His sarcasm cut through some of her anxiety. She didn’t want to act like a maudlin waif. She needed to be stronger.
“Well, that’s not true, anyway,” she replied more firmly. “After the last session,” when the UWB Senior Member had introduced his Bill of Severance, “Cleatus Fane would probably kill to know what you’ll do next.”
He didn’t rise to her riposte. Instead he prompted, “So what’s on your mind?”
Go on, she ordered herself. Do it. If she couldn’t trust Captain Sixten Vertigus, she couldn’t trust anyone. Certainly not herself.
“This is hard to say,” she began slowly. “There’s too much at stake.
“Of course you know what’s going on. You’re receiving the downlink from UMCPHQ,” not to mention data from Earth’s scan net. “Obviously the situation is bad enough as it is. But it could get a lot worse.” She faltered, then pushed ahead. “The timing of this incursion gives me a problem.
“I have some rather explosive information. Information that damns the UMCP.” She barely had enough strength—or enough conviction—to say the words. “And just about does the same to Holt Fasner.”
“Is it about kazes, Koina?” Sixten interrupted.
“Some of it is,” she admitted warily. Without substantial confirmation from ED Security and DA, Hashi Lebwohl’s accusation against the UMC CEO was purely inferential. “The rest is worse. For us, anyway.”
“And—” he urged.
“I was going to tell the Council about it. Dump it all in your collective laps. When this emergency session was first called, all we had to consider was an act of war around Massif-5. But now the Amnion aren’t out there somewhere. They’re right on top of us.
“I’m afraid”—she made an effort to speak clearly—“it’ll be a disaster if I start unpacking our dirty laundry under these conditions. I’m afraid I’ll cause a disaster.”
“How?” Captain Vertigus sounded distant, as if he were already thinking of something else.
She started to explain. “I’m afraid—”
Abruptly he cut her off. “Never mind. Forget I asked. I don’t want to know.” Without transition he was no longer willing to hear her. “You’ll have to forgive me, Director Hannish. I’ve got work to do.”
His dismissal stung her; his manner stung. “Wait a minute,” she demanded. “What work?” As soon as she heard the scorn in her voice, however, she tried to recall it. “I don’t mean to belittle the importance of what you do. But hasn’t this ‘work’ come up rather suddenly?”
Don’t push me away—not now. Not without telling me why.
Sixten sighed again. As if he were answering her question, he said, “Maybe you didn’t think of this.” Her PCR seemed to multiply his asperity. “Warden Dios is untouchable right now. He can’t be countermanded or overruled. The only legal way to stop him is to fire him—if anybody would be crazy enough to do that at a time like this. The ‘war powers’ provisions of the UMCP charter give him all the authority he needs. He can do any damn thing he wants.”
“Not quite,” Koina retorted. Sixten’s unexpected withdrawal left her acid and angry. “I’m familiar with the law, Captain Vertigus. The GCES can’t restrain or countermand the UMCP director. But the UMCP charter can still be revoked. The Council could do it today.” Crazy or not, Holt Fasner could fire Warden, if the Council couldn’t. “And if I expose our secrets right now the situation could get that bad.”
Who do you think will take Warden’s place? Who can?
But the old Member refused to be pulled back to what she needed. “I’m sure you’ll make the right decision,” he said unhelpfully. “You’re a big girl, Koina. You can do your job.”
Damn it, Sixten! she wanted to shout. You aren’t like this. What’s going on?
Who’s listening?
But she couldn’t ask him that. It might be dangerous—
While she wrestled with her distress, he spoke again.
“There’s just one thing I’m worried about,” he offered impersonally, as if he were discussing the weather with a stranger. “We have a rumor going around. Even I heard it, so it’s probably true. Apparently Special Counsel Maxim Igensard has been sharpening his ax. And he’s enlisted a whole platoon of Members to help him swing it. He even has Sen Abdullah’s proxy.
“I’m not afraid of your information—whatever it is. But that ax of Maxim’s scares me. If anyone can turn this session into a disaster, he can.”
