The Sword and the Plough Page 14

  The commander leant forward and tapped the call switch for deck five. The call light flashed amber once…twice…

  “Quartermaster, Sergeant Chiang.” A young man’s face, Asian in origin, with a full Prince Ferdinand copy beard, materialized on the screen.

  “Ah sergeant, I’ll need you to provide an armed escort for the Trionian prisoners to the planet surface.”

  “Yes sir. Any special instructions, commander?”

  “Yes. Make sure that they are treated with the utmost respect. Do not leave them until you are satisfied they are safely incarcerated with the others. And see to it that their wounded man is looked after.”

  * * *

  Commander Riddick leaned back into the black leather comfort of the bridge chair. He could not help the smile of satisfaction that crept across his face. The old ship had made it back from Trion to Megran with its cargo of hostages in record time, its photon engines and hull pushed to their limit.

  Now the battleship was to pick up her squadron. The advance fleet would consist of the battleship, six cruisers and a dozen or so smaller class vessels, destroyers and corvettes. The seven cruisers captured from the conquered planets would join them in due course.

  They would take up their station in the Jupiter Trojans,* the asteroid belt near the main space lanes between Megran and Earth. There they would await the code word, Valkyrie – the signal to attack.

  Their spearhead mission was to destroy or disable the queen’s space patrols in the area, using hit and run tactics. In addition, they were to launch missile strikes against as many of Earth’s military bases as possible, to create havoc and generally harass the surface forces.

  The operation would help clear the way for the main Megran armada waiting to commence the invasion.

  * * *

  The black leather command chair was unbelievably comfortable, and for one brief moment, Gregor Lipinski relaxed and enjoyed its luxury. But just for a moment, there were important things to attend to, strategic plans to implement.

  “Computer, this is First Officer, Gregor Lipinski. I want you to find me a spot inside the Jupiter Trojans to hide two dozen ships.”

  “Tactical projections are priority one only sir,” the computer’s female voice responded. “What is your authorization?”

  “Damn it, computer, I’m in command at present. I need no other authorisation.”

  “My apologies, sir – searching now.”

  The first officer leaned forward abruptly and tapped the call switch for deck seven.

  “Weapons deck. Corporal Podley.”

  “First Officer Lipinski here. Get those armourers working at the double. I want this ship in fighting trim – fast. There’s a war on you know, corporal.”

  “Yes sir. Right away sir!”

  First Officer Lipinski smiled to himself. He could have had his own scout ship eleven months ago, but he had gambled to stay with the old war dog, Riddick. It seemed the gamble was about to pay off – action at last. Surely, some of the glory would rub off on the battleship’s first officer.

  He tried a fantasy on for size. Captain Gregor Lipinski, MSMD – Megran Service Medal with Distinction. Alternatively, what if the old man retired after the war, who would be the logical choice for commander? Who would have the battle experience in the only warship of its kind? Who would have learned from the best?

  It could all happen, he thought, it really could – Gregor Lipinski, battleship commander.

  Chapter 20

  The queen’s cruiser “Daring”

  “Well Usha, a routine deep-space patrol should be a good first task for your new squadron, eh?” Admiral Arlos beamed across his sizeable mahogany desk at his newest commander. “Cover the main space lanes, make your presence known, show any potential wrong-doers that the Royal Space Force means business. You know the sort of thing.

  “You should be back in say, seven or eight Earth days.” He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial tone. “How does your husband feel about your going away, eh? In command of all those ships and men, hmm?”

  Usha Sinha smiled. “I don’t think he minds too much, sir. In fact, I rather think he envies me the adventure.”

  The queen’s admiral chuckled. “Yes indeed. I envy you myself.”

  He slapped both hands palm down upon his desktop, ending the niceties.

  “Right then, Usha, any questions?”

  “No sir. But thank you for choosing me.”

  “No need for thanks, m’dear,” the admiral responded easily. “I merely chose the best there was for the job.”

