Ian Douglas - Deep Time

Admiral Eugene Armitage, the head of the Joint Chiefs, grinned at him. “But we did get the bastard, Mr. President.”

“Yes,” Koenig said, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. “We got him.”

Whitney nodded. “There’s more, Mr. President. You might have missed it, but they just flashed the word back. They’ve captured Denoix as well, trying to leave the perimeter by air car.”

Koenig smiled. His chief of staff was scolding him, mildly, by letting him know that the information he’d wanted had come through to the command post just as quickly as Koenig could have gotten it from a direct link. “Outstanding, Marcus.” He glanced at Armitage. “Admiral?” he said. “Please flash Meteor a ‘well done’ from me, personally.”

Armitage nodded. “As you wish, Mr. President.”

“There’s … ah … there is still one part unresolved, sir,” Whitney told him.

“The recovery, yes. I assume you have the heavy transports on the way.”

“Yes, sir. But it’s not that.”

“What, then?”

“Eight Todtadlers launched a few minutes ago from a site in southern Turkey … a city called Adana.”

“Adana? What do they have there?”

“It’s one of Turkey’s larger cities, sir … and the site of a small spaceport. Incirlik.”

Koenig nodded as data flowed through his in-head. “Got it.”

Once, Incirlik had been a joint U.S. and Turkish military air base, back in the days of the old NATO alliance. After the mid-2100s and the beginnings of the Pax Confeoderata, the facilities had been developed as a local spaceport for Pan-Europe’s burgeoning asteroid mining initiatives. Turkey, geographically astride both Europe and Asia, had been an ideal region for economic development after both the Islamic Wars and the more recent Sino-Western Wars.

But the rise of the space elevators—first at SupraQuito, then in Kenya and in Singapore—had perhaps already doomed such antiquated assets as national spaceports. There wasn’t much at Incirlik now, save for a small military base.

But why were they attacking the USNA fighters in LEO?

For a moment, Koenig watched the data flow describing the slash and stab of aerospace fighters in low orbit. That why was becoming an increasingly important question. With the fighting at the Verdun planetary defense center all but over, there was no reason to challenge American space superiority, none at all.

Unless …

He called up a holographic map display, the board hanging transparent in midair showing the orbit of America ’s space superiority fighters southeast across the Balkans, Turkey, the Arabian Peninsula, and out over the Indian Ocean. A red dot flashed at the northeastern corner of the Med, marking Incirlik. Four of America ’s fighters had just shot down the last of the Todtadlers from the base; four more USNA Starblades were four thousand kilometers ahead … coming up now on the southern tip of India.

“A second launch, Mr. President,” Armitage reported. “More Death Eagles.”

“How many?”

“Five, sir. No … make that six …”

“From where?”

“Surat, Mr. President. North India.”

“Curiouser and curiouser,” Koenig said, thoughtful. Surat was a large city on India’s northwestern coast, next to the Gulf of Khambhat. “I think those Death Eagles are trying to punch a hole through our orbiting squadron,” Koenig said.

“For what possible purpose, sir?” Whitney asked.

“For an escape. Admiral Armitage?”

“Sir!”

“I suggest you order the Elliot and the Hawes down from their perch for a closer look.”

“Right away, sir.”

The Elliot was a destroyer massing eight thousand tons, the Hawes a smaller frigate, a light escort of about three thousand tons. The two had recently been assigned to America ’s carrier group and were now deployed in HEO—high Earth orbit, about thirty thousand kilometers out.

“Who would be trying to escape, Mr. President?” Whitney asked. “If we have both Denoix and Korosi—”

“Might be members of Korosi’s staff,” Koenig said. “Or it might be the real architects of Columbus.”

“The real architects, Mr. President?” Whitney shook his head. “We already know Korosi was behind that, don’t we?”

“No, Marcus, we don’t. He’s a nasty character, I’ll admit, but the Confederation really didn’t have reason to eat a city, not when they had to take that big of a public-relations hit.”

As Koenig had noted, the attack by the Confederation ship Estremadura —awful as it had been—had done more damage by far to the Confederation than to North America. Nation states that had been sitting on the sidelines of the fast-evolving civil war—the Chinese Hegemony and the Islamic Theocracy, especially—had openly come into the war against the Confederation. Perhaps just as important, members of the Confederation—including Russia, North India, and England—had immediately distanced themselves from the world state, with Russia and North India both seceding from the Geneva government.

But the politics over there were still murky. One of the Confederation ships escorting the Estremadura on her deadly mission, Koenig remembered, had been the North Indian heavy cruiser Brahmaputra . At least some within the North Indian government, clearly, had known about the nature of the attack that had destroyed Columbus … and approved of it. If fighters were coming up from Surat, they might well be piloted by officers still loyal to Korosi, even if New Delhi had disowned the guy since the attack.

And knowing if that was true was crucial. With the takedown of the last major fortress controlled by Korosi forces, Koenig knew it was vital to maintain the momentum; handled properly, Korosi’s capture might end the war.

So the question remained: Who the hell was trying to escape the USNA’s tightening noose?

VFA-96, Black Demons

LEO

0022 hours, TFT

Megan Connor thoughtclicked a symbol, sending two VG-10 Krait missiles streaking toward the last Confederation fighter. At a range of just two hundred kilometers, the missiles detonated in twin flares of dazzling, silent light … and the enemy Todtadler disintegrated in tumbling, half-molten fragments.

Elsewhere in the sky, soft-glowing clouds of expanding hot plasma and debris marked the passings of the other fighters; one had re-entered the atmosphere below, a streak of ablating hull material scratched across the intense blue of the Indian Ocean.

Through her communications link, Connor could hear the chatter among the other pilots in her squadron.

“Nice shot, Five! That’s a kill!”

“The last one! Hot damn, and we didn’t loose a single damned ship!”

That was pretty spectacular, Connor thought. Eight fighters in that first launch out of Turkey … and six more from North India. Fourteen fighters against four of the new Starblades, and every single one of them shot down without a single loss. That was worth a hot damn in anyone’s flight log.

“Hey, Skipper? Demon Six. My scanners weren’t picking up any people in those ships!”

“Copy that, Six. America ’s S-2 concurs. They were all on AI.”

“Shit, why? Aren’t we good enough for them?”

For centuries, the debate had continued to natter back and forth over the need for human pilots in fighter cockpits. Undeniably, artificial intelligences were faster than humans, sharper, more immediately aware, and surer in their assessment of data … but humans seemed to add a degree of creativity and inspired improvisation to the mix. So far, at least, the best tactical advantage seemed to rest with human brains cybernetically wired into AI-controlled spacecraft.