Karl Schroeder - Sun of Suns

Soon the clouds would be ringing with the signal that open air had been found.

He went back to the radar display. The shadow of Falcon Formation's giant ship still lay some miles inside the cloud, and it was slowing. "All ships: put everything into stopping the dreadnought. Release parachute nets ahead of it, mine the air—anything!"

—Hammering sound of bullets hitting the hull. Sudden flame of a missile veering past. He heard the Rook's own machine-gunners opening up at something. "Put us back in the cloud deck," Chaison commanded as he regained his chair.

The ship took a hit before they managed to escape into the mist. There was chaos over the speaking tube for about a minute, then an all-clear. Chaison frowned at the indiscipline, but most of his attention was on the radar.

They had arrived at this battle late. Daybreak was little more than an hour away. By the time Falcon's suns were glowing full, Venera would have had Mahallan switch Candesce's defensive systems back on.

During this long night of dark maneuvering, Slipstream had thrown the Falcon Formation fleet into disarray, had wiped out its bikes and smaller vessels, and scored crippling blows on a number of midsize ships. The troop carriers appeared damaged as well. But that was all—and it was nothing.

If they didn't score a decisive blow to Falcon's invasion plans in the next minutes, the whole mission would have been for nothing.

"Sir!" It was the radar man. "We—I think we've lost a ship."

Chaison looked where he was pointing. One of the fast-moving dots on the screens had broken in two pieces. As he watched the pieces subdivided and disintegrated. The dots dissolved into smudges on the screens.

"Any idea who that was?" Chaison asked into the sudden silence. He scowled at the display. The damn fools flirted with a mine cloud.

There was silence in the bridge; the men glanced at one another "Back to the dreadnought," Chaison commanded. "I want the cutters packed with explosives—warheads, bullets, everything we've got. Rockets haven't had much effect on it, so we're going to ram something bigger down its throat."

Aid if those don't work, we'll make the Rook itself into a missile.

CARRIER JUMPED.

Hayden grabbed the seam of the bike's saddle and pulled as hard as he could.

The cargo net he'd stuffed under the saddle flowered into the ail and he spun as best he could, throwing it at Carrier. The spymaster shouted and tried to evade it but he was in midleap now and there was nothing he could do. Tangled, swearing furiously, he bounced off the bike and back into the air.

Hayden planted both feet on the metal and pushed. The dive took him across the length of the room and he plucked his sword out of the air before spinning and kicking off from the far wall. Carrier was struggling to free his sword from the net; his awkward parry went bad and suddenly he was staring down at Hayden's sword which stuck out of his chest.

"Wh—" He tried to reach up; failed, and looked in Hayden's eyes. Carrier was trying to speak.

"Don't talk to me," said Hayden. "The one you need to explain yourself to isn't here. You'll see him soon enough." He let go of the sword, turned, and jumped back to the bike. Reaching around the exhaust vent, he caught a loop of the thin cable he'd stashed there before they had left the Rook. He pulled out the loop and began to unreel it.

When he was sure Lyle Carrier was dead he unwove the net from around him, and attached the cord to it. Then he moved to the door and looked for thefirst of the packages he'd ordered Candesceto provide.

AUBRI MAHALLAN WAS acting very nervous, and it was driving Venera crazy. After the tenth time that the woman bounced a circuit around the room, Venera said, "Is there something you need to do?"

Mahallan shook her head, becoming very still. "No. Nothing."

"Then settle down. It's not your husband who's in the middle of a battle right now. Your man's just down the hall."

"He's not my man," said Aubri quickly.

Venera raised an eyebrow. "Oh? He thinks he is."

Now Mahallan looked uncomfortable; as far as Venera was concerned, that was a definite improvement.

"You don't drink the waiting gets to me?" continued Venera. She crossed her arms, glancing once at the indicator device she had stashed in her bag by one wall. It still glowed steadily. As long as it was on, Chaison retained his advantage; so in a sense, its light was her lifeline to him. But she would have to shut it down soon, when dawn came.

"I'm not you," said Aubri, scowling. "I've done a great deal for your little project, Venera. Have you ever asked yourself what I'm going to get out of all this?"

Venera shrugged. "You never asked for anything, did you? Which is odd, except that you're an exile for whom everywhere is the same… But why not take Hayden Griffin? He's a fine catch for someone from the servant classes. Is that your problem with him? That he's not one of your own kind?"

"You wouldn't understand," said Mahallan.

Venera laughed. "On more than one occasion I've been told that my problem is that I do understand people, I just don't feel for them. Which is probably true. But you're right, I don't get it. We've completed our project, you're free and as rich as you want to be. In just a few minutes you can switch the sun's defenses back on, and then all you have to do is take your money and your man and go enjoy yourself. What could be simpler?"

Mahallan looked startled. "Is it time already?" Venera checked her pocket watch. "Getting there."

"Okay." Aubri smiled; it seemed a bit forced to Venera. Mahallan glided over to the command mirror. "I'll get ready to shut it down, then," she said brightly.

"All right." Venera watched her, keeping her face neutral. As the strange outsider woman gazed into the mirror, Venera let herself drift over to her bag. She made sure that she could see the glow of her indicator, and Mahallan, without turning her head. Just in case, she loosened the scabbard of her sword.

THE DREADNOUGHT WAS tangled in parachutes and trailed debris in a long smoking beard of rope and timber. Its engines were tangled knots of metal belching black smoke into the air. Its rudders were useless flags.

There were no significant holes in its hull.

The mist ahead of it was brightening as it approached open, flare-lit air. Just a few hundred yards and it would be free of the nightmarish disadvantage of the clouds. Its enemy would no longer be invisible. One shot from the rifled ten-inch guns mounted along its sides and the smaller ships would be matchwood. All it needed was the sight lines.

As the Tormentor slid into position to unloose a salvo, the dreadnought got its chance. The Slipstream ship had been relying on the veils of mist to let it do what it had done ten times already: stand off, hidden, and pummel the larger vessel before moving to another firing position. This time, though, the intervening clouds proved to be just a thin curtain and when it parted suddenly, the Tormentor was unluckily right in the way of a searchlight. The dreadnought's gunners had been waiting for this.

The first shell convulsed the cruiser with an internal explosion. The next broke it in half. Six more followed, pulverizing the twisting remains before the Shockwave from the first blast had died out. The Tormentor and all its men were simply erased from the sky.

Rockets continued to rain on the dreadnought from other directions—but the gun crews were emboldened now and began firing wildly. If some of their own ships were close by, well, too bad; any sane Falcon Formation craft would be headed for that brightening in the clouds by now. Only the enemy would lurk in the darkness, and so into that darkness they fired.