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FOR DAVID KECK, FROM STAVRO UBLAT
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Many thanks to my advance readers, A. P. Canavan and Baria Ahmed, and to Rob Sawyer, for being my early sounding board on the question of what I could get away with.
PROLOGUE
STAR-YEAR 235465.67B-8651.TYW114 …
Klang Sector, Planet Klingklang Orbit
“Chock gurak!” said the helm officer in a half-snarl, glaring at the viewscreen through the red-lit haze of the command bridge. “Krick gavlah j’ak’roth tumool!”
“Bak frill!” snapped the Second-in-Command, straightening from where he crouched at the captain’s long-toed, clawed feet. “Gorot’lak prik tahhrrr!”
“All right,” said Captain Betty, “enough of that fake language crap. I mean, if you got all that time on your hands, do something useful for crying out loud!” He leaned forward in his command chair and made a small, hairy fist. “Give me a close-up!”
Monitor Operator Ensign Bert, Third Class, twitched her nose in acknowledgement and adjusted a dial with a precise gesture, and the snapshot of Captain Hadrian Alan Sawback of the hateful AFS Willful Child expanded to fill the viewscreen.
Betty bared his sharp little teeth, of which he had many. “There he is.…”
“Well, no,” corrected Second-in-Command Molly, “it’s just a stock photo, sir. The whereabouts of Captain Hadrian and the Willful Child have not yet been determined.”
Betty swung a vicious glare on his 2IC. “And this, Molly of the Small Penis, is why you will never inherit the command of the KFC We Surrender, or any other new Abject Class Vessel of the Klang Fleet!” He extended his glare to his new crew of fierce-eyed females crowding every available centimeter of the bridge—some of them at actual stations—and said, “We are about to embark on the most glorious mission in Klang history!” He pointed a taloned finger at the viewscreen. “Look carefully, my wives. There he is! The most—”
“Actually—” began Molly.
“A photograph of him, then! Look at it! At him, I mean! The most infamous prize captain of the entire AFS Fleet! Wanted in a thousand galaxies—”
“Actually, only this galaxy,” said Molly. “We don’t know—”
“Shut up!” Betty shrieked, and then settled back in the chair, fingers twitching. “He’s already evaded Klang surrender once, foiling our plans of economic infiltration under the guise of pathetic needfulness—just think of the loans we could have reneged on! We could’ve brought the Terran Galactic Monetary Fund to its knobby-wobbly knees! Flat-lined the whole ponzi racket they run on every fucking alien civilization they whip into submission!”
Betty lifted his hands and made clutching gestures. His face twisted, as much as could a somewhat Meerkatlike face. “I mean, cripes and wipes, who else in the damned galaxy has extended the notion of Third World misery to entire planets?” His question ended in a near shriek. He now made fists that were white-knuckled high-density knobs of seething bone and bloodless skin. He rose halfway in his seat, small black beady eyes gleaming with hate and only a little grudging admiration. “I will have him!’’ he hissed. “I will roll on my belly at his very feet! I, Soonenoughian Betty, last survivor of the Meerkat/Radulak Eugenic Compromise, will have the soul of Captain Hadrian A. Sawback, cupped in my hand like … like … like the sack of my oversized testicular cluster—” He halted suddenly, only now sensing the impossible tension of the bridge surrounding him.
Betty’s pointy ears flickered, once. “No, not now—”
A high-pitched voice screamed, “Sexswarm!” The females flung themselves at Betty. Captain and chair vanished beneath a mob of writhing, lust-filled bodies.
Second-in-Command Molly—the only other male on the entire ship—looked on, and then whimpered.
STAR-YEAR 549LLP312.879-DXL-2Y67.338 …
AFS Prime Orbital HQ, Sol System
Aboard the AFS Century Warbler, newly minted Captain Hans Olo stood in his stateroom, facing the full-length mirror he’d had installed at great expense. His black-on-black-on-black uniform, accentuated by his unique dark lederhosen, revealed after close inspection not a speck of lint, every crease precise in its creasement, every fold exact in its folditude.
