Ark Royal 2: The Nelson Touch (15 page)

“Excellent,” he said.  He felt a dull quiver running through the ship as the main drive came online, ready for departure.  The damaged components from their desperate running battle had been replaced, even though some of the older systems had been completely irreplaceable.  “Then let us hope for a willing foe and sea room.”

***

It was funny, Kurt decided, as he entered his office and shut the hatch firmly behind him, just how much the carrier had become home.  The barracks were far from comfortable, there was very little privacy and he had to keep his affair with Rose under wraps, but it still felt more welcoming than his home on Earth.  But maybe it wasn't surprising.  There was a simplicity, a rightness, about the military life that was missing on Earth.  As an investment banker, he'd been called upon to compromise his morals more than once.  But as CAG, he wasn't required to lie or cheat to keep his job.

The thought made him grit his teeth, remembering just how much he hated his old job, now he'd tasted being a military officer again.  His boss hadn’t been as bad as some – Kurt had heard horror stories about some of the more aggressive bankers out there – but he had insisted that Kurt keep his mouth shut about certain matters.  Maybe he’d meant well, when an honest answer would probably have cost Kurt his job, yet it hadn't felt
right
.  Being in the military was so much simpler than being a civilian.

He winced as he sat down, wondering, once again, what he would do after the war.  As a military officer, he'd been given treatments that would keep him fit and relatively healthy for years to come, but he was damned if he wanted to go back to the bank.  And yet, he would certainly have to support his children, unless they managed to land high-paying jobs for themselves.  Maybe he could find a posting on a civilian interstellar freighter.  Former military officers were often headhunted by interstellar corporations, particularly those with experience of operations in deep space.  And Rose could come with him, if she didn't want to stay in the military.  It was rare for a starfighter pilot to remain in active service longer than five years ...

That may change
, he thought, dryly. 
We all signed up for the duration of war, if war broke out on our watch
.

Bracing himself, he pressed his fingertips against the terminal’s sensor and accessed the mailbox.  Inside, there were a handful of messages from both Percy and Penny ... but nothing at all from Molly.  A message from an unknown address revealed itself to be from Gayle, who seemed to be worried about how the kids were coping with the new situation.  Kurt cursed his lack of foresight – he could have asked the nanny to keep an eye on Molly for him – then scanned the message quickly.  Both of Kurt’s children were worried about how their parents had fought, even though they hadn't been there.  Kurt guessed that Molly had given them her version of the story first.

Carefully, he opened the message from Penny and read it, quickly.  His daughter didn't seem to know what was actually going on, but she did want to see her father again.  Percy seemed a little more perceptive, yet even
he
wasn't sure what was happening.  Kurt nodded in bitter understanding.  Children – even teenagers – were often unaware of emotional undercurrents between their parents, even if they knew about such things in the abstract.  He wondered, absently, if their school had ever discussed separation with them, then pushed the thought to one side.  There was no time to fret over it, not now.  The fleet was due to depart in less than an hour.

He sighed, again.  They were close enough to Earth to hold a conversation, if Molly had wanted to talk to him.  He hesitated, then started to tap in her contact code before stopping himself.  The last thing he wanted was another shouting match, not now.  But what the hell was she thinking?

You wanted to make sure your kids had the best possible schooling
, he thought, coldly.  It wasn't as if he’d disagreed with Molly’s ambitions for her children. 
But, by doing so, you brought her into contact with people who could spend money like water and never miss it
.

He cancelled the call, tiredly.  He’d never really felt
poor
, but then he'd had a good job, beautiful kids and a nice house.  He didn't
need
fancy clothes, luxury food or long holidays somewhere it was always sunny.  But Molly clearly felt otherwise; she’d wanted luxury, even though she’d known she could never have it.  Until she could ...

Or was she simply separated from me a long time ago
?  The thought was a bitter one, but it had to be faced.  Starfighter pilots rarely married while on active service, like most junior crewmen.  Molly had never had to deal with a long enforced separation.  Had she discovered, when he'd been called back to war, that she needed someone in her life?  Or was his paranoia simply getting the better of him.

“Record V-Mail,” he ordered.  There was a chirp from the console as the camera activated, recording the message.  “Molly.

“I don’t want to rehash our argument,” he said, carefully.  It was funny how he could always find the right words to chew out a pilot, but not to talk to his wife.  “But we do need to think about the future.  If you have found someone else, I don’t mind; we’re both old enough, I think, to handle a separation.  I ...”

He hesitated, again.  Should he mention Rose?

“I won’t stand in your way if you want a separation,” he said, deciding it would be better not to give Molly more ammunition.  “But I do worry about the children.  We agreed to raise them together, to bring them up until they became adults, and we must honour that agreement, no matter what we feel about each other.  I know, most of the burden in the past year has fallen on you.  But I still care deeply about them ... and about you.”

But it was a lie, he knew.  He knew he
should
care about Molly, but there was nothing in his heart apart from a cold dead emptiness.  They’d been lovers, they’d built a family together, yet the combination of his absences and the prize money had ripped them apart and forced her into the arms of another man.  Or was he still being paranoid?  Just because he was having an affair didn't mean that his wife was
also
having an affair ...

“We need to be honest with each other,” he said, slowly.  But he wasn't being honest, was he?  “When I return to the solar system, we will sit down somewhere neutral and talk, openly, about the future.  I will make arrangements for you to have some of my salary, to help take care of the kids – and even to take care of yourself.  All I ask in return is that we talk openly and that we don’t hurt the kids.”

