Homefall

by Chris Bunch

  "I'll make a guess," Yoshitaro said. "They got paid in loot and worked cheaper."

  There was a murmur of laughter.

  "I wasn't being funny," Njangu said, and the laughter stopped.

  "Monique," Garvin went on, "you're the closest thing to an old soldier around. Did you ever hear of anything like this?"

  "No," Monique said, then stopped, thinking. "Wait a sec. Before I joined up, when I was an opera dancer, somebody said something once about being damned glad that the local soldiers were regulars, since she was getting tired of chasing off shag artists.

  "I don't remember her saying any more."

  "Interesting," Froude said, and went on.

  "These people now calling themselves the Protectorate had been moved closer and closer to Centrum, evidently as problems on the homeworld worsened.

  "Then the Confederation fell out of contact with everyone, including these charmers.

  "The father of these three brothers who now are running things got the interesting idea that he was strong enough to take Capella and Centrum and then dictate what should come next.

  "The Confederation should dissolve Parliament after 'electing' a strong leader to put things back together, allowing no systems to declare independence, and to destroy any worlds attacking Confederation members.

  "He seems to have been a very cautious man, for his first steps were away from Centrum, taking control of other systems like Sabyn, turning systems like Mais into puppets, and so on. We are sure they control at least twenty systems now, maybe more.

  "The way the Protectorate operates is to skim only the cream from these systems, leaving enough for the worlds to keep functioning, not hurting them badly enough to tempt them to revolt, and, evidently, instantly coming down with an iron heel on anyone who dissents. I've heard of at least two worlds that didn't listen to reason and got the nuclear treatment.

  "I haven't been able to find out just how long Ja-gasti's father thought it would be before the Protectorate was ready to make a hard move on Centrum, although I did get a couple of hints that recon units were sent out, never to return. They were probably destroyed by whatever war fleets the Confederation still has operational, backed by the mechanical security devices around Centrum."

  "Things were going well," he continued. "And then the old man had the lack of grace to die. A surfeit of eels or some such. I couldn't tell, through the holos' purple hosannas at the funeral.

  "I don't think any of his sons did the usual junior tyrant act, and slipped a shot of radioactive bilgewater in the old bastard's nightcap, or piss poison in the porches of his ears.

  "Regardless, he's dead, and so Jagasti, who has a reputation of being a most noble warrior, although what real war he's fought doesn't get mentioned, takes over as Kuril.

  "He has nowhere near the ability of his father at keeping all of these thugs somewhat under control, and so the number two son, who evidently fancies himself a Greater Leader, stomped off, with his supporters, and now holds two systems, Degasten and Khon, and keeps saying that he's the rightful Kuril."

  "What about the third son?" Garvin asked. "He was at the circus the other night."

  "I'm developing certain areas of interest with him," Njangu said, trying to sound pompous. "Bayanti is ambitious, but it doesn't seem, so far, that he's thinking about striking out on his own.

  "However, I'm thinking of ways of encouraging his ambition."

  "That's a very fast precis of this Protectorate," Froude said. "I've got far more details for anyone interested.

  "The question now is what do we do? It doesn't seem that the Protectorate, for their own paranoiac reasons, will encourage or even allow us to make the next four jumps to Centrum."

  "I get the idea," Njangu put in, "that we're increasingly well thought of by Jagasti and crew. Which is good in one way, but makes it very hard for us to tiptoe out the back door without Jagasti getting a lethal—for us—case of the pouts."

  "What we need," Garvin said thoughtfully, "is a way to put some shit in the game, without us getting brownish in the process."

  The people in the room looked at each other.

  No one's expression suggested she or he had the slightest idea.

  Njangu's lips were moving up Maev's inner thigh when he sat bolt upright.

  "I'll be a sunnuvabitch!"

  "You damned sure are if you don't go back to what you're doing," Maev managed, with a sharp intake of breath.

  But Yoshitaro paid no mind, was sitting up, and touching com buttons.

  "This," Garvin's voice came, "had better be goddamned important, Njangu. There is a time and a place for everything, especially for using this number." He appeared to be breathing hard.

