A Separate War and Other Stories by Joe Haldeman Read Free Book Online Page B

shouting match rather than fists and feet. Cat had a pair who were an exception, though, and it escalated to attempted murder in the mess hall.
    This was ten days before the last collapsar jump—everybody on the ragged edge—between Lain Mayfair and “Tiny” Keimo, who was big enough to take on most of the men. Lain tried to cut her throat, from behind, and Tiny broke her arm at the elbow while everybody else was diving for cover, and was seriously strangling her—trying to kill her before she herself bled to death—when the cook, J. J., ran over and brained the big woman with a frying pan.
    While they were still in the infirmary there was a summary court-martial. With the consistent testimony of forty witnesses, Major Garcia didn’t have any choice: she sentenced Lain Mayfair to death for attempted murder. She administered the lethal injection herself.
    I was required to be a witness, and more, and it was not the high point of my day. Mayfair was bedridden and, I think, slightly sedated. Garcia explained the reason for the verdict and asked Mayfair whether she would prefer the dignity of taking the poison herself. She didn’t say anything, just cried and shook her head. Two privates held her down by the shoulders while Garcia took her arm and administered the popper. Mayfair turned pale and her eyes rolled up. She shook convulsively for a few seconds and was dead.
    Garcia didn’t show any emotion during the ordeal. She whispered to me that she would be in her quarters if anybody really needed her, and left quickly.
    I had to supervise the disposal of the body. I had two medics wrap her tightly in a sheet and put her on a gurney. We had to roll it down the main corridor, everybody watching. I helped the two of them carry her into the airlock. She was starting to stiffen, but her body wasn’t even cold.
    I had a friend read a prayer in Mayfair’s language, and asked the engineer for maximum pressure in the airlock, and then popped it. Her body spun out into its lonely, infinite grave.
    I went back to the infirmary and found Tiny inconsolable. She and Mayfair had been lovers back on Stargate. Everything had gone wrong, nothing made sense, why why why why? My answer was to have Sharn give her a tranquilizer. I took one myself.
    7
    We came tearing out of the Elephant’s collapsar about one minute after the defense phalanx, the ten high-speed intelligent drones that had multiple warheads, programmed to take out the portal planet’s nova-bomb minefield.
    The first surprise was that the minefield wasn’t there. The second surprise was that the Taurans weren’t, either. Their base seemed intact but long deserted, cold.
    We would destroy it with a nova bomb, but first send a platoon down to investigate it. Garcia asked that I go along with them. It was Cat’s platoon. It would be an interesting experience to share, so long as a booby trap didn’t blow us off the planet. The deserted base could be bait.
    We would have a nova bomb with us. Either Morales or I could detonate it if we got into a situation that looked hopeless. Or Garcia could do it from orbit. I was sure Garcia could do it. Not so sure about me or Aurelio.
    But while we were down in the prep bay getting into our fighting suits, there came the third surprise, the big one. I later saw the recording. The main cube in the control room lit up with a two-dimensional picture of a young man in an ancient uniform. He popped in and out of three dimensions while he spoke: “Hello, Earth ship. Do you still use this frequency? Do you still use this language?”
    He smiled placidly. “Of course you won’t respond at first; neither would I. This could be a trap. Feel free to investigate at long range. I am calling from a different portal planet. I’m currently 12.23 million kilometers from you, on the plane of the ecliptic, on an angle of 0.54 radians with respect to the collapsar. As you probably know