Sixten’s tone sharpened. “Don’t play his game, Koina. Make him play yours.”
Then the Senior Member withdrew again. “If my aides hadn’t all gone stupid with fear and distraction,” he remarked sardonically, “I wouldn’t be required to do any work. But they have. And in any case I don’t trust them. So it’s up to me.
“I need to get ready to reintroduce that Bill of Severance.”
His manner confused her: for a moment she didn’t grasp the import of what he said.
“See you soon,” he finished.
He was gone. Her PCR went dead before she could think of a reply.
Reintroduce—? She had the impression that she hadn’t heard him right. Reintroduce that Bill—?
Too late, she caught up with him.
Automatically she took the PCR from her ear, handed the earplug and throat pickup to her tech. There was no point in listening to UMCPHQ’s broadcast: Center’s reports had stopped making sense to her. Reintroduce—? She couldn’t tear her mind away from the sheer audacity of Sixten’s intentions.
“Did you get what you wanted, Director?” Forrest Ing asked. His tone suggested discipline rather than politeness.
She shook her head, not in denial, but in amazement. “He was too far ahead of me,” she said unevenly. “If he was younger—and knew what we know—he could probably handle this mess without us. We wouldn’t even need to be there.”
But Sixten Vertigus did need her: she knew that. He didn’t have a prayer of succeeding; not against Cleatus Fane’s corruption and Maxim Igensard’s ambitions. Not unless she carried out Warden’s orders. And even then it might go for nothing, unless Chief Mandich and Hashi Lebwohl did their jobs in time.
Indirectly the UWB Senior Member had helped her. Somehow he’d changed the nature of the stakes she was playing for in Warden Dios’ name.
MORN
With Morn Hyland in command, Davies on guard, and Mikka Vasaczk supervising helm, Punisher made her damaged way across the void in the direction of the Earth.
Despite her injuries, the cruiser could have covered the distance more swiftly than she did. But Morn refused to allow Emmett on helm to use more than one g-thrust for course adjustments or acceleration. You’ve been through hell, she told Min Donner. So have we. We all need the rest.
That slowed their progress. Simply bringing the vessel around to a heading for Earth required several hours. And without more velocity Punisher’s gap crossings were truncated: she had to translate herself across deep space more often, in smaller increments.
Finally she was hampered by the navigational instability caused by her core displacement. Here again Morn gave orders which reduced the cruiser’s accuracy and cost time: she maintained internal spin when Punisher went into tach. This was dangerous under any circumstances. Internal spin increased the ship’s inertia, which diminished her responsiveness. She became more vulnerable to surprises when she resumed tard. But now the hazards were multiplied by the fact that her core no longer spun true. Her orientation in her own gap field was subtly altered: her crossings often produced navigational errors of 200,000—or even 400,000—kilometers. Helm had to compensate for each discrepancy before the ship could risk her gap drive again.
This decision Morn explained as she had the other: There’s no hurry. We’re tired, we need normal g. And that was true. Human bodies were bred for g. The lack of it exhausted them.
In addition, this region of space had been charted many times. And Punisher was off the main lanes, unlikely to encounter another ship
. The chances of a surprise were small.
The rest of her reasons Morn kept to herself.
So time and the cold deep ticked ponderously by, full of leaden waiting. For reasons of his own, Angus was busy aboard Trumpet, assisted by the improbable combination of Captain Ubikwe and Ciro. The rest of Morn’s companions—Davies, Mikka, Vector—occupied themselves as best they could.
From a discreet distance, Davies kept an uneasy watch on Min Donner. He’d resolved the denials which had alienated him from Morn earlier: he was committed to her now. Doggedly he did what he could to protect her.
Nevertheless his position aboard Punisher created a conflict of another kind for him. Morn knew that, even though he hadn’t said anything about it. Most of his mind was still filled with her memories, conditioned by her experiences. And that part of him hadn’t been complicated by the particular changes which she’d experienced since his force-grown birth. For him, treating Min Donner as an enemy must have hurt like an act of self-violence.
