The Long War

Cracked Rock was a speck on an unprepossessing world some distance beyond the Corn Belt. Not many steps for the Franklin to travel from its last destination, but it seemed to take an age to cross a barren-looking copy of America before coming on the township’s lights, bright in the dusk, by the bank of a river. Now Maggie looked down on a tent city – there was no shame in that, many a flourishing city had started out as tents and shacks – with a church, unfinished by the look of it, dirt roads scraped across the surrounding landscape of sparse scrub. The sheriff’s office looked like the best-finished building in town.

As the twain descended, the sheriff himself came out to meet it, accompanied by a cocky-looking younger man – and a juvenile troll, in chains. Maggie wondered if they’d done something to the troll to stop it stepping away. A few more folk drifted in from the township for a look-see.

With Nathan Boss and a couple of midshipmen at her side, Maggie cut short the introductions and asked Sheriff Kafka to sum up what had happened.

‘Well, Captain, some trolls were walking past the township, a band of ’em – they know enough not to go too close – but there were some boys who intercepted them, including Wayne here, just looking for some fun, you know how good ol’ boys are, but they picked on a little one and the trolls fought back, and this one,’ he indicated the beast in the chains, ‘laid out Wayne’s brother. And then—’

Maggie had heard the same dumb story twenty times on this mission. Impatient, infuriated, she held up a hand. ‘You know what? I’ve had enough of this. Midshipman Santorini.’

‘Captain?’

‘Go back to the ship. Bring out Carl.’

Santorini wasn’t the type to argue. ‘Yes, Captain.’

They waited in silence in the gathering dusk, the five minutes it took Santorini to comply. When Carl arrived, accompanied by Santorini, he hooted softly at the young troll in the chains.

Maggie faced the cub. ‘Carl, I hereby appoint you to the crew of the Benjamin Franklin. For now, you’ve the rank of acting ensign. Santorini, make a note. XO, when we get back aboard, make it so.’

‘Yes, Captain.’

‘And, Nathan – give me your mission patch.’

The emblem of Operation Prodigal Son was an astronaut-type shield showing the dirigible hovering over a stylized chain of worlds. Nathan ripped the patch off his uniform, and Maggie used her own dog-tag chain to fix it to the troll’s arm. Carl hooted, apparently in pleasure.

‘Nathan, try to tell him what we’ve done here. Although I think he knows already.’

Nathan deployed his troll-call – the townsfolk stared curiously at the instrument – and started murmuring to the troll about being part of the Franklin family.

Maggie stared around at the gawking hicks with distaste. ‘That, citizens, is what we think of trolls.’

Sheriff Kafka looked utterly out of his depth. ‘So what now? You want Wayne to give his testimony?’

‘Hell, no. I want to hear the testimony of the troll.’

The hicks goggled as Nathan used the troll-call to converse carefully with the captive.

‘He remembers the incident. Well, of course he does. They know to avoid cultivated fields. They weren’t in the fields. But a couple of the young were lagging, and the band scattered. Then these boys found them. Throwing stones. Trying to trip up the young. The trolls didn’t fight back . . . You understand, Captain, you don’t really get a linear narrative out of a troll. It’s more impressions, bits of emotion. I’m having to interpolate—’

‘That’s OK, Nathan. The picture is clear enough.’

Wayne snorted. ‘What the heck is this? It’s a joke. It’s only a talking animal.’

That got roughly translated through the troll-call. And the speed with which Carl moved, grabbing Wayne’s leg and holding him upside down by one hand, was remarkable.

Maggie smiled. ‘Your point is refuted, I think. And your testimony. Sheriff, it’s not your people who deserve respect from the trolls but the other way around.’ She tilted her head to look at the inverted Wayne. ‘As for you, I’ll leave you in the hands of your parents, in the hope of a better future.’

The boy wriggled in the grasp of the placid troll, all but scraping his scalp on the ground. ‘Screw you. Everybody knows about you and your damn ship. It’s all over the outernet. Captain Troll Lover.’

She felt her blood rise. But she said calmly, ‘Drop him, Carl.’

And she turned away, heading back to the ship, before the boy hit the ground with a cry of pain.

56

THE BENJAMIN FRANKLIN hovered over the township of Cracked Rock through the night.

Still fuming from the sideswipe from that kid Wayne – how could a slimeball like him in some dump world like this know so much about her? – Maggie called her chief engineer. ‘Harry, who’s the nerdiest geek you have down there? You know the kind—’

‘Ensign Fox,’ Ryan said without hesitation.

‘Fox. Toby, right? Listen – send him up.’