Cassandra Kresnov 5: Operation Shield (42 page)

Ballan held up his hands, placating. “Shan, I'll look into it. I assure you that whatever happened to Cassandra, it wasn't my idea and I never authorised it. The woman saved my life.”

“And is there any particular reason you have not asked me to help with Kresnov's detention? Only with Commander Rice and Captain Chu?” Ballan blinked, not understanding. Or pretending not to. “Kresnov is surely more valuable to you if she still lives, and indications are that she does, given the combat flyer that fired upon her was itself destroyed shortly thereafter. If there was a coup attempt, surely she would be the ringleader? Yet you do not ask for my assistance in finding and detaining her, just her friends?”

“We're hearing reports that she may be dead. Information is very sketchy right now, I'm sure you can guess. If she's still alive, certainly we'd like your help to find her.”

“With evidence of her complicity in a coup attempt, I would be happy to do that.”

Ballan's stare was very hard. “You'd shelter her? As a fugitive?”

“A fugitive from
what
, exactly?” Ibrahim very rarely injected aggressive sarcasm into his tone. This was calculated. Ballan looked increasingly wary.

“Shan, I'm warning you. You have been an exemplary public servant for Callay and the Federation. But this could end very badly for you.”

“I'm quite sure,” Ibrahim agreed. “The difference between you and me, Ambassador, is that I don't care. You know how to gain my cooperation with this operation. Failing that, you shall not have it. Further, the FSA shall retain full operational independence and conduct operations of its own according to the best interests of the Federation as I see them. If some external power attempts to close down those operations in a manner that I perceive to be unconstitutional, I will resist that external power with every weapon at hand. Even if it should cost me my job. Even if it should cost me my life. Or your life. Do you understand?”

The Grand Council hallways were not safe to speak in, so Ibrahim waited until they were back in the car.

“Spec ops remains suspended,” he told Teo, opening an uplink channel so
the other FSA Chiefs could hear. “Half our people are arrested anyway, more than half if you count those who were at SWAT when the CSA locked them down. That's a command authority, if I ignored it they really could come in shooting.

“The rest of the FSA's technical suspension I'm ignoring. If anyone is sent to arrest me for that decision, I told Ballan I'll have them shot. All FSA personnel shall be armed from this moment, and no one will return home. We'll sleep on floors and sofas, all of us.”

“Yes, sir,” said Teo, adrenaline obvious in his voice. The situation was intense. Any young agent would feel both fear and excitement. And older agents might wonder why they hadn't brought forward their retirement.

“I do not discount the possibility of a genuine coup plot against the Grand Council,” Ibrahim continued. “But given the OID's behaviour, I have no choice but to treat such claims with great suspicion. I'm seeing the systematic elimination by arrest or assassination of individuals potentially embarrassing to the cause of 2389 and the constitutional amendments. The FSA will regard these actions as illegal until proven otherwise.”

“
Sir, begging your pardon
,” came Hando's voice on uplink, broadcast through the car, “
but spec ops are suspended, CSA SWAT is suspended, and something like half the serving combat GIs in Tanusha are in detention. We've lost most of our shooters, while OID has brought in combat teams from 2389-friendly worlds, we're guessing at least a thousand individuals from what we've seen, plus A-12s, we're seeing recon and combat drones, all operating under the authorisation of the President of Callay. We can regard them as illegal all we like, what can we actually do about it?
”

“Answering that question is our next step,” said Ibrahim, as Teo steered the car onto the offramp, tunnel lights flashing by. “Let's finish this step first.

“Mr Hando, I would like our legal experts to investigate the possibility of approaching the High Court. And I would like a secure communication arranged with Director Chandrasekar of the CSA ASAP.”

“
Sir, we've already heard from Chandi, or from his assistant…he said President Singh has ordered him directly to have no contact with the FSA. He intends to obey the order.
”

Ibrahim recalled Agent Ruben's jokes about Chandrasekar's perfect hair. The humour had not been superficial; Ruben had been making fun of precisely this—the instincts of a man for whom appearances mattered sometimes more
than substance, and who thus obeyed the chain of command above his institution's constitutional requirement to serve and protect all the people of Callay. A good Director should know that they were not always the same thing.

“
Sir, Council Chair Li is making his announcement.
”

Li Shifu appeared on car displays, projected before the windows. Grey-streaked, a serious, pale-faced man, though capable of kindly expression.

“
This morning at 1:16am
,” he said to the array of waiting reporters and cameras, hands upon his podium, “
I received confirmation of previous disturbing reports, that senior members of the Federal Security Agency's Special Operations Group were preparing the final stages of an armed coup against the Federation Grand Council. Acting upon advice from senior intelligence and military personnel, I have ordered preventative security action to eliminate the threat, and to protect the security and integrity of the people's representative body of the entire Federation.
”

A slight pause, perhaps caused by a dry mouth or a racing heart. Ibrahim could hear the reporters shuffling, scribbling, straining to hear each syllable, desperate for question time that they would surely not be granted.