Morn knew how he felt. She knew it too well.
But he had a separate problem as well, one which she only understood because she’d spent so much time under the control of her zone implant. His heightened metabolism made him restless. His body was too highly charged to sit still. He needed constant movement, duties, exertion. When he was inactive his own energies ate him alive.
At intervals he had to take his eyes off the ED director long enough to get some exercise. Thrusting his gun mutely into Morn’s hands, he would burst into a run, sprinting feverishly around and around the bridge until sweat splashed from his skin, unabsorbed by the fabric of his alien shipsuit. Then he would return to the command station, retrieve his handgun, and resume guarding Min Donner.
Nevertheless the hours passed heavily for him, and he grew gradually frantic under the strain. He was almost literally dying for something to do; something extreme or desperate enough to make him whole.
As for Mikka, Nick’s former second stood like clenched iron at Emmett’s shoulder, watching everything he did as if she were prepared to watch helm forever. When—at Min’s insistence—the bridge officers were relieved, and Emmett’s place was taken by Punisher’s helm third, Mikka maintained her supervision. Angus’ demand for Ciro’s company had disturbed her concentration briefly; but she hadn’t objected to it. Her only concession to her mortality was that she’d removed the bandage from the nearly healed wound on her forehead so she could see better. After that she’d kept her vigil like a woman who had no defense against despair except the duties Morn had given her.
Characteristically phlegmatic, Vector appeared to take a less arduous view of the situation. Once he’d confirmed that Punisher’s copy of his broadcast was accurate and ready for transmission, he became—in a sense—superfluous. He was useless with a gun; inexperienced at astrogation. For a while he talked to no one in particular about his time at Intertech: about his anti-mutagen research; about the experience of having his work stripped from him on the whim of a UMCPDA computer. In his oblique way, he was stating his loyalties so that everyone—especially Min Donner—would know where he stood.
After that, however, he announced to Morn that he needed sickbay. Internal spin may have benefited everyone else, but it aggravated the inflammation in his joints. He’d suffered too much g recently; for too long.
She feared to let him go. He would have made a useful hostage if Punisher’s crew had chosen to oppose her. But Min intervened. She used the command intercom to warn the ship that Vector Shaheed was on his way to sickbay, and that anyone who interfered with or troubled him would be liable to court-martial. With no discernible concern, he left the bridge.
When he returned he belted himself into a vacant g-seat and went effortlessly to sleep.
Min herself took an occasional nap. Like Davies and Mikka, Morn stayed awake.
That may have been easier for her than it was for her companions. She’d had far more sleep. But she couldn’t have rested in any case. Inside its cast her arm itched acutely, nagging her with memories of gap-sickness and pain. And as she skipped the light-years toward Earth, the confidence she projected to protect herself frayed; slowly went to tatters in the stellar winds of the void. Alarm and chagrin took over her fretted heart. An insidious sense of wrongness corroded her intentions—and she had no difficulty identifying its sources.
One was the dismaying fact that Punisher had let Calm Horizons live.
The Amnioni’s survival was bad enough; dangerous enough. Samples of Morn’s tainted blood remained safe aboard her. She’d heard Vector’s broadcast, receiving his formula. But the threats didn’t end there.
Earlier Calm Horizons had allowed Trumpet to escape: the warship had chosen to defend herself rather than kill her target, even though the apparent logic of the situation indicated that Trumpet’s death was essential. The Amnioni’s decision might be explained by the argument that she couldn’t be certain of destroying her target, and therefore couldn’t risk being destroyed herself. However, Morn could think of other explanations—
At first she’d believed that the Amnion had decided to live so that they could return to forbidden space with their knowledge of Vector’s immunity drug. But by now she’d had time to imagine other terrors. Was it possible that the Amnion could attack or neutralize Trumpet in other ways? Did they have other ships like Soar—human ships in human space, waiting to ambush the gap scout? Had they made covert agreements with Holt Fasner to undermine humankind’s future for the sake of his profits?
