Barbarians at the Gates

Chapter Forty-Six

Earth/Harmony System, 4098

The war had disrupted parts of the ICN. Some sections were delayed because the message had to be conveyed across the interstellar gulf by a starship. But Earth received news of the Battle of Harmony and the death of Admiral Justinian within three weeks of the battle, just in time for New Year’s Day.

Grand Senator Rupert McGillivray found himself considering it as the Senate Committee met at his mansion for the seventh time since the war began. President Yang had made a brief speech to the Senate—and Earth’s news networks—about the end of the war, but everyone knew that his speech had been little more than platitudes. The real decisions would be made in private, well away from the media and the cheering crowds. They did so love a hero, Rupert told himself dryly, yet their cheers wouldn’t last. The mob was always fickle and heedless of any long-term concerns. The Senators couldn’t allow themselves that luxury.

He poured wine into three glasses, passed one to each of his guests. “Lady and Gentlemen, I give you the New Year,” he said, holding his glass high. They echoed him and sipped their wine, the finest champagne from Gaul. “May it be long and peaceful.”

“One would hope so,” Grand Senator The Honorable Carlton Brockington said. He put his glass down and frowned. “There’s no point in dissembling, not here. The war is won. We no longer need Admiral Drake.”

“We may need him to deal with the remaining warlords,” Rupert pointed out mildly. “None of them pose a threat on the same scale as Admiral Justinian, but they do need to be crushed before their example spreads any further.”

“They’re small fry,” Brockington said disdainfully. “Now that we have assured ourselves of the loyalty of the Federation Navy, we can crush them one by one without his help. Let’s face it; he has a fleet that is loyal to him, and a reputation with the mob.” He snorted. “He’s a threat merely by existing. We need to remove him now.”

“We have our contingency plans,” Grand Senator Alison Wallisch said, nodding in agreement. “We can activate them now.”

Rupert kept his face expressionless.

“There is no need to hurry,” he reminded them. “He is going to spend months repairing his ships and securing the remains of Admiral Justinian’s little empire. We don’t need to order his death now.”

“This is precisely the time to order his death,” Brockington said firmly. “The longer we leave him alive, the greater the chance he will decide to act independently.”

“And there was the little matter of his formal complaint,” Alison added. “I don’t know how that got out into the public sphere, but the mob is up in arms about it. The man is dangerous.”

Rupert shrugged. He did know how Admiral Drake’s formal complaint had reached the media; the Brotherhood had slipped it to one of the better reporters in the system. Admiral Drake had demanded that the people responsible for the Bester Massacre be relieved of command and tried for mass murder, reminding the Senate that they’d given their word that there would be no recriminations or retributions. If they were punished harshly, he’d added, it might put the brakes on the insurgency developing within the sector. The Senators had not appreciated his candor, not least because the people responsible for the slaughter had been appointed by the Senate. It had been, Rupert considered, a brilliant public relations move.

“Very well,” he said finally. “May I offer a suggestion?”

They looked at him warily.

“If we send the execution order through the ICN, there is a good chance that the message will be intercepted and decrypted by someone loyal to Admiral Drake,” Rupert pointed out. “I suggest sending the message on a courier boat, one of the fast pickets we use to scout new systems. That would maintain security, and there would be no warning to the target.”

“We need to move fast,” Brockington said. “Besides, the codewords for authorizing the operation are…not likely to arouse suspicion. The ICN will get the message there faster than any starship.”

“And besides, we will be able to deny all knowledge of an ICN message,” Alison added, nodding. “A starship is far more likely to raise eyebrows.”

Rupert wondered, absently, what planet she was actually on, before pushing the matter aside. They’d refused his advice, which meant that he had to act quickly before all hell broke loose.

Once they’d settled in for the night, he accessed his private communications channel and ordered his personal starship prepared for immediate departure. He’d been telling everyone that he intended to take a long vacation once the war was over, so no one would question his departure, at least not quickly enough to do any good. And once he’d left the Solar System, he would run for Harmony. He wouldn’t beat the message there unless he was very lucky, but at least he’d be able to make contact with Admiral Drake.

If the admiral survived…

It was a gamble, he knew, but there was no other choice. The Federation was in a state of flux, where everything could be changed and rebuilt. Once the window of opportunity closed, however, the Senate would rule unchecked. The Brotherhood had been planning for this moment for a very long time. Everything rested on him now.

Him…and Admiral Drake.

Marius was waiting to hear how the Senate had reacted to his demand that they relieve, arrest and hang Colonel Scudder. But so far, they’d sent back nothing of substance.

