Guardsmen of Tomorrow (2 page)

Then the feed came back on-line. Still queasy-he hated field interface transits-he scanned the cascade of data on his visual field. There were reports of disorientation, jacker shock, and obvious confusion… but no damage, thank the Goddess, and no link dissociations.

“
Damn
them!” cy-Tomlin’s voice said.

“As you were, Mid,” Pardoe warned. But his own voice was barely under control.

Victor
had popped her drive field to further slow her lumbering mass just as she cut across the
Indy’s
bow. Vector drive fields worked on the fabric of space-time, a true space drive; a kind of curdling of bent space rippled along the interface between the inside of a deployed VDF and what lay outside. Though not dangerous if encountered at low speeds, it was disorienting and could damage delicate electronics. At high relative velocities, it could generate disruption enough to shred the largest vessel into scattered debris.

“Signal,
Victor
to
Indeterminacy
.” Cy-Tomlin reported. “Ware our wake!”

“The bastards did that on purpose!” Sotheby said.

“I very much doubt that, Lieutenant,” he replied. “They were already moving too fast, and spreading that extra sail moved them faster. They had to drag their fields to decelerate in time.” Still, it did seem to be a calculated insult. As
Indy
came to a near-dead stop,
Victor
drifted across her bow a scant half kilometer distant, making for Mooring Bay 16. Cooling vanes like squared-off wings, the vast reach of her sails, shimmering as they fought to slow the behemoth, and the deadly complexity of the first-rater’s aft maneuvering drive Venturis passed slowly, a moving mountain.

Indeterminacy
rocked and shuddered again with the passing of the big ship’s wake, and then the way ahead was clear once more.

Hazzard let out a slow breath. Things could have worked out
much
worse. “Let’s have the extra sail in now, Mr. Par-doe. Set sail for ahead, maneuvering dead slow.”

“Furling all main tops’ls, Captain. Set sail for ahead, maneuver dead slow.”

“What do you think, Captain?” Pardoe said on their private link. “Was Sullivese trying to be flashy for the admiral’s benefit? Or was he just being incompetent?”

“Arren is
not
incompetent,” Hazzard replied, a bit more sharply than he’d intended.

Sometimes, Pardoe spoke his mind a little too freely. “Maybe they’re just in a hurry.”

“Aye, sir. And maybe some cyberenhanced Starlords think they’re just a rung or two higher up the Darwin ladder than the rest of us.”

Hazzard said nothing. Pardoe’s bitter aside had struck just a little too close abeam.

Their blockade deployment at Danibar had been cut short by the arrival of dispatches requiring
Indeterminacy
to make for Tribaltren Station with all due haste and for Greydon Haz/ard to report to the Port Admiral’s office immediately upon docking. With so many other vessels available within a few days’ travel of Tribaltren, why had the
Indy
been called in?

Immediately
, fortunately, was a flexible term in the Galactic Union Navy, however.

There was the routine of seeing to it that the ship was safely docked, of course.

Most of the minutiae could be properly left to his First Lieutenant, but there were reports to electronically sign and a grumpy Port Disbursement Officer to cajole into giving an upcheck to the purser’s request for new condenser tubes for the galley’s stasis units.

And, perhaps more immediate, he needed to get presentable first. One did not visit a two-star admiral in shipboard skins. When he chose to make himself visible on the shipnet, of course, his icon could take on any appearance he chose… which meant in uniform. When he came fully awake on the jackrack, however, the crisp and spotless Navy blacks were gone. In their place were gray skins soaked with sweat, and all the usual accoutrements for waste absorption, cooling, and nutrient tubes. A jackrack technician helped him unplug, took his helmet with its forest of electronic feeds and cables, and stood by as he swung his feet onto the steel grillwork of the deck.

Forty minutes later, freshly showered with the last of this deciyear’s personal water ration, Hazzard was clad in his one decent set of dress black-and-golds, complete with shoulder half-cloak, visored cap, medals and decorations, and his personal computer woven into the left arm of his jacket, from shoulder to wrist, in closely worked patterns of what looked like liquid gold.

“You loog good, zur,” Cadlud, his steward remarked, brushing his uniform with a static cleaner. The Irdikad hovered over him as it worked, its single eye in an elephantine head studying his uniform in minute inspection as all three tentacles twitched the fall of his cloak into perfect line. “Zhip-zhape ond sqvared avay.”

