Charles Gannon - Raising Caine

“Little Guy” O’Garran, as well? Well, Downing certainly pulled the A-team off the benches for this overwatch mission. “So why the heck are you on the outside of the module?”

“We’re here to make sure you had some unseen backup. Just in case something went sideways.”

“Which, thanks to the Arat Kur, has now occurred. You got the alert?”

“Loud and clear. And unexpected. I thought we’d accounted for all the Roaches’ ships.”

Caine suppressed a sigh. That’s because you’re a few steps further down the clearance food chain. Just because we secured the Arat Kurs’ home system doesn’t mean we’re out of the woods. “Well, your overwatch job ended when the Slaasriithi left, so get in out of the cosmic rays.”

“Thanks, sir, but even cracking the outer hatch is contrary to the current blackout protocols. Opening the airlock to free space would produce a thermal differential that could show up on enemy sensors. Besides, our mission isn’t over until Mr. Downing says it is. Oh, and Chief O’Garran just reminded me that this is a rare opportunity for us to work on our tans.”

Yeah, tans which can be measured in double-digit REM per hour — the kind of tan which causes you to lose hair, and maybe a few years, if it goes on too long.

The green light flashed on the comm panel behind Riordan. “Hold on, Bannor: message coming in.”

Karam Tsaami’s voice was tense. “Commander, some big shot named Richard Downing wants to put you in the loop. The big loop. As in, patched through directly to Admiral Silverstein’s combat information center.”

“And when does this happen?”

“Dunno, sir. I’m just standing by like you are.”

Riordan heard the weary tone of a long-term professional — a long-term government professional. Who had been his aerial chauffeur on Delta Pavonis Three two years ago. An extraordinary coincidence. Or probably not , Caine realized with a smile. “So, Karam, nice to have you ferrying me around during yet another first contact. Pretty small universe, wouldn’t you say?”

“What? You don’t like me?”

“Oh, I like you just fine, Karam. It’s implausible coincidences that I’m not so fond of.”

“Yeah, okay. I was your taxi driver to the CoDevCo compound on DeePeeThree because I had the right clearances. But now — well, things are different. When it comes to you, that is.”

Huh? “Different how?”

“Caine, er, Commander, it’s like I was implying earlier: you don’t seem to realize how many people know your name, now. More to the point, you have no idea how many people are probably following your movements. Of course, being at the center of events during the invasion of Earth didn’t help matters, if you were trying to stay off the radar.”

“Not like I wanted that attention.”

“Didn’t say you did. You don’t seem the type. But even before the fires had burnt out in Jakarta, a bunch of intel types were inviting lots of your prior official contacts to come have a nice quiet chat in a nice secluded place for a nice long time.”

“Did they suspect some of you as moles?”

“Maybe, but mostly they were looking for folks with clearance who’d already had direct contact with you. They picked me to be one of the ship jockeys who could also watch your back. But you pretty much fell off the grid after Jakarta.”

Did I ever. “That’s because I didn’t walk away at the end of the Battle of Jakarta. I rode out here to Sigma Draconis in an intensive-care cold cell.”

“Ah. Sorry. I didn’t know that you— Wait: message coming through.”

Tsaami was back on within the minute. “Okay, I’m jumping off the line. Mr. Downing is going to come on in a few moments with brief instructions. He’s bouncing this one commo through my lascom and then cutting me out of the loop.”

“Good talking to you, Karam.”

“Yeah, likewise. We’ll have to get a beer someday when you aren’t on everyone’s watch list.”

The circuit switched channels with a pop. Downing’s voice — crisp, urgent, and decidedly Oxbridge — crackled out of the speaker: “Caine, if you are reading this, you are to reply with a zero point two second coded lascom pulse with wavelength variation protocol Hotel X-Ray Seven.”

Riordan did so, and then, after his pulse’s variation fingerprint had cleared the security firewall, asked, “Richard, what the hell is going on? Why would only one Arat Kur ship shift into—?”

“No time now, Caine. You’ll be receiving live-feed from my pickup here in the intel situation room. Once you are in that loop, just listen. Do not send. It is unlikely that tight-beam emissions would register on enemy sensors, but we don’t want to take a chance. In the meantime, stand by for emergency extraction by us, by the Slaasriithi, or to hear that we are relinquishing command authority over your team — Tsaami, Rulaine, O’Garran — directly to you.”

Riordan increased the volume for Bannor’s benefit. “So I’m waiting to learn if the shit that’s hitting the fan will bury half the fleet. Or more.”

Downing only replied, “Stay alert.”

The circuit closed and then reopened on a different frequency, this one a loud babble of orders, reports, and counterorders: the sounds of Admiral Ira Silverstein’s CIC at red alert and weapons free.

Bannor commented through the external comm circuit: “They sound pretty panicked.”

Riordan listened more carefully. “They’re scrambling every drone and Hunter-class control sloop they’ve got on ready status. Problem is, this Arat Kur ship shifted in so close that they don’t have the time to push out a full protective hemisphere around our shift-carriers. Whatever happens is going to be close, dirty, and very destructive.”

“Makes me glad the Arat Kur only brought one ship.”

Caine grunted agreement and listened to the staccato sitreps and flight ops chatter crackling out of the speaker behind him. He recognized Admiral Silverstein’s voice laying down a barrage of orders: “I want those Boulton-class cruisers out in front and on our flanks. And Commo, you tell the shift-carrier captains that if I don’t see them redline their thrusters and un-ass this area of operations, I will personally come to each of their bridges when this is over and bust them down to ensigns. Nothing is more important than our shift hulls. Nothing . Signal Halifax on Trafalgar that we are now at eighty percent of maximum power output and stand ready to discharge spinal weapons and point defense fire lasers simultaneously.”

“Sir,” cried another familiar voice — communications officer Lieutenant Brill, if Caine remembered correctly—“I’ve got incoming signals from the enemy ship. Well, maybe it’s not an enemy ship.”

“Brill, give me clear data or I’ll find someone who can.”

“Sir, I think— Listen.”

Yet another voice, this one unfamiliar, became prominent. “—your fire. I say again: hold your fire. This is prize-ship Doppelganger , transmitting on all frequencies, all codes: please respond. Repeat, hold your—”

“Damn it!” Silverstein shouted. “Captain Kagawa, you nearly had us soiling our duty suits over here. We were seconds away from frying that Arat Kur hull you’ve commandeered. Why the hell didn’t you follow protocol and communicate immediately?”

Kagawa sounded harried. “Two problems, Admiral. The first was that the Arat Kur left us some viral surprises in the communications software.”

“Damn it, I thought we’d purged all that crap.”

“From the coding and management systems, yes, sir. But not from the physical interfaces. The Roaches must have rigged this sleeper virus to activate when the shift drive was engaged without a passkey code. From the moment we came out of shift, we couldn’t get the radios or lascoms to realign or transmit.”