Center of Gravity

by Ian Douglas

  It was utterly strange, and wildly confusing.

  It was, in fact, alien, and must be some form of communications being transmitted from the aliens outside. Just how they’d managed to accomplish that, through the solid walls of Warship 442, was beside the point just now.

  Swift Pouncer wondered if it wanted to communicate with such beings . . . with vermin.

  If it wanted to avoid death, or the far worse prospect of claustrophobically induced madness, however, there were few alternatives.

  Swift Pouncer sent out a questing call.

  CIC, TC/USNA CVS America

  Sol System

  2342 hours, TFT

  “Admiral?” his aide’s voice said. “Admiral . . . I’m sorry to interrupt . . .”

  Koenig pulled back from the IHD connection, blinking. “What the hell?”

  “Admiral,” Lieutenant Commander Nahan Cleary said. “I’m sorry, but you have an Alpha-priority message. It’s Mr. Quintanilla, sir.”

  Koenig was very close to telling Cleary exactly what Quintanilla could do . . . but bit off the sharp retort. Biting off Cleary’s head would be less than constructive, and an Alpha-priority message was important. Koenig didn’t think that even an officious little prig like Quintanilla would ever dare misuse the urgency protocols.

  In any case, his usefulness in the operation was at an end. Garrison and his SEALS had reboarded the pod, given it a nudge from its drives, and sent it toppling over the edge of the fleshy parapet. It fell rapidly through the dense hydrogen atmosphere toward the lower curve of the alien ship’s internal spherical chamber.

  Turning the open comm channel with the pod over to Wilkerson, he nodded.

  “Okay. I’ll take it here.”

  A new channel opened, and Quintanilla’s image appeared hovering in the CIC immediately in front of Koenig’s workstation. It was, Koenig knew, an avatar. The disabled alien spacecraft had been traveling at just over sixty thousand kilometers per second for eight hours and twenty minutes; in that time it had covered twelve astronomical units, a distance so vast that any signal from Earth transmitted to the America would take ninety-six minutes to reach her, with another hour and a half plus required for the reply.

  It had been all America and her escorts could do to catch up with the fast-moving hulk. A number of tugs were now being deployed to begin decelerating the crippled alien vessel, but Koenig didn’t want to give that order until some sort of communications had been established with the craft’s crew.

  “Good evening, Admiral Koenig,” the image said. “Special orders are being uploaded to your personal e-comm net.”

  “I see. And why the avatar escort?”

  “I anticipate a certain amount of . . . resistance to these orders. I am here to answer questions you may have, and to ensure your full compliance.”

  Koenig’s jaw clenched with a momentary, sharp anger. “I am not in the habit of disobeying lawful orders, Mr. Quintanilla.”

  “Oh, these orders are lawful. There is no doubt of that.”

  “I assume this is something from the Senate Military Directorate?”

  “Higher than that, Admiral. This comes from the desk of Confederation Senate President Regis DuPont himself.”

  Koenig mindclicked on his personal security code, and the orders opened within a window in his mind.

  OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE SENATE OF THE EARTH CONFEDERATION

  GENEVA, EUROPEAN FEDERATION

  2250 HR 21 DEC 2404

  FROM: PRESIDENT REGIS DUPONT

  TO: ADMIRAL ALEXANDER KOENIG, COMMANDER CBG–18

  VIA: COMM UPLINK 7894, GENEVA

  SECLAS: BLUE DIADEM/PRIORITY ALPHA/URGENT

  SUBJ: RETURN ORDER

  ATTACHMENT 1: 847823 SPECIAL ASSIGNMENT/SENATE SPECIAL ORDER

  1. YOU ARE REQUIRED AND DIRECTED TO DECELERATE TC/USNA CVS America AND RETURN AT BEST SPEED TO THE SUPRAQUITO NAVAL DOCK FACILITY, SYNCHORBIT, EARTH.

  2. UPON YOUR RETURN TO SUPRAQUITO, YOU WILL BE IMMEDIATELY RELIEVED OF YOUR COMMAND PENDING ASSIGNMENT TO NEW DUTIES, AS SET FORTH IN ATTACHMENT 1. CAPTAIN RANDOLPH BUCHANAN WILL ASSUME COMMAND DUTIES OF CBG–18.