“Thank you, Cadlud. I just hope the admiral thinks the same.”

A launch took him from the
Indy
, now moored alongside the towering bulk of the station, across to one of the turreted tower complexes extending above the main body of the twelve-kilometer-wide facility.

The Port Admiral’s office was decorated in Late Jingivid Imperial, all mirrors and black trim in a jarring cacophony of light and reflections. Admiral Dalim cy-Koenin was a blunt, bullet-headed man with a no-nonsense attitude and little patience for protocol. Hazzard wondered, in fact, how the man had managed to survive politically long enough to be awarded two stars. Cy-Koenin’s implants encased parts of his head and were visible on the backs of his hands and extending down each finger to the tip.

Well, that, as much as anything else, explained his rank and considerable power.

“You’re late” was the way he greeted Hazzard, as the office door dilated and the ship captain stepped between the Marine sentries and into cy-Koenin’s inner sanctum.

“Yes, sir,” he replied. Hazzard was familiar enough with the ways of admirals to know that excuses were neither desired nor appropriate.

Wall screens displayed deep space-not the view from Tribaltren, but someplace closer in toward the Galactic Core, teeming with orange suns and the mingled, softer glows of pale nebulae. The mirrors, black trim, and star projections made it difficult to see where the walls of the room really were. Hazzard wondered if he could even find the door again.

Another man was in the room, reclining in a black synthliquid chair. Lean, hard, and angular, his face was faceted as though carved from obsidian. Both eyes were covered by a sensor array implant, and he was, if anything, more heavily intertwined with hardware than the Port Admiral. “Admiral,” cy-Koenin said, “this is the young man I was telling you about. Captain Hazzard, Admiral Starlord cy-Dennever.”

Hazzard inclined his head, as courtesy required. “My lord.”

Cy-Dennever looked him over coldly. “A noncy? My dear Dal, you
are
joking, I trust.”

Noncy. Non-cybernetically augmented.
That
again…

“I believe you will find me up to any task required of me, my lord.”

He sniffed and continued to address cy-Koenin, pointedly ignoring Hazzard. “I specifically require a frigate captain capable of leading my in-system squadron and with a master’s understanding of the Ordiku Anarchate and the political situation there. A noncy simply will not do.”

“Captain Hazzard is what’s available, Admiral,” cy-Koenin replied. “And he has personal knowledge of Kaden. Don’t you, Hazzard?”

“Yes, sir. I was an assistant diplomatic naval attache to the Anarchate home world for a year. My steward is Irdikad, in fact.”

Cy-Dennever gave him another look, harder this time. “And how long ago was this?”

“Oh, about eight years subjective, my lord.”

“How long objective? Things
do
change groundside while we’re on highspace approach. Or hadn’t you noticed?”

Hazzard had to consult his PC. He’d minused some subjective with this latest deployment at Danibar. How much? Nearly two years, this time.

“‘Nineteen years objective, sir.”

“Nineteen years. Well, you’ll find the political situation within the Anarchate radically transformed. I’m not so sure you will be of any use to me.”

“Their politics may have changed, my lord, but I doubt that the Irdikad have.

They’re solitary, traditional, meticulous, a bit stuffy, even stubborn at times. They are also unflinchingly loyal.” He smiled. “Despite their interest in tradition-their recorded history goes back something like nine thousand years--they respect, you might even say
revere
, madness. Insanity is rare, but it’s granted a special status in their culture, maybe to avoid the problems of stagnation.”

“Ahem, yes,” cy-Dennever said. “All very amusing, I’m sure. But the facts of the matter are that the Anarchate is now in negotiations with the P’aaseni Orthodoxate.

The Ministry of Political Intelligence assures me that a decision by the Anarchate is imminent, perhaps within the next ten days, and that Orthodoxate ships will almost certainly deploy before then to, urn, convince the Irdikad to come along.”

“The Irdikad volume is small, but strategically placed,” cy-Koenin added. “They have a fleet… a small one, true, but one capable of causing some considerable inconvenience should we extend our operations in that quarter. Lord cy-Dennever’s orders are to present a show of force at the Anarchate capital.”

“Exactly. My squadron has firepower sufficient to convince the Irdikads that joining with the Doxies would
not
be in their best interests.”