Entirely apart from the reasons she’d given Min, Morn maintained internal spin precisely because it slowed Punisher’s progress. She wanted to reach Earth later than her enemies might expect. That way she could hope to catch them already deployed and visible, rather than lurking out of sight behind her. Spring the ambush before she stepped into it.
Unfortunately other stresses wore at her as well.
She hadn’t told Min Donner anything like the whole truth about what she was doing, or why. She hadn’t discussed her fear of Holt Fasner’s—and therefore the UMCP’s—reaction to her intentions. And she’d made no mention of what could happen to her if Punisher risked hard g, either now or later. Nevertheless as time dragged on she believed more and more that Min had already penetrated her secrets.
Despite the obvious inadequacy of Morn’s explanations, the ED director didn’t press her. As closed as stone, Min accepted Morn’s command of the bridge in silence, speaking only when Morn asked something of her, or when she thought the cruiser’s people needed attention. To that extent, at least, she appeared to consider herself nothing more than a surrogate for Captain Ubikwe. Yet something in the nature of her unresponsiveness conveyed the impression that she knew about Morn’s gap-sickness.
Initially that confused Morn. Then, however, she remembered the weeks Angus had spent in UMCPDA’s hands, being welded. Min probably knew everything that Angus had ever known about Morn, or done to her, or desired from her, up to the time when Nick Succorso had snatched her away from Com-Mine.
Min knew about Morn’s zone implant—
Morn had grown accustomed to Angus’ knowledge; to Mikka’s, Davies’, Vector’s. Familiarity inured her to it. But the thought that the ED director also knew filled her with shame; as aggrieved and unanswerable as the burning in her damaged arm. Min Donner was the moral authority on which the entire Hyland family had built its beliefs and commitments.
And Morn had killed most of that family with her own hands. In some sense she’d killed herself: the Morn Hyland who’d served UMCPED no longer existed. Only Davies remained to uphold the allegiance of the Hylands.
As the journey dragged its length across the stars, Morn found it increasingly difficult to face Min without breaking down into explanations or appeals which might cost her more than she could afford.
Min Donner might be as honest as steel: the UMCP was not. Behind her stood men like Hashi Lebwohl and Warden Dios; men with ambiguous intentions, harsh desires. And behind t
hem loomed the Dragon in his malice. Regardless of her personal integrity, Min bore a kind of borrowed corruption. Borrowed or imposed—
Morn kept as much of her own truth to herself as she could.
From time to time—again at Min’s insistence—Punisher’s bosun brought food to the bridge. This was not for the duty officers, who could visit the galley when they were relieved, but for Morn, the others, and herself. Morn ate what she could. Vector roused himself to eat, but seemed more interested in coffee. Mikka gulped sandwiches where she stood. When Min had taken as much as she wanted, Davies devoured the rest.
Nothing else passed the hours except the studied litany of reports from helm and scan: descriptions of navigational errors and open space; announcements of course corrections or tach. No other vessels left blips or particle trails across the cruiser’s course. Communications heard nothing. Whatever Calm Horizons intended, she’d apparently lost her strange ability to track Trumpet’s movements.
By slow increments the distance to Earth diminished.
Angus brought Captain Ubikwe and Ciro back to the bridge shortly after helm announced that Punisher would soon be ready for the last gap crossing to Earth.
By then the rotation of watches had returned most of the officers Morn had first seen to the bridge: a woman named Cray on communications; Porson at scan; a shy, awkward young woman to the data station; a truculent, square-fisted man on targ. Only the helm officer was different: instead of Emmett a man called Patrice guided the ship.
Captain Ubikwe saluted his people gruffly as he arrived. Ignoring Morn, he faced Min. “Is my ship all right, Director Donner?” he asked in a tired rumble.
Min’s gaze had a sardonic cast as she referred the question to Morn.
The sound of voices roused Vector from a final nap. He looked up, straightened himself in his g-seat; smiled a question at Ciro, but didn’t speak.
Davies’ face showed relief. He may have been reassured by Angus’ return. Or he may have been glad to see that Angus hadn’t hurt Captain Ubikwe.