The Last Theorem - Arthur Charles Clarke [146]
Natasha spoke up at once. “That never happened, Mr. Bledsoe. I don’t remember anything at all of being a captive.”
Her father raised one hand. “He knows it’s a lie, hon,” he told her. “All right, Bledsoe. Why do you want to whip up the hatred for these creatures?”
“Because sooner or later we’re going to have to wipe them out. What else? Oh, we’ll let them land, all right. But then you go on the air, Subramanian, to say your daughter has confided things in you that you think the world needs to know, and then Natasha comes on and tells her story.”
He was looking actually pleased about the prospect, Ranjit thought. “And then what?” he demanded.
Bledsoe shrugged. “We wipe ’em out,” he said. “Hit them first with a Silent Thunder so they can’t do anything about it. Then we turn the entire American air force on them with every bomb and rocket they can carry, and all the ICBMs, too. Nuclear and all. I guarantee there won’t be anything bigger than the tip of your little finger left when we’re through.”
Myra snorted, but it was Ranjit who spoke. “Bledsoe,” he said, “you’re crazy. Do you think these people don’t have their own weapons? All you’re going to do is get a few thousand air crew killed—and make the aliens mad.”
“Wrong twice,” Bledsoe said scornfully. “Every one of those American planes is fly-by-wire, with all the crews safely on the ground. And it doesn’t matter if those things get mad. We’ve got a saying in the States, Subramanian. ‘Live free or die.’ Or don’t you believe in that?”
Myra opened her mouth to answer for all of them, but Ranjit forestalled her. “What I don’t believe in,” he said, “is telling lies that are going to get people killed, even if they aren’t human people. We aren’t going to do what you want, Bledsoe. What I think we ought to do is get on the screens, all right, but what we ought to do is tell the world what you proposed.”
Bledsoe gave him a poisonous look. “You think that would make any difference? Hell, Subramanian, do you know what ‘deniable’ means? I’m deniable. If this gets out, the president just shakes his head and says, ‘Poor old Colonel Bledsoe. He was doing what he thought was right, but completely on his own initiative. I never authorized any such plan.’ And maybe some reporters pester me for a while, but I just don’t talk to them and pretty soon it all blows over. As leader of the predominant force on this planet, it’s the president’s duty to defend the weaker states, and he has determined that to attack is the best course to follow. I serve at the pleasure of the president. What do you say to that?”
Ranjit stood up. “I want to live free, all right, but that isn’t on offer here, is it? If the choice is between living in a world where people like you are in charge and one run by scaly green monsters from space, why, I just might pick the monsters. And now get out of my house!”
42
A GREAT DEPRESSION
When at last the One Point Five fleet came down to the surface of Earth, they were accompanied by an enormous fireworks show. That pyrotechnical display did not come about for the same reasons a returning human fleet of spacecraft might produce such a display, though. All those old human-built Mercury capsules and Soyuzes and space shuttles struck Earth’s air in an eye-straining blaze of fire when they came home, and the reason was simple. They had no choice about it. They had to slow down for reentry, and nothing but friction with the atmosphere could brake their descent enough to allow safe landing on the ground.
The spacecraft of the One Point Fives, on the other hand, had no need for air friction. Their descent was slowed by a completely different mechanism. They simply fired their ionic rockets in a forward direction, at full power, to serve as brakes. It was a gentler way to land, and one that offered more accurate control on a landing site.
It also required immensely more energy, but