Deserter (6 page)

Kris sighed. Like a large blue arrow, it would point straight at the empty space in the dress where most women had breasts. “I will be wearing my uniform tonight.”

Abby frowned at the corner that held the items of Navy issue: battle dress, khakis, whites, and the standard formal evening dress of a junior female officer. She pulled the formal from the lineup and held it next to the cream dress. One was appropriate for a fairy Princess. The other was just flat dowdy.

The uniform’s white, floor-length skirt was cut from the same design as a millennia of gunnysacks. Kris had chosen the blue wool blouse that had the tight choker neck, thereby avoiding any hint of décolletage. Miniatures of her few medals were already in place. Abby looked back and forth between Kris and the standard dress uniform. “The colors are not your best,” she said as she chewed on her lower lip.

“The colors are established Navy wide,” Kris answered back.

Abby laid the Wounded Lion’s blue sash across the blouse. The light, watermarked blue of the sash and the dark blue of the blouse could only be said to fit because a thousand years of valor and service said they did. Abby shook her head, opened her mouth.

Kris cut her off. “That is what I am wearing tonight.”

Abby turned to Harvey and Jack. “Do all military uniforms seek to make a woman look so . . .”

“Unappealing?” Jack offered.

“Yes.”

“It seems that way,” Harvey agreed. “Women are there to do a job, not flirt,” the old trooper growled.

“But the men look so dashing in their uniforms,” Abby said.

“A historical anachronism left from days past,” Kris spat. “We women, however, have all the advantages of the modern era.”

“Or error,” Jack put in with one of his patented grins.

“Supper is ready,” Nelly spoke up, still in a low-tech voice, startling Kris. “Harvey, Lotty wants you downstairs to pick up a tray. Will you men be eating in the kitchen?”

“Looks that way,” Jack said, and the men left Kris and her new mistress of the wardrobe to dress. Having won on the most important point of debate that afternoon, Kris let Abby do as she pleased. Pampered, made over, and perfumed, her short, blond hair wound around her head in a confection that Kris never would have attempted, she was dressed in less than an hour. Nelly was back around Kris’s shoulders, a second reason to wear the uniform, before she and Abby crossed swords again. Abby returned with the diamond and gold tiara Mother had bought at some overpriced rummage sale. “Perfect for a Princess,” Mother had gushed.

As Kris did then, she said, “I’m not wearing that.”

Abby started to say something, looked at Kris, and seemed to think better of it. “What will you be wearing?”

“Right beside that in my jewelry box was a simple silver circlet, standard issue for any woman junior officer in formal dinner attire.”

“Not that!”

“Yes that.”

Abby glanced at the tiara, then eyed the circlet. “A Princess should wear a tiara.”

“That is a tiara. Says so right in the dress regulations. Tiara, formal, junior officers, female.”

“Do senior officers wear something nicer?” Abby said, trading the diamond concoction for the Navy issue.

“Yep. They get nicer and nicer until Admirals are wearing something pretty fancy.”

“And are very old,” Abby said with a sour frown on her face.

“Horribly old,” Kris agreed.

Tiaraed and sashed, Kris made her way carefully down the stairs in heels twice as high as she normally wore . . . which also were prescribed in regulations. Maybe Abby had a point. Whoever designed this outfit sure hadn’t put her physical comfort or appearance at a very high priority. Was the uniform regulations development bureau the last place in the Navy where a woman hater was allowed free rein? Jack, now in a tux, stood at the bottom of the stairs.

“You going to catch me when I fall?”

“Looks like it.”

“You could come up here and help me stay on these heels.”

“And get spiked by one? Sorry, not in my job description.”

“Seems like your job description is getting kind of short.”

“Yes, isn’t it,” Jack said, stepping aside as Kris left the stairs behind her. Harvey brought a monster limo to the front drive. Abby helped Kris arrange her skirt in the backseat.

Harvey got the limo on autopilot, then turned to take in Kris. “That sash does brighten up a dull outfit,” he drawled. “By the way, can a Wardhaven officer wear an Earth order?”

“Oh my gosh!” Kris was learning a Princess did not use the
S
word in public and should practice not using it in private. She reached to unpin the sash.

