Jack had blended in perfectly with the two rows of special citizens seated on the stage as a backdrop to the main events. A mixture of uniforms, suits, and academic gowns made up the “heroes gallery” that had become standard for any major public event where State officials were in attendance. He’d been happily monitoring the waves of electronic communications that teemed forth from the audience, and his analysis of the social media patterns was quite entertaining—especially as he tracked the reactions to the Dean’s rather pompous speech.
Katja glanced out at the audience. A few polite faces were still turned up toward the speaker, but most eyes were down on their devices. One or two people had left their seats, and there was a quiet but unmistakable restlessness. If she’d been listening to the speech she’d probably be bored, too, but bored people got careless.
By habit, she scanned the room again.
Even in the Cloud communications she sensed the shift in Jack’s tone, and with her eyes she saw him sit up slightly straighter and scan the room anew.
The Dean’s speech finally tumbled to a conclusion, amid enthusiastic applause. Katja listened vaguely as Christopher Sheridan was introduced—noting with interest the huge ovation he received—and she reached out again with her senses. There was nothing military she could detect.
In the backstage area all was quiet, so Katja stepped to the edge of the stage and casually glanced down at the reporters. Past experience made her suspicious of anyone with media augmentations. Switching to quantum-flux she scanned the six individuals who crouched near the apron. There were two head-mounted cameras that she interrogated immediately, and another optical device built into a pair of sunglasses. Nothing unusual. The other three reporters each held up tablet devices, and beyond a direct data stream feeding up to their network satellites there was nothing of note.
Katja watched as the sunglasses-wearing reporter stopped watching Sheridan and reached down into her bag. She appeared to be adjusting something when—
Jack’s sudden alert froze Katja in position. She went to pure passive, listening for any sudden changes in the Cloud. There was a ripple through the audience, but she heard with her ears more than anything.
Sheridan continued speaking, unaware of the invisible interruption, but there was a distracted murmur from the crowd.
The reporter flicked her fingers toward the stage.
Katja exploded into motion.
* * *
Jack fumbled at his belt, activating the local energy field. It crackled into life over most of the stage, a shimmer of light falling into a dome shape. Gasps erupted all around him, and Sheridan’s speech died away as the politician looked up at the shield.
Sudden movement to his left. He leapt to his feet, chair tumbling backward amid shouts from those around him. The movement was Katja, bounding across the stage and down onto the media cluster. Her tiny form crashed across three reporters and sent the entire group scrambling. Beyond the glimmer of the shield, he saw audience members frozen in shock. There were a few shouts, and screams of fear.
The reporters were inside the shield! He ripped the leather pouch from his belt and tossed it down on the stage behind him. The shield shifted obediently with its projector. Jack lunged forward, grabbing Sheridan’s arm and pulling him back.
“Sir, get down!”
Sheridan ducked immediately and retreated toward the chairs. Jack gestured to the other veterans and VIPs.
“Make a ring around Sheridan,” he ordered. Then he spun around and scanned the rest of the stage. Katja had pulled her weapon from her purse and was training it on all six of the prone reporters. Someone to his left was down. He scrambled over.
It was Vijay Shah. The minister had slumped out of his chair and sat collapsed on the stage, his face frozen in shock and one hand on his chest. Jack checked for breathing: none. He checked for blood: none. He checked for pulse: none.
“Medic!” he shouted.
Shah’s dark face had paled, his open eyes staring dully at nothing. Jack lifted the unresponsive hand from the chest, looking for any sort of wound. He pushed aside the fine wool of the suit jacket, and against the thin cotton of the shirt he saw a speck of blood. Tearing open the shirt he saw a matching red spot in Shah’s chest, right over the heart.
“What’s wrong with him?” He heard a female voice in his ear.
“Some kind of projectile,” he said. “I need a medic.”
The woman repeated his call for help then leaned in again.
“Can we move him?” she asked.
“I don’t know.” Jack did a quick check for any head injury, then slid his hands down Shah’s neck to feel for any unusual bumps. Nothing seemed to be broken. “Here, help me get him down on his back.”
Together they eased Shah’s limp form to the floor.
“Do you know CPR?” he asked.
“Yes,” she replied, pushing him aside.
He climbed to his feet again and did another quick survey. Sheridan was crouched behind the chairs, the veterans facing outward in a defiant ring around him while the other VIPs cowered. Shah was mostly surrounded by his official security detail and Jack saw one of them approaching with a medikit. The woman—it was Breeze, he realized—still desperately conducted CPR.
