by Timothy Zahn
For a thousand kilometers around where the Empyreal net had been, space was empty. Completely and totally empty. Every solid object within that sphere, be it asteroid, sandwich-metal-hulled combat ship, or fragile human body, had been disintegrated down to its component particles. Outside that zone, everything else seemed to be in motion, with small chunks of rock hurling outward and even large asteroids now carrying a vector component away from the point of the blast. Each of the asteroids the telescope screen was able to get a clear view of seemed partially shattered or half melted.
“Move us out of the net area,” Lleshi ordered the helm, feeling oddly ill. “What about Lorelei’s kick-pod catapults?”
“There was one with each net,” Campbell said. He sounded as awed as Lleshi felt, though there was no indication of the disquiet the commodore himself was feeling. “There’s also the one near Lorelei itself.”
The tactical display shifted to a projected schematic of the planet Lorelei, showing the small catapult in high polar orbit around it. Simultaneously, one of the telescope displays lit up with a slightly fuzzy real-time view. “The light from the nearest pod explosion will reach Lorelei in about three minutes,” Campbell went on. “That will be the first they’ll know about our attack.”
And the enemy’s first act ought to be to put a quick alert message together and get a kick pod out to that catapult. “Run a confirmation on the catapult location,” Lleshi ordered. On one of the aft displays, the Balaniki flickered into view as it was caught in the Pax net. “What about the main catapult?”
“It’s orbiting ahead of Lorelei in the planet’s leading Lagrange point,” Campbell said. “A pretty good distance out; they won’t be able to get a ship there very quickly.”
Provided there weren’t any ships already on the way. But there was nothing Lleshi could do about that. Besides, with the Pax net now the only door into Lorelei system, it wasn’t nearly as critical that word of the invasion be delayed.
Still, the more time they had to consolidate their position, the better. Reaching over, he punched his direct feed to the Balaniki. “Captain Horvak?”
“Yes, sir,” Horvak replied briskly. “Thunderhead is loaded and ready, awaiting your orders. If the Empyreals are still on the same schedule, their most recent kick pod went out half an hour ago.”
Which meant that if they could knock out the kick-pod catapult, it would be another five and a half hours before the other four Empyreal systems would even begin to suspect anything was wrong.
If. “You’ve received our up-to-date sensor readings?”
“Received and calibrated in,” Horvak said. “We’re aligned and green.”
“Good.” Lleshi shifted his gaze to the display showing the Balaniki. “You may fire when ready.”
“Yes, sir. Thunderhead: fire.”
There was nothing to see, really; only a half-imagined flicker of movement just before the circle of warning lights around the opening in the Balaniki’s nose went out. But the sensor display showed what human eyes were too slow to catch: the slender black missile that had been launched from the mass driver running the entire length of the Balaniki’s centerline, now hurling toward the distant planet. Lleshi looked back at the main display, silently counting down the seconds; and abruptly, the missile’s solid-fuel core ignited, burning with incredible ferocity and adding to the missile’s already blistering velocity at an acceleration that would have crushed a human crew.
It would take the Komitadji over two days to reach Lorelei from here. The remnants of the Thunderhead missile would make that same trip in just under an hour.
At which point, if the sensor data and computer calculations were correct, the warhead would fragment into a cloud of ultrafast hundred-gram particles and slam into Lorelei’s kick-pod catapult, shattering it and cutting off the Empyreals’ fastest method of contacting the outside universe.
On a Pax world, Lleshi knew, confusion and sheer bureaucratic inertia would delay the launch of an emergency kick pod at least that long. On an Empyreal world, under angel influence, there was no way to know if the Thunderhead would be in time.
Or, for that matter, whether the Thunderhead would even hit its target. If it had been misaimed, or if unexpected gravitational or solar wind forces deflected it even slightly off its proper course, those hundred-gram weights could conceivably slam full into the planet Lorelei itself at a significant fraction of the speed of light.
And if they did, the destruction the doomsday pod had caused out here among the small number of EmDef defenders would be multiplied a thousandfold among the people of that world.
