Chapter 50

Hell: Because war is that place,
no matter where you actually are.

Down in Aladdin's cave, the movement of the missile aiming spines on the top of the vast roundness of the Korozhet ship was detected.

"Condition red. I say again, Condition red!"

Within a minute . . . 

"Missile launch detected. Multiple missiles. Incoming."

All over George Bernard Shaw City, the sirens wailed. Siren systems set up when humans had still thought that this was going to be a conventional war, with missiles and air raids.

Many people had forgotten what they meant. There was chaos, from the streets full of protestors outside the courthouse to the crenelated grandeur of the Military Headquarters. The soup course of the elegant lunch being set on the vast tables caused some inelegant and painful accidents. But that was all. None of the Korozhet missiles would be wasted on useless targets.

The four geological/defense heavy lasers that the slowship had mounted were hooked up to the ship's power plant. They fired. They were energy expensive, never intended for simultaneous power-draw. But as the ship's fusion plant was almost certain to be a target, that made little difference.

Their targets were not the missiles, but their launch spines.

At the same time, not knowing just how the missiles were guided, Aladdin's cave spewed out as wide a range of jamming mechanisms as they could.

Some of it might even have worked. Not, however, for the old human slowship. That and the power plants south of the city were successfully hit. Fortunately, the bunker underneath the slowship had been designed to withstand tactical nuclear warheads. The non-nuclear explosives being used by the Korozhet were powerful, but not powerful enough to penetrate it.

Just as the judge was attempting to take down the rat who was, if not helping Fitz's case, at least giving the judge a novel view of his own unimportance—the alarms started. Then the lights in the windowless courthouse went out, as the ground shook. There was the sound of breaking glass. Fitz had thrown himself down, instinctively. The explosions were large, but not close. The screaming and panic in the courtroom were far louder. Having been a front-line officer took over.

"Quiet!" Fitz's voice was loud, but more like a whip-crack in its force. Only one hysterical screamer remained. "Shut that person up," he instructed.

Someone did.

"Right." Panic kills. If you're in charge you've got to keep your cool or your troops will lose theirs. "This building itself is not under attack," said Fitz. "Is that clear to all of you? This building is not being attacked. There is no cause for panic. Sergeant at Arms?"

"Sir!" said a voice from the darkness.

"Take two MPs and get out there and scout. Ariel," he knew she'd be in here, somewhere, "go with them."

"Sir!" There was relief in that assent. Relief that someone was taking charge.

The door opened. Several people headed after the three towards the rectangle of light.

"Stop right there," snapped Fitz. "The rest of you, stay put. If we get an 'all clear' out there we'll move out. In an orderly fashion. There will be no running. You will all maintain physical contact with someone. Do we have any injured?"

"I'm bleeding," said someone. "Glass I think."

"Right. Move, or help any injured to the light at the door. Doc. Treat them."

As this was happening, the sergeant at arms came back. "Chaos out there, sir. But no shooting. There are some fires. We saw a fire engine go past."

"Right. Sergeant, assist the wounded. Let's get out into the light. If there are any more incoming, all of you, scatter and get down."

He found himself with his arm being held joining the procession towards the outside. It was only when he got into the lighter passage that he realized that it was the hand of his mauve-lipsticked prosecutor, holding him.

"I should kill you now and save myself a lot of trouble next time," she whispered poisonously.

"Just try it," said Ariel, leaping up onto Fitz's shoulder in one of those prodigious bounds that the rats were capable of. " 'Twill be my pleasure to bite you properly. The street is full of idiotic screaming humans, Fitz. One said the missile trails came from the . . . Crotchet ship. Some of the city is on fire."

Major Tana Gainor let go of Fitz and ran for the doors.

They got out onto the steps and into the light. Several of the wounded were being tended on the steps. It seemed more a case of blood, minor injuries and fear than anything else.

"The phones are down," said one reporter, shaking her instrument.

The sergeant at arms came jogging up. "What do we do now, sir?"