But how could it
not
hurt the kids?  Both Penny and Percy were teenagers, never the most stable of people.  They’d both wonder, even if they didn't admit it, if
they
were responsible for separating their parents.  Maybe Molly, as angry as she’d been with him, had already blamed everything on her husband.  Or maybe Gayle had tried to explain parental rows and separations and the kids had picked up completely the wrong idea.  Or ...

“Take care of them,” he concluded.  “And take care of yourself, too.  I ...”

He wanted to say he loved her.  But the words wouldn't form on his tongue.

“I’ll see you when I get back,” he said.  “Goodbye.”

He ended the recording, reviewed it, then transmitted the message to Earth, where it would enter the planetary datanet.  Once it was gone, he recorded messages for both Percy and Penny, telling them to behave and reassuring them that it wasn't their fault.  After a moment, he recorded a message for Gayle too, asking her to keep looking after the kids.  Molly was likely to become unbearable for a while – Kurt remembered her raging when she’d been pregnant for the first time – and Gayle, unlike the kids, could simply leave.  It would be hard to blame her too.

“I’m sorry,” he said, quietly.  “I’m so sorry.”

But there was no way he could change the past, not now.  All he could do was try to steer his way through the coming storm ... and keep his children safe.  That was all that mattered.

***

“All systems report ready, sir,” the helmsman said.

“Thank you,” James said.  He stood on the bridge, looking up at the display.  “Take us out.”

Ark Royal
quivered slightly as her main drives activated, pushing her forward through the inky darkness of space.  James sat down in his command chair and kept an eye on the status display as the starship picked up speed, struggling to keep up with the other five carriers.  As large as they were, their lack of armour give them a higher rate of acceleration than
Ark Royal
could hope to match.  But then, the older carrier might move like a wallowing pig, but she could survive blows that would rip the newer carriers apart.

“All systems are working within acceptable parameters,” Alan Anderson said.  “I’m surprised.”

“I’m not,” James said.  Anderson was hardly a conventional engineer, but there was no one more innovative than him in any space navy.  He’d actually managed to splice an alien drive system into humanity’s control systems and get it to work properly.  After that, ensuring that human-designed components worked together was child’s play.  “You’re brilliant.”

“Thank you, sir,” Anderson said.  “Should I get on with installing the chocolate shower in your quarters now?”

James smirked.  Beside him, Commander Williams looked shocked.  She wasn't used to Anderson’s brand of humour yet.  James had taken some time to get used to it himself.

“Actually, I’d like a Jacuzzi with chocolate pudding,” he said.  “And maybe a large waterbed.”

He chuckled, then sat back in his command chair.  “Keep an eye on the fusion cores,” he said, after a moment.  “I don’t want them deciding to have problems while we’re so far from Earth.”

Chapter Twelve

“Jump,” Fitzwilliam ordered.

Ted braced himself as
Ark Royal’s
Puller Drive activated, jumping her down the gravity tramline to Terra Nova.  There was a faint feeling of unease, then a shock that was beyond description, then nothing at all.  But, on the display, the stars had changed.  They had hopped 10.5 light years in a split second.

“Launch probes,” he ordered.  Terra Nova was supposed to be safe, but the divided world was on the direct route to New Russia.  The aliens would be fools if they didn't have the system under covert observation.  “I want to know if there is
anything
nearby.”

The seconds ticked away as the remaining ships in the fleet came through, one by one, their sensors and weapons already active.  Ted doubted the aliens had managed to get a battlefleet alarmingly close to Earth without being detected, but he had no intention of skimping on tactical precautions.  If nothing else, skimping on precautions was a dangerous habit when the universe was suddenly a great deal less safe than it had been a year ago.  But then, it was quite clear that the aliens had spent years observing humanity.  They’d certainly tailored their attack fleets to match and overwhelm humanity’s active duty ships.

Good thing they didn't take you seriously, old girl
, he thought, rubbing the command chair affectionately. 
Or they would have taken us out too.

“Space appears to be clear,” the sensor officer said, finally.  “No traces of any active starships or spacecraft until the asteroid belt, sir.”

Ted nodded, although he knew not to take that for granted.  A single starship, it’s drives and sensors stepped down to the bare minimum, would be almost completely undetectable.  The aliens could have a ship within a few thousand kilometres of the human fleet, if they were prepared to take the risk of being detected by a radar sweep.  But the odds against detection were still staggeringly high, while the radar sweep would be picked up by passive sensors right across the star system.

“Probably smugglers or illicit miners,” Lopez said.  She sounded more than a little amused at the concept, which made sense.  Her grandfather had grown up on such a colony.  “The system still hasn't managed to sort out mining rights.”

Ted nodded.  The star systems held by the major powers belonged to them, at least once they had assembled the firepower to enforce their claims if necessary.  But Terra Nova, a perpetually divided world, had no unified defence force, let alone an authority that could speak for the entire planet.  There was nothing to stop miners from poking through the asteroid belt for anything interesting, or squatters to set up their own colonies far from the planet’s atmosphere.  But, compared to the growing industry of Sol, Washington or Britannia, the asteroid belt was almost completely undeveloped.  Terra Nova, close enough to Earth to take in hundreds of thousands of prospective settlers, was fast becoming a galactic backwater.

“Send our IFF to the blocking force,” he said.  A handful of frigates, mainly from the smaller powers, had been stationed in the system to watch for any large-scale alien intrusion.  “And copy it to the planet.  We may as well try to avoid a diplomatic incident.”

He settled back in his command chair and reviewed the reports.  All ships had jumped safely, he noted, without any major problems.  Good ... but the real test would come when they tried using the alien-derived systems.  Fortunately, Terra Nova had a tramline that would suffice for their first experiment.  And, with so little development in the system outside the planet itself, there was no real chance of being observed as they tested the tramline.