Melinda swallowed hard. Now, a meter away and no longer moving, she could finally make out the hawk-and-star insignia of a lieutenant colonel on his collar. "I'm sorry," she said, and meant it. "I didn't mean that the way it sounded."
For a moment he just stood there and let her flounder. Then-almost reluctantly, she thought-his lip twitched in a half smile. "Apology accepted," he said. "I'll meet you halfway: my choice of words could have been better, too. Let's try it again from the top, shall we? Welcome to Dorcas, Dr. Cavanagh. I'm Lieutenant Colonel Castor Holloway, commander of the Peacekeeper garrison here. My logistics officer tells me you came in with half a freighter load of supplies." He waved at the stacks of crates. "Obviously, he was correct. You can probably guess my next question."
"What's it all doing here?" Melinda suggested.
He smiled again. "Very good. And?"
Melinda studied him. Up close she could see he wasn't quite as young as she'd first thought. Somewhere in his late thirties, she decided, with eyes that looked considerably older than that. "I don't suppose I could tell you it was a private matter and that we should leave it at that."
Holloway shook his head. "Afraid not. You see, I pulled the record of your entry before I came down here. Apparently, you wanted permission to leave your freighter in orbit for a few days instead of bringing all this stuff down. That tells me that you don't intend any of these goodies for the fine citizens of our colony, but are simply using Dorcas as a transfer point."
Melinda nodded. He was sharp, all right. She would have to watch her words carefully. "You're right, we are," she said. "I'm meeting my brother Aric and some other men here in a day or two. All this is to be transferred to them." She fixed him with a stern look. "A task that would have been considerably easier if I'd been allowed to stay in orbit as I requested."
"An orbiting ship would also have instantly identified Dorcas as an inhabited planet if a Conqueror scout happened to mesh into the system," Holloway pointed out. "Or orbiting hardware of any sort-you may have noticed the absence of any communications or nav/weather satellites on your way in. I'm sorry if you were inconvenienced; but as I've already mentioned, this is a war zone. There's no point in being more of a sitting duck than we already are." He cocked an eyebrow. "All of which leads to another obvious question. Why Dorcas?"
Melinda shook her head. "I'm afraid I can't tell you that."
"I'm afraid you'll have to," Holloway countered. "Mid-space freight transfers might be a common sight at Earth or Bergen, but not at out-of-the-way spots like Dorcas. One might suppose you had some, shall we say, less than legal transaction in mind."
"Oh, come on," Melinda scoffed. "There are a million and a half cubic light-years of empty space out there for people to shuffle ships around in. Why in the world would anyone choose an inhabited planet to transfer illegal goods at? Especially a planet in the middle of a major Peacekeeper operation?"
"That's a good question," Holloway agreed. "That, along with the time crunch in general, is what's kept this supply dump of yours intact instead of disassembled and run through an extra-fine sand sifter. I'll ask it again: why Dorcas?"
Melinda sighed. "All right," she said. "The truth is that Aric and I are assisting a high-ranking Peacekeeper officer with a somewhat delicate and rather unofficial operation. It involves the space near Dorcas; hence, this is where we rendezvous."
"Very impressive words," Holloway said. "You have any substance to go along with them?"
"If you mean official authorizations, I'm afraid not," Melinda said, trying to keep the hesitation tearing at her throat from showing in her voice. Making up lies on the fly wasn't something a surgical design consultant's career had adequately prepared her for. "As I said, the operation is somewhat delicate. I was told that as long as we didn't request assistance from local Peacekeeper forces, we wouldn't have any trouble with them."
"Were you, now," Holloway said. "Rather naive thinking on someone's part. Have you any documents at all? Of any type?"
"No." She hesitated; but she could think of only one card she could still play. "If you want confirmation, you'll have to contact Peacekeeper Command directly."
He cocked an eyebrow. "Peacekeeper Command. As high as that?"
Melinda nodded. "Possibly even higher."
Holloway bowed his head slightly. "You've piqued my interest, Doctor. I believe I'll take you up on your suggestion. Anyone in particular I should direct the message to?"
The point of no return was well behind her. Bracing herself, Melinda took the plunge. "Send it directly to Admiral Rudzinski's office."
Holloway's eyebrows lifted. "Rudzinski himself, eh? You're definitely running in a higher circle than I would have guessed."
"Just make the message brief," Melinda said, sternly ordering her stomach to behave itself. If Holloway called her bluff and actually sent an inquiry to Earth, she was going to be in a swirl of trouble about seventy hours from now. But the option was to be in the equivalent depth of trouble right now... and in seventy hours Aric and Quinn, at least, should be safely off Dorcas and out of reach of official wrath. "The admiral has a lot of other matters to deal with."
"I shall be the soul of brevity," Holloway promised in what he probably intended to be a seventeenth-century Shakespearian British accent. "As well as the soul of discretion. In case it turns out that Rudzinski actually has heard of you."
"Will that be all, then?" Melinda asked, ignoring the not-very-veiled suggestion that she was in fact lying through her teeth about all this.
