The Stone Dogs

  The Palace infosystem was excellent. Not that he was in the command loop, of course. Today he was a spectator.

  Have I ever been anything else? he thought wearily. The lines traced over the globe. Somewhere outside there was a mammoth crack, like thunder. Manmade thunder, a laser burning a trail of ionization through the atmosphere, and a particle beam following it.

  "We got the sub!" someone shouted. Lines were spearing out from somewhere off the Cape of Good Hope. "Four skimmers away." Hypervelocity, low level. "Sweet mercy of the White Christ, that's Mournblade's sector."

  "The close-in will stop it… One down. Two. Three. Come on, baby, come on —"

  The voices cut off, as if sliced. An awed voice spoke. "That's Cape Town gone."

  The mother city, Eric thought. Cradle of the nation. Taste victory, old fool. Savor it.

  "Status," he said, without opening eyelids that felt heavier than worlds.

  "Excellence, we've lost… Wotan, we've lost nearly half the discrete platforms out to L-5. Alliance, ninety percent down an' falling fast. Freya bless, Excellence, if it hadn't been fo' the Stone Dogs,"—a quaver, hastily surpassed—"there wouldn't be anythin' left, Excellence."

  Another stone-shaking roar of manmade thunder through the walls. Eyes darted to the screens, relaxed; the last salvo had been at low-orbit targets, ones that were unlikely to respond. Eric forced his eyes open, onto the screens. Forced his mind to paint the full picture of what the bloodless schematics meant, through the hour that followed. Your doing, our responsibility.

  A man was cursing softly. "Oh, shit, oh, shit, that's Shanghai. Penetrator. Two. Another."

  "Northern hemisphere stations report high-incidence cloud cover—"

  "I don't believe it," somebody said. Eric looked up; that had been soft awe, not the hard control that had settled on most. "London's gone."

  Eric slammed a hand down on the arm of his chair. "Who ordered that? Get me their name!"

  "Excellence—" the operator looked back over his shoulder; the New Race control of hormone levels must have slipped, inattention, because there was a sheen of moisture across his forehead. "Excellence, they did it themselves."

  Eric sighed and sat back, reluctantly letting go the balm of anger. "It'll happen, if yo' inflict insanity on those in charge of nuclear weapons," he said quietly.

  "Multiple detonation, Japan." A toneless voice, lost in procedure. "High-yield groundbursts. Sublevel." A pause. "Jacketed bombs. Prelim'nry sensor data indicate radioactivity—"

  The Archon listened through the figures. "Schematic on distribution, given projected wind patterns," he said. "Give me an intensity cline, geography an' timewise." The deepgraven lines beside his beak nose sank a little deeper as the maps twisted themselves. "Note to Plannin' Board: we'll probably have to evacuate the survivin' shelters from the Korean peninsula up through the Amur Valley, minimum. Draw up estimates." The Japanese had been true to their tradition, and had taken a good deal more with them to the land of the kami than their home islands. They never liked the Koreans, anyhow, he thought.

  Minutes stretched into hours, as the quiet voices and screens reported. The thunder spoke less often now, outside; more of it was being directed offensively, into space, to make up for battlestations left derelict. More and more often his eyes went to the screens that showed the cumulative effects, graphs rising steadily towards the red lines that represented estimates of what the mother planet's biosphere could stand. Conservative estimates… we think, he reflected.

  At last he spoke. "Strategos, a directive to the Supreme General Staff. No mo' fusion weapons within the atmosphere. Kinetic energy bombardment only, on Priority Three targets and above." Active military installations. "Throw rocks at them."

  "Excellence—" A glance of protest from the Staffs representative.

  Suddenly Eric felt life return, salt-bitter but strong. "Gods damn yo', that's our planet yo' fuckin' over, woman!" A dot expanded over the Hawaiian islands. "There goes 25% of Earth's, launch capacity! Do it, get them on the blower, do it!" What's a few more million lives in this charnel house? he asked himself mockingly. Go on, finish the job.

  "If only it were that easy," he muttered to himself. "If only." Aloud: "I'm goin' to catch some sleep." Chemicals would ensure that, and these days they could bring true rest. Whether you deserve it or not. "Wake me immediately if we get any substantial info'mation on the Trans Lunar situation."

