Downbelow Station (31 page)

A sudden cheer erupted off the troop decks, found echo, all channels open.
 
People on the bridge were hugging one another and grinning. Graff embraced her; armscomper Tiho did; and others of her officers of many years. Some were crying.
 
There were tears in Graff’s eyes. None in her own; might have been, but that she felt guilt… still, irrationally, the habit of an outworn loyalty. She embraced Graff a second time, pushed back, looked around her. “Get all of us ready,” she said. It was going all over the ship, open com. “We’re moving in to take station central before they know what’s hit them. Di, hurry it.” Graff started giving orders. She heard Di doing so, down in the troop corridors, distinctive echo. The bridge moved into activity, techs jostling one another in the narrow aisles getting to posts. “Ten minutes,” she shouted, “full armament, all available troops arm and out.”

There was shouting elsewhere, the com giving evidence of troops rushing to suit even before the orders were officially passed. The commands began echoing through the corridors. Signy walked back to her small office/quarters and took the precaution of helmet and body armor, none for her limbs, trading risk for freedom of motion. Five minutes. She heard Di counting over the open com, with outright chaos feeding out from various command stations. No matter. This crew and the troops knew their business in the dark and upside down. All family here.
 
The incompatible met early accidents and those left were close as brothers, as children, as lovers.

She headed out, slipping her pistol openly into the armor-holster, rode the lift down; armored troops pouring down the corridor at a rattling run hit the wall to give her room the instant they recognized her coming through, so that she could run to the fore, where she belonged.

“Signy!” they cried after her, jubilant. “Bravo, Signy!”

They were alive again, and felt it.

iii

Pell council: sector blue one

“No,” Angelo said at once. “No, don’t try to stop them. Pull back. Pull back our forces immediately.”

Station command acknowledged and turned to its business. Screens in the council chamber began to reflect new orders; the muffled voice of security command gave reports. Angelo sank back in his chair, at the table in the center of council, amid the partially filled tiers, the soft murmurings of panic among those who had contrived to get back here through the halls. He propped his mouth against his steepled hands and sat studying the incoming reports which cut across the screens in rapid sequence, views of the docks, where armored troops boiled out.
 
Some of the council had waited too long, could not get out of the sections where they worked or where they had taken up an emergency post. Damon and Elene came in together, for refuge, out of breath, hesitated at the door. Angelo beckoned his son and daughter-in-law in on personal privilege, and they approached at his urging and settled at two of the vacant places at the table. “Had to leave dock office in a hurry,” Damon said quietly. “Took the lift up.” Hard behind them came Jon Lukas and his clutch of friends to seat themselves, the friends in the tiers and Jon at the table. Two of the Jacobys made it, hair disheveled and faces glistening with sweat. It was not council; it was a sanctuary from what was happening outside.

On the screens matters were worsening, the troops headed in toward the heart of the station, security trying to keep up with the situation by remote, switching from one camera to the next in haste, a rapid flickering of images.
 
“Staff wants to know if we lock the control-center doors,” a councillor said from the doorway.

“Against rifles?” Angelo moistened his lips, slowly shook his head, staring at the flick of images from camera to camera to camera.
 
“Call Mazian,” Dee said, a new arrival. “Protest this.”

“I have, sir. I have no answer. I reckon he’s with them.” Q disorder, a screen advised them. Three known dead; numerous injured.… “Sir,” a call broke through the message. “They’re mobbing the doors in Q, trying to batter them down. Shall we shoot?”

“Don’t open,” Angelo said, his heart pounding at the acceleration of insanity where there had been order. “Negative, don’t fire unless the doors are breached.
 
What do you want—to let them loose?”

“No, sir.”

“Then don’t.” The contact went dead. He wiped his face, feeling ill.

“I’ll get down that way,” Damon offered, half out of his chair.
 
“You’re not going anywhere,” Angelo said. “I don’t want you gathered up in any military sweep.”

“Sir,” an urgent voice came at his elbow, a presence which had come down from

the tiers. “Sir—”

Kressich.

“Sir,” Kressich said.

“Q com is down,” security command advised. “They’ve got it out again. We can splice something in. They can’t have reached the dock speakers.” Angelo looked at the man Kressich, a haggard, grayed individual, who had gotten more so in the passing months. “Hear that?”

