Counter-Measures

by W. Michael Gear

  She noticed the deepening of his breath. "So peaceful, rocking, rocking, rocking . . . "

  Chrysla sipped her stassa, sitting patiently beside him.

  Despite herself, she cast a glance at the comm, the screen empty now, mute to the testimony it had just given.

  She need only close her eyes to relive those wretched days on Myklene. Her nose would reek with the stench of death, her ears drowned in the cries of the dying.

  But here, for a moment, she could bring peace.

  She studied MacRuder as he slept, understanding the burden, remembering the horror. They had so little time left. So little peace to share.

  CHAPTER 14

  Magyar Dvork pounded the old wooden gavel that had been the traditional symbol of power in the Vermilion Council. They had come to the end of four days of bickering, taunting, shouted insults, two fistfights, and an attempted knifing, but Magyar had finally beaten, bullied, and shouted his opposition into submission.

  As a result, he hammered with a special vigor, that of triumph as he called the final session to the vote.

  "All in favor of the Articles of Self-Determination offered by the Bench are ordered to vote now. Press your comm buttons for the future of Vermilion, ladies and gentlemen. Opposed, you may push your buttons. Let the vote be made and counted!"

  The teaming Council hall quieted, at least as much as five hundred newly appointed politicians could manage for so important an occasion. After all, they'd defied the Administrator, and the Director of Internal Security had vanished the moment the subspace net had warned that Ily's old cronies were sabotaging planetary comms.

  The heady sense of achievement rose on the humid warm air like a phoenix from the ashes of empire.

  Dvork watched the lights tallying the vote. As he expected, his fledgling party had a full fifteen point lead. "Congratulations! " he shouted, banging his heavy gavel

  yet again. "Vermilion First accepts the Articles of SelfDetermination! "

  "You'll regret it!" Vicar Lewis, the Industrial Councilman, shouted, brandishing a fist. "You can't make it alone! Our industry is interdependent, you idiots! Rot you, what sort of lunacy-"

  A muscular arm snaked out from the crowd behind Lewis and clamped on the old man's neck, dragging him backward into the ensuing melee.

  "My fellow Vermilians!" Dvork cried hoarsely, "We're free! Free of the Empire!

  Free of outside interference in our affairs! Free of foreign entanglements!

  The comm buzzed in Kaylla Dawn's ear. She groaned and sat up, blinking as the room lighting began to brighten in response to her movement.

  :'What is it?" she asked in a muzzy voice.

  'Sorry to bother you, Magister," Wilm's baritone apologized, "but we've just gotten confirmation of a development from Vermilion. 71"y Pak, our agent there, has just reported that the Vermilion First Party has pushed their agenda through the Council. The planet has voted to become isolationist. Pak expects Magyar Dvork to solidify his political power over the next couple of weeks. When that happens, he's going to close the Orbiting Terminal and curtail commercial shipping."

  Kaylla sighed, rubbing a hand over her face. What should we do? Rotted Gods, she'd been nearly fifty hours without sleep. Her brain was working with the clarity of Sylenian slush, and now she had another crisis?

  "Power up the dish. Inform the Lord Commander." She paused, haunted by the headlong rush they'd been living in since the Sassan quake had shaken the future right out from beneath them. From that moment, Kaylla had been seated at the comm, building a communications network from bits and pieces of intelligence offices, military commanders, and occasional ambitious politicians who were betting their futures primarily on the Companions, and secondarily on the Seddi.

  "Who is spacing for Vermilion?" Kaylla asked the question aloud since she figured her fuzzy thoughts wouldn't coalesce in time to give her the answer.

  " Division First Kap aboard the Regan battle cruiser Climax," Wilm told her.

  "ETA one month Vermilion planetary time. Climax is still short of null singularity. Should I alert them?"

  That should be Staffa's decision. "Yes, Wilm. Do so.

  Time may be of the essence. Inform Dion Axel as well." What else? Damn it! If she could only think! "Wilm, have a couple of our people put together a statement. Something which won't goad every Vermilion into a boiling rage, but will remind them that they are still part of the whole, that we'll work with them in the formation of their government, but that we need strategic minerals and produce from their world. Send them ... I know, an economic profile of the industries and services which will collapse if they continue to pursue this futile policy."

