by Wren, M. K.
“No, but if I said you’re in protective custody, that would also be true. I assume you’ve been told about—”
“The war going on—” He waved a hand in an indeterminate motion at the windowless walls. “—out there. I’ve seen a sampling of it on the newscasts.”
“Then you understand the situation. You’ve also seen what happened at your Estate?”
“Yes, I’ve seen it,” he said, his tone more cutting than he intended. The woman unnerved him, perhaps because she displayed no hint of the maliciousness or arrogance he expected.
“I’m sure, my lord, you realize that if you and your sons hadn’t been abducted, you’d undoubtedly be dead. That’s why you’re here.”
“Well, Doctor, please don’t think we’re ungrateful, but I can’t believe that’s the only reason we’re here. And why go to the trouble of . . . putting us in protective custody if you intended to bomb my Estate?”
“Because we didn’t intend to bomb your Estate. We only recognized that in war, errors are possible. It might interest you to know that we also abducted Lord Drakonis and his family, as well as Lady Falda and her children. Lord Hamid, fortunately, is safe in Concordia.”
“Fortunately?” He took a step toward her. “What about my wife and daughters? Are they also safe in Paykeen?”
“To my knowledge, yes, my lord. We’ll set up an interconn so you can speak with them as soon as possible.”
“And relay your demands to the Directorate, I suppose?”
“No. You may relay the assurance that you and your sons will be released as soon as it’s safe to do so.”
“Safe? For whom?”
“For you, my lord.”
The woman was maddening. Eliseer glanced over at his sons, both listening attentively, carefully expressionless.
“It doesn’t make sense.”
Eliseer was vaguely surprised that he’d spoken aloud the thought that haunted him since he awakened.
“I know, my lord,” the woman replied, “and I’m sorry I can’t tell you more.” Then her head turned toward the twins. “And now, Ser Renay, Ser Galen, I must ask you to go into the next room for a short while.”
“Why?” Eliseer demanded, instantly suspicious.
“Only because I have someone with me who wishes a private audience with you, my lord. Nothing more sinister will come between you and your sons than a closed door. If it were our purpose to harm you, or if we had a nefarious purpose in separating you, we’d have done so before you regained consciousness.”
Eliseer sighed, reluctantly admitting the logic in that.
“Who asks a private audience of me here?”
“I’m not free to tell you, but she asked me to give you a message. ‘The long months of secret waiting are over.’ ”
Adrien.
It could only be Adrien. Eliseer didn’t realize how apparent his shock was until Renay started toward him.
“Father? What is it?”
After a moment, he had himself in rein again. “Renay, you and Galen go into the next room.”
“What? But we can’t—”
“Please.”
The brothers exchanged glances; twin’s glances, Eliseer called them, then reaching a silent accord, they retreated into the adjoining room.
Galen paused at the door. “We checked our ’coms and yours,Father. They’re all working.”
Eliseer smiled at that. “Thank you, but I don’t think you need to worry. Not about this, at any rate.”
When the door closed behind Galen, Eliseer turned to see the guard opening the outside door.
She was face-screened when she entered, but Eliseer knew he’d have recognized her even without the message as a cue. He looked down at her hands. She was wearing the ruby and sapphire betrothal ring; wearing it on her left hand.
He waited, motionless, hardly aware of the departure of the doctor and the silent guard.
Finally, he whispered, “Adrien . . .”
The face-screen went off, but still Eliseer was incapable of movement, and she seemed equally constrained.
“Father? Oh, Father . . .”
Then she ran to him in a rush of tears and laughter, and he held her in his arms, laughing and crying with her.
4.
The countdown clock read zero +03:00: 13:00 TST.
Ussher frowned at the coffee Isaks had brought him; it was cold. He put it down by the vidicom, then tilted his chair back to read a new series of figures appearing on the progress screen.
Robek Plan Transys Trafficon cntrs fac dem ests:
Pol Cas InP
Leda 75% Helen 80% Danae 90%
Hallicourt 95% Tremper 70% Titania 60%
Telhamid 95% Cuprin 95% Thymbris 45%
Omega 60% Oriban 85%
Lamont 80%
Petrovna 45%
Those figures meant aircar, ’train, and pedway traffic in all those cities had been brought to a virtual standstill. He smiled, his gaze shifting to the vidicom. He didn’t have to leave to his imagination the incredible snarls of traffic and the resulting confusion and panic. The bewildered newscasters were telling the story in words and pictures. They also told another story that he found equally satisfying.
The Hamid Estate in Leda had suffered serious damage from propulsion bomb strikes. Not as serious as the Eliseer Estate, but official concern was being voiced for the survival of Lady Falda and Lord Hamid’s heirs. There were no reports of damage to the Drakonis Estate in Danae, and he couldn’t ask about that. Garris had been too suspicious of the Eliseer strikes. Fortunately, he was occupied at the GroundComm console now; he had missed the Hamid Estate reports.
Isaks said quietly, “Sir, the first casualties will be coming through the lock in a few minutes.”
