He turned away from the terrified civilian to Commander Gianelli.

 

 

"Let's go get them, Christine."

 

 

CHAPTER FIVE

 

 

"A khimhok stands alone, Mistser President"

 

 

Howard Anderson switched off his terminal and rose, rubbing his eyes, then folded his hands behind him and paced slowly about his small study.

 

 

During his own naval career, courier drones had been the only way to send messages between the stars, but the slow extension of the interstellar communications relays was changing that. No com signal could punch through a warp point, but drones could, and deep-space relays could beam their contents across the normal space between warp points at light-speed. Their cost tended to restrict them to wealthier, populous systems, but the Federation had taken pains to complete links all along its frontier with the Khanate.

 

 

Which meant Old Terra had learned of the disaster in Lorelei ten times as quickly as it might once have. for what it was worth.

 

 

He looked around his study unseeingly. Eighty percent of the "Peace Fleet" had died, but Everest's Omega Drones had gotten off just before she blew her fusion plants. The data base download had included Chien-lu's log, and Anderson's fury had burned cold as he read the thoroughly illegal bootleg copy an old friend had passed him.

 

 

He picked up the message chip in age-gnarled fingers and wondered what the summons meant. Perhaps Saka-nami had discovered he knew and meant to shut him up? If so, he was about to discover the limits of the presidency's power.

 

 

The aide rapped on the ornate doors, then opened them and stood aside, and Anderson stepped wordlessly into a magnificent office. Its splendor was an expression of the power of the man in the president's chair, but he was unimpressed. He'd sat in that chair himself.

 

 

He stumped across the sea of crimson carpet, leaning on his cane. It was less of an affectation than it once had been. He'd been in his fifties before the antigerone treatments became available, and his body was finally beginning to fail. But his eyes remained as sharp as his brain, and they flitted busily about as he advanced upon his waiting hosts.

 

 

Sakanami Hideoshi sat behind the big desk, expressionless as a kabuki mask. Vice President Ramon Mon-toya and Hamid O'Rourke sat in armchairs by the coffee table, Pericles Waldeck stood gazing out the windows with ostentatious unconcern, and Erika Van Smitt, leader of the Liberal Democrats, sat across the coffee table from Montoya.

 

 

Quite a gathering, Anderson mused, choosing a chair beside Van Smitt. Add himself, and the people in this room represented the Administration and over ninety percent of the Assembly.

 

 

"Thank you for coming, Howard," Sakanami said, and Waldeck turned from the window with a smile. Anderson met it stonily, and it faded. The silence stretched out endlessly until Sakanami finally cleared his throat.

 

 

"I've asked you here because I need your advice, Howard."

 

 

"That's a novel admission," Anderson said, and the president winced.

 

 

"Please, Howard. I realize how you must feel, but - "

 

 

"I doubt very much," Anderson's voice was cold and precise, "that you have the least idea how I feel, Mister President." If you did, you'd've had me searched for weapons, you son-of-a-bitch.

 

 

"I - " Sakanami paused. "I suppose I deserved that, but I truly do need your help."

 

 

"In what way?"

 

 

"I need your experience. You've led the Federation through three wars, both as an admiral and as president. You understand what the Fleet needs to fight with and what it takes to produce it. I'd like to create a special cabinet post - Minister for War Production - and ask you to assume it."

 

 

"And what would the duties of this post be?"

 

 

"You'd be my direct representative, charged with rationalizing demand and output. If you took the post, I'd ask you to go out to Galloway's World. Admiral Antonov will be taking command in the Lorelei Sector, and I want you to help nim coordinate the operations of the Fleet yard with its civilian counterparts before he ships out. Are you interested?"

 

 

"Would I retain the right to speak my mind, publicly as well as privately?" Anderson was surprised and - he admitted it - excited by the offer.

 

 

Sakanami glanced at Waldeck, then nodded firmly. "I couldn't expect the full benefit of your experience if you didn't."

 

 

"Then I accept, Mister President," Anderson said. His voice was still cold, but he was beginning to wonder if he'd misjudged Sakanami.

 

 

"Good. Good! And there's another thing I need from you, Howard. You're the only man on Old Terra who's ever personally met Khan Liharnow, and a message from you will carry more weight than one from me."

 

 

"A message to Liharnow?" Anderson's eyes narrowed once more. They'd shown him the carrot, now they were about to tell him how high he had to jump to get it. "What message?"

 

 

"We haven'treleased the report, but ONI has finished its analysis of Admiral Li's drones," O'Rourke answered for Sakanami. The defense minister faltered as Anderson turned his basilisk gaze on him, then continued.

 

 

"You must have heard rumors the Thebans aren't human after all. Well, we have positive confirmation they aren't. The battle-cruiser Scimitar got away, but not before she was boarded. The Thebans have some sort of personnel capsule - something like a short-ranged capital missile - that lets them literally shoot small boarding parties at a ship. They have to knock the shields down first, but they carry drive field penetrators like fighters and small craft. ONI puts their maximum range at about eight light-seconds.

 

 

"Anyway, Scimitar's Marines took out her boarders, and the bodies are definitely non-human." He paused, as if that explained everything, and Anderson frowned. Obviously they didn't realize he'd already seen the original reports, but what were they driving at?

 

 

"I fail to see," he said into the expectant silence, "what that has to do with my acquaintance with Liharnow."

 

 

"Surely it's obvious that this changes everything, Howard." Pericles Waldeck's patronizing manner was one of several reasons Anderson detested him.

 

 

"How?" he asked coldlv.

 

 

"Mister Anderson" - O Rourke seemed stunned by his obtuseness - "we lost eighty percent of Admiral Li's force - over ninety percent of its tonnage, since none of the battle-line got away. That's more than a quarter of Battle Fleet!"

 

 

"I'm familiar with the figures, Mister O'Rourke."

 

 

"Well, don't you see, we agreed to intervene and handle the situation alone because we thought we were dealing with humans] We're not - and we don't have the least idea how powerful these Thebans really are. They said they had only one system, but they could have dozens. We need to invoke the Alliance and get the Orions in here to help!"

 

 

Anderson stared at him.

 

 

"We can't," he said sharply. "It's absolutely out of the question."

 

 

"Howard," Sakanami stepped into the breach, "I don't think we have any choice. It'll take us months to redeploy the Fleet, and if we do it'll leave the frontiers almost naked. We need the Orions."

 

 

"Don't you understand the Orion honor code?" Anderson demanded. "A khimhok stands alone, Mister President. If you ask Liharnow for help now, you're rejecting the role you asked him to let you assume! The best we can hope for is that he won't hold us responsible if the Thebans hit him again."

 

 

"But we accepted the role because we thought the Thebans were humans, and they aren't," Waldeck explained with elaborate patience.

 

 

"Which doesn't matter a good goddamn!" Anderson shot back. "Jesus, haven't you even talked to your xenolo-gists?! To an Orion, an obligation is an obligation. If he makes a mistake, takes on a responsibility because of a misunderstanding, that's his problem; he'll handle it anyway or die trying."

 

 

"I think you're overreacting," Sakanami said.

 

 

"Like hell I am! Damn it, Liharnow put his own honor on the line to let you handle the Thebans! You go to him with an idea like this, and you'll have the fucking Orion Navy on your back, too."

 

 

"I find your language offensive, Howard," Waldeck said coldly.

 

 

"Well, fuck you and the horse you rode in on!" Anderson retorted. "I'll help clean up your goddamn mess, Wonder Boy, but I'll be damned if I help you make it any worse!"

 

 

"Howard - " Erika Van Smitt started pacifically.

 

 

"You stay out of this, Erika! All you did was support the Administration - don't screw up now and get roped into this insanity!"

 

 

"I've had just about enough of you, Anderson," Wai-deck grated. "You and your holier than thou criticism! It's always the civilians, right? Always our fault! Well, Mister Anderson, this time your precious Fleet's in it up to its gold-braided ass!"

 

 

Anderson met the younger man's eyes contemptuously. Their enmity cut far deeper than mere politics - it was personal and implacably bitter. Waldeck would never forget that CNO Anderson had personally seen to it that Admiral Solon Waldeck was court-martialed and shot after ISW-1 for allowing the Orions to capture a copy of the Federation's entire astrogation data base. and attempting to conceal the fact. Other branches of the Waldeck clan had provided many a flag officer as distinguished as any family could wish, but Solon had been Pericles Waldeck's grandfather.

 

 

Now Waldeck's florid face darkened as the famous Waldeck temper roused. Sakanami looked alarmed and reached out a hand, but Waldeck ignored it.

 

 

"You're riding pretty high right now, aren't you, Mister Minister for War Production? All fired up to `help' us after you warned us and we went right ahead and put our foot in it, right?"

 

 

"Something like that," Anderson said coldly.

 

 

"Well, just remember this - it was your precious Navy admiral who decided to take his task force right onto Charon's Ferry and got his command shot to hell! You remember that when you tell us what we can and can't do to get out of the mess he made!"

 

 

Anderson's lined face went white, and Waldeck's eyes glowed. But he'd misread the old man.

 

 

"You goddamned lying son-of-a-bitch!" The ex-president was on his feet, age forgotten in his rage, and the taller, younger man retreated a half-step in shock.

 

 

"Howard!" Sakanami's face was distressed as he stood behind his desk.

 

 

"You get this shit-faced fucker out of my face or I'll ram this cane up his goddamned ass!" Anderson roared, and started for Waldeck.

 

 

"Mister Anderson!" O'Rourke had more guts than Anderson had guessed, for it was he who seized his arm to hold him back. "Please, Mister Anderson!"

 

 

Anderson stopped, quivering in every muscle, shocked by his own loss of control. He dragged in deep, shuddering breaths, and Waldeck recovered some of his lost composure.

 

 

"111 overlook your outburst," he said coldly, "because I know you and Admiral Li were close. But he was in command, and he took his entire force into a position it couldn't possibly escape from. If he hadn't, we wouldn't need the Orions. So whether you approve or not, we're going to ask for them."

 

 

"I see." Anderson's voice was ice, and President Saka-nami shifted uneasily as he turned his cold blue eyes upon him. "I'd wondered who really pulled the strings in this administration. But this time he's wrong."

