Original Work Future Shock (The Final Countdown meets deep SPAAAAAAAAAAAAACE!)

Chapter Nineteen: TFS John Birmingham, 2308

“It is hard to say how accurate our historical files are at this point,” Rachel said. Her image flickered slightly as she addressed the gathered council of war. “By now, it is at least possible that word has reached Diyang Prime, the homeworld of our enemies, and forced them into rethinking their tactics. However, we believe they will not have been able to make any significant changes to their current – ah, historical – dispositions, not unless events have changed more than we think possible.”

Howard frowned, studying the holographic starchart hovering in front of him. It was the kind of insight into enemy dispositions, military bases and population centres a strategist would kill to enjoy, although – as Rachel had said – the longer they waited the more out of date most of the information would become. The stars and planets themselves couldn’t be moved, but the fleets certainly could be redeployed as the Diyang came to grips with the new situation and tried to take countermeasures.

“We will deploy a scout to check, just to be sure, but assuming history remains broadly accurate the Diyang 2nd Fleet will be mustering here, at Diyang-14,” Rachel continued. “Their original intention was to harass your fleets as they withdrew to Earth, or sweep up colonies you would have been forced to abandon, but in this timeline we suspect their commander will be waiting for all his ships to arrive before going on the offensive. Our intention is to deal with the fleet, preventing the enemy from launching any further strikes on human territory, before moving to Diyang Prime itself.”

Howard felt his frown deepen as he worked out the distances. It would be one hell of a leap … for his squadron. They’d have serious problems reaching their destination and getting back would be even harder, assuming they didn’t have to fight their way in and out of the target system. Rachel, not even a military officer, made it sound as easy as ordering a cup of coffee in a cafeteria. He glanced at Captain Cao Zongying and raised his eyebrows. Boswell had asked him to bring Cao to the future starship, without any explanation. Howard’s best guess was that Boswell was trying to be inclusive. It still didn’t quite make sense.

“That’ll be a long jump,” Admiral Garland said. If he minded being briefed by a civilian, he didn’t show it. “Do you think we can take the risk?”

“Yes.” Boswell spoke for the first time, his tone slightly … off. “We’ll be leaving behind a handful of our ships, with most of our FTL missiles, which should be enough firepower to give even the Diyang pause. It’ll mean shortening the range when we attack Diyang-14, but that is a very minor price to pay for eliminating the threat once and for all.”

Howard eyed him, wondering just what was bothering the future officer. The man seemed … distracted. He put the thought aside for later contemplation as Rachel finished her briefing, then stepped back to allow a uniformed officer to outline the plan of attack. It was almost brutally simple, Howard noted, and there were few places for the guests to suggest improvements. Perhaps that was a mistake, Howard noted coldly. Admiral Garland was a reasonable man and yet he wouldn’t be happy with an attack plan forced down his throat with no input from him, no matter how brilliant it was. He made a mental note to raise the issue with Boswell later, once the discussions were over.

Admiral Garland looked at his peers. “We’ll need to clear the operation with our superiors,” he said, “and lay the groundwork properly, but it should be doable.”

Howard heard the concern in his voice and nodded. The plan seemed simple to Boswell – perhaps it was, with his advanced technology – but they were going to run up against some pretty hard limits of contemporary starships. Sustaining an offensive so many light-years from Earth was going to be a pain in the butt, without the purpose-built logistics ships that were supposed to come off the slips in a year or so … that had come off the slips, in the shadowy alternate history. He made a mental note to raise that issue too, when he had a chance. Boswell was just too used to his ships and didn’t quite grasp the limitations his ancestors had faced. Hell, he’d faced them in the other world.

“Thank you,” Boswell said. There was a faint edge to his voice. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to discuss the precise details with Captains Anderson and Cao while you raise the issue with your superiors.”

Howard exchanged looks with Cao. Something was definitely up. Admiral Garland had picked up on it too, from the brief glance he shot Howard. The unspoken orders were very clear. Find out what’s happening. Report back.

“Of course,” Admiral Garland said. Howard could hear the sudden ice in his tone. Could Boswell? The future captain was still a mystery in so many ways, the product of a society so different it was hard to tell just what motives truly drove him. “We’ll speak to you later.”

Boswell nodded, then motioned for Howard and Cao to follow him into the next compartment. “I apologise for asking you here in such a manner,” he said, as soon as the hatch had closed behind them. “I wouldn’t have done it if it hadn’t been urgent.”

Howard frowned. The admiral wasn’t going to be pleased. None of the officers would be pleased. Boswell might not have known it, but he’d blown hell out of just about every system of military etiquette on contemporary Earth. Boswell and his peers were less formal than their USN counterparts, he’d noted, yet they did have a certain understanding of the chain of command and military discipline …

“It isn’t unknown for things to pop up urgently,” Howard said, finally. “An advancing alien fleet, for one thing.”

“Or a future fleet.” Boswell smiled, although there was very little humour in it. “This … is something else.”

He paused, clearly considering what to say. “As part of the treaty, we are handing over a sizable chunk of near-future data – historical records – to your governments. This raises concerns about pre-crime ... if someone committed a crime in 2310, for example, but hasn’t actually committed it yet. Should we name them, even though they’re not yet guilty? Or should we say nothing and hope for the best?”

“I think that decision needs to be taken by someone well above my pay grade,” Howard said, glancing at Cao. The Chinese Navy officer hadn’t said anything. “Why …”

“Historically, the war against the Diyang was won – will be won – in four years,” Boswell said. calmly. “The war spurred economic and technical development, as well as encouraging the development of new colonies in previously-unknown star systems. Unfortunately, this also encouraged the governments on Earth to tighten their grip, much as the corporations did during the first Rock Wars. The result was inevitable. Rebellions and revolutions, some systems managing to gain independence and others getting better – or worse – terms from their parent countries. It was a long and bloody period that changed the human race forever.”

Howard had a nasty feeling he knew where the story was going. “And?”

“And you,” Boswell said as he looked at Cao, “will lead a revolt against the Chinese Government.”

Cao’s face froze. “Sir?”

Howard felt sick. America had her problems, but China was far – far – worse. The entire country resembled an insect colony, with the population kept under constant surveillance and dissidents removed – unpersoned – before they could contaminate the rest of the country with their ideas of a better way to live. The elite lived like princes, the rest struggled to survive … there was a little social mobility, true, but not enough. The analysts had been predicting collapse within decades. So far, they’d been wrong.

“These are the files,” Howard said. He held out a simple datapad. “We cannot edit the documents too far. They’ll spot some missing details and demand answers, which we won’t be able to offer without admitting we broke the treaty. If we name you, and we must …”

He paused. “We decided to offer you, and the others like you, asylum. If you don’t want to return home, we will be happy to give you a home here.”

Howard tried not to wince. There was no way this was going to end well.

Cao stared at the datapad as if it were a poisonous snake. “How long do I have to decide?”

“I’d suggest deciding quickly,” Boswell said. “The first datapacket needs to be delivered today.”

“I’ll read the files … we’ll read the files,” Cao said. “And then let you know.”

“Use the terminal to call me, when you are ready,” Boswell said. He passed a second datapad to Howard. “And … for what it’s worth, I’m genuinely sorry.”

Howard believed him. He didn’t think it was any use. His alternate self had been a war hero. Cao’s was a traitor. Howard didn’t believe the Chinese Government would leave Cao alive, certainly not outside a work camp, once they knew what he’d done. Would do. It wasn’t fair and it wasn’t right and …

He scanned the brief summery quickly, then dug into the files themselves. If anything, Boswell had underestimated the case. Cao was going to lead a major revolt that tore a vitally important star system out of Chinese hands, setting off a series of falling political dominos that would culminate in the collapse of the entire regime. There was no way in hell the Chinese Government would leave him alive. Not now. Horror washed through him as he realised how many other names there might be in the files, ticking time bombs just waiting to explode. He’d seen his own file, his own shadowy future that would never be. What about everyone else’s file.

“You should stay,” he said, quietly. The Chinese government would be pissed, naturally, but they’d signed the treaty. The future folk had the right to offer asylum to anyone they liked. “Take asylum. Stay here. Stay safe.”

“I have a family,” Cao said, quietly.

Howard winced. Of course Cao had a family. The Chinese Government mandated marriage for naval officers, arranging them to entrap promising young men in a web of obligations that could easily turn into a stranglehold if the youngster stepped out of line. Cao might love his wife and children, or he might resent her mere existence, yet … he couldn’t leave them behind. Howard had heard the horror stories, they all had. The wives and children of deserters received the punishment their husband and father would have received, if he’d taken it like a man.

“You don’t deserve it,” Howard snapped. “You haven’t done anything yet!”

He tasted bile in his throat. Would he strangle six-year-old Adolf Hitler? Would he snap the neck of five-year-old Osama Bin Laden? Would he kick Sir Travis Mortimer off a cliff? The man had come very close to death as a youngster, if he recalled his history correctly, and it wouldn’t take much for the man to meet his doom before committing any of his ghastly crimes. Would he kill someone who would grow up to be a great villain? They’d be children! They’d be innocent!

Hitler killed millions of people, his thoughts pointed out. Surely its worth getting a little blood on your hands, even the blood of an innocent child, to save those millions?

He looked up. “How do you know it won’t make matters worse?”

Cao made a face. “What do you mean?”

“If you go back home, they’ll kill you,” Howard pointed out. “They’ll purge everyone they can identify in the files as a potential rebel. A climate of hatred and fear will be created, one that will provoke others to rebel in the conviction they will be named in the files, sooner or later, or their name will be inserted by one of their enemies. You might do China a final service by leaving.”

“At the cost of my family,” Cao snapped. “And the state I swore to serve.”

Howard flushed. Cao was right. His family didn’t deserve to suffer.

“And if I go back, I can try to convince the government not to crack down,” Cao added, tapping the datapad. “If we can prevent the mistakes of the last timeline, the original timeline ...”

“If.” Howard met his eyes. “My government wasn’t very happy about any of this. Do you think yours will be any happier?”

“I have to try,” Cao said. “If I go face the government, my family will be spared.”

Howard hoped to hell that was true. Dictatorial governments rarely cared to spare the relatives of anyone convicted of crimes against the state and he doubted it would be any different here, even if the crimes hadn’t been committed. Not yet. It was just … he scowled as he stared down at the datapad. Cao was a good man. He’d done well during the hasty preparations for departure and deployment, and he would have gone on to do well during the battle … the battle that had never taken place. And then he’d turned into a traitor. Or a freedom fighter. It rather depended on who won the war.

“Good luck,” he said. “If you change your mind …”

Cao tapped the terminal. Boswell returned moments later.

“I’ll be returning to China, and taking the files with me,” Cao said. “If I can talk to them …”

Boswell met his eyes, evenly. “Are you certain?”

He doesn’t get it, Howard thought, numbly. He doesn’t realise Cao is going to his death.

“Yes,” Cao said. “Can you arrange transport back to my ship?”

Howard bit his lip to keep from saying something – anything. Cao didn’t deserve to die. He didn’t! But he was insistent on walking to his death in the hope it would save his family … the hell of it, he supposed, was that Howard could hardly blame him. If he’d been married with children, he would have done everything in his power to save them from certain death. How could he condemn Cao for doing what he would have done, if things had been different? How could he?

Fuck, he thought, as an officer appeared at the hatch. If we had never met these fucking ships …

He looked at the datapad, trying not to feel guilty as Boswell handed Cao over to a younger officer. How many other surprises were lurking in the datapad? The question nagged at his mind time and time again, a mocking reminder that something could go wrong – seemingly randomly – at any moment. What might blow up his future – his new future – at any point? How many of his officers and crew were going to lose everything, because of something they hadn’t done? Not yet. Perhaps not ever. History had already changed and now it had changed again and …

Howard swallowed, hard. He could take the datapad and tap in dozens, perhaps hundreds, of names. His brothers and sisters, his officers and crew, politicians and celebrities and … he shook his head. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know. How could he look someone in the eye knowing they’d committed a terrible crime, ten years in the future … except they hadn’t committed it!

There’s probably a world out there where Adolf Hitler is a hero, he thought, numbly. It was a sickening thought. And who knows how they’d react to our Hitler?

Boswell rejoined him. “I’m sorry about the delay.”

“You do realise you’ve sent him to his death?” Howard tried and failed to keep the bite out of his tone. “They’re going to kill him!”

“He had the right to choose,” Boswell said. “The others will have the same chance.”

Howard glared at him. “You didn’t have to share that with anyone!”

“We did,” Boswell said. “Access to future knowledge was part of the deal. We couldn’t withhold it …”

“Then deepfake it,” Howard argued. “You have all the computing power you need to put together a convincing fake …”

“And when they get clear proof we’re being dishonest, and they will, what’ll happen then?” Boswell shook his head. “We gave him the best chance we could. And he might just convince his government to listen.”

Howard snorted. “The Chinese Government is easily the most fascist system in history,” he said, tiredly. “They’re not going to change …”

“Even if they know their system is doomed?” Boswell met his eyes. “We let him take all the data with him …”

“They’re not going to change,” Howard said. “Authoritarians never do. They’ll do everything they can, save for giving up one little fragment of power. They won’t give their people any freedom … fuck! They’re probably going to cripple their fucking military with political commissioners, after this display of future independence! I … I wish I’d never found your ships!”

Boswell said nothing for a long moment, then stood. “I understand that you are upset …”

“Really.”

“Yes.” Boswell leaned forward. “I could tell you that our arrival saved countless lives – and it did. I could tell you that our arrival gives humanity a fighting chance against the Killers – and it does. I could tell you many things, but …”

“You have the power to smash the Chinese Government,” Howard interrupted. “Why don’t you?”

“Because we don’t have the firepower to do it without inflicting millions of casualties,” Boswell said. “Nor do we have the groundpounders needed to occupy China afterwards. Given time, China will reform. As will the rest of the world.”

“History has already changed,” Howard snapped. “There’s nothing determined about the course of the future, is there? For all you know, you might have ensued the survival of the Chinese Government instead!”

“I doubt it.” Boswell leaned back in his chair. “They never adapted. That was the core of their problem. They never adapted. And that won’t change even with knowledge of the future.”

“Really?”

“Yes,” Boswell said. “Like you said, they’d have to give up power. And that’s the one thing they can’t give up.”

 

Chapter Twenty: HMS Vendetta, 2308

“They’re very much like us, aren’t they?”

Y’Opohan allowed himself a toothy smile as he studied the data his crews had hacked from the planetary datanet, a system so creaky he had no idea why anyone thought it was remotely secure. There were so many gaps in the system, so many ways to get in and extract information without being detected, that his intelligent staff had an embarrassment of riches. They’d downloaded thousands upon thousands of files, from open-access history records to top secret government archives, so many that even the most advanced analysis software at his disposal was completely overwhelmed. He’d kept the crew downloading anyway, piling up vast amounts of data that would have to be sorted or discarded a few years down the line. It was only a matter of time before Captain Boswell managed to get the locals to tighten up their data security, perhaps even reinforce it with modern technology. Unless he was pillaging the local datacores too …

He felt his smile grow wider as he studied the files. The contemporary humans weren’t the self-righteous humans he knew, but beings little different from the Zargana Empire. They dressed it up differently, he noted, yet at base their attitude was practically identical. The mighty had the right to do as they pleased, because they were mighty; the weak bent the knee, serving their superiors without complaint. Earth was smaller than Zargana Prime, he observed, but the basic principle was still the same. The Great Powers bullied and exploited the smaller powers mercilessly, placing their interests ahead of any abstract principles; the weaker powers fumed helplessly, even as they made concession after concession at gunpoint. The Great Powers had no qualms about punitive strikes, if the weaker powers tried to object. It was astonishing how reasonable local rulers became when they realised they could be smashed flat from orbit and they had absolutely no way of resisting.

Hypocrites, he thought. Dealing with the Terran Federation was an exercise in patience, particularly when the humans started babbling about their moral superiority over just about everyone else. They were so self-righteous about their principles that they forgot the first rule of existence, there were no rules. The universe was red in tooth and claw. You were either strong enough to defend yourself or you were weak, targeted by everyone strong enough to take whatever you had and keep it for themselves. You could be the victim or the victimiser and if you happened to be the latter … you were at everyone’s mercy. You grew from this poisoned soil and yet you have the nerve to lecture us?

His lips twisted into an expression that would make most humans, and even his own crew, back away in a hurry. The contemporary humans were, in many ways, worse than his own ancestors, even by his standards. They prayed on their own people, without the obligations that came with being the lords and masters of everything they surveyed; they drowned themselves in poison, practiced sexual perversions that would have – presumably did – disgust even the notoriously libertine Terran Federation. What did Boswell make of it all, Y’Opohan wondered, as he gazed down from his cruiser onto the cesspit that had given birth to the human race? Did he ask himself if he’d done the right thing, in making contact with the locals? Or did he think he should have vanished into deep space and let history remain on course?

I suppose I’ll never know, Y’Opohan thought, coldly. It was beyond him to feel any sort of sympathy for a human, but still … History has already been derailed beyond any hope of repair.

His claws flexed. If he’d been in charge of the fleet, there would have been no hesitation. The nine human starships were more than powerful enough to overwhelm the local fleets, even if they were grossly outnumbered. Kill a few battleships – the lumbering designs would be heading to the scrapheap sooner rather than later – carry out a few demonstration strikes against particularly unpleasant local governments and take over, hammering out a modern tech base while ruthlessly eradicating anyone who dared to get in his way. The Diyang wouldn’t be a problem, not with the right mindset. A handful of long-range ballistic projectiles would deal with them once and for all, once slammed into their planets at a respectable fraction of the speed of light. Or a tailored bioweapon. It was a dishonourable way of war, even by the standards of a species that believed the only true honour lay in victory no matter how it was achieved, but he had few qualms about using such methods. The Diyang were doomed, one way or the other. The sooner they were destroyed the better.

But Boswell was too soft to do what must be done.

Y’Opohan did not pretend to understand it. Boswell commanded the nine most advanced starships in the system, making him the most powerful person for hundreds of light years. Sure, technically, some of the ships weren’t warships, but the technical disparity ensured it didn’t matter. A modern civilian tool could be a devastating weapon in primitive hands. The survey ships might have light weapons, compared to the warships, but they could still take on the heaviest local warships and win effortlessly. Boswell could take over – and he really should. It wasn’t easy to make head or tail of the local government, let alone the media – thousands of channels, broadcasting speculation rather than hard data – but it was clear change was going to come slowly, if at all. Boswell could fix the problems in a moment, if he took over. And yet he was bargaining for a worthless world rather than taking the entire system for himself.

It might give them their only hope of survival, once we reach the homeworld, Y’Opohan thought, coldly. Boswell may have more advanced technology, perhaps, but the empire has far more ships and more advanced ones that the local humans. And the longer he refrains from taking direct control of the system, the better for us.

He lifted his gaze and studied the handful of Federation Navy starships. They represented the only real threat to his people right now and they’d have to be disabled, or destroyed, if he was to make it clear. John Birmingham would be difficult to handle alone and she had five destroyers backing her up, with enough firepower to give Vendetta a very hard time. The humans preferred not to craft specialised warships – their cruisers were designed to handle everything from combat to rescue and relief missions – but he knew from experience their ships were not to be underestimated. Simply leaving Sol and running wasn’t an option. He had to make sure John Birmingham couldn’t come after him either.

Boswell himself might not understand the threat, Y’Opohan told himself. But the local humans very definitely will.

His smile widened, once again. The Federation Navy was too used to thinking of itself as the most powerful force in the galaxy. The survivors still did, even after the Killers. They were immensely rich men who hadn’t come to terms with being poor, who hadn’t quite realised they no longer had unlimited credit and bank accounts that could never be emptied, no matter how much they spent. The attack plan Boswell had drawn up made perfect sense, for a modern fleet, but the locals could no more carry it out than a brigade of crawler-mounted cavalry could charge into the teeth of plasma gun fire and expect to come out alive. One might as well order a wet-navy submarine to surface somewhere in the middle of a continent, miles and miles from the sea. It wasn’t going to happen …

Officer D’Holin twitched, drawing his attention back to her. She was still kneeling in a pose of supplication, waiting respectfully for her superior to speak … except she was showing traces of irritation, hints she wasn't quite happy holding her posture. Another thing she’d drawn from the humans, she and everyone else like her. They thought they could abandon the poses of proper respect and submission, that a society didn’t need lessers to prostrate themselves in front of their betters. Fools. Proper respect was the basis of civilisation. She would change her mind once she was in charge herself, he was sure. She’d hardly be the first liberal-minded officer to become a conservative when she found herself reaping the rewards.

Not that she will, Y’Opohan told himself, with a flash of pride. She’d be removed from her post once they reached the empire, reassigned to the motherhood nests where she’d raise the next generation of children. It was for her own good. She’d be far happier as a mother and child attendant and his ship would run smoother without a handful of fertile females on the command deck. She’ll be back in her proper place before too long.

“You may speak,” he said. His nostrils twitched, picking up subtle changes in her scent. She should be entering mating season shortly, but the drugs she’d taken to reduce her cycles ensured she wouldn’t go all the way into heat until the chemicals passed out of her bloodstream. Another unnatural human invention, a trick sold to his people in the guise of helping them. He felt his claws flex again and didn’t bother to try to hide it. The reduced scent irritated him. He’d be in a bad mood until it faded. “Have you located possible allies?”

“Yes, My Lord.” D’Holin didn’t raise her head from the deck. She knew better. “I believe that all of the local nations will be willing to work with us, if given the right incentive.”

Y’Opohan suspected she was right. His own people had been quite willing to sell each other out for even the slightest advantage, back before the First Emperor had united the Zargana under his banner and led them out to conquer the universe, and he saw no reason to think the local humans would be any different. Boswell’s reports – uploaded to the fleet datanet, allowing him to read them – had noted that every major power and a number of minor nations had tried to make private deals with the Federation … unsuccessfully. Or so Boswell had said, probably truthfully. The man didn’t have the imagination to realise he could make himself the Emperor of Man …

His jaws lolled open. And it would all be for their own good!

It wasn’t really funny. Humans needed complex justifications to convince themselves they were doing the right thing and taking over the planet for its own good was an excellent justification. It might be nonsensical by his standards, but …

I have to act fast, he thought. Given time, Boswell will realise what he can do or he’ll be replaced by someone else, someone with fewer scruples and more flexibility.

“We have applied to visit their world, have we not?” Y’Opohan had read the reports very carefully. Boswell had been in a place where he could be approached, without making it obvious, and if he happened to be in a similar place … “I’ll speak to their officials about allowing my crew shore leave, somewhere well away from human settlement. And see who approached us.”

“Yes, My Lord.”

“And continue downloading as much information as you can,” Y’Opohan continued. “I want to know everything about our possible allies, before the time comes to leave the humans behind. Go.”

D’Holin pressed her head against the deck, then crawled backwards out of the compartment. The last traces of her scent wafted against Y’Opohan’s nostrils, a reminder of the human innovations that had changed his society … they’d be gone shortly, he promised himself, as the hatch hissed closed behind her. The galaxy wouldn’t be dominated by the Federation and then murdered by the Killers, but ruled by the Zargana Empire. And he would know power beyond all restraint.

And the local humans will help us, he thought, darkly. He had coin to pay the human nations couldn’t possibly turn down. They won’t be able to stop themselves.

***

D’Holin straightened up as soon as the hatch closed, a surge of bitter anger and humiliation sweeping through her. It was never easy to be a female spacer on a ship commanded by a male, regardless of how many family connections you had, and it was all the worse when you were teetering on the brink of going into heat. The drugs took the edge off, ensuring she wouldn’t start to attract every male in the vicinity, but they left her permanently irritated – and irritable. She didn’t want to think about what might – probably would – happen when she ran out of her supplies. The formula might be in the medical database, or perhaps on one of the human ships, but it wasn’t a given she’d be allowed to obtain it. The conservatives had tried hard to ban the drugs, claiming they were unnatural, and here there was no liberal emperor to guarantee her right to contraception.

She felt another wave of irritation as she turned and made her way through the narrow corridors to her office. The male crewmen glanced at her, their nostrils flaring as they caught her scent … she felt her claws start to flex and controlled them with an effort. She might outrank them, technically, but it was always difficult for a female officer to handle male subordinates. It wasn’t as if her lord and master would back her up. It said a great deal about some of the officers she’d had to deal with, over her career, that Y’Opohan was far from the worst.

But now he has plenty of opportunity to indulge his ambitions, she thought, as she entered the compartment and shut the door. What’ll he do with them?

She sat in her nest and looked down at the latest set of reports without really seeing them. She wasn't blind to the simple fact most conservatives wanted to roll the clock back a few decades, back to a time where everyone knew their place and stayed in it. The humans had changed the empire beyond all hope of repair, when they’d beaten the Zargana in war and then offered support to liberal factions; she knew, beyond all doubt, that she’d have been dispatched to the mating nests, no matter how well connected her family, if the humans hadn’t changed society for the better. If Y’Opohan managed to take the ship to the empire …

But should he?

The question echoed through her mind. She wasn’t blind, either, to just what would happen when the locals humans started advancing in leaps and bounds. The local starships were primitive, puny compared to contemporary Zargana warships, but that would change very quickly. She’d run a handful of projections and concluded that, depending on just what course the humans chose to follow, they could churn out enough modern weapons to defeat the contemporary Zargana in less than five years. The empire wouldn’t stand a chance. They’d be barely able to reach Earth in time to take the offensive …

And would that be a bad thing?

She looked at her claws, unsure of the answer. The idea of permanently being second to the humans, at best, galled her as much as it galled her male superiors. She might have trusted the Federation, but the local humans were very different. They were as brutal and materialistic as her own people, at their worst, without the ties of honour and obligation that had bound her society together for centuries. How long would it be before they started demanding Vendetta be interned, the crew held prisoner until it was too late to save their empire from destruction? She was surprised Boswell hadn’t tried to put his Marine Jarheads on the alien ship. If she’d been in his place, she would have demanded it at once. Or simply opened fire from point-blank range.

If we do nothing, the humans rule the universe, she thought. But if we make it clear …

She didn’t want to think about it. She’d been lucky to grow up in an era where she’d had opportunities denied to her mother and grandmothers. She knew there were officers in the crew – male officers – who had opportunities their ancestors had lacked, through lack of connections or simply being born in the wrong caste. They would be in for a surprise, she reflected, if they came face to face with the realities of the current era. There was no guarantee they’d be welcomed in a society where their caste markings identified them as lower-class servitors, any more than her own scale markings marked her out as an unmated young female. Her scales itched at the thought. She didn’t want to go, not personally, but what was the alternative? She was a patriot. She couldn’t watch the empire slip into permanent subordination …

A flash of dark humour darted through her. Boswell had the same problem, only he had far more firepower and technological resources to draw on. How could he help his people, his local counterparts, while at the same time reforming them? Somehow, she suspected the human would have an easier time of it. The local humans would be tempted by the technological bounty on offer and embrace the ideals of the Federation, while the local Zargana would be much less impressed. And there’d be much less to bribe them with too.

She stared down at her claws, feeling utterly undecided. Betray her people or betray herself? Try to rely on the humans or hope her people could be reformed? She didn’t know what to do. One way lay treason and permanent subordination, the other … her thoughts ran in circles. Perhaps it was the drugs, or perhaps it was the sheer horror of the situation. Whatever she did, it was likely to be wrong.

Her claws flexed. Perhaps it was time to start drawing up some contingency plans of her own.

 

Chapter Twenty-One: Chinese Government Bunker, 2308

It was very quiet in the luxurious conference chamber, miles beneath the ground.

Outsiders, Chairman Tsang reflected, had no real understanding of how the Chinese Government worked. It was an aristocracy and a meritocracy, it was communist and capitalist, it was surprisingly democratic in places and outrightly dictatorial in others … it had evolved, over the years, to adapt to new technology and military realities, and embrace a handful of newcomers who had proved themselves worthy, without every placing itself at risk of being overthrow by the people. The different factions within the government – the bureaucracy, the military, the corporations – were an aristocracy in all but name, making private deals and agreements before the final decision was presented to the public as unanimous agreement. There were disputes and disagreements, from the simple to the complex, but they were never shown to the people. They might start getting ideas.

He felt trapped, not for the first time, as he looked around the table. He lived a life of incredible luxury, as far removed from the experience of the average peasant as Terra Nova was from Earth, yet he was both one of the most powerful men in China and a prisoner of his office. He had spent most of his adult life scrambling for power, working his way to the very top through a combination of hard work, family connections and a complete lack of scruples, but now he had it he was trapped. There was no way to climb down and spend more time with his family, no way to go into retirement. He would be on the committee until the day he died. In hindsight, perhaps he would have been wiser to avoid the climb. He’d been born into a wealthy and powerful family. It would have been easy to step out of the political power game before anyone saw him as anything other than his father’s son.

You were born to a family that sheltered you and demanded, in exchange, that you fight for it, he told himself, severely. And you cannot shun your obligations to the family any more than a peasant can abandon his plot.

The thought made him scowl. Most scions of the aristocracy never saw the world outside their private and heavily guarded communities. Even if they travelled to America or Europe to study, where they met foreigners under tightly-controlled supervision, they had no idea what it was like to grow up outside the aristocracy. Tsang did. His father, a man who had been cold-faced in public and surprisingly warm to his firstborn son in private, had made sure he’d seen what it was like to live outside the gates. Towering skyscrapers, each with thousands of occupants; tiny farms, run by peasant families trying to eke out a living from dying land, and giant mega-plantations owned and operated by corporations that treated their workers as slaves; schools that picked out the best and brightest and sent them for education elsewhere, while giving the rest just enough education to make themselves useful to their masters …

And the ever-present surveillance. There were cameras and drones everywhere, leaving little true privacy even in the home. No one could do anything in the cities without it being noted and logged, from dropping a piece of litter to trying to assemble to protest their living conditions or demand political reform. The few who tried found themselves quietly rounded up and sent to the work-camps, or brain-burned and turned into servants and slaves instead. Perhaps that was why there were constant bouts of mindless violence, he reflected tiredly, from drunken outbursts to once-docile husbands savagely beating their wives to death. They’d tightened their grip to the point it was literally maddening, while taking away all legitimate ways to vent feelings. And there was no way they could dismantle the nightmare they’d created without destroying themselves.

The other committee officials looked back at him. The one thing nearly everyone in the de facto aristocracy agreed upon was that there were to be no more dictators. No one man would ever rule China, his word law right across a vast country with ever-growing holdings scattered across interplanetary and interstellar space. Not again. The Central Committee was powerful, true, but most of their power rested in unity. They didn’t enjoy such power as individuals. He wondered, sourly, what his peers thought. Some were reasonable men, others hard-liners who refused to consider the possibility they might be wrong.

“You’ve all read the report,” he said, once the servants had retreated and the doors were firmly closed. The committee chamber was the one place in the country guaranteed free of outside surveillance. They could speak freely, even informally. “The future is bleak.”

“So they tell us,” Councillor Yin snapped. He’d been the most resistant to believing in aliens, then humans from the future. “They could easily be lying to us.”

“Their history files are too detailed to be intentional deceptions,” Councillor Li said. She was the sole woman on the council, and probably one of the most ruthless. “What we have been able to check has been checked. Our rule has thirty years to run and then … chaos.”

Tsang nodded, feeling the ghostly other history pervading the air. There were going to be revolts and uprisings, first in the colonies and then in China itself, as economic crashes and mass unemployment tore away the veneer of civilisation – and acceptance – and brought on riots too savage for even the secret police to crush. His own fate was written in the history files … it was galling, somehow, to know that his sons had vanished without trace. The only close relative whose fate was recorded was a granddaughter who didn’t even exist yet, a teenage girl who’d sought safety in America. A chill ran down his spine as he remembered the brief outline of her life. That poor girl might be all that was left of his family and she didn’t even exist.

“We act now,” Li said. “We tighten our grip on the colonies, purge all known rebels …”

She went on, demanding harsher and harsher punitive measures against citizens who hadn’t done anything. Not yet. It didn’t matter, she insisted, that most of her proposed victims were children … if they existed at all. Wipe them out now, before it was too late. Tsang shuddered in ill-concealed disgust. He had no qualms about executing rebels, either through firing squad or hard labour, but executing children was likely to start the revolt early. And who knew what would happen then? He recalled the files and felt cold. They’d be lucky if they were merely killed on the spot.

“Or we could try to calm the situation, defuse this time bomb before it is too late,” he said, calmly. “There are steps we could take …”

“At the risk of giving up control,” Yin pointed out. “If we do …”

“We could also lose everything,” Tsang countered. “If we make the wrong decision, here and now, we won’t get a second chance.”

He signed, inwardly. It was the eternal problem. China needed freedom of thought, freedom of ingenuity, even a certain degree of reward for innovators and producers who found newer and better ways to do things, but those very traits could easily become two-edged swords if the freethinkers started asking pointed questions about just why the aristocracy was in power and why the people themselves didn’t get a say. It was much harder to supervise asteroid miners in deep space, no matter how carefully they were monitored, or the computer specialists who were supposed to be maintaining the blocks keeping the population from learning about the outside world. It was astonishing how many commissioners had accidents in the asteroid belt, or how many miners simply went missing …

We need their services, he thought, bitterly. If we don’t clamp down on them, they may desert us; if we clamp down too hard, they’ll rebel against us.

It wasn’t a pleasant thought. The United States and Europe had hobbled themselves, luckily for China, but they were recovering and moving ahead. A controlled economy couldn’t compete with a free economy and China had been having trouble keeping up even before they’d woken up to discover an alien power on the borders and future starships in high orbit. The history records might be ghostly, and he wanted to believe they were faked, but they had the ring of truth. The economy was not going to survive for much longer and once it was gone, social order would go with it. It would be the end.

They may share their tech with us, as promises, he mused. But are we capable of making use of it?

“We need to seize control of the future starships,” Li said, flatly. “If they are in our hands, the rest of the world will be at our mercy.”

Councillor Zhou, the sole councillor with naval experience, leaned forward. “It is unlikely we’ll be able to get troops onto the ships, or that we’ll be able to operate them after taking control.”

“All starships are built with the same technology,” Yin snapped. “We have treaties …”

“Yes,” Zhou agreed. “Treaties signed with our peers. I can take a navcomp out of an American starship and insert it into one of ours and expert it to work. There’s no guarantee we could do the same with a starship hundreds of years in advance of our own, nor that we’d even be able to operate the ships. We might as well expect Zheng He to be able to operate one of our starships.”

