Angelmass

CHAPTER 13

Across the darkened room, a door opened. "Commodore?" an all-too-familiar voice called.

Commodore Lleshi sighed. "Come in, Mr. Telthorst," he said.

"Thank you." The door slid shut, and the Adjutor's shadowy figure started across the floor, just visible against the stars turning slowly beneath them. "Quite a view," Telthorst commented. "What is this place, anyway?"

"Visual Command Operations Center," Lleshi told him, giving the room's official designation. Not that anyone aboard ship actually called it that, of course. Pompous official titles were reserved for use with equally pompous visiting dignitaries.

"Ah," Telthorst said, sliding a chair over next to Lleshi's and sitting down. "The military equivalent of an observation deck, I suppose. That spinning must be hard to get used to."

"Not really," Lleshi said, taking a sip of his tea. "Was there anything in particular you wanted?"

"As a matter of fact, there was," Telthorst said. "I understand a drop pod from Scintara came in this afternoon."

"It came into the system, yes," Lleshi told him. "It arrived on the far side, though, so all we've got is a remote data dump."

"Why haven't I received a copy?"

"The signal was rather messy," Lleshi said. "We got it decompressed, but then had to run it through a scrubber to clean out the extraneous noise. Too hard to read otherwise."

"How thoughtful of you to take such good care of my eyes," the Adjutor said dryly. "Dare I predict that this wonderfully clean copy won't be available until after you send the wiring crews out?"

Lleshi braced himself. Here it came. "I've already seen the unscrubbed version," he told Telthorst.

"There are no orders concerning your request."

"No actual orders, no," Telthorst agreed. "But they did authorize you to accept my recommendation."

Lleshi glared at him, a waste of effort in the dark. "Who told you that?"

"It doesn't matter," Telthorst said, his voice hardening. "What matters is that we now have the goahead.

And we're going to take it."

"My crew is working double shifts to get this damn catapult put together," Lleshi ground out.

"Shifting orbit now would cost us a minimum of two days. We'd have to haul all the loose equipment inside and tether the framework to the ship."

"It would have taken only fifteen hours if you'd accepted my recommendation when I first made it,"

Telthorst pointed out icily. "And if you let the actual wiring get started before you move, it could take as much as a week. I would think a military man like yourself wouldn't need to have the hazards of procrastination pointed out to him."

"It's a waste of time," Lleshi growled. "Of time, fuel, and effort. What's the point of moving the catapult closer in to a planet that'll never be developed anyway?"

In the dark, he sensed Telthorst shake his head. With a condescending look on his face, no doubt.

"You continue to assume, Commodore," the Adjutor said, his voice matching the imagined expression, "that colonization is the only practical use for a planet. I'm perfectly willing to concede that the place is probably too dark and chilly for most people's taste. Though I seem to remember the Niflheim colony surviving nearly fifteen years under even more rigorous conditions than these."

Lleshi felt his lip twist. Niflheim. "Oh, well, if you're going to define that as a profitable development—"

"They built an extractor, refinery, and linac tube before they gave up," Telthorst cut him off sharply.

"The metal the Pax has taken off since then has more than made up for the cost of sending the colony there in the first place. Anyway, that's beside the point. The point is that the probe shows enough surface metals to more than make up for the cost of the time and fuel you're so concerned with."

"And how do you put a price tag on my crewers' effort?" Lleshi demanded. "Or on their morale, when I have to tell them to unravel some of the hard work they've done just so you can move the Komitadji around?"

"Morale is not my concern, Commodore," Telthorst snapped. "But money is. This is a monstrously huge ship, with a totally unreasonable slice of the military budget required to keep it flying. Like everything else in the universe, it's required to earn its keep."

"We're going to give you the Empyrean," Lleshi retorted. "Isn't that enough earnings for you?"

"It might be," Telthorst said. "If I was assured that we'd get the entire package in undamaged condition. But as you yourself have pointed out, there's no way to guarantee that."

Lleshi stared at the dark silhouette, an uncomfortable tightness in his throat. "Is that what this is all about? That Hellfire simulation we ran back at Lorelei?"

"That, and the various scorched-ground simulations you've run since then," Telthorst said. "And don't bother denying it. I may not be military, but I know how to keep track of what goes on around me."

"I don't deny it," Lleshi growled, the first stirrings of real anger swirling within him. "Our job, Mr.

Telthorst, is to be prepared for anything that might conceivably happen in this operation. Anything.

Including planetary burn-offs, if that should become necessary."

"It won't become necessary," Telthorst told him, his voice soft but positive. "Trust me on that one.

I'll pull the Komitadji out and wait for another opportunity before I'll let you go in just to destroy."

"You'll pull us out?"

"Yes, Commodore. Ultimately, you and this ship are responsible to the Supreme Senate... and right now, as far as you're concerned, I am the Supreme Senate."

"I don't accept that," Lleshi said. "You may represent them, but you have no direct authority here.

This is my ship, and I will give the orders aboard it."

He stopped, and as the reverberations died away the room filled with a brittle silence. "You know, Commodore, you worry me," Telthorst said at last. "You and your other military friends. You asked the Pax to pour money into Kosta and his superfluous little fact-finding trip, and you got it. You asked us to risk the Komitadji to deliver him, and you got that, too. You then asked us to risk three other major warships for the rest of the Lorelei survey, and you got that. Now you balk at taking a few extra days and a little extra effort to make future development of this system easier. And for no better reason than that I asked you to do so."

"The Empyrean is a danger to the Pax," Lleshi said stiffly. "You've said so yourself, on many occasions. Alien influenced or not, those people aren't stupid—surely they know by now that we're planning some kind of major operation against them. Every unnecessary hour we stay out here gives them that much more time to prepare."

