by Brian Daley
* * * *
Dextra had been getting her energy level up to face the media. Most of the Manipulant blood had washed off the Ext battlesuits, and what remained would pass for dark stains, and so the three Ext cousins were at least presentable. She had no intention of letting the journalists meet the Ext rank and file yet. The shuttle's viewport covers remained drawn.
She had Lod summon Nike Lightner from the shuttle, however. Blessed with the inner toughness that ran in the Lightners, Nike had recovered her mental equilibrium while most of her coterie was still glassy-eyed and speechless. She hadn't actually observed the Manipulants' attack, but circumstances supported Dextra's explanation, and Nike was fair-minded enough to put aside for the time being her resentment at being used. It had taken some high-density talk from Dextra to reach an agreement to brazen out the impromptu press conference and sort out the details and recriminations later. In exchange, Nike had extracted a promise from Dextra to accept reduced royalties on any production of And on the Way, We Dropped It Nike might decide to mount.
At Chaz Quant's order the news crews left their hover remotes behind in the VTOL; a dozen zooming, darting A/V reemos would only have invited chaos. The newsies balked until Quant promised to shoot down any reemo he saw with a close-in antiaircraft coilgun that had in actuality been stripped from the SWATHship years earlier.
Military aides, flunkies, and boot pullers tended to blur together, but Dextra vaguely recognized the dark-skinned naval commander because of his mustacheless patriarchal beard. In her recall his name was linked with some major debacle or dereliction of duty, a high-profile court-martial—irrelevant for the moment.
To compensate for the lack of reemos, the press gangs equipped themselves with extensible, articulated pickup booms, jockeying for position like hungry serpents. Competing for interview bites, the reporters all but bodychecked each other. That left Dextra and Nike to do more smiling and posing than responding to questions.
Though ignorant of the skirmish in orbit, the correspondents seemed disappointed that the three Exts lacked pointed tails and shreds of human flesh lodged in their teeth. The newsies moaned orgasmically when they spied Ghost's scars, however, and Burning and Lod had to fend them off a bit. Gimlet-eyed, Ghost endured the attention silently. Dextra had made it clear how central the baying media pack was to public opinion and the Exts' fortunes.
"Is it true that the Exts live only for war?" one reporter asked Burning.
"I was writing a dissertation on literature and Utopian thought when LAW came along," he told her.
"Ah! So you're telling my viewers that the Exts use pathological violence to conceal their basic cowardice?" Abruptly, the woman shifted her pickup to Lod. "How about it, Major?"
Lod cocked an eyebrow, something he did very well. "Madame, you were the one who kneed your colleague in the groin so you could get past him and stick that device in my face."
There were catcalls from some of the newsies as the correspondent sputtered and tried to recover, and more pickups swung Lod's way. "So you're saying the Exts are just good soldiers, Major Lod?" someone asked.
"I personally, sir, am a lover, not a fighter. So you might say that I'm here in the capacity of organ donor."
Correspondents glanced at their voice-stress analyzers to gauge Lod's anxiety level, but the devices didn't know what to make of his Ext-style Terranglish. "Major, do you think your rebels can serve without dissension alongside LAW troops?"
"Teamwork is essential in war, ladies and gentlemen. It gives the enemy other people to shoot at."
They liked that one, elbowing each other to feed him straight lines, the pickups caroming off each other.
"Do the Exts have a fighting motto?"
"'Life's too Short to Drink Cheap Wine.'"
Off to one side Burning groaned, but Ghost looked faintly amused. Dextra was mildly charmed by the way Lod was playing the press, but she knew she needed to give the event a different spin. It was important to get Nike Lightner in the spotlight and fix it so that the Preservationist conspirators would find it was too late to reveal the carnage in the Dam-ocles's passageway.
She glanced over to see that Quant, patience dissolved, was ordering up a strong-arm squad and getting ready to restore order. But in all the commotion and milling no one took note of the man worming his way through the feeding frenzy until he vaulted up between two pickup techs, almost landing on Burning's head.
Burning easily caught him and, seeing no weapons, merely kept him from collapsing.
