Backshot (9 page)

Anya exited the Atlas file and, hands shaking, entered her password to open an Ultra Secret listing of “special agents” assigned to Atlas. Henrico was a contract assassin. So that was it: The military would send in a deep recon team to penetrate the secret lab and find out what was going on. Meanwhile, CIO would infiltrate an assassin who would stand by for word from headquarters, probably based on what the lab analysis revealed, but maybe only on the whim of Adams, and then Lavager would be assassinated. Or maybe he would be murdered anyway, because the Director thought he knew better than anyone else in the Confederation how to solve problems among the member worlds. She controlled her stomach only with difficulty.

Anya got unsteadily to her feet. She took a few moments to compose herself and then headed for the CIO laboratory facility.

Office of the Director, CIO Laboratories

Dr. Blogetta O’Bygne, director of the labs, was a heavyset, middle-aged woman who made a show of wearing very thick lenses in her spectacles. She could easily have had her vision corrected through minor surgery but preferred the old-fashioned glasses because she thought they added a scholarly air to her appearance. But over the years, as one pair after another of her spectacles had gotten lost or broken, Blogetta had wondered if she should have the surgery after all and just keep the spectacles as props. As Anya Smiler came through the security door into the inner sanctum of the labs, Dr. O’Bygne was silently considering that possibility. Her health insurance would cover the cost of the procedure.

“Annie!” she exclaimed, noticing Anya.

“Bloggie!” The two women embraced warmly. They had known each other for years and got along famously.

“Well, my dear, you certainly look glum. Has Annie taken Atlas’s job and put the world on her shoulders?” She laughed enormously at her pun. Anya smiled wanly. “It sure feels that way, Bloggie, it sure does.” She took a stool beside her friend’s workbench and sighed. “Not much going on down here today,” she commented. Usually the labs were crowded with industrious technicians, analyzing specimens, testing new devices, or whatever else technicians did.

“Yes, it’s a slow day.” O’Bygne grinned. “I let everybody go early to get a jump on the weather. Don’t tell old Adams.” She put a finger to her lips. Anya laughed. She felt better. “Bloggie, can you do me a favor?”

“Anything.” She nodded.

“In a while you’ll be receiving samples from a presidentially authorized operation we’re conducting on Atlas. Would you let me know when the stuff comes in and would you—,” she hesitated, “—let me know what you find out?”

“Ummm, ‘presidentially authorized,’ eh? Ohhh, Annie! What are you up to now? You old field officers positively scare the joss sticks right off my mantelpiece.”

Anya grinned. “The usual, but as desk officer I want to know what you find out first.”

“I’ll bet you do.” O’Bygne made a disparaging noise. “But hey, anything as long as it stands a chance of putting the screws to Adams. Count on me.” She held out a pudgy hand and they shook.

R-76 Quadrant Desk, CIO Headquarters, Hunter, Earth

Back in her cubicle Anya sat at her station and tried to calm herself. Her hands were shaking and she was nearly in tears. She took several deep breaths. Okay, okay, she told herself, take it easy! With effort she managed to control her breathing. After a few moments her hands stopped shaking. What to do?

Well, first priority was get out of the CIO! But not before she got to the bottom of what Adams was up to on Atlas. She had a friend at the Ministry of War. That ministry hated the CIO. But not yet, not yet. On her way home Anya Smiler stopped at an FTL Union office and paid a week’s salary to send a private message to Jorge Lavager on Atlas. Tim Omix called her that night, she put him off, something about a headache.

CHAPTER TEN

Operations Division, Fourth Fleet Marines, MCB Camp Basilone, Halfway

The call for the commander of Fourth Force Recon Company to report to the Fourth Fleet Marine G3 was routine enough, right down to the “. . . at your earliest convenience . . .” which is military politesse for “Drop whatever you’re doing and get over here right now!”

Commander Walt Obannion, CO Fourth Force Recon Company, dropped whatever he was doing and called for his driver. Five minutes after receiving the call, he walked into the innocent-looking, but nearly impregnable building that housed Fourth Fleet Marines’ Operations department.

“Good morning, sir,” Commander Ronzo, the assistant G3, greeted him. “Th—He’s waiting for you.”

“Thanks,” Obannion said, and headed for the private office of Colonel Lar Szilk, the G3. Had Ronzo begun to say “
They’re
waiting” and changed his mind? Obannion wondered. Never mind; he’d find out soon enough.

“Come!” Szilk said when Obannion knocked on the frame of his office door. He gestured for Obannion to close the door behind him.

“Good mor . . .” Obanion saw that Szilk wasn’t alone and came to attention, facing the Marine sitting on the sofa to the side of the G3’s desk. “Sir!”

“At ease, Walt,” Lieutenant General Indrus, the commanding general of Fourth Fleet Marines, said mildly. “Sit down, get comfortable. This is informal, that’s why I sent for you to come here instead of to my office.”

“Very good, sir.” It might be an informal meeting, but a lowly commander still called a general officer

“sir” no matter how much the general first-named him.

