by David Weber
She paused for a moment, then inhaled sharply. "After a hit sent the fusion bottle climbing toward failure, all the survivors got off in the two cutters and the pinnace . . . and that's when the bastards opened up all over again. They lasered the blue cutter under Mr. Gedrosian, the XO. Ms. Arlemont, she was Engineering Officer, tried to ram them with the red cutter. They lasered them too."
Harpe swallowed. "The Captain got us clear before he died," she said. "I couldn't have evaded the bastards myself. He'd lost his legs from the hit on the bridge but I don't think it was that what killed him. He just gave up." She swallowed again.
"We knew the Peeps were on Air, so we couldn't go back there. It was just luck the Jerobahm was bound out-system and her skipper was willing to let us ride her hull. We'd be dead for sure otherwise, Sir. Those bastards don't want any witnesses left."
"Yes, all right," Nessler said. "Wait here for a moment while I consult with Mr. Singh."
Nessler stepped toward Singh on the porch. The shipwrecked spacers parted with mechanical precision. They'd lost everything but the clothes they stood in—and clothes as well in some cases—but their discipline held. Mincio had always considered herself a scholar and above petty concerns of nationality, but in this moment she was proud to be a citizen of the Star Kingdom of Manticore.
"Excellent!" Nessler said after a brief conversation. Mr. Singh disappeared into the house, calling half-heard orders.
"Bosun Harpe," Nessler continued, still on the porch which put him a head higher than the spacers he was addressing. "You and your people will be billeted in a warehouse and provided with rations during the period you're on Hope. I'll defray Mr. Singh's expenses and be repaid on my return to Manticore. Mr. Singh is summoning a guide right now."
Mincio doubted that Nessler would even request reimbursement for an amount that was vanishingly small in comparison to his annual revenues. Government paperwork was a morass, and she suspected that the Navy was worse even than the Star Kingdom's civilian bureaucracy. The comment was his way of not seeming to boast about his wealth.
"We really do want to get back for another crack at those Peeps, Sir," Harpe said. "They took us down, that's war. But the lifeboats . . ."
"We'll deal with that, Bosun," Nessler said sharply, "but first things first." Nodding toward the servant who'd appeared at the door behind him he continued, "You're to report to your new quarters until seven hundred hours tomorrow. A delegation of petty officers will wait on me here at that time. Dismissed!"
"Hip-hip—" called a rear-rank spacer.
"Hooray!" shouted the whole body, sounding to Mincio like many more than thirty-seven throats in the echoing courtyard.
As crewmen filed from the courtyard behind Harpe and the servant guiding the party, Mincio moved to where Nessler was talking to Beresford. "This is horrible," she said.
"The other side of the Dole Fleet not being very competent at waging war," Nessler said without emphasis, "is that they're willing to commit acts that would be unthinkable to a professional force. Like destroying lifeboats."
Mincio nodded. "I'd think that any war was bad enough without people trying to find ways to make it worse," she agreed, "but as you say—failed people are desperate to have anyone else in their power."
"I was just pointing out to the master," Beresford said, "that with the Peeps being the sort they is, and Air being so close by to Hope, maybe it'd be a good idea if we cut things short in this sector and got back to systems where the Navy shows the flag with something more impressive than a destroyer." He spat. "To take on a heavy cruiser, for chrissake!"
"The normal problem in League Sector Twelve is piracy," Nessler said in a voice as flat and hard as a knifeblade. "But I agree that it might have occurred to someone in the Ministry that when the Peeps began sending out cruisers for commerce raiding, our anti-piracy patrols should have been either reinforced or withdrawn. No doubt the Admiralty had other things on its mind."
Rovald came out of the house with a hologram projector, part of the extensive suite of equipment she'd brought on the voyage. She started to speak but stopped when she realized Nessler and Mincio, though silent, were focused on more important matters.
Beresford had no such hesitation. "So shall I see about arranging transport, say, to Krishnaputra?" he said. "Captain Cage hasn't broken orbit yet. It might be three months before another Warshawski ship touches down here!"
