Authors: Peter Grant
As he drew near the others fell back, allowing him to approach her alone. He settled the big wheeled suitcase upright on its base, came to attention, and saluted formally. “Major Carson reports to Vice-President Johns as ordered, Ma’am!”
She straightened, pulled her shoulders back and half-bowed her head to acknowledge his salute. “You’re very welcome here, Major. Congratulations on your spectacularly successful escape from the Bactrian forces illegally occupying Laredo.” She spoke loudly, presumably for the benefit of the journalists who were photographing and recording everything.
He smiled inwardly as he raised his voice in response. If public relations sound bites were what she wanted, he could oblige. “They did their best to stop us reaching you, Ma’am, but their best wasn’t anywhere near good enough.”
He saw approval flicker in her eyes. She opened her mouth to speak just as a high-pitched whine approached rapidly from behind him, growing louder and louder. He saw alarm flicker in her eyes as the Ambassador dived for the floor, then gunshots exploded. He felt three sharp blows across his back as bullets struck him, making him arch from the pain of their impact even though they didn’t penetrate his ballistic-fabric uniform. As he fell forward Vice-President Johns doubled over, clutching at her stomach, then her chest as red blood fountained. The younger woman standing beside her crumpled to the floor as a red line appeared on the side of her head. Shouts of alarm erupted from everywhere except directly behind him, where his soldiers were standing.
An electric utility cart squealed to a halt beside him. He rolled over, wincing at the pain as a big burly man wearing a mask grabbed the suitcase. Another masked figure beside him aimed a pulser down at Dave, clearly intending to shoot him again, but he was knocked sideways, shouting in pain, as a carry-on bag flew through the air and smacked into his head. He grabbed wildly at the side of the utility cart to stop himself falling out, dropping his pulser in the process. It skittered across the floor.
The driver stamped on the accelerator and the power pack whined to shrill, screaming life once more as he steered for the exit. A double swinging door was open to allow the passage of an older couple, and he drove right over them as he sped through the opening. As he did so a uniformed figure dived for the pulser, picked it up and rolled onto one knee, lining it at the fleeing cart. Dave yelled, “NO! DON’T SHOOT!”
The figure hesitated, then lowered the weapon as it turned to look at him. It was Tamsin. “Are you all right?” she gasped.
Dave shook his head, watching as a van screeched to a stop outside, tires leaving black marks on the road surface, side door already open. The utility cart couldn’t stop in time and bounced off the sidewalk, ramming the van’s front tire as the three men threw themselves and the case through its open door. The van accelerated away with a scream of plastic on metal, tossing the utility cart onto its side as the door slid closed.
He looked back at Tamsin. “My back hurts like hell,” he gritted through clenched teeth. “Who threw that suitcase?”
“That was me, Sir,” Sergeant Higgs said.
“Well done! You saved my ass. I know our uniforms are proof against pulsers, but he was aiming at my head when your case hit him.”
“Why wouldn’t you let me shoot?” Tamsin demanded.
“Too many civilians. A ricochet might have hit one of them.” As he spoke he rose to his hands and knees and crawled painfully over to Vice-President Johns. One of the terminal policemen was already kneeling beside her, cradling her head as she gasped for breath. Tamsin stooped to help him as the rest of his team gathered around. He saw the journalists avidly filming everything and bit back a curse. As far as he was concerned they were a bunch of ghouls and vultures to take such delight in killing, but at least their vid might help to identify those responsible.
Dave glared across the Vice-President at the Ambassador. “You
knew
about this, you bastard! You hit the deck before a single shot was fired!”
The man got to his feet, looking nervous. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Major.”
“The vid will show it clearly enough. You knew this attack was coming!”
Johns plucked weakly at Dave’s sleeve. He looked down as she moved her right hand slowly, laboriously across her body and fumbled with the strap of the attaché case. As he reached down to help her she placed the strap in his hand, took an agonized breath, and gasped, “You – take this – appoint you – my successor – I – ” She arched her back in another spasm of excruciating pain, then went limp. Dave had seen too many people die to be in any doubt that she’d taken her last breath.
He looked at Tamsin. “Help me up.” As she did, he pulled the strap from around the Vice-President’s shoulder and slid it over his own. Her blood was on the strap and case. Some wiped off on his new uniform, staining it, but he neither noticed nor cared.