  * * *

  Commander Sinha pushed open the tall glass swing door of the Royal Space Force Airbase building and made her way quickly through the now empty lounges towards the shuttle departure area. Traffic had been heavy on the way from the Admiralty and she was running late. It was not an auspicious beginning for a new commander in Her Majesty’s space force.

  “The shuttle is waiting for you, Ma’am, but there’s only a few minutes of orbit window for your ship left. You’ll have to hurry.”

  There were only cleaners left in the long corridor that led to the departure gate, and the commander was able to increase her pace.

  She did not see the side door open, or the young man who suddenly rushed into her path, until it was too late.

  The impact sent them both sprawling, and, for a second or two, Usha felt she might have broken something. She lay where she had fallen awaiting the onset of pain to announce a broken limb.

  The young man was on his feet in an instant. He had short-cropped blonde hair and startled looking blue eyes. The red of his uniform was noticeably new and lacking any service ribbons or other insignia.

  “Oh ma’am, I’m so sorry, so dreadfully sorry.” He held out his hand. “Here, let me help you up. You’re not hurt, are you?”

  Usha allowed herself to be helped to her feet. It appeared there were no bones broken. She dusted off her uniform.

  “I’m so sorry,” the young man blurted out again. “I was in such a hurry, I just didn’t see you.”

  Commander Sinha gave him a comforting smile. “I’m fine,” she said, “and really there’s no need to apologise. I think we were both in too much of a hurry to pay attention to where we were going.”

  “Well, if you’re really all right, ma’am, I’ll have to fly. I’m running late for the shuttlecraft out to my ship. And it’s my first ship, too. I don’t know what will happen to me if I’m late.”

  “And which ship is that?” Commander Patel enquired curiously.

  “The cruiser Daring ma’am.”

  Usha gave a short bright laugh. “What is your name young man?”

  “Jared, ma’am – Able Spaceman, Jared John Riddick.”

  The boy’s last name, Riddick, rang a bell somewhere in her memory.

  “Well Jared John Riddick,” Usha said with a smile. “I am Commander Usha Sinha, and I am new to the Daring, too. Let us be late together.”

  * * *

  One hundred and twenty-five kilometres above the sky, HMS Daring waited. She was a hundred and fifty metres in length, her long cigar like shape, with its bullet nosed bow, painted grey.

  Chapter 21

  The cage • Lars and Helen – childhood • Hakim

  “In Keb’s name, where are they taking us now?” the major muttered as the VIP hostages were marched to an underground passage beneath a heavily fortified citadel.

  The prisoners had landed in Modark, the capital city of Megran, and residence of its governor, His Royal Highness, Prince Ferdinand.

  “Humph! It looks like we’re to be slaves in a mine,” Caroline complained as they entered the dark tunnel entrance. “I hope they don’t expect me to work in this gown.”

  Judith Warner gave her a weak smile, but her look was troubled.

  The prisoners were in a single column, the major at its head, Judith Warner and Caroline in the middle, with the governor and Lars bringing up the rear. An armed guard in Megran green led the
little procession. Two more followed close behind. Captain Lancaster had been taken to a military hospital on their arrival. Sergeant Chiang, their escort from the Megran battleship, had seen to that.

  The brick lined tunnel stretched ahead of them, damp, dismal and dimly lit. Water dripped from the arched roof soaking their hair and clothing. In places, it oozed and dribbled down the walls, creating braided channels of green slime.

  They had gone perhaps one hundred metres, Lars estimated, when the tunnel came to a stop at a solid steel partition; at its centre a heavily armoured door. The guard at the head of their small column help up his hand and ordered them to wait. He went up to the door and rapped on it with the butt of his Meredith pistol.

  After a brief pause, a shutter slid back in answer revealing a peephole in the door. The major edged closer to listen as the guard began to converse with someone through the opening.

