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  “Apparently he doesn’t think so,” Szponder said sourly and poured more vodka.

  Kotarski nodded, but his eyes were thoughtful. Bjørn Kudzinowski headed the Komisja Wolności i Sprawiedliwości Społecznej, the Commission for Freedom and Social Justice, which was the most powerful non-police agency in the Republic. The combined functions of the old ministries of industry, labor, and commerce had been folded into his commission, and the airbus school tours were part of a KWSS outreach program. One would have thought…

  “I wonder how much hand he had behind the scenes in crafting Krzywicka’s and Sosabowska’s response to this,” he murmured out loud.

  “I don’t think Sosabowska wants to come within a thousand kilometers of ‘this,’” Szponder said, recapping the vodka bottle. “As Szymon pointed out, the actual inquiry’s being conducted by the Inspektorat Sił Zbrojnych. That’s Brigadier Pawlikowski’s shop, and he’s a hard-core career officer. Unfortunately, that means he’ll sign whatever he’s told to sign, whether he agrees with it or not. I’m pretty damn sure he doesn’t, but he’s got a wife and kids of his own. And, after all, it’s not like his objecting to it would change anything, would it?” He shook his head unhappily and sipped vodka. “He’ll sign off on this one, too, and that insulates Sosabowska from the entire mess. I doubt she could do anything about it if she wanted to, but this gets her off the hook so she doesn’t even have to try. And,” he added grudgingly, “it does get her pilot out of the line of fire, too. That young man did exactly what I’d’ve done in his place. I’m just as happy he’s not going to stand trial for it in the end.”

  “They can’t really think this is all just going to…go away, can they?”

  “I don’t think they care whether or not it goes away.” Szponder set his glass very precisely in the center of his blotter, formed his index fingers and thumbs into a triangle around its base, and stared down into it for several seconds, like an oracle consulting his crystal ball. Then he looked back up. “I think they think it doesn’t matter how the man or woman in the street reacts to this—or to anything else, anymore. They’re that far gone, Jarosław.”

  “Damn.” The single word came out with sorrow, not surprise, and Kotarski drew a deep breath, then shook his head.

  “It’s not like we haven’t seen this coming, Tomasz,” he said. “There was a reason you set up the Krucjata—yes, and gave me a job after the University threw me out on my ass.”

  “I know. It’s just that…that it hurt so much, sitting there across from Szymon this evening. He looks so much like Włodzimierz, and he was totally oblivious to any reason he ought to be doing something about this. That’s the worst part of it, Jarosław. I think he’s genuinely oblivious to it, not just closing his eyes and pretending he doesn’t see, like the rest of the aparatczyków. He’s that far removed from everything his uncle ever tried to accomplish. You know as well as I do that even at the very end Włodzimierz would never have stood by and watched the Party sweep more than a hundred dead kids under the carpet! Never!”

  “Probably not,” Kotarski agreed, although deep inside he wasn’t so sure. He’d known Ziomkowski even longer than Szponder had, and he wanted to agree. But by the end, the man who’d created the Ruch Odnowy Narodowej had been so thoroughly captured by the system—and been so tired and worn out—he might, indeed, have let this pass. Yet perhaps he wouldn’t have, either, and one of Tomasz Szponder’s greatest strengths was his loyalty. It would have been not just unrealistic but cruel to argue with him about a friend so many years dead.

  “Unfortunately,” he said aloud, “we have to deal with Szymon—or, rather, with Krzywicka and Mazur—not Włodzimierz. And from what you’re saying, that situation’s about to get a whole lot uglier. If they’re willing to ignore something like this, it’s only a matter of time until they ignore something even worse. And from what we’re hearing from the lower level cells, there’s enough anger building over this one for genuine disturbances. Tomek and I went over the latest reports while you were not enjoying dinner, and it’s pretty clear there’s a lot of pressure building out there. We could see riots coming out of the Projects…and that doesn’t even count our people’s reaction.”

  “Wonderful.”