“Casualties?” For a moment, Ussher was distracted. He looked at Isaks and saw that he was intent on his earspeaker. “Oh. Put me on the ADCon frequency.”
Some of the voices in his ear were echoes of those only meters away on the Approach and Docking Control board. He rose and went to the windowall. The crowd around the deck had dispersed, called to their duties. Towcars and crews waited near the lock tunnel, some of the ’cars equipped with pressure winches and cutting lasers. Across the hollowly empty vault, red-tunicked medsquads waited by the corridor entrance with ten loaders, two piled with emergency medical equipment, the others filled with empty stretchers.
He looked away, toward the lock tunnel, listening to the voices in his ear. Nine Falcons and two Corvets; damage and casualty assessments; order of arrival decided on the basis of proximity and extent of damage.
“ADCon—Pri-One override! This is Major Dylon, Eliad.”
“PNX ADCon on line, Eliad.”
“Hull damaged. Emergency bulkheads going. We’re one minute from locks. For the God’s sake, keep them clear!”
“Locks clear, Eliad, and open. Subtugs deployed on—” A burst of static; a dim voice buried in it. Ussher looked around at the techs on the ADCon board. He couldn’t be sure which was the source of the strained voice.
“Eliad? Major Dylon, come in! Eliad!”
Silence. Then another voice.
“ADCon, this is Subtug Squad 3. Corvet Eliad on visual. She . . . she’s disintegrating. Pressure implosion. We’ll try to—to get any survivors into our pressure chambers.”
Survivors. Ussher turned, staring blindly out into the hangar. Survivors in two hundred meters of water?
Someone came into the comcenter, and in the few seconds t
he door was open, he heard a whoosh like a muffled explosion, then a prolonged shriek. The first sound was the opening of the lock gates, the second he only understood when a ship lurched out of the tunnel. Corvet Ranger, listing so far to one side, her steering vanes were dragging, burning a line of sparks on the floor. Tow crews and medsquads swarmed toward her, the latter boarding even as she was dragged into the hangar, out of the way of the next ship emerging from the lock. Ranger’s side was a wreck of crumpled, fused metal; sea water gushed from tom holes between the struts.
“. . . Dr. Cabot in the infirmary to expect thirty-three injured. Fatalities estimated at twelve.”
Ussher’s hand jerked up to his headset to switch it off. He looked around the comcenter distractedly, finally fixing on the progress screen.
Confleet arsenals hit; facility damage estimates. Yes, he’d been waiting for those figures.
Pol Cas InP
Leda 70% Helen 65% Danae 60%
Telhamid 80% Tremper 70%
Lamont 75% Oriban 55%
Petrovna 85%
That was every Confleet arsenal in Centauri. He took a deep breath. A few casualties were unavoidable. Victory has its price.
“Your signal’s clear, Jan. Right.”
Ussher frowned, attracted first by Garris’s stentorian tones, then by the familiar form of address. That was First Commander Barret he was speaking to.
“What? No, our reports from Danae and all the Inner Planets bases say that sector should be clear.”
Garris was unhappy; more than that, alarmed. Ussher caught Isaks’s eye and with a hand signal directed him to put him on line with Garris and Barret.
Barret’s voice came through first. “. . . check with our Inner Planets agents. Cornel Demerin came out of SS into an attack wedge of Confleet Falcons. Twenty-two of them.”
“Jan, it had to be an accident; pure chance. There’s no way Confleet would have any of our emergence coordinates.”
“I know, Emeric. Confleet probably deployed extra ships in that sector specifically to guard the power plants. I would in their place. Demerin pulled out of the engagement with minor damage and no casualties, but I’m afraid we can count on extra steel around the Dionysus and Pan plants, too, so that scraps the power plant op. Tell TacComm that Demerin and his unit will shift to the Pan Obsat op, and I’ll—”
“You can’t scrap the power plant op!” Ussher reached the GroundComm board in a few strides, all but shouting into his mike, and Garris whirled, face scarlet to the roots of his grizzled hair.
“What the hell—”
“Damn it, those power plants are vital!” Ussher stared into Barret’s face on one of the screens. “You can’t give them up just because you ran into a few Confleet ships!”
Barret’s voice cracked in his ear, his face was almost unrecognizable in his sudden fury. That was something Ussher had never seen, or ever thought to.
“Predis, this is my decision.”
“And you’ve made the wrong decision!” Even before the words were out, Ussher realized his error, but he didn’t have time to amend it.
Barret snapped coldly, “Captain Lanc!”
Calvet Lanc, at his console only a meter from Ussher, responded with a quick, “Yes, sir?”
“Get him off my lines and keep him off!”
Ussher stood rigid, hearing a sharp click, then silence from his ’speaker. Garris sent him a single, baleful glance, then resumed his dialogue with Barret, and finally Ussher stepped back, finding nearly everyone in the comcenter staring at him incredulously, then turning away with something like embarrassment.
An error. Yes, it was an error, but damn it, those power plants were vital. And Jan—who did he think he was, talking to the chairman of the Council like that?
