The Devil and Deep Space

by Susan R. Matthews

  Andrej explained, because Stildyne was waiting. “That is a Malcontent, Chief. A religious professional of a particular sort. You’ve heard of Malcontents?”

  Maybe he had and maybe he hadn’t. Stildyne was a Security warrant, and had had contacts in intelligence fields, once upon a time. “Heard about them, yes, your Excellency. What do you think he’s up to?”

  Shaking his head, Andrej smiled. “There’s no use even wondering, Chief. The Malcontent does as the Malcontent pleases, and the Malcontent’s business is for the Saint alone. You needn’t worry.”

  “Looks familiar somehow,” Stildyne remarked, as if clearly aware that a Malcontent shouldn’t be. Andrej had to grin.

  “If you’d met a Malcontent you’d remember, Chief, trust me on this. We approach the river. Shall we run?”

  He didn’t know what the Malcontent might be about and he didn’t care, because there was no way he would ever find out unless the Malcontent should reveal the information for the Saint’s own purposes, and there was therefore no sense wasting the energy.

  “Very good, sir. After you.”

  Just he and Stildyne, in the early morning, on a worn old track that ran alongside the river down to the nearest bridge. The Security they had brought with them were on vacation, Stildyne had said, and came alone. Stildyne had Andrej all to himself. Stildyne was on a holiday of a sort as well, Andrej mused, and this was one of the treats he had granted to himself, morning exercise alone with his officer.

  Andrej could see no objection to so harmless a self–indulgence on Stildyne’s part. And he did owe Stildyne laps. He always owed Stildyne laps. He would die owing Stildyne laps.

  But not before he laid that Bench warrant before the Malcontent and asked the Saint’s assistance in identifying who on the Jurisdiction’s Bench wanted him killed, and why.

  Chapter Six

  Disquieting Undercurrents

  It was four days into his investigation, six days now since the accident. General Rukota stood on the flight–prep line in the Ragnarok’s maintenance atmosphere with the Ship’s Engineer louring beside him, watching Pesadie’s preliminary assessment team work through an operational audit on yet another Wolnadi.

  “Willful obstruction of an authorized Fleet investigation,” Rukota pointed out. “As has characterized the approach of this entire Command from the date of the incident. I have never encountered such a concerted effort to be unpleasant in any situation into which I have had the misfortune to be placed in over twenty years of service of the Judicial order.”

  Rukota himself was a tall man, unaccustomed to the company of people who could look down on him. Wheatfields was slender, but unquestionably very tall, and rolled a little twiglet of wood from one side of his mustachioed mouth to the other before condescending to favor Rukota with a response.

  “Flatterer.” There was no hint of any personal animosity in Wheatfields’s voice. There was no hint of any emotion whatever. “I suppose you say that to all the people you’re trying to screw.”

  Closing his eyes in a momentary spasm of frustration, Rukota reminded himself that it was nothing personal. Wheatfields just didn’t like strangers getting into his Wolnadis any more than Wheatfields was likely to tolerate strangers taking more personal liberties. Rukota was right with him, on that. He didn’t like the Pesadie team either. They were too obviously looking for something. They weren’t finding it, but they had no business coming here with any preconceived ideas on the subject of whether there was anything to find in the first place.

  “No, your Excellency, I usually take a more traditional approach: ‘Hello, what’s your name, did you know that artillerymen can do it on a full three–sixty transit?’ You know. Why don’t you just go ahead and tell us whose Security it was?”

  Wheatfields glanced sideways at him for a thoughtful moment, as though he was carefully evaluating Rukota’s facetious overture. Rukota felt a twinge of uncertainty: he didn’t want Wheatfields. He didn’t care for engineers; he’d always found their approach to intimacy to be entirely too focused on technical details to make for an enjoyable engagement. If he was going to try men at all a Chigan would be the place to start — there was no question about that — but when Wheatfields answered, Rukota realized with disgust that Wheatfields had been having him on. Making him think. Playing games with his mind.

