The Insurrection Read online

  The Insurrection

  David Weber

  David Weber

  The Insurrection

  GALE WARNING

  Ladislaus Skjorning frowned at his watch and rescanned the sparsely-peopled to ate-night ante-room of Federation Hall, but there was no sign of Greuner. It was unlike him to be late, add, from the code phrase, his news was urgent, so where was he?

  Someone tapped him on the shoulder, and he turned slowly, one hand moving unobtrusively to the small slug thrower in the sleeve of his loose tunic of Beaufort seawool. A man faced him in the conservative informal dress of New Zurich's upper classes but it wasn't Greuner. Greuner was a little man; this fellow rivaled Skjorning's own 202 centimeters, and, unlike many Corporate Worlders, he looked fit and mean. Ladislaus eyed him with hidden distaste, and the muzzle of the invisible slug gun settled on the newcomer's navel.

  "Mister Skjorning?" "Aye, I'm to be Skjorning." Ladislaus" deep voice sawed across the thin New Zurich accent like a doomwhale catcher through fog.

  "Mister Greuner sends his regrets." "Not to come?" Ladislaus asked siowlv, broad face expressionless as scorn for his uncouth dialect flared in the Corporate Worlder's mocking eyes. He plowed on like an icebreaker, pandering to the man's contempt. "Would it chance he's to be sending a wording why not?" "Illness, I believe." The Corporate Worlder's mouth was a thin slash of dislike as he eyed the bearded giant.

  Skjorning was a Titan for any world--- especially a heavy gray planet, even one whose chill temperatures favored large people--but the one huge hand he could see was a laborer's, thick-knuckled and scarred by a childhood with the nets and a young manhood with the purse seines and harpoons.

  "Not to be serious, I'm hoping," Ladislaus said sadly.

  "I'm afraid it may be. In fact, I believe he's decided to return to New Zurich for.., treatment." "I'm to see. Well, grateful I'm to be for your wording, Mister--his" "Fouchet," the tall man said briefly.

  "Aye, Fouchet. Remembered to me you'll be, Mister Fouchet." Skjorning turned away with a bovine nod, and Fouchet watched him enter a deserted washroom. He started to follow, then stopped and turned on a scornful heel. Whatever Greuner might have thought, that thick-witted prole was no danger.

  The washroom door eased slowly open behind him, and one brilliant blue eye followed his retreating back. The slug gun eased back into xs sleeve clip regretfully, and Skjorning stepped out of the washroom.

  "Aye, Mister Fouchet," he said softly, barely a trace of accent coloring his voice, "I'll remember you." Fionna MacTaggart looked away from her terminal and rubbed her eyes wearily, then glanced at the dock and allowed herself a crooked grin. Old Terran days were tiresomely short for someone reared to the thirty-two hour Beaufort day. The air was bothersomely thin, and the gravity was irksomely low, but one could grow used to anything, including feeling tired at such a ridiculously early hour. She rose and poured a cup of Terran coffee, one of the only two things about the motherworld she would truly miss when she finally returned to Beaufort for good. A chime sounded, and she crooked a speculative eyebrow and pressed the admittance key. The door hissed open, and Ladislaus Skjorning towered on the threshold, his blue eyes bright with annoyance.

  "He didn't show?" Fionna" knelt on the recliner next to him and massaged one taut shoulder.

  "No," he said softly.

  "Fhey got to him, is it?" she asked, equally softly. "Aye. Hustled him back to New Zurich--I hope. But there's little to be putting past a Corporate Worlder who smells gelt, Chief." She felt him relaxing as her strong fingers iug the tension from him, then frowned and stopped massaging, leaning her forearms on his massively muscled shoulder.

  "You're right, Lad. I just wish I knew what he had for "I feel the same," Ladislaus rumbled, allowing himself a frown, "but let's be grateful for what he already gave us. He turned from his own to be helping us because he thought it right; now I've the thinking he's to be paying for it soon and late." "I know, Lad. I know." She patted his shoulder, smiling contritely, and he felt a surge of guilt. It was hard enough heading a Fringe World delegation without your own people snapping at you. Besides, Fionna was fight to worry. The one clue they had to Greuner's message was the phrase "Gale Warning," and that was the code he and the little man had arranged to indicate a major Corporate World offensive against the Fringe.

