The siege record was poor. Down and Hssin were the only clear victories.
The assault on Down had been a massive surprise attack on a world whose star was so small that its singularity extended only to eighteen AU, less than the distance to Uranus. It was an anomalous outpost, sitting well inside human space, farther from Kzin than any other known world of the Patriarchy, poorly supplied, lightly taxed, underdeveloped and underpopulated. Still the warriors there had destroyed a quarter of the human fleet sent against them before being exterminated.
Yankee listened patiently. An officer whose place was held by a charging armored battle-elephant of the finest carved ivory began reminiscing about his elite unit’s landing on Down while he neglected his plum chicken—but not his slivovitz. “I was caught in the tower with no way to get down and my best cover man was blown ass overhead into the canal where he was stuck in his disabled armor. He couldn’t run so he just sat there popping off every ratcat as they jumped over the canal while I was shitting bricks because if they got him, I was dead meat. He swatted about a dozen of them, one by one, coming over the rise because they couldn’t see him.”
Yankee was reminded of the gambler who enthusiastically gave his audience a blow-by-blow account of how he won a hundred “big ones” early that morning—while forgetting to tell them about the thousand “big ones” he had just dropped at the tables. The kill ratio on the ground at Down had been three men for each kzin. Victors don’t remember details like that.
Down had been considered important because it was behind human lines. That was nonsense. It had zero strategic importance. Probably it had been a target of frustration. None of the bigger worlds were falling, so get the weakest one.
On the other hand, the conquest of Hssin in 2422 had been an absolute necessity. It was only two light years from Wunderland and 5.3 light years from Sol and had been the original staging area of the kzinti thrust at humanity’s heart. Theoretically it made an easy target. R’hshssira was a failed star with a singularity that extended out only eight AU, less than the distance to Saturn. Alpha Centauri was a mere week away by hypershunt, an optimal staging area from which to supply the assault. Yet fierce Hssin warriors managed to destroy a third of the UNSN fleet before the Wunderland marines were able to carve out their first beachhead.
Thirteen years on the offensive. Two victories. Thousands of kzinti starships destroyed in interstellar space. Hundreds of raids. Dozens of unsuccessful sieges. Stalemate. The MacDonald-Rishshi Peace Treaty had given both sides what they needed. The Patriarchy needed a breathing space. Humanity needed to stop beating its head against a stonewall. To call it a human victory was wishful thinking.
What humanity wasn’t doing was using the time that the Treaty gave them.
The dinner served its purpose. It reconvinced the hosts that they had won the war and were maintaining the peace. It convinced Major Clandeboye that he wasn’t going to get to Hssin by orthodox means. His hosts were gentlemen. Having been victorious over their guest verbally, they toasted him with Verguuz. He raised his glass, too, wondering who these cardboard men were. They had no substance. He was never going to get to know them. It left him with a kind of desperate despair.
When men are desperate they wander alone, deep in thought. Yankee took the long way home. He was already outside his apartment door before he noticed that Chloe was waiting for him, huddled on the hallway’s red carpet, arms around her legs. “Chloe!” He stuck his thumb in the lock and it opened. “Hi,” she said. She followed him inside.
“It’s past your bedtime, young lady.”
“Good idea,” she replied demurely, “let’s go to bed.” With the tiniest of smiles she watched the shock hit his face. She waited just exactly the right amount of time.
“Gotcha!” she triumphed. Then with a bob of her springy black hair she went to his console and called up the codes for a tinkly kind of beating music that he didn’t understand. “Cornucopia,” she said byway of explanation. He didn’t understand that either.
“Where’s Brobding?” was all he could think to ask.
“I never go out with a man again after he’s let me ‘tuck the George.’ How could I ever respect him?”
“Uh… what was that? I think I missed something.”
“What’s the flatlander word for it?” she asked in a tone that left him wondering if he was being teased or not.
“I think I should be taking you home.”
“You’re saying that through clenched jaws. I think you need a relaxing massage… all the way down your back to your bum.”
“Strangling a few people I know is the only thing that would relax me right now,” he growled. Since he was looking directly into her eyes she became momentarily frightened. That upset him to the point of hasty denial. “Not you!” He laughed at himself to put her at ease. “Actually you have a pretty neck. Breaking would ruin it. What I mean is: I don’t need a massage. What I need is to get you home before it is too late… before your curfew.”
“I just got here. You’re throwing me out already?”
“Yes.”
“No. I’m here to interview you for the school paper. You have to tell me about the mutiny. I’m writing you up.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Then could we take a shower together instead?”
“Young lady, I have to tell you something about myself. I don’t need any more trouble. I’m up to a giraffe’s eyeballs in zoo-doo already.”
“What’s a giraffe?”
“It’s just an expression. An extinct animal, I think.”
“I’m no trouble. I swear I’ve never ever gotten a man pregnant; cross my heart.”
“Your father is probably a chief petty officer with shoulders this wide. Petty officers enjoy making pulp out of me. They’re not supposed to hit majors, but with me they get away with it—and I get blamed. It looks terrible on my record.”
“That’s all very well and good but my father is not a petty officer. He’s a rear admiral.”
Yankee grabbed for her wrist “Young lady, you are going home right now!”
“No-I’m-not!”
“Yes you are.”
“Nope.”
“I may carry you every millimeter of the way.”
“In that case it’s a deal. But we have to take a long detour so you can buy me an ice cream. There isn’t any good ice cream place between here and home.”
“If that’s the best deal I can get.”
So he took her home and bought her ice cream. He asked her if her father ever worried about her. He was too busy, she replied. Well, didn’t her mother ever worry about her? No. Chloe was born on Tiamat just months before a mob liberated it from the kzinti during the Great Battle. Her mother was an axe-wielding member of the mob and had been killed. Chloe still wore her iron wedding ring on a chain about her neck.
“Ah, so you’re all of sixteen,” he said gently.
“No. I’m going-on-seventeen,” she replied stiffly.
Yankee was quite willing to drop her at her door and run but she dragged him inside to meet her father. “Daddy! I got him! Don’t blame me if it took all night! He wasn’t home!” In a quieter voice to Yankee she said, “Now you’ll have to tell me about the mutiny. Daddy’s going to wring it out of you.”
A bony but handsome Wunderlander appeared in a spidersilk bathrobe. He shook hands in the old flatlander custom. “I see you survived my little teufel. She was raving about you at breakfast this morning. The Clandeboye. I think it was a diversion so I wouldn’t question her about that no-good crashlander she’s taken a fancy to, but no matter. I decided it was time we met.”