The Forever Hero

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  “By the way, there is an emergency call function in the console. It cannot be tracked. No good if someone is standing by you and has a stunner to your head, but the normal security systems should prevent that. Emergency function is more for substantial policy questions where you would like guidance or to talk over the thrust of future decisions. Not for nuts and bolts questions…”

  The portal opened.

  “But…I don’t understand….”

  “You will…once you look it all over…. You will….”

  Lyr stood alone in the empty corridor, shaking her head, wondering. She looked down to find her portfolio, still unopened, under her left arm, and in her right hand, the small square databloc and the foundation card.

  After locking the databloc into her beltpak, she studied the address on the card.

  “Hegemony Towers…”

  She shook her head, nearly forgetting the address. How had he found out about El Lido and Farid? She had forgotten that summer as quickly as possible, even though the contract had been the only way she could have finished the university after her father’s death and mother’s suicide. She still shuddered at the thought…and the thankfully infrequent nightmares.

  “Hegemony Towers…” She repeated the address, as if to drive away the memories.

  Certainly a modest but respectable address in one of the business parks north of the capitol.

  She shrugged, as if lifting a weight from her shoulders.

  “Off to Hegemony Towers…” And to find out what she had volunteered for.

  Not understanding why, she hummed happily with each step toward the drop shaft at the end of the long corridor.

  XI

  “He’s requested that his orders be changed to maintenance, outbase station.”

  The Vice Admiral for Logistics and Administration looked up from the hidden console screen, pushed back a short and straggly gray hair, one of the few he retained for impressions, and nodded. “Did he say why?”

  “Standard language. For the good of the Service and for a broader exposure.”

  “Where’s the most out-of-the-way place where there’s an opening?”

  “Standora. Base Commandant.”

  “Could he mess things up much there?”

  “Admiral, that’s not the problem,” replied the commodore, who stood across the console. “We’ve checked his profile. He can run anything, probably better than ninety percent of the Service’s senior officers.”

  “So why is his folder red-lined? Political problems with the Court?”

  “Not exactly. Remember New Glascow? Where the official explanation was that the Emperor suddenly decided to dedicate more resources to rebuilding Old Earth and when he created Recorps and diverted two cohorts of combat decon dozers for effect?”

  “Where the Duke of Triandna’s yacht spread the word?”

  “That was the official line….”

  “And the unofficial one?”

  The commodore looked over his shoulder before realizing the portal was closed behind him.

  “Commander Gerswin hijacked the Sanducar, borrowed the yacht without asking, and delivered the arcdozers in person, claiming that the Emperor had donated them to Old Earth. The message torps and all the publicity were touches he orchestrated…but no one could ever totally prove it….”

  “Not prove it?”

  The commodore nodded slowly.

  “That good…. I see. And how do you know?”

  “My cousin was the navigator on the Sanducar. None of the officers ever made another rank, except one. She was wounded fighting them off.”

  “Your cousin?”

  “Unfortunately…no. He’s a cernadine narcie on Duerte.”

  “So you think Gerswin’s up to no good?”

  “I don’t know. But he’s the type that always has a purpose.”

  “How long has he been on the fringes?”

  “Fifteen standard.”

  “Maybe he’s tired. Even someone like him has to be running down. Send him to Standora. Five year tour. Or double tour. Surely we’ll close the place by then.”

  The commodore kept his face expressionless. He did not argue. When the vice admiral decided, the decision was final.

  “Yes, ser.”

  The vice admiral smiled. “I know you don’t agree, Medoro, but the C.O. of an out-of-the-way, nearly unused naval refit yard isn’t going to upset the Empire. How could he? The place is nearly obsolete. It only handles scouts these days, and it wouldn’t be there except to funnel currency to the locals under the terms of the Sector agreement.”

  The Commodore nodded in return and stepped back off the Furstan carpet, his heels clicking as they touched the tiles.

  Then he turned.

  “If it makes you feel better,” added the vice admiral, “you can code a memo to the file on your misgivings. I’ll even review it.”

  “I just might, Admiral.”

  “Always the cautious one, Medoro. Remember, caution saves worlds, but it doesn’t make them.”

  XII

  The screen lit as Lyr acknowledged, and the cloaked face of her interviewer appeared.

  “Have you had a chance to study the accounts in detail?”

  “Yes.” Her voice was cold. She had been waiting to question him.

  “Questions?”

  “Who is empowered to draw on the Special Operations Account? For what? Then there’s the Reserve Fund, and the way the system is set up I can only tell what goes into it, not what it’s for, and the charter doesn’t specifically mention it.”

  He raised a cloaked arm and gloved hand.

  “Answers? Or do you want to resign?”

  “Resign? Who said anything about resigning? I’m administrator of the Foundation, and I don’t know where more than thirty percent of the funds could go, or why.”

  “Very well.”

  “Very well, what?”

  “Let me explain. You are the administrator. You are not the trustee. The trustee is empowered to draw from the Special Operations Fund. Everything he draws will be reported, and the system will give you an itemization. That will allow you to comply with the Imperial record-keeping requirements.”