"We're talking about a few extra days, Commodore," Telthorst reminded him. "Not a year, not a month: a few days. What difference can a few days possibly make?"

"Against an unknown enemy?" Lleshi countered. "A few hours can spell the difference between victory and defeat. Sometimes even less than that."

Telthorst snorted. "Don't be ridiculous. This ship is indestructible. The Empyreals haven't got anything that can stand up to it, and we both know it. Scare tactics like that went out with the old military warlords." In the darkness, Lleshi had the sense that the other was eyeing him thoughtfully.

"You know, Commodore, in some ways you remind me of those warlords. Perhaps this ship has gone to your head, given you the idea that you can do whatever you want without regard for costs or budgets. It's a mode of thinking the Pax has worked very hard to bring under control. I'd hate to see isolated instances of it crop up and have to be dealt with."

"I thought scare tactics were out of date," Lleshi said coldly. "And as to the Komitadji, we've always delivered exactly what's been asked of us. The Pax has been well repaid for what's been put into this ship. And you know it."

The room fell silent. Lleshi watched the stars rotate beneath them; the stars and, at one point in the Komitadji's slow spin, the dazzling array of lights that was the embryonic catapult.

When and how, he wondered, had the Adjutors risen to this kind of power and authority? Certainly no such power had been given to them, at least not at first. They'd started out merely as a corps of professional mediators, calling themselves Adjudicators, dealing with disputes between warlords as the Pax slowly and painfully pulled itself together after the Splinter Wars a century and a half ago.

What had happened between there and here? The history books said the Adjudicators had shortened their title and shifted to advising the Pax on financial matters. That was their entire official standing even now, in fact.

But those who actually dealt with them knew the truth. The Adjutors, far from being mere advisers, had become a shadow government, with the final word on how the Pax's money was spent.

How had that happened? Lazy Senators, who relied more and more on their advisers' analyses and never bothered to check the figures themselves, until they couldn't function without Adjutors at their sides? Greedy Senators, who saw a way to make extra money on the side if a friendly Adjutor could quietly shave a few thousand out of a budget and funnel the funds elsewhere? Stupid Senators, who took their responsibilities so casually that they delegated authority with the same thoughtless attitude as if ordering lunch?

Lleshi didn't know. He doubted anyone knew, except perhaps the Adjutors themselves.

And they weren't talking. It was the victors, the saying went, who wrote the history. And, just as importantly, who decided what not to write.

"I could force the issue," Telthorst said at last. "If I sent a kick pod note out tonight, addressed to certain parties in the Supreme Senate, you'd have new orders within the next twelve hours. But I'd rather not do it that way. For one thing, you'd hate me for it, and I do so dislike being hated."

"Too late," Lleshi murmured. "You're already an Adjutor."

Telthorst seemed to consider rising to the bait, apparently decided against it. "The point is that the Komitadji is going to be moved," he said instead. "You can give the order, or you can accept the order. Which will it be?"

For a long moment Lleshi was sorely tempted to call the other's bluff. There was no reason for Telthorst or any other Adjutor to be aboard the Komitadji in the first place, let alone trying to control matters outside his tunnel-visioned field of expertise. Surely Telthorst's alleged friends in the Supreme Senate were smart enough to know that.

But the hallways of the Supreme Senate were crawling with Adjutors. And if they gave Telthorst what they wanted instead of slapping him down...

Lleshi ground his teeth together, the bitter taste of defeat coating his tongue. He couldn't risk it. If Telthorst got official sanction for this, it would create a precedent that would haunt every ship and commander in the Pax until the heat-death of the universe. "I'll give you your near-orbit," he told Telthorst, putting what little remained of his dignity into his voice. "But not because I'm afraid of these so-called friends of yours. I'll give it to you as a personal favor. The first and last such favor."

"Thank you, Commodore," Telthorst said smoothly. He wasn't fooled by the fancy words, of course.

But then, Lleshi hadn't really expected him to be. "I'll keep that in mind. So. Was there any news on how the Lorelei project is coming? Or do I have to find that out on my own, too?"

"It's running on schedule," Lleshi told him. "The last of the ships has gone in and vanished, presumably catapulted someplace to hell and gone. I'm guessing we'll have the coordinates and orbit for the last net within another week."

"Then all we'll have to do is cross our fingers," Telthorst said, a sour edge to his voice. "And hope the cocoon is doing what it's supposed to and not just sitting there with its thumb in its nose."

Lleshi smiled grimly in the darkness. Nice of Telthorst to bring up yet another instance where Lleshi and the military Spec Ops people had gotten their way. "No way to know," he reminded the other.

"Any kind of progress reports from the cocoon would have drastically increased the chances of discovery. Even spike-pulsed transmissions can be detected if the other side is clever or lucky enough. I'm sure you wouldn't want such an expensive collection of hardware to fall into Empyreal hands."

"Yes, I remember the arguments," Telthorst said, his tone frosty. "I just don't relish the thought of spending another four months in the middle of nowhere if this doesn't work."

Lleshi shrugged. "That's easily solved. We'll simply drop you off at Scintara before the jump-off."

Telthorst snorted. "You're too kind, Commodore. No, I'll be along for the invasion. If for no other reason than to make sure you don't damage anything you don't have to."

Lleshi was saved the need to reply by a chirp from his intercom. "Bodini here, Commodore. You wanted to be informed when the final scrubbing was finished on that last drop pod."

"Thank you, Ensign," Lleshi said, getting to his feet. "I'm on my way." He moved toward the door—

"Commodore?"

Lleshi half turned back. "Yes?"

"Don't forget to enter the order for the Komitadji's course change."

Lleshi took a deep breath. "I won't forget, Mr. Telthorst."

Not that, he promised silently as he strode from the room, nor the rest of this conversation. Not a single word of it.