The City Who Fought (51 page)

"
Heart Crusher.
Chindik t'Marid."

"Put it through."

"Lord Pol, you are receiving what I do?"

"Yes."

"Data coming in," the sensor chief said.

Pol t'Veng looked down again. The Fleet warships were coming up out of subspace like tunglor broaching in the seas of Kolnar; huge masses, neutrino signatures of enormous powerplants, ripping through into the fabric of reality.

"Command frequency broadcast! Identifying following," she said. "Fleet units emerging coordinates follow, probables: destroyers, six—correction, six destroyers plus three light, one heavy cruiser and possible . . . Confirmed, three assault carriers. All Clan ships, report status. Lord t'Marid, report status."

"We coordinate?" Chindick asked.

"No. You have not the insystem boost. Use the station for cover as long as you can. They will not endanger it."

"Repeat?"

"Scumvermin psychology. Go.
Lord t'Marid, status.
"

"T'Marid here," the familiar voice said, harsher than she could remember. "
Bride
decoupling. We can cover."

"No, with respect. Yours is the more valuable Seed."
Especially since this ship has t'Varak's
sweepings as crew.
"
Bride
,
Shark
and
Strangler
should cover the transports."

A pause. "Agreed. Wait for us with the Ancestors, Pol t'Veng."

"Guard our Seed and Clan, Belazir t'Marid," she replied.

Then her attention went back to the work at hand. A Central Worlds Space Navy medium attack group bore down on them, with a dozen times the firepower the High Clan had available here and now, given the general pathetic botchup. About equal to the whole current Clan armada, give or take a dozen factors. Pol had fought the Fleet before and had a healthy respect for their capabilities. They were dangerous scumvermin.

"Helm," she went on. "Set course. Coordinates follow." She had plugged the suit's leads into the couch.

"Maximum boost."

"Lord Captain," the executive officer said. "That is a course
for
the enemy fleet. What are we to
do
there?" With one undercrewed frigate, went without saying.

"Do?" Pol t'Veng roared out a single bark of laughter. "We
die
, fool!"

The commander's couch reclined, locking into combat position. "We will attempt to break through to the transports," she said. "The warships will maneuver to protect them. We fight for maximum delay. Any questions?"

"Command us, lord!"

"Prepare to engage."

* * *

Amos nodded. Without Simeon, the stationers lost their advantage of superior coordination. Against professionals, he had been the only one they had had, once the Kolnari recovered their balance.

"Simeon was a . . . a brave man," Amos said.
And if he were really a
man,
a dangerous rival,
he added to himself. "And very skillful. I honor his memory." Joseph nodded; they clasped hand to forearm.

"Farewell, my brother."

"Fardlin' touching, really," a voice said in his ear.

Amos leaped upright, then ducked again frantically as a bolt spattered metal near his face.

"Simeon?" he gasped.

"No, the Ghost of Christmas Past," the brain replied. "I'm back. So," he went on, glee bubbling through his voice, "are some other people."

A holo formed behind the barricade: a figure in green power armor of a chunkier, more compact design than the Kolnari suits Amos was used to. In the background was the bridge of a large vessel, battle-clad figures moving about. A woman, with a man in like equipment but different insignia beside her.

"Admiral Questar-Benn," the woman said. Remarkably, she appeared to be in late middle age but undeniably healthy and close-knit. "Commodore Tellin-Makie, of the battlecruiser
Santayana.
"

"Oh, God is great, God is Merciful, God is One," Amos murmured through numb lips. "Bethel?"

"Don't worry. It's a big navy. We hit them as they were getting ready to leave. Reports show not much damage to the planet since you left, if you're Benisur Ben Sierra Nueva."

"Keep firing!" Joseph barked to the others at the barricade. "You can die just as dead winning as losing."

The commodore laughed shortly. "Profoundly true," he said. "Simeon, Ms. Hap, all of you, you've done a very good job. Heroic, in fact. We didn't expect to find anything but bodies and wreckage."

"It was a close-run thing," Simeon said feelingly. "A damned close-run thing." Both the officers seemed to find that amusing.

"Here's my record of the whole thing, start to finish," said Channa and the Navy officers' eyes turned.

Evidently they had video of her. Amos hissed a low complaint, and three more holos joined the image of the
Santayana
's deck.

"We've still got a lot of the pirates in station," Channa said. "Should we back off?" She swallowed. "A lot of our people have been hurt."