  Szponder stood and crossed to the small office’s single window and gazed down on the street so far below. It looked so calm and peaceful at the moment, but it wasn’t hard for him to imagine a very different scene. He’d seen street carnage enough when he, Włodzimierz Ziomkowski, and the idealistic college students who’d provided so much of the National Renewal Movement’s initial fiery enthusiasm had assailed the corruption of the old Republic.

  Much as he’d loved Ziomkowski, he’d have shot him dead in the street himself if he’d even suspected then what the RON would become in the end.

  “It’s going to be bloodier than the Agitacja ever was,” he said softly, leaning his forehead against the crystoplast. “The BBP and the KWSS are a hell of a lot more deeply embedded than the old police and security services were. And more ruthless. And the Oligarchia’s learned its lesson, too. If they’d been willing to resort to the sort of tactics Pokriefke and Krzywicka are willing to embrace, we’d never have seen the Party legalized in the first place. They won’t make that mistake a second time.”

  “Of course they won’t, and you knew that from the beginning. That’s why we’re organized the way we are. The question is whether or not the time’s come for us to get more…proactive.”

  Szponder nodded against the window, his eyes closed, because Kotarski was right. He would so much have preferred to be able to agitate for new elections the way he and Włodzimierz had agitated so many years before, but he’d known long before Włodzimierz’s death that that wasn’t going to happen a second time. That was why he’d started building the Krucjata Wolności Myśli, the Free Thought Crusade, three T-years before Ziomkowski’s final stroke. He hadn’t taken that step lightly, but he’d taken it with his eyes wide open. And he’d known then that it had never been a question of whether or not the time would come, only a question of when.

  “We’re not ready yet.” He turned from the window to face the man he’d recruited as the Krucjata’s intellectual leader and raised one hand as he saw the protest forming in Kotarski’s eyes. “I don’t mean our people aren’t ready, don’t know what we’re going to ask of them, Jarosław. I mean we’re physically not ready. We’ve done—you’ve done—an outstanding job of building the willingness, the discipline we’ll need, but we don’t have the tools. And, frankly, I’m afraid it’s going to be a lot harder to get those tools into our people’s hands than I’d thought it would be. Pokriefke and her people—and Mazur’s people, for that matter—have made it a hell of a lot harder to smuggle anything in or out of the system. Getting weapons past them will be what Tomek would call a copper-plated bitch.”

  “We’ve already stockpiled quite a few weapons,” Kotarski protested, and Szponder snorted.

  “‘Quite a few’ isn’t remotely like ‘enough,’ Jarosław. Especially not when our ‘stockpiles’ consist of obsolete pre-Agitacja pulse rifles and less than two thousand civilian firearms. For a riot or a revolt, that might be plenty. But aren’t you the one who used to teach students the difference between ‘revolts’ and ‘revolutions’?”

  “Yes, I am. And you’re right.”

  “Exactly. Revolutions are revolts that succeed and revolts are the ones where everybody dies, instead. I’m not going to be a party to that, Jarosław, but I hadn’t expected this airbus business, so I never imagined something like this might come along so soon. I’ve been moving funds out-system a little bit at a time, but I don’t have remotely enough out there to buy the kind of firepower we’re going to need. Worse, I don’t have any idea how to get weapons on-planet even after I find someone to sell them to us!” He smiled thinly. “So dust off your researching skills, Professor. Figure out where we can buy what I need to rip the throat out of my best friend’s political monument.”

&n
bsp; Chapter Four

  Vice Admiral Quentin O’Malley was several centimeters shorter than Captain Aivars Terekhov, but broad shouldered and muscular. His dark hair was cropped short, and his brown eyes looked out from under bushy, aggressive eyebrows on either side of a strong, straight blade of a nose. He looked like the bruising rugby player he’d been at Saganami Island, but his voice was a surprisingly smooth tenor.

  He’d already greeted Terekhov, Commander Ginger Lewis, and Lieutenant Guthrie Bagwell, Hexapuma’s chief engineer (and acting XO) and electronic warfare officer, respectively, when they arrived aboard his flagship, Black Rose. Now he rose courteously as Rear Admiral Augustus Khumalo entered the briefing room with Vincenzo Terwilliger, Black Rose’s commander, trailed by Khumalo’s flag captain, Victoria Saunders, and Commander Ambrose Chandler and Commander Loretta Shoupe, his intelligence officer and chief of staff, respectively.