  "Boss," Njangu said proudly, "I have a scheme."

  Chapter 19

  "I propose," Njangu said, "to make the situation worse."

  "For whom?" Froude asked, amused. Garvin yawned sleepily, said nothing. The three were gathered in Gar-vin's cabin office, waiting for a stim.

  "Certainly not for us," Yoshitaro said. "At least, I hope not.

  "Look at what we've got. Three brothers, barbarians, two of 'em at least not getting along. They're plotting on grabbing all the gold, but, like their father, don't appear quite ready to make the big jump and go after Centrum. I'd guess if this Gegen, who's floated over to Degasten with everyone he can subvert, wouldn't mind at all if Big Brother Jagasti happens to trip and fall on his saber."

  "Your points are undebateable," Froude said.

  "Therefore, I propose to throw some shit in the game, as they used to say," Njangu said.

  "What species of doots?" Garvin broke off as a mess attendant came in with a tray, then, after he'd left, waited for an answer.

  "Suspicion will lie on every hand. And foot," Njangu said. "I'm going to convince these three yahoos they're about to get assassinated."

  "Good," Garvin said. "Who's going to be the head of the plot?"

  "Why, me, of course."

  "For all three?"

  "Can I juggle, or what?" Njangu said, slurping caff.

  * * *

  Jagasti's idea of fine sport was equipping lifters with probes, and hanging a cloth of a given color from one of them. The others… ten to a side, two men to a lifter… tried to take the cloth away or protect the flag-carrier until he reached a goal.

  As far as Njangu could tell, there weren't any especial rules, except all lifters should withdraw to their end of the field while an ambulance rescued the survivors of a crash.

  At least blasters didn't seem to be permitted.

  "Interesting sport, Kuril," Yoshitaro said.

  "Yes! It is the sport of men. Real men! Supposedly we first played it, riding animals, back on our home-worlds. But now it is much faster," Jagasti said.

  "And kills even more of our best fighters," Bayanti said.

  "Life is just a waiting for death," Jagasti said impatiently. "Men get weak, become like women, unless they test themselves."

  Bayanti was about to say something when two lifters soared high, then dived on the flag-bearer. The first slammed into the flag-carrier, sending it spinning, the flag carried away by the slight breeze. The second lifter speared it, and, at full drive, jinked right, then left, then through the goal.

  Jagasti was on his feet, bellowing praise, promising rewards to the scorers and the screen.

  Bayanti looked at Njangu strangely, then away.

  Jagasti returned to his seat, a metal vee with canvas strung across the metal.

  "You, Bayanti," he said. "Go praise those pilots, and give them… give them permission to join my First Imperials. This alien has said he wants to discuss something with me that is private."

  "And your brother isn't entitled to hear that?"

  "I shall decide that," Jagasti said. "Later."

  Bayanti got up, then stamped from the prefab enclosure.

  "Brothers!" Jagasti said, shaking his head. "Do you have any, Yoshitaro?"

  "I wasn't that lucky," Njang
u said.

  "No, you are the lucky one," Jagasti said. "It must be wonderful, growing up, not having to watch your back or to be able to run without someone trying to trip you.

  "Then, when you have finally seen clear to the goal, to have one of your own blood call you a fool, say you are not entitled to what you've won, and declare himself your enemy.

  "You are young yet, and do not know what it is to have your own flesh a traitor, betraying what he knows is right."

  Njangu waited.

  "Never mind that," Jagasti said. "My problems are my problems. Tell me why you wished to see me in secret."

  "I want," Njangu said carefully, "to make your problems mine."

  "What does that mean?"

  "As you've no doubt figured out, Circus Jaansma is a bit more than it appears."

  "I knew it! I knew it!" Jagasti exulted. "No one but a fool goes about in bloody times such as these doing no more than swinging through the air and hoping to be rewarded for it.

  "Tell me. What else do you do?"

  "It depends," Njangu said. "Sometimes we do no more than we offer at first. But sometimes, when we deal with the right kind of people, and the reward is great, we provide certain services."

  "You are still being vague."

  "I'll be specific, then," Njangu said. "For a fee, which we'll negotiate in advance, I think we can rid you of your brother, Gegen, and leave the way clear for you to continue your conquest of Centrum."