The intruder was a light-skinned man with a queue of brown hair and what might have been perfect features under less stressful circumstances. His eyes were fixed and staring, his lips purple and frothy. His LAW fieldsuit was damp with salt spray, and how he had gotten through Quant's security was anybody's guess.
As news pickups zoomed in and scoop-hungry crews vied to find out what was going on, the intruder rallied enough to say,
"I'm Claude Mason. I was acting commander of the Aquamarine survey team."
Stunned, Dextra fought her way to Mason's side. "I recognize you, Administrator Mason."
"Madame Hierarch," he said weakly.
"But how did you get here? And why are you here?" She didn't see how Mason's sudden appearance could possibly be a monkey wrench thrown by Lightner's faction, not after they'd defied censure, public opinion polls, and sunshine laws to keep the Scepter returnees under wraps.
Mason shot a trembling glance at the ocean swells. "I got here across the waters—in a stolen helipod." Whatever was driving him snapped him out of the thrall in which the ocean held him. "It doesn't matter now. I've only come to say that LAW must return to Aquamarine."
Every press pickup was focused on him. "The answer is there on Aquamarine—the solution," he raved. "An end to the Roke Conflict! Knowledge only the Oceanic has—" He was gulping air, nearly convulsing. "The Oceanic…"
He lost consciousness then, collapsing in Burning's arms before the eyes of viewers all over Periapt.
Chapter
Twenty-Four
The press gangs crowded in even harder on Burning and the slumped Mason, creating a frenzied babble of running commentaries, drowning out one another's questions, and bumping mikes into the Exts' faces and warding hands. The A/V pickup tentacles were dogfighting.
One grazed Dextra's head but missed doing her real harm. Lod was avid to lend supporting hands until she shook him off. She began to wish she hadn't ordered Tonii to remain in the shuttle out of concern for the gynander's loathing of public attention.
In short order the Exts, Nike Lightner, and Dextra found themselves hemmed in by a wall of metal-legged giants. Many of the techs and reporters were wearing lower-body exos with telescoping stiltboots that enabled them to rise above the crowd for unobstructed shots.
"Stand back!" Quant barked, his angry shouts like a string of detonating depth charges. Naval crewpeople and even some of the Science Siders ran to help him try to put an end to the newsers' feeding frenzy.
One journalist still at normal height infiltrated the cordon to grab Ghost's shoulder in the hope of charming an exclusive out of her. Instead, she pried his thumb back with her hand, then turned her wrist and sent him thudding to the flight deck.
Lod tripped a cam operator who was trying to give Ghost a retaliatory shove; the tech windmilled into another one, and both toppled, the pickup tentacles thrashing and tangling.
The falling newsers were descending straight toward Dextra when she was suddenly in the clear, lifted off her feet and whisked backward by two powerful hands at her waist. Quant—point to a flying wedge of Exts who had penetrated the near riot—set her down behind him and called to Burning, Nike, Lod, and Ghost. Dextra saw a half-exoed tech slam against Quant's shoulder and bounce off; the rest heeded the commander's orders to withdraw, with Burning bearing the semiconscious Mason.
The score of Exts held their rifles obliquely before them, muzzles pointed at the press gangers, who had stopped short. They had
piled up on top of each other partly to cam what was going on and partly because the demon-helmeted Concor-dancer Exts looked so fearsome.
In the moment's pause General Delecado, standing to one side with his helmet breather open, rasped in his sand-in-the-gears parade ground voice, "Fix… bayonets!"
Dozens of cams transmitted the image of carbon-black blades snapping out of the 20-mm boomers' front stocks.
Dextra had horrific visions of a replay of the Damocles butchery. Before she could intervene, she felt Tonii's touch on her arm. The gynander was wearing one of 'ers glowing enigmatic smiles.
"It's all right, Dex. See?"
Daddy D ripped out, "En… garde!"
The bayonets thrust in unison, with the two ranks impaling only the air. Then the front rank recovered and knelt in perfect sync as the rear advanced and lunged past it. The Exts in the front rank rose and recovered as the rear rank paired off with them, flipping heavy rifles into the air like propellers, with each troop catching its partner's piece, doing a split-second inspection arms to make sure the chambers were empty, and moving to present arms.