"For now," Holloway said. "Oh, there's one other thing. About half an hour ago now, we had a freighter mesh in that was piggybacking what seems to be an old Moray-class long-range battle fueler. Yours?"
From his tone it was pretty clear he already knew the answer. "Probably," she said. "Didn't they transmit a destination invoice?"
"Of course," Holloway said calmly. "I was just looking for confirmation." He nodded toward the crates. "I presume all this will be going aboard. I'll give orders for it to land as close to you as possible."
"Thank you," Melinda said.
"No charge." Holloway glanced at his watch. "If you'll excuse me, I have a great deal of other work to do. Be sure to bring your brother around when he arrives, Dr. Cavanagh. I'd very much like to meet him."
He nodded again and, executing a neat about-face, made his way out the way he'd come. "Right," Melinda murmured under her breath. "I'm sure he'd love to meet you, too."
The fueler came down alone, moving awkwardly in the unaccustomed environment of a planetary atmosphere and gravity well. Melinda held her breath as it wobbled its way toward the landing field, but the pilot evidently knew what he was doing and made it without turning stern up and driving into the ground. Bypassing the usual runways-the fueler had no landing gear to speak of-it curved up into half a loop, and with a roar and splash of Icefire dropped neatly onto its stern at the edge of the field closest to Melinda's rented warehouse.
The Icefire dissipated, and the twisting coronal glow around the edge-effect airfoils faded away, and Melinda started breathing again as she looked it over. The ship was a model of simplicity, little more than a large, slightly flattened cylinder with eight docking ports along its sides and a coupling port at the bow that enabled it to link up with larger ships or other fuelers. The space-normal Icefire drive at the stern was complemented by a Chabrier stardrive at the bow, with the compressed living quarters and control section in the center. Halfway up along the side facing her was a hatchway with an open-air lift-cage track running the length of the ship beside it, and as Melinda walked toward the fueler, a storage compartment near the hatchway opened and the lift cage rotated out and onto the track. It started down, arriving at the base of the fueler the same time she did.
She got in, and the cage started back up. Up close the fueler seemed smaller than she had expected it to be, especially considering that it was supposed to serve as both living quarters and mobile supply dump for sixteen men and their f
ighters. She wondered if Aric, who had once loudly complained about having to share a hotel room with his brother, really understood what he was getting himself into.
Like the rest of the ship, the hatchway and narrow corridors beyond it had been designed for free fall. Negotiating them in full gravity was something of a challenge, but with some stretching and ingenuity Melinda managed it without too much trouble. Passing through the cracker-box wardroom and half-cracker-box galley, she reached the control room.
It was empty.
She frowned. The pilot ought to be here, running through the check-down procedure. "Hello?" she called.
"Hello, Dr. Cavanagh," a disembodied voice replied from a section of the control board. "My name is Max. Welcome aboard."
"Thank you," Melinda said. So that was why the fueler was two days behind the tentative schedule her father had set for its arrival here. The old fox had thrown her a little twist. "Excuse my surprise. I was expecting to find a human pilot."
"I was apparently an afterthought of Lord Cavanagh's," the computer said. "It occurred to him that having someone of my capabilities aboard might prove beneficial to the mission."
"I'm sure it will be," Melinda agreed. "I'm afraid I'm a little unfamiliar with the CavTronics line of semisentients. May I ask which series you are?"
"I'm one of the Carthage-Ivy group," he said. "Carthage-Ivy-Gamma, if you need the full database designation."
"That's with, what, Class Six decision-making capabilities?"
"Class Seven," he corrected her. "I understand-"
"How about logic structures?"
"Modified Korngold-Che decay-driven randomized," Max said. "If you're truly interested, Dr. Cavanagh, all my specifications are on file. I understand you've brought the supplies for the expedition?"
"Yes," Melinda said, trying to hide a smile. That was a CavTronics computer, all right. Perpetually driven crazy by what he saw as self-absorbed conceit on the part of other companies' parasentient computers, her father had deliberately programmed the Carthage series with a strong reluctance to talk about themselves.
She glanced across the control board, her smile fading. The computer wasn't the only alteration her father had made in the fueler's original equipment. There, to the side of the main display, was a newly installed Mindlink jack for Quinn to use. Quinn, who had once stated at NorCoord Parliament hearings that he never again wanted to use the Mindlink that the Copperhead surgeons had built into his brain.
"Dr. Cavanagh?" Max prompted.
With an effort Melinda brought her attention back to the immediate task at hand. It made sense, of course, under the circumstances. But still, somehow, it seemed out of character with the quiet respect for other people she'd always associated with her father. Perhaps he was capable of a more hard-edged pragmatism than she'd ever realized. "Everything's over in that warehouse just to the north of here," she told Max.
"I trust you brought plenty of fuel," the computer said. "I wasn't expecting to have to land and take off again from here."
"Neither was I," Melinda said. "We'll just have to hope there's enough for what Aric and Quinn need."
