The Service of the Sword

by David Weber

  He swiveled back around. "Well?"

  The two Marines in the room had bland, blank none-of-my-business expressions on their faces. The sort of expressions which polite people assume when another family's skeletons are spilling out of an opened closet.

  Radamacher approved. This was StateSec's dirty laundry. As was obvious from the scowls on the faces of the two StateSec officers and—even fiercer—on the face of StateSec Citizen Sergeant Rolla.

  "That rotten SOB," Rolla hissed. "Give you three-to-one—no, make it five-to-one—that Alouette's been intimidating his mates and the section chief. Probably threatened the rating recording the test results, too."

  Citizen Major Citizen looked uncomfortable. "Yeah, that's probably it. I hate to say it, seeing as how I sure didn't shed any tears over those bums that the SI blew away, but their absence did hurt us a lot in security. It left holes all through my department, which I still haven't been able to get filled up all the way. Especially since I had to start from scratch coming over from the fleet."

  "Nobody's blaming you, Diana," Yuri assured her smoothly. "Isolated little tumors like this are bound to turn up, now and then, when a ship's security department was in the hands of human cancer cells for years. Which is about the most polite way I can think of to describe Jamka's cronies."

  He rubbed the back of his neck. "To be perfectly honest about it—cold-blooded, too—this is damn near perfect. Cachat'll rub his hands with glee over a bust like this one. Beats a penny-ante bootlegging case hands down. Inquisitors, you know, thrive on real sin."

  "Aw, c'mon, Yuri—" Ned started again. "The SI's not—"

  The sudden burst of laughter from everyone else in the room caused a look of grievance to come over the citizen sergeant's face. "Well, he's not that bad," he insisted.

  Radamacher didn't argue the point. At the moment, he was in such a good mood that he was even willing to grant that Special Investigator Victor Cachat probably didn't really match up to Torquemada. His understudy, maybe.

  He looked to Citizen Major Citizen. "You'll handle this, Diana? Mind you, I want a good, solid, rock-hard case against Alouette. Nothing flimsy."

  She nodded. "Won't be hard. Assuming we're right, everybody in the section will fall all over themselves spilling the beans—as long as they're sure that Alouette will get put away for a long time. Somewhere he can't retaliate against them."

  "Have no fear on that score. Just going by a minimum reading of regulations, if Alouette has been threatening his mates with violence in order to cover up his skill deficiencies—much less a senior rating like a section chief—he's looking at five years, at least. That's five years served in a StateSec maximum security prison, too, not a ship's brig."

  Yuri's face was grim. "That's if he's lucky. But I think Alouette's luck just ran out on him. Because his case will be coming up after the Special Investigator's return, and Cachat has the authority to mete out any punishment he deems proper. Any punishment, people. After I got my new assignment, for the first time in my life I studied carefully all the rules and regulations governing the position of Special Investigator. It's . . . pretty scary. And Cachat's already made crystal clear how he looks on StateSec personnel abusing their positions for the sake of personal gain or pleasure."

  He studied the far wall of the stateroom. It was a wide bulkhead, as you'd expect in a top staff officer's suite in a superdreadnought. Almost as wide as the bulkhead which Cachat had used as the backstop for his firing squad.

  Everyone else in the room seemed to share Yuri's grim mood, judging from the sudden silence.

  Not for long, though, in the case of the two noncoms. "Hey, Jaime," whispered Ned. "Any chance I could volunteer—just the once—to serve on a StateSec firing squad?"

  "S'against regs," Rolla whispered back. "But I'll put in a good word for you."

  Yuri sighed. There were times—had been for many years, now—when he felt like a sheep running with the wolves. And wondering when someone was finally going to notice that his moon-howl was distinctly off-key.

  The half-rueful, half-amused thought lasted for perhaps five seconds. Then the office hatch snapped open with no notice at all, a commo rating burst through the opening, and Yuri discovered that his long-extended fortnight had come to an end.

  Dr. Johnson's proverbial hangman had finally arrived.

  9

  The rating's face was pale as a sheet. "The task force is back in the system. We just got a message from the Citizen Admiral. They expect to be back in orbit inside five hours."