 

 

"I - " Sakanami began, but a savage wave cut him short.

 

 

"Understand me. You will not ask the Orions for help. If you try it, I'll move for your impeachment."

 

 

A moment of shocked silence hovered in the office, then Waldeck spoke.

 

 

"On what possible grounds?" he asked tightly.

 

 

"The truth, Piss Ant," Anderson said contemptuously. "And I'll enjoy nailing you to the cross where you goddamned well belong.'

 

 

"How?" Waldeck sneered.

 

 

"By producing the secret orders this administration handed Victor Aurelli after assuring the Assembly there were no such orders," Anderson said very softly.

 

 

He saw the shot go home, but Waldeck recovered quickly and managed a bark of laughter.

 

 

"Preposterous!"

 

 

"Mister President," Anderson turned to Sakanami, "I apologize for my intemperate language, but not for the anger which spawned it. I am in possession of a copy of Admiral Li's log. In it, he recorded the orders he received over your signature, placing Aurelli in command of the military as well as the diplomatic aspects of his mission, and also the orders he was given by Aurelli. and obeyed under protest. I leave it to you to estimate the effect of that log entry in the Assembly and press."

 

 

"You wouldn't dare!" Waldeck spluttered. "Wed - "

 

 

"Pericles, shut up." Sakanami's voice was cold, and Waldeck's mouth snapped shut in astonishment. Anderson was almost equally astonished as the president sat back down and turned his chair to face all of them.

 

 

"He's right," Sakanami continued in the same hard voice. "I should never have issued those orders to Li, whatever you and Aurelli thought."

 

 

"But, Hideo -

 

 

"Be quiet," Sakanami said icily. "You may be the majority leader in the Assembly, but I'm not letting you cut this administration's throat by pushing Howard into making good on his threat."

 

 

"But we need the Orions!" Waldeck said desperately.

 

 

"Perhaps. But what if Howard's right about the Khan's reaction? The last thing we need is to bring the Orions in on the wrong side of a three-cornered war!"

 

 

"But, Mister President - " O'Rourke began.

 

 

"Please, Hamid." Sakanami raised a hand. There was no affection in the gaze he turned on Anderson, but there was a cold respect. "I'll make you an offer, Howard. I will consult ONI'sxenologists before I proceed with any message to the Khan. If they concur with you, no such message will be sent, nor will I assign public blame for what happened at Lorelei to Admiral Li. In return, you will promise not to publish his log entries until after we're out of this mess. Is that acceptable?"

 

 

"Yes," Anderson said shortly. He felt like a traitor, but he knew the people at ONI. They would never support the idea of calling in the Orions, and that had to be headed off at any cost. Even Chien-lu's name.

 

 

"Then I think that concludes our business. Thank you."

 

 

Anderson nodded curtly and turned for the door, but Sakanami's voice stopped him.

 

 

"By the way, Howard, how soon can you ship out for Galloway's World?"

 

 

He turned back quickly, his face showing his surprise, and the president laughed sharply - a laugh that took on an edge of true humor at the matching surprise on Wai-deck's face.

 

 

"You've always taken your politics too personally, Howard. I don't like you, and you don't like me, but I really do need your experience.'

 

 

"I don't - " Anderson began, but Sakanami stopped him.

 

 

"Don't say it. Instead, reflect on your little victory here. You may not win the next round, but you called the tune today. Maybe you were even right. But whether you were or not, and whether or not I give in next time, I need you. So take the goddamned job. Please?"

 

 

Anderson stood irresolute for one more moment, watching the hatred on Pericles Waldeck's face and visualizing the inevitable battles if he took the post. But Sakanami was right - damn him. The situation was too grave to withhold any service he could give, and he nodded slowly.

 

 

CHAPTER Six The Path of the Storm

 

 

First Admiral Lantu stood on the bridge of the super-dreadnought Hildebrandt Jackson, double-jointed arms crossed behind him, and contemplated his visual display. The Alfred System was a distant GO/K2 binary, and each component had a habitable planet, yet only one was inhabited. Alfred-A IV, known to its inhabitants as New Boston, was on the dry side, but it lay within forty hours of a warp point. Alfred-B I, though suitably damp, was over a hundred hours from the nearest warp point - almost two hundred from the next closest. Lantu tended to agree with the infidels; there was little point wasting time going to Hel when Boston was so much closer to hand.

 

 

He rocked on his wide feet, watching another wave of shuttles slice into the planetary atmosphere. The space about New Boston was crowded with the ships of First Fleet of the Sword of Holy Terra, but he was beginning to think his concentration of firepower might be a bit excessive. Most of the survivors of the infidels' massacred fleet had escaped through the closest warp point, to the starless nexus JF-12 and the Blackfoot System. First Fleet's battle-line, headed by six superdreadnoughts and nine battleships, had encountered exactly five small frigates in Alfred, and those had fled at high speed. Lantu didn't blame them; there'd been no point in those ships sacrificing themselves to defend an unfortified world.

 

 

He shook his head at the blue and green planetary jewel on his display. There were over a million infidels on that gem, and not even a single missile platform to protect them. Incredible.

 

 

He settled into his command chair. Most of the infidels had blown their fusion plants when his samurai infantry sleds swamped them with boarders, but they'd fought well first. Captain Kumash's beloved Saint-Just would oe in yard hands for months, and her sister Helen Borkman would never fight again. The ferocity with which the infidel battle-line had turned on him, forcing him to let many of their light ships escape despite his initial success, had dismayed him. The Synod was pleased, but it saw only the destruction he'd wreaked without grasping what it had taken for the infidels to strike back so fiercely after their surprise, and the Church's obvious contempt for its enemies worried him.

 

 

Yet even he found the total lack of defenses in Alfred. odd. Most of their Lorelei prizes had managed to dump their data bases before they were taken, but Thebes had learned much. Among other things, they'd learned of the "Treaty of Tycho," and Lantu was inclined to concede that only demonic influence could account for its irrationality. The original assumption that the accursed Khanate had conquered humanity might have been an error, but the infidels had certainly been seduced into apostasy somehow. How else could a victorious Federation not only have concluded peace with the Satan-Khan but suggested a prohibition against fortifying "transit" systems along their mutual frontier? It was insane enough not to destroy their enemies when they lay prostrate, but this -! Lantu shook his head again, baffled. Of course, there were those none-too-clear references to "The Line." The Redwing System, five transits beyond Alfred, was its closest outpost, and he gathered from the scanty data that the infidels regarded it as a formidable obstacle, even though its fortifications were eighty and ninety Terran years old. But he and First Fleet would cross that bridge when they came to it. In the meantime, the shipyards could take the prizes apart and analyze away to their heart's content while Lantu tidied up by occupying all the systems the infidels had so obligingly left totally undefended.

 

 

Sergeant Angus MacRory of the New New Hebrides Peaceforce ran a hand through his wet, dark hair. His brown uniform was streaked with sweat, and his callused palms stung. His world was digging in, but they were almost as sadly deficient in construction- equipment as they were in weapons.

 

 

He laid aside his pick and climbed out of the weapon pit to survey his handiwork while tools clinked all about him. New Hebrides' (natives routinely dropped the official first "New" of their planet's official name) pseudo-coral islands made digging nard, but his painfully hacked-out hole was well placed to cover New Lerwick's single airfield - for all the good it might do. Angus had been a Terran Marine Raider for seven years before the home-hunger drew him back, and though he didn't intend to admit it to his fellows, he knew their efforts were an exercise in organized futility. Not that they needed telling. Peaceforcers were policemen, ill-equipped for serious warfare.

 

 

Corporal Caitrin MacDougall leaned on her shovel beside him. She was tall - rivaling his own hundred and ninety centimeters - and broad-shouldered for a woman. Short, red-gold hair dripped sweat under her uniform tam-o-shanter, her snub nose was smeared with dirt, and she was as weary as Angus, but she grinned tiredly as their eyes met.

 

 

"Deep enough?" she asked.

 

 

"Aye," Angus replied. "Or if no, it's no gang deeper."

 

 

"You've got that right." Caitrin held a doctorate in marine biology, and six years of study on New Athens had muted her New Hebridan burr.

 

 

"Weel, let's be gettin' the sandbags filled." Angus sighed, reaching for his own shovel. "And if we're dead lucky, Defense Command may even find us a wee little gun tae put in it when we've done."

 

 

Captain Hannah Avram, TFN, stepped into the destroyer Jaguar's briefing room. Commodore Grissom was bent over the holo tank, watching its tiny dots run through yet another battle problem, and she had to clear her throat loudly before he noticed her.

 

 

"Oh, hi, Hannah." He waved at a chair and put the tank on hold as he swung his own chair to face her.

 

 

"You sent for me, sir?'

 

 

"Yep. What's the status of your repairs?"

 

 

"We've got all launchers back on line, and one force beam. Shields are at eighty-six percent. Her armor's a sieve, but the drive's in good shape and datalink's back in. sort of."

 

 

"`Bout what I expected," Grissom murmured, tugging at his square chin.

 

 

How the heavy-set commodore managed to sound so calm baffled Avram. His pathetic "New New Hebrides Defense Fleet" was a joke. Her own Dunkerque and her sister Kirov, all that remained of the Ninth Battle-Cruiser Squadron, were his heaviest ships. Admiral Branco, the Ninth's CO, hadn't made it out of Lorelei, and Dunkerque and Kirov were here only because they'd been cut off from the JF-12 warp point. Grissom had three cruisers - a heavy and two lights - and two destroyers to support them. That and a hodgepodge of twelve Customs Patrol frigates and corvettes.

 

 

"As I see it, I don't have a hope in hell of holding this system, Hannah," Grissom said, finally admitting what she'd known all along, "but we have to make the gesture."

 

 

He leaned well back, folding his hands on his ample belly and frowning up at the deckhead.

 

 

"There are six and a half million people on New New Hebrides, and we can't just abandon them. On the other hand, the Thebans have a lot of warp points to choose from in Lorelei, and I figure it's unlikely they'll just race off in all directions when they can't be certain how quickly we can regroup.

