Downbelow Station tau-3

by Caroline J. Cherryh

  “India is moving forces in. Leave it at that, Mallory, and keep your troops out of there. Off the docks. Pull them all. I want to see you at soonest, hear?”

  “With a report, sir. By your leave, sir.”

  The light and the contact winked out. She slammed her fist onto the console and shoved the chair back, headed for the cubbyhole of a surgery in the half corridor off from the main lift topside.

  It was not as bad as she had feared. Di kept a steady pulse under the medic’s ministrations, showing no signs of leaving them. Chest wound, a few burns. There was a great deal of blood, but she had seen far worse. A chance shot, in an armor joint. She stalked over to the door where Uthup stood, smeared with blood from head to foot of her armor. “Get your filthy selves out of here,” she said, herding them out into the corridor. “It’s going sterile in there. Who shot first?”

  “Australia bitch, drunk and disorderly.”

  “Captain.”

  “Captain,” Uthup said thinly.

  “You hit, Uthup?”

  “Burns, captain. I’ll check in when they’re done with the major and the others, by your leave.”

  “I tell you to stay out of that territory?”

  “Heard over com they’d picked up Konstantin and Talley, captain. A sergeant was in charge and they were drunk as stationside merchanters in there. The major went in and they said it was off-limits to us.”

  “Enough said,” she muttered. “I want a report, trooper Uthup; and I’ll back you on it. I’d have skinned you if you’d backed away from Edger’s bastards. Quote me on that where you like.” She walked off, through the troops in the corridor. “It’s all right, Di’s in one piece. Get yourselves out of here and let the meds work. Get back to quarters. I’m going to have a word with Edger, but if you or any of the others take to the docks I’ll shoot you with my own hand. That’s my word on it. Get below!”

  They scattered. She walked forward to the bridge, looked about her at the crew who had gotten to stations. Graff was there, himself liberally bloodstained.

  “Clean yourself up,” she said. “Mind your stations. Morio, get back there and interview trooper Uthup and anyone else in that detachment; I want names and id’s on those Australia troops. I want a formal complaint and I want it now.”

  “Captain,” Morio acknowledged the order.

  He left in haste; she stood on the bridge and looked about until heads turned to their work. Graff had left to put himself in order. She continued to pace the aisle until she realized she was doing it and stood still.

  There was the matter of showing up on Mazian’s deck. There was blood on her uniform, Di’s blood. She decided finally to go and not to clean up.

  “Graff’s in command,” she said brusquely. “McFarlane. I need an escort over to Europe. Move it.”

  She started for the lift, hearing the order echoing in the corridors. Troops met her in the exit corridor, fifteen of them in full rig. She walked out through the troops which guarded the access ramp on the docks. She had no armor. It was a secure dock and she was not supposed to need any, but at the moment she would have felt safer walking green dock naked.

  v

  Pell: Europe; blue dock; 1/8/53; 2015 hrs.

  Mazian was not late showing up, not this time. It was an audience of two, herself and Tom Edger, and Edger had gotten there first. That was expected.

  “Sit down,” Mazian told her. She took a chair on the opposite side of the conference table from Edger. Mazian had his own. at the head, leaned on his folded arms, glared at her. “Well? Where’s the report?”

  “It’s coming,” she said. “I’m taking the time to interview and collect positive id’s. Di took names and numbers before they shot him.”

  “Your orders that sent him in there?”

  “My standing orders to my troops that they don’t back off from trouble if it sets itself in front of them. Sir, my people have been systematically harassed since the incident with Goforth. I shot the man, and my people are harassed, shouldered, subtle stuff, until someone got too drunk to know the difference between harassment and outright mutiny. A trooper was asked for her number and directly refused to give it. She was arrested and she drew her gun and opened fire on an officer.”

  Mazian looked at Edger and back again. “I hear another story. That your troops are encouraged to stick together. That they’re still under your orders even on supposed liberty. That they go in squads and under officers and throw their weight around the dock. That the whole operation of Norway troops and personnel is insubordinate and provocative, direct defiance of my order.”