  “Thank you for coming, Admiral,” he said, and Khumalo nodded.

  “Pleased to be aboard, Admiral O’Malley,” he replied, shaking the vice admiral’s hand briefly but firmly. Then he turned to the single civilian who’d been seated at the conference table and extended his hand to her, as well. “Ms. Corvisart,” he said.

  “Admiral,” she responded as her slim hand almost disappeared in his grip. She was a smallish woman, who looked even smaller beside Khumalo.

  “Please, be seated, everyone,” O’Malley invited. He waited until everyone else had settled into his or her chair before sitting himself, then looked around at the attentive faces.

  “I believe, Ms. Corvisart, that as the direct representative of Her Majesty and the Foreign Office, you’re the logical person to chair this meeting,” he said, raising one eyebrow at Khumalo. The circumstances were just a little complicated, because while O’Malley was senior to Khumalo, Khumalo was the Talbott Station Commander and—technically—O’Malley’s task force came under Baroness Medusa, the Talbott Sector Governor, and thus Talbott Station’s command authority. So when wearing his Talbott Station hat and acting as Medusa’s senior naval officer within the Talbott Sector, Khumalo was senior, and it wasn’t entirely clear—yet—which hat was on whose head here in Monica.

  “I concur entirely,” Khumalo said a bit more ponderously, and Corvisart inclined her head for just a moment. Then she leaned forward in her chair and folded her hands before her on the table.

  “Thank you, Admiral O’Malley. And thank you, Admiral Khumalo. I realize that, as you say, I’m here as the direct civilian representative of Her Majesty’s Government. Under the strict rubric of my instructions, I’m also the senior representative of the Star Kingdom. However, let’s not play any games here. Admiral Khumalo, in my opinion, your and Captain Terekhov’s actions—and Monican involvement in the effort to destabilize Kornati and Montana—make this an extension of your command area. As such, I believe you’re Her Majesty’s proper representative. I realize I’m cutting a bit of a Gordian knot here, but I think leaving you as our formal representative will capitalize on the fact that you’ve already been acting in that capacity and also, insulate you, Admiral O’Malley,” she looked at the vice admiral, “from the political side and allow you to concentrate on the military aspects of our situation.” She waited until O’Malley had nodded in agreement, then looked back at Khumalo. “And while I’m on the subject, Admiral Khumalo, I’d like to take this opportunity to state my full and unqualified approval for the actions you and, especially, Captain Terekhov have taken in Monica.”

  Some of the uniformed shoulders around that table relaxed ever so slightly, and she smiled faintly.

  “I’m sure all of you realize there will be a formal board of inquiry in the fullness of time. Having read your reports and reviewed the preliminary take from your intelligence officers and the summaries Commander Bonifacio here”—she nodded her head in the direction of O’Malley’s chief of staff, Blake Bonifacio—“has put together for me, I don’t think you need to have any qualms about that board’s conclusions. For my part, I intend to conduct myself as if those conclusions had already been rendered and your actions approved at the highest level. I’m fairly certain”—her smile turned almost impish—“I won’t be sticking my neck out too far when I do.”

  She paused for a moment, then sat back in her chair.

  “I’m scheduled for my first face-to-face with President Tyler tomorrow morning. Before I meet with him, I’d like an opportunity to discuss several of the points in the intelligence packet Captain Terekhov and Commander Chandler have assembled for me. I think your work’s been commendably clear and unambiguous, given the short timeframe and how little access planet-side you’ve had, gentlemen, but I want every round in the magazine before I sit down with these people.” This time her smile was thin and extremely cold. “I don’t know if you’re familiar with an ancient gambler’s maxim the Foreign Office is rather fond of, Commander Chandler, but I suspect you know the one I’m talking about, Captain Terekhov?”

  She arched one eyebrow across the table, and Terekhov nodded.

  “I imagine you’re referring to the one about suckers and even breaks, Ma’am?”

