“Tested ‘em just a few hours ago. I got this Artificial Intelligence boffin, smart as a whip. She’s got the equipment up and running. Once we reached Atlas, she found a store that sells pet rabbits, put one into the transporter and, presto! transported it to the shuttle bay. One seriously pissed off bunny, let me tell you. But alive and kickin’. Damn thing took off like a bat out of hell and we can’t find it anywhere, but it worked.”
Emily was astounded. “Cookie, this could be really important.”
Cookie shook her head. “Won’t help much, we don’t have enough Marines on the Yorkshire to make use of them and we still don’t know what the effective range is of the damn things.”
“How many Marines do you need?”
Cookie considered. “Well, three transporters with forty seats each. Pretty quick recycle time. With a lot of luck, we could maybe send two hundred forty soldiers through. Course, some of them would only be carrying wooden clubs; we don’t have nearly enough weapons.” They had a hundred and fifty of the air guns and a bunch of swords. The swords would be hard to make, but maybe they could make spears. Say a seven foot plastic pole with a hardened, sharp point and a cutting edge along the first two feet? That should be doable just using the Yorkshire’s work shop. She grimaced. Sending a Marine into combat with nothing more than a sharp stick as a weapon was not an attractive thought. But what else was there?
Emily meanwhile was on her comm. “Captain Rowe,” she said briskly. “I need your authority to place two hundred and forty Marines on the Yorkshire.” She explained everything Cookie had told her. “Yes, sir. Thank you.” She closed her comm and looked at Cookie. “You’ll have them in an hour.”
Cookie blinked in surprise, then smiled and stood up. “Damn, nice to have friends in high places.” Suddenly there was a lot to do in a very short time. She paused. “Emily, thank you for the time with Hirii. We — well, thank you.”
Emily was suddenly very somber. “Hiram asked me to make sure to bring you back. I’ll try, Cookie, I’ll try my best.”
Cookie half laughed, half sobbed. “Emily, I spend all my time thinkin’ about how to kill people, ‘bout how to make sure I get the other guy before he gets me. Last few days I shot people, stabbed ‘em and beat one of the bastards to death with a chair. Then, thanks to you, I get to see Hirii and he treats me like a piece of delicate china, like a lady.”
Emily raised an eyebrow. “Hirii?”
Cookie smiled softly. “‘Hirii’ is my name for him. He hates it, but I love it. You all know him as Hiram. A little stiff, straight as an arrow, always frettin’ ‘bout stuff, worryin’ all the time.” She shook her head. “That’s Hiram for sure, it is, but when I look at him, I see Hirii inside him, clever, funny, always thinking and seeing stuff I can’t see no matter how hard I try. You see Hiram, methodical and sorta boring; I see Hirii, takin’ horrendous risks that just scare the beejesus out of him because he knows that’s what we got to do.”
She looked Emily, eyes shining. “That’s Hirii, and he’s mine.”
Hiram Brill finally got back to his apartment. It was empty and too quiet. He walked through it slowly, trying to recapture every minute he and Cookie had had together. The bed was a wreck and he smiled. He sat on the edge and brought the pillow up to his face, breathing in to catch the faintest smell of her.
In the kitchen there was a note. He didn’t really want to read it; reading it somehow meant that she really was gone again, but he sat down and unfolded the paper.
My beloved Hirii:
I must leave now. I will go and do what I have to do, then I will come home to you forever.
I love you.
Maria
P.S. I think we broke your bed.
His comm buzzed. Reluctantly, he pushed the reply button. “Brill here, what is it?”
“The Black Watch and Queen’s Own have sortied, sir. Coldstream Guard will depart in twenty minutes.”
“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” he said. He raised Cookie’s note to his lips, then put it carefully back on the table, as if it were a precious jewel.
Chapter 64
Approaching the Refuge Worm Hole
The thirty nine remaining ships of the Black Watch and Queen’s Own were now four hours ahead of Atlas, well clear of the sphere-shaped shell of mines and missile platforms that encircled the space station. Together with the three Arks of the Home Fleet, they headed directly toward the Dominion blocking force.
On board the battleship Lionheart, Admiral Douthat could direct the upcoming battle and stay in touch with Atlas and the Coldstream Guards. Her monitors showed that the worm hole to Refuge was already moving to the left as they approached it, and the Dominion blocking force was falling back with it. No matter. She would press forward until they gave battle. She knew she was outnumbered, but she didn’t have to win the fight, only slow the Dominions enough so that they could not prevent Atlas from slipping through the wormhole when it finally stopped moving. So let the Dominions fall back. Every mile they moved further west put them a mile further from Atlas, assuming the damn worm hole really did move back to the east like the Light promised it would.
It should work.
Admiral Douthat snorted derisively. What could possibly go wrong with a plan like this one? Gods of Our Mothers, she thought, if my old tactics instructor from the Academy could see me now, he’d give me a failing grade for sure.
On board the Dominion battleship Vengeance, Admiral Mello glowered at Captain Pattin. “Are you sure, Jodi?”
“Quite positive, sir.” Captain Pattin had learned never to show the slightest doubt around Admiral Mello. Doubt implied weakness, and Admiral Mello instinctively attacked any sign of weakness. “We’ve triple checked. Although the worm hole is moving to the west as seen from our plane of approach, the Victorian space station is turning to the east.”
Admiral Mello shook his head. This didn’t make any sense. Why were the Victorians making such a blatant mistake? The space station was huge; it had to be difficult to turn. Were they pulling some sort of feint on him?
He turned back to Pattin. “Do you have any idea what they’re doing?”
She shook her head. “No, sir. Unless they think they’re going to miss the worm hole and they are turning around to make a run for Darwin.”
“But the Refuge worm hole is moving west?”
“Absolutely, sir.” Captain Pattin hesitated. “Shall I order the attack to be moved up, sir?”
He looked again at the holo display. Feint or no, at the end of the day the Vickies had to go to the worm hole, it was their only open path of escape. Let them twist and turn, that is where he would find them. Mello smiled. “No, Jodi. Let them continue to turn the wrong way. A very famous Old Earth general said, ‘Never interrupt an enemy when he is making a mistake.’ We’ll let the Victorians continue their mistake a while longer, then finish them.”
• • • • •
Two hours later the Refuge worm hole suddenly changed direction. One second it was moving west, then abruptly it was moving back east along the same path it taken earlier. The leader of the Dominion blocking force blanched.
“What the hell is it doing?” he shouted at the hapless Sensors Officer.
“I don’t know, Captain!” the man stammered. “It simply changed direction and is moving east.”
“Well, where is it going?” On the holograph display, the captain could see that it was coming up fast behind them and would go past them, toward the Victorians, in less than an hour.
“I- there is no way of knowing, Captain,” the hapless Sensors Officer confessed.
The captain cursed loudly and eloquently, displaying a rich vocabulary gathered during a lifetime of service in the Dominion Fleet. Then he sent a message to Admiral Mello. Several minutes later, he received a one word reply.