The countdown clock read zero +04:00: 14:00 TST.
Ussher again occupied his chosen position in the center of the chamber, hands clasped behind him. A new set of figures appeared on the progress screen; another report on the Obsat stations.
Pol Equatorial Obsat fac dem est 70%
Cas Polar Obsat fac dem est 55%
InP Perseus Equatorial Obsat fac dem est 45%
InP Pan Equatorial Obsat fac dem est 50%
Now all the eyes were blinded, or at least dimmed. Two more equally satisfying reports followed.
Selsd Interplan Sys Ports fac dem ests:
Pol Leda 80% Cas Helen 65% InP Danae 50%
Pol Telhamid closed Cas Tremper 70%
Pol Lamont closed
Selsd Mercfleet ss dam/des off-planet:
FLF 8 SLF 20 TDR 26
Total +04:03: FLF 16 SLF 35 TDR 38
The screen remained blank only long enough for Ussher to savor those statistics before the next ones appeared. Those he couldn’t savor. Phoenix casualties.
ss dam ss des ss cap ss unactd
F 13 C 7 F 9 C 4 F 3 F 7 C 3
Total +04:04:
F 34 C 11 F 21 C 10 F 6 C 2 F 10 C 7
Ussher frowned over the last division. Unaccounted for. Inevitably, that meant ships either destroyed or captured. He turned, bracing himself mentally, and looked out into the hangar. Fifteen falcons and four Corvets had already come in, carrying a total of twenty-three dead and sixty-two injured. More crippled ships were out in the sea depths making their way toward the lock.
But victory has its price.
The medsquads and towcrews went about their work with the same concentrated efficiency as the staff here in the comcenter. The Phoenix would bear its casualties as it must, even proudly.
After a moment he said to Garris, “I’m going out into the hangar. Perhaps I can help in some small way . . . a few words with those brave young men.”
Garris gave him such a blank look, Ussher wondered if the old man might be getting deaf. Or just senile. Ussher turned on his heel and went to the door.
The noise was staggering. Soundscreens insulated the comcenter from the onslaught, and Ussher wasn’t prepared for it. The low-pitched thump of the pumps, the thunderous clank of the lock gates opening periodically with a huge rush of air; there wasn’t time to wait for the pressure to equalize. The whines of loaders, towcars, winches, the explosive hiss of cutting lasers, the shouted exchanges of orders, questions, demands. The sounds reverberated in the great vault where the helions were dimmed in a fog of acrid smoke from burning metal as the docking crews cut open the smashed sides of ships to get at survivors trapped behind jammed locks.
Ussher held on to the railing as he descended the steps to the hangar floor. A grating shriek and a crash brought his head around abruptly. A Falcon had slipped its tows and careened into the wall of the tunnel into Hangar 2. Towcars and crews rushed to its assistance. The tunnel was blocked; more ships were stacking up behind the slewed Falcon. Another Corvet rumbled through the lock tunnel, sending a miniature tidal wave across the water-washed floor.
The towcrews shot out their snakes of cable and magnetic hooks and hauled the ship into the hangar. A medsquad was at the ship’s lock before it had come to a stop, and by the time Ussher reached the ship, the crew was already disembarking, the injure
d carried out on stretchers by the medtechs. Ussher looked up at the bow of the ship. The Hopewell. From the outside, only a seared concavity was visible, but through the lock, he could see that the explosion had made a shambles of the condeck; he wondered vaguely how the ship had managed to get back to Fina.
“Excuse me, sir . . .”
Ussher stepped back as two medtechs brought another stretcher and hurried up the ramp into the lock.
“Yes, of course, men. It looks pretty bad in there.”
One of the techs nodded. “It is.”
“Fer Ussher?”
He turned. One of the crew; a young man, Second Gen. Strange, he was having a hard time remembering names.
“Corpral Stennis, isn’t it? Looks like you took a bad lump on your head there.”
He smiled dazedly. “I guess . . . I was lucky. Sir, how is it going? The offensive?”
Ussher put his arm around Stennis’s shoulder, smiling.
“We’ve got them howling, Corpral. They don’t even know what hit them, and we’re still hitting. Now, you’d better get to the infirmary. You’ve done your part, and I want you to know I’m grateful. The Phoenix is grateful.” And with a pat on the shoulder, he sent him on, turning as another stretcher was maneuvered out of the locks.
“Dr. Huxley, any problems in the infirmary?”
The doctor looked up, then, on recognizing him, smiled fleetingly.
“Not yet, Fer Ussher. This is just the beginning.”
The beginning? Ussher blinked at him, frowning.
“Well, let me know. Is this . . . Major March?” The man on the stretcher was unconscious, half his head covered with a blood-soaked temporary bandage.
“No. Major March . . . well, he’ll leave the ship last. Excuse us, sir. We’ve got to get this man to the infirmary.”
“Oh . . . yes. Of course.” Last to leave the ship. March was dead, then. He’d never get his cornel’s wings.
“Sir! Watch out!’’