Innocent people. People whose salvation from the angel threat was the purported reason for this military activity in the first place.
“We’re wasting time, Commodore,” Telthorst said impatiently.
Unfortunately, this time the little man was right. The Thunderhead missile and Lorelei were now in the hands of the laughing fates. Whether or not the alert went out on the kick-pod catapult, the Komitadji’s next task was the same: to capture and secure the main catapult running in orbit ahead of Lorelei.
Preferably before the Lorelei government got its act together and got a ship up there and out of the system. But to capture and hold it nonetheless. “Acceleration alert,” he ordered. “Lay in a minimum-time course for Lorelei.”
And as the acceleration warning sounded and the big ship began to move, he wondered vaguely what had happened to Kosta.
The hospital corridor was quiet, its lighting slightly muted to late-night levels, as Chandris slipped in through the stairwell door. More importantly for her purposes, the area also seemed to be deserted.
No, not completely. There was a more brightly lit alcove area just off the center of the corridor behind a wide window-shaped service opening, and as she eased the stairwell door closed behind her she heard the faint sound of shuffling feet and papers.
Still, as long as she stayed at this end of the hallway—and as long as none of the duty nurses poked their heads out through the service window—she ought to make it okay. Moving as quietly as she could, she headed down the corridor, hugging the wall and trying to look all directions at once. It was a job more suited to a kitty-lifter than a lowly con artist like herself, and she was beginning to sweat by the time she reached her target door. Easing it open, she slipped inside.
The room lights had been turned completely off, but there was enough of a glow from the indicators on the various medical monitors for her to make out the outline of the big man lying motionlessly beneath the blankets. She was halfway across the room, concentrating on not finding anything to bang her shins on, when she spotted the other figure sitting half propped up in a chair beside the bed, clearly asleep. Hesitating only a moment, she changed direction and circled the end of the bed to the chair. She reached out to the other’s shoulder, wondering belatedly if this had been such a good idea after all, and gently squeezed. “Ornina?” she whispered.
The woman awoke with a start. “What—?”
“Shh, it’s all right,” Chandris hastened to assure her. “It’s just me, Chandris.”
Ornina sagged tiredly in her chair. “Oh, Chandris, you startled me,” she said with a sigh. “Wait, let me get the light.”
“No, don’t,” Chandris said. “I don’t want to wake up Hanan.”
“It’s all right,” Hanan said from the bed. “I’m already awake.”
Chandris grimaced. “I’m sorry,” she apologized as Ornina groped for the small light on the bedside table and flicked it on. The glow was dim, but Chandris still blinked a couple of times before her eyes adjusted. “I was trying to be quiet.”
“And you succeeded admirably,” Hanan said, his voice as cheerful as always. But his face in the faint light was drawn and seemed to Chandris to be deathly pale. “I just don’t sleep well in hospitals, that’s all. Probably the food.”
“We missed you here earlier tonight,” Ornina said. “Visiting hours—” She squinted at her watch. “Aren’t they over ye
t?”
“Long over,” Chandris admitted, feeling even more uncomfortable about this intrusion. “And I wouldn’t have bothered you so late at night except—look, I need some advice.”
“You’ve come to the right place,” Hanan said, nodding toward the other guest chair against the back wall. He did not, Chandris noted uneasily, raise a hand to point to it, as he normally would have. Not a good sign. “Pull up a chair and tell us all about it.”
Chandris took a deep breath. “The reason I wasn’t here earlier—”
She broke off as, behind her across the room, the door swung stealthily open and a figure slipped inside. She spun around, automatically scrambling for a cover story to tell the nurse—
“Ah,” Kosta said lamely, his face a study in awkward surprise. “Uh—”
“Is it a party?’ Hanan said cheerfully into Kosta’s discomfiture. “I love parties.”
“What are you doing here?” Chandris demanded.
“I’m sorry,” Kosta said, sounding thoroughly chagrined now. “I’ll go.”
“No, please,” Ornina said, getting up from her chair. “Here; sit down.”
