Otherwise, the Marauder had the same low profile, with a flat nose at the front and a taller stern. Its hull plating was angled, dull and unmarked, with no sign of erosion anywhere.

  “Two portside Ghost clusters instead of one,” said Deneuve, raising her arm and pointing at the flush circles of the launch tubes, positioned on the midsection.

  “And an extra Gatler,” said Grisham, his eyes moving to the two trapezoidal repeater turrets fitted to this same flank.

  “Good enough to knock out an Excar fighter and give an old-style Kijol destroyer a run for its money,” said Deneuve.

  “Yeah,” said Grisham. He didn’t know how much of challenge the Marauder would present in a one-on-one with a Kijol destroyer, but he liked the look of the warship. Appearances weren’t important in combat, but here in Bay 2, the Marauder looked mean and tough.

  “All things considered, it’s better than what we had,” said Deneuve, standing with her hands on her hips.

  “That it is,” said Grisham. “Come on, let’s get onboard.”

  The Marauder wasn’t designed to set down and it floated on its Charos drive about eighty metres above the bay floor. The forward boarding ramp was extended and dim red light was visible in the airlock. Gripped by a sudden eagerness to start the mission, Grisham broke into a sprint for the last couple of hundred metres.

  Two soldiers from the Marauder’s complement of ten guarded the ramp. They were dressed in full combat gear and held their rifles with both hands, keeping the barrels upright. Having spotted Grisham’s approach, they stood a little straighter, and scanned the nearby area of the bay, as if on guard for threats. Grisham recognized them through the visors of their helmets as being Corporal Arie Fine and Private Nestor Vaughan.

  “Corporal Fine, Private Vaughan,” said Grisham in greeting.

  “Sir,” said Fine in acknowledgement.

  “Anything I should know about?” asked Grisham.

  “No, sir.”

  “Are any other members of my crew onboard?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Are we heading out, sir?” asked Vaughan.

  “As soon as everyone’s here,” Grisham confirmed.

  He could see the questions in their eyes, but they kept quiet. Grisham climbed the steps of the steep ramp, feeling the muscles in his legs straining. From this close, the Marauder’s propulsion was a physical manifestation of sound that thickened the air and made it stifling.

  Passing quickly through the confines of the airlock, Grisham entered a tight corridor barely wide enough for two to pass and with a ceiling that brushed the top of his head with each stride. The lighting here was dim – a faded blue like old cloth – and the chill permeated everything. When he pressed his hand briefly against the solid walls, Grisham felt the vibration of the Charos drive – deeper and more resonant than the propulsion on the Castigate - and he shivered at the harnessed power.

  Not unexpectedly, the internal space was no more generous than it was on an old generation Tibor, meaning the Marauder’s interior was compact to the point of near absurdity. Corridors and rooms were considered wasted space that would be better utilised enlarging the engines or improving the onboard systems. A fleet warship wasn’t a good place for the claustrophobic, though Grisham already felt entirely at home here on the Marauder.

  The bridge wasn’t far – a couple of turns and then up some steps. Halting on the two-metre landing at the top of those steps, Grisham touched the access panel. The backend computer performed a scan and the blast door protecting the bridge slid to one side with the faintest of rumbles.

  Grisham entered immediately, looking around as he did, to make sure the technicians had left everything powered up. The bridge was square and lit in the same blue as elsewhere else. Its dimensions were no larger than those on the Castigate, and the arrangement of consoles was the same. A two-person propulsion station was left and a two-person comms station was right. At the front, the main command console was central and slightly raised, with a second console positioned to the right.

  Every console was a sophisticated piece of tech. Interaction was by keypads and touch panels, buttons and switches. Curved screens displayed inputs and outputs. A cursory glance was enough for Grisham to notice that the bridge hardware was newer than the tech on the Castigate. Presumably newer meant better, though the proof would come in the testing.

  Grisham dropped into his seat at the command console, and the fake leather creaked. A glance at the status readouts was enough to tell him that the technicians had done a good job – everything was online and available, and every light was green.

