A House United

by Caleb Wachter

  “That's right,” she said, sitting stiffly in the chair opposite Bellucci.

  “Whatever your reasons may be for doing so, I care not,” Bellucci said seriously. “All I care about is that you make contact with a certain organization operating in the Gorgon Sectors.”

  “You want me to run correspondence with the Imperial Fleet?” McKnight scoffed.

  Bellucci's golden eyes flashed dangerously, and she held McKnight's gaze for several seconds before shaking her head, “Do not play a fool—but more importantly, do not waste my time. I have several associates in the Gorgon Sectors who await my instructions.”

  “Act?” McKnight repeated skeptically, though she felt the familiar flicker of curiosity appear in the back of her mind. “I thought your family was in favor of the Gorgon Wars; why would you and of your associates be waiting to act? Shouldn't they be helping the Imperial Fleet whenever possible?”

  Bellucci's mouth twisted into a bemused smirk, “How little you know of the games which decide your very fate. No,” she shook her head, “blindly offered assistance benefits few, least of all those who offer it. A favor should never be given, only exchanged for another.”

  “That's pretty cynical.”

  “Call it what you will,” Bellucci shrugged. “Nevertheless, these associates await my instructions to act in the Empire's interests. And it seems that the Gorgon Sectors have undergone something of a political realignment in recent months; normally I would send my associates a missive of this nature through proper channels, but those channels are too dangerous right now and, frankly, too slow to be of any use.”

  McKnight narrowed her eyes, “What exactly are you asking me to do?”

  Bellucci produced a data crystal and held it between her thumb and forefinger emphatically, “Deliver this crystal to the coordinates physically imprinted on the crystal's surface.”

  McKnight eyed the crystal. “Should I deliver it to anyone in particular?”

  “No,” Bellucci shook her head, “simply give it to whoever awaits you at those coordinates. Agree to ask no questions, nor to harry them in any way, and I will consider that service sufficient to warrant reciprocity.”

  “What are you offering?” McKnight asked, her curiosity piqued as much by the intrigue and mystery as by the golden-eyed Senator sitting across from her.

  “Passage,” Bellucci replied simply. “I trust you have already secured your own mode of transport—likely the same ship which brought you through the Conduit—and have plans to leave Imperial space as soon as you rendezvous with it. But you know as well as I that, even with a Jefferson's peculiar FTL drive, the voyage to the Gorgon Sectors will take a year or more.”

  McKnight took the other woman's meaning immediately and blurted, “There's another Conduit?”

  “Indeed,” Bellucci nodded, clearly taking satisfaction in McKnight's surprise. “I will answer no questions about them, Captain,” she held up a halting hand an instant before the notion to inquire on the subject had even sprung to McKnight's mind, causing McKnight to scowl as the other woman continued, “all I offer is access to the Conduit through which elements of the Imperial Fleet traveled in order to reach the Gorgon Sectors. That access will cut your travel time by seventy five percent, assuming your former commander is where I think he is. Am I correct in presuming you desire to expedite this would-be reunion with your former commanding officer?”

  McKnight sat there for a long, silent while as she considered how to reply. Bellucci's perfect fingers drummed quietly against her thigh, never breaking rhythm for what had to be three minutes of uninterrupted silence before, finally, McKnight relented, “You think you're pretty smart, don't you?”

  “Smarter than some, not as smart as others,” Bellucci shrugged before leaning forward intently, “but that is not the defining difference between us. The single most important difference between you and I is that I know my place in this great dance of ours. You, on the other hand, have yet to truly understand—let alone embrace—your role.”

  “My role?” McKnight repeated hotly. “You mean as your servant?”

  “A servant would never have been asked to this private meeting,” Bellucci shook her head firmly. “We are, at this moment in time, very much equals in the great drama which drives humanity among the stars. You are, somewhat unexpectedly, an important cog in the machinery presently working to improve our entire species.”