The silent bayonet drill went on with robotic precision. Boomers were twirled, traded, and flung end over end to squadmates who caught them without looking up by dint of sheer timing and practice.
"Lod told General Delecado to have them standing by," Tonii whispered into Dextra's ear. "Most Exts don't care much for garrison stuff, but this group drilled to kill time on the voyage. He has a sense of showmanship, that Lod, but I suggest that we wrap up this show as quickly as possible."
Quant backed up to Dextra on her other side. He had gotten hold of a billy club or baton somewhere but was concealing it behind his back like a swagger stick now that things were under control.
"I advise you to get your guests out of here soon. They're blooded fighters, but they're a defeated people, too. And that, Madame Hierarch, is a formula for walking time bombs."
"A perceptive observation, Mr. Quant," Dextra told him. "In fact, my deputy concurs entirely."
When she indicated Tonii, the expression on Quant's face turned icily lethal. The baton was in the big right hand suddenly, and his left was halfway raised, close to his midsection in an edge-on parrying position. What Dextra saw in his eyes was so frightening that she went to offensive mode.
"Mr. Quant! Look at me when I'm addressing you! Post your people to make sure the newsies stay back when this demonstration has ended. Move, Commander, or I'll have you reassigned to the north pole, recycling toilet paper with an eraser."
The threat didn't phase him, but his sense of duty appeared to reassert itself, and Quant moved off to collect his crowd control details.
Dextra drew a shaky breath. "Tonii, has Mr. Quant some reason to hate you?"
Tonii answered, "I just realized who he is. But no, it's not me he hates—it's what I represent."
Dextra had seen brainless prejudice against engeneered people before, but Quant's was extraordinary. "No wonder his career's dead-ended, the brassbound fascist—"
"No, you're wrong," Tonii interrupted. "He's a good man and a very brave officer."
With the bayonet drill ended, there was no time to pursue details. Dextra beckoned Burning, Ghost, and Lod and stepped out to face the cams once more as the drill team opened ranks for her.
"Thank you all for helping to welcome LAW's newest auxiliary troops as well as introduce them to the citizens of Periapt. This concludes our arrival ceremony. These men and women of Concordance are famished, exhausted, and no doubt bruised from being roughhoused by you paparazzi brutes."
Dextra jumped in again before the groans had quite died away. "I do, however, want you to meet them again."
"Where and when, Madame Hierarch?" somebody called from the back of the pack.
Inspiration seized her. "The media annex at the Empyraeum. Tomorrow night, during the Lyceum ball."
They applauded her choice of venue. The bash celebrating the swearing in of freshman Hierarchs and the onset of a new legislative session was Periapt's most exclusive gala. Now the exotic, newsworthy Exts would be part of the mix.
The newsers were yelling questions again, demanding more.
"How about giving us our lead line, Madame Haven?"
"Throw us your best news bite, Dex!"
Dextra, with Burning looming behind her, draped her arms around Lod and Ghost, shook back her hair, and gave the cams a high-candlepower smile.
"They followed me home. Can I keep them?"
* * * *
Quant watched Captain Hall and Dextra Haven work effectively together, getting the press gangs herded back aboard their VTOL without giving undue offense. His security details backed them up, but Quant himself gratefully stood aside. Mason had been hauled off to sick bay, but there was still the shuttleload of Exts to deal with, dead and wounded among them. Even more important, Quant had to consider the impatient twixes from on high that probably had the commo equipment running molten by then.
Another complication materialized in the form of Dr. Zinsser, who somehow had slipped past Quant's diversionary forces. The oceanographer was stalking toward him now, a picturesquely skinny, sun-browned man wearing only a frayed salt-water-bleached singlet and swim strap. Zinsser's face was borderline homely, but his seafarer's tan, crow's-feet, wind-ruffled salt and pepper hair, and bottle-green eyes all gave him a mien that transcended looks. He combined it with all the humility and tact of a prima ballerina, despite the fact that his ego had led him to folly and, like Quant, he had been consigned to backwaters in retribution.
