The Lion and the Unicorn Read online

  “Which isn’t really possible for the tactical staff,” Donker put in. “The best we’ve been able to do is pit ourselves against Unicorn’s tactical staff, or run tracking and targeting exercises on the gunboats, but neither are particularly useful past a certain point. They’re just too different from us.”

  “You’d think we could arrange a simulated exercise with another ship and crew,” Thomas said, tiredly. “There has to be someone who’ll play with us.”

  “The other ships in the yard aren’t ready to carry out tactical exercises with anyone,” Donker said. “Half of them don’t even have tactical crews, not yet.”

  “Perhaps we can set up a direct link to the tactical staff on Nelson Base or Luna,” Thomas said. “It won’t be perfect, but we can work with it.”

  He took a sip of his coffee. The simulations served a purpose, but they tended to become predictable after a while. The computer-generated enemies simply didn’t have the spontaneity of human opponents. It was easy enough to scale up the enemy rate of fire, or their acceleration curves, or everything else to make the training as hard as possible, but a great deal harder to account for the unpredictability of combat. An intelligent opponent might do something crazy, or something that seemed crazy. It was impossible to be sure what’d look reasonable to someone on the other side of the battlefield.

  “Yes, sir,” Donker said. “I’ll try to arrange it, but right now I think we should be scaling back on the exercises. We’re starting to pick up bad habits.”

  “Perhaps it’s time to bring back pain suits,” Major Craig joked. “If they get hurt for each and every mistake, sir, they’d be less likely to repeat them.”

  “The idea is to learn from their mistakes,” Donker pointed out. “They have to be willing to discuss them openly, if any learning is to be done.”

  Thomas shrugged. “We’re learning as we go along,” he said. He’d already written several reports based on his observations, suggesting everything from slight changes to the starship’s design to prospective tactical doctrines for her deployment. “What about the gunboat crews?”

  “We’ve been treating them as starfighter pilots,” Donker said. “That might have been a mistake. Given the way they were recruited … well, they have less polish, even now, than a cadet who’s had a week or two of training. They’re pretty damned sloppy, sir; they barely know how to salute, let alone how to take care of themselves in space. And there are limits to how far we can correct them.”

  “Ouch,” Thomas said. Civilians got a great deal of leeway, if only because they simply didn’t understand their environment, but the gunboat pilots were military personnel. In theory. He wasn’t entirely convinced he liked the idea of recruiting expendable pilots, but … he shook his head. The pilots knew the risks. “How are their piloting skills?”

  “Good, in simulators,” Donker said. “To be fair, they did have one engagement four months ago. They performed well. But they caught the enemy by surprise. Next time, it might not be so easy. We’ve run simulations where the enemy doesn’t know what’s coming and simulations where they do. In the latter, the gunboats take heavy losses for relatively little gain.”

  “We can work on their deportment later, then,” Thomas said. “God knows, we’ve been making allowances for starfighter pilots for decades.”

  “It will cause some resentment, sir,” Craig warned. “The gunboat pilots have even less seasoning than a maggot.”

  “The crew will just have to live with it,” Thomas said. “How about your department?”

  “Like everyone else, we’ve been running endless drills and exercises,” Craig said. “There have been more problems than usual, sir, as the company was thrown together at very short notice.”

  “Just like everyone else,” Donker said.

  “Yes.” Craig frowned, heavily. “We’ve been smoothing out the rough edges through drilling, and simulating every possible environment, but it will take time for the entire company to learn to trust each other. Thankfully, we all share a common understanding from basic training, yet” - he shrugged - “there are officers and bootnecks who simply don’t know each other very well. It’ll take time.”

  “Keep on it,” Thomas ordered. “And let me know if you need anything else.”

  “I’d prefer six months on Salisbury Plain, where I can operate the entire unit against an opposing force,” Craig said. “Right now, we’re playing our own enemies. It works fine, for platoons against platoons, but we can’t take the entire company into battle. We simply don’t have anyone to fight.”

