Starfishers - Starfishers Triology Book 2

by Glen Cook

  "That's where Jupp was. It's a display record of a battle."

  The Confederation warships began their assault. Jupp had had his share of firepower.

  The guests munched complacently while watching the memory of the death of a Sangaree station.

  The fast boats trying to carry children to safety did not outrun Navy's blood-hungry hounds. Nor could the station's defenses stand up to the pounding delivered by a heavy siege squadron. But the Sangaree fought like a cat cornered by dogs, and left scars on von Drachau's command.

  Here, there, Navy's professionals commented on the action like detached spectators at a ball game. Perchevski glared at his plate.

  Von Drachau, he noted, was less excited than he.

  The steward kept bringing the courses. He had to remind Max to drink her wine. The vintages of January were Confederation's finest and rarest.

  The Sangaree persisted despite an overwhelming attack. It seemed impossible that they could have survived so long, let alone have continued fighting back.

  Take no prisoners. That was the general order to all command grade officers who engaged Sangaree.

  Christ, we're bloodthirsty, Perchevski thought He looked around. His neighbors were enjoying the spectacle even though they had no idea what it was all about.

  Mouse looked like he was poised on the brink of orgasm.

  How that man could hate! The Marine assault boats went in in time for dessert.

  Hand-held camera recordings replaced the sterile display replay. Marines stalked Sangaree and their hirelings through smoky, ruined corridors. The fighting was hand-to-hand and bitter.

  The camera technicians seemed inordinately fond of torn corpses and shattered defensive installations.

  An assault team blew its way through an airlock.

  Beyond, running for kilometers, brightly lighted, lay the hugest artificial environment farm Perchevski had ever seen. A voice boomed, "Sithlac fields." The holos expired. Lights came up. A spot trained on the DNI. She rose. "Ladies and gentlemen. Comrades in arms. That is what tonight is all about. An operation in the Hell Stars that destroyed the biggest stardust production facility we've ever located. The raid was carried out twelve days ago. Police forces throughout The Arm are rounding up the people who processed and sold the drug produced on that asteroid."

  She continued with a Navy-aggrandizing speech that Perchevski strove to ignore. Her theme was one of thank God for the Bureau's vigilance and determination.

  The CSN said the same things in other ways, and praised von Drachau and the fleet people who had acted on the information the Bureau had supplied.

  The hows and whys of the intelligence coup got no play. The details could not be divulged for security reasons. The agents responsible would receive decorations.

  "You're a dip, eh?" Max whispered.

  Perchevski shrugged. The near-worship in her face astounded him.

  "I had a kid brother, Walter. He got hooked on stardust."

  "Oh." He checked the time and was surprised to find that it had not been dragging after all.

  The CSN insisted on presenting Captain von Drachau to Confederation's billions. Jupp accepted his decorations reluctantly.

  "Instant celebrity," Perchevski mused. "Instant millionaire. And they won't remember his name in six months."

  "Why're you so sour?" Max demanded. "You ought to be kicking your heels. Look what you did."

  "I know what I did. I was there. Let's talk about something else. What about that Polar Flight airmail set you've been promising me for the last two years?"

  "I bet you get a ton of prize money. How much? Do you know yet?"

  "No. I didn't know about the raid till tonight."

  "You'll be able to buy my whole shop."

  "Probably." He had won prize money before. He was, by most standards, a wealthy man. He did not realize it. Money did not mean much to him. He could buy whatever he wanted when he wanted it, so economic problems never intruded on his life.

  "Aren't you excited?"

  "No."

  "I am. When are we going to the Darkside digs?"

  "I don't know. I think they're going to put me to work." He had come to a decision. He was going home. To his birthworld. One last time. Maybe there, where not one person in a billion gave a damn about Sangaree, or the March of Ulant, or McGraw pirates, or anything else going on offworld, he could get away from himself.

  And maybe he could refresh his memory of just what it was that had sent him into a life he so loathed now. Maybe he could relearn what the choices were.

  The show for the benefit of the holonets wound down. Then came the private postmortem, when he and Mouse shook hands with the mighty and received their medals and prize-money estimates.

