from hell; short, bald and terrifyingly loud.  Peerce had the same attitude, but smoother.  It took Percy a moment to remember that Peerce didn't have to deal with raw recruits.

“Lieutenant,” Peerce said.

“This is 2 Section’s new CO,” Hadfield said.  “Take him, get him sorted out, then start exercising.  I want 2 Section up to speed by the time we leave.”

“Yes, sir,” Peerce said.  He turned to look at Percy.  “Coming, Corporal?”

Percy nodded, then picked up his duffle and followed Peerce out of the tiny compartment. 

Chapter Six

“Captain,” Midshipwoman Powell said.  “Mr. Richards is here to see you.”

John barely glanced up from his terminal.  “Show him in,” he ordered.  “Then bring us both tea and a snack.  He must be hungry.”

“You want something,” a familiar voice said.  “Should I be worried?”

“Not yet,” John said, as he rose.  “It’s good to see you again, Philip.”

“And you, sir,” Philip Richards said.  “I was very surprised to be reassigned.  The Royal Navy had me flying a desk for the foreseeable future.”

John shook his hand, then motioned Richards into a seat.  “I need someone with your ... unique skill set,” he said, as he sat down behind the desk.  “In a fit of desperation, I chose to ask for you.”

“You must have been desperate,” Richards said.  He glanced up as Midshipwoman Powell entered the office, carrying a tray of tea and biscuits.  “Thank you, love.”

John waited until Midshipwoman Powell had retreated, then leaned forward.  “I need an assistant, Phil,” he said.  “Someone’s set me up the bomb.”

“That sounds bad,” Richards said.  “And, in the interests of great justice, you sent for me?”

“My XO is brilliant, but doesn’t have the slightest idea how to command respect,” John said.  He picked up the datapad and waved it at Richards, meaningfully.  “I don’t think I have to tell you just how many things remain undone, or unaccounted for, or ... well, you know how easily things can go wrong when someone doesn't do their work.  There are enough hiccups here to cause real trouble when we’re well away from Earth.”

“Shit,” Richards said.  “They’ve been getting away with too much.”

“Tell me about it,” John said.  He put down the datapad and took a sip of tea.  “I want you to serve as my ... well, my assistant.”

“You want me to do everything your XO can't,” Richards said.  “Without, I might add, the rank to actually do it.”

“In one,” John said.  “The Admiralty will allow me to give you a rank without a formal approval procedure, as long as we both understand it’s strictly temporary.  You won’t be allowed to retire as a Lieutenant-Commander.”

“I wouldn't want to retire as a Lieutenant-Commander,” Richards said, dryly.  “Very well.  I accept.”

John smirked.  “And to think I had a ten thousand word speech planned out to tell you why you should take the job.”

“You can save it for your next attempt at hijacking an underling,” Richards said.  He drained his teacup, then placed it to one side.  “What would you like me to tackle first, sir?”

“Everything,” John said.  He picked up another datapad, glanced down at it and then passed it to Richards.  “I hate paperwork as much as the next line officer, but half of these papers haven’t been done properly and it could prove a major headache, further down the line.”

“I should coco,” Richards said, as he studied the datapad.  “When were half these components replaced?”

John sighed.  Military-grade components were ultra-reliable, but the Royal Navy insisted on replacing them regularly anyway, just in case the ship needed to go to war tomorrow.  It wasn't something he grudged the beancounters - for once, the bureaucrats had a point - but he understood the temptation some crewmen would face to skip the paperwork.  Replacing a single component could take minutes, while filling in the paperwork could take hours.  And most of his crewmen knew it was a pointless endeavour, right up until the moment it wasn’t.

“I don’t know,” John said.  “Which is the problem, isn't it?”

“You could have a rat onboard too,” Richards offered.  “You know how much naval components are worth on the civilian market.”

“Yeah,” John said.  He leaned forward.  “If there is a rat onboard, I expect you to find him and bring him to Captain’s Mast.  But if it’s just laziness, I want them beaten into shape before they can cause a real disaster.”

“Yes, sir,” Richards said.  “I’ll get to work at once.”

John nodded, then returned to his paperwork as Richards left the office.  It wasn't a good thing to call in outside help - it would reflect badly on Commander Watson - but he didn't think he had a choice.  Richards would clear the decks, he was sure; there were very few crewmen who would cross him once, let alone twice.  And if there were any bad apples in the bunch, Richards would smoke them out before they managed to infest the rest of the crew.

His intercom chimed.  “Captain,” Midshipwomen Powell said, “it’s about time for the dinner to begin.”

“Joy,” John said.  He glanced at the chronometer and swore under his breath.  He’d been reading and marking paperwork for hours.  “Have the other commanders arrived?”

“Yes, sir,” Midshipwomen Powell said.  She’d taken over responsibility for organising the dinner, something else that should have been handled by the XO.  “They’re on their way to the Officer’s Mess.”

“Then I’m on my way too,” John said.  Thankfully, he’d specified informal wear, although he suspected that a couple of the officers would wear dress uniforms anyway.  “Tell them I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.”

He checked his appearance in the mirror, then hastened out of the hatch and strode down towards the Officer’s Mess.  Midshipwomen Powell was standing outside, showing another commanding officer to his seat.  John nodded to her, then stepped into the room and looked around.  It was small, barely large enough to hold all of his officers at once, but it was tolerable.  Unwritten rules dictated, after all, that any starship larger than a frigate had to have separate eating spaces for the officers and enlisted crewmen.

“Thank you for coming,” he said, as he took his seat at the head of the table.  “I apologise for the short notice.”

“Everything about this mission is short notice,” Captain Heath Meeks grumbled.  “I don’t get paid enough to be jerked here and there.”

“That’s what you pay for signing up with the Royal Fleet Auxiliary,” Captain Glen Larne reminded him.  “They paid half the cost of your starship in exchange for your service when they needed it.”

John motioned for them to sit, trying to keep his expression under control.  The Royal Fleet Auxiliary were torn between being civilians and being military; the Royal Navy had invested in their ships, in exchange for having first call on their services if a sudden emergency developed in interstellar space.  He couldn't blame Meeks for being a little annoyed - the Colony Support Vessel he commanded was a licence to print money, if he based himself in the right system - but he had signed the contract.  The Royal Navy would be happy to repossess his vessel and place a prize crew on her if he refused to uphold his end of the bargain.

Besides, he thought dryly.  The RFA is a suitable place for officers and men who want to remain close to the navy, without actually being in the navy.

“My cook has taken the liberty of preparing a simple meal,” he said, “using ingredients sourced from Earth.  There won’t be another one like this for months, I’m afraid.”

He had to smile at their expressions.  Only the very largest starships carried enough supplies to be able to offer their crews fresh food every day.  Everyone else got ration bars, reprocessed foods and algae-based meals.  They might taste nice, once the cook added some flavouring, but they became monotonous very rapidly.  It was one of the reasons why fresh fruit and vegetables were always included in care packages from home.

“Six months of deployment,” Meeks moaned.  “Do you know how much I could earn in a different system?”

“The Royal Navy is paying you well enough,” John said, patiently.  “And besides, there may be opportunity.  You never know.”

He cleared his throat as Midshipwoman Powell entered, pushing a trolley loaded with bowls of carrot and coriander soup.  “There will be time to discuss the mission afterwards,” he added, firmly.  “Until then, let us eat and chat about nothing.”

The ship’s cook had definitely excelled himself, John decided, as they ate their way through a three-course meal.  He allowed himself to relax slightly at the chatter, listening to stories of life in the post-war RFA, while silently envying some of their freedoms.  The Royal Navy didn't allow him or anyone else wearing the uniform anything like the same amount of freedom, although he knew it came with a cost.  Meeks was right, in a way; the RFA demanded attention, often at the cost of long-term financial security.  

