by Marque
“Lastway’s not out—did you know that?”
“I heard that from the crew as we came in. I really want a nice long chat with the local manager, because there’s every chance he’s one of them.”
“Because the ansibles here work?”
“Precisely. They seem to work, but do they? Are all messages being sent and received correctly? I rather doubt it. The people I suspect of being responsible still need to communicate with each other and would need a network to use—but a network they control. How many systems do you know, of your own experience, are down?”
“My own experience? Slotter Key. A ship coming to Belinta System as we left told me Leonora was down, and reported stuffed message bins blocking an automated intermediate station.”
“Full . . . that shouldn’t happen. Can’t happen without sabotage, but it’s a very simple way to mess things up. Easy to fix, if the repair crews know what’s wrong and are doing their job. But then easy to screw up again.”
“Low cost?” Ky asked.
“If you’re an ansible platform tech or administrator, yes. That’s where I think the trouble’s coming from anyway.”
“So—you want to check out the local administrator.”
“Very much. Actually, first I want to check out the ansibles themselves, the system software. I consider this my highest priority; partnering you would, at this point, be my second. I realize that no woman likes to come in second, but—”
“Don’t be stupid,” Ky said, more sharply than she intended. “I’m not a schoolgirl, even if I don’t have gray hair. I understand—you have to consider ISC first. But why would you even want to partner with Vatta?”
“Mobility. More resources. Many of the same reasons you want allies. This is too big for me alone, and I can’t—dare not—go straight to HQ. I can’t claim a place on any ISC ship without revealing who I am, which would make it impossible to uncover the plots and counterplots. Our merged networks are bigger than either alone.”
He looked honest, but then good liars did look honest. Ky was sure he was hiding things—he even admitted he was hiding things—but not sure if the things he was hiding were harmful to her mission. She was hiding things herself, for that matter. She caught herself wondering what he really looked like, with his own hair, with all disguises off, and dragged herself back to the issue at hand.
CHAPTER
THIRTEEN
So,” Ky said. “You want to partner with Vatta Enterprises, Ltd., or with me personally, or with me and Stella and Toby, or what?”
“You’re in command now, aren’t you? I believe in going to the top. I’d like to partner with you.”
“Stella’s going to be my G-2,” Ky said. She wondered if he knew the term.
“Good choice,” Rafe said. “You’ll want to have her vet the contract, I’m sure. Shall I write out what I’d like to see, since you don’t have an implant?”
“Go ahead,” Ky said. She called Stella, who arrived with a model contract already drafted. Rafe glanced at it. “This is fine,” he said. When it was signed and recorded, he stood and stretched.
“I would rather not run my inquiries from here,” Rafe said. “Your security may be as good as you paid for, but I don’t want any back-traces.”
“You have an idea who it is.”
“An idea. No data. If the idea’s right, then they have the same or better tech than I do.”
“Better tech than ISC?”
“Better tech than I’ve been given. If you could direct me to a bathroom, so I can put my face back on—”
“Down that passage, second left,” Ky said.
“Captain, there’s a call for you on the bridge.”
“Coming,” Ky said. “All right, Rafe, go find out what you can. If ISC’s whole local office is bent—”
“I didn’t say that.”
“No, but it could be. How long should I wait before rousing the troops?”
“The troops you don’t have? Don’t worry unless I’m not back in a full day cycle.”
“All right. And where should we look for the body if you’re not?”
“If I knew, I’d be safer. Just don’t . . . get into trouble while I’m gone.”
“I’ll do my best. See you then. Call us from the perimeter—you can ping Stella, right?”
“Right.”
On the bridge, Lee was holding an open contact with an odd expression on his face. “It’s a Mackensee ship,” he said. “Do you want to talk to them?”
“I wish I could afford to hire them,” Ky said, wondering if the value of Stella’s contribution would make that possible. Probably not. She sat in her command seat and flicked on her screen. “Captain Vatta here, go ahead.”