  Max patiently waited it out.

  "You should have gone home," he told her when he finally broke away. "You can't spend your life waiting for me."

  "I wanted to. I'm coming with you." She squeezed his hand.

  "Sonofabitch," he said softly. His mood skyrocketed.

  He had been firing on her for years. She had teased and led him on with smiles and gentle touches and had never given in. The occasional friendly date was as close as he had ever come.

  Max made it a rewarding evening after all.

  Eleven: 3048 AD

  Operation Dragon, Danion

  BenRabi groaned when he cracked an eye and saw the time. Noon already. He had wasted half his recreation day.

  He flung himself out of bed and into the shower. Minutes later he was shuffling his Jerusalem papers, trying to find where he had left off.

  The door buzzer whined. "Damn! I just got started. It's open."

  The door slid aside. Jarl Kindervoort, Amy, and a half dozen unfamiliar Seiners grinned at him. They wore gaily colored period costumes. Moyshe laughed. "You look like refugees from a blood-and-blades epic." Except for one little fellow way in the back, grimy-gruesome in Billy the Kid regalia. "What the hell? Is King Arthur aboard?"

  "It's recreation day, Moyshe," Amy said, using that smile that melted him. "We decided to drag the old grizzly out of his den."

  How could he stay angry in the face of that smile? It was so damned disarming and warm. "I was going to work on the story." She had been impressed by his being a published author. "Anyway, I haven't got anything to wear." He realized they were offering him something. He grew wary.

  "Eh?" Kindervoort asked, cupping his ear. "What's that? No matter, Moyshe. No time for it. Come on. We're late for the party now."

  Amy chanted, "We're late, we're late, for a very important date... "

  Kindervoort caught Moyshe's arm, pulled him through the doorway. He ignored benRabi's protests as he led him along a passageway crowded with young Seiners in wild costumes, zigging and zagging through to the common room serving as the landsmen's cafeteria, gymnasium, rec room, and lounge. It was a big place, but today Moyshe felt the walls pressing in. He had never seen it so crowded.

  Most of the landsmen were there, lost among five times as many curious Seiners. The mixer had been going awhile. It had gotten organized. Not far from the door, at a long table where a dozen chess games were in progress, benRabi spied Mouse and the harem he had recruited.

  "Where does he find the time?" he murmured.

  Kindervoort and Amy herded him toward the table.

  "Hey," Mouse said. "You dug him out. You have to use explosives?"

  "He gave up without a fight," Kindervoort replied, laughter edging his voice. "Who should he play first?"

  "Now wait a minute... "

  "Get serious, Moyshe," Mouse snapped. "You're going to go Roman candle freaker if you stay locked up. Come on out and say in to the world. Go on down there and beat the guy at the end of the table."

  There was a tightness around the corners of Mouse's eyes. And an edge to his voice. Moyshe recognized a command. He moved down the table.

  He did not like being pushed, but Mouse had a point. The mission was not dead. He would not get his job do
ne sitting in his cabin.

  He took the empty seat opposite the youth at the foot of the table, smiling wanly. His opponent had black. Moyshe opened with king's pawn. Four moves. "Checkmate." He could not believe it. Nobody fell for a fool's mate.

  "Good, Moyshe," Amy said over his shoulder. "Tommy, wake up. Moyshe isn't a subtle player. He's more your kamikaze type."

  BenRabi turned. "Really?" She was leaning on the back of his chair. Skullface Kindervoort and his troops had vanished.

  "From the games I've seen you play."

  Tommy's mouth finally closed. The swiftness of his defeat had shattered him.

  "Let's say that's just for practice," Moyshe said. Tommy smiled weakly.

  "Too generous of you," he murmured. "I deserved what I got."

  BenRabi beat him again, easily, but took longer. Then he moved up the table, playing Seiner after Seiner, quickly, and one landsman whom he had beaten before. The Starfishers, while enthusiastic, were even less subtle than he. They played the game like checkers, going for a massacre. He won every match he played.

  "Break time, Amy," he said. "I'm getting calluses on my butt."