Zinsser opened with ranging fire while he was still five meters away. "Quant, I'm going to scuttle this damn scow right out from beneath you! Do you know what you almost—" He drew up short, taken aback, as Quant stepped out to grab him by the arm.
As had already been proved in a number of confrontations, Zinsser couldn't bully or pull rank on Quant, but the face-offs took time that Quant couldn't spare at the moment. He therefore opted to strike first by tossing Zinsser a hot rock to juggle for a while.
"Doctor, I'm hereby invoking the Naval Security Act, section 380-5, which, you may recall, you signed and swore to under oath in order to do research aboard Matsya."
"Have… you… gone… synapshit?" Sinewy as he was, Zinsser had no hope of breaking Quant's grip.
"You'll cooperate during this emergency or I'll see to it you end up in a benthic arkology isolation module sorting fish jizm." Quant reared back, taking on a jovial tone. "Here, say hello to Burning, Allgrave of the Exts. His cousin and aide, Major Lod. And the Allgrave's sister, Ghost"
It was, as Quant had foreseen, Ghost who actually derailed Zinsser. A vanity-driven womanizer, he took one look at her ethereal beauty and otherworldly scars and forgot his pique.
Quant capitalized on it ruthlessly. "Allgrave—Dr. Raoul Zinsser. He'll help you get situated belowdecks. I suggest you take your first two platoons. If everything's satisfactory, my runners will guide the rest of your people in groups of the same size to prevent jam-ups in the passageways. My people will also get your casualties to sick bay; your medics can accompany them." He glanced at Zinsser. "Doctor, escort our guests to berthing spaces 32-01-L. I'll have a detail meet you there to lend a hand."
Quant was away before Zinsser could regroup.
* * * *
Being a Science Sider, Zinsser knew the designated berthing spaces only hazily, but he managed to find them by following deck and frame numbers and the centerline code. As he walked, he tried to chat up Ghost but mostly found Burning in his way.
Berthing space 32-01-L was big, dusty, and empty except for bunks stacked three and four high; in former times they had been occupied by embarked marines and other amphib troops. Most of the bunks were as close as fifty centimeters to the ones above them; in some a large sleeper would have to slide out in order to turn over.
Zinsser turned his craggy smile on Ghost. "As usual, Quant has blundered. Staterooms must be found for you and the officers."
&
nbsp; Burning declined. "This will do for us. It's not much worse than Sword of Damocles, and I don't want my force divided among small compartments."
While Burning looked the spaces over, Zinsser engaged Ghost's glance. "Was flawless beauty too much of a burden to bear? Or are your scars a way of forcing people to appreciate such other merits as you may possess?"
She lowered the detector she'd been running along the exposed overhead utility lines. Dark, impenetrable eyes stared at him from behind the whorls and hyphens of raised tissue.
"You couldn't understand, Periapt—even if I explained. Besides, you'd be too busy waging unspoken war on me. Your drives make you desirous, and you resent the power that the object of your desire holds over you."
Zinsser smiled condescendingly, poised to do so regardless of her response. "Ridiculous. I revere beauty. That's why the sea is my passion. Come diving with me and I'll prove it."
"I no longer suffer weak men, Doctor."
"Weak—"
"You're a weak man from a weak people or you wouldn't've survived to your age, tossing off mortal insults so carelessly."
Zinsser, pausing to get his bearings in suddenly unfamiliar territory, became cognizant of the silent attention of nearby Exts—mere children, he saw to his astonishment. Some were sidling to block the nearest hatch, regarding him with blank, merciless eyes.
He felt a touch and could not help flinching. It was the insouciant Lod, drawing him away by the elbow. "Doctor Zinsser, I think you should come with me right now. That's a good man. Before someone opens a new purge valve in your windpipe…"
Chapter
Twenty-Five
"Commander, I'm taking Claude Mason ashore with me," Dextra informed Quant as she approached him by the catapult. "The medics say he's recovered from his episode or whatever it was, and he's determined to get back to dry land."