“I checked.” Harvey grinned. “Earth, being an ally of Wardhaven . . . in some small thanks to whatever you did or didn’t do at the Paris system . . . their orders are authorized.”

“Harvey, you could have told me that in the first place!”

“Yes, but then we’d have missed that look on your face.”

“What look?”

“Oh, part shock, part dismay, part ‘Oh my God, I’ve screwed up again!’ It’s very becoming on you.”

“I did not think I’d screwed up again.” Kris settled for appealing only one of the three charges from her oldest friend.

 
The ball failed to match the excitement of its preparation. Kris passed the usual chatter with the usual suspects. Didn’t these people have day jobs to tire them out? Her older brother Honovi was at Father’s right hand, like a good junior member of Parliament, understudying the master. Since there was no immediate political need to paper over their feelings about her career choice, Kris and the Prime Minister ignored each other.

Mother could not be ignored.

“What do you think of Abby?” was the woman’s opening gambit.

Kris took a step back and opened her arms to show off her uniform. “I only fired her twice as she was getting me ready.”

“You can’t fire her. I’m paying for her. I had hoped she would at least put you in something presentable.”

“That would require firing her three times in one night.”

“And I was so looking forward to her dressing you in something that would remove my daughter from the top of the fashion police’s ten-worst-dressed list.” Mother sighed.

“Have your fashion
policia
send me the citation, Mother. I’ll file it among my dust bunnies.” Kris moved along as Mother launched into a diatribe to the woman on her right.

Grampa Ray made the required appearance and was mobbed by both favor seekers and eligible matrons looking to end his long years of widowerhood. Nothing like the chance to be Queen of eighty planets to gather every social climber within light-years. A few were presently married but clearly willing to trade up. King Ray made his way through the bejeweled crowd as a jungle scout might pass through a trove of bothersome flies. But he noticed who he wanted, and that included Kris. He raised an eyebrow at the sash and medallion.

“Accessories make the outfit,” Kris said. Fashion gossips might ignore the Wounded Lion; people like Grampa knew better.

“Earth is grateful you saved their bacon.” Grampa Ray grinned. “And their battle fleet,” he added with one of his tight, warm smiles that anyone would risk their life for.

“There really wasn’t another option,” Kris said. Her eyes suddenly watery, she settled them on the deeply carpeted floor.

“Been in that horrible position myself a few times,” King Raymond answered. “Lousy situations to be in. But the survivors make for nice company.” Kris was halfway home before she lost the glow from that moment.

“Kris,” Nelly said, “I have a collect call. I think you should accept it.”

“Who is it?” Kris quit taking collect calls early in her high school years. It was amazing the people who wanted to talk to a Longknife and expected her to pay for the privilege.

“A Miss Pasley is calling from the starship
Bellerophon
.”

“
Bellerophon
? Should I know that ship?”

“It is a tramp, mixed cargo and passengers. Tommy took passage on it, you may recall.”

Kris had forgotten. “I accept the charges.” A system voice told Kris she would be debited for a price that made even Kris’s eyes widen. Miss Pasley, whoever she was, had slapped a very costly priority on her message. Kris undid the top buttons of her choker collar so Nelly could project a holovid of the call.

A young woman, long, straight blond hair falling to her shoulders, came up. “Miss Longknife, or Princess Longknife,” she said nervously, “you don’t know me. But I know Tommy Lien, who says he’s a good friend of yours. He told me that if anything strange happened to him, I should call this number.”

The woman glanced off camera. “I think something has happened to Tommy. He wanted to see the ruins on Itsahfine. We were studying all the stuff about them in the ship’s database. He even had stuff he’d picked up, so I know he intended to go to Itsahfine. But he’s not going there.

“The Belly, that’s what we all call the
Bellerophon,
made a stop to refuel or maybe shift cargo here at Castagon 6. A guy came up while Tom and I were talking, said he was Calvin Sandfire and had to pass some words with Tom.”

“Tom left me, and I haven’t seen him since. The ship’s left the station, and we’re on our way to Itsahfine. I’ve asked all the other passengers, and no one has seen Tom. I’ve called him on net, but he doesn’t answer. I checked with the Purser, but he says Tommy’s room is still his, and he won’t do a search. I think he thinks I’m just chasing him. But I think Tom left the ship with Mr. Sandfire. Maybe it’s nothing, but I thought I ought to let you know that
I
think something strange has happened to Tom.”