  "That was kind, what you did for Tommy," she said as she guided him toward the refreshments line.

  "What's that?"

  "Giving him a second chance. Playing badly on purpose."

  "I did that?" He was glad they had dragged him in. The noise, the excitement of new people... It was infectious.

  "You did. I know something about the game. Tommy's eager, but a little short. You know." She tapped her temple. "He's my second cousin. I feel sorry for him. Someday he'll realize that he won't ever beat anybody. It'll really hit him. The only thing he can really do better than anybody is handle the animals."

  "Animals?" benRabi demanded incredulously.

  "Sure. The zoo animals. In Twelve South, over by Sail Control. We've got the space for it. That's one thing we don't lack. We've got botanical gardens and feral forests and football stadiums and all kinds of space wasters. Our ships are built to be lived in."

  "You remind me of somebody," he mumbled, remembering Alyce. Alyce had had that same elfin nose, those same high cheekbones, that same slim, small-breasted body.

  "What?"

  "Nothing." He tried to cover up by downing half a cup of steaming coffee. It scalded him. He sprayed the man in front of him. He mumbled apologies, felt small, and rubbed his lips and tongue.

  Amy guided him away before he humiliated himself.

  Swinging a hand to indicate the crowd, he said, "Reminds me of an Archaicist convention. For which read madhouse. Does this go on every week?"

  "Except last week, when they were getting ready for you to come aboard. You should see it during sports season."

  "How do they find people to play those games? From what Mouse told me... "

  "People isn't the problem. Every residential cube has teams. They can pick and choose their players. It's a big thing, being a sports hero. Specially if you make one of the All-Star teams that play against the other harvestships. We've got every game you can imagine. You ever try nul-grav handball?"

  "I've played. Maybe not by the same rules... Mouse and I play sometimes."

  "Who wins?"

  "He does. Most of the time. I don't have the killer instinct. I just play for fun."

  "He's always dead serious, isn't he? Completely determined. And yet he seems to enjoy life more than you."

  He scowled. "What is this?"

  "Sorry. Where was I? Oh. There's even an Olympics. And intership games whenever we're in The Yards, and Fleet games while we're harvesting."

  "The yards?"

  "Enough said. That's secret stuff."

  He did not press. But the agent in him red-tagged her words.

  Amy led him to a cluster of tables under a banner proclaiming: COLLECTOR'S CORNER. It was quieter there. The people were older and less flashily dressed. Moyshe spied coins and stamps and other odds and ends of milemarks from Old Earth's past. Coin and stamp collections had been popular, lightweight links with the motherworld during early space days, when mass and volume had been critically important.

  "Not a nibble," he overheard one man complain to another. The listener nodded tautly, as though he were hearing it for the nth time. "Told you it would be a waste of time, Charley. They're all hedonists." The speaker glared at a raucous group of Archaicists. "We won't see one thing new before next auction."

  His table caught benRabi's eye and interest. The man had laid out a display of British coins and stamps. "Excuse me, sir."

  "Yeah?" the complainer growled. Then he recognized Moyshe as an outsider who might have something to offer. BenRabi could see excitement rising in him. More companionably, "Sit down. Sit down. Name's George. What's your field?"

  "Victorians. Tell me, how does a Starfisher come by... "

  A quick, conspiratorial smile flashed across the man's face. "I would've bet you'd ask that, friend. I got lucky one time. I bought this unclaimed trunk when I was on The Big Rock Candy Mountain. Opened it up and, Holy Christ!" George launched a narrative which included the minutest detail of his lucky day. Collectors were that way, and every one had his story.

  Moyshe studied him. How had he gotten down onto a Confederation world? Why? Was this another tidbit that should be red-tagged? Did Starfishers make many surreptitious visits to the worlds of their hunters?

  "I didn't know if I'd run into any collectors out here," Moyshe said, "but I brought my trading stock just in case. I'm more into stamps than coins. British and American and German. If you know anybody. I've got some good stuff."

  "Know anybody? Look around you. See all those birddogs on point?"

  I'm a champion fool, Moyshe thought suddenly. I could retire on my collection if I could sell it at market. Hell. I'm rich.