"Negative," the admiral said, shaking her head. "Give them time to think, and sure as death and fate, one of them will find a way to blow the station. I've got a Marine regimental combat team in the transports.

We'll forcedock as soon as I swat the Kolnari warships. That battle platform could be tricky."

The commodore leaned out of the sight picture and spoke to someone else. "Well, then, get the destroyers to
englobe
it, then!"

"It's not over until it's over," Questar-Benn said.

"Er . . . not
the
Questar-Benn?" Simeon asked, awed.

"Not if you mean Micaya," she said dryly. "I'm the dull sister, the straight-leg." She glanced down at the data flowing in from SSS-900-C. "Bastards. Murdering sub-human mutant
swine.
Maybe
now
the inbred penny-pinching High Families incompetent corruptionists back at Central will get their thumbs out of their backsides and let us
do
something about Kolnar and all its little offshoots."

"Ma'am," Tellin-Makie said warningly.

"I'm not bucking for another star, Eddin," she said. "I can afford to tell the truth without a bucket of syrup on it." She looked up and out at the stationers. "Here's what we want you to do," she went on crisply.

God,
Amos thought.
Thank you.
For victory, and for someone else to tell him what to do for a change.

Leadership could get very tiring. He suspected Fate was going to send more of it his way. The prospect did not seem as attractive as it once had.

"I never understood what he meant before," Simeon said, looking out at the huge docking chamber which held only the dead, now in covered silent rows. "I thought I did, but I didn't."

The medics and their patients were gone, to station sickbays or to the trauma stations of the warships.

Equally silent were the motionless Marine sentries who stood with weapons reversed by the Navy dead.

The squad at the docking airlock snapped to attention as each shrouded body went by. The civilians looking among the stationer dead were nearly as quiet, only a few sobbing faintly.

"Understood what who meant?" Channa said, blinking behind the dark glasses that hid her bandages.

She appeared detached, almost aloof, just like the two Navy commanders who stood with her and the little group of stationers.

"Wellington," Simeon said. " 'I don't know what it is to lose a battle; but certainly nothing can be more painful than to gain one with the loss of so many friends.' He said that after Waterloo."

The admiral nodded. "I remember when I found that out," she said very softly. "If you've got a grain of sense, you never forget it."

"Ain't that the truth!" Patsy Sue Coburn said. Beside her, Florian Gusky put his synth-splinted arm companionably around her shoulders. She stiffened, then forced herself to put up a hand and pat it gently.

"You don't forget anything. But you learn to live with it. C'mon, Gus. I do believe you owe me a drink."

Channa turned her head toward their footsteps. "Yes," she said, with a bitter smile. "We learn to live with it. If this is heroism, why do I feel like such crap?"

"Because you're here," Questar-Benn said. "Heroism is something somebody else does somewhere far away. In person, it's tragedy." Her voice sharpened. "And it could be worse, much worse, and would have been but for you. We
did
win. You
are
here. And," she went on more lightly, "you're heroes in the media, at least. Which means, by the way, you can write your own tickets."

"Tickets?" Simeon asked.

"You always wanted a warship posting, didn't you?" she said. "With this on your record . . ."

Simeon hesitated. Joat had been standing by Channa's side, quiet and drawn. Now the old coldness settled over her face, and she began to edge away.

Everyone's always left her, or cheated her, or hurt her, he thought.

"I'm not so sure," he said aloud, "that I
want
a military career any more."

Admiral Questar-Benn nodded vigorously. "That makes you
more
qualified. They shovel glory hounds out of the Academy by the job-lot and we have to spend years breaking them of such fatuous nonsense."

"Besides, I have a daughter," and his instant and totally gratifying reward was the dawning of hope on Joat's face. "Thanks, though. Maybe, someday."
Some dreams don't transfer well into reality,
he told himself. He could see Joat's chest lifting with the deeper breaths of self-confidence and she didn't look about to disappear on him.

"And have you soured on Senalgal?" the commodore said, turning to Channa.

"It's still a beautiful world," she said, shaking her head slowly. "But it'snot my home." She reached down to Joat beside her and, touching the girl's face with her fingertips, felt the slightest of resistance to such fondling. Learning to trust, and to be a human being, was not something that came quickly or easily. But you had to
begin
somewhere or you never arrived. "Besides, Joat's my daughter, too. And I've friends here, the best there are."

Questar-Benn threw up her hands. "Simeon, you're going to be around a
very
long time. The offer still stands. I'll leave it on record."

