“Yes, I’m sorry, what is it, Mr. Lalwani?”
“The Commander would like to see you.”
Her expression smoothed over like the surface of the pale blue ocean. “Where is he?”
“On the main continent, Miz. He’s decided to take the forms.”
She closed her eyes in pain. “Dear souls in Hell … will there never be an end? Hasn’t he done enough to this wretched backwash?” Then she opened her eyes and looked at him closely. “What does he want with me? Has there been a reply from Central? Does he simply want an audience?”
“I don’t know, Miz. He ordered me to come and find you. I have a recon ship waiting, whenever you’re ready.”
She nodded. “Thank you, Mr. Lalwani. I’ll be along in a few moments.”
He saluted and walked away up the beach and around the bend. She sat staring out across the ocean; as always: an observer.
They had charted the positions of the fifty “forts” during the first pass at the planet. Whether they were, in fact, forts was entirely supposition. At first they were thought to be natural rock formations — huge black cubes sunk into the earth of the tiny planet; featureless, ominous, silent — but their careful spacing around the equator made that unlikely. And the recon ships had brought back confirmation that they were created, not natural. What they were, remained a mystery.
Lynn Ferraro stood with Drabix and stared across the empty plain to the enormous black cube, fifty meters on a side. She could not remember ever having seen anything quite so terrifying. There was no reason to feel as she did, but she could not shake the oppression, the sense of impending doom. Even so, she had resolved to say nothing to Drabix. There was nothing that could be said. Whatever motivated him, whatever passions had come to possess him in his obsession about this planet, she knew no words she might speak to dissuade him.
“I wanted you here,” he said, “because I’m still in charge of this operation, and whatever you may think of my actions, I still follow orders. You’re required to be in attendance, and I want that in the report.”
“It’s noted, Commander.”
He glanced at her quickly. There had been neither tone nor inflection revealing her hatred, but it trembled in the air between them.
“I expected something more from you.”
She continued staring at the black, featureless cube in the middle of the plain. “Such as?”
“A comment. An assessment of military priorities. A plea to spare these cultural treasures. Something … anything … to justify your position.”
She looked at him and saw the depth of distaste he held for her. Was it her Amicus status, or herself he feared and despised? Had she been repelled less by his warrior manner, she might have pitied him — “There are men whom one hates until that moment when one sees, through a chink in their armor, the sight of something nailed down and in torment.”
“The validity of my position will ensure you never go to space again, Commander. If there were more I could do, something immediate and final, I would do it, by all the sweet dear souls in Hell. But I can’t. You’re in charge here, and the best I can do is record what I think insane behavior.”
His anger flared again, and for a moment she thought he might hit her a second time, and she dropped back a step into a self-defense position. The first time he had taken her unaware; there would be no second time; she was capable of crippling him.
“Let me tell you a thing, Amicus , Friend of the Enemy! You follow that word all the way? The Enemy ? You’re a paid spy for the Enemy. An Enemy that’s out to kill us, every one of us, that will stop nowhere short of total annihilation of the human race. The Kyben feed off a hatred of humankind unknown to any other race in the galaxy …”
“My threshold for jingoism is very low, Commander. If you have some information to convey, do so. Otherwise, I’ll return to Stand of Light.”
He breathed deeply, damping his rage, and when he could speak again he said, “Whether this planet has what I think it has, or not, quite clearly it’s been a prize for a long time. A long time. A lot longer than either of us can imagine. Long before the war moved into this sector. It’s been conquered and reconquered and conquered all over again. The planet’s lousy with every marauding race I’ve ever even heard of. The place is like Terran China … let itself be overrun and probably didn’t even put up a fight. Let the hordes in, submitted, and waited for them to be swallowed up. But more kept coming. There’s something here they all wanted.”
She had deduced as much herself; she needed no long-winded superficial lectures about the obvious. “And you think whatever it is they wanted is in the fifty forts. Have you spoken to any of the prisoners?”
“I’ve seen intelligence reports.”
“But have you spoken to any of the prisoners personally ?”
“Are you trying to make a case for incompetence, too?”
“All I asked is if you’ve spoken —”
“No, dammit, I haven’t spoken to any of that scum!”
“Well, you should have!”
“To what end, Friend?” And he waved to his adjutant.
Drabix was in motion now. Lynn Ferraro could see there was nothing short of assassination that would stop him. And that was beyond her. “Because if you’d spoken to them, you’d have learned that whatever lives inside those forts has permitted the planet to be conquered. It doesn’t care, as long as everyone minds their own business.”
Drabix smiled, then snickered. “ Amicus , go sit down somewhere, will you. The heat’s getting to you.”
“They say even the Kyben were tolerated, Commander. I’m warning you; let the forts alone.”
“Fade off, Friend Ferraro. Command means decision, and my orders were to secure this planet. Secure doesn’t mean fifty impregnable fortresses left untouched, and command doesn’t mean letting bleeding hearts like you scare us into inaction with bogey men.”
The adjutant stood waiting. “Mr. Lalwani,” Drabix said, “tell the ground batteries to commence on signal. Concentrate fire on the southern face of that cube.”
“Yes, sir.” He went away quickly.
“It’s war, Commander. That’s your only answer, that it’s war?”
Drabix would not look at her now. “That’s right. It’s a war to the finish. They declared it, and it’s been that way for forty years. I’m doing my job … and if that makes doing yours difficult, perhaps it’ll show those pimply-assed bureaucrats at Central we need more ships and less Friends of the Enemy. Something has to break this stalemate with the Kyben, and even if I don’t see the end of it I’ll be satisfied knowing I was the one who broke it.”
He gave the signal.
From concealed positions, lancet batteries opened up on the silent black cube on the plain.
Crackling beams of leashed energy erupted from the projectors, criss-crossed as they sped toward their target and impacted on the near face of the cube. Where they struck, novae of light appeared. Drabix lowered the visor on his battle helmet. “Protect your eyes, Friend,” he warned.
Lynn dropped her visor, and heard herself shouting above the sudden crash of sound, “Let them alone!”
And in that instant she realized no one had asked the right question: where were the original natives of this world?
But it was too late to ask that question.
The barrage went on for a very long time.
Drabix was studying the southern face of the cube through a cyclop. The reports he had received were even more disturbing than the mere presence of the forts: the lancets had caused no visible damage.
Whatever formed those cubes, it was beyond the destructive capabilities of the ground batteries. The barrage had drained their power sources, and still the fort stood unscathed.