Then the fireworks started.
The Voyager's Q went. The multimillion-degree fusion process erupted into the Voyager, obliterating everything inside before it reduced the more stubborn hull to stripped nuclei. Those inside the Voyager did not live long enough to realize what had happened.
Probe had time only to determine that there were five beings aboard, all apparently human.
Before the fire faded OpsAvocat asked, "Can we head for Starbase now?"
Lady Midnight fluttered into WarAvocat's mind. "It's your Guardship, OpsAvocat. Condition Yellow One. WarAvocat out."
Nothing left now but the chore of hunting down the villains behind the ambush.
— 63 —
Valerena watched figures scroll. She was pleased. The balance had shifted just enough to produce the first profitable week of the century. Better weeks would come. All you needed was the will....
"What?" she snapped. She loathed interruptions. And that was one lesson these people were too stupid to learn. She glared at the creature in the doorway.
"I was told to deliver a message." Sullen and without honorifics. "A Tregesser Voyager has broken off the Web. A man named Lupo Provik wants to talk to you. He's sending a shuttle."
Lupo? Here?
She was frightened. This should not be. He was supposed to be in that end space with Simon. Had something happened? Had they aborted?
She had a thousand questions and a hundred fears.
She was on the flying city's docking platform, suited, when the shuttle set down. The poison wind barked and whined around her.
She stepped onto the bridge of the Voyager. Lupo was there alone, waiting. There was something wrong with him. "Have you been sick?" she blurted.
He responded with a soft, sad, almost holy smile. "Only here." He tapped his chest.
She frowned, worried. Lupo Provik, of all people, going spooky and mystic?
The universe could not be that perverse.
"What's happened? Why aren't you in the end space?"
"Sit down."
There was an echo of the old whipcrack. She sat.
"It's over, Valerena. We blew it. They came earlier than we expected. VII Gemina. XXVIII Fretensis. XII Fulminata."
"Three? But..."
"Three. We got XII Fulminata and VII Gemina. But XXVIII Fretensis finished us. Your father didn't get out."
Shock. She felt lightheaded, numb. Her brain closed up shop.
"Valerena? You hear me? Simon is dead. You're the Chair."
She nodded slowly. And for once told the complete and naked truth. "I'm scared, Lupo."
"That's what Simon said the day he took over."
"It's real, isn't it?" She knew it was. Lupo would not say it if it wasn't.
"As real as death, Valerena. I'm taking you to Prime. You have to be confirmed. You have to take charge fast. The Directors will panic when they find out we failed. They might get the idea they could profit by informing. They'll need supervision."
"Yes." Tendrils of self-possession insinuated themselves through her shock.
Simon Tregesser was dead. The Tregesser empire was hers. There were things to do.
Dead! "The bastard got me again. Dying in his own time and way."
Lupo smiled sickly. "He didn't die willingly or in a place of his own choosing."
"It was Simon who died? You're sure? It wasn't his Other?"
"It was Simon Prime."
"Will his Other give me trouble?"
"They always do. They don't want to die, either."
That was a snake's nest someone was sure to stir. The Simon Other had become a nonperson with Simon's death but some Directors might defy that, preferring the Other to her. Then, too, someone might try to make something of the fact that she was not the original Valerena. She was not popular with the Directors.
Did that matter? Simon hadn't been popular. He had been the boss. The king. The bloody damned emperor.
As she would be.
"Can we use it?"
Lupo paced. He milked his chin and stared at unseen infinities. "If you kept it out of sight, maybe. But we'd never dare forget it's Simon Tregesser in almost every sense." He faced her, "We can talk while we're on the Web. How soon can you leave?"
"Now. But how safe will I be?"
"Why would you... My loyalty is to the Chair. You're the Chair. I'm the one at risk."
"You are?"
"I've thwarted your ambitions so often."
Valerena examined her feelings. She entertained no resentment. He had been doing his job. "Will you do as good a job protecting me?"
"Probably better. Especially if I can convince Blessed to be patient."
"I could leave him where he is."
"You can't. He has to be on Prime, to learn. Just as you were, despite the frustration you caused your father."
"He bottled me up here."
"An emergency expedient. He was frayed. Too much pressure. You wouldn't have liked the solution he preferred himself."
"He wanted to kill me again?"
"All of you. I convinced him it would be more cruel to send you here. We're still saying things better said in transit."
"Then go, Lupo."
He nodded, touching something. "Two. Four. I need you."
Valerena watched the women enter. One had been Lupo's companion that day in the Pylon. The other had to be her sister.
Provik said, "We have a crash priority here, ladies. See if station will bump us to the head of the launch schedule."
Good heavens! The man had a sense of humor.
— 64 —
Starbase! At last!
That damned spook Trajana had not shut up the whole time. How did you exorcise such a ghost? It had tried to keep its prisoners alive, a captive audience.
No one talked much except when humoring the ghost. Trajana was not just weird, it was psychotic. Two prisoners had spoken their thoughts. Their remains shared confinement with the survivors.
The ghost kept hinting that Trajana wanted to acquire new living crew. Each hour raised the tension level. Degas had the shakes half the time.
Haget handled it best. He could take Trajana's ravings about the Presence without twitching a lip, feigning an interest in Trajana's obsession. Or maybe he was interested. Maybe Trajana did have something to say behind all the shit about devil gods, death cults, and phantom Travelers.
Haget broke away from the spook. "Starbase, people. XXVIII Fretensis is in for post-combat refitting after a joint mission with XII Fulminata and VII Gemina."
Jo asked, "What's up? You look rattled."
"Unsettled. It was the trap WarAvocat expected. XII Fulminata was destroyed. VII Gemina suffered heavy damage and hasn't yet made it back."
AnyKaat blurted, "Somebody took on three at once?"
"Yes. They had the hair and almost enough firepower. And that's all I know. Except that Trajana wants to horn in on the follow-up."
Jo asked, "How bad was VII Gemina hurt?"
"Trajana has graciously offered us refuge if VII Gemina doesn't come in. We're docking now. We have health and dietary matters to attend outboard. Let's go."
Haget led them on a long hike. Jo brought up the rear, behind Seeker, who stumbled with weakness. They debouched onto a vast, empty, sterile dock. A lighted dock. A dock not foul with the stenches of wastes and decaying corpses.