  “I cannot draw on that fund?”

  “That is correct, not unless you have a special need and ask the trustee to transfer funds to your accounts. Remember, you alone control the disposition of seventy percent of the Foundation’s income and more than half its assets.”

  Lyr frowned. “Only half the assets? The trustee controls the other half?”

  “No. Thirty percent of the assets are in the Forward Fund, with half their income being returned in addition to current income.”

  “I know that.”

  “—and the other half being invested in Forward Fund assets, which are currently a mixture of first line Imperial Money Houses.”

  “That’s not the best investment policy.”

  “If you have a better one, present it, and have the system put it forward for the trustee to evaluate.”

  Lyr worried at her bottom lip with her teeth.

  “Let’s get back to the unanswered questions. Why the Special Operations Fund? Why the Forward Fund?”

  The man in black’s shoulders slumped, as though he were sighing, although no sound was conveyed by the screen.

  “The Special Operations Fund was set up by the founders to allow sufficient funds for the trustee to carry out the aims of the foundation. If you will reread the bylaws, those funds can be spent on anything which is legal under the law, including, if necessary, the living expenses and transportation of the trustee.”

  As he looked straight into the screen, Lyr shivered as she saw the hawk-yellow of his eyes. She would know the man by them, should they ever meet when he was not in privacy clothing, and she had to ask herself why he chose a disguise that did not conceal his most prominent feature.

  “The Forward Fund is set at thirty percent of assets for one simple reason. That is the maximum allowed unde
r current Imperial law. At some point in the future it is anticipated that large capital grants will be required. To expend those funds requires a proposal by the trustee and the approval of the administrator.”

  “Capital grants?” asked Lyr with the horror of the financial professional who avoided use of capital whenever possible.

  “The goals of the foundation are to pursue biological technology. What if extensive laboratory or production capability could not be obtained without actually building it?” He waved a cloaked arm. “Premature at the moment. Job now is research. Later, the capabilities.”

  Lyr kept worrying her lower lip. The answers made sense. And she certainly couldn’t object to the trustee, anonymous as he might be, who was also her superior, having access to less than a third of the fund income when he reported to her what was spent.

  That left one unanswered question.

  “What about the Reserve Fund? That’s nearly twenty percent of the assets, and I have no control there at all.”

  “Reserves may be converted by the trustee without your approval, but only for the purchase or acquisition of buildings, facilities, permanent transportation equipment, or property.”

  “Does that give me any control?”

  “Only indirectly. The more the trustee spends, the less he has. The more he spends, the more you control. Call it a balance of power.”

  “Sort of. But he could replace me at any time.”

  “He could. And the founders could replace him. Or the Empire, if he ever should break Imperial law.”

  Lyr stopped worrying her lower lip. She still didn’t have the satisfaction she wanted, but she had some answers, and some implications that were even more far-reaching. The assets of the foundation were far greater, far greater, than she had been led to believe when the unknown hawk-eyed man had interviewed her and given her the job. And the emphasis on long-range contingency planning for capital grants and expenditures indicated a more action-oriented mentality behind the foundation than was usually the case.

  She looked at the screen. Was the man in black a founder? Or the trustee? Who were they? Imperial family? Court? Commercial? Or an Ethics Conscience Fund set up by a manufacturing consortium?

  “Any other questions?”

  She realized she had said nothing, caught as she had been in her own thoughts.

  “Uhhhh…” The nonsense syllable escaped her, and she clamped her lips shut. What else could she ask?

  “Nothing. Not yet.”

  “Check with you later.”

  The screen blanked, without even a good-bye.

  Lyr frowned, almost biting her lower lip. Was she being co-opted? What was she managing? Or more precisely, for what end was she managing the foundation?

  “You worry,” she said, wanting to express her feelings aloud, “but you don’t have a thing to point to. Except that the people who set this up don’t want to be publicly identified. Have you been asked to do anything shady? Haven’t they been overly concerned about insuring that all the legal formalities are complied with?”

  She looked at the blank screen, then at the blank walls. In the operating plan for the year was an amount reserved for decorating the office, however she wanted. An amount large enough to do it quite nicely, even extravagantly, although she could certainly reduce that if she wanted. Altering the plan was well within her discretion, but she suspected it had been a polite way of letting her know that she was welcome to decorate as she pleased.

  “You already have more control over your job than many of your contemporaries will have in their whole careers.”

  She stopped the monologue, ran her upper teeth side-to-side over her lower lip.

  She knew one other thing. Without a better reason, a great deal better reason, she wouldn’t walk away from the money, the title, and the mystery. Not now, maybe not ever.

  But she worried at her lower lip as her hands dropped to the console keyboard and the financial projections.

  XIII

  Hiro’s feet were beginning to hurt. The new C.O. had insisted on walking through every single hangar and viewing every single stasis dock. Every single one, including some Urbek Hiro himself had never seen in his ten years at Standora.

  Hiro had tried to steer the senior commander around the Delta complex entirely, which shouldn’t have been all that difficult since the only ground level entry was through the back of the last hangar in the flitter repair section.