“This is Captain Pensig, Mackensee Military Assistance ship Gloucester . I understand you are the same Captain Vatta who had a contract with Mackensee at Sabine?”
“That’s right,” Ky said. She hoped that contract wasn’t under dispute somehow; they had seemed quite cordial when she left them.
“We’re having a . . . a sort of situation has come up, Captain Vatta, and the officer commanding our mobile force would like to confer with you.”
“With me?”
“Yes, Captain. I’m not sure if you’re aware of Mackensee command structure: the ship crews and the mobile forces are, perforce, in different branches, as it were . . .”
“Are you here because there’s a war on?” Ky asked. Enough fencing around; she wanted something solid.
“No, no, nothing like that. I mean, nothing other than whatever’s attacking ISC installations. We’re here on what should have been a routine mission, rotating personnel in and out of the local recruiting and consulting station. But something’s come up . . . the ansible failure, among other things . . .”
“I see,” Ky said, to fill in the long silence. “And your OIC wants to talk to me? What does he—she—think I can do?”
“I’m not sure. As I said, he’s not in my chain of command, in fact he’s . . . fairly junior . . . but he asked me to contact you, ship to ship. The . . . uh . . . officer who would normally be in charge developed a medical problem and is in cryosuspension. Would you be willing to meet with him?”
“Certainly,” Ky said. “But I’m not leaving my ship at present. Where are you docked?”
“Five Alpha Blue. I’m sure you’d like to speak to him by com before meeting in person . . .”
“Yes, thank you,” Ky said.
“Just a moment then. I’ll have him paged.”
Ky wondered why the other officer wasn’t standing by, but the vidscreen of the Mackensee bridge made it clear he wasn’t. His face, when he appeared, looked much younger than she expected.
“Captain Vatta, this is Lieutenant Mason of the Mackensee Military Assistance Corporation; he is the ranking combat forces officer presently in the system.” The ship captain could have been Lieutenant Mason’s father.
“Captain Pensig, I’ll talk to Captain Vatta alone,” the young man said. A slow flush mounted Captain Pensig’s neck, visible on the scan.
“Of course, Lieutenant Mason,” Pensig said with grave courtesy. “The com officer will seal the line.” He stepped back out of vid pickup range, and the margins of the screen flickered then steadied as someone walked through the security curtain.
“You don’t look like I expected,” said Lieutenant Mason. He didn’t, either; Ky had met only a few of the Mackensee officers before, but all of them had the kind of hard edge she expected from experienced military personnel. This young man did not; he belonged in a shipping office, someplace where everything fit into a routine.
“What did you expect?” she asked. And why should you expect anything, she wondered silently.
“Someone taller,” he said. “Older, maybe.” She looked at his face, and felt considerably older than he looked. “You had a contract with us—with Mackensee—after all . . .”
So the tales told, whatever they were, had not emphasized youth and inexperi
ence. That had to be good for something.
“So what did you want, Lieutenant Mason?”
“I’d . . . uh . . . like to talk to you. I am the ranking Mackensee officer in this system.” She could hear both surprise and pride in that. “I’ve heard of you—we all have. And I have a dilemma that you may be able to help with.”
“I don’t think we have a lot of extra resources, Lieutenant.”
“I was thinking we might combine resources . . .”
“How?”
“Ma’am, I’d really like to talk to you in person, in a secure location. Could you come aboard our ship?”
“Er . . . no, thank you. I prefer to stay on my ship. You could come here.” That would give her time to find out a bit more about Mackensee on this station.
“All right. I’ll come right over.”
“But watch for trouble on the docks.”
A sound of throat clearing, followed by “Ma’am, I don’t expect I’ll have any trouble. I’ll bring a squad . . .”
As soon as she was offline, Ky called Martin to the bridge and told him about the call.
“Mercs want to talk to us?” he said. “That’s very interesting. I wonder what kind of problem they think we can help with.”
“I have no idea,” Ky said. “But they’ll be here soon, and I’d like you to sit in.”
“Of course, ma’am.”