  Njangu thought Jagasti's eyes glowed yellow, like those of Muldoon the leopard before he tried to rip someone's face off.

  "This is a long damned shot," Darod Montagna complained. "Plus this is one shitty platform to shoot from."

  Montagna lay behind a rather skeletal weapon, a still-experimental sniper rifle. It looked like something a child had built from a construction set, all struts and bolts. Rather than use a conventional blaster bolt, the weapon fired an old-fashioned solid projectile.

  The caliber was shockingly large—almost 18mm. The projectile was shielded from gravity and winds with a miniscule antigravity dropper in its nose that would keep the round on a flat trajectory for as far as six kilometers.

  The magazine held three rounds, the bullet weighing about 170 grams, and traveling at just under 2,000 m/sec. Above the action was an ugly stabilized sight, giving a variable magnification of from 2x to over 200X.

  It was deliberately weighted, for stability and to reduce recoil, to over eighteen kilos, and, of course not being shoulder-fireable, had a shocked, rear-pointing bipod up front and an equally angled monopod at the rear. It still would have kicked the marksman's shoulder into next week without two heavy springs in the stock against the action's rear, giving it almost ten centimeters of recoil, like an ancient cannon. Not that the piece could ever be considered fun to fire.

  Montagna was right about the firing platform's stability—she lay on the deck of a lifter hovering at about two-thousand meters, the weapon sticking out its lowered rear ramp.

  "Stop sniveling, Nimrod," Lir said as she ratcheted rounds half as long as her forearm into the rifle's box magazine. "And you're supposed to miss the bastard, remember?"

  "Yeh," Montagna said, squirming. "But I gotta get at least close enough to make him think he's a target, right?"

  Montagna wore a very tight shooter's jacket, and the rifle sling with an automatic tensioner ran from the weapon over her back, down between her legs, and back up to the gun's stock. She couldn't have wiggled if she'd tried.

  The lifter swayed in the breeze, and Lir muttered "Stop that," to the autopilot, trying to keep the lifter dead stable, using three points—the nose of Big Bertha, a dozen kilometers away, barely visible, Mohi IPs second moon overhead, and a distant mountain.

  Montagna sighed, peered through her sight at the mansion, five kilometers distant, its stone facade glittering in the rising sun. She found the steps, swept over the waiting lim, moved up to the main entrance. She ran it up to full magnification, decided this was the best it was going to get, backed the wheel down a turn.

  Lir had a pair of stabilized glasses on the mansion's entrance as well.

  They waited. Montagna felt the dawn breeze, brisk in her nostrils.

  "The driver just popped to," Lir warned. "He's got to be on the way."

  Montagna saw the door of the mansion come open, breathed in… out… held it… touched the first of the very old-fashioned set triggers. A heavy breath on the second trigger would set the rifle off.

  A man… clearly Bayanti… came into sight, talking animatedly to someone.

  Montagna touched the trigger, and the rifle, in spite of its flash/sound suppressor at its muzzle, slammed the Last Trump.

  Montagna, ignoring her mind saying, You flinched, you dumb-ass bitch, forced the behemoth back on target, waiting to see what happened while the bullet went on its way. By the time she had her sights back, the huge bullet had made a decent-size hole in the stonework about a meter above Bayanti's head, and he was flattened on the stairs, his companion bravely lying atop him, shielding him from another shot from the assassin.

  "I think you signified," Lir said.

  "Guess so," Darod said, unstrapping herself, and rubbing her shoulder. "Damn, but this sumbitch kicks."

  "Decent shot," Lir said. "Now let's go home and see how much of Njangu's shit this stirred up."

  It was considerable.

  Jagasti summoned Njangu within the day.

  "Someone," he said icily, "tried to kill my young brother this morning."

  Njangu pretended surprise.

  "That was all the commotion this morning. We were turned back from the city twice."

  "You were lucky you were not fired on," Jagasti said. "My men were in shock, and most trigger-happy. Now, you are officially given the commission to take care of my brother Gegen, as you said you could do."

  "I said I could try to do."