“We need to learn, and quickly,” Tsang agreed. China had a long and unpleasant history with advanced ships hovering at her borders. The idea of letting the future starships maintain their superiority was unthinkable. “And we need to take full advantage of the opportunity before us.”

“We can learn, yes,” Li agreed. “But what will it matter if we lose everything?”

Tsang allowed his eyes to move from face to face, trying to gauge opinion. Zhou was the most practical of the council, he thought, and Li could be trusted to be reasonable when her interests weren’t at stake … but they were. They stood to lose everything, no matter what happened. If they made the wrong choice, or even the right one …

“The files are genuine,” he said, calmly. “If history follows its previous path, our rule will come to an end in thirty years. If we crack down hard, we may bring on the chaos earlier than historically. Even if we succeed, we could end up like the Soviet Union. We could kill everything that makes the country work and find ourselves dying a long slow death of a thousand cuts.”

He grimaced. The Soviets had effectively murdered their own economy, through a combination of punishing ingenuity and refusing to reward workers for hard work. If there was no point in working hard, why would they? They hadn’t been able to keep up with their enemies and their system had paid the price. China had the same problem, despite the best efforts of his ancestors, and … according to the history records, it was going to bite them sooner rather than later.

Thirty years, he thought. He felt ghostly hands around his neck. He’d been strangled in the other timeline. Thirty years to save the state, or die with it.

“I propose we take drastic action,” he said. They were desperate. They’d listen to him. Some would object out of habit, rather than conviction. Others would agree without argument. “First, Captain Cao and his fellows will not be purged.”

Li snorted. “They committed treason!”

“Not here. Not yet.” Tsang tried not to show his anger. If you put someone in a place where they were damned if they did and damned if they didn’t, they’d revolt … and when those people were naval officers, a successful mutiny could put the entire country at risk. How many officers wouldn’t believe the story, or see it as inherently unfair, or … start fearing they too might be on the lists. “They haven’t done anything yet.”

“And Captain Cao did his duty rather than seeking asylum,” Zhou added. “That deserves respect.”

“Yes,” Tsang agreed. “First, they will not be purged. We will give them a fair chance to prove themselves once again.”

He went on before Li could object. “Second, we will work to learn as much as we can about the future technology, make contact with future people who can be bribed to supply us with information, and prepare to take steps to neutralise them. We will have little trouble finding others, even in America or Britain, who will have concerns about the effect the newcomers will have on their society. And if we can find allies on the future fleet …”

“There’s always someone,” Zhou agreed.

They shared a dark smile. It was rare, very rare, for anyone to say no to a Chinese aristocrat and very few ever had the chance to say it twice. The aristocrats could have almost anything for the asking, from expensive gifts and drugs to virgin young women – or men. Very little was forbidden to them, which made what was strikingly attractive and desirable even to people old enough to know better. There was a new scandal every year, all hushed up … he had no doubt there’d be people on the future ships who’d want something obscene, something China could provide in exchange for intelligence. It was just a matter of finding them.

“There’s also their alien allies,” Zhou added. “We can reach out to them.”

Tsang nodded. Aliens were, well … alien. He’d read the reports from the makeshift POW camps and they’d been long on anatomical detail and short on anything actually useful. The Diyang didn’t think like humans – he supposed that shouldn’t have been a surprise – and it was hard to predict how they’d act, under different circumstances. The Zargana were a third race … they might have little in common with humans too. They probably did. The files had been surprisingly vague, when it came to discussing that part of the history that would now never happen.

“We will,” he said.

He allowed his voice to rise, addressing the table. “This is the gravest challenge China has ever faced. Make no mistake. We are standing on a knife edge. If we act fast, we risk bringing on the disaster we fear; if we do nothing, we race towards an inevitable end to our endeavours, our power, our very lives. Our society itself is at stake. We must gamble, and take the risk of appearing conciliatory now so that we may prepare to reassert our power before it is too late.”

The words hung in the air. “It is a gamble. But it is one we must take.”

There was a long silence. The councillors were not used to feeling helpless. They weren’t inclined to do nothing, not when their power and position and lives were at stake. The urge to purge and purge again had roared through the chamber before and it would do so again, but if it was allowed free reign the consequences would be disastrous. They were standing on top of a nuclear bomb and their only hope was to disarm it carefully, rather than kicking it in hopes of breaking the detonator. The mere act of kicking it might trigger the explosion. Or worse.

A great many officers and crew died in the Battle of Earth, he reminded himself. Or would have, if the battle had been fought. How many of the dead in that timeline are the disloyal in mine? How many will revolt, if we purge the known rebels, or flee to the future starships and beg for asylum? How many officers will turn on us if they think we’ll kill them first?

“This is our gravest challenge,” he said, again. It was, but China knew how to defeat enemies she couldn’t beat in the field. “But a careful program of preparation can put us in a position to act.”

He leaned forward. “Shall we vote?”

Afterwards, he left the chamber and allowed his bodyguards to escort him back up the shaft to the massive government complex overhead, a palace in all but name. It was a remarkable place to grow up, he reflected, even if he’d been spoilt in a manner he hadn’t fully understood until he’d become a father himself. His children were given a little less freedom than himself and yet … they had no idea how lucky they were, not really. His heart twisted as he walked into his private apartment, his children already lining up to meet him. It looked spontaneous. It wasn’t.

He kept his face blank with an effort, even as his eyes wandered down the row of neatly-dressed boys and girls. They were his ... he wondered, grimly, why history recorded so few of them. It meant … he wanted, suddenly, to get them out of China, but even for him it was practically impossible to move his family overseas. Certainly not on such short notice. His children would face the same fate as himself.

His son stepped forward and hugged him, a nanny gasping in horror as the little boy broke etiquette. She could be fired on the spot for such a breach and she knew it, her long years of service forgotten as the bodyguards marched her to the gate and threw her out. Tsang shook his head at her and hugged his son back, feeling a wave of emotion crashing through him. What would happen to his son … what had happened, in the ghostly other timeline? He didn’t know, but as he held the little boy he promised himself it would not happen again. No matter the cost, he would keep his family safe …

And his country would rise again.

 

Chapter Twenty-Two: UN Compound, 2308

You should not judge people by their appearances, Cassidy Waters told herself, time and time again. You should not judge people by their appearances.

It didn’t help. The alien in front of her, being welcomed and shown into the UN Compound by the Secretary-General, was utterly terrifying. It looked like a humanoid raptor, right down to the mouth full of sharp teeth set in what looked to be a permanent smile and small stubby hands that ended in claws … the eyes, set back in the scaly head, seemed to meet hers for a second, putting her firmly in her place before looking away again. Cassidy had seen predators before – anyone who grew up in New York knew they might have to run at any moment – but the alien made any merely human predator look harmless. It looked like a wolf amongst sheep.

She felt terror curdle in her breast as the alien walked onwards. She had no idea how the Secretary-General could bear being so close to the monster … she had a sudden mental image of the jaws snapping shut on her head and felt sick, before she forced herself to turn away. The alien didn’t seem to notice or care. Why should it? She was just another human … prey. She tried to tell herself she shouldn’t feel that way, that she shouldn’t be afraid of an alien because it looked like a walking nightmare, but some very old instincts were screaming at her. It was time to run.

Her mind refused to calm itself until she was halfway through the security zone, heading to the gate. A handful of future crew and refuges had been granted shore leave and the NYPD had responded by deploying hundreds of policemen to ensure their safety, along with National Guardsmen called up after the first reports of alien contact had turned into warning about interstellar war. She couldn’t help feeling a twinge of bitter rage at how quickly the streets had been made safe, once the political will was there. Why had she and her peers been left to the tender mercies of thugs, rapists, shoplifters and crazies when they could have been swept off the streets at any moment? Why?

“Cassidy,” a voice called. Dan Green, her senior editor … a sallow weak-chinned man who claimed to be a reporter even though he hadn’t penned a single story. He’d been a weak reed – and a weed – when she’d been arrested and it was hard for her to forgive him, even though she understood his fears. “How are you doing?”

Cassidy was tempted to pretend she hadn’t heard him, but it was already too late. “I was invited to watch the ceremony,” she said. “And then follow a tour group around the city.”

“Quite a beast, isn’t it?” Green nodded towards the UN Compound. “What is that thing?”

“Careful,” Cassidy said, dryly. “You could get in trouble for using such dehumanising words.”

Green hesitated, a man who had suddenly realised he’d stepped into some very dangerous waters. “It isn’t human.”

“I’m sure that won’t matter in the slightest, if someone makes a complaint,” Cassidy pointed out, sarcastically. Watching him sweat was worth all the trouble he’d given her when she’d been starting out as a junior reporter. “What’ll happen then?”

“You recall that series about a human family growing up in a land of the dinosaurs?” Green didn’t seem inclined to respond to her question. “It feels like that, doesn’t it?”

Cassidy made a face. The series had been a clunky metaphor for … something, with the humanoid dinosaurs obvious stand-ins for the Chinese – with insultingly stereotypical accents just to drive the point home – and she had never been a fan, even though it had been very popular when she’d been a teenager. She suspected it had something to do with the fur bikinis worn by the teenage daughters, barely legal in even the most liberal states. God knew the storytelling hadn’t been up to par. There were twenty-seven episodes and nineteen had had the same basic plot.

“No,” she said, finally. The dinosaurs had been stupid, bumbling around like clowns in a kid’s show. The very real alien behind her was very different. “It doesn’t feel remotely funny.”

Her legs threatened to buckle. She’d heard the news of alien contact, and she’d seen the POWs on holovid, but this … this was different. It was real. And …

“You’ll drop into the office later today,” Green said, unaware of her feelings. “You have some sponsorship deals to sign.”

“Oh.” Cassidy sighed, inwardly. Funny, really, how she had everything she’d ever wanted after she no longer wanted it. She had a name now, a name and fame and … she wanted to get back into space and go back to work, rather than plastering her face over products in the hope someone would buy them. She’d be surprised if anyone did. “I’ll do what I can.”

“Do,” Green said. “It won’t last forever.”

And then you’ll be back in the gutter, his face added. And then …

“I’ll do what I can,” Cassidy repeated. “See you later.”

She turned and walked away, practically feeling his eyes burning into her back. Green was hardly the worst person she’d worked for – and she’d heard of far worse bosses, in all walks of life – but he got on her nerves. He hadn’t even had to try to pressure her into bed to get on her nerves … lucky for him, she supposed, now she had fame. She could have ratted him out and people would have believed her. Now. And he’d never make it on his own, not like her.

You had luck, her thoughts pointed out. You still don’t know who sent those documents.

Yeah, she answered herself. But does it matter?

***

The Federation prided itself on being clean, their starships and space habitats practically sterile to the point visitors wondered if the inhabitants expected to be performing surgery without warning. Y’Opohan had certainly wondered if the humans thought they would die if they had even a hint of dirt in their homes, back when the universe had made a certain kind of sense. He thought he understood now, as he walked through the local city and entered the massive compound. New York stank so badly even the humans must be able to smell it.

It wasn’t just the city, he noted as he was shown to his quarters. The humans themselves stank, of everything from perfume – disgusting to his nostrils – to human waste and fear, the latter scent swelling every time a human looked at him. They might know his species had a heighten sense of smell, certainly when compared to their human enemies, but did they realise he could actually smell their fear? It was hard to be sure. The files should have told them, if they’d been forwarded, but did they know what it meant? Did they realise they were telling him things he needed to know, just by standing close to him?

“You’ll have a chance to freshen up, before the welcoming dinner, “ the Secretary-General said, quietly. He was nervous and trying hard to hide it. “Do you wish to begin discussions tomorrow?”

Y’Opohan reminded himself not to disconcert the human too much. “That will be fine,” he said, keeping his mouth from lolling open a little too much. “We’re not asking for very much.”

He kept from smiling as the human bowed and retreated, leaving him alone. Boswell hadn’t objected to the mission’s stated objectives, the desire to purchase land on Earth that could be turned into a Zargana colony. Y’Opohan couldn’t tell if Boswell figured the proposal would come to nothing, intended to sabotage it without making it obvious or was genuinely blind to the true purpose of the trip. It wouldn’t be that easy for a man from Boswell’s era to adept to the past – in that, at least, Y’Opohan had an advantage – and it was possible he’d miss things. He also had far too many other problems to distract him.

Remain calm, he told himself. His people knew how to be patient. Let the humans come to you.

It wasn’t long before the first visitor arrived. “Greetings,” he said. He spoke the common human tongue, but with an odd accent that made him a little hard to understand. “I am Ambassador Yung of China. I bid you welcome to Earth.”

“I thank you,” Y’Opohan said. The Chinese had been on his list of potential allies, powerful enough to be worth cultivating – if the downloaded files were accurate – and practical enough not to be overburdened with sentiment. “It is a honour to meet you.”

He tapped one of the devices at his belt. “You may speak freely,” he added. “The privacy bubble will keep out prying eyes and ears.”

“That is good to know,” Yung said. “Are you sure your fellow time-travellers cannot see into the bubble?”

Y’Opohan gave a very human nod. “Their technology is equal to ours,” he said, a statement that wasn’t entirely true. The Federation had been steadily outpacing the Zargana for years. If the Killers hadn’t arrived, the gap might have become impassable within a few decades and the Zargana wouldn’t have been able to catch up. “Their spy probes wouldn’t be able to see into the field without triggering alarms.”

Yung bowed, again. “We understand you wish to purchase land on Earth,” he said. “What are you prepared to offer in return?”

“I understand that you tried to make a private agreement with Commodore Boswell,” Y’Opohan said, instead of answering the question. “Would you be interested in making one with us instead?”

He allowed himself a smile – the human shuddered, through he made a good attempt to hide it – as the verbal sparring began in earnest. The local humans really were like his people … soft living had clearly ruined them, by the time they’d overshadowed the empire and changed it beyond all hope of repair. Boswell couldn’t understand just how badly he’d threatened the contemporary balance of power, nor how desperate the locals would be to set it right. The irony almost made him laugh. The humans had messed with his people, creating the factions that had been threatening a second civil war when the real enemy arrived, and now he was going to do the same to them.

The Chinese want our help, he thought. They might be humans, rather than primitives on a planet that had never advanced beyond basic muskets and swords, but the principle was the same. Give the tribe you wanted in charge advanced weapons, let them hammer their neighbours … making them permanently dependent on weapons they couldn’t make for themselves. Boswell really didn’t understand how badly he’d screwed up … he didn’t even realise he had. And the price for our assistance will be higher than they can possibly imagine.

***

“We did manage to finalise the plan, sir,” Howard said, once he’d been shown into the admiral’s office. “It just needed a little” – a lot – “of modification.”

“I saw.” Admiral Garland was standing at the window, staring over New York. “You heard the news from China?”

Howard nodded. The United States was still debating what to do with the future criminals, the ones who hadn’t – yet – committed their crimes, but China had moved ahead and declared a complete amnesty for pre-crime criminals. It was so astonishingly reasonable that he couldn’t help wondering if it was some kind of trick, even though they’d allowed Captain Cao and his crew to return to their ship. It was just …

“They do seem to have done the right thing, sir,” Howard said. “We could stand to do the same.”

Admiral Garland snorted. “There’s a nine-year-old girl who’s named in the files as someone who’ll grow up to become a paedophile,” he said. “She hasn’t done it yet, of course not, but no one will trust her again. Not now.”

Howard grimaced. “Yes, sir.”

“And a number of prominent politicians have been named and shamed for various kinds of criminal activity, including – again – pre-crime,” the admiral continued. He sounded as though his thoughts were a very long way away. “Their lawyers are already challenging the use of future evidence in court, claiming it is no better than spectral evidence, or that it was gathered illegally and therefore has to be thrown out. My wife is a very busy woman.”

“Your wife, sir?”

“She’s a lawyer,” Admiral Garland said. “She’s dealing with people arguing the future files should be sealed for the protection of the country, by which they mean them.”

“Yes, sir.”

“She also has more time on her hands,” the admiral added. “The files revealed she was cheating on me.”

Howard blinked. “I’m sorry, sir.”

“I guess I wasn’t enough for her,” Admiral Garland said, thoughtfully. “The affair was a complete surprise, when I read my own file. I wasn’t supposed to find out for another five years.”

“Oh.” Howard didn’t know what to say. Bad enough to be cheated on, worse to know you would have remained in ignorance for another five years … he had no idea if it was good or bad news for his superior, or even why the admiral was telling him about the affair. Perhaps on some level he blamed Howard for the revelation, even though it would have come out in the end. “I …”

“I think we’ll be trying to sort out the mess for a long time to come,” Admiral Garland said. He turned away from the window and sat at the desk. “Right now, though, that isn’t a problem. Do you believe the new plan is workable?”

“Yes, sir,” Howard said. “It should work in combat.”

“No battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy,” Admiral Garland reminded him, sharply. “You can’t count on a second future fleet arriving to save your ass again.”

“No, sir,” Howard agreed. “We’ll be carrying out exercises once the plan is approved, to make sure it actually works in combat. If it doesn’t … we can try a few other ideas.”

“Make sure you go through all the possible outcomes,” Admiral Garland said. “And don’t let yourself be caught so far from home.”

Howard nodded. If something happened to the future starships, a sizable percentage of humanity’s combined navies would be trapped, dozens of light-years from home. He had no reason to suspect trouble, but …

“There was a great deal of debate about what to do with you,” Admiral Garland added, after a moment. “Your history record shows you to be a tactical genius. You took on a vastly superior fleet and delayed it long enough for the navies to counterattack, then won a number of later battles against the Diyang, eventually crushing their navy and ending the war. You were also promoted, several times, because your superiors died in combat.”

“Yes, sir.” Howard shivered. There were times when the other timeline seemed close enough to touch and times when it was nothing more than words on a page, no more real than a fantasy story involving witches and wizards. “It …wasn’t me.”

“There’s normally a ceremony for this, but we don’t have time.” Admiral Garland reached into a desk drawer and pulled out a small box, holding it out to Howard. “By the authority of the Multinational Force Command, with the concurrence of the Great Powers, I promote you to Admiral. Congratulations.”

Howard swallowed, hard. “Sir?”

“You’re an Admiral.” Admiral Garland shook the box. “Congratulations.”

“I …” Howard took the box. “Sir, I’m a Captain. I barely spent any time as a de facto Commodore …”

“Didn’t anyone tell you not to look a gift house in the mouth?” Admiral Garland leaned back in his chair. “First, you made contact with the future starships and handled the situation with aplomb. You’ve established a good working relationship with Commodore Boswell and that’s not something to be sneered at, certainly not when maintaining the relationship is important. Second, you took command of a multinational force made up of ships and crews that had never worked together before and melded them into a fighting unit that would have held the line against the Diyang, when they attacked in the other timeline. Third, you were an excellent commanding officer in the other timeline, which speaks well of your promise in this timeline …”

He paused. “And fourth, you’re one of the very few candidates everyone agreed on. You will accept this promotion, Howard, because your country needs you. Your world needs you.”

Howard stared down at the insignia. “I …”

“I understand your qualms, but you are needed,” Admiral Garland said. “Will you accept the promotion? And the position of fleet commander?”

Howard said nothing for a long moment. It felt wrong to be benefiting from his counterpart’s successes, even if they were technically the same person. He knew, too, that his promotion was going to cause one hell of a lot of resentment, no matter his career in either timeline. Men with far longer in grade than himself would complain, loudly, and they wouldn’t be wrong. It would end very badly if he fucked up. And it was quite likely, given how many new technologies were being hastily prepped for introduction into the older ships, that there would be a fuck up.

But it was his duty. “Yes, sir.”

“Very good,” Admiral Garland said. He nodded in approval as Howard pinned the insignia to his uniform. “What are your plans for the evening?”

“I said I’d take Cassidy to dinner, sir,” Howard said. “And then back to the spaceport.”

“There’s no mention of her in the files,” Admiral Garland said. “No trace of her existence. It isn’t suspicious, just sad. She lived and died not too far from here and no one in the far future even knows her name.”

Howard felt cold. “She’ll do better here.”

“She already has,” Admiral Garland said. He stared down at his hands for a long moment. “And that is thanks to you.”

 

Chapter Twenty-Three: USS Grant, 2308

“Welcome back, sir,” Lieutenant Henry Georges said. “Ah … are you still in command of the ship?”

Howard was torn between amusement and annoyance. On one hand, Grant was no longer a suitable billet for him now he'd been promoted; on the other, the Pentagon had yet to assign him a new command or remind him, politely, that as an admiral he had no business commanding a ship while also commanding a squadron, if not an entire fleet. He had no idea if his superiors thought they didn’t need to change anything, because he had technically commanded both the ship and the squadron at the same time, or if the military bureaucracy hadn’t quite caught up with his appointment. There were enough uncertainties around the precise role of an ‘international’ admiral that it was probable nothing had been sorted out yet. He wasn’t going to complain. He intended to remain in command of the ship as long as possible.

“I guess so,” he said, after a moment. “Did you clean the injector tubes and scrub the maintenance passageways?”

“Yes, sir,” Georges said. “I also saw to it the crew had a few days on Luna. They needed it.”

Howard nodded, making a mental note to ensure Georges was promoted himself as quickly as possible. The navy would eventually notice he was holding down two roles and send a replacement, unless there was someone already on the ship who could take command. George was technically too junior for a starship command, but Grant was hardly a fleet carrier and Georges knew her inside and out. Better he took the role than someone with far less experience of the old ship’s quirks.

“I hope the crew had a good time,” he said, as the hatch hissed closed behind him. “Any trouble?”

“Nothing noteworthy, sir,” Georges assured him. “Crewman Collins was arrested for excessive drinking, which is quite an accomplishment on Sin City and Crewwoman Hammond reported back late after going to a hotel with a courtesan and losing track of time. Collins was fined by the local police and cautioned not to do it again, I’ve yelled at Hammond and told her she’ll be in deep shit if she does it again. She’s lucky we weren’t boosting out of orbit.”

“True,” Howard agreed. Reporting back late was a minor issue, if the ship wasn’t going anywhere in a hurry. Being late when the ship was going somewhere was a court martial offense, a career-wrecker unless the unfortunate crewer had a very good excuse. “I hope it was good for morale, if nothing else.”

“It was, sir,” Georges said. “The crew desperately needed a break.”

Howard nodded. The navy had needed time to decide what to do about the future folk, time that his crew had spent cooped up on their ships, first at Titan and then at Earth. It was no surprise that morale had plunged, that incidents that needed the XO’s attention had risen sharply. The crew were used to their cramped conditions, normally, but there was a difference between serving on a warship in an active combat zone and spending time floating around doing nothing. The crew had needed a break from each other … he wondered, suddenly, if Boswell ever had the same problem. John Birmingham sometimes struck him as more of a flying luxury hotel than a warship.

He felt a twinge of sudden unease as they floated through the corridors, back onto the bridge. It looked so crude to him, compared to the futuristic vessels holding station beside the squadron. A handful of futuristic holographic displays sat in the middle of the compartment – they’d borrowed the projector from John Birmingham – reminding him that the rest of his ship was almost painfully primitive by comparison. The lack of gravity alone nagged at him, even though he’d been perfectly used to it only a few short months ago. A chill ran through him, his ghostly other self seeming to stand beside him. History had changed and …

You can’t change the past, he told himself, although he knew it wasn’t true. Not any longer. The cynic in him was sure time travel would be researched extensively, now the human race knew it was possible, until they found a way to make it happen on purpose. You have to learn from it and move on, even if it is a shadowy alternate past that never truly happened.

He took his seat, strapping himself in as he inspected the display. The squadron was gathered around the flagship in a loose formation, one a civilian would probably see as a drunken mess rather than any sort of military display. There was no need to line the ships up neatly, no need to make it look good … it wasn't as if they had a civilian audience. The lone stranger in the formation, TFS Dauntless, didn’t seem to be any more organised than the rest of the ships. His lips quirked. The future officers and men might be mildly military by his standards, as if they were civilian explorers who’d bolted weapons to their ships with little intention of actually using them, but they knew what they were doing. He wondered, idly, how many of his superiors truly understood it. The USN had too many problems with civilians who thought they knew how the navy worked, while being ignorant of their own ignorance, and the future folk often gave off the same vibes.

“Contact the squadron,” he ordered, putting his thoughts aside. “The exercise will begin at 1230 precisely. If any of the ships have any problems, I want to know about them now.”

“Aye, sir.”

Howard waited, watching the display as it updated rapidly. The squadron hadn’t had as much time for refitting as he’d hoped, between the general paranoia about alien attack or uncertainty over the motives of Boswell and his ships, and he was all too aware their limited maintenance would cause all sorts of problems over the next few weeks if the crews didn’t get back on top of it, but there was nothing that could be done about it now. His eyes lingered on Captain Cao’s ship for a long moment, his thoughts torn between relief his friend hadn’t been murdered by his own government and concern about what it meant. He’d read the history records. The Chinese Government had preferred to ride their country down in flames than give up even a smidgeon of power. It was very out of character for them to let a traitor go … even if he hadn’t committed treason yet. Why had they changed their minds?

Either they decided to change course now, to save themselves, or they have something else in mind, he mused. Which one is it?

Georges cleared his throat. “The squadron has checked in, sir,” he said. “There are no reported problems.”

Let’s hope no one is playing games with their reports, Howard thought. The squadron hadn’t worked together long enough for him to be sure his captains wouldn’t. There were too many nationalist officers under his command, officers who would shade their reports to spare their country’s blushes. He understood it better than he cared to admit, at least to anyone other than himself. He wouldn’t want to admit problems to foreigners either. This time, it could get us all killed.

He braced himself. They were about to do something that could get them all killed.

“Signal Dauntless,” he ordered. “Inform her we are ready to begin.”

“Aye, sir.”

A prickle ran down Howard’s spine. It was flatly impossible for starships to jump in formation, let alone bring another ship along with them … no, it had been impossible. The slightest mistake could scatter the squadron across dozens of light years, if they were lucky, or dump them into the heart of a star if they weren’t. The navy had experimented with linking jump drives together in the hopes of solving the problem, but the test starships had never been seen again and further experiments had been forbidden. Clearly, at some point in the future, the problems had been solved. He’d seen the future ships tow his squadron through jumpspace …

“She’s ready, sir,” Georges informed him.

“Signal the OpFor,” Howard said. “Inform them the exercise will begin on schedule.”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said. There was a long pause. “They’re ready, sir.”

Howard blinked, a shock running through him. FTL communications … he caught himself, sharply, before he could rebuke Georges for saying obvious nonsense. They had a hypercom now, one capable of sending signals across interstellar distances … of course they did. He’d expected the reply to come slowly, if at all, but instead …

“Good.” Howard took a breath. He’d been assured it was completely safe, or as safe as military operations ever got. He knew better than to think exercises were completely save even if live weapons weren’t being used. “Signal Dauntless. She may deploy her tractor beams” – another piece of impossible technology – “at will.”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said. A dull shudder ran through the ship, followed by a creepy sensation that made Howard want to clench his teeth. “They’ve locked on.”

Howard gritted his teeth. “Signal the squadron,” he ordered. “We jump in two minutes.”

“Aye, sir.”

The display updated rapidly, the squadron being pulled into position around Dauntless. It looked unnatural, a nightmare … Howard, not for the first time, was tempted to pinch himself, just to make sure he wasn’t actually dreaming. The future folk had talked about all sorts of technologies, marvels they’d be able to perform once they set up a proper tech base, but it was hard to believe they truly existed. There was something almost dreamlike about them, a hint of jam tomorrow but never jam today. This was different. This was something that struck at the very core of his being.

He shivered. Dauntless was classed as a destroyer, but she was bigger and far more powerful than his entire squadron put together. She could wipe them out effortlessly from far beyond their engagement envelope, or dive into the heart of their formation – a tactic more common in military science-fantasy than the real world – and slaughter his ships from point-blank range, effortlessly evading or simply shrugging off their response. His heart clenched painfully. He told himself, firmly, that it was because of the coming jump. He’d been a spacer for decades and jumping still felt unpleasant. Anyone who claimed they liked the sensation was a liar.

Georges spoke with quiet urgency. “Jumping … now!”

Howard expected to feel his insides knot, for a painful second, before the sensation vanished so quickly it was hard to believe he hadn’t imagined it. It was how he always felt … this time, there was nothing beyond a faint sense of disorientation, as if they hadn’t jumped at all. He wondered why it surprised him – he’d been on Dauntless when she’d been sent to Earth – and why it bothered him. It was something to worry about later. The display was rebooting with terrifying speed.

“Deactivate the tractor beams,” he snapped. They’d come out of the jump disturbingly close to the OpFor, at a speed that should have had his crew vomiting helplessly. Instead, they were rushing towards the enemy, the range closing rapidly … a chill ran down his spine, again, as he realised the display wasn’t projecting the rough location of the enemy starships, but showing precisely where they were. It should have been impossible … it was, for contemporary technology. “Launch fighters. Lock long-range weapons on target. Prepare to engage the enemy.”

“Aye, sir.” Georges sounded shaken too. FTL communications were one thing, FTL sensors were quite another. The analysts hadn’t been able to quite wrap their heads around it too. “Mass drivers targeted, ready to fire. Long-range missiles targeted, ready to fire. Point defence armed, ready to fire.”

“Signal the squadron,” Howard ordered. “All ships assigned to Group Alpha are to fire on my command.”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said. There was only one ship outside Group Alpha – Dauntless – but it was well to be careful. “All ships report ready to fire.”

Howard braced himself. The range was closing rapidly, but they were still outside optimum firing range for mass drivers … technically. The largest starship humanity had ever produced was still smaller than a grain of sand on a beach, when counted against the sheer immensity of interstellar space, and even the best contemporary sensors couldn’t hope to guarantee a hit if the fleet fired from long range. Hell, the target might just have enough time to realise it was under attack and alter position to evade the incoming fire, although that raised the spectre of accidentally steering into the path of another volley. He’d never heard of it happening in real life, but …

“Fire,” he ordered.

The display sparkled as the mass drivers opened fire, sending dozens of projectiles rushing towards their targets. The projections updated rapidly, practically guaranteeing hits … the enemy ships opened fire at the same moment, their mass drivers responding to his volley by spitting venom at him. He shook his head in disbelief. The FTL sensors were giving him plenty of warning. It felt almost as though he was cheating.

“Signal the squadron,” he ordered. “All ships are free to evade incoming fire. All point defence is to engage at will.”

“Aye, sir.”

Howard nodded, watching as the mass driver projectiles neared their targets. The OpFor was trying to alter position too, but they hadn’t had time to build up their speed and it looked as if they’d been caught by surprise too. The umpires were probably going to have a field day afterwards, he noted coldly; surprise was something difficult to simulate, certainly not in a military exercise in deep space. They’d all learn a great many lessons from the whole affair … he put the thought aside as the range continued to close, three icons going dim as they were struck with mass driver projectiles. Their fighters were doing what they could to cover the motherships, but it wasn’t enough.

“Stand by plasma cannons and laser lances,” he ordered. The enemy ships were boosting desperately – probably trying to charge their jumpdrives too, if he was any judge – but they just didn’t have time. They weren’t going to build the speed they needed to get out before it was too late. Hell, his ships were closing so rapidly that they wouldn’t need the FTL sensors to find their targets. “Engage on my command.”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said. Both fleets were still spitting mass driver projectiles at each other, but as the range closed – and point defence became more effective – the projectiles became less useful. It didn’t stop them. The projectiles were little more than compressed pieces of rock and there was a near-infinite supply floating around in space, just waiting to be mined. “All ships ready to engage.”

Howard gritted his teeth. “Fire!”

The display updated again as the squadron plunged into the enemy formation. His earlier thoughts mocked him as the range closed sharply and then started to open again, their weapons tearing through the enemy ships and leaving them dead in space. The point defence crews engaged the fighters, using FTL targeting sensors to ensure a hit … the enemy ships altered their positions, trying to bring the rest of their weapons to bear on his ships, but it was already too late to save themselves. One ship managed an emergency jump, the rest lay dead in space. It was over.

“We won!” Georges sounded as though he was grinning like a loon. “They’ll be buying the beer tonight!”

“Definitely,” Howard agreed, although he knew he wouldn’t be drinking. He and the officers on both sides of the engagement would have to sit down, talk through everything that happened from start to finish, then submit recommendations to their superiors. Every analyst in the military – every military – would be doing the same, trying to learn from the exercise before the navy had to take its ships up against a real foe. “Signal the OpFor CO, inform him that we are claiming victory, then order the squadron to stand down from exercise stations.”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said.

“And inform the crew I said well done,” Howard added. The engagement had been a little one-sided, but they’d still learn a great deal from it. “They all did very well.”

He tapped his console, bringing up the all-ships display. Ten ships had taken part in the simulated engagement, two had been destroyed and two more had taken minor damage … the next time, he reminded himself, the damage might not be fixable with the press of a button. The mass drivers had been less effective than he’d hoped, although the simulators were programmed to assume the projectiles had missed if there was any realistic prospect of them doing so. A real engagement would be fought without that handicap. He shook his head quietly. A real engagement would present all kinds of surprises, no matter how much they knew from the future records. The Diyang might already be changing their tactics in response to their recent defeat.

“The OpFor has acknowledged,” Georges said. “Their CO says he’ll get you next time.”

“Noted.” Howard suspected the CO probably would. Defeat was a great teacher, particularly when his students didn’t suffer anything beyond embarrassment. It would spur the losers of the first match to greater efforts, when the second started. “We’ll adjust our own tactics too.”

He sighed, inwardly. The face of warfare had changed, and it would change again as more future technology became available. His training had been state of the art, years ago, but now it was so primitive it was actually harmful. How much didn’t he know? He didn’t know.

We’ll catch up, he promised himself. The gulf was wide, but it wasn’t unbridgeable. Until then …

He cleared his throat. “Signal the squadron,” he said. “All ships are to prepare to return to base.”

“Aye, sir.”

 

Chapter Twenty-Four: Combined Marine Training Centre, 2308

The Jarheads weren’t even trying to hide.

