The Shadow of Saganami Page 16

  "Anyway, Princess Ruth got Captain Oversteegen and the Gauntlet involved, and, along with some Solly Navy types who had their own axes to grind, got the transport to Congo, along with an assault force made up mainly out of the liberated slaves and some Ballroom 'terrorists' Daddy just happened to know how to find, which boarded Manpower's space station and captured it."

  She shrugged, her face suddenly grim.

  "Without the space station to back them up with orbital fire support, the Manpower goons and the slave overseers on the planet didn't stand a chance. It was . . . pretty ugly. Lots of atrocities and lots of payback. And it would've been a lot worse without Berry. She managed to put the brakes on the worst of the massacres, and along the way, somehow, and I still don't understand exactly how it all worked, she got drafted to be their Queen."

  She shrugged again, this time helplessly, and raised her hands, palms uppermost. She really didn't understand how it had all worked, even though Berry had done her best to explain it in her letters. All she knew was that the brutalized waif she'd rescued from the subterranean labyrinths of Old Chicago had become the reigning monarch of the planet Torch and a kingdom full of liberated slaves fanatically devoted to the destruction of Manpower and all things Mesan. With an ex-Solarian Marine lieutenant as her military commander in chief, a princess of Manticore as her chief of intelligence, the local Havenite intelligence service's chief of station as her conduit to the Republic of Haven, and a precarious balance of support from both Manticore and the Republic which seemed to be standing up despite the resumption of hostilities. And, of course, her very own wormhole junction.

  With termini whose locations none of her people, so far, knew the least thing about, since Manpower either hadn't explored them itself or had managed to destroy the data before it lost Congo.

  She shook off the familiar thought with a grimace, and looked up to see five sets of eyes looking at her in various stages of bogglement.

  "Anyway," she said again, "that's the simple version of it."

  "Excuse me," d'Arezzo gave her one of his rare smiles, yet there was something in his eyes that she couldn't quite identify, "but if that's the simple version, I'm glad I missed the complicated one!"

  "You and me both," Leo agreed, nodding emphatically. Ragnhild only looked at Helen thoughtfully, but Aikawa leaned back and folded his arms.

  "I know we all agreed not to try to drag any more out of you, so I'll just content myself with pointing out that your little explanation left quite a few loose ends floating around." She met his gaze with her best innocent expression, and he snorted. "Leaving aside any more questions about how the change in management was engineered, can you tell us if there's any truth to the rumors your sister's new planet has officially declared war on Manpower and Mesa?"

  "Oh, sure. That's no secret," Helen replied. "What did you expect a planet inhabited almost exclusively by freed genetic slaves to do?"

  "And they're using those frigates your father and mother—I mean, your father and Lady Montaigne—had built for the ASL for their fleet?" d'Arezzo asked, his expression intent.

  "As the nucleus for it. At the same time, I understand they're negotiating with both us and the Peeps for heavier ships. Even 'obsolete' Allied designs are as good as anything Mesa or Manpower might have. And everyone on Torch figures it's only a matter of time until Manpower decides it's found a way to regain possession of Congo somehow. So building up a big enough fleet to discourage temptations is pretty high on the priority lists of 'Queen Berry's' senior advisers."

  "I can see why it might be," Leo said dryly. "But, tell me, how does your dad think Mesa feels about the Star Kingdom's part in what happened to Congo?"

  "He thinks Mesa's probably pissed off as hell," Helen said with a smile. "After all, Oversteegen and Gauntlet escorted the 'hijacked' Trojan horse to Congo in the first place. By now, they have to know Princess Ruth—the Queen's own niece—was involved in the entire thing up to her ears, too. Then there's the fact that it was Oversteegen who initially faced down the Mesan task group sent in to retake the system. Not to mention the fact that we've basically been at war with Manpower ourselves for the better part of four hundred T-years."

  "And, like the Captain said," Leo murmured slowly, "the Cluster's only a couple of hundred light-years from Mesa."

