“You’re stooping to making Kel jokes?” Kujen said. The corner of his mouth lifted.
“Someone has to,” Mikodez said. The Kel hexarch was known to make them herself.
Kujen fiddled with something off-screen. “Anyway, all those calendars are compatible with the Fortress’s shields. I have advised Kel Command that they might as well just say how to take the shields out since it’s not like it’ll stay a secret, but they are proving resistant.”
“Never give information away if you don’t have to,” Mikodez said. If the shields went down, the Fortress was dangerously vulnerable.
“Yes, but your own side?”
“Own side” was putting it a bit strongly. “They won’t like it if you say anything about it,” Mikodez said, as if Kujen needed the warning. Kujen shouldn’t have a say in a military decision anyway, except no one else was capable of overseeing the particular weapon Kel Command wanted to deploy.
“I can keep my mouth shut,” Kujen said irritably. “You’ve made no secret of the fact that you have the usual Shuos prejudices, but I suppose you have your reasons for authorizing the mission.”
It had been a sore point with Shuos leaders for almost four centuries that the Kel had snatched away their last general, even if the Shuos still had to approve Kel operations involving his use. “Anyway,” Mikodez said after a pause to see if Kujen was going to add anything, “you haven’t told me if you think the candidate’s acceptable.”
“You really like the Sheathed Wings, don’t you? Aren’t you afraid she’s going to put Jedao to sleep?”
It was entirely in character for Kujen to think psychological stability was dull. “I’m sure the general will bring some excitement into her life,” Mikodez said.
“She’s wasted on him,” Kujen said. “I still think that commander would be a better fit. And I could get more use out of the Sheathed Wings if Kel Command doesn’t want her anymore.”
Sometimes Mikodez thought Kujen would benefit from having his knuckles rapped. “Don’t get greedy,” he said. “You’ll have plenty of time to see if she can tell you anything about the latest cryptology conjectures after the Fortress has been dealt with.” Although whether she would prefer dealing with the Fortress or a sociopathic hexarch was an open question.
“Killjoy,” Kujen said. “You’re not going to fold on this one, are you?”
Mikodez smiled at him. “You wanted more funding for research on that latest jamming system, didn’t you?”
“It’s unlike you to resort to naked bribery,” Kujen said, “not that I’m complaining.”
“I’m bored,” Mikodez said, “and if I don’t spend this money, one of my subordinates will put it into something wholesome, like algorithmic threat identification.” He cultivated a reputation for being erratic for occasions like this.
“All right, all right, I’ll put in the authorizations on my end,” Kujen said. “You think you have paperwork, you should see mine.”
You think I don’t? Mikodez thought, but he kept his expression bland. Kujen’s security wasn’t nearly as up-to-date as he thought it was.
“At least I’ll get a chance to say hello to her,” Kujen went on, “even though I’m sure she’ll be focused on her duty. Sometimes I think Visyas and I did too good a job designing formation instinct, but the results can be adorable.”
Mikodez would have felt sorry for Kel Cheris, but at the moment Kujen was unlikely to damage anyone who had a chance of entertaining him in matters related to number theory. Besides, the emergency was real. A shame that she had made herself a candidate for dealing with the calendrical rot, but someone had to do it, and she had a better chance of survival than most.
“I’ll set it up, then,” Mikodez said. “Depending on how hard I can lean on Kel Command, I can get her to you in eighteen days or so.”
“Splendid,” Kujen said. “In the future, do try to be less transparent about avoiding me. It’s embarrassing when a grown Shuos is so obvious.” He signed off without waiting for a response.
Embarrassing, but worth it to ensure that his preferred candidate was sent to deal with the calendrical rot. Mikodez spent several minutes composing his instructions to Kel Command, then sent them off.
Kel Cheris was sane, although the odds were that she wouldn’t stay that way. Still, Mikodez had to trade her welfare for the hexarchate’s. Someday someone might come up with a better government, one in which brainwashing and the remembrances’ ritual torture weren’t an unremarkable fact of life. Until then, he did what he could.
CHERIS SPENT THE flight back to the boxmoth infantry transport in silence. The boxmoth was like any other: walls painted solemn black and charcoal gray, with the occasional unsubtle touch of gold. Cheris reported to the commander’s executive officer, an unsmiling man with a scar over his right eye. She saluted him fist to shoulder, and he returned the salute. She passed over her company’s grid key so the data could be examined by her superiors at their leisure.
“Welcome back, Captain,” the executive officer said, eying her with a faint spark of curiosity.
This alarmed her – it never paid to stand out too much among the Kel – but no response seemed to be expected.
The mothgrid informed her of the vessel’s current layout and where she might find the high halls, her quarters, the soldiers’ barracks. In reality, no one was going to their assigned high hall without cleaning up first. Per protocol, she was told the status of those who had been taken to Medical for their injuries. She thought of the recalcitrant squadron that had died on Dredge before the evacuation.
Her quarters were next to her company’s barracks. She had two small rooms and an adjoining bath. All her muscles ached, but she dug out a small box of personal items and pulled out the raven luckstone her mother had given her on her twenty-third birthday. It was a polished stone, drab gray, and the raven’s silhouette was a welcome reminder of the home she visited so seldom.
There came a rapid series of taps at her door: three, one, four, one, five –
“Come in,” Cheris said, amused at the ritual. She put the luckstone away.
One of the boxmoth’s birdform servitors came in bearing an arrangement of anodized wire flowers. There were twelve flowers, just as twelve servitors had fallen in action. They would never receive official acknowledgment of their service, but that wasn’t any reason not to remember them.
“Thank you,” Cheris said to the birdform. “It was bad down there. I wish I could have done more.”
The birdform flashed a series of ironic golds and reds. Cheris had learned to read Simplified Machine Universal, and nodded her agreement. It added that it had been having trouble with one of its grippers, if she had a moment to adjust it?
“Of course,” Cheris said. She wasn’t a technician, but some repair jobs were better handled by human hands, and she had learned the basics. As it turned out, all it took was a few moment’s jiggering with some specially shaped pliers. The birdform made a pleased bell tone.
“I have to see to my duties now,” Cheris said. “I’ll talk to you later?”
The birdform indicated its acquiescence, and headed out, leaving the flowers.