“I’d heard that. So it’s true.”
“Yes.”
“But you miss them. You know who they are, I assume. If someone didn’t manage the bloodlines, you’d be very inbred.”
“I have not spent enough time with them to miss them. Nor been parted from them long enough.” If she thought she could put pressure on him that way, then she had more to learn about Sangheili than he’d thought. “Now, either tell me what you want from me, or leave me in peace.”
Magnusson didn’t appear offended. Jul knew what to watch for in human faces now. They were a mass of signals, and all could be learned. She looked over her shoulder at the guard, then stood up, collecting the files and sheets of paper again, and Jul wondered why she’d brought them with her if she’d decided not to make use of them.
I must learn to read their language. That’s essential if I’m to get out of here.
Escape had to be his sole focus now. He’d take everything else as it came. His next step would be to work out the geography—to understand where he was and what other facilities were here. He got up and went over to the window again, watching for signs of activity. The land outside was rolling grassland, but new low-rise prefabricated buildings were springing up, and he could hear the occasional hum of vehicles. The humans were making Trevelyan their own.
He heard the door open behind him. He didn’t turn.
“Actually, Jul, the most useful thing you can do for me right now is just to be yourself,” Magnusson said. “You don’t have to tell me anything, although it would be great if you had jamming frequencies for Sangheili air defenses and the command codes. But we’ve got Huragok who can deal with all that. We’ve even got some that the Forerunners left here to look after the place. Imagine it, knowledge from the time of the gods.”
The door closed again and Jul tried to make sense of the encounter. Magnusson was working up to something, or perhaps she was simply not very good at her job. Humans didn’t kill incompetent inferiors, so they multiplied. It was a miracle that they could achieve so much.
But they had Huragok now. They could be as stupid and lazy as they wished, and still have the military advantage over Sanghelios.
Huragok left here by the Forerunners. A race that could build stars. That kind of knowledge is too dangerous to fall into human hands.
Jul didn’t believe in divine plans, but he did believe in seizing advantages. Who was best placed to stop humans exploiting the Huragok to wipe out the Sangheili? It was him. He was here. He was in the heart of the enemy camp, breathing their air, knowing their intent—and their capability.
In fact, he was in the very best place that a warrior could be to save his people.
His plans needed to change a little. He would start with the Huragok.
ADMIRALS’ INSPECTION, UNSC INFINITY: COMMAND BRIDGE
There were already three hundred personnel working in Infinity, and still she felt like a ghost ship.
Parangosky thought of all the families back home who never asked where their loved ones had been for the past six months. They’d learned not to. Many of the crew didn’t have families, of course. They were from colony worlds now wiped off the charts, reduced to glass.
And we’ll never let that happen again. We’ll reclaim those worlds. And we’ll hold them.
She reached for a pastry, watching Hood having one of those very quiet, nose-to-nose boys’ chats with Del Rio. She kept an eye on the officers coming and going, too. It was a very junior staff considering that this was the UNSC’s flagship. Parangosky racked her brains to think of any of Del Rio’s key officers other than Lasky who were above the rank of lieutenant, and came up empty. Rank wasn’t any gauge of effectiveness or combat experience, though. It told her more about bottlenecks in the rank structure and the lack of ships to promote people to than the caliber of the crews.
That, and the sheer number of people we lost.
Parangosky felt bullish rather than defiant for the first time in years. The scent of new upholstery, adhesive, and that hot radiator smell of components being run up to operating temperature for the first time was a fragrance she wished she could bottle. It had been a very long time indeed since she’d served in a warship. She recalled her first ship as if it was last week.
UNSC Lutyens. Broke my heart when she went for scrap.
You could truly love a ship. She was glad she hadn’t forgotten how that felt. But she was here to work, to evaluate, to spot the cracks, and she was letting nostalgia and sugar get the better of her. Her datapad vibrated gently in her pocket. There was only one caller it could be.
“What have you got for me, BB?”
It was the AI’s fragment in the Bravo-6 system, not his matrix. “We’ve now had contact from the Arbiter—he’s sent a message to Hood’s office that the official escort has misplaced Phillips. I just happened to fall over it before it was read.”