  3. YOU WILL TAKE AVAILABLE MILITARY TRANSPORT TO BERN SPACEPORT, WHERE TRANSPORTATION HAS BEEN ARRANGED FOR THE TRIP TO THE CONFEDERATION GOVERNMENT COMPLEX.

  4. YOUR PRESENCE AT GENEVA WILL BE PHYSICAL, YOUR UNIFORM FULL DRESS.

  5. YOUR PRESENCE IS REQUIRED FOR A CLOSED SESSION OF THE SeNATE POLITICAL AFFAIRS COMMISSION, SCHEDULED FOR 1400 TFT, 22 DEC 2304.

  [SIGNED]

  HENRI GERARD

  BY ORDER OF

  REGIS DUPONT, SENATE PRESIDENT

  “ConGov?” Koenig said with distaste. “What the hell do they want with me?”

  “Well, I can’t tell you very much,” Quintanilla’s image told him. “But a full Senate hearing has been called, and they very much wish to speak with you.”

  A hearing! Was he being accused of mishandling the battlegroup? If so, the message would have come from the Senate Military Directorate, not from the Senate as a whole.

  He opened the attachment, which consisted of short several lines indicating that once relieved of command, he would be under the direct orders of the Senate, pending the outcome of the meeting in Geneva.

  There was so much Koenig wanted to say in that instant . . . and no point in berating a low-level message AI. He cut off the transmission without comment, and wondered what the hell they were trying to do to him back home.

  Chapter Eight

  22 December 2404

  Ad Astra Confederation Government Complex

  Geneva, European Union

  0920 hours, TFT

  Admiral Koenig stepped out of the private grav capsule he’d boarded at Bern Spaceport, walked through the airlock, and emerged in front of the shuttle access onto the Place d’Lumiere in front of the ConGov pyramid. He squinted against the glare. It was like stepping into bright daylight once more, after his journey by tube beneath Lake Geneva, though in fact the Confederation capitol was covered over by the span of a twenty-kilometer geodesic dome. The climate beneath the dome was comfortably warm despite the bitter winter conditions outside, with an interior space high enough to allow clouds to form within. The morning sunlight was green-tinted as it filtered down through the plaspanels high overhead.

  The Ad Astra Confederation Government Complex itself was an immense green glass pyramid located almost exactly at the center of the city, just behind the broad Plaza of Light and its labyrinth of parkland, fountains, and statuary. Popolopoulis’s Ascent of Man gleamed golden in the light at the center of the plaza, towering nearly forty-five meters above the citizens on the marble paths at its feet . . . taller than the corroded green body of the crumbling Statue of Liberty back in the United States of North America.

  “Pretty impressive, isn’t it?” Quintanilla said at Koenig’s side. “The sight always chokes me up.”

  “It’s . . . impressive,” Koenig replied.

  It was, Koenig thought as his handlers led him toward the government building, quite a show.

  And it was just a show, a grand advertisement on an epic scale, designed to awe and, perhaps, to intimidate. The Terran Confederation liked to advertise itself as the representative government for Earth and all of her colonies, but that was a fiction, pure and simple. Both the Chinese Hegemony and the Islamic Theocracy had off-world colonies of their own, but so far had not applied for admission. The South Indian States had a non-voting membership, and the Union of Central Africa was being courted by both the Confederation and by the Islamics, but was as yet undecided.

  One of the deepest fears within the Confederation’s halls of government was the dread that the Islamics or the Chinese might make a separate peace with the Sh’daar Empire, might even join the Sh’daar as allies against the Confederation. Of course, that
seemed quite unlikely now in light of the enemy’s attack on Everdawn, the Chinese colony of Yong Yuan Dan, a year ago, or with the more recent conquest of the independent Islamic outpost at Eta Boötis IV. The Sh’daar and their Turusch, H’rulka, Nungiirtok, and other servant races appeared unwilling—or, perhaps, unable—to distinguish among the myriad political flavors of Humankind.