  Easy-going as Yuri was, the rating's lack of basic military courtesy was just too extreme to let pass unreprimanded. Yuri wondered what was wrong with the woman. The task force's return was hardly unexpected, after all.

  "What is your name, Citizen Rating?" he demanded frostily.

  The woman had apparently taken leave of her senses. She didn't even have the excuse of being a young recruit. From her age and the two hash marks on her sleeve, she'd been in StateSec service for at least six T-years. Even a wet-behind-the-ears newbie knew enough to recognize a superior officer's you-are-about-to-be-fried-alive tone of voice.

  Utterly oblivious, it seemed. "You don't understand! The SI sent a message too. Ordering Citizen Captain Gallanti to disregard the message from the merchant ship—"

  Yuri felt his stomach drop out from under him. He had a very bad feeling that the sensation was much like that of a man feeling the trapdoor open under the gallows.

  "What message from a merchant ship?"

  "—and stand down the impellers and sidewalls."

  Citizen Lieutenant Commander Saunders bolted upright in his chair, his head cocked as if straining all his senses. He stretched out a hand and laid fingertips delicately against a bulkhead.

  "She's right. The ship's getting under way. What the hell—?"

  Impellers couldn't be detected in operation inside a ship. They were not reaction engines and produced no discernible noise or vibration. But the impeller rooms were close to Yuri's cabin and although Yuri himself still couldn't sense anything, Saunders was apparently picking up the subtle vibrations created by the various auxiliary engines. That was Saunder's specialty—although even he hadn't noticed until the rating brought it to his attention. Yuri didn't think to doubt him.

  What was Gallanti doing? There was no logical reason for the Hector Van Dragen to be leaving orbit. And even if she were, why bring up the sidewalls unless . . .

  Yuri forgot all his own by-the-regs proscriptions. "Jesus Christ," he whispered. Then, firmly, to the still-jittery rating:

  "You're making no sense at all, woman! Settle down!"

  That seemed to calm her, finally. She swallowed and then nodded abruptly. "Com Tech first-class Rita Enquien, Citizen Assistant Investigator. Sorry for the discourtesy. It's just—I'm not supposed to be here—the Citizen Captain finds out I left the bridge I'm dead meat—"

  The sensation in Yuri's stomach was now definitely one of free fall. He wondered how long a man dropped before the rope ran out and the noose broke his neck.

  "No problem, Citizen Tech Enquien," he said soothingly, in his best confessional tone of voice.

  He realized, finally, what was happening. In general, if not the specifics. Something had completely panicked the rating and, in her confusion, she'd broken discipline and gone to the one person in the ship she'd come to trust in a pinch. Given that Yuri didn't know her, the woman's estimate was obviously based on what she'd heard from her shipmates.

  Which meant . . .

  The falling sensation vanished. Dr. Johnson's hangman be damned. Yuri had set out weeks ago to steal a capital warship right out from under its own captain, hadn't he? Just in case all hell broke loose.

  All hell had broken loose, clearly enough. But the ship was there for the taking.

  "Now, Enquien. Let's start from the beginning. What merchant ship are you talking about? And what message did it send?"

  The woman's mouth made an "O" of surprise. "Oh. How stupid
of me." Then, in a rush:

  "A merchant ship arrived in the system just half an hour before we got the message from the Citizen Admiral. It's from Haven. There's been—a revolution, I guess. Coup d'état, whatever you call it. Citizen Admiral Theismann's taken over, they say. And—"

  She swallowed. Yuri suddenly knew what was coming next. Exultation flooded over him. Yet at the same time, oddly, a wave of fear also.

  At least the Devil you know is the one you know.

  "Citizen Chairman Saint-Just is dead. Nobody knows exactly how, I guess. Well, by whom exactly, I mean. They know how, that's for sure. The merchant ship sent us the recording, it was played all over Nouveau Paris' HD networks. I saw it myself. It was Oscar Saint-Just all right. The face wasn't touched. Just a great big pulser dart hole in the middle of his forehead."

  The rating shook herself, as if chilled. "He's dead, Sir!" she cried.