Major John Montrose sucked in his breath as the futuristic monsters charged the enemy position, moving so quickly the defenders found it hard, almost impossible, to track and engage the attackers with any sort of weapon. The Jarheads fired as they came, launching blast after blast of plasma fire that swatted drones out of the air and killed missiles before they came remotely close to harming the future marines. They tore through the defences with a combination of precision and savagery that chilled him to the bone, wiping out the defenders with casual ease while leaving the hostages completely unharmed. It was designed to be a difficult exercise, even for the most capable soldiers in the world, and yet the future marines were crushing it.

He swore under his breath. Kratman City was a giant training arena, a makeshift city designed to teach soldiers how to handle themselves in urban environments. It was crammed with remote-controlled weapons and booby-traps, as well as all kinds of unpleasant surprises intended to minimise the advantages of advanced technology and put the recruits on equal footing to their enemies. It should have taken weeks for the marines to clear it, weeks during which the defenders would have plenty of time to do horrible things to the hostages and adjust their tactics to drive back the invaders. Instead, the defenders had been crushed so rapidly they hadn’t had a chance to rally and two-thirds of the had already been freed. It looked as though the operation had already been a success.

Fuck, he thought, numbly.

He shook his head in disbelief as a handful of IEDs detonated one after the other, deliberately triggered by the invaders. They didn’t wait for the shock to subside before they charged into the haze, tearing through the defenders before they had a chance to recover. A tank lumbered into view, main gun already traversing to open fire, only to be blown away before it managed a single shot. The Jarheads kept moving, pausing only to liberate two more hostages and escort them back to the lines. They hadn’t bothered to erect a proper barricade around the city. John wasn’t sure if it was carelessness or a simple faith they could crush the enemy before they could escape … if so, he reflected grimly, they were right. A defence that should have lasted for weeks had crumbled in less than an hour.

Another explosion blasted up, a fireball rising into the air and glowering balefully at the men on the ground. John didn’t know if the Jarheads knew it – he hadn’t brought it to their attention – but they’d already won. They’d saved two-thirds of the hostages and delivered a crippling blow to the terrorists dominating the city, perhaps even giving their victims a chance to fight back and extract revenge for how they’d been treated. If the exercise had been real ..

He shuddered, again. Civilians didn’t realise how tricky hostage-rescue missions could be, particularly in the middle of a war zone. Military officers quietly agreed that a certain number of causalities was acceptable, even though it sounded heartless – or worse – to their civilian counterparts. The Jarheads wouldn’t be in trouble if they lost three-fourths of the hostages – Kratman City was designed to make hostage-rescue hard, if not completely impossible – but they’d already won. He checked his terminal, accessing the live feed open to the umpires alone. So far, they hadn’t lost a single hostage …

“There’s going to be one hell of a mess to clear up,” Colonel Browne noted, crossly. “It’ll take weeks to rebuild the city.”

John snorted. Kratman City was almost completely pre-fabricated, from the combination of small shops and apartments to towering skyscrapers, as was the robotic population. It wouldn’t take that long to replace the damaged buildings and drones, while most of the other weapons and vehicles were outdated, destined for the scrapheap if they hadn’t been given one final chance to make themselves useful. The smoking remnants of the tank and other vehicles would be scrapped, now they’d done their duty. It wasn’t a problem.

“We need to know what they can do,” he said. No human military could hope to match the Jarheads. Anyone who passed the Royal Marine Commando course was tough – if you weren’t tough, you’d be binned before you got yourself or someone else killed – but there were hard limits. He’d seen men wounded or killed by IEDs … even in training accidents. A real combat zone could be a great deal worse. “And here …”

He shook his head as the last of the defenders crumbled before the onslaught. The umpires were going to go nuts, as they tried to analyse the data they’d collected. Would they demand their own version of the Jarheads? Or would they insist the machines be withdrawn from combat? On one hand, they did save lives; on the other, they encouraged their operators to take fearsome risks in the certain knowledge their lives were not in any real danger. John knew a drone operator who’d been court-martialled for flying his drone into an enemy fuel dump, destroying both the drone and the dump. He’d been pardoned, but it had been a near thing. The beancounters had moaned about the cost of replacing the drone, as if it would have been cheaper to let the enemy continue the offensive …

And we couldn’t ask a live pilot to take on a suicide mission, he reminded himself. That would be a bit much, even for us.

The racket slowly died away as the exercise came to an end, the Jarheads withdrawing from the combat zone with the last of the hostages. John scowled as he saw the robotic men, women and children … they’d always given him the creeps, their faces an uncanny valley of something that was disturbingly close to human, but subtly wrong. He’d heard stories about rich men who built themselves robotic families, the wives programmed to be tender and loving and the kids designed to be perfectly behaved … the thought was sick. It wasn’t real. It was nothing more than an illusion. The idea of losing himself in such a fantasy was appalling. He couldn’t understand the appeal.

“They’re not securing their hands,” Browne noted. He sounded like a man trying to find something – anything – to criticize. “They could be attacked at any moment.”

John snorted. It was standard procedure to cuff the hostages as well as the terrorists during hostage rescue missions. Some terrorists tried to hide amongst the hostages, some hostages wound up sympathising with the terrorists and fighting on their side when the rescue began … some could even be so badly traumatised by their treatment that they’d lash out at both sides or run right into the gunfire. Better to cuff them than bury them, even if they looked completely harmless. But what were the unarmed robots going to do to the Jarheads? One might as well punch a tank and expect it to explode.

“I don’t think it matters,” he said. His eyes lingered on a robotic little girl, her face a little too long and her arms a little too short. “They’re not in any danger.”

Browne made a rude noise. “We’ll see,” he said. “Do you think our masters will try to duplicate those … things?”

John shrugged. “I guess so,” he said. The drones had never quite replaced humans on the battlefield, not after a string of disasters had made it clear the military always needed a human in the loop. He’d seen drone command networks jammed or hacked in the field, causing the drones to freeze in place or attack their own side. “Once they solve the communications problem …”

He scowled, inwardly. An operator on the far side of the world couldn’t hope to have a proper feel for the battleground, nor could he work with the natives or any one of a hundred other roles that could only be filled by boots on the ground. It was even harder in space, where the time delay ensured it was impossible for a distant operator to respond to a crisis in time to save the day. But in the future, that had changed. Would there still be a role for him? Or would he find himself replaced? Assuming he survived the war … he hadn’t checked to see what had happened to his other self, in the other timeline. It wasn’t as if they were the same person.

“Good luck,” Browne said, stiffly. “I’ll see you at the debriefing.”

“I’ll be sure to bring my briefs,” John said. The joke fell flat. “And my report, when I have a chance to write it.”

He looked back at the training ground as Browne turned and hurried away. The city was still burning, the flames being left to burn themselves out. There was no one in the city now, nothing save for damaged robots and sensors that were easily replaced, but it still felt as if he was gazing into a nightmare. It was hardly the first time he’d seen a city that had been converted into a war zone, and the city wasn’t even real, yet …

“Fuck,” he muttered to himself. “I’m getting too old for this shit.”

***

The Combined Marine Training Centre, Private Hattie Notting decided as her platoon marched across the street towards the pub, was distinctly bizarre. It was a vast tract of land in the United States, with troops and vehicles from all over the world, officers and sergeants running around like crazy as they tried to put together some kind of joint training program that would integrate ideas and technologies from every nation and the far future. Some parts made sense to her – they were much like her own training centre, back in the future – while others struck her as absurd to the point she wondered just what the base’s commanders were thinking. The military base didn’t just include a firing range and everything else the trainees needed, but a shopping mall that included restaurants and eateries from all over the world. And a brothel that was carefully not acknowledged by the authorities. Hattie hadn’t worked out why until she’d looked up the legal position. Prostitution was not technically legal. Not here.

And they have it on a military base, she thought. What does that say about them?

She put the thought aside as they entered the pub. It was larger than she’d expected, with tables heaving with military personnel from all over the world. They looked … rougher … than her peers, she noted, lacking both the polish of Terran Marines and the bioengineering that made the marines an unstoppable fighting force. There was something in the air she didn’t like, a sense the situation could turn bad very quickly. Or perhaps that was the tobacco. Her lungs were engineered to sweep such substances out of her body, without doing any real damage, but it still smelt unpleasant. A handful of men were even injecting themselves with something. She hoped to hell they didn’t have any weapons.

The bartender eyed her warily, his eyes flickering over her and her peers before giving a very visible shrug. “What can I get you?”

Hattie shrugged back. “What’ll you recommend?”

“Beer, beer, or more beer.” The bartender waved a hand at the bottles behind the bar. “Or you can have something more fancy, if you like.”

“Beer will do,” Hattie said. She had no idea what it would taste like, or even if there was any point in drinking it. Alcohol would be swept from her bloodstream too. “Just one glass, please.”

The bartender eyed her. “Your card?”

Hattie blinked, then remembered the cards they’d been given. The idea of paying for food and drink still struck her as absurd, although the locals didn’t have gene-engineered algae-based foods – let alone anything more advanced – to cut the price of food down to the bare minimum. The briefing had said as much, but … she found the card, tapped it against the reader, then accepted the offered pint. It didn’t smell very good, she decided as she made her way to an empty table and sat down. The rest of the platoon were having fun ordering their own drinks.

A display was blaring in the corner. “Senator Michelle Clooney was arrested by the FBI this morning, after information from the future starships revealed that she took money from Chinese and Russian agents in exchange for promoting the interests of both nations,” the newsreader said, calmly. “The Senator’s office has yet to issue a statement, but her husband has gone on the record denouncing the whole affair as a political smear campaign mounted by her opponents rather than anything real.”

The image changed. “In other news, the economic downswing has only worsened following the news from the future,” a different newsreader said. “Corporations are cutting R&D budgets until they know which departments are already obsolete, despite government pressure to retain as many jobs as possible. Speaking in Washington today, Congressman …”

Hattie scowled. That wasn’t going to end well. She had grown up in a society where she hadn’t needed to work to eat, the locals had not. There was going to be real trouble soon, if she was any judge, and it wouldn’t be resolved in a hurry. She had barely had time to study the local history files, but one thing was clear. A great many people were living permanently on the edge.

A man sat down next to her. “Do you future lot really think you’re so great?”

Hattie blinked, caught by surprise. “What …?”

“You’re not real warriors,” the man said. His voice was slightly slurred. “You’re not even fighters.”

His eyes looked her up and down. “You don’t even look the part!”

“And why would you think that?” Hattie had never bothered to change her appearance. Her body was already bioengineered. She didn’t have to grow truly insane muscles, or a penis, or something – anything – that wouldn’t make the slightest bit of difference to her ability to carry out her duties. “What does it matter?”

“You’re not getting to grips with the enemy,” he said. “You’re just … drones.”

Hattie felt a flash of anger. She’d heard that argument before, although more in debates over the role of the Terran Marines than anything else. Personally, she thought it a silly argument. The Jarheads carried more weapons than even a bioengineered human, with support programs to ensure the controller could handle multiple tasks and orders at the same time, and – if worse came to worst – they were expendable. A Jarhead could be replaced. A human couldn’t be. Not completely. Being reincarnated was disorientating even when her memories were up to date and they so rarely were.

She took a sip of her drink. It tasted foul.

“If you have a point to this,” she said, “get on with it.”

“You are cowards,” the man said. “Hiding behind robots, fighting from a safe distance …”

He took a swing at her. Hattie felt time slow down as her training took over, enhanced strength catching the man’s hand and shoving it aside. She felt his arm break as she pushed hard … a shock ran through her as she realised just how strong she was, compared to him. It wouldn’t have done more than bruise one of her peers, if he’d thrown such a slow punch in the first place … she’d certainly sparred with them often enough to know they were far faster than her new opponent. He gaped at her, too drunk to feel enough of the pain, then hurled himself at her. The impact sent her crashing backwards. A moment later, the entire bar seemed to go mad.

Hattie barely noticed as she crashed to the ground. Her opponent was trying to strangle her with one hand, even as his other arm hung uselessly. She gritted her teeth and shoved him off her, just as a chair flew over her head. The man yelped in pain … she sprang to her feet, staying low, and glanced around. She’d expected everyone to turn on her platoon, but instead everyone was fighting each other. There was no rhyme or reason to the conflict, no sense it was planned or organised … it was madness. The racket was deafening.

A hand caught her arm and she spun around, ready to fight. A tall dark man was aiming a punch at her … she pulled free and punched him in the chest, then darted over his body to find the rest of the platoon. They were pressed against the bar, trying to keep their heads down … Hattie wished, suddenly, for a stunner or even a gas grenade. The fighting was getting worse.

“We need to get out of here,” Private Williams yelled. Hattie’s hearing was enhanced too, but she barely heard him over the racket. “The cops will be here at any moment!”

Hattie nodded. She’d heard horror stories about local cops. The military police were supposed to be the worst. She checked they weren’t missing anyone, then led the way over the counter and into the rear room. The bartender and his staff were hiding there … she nodded to them and hurried through the door, out into the cold night air. She could hear sirens in the distance, growing louder with every passing second. They were in some trouble. She had no idea what the local authorities would make of it, but she knew what her commander would say. It wouldn’t be remotely pleasant.

“This way,” Williams said. “Quickly.”

They hurried away, leaving the pub behind. Hattie shook her head in disbelief.

“Madness,” she said. What had her half-drunk attacker been thinking? Hadn’t he known he was drunk? “And we’re supposed to make this place our home?”

“I guess so.” Williams didn’t sound too put out. “It isn’t as if we have anywhere else to go.”

 

Chapter Twenty-Five: TFS John Birmingham, 2308

“Thank you for inviting us,” Anderson said, as he and his companion were shown into Ethan’s cabin. “It was a surprise to receive your invitation.”

“I thought we should meet and chat in an informal setting,” Ethan told him. It was more of a honour than Anderson knew. Everyone had the right to a private space of their own and it was a severe breach of etiquette to demand access, while an unforced invitation was a sign of true friendship. Or everyone had had the right. They’d managed to transfer most of the refugees to Luna, while allowing them time on Earth, but it would be a long time before everyone had their own private space once again. “And it is always nice to share a meal.”

Cassidy Waters looked nervous as she glanced around the cabin, her pale face oddly wrong to Ethan’s eyes. It was hard to be sure, but it looked as if she’d been half-starved early in life and never quite recovered, her body and mind left damaged in a manner Ethan considered truly unforgivable. He made a mental note to suggest she visited sickbay, where the doctors could try to do something for her, although there were limits on just how many people they could help. It was an utter nightmare …

He put the thought out of his head. “Rachel will be joining us in a moment,” he added. “Please. Take a seat.”

Cassidy looked up at him. “It’s been an interesting few weeks,” she said. “Did you mean to upset so many people?”

Ethan smiled, rather wanly. There had been no way to prevent a steady series of revelations about the future, from criminals and traitors to government mistakes and corporate misdeeds. Some had been easy to sort out, others would be difficult to untangle in a hurry … and, of course, there was the problem of just what to do about pre-crime criminals. Or the problem of people losing their jobs, because their corporate masters thought their roles were no longer required … there was no way, either, to avoid the fact they’d caused one hell of a lot of disruption. Nor that there was no way to sort it out.

And it isn’t as if they can take a blueprint from three hundred years in the future and start churning it out, he thought, coldly. The corporations would need those R&D guys back in a hurry, once it dawned on them they’d need to work out how to turn the blueprints into something they could actually produce. They’d also need people to work out how best to improve on the future tech. The Federation had never stopped innovating, even in the middle of the final war. They’re being short-sighted and it will bite them on the behind.

“No,” he said. Perhaps it would have been wiser to stay clear … no. That had never been an option. “We just have to deal with the problems as they pop up one by one.”

Anderson leaned forward. “The exercises are going well, now we’ve made all the obvious mistakes,” he said. “The fleet will be ready to depart shortly.”

Ethan nodded. Anderson’s squadron had swelled rapidly until it had become a full fleet, with battleships and fleet carriers surrounded by a sizable number of smaller ships and fighters. The latter had been almost unknown in his time, as modern weapons and sensors had rendered them obsolete, but he had to admire the bravery of their pilots and their determination to strike a blow against the Diyang. And any of the other threats out there.

“I think we should be able to depart on schedule,” he agreed. “I’m still not happy with the limited logistics, but there’s little we can do about it.”

“Not unless you want to delay the offensive,” Anderson said. “We spent billions of dollars on warships and very little on their support ships.”

Ethan reminded himself, sharply, that Anderson and his peers had never fought a real interstellar conflict. They’d had to learn as they went along, inventing better tactics and weapons as well as building a fleet of support craft to transport missiles and everything else the fleet needed from Earth to the front lines. It was inevitable they’d make mistakes, he reflected, and they had in the original history. He, by contrast, had the legacy of centuries of interstellar warfare to draw on, when it came to planning his tactics. It wasn’t perfect – he knew how easy it was to convince himself the locals could do things they couldn’t – but it was very helpful. As long as he remembered the limits of the possible …

“We’ll just have to hope for the best,” he said. It helped that he had no particular interest in actually taking Diyang-14. He didn’t need the system as a springboard to launch an offensive further into enemy territory, nor did he have any intention of occupying the planet. There was certainly no need to slaughter the population. Once the high orbitals had been cleared, they could be left isolated until the end of the war. “We do have better jumpdrives than the Diyang. We can bring in more supplies very quickly, if need be.”

Rachel materialised in the compartment before he could continue. “Sorry I’m late,” she said, as she took her seat. “Professor Wiggin had a bunch of theories he insisted I had to hear.”

Cassidy stared at her. “You’re a computer program?”

“No, I’m an eHuman,” Rachel said. “I was flesh and blood, like you, until I transcribed myself into a datacore. I’m not a program, just a … human in electronic form.”

“Oh.” Cassidy looked as if she didn’t quite know what to make of it. “Is that safe? Couldn’t someone delete your program and kill you? Or rewrite you?”

“Someone could kill you with a gun,” Rachel pointed out, dryly. “If someone did manage to destroy my identity matrix, it would be attempted murder. If none of my back-ups survived, for whatever reason, it really would be murder. As for rewriting me … it’s very hard to alter an identity matrix without causing a complete collapse. In some ways, I’m safer from forced mental conditioning and personality editing than yourself.”

“What’s it like?” Cassidy sounded fascinated. “Are you … what is it like to be an eHuman?”

Ethan hid his amusement. It was a cheeky question.

“It’s different,” Rachel told her, after a moment. “I exist within the starship’s datanet. I can flow from datacore to datacore, making their contents part of me, or perform tasks within my core being without being distracted by the needs of a human body. I can create a virtual world for myself, a pocket all for me, or integrate myself with other minds to combine myself into something new. Even in a limited datacore, such as the one I rode down to the surface, I still have near-limitless options, ways to distract myself from endless boredom. It’s different. But I’m still human.”

Cassidy flushed. “I’m sorry for being nosy.”

Anderson winked at her. “I thought that was your job.”

Ethan stood. “You can order anything from the food dispensers,” he said. “What would you like?”

“I still can’t get used to those,” Cassidy said. She cleared her throat. “Roast beef and all the trimmings?”

“Easily,” Ethan said. He ordered the food, then glanced at Anderson. “Howard?”

“Same for me, please,” Anderson said. “I’m surprised you don’t have a steward.”

Ethan shrugged. “We produce food on the spot” – he picked up the plates and put them on the table – “and don’t waste time worrying about our uniforms, or anything else along those lines,” he said. He ordered his own food and carried it over to the table. “There’s no need for a servant and … really, few volunteers for the job.”

Anderson had to smile. “No one wants to do the scutwork?”

“There’s normally someone willing to do anything,” Rachel said. Her meal was holographic. “But the navy never quite saw the point.”

Cassidy took a bite of her food. “If you don’t mind me asking, how do you live in the future? I mean … what sort of lives do you have?”

Ethan and Rachel exchanged glanced. “I grew up on the Hadley Hexagon … ah, a curiously-designed Dyson Sphere,” Rachel said. “It was a good life. Plenty of things for a child to do, plenty of adults to talk to you … I used to shadow a bunch of different people around, just to see what they did when they grew into adults. There were a lot of different professions that drew my eye.”

She paused, jabbing a finger at the meal. “This isn’t luxury. This is … common. Real luxury is going to a café run by a chef and being fed by him personally. Food cooked by real human hands … works of art, really. There were meals as simple as this and meals so complicated you wouldn’t believe a human had made them, if you hadn’t seen them. If you were a great cook, or even a cook one, you’d win honour just by existing.”

“And you never had to pay for it?” Cassidy shook her head. “I don’t understand how it works.”

“Prestige,” Rachel said. “If you had a breakfast ticket from a certain cook” - she grinned – “that’s how you knew you’d made it. Or if you managed to be lucky enough to get to a certain café before they ran out of tables … that’s another way to make it. If you got excluded, on the other hand, it was how you knew you weren’t welcome, that you had crossed the line in some way.”

Anderson frowned. “I meant to ask,” he said. “How do you deal with criminals?”

“We don’t have many criminals, not like … like here.” Ethan kicked himself mentally. That had been rather undiplomatic. “Generally, it depends on the crime. Smaller offences bring social exclusion – if you cross the line, as Rachel said, you’re no longer welcome in society. Greater offences … you’re generally offered a choice between having your personality rewritten or spending the rest of your life in a prison. A comfortable prison, true, but a prison nonetheless.”

“Charming,” Anderson said. “How do you think it is all going to work out?”

“There are plenty of cases of colony worlds losing technology and falling back to barbarism, only to be rediscovered and contacted a few decades or centuries down the line,” Ethan said. “It’s always a shock to come face to face with advanced technology and a society that isn’t bound by the same limits, but they do come to terms with it. Here … it is a little harder because we don’t have the resources to help you catch up, yet it can be done.”

“I hope so,” Anderson agreed. “What happens to those worlds?”

“It depends,” Ethan said. “We tend to reach out, tell everyone what happened to their world and see how they want to proceed. Some come to join us, leaving the past behind; others try to adapt slowly, if at all. As long as they choose it freely, we don’t mind. But here … we don’t have the resources to invite your people to leave, even if they wanted to.”

“I would,” Cassidy said, quietly. “And that would be true of many others.”

Ethan kept his face blank. Cassidy and everyone like her had been caught in a ghastly trap, one bad month or one lost job from being kicked out onto the streets. Or worse. And then she’d been arrested for a crime that really shouldn’t be a crime and very lucky to be released without a very long jail sentence. Ethan wanted to reach out and offer her asylum, a place in a better world, but he knew he couldn’t offer it to everyone. That would change, he promised himself, as they rebuilt their tech base. They’d be able to offer everyone a chance to vote with their feet.

“One day, things will be different,” Rachel said. “You’ll always be welcome here.”

Anderson made a very visible effort to change the subject. “Do you think the refits will be ready in time to make a difference?”

Ethan’s earlier thoughts returned to haunt him. There was no need to duplicate John Birmingham, not yet. There were plenty of in-between designs they could put into production with far less effort, from better jumpdrives and artificial gravity to makeshift defensive shields and more powerful weapons. The space navies were already planning ways to close the gap between the two eras, he knew, and the corporations were definitely going to regret discarding so many of the people they so desperately needed. Such callousness was difficult to grasp and the short-sightedness was just …

Given a few years, we can start producing anti-aging treatments too, he mused. The corporate official who cuts research now will have to face the consequences, a few decades down the line.

“I doubt they’ll be ready to join the first offensive,” he said, finally. “But they’ll be ready when we need them.”

“How many other alien enemies are there out there?” Cassidy sounded as if she were trying to distract herself. “How many big wars were there?”

“That’s a hard question to answer,” Ethan said. “One war against the Diyang. Several smaller skirmishes with other powers that were eventually resolved peacefully. One much bigger war against the Zargana, then another … an intervention to support one side of their civil war. And then there were the Killers.”

“So many?” Cassidy shook her head. “Why?”

“Different reasons for different conflicts,” Ethan said. “The Diyang are expansionists – but you already know it. So were the Zargana, although for different reasons. The other conflicts … miscommunications, mainly, that sparked brief engagements before being resolved through diplomacy. First Contact missions are always tricky, because you never quite know if the universal translators are living up to their name. You think you’re sending a greeting and he hears a challenge to do battle, or an insult to his mother. Or worse.”

“Charming,” Anderson muttered. “And the Killers?”

“We don’t know,” Ethan said. There were times when he could almost forget the horror they’d escaped through sheer dumb luck, times when he wanted to pretend the war had been nothing more than a nightmare. He knew better. Sooner or later, mankind would meet the Killers again. They had to be ready. “They just came out of nowhere and started to kill.”

“They must want something,” Cassidy protested.

“If they did, they never deigned to tell us,” Ethan said. The question was hardly a new one. “We never even saw a Killer, just their ships. Some of our researchers speculated the Killer ships were the Killers, that they were a space-dwelling form of life … we simply don’t know. My best guess is that they’re xenophobes, wiping out all other life forms to ensure they’re the only ones left in the universe.”

“We may never know,” Rachel said.

“You can’t negotiate with someone who wants you dead,” Anderson agreed. He finished his plate and pushed it to one side. “There’s no room for compromise with someone who won’t take anything less.”

Ethan nodded in agreement, although it had been rare to meet someone uncompromising until the Killers had arrived. There had been so little to fight over. A post-scarcity society hardly needed to bicker when there was more than enough to go around. But the Killers … perhaps they were just too alien to be easily understood, even by a society as advanced as the Terran Federation. There were life-forms that were practically incomprehensible, aliens the human race had never been able to understand … it no longer mattered. The war was centuries in the future.

And when we encounter them again, he promised himself, we will be ready.

“We’ll be leaving in a week,” he said, changing the subject once again. “You’ll be coming with us?”

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Cassidy said. “My boss would murder me if I stayed behind.”

Ethan hoped that was a joke. Here, he wasn’t sure.

“You’re more than welcome,” he said. “Hopefully, we can end the war before the Diyang go on the offensive or something else happens to change history, once again.”

Cassidy cocked her head. “You have hundreds of years of technology on them,” she said. “Is there anything they can do to you?”

“I knew a man who got badly wounded by a thrown rock,” Anderson said. “Just because they’re primitive doesn’t mean they’re not dangerous.”

“I wish I knew,” Ethan said. “It depends on how much they know. Do they realise we can’t repeat our earlier feat? Do they know we have to hold the FTL missiles in reserve? Or do they know so little they don’t understand the danger? Or … if they jump into this system a very long way from the sensor platforms and come in on ballistic trajectories, they might well be missed until they get very close. It depends …”

He shook his head. “Advanced technology doesn’t guarantee a victory,” he added. “But it does ensure a loss if you assume your technology will make up for any flaws in your strategy.”

“You’re still human, aren’t you?” Cassidy sounded thoughtful. “I mean … you have the same flaws as we do.”

“Of course,” Rachel said. She gave Cassidy an understanding smile. “And sometimes, those flaws let us be short-sighted. We have so many options that it’s hard to realise others don’t share them.”

“Nor do we, now,” Ethan said. He stood to fetch coffee. “That’s something else we’ll have to come to terms with, sooner or later. The Federation is gone, save for us. And it’ll take decades to even begin to rebuild what we’ve lost.”

“Things will be different, as your ideas and ours meld together,” Anderson agreed. “And what comes out afterwards will be the best of both worlds.”

 

Chapter Twenty-Six: Earth Orbit, 2308

“This link is secure?”

Y’Opohan allowed himself a light smile at the concern in the human’s voice. The Chinese were paranoid about their communications security, with good reason. Their human rivals invested a great deal of time and resources trying to hack their datanets and now they were facing a foe with technology literally hundreds of years in advance of their own. What should have been a relatively simple discussion, a negotiation carried out in the space of a day or two, had mushroomed into a long and tedious process, only slightly accelerated by the gift of a modern communications transmitter. It was supposed to be undetectable, even to the Terran Federation, and the encryption protocols were supposed to be unbreakable. Y’Opohan had no idea if that was actually true, although he hoped so. The Federation starships certainly had no reason to suspect the transmitter’s existence.

“Yes,” he said, knowing the translation software would strip all emotion from his voice. The Chinese were at a disadvantage in dealing with him, if only because they had no experience talking with aliens while he had years of experience dealing with humans. They had the slight advantage of being paranoid, with good reason, but it wouldn’t be enough to save them when the time came. “I trust you received our gifts?”

He hid his amusement with an effort. It had been tricky to get the shuttles down to the surface without being detected, and two of the flights had been classed as tourism rather than try to use their stealth systems to avoid attracting attention. The Federation’s sensors were alarmingly good and if they realised he was sending shuttles without telling anyone … he bared his teeth in a grimace that would alarm the human, if he could see it. There was nothing gained without a little risk and the reward was high enough to justify almost any risk. If the Chinese played their role …

“We did, for which we thank you,” Chairman Tsang said. “You will always have a place with us.”

“My crew and I will be grateful, when the time comes,” Y’Opohan assured him. “We look forward to a long and productive relationship.”

He allowed himself another hungry smile. The Chinese believed – or at least pretended to believe, it was hard to be sure when manipulating humans so different from the pampered brats of the Federation – that he was terrified of seeing his own people forced into permanent subordination by the human race. The Zargana wouldn’t be able to compete, he’d pointed out, with a human race boosted by technology from the far future, a motive the Chinese could not only understand but sympathise with. They’d agreed to help take steps to minimise the human advantage as much as possible, even work with the Zargana Empire to ensure no race had a decisive and unchallengeable advantage. Y’Opohan had no intention of keeping any more of the agreement they’d finally hammered out than strictly necessary, and when the time came he would desert the Chinese without a qualm, but for the moment the covert alliance suited both of them. The Chinese certainly knew they were getting their payment in advance.

Which does make one wonder, he mused. Are they mentally preparing to bury the knife in my back even as I prepare to do the same to them?

His lips twisted, his tongue licking his sharp teeth. The Chinese weren’t that different from the Zargana who’d built the Empire, in the glory days of old. They had a caste system dominated by absolute rulers, a warrior caste yearning for death or glory and a determination to stamp themselves on the rest of the universe by force. They had been trapped in a covert struggle with their peers for decades, trying desperately to get a decisive edge even as they feared their rivals would be the ones to gain an insurmountable offensive. In many ways, it was a macrocosm of the relationship between the Federation and the Zargana, after the war. He’d made sure to tell the Chinese about the Intervention, about how the Federation had meddled in his people’s internal affairs. The more they believed their only hope lay in collaborating with him, the better.

And as long as they think we need them more than they need us, they won’t betray us, he told himself, calmly. The agreement included settlement rights for his crew, holding out the prospect of him putting his people in their power. He had no intention of keeping that part of the secret treaty, but as long as they thought they’d get everything they wanted if they remained patient … he smiled, inwardly. Greed was an understandable motive. So was the desire to preserve one’s position, even at the expense of everyone else. Let them think we’ll be their loyal allies until the time comes to betray them.

“Then we will lay the groundwork now,” Chairman Tsang said. Was that an edge of nervousness in his voice? It was hard to tell. These humans practiced deceit in a manner his humans had never done. They could be setting him up for the kill even now. “And when the time comes, we will strike and strike hard.”

“Just make sure you don’t let either your rivals or mine get a good look at the equipment I sent you,” Y’Opohan cautioned. He’d been careful to point out just how exposed the local datanet was to future technology, without mentioning that the Federation regarded peeking as ungentlemanly. Their willingness to uphold absurd standards of behaviour was just another thing he found hard to stomach, knowing it was a reflection of their arrogance rather than anything real. “They’ll have no trouble tracing it back to us.”

“We are not unpractised in such matters,” the human assured him. “Nothing will leak out.”

Y’Opohan hoped he was right. The plan was in a very delicate stage. Sure, the local shipyards and corporations were buzzing as they tried to refit the human navies with modern technology, or at least a pastiche that would still give the locals a decisive advantage against the Diyang, but there was a difference between a ramshackle energy weapon and a piece of modern technology stripped from his ship. The Federation would know what he was doing, if they realised he’d given the Chinese such advanced technology, and all hell would break loose. He was surprised Boswell hadn’t tried to place Vendetta under his direct control. That would change the moment the human discovered Y’Opohan had plans of his own.

“Good,” he said. “Now, let us proceed.”

They exchanged brief polite goodbyes, then closed the connection. Y’Opohan allowed himself a dark smile as he stared at the terminal, then stood. The humans couldn’t be trusted – of course not – but they would serve his interests long enough, after which they would be abandoned to their fate. No doubt they had the same plan concerning him and his crew, threatening utter chaos if both parties tried to betray the other at roughly the same time. His lips twisted in disdain. He’d done everything in his power to discourage a Chinese betrayal, but what if he was wrong? Or if the Federation caught on anyway? It would be disastrous.

We have no choice, he told himself, sharply. The future of the empire – the real empire, not the milksop the humans had brought into being – was at stake. Anything was justified when it came to preserving his people and making sure they attained their rightful place in the universe, anything at all. It must be done.

He stood. It was time to prepare his ship for war.

***

Howard felt oddly out of place as he studied the holographic tank, newly installed in Grant after the first set of exercises had been completed. The system was a combination of futuristic and contemporary technology, a datanet that held the promise of his starships combining together into a single entity … if they managed to overcome both technological and political issues. The future folk didn’t seem to realise that local governments were reluctant to give anyone complete authority over their ships, no matter what sort of reputation they’d had in the shadowy alternate timeline. He had direct access to a live status feed from each and every ship, but no way to command them remotely. If they hadn’t installed an FTL communications network, it would be impossible to make the system work. Even so, it was going to be a pain when they took the system into battle. He’d have preferred more time exercising before the shit hit the fan.

Or we set off to throw shit into the fan, he mused, rather dryly. The political situation on Earth was a mess. It was hard to get any sort of solid agreement between governments, half of whom seemed to believe the war was already over. I suppose we’re lucky they agreed to go on the offensive at all.

His terminal pinged. “Anderson.”

“Admiral,” Lieutenant Steven Gammon said. “Admiral Garland is requesting to speak with you.”

Requesting, Howard thought, dryly. Technically, it was a request; practically, it was an order in all but name. It would be a rare captain who refused to speak to an admiral and if he didn’t have a very good excuse his career would come to an end in short order. The USN had plenty of places it could send someone to sideline them permanently, without making it obvious. It isn’t as if I have a choice.

“Put him through,” he ordered.

His terminal bleeped. “Howard.”

“Admiral,” Howard said. “What can I do for you?”

