MacRoscope (55 page)

Probably some answers were in the Drone’s mind — but it would be a tedious chore digging them out and organizing the information for his own comprehension. There was a hundred times the store of facts he needed — relevant only to the Drone’s life, not his own.

The Queen glanced at him with a single eye to hint at her displeasure at his slight tardiness, but did not make an issue of it. He had performed within tolerance — this time.

The communication screen came alive before he finished the grooming. “Mistress,” the pictured neuter said respectfully, keeping its third eye lidded in respect for royalty.

“Crisis already?” the Queen demanded.

“A Felk battlemoon has materialized four twis distant.”

Groton felt the reaction of his host. A twi was a unit of spatial measurement equivalent to about eighty-five light-seconds. The Felks — enemies — were within six light-minutes.

“So soon! So close!” the Queen exclaimed angrily. “How did they know?”

But she did not wait for an answer. Obviously there had been a leak, and the Felks had followed this expedition in. They could not have traced it in space so rapidly, since this would require years by lightspeed observation.

The Queen was already traveling down the hall at a pace that pressed even the trailing Drone hard. She was a magnificent specimen of life, large and sleek and strong, one who had been not merely born to command, but evolved for it.

The supervisory workers were already assembled in the royal hall. “Show me your deployment,” the Queen snapped, having no need of query or courtesy.

A sphere of light appeared, bright dots within it. A map of space, Groton realized, that covered a volume half a light-hour in diameter. A sun, several planets, and two free moons showed within it: the Queen’s battlemoon and the Felks’.

A sun? No, the Drone memory corrected him: that was merely the identifier for their point of focus, the scheduled location of the station. There was no sun within two light-years.

The magnification increased in response to an imperative gesture by the Queen, and the pattern of ships appeared. The Queen’s moon was englobed by dreadnoughts — but already similar armor was emerging from the enemy moon.

“What kind of disposition is that?” the Queen demanded. “They will penetrate it in hours.”

“Our tactician was lost in the last engagement,” the leading officer-worker reminded her carefully. “We did not pause to pick up a replacement.”

“Naturally not. I would not tolerate an alien in my hive. Where is the next tactician-egg? Hasn’t it been hatched yet?”

Almost, the Queen reminded Groton of someone. Would her next expostulation be against the need to take care of every detail herself?

“I am it,” the officer said, answering her question. “But the enemy has surprised us and I lack experience.”

The Queen brooded over the sphere. “My Drone could make a better deployment,” she said.

The officer very nearly dared to show its ire at the disparagement. “Perhaps your Drone should assume tactical command.”

The Drone-mind suffered a flare of rage at the well-turned sarcasm. The Drone would never have implemented it or even expressed it in the presence of the Queen; but Groton, caught off-guard by the ferocity of the emotion, did.

“The Drone
will
assume command,” he said, with the resonance of triple-range vocal chords.

The Queen turned, about to rebuke him — such rebuke possessing the force of exile — but changed her mind. “Yes — he will. You tactician — attach yourself to him as apprentice. It should be an intriguing experience.”

Thus had a single incontinent outburst netted him stellar responsibility. The whim of the Queen was cruel.

Desperately, Groton assessed his resources. The Drone-mind was cowering in horror, as a man might who had just broken wind vociferously while saluting his country’s flag. He had to detach himself from its emotional state and suppress that mind almost entirely to prevent being overwhelmed by cowardice. This meant taking over most of its remaining functions and dispensing with its store of information. He became the Drone.

Yet it seemed to him that the joke was not as farfetched as the Drone’s diminished status had encouraged the neuters to believe. The Drone had spent several years in close attendance upon the Queen, and surely had overheard many of her directives. The Drone had a good mind and excellent information; it was its timidity and dependence on the Queen that made the notion of command ludicrous.

Neither Queen nor workers knew that a determined human personality had taken control. The Drone had strong emotions and weak initiative; Groton had mild emotions and strong will. The combination could have meant weakness in both departments — but fortunately that was not the case. This worm could turn, as the experience with the supply depot worker had shown.