  And, in her voice also, Yuri Radamacher could sense the same conflicting emotions. His eyes scanned the room, seeing them on every face.

  Exultation. The cold, gray, heartless man who had loomed over the Republic for years as the incarnation of murderous ruthlessness was finally gone. Dead, dead, dead.

  Terror. And now what?

  The paralysis lasted for perhaps five seconds. Then Yuri slapped his knees and rose abruptly.

  "Oh, bullshit," he said, softly but firmly. "Now's the same as it always was. We do the best we can, that's all, with what we've got."

  He looked at the rating. "I take it the Citizen Captain's gone berserk?"

  Enquien jerked a nod. "Yes, Citi—uh, Sir. That's why I snuck out when she wasn't looking and came here." She hissed in a breath. "I'm scared, Sir. I think the Captain's really lost it."

  Yuri sighed and shook his head. "I don't think she ever really had it, Enquien." Then, much like a priest might bestow absolution:

  "Relax, you did the right thing. I'll take care of it."

  The rating's taut face eased. Yuri turned to the other people in the room.

  "Will you follow me?"

  There was no hesitation. Five heads in unison—StateSec and Marine alike—jerked their own nods.

  "Good. Citiz—the hell with it, the rating's got it right. Saint-Just is dead and his petty regulations went with him. Lieutenant Commander Saunders, I want you to return to your post and take control of the impeller rooms. Use whatever force you need to, in the event of resistance. Major Lafitte, you and Major Citizen go with him and see to it. Round up whatever Marines and reliable StateSec troopers you can. Whatever else, I want those impellers taken out of Gallanti's control. Understood?"

  "Yes, Citizen Assistant Spec—uh, Sir." The stumbled phrase came in unison, and so did the rueful little laughs which followed.

  The StateSec major grinned at her Marine counterpart. "This'll be worth it just so people won't keep making jokes about my last name." More seriously: "You're senior to me, Khedi. In years of service, anyway, and I don't know how else to figure this. Besides, you've got experience in boarding operations and I don't. So you take the lead and I'll follow."

  Lafitte nodded. An instant later, the three officers were out into the corridor and hurrying in the direction of the impeller rooms.

  Yuri looked to the two sergeants. A quick glance at their hips confirmed the fact that neither was armed. There had been no reason for them to be, of course. In fact, it would have been against regulations. Aboard a StateSec ship, unless expressly ordered otherwise, only StateSec officers were permitted to carry sidearms. And they were required to carry them. From old habit, in fact, Yuri had a pulser on his own hip, even though the regulations were not entirely clear as to whether the provision applied to an Assistant Special Investigator.

  He was hoping that single pulser would be enough. But given Gallanti's temper . . .

  He'd planned for that eventuality also. "Come here," he commanded, stepping over to a locker along one wall. Quickly, his fingers punched the combination and the locker opened. Inside—

  Ned Pierce whistled admiringly. "Hey, that's quite an arsenal. Uh, Sir. You allowed to have this?"

  Yuri shrugged. "Who knows? You wouldn't believe how vague the regulations get when it comes to specifying what Special Investigators—their assistants too, I presume—can and can't do."

  He stepped aside from the locker. "This really isn't my line of work. So I'll let the two of you choose whatever weapons you think most suitable."

  Pierce reached eagerly for a light tribarrel—about the heaviest man-portable weapon made (short of a plasma rifle, at any rate)—with a thousand-round ammunition tank. The tank was coded for a mixed flechette, armor-piercing, explosive belt, and the Marine's eyes glowed with anticipation. But—

  "For Pete's sake, Ned!" Rolla protested. "You'll slaughter everybody on the bridge with that thing. You know how to fly a seven-million-ton SD? I sure as hell don't."

  "Oh." Pierce's face looked simultaneously embarrassed and frustrated. "Yeah, you're right. Damn. I love those things."

  "Just take a frickin' flechette gun, if you really need to splatter people wholesale," growled the StateSec sergeant, plucking a hand pulser out of the locker himself. "At least that way you won't blow any essential hardware apart, too! Or have you forgotten how to aim at anything smaller than a moon?"

