Death's Bright Day: Chapter Ten

Above Peltry

    Adele found freefall very uncomfortable when she was aware of it, but she easily slipped into an existence outside her physical body when confronted with a fresh mass of data to be processed. There was a smile — or at least contentment — at the back of her mind as she began linking Peltry’s communications networks to the Princess Cecile.

    “Cinnabar registry ship Princess Cecile to Newtown Harbor Control,” Vesey called. Newtown was Peltry’s capital and main starport. Vesey didn’t have a particular flair for communications as Cory did, but she would be polite, correct, and if necessary extremely patient with the local personnel.

    It was usually necessary to be patient with ground control once one got outside the core planets of the Cinnabar and Alliance blocs. Adele had the skill and equipment to take over most port control computers. She could give the Princess Cecile authorization to land and could block other ships from landing or lifting off.

    That would often have been easier than dealing with a numbskull on the ground — or waiting for someone to finally wake up in the control booth. It would also tell everyone with a modicum of awareness how great the Sissie’s capabilities were and how dangerous the ship was to anyone with something to hide.

    The most Adele had ever done was to set off the tornado warning sirens in the port of Sisleen on Brookshire, a sleepy Friend of Cinnabar. The sirens continued to wind until someone in Port Control responded to the alert signal on the console — which was the Sissie’s request for landing authorization. Adele felt that this would be explained as unconnected computer glitch…but since then, unless there was a specific reason for her to perform as a normal signals officer, she thought it best to leave the task others.

    Besides taking over Peltry’s networks, Adele was collecting the contents of official databases — those of the Newtown and Peltry administrations, as well as what passed for the government of the Tarbell Stars. The last was a mare’s nest — or rather, half a dozen mare’s nests which communicated badly or not at all with one another — but Adele was used to that.

    The Department of War was a well-organized exception. There was even an attempt at security. Adele’s software had been designed to penetrate Alliance systems. The 5th Bureau data from Grozhinski had specific keys to the Department of War files, but Cory hadn’t required them. A computer capable of guiding a starship through the Matrix could, with the right software, defeat almost any form of encryption.

    Cory was sucking in data from the Tarbell Navy. There were at least a dozen ships in the naval harbor separated by moles from the general harbor. The largest vessel was a heavy cruiser, but it appeared to be out of service.

    Adele gave the naval material only a passing glance. Cory was fully competent with the process, and his Academy background gave him advantages. She would go over his gleanings at leisure, but she didn’t expect to find anything Cory had missed.

    “Princess Cecile, this is Newtown Control,” a female voice announced. “I’ll be able to clear you to land in about five minutes. There’s a freighter scheduled to lift ahead of you, over.”

    Cazelet was searching Port Control and the logs of the sixty-odd ships in the general harbor. He had worked all his youth in his family shipping business until his parents fell foul of Guarantor Porra. Cazelet had fled to his grandmother, who had in turn sent him on to Adele Mundy on Cinnabar.

    Just as Mistress Boileau had fostered Adele on Bryce, so Adele took responsibility for Cazelet by placing him in the crew of the Princess Cecile. It had been a good bargain for the RCN, and a very good one for Adele herself. Cazelet’s different training meshed well with what Cory had received from the RCN, and the two young men even got along well.

    I’ve created a uniquely skilled staff for myself, Adele thought. Without in the least intending to. And they both feel that I’ve saved them, which is true enough but wasn’t part of a plan either.

    You could accomplish quite a lot — and do quite a lot of good — without goals. Focusing on a task and doing it well was as much as could be expected of anyone. Adele assumed that must be more difficult than it seemed to be to her.

    Adele noticed three small civilian craft — the largest was under two thousand tons — clustered around a hulk. They were in the orbit of Peltry’s outermost moon, about a million miles above the planet’s surface.

