Christopher Nuttall - The Trafalgar Gambit

“We’ll do our best, sir,” he said.

“You can have first call on yard services and engineering crewmen,” the First Space Lord promised. “And whatever else you need.”

A few hundred more carriers just like her , Ted thought. It was clear the aliens had chosen their weapons carefully, intending to slice through human naval fleets like a knife through butter. And it would have worked, too, if Ark Royal hadn’t remained in service. The aliens had evidently missed her when they’d done their survey of human space. But it would be years before another heavy carrier joined the fleet.

“Doctor Russell and his team will accompany you,” the Prime Minister said. “If negotiations fail, or simply don’t get off the ground, you may need them.”

Ted felt sick. The whole concept of biological weapons was obscene. It was the sort of nightmare the Royal Navy was meant to stop, not seriously consider deploying. And yet, even putting morality aside, was there any guarantee the weapons would spread to the entire alien population? Ted rather doubted it. Humanity had dozens of settled worlds; the aliens, if their records were to be believed, had more. They’d slaughter one planet’s population, but the remainder of the alien race would survive… and know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that humanity had tried to exterminate them.

“Yes, Prime Minister,” he said. If nothing else, he could make sure that Russell and his team didn’t do anything stupid — or anything likely to make the war worse than it already was. “I won’t let you down.”

The Prime Minister nodded. “You have another appointment, Admiral,” he said. He rose to his feet, signalling the end of the meeting. “The King wishes to speak with you — both of you.”

Ted winced, feeling Janelle’s sudden apprehension. Some bastard in the crew — and Ted intended to keelhaul the blighter when he figured out who — had leaked the news of her relationship with Prince Henry to the media. And some other bastard in the media had spread it far and wide, perhaps calculating the British public needed a diversion after the alien attack had devastated large parts of the country. It was thoroughly absurd, all the more so with millions dead and millions more lost without trace, but the media had still tried to lay siege to Ark Royal anyway. The only explanation that made at least some sense was that the reporters were trying to pretend that everything was normal.

Idiots , he thought, as the room rapidly emptied. Nothing will ever be normal again .

“Yes, Prime Minister,” he said. It wasn’t as if they could decline an invitation from the King, no matter how much his young aide would have preferred to avoid it. “It will be our pleasure.”

The Prime Minister smiled tiredly, perhaps recognising the lie. “Good luck, Admiral,” he said. His voice was utterly tired, tired and depressed. He’d been in charge during the greatest disaster to hit Britain, ever. No matter how many decisions he made, the ultimate resolution wouldn’t come from his office. “We need to end this, as quickly as possible. Whatever we have to do…”

Ted nodded, understanding the Prime Minister’s dilemma. Peace with the aliens would come at a price, of that he was sure. And the aliens — or Faction One, at least — had never shown any interest in talking . Biological warheads might be the only way to force the aliens to the peace table… or at least ensure that humanity remained alive to mourn the genocide that had been wrought in its name. He knew that to be true…

But he didn’t like it. And he hoped he never would.

One of the curses of being born into the Royal Family, Prince Henry had decided long ago, was that one was expected to visit other countries and pretend to like them. It wasn’t so bad when visiting a modern country like America or France, but a less-developed or traditionalist country could be an uncomfortable place to visit. He still had nightmares about the water houses in Malaysia, where there had been no air conditioning, or the tents in Southern Arabia where his staff had been strictly segregated by sex. And complaining hadn’t been allowed, no matter how uncomfortable or unpleasant it became. It had been one of the many things he’d hated about his life.

But he had to admit it was also good practice for being an alien prisoner.

He lay naked on the uncomfortable bed, staring up at the transparent canopy. Outside, thousands of brightly-coloured fish swam through the water, showing no fear of the aliens or — for that matter — the human in the cell. And it was a cell, he knew, even if there were no locked doors or handcuffs. The only exit involved swimming through murky water and somehow getting up to the surface before he drowned. Henry knew he was a good swimmer, but he would never be as good as the aliens. They drew oxygen directly from the water through their gills.

The cell wasn’t exactly uncomfortable, although the aliens didn’t seem to understand what humans needed to survive and prosper. They hadn’t provided him with any clothes, either out of a misplaced paranoia over what he would do with them or through a simple lack of awareness that humans needed clothes. The aliens never wore clothes, as far as he could tell, at least outside combat situations. Given their biology, it was quite likely they had never developed any form of nudity taboo. Henry had rapidly grown used to being naked in front of his visitors. It helped that they were very definitely not human.

He sat up as water splashed around the entrance, then swung his legs over the side of the bed as an alien clambered up into the compartment. As always, the alien seemed largely uncomfortable in the cell, even though the atmosphere was warm and moist enough to pass for Malaysia. He couldn’t help comparing its movements to a strange mixture of wet dog and wetter seal, before it turned to peer at him with bulging, utterly inhuman eyes. Henry had the feeling that bright light would disorientate the alien — its eyes were designed to see underwater — but there was no way to be sure. He didn’t have anything, apart from his wits.

“Greetings,” the alien said.

Henry rose to his feet and affected a bow. “Greetings,” he replied. “Have we seen each other before?”

“Yes,” the alien said.

There were humans, Henry knew, who would have been offended by the suggestion that every member of a particular ethnic group looked alike. And it was stupid; it was quite easy to tell the difference between two different humans. The only exception to that rule, at least in Henry’s experience, was an asteroid where every single person was a clone of the asteroid’s founder or his wife. But the aliens didn’t seem to care. They all looked alike to him and, no matter what he did, he had never been able to even tell the difference between male and female aliens.

They might have the same problems with us , he told himself.

The alien seemed to flow into a sitting position. “Sit,” it ordered. “Please sit.”

Henry nodded, wondering just where the aliens had learned their English. His best guess was that they had recovered a tutoring console, perhaps from Vera Cruz or one of the other smaller colonies out along the rim of known space. They seemed to have a good grasp on the basic structure of the language, but they had real problems with understanding the differences between requests, commands and warnings. And that, he suspected, was just scratching the surface. It was possible that humans and aliens would never come to understand one another.

He sat cross-legged and faced the alien, wondering just what the alien saw when it looked at a human. A faceless monster, an animal… or another intelligent being? Humans saw monsters when they looked at aliens, Henry knew, although he wasn’t sure how much of that sensation had been dictated by experience. He was looking at a representative of a race that had devastated several worlds, occupied more and taken countless humans as prisoners.