Kris found herself staring into a black screen; Ron had been cut off. Before Kris could blink, the screen filled with Hank’s aquiline nose and perfect mouth. Unusual for him, his cheeks were reddened by a rising temper. “Lieutenant, what’s going on here? Where are my liberty launches? We sent fifteen down and the first ones are overdue to return.”
“And likely to be more overdue before you see them, Hank.”
“Commodore, Lieutenant.”
Kris weighed several comebacks and decided the situation was way to hot for silly games. “Have you been watching the news?”
“And if I had, what would I have seen, Lieutenant.”
“Your sailors started a riot tonight. Buildings are burning. Women were raped.”
“Not by my men, Lieutenant. My sailors were told to be gentlemen during their liberty. They are ambassadors of Greenfeld,” Hank said, quoting the usual admonishment to sailors going ashore. “Whatever may be happening on Chance, it is clearly the work of your Longknife instigators.”
“They’re welcome to use that defense in court tomorrow, but if I were you, I’d get some lawyers down there to help your sailors get their stories straight.”
“Peterwalds do not need lawyers, Lieutenant. We make our fine legal points at the tip of a bayonet.”
Kris and Hank locked eyes at that. A long minute passed. “If that’s your attitude, may I suggest that you keep your sailors confined to your ships and off my station.”
“That is not something that you can demand, Lieutenant.”
“It is, however, something that I am within my rights to request, considering the trouble on the planet below.”
“Chance has not declared martial law?”
“I don’t think they have the option in their Articles.”
“No martial law, your station stays open to my ship personnel, Lieutenant Longknife.”
“Now who is arguing a fine point of the law. You have heard my request. Now I’ll offer you some advice, free of charge. You are taking on more than you realize. Back off. Chance does not take well to strangers trying to bully them.” Kris didn’t add that Chance did not take well to strangers, period. “I may have only been here a bit longer than you, but I’ve learned they are very definite about where they owe their allegiances. And they can be very stubborn when pushed—just my advice.”
“And when does a commodore listen to anything a lieutenant says. When have Peterwalds ever listened to the lies handed out by Longknifes. Don’t try to scare me, Little Princess, you’re out here alone. Nobody’s going to come riding to your rescue this time. I’ve got this situation under my control and I’ll do with it what I want. You can’t stop me.”
Again, the screen was blank in front of Kris.
“That kid has a serious problem with authority,” Jack said.
“I’d hate to be a captain with my twenty in and have to tell him anything,” Penny said.
“Kind of makes you feel sorry for Captain Slovo,” Kris said. Then the screen lit up in front of her.
“Kris, did we finish?” Ron asked. “We got cut off and then I couldn’t get back to you.”
“Hank managed to override your call. I’ve been talking to him for the last couple of minutes.”
“You give him a piece of my mind?”
“Kind of,” Kris said, and paused to walk around the room, check the monitors. “I’m looking to see if he has his Marines storming my station. So far, nothing but an unbelievably quiet night. Anyone, did we make a recording of my call with Hank?”
“Got it right here,” Chief Ramirez said, and began playing it. Ron’s image filled a quarter of the screen before Kris. He listened to Hank and Kris’s call with a deepening scowl.
“Nice to see that you got us right the first time,” Ron said as the call finished. “Chief, squirt me that file if you can.”
“Doing it,” she said.
Kris raised her hands as if to show that she wasn’t touching anything . . . or maybe in surrender. “You folks don’t like being pushed. I’m not pushing.”
“But that guy thinks he has this situation under control.” Ron snorted. “I’m glad you took the call. If I’d been talked to like that, I might have forgotten myself and . . .” He shivered. “Forget that thought.”
“How are things on the ground?”
“We’ve got sailors headed for the port. We’ve got three busloads of sailors cuffed to their seats and headed for our jail.” Ron scratched his ear. “This will overfill it. I’ll have to release everyone but our worst—wife beaters, check kiters.”