  “And what about my crew?” McKnight asked, feeling bitter anger well up within her as she remembered the attack on the Rainbow—an attack which had claimed so many of her crewmembers' lives. “Were they unimportant dross to be discarded at the first opportunity?”

  Bellucci sighed, “I had hoped you understood the truth by now. It seems that hope was misplaced.”

  “How about you try to make me understand?” McKnight demanded, standing from her chair and feeling her hands ball into fists at her sides. “Because right now I'm finding it hard to resist the urge to break that perfect little nose of yours—and worse!”

  Bellucci's posture did not shift, nor did her expression flinch in the slightest at McKnight's outburst. In fact, she relaxed even deeper into her chair and sighed again, “Surely you understand the concept of high politics? Games within games; feints and gambits executed with every intention of deceiving the other players?”

  “That's all my people were to you, isn't it? Pawns in your fucking game?!” McKnight snarled, finding it far more difficult than she had expected to rein in her emotions. She doubted she could win a fight against Bellucci, or that she could even make good on her threat to break her nose, but she would be blasted if she sat back and acted like the deaths of her crew didn't count for something.

  If that degree of callous disregard for human life was required to 'play the game' at the highest levels, McKnight wanted no part of it.

  “Captain,” Bellucci said, her expression softening before slowly hardening into one that sent chills down McKnight's spine as the other woman deliberately stood from the chair and took a poised step toward her, “I have knowingly sacrificed orders of magnitude more than you and your people have lost in service of this particular operation. I do not care if you believe that or not; all I care about is completing this work, which is undertaken in service to our entire species. Yes, I ordered the deaths of your crew—“

  McKnight cocked a fist and launched her best overhand left at Bellucci's face, finding herself surprised to the point of being stunned when her fist smashed straight into the Senator's nose. Even more surprisingly, Bellucci made no effort to evade the second blow, a left hook to her jaw. But though McKnight put everything she had into both punches, she did little more than snap the Senator's head back and aside with the perfectly-executed combination.

  The third blow, a kick McKnight had aimed at Bellucci's crotch, was deftly intercepted by Bellucci's hands—which had a grip that felt like iron when they clamped down on McKnight's ankle. With a subtle shift of her hips, Bellucci twisted McKnight's leg so hard that she felt something give in her upper calf.

  With strength far beyond that which her hyper-feminine frame suggested, the golden-eyed Senator lifted and spun McKnight's body into a nearby bulkhead where her shoulder struck a vertical strut with enough force to break her shoulder. The lance of pain McKnight felt suggested that very thing might have happened, but before she could process that blow she felt her face explode in a riot of white and red pain.

  Dimly aware she was lying on the deck, McKnight staggered to her feet and fought through narrowed vision to focus on the Senator, who stood impassively with her arms folded across her chest—a chest which now featured a rivulet of red running down between her improbably perfect breasts.

  “I will suffer no more of your spite,” Bellucci said with deadly precision as she pointedly lifted a finger beneath her bleeding nose—which somehow seemed to have already ceased flowing. “If you are not prepared to accept my offer, I will rescind it and drop you off in an escape pod. But if you desire to accept
my offer, you would be wise to refrain from further outbursts.”

  “You're a heartless bitch,” McKnight seethed as she considered, however briefly, launching another likely-futile attack against the physically-superior woman.

  “Of course I am,” Bellucci smirked. “But that is immaterial at this moment; do you wish to accept my offer or not?”

  McKnight reached up to her own nose, finding that it still dripped a stream of blood down onto her uniform, and wiped it angrily before finally regaining control of her emotions. “Of course I accept,” she spat.

  “Good,” Bellucci nodded, producing a second data crystal, “this contains the location of, and access codes for, the Conduit which will conduct you to the Gorgon Sectors. I have also taken the liberty of highlighting the least-patrolled regions for you to travel through en route to your rendezvous. You are free, of course, to use this information or not as you see fit. For your sake, I hope you opt to utilize it.”

  “Why help me at all?” McKnight demanded, her former fiery disposition cooling to something more resembling her usual, calculating demeanor.

