The Praxis

by Walter Jon Williams

  “Starburst, Lord Elcap!” Navigation managed to simulate surprise. “Enemy starburst!”

  Which meant that the target squadron, perceiving incoming missiles, were now trying to separate from one another as swiftly as they could. To keep their ships firmly under their control, squadron commanders usually wanted to keep them clustered about them as long as possible, but ships that were clumped together also made overlarge targets, with a possibility of one strike destroying more than one ship. The question of when to order a starburst was one of the questions that junior officers debated ceaselessly in their wardrooms. If the senior officers debated this subject, or indeed anything at all, they gave no sign.

  Tarafah frowned down at his displays. “Weapons, this is a drill. Power up the point-defense lasers.”

  “This is a drill, Lord Elcap. Point-defense lasers powered.”

  As the enemy’s second salvo came in, the point-defense lasers fired away at low power, perhaps even scoring hits. Whether hit or not, most of the salvo had been declared destroyed days before they were fired, and were deactivated. Whether hit or not, one missile was assigned to penetrate the defensive shield and detonate, its simulated radiation burning away the control systems on the number two engine, setting off a potential runaway antimatter leak that required a fuel tank to be vented into space. Other damage would include the disabling of an entire bank of missile launchers, and sensors burned away along one whole flank of the frigate.

  A message flashed onto Martinez’s displays. Relief danced in his heart as he reported it to Tarafah. “General message from flagship Majesty.” The qualifier was to distinguish it from the heavy cruiser that was the flagship of the mutineers’ squadron. “Bombardment of Kashma has failed to launch pinnace number three. All ships are to proceed as if the pinnace were launched.”

  “Comm, acknowledge,” Tarafah said. He could barely contain his delight. Some other ship had screwed up, and furthermore, one in Fanaghee’s own squadron.

  Corona could look on the rest of the maneuvers with rising optimism. Even if they made some hideous mistake, they wouldn’t be alone.

  The hideous mistake came twelve minutes later, when the simulated damage occurred to a bank of eight missile launchers. It was not to be repaired by actual members of the crew, because the powerful and unpredictable accelerations of a warship might fling them fatally against the nearest bulkhead. Instead weaponers, from the safety of their thick-walled shelters, cleared the missiles from the tubes with remote-controlled robots, massive machines built on the lines of spiders, with multiple arms that would clamp on stanchions fixed to the ship’s polycarbon frame, move from one stanchion to the next while the powerful arms secured themselves against accelerations, and smaller manipulator arms did the work.

  The movements of the two robots seemed at first to go well. “Damaged” control systems were replaced, and the robots began to yank missiles from their tubes. Then somehow one of the multilegged machines fouled the other, and in an effort to break free, tore away the other robot’s central hydraulic reserve. Hydraulic fluid jetted out into the weightless missile compartment, forming a spray of perfect azure globes, and the second robot died.

  Now both robots were useless, since the dead robot was blocking the one that still functioned.

  Martinez watched the silent little video picture with the same fascination with which he would watch any other disaster he was helpless to prevent. The footballers Tarafah had stuffed in the weapons division might have just finished off their patron’s career.

  Martinez glanced up from his screens to tell Tarafah what was happening, then hesitated. The captain couldn’t affect whatever was going in the weapons bays, not now, not from Command. Perhaps he would be happier not knowing.

  And besides, Martinez wasn’t supposed to be spying on other divisions.

  Then he looked back at the video at the sight of motion in the weapons bay. Little suited figures were shooting weightless into the bay. The figure in the lead seized a stanchion with one hand and, gesturing, directed the others to the work. From the leader’s erect posture, and something of his air of command, Martinez recognized his own orderly, Alikhan. The retired master weaponer was trying to set things right.

  How long till the next acceleration? The terrifying question shot through Martinez’s mind. And suddenly his fingers were tapping his screens in an attempt to call up the script for the maneuver.

  Unsuccessful, Tarafah had the whole thing under his captain’s key. Martinez glanced in claw-handed frustration at his displays.