  “No, I don’t like the psychology of it, Rukota. The minute we say ‘Look here for a malfunction, if any,’ we’ve introduced the concept, and there isn’t any malfunction to find. The best way we have of proving that is to let your people run a really thorough test on everything here. If they can’t identify the subject craft on empirical evidence alone — you have your answer.”

  In more ways than one. Wheatfields’s reputation should have warned Rukota that Wheatfields was teasing. It had been years since the Judicial mistake that had resulted in the horrible death of Wheatfields’s lover, spouse, partner, whatever it was that Chigans called each other when they mated.

  Chigans didn’t necessarily mate for life — the peculiar population dynamics of Chigan society encouraged a rather more fluid approach to intimate relationships — but Wheatfields himself had by report been deeply scarred by the emotional trauma. It had been an exceptionally egregious lapse of good judgment on whoever’s part to have let Wheatfields look at the Record of his lover’s torture.

  At any rate Wheatfields had been as celibate as a woman in a Chigan enclave ever since, by all reports, and had a reputation for being unpleasant. Rukota supposed he was lucky that Wheatfields was speaking to him at all. Part of the investigation, yes, but that didn’t mean that Wheatfields would have acceded to an interview if he’d been feeling difficult.

  Wheatfields had been daring the Fleet to discipline him for years, and Fleet to its credit had turned its back on behavior that could easily have meant Wheatfields’s dismissal in disgrace. It was his death that Wheatfields was looking for, anyway.

  “At the rate we’re going it’ll be weeks before we’re finished, your Excellency.” There were twenty Wolnadi fighters in the Ragnarok’s inventory, twenty–three if you counted the reserves. And Wheatfields probably was. Just to make his point. “What’s your investment in hanging on to a bunch of admin types from Pesadie Station for that long? I’d think you’d want us off as soon as possible.”

  Four days, and this was only the second Wolnadi that Pesadie’s team had worked on. Operational audit took time, especially when the Ship’s Engineer held so close to his principles and absolutely declined to offer assistance from the Ragnarok’s resources — all in the name of ensuring a true and pure result, of course.

  Wheatfields smiled. Rukota noticed with astonishment that Wheatfields could actually look pleasant, when he smiled, and really very engaging when he almost laughed.

  “Operant behavior,” Wheatfields said. “We haven’t had staff to run audit on everything. This is an opportunity, Rukota, free labor for as long as it takes. I’m sorry about the environment, though. The stores are pretty low. Nothing personal.”

  Wheatfields was right about the quality of life on board of this ship. Worse, there were maintenance issues that could only result from increasing starvation for replacement articles and consumables. The Ragnarok hadn’t been at Pesadie Station above two months; there had to be a more pernicious reason for the state of its stores than just the timing of its depot visits. Somehow or other the Ragnarok had simply not been getting its stores in.

  “You want me to believe that your people weren’t out there on overtime to sanitize that exercise craft?” Rukota demanded. Because if Engineering truly hadn’t done an operational audit on the craft before hazarding the findings of the assessment team, the Ragnarok was naively convinced that innocence was adequate protection against harm. That would be deeply troubling, because of its stupidity, but also because the Ragnarok could only think that if they already knew that there was a reason that would be revealed, and from outside its boundaries.

  “Just enough tim
e to satisfy ourselves on the fighter in question.”

  Wheatfields’s candid response made Rukota feel better . . . and then made him feel worse. Wheatfields was confiding. Wheatfields was extending the handshake of truce, and inviting Rukota to become complicit in the Ragnarok’s cover–up. It was a risk for Wheatfields to take. Rukota was supposed to be an impartial observer. He had a duty to the Bench.

  What duty?

  The people that Admiral Brecinn had sent along with him were not in the least bit neutral. They almost didn’t even pretend to be. So why should he hold himself to a higher standard, when everything around him was so corrupt?

  “Well. You’ve got to grab resources where you can find them, I suppose.”

  Because it was his honor, that was why. He couldn’t quite turn his back on Pesadie and ally himself with the Ragnarok. He couldn’t. He had a duty. And his own integrity to consider — at least what was left of it. “No chance of a stash of good bean tea on board, is there? I mean decent stuff. The bean tea in mess is enough to drive a man to desperation. By which I mean khombu.”

  With clear regret, Wheatfields shook his head. “Sorry, Rukota. Don’t even try it. You’ll never find my supply. You’ll just have to suffer.”

  That was right. Chigans drank bean tea. He should have remembered.

  Wheatfields went off for a word with one of the Security warrants and Rukota stayed behind, watching the assessment team work on the Wolnadi and wondering if he could get a word through to his wife. Desperate straits. Please send bean tea.

  There had been some stores with them on the courier ship when they’d arrived, the standard issue and survival rations. Meat broth, for one, which had been the only thing that had saved him thus far. When that was gone, they would have no choice but to share the Ragnarok’s common mess: and Rukota did not know how he was to face that prospect, and survive.

  ###

  In all of the years that Ferinc had been here, he had never been so reluctant to approach the Malcontent’s cell in the Brikarvna safe house as today.

  He was usually happy to be called to open his accounts for examination, because it meant that Stanoczk would be there, and Stanoczk would not deny him reconciliation. This time it was different. Stanoczk would be angry with him. He had transgressed.

  That Stanoczk would deny him was unthinkable. The all but certain fact of Stanoczk’s disappointment was almost as horrible as the thought of being sent away alone, unblessed, uncomforted, un-Reconciled. Ferinc knocked.

  It was an old place. It had doors made out of wood, heavy and hung on actual hinges, and when they closed behind one the report of their impact was muffled against the wood that lined the walls into a dull, thudding sound of very oppressive — or promising — finality.

  “Step through,” Stanoczk called from inside the cell, but Ferinc hesitated, wondering if he should not turn around and go away. He had not done as he had been supposed to do. Stanoczk would be unhappy with him.

  And still he was a man, and would stand evaluation like a man. Koscuisko had ruined him, destroyed him, annihilated him, but Koscuisko had not yet made him into a coward.

  Ferinc went in, closing the door behind him with quiet resignation. Stanoczk was there, sitting at the long low table, drinking a glass of rhyti. There was only one chair at the table. Ferinc bowed over Stanoczk’s hand to kiss his knuckles, a formal and traditional greeting that he had learned to give with affection. Stanoczk did not take Ferinc’s hand in return. Stanoczk was that angry.

  Sitting down on the floor at a polite distance Ferinc folded his legs for compactness’s sake, and waited. He had been in the wrong. This would not be easy. But Stanoczk was his reconciler, and would not let him suffer so long as the peace of the Malcontent was within his power to grant.

  Had it not been for Stanoczk, Ferinc believed that he would have killed himself years ago. After Koscuisko.

  “What news do you bring from the Matredonat, Ferinc?”

  Cousin Stanoczk’s deep voice was low and level. He didn’t look at Ferinc. Ferinc could be grateful for Stanoczk’s candor; he would not draw the painful confrontation out.

  “All seems well, Stanoczk; the child learns not to fear the stranger, the lady grows accustomed to his presence. They say that they sleep in the same bed, but not together.”

  He wasn’t supposed to know. He was supposed to have kept clear of the Matredonat until Koscuisko was summoned to Chelatring Side.

  “Tell me, Ferinc,” Stanoczk suggested. “Explain. You haven’t been reckless in the past. Sometimes almost I have heard praise for you. Talk to me now. Why did I have to seek here for you, when I expected you in Pirlassins?”

  Resisting the temptation to solicit reassurance, Ferinc concentrated on the report Stanoczk required. To keep things from one’s own reconciler was as much as to shut one’s own mouth against sustenance when one was starving.

  “I met the party at the airfield, Stanoczk, as I was directed. I sent the report to the person at Chilleau Judiciary. It was acknowledged.”

  Stanoczk had set his glass of rhyti down, and was preparing to smoke a lefrol. The simple ritual always made Ferinc shudder. Andrej Koscuisko had been smoking a lefrol. “You also had acknowledged your instructions, Ferinc.”

  That cell had been bigger than this one, better lit, much colder; but it had been as bleak and comfortless, and the stone floor had been as hard.

