The Lost Stars 01-Tarnished Knight

by Jack Campbell

  Iceni looked down, her eyes hooded, recalling the messages she had received from Black Jack. “I can’t be sure of anything, but he seemed authentic. Just a military officer out to do his job. He’s either real, or he’s the best fraud I’ve ever seen.”

  “He has to be working some angle.”

  “If he were one of us, he would be.” Iceni fixed her eyes on Drakon’s. “Speaking of working angles, if I haven’t made it clear already, we still need each other. If you try to betray me, you might succeed, but even though the snakes are gone you’ll still go down with me. Just so you know.”

  Drakon smiled at her, his voice and expression betraying nothing. “I already assumed that. I have control of the ground forces on the surface here and elsewhere in the star system”—he used one hand to mime pointing a weapon at her head—“and you have control of the mobile forces.”

  She mimicked his gesture, pointing her own forefinger at him. “Let’s hope neither one of us is foolish enough to force the other to pull the trigger.”

  “What do I have to promise to make you feel secure returning to the surface?”

  “Your promises mean nothing.” Iceni watched him again, wishing she knew more about the man. “But I do have control of the mobile forces, and I will tell you that if anything happens to me, dead-man programs within their targeting systems will automatically launch a bombardment of the planet using every kinetic projectile aboard these warships.”

  “I’d hate to see that happen.”

  She couldn’t tell whether or not Drakon believed her. In fact, she hadn’t had the chance to set up such a system. But all that mattered was that Drakon believed she had, or remained uncertain about whether such a system to retaliate for her death existed. “Me, too. I’m glad we understand each other. I’ll be taking a shuttle down soon. I believe a face-to-face conference in a secure location as soon as possible is important. Where will we meet?”

  Drakon paused to think. She knew what he was concerned about. If he came to her offices, it would feed the impression that she was superior to him. But if she went to his headquarters to meet Drakon, it would imply that Drakon was ultimately in charge.

  “There’s a set of secure conference rooms the snakes maintained partway between your offices and my headquarters,” Drakon finally said. “We already went through them, looking for any snakes hiding out there, but I’ll make sure they’re swept again for snake surveillance gear and booby traps before you land. Is that acceptable?”

  It would mean trusting that Drakon and his people would do a good enough job on that sweep. But she would have her bodyguards with her, and they carried their own hidden gear for spotting danger of many kinds. Iceni considered the idea, then nodded. “All right. I’ll notify you when I’ve landed.”

  * * *

  WHEN she stepped off the shuttle Iceni could see Togo and several of her bodyguards waiting at the ramp. Much farther off, soldiers and military vehicles were positioned around the landing area. “Why are they here?” she asked.

  Togo made a helpless gesture. “Security and crowd control. They said. They have not attempted to hinder us in any way.”

  “We’ll see if that continues.” At least Drakon had shown the courtesy to keep his soldiers at a distance from her rather than placing them so close they might have seemed to be controlling Iceni.

  She started walking toward her offices. “How does everything look?”

  If Togo had wanted to say everything is fine, it was the perfect opening, but he didn’t respond that way. “Things could be worse.”

  As they cleared some of the barriers around the field, Iceni could see the crowds of citizens still filling the streets. The noise from them, which had formed a low-level background hum that Iceni hadn’t really noticed, rose in volume as Iceni came into view. After a tense moment she realized that once again she was hearing cheers. “For me?”

  “You are one of the liberators, CEO Iceni,” Togo replied, his expression deadpan. “The citizens are happy that thanks to you the mobile forces are no longer threats but have become guardians of their safety.”

  Iceni, moved by a silly impulse, raised one hand to wave and heard the cheers rise a little louder. It felt good, and frightening. “Drakon is calling himself General now. I need a new title. CEO has too many bad connotations, and reeks of the Syndicate Worlds.”

  Togo pulled out his hand unit as they kept walking, the bodyguards behind at a discreet distance. He punched in the query and frowned as he read the response. “There are many possible alternatives. Queen?”

  “A good job description but that might sound a bit autocratic to the citizens,” Iceni said.

  “There is no sense in telegraphing your intent,” Togo agreed. “Governor?”

  “Too subordinate-sounding.”

  “Prime Minister?”

  “First among ministers? No, I need to be first, period.”

  Togo consulted his unit again. “The Man.”

  “What?” Iceni asked.

  “The Man. Archaic. Very archaic.”

  “And obviously not me,” Iceni said.

  “The Big Cheese. The Big . . . Kahuna.”

  “Are you making these up or actually reading those titles?”

  “I am reading them, Madam CEO. How about Czar, Kaiser, or Caesar? The first two were derived from the last.” Togo frowned again. “But they all mean absolute ruler. Leader, Khan, Sheik, Pasha, Sultan, She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed . . .”

  “I like that last one.”

  “And it is fitting,” Togo agreed. “But it might cause the citizens to believe that you have simply altered your brand name and intend to rule the same as a CEO.”

  “We can’t have them believing that, can we?” Iceni said.

  “How about the President? Or First Citizen?”

