Hero! (25 page)

Frisde waits, and he shrugs and continues.

“We have been given no proof of this alleged war on Avalon. We were merely shown a couple of ambiguous com interceptions, fragmentary and cryptic. They would not be admissable in any courtroom, civil or military. The testimony of the last emigrants is contradictory and hearsay. They think that some enclave of illicit technology was destroyed at some obscure settlement in a remote corner of the planet…when was it?”

“By our calendar, it would be 29,364,” Roker says coldly.

The other smiles nastily. “And how long was that before
Green Pastures
left Avalon?”

“Seven years, Ultian years.”

“Prior was a cadet then, was he not? Your witnesses do agree on one thing—that Prior was an adolescent when the journey began. He could not have been more than a child at the time of the trouble, whatever it was. Now another ship is arriving from Avalon. Absolutely no evidence has been put forward that it is anything other than a routine interstellar—”

Roker breaks in. “Prior appointed himself to command the pilot boat.”

The tall boy seems to snuggle down more contentedly in his comfortable chair. “Unusual, but hardly seditious! And perfectly natural. He was born on Avalon. He would be interested in hearing news of his former world.”

He flashes a rosy smile up at Roker, as if asking him to confirm the score. Then he returns to addressing Frisde. “Absolutely no evidence has been presented that standard security precautions would not suffice, ma’am. They could be augmented, perhaps. We might go that far. But to trash the constitutional rights of a senior member of the Patrol and subject him to the barbarity of a mind bleed…that should need evidence, ma’am! Real evidence!”

All eyes switch to Roker, whose head has drooped low on his bovine shoulders. He glares across at his opponent. “We are not contemplating an attack by pirates here, nor a canoe full of cannibals! Our standard security can detect ordinary subversive elements, yes, and I am not suggesting that any sort of conventional armed invasion across interstellar distances could ever be more than the stuff of pubcom fantasy. No, (his is a disease we are fighting! Let the infection once gain a hold, and we may never stamp it out! One boatload of technicians and supplies would be enough.”

He is not very convincing, Vaun minks. An impalpable mist of disbelief seems to rise from the distinguished audience. Ingrown aristocracies are never cordial toward revolutionary ideas.

“You are risking the, whole planet for one boy!” Roker barks.

Worse—he will have to do better than that.

Vaun wonders what his own fate will be if the mind bleed is refused. Then he will be merely one more piece of evidence to be thrown in jail and held until the Q ship has been inspected and the truth discovered. Before that happens, much of the evidence may vanish in the labyrinthine obscurity of Patrol politics, especially when the stakes are so high. And if Roker is wrong, if crew and passengers are normal human beings…then what?

He has enjoyed two wonderful weeks with Maeve in the paradise of Valhal, but a Putran mudslug does not belong in this lofty, shimmering world of power. He will certainly never be tolerated within the Patrol on a permanent basis, and the best he can hope for—the very best—is to be thrown back in his swamp. The meeting is concerned with Prior. Nobody here or anywhere cares about Vaun’s welfare…except Maeve, and for all her noble birth, she is only a spacers’ recreation girl.

The ruddy-faced boy smells triumph. “After all,” he says jovially, “if the human race is indeed battling such a peril on Avalon, then surely Avalon Command would have sent us a warning? Radio waves do still travel faster than Q ships, surely?”

Roker smiles.

Before he can seize the opportunity presented, Frisde demonstrates that she can still cut both ways. “Ensign?”

Vaun is so taut already that he can not stiffen further. “Ma’am?”

“Answer Admiral Hagar’s objection.”

Ouch!
“Q ships travel along line of sight, ma’am. Their singularities generate interference which impedes radio transmission between the destination and the world of origin…ma’am.”

Kindergarten stuff. The room squirms.

“Thank you,” Frisde says agreeably. “I thought there was some rule like that.”

Hagar’s face has turned an unbelievable scarlet.

The high admiral lays a hand on her escort’s knee and another on the arm of the divan, and flows easily to her feet. She saunters forward to inspect Vaun more closely. Her delicious red lips still wear traces of a smile, but what he sees in her eyes appalls him. He wonders which is more dangerous to meddle with—the Brotherhood, or High Admiral Frisde. He realizes with shock that his present peril is even greater than Prior’s.