  Even this day had to end, sometime.

  BEYOND THE ORBIT OF MARS

  ABOARD DASCS DIOCLETIAN

  NOVEMBERS, 1998

  The bridge was still chaotic, but it was a more orderly confusion now. Merarch Gudrun von Shrakenberg took another suck at the waterbulb and glanced over at the console that had housed the main compcore; there was an ozone and scorched-plastic stink from it even hours after they had crashed it with two clips from a gauntlet gun. A bit drastic, but it had worked… Now the circular command chamber was festooned with jury-rigged fiber-optic cables, and a daisy chain of linked perscomps floated in the center.

  "Ready?" The Infosystems Officer looked up from his task. Goddam New Race bastard still doesn't look tired, she thought, then caught herself. It was amazing how habits of mind stayed with you, long after the circumstances had made them irrelevant. Now everything is irrelevant, with two exceptions, she mused.

  "Ready," he affirmed, and looked down, flexing his hands.

  "Sensor Officer?"

  That one spoke without taking her eyes from screens that had to be manually controlled. "They're still matching at what they think is a safe distance." There was a vindictive satisfaction in the tone, and Gudrun nodded in agreement. Safe distance from the standard suicide bomb, but not from everything on the cruiser rigged to go at once.

  She felt very tired, herself. "The rest of the squadron?"

  "Still acceleratin', Cohortarch; looks like they'll be able to break contact."

  The Stone Dogs had scourged the enemy fleet even more drastically than the comp-plague had crippled the Draka; it was the Alliance's civilian jackals who were closing in on the helpless Diocletian now. Miners and haulers and prospectors, fitted with a few haphazard weapons and crewed by irregulars . . leathering like buzzards around a prey they would not dare to approach if it were hale.

  "Cleon," she said conversationally, "yo' were at Chateau Retour last leave, weren't yo'? Met my mothah?"

  "Yes, Cohortarch," he said, making a final adjustment. "Always admired her paintings." And he was probably sincere, considering what they were about to do.

  That had been a good leave. It would be good to see home again, she thought. The vintage would be in; the fruity red of Bourgeuil, the Loire Valley Pinot Noir that smelled ever so faintly of violets.

  "Actually, I was thinkin' of somethin' she told me about the Eurasian War. She was in tanks then, the Archonal Guard."

  "Oh?"

  "Yes, they had a sayin'… Is that damn fool still comin' in to board?"

  The Sensor Officer nodded. "Makes sense, actually. We've been givin' a pretty good imitation of a dead ship. Be quite a prize if they could get it."

  The Infosystems Officer made an affirmative sound, then asked: "About that sayin', Cohortarch?"

  "Oh. 'If yo' tank is out of fuel, yo' becomes a pillbox.' " Her hand closed on an improvised switch, and her eyes went to the screen. Nothing fancy, someone had chalked a line on the surface. When the blip crossed it…" 'If yo out of ammunition, become a bunker. Out of hope, then become a hero.' Service to the State!"

  Her finger clenched.

  "Glory to the R—"

  CENTRAL OFFICE, ARCHONAL PALACE

  ARCHONA

  DOMINATION OF THE DRAKA

  NOVEMBER 14, 1998

  "So," Eric said, looking at the head of Technical Section.

  The table was more crowded for this conference than it had been for the final one on the Stone Dogs. "Strategos Snappdove, what yo' sayin' is basically that we in the position of a man in a desert wi
th a bucket of water. There's enough to get us to safety, but we got a dozen holes in the bucket and only one patch." Somebody actually managed to laugh, until Eric stared at her for a moment with red-circled eyes.

  The Militant Party's man frowned. "None of the problems seem insoluble, on the figures," he said suspiciously.

  Eric kept his face impassive; somewhere within him, teeth were barred. You'll be dancing to our tune for some time, headhunter, he thought coldly. The wall-screens were set to a number of channels; one showed the streets outside. Rain was falling out of season, mixed with frozen slush… We humans may have earned this, went through him. The plants and the beasts did not. His hand gestured to the scientist.

  "Ah." Snappdove tugged at his graying beard. He looked as if he had not slept for a week, and then in his uniform, but that was common enough here today.

