Oberheim (Voices): A Chronicle of War by Christopher Leadem (to read list txt) 📗

"So now we're talking about pride, are we?" Without realizing it,
Witherspoon had begun to speak (and think) in the way of the natives.
He had lived there for seven years, from the time he was thirty.

"If you think we liked being in their debt, both literally and figuratively, you're mistaken. But we had to survive. We had to hang on, so we did what we had to do. Don't you see, it's not a question of principles, or faith, or anything else at all. It's reality; it's war; and the extinction of lives and irreplaceable treasures is final. Didn't we learn that all too well?

"And what did we get in return for our heroic stand? We took all the early pounding, along with the Russians, absorbed the enemy's worst blows, only to have the Yanks come charging in late in the game, and take all the credit for final victory. Financially we'd have been better off to declare war on the Americans ourselves, and then lose. They went in afterward like good Samaritans and rebuilt the factories of Germany and Japan, and set them well on their feet for a run at the modern age. And what was left for England, not so very long before the most powerful nation on Earth? Naught but a mountain of debt, a crumbled economy, and the laughter of the world for the aging lion, no longer able even to hold its own among the shifting tides of fate.

"You say we were only paying our dues. Well if that's so then we paid them in full, and not an ha'penny short. Not that the Irish wasted any tears on our behalf." Now it was his eyes that glowered.

The Irishman drained his snifter and let it fall wearily to the woven rug. He looked now truly old and weather beaten, proud still, but with very little hope left. Witherspoon had time to recover himself.

"Please, Bryan. Won't you at least pass the message on to your approaching fleets?" He knew their Commander's name and (complete) authority, even his current location; but this was no time to flaunt the thoroughness of British intelligence. "I love New Belfast as much as anyone. You don't know what it's given me. If it goes down to the bloody French Elite, a part of me will die as well."

Gale looked up, and saw to his astonishment that there were standing tears in the younger man's eyes. He lowered his head again, shook it, and said finally, heavily. "I'll think about it."

"Do this one thing for me, Bryan, I beg. Don't think too long. Or there will be nothing left to defend." He rose and left the room.

The next day, Gale relayed Blackwood's proposal to Commander Donovan, venturing to suggest that the way things were—-desperate—-perhaps it could be considered as a fall-back position. After the necessary signal delay (and not two minutes later) he received the following reply, an audio/visual recording.

"Have you lost your mind, man? I'd sooner make a pact with the Devil. You just do your job and hold 'em off until we get there, or I'll replace you with someone of stouter fiber and longer memory. Help from the English, indeed!" And that was the end of it.

New Belfast fell to the enemy, and could not be retaken.

Here, at least, was a clear moral for anyone to read. By facing the darkness alone and stubbornly, refusing all help, by not using unsparingly all the resources at their disposal, and by placing beliefs in constraining patterns upon a world where no such narrow order existed, the frontier Irish were swept away. And all their heart, courage and past, all their faith in life and beauty of soul were rendered meaningless, and in the end amounted to naught, because of it.

But for one disturbing question. What was Blackwood really after?

                                The wind, she blows extreme
                                My mind would scream
                                        But for the discipline
                                That empty years have taught it.

Richard Dark, a denaturalized American citizen, had risen swiftly through the ranks of the (People's Republic of) Chinese Army, and because of his technical understanding and combat experience, along with the marked favor of vice-Chairman Tam, had been put in charge of the Outer Fences of the two settled planets of the Tsingtao system, now under attack by Soviet-backed Cuban forces.

Viewed mockingly by some, since they were not accompanied by a powerful Space Navy, these unique defenses were nonetheless a highly effective form of planetary cover. Invented by Dark himself, in conjunction with the exiled physicist Tolstoy (both men had chosen not to reveal the full discovery to their native governments, and were therefore outcast), they were based on a combined series of shields and orbiting Artillery Stations, similar to, but more highly integrated than those of the East Germans, in that the shields themselves were wrapped about the great mace-shapes of the Stations like nets of energy strung between harbor mines.

But what made them effective was the source of their power. Not only did they feed off the sun, but also used the very energy of assaulting blasts to strengthen the fields, and channel the drawn-off power into a reverse stroke by the corresponding station—-like an aimed mirror of aggression. The harder an opponent struck, the harder was the blow returned.

Though much of the final figuring had been Tolstoy's, the inspiration and early experiments all belonged to Dark. The idea had first come to him during one of his many visits to the Taoist monastery near his home in Manchuria, where he had been raised by his father, a stern U.C. Army Captain stationed there. Of all the things he had learned (the Shao-lin had let him ask all the questions he liked, though they seldom answered directly or in full), one precept of the Kung Fu style of fighting had always intrigued him most deeply:

If a man, in hand-to-hand combat with another, could turn the force of his opponent's assault back upon him, adding to it the strength of his own spirit, why couldn't a machine, or even a defense field, do the same? He had carried this thought through all the years of his scientific and worldly education, and while serving in the Commonwealth Space Navy during the Manxsome conflict, had seen first-hand the need for such a defense: a way for the week to hold off the strong.

