Warden paused in midstride to stare at the DA director. “‘Apotheosis’?”
Hashi grinned smugly. “You will understand that I required a word which he would be unlikely to hear from anyone but us.”
That was true. But still—apotheosis?
With an effort Warden pushed himself into motion again.
Hashi’s respiration began to show the strain of matching Warden’s pace.
“Another, similar command will free him from all restriction in his response to UMCP—or UMC—personnel. Hearing the word ‘vasectomy’ will enable him to harm or kill anyone who interferes with him. Anyone at all.”
“‘Vasectomy’?” Warden shook his head in bemusement. “Well, damn it, Hashi. Sometimes I’m forced to admire your sense of humor. I just can’t help myself.”
He had no idea whether or not Hashi’s failsafes would do him any good; but he approved of them anyway. He could imagine—or pray for—circumstances—
“Is there more?” he inquired.
“Just one,” Hashi replied shortly. He appeared to lack the breath for complex sentences. “The word ‘sepulcher’ will invoke self-destruct. His zone implants will fry his brain to jelly.”
Warden winced. He’d already done Angus too much hurt: he didn’t like to think that he might be forced to go further.
Unfortunately he could imagine worse fates.
Boarding Calm Horizons alone might be one of them. Despite Marc Vestabule’s promises, the Amnion had nothing to gain by releasing him.
How much of Vestabule’s human capacity for treachery did the Amnioni remember?
That question gave the fears feeding in his chest new teeth. He checked his pockets to be sure he still had his breathing mask and capsule. Then he focused on the simple, arduous task of walking steadily until he reached the docks and his shuttle hangar.
His shuttle was ready: he headed straight toward it as if all the doubt and hesitation had been eaten out of him. At the airlock of the craft, however, he stopped; turned. For a moment he faced Hashi squarely.
With his crew, the dock personnel, and UMCPED Security as witnesses, he announced, “Director Lebwohl, you’re in command while I'm away. Your orders are—” He shrugged, tried to smile. “Well, just don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” Then he added more sternly, “And don’t talk to Holt Fasner. He’s my boss, not yours. If he wants to throw his weight around, he’ll have to do it with me in person.”
Hashi didn’t reply. He also didn’t salute. Instead he answered with an old, oddly formal bow-the elaborate sweep-and-flourish of a courtier, or a comrade-in-arms.
That was all the comfort Warden took with him as he entered his shuttle and gave the order to leave dock.
KOINA
The PR director’s shuttle was halfway to Earth when UMCPHQ reported that a Behemoth-class Amnion defensive had encroached on the orbital platform’s control space.
The crew of the shuttle, Koina’s PR communications techs, and her ED Security guards received the broadcast simultaneously on separate channels. At once the crew routed their reception to the passenger cabin so that everyone could hear it. After the first shock, however, Deputy Chief Forrest Ing—again assigned to ensure the PR director’s safety—ordered the cabin speakers silenced. “If you pipe that back here,” he told the crew sharply, “we won’t be able to hear ourselves think.” Instead, he and the PR techs passed around PCRs so that the passengers could listen to UMCPHQ’s transmissions and still talk to each other.
For a time, however, no one said anything. They listened in an eerie quiet, as if they were transfixed or hypnotized. The crisis was too great to be discussed—or questioned. Over and over again Koina opened her mouth, but no words came out. There seemed to be no words she could afford to utter.
A Behemoth-class Amnion defensive had arrived with too much velocity too close to UMCPHQ. Earlier the station had shifted to a geosynchronous orbit over Suka Bator. Now the huge defensive decelerated straight for it as if she were aimed like a shaft of coherent ruin at Warden Dios’ heart.
Koina couldn’t think of anything to say except, What am I going to do now? Dear God, what am I going to do?