  “It was an error of judgment. I looked out of the window. I knew that Chief of Security, Stanoczk, before he was a chief warrant officer. Oh, I could ruin him — I know things about Stildyne that Koscuisko would not tolerate – ”

  “We aren’t talking about the warrant officer,” Stanoczk reminded him. “Go on, Ferinc. I am hoping to be able to excuse you. Help me.”

  Stanoczk was angry. And Ferinc was heartily sorry for it. Sorry that he had betrayed his discipline; sorry that he had seen Koscuisko; and sorry that he had made Stanoczk angry. There was no way to make it right.

  “Oh, I went to look out the window, Stanoczk, and he looked up. Him. As if he knew that I was there. Marana was so unhappy. To think of him in her arms, in her bed, I couldn’t stay away. I had to see for myself that she was all right. And then I saw them by the river, Koscuisko, and Stildyne, and . . . ”

  He didn’t want to say this.

  He couldn’t keep the truth from Cousin Stanoczk.

  “I think he may have recognized me. Stildyne. Koscuisko wouldn’t. I don’t think that he would, not from a distance, not like this. Surely he didn’t know — he couldn’t have guessed — ”

  “You let yourself become distracted, Ferinc, and I do not tolerate being disregarded.” Stanoczk’s warning called him back from the edge of the abyss — as Stanoczk had so many times before. Stanoczk’s voice. And Stanoczk’s touch.

  And the skillful, loving passion of Stanoczk’s caress, which had the power to turn the self–punitive fury harmlessly into the emptiness of the past, the power to turn him back from the edge of madness toward a species of fury of a more benign sort, raging in his mind and his desire; quieted to Stanoczk’s word in the embrace of the Malcontent.

  “I’m sorry, Stanoczk.” At least Stanoczk would know he was sincere. “I should have fled to this place and cried for mercy. And instead I went back to the Matredonat. Are you very angry with me?”

  Rising to his feet Cousin Stanoczk began to pace, smoking his lefrol, his head bent to regard the floor very thoughtfully.

  “After all these years, Ferinc, and to be put back into that place in your mind so suddenly and so completely. It is as though we have not helped you find any healing, at all. If I can’t reconcile you to your past they will excuse me from the exercise and try to fit you to another man, one who can better share the true peace of the Malcontent with thee. I don’t want that.”

  Ferinc heard Stanoczk’s language drop into the familiar, intimate mode of address, and felt fear gripping his heart. He hadn’t stopped to think about that. He hadn’t stopped to consider t
he effect his selfish action might have on Stanoczk at all.

  “I don’t want another reconciler.” He had come much closer to the mystical understanding of the Malcontent with Stanoczk as his tutor than he had ever hoped. “How shall I beg to be forgiven? Do not deny me reconciliation, Stanoczk. I couldn’t bear it.”

  Stanoczk turned so sharply on his heel that for a moment Ferinc saw Stanoczk’s cousin, and not Stanoczk himself. Koscuisko had had a quickness about him. It had been very unnerving.

  “You do not ask forgiveness of any Malcontent, Ferinc, surely you know so basic a thing as that by now. Nor may I deny you reconciliation, even if I wanted to. It is as much as my soul is worth. But neither your wishes nor mine will change the fact that you are not of the Blood. The Malcontent has taken you on trust and out of compassion for your suffering because of the man who is responsible for it, and should I fail to help you to find peace, I fail our divine Patron. May he wander in bliss.”

  In bliss and in intoxication. The Malcontent had been a very famous lover of liquor, in his life: liquor, lovemaking, and laughter.

  “What happens now?” Ferinc asked, looking at his feet folded beneath him, on the floor. “I want to go back and see him again. I want to be sure Marana is all right. I love Koscuisko’s child, Stanoczk. What am I to do?”

  He watched the ash fall from Stanoczk’s lefrol to the floor, and shuddered. Stanoczk turned back toward the table, and sat down.

  “I will bring the Bench specialist to the Matredonat, Ferinc, she will an interview with Koscuisko conduct. You may during that time speak to the lady. The Second Judge still believes that she needs this Judiciary to win her bid, and has offered concessions that we want. We particularly need to secure them before Chilleau Judiciary comes to understand that it need not sue to the Combine for victory.”