Warring States

by Susan R. Matthews

  “And you, Robert. Are you here on fifthweek?”

  Everybody on the Ragnarok did fifthweek, a periodic rotation from their normal assigned duty station to somewhere different. Bond-involuntaries could only do their fifthweek in Infirmary, though, because they needed specific medical skills to support their officer — and to keep them close to their officer, as well, for their mutual protection.

  St. Clare was not wearing Infirmary whites, however, but his Security colors. St. Clare didn’t blush, no, he answered Rukota candid and open-faced as any man, and Rukota’s sense of respect — and amusement — only grew.

  “Sent to fetch his Excellency for laps, if the General please.” It was an inside joke, Rukota had gathered, Security Chief Stildyne, and Koscuisko, and laps. “The officer saw Ship’s Engineer on the tracks the other day and has refused to return. This troop is to tell the officer that a Security detachment will be standing by to prevent any accidental mechanical, ah, accidents.”

  There was no real need for St. Clare to choose his words carefully so as to avoid falling into error; there was no governor there to punish him, but bond-involuntaries were carefully trained, thoroughly conditioned. Maybe it didn’t really even matter that the governor was gone. It took months of adjustment to prepare the occasional man who survived his sentence to be returned to normal life, after all.

  Rukota stopped, and held up his hand. “Let’s just pause for a moment,” he suggested. “And I’ll predict the future. We’ll get around the corner, but at some point between the next turning and the one after that you’ll lose your footing and knock into me. It’ll be an accident, of course, and you’ll be horrified, and I’ll quite naturally take appropriate pains to assure you that there has been no violation.”

  Operant conditioning didn’t require unfailing negative reinforcement. So long as the negative reinforcement was negative enough it didn’t really matter whether it was there every time. The strength and persistence of the conditioned behavior depended on the intensity of the stimulus that either rewarded or punished it, and if there was anything that could do a better job of negative reinforcement than an artificial intelligence with direct linkages into pain receptors in a man’s brain, Rukota didn’t know what it was.

  “If I don’t take long enough to do that, you’ll suddenly realize that you’ve wrenched your ankle, but very oddly there won’t be a soul in corridors, not even though we’re between Pharmacy Restock and Issues, which by the breadth of these corridors is generally well-traveled. And it’s all so unnecessary. I don’t want to ambush your officer. I do have to pass on a message to him.”

  If he was wrong he might have just done an unkind thing, the sort of thing he himself had never tolerated — bullying a bond-involuntary troop, pressuring them until the stress convinced the governor that something was wrong and punishment was in order. He waited; then he turned his head. St. Clare was looking straight ahead, and the only part of his face that was smiling was such a minute number of muscles in his eyelids that he couldn’t be accused of smiling at all by any reasonable soul. But he was smiling. For a bond-involuntary it was as good as a broad grin.

  “With respect, General. This troop regrets having no idea what the officer means to imply, due to this troop’s limited understanding and inability to grasp advanced concepts of cause and effect. Had considered attempting to lock the officer in a stores-room, but not the officer’s suggestion. Request permission to offer thanks. This troop appreciates the opportunity to benefit from superior wisdom and understanding of tactics and strategy. Sir.”

  Oh, very good. “What’s the plan, then? Do I hunt him through Infirmary, or lay in wait outside of quarters?” Rukota started moving again, confident that he and St. Clare understood each other. He might still get knocked to the floor or locked in a stores-room, but at least he and St. Clare were clear on whether or not it would be an accident. It was a pity, in a sense. It might have been worth being locked in stores to hear what story St. Clare could possibly have come up with to cover.

  “His Excellency is usually in his office at this point in shift, if the officer please,” St. Clare said blandly, as coolly as could be imagined. “Which is why this troop was sent to fetch him from there for laps. If the officer will follow me.”