  “I have given my troops no duties during their liberties. If they’re going in groups it’s for self-protection. They’re set upon in bars that are open to all but Norway personnel. That kind of behavior is encouraged among other crews. You have my complaint of that matter on your desk as of last week.”

  Mazian sat and stared a moment, tapped the table in front of him, a slow, nervous gesture. Lastly he looked toward Edger.

  “I’ve hesitated to file a protest,” Edger said. “But there’s a bad atmosphere building out there. Apparently there’s some difference of opinion about how the Fleet as a whole is ordered. Ship loyalties — loyalties to certain captains — are encouraged in some quarters, for reasons I refuse to guess at, perhaps by certain captains.”

  Signy sucked air and slammed her hands down, all but out of her chair before colder sense asserted itself. Much colder. Edger and Mazian had always been close… were close, she had long suspected, in a way in which she could not intervene. She evened her breath, leaned back, looked only at Mazian. It was war; it was as narrow a chute as ever Norway had run, the straits of Mazian’s ambition, and Edger’s. “There is something vastly amiss,” she said, “when we start shooting at each other. By your leave… we’re the oldest in the Fleet, the longest survivors. And I’ll tell you plainly I know what’s afoot and I’ve played your charade, gone on with this station organization, which isn’t going to have any importance whatsoever when the Fleet moves. I’ve done your make-work operations and done them well. I’ve said no word to my troops or my crew about what I know; and I get the drift of things, that the troops are allowed to do what they like on this station because in the long run it doesn’t matter. Because Pell has stopped mattering, and the survival of it is now contrary to our interests. We’re aiming at something different now. Or maybe we always were, and you’ve moved us to it by degrees, never to shock us too much, when you finally propose what it is you really have in mind, the only choice you’ve left us with. Sol, isn’t it? Earth. And it’s going to be a long run and dangerous, with plenty of trouble when we get there. The Fleet — takes over the Company. So maybe you’re right. Maybe it’s the only thing to do. Maybe it makes sense and it began to make sense a long time ago, when the Company quit backing us. But we don’t get there if Pell destroys the disciplines on which this Fleet has functioned for decades. We don’t get there if the units of it are homogenized into something that can’t work apart. And that’s what this harassment does. It tells me how to run Norway. If that starts, then it all breaks down. You take from the troops their badges and their designations, their identification and their spirit and it goes, it all goes… and whatever you call it, that’s what’s in progress out there, when a ship is made to conform to a standard against every rule they’ve ever known, when captains in this Fleet are subtly encouraging their troops to the harassment of mine, and they’re taking to it, in the absence of another enemy. The Fleet as a whole hasn’t existed in decades, but that was our strength… the latitude to do what had to be done, across all this vast distance. Homogenize us and we become predictable. And few as we are… then we’re done.”

  “Amazing,” Mazian said softly, “that somehow you end up arguing for separation of the crews, when you’re the one complaining about lack of discipline. You’re an amazing sophist.”

  “I’m being ordered to fall in line, to change every policy and order that exi
sts on my ship. My troops perceive that as an insult to Norway, and they resent it. What else do you expect, sir?”

  “The attitude of the troops rather reflects that of the officers in charge and of the captain, doesn’t it? Maybe you’ve encouraged it.”

  “And maybe what happened in that bar was encouraged.”

  “Sir.”

  “With all respect — sir.”

  “Your men moved in and removed prisoners from the custody of the troops who performed the arrest. Credit-snatching, doesn’t it seem so?”

  “Removed prisoners from a drunken body of libertied troops in a bar.”

  “Dock headquarters,” Edger muttered. “Tell it clear, Mallory.”

  “The troops were drunk and disorderly in your dock headquarters, and one of the prisoners involved was Norway property. There was no commissioned officer in this dock headquarters. And the other prisoner was valuable and one my make-work operation on the docks would find useful. The question is why the prisoners were taken to that so-named headquarters at all, instead of to the blue dock facilities or to the nearest ship, which was Africa.”