The Queen was gone, leaving him to his mess.

The tactician-worker waited beside him as directed. Groton perceived the distress caused by this ultimate indignity — but the Queen’s word really was law. The officer, like himself, was captive to its own indiscretion. The Queen had her own ways of dealing with insolence — and the remaining workers had had another lesson.

“What is the immediate objective?” Groton asked the officer, determined to do his best, whatever became of it.

“To drive off the enemy, so that the station can be installed and activated, and the mines placed,” it replied.

“And the mines will prevent subsequent attacks?”

“Yes.”

“How does the Felk armament compare to ours?”

“It is superior. In number, not in kind. We suffered losses in prior placements.”

“How much time do we have?”

“Time for what?”

Groton perceived another weakness of the worker-mind. “How much time do we have before the enemy breaks through and destroys the station?”

“About six hours — unless we can outmaneuver them or frighten them away.” The time had been given in alien units, but Groton had no difficulty in comprehending.

He studied the map-sphere. “You plan to wait for them to attack?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“How else can we observe the nature of their thrust?” Orders or no, the officer had little respect for the Drone. Groton was reminded of a somewhat similar experience many years ago. Then it had been high school students. Now, as then, he had no higher appeal, contrary to the theoretical situation; he had to handle the matter by himself or be washed out.

“Yet,” he said, “with their ships massed and traveling at high velocity, our scattered forces cannot hope to stop them all. And one ship should be sufficient to blast the station.”

The neuter did not bother to reply.

“You have no manuals of strategy?”

“Of course not. A tactician learns by experience.”

The military mind! “Provided he lives.”

“Yes,” the officer agreed. “My predecessor—”

“And the Felks are similarly organized? No study of the lessons of history?”

“I assume so. How else should it be?”

How else indeed!

It appeared that a noncombative but practical-minded Earthman was as well equipped to handle galactic battle tactics as the galactic commands were.

“All right. Relay this directive: All ships, repeat
all
ships, to proceed immediately to the Felk battlemoon, there to attack without englobement.”

The officer, true to its nature, relayed the command. Groton heard the controller giving directions to individual ships. Then, thinking about it, the officer objected. “What?”

“You wouldn’t be familiar with the dictum ‘The best defense is a good offense’?”

“Certainly not.”

“Well, chalk it up to experience, once you see it happen. We know we can’t stop their attack, if we wait for it to develop, nor can we hope to overcome the enemy in a normal encounter — but our ships do have an advantage of several hours in deployment. We can hit the Felk before the Felk hits us.”

“But with no defense—”

“Wait and see.” Inwardly, Groton prayed that his audacious gamble paid off. He was not, ordinarily a gambling man. He was exchanging almost certain defeat for a fifty-fifty chance at victory — but had he been a real tactician, he might have known how to play for two- or three-to-one odds in his favor. “Now you and I will board the fleet flagship,” he finished.

That made another stir. It seemed that commanders of naval operations generally ensconced themselves safely within the base moon and jumped to another location in space when the battle went against them. No wonder losses could be heavy!

He had no time to concern himself with the details of the ship he boarded. It was a standard cruiser, heavy on armament, slow on maneuver, but capable of high velocity under sustained acceleration.

Three hours later they were closer to the enemy moon than to their own. The Felk fleet was still emerging, though about half of it was now positioned around its base.

“Form our ships into three wedges,” Groton said. “Send them in simultaneously from three directions.” And it was done.

The enemy fleet deployed to counter this move. “Why don’t they mass and attack our station?” the officer asked, baffled.

“Would
you
attack the enemy home-base — if your ships were needed to save your own hide?”

“Hide?”

“Carapace. Chitin integument. Personal dignity.”

“Oh. Yes. Self-preservation.”

An underling-worker reported: “Felk commander has a message for Queen commander.”

“Is that safe to accept?”

“Yes,” the officer replied. “The Felks are reputed to be honorable in battle.”

