He watched, grimly, as more and more icons appeared in the display. The planet was heavily defended, with nine orbital battlestations and countless starfighters zipping to and fro, making no attempt to disguise the fact they were watching the humans with eagle eyes. There were fewer warships than he had expected; the largest one, holding station several hundred thousand kilometres from the planet, was a battlecruiser comparable to the ship Ark Royal had captured, months ago. He couldn’t see any carriers at all.
They could be under stealth, he told himself, or perhaps they’re elsewhere. Or maybe they don’t exist.
He’d been forced to become more familiar with productive figures during the run-up to Operation Nelson than he’d ever wished to be. Producing starfighters in vast numbers was relatively simple. They weren’t that complex, he knew; the real problem was producing starfighter pilots who could last longer than thirty minutes against the aliens. But the real bottleneck lay in producing carriers. Part of the reason modern carriers were so frail was that the designers had cut the armour back to the bare minimum. A carrier like Ark Royal could take upwards of two to three years to build.
Was it possible, he asked himself, that the aliens had worked their carrier force to the bone?
Wishful thinking, he thought, coldly. You don’t know anything of the sort.
“We’re entering orbit now,” Janelle said, breaking into his thoughts. “They’re inviting us to send a party down to the surface.”
She paused. “And they’re inviting you to join them.”
Ted was seriously tempted. He’d never set foot on an alien world; hell, this was the first semi-friendly visit any human had made to an alien world. The Marines had raided alien worlds before, but that had been far from friendly. And yet he knew he couldn’t risk leaving his command or falling into unfriendly hands.
“Tell them that I respectfully decline,” he said. “No, tell the diplomats to decline for me.”
“Aye, sir,” Janelle said. “The analysts are sending you their preliminary report now.”
Ted glanced down at his console. The alien world — the analysts had dubbed it Atlantis — was almost completely drenched in water. There were no ice caps — or, if there had been, they’d melted long ago. Judging from the report, the aliens had deliberately created a greenhouse effect to heat the world to the standards they considered acceptable. Somehow, they’d managed to avoid the runaway effect that had made Venus so unsuitable for immediate settlement.
But we’re working on terraforming the world now, he thought. The aliens have just done the same as ourselves.
“It’ll be like walking into a sauna down there,” he said, gazing down at the orbital images. It was painfully obvious that once-great continents had vanished below the waves. Alien settlements, placed in shallow waters, could be seen everywhere. “Make sure the shuttle pilots are aware of local conditions.”
“Aye, sir,” Janelle said.
Ted turned his attention back to the tactical display. The aliens, either out of consideration or paranoia, had cleared orbital space around the flotilla, but he was far too aware that it was purely nominal. Ground-based weapons or starship-launched missiles could reach the flotilla within seconds. Ideally, he would have preferred to keep his distance from the planet, but the aliens had ensured it wasn’t an option. He couldn’t tell if they were trying to be welcoming or planning a sneak attack when he was looking the other way.
“Admiral,” Janelle said suddenly, “our shadow has revealed himself.”
“I see,” Ted said, as a light cruiser materialised some distance from Ark Royal. “And what does he want?”
“Unknown,” Janelle said. There was a long pause as she worked her console, accessing the live feed from the ship’s passive sensors. “But he’s exchanging signals with the orbital defences. They’re not even trying to hide the signals.”
“Odd,” Ted commented. Any amount of information could be sent via laser, with no one outside anyway the wiser. “Do they want us to know what they’re saying?”
“I don’t think we can break the code,” Janelle said. “Even if they think they’re sending it in clear…”
Ted shrugged. “Keep an eye on him,” he ordered, slowly. There was nothing else they could do, unless they opened fire and restarted the war. “And let me know if he does anything worrying.”
He settled back in his command chair. Everything rested on the talks. Everything.
And if they didn’t work, he reminded himself grimly, he would have to deploy the bioweapon. No matter the claims the designers made, Ted doubted it would be completely effective. And the aliens would know that humanity had attempted genocide. The war would become utterly merciless. Humanity’s worlds would burn when the aliens struck back, exterminating large parts of the human race. And the survivors would find it impossible to rebuild their society.
Feeling sick, Ted forced himself to wait. There was nothing else he could do.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“Well,” Ambassador Melbourne said, “is this better than flying a starfighter?”
Henry shook his head as the shuttle bounced through the planet’s atmosphere. It was impossible to fly a starfighter within a planetary atmosphere, thankfully, because he had a feeling it would be just as bad if he’d tried. The shuttle shook so violently as it descended that he felt sick, so sick that only bloody-mindedness was keeping him from throwing up everything he’d eaten over the last few days. Several of the Ambassadors and their aides had lost that battle and were vomiting into paper bags.
“No,” he said. The shuttle plunged, so sharply that he had the unnerving sensation that it was about to crash, then steadied. Outside, lightning flashed against the portholes. “In a starfighter, no one can smell vomit.”
The Ambassador chuckled as the shuttle rocked again, then shuddered so violently that Henry thought it had rammed another shuttle in midflight. He braced himself, trying hard to breathe through his mouth, as the shuttle lowered itself the final few metres, then hit the ground with a terrifying bang. The deck rocked so violently that, for a long moment, he was honestly not sure it was over.
“Well,” the Ambassador said. “See if I use this airline in future.”
Henry chuckled as he undid his buckle and stood. His legs felt unsteady as he staggered towards the hatch, which was being opened by two armed Marines. The shuttle’s display panel beside the hatch showed an alarming number of red lights, suggesting that the flight through the planet’s atmosphere had been more hazardous than he’d realised. Whatever the aliens had done to terraform — alien-form — the planet had royally screwed up the planet’s weather system. The flight had been thoroughly unsafe.
Maybe they did it on purpose, he thought, as the hatch opened. They wanted to discourage visitors.
The planet’s atmosphere smelt warm and mushy, almost like one of the few surviving tropical rainforests. Rain poured from high overhead, the raindrops falling so heavily that Henry was half-convinced that someone was pouring water on them from above. It was very hard to see past a few metres, but he was almost grateful. The ground below the shuttle might have been made of concrete — and slightly slanted to allow water to run down towards the ocean — yet it didn’t look particularly safe.