by Ian Miller
"So he gets away with . . ."
"With what?"
"You're as bad as Antonia," Lucilla said sourly. "You should be able to see that Gerenthe has lied."
"I tend to agree," Gaius shrugged, "but to accuse him of lying, you have to know what the lie is. Exaggerating his own importance, while bad, is unlikely to be critical at a moment of crisis, because even if he's flawed, he's the best available."
"There's you!"
"The best Ulsian available," Gaius countered.
"I suppose so," Lucilla said, "but it's wrong that he can get away with whatever it is. Surely you can see we've got to do something."
"It's undesirable that I countermand my associate's orders," Gaius replied tersely, then with a grin, added, "and before you bite my head off, there's a way around it. Straight out of Titus Flavius' guide-book on how to piss off your associate legates."
"What's that?"
"I'll give you a direct order that he cannot countermand," Gaius offered, "and that's that you check on his supplies and the manoeuvres that he is undertaking."
"His ships are stationary," Lucilla pointed out.
"Which is why I find his orders to stop shore leave for additional training disturbing," Gaius said slowly. "He has a secret manoeuvre, or so he claims. It is my duty, as a commander, to give my troops the fullest information on whatever tactical methods work against the enemy. If he practices his manoeuvre, I want to know what it is."
"And if he doesn't?"
"There's not a lot I can do. I've asked the Ulsian high command, and they report back that Gerenthe now claims there is nothing special, just timing."
"That's not very likely," Lucilla said in a scathing tone.
"I know that," Gaius replied. "Something's wrong, but I don't know what. So, you have a free run to follow your nose, within certain limits."
"I'll be right on it," Lucilla said.
"I know," Gaius said, "with or without my orders. All I've given you is some sort of cover, but Lucilla, please, be careful. Remember this. If you go too far out on a limb and give him a chance to think you might be an enemy infiltrator, I doubt he'll pause too much before shooting at you. So, keep at a reasonable distance, and under no circumstances try something like boarding his ship. I have a very bad feeling about this."
* * *
Lucilla decided that Vipsania would offer a more sympathetic ear, so she invited her to dinner. Vipsania, however, proved to be much more cautious. "You're best off to forget it," she said, after listening to Lucilla's tirade.
"You do agree there's something wrong?" Lucilla almost demanded agreement.
"Yes, but I don't see what we can do. We're much better off dealing with the new threat."
"But that Gerenthe . . ."
"Yes, I know," Vipsania replied quietly, "but we have to go off and fight, and the last thing we need is for our own side to be distracted over some previous incident."
"Distracted! I want Gerenthe removed."
"Yes, that's fine if you succeed," Vipsania pointed out, "and provided the Ulsians don't get peeved by the fact that their hero lost on a point of protocol, and decide to be unenthusiastic about following Gaius' orders."
"I'm sure they'll follow orders," Lucilla said, although her tone indicated that she was clearly not overconfident.
"And suppose you fail and the matter's unresolved? Now what? Gaius' troops might quit and leave us to the enemy."
"They wouldn't do that," Lucilla said.
"You know the Ulsians that well?"
"I suppose not," Lucilla had to agree, then added, "but if we don't do something now, the evidence could be lost forever."
"There's no harm in investigating," Vipsania said softly. "You've just got to be discreet about it."
"Of course I'll be discreet," Lucilla said sourly. "This has to be investigated."
"You haven't been very discreet so far," Vipsania said. "If I were you, I'd give up for the time being."
"No way!" Lucilla snorted.
* * *
So Lucilla began her discreet enquiries. Unfortunately for her, being human she tended to stand out in the crowd, and after her first two or three efforts she noticed that Ulsians were giving a forced 'No!' before they even heard the question. It was soon confirmed for her that Ulsians connected with Gerenthe had been told in no uncertain terms to avoid her.
She requested to see the ships' logs, and permission was denied.
"I thought these were available for study by any Ulsian?" she queried.