"There is an alternative," he suggested. "My accompanying freighter is presumably carrying fuel reserves. Lord Cavanagh instructed its captain to withdraw from Dorcas as soon as I was in position, but under the circumstances you could presumably countermand that order."
"No, you'd better let him go," Melinda said. "The local Peacekeeper commander doesn't want ships sitting in orbit any longer than they have to."
"You could order it to land."
"And have the crew sitting around where Colonel Holloway can pump them for information?" Melinda shook her head. "No, thanks."
"I understand." There was a brief pause. "The freighter has been instructed to carry out its previous orders."
"All right," Melinda said, glancing around the control room and locating the spare module storage compartments. "I can handle most of the small stuff myself. For the crates and tanks, we'll need lifters and people to operate them. I'll get back to the warehouse and start the ball rolling." She turned to go-
"Just a moment," Max said suddenly. "I'm picking up a signal that appears to be in one of Lord Cavanagh's private codes."
"Is it Dad?" Melinda asked, squeezing through the cramped space to the command chair. His errand on Mra-mig must have gone faster than he'd expected.
"No," Max said. "It's Mr. Aric Cavanagh. I've answered his hail and set the decoder. Here he is."
The soft hum of a carrier signal came on. "Melinda?" Aric's voice came.
"I'm here, Aric," she called. "Welcome to Dorcas."
"Pleased to be here," he said dryly. "After twenty-six hours in a fighter, it's going to be nice to be able to turn around without bumping into something."
"Don't get too used to it," she warned him. "This fueler hasn't got a lot more room than that cockpit has."
"Dr. Cavanagh, this is Quinn," a new voice cut in. "I read you as moving away from the planet. Is something wrong?"
"That's not me," Melinda said. "That's the freighter that brought the fueler in. The fueler and supplies are here on the ground."
"On theground?" Quinn repeated. "I wanted them in orbit."
"I wasn't given that option," she told him. "No ships are allowed to stay in orbit longer than two hours. Peacekeeper orders."
There was a long moment of silence. "Not good," Quinn said at last. "Not good at all."
"What's the matter?" Aric asked. "Can't the fueler lift off the ground?"
"It can lift just fine," Quinn said grimly. "That's not the problem. With it sitting on the ground like that, we won't be able to stencil on the proper insignia and numbers without everyone around seeing us do it."
"Ouch," Aric said. "You're right. And if we don't get it painted, those incoming Copperheads are going to ask some awkward questions."
"Which we don't have answers for," Quinn said. "We'll have to think of something to do about that. Dr. Cavanagh, did you get everything on the list I gave you?"
"Yes, it's all here," Melinda said, frowning. "Did you say incomingCopperheads?"
"We'll explain later," Quinn said. "Our first job is to get the supplies aboard the fueler. You get started, Doctor; we'll be down in about an hour to give you a hand. We need to be finished by morning-the rest of the fighters could be here as early as noon tomorrow."
"I'll get right on it," Melinda promised. "Watch out for the local Peacekeeper commander-a Lieutenant Colonel Holloway. He's not stupid, and he's already halfway to locking this whole thing down on general principles."
"Don't worry, I know how to handle officers like that," Quinn assured her. "You just get the loading started."
"All right. I'll see you soon."
The carrier went dead. "I have the local communication frequencies identified, Dr. Cavanagh," Max said. "Would you like me to contact someone about hiring workers?"
"Thank you, but no," Melinda said, prying herself out of the chair and clawing her way to the control-room door. "We're drawing enough attention as it is without people finding out we've got a Carthage-Ivy here. You just stay quiet and run some checks on the fueler's systems. We may have to get this thing off the ground on ten minutes' notice."
"Now, here's the north end of the canyon, coming in low from the east," Major Takara said, keying the tactical display for the next view. "If you look closely-right there-you can see where we've burned the softer rock out from under that granite crest. Shredder gun nests here, here, and here; rocket launchers under these overhangs; dazzler projectors up on the crest here and over here."
Holloway nodded. It wasn't anything like an ideal textbook defensive setup, but it was light-years better than anything they'd had when that watchship had burned through on its way to Earth sixteen days ago. "You've done good work, Fuji," he said.
"Thanks, but we've still got a long way to go," Takara said. "I just hope the Conquerors are considerate enough to actually invade. I'd hate to have gone
to all this effort and then have to sit there while they fry the planet from orbit."
"If you're going to wish for something, wish for them to miss the Commonwealth completely," Holloway said tartly. "All right, what's left to do?"
"Here, not much. We've just about finished with that soft rock layer-everything else seems to be solid granite. I figure we'll have enough room for the command post and medical facilities, plus as much of the supply cache as we can squeeze in."
"Leaving the bulk of the civilians out in the cold."
"And the bulk of the garrison, too," Takara conceded. "That geologist group is still hunting for more of those soft rock intrusions or whatever they're called, and if they find any, we'll be happy to burn out more of these half-cave things. But chances are everyone's going to have to make do with tents and shelters.