“Well done. Still no sign of him or your other fragment, then.”
“No, and the explosion was linked to an attack in Ontom by Jiralhanae still working on Sanghelios. We didn’t see that one coming.”
“Thank you for the heads-up, BB. I may have to get things moving myself. Stand by.”
Parangosky realized this was rapidly adding up to a dead operative. Much as she liked Phillips, his death would be marginally easier to handle from a political perspective than his capture. But she had to be sure. She needed confirmation, and not from the Sangheili.
I’m betting Kilo-Five could infiltrate Sanghelios. I’d lose some of them, though, and it’d be politically messy for everyone. On the other hand … I could play this straight, and use the leverage I’ve already got.
The mission—destabilizing Sanghelios—came first. There were many ways to skin that proverbial cat. Hood could do what he seemed to do best: dealing man to man, handshake to handshake, with Thel ‘Vadam, the Arbiter. She drained her coffee and made a beeline for Hood. Del Rio saw her coming and melted away.
“I think I’m finally enjoying my Medusa reputation,” she said, forcing a laugh out of Hood. “Women normally become invisible to men at the age of forty. But he can obviously still see me.”
“Yes, I warned him not to look directly at you, merely to gaze on your reflection for his own safety.” Even Hood’s sarcasm was gracious. Parangosky still liked him, for all his excessive optimism. “You really don’t care for the cut of his jib, do you, Margaret?”
“No, I do not.”
“He’s a safe pair of hands. We won’t get any surprises from him. And he’s Halsey-proof. She won’t be able to manipulate him.”
Parangosky kept walking. “You don’t have to sell him to me any longer. He already has the ship.”
“And you have Lasky.”
“And you’ll need Lasky one day when Del Rio can’t politic his way out of a tight spot.”
“Why do you always go for the straight-as-a-die, man-of-the-people types?”
“Because they’re so unlike me, my dear. My morbid fascination with the exotic.”
“So you feel you have your budget’s worth.”
“I’m satisfied we’ve got a vessel that’ll not only loosen Sangheili bowels, but that can also vaporize them.”
“I’m hoping it won’t come to that again.”
“Do you have a few minutes to walk with me, Terrence? I promise it’ll be leisurely. It’s my only speed setting these days.”
Hood followed her out into the passage, hands clasped behind his back. The long, dimly lit, half-finished passage echoed with their footsteps. Somewhere on a deck below, someone was hammering metal, a strangely old-fashioned noise in a state-of-the-art warship.
“Is this about Phillips?” Hood asked.
“He’s still missing. If he’s been killed, I’m going to take a very dim view of that.”
“How dim? Remember that we have a peace treaty with the Arbiter, Margaret.”
“But the Arbiter’s not immortal, and he’s facing another civil war. I need to find Philli
ps.”
“I’m sure the Arbiter’s searching for him.”
Parangosky trod carefully. Hood knew she’d be monitoring everyone’s comms, but there was no point in ramming it down his throat. “I think I’d rather have our own people involved in that. If only to make it clear that we’re not the underdogs any longer.”
Hood didn’t say a word for a while and carried on walking, matching his pace to hers.
“That’s what they used to call a very big ask,” he said.
“Yes, I’m asking. But I think you would be best placed to actually raise it with him.”
“So you want to insert … who, exactly?”
“Kilo-Five.”
“This ask is getting rather large. What if he refuses?”
“I’m damned if I’m leaving a man behind. I need a body, dead or alive.”
“So you’re telling me you’ll insert an extraction team whether he agrees to it or not.”
“Yes.”
“Quite apart from the size of the task, we can’t trample on their sovereignty like that.”
“Then why are you allocating more than half the Fleet budget to Infinity? We don’t need her to handle human insurgents.”
Hood almost smiled. “Perhaps I want to stop you owning her outright.”
“You don’t trust the Sangheili any more than I do.”
“No, but that doesn’t mean I want to restart the war.”