He knew it when he made the deal, he reminded himself, as the dinner came to an end.  And he can't complain now.

“I would like to be brief,” he said, once Midshipwoman Powell had cleared away the plates and retreated into the galley.    “But I don’t think I can be.”

He smiled at them all, then keyed a switch, activating the holographic projector.  “Our destination is Pegasus, the star system here,” he said, nodding towards a blinking icon.  “As you can see, Pegasus plays host to a number of tramlines, thus ensuring that whoever controls the system will be able to control those tramlines.  Our mission is to proceed to Pegasus and establish a base on Clarke III, a moon orbiting a gas giant.  Once the base and cloudscoop is established, we will formally lay claim to the entire system.”

“And make sure no one else can tap the gas giant for fuel,” Meeks commented, sourly.  “I like it.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” John said.  “And I’m sure there will be long-term opportunities here.”

He shrugged.  Meeks was right, again.  Ownership of the sole economical source of HE3 in the system would ensure that Britain maintained a controlling interest, even if other powers managed to establish their own outposts.  International treaties forbade such blatant theft, but there were loopholes.  Pegasus didn’t have any Earth-like planets to claim, so someone could easily try to argue that the treaty didn't apply to that system.

“And once we have the base established, we proceed to Wells?”  Captain Jerry Samisen asked.  “Or do we leave that world for later?”

“I believe our long-term plans call for a slow terraforming program,” John said.  “It isn’t as if anyone is interested in investing the resources for a least-time effort.  Wells isn't Mars.”

“True,” Meeks agreed.  “There are several Earth-like worlds within one or two jumps of Pegasus.”

John nodded.  Mars had been force-terraformed, a project that had started well before the first tramlines had been discovered.  The various nations that had established settlements on Mars had dumped millions of tons of water into the atmosphere, followed by producing genetically-engineered seeds and orbiting mirrors to heat the planet.  Mars’s original ecosystem, such as it was, had been utterly destroyed, replaced by a fragile world that could support human life.  There were people who still hinted that there might have once been life on Mars, but the terraforming program had obliterated it.  Until the Tadpoles had arrived, speculation that Mars had once possessed intelligent life had been among the most popular conspiracy theories in human existence.  

But Mars had also cost the various nations a great deal of money.  And the colonists hadn't been entirely grateful.  It wasn't something that would be repeated in a hurry.

“We will depart in three days, barring accidents,” he said.  “Will your ships be ready to depart by then?”

“We could have left last week,” Meeks said.  “I think the real delay came out of Nelson Base.”

“Probably,” John agreed.  It didn't take much imagination to see how the political struggle had delayed the colonisation mission.  “We can leave on the scheduled date, though?”

“Yes,” Meeks said, flatly.  The other commanders echoed him.  “Do you anticipate running into trouble?”

“I would prefer to be prepared,” John said.  “The Tadpoles might be on the other side of human space, but there might be other threats out there.  That’s another good reason to secure Pegasus as soon as possible, I think.  There could be anything out there, waiting for us.”

“Yes, Captain,” Samisen agreed.

“Warspite will take point,” John continued.  “Canberra” - an escort carrier - “will bring up the rear.  We will maintain a watchful eye on our surroundings at all times, including a CSP of no less than four starfighters.  I trust such a tempo will not prove too challenging?”

Captain Jonny Minion shrugged.  “We’ve been practicing heavy deployments regularly, ever since the war,” he said.  “Keeping a mere four starfighters on station at all times will not prove to be a challenge, at least not for the moment.  I’d be happier with more, of course ...”

John nodded as Minion’s voice tailed off.  Escort carriers were nothing more than converted bulk freighters, lacking the weapons, sensors and armoured hulls - such as they were - of fleet carriers.  The Royal Navy had seen no choice, but to deploy the modified starships, knowing that they would take hideous losses.  And they had; by the time the war had come to an end, thirty-seven escort carriers had been lost, along with over five hundred pilots.  John had served on one himself and knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, just how lucky he had been to survive.

And Colin died, he thought, morbidly.  I could never fly a starfighter after that, could I?

He pushed the thought aside as he rose to his feet.  “We can affix a couple of starfighters to Warspite’s hull, if necessary,” he said.  “It would give us some additional striking power, if we do run into trouble.”

“Let us hope not,” Meeks said.  “Danger will only delay proceedings.”

“Tell me about it,” John muttered.  He walked around the table and stopped in front of the display.  “Do any of you have any concerns about our proposed route?”

There was a long pause.  “I would prefer not to go through Terra Nova,” Captain William Hunter said, when it was clear that no one else was going to speak.  “The system is not entirely safe.”

“Nowhere is safe,” Minion snapped.

“Terra Nova is having a major civil war,” Hunter said, ignoring the unsubtle jab at him.  “And some of the fighting has spread to outer space.  I would prefer not to take the squadron through the system if it could be avoided.”

“I don’t think any of the out-system powers are likely to court a war by attacking us,” Minion sneered.  “And the locals don’t have the firepower to take on the entire squadron.”

“It would also add two weeks to our journey time if we avoided Terra Nova,” John said, quietly.  He understood the concerns, but he also knew there was no time to lose.  “We will avoid the settled parts of the system as much as possible, I think.  It should be enough to prevent an encounter with the locals.”

“Something ought to be done about Terra Nova,” Meeks grumbled.  “Right now, the entire system is falling apart.”

“Like what?”  Minion demanded.  “Put an army on the ground and kill anyone who even looks at us funny?  That never worked out very well during the Age of Unrest.”

John sighed.  It had been a semi-serious debate before the First Interstellar War, when Terra Nova had merely been unstable.  Now, with a full-scale civil war on the planet’s surface, there were people calling for armed intervention.  But how could the problem be actually solved?  The only real solution, he suspected, was for anyone with half a brain to flee the planet, which was what they were doing.  They wanted to live somewhere where there was not only a demand for skilled labour, but a chance to keep their earnings without having them stolen, or their sons conscripted into a militia, or their daughters raped by whatever force happened to occupy their hometown this week.  

He shook his head.  They were getting away from the subject at hand.

“Leaving Terra Nova aside,” he said, “does anyone have any other concerns?”

There was a long pause.  This time, no one spoke.

“Then we will leave on our scheduled departure date,” John said.  “Please let me know if you have any concerns, prior to departure.  I will be sending some crewmen to Sin City for a brief period of leave; you may do the same, if you make sure they know to report back twenty-four hours prior to departure.  Anyone who isn't back by then can explain themselves to the Shore Patrol and the Military Police.  And yes, that includes RFA personnel.”

“Yes, sir,” Meeks said, without argument.  “My crew will be glad of a short break.”

“Just remind them not to take out any loans,” John said, ruefully.  He had, as a junior pilot, and he’d regretted it ever since.  “If they run out of hard cash, they can make their way straight back to the ship.”

Meeks smiled.  “I’ll make sure they know,” he said.  “It’s always the young ones who get into trouble, isn't it?”

John nodded.  “My officers need their Mess back,” he said.  The others rose.  “Next time we meet in person, it will be in the Pegasus System.”

He watched them file out of the room, then turned and walked through the door into the galley.  Not entirely to his surprise, there were signs that the cook had saved some of the dinner for himself and Midshipwoman Powell, a tradition that was technically forbidden, but winked at by almost all senior officers.  Powell herself was sitting at the table, reading a datapad and waiting for the call.  John cleared his throat and she jumped.

