Read Starpilot's Grave: Book Two of Mageworlds Online

Authors: Debra Doyle,James D. Macdonald

Starpilot's Grave: Book Two of Mageworlds (11 page)

BOOK: Starpilot's Grave: Book Two of Mageworlds

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“You really can do that?”

He looked embarrassed at the gratitude in her voice. “It’s not much,” he said. “If you want proper training, it’s barely the first step on a long road.”

She didn’t care. “But you can do it.”

“Yes.”

For the first time in months—for the first time, really, since the morning five years ago when she’d sliced her left arm open with one of the kitchen knives and then found out she didn’t even have the guts to let herself die—Klea felt a stirring of hope. The new sensation went to her head like a shot of aqua vitae on an empty stomach; not until quite a while later did she realize that Owen had left unanswered the most important of her questions.

No matter who had left him for dead in the alley, and no matter why they had done so, her upstairs neighbor clearly had no intention of explaining any part of it.

VII.

GALCEN: PRIME BASE NINGLIN: RUISI PORT

G
ENERAL JOS Metadi looked at the miniature hand-blaster lying on his desk and frowned. At sixty-two percent, the blaster’s energy level was lower than he usually liked. It wouldn’t last through any sort of prolonged encounter with that kind of charge. Most people wouldn’t have worried—nobody expected a holdout gun to take them through an extended firefight—but Metadi hadn’t survived as much as he had by being careless.

He pressed a button on the desktop. Part of the smooth black surface slid aside. The little niche thus revealed held a half-dozen of the small square power packs the Space Force used in its ubiquitous clipboards and datapads. He took one out, then broke open the hand-blaster to remove the low-charge pack still inside. After switching in the fresh pack, he put the old one into the desktop to recharge and pushed the button again. The niche slid closed as Metadi tucked the miniature blaster back into its grav-clip up his sleeve.

That taken care of, he turned his attention to the stack of printout flimsies that had been waiting for his attention ever since he came into the office. His new aide, Commander Quetaya, had already sorted through the morning message traffic and weeded out all those items that could be handled effectively at some lower level. The messages that remained, Metadi knew from long experience, would concern problems so touchy, secret, or complex that they couldn’t be solved, only worried about—and that, by somebody of the very highest rank.

As if I didn’t have enough to deal with already … .

Metadi let his gaze drift from the pile of flimsies to the holocube beside them. Three of the four side faces of the cube contained images of his children: Beka at her coming-of-age party; Ari in dress uniform; Owen in the plain garments of an apprentice Adept. The fourth side, and the one currently closest to the General, held the holographic likeness of a slender, fair-haired woman in Councilor’s robes and a tiara of plain black metal.

You drive a hard bargain, my lady. If I’d known thirty-odd years ago where your job was going to lead, I might not have had the nerve to take it.

The Domina Perada Rosselin of Entibor looked back at him from the holocube and said nothing. More and more, these days, Metadi found himself conversing with his late wife as if she were still present. He supposed it meant he was growing old—or maybe he was just running short of people he could talk to.

The family’s all gone now,
he told the holopic, and
the house is so empty you wouldn’t recognize it. Ari’s off somewhere between Nammerin and Infabede, Beka’s poking around on the far side of the Net—stirring up trouble, if I know the girl!—and Owen … these days I never know where he is or what he’s doing.

Metadi shook his head.
Everything Owen finds out goes straight to the Guild anyway. If I want Errec to know something I’ll tell him myself and get the story right the first time.

He pushed back his chair and stood up. “The hell with it,” he said aloud. “Metadi, what you have to do is get out of town for a while.”

In the next room, the General’s aide was hard at work dealing with yet another stack of message flimsies. Unlike Jervas Gil, who had been so ordinary in his appearance as to be effectively invisible most of the time, Rosel Quetaya was trim and strikingly good-looking, with ivory skin and glossy black curls. She looked up as the General strode into her office.

“Commander,” Metadi said without preamble, “give me a list of sectors that could use a surprise inspection.”

“Yes, sir.” The commander set the messages aside and began keying search criteria into her desk comp. “We have an entire range of possibles,” she told him after a few moments. “Do you want the units in question merely startled, somewhat astonished, or caught with their pants completely down?”