  “I told you,” Bellucci said coolly, “we can still be of use to one another; it is a waste to discard such an opportunity when the associated costs are acceptably low—or, as in this case, are no costs at all.”

  A thought occurred to McKnight, and this time she considered her words before concluding, “You're going to frame Cornwallis for our use of the Conduit.”

  Bellucci flashed a predatory—and somehow approving—grin, “Correct. By itself, a relatively minor abuse of a Senior Senator's authority. But combined with a series of well-timed revelations regarding the would-be Triumvir's myriad flaws—among them his rigid adherence to, and promulgation of, the very brand of superstition which once threatened to destroy our entire species—it will, I believe, prove a decisive weight upon the scales of political balance.”

  McKnight considered the situation for another lengthy, pregnant pause before nodding, “Fine, I'll do it.”

  “Good.”

  “It has been a pleasure, Captain,” Senator Bellucci said as the shuttle sent over by the 24 made seal with the airlock. The airlock cycled, and McKnight was surprised to see Fisher on the other side when it opened.

  “Fish?” McKnight asked, perplexed by the other man's presence. “You're staying with them?” she asked as she came to understand his presence—along with the more predictable presence of Bethany and Mr. Largent, or just 'Largent.'

  Fisher's eyes flicked back and forth between McKnight and Bellucci as he said, “It looks like this is where I can do the most good. Sorry, McKnight; it's got to be this way. I wish I could have come with you.”

  “Is this your choice?” McKnight asked tightly, suspecting some measure of coercion on the parts of Bellucci, Tremblay, and Bethany. “I won't leave anyone behind who doesn't want to stay,” she finished with a hard look Bellucci's way.

  Fisher shook his head firmly, “It ain't like that, McKnight. There's still moves that need to be made here, and it looks like I'm needed to help make them. I made Lynch a promise,” he said, briefly lowering his gaze introspectively, “and I'm not about to break it.”

  McKnight wanted to press the issue, but when his eyes met hers she could tell it would accomplish nothing. The affable Fisher's expression was intent and somber, but spoke nothing of being intimidated or otherwise coerced. “All right,” she thrust out a hand, “thank you for everything, Fish.”

  Fisher clasped her hand in his own and nodded, “Likewise, McKnight. It's been a serious ride. I wish I didn't have to get off just now.”

  “Nobody chooses when they get off a ride like this,” McKnight said pointedly, “only when they get on, and how hard they grip the rails while there.”

  “True enough,” Fish agreed.

  “And what about you?” McKnight asked steadily, turning to Largent.

  “Who, me?” he asked in faux confusion, playing every bit the annoying scoundrel Lu Bu had painted him to be. “Think of me like a cab driver: I'm just here to make sure everyone gets where they're tryin' to go.”

  McKnight quirked an eyebrow, but seeing Largent's hand resting near the blaster pistol at his hip suggested he had, in fact, come to the transport expecting—or at least affording for—some measure of trouble.

  “Then your presence was unnecessary,” Bellucci said in a tone that was somehow both reassuring and menacing.

  “You know me,” Largent flashed a cocksure grin, while his eyes remained fixed on the Senator—and his hand remained near his pistol, “better to have without needing than to need without having, especially when it comes to yours truly—I mean, have you looked at me lately? I brighten every room I step into. Besides,” he drew an audible breath through his nose, as though smelling something on the air, “I'm feeling a sudden burst of freedom lately.”

  Bellucci's eyes narrowed fractionally, “Good luck in your future endeavors, then.”

  “You too, babe,” Largent said with a curt nod as Nazoraios moved beside McKnight. “Howdy-do,” Largent whistled in mock appreciation at the old Tracto-an, “I didn't think any of you brutes made it into your grey hairs.”

  “We should leave,” Nazoraios said to McKnight, drawing a scornful look from Bethany as he did so, “now.”

  “No argument there, Gramps,” Largent agreed.