Suddenly the mission on which Warden had sent her to Earth looked like the biggest mistake of his life. Right now was the worst conceivable moment for her to begin exposing the UMCP’s derelictions and malfeasances. It didn’t matter that Holt Fasner was the true target of her attack: Warden would suffer for it long before its implications reached the Dragon. And the hostile warship was armed with super-light proton cannon. Therefore anything which undermined Warden Dios also threatened the UMCP and Suka Bator and all of humankind. If Earth’s defenses were prevented from responding effectively, the Amnioni’s cannon could dismantle most of the planet.
Now where did Koina’s duty lie?
She had no idea.
She ought to say something. She was the highest-ranking person aboard. Her own people, if not Forrest Ing’s and the crew, would take their reactions from her. She was PR, wasn’t she? Surely it was her job to provide information or explanation; put events in perspective; indicate direction? What else was a “public relations” interface for?
But she couldn’t imagine how to go about it. She didn’t know what she was going to do.
In which case, she asked herself bitterly, what in hell was she for?
Fortunately Deputy Chief Ing’s reaction was of a different kind altogether. He listened hard to his PCR for several minutes. Then he breathed in amazement and pride, “I swear to God, Director Dios must have seen this coming.”
He spoke quietly; but his voice was audible throughout the cabin. Half a dozen techs and guards jerked around to look at him as if he’d offered them some kind of hope.
His tone was so unlike Koina’s stunned fear that it surprised her out of her paralysis. Although the doubt in her mouth threatened to choke her, she swallowed it.
“What do you mean?” she asked softly.
Forrest scowled with concentration. Apparently he was determined to miss no moment of UMCPHQ’s broadcast. He didn’t keep her waiting for a reply, however.
“When Valdor’s drone first came in, Director Dios deployed a cordon of gunboats and pocket cruisers all around the planet. He called Sledgehammer, sent flares for Valor and Adventurous.”
This was common knowledge, but Koina didn’t interrupt to say so. She hardly noticed that Ing had sloughed off his usual meticulous courtesy. Under the circumstances, he had no deference to spare for civilians.
“None of us understood,” he said. “We thought he was just being cautious. We never imagined something like this. But he must have. We’re as ready as we could possibly be without knowing which side an attack might come from.”
The Deputy Chief closed his eyes like a man visualizing trajectories and vectors. “Center is pulling the cordon into position,” he went on. “Sledgehammer has been ordered to burn. So has Adventurous. Valor will be here soon. If that defensive doesn’t attack and run, she’ll find herself in a crossfire she can’t escape. We’ll get hurt—but she’ll be dead.”
“Hurt?” Koina protested without thinking. “She has a proton cannon, for God’s sake. She can destroy UMCPHQ. She can destroy Suka Bator. Do you call that ‘hurt’?”
“All right,” Ing growled vehemently. “We’ll get hurt bad. But she’ll still be dead.”
He took a deep breath to calm himself. “Anyway,” he added with less force, “she hasn’t fired. God knows why. And the longer she waits, the less damage she’ll do before we get her.”
Intuitively Koina knew why. The defensive had entered human space in order to kill Trumpet. But the warship had failed. So she must have made the logical assumption that Trumpet—and Punisher—would return to Earth from Massif-5. The Amnioni had come to intercept them. She wouldn’t attack, wouldn’t risk her own death, until she’d made another attempt on the gap scout.
That odd piece of certainty did nothing to ease Koina’s indecision.
>
Now that she’d spoken, however, she was no longer stuck. Gathering her resources, she turned to one of the PR techs. “Get me a channel to Center, would you? I think I should check in.”
“Right away, Director.” At once the woman began tapping keys on the small box which linked the PR director to UMCPHQ.
The demands on the station’s dishes must have been staggering. The tech had to reenter her commands—and invoke Koina’s full authority—several times before she was able to report, “Channel’s open, Director.” Quickly she handed Koina a throat pickup.
Koina pressed the pickup to the side of her larynx and announced with as much firmness as she could muster, “This is Protocol Director Koina Hannish.”
“Center, Director Hannish,” an impersonal voice replied in her ear. “Forgive the delay. We have our hands full.”