Katja was on the floor below the stage, pistol pointed down at the sprawled reporters. Jack surveyed them, noting the various expressions of shock. He blinked slowly to activate his quantum-flux and carefully swept his gaze over them. Each one of them carried an array of electronic devices, and he could see the biofeed devices linking the brains of the two head-mounted cameramen with their equipment. Not true implants, then, but a common “hands-free” technique for controlling external appliances.
Then, in the reporter with the sunglasses camera, there was a flash of Cloud activity.
“You!” he barked, looming over her from the stage. “Who are you?”
Darkness consumed the auditorium as all the lights were extinguished. Amid the sea of screams Jack watched in his quantum-flux vision as the reporter ripped off her sunglasses, reached into her bag, and then flicked her fingers at him. Something tiny thudded against his chest, the force of the blow dispersed by his body armor.
Shots rang out in the blackness. Jack saw the quantum-flux form of the reporter stagger as Katja’s bullets struck home—but the woman didn’t fall. From her crouch she sprang into flight, colliding with Katja and sending them both tumbling to the floor.
Jack drew his pistol and stepped back toward the fallen form of Shah, spotting Sheridan still crouched behind the human shield. He was suddenly glad of the darkness, as no one could see how his hand was shaking.
* * *
Katja lashed out with a jab, clipping the enemy’s ear. The target was inhumanly fast
, and Katja desperately blocked another barrage of fist strikes. Fighting in quantum-flux made distances hard to judge, but she already feared that this fighting disadvantage was the only thing keeping her alive.
Her pistol was somewhere in the darkness, knocked clear by the thundering impact as her attacker had slammed them both to the floor. Katja had managed to get herself between the enemy and the nearest escape route, however, and they squared off again.
Ignoring the screaming around her, she blocked another strike at her face, but grunted as a blow cracked against her ribs, the force only partially deflected by her armor. She backed up two steps, then launched a front kick with her augmented boots. Her attacker’s gasp of pain made the impact sweeter, but the triumph was short-lived. The opponent charged forward again, literally flying as both knees smacked against Katja’s blocks. A crushing blow came down on Katja’s head and she staggered backward, dodging left to avoid another strike from above.
Her right hand was in close and she grabbed desperately at fabric, then felt her fingers against the soft skin of a throat. She squeezed with all her strength, grabbing the back of the neck with her left hand and pulling herself tight against her opponent. In the haze of flux-lit darkness she could almost make out facial features, could see the gasping expression as she tightened her choke hold.
A forearm smashed up against her wrist like a steel pipe, but she kept her grip on the throat.
The attacker’s legs left the ground and swung around her torso like pythons. Her own legs buckled under the sudden weight of two bodies and she toppled forward, slamming down on her enemy even as they both tightened their holds. Katja felt her body armor buckling under the strain, felt her insides burn, but still she throttled.
In that moment, with the Cloud conduit open between their minds, Katja suddenly confirmed with whom she grappled. Valeria Moretti’s mind burned with images of a blasted street. Houses torched and half-collapsed. Bodies of children being pulled from the wreckage. Not just any children—her children. A son and a daughter. Marco and Roberta. Their broken bodies laid on stretchers, tortured expressions burned into her memory before they were covered by blankets.
Katja felt a rage smash into her, a burning fire of vengeance like she’d never felt before. A mother’s children had been killed— innocent victims in a pointless battle. She recoiled from the tidal wave of emotion, screaming inside at pain she’d never known could exist.
A flurry of defenses welled up in her mind.
But none of her frantic arguments could overcome the single, fiery accusation that beat her down.
Katja turned toward the assault, pushing back with her own rage.
Moretti’s thoughts dissolved into incoherence. Katja felt the constriction of her torso tighten, and she leaned into the choke hold with all her remaining strength. Moretti’s life energy pulsed in the quantum-flux, as civilian screams continued in the darkness around them.
Then, suddenly, the pressure on her body eased. Moretti’s feet pounded down on Katja’s thighs, knocking her over and shaking her grip. Moretti rolled, slamming Katja’s arms with impossible force. Katja was on her back, left arm numb and right arm knocking away a new barrage of strikes. She pulled in her legs and kicked with all the power of her boots.
* * *
Light poured into the auditorium once again, and Breeze blinked in shock. She still held the limp hand of her husband. The illumination revealed a series of packs laid out across Vijay’s chest, and the security guard who frantically operated them.
Vijay’s heart would start, but after only a few beats it would cease again. The mask over his face pushed oxygen into his lungs, but his body refused to respond. Aside from a single pinprick in his chest there was no sign of violence, but any ability to live seemed to have been stolen away.
“Is there an ambulance coming?” she asked.
“Yes, ma’am,” another guard replied. “Two minutes away.”
“Come on, darling,” she whispered, squeezing his hand again.
