“Nicely done, Ean,” Abram said.
Ean looked around the room. Everyone was laughing. The insane after-battle-adrenaline laughter. Through the comms, he heard Wendell say to Kari Wang, “Nice control there.” It was seconded by Helmo and Gruen.
“Thank you.” Kari Wang was still swearing. “No thanks to Lambert. But when we’ve learned to use this thing properly, we’ll be able to turn it on a pinhead.”
Ean decided to keep out of Kari Wang’s way for a while.
The attack was midnight news. Here, and—if you believed Ru Li—throughout the Lancian sector as well. Ean hoped Radko’s family was keeping her occupied enough to keep her away from the vids.
Abram gave a press conference in person this time. Ean watched it from his rooms on Confluence Station. He didn’t go into the shared area, for Rossi still twitched when he came near. He seriously considered singing Rossi’s lines calmer, but that wasn’t going to end anywhere good.
He watched the Blue Sky Media feed. Sean Watanabe hadn’t been so animated in months.
“Is the New Alliance ready to move against Gate Union at last? Yesterday, they unveiled new technology in the form of intersector communication. Today, they showed what power the alien ships have given them. An hour ago local time, a disguised freighter attacked Confluence Station and was repelled by one of the alien ships. Is this the next step in their war against Gate Union?”
Ean flicked over to Galactic News, where Coral Zabi was interviewing someone in a mottled purple uniform. “And what of the rumors that the New Alliance staged the attack themselves to demonstrate how powerful the alien ships are? We have with us Admiral Markan, from Roscracia.”
Markan was the military commander of Gate Union, although—according to Abram and Michelle—he was struggling to keep that command right now. Especially given that his plan to win the war by denying the New Alliance access to jumps wasn’t going as well as he’d planned. Not only that, the Redmond/Gate Union accord was shaky right now, and that had to be worrying Markan, for the line factories were all on Redmond worlds. If Redmond went its own way, Gate Union was as vulnerable as the New Alliance. It was all very well to control the jumps, but if Gate Union didn’t have line ships to jump with, they weren’t any better off than the New Alliance.
Zabi turned a professional smile on Markan. “Before we start, can you tell us where you are right now, Admiral?”
“Merchett,” Markan said.
Merchett was the major Gate Union world in the Lancian sector. Ean smiled. It must have hurt Markan to say that. Especially since Markan’s home world, Roscracia, was three sectors on from Lancia and half a galaxy away from the Haladean Cluster. He would have made the trip specially to find out if the rumors of instantaneous communication were true.
He was finding out they were.
“And I’m Coral Zabi, from Galactic News, currently situated close to the New Alliance capital, Haladea III. Galactic News is making history tonight, being the first to report live in real time between sectors.” Zabi smiled her professional smile again.
From the scowl on Markan’s face, he hadn’t planned on being part of that history.
“Admiral, did Gate Union attack Confluence Station earlier?”
Ean sighed. Markan’s answer would be as slippery as one of Abram’s.
Sure enough. “We are at war. Why would we hide the fact that we are attacking our enemy by disguising the attacker as a freighter?”
Maybe because a Gate Union battle cruiser wouldn’t have gotten anywhere near as close.
“So you believe this was a message from the New Alliance,” Zabi suggested. “Showing what they could do. You think they would pretend to attack one of their own bases?”
“It’s hard to know what to think,” Markan said. “I don’t know what the New Alliance planned. Fact. Gate Union is at war with the New Alliance.” He paused long enough for Zabi to open her mouth to ask the next question. “I imagine the New Alliance was waiting for an opportunity to show off that particular piece of technology. A controlled experiment might be safer for them than taking their showpiece into a real war situation, and the New Alliance might well consider the station expendable.
Expendable. All those people who had died. Yet Zabi was nodding.
Ean switched back to Blue Sky Media. They were showing the jump and what had happened after.
From the outside, looking in, it didn’t look much. You couldn’t see the explosions. The station spun a little, but not as noticeably as it had when you were on it. If it hadn’t been for the feed Ean had sent through—which was showing on half the screen—you might not have known it was under attack.
Suddenly, Confluence Station wasn’t there and the Eleven was. Heading at speed toward the freighter.
They weren’t getting the Eleven feed. Ean was glad about that.
The Eleven’s green field pulsed out. Both the Eleven and the freighter fired thrusters. The green field enveloped the freighter.
Ean switched off the vid.
As well as the freighter, they had destroyed every shuttle in a two-hundred-kilometer radius. Shuttles with people on them. Innocent people who’d been trying to escape. Innocent people who’d been going about their business ferrying goods, until Ean had unleashed the Eleven.
He would have liked to talk to Radko about it. She wouldn’t judge. She wouldn’t say, “It’s war, don’t worry about it.” She’d listen.
What was the problem with Radko’s family, anyway? Radko had once said the crew on the Lancastrian Princess was her family. That Abram Galenos had given her a life.
Why wouldn’t anyone talk about what was wrong?
The lines must have picked up some of his worry, for Jordan Rossi’s own thoughts came through the lines. “Hey, Bastard, sing your own lines straight rather than corrupting everything on the station.”
Ean sighed and lay back on his bed.
CHAPTER FOUR: DOMINIQUE RADKO
Iris recognition got Radko into the barracks, where she hunted up an old squad mate she hadn’t seen in years. Toll had been at headquarters forever.
“It’s a little early for partying,” Toll said. “Incidentally, your hair’s sticking out like you’ve plugged your arm into an electricity supply.”
She fixed that by pulling off the cleverly designed hairpiece Pieter had made for her. “Do me a favor, Toll. I’ll owe you forever. My kit is in the Emerald waiting room at the palace. Can you send a guard to collect it?” Toll was a group leader. He’d have the authority to send someone.
“Emerald. We do live the high life. A little too grand for a simple spacer now. Or are you team leader?”
Another advantage was that Toll knew about her family.
“Please, Toll.” She was begging, and he could see it.
“Owe me forever, right.”
“Thank you. I’m going to wash this makeup off.”
She recycled the fresher twice before Toll arrived back with her kit, but she couldn’t wash the stupidity out. What was done was done. Should she warn her family?
“Your kit’s here,” Toll said. “And the guard I sent said there were a lot of minor dignitaries in that room. All twittering.”
Twittering. What an apt word. Radko smiled as she came out to dress.
The bag vibrated. Her comms. She ignored it while she pulled on her uniform.
“And she said someone wants you really badly. They called you four times on the way across.”
Radko could imagine what it was about. She ignored it.