Chapter 16

The orders went out to the designated destroyers, but they had barely begun to maneuver away from the main formation when the navigation officer called for Admiral Weelock's attention.

Weelock, who was concentrating on the dirtside battle, looked up in irritation. "Wha..." he drew up short as his eyes swept across the external viewscreen, then the battle plot. "Where the parkdrivnul did those ships come from?!"

"I-I don't know, Fleet Admiral," the instruments officer quailed. "One nanocycle, there was nothing there. The next, all of them appeared. I cannot explain it, sir."

"Your sensors failed! Clearly, they have not been properly maintained!"

The new communications officer was no friend of the instruments officer, but this did not seem to be the right time to let Weelock execute him, so he spoke up. "Sir, if I may, the other ships are reporting the same phenomenon."

"That cannot be!" Weelock remembered the tales. Creche mothers used them to scare misbehaving cubs into compliance. The chofries will get you. The invisible chofries, who had, somehow, been able to appear and disappear at will, as had their ships. That had been one of the most difficult conquests in Gorz history, spanning more than twelve birth cycles. The tellers, in relating the story of the chofries, never failed to stress how they could appear and disappear at will.

The Gorz had figured out how to manipulate that feature in the few invisible ships they had captured in that invasion, but had never been able to duplicate it.

This race, whoever they were, apparently had the same ability. Had some of the chofries escaped? Was this a colony of chofries? There had been no record of such a colony in the records captured on the planet, but so much of the knowledge of that planet had resided in the computers that stubbornly refused to regurgitate any information. They had, instead, chosen to destroy themselves and whatever machine they were installed in, along with whatever Gorz were in the vicinity.

All of this flashed through his mind in less than a nanocycle. It was, he realized, not the origins of the ships that was important, but their number, armament and formation.

"Status!" he growled.

"They have us trapped, virtually motionless, in a gravity well, sir," replied his tactical officer, trembling. "I cannot get a reading on their armament, but they have us outnumbered five to one in almost every class, and there is no guarantee that there aren't more of them sitting there, invisible."

Whatever Weelock might have said in response was cut off as the image of a sort of alien that Weelock was sure the Gorz had never encountered before appeared on the primary viewscreen, clearly overriding their security to take over the screen.

A stilted, but understandable version of Gorzai came through the audio emitters, out of synch with the movement of the creature's mouth.

"Fleet Admiral Weelock," it said. "Greetings. If you stand down now, we will spare your lives. Choose to fight, and the Gorz will share the fate of the races of the planets you have ravaged."

"You think you have us trapped," Weelock snarled desperately, "but this is only half of our fleet. The others will rebuild and come back to destroy you!"

"That would be very difficult for your support fleet to accomplish," the creature replied, his knowledge of the fleet clearly greater than Weelock had expected. "We captured Admiral Guadneef and his fleet as they entered the system. You should have paid more attention to their communications."

"Impossible! You can't capture a whole fleet and hold it when your fleet is arrayed against us, here."

"Oh, this is only Third and Fourth fleets," the other being said, off-handedly. "First Fleet is keeping an eye on your support fleet, but since the Sixth Marine division is in control of the ships, they don't have much to do."

The implications were clear: At least one more fleet, presumably at least half the strength of the force surrounding them, was out there somewhere, and the ships guarding his support fleet could join the battle if they were needed.

"I don't believe it! No one could capture a Gorz fleet! Even a fool like Guadneef would be more than a match for any other race."

The image on the screen zoomed outward to reveal another being standing beside the alien - Admiral Guadneef.

"You were saying, Fleet Admiral? Would you like to address your Fleet Admiral, Admiral Guadneef?"

"I would, indeed! You have a lot of nerve calling me a fool, Weelock! While you were busy ignoring my calls for help, these beings destroyed my communications and infiltrated my ships. They had so many warriors aboard that, by the time we knew they were there, there was no point fighting them. The few that tried were disabled without even damaging the invaders. Now, while you and your entire fleet sit there, helpless, in a gravity well, they are destroying your ground forces. Who is the bigger fool, Weelock?"

"I will fight my way out of this!" Weelock roared, "Then I will return and destroy this puny system until nothing remains but pebbles!"

"Before you attempt that, Weelock, I direct your attention to, let's see, that ship will do nicely..." the choice of ship appeared to be random. Weelock had no way of knowing that it was chosen because it was the ship on which the returning 'Invisible Fighter', captured by the UE earlier, had planted an explosive device.

Weelock's attention was drawn to his battle plot where one of his largest fighter carriers was careted, as if targeted by his own weapons. Before his eyes, the ship erupted into a rapidly expanding incandescent ball. Two of the destroyers in its escort were engulfed in the blast, their shields stripped away, not by the blast itself, but by the high velocity storm of debris. In seconds, both were drifting hulks.

Weelock had only brief moments to wonder what kind of weapon the aliens wielded that could destroy a ship so easily, as if its shields were not even there.

"Do you need another demonstration, Weelock, or will you surrender?"

"If we are to die, we will die fighting!" Weelock replied heatedly. "Not like tame food animals."

"If you fight, you will die," the alien said. "If you surrender, you get to keep the planet below as your consolation prize, and live there."

Stunned, Weelock thought furiously. Would they really give up their planet? Surely it must be a trap!

As if reading his thoughts, the alien spoke again.