 

 

"If they were coming straight through, they'd already be here. They aren't, which may mean they're being cautious and methodical, and that means they may probe with light forces before they come whooping through the Alfred warp point. If they do, we might just manage to smack `em oack through it and convince them to go pick on someone else until Fleet can get its act back together and rescue us. That's a best chance scenario, but it looks to me like we've got to play for it and hope, right?"

 

 

He straightened quickly, eyeing her intently, and Avram nodded.

 

 

"Right," he grunted, and flopped back. "Okay, I'm giving you a brevet promotion to commodore and putting Kirvv, Bouvet, Achilles, and Atago under your command." Avram sat a bit straighter. That was his entire battle-cruiser and cruiser strength. "I'll hold the tin cans and small fry right on the warp point to pound `em as they make transit, and I want the cruisers close enough to use their force beams, but keep Dunkerque and Kirov back."

 

 

He paused, and Avram nodded again. Her battle-cruisers were Kongo-class ships with heavy capital missile batteries and weak energy armaments. They were snipers, not sluggers, and keeping them well back would also keep her wounded armor away from those godawful lasers.

 

 

"It's my duty to defend this system, Captain," Grissom said more somberly, his black face serious, "but I can't justify throwing away battle-cruisers when I figure they're worth more than superdreadnoughts were a month ago. So if I tell you to, your entire force will shag ass out of here."

 

 

"Yes, sir," Avram said quietly.

 

 

"In that case, you'll be on your own, but I recommend you make for Danzig." Avram nodded yet again. Danzig was in a cul-de-sac, a single-warp point system not covered by the Treaty of Tycho's prohibition against fortifying "transit" systems. It was fairly heavily industrialized, too, and Fortress Command had erected respectable warp point defenses.

 

 

"If you can help the locals hold, you'll suck off enemy forces to seal your warp point. More important, there are fifteen million people on Danzig. It'll be your job to protect them, Captain."

 

 

"Understood, sir. If it happens, I'll do my best."

 

 

"Never doubted it, Hannah. And now" - Grissom propelled himself explosively from his chair - "let's go find a tall, cold drink, shall we?"

 

 

Admiral Lantu rechecked his formation as Chaplain Manak's sonorous blessing ended. The tricky thing about warp point assaults was sequencing your transits so no two units emerged too close together and overlapped in normal space. That resulted in large explosions and gave the enemy free kills, which meant an alert defender always had an important edge. You had to come through carefully, and if ne had the firepower he could annihilate each assault wave as it made transit.

 

 

Lantu doubted there was that much firepower on the other side of this warp point, but there could be enough to make things painful.

 

 

"All right, Captain Yurah," he told Jackson's captain. "Execute."

 

 

"They're coming through, Skipper."

 

 

Acting-Commodore Avram acknowledged her exec's report as her tactical display lit with the first red dots. Grissom's light craft were a loose necklace around the warp point cursor, already launching while she waited impatiently for her own scanners to sort out the targets.

 

 

Aha! The symbols changed, shifting to the red-ringed white dots of hostile destroyers, and Grissom's ships were concentrating on the leaders.

 

 

"Gunnery, take the trailers!" she snapped, and Dunk-erque bucked as the first salvo of capital missiles spat from her launchers and external ordnance racks.

 

 

Angus MacRory looked up from his hole. Night hung heavy over New Lerwick, fit only by the wan glow of Brigit, the smallest of New Hebrides' three moons, and the sudden glare tore at the eye. Searing pinpricks flashed and died against the cold, distant stars, and his lips tightened. Caitrin slid into the hole beside him, one hand gripping his shoulder bnsingly, as they watched their threadbare defenders meet the foe.

 

 

"Execute Plan Beta," Lantu said quietly to Captain Yurah. The first destroyer should already have returned if there was no resistance.

 

 

"Aye, sir," Yurah replied, and the battleship Mohammed moved forward.

 

 

"That's no destroyer, Skipper!" Commander Dan Ma-quire said, and Hannah Avram's heart sank as the crim-son-on-crimson of a hostile capital ship burned in her plot. Another appeared behind it, and another.

 

 

The commodore's scratch team had done well against the first wave. Six destroyers had been blasted apart in return for a frigate and heavy damage to a corvette and one precious Terran destroyer, but this was no probe.

 

 

Her display flickered and danced with the violence of warheads, force beams, and the deadly Theban lasers, and Terran units vanished with dreadful, methodical precision. Capital missiles from her battle-cruisers blanketed the lead battleship, pounding down her shields and savaging her armor, but it wasn't going to be enough. `Personal signal from Flag, sir.' Avram punched a stud, and Grissom's broad, dark face appeared on her com screen.

 

 

`All right, Hannah," he said. "Shag on out of h - "

 

 

His signal chopped off, and Hannah Avram's contralto was harsh.

 

 

"Execute Dunkirk, Maneuvering." Her lips thinned. "Gunnery, maintain fire on Target One until we lose the range."

 

 

"Jaysus!" someone murmured beside Angus's hole. The explosions had died away briefly, only to erupt with fresh violence minutes later. Waves of nuclear flame billowed, far hotter than before, and the Navy couldn't possibly throw that many missiles with what Angus knew they had out there.

 

 

The silent, white-hot flashes continued for perhaps two minutes, then began to scatter and die. A cluster of them sped off across the system as some of the defenders retreated under fire in a desperate effort to reach the Sandhurst warp point. Smaller clusters flashed and faded, and he clenched his fists. The enemy was picking off the cripples, but one glaring spark was bigger and brighter than any of the others. Someone was kicking hell out of something big up there, he thought fiercely, pounding it again and again and -

 

 

The spark suddenly flared still bigger, expanding in an eye-aching boil of light.

 

 

"They got one o' the bastards," he said softly.

 

 

Admiral Lantu read the message flimsy, then looked up at Yurah.

 

 

"Break off the pursuit, Captain."

 

 

"But, sir, we've got eight cruisers and six battle-cruisers after them. They can't - "

 

 

"You may overhaul the cruisers, Yurah, but not the battle-cruisers, and you'll lose more than you'll gain in the chase. Break off/'

 

 

"Aye, sir." Yurah sounded a bit rebellious, but Lantu let it pass, unable to blame him for wanting the kills.

 

 

He'd gotten one of the lights, but infidel cruisers mounted more launchers; they were giving almost as good as they got. Lantu coulu still have them in the end - his ships nad to score a crippling drive hit eventually - but meanwhile the infidel battle-cruisers were pounding their pursuers with those damnable long-ranged missiles.

 

 

The yards back home were putting matching weapons into production, helped by the fact that they, too, used standard Terran units of measure and tech notations, but he didn't have any yet. And, as he'd told Yurah, he'd lose more than he gained without them. Just as he'd already lost Mohammed.

 

 

He folded his arms behind him once more, rubbing his thumbs against his shoulder carapace. A single battleship, one heavy cruiser, and six destroyers wasn'tan exorbitant price for an entire star system, but he was bothered by how well the infidels had done. Most of their minuscule ships hadn't even had datalink, yet he'd lost eight ships, and the damage reports from Karl Marx and Savonarola sounded bad. If the infidels ever managed to assemble a real task force, things might get nasty.

 

 

He shook himself out of his gloomy thoughts and glanced at Yurah.

 

 

"Shape your course for New New Hebrides, Captain."

 

 

Dawn bled crimson over New Lerwick Island, and Sergeant MacRory sat in his hole with his com link. There was no sign of the invaders here - which was just as well, since Major Carmichael had never gotten his promised heavy weapons - but there was heavy fighting elsewhere. New Hebrides was a world of archipelagoes and small continents, and her people were scattered too thinly to prevent the enemy from landing unopposed in far too many places. But the enemy wasn't interested in unopposed landings; he was dropping his troops right on top of the population centers.

 

 

The civilian com channels were a madhouse of civil defense signals, frantic, confused queries, and Theban broadcasts in perfect Standard English. Angus couldn't make much sense of the latter; they seemed to consist mainly of weird commands for all "infidels" to lay down their weapons in the name of "Holy Terra," and wasn't that a fine thing for aliens to be telling humans?

 

 

But the Peaceforce channels were clear. and filled with horror. The main landing had apparently been over the capital of New Selkirk on the continent of Aberdeen. The first few shuttles had fared poorly against the capital's hastily cobbled-up defenses, but the Thebans had put a stop to that. Two-thirds of New Selkirk had been obliterated by a kilotonne-range nuke, and there were reports of other nuclear attacks, apparently called in from orbit anywhere the defenders denied the Thebans a foothold.

 

 

MacRory leaned back in his hole, tam-o-shanter covering his eyes, and hatred and helplessness coursed through him. How the hell were they supposed to fight that sort of firepower in the hands of someone ruthless enough to use it so casually? He was thankful they hadn't come to New Lerwick yet, for he had no more desire to die than the next man, but he knew. The planetary president had died in New Selkirk, but as soon as the surviving government could reach a com, they would have no choice but to order a surrender.

 

 

He ground his teeth and tried not to weep.

 

 

CHAPTER SEVEN The Faith of Holy Mother Terra

 

 

Archbishop Tanuk smothered his impatience as his shuttle entered the atmosphere of his new archbishopric, but try as he might, he could not suppress his pride.

 

 

A century before, the Angel Saint-Just had set forth to claim this very world for Holy Terra. Now the Holy Messenger's true People would complete his mission, even if they must wrest it from his own apostate race, and the Synod had elevated the son of a lowly mining engineer to the primacy of New New Hebrides to oversee that completion.

 

 

He folded nis hands, watching his amethyst ring catch the cabin lights, and the incised sigil of Holy Terra glittered like a portent.

 

 

Angus MacRory tried to hold his head erect as he marched with the survivors of the New Lerwick detachment, coughing on the dust of their passage. The day was hot for Aberdeen - almost twenty degrees celsius - and they were far from the first to make this march.

 

 

Thousands of feet had churned the surface to ankle-deep powder, and their guards' odd, three-wheeled motorcycles trailed thick plumes as they rode up and down the column. Those bikes might look silly, but they made sense; the Thebans' short, stumpy lees would be hard-pressed to match even their prisoners weary shuffle.

