Company Wars 01 – Downbelow Station

and blinked the memories away. Only… war… Someone near him whispered about

having to evacuate the station.

It was not possible. It could not happen.

Damon! he thought, wishing that he could get up and leave, go to the office, be

reassured. Only there was no reassurance to be found, and he was afraid to try

it.

Mazian’s Fleet. Martial law.

She was with them.

He might break, if he was not careful; the balance of his mind was delicate and

he knew it. Perhaps to have asked for this oblivion was in itself insane, and

Adjustment had made him no more unbalanced than he had ever been. He suspected

every emotion he felt, and therefore tried to feel as few as possible.

“Rest,” the supervisor said. “Ten-minute break.”

He kept working, as he had through previous rest periods. So did the girl beside

him.

ii

Norway; 1530 his.

“We hold Pell,” Signy told her crew and the troops, those present with her on

the bridge and those scattered throughout the ship. “Our decision—Mazian’s,

mine, the other captains—is to hold Pell. Company agents have signed a treaty

with Union… handed them everything in the Beyond and called for us to stand

aside while they do it; they turned our contact code over to Union. That’s why

we aborted the strike… why we took out. No knowing what of our codes is

betrayed.” She let that sink in, watching grim faces all about her, aware of the

whole body of the ship and all the listeners elsewhere within it. “Pell… the

Hinder Stars, this whole edge of the Beyond… this is what we have left secure.

We aren’t going to take that order from the Company; we aren’t going to accept

surrender, however it’s cloaked. We’re off the leash, and this time we fight the

war our own way. We’ve got ourselves a world and a station; and the whole Beyond

began from that. We can rebuild the Hinder Star stations, all that used to exist

between here and the Sun itself. We can do it. The Company may not be smart

enough to want a buffer now between themselves and Union, but they will, believe

me they will, and they’ll be smart enough at least not to trifle with us. Pell’s

our world now. We’ve got nine carriers to hold it. We’re not Company anymore.

We’re Mazian’s Fleet, and Pell is ours. Any contrary opinions?”

She waited for some, although she knew her people like family… for some might

have other opinions, might have second thoughts about this. There was reason

they should.

A sudden cheer erupted off the troop decks, found echo, all channels open.

People on the bridge were hugging one another and grinning. Graff embraced her;

armscomper Tiho did; and others of her officers of many years. Some were crying.

There were tears in Graff’s eyes. None in her own; might have been, but that she

felt guilt… still, irrationally, the habit of an outworn loyalty. She embraced

Graff a second time, pushed back, looked around her. “Get all of us ready,” she

said. It was going all over the ship, open com. “We’re moving in to take station

central before they know what’s hit them. Di, hurry it.”

Graff started giving orders. She heard Di doing so, down in the troop corridors,

distinctive echo. The bridge moved into activity, techs jostling one another in

the narrow aisles getting to posts. “Ten minutes,” she shouted, “full armament,

all available troops arm and out.”

There was shouting elsewhere, the com giving evidence of troops rushing to suit

even before the orders were officially passed. The commands began echoing

through the corridors. Signy walked back to her small office/quarters and took

the precaution of helmet and body armor, none for her limbs, trading risk for

freedom of motion. Five minutes. She heard Di counting over the open com, with

outright chaos feeding out from various command stations. No matter. This crew

and the troops knew their business in the dark and upside down. All family here.

The incompatible met early accidents and those left were close as brothers, as

children, as lovers.

She headed out, slipping her pistol openly into the armor-holster, rode the lift

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *