The Volgodon Traveler reached M. Meddinia without incident. The old station was almost completely automated, which made for slow handling of what little traffic there was. Sixteen hours passed before Seeker and Amber Soul began their descent to the homeworld she did not remember. Their station's one shuttle was ancient and quirky and slow, but utterly dependable.
The companions sent by House Tregesser were not themselves strictly human. They were products of Lupo Provik's secret lab, expendable artifact operatives. A condition of the Traveler's charter required it to stay at station till it verified the arrival on-planet of its passengers.
As the shuttle entered atmosphere the station's fusion plant went berserk. Its Q blew. The electromagnetic pulse triggered a device that set off a similar disaster in the Traveler's power plant.
That double blast vaporized me Traveler and seventy percent of the station.
Lupo Provik had kept his word—while making sure an alien who knew too much would not get back into circulation.
— 96 —
Six months after VII Gemina's fleet directive, twelve Guardships were involved, six beyond the Rim. At Starbase Tulsa new construction proceeded at capacity, concentrating on fighters and riders.
The methane breathers had not anticipated the utter ferocity of the onslaught, nor the suddenness with which it would come. In the seventh month they regained their balance enough to launch a limited counterstrike.
Six battle groups penetrated Canon space. Four thousand years of Outsider incursions made them predictable. The fleet was ready.
A group headed for Starbase found a Guardship waiting off the Barbican, supported by a quadruple complement of secondaries.
A group for D. Zimplica broke off the Web into a tunnel of death maintained by secondaries ferried in earlier.
Of the six groups only one succeeded. Only a few ships survived to scurry home.
— 97 —
Jo crawled out of the ruins the next morning, squandering her reserves in order to reach AnyKaat before she passed out again.
She made it.
"What the hell happened, Jo? You're all torn to shit."
"Ricochets. She never hit me solid."
"Could have fooled me. She? Who?"
"Provik's girlfriend. They were the other two. I got them all. We're safe."
AnyKaat laughed sickly. "Right. Two women shot to hell in a place where women are bitches and bitches are commercial property."
Jo did not argue. "Can you walk? They had a lot of good stuff. If we don't grab it, somebody else will. And maybe use it on us."
"I'll manage."
She did. The stuff was there. But what had become of the bodies?
— 98 —
When they brought Four in, she still had not recovered physically or mentally. The family, now including Seven, Eight, Nine, and Ten, and a new Three, took her information in an update and tried to remove her pain.
Afterward, Two told Lupo, "Blessed will be upset about Shike getting shot up."
"That was the risk he took, sending him out. But he'll patch up. I've seen Troqwai fix worse."
"You want to send someone to see if that AnyKaat woman survived?"
"No. If she did, she won't last. What we need to worry about is Four's trauma."
Two winced. No one would say it, or even wanted to think it, but the family had to decide if Four had been too badly damaged to be taken back. The meld had been agony. Four was convinced her ineptitude had killed Three and Five.
Two said, "It would have to be unanimous."
However much it might hurt, Lupo could not imagine his family being less than unanimous about anything.
— 99 —
WarAvocat felt old and tired. Was it time to step down?
VII Gemina had fortress-busting down to a mechanical routine. But each new system threw up a more hysterical defense. Nowadays he needed another two Guardships backing him.
He stared at a viewscreen showing a fortress he meant to kill. It was the biggest yet. And only one of five. The system was a sector capital.
VII Gemina came to rest with respect to its target. "Project the tube," WarAvocat directed.
Screen generators strained to produce a shaped field. Twelve modified riders moved into the expanding bubble, feeding it with their own shaped-shield generators till it expanded into a tunnel with its small end firmly against the fortress's screen.
"Loose the Hellspinners."
Hellspinners preferred the path of least resistance.
The Twist Masters cut loose. Hellspinners tumbled down the funnel and collided with the enemy screen. They gnawed through. After the Hellspinners splattered the fortress for several minutes WarAvocat introduced a pulse into their flow. Axial cannon CT shells flew. After those opened a pathway, thermonuclears followed, killing the fortress's shield.
WarAvocat moved to the next fortress. The other Guardships finished the first with their Hellspinners.
Systematic. Routine. Too much time left to think about the chain of chance that had brought VII Gemina here, point ship in a war no one understood but that looked likely to persist for years. VI Adjutrix's data had been incomplete.
There were a hundred gas giants, as reported, but VI Adjutrix had failed to mention the other species the colonial creatures dominated.
The Guardships focused on the methane breathers, but the other side's dying was done by subject species. WarAvocat hoped that with continued fleet successes the subject races would shift allegiances.
All this because VII Gemina had stumbled over a krekelen shapechanger.
WarAvocat smiled gently. Some House had set that up hoping to grab a Guardship. They had enlisted Outside help without realizing what they were getting. They would have lost VII Gemina instantly had they taken it.
The artifact crossed his thoughts. What had become of her? Had Haget caught the Ku? The Ku haunted him.
The new Haget was a staff officer with one of the ridership squadrons. Klass was in the pits, an apprentice Twist Master. The civilians were in storage.
Space behind VII Gemina turned purplish. The barrage pounding the fortress had sparked a self-sustaining Hellspinner reaction.
So damned tired. He really should consider stepping down.
— 100 —
Lupo asked, "Are you stupid, Szydlow?"
The Canon legate dropped the hand he had begun to extend.
"Five months ago we told you you would be given dockage only if you invoked Article Ninety-One. You did. But Ninety-One wasn't written to support the ambitions of itinerant bureaucrats. We've soaked you the limit for dockage and service fees, and we've refused you exit from your Traveler. No one will take your calls."
Szydlow sputtered.
"Don't sit down. I didn't invite you. We haven't been subtle. We don't want what you're selling. Go away. Stop taking up dock space. Your credentials have been rejected. You have no immunity. If I offed you, the Chair would pardon me." Lupo produced a hairsplitter. "Whump. The asshole quotient of the universe drops a point. Goodbye, Szydlow."
"I shouldn't have threatened him. I don't let people provoke me."
The Valerena said, "You don't scare his kind with threats. You frame them for child molesting. Bad press deflects career trajectories and destroys retirement points."
"Hoo! Should have thought of that. Frame him, try him, give him twenty years on a labor gang. I'll do it if he makes a pest of himself."
A year fled. Canon legate Szydlow returned to Capitola Primagenia. An expected tide of commerce raiders came and receded. The War had no impact on the lives of most people and little upon commerce. House Tregesser noticed it because Provik spent fortunes keeping track.