Nessler shook his head no. He said, "Yes, that's the problem. We can get out of the region, but the survivors of L'Imperieuse cannot—certainly not in their pinnace, and not with any likelihood on any of the small-capacity vessels which call on a world like Hope."
"Well, Sir . . ." said Beresford, looking at the ground and thereby proving he knew how close he was skating to conduct his master would find completely unacceptable. "It seems to me that when they signed on with the Navy, Harpe and the rest, they kinda . . ."
"Yes, one does take on responsibilities that one may later find extremely burdensome," Nessler said in a cold, distinct tone. "As I did when I took the oath as an officer in Her Majesty's Navy. Nothing that touches you, of course, Beresford. I'll send you and Rovald—"
"Sir!" Beresford said. With a dignity that Mincio had never imagined in the little man he continued, "I don't guess anybody needs to teach his duty to a Beresford of Greatgap. Which it may be to keep his master from getting scragged, but it doesn't have shit to do with leaving him because the going got tough."
Nessler made a sour face. "Forgive me, Beresford," he said. "This isn't a good time for me to play the fool in front of the man who's looked after me all my life."
"Sir?" said Rovald, perhaps as much to break the embarrassing silence as because she thought anybody cared about what she had to say. "As Ms. Mincio instructed, I've analyzed the damaged crystals in the deKyper collection to find a common oscillation freq—"
"A moment please, Rovald," Nessler said, raising his hand but looking at Mincio rather than the technician. "Mincio, would it be possible for you to win a great deal of money at poker from Lord Orloff? More money than he could possibly pay?"
"No," Mincio said, her words as clipped and precise as the click of chips on hardwood. She and Nessler were no longer tutor and pupil, though she didn't have the mental leisure to determine what their present relationship really was.
Ignoring the chill in Nessler's expression she continued, "He wouldn't play with me for amounts in that range. If I have the complete cooperation of Beresford and Rovald, however, I think I might be able to arrange for you to—" she smiled like a sharp knife "—shear him like a sheep yourself in a day or two."
Beresford guffawed. "Who d'ye want killed, boss?" he asked; not entirely a joke from the look in his eyes, and the sudden tension in Rovald's thin frame.
"Just a matter of borrowing a deck of cards from Orloff's camp," Mincio said. "It shouldn't be difficult, given your contacts with the Melungeon crew; and perhaps a little money, but not much."
She turned to the technician. "As for you, Rovald," she continued, "I'll want you to reprogram the deck's electronic response. I could probably do the job myself with your equipment, but I couldn't do it as quickly and easily as I'm sure you can."
Rovald let out her breath in a sigh of relief. "I'm sure it won't be a problem, Ma'am," she said.
"I'm going to win at poker?" Nessler said. "That'll be a change from my experience at school, certainly." He chuckled. "But you're the expert, of course. And Beresford? Before I surrender your services to Mincio, be a good fellow and find my alcohol catalyzer. Orloff's bound to be pushing his horrible brandy at me, and I wouldn't want him to think I had a particular reason to keep a clear head."
It was midmorning before Reserve Midshipman Nessler finished his meeting with the ranking survivors of the L'Imperieuse. That suited Mincio much better than an early departure for the pylons. She was still feeling the effects of the dance two nights before.
Besides letting her muscles work themselves loose, the delay permi
tted Mincio to examine Rovald's work of the previous day. The technician had calculated the range of resonant frequencies for the four least-damaged Alphane "books" from deKyper's collection. The next step would be to calculate the frequency of common resonance, then finally to determine the factor by which that prime had to be modified to properly stimulate the crystals in their present damaged state.
If Rovald was successful—and that seemed likely—the breakthrough in Alphane studies would be the high point of Mincio's scholarly life. She wasn't really able to appreciate it, though, because for the first time since her father died Edith Mincio wasn't primarily a scholar.
Nessler lifted the air car. He and Mincio were in the front seats; Beresford and Rovald shared the back. There was space for a fifth passenger, but none of them cared to chance adding even deKyper's slight additional weight. The drive had labored just to carry three the day before.
They'd barely cleared the walls of Singh's courtyard before they saw the Melungeon air car curving down toward the landing field. Lord Orloff's vehicle had a fabric canopy with tassels which whipped furiously in the wind of passage.