"Yes," the attendant said, "but you are not an Ulsian."
"You mean," she almost yelled, "that I am good enough to fight and die for your miserable civilization, but I'm not good enough to see these logs."
"Space Marshall Gerenthe has specifically ordered that these not be made available," the attendant explained. "That order is general, and must be obeyed unless another law takes precedence. The right of Ulsians to view this material is one such law that takes precedence, but the law does not specifically permit non-Ulsians, so the answer is no, without specific permission from Marshall Gerenthe." He paused, and seeing the sour face of Lucilla, said, "You could ask the Space Marshall for permission."
"That'll be a winning strategy," Lucilla muttered sourly.
"Then I'm afraid you do not have the right to see it."
"So much for all the rights and privileges of that honour," Lucilla said even more sourly. "Just when I need something any Ulsian can have, it isn't enough."
"What honour?" the attendant asked, as if he could not believe this human was capable of earning anything, except possibly a time in prison.
"I'm a Commander of the Order of Camran," Lucilla replied, "for all the good it is going to do me."
"The order of what?" the attendant asked, now somewhat less sure of himself.
"Camran," Lucilla said, then suddenly she began to realize, as she continued, "You have no right to deny me, do you?"
"Please wait here," then attendant said. "I shall have to check."
Lucilla sat down, then as an afterthought she made thought contact with Antonia.
'Yes?' Antonia asked.
'I'm trying to view the logs of those ships,' Lucilla thought. 'I have mentioned my honour. Does it give me rights of ordinary Ulsians?'
'Very many more,' Antonia affirmed. 'Demand that they be placed in official verification equipment, and exact and complete transcripts be sent to the Romulus. That way, you can view them at your leisure, and more to the point, the Romulus can view them.'
'Does that help?'
'It can analyse every word in its context to see if any alterations have taken place, and for verbal records, it can analyse the emotional state of whoever is recording.'
'And if this Ulsian refuses to let me?'
'Capture his image with your Krezell wand, transmit it here, and watch what happens to his career.'
In the event, when the attendant returned, he could not have been more helpful. Lucilla's request was filled immediately, and she was given immediate access to the verification equipment she had requested. The access was so immediate that four Ulsians were removed from the room, with explanations as to why, which, as Vipsania pointed out later, was hardly discreet.
"They wouldn't say anything," Lucilla snorted.
"Well, I got blamed for it later," Vipsania said, "and I was four buildings away."
As it happened, Antonia informed her that while the logs were interesting, they were not very helpful as yet. Lucilla did not take up the significance of the 'as yet'.
* * *
Of the party, Lucilla alone had developed a taste for Ulsian music and often spent days at the café-concerts that Ulsians so liked, and indeed she frequented one sufficiently often that they had made a special effort to obtain delicacies that she could eat or drink. She decided to visit her favourite café again after a particularly frustrating sequence of inquiries that had gone nowhere. She really liked this café, and for some reason the owners seemed to pa
rticularly like her. After acquiring details of her metabolism, they offered to formulate some special drinks and delicacies for her to try. Some of these were simply awful, in fact one looked suspiciously like clotted blood, but eventually some turned out to be quite interesting. They had two really strange fruit juices, quite unlike anything she had ever tasted, and one or two other strange drinks that she later found out contained caffeine.
Suddenly she had an idea, and called a waiter. Yes, he informed her. The raw materials for this special food originated on Plotk. In principle this food and drink, and the fruit, would have been available for Quintus. She ordered one of the strange carbonated drinks that, she was told, were very popular on Ranh. Originally she had found this drink simply strange, but she had to admit it did grow on her, and by drinking it, she felt she had some connection with Quintus. She was halfway through this when an Ulsian officer suddenly sat down in front of her.
"You!" he said. "Stop sticking your nose in where it isn't wanted."
"And who exactly do you think you are!" Lucilla said. She turned for help, but all she saw were two other officers standing behind her.
"Sit down!"