  "Exactly," d'Arezzo said. "We're one of the few Navies that actually enforce the Cherwell Convention like we mean it, and the Star Kingdom and Mesa have been locking horns for centuries now. Even when we were the better part of a thousand light-years apart."

  "Damn straight." Ragnhild nodded. "Manpower's going to be pretty unhappy to suddenly find us with secure fleet bases that close to its home system. Which is why I think the Captain has a definite point about just how nasty things could turn. We've always had a tendency back home in the Star Kingdom to think of Manpower and Mesa as two separate entities—sort of like the Star Kingdom and the Hauptman Cartel, or Grayson and Sky Domes. But it doesn't really work that way. Manpower and a handful of other huge companies own Mesa, and Mesa has its own navy. Not too big compared to our Navy, maybe, but nothing to sneeze at, and equipped with modern Solly designs. Plus most of the companies headquartered there have at least some armed ships of their own. With us as distracted by Silesia and the front as we are, they'd almost have to be tempted to use that military capability in an effort to destabilize our annexation of the Cluster."

  "And Frontier Security would be just absolutely delighted to help them do it," Leo agreed grimly.

  "You know," Aikawa said thoughtfully, "this deployment may not turn out to be quite so boring as I figured it would."

  Chapter Ten

  "You there, Steve?"

  Stephen Westman, of the Buffalo Valley Westmans, grimaced and shoved his hat back on his head. It was of a style which had once been called a "Stetson" on humanity's homeworld, and a decorative band of hammered silver and amethyst winked as he shook his head in exasperation. There was such a thing as operational security, but so far most of his people seemed to have trouble remembering that.

  At least I managed to get my hands on commercial market Solly crypto software. The Manties can probably break it once they get here in force, but as long as we're only up against our own locally produced crap, we should be okay.

  "Freedom Three, this is Freedom One," he said into his own com in a patiently pointed tone. "Yes, I'm here."

  "Aw, hell, Ste—I mean, Freedom One." Jeff Hollister sounded sheepish. "Sorry 'bout that. I forgot."

  "Forget about it . . . this time," Westman said. "What is it?"

  "Those fellows you wanted us to keep an eye on? They're headed up the Schuyler. Looks like they figure to put down for the night somewhere around Big Rock Dome."

  "They do, do they?" Westman pursed his lips thoughtfully. "Why, that's mighty interesting, Freedom Three."

  "Thought you might think so." Hollister's tone was satisfied.

  "Thanks for passing it along," Westman said. "I'll see you around."

  "Later," Hollister agreed laconically, and cut the circuit.

  Westman folded up his own com and shoved it back into his pocket while he considered the information.

  He was a tallish man, a shade under a hundred and eighty-eight centimeters in height, with broad, powerful shoulders. He was also strikingly handsome, with sun-bleached blond hair, blue eyes, and a bronzed face first-generation prolong kept reasonably young, but which sixty-one T-years of experience, weather, and humor had etched with crow's-feet. At the moment that face wore a thoughtful expression.

  Well, he mused, it's about time I get this show on the road, if I'm really serious. And I am.

  He considered for a moment or two longer, standing in the dappled shade of the Terran aspens which had been introduced to Montana over three T-centuries before. He listened to the rustle of wind in the golden leaves and looked up, checking the sun's position out of automatic habit as deep as instinct. Then he nodded in decision, turned, and walked through what appeare
d to be a solid wall of stone into a large cavern.

  Like the crypto software he'd purchased for his people's communicators, the holo generator which produced the illusion of solid stone was of Solarian manufacture. It galled Westman to use Solly technology, given the fact that the Solarian League and the never-to-be-sufficiently-damned Office of Frontier Security had been The Enemy much longer than the Manties. But he was a practical man, and he wasn't about to handicap himself or his followers by using anything but the best hardware available.

  Besides, there's something . . . appropriate about using Solly equipment against another fucking bunch of carrioncat outsiders. And those bastards on Rembrandt are even worse. If that son of a bitch Van Dort thinks he's going to waltz Montana off and fuck us over again, he's in for a painful surprise.

