Falcone Strike

by Christopher Nuttall

  “Captain, that could cost you your career,” the XO said.

  “Yes, it could,” Kat said. Technically, naval personnel were excluded from the legal protections laid down in the Commonwealth Constitution, but it would still hamper her career if the effort proved fruitless. No one liked the thought of what were effectively random strip searches, even if there was no alternative. Legal, perhaps; moral, certainly not. “I do not see any alternative.”

  She glanced at Davidson. “Start with Commander Roach,” she added. “He’s in charge of the department; he may have noticed someone behaving oddly, or acting in a suspicious manner.”

  “Lieutenant Parkinson has been handling personnel issues for tactical,” the XO put in quickly. “Commander Roach has spent far too much of his time on the bridge.”

  “Check with her too, then,” Kat ordered. She’d have to have a word with Roach if he’d been neglecting his duties. But then, half the tactical staff that should have been assigned to them never had been. “And see if she merits a brevet promotion if she’s handling matters above her station.”

  Her eyes narrowed in sudden recognition. “Lieutenant Parkinson . . . wasn’t she the girl with the gambling problem?”

  “I have kept an eye on her, Captain,” the XO said. “I believe she has largely recovered from that misstep. And she did handle herself well during the battles around Cadiz.”

  “Good,” Kat said. She knew all too well just how hard it was to recover from a youthful mistake, particularly if it was one that could have had nasty consequences. “Get some sleep, then check with both of them.”

  “Aye, Captain,” the XO said. “With your permission, I will check in on the bridge and then go to my cabin.”

  “Granted,” Kat said. She hoped that meant he would actually sleep. “Whatever else happens, we need to sit down in a couple of days and plot our next moves.”

  The XO nodded and rose. “We need to make sure the enemy knows we’re not cowed,” he said. “Right now, they’re probably gloating over their victory. Even a small raid would give them a nasty fright.”

  He saluted and then headed for the door.

  “He’s a good man,” Davidson said once the hatch had closed. There was nothing but genuine affection in his tone. “Looking out for his people, despite knowing that one of them is a rat.”

  “I know,” Kat said. The best XO she’d known had offered good advice to junior officers even though he’d ridden them hard. Davidson made a better XO, she thought, than she’d ever been. “Can we find the spy?”

  “If worse comes to worst, we can interrogate everyone on the ship,” Davidson said. He yawned, suddenly. “It may not get us anywhere, if the spy has already been killed, but . . . at least we’d know the survivors were innocent.”

  “Or that there’s another explanation,” Kat said.

  Davidson looked at her tiredly. “Like what?”

  “I wish I knew,” Kat said. She yawned herself, fighting down the urge to just curl up in her chair and go to sleep. “Any technological explanation . . . if the enemy could track ships through hyperspace, Pat, they’d have won the war by now. Unless they somehow managed to get a rogue program into our datanet . . .”

  “It would have been found,” Davidson said. “The techheads who do the work are among the most stringently vetted people in the Commonwealth.”

  Kat nodded. It was an unpleasant fact that certain agencies within the Commonwealth were allowed to discriminate, refusing to accept applicants who had items in their background that might—might— make them a security risk. Anyone who had relations on the other side of the border had to be considered a potential danger, even though it was unlikely they’d serve the Theocracy willingly. The refugees from Verdean and Ringer would never be allowed to rise to the very highest levels, no matter how loyal and faithful they were. And they would never be allowed anywhere near a starship’s datacores.

  “Then we must proceed on the assumption we have a spy,” she said curtly. “Get some rest, then start hunting for the bastard.”

  Davidson gave her a stern look. “You need to sleep too,” he said. His voice softened before she could take offense at his tone. “Get some rest yourself.”

  “I will,” Kat said.

  She hesitated, then reached out and pulled him into a kiss. It was the wrong time and place, but she wanted—needed—to feel alive. His lips felt hard and demanding against hers . . . she moaned slightly as his tongue slipped into her mouth, his hands reaching down to stroke her breasts through the uniform.

  “Come with me,” she said, standing. “Please.”

  Davidson grinned, then followed her into the bedroom.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  William was not pleased. He’d been raised to believe in loyalty. As a child, one was loyal to one’s parents; as a grown man, one was loyal to one’s group; as a starship crewman, one was loyal to the rest of the crew. There was room for dissent, even for active disagreement, but not for outright disloyalty. The glue that bound a ship’s crew together could not survive treachery. It would undermine the faith and trust the crew needed in order to work together. A spy—someone who had deliberately betrayed his fellow crew to the enemy—was the worst of all. He had tried to get them all killed.

  He hadn’t slept very well. He’d kept thinking, wondering just who would betray his or her shipmates—and why. As XO, he was responsible for supervising the crew; had he, somehow, missed the signs of a budding traitor? Or had he overlooked something that had started a person down the road to treachery? Or had he simply ignored the traitor, dismissed him as unimportant and never even considered the possibility of treachery? By the time he’d finally drifted off to an uncomfortable sleep, his head was echoing with anger and bitter pain. Someone was going to pay for betraying their shipmates . . .

