Admirals and generals did not have to endure the usual waiting
and decontamination procedures getting into Luna Command. The
security checks were abbreviated. No staff-grade officer had gone
sour since Admiral McGraw had turned freebooter following the peace
with Ulant. Admiral Beckhart entered his office just three hours
after his personal shuttle berthed a little south of the Sea of
Tranquility.
He had not spared the horses, in the vernacular of another age.
The mother had dropped hyper midway between Luna and L-5. The first
message he had received had been code-tagged, “Personal
presence required immediately. Critical.”
Either the bottom had dropped off of the universe or
McClennon and Storm had come home with their saddlebags dripping
delicious little secrets.
The Crew, as he called his hand-picked brain-trust, were in the
office when he arrived.
He raised a hand. “As you were. What have we
got?”
Jones asked, “You don’t want to shower and
change?”
Beckhart looked ragged. Almost seedy. Like a derelict costumed
as an Admiral.
“You clowns sent a Personal Presence, Critical. If
I’ve got time to shit, shower, and shave, you should’ve
said it was urgent.”
“Maybe we were hasty,” Namaguchi admitted.
“We’d just scanned the crypto breakdown. We were a
little excited.”
“Breakdown? What the hell’s going on?”
Beckhart tumbled into a huge chair behind a vast, gleaming wood
desk. “Get to the point, Akido.”
Namaguchi jerked out of his seat, flipped a square of manila
across the gleaming desk.
“Numbers. Your handwriting hasn’t
improved.”
“The Section’s doing up a printout. That, sir, is
what Storm had for us.”
“Well?”
“Morgan Standard Coordinate Data, sir. A stellar
designation. Took us two days to convert it from the Sangaree
system.”
“Sangaree? . . . Holy Christ! Is
it? . . . ”
“What we’ve been waiting for all our lives. Where to
find their home star.”
“Ah, god. Ah. It can’t be. Two hundred years
we’ve been looking. Cutting and dying and generally carrying
on like a gang of fascist assholes. So it paid off. I bet my butt
on a long shot and it paid off. Give me the comm. Somebody give me
the goddamn comm.”
Jones eased it across the desk. Beckhart punched furiously.
“Beckhart. Priority. Hey! I don’t give a damn if
he’s banging the Queen of Sheba. Personal, Critical, and
I’m going to have your ass for breakfast if you
don’t . . . Excuse me, sir.” His
manners improved dramatically.
“Yes, sir, it is. I want a confirmation of our position on
Memorandum of Permanent Policy and Procedure Number Four.
Specifically, Paragraph Six.”
A long silence ensued. Beckhart’s cronies leaned closer
and closer to their chief. The man on the other end finally said
something.
“Yes, sir. Absolutely. I have the data in my hand, sir.
Just decoded. Give me von Drachau and the First
Fleet . . . Yes, sir. What I want is a blank
check for a while. I can get started tomorrow.”
More silence.
Then, “Yes, sir. I thought so, sir. I understand, sir.
Thank you, sir.” Beckhart broke the connection. “He
wants to take it up with the Chiefs of Staff.”
“They’re going to back down now? After all the lives
we’ve spent?”
“Commander Jones. Do you realize the enormity of
what I just dumped on him? Let me draw you a picture. I interrupted
him while von Staufenberg was briefing him on what we saw
centerward. Which was about what we expected to see, and as pretty
as a barge loaded with dead babies. Some psychopathic race is doing
its damnedest to kill off anything sentient it can find. Then I
horn in and ask for a confirm on Memo Four slash Six. Which is a
vow to exterminate the Sangaree whenever we find out where the hell
they’re hiding their homeworld. We’re supposed to be
the good guys, Jones. The things he’s looking at right now
kind of tend to put the damper on the fires of that good old-time
anti-Sangaree righteousness.”
“I don’t see the problem, sir.”