“There’s been a change of plan,” Admiral Garland said. He’d spent most of the last few weeks closeted with admirals and politicians from all over the world, trying to protect Howard and the rest of the combined navies from political interference. “It may not go down very well with our friends.”

Howard felt a frisson of alarm. “Sir?”

“The original plan was to sweep through the enemy system, destroy their facilities and then withdraw,” Admiral Garland said. “The joint planning committee wants to take and hold the system instead.”

“I see.”

Howard forced himself to think. The joint planning committee was both a very real committee and a mouthpiece for their political superiors. They had only as much freedom as the latter granted them, which was a major headache when there were dozens of nations involved … not all in full agreement about how to prosecute the war. They all wanted to ensure advantages for their own nations and disadvantages for their rivals … as if there wasn’t a war on. The idiots – he cut that line of thought off before he could let it slip – were already dividing the spoils. They thought the war was done and dusted. Howard knew better. Just because one side had a major technological advantage didn’t mean their victory was certain. No battle plan ever survived contact with the enemy, and the enemy – that dirty dog – had plans of his own.

“It should be doable,” he said, finally. “However, it will be difficult to resupply the orbital facilities from Earth and we’ll need to keep the alien population under control.”

“They can be left isolated on their planet,” Garland said. “However, we do want the system as a forward base.”

Howard felt a flicker of relief. There were too many voices calling for the extermination of the Diyang, a crime that would make the Holocaust or Liberty Asteroid look minor. He’d privately decided he’d refuse orders to bombard alien population centres, although he had no idea if his refusal would accomplish anything beyond his immediate relief. The USN didn’t believe in loyalty officers, not to the degree of their Chinese or Russian counterparts, but it was quite possible there was a crewman on his ship with orders to keep an eye on him. So many officers and crew had been moved around in the last few weeks that he was unfamiliar with two-thirds of the men under his direct command. Who knew if they had agendas of their own?

“I’ll do what I can,” Howard said. A thought crossed his mind. “Is this a covert test, sir?”

“A covert test?”

“Yes,” Howard said, flatly. “A test to see if the future personnel will follow orders?”

There was a long awkward pause. Howard suspected he was right. Boswell had been dismissive of any plans to take and hold the system, pointing out the future ships didn’t need the forward bases of their contemporary counterparts. He was right, from his point of view. Howard was mildly surprised he hadn’t suggested an immediate attack on the enemy homeworld, although neutralising any threat to Earth had to come first. But changing the plans now would be an interesting test of Boswell’s willingness to follow orders …

He scowled, inwardly. Every book he’d read, every TV series he’d binge-watched, everything he’d glanced at that so much as touched on the concept of people, ships and even entire nations going back in time had suggested the future personnel would ally themselves with their contemporary nations. If they weren’t actual nations themselves … But what would happen when the future nation simply didn’t exist? Not yet? Or if it might never exist because of the time travellers … where would his loyalties lie, he asked himself, if he found himself in the Seven Years War? It was a question he hoped he’d never have to answer.

“Yes,” Garland said, finally. “We need to know.”

And what’ll you do if the answer is no? Howard didn’t want to ask the question out loud. If Boswell refuses to follow orders, there’s not a damn thing we can do about it and you know it. Not yet.

“Yes, sir,” he said, instead. “I’ll take care of it.”

“Very good.” Garland sounded relieved. “Good luck with the mission, Howard. I look forward to welcoming you home.”

Howard nodded as Garland’s face vanished from the display. The mission was no secret, despite the best efforts of various governments to keep the plans as quiet as possible, but they’d agreed not to hold any formal departure ceremonies. Howard suspected the governments were too busy trying to divide up the bounty from the future to actually make an effort for the military crews, although he’d already decided he wasn’t going to argue about it. An extensive ceremony would only have delayed departure, after the date had already been put back twice. The sooner they were on their way, the better. They could have the ceremony after they returned home.

He keyed his console. “Connect me to Captain Boswell.”

There was almost no delay before Boswell’s face materialised in the display. “Howard,” he said. “What can I do for you?”

“There’s been a change of plan.” Howard explained, briefly. “Can we make it work?”

***

Ethan said nothing for a long moment, considering his options. The fleet was ready to depart, the contemporary vessels attached to his ships … including Vendetta … and they’d made all the preparations they could. The sudden change in plans was a hiccup, but hardly one that couldn’t be handled. They had enough space-capable marines to seize and hold the enemy orbital installations. There was no way the Diyang could be ready for them.

Unless they have a good idea of just what happened to their last fleet, he mused. The analysts hadn’t been able to determine just how much information had made it out, which forced the analysts to assume the Diyang knew everything. They might have plans for dealing with us.

He scowled. The change made the mission more complicated, which meant …

“I dare say we can handle it,” he said, finally. “However, there’s really no need to take the system.”

“My superiors want a forward base,” Anderson said. There was a hint of irritation in his tone, as if he disagreed with their logic. “They think we’ll need it if things go wrong.”

Ethan studied the display for a long moment. The hell of it was that the contemporary admirals weren’t entirely wrong. Their jumpdrives required massive amounts of power and without a steady supply of HE3 for the fusion plants their starships ran the risk of being stranded in interstellar space, light years from any possible salvation. It was one of the reasons humanity’s first interstellar war had taken as long as it had, as the combined fleets hacked their way towards the enemy homeworld. The idea of a single strike at the heart of enemy territory might have looked good on paper, but in the real world it wasn’t remotely practical. The future vessels were far more capable of powering themselves.

“If they want it, they shall have it,” Ethan said. “It may come in handy.”

Anderson nodded. “It might,” he agreed. “Are we still ready to jump out as planned?”

“Yes.” Ethan heard a note of relief in his counterpart’s voice and frowned inwardly. Had he missed something? Or was it the understandable relief of someone who knew he was making a difficult and somewhat rude request? He’d discuss it with Rachel later. “We should be ready to jump out as planned.”

“Good.” Anderson raised a hand. “Good luck to us all.”

His face vanished. Ethan frowned, eying the nearspace display. The fleet surrounding his squadron looked somewhat ramshackle to his eyes, their technology a strange blend that reminded him of a scavenger race that had briefly challenged the Federation a few decades ago and hundreds of years in the future, but looks weren’t everything. As long as they were ready for war …

We put an end to this war, then get settled on Coventry, he thought. It wasn’t going to be easy to cope, once his people had time to relax and think about what had happened to them. He’d been keeping the crews busy in hopes of ensuring they didn’t have time to brood. And then we can build a society to replace everything we’ve lost.

 

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Combined Fleet, 2308

Cassidy Waters hadn’t been sure what to expect, when the fleet jumped out of orbit and crossed dozens of light-years in the blink of an eye.

She’d braced herself as best she could, all too aware of horror stories ranging from incredible pain and vomiting to a sensation almost, but not quite, like being punched in the belly. It had been almost disappointing to feel nothing when the future starship jumped, save for a faintly disconcerting sensation that came and went so quickly she was tempted to think she’d imagined it. The future crew, sitting at their stations and mindlinked to their datanet, didn’t seem to notice anything had changed. A shiver ran down her spine as she eyed a too-handsome man operating a console, his mind part of a greater whole. There was no way she would trust a machine designed to read her mind and she suspected most of her peers felt the same way. The police who’d arrested her had strip-searched her, an experience she had no desire to repeat, but the thought of having her mind read was far worse.

The display cleared a moment later, revealing the fleet … surrounded by empty space. A lone star hung in front of them, orbited by a series of icons representing planets and possible enemy contacts … the latter oddly shaded to remind the crew that the enemy positions, even the positions of long-established industrial stations, were not quite certain. Cassidy found it oddly reassuring to know the future crew weren’t entirely infallible, although she was fairly sure she wouldn’t have coped any better if she found herself a mere decade in the past. What the hell had she worn, when she’d been fifteen? She couldn’t remember which outfit she’d worn on any specific day. It had never occurred to her to keep a record.

She looked at Captain Boswell. The reporters and military liaison staff had been cautioned not to interrupt any of the future crew, when they were communing with their datanet. Cassidy knew from experience that yanking someone out of a VR sim was disconcerting enough, and the datanet linkages were far more complex than any simple VR helmet, but she wouldn’t have risked alienating the future personnel even if she hadn’t been aware of the danger. Her boss had told her, the last time they’d met, that her fame was already fading, her name already being pushed aside by others as they broke stories of their own. She needed something good and that meant not picking fights with their hosts.

Boswell leaned back in his chair. “Jump completed,” he said. “There’s no sign the enemy is aware of our presence.”

Cassidy heard a military officer suck in his breath. Howard had tried to explain the sheer scale of interstellar warfare to her, but she lacked the background knowledge to understand what he’d said except at a very basic level. They’d hopped dozens of light years in the blink of an eye … she couldn’t wrap her head around it, couldn’t grasp the immensity of what they’d done. She knew it was remarkable and yet, part of her mind refused to believe it. How could they have made it so far in so little time?

“We’ll deploy two drones now, to survey the system,” Boswell continued. “And then we’ll take the offensive.”

The display updated quickly, more detail coming into view as the sensors collected more data. The system was surprisingly industrialised … Cassidy told herself she shouldn’t be surprised. The Diyang had been in space for nearly a hundred years longer than humanity, with more time to establish colonies … and, it seemed, less political willingness to keep the colonies from developing industries of their own. The real surprise was that humanity had beaten them, the first time around. She’d read the historical records, at Howard’s insistence, yet there was something faintly unreal about them. They talked about events that had never happened and never would.

And I vanished without a trace, Cassidy thought. Cold logic told her that it was unlikely anyone would remember her name, raw emotion insisted that everyone should. What had happened to her shadowy alternate self? Raped and murdered, another statistic demonstrating the decline of New York … she knew people who’d been pushed into passing traffic by maniacs who should have been taken off the streets years ago. Or maybe she’d lived a life of quiet desperation until she died of old age, her death unnoticed and unmourned. That won’t happen in this time. I won’t let it.

The military officer leaned forward. “Are we ready to take the offensive?”

“It seems so.” Boswell didn’t appear irked by the question. “All ships have checked in. We’ll jump as soon as we know the enemy’s exact location.”

He paused. “And then we’ll see what preparations they’ve made for us.”

***

“My Lord,” Officer D’Holin said. “The drone is away, as per your instructions.”

Y’Opohan thought he heard a hint of disapproval in her voice. His claws itched with the urge to teach her a lesson, tempered only by the grim awareness he needed her … that he needed every officer and crewman on his ship. Vendetta’s crew represented a resource that could carry him to the very top, as long as he didn’t expend them needlessly … even a mere female. He reminded himself, sharply, that there were too many tainted pheromones in the air. His moods weren’t entirely his own.

“Good,” he said, stiffly. “Did the humans detect it?”

There was a long pause. “I do not believe so,” D’Holin said. “We concealed the launch within our own jump field, which should have concealed it from enemy detection …”

She paused. “However, I cannot guarantee the humans …”

“Focus on your work,” Y’Opohan ordered, firmly. “Leave such matters to me.”

He smiled at her downcast posture, briefly visible before she schooled herself into immobility, then studied the display. He had no doubt the joint fleet would make hash of their enemies – given their technical advantages it would be astonishing if they lost even a handful of ships – but anything that could force the Federation crews to expend their advanced and irreplaceable weapons worked in his favour. The cover story was a little iffy, and he knew the warning could alert his rivals that someone was playing games, but … the humans always wanted to think the best of people, a weakness he had no qualms about exploiting ruthlessly. Let them think they’d gotten unlucky. Let them think a Diyang scout had detected their approach and jumped back to warn their superiors. Let them think …

“Signal from the flag, My Lord,” another officer said. “We are to prepare to jump as soon as we have updated tactical data.”

“Of course.” Y’Opohan allowed himself a smile, showing all his teeth. “It will be my pleasure.”

***

“Signal the fleet,” Howard ordered. The jump had left him feeling a little unsteady, even though he was half-convinced he was imagining it. The experience had been so smooth it had crossed his mind to wonder if he was trapped in a VR sim, rather than living in the real world. “If anyone has any problems, I want to know about them now.”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said.

Howard gritted his teeth and forced himself to study the holographic tank. Ninety-seven warships, massive fleet carriers and battleships flanked by dozens of smaller vessels … and, of course, the future starships. Every instinct in his body screamed in horror at just how closely they were linked together, the fleet ready to jump in formation rather than individually … he knew just how many officers had complained, fearing the worst even with future technology ensuring the jump was damn near perfect. Perhaps that was another reason he’d been promoted so quickly. He’d had enough experience with the future technology to trust it.

He tapped the console, bringing up the starchart. Seventy light years … they’d jumped seventy light years in less than a second. Ice prickled down his spine. Grant would need to refuel several times before she managed to cross seventy light years and that assumed she didn’t burn out her drives and find herself stranded in interstellar space … the fastest courier boats in the navy, with the best jumpdrives they’d been able to produce, couldn’t do much better. He swallowed hard as the reality of the situation dawned on him, once again. They were so far from home they’d have real problems getting back without the future starships.

I suppose that explains why the admirals want us to seize the system, he mused, as he turned his attention back to the status display. They’re nervous about losing ships to interstellar space.

He felt his heart sink. And the future starships can’t be everywhere at once.

Georges spoke with quiet intensity. “Sir, all ships have checked in,” he said. “There are no major problems.”

Howard shook his head in disbelief. There was always a problem, from a crewman vomiting helplessly in zero-g to a drive field generator burning out at the worst possible moment. He’d heard horror stories of ships accidentally cut in half through drive malfunctions or crews sent insane through a poorly maintained drive system … no, now there was no problem. Nothing large enough to be brought to his attention … he hoped to hell someone wasn’t covering up something bad, something he needed to know about. They really shouldn’t, but who knew?

“Hold position,” he ordered, feeling a shiver running down his spine. They were about to launch the first invasion of an enemy star system in human history, the first truly aggressive move humanity had made in this very strange war. He knew it needed to be done and yet … he had the uneasy sense they were out on a limb, with someone carefully sawing it off behind them. “We’ll move once we see what’s waiting for us.”

“Aye, sir.”

Howard felt time ticking by, each second seemingly an hour. He knew he shouldn’t feel so exposed and yet he did, all too aware there were enemy starships between them and the rest of the human race. The odds of the fleet being intercepted as it withdrew were minimal and yet … he told himself not to be silly as he waited, not when they could cross dozens of light years in the blink of an eye. The Diyang might have targeted humanity’s bases, and fuel depots, but … they weren’t needed any longer, not unless the future ships were somehow destroyed. Or sent elsewhere.

Don’t get cocky, he told himself. That’s when things tend to go badly wrong.

The display pinged. New icons flickered into life.

“Sir,” Georges said. “The drones are transmitting now.”

Howard nodded, feeling something he didn’t care to look at too closely. The drones were flying into the enemy system, relying data back to the fleet through FTL transmitters … their passive sensors so good, so capable, that it was unlikely the enemy could hide anything from them. Hell, their active sensors were practically impossible to detect with contemporary sensors … something he’d always believed to be impossible. He had been trained in a world where shutting down your drives and pretending to be a piece of space junk was practically guaranteed to work, as long as you didn’t do anything stupid like turning on the radio or opening a gas vent in interplanetary space, but now … all the drills he’d done for hiding in an endless ocean suddenly seemed small and stupid, even pointless. It almost felt unfair.

You’re being an idiot, he told himself, sharply. If they had the drop on you, do you think they’d give any thought to you being unfair?

He shook his head. The Diyang had launched an attack on Earth that had come very close to success in the ghostly original timeline and no one, certainly not him, wanted to give them another chance. They had advantages of their own … no, those advantages were gone now. And if they’d wanted the universe to be fair, they shouldn’t have started a war. But …

But nothing, he thought, grimly. It’s time to make war.

***

“Are you sure they can’t see the drones?”

Ethan glanced at Cassidy, unsure if it was a serious question or if she was just trying to break the silence. The big display was filling rapidly, enemy starships, orbital fortresses, industrial nodes and cloudscoops taking their places in front of him. Diyang-14 was bigger than he’d expected, as was the fleet surrounding it, but nothing they couldn’t handle. The shock of the defeat at Earth had probably forced the Diyang to reinforce their defences, rather than go on the offensive somewhere else.

“Not unless they get very lucky,” he assured her. “Or they have some piece of technology we never realised they had.”

He smiled at the thought, knowing that few commanders had ever enjoyed such complete understanding of the other side. The Diyang weren’t primitive or stupid, but they couldn’t hope to close the technological gap in time to matter and his history records assured him they’d never discovered any ancient alien artefacts that might – just – give them an edge. It had happened before – history had many examples of aliens discovering a piece of long-lost technology and using it to climb up the technological ladder – but not here … not unless something had been left out of the history books. He didn’t think it was possible. The contemporary governments might have classified certain pieces of data, but they wouldn’t have remained classified forever. Why bother? The war had been in the distant past …

Except it isn’t in the past now, he thought. It’s part of the present day.

The thought made him frown as he recalled the history files. Historically, the next six months involved a great deal of raiding and sniping as both sides fought for advantage and prepared themselves for the next major engagement, he reminded himself. Earth might have won the battle of Earth, but she took heavy losses and needed several months to rebuild. But that isn’t true here.

He frowned again as the enemy positions became clearer. The Diyang looked to be preparing to defend themselves … had they caught a sniff of his drones? It should have been impossible, according to the techs, but he’d been a naval officer long enough to know the technology rarely worked in the field as well as it performed in the lab. The Diyang did know they were facing an immensely powerful with a major technological edge … they might have deployed hundreds of sensor drones and platforms themselves, hoping to get some warning before the shit hit the fan. It was what the Federation had done, when the Killers arrived …

And most of our crazy concepts were worse than useless, he reflected, sourly. It didn’t end well for us.

“Sir,” Commander Horace Abad said. “I think we have all the targets locked down.”

Ethan nodded, slowly. The Diyang fleet was powerful. Fifteen fleet carriers, nineteen battleships … nearly two hundred smaller vessels, enough firepower to give the entire contemporary human navy a very hard time. It made him want to grind his teeth in frustration. If he had an unlimited supply of FTL missiles, or Jarheads, he could wipe them out from so far beyond their range they’d have no idea they were under attack until it was far too late. But he didn’t and that meant he had to close the range …

“Contact the flag,” he ordered. Just who was in charge – Ethan or Howard Anderson – had been left just a little undetermined. The contemporary governments had spent so long arguing over which officer should command the contemporary starships that they hadn’t tried to clarify the relationship between the contemporary and future crews … thankfully, he and Anderson got on well. “Inform them we can jump when ready.”

He tapped the console, inspecting the rest of the enemy positions. It was odd that the defenders were concentrating more on the planet than the cloudscoops, unless they had some reason to think the planet wasn’t just going to be isolated and left to wither on the vine. Perhaps they thought the contemporary humans intended to commit genocide or they simply weren’t sure what they were facing, beyond a foe that had come out of nowhere and captured an entire fleet. It was something he’d have to ask, after the fighting was over.

“Signal from the flag, sir,” Abad said. “Coordinates locked. The fleet is to jump in five minutes.”

“Good.” Ethan glanced at the coordinates. Howard was playing it careful, bringing the fleet into the system at some distance from the enemy positions. Not ideal, with future technology backing up the contemporary starships, but probably the best way to ensure a successful engagement without heavy losses. “Conduct a full sensor sweep as soon as we jump in, then transmit the pre-recorded message.”

“Aye, sir.”

Cassidy caught his eye. “Do you think they’ll surrender?”

Ethan doubted it. The Diyang Government had never surrendered, not until they’d lost the final battle and realised they were on the brink of total defeat. They needed to be knocked down hard before it dawned on them that they were doomed … would the shock of the defeat at Earth have changed a few minds, or would they have refused to believe the reports, when the scouts got home? He still had no idea just how much the scouts had seen, before they'd tried to flee. It could be everything from a complete sensor record to a single emergency signal, with no real detail. He had no way to know.

Not yet, anyway, he thought. We’ll see.

“It depends,” he said. “They were always a stubborn race. They needed to be taught there were beings in the universe stronger than them before they gave up. And in this time …”

He shrugged. “Hopefully, they’ll surrender before it is too late.”

 

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Diyang-14, 2308

Fleet Admiral Yasa-Taha, Clan Tago, sat on his command deck and fretted.

His people had been shocked to discover another intelligent race so close to them, certainly a race as aggressive and expansionist as their own; they’d never doubted, not for a second, that direct contact between the humans and themselves would end in conflict even if the two races tried to negotiate a treaty that would establish a border between them. The humans were just too aggressive, even if their technology was not as advanced. They were a multitude of competing factions and one would inevitably start a war, even if the others wanted peace. The decision to go to war, to crush the humans before the Diyang could be crushed themselves, hadn’t been taken lightly … but it had been taken. There had been very few arguing against it.

The plan had been relatively simple. Conquer a handful of human colonies. Lure the human fleet out of place. Strike at the human homeworld, devastate their industrial base and wait for the rest of their fleet to run out of fuel and supplies. They could be mopped up at leisure, the smaller human colonies evacuated and the larger settlements – and their homeworld – locked out of space. The threat to his people would be ended before it was too late, before the humans had a chance to take note of their neighbours and start preparing for war. It shouldn’t have gone wrong …

But it had.

A mighty fleet had headed to the human homeworld and … been boarded and captured. Details were scant, the lone survivor unable to report more than what little her crew had seen, but it was clear the invasion fleet had been defeated, if not destroyed. It should not have happened – even if the humans hadn’t been fooled by the division, the fleet should have been able to fight its way out – and yet it had. The higher command had been panicking ever since word had reached the homeworld, unsure what had consumed so many ships. Had they terribly misjudged the human military machine? Or had another power intervened on their side? Or … or what?

And then the warning had arrived.

The message tags indicated it was from a scout ship, patrolling the outer reaches of the system. No such scout had been deployed, as far as he knew, although it wasn’t uncommon for higher command to order a system kept under very quiet observation if they’d committed dozens of starships to its defence. The message was very clear: the system was about to be attacked, by a vastly superior foe, and the defenders had to act fast if they wanted to preserve their ships and civilisation. It suggested the planet itself would be bombarded, the millions of settlers exterminated rather than being forced to leave or simply trapped on the planet’s surface. He had no idea if the message was real, yet all the other explanations were worse. If the humans had managed to hack the starship datacores, which should have been destroyed if there was a risk of them falling into enemy hands, they knew everything from the exact location of each and every settled planet to the complete fleet listings. If they did …

He tried hard to keep from betraying his agitation, but it was impossible. His people feared the unknown. It was standard practice to be wary of strangers and who could be stranger than an alien race, particularly one with advanced technology. The system should have been well beyond human reach, at least until they built up the logistic bases to take the war into friendly territory, but if they were wrong about human capabilities the system might be more vulnerable than he’d thought. Defences that should have stood off just about anything, or at least anything he could imagine, might not be anything like as powerful as he’d been assured. The planetary defence centres would be easy targets, instead of fortresses capable of dominating the orbitals and keeping the enemy from landing troops or bombarding population centres …

An alarm sounded. A cluster of enemy starships appeared on the display.

His crew rushed to their stations, giving him time to study the situation. The enemy deployment was odd, neither materialising close enough to give the attackers the advantage of surprise nor far away enough to prevent detection. They’d given him plenty of time to muster his troops, deploy fighters and prepare for the coming engagement, which meant they were either idiots or had something nasty buried in their snouts. They were in tight formation too, which suggested their jumpdrives were better than his own. His fur stood on end. They really were facing an enemy of unknown power and sophistication. All of a sudden, the concept of them actually managing to destroy an entire fleet – practically effortlessly – didn’t seem so difficult to believe.

“Deploy scouts and pickets,” he ordered, quietly. “The homeworld has to know what happens here.”

He felt his fur ripple again. The first fleet had had an entire flotilla of scouts watching from behind stealth screens, and only one of those starships had made it clear. No one was quite sure what had happened to the rest, which meant … what? He didn’t know.

The enemy fleet grew larger on the display, dozens of starships … mostly sharing the modular structure of his own ships, but a handful very different … practically alien. His earlier thoughts returned to mock him. The humans had allies, immensely powerful aliens who thought nothing of wiping out entire fleets … the shivering threatened to unman him, to send him curling up into a ball like one of the creatures who’d eventually evolved into an intelligent race. It was too much and yet …

An officer looked up. “Clan Leader, the humans are demanding our surrender.”

Yasa-Taha said nothing. The humans had cracked the datacores, then. It had taken years for his people to unravel the human tongue, ensuring they could at least talk to their prisoners once the war actually started, and that had only been possible with the help of a captured human educational database. The humans shouldn’t have been able to repeat the feat, even if they’d taken hundreds of POWs, unless they had gained access to the files … he felt his heart beat erratically as the realisation dawned on him the humans might have a decisive advantage. And yet, the message had suggested the humans only had a limited selection of advanced weapons …

“Signal the fleet,” he ordered, harshly. “All ships are to open fire with mass drives, then prepare to implement quick-hop on my command.”

***

Howard gritted his teeth as he watched the alien fleet form up to face the human intruders. The Diyang had evidently had at least some warning, judging from the way they’d clearly been massing their fleet even before they’d made their formal entry into the system, which meant their sensors were better than he’d thought or someone was playing games. He doubted anyone would take such a risk, not when the future of the entire human race at stake. It was quite possible someone would consider selling out the rest of humanity, if it meant they’d come out on top, but the future records suggested no one had tried even in the original timeline. Here, with human victory certain, who would try? Benedict Arnold had had reason to think the British would win the War of Independence, and Andrew O’Hara had been an ideological convert, but here … who would want to join a side they knew would lose? It would be insane.

Although there are enough humans out there insane enough to want almost anything, Howard reminded himself, dryly. The last five hundred years were littered with lunatics, from Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin to Joshua One-Soul and Gaby Gainsworth, all of whom had committed or tried to commit outright genocide. That’s the price we pay for such a large society.

Georges looked up. “Sir, there’s been no response to our message.”

Howard wasn’t surprised. The enemy had the human fleet outnumbered, at least on paper. They might not know just how badly they were outmatched, and if they were anything like their human enemies they wouldn’t be keen on surrender anyway. He wouldn’t have given up his ship if he could avoid it, and he wouldn’t want to admit – even to himself – that the enemy had a decisive advantage. He recalled some of the tales of John Paul Jones and Admiral Cochrane, neither knowing how to give up. They wouldn’t have surrendered even if they were facing an enemy they couldn’t even touch.

An alarm sounded. “Sir, they’re opening fire with mass drivers!”

“Deploy fighters and point defence to intercept,” Howard ordered, smoothly. It wasn’t a bad move on the enemy’s part, and if they were facing the contemporary fleet alone it would likely have worked. The mass driver projectiles would arrive hard on the heels of any warning he received, giving him very little time to defend himself before they started hitting their targets and tearing through their hulls. Their targeting would be shit at such range, although better than he cared to admit, but they’d be firing so many projectiles they’d be bound to hit something. “And prepare to engage with long-range missiles.”

“Aye, sir.”

Howard sucked in his breath as the projectiles flashed towards his ships. Lacking any sort of drives, they should have been practically invisible to his sensors. His only hope would have been to calculate their rough trajectories, a difficult task under controlled conditions, but with FTL sensors … he allowed himself a moment of relief as the projectiles were detected, tracked, and interception trajectories calculated before they reached his engagement envelope. The datanet was working as advertised, wielding his point defence into a single entity. It was damn near perfect.

And once again, warfare changes, he mused. His fleet hadn’t taken a single hit. He wondered if the enemy knew it. The two fleets weren’t that far apart, certainly not far enough for the time delay to be more than a minor nuisance … there was little hope of convincing the enemy destroyed ships were still intact or vice versa. If we let them know they can’t hope to hit us …

The display sparkled with red light. Alarms howled. Howard swore out loud as the entire enemy fleet jumped into engagement range, moving so quickly there had been almost no warning … a Picard Manoeuvre, pulled off through guts and sheer bloody determination. The enemy formation was scattered, any combat datanet probably broken beyond easy repair, but it didn’t matter. They were so close to his ships that they didn’t need a datanet to defend themselves. They could focus all of their energies on taking out his ships. It was a possibility that had never been envisaged.

“All ships, launch fighters and open fire,” he snapped. They were at practically point-blank range. “I say again, open fire!”

Grant shuddered as she fired her mass drivers, then opened fire with pulse cannons and particle beams. The rest of the fleet followed suit, the fleet carriers launching waves of fighters to harass the enemy ships or defend themselves against enemy fighters. He had to admire the enemy nerve as the range closed, their determination to take down the heavy ships even at the cost of their own. They might even win, if they rammed their vessels into the future starships. That would be bad … his lips twisted sourly. The enemy had turned a certain victory into an engagement in which the outcome was still very much uncertain.

“Enterprise is taking heavy fire,” Georges reported. “Invincible has been disabled … Kuznetsov has been destroyed. They’re targeting the carriers specifically … Foch is taking heavy fire …”

“Deploy fighters to cover them,” Howard ordered. The Diyang didn’t seem to have realised Howard was commanding the fleet from a relatively small starship. They certainly didn’t have Grant on the list of priority targets. “And deploy defensive platforms to cover them.”

He paused. “Authorise the carriers to jump out, if need be,” he added. “We’ll worry about reuniting the fleet later.”

“Aye, sir.”

Howard forced himself to lean forward, watching as the range kept closing. The enemy fire was getting more accurate, despite his point defence’s best efforts. He cursed himself for not insisting on engaging with FTL missiles, although the weapons were effectively irreplaceable until the future industrial nodes were up and running … he told himself, sharply, that it had been a mistake. The battle wasn’t lost, but …

His display flashed up another alert. What the hell was that?

***

Y’Opohan was perfectly familiar with the concept of using other races as cat’s paws. The Zargana were superior to all, naturally, but the idea of other races merely mimicking intelligence rather than being intelligent in their own right was one that had been abandoned long ago, when even his famously stubborn people had been forced to admit that some lesser races were actually thinking beings. It helped to manipulate your targets when you understood how they thought and yet … he couldn’t help thinking the Diyang were animals pretending to be thinkers. He’d given them a very clear warning and yet … they hadn’t taken heed of it. And that meant …

He opened his mouth as the range closed rapidly, baring his teeth. The Diyang would have been risking everything even if they were facing the human ships alone. They were charging into the teeth of their fire, relying on primitive ECM and decoys to keep the humans from concentrating their fire against the real starships … it was unlikely they would have fooled the humans for long even if they didn’t have FTL sensors. Their starships were just too powerful, their emissions too complex for the decoys to mimic them at such close range. And that meant ....

“Energy weapons locked on target,” Officer Y’Kentuck reported. The weapons officer wasn’t bothering to hide his enthusiasm. “Ready to fire on your command.”

“Fire.”

Vendetta opened fire. The enemy starships charging his position disintegrated. Y’Opohan felt his jaws loll open in a terrible smile as his energy weapons induced instant fission, setting off a chain reaction that blew the enemy starships into dust. Their lasers and particle beams and pulse cannons and even mass drovers were powerful by the standards of their time, he supposed, and their hulls were armoured to survive a hit or two from such weapons, but they had absolutely no defence against his ship’s primary armament. A carrier, holding position far enough to be relatively safe from contemporary weapons, was struck by a glancing blow and immediately disintegrated in a series of tearing explosions as the chain reaction spread through the hull. The crew had no time to take to the lifepods, if indeed they had any. He understood the importance of ensuring the crew had a chance to save their lives, if their vessel was lost, but … did they? He’d read the files – Boswell had made the records available to him, another mistake on his part – yet he’d never encountered a Diyang in person. He had no idea how seriously they took their own lives.

Not that it matters, he told himself. The destruction would impress the Chinese … and hopefully remind the rest of the contemporary humans that his ship and crew weren’t toothless. They weren’t going to win this battle, whatever happened.

The Federation starships opened fire a moment later, their weapons equally as powerful … although their heavy cruiser mounted fewer energy weapons than his own. The Diyang fleet came apart at the seams, a hundred fighters diving in to buy time as the larger vessels tried to recycle their drives to escape. They didn’t have time, Y’Opohan noted coldly; they’d jumped into point-blank range and the only way they were going to escape now was through the mercy of their enemies or sheer dumb luck. A fighter swooped down on Vendetta and launched a pair of nuclear-tipped missiles, both exploding harmlessly against the ship’s shields. The fighter was swatted a second later, the pilot atomised before he knew he was under attack. Y’Opohan felt torn between reluctant admiration and disdain for the sheer waste. If you were outmatched, the smart thing to do was to back off and prepare for the next encounter, not throw your lives away for nothing. It was a degree of sacrifice that even he found appalling.

But it will give us time to prepare, he thought, eying the icon on the display. And when the time comes to leave the fleet, we’ll make sure they can’t follow us.

***

“My God,” Cassidy said. “They’re just … killing themselves.”

Ethan nodded, keeping his face blank as the enemy ships impaled themselves on his guns. The microjump had caught him by surprise, and they’d done considerable damage to the contemporary fleet, but the cost had been appalling. It was a savagery unseen since the Zargana War, at least until the Killers had shown themselves, and every instinct he’d formed in a lifetime of near-complete technological superiority insisted he should be able to prevent the slaughter without harming a single enemy soul. If he’d had a fleet of modern cruisers …

“There’s nothing we can do,” he said, a little more harshly than he’d intended. “They’re determined to buy time.”

He shuddered as an enemy cruiser rammed a contemporary starship amidships, both starships blowing up with terrifying force. The enemy had no idea what they were facing, no idea there was nothing they could do to save themselves … he was almost relieved as he saw a handful of starships jumping out, even though he knew they’d see them again soon enough. At least those crews would survive a few weeks more …

“Signal from Grant, sir,” Yu said, as the last active enemy starship vanished from the display. “They’re requesting that we commence deploying the Jarheads.”

Ethan nodded. “Inform Chesty Puller she may begin deploying Jarhead at will.”

“Aye, sir.”

 

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Diyang-14, 2308

The Diyang fuelling station was remarkably conventional.