She stands in front of him, and yet speaks to the whole room. Her voice is the purr of a starving predator. “We must not forget that there is more at stake here than the fate of one commodore. Ensign Vaun?”

“Ma’am?”

“This Q ship will be arriving very soon. It may represent a considerable threat to our…to our culture. Admiral Roker reports that you are willing to attempt an investigation to confirm—or disprove—its hostile intent. If it is hostile, then it will be because it is crewed by more facsimiles of yourself.”

The green eyes have noted the sweat he can feel running on his face, and they glitter in contempt.

She has paused, though, so he says, “Ma’am.”

“In that case, they will certainly regard you as a turncoat, and you will be in extreme danger.”

Here come the big, big questions. Fortunately—oh, how fortunately!—he has been well coached by Maeve.

“You are willing to undertake this mission?”

“Ma’am.”

“
Why?
”

“I am loyal to the Empire, ma’am.”

She smiles sardonically. “And at the moment you really don’t have any choice, do you? If you don’t cooperate, it’s lab cage for you…right?”

Vaun says, “Ma’am?” as if shocked.

“Understandably, you prefer to keep your body cells assembled in one place, so naturally you wish this mission to proceed. So far your motives are clear. But if it does not proceed. Ensign, there must come a time when you do have a choice. You will be in communication with the Brotherhood—assuming the ship is what Admiral Roker suggests it is. You will be impersonating Commodore Prior. You will be in command of a spacecraft. So tell me why you will then continue to take our side and not theirs?”

“Ma’am, my culture is your culture. I was not reared as a unit of the Brotherhood. With respect, ma’am, you know my background. I am an Ultian, and a spacer.”

“A well-prepared one,” Frisde mutters very softly. She turns and paces toward the window. All eyes follow. This is the famous stagecraft Maeve has mentioned.

She speaks without turning, but her voice, like her personality, fills the room. “If you then defect to the other side…what then? The Brotherhood would reward you, I expect. I cannot imagine what form their gratitude would take…can you?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Whatever it is, they will tender something of value, so we must outbid them. We must make you an offer they cannot surpass.”

She whirls suddenly. “So? What do you crave, Ensign? I know what most people seek from life: power and wealth and fame. But those are not entirely valued for their own sake. Partly they are the means to sexual gratification and—ultimately—the means to raise offspring in the hope of biological immortality. You are effectively sterile. There are no girls with twelve chromosomes. What promises can we give you to take with you on your mission? What will motivate you?”

The words are almost exactly what Maeve has predicted in the dark, hot nights, in the calm tutorials between the storms of passion. And he plays by her coaching.

“Power and wealth and fame, ma’am.”

The room murmurs like a nest of gishsaths.

Frisde stares hard at him. “How much fame? How much wealth? How much power?”

“You are asking me to name an exact price, ma’am?”

“I certainly am.”

Vaun takes a deep breath and wonders if it will be one of his last.
Oh, Maeve, be right!
“I wish to be publicly recognized as savior of the planet and promoted at once to the rank of admiral in the Patrol, with all the normal monetary compensation and perquisites, and an endowment of an estate of my choice.”

The room erupts in clamor. A few shout oaths, most just laugh—angry laughter, patient laughter, tolerant laughter. But Roker is not laughing, and neither is the high admiral. Frisde stares at the upstart, and the tips of her teeth show.

“Extremely well prepared! Have you any particular estate in mind, Ensign, or must we all tremble, awaiting your decision?”

“With respect, ma’am, unless I do save the planet and manage to survive the effort, then I shall be making no decision.”

Frisde nods slightly to acknowledge the point. But Maeve is right again.

“Nevertheless, I think exact terms should be specified, and in advance.”

“Ma’am. I want this one. Valhal.”

Louder yet—those who laughed now curse. Those who profaned now laugh. Roker’s face drains of color.

Frisde glances at the big boy appraisingly. “Whoever’s been prompting him, it wasn’t Admiral Roker, I think.”

“No, ma’am, it was not!” Roker’s glare bodes no good for Vaun when the admiral can get him alone. “Of course I agree, ma’am, that the ensign’s continuing loyalty should be ensured by a promise of a generous reward if he succeeds. But his ambitions seem somewhat excessive.”