"Ah!" said Nessler as he leaned into the control yoke to turn the car. "I think we'd best join them before going on. You may have to drive Rovald to the site yourself, Beresford."
"I guess I can handle that," the servant said. "Seeing as I've been driving air cars since I was nine. And didn't your father whip my ass when he caught me, Sir."
Orloff and his entourage were about to enter the Melungeon cutter when Nessler settled his borrowed car nearby. Orloff beamed at them and cried, "Nessler! Come and see my Colonel Arabi. Then the two of us can go back to the camp and play cards, not so?"
"Mincio and I would be delighted to visit your ship, Captain Orloff," Nessler said cheerfully. He strode to the Melungeon and embraced him enthusiastically. Mincio noticed that this time Nessler's arms were outside Orloff's instead of being pinned to his chest by the Melungeon's bear hug. "There's no problem with my servant and technician going to your camp to record the pylon before you remove it, is there?"
"Foof!" said Orloff. "Why should there be a problem? Alec, go back to camp with my honored guest's servants and see to it that the dogs there treat them right. It's only the other ranks there now, you see."
"And perhaps tomorrow when we've had a chance to rest," Nessler added, "I'll be in a mood for some poker. I hope you don't have a problem with high stakes?"
Lord Orloff's laughter thundered as he patted Nessler ahead of him into the pinnace.
Mincio had no naval experience, so the view of the approaching cruiser wouldn't have meant anything to her even if the cutter's view screen had been in better condition. If the fuzzy image was an indication of the Colonel Arabi's condition, however, the cruiser was in very bad condition indeed.
"Why, if I didn't know better," Nessler said as he looked over the coxswain's shoulder, "I'd have said that was a Brilliance-class cruiser of the People's Republic of Haven! That's very good. Did the Grand Duchy purchase the plans from the Peeps, or . . .?"
"Not plans, no," Orloff said from the command seat to the right of the coxswain. "We bought the very ship! Nothing is too good for Melungeon, and nothing on Melungeon is too good for Maxwell, Lord Orloff." He pounded his broad chest with both fists. "My very self!"
The cutter passed into the cruiser's number two boat bay and settled into the docking buffers. The mechanical docking arms clanged rather more loudly than Mincio had expected, and the personnel tube ran out to the cutter's lock.
The sale of warships to minor states would be a useful profit center for a government like that of Haven, which needed massive production capacity for its own purposes. Post-delivery maintenance wouldn't be part of the deal, however.
"We bought the Colonel Arabi not twenty years ago," Orloff continued as crewmen manually opened the cutter's hatch. The powered system didn't work. "Direct from the yard on Haven, not some dog of a castoff. Have you ever seen so lovely a ship in your life, Sir Hakon Nessler? My ship!"
The view of the boat bay gallery beyond through the personnel tube didn't strike Mincio with anything but an awareness of squalor, but Nessler seemed genuinely impressed as he followed Orloff down the tube. "This is much more than I'd expected," he said. "Lord Orloff, I'll admit that I didn't think the Melungeon navy had so very modern a vessel in its inventory."
Orloff's officers were obsequious to both him and Nessler, but they showed no such reserve toward Mincio or one another. After Mincio had been pushed aside by a woman with three rings on her sleeves and a dueling scar across her forehead, she waited to disembark after all the ship's officers.
"Get to work on the forward lasers, Kotzwinkle," Orloff said. "Whichever one you think. And I don't want to spend all day here, either! A drink, Nessler?"
"So . . ." Mincio said as she caught up with the others as they left the boat bay. The Melungeons were intent on their own business; she was in effect speaking only to Nessler, though without any suggestion of secrecy between them. "This ship is actually the equal of the Peep vessel on Air?"
"Oh, good God, no!" Nessler said in amusement. "This is a light cruiser. The ship on Air is a heavy cruiser, quite a different thing, and newer as well. Though—" in a lower voice, still amused "—there may not be a great deal to choose between the professional standards of the crews. And it is a great deal better than I expected."
Orloff turned and thrust one of the two beakers of brandy he now held into Nessler's hand. "Come! Look at my lovely ship."
