"Only if he had more lives than a litter of kittens. Those tunnels have at least eight types of sensors, hooked to three separate sets of active and passive defense systems. Lethal defense systems."
"After thirty years—"
"Some of them will be working for another century or two."
Caine pursed his lips. The whole thing was sounding less promising by the minute... and he might have said so if Lepkowski hadn't beaten him to it. "You know, Caine, the more I think about this the more I think the mission would be a dangerous waste of time. If the Ryqril haven't been able to get in, you won't be able to either; and if they have gotten in, you won't want to. Maybe you'd better go for something a little less ambitious."
Something a bit easier for beginners? Even if that wasn't what Lepkowski had meant, the thought was too much to ignore. "Thanks for the advice, sir," he said, perhaps a shade too stiffly. "But it's my time to waste. It can't hurt to just take a look."
Lepkowski shrugged. "It's your team and your mission. But you're totally insane to even consider it."
Caine had to smile at that one. "Any more than you are to zip around the TDE in that big flying target of yours? But let's keep my insanity our private secret, if you don't mind," he added, glancing automatically at the humming bug stomper. "Even my team isn't going to know the objective until they need to; I don't want anyone else knowing, either."
"Not even Lathe?"
"No. Compartmentalization of secrets, remember?"
Lepkowski's eyes bored into his. "It's hardly the same thing. Lathe is in charge here."
"Here he's in charge. Not on Earth."
For a moment the general gazed at him, a frown creasing his forehead. Then he shrugged. "I suppose I can understand how you feel. It is your first command, after all. Well... good luck. If there's anything else I can do to help, just let me know."
"Thank you, sir, but I think all we'll need from you now is safe passage to Earth. The rest will be up to us."
The rest will have to be up to us, Caine reflected as he returned to his own room. Any details about Denver that Lepkowski or the blackcollars might have once had would be at least thirty years out of date. His team would have to pick them up once they were down.
And hope that local Security was slow on the uptake.
Chapter 2
Seen from several kilometers up, the picture artificially enhanced six ways from center, Caine's blindman test was still one hell of an impressive display. Prefect Jamus Galway, head of Plinry Security, ran the tape twice before turning to his aide. "Have the Ryqril seen a copy of this tape?" he asked.
Ragusin shrugged helplessly. "This tape and all the others. There's still no change in the order."
The order. No need to specify, of course. Monitor all activities at the blackcollar training camp but do not attempt disruption. Galway had appealed it twice, but the Ryqril had consistently turned him down, and the apparent foolishness of that position was beginning to get to him. Were the aliens so intimidated by those three Novas that they were willing to put up with a military school in occupied territory? A school run by blackcollars, for God's sake?
"It could be worse," Ragusin broke into his thoughts. "At least they're not turning out full blackcollars—the analysis shows Caine's reflexes are only a few percent better than when he began the training. Same range of improvement we've found with the other trainees."
Galway nodded. He knew all that, probably better than anyone else on Plinry. The training center had occupied far too many of his waking hours over the past few months, taking his attention away from other, more routine, security matters. There were reports on the rise of teenage gangs in Capstone's poorer sections which he'd barely had time to skim; details on the upgrading of the Hub's protective wall that he should be paying better attention to. And to be fair, as long as Lathe was turning out little more than unusually good guerrilla soldiers—and as long as Ryqril could keep tabs on both school and graduates—there really was little danger to either Plinry or the Ryqril Empire as a whole.
Or so the logic went. Galway didn't believe a word of it.
He ran the tape again. There was little data yet on such things, but Galway's gut feeling was that Caine had passed. "So Caine is finished here. Any idea when he'll be leaving? And with whom?"
"Only indications, but they're pretty positive ones," Ragusin said, shuffling a page out of the stack of paper he habitually carried around these days. "The Novak's leaving in five days for a swing around his section of the TDE—stops at Hegira, Juniper, New Calais, Earth, Shiloh, Magna Graecia, Carno, and Bullhead. Presumably Caine will be aboard."
"Passengers?"
"They'll start with thirty businessmen from here, undoubtedly add and subtract en route. All ours have been checked out and seem legit."
Galway nodded sourly. Before Caine and his Novas only government officials and a handful of loyalty-conditioned businessmen had ever been permitted interstellar travel. Now, General Lepkowski's starships and the concessions he'd wangled out of the Ryqril had scrapped that policy—and turned Galway's security responsibilities from headache to nightmare. Lepkowski was hardly going to be content with ferrying petty entrepreneurs around the TDE, and Galway's office simply didn't have the manpower to weed out the spies, saboteurs, and weapons that would eventually begin pouring through the pipeline.
But again, there was nothing he could do about it. "All right." He sighed. "Potential teammates?"
"Only one probable set," Ragusin said. "Woody Pittman, Stef Braune, Doon Colvin, and Mal Alamzad. Almost all of Caine's team exercises have been with them."
The names were familiar: local Capstone kids, all four, who'd gotten a head start in their guerrilla training through the secret martial arts classes the blackcollars had started seven years back. One name was familiar for another reason, as well. "What about the blackcollars themselves? Any chance Lathe would send one with Caine?"
"It's possible, I suppose, but there's no indication of anything like that. No indication, either, as to which planet Caine will be making for."
"Earth." Galway had no doubts on that score. Born, raised, and Resistance-educated in Europe on Earth, Caine would surely return home to begin his private war. Eight parsecs out of Galway's jurisdiction... which meant the prefect could file his report, watch Caine climb aboard the shuttle, and then put it all out of his mind.
Except that he couldn't. And he knew it.
Reaching to his intercom, he buzzed for the Blackcollar Monitor duty officer. "I want locations for four trainees," he said when the other answered. "Pittman, Braune, Colvin, and Alamzad."
There was a slight pause. "All four are at the Hamner Lodge camp, sir," the other reported. "Braune since five this morning, the other three since seven."
Galway glanced at his watch. Almost five now; they'd been there for fifteen and thirteen hours, respectively. If Lathe stuck to his usual scheduling pattern the kids would be heading back to Capstone soon. "Let me know immediately if any of those four or Caine comes out," he instructed the officer and broke the connection. "Ragusin," he said to his aide, "get two cars and drivers and meet me outside. We're bringing them in for a farewell chat."
"All of them, sir?" the other asked, moving toward the door.
"It'll be safer that way," Galway said. "Besides, I'd like to see up close how Caine's changed in the past seven months."
Ragusin nodded and left. Opening his desk drawer, Galway pulled out his laser and holster and strapped them on. If the trainees didn't want to come peaceably the weapon would be of only marginal use, but seeing how they reacted to the presence of armed Security men on their home territory might prove interesting.
Presumably the reaction would remain at nonlethal levels. But if not... well, that was something he needed to know, too.
—
Caine was in the lodge dining room, studying the orbital maps of Denver Lepkowski had run off for him, when Chelsey Jensen came in with the news.