  “Let’s check what’s happening in the bay,” said Grisham, tapping into the sensor hardware and bringing up the feeds.

  “Looks like they’re evacuating already,” said Deneuve. “The station controller must be confident the rest of our crew will be here soon.”

  The warship’s feeds offered a crystal-clear view of the activity outside. Personnel who’d been working within the bay were flooding towards the exits. It was a well-rehearsed routine and Grisham guessed he’d have a green light for departure within twenty minutes, maybe less.

  “Here’re the others,” he said.

  A gravity car was speeding across the bay floor, each of its four seats occupied. The faces were those from the recent mission at Tambus. These officers had served with Grisham for a long time, and he knew he could rely on them.

  “Anything interesting in the mission documentation, sir?” asked Deneuve from the adjacent seat.

  “I’ll let you know when I’ve had an opportunity to read it, Commander,” said Grisham.

  Deneuve’s question reminded him that the Marauder was meant to be delivering a replacement comms unit to Xaros in the event this alarm was caused by nothing more than hardware failure.

  Calling up the inventory of the warship’s tiny underside storage bay, Grisham discovered that, aside from the standard lightly armed ground vehicle, the bay held a military XFG-45 comms console, along with the haulbot required to manoeuvre the hardware into position.

  “Looks like Xaros is getting an upgrade,” said Grisham.

  “Someone must know someone to have gained clearance for that XFG-45, sir,” said Deneuve.

  “Yeah,” said Grisham noncommittally.

  Less than ten minutes later, the remaining four members of the Marauder’s crew arrived on the bridge. Grisham fended off the questions. There’d be plenty of time for those on the journey to Xaros.

  “Sergeant Maxwell reports his two squads are onboard, sir,” said Lopez. “The station controller has given us the all-clear to depart.”

  “Send our acknowledgement,” said Grisham. “We’re getting out of here.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Lopez. “Our departure window is open.”

  Red lights began cycling in the bay, rich like blood. Grisham kept his gaze on the main bay exit doors and, after ten seconds, the seam between them widened as the two slabs of curved alloy slid sideways into their recesses.

  Pulling back on the twin-bar controls, Grisham lifted the Marauder vertically from the bay floor. The warship’s Charos drive hummed eagerly and the output gauge hardly flickered even with the strain of lifting 200-million tons through the Bastion station’s artificial gravity.

  By now, the exit doors were fully open and Grisham rotated the Marauder’s nose so it was pointing towards the darkness outside. A warship could fly equally well in any direction and the opening was easily large enough for the vessel to exit flank-first if he’d so chosen. Somehow, following the nose just felt natural.

  Grisham guided the Marauder through the Bay 2 exit doors and into the void outside. This mission to Xaros had him worried for reasons he couldn’t explain - and it wasn’t because Commander Deneuve had planted the seed in his head. The rational part of Grisham’s mind knew that his biggest concern should be the Human Federation’s changing fortunes in the war against the Kijol, and yet the irrational part of his mind – the part that was guided by hunches and gut feel – wasn’t listening.

  Time would reveal. It always did.

  When Grisham pushed the controls through their guide slots, the Marauder accelerated away from the space station. Staring at the slowly dwindling grey cylinder on the rear feeds, he couldn’t shake off his growing unease, and he wondered what the hell was waiting for him and his crew at Xaros.

  Chapter Six

  At the regulation distance of fifty thousand kilometres from Bastion station, Grisham reduced the Marauder’s velocity until it was travelling at a crawl. On the portside feeds, the ice giant Dimos-4, around which the space station orbited, was a blue of the coldest hue Grisham could imagine.

  “Lieutenant Adler, you know where we’re going,” he said.

  “Yes, sir. Xaros. The navigational computer reports it’s an eight-day journey at our highest lightspeed multiple.”

  “Since when did anyone go anywhere at half maximum?” asked Deneuve.

  Adler ignored the question. “I’ll ready the Charos drive on your order, Captain.”