"This planet is named 'Bates World', but the colonists who vacated it before you entered the system called it, simply, 'Bait'. Their name was, perhaps, more appropriate. We occupied this planet more than one hundred of your cycles ago for the express purpose of enticing you and your fleet to attack it. Now, we have no further need for the planet. If you power down your engines and weapons and do not give our boarding parties cause to kill you, you and your people will be transported to the surface of the planet, where, even now, General Glardfan is overseeing the disarmament of his troops."

"I still have forces you don't know about..." Weelock tried.

"If you mean the 'Invisible Fighters' as you call them, don't pin your hopes on them bailing you out. Their pilots are in our custody and they are now being flown by our own pilots. Even if you had more of them, which our friends the Chofri tell us is highly improbable, you should know by now that we have many more, and the secrets to their manufacture. They will not be of any help to you."

Madly, Weelock's mind whirled, searching for a way out of this dilemma, only to be stymied at every turn. Like a fool, he had flown his fleet into the middle of a well-laid trap. While he was still seeking a way out, the decision was taken out of his hands. His second in command simply walked up behind him and triggered his blaster into Weelock's skull.

"I am Marfdan," the blaster-wielder told the image on the screen. "I now command this fleet. As my first official act I surrender the fleet to you. I will issue orders to the crews to stand down."

He turned to the others on the bridge and issued a series of orders in rapid-fire Gorz.

"Weapons, stand down and secure your weapons! Engineering, shut down the engines! Communications, notify the rest of the fleet of the change of command, then issue the order to stand down! Open all shuttle bay doors and prepare to be boarded! I will personally space anyone who resists the boarders, is that clear?"

Returning his attention to the screen, he casually reached forward with a scrap of cloth and cleaned his predecessor's residue off the lens of the optical pickup.

"Did you understand the orders I issued?"

"We did," was the terse reply from the alien. "And our sensors indicate that your ships are complying. Stand by for boarding parties."

Abruptly, the screen went dead.

Colin turned to Guadneef who casually munched on a chicken leg that had been provided from the galley.

"Was that absolutely necessary?"

"What?" Guadneef asked.

"Assassinating the Fleet Admiral."

Guadneef puffed his shoulder sacs briefly without tensing the muscles that would raise his hackles.

"Marfdan did him a favor," Guadneef cracked the chicken bone and sucked the marrow from within. "Got any more of this? It's not Wgramm, but it's not bad."

An armor clad soldier produced the serving dish that held a pile of fried chicken and set it in front of the prisoner.

Guadneef grabbed a handful and began tearing the meat from the bones. "That's how promotions are made in the Fleet, and Weelock wouldn't have survived long after having lead us into your trap, anyway. Marfdan, having killed the failed Fleet Admiral, can now lead the surrender. That's why Weelock was stalling. He knew he had no way out, but nobody would have listened to him if he had ordered the surrender. He knew Marfdan had to act. Didn't you see his ears twitch when Marfdan charged his blaster? I'll give Weelock credit for that, at least. He knew he was about to die but he did it like a Gorz."

Give me the numbers, Siggy, Colin told his MI.

Four thousand, three hundred forty two humans, fifty six Bandlar, and twelve thousand five hundred twenty three Manufactured Intelligences were destroyed, Eight thousand four hundred sixty seven humans, one hundred thirty two Bandlar, and thirty-seven Manufactured Intelligences were seriously wounded or damaged. Seven hundred eighty three Gorz were killed and approximately twice that many seriously wounded.

Colin shook his head at the staggering numbers. Sure, they were far fewer than the projections, but each one of them represented a living being. He did not know if his conscience could bear the weight of so many deaths.

Another number that might be of interest to you, Colin, is the rescue and potential re-settlement of one hundred twenty nine thousand, thirty five assorted beings from Gorz slavery. We are currently assessing which can be integrated into human society and which must be settled on new worlds. That is a significant number on the positive side of the balance sheet, but nothing compared with the almost seven billion lives that you saved on Earth. One should never consider a death as insignificant, but neither should you consider those lives as wasted. Imagine the weight upon your conscience had you failed to stop the Gorz and they had engaged Earth in a protracted battle of the sort fought by the Chofri. You did well, Colin, for your friends and for your enemies. When we asked you to bear this burden, we believed that the only viable solution was to wage genocide against the Gorz. You have proved us wrong, and have saved more lives in the process than we thought possible.

Thank you, Siggy, Colin smiled wanly, if you ever get tired of being my MI, perhaps you should hang up a shingle and go into the psycho-therapy business.

Und vy vould I vant to do zat? Siggy replied, with a thick accent, turning Colin's smile into unexpected laughter.

The General Assembly fell suddenly quiet as a figure appeared simultaneously on the podium and in the projected hologram overhead.

"Almost a century ago," the figure spoke without preamble or introduction, "I appeared before the Security Council of what was, at that time, a weak, contentious body called the 'United Nations' to warn of a threat to Earth in the form of a race of rapacious marauders known as the Gorz. I now appear before this General Assembly of the Congress of United Earth to report that the Gorz no longer pose a threat to Earth or any of its colonies."

The pandemonium would have been deafening had the sound dampers not been in operation, keeping it to bearable levels. Colin waited for the cheering, back slapping, and handshaking to subside somewhat before he continued.

"Your work here, however, continues," the audio projectors in his suit ensured that everyone heard Colin's words, even over the diminishing rumble in the wake of his announcement. "The Gorz had with them a slave ship housing almost a hundred thirty thousand beings from more than thirty races. It will be your task to find them homes. Most of these beings were born into slavery, so they will need support to adjust to freedom and to fending for themselves. It is a daunting task, especially since the only common language among them is Gorzai, but I have no doubt that, having accomplished the survival of humanity, you can accomplish this task as well."