Less than an hour later, the external scans lived up to their reputation and programming by signaling the arrival of “multiple armed individuals in body armor.” In the midst of ten Mackensee soldiers in nonpressure armor, faceplates closed, was their lieutenant, dwarfed by their imposing presence. Martin met them, gave the lieutenant a nod as crisp as a salute, and led him to the ship entrance.
Ky opened the lock and extended the access tube. “Lieutenent Mason, welcome to Dockside Vatta.”
“My escort will remain here,” the lieutenant said. He matched his appearance on the vidcom. “May I come aboard?”
“Yes, of course,” Ky said. Inside the ship, she took him to the rec area and settled him at a table. Martin stood at ease by the hatch to the galley. The lieutenant refused refreshments, sitting bolt upright in his chair, lips pursed tightly.
“Well,” Ky said, when he did nothing for several seconds. “Spit it out—what did you want to talk about?”
He glanced at Martin. “That man—”
“Is discreet and honest, Lieutenant Mason. That’s all you need to know.”
To her surprise, Mason flushed red, but he started in. “Here’s the situation, ma’am. The local station director says that the ansibles here are up and running, but we aren’t getting any messages. Any at all. We’ve sent them out, but we don’t know if our people are receiving them. Maybe the ansibles are blocked where they are. I—we can’t leave without orders; we don’t know where to go. And . . . we’re running out of credit.”
“Wait a minute,” Ky said. “What are you doing here in the first place? Did you have a contract to come here?”
“No, ma’am,” he said. “Lastway’s a good place to pick up contracts; that’s why we have a recruiting station and consulting office here. Out on the edge of settled space, like this, things are . . . a bit looser, if you know what I mean. You have arms deals . . . there’s MilMartExchange, you know about them . . . the largest purveyor of new and used military heavy weaponry and equipment . . . out here at the Fringe. When . . . someone . . . is thinking of fighting a war, they often come here to stock up on equipment. You must have gone by our recruiting station . . .”
“Yes.”
“It’s also the local consulting office. Whatever people say about mercs, ma’am, Mackensee is a quality outfit, platinum all the way. We don’t sell war, we sell expertise to people who otherwise will get themselves in unnecessary wars and cause a lot of damage.”
“Really . . .” That sounded like something he’d memorized from a brochure. Ky struggled not to glance at Martin and see what he thought of this spiel.
“Yes, ma’am. The Old Man says the only good war is the one that doesn’t happen—that’s why we like to take advisement contracts, not combat ones, if we can. And if the war has to come, better it be fought by people on payroll, because then the costs are calculable.” More advertising language.
“How many actions have you been in, Lieutenant?” Something about the young man’s glib delivery was making Ky wonder if he’d ever shot at anything but a target.
“Er . . . none yet, ma’am. But I’ve had two years of training, one at the Mackensee Combat Simulation and Practice Range.”
“I see. What made you join Mackensee?”
He shrugged. “Oh, the usual. Got in trouble, the judge said jail or mail, and I picked mail. I was lucky; Mackensee made me finish school after I went through boot, and my scores qualified me for their officer training.”
Ky thought they should have run him through a war first, but after all, she’d qualified for Slotter Key’s supposedly elite Space Academy on test scores and school grades. And look how that had turned out.
“So . . . you’re the ranking officer. Were you commanding here, on Lastway Station, or—”
“No, ma’am. I’m—I was the payroll escort officer, coming from our corporate headquarters out to Lastway . . . Major Delinn was the OIC in charge here, and Captain Oscone was in charge of troops aboard the two ships. When the ansibles went out, we were at Teglin Junction. Captain Oscone diverted one of the ships back to HQ to get new orders and put me in charge of the troops as well. Then when I got here, about two days later, Major Delinn suffered an arterial blowout and had to be put in cryosuspension because there’s no medical facility here that can handle that kind of thing. And that left . . . me.”
He sounded both scared and excited. “How many do you have in your command?” Ky asked.