  Two of the suited figures had wrestled a missile out of its tube and were now guiding it through a tangle of robotic limbs between it and the disposal bay. At least the missile hadn’t received its antimatter, and was therefore relatively light.

  How long? Martinez clenched his teeth. He thought about shouting out, “Crew in the weapons bay!” which would presumably halt any future accelerations.

  No. No acceleration would occur without Tarafah’s command, and if Tarafah gave the order, he could announce the danger in time.

  Or so he hoped.

  Another missile was being wrenched out of its tube, by a single straddle-legged figure braced against the weapons bank. At least the footballers could be counted on for brawn.

  A message flashed across screens. “Message from Flag,” he found himself repeating. “Second Division, alter course in echelon to two-two-seven by three-one-zero relative. Accelerate at four-point-five gravities. Execute at 28:01:001 ship time.”

  He glanced at the time display. That was six minutes from now.

  He was never more thankful for the regulation that made certain his helmet was sealed. He touched his controls and said into his helmet mic, “Page Crewman Alikhan.”

  “My lord?” The answer came within seconds.

  “You’ve got five minutes before the next acceleration.”

  There was a moment of silence as Alikhan calculated the odds. “Three missiles remaining. We’re not going to make it.”

  “No. Get the people to the acceleration couches, and I’ll tell the captain what’s happening.” Martinez looked at the hopeless situation, the awkward crew in their vac suits guiding a missile past the tangled arms of the robots, then said, “Halt that. Wait a minute.”

  He paused to think his idea through. “No, what you do is this: get someone on the robot controls; have the others yank the missiles from the tubes and then just hand them to the robot manipulator arms. The robot can hang onto them till the maneuver is over. There’s no antimatter and no danger, and after the maneuver’s completed, you can finish the job manually.”

  “Very good, my lord.” Alikhan cut his comm very fast, and from then on Martinez had to watch in silence. Alikhan himself bounded out of the frame, presumably to Weapons Control and the robot controls. The other crew popped the hatches, pulled the missiles, and boosted them gently in the direction of the functioning robot. In another few seconds the robot’s manipulator arms snatched the missiles from midair and then froze.

  The suited figures bounded from the weapons bay in the direction of their armored shelter. Martinez looked at the time display: 26:51:101.

  Two minutes to spare.

  “Oh, it was a shambles in the weapons bays, my lord,” Alikhan said as he buffed Martinez’s number two pair of shoes. “No one was in charge. The master weaponer was so drunk he couldn’t manage a single order that made sense or had anything to do with the situation. One of our two weaponer/firsts was a footballer, and so was one of the weaponer/seconds. And the two cadets who usually help out—nice young people, really, they’re learning fast—were stuffed into pinnaces and fired out of the ship.”

  “I’m glad I thought to put you on the scene,” Martinez said. “But still, I could have got you killed.”

  Alikhan put the shoe down and tapped the inactive communications display on his left sleeve. “I had Maheshwari on the comm. He would have aborted any accelerations if we’d still had anyone in the weapons ba
y.”

  Martinez nodded slowly. The senior petty officers had their own networks, their own intelligence, their own way of surviving the officers who the Fleet had placed over them.

  If you can find a master specialist who isn’t a drunk, isn’t crazy, and who retains most of his brain cells, Martinez’s father had told him, then grab him.

  Martinez blessed his father for the advice, and helped himself to whisky from his private stash, the dark-paneled cabinet under his narrow bed. On taking command, Captain Tarafah had repaneled the officers’ quarters—and his own—with rich, dark mahogany, complemented by brass fixtures and dark tile with a white and red geometric pattern. Officers’ country was now scented faintly with lemon oil, at least when it didn’t whiff of brass polish.

  Martinez needed the whisky, having just finished a double shift, standing watch in Command while Corona picked up its pinnaces and spent missiles, and Tarafah and the senior lieutenant shuttled to the flagship for a debriefing with the other captains and the fleetcom. The neat whisky scorched Martinez’s throat, and he could feel his bruised muscles begin to relax.

