Empire's End

by Chris Bunch

  "Welcome home," he said.

  "Thanks, boss."

  "No offense. But you look like slok."

  "Lad, i' wae a noisesome task Ah set myself."

  "You were blown?"

  "Aye. But noo by th' Emp, thoo Ah hae an in'trestin' run in wi' India Sierra as we w're runnin't th' mission. An' noo on Earth. An Ah'll noo 'splain. But Ah hae traces ae whae Ah wen' lookin't for, which Ah'll noo 'splain till we face-t'-face.

  "Whae's been th' haps i' m' absence?"

  And Sten found himself briefing Alex. Further, telling him about the com from Ecu/Marr/Senn. He stopped short, without mentioning his decision.

  "Ah." Alex nodded. "Ah ken. Y' noo hae a choice, do y'?"

  Sten didn't answer.

  "Ah'll hae th' Victory packed an' liftin' wi'in an E-day after Ah return, lad."

  Sten blinked.

  Alex smiled. "Y' noo thought thae was whae Ah meant, did y'? Y' were thinkin't aboot duty an' respons'bility, aye?"

  "Something like that."

  "Well… consider all thae lads an' lassies thae went rebel wi' y. Some went oot frae selfish reasons, some went oot frae reasons ae' aidin' th' gran' cause ae civil'zation. But more went oot 'cause they're servin't y'r wee smilin't face, lad.

  "F some ways, 'tis noo a good part ae life, wee Sten. We all should mak't decisions wi' logic an' frae th' good ae all livin't things.

  "But thae's noo how it works.

  "An' i' the foolish ones who're servin't you because y're one wee mon, shouldnae you be thinkin't th' same? Willin''t' spend y'rself f r th' life ae one wee fellow rebel? 'Cause if you're noo willin't't' go doon i' flames like thae, then we're noo dif'frent thae the Emp, and p'raps should cast i' our lot immed'jately.

  "V sh'd noo be sendi't frae which fool th' bell tolls frae, an' thae, aye?

  "Ah reck y' hae noo choice othern't to gie y'self a'ter Haines an' th' two furballs."

  It was completely wrong, and one of the more stupid things that Sten could do. And why he decided to go for it. What the clot, the rebellion was doomed anyway. He had zip-burp chance of toppling the Empire. So why not go down in flames on a noble gesture?

  "GA," he started. Then he caught himself, and an evil smile spread across his face. He remembered a scam he had worked once before on a prison break, and thought he could ring yet another change on it.

  "Negative, Mister Kilgour. I won't need the Victory. All I need is one Bhor robohulk and the Aoife. There's no reason I have to be a complete Don Quickshot. Oh yeah. And one livie crew and some actors. I want three pilot sorts, two goons, and one idiot with steel teeth. Unbathed and whacko-looking. All human. Oh yeah. I need about fifteen or so terrified cute children.

  "Now, get your butt down here. I have need of your talents. And somebody to hold the fort while I'm off playing Sir Gawaine. Clear."

  Sten's plan took less than half a day to accomplish.

  He was still going out to his death, but at least in a sneaky, dirty, underhanded sort of way instead of the imbecilic "charge in full dress uniform waving an ivory-hilted can opener" that he had always despised.

  "Soward Control, this is the transport Juliette. Now in normal space, coordinates transmitted… now. Using commercial orbit Quebec Niner Seven. Request landing instructions. Over."

  And so terror came to Prime World.

  "Juliette, this is Soward Control. Have your coordinates. Transmitting landing data… now. Please enter data and activate ALS at termination of your orbit Quebec Niner Seven, over."

  "Soward, this is Juliette. Wait one… uh, I've got a slight problem with your data, Control. That'll park us on the far southeast corner of the field, correct?"

  "That's an affirm."

  "Got a favor to ask, Soward. Any possibility of getting closer? I've got a shipload of scholarship kids aboard, and they'd get a boot out of seeing things a little closer. Plus that's a long walk to the terminal. Can we get a shuttle?"

  "This is Soward. No problem. We'll tuck you right over here, near the tower. Transmitting new data… now. And for a shuttle… all we've got is commercial. Shall I notify a carrier?"

  "This is Juliette. Thanks for the shift. And, uh, negative on that commercial carrier. My kids don't have a lot of money. This is one of those starving-students hops."