Each and every follicle of his sandy, coiffed hair was subdued and tamed and perfectly in place. His jaw remained square, his eyes steely. His muscles were pumped and all in place, his crotch bulge subtle yet undeniable. His domesticated Klanglet kit, Gnawfang, was perched on his left shoulder, staring back at him in the reflection with, Hans assumed, shining adoration, its tail undulating like a snake, albeit a twitchy one.
Hans was fit, young and—if he was being honest and objective about it—undeniably handsome, and now the second youngest captain ever to command an Engage Class vessel of the AFS.
Second youngest. One cheek twitched at the thought.
Seeing this minute gesture, Gnawfang shat down the front of Olo’s tunic, a thick glob of guano that glistened like ice cream.
The blood drained from Hans Olo’s manly face.
Gnawfang leapt away an instant before the captain’s hands could close round its scrawny neck. Landing lithely on the floor of the cabin, the kit darted toward the climate duct. Having worked loose the screws earlier that day, a mere flick of talons along the top edge flung the grille away, and then Gnawfang was inside, scampering out of reach of the stupid manthing.
Twitching tail means I gotta shit! Kits are born knowing that! But no! Manthing sees my tail twitch, grabs me and sticks me on his fucking shoulder! Fine! Have it your way!
Give it a couple hours, then I can start mewling from the duct, until he sighs and coaxes me out to cuddle and stroke and do those other things I can’t quite figure out what they mean yet.
Day after day of this. What a life! And what’s with that name? Gnawfang? Are you kidding me? I want something proper and manly as befits a soon-to-be virile adult male Klang. I want … Anna.
In the meantime, Hans Olo quickly removed his soiled tunic and the black-on-black-on-black memory-mesh undershirt. He flung the whole mess into the sonic atomizer and set it to Molecular Sterilization, High Intensity, the only setting the small chip-brain of the washing machine had yet to use—to its sizzling frustration.
He waited for the machine to cycle through, wondering at the strange hisses emanating from it, which hadn’t been there yesterday.
A short time later, once more attired in regulation perfection, Captain Hans Olo exited his stateroom.
Gnawfang crept out warily, sniffing the air. The ducts and remixers were clearing the air of manthing stink, but nothing of the kit’s own so-sweet shit
-and-musk smell was evident either. He was fairly certain that he was the only Klanglet on this strange ship, but such assumptions could be deadly. With that in mind, he began peeing on everything in sight.
* * *
Second-in-Command Frank Worship sat in the captain’s chair. Before him, the massive hulk of AFS Prime Station grew steadily in the viewscreen as the ship prepared to dock. The glorious curve of Earth loomed behind the station, to magisterial effect, the great gray ball luminous and glowing in places as if radioactive.
Maintenance crews swarmed Prime’s bulky modules and extensions, and as they drew closer, he could see the dents and smudges on the once-white surfaces, the broken fittings, dangling cables—some spitting sparks—and the skeletal framework of unoccupied scaffolding all covered in smart-tape flashing bright to warn off careless sleds and other sundry vessels as they darted here and there on various tasks.
He heard the door behind him slide open and Lieutenant Janice Reasonable, stationed at the Astrometrics, announced, “Captain on the bridge!”
Frank rose to face his commander, and once more his heart seemed to double in size inside his chest, constricting every breath, tightening his throat and drying his mouth. “Sir,” he managed. “I stand relieved.”
“You are relieved, Number Two,” Hans Olo replied without a hint of a smile as he moved past Frank to stand in front of the chair, his steely gaze upon the viewscreen.
Once again Frank wondered, somewhat wildly, at that strange and strangely sweet odor that wafted in his captain’s wake, stirring the hairs on the back of his neck, even as something animal and swollen with lust surged inside him. “AFS Prime dead ahead, sir,” he said unsteadily. “CompNav has the approach.”
