A smile curled her lips. A turncoat or a patriot loyal to her husband let her into the sanctum? This filled her with a small glow fed by delicious treachery. She had used Donal's name to good advantage before. This time her belly churned. Her husband had betrayed her. She would as quickly eliminate him as Weir if the opportunity arose, but it wouldn't. No one rallied to her who wasn't bribed or ambitious to succeed in a realm she ruled.
She pressed on, memories driving her now.
Even depending on Bella had proven difficult. The skill was great in her daughter, but her dedication to revenge faltered. Even with her lover dead at Weir's hand, Bella had proven a weak weapon. Scarlotti might have been a better ally. At least he understood propaganda. Her entire fight had been done with poor tools.
She drew her pistol as she came to the underground foyer that had once served as a retreat from the furor of government a few stories above. Either Weir knew nothing about this area or the elevator shaft had been sealed. From what she saw around the once tranquil area, destruction trumped ignorance. The elevator doors hung askew, and the pungent odor of hydraulic fluid billowed from the shaft. Picking her way through the debris, she reached the elevator and tried to pull open the doors. They were jammed. Peering into the shaft convinced her that this wasn't the way up.
"You can take the access tube around the side. There's a ladder inside, though you will have trouble wearing that bulky backpack if you climb. It's a tight fit at the best of times."
She whipped her lasepistol around in the direction of the voice. The small red aiming dot fixed dead center on the grill of a small makeshift speaker fastened to the wall.
"You're my contact? You were supposed to join me at the exterior door, not in here."
"That wasn't possible because of the fighting outside the Residence."
"Who are you?"
"You're worrying about trusting me? Now?" A harsh laugh overdrove the speaker and caused a feedback screech. "You've come this far because of what I've promised."
"No guards," Kori admitted. "I want to look you in the eye."
"I installed this speaker because you are so trigger happy. Getting sliced into thin, charred ribbons the instant you laid eyes on me will have to wait for another day."
Kori almost squeezed down on the corrugated plastic trigger to blow the speaker to smithereens. She relaxed, looked around and saw several places where her unknown ally had placed cameras. With methodical skill, the burned one after another.
"Oh, really. That wasn't necessary."
The irritation convinced her she had eliminated all the cameras. She considered blasting the speaker, too, then relented.
"If I take the access ladder, where do I go?"
"The same place as the elevator, only a few meters down the service corridor leading to Weir's office."
"He's there? In his office?"
No answer gave her pause. The more she spoke with her ally, the more certain she knew the identity who guided her to killing Weir. The cadence of his voice, the inflections, even over the speaker static, gave definite hints. She moved around to the access tube, popped open the door and stared up the ladder. The tube was a tight fit, as she had been warned. Moving the straps from her shoulders and slinging the pack around her waist gave more clearance for the climb. If she had identified her unseen friend, she knew getting killed in the tube wasn't likely. He had a half dozen better opportunities to kill her or, worse, capture her.
She tested the first rung, then pulled herself up and slowly climbed into the darkness. Stale air and the pressure on her arms and back, with the weight of the backpack around her waist pulling her down, caused her to feel faint. She caught herself, wiped sweat off her forehead using her sleeve, then forced herself to keep climbing. It felt as if she had entered a vertical grave. A small red light showed where the door release awaited her. She let out breath she hadn't known she held. For a heart-stopping moment, her touch didn't open the door. Then she realized the delay was only in her mind. The access door slipped open silently after only a small pause.
The gust of air against her sweaty body chilled her. She stepped out, lifted the pistol and expected a rush of soldiers come to capture or kill her. Even the distant rumbling of fighting in the streets disappeared here. She had truly come to the heart of the beast.
Walking carefully, she came to the door leading into an antechamber behind the Programmer General's office. Kori tried to remember if she had ever come this way when her husband had occupied these rooms. She couldn't. There had been no need to sneak about when Donal had worn the control helmet and run the affairs of a nation, of almost the entire world. She touched the access button, then kicked hard to snap the door inward. The rebounding door almost caught her as she stepped forward. She winced as the door slammed into her elbow, but as much as it hurt, it didn't stagger her. Her lasepistol remained in a rock steady grip in her other hand.
The floor to ceiling video displays gave more than a dozen different views of the Residence grounds. From the look of the destruction and the bodies strewn about, some on fire from high-powered laser artillery and other simply lifeless, the revolt had been crushed. The soldiers moved behind tanks to rout the citizens. The distraction caused by the fighting would be lost to her soon.
She planted a few parcels of explosive and set proximity switches to protect her back before going to the door leading into the Programmer General's office. Hesitantly reaching out, she pushed against it. Locked. Kori started to use a charge from her backpack, then wondered if her palm print still opened the door. Shifting the pistol to her left hand, she touched her right to the door.
The almost imperceptible click told her Weir had not bothered changing the codes. He might have added his own to open the door but hadn't erased any of the Tomlins family codes. And why should he? Donal was gone, Cletus with him off-planet, Ebony had been blown up in her carrier, and she and Bella were fugitives run ragged by the soldiers. For all Weir knew, the lot of them were long since dead.
