The Excalibur Alternative

And whoever had designed this ship hadn't stopped with simply pressurizing the bay. The admiral felt yet another flicker of envy as he saw the islands of greenery scattered artistically about between the landing circles. No one in his experience, not even the Galactics, had ever landscaped a warship's boat bay, but these people had. It was readily apparent that they'd taken pains to avoid compromising the efficiency of the bay's layout, but that hadn't prevented them from sprinkling it with towering banks of blossom-bedecked shrubbery, flower beds, fountains, and even a few groves of what looked for all the world like Bartlett pear trees.

The additional proof of this Avalon Empire's capabilities flickered through Mugabi's mind, but then it was abruptly displaced by fresh astonishment as the cutter touched down and he caught his first glimpse of the welcoming committee through a viewport. There were four people in it... and not one of them was a Ternaui.

Admiral Quentin Mugabi sat very still, gazing through the port at the last thing his brain had been prepared to see, then rose as the cutter's hatch cycled open.

"Admiral Mugabi," the tall, red-haired, blue-eyed, and very human man at the head of the welcoming party greeted Mugabi as the Solarian admiral stepped through the hatch. The redhead wore a black-and-gold uniform which managed to combine sharp military tailoring with obvious comfort. It was unlike any Solarian uniform Mugabi had ever seen, but its rank badges were completely familiar. His eyes narrowed as he saw the cluster of five five-pointed stars pi

"Welcome aboard Excalibur," he continued in the same oddly accented English the Ternaui had used as Mugabi automatically reached out to return the handclasp. "I'm Fleet Admiral Maynton. I apologize for the absence of the regular military courtesies, but we thought that it might be a little less confusing to greet you without all of the fuss and nonsense of side boys and bosun's pipes."

"Less confusing... Sir?" Mugabi repeated, and Maynton smiled crookedly.

"Not, perhaps, the best possible choice of words," he conceded. "Still, I hope that our arrival was at least a welcome surprise."

"Oh, I think you can rely on that!" Mugabi assured him.

"Good! It was also a surprise we've been looking forward to delivering, not without some trepidation, for a very long time. And one which I'm happy to say appears to have come as just as great a surprise for the Federation."

"You have a gift for understatement, Admiral," Mugabi said dryly.

"I suspect that most people would, under the circumstances," Maynton replied with another small smile, then gestured at his companions. "I realize that you must have several thousand questions, Admiral, and I promise we'll answer them as quickly as we can. In the meantime, however, allow me to introduce Captain Veronica Stanhope, Baroness of Shallot, Excalibur's commanding officer." The slightly built, fair-ski

"And this," Maynton continued, "is Captain Sir Anthony Moore, my chief of staff." Moore was almost as tall as Maynton, a good two inches taller than Mugabi's own six feet-two, a platinum blond with steady gray eyes, and his handclasp was as firm as his admiral's had been.

"And this," Maynton finished, "is Admiral Her Imperial Highness Princess Evely

Something about the tone of his voice, even more than the title, made Mugabi look very closely at Admiral Wincaster. She was extremely tall for a woman, standing somewhere between Maynton and Moore and literally towering over Mugabi. Like Maynton himself—and all of his companions, for that matter—she seemed absurdly young for her rank, for not one of them could be much over thirty, yet she possessed a perceptible aura of command and authority that owed very little to her imposing height. Golden hair spilled over her shoulders, in direct contrast to the short hairstyles the Solarian Navy favored for men and women alike, and her eyes were a strikingly dark cobalt blue.

Mugabi hesitated for just a moment, uncertain whether or not he should initiate a handshake with someone who hung an "Imperial Highness" in front of her name, but Princess Evely

"Let me join Admiral Maynton in welcoming you aboard Excalibur." She spoke with the same oddly musical accent as Maynton, although it sounded even more exotic and intriguing in her soft, firm contralto, and her clasp on his hand was firm. "I've studied your career with great interest and the deepest respect, Admiral Mugabi. You and Admiral Stevenson, in particular, have accomplished an incredible amount in light of the tremendous handicaps you faced. I can't begin to tell you how pleased I am to make your acquaintance at last."

"Thank you... Your Highness." Mugabi felt acutely uncomfortable before the sincerity of her tone. "I appreciate the compliment," he continued, "but the truth is that we obviously didn't manage to accomplish enough. Without your... unexpected arrival, we'd all be dead."

"Her Highness is completely correct," Maynton disagreed firmly. "Given the technological handicap with which you started, the time pressure under which you were forced to act, and the degree to which the Galactics kept you under minute observation, your achievement in building a navy powerful enough that the Federation felt compelled to deploy a full battle squadron against it was nothing short of miraculous. In fact, our greatest regret is that we were forced to leave you to accomplish it on your own. Unfortunately, we dared not make direct contact with you."

"I don't understand any of this," Mugabi said frankly. "Why couldn't you contact us? And, for that matter, who are you people? The entire—"

He paused, then shook his head.

"I was going to say that the entire human race owes you an immense debt, but it would appear that what I should have said is that the entire Solar System owes you, because it's painfully obvious that what we always thought was the entire human race isn't."

"No, it isn't," Maynton agreed in a tone of deliberate understatement. "And I apologize for keeping you here talking instead of escorting you to His Majesty for the explanations you and the rest of Earth's population deserve. Please, come with us, and I promise that the answers will be forthcoming."

Mugabi followed Maynton and his companions out of the elevator which had transported them from the boat bay to the core of the immense warship. He'd felt a sense of awe which was becoming familiar as he watched the projected holographic schematic which had shown their progress on the way here. The elevator had streaked across the schematic with incredible speed, yet he'd felt absolutely no sensation of movement, which suggested that these people were even more competent gravitic engineers than the Galactics.

Not that he should have been too surprised by that, he told himself, given the way that nine of their ships had trashed Lach'heranu's entire squadron. Besides—

His reflections slithered to an abrupt halt as he stepped out into the trackless depths of space itself.

For just an instant, his brain came to a complete, shuddering stop in terrified anticipation of explosive decompression. He actually felt his lungs lock down in a desperate attempt to retain the air still in them, and then he exhaled in an explosive whoosh as his cognitive processes caught up with him once more.

It was the most breathtakingly perfect holographic display he'd ever seen. No wonder he'd felt such terror at the sight! The training required to survive in vacuum was driven into every recruit on an instinctive level from the very first day of suit drill at the Academy, and every one of those instincts had told him that he was dead as the display enfolded him in the consummate fidelity of its illusion.