“
Central in these intelligence reports was the discovery of a secret base of combat GIs, down in the Maldari Islands, thirteen thousand kilometers from Tanusha. These reports conclusively established that this group of several hundred GIs was being secretly armed and equipped to assist in the coup. Such a force of GIs would have proven formidable for even the brave Tanushan security forces. To eliminate this danger, at slightly after 2am this morning, I ordered the elimination of this base by means of an orbital artillery strike from a Fleet warship. Surveillance indicates there were no survivors.
”

The gasp from Togales in the backseat was clearly audible above the thrum of tires on tarmac. Then the faint squeal that might be tears. Ibrahim stared stony-faced at the approaching guard post between Grand Council and CSA HQ.

“
That little cunt Ballan!
” Hando seethed over the rest of Chairman Li's announcement. “
Secret base my ass, he put them there! He set the whole thing up, then he uses them as proof of a coup and kills them all!
”

“And so the game changes again,” Ibrahim said quietly, as the car pulled to a stop before the security gate. “A ‘secret’ base of League GIs will convince many of the public that the coup threat was real.”

“
Yeah, but we know what Ballan did. We could leak it.
”

“The FSA does not play petty games through the media,” Ibrahim said
firmly. The security search heading back the other way to HQ was nowhere near as thorough, just a brief skim. “We would cheapen our image, and thus our authority to our detriment, and we would also harm any genuine public dissidents, providing their enemies with ammunition to discredit them as FSA stooges. We may consider the use of that information later, but not now.”

“
And
,” came the cool consideration of Chief Shin, “
the coup may still be very real. Those accused of it certainly have motive, those now withholding the evidence of it have solid reason for doing so if they believe Director Ibrahim somehow involved, and if it were being planned, two hundred battle-hardened combat GIs based in a remote location would be the logical way to do it. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, and I would counsel that we do not treat it as such.
”

“Quite so, Mr Shin. However, OID's refusal to share evidence with the FSA is a procedural breach, perhaps explainable in extraordinary circumstances, but a breach nonetheless. I am confident that of our two institutions, my actions are the more procedurally correct.”

Going head to head against the Grand Council itself, they'd need to be.

“The Owl” was an old-fashioned bar on Ramprakash Road that never closed. Sinta had loved coming to places like this in her teenage theatre days, when she'd still harboured some dreams of stage and lights. Her younger sister Lakshmi continued to live in and out of places like this, up and down the Big R, a solid two kilometers of theatres, concert halls, and other stages, plus all the diners, bars, and fancy restaurants that catered to audiences, performers, and stagehands at all hours, dawn to dusk and round again. But this very early morning, the Big R's lights still ablaze before the sun, she was not here to meet Lakshmi and friends after an encore performance. This morning, she was looking for someone else.

She walked the bar, looking at booths by the windows. Only one in three were occupied. Some dancing girls with painted hands and faces under off-duty clothes, sharing coffee and complaining about their choreography. A couple of drunk young men in tuxedos, all that remained of a wedding party, sprawled and giggling into their coffees as they reminisced about events just hours old. A man alone, slumped in a dark corner, shades on, face twitching as the VR kicked in.

Around the bar corner, beneath signed photographs on the wall of famous performers, sat another man, watching the booth's holo. News, images of recent events, Chairman Li speaking at the podium, scrums of journalists, other important people making announcements. An Indian man, but with a gold ring on the fourth finger, like a Christian wedding ring.

Sinta slipped into the seat opposite, with an easy smile and clasp of the hand, like she was meeting an old friend. “Sinta,” she introduced herself quietly. “We can talk. This place is clean, I scoped it just a week ago tailing someone.”

The man deactivated the holo, giving her a clear look at him. The beard was probably fake, but good work. Solidly built with thick arms, he worked out, was possibly a fighter. An old scar on one cheek.

“How the hell did you find me?” he asked. Clearly he was surprised, and unhappy. She could see the tension, the sideways dart of the eyes.

“I'm a detective,” she said. “I detect. I know you've something to tell me.”

“I've something to tell someone,” the man replied edgily.

“You don't have the luxury of waiting any longer. Half your contacts have gone to ground, there's at least two I think the Feds have grabbed…”

“They're dead.” Sinta stared at him. “If we're talking about the same two. I found one in his apartment two hours ago, looked like a VR assistant overdose. I was supposed to meet him.”

“Ravi Das sent you from the League?” He nodded. “To meet Idi Aba?”

