All for All (Cast Adrift, #3), page 18
We know some of them are intelligent, she told herself. Are the rest of them just organic robots, or what?
“Right now, it doesn’t matter,” she said. She’d wanted to see the scene for herself and now she had. “We can’t linger, not for more than a day or two. Do you have a meeting lined up with the local government?”
“Their ambassador,” Nancy confirmed. “They insisted he’ll be meeting us at Town Seven,”
Naomi grimaced. There’d once been several cities and hundreds of towns within the occupied zone, but the fighting had reduced most of them to rubble. They were lucky many of the locals had managed to get out, either before the enemy advance had swept over their homes or when the humans had come in to liberate them, yet an uncomfortably large number of locals had been caught in the storm and killed. The local government didn’t seem inclined to blame the humans for the deaths, thankfully, but she still felt guilty. Perhaps she could have convinced the Pashtali to surrender, if she could have found the right words, or even to sit on the sidelines and wait for the larger war to be resolved one way or the other. She knew she’d done her best and yet, she’d wonder – for the rest of her life – if there’d been a way to avert it, to save innocent lives.
No, she told herself, as a pair of shuttles flew overhead. They were determined to do as much damage as possible, to us and their unwilling hosts, in their last few hours of life.
Nancy met her eyes. “My aircar is due shortly,” she said. “I’ll see you back on the ship?”
“Please,” Naomi said. She took one final look at the nightmarish scene, promising herself she’d do everything in her power to make sure the Pashtali got the blame they so richly deserved, and then turned back to the shuttle. “Good luck.”
Olson joined her as she stepped through the hatch. The younger man looked as green as the ambassador ... Naomi felt another twinge of guilt. She wasn’t sure why she’d insisted on her assistant accompanying her. It wasn’t as if she needed his presence. If he’d needed to tell her something, he could have done it – just as easily – over the communicator. And besides, if something happened to Naomi, her successor would need Olson to ensure he caught up with everything he had to know before the shit hit the fan. Again. Naomi was careful to ensure her senior officers knew as much as possible, but any sudden change in command would bring confusion in its wake.
“Admiral,” he said. “Daffodil has returned, and reported she lost track of the alien ships.”
Naomi nodded, curtly. She hadn’t expected the scouts to be able to track the alien ships all the way to their reinforcements, although she’d allowed herself to hope they might. If she had a chance to bite off and destroy a chunk of the alien fleet, before it could be reinforced ... she shook her head, dismissing the thought. The engagement would have been chancy even if they’d had an opportunity to make it work.
“Hazel has yet to return,” Olson added. “She might have better luck.”
“We’ll depart as planned, unless she brings us very good news,” Naomi said. She took her seat and closed her eyes. The shuttle’s atmosphere tasted of dead and rotting bodies. She felt as if she should pass through a biohazard screening when she returned to the ship. “We can’t stay here.”
She felt another twinge of guilt. Tarsus hadn’t lifted a finger to assist her, not when she’d chased the enemy fleet away nor when she’d landed troops to take out the enemy positions on the ground. They’d done nothing to anger the Pashtali and yet, she had a nasty feeling the Pashtali would take their anger out on Tarsus anyway. It was sickening and yet very in character for a race of interstellar bullies. How dare someone fight back against their would-be enslavers? How dare someone come to liberate the slaves? She suspected the locals would be completely quiet, refusing to commit themselves, until the war ended with a clear winner.
They have a point, the cynical part of her mind noted. Their orbital defences are gone and their planetside fortifications are badly battered. They cannot use the crossroads as bottlenecks, ensuring they cannot keep the Pashtali out of their system ...
“I also have an updated report from the FTL network,” Olson said, holding out a datapad. “Task Force Skinsuit is proceeding towards its target.”
“And let’s hope the enemy aren’t ready for them,” Naomi said. The Pashtali might have assumed no one could fly their starships. They knew, now, that that wasn’t true. “If nothing else, we’ll keep them off balance.”
She took the datapad and sat down, feeling uncomfortably grimy. She hadn’t felt so filthy in years. The shuttle hatch closed and the craft took off, clawing its way into orbit. Naomi scowled as she glanced through the brief statement, then turned to the updated reports from the fleet. The ships were as ready to depart as they’d ever be. And ...
Her heart clenched. She’d lost two hundred Marines on the surface, according to the final count. It was a tiny figure, compared to the hundreds of thousands of dead aliens, but it still hurt. Eighteen bodies had yet to be recovered, if indeed there was anything left of them ... she wondered, numbly, what the locals would do if they found the bodies after the fleet departed. Legally, they were supposed to return the body to the nearest human consulate; practically, they might be better off destroying the body and pretending they’d never seen it. Who knew how the Pashtali would respond if they returned in force? They had never struck her as being petty and spiteful before, yet what they’d done to Tarsus had been incredibly so.
We might still find the missing bodies, she told herself, although she knew it was unlikely. The post-battle assessment teams would have located the fallen, even if they hadn’t had time to recover them. And then we can give them a proper burial.