“Pragmatically it doesn’t exist. Having seen
what’s going on centerward, I’d say Four slash Six is a
strategic imperative. We’ve got to get those bloodsuckers off
our backs fast. They ate us alive during the wars with Ulant and
Toke. Any time there’s a dust-up between non-Confederation
worlds they come on like jackals. Raidships in
swarms . . . Not to mention the price we pay in
stardust addiction. Hell, half the fleet is tied up protecting
shipping. Four slash Six would free those ships. And if we burned
the Sangaree, the McGraws would close up shop. Those are the
arguments in favor. Akido. Take the Devil’s
advocate.”
It was an old game. Namaguchi knew his commander well.
“Sir. How in God’s name can we go to the people of
Confederation—not to mention our allies—with the news
that we’ve destroyed a whole race? Just when we’re
about to pump them up with moral indignation so we can justify a
preemptive strike against a species we claim is guilty of the
identical sin? Let me understate, sir, and say that the positions
are inconsistent. Let me say, sir, that we’re on a quick
slide down into a moral cesspool. We would, quite simply, be the
biggest hypocrites this universe has ever seen.”
“Shit,” Jones responded with no great force.
“There isn’t one in a thousand of them would ever see
the inconsistency. They’ll cheer about the Sangaree going
down, then go sign up for the war against these centerward creeps.
Akido, you’re giving Mr. Average Man too much credit. He
can’t even follow his credit balance, let alone weigh a moral
one.”
“Charlie, that attitude is going to destroy Luna Command.
And when we go, Confederation goes. When Confederation goes, the
barbarians come in. In the words of the Roman Centurion Publius
Minutius, speaking of the legions, ‘We are the
Empire.’ ”
“Just a minute,” Beckhart interjected. “Akido.
Come over here.” He pushed the comm across the desk.
“Punch up the library and get me an abstract on this
Minutius.”
“Uh . . . ”
“I thought so. Another one of your out-of-the-dark
authorities.”
Namaguchi chuckled. It was a favorite trick. His boss was the
only man who caught him every time. “Actually, old Publius
probably said something more like, ‘Which way to the nearest
whorehouse, buddy?’ But I’ll stake my reputation on the
fact that some Roman soldier said it somewhere along the way. It
was true. The army was the Empire.”
“You don’t have any reputation to stake,
Akido,” Jones quipped.
“The army got a lot of help from the fact that everybody
in the provinces went along with a lot of tacit rules,
Akido,” Beckhart remarked. “We’re getting off the
subject. What about McClennon’s report?”
“They’re still working on it. First abstracts should
be up any time now. The key thing we’ve gotten is that the
Starfishers did go after Stars’ End. So you guessed right on
that one, too.”
“I didn’t guess. I had inside
information.”
“Whatever. That’s where Storm came up with the
Sangaree data. Raidships hit the harvestfleet there. They came out
on the short end. The point is, the Seiners were sure they could
pull it off. The battering the Sangaree gave them is what kept them
from trying.”
“How soon will those boys be done de-briefing? I want to
see them.”
Silence hit that room like a cat jumping on a mouse. It
stretched till it became an embarrassment.
“Well?”
“Uh . . . ”
“Not one of your more endearing traits, Akido. I
don’t need protecting. Out with it. Who got hurt? How bad was
it?”
“It’s not that. Sir, they didn’t come
back.”
“They’re dead? How did they? . . . ”
“They’re alive. But they crossed over.”
“They what?”
“Remember, McClennon was programed for it.”
“I know that. It was my idea. But he wasn’t supposed
to make a career out of it. He didn’t de-program? What the
hell was wrong with Storm? What’s his story? Why didn’t
he bring Thomas out?”
“We’re working on it, sir. Interrogating returnees.
When we can lay hands on them. They scattered after they hit
Carson’s, before we knew we had a problem. Near as we can
tell, Storm stayed behind because he didn’t want to leave
McClennon there alone. The programming must have broken down.
McClennon asked to stay. They kept Storm from bringing him
out.”
“I see. That would be like Mouse. Don’t leave your
wounded behind. He’s too much like his father. I knew Gneaus
Storm. When you get to the bottom line, it was his sense of honor
that got him killed. Well, I’ve got my honor too, even if
it’s a little discolored around the edges. I don’t
leave my wounded behind either. Akido, I want those boys brought
out.”
Jones snorted.
“Charles? What’s biting your ass?”
“I was just thinking that anybody who cared as much about
his troops as you put on wouldn’t have thrown them back in
the furnace before they’d cooled off from The Broken Wings.
And you hit them with that one before they’d cooled off
from . . . ”
“Hey! Charlie, it’s my conscience. I’m the one
who’s got to live with it.”
“Storm could handle it. He didn’t get the deep
Psych-briefings. But McClennon . . . You
probably overloaded the poor bastard. He was goofy at his best
times.”
“That’s enough. Right now, right here, we finish
crying about Storm and McClennon. That understood? We start
figuring out how to get them back. And in our spare time we worry
about the Four slash Six. And come bedtime, if you get tempted to
waste time sleeping, start figuring how we’re going to get a
hammerlock on the Starfishers before they get their hands on
Stars’ End.”
“Sir?” Namaguchi inquired.
“One of you clowns told me they were sure they could get
in. You know what happens if they do?”
“Sir?”
“We bend over and kiss our asses good-bye. Because
we’re dead. We can hope, but we’ll still be in the line
to the showers.”
“I don’t follow your reasoning this time.”
“You’re not looking at the whole picture, that’s
why. The gestalt, if that’s the right word. Look. If they get
those weapons before we do, they can tell us to go pound sand and
make it stick. We won’t get control of ambergris production,
meaning the Fleet will have to do without adequate instel
communications, meaning its chances against those centerward things
will go down to zit. They aren’t your candy-ass Ulantonids,
planning to give us a fair shake after they whip us.”
“On the other hand,” Namaguchi suggested, “if
we get the Fishers under the gun in time, we’ll not only be
able to equip the Fleet, we’ll have the potential of the
Stars’ End weaponry. Assuming it’s
adaptable.”
“There,” Beckhart told the others. “You see
why Akido is the Crown Prince around here. You take a stick and
whack on him long enough and he actually starts thinking.
Let’s do a little brainstorming, gentlemen. Along the lines
of turning our liabilities into assets.”
Jones suggested, “Regarding the Four slash Six paradox.
The right leak of the right info at the right time at the right
place might give Luna Command a public opinion base that would make
the kill a matter of popular demand. There are some real pros in
the Public Information
Office. They’ve done a hell of a job creating a climate of
trepidation with hints about trouble in the March. Suppose they let
a little truth wriggle out now? Just enough so people start asking
what kind of horror we’re covering up by giving our friends
from Ulant a bad press. There isn’t anything the public
won’t swallow quicker than a good conspiracy theory.
Especially a cover-up conspiracy.”
Beckhart chuckled. “What is this? Two brains working in
one room? At the same time? Gentlemen, that’s a first. So.
We’ve got a couple of things to work on. Will they let us
orchestrate the show?”
“Why don’t we just do it? It wouldn’t be the
first time.”
“But it could be the last. We’ve reached a
crossroads. We—and I mean everybody in Luna Command—are
going to have to fine-tune the Luna Command machine. It won’t
have the internal tolerance for playing games with each other. We
don’t have much time to get ready for this centerward race . . . That plan is simple. We’re going to hit them first, hit
them hard, and keep hitting them with everything we’ve
got.”
“The way Ulant did us?”
“Exactly. The Prime Defender’s General Staff is
doing the planning, based on their intelligence. She’ll
modify it daily, keeping as close to the realtime situation as she
can. We come up with something, it’ll be programed in. If the
centerward crowd do something unexpected, that’ll go in too.
They’ve sent out a whole fleet of self-destruct equipped,
instelled scout ships to keep track of what’s
happening.”
“Sir, that strategy didn’t work for Ulant
before.”
“It may not work this time, but it’s the best shot
we’ve got. Ulant’s intelligence analyses paint a pretty
grim picture. The numbers . . . You’ll
see the tapes. While you’re watching, remember that
you’re only seeing one battle fleet. Ulant has identified
another four. They just seem to skip from star to star behind a
swarm of scouts, coming out the Arm, scouring every inhabited world
of any sentient life.” The comm hummed. Beckhart stabbed it
with one finger. “Beckhart. Yes, sir.”
The sound was uni-directional, the picture flat-faced
television. The others could not hear, nor could they identify the
caller. After listening awhile, Beckhart said, “Very well,
sir,” in an unhappy tone. He punched out.
“That was the C.S.N.. They’ve decided to go with
Four slash Six. But they’re not going to let us run it. He
said they’ll use von Drachau, but R and D will have
operational control.”
“R and D? What the hell?”
“What have they got going over there? What don’t we
know?”
The comm hummed again. Beckhart answered, said,
“This one’s for you, Charlie.”
Jones sat on the edge of the vast desk, turned the comm his way.
“Go ahead.” In a few seconds his tall, lean, black
frame began quivering with excitement. “Good. All right.
Thank you.”
“Well?” Beckhart growled.
“One of my Electronic Intercept people. They just picked
up a message from the Starfisher Council to Confederation Senate.
Routine request for clearance to hold an ambergris auction. They
asked for The Broken Wings.
Usual rules and mutual obligations. The same request they send
whenever they hold auction on a Confederation world.”
“The Broken Wings is close to Stars’ End. Any other
reason to be excited?”
“Payne’s Fleet is going to sponsor.”
Beckhart stared at his hands for more than a minute. When he
looked up his expression had become beatific. “Gentlemen, the
gods love us after all. Cancel all leaves. Cancel any computation
capacity loans we have out. Pass the word that we’re going on
overtime. Everybody, including the janitors and shredder operators.
I’ve got a feeling we’ll find a rose in this dungheap
yet.” He laughed demoniacally. “Eyes open and ears to
the ground gentlemen. Everything that comes in from now
on—and I mean everything—goes into the master
program for correlation. And have the programming teams start
working backward. I want the biggest and best goddamned model
outside the High Command Strategic Analysis. Let’s see if we
can’t do this all up in one big, pretty package.”
Beckhart departed his desk and unlocked his personal bar. He
took out glasses and the half gallon of genuine Old Earth Scotch he
saved for occasions of millennial significance. “A toast to
successes and victories. Hopefully ours.” He poured
doubles.
Admirals and generals did not have to endure the usual waiting
and decontamination procedures getting into Luna Command. The
security checks were abbreviated. No staff-grade officer had gone
sour since Admiral McGraw had turned freebooter following the peace
with Ulant. Admiral Beckhart entered his office just three hours
after his personal shuttle berthed a little south of the Sea of
Tranquility.
He had not spared the horses, in the vernacular of another age.
The mother had dropped hyper midway between Luna and L-5. The first
message he had received had been code-tagged, “Personal
presence required immediately. Critical.”
Either the bottom had dropped off of the universe or
McClennon and Storm had come home with their saddlebags dripping
delicious little secrets.
The Crew, as he called his hand-picked brain-trust, were in the
office when he arrived.
He raised a hand. “As you were. What have we
got?”
Jones asked, “You don’t want to shower and
change?”
Beckhart looked ragged. Almost seedy. Like a derelict costumed
as an Admiral.
“You clowns sent a Personal Presence, Critical. If
I’ve got time to shit, shower, and shave, you should’ve
said it was urgent.”
“Maybe we were hasty,” Namaguchi admitted.
“We’d just scanned the crypto breakdown. We were a
little excited.”
“Breakdown? What the hell’s going on?”
Beckhart tumbled into a huge chair behind a vast, gleaming wood
desk. “Get to the point, Akido.”
Namaguchi jerked out of his seat, flipped a square of manila
across the gleaming desk.
“Numbers. Your handwriting hasn’t
improved.”
“The Section’s doing up a printout. That, sir, is
what Storm had for us.”
“Well?”
“Morgan Standard Coordinate Data, sir. A stellar
designation. Took us two days to convert it from the Sangaree
system.”
“Sangaree? . . . Holy Christ! Is
it? . . . ”
“What we’ve been waiting for all our lives. Where to
find their home star.”
“Ah, god. Ah. It can’t be. Two hundred years
we’ve been looking. Cutting and dying and generally carrying
on like a gang of fascist assholes. So it paid off. I bet my butt
on a long shot and it paid off. Give me the comm. Somebody give me
the goddamn comm.”
Jones eased it across the desk. Beckhart punched furiously.
“Beckhart. Priority. Hey! I don’t give a damn if
he’s banging the Queen of Sheba. Personal, Critical, and
I’m going to have your ass for breakfast if you
don’t . . . Excuse me, sir.” His
manners improved dramatically.
“Yes, sir, it is. I want a confirmation of our position on
Memorandum of Permanent Policy and Procedure Number Four.
Specifically, Paragraph Six.”
A long silence ensued. Beckhart’s cronies leaned closer
and closer to their chief. The man on the other end finally said
something.
“Yes, sir. Absolutely. I have the data in my hand, sir.
Just decoded. Give me von Drachau and the First
Fleet . . . Yes, sir. What I want is a blank
check for a while. I can get started tomorrow.”
More silence.
Then, “Yes, sir. I thought so, sir. I understand, sir.
Thank you, sir.” Beckhart broke the connection. “He
wants to take it up with the Chiefs of Staff.”
“They’re going to back down now? After all the lives
we’ve spent?”
“Commander Jones. Do you realize the enormity of
what I just dumped on him? Let me draw you a picture. I interrupted
him while von Staufenberg was briefing him on what we saw
centerward. Which was about what we expected to see, and as pretty
as a barge loaded with dead babies. Some psychopathic race is doing
its damnedest to kill off anything sentient it can find. Then I
horn in and ask for a confirm on Memo Four slash Six. Which is a
vow to exterminate the Sangaree whenever we find out where the hell
they’re hiding their homeworld. We’re supposed to be
the good guys, Jones. The things he’s looking at right now
kind of tend to put the damper on the fires of that good old-time
anti-Sangaree righteousness.”
“I don’t see the problem, sir.”
“Pragmatically it doesn’t exist. Having seen
what’s going on centerward, I’d say Four slash Six is a
strategic imperative. We’ve got to get those bloodsuckers off
our backs fast. They ate us alive during the wars with Ulant and
Toke. Any time there’s a dust-up between non-Confederation
worlds they come on like jackals. Raidships in
swarms . . . Not to mention the price we pay in
stardust addiction. Hell, half the fleet is tied up protecting
shipping. Four slash Six would free those ships. And if we burned
the Sangaree, the McGraws would close up shop. Those are the
arguments in favor. Akido. Take the Devil’s
advocate.”
It was an old game. Namaguchi knew his commander well.
“Sir. How in God’s name can we go to the people of
Confederation—not to mention our allies—with the news
that we’ve destroyed a whole race? Just when we’re
about to pump them up with moral indignation so we can justify a
preemptive strike against a species we claim is guilty of the
identical sin? Let me understate, sir, and say that the positions
are inconsistent. Let me say, sir, that we’re on a quick
slide down into a moral cesspool. We would, quite simply, be the
biggest hypocrites this universe has ever seen.”
“Shit,” Jones responded with no great force.
“There isn’t one in a thousand of them would ever see
the inconsistency. They’ll cheer about the Sangaree going
down, then go sign up for the war against these centerward creeps.
Akido, you’re giving Mr. Average Man too much credit. He
can’t even follow his credit balance, let alone weigh a moral
one.”
“Charlie, that attitude is going to destroy Luna Command.
And when we go, Confederation goes. When Confederation goes, the
barbarians come in. In the words of the Roman Centurion Publius
Minutius, speaking of the legions, ‘We are the
Empire.’ ”
“Just a minute,” Beckhart interjected. “Akido.
Come over here.” He pushed the comm across the desk.
“Punch up the library and get me an abstract on this
Minutius.”
“Uh . . . ”
“I thought so. Another one of your out-of-the-dark
authorities.”
Namaguchi chuckled. It was a favorite trick. His boss was the
only man who caught him every time. “Actually, old Publius
probably said something more like, ‘Which way to the nearest
whorehouse, buddy?’ But I’ll stake my reputation on the
fact that some Roman soldier said it somewhere along the way. It
was true. The army was the Empire.”
“You don’t have any reputation to stake,
Akido,” Jones quipped.