  Senior Commander MacGregor Gerswin had just pointed to the portal and said, “To Delta complex.”

  It had not been a question, and Captain Urbek Hiro had just nodded.

  Unlike most new commandants, Commander Gerswin had either committed the entire plan of the base to memory or was personally familiar with it. Neither possibility appealed to Hiro.

  Three steps behind the senior commander, the captain shook his head.

  The senior commander frowned, and for the moment appeared nearly as old as a senior commander should. His hand jabbed at the pile of assorted metal parts in the corner of the dusty hangar.

  “And that?”

  “Sort of an unofficial spare parts inventory, Commander.” Hiro repressed a sigh. He had hoped the new chief would be as easygoing as the last. According to the records, and to his HQ sources, senior commander Gerswin had close to a century in Service, and was the senior commander of the I.S.S. With that sort of record, Hiro had expected a silver-haired, lightly wrinkled man ready to enjoy a graveyard tour.

  Commander Gerswin looked more like a thirty-five-year-old, fast track deep selectee, but one of the medical techs had informed Hiro, off the record as usual, that the senior commander was indeed the senior commander.

  “Captain Hiro. Correct me if I’m wrong, but some of these parts belong to Beta class scouts. The I.S.S. hasn’t had a Beta class scout in service since before I joined.”

  “Yes, ser. I’ll have them removed.”

  The commander patted Hiro on the shoulder. The captain couldn’t stop the quiver.

  “No. Don’t remove them. Might find them useful. But not in a heap. Have them sorted and categorized, those that are serviceable.”

  “What…I beg your pardon, ser?”

  “Captain Hiro. I don’t like messes. Not terribly fond of people who try to cover up. But Standora is nearly a junkyard. You know it, and I know it. Rather have a museum than a junkyard. Least that’s good for something.”

  Hiro shook his head again, so imperceptibly it was scarcely visible. The senior commander made no sense at all. He avoided thinking about it by lifting his eyes from the discolored plastone floor to the open hangar end. Outside, the sun had disappeared behind the thick gray clouds that usually formed by midafternoon of every day.

  The new commandant’s laugh—like a series of short barks—shook Hiro’s disintegrating composure further.

  Across the hangar one of the idle techs had lifted her head from the unused console where she had been dozing. As she saw the silver triangles, she came to her feet and began to wipe off the console with brisk strokes. The fact that it had no screen did not deter her sudden enthusiasm.

  “Look at that, Hiro,” added the commander in a softer voice. “People need something constructive to do.”

  Hiro didn’t like the idea of something constructive to do at all. Not at all. But he smiled, as he had learned to do so many years earlier.

  “I also don’t like being humored, Captain.”

  Hiro could feel the sweat beginning to trickle down his back. What in the Emperor’s mangy name had they sent him? And why?

  “I understand, ser. I understand.”

  The senior commander did not respond, instead stepped up his pace through the hangar, heading for the empty stasis docks outside.

  XIV

  Gerswin checked the time. 2303 standard Imperial.

  Easily, almost lazily, he moved to the locker and began pulling on the black uniform stored in the back of the bottom drawer.

  When he was finished, he studied his i
mage in the mirrored back of the locker door, aware that even his own eyes wanted to avoid the indistinctness of the full-fade black uniform. Only his eyes were uncovered.

  After palming the light stud, he eased into the narrow space between the portal frame and the wall, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness, and waited.

  Shortly he could hear the muffled feet of the four, slow step by slow step, as they approached his temporary quarters.

  He grinned in the darkness.

  Click. Click.

  The portal irised open, and a dim sliver of light pierced the room, followed by a searing yellow glare.

  Thrummm! Thrumm! Thrumm!

  Three stunner bolts, wide angle, blanketed the small room.

  “Mange!”

  “Gone!”

  Rather than leaving, as professionals would have, the four crowded in through the portal.

  Gerswin noted the heavier bulk of Hiro as the last inside.

  Striking with the silence of unseen black lightning, Gerswin garroted Hiro with his forearm, while knocking the captain’s knees and legs from under him. The quick, brute-strength maneuver left the heavy captain unconscious in seconds.

  Gerswin dropped the maintenance tertiary and dispatched the pair next before him with alternate hands.

  “What—”

  The cry of the fourth man died as Gerswin’s elbow crushed his throat.

  The senior commander, still scarcely breathing heavily, tapped the portal shut, relocked it, and tapped the light plate.

  The three dead men—Morin, Zorenski, and Vlaed—all had stood close to a head taller than Gerswin. The hawk-eyed commander nodded, rearranged two of the bodies. Next, Gerswin pulled the unconscious form of Hiro around so that the maintenance captain was propped against the side of Gerswin’s bunk.

  “Uhhh…”

  Last, Gerswin picked up the stunner, already set to the setting that was lethal at short range. Lifting Vlaed’s body, he stood, supporting the dead man in front of him, and waited for Hiro to react.

  Hiro’s eyes opened, and he grabbed at the side of the bunk. He looked, wide-eyed, at the dead man, who with open eyes had a stunner leveled at him, then scrambled toward the weapon.