Lacuna: Demons of the Void Read online

  “Awesome,” whispered Summer, enthralled.

  Liao translated. “Saara was just asking why the animosity exists between those two nations.” She turned to the Toralii woman. “Well, it’s a conflict going back almost a hundred years without a real resolution in sight. The two nations have been to war several times-”

  “-which started with Israel responding to Arabic aggression...” Alex opined, drawing a dark frown from Doctor Saeed.

  “... who themselves were responding to the forced seizure and colonization of their lands,” countered Saeed, the Iranian man leaning forward in his chair. “And the creation of an artificial state in already settled territory backed by the combined might of the world’s superpowers... superpowers who simply displaced those already living there-”

  “-living in territory promised to the Jewish people, as their sovereign territory, by God himself! Israel is a sovereign nation and it has a right to exist!”

  Saeed’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “Well, when God’s handing out the real estate contracts, who are we mortals to quarrel with His dictions?”

  Alex looked to be about to continue, but Liao held up her hands for calm.

  “Enough.”

  She gave each of the two men a long, determined stare. “I know there’s a lot of animosity between your two peoples, but right now, we are all human beings in this crisis...” a nod to Saara, “...more or less... So I want you two to put aside your differences and behave yourselves while you serve on this ship. I know it’s not enough to say that you’ll simply abandon nigh-on a century of anger, but for the moment, I need you two working together against a common enemy, not squabbling amongst yourselves.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  “Good.”

  Liao stepped back again, giving James a nod and letting him speak once more.

  “Now... to the other part of the Sydney’s treat. At 0500 tomorrow we’re equipping all of the three Pillars of the Earth with close-range auto-cannons for point defence. The Sydney had her chassis modifications this morning and she’s looking sexy in her new skirt. Taskforce command was concerned that, during the Battle of Jupiter, if the Toralii strike craft had gotten close to the ship, we wouldn’t have had any means of hitting them aside from nuking ourselves... The auto-cannons are designed to counteract this deficiency. Originally we weren’t anticipating strike craft, but now that we know the Toralii use them, we’ll adjust our tactics accordingly.”

  “Yeah, we were totally ‘point defenceless’ before, huh,” offered Summer, laughing at her own joke. Nobody else except Alex laughed.

  When the two person ‘mirth’ had died down, Liao gestured again to the screen.

  “So, we have new weapons, new tactics, new crew members... and we have a goal. The Forerunner in our system could be hiding anywhere, but there are only so many Lagrangian points in the system, so we’ll find it eventually. But, of course, it’s not just a matter of finding the ship. We know that the Forerunners will simply jump to another point if threatened. Obviously, our ships can only be in one place at a time, so the plan is this.”

  She pointed to the Martian L1 Lagrangian point, the space between Mars and the Sun. “Tomorrow the Tehran, the Beijing and the Sydney will take up position here. All three ships will be within weapons range of the Lagrangian point, but none so close that their mass would interfere with a potential jump-in… a few thousand kilometres or so. All the crews will be sitting at general quarters for some time, so make sure you all get a good night’s rest beforehand.”

  James motioned with the laser pointer, drawing green trails out from Mars to each of the planets in the solar system.

  “All three ships will use their railguns to fire nukes at each of the Lagrangian points in the solar system. Given the distances between those points, some nukes will be travelling faster than others; the idea is to time their arrival so that all nukes arrive roughly together... within a minute or two, give or take. The whole process will take about three days for the first nukes, travelling at one-tenth the speed of light, to reach the Neptunian Lagrange points.”

  James paused a moment to let the information sink in then continued. “For the empty jump points, the shock wave, heat, radiation, and EM disturbance should prevent a jump-in at that location for a few hours; if the Forerunner IS there, we anticipate it’ll jump away long before the nuke hits.”

  Alex spoke up. “...So, I’m guessing the plan is to force the Forerunner to jump to another point, right as that point – no matter what point that is – is about to be nuked. So that no matter where it goes, we kill it after it jumps.”

  Summer raised her hand, looking to James. “Sorry Captain, but that sounds pretty risky. The mathematics of hitting every Lagrangian point in the whole solar system is fairly simple and we can be precise about that, but what’s to say that the Forerunner can’t detect that there’s no safe point in the system and jump away to another system? I’m guessing you want to force the Forerunner into the sole un-nuked jump point, so we can capture it... but what’s to stop it simply jumping away to another system and returning with a whole Toralii fleet?”

  Liao gave a wide, savage grin that surprised the red-headed woman. “Actually, that’s plan B and, in a strange way, we’re counting on it.”

  There was a moment of stunned silence.

  “Hang on, just a few months ago you were fucking spazzing out because one of their scout ships nearly got away – and now you want to deliberately lure their whole fleet to you?”

  Liao folded her arms in front of her, giving a firm nod.

  “That’s correct. If it comes to that, we’ll make our stand at Mars. Because of the nuke strike, we’ll have disabled all the jump points in the system for a time... enough to effectively make a choke point to get into the system. This choke point will be our kill zone. We’ll have all three ships, along with our strike fighters, to blast anything that comes through that point straight to hell. There’s even talk of establishing terrestrial missile batteries on the surface of Mars and its moons to help out.”