“The army got a lot of help from the fact that everybody
in the provinces went along with a lot of tacit rules,
Akido,” Beckhart remarked. “We’re getting off the
subject. What about McClennon’s report?”
“They’re still working on it. First abstracts should
be up any time now. The key thing we’ve gotten is that the
Starfishers did go after Stars’ End. So you guessed right on
that one, too.”
“I didn’t guess. I had inside
information.”
“Whatever. That’s where Storm came up with the
Sangaree data. Raidships hit the harvestfleet there. They came out
on the short end. The point is, the Seiners were sure they could
pull it off. The battering the Sangaree gave them is what kept them
from trying.”
“How soon will those boys be done de-briefing? I want to
see them.”
Silence hit that room like a cat jumping on a mouse. It
stretched till it became an embarrassment.
“Well?”
“Uh . . . ”
“Not one of your more endearing traits, Akido. I
don’t need protecting. Out with it. Who got hurt? How bad was
it?”
“It’s not that. Sir, they didn’t come
back.”
“They’re dead? How did they? . . . ”
“They’re alive. But they crossed over.”
“They what?”
“Remember, McClennon was programed for it.”
“I know that. It was my idea. But he wasn’t supposed
to make a career out of it. He didn’t de-program? What the
hell was wrong with Storm? What’s his story? Why didn’t
he bring Thomas out?”
“We’re working on it, sir. Interrogating returnees.
When we can lay hands on them. They scattered after they hit
Carson’s, before we knew we had a problem. Near as we can
tell, Storm stayed behind because he didn’t want to leave
McClennon there alone. The programming must have broken down.
McClennon asked to stay. They kept Storm from bringing him
out.”
“I see. That would be like Mouse. Don’t leave your
wounded behind. He’s too much like his father. I knew Gneaus
Storm. When you get to the bottom line, it was his sense of honor
that got him killed. Well, I’ve got my honor too, even if
it’s a little discolored around the edges. I don’t
leave my wounded behind either. Akido, I want those boys brought
out.”
Jones snorted.
“Charles? What’s biting your ass?”
“I was just thinking that anybody who cared as much about
his troops as you put on wouldn’t have thrown them back in
the furnace before they’d cooled off from The Broken Wings.
And you hit them with that one before they’d cooled off
from . . . ”
“Hey! Charlie, it’s my conscience. I’m the one
who’s got to live with it.”
“Storm could handle it. He didn’t get the deep
Psych-briefings. But McClennon . . . You
probably overloaded the poor bastard. He was goofy at his best
times.”
“That’s enough. Right now, right here, we finish
crying about Storm and McClennon. That understood? We start
figuring out how to get them back. And in our spare time we worry
about the Four slash Six. And come bedtime, if you get tempted to
waste time sleeping, start figuring how we’re going to get a
hammerlock on the Starfishers before they get their hands on
Stars’ End.”
“Sir?” Namaguchi inquired.
“One of you clowns told me they were sure they could get
in. You know what happens if they do?”
“Sir?”
“We bend over and kiss our asses good-bye. Because
we’re dead. We can hope, but we’ll still be in the line
to the showers.”
“I don’t follow your reasoning this time.”
“You’re not looking at the whole picture, that’s
why. The gestalt, if that’s the right word. Look. If they get
those weapons before we do, they can tell us to go pound sand and
make it stick. We won’t get control of ambergris production,
meaning the Fleet will have to do without adequate instel
communications, meaning its chances against those centerward things
will go down to zit. They aren’t your candy-ass Ulantonids,
planning to give us a fair shake after they whip us.”
“On the other hand,” Namaguchi suggested, “if
we get the Fishers under the gun in time, we’ll not only be
able to equip the Fleet, we’ll have the potential of the
Stars’ End weaponry. Assuming it’s
adaptable.”
“There,” Beckhart told the others. “You see
why Akido is the Crown Prince around here. You take a stick and
whack on him long enough and he actually starts thinking.
Let’s do a little brainstorming, gentlemen. Along the lines
of turning our liabilities into assets.”
Jones suggested, “Regarding the Four slash Six paradox.
