"Weird EEG?" It was time for Alicia's eyebrows to rise, and her surprise was not at all feigned.
"Yep. 'Weird' is Captain Okanami's term, but I'm afraid it fits. He and his team didn't know what they had on their table till they twanged your escape package, but they had a good, clear EEG on you throughout. Spiked just like it's supposed to when you flattened that poor Commander Thompson-" Tannis paused. "They tell you about that?"
"I asked, actually. I knew they'd hit something, and most of the docs were too busy staying out of reach to get anything done. I've even apologized to him."
"I'm sure he appreciated it." Tannis' eyes gleamed. "Nice clean hit, Sarge, just a tad low." She grinned, then shrugged. "Anyway, there was the spike and all those other squiggles I recognize as lovable old you. But there was another whole pattern-almost like an overlay-wrapped around them."
"Ah?"
"Ah. Almost looked like there were two of you. Mighty peculiar stuff, Sarge. You taking in boarders?"
"Not funny, Tannis," Alicia said, looking away, and Tannis inhaled.
"You're right. Sorry. But it was odd, Alley, and when you tie it in with all the other odd questions you've presented us with, it's enough to make the brass nervous. Especially when you start talking as if there were someone else living in your head." Tannis shook her head, eyes unwontedly worried. "They don't want a schizoid drop commando running around, Sarge."
"Not running around loose, you mean."
"I suppose I do, but you can't really blame them, can you?" She held Alicia's gaze levelly, and it was Alicia's turn to sigh.
"Guess not. Is that the real reason they've kept me isolated?"
"In part. Of course, you really do need continued treatment. The incisions are all done, but they had to put a hunk of laminate into your femur, and about four centimeters of what they managed to save looked like a jigsaw puzzle with missing pieces. You know how quick-heal slows up on bone repair, and you ripped hell out of your muscle tissue, too."
"I realize that. And I also know I could've been ambulatory in this thing-" she tapped the upper tractor collar "-weeks ago. Okanami's 'have to wait and see; we're not used to drop commandos' line is getting a bit worn. If he weren't such a sweet old bastard, I'd have started raising hell then."
"Is that why you've been so tractable? I was afraid you must really be messed up."
"Yeah." Alicia ran her hands through her amber hair. "Okay, Tannis, let's get right down to it. Am I considered a dangerous lunatic?"
"I wouldn't go so far as to say 'dangerous,' Sarge, but there are … concerns. I'm taking over from Captain Okanami as of sixteen hundred today, and we'll be running the whole battery of standard diagnostics, probably with a bit of psych monitoring cranked in. I'll be able to tell you more then."
Alicia smiled a crooked smile. "You're not fooling me, you know."
"Fooling?" Tannis widened her eyes innocently.
"Whatever your tests show, they're going to figure I'm over the edge. Post-combat trauma and all that. Poor girl's probably been suppressing her grief, too, hasn't she? Hell, Tannis, it's a lot harder to prove someone's not loopy, and we both know it."
"Well, yes," Tannis agreed after a moment. "You always liked it straight, so I'll level with you. Uncle Arthur came out with me, and he's going to want to debrief you in person, but then you and I are Soissons-bound. Sector General's got lots more equipment, so that's where the real tests come in. On the other hand, I have Uncle Arthur's personal guarantee that I'll be your physician of record, and you know I won't let them crap on you."
"And if I don't want to go?"
"Sorry, Sarge. You've been reactivated."
"Oh, those bastards!" Alicia murmured, but there was a trace of amused respect in her voice.
"They can be lovable, can't they?"
"How long do you expect your tests to take after we hit Soissons?"
"As long as they take. You want a guess?" Alicia nodded, and Tannis shrugged. "Don't make any plans for a month or two, minimum."
"That long?" Alicia couldn't quite hide her dismay.
"Maybe longer. Look, Sarge, they want more than just a psych evaluation. They want answers, and you already told Okanami you don't know what happened or why you're alive. Okay, that means they're going to have to dig for them. I'm sorry, but that's the way it is."
"And while they're looking, the scent's going to freeze solid."
"Scent?" Tannis sat up straighter. "You in vigilante mode, Sarge?"
"Why not?" Alicia met her eyes. "Who's got a better right?"