Mincio followed the pair of them, glad not to have more Musketoon to deal with. Nessler had swallowed a catalyzer before boarding. It converted ethanol to an ester which linked to fatty acids before it could be absorbed in the intestine. So long as Nessler had a supply of suitable food—the bowls of peanuts on the Melungeon card table would do fine—nobody could drink him under the table.
The catalyzer didn't affect the taste of Musketoon, however. If Mincio had a choice, she'd prefer to drink hydraulic fluid.
Several of the officers went off on the business of the ship, shouting angry orders at the enlisted personnel still aboard. With Nessler at his side, Orloff led the rest of his entourage on a stroll through the vessel. Mincio followed as an interested though inexpert observer.
The voyage from Melungeon to Hope was long and presumably a difficult piece of navigation, so the officers and crew had to have at least a modicum of competence. More than a modicum, given the Colonel Arabi's terrible state of repair.
No expertise was needed to notice the ropes of circuitry routed along the decks, sometimes to enter compartments through holes raggedly cut in what had been blast-proof walls. Equipment didn't fit the racks and was interconnected by exposed cables. Sometimes a replacement unit was welded onto the case of the original.
Above all, everything was filthy. Lubricants and hydraulic fluids had obviously won their battle to bleed over every surface within the closed universe of any starship. Only constant labor by the crews could remove the slimy coating. There was no sign that anybody aboard the Colonel Arabi even made the effort. Mincio saw 20-centimeter beards of gummy lint wobbling everywhere but in the main traffic areas.
They entered an echoing bay. For the most part the Colonel Arabi had given Mincio the dual impressions of being very large and simultaneously very cramped. This was the first time she had the feeling of real volume. Crewmen flitted half-seen in the shadows; only a fraction of the compartment's lighting appeared to function.
"Here we will store the pillar," Orloff said, gesturing expansively with both hands. "Three months it took to open the space! Our dockyard on Melungeon, it's shit!"
He spat on the deck at his feet. "Cheating crooks, just out to line their pockets!"
"That bulkhead separated the forward missile magazine from a main food storage compartment, did it not?" Nessler said. "Removing the armor plate from a magazine would have been a serious job for any dockyard, Lord Orloff. And I wonder . . . don't you have flexi
ng problems as a result of the change? That was the main transverse stiffener, I believe."
"Faugh!" Orloff said. "We had to have room for the pillar, did we not? What use would it be to come all this way if we couldn't carry the damned pillar?"
As Mincio's eyes adapted to the lack of lighting she made out the forms of two huge cylinders, each nearly the size of the Colonel Arabi's cutter. They were missiles, sublight spaceships in their own right, each with a nuclear warhead as its cargo.
Perhaps a nuclear warhead. Based on the rest of what she'd seen of the Melungeon navy, the warhead compartment might be empty or hold a quantity of sand for ballast.
"You've had to remove most of your missiles to make room to store Alphane artifacts, I gather, Lord Orloff?" Mincio said. In fact she didn't think anything of the sort. Close up she could see that the cradles which should have held additional missiles were pitted with rust. It had been years if not decades since they'd last been used for their intended purpose.
"This is just the forward missile magazine, Mincio," Nessler said quickly. "There's the stern magazine as well, and it hasn't been affected by these modifications."
"Faugh!" Orloff repeated. "What do we need missiles for? Are the Alphanes going to attack us, my friend?"
He whacked Nessler across the back and laughed uproariously. "Besides, do you know how much one of those missiles costs? Much better to spend the naval appropriations on pay for deserving officers, not so?"
A bell chimed three times. A voice called information that Mincio couldn't understand: the combination of loudspeaker distortion, echoes, the Melungeon accent, and naval jargon were just too much for her.
"Hah!" Orloff cried. "Kotzwinkle is ready so soon. I'll have to apologize for calling him a lazy dog who'd rather screw his sister than do his duty, will I not?"
His laugh boomed again as he shooed both Manticore visitors ahead of him toward the hatch by which they'd entered the bay. "Another drink and we go back to the camp and play poker, not so?" he said.