  "Roger. Maybe we can—"

  And the Juliette's signal cut.

  "Juliette, this is Soward Control. Juliette, please respond to this transmission."

  Static. No response. The controller automatically hit EMERGENCY and STANDBY buttons.

  "This is the tower," he said. "I've got an inbound, closing on final, and they went off the air. Info from pilot said they've got children aboard. Stand by."

  Rescue crews rolled into their vehicles.

  The controller fingered a touchpad, and went to both the standard landing and the Imperial Standard emergency freqs.

  "Juliette, this is—"

  "Who is this?" It was a new voice, from the Juliette.

  "This is Soward Landing Control. Identify yourself. Is this the Julliette?

  A laugh.

  "Yeah. Yeah. Is this the visual-transmit switch… yeah. Here we go."

  A acreen cleared, and showed an appalling scene. It was the control room of the Juliette. The four beings in the flight crew sprawled in bloody pools. In front of the pickup was a wild-eyed man, wearing a filthy, stained shipsuit. He held a gun.

  Behind him were two equally repellent assistants. Each of them held a wriggling child in one arm—and held a knife pressed to that child's throat.

  "See what you got," the man said. "Now. I want a straight patch to an Imperial livie station. Now!"

  "I can't—"

  The man gestured, and one of his assistants slashed a throat. Blood gouted, the other child screamed, and a body flopped on the deck.

  "Get another one," the man said, and his pet goon vanished, and came back dragging another preteenager. "You see? We ain't drakhin' around. Get a—"

  And the dispatcher was hitting keys.

  "You better sound convincing," the hijacker said. "Because I got me another fourteen crumbsnatchers I don't mind thin-slicin'. Or doin'… some other things to them. Stuff that's worse."

  So began the drama of the Juliette. The feed went live on K-B-N-S-O, back on the air, but broadcasting from a temporary, planetary headquarters.

  Prime World came to a stop as the battered transport orbited over Soward Spaceport. The man announced what he wanted.

  "I want a link to the Eternal Emperor. Not on a clottin' com like this. But face to face. He's gotta settle something. He's gotta stop doing to my family what he done. It ain't right for nobody that big to be feuding like he was some kind of backcountry pencilneck, it ain't. And it's gonna come to an end, it is. My family's near wiped out.

  "Hell, if there ain't no clottin' change, I'm subject to send this clottin' transport at full drive straight into that clottin' palace of his. You tell the Emperor that."

  Hostage-rescue teams were assembled, and waited to see if they'd be called on for the last resort of boarding the Juliette. The Imperial fleet patrolling offworld closed on Prime. Arundel's already alert security elements were ready with AA missiles held one count from launch, and would fire if the Juliette headed toward the Emperor's palace.

  Of course there would be, there could be, no meeting between the Eternal Emperor and the men aboard the Juliette. Terror must not be surrendered to.

  Negotiators began the long slow drone, trying to bore the hijackers into surrender. But the hijackers didn't respond—the only response they made was either to repeat their preposterous demand, to stare blankly at the pickup, or occasionally to shut down without a warning.

  The livies ate it with a spoon. The story had everything. Crazed terrorists. The cutest on-camera kids since they caught child star Shirlee Rich in bed with her orangutan. Understanding shrinks analyzing everything endlessly. Experts trying to figure out just what world the still-unknown hijackers could have come from. W
arships blasting back and forth across the sky. Unknown movement of forces that not even the biggest sleaze livie show host would speculate on, to avoid possibly exposing a secret rescue plan. Lloyds insurance executives explaining what might have happened to the transport Juliette since it had disappeared into Imperial Special Service all the way back during the Tahn war. Noble-looking special-weapons teams ready to sacrifice their all.

  Best of all, it was real.

  The only challenge the Aoife got as it closed on Prime was mechanical, perfunctory, and at least three cycles out of date. Berhal Waldman didn't even have to analyze the challenge, but found it in a standard code-fiche. Everybody was preoccupied.

  The Aoife went straight in for a landing.

  No one noticed, even in the tiny village at the far end of the narrow valley. That abominable monster aboard the Juliette had just butchered another child.

