Empress of Eternity

by L. E. Modesitt

  Valakyr shook her head. “No, ser.”

  “I saw the silver pulse and the destruction of the scramjet,” replied Symra, “but I was watching the Aesyr attackers after that.”

  “There was an anomalous energy pulse surrounding the release of energy that destroyed the aircraft,” said Helkyria. “That would suggest that Thora was correct…and that the Aesyr have weaponized the theorem.”

  “So that was why they used the submersible? They needed the space for the equipment?” asked Symra.

  “I’d judge so. The weapon on the submersible may have been a prototype.”

  “Sweet father Njord…” muttered Valakyr.

  “Oh…and one other matter,” said Helkyria. “We don’t have to worry about public opinion quite as much anymore. Asgard has declared its secession from the World Republic and issued a statement of independence.”

  Duhyle studied her face before asking, “What else?”

  “What amounted to a suicide force attacked the Institute at Vestalte, and several other key installations have suffered damage.”

  “How much damage?” Valakyr’s words were intense.

  “They were repulsed and largely destroyed, but the weapons laboratories at Security’s research center were nearly totally leveled.” A wry smile followed. “That might not matter. Most conflicts are fought and won—or lost—by weapons already developed or produced.”

  She didn’t state the obvious—that the Hammer was clearly already developed.

  “What would you like from us, ser?” asked Valakyr.

  “The same as before. Keep the station secure so that I can continue working. What may be here is likely to be more important than we thought.”

  “Because of…this Hammer?” Symra’s words were strained.

  “Exactly.” Helkyria paused, then said, “If there’s not anything else…?”

  “No, ser.”

  Duhyle stepped back to see if Helkyria would need anything else after the officers departed.

  Once the two left the station, she looked to Duhyle. “I’ll need some equipment and components from the storeroom…along with your assistance.”

  Duhyle nodded. He’d thought so.

  25

  28 Ninemonth 1351, Unity of Caelaarn

  Maertyn glanced up from the desk screen and out into the darkness beyond the Ministry, absently massaging his forehead with his left hand. He’d spent part of the twenty-sixth and a good portion of the twenty-seventh just going through the reallocation documentation. He was a scientist, not a bureaucrat, and the welter of weasel-worded footnotes and annotations to the various budgets—just within a single subministry—was close to overwhelming.

  Outside, he could see the local tube-train station, barely outlined by the backscatter of lights that projected downward. There could only be a few Ministry employees there. Most had left a good hour earlier.

  “Sir…?” Marcent’s tentative voice projected into the assistant minister’s office. “Will you be needing me any more this evening? You didn’t say, and it is past six.”

  “Oh, no. I’m sorry. I should have let you know earlier. I’ve been buried in the bud get documents. By all means, leave.”

  “Thank you, sir. Good evening.”

  After a moment more, where he just closed his eyes and tried to relax tight muscles, especially in his shoulders, Maertyn forced himself to look again at the footnote to a subaccount in a submission from the Office of Water Research.

  …the monitoring equipment expenditures projected for the final quarter of the budgetary year in this category have been allocated [as req. per MSci 231.b.3.a.], but may not be realized, in view of the longer than contracted lead-time in fabrication of certain key elements of the control-activation subassemblies [see MSci Procurement 1103], in which case said expenditures must be rolled over into the next bud get cycle, in order to avoid the cancellation fees required by the manufacturer, as per CompDec 1103.1, and as approved by the comptroller in the specific case, because no other manufacturer possesses said manufacturing capabilities [defined in CompDec 511.A]…

  In short, reallocating the funds would cost the Ministry far more in the next bud get cycle than would be saved in the present.

  Maertyn took a deep breath. He suspected that all too many of the footnotes, explanations, and annotations were less than perfectly legally sound in their assertions, but he had neither the knowledge to question most of them, nor the time to go over every suspect justification or assertion with both a procurement advocate and Amirella or one of the other comptrollers.

