Peter Hamilton - Fallen Fragon

Because of the debilitating effect of freefall on human physiology, especially on twenty-seven thousand untrained colonists over ten weeks, some kind of gravity field had to be provided for them and the crew. It came in the simplest fashion there was: six life support wheels, fat doughnuts thirty meters wide and two hundred in diameter. They were arranged in pairs, counter-rotating around an axial shaft to balance precession. Their hulls, in common with all spacecraft operating outside the protection of Earth's magnetic field, were blank, without ports or markings; just the standard coating of light gray foam rucked from particle impacts and bleached from the light of different stars.

Adapting them for strategic security transport was an easy refit. Z-B turned common rooms and lounges into gyms and sim-tac theaters; some dormitories were taken out of commission and used as Skin suit depots, while the remaining dormitories were unchanged. Between them, they could billet twenty thousand squaddies.

Behind the life support wheels came the cargo section, a broad open cylinder section built up from a honeycomb lattice of girders, which formed deep hexagonal silos. They had once carried modules of industrial machinery and essential supplies that the colonists needed to maintain their settlements. Modifying the silos for asset-realization missions was a simple matter of changing the hold-down clamp designs.

Now, seven orbital transfer ships held station three hundred meters away, encircling the Koribu. One-man engineering shuttles glided backward and forward between them and the starship with halo bursts of green and blue flame, carrying the Third Fleet's lander pods, which they slotted down into waiting silos. At one end of the honeycomb, silos had been merged to form long, deep alcoves. They contained space-planes, the familiar sleek profile of Xianti nose cones just visible rising above the shadows.

Koribu's final stage was its main reaction drive, five direct fusion rockets in the shape of elongated cones over three hundred meters long, ribbed with a filigree of pipes and cables. Big spherical deuterium tanks were plugged into the stress structure at the head of the cones, along with ancillary support equipment and ten small tokamaks that provided power for the main engine ignition sequence.

The Moray docked just ahead of the life support section, nuzzling up to a tunnel that had extended out beyond the star-ship's body. Lawrence had to wait for another twenty minutes listening to the clamor of other platoons banging their way through the orbital-transfer ship's habitation cabins and into the tunnel. Finally, they were given clearance to disembark.

It was a long trek through the starship's freefall corridors to the rotating transfer toroid of their wheel. Inside the top of the wheel spoke was an elevator that was barely high enough to take an adult. They all aligned themselves, tucking the boots into the floor hoops. The G-force built as they descended, much to Lewis's relief. They stopped on the middle of the three decks occupying the wheel itself, where the gravity was an eighth Earth-standard. Enough to settle their stomachs and restore normal circulation patterns. But with it came a disconcerting spinning sensation, as if the decking were about to heave over. They emerged from the elevator, reaching out to steady themselves against the wall.

Every time he came down into one of the wheels, Lawrence swore he wouldn't let the effect trick him again. Every time his body promised him he was about to flip over. He gingerly took his hand away from the wall. "Okay, I know it feels like we're washing about. Ignore it. You're all down and stable. Let's go find our quarters."

He set off down the corridor. After ten paces he had to move to one side to avoid Simon Roderick and his retinue of senior managerial staff. The Third Fleet's board representative was so busy snapping out instructions to a harried aide he never even noticed the platoon. Lawrence kept his own face impassive. He'd followed the investigation Roderick and Adul Quan had launched in the wake of the bar fight in Kuranda. His Prime program had loaded unobtrusively into the base's datapool, passively observing the surge of traffic shunting between AS programs, the information requests to skyscan. Their inquiries had withered away after a couple of days, and the police had never turned up anything. Even so, it was a shock coming face-to-face with a board representative who'd taken such a keen interest in his off-base activities.

Roderick and his entourage disappeared up the curve of the corridor, and Lawrence walked on without breaking stride.

The dormitory that they'd been given was probably only double the size of the compartment on the Moray. It had two ranks of bunk beds each with its own locker containing a standard clothes package for everyone, a couple of aluminum tables with chairs and a sheet screen. There was a small washroom next door.

Hal looked around, his face screwed up in dismay. "Oh man, what is this shit?" he exclaimed.

Amersy laughed. "Best quarters in the fleet, welfare boy. Lie back and enjoy. You get fed, you get paid and nobody shoots at you. Now find a bunk and make the most of it."

"I'll go fucking stir crazy." He made to climb onto a top bunk, only to find his way blocked by Karl's forearm.

"Bottom rung, kid," Karl said, grinning a challenge.

"Jesus fucking wept." Hal threw his small bag onto a lower bunk and hopped on after it. "I can't take these closed-up rooms."

"You'll put up with it," Lawrence said. He dropped his own bag on a top bunk, momentarily fascinated by the weird curve of its fall. "Settle down, all of you; you know the onboard drill. I'll find out what our canteen schedule is, and then we work training and fitness around that. Lewis, how are you feeling?"

"Not too bad, Sarge. Guess the doc was right."

Lawrence made his way over to the small keyboard set into the wall beside a sheet screen. Platoon dormitories didn't rate an AS program, but the operating system was sophisticated and easy enough to operate. He called up their basic shipboard data: where they ate and when, what the local time was, when departure was scheduled.

"Hey, you guys want to know where we're headed?" he asked.

"Thallspring," Karl shouted back. "Didn't they tell you, Sarge?"

Hal gave him a puzzled look. "How did you know that? It's like top secret."

Karl shook his head. "Fuck, you are a big waste of space, kid."

They were due to depart in twenty-two hours. Lawrence read the Third Fleet data from the screen and muttered, "Jesus."

"Problem?" Amersy asked quietly.

Lawrence took a quick glance round the dormitory. Nobody was paying attention to them. "Seven ships. Is that what the Third Fleet is these days?"

"More than a match for Thallspring. Their population is small, barely seventeen million."

"Projected," Lawrence said. "That's no true guide. But it's not what I'm worried about."

"The ships?"

"Yeah. Fate! My first mission, to Kinabica, that took seven weeks of spaceplane flights just to lift us and our equipment offplanet. There must have been thirty-five starships on that mission."

"We don't have that many starships anymore. Not since Santa Chico."

"Not just there. Second Fleet lost two ships on approach to Oland's Hope. No one projected they'd have exo-orbit defenses. But they did."

"You want to eject?"

"Hell no. I'm just saying this one could be tough. We're going in too small."

"They'll cope." Amersy clapped him on the shoulder. "Hell, even the kid will pull through."

"Yeah, right." Lawrence began pulling menus from the starship's computer, seeing what he could throw up on the screen. He read one schedule and smiled, hurriedly calling up supplements. "You might want to see this," he told the platoon. "You'll probably never have another chance for ringside seats this good."