  Lars found a patch of wall that appeared less damp and leant against it. His eyes roved the walls and the vaulted ceiling, and he wondered idly how long it might have taken, brick on brick, to build.

  Megran had been the first planet settled from Earth, and much of the new world had been built by convict labour – slave labour. Lars could almost see those lost souls now, the sweat pouring from their bodies as they toiled in the near dark…

  “Well, Lars!” The governor had found a dry section of wall beside him. “I’m sorry we couldn’t have chosen a better occasion for your first space trip.” Sir Henry was smiling, but there was something close to despair in the tone of his voice.

  “I wouldn’t have missed it for anything, sir,” Lars replied brightly. “Although I do think the accommodation so far leaves a bit to be desired.”

  “And the service is far from the best,” Caroline added lightly, coming over to join them. “I shall certainly complain to the management at the first opportunity.”

  The older man laughed. “Well, it’s good to see such spirit, isn’t it, Judith?’

  The woman nodded, smiling nervously all the while.

  The governor said no more. His charges seemed in good heart. He sank back against the concave brick wall and closed his eyes. The strain of the last few days was making itself felt. His queen was in danger. The civilisation that had flowered over the last century and a half was in jeopardy. Everything he knew was crumbling.

  The major rejoined them “Gather round,” he said in a low voice. His look was grim.

  “From what I could gather,” he continued, “there’s no room left in whatever they’re using as a prison. However, they’re going to squeeze us in anyway.”

  “So, we’re not the only prisoners then,” Lars murmured.

  “I’m afraid not,” the major replied. “And I have an uncomfortable feeling about just who the other prisoners are.”

  “No talking!” one of the guards growled.

  * * *

  The heavy steel door clanged shut behind them. They were on the next stage of their journey. The tunnel was larger now, but the air had suddenly become hot and heavy, with a burgeoning stench such as Lars had not smelt before. He shuddered. He had the dread feeling they were entering some eerie underworld, a parallel Hades, the mythical abode of the dead.

  Their guards herded them on. After fifty metres or so, they began to hear the sound of voices, a multitude of spectral mutterings, like lost souls in the gloom. Judith Warner began to sob uncontrollably. Caroline tried to comfort her, but she could think of nothing reassuring to say.

  Another fifty metres farther on, the tunnel ended abruptly poised above a flight of perhaps thirty steep steps leading down to a brightly lit landing. The babel of voices coming up from the hole of yellow light at their feet was now almost deafening. The prisoners glanced uneasily at one another. Lit by the subterranean glow, their faces took on a ghastly hue, and their shadows ranged huge and menacing on the tunnel walls and vaulted brick roof.

  The guard at the head of their column raised his hand and signalled to the prisoners to follow him down.

  What ancient instinct binds us together in time of fear, Lars wondered; some sixth sense, or some inborn lore, a shadowy memory from our primeval past? Whatever it was, and wherever it came from, it bunched the Trionians closely together in a protective knot as they followed the guard down the steep stairway.

  * * *

  The last few steps down revealed all. Their primal fears were quickly replaced by a dread more real, more chilling. In front of them was a large cellar under a high domed ceiling. Taking up the entire space was a circular wire cage jam-packed with prisoners – more than two hundred, by Lars’s reckoning, men and women both; the rank odour of unwashed bodies in the air, all at once explained.

  Around the circumference of the cellar was a wooden platform built out from the walls, on which Megran troopers spaced at intervals stood guard, long barrelled Bess rifles held ready across their chests.

  Within the crowd of prisoners, red uniforms abounded, and gold braid too, but there were other dress styles as well, suggesting the captives had been plucked from a variety of settings, both military and civilian. However, from what he could see, it seemed to Lars he might be the only farmer in their midst.

  “Looks like more hostages,” Lars muttered half in relief that the phantoms had gone.