  "I did pick up something a mite useful," he proffered as a peace offering. 'rhe name of the new New Zurich bully boy, I'm to be thinking.

  Fouchet. A tall, mean son-of-a sand-leech with a face like boiled blubber." "He's their new security chief?." Fionna asked, eyes narrowing.

  "Chief, you know they're not to be using such titles] They're not so crude as that--heql to be called Computerman's Syndic or some such. But, aye, he's the one.

  And had he just a little more curiosity or a little less brain--mind, I'm not sure which it was--it's squeezing Greuner's information from him I'd be the now." "Lad," Fionna said sternly, "I've told you we can't operate that way! They already call us 'barbarians". What do you think they'll call us if you start acting like that?" "Aye? I don't have the thinking it's to mind me the much," Ladislaus said, laying the accent with a trowel. "It's maybe "Corporate Worlder" they're to call me if I have the doing of their own against them. And where's the difference to lie? Yon Corporate Worlder flays his whales with money, Chief; I'm only after the doing of it by hand." Fionna started to reply tartly, then stopped.

  She and Ladislaus had grown up together on the cold and windy seas of Beaufort, and she knew it irked him to play the homespun fool for men like Fouchet--but she also knew he recognized the advantages of his role. During his time in the Federation's navy, Ladislaus had acquired a cosmopolitanism at odds with the Innerworld notion of a Fringer, though, like anyone, he tended to revert to the speech patterns of childhood under stress. The slow Beaufort accent had drawn attention even in the Fleet, where such idosyncrasies were far from rare, and Lad had learned the hard way to speak excellent Standard English. But his' sense of humor had stood him in good stead, and he'd also learned to ape the stereotype so well few of his victims ever realized they were being hoodwinked. He found his hayseed persona useful as head of security for the Beaufort delegation, and he usually enjoyed it. Yet it seemed this latest episode had cracked his normal shield of humor. He'd evidently become closer to Greuner than she'd thought.., and he was right, damn it! The little banker had jeopardized his career, certainly, and possibly his life, to help worlds he'd never even visited--and now he'd pay for it. She felt a sudden hot stinging behind her own eyes, and her hands squeezed his shoulder in silence until she felt the new tension run slowly out of them both onc more.

  Her eyes swept over upward-soaring walls hung with the flags and banners o pounds scores of planetal systems, all dominated by the space-black Federation banner with its golden sunburst, and the blue planet and white moon o* the homeworld.The air stirred coolly against her skin as she adjusted her hushphone headset over her red hair. Ladislaus was going to he to ate ff he didn't get a move on.

  A tiny light glowed on her panel as the Sergeant at Arms warned her a member o pounds her delegation was on his way, and she looked up, hiding a smile as Skjorning lumbered down the aisle. Thank Cod none of their constituents ever visited Old Terra! They'd have a fit ff they ever saw the role Ladislaus had assumed so well.

  The big man sidled bashfully through the crowd in a state of perpetual embarrassment, then sank gratellly into the chair at Fionna's left hand and leaned forward to fumble clumsily with his hushphone.

  "Any clues, Lad?" she asked softly.

  "No, Chief." Ladislaus' lips barely moved. "Only the code, and it's a seaharrower's own luck that much got to US.

  Fionna rowned and nodded in agreement. She started to say somethi
ng more, but the echo o pounds a soft chime cut her short.

  The Legislative Assembly of the Terran Federation was in session.

  Fionna fidgeted uneasily as the opening formalities filtered past her. She could see the Galloway's World delegation from where she sat, and Simon Taliaferro wasn't in his usual place. The New Zurich delegation was less than ten meters away, and she noted sinkingly that Oskar Dieter wasn't with his fellows, either. Whatever Greuner had tried to warn them of, those two would be at the heart of it. Her fingers flew over her information console, keying their names and punching up a cross index of the committees on which they sat, for she'd learned long since that it was in the closed committee meetings that the Corporate Worlds wove their webs.