  “How terrible,” Donker said, dryly.

  Thomas’s wristcom bleeped. He tapped it. “Go ahead.”

  “Captain, this is Lieutenant Cook,” a voice said. “The Admiralty just sent a formal priority-one message, your eyes only.”

  “Forward it to my terminal,” Thomas ordered. He opened the terminal and pressed his hand against the scanner. A priority-one message was almost certainly bad news. “And then signal Unicorn and inform Captain Campbell that I need to speak to him.”

  The message opened in front of him. He scanned it quickly, feeling his heart sink. “The Admiral is coming here, personally,” he said. “And we have formal movement orders. We’ll be departing in a week.”

  Donker sucked in his breath. “A week? Sir, we’re not ready.”

  “Then we have to be ready,” Thomas said. He looked from one to the other. “Make sure the department heads and everyone understands that we have to be ready. We’re going to war.”

  Chapter Nine

  “You’ve done well, Captain,” Admiral Onarina said. “Unicorn appears ready to go into battle.”

  “Indeed, Admiral,” Mitch said, feeling a flicker of pleasure. The crew had spent the last month working hard to prepare for departure, ready to leave on their own if Lion failed to meet the deadline. He wasn’t too displeased with their departure date. The crew had done well - and the newcomers had meshed smoothly with the old hands - but they wouldn’t be a single unit until they’d faced the enemy. “We’re ready to depart on your command.”

  He smiled as he sat back in his chair. They were in the mess, the largest compartment on the ship save for the bridge and the engineering section. It was awkward, to say the least, but the admiral didn’t seem to mind. It spoke well of her, Mitch thought. Unicorn was too small to have a separate mess for officers, let alone a private dining room for her commander, but he’d known captains and admirals who’d have flatly refused to eat with the men. The thought never ceased to irritate him, whenever he thought about it. He might be a captain, master of his ship, but he still went to the toilet and put his trousers on one leg at a time, just like everyone else. Anyone who tried to pretend the commander was something other than a mortal man was asking for trouble.

  “Lion is also ready, more or less,” Admiral Onarina said. She took a sip of her tea. “Can you open the conference?”

  Mitch tapped his wristcom. It felt odd to be holding a command conference in the mess, but the admiral had insisted. He wasn’t sure if she’d reasoned it would take longer to inspect Lion than Unicorn, and therefore inspected the bigger ship first, or if she was sending a subtle message to her superiors. Or if it was just something she had to do. If there was one thing he’d learnt in his career, it was that there was no point in searching for a complicated motive for anything when the answers were relatively simple.

  Captain Hammond’s hologram materialised in the centre of the compartment, bisecting a table that was solidly fixed to the deck. It looked faintly odd, but Mitch didn’t smile. A holographic conference was vastly superior to a face-to-face conference, if only because it ensured everyone would be on their ships, ready to act if the shit hit the fan. And because it imposed some distance between the participants. It was a great deal easier to respectfully disagree with one’s superior if one wasn’t on the same ship.

  “Admiral,” Captain Hammond said. If he was irked at the conference being effectively held on Unicorn, ra
ther than the much larger battlecruiser, he didn’t show it. “Captain Campbell.”

  “Welcome,” Mitch said. Captain Hammond hadn’t inspected Unicorn personally, something a hostile Board of Inquiry could turn into a dereliction of duty. Mitch had no intention of making a fuss about it. Hammond had too many problems of his own. “Admiral? The deck is yours.”

  The admiral smiled. “Not since I was promoted, alas,” she said. “I’m just a passenger on your ship.”

  Mitch felt a flicker of sympathy. Admiral Onarina had been promoted to flag rank shortly after the Second Interstellar War - the Order of the Garter was a clear sign she was destined for great things - but, as far as he could recall, she’d never actually commanded a fleet in combat. She might never command a fleet again, let alone a starship. He wondered, idly, if she regretted it. High-ranking officer or not, she was still assigned to Nelson Base instead of an independent command. It was strange to think that a captain might be more trusted than an admiral, but it was true.