Fitz shrugged. "I'm the prisoner around here, Sergeant. Why don't you ask your judge? I just gave orders in there because somebody had to." The military judge in question was sitting on the steps looking at the milling crowd and the fires burning where the south side power station used to be.

The sergeant at arms tried asking him. Judge Silberstohn, so ready to lay down the law to an obstreperous rat, blinked at him. "I don't know," he said, in a lost, slightly quavering voice.

Lieutenant Colonel Ogata came up, with several of the officers from the panel. "Major, we appear to be having a military emergency. I've spoken to several of the people who were out here when the attack took place. It would seem that the missiles came from the Korozhet ship. I think we can be fairly sure that they've taken out Military Headquarters. They've certainly taken out communications, power and the old slowship. You're the only one of us here with any first-hand combat experience. We need your help, Major. We need it now."

Fitz looked at the scene. "I'd be glad to serve," he said dryly. "However, these leg shackles are an impediment."

Ogata looked down. "Oh. I think we can extend parole, Major. For the duration," he said, with an almost straight face. "I'll put it to the panel to vote on."

They all nodded vigorously, which was just as well as the sergeant at arms was already unlocking the shackles.

"The ayes have it," said Ogata. "Now, Major Fitzhugh. What do you advise?"

Fitz took control. "We need communications and assessment. We'll need drivers, and we'll need reliable observers. We need to scatter civilians and get them away from fire-zones as quickly as possible. Colonel Jones, if you would . . ."

Within twenty minutes they were digging in, in the park across from the courthouse. Sentries and lookouts were posted. Patrols were going out. Couriers and observers were driving set routes to establish what had happened. An aid station had been set up. And the former prisoner had the judge lying down on a blanket in the aid-station. He seemed to be in shock.

The next attack came some twenty minutes later. The missiles went straight up and out, and exploded without hitting any targets. The thousands of plastic cubes that were scattered far and wide were not directly fatal.

"We advise all humans to proceed to the Webb Fields. Your colony is under attack by Jampad. Proceed to the Webb fields for processing into our safe shelters. The Korozhet will protect you. Do not bring weapons or any metal objects as the Jampad weapons detect these. We advise all humans to proceed to Webb . . ."

Endlessly repeating their message, the cubes spread Korozhet poison. And a lot of sheep-minded humans did in fact start heading for the vast Webb sports complex west of the city.

Of course, a lot did not. The first helicopter up had drawn fire from the Korozhet ship. It was a tragic—if direct—way of telling anyone who looked up that the Korozhet ship was not treating human aircraft with any tolerance.

Fitz, with at least five thousand soldiers and civilians taking orders, did his best to counter the Korozhet instructions. But communications were in a shambles. Even radio was jammed. They had a few old wire-based field-telephones from the signals unit working. Everything else had to be done by courier.

Mike Capra was one of the forward observers watching Webb Fields through a pair of binoculars. He was able, later, to reassure the officers of the temporary field command that in fact Military HQ had not been a target.

A little later he was able to report in person: "There were four bus loads and about sixteen staff cars." He looked askance at Conrad Fitzhugh. "And I think I can safely assure you, Fitz, that Major Tana Gainor will not be prosecuting you again. She's quite recognizable, even through binoculars. And she was part of that crowd of top officers who pushed their way through to the front of the queue. The Pricklepusses took them away, into their ship."

"Methinks, the army just got a lot more efficient," said Ariel, contentedly.

"I was about to send a runner back when we had some more action, which I thought maybe I'd better actually come back to tell you about personally. Webb Fields have come under mortar fire. Heavy smoke. The people on the field have been scattering in panic. If it had happened ten minutes earlier, we'd have been digging generals out from under bushes."

"Did the mortars come under any tracking fire? We saw some laser-fire from here."

"Yep. It was just the three mortar rounds. Almost simultaneously. Then the lasers opened up from the ship. I don't think they were H.E. bombs. There was just a lot of heavy smoke."

"We'll have to see if we can get a cordon in place, to see if we can stop any more people going in. And we need a line laid out there. I wish to hell we could get radio comms."