 

 

One of them puttered closer. He - at least Angus assumed it was a male - was dark skinned, his face covered with a fine, almost decorative spray of scales. His dark green uniform and body armor couldn't hide the strange angularity of the bony carapace covering his shoulders, and the smaller carapace over the top and back of his head gleamed under the sun. His amber eyes reminded Angus of a German Shepherd, but his blunt, vaguely wolf-like muzzle ended in flared, primate-like nostrils, and his large, powerful teeth were an omnivore's, not a carnivore's.

 

 

Angus had examined his captors carefully, and the first thing he'd thought of was an Old Terran baboon. The aliens' torsos were human-size but looked grotesque and ungainly perched on legs half as long as they should have been - an impression sharpened by their over-long arms. Yet they weren't baboons or anything else Old Terra had ever seen. Their limbs appeared to be double-jointed; their ankles sprang from the centers of broad, platform-like feet; they had three fingers, not four; and their thumbs were on the outsides of their hands, not the insides.

 

 

They were ugly little boggits. But though they might look like clumsy, waddling clowns and their planetary combat gear might be obsolescent by the Corps' standards - indeed, from what he'd seen, he suspected it wasn't quite as good as that issued to the paramilitary Peaceforcers - they were backed by starships and nukes. That was all the edge they'd needed to smash New Hebrides' pathetic defenses in less than eighteen hours, and their quick, ruthless organization of their prisoners soon finished off his amusement.

 

 

The officers and both chaplains had been singled out and marched away even before they'd been shipped over to the mainland, and Sergeant-Major Macintosh had been shot two days ago for jumping a guard. They'd passed a line of civilian prisoners separated into three groups - men in one, women in another, children in a third - -and the weeping bairns had pushed the big sergeant-major over the edge. Macintosh's death had also made Angus the senior surviving noncom, and he tried to keep himself alive by reminding himself others depended upon him.

 

 

Unlike the civilians, the military POWs hadn't been segregated by sex. He didn't know if that was a good sign or a bad, but as he'd told the others, if they'd meant to shoot them all, they could've done it on New Lerwick instead of shipping them clear across the Sea of Forth.

 

 

He lowered nis eyes to Caitrin MacDougall's shoulders as she trudged along in front of him and tried to believe it himself.

 

 

"Welcome, Your Grace." Father Waman bent to kiss Tanuk's ring.

 

 

"Thank you, Father, but let us waste no time on ceremony. We have much to do in Holy Terra's service."

 

 

"Ive made a start, Your Grace, if you'd care to read my report.?"

 

 

"A orief verbal summary will do for now." Tanuk waved the priest to a chair and settled back behind his own desk.

 

 

"Certainly, Your Grace. The leaders of the heresy have already been executed." Waman gestured distastefully. He'd been astounded by how stunned the infidel priests and government leaders had looked as they were lined up to be shot. The military officers had seemed less surprised.

 

 

`Of course," Tanuk said a bit impatiently. "And the others?"

 

 

"That will take time, Your Grace. The infidels aren't gathered in large cities but spread out in towns and villages. Almost half live on one and two-family farms and aquaculture homesteads, but we've made a start, and the children are being segregated as you instructed."

 

 

"Excellent. If we can reach them young enough, perhaps we can wean them from their parents' apostasy."

 

 

`As you say, Your Grace. The ministers of Inquisition have completed their first re-education camps. With your permission, I've instructed Father Shamar to begin with the captured military personnel."

 

 

"Indeed?" Tanuk rubbed his muzzle. "Why?"

 

 

"I believe they will be the ones most steeped in fallacy, Your Grace. I fear few will recant, but we may learn much from them to guide us when we turn to the civilians. And if some sheep must be lost, best it should be such as they."

 

 

"I see." Tanuk frowned, then nodded. "So be it. You've done well, Father, and I shall report it to the Synod with approval. Continue as planned and inform Father Shamar I look forward to his first reports."

 

 

At least there were beds. For the first time in over a week, Angus wasn't sleeping on the ground, and he was clean, for the POWs had been herded into communal showers on arrival at the camp. Their captors still made no distinction between male and female, and he'd been forced to deploy his small washcloth with care as he and Caitrin bumped under the spray. He was eight years older than she, and he'd known her all her life, but he'd been away for four years before she left for New Athens, and she'd only returned last spring. The beanpole adolescent he remembered had vanished, and his body had been intent upon betraying his awareness of the change.

 

 

Yet it was hard to remember that pleasant tide of embarrassment as he lay on his hard, narrow cot. All the surviving noncoms shared one hut, and Caitrin lay two cots down, but his mind was full of what he'd seen of the camp.

 

 

It was near ruined New Selkirk, at the foot of the New Grampians, the rugged mountain spine of Aberdeen. New Hebrides' islands had been formed by eons of pseudo-coral deposits, but the continents were granite. The mountains had been air-mapped yet remained mostly unexplored, for the New Hebridans were a coastal folk. If he could slip his people away into the Grampians.

 

 

He snorted bitterly in the dark. Certainly. Just slip away - past three electrified fences and guards with automatic weapons. True, they seemed a bit casual, without a single proper weapon emplacement in the place, yet that gave him no hope. There were some good lads and lasses caged up with him - not Marines, but good people - and if he could have gotten his hands on a weapon it might have been different, but that was wishing for the moon.

 

 

No, he could only wait. Wait and hope. and maybe pray a bit.

 

 

"I am Yashuk," the alien announced, "and I am your teacher."

 

 

Angus and Caitrin exchanged speaking glances. Yashuk stood on a dais that brought his head to human height, and the two manacled humans sat in low chairs. Angus found the effort to place them at a disadvantage fairly crude, yet there'd been something peculiarly demeaning in submitting to the armed guards who'd split the non-coms into handcuffed pairs and marched Caitrin and him away to this small room.

 

 

He looked back at Yashuk. The alien wore a violet-colored, hooded robe, like a monk's, but there was nothing monkish about the businesslike machine-pistol at his side. A purple-stoned ring flashed on his narrow hand as he gestured with a thick metal rod, and the rheostats on that rod's grip made Angus uneasy.

 

 

He realized Yashuk had fallen silent, his head cocked, and wondered if he was showing impatience.

 

 

"To teach us what?" Caitrin asked. It seemed to be the right question, for Yashuk nodded almost approvingly.

 

 

"It is well you ask." Angus hid a grin. Yashuk's Stan dard English was better than his own, despite his elongated palate, and his pomposity came through perfectly.

 

 

"You have been seduced into apostasy," the Theban continued. "Your race has fallen into sin, abandoning the way of Holy Terra to commune with the Satan-Khan. As the Angel Saint-Just brought enlightenment to my world, so now I return the Holy Messenger's gift to nis own race."

 

 

Angus blinked. Yashuk seemed to feel his gibberish meant something, but what was an "Angel Saint-Just"?

 

 

"Excuse me, Yashuk" - it was Caitrin again, and Angus was content to let her speak; he'd never been very verbal even with other humans, and she was the one with the fancy education - "but we don't understand you."

 

 

"I know this," Yashuk said smugly. "The Truth has been concealed from you, but I shall open your eyes. Listen, and heed the word of Holy Terra."

 

 

He drew a small book from his robe and cleared his throat with a very human sound, then began to read.

 

 

"For ages, the People dwelt in darkness, worshiping false gods, and nations warred each upon the other for empire and the wealth of their world.

 

 

`Yet they were not suffered to remain in darkness, for in the Year of Annunciation, the Holy Messenger came upon them. Saint-Just was his name, and he was sent by Holy Terra as Her Angel to lead the People into light.

 

 

"But the Satan-Khan, who hates Holy Terra and all Her children, harried the Angel's fleet, destroying its ships, so that only three of the Messenger's vessels ever touched the soil of the world the Holy One named Thebes. On the Island Arawk they landed, and they were Starwalker, Speedwell, and John Ericsson. Scarcely ten score Messengers survived the Satan-Khan's attack, and they were sorely wearied and afraid when they came to the People.

 

 

"Yet great was their mission, and the Angel Saint-Just went forth among the People, sharing with them the science of Holy Terra. As children they were before Her knowledge, but freely he gave of it to them.

 

 

"Now other nations were afraid and sought to smite down the Messenger and the People of Arawk, but the Messenger and his Companions aided those who had received them. The guns and tanks of Arawk's enemies withered before the weapons Holy Terra placed in the hands of those who had succored Her Messengers, and their foes were brought low.

 

 

"But even in that moment of triumph, the Satan-Khan struck, sending a terrible pestilence upon the Holy Ones. Not one of allthe People died, but only the Holy Ones, and the pestilence slew and slew until only the Angel Saint-Just and less than a score of his fellows lived, and they sorrowed for all the Satan-Khan's despite had slain.

 

 

`Yet they lived, and they gathered to them disciples, among them Sumash, Prince of Arawk, and taught them the Faith of Holy Terra. And the Angel Saint-lust said unto Sumash, `Learn of Holy Terra's arts and gather your people, that they may gird themselves, for the day shall come when they will be called by Holy Terra to return the gifts She has given. The Satan-Khan presses Her sore, and it may be She shall fall even into his hand, but your people shall become the People of Holy Terra even as my own. They will go to Her as sons, mighty in Her Faith, and smite the Satan-Khan. They will raise Her up once more, and woe be unto the unbelievers in that day, for they shall be gathered up and cast into the Fire forever.'

 

 

"Thus the Holy Messenger taught Sumash, and he learned all the Angel Saint-Just set before him. He mastered Starwalker's Holy Records and grew mighty in the knowledge of Holy Terra, yet always he remembered he was but Her humble servant, and greatly did he please the Messenger.

 

 

"Yet in the Eighth Year of the Holy One, the Satan-Khan's pestilence returned, more terrible than before, and slew even the Angel Saint-Just and all his Companions.

 

 

"Great was the despair of the People when the Messengers were taken from them, and some among the disciples proved false and turned from the Holy One's teaching of jihad, but a vision came upon Sumash. Holy Terra Herself appeared unto him, anointing him as Her Prophet and the Messenger's Sword, and he cast down the faint of heart and drove them from Starwalker. And when they went among the People, preaching sedition against him, the Prophet came upon them in terrible wrath, and he slew them for their apostasy."

