Into the Maelstrom - eARC

by David Drake

  “I know it looks a bit like an exploded diagram of a ruminant’s gut structure,” Kiesche said.

  “Yes,” Allenson replied, firmly suppressing that vision.

  “But it’s a hydraulic pump that I’ve stripped out of a canal lock gate and converted into a ram.”

  “I see,” Allenson said, patiently. “And why would you want to do that?”

  “To make artillery, sir, to supplement our lasercannon.”

  Allenson must have still looked blank because Kiesche elucidated further.

  “Like battleship guns, General.”

  The penny dropped. Heavy naval assets employed hydraulic-power rams to throw ceramic kinetic projectiles out through their fields into the Continuum. These weren’t the most powerful weapons in existence but they generated little heat or toxic fumes compared to railguns or explosive weapons.

  Kiesche said helpfully, “The power and recycle speed of a naval cannon depends on the pumping rate. Almost any pump will do for any sized gun within reason if you can wait long enough between shots.”

  Allenson looked at the man, wondering what to say. No one in their right mind would use hydraulic cannon if there was anything else available. Continuum combat was a very special case. However, he didn’t want to insult the engineer or curb his enthusiasm so he replied noncommittedly.

  Kiesche insisted on demonstrating his spaghetti-weapon. It lobbed a ceramic bolt a surprisingly long way but the chamber took forever to repressure. Kiesche tried to speed it up but something inside broke. It sprayed the engineer with oil as he struggled to stem the leak

  Allenson retreated to a safe distance as he only had one decent dress uniform and he was wearing it.

  “Perhaps it needs a little more work, Kiesche?”

  “Yes, sir,” Kiesche said, a little crestfallen.

  “Keep up the good work,” Allenson added.

  CHAPTER 13

  Home World High Jinks

  “Marshal Ovaki will see you now,” the secretary said.

  General Brine paused at the door to watch her sashay back to her podium. Long flowing lilac and indigo hair cascading down onto a very pert bottom made her worth a look. Her metallic purpurrot dress in a crushed velvety cloth unfortunately retained imprints. These included a distinct outline of a large male hand on her right buttock.

  Brine knocked and walked in without waiting for a reply.

  “Ah, Petrov, thanks for popping over, have a seat,” Ovaki said.

  “Your secretary’s looking a little flushed, Sam,” Brine replied.

  “She’s a charming girl but a bit forgetful. She mislaid a file so I had to admonish her.”

  “So I saw.”

  “Scotch?”

  The marshal produced a bottle and two glasses.

  “Plum brandy for me, if you have it.”

  Nancy-boy’s drink, Brine correctly predicted the marshal’s next sally.

  They went through this ritual every time Brine was summoned to the marshal’s office. Why Ovaki couldn’t just get on with it and pour him a plum brandy was beyond Brine’s comprehension. Possibly it was some sort of psychological dominance display. Maybe Ovaki actually liked scotch and really couldn’t understand why no one else did. God knows, he drank enough of the filthy stuff.

  Brine asked, “Well, what was so urgent and confidential that I had to rush over in person?”

  “It’s about the damned Bight colonies.”

  Brine groaned and took a gulp of the brandy.

  “Not again. Haven’t we wasted enough energy not to say money on those mudballs. Don’t tell me some idiot politician on the Council has decided to make the little coup the colonials are cooking up a cause célèbre.”

  Ovaki tried to reply but Brine was in full rant mode.

  “It’s not as if we want the Bight colonies particularly. They’re an economic sinkhole of no strategic value. The only reason we fought a war there last time was to stop Terra getting them. That was purely for reasons of national prestige. Surely it’s not beyond the wit of even our politicians to come up with some face-saving form of words that will give the colonials independence in practice while maintaining Brasilia’s prestige among the Home Worlds?”

  He finally ran down and glowered into his glass. Ovaki took the opportunity to get a word in edgeways.

  “That was the plan. However, it’s not some politician who’s dropped a grenade at the mess dinner this time but the poxy academics.”

  Brine was genuinely astonished.

  “What? Who cares what academics think?”

  In Brasilia’s socio-economic structure academics ranked somewhere between poets and classical dancers in that they were decorative items.

  Ovaki continued. “It’s not what they think, it’s what they’ve discovered. Have you heard of unbihexium?”

  “No,” Brine replied.

  “It’s element 126, a super-actinide,” Ovaki said helpfully.

  Brine didn’t bother to reply. The marshal knew very well he hadn’t a clue what that meant. He doubted Ovaki had heard of unbi-whatever until he read the plastic file lying on the desk.

  Plastic files were secure isolated datapads disconnected from any outside communication system and code-locked. They could only be read when activated by someone whose DNA, epigenetics and proteomic patterns matched the lock. In this case that was probably only Ovaki and possibly his secretary.

  “Super-actinides are transuranic stable elements,” Ovaki said didactically. “Except this one becomes unstable in the presence of a continuum field.”

  Brine shrugged.

  “So it’s another explosive, so what?”

  Ovaki explained.

  “It doesn’t explode it implodes, sucking in energy.”

  “And that makes it important enough to fight a war over because . . .”

  “Because tiny amounts can be used to refreeze a ship’s heat sinks while in transit.”

  “I can see that more efficient ships would be useful—” Brine began.

  Ovaki silenced him with a gesture.

  “No you don’t see. This stuff makes possible massive battleships with near infinite range at full speed. We can build fast armored transports that carry huge loads—including metals. In short, we could build an invasion fleet that could conquer a Home World. All it takes is a few kilos of unbihexium. Right now no one knows how to make the stuff in usable quantities, but the navy found a source in the Bight Hinterland with shiploads just waiting to be mined.”

  “Oh dear God,” Brine said finally catching on. “If the Terrans get their hands on it . . .”

  “Quite! I want you to plan for a major invasion across the Bight. I know,” Ovaki held up a hand to forestall a list of reasons why that was next to logistically impossible.

  Brine considered. “Our army is already overcommitted in a dozen brushfire conflicts with Terran proxies this side of the Bight. It will take time to recruit, train and equip new formations.”

  “Time is what we don’t have, so hire mercenaries.” Ovaki said. “I have a near unlimited budget for this operation. That is how seriously element 126 has rattled the Standing Security Committee. For once the political parties are in tight agreement. The politicos see their personal cozy little universes threatened.”

  A hologram marker winked over Ovaki’s desk. He waved a hand and it disappeared.

  “Just my secretary telling me she is going to lunch,” Ovaki said, in answer to Brine’s unspoken question.

  “She’s quite a babe even by your standards.” Brine said, recalling the pert bottom. “Where did you find her?”

  “She came highly recommended by a colleague in Security.” Ovaki replied. “He had to unload her in a hurry. His wife bumped into her at a reception and discovered she wasn’t as homely as my colleague had implied.”

  “I can imagine the scene,” Brine said, chuckling. He raised his glass, “To our wives and loved ones; may they never meet.”

  The babe in question often lunched outside the
Department of War building. Today was no exception. She hurried across the open square into the warren of alleyways housing cafes and shops that serviced the staff who worked in the various government offices around the plaza. Her gait was a little stiff. Her bottom still smarted from the spanking administered earlier by the marshal.

  He enjoyed catching her out in little errors because it gave him an excuse to indulge his obsession with pert bottoms. In this case, she thought, the filthy old perv’s habits were useful as they distracted him from wondering why the unbihexium file had gone missing. It was sheer bad luck he asked for it while she had it linked to her pad.

  She sat down somewhat gingerly on a bench outside a small restaurant specializing in spiced food from Rautmala, an unimportant Home World in the Terran sphere of influence. She opened her bag to find the sandwich she had purchased earlier. She also took her pad out of her bag and watched a catch-up program about a popular soap opera as she ate.

  She blinked back tears. The food aromas and restaurant music reminded her of the Rautmalan boyfriend she had met on holiday and with whom she had fallen deeply in love. She hadn’t seen him in months, not since he had been picked up by the Rautmalan Social Protection Guards for ownership of proscribed texts.

  Terran Security had promised to use their influence with the Rautmalan authorities to free her beloved if she did the odd favor for them occasionally. Favors like copying high security files using one of a suite of apps they had added to her pad.

  The catch-up show was a Terran app with special features marked only by an inconspicuous green light in one corner. After a few minutes the light turned yellow and disappeared, indicating that the unbihexium file had successfully downloaded into the restaurant’s espionage equipment.

  She finished her sandwich and returned to work.

  General Brine worked late that evening in his office. He often did but rarely on something as important as planning a war. At the moment however, exhaustion had set in and further action would be counterproductive. He buzzed his secretary, who had stayed to access necessary files and send out the streams of orders that would start the slow and ponderous wheels of the Brasilian military spinning.

  “We’ll call it a day, Trixie. Thanks for working late.”

  “My pleasure, sir, is there anything else before I go.”

  “Yes, we will need to start again at eight. It’s hardly worth me going all the way home and back. I think I’ll stay in town tonight. Would you let my wife know?”

  After a moment’s thought he opened the link to his secretary’s office again.

  “And send a message to Mistress Fairhead asking if she wants to meet me for dinner at nine.”

  “Of course, General, at your club?”

  “Correct, goodbye Trixie. Get a good night’s sleep as we have a busy day tomorrow.”

  “You too, sir.”

  “Oh, I intend to.”

  The advantage of the reverse cowboy position, thought Reeva Fairhead, is that you can feign passion with just a few theatrical moans without the tedious business of also having to simulate an expression of ecstasy. The disadvantage is that it is hard work involving bouncing up and down especially when your protector is elderly and tired. By the time Grimes climaxed she was exhausted. She leaned forward for a few moments to catch her breath.

  Pointing down the bed, she had a good view of herself in the mirror. She examined her reflection with a professional eye. By most standards she was beautiful but the competition from younger hetaerae grew ever fiercer. Her breasts were sagging just a little and lines were showing in the skin around her neck. She was, she thought, getting too old for all this exercise.

  Reeva was a great deal older than she looked. As the years passed the degree of rejuvenation treatment required to give her the right appearance of bubble-headed youth became more costly and uncomfortable.

