Into the Fire

by Elizabeth Moon

  When they passed on to the actual shops, they found most moderately busy, tools in use, technicians willing to describe what they were doing, seemingly quite at ease. Ky entered each one, glanced around, asked a few questions. The technicians opened cabinets and closets happily, showing off how neatly arranged they were. As they neared the end of the row, Ky said, “I’m wondering about something that was on an inventory list in Commandant Kvannis’s office—but it’s not there. Do you have any idea where I’d look for number 238–665–9817?”

  “What size, Commandant?”

  Ky outlined the box with her hands. An assistant looked up sharply. “I remember—it was an orange-striped thing, kind of like a flight recorder?”

  “The list didn’t give a description.”

  “I’m sure of it. It’ll be down in room one-twelve-C. That’s the Air Safety Investigation and Research Unit, and they have a pile of those things. Their staff isn’t there right now—they’ve been off investigating a crash since yesterday—but I can let you in.”

  Indeed, the shelves along one side were stacked with flight recorders. Their guide rattled on. “They said some of these are really old—sixty years or more—from all kinds of aircraft. They do some kind of testing—lots of kinds, I guess. But they’re not here all the time, like today.”

  “How long has this unit been here?” Ky asked. “It wasn’t here when I was a cadet.”

  “Oh—not that long. I think it came in sometime last spring.” He stepped to the door. “Hey, Louie—Commandant wants to know when this unit came in!”

  “Before or after the shuttle crash?” Ky asked, without waiting for an answer.

  “Oh, just after, I guess.”

  Ky looked at Palnuss and he looked back. “Well,” he said. “The Commandant may want to look around some more. I don’t think either of us has ever seen this many flight recorders in one place. You can return to your work.”

  Ky added a nod to that, and the guide wandered out. Palnuss shut the door behind him. “Now what? We look at every one?”

  “If we have to,” Ky said. “But just let me prowl for a minute or two. If he’s hidden it in here, it’ll be where someone who finds it will be marked in some way. So where is something especially dirty, or balanced where dusty or dirty ones will fall, something like that?”

  “Not just behind a stack?”

  “The shelves aren’t that deep. They’re not hung on the wall; they’re freestanding racks. I think they were moved from wherever this unit was before, and were purpose-sized to the more modern recorders. If I’m reading his thought processes right, he’ll assume a searcher will expect it to be at the back, or under something…hidden.” She turned around, eyeing all the shelves.

  Major Palnuss, following her gaze, looked along each shelf in turn. “I don’t see—”

  “There,” Ky said. She went toward the door, to the narrower rack beside it, with a clipboard hanging from a string and a battered pencil thrust into the clip.

  “Why that?”

  “Because every shop I’ve ever seen had the formal, official list of what was there—on some kind of tablet or computer—and then it had the real list, usually on actual paper. A clipboard or a spiral notebook, kept where it is handy to the techs but could pass for a sign-in/sign-out sheet if the brass comes by.”

  “You think it will be listed?”

  “Yes. Even if Kvannis told them not to put it in the official catalog for some reason, they’ll have it here.” She took the clipboard down; Palnuss craned his neck to see the top page. SIGN IN/SIGN OUT.

  “I’ll be—is there something like this in the other shops?”

  “Yes—I noticed them when we were there. Just like other stores and shops I’ve been in, civilian, merc, military alike.”

  She flipped up the pages until she came to something different. “Aha. This is their personal stack map. With initials, how handy. D for drop-offs, CI for currently investigating, R for removals. Item’s accession number. And a column for who dropped it off or picked it up, conveniently labeled WHO. And date. And this at the end is where it is.”

  “And you can figure out that code?”

  “I think so. The most recent item dropped off was six days ago, by RG, whoever that is. If L2-T means top of the stack on the second shelf of the left-hand set of shelves…now, is that coming in, or going out?” She was facing the back of the room. “I’ll take the one on my left, you take the one over there.”

  “What’s the accession number?”

  “For this entry? XRM-VTOL-2914M8.” Ky looked at the second shelf on her side without success. Three stacks and the top item in all three had the wrong number.

  “Three stacks on this shelf,” Palnuss reported. “Aha!”

  “So they mapped facing the door,” Ky said. “Now, how long would it have taken for that item to get here, after I turned it in?” She worked backward through the scribbled notes until she saw IK in the WHO column. Two days after she’d handed the flight recorder in, Kvannis had turned it in here. “Accession number correct, Kvannis’s initials correct, but—no map code. Wait. They put it in and he must have made them erase it.”

  “That I can fix,” Palnuss said. “We’re good at forgeries, invisible inks, and the impressions left by pencils. Let me see it.” He dusted it with powder, blew softly, and said, “B. Back, that should be. L…lower or left. Three T. Let’s try the third shelf near the left end, on top. Or, if Kvannis made them move it, somewhere nearby.”

  “If he annoyed them enough, they probably put it back where they wanted it,” Ky said. Ky recognized the right flight recorder as soon as she was close enough, on top of the end stack on the third shelf. It had snagged a thread in the pocket of her survival suit, and the short length of orange thread was still there. She checked the number anyway.