  After reviewing the bud get reallocation documents he’d finished so far and thinking about his meeting with the Assistant Minister for Medical Research, the more puzzled he’d become. Even if every questionable attempt to hang on to research funds within the Environment Research Subministry happened to be suspect, the total amount of funding that could be reallocated to other subministries—or to other ministries—was comparatively insignificant. While he didn’t have access to current-year bud gets of other ministries, the overall bud gets for previous years were a matter of record, and the expenditures of the Ministry of Public Safety or of Transport truly dwarfed the total bud get of the Ministry of Science. And within the Ministry of Science, the Subministry of Medical Research was second only to the Subministry of Protective Services Research. The smallest bud get of all belonged to Environment Research.

  So why had Ashauer warned him, and why had Tidok and Amirella pressured him? What else was involved?

  He shook his head. Why was everyone that concerned about a few million credits? Another hour later and perhaps another score of pages later, he closed down his desk screen, no wiser than before, and stood. Another day or so and he’d be ready to formalize his recommendations for Minister Hlaansk, not that he was looking forward to that in the slightest.

  He donned his jacket, this one maroon, and like the others, silver-trimmed and designed to protect him against less powerful weapons…and moderate vagaries of the weather. Then he left the office, maglocking it behind him, and headed down to the main level of the Ministry.

  A single guard in the dark green and black of Unity Protective Services sat on a high-backed stool behind the security console and gate. Maertyn offered his hand to the scanner and the gate slid open.

  “Good night, sir,” offered the guard.

  “And to you. I hope it’s not too long or too late.”

  “Thank you, sir. The quiet doesn’t bother me…sort of restful.”

  A cold misty rain drifted down from low clouds as Maertyn walked the hundred yards across the narrow bridge from the Ministry building out to the car park. Despite its biofoam coating, the bridge walkway was slippery, almost icy in spots, and ice coated the handrails. Maertyn reminded himself to be careful driving.

  Once he was inside the vehicle, he checked the power. Despite the fact that the day had been overcast, the level was at eighty percent, considerably more than necessary for the ten minutes needed to return to his town home. He pressed the studs for the running lights and headlamps, then eased the small vehicle out of the car park and along the short drive that led to the avenue bordering the greenbelt.

  When he turned onto the avenue, heading roughly southeast, he noticed a larger vehicle pull out of a turnout, as if to follow him. The larger vehicle was obviously traveling faster than Maertyn, without headlamps and showing only running lights, and was rapidly gaining on him.

  Maertyn immediately increased his speed, and could sense a growing instability in the runabout, but his pursuer drew closer. He slowed, and the lorry swooshed up and thumped the bumper-bar of the runabout, rocking it slightly, although Maertyn managed to speed up just enough to mute the effect, despite his worries about spinning out on the cold-slicked road. Even the lorry skidded slightly, and dropped back momentarily.

  Ahead, on the left was a loop drive that ran around a group of buildings housing various subministries of the Ministry of Infrastructure. Maertyn slowed and mad
e the turn, wishing that the running lights hadn’t signaled his intent.

  The lorry followed him, but slewed slightly on the curves, and again had to slow down. Still, after he’d returned to the avenue, still headed southeast, the lorry began to gain on him, then slowed as several other vehicles passed them both coming the other way. With headlamps coming in the opposite direction, their light and sharpness hazed by the continuing chill mist-rain, the driver of the lorry maintained a distance of perhaps fifteen yards between his vehicle and the runabout.

  Although Maertyn had no proof, he also had no doubt whatsoever that the driver of the larger vehicle—a small lorry-type, he could see in the rear display—wished to create a crash, most likely one fatal to Maertyn, given the lightness and smaller size of his vehicle.

  Exactly what could he do? The lorry had better traction and more mass, and there was no local Gaerda station nearby. Besides which, if Ashauer happened to be correct, there was no guarantee that a Gaerda operative wasn’t driving the chase lorry.