“They’re afraid,” Kressich said, “that you’re going to leave here and let the Fleet leave them for Union.”

“We don’t know what the Fleet’s intention may be, Mr. Kressich, but if a mob tries to breach those doors into our side of the docks, it’s going to be beyond our power to do anything but shoot. I suggest you get on the com link to that section when they get it patched, and if there’s a speaker they haven’t broken, make that clear to them.”

“We know we’re pariahs whatever happens,” Kressich returned, lips trembling. “We asked, we asked over and over, speed up the checks, run id’s, purify our records, do it faster. Now it’s too late, isn’t it?”

“Not necessarily, Mr. Kressich.”

“You’re going to see to your own people first, get them on the available ships in comfort You’re going to take our ships.”

“Mr. Kressich—”

“Work has been progressing,” said Jon Lukas. “Some of you may have clear papers.

I wouldn’t jeopardize them, sir.”

There was sudden silence from Kressich, an uncertain look, his face an unwholesome color. His lips trembled and the tremor spread to his chin, his hands locked upon each other.

Amazing, Angelo thought sourly, how easily it comes down to small concerns; and how accurately he does it.

Congratulations, Jon.

Easy to deal with the refugees of Q. Offer all their leaders clear paper and reason with them. Some had, in fact, proposed that.

“They’ve got blue three,” Damon muttered. Angelo followed his gaze to the monitors, on which the flow of armored troops and their stationing along the corridors had become a rapid, mechanical process.

“Mazian,” said Jon. “Mazian himself.”

Angelo stared at the silver-haired man in the lead, mentally counting off the moments it would take that tide of soldiery to flow up the spiraling emergency ramps to their level, to the doors of the council itself.
 
That long, he still held the station.

iv

Sector blue one; number 0475

The images changed. Lily fretted, sprang up and walked back and forth, a step toward the buttons on the box, a step toward the dreamer, whose eyes were troubled.

Finally she dared reach for the box, to change the dream.
 
“No,” the dreamer told her sharply, and she looked back and saw the pain… the dark, lovely eyes in the pale face, the white, white sheets, all about her light, save the eyes, which gazed on the sights in the halls. Lily came back to her, interposed her body between dream and dreamer, smoothed the pillow.
 
“I turn you,” she offered.

“No.”

She stroked the brow, touched so, so gently. “Dal-tes-elan, love you, love you.” They are troops,“ Sun-her-friend said, in that voice so still and calm that it shed peace on others. ”Men-with-guns, Lily. It’s trouble. I don’t know what may happen.“ “Dream them gone,” Lily pleaded.

“I have no power to do that, Lily. But see, there is no using the guns. No one is hurt.”

Lily shivered, and stayed close. From time to time on the ever-changing walls the face of Sun appeared, reassuring them, and stars danced, and the face of the world shone for them like the crescent moon. And the line of men-in-shells grew, filling all the ways of the station.
 
v There was no resistance. Signy had not drawn her gun, although her hand was on it. Neither had Mazian or Kreshov or Keu. Threat was for the troops, leveled rifles with the safeties off. They had fired one warning burst on the docks, nothing since. They moved quickly, giving no time for thought in those who met them now, no hint that there was argument possible. And there were few who lingered to meet them at all in these sections. Angelo Konstantin had given orders, Signy reckoned—the only sensible course.

They changed levels, up a ramp at the end of the main hall. Boots rang in complete vacancy; the sharp report of troops in their wake filing off to station themselves at the appointed line-of-sight intervals sent up other echoes. They passed from the emergency ramp to the area of station control; troops moved in there too, under officers, lowered rifles, while other detachments headed down the side halls to invade other offices: no shooting, not here. They kept moving down the center corridors, passed from cold steel and plastics to the sound-deadening matting, entered the hall of the bizarre wooden sculptures, whose eyes looked no less shocked now than before.
 
And the human faces, the small group gathered in the anteroom of the council chambers, were as round-eyed.

Troopers swept through, pushed at the ornate doors to open them. The leaved doors swung to either side and two troopers braced like statues facing inward, rifles leveled. The councillors inside, in a chamber far from filled, rose and faced the guns as Signy and Mazian and the others walked through. There was dignity in their posture, if not defiance.