Any politically aware man would have expected ONI to try to destabilize the Sangheili. Dirty tricks had long been the textbook method for neutralizing threats. He doesn’t want to know. He’d rather be able to look the Arbiter in the eye and feel he was technically telling him the truth. Hood was a gentleman, but not an idealist. That was a relief.
Parangosky had covered a lot of deck today and her knees were killing her. She ground to a halt at the doors to the atrium, a vast transparent dome over a space the size of a park. When she held up her datapad and checked it against the schematic, oxygen-generating plants and ergonomic seating snapped into place to give her a three-dimensional impression of what a pleasant—and huge—area it would be. There were already some specimens basking in artificial sunlight, a few gingko trees and a Parana pine.
“Lavish,” she said, looking for a raw nerve she could twang. It was hard to find one in a seasoned horse-trader like Hood. “I realize habitability is important, but I hope none of our hard-pressed ODSTs or green-jobs see this.”
“The ship’s complement is more than seventeen thousand. Long deployments. Half the crew never even meet one another. We have to think in terms of the human dynamics of a small city.”
“Of course we do.” They’d played this fencing game far too often and for too many years to fool each other, but Parangosky detected just a little defensiveness creeping in, a whiff of guilt. Hood didn’t like the suggestion that he gave some personnel privileges that ground troops didn’t get. Good. That was the idea. “When do you want the Sangheili to know we have her?”
Hood ambled across an empty deck that reminded Parangosky more of the Coliseum than a plaza. “When we have those new drives online. So what are we going to do about Phillips?”
“Osman’s on her way to Sanghelios. But if we don’t find him fairly quickly, I think that the presence of a very large warship might be helpful in a number of ways.”
“It’s far too soon. And it’s not as if the Sangheili are holding him.”
“Think of it as a work-up exercise. A Thursday War.”
“We’ve still got contractors crawling all over the ship.”
“Just cosmetic stuff. Come on, Terrence. She can deploy.”
“She’s not ready. Or perhaps I’m not ready.”
Or Del Rio isn’t, you mean. Parangosky put on her it’s-all-your-fault-anyway face, a studied, sad regret with a hint of disappointment, and said nothing. Subconsciously or otherwise, most men were scared of upsetting their mothers. Parangosky pressed that primal button and Hood blinked first.
“Just tell me this wasn’t part of your plan,” he said.
“I know I’m good, Terrence, but even I can’t set up something that convoluted. I genuinely fear for his life. And we do need his unique rapport with the Sangheili.”
“So what are our options?”
“Call the Arbiter. Ask him a personal favor. If he refuses, then you know where you stand. We don’t even have to involve Infinity unless things really deteriorate. But this is exactly why we commissioned her—to dominate space.”
Hood looked around the atrium as if he was lost, then indicated an exit on the port side.
“Very well,” he said. “I’ll call him. But we don’t push our luck on Sanghelios until we’re sure we can win. I will not go to war again unless they come after us.”
“You won’t need to,” she said.
It wouldn’t be his decision, though. She knew it, and so did he.
CHAPTER
THREE
ARBITER, I WOULD CONSIDER IT A PERSONAL FAVOR IF YOU WOULD ALLOW MY SEARCH AND RESCUE EXPERTS TO LAND AND HELP LOOK FOR PROFESSOR PHILLIPS. IN FACT, IF THEY ASSUME RESPONSIBILITY FOR HIS SAFETY, THEN YOU AND THE SANGHEILI WILL NOT BE MORALLY ACCOUNTABLE SHOULD ANYTHING HAPPEN TO HIM. I REALIZE THAT IT’S A MATTER OF HONOR FOR SANGHEILI WHEN THEY PROMISE SAFE PASSAGE TO A GUEST, BUT I FULLY UNDERSTAND THAT THERE ARE EVENTS OVER WHICH YOU HAVE NO CONTROL.
(ADMIRAL LORD TERRENCE HOOD, CINCFLEET, TO THE ARBITER, THEL ‘VADAM)
CURO KEEP, MDAMA, SANGHELIOS
“You.” Raia ‘Mdama swept into the keep, shoving aside some insignificant adolescent who tried to bar her way. “Fetch your lord. Tell him I demand to see him.”
