Battle of the Ring (30 page)

“You see, I do take you at your word,” Trace explained. “I
do consider it very likely that you will either escape or die in the attempt.
This way, if you do part from our company, you will leave what I need behind.
What do you think, Doc? A hand?”

“Yes, that is one item he has in redundant quantities,”
Wriestler agreed, regarding his subject appraisingly. Although far shorter than
Donalt Trace, his thin, lanky frame made him appear taller than he actually
was. “Yes, a hand would be quite sufficient. Which one do you favor?”

“I am quadrilateral ambidextrous,” Velmeran explained, trying to
look more nervous about the prospect than he actually was. “There is,
however, an iarbitrary order of importance. I should miss the lower left the
least of any.”

“So be it,” Wriestler agreed. He took the hand in question,
twisting the cuff to remove the glove. “Will you require any medical
attention?”

“None at all. There will be no bleeding, since veins and arteries seal
automatically, and healing will be complete in a few hours.”

“If you will allow me, I have my suspicions about Starwolf
reflexes,” Trace interrupted. He had Velmeran to sit down on the floor,
his wrist extended, then instructed one of the sentries by the door to brace
both of its forelegs atop the armored sleeve. Wriestler regarded this procedure
questioningly, but wasted no time as he adjusted the setting on the laser
scalpel to maximum intensity.

There was a loud electric snap and the sentry somersaulted to land heavily
on its back. Velmeran drew back his arm, swearing in his own language, but the
pain faded almost immediately; Kelvessan nervous systems included a feedback
mechanism that blocked unnecessary pain. By the time he looked up, Wriestler
had already transferred the hand to the suspension box and was setting the
controls. Trace was watching the uncertain movements of the sentry, undamaged
but unable to raise itself without help.

“Are you all right, little fellow?” Wriestler inquired
professionally, taking the injured wrist to look inside the open sleeve. He
looked surprised and approving. “My, it really is healing up in a hurry.
You people are remarkable.”

“Take care of that,” Trace said as the physician quickly packed
up his supplies. “That hand means more to the final defeat of the
Starwolves than this entire ship.”

Wriestler made some impatient gesture of assurance as he pushed the cart out
the door. Trace frowned, obviously displeased with the physician’s
indifference at what was to him a very important occasion. A threatening
gesture from the sentries alerted him to the fact that Velmeran had risen and
was returning to his stool. His almost festive mood returned instantly.

“I’m glad that you could give me a hand,” he remarked
glibly as he took his own seat, as if he expected Velmeran to appreciate his
attempt at humor. He shrugged. “I do hate to see you so dejected,
although I can hardly blame you for that. I guess that I was expecting to find
the friend I last saw in that cafe in Vannkarn.”

Velmeran glanced up at him. “What did you expect? This is business,
remember?”

“As you say, this is business,” Trace agreed. “Oh, hating
you and plotting dire revenge enlivened those endless weeks while they made and
installed new pieces of my back, and those endless months of pain while I
learned to use those new parts. But, when it was all over, I realized that I
hurt you worse than you had hurt me. Now it seems that I’ve hurt you
again, and I honestly regret that.”

“Why did you not die?” Velmeran muttered.

Trace laughed ironically. “Pure perversity, I assure you. Listen to
me, Starwolf. We both have our duty. You have to destroy my fine, big ship, and
I mean to destroy yours. I think that only one of us will succeed, and I do
seem to be winning. I thought it was a purely human failing to imagine your
enemies as cruel monsters devoted to the service of evil. I assure you that I
am an honest man.”

Velmeran glanced at him sharply. “The honest man who dropped a bomb on
a city just to get my attention. It seems to me that you are the very monster
you describe.”

Trace shrugged indifferently. “It is of small consequence. You see,
young Richart is a more practical man than Jon ever was. He’s impatient
with sending invasion forces to take planets, only to have them freed by
Starwolves. He’s instituted a new policy, one that even I find a bit severe.
Just now, there are six conversion devices in orbit over Tryalna, four equally
spaced in equatorial orbit and two in polar. The explosion would blast away the
air, seas, and rip off at least a few kilometers of the surface itself, caught
in the center of a concussion like that. The way I see it, the entire
population of that world lives on my sufferance now. I simply called a small
portion of that debt due.”