"Help!" Lucilla called out at the top of her voice, reverting to Latin. "I'm being attacked!"
"You are not! Nobody has touched you." The Ulsian officer was emphatic, but he was also perhaps a little embarrassed, as all the others in the cafeteria had turned to stare at them.
"Then send those goons behind me away. Clear the exit."
"Nobody will hurt you, at least not here."
"And what's that supposed to mean?" Lucilla stared at him.
"You will stop interfering in the affairs of Space Marshall Gerenthe."
"Or else you'll arrange for something nasty to happen to me, I suppose?" Lucilla was so angry she again inadvertently reverted to using Latin.
"Something like that," the officer said, in turn reverting to Latin so that the other diners could not understand. "Quite simply, you will stop this pursuit of Space Marshall Gerenthe or you will suffer consequences you will definitely not like."
"I see," Lucilla said. Her anger had by now overwhelmed her fear, possibly because she could see that it would not be practical for anything to happen to her inside this cafeteria. "You know what would entice me to stop?" she said.
"What? Are you on the make?"
Lucilla got to her feet and said loudly, in Ulsian, "I shall stop trying to find out how Admiral Gerenthe managed to take on a fleet several times bigger than himself and beat them without sustaining a scratch on his ships when he, or for that matter you or anyone else, tells me how he managed it. I want to know this so that all the other Ulsians flying out to war have the best chance of coming back."
"Indeed!" came a cry in Ulsian from the back of the cafeteria. A small round of applause broke out, which expanded into a wave. The music has stopped, and all the listeners were applauding, and staring at the officer.
"You'll regret this!" he said, as he got up to leave.
"No she won't," the owner of the café said. "Here, a free drink, and I'll arrange an escort for you. And I'll see that Space Marshall Gerenthe hears about your boorish behaviour," he added, and waved a finger at the retreating Ulsian.
Lucilla was pleased at the support she received. When she had entered the cafeteria she had been depressed. She felt she would get nowhere because she was an alien; now she felt a little less alien.
Chapter 38
Official departure was the following day, and Gaius was extremely busy. Lucilla had met Vipsania for breakfast, and in the strange conversation that followed, it appeared both had almost convinced themselves that they would not return to Ulse. Lucilla was convinced half of the fleet must pursue the losing M'starn back to their planet of origin, and that Gerenthe would ensure that it was Gaius who did that, so that he could return to Ulse to claim victory. Vipsania was convinced that after they won, they would be able to return home. Lucilla had no intention of trying to talk Vipsania out of that, but she felt that nothing was less likely.
Accordingly, Vipsania decided to spend her last day on Ulse ensuring that all their special possessions, their belongings from home and special memorabilia from their adventures were carefully packed and sent to their ships. Lucilla had collected few special belongings, so she decided to visit her favourite cafeteria again for the last time. Vipsania offered to look after her property while she said goodbye to her friends on Ulse.
So again Lucilla found herself at the cafeteria, and this time almost a centre of attention as a sequence of Ulsians came to wish her well, and offer her a toast to victory. At the end of the afternoon Lucilla was feeling slightly drowsy, and perhaps a little bloated. She had to admit that, being her last day, she had drunk too much of the special wine, and she was also feeling quite sad. These Ulsians had been so kind. They seemed almost in awe of the fact that she was going off to fight for the very future of Ulse, and since she could not return for many years and nobody else could ever eat or drink her specials, they donated their entire supply to her. After gratefully accepting the offer, she had immediately contacted Antonia, who offered to come down in a shuttle and collect the goods.
She decided to take one last look around, and walked slowly into one of the grand plazas. The open area was huge, with many of the strange fountains that flattened so prematurely. The very solid trees with their stubby branches and their clean green leaves seemed both familiar and alien at the same time. The alien-ness was emphasised by the complete absence of birds or animals. As usual, the sunlight seemed so pleasant, the sky so clear and blue, without a cloud in the sky for it never rained in this underground city.
"So, you are the foolish hero?"