 

 

Yashuk drew a deep breath, almost a sigh, and closed his book.

 

 

"Thus did the Angel Saint-Just come to Thebes and charge the People with their holy task," he said reverently, and Angus gaped at him.

 

 

"But, Yashuk," Caitrin said softly and carefully, "we've never heard of the Angel Saint-Just, nor of the Faith of Holy Terra."

 

 

"We know this," Yashuk said sorrowfully. "We have scanned your records, and the Faith has been extirpated root and branch. Even as the Holy One foretold, the Satan-Khan has brought Holy Terra to the dust and seduced Her own children into sin."

 

 

"Like hell," Angus grunted. "We kicked the Tabbies' arse!"

 

 

"You will not use such language to me," Yashuk said sternly.

 

 

"Get knotted!" Angus snarled. "An" as fer that load o' crap yer peddlin', I - "

 

 

Yashuk'syellow eyes flamed. His rod hummed, and Angus screamed and arched up out of his chair. Molten lead ran down his nerves, and torment hurled him to the floor, twisting and jerking, teeth locked against another scream.

 

 

Agony tore at him forever before it ended with the quiet snap of a released switch. He grunted in anguished relief, consciousness wavering, and Yashuk's voice was colder than the gulfs between the stars.

 

 

"Be warned, infidel. For the Messenger's love, we will teach you Truth once more, but if you cling to apostasy, then even as he foretold, you will be cast into the Fire, and all other unbelievers with you. Return to your Faith and embrace Holy Terra, or you will surely die."

 

 

Angus wasn't particularly religious, and he knew it was stupid to defy Yashuk, but there was too much Highlander in his heritage. The agony of the rod's direct neural stimulation punished every defiant word, and his brawny body grew gaunt, yet the grim denial in his hollow, hating eyes never wavered.

 

 

It seemed Yashuk's stubbornness matched his own. Half the noncoms vanished within a week, "cast into the Fire" by less patient "teachers," but he refused to admit Angus might defeat him, though Angus had no doubt the alien would already have sent him after the others if not for Caitrin.

 

 

She sought desperately to divert Yashuk, tying him up in conversation, seeking "enlightenment," and her keenly probing questions seemed to delight the alien. On a good day she could divert him into an hours-long explanation of some abstruse theological distinction while Angus sat quietly, gathering his strength as she watched him from the corner of one anxious eye. He knew she regarded Yashuk's drivel exactly as he did, despite her exasperation with his own stubborn, open rejection, but they were different people. She had the gift of words, the ability to dance and spar. Angus didn't, and even though enough defiance must exhaust even Yashuk's patience, he couldn't pretend.

 

 

It was the way he was.

 

 

"I weary of you, infidel," Yashuk said coldly, tapping his rod as he glared at Angus. "Caitrin seeks knowledge, yet you hold her back. You cling to your darkness like the Satan-Khan's own get! Will you die for it? Will you see your soul cast into everlasting damnation before you return to your Holy Mother?"

 

 

"Aye? Weel, I've had aboot enow o' yer drivel, tae," Angus said wearily, matching glare for glare. He was weary unto death, and a darkness had begun to grow in his brain. Not the darkness Yashuk yammered about, despair. He knew Caitrin had not yet professed her "conversion" only because she was protecting him. But she'd felt the rod twice in the last two days for defending him too openly, and enough of that would get her killed.

 

 

"I've had you and yer maunderin'," he said now, coldly. " `Holy Terra' my left nut!"

 

 

"Blasphemy!" Yashuk screamed, and the dreadful rod whined.

 

 

Angus shrieked. He couldn't help it, couldn't stop the screams, yet within his agony was a core of gratitude. This was the end. This would kill him and set Caitrin free to -

 

 

His torment died in a high-pitched squeal; not his, but another's. Reaction's heavy hand crusned him to the floor, but he rolled his head and opened his eyes, then gaped in horror.

 

 

Somehow Caitrin had reached Yashuk while the alien concentrated on him. Now her wrists were crossed behind his neck, and the chain between them vanished into his throat.

 

 

Yashuk writhed, one hand raking bleeding furrows in his throat as it scrabbled at the chain. The other reached back, and his incredibly long arm clubbed her with his rod. Angus heard her grunt in anguish as the blows crunching into her ribs lifted her from the floor, but she held on grimly, and her forearms tightened mercilessly.

 

 

Angus groaned and dragged his hands under him, but he had no strength. He could only watch their lethal struggle while the alien's face darkened and his squeal became a strange hoarse whine. He smashed his cranial carapace into Caitrin's face again and again. Blood ran from her mouth and nose, and her knees buckled, but Yashuk was weakening. He stumbled to his knees and dropped the rod to paw at the chain two-handed in a weak, pathetic gesture. His limp hands flopped to the floor, and she braced a knee in his spine, her race a mask of blood and hate, and wrenched the chain still tighter.

 

 

She held it until the last light faded from the bulging yellow eyes, and then she collapsed over the body of her foe.

 

 

Caitrin MacDougall opened swollen eyes, blinking as Angus's face swam above her, and stifled a whimper as simply breathing grated broken ribs.

 

 

"Bloody fool, Angus said softly. His brogue was more pronounced than ever as he dabbed at her face with a damp cloth from somewhere.

 

 

"Me?" she whispered through split, puffy lips. "He'd have killed you this time, Angus."

 

 

``Twas what I wanted, ye great twit. Ye took tae many chances fer me, lassie."

 

 

"Well, we've both blown it now," she sighed. She tried to sit up and collapsed with a moan. "Wnat're you still doing here?"

 

 

"I cannae leave ye," he said reasonably.

 

 

"You're going to have to. If you move fast, you might even make it as far as the wire, but with me to slow you down - "

 

 

"Hisht, now! Ye'll no have tae run. We'll see tae that."

 

 

"We?" She rolled her head and gaped at the crowd of brown-uniformed men and women. Each of them seemed to be holding a Theban machine pistol or assault rifle. "What -?"

 

 

"Yon Yashuk had our handcuff keys and a knife, Katie," Angus said with an ugly smile, `and no a one of `em expectin' an `infidel' tae be runnin' aboot loose. I slippea around ahind the spalpeens and picked off a dozen o' our wee'teachers.' They've had nowt tae worrya t fer tae lang, and when I threw a dozen pistols in thei ¯¯h ut door, weel.

 

 

He shrugged as if that explained everything, and Caitrin gawkedat him.

 

 

"Do you mean you lunatics -?"

 

 

"Aye, lassie, we ve taken the whole damned camp, and we started wi' the com shack. Sae just lie easy, Katie girl. We've a stretcher here, and ye're comin' wi us!"

 

 

CHAPTER EIGHT A Question of Authority

 

 

Senior Chief Petty Officer Hussein watched Captain - no, he reminded himself, Commodore - Avram stalk into Dunkerque's boat bay and felt sorry for whoever the Old Lady was going to meet.

 

 

He sprang to attention with alacrity. The sideboys did the same, but Commodore Avram hardly seemed to notice. She saluted the Federation banner on the forward bulkhead with meticulous precision as the bosun's pipe shrilled, then stepped silently into her cutter, and the atmospheric pressure in the boat bay dropped by at least a kilo to the square centimeter as its hatch closed. It departed, sliding through the mono-permeable force field at the end of the bay, and Chief Hussein shook his head sadly.

 

 

Some poor bastard dirtside was about to grow a new asshole.

 

 

Hannah Avram sat on her fury and made herself lean back as the cutter headed for Gdansk, the capital city of New Danzig. Despite her preparations, her position was unbelievably fragile, and venting her volcanic anger would do more harm than good, but still -!

 

 

She smoothed the cap in her lap and smiled unwillingly as she stroked the braid on its visor. That was the single card she had to play, and she'd built her entire strategy on it. And it helped enormously that Commodore Hazelwood was such a gutless wonder.

 

 

She shook her head, still unable to believe either the situation or how much she'd already gotten away with. Richard Hazelwood came from a distinguished Navy family, but now that she'd met him she understood how he'd gotten shunted off to Fortress Command in a system no one had ever dreamed might actually be attacked. She doubted Hazelwood would blow his own nose without authorization - in triplicate! - from higher authority.

 

 

Her arrival in Danzig with what was left of the New New Hebrides defenders - her own ship, Kirov, the heavy cruiser Bouvet, and the light cruiser Atago - had been bad enough. They hadn't even been challenged until they'd been in-system over two minutes! God only knew what Thehans might have done with that much time, and Hannah Avram had no intention of finding out. That was one reason Kirov, Bouvet, and Atago, along with the six destroyers which constituted Danzig's entire mobile local defense force, were sitting on the warp point under Captain Van, Kirov's skipper.

 

 

The only good thing about the entire bitched-up situation was that Hazelwood was such a wimp he hadn't even questioned her brazen usurpation of his authority. He'd been overjoyed to let her shoulder the responsibility by exercising a Battle Fleet commodore's traditional right to supersede a Fortress Command officer of the same rank. Of course, that assumed the Battle Fleet commodore in question was a real commodore and not simply a captain who'd been "frocked" by a desperate superior. Hannah had a legal right to the insignia she now wore, but her rank certainly hadn't been confirmed by Fleet HQ. It hadn't occurred to Hazelwood to ask about that, even though his personnel files had to list her as a captain, and she wasn't about to mention it to him.

 

 

Only her staff knew her promotion had been signed by Commodore Grissom rather than some higher authority, and she'd used the week since her arrival well, getting personally acquainted with all of Danzig's senior officers. For the most part, they were a far cry from their erstwhile CO, and they were delighted by her assumption of command.

 

 

But now that Hazelwood had gotten over his immediate panic he was proving a real pain in the ass. The man commanded a dozen Type Three OWPs, for God's sake! Admittedly, his forts were a lot smaller than The Line's, but they were still more powerful than most battleships and covered by a minefield whose strength had surprised even Hannah. He was also responsible - or had oeen, until she took the burden off his shoulders - for the protection of fifteen million Federation citizens. Yet he wanted to send out a courier ship to discuss "terms" with the Thebans!