“No, no,” Kosta said hastily. “I’ll go. I just thought …”
The pieces suddenly clicked. “You thought I came here for Ronyon’s angel, didn’t you?” Chandris accused. “You followed me from the Institute.”
Even in the dim light she could see Kosta’s face redden. “Do you blame me?” he countered. “You tell me to trust you; and then you head straight here to the hospital. What was I supposed to think?”
“Whoa, everyone,” Hanan cut in. “Could we get a little annotation on this argument? For starters, what do you mean, Ronyon’s angel? Don’t you mean High Senator Forsythe’s angel?”
“Forsythe isn’t wearing an angel,” Chandris told him. “Ronyon’s got it. I was thinking that since everything about that was illegal anyway, one good crime deserved another.”
“Or to put it another way, she was planning to steal it,” Kosta said. “She’s been planning it as far back as the Gazelle.”
“Oh, Chandris,” Ornina said. The sorrow and disappointment in her voice was like a twisted knife in Chandris’s stomach. “Please. Don’t.”
“I just wanted to find a way for Hanan to get well,” Chandris said, hearing an unaccustomed note of pleading in her voice. “He needs it more than ever now.”
“I’ll be all right,” Hanan assured her. “Really I will. The Gabriel Corporation’s picking up the bill for all this, and the doctors say the long-term prognosis is hopeful.”
“I don’t want hopeful,” Chandris said, the taste of bitterness in her mouth. “I want you well.”
“I know,” Hanan said, smiling sadly. “And I appreciate it, Chandris, more than you can ever know. But this isn’t the way to do it.”
“Maybe not,” Chandris muttered. She still wasn’t ready to let this drop, but there was no point in discussing it any further now. “But in the meantime,” she added, looking pointedly at Kosta, “there’s been another development.”
“You’re engaged?” Hanan asked hopefully.
Chandris snorted. “Hardly,” Kosta said. “Mr. and Mrs. Daviee—”
“Hanan and Ornina,” Ornina corrected him mildly.
“Mr. and Mrs. Daviee,” Kosta repeated stubbornly, “I must inform you that I am an agent of the Pax, sent here to study Angelmass and the angels.”
“Really,” Hanan said. “And she’s right, by the way: it’s Hanan and Ornina.”
Kosta frowned at him. “Did you hear me?” he asked.
“Of course,” Hanan said, lifting his eyebrows toward Ornina. “Pax spy, here to study Angelmass.”
“That’s what I heard, too,” Ornina confirmed, nodding. “Have you found anything interesting?”
Kosta looked at Chandris, clearly completely confused now. “Don’t look at me,” she told him with a shrug. “These are the same people who knew I was running from the cops when they hired me. They don’t rattle easy.”
“We have a secret weapon against the rattles,” Hanan said with a conspiratorial grin. Against the backdrop of his strained face, Chandris thought, the grin looked forced. “So tell us. What have you found out about these angels of ours?”
CHAPTER 31
They were four hours on their way toward Lorelei when the first sign of resistance appeared.
“They appear to be mining ships, Commodore,” Chief Sensor Officer Dahlgren said, peering back and forth between his displays. “About thirty of them, moving in on individual intercept vectors. The nearest ones have started tracking us. Looks like they’ve got fairly low-grade target acquisition systems, possibly something adapted from a mining sensor package.”
“Weaponry?” Lleshi asked.
“Minimal,” the other said. “The best they’ve got are medium-focus lasers, again probably adapted from standard equipment, plus some probe rockets with small, primitive warheads.”
“How primitive?”
Dahlgren shrugged. “They’re non-nuclear, just a few kilograms of high explosive each. Frankly, sir, they look almost handmade.”
Lleshi exchanged frowns with Campbell. “Did he say primitive or pathetic?” Campbell asked. “What in the worlds do they think they’re doing?”
“Maybe trying to distract us,” Telthorst put in. “Ever think of that?”
Lleshi lifted his eyebrows to Dahlgren. “Lieutenant?” he invited.