She held her friend's eyes levelly, her own suddenly cold and hard. After moment, Tannis looked away.
"No one, I guess. But that's going to be a factor in their thinking, too, you know. They won't want you running around to do something outstandingly stupid."
"I know." Alicia made herself step back and smile. "Well, if I'm stuck, I'm stuck. And if I am, I'm glad I've got at least one friend in the enemy camp."
"That's the spirit." Tannis rose with a grin of her own. "I've got an appointment with Uncle Arthur in ten minutes-gotta go give him my own evaluation of your condition-but I'll check back when it's over. I may even have more news on your upcoming, um, itinerary."
"Thanks, Tannis." Alicia leaned back against her pillows and smiled after her friend, but the smile faded as the door closed. She sighed and looked pensively down at her hands.
This will not do, Little One, Tisiphone said sternly. We cannot allow these friends of yours to stand in our way.
I know. I know! Tannis will do her best for me, but she's a stone wall where her medical responsibilities are concerned.
Will she conclude you are truly mad, then?
Of course she will. That 'psychobabbler' was a load of manure, and let's face it-by her standards, I am buggy. And one thing the Cadre doesn't do is let out-of-control drop commandos run around loose. Terrible PR if they accidentally slaughter a few dozen innocent bystanders in a food-o-mat.
So. Mental silence hovered for a moment, broken by a soundless sigh. Well, Little One, in this instance I have little to offer. Once I might have spirited you out of anyone's power, but those days are gone, and friends are always harder to escape than enemies.
Don't I know it. Alicia wrapped herself in consideration for a long moment, thinking too quickly for Tisiphone to follow, then smiled. Okay. If they won't let me go, we'll just have to bust out. But not yet. She rubbed the tractor collar again. Not till we get to Soissons, I think. Nowhere to hide if we tried it here, anyway. Unless you'd care to take me back to that place where 'time has no business' of yours?
I could, of course. But we could not stay there forever, and when I released you, you would return to the exact spot you had left.
To be grabbed by whoever sees us. Hell, what if they knock down the hospital and clear out entirely? Freezing my keister in the snow in a hospital gown isn't my idea of a Good Thing.
It would seem to have drawbacks, Tisiphone agreed.
Indeedy deed. All right, it'll have to be Soissons. And if they think I'm crazy anyway, we might as well use that.
Indeed? How?
I think I'm going to become extremely buggy-in a harmless sort of way. Something I learned about the brass a long time ago, Tisiphone: give them something they think they understand, and they're happy. And happy brass tend to stay out of your way while you get on with business.
Ahhhhhhh, I see. You will deceive them into lowering their guard.
Exactly. I'm afraid I'll be talking to you-and the recorders-a lot. In the meantime, I think you and I had better figure out exactly what capabilities you still have to help out when the moment comes, don't you?
I do, indeed.
There was a positively gleeful note to the mental whisper, and Alicia DeVries grinned. Then she lowered her bed into a comfortable sleeping posture and smiled dreamily up at the ceiling.
"Well, Tisiphone," she said aloud, "it doesn't sound like they're going to be too reasonable. The Cadre can be that way, sometimes. In fact, this reminds me of the time Sergeant Malinkov's pharmacope got buggered on Bannerman and pumped him full of endorphins. He got this glorious natural high, you see, and there was this jammed traffic control signal downtown. Now, Pasha was always a helpful soul, and he had his plasgun with him, so-"
She tucked her hands behind her head and babbled cheerfully on to Tisiphone's invisible presence … and the recorders.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The Lizards were showing off again, damn them.
Commodore James Howell gritted his teeth as the Rishathan freighter coasted towards him at five hundred kilometers per second. The Rish deeply resented their physical inability to use synth units-much less cyber-synth-links. They went to enormous lengths to avoid admitting it, but that resentment was why they insisted on overcompensating by showing humanity their panache … and also explained why he always met his Rish contacts well outside the Powell limit of any system body. Their drives could come closer than humanity's to a planet without destabilizing (or worse), but not by all that much, and losing one's drive during a maneuver like this one could lead to unpleasant consequences all round.