  “The arresting troops were reporting to their sergeant. Who was present, when your troop major broke into the place.”

  “I suggest that that attitude is contributory to the atmosphere in which Maj. Janz was shot. If that was dock headquarters, Maj. Janz was fully entitled to walk in there and assume command of the situation. But he was told outright on entering that the so-named dock headquarters was staked out as Australia territory; the Australia sergeant present did not object to that insubordination. Now is a troop headquarters to be the private preserve of one ship, or what? Can it be that other captains are urging their crews to separatism?”

  “Mallory,” Mazian cautioned her.

  “The point, sir: Maj. Janz gave a proper order for surrender of the prisoners to his custody and received no cooperation from the Australia sergeant, who contributed to the trouble.”

  “Two of my troopers were killed in that exchange,” Edger said tautly, “and how it started is still under inquiry.”

  “From my side also, Captain. I expect the information momentarily and I’ll see that you get a copy when it goes in.”

  “Captain Mallory,” Mazian said, “you make that report to me. At the soonest. As for the prisoners, I don’t care what you do with them. Whether they’re here or there is not the issue. Dissension is. Ambition … on the part of individual captains of the Fleet… is an issue. Whether you like it or not, Captain Mallory, you will walk in line. You’re right, we’ve operated separately, and now we have to work as a body. And certain free spirits among us are having trouble with that. Don’t like taking orders. You’re valuable to me. You see through to the heart of a matter, don’t you? Yes, it’s Sol. And by telling me that, you hope to be on the inside of councils, don’t you? You want to be consulted. Want to be in the line of succession, maybe. That’s very well. But to get there, captain, you have to learn to walk in line.”

  She sat still, returned Mazian’s stare. “And not know where I’m going?”

  “You know where we’re going. You said as much.”

  “All right,” she said quietly. “I’m not adverse to taking orders.” She looked pointedly at Tom Edger and back again to Mazian. “I take them as well as others. We may not have worked partners in the past; but I’m willing.”

  Mazian nodded, his handsome, actor’s face quite, quite affectionate. “Good. Good. So it’s settled.” He rose, went to the sideboard, pulled a brandy flask from its clamps and glasses from the cabinet and poured. He brought the glasses back, set them before him, slid them in either hand to Edger and to her. “I hope it will be settled once for all,” he said, sipping at his drink. “And I mean it should be. Any further complaints?”

  There might be some from Tom Edger. She saw him sulk while she drank the liquid fire of the brandy. She smiled slightly. Edger did not respond.

  “The other matter you brought up,” Mazian said, “the disposition of the station — is the case. Yes. And I’ll trust that information doesn’t go beyond present company.”

  Hence this show, she thought. “Yes, sir,” she said.

  “No formalities. In time all the captains will be given their instructions. You’re a strategist, in many ways the best. You would have been brought in early. You know that. Would have been already, but for the unfortunate incident with Goforth and the market operation.”

  Heat flushed her face. She set the glass down.

  “Temper, old friend,” Mazian said softly. “I have one too. I know my faults. But I can’t have you split from me. Can’t afford it. We’re getting ready to move. Within the week. Loading’s nearly finished. And we move before Union expects it… take the initiative, give them a problem.”

  “Pell.”

  “Just so.” He finished his brandy. “You have Konstantin. He can’t go back; we have to take out Lukas too. All those techs working and in detention. Anyone who could possibly manage comp and central and get Pell back into order. You rig it to collapse and you don’t leave anyone alive who could correct it. And particularly Konstantin; he’s dangerous in two regards, comp and publicity. Vent him.”

  She smiled tautly. “When?”

  “He’s already a liability. Nothing public. No display. Porey will see to the other one — to Emilio Konstantin. Clean wipe, Signy. Nothing left of help to Union. No refugees from this place.”

