The Sirens of Space by Jeffrey Caminsky Read Free Book Online

acknowledge?”
    “ Roger, Demeter Command, we are
departing...but, Charlie?”
    “ Yeah, Sam...what is it?”
    “ What are you sending us off with? My
computer comes back gibberish every time I try to check the
manifest. And my orders say we’re being escorted all the way to
Ishtar. What’s going on here?”
    “ Well, it is Code Blue.”
    “ Charlie....”
    “ Okay, okay. Wait a second, I’ll
check.”
    “ This stuff must be solid ultrynium.
The tractor’s at full power already and we’re not even moving yet.
It feels like I’m pulling a neutron star, and I can’t even see all
the way to the end of the train.”
    “ Most of it’s the usual—food,
equipment. Probably some inflatable broads for the redshirts. You
know the bit. But you have a dozen frigates right from the store,
four to a box.
    “ And be careful with the last three in
Section Two—they’re brand new starships, fresh from the
mint.”
    “ The new model? The Challengers ?”
    “ You got it.”
    “ Why the hell are they sending’em by
transport train? Why not have the engineers putz’em over to IshCom
and check’em out along the way?”
    “ Well, what’s even dumber is that two
of them are coming right back here after shakedown. But who are we
to question thousands of years of military tradition? Why do
something right if you can fuck it up—eh, Sammy? Just don’t
break’em, hear? Clay’ll have your butt.”
    “ Roger that. See you next month,
Charlie.”
    “ Smooth sailing, buddy. And if you
make it over to the planet, don’t bring back the Flu.”
    “ You got it, pal—and I’ve got my
shots. Over and out.”

 
     
     
     
     
     

Chapter 5

    “HELLO, ADMIRAL,” said Georgina Dyer, Admiral
Clay’s personal secretary, looking up from her desk.
    “ Any news today?” barked a gruff voice
with the barest hint of a Zarathustran accent.
    “ All’s quiet on the frontier,” she
replied, “and the day’s reports are waiting for you at your desk.
The ship rotations were posted at Zero Hour on all command boards,
as you ordered, and I printed a copy for your review. And the new
starships are finally on their way. Admiral Weatherlee says they’ll
arrive in eight or ten days at the latest.
    “ Oh, and Admiral Pendleton wants to
talk to you when you get the chance, about some proposed new
Central Command directive. Apparently they want all ships to
transmit their weekly reports to their home base instead of
flagging their position and heading, and filing the rest when they
dock, like they all do now. He’d like your opinion.”
    The admiral grunted an acknowledgment of
sorts, but said nothing beyond the usual.
    “ Thank you, Mrs. Dyer. I’ll be in my
office.”
    The door closed with a rush of air. The
admiral stalked over the blue carpeting to his oversized desk on
the far side of the room and sat down in a soft, padded chair.
    Tall and vigorous, Fleet Admiral Porter Clay
was an intimidating figure, even to his close friends. His white,
thinning hair added a look of distinction to the alert eyes and
ruggedly handsome features that found themselves at the center of
the Cosmic Guard’s most taxing controversy in two centuries. His
sharp baritone voice no longer barked commands to crewmen whose
most important concern—aside from staying on the good side of the
best, if most demanding skipper of his day—was clearing pirates
from the trading corridors of eastern Terra. He had risen to
command whole fleets rather than single ships, and the safety of
the entire frontier now rested in his powerful, oversized
hands.
    But there were times, and they came often
these days, when he longed for the simplicity of earlier
days—before aliens and diplomats started complicating his life;
before frontier politicians began calling for his head; before
marching demonstrators burned him in effigy. He longed for the
times when his hardest problems involved checking the flight
manifests of freight haulers caught outside approved