  "Hmm," he continued. "Strategos, you are missing the, ah, the synergies between these problems." His hands moved on the table before him, calling up data. They scrolled across one wall, next to a view of Draka infantry advancing cautiously through a shattered town. The troops were in full environment suits, ghosting forward across rubble that glistened with rain. It was raining in most places, right now.

  "We lost some fifteen percent of our Citizen population," he went on.

  Unbelievable, Eric thought. Worse than our worst predictions.

  "And twenty-two percent of the serfs. Three hundred million in all. But these losses are concentrated in the most highly skilled, educated components, yo' see? Then again, half our Earth-based manufacturin' capacity is still operable. But crucial components are badly hit. And to rebuild, we need items that can only come from zero-G fabricators: exemplia, superconductors and high-quality bearings. Not to mention the electronics, of course."

  "Ghost in the machine," the Faraday exec half-mumbled. They all glanced over at her. "We still haven't gotten certain-sure tracers on that comp-plague," she went on, and returned her gaze to her hands. "May have to close down all the fabricators commissioned in the last decade—what's left of them—an' start from scratch."

  Snappdove nodded. "So we need the orbital fabricators. But we lost mo' than eighty percent of those. And of our launch capacity. We must rapidly increase our launch capacity, but—" he spread his hands. "— much of the material needed for all forms of Earth-to-orbit launch is space-made. And so it goes."

  "Not to mention mo' elemental problems. Miz Lawrence?"

  The Conservancy Directorate chief raised her head from her hands. "We stopped short of killing the planet," she said dully. There's someone who looks worse than I do, Eric thought with mild astonishment. "Just. Lucky the worst effects were in the northern hemisphere, where it was winter anyways. Even so—" she waved a hand to the screen that showed freezing rain dripping on the jacarandas and orange groves."—damn-all crops this year from anywheres. Not much in the north fo' one, maybeso two years. Oceanic productivity will be way down, we got ice formin' in the Adriatic, fo' Freya's sake. Even half normal will take a decade; it'll be a century befo' general levels are back to normal." A death's-head smile. "That's assumin' some beautiful synergism doesn't kick us right ovah the edge."

  Eric looked over to the Agriculture Directorate's representative. "We can make it," he said, "if the transport system can get back to somewhere like thirty percent of normal in a year or two. And if there's no more excess demands, and we impose the strictest rationin'. We'll have just enough in the stockpiles to tide us ovah without we have to eat the serfs." A few hollow chuckles. "We're already freezin' down the livestock that died. Best we get control of the enemy territory's grain-surplus areas as quick as may be."

  The Archon nodded to the Dominarch, the head of the Supreme General Staff. He was coolly professional as he took over control of the infosystem.

  "Well, we made a mistake tryin' fo' immediate landings in North America," he said. Casualty figures and losses in equipment flashed on the wall; his tone became slightly defensive at the slight but perceptible wince. On the screen beside the schematic a firelight was stabbing bright tongues of orange-red through the gray drizzle.

  "Too much of our orbital capacity is out; reconnaissance and interdiction we don't have. Not all that many organized fo'mations to oppose us, but we're hurt badly, too; also, we've had to keep back a lot of troops to maintain order an' help with relief efforts." He paused. "An' they had a damn good fallback force waitin'," he said grimly. "Couple of cases, it was like stickin' our dicks into a meatgrinder. It goin be a long time befo' we get that area pacified. 'Specially iff'n we have to give priority to economic uses of our launch capacity. We're occupying a few strategic areas, stompin' on any major concentrations, an' otherwise pullin' back. Fo' one thing, we still haven't gotten the last of those subs."

  Snappdove joined in the general nod; Trincomalee had taken a hypersonic at short range only yesterday. "In any case, the survivors in North America would be almost as much trouble in labor camps," he said. "Making better progress in some other areas we are, but… these are territories dependent on a mechanized agriculture. We cannot support it, and the industries that did we have smashed. Also, ground combat devours resources we need elsewhere, not so much of material as of trained personnel."

  "Aerospace?" Eric said.

  A nod from another of the Arch-Strategoi. "Well," she said, "in Cis-Lunar space, we won—iff'n yo' consider bein' almost wiped out as opposed to completely wiped out in those terms. Only Alliance installations survivin' are in Britannia an' New Edo, with our people from Aresopolis sittin' on them. Aresopolis came off surprisin' well, which is a good thing because fuck-all help we goin' give them these next few years."