Five hundred KPS wasn't all that fast, even for intra-system speeds, but the big freighter was barely fifteen thousand kilometers clear, already visible on the visual display, however assiduously Howell might refuse to look at it, and proximity alarms began to buzz. He made himself sit quite still despite their snarls, then sighed with hidden relief as the Rishathan captain flipped her ship end-for-end, pointing her stern at his flagship. The flare of the freighter's Fasset drive (for which, of course, the Rish had their own unpronounceable name) was clear to his gravitic detectors, even though its tame black hole was aimed directly away from them. The ship slowed abruptly, then drifted to a near perfect rendezvous in just under fifty-seven seconds. Amazing what nine hundred gravities' deceleration could do.
Attitude and maneuvering thrusters flared as the Fasset drive died, nudging the freighter alongside Howell's dreadnought, and he grinned in familiar, ironic amusement. Mankind-and Rish-kind, unfortunately-could out-speed light, generate pet black holes, and transmit messages scores of light-years in the blink of an eye, yet they still required thrusters the semi-mythical Armstrong would have recognized (in principle, at least) a thousand years before for that last, delicate step. Ridiculous-except that people still used the wheel, too.
He shook off the thought as the freighter's tractors latched onto his command and it nuzzled up against cargo bay ten, extending a personnel tube to his number four lock. He glanced around his bridge at the comfortable, non-descript civilian coveralls of his crew and thought wistfully of the uniform he had discarded with his past. The Lizards weren't much into clothing for protection's sake, but they understood its decorative uses, and their taste was, quite literally, inhuman. It would have been nice to be able to reply in kind to the no doubt upcoming assault on his optic nerves.
His synth-link whispered to him, announcing the imminent arrival of a single visitor, and he skinned off the headset and slipped it out of sight under his console. The rest of his command crew were doing the same. The Rish would know they'd done it to avoid flaunting the human ability to form direct links with their equipment, but there were civilities to be observed. Besides, hiding it all away was actually an even more effective way of calling attention to it-and one to which his visitor could take exception only with enormous loss of face. He hoped Resdyrn still commanded the freighter. She always took the con personally for the final approach, and he loved the way her fangs showed when he one-upped her one-upmanship without saying a word.
The command deck hatch hissed open, and Senior War Mother Resdyrn niha Turbach stepped through it.
She was impressive, even for a fully mature Rishathan matriarch. At 2.9 meters and just over three hundred and sixty-five kilos, she towered over every human on the bridge yet looked almost squat. Her incredibly gaudy carapace streamers enveloped her in a diaphanous cloud, swirling from her shoulders and assaulting the eye like some psychotic rainbow, but her face paint was sober-for a Rish. Its bilious green hue suited her temporary "merchant" persona and made a fascinating contrast with her scarlet cranial frills, and Howell wondered again if Rishathan eyes really used the same spectrum as human ones.
"Greetings, Merchant Resdyrn," he said, and listened to the translator render it into the squeaky, snarling ripples of Low Rishathan. Howell had once known an officer who could actually manage High Rishathan, but the same man could also reproduce the exact sound of an old-fashioned buzz-saw hitting a nail at several thousand RPM. Howell preferred to rely upon his translator.
"Greetings, Merchant Howell," the translator bug in his right ear replied. "And greetings to your line-mother."
"And also to yours." Howell completed the formal greeting with a bow, amazed once more by how lithely that bulky figure returned it. "My daughter-officers await you," he continued. "Shall we join them?"
Resdyrn inclined her massive head, and the two of them walked into the briefing room just off the command bridge. Half a dozen humans rose as they entered, bowing welcome while Resdyrn stalked around the table to the out-sized chair at its foot.
Howell moved to the head of the table and watched her slip her short, clubbed tail comfortably through the open chairback. Despite their saurian appearance and natural body armor, the Rishatha were not remotely reptilian. They were far closer to an oviparous Terrestrial mammal, if built on a rather over-powering scale. Or, at least, the females were. In his entire career, Howell had seen exactly three Rish males, and they were runty, ratty-looking little things. Fluttery and helpless, too. No wonder the matriarchs considered "little old man" a mortal insult.
"Well, Merchant Howell," the irony of the honorific came through the translator interface quite well, "I trust you are prepared to conclude our transaction for the goods your line-mother has ordered?"