The right leak of the right info at the right time at the right
place might give Luna Command a public opinion base that would make
the kill a matter of popular demand. There are some real pros in
the Public Information
Office. They’ve done a hell of a job creating a climate of
trepidation with hints about trouble in the March. Suppose they let
a little truth wriggle out now? Just enough so people start asking
what kind of horror we’re covering up by giving our friends
from Ulant a bad press. There isn’t anything the public
won’t swallow quicker than a good conspiracy theory.
Especially a cover-up conspiracy.”
Beckhart chuckled. “What is this? Two brains working in
one room? At the same time? Gentlemen, that’s a first. So.
We’ve got a couple of things to work on. Will they let us
orchestrate the show?”
“Why don’t we just do it? It wouldn’t be the
first time.”
“But it could be the last. We’ve reached a
crossroads. We—and I mean everybody in Luna Command—are
going to have to fine-tune the Luna Command machine. It won’t
have the internal tolerance for playing games with each other. We
don’t have much time to get ready for this centerward race . . . That plan is simple. We’re going to hit them first, hit
them hard, and keep hitting them with everything we’ve
got.”
“The way Ulant did us?”
“Exactly. The Prime Defender’s General Staff is
doing the planning, based on their intelligence. She’ll
modify it daily, keeping as close to the realtime situation as she
can. We come up with something, it’ll be programed in. If the
centerward crowd do something unexpected, that’ll go in too.
They’ve sent out a whole fleet of self-destruct equipped,
instelled scout ships to keep track of what’s
happening.”
“Sir, that strategy didn’t work for Ulant
before.”
“It may not work this time, but it’s the best shot
we’ve got. Ulant’s intelligence analyses paint a pretty
grim picture. The numbers . . . You’ll
see the tapes. While you’re watching, remember that
you’re only seeing one battle fleet. Ulant has identified
another four. They just seem to skip from star to star behind a
swarm of scouts, coming out the Arm, scouring every inhabited world
of any sentient life.” The comm hummed. Beckhart stabbed it
with one finger. “Beckhart. Yes, sir.”
The sound was uni-directional, the picture flat-faced
television. The others could not hear, nor could they identify the
caller. After listening awhile, Beckhart said, “Very well,
sir,” in an unhappy tone. He punched out.
“That was the C.S.N.. They’ve decided to go with
Four slash Six. But they’re not going to let us run it. He
said they’ll use von Drachau, but R and D will have
operational control.”
“R and D? What the hell?”
“What have they got going over there? What don’t we
know?”
The comm hummed again. Beckhart answered, said,
“This one’s for you, Charlie.”
Jones sat on the edge of the vast desk, turned the comm his way.
“Go ahead.” In a few seconds his tall, lean, black
frame began quivering with excitement. “Good. All right.
Thank you.”
“Well?” Beckhart growled.
“One of my Electronic Intercept people. They just picked
up a message from the Starfisher Council to Confederation Senate.
Routine request for clearance to hold an ambergris auction. They
asked for The Broken Wings.
Usual rules and mutual obligations. The same request they send
whenever they hold auction on a Confederation world.”
“The Broken Wings is close to Stars’ End. Any other
reason to be excited?”
“Payne’s Fleet is going to sponsor.”
Beckhart stared at his hands for more than a minute. When he
looked up his expression had become beatific. “Gentlemen, the
gods love us after all. Cancel all leaves. Cancel any computation
capacity loans we have out. Pass the word that we’re going on
overtime. Everybody, including the janitors and shredder operators.
I’ve got a feeling we’ll find a rose in this dungheap
yet.” He laughed demoniacally. “Eyes open and ears to
the ground gentlemen. Everything that comes in from now
on—and I mean everything—goes into the master
program for correlation. And have the programming teams start
working backward. I want the biggest and best goddamned model
outside the High Command Strategic Analysis. Let’s see if we
can’t do this all up in one big, pretty package.”
Beckhart departed his desk and unlocked his personal bar. He
took out glasses and the half gallon of genuine Old Earth Scotch he
saved for occasions of millennial significance. “A toast to
successes and victories. Hopefully ours.” He poured
doubles.