“Sir,” she said, rising.  “I ...”

“Thank you for your service,” John said.  “It was very good.”

Midshipwoman Powell coloured.  “Thank you, sir.”

“You can clear away the rest of the dishes now,” John continued.  “Make sure that the remains of the dessert are handed round in the Crew Mess.  And tell the cook to save some of the supplies for later.  You never know when we might need a fresh dinner.”

“Yes, sir,” Powell said.

John smiled, then walked back to his office.  There was still no shortage of work to do.

Chapter Seven

“They’re coming around our flank, Corporal.”

“I see them,” Percy said.  1 Section was attacking, while 2 Section was defending.  He’d distributed his men carefully around the airlock, but he knew the dangers of trying to be strong everywhere.  “Keep your head down.”

He gritted his teeth as he crawled forward.  There were worse places to fight, he was sure, than the hull of a starship, but he couldn't think of any.  Hardly any cover, apart from weapons emplacements and sensor blisters, and no way of digging a protective foxhole to conceal his men.  He hated to think of what the Captain would say if he actually did manage to cut a hole into the hull, releasing the atmosphere out into interplanetary space ...

The enemy appeared, wearing the same light combat suits as his own men.  Percy levelled his rifle at the nearest enemy soldier and opened fire, sending flickering bursts of laser light across the hull and into their target.  The enemy soldier jerked, then made a show of lying there dead as his comrades scattered, then advanced, throwing grenades towards Percy’s position.  Red lights flashed up in front of him and he cursed as his suit locked up.

“You’re dead, Corporal,” Sergeant Danny Peerce said.

“I noticed,” Percy said.  He’d blundered badly and his men were about to pay the price.  1 Section advanced into the gap they’d created, then secured the airlock and drove the remnants of 2 Section away.  They’d still have to board and storm the entire ship, but command of the airlocks would ensure they could bring in as many reinforcements as they wanted.  “And we lost.”

“Indeed you did,” Hadfield said.  “Exercise terminated; I say again, exercise terminated.”

Percy pushed himself to his feet as his suit unlocked, then looked around as the other Marines made their way towards the airlock and safety.  As always, his head swam when he contemplated that he was standing on the hull of a starship, where it wasn't actually clear which way was up and which way was down.  He forced himself to look back at the deck, cursing under his breath.  It had been too long since his last stint of shipboard duty.

He stepped through the airlock, then joined the other Marines in clambering out of the suits and checking them, before hanging them back on the hooks for later use.  Taking care of his equipment was important, he knew; it had been hammered into his head, time and time again, that taking care of his equipment was the only way to make sure it would take care of him.

“Back to the barracks,” Hadfield ordered, as soon as the suits were checked.  “We need to go over the exercise.”

Percy groaned, inwardly.  Two days of constant exercises had left him tired, sore and cranky, but he knew he couldn't avoid the aftermath.  At least he’d done better in the simulated ground environments, thankfully.  No one seriously expected the Royal Marines to have to fight off boarders in this day and age, although it had happened during the war.  It was one of the reasons why every crewman was required to carry a personal weapon at all times, despite the risks.

“2 Section misread the enemy’s intentions,” Hadfield said, once they were back in the cramped barracks.  Warspite had no briefing compartment for her Marines.  “They also missed a chance to launch a counterattack by sending half the section around the ship and ramming their rifles up the enemy’s butt.  Once this mistake had shown itself, it was too late to recover.”

Percy nodded, ruefully.  It had been his mistake.

“We will try again, of course,” Hadfield said.  “And again, and again.  Get some sleep, then return here for the next exercise at 1700.  Schneider, Peerce, you’re with me.”

“Yes, sir,” Percy said.

“You lugs get plenty of sleep,” Peerce said, addressing the Marines.  “You’ll need it.”

Percy nodded, then followed Hadfield out into the corridor, then into the small office.  “I’m sorry, sir,” he said.  “That was my fuck up.”

“Yes, it was,” Hadfield said.  There was a grim note to his voice that made Percy quail inwardly.  “Luckily, it wasn't real.  You get to try it again.”

And then discover there’s more than one way to fuck up, Percy thought.  He’d thought training at Lympstone was bad, but it never really ended.  There’s no shortage of ways to fuck up and get people killed.

“I have to report to the Captain,” Hadfield said.  “I’m supposed to be terribly subtle about finding a way to get you two to bond, but I really can’t be arsed.  There’s cheap whiskey in the cabinet, the hatch will be locked and I’ve blocked your terminals.  Sit down and bond.  Or I can find a less friendly environment for you to do your bonding thing.”

Percy stared at Peerce in astonishment as Hadfield strode out of the compartment, closing the hatch behind him.  “Sergeant ...?”

“Perils of taking over a Section without spending weeks of quality time training together first,” Peerce said.  He stood up and walked over to the cabinet, opening it to reveal a bottle of amber liquid.  “Do you know how many regulations prohibit drinking on duty?”

“Yes, Sergeant,” Percy said.

“But we’re not on duty now,” Peerce said.  He opened the bottle, sniffed it suspiciously, then poured two glasses.  “He wasn’t kidding about the whiskey being cheap either.  I’ve had better brews made by Military Moonshine, Inc.”

“For people who want to know why we’re in such a vile temper all the time,” Percy said, recalling the adverts.  They had brought a certain amount of amusement into the camps, even if half the manufacturer’s claims were bunk.  “But why would he spend half of his salary on a bottle of expensive whiskey?”

He took the glass Peerce offered him, then sipped it carefully.  “Are we on the two-pint rule?”

“The one-glass rule, here,” Peerce said.  He returned to the seat and sat down.  “So ... we’re meant to bond, aren't we?”

Percy scowled.  “I don’t know how to bond,” he said.  He paused, thinking.  “How did you become a bootneck, Sergeant?”

“Runs in the family,” Peerce said.  “My father was a bootneck, his father was a bootneck ... I think the very first Royal Marine in the family lived during the Napoleonic Wars.  Got quite a few medals by the time he retired too.  My mother rolls her eyes every time my father starts talking about his career, but she’s very proud of him.”

“Rupert Peerce,” Percy said, placing the name.  “Right?”

“Big hero of Tripoli,” Peerce confirmed.  “Jumped in to recover a pack of idiot hostages from the teeth of a bunch of wogs, then called in a kinetic strike that flattened the remains of the city after the hostages were dragged back to Britain.  Fucking miserable place, my father said, and he was right.  It didn't improve any since then, sir, and I know that because I served there too, twenty years after dad.”

Percy nodded, slowly.  Parts of the world had gone to the stars, claiming the endless resources of interstellar space for themselves, while others had declined into chaos and endless anarchy.  They had nothing the spacefaring powers wanted, so they were generally left to kill each other to their heart’s content ... unless they impinged, somehow, on one of the great powers.  And then military raids or kinetic strikes were used, once again, to remind the savages that no one had any patience for their antics.  It was no longer the era where a few oil sheikhs could hold the entire planet hostage.

“It was largely their fault,” Peerce said.  “The hostages, I mean.  You know what they wanted to do?  Start their own society on Mars.  But ... big but here ... it turns out that Mars needs women.  So they have the bright idea of recruiting women from refugee camps on the grounds they would be grateful enough to be rescued that they wouldn't complain about being used as breeding stock.”

“Arseholes,” Percy commented.

“Yes, sir,” Peerce conformed.  “And when you think about just how many youngsters were willing, even then, to leave Earth behind for good, you realise that their motives were very far from pure.”

He sighed, then took another sip of cheap whiskey.  “Not that things got much better for the refugees, in any case,” he added.  “The tidal waves only made it far worse.”