  And admirals have to play the political game, he reminded himself. Captains have a degree of freedom from politics.

  Captain Hammond leaned forward. “You will be accompanying us?”

  “I’m afraid not,” the admiral said. “My services are required on Earth.”

  She took a datachip out of her pocket and inserted it into the projector. A holographic starchart appeared in front of them, a multitude of human, alien and infected star systems linked together by tramlines. Mitch’s eyes narrowed. The number of infected systems seemed to have grown larger in the last few days. The naval updates had been bland. In hindsight, they’d been almost disturbingly bland.

  “We’ve been putting together a picture of enemy movements over the last twelve months,” Admiral Onarina informed them. “The virus does not appear to be very rational or sane by our standards, unlike our alien allies, but we think there is a logic to its actions. A number of starships have been travelling through these systems” - her finger traced a line on the display, moving from star to star - “in preparation for an attack on New Washington. We think the virus intends to launch a two-pronged offensive into the system.”

  Mitch frowned. He was no stranger to bold and daring stunts, and he liked the idea of doing something so crazy the enemy literally couldn’t imagine it, but … it was the sort of idea that made perfect sense on paper and failed spectacularly when it was actually tried. Even with the flicker network, coordinating an assault across interstellar distances was almost impossible. There was a very real chance the two prongs would be unable to coordinate their attacks, giving the enemy an opportunity to destroy one assault force before turning its attention to the other. Was the enemy fleet so numerous the virus felt it could take the risk?

  “It seems odd,” Captain Hammond said. His thoughts had clearly been moving in the same direction. “Why not focus on a single prong?”

  “We think - we think - the enemy intends to harass shipping rather than targeting the orbital defences directly,” the admiral said. “Assuming they manage to take control of the outer system, they’d be able to isolate two entire sectors while opening up tramlines to five more … including a direct chain to Terra Nova and Earth. They’d also be able to rain kinetic projectiles on the planet’s defences, in the certain knowledge that - sooner or later - they’d hit something important. That would give them the chance to weaken our industrial base, perhaps even opening up the orbital nodes to infection. We’d have to retake the system, whatever the cost.”

  “Shit,” Mitch said. “How long do we have?”

  “We don’t know,” Admiral Onarina admitted. “The last probe into the occupied system told us that the virus was setting up what looks like a forward logistics base. Given how screwed up their logistics actually are, we simply don’t know how long it will take them to get ready and then mount the offensive. Our worst-case scenario is two months. Of course” - her lips twisted, as if she’d bitten into something sour - “that might not be pessimistic enough.”

  “They might attack tomorrow,” Captain Hammond noted.

  “Quite,” the admiral agreed. “They may want to hold New Washington permanently. Or they might simply want to punch their way into the system and do as much damage as possible before we drive them out again. If the former, they’ll need the logistics base to resupply their ships in a hurry; if the latter, it probably won’t matter that much. Like you said, they might attack tomorrow.”

  “So we put the virus off balance,” Mitch said. “We launch a spoiling attack first.”

  “That’s the plan,” the admiral said. “Right now, there’s no political will for launching a major offensive from New Washington. The Americans are understandably reluctant to risk drawing down their mobile units, even though the system has heavy fixed defences. GATO agrees. Lion and Unicorn, however, represent another option. Your weapons might be enough to seriously weaken the enemy fleet.”

  Captain Hammond looked stunned. “Admiral, with all due respect, we cannot wipe out an entire fleet on our own.”

  “We don’t have to.” Mitch’s mind raced, considering the possibilities. “Their fleet will include a bunch of brainships, the masterminds of the operation. We just have to take them out, forcing the remainder of their fleet to stand on the defensive until replacements arrive.”