“I’ll take that, Major!” the Ambassador said sharply, striding forward and holding out his hand. “I’m now the most senior representative of Laredo’s Government-in-Exile. Hand it over!”
“Like hell!” Dave snapped. He looked down at the Terminal police sergeant still kneeling by the dead Vice-President’s side. “Sergeant, will you please state publicly and for the record what you heard the Vice-President say and do before she died?”
“Yes, Sir.” He rose to his feet. “She gave you that bag and appointed you her successor, Sir.”
“Nonsense!”
the Ambassador exploded. “You must have misheard!”
“No, he didn’t,” one of the journalists corrected him. “I filmed the whole thing. It’s all in here.” She patted her vid recorder. “She did just what the Sergeant said.”
“Thank you,” Dave said, nodding to her in acknowledgment. “I’d be grateful if you’d please let me have a copy of that vid for our records. I’ll pay for it, of course.”
“Sure.” The woman’s face was white and strained.
“How’s the other lady?” he asked the policeman.
“She’s out cold. The bullet grazed her head, but didn’t penetrate the skull that I can see.”
“She should be OK then.”
Dave opened the attaché case, already knowing what he’d find inside it. Sure enough, the Great Seal of Laredo nestled in a special container in the front compartment. The metal seal matrix was attached to a low, flat handle carved from stone quarried in the Matopo Hills. Beside it was a flat box holding different-colored sticks of sealing wax. A small leather wallet held a card that Dave recognized as a bearer key for Laredo’s account at the Handelsbank, identical to the two already in his possession. The rear compartment held what looked like official documents.
Dave took out the Great Seal and held it up for everyone to see. “As Vice-President Johns’ freely chosen successor, I’ve assumed her office as President Pro Tem of Laredo’s Government-in-Exile in accordance with the Declaration of Emergency filed with the United Planets. Ladies and gentlemen of the Press, please witness my first official action in that capacity.” He turned to the Ambassador, his voice coldly formal. “Ambassador McNairy, you are dismissed with immediate effect from all your posts and offices. Your diplomatic immunity is also revoked as of this moment. You no longer have the authority to represent the Republic of Laredo in any way, shape or form, or make use of any of her assets or funds. You will hand over all official documents, records, equipment and other paraphernalia to me or to anyone I designate to receive them from you.”
“You can’t do that! It’s preposterous! You’re acting illegally!”
Dave lost his temper as he shook the Seal under his nose.
“This
makes it legal, damn you! You
know
that – just as your behavior proves you knew the attack was coming! If this weren’t a neutral planet, I’d execute you here and now as a traitor to Laredo.
Get out of my sight before I change my mind!”
McNairy opened his mouth to reply, then caught sight of the fury blazing in Dave’s eyes. He gulped, sidled backwards, then turned and fled into the crowd of onlookers that was picking themselves up from the floor, gathering round, staring, pointing, exclaiming in shock and horror.
“I’ll take that, please, Ma’am,” he heard the second Terminal policeman say. As he turned to watch Tamsin handed him the pulser she’d picked up, holding it by the frame, barrel pointing downwards. “Thank you for not shooting,” the policeman went on. “The risk of hitting innocent bystanders would have been too great.” Tamsin rolled her eyes rebelliously, but said nothing.
The police sergeant asked, “What was in that suitcase they took, Sir?”
Dave thought fast and chose his words carefully. He was being recorded, and knew whatever he said would doubtless be on news bulletins within the hour. He didn’t want to give anything away. “That suitcase was prepared on Laredo to contain all the evidence we’d accumulated over the past three and a half years of Bactria’s atrocities and war crimes, plus our bearer bank account keys and other information and materials that Vice-President Johns would have found useful.”
A contingent of police approached on the run, bursting through the crowd with two medical carts hot on their heels. Dave could see more heading for the doors to assist the older couple who’d been bowled over by the escaping attackers. As the medics bent over the Vice-President’s body, the police Sergeant asked, “Do you need medical attention, Sir? Even if those bullets didn’t penetrate your uniform, they’ve got to have left a mark.”
“They did. I’m going to have some bad bruises there come morning. I’ll want to change, and get a doctor to look at them.”
