“Speaking of which,” he said in a casual tone he knew wouldn’t fool her, “how are they coping with Woodrow’s death?”
“They liked her,” Rose said. She started to scrub his back, her fingers reaching down to stroke his buttocks. “Poor kids. They have to get close to each other, they have to rely on each other, yet… they take it badly when they lose their fellow pilots.”
“I know,” Kurt said. It took time to develop the strange mixture of affection, respect and dispassion that allowed the squadrons to remain effective, after losing several pilots in combat. He’d often considered trying to split up the squadrons in the hope it would make it easier to slot a pilot from one into another, but he had a feeling it would just reduce overall effectiveness. “Very poor kids.”
He sighed. “Make sure you sleep with them tonight…”
Rose pinched his bottom, hard.
“That wasn’t what I meant,” Kurt said, turning to face her and reaching for the scrubber. “You need to keep an eye on them to make sure they don’t crack up under losing their first comrade — and friend.”
“I know,” Rose said. She stuck out her tongue. “But it was so easy to take advantage of it.”
Kurt rolled his eyes, then sobered. If the squadrons had had a greater percentage of veterans, men and women who would take losing their fellows in their stride, he would have felt happier about them. But, as it was, the rooks had just lost their first friend and comrade to the aliens. And there would be more to come.
“Take care of them,” he said, as he washed her back, then manipulated the shower to cleanse his body of soap. “Don’t give them any chance to brood, not now. Once they’re awake…”
Rose grinned. “More exercises?”
“More exercises,” Kurt said. “Keep them busy, keep them occupied, keep them thinking about the future rather than the past. Hell, if you have to, kick someone out of the large entertainment suite and force the pilots to watch a movie together.”
“Perhaps not some of the movies they brought with them,” Rose said. “Do you know what some of them brought on their personal terminals?”
“I can guess,” Kurt said. It was a matter of a few seconds to download an entire collection of porn from the lunar datanet. Hell, there were always rumours of secret caches of porn hidden away on the military network, no matter how many WebHeads were gainfully employed keeping the military systems free of porn. He’d always believed that the rumours were meant to encourage the WebHeads to keep inspecting the older parts of the database. “I think they’d prefer something a little less… interesting.”
Rose smirked again as she followed him out of the shower. “Or exciting?”
“Yes, please,” he said. He watched as she dressed, finding it oddly exciting. Rose taking off her clothes was obviously arousing, but why did he find her dressing to be almost as interesting? There was no time to think about it now. “Maybe something cartoonish.”
“They’re pilots, not little kids,” Rose pointed out. She buttoned up her jacket, then glanced at her reflection in the terminal. “I think they’d prefer a science-fantasy to a cartoon meant for kids.”
“Oh?” Kurt asked. “Who was it who forced me to endure all five remakes of Kung Fu Panda?”
Rose gave him the finger, then slipped out of the hatch.
Kurt chuckled as the hatch slid closed, then turned to his terminal and brought up the records of the battle. The analysts would clearly be ploughing through them for years to come, looking at every last aspect of the fight, but he wasn’t searching for alien weaknesses. He just wanted to know how Prince Henry had performed.
“Not too bad, for someone without any combat experience at all,” he considered. The Prince hadn’t switched to automatic fire as quickly as he should have done — Rose would have to point it out to him — but other than that he’d done well. And he’d picked off four alien fighters. There were pilots among the rooks who hadn’t managed to hit any. “Not too bad at all.”
He sighed, wondering just what the Captain had said to the Prince. It had forced Kurt to make some awkward explanations, including one that would get him into trouble with the Captain if he ever heard it. The suggestion that he was still finding his way wouldn’t go down well with Captain Fitzwilliam. Or, for that matter, with his XO. She’d been quite annoyed to discover that the Captain and Admiral Smith had withheld Prince Henry’s presence on the ship from him.
His terminal pinged. “Meeting in thirty minutes,” the XO said. Her voice brooked no dissent. “Your presence is requested.”
“Understood,” Kurt said. He looked down at the terminal. There should be just enough time to complete a basic analysis of the engagement. Both the Captain and the Admiral would be very interested to hear it. “I’ll be there.”
Chapter Nineteen
“This system is clearly more useful to the aliens than the last,” Ted said. He looked up at the display, showing dozens of alien ships moving between three tramlines. There might be almost nothing in the system apart from the tramlines, but that alone made the system worthwhile. “And our target is here.”
“Assuming, of course, that the intelligence officers are correct,” Captain Atsuko said, pessimistically. “If the system is largely useless…”
“The attack on our ships proves that we have found something,” Shallcross snapped. “We must proceed, now. The aliens are no doubt already scrambling to reinforce their defences.”
“Almost certainly,” Ted agreed. He tapped the display. “They have had enough time, I think, to get a signal through to Target One. We must assume that they know we’re coming.”
He scowled. He’d feared encountering an alien fleet in this system, but they’d seen nothing apart from a handful of freighters or freighter-like vessels. If their drive systems hadn’t matched the signatures from Alien-1, he might have wondered if they’d stumbled into someone else’s star system. The freighters showed no evident concern about a marauding alien battlefleet within the system.
All they’d have to do is turn off their drives and go dark, he thought. We’d never be able to find them even if we were inclined to try.
“Then the advantage of surprise is lost,” Captain Atsuko said. “We should withdraw, now.”
“We have not come all this way to withdraw,” Bellerose snapped. The Frenchman’s image seemed to splutter with indignation. “Right now, we are behind enemy lines. Even if we pull out successfully, without encountering any other threats, the aliens will have all the time in the world to prepare a warm reception for the next fleet heading their way. We have to move now!”
“I agree,” Shallcross added. “This isn’t the time to turn back, Admiral.”
Ted saw both sides of the argument. They had a wonderful opportunity to knock the aliens back on their heels, if they managed to get to Target One in time. But, on the other hand, they had been detected… and they’d been very lucky that the aliens who’d sighted them hadn’t realised the full size of the fleet until it was too late. Target One would have, at best, nine hours before the fleet arrived… longer, of course, if the aliens managed to delay Ted’s passage through the single remaining star system. If the aliens managed to put a substantially greater force in the system before they arrived, the task force could be chopped apart by overwhelming numbers.
But the Royal Navy hadn’t earned its reputation by backing down when the odds looked too dangerous to proceed, particularly when there was no strong evidence that the odds were badly against them.