Intrepid (29 page)

The State Security man pulled his gaze away from someone and focused on Kris. “I am told that you have information about a plot against the life of First Citizen Smythe-Peterwald. If so, the state demands and requires that you provide it.”

“I have already given all that I know to your Captain Krätz. If you have talked to him, you know as much as I do.”

“I am required to hear it from the source’s lips.”

Kris considered making an issue of it but found she was running out of patience with a man who couldn’t say a word without making it a demand. She quickly told him what she knew.

“That hardly constitutes quality intelligence,” the colonel snapped. “It is no more than an allegation of rumors heard.”

“You may take it as you please,” Kris said. “But I assure you, if your First Citizen ends up suddenly dead in the next few days, your superiors may not take it that way.”

The colonel swallowed. Hard. “Do you have a picture of this Lucifer fellow? The devil’s own, he sounds like.”

“The Abdicators do not believe in making representations of themselves,” Kris said.

The colonel paused for only a moment before saying, “That was not their way when last they were heard from.”

“Suicidal terrorism was not their way when last we heard from them, either,” Kris said. And got a chip of a grin from Captain Krätz for quoting him.

Now it was the colonel’s turn to frown. Kris suspected the prospect of going back to his bosses with nothing helpful to add to their pot of boiling paranoia did not excite him.

“There is one thing I can give you, Colonel.”

“What might that be?”

“We have the boy’s father aboard. I have no qualms about photographing a man. We have run it through a computer program to take the years off his face. Captain Drago?”

“Yes, Your Highness.” He spoke into his commlink, and a short while later Sulwan Kann, in a Navy lieutenant’s uniform, brought in a large envelope for the captain. He handed it to Kris. “As you requested.”

Kris opened the envelope. There was an enlarged photo of Prometheus and a similar-size reworked photo. It looked amazingly like Lucifer, his son. Kris handed off the photos to Jack, who took them to the colonel.

“Colonel, I have personally met the young man you are hunting. That reworked photo is almost a perfect image of him.”

“You have met the young madman?” A dozen indictments lurked behind those words, starting with high treason.

“He was a guide when I first visited his world. I did not see him the second time. His father says he had already left.”

“Ah, yes, there is the matter of the father. You will turn him over to us for questioning.” That wasn’t quite an order. More like the assumption of someone who’d never been told no.

“No. He is on board in our care,” Kris said, switching to the regal plural. “We are satisfied from our own questioning that he knows nothing more than what he has told us.”

“You are in Peterwald space.” Was that a slip, or was the fiction of Greenfeld so quickly overshadowed by the man?

“You are on a Wardhaven ship,” Kris said, standing up to her full six feet and looking down a good two inches on the colonel. “And you will depart from it now.”

Kris would not have believed that the Marines behind the State Security team could get stiffer, but there was a silent click in the air as they did. The young security captain broke his attention to glance around, worry breaking through his mask.

At the door, Gunny appeared, pistol now at high port.

The colonel held his ground for a moment, then seemed to shrink. “Your embassy will hear of this. I will go now, but I expect to return soon.”
With a large army
hung unsaid.

The colonel did a smart about-face, and started to march out. Captain Krätz rested a hand on his shoulder as he went by. “I have had dealings with this woman before. I’ll stay behind and see if I can’t wangle her out of a trifle more.”

“You can give her the spanking she deserves, but get that man,” the colonel snapped, then continued his march out.

The others in State Security black were soon herded out. When the tread of Marine boots grew distant in the passageway, Kris relaxed. “Lights, Chief. It’s too dark in here to think.”

The lights went to full. The bulkheads gleamed gray again. And without an order given, chairs were hurriedly pushed in by sailors and Marines.

Kris’s staff collapsed into the chairs and found themselves staring at each other. Kris had a very puzzled team. . . that now included a captain from her sworn enemy.

Oh, and his daughter.

Vicky settled into the chair at her captain’s right hand. He’d taken the seat at the foot of the table, opposite Kris. “Have you really come here to save my dad’s life?” Vicky asked.

“I don’t see much choice in the matter. If your father is killed anytime soon, Lucifer and his team will paint my fingerprints all over the plot. Propagandists will demand I either stand a kangaroo trial here or war. Since I don’t think King Ray would hand me over for a show trial, it looks like war.”

“You don’t sound all that sure about your king,” Captain Krätz said, a knowing smile on his face.

Kris made a face. “Let’s just say I don’t want to find out. Grampa Ray has tossed me into a lot of messes, sink or swim. I’d prefer not to see how I could manage on Greenfeld.”