"I am, Merchant Resdyrn," he replied with matching irony and a gesture to Gregor Alexsov. His chief of staff keyed the code on a lock box and slid it to Resdyrn. The Rish lifted the lid and bared her upper canines in a human-style smile as she looked down at a prince's ransom in molecular circuitry, one of the several areas in which human technology led Rishathan.
"These are, of course, but a sample," Howell continued. "The remainder are even now being transferred to your vessel."
"My line-mother thanks you through her most humble daughter," Resdyrn replied, not sounding particularly humble, and lifted a crystalline filigree of seaweed from the box. She held it in long, agile fingers with an excessive number of knuckles and peered at it through a magnifier, then grunted the alarming sound of a Rishathan chuckle as she saw the Imperial Fleet markings on the connector chips. She laid it carefully back into its nest, closed the lid once more, and crooked a massive paw protectively over it. The gesture was revealing, Howell thought. That single box, less than a meter in length, contained enough molycircuitry to replace her freighter's entire command net, and for all her studied ease, Resdyrn was well aware of it.
"We, of course, have brought you the agreed upon cargo," she said after a moment, "but I fear my line-mother sends your mother of mothers sad tidings, as well." Howell sat straighter in his chair. "This shall be our last meeting for some time to come, Merchant Howell."
Howell swallowed a muttered curse before it touched his expression and cocked his head politely. Resdyrn raised her cranial frills in acknowledgment and touched her forehead in token of sorrow.
"Word has come from our embassy on Old Earth. The Emperor himself-" the masculine pronoun was a deliberate insult from a Rish; the fact that it was also accurate lent it a certain additional and delicious savor "-has taken an interest in this sector and dispatched his War Mother Keita hither."
"I … had not yet heard that, Merchant Resdyrn." Howell hoped his dismay didn't show. Keita! God, did that mean they were going to have the Cadre on their backs? He longed to ask but dared not expend so much face.
"We do not know Keita's mission," Resdyrn continued, taking pity on his curiosity (or, more likely, simply executing her own orders), "but there are no signs that the Cadre has been mobilized. My line-mother fears this may yet happen, however, and so must sever her links with you at least until such time as Keita departs. I hope that you will understand her reasoning."
"Of course." Howell inhaled, then shrugged, deliberately exaggerating the gesture to be sure Resdyrn noted it. "My mother of mothers will also understand, though I'm sure she will hope the severance will be brief."
"As do we, Merchant Howell. We of the Sphere hope for your success, that we may greet you as sisters in your own sphere."
"Thank you, Merchant Resdyrn." Howell managed to sound quite sincere, though no human was likely to forget the way the Rish had set the old Federation and Terran League at one another's throats.
"In that case," Resdyrn rose, ending the unexpectedly brief meeting, "I shall take my leave. I am covered in shame that it was I who must bring this message to you. May your weapons taste victory, Merchant Howell."
"My daughter-officers and I see no shame, Merchant Resdyrn, but only the faithful discharge of your line-mother's decree."
"You are kind." Resdyrn bestowed another graceful bow upon him and left. Howell made no effort to accompany her. Despite her "merchant's" role, Resdyrn niha Turbach remained a senior war mother of the Rishathan Sphere, and the suggestion that she could not be trusted aboard his vessel without a guard would have been an intolerable insult to her honor. This once, he was just as glad of it, too. Contingency plans or no, this little bit of news was going to bollix the works in fine style, and he needed to confer with his staff.
"Jays, Skipper," one member of that staff said. "Now what the bloody hell am I supposed to do?"
"Keep your suit on, Henry," Howell replied, and his long, cadaverous quartermaster leaned ostentatiously back in his chair.
"No problem-yet. But we're gonna look a bit hungry in a few months with our main supply line cut."
"Agreed, but Greg and I knew this-or something like it-might happen. I wish it had waited a while longer, but we've set up our fallbacks."
"Oh? I wish you'd told me about them," Commander d'Amcourt said.
"We're telling you now, aren't we? You want to lay it out, Greg?"