  As they walked through the Ad Astra statue’s shadow, Koenig studied his companions with some distaste. There were five of them: John Quintanilla and four others who had the look of armed security bodyguards. He thought of them as his handlers; they’d met him at the Bern Spaceport, separated him rather rudely from his aides, and shepherded him closely past customs and into the underground vault where a private grav shuttle had been waiting. They seemed especially anxious to keep him from talking with anyone. At the spaceport, Koenig had seen Captain Diane Gregory, Admiral Carruthers’ aide, standing in a crowd behind a security barrier. They’d made eye contact and she’d mouthed something at him—he thought it was “We need to talk.” But he couldn’t pick up her id, and his own electronic senses were being blocked, at the moment. He wondered if his handlers were responsible for that as well, or if he’d simply been in one of the spaceport security areas at the time.

  He had the feeling that there were certain electronic constraints on him, on his freedom to communicate.

  As they crossed the plaza, Koenig decided to test those limits. He assumed that it was Admiral Carruthers who wanted to talk to him, not his aide, and normal military channels should have made a connection to the JCS simplicity itself . . . but his signal was clearly being blocked. There were no signs of official electronic jamming . . . but his implant was not connecting with the local Net, and his personal AI, Karyn’s avatar, could only report that there didn’t appear to be a local Net with which she could connect.

  Which was impossible, of course. Geneva was not a Periphery wasteland or primitive reserve.

  “So why are you jamming me, Quintanilla?” he asked in a conversational tone.

  “Ah . . . well . . .” Quintanilla looked uneasy.

  “You do realize that it’s illegal to jam without my awareness, don’t you? Freedom of Electronic Access is a fundamental Charter Right.”

  “Of course, of course it is. But . . . this is an unusual situation. The Commission requested that you be, um, temporarily shielded from external influences until we can have this meeting.”

  Stranger and stranger.

  “Am I under arrest?”

  “Of course not, Admiral!”

  “Have I been charged with something? Is this a formal inquest?”

  “Absolutely not! Just . . . be patient for a little longer. Believe me, everything is fine!”

  When someone representing the government said that, Koenig felt like diving for cover.

  “I would appreciate knowing, then, why I am being held incommunicado.”

  “Admiral, there are certain . . . political realities we’re having to deal with here. Be patient, and everything will be explained.”

  Political realities?

  The Earth Confederation—officially the Terran Confederation of States—was hanging on by its fingernails, he knew that much. The war of the past thirty-some years had put a tremendous strain on the Geneva government, principally because many of the member states didn’t agree with the war. Geneva had been unable to persuade China or South India to join the Confederation, and they’d deliberately blocked the Theocracy from full membership. And, lately, there’d been rumblings within established member states. Russia was threatening to secede from the Confederation because of Arctic Ocean trade issues, and America del Sur was discussing the possibility of a public referendum on secession over religious rights. If either Russia or South America pulled out, the Confederation might well fall.

  What Koenig didn’t understand was what he had to do with these “political realities,” as Quintanilla had called them. Koenig, like the other North American members of the Confederation military, was an officer of the USNA Navy with a joint commission with the Terran Confederation, just as the CVS America was a USNA vessel in Confederation service. If the Confederation government fell, Koenig, the America, and her crew would all find themselves back in USNA service. Their orders simply would be coming from the USNA Confederal Union capital in Columbus, District of Columbia, instead of from Geneva.

  Like many in the Confederation military, Koenig had mixed feelings about the arrangement. His first loyalty, he felt, was to the Confederal USNA. Normally, the USNA’s best interests dovetailed well with those of the TC, but that might easily change if a break-up occurred.

  The thought of a Confederation civil war was not a pleasant one, especially in the face of the continued campaign against Humankind’s interstellar polity.

  Quintanilla and his security escort led him through the security screening at the front of ConGov pyramid, then down an elevator into the nuke-shielded lower levels that, reportedly, extended far out beneath the placid waters of Lake Geneva. High Guard headquarters were based in Geneva as well, while the Confederation Military Directorate and the headquarters of the Confederation Star Navy were located in a separate facility to the south, deep beneath the granite of Mont Blanc.