Corporal Yammer Allyson reminded himself, dryly, that he really shouldn’t be surprised. The Diyang had the same technological limitations as the contemporary humans, the same lack of ability to tell the laws of physics to take a hike and leave the designers alone to craft starships and space stations that were true works of art. The cloudscoop was little more than a cluster of giant gas bags, linked to a long tube that dangled into the gas giant’s atmosphere and drained HE3 to fuel the system’s industrial development, passing it through a small refinery before channelling it into the tanks. The manned station was larger than he’d expected, but he supposed that shouldn’t be a surprise either. The Diyang presumably had the same need for space as humanity, despite being smaller, and there was no real reason beyond beancounting that they couldn’t expand the facility to give their crews plenty of room. It was simple common sense.

His awareness expanded rapidly as the platoon glided towards the station, keeping communications and active sensors stepped down even through the locals shouldn’t be able to detect the incoming Jarheads. The Diyang had realised their system was about to be attacked, according to the briefing they’d received before launching themselves into space, and no one in fleet command had been able to figure out how. Personally, Yammer suspected a spacer had done something careless and the aliens had picked up on it, although they’d probably never know for sure. The naval crews weren’t known for poor discipline, but they lacked the sheer bloody-minded determination of the Terran Marines. It came from serving on glorified hotels and not being prepared, mentally speaking, to find themselves stranded in a very different era. He was honestly surprised there hadn’t been a hundred more disciplinary issues over the last few weeks …

The thought made him smile as he studied the latest sensor readings. The alien facility was heavily defended, for its size, but the handful of weapons platforms surrounding the station were of little use if they couldn’t detect the incoming marines. They were filling space with active sensor pulses, the kind of trick most tacticians disdained as more revealing to the enemy than your own people … although, in this case, there was little point in trying to hide. The cloudscoop was a very big and obvious target and there was just no way to hide it. Even contemporary spacers would have to be blind and deaf to miss it. Their passive sensors would be more than enough.

He kept the portable sensors stepped down as the station grew and grew, until it dominated the horizon. Some Marines had protested the order to go in stealthy, arguing that the Diyang couldn’t detect sensor systems that were literally hundreds of years ahead of the best they had to offer, but the CO had pointed out that – sooner or later – they’d face a more advanced opponent and if they let themselves get sloppy the enemy would kick their asses around the field and then murder whatever was left. Yammer tended to agree, and had said as much to the men under his command. They were all that remained of the Terran Marines. They had a reputation to maintain. And rebuild from scratch.

There was no sense of gravity as he landed neatly on the exposed hull, passive sensors flickering back and forth for possible threats. The training scenarios had included a number of alien soldiers sitting on the hull, ready to pop up and open fire, but there were no visible defenders or weapons turrets. The sensor platforms were more of a danger. The advanced systems – by contemporary standards – shouldn’t be able to detect the Jarheads, unless someone screwed up by the numbers, but a stupidly-simple video camera, a device too primitive to register on most sensors, would be more than enough to sound the alarm. If he’d been setting a trap, he would have installed equally stupid motion sensors and a bunch of other tricks, presenting one hell of a challenge for the boarding party. He made a note of it for the next training exercise. It would teach the more overconfident marines that primitive didn’t mean stupid – or harmless.

Shame we have to take the station intact, he thought, as he led the way to the nearest hatch. He would have preferred to burn through the hull, ensuring the enemy had no time to assemble a blocking force before it was too late, but orders were orders. Should just blow the station away from a safe distance if it refuses to surrender.

He pushed the thought aside, then paused when they reached the hatch. It was a simple design, oddly small … he snorted in dark amusement, recalling the Diyang were smaller than the average human and presumably didn’t need a hatch big enough for several Jarheads to enter at the same time. The lock was just as simple as the rest of the station, lacking the complex security measures he’d expected … measures he could easily have subverted, if he’d wanted to open the hatch without sounding an alarm. He used a laser cutter to open the hatch, then plunged inside. A stream of atmosphere poured past him as he opened the inner hatch, revealing a handful of aliens waiting in ambush positions. Civilians, he guessed. They were too close to the hatch for trained spacers. He launched a stun grenade ahead of him, then darted into the corridor. His weapons engaged automatically, tracking targets and stunning them with gleeful abandon.

“Seal the hatch,” he ordered, as the rest of the platoon followed. The Diyang had learnt a few lessons from the previous engagement, using high explosives and particle weapons – including something that looked like a laser cutter off their own – rather than relying on sidearms and assault rifles. They’d also ditched their spacesuits and protective gear, if they’d ever had them. It wasn’t a bad move, under the circumstances. Their suits reduced their mobility without providing any additional protection. “And go through …”

He gritted his teeth as the hull shuddered around him, his Jarhead reporting light battle damage for the first time in years. The enemy were working frantically to slow him down, hammering the platoon with everything they could throw at him … he cursed under his breath as a makeshift fusion lance came within bare seconds of striking and actually destroying a Jarhead. The damage report was oddly impressive … he ordered the operator to back off and cover the hatch, while the rest of the platoon cleared the way into the station. They might have to kill or capture the entire crew. The internal command net was as simple as the rest of the station. Perversely, the design made it harder to crack. It was too primitive to allow his tools to get in and shut the system down.

The though mocked him as they crashed through what had to be living chambers, hunting for the control centre. There was no point in shutting the life support down, not now … he frowned as his sensors detected interference, several different kinds of makeshift ECM. Were they trying to shut down his communications links? If they’d worked out the Jarheads were remotely controlled, they might think they could cut the link between the operators and their machines … good thinking, if unlikely to actually work. There was simply no way to cut a quantum entanglement …

Unless the Killers could do it, Yammer reminded himself. The Killers had demonstrated all sorts of abilities the Federation had thought impossible, from utterly bizarre hyperspace tech to sensors that could track perfectly stealthed targets. Could they cut a quantum entanglement …? He shook his head. The Diyang couldn’t and that was all that mattered at the moment. Worry about it later. Right now, we have a job to do.

The command hatch was closed, of course. The enemy seemed to be running out of manpower, thankfully … he guessed the Jarheads had advanced so quickly they’d prevented the enemy from carrying out an organised retreat. The hatch was solid metal, strong enough to stand off a nuke but nowhere near solid enough to keep his cutters from burning though the lock and opening the way into the command centre. It looked like a warren, the aliens raising their weapons and …

He found himself back in his own body, fighting to breathe. It was hardly the first time he’d been kicked out of the mental link, but it was easily one of the worst … his stomach twisted painfully as the world shifted around him, threatening to expel everything he’d eaten in his entire life. A stab of pain shot through his head as he grabbed for the helmet and picked it up, the sudden disorientation making him feel as if someone was playing games with the gravity generator. Up was down, left was right … his thoughts were spinning so violently it was hard to focus. He’d been assured, time and time again, that there was no risk of mental damage from losing the link without warning, but right now it was very hard to believe.

“Fuck,” he managed. A contemporary swearword, one that had become popular amongst his team in the last few weeks. “What happened?”

He sat upright. The rest of the platoon were awake and aware, some rising and others glancing around as if they were badly disorientated. The Jarhead control chamber was familiar – he’d been in the compartment hundreds of times, perhaps thousands – and yet it felt badly wrong, as if he’d found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time. Everything was right and yet …

“You lost,” Lieutenant Jeanine Parker said. She looked as battered as the rest of them, odd given that they’d been in no physical danger. “They blew the station.”

Yammer swore. “The Jarheads?”

“Gone.” Jeanine shot him a sympathetic look. “You won’t get new ones in a hurry.”

“If at all,” Yammer muttered. General Geddes was a reasonable officer, and long custom Marine officers handled Marine issues, but she’d be pissed about losing the Jarheads. The most optimistic projections he’d seen suggested there wouldn’t be any new ones for at least five years – and that assumed the fabricators wouldn’t be ordered to produce something fleet command considered more important. “What now?”

“Get yourself and your platoon sorted out,” Jeanine advised. “You can report to the General afterwards. I’m sure she’ll send you the bill.”

Yammer snorted and forced himself to stand on wobbly legs. The idea of actually paying for something as simple as food and drink, let alone a Jarhead, had been completely alien to him before they’d found themselves hundreds of years in the past. Now … he shook his head. They didn’t get pay packets, unlike their counterparts, and even if they did the lost machines were literally priceless. He kicked himself, mentally, for never even considering the possibility the aliens would blow the station. The Diyang weren’t known for suicide attacks.

That’s someone else’s problem, he told himself, sharply. Stick to your team.

***

“I hear someone lost a fuelling dump,” a voice said, from behind him. “I guess those shiny machines aren’t as good as they say.”

“As you were,” Major John Montrose snapped. The shuttle was making its descent into the half-terraformed planet’s atmosphere and the flight could go badly wrong very quickly. He certainly didn’t need more rivalry between the contemporary and future soldiers. There had already been enough clashes to leave him convinced there would be worse trouble in future, if they didn’t find a way to keep it under wraps. “Focus on the task at hand.”

He kept his eyes on the display as the shuttle dropped further, bracing himself for everything from enemy fire to turbulence. Planet IV – if it had a local name, it hadn’t been mentioned in the briefing – could have passed for Mars, although the atmosphere was breathable and the terraforming effort was well underway. The sensor sweeps insisted the air was thin, but not too thin … John had insisted on the teams keeping their rebreathers in hand, just in case. They might need them in a hurry. The shuttle rocked, a handful of whoops coming up from behind him, as it hit a rough patch, his stomach twisting painfully as the craft seemed to drop several hundred metres in the blink of an eye. Turbulence was rarely dangerous back home, but here …

“We’ll be down in a heartbeat,” the pilot called. “Brace yourselves.”

“At least they can’t blow up a whole planet,” someone else remarked. “Can they?”

“No,” John snapped. “Brace yourself for landing!”

He gritted his teeth. It was never easy probing buildings that were crammed with IEDs, prepped to explode at the slightest hint of enemy activity, and nerves would only make it harder. The thought of someone blowing up the whole facility to get a handful of humans was just … he shook his head, bracing himself as the shuttle dropped again. They were trapped and helpless on the shuttle, a single hit more than enough to blow away the craft and fifty trained and experienced men; it was no wonder his troops were letting off steam. They’d be alright on the ground. If nothing else, they’d be able to shoot back at anyone trying to kill them.

The shuttle hit the ground, hatches crashing open. John unstrapped himself and hurried for the hatch, the lead elements heading outside and fanning out into a defensive position just in case the enemy had predicted their landing site and prepared a surprise. The air outside was thicker than he’d expected, from the briefing, oddly scentless for a very alien world. He looked around, keeping one hand on his weapon as he searched for potential threats. He’d half-expected the surrounding landscape to be red, like Mars, but instead the rocks were a weird yellow-greenish colour. It was hardly the weirdest thing he'd seen, yet …

He snapped orders as the rest of the shuttles landed and disgorged the assault force. A small group would remain with the shuttles, just in case, but the rest of the troops had to get underway before the enemy rallied and counterattacked. The Diyang were being attacked right across the system, unless something had gone spectacularly wrong, and they shouldn’t have the mental bandwidth to worry about one more landing, yet only an idiot left an enemy beachhead alone any longer than absolutely necessary. The enemy really should be hurling missiles or shells at them even now …

“Move out,” he ordered, hopping onto a LAV. The hovercraft wasn’t the toughest vehicle the Royal Marines used, but it was fast and light, both vitally important when deploying to other worlds. “Launch drones, get me a clear view of the target.”

“Aye, sir.”

The LAV picked up speed, the rest of the assault force fanning out behind it. John braced himself for trouble, from enemy aircraft to incoming shells, but the skies were surprisingly clear. The last update had noted that the fleet was deploying troops to hundreds of targets … perhaps the enemy were having trouble deciding which threatened zones needed reinforcements and which would have to be abandoned, at least for the moment. Or … he braced himself as the enemy facility came into view, a handful of glass domes that looked a little out of place on the terraformed world. A handful of enemy troops were clearly visible, trying to set up a defence. They looked to have been caught by surprise.

They couldn’t have expected us to strike so far into their space in a single bound, he told himself, as he gave the command to open fire. The enemy didn’t need to be given more time to prepare their defences. We might as well have teleported right behind their lines.

The Diyang returned fire, plasma pulses shooting through the air. John felt an odd little pang as he saw the diminutive aliens, a sensation running through him he didn’t care to look at too closely. They couldn’t have passed for children, not unless it was very dark, but still … he saw a LAV exploded as a plasma pulse struck its target and pushed his feelings aside. The assault force dismounted and advanced at a rush, tearing through the enemy positions and striking them down before they could retreat or throw down their arms. John tapped his radio, sending out an offer to accept surrender. If it was received, there was no answer. The Diyang fought to the death.

“Get into the facility,” he snapped. The design looked civilian and given the lack of fixed defences, he was inclined to believe it hadn’t originally been designed for military purposes. It didn’t mean it was harmless. Given time, there were plenty of ways to turn a civilian facility into a death trap. He’d seen many during his long career. “Get control now and …”

Sweat prickled down his back. He wanted to lead the assault in person, now they’d reached their target, but he was the commander. There were limits to how much danger he was allowed to face personally, limits he knew he couldn’t exceed without risking military disaster or court martial. He knew his duty and yet it felt wrong to come so far and then remain behind, in safety, when his men went into war. He knew, now, why the Terran Marines used their Jarheads. It was a way to both safeguard their men and ensure the CO could be on the scene. No one was in any real danger. Even if the Jarheads were destroyed, the operators were safe.

His radio buzzed. “Sir, this is Niles,” a voice said. The tone was low, urgent. “I think you should see this.”

“Got it,” John said, with a private flicker of amusement. Underling’s Inability Descriptive Syndrome, definitely. “I’m on my way.”

 

Chapter Thirty: Diyang-14, 2308

“Jesus,” Anderson said. The shock in his voice was rapidly replaced by anger. “How did you not know?”

Ethan had no answer. The history files had suggested the Diyang largely left the human population of the occupied colonies alone, once they’d secured the high orbitals and blasted anything on the surface that could be a possible threat to them. There had never been any suggestion the aliens had taken human prisoners deeper into their space, not even after the war where records had been compared and historians started filling in the blanks of each side’s understanding of the war. The Diyang had been remarkably civilised, by human standards. They certainly hadn’t been as bad as the Zargana. Or the Killers.

He gritted his teeth. There’d been nearly five hundred humans in the facility – men, women and children – and many had been brutally interrogated. Some had been tortured, others had been drugged or given experimental treatments that hadn’t been designed for human minds … the medical reports were sickening, noting that many would never recover even with modern medical treatment. The physical wounds were bad enough, but the mental scars were far worse. It would be years before the prisoners returned to normal, if they ever did. And the worst of the whole affair was that it had been completely pointless. The prisoners hadn’t known anything about either the contemporary militaries or the future starships. How could they?

“History has changed,” Rachel said, quietly. “And our guidebooks to the past – the future – are no longer reliable.”

Anderson glowered at her. “How can you be sure?”

“We checked the prisoners against your records and our history files,” Rachel told him. “We have at least four people of historical note in our sickbay, people who were never alien prisoners in the original timeline. Steward Yang, for example, was a noted reformist during the colonial conflict, but none of the hundreds of biographies mention him ever being an alien prisoner.”

“Maybe it got left out,” Cassidy said. She sounded bitter and broken. “Do you know how many embarrassing facts are left out of biographies?”

“Yang was the subject of hundreds of biographical works.” Rachel spoke with calm authority, tapping the terminal to bring up a holographic image of a young man. “I scanned them all. There are works that insist he was the greatest political genius who ever lived, works that claim he was a fool who made things worse for everyone else … and, mostly, works that take a balanced position between genius and utter moron. There is no suggestion in any of them that he was an alien prisoner, merely someone who happened to live on an alien-occupied world. Even the works that flatter him to the point of madness don’t claim he was a resistance fighter, or anything along those lines. He shouldn’t be here.”

“And yet he is,” Anderson said, glowering at the display. “Why?”

“The files were destroyed,” Ethan said. “We didn’t capture anyone who knew about the prisoners …”

“As far as we know,” Anderson put in.

“… “But it seems likely the Diyang wanted to discover if they’d bitten off more than they could chew,” Ethan continued, ignoring the interruption. “They might have taken the prisoners to interrogate them about our ships, unaware of where and when we really come from.”

He felt a pang of guilt. Anderson and his peers had fought the Diyang on roughly even terms. The Diyang had even had a slight edge over their human enemies. They’d known they’d been outfought during the Battle of Earth, that sheer bad luck had placed a human squadron in position to slow their fleet while screaming a warning to humanity’s homeworld. There had been no reason to torture or kill prisoners, no need to think they had to discard common decency to prepare themselves for the coming nightmare. But now …

They must have thought they’d severely underestimated the human race, he mused. Their defeat in this timeline suggested the human race was – is – far more advanced than they knew. Then they interrogated the prisoners to find out what they’d missed, only it was pointless because the prisoners didn’t know anything. Couldn’t know anything. And now we have a crisis on our hands.

Anderson calmed himself with a visible effort. “Are there more prisoners, further into enemy territory?”

Ethan didn’t know. The Diyang had had several months to realise they needed information and implement a plan to get it … and there were hundreds of thousands of humans trapped behind enemy lines, unable to resist if the Diyang decided to take them. They might not have a very effective chest of horrors, when it came to getting answers out of human captives, and no way to verify what they were being told. There was no point in torturing someone for answers when you didn’t know enough of the truth to convince the victim there no point in trying to hide something or lie, not when the poor bastard would say whatever his interrogator wanted to hear to stop the pain. Ethan could easily imagine a human screaming he knew nothing, truthfully, and an alien interrogator keeping up the pain, or worse. Given time, they’d find ways to use drugs or direct neural manipulation or ... something, anything, that would work. Except it wouldn’t because they wouldn’t believe the truth …

“There’s no way to know,” he admitted. “They had plenty of time to round up prisoners before we begun the offensive.”

“Then we have to do something,” Anderson said. “Are there more prisoners even in this system alone?”

“Unknown,” Ethan said. He stared at the display himself. Diyang-14 was a star system. They could search the system for weeks, using the most advanced technology in the known universe, and scan enemy records for signs of human prisoners and they’d never be sure there were none to be found. It was easy to imagine a tiny asteroid, converted into a POW camp and left drifting on the edge of the system; harder to figure out a way to find it if the enemy manning the station didn’t make any mistakes. “We may never know for sure.”

Anderson shot him a sharp look. “How can you be so calm about it?”

Ethan understood, better than he cared to admit. He should be shocked … he was shocked. The barbarity on the display was horrifying, all the more so because it had been singularly pointless. And yet, he was old and mature enough to know a violent reaction would only make things worse. What should they do? Bombard the planet and slaughter millions of aliens? Or launch surgical strikes to take out the enemy leadership? Or … he shuddered, inwardly. The contemporary governments had few qualms about hammering targets from orbit and to hell with any innocent bystanders who happened to be standing too close to ground zero. It wasn’t something he could do …

Careful now, a voice pointed out at the back of his head. You don’t have the resources of the Terran Federation backing you up.

“There is nothing to be gained from anger, not now,” he said. It was a mistake and he knew it the moment the words passed his lips. “We will deal with the guilty parties, in time.”

“And how many others will die,” Anderson asked, “before you catch the guilty and deal with them?”

“We’ll search the system as best we can,” Ethan said. “Right now, we need to decide what we do when the search is completed.”

He hoped Anderson wouldn’t suggest retaliating against the Diyang POWs. It wasn’t something he could go along with, yet … he cursed under his breath. There would be someone on Earth who insisted that murdering the POWs was the right thing to do, to make it clear to the alien government that harming human prisoners would result in bloody revenge. Ethan understood the logic, really he did, but unleashing a chain of massacre and reprisal would end very badly indeed. Better to put an end to the war and then deal with the guilty parties.

“I’ll discuss it with my commanders,” Anderson said. “I trust you’ll go along with our decision.”

He closed the channel before Ethan could respond. Ethan gritted his teeth. Their relationship had grown strained over the last few weeks and now … he wasn’t sure how it would end. Anderson had too many problems he needed to juggle, as well as the ghostly shadow of a life he’d never led peering over his shoulder. Anderson would have very real problems living up to his alternate self. How could he?

“I’ll speak to him later,” Cassidy said. “I’m sorry, but …”

“Don’t worry about it,” Ethan said. He didn’t really blame Anderson for his feelings. There had been no reason to expect such a chamber of horrors, no grounds to prepare the contemporary humans for such a nightmare. Anderson’s faith in the future records had been shattered and who could blame him? “We’ll discuss the matter further when we know just what we’re dealing with.”

Cassidy nodded, then left the compartment. Ethan watched her go, feeling a twinge of sympathy. Howard Anderson was haunted by his heroic other self, Cassidy’s other self had vanished without a trace. There was probably going to be a lot of material for psychologists once everyone had calmed down, allowing him to start resurrecting people who only existed as patterns stored in the datacores. He wondered if it would lead to a whole new field. It was one thing to try to live up to a parent, but quite another to live up to yourself.

And would I handle it so well, he asked himself, if I had been the one meeting a fleet from the far future?

He scowled. He would have been glad of the help. Anderson … it hadn’t quite dawned on Anderson how close the human race had come to utter defeat. Ethan knew better. His civilisation was gone.

Rachel cleared her throat. “The records are very clear,” she said. “They never took prisoners.”

“So you said, unless some missing people were actually taken prisoners and vanished in the chaos,” Ethan agreed. The simple fact they had rescued people who had never been prisoners in the alternate timeline suggested otherwise. “We should have gone on the offensive at once.”

“We had other problems,” Rachel reminded him. “You can’t second-guess yourself. Someone else will be more than happy to do it for you.”

Ethan managed a smile at the weak joke, then tapped his terminal. “Analyst Green, this is Boswell,” he said. “Did you complete the post-battle analysis of the enemy records?”

“Yes, sir,” Green said. She sounded oddly unsure of herself. “To the best of my ability, at least. The enemy improved their datacore defences considerably, sir, and a number were physically destroyed as soon as they realised we had gained access. They must have worked out we were able to hack their datacores or … or at least they considered it a realistic possibility. They certainly gained access to a local datacore in the original history, so they must have realised we could do the same to them.”

“Noted,” Ethan said. It wasn’t unexpected, but it was irritating. The historical records were no longer accurate, which meant they needed to obtain updated data if they didn’t want to avoid being surprised. “What have you been able to obtain?”

“Very little,” Green admitted. “Their databases were carefully scrambled. All high command units were destroyed, either in combat or afterwards through self-destruct. We couldn’t get much of anything, sir, and what we did recover might be misinformation … deliberate or otherwise. If there’s more data in the planetary datacores …”

“If.” Ethan cut her off. “Are there any other human prisoners within the system?”

“Going by what few records we’ve been able to recover, no,” Green said. “But I don’t know how trustworthy that assessment is, not after the records were so badly scrambled.”

Ethan nodded. “And how did they know we were coming?”

“Their records state a scout ship detected our presence and jumped home,” Green said. “It’s plausible, but … it might have happened. It’s just very unlikely.”

“They’d have to be very lucky,” Ethan agreed. The Diyang jumpdrives weren’t that much better than their contemporary human counterparts. They could get from star to star easily enough, as long as they had the fuel to power their drives, but jumping into a system blind was asking for trouble. The fleet certainly hadn’t detected any starship jumping out as they arrived … he’d had the records checked, time and time again. “Do you have any reason to doubt it?”

“Only the sheer unlikelihood of it ever happening,” Green said. “The odds of Admiral Anderson encountering the enemy fleet were very low. The delay we caused would have caused them to miss the incoming ships, if we hadn’t told them what was happening. The odds of it happening again … sir, it could be coincidence, but … I wouldn’t put money on it.”

“Keep studying the records,” Ethan ordered. “Let me know if anything changes.”

“Aye, sir.”

***

Howard ground his teeth in sheer blinding rage.

He was no stranger to horror – he’d seen accidents in deep space that had left men dead or wishing they were – but there had always been a slight distance between himself and his foes that made it easier to think of them as icons on a display rather than living beings with thoughts and feelings of their own. He’d never gone up close and personal with an enemy soldier, never had to kill a man with his bare hands … never had to walk through the aftermath of a terrorist attack and see the damage, the broken bodies and shattered lives. The images they’d recovered from Planet IV were horrifying beyond words, all the worse because the atrocities had been committed by an alien race. A race he’d been told was civilised.

They didn’t know, he told himself. The history records had changed … no, history itself had changed. His alternate self was just a ghost now, an echo of a world that would never be. How could they know …?

He eyed his desk drawer, sourly. Admiral Garland had given him a bottle of expensive wine … although Howard, no oenophile, had no idea if it truly was expensive or it was nothing more than shipboard rotgut. He’d never been much of a drinker either, never seen the point even when he wasn’t in the middle of a combat zone … he eyed the terminal screen sourly, noting how thinly they were spread across the system. The enemy had a perfect opportunity to counterattack … if they knew it. The future starships couldn’t be everywhere.

No. Howard shook his head. There’s nothing to be gained from getting drunk.

He scowled at the planet, surrounded by mines and a handful of automated weapons platforms. It would be justice, part of his mind insisted, to drop a cluster of rocks on the alien world. Kill millions, perhaps billons, of the little aliens, teach them human lives didn’t come cheap. If they didn’t uphold the laws of war, never mind that they’d probably never heard of human laws of war, they couldn’t claim their protection. That had been settled long ago. He felt the urge rising within him, savoured it for a long moment, then fought it down. The alien civilians had nothing to do with the aliens who’d kidnapped, tortured and killed hundreds of humans. Slaughtering them all would be wrong, a crime against humanity. And yet …

No, he told himself firmly. The temptation had to be resisted. We will not cross that line.

He tapped a switch, summoning a command conference. The holograms materialised in his cabin one by one, blurring together as the projector fought to display them all within such a confined space. Howard would have to move his flag to a battleship or carrier soon enough, he reflected, despite the risk of drawing enemy fire. Grant just didn’t have the space for a proper fleet control system. This might be his last voyage on his ship. She’d be someone else’s soon enough.

“You have all seen the report from Planet IV,” he said, without preamble. The overconfidence was gone, now the fleet had taken a bloody nose. “The prisoners are being transferred to the fleet, where they will be cared for as best we can. The industrial facilities within this system” – the ones the aliens didn’t blow, his thoughts added silently – “will remain under our control. As planned, we will leave behind a handful of squadrons to protect them from enemy counterattack.”

He paused. “We cannot proceed with the original plan,” he continued. The damaged and destroyed ships were bad enough. The human prisoners were worse. “Therefore, the majority of the fleet will return to Earth once we have completed searching the system for human prisoners and report to our superiors. They will, no doubt, give us further orders.”

There was a long pause. The irony mocked him. He’d never enjoyed receiving orders from officers and politicians too far behind the lines to offer timely advice and now he was crawling home to beg for orders. He had hoped to remain in sole command for longer. But there was little choice. The discovery of human prisoners changed everything.

“If any of you wish to lodge an official protest, you may do so,” he added. The responsibility was his. There was no way he’d let his subordinates take the blame for a decision that rested solely with him. “It will be noted in my log.”

He paused, again. No one spoke.

“We’ll aim to depart in one week,” he finished. Some would keep their disagreements to themselves, at least until they got home. Others would agree with him. Either way, no one was challenging him openly. He’d take what he could get. “Dismissed.”

 

Chapter Thirty-One: Luna Settlement, 2308

It wasn’t the first time Ethan had set foot on Luna, but in a sense it was.

The Luna he’d known had been settled for hundreds of years, the early national lunar bases giving way to a unified government that had been one of the founders of the Terran Federation and the first host of the Federation Senate. The plans to terraform the moon had never come off the drawing, for better or worse, but modern technology had ensured it could still play host to millions of humans … at least until the Killers arrived and blew the entire system to hell. Here … Luna was much smaller, the surface covered with a multitude of national, corporate and independent settlements that were not united in any sense of the word, although – apparently – there was an underground movement for lunar unity that had never quite been suppressed despite the best efforts of the colonial masters. Ethan had no idea how it would work out, but right now it wasn’t his problem. He had to deal with the ships and crews that were all that remained of the Terran Federation.

“Welcome to Lunaville,” Director Julius Augustus said, once Ethan had stepped out of the shuttle and looked around the landing pad. “I’m sorry we didn’t have time to arrange a proper welcome.”

Ethan nodded, waving away the older man’s concern. “It doesn’t matter,” he said, as they made their way through the airlock. Lunaville wasn’t designed to take modern shuttles, although someone had managed to rig up a force field generator to ensure shuttles didn’t have to link to the airlock to unload their passengers. “I’m only passing through.”

He kept his face under tight control as they entered the dome. Lunaville had been financed by a consortium of colonial developers, who had intended to market the settlement to wealthy and powerful Europeans who wanted to move away from the chaos sweeping across the continent, only to go bankrupt before the developers could actually sell the settlement to anyone. The UN had offered to purchase the settlement for full price, once they realised they needed somewhere to house the future visitors while waiting for Coventry to be prepared for settlement, and the owners had agreed without hesitation. Ethan didn’t pretend to understand quite what had happened, but it didn’t matter. They had somewhere to call their own.

“I quite understand,” Augustus said. “You will make time to meet with people, though? They’ve been through a lot, over the last few weeks.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Ethan told him. “But right now, time is very limited.”

He sucked in his breath, looking around as they stepped onto the grassy path. The settlement was a piece of Earth on Luna, a domed town that would be in deep shit if something – anything – happened to break the dome. Ethan had noted the underground tunnels and warrens, far less appealing to the eye than the grassy paradise, and checked to make sure they had enough room for all the settlers, but he doubted the surface-dwellers would have time to reach the shelters if something really did happen. The children running outside might die in an instant if something hit the dome … he caught himself, shaking his head in tired resignation. It would have been perfectly safe back home …

Sure, his thoughts mocked. Until the Killers arrived.

“The kids have been confined here, for their own safety,” Augustus said. “They … they still think they’re in the Federation and don’t quite realise that the world down there” – he jabbed a finger at Earth, a blue-green orb clearly visible through the dome – “isn’t the one they left behind. Some are missing their parents … we’ve done what we can to foster them out, as best as possible, but we don’t have enough volunteers to take them all. Others seem to have forgotten their homes … frankly, we’re worried more about them. They’re not exactly babies who won’t miss their mothers.”

Ethan nodded, keeping this thoughts to himself as they reached a long low bungalow. It reminded him of home, just a little, and yet there was something oddly fake about it. He couldn’t put the feeling into words, but it was there. There was a small guardpost at the main entrance, something that made him smile …it was empty, of course. Augustus didn’t need guarding from his own people. The interior of the bungalow was as fake as the outside, an odd mix of primitive, contemporary and future technologies. Ethan couldn’t help feeling as though he’d stepped onto a holovid stage.

“Please, take a seat,” Augustus said. His sitting room looked oddly formal, as if it was normal to sit on armchairs and couches while discussing business. “Would you like something to drink? Or eat?”

“Yes, please,” Ethan said. He sat on an armchair and leaned back, enjoying the sensation of relaxing into a comfortable cushion rather than a gel field. “Have there been any major problems?”

“Some,” Augustus said. “Demands for trips to Earth … I think the local governments are trying to seduce our people, get them signed up for introducing newer and better technology. So far, no one appears to have taken them up on the offer, but … it could change.”

Ethan nodded. It had been rare for a Terran Federation citizen to move to a primitive society. If you wanted hardship, you moved to a habitat designed to allow you to experience hardship in any manner you pleased … with the option of returning to civilisation the moment you decided you’d had enough. You could playact at being anything, from a slave to a farmer and anything in between, without being in any real risk. The rewards of going elsewhere were minimal compared to the rewards of staying in the Federation – few societies could offer anything like as much freedom – and the risks terrifyingly high. Why would anyone want to give it up?

But here … he wondered, sourly, just what the various human governments could offer to induce his people to join them. Money? Power? Sex? Or …

“If they want to leave, they have the right to do so,” he said. It was unlikely any single emigrant could boost technological development in any meaningful way, certainly not in less than a few decades. Even if they copied files he’d denied to the contemporary nations, they’d still need years upon years to make the machines to make the machines. “Just make sure they understand we might not be able to help them, if they run into trouble.”

“Of course,” Augustus said. His lips twisted in dismay. “But you know …”

His voice trailed off. Ethan understood. The Federation had been safe in the truest possible sense. There had been little crime, little risk of injury … even those who joined the Federation Navy or the Terran Marines faced very little danger. Death wasn’t a problem, when biological immortality was possible and a dead man could be resurrected from a back-up copy … why fear anything? The Killers had changed all that, of course, but the reality had never quite sunk in until it was too late. And now old habits were returning with an vengeance.

“I know,” Ethan said, quietly. “Our tech?”

“We took a couple of fabricators out of Laura Ingalls Wilder and set them up here,” Augustus told him. “There’s a long way to go before we get a proper tech base up and running, and we’re working on improving their tech as much as possible, but we’re on the way. I should say there’s a growing demand for resurrection tech now … both from our own people and from others. I suspect that was a secret we shouldn’t have let out of the bag so quickly.”

Ethan grimaced. Few primitive worlds reacted well when they heard about rejuvenation and resurrection technology, for all sorts of reasons. The locals wanted the technology to prolong their lives and didn’t care who got hurt in the process … he should have expected it from Earth too. The great and the good would offer vast sums of money for the technology, while the poor and dispossessed would riot in the streets …

He leaned forward. “Our own people?”

“Yes, sir,” Augustus said. “They want to resurrect the missing and the dead.”

All dead now, Ethan thought. Or lost to us forever.

“Put together a list, then we’ll resurrect candidates at random once we get the facilities up and running,” he said. It would have to be random. There’d be riots if he showed any kind of favouritism. Rachel would have to wait to be resurrected … although she, at least, wasn’t suspended within a datacore, utterly unaware of the passage of time. “I think we can discard the normal verification requirements.”

“That’s the first step to chaos,” Augustus said, deadpan. “But yes, there’s probably little risk in doing so.”

Ethan nodded. The law insisted that the authorities did everything in their power to ensure the dead person was truly dead before they resurrected them from their back-up. The risk of accidentally duplicating someone, of creating two copies of the same person, was just too high. It was a taboo that had rarely been broken, and only then by people who had duplicated themselves rather than wait to be resurrected after death. But there was no point in waiting for verification here. If anyone lost was still alive, they were in the far future. Their relatives who had made it to 2308 would never see them again.

“We’ll probably have to find a way to expand the facilities to include the locals too,” he said, tiredly. “But there’s no way we can do that in a hurry.”