  "Yes, Magister. "

  "Wait. Just write it up. I'll want to scan it, make sure we don't set anyone off. Do you understand? This has got to be done very carefully."

  "Yes, Magister. Oh, we've had a report from Cobra. Delshay informs us that Legate Roma has been working ceaselessly. If the Mag Comm mission is a failure, the prognosis for a workable software to be employed is roughly six months standard. Delshay repeats that date to be a bare minimum, that teething problems could prolong implementation by another three to six months."

  Kaylla slumped back onto her sleeping platform. Six months at a bare minimum?

  Too long. Sorry, Staffa, but if Vermilion is turning isolationist, Phillipia is brewing revolution, Ashtan is paralyzed, Rega is coordinating itself by means of battle comms, and Imperial Sassa is starving, we don't have four months, let alone six.

  "Thank you, Wilm. " Her mind had started to race, foggy cobwebs of fatigue shredding. "Call me if ... no, forget it. I'll be down as soon as I can drink a couple cups of kaffe, take a hot shower, and eat some stim pills."

  "Magister, you've only had'two hours of sleep. It'll-- "I'm on my way. Keep the lid on for me, all right?" "Yes, Magister. "

  Kaylla swung her legs over the edge of the sleeping platform, shoulders slumped, head hanging. Perhaps it was just the curse of the quanta, but this would be a long, hard pull.

  As she staggered, loose-limbed, into the shower stall and slapped a palm to the hot water control, she wondered if in the end their sacrifice would be worth it, or whether they'd watch the dissolution of humanity in a state of total physical, spiritual, and mental exhaustion.

  "If you can't win, Kaylla, you might as well go back to sleep and watch the extinction rested and alert. It won't make any difference any other way."

  Except that she couldn't give up like that-no more than she could have when Anglo was raping her day in and day out in the Etarian sands.

  As the steaming water raced down her tanned flesh, Kaylla Dawn pounded the duraplast wall with a knotted fist.

  "Sleep well?" Staffa asked as Sinklar passed the big double hatch that guarded the entrance to Staffa's personal quarters. The Lord Commander sat in one of the gaudy red, overstuffed chairs, a lap monitor before him.

  "No. Thanks to you." Sinklar rubbed the back of his neck as he paused in the middle of the room. "Most of my dreams were about being a bug in a jar.

  Everything beyond the glass was dark, with hazy things watching from the darkness. All I could see was their eyes, yellow, with slits for pupils. "

  Then there had been the other dream. A nightmare of violet blaster bolts and the hum of pulse fire while a mountain pass was riven by disrupters. There, on a lone point, Gretta had stood, her back to him, her slim body shining in the light of burning trees.

  Sinklar shook his head, casting it away into the recesses of his mind where it would wait, ready to possess him again and again.

  "Hungry?" Staffa asked. "I cheated, had security warn me the moment you stepped into the corridor. I took the liberty of ordering breakfast."

  "Cheated? I came as soon as I woke up. You should have known the moment my eyes opened."

  Staffa grunted. He flipped his black ponytail off his shoulder, setting the small comm to one side. "I've never monitored your personal quarters. If you were Ily Takka, on the oth
er hand, I imagine I'd have had other considerations. "How noble of you."

  Staffa smiled, leaning forward to rub his eyes.

  "Do you ever take those gray gloves off? Or the cape?"

  Staffa gave him an amused look. "I do, but not for occasions when I'd want you present."

  At that, the Lord Commander's demeanor changed, as if he were caught up in memories. His eyes lost focus.

  Skyla. He's worried sick about her. From what he remembered, the Wing Commander,

  if anyone, ought to be able to care for herself. But then, she, too, had been in Ily's hands.

  "She's going to be all right," Sinklar stated sympathetically.

  "She has to find her own solution. I can't do it for her." He paused. "That doesn't mean I have to like it."

  At least you can still hope, Staffa. Skyla is alive. Anatolia is dead. He turned away, disgusted with himself. Staffa lived with constant uncertainty.