“You are a monster,” the Starwolf said, shaking his head slowly.

Commander Trace’s calm indifference broke suddenly, turning with
frightening speed to self-righteous fury. “Damn it, you four-armed freak,
I’m trying to save my race and my civilization. Can’t you see that
our only hope is in the firm hand of a strong government to enforce selective
sterilization on large segments of a dying population?”

“No, because that is not your only hope,” Velmeran insisted.
“There is a much easier way. In our worlds, the human population has
already begun a program of voluntary screening of genetic defects at the time
of artificial insemination. No genetic tampering is allowed, just a deletion of
the faulty genetic variables so that the sound genetic variables have a better
chance. That protects the complete freedom and individuality of the offspring.
And it allows the positive aspects of evolution to remain in effect so that the
race does not stagnate. In fact, five hundred years should completely eliminate
the overload of genetic defects that have accumulated. And potential parents
are very eager to make use of genetic screening, when the alternative is a
forty percent chance of some mental or physical defect.”

Donalt Trace sat in silence for a long moment as he considered that. His one
virtue was that he was indeed an honest man. But fairness and honesty were by
no means the same thing; he knew that he was not always fair, and he was less
fair than he believed himself to be. He proved just that.

“You are right on one thing,” he agreed. “That is a
simpler, more effective idea. I’m sure our planners thought of that and
rejected it. Your mistake must be in thinking that we are too backward and
shortsighted to know better. You and I both know that we intend to eventually
breed whole races of workers designed for specific tasks.

“I know all about this great democracy that your Republic values so
highly. Wonderful theory, but it works only on paper. It is a shaky, effectual
form of government at best. Man was barely able to govern himself at his
height; he certainly cannot now, in the days of his decline. The fact remains
that there is an inherent flaw in any system that tries to reciprocate
political power back into society at large. Power is used effectively when it
is concentrated into the hands of those who have been trained to use it. And do
not think that the sector families look upon our civilization as a society of
slaves to serve us. We are not the masters. We serve just as anyone else, and
we have bred ourselves thousands of years to be what we are.”

Velmeran sighed at the hopelessness of the situation. “Donalt Trace, I
did not come all this way to discuss philosophy with a tyrant. But I will tell
you this. I am in control of this situation. I will escape, and I will destroy
this ship in the process. And if you want to escape with your own life, you
will abandon this ship within the next half hour.”

Trace only laughed. “You sound so sure of yourself, you almost have me
worried. Unfortunately for you, I do know the value of a good bluff.”

He paused as his communicator beeped imperiously, and held the small device
to his ear for private listening.

“Right away,” he responded tersely before putting away the
device. He turned back to his prisoner. “I have to go up to the bridge
for a while. I know that you won’t mind me leaving you in such fine
company.”

“Not at all.”

He turned to the sentries. “If he so much as gets off the stool, you
are to shoot to kill. Is that understood?”

“Understood,” the sentries agreed in a ragged chorus, including
the one still lying on the floor. Trace left, locking them inside the room.

Nearly three-quarters of an hour later, Lenna Makayen was concluding her
sixth act of judicious sabotage. She would have liked to have done more, but
she was running out of time. Lieutenant Skerri stood well to one side, watching
her closely. His obvious concern told her that she must be doing something very
right. He had been very reluctant to cooperate, but he also had shown very
little tolerance for the minor beating he had received at her hands. Bill, the
sentry, stood at the door leading into the weapons chamber, watching his
prisoner while he listened down the hall. His electronic patience was
inexhaustible.

“There’s the last one, all set,” she said to herself with
satisfaction.

“Damn it, don’t you appreciate the seriousness of what
you’re doing?” Skerri demanded, resuming their previous argument.
“Sabotage of a Union warship is a very serious crime. You would do well
to give yourself up now.”