“I wouldn’t want to take my chances with what passed for a justice system back home, either,” Vicky said. Then changed the subject. “How do we stop this devil boy from killing my dad?”

Captain Krätz was shaking his head. “I don’t see that he has any chance of getting close to the First Citizen.”

“I agree,” Kris said.

“Now, hold it,” Jack said, half out of his seat. “You dragged us out here to stop devil boy. I like her choice of words. But now you say he ain’t likely to kill anyone. Kris!”

Kris just shrugged. Since Captain Krätz made no effort to talk, she explained. “Lucifer and his Xanadu team are fish out of water. They’re hicks with hayseed in their hair. They can hardly open their mouths without getting arrested. No. There is no way they’ll get close enough to Peterwald to kill him.”

“And we’re here because. . .” Jack said, sounding very tired.

“Because,” Captain Krätz said, “they will be captured. Under interrogation, they will mention your Kris. If anyone kills Ensign Victoria’s dad, the trail is set to lead straight back to Kris. Heads, they win. Tails, you lose.”

Jack settled back into his chair, eyed the overhead, and muttered a long stream of curses.

Now it was Kris’s turn to lean forward. “Who came up with the stupid idea of having Vicky’s father go on safari on a half-pacified planet?” Kris asked.

It was Vicky who answered. “It could have been any number of factions. Dad prides himself on being ‘The Mighty Hunter.’ Show him something he hasn’t killed, and he’ll be off in a flash. When I heard Birridas was joining the Alliance, I would have bet Dad would be here hunting in no time.”

Captain Krätz nodded along. “It was just that none of us thought he’d come before planetary defenses were in place. And the idea of not trusting the Navy to guard the planet. It’s almost as if. . .” The captain could not finish that sentence.

“It’s almost as if you were being set up for something,” Captain Drago said. Then paused. “Wait one.” Now his eyes fixed on the overhead as he listened to something. Then he stood. “Kris, I strongly suggest that we continue this conversation on the bridge. It seems matters are developing.”

“What’s happening?” came in a half dozen voices.

“It’s quicker to see than to explain it,” hung curtly in the air as Captain Drago rushed for the door.

Kris had had enough of stately pomp and pretensions; she sprinted right after him.

48

A breathless minute later, Kris’s team arranged themselves in front of the main screen. A deadly serious Sulwan Kann explained what they were looking at.

“Three minutes ago, the FolkFestiva starliner
Dedicated Workers of Tourin
came through Jump Point Alpha. It did so at twenty thousand klicks an hour.” That drew a low whistle from those qualified to know just how suicidal that was.

“Is that a problem?” Colonel Cortez asked.

“Only if you want to get where you’re going,” Captain Drago explained. “Jump points orbit two, three, six planets, and the influence of all of them affect the jump point, making them seem to wander aimlessly from the perspective of any one planet. A smart captain and navigator approach a jump carefully to make sure it hasn’t moved. You approach it too fast, and you may end up at some planet halfway across the galaxy. If you’ve got a spin on your boat, it only gets worse.”

Drago rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Usually liners and expensive battleships tiptoe through a jump. Strange.”

“And it’s gotten stranger,” Sulwan announced. “She’s hit the accelerator—3.26 gees.”

“No captain of a liner puts his passengers under that kind of acceleration,” Captain Krätz said.

“So we assume that the
Workers of Tourin
is no longer under its captain’s control,” Colonel Cortez observed softly.

“Talk to me about the
Tourin
,” Drago ordered.

Sulwan brought up the required specs.

“A million tons,” Jack said. “Oh God.”

“Five thousand passengers and crew.” Penny’s voice broke.

“How long before she gets here?” Kris asked, voice cold.

“Assuming the
Tourin
keeps accelerating, and does not flip and start decelerating,” Sulwan said as the screen changed to reflect her words, “we’ve got seven hours, thirty-three minutes before it digs a big hole off the coast of South Continent.”

“Where my dad’s hunting,” Vicky added.

“You’ll have to get him out. There’s time,” Kris said.

“No,” Krätz cut in. “There’s a storm raging there. Think big, bad hurricane. It’s got everything grounded.”

Kris frowned. “Assassin’s luck, or planned?”

Krätz shrugged. “It is the season for those things.”

“So, seven and a half hours. How many ships can you get under way?” Kris asked, eyeing the Greenfeld captain.

Captain Krätz shook his head. “We told State Security that this dinky station’s reactor would need a month to boil enough plasma to power up the fleet, but no. ‘One of your ship’s engineers might send his reactor critical and try to kill the First Citizen. ’ Every ship had to go cold steel. They are all a bunch of idiots,” Krätz roared.

