Beau, I’m so blessed.”
I could hear another buzzing somewhere off in the distance.
“Got to sign off,” the Captain of the Thunderbolt said. “Keep on flying, partner!”
“You too, Bill. Take care of yourself.”
The two colonels were both good men from what I’d seen. I wasn’t as sure of Major General Fritz Burgess, Commander of the expedition: I just didn’t know him personally, had only met him once, in fact, at a planning session at the Pentagon. He had the reputation of being a real hard ass, but given the nature of our mission, perhaps that was just as well. Still, I was glad that the designated flagship vessel and primary military transport of the fleet was the Thunderbolt and not the Armageddon.
“What else, Smith?” came the query, waking me out of my reverie. “I do have a few other things on my plate.”
I cleared my throat.
“Do you know anything about Reverend Lesley? I met somebody by that name during the War.”
“No, sir, but you can access the public portions of her file through the ship’s library database. The ship rosters can be reviewed by anyone.”
“Thanks, I didn’t know that,” I said. “On another matter, I’ve been selected by my colleagues to represent their interests on this mission. They’re concerned about the absence of any formal mechanism by which they can both receive intelligence about the Martians and provide feedback to you and your colleagues. I realize that you have no choice about including us on this trip, but I do think you could take some better advantage of our cumulated experience and knowledge.”
“You do, huh?” the Colonel said. “Look, Doctor, I’m trying to get this boat launched on time. That’s all I’m interested in right now. Once we actually get going we’ll have more leisure in which to discuss what happens when we finally reach Mars.
“All of you should understand at least this much, however: I and my superior officers have the ultimate decision-making authority on this mission. Yes, I will attempt to consult with you people whenever it seems appropriate. Yes, I may even listen to you on occasion. Right now, though, we have a job to do. I can’t let anything else interfere with that. Any other questions, comments, or issues, Doctor?”
I shook my head “no.”
“Then you’re dismissed,” he said, and went back to his screen, using his wand to approve the various dispositions pending before him.
I was left to pull myself through the door hole. The guard stationed in the corridor outside didn’t even bother to salute.
CHAPTER SIX
CROSSING THE RIVER
Let us cross over the river, and rest under the trees.
—Stonewall Jackson
Alex Smith, 1 Bi-April, Mars Year vii
U.S.S. Armageddon, in Orbit Around Planet Earth
The day had at last arrived. Everything that I’d worked for during the previous years was finally coming to fruition. We were going to launch the main assault fleet in just over an hour.
This wasn’t the first manned journey to Mars, of course. During the most recent pair of oppositions between Earth and the Red Planet, we’d sent several small groups of probes and weapon ships and observation platforms there, just to learn what we could expect in response. All of the brave men and women on Expedition I had died very quickly in Bi-April of Year Five. Half of those on Expedition II had perished within months of their arrival in Bi-June of Six, and another half of the survivors had perished in the interim; but the remaining fifty or so veterans were waiting for us at their bases on the Martian moons of Phobos and Deimos.
Phobos is the larger of the satellites, and since it orbits relatively close to the planet (about 5,600 miles from its surface), it provided our forces with a fairly safe and secure hideaway once they managed to dig in. A small automated Martian observation station there was destroyed by our sappers. We also established a second, smaller base on Deimos, the outer moon. Both camps had extensive laser and missile defensive and offensive systems. Curiously, the aliens had made no attempt to assault either facility. Also, neither base had reported any additional or unusual activity on the surface of Mars in response to the construction of our fleet.
What these two previous raids had also established, however, was the type and scale of weaponry we would have to face once we arrived at the Red Planet.
The first of these was a long-range adaptation of the Martian sting-ray (essentially a souped-up laser); this development had been predicted by the engineers who had salvaged and analyzed these weapons from the great striding tripods abandoned by the aliens during the War of Two Worlds. We’d already developed our own versions of these systems, together with several possible defensive mechanisms and reflective metal shields. They weren’t regarded as a major military threat.
The second weapon employed by the Martians was a kind of cosmic pea-shooter. The atmosphere and gravity on the Red Planet are both sufficiently slight that small projectiles can actually be fired from the surface without too much expenditure of energy. In essence, the aliens were using giant cannon to pepper our spacecraft and bases with fast-moving rocks of varying sizes. Later, they employed a variation of this by shooting small cluster-bombs at our ships. These would explode before actually hitting anything, scattering dozens or hundreds of fast-moving metal or stone pellets at their targets. The result was deadly.
We were eventually able to build our own versions of these giant sling-shots on Phobos Base, and thereafter we were able to respond in kind to any alien attacks; by Year Seven we’d put all of the known launching sites on Mars out of commission.
During those initial expeditions, our forces reported seeing very few Martian spaceships as such. I suspect that these were just too valuable as primary assets to be wasted in wanton and risky attacks on our fleets.
We still didn’t know for sure where the aliens were modifying the meteor orbits to allow them to hit the Earth. Mindon believed that the Martians had one or more bases out in the Asteroid Belt, including the minor planet Ceres, and were installing their ion engines on selected rocks that crossed the Earth’s orbit. Even so, it would take many years in some instances to generate enough of an aberration in the paths of these asteroids to make them a danger to our planet.
We knew for certain of about a dozen rocks that had been lobbed in our direction, beginning with that first strike in Year Two. Several had been near misses; several others had been detected by our long-range radar, and had either been nudged sufficiently to remove them from the danger list or had been split into a number of pieces by well-placed nuclear bombs. Half a dozen meteorites, however, had actually struck Earth dead center, causing horrendous damage to our ecology and our economy.
We practically had to mortgage the planet to mount the response that was now being launched. Every nation in the world had contributed, even third-world countries. No one was left out. The cost had already reached into the many trillions of dollars. The damage caused by the Martian pounding of Earth had added trillions more. The world would forever be a different place because of the War of Two Worlds.
“Daddy,” my twelve-year-old daughter Mellie exclaimed, “look!”
She pointed to the viewscreen. We were all locked in our small cabins for the departure, on the orders of General Burgess,