  Koenig kept wondering why the Senate, instead of the Senate Military Directorate, wanted to see him.

  The meeting was being held in one of the Senate conference chambers, an auditorium carved out of solid bedrock some one hundred meters below the surface of the lake. He went through four security checkpoints, including backscatter X-ray, DNA checks, and retinal scans, before he could enter the innermost sanctum. They took security seriously here.

  A long mahogany table at the front of the auditorium was for the meeting’s principal participants. Many of the auditorium seats were already occupied, however, by expensively dressed people—senators and their personal staffs.

  The meeting was called to order by Senator Eunice Noyer. President DuPont was conspicuous by his absence.

  Koenig didn’t know anything about Noyer, and reached for her public id. His personal electronics, however, were still being blocked.

  Interesting.

  “Admiral Koenig?” Noyer said, standing at the head of the table. “We appreciate your coming on such short notice.”

  “I got here when I could,” he told her. He didn’t add that Quintanilla’s message avatar had seemed most upset at his delay in setting course for Earth. Koenig had been determined, however, to make certain the SEALS team had emerged from the crippled H’rulka vessel and been recovered safely by the gunboat Ramage.

  He was not going to abandon his people on the whim of some conclave of bureaucratic assholes back home. He’d delayed until the SEALS were back, then waited for Dr. Wilkerson and his staff to transfer to the railgun cruiser Kinkaid. Reportedly, Wilkerson’s staff had managed to make contact with the lone H’rulka aboard that huge ship, though no real information had been exchanged yet. The fleet tugs with the CBG, though, had begun gently decelerating the H’rulka ship. It would take some weeks yet to reverse the vessel’s heading and bring it back to the fleet base at Mars.

  But America had required long hours to reverse course even at maximum combat accelerations, and she’d had to hump hard to make it back to Earth Geosynch in time.

  “We’re glad you made it, Admiral,” Noyer told him. “We have . . . an offer to make, one which we do hope you will accept.”

  An offer? Not a reprimand, then. Koenig was more curious than ever.

  “It must be fairly important,” he said, “to require illegally sequestering me from free access.”

  His words caused an uncomfortable stir around the table, and many of the senators up in the auditorium seats began whispering back and forth.

  “Not ‘illegal,’ ” Noyer said. “If you’ll recall, you were relieved of your command of CBG–18 and assigned specia
l duties at the behest of this commission. Those special duties include certain security requirements which, I assure you, are temporary only.”

  Koenig wondered if any of that would hold up in a court of law. The attachment to his orders had placed him under the direct command of the Confederation Senate, but said nothing about him signing away his Right of Access . . . or any other rights, for that matter.

  He decided to say nothing and see what the commission had to say.

  “Naturally, Admiral, anything said inside this chamber is to be considered Ultra-class secret, and is not to be discussed with anyone else. Do you agree?”

  He hesitated, then nodded. “I do, Madam Senator.”

  “Very well.” She paused as if reading an internal display. “The truth sensors in your seat suggest no evasiveness or intent to deceive. The data will be appropriately logged.”

  Truth sensors? Again, ordinary citizens had to agree to be scanned for that to be legal. Military personnel by definition gave up many of their civic and public rights, but it still seemed like a highly questionable breach of legal ethics.

  “Admiral Koenig, I’ll get right to the point. This commission would like to discuss with you the possibility of you being selected as our next President of the Senate.”

  Koenig opened his mouth, then shut it again. He was stunned, literally unable to respond right away. President of the Confederation Senate? Him?

  “I see the news caught you by surprise,” Noyer said, grinning. “That’s good, actually. There have been a lot of rumors circulating about the possibility, especially since the presentation at the Yule ceremony last night in New York. One reason for the heightened security is to avoid public debate on the matter . . . and to avoid a certain, ah, poisoning of your own attitude by that debate.

  “Madam Senator . . . I’m not sure what to say. . . .”

  “Tell us you’ll consider it, Admiral.”