He sighed. “Coventry?”

“We’re working on it, but it’ll take time,” Augustus said. “There’s some feeling we should be settling here permanently instead. And some suggestions about a return to democracy.”

Ethan rubbed his forehead. Lunaville wasn’t a bad place to live, but the settlement couldn’t be anything other than a temporary expedient. It just didn’t have room for all the resurrected citizens, nor was it a safe distance from the local governments. There would be too much interference on both sides … hell, given time, too many of his people might want to leave as it dawned on them they wouldn’t be getting the old world back in a hurry.

“I’m worried about defending Coventry too,” Augustus added. “The Diyang aren’t the only enemies out there.”

“And we don’t have a huge tech edge either, not any longer,” Ethan said. He had an ever-growing list of supplies that couldn’t be replaced in a hurry. The techs were working on it, but … he scowled. “Given time, all those problems will be solved.”

“If we have time,” Augustus said. “Our mere presence here is massively disruptive, sir. The Federation grew out of the fires of war and technological advancement, stumbling towards a post-scarcity universe, but here … none of those things ever happened. I don’t pretend to know how it’ll work out. There are too many variables and …”

He made a face. “You recall the Deniker Experiment?”

“No,” Ethan said.

“Professor Deniker wanted to create an ecosystem from scratch,” Augustus said. “He built it up piece by piece, designing the whole system rather than letting it evolve naturally … it was nice and neat and elegant until something completely new was added to the mix, resulting in total disaster. The ecosystem had never learnt how to be resilient, never evolved to the point it could cope with sudden change … it came apart at the seams, the moment it faced a comparatively minor challenge. You see the same thing in children, when the parents don’t give them the freedom to grow on their own.”

Ethan cocked his head. “And your point is?”

“We can cover this society with a veneer of the world we lost, but it won’t have the resilience we took for granted,” Augustus said. “It’ll take them time to adapt to a universe where resurrection is possible, or free food and drink for everyone, or one of a hundred other technological marvels we take for granted. Trying to rush the process will only make things worse. That’s what made the Crazy Years so dangerous, if the history records are accurate. Too many people tried to rush change, and then slapped down anyone who tried to tell them to take it slowly, and then the whole system fell apart. It was a bloody mess because all goodwill was gone.

“We have the same problem. If we push for too much change, all hell will break loose; if we do nothing, we’ll be condemning our ancestors to wallow in squalor for the rest of their days.”

“Charming.” Ethan wished, not for the first time, that a planetoid had come back in time with the rest of the fleet. It would have been so much easier. A lone planetoid had more industrial capability than contemporary Earth, as well as the facilities and crew to ensure everyone could be uplifted in short order. “We’ll keep going. And hope for the best.”

“Yes.” Augustus met his eyes. “How bad was it on Diyang-14?”

“The records are in the database,” Ethan said. They hadn’t been officially released on Earth, but the recordings had leaked out anyway. The governments were still arguing about what to do. “We did what we could for the survivors, but … it wasn’t enough. They’ll never be whole again.”

He scowled. “It was like looking back at the darkest days of the Zargana War,” he added. “It didn’t help that they took a bite out of the fleet, too. And that they somehow saw us coming.”

Augustus frowned. “They could have gotten lucky.”

“Suspiciously lucky,” Ethan said. He’d hoped to overawe the Diyang, convince them to surrender without a fight. Instead, there’d been a brutal slaughter. They would never know how many aliens had died in the engagement. “It could have been a great deal worse.”

“Yes,” Augustus said. “Speaking of the Zargana, they refused our offer of a place here.”

“They want a place of their own,” Ethan said. There was no reason they couldn’t be offered a place on Coventry. He had already made the offer. “It isn’t as if this place would suit them.”

“True, but you’d think they’d want something from us,” Augustus said. “They’re not in a good place right now.”

Ethan couldn’t disagree. One heavy cruiser couldn’t support an independent colony, not on its own, and Y’Opohan would not have the help of contemporary Earth. They’d be insane to go to the contemporary Zargana Empire and the odds were good they’d be butchered if they tried … it had taken a vicious defeat to convince the violently xenophobic Zargana that aliens weren’t just animals who happened to mimic sentience, creatures who could be used and abused as the masters of the known universe pleased. If they worked with Ethan and his fleet, they could develop a colony and prepare themselves for the time they met the contemporary empire. If not … where could they go?

“I’ll speak to Y’Opohan myself,” he said. The contemporary humans had wanted to intern the Zargana. He had no intention of putting the alien commander in a place where he had to bend the knee or fight to the death. “See what we can work out, given time.”

Augustus nodded. “Good luck,” he said. “What do you intend to do now.”

Ethan sighed. The junior crewers were heading to Luna for shore leave – some visiting Lunaville, others travelling to more … exotic … settlements – but he was too busy to consider taking leave. There was a war on, if an odd little conflict that bore little resemblance to any in human history. He had a duty to end the conflict as quickly as possible.

“Convince the locals to let us attack Diyang Prime,” Ethan said. Reports of the last two battles would certainly have reached the enemy homeworld by now. The Diyang could be defeated, their industrial base destroyed and their surviving starships left to wither on the vine, if we act now, before they have a chance to save themselves. If we make the move now … the war would be over and then we could focus on preserving what we can of the world we lost.”

“If they agree,” Augustus said. He sounded as if he didn’t believe it would be easy to get the locals moving in the same direction. “Have you considered acting alone?”

Ethan would be lying to say the thought hadn’t crossed his mind. The idea of just jumping to the enemy homeworld and crushing their fleet was tempting, even though he knew it would be difficult to pull off. There was no way he could waste their last FTL missiles on targets that couldn’t shoot back, but his ships weren’t designed to fire contemporary missiles and getting close enough to use energy weapons was incredibly risky when the enemy had shown a willingness to ram. His ships were tough, yet could they survive another starship ramming them amidships? He didn’t know and he didn’t want to find out the hard way.

“We need their assistance,” he said, quietly. Perhaps they could take the enemy infrastructure out through kinetic strikes … no, that would risk striking the enemy homeworld and causing massive casualties. Perhaps even committing genocide. He had no intention of having that on his conscience, not when there were other options. “There’s no way around it.”

“Good luck, then,” Augustus said. He gave Ethan an odd little smile. “Just remember, this isn’t our world.”

“I know,” Ethan said. It would be more jarring, perhaps, to be in the early days of the Terran Federation. It would be familiar, until it wasn’t. This world might be human, but it was also disturbingly alien. “It’s something I can never forget.”

 

Chapter Thirty-Two: UN Compound, 2308

The crowd outside the security fence was terrifyingly large.

Howard felt something cold and unpleasant in his chest as he stared down at the chanting protestors. Public protest was rare in the United States of 2308, with most protests carefully astroturfed by one faction or another, and he couldn’t help thinking the protestors were either riding for a fall or convinced they enjoyed so much public support the police and federal authorities wouldn’t dare try to crack down on them. They might be right, he reflected grimly, as he spotted the handful of NYPD officers trying to keep the crowd from breaching the fence or getting out of control. The media insisted there were similar protests in nearly every large city inside the US, as well as Britain, Europe, Russia and even China. And if those protests were genuinely spontaneous …

His stomach clenched as he ran his eye over the protestors. One man, holding up a sign reading DO YOUR JOB, DROP THE BOMB, was standing next to a woman with a sign that read BRING THEM HOME. A trio of topless women were holding up a banner demanding the navy be pulled back to Earth to defend the homeworld against alien threat; a handful of young men, beside them, were waving signs he couldn’t read from his angle but probably expressed similar sentiments. Howard had painful memories of being drawn into a pair of causes by young women when he’d been a high scholar, his hormones getting in the way of his common sense. The first girl hadn’t been wrong, but her methods undermined her goals; the second had merely wanted, as far as he could tell with the advantage of hindsight, to be the centre of attention. He wondered what had happened to her as he studied the boys, feeling a twinge of sympathy. Attending a protest was an easy way to get yourself blacklisted, even if the demonstration didn’t turn violent and the police didn’t crack down with immense force. He’d been lucky no one outside the school had ever realised he’d paid more than a moment’s attention to the rabble-rousers. They’d called themselves community organisers, but everyone knew what they truly were.

And what would George Washington and Benjamin Franklin think of us, he asked himself, if they came to the future and saw this?

The thought made him grit his teeth. The United States was the finest nation on the planet. He’d seen enough over his career to be sure of it, from the authoritarian governments in Europe that covered their dictatorship with a thin veneer of democracy to the fascist states that didn’t even bother to hide their true nature. He would sooner be a poor man in America than a wealthy man in China, if only because no amount of wealth could offer safety in such a system, and he had no doubts about it. But it was painful to realise how far the United States had fallen from the ideals of the Founding Fathers, how much freedom had been lost in the interests of safety … a safety that had never materialised, not for the vast majority of the population. He’d been lucky, growing up in a military family in the suburbs. Cassidy had no shortage of horror stories about being a young girl in New York. And she’d been lucky compared to many others.

No wonder the colonies are going to revolt, he thought. They had, in the shadowy other history … and who could blame them? How are we going to sort out that mess?

The door opened, behind him. “Sir? Admiral Garland will see you now.”

Howard nodded, turning away from the window and the disturbing scene outside. The protestors wanted blood, alien blood. They wanted the navy to blast the alien homeworld from orbit, turning it into a radioactive hellhole, or land troops and systematically slaughter every last alien, every last man, woman and child. Howard understood how they felt, if only because part of him felt the same way too. The urge for bloody revenge, driven by alien horror and a grim awareness of how many times the United States had turned the other cheek instead of punishing the guilty as they deserved, festered within him. There were protestors down there who thought him a traitor for not blasting Diyang-14 back to the Stone Age, never mind that it would be an atrocity that would make Hitler or Stalin look like rank amateurs or that Boswell would have flatly refused to go along with it. Howard almost envied the other man. He had a certain distance from the era that Howard, born and bred in the current time, couldn’t hope to emulate.

But he’s trapped here, with the rest of us, he reminded himself. There’s only so long he can keep himself aloof.

His lips twitched as they made their way through a pair of security checks and into the admiral’s office. The future folk were spoiled sweet, children who had indulgent parents who gave them everything they wanted … and, somehow, were as nice as could be instead of becoming entitled spoilt brats. The navy psychologists had produced a whole string of articles arguing why that might be so, complex pieces of jargon that made Howard’s head hurt whenever he tried to read them – they weren’t written in English, but Academese – and offered complicated explanations instead of running with the simplest. The future folk had so much they no more needed to think about it than he needed to think about breathing … no, they’d had so much. It was going to be a rough day when it finally dawned on the future civilians they were going to have to work for a living.

Admiral Garland looked up as they entered. “Thank you, Shelia,” he said, to Howard’s escort. “Please fetch us some coffee, then hold my calls unless they’re Alpha-One.”

“Yes, sir.”

The admiral nodded to Howard as the ensign left the room. “I’m sorry for the last few days,” he said. “Being an admiral sometimes means you’re the target of a mass interrogation.”

Howard nodded, taking the offered seat. The United Nations Committee for the Conduct of the War was a political football, a genuine attempt to get the Great Powers working together or some combination of the two, and the committee had spent several days going over everything that had happened at Diyang-14. It had been a nightmarish process, with questions being repeated time and time again – as if his answers would change with every repetition – covering everything from sensible matters to issues that had little or no bearing on the engagement, the navy or even his career. He had a nasty feeling some of the ambassadors and uniformed politicians were taking advantage of the committee to grandstand, although it was hard to be sure. The briefing had suggested the real work was done elsewhere, while the committee served to ask questions and otherwise keep certain people out of trouble.

Or perhaps I’m reading too much into it, Howard thought, as Shelia returned with two cups of coffee and a plate of biscuits. The engagement didn’t quite go the way we wanted.

“The news leaked almost at once,” Admiral Garland said, once Shelia had withdrawn as silently as she’d come. “I hope it wasn’t your girlfriend who broke the gag order.”

Howard felt himself flush. “No, sir,” he said. He was fairly sure Cassidy wouldn’t have broken an explicit gag order. “The records didn’t come from Grant, or John Birmingham.”

“I suppose she must have learned her lesson,” Admiral Garland said. “So who did break the story?”

“I don’t know,” Howard said, suppressing a flash of irritation. The committee had asked him that question time and time again, inviting him to speculate … not something he could do without a certain degree of evidence. The records had presumably come from a naval officer, unless the reporter had actually hacked the starship’s datacore, but there were just too many possible suspects and no way to narrow it down. “I don’t think we could have kept the atrocities secret for long, in any case.”

“Don’t say that too loudly, or they’ll be pointing the finger at you.” Admiral Garland met his eyes. “The truth getting out, Howard, means that we are constrained in how we respond to the crisis.”

“Yes, sir,” Howard said.

“Right now, there are two streams of thought in the body politic,” the admiral continued. “One wants bloody revenge, I’m sure you saw the people outside. Polls suggest that much of the country, indeed the world, agrees with them. They’re pressing for punitive strikes against enemy worlds, even at the risk of killing human prisoners.”

Howard swallowed. “Sir, with all due respect, Boswell and his crew will not support such atrocities. And yes, it would be an atrocity.”

“I agree, for what it’s worth,” Admiral Garland said. “The problem is that the country hasn’t been so politically engaged for decades. The prospect of future technology becoming mainstream, for example, has excited opinion in ways our lords and masters are finding very difficult to control. There will be real trouble, I suspect, if we don’t do something to satisfy the protestors.”

“I …” Howard swallowed, again. “Are we going to order mass murder to avoid a political crisis?”

“I’d suggest you didn’t say that again,” Admiral Garland said. “And hopefully no.”

He paused. “The second stream of thought is that we need to liberate the colonies. Now. Before the future starships arrived, we were too busy worrying about Earth to try to do more than send scoutships back to the colonies; afterwards, the history records suggested we could leave the colonies, on the grounds the occupiers wouldn’t try to harm the civilians. But that can no longer be taken for granted. How many other prisoners have been taken further into enemy space? And what is happening to the people left behind?”

Howard shook his head. “We don’t know.”

“No,” Admiral Garland agreed. “And the question is roiling the body politic.”

Howard understood, better than he cared to admit. The colonies were a source of national pride, the colonists themselves held up as brave adventurers settling out to tame a new world and, just incidentally, build new lives for themselves. They were brave, he knew; he’d always intended to emigrate himself, once his time in naval service was over. It didn’t matter if the colonists were America or European or Russian or Chinese; they were seen as representing the best of their homelands. And now they were trapped behind an icon curtain, exposed to the tender mercies of an alien race that had demonstrated it had no qualms about torturing humans for information they didn’t have.

And a few moments of rational thought would convince them their prisoners couldn’t possibly know anything, he reflected, rather tiredly. No one had known John Birmingham and her escorts existed, until they’d fallen out of a time warp, and even if they had been part of a top secret government project the colonists wouldn’t have known about them anyway. They must be panicking.

“Yes, sir,” he said. “Commodore Boswell thinks we should strike at Diyang Prime and end the war in a single stroke.”

“So you said, to the committee,” Admiral Garland said. “Unfortunately, they disagree.”

Howard blinked. “Sir?”

“They want you and your squadrons to liberate the colonies first,” Admiral Garland told him, bluntly. “They also want to lay the groundwork for a proper offensive into enemy territory rather than a strike aimed directly at their homeworld.”

Howard was moved to argue. “Sir, permission to speak freely?”

“There’s no recording devices in here,” Admiral Garland said. “You may speak as you wish.”

“Noted.” Howard doubted that was wholly true, but he pressed ahead anyway. “With all due respect, this is a serious mistake.”

Admiral Garland raised his eyebrows. “It is?”

“Yes.” Howard leaned forward. “Interstellar warfare follows rules of its own. If we get behind enemy lines, take out as much of their fleet and industrial base as possible and then withdraw again – if the enemy homeworld cannot be held – the rest of their forces will wither on the vine until they are no longer combat-effective. We’ll be able to mop them up at leisure or simply leave them to die. It doesn’t matter how much insight they have into our technology and capabilities, sir, if they lack the ability to take advantage of it. We could end the war very quickly if we act now.”

“They have already shown a disturbing adaptability,” Admiral Garland said, tonelessly. “If we thrust into their territory without careful preparation, we may lose more ships and crews.”

“All the more reason to act now,” Howard said. “The longer we give them to prepare, the greater the danger of them coming up with something effective.”

He scowled. Boswell’s analysts were fairly sure the Diyang couldn’t push past a certain point even if they had full access to the future database, which they didn’t. There were limits to how quickly modern – futuristic – technology could be put into production; they’d have to make the machines to make the machines, for one thing, and then sort out all the little problems that would come with taking a diagram off the database and trying to make it actually work. Howard understood and accepted their point, but it didn’t mean the Diyang were harmless. They would be doing everything in their power to strengthen their defences. If they managed to ram a future starship …

“I understand your point, but there are some countervailing arguments,” Admiral Garland said. He held up a hand before Howard could speak. “First, our assumption the colonists would be left alone was clearly false, which means the longer we leave those worlds under occupation the more time the Diyang will have to harm or kill the colonists. We have a duty to protect American civilians, Howard, and our allies have a duty to protect their own civilians. I do understand your logic, and I suspect most of the committee understands it too, but we cannot leave humans in alien hands any longer than strictly necessary.”

Howard flushed. “Yes, sir.”

“Second, the colonies represent massive investments, in both colonists and treasure,” Admiral Garland continued. “Historically” – his lips thinned, as if an alternate future didn’t really count as history – “the colonies were largely untouched by the war, save for the destruction of their spaceports and orbital facilities. Their founding nations were able to recover the systems, rebuild the destroyed facilities, and continue onwards from there. Now, however, we don’t know if that’s true. A destroyed colony would be difficult to rebuild, even if the founding nation can find colonists willing to resettle a ruined world, one that no longer feels safe.

“And third, the colonies will be needed as bases to strike further into enemy territory.”

“Which isn’t such a problem with the future starships providing transport,” Howard pointed out. “They can jump halfway across known space in the blink of an eye.”

“The future starships are not invincible,” Admiral Garland reminded him. “If we lose one, we lose a great deal of mobility. And there are people in the committee who don’t want to be dependent on the future crews.”

Howard frowned. “Then why not push for victory now?”

“They want to recover the colonies before the colonists can be butchered,” Admiral Garland said, sharply. “From a military point of view, you are correct; from a political point of view, we cannot let the colonists be slaughtered if there is any way to prevent it. It will not go down well with the public.”

“Yes, sir,” Howard said. “But why …”

A thought crossed his mind. “Are the other governments planning to move troops to the colonies to prevent later trouble, even rebellions? Are we doing the same?”

Admiral Garland said nothing for a long moment. “I suspect the thought isn’t far from their minds,” he said, finally. “The risk of losing the colonies to a rebellion is dangerously high … even for us … and it’ll be worse if the colonists think we abandoned them to their fate. I don’t know what the Chinese and Russians are thinking, but I suspect nearly every nation that settled a world is thinking about ways to keep it. If they can prevent trouble from brewing, they might be able to save themselves.”

“And instead of making reasonable concessions, they’re preparing to dig in and fight,” Howard said. “That didn’t work out very well for King George, did it?”

“That isn’t your concern, Howard.” Admiral Garland’s voice hardened. “I understand your logic for urging a deep strike, but we are military men and we must bow to the dictates of our political masters. If this was solely an American operation, there might be room for debate … it isn’t and there isn’t. I understand, really I do, but …”

Howard felt his own voice harden. “So we’re bowing to Chinese and Russian demands, in order to maintain the alliance?”

“First, don’t imagine it is just the Chinese and Russians making these demands,” Admiral Garland said. “It isn’t. Our own Planetary Settlement Department is making the same demands, for much the same reasons. And second, we do need to maintain the alliance. And that, Admiral, means we have to listen to our allies, and compromise with them, rather than acting like the dog in the manger. There is no way we can act alone, not now, and if we try we’ll find ourselves isolated very quickly. Like I said, I do understand your concerns, but ...”

His voice trailed off. Howard scowled. “Shut up and soldier?”

“Quite.” Admiral Garland met his eyes. “The decision has been taken, Admiral, by the people who have the authority to take it. Your arguments aren’t unfounded, and I agree with most of them, but the decision has been made. Will you carry out your orders?”

Howard nodded, stiffly. “Yes, sir,” he said. “But I think we’re making a mistake.”

 

Chapter Thirty-Three: Chinese Spaceport, 2308

His security team were not happy.

Chairman Tsang resisted the temptation to rebuke the team leader as he waited just inside the terminal, all too aware the man wasn’t wrong to be worried. They were well away from Bejing, well away from the colossal security forces that could be summoned to whisk him away and put the entire area into lockdown while the threat was summarily terminated; there was a very real risk of being assassinated, if one of his rivals realised how exposed their chairman was, or simply being recognised and assaulted by his own people. Outbursts of anti-regime revolts weren’t unknown outside the big cities, where they couldn’t be shut down in a hurry, and even in the cities there were random bursts of violence that couldn’t be wholly prevented no matter how many police, security officers and troops flooded the streets. And now, with super-advanced humans and aliens entering the mix, it was hard – if not impossible – to be sure what they might face. They could take every reasonable precaution and still find themselves losing to a threat they couldn’t possibly predict.

We faced the Americans and Europeans on equal terms, he reminded himself. The Americans had always been annoyingly ingenious, when their government had gotten out the way and let their inventors do their thing, but China had never fallen so far behind the Americans could dismiss her without a second thought. The 120 years of humiliation, where China had been carved up between Western powers who hadn’t cared one jot for her resistance, were over and they would never come again. But who knows what the future people can do?

The thought made him scowl. The future histories were bad enough, but the introduction of future technology was likely to be far worse. They could suppress news of the future and to a very great extent they had, covering up the general gist of the alternate timeline as well as the names of the heroes and villains; there was no way to hide the advanced technology being offered to the military, technology so far beyond their own that it might as well be magic. It was galling to realise it was simple to the future people, crumbs from a very rich table. If they could do so much so quickly, he asked himself again and again, what could they do in a few years? The projections didn’t make comforting reading. He wanted to believe the analysts were wrong. He feared otherwise.

Ice prickled down his spine, despite the warm night air. China hadn’t been that far behind the British, French, Germans, Russians, Japanese and everyone else who’d picked on them during the years of shame. If Imperial China had had half the determination of Imperial Japan, he’d reflected in his younger days, she would have combined technology with her superior numbers and smashed the invading armies, preserving both her honour and her independence. Instead … his ancestors had worked long and hard for him to inherit a truly independent China, a China that might lose her independence once the future technology spread out of control. He had one opportunity to stop disaster and if that meant working with aliens …

He shivered. He understood Americans. They were odd, by his standards, but they were still human. They could be as noble as anyone else or as venial. He could predict their thinking and, to a certain extent, be right. But the future people were strange, growing up in a world where they had near-infinite resources to do as they pleased, and aliens were stranger still. They weren’t human, literally. And who knew how they truly thought?

The thought mocked him. The decision to work with the aliens was a risk. It couldn’t be otherwise. The aliens had made a deal and yet … could they be trusted to keep it? It seemed logical and yet …

Chairman Tsang ground his teeth, an expression of frustration he would never have allowed himself anywhere else. He had studied history – not the slop fed to the masses, but the true history of his nation – and he knew what would happen, if China fell too far behind or the regime lost the Mandate of Heaven. The history of Imperial China was denied to the people, who were raised to believe the Party had always existed and always would exist, but he had studied the truth. Each Chinese regime lasted only so long as it was strong, able to protect and dominate the people under its thrall. The moment it looked weak was the moment it would be challenged, perhaps destroyed. And that would be the end, both of China and of his family’s personal power.

No, he told himself. It will not happen that way.

A military aide hurried over to him and saluted, her eyes wide with ill-concealed fear. Tsang wondered who she’d annoyed to get the job, given that most of the spaceport’s personnel had been ordered to remain in the barracks or been hastily reassigned to a training exercise on the far side of the nearest city. Perhaps her CO hoped she would deflect his anger, if he had reason to be. A CO might not be punished for the act of a junior officer. Or perhaps he had something else in mind. The aide’s uniform was suspiciously tight in all the right places. If the CO hoped she’d be swept into the chairman’s bed …

“Sir,” she said, keeping her eyes downcast. “The shuttle is due to land in two minutes.”

“Very good,” Tsang said. The alien shuttle was perfectly stealthed, masking its presence so completely she could pass through the most advanced air defence network in the world without being detected. Another reason to press ahead with the alliance, despite the risk of being detected before it was too late. Who knew how the future humans would react to an alliance between the Chinese and the alien crew? “I’ll wait here.”

He felt, more than heard, the rustle of discontent from his bodyguards. He ignored it. Aliens were alien by definition, but a basic rule of power was never let them see your fear and he was fairly sure it was a universal convention. The aliens would probably be better at reading him than vice versa, he reflected, given that they’d had far more experience dealing with humans than he’d had with aliens. But then, they’d dealt with the Federation … a never-never wonderland where everyone had enough to eat and near-complete freedom to develop their potential, a far cry from the world they faced now. The aliens might not be prepared for them. How could they be?

“Thank you,” he added. A word from him could see the young woman dismissed from her post – or worse – and she knew it. Her fear was all too obvious. She had reason to be, he acknowledged sourly. The predations of some of his peers were never officially mentioned, never discussed on the news, but everyone knew they happened regardless. No one had managed to keep gossip from spreading and no one ever would. “Return to your post.”

He turned his gaze back to the runway. The spaceport was lit up brightly, save for the makeshift landing pad in front of the terminal. There should be nothing to alert prying eyes from overhead… he scowled inwardly, all too aware that something could have already gone wrong. If they’d missed a stealth spy satellite, or the future humans had some piece of technology neither him nor his allies had ever heard of, the whole secret was about to be blown wide open. And who knew what would happen then?

We must take the risk, or see ourselves diminish, he told himself. The future histories were a guidebook, warnings of mistakes to avoid before it was too late … mistakes that couldn’t be averted by executing every named rebel before they even thought of raising their hands against the regime. The hardliners had argued they should do just that, slaughtering thousands to save their country from decline; Tsang had argued, time and time again, that they needed to lay the groundwork for a better world. The conditions that had produced rebels wouldn’t go away just because they’d killed the first batch of rebels. The future is still within our grasp.

His lips twisted. And if this goes wrong, it will all be blamed on me.

The alien shuttle dropped out of the dark sky, casually landing right in front of the hangar in a display of technological sophistication and casual power that awed and terrified him. The landing crews hurried forward at once, dragging the camouflage netting into place … a simple trick, hardly technological in any real sense of the word, but its sheer simplicity might work better than anything more advanced. A masking field would certainly draw attention … it was a shame the aliens had flatly refused to allow their shuttle to be moved into the hangar, he reflected, yet he could hardly blame them for feeling paranoid. They didn’t trust him any more than he trusted them.

And there can’t be more than a few hundred on their ship at most, he reminded himself. China had a long history of recruiting foreigners to improve their technology, luring them in with promises of everything from wealth and power to sex forbidden even to decadent Westerners, then discarding the foreigners as soon as they were no longer useful. They have the technology, for the moment, but once we have it ourselves …

He put the thought aside. They weren’t anything like ready to discard their allies. Not yet.

A bodyguard swore, a breach of discipline that would normally have landed him in hot water. Tsang barely noticed. His eyes were fixed on the alien, a humanoid dinosaur with sharp white teeth, beady bird-like eyes, green scaly skin that was subtly wrong … it crossed his mind to wonder if it was a trick, if the alien was nothing more than a man in a suit, but every movement the alien made revealed muscles that bent and twisted in ways no human could match. If Tsang had tried to walk like that, he would probably have broken bones or … it was just wrong. The alien was real. It had to be.

His heart started to race. He was no coward, and he had bodyguards behind him, but he found himself fighting an urge to turn and flee that threatened to unman him. His eyes darted over the alien’s hands, noting claws that could presumably tear through human flesh and bone as easily as paper; they lingered on the alien’s jaws, half-expecting to see pieces of red meat caught between the sharp white teeth. There were none, but … up close, he caught a whiff of the alien’s scent. It sent a very primal fear running down his spine. He was sure there had been no humans alive during the era of the dinosaurs, before the terrible beasts had all died out to make room for humanity, but all of a sudden it was hard to believe. His instincts were screaming at him to run.

He’d seen the images. But they didn’t convey the reality. How could they?

“Welcome to China,” he said. He didn’t bow. It was vitally important the aliens saw him as an equal. Judging by their appearance, it was unlikely they would be kind if they didn’t. “I look forward to working with you.”

He spoke English, the one language they shared. Federation Standard had apparently evolved out of English, although he’d been darkly amused to note it had absorbed a number of words from Chinese and nearly every other major language on Earth. There were probably going to be problems in making himself understood, despite both sides having weeks of experience, but nothing that couldn’t be overcome. The alien had presumably been noting how their human peers spoke to their contemporary allies. In some ways, they might even have an edge. They hadn’t grown up speaking a human tongue. They wouldn’t assume they’d be understood easily.

“As do I,” the alien said. His jaws barely moved. Tsang had wondered how the alien could make human sounds … he hid a sudden flicker of amusement as he realised the alien was using a voder. “We have much to discuss.”

And you wanted the meeting in person, Tsang said. Did the aliens suspect their communications might be intercepted, or did they just want to get a feel for their allies that was simply impossible over a communications link? He hoped the latter. One way or the other, we’re both committed now.

***

Y’Opohan studied the human with interest, even as part of his soul itched to bury his claws in the human’s fleshy neck. It was one thing to play power games with his own kind – that was common to all races, ensuring the strongest and most adaptable rose while the weak were removed from the gene pool – but quite another to commit treason against an entire race. The Chinese might have a great deal in common with the Zargana, if the files were accurate, yet they had little to gain by betraying the rest of their people. The Zargana Reformists had betrayed the Zargana and their reward had been becoming puppets for the Federation … forced to make far more reforms than even they wanted, just to ensure they remained in power. The Chinese wouldn’t be so lucky, once the time came to cut them loose. They would be slaves – or worse.

And yet, this one grew up in a bitter competition for power, Y’Opohan reminded himself. The Federation was soft because it was never tested … no wonder they’d lost to the Killers. The contemporary Chinese, by contrast, had never forgotten that the universe was red in tooth and claw, that nothing was ever guaranteed and you had to fight like hell to keep what you had before someone took it from you. I cannot be certain he isn’t planning my defeat even as I plan his.

He was careful not to smile. The humans found his smiles unpleasant.

“You have reviewed the terms of our agreement?” Humans liked small talk before they reached the point, but there was no time for hours of chatter. “You find them acceptable?”

“Yes,” the human said, without any hint he was annoyed at moving right to the mean of the matter. “You will assist us in … dealing …with the future starships and their crews, then building up our technological base. In exchange, we will provide you with land and property of your own, completely independent from ourselves. You may use it as you see fit.”

Y’Opohan bowed politely, hiding his amusement. The Chinese had set up autonomous zones within their empire, according to the history files, and none had lasted one second past the moment the Chinese government decided they no longer needed to exist. He had no doubt the Chinese were planning to steadily weaken his position, and his control over Vendetta, until they could take over and reduce his crew to slaves. Why not? It was what he would do in their place. And yet, would they suspect he was being a little too cooperative? He would certainly have wondered, if he were preparing to put a knife in someone’s back, why they’d deliberately turned to expose their rear …

“We will rebuild part of our lost civilisation on your world,” Y’Opohan said. It was a motive the Chinese could understand, as well as one that suggested there was no immediate reason to try to take control of Vendetta. Let them think they had months, even years, before they needed to bring the hammer down. “And together we will reach the stars.”

The human nodded. There was one point the contemporary humans didn’t quite seem to grasp, not yet, and that was that Vendetta could reach the homeworld. Zargana Prime was so far away that no contemporary starship could hope to get there, not without a chain of logistics bases that didn’t exist outside proposals that would never be turned into reality. There was no reason for them to think he had anywhere to go, not the homeworld nor an uninhabited planet he could take for himself before the contemporary humans reached it. Unless they had realised how far he could take his ship …

He put the thought aside. Getting to the homeworld wasn’t the problem. He could have deserted the fleet at any moment, if that had been the sole issue facing him. But there was another.

“Together,” the human agreed.

Y’Opohan bowed his head, a human nod, and silently prepared himself to betray.

And to be betrayed.

***

The discussion was shorter than Tsang had expected, although most of the details had already been worked out through the communications link. The plan was risky as hell, and he was sure his rivals were already planning to leave him holding the bag if it went spectacularly wrong, but it hardly mattered. China was doomed, if she didn’t act fast. He had no intention of ending up like the Dowager Empress, forced to bow and scrape in front of the barbarians … a particularly perverted Westerner had suggested she’d performed all kinds of sexual acts, which was probably nothing more than the man playing with his audience, but still … Tsang shook his head as the alien shuttle returned to the dark skies. Cixi had been a fool, more concerned with her position than the fate of her nation. She had ruined China’s one attempt to save herself and her people had paid the price. He could not afford to make the same mistake.

And if that included betraying the rest of the human race, he told himself as he turned away, it was a small price to pay for the salvation of his nation. And the survival of his family.

This time, things would be different.

 

Chapter Thirty-Four: Xian Tian, 2308

It was perhaps inevitable, Ethan reflected as the small squadron burst into realspace, that the Chinese settlers would have named the colony Xian Tian. The planet was nearly ninety percent land surface, with only a handful of relatively small seas, and most of the surface was covered in forest, an alien ecosystem that promised great boons to the settlers once they unlocked its secrets and worked out how to use them for profit and the long-term good of the human race. They had, in his past, which hadn’t worked out too well for the Chinese. Xian Tian had also been one of the flashpoints that had triggered the rebellion that freed most of the colonies from their national masters. It was easy to understand why.

“Jump completed, sir,” Lieutenant Sadie Hawking reported.

“Local space is clear,” Commander Horace Abad said. “Long-range sensors are picking up two Diyang starships orbiting the planet, as well as a number of orbital weapons platforms. They’ll detect us shortly.”

Because they’re still limited to light-speed sensors as well as communications, Ethan reminded himself. They probably don’t know anything about the Battle of Diyang-14 either.

“Deploy the squadron,” he ordered. “Prepare to engage the enemy.”