  "You will do it," Jagasti said. "I do not respect failure, particularly when someone not familiar to me volunteers for a task, then does not succeed.

  "You can have any resources you need, any amount of credits.

  "Now go, accomplish your mission!"

  Degasten/Ogdai

  Njangu wished they'd had room in Big Bertha to conceal a small destroyer, or, better, one of the Musth velv. But covert operations is exactly like hiking— there's never room enough in the pack for everything that might be needed. So they took a Nana boat, and had one of the Protectorate's battleships transport it two of the three jumps to the Degasten system, where Gegen and his dissidents headquartered.

  Njangu took four with him: Ben Dill as pilot, Moni-que Lir; Alikhan because an alien with big ears might be useful, and Danfin Froude as his "handler."

  Ogdai was Degasten's most settled world, and Dill set an open orbit toward the planet as soon as they came out of N-Space, after leaving a small object just beyond the nav point.

  Unsurprisingly, they'd only been in normal space a ship-hour or two before a pair of heavy cruisers dropped on them, ordered them to stand by for boarding, and performed the usual search. As usual, they missed various items Njangu had well hidden about the ship. He was starting to realize Garvin was right when he said a professional smuggler always stole the march on customs.

  Njangu declared his intent as "forward man for a circus." Their ship was escorted to a distant, barren field, and he was told to stand by.

  Four officials of increasing rank came, were told of Circus Jaansma and its desire to play Ogdai and Degasten's other worlds, and here was an example of their artists, looked startled when Njangu said the circus was currently appearing on Mohi II. The last, and highest-ranking, was also told that Yoshitaro wished an audience, if that was what it was called, with Kuril Gegen.

  The officer looked at Njangu haughtily. "The Kuril hardly needs to be involved in deciding whether to allow a group of entertainers to appear in our system."

  "Of course not," Njangu agreed. "But he could be interested in something involving his brothe
r."

  "Jagasti? What? You can tell me. I report to Kuril Gegen myself."

  Njangu smiled, didn't answer. The officer stared at him for a while, then left.

  Two days later, the summons came: Njangu to be ready at dawn the next day, alone.

  "I don't suppose," he asked Maev, "if there's any way I can put a secret gun up my wahoonie or something."

  "You can shove a frigging howitzer up there for having this idea of yours that surely sounds like you're gonna end up at the bottom of somebody's dungeon," Dill said. "But no. There's never been a weapon made that wouldn't show up on at least a density detector. If you feel murderous, bite him to death."

  "Mmmh," Njangu said, and at dawn was pacing back and forth outside the Nana boat's lock.

  A rather bulky lifter settled down, with two destroyers floating overhead, and Njangu was ushered aboard and told, unceremoniously, to strip. He pretended indignation, actually felt none, and was escorted into a room by two obvious medical types, and told to wait.

  I just hope, he thought, they aren't into laxatives and vomitoriums. Never can tell when these damned barbarians run out of peep-bo machinery in the walls and start using the good ol' soapy water.

  But evidently the machines still worked, for Yoshi-taro was told to get dressed, and his treatment became noticeably less chilly. But Njangu wasn't given access to a compartment with a screen or porthole.

  They landed after about two hours estimated flight time, and Yoshitaro was ushered out and greeted by four men in uniform-like gray, and a smiling young man who introduced himself as Maj Kars. Njangu noticed the smile never touched the man's eyes, but then, he'd been accused of having the same chill look himself.

  "Forgive the care," Kars said, "but it seemed worthwhile, since you said you had something about the Kuril's brother to discuss, and we hardly consider Ja-gasti someone to take casually."

  "No," Njangu said. "He certainly is not."

  The landing platform was atop a huge stone fortress that must have been a thousand years old, standing above a large city. The fortification might have been a monument until recently, but had been brought up to contemporary requirements, with little consideration for niceties such as architecture or historical importance. Stone gun turrets had been cut off flat, and various antennae mounted on steel decks. Domes had been rebuilt so missile launchers protruded through them. Here and there along the walls and roofs blisters with chainguns sat like boils, and on the once-gardened grounds were entrenchments and pillboxes.