  The dead couldn't suffer. They were beyond one's ability to help. Angrily, he drew a cup of stassa.

  The comm announced the arrival of breakfast and two orderlies escorted an antigrav into the room, carefully removing stasis covers. Saluting, they left with never a word spoken.

  "Come on, help yourself. Despite all else, Companions eat well."

  Sinklar settled himself on the couch, aware for the first time how hungry he'd become. "Any more thoughts on the Mag Comm?"

  Staffa chewed thoughtfully. "I'm wondering if we can make something like a worry-cap in reverse. A skull-shaped globe that will interface with that pustulous golden helmet. That way, we can avoid direct exposure to the machine."

  Sinklar jabbed at the food. "You know, I'll never look at the stars the same way again." He paused - "What do you think they are? Creatures like us?

  Warm-blooded? Or something so different we can't even comprehend them?"

  "You sound like you've accepted the hypothesis." Sinklar shrugged, forcing himself to eat. "Suppose the Etarian priests had an inkling once. You know the story. The Blessed Gods fought for humanity in a great war with the Rotted Gods. In the end, they won, but just barely. To hold the Rotted Gods at bay, they erected the Forbidden Borders. What if, by opening the Forbidden Borders, we're implementing our own destruction?"

  Staffa gestured toward the monitor he'd set aside. "I just reviewed another report from Kaylla. They had riots in Rega. It seems that one of the distribution centers ran out of food. In addition, an interim government is forming on Vermilion. Their platform is isolationism. You know what that will lead to?"

  " They can't isolate themselves. They need too many imports to maintain their economy. "

  " The leaders from the new movement haven't quite figured that out yet. In the event they do rise to power, they'll find that out soon enough. Their next act will be piracy. That or a raid on another world." Staffa wiped his mouth. "And that brings us back to the problem. We have three options. First, we establish an iron-fisted rule and implement rationing and strict social control. That way, we can manage with the status quo-survival through stagnation and carefully monitored resource redistribution. The second option is to break the Forbidden Borders and accept the risk that something more sinister than the Rotted Gods lies beyond. "

  ' 'And the third is self-destruction. " Sinklar scowled at the wreckage of his meal. "What if we let the people decide? Put it up for a vote?"

  Staffa gave him a skeptical look. "Just how do you expect them to understand the ramifications? Etarian belief runs rampant in Regan territory. Within the Sassan Empire, they're just as gullible. They swallowed that Terguzzi sumpshit about Sassa being a god. If that's a god, I'm camping in the atheist fold the Mag Comm was so worried about. "

  Sinklar rubbed his knobby nose. "Somehow, I have problems making decisions which will atfect all of humankind. " ' 'Got a better idea? We don't have a lot of time to make

  a decision. Assuming we go to the second option, create a static situation, we won't have any surplus of resources to use for breaking the Forbidden Borders.

  All of our time and efforts will have to go into governing, maintaining the peace. A lot of minor officials who have chafed under the old systems will see their opportunity to take power."

  Sinklar chased a chubba leaf around his plate. Rot it all, Staffa was right.

  "How about your magical Seddi philosophy? Your new epistemology?"

  "Integration of an idea like that takes time. A toolmaker on Farhome doesn't wake up one morning and say to himself, 'This morning, I'm going to change the entire way in which I view the world.' We've got a lot of cultural baggage to deal with. Ingrained values."

  "You seemed to have picked it up rather quickly." "Only because I was searching for something."

  Sinklar sighed, shoving his plate away. "Despite my distaste, I accessed some of Kaylla Dawn's broadcasts. If it weren't for the fact that I hate having anything to do with Seddi, a lot of it makes sense."

  Staffa steepled his hands. "Like it or not, you believe a lot of what the Seddi teach. Were it not for an accident of politics, you would have sided with them against Tybalt. As I understand your goals, you were headed in basically the same direction. Breaking the old patterns of conquest and repression, working to free people from the system so that an event like Targa could never happen again. "

  "Bruen was the Seddi leader!" Sinklar shot to his feet. "He wasted human beings like they were hydrogen atoms. " "I make no apologies for Bruen. "

  Staffa finished his meal

  and pushed the antigrav to one side. "Our duty is to see that his sort of teleologic ethics are never employed again. " Sinklar prowled restlessly.