  "Outer system."

  A shrug. "Excellence, Mars is pretty safe, not least because what's left of the Fleet is mostly in orbit around it. A lot of them with their compcores blown. Not much direct damage to the Martian installations; the comp-plague hit them bad, wors'n here, but they on a planet, which makes the life support easier. Trouble is, the Fleet units down are our best, the most modern." Another shrug. "As fo' the gas-giant moons, we be lucky just to keep them supplied, and that's assumin' no hostile action."

  "And in the Belt?"

  "We lost. They whupped our ass, Excellence. We hurt them bad, totaled Ceres, but they've got pretty well complete control in there now. No offensive capability to speak of, but plenty of defense, all those tin cans with popguns an' station-based weapons. And that starship. We don't know much of its capacity, but we do know its auxiliaries are Loki on wheels; roughly equivalent to what's left of our Fleet. Less the Lionheart, but they're out of the picture and runnin' their systems on the research computers."

  "Dominarch," Eric said formally, "is it yo' opinion that, as matters stand, we can break the remainin' enemy resistance?"

  The head of the Domination's military looked to either side at his peers, then nodded. "Depends on yo' definitions, Excellence. In Cis-Lunar space, not much of a problem, for what it's worth. On Earth, we can prevent any organized military challenge, yes. Dependin' on the resources made available," —he inclined his head towards Snappdove—"we can pacify the last of the Alliance territories in twenty to fifty years. Pacify to the point of bein' open fo' settlement; I expect some partisan activity fo' a long, long time."

  He bit his lower lip and tapped at the table with a stylus. "Problem is Trans-Lunar space. There's maybe half a million ferals still left in the Belt, an' they have that starship and the facility that built it. We have our own antimatter production, just cumin' on stream near Mercury, but the transport an' guardin' problems… And they are standin' above us on the gravity well." A long pause. "All factors considered, yes. We'll have to devote everythin' we can spare to it beyond survival, but yes. Certain advantages to bein' nearer the sun, and we do grossly outnumber them, in production as well. Long, long war of attrition, though. Possibility of technological surprise, although I doubt it; rate of innovation was slowin' down even befo' the War, and they won't have nearly as much to
spare fo' research now."

  Eric tapped his fingers together, looking around the table. The Draka were not a squeamish people, nor easily frightened—but the magnitude of this was enough to daunt anyone. Myself included, he thought, and surprised them with a harsh laugh.

  "Come now, brothers and sisters of the Race," he said. "These are the problems of victory. Think how our enemies must be feelin'!" He turned to the Dominarch again.

  "Consider as an alternative that we get a year's grace," he said. "In addition, that that starship actually leaves."

  "Oh. Much better. Same prediction here on Earth; then… oh, say forty years to mop up the Belt. Still difficult an' expensive, but it would give us some margin."

  Eric tapped the table lightly. "Here is my proposal. We offer terms to the remainin' enemies in Trans-Lunar space. The, ah, New America to be allowed to leave; we can guarantee that with exchange of hostages an' so forth. They turn ovah the complete schematics on the comp-plague. In addition, we offer Metic Citizenship to any who surrender on Luna an' beyond." That meant civil rights but not the franchise, with full Citizenship for their children. "Between the ones who leave, and the ones who take our offer, we cut the problem down to size."

  Shock, almost an audible gasp. The Militants' spokesman burst out: "Inconceivable!."

  Thank you, Eric thought. Gayner would have been more subtle, "There's ample precedent, aftah the Eurasian War, fo' example." Everyone there would be conscious that Snappdove was the child of such.

  "No precedent fo' that scale. And many of them would be racially totally unsuitable."

  Eric smiled thinly. "Is there any precedent fo' the size of this war? Fo' the extent of our losses? Fo the situation? We need those skills, fo' sheer survival's sake. War to the knife now might bring down the Domination." He paused at that, for the political implications to seep home. That's right, think on the fact that I'm the Archon who's winning the Final War. Who'll be seen as the prudent one, and who the reckless, if you push this issue. "As to the cosmetic problem, the Eugenics Board can see that their children have suitable exteriors." And they will know which party to throw their support behind, a factor not to be dismissed.