  Rowe tilted her head to one side. “The report Saara wrote says that the Toralii have ‘huge fleets’. That sounds... well, bad for us. What if they keep coming?”

  “Then we keep shooting,” offered James. “Although if we begin to get overwhelmed, we nuke the points to temporarily prevent reinforcements from coming in. Fleet command doesn’t anticipate more than one ship coming through at once, so our control over the flow of battle will be very good. Additionally the ships that jump through have no way of warning the ships that have yet to come through. So if we start to get overwhelmed, we nuke the point and finish off what’s left.”

  “Okay, okay... um.”

  Summer held up her hand, taking a moment to compose her thoughts, then continued.

  “...So we’re going to nuke the hell out of the points, that’s fine... fairly sure it’ll work, but that seems like a temporary solution; what happens when the radiation dissipates, mmm? How long’s that going to take? A couple of days, tops? Then the Toralii will have any number of jump points to come in through and we’ll be utterly fucked. Seems like we’re just delaying the inevitable...”

  Saara spoke again and Liao translated.

  “Saara reminds us that the Toralii will be expecting a no-contest victory. A pronounced defeat will send them reeling and they will be far more cautious in the future. Their navies are powerful, but they as a society are still quite fractured despite their proclaimed unity.”

  Liao gave a low chuckle. “That, and they haven’t been beaten in a while. If we bloody their noses there’s a good chance that they’ll want to send in another Forerunner before committing more warships to the fight... once they see that we’re kicking back there’s a good chance they might back off entirely. Still, even if they don’t, we have an ace up our sleeves.”

  Summer tossed her hair. “Right, right.” She gestured down at her handout. “I’m guessing that is this part he
re, that says something about gravity mines?”

  Liao pointed directly to Summer. “That’s right. One more thing I’m going to throw on your plate. In order to secure a long-term lockdown of this whole system, we’re going to lay mines in each and every point we think they can use. The mines will take the form of modified Reactionless drives designed to mess up the jump points when they’re active, by emitting a randomly fluctuating gravimetric pulse. Then we’ll have full control over this whole system. If someone wants to jump in, they’d have to do it through a point we control or spend decades cruising in from deep space. If they do that, we’ll have plenty of warning due to our long range optical telescopes.”

  Summer nodded her head thoughtfully and didn’t have an answer right away. James clicked off the laser pointer and handed it back to Liao who tucked it in her pocket, took a breath, and addressed the assembled staff.

  “Now, tasks. We have a lot to do before we move on the Forerunner so we all need to be putting in long days until we’re good to go. Major Aharoni, I want you to coordinate with Lieutenant Jiang to work out how to best integrate our strike craft into our tactical environment. Organize drills and training; I want the whole strike wing functioning at top efficiency when this party picks up.”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  “Very good. Summer, I want you continuing to work with the Engineering teams and see what useful intelligence or – in particular – hardware we can get out of the wreckage we have on board. I want you to work with Saara on this; have Lieutenant Yu work with you and translate.”

  “Sure.”

  Saara gave her acknowledgement.

  Liao gave a nod to Lieutenant Dao and the rest of the Operations room crews for the Tehran and the Sydney. “Have the navigation teams plot out courses for the nukes and for all three ships. Double and triple check everything; we have to get this right the first time. The ship’s computer cores should be able to provide sufficient processing power for any simulation you need. Work with Summer to make sure you’ve got it right, but don’t take away from her work on the Toralii wreckage.”

  Summer snorted with laughter. “A Commodore 64 was enough to put man on the moon, Captain. The hundreds of gigahertz of processing power we have here will be more than enough.”

  Liao let the slightest grin play on her lips. “Good... Then I expect no mistakes.”

  She indicated to Warrant Officer Cheung, whom she had appointed to be head of the ship’s marines since the incident with Sheng and the mutiny.

  “Warrant Officer, I want you to run daily drills: counter-insurgency and boarding actions. According to Saara the Toralii quite favour boarding enemy ships and destroying them from the inside out – I want double guards on our power plants and missile tubes. On the day, if there are any intruders, I want you to be quick and brutal; trap them behind bulkheads if they’re deep in the ship’s belly or activate the fire-suppression protocols and vent them straight to space if they’re near the outer hull. Fire fights are a last resort.”

  “Aye aye, Captain.”

  More tasks were given out and every section of the crew had something to do. There was a moment of silence as Liao let everyone digest their orders.

  “If there are no more questions, then we’re dismissed.”

  Liao watched as the combined senior staff of the Beijing and the Tehran got up and filed out of the room, leaving her alone. She spent some time in the empty room, mentally revising the plan over and over in her head, trying to work out any complications or problems with it.

  It wasn’t a perfect plan, but it was better than doing nothing. It was better than cowering forever, living as a nail constantly waiting for a hammer. The Toralii had wisdom of a sort, but the very nature of man required them to investigate everything – every opportunity, every threat – and to confront it. It was just a fundamental urge; a base, primal drive found in all humans.