Around her, the stage was under siege. She and Vijay were surrounded by security, and through the black legs she saw Sheridan protected by another ring of guards. The young veteran who had first helped her with Vijay was standing at the edge of the stage, pistol pointed down at a group of people lying on the floor.
Near the first exit from the auditorium, she saw a woman suddenly fly upward into the air. Another woman—one of the certificate carriers in her long, black gown—lay on her back, booted legs thrust upward. The first woman crashed down to the floor, but was on her feet again so fast Breeze blinked to clear her vision.
Then the exit door was open, and the woman was gone. The olive-skinned certificate carrier leapt to her feet and took off in pursuit.
Breeze looked again at her husband’s still form, watched it jerk as the guard attempted to start the heart yet again. She’d seen enough death in her military career to know that it was too late, that no amount of medical help could bring Vijay back. She slumped where she sat. Everything had happened so fast. A lightning courtship and a quick wedding, and the sudden promotion to minister. And now, just as fast, it was all over. Her husband was dead, and with it her political ambitions. There was no way she could pull off that trick a second time.
Tears trickled down her cheeks. She brushed them away, trying to hold back the surge of frustration and disappointment. This had been a terrible year, with one setback after another, and she was too young to just be put out to pasture.
There was a bony hand on her shoulder. Looking up, she saw the Dean gazing down at her sadly.
“He is a strong man,” he said quietly. “He’ll be all right.”
The old coot was offering her sympathy. It was the last thing she wanted right now. She dropped her eyes, wanting simply to disappear, then she felt something warm and soft drape over her shoulders. It was a blanket, and she noticed that a new team of medics had arrived, along with a troop of armored police officers who kept the audience in their seats while investigator drones began scanning the crowd.
Strong hands took her arms and she let them lift her to her feet.
“Mrs. Shah,” one of the security guards said with deep sadness in his eyes, “we need to get you to a safe place.”
They were still treating her like a VIP, she noticed absently. Like someone worth protecting. But she was just the new wife of a minister—why would she matter?
Because, she suddenly realized, their careful PR campaign had made her into someone who mattered. The shock of the moment suddenly vanished, and she saw the situation with new clarity. The medics worked on Vijay, there were guards all around, and there was an entire audience watching. She had performed CPR to try to save him, before staying loyally by his side when the first medics arrived.
Oh, this was gold.
“What about my husband?” she asked.
The guard hesitated, glancing down at the limp form.
“We’ll do our best, ma’am.”
She nodded solemnly, then allowed herself to be led away to safety.
Her mind was already racing. There was much to do.
20
Thomas flopped down on the couch in Club Sub, loving the feeling of falling onto the soft surface. Gravity was back on, and life was just that much better. With Bowen so close to the jump gate and scheduled to hold station until the arrival of another Terran warship in two days, the mood on board seemed almost like a working port visit.
Jobs got done, but the tension was down.
The lights in the mess deck seemed permanently on these days, despit
e the XO’s insistence on day, evening, and night lighting throughout the ship. None of the subbies seemed to be sleeping much, anyway. Chen had the mids, but his bunk was open and he was watching some show. Hayley Oaks had just finished a shower and she strolled through from the washplace wiping down her hair with a towel.
It was uncommon for men and women to share mess decks, but a single subbie female didn’t warrant her own cabin. Sometimes mixed quarters caused troubles, but as Bull Sub he’d enforced the rule from day one—no nudity in the main mess. The subbies were free to get changed in their bunks with the slides closed, and if Hayley was in the shower the washplace was out of bounds. No exceptions, else the wrath of the Bull Sub would descend.
Hayley hung her towel and glanced over at Thomas, who suddenly realized that he’d been watching her. She was bundled up in her coveralls, but her bare feet and the slightly lower swell of her chest suggested nothing underneath. She smiled absently under damp, curly brown hair that was surprisingly long. She always wore it tied up, he realized, and she was a different woman with this look.
“Enjoying the sprawl, Guns?” she said, strolling over to flop down on the couch opposite him.
He gave her a smile, but didn’t dare hold her gaze. He was old enough to be, if not her father, then at least her uncle, and he was a married man now. Those days were long gone. There was another reason besides regulations, he knew, which had made him take such a strict stance on decency.
“When I lounge,” he said, staring up at the deckhead, “I like to feel it.”
Hayley stretched—he definitely kept his eyes averted for that—and shouted over toward Chen.
“Get to sleep, fuckbrain. I need you awake enough to remember to shake me at three.”
“Bite me,” he responded playfully.
“Blow me,” she muttered, grabbing one of the tablets from its pouch on the bulkhead. She lifted it to Thomas. “Thanks for putting together those lists of dates—it must have taken you hours.”
“It would have taken you hours, but I knew most of it from memory.”
“Really? You like that history shit?”
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