    From their electronic signatures the ships were barely functional. Adele turned the Sissie’s excellent optical sensors to the largest of the three. The imagery showed it just as decrepit as the electronics implied: one of the ship’s four antennas was a stump, and a yard was missing on two of those remaining. A rocket basket had been welded to the hull beside the stub antenna where it would have the broadest field of fire.

    She highlighted the image and checked Daniel’s display on the command console, intending to pin an icon there for him to call up when she alerted him. Daniel was already observing the strange ships, but he had focused on the hulk.

    A shaded triangle on his display alerted him that she was echoing his screen. He grinned and said, “Adele, I’m looking at pirates.”

    Adele had set the system so that her name cued a two-way link. She said, “I thought that’s what they were. But what’s the hulk?”

    When we first met, Daniel wouldn’t have noticed that I was echoing his display, she thought with mild pride. And I wouldn’t have recognized pirates.

    “They’re using a junked freighter as a water buffalo,” he said. “They probably towed it through the Matrix from wherever their base is so that they can keep a way on while they’re waiting for a target.”

    “Are we going to do something?” Adele said. It wasn’t idle curiosity — she would have a part in any action. Though I don’t suppose I would have to apologize for being curious.

    “I’d like to,” Daniel said. “But –”

    “Princess Cecile, this is Newtown Control,” said the voice. “You are cleared to land in the outer harbor. A tug will bring you to your berth. Over.”

    “But there isn’t time,” Daniel continued, “and it’s not really our business. Not yet at least. Still — can you get me a tight beam to the biggest pirate?”

    “Yes,” said Adele, “but I’d be amazed if they had functioning laser or microwave receivers. I certainly don’t see any sign of antennas on them.”

    “Then short wave will do,” Daniel said.

    Adele adjusted the hailing antenna toward the largest vessel and said, “Go ahead.”

    “Unidentified ships,” said Daniel, “this is RCS Princess Cecile. Stand by to be boarded. If you offer resistance, you will be immediately destroyed, over.”

    Daniel hadn’t alerted the Sissie’s crew to what he was doing, but the ship trembled as both gun turrets slewed to bear on the pirates. Sun had been monitoring radio traffic. In a moment he would lower the turrets and lock them for landing, but now the plasma cannon were ready to fire.

    Lights winked in a corner of Adele’s display. She knew if she checked she would learn that Chief Missileer Chazanoff was arming his weapons too. None of the pirates looked worth a missile, but Chazanoff wasn’t going to miss any chance that was offered.

 

---

 

    The pirates had been cruising at low thrust, just enough to maintain a semblance of gravity. There was no reply by radio, but two and then the third vessel came up to what was probably full power. As Adele watched, one vessel entered the Matrix. The other pirates followed a moment later.

    “I don’t blame the locals for not chasing them off,” Daniel said, back on the two-way link. “But they ought to be able to smash the water buffalo. Still, it’s not our business.”

    Adele was sure that Daniel did blame the Peltry forces. She understood that it was considered polite to be charitable to incompetents, but she had never been able to fathom why.

    “Princess Cecile, this is Newtown Control,” the radio voice said unexpectedly. “Is Captain Leary aboard, over?”

    Without hesitation, Vesey sent an alert to Adele’s console, passing the call to her. Adele, feeling her voice harden further with each word, said, “Ground, this is Princess Cecile. Captain Leary is aboard. What is your reason for asking, over?”

    “Princess Cecile,” said Newtown Control, “the Tarbell Stars have directed that Captain Leary and his staff report as soon as they arrive to Christopher Robin, the Minister of War. The Ministry will send an aircar to pick them up, over.”

    “Message received,” Adele said without discussing the matter with Daniel. “Princess Cecile out.”

    Instead of turning her head toward Daniel, Adele expanded his face on her display. Over the two-way link she said, “Well, it gives you plenty of time to change.”

    Daniel stretched at his console. “It would,” he said, “but I think I’ll wear these utilities, like the civilian captain I am. I’ll wear a saucer hat, though.”