“I should think their best interests would be obvious,” Hazzard said. “The Orthodoxate is anthropocentric. Rather virulently so, in fact. The Irdikads would be reduced to slave status or worse.”

“Obviously.” Cy-Dennever sniffed. “And obviously, too, the Doxies are on their best behavior until the Anarchate planetary defense batteries are safely in their hands.

Remember, most Irdikad dealings have been with the Union so far. They are a simple people. To them, all humans are the same. Planetary genocide by what they consider to be an honorable and
civilized
species is probably utterly beyond their comprehension.”

Hazzard held his peace at the patronizing nonsense of “a simple people.” The man acted like he was a few genes short of a full chromosome.

If cy-Dennever represented
Homo sapiens superioris
, though, as his kind so often claimed, maybe he simply wasn’t done evolving yet.

“The question of Anarchate neutrality is in the hands of the diplomats,” cy-Koenin said. “Your mission, Captain Hazzard, will be to take command of the in-system squadron, as a part of Admiral cy-Dennever’s diplomatic show of force.”

Hazzard digested this. The in-system squadron would be the mission’s cutting edge, of course, patrolling within a few million kilometers of the Anarchate home world.

Admiral cy-Dennever would have the heavies, the main squadron’s ship of the line out on the fringes of the Kaden system, accelerating back and forth at near-c so as to be ready for a near-immediate jump in-system at need. “Aye, sir,” he said.

“It is vital, absolutely
vital
,” cy-Dennever put in, “that you not fire on Irdikad assets.

Enemy vessels, of course… but under no circumstances will you fire on the locals, even if you are provoked.”

“You’re saying, my lord, that we can’t shoot even if they shoot at us first?”

“Well done! That is
precisely
what I am saying. These negotiations are too delicate, and too much is at stake to risk…” He stopped and looked at cy-Koenin. “Are you certain there are no augmented frigate captains available? I can’t be expected to trust a mere biological’s reflexes or instincts in a situation this precarious! He doesn’t even have the hardwiring to handle his ship properly! His vessel very nearly fouled mine during our approach a few hours ago!”

Cy-Koenin glanced at Hazzard, then looked hard at cy-Dennever, saying nothing outwardly. Hazzard decided the two must have shifted to a telepathic exchange, one he was not privy to. Micro-radio transceivers implanted in their skulls allowed Starlords to converse privately, in much the same way that Hazzard could open a private channel to Par-doe when they both were on-line.

At last, cy-Dennever sighed and looked away. “Very well. But you are responsible, sir, if this goes wrong!”

“Of course, cy-Dennever,” cy-Koenin replied.

“What ships will I command?” Hazzard asked.

“Besides
Indeterminacy
,” cy-Koenin said, “there is
Decider
, a frigate of thirty-three guns, Captain-sixth Bellemew. The other vessels are smaller…
Swift
, twenty-seven;
Fire Angel
and
Ferocious
, both twenty-one; and
Uriel
, of eighteen guns. All five are already on-station or will be by the time you arrive. Four line battleships will be on blockade station out-system within two days objective. Admiral cy-Dennever’s
Victor
will bring that to five, under his flag. Your full operational orders will be transmitted to your ship. You are clear for departure as soon as you complete taking on necessary stores and provisions.”

“Aye, aye, my lord.”

“Should be an easy deployment, Greydon,” cy-Koenin added, dropping into less formal speech. “The Irdikad aren’t hostile, and they won’t pick a fight with one of our line battle squadrons!”

“Clarification,” cy-Dennever said. “They’re not hostile
yet
.”

“Mm,” cy-Koenin said. “As always, minus-tau is against us. We need you at Kaden as quickly as possible. Assume one day for refit, five days for the trans-c jump to Kaden. You will have a three-day margin, some of which will be lost to minus-tau.”

“Tau is of the essence, you might say,” cy-Dennever added, smirking at his own joke.

“Admiral cy-Dennever will be there in
Victor
within five days more,” cy-Koenin went on, ignoring him. “It will be up to you to assess the situation when you arrive, and to report to Admiral cy-Farrol, currently in command of the Kaden Squadron. You will have dispatches and orders to deliver to him.”

“Aye, my lord.”

“Dismissed, Captain Hazzard. Inform me when your vessel is fit for space.”