The Xenocide Mission by Ben Jeapes Page B

turning into a leader
, he thought, and grinned. Who cared? They were alive and going home, and that was what mattered.
    ‘
Martial Mother
.’ Stormer’s voice crackled with anger in Barabadar’s headphones as the Marshal of Space’s suit thrusters carried her back to the asteroid, a sheer rock face that filled her vision dead ahead. Her suit’s computer was aiming her at the dark circle of the ship cavern.
    ‘Tell me the worst,’ she said.
    ‘
Twelve dead, Martial Mother. Their armour ruptured
when they were smashed against the sides of the cave. And
two missing
.’
    Twelve dead
. Battle hormones doubled their rush into her bloodstream and she raged silently as she flew through space. She and Stormer and the others who still lived had survived only by chance. When that . . . that
thing
had taken off, everyone in the cave had been sucked out with it, as if caught in some kind of slipstream. Except that there could have been no slipstream in a vacuum – and yet, Barabadar herself had been flung far enough for her suit to take a couple of minutes to slow her down and reorient her to thrust back to the rock. Did it play with gravity? Had there been some kind of gravitational backlash as it fired its engines?
    She put the speculation to the back of her mind as Stormer continued.
    ‘
Martial Mother . . . I have to report that one of the
missing is your Third Son. He is not among the dead that
we have found but he isn’t responding to calls.
’
    Third Son!
Barabadar felt the sudden horror of loss. Third Son gone, and no body to take a full Sharing from . . .
    She gave no hint of it in her response, carefully vetting the harmonics of her speech for any trace of emotion. ‘I see,’ she said.
    ‘
My Learned Mother Oomoing is also missing
,’ Stormer said, and Barabadar cursed. Third Son was one thing; he would be mourned properly, she had old Sharings of his, and sons Four through Twelve would welcome the promotion. But the loss of Oomoing would annoy the Scientific Institute, which would annoy the government, which would all come crashing down on
her
.
    Well, she would just have to take it. The fact was, infuriating and costly though the business had been and even though her plan to return the Not Us to their own people hadn’t unfolded quite as she would have liked, the net effect was the same. She still had a load of dead outlanders on her hands but the live ones were on their way back.
    A new voice spoke inside her helmet.
    ‘
My Mother, this is First Son
.’
    ‘Yes, First Son?’ Her oldest offspring was on watch onboard her ship.
    ‘
We’ve been tracking the course of the outlander ship and
using the probes in Firegod orbit to project ahead of its
course. Now we know where they’re going and where to
look . . . My Mother, the probes have detected something
.’
    ‘Another ship?’ Had the outlanders come in force already? Was it too late?
    ‘
Too small
,’ First Son said, to her relief, ‘
and it’s
just sitting there in space. It’s small and dark and using
some kind of stealth, but once we knew roughly where to
look . . .
’
    ‘I know.’ Hidden in space, just like the outlander base itself . . . but that didn’t mean it belonged to them. It could still be some covert probe from another Homeworld nation.
    ‘
One of our probes is in a position to do a flyby
,’ First Son said. ‘
I’ve already sent the orders
.’
    Of course, if it
was
outlander . . .
    ‘Tell it to abort,’ Barabadar ordered.
    ‘
Very well . . . My Mother, the object is signalling the
probe
.’
    ‘What’s it saying?’
    ‘
Unknown, but . . . Oh
.’ First Son sounded almost despondent.
    ‘What?’ Barabadar said, not sure if she really wanted to know.
    ‘
The object has exploded, My Mother
.’
    Step-through generator has self-destructed following non-receipt of correct codes
, said the display on the pilot’s desk.
    Joel stared at it in horror.
    ‘Oh, crap,’ he said.

Five
    Day Ten: 12 June 2153
    ’Now