"Yes, Sir." Alexsov leaned slightly forward, cold eyes thawed by an atypical amusement as he met d'Amcourt's lugubrious gaze. "We've set up alternate supply lines through Wyvern. It'll be more cumbersome, because our purchase orders will have to be spread out carefully, and it was certainly convenient to have the Rish as a cutout in our logistics net, but there are advantages, too. For one thing, we can get proper spares and missile resupply direct. And we've already been dumping a lot of luxury items through Wyvern. I don't see any reason we can't fence the rest of our loot there-they certainly won't object."
He shrugged, and heads nodded here and there. Most Rogue Worlds were fairly respectable (by their own lights, at least), but Wyvern's government was owned outright by the descendants of the captain-owners of one of the last piratical fleets of the League Wars to go "legitimate." It bought or sold anything, no questions asked, and was equally indiscriminate in the deals it brokered. Many of its fellow Rogue Worlds might deplore its existence, yet Wyvern was too useful an interface (and too well armed) for most of them to do anything more strenuous. Which, since the Empire had both the power and the inclination to smack the hands of those who irritated it, gave Wyvern's robber-baron aristocracy a vested interest in anything that might disrupt the nascent Franconia Sector's stability.
"As for our other support-" Alexsov paused, mentioning no names or places even here, then shrugged "-this shouldn't pose any problems. Unless, of course, Keita's presence means the Cadre plans to shove its nose in."
"Exactly, and that's what worries me most," Howell agreed. He glanced at the rather fragile-looking commander seated at Alexsov's right elbow. Slim, dark-skinned Rachel Shu, Howell's staff intelligence officer, was the sole female member of his staff … and its most lethal. Now she shrugged.
"It worries me, too, Commodore. My sources didn't say a thing about Keita's coming clear out here, so my people don't have any idea what he's up to. On the face of it, I'm inclined to think the Rish have overreacted. They don't dare antagonize the Empire by getting caught involved in something like this, and they remember what Keita and the Cadre did to them over the Louvain business, so they're pulling in their horns and getting ready to disclaim any responsibility. But I don't think my sources could have missed the signs if the Cadre were being committed on any meaningful scale."
"Then why's Keita here? Wasn't he their point for Louvain, too?"
"He was, but he's been 'point' for a lot of their ops over the years, and the Cadre's too small for him to have pulled out any major force without my people noticing it. Besides, my last reports place him in the Macedon Sector, not on Old Earth, so this looks more like a spur of the moment improvisation, and the timing's about right for it to be in response to Mathison's World. He was right next door and they banged him on out-they didn't deploy him from the capital. I suspect he's on some sort of special intelligence-gathering mission for Countess Miller. She's always preferred to get a reading through Cadre Intelligence to crosscheck on ONI and the Wasps, and Keita's always been happier in the field than an HQ slot. If he hadn't, he'd have the general's stars and Arbatov would be his exec."
"Which means we could see the Cadre yet," Rendlemann pointed out.
"Unlikely," Shu replied. "Our support structure's very well hidden and dispersed, and the Cadre's a precision instrument for application to precise targets. In fact, I'd say the Ministry of Justice was more dangerous than either the Fleet or Cadre, since it's the covert side of this whole operation that's most likely to lead the other two to us, and Justice is best equipped for getting at us from that side. As far as the Cadre's concerned, I'll start to worry when we see a major transfer of its personnel to this sector or one of its neighbors. Until that happens, Keita's just one more spook. A good one, but no more than that."
"I think you're right, Rachel," Howell said. At any rate, he certainly hoped she was. "We'll proceed on that basis for now, but I want you to double-check with Control ASAP."
"Yes, Sir. The next intelligence courier's due in about five days. It may already be bringing us confirmation; if it isn't, I'll send a request back by the same dispatch boat."
"All right." Howell toyed with a stylus, then glanced at Alexsov. "Is there anything else we need to look at while we're all together, Greg?" Alexsov shook his head. "In that case, I think you and Henry might make a quick run to Wyvern to set things in motion there. Don't take along anything incriminating-we've got the liquidity to pay cash for the first orders-but sound out the locals for future marketing possibilities."
"Can do," Alexsov replied. "How soon can you leave, Henry?"
"Ummmm … a couple of hours, I'd guess."
"Good," Howell said, "because unless I miss my guess-and unless Keita is going to make problems-we ought to be getting our next targeting order from Rachel's courier. I'll want you back here for the skull sessions, Greg."