He had also been severely wounded, and nearly died, when his ship's own force-shields had been broken, and the exposed vessel riven with agonizing heat. The next four years had been spent in hospitals and operating rooms where, remarkably, he had slowly recovered with no permanent (physical) damage.

In fact, though his life totaled only twenty-nine Earth years, they had been lived with such intensity and trauma, through no conscious choice of his own, that while he was considerably younger than most of the officers under him, he was, in his way, more experience, time-wizened (and weary of life) than nearly all of them. If hope, despair, and nearness to death are the great teachers of this existence, then here was a student who knew the lists by rote.

He stood now in the engineering room of Power Station One, at the heart of the Fences surrounding the planet Ten Hsiao-p'ang, examining damage reports. The Cubans, after trying for a week to storm the defenses of both planets at once, had decided to concentrate their forces upon Teng along, believing, correctly, that once it fell, the power of the other would be diminished as well. Though Dark's shields still held, the outlook was not bright. For even a mirror may be destroyed by a well aimed and determined laser; and the colonies had to hold out for another month at least.

"I don't know why I try," he muttered to himself. He switched off the last tracer diagram, leaned on the railing heavily.

IT'S FUNNY, REALLY. LIKE A STUPID GAME I CAN'T POSSIBLY WIN. I JUST PLAY IT BECAUSE I DON'T KNOW WHAT ELSE TO DO. This assault had become a symbol, and more than a symbol to him. If these planets fell, crushing forever his last dreams of a home, then the efforts of a lifetime had been wasted.

Here he had resolved to make his final stand. No more running: fleeing from his body's weakness, and before the haunting loneliness, the creeping paralysis of a life without love, companionship, or the simplest human feeling of attachment. Here he would stand, until he was either conquered or set free, or surrendered in death the slender sinews that knitted his soul to flesh. A defeatist's attitude, some might say, but for this important difference. He had spent a lifetime learning how not to surrender, and he did not intend to lose.

An under-officer, the closest thing to a friend he had, approached him.

"Richard. Commander Chang says his station can hold them no longer. They've singled him out and are pounding it apart. The fields are overloaded and the power can't be channeled back fast enough."

"Tell him he HAS to hold them. I'll release the Harrier Squadrons as soon as they're massed and I know it's safe. Then we'll try to rotate him in; but no promises."

Kim looked dispirited, started to walk away. Dark clasped the thick of his sleeve.

"Tell him I haven't forgotten them. It will just be a while longer."

When the time came, he released the Harriers. Their mission was successful, and the more damaged stations were rotated back into the inner circle, replaced by those that had not yet faced the enemy eye to eye. But a dozen ships were lost and that tactic, by its very use, had been rendered less effective. The adversary knew it now, and would watch for signs of its reuse.

The progression slowly passed before the designated hours of his sleep—-he needed only eight in thirty-six—-and the Cuban fleets withdrew to regroup. He remained on the bridge until he was sure it was not a feint, then sought out his own quarters, leaving message to wake him if they tried anything new or unexpected.

Safe again within the darkness of his room he lay on his back, unable to sleep. After a time he reached for the microphone beside the bed and began a supplemental Log entry, which doubled as his personal diary. He knew that his enemies might one day use it against him; but he did not care. He spoke slowly, not letting the words run away with him, pausing often, thinking out loud. This was the only way he had found of drawing the real knowledge of internal warfare from himself, and of rising above the constrictive circle of day-to-day thoughts and concerns. A part of what he said is recorded here.

"God they're giving us a hell of a pounding. How do I tell them? How do I tell my own men that they have to hang on?

"When you're under attack. . .and all the things that you believed in, or wanted. . .and all your hopes, your reasons for continuing, seem to disappear. Or seem to be cut off behind you. And you're left out there. . . can't find any reason for the suffering, it makes no sense. It's impossible to remember the other parts of your existence: all you know is that. . .you're struggling, you're under attack. . .and there's not a damn thing you can do but to hold on. Try to deal with it.

"Maybe I could write something out in the order of the day, if that wouldn't be resented. Go back to Chinese history, and show that their ancestors, when under attack or political repression. . .the thing they all had in common were the things I mentioned earlier. The struggle to endure without knowing why, and stubbornly. . .when the logical thing to do, would have been to despair. And somehow. You know, what Prince Andrei was going through: the way he. . .was just numbed and overpowered by it all. And he couldn't find any reason or meaning anywhere. How it went beyond words or thought so that, in his heart, in the