"Excuse me?" Lucilla looked up to see a bouncy Ulsian standing in front of her.
"You are foolish to serve under Marshall Gerenthe," the Ulsian said in a flat tone.
"Exactly what do you mean by that?" Lucilla asked in a mixture of curiosity and anger.
"Marshall Gerenthe is, in your words, a traitor and a fraud."
"Can you prove what you are saying?" she asked quickly.
"I can prove he is a fraud," the Ulsian said. "I served on his ship. I have the real data logs from his expedition."
"You have the what?" Lucilla's voice was now filled with excitement. Could this be what she needed?
"The real data logs. You must have realized when you saw his undamaged ships that he had never been in anything like the fight he claimed to have been in?"
"I've made that point already," Lucilla explained, "but nobody thinks it's significant."
"Nobody wishes to see their hero brought down," the Ulsian snorted.
"Can I get access to these data logs?" Lucilla asked.
"If you and Vipsania are at this address in one hour, and if you each assign to me three months consumption rights, you can have them."
"Consumption rights?" Lucilla frowned.
"You won't need them where you're going and they'll have expired long before you return," the Ulsian noted.
"But you can't use them," Lucilla frowned. "They're largely for specific items designed for our metabolism, and . ."
"I have a use," the Ulsian said, "and you have no need to know what it is. Do you wish to have the logs or not?"
"It's a deal," Lucilla said.
"You must bring Vipsania," the Ulsian said, "because I need her palm-print on her rights."
"She'll come," Lucilla assured the Ulsian.
"Then I'll see you in an hour."
Lucilla was about to contact Vipsania, when she remembered that she was supposed to meet Antonia at the shuttle. She had to contact her, but how? She would try the thought method.
This worked immediately, and Lucilla was about to engage in a discussion about how what she was going to say was difficult when Antonia suggested that Lucilla should open her mind and let her see the problem. At first Lucilla was reluctant, but she realized she would have to trust Antonia in many situations, so she agree
d.
'I see,' Antonia immediately responded.
'What do you see?' Lucilla thought, with a touch of pique.
'Your problem. Oh, you do not realise. I am now fully aware of the meeting, and I share your doubts about the authenticity of this Ulsian. Vipsania absolutely must not attend. I shall attend in her place. Amongst other things, you must be aware of all possible escape routes if this goes wrong, and only I can provide you with the knowledge, and have the resources to rescue you.'
'He's expecting Vipsania,' Lucilla noted.
'I shall give him a verifiable authorization for Vipsania's consumption rights, and if that's not satisfactory, then you are in deep trouble,' Antonia replied, 'which is all the more reason I go rather than Vipsania.'
'You think I shouldn't go at all?'
'That would be the safest course,' Antonia advised, 'but I share your assessment of the value of this information if it is true. In my opinion, no ordinary Ulsian could get such logs without Gerenthe's permission, but I cannot rule out an extraordinary effort, or something from another ship.'
'Another ship?'
'The log from another ship would be easier to get, but it would be less informative. However, as long as you promise to do what I say, I believe I can keep you safe. I shall meet you in fifty minutes.'
* * *
At first Lucilla thought something must have gone wrong when Vipsania approached her, but then the thought came into her head, 'See, if I can fool you, I can most certainly fool the average Ulsian.'
'There's the problem of the palm print?' Lucilla warned.
'Problem?' Antonia queried. 'I am a companion of the highest grade. Unless the reader is linked to a major Ulsian defence system computer, it will be under my total control. And if it is linked to such a system Gaius will authorise whatever is necessary. Do not worry. If you have been approached truthfully, I shall have no difficulty whatsoever, and they will never know I was here.'
They walked along a path towards the destination. Lucilla had no idea where they were going, but Antonia had no difficulty. She did not go the standard way, but approached from a narrow alley that meant that when they entered the designated street, they did so from behind the Ulsian waiting for them, and staring in the expected, but wrong, direction. Nobody else was around.