“I know you do, Center.” Koina spoke distinctly to cut through Center’s background hubbub. “I don’t want to make your life even more complicated. I assume that Director Dios doesn’t have time to talk to me. But I need to ask whether he has any instructions for me. Any message at all?”
Forrest Ing frowned in her direction as if she confused him—as if he thought everything had been made clear—but he didn’t question her.
“Just a moment, Director.” Koina heard the distant flurry of a keypad. Then Center’s voice came back to her PCR. “Yes, Director Hannish.” The man sounded so far away that he might have been buried in a crypt. “There is a message.” If the defensive opened fire, UMCPHQ was doomed. Most of the people Koina knew or loved would die in a conflagration of unnatural physics. “Director Dios didn’t ask us to send it out,” the man explained. He may have been apologizing. “It’s coded to be given to you when you call in.”
“I understand, Center,” she returned, although she didn’t understand at all. “Go on.”
“Here it is, Director.” No doubt the man was peering at a readout. “It says, ‘Nothing has changed. Go ahead.’ “The voice paused, then added, “I’m sorry, Director. That’s all.”
“It’s enough,” Koina pronounced. She didn’t want anyone in Center—or anyone around her—to know that her heart was failing. “Thank you.”
She looked at her tech and nodded. When the woman had closed the channel, however, Koina didn’t return the pickup. Instead she rested her head on the back of her g-seat and tried to pull her torn emotions back together.
Nothing has changed. Go ahead.
It’s enough.
No, it wasn’t. Not at all. It told her only that Warden hadn’t changed his mind. It did nothing to resolve her dilemma.
Despite the fact that an alien warship had taken him by the throat, he still wanted her to destroy him. Even though humankind’s ability to wage war might collapse in the process.
Surely it was wrong to do this now?
The GCES would be terrified: she knew that. Certain Members would retain the ability to think and plan and serve. The rest would turn frantic. The threat of mutation had that effect, even on men and women who were normally stable. More than anything else the Members would want protection. And if the effectiveness of the UMCP was compromised, they would inevitably look to Holt Fasner for their defense; to the broader, but less tangible strength of the UMC.
In the name of God! It was possible that Fasner would emerge from this crisis as the Dictator for Life of all human space.
Yet how could she, Koina Hannish, justify disobeying the direct orders of her director? Especially when what Warden had told her to do was: tell the truth?
Any choice she made might have appalling consequences. She didn’t know how to think them through.
She needed help.
It would be dangerous—if not irresponsible—to explain her problem to anyone. Nevertheless she decided to take the risk. She was floundering on her own; getting nowhere. If she didn’t do something, she might slip back into paralysis.
With an effort, she lifted her head.
“One more call,” she told her tech. “I need to talk to the UWB Senior Member. Captain Sixten Vertigus.”
The woman was distracted by UMCPHQ’s voice in her ear; wild-eyed and vague at the same time. Automatically she said, “Right away, Director.” But when she turned to her keypad, she seemed to have forgotten how to use it. Her hands fumbled as she began to route a transmission.
Koina didn’t try to hurry the tech. She knew how the woman felt. While she waited, she thought about what she could hazard saying to Sixten Vertigus.
The Captain was old; almost ancient: half the time he was barely awake. But he was the only person Koina could think of who might understand her dilemma. He valued the UMCP. He hated the UMC and Holt Fasner. And he believed in the Council’s responsibility for humankind’s future.
Abruptly Forrest Ing leaned toward her from his g-seat. “I don’t think you should do that, Director.”
At least he’d remembered to call her by her title.
As she looked over at him—at his hard face and his soldier’s eyes—she realized something that she’d never grasped before. He was capable of killing his enemies. Of spending lives in order to do his job. All of Min Donner’s people seemed to have bloodshed somewhere in their minds.
“Why not?” she asked noncommittally.
