For the second time in less than an hour, Katya went to the FP-1’s bridge. This time, however, she was in the company of both Kane and Mila Vetskya who turned up just as they were leaving Katya’s room, presumably to see why Kane was taking so long on a simple errand. The lift went up two decks further before moving sideways this time and here was no scenic view of the war fleet under construction. Katya noticed that Mila had entered the destination through the lift’s keypad rather than using the voice recognition, and must have programmed in the diversion around the manufacturing area. It appeared that there were a few things the Conclaves weren’t ready to gloat about just yet.
The bridge was still impressive when they arrived and Katya didn’t have to pretend too hard that its scale overawed her. It would take a few visits yet before she could walk in there and not be shocked by the size of the low-domed command centre. The only real difference was that the main holographic display had been reconfigured to no longer show Russalka in its entirety. Instead one section of ocean was being displayed as a great gently undulating square hung vertically like a banner. Katya watched the undulations and thought, is that just for show or do they really know what the wave patterns are from minute to minute? They’d need satellites to do that, wouldn’t they? If the Conclaves had got a surveillance satellite network back into orbit without anybody else knowing about it, then they were years ahead of the Federal settlements in development. She was comforted when Kane leaned towards her and whispered, “Don’t fall for the waves on the display. They’re just for show. They’ll have satellites up soon enough but not just yet.”
The display’s major points of interest were a large yellow dot labelled FP-1 in the upper right and an ominous red arrowhead icon marked Lev. in the lower left. They never seemed to change position, but the scale ratio in the display’s lower right was constantly ticking down as it adjusted to the dot and the arrowhead growing closer together.
Katya nodded at it. “It’s not making much effort to hide itself.” I don’t suppose it has to, she added to herself. Tokarov’s in friendly waters. I wonder if he expects some sort of hero’s welcome? She remembered Kane’s horror of the interface process and decided that there was probably precious little of Lieutenant Tokarov left to expect anything.
A senior ranking Yagizban walked in front of them to reach the operators sitting at the sensors position. “How long until it gets here?” he demanded.
“Two hours, sir.”
Satisfied, the senior officer turned to walk away and stopped with shock. He was looking full at Katya and, with an equal shock, she recognised him as one of the two men who’d been monitoring Kane’s debriefing.
“Who,” growled the officer, “is this?”
Missing all the danger signs, Mila said brightly, “This is Katya Kuriakova, sir. A civilian from the Federal settlements.”
“Really? Then perhaps you’d care to explain what she was doing on the bridge less than half an hour ago in administrative fatigues eavesdropping on a confidential conversation.”
Mila blanched. “Sir? But, but she’s…”
“She’s a spy. A Federal spy. Security!” He stepped back from Katya as if she was carrying something contagious and pointed at her. Two troopers ran up. “Take this girl and put her with the rest of the Federal prisoners. Now!”
Katya didn’t mind the humiliation of being bundled into the lift in front of the staring bridge crew. What really hurt was that Kane didn’t lift a finger to stop them. He just looked at her with disappointment as if her scout around the station had come as a surprise to him. It had certainly come as a surprise to Mila and Katya felt sorry for her; when it emerged that she hadn’t locked Katya into her room, Mila would be in all sorts of trouble.
The holding area on level Beta turned out to be almost as unpleasant as it sounded. It was obvious that the Yagizban had been anticipating taking large numbers of prisoners when they made their move against the Federal authorities and had built extensive holding facilities into the FP-1 and presumably its sister stations in anticipation of that day. It was equally obvious that “that day” wasn’t supposed to be today, as the facilities were not yet completed. The surviving Novgorod crew, perhaps twenty strong, had been locked into what seemed to be a building site. Eventually, it would probably be an imposing gaol. At present, it was as extemporised as the disused office that the pirates had locked them in just before the Leviathan had attacked.
Uncle Lukyan loomed up from the floor — there was nowhere else to sit — and came to greet her when she was half pushed, half thrown through the door.
“I was hoping you would be spared this,” he said, indicating the bare chamber, a couple of hastily placed chemical toilets in one corner its only nod to humanitarian facilities.
“I was, for a while,” said Katya. She sat down with him by Lieutenant Petrov and related what had happened to her since she’d been separated from them.
When she had finished, her uncle blustered angrily but Petrov seemed to have been expecting much of it.
“It all makes a sort of sense,” he said. “The pirates were obviously hand in glove with the Conclaves, that was clear as soon as we were picked up. I’ve been sitting here thinking abut it and, yes, it had occurred to me that most of our pirate problem might have been nothing but the Conclaves keeping us busy while they worked on all this. I’m disappointed about Tokarov, though. I’ve read his file, I knew he was born in the Conclaves. It’s not common for Yagizbans to join the FMA, but it’s not rare either. I really thought his loyalty to us was solid. It turns out he was not only a good officer, but a good actor.”
“So, what can we do?” asked Katya.
“Do? Nothing. We’ve already checked the walls and door and, believe me, we’re not getting out of here unless they let us. Even if we did, we’re trapped on a hostile station thousands of kilometres from the nearest Federal ship. We’d need a cogent plan of action once we’re out and we don’t have enough information to form one.”
They sat glumly for a few minutes. “If only I hadn’t got excited about seeing that damned thing on the scope when we were in the Weft, Katya,” said Lukyan. “I’d never have accidentally woken it and it could have stayed there for another ten years.”
“Not your fault, uncle. Who was to know? Besides, Leviathan or not, the Yagizba Conclaves would have launched their attack on the rest of the settlements and, really, what chance would we have had anyway? They’ve got the boats, the facilities…”
“They have surprise,” agreed Petrov. “They’ve always been difficult to deal with but we never thought they were intending anything like this. And now they have the Leviathan.”
“A fait accompli,” said Katya, remembering Kane’s words. The Yagizbans had effectively owned the planet for months. Only the sudden appearance of the Leviathan had brought forward the surprise party when they’d been intending to tell this rest of the Russalkin about it. She got to thinking about other things that Kane had said and as she did, a faint glimmer of hope appeared. “They might not have the Leviathan on their side,” she said quietly.
Petrov looked up at her sharply. “What do you mean, Ms Kuriakova?”
“Kane has always talked about the interface process like it was the worst thing he could imagine. The Yagizbans are acting like Tokarov has become the Leviathan’s captain, but that’s not the way Kane describes it. He says it’s more like whoever is in the chair is absorbed into the Leviathan’s artificial mind, giving a spark that turns it into a synthetic intelligence. Capable of imagination, cunning, lateral thinking, all the sorts of things that artificial intelligences aren’t so good at. If Kane is right, Tokarov isn’t really in full control of the Leviathan, he’s just a component. He can guide it, but its basic impulses will remain the same.”