  “I’m glad we’re not in a real war,” he said. “You would all have been shot through with gamma rays.”

  “In a real war,” Alikhan said, “we would have stayed safe in our bunker and used a different bank of missiles.”

  Martinez fingered his chin. “Do you think the captain will find out what happened?”

  “No. The jammed robots were repaired as soon as we secured from quarters. The damaged missile will be written off the inventory somehow—there are all sorts of ways to make a missile disappear.”

  “I take no comfort in this knowledge,” Martinez said. He took another sip of whisky. “Do you think the captain should find out?”

  By which Martinez meant, Do you think the captain should find out that we saved him during the maneuvers?

  Alikhan looked sober. “I’d hate to end the career of a thirty-year man just short of retirement. And it’s the master weaponer who’d be blamed, not the footballers.”

  “True,” Martinez said. He hated the idea of doing something clever and no one ever finding out. But getting the master weaponer cashiered would not endear him to Alikhan, and he found Alikhan too valuable to offend.

  “Well,” he shrugged, “let it go. Let’s hope Corona doesn’t get into a war before the master weaponer retires.”

  “Hardly likely, my lord.” Alikhan brushed his mustachios with the back of a knuckle. “Corona has survived worse commanders than Tarafah. We’ll get her through it, never fear.”

  “But will I get through it?” Martinez asked. He sighed, then reached into the mahogany-paneled hutch beneath his bed and withdrew another bottle of whisky. “This might help your cogitations,” he said. “Don’t share it with anyone in the Weapons Division.”

  Alikhan accepted the bottle with gravity. “Thank you, my lord.”

  Martinez finished his drink and decided not to pour himself another, at least not yet. The example of the master weaponer was a little too strong. “Too bad it’s the only reward you’re going to get for saving the captain from disgrace.”

  “It’s more than I usually get,” Alikhan remarked—and, with an ambiguous smile, braced in salute and left.

  Two days later, after the last of the meetings in which the commanding officers refought the maneuver, Fleet Commander Fanaghee announced a Festival of Sport that would take place at Fleet facilities. Teams from every ship in Fanaghee’s command would participate, and Corona’s football team would face Magaria’s own champions from the Bombardment of Beijing in a special match. Tarafah announced an intensified program of training for his team, beginning immediately, before the ship even docked.

  When Martinez crawled off his watch that night, he didn’t stop at one drink. Or at two.

  EIGHT

  The bank was built of granite, a miniature Great Refuge complete with dome, probably to suggest permanence, but now, in the absence of the Great Masters, perhaps suggesting something else. Wesley Weckman, the trust manager, was a young man with a prematurely grave manner, though the style of his glossy boots and his fashionable bracelet of human hair suggested that his life outside the bank was not as sedate as his working hours.

  “Interest has stayed at three percent in the years since you entered the academy,” he said. “And since you’ve returned most of your allowance to the bank since that time, I’m pleased to report that the total sum now exceeds 29,000 zeniths, all of which I can put in your hands when your trust fund matures on your twenty-third birthday.”

  Which was in eleven days. Which made her, in Terran years—she had once known someone who calculated “Earthdays”—just past twenty.

  Sula briefly calculated what 29,000 zeniths might buy her. A modest apartment in the High City, or an entire apartment building in a decent section of the Lower Town. A modest villa, with extensive grounds, in the country.

  At least a dozen complete outfits from the most fashionable designers of Zanshaa.

  Or one perfectly authentic rose Pompadour vase from Vincennes dating from four centuries before the conquest of Terra, conveniently up for auction at the end of the month.

  Given prices like that, Sula figured the antimatter bombs had broken a lot of porcelain.

  It was a ridiculous fantasy to spend her entire inheritance on a vase, but she felt she’d been working hard for a long time now and deserved a moment of complete irrationality.

  “What do I have to do to get the principal?” she asked.

  “A small amount of paperwork. I can do it now, if you like, and it will take effect on your birthday.”