  It was with a sinking feeling in his gut of having been played for a fool, and richly deserving it, that Rukota followed St. Clare the rest of the way through Infirmary to Koscuisko’s office. In which Koscuisko sat, as calmly as could be imagined, apparently hard at work on clinic reports — but in Infirmary whites, rather than his duty blacks. Medical officers didn’t wear Infirmary whites unless they were actually in Infirmary. For a moment Rukota thought he remembered a whisper of a recent rumor about Koscuisko and bond-involuntaries, but it was gone before he could grasp it.

  One way or another, he’d been out-maneuvered, for whatever reason. There was no shame in that. It was just too bad that such successful strategic misdirection could be done by bond-involuntary troops and not fifteen out of sixteen of the junior officers that Rukota had been privileged to know — though perhaps ap Rhiannon herself might be admitted as belonging to the one out of sixteen category.

  “Your Excellency,” Rukota said. He was senior in rank on the face of it, but he was not the senior Command Branch officer on board. That was ap Rhiannon, by default. And therefore, in the hierarchy of military courtesy, he was to address Koscuisko respectfully by title, whereas Koscuisko was free to address him by rank. Which was respectful enough. “The Captain expects you on the courier launch apron in order to brief you prior to your immediate departure for Connaught Station. There is a call on your professional services.”

  Of which fact Koscuisko had clearly already been apprised, even if the Captain wished to respect his dignity — and ensure that her instructions were perfectly clear — by sending Rukota to communicate the information to him personally, face-to-face. Koscuisko stood up. “Has Stildyne been told?” Koscuisko asked, but Rukota was certain that it was just for form’s sake. “I shall need my kit.”

  Koscuisko knew that someone wanted information, but Koscuisko was annoyed, not worried. Ap Rhiannon had been very clear on what she expected from him as far as Inquiry was concerned, and Secured Medical had been converted into storage space for some time.

  “I’ve no doubt that Chief Stildyne will be meeting you on the docks, your Excellency. Perhaps you should take Robert with you, as well.” Because an Inquisitor was accompanied by bond-involuntaries any time he left the ship — both for his own protection and because the only reason an Inquisitor left his ship unless he was on leave was in order to execute the Protocols against an accused, and the Bench had made bond-involuntaries specifically to give Inquisitors captive hands with which to do the dirty work.

  Rukota wondered suddenly whether Koscuisko’s man Pyotr would be allowed to travel; he remembered the whisper, now. There had been a rumor about bond-involuntaries. One of them had been suddenly diagnosed with a brain-slug, and another almost as suddenly came down with a moderately rare case of crystallization of matter in the limbic system or something of the sort. It was none of his business, however.

  “We’d best not keep the Captain waiting, Robert,” Koscuisko said, sorting his documents-cubes into a tidy array and standing up. “Let us be going directly. Thank you, General.”

  Speculation and rumor were just that. Where there was a dust cloud, there was a dust cloud; no more, no less. Surrendering any residual curiosity to the basic good sense of minding his own business Rukota went whistling down the narrow corridors of the Ragnarok to go see the Ship’s Engineer and review the requirements for the Ragnarok’s battle cannon.

  ###

  “This then is the officer in charge at the Connaught vector control,” Andrej Koscuisko said, with his arms folded across his chest and one hand wrapped around his elbow to keep a firm grip on his upper arm. To prevent himself from hitting her absent-mindedly, Vaal thought; but did her best to keep her military bearing.
Of course she was afraid of him. That was Andrej Koscuisko, and everybody knew that he was either completely out of his mind or ought to be. “Tell to me again what service you mean me to perform for you.”

  Her people had gotten her up altogether too early into her rest-period, and after that things had gone very quickly. She was supposed to be asleep, not standing in her office face-to-face with a notorious painmaster. A professional torturer. The opportunity that Koscuisko’s presence suggested could not be wasted, no matter how much it upset her to be talking to a man with his history.

  “Thank you for coming, your Excellency.” It hadn’t been his sleep-shift. No, he looked fresh and rested, and the beautifully tailored curve of the black fabric of his over-blouse seemed to breathe a clean bright fragrance of citrus and snow. That was nonsense, it had to be. Snow didn’t have any fragrance. It was just fluffy ice. “We have orders pertinent to the terrorist attack at Ghan that require us to stop any specified traffic through the vector that doesn’t have a valid audit stamp.”