  The destroyer may have been a tiny ship—in space, and compared to a battlewagon/carrier like the Victory, or on the wide, bare tarmac of a landing field where the eye couldn't provide any scale. But it made the tower it landed beside into a toy. Waldman's fingers ran across the keys, keeping the Aoife hanging just clear of the ground on its McLean generators. It would not do to leave a five-meter-deep impression in the middle of the beautifully-laid-out garden. Not only for aesthetic reasons, but that might suggest to the curious what had happened.

  There was no movement from the tower.

  The Aoife's chainguns swept the pinnacle, Honjo fingers hovering above firing keys.

  The ship's ramp slid down, and Sten came out. He was wearing combat armor, and carried a willygun. But his helmet face was open.

  Waldman thought that was truly insane—Internal Security could be waiting just inside. But Sten couldn't figure out any other way to let beings know they were being rescued, not attacked.

  He was nearly at the door before it opened.

  Marr and Senn stood there.

  "I must say," Marr said. "You certainly arrive in a baroque manner, my young captain."

  "Yeah. Baroque. Let's get the clot out of here before somebody baroques us in half. Later for the aphorisms, troops."

  And Haines was there, in the doorway.

  "Took you long enough."

  "Sorry. Hadda stop and tie my bootlaces."

  Behind Haines, a human male. Slender. Balding. Early middle age. Dressed about ten years out of style. Sten flashguessed that was Haines's husband. Not at all the sort of man he would have expected her to end up with.

  Don't be considering that, idiot. Like you just told everybody else. Book.

  Senn, Haines, and Sam'l ran for the ship. Marr hesitated for a moment, then bent and picked up a small, multihued pebble.

  "There might be nothing left to come back to."

  And then he, too, boarded the Aoife, Sten close behind him.

  "Lift, sir?" Waldman asked as Sten boiled into the control room.

  "Wait one."

  He looked at a screen, which showed the bridge of the Juliette. No one was in front of the pickup, either hostage or terrorist.

  "Send it."

  "Yessir." The com operator next to the screen hit a button, and the Aoife broadcast a single letter in code to the Juliette.

  Onscreen chaos.

  Shouts. Screams. The hijackers, bellowing incomprehensibly. A young girl broke away and tried to run. She was shot down. The hijacker was shrieking in some never-to-be-translated tongue. His pistol swayed, then blasted. Straight into the pickup! Dead air.

  "Oh my dear, oh my dear," Marr moaned, arms around Senn. "Those poor baby humans!"

  "Yep," Sten said. "Terrible, terrible. And it's going to get worse. Berhal Waldman, take us up. About five hundred meters, please."

  The Aoife shot skyward.

  Sten was quite a prophet, as a second screen went to life, this time on a commercial station.

  Blur… snap-focus… a battered spaceship… McLean units off… haze from the ship's stern as the Yukawa drive went to full…

  Screaming incoherence from some liviecaster: "Horror… Horror… oh the horror of it all…"

  "Full drive, if you please. , ."

  The Aoife slammed into hyperspace, sonic boom as air rushed to fill the vacuum left by the destroyer.

  That explosion went unheard, buried by a greater one as the Juliette crashed straight into the center of Soward's main landing field. There was no fire, no rubble. Just a smoking crater.

  Sten turned sadly as the Aoife's pickup lost the commercial 'cast.

  "What an awful thing," he said. "All those beautiful little children, spread over the landscape like so much strawberry preserves. Strawberry? Tomato. Saltier-tasting.

  "And so coincidental, too. Unfortunate for them, although they'd probably all grow up to be ax-murderers or lawyers or something, but certainly providential for us.

  "As Mister Kilgour says, God never takes away with one hand but he gives with the other."

  Marr and Senn uncurled from their woe and their great eyes focused on Sten. Haines verbalized it.

  "You know, you're an utter bastard, Sten."

  "That's what my mother always said," Sten agreed happily.

  "Thanks," she said, quite seriously.

  "Hey. It wasn't that much. You know me. Saint Sten. Slayer of Virtuous Maidens. Rescuer of Dragons."

  Amid the banter Sten felt very, very good about himself. And very surprised they'd gotten away with it.

