Tevedes sighed. “Yeah. No matter how hard you try, some things just can’t be kept secret.”
Planetfall, Atlas
The fast frigate CNSS Admiral Nelson was under power, a day away from Atlas orbit, when a government launch docked at her larboard personnel hatch to put aboard the pilot who would supervise her insertion into orbit. Unknown to the pilot or the launch’s crew, the Admiral Nelson ’s starboard cargo hatch was already open to the vacuum of space. As soon as the clangs of the docking launch sounded in the ship, a StealthGhost shuttle was ejected through the cargo hatch, the sound of its ejection lost in the noise of the launch’s docking. The navy’s stealth lander, called the AstroGhost and used exclusively for clandestine insertions, was about the same size as an Essay, the navy’s standard surface-to-orbit shuttle, though its cargo capacity was little more than half that of the Essay. The AstroGhost was matte black to make it almost impossible to see in visual except as a hole in the stellar background, and surfaced with a radar-absorbing coating to avoid detection by planetary warning systems. In addition, the plates of material it was constructed with had been assembled at angles designed to scatter any radar waves its coating didn’t absorb. Which made an AstroGhost nearly impossible to detect during its approach to a planet’s atmosphere. But no matter how stealthy an orbit-to-surface lander might be on approach to atmosphere, the brilliant streak it made dropping through the atmosphere was impossible to miss. Which was why the AstroGhost’s cargo space was so much smaller than that of the similar-size Essay; it had a massive, hypereffective refrigeration unit that significantly slowed the burning of the ablative coating on the exposed surfaces. That cooling, combined with kilometers-long radiator strings that trailed it, was so efficient that an AstroGhost left no more atmospheric trail than did a meteorite barely big enough to make it all the way to the ground.
The major drawback to the refrigeration unit was that its initial installation was monstrously expensive, and its cooling elements and fluids had to be replaced after every use—again at considerable expense. Which expenses were the major reasons the AstroGhosts were strictly used in clandestine operations where entry couldn’t be concealed by other means. When the pilot’s launch docked, the AstroGhost was ejected with enough force to quickly separate it from the Admiral Nelson . In twenty minutes it was more than a hundred kilometers aft of the starship, and the coxswain fired its heavily shielded engines long enough to send it on a collision course with Atlas. Between its own shielding and the further shield offered by the firing engines of the Admiral Nelson, which was directly between the AstroGhost and Atlas, the firing went unnoticed by anybody planetside or in orbit.
Shortly after the AstroGhost’s course adjustment, the Atlas pilot cut the Admiral Nelson ’s main drives and made a minor course correction to drift her into her proper slot among the spacecraft orbiting the planet. An hour later, the AstroGhost, heading directly toward Atlas, was closer to the planet than the starship, which was aimed at an angle to achieve orbit. The pilot onboard the Admiral Nelson was just starting to make his final calculations to slide into orbit when the AstroGhost reached atmosphere. It may have been a different vehicle, but the ride from the toposphere to the planetary surface was just as much a “high-speed ride on a rocky road” as planetfalls made by FIST Marines in a regular Essay. The only difference was, the Marines of second platoon didn’t make planetfall over open water. The AstroGhost gently touched down in a forest clearing some three hundred kilometers from New Granum and several klicks from the nearest road. The landing zone and most of the area between it and Spondu and the Cabbage Patch facility were unpopulated, so it was highly unlikely that anybody would come to investigate the “meteorite,” or see any sign of the Marines as they approached their objective.
Metsa Forest, Three Hundred Kilometers East of New Granum
“Clear space under those trees!” Lieutenant Tevedes ordered.
“Move, move, move !” Gunny Lytle shouted.
“You heard the man, let’s see some hustle here!” Staff Sergeant Suptra commanded.
“In there!” Tevedes ordered, pointing at an area where spreading boughs covered a space barren of full-grown trees.