  -Speaking of ethics, or lack of them, is there any word on Ily? "

  ' 'None. But most of our ships haven't arrived at their target worlds yet. "

  Staffa stared absently at the Etarian sand tiger. "She could have run anywhere. Who knows what sort of hole she prepared."

  Sinklar fingered a vase where it had been fastened to the wall. "She's going to strike back. It's in her nature. She told me once that she never surrendered all of her options. Never underestimate her."

  Staffa clasped his hands behind him, head down. "I'm well aware of that. I had the chance to kill her once. All it would have taken was a moment to turn, blow her apart, and I'd have been done with her." He closed his eyes. "So much would have been so different for so many."

  Sinklar read the worry as Staffa looked toward the doorway leading into his sleeping quarters.

  Sinklar had only seen Skyla twice, a beautiful woman with stunning blue eyes and ice-blonde hair. The first time

  had been here, in this room. He could remember her as she was then: commanding, competent, striking in her gleaming white armor. The second time he'd seen her had been in Ily's interrogation room, a broken sobbing thing, whimpering under the influence of the Mytol and whatever other horrors Ily had perpetrated.

  "Don't underestimate Skyla, either."

  Staffa gave him a look of appreciation. "Normally, I wouldn't." He bounced on his toes, powered by nervous energy. Desperate to talk, hating to admit the need. Like me, Sinklar decided.

  Overcoming his reluctance, Sinklar stated, "Ily played me like a master. She used my inexperience against me. She's good, Staffa. Every time I balked, she had a smooth explanation, a perfect reason for what she was doing. And she's-"

  his skin reddened-- she's . . ."

  " Sexually engrossing. " Staffa nodded his understanding. When did you find out the truth?"

  Sinklar fumbled with the vase, running his fingers over the cut gems set into the metal. "When I accidentally discovered Tybalt's journal. He knew her for what she was, and she still killed him in the end."

  "You seem to have come to grips with what happened. You won't be fooled again."

  :'Ana helped with that." The raw wound chafed.

  'I hope Skyla deals with it as well as you have." Staffa shook his head.

  "Tell me about her."

  Staffa continued to hesit
ate, needing desperately to talk but afraid to.

  I

  Sinklar studied the man. Come on. I leveled with you. Get it out, Staffa.

  " Skyla . . . she came from a tough world. Sylene. The place is filled with the human equivalent of siff jackals. She survived there as an assassin, hunted by the police. Mac Rylee was walking down the street one day and Skyla saw him; she took the chance. I always accepted bright people for the Companions."

  Staffa fidgeted, drawing a bulb of stassa from the dispenser just for something to do. "From the time she set foot aboard Chrysla she excelled at everything. She had that drive and ambition. I'd barely noticed her, but she got detailed to security once when I was going to see a man, an assassin and bounty hunter. He specialized in finding people. When we got to the tavern where we were supposed to meet, he told me he couldn't find Chrysla ... or you. "

  Staffa sipped the hot liquid. "If Rygart couldn't find you, no one could. The effect, well, I always maintained a sober control in those days. That night, I went a little crazy. Drank too much. Skyla was one of the people who brought me back here. "

  "Is that when you started to fall in love with her?" "No. I mourned over your mother for almost twenty years. But when I sobered up, I kept Skyla close. To keep an eye on her. That's when I noticed just how good she was."

  He frowned. "She never failed, Sinklar. Skyla was always so sure of herself.

  Any task she tackled, she completed. It never came easily, but she did the job, and with machinelike efficiency. She'd never been broken before. Never failed at something she'd set her mind to until Arta grabbed her off Ryklos.

  "That's what worries me. I know her better than any person alive. " He scuffed at the Nesian carpet underfoot, sending a rainbow of ripples across the floor.

  "I should have known she'd try something. Chrysla warned me." He shook his head. "Why didn't I take the time, Sinklar? When she really needed me, why didn't I . . . ' He turned away.