“Do they?” Frisde glances thoughtfully around the room. The power-infested chamber has gone very still. Vaun almost can hear his own turmoiled heart.

Then she strolls forward again, across the downy carpet, stalking him. Drawing close, she lets the fear and hatred and contempt burn up in her eyes, for him alone to see. And her words are soft enough that only he can hear. “So that is your price for saving the world, Ensign?”

He meets her glare steadily. “Yes, ma’am.”

Quieter yet…“No pay, no play?”

“Highest bidder wins, ma’am.” He speaks without moving his lips, and the insolence draws color to her face.

“I can have you destroyed, you know.”

Cold rivulets run down his chest. “You need me.”

“You think I don’t have any real choice?”

Choice is power and power is choice. After more than a century, she has been cornered at last, and cornered by an artificial pseudo-person, a peon from the mud of the Putra. If she could scratch him to tatters with her nails, it would be a great joy to her.

“You’re bidding for a planet…ma’am.”

Then neither speaks for a long lifetime, as Frisde weighs duty against personal satisfaction…and finally it is Frisde who blinks, and turns away. “Dismissed.”

Fighting to conceal his exultation, Vaun salutes. He is sure now that another of Maeve’s prophecies is about to be fulfilled. Who can put a price on a planet? Frisde must support Roker. His friends certainly will, and his enemies need settle for whatever diey can get, even if it is only a chance to spite him by throwing Valhal into the pot. So Ultian Command will argue and discuss and debate for hours, and then accept Vaun’s terms.

After all, his chances of collecting are barely more than zero, and Roker himself will do his best now to see that they become even less.

T
HE SUN HUNG close above the sea, splashing red on the breakers that rushed suicidally to death on the sand. Gritty-eyed with fatigue and still mildly hung over, Vaun stood within the gaggle of assembled sycophants, and listened with all the calm he could muster to their oily insinuations as they taunted his impotence. “I do find surprises exciting!” Boorior told Legarf, peering around her bony nose to make sure Vaun was listening. “I wonder who this mysterious Quild boy is?”

Vaun chose not to spoil her fun by explaining. Few of Roker’s lackeys were effective enough to be killers; they would be genuinely shocked by the tragic accident Roker must be planning.

Long shadows scored the sand like wounds. Bandor wore pink and peach before a darkling sky.

A couple of senior officers were tossing a football. The flirtatious Admiral Gargel, head of the Medical Corps, was clowning with Lepo and Tawlet and screaming shrilly as they tried to force sand down her cleavage. That was clearly foreplay, and any minute now all three of them would vanish into the bushes.

There were several other people huddling in the wind—unnamed civilians whose presence had not been explained. Mostly they seemed awed by their distinguished companions and were staying very quiet. One or two looked unnervingly apprehensive.

Feirn stood a little back from the beach, half-hidden in the trees, and Vaun wished she weren’t there. Whatever the nature of the child’s peculiar fixation on him, the forthcoming disaster would upset her mightily. The inevitable Ensign Blade was with her. Blade’s protection might well be fearless, but he would be less use than a giant sea slug if she needed comforting.

Valhal’s largest thicket of pepods was rustling around on a shingle bank not far away, stirring into life as evening cooled the air. Security should be herding them off to a less-populated area and obviously wasn’t, so there could be no doubt that Blade’s information had been correct, and pepods were the business of the day.

At last a hovercart came whining down the trail and squirted out onto the beach in a blinding cloud of sand. Roker’s massive form was squeezed aboard beside a boy even larger, undoubtedly the cryptic Professor Quild. Vaun distrusted all academics on principle, and any who consorted with Roker would be worse than most.

Quild, when he grasped Vaun’s hand in what he obviously expected to be a crushing grip, was a most unlikely-looking scholar. Not only was he as tall as Roker, and even bulkier, but he had hair hanging to his shoulders and a primitive’s beard trailing almost to his waist—an obscenity that belonged in a swampy jungle rather than an ivy-coated college. Moreover, his arms and legs were coated with black fur, and and black curls sprouted from his neckband like weeds. Any normal boy cursed with such a pelt would get his booster adjusted.