“I’m not interested in the small stuff,” Metadi said. “But if there’s anybody out there with serious bodies buried in their backyard, I want things dug up and straightened out while we still have a chance to do it.”

“Right. We’re talking wrath-of-the-gods time, then.” She tapped a few more keys. The comp extruded a slip of flimsy, which she tore off and handed to the General. “This is the short list based on the extended criteria.”

Metadi scanned the printout. “Hah. Here’s something that could stand looking into. Infabede sector, Admiral Vallant commanding. It says here the last five lieutenants Space Force assigned to staff duty with Valiant all resigned their commissions before the end of their tours.”

Quetaya nodded. “I asked for unusual turnover patterns when I did the search.”

“Good thinking. It could just be that the food on Admiral Vallant’s flagship is bad … but I don’t think so.”
And Ari’s outbound from Nammerin for the Fezzy, which means if there’s anything wrong on her he’s going to walk straight into it. That boy draws trouble the way a tree draws lightning; I swear I should have let Ferrda keep him on Maraghai.
“Let’s go to Infabede and find out.”

“Yes, sir,” Quetaya replied. “Will you want me to file the movement report?”

“And give everyone in the galaxy word on where I’m going? I don’t think so.”

Quetaya looked doubtful. “The regulations say—”

“I wrote those regs,” Metadi told her. “The first draft, anyhow. Now get me a list of ships currently in close orbit or on the ground at Galcen Prime.”

“Yes, sir,” Quetaya said again. She turned back to the comp. A few keyclicks more, and a second slip of flimsy appeared. “Departure schedules for all available ships.”

The General scanned the list. “There,” he said, his finger stabbing toward a name. “RSF
Selsyn-bilai
. Stores ship outbound for Infabede with a fresh loadout of supplies. She’ll do. Now get me a secure line to the base CO, so he won’t have fits when I turn up missing.” The General chuckled. “No sense slipping away undetected if we start a galaxy-wide manhunt in the process. That would ruin our incognito for sure.”

Quetaya looked up from punching a routing code into the comm link. “Incognito?”

“That’s right,” Metadi said. “Visiting brass hats never hear about the down-and-dirty stuff, the sort of things that get handed over to junior officers and enlisted types and then forgotten about. I want to poke around in Vallant’s territory for a few days before I officially turn up.”

“Someone’s bound to recognize you,” Quetaya protested. “Your picture’s all over the place.”

“People don’t see the face, they see the uniform. And if Warrant Officer Bandur down in Engineering happens to look a lot like General Metadi in the holonews broadcasts … well, it’s a big galaxy, and Bandur sure would like to be drawing the General’s pay instead of his own.”

“I understand,” said Quetaya. “I’ll get uniforms and ID plates ready for you in the name of Gamelan Bandur.”

“You do that, and think of a name for yourself while you’re at it.” The comm link’s buzzer sounded. Metadi picked up the handset. “Metadi here.”

“Good morning, General.” The commanding officer of Prime Base sounded a bit surprised to be hearing from Metadi at this hour on a secure line. “Any trouble I should know about?”

“No trouble, Perrin. I’m granting myself some leave. If anything comes up, handle it.”

“Handle it, aye,” the CO said. “Enjoy your leave time, General.”

“There’s that,” Metadi said as he switched off. “Now let’s get moving.
Selsyn
hops out of orbit at 1149.45 Standard, and we have to be aboard her with in-transit orders cut for—let’s make it for the supply depot on Treidel.”

As soon as Commander Quetaya had gone to take care of the uniforms and ID, Metadi reached over and touched another key on the comm panel. “Metadi here,” he said, as soon as the link opened. “Patch me through to the Retreat. And go secure.”

“Secure aye,” said the voice on the other end of the link.

A series of clicks and beeps marked the progress of the transfer, followed by a synthesized voice informing him that he had contacted the Retreat’s information center and inviting him to leave his comm code and a message.

“Private message for Guild Master Errec Ransome,” Metadi told the voice.

“Please enter authorization code for direct messages to that recipient.”