She looked at her aide. “Inform the fleet we will be departing as planned,” she said, firmly. The longer they stayed, the greater the chance of the Pashtali pinning the fleet down and tearing it to shreds. “There’s no longer any point in staying here.”
“Aye, Admiral.”
***
Under other circumstances, Nancy Middleton thought she would have found Town Seven – or whatever the locals called it – surprisingly charming. It looked very much like an old-style human village, the kind of habitation that had only been preserved through human determination to retain something of their past, resting within a pool of shallow water. A deeper lake sat right next to the village, ripples within the water suggesting the wildlife was slowly returning after the fighting had come to an end. She thought, as the aircar dropped to the muddy ground, that humans who lived in similar environments would have built their homes on stilts, to keep them safely above the waterline. The locals didn’t need to bother.
She composed herself, despite suddenly feeling a mad urge to giggle at the collection of humanoid frogs waiting for her. They looked like cartoon characters that had stepped into the real world ... she bit her lip, dismissing the thought before it could show on her face. Tarsus had been a self-spacefaring world before the invaders had arrived, which was more than could be said for Earth, and they might know enough about humans to read her expression. Besides, they probably found her appearance just as comical. She was tall, by their standards, and almost insanely thin. In their shoes, she might wonder how she could walk upright without tripping over her own feet.
“I greet you,” she said, in careful GalStandard Four. It wasn’t her favourite language – she understood it better than she spoke it, and she had to think to avoid mispronouncing the words – but the locals couldn’t speak GalStandard One or Two. Their mouths just couldn’t form the words. “I speak for my people.”
The leader stepped forward. He barely came up to her chest. Nancy resisted the urge to kneel. It was hard to escape the sense she was dealing with a child, even though she knew better. She bit down hard on that reaction, too. The alien in front of her might not be the head of government – an ambassador could be thrown under the shuttlecraft, his diplomacy declared the work of a rogue who’d exceeded his authority if it blew up in the government’s face – but that didn’t mean she shouldn’t take him seriously. His government would be offended, even if it was hoping the human ships would leave before the Pashtali returned. They didn’t want their system to become a battleground. Again.
“I speak for my people,” the alien said. His voice was low and raspy. Nancy was surprised he didn’t use a voder. The tone bothered her, even though she knew it was just her perception. He wasn’t trying to be offensive. “We are grateful for your help.”
Nancy nodded, keeping her face bland. “We are grateful for the chance to offer it,” she said, picking her words carefully. GalStandard Four had always been a little more flowery than GalStandard Two. “And we will soon be departing your system. Your worlds will be yours again.”
She thought she saw surprise on the alien face. Galactic history teemed with liberators who’d kicked out the old masters, then established themselves as the new. The Pashtali had certainly told the galaxy they were liberating their conquests from their former masters ... not, she was sure, that anyone actually believed them. It just provided a fig leaf to do nothing about it. Here ... she was certain the locals had braced themselves to discover that the human fleet intended to keep the system, even if they didn’t take the planet itself. They might be better masters than the Pashtali, but they’d still be masters.
And the Pashtali would return and kick us out, she thought. And then they’d become the masters once again.
She sighed, inwardly. She’d read a story once, written in the days before the galaxy had forced itself upon the human race, in which Earth was conquered by an alien race that was fighting a war with another race, pressing the humans into service as sepoys. They’d told their human servants the second race was utterly monstrous, a plague that had to be eradicated. And then the second race had invaded, kicked the first race off humanity’s homeworld, and told the humans they’d been duped. It was the first race that was monstrous ....
And the planet kept changing hands, until there was nothing left of the human race, she thought, cold despite the heat. They were both monsters who cared nothing for the innocent lives crushed beneath their feet.
“You will not impose unequal treaties on us?” The leader lifted his eyes to meet hers. “Or insist on trading agreements?”
“No,” Nancy said. The human fleet could impose whatever it wanted, now, but that wouldn’t last. Besides, they’d made a good start by dealing with other races as equals. She wasn’t about to throw it away now. “The planet is yours. We hope you will trade with us, under galactic protocols, but we do not insist on it.”
She couldn’t read the alien races, but she was sure they were staring at her in stunned disbelief. She’d felt the same, when the Alphans had told her they were abandoning Earth and leaving the human race to its own devices. It had been hard to believe, back then, and it was hard to believe now. She sighed inwardly. Leaving the system to its own devices was the best thing they could do. The Pashtali would need to think long and hard to come up with an excuse to invade for a second time ...
Not that that will slow them down for long, she thought. But they’ll look like the aggressor in front of the entire galaxy.
She kept that thought to herself – she doubted the Pashtali would lose sleep over the matter, not when it was unlikely the galaxy would unite against them – as she briefly discussed trade deals. The system didn’t have much to offer, beyond the right to make transit through the crossroads. The once-proud industrial base was nothing more than ruins, save for a handful of asteroid settlements that had gone doggo before the enemy started to look for them. They would rebuild, if they were given the chance. And if they did, they might be grateful to humanity for saving them.