  “Fire it up, Lieutenant.”

  “Yes, sir. Charos drive warming up. Eight minutes and we’ll be on our way.”

  The hum of the warship’s propulsion deepened and a whining sound rose to prominence, coming from all around. Grisham gritted his teeth and readied himself. In that briefest of moments when the transition into lightspeed took place, the warship’s life support would be unable to fully suppress a force that wasn’t exactly acceleration in the traditional sense, but which was nonetheless traumatic to biological life forms.

  Grisham could have put on his suit helmet and he should probably have fastened his seat harness, but he did neither. Instead, he watched the utilisation of the Marauder’s twin processing cores, which were nailed on one hundred percent as they worked on the complex and semi-theoretical mathematics required to shape the Charos drive’s output in order that it could hold open a lightspeed tunnel all the way to the intended destination.

  Knowing the basics of how it worked made it even harder for Grisham to comprehend how some human minds were clever enough to figure out this kind of stuff.

  “Two minutes and we go,” said Adler.

  “This is the Marauder’s fifth lightspeed transition coming up,” said Kinsey.

  “That’s not helping, Lieutenant,” said Grisham.

  If a warship survived its first five lightspeed transitions, it was statistically far less likely to suffer technical failure during subsequent transitions. The chance of failure was still tiny, but Grisham would have preferred it if Kinsey had kept his mouth shut. Sometimes, ignorance really was bliss.

  The whine of the propulsion levelled out, though the processor utilisation didn’t fall. Grisham kept a close eye on the status readouts. All the lights were steady green.

  When the timer hit zero seconds, the Charos drive fired with a deep booming sound. The feeds went blank and Grisham experienced the usual momentary giddiness, which transformed rapidly into nausea. He retched and coughed, and sucked in deep breaths of cold air.

  “Damnit,” he swore as the nausea faded. “Status reports!” He swept his gaze across the command console. Every gauge and readout was in the right place.

  “We’re holding together, sir,” said Kinsey. “No errors, no problems.”

  Grisham hadn’t been expecting anything else, but hearing it said nevertheless came as a relief. Fleet warships were robust and they didn’t fail more often than once in a blue moon, even during those first five transitions. Still, it happened, and Grisham was glad that debris from his vessel hadn’t been strewn across a billion kilometres of space, dumping him into the void to die of rapid hypoxia because he was too stubborn to wear his damned suit helmet.

  “Eight days of fun ahead,” said Deneuve.

  “I’ve had the scheduling software generate a shift pattern, sir,” said Bishop. “We should arrive at Xaros bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.”

  Grisham called up the shift schedule and discovered he was due four hours downtime, six hours from now. He cursed, since he was well-rested and wouldn’t be ready for shuteye for another eight hours at least.

  “Sir?” asked Deneuve. “You were going to tell us about the mission.”

  “Yes, I was,” said Grisham.

  He tapped a command into his console. The mission documentation loaded onto his centre screen and he read through it. Like Admiral Danner had prewarned him, the file was light on detail. None of it was confidential, so Grisham updated the permissions on the data, so the other members of his crew - and Sergeant Maxwell - had access to view the contents.

  “Check it out for yourselves,” said Grisham.

  “This mission has been assigned a low priority,” said Kinsey, stretching out the word.

  “Isn’t the usual description low priority with a high chance of death?” asked Lopez.

  “For once we might be able to lay back and take it easy,” said Adler.

  “Enough,” said Grisham mildly. “You don’t think this mission ended up my lap without it passing through Senator Maynard’s grubby little hands, do you?”

  “What happened to showing respect for our elected representatives, sir?” asked Deneuve innocently.

  “Respect, my ass,” said Adler. “Someone needs to rein in that scumbag.”

  “So we keep saying,” said Kinsey. “And there he is, screwing things up for us, time and again.”

  “The past needs to stay in the past,” said Lopez. “Or it’s going to kill us all.”