Metadi punched in the code sequence for Ransome’s private message queue. For a moment, he considered using the personal code that would, within minutes, fetch Errec Ransome himself to a direct voicelink from anywhere on Galcen, then decided against it. He’d used that sequence only two times in the past five years—once when the news came in about Beka supposedly crashing
Warhammer
outside Port Artat; and once before that, on the night that Perada had died.

No point in scaring whatever poor kid’s got the job of monitoring the Retreat’s comm system this morning,
he thought, and left a recorded message instead.

“Errec, Jos here. Don’t bother trying to find me for a while … I won’t be around. Talk with you when I get back. Metadi out.”

He switched off. Back in his own office, he took his uniform tunic out of the closet and began removing the ribbons and collar tabs. Once his aide brought the proper insignia for an engineering warrant officer, the tunic would do as well for Gamelan Bandur as it had for Jos Metadi.
Selsyn-bilai
was large enough for him to be just another service member in transit—and large enough, also, that the warrants would have their own mess. That way, Warrant Officer Bandur didn’t have to worry about getting bumped up into the wardroom, where there was always the outside chance he might run into someone who’d met the General in person.

Some time later Commander Quetaya returned, wearing an enlisted crew member’s uniform and carrying an assortment of insignia, nametags, IDs, and orders.

“All cleared,” she said. “I sent the clerk on an errand over to Records and did up the orders and the nametags myself.”

“Good,” Metadi replied. “I knew there was a reason I grabbed you out of Intelligence. Have you decided who you’re going to be for the trip?”

She waved a flimsy at him. “According to this,” she said, “I’m a clerk/comptech first class named Ennys Pardu, going to help maintain the systems on Treidel.”

“Sounds fine to me. Let’s find some ground transport over to the docks and see about getting back into space.”

Wearing their uniforms as enlisted and warrant, Commander Quetaya and the General made their way to the transit deck just below the HQ building. From there, they took the next glidepod to the main port, getting off at the Orbital Arrivals and Departures section. Rows of flat-displays along the walls listed the shuttles to and from the various ships currently in orbit, including a shuttle lifting for
Selsyn-bilai,
outward bound for Treidel at 1149.45 Standard.

Metadi and Quetaya made their separate ways through the paperwork drill. Their orders and false IDs passed official scrutiny with ease—the commander had done her work thoroughly—and in short order a warrant officer and a clerk/comptech first class joined the twenty or so other people aboard the shuttle. The craft lifted from Galcen shortly afterward.

The pilot’s acceleration was smooth and the orbits were matched with flawless precision, but Metadi felt his palms itching nevertheless. It had been years since he’d been anywhere during a lift besides the pilot’s seat or somewhere close by it, and he didn’t like the sensation.

They docked first with RSF
Margaraine,
where eight of the passengers shuffled off under that ship’s artificial gravity. Then the shuttle broke free again and boosted to another and, Metadi knew, higher orbit. A little later, they linked up to
Selsyn-bilai
with a click of magnetic grap nels and a sigh of air systems matching. Metadi and Quetaya—as well as a lieutenant commander in traveling blues, three spacers-first, and a petty officer clutching a thin-fold tool case—unstrapped and walked through the connecting passageway to the Selsyn’s quarterdeck area.

A young lieutenant was on watch, aided by a clerk/ comptech and a runner. As the seven new arrivals entered the space, the comptech ticked each one off on a nearby flat-display.

“How’s everything been, Arlie?” the lieutenant commander asked as he emerged from the passageway.

“Nice and quiet,” the lieutenant replied. “Going to be a smooth one this time. How was leave?”

“Outstanding. I’ll move along and let you get on with things here. Later.”

The three spacers-first and the petty officer, like the lieutenant commander, also appeared to be well known to the quarterdeck team. The young lieutenant processed them quickly before turning to the pair of transients—Metadi and Quetaya.

“I don’t have either of you on the manifest,” he said. “Are you sure you’re on the right ship?”

Metadi showed him the orders and the ID. “I’m directed to travel by quickest available means to Treidel.”

BOOK: Starpilot's Grave: Book Two of Mageworlds

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