  McKnight was hesitant to do so, but she knew it was time. They needed to make their rendezvous with the Rainbow as soon as possible so they could get to the Gorgon Sectors. She still didn't know whether or not it was a fool's errand, running off to reunite with Captain Middleton on nothing more than a vague, purported vision experienced by a wounded crewman. But, foolish or not, she was committed so there was no sense dawdling.

  She turned her gaze toward Tremblay, who had quietly observed the scene with a scowl. “Good hunting, Mr. Tremblay,” she said, proffering her hand and apparently catching him by surprise. He hesitantly reached out, his expression stony as he did so, and when their grips met she added, purely for spite against the man who represented almost everything wrong with humanity that she could conceive, “Let's hope you play the rest of your little game better than you did against me.”

  He smirked, tightening his grip, “I could have had you all killed, McKnight. It would have been cleaner and caused me fewer headaches.”

  Nazoraios snorted bemusedly at that, drawing a dark look from Tremblay.

  “I know,” McKnight said with a smirk of her own, causing his focus to return to her, “but you knew then what you know now: this mission is too important. Personal feelings can't get in the way of it. On that much, if nothing else, you and I see eye-to-eye.”

  His smirk melted away and his eyes narrowed, “No one can know about what we did until the time is right—and I'm the one who determines when that is.”

  “Agreed,” McKnight said with a hard edge in her voice, “I wouldn't disrespect the sacrifices made to reach this point by blundering the endgame. This was my mission as much as yours, Tremblay.”

  “On that, you're wrong,” he shook his head, releasing his grip on her hand. “This is what I was born to do; for you, it was just another assignment.”

  “Whatever gets you through the day,” she sniped, turning on her heel and making her way through the airlock. But she knew that he was partially right: this was just another assignment for her.

  Unlike Tremblay, she was confident that her finest hour was yet to come—and given the magnitude of what she'd already accomplished, she knew just how arrogant that presumption would have seemed.

  But she didn't care. She had shipmates to find—and to possibly rescue! Everything else was irrelevant, including the fate of the vaunted Empire of Man.

  When the airlock door closed, and they pulled away from the docking clamps on the hull of the transport, both Largent and Nazoraios were aboard the shuttle with her.

  “Good work, XO,” McKnight said after receiving the brief report on the 24's status.

  “
I'm just glad you decided to join us,” Spalding said seriously. “This mission needs you.”

  “If I didn't have faith in my XO, I wouldn't have left him in command,” she chided, but gave a fractional nod of gratitude for his expressed sentiment. “I'm surprised that only a couple dozen of the Tracto-ans—mostly the younger ones—opted to stay behind,” she said, casting a pointed look over her shoulder where a few minutes earlier Nazoraios had been.

  “Apparently Valeria's got her people wired down tight,” Spalding said with a measure of approval. “They've already followed her halfway across the galaxy, why not go the rest of the way?”

  “So say we all,” McKnight said pointedly, to which Spalding nodded in silent agreement. “The good news is that trip just got cut a lot shorter than we'd planned—the bad news is that we're going to have to use another Conduit.”

  “Another one?!” Spalding blurted. “Just how many of those blasted things are the Imps sitting on?”

  “I don't know,” McKnight shook her head flatly, “but their existence does explain a lot of why Imperial military operations are so well-choreographed. By delaying the arrival of their ships to make it look like they used conventional FTL drives to go from the Empire to a region like the Spine the whole way, they buy themselves months of prep time.”

  “I doubt they send every expedition through the Conduit,” he rejected. “If they did, someone—somewhere—would have leaked their existence by now.”

  “Possibly,” McKnight allowed, “but irrelevant to our current situation.”

  “Agreed,” Spalding nodded. “The 24 will be ready to jump in another three hours, and it should take us two weeks of continuous jumping to rendezvous with the Rainbow.”

  “Good,” she acknowledged, checking the 24's main sensor readout and seeing Senator Bellucci's hired transport pulling away to a distant remove while it, too, made ready for the first in what would certainly be an extensive series of point transfers. “The sooner we're out of here, the better.”