"Hey, Pops," Joat said, her voice a little unsteady despite the cocky tone. "I mean
you
, Simeon."

"Great Ghu! Can
you
, of all people, not think a more suitable title than 'Pops' to call me?" Simeon demanded in a semi-indignant tone, but he would have settled for anything of a familial nature from Joat.

"Sure, but I don't think you'd like to know 'em!" She smiled her urchin grin in his image. "Any rate, I'm gonna be sixteen standard in a few years. Enlistment age. And I don't want you blaming me for screwing up your career plans. I . . . I'd sort of like to keep this from happening to somebody else, you know?"

She turned to the admiral. "Think these brass-a . . . um, general-type people might have a use for me?"

Questar-Benn shuddered. "I'm probably perpetrating horrors on some unsuspecting commander left to deal with you in the future, young lady, but yes. I'd be very surprised if we couldn't find a use for
all
of you." She swept the present company with her piercing gaze.

"Then we may take you up on that offer," Simeon said. Although he was too enervated to enjoy thoughts of revenge, no amount of emotional exhaustion could remove the need to do something about the Kolnari: next week, maybe. "But right now, I'd rather call in the gratitude as a favor, if you don't mind, Admiral," Simeon said.

"Favor? For who?"

"A friend," he said. A holo grew, of a boy about Joat's age.

Joat started violently. "Seld! They wouldn't let me see ya, said you were sick!"

The figure nodded. "You knew that. You know I've been sick a long while, Joat," he said with the incredible patience of the chronic invalid. "Only it went off the screen. I can see this," and he looked down at his frail, limp body, strapped in an upright position on the bed, "but I can't feel anything or move it, or do anything, really."

"Oh, damn!" Joat moved a hand through the holo as if she could reverse the damage somehow.

"The navy medicos have got me hooked up to a nervesplice monitor, to keep my heart going and stuff.

Simeon himself," and now he managed a proud grin, "is hacking into it."

Joat blinked. "I'm sorry," she said in a small voice. "I shouldn't've called you a wuss. I heaved my cookies afterwards, too. I guess it's my fault, hey? Expecting you to do more'n you could, should!"

"Nah," Seld on the holo said. "I was stupid, you know. You could do all those things I couldn't, and I was . . . hell, Joat, I was gonna end up like this anyway, sooner'r later. Grudly, but I knew it. Dad knew it, but he sort of didn't at the same time. I've had a lot of time to think about it."

Joat nodded, then narrowed her eyes. "Those caps were the final push, weren't they? Why'd you
use
one?"

"'Cause I was so scared of seeing you get killed, Joat. You're my best friend. Besides," he went on, "that Kolnari Lord'd just belted me real hard. Then . . . I tell you, the ultimo grudly," and Seld rolled his eyes in disgust, "when he
kissed
me, so I wanted some of my own back."

"Yeah," and Joat nodded in approval, "you would at that!"

"That's when I had a fit. Would have happened eventually, really it would, Jo. Dad says another ten years, max."

Joat looked around at the Navy officers. "I don't think that's good enough. Can't you guys better the odds for 'm? Doesn't he
deserve
more than ten years?" Her hard voice cracked a little.

Questar-Benn winced and the commodore focused his eyes on something else.

"I never get used to this," the commodore under his breath. "What's the favor, Simeon?

Channa's head came up sharply. "Simeon? You've a suggestion?"

"I do," Simeon said in such a positive, you-should-have-known-I-would tone of voice that he commanded everyone's attention. "I've been checking around and the AlexHypatia-1033 told me about new tricks that Dr. Kennet Uhua-Sorg's been working on. No one—yet—is able to regenerate the spinal nerve sheaths. Kenny Sorg developed a prosthesis—for himself, incidentally, but it'll suit Seld's particular requirements, too. Kid, you're too old to be a shellperson: you'd never psychologically adjust. Kenny Sorg's condition is about the same as yours and he gets around just fine," and Simeon projected a holo of a man, moving down a corridor but too smoothly to be "walking." He "walked" upright, true, but his body was framed by an slender exo-skeleton which held him erect, with his feet on a platform, similar but much thicker than the station float disks. The base ingeniously held the power supply and monitoring equipment. "I'm told, Seld, that you'll have use of your arms and the base is sophisticated enough to do as much for your body as my shell does for me. Long as you don't try slipping through ventilation ducts or falling headfirst out of services hatches, you should last as long as most softshells, skeleton man!"