  “Replacements could arrive tomorrow,” Captain Hammond pointed out, tartly. “And the virus doesn’t need the brainships to fight.”

  “No, but without the brainships it fights … robotically,” Mitch countered. “We’d have the edge. The Yanks would have the edge, if the virus came knocking. An easy victory would do wonders for political will.”

  “It might not be easy,” Admiral Onarina cautioned. “But yes, that’s the general idea.”

  Mitch smiled, broadly. The plan was risky, but … it wasn’t that risky. If it worked, the Royal Navy would throw the enemy onto the defensive and win the human race - and their allies - much needed time to rebuild its defences and develop new weapons and tactics. If it failed, if both Lion and Unicorn were blown out of space, the navy wouldn’t lose much. Both ships were expendable, considering what was at stake. Mitch didn’t like the thought of throwing his life away, but he understood the logic. Better to risk two experimental ships than an entire fleet.

  “So we sneak into the system, snipe at them from a safe distance and run for our lives,” he said. It wasn’t a particularly honourable plan, but the virus knew nothing of honour. It had to be destroyed, or it would be the end of everything. “And if it comes chasing us, we can lead its headless ships into the American defences.”

  “If the brainships are taken out,” Admiral Onarina said. “If not, take an alternate route as you try to break contact.”

  “We could always lure them onto a minefield,” Mitch said. “Didn’t that tactic work before?”

  “Yes, once,” Admiral Onarina said. “After that, the virus started being a little more careful.”

  “We should be able to carry out the mission,” Captain Hammond said. “The only real problem is getting the missiles through the enemy point defence. We might be effectively throwing snowballs into the fire.”

  “The missiles are designed to be hard to hit,” Mitch said. “And they’re tougher than the average missile …”

  “I wouldn’t care to bet on a missile surviving a direct hit,” Captain Hammond pointed out. There was a hint of irritation in his tone. “And it will only take one hit, if the boffins are wrong, to take out a missile.”

  “We won’t know until we actually take them into combat,” Mitch said. “Admiral, how many other ships will be assigned to the squadron?”

  “None.” Admiral Onarina looked grim. “You’ll be travelling with a convoy until you reach New Washington, then you’re on your own. We’ve been trying to scrape up some more ships from somewhere, but the blunt truth is that no one has any to spare. Everyone who has some firepower doesn’t want to let go of it.”

  “And as long as the vi
rus is pushing at us along multiple angles of advance,” Captain Hammond said, “there’s a chance that strengthening the defences in one place will weaken the defences somewhere else.”

  “Yes,” Admiral Onarina said. “There’s a handful of possibilities for improving our defences and freeing up more ships for aggressive operations, but none of them show more than a hint or two of promise. The formations assigned to Home Fleet are our only real strategic reserve and … well, there’s hardly any political will to draw them down any further. In theory, we could cut them loose and go on the offensive; practically speaking, it would be too great a risk.”

  “I understand,” Captain Hammond said. “We dare not lose the core worlds.”

  Mitch wasn’t so sure. The human navies were losing. The virus was maintaining a steady pressure on the defences, wearing them down to a nub. It was only a matter of time until something broke, until the defenders had to fall back to the homeworld and abandon all hope of taking the war to the enemy. They were desperate, perhaps desperate enough to stake everything on a gamble. If he had command of the space navies, he’d certainly consider launching an all-out assault on enemy space. It might just turn the tide.

  But he knew, all too well, what his superiors would say if he proposed it. Lightning strikes into the heart of enemy power worked perfectly in books and movies, but rarely in the real world. They’d risk heavy losses, both to the fleet and to the industrial nodes they’d be leaving undefended. They might score a tactical victory, but lose the war. His superiors would reject the idea out of hand, even though it held out the tantalising promise of total victory. They’d think they had no choice.

  We can’t stand on the defensive forever, he told himself. We have to take the fight to the enemy.