The Praxis

by Walter Jon Williams

  “Yes, my lord,” Martinez said, tasting the bitterness that striped his tongue at the knowledge of what he’d have to say next.

  Delay, he told himself. Delay was all. Delay would justify everything.

  “If you’ll just give me the code word,” he told Tarafah, “I’ll swing the ship around and start the deceleration.”

  Tarafah had started to turn, ready to return the football pitch, but now he swung back to the camera. “The what?” he said.

  Martinez tried to keep his face earnest. “The code word,” he said. “The code word you gave me last night.”

  A snarl of frustration crossed Tarafah’s face. “What are you talking about, Martinez?”

  “Remember?” Martinez said, sorrow and dread entering his heart even as he tried to keep his face earnest and eager. “Remember at dinner? When I raised my suspicions about the Naxid movements, you told me that no one was to board Corona unless you gave the password.”

  “I never gave you a password!” Tarafah said. “What are you driveling about?”

  He seemed genuinely baffled. Sadness weighed on Martinez like the slow, inevitable pressure of gravity. Tarafah didn’t yet understand just how seriously he had been betrayed.

  “The password that tells me that you’re free and uncoerced,” Martinez said. “You’ve got to give me the password, my lord, before I can turn Corona around.”

  “I didn’t give you anything—” The camera on Tarafah jiggled. “—Anything of the sort. I—” He hesitated, his eyes cutting out of frame, then back. “I demand that you turn Corona around and return to the ring station!”

  “Without the password?” Martinez said, and this time he allowed his sorrow to show. “I understand, Lord Elcap. End transmission.”

  He could have kept the dialogue going for another few rounds, but he didn’t have the heart for it.

  He had bought time, and he had bought it with his captain. It would take time for the Naxids to get a password out of Tarafah, the more so because the password did not exist.

  For a moment Martinez gave himself up to the images of Tarafah being slashed with stun batons, battered, shackled, shot. He saw Tarafah lying in his blood, insisting through pain-clenched teeth that there was no password.

  Delay. He had bought time, that was the important thing.

  He paged Alikhan again. “Anything?”

  “There was a safe in the elcap’s office, my lord. Nothing in it but documents.”

  “Have you searched the office?”

  “I’m doing so now, my lord.”

  “Shall I send you help?”

  “Can you trust anyone else for the job, my lord?”

  The question brought Martinez up short. Who could he trust? The captain’s and lieutenants’keys were the most dangerous items on the ship. It was a capital crime—one of those involving flaying and dismemberment—to possess a key that didn’t belong to you. Was there anyone on the crew who was truly convinced that it was necessary to get ahold of the keys, and actually obey the order?

  Martinez considered the matter, then laughed as a possibility occurred to him. He checked the crew manifests to find where the crew action stations were, then paged Zhou and Knadjian. The two stared at him from the displays, surprise plain on their bruised faces.

  “I want you to report to Alikhan in the captain’s office and follow his instructions,” he told them, to their further surprise.

  Corona’s merry thugs should have a fine old time tearing the captain’s stateroom to bits.

  “My lord!” Tracy, the sensor operator, gave a sudden surprised squeak. “Ferogash has launched!”

  A cruiser, roughly twice Corona’s size. “Do you have a course?” Martinez asked.

  “It hasn’t fired its torch, my lord. It’s just separated from the ring station.”

  “Let me know if it goes anywhere.”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  The Naxids were planning something for Ferogash, and Martinez was willing to venture that Corona featured in that plan.

  He thought a moment, then paged the captain’s secretary. “Saavedra,” he said, “you understand our situation.”

  Saavedra gave him a careful look, lips pinched beneath broad mustachios. “I understand your explanation of the situation, Lord Lieutenant.”

  Martinez found growing in himself a distinct lack of enthusiasm for warrant officers who made these sorts of rhetorical distinctions.

  “Do you understand that Corona is in danger?” he asked. “That we may be fired on?”

  Saavedra gave a terse nod. “I understand, my lord.”

