Event Horizon (Hellgate) (46 page)

“I’ll take that as a confirmation,” Travers said acerbically.

“Take it any way you want,” van Donne growled. “It’s too fucking late to turn back, if you’re starting to get the willies.”

And Vidal, from the
Wastrel
: “Ignore him, Neil. He’s hungover as all get out. The
weapon
is fine. The proclamation transmission went out, clear as a bell … and Elaine Osman made sure she was on camera, every time the President wasn’t. I was watching.”

“Osman?” van Donne echoed. “You mean the big Pak beauty, the First Lady? So she was on camera, what’s it to you? You don’t like aeroball?”

“It depends,” Vidal said darkly, “who’s playing.” If van Donne was unaware of his connection to Osman, Mick was not about the mention it. Instead he deflected the issue neatly. “Neil, you’re coming up fast on our position. You want to hand over to Etienne?”

JS-25 had just broken away and was heading back to the surface while the
Wastrel
loomed up ahead, a shadow against the stars. Below, the night side of the world was a carpet of indigo ocean and gold lights, the traceries of highways, the hotspots of the towns and cities following the coast. For once Travers let the AI take the Capricorn, and like Marin ignored the banter between Vidal and van Donne.

He and Travers were listening to CNS as the plane rose back into Hangar 4. The party was at full throttle, booze flowing freely. Not even Westminster ATC would have noticed as the
Wastrel
broke orbit and headed for the anonymity of
Nysos
, the third of Jagreth’s moons – distant enough to be little more than a spark in Westminster’s night sky. She would tuck in there, hidden in the sensor blind of the minor planet. And then they would wait.

As the tug left orbit Marin took the combug from his ear and tossed it onto the dashboard above the flight surfaces. Neil was already on his feet, stretching his back. The hatch was open, admitting bitter hangar air and the sounds of a maintenance crew.

The status board at the armordoors showed the
Wastrel
already on approach to
Nysos
, with a party in the techs’ crew lounge. Several of Ingersol’s people, who were local to Jagreth, had just come back up with several crates of local champagne and beer.

“You want to party, Harry?” Jon Kim asked doubtfully as the service lift took them up from the hangar.

“For five minutes, and only if you must.” Shapiro had his jacket folded over one arm and was rolling up his sleeves. “For the first time in six months, I’ve no work waiting for me.” He gave Marin and Travers a rueful glance. “Jagreth was the last assignment I’m in any position to coordinate. The Battle of Omaru will be fought after Lai’a is gone – if it’s fought at all, and please gods the Fleet officer commanding should have more brains, after Velcastra and Jagreth. I imagine you’ve been briefed regarding the
London
?”

The lift had opened, and Travers stepped out. “The change in the command corps? We were told Fleet took Andrew Grimes and his officers off her just before she shipped out of the Middle Heavens and installed a whole new corps, rushed out from the homeworlds by courier. Some hardline moron called Carvalho.”

“According to General Bauer,” Marin mused, “Colonel Grimes himself was old school enough to be a pain in the ass, but I’m guessing he has a few too many gray cells to throw the
London
into the same hot water they saw at Velcastra.”

Shapiro breathed a long sigh. “I’ve met Grimes once or twice, though not socially, I admit. He’s an
Earther
, but highly intelligent. He has no truck with colonial mutiny, but at the same time he’d say the welfare of his crew was paramount. His crewdecks may be populated by ‘colonial trash,’ but they’re still human souls. I’d have tipped Grimes for putting a toe in the water at Jagreth, seeing how one or two of his ships – a couple of frigates, perhaps – fared as they drove in through the system with armed weapons. When they vanished, as they would, my prediction was that Andrew Grimes would back off, way off, and make a report back to Quadrant Command: the rumors about the Deep Sky possessing
The Weapon
are quite true.

“It was,” he added, “vaguely possible that after such a strategic withdrawal we might have dragged a company of Terran ambassadors to the negotiating table. Robert Chandra Liang has been in talks with Tarrant, Prendergast and Joyce Cardwell – the senior Daku representative on Borushek. If Earth could have been forced to the table, those four were prepared to spend months, years, talking their way to a peaceful solution in the Deep Sky.”

“It won’t be happening that way,” Kim sighed, “not with Colonel Tomas
Carnairo
de Carvalho in command. A billionaire from Lisbon and Brasilia, with
grandchildren
ranking in the homeworlds Starfleet? Oh he’s intelligent enough but – dogmatic. Likely to be blinded by doctrine. Committed, loyal, unquestioning to the point of utter insanity.”

“Yes.” Shapiro glared at the deck ahead of him. “I have no doubt he’ll throw colonials against colonials – pitch his battle group at Jagreth, and who cares how many ships are deleted from the face of the universe? The crews are only ‘trash’ from Lithgow and Haven and Kuchinbai.”

Shadows settled on Shapiro’s face, making him look older. He was mortally tired, Marin saw. Worse, he had reached the end of any contribution he could make to a colonial victory. “General … Harrison. Let it be,” Marin said quietly, and when Shapiro looked up at him he added, “There’s something the Resalq say. The same downpour plumps up the apples and floods the cellar.”

At last Shapiro smiled faintly. “Meaning?”

“Meaning … all you can do is prepare the ground,” Marin said with a deep sense of fatalism. “You can’t go out and fill every shirt on both teams. It’s up to
them
to actually play the damn’ game, win, lose or draw.”

“What he said, Harry,” Kim muttered.

“Indeed.” Shapiro stretched his shoulders and gave his partner an apologetic look. “Go and party, if you like, Jon. I think I’ll pass.”