  The screen lit, confirming her memory. Both men were from populous worlds; combined with their personal seniority in the Assembly and the "representative membership" committee rules the Corporate Worlds had rammed through twelve years ago, that gave them membership on dozens of committees... including shared membership on Foreign Relations and Military Oversight. She frowned. blot only was each a member of both, but Taliaferro chaired Foreign Relations and Dieter chaired Military Oversight. It was an ominous combination.

  Unfortunately, there was little he could do about it.

  "Ladies and Genfiemen of the Assembly," Haley said, "the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee has requested a dosed session of the Assembly sitting as a committee of the whole. Are there any objections?" Fionna keyed her console and saw Haley glance down as her light pulsed on his panel. Then he looked out over the sea of faces to the Beaufort delegation, and his face vanished from the giant screen behind the podium, replaced by Fionna's, though his image continued to stare up from the small screen before each delegate.

  "The Chair recognizes the Honorable Assemblywoman for Beaufort," he said, and Fionna's headset beeped to indicate a live mike.

  "Mister Speaker, this is highly irregular," she said quietly. "I would ask why the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee feels the need for a closed session? And why we were not informed in advance?" The faee on her console screen was dearly unhappy. Haley was too experienced to show his emotions openly, but the assemblymen were too experienced not to read him anyway.

  "Ms. MacTaggart, I can only tell you that the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee and Minister of Foreign Affairs Assad jointly have requested the Assembly's attention to a matter of grave import. That is all the information I have. Do you wish to object to the request for closure?" Fionna certainly did, but it would accomplish little, since she would know no more about Taliaferro's plans after blocking the secret session than she did now. Damn him! Despite the warning, he'd managed to keep her completely in the dark!

  "No, Mister Speaker," she said softly. "I have no objection." "Is there any debate?" Haley asked. There was none, and the Speaker gaveled the Assembly into secret session.

  The chamber buzzed with side conversations as the Sergeant at Arms and his staff escorted the news people out. The great doors boomed softly shuLike and sophisticated anti-snooping defenses were set in motion. There would be no way for the outside world to discover what was said or done here unless a delegate leaked the word. Such "accidental leaks" were far from uncommon these days, though they once had been. As the Fringer population base had slowly grown to challenge the Corporate Worlds' domination of the Assembly, the campaign of secret slander and counter-slander had taken on vicious overtones.

  Initially, the Outworlders had been at a considerable disadvantage, but Fionna was almost saddened by how well they'd learned to play the game since. Onlv this time, leaks wouldn't be enough. Greuner's disappeaiance proved that. Two new figures appeared beside Haley. One was Oskar Dieter, though he was as careful as ever to stay in the background. The other was Simon Taliaferro, possibly the man the Fringers hated most of all.

  "Ladies and gentlemen," Haley said, "the Chair recognizes the Honorable Simon Taliaferro, Delegate for Galloway's World and Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.

  Mister Taliaferro." "hank you, Mister Speaker." Taliaferro's dark face was incongruously jovial on the huge screen, and Fionna's lips curled with dislike.

  It was like a badly crafted disguise, she thought. A threadbare mask for the ruthless brilliance under that jolly exterior--yet the rules of the game required one to pretend his bonhomie was real.

  "Members of the Assembly," Taliaferro said, "I bring you great news! After months of negotiation, I can now tell you that perhaps the most momentous departure in the history of the Galaxy has been proposed. President Zhi and Prime Minister Minh have received a direct communication from the Khan of the Orions, borne by a fully empowered plenipotentiary." He paused for effect, knowing he'd gathered the eyes and ears of every delegate.

  'le Khan proposes nothing less than the amalgamation of the Terran Federation and the Khanate of Orion!" His voice rose steadily through the last sentence, but it was almost, lost in the roar which burst forth at the word "amalgamation," and Fionna was on her feet, one fist clenched on the top of her console.

  "No.t" she shouted, but her voice was lost in the uproar. It was just as well, she realized a moment later. She was the leader of the Fringe Caucus. She must appear calm and reasonable. Above all, reasonable[ Yet such a proposal would be intolerable to her constituents, and the Corporate Worlds knew it. In fact, only those fit-headed, liberal-minded, bureaucracy-worshiping ,Heart Worlders could be so blind as to think the Fringe wouldn't fight this!