  “In order to activate the defensive weaponry, I need the captain’s key. Do you know where the captain keeps it?”

  Saavedra’s eyes hardened. His jaw firmed. “I do not, my lord.”

  “Are you certain? The lives of everyone on this ship may be at stake.”

  “I don’t know where the key is, my lord.”

  “You’ve never come across it? You’ve never seen him take it off, or take it from a drawer, or from his safe…?”

  “On the sole occasions on which I have seen the captain’s key, it has been around the captain’s neck.”

  Martinez decided he didn’t like warrant officers who used excessively formal diction either. He considered visiting Saavedra in whatever compartment he sheltered in and blowing a hole in his knee in hopes a memory might leak out. But the fantasy was only that; he didn’t dare leave Command.

  Sweet reason would have to prevail.

  “I need you to think,” Martinez urged. “Think about where the captain puts his valuables. Where he might hide something precious. Anything you can tell me.”

  Saavedra looked imperiously from the display. “I shall consult my memory, my lord.”

  “Consult away.” Disgusted. “End transmission.”

  For the next fourteen minutes Ferogash continued to drift away from the ring station without maneuvering. Alikhan reported no success, even after the two reinforcements arrived and Martinez suggested thumping the paneling for secret compartments and tearing open the captain’s pantry. If the office had been carpeted, he would have suggested ripping up the rugs.

  Then another transmission came from Ring Command. “It’s Deghbal, my lord,” Vonderheydte reported.

  “Tell him to stand by.”

  Martinez counted a minute and a half, as much as he dared, then answered.

  “This is Martinez, my lord.”

  Deghbal’s black-on-green eyes glimmered in the lights of the ring’s command center. “Your captain has recalled the password he gave you,” he said. “The password is ‘offsides.’ ”

  Martinez tried to look relieved, as if the word were the thing he desired most in all the world instead of the first thing Tarafah could think of when the pain finally grew too great to bear.

  “Thank you, my lord,” Martinez breathed. “Now may I hear the word from Lord Elcap Tarafah himself?”

  “Lord Tarafah is unavailable,” Deghbal said. “Your team has just won a victory, four points to one. The field is in turmoil. There is much celebration. I don’t believe we could locate Captain Tarafah even if we wished to.”

  Martinez forced onto his face what he hoped was an ingratiating smile. “I’d still like to hear it from the captain, if I may.”

  “You may not!” Deghbal’s response was immediate, and sharp. “This has gone on long enough. You will return Corona to her berth at once.”

  “I’d very much like to hear that from my captain.”

  “You will return immediately!” Captain Deghbal’s voice contained the glottal throb that was the Naxid equivalent of a snarl. “There have been enough games today!” Deghbal leaned toward the camera, his black beaded lips drawn back. “If you fail in your obedience, I will order that your ship be fired upon.”

  “Just because I want to speak to my captain?” Martinez said. He widened his eyes in feigned disbelief. “Just let me hear the word from my captain and everything will be fine.”


  “Obey my order or face the consequences.” Deghbal reared back, his black-on-green eyes glaring.

  Martinez said nothing, simply leaned back in his couch and looked impassively at the camera. He could think of no other way to delay things. He and Deghbal stared at each other for a long, long moment…Martinez counted eight seconds. Then Deghbal gave a contemptuous flick of one hand.

  “End transmission.” The orange End Transmission symbol appeared, and Martinez told the display to vanish.

  Now we die, he thought.

  But nothing happened right away. Corona’s engines burned on for another nine minutes before anything was heard from the ring station.

  “Ferogash is maneuvering, my lord!” from Tracy.

  “Ferogash firing main engines!” echoed Clarke.

  Martinez tried to control his suddenly leaping heart. “What course?”

  “Zero-zero-one by zero-zero-one. Course due north, my lord. Two gravities and accelerating.” The 313-degree Shaa compass had no zero coordinate, but began instead with one, the odd number left over after factoring the prime number. The one, of course, stood for the One True Way of the Praxis.

  Ferogash wasn’t chasing, it was heading north, the quickest way to clear the ring and open fire.