“I know,” Percy said.

“So tell me,” Peerce said.  “Why did you join the Royal Marines?  I know there was a slot held for you at the Naval Academy.”

Percy looked down at his glass.  Whiskey had never been his favourite drink; hell, he’d never really liked drinking at all.  His mother had used to start the most terrible rows whenever she’d seen his father drinking ... and, now his mother was gone, he didn't really want to disgrace her memory by becoming a drunkard.

“My father,” he confessed.  “I didn't want to live in his shadow.”

“I always honoured my father,” Peerce said.  “The old buzzard moved to Britannia, where he’s terrorising the wildlife and building a farm.  Why didn't you want to honour yours?”

Percy hesitated, unsure of what to say.

“My father died a hero,” he said.  “I don’t know how many people outside the Royal Marines knows your father’s name, but everyone knows mine, even if they don’t know the exact details of his death.  Even after we were ... adopted ... we still carried the family name.”

“Odd,” Peerce observed.  “I would understand if you were called Quisling, or Morrison, or even Gallows, but not Schneider.  Your father died a hero.”

“Yes, but everyone expected me to follow in his footsteps,” Percy said.  “If I had gone into starfighters, I would have been pushed through the Academy on the strength of my name.  I think the same would have happened if I’d become a line officer, rather than a pilot.  My name would have opened doors for me, rather than my accomplishments.  Does that make sense?”

“It does,” Peerce said.  “And the Royal Marines treated you as just another recruit.”

Percy nodded.  “There's no other part of the service where the aristocracy doesn't have a huge amount of influence,” he said.  “I could stand or fall on my own merits.”

“And you won the Green Beret,” Peerce said.  “You have a great deal to be proud of, Corporal.”

“Thank you,” Percy said.  He gave his nominal subordinate a long look.  “How many other junior officers have you kicked into shape?”

“Too many,” Peerce said.  “It helps that most of them have combat experience, so they know what’s really important, but it’s sometimes hard to separate them from the bootneck they were before they were promoted.  I imagine you should have been sent to Officer Training - and you would have been, if there had been a chance.  As it is, you will just have to learn on the fly.”

He smiled.  “And I think your father will understand,” he added.  “He was a reservist, wasn't he?”

“Yes,” Percy said.  “Sergeant ... why haven’t they disclosed everything about his death?”

Peerce considered it.  “You do know,” he asked finally, “that closed-casket funerals are not uncommon in Special Forces?  Or that the truth behind some of our combat losses will not be publically known for over a hundred years, when everyone involved is dead?”

“He wasn't a soldier,” Percy protested.  “He was a pilot.  Nothing more than a pilot.”

Peerce looked down at his empty glass, then put it on the table.  “There is a story, which I am not going to tell you, about a starship that sneaked into the Waco System during the Chinese-American Confrontation.  That starship stealthily monitored shipping in the system and reported home to its base, then prepared itself to intervene if the two sides came to blows.”

“But they didn't,” Percy reminded him.

“No, they didn't,” Peerce agreed.  “The ship withdrew as quietly as it came ... and there will be no formal public acknowledgement that the mission even took place, not for another fifty years.”

“If that’s true,” Percy asked, “how do you know about it?”

“I was on the ship,” Peerce said.  

He shrugged.  “Point is, sometimes a veil of secrecy is drawn over an affair to avoid causing diplomatic upsets,” he said.  “And sometimes the truth is hidden because it upsets those in power.  I’ve heard enough rumours about the last flight of Ark Royal to think that something happened, something bad enough for everyone to want to cover up the details.”

“Helped by everyone being dead,” Percy muttered.

“Quite,” Peerce said.  “There were only a handful of survivors from Ark Royal and none of them are talking.  But you know what?”

He reached out and clapped Percy on the shoulder.  “You wanted to build your own destiny, sir,” he said.  “So stop worrying about what happened to your father and concentrate instead on becoming the best damned bootneck in the history of the Royal Marines.”

“Thank you, Sergeant,” Percy said.  He drained the last of his glass, then put it down on the table.  “Is that enough bonding now or do we have to talk about something else?”

“You've had a couple of days with your Section,” Peerce said.  “Do you have any observations?”

Percy hesitated, thinking hard.  “The two Johns have each other’s back, half the time,” he said.  “They’re good at watching out for each other.”

“We’re surrounded by Johns,” Peerce said.  “I think there’s twelve people on the ship called John, including the Captain.”

“I was surprised they were together,” Percy said.  It was far from uncommon for naval personnel to share the same first name, but it could cause problems.  “Doesn't it cause confusion?”

“I just call them by their surnames, even in combat,” Peerce said.  “They got here together, so there’s no precedence for which one should be called John.  Besides, they do work together well, so why break up a successful team?”

He smiled, thinly.  “Anything else?”

“Matt is very much the baby of the team,” Percy said, after a moment.  “He did well at the training camp, but this is his first real deployment and it’s clear he’s a little unsure of his place.”

“Some proper experience will put paid to that,” Peerce assured him.  “Or weren't you unsure when you spent your first night in the barracks?”

Percy nodded, although he knew he’d had an easier time than most.  Thanks to the tidal waves and the refugee camps, he was used to having very little to his name.  Besides, as uncomfortable as they were, the Royal Marine Barracks were far more pleasant than the refugee camps ... and the company was better too.  But not all of the recruits had endured such a life before joining the Marines.  Homesickness had affected quite a few of them before they’d either got used to it or quit. 

“And Ron is worried about his girlfriend,” he concluded.  He’d overheard enough whining to understand the problem, even though Ronald Fisherman hadn't spoken to him about it directly.  “He thinks the poor bitch will leave him.”

“Not an uncommon problem,” Peerce said.  “Young men and women may pledge themselves to one another in person, but absence makes the heart grow colder and start looking for comfort elsewhere.  You may wish to keep an eye on him, once we leave the system.  He won’t be able to get many messages from home until the mail packets arrive.”

“And one of them might be a Dear John letter,” Percy said.  “I’ve found someone else, so goodbye and thanks for all the fish.”

“Might be,” Peerce said.  “You may, of course, review all such messages before they are forwarded to their recipients.  However, I would caution you that such reviewing could cause problems with the troops.”

Percy winced.  He'd never actually reviewed, let alone censored, letters from the outside world to Marines on active duty, but he'd heard rumours.  Everything from nude photographs to wifely nagging and ‘Dear John’ letters had passed through the censors, back during the war.  There had even been a major scandal when one of the censors had started copying the most interesting photographs and putting them on the datanet.  Percy wouldn't have given a rusty penny for the man’s chances once the husbands found out.

“I know,” he said.

“It could be worse,” Peerce said.  “You know what happened during the war?”

He went on before Percy could answer.  “Someone in Public Relations had the bright idea of getting young girls to write to soldiers on deployment,” he added.  “It worked reasonably well, for a few months, then we got a howler of complaint from someone’s mother.  The squaddie her daughter had been writing to had written back, asking for naked photographs and videos.”

“Oh, God,” Percy said.  “Do I want to know what happened?”

“I believe the young man in question was bawled out by his superior, then his superior’s superior, then several other officers,” Peerce said.  “Luckily, it didn't stop the program.  I believe several post-war relationships grew out of such exchanges.”

“Perhaps including nude photographs,” Percy mused.  “No one offered to send me any.”

“The program was discontinued after the war,” Peerce said.  “But it might be worth trying to restart it at some point.”

“The CO can worry about that,” Percy said.  “What should I do about the situation?”

“Keep an eye on Ronald and be prepared to give him some counselling if necessary,” Peerce advised.  “Deployments are never easy.”