    He frowned slightly and added, “You know, I think it might be just as well if you weren’t with me. Though if you want to come, of course…?”

    “I can check with the local representative of our principal during the time,” Adele said calmly. She knew that Daniel liked to keep a distance from her intelligence activities, but there was more going on here. “Is there any particular reason that you’d like me to be absent?”

    Daniel laughed; the question seemed to have restored his normal good humor. “Not really,” he said. “Well, the same reason you didn’t give a real answer to the demand. We knew we’ll be working with the Minister of War, but…”

    He frowned again and said, “There are a lot of people who can give me orders. They all wear RCN uniforms. More to the point, none of them are jumped-up quartermasters like Christopher Robin, sitting behind desks in the back of beyond.”

    Adele smiled. Lady Mundy understood Captain Leary’s reaction very clearly. Another person would have laughed out loud.

 

---

 

Newtown on Peltry

    “Captain Leary?” said the man waiting on the pier in a white uniform without rank insignia. “I’m Captain Walters. I’m to escort you and your staff to the Minister of War.̶#8221;

    Daniel eyed the aircar behind Walters. It would seat twelve in the benches running along the sides of the passenger compartment; there was a cab in front for the driver.

    “Is that Army?” Hogg said, frowning. “It sure looks like it.”

    “It doesn’t have armor,” Daniel said. “Police, maybe. A paddy wagon, I shouldn’t wonder.”

    Walters was young and had a fluffy blond beard which contrasted with the flush of his skin. “His Excellency wasn’t sure how many personnel you would be bringing. I thought it best to borrow a vehicle from the Quick Response Force of the National Police. It is not a prison van.”

    “I’ve ridden paddy wagons before,” Daniel said mildly. “We can leave whenever you’re ready, Master Walters.”

    Walters looked past Hogg and Daniel and frowned. “I’m to bring your staff with you, Captain Leary,” he said.

    “That’s me,” said Hogg, sauntering past Walters toward the aircar. The female driver watched him silently. She had shut down her fans.

    “I distinctly remember His Excellency telling me there would be a woman!” Walters said.

    “Then he’s going to be disappointed,” Daniel said, walking around the aide’s other side. He had told Hogg about the summons from Minister Robin, but he probably wouldn’t have needed to. Hogg automatically got a chip on his shoulder when he had to deal with what he considered uppity foreigners — who were basically anybody who wasn’t a Cinnabar citizen.

    “Say, but if you find one,” Hogg said, “see if she’s got a friend. I don’t know anybody yet on this pisspot world.”

    “Drive to the Ministry!” Walters called to the driver as he got in behind them. He banged the door shut. The back had a cage of heavy wire. It could be covered with a tarpaulin, but at present the mesh was open to the sky.

    The driver balanced her six motors and lifted. The two beneath the stern squealed loudly at idle. Probably why she’d shut down while she waited, Daniel thought, but the sound muted once the oil was at full pressure.

    “I was expecting to call on the President as soon as I’d changed,” Daniel said truthfully to Walters. He raised his voice only slightly.

    Walters had seated himself on the back end of Daniel’s bench. He slid closer so that he didn’t have to lower his dignity by shouting and said, “You’re welcome to see President Menandros, but if you want to discuss the war you’ll be very disappointed. If you’re a wine connoisseur, the President is your man.”

    Daniel nodded with a smile. For the first time the aide sounded like a real human being instead of the puffed-up retainer of a puffed-up bureaucrat. He said, “Then perhaps I’ll get on better with Master Robin than I feared I would from his summons.”

    Walters flushed again. “He is the Minister of War of the Tarbell Stars, Captain Leary,” he said.

    “Right,” said Hogg. “And me and the young master is Cinnabar citizens. So now we’ve decided who’s the class act on, what’s the name of it again? Peltry.”

