Are you intending to arrest us? Impound our ship? Clap us in chains?
"In approximately fifty minutes," Hadeishi said, fighting to remain calm, "you will be showing me your identification, Imperial writ and other authorities proving you are, in fact, executing the Emperor's Will in this matter. If I am satisfied -"
Satisfied? Chimalpahin interrupted, face blushing coppery red. We are not beholden to Fleet! Our authority far exceeds yours, particularly in these matters! The Admiralty will severely reprimand you for interfering, Hadeishi, and your career -
"If I am not satisfied, Captain," the Chu-sa snapped, "then my Marines will storm and seize your vessel and you will be put in shock restraints until this matter is sorted out! As for your authority, I have yet to see any proof you are more than saboteurs, agitators and insurrectionists." He paused, trying to remain impassive. "Fleet reaction protocol to revolt is quite clear. How am I to know – despite your noble face – you are not a pack of HKV operatives, or a Danish volkscommando conspiring with native elements?"
The comm channel suddenly cut out, much to Hadeishi's surprise, and then popped back in. Chimalpahin seemed taken aback, staring off the edge of his v-pickup. The Chu-sa – feeling unaccountably wary – glanced at the comm channel status information and was perplexed to see no warnings indicating a lost relay or network problem.
"What was that?" Hadeishi growled. "Are you showing a secure comm connection on your end?"
Yes… The freighter captain stared at his panel in alarm. Then he looked up, his expression ashen. Return to your ship immediately, Captain. We can meet socially on another day.
The channel went dead.
"Five minutes to deceleration. Forty minutes to intercept," Asale said quietly, watching her commander's stonelike face with concern. "Should I turn around?"
"No…" Hadeishi switched comm to the bridge channel on the Cornuelle. "Hayes-tzin, are we suffering some kind of comm interference? I just lost channel with the Tepoztecatl in mid-sentence."
No, sir. Everything here shows green. Should we run a system check?
The Chu-sa tapped one knuckle thoughtfully against the faceplate of his helmet. "Something odd is happening with comm. If Isoroku has a moment, have him check the relays and master nodes for interference, degraded comp function, anything at all."
Hayes signed off and Hadeishi nodded to the pilot. "Proceed."
I'm going to need something solid out of this priest, he thought, fighting imminent melancholy. The faces of Kosho and Hayes and Isoroku and even midshipman Smith were clear in his mind's eye. To save their careers. Otherwise, every indication will point to incompetence on my part and complicity on theirs. And they will be dragged down with me.
Hadeishi felt certain Fleet Command had been apprised of his slow return to Imperial space. A black mark has been set beside my name, against the Cornuelle 's record, an admonitory note for every officer serving with me. And with no patrons to offset my…refusal…to obey orders, my old ship becomes expendable. An honorable sacrifice to cover some political game played out by the xochiyaotinime. Her brave heart spared the wrecking yard…
He started to feel very bitter and forced himself to think of something else, something beyond the faceless hand which placed his ship and crew in danger of disgrace. The first words which popped into his consciousness were very old, a fragment he'd seen on a moss-covered tombstone in the old temple grounds at Joriku, on the western side of Shinedo city, overlooking the Chumash Sound.
A noteless tune fills the void:
spring sun, snow whiteness, bright clouds…
clear wind.
He grunted, feeling entirely helpless, trapped in a tight, confining suit in a tiny bubble of air, light and power speeding through limitless darkness towards an uncertain welcome. A death poem. But whose? Mine?
Heicho Felix grunted, feeling the strain in her upper back, and heaved a packing crate onto the back of the groundtruck her squad had commandeered. Helsdon and one of his technicians grabbed hold on the other side and shoved the heavy package against the sidewall.
"That's the next to last," a man in an Imperial Development Board jumper yelled, scrambling up onto the truck. Felix turned, jammed ink-black hair back behind her ears, and saw two of her troopers struggling to carry the last crate out of the warehouse.
"Leave it," she snarled, listening to a steadily increasing level of panicky chatter on the all-hands channel serving the Imperial installations around the periphery of the landing field. "We've got to get to the shuttle. Let's go!"
