There were others in the hall, farther on. He snapped an order at them, cleared them out, not blaming them… there were others besides Konstantins who had loved ones scattered about the station, children in school and nurseries, people in hospital. Some ran ahead of them, refusing orders. A station security agent shouted out another order to halt; ignored, laid a hand on his pistol.
“Let them go,” Damon snapped. “Let be.”
“Sir.” The policeman’s face relaxed from a grimace of panic. “Sir, I’m not getting anything over com.”
“Keep that gun holstered. You learn those reflexes from the troops? Stand your post. Calm people down. Help them where you can. There’s a scramble going on. Could even be drill. Ease up.”
“Sir.”
They walked on, toward the emergency ramp, in the quiet hall… not running; a Konstantin could not run, spread panic. He walked, trying to hold off panic in himself. “No time,” Josh said under his breath. “By the time the alert gets here, the ships are on us. If Mazian’s been caught at dock…”
“Got militia and two carriers out from station,” Damon said, and remembered all at once who Josh was. He caught his breath, gave him a desperate look, met a face as worried as his own. “Come on,” he said.
They reached the emergency ramp, heard shouting, loud as they opened the doors. Runners were headed in down it from other levels. “Slow down!” Damon yelled at those who passed him, and they did, several turns, but a few became many, and suddenly there were more coming up, the noise increasing, more running… the transport system jammed everywhere and all the levels pouring into the spiral well. “Take it easy,” Damon shouted, grabbed shoulders physically and tried to slow it, but the rush accelerated, bodies jamming in, men, women, and children, impossible now even to get out of it. The doors were full of people trying to go down.
“The docks!” he heard shouted. It spread like fire, with the red light of alarm burning in the overhead, the assumption that had been seething in Pell since the troops came — that someday it would come, that the station was under attack, that evacuation was underway. The mass pressed down, and there was no stopping it.
ii
cfx/knight/189-8989-6877 easyeasyeasy/scorpiontwelve/zerozerozero/ endit
Signy keyed back acknowledgment and turned to Graff with a wide sweep of her hand. “Hit it!” Graff relayed, and go sounded throughout the ship. Warnings flared, spreading to dockside. Troops outside finished stripping the umbilicals. “We can’t take them,” Signy said when Di Janz fretted in com. It sat ill with her to abandon men. “They’re all right.”
“Umbilicals clear,” Graff shouted across, off com. It was a go-when-ready from Europe, which had left its troops, already moving out. Pacific was moving. Tibet’s rider was still heading in behind the wave of the original message, signaling with its presence what Tibet had already sent; and what was happening on the fringes of Pell System was as old as the light-bound signal that came reporting it, ships inbound, more than an hour ago. The lights on Norway’s main board flicked green, a steady ripple of them, and Signy released clamp and set Norway free, with the troops who had made it aboard still hastening for security. Norway moved null for a moment under the gentle puffs of directionals and undocking vents, continued the roll of her frame and cut in main thrust with a margin that skimmed Australia’s clearance and probably set off alarms all over Pell. They acquired hard G, the inner cylinder under combat synch, rolling to compensate stresses: weight bore down, eased, slammed down again.
They came to heading, with a clutter of merchanters in lower plane; Europe and Pacific ahead of them, Australia breaking clear behind. Atlantic would be moving any second; India’s Keu was on-station and headed for his ship; Africa’s Porey was downworld. Africa would move out under its lieutenant’s command and rendezvous with Porey shuttling up from Downbelow, running tailguard at best.
The inevitable was on them. That rider was some minutes behind Tibet’s message, insurance. Its message was reaching them now; and a chatter of further transmission from Tibet itself, and North Pole’s voice added itself, along with the alarm of militia ships helplessly in the path of the strike. Tibet was engaged, trying to make the incoming fleet dump speed to deal with them. North Pole was moving. Merchanter vessels serving as militia were altering course, slow ships, short-haulers, at a standstill compared to the speed of the incoming fleet. They could slow it if they had the nerve. If.
“Rider’s turned,” scan op said in her ear. She saw it onscreen. The rider had gotten their acknowledgment minutes ago, had put about; that scan image was meeting them now. Longscan comp had put the rest of the arc together and the comp tech had reasoned the rest by human intent… the yellow fuzz going off from the red approach line was long-scan’s new estimate of the ridership’s position; the old estimate faded to faint blue, mere warning to watch that line of approach in case. They were headed right down it in outgoing plane, while the incoming rider was obliged to go nadir. And they were all streaming out together, right down the line.
Signy gnawed her lip, cautioned scan and com monitor to keep up with events all around the sphere, fretting that Mazian had hauled them out in one vector only. Come on, she thought with the taste of one disaster in her mouth, no more like Viking. Give us a few options, man.
cfx / knight / 189-9090-687 / ninerninerniner / sphinx / twotwotwo triplet / doublet / quartet / wisp / endit.
New orders. The late ships were given the other vectors. Pacific and Atlantic and Australia moved onto new courses, slow motion flowering of the pattern to shield the system.
iii
merchanter hammer to ecs in vicinity/maydaymaydaymayday/union carriers moving/twelve carriers our vicinity/going for jump/maydaymaydaymayday…
swan’s eye to all ships/runrunrunrun…
ecs tibet to all ships/relay/…
Over an hour old, proliferating through the system in relay through the com of every ship receiving and still going, like an echo in a madhouse. Angelo leaned to the comp console and keyed through to dockside, where the shock of a massive pullout still had crews spilling out on emergency calclass="underline" military crews had handled it, their own way, undocked without interval. Central was in chaos, with a pending G crisis if the systems could not adjust to the massive kickoff. There were palpable instabilities. Com was jammed. And for nearly two hours the situation on the rim of the solar system had been in progress, while the message flashed its lightbound way toward them.
Troops were left on the dock. Most had been aboard already, barracked onship; some had not made it, and military channels on-station echoed with incomprehensible messages, angry voices. Why they had pulled the troops, why they had delayed to board those they could with attack incoming… the implication of that was the liberty of the Fleet to run out on them. Mazian’s order…
Emilio, he thought distractedly. The schematic of Downbelow on the left wall-screen flickered with a dot that was Porey’s shuttle. He could not call; no one could — Mazian’s orders… com silence. Hold pattern, traffic control was broadcasting to merchanters in orbit; it was all they could say. Com queries flowed from merchanters at dock, faster than operators could answer them with pleas for quiet.