    The driver flew them around a large courtyard building, three stories tall like the square structures to either side of it. The front entranceway was covered by a cornice supported on full-height pillars, but the back was an alley not much wider than the aircar. The driver settled to the alley pavement skillfully, keeping a degree of forward motion to steady the vehicle despite the currents eddying between the buildings. She shut off the motors.

    “His Excellency thought it would be better for you to arrive without fanfare,” Walters said. “There are spies in Newtown, you see.”

    Yes, Daniel thought. We’re working for some of them.

    Storn’s officers weren’t the only spies on Peltry, of course. But it was equally obvious that entering by the back door wasn’t going to keep Daniel’s presence a secret from the Upholders and their 5th Bureau backers.

    I wonder if Robin is hoping to hide us from his President?

    The aircar had landed just ahead of an unobtrusive door in the back wall of the War Ministry. Walters removed an electronic key from his breast pocket and inserted it in the lock. The heavy door opened outward; it wouldn’t have cleared the side of the car if they’d been directly in front of it.

    Walters gestured Daniel and Hogg into a dim-lit anteroom. “There’s no guard,” the aide said, “because there’s only this one key. His Excellency keeps it himself. Being entrusted with it was a great honor for me.”

    Hogg sniffed, but Daniel was glad that he didn’t say what he was obviously thinking: if you think an electronic lock will keep out anyone but the key-holder, you haven’t met Adele. Which was true, of course.

 

---

 

    The anteroom was tight for three people. Daniel wondered what would have happened if he had brought a staff of ten.

    Walters pressed a button in the wall. A green light winked above the inner door, which he then pushed open. “Your Excellency, the visitors are here. They’re both male.”

    There hadn’t been a lock. The light was simply to indicate that the person within was free.

    Christopher Robin had risen from his wooden desk. He faced Daniel and Hogg with a noble expression. The large office beyond was empty of furniture except for three chairs and the smaller desk set near the door to which Walters went.

    Robin was large without being really fat. He would have been an imposing man even without the white leather uniform glittering with medals and braid. Adele’s briefing mentioned that Robin was the Marshal Commanding All Military Forces of the Tarbell Stars. Apparently it was in that guise he had decided to meet the Cinnabar advisors rather than as the civilian Minister of War.

    In official Tarbell records Robin was a former Admiral of the Kostroman Navy. Kostroman naval ranks didn’t rise to admiral, and the captains had to be members of the ruling families; Robin’s father had been a dockyard welder and his mother a schoolteacher.

    Robin had been in the Kostroman navy, as a quartermaster. He had left his position and Kostroma ahead of an investigation. That said, Tarbell’s Ministry of War was well organized and well run — uniquely among the government bureaus.

    “Seat yourselves, please,” Robin said, gesturing to the chairs facing the front of the desk. Daniel walked around to take one.

    “I’ll stand,” said Hogg. He leaned against the door they had entered by.

    Robin laughed and sat down on his own chair though that left Hogg glowering at his back. He said, “Captain Leary, I’ve heard a great deal about you and Lady Mundy.”

    “Friends of the Tarbell Stars thought the Princess Cecile could be useful to your government in fighting the Upholders,” Daniel said. He ignored the reference to Adele.

    “Indeed, indeed,” Robin said. He took off his saucer hat — leather as well, it appeared — and set it on the desk. “The Upholders have three modern destroyers, one of which has a crew of Fleet veterans. Not so very impressive, you might say, but we have only three destroyers which are really serviceable, plus the destroyer which recently came to us when Nabis decided to join the Tarbell Stars.”

    That hadn’t been in the briefing materials, Daniel thought. Aloud he said, “When did Nabis join? I’d understood they were taking a strongly independent line?”

    “The former ruler, Peter Langland, certainly was independent,” Robin said with a chuckle. “He asked for help from us and from Karst to resist pressure from the Upholders. Karst sent a regiment — which promptly assassinated Langland and started looting the capital. The locals rose up and slaughtered about half of them. The provisional Nabis government was happy to join Tarbell when our troops arrived.”