  Ghan was different from other recent mass casualties. Someone had gone to great lengths to maximize murder, and there seemed to be no sense to it, but was there ever any sense to terrorist activity? The fuel pipes could have been poisoned at any time over a period of days, with the right time-release, and up until the morning on which the port had died traffic had been leaving Ghan on the usual closely timed schedule of a busy mercantile port. There had been a lot of traffic, and the records were for the most part unrecoverable, destroyed in the fires that panicked rioters had set.

  “And you have to feed them until Fleet can spare an Inquisitor,” Koscuisko added. His tone was not very cordial. Officers at his level of rank didn’t have to be cordial, unless it was to their own senior officers. Few people under Jurisdiction outranked a Ship’s Inquisitor.

  Andrej Koscuisko was more than just a Ship’s Inquisitor. Andrej Koscuisko was widely reputed to have the truth-sense on him. Whether there were such a thing as truth-sense or not Vaal neither knew nor cared. He was a professional uncoverer of secrets. He would know if she was keeping any.

  “When you’re a maintenance technician everything looks like a salvage job, your Excellency.” When you were an officer who dealt with sabotage and treason, everything looked like the one thing or the other. Inquisitors saw everybody as guilty, in part because once an Inquisitor was called in everybody either confessed or died. Usually one, and then the other. By a quick flash in Koscuisko’s very pale eyes Vaal deduced that he had taken her meaning; she hurried on while she still had the nerve.

  “Five of the ships we’re holding are from Port Rudistal outbound for Emandis space, your Excellency. The story is that they are to establish a mining colony on one of the slow-moons in system.” The truth was that they meant to take the vector through Emandis to Gonebeyond space, and escape from Jurisdiction entirely. That had been her conclusion, at any rate. “If you could just verify their story, sir. We could let them go on about their business.”

  She had to feed them, yes. That was so. She had a legitimate reason for wanting them out of here as soon as possible. Technically speaking Nurail were classed as displaced persons confined to a limited number of systems where labor was in short supply.

  The Domitt Prison was closed — Andrej Koscuisko had closed it, years ago, and exposed a catalog of horrors that remained one of the blackest blights on Jurisdiction in recent history. Hadn’t the Nurail earned the right to flee the Bench for Gonebeyond if they could? The Domitt Prison was drenched in the blood of Nurail men and women who had, in the end, been guilty of no crime but that of wanting to be free.

  “Take me to your facilities, then,” Koscuisko said, unfolding his arms. His voice was no longer quite so glacially superior. “Have you a manifest of the cargo?”

  She had. “There are one or two anomalies,” she admitted. “Some of the equipment appears to be make-shift. Ore-crushers are expensive. I expect a good mechanic could make do with a lighter, more portable vehicle.” Agricultural equipment ran significantly smaller and lighter than mining equipment. Nurail had limited funds. It only made sense that they’d had to pool their resources and buy what they could, knowing they’d have to retool when they got to the mines. And if they never got to the mines, but ended up somewhere else — oh, well. There were no economic enterprises without risk.

  “No matter,” Koscuisko said, and waited while his silent standing Security opened the door to Vaal’s office to let them all out. “I will take the manifests as audited. Send to me your persons of interest. Have you holding facilities?”

  It was with difficulty that Vaal mastered the warm rush of gratitude that she felt. It would not do to show any unexpected emotion. People might think. Koscuisko was going to play along, he’d said so. Well, he’d said send to me your persons of interest, but it amounted to the same thing.

  “No cells at the hospital, your Excellency, but we can hold people in a clinic wing. Since there’s nothing there. You will wish to use — ah — ”

  There was no Secured Medical, no dedicated torture room. Not in a small hospital at an administrative station. Koscuisko smiled — yes, actually smiled — and preceded her out of the room, according to the protocols of military rank-courtesy.

  “I will want bedding enough to keep my people,” Koscuisko said. “Also open for me a field kitchen so that people may eat. I do not need Secured Medical, Vaalkarinnen. I am accustomed to working with minimal infrastructural support. That is why the Bench has granted to me Security.”