 

 

She gritted her teeth against a fresh flare of anger. Bad enough to have an idiot as her second in command, but Hazelwood also had close ties to the local government. Well, that was to be expected after he'd spent six years commanding their defenses, but it also meant they were prepared to back him. Indeed, she suspected President Wyszynski had actually put Hazelwood up to it. Or it might have been Victor Tokarov. In fact, it sounded more like Tokarov than Wyszynski.

 

 

The president might, on a good day, have the independence to decide what color to paint his office without running it by the manager of the Cracow Mining Company. Danzig had been settled by Polish neo-ethnicists fifty years ago, but the planet's incredible mineral wealth had brought New Detroit's Tokarov Mining Consortium in almost from the beginning, which had contributed immensely to the speed of Danzig's industrialization. It had also moved the planet firmly into the Corporate World camp.

 

 

Backed by Tokarov money, Wyszynski could be re-elected planetary president three months after he died. Conversely, of course, if he irritated the Tokarov interests, he couldn't be elected dog-catcher. Assuming, that was, that there were enough dogs on Danzig to need a dog-catcher.

 

 

The more she thought about it, the more convinced she'd become that Tokarov had originated the suggestion. It was just the sort of brilliant idea to appeal to a busi-ness-as-usual financier. But neither Tokarov, Wyszynski, nor Hazelwood - damn him! - had been at Lorelei or New New Hebrides. They'd make out better negotiating with a saber-toothed tiger. or a zeget.

 

 

The cutter's drive changed note as it settled towards the pad, and she looked out the armorplast view port at the spaceport's orderly bustle. A dozen local shuttles full of additional mines were about ready to lift off, and there were another dozen Fleet personnel'shuttles spotted around the pads. Most had their ramps down, and she could just see a platoon of Marines marching briskly off towards their waiting ground transport.

 

 

Her lips quirked wryly as she turned away from the view port. Her newest idea had horrified most of her fledgling staff, but they'd come through like champs. Danny had worked like a Trojan with Commander Band-aranaike, her legal officer, as well as finding time to handle the logistical side. And, she supposed, she might as well be hanged for a sheep. Besides - her smile vanished - Commodore Grissom had charged her with the defense of Danzig. If he could go down fighting knowing it was futile in defense of less than half as many people, then she could damned well do the same for Danzig s.

 

 

Even if she had to do it in spite of their government.

 

 

Victor Tokarov watched Commodore Avram walk in. She laid her briefcase neatly on the conference table, then sat and set her cap equally neatly beside it. She was smiling, but Tokarov had attended too many outwardly affable business meetings, and the good commodore sover-controlled body language spoke volumes. He could teach her a thine or two about stage-managing meetings. Not that he haa any intention of doing so. Or perhaps, in a way, he did, he thought with a hidden smile.

 

 

President Josef Wyszynski nodded pleasantly to her. Commodore Hazelwood did not, but he'd made it clear he intended to distance himself from the entire discussion. It was a pity, Tokarov thought, that it was Avram who was the newcomer. She had so much more to recommend her as an ally, aside from her foolish insistence on "defending" Danzig. No single system could stand off the juggernaut which had smashed Battle Fleet at Lorelei and driven this deep into the Federation so quickly. Far wiser to make bearable terms locally, preserving Danzig's industrial infrastructure - and people, of course - from pointless destruction. The Navy would get around to rescuing them sooner or later, after all.

 

 

"Thank you for coming, Commodore," Wyszynski said. "I appreciate your taking the time from your busy schedule."

 

 

"Not at all," Hannah said with a tight smile. "I'd planned on paying a call as soon as convenient. I do rather regret pulling Dunkerque off the warp point at this particular moment, but I'd have had to turn her over to the local yard for permanent repairs sometime soon, anyway."

 

 

"Uh, yes, I see." Wyszynski cleared his throat. "Turning to the point which, I believe, Commodore Hazelwood has raised with you, it seemed a good idea for the planetary government's viewpoint to be -

 

 

"Excuse me, Mister President," Hannah said calmly. "I presume you're referring to Commodore Hazelwood's suggestion that we seek a negotiated local modus vivendi with the Thebans?"

 

 

Wyszynski seemed a bit taken aback by her interruption, but he nodded. "Well, I'd hardly put it in quite those words, but, yes. I understand you oppose the idea, and of course, as the senior officer in Danzig you have every right to make your own tactical dispositions, but we reel - "

 

 

"Excuse me again, sir," Hannah interrupted, and To-karov gave her high marks for tactics as she crowded the president, throwing him off stride and asserting her own authority. "Such negotiations - which, I feel I must point out, have not been authorized by President Sakanami or the Legislative Assembly - represent rather more than a simple tactical decision.'

 

 

"Well, we know that," Wyszynski replied a bit tartly. "But President Sakanami is on Old Terra, not here."

 

 

"True. On the other hand, sir, any negotiations with a hostile power lie strictly within the purview of the Federal government, not of member planets. I direct your attention to Article Seven of the Constitution."

 

 

Wyszynski's mouth opened, and his eyes darted to To-karov. The mining director swallowed a frown, but it was clear more direct action was in order.

 

 

"You're quite correct, Commodore. But while I realize I'm present solely as an economic and industrial advisor, I think President Wyszynski's point is that the Constitution makes no provision for a planet which finds itself cut off from the rest of the Federation by a hostile power. And Danzig, as a Federated World, has no Federal governor and hence no official representative of the Federal executive."

 

 

"I see." Hannah cocked her head thoughtfully. "Your point is that with no such official the planetary government must - strictly as an emergency measure - create its own foreign policy until contact with Old Terra is regained?"

 

 

`Exactly," Wyszynski said quickly.

 

 

"I see, Hannah repeated. She shrugged slightly and opened her briefcase. "Actually, gennemen, I didn't come specifically to discuss this point. I'd intended to give you this" - she handed over a document chip folio - which details my planned repair and construction policy. Given Danzig's industrial capacity, I believe we can easily triple the density of the present warp point minefields within two months. After that, I'd like to get started on the construction of destroyers and light carriers. I doubt we'll have time for anything much heavier, and the local population would be strapped to provide crews if we did. In respect to that point, it occurs to me that we may have to introduce conscription - on a hostilities-only basis, of course - and I'd intended to discuss that with you, as well."

 

 

Her listeners stared at her in shock. Even Tokarov's jaw had dropped just a bit, and she smiled at them.

 

 

"Still, if you feel we must resolve this negotiations question first, I am, of course, at your service.'

 

 

Wyszynski blinked. Avram's fast, unpredictable footwork was hardly what one expected from a bluff, apolitical TFN officer. For his part, Tokarov eyed the commodore with new respect. She might not be very good at hiding emotions, but he made a mental note against equating that with lack of guile. Poor Josef was obviously uncertain how to proceed, so it looked as if it was going to be up to him.

 

 

"Speaking for Danzig's industrial interests, we'll certainly be glad to take the fabrication side of your requests under advisement. But I really think we have to determine whether or not such a program would accord with the government's intention to seek a cease-fire with the Thebans."

 

 

"Not really, Mister Tokarov. You see, there will be no negotiations."

 

 

`I beg your pardon?" Wyszynski demanded, swelling with outrage. ` With all due respect, Commodore, this is a political question - and a legal one, of course - but certainly not a military one."

 

 

"On the contrary, sir." The steel glinting in Hannah's brown eyes gave Tokarov a sudden feeling of dread. "It most certainly is a military question. On the other hand, I wasn't speaking to its purely military aspects. I was, in fact, addressing those same legal and political points you just referred to."

 

 

"In what wav, Commodore?" Tokarov asked. "In this way, Mister Tokarov." She extracted another document from her briefcase, this time a printed hard copy, and handed it across the table to him. He looked down at it in some surprise.

 

 

"This seems to be a copy of the Articles of War," he said, playing for time and trying to deduce her intent.

 

 

"It is. If you'd take a look at Article Fifty-Three, please?" He thumbed pages, and those steely brown eyes shifted to Wyszynski like Dunkerques main battery. "Since we have only one copy, I'll save a bit of time by citing the relevant passage for you, Mister President. Article Fifty-Three says, and I quote, `The senior Naval officer present shall, in the absence of guidance from the relevant civil authorities, exercise his discretion in the formulation of local military and supporting policies, acting within the understood intent of previously received instructions.'"

 

 

Tokarov stopped turning pages. He didn't doubt she'd cited correctly, but he still didn't see where she was headed. Which didn't prevent a sudden sinking sensation. Commodore Avram looked entirely too sure of herself. She had something nasty up that silver-braided sleeve of hers.

 

 

"I fail to see," President Wyszynski said, "the relevance of that article, Commodore. We re not discussing military policy, except, perhaps, in the most indirect fashion. We're talking about a political decision made by the duly constituted local authorities. In fact, I believe we are the'relevant civil authorities' in this case!"

 

 

"With all due respect, Mister President, I must disagree," Hannah said coolly, and Wyszynski gaped at her. "The document I've just cited from is the legal basis of the Federation Navy. It is not merely a military document; it is also a legal document, drafted by the Admiralty but approved and enacted by the Legislative Assembly and, as such, constitutes a portion of the legal corpus of the Federation, not of any single member planet. Under Article Two of the Constitution, Federal law, where existent, supersedes locally enacted law. As such, I am not bound by your wishes, or those of Mister Tokarov, in the formulation of my own `military and supporting' policy. In fact, I am a direct representative of the Federal government. Wouldn't you agree?"

 

 

"Well, I. I suppose that sounds like it makes sense, in a way. Not," Wyszynski added hastily, "that I've ever seen any documentation on the point. And constitutional law is hardly my strong suit. I d hesitate to make any rash pronouncements or commitments."

 

 

"I realize that, sir, and I am, of course, equally desirous of maintaining a scrupulous adherence to the law of the Federation. Accordingly, I discussed this very point at some length with my legal officer before I left to attend this meeting. At her suggestion, I refer you to Har-good-vs.-Federation and Lutwell's World-vs.-Federation. In both cases, the Supreme Court determined that the senior Navy officer present was, in fact, directly representative of the Federal government. I'm certain your own Attorney General could provide you with copies of those decisions."

 

 

"All right, then," Wyszynski said. "But I still fail to see how your authority to determine military policy applies to a purely political question like negotiations with the Thebans!"