  Officially, the Juliette incident remained a tragic event, another example of the growing collective psychopathology of an overcomplex civilization. Privately, though, investigators were fairly sure they had been snookered. Not that any trace of the tape Sten's actors had carefully prepared during the flight out from Vi remained. Nothing remained of the Bhor robohulk except a hole in the tarmac and a wisp or six of greasy smoke. But investigators knew they would have found some carbon traces of the eighteen or more beings who died before or in the crash, no matter how thorough the splatter.

  When Sten heard that, as a passed-along rumor, he swore mightily. If he had given the situation one more thought, he could have scored ten or so beef carcasses from a butcher shop, and no one would ever have known.

  Three mighty Imperial battlefleets flashed out of hyperspace in the Ystm system, all weapons stations manned and ready to obliterate the rebellion.

  Six worlds and their moons and moonlets orbited a dead star.

  Nothingness.

  No Sten.

  No rebel fleet.

  No nothing.

  And as far as the most sophisticated analysis could determine, no known ship had ever entered this system. It had been named on a star chart and never explored. Not that there was anything worth exploring.

  Sten's big con had worked. Or, rather, was working. He had never considered raiding Al-Sufi, of course, nor going anywhere that close to Prime World with his tiny battlefleet.

  The deception that had been leaked through Hohne's doubled net and other agents around the Empire was just the first step.

  Sten was playing liar's poker with the Emperor.

  This time, there was nothing there.

  Next time, in another system, there might be traces that Sten or some of his ships had recently passed through.

  Not only was this game something that could be played over and over again—the Emperor could not and would not ignore any reports of Sten's presence—and burn AM2, Imperial ships and supplies, whatever faith the Imperial Navy had in its intelligence, and the Eternal Emperor's arse, but it would have a payoff.

  One that would shake the Imperial forces to their souls.

  Chapter Fifteen

  SUBADAR-MAJOR CHETHABAHADUR SNAPPED a crisp salute. "Sah! Reporting as ordered, sah."

  "Sit down, Subadar-Major," Poyndex said. "No need for formality."

  Chethabahadur sat, his small, slender body stiff in the seat.

  "I'm afraid I have some very bad news," Poyndex said. "I'm sorry to be the one bearing it. But there'
s no sense beating about the brambles and making things worse. So here it is. As you know, the Eternal Emperor holds you people in great esteem for your years of dedicated service."

  Chethabahadur blinked. Very quickly. All other reactions were caught in time. The phrase "you people" was clearly an insult worthy of a cut throat. The "years of dedicated service" numbered in the hundreds, which meant that Poyndex should have had his throat cut a second time. As for "high esteem"—well, it was almost too much.

  The subadar-major kept his expression mild, wondering at the several miracles allowing this toady to remain alive after mewling such nonsense.

  "Very high esteem, indeed," Poyndex continued. "Unfortunately, he has found himself in a terrible position. Money is very tight now, you understand. Cutbacks and belt tightening has been ordered all through the services."

  "Yes, sah," Chethabahadur said. "The Gurkhas have done their part, sah. But if further reductions are required, sah… be assured we are ready."

  Poyndex smiled condescendingly. "How generous. But that won't be necessary. Under the circumstances. You see, I have been ordered to disband your unit. As I said, I'm very sorry. But we all have to make sacrifices in times like these."

  Without hesitation, Chethabahadur said, "No need to apologize, sah. Tell the Emperor the Gurkha stand ready for any command. If he needs us to disband, sah… and return to Nepal… well, it shall be done. And without complaint, sah. Assure him of that."

  Another Poyndex smile. "Oh, I will. I certainly will."

  The subadar-major came to his feet and snapped another salute. "Then if that is all, sah, I will depart to inform my men."

  Poyndex made with a weak reply to the salute. "Yes… That is all… And thank you very much."

  "It is you who are to be thanked, sah," Chethabahadur said. He spun and marched from the room.

  Poyndex eased back in his chair, pleased with himself for a difficult task well done… although he was surprised at how easy the Gurkha major had taken the news.

  Such loyalty.

  Blind, ignorant loyalty.

  Poyndex laughed. He keyed his com and ordered his Internal Security troops to the posts of the departing Gurkhas.

  Outside, in the corridor leading away from Poyndex's office, one floor below the Emperor's private quarters, Chethabahadur had to force down the sudden desire to leap high in the air and click his heels.