“Um… correct,” she murmured. Not under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, but if they were going to charge him under MEJA, he was right. “You are so entitled.” She added, “I see you’ve looked up the relevant statutes, in anticipation of your arrest. Still a step ahead of us, I guess.”
He smiled. “It’s not that hard.” He tilted his head toward the chairs. “If you don’t mind. Since you’re obviously having second thoughts about staging your little drama. Dan?”
“Not a problem,” Lenson said. After a moment, he pulled down a chair too, facing the physicist across the coffee table. She wasn’t really sure how or when it had happened, but the confrontation was between the two men now, with the rest reduced to onlookers.
Noblos said, “All right, let’s set up the problem. What exactly am I being accused of?”
“Like the agent said. Assault, rape, attempted murder.”
“Ridiculous. You’d never bring me to trial.”
Lenson regarded him steadily. Aisha remembered the scuttlebutt about this captain: that he’d actually once executed a murderer; hanged him, aboard an old destroyer. She didn’t believe it, but something about his cold stare made her shiver. “Oh, I think we could,” he said.
“You can’t bullshit me, about those disks. None of you could break the encryption I put on them.”
“The Justice Department can.”
“No, Captain. Not even them. Maybe the NSA, but it would take years of supercomputer time. Which I doubt they’d be willing to commit, in the middle of a war. It’s a block cipher with a 128-bit key. No one’s ever going to see what’s on there unless I give them the key.”
“So what’s on them?” Aisha put in. “Your home movies?”
The hard smile turned on her. “Test-results data. Tuning algorithms. Highly classified software.”
“Not video footage? Your rape records?”
“What an imagination, Special Agent. You should write for television.”
Lenson said, “What about the knife? The blanket? Longley identified it as yours.”
Noblos rolled his eyes. “A knife? Someone planted it. I don’t own one. The blanket? Yeah, that’s mine. Someone stole it from my room. I’d like it back, by the way. There’s nothing that proves it was at your crime scenes. Just the assertions of a couple of hysterical women.” Noblos caught himself. “I mean, no doubt they were attacked. But not by me. The agent here needs to do her job. Not persecute someone who’s out here at great personal risk to help his country.”
“I believe her,” Lenson said.
Noblos pulled a face. “So… what? You arrest me? Confine me to quarters? You can’t.”
“Try me,” the captain said. “You’re not getting away with these crimes. I promise you that.”
Noblos addressed the compartment at large. “Let’s sum up. None of you can prove a thing. But even if you could, you can’t do without me. Not if you hope to survive out here.
“Actually, come to think of it, right now, arresting me would be the best thing for the ship all around.”
Lenson blinked. “How do you reach that conclusion?”
Noblos spread his hands, as if explaining trigonometry to a first grader. “Simple. Confine me, and in a very short time, your Aegis is useless. Your SPY-1 detunes. Especially Illuminator One. ALIS degrades.
“Therefore, your ship has no combat value. At which point you can retreat, and offload me. Everybody wins.”
“Without charges?” Aisha put in, at the same time that Lenson said, “We’re not retreating,” in a flat voice. He interrupted himself and looked to her. “Sorry, Special Agent. This should be your show.”
“Is that really what you expect?” she asked Noblos. Trying to take over again.
The physicist shrugged, still speaking to the CO. “Charge me, and I stop work. The next incoming missile, air strike, takes your precious ship out. Kills the crew you’re worrying so much about. Your choice, Captain. But that’s what they pay you for, right? To make the tough calls?”
Lenson glanced at her. She opened her hands to convey that, essentially, the scientist was right. She couldn’t take him into custody against the wishes of the command.
Noblos looked from one to the other, then sighed. “Very well then. We’re in agreement. And I’m free to go.”
When he stood, Toan reached for the cuffs again. Tausengelt, too, went to stop him. But Lenson waved them off. “Belay that. He’s got us over a barrel.”
Toan gaped. “We can’t let him remain free. Roaming the passageways. Sir?”
“I have no intention of that, Sheriff. We’re shorthanded, but you’ll just have to bird-dog him. Who do we—”
Aisha gripped the pistol under her wrap. “I’ll do it.”
Lenson frowned at her. “You, Special Agent?”
She swallowed. The stairwell. His reeking breath. “I, uh… don’t have a general-quarters assignment. As far as fighting, I’m a spare wheel. The least I can do is keep an eye on this… suspect.”
“My own personal minder,” Noblos said drily. “Aren’t you afraid of me, Aisha? That I’ll get you in a corner and work my will?”
She met his amused stare with as stony a glare as she could muster. “Not really. But if you did try it again, I’d have to shoot you.”
Lenson nodded again. “Fair enough. All right, he’s yours. CIC, Aegis spaces, his cabin, the wardroom. Nowhere else. He wants to sleep, lock him in. And once we get home, Doctor, I’m turning you in for prosecution.”
“A deal I can’t refuse.” Noblos’s sneer was open now. “And you imagine I’ll go along with being railroaded? You have no evidence. Just this crazy woman’s imagination. She can’t come up with the real doer, so it’s got to be somebody who’s not in ship’s company. Or is it actually you, Captain? Did you ever think of that, Special Agent? That it’s really him?”
Aisha didn’t answer. Just stood, looking to the skipper. Who put his hands down flat on the table and rose.
“You can’t even answer.” Noblos shook his head sadly. “Pathetic, the lot of you. Without me, you’d already be dead. You’re fooling yourselves. I won’t be prosecuted. They wouldn’t dare.”
Steel shuddered around them as the ship slammed into a heavy sea. “I’ll be in Combat,” Lenson said to no one in particular. Then, to her, “Let me know if you have any problems with him.”
Noblos turned his back. She took advantage of that to reach under her wrap. Pretending to adjust her bra, she clicked the safety off the SIG, then followed her new charge out.
28
Blair was in the conference room when the news arrived. She’d had to park some distance away. The lot, including where her space was, had been blocked off. Power diggers were gouging out earth. General Tomlin, the chair, Ms. Clayton, and the others were taking their seats when the new staffer barged in. Without a word, Reich turned on the television. They watched, appalled, as a stony-faced anchor spoke against a background still of a carrier departing port, sailors lining the rails, families waving from the pier.
“Details are sketchy. But the Department of Defense has confirmed that a possible nuclear explosion was reported early this morning. The presumed target was a U.S. task force on its way to support our allies in the Western Pacific. Five to six Navy ships are out of communication and may be lost. A Canadian ship reports heavy damage. It is searching for survivors, but encountering high seas and bad weather.”
The anchor paused, then went on, tone of voice somber. “Critics of the administration are already asking why the force was sent into a war zone without antimissile protection. Apparently an escort was planned, but was not yet ready for deployment. The group was directed to sail without it.”