Ignoring her, both men staggered up, then tipped the crate onto the rear lip of the truck bed. Cursing, Felix joined in, pushing for all she was worth. The vehicle groaned, settling on its springs, and then complained bitterly as all three troopers swarmed aboard. Helsdon ignored them, concentrating on throwing tiedowns around the cargo and punching the liftgate control. The Heicho clicked over to the squad channel.
"Drive," she barked, swinging her Macana around to point out the back of the truck. The corporal in the forward cabin fired up the big engine, threw the vehicle into gear and they jounced out of the cargo yard behind the warehouses in a cloud of fresh dust. Felix swayed, caught herself, then braced one armored foot against the metal-reinforced crate squatting between her and the machinist's mate.
"What is all this stuff?" she asked, dark brown eyes wary, as the truck turned out onto the ring-road surrounding the number two landing strip. The driver jammed on the accelerator and they raced down the unsurfaced road. Felix could feel a pregnant heaviness gathering in the air. A thunderstorm was about to burst over their heads, turning the roads and fields around the strip into gooey, hip-deep mud.
Helsdon grimaced, eyes tight, holding a bandanna to his mouth and nose. None of the technicians were in armor and they'd left their z-suit helmets back on the shuttle. "Power supplies," he shouted, trying to best the roar of the methanol engine in the old-style truck. "They were supposed to go into the communications satellites the Board is putting up."
They hit a buried culvert under the road and everything bounced up, then slammed back down again. Felix clung grimly to a stanchion, hoping she wouldn't be pitched out. "How'd you get them?" she wondered aloud, watching the packing crate shimmy and bounce from side to side, straining the tiedowns. "Aren't they expensive?"
"Part of our trade." Helsdon shrugged, face coated with a fine layer of yellow dust. He sneezed, wiped his nose and left a muddy smear. "These are Fleet-grade packs, but they're not the right kind to fit the latest round of satellites. So Isoroku traded all our scrap -"
The man in the Development Board jumper leaned over, shaking his head. "These aren't Fleet grade," he shouted, then clutched wildly at a hanging strap as the truck swerved off the main road and into a parking lot behind shuttle hangar six. There was a squeal of brakes, Felix felt the tires slipping on loose gravel, and then the whole vehicle lurched to an abrupt halt. A veil of road dust drifted past, settling on everything.
"Everyone out!" Felix bawled, jumping down and stepping out, scanning the immediate area. Her Macana was off-safety and she'd made sure a fresh clip of armor-piercing was loaded up. The latest intel on the Jehanan troops deployed on the perimeter said they were lancers in heavy ceramic and cloth armor, armed with a wide variety of hand-weapons and native muskets. Against targets in so much ablative armor, she thought penetration would knock them down faster than trying to flay them alive with splintering sub-munitions. Technicians piled out of the truck, surrounded by a screen of Marines with weapons at the ready.
The Board technician jumped down and Felix seized him by the collar. "What do you mean, those aren't Fleet-grade power supplies? That's what the packing display says. That is what we paid for!"
The civilian went pale, fingers clutching at her armor-clad wrist. "Urk! I repacked those crates myself…Go easy, ma'am! They're the original power supplies from the satellites. They've got the same interface -"
"Helsdon!" Felix pointed at the crates being l
ifted down from the truck. "Break open one of those once we're inside. I think you've been stiffed by this insect…"
"Not me! Not me!" The technician was now an alarming shade of parchment. "The lead engineer on the project had us switch them out – he wanted to extend the time-to-repair for the commercial comm relays! They can drain a pack pretty quickly. But…but these will work fine in your equipment. I swear!"
"That," Felix said, shoving the man in front of her and prodding him towards the hangar with the muzzle of her rifle, "is not the point. You don't cheat the Fleet, and if you do…"
A long, drawn-out crackle of thunder drowned out the rest of her threat. Everyone looked uneasily at the sky, which was now dark with huge, humped clouds. The Fleet crewmen seized hold of the rest of the crates and began moving them inside with commendable speed.
Scowling at the buildings across the road, rifle to her shoulder, Felix waited just inside the hangar doorway until everyone else had gotten under cover. Nothing was moving save stray winds eddying debris across the tarmac and the ring-road, blowing clouds of dust and litter into swirling tchindi. The Heicho could hear Sho-sa Kosho's distinctive voice echoing inside, ordering everyone onto the shuttles and the crates aboard.