    That was too recent to have been in the briefing materials. No doubt Adele would be getting an update from her sources right now.

    “Anyway,” Robin said, “I’d like you and your officers to transfer to the Nabis destroyer, the Katchaturian, and whip her into shape. I’ll provide Tarbell officers for your corvette. I think that’s the most efficient way to use the available resources.”

    A number of ways to respond riffled through Daniel’s mind like the pages of a flipbook. “I don’t think we’ll do that,” he said mildly. “I think we’ll be able to work out something satisfactory when I’ve got a little more information, though.”

    Daniel coughed into his fist, enough of a pause to allow Robin to absorb the idea but not to respond, then said, “You mentioned the Upholder destroyers but you didn’t say that the rebels are also believed to be negotiating for a heavy cruiser. Can your own cruiser be readied in time to meet it?”

    Both of Adele’s sources were certain that General Krychek was arranging the transfer of an Alliance cruiser to the Upholders. On paper the rebels were buying a hulk for scrap value. The reality was that the paperwork had been switched with that of a sister ship which was old but fully functional.

    Robin certainly knew that. Either he was testing how much Daniel knew, or he was simply trying to hide the real situation from his new advisor.

    “The Maria Theresa can’t be returned to use,” Robin said without hesitating. “What I can do is configure a pair of modern transports as missile ships. The Upholders can’t fight a battle of maneuver. If we can overwhelm the cruiser they may be getting, then any surviving ships will lose heart and flee. The war’s over then.”

    That’s a good plan, Daniel thought. His opinion of the Minister was going up.

    “We’re getting the missiles from Cinnabar stocks,” Robin went on. “I suspect you may know more about that than I do.”

    You’re wrong, Daniel thought.

    “Anyway, they’re Alliance missiles captured in the recent war and being shipped to us as scrap. I’ve just been informed that they’ve arrived on Danziger, which is the usual transfer point for the cluster.”

    “My crew and I can help in refitting the transports as warships,” Daniel said.

    Robin grimaced and spread his hands in a dismissive gesture. “We have dockyards here,” he said. “Perhaps when it comes to fitting the fire control a specialist might be helpful. The Katchaturian is too important a ship for me to just hope that Langland did a good job of maintaining it and training its crew!”

    Daniel pursed his lips. Robin was being forceful, but he didn’t repeat his initial error of trying to give orders to someone who wasn’t under his command.

    “I think we can find a useful compromise,” Daniel said. “Give me command of the Katchaturian. I’ll treat her and the Sissie as a small squadron and work them up together. That is, if I have a free hand with the Katchaturian’s crew?”

    Robin snorted. “You have it,” he said. “Hang a few of them if you think that’ll wake the others up. The officers are Nabis gentry, so that might be a good idea. The crew is whoever signed on, of course. Some Nabis, most not.”

    “All right,” said Daniel, rising. “You’ll arrange that I have any authorizations I need?”

    “Walters, see that Major Berners gives Leary whatever he wants,” Robin said. “And guides him around personally.”

    “Yes, your Excellency!” Walters said. “I’ll take him straight to Berners.”

    “Say, Leary?” Robin said. “I know the destroyer’s under strength. How would you like to take over the Nabis ground troops too? I shifted the Nabis Capital Regiment to Peltry and put a Tarbell regiment on Nabis, just for safety. The Nabis troops really are from Nabis, you see — Langland was trying to make the planet great, the way it was before the Hiatus.”

    “Yes,” Daniel said. There were many questions, many ways that could go wrong. His assumption was to assume he could deal with whatever luck or the gods threw him. There were always too many potential side-effects to prepare for all of them.

    “Then I think we’re done here, Leary,” Robin said. “Walters, take him to Berners.”

    They left by the front door of the office. Daniel wondered how he was going to get back to the Princess Cecile, but he would deal with that when the time came.