 

 

"I invite your attention once more to the relevant portion of Article Fifty-Three, sir." Hannah smiled. Why, she was actually beginning to enjoy herself! Odd. She d never thought she had a sadistic streak.

 

 

"What `relevant portion'?" Wyszynski snapped.

 

 

"I refer," she said softly, "to the specific phrase `military and supporting policies.' I submit to you, sir, that my intention to defend Danzig and prevent any Theban incursion therein, which is clearly a military policy and hence within my jurisdiction, precludes any negotiation with the enemy. And, as the proper authority to determine policies in support of my military intentions, I must ask you to abandon any idea of those negotiations and, instead, turn your attention to my industrial requirements."

 

 

"Now just a moment, Commodore!" Tokarov said sharply. `You can't seriously suggest that we allow a military officer to dictate to a duly elected planetary government!"

 

 

"That, I'm afraid, is precisely what I'm suggesting, Mister Tokarov," Hannah said flatly, "though'suggest' is, perhaps, not the proper word. I am informing you of my decision."

 

 

"This - this is preposterous!" Wyszynski blurted. "Why, you haven't got any more legal right to issue. issue dictats to civilian authorities than. than." He slid to a halt, and Tokarov looked at Hannah with narrow eyes, all humor vanished.

 

 

"I believe President Wyszynski means to point out that while you may represent the Federal military, you have no civilian authority, Commodore," he said coldly.

 

 

"On the contrary." Hannah pulled out another thick book. It thudded onto the table, and Tokarov's eyes dropped to the cover. Admiralty Case Law of the Terran Federation, Vol. XLVHI, it said.

 

 

"And what, if I may ask, does this have to say to the matter?"

 

 

"Under Admiralty law, Mister Tokarov, the senior Federation Navy officer present becomes the Federation's senior civil officer in the absence of proper civilian authority. I refer you to Anderson-vs.-Medlock, Travis, Suchien, Chernov, et. al, otherwise known as `The Star-quest Case.' Since we have all just agreed there is no local Federal authority in Danzig, I have no option but to consider myself acting in that capacity. This" - she extracted yet another document from the deadly magazine of her briefcase - "is a proclamation drawn up by my legal officer and myself. It announces my assumption of civil authority as Governor of the Danzig System in the name of the Federal government."

 

 

"You're insane!" Hazelwood blurted, speaking for the first time. "That's patently illegal! I refuse to listen to this driv - "

 

 

"Commodore Hazelwood," Hannah said very, very softly, "you are in violation of Articles Seven, Eight, and Fourteen of the Articles of War. I am your superior officer, and you will bear that in mind and address me as such or I'll have your commission. Do you read me, Commodore Hazelwood?"

 

 

Hazelwood wilted into a confused welter of dying half-sentences, and Hannah turned back to Tokarov, dropping all pretense that anyone else in this room mattered.

 

 

`Commodore Hazelwood has just been relieved - on my authority - of his duties as Sky Watch commander." She glanced at her watch. "One hour ago, Captain Isaac Tinker turned command of Bouvet over to his exec and assumed Commodore Hazelwood's duties to free the commodore to act as my personal liaison with Danzig's industrial complex. I'm certain he'll carry out his new duties in the exemplary manner in which he carried out his previous responsibility for Fortress Command."

 

 

"You won't get away with this, Commodore," Tokarov said quietly.

 

 

"Governor, please," Hannah replied calmly. "I am, after all, speaking in my civilian persona. And I've already `gotten away' with it, sir. With the exception of one or two defeatists, the officers and enlisted men and women of the Navy have no interest in negotiating with the Thebans. Nor, I might add, do the officers and enlisted people of the Marine detachments."

 

 

Tokarov swallowed, eyes suddenly very wide, as she reached into that deadly briefcase yet again. She extracted a small handcom and activated it.

 

 

"You may come in now, Major," she said into it, and the conference room doors opened. Ten Marines in un-powered body armor stepped through them, bayoneted assault rifles ostentatiously unthreatening in their hands. They took up properly deferential positions against the wall, paying absolutely no attention to the people sitting around the table.

 

 

"Now, gentlemen," Hannah's voice drew their pop-eyed stares from the silent Marines as she closed her briefcase with a snap, "I believe that completes our business."

 

 

"This - this is mutiny! Treason!" Wyszynski blurted.

 

 

"On the contrary, Mister President. This is a constitutional transfer of authority, in exact accordance with the legal precedents and documents to which I have drawn your attention."

 

 

"That's nonsense!" Tokarov's voice was more controlled, but his eyes were just as hot. "This is a brazen use of force to circumvent the legitimate local authorities!"

 

 

"That, Mister Tokarov, is a matter of opinion, and I suggest you consult legal counsel. If I've acted beyond the scope of my authority, I feel certain the Admiralty and Assembly will censure me once contact with those bodies is regained. In the meantime, we have a war to fight, and the organs of the Federal authority in this system - the Fleet and Marine units stationed herein - are prepared to do their duty, under my orders, as per their oaths to protect and defend the Constitution of the Terran Federation. Which, I'm very much afraid, makes your objections irrelevant."

 

 

"You'll never get away with this. My people won't stand for it, and without us, there's no industrial base to support your insane policy!"

 

 

`On the contrary, sir. Your managerial personnel may, indeed, refuse to obey me. Your labor force, however, won't refuse, and you know it. In the meantime, Marine units are on their way to your offices and major industrial sites even as we speak, and any act of sabotage or active resistance will be severely dealt with. You may, of course, at your discretion, elect to employ passive resistance and noncooperation. I should point out, however, that such a decision on your part will have the most serious postwar repercussions if, as I confidently expect, my actions are retroactively approved by the Assembly."

 

 

She held his eyes unblinkingly, and something inside him shied away from her slight, armor-plated smile. She waited a moment, inviting him to continue, and his gaze dropped.

 

 

"I oelieve that's everything then, gentlemen," she said calmly, standing and tucking her cap under her arm. "Good day."

 

 

She walked out amid a dead, stunned silence.

 

 

CHAPTER NINE Ivan the Terrible

 

 

The VIP shuttle completed its approach run and settled on the landing platform with a sort of abrupt grace that would have looked inexplicably wrong to anyone who'd lived before the advent of reactiomess, inertia-canceling drives. Its hatch slid open and a solitary passenger emerged into the light of Galloway's sun.

 

 

Fleet Admiral Ivan Nikolayevich Antonov was of slightly more than average height but seemed shorter because of his breadth, thickness, and - the impression was unavoidable - density. His size, and the way he moved, suggested an unstoppable force of nature, which was precisely what his reputation said he was. But he stopped at the foot of the landing ramp and saluted, with great formality, the frail-looking old man in civilian clothes who headed the welcoming committee. One didn't ordinarily do that for a cabinet minister. but Howard Anderson was no ordinary cabinet minister.

 

 

"Well," Anderson growled, "you took your sweet time getting here, EYE-van."

 

 

"My orders specified `Extreme Urgency,' sir," the burly admiral replied in a rumbling, faintly accented basso. ` I had certain administrative duties to attend to before departure. but Captain Quirino is speculating about a new record for our route."

 

 

"So what are you doing standing around here now with your thumb up your ass?" was the peevish reply. The other dignitaries stiffened, and the painfully young ensign beside Anderson blanched. "Let's go below and make all the introductions at once. You already know Port Admiral Stevenson. he'll want to welcome you to The Yard." Ever since the First Interstellar War, the sprawling complex of Fleet shipyards and installations in the Jamieson Archipelago of Galloway's World had been called simply that.

 

 

"Certainly, sir," Antonov replied stonily.

 

 

Anderson led Antonov in mutual silence towards the luxuriously appointed office that had been set aside for his private use. The ensign who'd hovered at the old man'sshoulder throughout the formalities scurried ahead to the door, but Anderson reached out with his cane and poked him - far more gently than it looked - in the back.

 

 

"I'm not yet so goddamned feeble I can't open a door, Ensign Mauory!" His aide stopped dead, face flustered, and Anderson shook his head in exasperation. "All right, all right! I know you meant well, Andy."

 

 

"Yes, sir. I - "

 

 

"Admiral Antonov and I can settle our differences without a referee," Anderson said less brusquely. "Go annoy Yeoman Gonzales or something."

 

 

"Yes, sir." Mallory's confusion altered into a broad smile, and he hurried away. after punching the door button. Anderson growled something under his breath as the panel hissed open, waved Antonov through, and used his cane to lower himself into a deeply-padded chair.

 

 

"Puppy!" he snorted, then glanced at Antonov as he settled back. "Well, so much for your introductions - and thank God they're over!"

 

 

"Yes," Antonov agreed as he loosened his collar and shaped a course for the wet bar. "Upholding your image as an obnoxious old bastard must be almost as great a strain as serving as the public object of your disagree-ableness. Don't they keep any vodka here? Ah!" He neld up a bottle. "Stolychnaya, this far from Russia!" He looked around. "No pepper, though."

 

 

Anderson shuddered. Make mine bourbon," he called from the depths of his chair, "if there is any. Do you know," he went on, "what the problem's been with the TFN from its very inception?"

 

 

"No, but I have a feeling you're going to tell me."

 

 

"Too many goddamned Russkies in the command structure!" Anderson thumped the floor with his cane for emphasis. "I say you people are still Commies at heart!"

 

 

Anderson was one of the few people left alive who would even have understood the reference. But Antonov knew his history. His eyes, seemingly squeezed upward into slits by his high cheekbones in the characteristic Russian manner, narrowed still further as he performed a feat most of his colleagues would have flatly declared impossible: he grinned.

 

 

`Also too many capitalistic, warmongering Yankee imperialists," he intoned as he brought the drinks (and the vodka bottle). "Of which you are a walking - or, at least, tottering - museum exhibit! These last few years, you've actually begun to look a bit like. oh, what was the name of that mythological figure? Grandfather Sam?"

 

 

"Close enough," Anderson allowed with a grin of his own.

 

 

It was an old joke, and one with a grain of truth. The Federated Government of Earth, the Terran Federation's immediate ancestor, had created its own military organization after displacing the old United Nations at the end of the Great Eastern War. Twenty years later, China accelerated the process with her abortive effort to break free of the FGE. Not only did the China War have the distinction of being the last organized bloodletting on Old Terra, but it had encouraged the FGE to scale the old national armed forces back to merely symbolic formations. quickly.