“Let’s see it then. Maybe he wants to negotiate.”

“Negotiate?”

“Don’t you ever bargain for some settlement short of total victory?”

“Bargain?”

Groton shrugged and watched the communications screen. A picture of a two-eyed creature with a caved-in face formed, manlike in its way.
Do we look that ugly?
he asked himself, already acclimatized to the shell-gloss outlines of the hive personnel.

The Felk commander spoke in whistles, pursing its flaccid lips, but there was a running translation. “Commander, I am impressed by your technique.” There was no opportunity for normal dialogue, since there was almost a minute’s delay owing to lightspeed limitation of communications. By the time a rapid conversation was feasible, they would be virtually on top of the enemy moon. “I did not anticipate such initiative on the part of the Queen’s forces. From the facility with which you are adjusting formation, I suspect that you, commander, are aboard one of the ships in the area. This demonstrates courage, and gives a tactical advantage over me, since my communications delay is much greater than yours. I am authorized to offer you a generous commission in our navy, if you will defect to our side.”

Groton stood before the silent screen, amazed at the audacity of it, “He’s losing — so he offers his enemy a commission!”

“Felks are adroit,” the officer agreed indifferently. “That’s how we lost my predecessor.”

“He defected?”

“He tried to. But the Queen overheard and cut off his head. The mission was successful.”

Groton gained respect for the Queen. She, at least, had unquestioned loyalty to her side. Of course, she
was
her side, largely…

Still, the notion of blatantly buying off the opposition… “Well, beam back a picture of me,” he said hotly. “Nothing else. We’ll see if the Felks figure to bribe away the Queen’s Drone.”

He had his answer in two minutes. “As it happens,” the Felk commander whistled, “we hold captive a Queen of your species, obtained as the result of a singularly fortunate maneuver. Unfortunately her Drone died. She has been very lonely for a year, though we permit her a reasonable retinue of her neuters, hatched from the few remaining eggs she has in storage. I suspect she would not tire of a serviceable mate for a very long time, knowing she could not obtain another. As you know, the favor extended to individual Drones is normally of short duration — two or three years. I can arrange to send you to her.”

Again Groton was astonished. Would this creature stop at nothing? The Drone’s memory verified that the Felks had overrun an outpost some time ago — one staffed by a Queen — and that a Queen could not raise her own Drone from an egg. Incest did not exist, in this culture.

The Drone-mind clamored for attention. The offer, it developed was attractive, particularly to one who faced the prospect of early retirement by his present Queen. A Drone could live as long as a Queen could — if permitted. That amounted to decades. Felks did not lie; the offer was valid.

Sorry
, Groton said to the Drone. Then, to the officer: “Tell the Felk to look to his defenses. This commander is not about to be bought off by the boudoir.”

In the interval between messages, the officer fidgeted, then spoke. “Request permission to voice an opinion.” The third eye was now lidded.

“Granted, provided it is brief.”

“I had thought it was an insult to serve under Drone command. I was mistaken.”

“We all make mistakes,” Groton said, touched but not forgetting that it would be a mistake to betray any personal softness. The mission was not yet over. More and more he appreciated the lessons of that hectic school-teaching session of his earlier life. Then it had been merely his pride and self-confidence that took beatings; now the lives of thousands were at stake.

The third message showed that the Felk had not given up. “You evince a handsome loyalty to your Queen. But have you properly considered the nature of your loyalty to your species, and to other technological species? Surely you are intelligent enough to perceive that this station and the others in your program will hurt all of us. All we ask is the right to travel — yet only one species in a thousand is to be permitted this, if the stations function. Neither your species nor mine is among the select. Why cooperate as the tool of the destroyer?”

The destroyer! Suddenly the meaning of all this settled into focus. He was participating in the origin of the destroyer station — perhaps the very one that had blanked out Earth’s finest minds.
Would
blank, for what he experienced now had to be history at least fifteen thousand years past. His mystic journey had finished on target; there could be no more significant event.