The youth stumbled a few paces as he walked backward, still trying to slow her down. He should have known better. She was the wife of a clan elder, and in his absence—temporary absence—she wielded his authority outside the keep.
And he’s my husband. Hang the conventions of society. I have a right to know where he is. I have a right to do whatever it takes to find him.
“Who are you?” The young male was slow on the uptake, and wives and daughters were seldom seen outside their keeps. “I have to tell my Lord Forze who wants to see him.”
“Child, I am Raia ‘Mdama, wife of Jul ‘Mdama, elder of Bekan keep.” She loomed over him, jaws parted and fangs bared. “Forze knows me. He uses my keep as a storage facility for his vessels. Find him and bring him to me.”
The youth finally realized she wasn’t going to back down and that he’d avoid a good cuff around the head if he simply did as he was told. “Yes, my lady.”
Raia stood in the courtyard trying to hold down a strange mix of anger and fear. Jul often disappeared for days now that he’d decided to overthrow Thel ‘Vadam, but this was exceptional. He’d been gone for weeks. Did he really think that not disclosing details of his planned coup would save her from being implicated? The Arbiter wouldn’t look at those subtle details. She would be the wife of a traitor if Jul was caught, whether she agreed with his politics or not, and the whole clan would pay the price.
But I do agree with him. There can never be peace with the humans. They’ll always expand, encroach, colonize.
She could see faces at the small windows set high in the walls. The children of Forze’s clan were trying to catch a glimpse of this roaring, angry female who’d burst into their keep.
What about my children? I know who their fathers are even if they don’t. Dural and Asum don’t ask where Jul is. But he should be there for them.
Forze finally appeared in the doorway, arms held out in apology. “Raia, my dear respected friend. There’s no need to wait out here. Come in. Please, come inside.”
“I still have no answer from you, Forze.” She strode through the door, head thrust forward in a don’t-you-dare gesture, ready to barge him with her shoulder if he didn’t give her the right response. “I want to know where my husband is. You must have some idea.”
Forze ushered her into a room that looked as if s
omeone had rushed out of it in a hurry, leaving chairs at odd angles and datapads on the table. She heard the clattering of feet in the passage beyond. He’d obviously told his family to leave and give him some peace to talk sense to this enraged female. Did they even know what he was doing? Did they know he was part of the uprising? Well, that was his problem to address, not hers.
She decided to remain standing. It was much harder somehow to keep her anger fed and functioning when she sat down.
“I’m telling you all I know, Raia,” Forze said. “I haven’t heard from him. I spoke with ‘Telcam, and he’s had no word from him either.”
“Do not tell me that everything’s all right.”
“I can assure you I won’t. I’m concerned, too.”
“He left to follow ‘Telcam, to find out where his rendezvous point with his arms supplier was. Yes?”
“Yes. But I didn’t dare mention that to ‘Telcam, in case Jul was right to be suspicious.”
“So you think ‘Telcam has silenced him?”
“If he has, he’s very convincing about being outraged by his absence.”
“This monk is an adherent of the Abiding Truth. Reason and rationality are hardly their watchwords. Look what they did to Relon and his brother. Veteran warriors, honorable men, slaughtered for some imagined blasphemy against so-called gods who never existed anyway.”
Forze looked pained. It was still hard for many to abandon their beliefs, and the fact that the Prophets had been exposed as frauds didn’t convince them that the Forerunners weren’t divine and capable of noting the names of heretics and unbelievers. Raia didn’t care. If the gods wanted her to abandon her husband to appease them, they weren’t worth her devotion. She would spit on them—if there were anything to spit on.
“You might not trust my judgment,” Forze said at last, head lowered a little. “But I’ve spoken at length with ‘Telcam, and I think I would know if he was behind this. He’s angry. He’s always angry, but I do think it’s genuine, that he feels Jul has gone off on some jaunt and isn’t pulling his weight.”
Raia had to ask the obvious. “And you’re certain that you never mentioned Jul’s unease about him.”
The Thursday War Page 6