  “Anytime you request a transfer, Lieutenant, I’ll shake your hand and recommend you for whatever you choose,” said Grisham.

  “Hell no, sir. If I transfer, it’s guaranteed I’ll be immediately blown to pieces by Kijol missiles.”

  “You might be spoon fed the crap, sir, but we keep pulling through,” said Adler. “I’ll take my chances on the Marauder.”

  It was old ground, oft covered and Grisham smiled inwardly, even though the situation wasn’t remotely funny. Regardless of the fact that Senator Maynard was a thoroughly unpleasant and dislikeable asshole, Grisham couldn’t deny that the man had good cause for hate, even if that hatred was misplaced.

  “I was expecting something juicy in these mission files,” said Deneuve in mock disgust.

  “Thought I’d been holding out on you, Commander?”

  “It’s possible you overlooked something, sir, that’s all,” said Deneuve with a grin.

  “Not this time,” said Grisham. He pursed his lips. “However, since this mission wouldn’t be taking place without someone in the Senate pushing for it to happen, I’d guess we can safely disregard the low priority classification. I’m sure the outcome will be closely watched and I’m sure every comm we send will make its way to the right ears.”

  “We don’t need this crap,” said Lopez.

  “No, Lieutenant, we don’t,” Grisham agreed. “However, it’s what we have and we’re going to handle this just like we would any other mission.” He pushed himself to his feet. “The Marauder’s all yours, Commander Deneuve. I need to go stretch my legs.”

  Deneuve didn’t mention that Grisham had already stretched his legs sprinting across the floor of Bay 2. Instead, she smiled and gave him a thumbs-up of acknowledgement.

  “Take as long as you like, sir. I reckon I can manage the Marauder while it’s at lightspeed.”

  Grisham gave a short laugh. Deneuve was one of the most talented officers in the fleet and it was a travesty that, while she could easily take command of her own warship, she was certain to be overlooked on the basis of her association with Grisham. Or so he thought. In truth, Deneuve hadn’t even put herself forward for promotion. Maybe she had her own reasons.

  Exiting the bridge, Grisham headed aft. A short distance away, narrow steps descended deeper into the vessel.

  At the bottom of the steps, he followed the passage to the underside bay entrance and had a look inside. The space was fifteen metres square, low-ceilinged and seemingly empty. A raised hatch in the portside floor led to the Marauder’s ground vehicle, while the haulbot could be deployed either from the bridge or from the control panel adjacent to the starboard floor hatch.

  Exiting the bay, Grisham took the passage leading to the warship’s single communal area, where the soldiers usually congregated. Entering the mess – a space not much more than three metres by four and with two exits - he discovered that all ten of the soldiers were either sitting at the single long metal table or talking near the food replicator. Every pair of eyes turned Grisham’s way and he was unable to gauge the mood.

  Grisham headed over to the replicator. Private Kandy Lyles – with blonde hair tied back severely and high cheekbones that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a magazine cover - stepped aside to give him room. There was nothing insubordinate in her manner, but he could sense her coldness.

  Having vended himself a cup of orange juice that he knew would taste metallic, like licking the walls of the spaceship, and a grey-looking burger in a wilted bun, Grisham shooed Private Danny Chau further along one of the benches and sat himself opposite Sergeant Maxwell.

  Sergeant Tyrus Maxwell was thirty years old. Outwardly, his appearance was that of an archetypal meathead who spent every available hour in the gym, bulking up in the hope that one day he might bench press a Tibor-class warship. Grisham wasn’t fooled – he reckoned Maxwell had a mind as sharp as a razor.

  The soldier had been assigned to the Marauder not many weeks ago. What sins he’d committed to suffer that fate, Grisham didn’t know, but Maxwell evidently had someone watching out for him, since he’d been given permission to bring his two squads with him.

  “Captain Grisham,” said Maxwell. His voice was deep, and he didn’t smile.

  “Sergeant Maxwell,” said Grisham, not smiling either. “You’ve read the mission documentation?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What did you make of it, Sergeant?”