 

 

Since the Chinese military had no longer existed, the Soviet Union and the United States had possessed the largest military establishments, and hence the largest number of abruptly unemployed professional officers. Inevitably, the paramilitary services that were later to become the TFN had come to include disproportionate numbers of Russians and the "American" ethnic melange in their upper echelons. Even now, after two and a half centuries of cultural blending had reduced the old national identities largely to a subject for affectation (on the Inner Worlds, at least), the descendants of the two groups were over-represented among the families in which Federation service was a tradition.

 

 

"I'm starting to feel about as old as a mythological figure," Anderson went on. "You're looking well, though."

 

 

It was true. Like other naval personnel who had declared their intention of emigrating to the Out Worlds later, Antonov had had access to the full course of anti-gerone treatments from an early age. At seventy-two standard years, he was physiologically a man in his early forties. He shrugged expressively and settled into the chair opposite Anderson's.

 

 

"I keep in condition. Or try to. For an admiral, it's about as hard as for this damned peacetime Fleet." He scowled momentarily, then gave Anderson a reproachful look. "But we're wasting perfectly good drinking time! Come on, Howard! Ty chto mumu yebyosh?" He raised his glass. "Za vashe zdorovye!"

 

 

They drank, Antonov tossing back his vodka and Anderson sipping his bourbon more cautiously, muttering something inaudible about doctors.

 

 

"That's another thing about you Russians. if you want to tell a man to drink up, why not just say so? `Why are you fucking a cow?' indeed! Well, I'll say this much for you: your language is rich in truly colorful idioms!"

 

 

"Rich in every way!" Antonov enthused, refilling his glass. "Ah, Howard, if only you knew the glories of our great, our incomparable literature - "

 

 

"I read a Russian novel once," Anderson cut in bleakly. "People with unpronounceable names did nothing for seven hundred and eighty-three pages, after which somebody's aunt died."

 

 

Antonov shook his head sorrowfully. "You are hopelessly nekulturny, Howard!"

 

 

"I'll kulturny you, you young upstart!" Anderson shot back with a twinkle. For an instant, the decades rolled away and it was the time of the Second Interstellar War, when Commander Nikolai Borisovich Antonov, his Operations officer, had learned of the birth of a son on the eve of the Second Battle of Ophiuchi Junction. They'd all had a little more to drink that night than they should have, but Nikolai had survived both the vodka and the battle. And toward the end of the Third Interstellar War, President Anderson had met Vice Admiral Antonov's newly commissioned son. who now sat across from Minister of War Production Anderson, tossing back his vodka so much like Nikolasha that for an instant it seemed.

 

 

Too many memories. We are not meant to live so long. Anderson shook himself. That's enough, you old fart! Next you'll be getting religious!

 

 

Antonov, watching more closely than he showed, sensed his change of mood, if not its cause. "How bad is it, really, Howard?" he asked quietly. "Even these days, the news is always out of date. I don't know much beyond what happened to Admiral Li."

 

 

"Then you know we've lost a third of the Fleet," Anderson responded grimly. "What you may not know yet, is that ONI's latest estimate, based on scanner reports from the Lorelei survivors, is that the Thebans actually deployed a fleet stronger than Chien-lu's was."

 

 

Antonov's eyes became very still, and Anderson nodded.

 

 

"Right. So far, we've actually observed twelve super-dreadnoughts, eighteen battleships, and twenty-odd cattle-cruisers, and I'm willing to bet there's more we haven't seen. They seem a bit weak in escort types, but that still gives them effective parity with our entire surviving battle-line, though we haven't seen any sign of carriers yet. On the other hand, we lost an even larger proportion of our carriers than we did of our battle-line, and, of course, they're concentrated with the interior position and the initiative. You can infer the strategic situation that leaves us with."

 

 

He pushed himself erect with his cane, reaching across the desk for a remote-control unit, and touched a outton. A wall vanished, giving way to a holographic display of warp lines.

 

 

"It's at least as bad as you think, Ivan." (Preoccupied, he forgot to mispronounce the name.) "At the rate the Thebans - whoever or whatever they are - have pushed on from Lorelei; they're two or three transits out in all directions by now. All our directions, that is; they've stopped well short of the Orion border fortifications for the moment. another mystery, but one complication we don't have to worry about. Yet." He fiddled with the control, producing a pair of cursors which indicated two systems: Griffin and Redwing. "Some of Chien-lu's survivors are still picketing the approaches, and the way they're spreading out is attenuating some of their numerical advantage, but we don't have anything with a prayer of stopping them short of The Line.

 

 

"Now for the good news, such as it is. Our Ophiuchi allies have agreed to help. They're not going to commit forces to actual combat against the Thebans - they're a long way off, and the proper role of a khimhok's allies is a pretty fuzzy area - -but they're arranging to take over some of our border obligations. That'll let us shift a lot of what's left of the Fleet to this sector, but it'll take time to concentrate our forces, and new construction is going to take even longer. For now, your `Second Fleet' will nave to depend largely on the mothballed units here at Galloway's World. such as they are. The big question concerns priorities in reactivating them." He raised an eyebrow, inviting comment.

 

 

"The Pegasus-class light carriers first," Antonov responded without hesitation. "And, of course, the reserve fighter squadrons."

 

 

"That decision didn't take long," Anderson remarked with a smile. "Are you certain? Those ships are as obsolete as dodoes, and they weren't anything much even in their day. Just very basic fighter platforms built early in ISW-3.

 

 

". for an emergency not unlike this one," Antonov finished for him. "As you've so rightly - and publicly - pointed out, my trip here took a while, so I've had time to think. Two points: first, we have more Pegasus class than anything else in the Reserve and they're relatively small. Coupled with their austerity, that means they can be reactivated more quickly than fleet carriers or battle-line units. and time is of the essence. We have to use what we have and what can be made ready in the next few weeks.

 

 

"The second point," he continued with a frown, "is a little more speculative. But from the courier drones Khardanish and Admiral Li were able to send off, it seems clear the Thebans don't have strikefighters and that Admiral Li, due to the circumstances in which he found himself, was unable to employ his fighters effectively. Taken together, these two facts suggest to me that the Thebans may not take fighters seriously. This attitude - while it lasts - could give us an advantage. But if we're to seize it, we have to deploy all the fighter assets we can in as short a time as possible."

 

 

"Very cogently put," Anderson approved. "As a matter of fact, I just wanted to hear your reasoning. which, it turns out, parallels mine. You must have noticed all the work going on in the orbital yards. The first three Pegasuses will recommission in a few days, with more on the way."

 

 

Antonov looked like a man who'd had one of several heavy weights lifted from his shoulders. "Actually, you forgot a couple of lines of good news." He smiled at Anderson's quizzical look. "Not even Russians are always gloomy, Howard. I'm referring to a few new developments which fortunately were already in the R&D pipeline. Captain Tsuchevsky's last post before joining my staff was assistant project officer on the strategic bombardment program to increase capital missile range, and he's given me a glowing report on the possibilities. Add that to this new missile with warp transit capability - whatever they've decided to call it - and the new warheads."

 

 

"Right, right," Anderson interrupted, "but you're going to have to nght your first battle without any of the new hardware."

 

 

"Understood. But you know the old saying about light at the end of the tunnel." He paused. "There'ssomething else that could mean even more to us. if it exists. In which case it's still classified `Rumor' even for a fleet admiral. But one does hear things about a new breakthrough in ECM." He left the statement hanging.

 

 

"So one does. I'll look into it and see if there'sanything to the rumor." Anderson was all blandness, and Antonov merely nodded. They understood each other.

 

 

"And now," Anderson said briskly, "there's someone I want you to meet." He touched another button. "Ask Lord Talphon to come in," he said.

 

 

Antonov's mouth didn't quite fall open, but his expression constituted the equivalent. Before he could formulate a question, a side door slid open to admit a tall Orion whose fur was the jet-black of the oldest noble bloodlines rather than the more usual tawny or russet shades. Antonov recognized his jeweled harness as being of the most expensive quality and noted the empty spots from which insignia of military rank had been removed.

 

 

"Admiral Antonov," Anderson said formally, "permit me to introduce Twenty-Third Small Claw of the Khan Kthaara'zarthan, Lord Talphon."

 

 

The massive admiral rose and performed the small bow one gave an Orion in lieu of a handshake.

 

 

"I am nonored to greet you, Admiral Antaanaaav," Kthaara said, returning his bow just as gravely.

 

 

His voice was deep for an Orion, giving an unusual, almost velvety rumble to the gutturals of ms language. Antonov was widely recognized as one of the TFN's "Tabby experts" - which, he knew, was one reason he'd I been tapped to command Second Fleet - and now hes avored Kthaara's patrician enunciation. Others might refer to the Orion language as "cat fights set to bagpipes" and bemoan the facts of evolution which made it impossible for the two species to reproduce the sounds of one another's languages, but not Antonov. He would have preferred to be able to speak Orion himself, but he differed from most of his fellows in the fact that he actually liked the sound of Orion voices. Which, Anderson had always maintained, was a perversion only to be expected from anyone who thought Russian was Old Terra's greatest language.

 

 

"Mister Aandersaahn is not altogether accurate concerning my status, however," Kthaara continued, "for I have resigned my commission, though it is true that I have been Lord Talphon and Khanhaku'a'zarthan since my cousin Khardanish died without issue."

 

 

Understanding dawned. "Please accept my condolences on the death of your cousin. He was a victim of treachery" - Antonov knew what that meant to an Orion - "but he died well."

 

 

"Thank you, Admiral," Kthaara reciprocated. "The circumstances of his death are the reason for my presence here, The Khan'a'khanaaeee's agreement to accept the Federation as khimhok satisfies the honor of our race, but I, as an individual and as Lord Talphon and - especially - as khanhaku of my clan, carry a special burden. Thus the Khan'a'khanaaeee has allowed me to set aside my military duties until this burden is lifted. I come to you as a private individual, to volunteer my services in the war against my cousin's killers!"