  "Luis!" he called as he walked deeper into the cavern. Much of it was natural, but he and his people had enlarged it considerably. The New Swan Range was lousy with iron ore, and enough of that still made the best natural concealment available. He didn't really like putting so many eggs in a single basket, even one this well hidden, but he hadn't had a lot of choice when he first decided to go underground—literally. Hopefully, if things went the way he planned, he'd be able to expand into an entire network of satellite bases that would lessen his vulnerability by spreading out his assets and his organization.

  "Luis!" he called again, and this time, there was an answer.

  "Yes, Boss?" Luis Palacios called back as he came clattering up the poured concrete steps from the lower level of caverns.

  Palacios had been Westman's foreman—effectively, the field manager for a ranching and farming empire which had netted profits on the order of ninety million Solarian credits a year—just as he'd been for Westman's father. He was lean, dark, and almost a full centimeter taller even than Westman, and the left side of his face carried three deep scars as a legacy from one of Montana's nearcougars. He was also the one man on Montana—or, for that matter, in the entire Talbott Cluster—whom Westman trusted without reservation or qualification.

  "Jeff Hollister just called in," Westman told him now. "Those Manty surveyors and that jackass Haven are headed up the Schuyler to Big Rock. What say you and I and some of the boys go extend a proper Montana welcome?"

  "Why, I think that'd be right neighborly of us, Boss," Palacios said with a grin. "Just how warmly do you figure to welcome them?"

  "Well, I don't see any reason to get carried away," Westman replied. "This'll be our first party, after all."

  "Understood." Palacios nodded. "You want me to pick the boys?"

  "Go ahead," Westman agreed. "Be sure to include at least three of the ones we're considering for cell leaders, though."

  "No sweat, Boss. Bennington, Travers, and Ciraki are all on call."

  "Good!" Westman smiled in approval. "Tell them I figure to drop in on our off-world guests tomorrow morning, but we've got a ways to go. So I want to move out within the next four or five hours."

  * * *

  Oscar Johansen checked his GPS display with a certain sense of satisfaction. He'd been pleased to discover that Montana at least had a comprehensive network of navigation satellites. He could have asked HMS Ericsson or Volcano—the support ships the RMN had stationed here—to provide him with the same data, but he really preferred working with the existing local infrastructure . . . whenever he could.

  You never knew what you were going to find on a planet in the Verge. Some of them were little better than prespace Old Earth, while others were even further advanced than Grayson had been before it signed on to the Manticoran Alliance. Montana fell somewhere between the two extremes. It was too dirt-poor to afford a really solid tech base, but it had made innovative use of what it could afford. Its navigation satellites were a case in point. They were at least a couple of centuries out of date by Manticoran standards, but they did the job just fine. And they also pulled double duty as weather satellites, air traffic control radar arrays, law enforcement surveillance platforms, and traffic control points for any freighters which called here.

  And there's no reason why the place has to be so poor, he thought as he tagged the GPS coordinates to the electronic map in his memo board. The beef they raise here would command top prices back home, and with the Lynx Terminus, they can ship it fresh direct to Beowulf or even Old Earth. He shook his head, thinking of the astronomical prices Montanan beef or nearbuffalo could bring on the mother world. And there are dozens of other opportunities for anyone with just a little bit of startup capital.

  Which, after all, was the reason Johansen was here. The Alexander Government had made it clear that Her Majesty had no intention of allowing her new subjects in Talbott to be turfed out of the development of their own star systems by sharp Manticoran operators. The government had announced it would carry out its own surveys of the Cluster, in conjunction with local governments, to confirm all existing titles of ownership. Those titles would be fully protected, and to ensure local participation in any development projects, the Chancellor of the Exchequer had announced that, for its first ten T-years of operation, any new startup endeavor in the Cluster would enjoy a reduction in taxation equal to the percentage of ownership held by citizens of the Cluster. After ten T-years, the tax break would reduce by five percent per T-year for another ten T-years, then terminate completely in the twenty-first T-year. Given where the Star Kingdom's wartime tax rates stood, that provision alone was guaranteed to ensure the massive representation of local interests.

