* * * *
A few years ago that would have been enough for Dom to trash the whole megagram deal. However, during the past year Dom had winded an instability in the air, the sense of a storm on the horizon. Nothing concrete, but the paranoia was enough for him to sink a large chunk of capital into a mountainside bolt-hole. Even his chief of security, Mariah Zanzibar, thought that purchasing the virtually unknown commune wasn’t the best financial move—even if it was an admirable precaution.
Ironically, after sinking the money into that commune, he wasn’t in a position to refuse the Prometheus. Dom had to force himself to ignore his last disastrous involvement with the Confederacy, if not to forget it. Past was past, and Dom doubted that anyone in the Executive Command still knew his name—with one exception.
Dom slid a drawer out from his desk and contemplated what kind of sidearm he should carry into the deal.
The suit he wore was tailored for either a shoulder holster, or one on the hip. He chose both. On the hip he holstered a cartridge weapon, a slugthrower with nine-millimeter projectiles. It would do nothing against even halfway-decent body armor, but it was the custom on Bakunin to go into business dealings visibly armed. The chromed antique would be both expected and non-threatening.
However, because he had a Bakuninite’s distrust of the Confederacy, he wore a considerably more effective weapon in the concealed shoulder holster. A GA&A random-pulse variable-frequency antipersonnel laser was built to play hob with a personal field.
An Emerson field—force field was an unfortunate misnomer, since the Emerson effect dealt with energy, not fields of force—could suck up a considerable amount of energy at its target frequency. However, only the very high-end military models had processors able to compensate fast enough to defeat a laser that changed frequency at random microsecond intervals.
Once he was properly armed, he told his onboard computer to activate the observatory. He wanted to see the Prometheus land. The computer wired into his skull sent a coded pulse to the hemispherical white walls of his office, and they vanished from view.
His desk was on a raised dais in the center of the room, so he could sit behind it and get a panoramic view of the GA&A complex.
In the high-backed chair he could look down on the whole complex. The blinding glare reflecting off the landing quad splashed white light off of the mirrored U-shaped office complex. The smaller of Bakunin’s two moons was rising behind the concrete tower of GA&A air traffic control, above the offices.
A slight heat shimmer above the perimeter towers obscured the Diderot Mountains beyond. The shimmer was a side effect of the defense screen generators in the towers, housed below the antiaircraft batteries.
Dom sat on top of the twenty-story residence tower. The deal he’d worked with the owner of the Prometheus would bring an influx of income that would not only compensate for his purchase in the mountains, but would be enough to give every one of the 1500 employees living below him a ten-percent bonus this year.
It was almost too good to be true.
The ten-minute klaxon sounded five minutes ahead of schedule.
Dom turned the chair away from the quad and faced west. It was a nice sunset. The ruddy orb of Kropotkin dominated the horizon, larger than either of Bakunin’s moons. An awesome sight, a reminder that, in the cosmic scheme of things, life should not exist on this planet.
But then, Bakuninites had a habit of bucking the natural order of things.
Dom squinted. The ship was on its orbital approach. It would come over the city of Godwin to make its landfall. He’d see it in a few minutes.
A different klaxon sounded. The heat shimmer around the perimeter towers disappeared in a sheet of electric-blue light, the St. Elmo’s fire from the defense screens’ excess charge. The field had deactivated for the Prometheus’ approach.
Something was wrong. He hadn’t heard the all-clear first.
He told his onboard computer to call up the GA&A communications net. He needed to contact the control tower, now. Air traffic control was supposed to confirm the ID of any approaching craft and sound the all-clear before anyone even thought of lowering the defense screens.
He turned around and faced the holo projection above his desk.
Nobody was manning the control tower. He was looking at a totally empty room, lit only by the computer schematics showing the local airspace. There was no one to authorize downing the screens.
Dom called security.
The holo fuzzed and the empty control room was replaced by the dusky face of Mariah Zanzibar. “Yes, sir?”
“Red Alert. Prepare the defenses for immediate attack.”
Alarms sounded, and the antiaircraft batteries began turning to track the incoming target. Dom had the feeling that it was already too late. He turned back to watch the approaching Prometheus. The ship that was just becoming visible over the glowing sprawl of Godwin wasn’t the Prometheus, or anything close to a Hegira cargo liner—
The lines were unmistakable, even at this distance. It was a Confed troopship.
“Damn it, Zanzibar, get those screens back up—”
Even as he spoke, he could see a streak of light emerge from the ship. It split into five arrows of fire, heading right for the perimeter towers. EM-tracking missiles with independently targetable warheads. If the screens were up, the ECM would take out 70% of them.
The screens did not go back up.
Five field generators and accompanying antiaircraft exploded into cherry-red balls of flame. Dom felt the building shake underneath him and knew that defending the complex now would be a futile gesture.
The realization was like a sheet of ice slicing through him. He was suddenly very calm.
He turned back to the holo. Zanzibar was facing away from him and shouting orders at her security team. She turned back. “We can’t get the defense screens back up, Mr. Magnus. Someone scragged the independent power supply. We’re trying to hook into the factory generators. That’ll take another five minutes and the power supply will be vulnerable.”
Dom nodded; he knew his own complex well enough. “Start evacuating personnel,” he said, his voice a monotone. “It’s a lost cause.”
“Sir?”
“Get everyone you can to the Diderot Commune. That’s an order.”
“Yes, Mr. Magnus. Good luck.”
Dom cut the connection.
Behind him the holographic walls flashed with more red light. Five more warheads, Dom thought, another five perimeter towers. Even if Zanzibar could get power to the remaining screen generators immediately, the screens would cover only three-quarters of the complex.
Dom looked toward the invader. The ship was slowing, disgorging its landing craft. It wasn’t going to blast the complex.
They were going to try to take it.
His thoughts were ice-fine and cold, like filaments of metallic hydrogen. Only briefly did he wonder why this was happening. But the fact that the invaders were shifting to a ground assault gave him a chance to salvage something—
Himself.