“No other craft showing, in either inner or outer scan range,” Dahlgren said. “And we’re coming to the edge of the main asteroid mass, which means they’re running out of places to hide. I suppose they could have mines planted on some of the rocks we haven’t passed yet, but if so they’re going to be pretty low-yield.”
“And still only HE?” Lleshi asked.
“No radiation readings to indicate nuclear.”
“I don’t like it,” Telthorst growled. “They can’t just be sacrificing men and mining ships this way. I strongly recommend we launch fighters and engage them at a safe distance from the Komitadji.”
Again, Lleshi and Campbell exchanged glances, this time looks of mutually strained patience. “That won’t be necessary, Mr. Telthorst,” Lleshi said. “The Komitadji’s defenses are quite capable of dealing with this threat.”
“Unless it’s a feint.”
“It’s not a feint,” Lleshi said, feeling his temper beginning to strain. “This is the tactics of desperation; nothing more. The Empyreals are throwing whatever they have at us in an attempt to slow us down until they can bring real warships into the system.”
“They almost certainly don’t realize there’s still a net left in the system and that we control it,” Campbell added. “They’ll be counting on defense forces from the other four systems being able to sweep in on us. With that assumption, any delaying action will seem reasonable to them, no matter what the cost.”
“At any rate, dropping and regathering fighters would take time I’m not willing to waste,” Lleshi concluded.
“What’s the hurry?” Telthorst asked. “As you say, there’s nothing the Empyreals can do.”
His eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Or could it have something to do with that liner that left Lorelei orbit an hour ago, just after the Thunderhead took out their kick-pod catapult?”
Lleshi had hoped Telthorst hadn’t noticed that. “Yes, the liner is part of it,” he confirmed, keeping his voice steady. “We naturally want to cut it off at the catapult before it escapes.”
“Why?” Telthorst demanded. “At their current acceleration, it’ll take them nearly as long to get there as it will us. Long before then the absence of scheduled kick pods will certainly have alerted the enemy to our presence here. What do we care if they leave with confirmation that the Komitadji is in Lorelei system?”
His eyebrows lifted. “Unless, of course, you have other plans for the liner. Or for the Komitadji.”
The man was definitely smarter than he looked. “What other plans could
we have?” Lleshi asked.
“None, I hope,” Telthorst said darkly. “Because as I’m sure you’re aware, your orders are to take and hold Lorelei system.”
“My orders are to bring the worlds of the Empyrean under the authority and dominion of the Pax,” Lleshi said, enunciating each word precisely. “My initial strategic instructions are to take and hold Lorelei system.”
‘To use as a bargaining chip to force open the rest of the Empyrean,” Telthorst bit out. “That means you are to sit and hold and consolidate.”
“The Balaniki group is already holding the net,” Lleshi countered. “When the Macedonia group reaches Lorelei, they will hold the spacelanes around the planet. My orders make no mention of sitting.”
“I see,” Telthorst said, his voice deadly quiet. “So in other words, victory is as good as achieved. Congratulations. So what are your intentions?”
Lleshi looked him straight in the eye. “The Supreme Council refers to this campaign as a rescue mission,” he said. “Our stated purpose is to save the people of the Empyrean from the ongoing invasion of angels.”
“And?” Telthorst prompted.
“It therefore seems only right,” Lleshi said, “that we push our attack into our true enemy’s home territory.
“I am therefore taking the Komitadji to Angelmass.”
Telthorst’s face went rigid. “What?” he snarled. “If you think you can—”
He choked down the rest of the sentence. “That’s an insane move,” he said instead, his voice still tight but under control again. “You saw what happened on our first trip to Lorelei. The minute we show up in a Seraph net, they’ll throw us straight out again.”
“I know.” Lleshi gestured to the display. “That’s why I need that liner.”
“Explain.”
“You don’t give the orders aboard this ship, Adjutor,” Lleshi reminded him. “You’ll see when we get there.”
Telthorst glared at him with an expression that was pure hatred. “I could give the orders aboard this ship, Commodore,” he said quietly. “I could declare you incompetent and take command. Despite your obvious contempt for the Adjutors, I do have the authority to do that.”