“Have you ever run an operation by presidential special order?” Indrus asked casually.

“None that were presented to me as by ‘presidential special order,’ nossir.”

“I didn’t think so. I’ve been a Marine for forty-five years, and this is only the third one I’ve seen.” He paused and looked inward, wondering if he should restate that; one of the other two orders had to do with whatever it was that was going on with 34th FIST, and he’d only
heard
of that one, he hadn’t actually seen it.

Indrus leaned forward and handed over a sheet of paper. Obannion raised his eyebrows. Force Recon missions of whatever classification were always need-to-know, some even Ultra Secret, need-to-know. But what kind of mission was so secret that it had to be hand-delivered by a top-level Marine general, so secret that it had to be committed to easily destroyed paper rather than crystal? He gingerly accepted the sheet and read.

FROM: The President of the Confederation of Human Worlds TO: Commanding General, 4th Fleet Marines RE: Special Orders

CLASSIFICATION: Ultra Secret Eyes Only

1. Fourth Force Recon Company will deploy Force Recon resources to the geopolitical entity called the Union of Margelan on Atlas for a classified mission. See Annex 1.

2. Appropriate transportation will be provided from Halfway to Atlas and for the Force Recon resources’ return. See Annex 2.

3. The nature of Objective One is twofold:

a) To determine whether or not the facility near the mountain town of Spondu, called the “Cabbage Patch,” forty kilometers from New Granum, the capital city of the geopolitical entity called the Union of Margelan, is a weapons research facility or manufactory, or in fact an agricultural research center.

b) If the facility is determined to be a weapons reasearch facility or manufactory: To conduct a raid to destroy it and, if possible, secure evidence of weapons research or manufactory to bring back to Fourth Fleet Marines HQ.

c) If the facility is an agricultural research station: To collect specimens of what is being developed and analyze said specimens using equipment to be provided to the Force Recon resources tasked with the mission. See Annex 3.

4. The Marines participating in this mission will:

a) Make planetfall via surreptitious means to be provided by the Confederation Navy;

b) Wear appropriate uniforms and conduct themselves at all times as in hostile territory;

c) Do their utmost to avoid all contact with locals with the single exception of the raid, if necessary, on the facility.

5. The Marines participating in this mission will, upon completion of the mission, whether or not said completion neccessitates a destructive raid on the “Cabbage Patch” facility, depart Atlas in a surreptitious manner so that no one on Atlas will know they have departed.

Annex 1. Personnel:

1. The mission is to be conducted by one Force Recon Platoon, plus one navy corpsman, minus its sniper squad.

Annex 2. Transportation:

1. Transport from Fourth Fleet Marines Headquarters to Atlas. a) Personnel will depart Fourth Fleet Marines Headquarters on the fast frigate CNSS
Admiral Nelson
, currently en route to Halfway.

2. Transport from Atlas to Fourth Fleet Marines Headquarters. a) The CNSS
Admiral Nelson
will remain in orbit around Atlas until completion of the mission. Marines from Objective One will rendezvous with CNSS
Admiral Nelson
for return transport to Halfway.

Annex 3.

1. A compact genetic analysis machine will be provided to the Force Recon resources conducting Objective One with which to analyze organic specimens from the so-called “Cabbage Patch.”

by Special Order,

Madam Cynthia Chang-Sturdevant,

President,

Confederation of Human Worlds

Obannion looked at the back side of the paper after reading the orders, then at Indrus. The orders didn’t contain anything so far out of the ordinary that they required a special presidential order, or hand-delivery by a lieutenant general. But there was that puzzling “Objective One” without an “Objective Two” mentioned, plus paragraphs 3A, 4A, and 5A without “B” paragraphs. “Sir?”

Indrus looked at Szilk. “I’m sorry, Lar. Need-to-know. Would you excuse us, please.”

“Certainly, sir.” It may have been phrased as a polite request, but Lieutenant General Indrus had ordered Colonel Szilk to leave his own office. The colonel obeyed the general’s order.

“There’s more,” Indrus said when he and Obannion were alone. This time he handed over two sheets of paper.

Obannion read the first page, which was exactly the same as the first page he’d read. Then he read page two.

“Allah’s pointed teeth,” he breathed when he finished reading. He looked up at the commanding general and, before he could think about it, blurted, “Has this been authenticated, sir?” Had he thought about it, he might not have asked.

Indrus looked at him with approval. “I’m glad you asked that, Walt. That was my first reaction, too. I sent a back-channel to Marcus Berentus, asking for verification.”

Obannion fleetingly wondered how many regulations Indrus had violated, bypassing the chain of command and going directly to the Minister of War for verification of orders.

“I’ve never seen orders with a Darkside penalty attached to them before.”

“I have, Walt. You do know what that means.” It wasn’t a question.

“Anyone who says anything . . .”

“If anyone who knows about Objective Two says anything to anyone who doesn’t, everyone who knows about it goes to Darkside.”