  “I understand you. I’ll do the disposal.”

  “You and Tom, for all your bickering, have done a good job. I was very worried about having Konstantin unaccounted for. You’ve done an excellent job. I mean that.”

  “I knew what you were up to,” she said levelly. “So the comp is already set up that way; a key signal can scramble it completely. A couple more of the comp operators are still missing. I’m fixing to shut down green tomorrow. They’ll surrender or I vent the section and that fixes it anyway. I’ve got prints on the missing operators. I’ll pull in the informer Ngo and his lot. Ask questions and pinpoint what I can before we move. If agents can pull the comp people out so we’re absolutely sure, so much the better.”

  “My men will cooperate,” Edger said.

  She nodded.

  “That’s the way,” Mazian said cheerfully. “That’s the kind of thing I expect from you, Signy; no more of this quarreling over prerogatives. Now will the two of you get about it?”

  Signy finished her glass, rose. Edger did. She smiled and nodded at Mazian, but not at Edger, and walked out with a deliberate lightness.

  Bastard, she thought. She did not hear Edger’s steps behind her. When she entered the lift and started down to meet her escort, Edger was not with her. He had stayed behind to talk to Mazian. Whore.

  The lift whisked her down to exit level. Her troops were where she had left them, ramrod stiff and carefully avoiding any altercation with Europe troops who came and went in the suiting room. A trio of Europers were there with smiles which wiped themselves at once when she walked out among them.

  She gathered up her escort and stalked out the lock, down the access to the dock, to the waiting lines of her own troops.

  vi

  Pell; Norway; blue dock; 1/8/53; 2300 hrs. md.; 1100 hrs. a.

  It was better when she had had a chance to relax, to bathe, to get the dock mess straightened out and the reports written.

  She cherished no illusions that there would be anything done to the Australia trooper who had fired on Di and lived… not, at least, officially: but that woman would do well not to walk alone where Norway troops were docked, as long as she lived.

  Di was all right, out of surgery and burning mad. That was healthy. He had a splice in a rib and a good deal of the blood in him was borrowed, but he was able to face vid and curse with coherency. It helped her spirits. Graff was with him, and there was a list of officers and crew willing to sit and keep Di quiet, a show of concern which would greatly disturb Di if he realized the extent of it.

>   Peace. A few hours’ worth, until tomorrow, and operations in green. She propped her feet on her bed, sitting sideways at the desk in her own quarters, cross-handedly poured herself a second drink. She rarely had a second. When she did it went to thirds and fourths and fifths, and she wished Di or Graff were here, to sit and talk. She would go sit with them, but Di had a head of steam he was willing to let off, which would have his blood pressure up telling her the tale. No good for Di.

  There were other diversions. She sat and thought a while, and, hesitating between the two, finally punched up the guard station. “Get Konstantin in here.”

  They acknowledged. She sat back and sipped the drink, keyed in on this station and that to be sure that operations were going as they should and that the anger below decks stayed smothered. The drink failed to tranquilize; she still felt the urge to pace the floor, and there was not, even here, much floor to pace. Tomorrow…

  She dragged her mind back from that. One hundred twenty-eight dead civs in stabilizing white sector. It was going to be far worse in green, where all who had real reason to fear identification had taken cover. They could vent it if the two comp-skilled techs could not be turned up in time; indeed they could. It was the sensible solution; a quick death, if indiscriminate; a means to be sure they had all the fugitives… and more merciful to those individuals than to be left on a deteriorating station. Hansford on a grand scale, that was the gift they would leave Union, rotting bodies and the stench, the incredible stench of it…

  The door opened. She looked up at three troopers and at Konstantin — cleaned up, wearing brown fatigues, bearing a few patches on his face the meds had done. Not bad, she thought remotely, leaned forward on one arm. “Want to talk?” she asked him. “Or otherwise?”

  He did not answer, but he showed no disposition to quarrel. She waved the troopers out. The door closed and Konstantin still stood there staring at something other than her.