  “That first one is a possibility. How does one become a president?”

  Togo consulted the definition. “President describes the position as preeminent and is nonspecific as to the source of authority. It has been used for leaders of entities ranging from absolute dictatorships to societies so populist that they are only one step removed from total anarchy. Calling you the President may be a good choice.”

  “President Iceni.” She tried out the title, saying it slowly. “The President, because there are no others. I do like that.”

  “May I be the first to congratulate you, President Iceni?” Togo said.

  “You may. Let’s go see General Drakon.”

  * * *

  THE office building holding the secure conference rooms which had once belonged to the ISS had a nondescript façade. It had no sign or other identification beyond the street number and could have hosted any of a thousand kinds of modest businesses. The ISS had always displayed that two-faced approach to the outside universe. On the one hand, omnipresent and obvious surveillance systems, and headquarters or regional command centers that were large and clear signs of the power and presence of the snakes. On the other hand, lesser facilities hidden in places where they would least be expected, and other surveillance systems designed to be undetectable except by the most sophisticated equipment. The citizens of the Syndicate Worlds had always known that the ISS was there, but they had never known just where the ISS was, making for a powerful mix of justified fear and paranoia.

  Inside the offices, though, the snakes had spared no expense. Iceni strolled past the plush furnishings to stand before a floor-to-ceiling virtual window giving a view on a gorgeous stretch of beach. She might have actually been standing near the sand, hearing the muffled, rhythmic roar of the surf on the other side of an actual window. The primary world of the Midway Star System, usually also called Midway, had a lot of beaches, but the nearest of those was over twenty kilometers from this building. Iceni doubted that this view was that of the nearest shoreline. The positi
on of the sun appeared to be about an hour off, and the beach had the looks of one of the many archipelagoes that dotted the surface of Midway the planet, perhaps one of the island chains the ISS had declared off-limits to others so that the snakes could enjoy recreation there with privacy. The small continent on which the city was located, and which was the only other landmass boasted by the planet, had plenty of nice beaches, too; but they almost always had visitors on them since that was one of the few recreations for common citizens that the Syndicate Worlds hadn’t found a way to limit.

  The door opened and Drakon entered, followed by two other soldiers. Togo, already seated at the gleaming conference table, murmured subvocally into his mike, and Iceni heard the words clearly through her own pickup. “Bran Malin and Roh Morgan. General Drakon has converted their sub-CEO ranks to colonel. They are his closest and most trusted advisers.”

  Drakon nodded to Iceni. “All bodyguards outside? Good. Do you object to my two aides being here?”

  “Not if you don’t object to my assistant,” Iceni replied, moving back to the table and taking a seat next to Togo. She surreptitiously examined Drakon’s aides as she did so. Unlike Togo, who at nearly fifty standard years old was both physically fit and very experienced, both Malin and Morgan were relatively young, perhaps in their late twenties or early thirties. They appeared to be about the same age. But both seemed to be confident and comfortable in the unpretentious way of people who really knew their job well.

  The door sealed behind Drakon and a string of green lights flashed into life above it, indicating security systems active to prevent any intrusions or surveillance. He took a chair opposite Iceni, one colonel sitting to either side of him. “Here’s where we are right now,” Drakon began without further preamble. “I’ve got control of the surface and confirmed control of every important facility off the planet as well. My people are still conducting sweeps to ensure that no snakes are running loose on any of the islands. Until we complete those and make sure the populace is settled, I don’t have a lot of personnel to spare. The main mobile forces facility at the gas giant is under my control, but they’re afraid to blink because they say the mobile forces there are still controlled by snakes.”

  “That matches the communications I have received from heavy cruiser C-625,” Iceni said. “It is possible that the other warships there, one light cruiser and three Hunter-Killers, are still commanded by their own officers, but the snakes on those units must be alert and will not be easily overcome.”

  “Will they knock out the facility?”

  “I don’t think so,” Iceni said. “It’s a very valuable facility to whoever controls this star system, and they have no orders from superiors to do so. I believe they will soon head for the hypernet gate to report on events here to the government at Prime.”

  Drakon made a dissatisfied face. “And you lost two other cruisers as well?”

  That stung. “I lost one other cruiser, Kolani’s flagship C-990. She sabotaged it. C-818 took a lot of damage to its main propulsion, but I already have other units en route to take it in tow so we can have repairs done. We will have four heavy cruisers to defend this star system.” Not until Iceni had said it did she realize how pathetic that force level really sounded.

  But Colonel Malin commented before anyone else could. “That’s not much, but compared to what else is available out here now, and to the government on Prime, it’s a significant defense force.”

  “You can’t catch the last cruiser? C-625?” Drakon asked.

  “It’s one and a half light-hours distant, General,” Iceni replied. “Do you have any idea how many billions of kilometers that is?”

  “I’ve marched enough kilometers to know how far one is,” Drakon said, his voice growing sharper. “Maneuvering is a matter of planning ahead and outthinking the opponent.”

  Iceni smiled humorlessly. “I only wish space combat were as simple as ground combat.”