He took the PCR from his ear as if to show that he was serious. “We can’t guarantee you a secure channel,” he explained. “Not under these conditions. UMCPHQ can’t spare the downlink capacity to relay it for us, and we aren’t equipped to do it ourselves.” He seemed to have a prescient knowledge of what she wanted to talk to Captain Vertigus about. Chief Mandich must have briefed him thoroughly. “Somebody might tap in, overhear you.”
His concern took her by surprise. “Who would bother?” she objected. “My God, Forrest, there’s a Behemoth-class Amnion defensive armed with super-light proton cannon coming down on UMCPHQ. Right now the whole planet is at stake—and Warden Dios is the only one who can do anything about that. Who’s going to care who I talk to, or what I talk about?”
This was what she needed: someone to argue with; someone to get mad at. That energy would help her think.
The Deputy Chief shrugged; but he didn’t back down. “Cleatus Fane?”
He was right, of course. No doubt Holt Fasner would tackle the crisis of the Amnion warship personally. His First Executive Assistant’s mandate would be to deal with the Council—and with Koina. She couldn’t afford to be dissuaded, however.
“Then distract him,” she retorted with an edge to her voice. “While I’m talking to Captain Vertigus, you call him. Tell him you’re calling for me. Tell him—oh, I don’t know”—she fluttered her hands—“tell him I want to be sure he’ll attend the emergency session. Make it sound ominous, like I’m trying to scare him. If you get his attention, I’ll probably be safe.”
“All right.” Once again Forrest had abandoned deference. “I’ll do it. But I have to tell you—” He shifted still closer to her; pitched his voice so low that he might have been whispering. “ED Security is working its ass off to get the evidence Director Dios wants for you. If you compromise that, we won’t take it lying down.”
He touched an unexpected spring of anger in her. “Don’t insult me, Deputy Chief,” she snapped quietly. “Protocol is my job, not yours. Director Dios has given me my orders. How I carry them out is between him and me.”
He didn’t argue the point; but he kept his hard gaze on her as he jacked his PCR back into his ear and told his own communications tech to put him in touch with Cleatus Fane.
“Director,” Koina’s tech offered tentatively, “I have a channel. Captain Vertigus is waiting.”
“Thank you.”
With her heart throbbing anxiously, Koina set the small pickup to her throat and pushed herself as far as she could into the illusory privacy of her g-seat.
The pickup’s sensitivity was her only real protection against the ears around her. It could read the vibrations of her larynx even when s
he subvocalized every word.
As loudly as she dared, she murmured, “Captain Vertigus, it’s Koina Hannish.”
No one else could hear her PCR. Nevertheless his response seemed dangerously loud. He might have been shouting.
“My dear Koina, you astonish me.” Despite the tremors of age, his tone was strangely cheerful. Perhaps he liked emergencies. They may have helped him stay awake. “My own aides hardly notice me with all this going on. How does it happen that you can afford the time to call?”
Apparently he didn’t expect an answer. “Are you all right?” he went on. “You sound strained.” Then he chuckled dryly. “As if anyone doesn’t these days.”
She huddled into herself; but that isolation was as illusory as the protection of her g-seat. She felt small and vulnerable as she breathed, “I need to talk to you, Captain. I need advice.”
“That’s absurd,” he replied at once. “I’ve never met a woman who needed advice less than you do. Certainly not mine.”
“I’m serious, Sixten.” Koina found it difficult to insist in a whisper. Speaking softly seemed to emphasize her weakness. She had a command decision to make—and no experience to guide her. “I don’t know what to do.”
He sighed. Volume alone made him sound vexed; disdainful. “Then I suppose you’d better tell me what’s troubling you.”
As soon as he offered to listen, she began temporizing. “This line isn’t secure.” Even now she feared to name her concerns. “Do you know if anyone can hear us on your end?”
“My dear Koina,” he drawled with bitter humor, “I’m Captain Vertigus—the Captain Vertigus. I’m notorious for being old and irrelevant. In any case, I’m usually napping. Nobody here wastes time listening to me.”