  Sula grinned. “Why not?”

  Weckman printed out the papers in question, and handed them to Sula along with a fat gold-nibbed pen. Then he activated the thumbprint reader and pushed it across his desk.

  “You’ve got my thumbprint?” Sula asked in surprise. “From all those years ago?”

  Weckman looked at his screens to make certain. “Yes. Of course.”

  “I don’t remember giving it.” She crossed her legs, laid the papers on her thigh, and read them carefully. Then she put the papers on the desk, raised the pen above the signature line, and hesitated. “You see,” she said, “I don’t know what I’m going to do with the money.”

  “The bank employs several investment counselors,” Weckman said. “I can introduce you to Miss Mandolin—I see that she’s at her desk.”

  Sula capped the pen. “The problem is, I’m in transit. I don’t even know what my next assignment is going to be.” She put the pen on the desk before Weckman. “Maybe I’ll just leave it in the trust fund, at least till I make Lieutenant.”

  “In that case, you need do nothing at all.”

  “Is it all right if I keep the papers?”

  “Of course.”

  She rose, and Weckman bowed as he showed her out of his office.

  What would she do with a vase anyway? she thought. She didn’t even own any flowers to put in it.

  She decided to visit the auction house again, and say good-bye.

  She should have known better than to permit herself certain dreams.

  “Put him in the river,” Gredel said. “Just make sure he doesn’t come up.”

  Lamey looked at her, a strange silent sympathy in his eyes, and he put his arm around her and kissed her cheek. “I’ll make it all right for you,” he said.

  No you won’t, she thought, but you’ll make it better.

  The next morning, Nelda threw her out. She looked at Gredel from beneath the slab of gray healing plaster she’d pasted over the cut in her forehead, and she said, “I just can’t have you here anymore. I just can’t.”

  For a moment of blank terror Gredel wondered if Antony’s body had come bobbing up under Old Iola Bridge, but then realized that wasn’t it. The previous evening had put Nelda in a position of having to decide who she loved more, Antony or Gredel. She’d opted for Antony, unaware that he was no longer an o
ption.

  Gredel went to her mother’s, and Ava’s objections died the moment she saw the bruise on her cheek. Gredel told her what happened—not being stupid, she left out what she’d asked Lamey to do—and Ava hugged her and said she was proud of her.

  Ava worked with cosmetics for a long time to hide the damage, then she took Gredel to Maranic Town, to Bonifacio’s for ice cream.

  Ava, Lamey, and Panda helped carry Gredel’s belongings to Ava’s place, arms and boxes full of the clothing Lamey and Caro had bought her—the blouses and pants and frocks and coats and capes and hats and shoes and jewelry—all the stuff that had long ago overflowed the closets in her room at Nelda’s and for the most part was lying in neat piles on the old, worn carpet.

  Panda was highly impressed by the tidiness of it. “You’ve got a system here,” he said.

  Ave was in a better situation than usual. Her man was married and visited only at regularly scheduled intervals, and he didn’t mind if she spent her free time with family or friends. But Ava didn’t have many friends—her previous men hadn’t let her have any—so she was delighted to spend time with her daughter.

  Lamey was disappointed that Gredel didn’t want to move into one of his apartments. “I need my ma right now,” Gredel said, and that seemed to satisfy him.

  I don’t want to live with someone who’s going to be killed soon. She kept that thought to herself. And she wondered if she was obliged to live with the boy who had killed for her.

  Caro was disappointed as well. “You could have moved in with me!” she said.

  Shimmering delight sang in Gredel’s mind. “You wouldn’t mind?”

  “No!” Caro was enthusiastic. “We could be sisters! We could shop and go out—have fun.”

  For days Gredel basked in the warm attentions of Caro and her mother. She spent almost all her time with one or the other, to the point that Lamey began to get jealous, or at least to pretend that he was jealous—Lamey was sometimes hard to read that way. “Caro’s kidnapped you,” he half joked over the phone. “I’m going to have to send the boys to fetch you back.”