“Ninety-two, all told, not counting ship crews. It’s more than a lieutenant usually has, of course. There’s twenty in the recruiting station and consulting office, another twenty in the rotation that was coming in to relieve them, and then the ships’ complements of troops. They’re not even the same organization, you see . . .”
And a payroll escort officer shall lead them . . . maybe. “How many ships do you have here?”
“Two. There’s a courier with the payroll, and a sheepdog to guard it. Not one of the big cruisers, of course, but well armed and capable of handling anything but major ships of the line. The other ship was much the same, the one the captain took back to HQ.”
“So what do you think I can do to help you?” Ky asked.
“I was thinking you could hire us,” he said. “I mean, we hear that someone’s attacking Vatta ships and people and things. We could protect you. Then you—Vatta, I mean—would be guarantors for our support onstation.”
Much as she’d wanted to hire Mackensee, this young man did not inspire confidence. She hedged. “Are you—forgive me for asking an awkward question—but are you entitled to make contractual agreements on Mackensee’s behalf?”
“Master Sergeant Dolan says I am—I mean, it’s in the regulations. The ranking officer may make binding contracts provided that such contracts are in the best interests of Mackensee.”
“And how many personnel in ship crews?” Ky asked, thinking that probably explained why they were running short of cash even if they’d brought the payroll. She wondered how big it was. She had no idea what it cost to support a military unit in idleness, a topic not covered in the Slotter Key Space Academy.
“Fifteen in the courier, and probably a hundred in the other. Why? They aren’t my problem.”
They were his problem, and he was a very stupid junior officer if he couldn’t see it.
“What sort of contract were you thinking of?” Ky asked.
“Like I said, we could protect you. You were attacked, right?”
“Yes, but as you can see I’m fine,” Ky said.
“Yes, but if you had guards, it wouldn’t have happened. And you were nearl
y killed, they said.”
“Who?”
“The Garda.” He reddened suddenly. “The . . . uh . . . Garda have an arrangement with Mackensee. Long-standing understanding.”
“I see,” Ky said. “So you know what they know?”
“Some, anyway. Master Sergeant Dolan does.”
Ky felt a strong desire to talk to Master Sergeant Dolan instead of Lieutenant Mason, but she was sure Dolan couldn’t negotiate contracts.
“So can we make a deal?” Mason asked.
“Patience, Lieutenant,” Ky said. She felt years older than this young man. “I have to assess my needs, and you have to tell me what your rates are. Whatever you’ve heard, merchanters aren’t made of money, and we don’t have unlimited funds. Aren’t you people usually hired by whole planets?”
“Yes, but you’re not getting an entire expeditionary force . . . you’re just getting us.”
“Suppose you present a formal proposal, Lieutenant, with estimates of the cost to us, and I’ll go over it with my financial officer and see if we can come to an agreement. I have no objection in principle to hiring Mackensee for a job of work, but I’m not going to give verbal agreement to an open-ended contract with no details specified. Surely you have a good clerk NCO who can draw up a sample . . .”
“Oh. Of course. Yes, ma’am, I do. Perhaps Master Sergeant Roth . . . he’d know. Can he . . . uh . . . just ping your implant?”
“I don’t have an implant,” Ky said. “Why not have Roth work something up, get your approval on it, and bring it over to discuss?”
“Yes, ma’am, I can do that.” He seemed much cheerier with a definite plan in mind, but then most people were. Ky would be much happier when she had a definite plan in mind. “Can we do this . . . uh . . . soon?” he went on.
Curiosity and amusement pushed her past tact. “Just how short of funds are you, Lieutenant?” Ky asked.
He reddened and for a moment she thought he was going to cry. “I—they—they just cut us off short, like that, and I know the ship captains have been after me to do something, but what could I do? I was trying to do the captain’s work and the major’s work and I didn’t know where anything was, and Dolan and Roth kept looking at me like I was a five-year-old and finally Dolan said why not ask you—actually he said that two days ago, but I thought maybe if I just talked to the bank—we’ve always had a good credit rating, and maybe a message would come through from home . . .”
