Our relief was short-lived. I thought about asking the Macros for more details, such as how long they would give us to “prepare” but decided it wasn’t a good idea. We would take all the time they gave us, then when they became antsy again, we would act surprised and beg for more. It was the same technique my kids performed flawlessly upon me every night back when I had been a father. When I’d said: Time to go to bed, they had heard: Agree to go to bed, then quietly stay awake until I remember to order you to bed again…go back to step one and repeat.
Thinking of my kids gave me a pang I hadn’t felt in a while. I stood staring at the screen for a full minute. When I noticed my surroundings again, I saw a new face, standing beside me and staring at me. It was Sandra.
“Are you awake now?” she asked.
“Yeah.”
“What the hell’s going on? Are we at battle stations or not?”
“No,” I said. I turned to Captain Sarin and instructed her to relay the order to stand down.
“Where’s the rest of the command brick crew?” Sandra asked, looking around. “What about Raphim?”
The bridge crew looked glum. There was only myself, Captain Sarin and three other staffers there, two warrant officers and a non-com staff sergeant named Gorski. He had taken over navigation from the deceased Lieutenant Raphim Shrestha because he’d been an engineering major in college before he signed up.
Gorski lifted a gloved hand and waved at Sandra. He wore a weak smile. “I’m new,” he said. Gorski always appeared to need a shave and his watery blue eyes gave him a permanent expression of surprise.
“Raphim and the others were lost on Helios,” Captain Sarin told Sandra quietly.
“Oh-of course,” Sandra said quickly, with an uncharacteristic hint of embarrassment. She appeared flustered. “I’m sorry. Looks like you need to get some new people in here.”
I nodded. “I thought we were heading for Earth. I figured we could reassign people when we returned to base. But you are right…as this mission isn’t over yet, I need to have a full complement here in the command brick. We’ve lost eighty percent of our officers. An occupational hazard of leading from the front.”
Sandra frowned at the big board and looked sorry she had brought the matter up. Everyone was in a state of shock, thinking about a new campaign.
I sucked in a breath of air and shook my head. I needed to stop daydreaming and get people moving. Dwelling about the fact most of us were dead and we were about to face another unknown enemy wasn’t helping anything. It was time to take command again.
“All right,” I said, looking around the room. Dim-lit faces looked back at me, reflecting the bluish glow of a dozen screens. “You are all second lieutenants now, except for Captain Jasmine Sarin, who I hereby promote to Major. Congratulations Jasmine, you will be my new exec, replacing Robinson.”
“What about me?” Sandra asked, smiling.
I could tell she was half-joking, but I looked at her seriously. “Didn’t you hear me? You are a second lieutenant now. You know your way around the command brick as well as anyone else I’ve got left. You were working my office communications, but I’m expanding your job description. Now you will run the com board for the entire unit.”
The crew looked surprised, but no one objected to any of the changes. I could see in their eyes they all felt they’d earned their promotions. I agreed. Under these conditions, knowing how to survive was a trait I wanted in all my officers. Even Sandra had fought hand-to-hand back on Helios. How many humans back on Earth had killed an alien barehanded? Not many. She had never finished her college degree due to the war, but she was as qualified as anyone. I ordered a staff meeting, and summoned Major Sarin, Lieutenant Gorski and Staff Sergeant Kwon to my office. The second I saw him, I promoted Kwon to Captain, over his objections.
“I have no education, sir,” he complained. “I won’t know what fork to put on the table at the officer’s mess!”
“You are under a mistaken impression, Captain,” I said. “Star Force officers don’t use forks.”
“Oh,” Kwon said, looking honestly surprised. “I will have no trouble then.”
“Excellent. I need an experienced field officer to give me input on the ground forces. If we have to invade these artificial satellites-which I take to be space stations of some kind-it will be all infantry work. We won’t be able to use armored hovertanks aboard an enemy structure.”
Everyone eyed me in alarm. I think it was the first time they’d seriously considered what the Macros wanted us to do. Running around with a rifle on a planet was one thing…invading an enemy orbital base while it was presumably shooting at you was a different matter entirely.
“Sir,” Major Sarin said, speaking up for the first time. “I don’t understand how we are supposed to gain access to the enemy base-whatever it is.”
“That’s on the list of reasons we are having this meeting. I want ideas, people.”
Everyone looked at Kwon, as he was the infantry man present. Kwon stuck up a set of his thick fingers. “We’ve got suits. Worst case, we float over and burn a way inside.”
“Worst case,” I agreed.
“Better idea,” Kwon continued, “we build some kind of invasion craft.”
I thought about it, and nodded. “How big?”
Kwon shrugged. “One-man, or tank-sized. Whatever is easiest.”
I thought about it further. “We’ve got a few drill-tanks left,” I said. “They would do nicely as a platform. But they can’t carry everyone. They can only carry about twenty marines each. But if we alter the propulsion and guidance systems, they can fly to the targets and use their big drilling lasers to burn breaches through the enemy hulls.”
“Good idea, sir,” Kwon said, nodding.
Sarin and Gorski watched this interchange with shocked expressions. They stared at us as if Kwon and I were the aliens at the table.
“What are you two thinking?” I demanded.
“Honestly, Colonel?” Sarin asked.
I nodded.
“I can’t believe we are actually planning to do this. We have no idea what the hell the enemy look like, or what their space stations will look like-not even what kind of defensive fire they will be throwing back at us.”
“Right,” I said, nodding. “Keep going.”
“So, how can we plan an attack with so little intel?”
“Because we have no choice. The Macros don’t like questions. They aren’t going to give us an infinite allotment of time to prepare, either. We will prepare for this mission, as full of unknowns as it is, as quickly as possible. We will then use every additional second we are allotted to gather more intel and improve upon our plans.”
Gorski cleared his throat. Up until this point, he had been quiet. I nodded to him.
“Sir,” Gorski said, “I think there is another option we aren’t considering.”
We all stared at him. Major Sarin fidgeted uncomfortably. Kwon grinned with broad teeth. We all knew what Gorski was going to say.
“Tell us about it, Lieutenant,” I said.
“We could take this ship instead. If we are going to build a force to fight in null-gravity and vacuum anyway, why not turn it on the Macros?”
I nodded slowly. Everyone had thought of this before. “There is something inherently frightening and foul-feeling about turning upon your allies,” I began, “no matter how unpleasant those allies might be. But don’t think for a minute I have never considered the idea. If it were only us involved in the equation, I would have done it long ago. But I’m not thinking of just us here. I’m thinking about everyone else back home on Earth.”
I ran my eyes over everyone. They stared back, troubled.
“If we screw up out here,” I said, “then the Macros will attack Earth. We can’t doubt that for a second. We will have restarted a war that cost hundreds of millions of lives during the last round.”
“But,” Gorski said, speaking up again. “If we are successful, I doubt the rest of the Macro Empire would even know about it, sir.”