  Bond-involuntary security, yes, of course. Green-sleeves, marked as Security slaves by the thin edge of poison-green piping that trimmed the cuffs and collars of their uniforms. She wished he hadn’t said that, about infrastructure; some of the most famous horror stories about Andrej Koscuisko had to do with his genius for improvisation.

  “As you say, your Excellency.” It was too late now, one way or the other. She had called for Andrej Koscuisko. She would simply have to trust that nothing would go awry. If it did, it would be her fault.

  If it all worked out, though, she need have nothing in her memory to accuse her. She would put her trust in Koscuisko’s reputation for anarchy — and for having a weak spot for Nurail after so many of them had been cruelly murdered, a significant number by Koscuisko himself, at the Domitt Prison in Port Rudistal, so many years ago.

  ###

  Chapter Two

  Reminiscences

  How often had he found himself here? Andrej Koscuisko asked himself, with an emotion that he could not quite identify or bear to examine too closely. Some makeshift torture-cell in some station with a problem and no solution in view. Prisoners. Security. Drugs. All of his favorite whips.

  “Just like old times,” he said to Stildyne, who was hovering — just a bit. He was wrong about the whips. He hadn’t brought them. There was no sense in testing one’s resolution; and a whip was traditional, but unnecessary. Andrej was Dolgorukij born and bred. Dolgorukij had respect for tradition, and his family was among the more traditional of the great Houses of the Dolgorukij Combine in these latter days. If he’d brought a whip he would have had all that much more difficulty refraining from using it.

  “Don’t get started in on that,” Stildyne replied, setting an array of doses down on the shining surface of the sterile table in front of them. “You’ll only work yourself into a mood. And you’ve been in a mood ever since you got here.”

  Just now? Or five — nearly six — years ago, when he had joined the crew of the Ragnarok, and met his new Chief of Security? It was perhaps better not to ask, Andrej decided. Brachi Stildyne had taken good care of him and good care of his people as well. There was nothing to be done about the fact that Andrej could return Stildyne’s awkwardly expressed if deeply felt regard with gratitude and respect, and nothing more.

  The best way he could communicate the gratitude that he owed was to do as he was told and not argue. Yes, he was the superior officer. Yes, technically speaking it was Stildyn
e who had to shut up and get on with his work. It was also true that Stildyne had spent more time holding Andrej’s head over the basin of the toilet than could reasonably be expected of anybody save a wife or a servant, and Stildyne was neither.

  There was a subtle sound behind Andrej’s back; Stildyne looked over his shoulder, and called “Step through.”

  Robert St. Clare, with lab results in cube. “The officer’s documentation,” Robert said, passing the cube to Stildyne. “And the officer’s rhyti coming directly.”

  Rhyti now; liquor later, perhaps. It wasn’t that Andrej didn’t know how to be humiliated at being so drunk that he had to be washed and changed like an infant, wrestled into bed, forcibly restrained from taking unsafe actions with sharp objects. He knew perfectly well how contemptible a drunk he was. The humiliation of his drunkenness was a species of punishment that kept him returning to drink when he could no longer bear the fear of his own dreams.

  Had it not been for Stildyne’s nursing and the support of his people, his own medical staff would have had to confine him on ward as self-destructive, and then he would have been publicly humiliated every time. For all he knew his medical staff would have liked to do just that, though not out of any particular desire to humiliate him. Captain Lowden had seen to it that they left him alone — and placed the entire burden of his care in the hands of bond-involuntaries, like Robert.

  Now Captain Lowden was dead, but Andrej’s medical staff was apparently willing to trust Security with the care of drunken officers. If he’d known that his staff was going to take that approach, Andrej told himself, he might have murdered Lowden much sooner than he had.

  And it was better not to think of it, because although Bench Intelligence Specialist Karol Vogel had claimed responsibility for the assassination — Lowden had needed killing, and Vogel had the authority — it would still be Tenth Level command termination for Andrej if the truth ever came out. He was living on borrowed time.