"In that case, I'd better get packed." Alexsov stood, a general signal for the meeting to break up, and Howell watched his subordinates file out of the briefing room. He walked over to the small-scale system display in the corner and stood brooding down at the holographic star and its barren, lifeless planets.
Rachel was probably right, he decided. If Keita were the spear-point of a Cadre intervention, he would have brought at least an intelligence staff with him. On the other hand, Keita was the tip of a damned spear all by himself; the rest of the weapon could always be brought in later, and that could complicate life in a major way.
He reached out, cupping a palm around the minute, silvery mote of his flagship, and sighed. Problems, problems. The life of a piratical freebooter had seemed so much simpler-and so much more lucrative-than a career with the Fleet, and the bigger objective was downright exciting. There were the minor drawbacks of having to become a mass murderer, a thief, and a traitor to his uniform, but the rewards were certainly great … assuming one lived to enjoy them.
He released his flagship with a heavier sigh, folding his hands behind him, and started thoughtfully towards the briefing room hatch.
How in hell, he wondered silently, had Midshipman James Howell, Imperial Fleet, Class of '28, ended up here?
Chapter Thirty-Eight
"Still so eager to be up and about?"
Alicia inhaled a spray of sweat as she gasped for breath, but she welcomed the teasing malice in Lieutenant de Riebeck's voice. The physical therapist was a fellow Cadreman, without a trace of the semi-awe her drop commando reputation woke in ordinary medics. He was even remarkably impervious to the fact that she held the Banner of Terra, which was even rarer. Both of those things were refreshing, and his complete indifference to her mental state was even more so. Alicia had agitated so noisily to get out of bed that even Okanami and Tannis had finally given in, but de Riebeck had been their revenge. His sole interest lay in getting one Captain Alicia DeVries not merely ambulatory but fully reconditioned, and his was clearly an obsessive personality.
"Looking a little worn to me, Captain," he continued brightly, and cranked the treadmill's speed control up a bit. "Care for another five or six klicks? How about another five percent of grade just to make it interesting?"
Alicia moaned and collapsed over the handrails. The still-moving treadmill carried her feet from under her, and she twitched with a horridly realistic death rattle and belly-flopped onto the belt. It deposited her on the floor with a thump, and she oozed out flat.
Lieutenant de Riebeck grinned, and someone applauded from the training room door. Alicia rolled over and sat up, raking sweat-sodden hair from her forehead, and saw Tannis Cateau clapping vigorously.
"I give that a nine-point-five for dramatic effect and, oh, a three-point-two for coordination." Alicia shook a fist, and Tannis chuckled. "I see Pablo is being his usual sadistic self."
"We strive to please, Major, Ma'am," de Riebeck smirked. Alicia laughed, and Tannis reached down to pull her to her feet.
"You know, I never thought I'd admit it, but this is one part of the Cadre I've missed," she panted, massaging her rebuilt thigh with both hands. The repaired muscles ached, but it was the good ache of exercise, and she straightened with a sigh. Despite her reactivation, she refused to cut her hair, which had escaped its clasp once more. She gathered it back up and refastened it, then scrubbed her face with a towel.
"I think I'm going to live after all, Pablo."
"Aw, shucks. Well, there's always tomorrow."
"An inspiring thought." Alicia hung the towel around her neck and turned back to Tannis. "May I assume you arrived for some reason other than to rescue me from Lieutenant de Sade?"
"Indeed I have. Uncle Arthur wants to see you."
"Oh." The humor flowed out of Alicia's voice, and her forefingers moved in slow circles, wrapping the towel-ends about them. Her success in so far avoiding Keita made her feel a bit guilty, but she really didn't want to see him. Not now, and perhaps never. He was going to bring back too many painful memories … and Cadre rumor credited him with telepathy, among other arcane powers. He'd always made her feel as if her skull were made of glass, at any rate.
"Sorry, Sarge, but he insists. And I think it's a good idea myself."
"Why?" Alicia demanded bluntly, and Tannis shrugged.
"Look, you never told me why you quit the Cadre." There was a trace of remembered hurt in her eyes, but her voice was level. "One thing I do know, though, is that whatever your reason, it wasn't just to avoid Uncle Arthur, and you've been hiding from him long enough."