Operation Crimson Storm. Robert Reginald

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СКАЧАТЬ enjoying “Duck Dodgers” on the Cartoon Network.

      The nearby Bellerophon Orbital Defense Station was hosting the major world leaders, including the Presidents of the United States, Russia, China, the European Community, La Comunidad Latina, India, the Organization of African States, and the al-Jihadi Arab Coalition, plus the Secretary General of the United Nations, among others.

      Displayed on the screen were the large space docks containing the Armageddon, the Thunderbolt, the T-Rex, the Phoenix, the Uhuru, the Yarost’, the Fléau, the Hasta, the Huracán, the Van Dine, and the Annihilation. Surrounding these were some 200 points of light representing the attack, transport, and support vessels of the fleet.

      We were going to Mars to stay.

      “It’s beautiful, Daddy!” Mellie said.

      Then President Bush’s face appeared, the former Governor of California close by her side.

      “We inaugurate this expedition to save all mankind,” she intoned. “May you go with God’s good grace and all of our blessings. The hopes and future of the world journey with you.”

      The ex-Governor then stepped forward, holding a document in his right hand where everyone could see.

      “General Fleming Thomas Burgess: in accordance with the authority granted to me by the United Nations and the United States of America, you are hereby requested and required to assume command of Mars Expedition III, and to proceed at flank speed to the Red Planet, where you will undertake any and all steps necessary to defeat the enemy and to secure his territory.

      “Let’s go kick some Martian butt!” the politician then shouted, to the cheers of the official delegation and the watching billions around the globe.

      General Burgess virtually received a copy of the proffered proclamation.

      “On behalf of the men and women of Expedition III, I accept this sacred charge,” he said. “Operation Crimson Storm has now commenced. We will defeat the Martians or die trying, sir.”

      Then he saluted from his station on the command deck of the Thunderbolt. I wasn’t sure that an either-or proposition was entirely suitable to the occasion.

      Half an hour later the grand armada began to move, very slowly at first, but gradually, oh so gradually gathering speed as the ships’ ion engines came on line. They would continue to accelerate until the mid-point of their journey, and then decelerate all the rest of the way to the Red Planet.

      Only one thing marred the departure: the H.M.S. Wells just sputtered a bit and sat dead in the water, so to speak. It would join the rest of the fleet as soon as they could find a Scottish engineer to clean out the pipes.

      They let us out of our cages an hour after departure. I guess they figured that anything that could have gone wrong would already have happened by then.

      The acceleration was minor enough that it had no real effect on our senses: the ship still felt like a zero-G environment. You either got used to it or you didn’t. I knew of one poor slob who spent the entire blasted trip vomiting out his insides, and was so happy finally to land on Mars that he completely forgot his basic training, and accidentally killed himself by failing to secure his helmet adequately. Oh, well, these things happen.

      All in all, though, I found the occasion very positive and gratifying. To quote one of my dippier colleagues, we took a partridge from a lemon tree and shook some lemonade out of it. We were finally taking action against the aliens! I had no doubt whatever that we’d prevail.

      Sometimes, though, winning a war isn’t everything.

      Sometimes it doesn’t amount to very much at all.

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      ON THE THRESHOLD

      The inevitability of gradualness.

      —Lord Passfield & Beatrice Webb

      Alex Smith, 26 Bi-May, Mars Year vii

      U.S.S. Armageddon, in Transit from Earth to Mars

      I think Becky was secretly pleased to have been included on the expedition, although I know she wasn’t too happy about our daughter being there. I’d tried to get both of them removed from the ship before our departure, of course, but without any success.

      I believe that it was President Bush who’d had the last word on the subject. She’d been influenced by that thrice-damned charlatan, Madame Stavroula, to add the psychics to our group of advisers, over the strenuous objections of both the scientific and military communities.

      “Maybe it means nothing,” she said, “and maybe they will add nothing, but right now they seem to have more answers than any of the rest of you.”

      “With all respect, Ma’am,” General Burgess had said, “their so-called answers are unverifiable speculations, based on nothing tangible that I or anyone else can discern. This woman means well, I’m sure, but she and her little group of fortune tellers will consume a great deal of our limited supplies of food and water while we’re trying to determine the veracity of their speculations.”

      But the real “Madame” got her way, as usual, and so the Sensitives were included among the ship’s company. Even the ex-Governor had to defer to her on such occasions, despite his public blustering.

      Mostly, though, I saw very little of them. The women kept largely to themselves. I knew from Becky, their elected representative on the Expedition Advisory Council, that their dreams and visions continued to intensify as we progressed further in our journey through space. Why only certain female members of the species had been affected in this way was the subject of much speculation by psychologists, including Dr. Emil Kürnig, a member of my own group on the expedition.

      “Ve see dat the intuitive nature of the Ayesha pershona now ish coming to the foreground,” he would mumble, “und ve undershtand how it is dat dish ting, it ish accompolished.”

      Frankly, I hadn’t a clue as to what he was talking about, but he was like that sometimes. He was much more personable when drinking beer, which of course was forbidden on the ship, along with anything else of an alcoholic nature (although I believe that Mindon had somehow smuggled a flask of whiskey on board).

      There were also a few children present, all of them over the age of six, and all offspring of other Sensitives; and of course my daughter Mélusine was among them. They seemed to adapt to ship life much more quickly than any of the rest of us.

      Mellie would swoop down the corridors of Deck Three, our living quarters, using the hand-holds to swing like Tarzan’s mate up and down the length of the vessel. I had to caution her several times after a couple of near collisions with adults.

      A few days later I was paged on the com system to report to the Infirmary, where my daughter was being treated. Becky was already there when I arrived, breathless from having swung myself nearly the length of the ship.

      “What happened?” I asked my wife.

      I could barely see Mellie strapped to an examination table in the other room, several bloody cloths hanging in the air next to her.

      Becky pulled me away from the door hole.

      “She started bleeding a few hours ago,” СКАЧАТЬ