“Better things to do?” Travers guessed,

“Nothing at all to do,” Shapiro said self-mockingly, “which hasn’t happened in so long, I don’t quite know what I’ll do with myself.”

“I have a few ideas,” Jon Kim offered.

Shapiro actually chuckled. “I imagine you have.” He gave Marin and Travers a wry look. “Good night, gentlemen.”

Alone in the passageway between the staterooms, Marin cocked his head at Travers. “Party, Ops room, a lot of booze and kip grass…?”

“Soft bed, sweet wine, sex?” Travers argued. “You want to flip a coin?”

“Only,” Marin breathed, “if it was double-headed.” And he turned in the direction of their quarters as he spoke.

He did not make it through the door before Travers pounced on him, and no part of Marin was inclined to argue. The lights were dim as big arms went around him from behind. Neil’s hands were inside his shirt, palming the contours of his chest – he felt the hard, hot press against his hip, speaking to him more eloquently than anything Travers could have said.

The mattress bounced under their combined weight and he felt it conform around him as he rolled over and scissored both legs around Neil’s hips. His shirt was open, and Neil put his head down, teeth busy, nipping and tugging gently on tender nipples till Marin hissed. Travers relented and knelt up. His jacket landed on the deck at the bedside, and the smart gray slacks followed a moment later.

“What happened to the sweet wine?” Marin asked breathlessly as Neil’s hands tackled his belt.

“I’ll drink your health in it,” Travers promised, “after.”

“After the war?” Marin arched his back to let the slacks slide off.

Travers palmed the whole shaft of him, worked him with exquisite pressure against his own belly. “If you want to wait that long.” He leaned down over Marin, hunted for his mouth.

The kiss was deep, restless, searching. Marin opened to it, wondering what was on Neil’s mind. His hands cradled Travers’s skull, holding him to the kiss until the bigger, stronger body arched up again. Travers sat on his heels, reaching over into the drawer by the pillow, and Marin lifted a brow at him.

He would have liked to start at Neil’s mouth and work his way down over every sensitive part, and back, but like the wine it would have to wait. Travers was –
inspired
, Marin decided. That was the word. He had no idea what bug had gotten into Neil, but he was not about to complain. He had only to lie back and watch as the pale blue gel slicked him from root to crown, and then Neil lifted himself up and over. The big muscles in his thighs stretched as he settled carefully, found the place, and just the right angle.

Raw pleasure stormed through Marin, chasing every lucid thought out of his head. It seemed nothing was left but pure feeling, emotion unsullied by rationale or apology. He took a ragged breath, held it, and brought his heart, lungs and gonads back under control with iron willpower. An old mantra of calm whispered through his mind while Travers gave a bass moan and wriggled his hips to comfort.

Hands butterflying up and down the big arms, from sinewy wrists to round, hard-worked biceps, Curtis watched the self-absorbed clench of Travers’s face as he came to rest. Time might have stopped; the universe consisted of the two of them. The future, Lai’a, transspace – none of it existed for Marin.

A groan rumbled from Travers’s chest as fingertips slid over the wide slabs of his pectorals, the nubs of rucked nipples, and on down. Then Neil’s eyes closed, his head tipped back as he savored every sensation. Still, Curtis made him wait, teased him until he swore fluently. Sweat shone on him, outlining every muscle Neil had sculpted in the gym until Marin could not imagine an uptown Companion or an Elstrom StarCity
showpony
who could compare.

In Marin’s rookie year in Fleet, the ‘old men’ of the
crewdeck
– over twenty and infinitely experienced in matters military and sensual – would often say they could only turn on to veterans, and especially those who had just returned from the
zone
, the places where action turned to combat, even to blood. Everything else was ‘chicken,’ and often despised. Marin himself had soon learned to admire, envy and desire the veterans, the sergeants and company lieutenants who had been there, seen it, done it, knew it. By comparison, rookies were so insignificant, they might have been worthless, even though he was one of them. Or especially so.

And here was Neil Travers. Everything Marin had ever admired was wrapped up in the neat parcel of him, and as Travers began to work hard, Curtis wished he had the words to tell him. Words had vanished like mist on a summer’s morning. He found a rasped endearment as Travers bent over him to have his mouth again. Then even this moment of lucidity was gone, and Marin surrendered to a blind hunt for pleasure that would have been little different when mankind dwelt in caves.

Chapter Nine

Salvage tug Wastrel,

Nysos
, Jagreth system

They slept long enough for Travers to lose track of the time, and a chime from the threedee woke him. He stumbled into the bathroom, drank a glass of water and focused properly on the display as Marin rolled over and heaved a yawn. The bed was a tangle of bronze sheets and discarded pillows, and a trio of amber bars had appeared in the threedee.

“What time is it?” Marin was knuckling his eyes. He sounded half conscious, and cleared his throat.

Travers could still taste the wine, and went to the ’chef for more water. “Shiptime, just after 02:00.”

“I heard a chime.” Marin grabbed a black silk kimono and shuffled over to sit on the foot of the bed. “We’ve been asleep about four hours.”

“What’s
that
?” Still drinking, Travers glared at the threedee.

“Don’t know, but I can –” Marin was surely about to say he could call the Ops room and find out, but as he spoke one of the amber bars turned red. “We just went to full alert,” he said quietly. “They’re not reporting any immediate danger to the ship, but something’s wrong.”

“Or maybe something’s right,” Travers countered as he tossed the beaker into the chute and went in search of fresh clothes.