  Prize money had a way of piling up. He only used his to support his hobbies.

  "Come on, friend. Sit. How many times do I have to tell you? Paul, get the man some coffee." All warmth now, George practically forced him into a chair. Moyshe surrendered. Amy attached herself to its back.

  She must be assigned to me, the way she's sticking, benRabi thought. It's not my overwhelming charm keeping her here.

  "Like I said, I'm George. Grumpy George, they call me. But I kind of grow on you after a while."

  "BenRabi. Moyshe benRabi. I was noticing this stamp here... " He and George swapped stories for an hour.

  "I'm glad you dragged me over here," Moyshe told Amy afterward.

  "Good. I'm glad you're enjoying yourself." Her tone said she was not having fun.

  "What're you doing tonight?" he blurted. He felt as nervous as a youngster trying to make his first date. "About the ball, I mean. One of the Archaicist groups is having that American Deep South Civil War thing... "

  She smiled a sad smile. "I don't have any plans, if that's what you mean. But you don't have a costume."

  "Is it mandatory?"

  "No. You know Archaicists. They'll put up with anything to interest people in their pet periods. That one's already popular. The American ones are here. Our ethnic roots mostly go back to North America. Are you asking me?"

  "Yeah. I guess."

  "Good." She laughed. "I'll pick you up at eight."

  "What? Shouldn't the man?... "

  "Not when he's a landsman. The rules. You'd get arrested if you went running around looking for me."

  "Oh. All right. What now?"

  "There isn't much happening. Unless you want to join the Archaicists, or go to a ball game."

  "Let's just circulate." He might pick up something interesting.

  They milled in the press, watching several Archaicist performances, Mouse handling the Tregorgarthian youths, a fencing tournament, and the endless chess matches. Life aboard Danion was little different from that aboard a warship on extended patrol. The limits just were not as narrow.

  Amy introduced Moyshe to scores of people whose names he forgot immediately. "This is getting to be like
an overgrown cocktail party," he observed. "I hated them when I was line. You had to attend. They're the reason I decided to be a spy. Spies don't have to be nice to people they don't like."

  Amy looked at him oddly.

  "Just joking."

  "Your friend is good at everything he does, isn't he?" She had become impressed with the way Mouse had handled the Tregorgarthians.

  "When he gets interested in something he gives it everything. He's got a knack for switching on and off to complete commitment."

  "And the girls. How does he find the time?"

  "I don't know. If I did, I'd be cutting a swath myself."

  His answer did not satisfy her. She kept trying to pry something out of him. She wasted her time. He had been in the spy business so long that the information shutdown was reflexive.

  "You want to find out about Mouse, go to the horse's mouth," he finally told her.

  "I don't think so, Moyshe."

  He smiled. Mouse would talk about himself all night, not tell a word of truth, and seduce her three times in the process. "Probably not. We're different, him and me. I'm the type that would rather observe."

  Amy linked her arm with his. "Observe for me, observer."

  "About what?"

  "You came to watch Seiners. Tell me about us. What do we look like to you?"

  "Uhm. Happy. At peace with yourselves and the universe. Here's a thing. About laughter. It's different here. Not anything like at home. Like your souls are part of it. Like my people only laugh to push back the darkness. The guy who was doing the comedy routine?"

  "Jake?"

  "Whatever his name is. The one who told the story about Murph, the guy who knew everybody. He even made me laugh. And you know why? Because he was poking fun at things I wouldn't even have thought about. Or wouldn't have the nerve to criticize. I'm a moral coward."

  "Whoa. What're you talking about? What brought that on?"

  "I just started thinking about my boss. Very dignified gentleman. When he wants to be. All the big-timers are in Luna Command. Only their dignity is almost always pomposity in disguise. Ever since I was a midshipman I've had this fantasy about being the king's secret agent. I'd go around disguised as Joe Citizen. I'd keep a list. Whenever a civil servant or sales person was obnoxious, I'd put their names down and the king's men would come and get them. I'd also be a sort of wandering clown who made pompous bigwigs expose themselves for what they were. The Bureau would be my first target."