“Aye, sir,” Abad said.

Ethan nodded, watching as the squadron spread out around his ship. It was hard to believe they were truly approaching Xian Tian – in his time, the system had been an industrial powerhouse before the Killers had blown it to ash – and he was tempted to order Sadie to check their location, even though he knew it was pointless. Xian Tian was practically deserted by the standards of his time, the millions of humans the planet’s ring had once supported gone … no, they didn’t exist yet and nor did the ring. He gritted his teeth – they were going to have to come up with a proper terminology for the altered past and future – and leaned forward. The sooner they finished the operation, the better.

He’d argued, of course, when Anderson had brought the news. There was nothing to be gained from wasting time liberating colonies when they could bring the war itself to an end. He’d been as shocked as the rest of his crew when he’d seen the images of tortured and broken humans – he’d visited the former POWs in sickbay or watched when they were removed from the stasis tubes for treatment – and yet, the quickest way to end the war was to attack the enemy homeworld and force them to surrender. The local governments disagreed, pointing out that hundreds of thousands of aliens remained in enemy hands, so completely at their mercy they could be ruthlessly slaughtered at any moment. They’d insisted on mounting relief missions at once …

And we need to work with them, Ethan reminded himself. We can’t just do our own thing any longer.

He sighed, inwardly. They had taken measures to assist the locals, to try to help, but they’d been frustratingly small compared to the sheer scale of the problem. He wished for a planetoid, a mobile industrial base, or something – anything – capable of handling the vast demand for future technology and supplies. It was almost worse than not having the tech at all, he reflected; the contemporary nations were seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, true, but also becoming aware that the light was a very long way away. It would be a very long time before everyone had their birthright, before everyone had the freedom to do as they pleased ... before they matured and became a truly advanced race. Until then … he’d just have to work with what he had. He imagined the contemporaries felt the same way.

“Captain,” Abad said. “The enemy starships are reacting to our presence.”

We could hit them now if we launched FTL missiles, Ethan thought, numbly. Two missiles. That’s all it’d take to win the engagement. They wouldn’t even get off a single shot.

“Helm, keep us heading towards the enemy,” he ordered, putting his thoughts aside. “Comms, transmit a demand for surrender.”

“Aye, sir.”

Sadie looked up. “Sir, we could close the range sharply …”

“Maintain current speed,” Ethan said. John Birmingham could close the range very quickly – she was the fastest thing in realspace right now, at least within forty-odd light years – but that would mean leaving the rest of the squadron behind. He’d considered microjumping into orbit, to get the engagement over as quickly as possible, yet … no, it would have been too risky. “Give them plenty of time to hear our demand for surrender.”

He glanced at the starchart, working out the vectors in his head rather than rely on the datanet or the tactical staff. Xian Tian was quite some distance from Diyang-14 and the Chinese hadn’t set up a cloudscoop or anything else the Diyang could repurpose for their own use, suggesting the colony was unlikely to have been informed about the decent engagement. The invaders certainly didn’t have any reason to want to keep the colony, certainly not as long as they had more important priorities elsewhere. In the long term, Xian Tian would be very useful; in the next few weeks, the planet would be nothing more than a resource sink. He was mildly surprised the enemy starships hadn’t jumped out the moment they’d detected his arrival. They would be destroyed if they stood and fought, for nothing. If he was in their shoes, he would have retreated without shame.

Although their culture may not see it the same way, he reflected. There are local humans who would prefer to fight to the death, rather than surrender or retreat.

“No answer, sir,” Lieutenant Jonathan Yu said. “They certainly should have understood the signal.”

Ethan nodded, impatiently. The universal translator was extremely good, yet translating a completely unknown alien tongue was difficult … and the translator was just good enough to make it difficult to spot any errors before they caused massive offense or raised the spectre of accidentally starting a war. It wasn’t a problem here. The Diyang languages had been cracked long ago and his specialists had checked by communicating with the POWs, who had been universally shocked at how well the humans spoke their language. He doubted the aliens had expected their language to remain secret forever, but if they had a realistic idea of just how difficult it was to crack an alien language …

“Repeat the signal,” he ordered. The alien ships were coming about, preparing to engage. “Helm, if they jump, jump us too. Don’t wait for orders.”

“Aye, sir,” Sadie said. They’d discussed the possibility of another alien microjump when they’d been planning the operation, reasoning that it was the only real hope the Diyang had of scoring a hit on the futuristic ships. That trick wouldn’t work twice. “Drives powered up, ready to jump. Coordinates locked.”

The rest of the squadron will jump right out of the combat zone, Ethan thought. The captains and crews would be embarrassed, but at least they’d be alive. Their drives couldn’t jump anything like so accurately, nor could they recycle and jump again in time to save themselves if something went wrong. They’ll rejoin us after we finish the mission.

He leaned forward, gritting his teeth as the alien starships left orbit. What were they doing? They should be running – he couldn’t stop them now, not without FTL missiles – and as far as they knew they’d be perfectly safe if they did flee. He certainly had no intention of chasing them across the light-years, not when his intention was saving the planet. Their acceleration curve was surprisingly low too … they should be boosting their drives, if they wished to close the range still further. Why …

A thought struck him. “Tactical, deploy a drone to get visual images of those ships.”

“Aye, sir,” Abad said. There was a hint of doubt in his tone. “Deploying drone … now.”

Ethan ignored the younger man’s doubt. The Diyang weren’t stupid – and they were desperate. They had to be. He didn’t know how much the enemy ships knew about Diyang-14, but they had to know about the Battle of Earth … in their place, he’d be willing to do just about anything to give him an edge over an enemy with seemingly supernatural abilities. Their microjump trick had come very close to giving them a victory, or at least take out one of the future starships, and if they had something else up their sleeve …

Abad sucked in his breath. “Sir, they’re towing missile pods!”

“Clever,” Ethan said. He was almost relieved. The enemy had come up with a trick that wouldn’t really threaten his ship, instead of something that might be harder to handle. They wouldn’t risk a microjump either, not unless they’d somehow found a way to extend the jump field to cover the missile pods. “Prepare to engage.”

The range closed, achingly slowly. The Diyang couldn’t accelerate past a certain point without breaking the tow cable, according to his calculations, which limited their ability to manoeuvre. It wouldn’t be that much of a downside if they were merely facing a contemporary fleet, but against his ships it was suicide. He was almost tempted to close the range himself, just to get it over with. The enemy ships seemed desperate to prolong the engagement.

Or are they trying to buy time? Ethan scowled. Time to get their occupation force off the surface, if they have the logistics to handle it, or time to complete the genocide?

“Captain,” Abad said. “They will be within effective firing range in two minutes.”

Ethan nodded. The enemy missiles would normally burn out before they reached the squadron, but the squadron was closing the range itself, literally impaling itself on the enemy weapons. He could bring his ships to a full stop the moment the enemy fired … no, he couldn’t. The contemporary starships couldn’t stop in a hurry … did the enemy know it? Probably. Had they planned the engagement to take advantage of their technical limitations? Or was he overthinking it? Missile pods had been retired years ago, because more advanced energy weapons had been developed …

“Stand by point defence,” he ordered. “Prepare to engage.”

“Aye, sir.”

The display sparkled with red light, the missiles blasting free of their pods and launching themselves towards their targets. They were crude and yet faster than he’d expected … were they overloading their drives in a desperate attempt to hit a target before it was too late or had the history files missed something? It was something to worry about later … he felt a sudden surge of anger at the enemy commander, fighting to the death when he could have easily withdrawn or surrendered. There were nearly two hundred aliens on each of the starships and they’d be dead the moment his energy weapons started tearing them apart …

“The enemy has opened fire,” Abad reported. “Nine hundred missiles, closing at speed.”

“Engage at will,” Ethan ordered. The swarm would have posed a serious threat to Anderson’s original squadron. Their point defence wouldn’t be able to kill more than a relative handful of missiles before it was too late. Their sensors would have trouble locking onto the missiles – they were flying so close together that their drive emissions would blur into a single haze mess – and by the time the range narrowed to the point they could the missiles would be well within engagement range themselves. “And then target the alien vessels.”

“Aye, sir.”

Ethan leaned forward as John Birmingham opened fire. The enemy missile formation started to come apart at the seams, the fission beams triggering explosions that damaged or destroyed the missiles flying close to the target. The enemy hadn’t anticipated that, he noted coldly … proof, perhaps, that they didn’t have accurate data on just what had happened at Diyang-14. Or they thought they’d only be facing contemporary starships … not that it would have made any difference, he reflected grimly. If they’d spread out the missiles, they'd only have made them easier targets. Not a single one made it through the point defence web to reach a starship.

“Captain, I have weapons lock on their bridges,” Abad reported. “Permission to open fire …”

He paused. “Sir, they’re preparing to jump!”

“Helm, jump us to the RV point,” Ethan snapped. The enemy might not be capable of precise microjumping, but after Diyang-14 he wasn’t going to take chances. Better to relocate the squadron than risk a kamikaze strike. His shields were tough, but the engineers hadn’t been certain if they’d be able to handle a ramming attack. “Comms, order the squadron to jump as planned!”

“Aye, sir.”

The display blanked, just for a second, as John Birmingham jumped. Ethan leaned forward, bracing himself, as the ship returned to realspace. The display filled rapidly … there was no sign of the alien ships. Ethan would have been more alarmed if he hadn’t been sure his FTL sensors would have noted them if they’d been anywhere near the planet, no matter how hard they tried to hide. They simply wouldn’t have time to engage a masking field before they were tracked down. And if they didn’t know it …

“Sir,” Abad said. “Tactical analysis suggests they jumped right out of the system, probably at least a light-year.”

“They retreated.” Ethan was almost relieved, even though he knew they’d see the ships again in a later engagement. They wouldn’t have to kill nearly four hundred aliens who couldn’t possibly stand against his ship, let alone the rest of the future squadron. “Inform the squadron, order them to meet us at the planet.”

“Aye, sir.”

“Helm, take us in,” Ethan added. “Tactical, continue scanning for threats.”

“Aye, sir,” Abad said.

Ethan watched as the planet swelled in the main display. The orbital weapons platforms were easy targets … perversely, he reflected, they’d be even easier targets for the contemporary starships. John Birmingham’s designers had never thought to install rail guns or mass drivers, nothing that might give him the ability to launch ballistic projectiles at a target following a very predictable path. It had made sense at the time, he reflected, but now … he made a mental note to have them fitted to his ship when possible, if only to give him the opportunity to hit targets from well beyond their own range. His lips twisted in dark amusement. There was something to be said for primitive weapons that had a practically limitless supply of ammunition after all.

“They’ve deployed free-floating missiles too,” Abad reported. “No active seeker heads, as far as I can tell; I suspect they’re geared to receive targeting data from the weapons platforms.”

Ethan nodded. It wasn’t a bad idea, again, but against his ships the trick was largely futile. He felt a twinge of sympathy for the alien commanders, mingled with irritation at himself. He should be glad of such easy targets, should be glad that no matter how hard the enemy worked they would never catch up in time … hell, he should be glad the enemy defences were now completely automated. He wouldn’t be killing anyone, not even semi-sentient machines. He should be relieved.

And you’re not, because you consider this operation a waste of time, he reminded himself, sharply. Be grateful for what you have. You could be facing the Killers once again.

“Engage at will,” he ordered, quietly. “Sweep the high orbitals before we enter orbit.”

“Aye, sir,” Abad said. “Engaging … now.”

Ethan watched as, one by one, the enemy platforms started to die. They didn’t have a proper AI commanding the defences, still less a living mind. The platforms flailed around, trying to engage a target far beyond their own range, while the missiles launched themselves towards John Birmingham in a desperate and futile attempt to damage his ship before it was too late. They were wiped out one by one, vaporised before they could pose any threat to anyone … Ethan had to admire the determination, even though it was pointless. The Diyang had no intention of going quietly …

We’re not going to exterminate them, he thought, savagely. There was no need to commit genocide. Why couldn’t they see it? They won’t lose everything if they give up now!

“Sir,” Abad said. “Local space is clear. The rest of the squadron will enter orbit shortly.”

He paused. “I am unable to detect any alien presence on the surface.”

Ethan felt a sudden prickle of ice running down his spine. It wasn’t a bad thing and yet … it worried him. “Comms, try to raise the human settlements.”

“Aye, sir,” Yu said. He paused. “No response.”

Ethan felt the ice congealing around his heart. Historically – in the original timeline - Xian Tian had remained occupied for most of the war … for a certain value of the word. The Diyang had held the high orbitals and blew up the spaceport – such as it was, on such a newly-settled world – but otherwise left the human colonists alone. In this timeline … it was impossible to say. They hadn’t recovered any prisoners from Xian Tian at Diyang-14, but that was meaningless. There was no way to know how many prisoners had been interrogated, killed, and buried in unmarked graves.

“It doesn’t mean anything,” Abad said, quietly. The concern in his voice was all too obvious. “They could have shut their radios down.”

“Maybe,” Ethan said. He hadn’t thought to check if the colonists had monitored the airwaves for incoming signals. Actually transmitting would get them killed, if the signals were picked up and it was unlikely they’d be missed by any reasonably capable opponent, but passively listening for radio signals shouldn’t set off any alarms. “Signal the squadron. Prepare to land troops.”

“Aye, sir.”

“And deploy a third drone,” Ethan added. “I want a good look at the colony before the troops land.”

“Aye, sir.”

 

Chapter Thirty-Five: Xian Tian, 2308

The colony was gone.

Colonel Tao Renshu resisted the urge to curse under his breath, or spit on the blackened ground, as he looked around the remains of what had once been a thriving colony. He’d seen the images of an orderly planned colony, slowly giving way to a much less ordered and completely unplanned settlement that, in happier times, would have incurred the wrath of the planners and bureaucrats who couldn’t stand the idea of anyone demonstrating such independence of mind, but both the colony and the settlement were now gone. The prefabricated buildings that had made up the core of the settlement were scorched and twisted metal, the wooden and stone housing surrounding them little more than piles of ash. There were no visible bodies, something that bothered him even though he knew the local ecosystem might have consumed the dead and dying a long time ago. Perhaps the Diyang had crammed the bodies into a mass grave. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

He felt sick as he directed his men to search what little remained of the settlement, more in hope than in any expectation of finding someone – or something. He was no stranger to eliminating enemies of the state, and he had few qualms about dealing with such enemies in a manner both efficient and lethal, but the colonists had had perfect social credit scores as well as ties to high-ranking party members and administrators. They’d been the best of the best, even if they had started to show a disturbing independence of mind once they’d realised they were a very long way from home. He could imagine handsome men, beautiful women and cute little children being gunned down mercilessly, or rounded up and locked in their homes before the buildings were set on fire. Or … perhaps they’d been taken off-world. If the Diyang wanted human slaves …

Or simply people to interrogate, he thought, although he knew it would be pointless. The colonists hadn’t been very well informed about matters on Earth before the war, let alone the arrival of the future starships. There was nothing to be gained by interrogating them and yet … how could aliens be expected to know it? They could have taken their captives a very long way away.

He clung to the thought as the rest of the shuttles came in to land, disgorging troops and forensic specialists with orders to track down what remained of the colonists and try to close their files in the databases back home. China knew the importance of making sure enemies of the state were actually dead and while the colonists weren’t actual enemies – not yet – it was important to find out what had happened to them, even if they were nothing more than ash on the ground. It was unlikely they’d find everyone, but they had to try. Who knew what would happen if someone presumed dead turned out to be alive, a few years down the line?

His heart clenched, bitterly. He’d been given some very specific orders for what he was to do, when he landed and took control of the colony, but those orders could no longer be carried out. There was no point in assuming military control when there was no one to control, no point in quietly arresting future dissidents if they were already dead. He’d have to slant his report carefully, hinting the colony was under control even though … he suspected no one would pay close attention to the exact details. The Party would probably be quietly relieved the colonists had been wiped out. They could declare them martyrs without even having to wrestle with the question of how to handle the pre-criminals. He could see their logic – part of the reason he’d gotten the command was that he wasn’t mentioned in the future files - but still …

If you arrest a man for something he hasn’t done yet, he mused, there’ll be panic amongst those who think they might have done something in the future … something they haven’t even considered yet.

The thought mocked him as he set up his command post and listened to reports from the military patrols. It was one thing to arrest someone for a crime they committed, quite another to arrest them for something they hadn’t done yet … might never have done, if things had been different. Just thinking about it gave him a headache. How could they be sure the future files were accurate? How could they be sure someone hadn’t added a few names to get rid of their rivals? How could they be sure …

And you’re thinking about this because you don’t want to think about the destroyed colony, he told himself, sharply. Forgot the future. You have a job to do.

The reports kept coming in. No sign of contacts, enemy or friendly. The local wildlife was giving the humans a wide berth, suggesting they’d come to understand humans were the new apex predators. There were no higher-order life forms on the planet, as far as anyone knew, but the lower-orders tasted surprisingly good if they were cooked properly. Or so he’d been told. The files stated the colony could have made a mint hunting animals, freezing the meat and shipping it back home. It was a minor surprise they hadn’t tried before all hell broke lose.

“Sir,” Doctor Hu Zhilan said. She was an older woman with decades of experience, although it wasn’t quite enough to keep the fear from her eyes when she faced him. A security officer outranked just about anyone who wasn’t a high-ranking party mandarin and even they could find themselves in trouble if they annoyed the wrong person. “We have completed our preliminary sweep of the ruins.”

Tao nodded, curtly. “And?”

“There are traces of human remains in the ashes,” Hu said, holding out a datapad. “So far, we’ve been able to identify seven different colonists.”

“Noted.” Tao glanced at the datapad for a moment, then passed it back. There were ways to fool genetic testing, particularly when the remains had been recovered in places genetic damage would be almost inevitable, but he found it hard to believe the alien murderers would bother to try. “And the rest?”

“We’re still digging into the ruins, sir,” Hu told him. A flicker of nervousness crossed her face. “There are human remains we haven’t been able to match to anyone in the database. They’re simply too badly damaged. They could all be from the same person or a multitude of different people …”

“Do what you can,” Tao ordered. Seven men confirmed dead … he suspected the rest of the colony would be dead too. They hadn’t had any reason to suspect trouble, no reason to think aliens would descend on the settlement and tear their lives apart. The whole idea of intelligent alien life had been a joke, until real aliens had arrived. “Give me a full report when you’re ready.”

Hu nodded and hurried away. Tao watched her go, then looked up as more shuttles landed. They intended to set up a proper military base on the planet … orders were orders, even through the colonists the troops were ordered to watch were dead now. There would be others coming shortly, he was sure. The planet was a biological paradise, a wealth of resources for China and her leaders … there was no way it would be abandoned. The military base would pay for itself in time.

Someone shouted. Tao’s hand dropped to his sidearm, bracing himself for trouble. The forest beyond the edge of the settlement was vast, the canopy capable of hiding millions upon millions of aliens … there could be an entire army lurking in the undergrowth, ready to spring on the new settlers and their defenders, or even an alien settlement built near the ruins of its human counterpart. It was what he would do, if he had conquered an alien world. There was nothing like building your settlement on top of the old to make it clear you’d come to stay.

A pair of security troops hurried towards him, escorting … Tao blinked. A young girl, probably no more than nine, wearing a simple colonist’s overalls. Several more children followed, an older man bringing up the rear. Not that old, Tao noted coldly … he wore a tattered commissioner’s uniform, his face unshaven even through commissioners were meant to maintain proper decorum at all times. The nasty party of Tao’s mind whispered he should be rebuking the younger man for such a ghastly appearance, even though there were migrating factors. He told himself not to be silly. They should be glad there was at least one adult survivor.

“Sir,” the commissioner managed. He tried to maintain an appearance of authority and failed miserably. Not that it mattered. Tao outranked him. “I … I have a vitally important report to make.”

“Get the children to the medical tents,” Tao ordered, addressing the nearest trooper. The doctors would tend to their wounds, while checking their DNA against the databases. The commissioner needed to give his report before he got any medical attention, just to make it harder for him to maintain any sort of lie. “Start from the beginning.”

The commissioner shook as he spoke. “We … I … I had orders to take the Red Guards out once every week, scouting around the colony and … and … we were outside the settlement when they landed, remained in hiding as they burned the colony to the ground. We just stayed in hiding and …”

“Good thinking.” Tao couldn’t really blame the poor bastard for not doing something to save the colonists. What could he do? There had never been many weapons on the planet. “Right now, the colony is under military control. Report to the medical tent for treatment, then you can write a proper report for our superiors.”

The commissioner nodded and staggered off. Tao motioned to one of his men, ordering him to stick with the commissioner. It was unlikely the man would cause any trouble, but he’d been through hell and such people could be dangerously unpredictable. He’d seen some snap under immense pressure, or take refuge in mindlessly following rules that no longer applied … that could no longer be followed. Tao suspected the commissioner had tried to keep the children following the Red Guard rules, tried to hint they should inform on their parents even through their parents were dead … it was hardly uncommon, back home, but it was thoughtless here. The colonists needed to trust each other. They didn’t need to be denounced for minor thoughtcrimes. They wouldn’t have gotten the posting if they hadn’t been amongst the best of the best.

At least we found some survivors, he told himself. Seven children, one adult … the colony had had over a thousand settlers at the last census, with a couple of hundred children. Maybe there were other survivors, people who’d fled further into the jungle, or … he shook his head. They might be so far away by now they hadn’t realised the planet had been liberated. We may never know what happened to all the colonists …

He tapped his communicator. “Put the children on the shuttles, once the doctors are finished with them,” he ordered. “They’ll go back home. The rest of us will continue to set up the base here.”

***

“The drones found nothing?”

“No, sir,” Lieutenant Paris said. He looked young, but he had the haunted eyes of an older man who’d undergone his first rejuvenation shortly before the Killers had come out of nowhere and pushed the Terran Federation to the brink of total defeat. “There’s just too much life on the surface for us to pick out proper human lifesigns.”

Ethan nodded, curtly. It was tricky to locate human lifesigns at the best of times and here, on a planet teeming with life, it was practically impossible. The Killers might have been able to do it – they’d certainly been uncannily good at picking out wrecked starships with surviving crews and blowing them to hell – but they were the only ones. The Federation Navy couldn’t sweep a planet with its sensors and provide an accurate count of the inhabitants, let alone track down a lone person in the midst of alien life. If there were any other survivors on the planet, they wouldn’t be found until it was too late.

He stared at the display for a long moment, willing himself to understand. The Chinese had found the remains of nearly two hundred settlers, as well as human remains too badly damaged to be identified. The forensic team’s best guess was that there were the remains of five hundred humans in the ashes, but they’d been careful to remind everyone that it was little more than an educated guess. Ethan felt his stomach churn every time he looked at it. The Killers had slaughtered billions, leaving nothing but devastation in their wake, yet their atrocities had been so immense it was difficult to wrap his head around the sheer number of innocent people who’d been blasted to atoms. The Diyang had destroyed a small colony and … somehow, the death of a relative handful of people had more of an impact. He didn’t pretend to understand it.

“Thank you,” he said. “Pull the drones back to orbit, then run the data through the analyst datacores. They may pick out something.”

“Aye, sir,” Paris said.

Ethan turned his gaze back to the terminal. The Diyang hadn’t done anything like it in the original timeline … why had they changed? Were they in a different timeline, one that had changed in a way they hadn’t been able to detect … perhaps something had changed on Diyang Prime, two hundred years ago, something that hadn’t had any effect on Earth until comparatively recently. Perhaps … it made a certain kind of sense. There were nearly ninety light years between Earth and Diyang Prime. Whatever happened on one world wouldn’t affect the other …

Or we scared the crap out of them and this is their response, he thought. Shit.

Rachel materialised facing him. “I got the updated medical reports,” she said. “Those poor kids.”

Ethan grimaced. “The Chinese insisted on taking care of the kids themselves,” he said. “Is there anything we should be worried about?”

“Some malnutrition,” Rachel said. “I suspect they didn’t quite have a proper diet while they were in hiding. Other than that, physically they’re fine. No sign of abuse, either physical or sexual. Mentally, however, they’re not in a good state. They veer between relief at being rescued, grief over their missing parents, and fear of the future.”

“Poor kids.” Ethan felt a twinge of guilt. If they’d somehow changed history so the colony was destroyed … was it their fault? They’d done everything right, as far as he could tell; there’d certainly been no reason to think the colony’s population was in any immediate danger. “Hopefully, they’ll get the help they need.”

“Hopefully,” Rachel echoed. “We could offer to take them in.”

“We could, but I suspect the Chinese would say no,” Ethan said. “They’re bent on recovering the planet below.”

He glanced at the nearspace holographic display. The Chinese had dispatched two troop transports and four freighters, the former loaded with groundpounders and the latter crammed with colonists and their supplies. He couldn’t help thinking it boded ill for the future. The original settlers might not be punished for crimes they hadn’t committed, not yet, but they’d be drowned in a tidal wave of newcomers who knew better than to rock the boat. Ethan suspected the Chinese were storing up trouble for themselves, particularly as the newcomers grew accustomed to their new home and started having children, yet … he shook his head. There was nothing he could do about it. Not now.

Rachel leaned forward, her illusionary semi-solid lips brushing against his. “You remember when we went to Fire Falls?”

“Yeah.” Ethan felt a flicker of nostalgia. They’d been younger then, newly married … they’d taken the boats through lakes of lava, watched fiery geysers bursting into the air, then made love on the beach near the pools of fire. The emotion faded as he realised Fire Falls no longer existed … no, had never existed. It had been crafted three hundred years in the future. “We’ll never go there again.”

“It exists in our hearts and minds,” Rachel said. She shot him an odd little smile, reminding him of when they’d first met … decades ago and hundreds of years in the future. “I was trying to cheer you up.”

Ethan sighed. “I don’t feel very cheery,” he admitted. There was no point in trying to take refuge in happy memories. “When news reaches Earth, the locals are going to want bloody revenge. And you know it.”

“Yeah,” Rachel said. She sobered. “What changed?”

“I wish I knew,” Ethan said. The Diyang were aliens, true, but humanity had hundreds of years of experience dealing with them. They weren’t monsters. But aliens were aliens and sometimes they could be dangerously unpredictable. Hell, humans were unpredictable. There was always someone crazy enough to want the unthinkable, even in a post-scarcity society. “I suspect we’ll probably never know.”

His terminal bleeped. “Captain, Colonel Tao has declared the surface secure,” Abad said. There was a hint of annoyance in his tone. “He’s taking over full responsibly.”

And now he wants us to go away, Ethan finished, silently. The Chinese presumably had plans to make sure the colony remained firmly in their hands … plans they didn’t want him to see. Pointless, now the original population was effectively gone. Charming.

“Understood,” he said, out loud. “Detach two destroyers from the fleet for overwatch duties, then inform the remainder that we’ll be heading back to Earth in two hours. That should be long enough to put everything in order.”

“Aye, sir,” Abad said.

 

Chapter Thirty-Six: USS Nimitz, 2308

“You’ve all seen the recordings from seven different colony worlds,” Howard said, as he stood at the podium and stared at his audience. The rotating gravity field felt wrong after experiencing a real gravity field. “The missions to Dorcas, Springfield and Suzuki have not yet returned, but it seems clear the Diyang have adopted a policy of destroying the human colonies they conquered during the early stages of the war. They have killed at least ninety thousand humans – men, women and children – and the total may actually be much higher. Only a handful of survivors have been found, all traumatised.”

He paused. “It is possible a number were taken prisoner instead,” he added, “but it would be unwise to get our hopes up. The majority appear to have been mercilessly killed.”

Someone muttered an oath. Howard didn’t blame him. They were experienced military personnel, save for a handful of reporters watching from the rear of the auditorium, and they were used to horror, but the colony slaughters had chilled them all to the bone. They’d all know what was coming and yet … he scowled, remembering the protests growing in number with every passing day. The news had broken days ago and now the human race wanted bloody revenge, even if it came at a high cost. God alone knew what’d happen, if the politicians gave in and ordered planetary bombardment. It would be a crime vile enough to make Hitler look like a rank amateur.

He took a breath. “I won’t waste your time,” he said. “Our orders are very clear. We are to take our fleet to Diyang Prime, destroy their fleet and orbital defences, and force a complete and unconditional surrender. If they refuse to give in” – he swallowed hard – “we are to destroy their space-based industries, spaceports, anything on the surface they can use to reach orbit and all identified military facilities. They will not be permitted to threaten the human race again.”

His heart sank. He’d been spared most of the political arguments, but Admiral Garland had kept him informed. Any hope of moderation had died with the murdered settlers, forcing the more thoughtful politicians to push for immediate military operations in hopes of undercutting the politicians who wanted to blast the enemy homeworld back into the Stone Age, sentencing the entire population to a slow and thoroughly unpleasant death. Howard knew he was lucky they’d done most of the preliminary planning already, given how hard it was to get a number of starships moving in the same direction – let alone fight as a unified force – without weeks of heavy exercise. They were still going to have problems, particularly as the enemy could be expected to dig in and fight to the last alien. They’d certainly expect no mercy after what they’d done to the human colonists.

“We’ll be spending the next few days exercising as heavily as possible,” he continued, “while gathering the remainder of the fleet. It will not be easy. There will be all sorts of problems, which we can and will iron out before departing for Diyang Prime. I expect each and every one of you to give the fleet your all, putting aside personality clashes and historical grudges to prepare the fleet for departure. If you cause problems instead of trying to solve them, you will be relieved of your post and held until we return to Earth. Do I make myself clear.”

There were no challenges, somewhat to his relief. Few of the officers in the giant compartment liked taking orders from someone who had been jumped up the ladder, even if he had a brilliant military record in the other timeline. Some felt they should have been given the command, others felt as if they had something to prove after learning they’d died in the original timeline; some resented an American commanding the force, others figured it should be steered by committee rather than a single commander, no matter how experienced. It was just a matter of time, despite the urgency of the situation, before the grumbling began. He’d be surprised if they waited until the battle was done.

He nodded to Commander Parker, then sat back as she stood and outlined the rough plan. It was crude, but simple enough for a fleet that had little practice working as a fleet. He wasn’t trying to be clever, just to finish the coming battle as quickly and brutally as possible. The Diyang would have their chance to surrender and if they refused … a flash of bitter rage shot through him. The aliens had killed human civilians, without even the shadow of an excuse. If they refused to surrender, they’d deserve everything they got.

Commander Parker kept talking, giving his eyes time to sweep the chamber. A handful of familiar faces looked back at him, including Captain Cao Zongying. The Chinese officer should be dead by now, given his future crimes, but instead … he’d been promoted. Howard wasn’t sure what to make of it, but … he supposed the Chinese had decided that purging officers who weren’t – yet – guilty of anything would be too far even for them. The US hadn’t been that much better, he admitted privately. An officer who had fled combat, two years in the shadowy alternate future, had been quietly reassigned to Alaska. His protests had been ignored.

At least he was just a coward, Howard reflected. The real criminals are far harder to handle.

He waited until Commander Parker finished, then stood again. “We will begin exercising immediately,” he said. “You should have received exercise-specific orders by now. If you have any concerns or suggestions about our plan of attack, inform me immediately. If not” – he paused, letting his eyes sweep the chamber again – “dismissed.”

The sudden burst of chatter was surprisingly loud, as the officers stood and made their way to the hatches. Howard had thought twice about organising an in-person meeting, even on the giant supercarrier, but the advantages of meeting his subordinates face to face outweighed the disadvantages. There wouldn’t be many other opportunities, not when they had to spend every last hour preparing for war. The planned formal dinners and ceremonies would have to wait until they returned home, victorious.

His lips twisted. Oh, what a pity.

Cassidy walked across the chamber to join him. “Do you think everyone will work together?”

“They should, if they care one jot about the war,” Howard said. The original timeline had shown the human race working together, putting the interests of the entire world ahead of individual nations. This timeline was different. “We’ll keep them busy, ensuring they don’t have enough time to cause trouble.”

He sighed as he looked down at his terminal. There were hundreds of officers under his command, demanding posts be handed out by merit, seniority, nationality or some combination of the three. Several officers had been effectively demoted because someone senior had arrived, others had been promoted over the heads of more deserving – at least in their own minds – candidates, just to ensure some degree of command continuity. He didn’t need a military staff, he reflected; he needed a team of experienced diplomats. The snarl was going to take weeks to sort out, if he were lucky. The arguments would probably continue long after everyone involved was dead.

Cassidy smiled, rather tiredly. “You expect them to cause trouble?”

“During the Iranian War,” Howard asked, “who was General Fareham’s second in command?”

“I could look it up,” Cassidy said, after a moment. “A Brit, right? Or an Israeli?”

“General Farnham is a household name, years after his death,” Howard said. “His second is completely unknown. And everyone here feels the same way.”

He shook his head. “We’ll keep everyone pointed in the right direction. And then …”

Cassidy smiled, again. “Should I leave that out of my report?”

“Please.” Howard had no illusions. Everything the reporters sent home would be carefully scrutinised before it was allowed into the public domain. The censors would blow a fuse if she tried to report such matters, no matter that everyone knew such disputes were inevitable when multinational formations were put together at terrifying speed. “Save it for the tell-all book.”

“I’ll try,” Cassidy said. She grinned, suddenly. “Do you have time to join me for dinner?”

“Only after I deal with the next set of messages,” Howard said. “They’ll all be getting their complaints in first. And their suggestions about how the plan should be modified.”

“They don’t trust your planning?” Cassidy shook her head. “Don’t they know you won the war?”

“I didn’t, not here,” Howard reminded her. “And they know it all too well.”

Cassidy cocked her head. “Does it bother you? That they’re questioning your planning?”

Howard was tempted to point out he hadn’t planned anything, except in very broad strokes. The planning office had taken his rough idea – really, nothing more than taking the fleet to Diyang Prime and opening fire – and turned it into a detailed plan of attack, laying out everything from crude fleet formations to planning logistics support, assigning dozens of freighters to serve as a makeshift fleet train to keep the fleet operational nearly a light-century from Earth. They’d solved a number of problems too, from booster stations to keep the freighters moving without support from the future starships to standardising everything to ensure a Chinese starship could use a Russian or American component or vice versa. It would make future settlement easier, he reflected, once the war was over. It had happened in the other timeline, after all.

They gave us a cheat sheet, he reflected. We just need to take advantage of it.