  “Where do you want it now?” Palnuss asked. “The safes won’t lock.”

  “Do you have one in your office that will?”

  “Yes, but all my personnel have the combination.”

  “And do you trust them?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then keep it there. It won’t be long, I think, before you or I will be asked where it is. We should know that.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  DAY 13

  Rafe woke finally and listened to the house. Silence. Was he alone here? It took him several minutes to remember that Teague and the others were out at the base, that the Vatta house had been damaged and he was at Grace’s. His implant told him it was 1600 local time, afternoon of the same day he’d flown in from Stone Crossing. He showered, raising his eyebrows at the bruises the cattlelopes had left on him, but glad the headache had gone. Dressed in slacks and a sweater, he tucked his usual weapons into their places and padded downstairs to investigate.

  He found MacRobert in the kitchen giving instructions to a pair of men in uniform. MacRobert looked up sharply, then nodded at Rafe. “I was thinking we should call a physician, Ser Dunbarger.” Formality in front of the guard; MacRobert had been calling him Rafe. “You slept a long time.”

  “Being run over by large animals with hooves and horns will do that to you,” Rafe said. “Is there anything to eat?”

  “Can you cook?” MacRobert asked. “I’ve got to go back to Grace, and these gentlemen are here as guards, not servants.”

  “Well enough for a quick meal. Eggs still in the cooler?”

  “Fairly well stocked. Enjoy yourself. The Commandant will be glad to know you’re awake.”

  The Commandant—that was Ky, now. “What else has been happening while we were gone?”

  “Too many attacks on Vatta,” MacRobert said. “There’s a little brushfire out in the Southwest and a frank attempt at a revolution got started about twelve hours ago in Makkavo—that’s on Dorland. Last we heard something probably related was also popping in Fulland.”

  “Heard that yesterday—if it was yesterday. That knock on the head messed up my time sense. Ky and Stella both all right, though?�
��

  “Yes. Ky’s supposed to be interviewed on the news later.”

  Rafe rummaged in the cooler, coming out with eggs and a chunk of ham. He put Grace’s smaller frying pan on the stove, added a knob of butter, and took a slice off the ham and diced it. The two guards hitched up their weapons harnesses and left the kitchen, one to the front of the house and one to the back.

  “The Vatta legal staff and Grace are both working on your visa status,” MacRobert said, relaxing now that the guards were gone. “It’s too bad you lost your ID jumping a fence. Teague’s safe at the base. Immigration can’t get at him there, and the guards here have been told to say nothing.”

  Rafe found the drawer with the whisks in it, and beat up three eggs and poured them into the frying pan. He reached for the diced ham.

  “If you added an egg to that, I wouldn’t say no to some,” MacRobert said.

  Rafe cracked three more eggs, gave them a brief mix with the whisk, and poured them in, along with the diced ham. “Easier to divide in half,” he said. “And if you don’t want that much, I can manage to get around it.”

  MacRobert chuckled. “Always did appreciate a partner who could cook.”

  “So we’re partners now?”

  “Only in that we’re both working for Ky at the moment. And Grace, of course, though she’s gone odd since the gas attack.”

  “Odd how?”

  “Blaming herself for not knowing about the deal her father made to get her out of prison, and accepting a political post. She thinks that’s what set the Quindlans off. Which it isn’t; the attack on all the Vattas came before that.”

  Rafe dumped a heap of stirred eggs and ham onto one plate and the rest on another, turned off the stove, and carried the plates to the table. “I thought that attack was mostly Osman.”

  “Osman wanted Vatta taken down, but so did Quindlan.” MacRobert shoveled in a mouthful of eggs and after a moment went on. “After all, why put in a secret access to your customer’s basement if you’re not planning to harm them? We don’t know when the charges were actually placed, but my guess is that they’d been there a long time.”

  Rafe nodded. “And Vatta had refused to carry Quindlan’s cargo that they couldn’t give provenance for—that was long before, wasn’t it?”

  “Right.”

  “That time in the psych prison Ky told me about—did Grace ever get any treatment for combat trauma?”

  “Apparently not.”

  “She should,” Rafe said. “It helped Ky a lot.”

  MacRobert looked at him and shook his head. “Rafe…you’re too young to understand some things, never mind what you’ve been through.”

  Rafe bowed slightly. “My apologies.”

  “Accepted. That Vatta lawyer’s stopping by later to talk to you about the progress on your own legal problems.”

  —

  Midmorning, Ky gave a brief press interview, at Joint Services Headquarters, along with General Molosay, Sergeant Major Morrison, and a representative from the Assembly. She let the others explain how the rescue plan had developed.

  “But then you were rewarded by being named Commandant of the Academy,” said one journalist. “Isn’t that so? And is that not unusual, that someone not actually a graduate should be offered such a post? Or did you ask for it?”

  “I will answer that,” General Molosay said, “since I made the decision.”

  “I asked Commandant Vatta,” the journalist said.

  “It was not a reward,” Ky said, “nor did I ask, or imagine it, until the general asked me to accept the post. When the former Commandant left secretly, it was understandable that the higher command would be concerned someone else at the Academy—the next in line for promotion, for instance—might be part of the same conspiracy, the one that kept the survivors isolated and in captivity.”