The Marines of second platoon, Fourth Force Recon Company, boiled out of the rear hatch of the AstroGhost and raced to the cover of the nearby trees. Armed with long knives, some of them immediately started chopping away at undergrowth and low branches; others grabbed the cut growth and hauled it deeper into the forest. HM2 Natron, the corpsman assigned to the mission, pitched in and helped.
In ten or twelve minutes, the area under the spreading boughs was clear of most growth. The Marines scrambled out of the way and the coxswain drove the AstroGhost into the makeshift hangar. The AstroGhost’s navigator-radioman jumped out, carrying a small parabolic dish trailing a cable, and clambered up the closest tree. He was back down in a couple of minutes and signaled Tevedes that tight-beam comm was established with the Admiral Nelson , which was nearing orbit. Tevedes reboarded the AstroGhost and climbed into the cockpit. “Aerie, the Eagle has landed and the nest is secure,” he said into the radio. He waited for the doubled bursts of squelch that told him the message was received. If the Admiral Nelson had any reason to suspect the entry had been detected, the reply would have been a triple squelch. He handed the radio set to the coxswain and asked for the AstroGhost’s locator reading, which he compared with his own. When he saw they matched, he said, “We should be back within forty-eight hours.”
“We’ll be here, sir. Good hunting.”
“Thank you.” Tevedes left the cockpit. When he got outside he found the platoon waiting for him in rough formation; the Marines had their helmets off so he could see them. They already had puddle jumpers strapped to their backs.
“We’re exactly where we should be,” Tevedes told his Marines. “Our objective is two hundred and ninety kilometers that way.” He pointed north of due west. “We’ll jump the first two-seventy klicks and walk the rest of the way. You know what to do when we get there.” He grinned. “So let’s hop to it.”
With a minimum of talk, the Marines headed into the clearing where squad and team leaders checked the ultraviolet locator lights on their men’s shoulders as soon as they donned their helmets. Gunny Lytle and Doc Natron checked each other, and Lytle and the lieutenant did the same. On Tevedes’s order, the Marines fired up the puddle jumpers and rose twenty meters into the air before switching to level flight and heading a few degrees north of due west. The area selected for the insertion was unpopulated, chosen to reduce the chances of anyone seeing the AstroGhost land or the Marines fly away from it with their puddle jumpers. There were few roads and no regular air traffic in that region of the Union of Margelan, so they were able to make good time for the two hundred and seventy kilometers they traveled in thirty-klick jumps. An experienced Marine could average better than a hundred kilometers per hour using a puddle jumper, and every Force Recon Marine had that much experience. Flying closer than twenty kilometers from their objective, they ran a slight risk of detection by traffic to and from Spondu. After three and a half hours, mostly in the air, they dropped the puddle jumpers and hid them to pick up on their way back. They continued on foot. Rapidly for the first ten kilometers, then at a more normal walking pace for the next five. The last five they took at a slower pace. They made the entire two hundred and ninety kilometers without being noticed by anyone—except for a few animals that startled at nearby noises made by beings they couldn’t see.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Somewhere in New Granum, Atlas
The man was very disturbed about what he had to do. But what had to be done could be accomplished only by a member of the inner circle, and he was one of the most central figures in that small circle. He hadn’t approached any of the others, but he knew they were too blinded by their loyalty to Jorge Liberec Lavager to see what he was becoming, had become. Early in his presidential term—a presidency he’d won out of the gratitude of the citizens whose
army he’d led during the war that led to the current preeminence of the Union of Margelan among the nation-states of Atlas—he’d been a marvel in getting the disparate nation-states to cooperate, to the enrichment of all of them. And he’d seen to it that Margelan had maintained its dominant position among the nation-states. Margelan—and Atlas at large, thanks to Lavager—was more prosperous than it had ever been in the past.