  Liao’s mind turned back to the very first humans in Africa and how those primitive people had fought their way out of the continent, tamed the land, encountered, fought and overcame innumerable dangers, including struggling through a devastating ice age – surviving as humans always seemed to do despite their fragile bodies – going on to further harness their environment, to produce crops and food to sustain themselves, to develop agriculture.

  Agriculture had changed humans more than almost any other invention; it allowed some to cater for the many, so that the remainder could devote their time to specialization and develop skills such as tailoring and blacksmithing that improved the group’s overall chance of survival, their comfort and their technology. From there grew other more cerebral pursuits which served to sharpen the society’s intellect: philosophy, science, art, and music. Armed with their intelligence, Humans had taken control of their entire planet, Earth, and were now her uncontested leaders.

  Earth. The cradle of humanity... the birthplace of the entire species. Without it, they were nothing. Liao pulled out a notepad and scribbled a small message in the corner.

  We must succeed.

  She slashed three lines underneath the sentence for emphasis.

  Chapter IX

  “Old Wars with Young Soldiers”

  *****

  Captain Liao’s Quarters

  TFR Beijing

  Orbit of Earth

  Two weeks later

  “Oooooooh, that’s gooOOOoood...”

  Liao purred like a kitten as James expertly stroked and kneaded her back, working out the tension, allowing her to practically melt into the thick comforting blankets of her bed.

  Captain James Grégoire had many talents, it seemed, and naked post-sex back rubs were another thing Liao could add to the list. They’d spent every night they could in bed together. And although their respective captaincies often had them sleeping apart, the crews of both vessels had been quick to notice the “combined briefings” that went from the exception to the norm at a suspiciously fast pace.

  “You’re unusually tense tonight,” he remarked, working at her lower back, causing the naked Chinese woman to wiggle around in pleasure, his dark hands working her tanned skin firmly and expertly.

  “Mmm... yeah, Summer nearly caused me to blow my stack today. She was curious about the plasma pistol they found on Saara’s vessel... Saara was trying to show her how to use it safely and Summer was impatient; she accidentally grabbed what must have been the trigger mechanism and damn near blew Saara’s head off. Melted another hole in a bulkhead, which had to be replaced, but – ooohmmm...”

  James worked his hands lower, taking the cheeks of her rump into his palms, giving a firm, lingering squeeze.

  “Is she okay?”

  Liao gave her hips a cheeky wiggle for James’s benefit. “Oh, she’ll be just fine, more’s the pity. I chewed her out pretty badly, but I’m not sure how much will stick. She looked bored more than anything... Ugh, nothing I say gets through to that girl.”

  James worked his way down the insides of her legs, her skin still warm and slick with sweat from their recent coitus, chuckling as Liao obligingly parting her thighs slightly to give him better access. “I actually meant Saara.”

  Liao murmured something gently, her eyes closed as she enjoyed the tender affections. “Oh, she’s fine. Lost a little fur but she’s – oooh! – quite fine.”

  “Hmm! A moan like that suggests I haven’t done my job properly...” A stray digit wandered up her thighs, gently nudging up between her legs, beginning to explore.

  Melissa reached around with her hand, giving James’s arm a playful swat. “Heeey! Again so soon? My my my... What are you, sixteen again and horny as a dog?”

  James casually slid himself over her prone body and Liao arched her back slightly, teasingly, pressing her rump to his groin. The man began kissing at the side of her neck, his sable-skinned body pressing tightly to hers. “I feel sixteen again, at least when I’m with you,” he clarified, giving her ear a playful nibble. “...And I thought I w
as the only one who could ‘blow your stack’...”

  Melissa gave a soft moan as he entered her again, her small hands gripping the bed sheets tighter. “That’s a different kind of- nnnf! Mmmm!”

  *****

  Corridor Twenty Two, near Power Plant One

  TFR Beijing

  Orbit of Earth

  The next morning

  Melissa checked off items from her checklist, taking a full tour of the ship as the crew went about their daily tasks. A full inspection of the ship’s power plants occupied her attention for a time, although her mind wandered as she spoke to the engineers in charge of the reactor.

  Liao had not had much luck with men in her life. Part of that problem was the fallout of the One-Child Policy leaving far too many men and far too few eligible women to go around. She had been courted by rich businessmen’s sons, singers, artists, ordinary men... Some had taken her fancy and she had lost her virginity early, but she ended up losing patience with all of them. She was looking for something a little more than physical intimacy, but a little less than total commitment. It was an awkward grey area that she could never quite put into words, no matter how hard she tried. Melissa had slept with many men in her life, but she had never met anyone quite like James. James... was different. He seemed to be able to ride that balance, to find that little place that she was looking for - a feat none of her other lovers had managed. He was not only skilled – and endowed – but he genuinely cared about her own pleasure too... he was a giving, passionate lover and-

  “...Captain?”

  A young Senior Lieutenant, an engineer new to the ship’s crew, stared at her curiously. The engineer had been talked to her for some time now; Liao realized she had been absently playing with the tip of her slowly growing hair and hadn’t been paying attention to a word the crewman had been saying.