  Johansen looked up at the sun blazing in a wash of crimson and gold coals on the western horizon. Montana's primary—also called Montana—was a bit cooler than Manticore-A. And Montana was almost one full light-minute farther from its primary than the capital planet of the Star Kingdom was from Manticore-A, too. With evening coming on rapidly, that coolness was especially noticeable, and he looked over to where the expedition was pitching its tents for the night. They were going up with the efficiency of well-organized practice, and his eyes strayed to the rippling, steel-colored sheet of water rushing over the rocks and gravel of the Schuyler River. Local trees, interspersed with Terran oak and aspen, grew right down to the riverbank, casting their shadows over the crystal-clear water, and temptation stirred. There had to be some deep pools out there, he thought, and he'd already encountered the planet's nearbass.

  It's usually a good idea to maintain a certain separation between the chief and his Indians, he thought with a lurking smile, so I probably shouldn't disturb them now that they've gotten into the swing of things over there. And if I get busy fast enough, I might even hook enough fish to give us a little variety for dinner. Even if I don't, I can always claim that was what I was trying to do!

  He headed for his personal air car and his tackle box.

  * * *

  The sun rose slowly over the eastern rampart of the Schuyler River Valley. Light frost glittered on the higher slopes to the north, and long fingers of shadow—crisp and cool in the mountain morning—reached out across the sleeping surveyors' camp.

  Stephen Westman watched the sun edging higher, then checked his chrono. It was time, and he rose from his seat on the fallen tree trunk, lifted his pulse rifle from where it had leaned against the trunk beside him, and started down the slope.

  * * *

  Oscar Johansen rolled over and stretched luxuriantly. His wife had always been perplexed by the way his sleeping habits flip-flopped whenever he was in the field. At home, he was a night owl, staying up until all hours and sleeping as late as he could get away with. But in the field, he loved the early hours of sunrise. There was something special, almost holy, about those still, clear, crystalline minutes while sunlight flowed slowly, slowly back into a world. Every planet habitable by man had its analogues of birds, and Johansen had never yet been on a world where one of them hadn't greeted the dawn. The songs or calls might vary wildly, but there was always that first, single note in the orchestra. That moment when the first singer roused, tested its voice, an
d then sounded the flourish that formalized the ending of night and the beginning of yet another day.

  His Manticoran-manufactured tent's smart fabric had maintained his preferred overnight temperature of twenty degrees—sixty-eight degrees on the ancient Fahrenheit scale Montana's original, -deliberately archaic settlers had brought with them—and he picked up the remote. He tapped in the command, and the eastern side of the tent obediently transformed itself into a one-way window. He lay there on the comfortable memory-plastic cot, enjoying the warmth of his bedroll, and watched the morning shadows and the misty tendrils of vapor hovering above the river, as if the water were breathing.

  He was still admiring the sunrise when, suddenly, the fly of his tent flew open. He shot upright in his cot, more in surprise than anything else, then froze as he found himself staring into the business end of a pulse rifle.

  "Morning, friend," the weathered-looking man behind the rifle said pleasantly. "I expect you're a mite surprised to see me."

  * * *

  "Goddamn it, Steve!"

  Les Haven sounded more irritated than anything else, Johansen decided. The Land Registry Office inspector obviously knew the tall, blond-haired leader of the thirty or forty armed, masked men who'd invaded their encampment. The Manticoran wondered whether that was a good sign, or a bad one.

  "Looks like you've fallen into bad company, Les," the leader replied. He jerked his head at Johansen. "You procuring for off-world pimps these days?"

  "Steve Westman, if you had the sense God gave a neoturkey, you'd know this was just goddamn silliness!" Johansen decided he would have been happier if Haven had been just a bit less emphatic. But the Montanan had the bit well and truly between his teeth. "Damn it, Steve—we voted in favor of annexation by over seventy-two percent. Seventy-two percent, Steve! Are you gonna tell that many of your neighbors they're idiots?"