“I’d offer my brig, but I may be filling it real soon,” Kris said. “Jack, turn off the escalators to the docks.”
“Already done it.”
“Ron, I’m going to have to go. There’s a walker I know leaving one of the ships and I think I better talk to this one.”
“Take care. Will I see you down here tomorrow?”
“Don’t know. And wouldn’t say on a line I suspect is open.”
“Kris, one thing, we haven’t found evidence of Longknife provocateurs in this. Am I missing anything. Are they here?”
That was a shot to the jaw. Kris put all the sincerity she had into the reply she gave Ron. “You’ve seen every cent I’ve spent on Chance. I’ve bought food, energy, a ship. To the best of my knowledge, I have not bought any people.”
“I think I trust you on that, Kris. Do you trust the other Longknifes not to have?”
At that question, Kris let out a dry snort. “I’m not sure I trust any Longknife as far as I could throw them.”
Ron shook his head. “Strange, that was my attitude toward all Longknifes until I met you.”
Ron rung off and Kris headed for the door. “Where do you think you’re going?” Jack demanded.
“Down to talk to Captain Slovo,” Kris said. “You stay here. If things go to hell, I trust you on the auto guns. Anyone here you trust more than you?”
Jack eyed Penny; she did not meet his eye. “You win this one. But so help me, if anything happens to you, I’m turning loose the 6-inch lasers to fillet those ships. No warning given.”
“I understand. We’re a second away from hell and the sulfur fumes are getting awfully thick.”
Captain Slovo apparently took his time climbing the stairs out of the dock, Kris was trotting up to Pier 1 area as he started walking toward her. She saluted; he returned the honor. “Did you have to turn off the escalator? That was a long climb.”
“You are not that old, and you’re not in bad shape.”
“Compared to those babes in arms, I am.”
“You have my sincerest sympathy, trying to educate Hank.”
“Yes, there is that. Well, I am supposed to prove Peterwald personnel can indeed trespass on your command. Have I done it?”
“You know there’s a five-millimeter auto cannon aimed right at your heart.”
“I hope you have a good man on the trigger.”
“First Lieutenant Jack Montoya of the Marines.”
“Good hands to have my life in.”
“My life’s been there many times.”
“Someday I must read the full folder on you.”
“Why are we having this chat?” Kris said.
“My master told me to come out here, bay like a dog, and see what happened. He didn’t tell me when I could come back in. Oversight on his part, I hope.”
“I’ve got a ship I think you’d make a very good captain of.”
“Are you attempting sedition?”
“Hardly,” Kris said. “You just told me you had no place to go, and I just offered you one.”
The captain chuckled wryly. “We would have quite a time, but I think that I should assume that I have done my duty to Greenfeld, and can now return. Though I suspect the commodore may be disappointed that you did not shoot me down on sight, thereby opening up all sorts of new options to him.”
“And without you to provide unwanted advice and wisdom.”
He
did not react to Kris’s last words, but started to turn. Kris held him with her eyes. “Captain, this could get very bloody very fast now. Hank is not playing with toys, or paying for someone else to write a term paper for him.”
“Dear God, don’t I know.”
Kris went on. “There are a lot of people involved here that I like . . . Hank excluded. I’ll do my best to see that Hank has chances to call it quits without bloodshed. To back out even if things do get bloody. But I do not intend to let him add Chance to his daddy’s holdings by walking through a pool of blood.”
“I understand you very well. ’Tis a pity he does not.”
The captain made his way slowly toward the stairs, evincing no eagerness for what he was returning to. Kris quick marched back to the Command Center.
“What was that all about?” Jack asked as she came in.
“Any change in our status?” Kris demanded, got head shakes, and then turned to answer Jack. “I think the good captain was set up as a sacrificial lamb. If I’d been trigger happy about my No Go Zone, he’d be dead. As it is, watch for more walkers. How many troops do we have to keep an eye on anyone who wanders out of the ships?”