Kris went over the message quickly in her mind as she told Nelly to save message. “What do you think?” she asked Jack.

The secret service agent rubbed his chin. “When you’re free and unencumbered, you can change your priorities very quickly. Maybe Mr. Sandfire made him a better offer than crumbling relics of the Three. Maybe he was from Santa Maria and had a message for Tom from his family.” Jack shrugged. “It could be a lot of things that don’t add up to bad.”

“Or it could be bad,” Kris said. “Nelly, do a search on Mr. Calvin Sandfire. Start with Santa Maria.”

“Already working,” Nelly said, her voice back to its usual sweet self. Tru would have to wait a while longer to crack the rock chip and the Three. “I am also searching on Wardhaven, Earth, and Greenfeld.” Wardhaven was home to Kris. Earth was Earth. Greenfeld . . . well, that was a totally different can of worms. With luck, Nelly would draw a blank there.

“Also, Nelly, check ships’ registries for a Mr. Sandfire.” Of course, that would tell them nothing if Mr. Sandfire was getting the use of a ship by leasing, renting, stealing, hijacking, or any of the other myriad of ways that people had of getting around starship ownership while acquiring needed mobility.

The problem with having readily available information about a hundred billion people on six hundred planets is learning patience while it was converted from “readily” to “available.” The long silence of the drive home was broken. “Mr. Sandfire is not in the Santa Maria database.” No surprise there.

“Mr. Sandfire is not a registered owner of any starship.”

“You couldn’t expect things to be that easy,” Jack said.

“Mr. Calvin Sandfire is the owner of Ironclad Software, registered on Greenfeld,” Nelly reported five minutes later.

“Oh shit,” Kris moaned. There were times when even a Princess had to say what she had to say.

“What should I know about this fellow?” Jack said.

“He’s not already in your official reports?”

“Nope, but you have this way of not letting my agency know of all the people that want you dead.”

“I don’t think Mr. Sandfire has tried to kill me yet,” Kris said, giving Jack a cheery smile. He didn’t look at all mollified. “He is reported to have paid off the man that added a heart attack to the last meal of my previous squadron commander, Commodore Sampson. His software was what Sampson used to keep the ships of AttackRon Six at the Paris system from hearing their attack orders were bogus.”

“Oh shit,” Jack echoed her.

Harvey didn’t bat an eyelash at all those answers to his questions about Paris. “Well, at least he’s far away from us.”

“For now, at least,” Kris said. Jack eyed her, but Kris offered no further comment, and Jack said nothing.

4

Kris drummed her fingers on the dressing table while Abby got her hair down. “Search on ships that docked at Castagon 6 a week before the
Bellerophon
and get their passenger lists.”

“Yes ma’am,” said Nelly.

In sweatpants and tank top, Kris joined Harvey and Jack in the sitting room, now an intelligence center. One wall proved to be a screen. It now showed what they knew: not much. Lotty arrived; no one was in danger of starving tonight or going without caffeine.

As Kris settled into a lounger, Nelly announced the search of shipping to Castagon 6 was negative. Only the
Bellerophon
had docked there in the last week. “Why do I find that hard to believe? Nelly, Tru has this way of getting better information about shipping. Check with Sam.” Nelly made a call.

Sam suggested the list of ships jumping
to
a port often showed more traffic than the list of ships the port said arrived.

The morning sun streamed through Kris’s unused bedroom before Nelly completed a much broader search. Done the other way around, it seemed that the yacht
Space Adder
had jumped from Turantic 4 with the destination of Castagon 6 two days before the
Bellerophon
arrived. The
Space Adder
was back at Turantic two days after Tom’s ship left. Ah, the bits of information in the public domain databases . . . if you just didn’t get misled by the easily doctored answers.

Lotty arrived with breakfast as Kris sat silently organizing her day. She should report to the ship. It was Saturday, and she didn’t have to, but the Captain usually put in half a day, and Kris tried to match him. She stifled a yawn and reviewed what Nelly had sifted out of the mass of information available. The wall screen was now full; down one side was a chronology. While Kris had found out about Tom’s travel plans and interruptions only in the last twelve hours, it had been longer in the doing.