With effort, he recovered his temper. “And now it seems that some of them are traitors as well. We have been set up.”

Captain Drago cleared his throat. “With all respect to the captain, there is one ship that can get under way.”

“Who?” Captain Krätz demanded.

“Us,” Captain Drago said, with a sly smile.

The Greenfeld captain frowned. Then his eyes grew wide for a moment before he growled, “You wouldn’t do that?”

“The
Wasp
was rigged for that procedure last overhaul,” Drago shot back. “We are an exploration ship. There was no way to foretell what our needs might be out beyond the Rim.”

“That’s insane. Worse, it’s suicidal and mass murder.”

“Not when properly done with modern power supplies.”

Kris felt like she was watching a Ping-Pong match. Only she had no idea what it was that the two men were batting back and forth. “Would one of you mind,” she shouted into the rapid fire of words, “telling the rest of us what you are talking about?”

For a moment longer, the two captains stood eyeing each other. Then Captain Krätz gave a curt wave at Captain Drago.

Drago, with a confident half bow, began. “Our four landers have antimatter cells. We can remove them and rig two of them to our auxiliary power supply generators. Those two will get the magnetic containment field up. Then we dump the other two into the main reactor and jump-start the fusion process,” he said, proud as the calico cat that swallowed the Cheshire canary.

Kris eyed the only slightly controlled rage on the other captain’s face. “Is your
Surprise
rigged with such capability?”

“Hell no,” he shot back. “It would be a violation of Society of Humanity rules as well as Greenfeld regulations. For the last sixty years, since the old
Canopus
blew up herself and half the Borden station, it’s been illegal. A hundred thousand died in one second.”

Kris walked away from the two captains. One offered a solution. . . that might be suicide and murder. The other offered no solution. . . and demanded that this one not be tried. Kris found herself staring at a very pale Victoria Peterwald.

“Vicky, what do you think?”

“I don’t know what to think, Your Highness.”

“Talk to me, Vicky. I need to know something about what you’re thinking.”

“Okay, Kris,” the young woman said, and took a deep breath. “I want to save my dad. Other people may hate him, but he’s my dad. Maybe not the best one around, but he’s all the dad I have. How do we do it?”

There it was. A plea from a younger Peterwald to save the elder. A plea made by a Peterwald to a Longknife. Capulet to Montague.
Do I accept it?
Kris asked herself.

Stupid question. Her head was in the same noose. Let that starship smash into South Continent, and there’d be rocks and wreckage all over the place. Not to mention certain gun-happy fellows in black uniforms oh so certain that Kris had caused it.

With a sigh, Kris winked at Vicky.
Watch and learn, my friend.
She whirled to face the captains.

“Captain Krätz, how long would it take one, just one of these ships hanging on to this station to get under way?”

“Twelve hours. Maybe more. This station is a piece of shoddy junk. We’d have to jump up the electric production to get the containment field of a ship up and running, then get a containment chute from the station’s reactor to the ship. Most of the plasma would cool in the chute, so it would take a lot of plasma to get the reactor critical. Then you’ve got to grow the reaction mass, get your own electricity generators going.” Krätz’s voice trailed down into a whisper as he spoke. He finished shaking his head. “Some son of a bitch set us up.”

“
So
, you are set up,” Kris agreed. “Somewhere about two-thirds of the way into powering up one ship, her dad gets suddenly dead. Out of curiosity, what happens next? Does your ensign get promoted to First Citizen?”

Vicky’s eyes got wide with that question. The captain studied the polished toes of his shoes. “I don’t know. You know our attitude toward women.” Now his gaze rose to take in his JO. “But I’d fight to my dying breath to protect you.”

“I don’t want your dying breath,” Vicky snapped. “I want to save my dad.”

The captain’s shoulders slumped. “That I cannot do. No one in the fleet can do that.”

“But someone in the Wardhaven fleet is willing to make a good solid try,” Vicky growled low. “A Longknife is willing to risk her neck to save a Peterwald!”

“And maybe kill us all.”

“You just told me that I’m not likely to outlive my dad for more that a couple of months. Strange, Captain, that is one thing we can agree on. Maybe someday I could tame the Palace with a whip and a gun and a gallows working overtime, but not now. Not today. We need to save my father.”

Vicky opened her arms, pleading, “Captain, please help these people save him.”

“And if they fail?”

“None of us will be any deader than we’re likely to be this time next year.”

For a long moment, Captain Krätz continued to shake his head. Then he turned to Kris. “Your Highness, what can I do to help?”