“We thank you for your kind offers,” the alien said, when they’d finished. “My government will debate the matter and reply directly to yours.”
“Of course.” Nancy bowed her head. “My government will be very eager to hear from yours.”
She sighed to herself as she took a step back. She knew they intended to stall as long as possible, first to make sure the fleet actually departed on schedule and second to wait and see if the Pashtali intended to respect their newfound independence. The locals might have preferred to have the human fleet point its guns at their homeworld, making it very clear they’d been forced to concede whatever the humans wanted. But then, like the aliens in the story, the Pashtali might not accept such an argument. It was a great deal easier to dispute such claims when you weren’t the one being held at gunpoint.
But the galaxy would know we’d bullied them, she reflected, as she boarded the aircar for the flight back to the camp. It might be necessary, to await the wrath of the system’s former masters, but it would look bad in the long run. The Pashtali would certainly make a big show of how they were liberating the world from its human invaders, and the human race would wind up with egg on its face. And the only thing worse than a bully is an unsuccessful bully.
She shook her head. They’d done all they could, as little as it was. And now it was time to go.
Chapter Nineteen
System P-25, Pashtali Space
The Pashtali did not, as far as anyone had been able to determine, name either their ships or their worlds. Commodore Roger Valentine found it difficult to imagine a species with such a lack of imagination – and he knew the Pashtali had to have some, or they would never have climbed into space without help – and yet there were no suggestions the xenospecialists were wrong. It was possible, he supposed as the tiny squadron glided into System P-25, that the planets and ships had names in the alien language, but if so they’d never been translated into any galactic tongue. Perhaps it was an insane security precaution. Or perhaps they honestly didn’t feel the need to share anything of themselves with aliens.
I suppose they do have a reason to be annoyed, he thought. Earth had barely been poking its way into space when human history had run into a brick wall and stopped dead. The Pashtali had been a major spacefaring race when they’d encountered the Alphans and discovered, to their horror, that they had no say in galactic protocols. It would have been galling to have laws imposed on you even if you agreed the laws were generally good laws. Galactic history would be very different if they’d been the ones to make it into space first.
He put the thought out of his mind as he studied the sensor display. System P-25 was a major shipping hub, located perfectly to support either a renewed drive against Earth or an offensive against Terminus. Hundreds of ships were gliding around the system, either going to and from the crossroads or plying the lanes between the various planets. The three major worlds were heavily defended, if the files were accurate, and for once he had no reason to doubt them. The Pashtali had invested heavily in the system’s infrastructure. He was sure they’d be certain to invest in defences too.
Which means that getting too close to the planet is likely to be impossible, he told himself firmly. Task Force Skinsuit might be flying Pashtali ships, but if they hadn’t changed their IFF codes after the Battle of Terminus he’d go spacewalking without a spacesuit. They knew humans could fly their ships now. But we don’t have to get too close to make a splash.
“Captain,” Marquez said. “Long-range passive sensors have picked out a handful of industrial nodes orbiting the planets.”
“Add them to the target list, when we start firing kinetic projectiles,” Roger ordered. He doubted more than a handful of the ballistic projectiles would strike their targets – it was hard to target something from light minutes away, even if the defenders weren’t on alert – but it would keep the enemy off balance. “Any convoys?”
Marquez peered down at her console. “I think one is forming up now,” she said. “But it’s hard to be sure.”
Roger nodded. The Pashtali system was surprisingly ordered – the majority of industrialised systems had hundreds of starships and spacecraft swarming around – but it was still hard to work out what was going on, not from a safe distance. The Pashtali were randomly sweeping space with active sensors, as if they hoped to catch intruders sneaking into their system. Normally, he’d consider it a waste of effort. Here, it might work in their favour. The Pashtali did have intruders in their system.
They’ll be putting a hell of a lot of wear and tear on their systems, he reflected. It was a grim reminder that, despite everything, the Pashtali had money and resources to burn. But they can afford it for a while longer.
“Keep an eye on the convoy,” he ordered. “And alert me when it starts to move.”
He scowled as he sat back in his cramped chair, keeping an eye on the display. They’d intercepted a handful of transmissions, as they’d made their way to System P-25, but none of them had been particularly helpful. The Galactics were broadcasting wildly exaggerated claims, from human fleets bombarding the Pashtali homeworld into submission to the entire human fleet wiped out with a single shot. The only Pashtali message they’d intercepted had been indecipherable, to the point he wondered if it was a decoy intended to make them waste their time. It might have that effect, even if it was unintentional. If it drew on cultural aspects the human race didn’t share ...
“Captain,” Marquez said. “The convoy is departing the planet and setting course for Crossroads Three.”
Roger smiled, coldly. “Plot an intercept course, then move us into position,” he ordered. He’d picked their current location with malice aforethought. Crossroads Three linked to threadlines that headed further into enemy space, rather than leading outside their empire. It was just possible they’d be less wary about escorting convoys in safe territory. They’d learn better in a hurry, if his plan worked. “And prepare to start launching kinetic projectiles.”