  “But you—”

  “But she had no connection with any of them,” Molosay said. “And she had combat experience, which most of our officers do not have. Plus familiarity with the Academy and its procedures. So for an interim appointment—and I stressed that it was an interim appointment—my staff and the government all agreed that she was both qualified in terms of military knowledge and stature, and completely unconnected with the current group of senior officers.”

  “I see,” the journalist said.

  “Next question,” Molosay said before the man could ask more.

  Afterward, Molosay complimented her on her responses.

  “The Public Affairs officer at the Academy coached me,” Ky said. “I could have used such coaching in the past—I know I ruffled feathers best undisturbed.”

  “On another matter,” Molosay said, nodding toward the corridor that led to his office. “You have been busy over there, ferreting out bent officers and discovering most of the missing evidence. But have you had time to go over the items I sent with you that first day?”

  “Frankly no, sir, I have not. Is there something that you want to brief me on?”

  “Yes. Come on in—” He opened the door, then spoke to his aide. “Jerry, we’ll want something to drink and sandwiches; this may take awhile. Be sure the screening’s on max.” He waved Ky to a seat. “Do you have any information on the size of the conspiracy? Who else is behind it besides the former Commandant and this Colonel Stornaki you sent us?”

  “I would bet on the Quindlan family, or some part of it,” Ky said. “While I was on Miksland, the Rector discovered some evidence that they had known about Miksland very early and had originated—or cooperated with—the plan to keep it secret. I’d always known our families were rivals in trade; what I didn’t know was that one of my ancestors refused to help one of theirs transport raw materials from Miksland and sell them—illegally—offplanet.”

  “I’m more concerned about the military conspirators,” Molosay said. “You told us about Greyhaus; his logbook reveals that he was training military personnel chosen for their political bias and attachment to the Separatists, preparing for an insurrection funded in large part by those valuable ores being mined in the northern part of the continent. But such a conspiracy has to be bigger than a few officers and a few hundred disaffected soldiers. Even a large corporation like Quindlan, or a criminal organization like Malines—that’s not enough to pull off a successful revolt. Controlling the surveillance satellites so that in several hundred years they never reported what the surface was really like—?”

  “The data could’ve been intercepted and falsified elsewhere,” Ky said.

  “Not reliably for that long. And there’s this: you, as Commandant of the Academy, have other military duties that—worst case—might show up.”

  “What’s that?” She hadn’t signed up for anything but running a military academy, definitely a full-time job. The sudden realization that though her word might be final in the Academy, she had someone above her in the command chain put a chill down her spine.

  Molosay handed over a folder with the title of EMERGENCY ORDERS LOCAL. “The Academy is part of the Central Command’s Table of Organization. Normally that means nothing much. But in the event of an attack on Port Major, or any major emergency situation involving the capital, the Academy is tasked with protecting the seat of government. The ceremonial honor guard, though armed, may not be sufficient in the case of attack.”

  Ky opened the folder and scanned the first few pages. “Has the Academy ever been called on?”

  “Once or twice for urban riot situations, when the request for help came from the police. Never for protection from military attack. Even at the height of the Unification War, conflict never made it to this continent.” He looked at her as if expecting an answer.

  “But now, since Kvannis hasn’t been captured, you’re worried. Any idea what troops he might turn up with?”

  “Greyhaus’s bunch, for sure. They’d been moved to a northern base, but then dispersed, and now a number of them are AWOL. Right now it looks like somewhere between five hundred and a thousand, which isn�
�t anywhere near enough to win a war. Kvannis must know that. And I don’t know how many more there might be—two thousand? Three? Surely not more than that, at least not on this continent. But if they decided to hold the President hostage, occupy the Palace or Government House—”

  “So…it’s my job to protect them with the ceremonial guard and cadets and staff? Is there an actual operational plan in here?” Ky tapped the folder.

  “That’s a copy of what was written originally, with an update from maybe a hundred and fifty years ago. Not worth the paper it’s printed on, but you needed a copy. I know ground warfare isn’t your thing, and you were right to get your people out ahead of the trouble in Miksland, but I don’t have a spare thousand or so troops to lend you.”

  “Any idea when this mysterious possible attack might take place?”

  “No. But my gut tells me it’s coming. Not today or tomorrow, but if he’s got powerful and most of all wealthy allies in Port Major, it could be within a few tendays. There are riots in both Makkavo and Esterance; word is some ground troops have broken into the armory at Fort Jahren and marched toward Makkavo’s portside.”

  “If we’re in your command, then how do we get more supplies?”

  “Ask me, or my aide. We’re well supplied at the moment, so I can release ammunition, firearms—”

  “Transport?” Ky asked. Molosay looked confused. “If there’s already an element of this conspiracy in the city, it would be stupid to march the entire cadet corps on foot across town to the government complex. They’ve had no training in urban maneuvers.”

  “I’ll connect you with someone,” Molosay said. “I’m sure we have vehicles, but…do you have room to park them over there?”

  “Some, certainly. I don’t know how many it would take. No Land Force background.”

  “I’ll see that you get that information in the next two days.”

  DAY 16