Leaning forward, she used her shoulder to push open the door. This entry came at the side of the Programmer General's office. The huge desk with the HUD projectors built in and the cobweb wiring of the control helmet dominated the center of the room. Sound dampening wall hangings depicting life back on Earth aided her entry. Only the movement as she closed the door and latched it behind her caught Weir's attention.
He blinked, then batted about to clear the virtual display only he saw from in front of his face. He reached for a control on the desktop.
"Don't move a muscle toward that toggle. Listen carefully. Take off the helmet, or you die here and now." She triggered a blast a few centimeters in front of his nose to let him know she meant it.
"Kori!"
"Off with the helmet. Now!"
Weir slid the fragile device off his head. Small bald patches showed where he had already worn down the hair from electrodes. Donal had been Programmer General more than a year before his scalp looked like this. Weir had been living in this office, with the controller on. She hoped he had enjoyed his brief flirtation with power.
"My field commander reported your death after the robots attacked the base. I thought whoever controlled the warbots had killed you."
"My husband and son were in the robotic suits. They came to rescue me─or be certain I was dead."
"Why would Donal do that? He and Cletus have been raising hell with cargo coming into the planet." Weir slumped. "At least, I think they are both alive. One of them survived because the Shillelagh has turned pirate, and I can't imagine any officer aboard having the ability to command the way someone has."
"If they are alive, I will deal with them later." She raised her pistol and sighted in so the coherent beam would rip through Weir's face. She wanted to see the flesh sizzle and pop, then melt.
"I didn't have a choice. I had to remove him. He wasn't giving the people what they deserve. I can. I have."
Kori had no reason to prolong the discussion. She drew back
on the trigger. The lasepistol grew hot in her hand. She flung it aside before it burned her palm.
"I installed a dampening field." Weir stood and came around the desk. He towered over her, but her rage would overcome his strength, his skill.
She launched herself forward but got only a meter before hitting a solid wall. As she recoiled she saw the energy curtain shimmer and dance. The resources of a nation had gone into protecting Weir. She took a step back and sat heavily next to her backpack. A grenade came into her hand. She flipped it forward as she flung herself facedown an instant before the explosion.
Ears ringing, she listened hard for Weir's death moans. Nothing. The smoke filling the room obscured her view of the desk, but from the way the eddies billowed about, she had destroyed the force field. A second grenade fell from the backpack. She stood, steadied herself against the wall and hunted for Weir through the smoke.
Efficient fans sucked the acrid smoke from the room. Weir had vanished.
The explosion had damaged the desk and its equipment, but Kori went around and sat in the chair, taking in what still worked. The control helmet was useless to her, even if it hadn't been partially destroyed. It required considered training to link a brain with Blarney Stone to control through programming every aspect of the country's economy, its military and its people. But the desk display still glowed. She reached out and activated it, causing a small hologram to pop up a few centimeters above the desktop. It spun about, then spoke.
"You won't find him. Those are external views."
"This one isn't. It's within the Residence." She expanded the view of the corridor just outside the Programmer General's office. Guards stirred, trying to decide what to do. The explosion had been muffled by the anechoic wall hangings.
"He's not out there. If he were, the guards wouldn't be milling about, wondering how far up the chain of command to go before bursting in on the Programmer General."
"Tell them to stand down." Kori felt no satisfaction that her order took him by surprise.
"You know who I am."
"I don't know why you're helping me, Commander in Chief Riddle, but I appreciate it."
The guards fell into formation as a command reached them. They marched away with their rifles at port arms. One cast a glance back, then snapped his eyes forward and fell into step with the others in the squad.
"I've sent them to guard the staircase leading to this floor from the grand lobby. There's no reason since the rebels have been killed or run off, but it takes them away from the office doorway."
"Where's Weir?"
She tried to run a scan, but too many of the desktop displays had been smashed by the grenade blast. All she got were scattered camera feeds. Even the ubiquitous flitter cams were beyond her control.
"I have no love for the man, but I need to know what benefit comes my way if I help you further."
"What did you expect to gain clearing the path for me to get this far?"
"I keep my post as military commander."
"What else?"
Riddle popped up in the small hologram in front of her, the mist solidifying into a sharply defined figure. He wore a full dress uniform and looked smug. Kori resisted the urge to sweep her hand through the display and perform a mock decapitation.
"Weir kept the spoils for himself. Power is good. I already have that since I am in almost complete control of the military. I want to expand the space fleet and Low Guard, but that requires a loosening of the purse strings. Those warbots used by Donal and your son are expensive, and there has never been reason to implement them before."
"You want to overthrow both Uller and Eire?"
"This nation has foolishly allowed them to maintain their independence far too long. Warbots will make an otherwise lengthy invasion a quick one. With a Programmer General backing my invasions, both countries will soon fall. The warbots are of Far Kingdom manufacture, I believe. That was the purpose of your husband's mission to Far Kingdom. Negotiating for such powerful weapons in person has the benefit of secrecy."