  The Laarnian Martyrs’ Memorial! That just might work…if the oncoming traffic kept his follower from attempting anything until Maertyn reached Memorial Park…and if he could accomplish on ice slicked roads what he had done on a dare years before when he’d been too young to know the dangers.

  He continued to drive onward, glad that it was still relatively early and that there was just enough traffic on the avenue to keep his pursuer from making another attempt. As he neared the park entrance, he eased his speed up as much as he dared before angling left into the narrower road. Ahead was the roundabout.

  Behind him, the lorry accelerated, doubtless because there were no headlamps along the access road or on the roundabout.

  Maertyn didn’t even try to make the turn into the roundabout, but cut off all the lights and guided the runabout straight across the hand-high berm separating the pavement from the sidewalk. The runabout bounced, but settled almost straight on the narrow park pathway, and Maertyn let it decelerate, guiding it through the antique stone pillars, flanked by near-ancient golden oaks, that served as the south gateway to the memorial placed in the center of the roundabout. The runabout slid through the stone with little more than a finger’s clearance on either side, and Maertyn let the vehicle slow without attempting to brake on the slick surface.

  He’d decelerated to little more than a fast walk when he came to the right-hand branch pathway, which he took. Fifty yards along the path, he slowly eased his vehicle through another set of pillars and back down the eastern radial from the monument to the roundabout road. Gingerly, he added a touch of power to get the runabout over the berm. Then he continued around the memorial.

  As he neared the entry road, through the darkness he could make out what had happened. The lorry had attempted the turn and slid into the trunk of one of the large golden oaks flanking the memorial entrance. The entire front had crumpled. He’d hoped for something like that.

  What he hadn’t expected was the larger black lorry and the men in black already dragging the damaged vehicle into the covered rear section of the larger lorry. None of them so much as looked in his direction as he eased the runabout onto the entry road back to the avenue.

  He kept checking behind him, but if anyone followed, they were doing so at enough distance that he couldn’t discern them. Even so, he left both running lights and headlamps off for the remaining distance to the house.

  Once he had parked the runabout in the garage, he just sat there for several moments, his body not quite shivering while he thought over what had just occurred.

  Ashauer had intimated that, while some people wanted him to succeed in his research, more than a few people wanted him dead or out of the picture. Maertyn still didn’t understand why he posed a threat to anyone. As a deputy assistant minister, he served at the pleasure of Minister Hlaansk and the Executive Administrator of the Unity. If they wished his departure, all they had to do was ask. If he refused to resign, they could terminate his appointment immediately. His research on the canal could certainly be ended with the stroke of a pen, as Hlaansk had hinted merely by asking for a report.

  Unless…unless there was actually some evidence somewhere that some sort of power that could be used lay within the canal structure. But…if that were so…why hadn’t those who wanted him to discover how to use such a power found a way to let him know?

  After a few more moments of fruitless speculation he eased himself out of the runabout, glancing at each side. Except for several golden leaves caught around the doors, he didn’t see any signs that he’d actually scraped anything in his escape maneuver.

  Rhesten was standing in the hallway between the kitchen and the breakfast room.

  “Is there a problem with the runabout, sir?” asked Rhesten. “I noticed you entered without lights.”

  “I made certain that the charger was attached,” replied Maertyn. “It should be fully powered in the morning.”

  Rhesten nodded. “I did take the liberty of preparing a light supper in case you might wish something to eat. I had thought…the breakfast room.”

  “That sounds excellent,” Maertyn admitted. “I had an early lunch and didn’t eat all that much.”

  The “light” supper consisted of cream of mushroom soup, with a touch of roast garlic, two warm biscuits, and a small green salad, accompanied by green-gold hot tea. Maertyn ate it all and had two cups of tea.