  “Page crewman Saavedra,” Martinez said.

  The warrant officer’s supercilious face appeared promptly.

  “We’re about to be fired on by a cruiser twice our strength,” Martinez said. “If you’ve got any ideas about where the captain keeps his key, it’s time to let me know.”

  “I have no idea, Lord Lieutenant,” Saavedra said. “I had no desire to know where the captain kept his key, and I paid no attention to it.”

  “Missile flares!” Clarke called. “Three, five, six…eight missile tracks, my lord!”

  “We’ve got eight missiles coming our way,” Martinez told Saavedra. “If you’ve got any ideas about the key, you’d better let me know.”

  Saavedra stared stonily at Martinez. “You could surrender, my lord, and return to base,” he said. “I’m sure the fleetcom would order the missiles disarmed if you obeyed her command.”

  The total, incorruptible bastard, Martinez snarled. Kneecapping was too good for him.

  “Fourteen minutes to detonation, my lord,” Tracy said.

  “You’ve got less than fourteen minutes to think of something we haven’t tried,” Martinez told Saavedra. “Then you can die with the rest of the crew.” He signed off and turned to Kelly. “Weapons. I want you to prepare to launch one of the pinnaces as a decoy.”

  “Yes, my lord.” She hesitated, then turned her dark eyes to Martinez. “My lord, ah—how exactly would I do that?”

  “We fire the pinnace on the same course, but a slower speed. We hope the missiles lock onto the pinnace instead of us.”

  Without the captain’s key, the two pinnaces were the only things Martinez could launch. Unfortunately, they weren’t armed, so they were useless for offense, and the chances of one of the missiles mistaking a pinnace for the frigate were slim to none.

  Kelly blinked at her console. “I think I can do that, my lord.”

  “Good. Let me know when you’re ready, and I’ll check your work.”

  She seemed reassured. “Very good, my lord.”

  Martinez called Alikhan. “Have you tried searching Koslowski’s cabin again?”

  “We have, my lord.”

  “Any new ideas at all?”

  “Nothing, my lord.”

  “Right then. Get your people into the officers’ racks. I’m going to kick some gees.” To Mabumba. “Acceleration warning.”

  The wailed cry of the acceleration warning sounded. “Very good, my lord.”

  He increased Corona’s acceleration to six gees while he tried desperately to think of a way to escape. The heavy gravity should have wearied him but his mind blazed with ideas—radical maneuvers, imaginative improvision of decoys, suicide pinnace dives into the ring station—all of them pointless. The only thing he’d succeeded at was slowing the rate at which the missiles were closing, and buying his crew a few more minutes’ life.

  “Twelve minutes, my lord.”

  Martinez realized that his mind was racing too quickly to actually be of any use, and he tried to slow himself down, go through everything he knew step by step.

  Garcia had told him that Koslowski never wore his lieutenant’s key while playing football. Koslowski was the only one of Corona’s officers who Martinez definitely knew wasn’t wearing his key, so that meant he should concentrate on Koslowski.

  The sensible place for Koslowski to put his key would be in the safe in his cabin, but Koslowski hadn’t been that sensible. He hadn’t put it in any other obvious place in his cabin either. So where else could he have gone?

  Where else did officers go?

  The wardroom. It was where the officers ate and relaxed. There was a locked pantry where the officers kept their drinks and delicacies.

  But the wardroom was an insecure place, there were people in cleaning, and the wardroom steward and cook both had keys to the pantry. The wardroom seemed highly unlikely.

  Perhaps Koslowski gave the key to someone he trusted. But the only likely candidates were on the team.

  “Ten minutes, my lord.”

  Fine, Martinez went on, but if officers weren’t going to be wearing their keys, they were supposed to return them to their captain. So on the assumption that Koslowski did what he was supposed to do, where did Tarafah put it?

  Not in either of his safes. Not in his desk. Not in his drawers. Not under his mattress or in a secret compartment in the custom mahogany paneling of his walls.