  But it wouldn’t be enough. How could it be? The crew would be broken and scattered by the news, when they needed to pull together. Their faith in one another would be shattered. It wouldn’t be easy for them to bond again after such a betrayal. And yet he needed to make them work as a group once more. Maybe, just maybe, they could isolate the spy— even keep news of his or her existence a secret. But it wouldn’t work unless they caught and removed the traitor before it was too late.

  William pulled himself out of bed and stumbled into the shower, then turned on the tap and washed his body down with cold water. The cold shocked him awake; he cursed under his breath, then forced himself to look in the mirror. He’d terrify anyone who saw him, he suspected; his face looked as if he hadn’t slept for days, let alone hours. He washed his face thoroughly, then turned up the temperature and concentrated on relaxing. If things had been different, he might have declared himself unfit for duty and asked the doctor for a sedative, but it was unthinkable when the ship was in deep trouble. He stepped out of the shower and dressed quickly, then glanced at the status update on his terminal. Lightning was still several hours from being ready for action, while the remaining four ships were days away. It might be better, he thought, for Lightning to set out on her own, while the other ships were repaired.

  Once we have the spy in the brig , he told himself firmly, then we can start making some proper plans.

  He checked his appearance in the mirror, then walked out of his cabin and down towards the tactical compartment. He’d run through everyone’s file in the department last night before his meeting with the captain, and none of them had stood out as a potential spy. Not, he had to admit, that he’d expected anyone to have spy written in his or her personnel dossier. The Theocracy wouldn’t use someone without a background that would stand up to scrutiny, particularly given how much sensitive information flowed through the tactical department. It practically had to be someone from Tyre . . .

  . . . which, he hoped, meant an unwilling spy rather than a willing traitor.

  It struck him as odd, but he’d been an officer long enough to know that everyone had their pressure points. If someone had offered him command, h
e knew, it would have been hard for him to refuse whatever they demanded in exchange. Or if they’d offered him something he wanted . . . who knew? If someone desired something badly enough, the mere prospect of getting it would be enough to weaken their resistance. Money? Forbidden pleasures? Or even a chance to live life high on the hog after the war? Or resentment, he added, mentally. Someone might have been passed over for promotion enough to want revenge on the entire system.

  It wasn’t a comfortable thought. If someone had started to compile a list of officers and crew who had good reason to be resentful, they would have to put William himself at the top of the list. Sixty years old, forty years in the Navy, a career that hadn’t been blighted by any ghastly failures . . . and he hadn’t been offered a command, while a young girl in her late twenties had been promoted ahead of him. If Captain Falcone hadn’t proved herself, he wondered, would he have resented her badly enough to betray the Navy? Once, he would have considered it unthinkable; now, he knew it was a very real possibility.

  He sighed inwardly as he stepped into the tactical department and surveyed the thirteen officers working at their consoles, replaying everything that had happened at Morningside, from the moment they’d entered the system to the moment they’d fled back into hyperspace, losing six ships and hundreds of lives in their wake. None of them looked like obvious traitors—William chided himself for thinking that any of them would look evil—but one of them was the most likely suspect. Unless, of course, something had been leaked and the spy was in a different department. It wouldn’t be the first time someone seemingly insignificant had proven themselves a deadly threat.

  “Commander,” Lieutenant Cecelia Parkinson said. She looked older, more mature, than he remembered, although her short red hair and freckled face still made her look young. She’d lost some of her innocence, he noted; her mistakes on her first cruise, even if they hadn’t been fatal, had left scars. “What can I do for you?”

  “I need a word,” he said. He didn’t think Cecelia was the spy, but she did have a black mark in her record. “Your office, now.”

  Cecelia hesitated, then turned and led him through a hatch into a small office. It was barely large enough to swing a cat: a desk, a couple of chairs, a computer terminal . . . really, it was nothing more than a status symbol. Technically, it should have belonged to Lieutenant Commander Roach, but he’d passed it to Cecelia when it became clear she would be largely running the department. William made a mental note to have a few words with him about the issue, then sat down and faced the younger woman. Cecelia was clearly trying to keep her expression under control, but it was easy to tell she looked worried. She just didn’t have the experience to hide her emotions from him.

  “Lieutenant,” William said, “how are things in your department?”

  “A little shaken up, sir,” Cecelia said. “The enemy caught us by surprise and no one’s quite sure how they managed to do it.”

  “I’m sure,” William said dryly. He looked her in the eye. “Have you been having any more problems with gambling?”

  Cecelia flinched. “No, sir,” she said. “I’ve been too busy to do anything other than my duties.”

  William nodded slowly. Crewman Steadman, who’d lured Cecelia into his gambling network, had been transferred off the ship when Lightning returned to Tyre, along with most of his cronies. The notes William had put in their files should ensure they were never assigned to any frontline ships, although the demands of war might overrule his wishes. Cecelia would have a chance to grow out of her mistakes, if she had the determination. She seemed to be doing fine.

  “Someone leaked,” he said flatly. “The enemy knew where we were going in advance.”

  Cecelia looked relieved. “Yes, sir,” she said. “That was my conclusion too.”