Uneasy, Felix threw the locking bar and sprinted for the shuttle. Kosho was waiting on the loading ramp, silhouetted against the bright lights of the shuttle hold and the yellow-orange glow of the sun gilding the runway and the other station buildings.
"Come on, Felix, the captain wants us upstairs right away."
The Heicho double-timed up the ramp, automatically checking to make sure her men and the engineers were strapped in, the cargo was secured and everything was shipshape. The ramp whined up, and then clanged shut. Koshoran through the environmental seal checklist at light-speed and then tapped open her comm.
"Kosho to pilot, we're clear to lift. Is the other shuttle ready to take off?"
Hai, kyo. They are on rollout now.
Felix found a seat and wedged herself in. Kosho was sitting opposite, somehow already secured and looking unruffled in her matte black Fleet z-suit. The shuttle began to tremble and the Heicho felt the landing wheels rolling across broken concrete through the seat of her armor. She thumbed up a v-pane on the inside of her visor, catching the feed from the pilot's station. Clouds were still building over the field and the northern horizon was black with rain.
"Kyo – did Helsdon tell you about the power packs?"
Kosho nodded, lifting her chin to indicate the row of crates secured to the pal-lets running down the middle of the hold. "Isoroku got stiffed, I see. What was supposed to be in these packs?"
"Military-grade field power cells," Helsdon said. The machinist's mate had his comp out and the inventory tag on the side of the nearest cargo pack was blinking in response. "Sunda Aerospace Yards PPCAM-17's – that's a long-term, antimatter powered cell – should keep those satellites with juice for…" The engineer paused, and Felix turned, catching a raised eyebrow through the glassite of his facemask. "…about three thousand years at the draw on file for the commsats the Board is putting up."
"What?" Kosho turned her attention on the Board technician, who looked like he'd swallowed a whole puffer fish. "What does the Development Board think it's doing? Those satellites will wear out from micrometeoroid abrasion long before these cells decay!"
The shuttle trembled again, rolling out onto the landing strip tarmac.
Hold on, came the pilot's voice. The other shuttle is boosting off the field now. We'll be at high-grav accel in -
Felix flinched, her face suddenly awash in brilliant light. The pilot shouted in alarm.
The evacuation shuttle carrying the clerks from the Supply office disintegrated in a blossom of blue-white flame. For an instant, both engines continued to flare, propelling the shattered vehicle out over the shantytown surrounding the landing field. Then the shuttle drive blew apart in a secondary explosion. A corona of explosive gas and smoke belled out in a black cloud, and then burning debris was raining down among the rows of huts. The main mass of the shuttle, wreathed in flame, corkscrewed into the ground. Another concussive blast followed, flinging shattered rooftops and wooden tiles up in a billowing cloud of dust and smoke.
Missile launch plume at eight o'clock! the pilot shouted. That was a high-v interceptor shot!
Felix twitched back to look at the Sho-sa, and Kosho's voice was crystalline in her earbug: "Battle comp says it was a ATGM – they've got a sprint range of six kilometers – full acceleration, Chu-i, and keep us on the deck! If they only have one launcher there's a minute-and-a-half reload time between shots. Get us out of range!"
Felix jammed her head back against the supports and the Fleet shuttle engines lit off at maximum power. The back blast flooded the hangar behind them, tearing off the doors, and sending flames roaring from the windows. The entire building buckled, crumpling like a paper bag tossed into a fireplace. The shuttle roared across the tarmac, crossways to the flight line, canted over at an angle – wingtip barely missing the rooftop of a maintenance shed – and blew across the perimeter fence with a shriek of ruptured air.
A rippling crack-crack-crack slammed into flimsy buildings, shattering windows and deafening thousands of amazed Jehanans crowding into the narrow lanes to see what had made the violent noise in the sky. Howling wind lashed them seconds later and the multitude flattened as the gleaming black shape of the shuttle raced past overhead, heading northeast.
Clinging grimly to her shockwebbing, Kosho cleared the ground-to-ship channel. "Hayes! We've been attacked at the Sobipurй field by a ground-launched surface-to-air missile. Do you have us on tracking scope? Hayes? Hayes, are you there?"
The comm channel was howling with static, frequency indicators blazing red and hopping madly as the comp in her suit searched desperately for a clear channel.
"Hayes?! Kosho to the Cornuelle, is anyone there?"