“I know,” Percy said.  

The hatch opened, revealing Hadfield.  “I trust you two have managed to bond?”

“Yes, sir,” Peerce said, before Percy could say a word.  “We know each other a little better now.”

“Good,” Hadfield said.  He made a show of looking at his watch.  “Go get some rest, both of you.  I intend to kick off the next exercise as soon as possible.”

“Yes, sir,” Percy said.

Chapter Eight

“All systems are online, sir,” Commander Juliet Watson reported.

“Thank you, Commander,” John said, with the private thought that Richards must have found some time to advise the XO on how best to handle the Captain.  “Helm ... take us out of the shipyard.”

A dull quiver ran through Warspite as her drive field came to life.  John braced himself, feeling an odd mixture of anticipation and fear.  To command a starship was to be Master Under God, sole voice of authority on his ship, but also to bear the burden of being responsible for the entire ship and her crew.  If something went wrong and his ship were to be lost, it would rest with him, not with anyone else.  Even if he hadn’t known what was going wrong until it was too late, the Admiralty would assert he certainly should have known.

He watched, grimly, as Warspite slowly detached herself from the shipyard’s nodes and made her way out of the shipyard, passing a number of automated weapons platforms.  They saluted the new starship briefly, flickering their running lights at her, before returning to their silent contemplation of interstellar space.  John studied the display for a long moment, then turned his attention to the updates from all decks.  Everything seemed to be working at peak capacity, although he was expecting some glitches.  Very few starships powered up without discovering that something - anything - wasn't quite right.

Maybe the shipyard did it perfectly this time, he thought.  It was unlikely - human error crept into the damndest places - but he could still dream.

“Report,” he ordered.

“All systems are functioning as predicted,” Commander Watson said.  “Drive field is active within nominal parameters.  Sensors are active and calibrating now.”

John nodded.  Warspite would be blind without her sensors, both active and passive.  The specs he’d read had told him that the Royal Navy had vastly improved their sensor suites in the wake of the war - and encountering alien stealth technology - but no one had deployed the new systems in combat.  He would almost have preferred to rely upon tried and tested technology, but he knew that would be dangerous - and stupid.  Even if Britain refused to move forward, the rest of the human race - and the Tadpoles - certainly would.  

“Passive sensors are functioning at predicted levels, sir,” Lieutenant-Commander Paul Howard said.  Warspite had no dedicated sensor officer, unlike a fleet carrier.  “Active sensors are functioning at seventy percent of predicted levels.”

John swallowed a curse.  “I see,” he said.  “Why?”

“One of the sensor blisters failed when we tried to power it up,” Howard reported.  He sounded irked - and well he might.  This failure could be laid at his door, if his commander decided he wanted someone to blame.  “I’ve earmarked it for replacement.”

John glanced at his terminal.  “Have it replaced now,” he ordered.  An engineering team could go EVA and replace the sensor blister now, while the ships of the squadron gathered around Warspite.  “And then run checks to make sure the rest of the network is fully functional.”

“Aye, sir,” Howard said.

“The remaining blisters can pick up the strain, if necessary,” Commander Watson said.  “I designed a considerable degree of redundancy into the system.”

John scowled, inwardly.  Clearly, Richards’s lessons hadn't gone very far.

“I prefer to have everything in working order,” he said, tightly.  Didn’t Commander Watson know it was unwise to question her commander on his own bridge?  John had disagreed with his CO, from time to time, but he’d always done it in private.  In public, in front of the junior officers and crew, the Captain and his XO had to provide a united front.  “And besides, we won’t be departing for another hour.”

He settled back in his chair as department after department checked in, reporting that almost all of their systems were functioning within acceptable parameters.  John ordered a handful of systems replaced, then checked again.  Even if they’d been assigned to Home Fleet and kept within the Sol System, he would have insisted the systems be replaced.  War could come at any moment, he had learned, and it was much harder to make repairs while under fire.  He’d even read reports that speculated the First Battle of New Russia wouldn't have gone so badly if the human ships had been at full readiness.

But it wouldn't have made any difference, he told himself, as the endless checks went on and on.  The Tadpoles had us bang to rights the moment they jumped into the system.

“Captain,” Lieutenant Gillian Forbes said.  “The squadron is transmitting its readiness details to you.”

“Transfer it to my terminal,” John ordered.  “And then inform the commanding officers that we will leave on schedule.”

“Aye, sir,” Gillian said.

John smiled to himself.  He wasn't sure he approved of keeping the communications officer, when a sensor officer might be more useful if they ran into trouble, but he knew the Admiralty’s thinking.  Three years ago, the prospect of running into aliens had seemed a pipe dream, at best.  No one thought that now.  Opening communications with aliens as fast as possible was a priority, before another war broke out over a misunderstanding.  The last thing humanity needed was to be pushed to the wall - again.

He checked the reports, one by one.  Captain Minion - he smirked at the name, even though he knew it was unfair of him - had reported with military efficiency, while the other four commanders had been considerably more lax.  John wasn't surprised - they were merchant skippers, rather than military officers - but it was annoying.  All five commanders reported that they were ready to move on his command, then follow Warspite through the tramline to Terra Nova.  

And then they will want to go home, he thought, ruefully.  RFA Argus might be designed as a giant Colony Support Vessel, intended to transport and then assist the settlers as they carved out a new home, but the other three were nothing more than glorified freighters.  They would reach Pegasus, unload their cargo, and then find themselves surplus to requirements.  Their commanders would want to go home and find themselves a more rewarding contract shipping goods from Sol to one of the better-established colonies. 

He smiled, sardonically.  Anyone would think they were ungrateful for the Royal Navy’s contribution to the running costs of their ships.

“Captain,” Commander Watson said, breaking into John’s thoughts.  “All systems are fully functional.”

There was a hint of annoyance in her voice.  John understood, but it was still bad for discipline.  He took a moment to check the reports for himself - the EVA crews had plenty of experience in replacing or repairing damaged components on the ship’s hull - then smiled, tiredly.  The ship had barely left the shipyard and he was already feeling the strain.

Maybe I should have stuck with starfighters after all, he thought, mournfully.  But without Colin, it wouldn't have been the same.

“Lieutenant Forbes, record,” John said.  He waited for the communications officer to give him the thumbs up, then continued.  “From Captain John Naiser, CO HMS Warspite, to Admiral Percy Finnegan, First Space Lord.  Sir.  I certify that HMS Warspite is ready to depart the Sol System on schedule.  We will commence our mission to Pegasus immediately and pass through the tramline in two hours, forty minutes from this message.  God save the King.”

He drew a finger across his throat.  Lieutenant Forbes stopped recording and looked at him, expectantly.  He couldn't help thinking that she looked too young and too inexperienced to be an officer, but that seemed to be par for the course on Warspite.  The experienced officers would simply have to carry the load themselves until their newer comrades were brought up to speed.  But Gillian Forbes ... if her file hadn't stated she was twenty-three, he would have wondered if the Admiralty had resorted to conscripting Secondary School-age children.  He wouldn't have placed her as any older than seventeen.

“Encrypt the message, then transmit it to Nelson Base,” he ordered, silently calculating the time it would take for the message to reach the First Space Lord.  It was unlikely the mission would be scrubbed on short notice, but the First Space Lord would have barely an hour to respond before it was too late.  “And then signal the other ships to assume formation.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Forbes said.