“Him too. Only I get here, find everyone dead or missing. And now you've come to me, and we're probably going to die too.”

“I wasn't tailed,” said Sinta.

“Sure.” The bearded man sipped coffee. “They always think that.”

“I have contacts,” said Sinta, leaning forward, holding eye contact. She had advantages there, with heterosexual men. “Big contacts. People you can't reach now that everyone's out to get you. People who need to hear what you know, if they're going to stop 2389 reshaping the GC to pass any damn amendments they like.
They're
the ones doing the coup, you get that? And if those amendments pass, there won't be a damn thing anyone can do legally in the Federation to help your cause, FSA, Kresnov, hell, they'll even be able to rule that underground Federation groups with the same cause as yours are in constitutional violation and thus outlawed.”

The man grimaced and looked at big hands on the tabletop. Cracked a knuckle. “It's a fight the Federation could win,” he muttered. “Should win. Fucking cowards.”

Sinta shook her head. “No one is going to war against the League to emancipate the GIs. You guys have to understand that, no matter how bad the atrocities, it's not going to happen.”

The man rubbed his brow. “We didn't find atrocities. Or not beyond the usual.” Sinta frowned at him. He looked up at her warily. “I was hoping to speak to Kresnov. Kresnov cares about GIs. You're a brave cop, but at the end of the day you're just another Fed.”

“Kresnov was nearly killed. No one knows where she is. I'm all you've got, and if you don't give me and my friends something fast, not only are you going to lose your only potential allies in the Federation, I'm going to lose even basic democracy in the Federation. Damn right I won't die for your cause, but right now our causes are the same.”

The man looked out the window, at the blazing lights and displays of the neighbouring theatre. A couple of beat cops were moving on some wanderers—sleep walkers, the street called them, high on AR assistant drugs, wandering the night in an augmented parallel universe of simultaneous drug and uplink realities.

“I was League marines,” he said. Sinta wasn't surprised. “We never worked with GIs directly; they had their own units. Most of us didn't think much about them; they got the toughest assignments, we were glad it was them and not us.

“Then one day…eleven years ago now…we were sharing a ride with a Dark Star team. Dark Star are smart, I even talked with a few of them, a few were smarter than me.” A self-deprecating smile. “But that's not so hard.”

Sinta nodded. “Kresnov was Dark Star. And Captain Chu.”

“And then,” the ex-grunt continued, “we got hit. No idea what did it, marines never do. One minute we were playing cards, the next it's emergency manoeuvering…a couple of my guys couldn't make the acceleration slings in time, they got plastered on the walls, except for two of them, GIs grabbed them, held on all through the manoeuvers, GIs handle ten-Gs fine. Saved their lives.

“And then we were spinning and power-out, half the environmentals went, maybe half the crew died slowly, suffocated or decompressed. The rest of us were crammed into airtight compartments, trying to jury-rig what was left of the air and temperature controls to give us a few more days to live. Some of us were GIs, these Dark Star guys. They were just…just great.”

His voice was a little tight. He sipped coffee to cover it. Sinta listened, wide-eyed.

“Helpful, you know? No selfishness, no wigging out. Helped with the technical stuff, volunteered to risk airlocks into airless compartments, since they last longer without air than the rest of us. And the rest of the time, we just talked. And they were scared just like the rest of us. I'd never figured that, you know?” Looking up at her. “GIs, being scared? I mean, they're killing machines. But you get locked in a closet with someone for forty-eight hours, running out of air and slowly freezing to death, you get to know them.

“Anyhow, ship found us, we were okay. But I kept in contact with some of these GIs, forty-eight hours of hell and we were like, best buddies. Six of them, three guys, three girls. Girls real pretty too, you know?” A faint smile,
remembering. “Even met up with one of the girls a year later, happened to be on the same station, she showed me a good time. Could have snapped me in half with the back of her hand, but she was gentle.

“Two years later, five of them were KIA, including that girl. Jade was her name. They just got sent into the toughest shit; command spent them like toilet paper. And then a year after that, my last buddy, Roh, just stops replying to my messages. I asked after him, but there's this blackout on Dark Star, he's disappeared, no one knows a thing about him or anyone from Dark Star. It's only after Kresnov appears here, and makes waves in the Federation, that everyone back in the League learns about what command did to Dark Star, got rid of them all. I mean, command were never allowed to build GIs that smart in the first place. All us normals who met them, we knew. But we all liked them, so we didn't want to get them in trouble. Should have guessed that would happen.

“I'm not some crazy bleeding heart, Detective, not like some of this group. I still love the League. But the League can't be what I want it to be unless we stop treating GIs like shit. And until we apologise for what we did to those others. Can't blame Kresnov for leaving. Couldn't blame any of them.”