“Captain Mazian,” said Angelo Konstantin, “can I offer you to sit and talk this over with us… you and your captains?”

Mazian stood still a moment. Signy stood between him and Keu, Kreshov on the other side, surveying faces. Not the full council, not by half. “We don’t take that much of your time,” Mazian said. “You asked us here, so we’re here.” No one had moved, not to sit, not to shift position.

“We’d like an explanation,” Konstantin said, “of this—operation.” “Martial law,” Mazian said, “for the duration of the emergency. And questions… direct questions, Mr. Konstantin, regarding agreements you may have made with certain Company apents. Understandings… with Union, and the flow of classified information to Union intelligence. Treason, Mr. Konstantin.” Blood left faces all about the room.

“No such understandings,” Konstantin said. “No such understandings exist, captain. This station is neutral. We are a Company station, but we do not permit ourselves to be drawn into military action, or used as a base.” “And this… militia… you have scattered about you?” “Sometimes neutrality needs reinforcement, captain. Captain Mallory herself warned us of random refugee flights.”

“You claim ignorance that information… was handed to Union by civilian Company agents. You aren’t party to any agreements, arrangements, or concessions which those agents may have made with the enemy?”

There was a moment of heavy silence. “We know of no such agreements. If there were any agreements to be made, Pell was not informed of them; and if we had been we would have discouraged them.”

“You’re informed now,” Mazian said. “Information was passed, including code words and signals which jeopardize the security of this station. You’ve been handed to Union, stationmaster, by the Company. Earth is folding up its interests out here. You’re one. We’re another. We don’t accept such a situation.
 
Because of what’s already been turned over, other stations have been lost.
 
You’re the border. With what forces we have, Pell is both necessary to us and tenable. Do you understand me?”

“You’ll have every cooperation,” Konstantin said.

“Access to your records. Every security problem should be weeded out and set under quarantine.”

Konstantin’s eyes shifted to Signy and back again. “We’ve followed all your procedures as outlined by captain Mallory. Meticulously.” “There’ll be no section of this station, no record, no machine, no apartment, if need be, where my people don’t have instant access. I would prefer to withdraw most of my forces and leave yours in charge, if we can have this clearly understood: that if there are security problems, if there are leaks, if a ship bolts from pattern out there, or if order breaks down in any particular, we have our own procedures, and they involve shooting. Is that clear?” “It is,” Konstantin said, “abundantly clear.”

“My people will come and go at will, Mr. Konstantin, and they’ll shoot if they judge it necessary; and if we have to come in shooting to clear the way for one of ours, we will, every man and woman in the Fleet. But that won’t happen. Your own security will see to it—or your security with the help of ours. You tell me which way.”

Konstantin’s jaw clenched. “So we are plain on both sides, Captain Mazian, we recognize your obligation to protect your forces and to protect this station. We will cooperate; we will expect cooperation from you. When I send a message hereafter, it goes through.”

“Absolutely,” Mazian said easily. He looked to right and left of him, moved finally, walked a space toward the doors while Signy and the others still faced council. “Captain Keu.” he said, “you may discuss matters further with council.
 
Captain Mallory, take the operations center. Captain Kreshov, check through security records and procedures.”

“I’ll want someone knowlegeable,” Kreshov said.

“The security director will assist you,” Konstantin said. “I’ll call that order ahead.”

“I also,” Signy said, glancing at a familiar face at the central table, the younger Konstantin. The young man’s expression altered at that look, and the young woman by him reached a hand to his.

“Captain,” he said.

“Damon Konstantin… yourself, if you will. You can be of help.” Mazian left, taking a few of the escort with him, for a general tour of the area, or more than likely, further operations, the taking of other sections, like the core and its machinery. Jan Meyis, Australia’s second in command, was on that delicate task. Keu drew back a chair at the council table, taking possession of it and the chamber; Kreshov followed Mazian out. “Come on,” Signy said, and young Damon paused for a glance at his father, who was thin-lipped and upset, at parting with the young woman at his side. They did not, Signy reckoned, think much of her company. She waited, then walked with him to the door where she gathered up two of her own troopers for escort, Kuhn and Dektin.
 
“The command center,” she directed Konstantin, and he showed her out the door with incongruous and natural courtesy, tending the way they had come in.
 
Not a word from him; his face was set and hard.