John sighed, inwardly.  On Earth, the speed of light - and radio transmissions - was effectively immediate.  There was no time delay in sending an email or v-mail from London to Kuala Lumpur, from one side of the world to the other.  But spacers knew the speed of light was far from infinite.  It took seconds to signal from Earth to the Moon, minutes to signal Mars at closest approach and hours to send a signal to Jupiter and the planets beyond.  And even that didn't include sending messages through the tramlines.  It could take weeks to send a message from Earth to Britannia, even longer to Vera Cruz or Heinlein.  During the war, entire fleets had gone to the wrong destinations because their orders had changed after their departure, but their commanders hadn't known until it was too late.

The boffins keep promising FTL communications, he thought.  But I’ll believe it when I see it.

“The squadron has responded,” Lieutenant Forbes said.  “They’re standing by.”

John rose to his feet, his eyes fixed on the holographic display.  “Mr. Armstrong, set course for Tramline One,” he ordered.  “Best possible squadron speed.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Carlos Armstrong said.  He tapped a switch on his console.  The course would have been laid in as soon as Warspite cleared the shipyard.  Moments later, the background noise of the ship’s drives grew louder, an omnipresent thrumming echoing through the entire ship.  “ETA Tramline One; two hours, thirty-nine minutes.”

John smiled to himself as he sat down, then monitored the readings from the ship’s drives.  Everything seemed to be fine, much to his relief.  Johnston wouldn't let matters get out of hand, he was sure, but Warspite was new, utterly untested.  The tactical department ran tracking exercise after tracking exercise,  locking the ship’s sensors on the other starships in the squadron, then asteroid miners and transport ships some distance from the small convoy.

“Fools,” Howard muttered, as his sensors locked - briefly - onto Message Bearer.  “They don’t have a hope.”

“The technology is solid,” Commander Watson disagreed.  “But it is slow.”

John smiled, inwardly.  Message Bearer had been built before the tramlines, a giant starship intended to crawl from Sol to the nearest system with life-bearing worlds.  The consortium of libertarians who’d built the ship had declared their intention to leave Earth and her many governments behind altogether ... mere years before the first tramline had been discovered.  And at that point, they’d abandoned their planned starship and moved en masse to one of the newly discovered systems.  Message Bearer had been left, utterly abandoned, until the war, where her current owners had hastily readied her for departure.  There were systems that were free of tramlines, after all, systems where some remnant of the human race could survive.  

But we survived the war, he thought.  And yet they’re launching the mission anyway.

He pushed the thought aside, then turned his attention to the next set of reports from various intelligence departments.  The Indians, Turks and Brazilians were all showing interest in the worlds near Pegasus - and Cromwell.  They would have to be crazy to risk challenging the pre-war Royal Navy, but post-war he knew the odds were a great deal more even.  Besides, the newer powers had learned from the war ... and the mistakes made by the older spacefaring powers.  And they could build a modern fleet without worrying about hulls that had been modern only twenty years ago.

And they’re signed up to the Solar Treaty, he reminded himself.  They could send more of their fleet out of the Sol System than we could countenance.

“Captain,” Lieutenant Forbes said.  “The Admiralty has acknowledged our message and sends us its best wishes.  They’ve also included an encrypted packet for you.”

“Good,” John said.  “Transfer it to my console, then dump it into the secure data store.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Forbes said.

John pressed his hand against the scanner, allowing it to read the implant buried in his palm and check it against the secure database.  Moments later, the message decompressed itself and demanded a second security check.  John snorted, inwardly, at the cloak and dagger precautions, but complied without argument.  Every year, it seemed the intelligence officers came up with a new and unbreakable code ... and, every following year, enemy intelligence services succeeded in breaking it.  There were times when John felt it would make more sense to agree that everyone would send messages in the clear, but he knew it would never happen.  Even a delay of a few short days between receiving the message and cracking it through brute force decryption could mean the difference between victory or defeat.

And we assume the Tadpoles are still watching us, he reminded himself tartly.  We might go back to war with them one day - and this time, we won’t have Ark Royal.

The message unfolded itself in front of him, divided into three sections.  One was a précis on known human activity in the region - the diplomats would have to come up with a name for the entire region, John thought - while the second was a warning that two starships had been reported lost by their insurers.  Both were old, dating from the early days of tramline exploration, which suggested there was nothing particularly sinister about their disappearance, but the Admiralty would prefer to know what, if anything, had happened to them.  They weren't British ships, John noted, yet that hardly mattered.  Spacers in distress were spacers in distress, regardless of their nationality.  

But the search would be futile, John suspected.  Space was incomprehensibly vast.  A powered-down starship was almost completely invisible, unless it happened to drift close to a planet or another starship using active sensors.  By now, months had passed before the owners had requested the insurance companies pay up - and the companies, unsurprisingly, were dragging their heels about payment.  After all, it could be part of a scam ...

He shrugged, then moved to the third section - and froze.  It was written permission to relieve Commander Watson of duty, if he felt it necessary, and promote either Howard or Richards to take her place.  John wasn't blind to the politics behind the appointment - or the political risk the First Space Lord had taken by sending him the message.  Commander Watson herself might not complain if she was relieved of duty - John suspected she wasn't keen on the position - but her patrons definitely would.  There would be hard questions to be answered when they returned, with Richards or Howard inspected closely for signs of undue influence over their commander.  It might well ensure they never saw another promotion for the rest of their careers.

Damn it, he thought, darkly.

“Captain,” Armstrong said, suddenly.  “We are approaching the tramline.”

“Signal the squadron,” John ordered.  “We will proceed through the tramline in the order discussed.”

He looked up at the holographic display, noting the green line that marked the location of the tramline.  There was nothing to see, at least not with the naked eye; it took finely-tuned gravimetric sensors to pick out the corridor of gravity linking one star to another.  Some reports suggested there were greater quantities of space dust within the tramline, as if the gravity field was slowly drawing tiny particles into its grip, but it didn't seem to be a consistent pattern.  But then, there was a great deal about the tramlines that no one, human or Tadpole, truly understood.

A shame we can't establish battlestations along the tramline, he thought, as Warspite moved closer to the tramline.  But the enemy could jump out anywhere and leave the defenders to wither on the vine.

“The squadron has responded, sir,” Forbes said.  “They’re standing by.”

John sucked in a breath.  “Then take us through the tramline,” he ordered.

“Aye, sir,” Armstrong said.  “Reducing speed.  Transit in ten seconds ... nine ...”

John braced himself as the countdown reached zero.  Only a desperate fool would try to jump through the tramline at high speed, knowing it would have half of his crew throwing up on the deck.  A faint shudder ran through the ship, followed by sensation of indescribable wrongness, then the display snapped out of existence and hastily rebooted itself, sucking in data from the Terra Nova system.  It wasn't anything like Earth.

“Transit complete, sir,” Armstrong reported.

“The Puller Drive was poorly tuned,” Commander Watson said.  “Unfortunately, we could not calibrate properly without making a jump,”

“Then I suggest you recalibrate the drive now,” John said, harshly.  He hadn't thrown up, but his head hurt.  Was it a problem caused by poor calibration, he wondered, or the attempt to merge human and alien technology into a single unit.  Did the Tadpoles suffer from jumping through tramlines?  No one actually knew.  “Did we make it through without serious problems?”

“Yes, sir,” Commander Watson said.  “Our drives and other systems are undamaged.”

“Then set course for Tramline Seven,” John ordered.  “The sooner we are out of this system, the better.”

“Aye, sir,” Armstrong said.  

John rubbed the side of his head, feeling the pain slowly fading into a dull throbbing that didn't seem disposed to disappear anytime soon.  He was tempted to reach for a painkiller, but he knew he didn't dare use any kind of drug in front of the crew.  Instead, he watched as the reports came in from all over the ship.  Headaches, it seemed, were very common.  It had to be a problem with the drive.