“We can do that at our station here, Sir. If you’ll all come with me, please?”
“No, Sergeant.” Dave spoke as firmly as he could. “I realize you want statements from us, but we have work to do – even more urgently now that Vice-President Johns is dead. We’re all traveling on diplomatic passports, so you can’t detain us. I’ll arrange to give statements tomorrow once we’ve had time to begin putting the affairs of our Government-in-Exile in order.”
“I’ll need to confirm your diplomatic credentials, Sir.”
“Of course. Passports, everyone, please.”
It took less than five minutes for the Sergeant to scan all the passport numbers, compare them to a list of accredited diplomats, and find where Vice-President Johns had registered them in the Neue Helvetica Foreign Ministry database. “You’re free to go, Sir,” the policeman advised reluctantly. “Please don’t forget those statements.”
“We won’t,” Dave promised. “We want Vice-President Johns’ killers apprehended far more than you possibly could!” He turned to his team, wincing at the pain in his back. “All right, people. If someone could please deal with my suitcase, I don’t feel up to it right now. Let’s get a passenger van and head for our hotel, call a doctor, then send a message to the others aboard ship to let them know we’re safe. If they hear about this first from news reports, they won’t be happy with us. I’ll tell them to join us as soon as possible. I think the immediate danger has passed.”
~ ~ ~
The tall, graying man rose from behind the ornate wooden desk as his receptionist showed Dave and Tamsin through the door of his office. His face was creased with concern.
“Major Carson, Lieutenant Gray, I was so terribly sorry to hear the news this morning! Vice-President Johns was a remarkable lady. Even though she couldn’t access your planetary account, she set up a secondary account for her mission with us, depositing in it the funds she brought from Laredo plus occasional contributions from sympathizers and well-wishers. She was a frequent visitor.”
Dave shook his hand. “Thank you, Herr Gottschalk. I’m glad she had the services of the Handelsbank at her disposal during the past few difficult years.”
“We tried to ease her way through the jungle of interplanetary finance,” the executive agreed as he shook Tamsin’s hand, then waved to comfortable seats around a table in the corner. As they sat down, he asked, “How is her assistant?”
“She’ll be OK,” Dave responded as he lowered himself carefully into the chair. He was unable to suppress a wince as his bruised back touched its softly upholstered surface. He tried to sit in such a way that he hunched forward, away from the pain. “She has a mild concussion, nothing worse.”
“Are you all right?” Gottschalk asked in concern.
“Not really, but I’ll cope. You said the Vice-President had a secondary account here. I’ve succeeded to her office, as you’ll know if you saw the news reports about this morning’s events. How much is in it?”
The man flushed, seeming almost ashamed. “There were two authorized operators of the account, herself and your Ambassador to the United Planets, Mr. McNairy. Within an hour of her assassination he entered our banking hall downstairs and withdrew the entire contents of the account in cash. I’m very sorry to say – particularly in the light of what you said to him this morning, as reported by the news vids – that he left here with all her funds.”
Dave tightened his fists in frustration. “How much did he steal?”
“It’s not technically theft, Major – he did have authority to use the account, after all. He withdrew the balance of close to half a million Neue Helvetica francs.”
“It’s theft all right, Herr Gottschalk. He’d already been relieved of his post and his authority to make use of Laredo assets, which would include bank accounts. However, I’m glad to hear it was a relatively small amount compared to Laredo’s main planetary account. I’m here to take charge of that and make new arrangements.”
“Ah, yes.” The executive sat back in his chair, steepling his fingers together, shrewd eyes fixed on him. “Do you have three bearer bank keys?”
“I do; Vice-President Johns’ key, plus two that I brought from Laredo.” He reached into his jacket pocket and took out the three cards in their protective envelopes.
Gottschalk accepted them from him. “May I please validate these, Major? There are certain security checks, you understand. They won’t leave this room.”
“In that case, go ahead.”
“Thank you.”
Gottschalk summoned his secretary, who made a call. Within five minutes two uniformed security officials came through the door, pushing a cart bearing a large, sophisticated card reader on its surface. Gottschalk inserted each card in turn into a slot in the top of the machine. After a few moments, each card elicited a sharp
beep!
as a green light illuminated.