But now he wanted to unite the entire world under one central government. He said that would only strengthen Atlas as a whole, that the Confederation of Human Worlds would necessarily pay closer attention to a united world than to a fragmented Atlas, that now Confederation members saw Atlas as a backwoods world, almost a world of savages who were almost constantly at each other’s throats. He said that nobody elsewhere in Human Space took Atlas or its nation-states seriously. But what Lavager failed to see, and the other members of the inner circle were too blind to see, was that the Confederation would see a united Atlas as a threat. Too many shipping lanes passed near Atlas. The world’s near-space, the area between its orbit and the orbits of the planets sunward and spaceward from it, was used as a convenient transfer point for cargos from one starship to another. Starships on long voyages made stops at Atlas to give their crews shore liberty—and didn’t have to worry about crew members jumping ship. But if Atlas was united, it could control interstellar shipping in its area. A united Atlas could charge dockage fees in its area and build a navy to enforce payment of those fees. A united Atlas could deny planetside rights to passing starships. A united Atlas would command a strong voice in the Confederation Congress on Earth. Balances of power would be upset—the powers who ran the Confederation of Human Worlds would be upset.
If that happened, the Confederation would take action. It would send its army and navy to Atlas, to crush any possible united government and impose its own regent on the world. Now, a number of people on Atlas had power and riches in their own nation-states. Not as much as they would have in a united Atlas, and not as many as would benefit by uniting. But none of them would have anything like the same power or wealth under a Confederation regent. And what would they do without power and riches?
A core member of the inner circle, the man knew these things very well. He had received visitors from powerful agencies within the Confederation, and they had impressed upon him the truth of these things. There was only one way to prevent the Union of Margelan—and the rest of Atlas as well—from becoming a ward of the Confederation. Jorge Liberec Lavager had to go. The man was very disturbed about what he had to do. Jorge Liberec Lavager was an old friend of his. But he had to do it.
A Private Residence in New Granum
The coffee cup looked tiny and fragile in the big man’s hand.
“No one saw you coming here, I hope?” his host asked nervously. He couldn’t keep his eyes off the big man’s hand. For its size it was delicate, almost, hairless, the hand of a man who was unused to rough labor of any kind, not the kind of hand one would imagine belonged to an assassin.
“Thank you for the coffee,” the guest replied sarcastically. “I understand the beans are grown right here in Margelan somewhere? Something you’re working on at your secret facility near Spondu, the Cabbage Patch?” He grinned fiercely at his host and sipped the coffee. He ran his free hand through his closely cropped blond hair.
“Very funny, Mr. Germanian, or whatever your name is.”
The big man nodded. “In my line of work a good sense of humor is essential.” He sipped again from his coffee and then set the cup on the table. “Do you think I’m an amateur, General?” His voice had turned hard. “We’ve spent a lot of money on this operation and I’m here to see that it gets spent properly, that things get done right. You, personally, have a lot riding on this, my friend. If it goes off smoothly, we will spend even more money to put you into the top slot. We’ve done that in other places for other clients, and we can do it again. For you. Now, what have you been able to put together for us?”
They were sitting in a back room in a big house in an exclusive neighborhood on the outskirts of New Granum. Since his host was so well known in the city, the big man had agreed to meet at the general’s home to finalize the arrangements they were discussing.
“I’ve put together a team of assassins, all men from other nation-states. Reliable men, professionals. They are currently occupying safe houses in the city, waiting for the signal to proceed. I will not kill him in New Granum; it’s got to be done outside the city. On the way to the Cabbage Patch there’s an ideal spot that we’ve already reconnoitered. They just need advance warning to get in place out there.”
“Can you get him to go out to the Cabbage Patch?” Germanian smiled at the name of the facility.
“Sooner or later, yes. I’ve mentioned a trip to him several times. With all that’s happened recently, especially the death of Dr. Paragussa and the murder of that reporter, Gustafferson, I think he wants to go out there just to be sure security’s in place. The truth of the matter is, everyone’s curious to know what’s going on out there, especially our friends from South Solanum. We’ve been surveilling several of their agents based right here in New Granum. I’ll see to it that they are arrested as soon as the job is done.”
The big man smiled cryptically. “Why is the place called the ‘Cabbage Patch,’ if I may ask?”