  The major leaned in and spoke in Lars’s ear. “That may yet be the understatement of the year, Lars,” he murmured. “I recognise several top military and government leaders from every planet in the Commonwealth, save Earth, plus some good Megran folk as well.”

  “Move it!” a guard pushed the Trionians ahead of him using his Bess rifle like a staff.

  The little group made their way down from the wooden platform to the cellar floor. It was hotter by far than the hottest day under Trion’s twin suns. Another guard stood by the open cage door, his drawn pistol motioning them to enter.

  “Come on! Move it!” he growled. “We haven’t got all day.”

  Several of the other prisoners had spotted them now. Some, who had been sitting, stood to see better, while others moved over to stand at the cage wire. The clamour and din subsided as the remainder of the inmates became aware of the new arrivals, and the deep hush that followed was one of both deep sorrow and despair.

  “Welcome Trion!” A man’s deep voice cried out abruptly, breaking the silence. Two hundred voices echoed his cry. “Welcome Trion!”

  “Major Waterman,” a voice nearby exclaimed. “Glad to have you with us, sir.”

  Excitement now spread rampant across the cage. Despondency evaporated and sudden hope took its place. Laughing faces pressed against the wire and arms stretched forth to wave in greeting.

  “Good old Trion!” someone exclaimed suddenly over the welter of voices. “Bloodied those Megran dogs a bit, I’ll bet – gave them a whipping.”

  “Shut up, royalist swine,” the Megran guard at the cage door snarled, but the excited throng ignored him and the defiant taunts and jibes carried on.

  “So, Ferdinand’s won a few minor planets,” another voice bellowed. “Wait ’til he faces the queen. She’ll send him packing with his tail between his legs. She might even cut it off.”

  Hoots of laughter and cheering followed this last remark, growing louder as it gathered momentum across the cage until, like a titanic wave breaking, two hundred voices cried out as one.

  “Long live the queen!”

  The crowd of prisoners began to surge forward like a giant sea.

  The Trionians hesitated.

  “Hurry up! Get in!” the Megran guard at the door shouted.

  But the flood was upon them. Before the Trionians could move, a mob of prisoners rushed the open cage door. The guard slammed the door shut and jumped back, his pistol pointed stiffly at the jeering crowd. In an instant, he had scrambled up onto the ledge and the safety of his fellows, leaving the Trionians outside the cage.

  “Long live the queen!” The cry came again and multiplied in a tumultuous burst across the sea of captives.


  The Megran guards took a step forward, their rifles raised.

  “Long live the queen! Long live the queen! Long live the queen!”

  The Trionians found themselves swept up in the turmoil and pandemonium. They clasped at the dozens of outstretched hands; embraced their grinning comrade prisoners through the cage wire. They hollered with the multitude, their voices straining.

  A Megran lieutenant used a loud hailer, but his call went unheeded.

  A rich contralto launched into the traditional royal hymn of praise. Two hundred voices joined her. Lars knew the words but vaguely. He heard snatches he recognised as the ancient words rang out.

  “Send her victorious… happy and glorious.”

  Lars sang along with the words he knew, Judith Warner’s squeaky soprano and the governor’s lusty bass in fervent chorus beside him.

  “Long to-o reign ov-er us…”

  The Megran guards stepped up, aimed their rifles above the crowd. Their lieutenant raised his arm.

  “Fire!” The light-bolt rifles discharged a crisscross of blazing bolts into the cellar ceiling showering burning rock fragments onto the frenzied horde below.

  The anthem faltered amid cries of pain.

  Lars heard the order. “Ready!” Saw the guards raise their rifles for a second volley. Saw two hundred prisoners crouch low.

  “Fire!” The Megran rifles roared again. Blinding bolts of white

  light burned into the high dome ceiling. A fiery hail of punishing particles rained down on the defenceless multitude below.

  Two hundred voices cried out in shock and pain as the glowing splinters seared human flesh. Lars groaned out loud as a white-hot shard creased his neck.