And we need to fix it, he told himself, firmly.  Because if we’re going to fight, we can't afford to be distracted.

Chapter Nine

“They say we’re going to be fighting there, one day,” Sergeant Peerce said.  “What do you make of that?”

Percy winced, inwardly.  “Not much,” he said.  “Terra Nova is a mess.”

He rubbed the side of his head, cursing the Puller Drive under his breath.  A third of the Marines had reported headaches, while - from what he’d heard - nearly half the ship’s crew had had the same problem.  There was nothing to separate the affected Marines from the unaffected Marines, as far as he could tell.  It didn't seem to matter if they’d spent years in space or if this was their first deployment; the headaches seemed totally random.  And he had one himself.

“How true,” Peerce agreed.  “I hear tell that the shore-leave facilities on the planet are nothing more than armed fortresses, with hardly any locals permitted to enter.”

He shrugged.  “But if you had to intervene,” he added, “how would you go about it?”

Percy gritted his teeth and tried to think.  Peerce seemed to like tossing questions at him, forcing Percy to consider everything from an enemy boarding party to a crash-landing on a hostile planet.  He’d done his best to answer, but he couldn't help feeling as though he’d let the older man down more than once.  Peerce had a long enough career to deserve respect, even if he had stayed a Sergeant for longer than Percy cared to contemplate.  The Royal Marines had found a round peg for a round hole and had no intention of sending Peerce anywhere else.

“I would try to separate the warring factions,” he said, finally.  His experience on Earth had showed that the only way to end factional warfare was to separate the two sides, but the political will to intervene so boldly had been lacking ever since the Troubles - and the move into space.  “But I would need much more manpower.”

“True,” Peerce said.  “The entire complement on this ship would vanish without trace on Terra Nova.  And if you were forced to intervene with the forces at your disposal?”

Percy considered it, slowly.  “Assassinate the leaders,” he said, knowing it was an unsatisfactory answer.  It seemed good enough - brilliant, even - until one considered the dangers involved in killing the only people who could surrender.  Killing their foot soldiers was much less kind - he’d seen enough armies in the Third World to know that most of their manpower was composed of hapless conscripts - but there was little choice.  “Kill the ones who refuse to make peace until their replacements start giving peace a chance.”

“But that might cause more problems,” Peerce pointed out.  “Their factions might fragment.”

“I know, Sergeant,” Percy said.  “But what else could I do?”

Peerce gave him a long look.  “You could go back to your superiors and point out that the task is impossible with the resources they dedicated to it,” he said.  “Most of Britain’s greatest military disasters resulted from the resources being utterly insufficient for the job at hand.”

He shrugged.  “Sometimes, courage is more than just charging the enemy strongpoint, rifle in hand,” he added.  “Sometimes, courage is telling your superiors that the job is impossible.”

“I see,” Percy mused.  “But ...”

He broke off as his wristcom bleeped an alert.  “Time to go back to drilling?”

Peerce smirked.  “So it would seem, Corporal,” he said.  “Just remember: these drills might save your life one day.”

***
“So,” John said.  They sat together in his office, drinking tea.  “What happened?”

Commander Watson and Johnston exchanged glances.  “Basically, sir,” Commander Watson said, finally, “the harmonics produced by the modified drive created interference patterns that disrupted ...”

John held up a hand.  “English, please,” he said.

Johnston cleared his throat.  “We didn't tune the modified drive properly, because the simulations didn't account for rogue gravity fluxes within the tramline,” he said.  “The jump was thus rather less gentle than we had assumed.”

“And I assume it will get worse if we have to jump at high speed,” John snapped.  “Half the crew had headaches for hours after the jump.  The doctor is already warning me that our supply of painkillers has been severely depleted.  Already!  Can we fix this problem or should we resign ourselves to no longer being combat-capable when we jump?”

He scowled at them both.  The whole problem was outrageous.  There were times, true, when a fleet would jump through the tramline and then take hours before it engaged the enemy, but there were other times when combat would start almost immediately.  The thought of having to fight with half his crew effectively incapacitated was horrific.

“I believe we can make use of the readings we took during the jump to retune the drive,” Commander Watson said, finally.  She hadn't had a headache.  “However, I am unable to determine why so many crewmen suffered an adverse physical reaction.”

“There is no defining factor, as far as I can tell,” Richards said.  “Experienced crew got headaches; inexperienced crew got headaches.  Men got headaches; women got headaches.  Old officers got headaches; young crew got headaches.  There is a slight preponderance of men affected by the jump, but that could easily be a reflection of the crew’s makeup.  Men outnumber the women two to one.”

“This isn't the first time humans have used a modified drive,” John mused.  “Did Ark Royal ever encounter the same problem?”

“If she did, it was never listed in the logs,” Commander Watson said.  She sounded intensely disapproving.  “Chief Engineer Anderson was in charge of supervising the refit, Captain, but his log entries left something to be desired.  I believe he would have been penalised for insufficient data if Ark Royal hadn't been unique.”

“I don’t think that either Admiral Smith or Admiral Fitzwilliam would have left such a detail out of their logs,” John mused.  He took a sip of tea, thoughtfully.  “And the ship’s doctor would definitely have recorded such an incident, wouldn't she?”

“Yes, sir,” Johnston said.  “There would have been multiple reports of people suffering from using the drive.  I do not believe that such reports were ever made.”

Richards leaned forward.  “So,” he said.  “What’s different about our drive?”

Commander Watson coloured, slightly.  “Previous attempts to use alien technology effectively consisted of bolting the alien tech to the hull and praying for the best,” she said, tartly.  “There was no time to refit multiple carriers and frigates with modified drive systems, given there was a war on.  Our drive, however, represents the first attempt to marry human and alien technology within a hull.  Clearly, our models were insufficient to predict issues caused by the marriage.”

“The Tadpoles might have used the same kind of technology as ourselves,” Johnston added, “but they had some different ideas about how the universe worked.”

“Stuff and nonsense,” Commander Watson snapped.  “The laws of science are identical, wherever one goes.  Maybe the aliens can do something that looks inexplicable, but we will understand it, one day.  There’s no such thing as different laws of science for different races.”

She glared down at the deck.  “Imagine this ship being tossed back in time to the early days of space flight,” she said.  “Imagine Yuri Gagarin coming face to face with Warspite, or a carrier like Illustrious.  He’d think the ship did the impossible, but it is merely an application of technology.  It would take years, perhaps, for the humans of that era to come to grips with our technology, but they could do it.”

“They would have to reinvent a great many technologies,” Johnston mused.  “Even our standard reaction drives would be several steps ahead of them.”

“It could be done,” Commander Watson insisted.  “Knowing that something is possible is half the battle.”

John cleared his throat, loudly.  “As fascinating as this debate is,” he said, “we are getting away from the point.  Can the drive be modified to prevent future headaches?”

“Yes,” Commander Watson said.  “I have recalibrated the systems personally.  Once we upload the refitted drive matrix, we should have a smoother transit through the known tramlines.  However ...”

John felt his blood run cold.  “However?”

“The early days of tramline exploration concentrated on lines of gravimetric flux we knew were solid,” Commander Watson said.  “In many ways, there was no need to chart the subtle gravity fluxes that made up the majority of the tramline.  Our drives effectively made their way through using brute force.  Now, however, we are more dependent on monitoring the tiny gravity fluxes, because they can cause problems for us.”

“We’ve used Tramline One for over a hundred years,” Richards said, doubtfully.  “I don’t think we ever had such problems before.”

“We didn't have the modified drive system either,” Commander Watson said.  “I suspect we may have problems every time we try to use an unexplored tramline.”