“You could use us,” an enthusiastic teenager with pink spiked hair said from her station at a monitor.
Kris considered that option, found it about as effective as ordering a puppy to lick burglars to death, but lacked other options. Still . . . “Maybe eager teens could carry the right message if we had them handing out flyers that said ‘You wander our station at your own risk. There are auto guns zeroed in on you and we are prepared to use them.’ Penny, print up a couple hundred flyers. Have some of the young folks over-nighting on the Patton hand them out at the ship piers.”
“How about we change your message to ‘and our Marines are prepared to use them,’” Jack said.
“Now that’s scary,” Chief Ramirez said.
“I’m doing it, and I’ll get them to the Patton in ten minutes,” Penny said. “Hey, anyone seen Chief Beni? Aren’t he and his drinking friends usually back by now?”
“He wasn’t on the eleven thirty that brought me up,” Ramirez said. “Might be hard to catch a cab down there tonight.”
Kris had other worries. Hopefully, the fellow would stay out of harm’s way. That was all he usually wanted to do.
Liberty boats began to climb into orbit. They docked with their ships and Kris got a quick call from Captain Slovo. “We have a bit of a problem, Your Highness. You don’t want us on your station, but our liberty parties returning are a very mixed bag. Simply put, crewmen from the Incredible are now on three other ships. You mind if they trek back to their bunks?”
“Of course not, Captain,” Kris answered in full Noblesse Oblige. “I assume they’ll do a straight line for their ship.”
“Ah, yes, Your Highness, but, there is the matter that many of them are not in the best of shape. Could you please turn on the escalators?”
“Done,” Jack said, tapping his board. “Just remember whose finger is on the auto guns.”
“Actually, I’d prefer not to mention the guns to them.”
“Think Hank’s listening to his flag captain?” Penny asked.
“I think Hank wants to have as many of his sailors ready and armed as possible for a bit of saber rattling tomorrow,” Kris said. “The way things ended up tonight, they aren’t, so he sends Slovo to beg.”
“Should we be helping him?” Jack asked.
“There will be plenty of empty bunks on those ships tonight. No, let’s let Hank do his thing. We’ve just got to make sure he falls flat on his face when he does it.”
Kris glanced at the clock. It was well after one. Except for a brief nap, she was running on adrenaline and four hours’ sleep—not a good mix for battle. She turned to Chief Ramirez, “I’m going down for the night. Wake me at six, seven if things are quiet. Jack, Penny, you split the watch tonight.”
Jack nodded without taking his eyes off his board. Penny said, “Yes,” as she left to get fliers for the kids on the Patton.
“Which one of you is going to bed now?” Kris demanded.
“I will, after I get the fliers out,” Penny said.
“I can have a kid run the fliers down,” the chief offered.
“I want to talk to some seniors,” Penny said. “This isn’t just handing out paper, it’s knowing when to duck if Jack opens fire.” Jack nodded.
Kris headed for bed but, tired as she was, sleep was a long time coming. What would Hank do? What should she do?
She wanted to be where Hank was when he made his move. That was an easy call. But where would he move . . . the station or the planet? If he rushed the station, he’d control the space above Chance . . . and access to the jump points that lead to all those alien worlds. Let’s not forget that, Short Fork, she could almost hear Tommy saying. Oh God, she missed him, his easy smile, his way of cutting through her presumptions.
Kris slammed that door shut. Tom was gone.
Hank was here. Now. What was he going to try tomorrow?
Clearly he wanted a riot on the ground. How many Peterwald takeovers started with a barroom brawl—a local disagreement that got out of hand and ended with troops marching in and knocking heads. Everything pointed to Hank leading his troops down to Last Chance, gunning down a few “terrorists and hostage takers,” and setting up a pliant government.