  Her eyes narrowed as she sank back into her seat. Of course the Corporate Worlds knew, and Taliaferro's obvious delight made cold, ugly sense. How was the huge population of the Khanate to fit into th new, amalgamated monster? were the Orions suddenly to find themselves enfranchised to vote for the first time in theft history? It had takest over a century of slow, painful population growth in the outwodds to earn the delegates to challenge the Corporate Worlds. With such a huge influx of votes, the Assembly would have no choice but to cut the representational basis... which would just coincidentally gerrymander the sparse Fringe population out of the representation it had finally gained.

  Just who, she wondered, had proposed what to whom? Had the Orions conceived this on their own? Or had the Corporate Worlds suggested it to them? Or had they, perhaps, simply misled the Khan's ambassadors into thinking the proposal would be joyfully accepted throughout the Federation? There were too many possibilities and too few answers--yet.

  "Mister Speaker," Taliaferro's amplified voice cut through the uproar, "I yield temporarily to the Honorable Assem-blywoman for Beaufort!" The background noise died instantly as Fionna appeared on the giant screen, and her green eyes flashed fire.

  "Mister Speaker," her voice was dear and strong, "I must tell the Honorable Assemblyman for Galloway's World that he has made a grievous error ff he expects every Federation citizen to greet this proposal with loud hosannas! No one in the Federation has more respect for the Orions than we of the Fringe. We have fought against them and beside them.

  We admire their courage, their fortitude, and their spirit. They have their own claims to greatness: the first race to hypothesize the possibility of warp travel; the first to create a stellar empire; and the first to recognize the inevitable end result of blind militarism and turn away from it. But, Mister Speaker, they are Orions--and we here represent the Terran Federation! We represent a society forged, in part, in combat against the Orions, one which has made for itself a place second to none in the known Galaxy. And, Mister Speaker--was her long anger and frustration burned in her throat as she hurled the final words at Taliaferro his-comthe Fringe will never consent to this so-called amalgamation!" She sat down abruptly, and the Chamber of Worlds went berserk.

  Soft, somehow mournful music swirled like the sea as Fionna stood at the head of the receiving line, smiling and gracious despite her exhaustion. The last week had been a nightmare, and only the extravagance of her personal exertions had held the Fringe bloc together. It wasn't that an
y delegation favored the proposed amalgamation; the reverse was true-they were angry with her for not taking a more extreme position.

  But if twenty-five years in the Assembly had taught her anything, it was that the Heart Worlds didn't understand the Fringe. The Corporate Worlders knew their outworld cousins and enemies far better than the motherworld and its oldest colonies did, though she suspected not even the Corporate Worlds fully realized the fulminating anger they were fanning. But the Heart Worlds were too far removed from their own frontier days. They'd forgotten what it was like to know that any ,outside attack must come through their systems to reach the heart of empire. As they'd forgotten--ff they'd ever known--whichat it was to have their commerce, the lifeblood of their societies, manipulated and exploited by predatory mercharts with a yen for power.

  And because they had forgotten or did not know, they were a terrible danger to the Fringe. Fionna had seen the "new liberalism" of her Heart World colleagues. The Heart Worlds had it too good, she thought bitterly; they were too content, too ultracivilized. The Corporate Worlds could convince them the Fringe really was peopled by uncouth barbarians but little removed from outright savagery.

  Worse, they could be convinced to do what was "best" for the Fringe even ff it killed the object of their kindness! Knowing that, she also knew it was imperative to convince the Heart Worlds of the Fringe's maturity.., or at least open-mindedness. The position she'd taken was the strongest she could take.

  Of all the Fringe Worlds, Beaufort, perhaps, most despised Corporate Worlders. Beaufort's heavy gravity had not been kind to its colonizers, despite their selection for high pressure tolerance, yet there had been fierce compe-fit'ion for space on the colony ships. The rebels of the Corporate Worlds, those who could no longer tolerate their roles as cogs in the vast machines, had seen in Beaufort a world poor enough and distant enough to be secure from manipulation and control. They'd gone to Beaufort to escape, and many had died there so many BuCol actually closed the planet to immigration for almost sixty years.