John winced.  “Can we solve this problem?”

“I believe we can reconfigure the drive as we approach the tramline,” Commander Watson said.  “But we would have to do that in something of a hurry.”

“I see,” John said.  “Make the calibrations, then write up a full report for transmission to the naval station in this system.  They can take the message home if we don’t return.”

Commander Watson leaned forward.  “Shouldn't we take the message back ourselves?”

John frowned, considering the thought.  It would take a brave or foolhardy commanding officer to take it upon himself to rewrite orders from the Admiralty, particularly given the urgency of their mission.  But Commander Watson had a point.  Transmitting the message to the naval base near Terra Nova ran the risk of having the message intercepted, then decrypted by other human powers.  They’d get a leg-up on their own advanced drive programs.  

But it was a risk they needed to take.  “We’ll transmit the message,” he said, firmly.  “Inform me when you have the messages prepared.”

Commander Watson nodded, drank the rest of her tea and rose.  “Thank you,” she said.  “I will start right away.”

“With your permission, sir, I will go with her,” Johnston said.  “I need to monitor every last aspect of the drive recalibration.”

“Make it so,” John said.

“I think he likes her, sir,” Richards said, once the hatch had hissed closed behind him.  “They do spend a lot of time together.”

John groaned.  Whatever was tolerated on Hamilton - and he knew shipyard crews had plenty of leeway for getting into trouble, just like starfighter pilots - he knew he couldn't tolerate such a relationship on his ship.  Commander Watson was Johnston’s direct superior; if they developed a relationship, it would result in a court martial.  They’d be lucky to keep from being busted down to midshipmen when the board was finished with them.  But Commander Watson was deemed important ... perhaps the board would choose to overlook the affair, which would be bad for discipline ...

Or maybe I’m making a fuss about nothing, he thought.

“Let me know if they seem to be doing more than meeting minds,” he said, instead.  “But close relationships between engineers aren't exactly uncommon, even if they’re rarely sexual.”

“Of course, sir,” Richards said.

John nodded.  “And the crew?”

“A little stunned by the headaches, sir, but recovering nicely,” Richards said.  He’d already started to form ties with the crew, something John couldn't do and Commander Watson wouldn't do.  In some ways, a posturing blowhard would be preferable.  “Some muttering about the shortage of shore leave, but given what happened to the last crewmen who went for shore leave on Terra Nova, the muttering was very muted.”

“Good,” John said.  People who wandered outside the secure zones on Terra Nova tended to come to short and gristly ends.  “We will certainly try to organise something when we call in at a colony world.”

“If we do,” Richards agreed.  “I don’t think anyone would want shore leave on Clarke III.  At best, it’s another Titan.”

“And Titan helped power us to the stars,” John said.  “Clarke III may do the same for the entire sector.”

He smiled at the memory of lessons he’d absorbed as a young man.  Titan had been the objective of Britain’s first large interplanetary mission, one that had ensured that the British Space Program would remain prominent for decades to come.  Water from Titan had helped the terraforming of Mars, as well as providing fuel and support to spacecraft heading out into the further reaches of the Solar System.  Maybe Britain had made a smaller contribution to Mars than the Americans, Russians, Chinese or Japanese, but it didn't matter.  Britain had controlled a major source of resources that had boosted the space program to the stars.

“Let us hope so, sir,” Richards agreed.  “With your permission, Captain, I will resume my rounds.”

John nodded, then turned his attention to the latest set of reports as Richards left the cabin and Midshipwoman Powell cleared up the cups and saucers.  The situation on Terra Nova hadn't improved in the weeks since he’d last looked at the Naval Update; the locals were still killing each other in job lots, hundreds of experienced personnel were fleeing to space and outside powers were still colonising the outer edge of the system, despite protests from Terra Nova’s various factions.  Brazil and India had even opened naval bases of their own, running regular patrols though the system.  John had a suspicion that the Indians, at least, weren't just posturing.  There was a sizable population of Indian settlers on the planet’s surface.

It was nearly four hours before he was called to the bridge, where the XO was waiting for him.  “The message is ready, sir,” she said, holding out a datapad.  “I have described the problem and my method of solving it in great detail.”

John took the datapad and studied it, carefully.  Technobabble had always irritated him - it had always seemed a way for engineers and computer programmers to put one over their superiors, who didn't have the slightest idea what they were talking about - but Commander Watson had thoughtfully included a summery at the beginning.  He approved it for transmission, added a short note of his own for the First Space Lord, then uploaded the entire message to the communications console.

“Encrypt the message using Level Forty-Two protocols, then send it via laser to the naval station,” he ordered.  “Repeat the message twice, then inform them we require an acknowledgement.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Forbes said.  

John nodded, then sat back in his command chair and studied the tactical display.  The squadron had dog-legged around the inhabited parts of the system, although it was clear that a handful of new asteroid settlements had sprung into existence since the last time the Royal Navy had tried to perform a census of the system.  Most of them were tiny, perhaps manned by a single family; others looked large enough to hold a few hundred engineers.  It was like the early days of space exploitation, he considered, only worse.  Terra Nova wasn’t the safest place to live and raise a family.

His eyes narrowed as he saw the number of patrolling starships in the system.  None of them belonged to Terra Nova itself, unsurprisingly; they belonged to various human spacefaring powers, apart from one ship making its way to Tramline Five.  The Tadpole starship was clearly visible on the display, not even trying to hide.  They’d sent another mission to Earth, John recalled; perhaps the ship making its way back home was their transport.  And probably doing some spying at the same time.  Officially, John knew, human starships visiting alien space didn't spy on the aliens.  He would have been very surprised, he told himself, if anyone actually believed it.  Spying on one’s former enemy was a very good idea.

After all, the war could break out again, he thought.  And we have to be ready.

It was a haunting thought.  The squadron could travel to Pegasus, putting itself out of contact for several months ... during which time the war could start again, with him and his men completely unknowing until they returned to more settled worlds.  And then ... he shook his head at the thought.  No matter the modifications to her design, Warspite was not intended to cruise indefinitely.  She would rapidly decay into uselessness without access to spare parts and a shipyard.

A carrier might be able to either escape or launch a final vengeful attack on the alien homeworld, he thought.  But we might not be able to make it.

“Captain,” Forbes said.  “We have received an acknowledgement from the naval station.”

“Excellent,” John said.  He turned to face Armstrong.  “Take us through the tramline as soon as we reach it.”

“Aye, sir,” Armstrong said.  “Transit in ten minutes.”

John nodded, then keyed his console.  “Now hear this,” he said, his voice echoing through the ship.  “Transit in ten minutes.  I say again, transit in ten minutes.”

“Everyone is going to be nervous, sir,” Richards muttered, too quietly for anyone but John to hear.  “It may take a few safer jumps before the tension wears off.”

“It isn't as if we’re jumping right into the unknown,” John muttered back.  He’d considered survey work, when it had become clear he no longer wanted to be a pilot.  “But we might as well be, with the new drive.”

He forced himself to relax as the countdown reached zero.  No matter how nervous he felt, he couldn't show it, not to the crew.  A panicking commander would almost certainly cause the crew to panic too.  Rumour had it that a couple of Russian commanders at New Russia had panicked, when the Multinational Fleet was cut to ribbons.  They’d been practically unable to mount any kind of defence when the aliens moved in on their planet.

And they could have wiped out most of the Russian population from orbit, if they’d seen fit, John thought.  If they’d been bent on slaughter ...

“Jump in ten seconds,” Armstrong announced.  “Ten ... nine ... eight ...”

The entire ship shook, violently.  And then the bridge was plunged into darkness.