  “Good,” William said. He felt a flicker of pity for her. She had to know that the leak had almost certainly come from the tactical department, her command. On the other hand, if she’d had concerns, she should have brought them to him. He’d have to give her a stern lecture later. “Do you have any suspects?”

  “No, sir,” Cecelia said. She took a long breath. “There doesn’t seem to be anyone with a valid reason to support the Theocracy.”

  “There aren’t any valid reasons to support the Theocracy,” William growled. A young woman like Cecelia would have to be utterly insane to support the Theocracy, which would—at best—regard her as a brood mare. “But someone else might disagree.”

  He closed his eyes for a long moment. The thought of having everyone in the department interrogated was horrific. It would undermine the bonds of trust between officers and crewmen as surely as the spy’s existence would undermine the glue binding the ship’s crew together. No one, absolutely no one, liked the idea of being drugged, then having to answer questions . . .

  “I think we need to go through the files again,” he said, keying his wristcom. Davidson could start making preparations to carry out the interrogations, one by one. “Let me see whom you have under your command.”

  Cecelia nodded, then tapped her terminal, calling up the files. Lightning had fifteen tactical officers in all, ranging from officers on the command track to analysts who weren’t expected to rise any higher in the service. William marked the latter as potential suspects, particularly if one of them had been pushed into becoming an analyst rather than remaining on the command track. Resentment could be a powerful motivator, after all . . .

  But we need officers and men, he thought. There’s a bloody war on. They could probably reapply to the command track and no one would try to stop them. It isn’t as if any of them are superusers from Tyre.

  He scowled. The more he looked at it, the more he wondered if the only viable suspect was Cecelia herself. She had a past, after all, and while it was a very minor past it would be enough to damage her promotion prospects beyond repair. There might be no alternative, but to put a young officer through enhanced interrogation . . .

  Damn it, he thought. They’re all from decent families with naval backgrounds . . .

  He stopped as a thought occurred to him, then started cross-referencing the dossiers with other naval files. If the officers were members of naval families, it was quite possible that one or more of them had a relative who had been captured by the enemy. It should have sufficed to have the officer removed from any sensitive position—the prospect of blackmail couldn’t be ignored—but maybe there had been a glitch in the system. Or, perhaps, something had been overlooked.

  “Bingo,” he said, delighted. “Look what I’ve found.”

  Cecelia frowned. “Lieutenant Aloysius Parker,” she said. “Newly minted; command track . . . with a sister who was listed as missing in action after the Battle of Cadiz. Not a confirmed POW . . .”

  “No,” William mused. There were times when he really hated bureaucracy. “And because she wasn’t listed as a POW, there was no red flag in his file.”

  He gritted his teeth in rage. There had been so much confusion during the first battle that quite a few officers had been listed as MIA, even though they were probably either prisoners or dead. The Theocracy hadn’t bothered to open negotiations regarding POWs; they certainly hadn’t even shared the details of captured officers and men with the Commonwealth. No doubt they’d calculated that refusing to swap POWs hurt the Commonwealth more than the Theocracy. He had to admit that they were probably right.

  “It doesn’t prove anything, sir,” Cecelia pointed out carefully.

  “He should have declined the assignment,” William said. He opened the next set of files, just to check to see if there were any other possible suspects. “If you can be forced into betraying your planet, you are supposed to take it to your superiors and ensure you are not posted to anywhere harmful. There are procedures in place for that.”

  “Yes, sir,” Cecelia said.

  “Stay here,” William ordered once he’d finished skimming the remaining files. He had no faith in Cecelia’s ability to dissemble, not when h
e needed to round up the Marines and make the arrest. Maybe he didn’t have proof, but at least he had solid grounds for carrying out a formal interrogation. “I’ll deal with the matter personally.”

  “Yes, sir,” Cecelia said. “What . . . what are you going to do to him?”

  William sighed. It was easy to feel sorry for Parker—and, no doubt, when the case finally came to trial, the defense lawyer would spin a sob story for the jury. But Parker had managed to get several hundred crewmen killed and a number of ships destroyed or put permanently out of commission. There couldn’t be mercy . . .

  “It would depend on just how cooperative he’s feeling,” he said finally. The Theocracy might not realize the spy had been caught . . . assuming, of course, that Parker was the spy and he wasn’t following a wild goose chase. “But that will be up to the captain.”

  “Yes, sir,” Cecelia said.

  William rose, headed out of the office, and walked through the tactical department. Parker didn’t look any different, even though he was certainly guilty at the very least of concealing the fact he could be blackmailed. But the XO hadn’t really expected horns growing out of his skull. He did look tense, but that proved nothing. Half the crew looked tense when they had a moment to think about just how impossibly unlikely the ambush had been.

  He keyed his wristcom as soon as he was out of the department. “I have a suspect,” he said shortly. “Set up to receive him in tactical chamber five, then have Roach call him into the compartment.”

  “Aye, Commander,” Davidson said. He sounded disgustingly fresh and alert, although William had a suspicion he’d spent the night in the captain’s cabin. On the other hand, anyone who’d lived through boot camp would be able to survive on three to four hours of sleep a day. “I’ll meet you there in five minutes.”