  It would be nice to retire. She had built up a decent little nest egg by the simple expedient of running a number of protectors simultaneously. Each paid the rent on her villa unaware of the others’ existence. Additional revenue accrued to her pension fund by getting each protector to buy her identical presents such as clothes and jewelry and then selling off the surplus. She only needed one of each item to wear for each doting admirer in turn.

  Nevertheless prices never came down. One’s nest egg could never be too well padded. There were too many horror stories of elderly courtesans who had overlooked the effect of inflation forced out of retirement in their dotage. Reeva did not intend to be reduced to hanging around docks doing favors for sailors for the price of a hot meal. She shuddered at the thought.

  At one time she had hopes of marrying a suitable financially endowed protector. Somehow no offer ever seemed good enough when she was younger and they had dried up as she aged. Reeva was enough of a realist to grasp that this situation was unlikely to change now.

  A snore behind her back indicated that Grimes had gone to sleep. Charming, she thought, not even a thank you for her efforts. She carefully lifted herself off but she needn’t have bothered. Alcohol and sex had worked their usual magic on the male body.

  Reeva wore clothes that could be donned as well as removed easily. One of the attractions of a professional companion to gentlemen is that unlike a wife they leave without fuss when the business is concluded and let a chap sleep in peace. She forced herself to dress quietly even though her mind was racing.

  Grimes like many men had the urge to try to impress the woman he was about to screw. That was wasted energy as far as hetaerae were concerned. She regarded him in much the same way a farmer considered a dairy cow. To wit, it was only as valuable as its milk supply. In Grimes’s case said attempts to impress took the form of boasts about the importance of his work projects. He recounted these in tedious detail despite his patronizing expressed view that she wouldn’t really understand.

  Actually Reeva understood far more than he gave her credit for. Her wide-eyed expression of awed stupidity was purely professional courtesy. Hetaerae entertained by massaging egos as well as bodies. She understood that what she had heard tonight was probably worth a great deal of money to someone. On the taxi ride home she thought long and hard about her future and how it could be best secured.

  Suntalaw tapped his fingers on the blank surface of a switched off desk while keeping a subordinate called Preson waiting outside his office.

  His official title was Director General of the Terran Commonwealth Social Welfare Directorate, in which role he chaired the Committee for Public Security that was his true powerbase. Public Security covered a wide remit including counterinsurgency, counterespionage, and public morality. The counterinsurgency hat gave Suntalaw control of the internal security troops but his public morality brief was even more valuable. In the final resort everyone was immoral in some way or other. A case could be made against any person whom he decided needed removing. He kept files on anyone who mattered in the Terran power structure and many who did not but might someday become important.

  The only individual more powerful than Suntalaw was the advocate general himself. He perched atop the various silos of state, playing off one DG against another.

  Suntalaw drummed his fingers, impatient to hear Preson’s news but it wouldn’t do to let an underling think he was important. Always make ’em wait outside the door to establish the pecking order.

  Finally he keyed the desk on and said, “Come.”

  Preson oozed in, oilier than a seabird caught in a petroleum disaster.

  “Well, what is it?” Suntalaw asked, injecting just the right amount of boredom into his tone. “You claimed that you had to report something to me personally.”

  “Important intelligence from the Exoworld Directorate spooks, sir.”

  Preson placed a plastic file on Suntalaw’s desk with exaggerated care.

  Suntalaw gave it a sneer but refrained from opening it. Preson claimed to have a snout, an informer, in the Exoworld Directorate that among other things ran Terra’s outworl
d spy networks.

  “I don’t have all day so summarize the salient points.”

  Preson did as he was bid and when the man finished Suntalaw sat back in his seat.

  “And Exoworld buy into this fanciful tale of magic Hinterland colony metal that will revolutionize naval warfare.”

  “They have independent verification from two separate sources. The first is a secretary that they turned using a honey trap. She thinks her beloved an imprisoned Rautmalan dissident,” Preson said.

  Suntalaw sniggered.

  “I presume the boyfriend is an Exoworld operative.”

  Preson nodded.

  “The other source is a mistress of a Brasilian general.”

  Suntalaw wondered how this could be worked to his advantage. His mind plodded carefully through the various possibilities, each scenario more paranoiac than the last. Should he sit on the information, pretend he’d never seen it, or report the matter to the advocate general. What spin should he apply if he decided to pass it on?

  His first reaction was to ignore the whole affair and let matters take their course. He would have to impress upon Preson the need to keep his mouth shut if he chose that option. The advocate general undoubtedly had spies within every DG including Home Security. Could he trust Preson? Now that was a stupid question.

  An unfortunate fatal accident could be arranged of course but suppose Preson was the advocate general’s spy in Suntalaw’s directorate. Terminating him might seem like an attack on the advocate general himself. That thought brought Suntalaw out in a cold sweat.

  He forced himself to think through the logical possibilities. It was of little concern whether this magic metal actually existed but who thought it existed. Could this be an elaborate and convoluted scam by Brasilian Security to discredit Exoworld? In that case it would be better for Suntalaw to lie low and let events take their course.