Kris snorted. Chance didn’t have a planetary government to start with. Things would not go as easy as Hank figured when he declared Last Chance the seat of government for the whole planet . . . and under his thumb. But by then, the fight would be on and Hank would have a plea for help from the Chance “government” and matters would go their usual, bloody way. Grampa Ray was right; Peterwald preferred not to get his planets covered with rubble. But a small planet like Chance wasn’t an economic powerhouse. Peterwald wouldn’t mind laying it waste to “save” it.
Her best move was to take all her spare weapons, drop down to Last Chance, and keep Ron from becoming suddenly dead.
And if Hank attacked her station while she was gone?
That is the problem, now, isn’t it.
Kris rolled over, hunted for sleep on her other side. What were the chances that Hank could take her station if he tried? The station had the guns. A charge across all that open space on Deck 1 would be bloody and unsuccessful.
So punch a hole in the deck—let out all the air.
Hank had to know that would fail. All the critical areas had their own airtight compartments. His Marines would still be shot down as they covered the distance from their ships to just about anyplace . . . and Kris would let the 6-inchers hack and slash the ships at the same time. Taking down a space station looked easy on the vids. It didn’t work all that well in practice. Hopefully, Captain Slovo had educated Hank on that.
Kris shook her head against her pillow. Hank, learn something? That did not sound like a good bet.
If it turns into a fight, where’s the best place for me?
As Commander, Naval District 41, there was no question, her place was on her station. That answer took no brains.
Okay, Longknife, where’s the best place for you?
Where did she belong? Where would Grampa Trouble or King Ray want her. No, where would their junior-officer selves be? Kris smiled. That was also a no-brainer.
She belonged down on Chance, keeping Hank from rape, pillage, and burning. Maybe there, she could keep the war from starting. And so long as she was down there, Hank would be in a very difficult position. He couldn’t start bombing and wildly lasering the people from space.
Besides, I’ve always wanted to run a guerrilla campaign. On that happy thought, Kris rolled over and went to sleep.
Ramirez’s wake-up call didn’t come until seven hundred hours. “Steve’s on his way up. The shuttle’s ahead of schedule. He’ll be here in fifteen minutes. Thought you’d like to know.”
Kris was showered, in undress whites with ribbons, and just entering the Co
mmand Center when Steve arrived. He was clean shaven, hair cut, and in undress whites. “Figured today might be a good one to look Navy,” he said, saluting Kris.
She returned his honor and turned to Chief Ramirez, “What’s our situation?”
“Not bad, folks. The dregs of that liberty party were a sorry-looking bunch. We had a few walkers come out around six, but they just looked around, smelled the air, and ducked back in. They did get leafleted by the kids.”
“Pull them in,” Kris ordered. “If Hank breaches our hull, I want them safe. Get everyone behind airtight bulkheads. Penny, batten down our ships. Have we checked the fire curtains lately?” The station could be divided quickly by curtains that prevented the spread of fire and the loss of air pressure.
“I tested them last week,” Ramirez said. “No problems.”
“One more thing, we provide waste treatment to the ships. I noticed there are holding tanks in the pier areas. Start storing sewage there. Don’t let anything from Hank’s ships get to our central treatment plant.”
Steve frowned. “I respect the twisted mind that came up with that defense, but I really have to wonder what kind of people would think of attacking a station that way.”
Penny swallowed a smile. Jack shook his head ruefully. Kris said, “I’ll explain later. Are the lasers powered up?”
“Their capacitors are full,” Ramirez said.
“They can be controlled from here,” Steve Kovar, Lieutenant, retired, said. “You could get two or three shots off before they need local attention.” He grew a big, cat-dining-on-canary grin. “And when we resited them onto the end of the piers, we made sure they could fire at the stern of ships berthed there.”
“Very good. Jack, target the stern engines of Hank’s ships. Fix it so if you lean on the wrong chunk of your board, Hank’s six ships lose a goodly portion of their speed and maneuverability.”
Kris thought her grin was big, but Jack’s was even wider. “Done, Your Bloodthirsty Highnessness. Grampa Trouble would be proud of your Commandership.”
Kris Longknife: Resolute Page 28