To most citizens of the Confederation, Darkside was a mythical place; a bogeyman used by frustrated parents to frighten misbehaving children into good behavior. But it was real, very real. Nobody who didn’t need to know where it was knew its location. A sentence to the penal world called Darkside was for life; nobody committed to Darkside ever left, not even in death for burial on their home world. If everyone with the need-to-know about the mission was under threat of sentence to Darkside, that explained why Obannion had never heard even a whisper of an assignment like the one before him carried out by Force Recon—if there ever had been such a mission. Indrus gave Obannion a moment to absorb the implications of the penalty, then got briskly back to business.

“I know that all of your Marines have high enough security clearances for the mission on the first page of these orders, and I believe you have snipers who have high enough clearances for the second mission. Is that right?”

“Yessir.” That business about the personnel on the page-two orders. Very curious. He’d have to check with Sergeant Major Periz to be positive, but he was certain that Lance Corporal Dwan had an Ultra Secret clearance. “But, sir, while the main mission is a routine enough mission for Force Recon, that second mission—it’s an assassination, and
that
is nowhere near a routine assignment.” Obannion paused in thought for a moment, then said, “Offhand, I don’t think I’ve ever heard of an assassination mission being given to Force Recon.”

Indrus looked at Obannion for a long moment, considering what he should say. He decided and abruptly leaned forward. “Walt, we both have Ultra Secret clearances. You have one, I have one. There are things we are both cleared to know, things known to almost nobody else in the entire Confederation of Human Worlds. But neither of us knows everything Ultra Secret; most of that knowledge is restricted to those few who need to know it. A general, especially at my level, has a need-to-know that a commander doesn’t.

“You don’t know what I’m about to tell you, you don’t have the official need-to-know. But I’m a Confederation Marine Corps Lieutenant General, and
I
think you need to know more than you do.

“I happen to know of four assassinations carried out by Force Recon—and I’m morally certain there have been many more.”

Stunned, Obannion simply stared at his commanding general. The Force Recon community was tight-lipped; it had to be, most of what Force Recon Marines did was classified. Nonetheless, word of out-of-the-ordinary missions, particularly difficult missions, extremely hazardous missions—in short, anything truly unusual—got around regardless of their level of classification. Force Recon Marines believed they all had to know about the particularly unexpected or unusual, that such knowledge might save Force Recon lives and increase the odds of mission success. How did it happen that a Force Recon company commander didn’t know about assassination missions?

That
was the real reason for Indrus meeting Obannion in the G3’s office rather than his own; if the commander of the Force Recon company had been called to the office of the CG, Fourth Fleet Marines, it would be unusual enough to attract attention, and people who didn’t have the need-to-know might try to find out what the mission was. Obannion almost wished he didn’t know about it himself. It was as though Indrus read Obannion’s mind. “Those missions were Ultra Secret, need-to-know, with a Darkside penalty, the same as this one,” he said. “The only people who will know about this mission are the two of us, the sniper team that gets the assignment, and the platoon commander and platoon sergeant who will give the final go-ahead if Objective Two proves necessary. Now do you understand why you’ve never heard about these missions?”

Again, Obannion felt as though Indrus was reading his mind. “Yessir, I guess I do.”

“You’ve got the people who can pull this mission off—including Objective Two. Now, do you have a problem with it?”

“A problem? Let’s say rather, I have a discomfort with it.” Obannion leaned forward. “But you checked this out with Minister of War Berentus, and he said this is what the President wants?”

“Yes, I did. And he said she wants it.”

“We’re Force Recon, sir. The merely difficult, we do immediately. The impossible may take a little longer.”

“Good. Lar will develop a cover story for the primary operation; nobody not directly involved in the planning and running of the op has the need to know about it. I’m talking about the page one mission now. Understand?”

“Yessir.”

“Don’t draw plans for the page two mission, that’s already been done. It came directly from the Office of the Chairman of the Combined Chiefs.” An expression of disgust flickered across his face. “I’m afraid I can’t show it to you yet, not until your platoon is ready to embark on the
Admiral Nelson
. Then you’ll have to brief the platoon commander and platoon sergeant. You’ll have a little time after that to brief your sniper team and get them on their way. You’ll have noticed that page two of the orders I showed you is missing its Annex Two. The specific personnel details of that mission are in that annex.”

“When you’ve got your main operation plans drawn up,” the general said as he stood, Obannion jumped to his feet as well. “Lar will pass them on for my approval. You’ve got three days. Lar should have your cover story ready by then as well. You will tell
no one
about page two. Understood?”

“Yessir.”

“Good day, Walt.” Indrus turned and left the office via a rear exit. Nobody in Operations knew he’d been there, except for Colonel Szilk—and probably Commander Ronzo.

Fourth Force Recon Company, Fourth Fleet Marines, Camp Howard, MCB Camp Basilone, Halfway

“What kind of clearance does Bella Dwan have?” Obannion asked Sergeant Major Periz as soon as he returned to his office.

“Ultra Secret.” Periz didn’t have to check, he knew these things. “So does Sergeant Gossner.” If the skipper wanted to know about Lance Corporal Dwan’s clearance, Periz reasoned, he’d also need to know her team leader’s clearance.