  “Simple?” She had apparently touched a nerve. Drakon openly glared at her. “I’m sure everything is all clean and easy and sterile up in space, where you can slam shots at the enemy and never see their faces, let alone the blood and bodies, but it’s different and harder in the mud.”

  Visions of the nightmare images from C-990 flashed into Iceni’s memory. To her own surprise, her voice came out fairly steady. “You may be seriously underestimating the impact of war even amid the silence of space.”

  Something in her tone nonetheless registered on Drakon, whose anger shaded into careful study of Iceni. “Did you lose many people up there?”

  “No. Except on C-990.”

  Togo intervened, speaking emotionlessly. “There were no survivors on C-990. Internal fighting killed everyone.”

  “Internal.” Drakon nodded and sat back. “That must have been ugly. All right. There are four heavy cruisers and some lighter units. I’ve got enough ground forces to hold the planet easily, especially once I get all the local troops up to speed now that I don’t have to worry about stepping on the toes of any CEOs a hundred light-years from here.”

  Iceni, regaining her own composure, brought up a display of this region of space. “According to the latest information we have, there are a few other mobile forces in nearby star systems. I’m going to send individual HuKs out to those star systems to invite those warships to join with us. The last we heard, there were mobile forces units at Taroa, Kahiki, and Lono.”

  “Nothing at Kane, Laka, Maui, or Iwa?” Drakon asked, naming the other four Syndicate star systems that could be reached from jump points at Midway. Being able to access such an unusually large number of other stars directly had given Midway its name.

  He didn’t have to ask about the eighth star that could be reached from Midway. Pele had been abandoned to the alien enigma race a long time ago. Every Syndicate ship sent there since that time had vanished without a trace.

  “Not to our knowledge,” Iceni replied. “The warships we send to Taroa, Kahiki, and Lono will also give us current information on what is happening in those star systems and anything they know about other places. Once they report back here I’ll send another wave out to check the remaining neighboring star systems.”

  “Good plan,” Drakon approved.

  Iceni watched him, judging her next move. Despite the fact that they had launched a rebellion together, they knew very little about each other as persons. Their coordination had of necessity been through the briefest possible means, all communications and the rare personal meeting in the course of their Syndicate duties carried out with official faces on. Anything else might have compromised their cooperation and plans to the ever-watchful snakes. Their official records were well-known to each other, but the things not in those records remained ambiguous. She knew Drakon’s face, but what lay behind it was another matter, and he surely felt the same regarding her.

  Making up her mind to confront a volatile issue, Iceni leaned forward. “Now that you’ve agreed with my plans for the mobile forces, I’d like some input on what your assets are doing. I understand that there are ground forces guarding the snakes’ family complexes.”

  “That’s right.” Drakon met her gaze without flinching. “All snakes have been pulled from the complexes. All that’s left are families.”

  “What do you intend doing with them, General?”

  Drakon paused, then blew out a long breath. “I’m still considering options.”

  To his left, Colonel Morgan managed to convey disapproval without moving a muscle or making a sound.

  Togo spoke into the silence that followed. “They will never be welcome, or safe, within this star system.”

  Once again, Drakon displayed simmering anger. “Then what are you proposing?”

  “It is too late to let the citizens resolve the issue for us—”

  “I don’t let someone else resolve issues in order to make it eas
ier for me,” Drakon snapped at Togo.

  Iceni kept her expression unrevealing as she watched Drakon. “They can’t stay here, and neither you nor I is willing to murder families en masse. That leaves one option. We put them on a ship and send them somewhere else. Back to Prime, perhaps.”

  Morgan finally spoke. “Waste a ship on that? We’d never see it again.”

  “That is likely,” Togo said. “It is not a cost-free option.”

  “They’re all going to want vengeance,” Morgan insisted. “When you kill a nest of snakes, you kill them all. Otherwise, the young and the others will come after you someday.”

  “That option,” Drakon said, “is not under consideration.”

  Iceni nodded. “I agree.”

  “General—” Morgan began.

  “That is all,” Drakon said.

  As Morgan sat back, her expression gone impassive, Colonel Malin nodded toward Iceni. “I believe that the ship suggestion may be our best option, especially if we contrive to impress the snake families with our military strength before they depart. C-625 will carry news of the forces here when it left. If we wait until C-625 departs, we could fool the snake family members into believing that our mobile forces have received new reinforcements and are far stronger than they are. That is what Prime would believe.”

  “Planted disinformation?” Iceni said. “Under cover of a humanitarian action? I like the way that you think, Colonel.”

  Togo made a small gesture of agreement. “One merchant ship would be a small price to pay for misleading the Syndicate government as to our strength.”

  Left unsaid was something they all knew. With so many star systems spinning out of Syndicate control, the government on Prime had to choose which ones were marked for reconquest. Midway, with its hypernet gate, its access to multiple star systems, and its connection to space controlled by the enigma race, would be a priority for such a counterattack. It wasn’t a matter of whether or not Prime would send an attack force to try to reassert its authority, but when that would happen.