The Gemmilsky House Gandaris, "Abode of the Heaven-Sundering Kings"
Prince Tezozуmoc stretched out his arms and beckoned with his head for Sergeant Dawd to produce the next garment. Trying not to roll his eyes, the Skawtsman draped a greenish-tan velvet shirt over the young man's arms and chest.
"Hmmm…no…makes me look too sallow." The prince plucked the silk out of the sergeant's hand and tossed the shirt into a heap of equally unsuitable garments. "Is there anything red in there? A nice crimson or scarlet one – they always make me look striking."
"You've already gone through the red ones, mi'lord." Dawd pursed his lips. "We're down to duller tones."
"Curst wardrobe! Where is that adjutant! He's lost all my good shirts…" Tezozуmoc kicked a wardrobe bag aside and began rooting through his boxes of shoes. "Did I give one of my shirts to Mrs. Petrel – that's it, I did! Hers was ruined…" The prince squinted over his shoulder at Dawd. "Oh, Lord of Light, I spilled wine on her blouse didn't I?"
"You were laughing, mi'lord," Dawd said, keeping a straight face. "And the glass tipped."
Tezozуmoc blushed. "I shouldn't be allowed to touch alcohol. I gave her the red shirt as a replacement? Did I apologize?"
Dawd nodded. "I believe you did, mi'lord."
The prince made a growling sound, hands on his hips. "Can't we beg off this festival? Say I've cut off my head by mistake, or lost a leg in a car accident?"
"No mi'lord, we cannot." Dawd said patiently. "Mrs. Petrel and her ladies have already gone off to breakfast. Corporal Clark will be coming back for us momentarily with the aerocar. So you do, in fact, have to get dressed, be presentable and prepared to hobnob with the kujen and his relatives."
Tezozуmoc pouted sourly. "What is a Nem anyway? One of their gods?"
"The Nem, mi'lord, is a flowering bush – sometimes growing into a tree – which grows in the bottomlands along local rivers. Their blossoms herald the end of the rainy season. I also understand they are considered sacred, due to a bitter, psychotropically-active sap -"
Tezozуmoc, perking up at the prospe
ct of something novel, was taken aback by the fixed, focusless way the Skawtsman stared at the door to the prince's dressing chamber and he turned, wondering what had drawn Dawd's attention.
Gemmilsky had not stinted with furnishings or ornamentation in his house. The master bedroom possessed magnificent doors of dark red ruhel wood inlaid with pearl and jade. At the moment, both were closed, though the prince expected one of his servants to arrive at any moment with a fresh bottle of vodka. "Sergeant? Is something -"
Dawd moved, one forearm slamming the prince back, sweeping Tezozуmoc behind him. In the same motion, a flat Webley Bulldog sprang into his hand.
The doors burst open, crashing into the marble-covered walls on either side, porcelain doorknobs shattering, and three Jehanan in Gandarian livery rushed in. The lead native twisted from the waist, broad shoulders powering a lohaja-wood machete straight at the Skawtsman's head. Dawd ducked inside the blow, jammed the pistol into the charging creature's gaping mouth and pulled the trigger twice. The blast was muffled by the Jehanan's snout, but the shock-pellets blew out the back of his cranial cavity, spraying a cloud of broken bone and blood and bits of scale through the door. The jaws, abruptly severed from central control, spasmed shut and Dawd grunted, feeling needle-sharp teeth shear through the cuff of his jacket and shatter on the combatskin beneath.
Tezozуmoc screamed in fear, bounced off the bed, and flung himself towards the bathroom. One of the Jehanan assassins hurled a short-bladed spear overhand, missed the prince by a scale, and the ceramic blade punched straight through the light wood of the door as it slammed shut.
Dawd wrenched his caught arm sideways, dragging the still-twitching corpse of the Jehanan into the path of the next assailant, who stabbed under the falling body with a spear. The Skawtsman skipped back, barely avoiding taking a blow to the inside of his thigh, twisted his hand inside the mouth and fired three times in quick succession. Highex pellets shredded the rest of the skull and stitched across the spearman's chest with a rippling series of explosions. Chunks of scale and ligament spattered across the dresser and a heavy antique mirror, and drenched the window drapes. The Jehanan flew backwards into a shattered wardrobe and then crumpled slowly to the floor.
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