Extremis by Steve White

Author:Steve White [White, Steve]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Military, General, Space Opera, Science Fiction, Fiction
ISBN: 9781439134337
Publisher: Baen Books
Published: 2011-05-02T23:00:00+00:00

16

Presuppositions Perturbed

Injury, violation, exploitation, annihilation, cannot be wrong in themselves, for life essentially presupposes injury, violation, exploitation, and annihilation.

—Nietzsche

Arduan SDH Shem’pter’ai, Main Van, Expeditionary Fleet of the Anaht’doh Kainat, Treadway System

Narrok flicked a selnarm tendril toward his sensor prime as they came within ten light-seconds of the Treadway system’s Desai limit. “Any sign of human craft?”

“None, Admiral Narrok. We have apparently—” And then the prime’s selnarm emission became momentarily sublexical: (hold, change, data) he pulsed in a sequence so fast that it was almost one thought.

Three murn-colored icons flashed into existence in the holotank at the same instant that the prime identified them. “Three human vessels, sir. All light cruisers. On a high-speed intercept course.”

Narrok paused: that he had not expected. He double-checked the plot: no planets nearby, no emissions that suggested a new human cloaking technology concealing a flotilla. He had had his fighters scour the light-hour of space surrounding the warp point that was his route of withdrawal back into the Mercury system relentlessly. No, there was no chance that this was some kind of ruse, that another human force was nearby. It was just three human cruisers heading directly for his immense fleet at their best speed. They could not reasonably hope to ram his vessels or get close enough to explode a widely destructive warhead akin to that which the humans deployed in their AMBAMMs. Therefore, this suicidal rush by three light ships made no sense.

But Narrok’s course of action—and duty—was unconfused by the perplexing behavior of the human craft. “Targeting solutions?”

“Calculated and locked, sir.”

“Range?”

“Forty-eight light-seconds and closing.”

“SDHs Memref, Tumpep’f, Herres forward to engage. Fleet signal: maintain best uniform speed.”

“Yes, Admi—the humans are reversing course, sir!”

And so they were…in a manner of speaking. The three murn icons had come to a complete halt. Then they started moving again, but now they were veering off in three radically different directions, mostly aiming themselves directly up out of the system’s ecliptic plane.

Odd, thought Narrok. But obeying his general orders and taking advantage of an easy kill had priority over—and compelled him to put aside—the faint curiosity aroused by what the unprecedented human scattering might portend. In the tacplot, this three fastest SDHs were closing on the light cruisers.

“Lock confirmed. Missile launch,” his operations prime signaled.

Somewhere out in space, too far ahead for it to be detected with the unaided eye, the bows of Narrok’s three pursuing SDHs had sent forth a rippling sheet of flame that quickly resolved into a dense spread of missiles. The human ships weaved slowly in the tacplot. Another, more faint murn-colored icon appeared briefly, then flickered away: a sensor ghost generated by a human ship’s image-making ECM package. None of the Arduan missiles were distracted from their target icons.

Ten seconds later, those target icons faded, changed to a dark crivan color, and were then blanked from the holoplot. “Enemy vessels destroyed,” affirmed Narrok’s tactical prime.

But Narrok kept staring at the plot. The tactical prime’s selnarm touched his deferentially. “Admiral, you seem—distracted.”

“I am, Prime. Tell me.

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