“I would, now? And why is that?”

“Because what you’ve done is more than illegal, it’s
treasonous!” he declared. “You’re obviously not a Starwolf,
but you are in league with them. Your crime is punishable by death. You should
surrender yourself immediately and accept your punishment.”

Lenna set down her socket wrench to stare at him. “That has to be the
most damned foolish, illogical argument I’ve ever heard. ‘Give
yourself up, and we’ll thank you before we kill you.’ You’re
in no position to make threats, boy.”

She turned back to her work of securing the inner access plates, hurrying
now because she was afraid that it might be getting late. She had a long trip
back to her fighter yet. She had no desire to be inside this ship when the
Methryn attacked, especially after her own tampering.

“Where are you from?” Skerri asked almost politely.

“Scotland,” she snapped.

“Sounds like a frontier planet.”

“It is. Named after Sir Walter Scott, the first colonist.”

“How did you happen to fall in with Starwolves?”

“Answered an advertisement in the paper, just like everyone,”
she replied absently.

“But why?”

She afforded him another of those impatient stares. “Because I think
your Union sucks rotten eggs. At least my new friends don’t pitch nuclear
missiles at defenseless planets just to get your attention.”

Skerri remained silent, lacking a ready answer for that. His arguments were
not going very well, so he finally admitted to himself that he was not going to
convince this girl to surrender. Instead he now thought it best to allow her to
conclude her business so that she would let him go in time to warn the ship
about the damage she had done. He really was a trusting soul, and not
particularly bright.

“You will be leaving when you finish here?” he asked guardedly.

“Of course. And you...” She paused to look at him. “I
can’t take you with me, and I certainly can’t just let you go. I
really cannot risk your getting free if I left you tied up somewhere, and
you’ll be dead soon enough anyway.”

She looked over at Bill, and Skerri knew that she meant to have the renegade
sentry shoot him. Lenna turned back to her work unconcerned, but he watched the
motionless sentry. After a moment the machine moved for the first time since
they had arrived, turning its head to look out the door.

“The lift door just opened,” Bill reported. “I also hear a
sentry approaching from the other direction.”

“Check it out, Bill,” Lenna told him. “I can keep an eye
on Captain Dauntless. I’ll blow his head off if he makes a sound.”

Although she had been addressing the sentry, Lieutenant Skerri was quite
aware that her final statement had been for his benefit. Nor did he doubt that
she meant it, and he had nothing to lose except a couple of minutes off a
severely limited life expectancy. As soon as Lenna returned to her work of
securing the outer access panel, he launched himself directly at her. She saw
him coming at the very last moment and threw herself well to one side,
unfortunately in the opposite direction of the gun that she had laid handy on
top of the launch tube. Skerri knocked the gun off the top of the tube as he
landed against it, and it disappeared into the shadows beyond.

The two combatants came off the floor at the same time, ready for battle.
Lenna had three distinct advantages: she was much stronger, quicker, and Skerri
was under the mistaken impression that both of those advantages were his. She
was more than a match for him, at least until he snatched up the long-handled
socket wrench. That put her on the defensive from the start.

Skerri advanced menacingly, swinging the wrench in a wide horizontal sweep
as if it were a club or battleax. Lenna avoided it easily, but his tactic
was simple; each swing drove her half a meter toward the wall at her back.
After the second attempt she followed his swings with a quick rabbit punch to
the jaw. Skerri endured three of these dizzying punches before changing his
tactics, lifting his swing high enough to make her duck. While bent over, she
delivered one more vicious punch to his stomach, ducked under his arm, and
followed with a joint-snapping two-fisted thump in the middle of his back. The
combination so thoroughly knocked the wind out of him that he nearly passed out
and was forced to retreat.

Skerri returned to the battle with a little more respect for his opponent.
He held the wrench in one hand, leaving him freer to hit and kick. That helped
a bit; he did not score any hits on Lenna, but at least she was scoring fewer
hits on him. But Skerri was clearly on the defensive, and Lenna knew that she
only had to bide her time until Bill returned.