  When he finished, he looked to Rhesten. “Thank you. That was excellent, and perfect on a chill evening.” He paused. “Rhesten…”

  “Sir?”

  “I’ll be assembling a number of items and packing them up in a crate. In the next day or so I’d like you to arrange shipping it to Lady S’Eidolon at the canal research station. It’s nothing urgent. The crate can go as regular freight, but you’ll need to have a second crate built around it. Some of the items for her comfort are fragile.”

  “Very good, sir. I’ll take care of it.”

  Once Rhesten had departed to the kitchen, Maertyn made his way down to the lower workroom, where he had gathered and hidden various items before he and Maarlyna had left for the canal. He’d concealed them because he hadn’t believed they’d be necessary at a research station. While he would retain several, such as the miniature stunner, the invisible knives, and the light-cloaking uniform he’d never returned after his stint in the Gaerda as a very junior ensign, the others would go in the crate.

  That way, if a warrant should appear, they wouldn’t be in the house, and they would be where Maertyn could make use of them, if necessary. The crate might or might not arrive at the canal research station, but if it did, Maertyn would feel far more relieved…assuming he also arrived at the station.

  26

  30 Quad 2471 R.E.

  Despite Eltyn’s worries, no aircraft or other inspectors soon followed the first group of RF inspecting enforcers. Their sole captive lapsed into sullen silence. Eltyn had also been correct about the difficulties in changing the calibration settings for Faelyna’s equipment. After another day’s work by both of them, her modified assemblage was ready to test by late afternoon on sixday.

  Once more the assembly was focused upon the upper-level north side window, except this time Eltyn was standing well back from both window and the projecting transmitter.

  Ready…actuate! pulsed Faelyna.

  The only sound was a faint hum—and the window opened, far wider than Eltyn had seen whenever he’d touched it to open it in the past. Outside, the sky was a hazy grayish yellow, an indication that another sandstorm was imminent, possibly why they had not seen another RF attempt to attack the station.

  Eltyn looked back to where the window would have been on the south side of the chamber, but that space remained solidly closed.

  !!!!!!!!!! Faelyna smiled broadly.

  “You did it!” exclaimed Rhyana from the top of the ramp into the work space. “You didn’t have to touch the window.”

  “Would you look down below and see if any windo
ws or doors opened?” asked Eltyn.

  “Yes, sir.” Rhyana headed down the ramp.

  That shouldn’t happen. That command shouldn’t affect any openings below.

  Correct…but…sometimes…

  Skeptic.

  [rueful admission]

  The delivery woman reappeared. “Tight as tight can be down below.”

  Faelyna arched her eyebrows. [satisfied amusement]

  I concede. “So…we can now seal the entrances and windows?” Eltyn spoke aloud for Rhyana’s benefit. “From one location? You won’t have to cart the assembly to each place?”

  “Possibly.” That comes next. Provided there’s not something else locked into the shadow codes.

  ????

  Secondary control level beneath(?) direct physical controls for station.

  Physical controls secondary to other layer?

  Most probably.

  Interrogative protocol? Similarity?

  Structure appears the same. Greater4 complexity.

  “What are you two talking about?” demanded Rhyana.

  “Whether we can learn to do more than open and close and lock windows and door openings,” replied Faelyna. “We might need that if The Twenty sends a large force.”

  ??? pulsed Eltyn.

  “If they can’t get in, what can they do?” Rhyana’s pale brow furrowed.

  “Starve us out,” replied Faelyna. “They could surround us to the point where we couldn’t get out, even if they couldn’t get in.”

  “Couldn’t you just make that stone window small enough to poke out a projectile rifle?” asked Rhyana.

  “That’s possible. We don’t have unlimited ammunition or food, and they can sever the cables from the powernet.”

  “Best you keep working. I’ll check on the riffie again.” Rhyana headed back down the ramp.

  Practical, observed Eltyn.

  Practical3.

  Now what? he asked.

  Follow Rhyana’s advice.