He reached into an inside pocket and pulled a chip. Sinta took it on the table top, covering with her hand. “What's on it?” she asked. Making an uplink connection wasn't safe. In a city of sixty million she could stay undetected indefinitely so long as she resisted the Tanushan compulsion to stay permanently uplinked. Autistic, she was safe.

“Inside footage,” he said. “A new production facility. We still don't know where; it's an inside job. But the vision is real.”

Sinta frowned. “A production facility? For GIs?” The man nodded. “New GI production is outlawed by the Five Junctions Treaty.”

“That it is.” Another sip of coffee.

“How big a facility?”

“Production maybe ten thousand a year. Mostly high-des.” Sinta nearly gasped, hand to her mouth. “New tech. Rumour is there's a way to make GIs that don't think as much but are still high-designation. Keep them loyal.”

“Ten thousand high-designation wouldn't violate the treaty,” Sinta breathed. “It would smash it.”

“And if the Federation's still serious about anything, restart the war.”

“Only 2389’s trying to stop us from ever fighting another war unless we get attacked first. And you guys come along with this info at the worst possible moment, Idi Aba's preparing to go public, so they kill him. Only maybe it
was
the League, League would want him dead as badly as 2389…”

“No.” Her company shook his head. “Internal Federation politics is too far away, local League operatives might have helped plan it, tell them when that other attack would take place so they can use it as cover. But League Gov's never going to authorise that themselves on such short notice, how can they? Takes two months each way for a message, Idi Aba was killed on short notice.”

“And ISO's lost their main operatives and facilities when the League embassy closed,” Sinta finished. “Much easier to plan long-term hits on orders from League Gov than short-term reactive ops, their decision-making processes aren't there anymore. Dammit, if you guys had only gone straight to the FSA, Ibrahim would have heard before any of this happened. He'd have stopped it.”

“Detective, I understand you're normally dealing with gang bangers, jealous spouses, and drug addicts, so this Federal-level stuff isn't really your go. But think for a moment. Who does the FSA answer to?”

Sinta blinked. “The Office of Intelligence Directorate. Shit.”

“Who are probably behind this whole fucking thing.”

“But Ibrahim doesn't have to tell OID everything, does he? He can operate alone if he wants?”

“Sometimes, sure. But how does Ibrahim get his information? Especially from the League?”

“Federal Intelligence.”

“And FedInt is run by Chief Shin, who is very likely in on this as well.”

“How do you know?”

“Shin's the real power in the Federation. The thing with interstellar civilisation, there's this communication gap between worlds. In the old days, with just one world, easy, communications lasted seconds. Here it's months. Messages don't hit with the same force, getting a month-old recording isn't the same as being yelled at real time by your superior. And foreign events can't be monitored real time, you just see them in bursts, like trying to watch a football game from the cheap seats as people keep walking in front of you, you see bits and pieces, but it's hard to put it all together, figure out what's really going on.

“But, Shin.” Another sip, finger raised for emphasis. “Shin's job is ferrying those messages, all through the Federation. He controls appearances. And he knows exactly what's going on, because he's the only guy with the whole picture. He's the guy who controls what Ibrahim sees and doesn't see. And he's the guy who knows what goes on in Fleet, because Fleet ferry a lot of the most sensitive data. You think Fleet could land a bunch of foreign troops on the Federation capitol to fight this ‘coup’ without Shin knowing? Hell, he probably made it happen.”

Sinta knew enough war stories to know the entire League were paranoid about FedInt, and thought they caused everything from cricket scores to nosebleeds. Yet in parts, it sounded all too plausible.

Someone was walking toward them along the bar, calm as you like. Sinta looked…and stared. It was Agent Ruben, smart jacket, cool stride. Dark shades, even before sunrise…but not uncommon for the Big R. The ex-grunt reached into his jacket, looking alarmed, but Sinta raised a placating hand. Ruben stopped at the booth and leaned in.

“We have to go,” he said. “Now.”

“Who the hell are you?” Then an accusing look at Sinta. “Not tailed, you say?”

“I was tailing the Feds who were tailing
you
,” Ruben replied. “They're close, we have to leave.”

“Agent Ruben, he's CSA,” Sinta explained, climbing from her seat. And saw two men had followed Ruben in, both in suits, following him around the L-curve of the bar. At the rear entrance, another two, pushing through the door. Her heart hammered. She wasn't trained or equipped for this. She didn't have these men's augments, nor their weaponry and backup. Panic threatened.

“Come on,” said Ruben, straightening his jacket and walking back the way he'd come quite calmly. Sinta followed, eyeing the men behind, hand itching for her pistol but knowing that as soon as she drew it, the others would draw faster, and be far more numerous. Her contact hesitated, as though sizing up the situation.