  “Indeed I am. Anyone stupid enough to sign off for even a tenth of what it looks like Tyler bought into in this case certainly qualifies as a ‘sucker,’ and after the price your people paid derailing this plot, the only break I’m interested in giving him would occur somewhere around the C4 vertebra. It’s entirely possible we’ll wind up cutting some sort of deal with him in the end, little as any of us might like that prospect, on the theory that he was only a front man. I have a strong suspicion that you and Commander Chandler are correct about that, too, in which case we have bigger fish to fry than one more tinpot dictator. But I have no intention of letting him get away scot free. There will be a reckoning for the good president, and I guarantee you he’ll give us everything we want before I sign off on any proposed settlement with him.”

  She held Terekhov’s eyes for a heartbeat, then switched her gaze to Khumalo. Both officers looked back levelly, and she gave them a crisp nod, almost like a formal oath. Then she tapped the display in front of her, bringing it online.

  “First, Captain Terekhov, I’d appreciate it if you could run back down the chain of events that brought the freighter Marianne—or Golden Butterfly—to your attention. I want to be particularly clear on its role in running arms to that butcher Nordbrandt and how that led you to Monica in the first place. I think I have the sequence of events clear, but I want to be certain of that before I confront Tyler with Captain Binyan’s testimony and the documentation from his computers. After that, Commander Chandler,” she shifted her attention to Khumalo’s intelligence officer, “I’d like you to run down your findings from the Indefatigables you’ve examined at Eroica Station. I’m not a naval officer, and I’m not technically trained myself, so I want you to put it into layman’s terms for me, as well as you can. In particular, I want you to be conversant with every detail that proves they came direct from the Solarian Navy and that Technodyne connived with the SLN’s own in-house inspectors to make that happen. I want to be able to rattle off those details with so much assurance he doesn’t even think about the possibility that I don’t know exactly what I’m talking about. I’d also like to ask your electronic warfare officer, Captain Terekhov—Lieutenant Bagwell, I believe?”

  She raised her eyebrows again. Terekhov nodded to the lieutenant seated to his left, and she turned her attention to him.

  “I find myself actually almost understanding nearly fifteen percent of your report, Lieutenant,” she said wryly. “Given my total ineptitude for things military, that says quite a bit for the clarity with which you set forth your conclusions. Nonetheless, I’d like you to try to simplify that even more for me after we’ve heard from Commander Chandler. And, if Captain Terekhov can spare you, I’d like for you to accompany me to my initial meeting with President Tyler. I want you along to give me the nod if he or any of his navy people who may be present start trying to hand me
any horse shit.”

  Several surprised chuckles greeted her last two words, and Bagwell nodded with a smile. Then she switched her attention back to his superiors, and her expression turned rather more serious.

  “Given the somewhat…irregular nature of the Navy’s presence here in Monica, I think it would be best if Admiral Khumalo accompanied me as the senior naval representative at the table. As I say, that will leave you free to continue implementing your people’s control of the entire system infrastructure, Admiral O’Malley, with a degree of insulation from the political side of things. Frankly, Captain Terekhov, I’d really like to have you present, particularly in light of your own Foreign Office experience. Under the circumstances, though, I think it might be more, um, tactful to keep you and the senior Monican leadership as far apart as possible for the next little bit. Although, if they should be foolish enough to turn intractable, I have every intention of flourishing you over their heads. If there’s one officer who terrifies the entire Monican Navy, it’s probably you. For now, I’m prepared to try the silk glove approach, but if I need a knuckleduster to tuck inside it, that’s you.”

  “Understood, Ma’am,” Terekhov said after a moment. It was only the briefest of hesitations, but Corvisart heard it anyway. She raised an eyebrow at him, and he shrugged ever so slightly.

  “Frankly, Ma’am, I’m fully occupied right now trying to put Hexapuma back together. Captain Kurtz and Ericsson’s people are accomplishing more than I would have believed they could, but she’s a long way from ready to head home. If you need me dirtside, I’ll make myself available, of course. But the truth is, I’ve seen more than enough of Monica from orbit. I don’t feel the least bit slighted to not be at the table with you. In fact, it’s probably a good idea to keep me as far away from those people as you can.” Those blue eyes went cold and bleak. “I might find it a bit difficult to remain…civil.”