"You want to install yourself as ruler of Uller and Eire?"
"Oh, no, I want the Programmer General to tuck them into the Burran fold. United Ballymore or whatever you'd want to call the fusion of all the countries."
Kori leaned back and considered what Riddle said. A unified planet made sense. Riddle's ambitions extended beyond the planet's gravity field, though, if he wanted an enlarged High Guard. A dozen dreadnoughts could bring any of the nearby star system's inhabited planets under his heel. He wanted to be a conqueror, the ruler of an entire planet. Planets. To achieve such conquest, he had to have a prosperous Burran─a united Ballymore─backing him. Ballymore was richer in both resources and technological expertise than any nearby human world. Did his military adventuring extend to trying to conquer the alien Sporr, as well?
There hadn't been an interstellar war because of logistics, but she knew Riddle wanted power. The Blarney Stone presented a conquest beyond that of most warlords because it required training and genetic disposition─both available only from Bella.
"Do you know that Donal and Cletus are alive?"
"I suspect they are. I am not absolutely sure. Weir kept the skirmishes with the Shillelagh confidential, though I took part in some of the mission planning."
"If you kill them and take the Shillelagh, the war robots are likely yours, too."
"You would sacrifice your own husband and son?"
"Where's Weir? Tell me, Commander Riddle, and we can continue our discussion how to bring peace back to Ballymore."
His hologram shimmered slightly. A second column appeared for a few seconds, then disappeared. Riddle consulted with someone else before his hologram solidified so she could read his expression plainly.
"He is in the priest's hole behind the desk."
"What's that?"
"Ah, dear Kori, you don't know about it? Perhaps this lack of communication with Donal feeds your willingness to get rid of him. Or Weir might have installed it out of caution."
A single spot glowed red at the side of the desktop. She stood, turned and pressed the grenade's arming button. Using her left hand, she covered the spot on the desk. A portion of the back wall slid away to reveal Weir inside a small room. He looked up, startled. He started to speak.
Kori tossed the grenade into the room and removed her left hand from the opener. The contained explosion buckled the closed door. She went to a blast crack and peered inside. A grim smile of satisfaction curled her lips. Weir was no longer a problem.
It was time for Bella to take control of Burran. And for Riddle to take care of her remaining problems. After he killed Donal and Cletus, he would be consumed with the victory. Then he would be most vulnerable. Kori leaned back in the Programmer General's chair and tented her fingers as the spun more elaborate plans.
Chapter Twenty-nine
"It was very messy. Noisy, too, I suppose." Aaron Riddle waved his hand about as if shooing away bugs. The faint smell of ionization and spent explosive made his nose twitch, in spite of the efficient air conditioning in his office in the bowels of the Military Directorate Building. "Would you like to see?"
"It was the hiding place in the Programmer General's office where he cowered like a trapped rat?"
"Yes," Riddle said. He stared at the slowly shifting, misty gray column on his desk. With a move that ran his hand through the hologram, he brought up a new display.
"A flitter cam? How did you get it into the Residence?"
"That was easy. A loyalist smuggled it in. Getting the signal out is still difficult. Weir had become paranoid the past few days. But then, why shouldn't he fear everyone around him? The citizens whom he thought to rescue turned on him because he made such a botch of providing them with the necessities. Then I made certain martial law stirred them against him at every turn."
"The flitter cam. How?"
"Really, do you think that was so difficult? He believed he had a spy in my staff. Admiral Lamont reported
to me immediately after Weir tried to buy him off with the promise of a small fleet of his own to command rather than just command of the space station and the fleet facilities there. Lamont guessed my bigger plans."
The column began turning every shade of the rainbow, finally settling on a deep red, angry and befitting the emotions Riddle believed drove his benefactor. Baiting someone who had been his ally so far was wrong until he secured a better grip on power. With Kori Tomlins intent on putting her daughter into the Programmer General's office, he needed all the allies he could rally to his banner. Kori was not the kind to believe anyone played fair with her. He had ordered a small army of psychologists to profile the leaders of the guerrillas fighting him. Recognizing who he fought had been easy. Hers had shone out like a distinctive beacon in the night. The failed rescue attempt had turned her into an implacable enemy of both her husband and son.
Riddle was not going to tell her Cletus and whoever had piloted the other robot had almost been destroyed. If they had stayed even a few seconds longer, both would have been blasted into plasma. He closed his eyes, wondering who the second pilot had been. Not Donal. He had remained in his flagship in orbit. Someone else. A junior officer? Cletus Tomlins had never shown himself to be anything more than adequate in his studies or commands. If his father hadn't been Programmer General he would have reached mid level, possibly in command of a cruiser at best, and never gotten the chance to show his courage in real battle.
Cletus' warbot had been damaged but he fought on. His companion had rescued him, possibly overriding his controls to whisk him from certain destruction.
Too bad.
Now Riddle had to be sure both Cletus and Donal were destroyed, but ideas swirled about to build into new schemes, and he knew how to get Kori's support. His attention returned to the mist thrashing about like a miniature tornado on his desk.
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