David Brin: Startide Rising

It watched the Pthaca ship collide at a large fraction of light speed with a barrier that had not been there minutes before.

It was only a diffuse stream of gas particles, drifting in their path. But, unexpected, it met the Pthaca warship's screens like a solid wall. At a fair fraction of light speed, any barrier was deadly.

"Veer off " the Gubru commanded. "Fire all weapons on the quarry!"

Fiery energy lanced out, but the beams stuck an intangible wall between the Gubru and the rapidly turning Earth ship.

"Water!" it shrieked as it read the spectral report. "A barrier of water vapor! A civilized race could not have found such a trick in the Library! A civilized race could not have stooped so low! A civilized race would not have…"

It screamed as the Gubru ship hit a cloud of drifting snowflakes.

Lightened by megatonnes, Streaker screamed about in an arc far tighter than she could have managed minutes before. Her locks closed, and the ship slowly refilled with air. Internal anti-gravity was reapplied. Her spacesuited crewfen flew back to their duty stations from the hull rooms where they had taken refuge.

In the still water-filled bridge, Gillian watched the annihilation of the first two pursuing vessels. The crew cheered as the third battered cruiser swerved desperately, then suffered a malfunction at the last moment, and collided disastrously with the diffuse cloud. It dissolved into a flat ball of plasma.

"The rest of them are still out of sight beyond the gas giant," Gillian said. "After the chase from Kithrup, they'll think they know our dynamic, and never guess we could turn around like this!"

Tsh't looked less certain. "Perhapsss. We did fire off a decoy probe along our old flight path, mimicking our radiation. They may chase it.

"At least I'd be willing to bet they'll come in on a tight and fast hyperbolic-c."

"And we'll pick 'em off as they come!" Gillian felt a little giddy. There was just a chance they might be able to do it cleanly, so cleanly that they might be able to lie low, to wait a little longer for Hikahi and Creideiki. For another miracle.

Streaker groaned as she fought to change direction.

"Suessi says the wall braces are under stresss," Lucky Kaa reported. "He asks if you're going to be turning off stasis again, or pulling any other… uh, he calls them 'wild, crazy, female maneuvers.' His words, sssir!"

Gillian gave no answer. Suessi certainly didn't expect one.

Streaker completed her sharp turn and sped back the way she had come, just as two more battle cruisers came into view around the limb of the gas giant.

"Get 'em, Tsh't," Gillian told the dolphin officer. An outrage she had not allowed to show in weeks of frustration came out in her voice. "Use your own tactics. But get them!"

"Yesss!" Tsh't noted Gillian's balled fists. She felt it too. "Now!"

She whirled and called to the crew.

* Patiently,

We took the insults —

* Patiently,

Evil intent —

* Now we stop,

Patient no longer —

* Dream and logic,

Join in combat!!

The bridge crew cheered. Streaker dove toward the surprised foe.

The voice of the Soro matriarch growled out of the communications web. "Then we are in agreement to stop this chase and join our forces?"

The Tandu Stalker promised itself it would remove two legs, not one, for the shame of making this agreement.

"Yes," it replied. "If we continue in the present manner, we will only erode ourselves down to nothing. You Soro fight well, for vermin. Let us unite and end it."

Krat made it explicit. "We swear by Pact Number One, the oldest and most binding to be found in the Library, to capture the Earthlings together, to extract the information together, and to seek out together the emissaries of our ancestors, to let them be the judges of our dispute."

"Agreed," the Tandu assented. "Now let us finish here and turn about together to seize the prize."

He now understood what humans meant by a "Nantucket sleighride."

Takkata-Jim was tired. He had fled for what seemed like hours. Every time he tried to make the boat drift to one side, so he could surrender to one party, the other side fired salvos between him and his goal, forcing him back.

Then, some time ago, he detected a long chain of ships leaving Kithrup in the other direction. It didn't take much to figure out that Streaker was making her move.

It's over, then, he thought. I tried to do my duty as I saw it, and save my own life at the same time. Now the die is cast. My plan is lost.

I'm lost. There's nothing I can do except, maybe, buy Streaker a few minutes.

Some time ago the two fleets had stopped tearing at each other as they chased him. Takkata-Jim realized they were coming to an agreement.

Suddenly his receiver buzzed with a basic contact code in Galactic One. The message was simple… stop and surrender to the combined Tandu-Soro fleet.

Takkata-Jim, clapped his jaws together. He hadn't a transmitter, so he couldn't respond. But if he stopped dead in space they would probably take that as a surrender.

He delayed until the message had been repeated three times. Then he began decreasing speed… but slowly. Very slowly, drawing out the time.

When the Galactics had drawn close, and their threats began to sound final, Takkata-Jim sighed and turned the longboat's fire-control computers back on.

The boat bucked as small missiles leaped away. He applied full thrust again.

When both flotillas simultaneously fired volleys of missiles at him, he tried to evade, of course. It would be unsporting to give up.

But he didn't have the heart for a major effort. Instead, while he waited, he worked on a poem.

* The saddest of things

To a dolphin — even me—

Is to die alone… *

The ambush at the gas giant was unexpected. The enemy came in close, using the great planet's gravity to swing about in a tight hyperbolic turn. They were unprepared for an attack on their flanks.

Compared with their breakneck dive, Streaker was almost motionless. She fell upon the pair of cruisers as they passed, lacing a web-like tracery of antimatter in their paths.

One of the battleships blossomed into a fireball before Streaker's computers could even identify it. Its screens were probably already damaged after weeks of battle.

The other cruiser was in better shape. Its screens flashed an ominous violet, and thin lines of exploding metal brightened its hull. But it passed through the trap and began decelerating furiously.

"It'll misss our mines, worse luck," Tsh't announced. "There wasn't time to lay a perfect pattern."

"We can't have everything," Gillian replied. "You handled that brilliantly. He'll be some time getting back to us." Tsh't peered at the screen and listened to her neural link. "He may be very tardy, if his engines keep missssing. He's on a collision spiral with the planet!"

"Goody. Let's leave him and see about the others."

Streaker's motion was taking her away from the giant planet, toward another group of five onrushing cruisers. Having witnessed part of the ambush, these were all adjusting course furiously.

"Now we see how well the Trojan Seahorse works," Gillian said. "The first bunch was close enough to read our engines and know we're Earth-made. But these guys were too far back. Has Suessi altered our power output along Thennanin lines, as planned?"

Wattaceti whistled confirmation. "It's done. Suesssi says it'll cut efficiency, though. He reminds you that our engines aren't Thennanin."

"Thank him for me. Now, for all our lives, what happens next depends on whether they're an unimaginative lot, as Tom guessed they'd be.