His host shrugged. “Lavager gave it that name. He told me once he got it from a book by the French philosopher Voltaire. Candide. Did you ever read it? I didn’t think so. It ends with Candide attending his cabbage patch, giving up politics. It’s a dream Lavager’s had for himself for years to retire and become a nobody again.”
“He’s your friend, isn’t he?” the big man said as he reached for his coffee cup.
“Yes,” his host answered, his voice heavy. “He’s also one of the greatest men I’ve ever known. He’s a greater man than I’ll ever be,” he added bitterly. Germanian grinned and sipped his coffee. “This really is an excellent blend. Have you ever read the Judeo-Christian Bible, General?”
“What? I’m familiar with it, of course, but I’m not a Judeo-Christian, Mr. Germanian.”
“You really ought to read one of the books in it, the Book of Job. God made a bet with the Devil that Job couldn’t be turned against him. The Devil lost that bet. We’re counting on winning this one.” He grinned and finished his coffee. “That ought to tell you exactly whose side you’re on, General.” He laughed as he poured more from the silver pot sitting on the table.
“I do know about Judas,” the General said softly. “All about him.”
“Have you checked your off-world account lately? There’s a lot more than thirty pieces of silver in it, General. Judas ended up badly. You’ll die rich and in bed—if this is done right.”
“I’ve led armies, Mr. Germanian, I can pull off a little ambush, don’t you think?”
The man called Germanian looked carefully at his host over the rim of his coffee cup. He will do it, he thought, but he’s beginning to have second thoughts. That reference to the Biblical Judas spoke volumes about his state of mind. Out loud he said, “I need to see a layout of the ambush site.” He nodded at the reader sitting at one end of the coffee table.
“This is the main road to the Cabbage Patch. It’s the one we’ll use. Right here is where the team will be waiting for him. He’ll be in a three-vehicle convoy, him in the middle vehicle, me in the lead vehicle. My men will take out Lavager’s car and make their escape to this road here, the one on the other side of the cornfield running parallel to the main road. You’ll see,” he zoomed out, “there are no dwellings within kilometers of this site except those of the farmer who owns these fields. The whole thing will be over before the farmer even knows what’s going on in his fields. The harvest is weeks away yet, so there’s no reason for anyone to be working in that field.”
“Good. Now give me the crystal.”
“Wh—?”
“Give it here, General. You don’t want to be
caught with the damned thing. Your men have been briefed? They know the lay of the land? Escape routes have been laid out? Good. You won’t need this anymore then. I presume, and I’d better be right, there are no copies.” He took the crystal and slipped it into a pocket. “Let me know as soon as the team is in place.” He stood up. “Well, I must be off now. Thanks for the coffee. I’ll see myself out.” He paused at the door, turned, and looked back at his host.
“General, everything has its price. Your price to be President of Margelan is to kill your friend.” He shrugged. “Read the Book of Job. Screw this up and what he went through will look like the common cold compared to what’ll happen to you. I guarantee it, and you know who I work for.” Grinning, he turned and left.
The man with the scar on his face held his beer mug loosely in one hand, a massive, hairy hand that was missing its little finger. He looked steadily at the big man sitting on the opposite side of the booth. To him the man looked like nothing more than a soft fairy, someone he could easily take down, if the need arose. But he was paying the bills.
“The general sends his regards and me with this,” the big man said, shoving a fat envelope across the table. The man with the scarred face tore off one edge and examined the contents. He raised his eyebrows. “That’s just expense money,” the big man said. “When the job’s done, the second half of your fee will be deposited in your accounts.”
“Check.”
“That farmer? Take him out and anyone else you find on the place. Your back has to be secure,” the big man said.
“Check.”
“Take out all the vehicles in the convoy. There can be no survivors.”
“Check.”
“Your men are ready? Weapons secure? Everyone knows his job?”
“Check.”
“Very well, then. As soon as the job is done send me the signal we agreed on and the rest of your money will be deposited for you.”
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