“Marlowe, are there any more vultures closing on us?” Kennedy asked suddenly.
“Or is this batch all of them?”
“Uh…” Marlowe frowned at his displays, fingers dancing over his console. “I don’t track any more coming this way, no.”
“Then I don’t think we’ve got a problem.” She swiveled around. “Captain, the Scapa Flow’s got netting equipment aboard. We can cut them loose, send them ahead to clear out the optical net, and link up with them again before we Jump.”
Roman shifted his attention to Ferrol. “Possible?”
Ferrol hesitated, then nodded. “It should be, yes,” he said slowly. “But not unless Sso-ngu can get Sleipnir to kill some of this acceleration.”
Roman nodded, feeling the tension ease somewhat. The problem wasn’t gone, but at least their deadline for action was extended somewhat. “Did you hear that, Rrinsaa?”
he called. “You and Sso-ngu have got to get Sleipnir back under control.”
“We will try, Rro-maa.”
“Good. Ferrol, alert your people on the Scapa Flow; we’ll want them to move as soon as they can.”
“Yes, sir,” Ferrol said, an odd expression flicking across his face before he turned back to his console.
Roman turned his attention back to the vultures. They were nearly in position now… and even as he watched the acceleration pressing him into his seat abruptly eased, and then vanished.
“Rro-maa? Sleipnninni is no longer in perasiata.”
“Thank you, Sso-ngu.” Roman looked at Ferrol. “Pop the tether line and tell the Scapa Flow to go,” he ordered the other. “Kennedy, check and see if we’re going to have any trouble Jumping from this deep in the gravity well.”
“Already checked, sir,” she said. “We’re a little close, but shouldn’t have any major problems. Our best bet will be the Toru system; recommend we Jump there and alert Prepyat and Earth via tachyon.”
And while the Starforce scrambled a task force they would have time to get into position for the next Jump. “Sounds good,” he nodded. He glanced at Ferrol—
And paused for a second look. The other was still sitting facing him, ignoring his console. “Ferrol? What’s the trouble?”
Ferrol swallowed visibly, a strangely haunted look in his eyes. “No trouble, sir.”
“Then get the Scapa Flow going.” He turned back to Kennedy—
“No, sir.”
Roman looked back. “No?” he asked, very quietly.
Ferrol’s eyes flicked to Kennedy as his hand dipped into a pocket and withdrew an envelope. “Captain Roman,” he said, his voice abruptly formal, “pursuant to the Senate carte blanche directive contained in this envelope—” He took a deep breath.
“I hereby relieve you of command.”
Chapter 28
It had been a moment Ferrol had thought about ever since coming aboard the Amity, a moment he’d thought about, and worried about, and occasionally dreamed about. A moment that had been part of the background of his mind for over a year now.
A moment that, with all that preparation, surely ought to have been easier.
The bridge was deathly silent, even the occasional clicks and beeps of recording and sensing instruments sounding muted to him. The crewers were silent, too, for the most part frozen in place like so many statues. Ferrol kept the bulk of his attention on Roman, forcing himself to meet the other’s eyes as he fought back the strange sense of guilt and shame and waited tautly for the inevitable explosion of disbelief and rage.
The explosion never came. “May I see that?” the captain asked calmly, extending a hand toward Ferrol.
Swallowing hard, Ferrol unstrapped and floated across to the other, planting one foot into a velgrip patch. Roman took the envelope, glanced once at the Senator’s handwriting on its face, and opened it. Withdrawing the paper inside, throwing a speculative look at Ferrol as he did so, he began to read.
Ferrol licked his upper lip, his eyes darting around the bridge. This was the critical moment, the moment when the entire thing hung by a thread. If Roman refused to accept the Senate directive—if he refused to relinquish his command—
His darting glance touched Kennedy… and froze there.
He licked his lip again, the knot in his stomach tightening painfully as all of the Senator’s veiled warnings about Kennedy flooded back at once. The most dangerous person on the Amity, he’d called her… and as Ferrol looked into those eyes—those rock-hard eyes, gazing unblinkingly straight back at him—he had no doubt whatsoever that the Senator had been right.
He took a careful breath, suddenly and acutely aware of the flat bulge of the needle gun pressing into his ribs beneath his tunic. You’ll be able to handle her, the Senator had assured him; but gazing into those eyes, Ferrol wasn’t nearly so sure of that. If she was indeed a trained professional, his only chance would be to make sure he shot first.
From Roman came a faint rustle of paper; with an odd combination of relief and reluctance, Ferrol broke his gaze from Kennedy and looked back at the captain. “I presume,” the other said, almost conversationally, “that you have some explanation for this.” He waved the paper gently.
“I believe the directive is self-explanatory,” Ferrol told him.
“The directive itself is quite clear, yes,” Roman agreed coolly. “I was referring to the reason you’ve chosen this particular moment to invoke it.”
Ferrol took a deep breath. “I’m not here for a debate, Captain,” he said, fighting against a quaver in his voice. This was hard enough without Roman dragging out the discussion. “The only question you need to consider at the moment is whether you’re going to obey that directive. Yes or no.”
Once again he braced himself for an explosion… and once again the explosion didn’t come. Roman gazed expressionlessly at him for a long moment; then, with only a touch of hesitation, he keyed his intercom. “All crewers: this is Captain Roman,” he said, his eyes steady on Ferrol. “As of this moment, per a Senate directive… I’m relinquishing command of the Amity to Commander Ferrol.”
He keyed off and, releasing his restraints, pulled himself out of the command chair.
“Your orders, Captain?” he asked Ferrol.
Ferrol looked down at the empty command chair, fighting back the acrid surge of shame rumbling through his stomach and wishing bitterly that Roman would at least show some resentment over what had just been done to him. To humiliate a captain in front of his crew this way was a horrible thing to do to any man; to do it to someone who accepted the blow uncomplainingly was absolute hell.
But on the other hand, that sense of guilt might be exactly what Roman was going for. Steeling himself, Ferrol pulled off the velgrip patch and eased himself into the command chair. It felt damned awkward; but if there was one thing he’d learned from the Senator, it was that appearances and symbols were important aspects of command. “Marlowe; status report on the sharks,” he said, keying for scanner repeater.
“They’re still coming,” the other growled.
“Their ETA to the corral?”
“At current acceleration, and assuming a comparable deceleration phase, about two hours.”
Two hours. For a moment Ferrol studied the tactical display. The three Tampy space horses were still giving ground; but the display now showed two more vectoring in toward the defenders from behind and upslope, and even as he watched a third Jumped into view. The rest of the Tampy empire, clearly alerted to the threat, throwing everything they had left into the Kialinninni system in a desperate effort to defend their corral.
Exposing the rest of their space horses to the attacking sharks… and in the process completing the total destruction of their space-going capabilities.
It was, perhaps, the last irony. For nine straight years now Ferrol had dreamed of playing a part in the Tampies’ downfall; had hatched scheme after grandiose scheme designed to drive them from space and to pay them back in full for their cold-blooded theft of his world. And now, after all that planning, they were going to do the job all by themselves. By themselves, with a little help from the cycles of nature they professed such love for.