“So I can see,” Olo murmured in reply.
Frank fainted.
At hearing the thump, Hans Olo turned and frowned down at the motionless form of his second in command. “Lieutenant Reasonable.”
“Medic’s already on his way,” Janice Reasonable replied from her station.
“This appears to be becoming a habit.”
“No doubt he’ll find his sea legs soon enough, sir.”
Hans Olo said nothing, returning his attention to the viewscreen. Their berth awaited them, brightly lit except for where bulbs had broken, and the one struggling welder who had inadvertently welded his magboots to the hangar door. “Helm,” said Hans Olo, “try not to scrape him off on our way in.”
“Yes sir.”
The medics arrived and carried off Frank Worship.
Janice Reasonable returned her attention to her station, although now that they’d docked, there was nothing for her to do. Still, her fists were tight and sweaty where she hid them in her lap, and adrenaline was roaring through her skull.
This instinctive urge to bare her teeth and then sink them into her captain’s throat the instant she saw Hans Olo was rather alarming. And what was with that damned creepy cologne the man used, anyway? She sat trembling, awaiting the stand-down.
“Seals confirmed, docking complete, Captain.”
“Thank you, Helm. Secure all stations.” The captain turned to Reasonable. “Lieutenant, you have the bridge until the end of the Prime-time Cycle. Carry on.”
Reasonable held her breath until the doors closed behind Olo, and then she let out a low snarl. Curiously, so did every other woman on the bridge.
* * *
Captain Hans Olo paused outside the door of the Commandant’s Office, ACP Security Division, and adjusted his immaculate uniform, removing a single fluffling of lint which he carried over to a nearby Incinerator Chute before returning to the door and conducting a second examination, his attention ending on the bright Captain’s bars affixed to the upper left quadrant of his uniform. Satisfied that all was finally in order, he stepped forward.
The door slid open with a hiss and he stepped into the Commandant’s Office, then halted. “Commandant, you wished to see me?”
The man seated behind the desk already had a guest: a gaunt figure wearing black sunglasses and dressed in the black-on-black-on-black-on-black uniform of ACP Security, sitting in a chair against the wall to the commandant’s right, thin legs delicately crossed and spidery hands folded on his lap.
Commandant Einstein Prim, the head of ACP Security, leaned back in his plush leather chair. “Yes, thank you for being prompt, Captain.” He gestured to the security agent. “May I introduce Field Agent First Class Lieutenant-Commander Rand Humblenot.”
Hans Olo clicked his heels and tipped his head. “Agent Humblenot, it is a pleasure to meet you.”
“No doubt,” murmured the pale, hatchet-faced man, responding to the salute with a flutter of his fingers. “You possess quite the record of accomplishments, Captain, and now at last you are in command of a ship in the most prestigious Engage Class of the Fleet, and all of this at the modest age of twenty-nine. Indeed, most impressive. And how long did it take to compete the Mishimashi Paradox? Eight months?” A thin smile curved his lips. “Not quite the record, alas.”
Hans Olo’s eyes narrowed at that. “But it is, Agent Humblenot. When the exercise is conducted within the rules.”
Rand Humblenot’s thin lips thinned some more as his smile spread wider. “No evidence of cheating has been found, Captain, no matter how hard the programmers looked. Face it, you were bested by Hadrian Sawback.”
Einstein Prim cleared his throat. “Which brings us to the purpose of this meeting—and as for you two showing off your hackles, save it for the tabloids.” He leaned forward. “Speaking of tabloids, Captain Sawback’s popularity among the … uh … plebian classes is increasingly perceived by Fleet HQ as a source of embarrassment. Which is fortunate for us.”
Hans Olo frowned. “I’m not sure I understand, sir. Sawback is a charlatan, an imposter, a puffed-up gas bag of putrescent—”
“Not that you’ve taken his growing fame personally,” observed Rand Humblenot, with a smirk.