  He put it…around his neck. Martinez’s heart sank. He could picture it happening, picture Tarafah looping the elastic cord around his neck and tucking the key down the front of his sweats, to join his own captain’s key nestled against his chest hairs…

  No. Martinez put the image firmly from his mind. The key had to be somewhere else.

  “Nine minutes, my lord.” The words were spoken over a long, groaning shudder from Corona’s stressed frame.

  Would Fanaghee accept Corona’s surrender? Martinez wondered. He could safely assume that she would want the frigate back, certainly. But—perhaps of more vital interest—would Fanaghee accept Martinez’s surrender?

  Martinez thought not. His blood would probably still be decorating the walls of Command when Fanaghee put her new captain on board. Perhaps it would be easier on everyone if he just took his sidearm and blew out his own brains.

  No. Martinez put the thought out of his mind. Where was the key?

  He pictured Koslowski’s cabin, exactly like his own…small, the narrow gimbaled bed, the washstand, the large wardrobe that contained the formidable number of uniforms required, the chests with the grand amount of gear an officer was expected to carry with him from one posting to the next. The shelves, the small desk with its computer access.

  There just wasn’t any room to hide something. A cabin was small.

  He knew that the captain’s sleeping cabin was larger, though he’d never been in it, but he couldn’t imagine it would be very different.

  And then there was the captain’s office. The desk, with its computer access. The safe. The shelves, and all the football trophies.

  The trophies. The glittering objects, standing in his office and braced against high gee, that meant more to Lieutenant Captain Tarafah than anything else, including probably his command. The objects that he savored every day, that he probably caressed in secret.

  Martinez was so transfixed by the memory of the trophies that he failed to hear the words that were spoken to him.

  “Sorry?” he said absently. “Repeat, please.”

  “I think I’ve configured the pinnace as you wished,” Kelly said.

  “Right. Stand by.”

  He paged Alikhan. “Did you check the trophies?” he demanded.

  “My lord?”

  “Did you l
ook in the trophies? The Home Fleet Trophies are cups, aren’t they?”

  He could hear Alikhan’s chagrin even through the strain that six gravities was putting on his voice.

  “No, my lord. I didn’t think to look.”

  “Engines!” Martinez cried. “Reduce acceleration to one gravity!”

  “Reducing acceleration to one gravity, my lord,” Mabumba repeated.

  Corona’s beams groaned as the oppressive weight eased. Martinez gasped in air, grateful to breathe without labor. He took a half-dozen sweet breaths, then impatience drove him to demand information.

  “What are you finding, Alikhan?”

  “I’m trying to work the catch to the lid now, my lord. There…I’m reaching inside…”

  In the silence that followed, even over the remorseless percussion of his heart, Martinez could hear the metallic scrape of Alikhan’s fingernails whispering against the inside of the cup. And then he heard Alikhan’s deep sigh, a sigh that to Martinez seemed filled with all the despair in the universe…

  “Six minutes, my lord.” Tracy’s words were leaden.

  “I’ve got them both, Lord Gareth,” said Alikhan in a voice of quiet exultation.

  For an instant the hopelessness still clung like a shroud to Martinez’s mind, and then it was obliterated by an electric surge of triumph that almost had him whooping aloud.

  “Activate the captain’s desk display,” he said. “Insert his key. Prepare to turn on my mark. Weapons! Kelly! Catch!”

  Cadet Kelly turned as Martinez fished in his pocket for Garcia’s key. The expression on her face was luminous, as if with glowing eyes she were seeing Martinez descend from heaven on rainbow clouds.

  The cadet stretched out her lanky arms, and Martinez tossed her the key.

  “Insert and turn on my mark.”

  “Very good, my lord!”

  Martinez opened his tunic and pulled his own key off over his head. He inserted the key into the silvery metal slot on the command console before him.

  “Weapons. Alikhan. Turn on my mark. Three. Two. One. Mark.”

  Kelly gave a dazzled smile as the weapons board lit up before her eyes. Another light appeared on Martinez’s board, indicating that the weapons were free.