Cassidy cleared her throat. Howard flushed.

“They say no battle plan survives contact with the enemy,” he said. “That’s partly because the planners don’t think of everything, so … the more eyes on the plan the better. There might be something terribly wrong with it, something that’ll be embarrassing if it gets caught here but lethal if it gets missed until we take the fleet into battle. Better to be embarrassed than killed.”

“I know people who’d disagree,” Cassidy said.

“Me too.” Howard grinned in dark amusement. “But I’d bet most weren’t in the military.”

He felt his mood darken again as he led the way to the hatch. The governments had put a great many starships under his command, showing an astonishing amount of faith in him. Even the Chinese and Russians had cooperated without pro forma arguments, something that struck him as odd. They were normally determined to make it clear their cooperation could never be taken for granted, extracting a price for each and every concession. Perhaps the wrecked colony had been a wake-up call, or perhaps … he shrugged. They all knew the war had to be brought to an end, before it was too late. The Diyang, naturally, had plans of their own.

And if we give them time, they’ll put them into action, he mused. We have to act fast.

***

“It is impressive, is it not?”

Ethan kept his thoughts to himself as Captain Rathdrum showed him to the shuttlebay. The giant supercarrier was impressive, the epitome of contemporary shipbuilding … although the tactical expert in him dreaded what would happen if Nimitz went up against a modern ship. Her hull armour wasn’t anything like enough to deflect fission beams, while an FTL missile could materialise inside the ship and blow her to atoms before she even knew she was under attack. The rotating gravity felt odd, despite the enhancements in his genetic structure designed to compensate automatically for variable gravity fields. She was slow and lumbering and …

Don’t be an ass, he told himself. They can’t even come close to producing a modern ship. Not yet.

“She’s a very impressive ship,” he said. Captain Rathdrum was supposed to be dead, killed in the Battle of Earth. Thankfully, he hadn’t fallen into shock – unlike others – when he’d heard the news. “I wish I had more time for a tour.”

“We can arrange one after the war, if you’re still interested,” Captain Rathdrum said. “I don’t think we need to hide anything from you, hah.”

He chuckled, rather dryly. Ethan nodded. Nimitz was crammed with highly-classified pieces of technology, technology that had been declassified two hundred years in the future. There were probably complete diagrams of the supercarrier in his datacores, plans that exposed everything she was carrying … not, he supposed, that the plans were anything more than a curiosity. The introduction of artificial gravity would render the giant supercarrier obsolete in a few years … perhaps less, depending on how quickly the contemporary tech base advanced. Nimitz was just too cumbersome to be redesigned …she’d probably be scrapped, if she couldn’t be repurposed in a hurry. He felt a flicker of sympathy for the older man. Captain Rathdrum had reached the pinnacle of his career, supercarrier command, just in time to see his vessel become hopelessly out of date.

“There’s a great many things I wanted to ask you,” Captain Rathdrum added. “But tell me, did you do the right thing in contacting us?”

“I think we had no choice,” Ethan said. He would keep his own doubts to himself. “If we hadn’t made contact, you would be dead.”

“I know.” Captain Rathdrum smiled, but there was little humour in it. “Was I supposed to die on that date?”

“History isn’t fixed,” Ethan said. Their mere existence was proof time travel was possible, the fact they’d changed time was proof time could be changed. What did it matter if they’d created an alternate timeline, rather than altering the original? They had escaped certain death and now the entire human race had a chance to survive. “There’s no point in worrying about it.”

“But I do,” Captain Rathdrum said. “Did we somehow cheat God?”

Ethan considered it for a long moment. “I think if God wanted you home, He’d take you,” he said. He wasn’t ready for a theological discussion. Religion had been largely a matter of academic interest in his time, save for a handful of worlds which clung to the old faiths, and he didn’t see the point in arguing about it. There was no way to cheat an omnipotent entity who saw and heard all, unless He chose to let you. “Why not make the most of your life?”

“My wife remarried,” Captain Rathdrum said. “Her stepson grew up to be a great man. Will that still happen?”

“I don’t know,” Ethan said. They paused at the shuttlebay. “But all we can do is play the hand we’re dealt.”

The thought bothered him as they exchanged handshakes and salutes, then he took his leave of the giant supercarrier. It was rare for a relationship to last forever back home, particularly as humans themselves could live forever … at least in theory. He’d accepted long ago that his marriage would come to an end one day, not that he intended to do anything to bring that day any closer. But Captain Rathdrum was from a very different world …

Just another little tragedy, Ethan thought. And another personal crisis we caused.

He sighed, again. And one we can’t do anything about either.

***

Captain Cao Zongying felt cold as he made his way back to his shuttle, despite the warm air.

He’d expected to die, when he’d reported home in the wake of the future historical records being released. He’d known his duty and yet … he had been tempted to accept the offer of asylum rather than going home to be killed. Only the thought of his wife and family being executed in his place had given him the courage to go home and face his fate … he’d been astonished when he’d been told he could return to his ship. The regime should have killed him. Why had it let him go?

The cold clenched at his heart, a grim reminder of the meeting he’d had with his superiors. He’d been given orders, orders so secret they hadn’t been written down … orders that would likely get him killed even if he carried them out to the letter. They’d get his wife and children killed if he didn’t, he knew all too well; his entire family, and that of a handful of other officers, had been gathered together, just to make them easier to kill. He wanted to scream at the universe as he boarded his shuttle, the pilot saluting before disengaging from the American carrier and carrying Cao back to his command. Cao eyed the pilot’s back, wondering if he was a spy … there were spies everywhere, the obvious watchers providing cover for the real observers. They’d know what he’d been ordered to do, he was sure, and if he failed …

He forced himself to think, trying to come up with a plan. Nothing came to mind. He was being watched at all times, by people who wouldn’t hesitate to remove him if he stepped out of line and then … his heart twisted again. His son was a university student bound for a military career … he’d be bound for a work camp, at best, if Cao failed. His daughter was young and beautiful and his family were already discussing possible marriages arrangements … he didn’t want to think about what would happen to her, if he failed. His wife would be killed, of course, and her family disgraced … he couldn’t bear the thought of it. And yet, he knew what he had to do.

They’ve given me no choice, he thought. He should have killed himself, in hopes his family would be spared. Instead, he’d been put in a trap, one that forced him to follow orders or watch helplessly as his family was destroyed. If I don’t go through with it, they’ll know.

He took a long breath, then composed himself. If the watchers saw him now, it would almost be a relief. But it would cost his family everything …

And success will be even worse, he predicted, grimly. The briefing officer had dismissed his concerns. This could turn into a complete disaster, and the entire country is at stake.

 

Chapter Thirty-Seven: Diyang Prime, 2308

“The scout ship has returned, sir,” Georges said. He’d transferred to Nimitz to ensure there was at least one familiar face in the CIC. “They’re uploading their sensors records now.”

Howard nodded, curtly. The transit should have taken a few hours, according to the projections, but it had wound up taking nearly five days, as the future starships towed the fleet into attack position. The formation was a ragged mess that looked as if the ships had been scattered around at random, something that would probably outrage any civilian who saw it, yet – thankfully – nearly every ship had reached the RV point without problems. A handful had suffered drive failure and had been left behind to guard the fleet train, just in case the enemy realised they were lurking in interstellar space and launched a counterattack. They still didn’t know how the Diyang had realised Diyang-14 was about to be attacked.

He turned his attention to the display as the sensor records appeared in front of him. The Diyang appeared to be preparing to go to war, or perhaps to mount a last stand, judging by the sheer number of starships assembled around the homeworld. There were nearly five hundred warships and almost two thousand freighters that had presumably been armed, although it was unlikely they would pose much of a threat once they shot themselves dry. The scout hadn’t been able to determine how many fighters were buzzing around the enemy fleet, but it looked as if there were over two thousand … not counting, he noted sourly, the hundreds of shuttles, cutters, worker bees and other spacecraft pressed into service for the final engagement. If they had faced the contemporary fleet alone, he noted, they might have had a chance. As it was …

“Signal the fleet,” he ordered. “We’ll proceed with Alpha-5.”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said.

Howard kept his eyes on the display. The Diyang could microjump again, if they wished, but it would mean leaving their fighters and smaller spacecraft behind. They’d be more likely to stay near the planet, ensuring the gravity well gave them some protection from human microjumps … unless they knew the future starships could jump right into the atmosphere without hitting the planet itself. Did they? There was no way to be sure. He put the thought aside – he had no intention of trying such a risky tactic – and tapped the controls, bringing up the fleet formation display. The pattern hadn’t improved – it still looked ragged – but the command and control system was up and running. It was cumbersome compared to the future datanet, he admitted to himself, yet it was better than anything they’d had previously. And with the fleet grouped in smaller squadrons, they’d be able to keep fighting if something shattered the command net.

Georges looked up. “Sir, the fleet is ready to jump on your command.”

Howard nodded, the sheer enormity of what he was about to do pressing down on him. The largest fleet humanity had ever assembled, at least in his era, was about to jump into its final engagement. He felt like a cheat, a fraud, someone who had gained by the efforts of another … the fact the other person was an alternate version of himself didn’t make him feel any better. His shadowy counterpart had learnt his trade the hard way, while Howard himself hadn’t had anything like the same experiences …

He wanted to step down, to let someone else take command. But he knew his duty.

“Signal the fleet,” he ordered. “We’ll jump in one minute.”

“Aye, sir.”

It felt as if time itself was slowing down, as the fleet prepared to jump. The starships were nothing more than light codes on the display, but Howard’s imagination showed him metal hulls surrounding men and women preparing themselves to fight. For some, it was their first taste of combat and they relished the chance to test themselves; for others, older and wiser, it was going to be a bloody business, no matter who won. Some would die today, others would go on to wonder why they’d been spared … perhaps knowing that, in the shadowy other world, they had died in combat. It was a riddle that could never be truly solved. Who deserved to live … and to die?

Death in combat is often random, he scolded himself. There’s no real pattern to it.

“Ten seconds,” Georges said. “Nine … eight …”

The universe blurred. The display blanked, then rebooted. Hundreds of icons appeared in front of him, the enemy fleet suddenly all the more intimidating for being real rather than sensor images. They’d see him coming too … probably. They had aimed to jump close enough to the planet to cut down on transit time, while ensuring there was plenty of room to assemble the fleet, but it was difficult to be certain. They just didn’t have enough future starships to tow the entire fleet through a single jump.

“The fleet is reporting in now,” Georges said. “Communications links – primary, secondary – are up and running. Enemy fleet is coming to battle station.”

“The time delay has been cut down sharply,” Howard agreed. “Transmit the surrender demand.”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said.

Howard braced himself. Historically, the Diyang had been willing to come to terms when they’d been soundly beaten by the human race. Here … he didn’t know. The four years of hard fighting in one timeline had been replaced by a pair of one-sided engagements, both incredibly costly for the aliens and remarkably cheap for their human opponents. No wonder the Diyang were frightened, he reflected, but that didn’t excuse their crimes. No amount of fear could justify mass slaughter. If they refused to surrender, they were going to get thrashed. And then confined to their homeworld for the rest of existence.

“No response, sir,” Georges reported. “Should I resend the signal?”

“Yes.” Howard suspected he already had his answer, but he owed it to himself to try again. “Do it.”

There was a long pause. The signal would already have reached the enemy fleet, he knew, and there should have been enough time for a reply. Could they read the signal? Understand it? Their language held no secrets, not to the future. They should have no trouble reading the signal and then …

Perhaps they just don’t want to admit they’re beaten, he mused. Or perhaps they think they can win better terms if they fight to the end.

He keyed his console. “This is the flag,” he said. The words felt strange, almost alien. “The enemy has declined our offer to accept surrender. All units” – he paused, bracing himself – “begin the advance.”

A dull quiver ran through the carrier. “Sir,” Georges said. “The carrier squadrons are requesting permission to launch their fighters.”

“Granted,” Howard said. Fighters had short endurance, compared to shuttles or cutters, but better to get them out in space than risk losing them along with their motherships. “And order the fleet to prepare to engage with mass drivers.”

“Aye, sir.”

***

“My Lord, the humans are advancing to attack,” Officer D’Holin reported. “They will be within engagement range in seven minutes.”

Y’Opohan allowed himself a smile. The future humans would have wasted hours, perhaps days, trying to convince the Diyang to surrender. They’d probably have wound up offering to pay to rebuild their shattered society, as long as the aliens surrendered without any further bloodshed, or making other concessions that would ensure a second round of fighting a few hundred years down the line. They’d certainly made that mistake with the Zargana, although the Civil War had prevented a second war and then both races had been slaughtered by the Killers. Y’Opohan had no doubt there would have been a second war, given time …

The contemporary humans were much more practical, he noted to himself. They were already closing the range, displaying a degree of aggression he hadn’t known humans possessed. It was lucky their technology was so primitive or all his plans would have come to nothing, smashed by a race that matched his own for ruthlessness and exceeded them in technology. Even so … time wasn’t on his side. His eyes lingered to a single light code on the display, a mocking reminder of the one goal he absolutely had to meet. If he failed … it would be the end of everything.

“Then take us in after them,” he ordered. He’d carefully not tried to place Vendetta too close to her allies. There was just no way to know if the Federation knew he was collaborating with the Chinese. They didn’t know the truth, or even a man as pusillanimous as Boswell would have acted with a speed and ruthlessness fully worthy of his ancestors, but they might know something. “Let them see us as willing allies.”

“Yes, My Lord.”

Y’Opohan settled back on his throne, watching the two fleets slowly closing. The Diyang were clearly scraping the barrel, desperately assembling everything they could in a bid to save their world. They were likely doomed and they knew it and yet they intended to go out fighting … admirable, in a way, although pointless. Their only real role now was to serve as a distraction and if it worked they might survive long enough for the Zargana Empire to reach the sector …

And then they will face true predators, he told himself. They will die.

***

“Captain, I’m picking up more free-floating missiles and missile pods,” Abad reported. “They’re preparing to launch.”

Ethan nodded, feeling cold. “Stand by point defence,” he ordered. The two fleets were already dangerously close, by his standards. The Diyang would start engaging with mass drivers shortly, trying to take out as many ships as possible before it was too late. They’d be able to put out enough projectiles to guarantee they’d hit something, despite the best efforts of his point defence datanets. “Engage as soon as the projectiles enter range.”

“Aye, sir,” Abad said. “I’m picking up emissions from their lunar bases.”

“Watch for more mass drivers,” Ethan ordered. The planet’s two moons were too far away to take an active role in the battle – it would take hours, at least, for mass driver projectiles to reach their targets - but that didn’t mean they couldn’t be dangerous. “If they open fire, deploy a destroyer to shut them down.”

“Aye, sir.”

Ethan sat back, feeling his heart clench. The Diyang should have surrendered. They knew they were outmatched. But … they also knew the human race wanted revenge. They might fear what would happen, if they refused to surrender, or even if they did. Their human enemies might bombard their homeworld after they surrendered … he scowled inwardly, watching the two fleets converging. They didn’t know about the Federation, how could they? They didn’t know the Federation was kind and compassionate to their enemies … they didn’t know they had nothing to fear …

Except they do, because the Federation doesn’t exist yet, he reminded himself. It was something he had to remember. They’re facing a foe that wants revenge and intends to take it.

“Captain, I’m picking up traces of jump emissions,” Abad reported. “They’re not big enough to be a starship, let alone an entire fleet …”

“Odd.” Ethan’s eyes narrowed as he checked the display. “Cloaked in some way?”

“I don’t think so,” Abad said. The doubt in his voice was obvious. “The closest thing in the database is stress-testing their drives and that’s … unlikely.”

Ethan snorted. There was a time and a place for stress-testing jumpdrives and it wasn’t in the middle of a battle. The very thought was absurd. No, the enemy was up to something … but what? A microjump … no, the emissions weren’t strong enough. What else could they do with such low-powered emissions?

The display sparkled with red icons. “Sir, they built a jump cannon! They just tossed several hundred missiles at us!”

“Clever,” Ethan muttered. The concept wasn’t unknown, although there’d been nothing in the records suggesting the Diyang had been experimenting with it themselves, let alone deploying it during the war. A project that had been hastily accelerated after the Battle of Earth? Or a chaotic hodgepodge of machinery put together out of sheer desperation? “They got right into the teeth of our defences.”

He raised his voice. “Engage with point defence,” he snapped. They didn’t have much time, not when the missiles were already within the fleet’s formation. “Now!”

The display changed, again. “Sir, they’re launching the remainder of their missiles,” Abad ordered. “And they’re engaging with mass drivers. I think they have solid locks on most of our hulls now.”

“Clever,” Ethan said, again. The enemy had played a losing hand very well. The first wave of missiles might just buy the second enough time to get close and engage their targets, while the second would provide cover for the mass drivers and the fleet itself. Their ships were already bringing up their drivers, preparing to engage. “Warn the flag, then prepare to microjump.”

“Aye, Captain.”

***

Lieutenant-Commander Tara Mayberry was rather relieved the action was about to begin, even though she knew there was a very good chance she wouldn’t survive the coming engagement. Her tiny fighter didn’t have anything like enough endurance to stay on station for hours, certainly not without returning to refuel and rearm, and the risk of being caught on the carrier when an enemy ship blew it apart was very real. She gunned her drives as the enemy missiles accelerated towards her, her guns engaging automatically as her targeting systems saw opportunities and took it. A pair of missiles exploded in front of her – nukes, not the antimatter some of the future folk had insisted could be mass-produced with very little effort – as she flashed past … thankfully, a nuke wouldn’t explode unless it was deliberately triggered. Personally, she would have set them to explode whenever a fighter got close enough to engage, but …

She pushed the thought out of her mind as she swept past another wave of incoming missiles and hurled herself on the alien fighters. They were nippy little buggers, she recalled from the last engagement, and their pilots were very good … she darted forward, spinning through a series of evasive manoeuvres, and brought her guns to bear on the alien’s cockpit. She fancied she saw the alien looking back at her, a second before she blew him away, but knew it was unlikely. They were moving too fast for her to see more than a flicker of light, if she were lucky.

Her fighter spun around to engage another missile, while she fought to get a look at the overall battlefield. Most fighter engagements turned into chaos and now … it was hard to get any sense of just what was happening. The enemy cutters were launching full-sized missiles at human starships, then throwing themselves into the teeth of their defences … it was madness and yet it was working. It was …

She spun around, just in time to avoid an enemy pilot intent on killing her. She couldn’t afford to get distracted, not now. She had to focus or die, like the pilots she’d killed earlier. The rest would have to take care of itself. She’d worry about it afterwards. If she survived.

If.

***

“They’re closing the range sharply now,” Georges said. The display updated rapidly. “They’re launching more missiles.”

Howard cursed under his breath. The alien tactics had worked … at least to some extent. They’d been lucky the alien ECM was no match for the futuristic sensors or the alien tricks would have worked a great deal better. As it was … he saw an alien ship vanish from the display, a mass driver projectile smashing it to atoms, even as its projectiles struck human targets and wiped them off the display. He tried not to think about what the blinking light codes really meant, about the men and women who’d died before knowing they were under attack or the ones still battling for survival in a ruined starship. There’d be time to think about it later, when they were counting the cost.

“Deploy additional point defence drones,” he ordered. The Diyang had to know they were doomed …why were they still fighting? They could have surrendered at any moment. Were they that scared? Or were they convinced surrender was just another word for annihilation. “Target their carriers with mass drivers, force them to pull back fighters for their own defence.”

“Aye, sir …” Georges paused. “Sir, Queen Elizabeth was just rammed by a cutter. Preliminary analysis suggests the small craft was crammed with nukes.”

One would be enough, Howard thought. The British carrier was now nothing more than an expanding cloud of superhot plasma. The crew hadn’t had any time to get to the lifepods … even if they had it was unlikely they’d manage to get clear before it was too late. But they’re desperate.

He cursed under his breath. An entire fleet of future starships would have no trouble evading the enemy fire. His fleet was just too cumbersome to manage it properly. He was locked in a death match that would cost his fleet dearly, if he survived long enough to add up the price. And there was no way to get out without abandoning the battle completely …

Or at least leaving my cripples behind, he thought. Twenty-seven ships were no longer capable of jumping out, if the fleet decided it was better to cut its losses and withdraw. Crap.

“Signal the fleet,” he ordered. “Squadrons seventeen to nineteen are to target the enemy orbital installations. Force them to pull back their defenders, cripple their ability to support their fighters …”

“Aye, sir,” Georges said. “They’re …”

He broke off. “Sir, the Chinese!”

Howard swing around to stare at the nearspace display, but it was already too late.

 

Chapter Thirty-Eight: Diyang Prime, 2308

“Lock weapons on prime target,” Captain Cao Zongying ordered. “Prepare to engage.”

He gritted his teeth, feeling a ripple of tension running around the bridge. The crew was still reeling from the disclosure that they were going to fire on the future starships, their objections stilled by the simple fact the security troops had already moved into position to deal with anyone who questioned orders or tried to do something, anything, to stop the disaster before it had a chance to unfold. No one doubted their orders were to make sure the ship’s crew carried out their orders, nor that they’d intervene in a heartbeat if anyone showed the slightest hint of disagreement. The simple fact they weren’t arresting the captain for aiming his weapons at a future starship was proof, beyond all doubt, that he was following instructions from the very top.

Ice prickled down his spine. The battle was still underway, an engagement that was increasingly starting to resemble a mid-air conflict between jet fighters fought with starships and their support craft. It was the perfect opportunity for a stab in the back, yet it would leave the rest of the fleet dangerously exposed to the Diyang … his orders were to avoid firing on contemporary starships, if possible, but there was no reason to think the Diyang would stop shooting just because their enemy had started firing at each other. The captains and crews he’d trained and fought besides were about to be hammered, because of him. And his country’s treachery. Cao understood the reasoning, really he did, but …

If I carry out my orders, the rest of the fleet may turn on me, he thought. His briefing had suggested the rest of the Great Powers had their own doubts about the starships from the future, that they wouldn’t shed any tears if the Federation Navy vessels were destroyed light years from home. Cao rather suspected that wasn’t true. Unilateral action was always a risk, even under controlled conditions, and right now they were in the middle of a furball. But if I don’t carry out my orders, my family will be executed and purged.

He gritted his teeth. It wasn’t just his family that were at stake. It was the family of every last crewman, from the squadron’s subcommander to the lowest-ranking crewman on the smallest starship. They would all die, if he failed to carry out his orders … if he failed. The nasty part of his mind suggested he’d been set up to take the fall, if the operation went spectacularly wrong. If the government blamed everything on a rogue officer … it was unlikely anyone would believe them, he thought, but China was a Great Power. The other nations might pretend to believe the story to maintain the precarious alliance against outside threats.

“Communications, activate the national communications net,” he ordered. “And on my command, crash the fleet command net.”

“Aye, sir,” the communications officer said. Her voice was flat, so flat Cao knew she was worried. She didn’t dare show it, not with the security troops on the bridge. “National command net up and running, crash commands loaded into the fleet command net.”

Cao paused. If he refused to carry out his orders …

“Crash the fleet command net,” he ordered. “Tactical, open fire!”

He swallowed, hard, as the display switched to the national command network. The Chinese ships would maintain their local command net, even as the other starships found themselves isolated from both their own nets and the overall international network. They’d need at least five minutes to bring their own command networks up again, according to his most pessimistic calculations, and longer to restore the international net. There was a very good chance the fleet elements would refuse to rejoin the latter, he mused, if only because they wouldn’t know who they could trust. It was going to cost them – each ship would suddenly be on its own, giving the Diyang an excellent shot at their hulls – but hopefully it would also distract them.

“Transmit the message,” he ordered, quietly. “And continue firing.”

***

John Birmingham shuddered, violently.

Ethan swore, honestly shocked. His ship had the most powerful defensive shields in the known universe and yet, they were taking a beating. The Chinese ships had somehow strengthened their particle guns, altering the frequencies to give them a chance to weaken the shields … they were launching missiles even now, bomb-pumped lasers detonating almost as soon as they entered effective range and unleashing ravening beams of pure fury that slammed into his shields and threatened to overwhelm them. It should have been impossible and yet … how the hell did they know what to do? He’d been careful not to let the contemporary militaries learn too much about how his shields worked, just in case. It should have been impossible.

And his squadron had been caught completely by surprise.

“Retarget the point defence,” he snapped. The Chinese were attacking them at point-blank range … how many other starships were going to join them? The Russians? The Europeans? The Americans? “Retune our shields to stand off their weapons …”

The display shifted, reporting that the international command network had gone down. Ethan sucked in his breath. That should have been impossible too, given how much futuristic tech had been woven into the net. The Chinese might have been experts at devising contemporary hacker and subversion programs, according to the history files, but they couldn’t possibly have come up with something that would let them hack his network, certainly not in less than a few years. A nasty thought crossed his mind. A defector? Or …

“Sir,” Abad reported. “The Chinese ships are closing the range!”

Ethan gritted his teeth. The tactical display was still updating, classing the remaining contemporary starships as neutral, perhaps waiting to see who won before they took sides. If they all opened fire at once, Ethan might find himself in some trouble … hell, if the Chinese actually rammed his ship, they’d do real damage. Daring and Dauntless were already damaged, the former spinning out of control after a lucky hit had damaged her drive nodes and the latter pleading frantically for permission to return fire. Ethan wasn’t sure which way to jump. If they opened fire on the Chinese starships, would the rest of the contemporary starships open fire too? And if so, on which side?

“Helm, microjump us clear,” he snapped. They were too close to the Chinese vessels to think, to do anything beyond making a choice between opening fire or escaping … he cursed under his breath as he saw the Diyang, pressing the advantage against their suddenly scattered foes. He had no idea what the Chinese were doing, but they’d condemned a great many contemporary spacers to death. “Communications, signal Chesty Puller. She is to deploy boarding parties to the Chinese vessels.”

“Aye, sir.”

***

Howard stared numbly at the display.

The command network going down wasn’t entirely a surprise. They’d known the system was fragile and they’d done everything they could to set up contingencies for a collapse, but the system being hacked and crashed from within hadn’t been anticipated. There had been no reason to think anyone would be daft enough to take down the network in the middle of an engagement, no reason to think they should take precautions against a deceitful ally … it had to be an ally. The Diyang couldn’t have hacked the network from outside the human command net …

“Comms, use lasers to get the fleet back in touch,” he snapped. The bastards had wiped the final positioning data too, ensuring his ships would have to be located manually before the laser beams could be aimed at their ships. “Tactical … general broadcast to the fleet. All units are to activate IFF beacons. I say again, activate IFF beacons.”

“Aye, sir.” Georges relayed the orders, even though they’d been issued as though they were on the bridge instead of the CIC. “Sir … the Chinese are attacking the future squadron!”

Howard blinked. The Chinese were firing on the future starships? Were they insane? They had to be. The future ships weren’t just dangerously advanced, they were the key to a better future for everyone. And yet, they were being fired upon … he cursed under his breath as more and more data flowed into the display, the process oddly jerky now the supercarrier had been thrown back on her own resources. The Chinese really were firing on John Birmingham. Howard couldn’t tell how much damage Boswell’s ship had taken, but he found it hard to believe the ship hadn’t been damaged. They’d had no reason to expect treachery in the middle of a fucking battle!

His console bleeped, reporting a text-only message from the Chinese ships. Howard scanned it quickly, noting the simple justification for the attack and the vaguely-worded promise that the rest of the Great Powers would share in the technological bounty once the future starships were captured or destroyed. He dismissed the claims immediately. The Chinese would no more share such advanced technology than the United States, not if they got exclusive access to the future starships. He suspected he understood, now, what they were planning. The contemporary starships couldn’t return home without the future ships or the relay stations, the latter already in Chinese hands. By the time Earth realised what had happened, it would be too late to do anything about it. The Chinese would be supreme.

“Sir, the national command net is up and running,” Georges reported. “We’re having problems linking to the other national squadrons.”

Howard nodded, curtly. Half the starships on the display hadn’t followed orders to turn on their IFF beacons, a wise precaution in the middle of a battle but deeply frustrating now. They’d be setting up their own command networks, which meant … how many officers were tempted by the Chinese offer, or thought the future folk needed to be taken down a peg or two before they disputed contemporary society beyond repair? If the Chinese had been planning their treachery for quite some time, they could easily have brought others into the conspiracy …

No, he told himself. The more people and nations they invited to join, the greater the chance the secret would be revealed before it was too late.

He felt oddly indecisive. The rules of engagement had never covered such a contingency. The pre-war rules forbade him from firing on foreign starships unless they fired first, or he had reason to think they posed an immediate threat to his ship … his naval training had covered a number of legal contingencies, the officers pointing out that if he was wrong – or failed to convince his seniors he’d been right – he’d be looking at a court martial, perhaps even extradition to a foreign country. Under normal circumstances, he wasn’t supposed to intervene if the Chinese were picking fights with the Russians or vice versa. But these were far from normal circumstances.

“Sir,” Georges reported. “John Birmingham has jumped out!”

Howard nodded. In some ways, that made the decision easier. The FTL sensor network had gone down – he didn’t know if the Chinese had killed it or if Boswell had simply turned it off – but it was unlikely John Birmingham had jumped very far. The heavy cruiser had not only survived, she’d opened the range, allowing her superior weapons to become decisive. And that meant the Chinese plan had failed.

His lips twisted. No one likes a loser …

He tapped his console. “Group One is to defend the formation from alien attacks,” he ordered, coldly. “Group Two is to light up the Chinese ships with tactical sensors.”

“Aye, sir.”

Howard gritted his teeth. He’d been careful to assign most of the American ships – the ones he was sure would follow orders – to Group Two. The foreign commanders might not be quite so willing to let him lead them into an engagement with the Chinese, particularly if their governments had given them sealed orders to let the Chinese take the risk and reap the rewards if the Chinese succeeded. His eyes narrowed as the display updated, noting a number of ships that remained outside the datanet. Friends? Enemies? Undecided? Howard gritted his teeth. It was time to take a stand.

“Open a channel,” he ordered. He waited for the nod, then continued. “Chinese starships, this is Admiral Howard Anderson of the Multinational Fleet. You are ordered to cease fire and hold position; I say again, you are ordered to cease fire and hold position. If you do not stand down, or you attempt to jump out, you will be fired upon without further warning.”

He tapped his console, bracing himself. The Chinese really had stepped across the line. It made no sense. They had to know the remainder of the fleet might turn on them … not to mention the Diyang themselves. What was he missing? They couldn’t have hoped to win alone, could they? The attack had been a crazy gamble and the Chinese should have known it. Cao Zongying was hardly a fool. What the hell was he thinking?

“Sir,” Georges said. “I’ve located John Birmingham.”

Howard glanced at the display. Boswell hadn’t jumped very far at all, by interplanetary standards, but he’d opened the range quite nicely. Except … he was also coming towards the fleet, altering his position seemingly at random … what the hell was he thinking? Four of his remaining ships were orbiting the cruiser … the others having remained behind. Did the Chinese have a plan to deal with them too? They must.

“Signal John Birmingham, inform Commodore Boswell that we’re ordering the Chinese to stand down,” Howard ordered. The Chinese had seriously damaged at least one future starship. If she’d been a contemporary vessel, she’d be dead. Howard wasn’t sure if a future starship could survive such a hammering or not. “And that we’re ready to render assistance if she requires it.”

He sucked in his breath. The mass drivers had done an excellent job of clearing the high orbitals, systematically destroying everything from orbital weapons platforms to shipyards, industrial nodes and a handful of installations with no discernible function. A number of pieces of debris were deorbiting rapidly, some large enough to make it through the atmosphere and do very real damage when they hit the surface. The local defenders might be able to blow them apart before it was too late, but … if they did, they’d reveal the location of their ground-based defences.

“Signal the Diyang,” he ordered, quietly. “Repeat our offer to accept surrender.”

“Aye, sir.”

Howard braced himself. The Chinese ships were altering position, grouping together … planning a final desperate stand? Or did they think he was bluffing? It would be difficult to be sure the Chinese were planning to flee until it was too late to stop them, now they’d been cut off from the future sensors. Did the Chinese know it? Or … had command been usurped by someone who didn’t know what he was doing? It wasn’t impossible …

“Signal the Chinese,” he ordered. Boswell was well within firing range now. He could vaporise the Chinese ships without putting his vessel in any danger at all. “Order them to stand down.”

His mind raced. If he tried to force the Chinese to surrender, they might fight. Probably would, given what they’d done. But the longer the stalemate endured the greater the chance something would happen to break it, something unpredictable …

And if I order the fleet to open fire, he asked himself, how many foreign starships would join me?

He didn’t know. It was possible they’d all join him in putting down the Chinese. Or they’d choose to stand aside. He could hardly blame them. The risks were terrifyingly high. And if the Chinese had secret allies … whatever happened now, the world would never be the same. Who knew how it would end?

***

“The Chinese inflicted some damage on the Federation ships,” Officer Y’Kentuck reported. His voice was very calm, suggesting he was about to offer his commander bad news. “However, it was not enough to cripple or destroy the cruiser. She is still jump-capable.”

Y’Opohan allowed himself a moment of pure frustration. The human starship had the luck of the seven devils. She’d survived the Killers, fallen back in time, made an alliance with the local humans … and now she’d survived an attack he’d been sure would leave her crippled. He had to cripple her, before he fled, or she’d come after him … the smaller ships weren’t a match for Vendetta, but John Birmingham could give his ship one hell of a fight. Win or lose, it would be the end of his dreams.

And once the Chinese crews are interrogated, the humans will have enough clues to figure out our involvement, Y’Opohan told himself. The Chinese had sworn blind their spacers wouldn’t be told the truth, but the modifications to their weapons systems were well ahead of anything they could achieve for themselves. Their failure would point straight to his ship and crew. We have to act now or lose everything.

He smiled, relieved he could finally drop the act. The humans were a pest, a plague on the galaxy, and collaborating with them had galled him even as he’d prepared the knife for their backs. He’d always intended to betray the Chinese … he didn’t quite understand human politics, even in an era where the humans had been more like the Zargana than the milksop Federation, but it didn’t matter. The humans would have too many problems to prepare themselves for the coming war.

“Tactical, deploy the decoy drones,” he ordered. They wouldn’t fool the humans for long, if at all, but a few seconds of pure shock would buy him all the time he needed. “On my command, activate them.”

“Yes, My Lord.”