"All that work. Sten'll kill that clottin' moron—but I'll have beaten him to it! Jesus Mary Mother on a grav-sled! I'll crucify the clot! Have his guts for a winding sheet." He broke off. "I do not believe this. Clot!"
The Emperor picked up the fiche, put it in a viewer, and scanned the decoded message that had been transmitted in the Empire's personal command code.
He scanned it again, then grunted. "Not good, Ian. Not good at all."
"Not good... okay." Mahoney brought himself under control. "You're the boss. How high do we hang this—whoever did this? Not that it matters. What's the spin for damage control?"
The Emperor thought a moment. "None. What happened is what happened. And I'll arrange the proper way to deal with our ambitious gunman. But that's all. No investigation, Mahoney. That's an order." He paused. "So we've lost our war crimes trial. I don't think it matters. There's too much of the privy council's drakh left around for anybody to be much interested in what happened to Malperin and Lovett."
"That's it," Mahoney said incredulously. "Those two just... vanished?"
"Something like that. As I said, what happened is what happened. Pour me a drink, Ian. We'll drink their souls to hell, like Sten's hairy friends say."
Ian stared at the Emperor, then got up and went to a table, where he found the decanter of stregg.
The Eternal Emperor turned his chair and looked out the window at the once-blasted site of his palace, Arundel. Reconstruction had already begun.
Mahoney could not see his face.
The Eternal Emperor smiled.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
CHRIS BUNCH is a Ranger—an airborne-qualified Vietnam Vet—who's written about phenomena as varied as the Hell's Angels, the Rolling Stones, and Ronald Reagan. ALLAN COLE grew up in the CIA in odd spots like Okinawa, Cyprus, and Taiwan. He's been a professional chef, investigative reporter, and national news editor of a major West Coast daily newspaper. He's won half a dozen writing awards in the process.
BUNCH AND COLE, friends since high school, have collaborated on everything from the world's worst pornographic novel to over fifty television scripts, as well as a feature movie. This is their second novel.