“My point is, sir,” Hans Olo continued addressing the commandant, “he can’t last. His fall is pretty much guaranteed. Somewhere, soon, he’s going to…”
“Fuck up?” Einstein Prim asked, one brow lifting. “Well now, how about we help him along?”
At that, the agent of ACP Security leaned forward as well. “Ah, Commandant, at last we’re speaking the same language. Adjutant Tighe was once a bright star, rising fast in the esteem of Central Security. Now? Now she’s a washed-up nervous wreck sending daily requests for transfer—all of which are summarily denied.”
“Why?” Hans Olo asked. “Get her out of there, rehabilitate her. In the meantime, send Sawback a hard-ass—I’m sure you’ve got a few in your ranks.”
“Not yet,” Humblenot replied. “Indeed, we like Lorrin Tighe precisely where she is. What better chance of disaster befalling Sawback than a security adjutant incapable of reining him in? No, Captain, when the time is right, well, you’re looking at her replacement, and when I step onto the deck of the Willful Child, Hadrian Alan Sawback won’t know what’s hit him.”
Hans Olo returned his attention to the Commandant. “Forgive me, sir, but what has all this to do with me?”
Einstein Prim bared his teeth. “Hadrian Sawback was directly responsible for the loss of my father and the Fleet’s flagship. These are crimes that won’t go unanswered. That said, we need to tread carefully. We need to devise a plan that will lead Sawback into unmitigated disaster.”
“Again, sir, what has this to do with me?”
“I want you to shadow the Willful Child, Captain. Your Engage Class vessel is the next generation, superior in every way. When Sawback fucks up, we need to ensure that you’re there to clean up the mess. The last thing we want, when destroying Sawback, is to water down our satisfaction by having to deal with a major galactic incident—or worse, an outright war.”
“Ah, I see.”
“Surely you’re capable of that, Captain Olo?”
“Of course, sir. It would be my pleasure.”
?
??Not too much pleasure,” Einstein Prim growled. “Stick to The Book, Captain.”
“Always, sir.”
“Well, let’s just make certain of that, shall we? Captain, may I introduce to you, again, Lieutenant-Commander Rand Humblenot. Your new interim Security Adjutant.”
Hans Olo eyed the agent, then clicked his heels. “A delight to meet you again, Mr. Humblenot.”
Rand Humblenot rose from the chair, removing his sunglasses to reveal implanted eyeshades making his eyes a smoky black. “Thank you, Captain. Now, I would be pleased for a tour of your new command, and my latest posting.”
“I’m sure,” Hans Olo said. “I believe the AFS Century Warbler will please you as much as it does me. However, as I have many responsibilities to attend to in preparation for our departure, I trust you will be satisfied if I assign a subordinate to conduct the tour.”
“Actually,” Rand replied, “no.” He put on his sunglasses once again. “The Security Branch of the Affiliation Directorate is, as you know, distinct from Fleet Command. I’m afraid a subordinate will not do.”
Hans Olo eyed the agent for a moment, then said, “I am well aware of the status you hold, Agent Humblenot. I am also cognizant of the particular conditions under which you may invoke the privileges of your special rank, and alas—” his gaze turned icy—“a newbie tour is not one of them.”
Rand Humblenot smiled. “Point conceded.”
“Well,” drawled Prim from behind his desk, “now that you’ve both pissed on your particular posts, get going. You can take up your private little war once aboard your ship.” He gestured a dismissal and then watched the two men depart. When the door had hissed shut, he sighed, then called up on his desk monitor the latest front page of Which! Greatest Space Captain Edition (With Nude Centerfold!), and that grinning, all-too-familiar face plastered on it. He pointed a finger. “You, Hadrian Alan Sawback, are going down!”
His desk intercom buzzed and he said, “Prim here, what is it?”