  "Teach your grandmother how to suck eggs," retorted Pierce. Quickly, easily, the Marine sergeant took out a flechette gun, examined and armed the weapon.

  Then, he and Rolla studied each other for a moment. It was an awkward moment.

  Yuri cleared his throat. "Ah, Sergeant Pierce, I believe you're senior to Sergeant Rolla. In terms of service, certainly—and, as Diana said, I don't see any other way to settle these things at the moment. Nevertheless—"

  To his relief, Ned just shrugged. "Yeah, sure, Sir. Hey, look, I ain't stupid." He nodded at Rolla. "Jaime can have it. I really don't care."

  "Good. What I hope we'll be dealing with is really more a police matter than a military one. Not to put too fine a point on it, but Sergeant Rolla has experience making arrests. Whereas, ah, you—"

  Pierce's piratical grin was on full display. "I blow people apart. Don't worry about it, Sir. Mama Pierce's good little boy will follow orders."

  Yuri's fears that they might face opposition on their way to the bridge proved to be unfounded. All they encountered, here and there, were a few small knots of StateSec ratings huddled and whispering. Clearly enough, some scraps of the news had begun percolating through the ship. Just as clearly, the scraps were just that—murky, muddled, impossible to make any clear sense from. The huge size of the superdreadnought added to the confusion. Wild rumors in a smaller ship might have stayed concentrated long enough for people to boil down the truth from them. In an SD juggernaut, rumors echoed down endless passages, becoming completely distorted and incoherent the farther they went.

  He was a bit puzzled, at first. He would have expected Gallanti to have at least stationed StateSec guards at the critical access routes to the bridge. But . . . nothing, until they finally reached the hatch leading into the bridge itself.

  By then, Yuri had figured out the reason, and so it was armed with that knowledge that he marched forthrightly toward the two StateSec security ratings standing guard by the hatch. The two guards were not from a special unit, summoned by Gallanti for the purpose. They were from the unit which was routinely stationed there—and these two happened to have the bad luck to be on shift when the crap hit the fan. They looked as nervous as mice when cats are on a rampage.

  Gallanti was just a stupid, self-centered, hot-headed bully, that's all. The explanation was no more complicated than that. A woman who'd gotten her way for so long simply because of her rank and her overbearing personality that she wasn't giving a second's thought to the fact that she might be facing a tactical situation.

  He was almost surprised he couldn't hear her screaming even through the closed hatch.

  The Boss is blowing her stack, and when the Boss blows her stac
k everybody has to stand around and eat her shit. A law of nature, like gravity.

  Idiot.

  "Stand aside," he commanded, as soon as he came up to the guards. The words were spoken in a mild tone, but a very self-assured one.

  The guards didn't think to question him. In fact, they were obviously relieved that he was there. Yuri jerked his thumb over his shoulder at Sergeant Rolla.

  "You're now under the command of Citizen Sergeant Rolla. Is that understood?"

  "Yes, Citizen Assistant Special Investigator." The replies came simultaneously. Then, seeing the figure of the commo rating following gingerly at the rear, their eyes widened.

  Yuri opened the hatch and stepped through, followed by the two sergeants. Behind, he could hear one of the guards hissing to the commo rating.

  "Jesus, Rita. You told us you were just gonna be gone for a minute. The Citizen Captain's ready to skin you alive. She finds out we let you pass—"

  "Piss on Gallanti," Enquien hissed back. "I went and got the People's Commissioner. He's here now—and that bitch's ass is grass. You watch."

  The phrase she used made Yuri pause in midstep. Not "the Citizen Assistant Special Investigator." Just . . .

  The Citizen Commissioner. No. Simply the People's Commissioner.

  He found it all, then. All he needed for what had to be done. In that moment, for the first time in his life, he thought he understood that bizarre self-assuredness possessed by fanatics like Victor Cachat.

  The People's Commissioner.

  Indeed, it was so. For ten years he had carried that title, and made it his own. He had absolutely no idea what the future was going to bring, either for himself or anyone else, except for one thing alone. Whatever else happened, he was quite certain that the title "people's commissioner" was going to go down in history draped in the darkest of colors. As dark, he knew, as the term "inquisitors."