Since they’d told him nothing, he’d had all the prisoners moved to a deserted island on Harmony on his own personal recognizance, and Vaughn had assigned loyal Marines to guard them—ostensibly from escape, but in actuality, to keep the Internal Security troops from murdering them outright. The Internal Security troops had quite predictably protested, as they were supposed to guard the captured prisoners, but Marius had ignored them.

There wouldn’t be another massacre on his watch.

Besides, while he waited, he’d had better things to do.

“I suppose there hasn’t been any response from the Senate yet?” Tiffany asked.

Marius, lying back on the bed, thought that she’d never looked more beautiful as she walked around. Her long red hair fell down around her breasts, leaving her nipples winking at him as she moved. He wasn’t entirely sure if he loved her—after all, she was a great many years younger than him and certain to outlive him regardless of how long the marriage lasted—but being with her made a quite a few things worthwhile. Besides, she was a lot smarter than he’d expected.

“Just worthless platitudes,” he said. “Did your father send you anything in the mail?”

“Nothing,” Tiffany said. Her father rarely sent her anything. “He did say that he was proud of me for risking my life and that he thinks I should go back to Earth.”

Marius shrugged. “And are you going to go back to Earth?”

“Not if I can avoid it,” Tiffany told him. “High Society is rather boring at the best of times…and it won’t be very exciting after all this.”

“The less exciting, the better,” Marius said seriously.

He pulled himself to his feet, kissed her on the forehead, and stepped into the fresher. “I have a staff meeting in forty minutes, love. Are you going to attend?”

Tiffany stepped into the fresher with him, a delightful surprise.

“Of course,” she said, as she pressed against him. “You’d only mess it all up without me.”

The courier drone popped out of the Asimov Point and immediately uploaded its messages to the relay station. There was a brief moment as the relay station’s automated computers checked the message headers against its list of authorized senders, and then it started to relay the message across the system to Harmony. Once the message reached the planet, it was inserted into the military datanet and uploaded to Magnificent. It appeared inside Blake Raistlin’s inbox seven weeks after it was sent from Earth.

The message itself was unlikely to attract attention. It was nothing more than a statement that there was going to be a wedding in the family and the recipient was invited to attend. The reader, however, knew what the message signified. It was time to move.

He swallowed his concern and fear—he’d never wanted to be an assassin—picked up the weapon he’d been given years ago, and checked it carefully. It was still in working order.

Part of him wanted to call off the mission, to retreat from the battlefield, but he knew his duty. He’d been promised a reward for his work, something he desperately wanted. All he had to do was carry out one specific task.

Kill Admiral Drake.

Roman fought his way to awareness through a dizzying wave of pain and disorientation that threatened to drag him back into the darkness. He could hear voices as he awoke, voices that seemed oddly familiar and yet completely unrecognizable. His memory started to return as he opened his eyes, reminding him that his ship was in desperate danger when he’d blacked out…

“Report,” he croaked. His mouth felt impossibly dry. “The ship…?”

“Lie back,” another voice said. It was firm and very feminine. “You’re on the Magnificent…”

His vision stabilized, revealing a young woman wearing a doctor’s uniform.

“You took a nasty blow to the head,” she said. “Luckily, your helmet cushioned most of the blow and medical crews were able to preserve you long enough for the recovery team to get you into a stasis pod. You should be fine, but lie still.”

“My ship,” Roman said. His voice felt clearer, even though he could hear a distant roaring in his ears. It seemed to be almost impossible to form a coherent thought. “What’s happened to my ship?”

The doctor didn’t answer him. “I told you to lie still,” she said, firmly.

Her voice didn’t sound as though she would brook argument. Besides, a doctor had authority to relieve a captain on medical grounds. And he wasn’t even on his ship!

“Your ship is fine,” she finally told him.

That was a lie; Roman knew it was a lie. His ship had to have been badly damaged, perhaps even destroyed. His survival didn’t prove anything. The crew could have pulled him off the ship if their sickbay was overwhelmed. And yet, it was growing harder to think…

“I’m putting you back under,” the doctor said urgently.

He opened his mouth to argue, but it was impossible to speak. The words wouldn’t come to his lips.

She pressed something against his neck and there was a brief, almost inaudible hiss. “Relax.”

There was a brief spark of pain, almost unnoticeable against the pain in his head, and then nothing.

“The Harmony Shipyard has been most helpful,” Commodore Yang concluded. “We have successfully repaired most of the damaged ships without needing to leave the system. A handful of starships will require longer periods of repair work, but I believe they can be towed to Penganga Shipyard or repaired here, as the admiral wishes.”

Marius considered it. Using Harmony’s shipyards was a two-edged sword. It was quicker than returning to a Federation Navy shipyard and it did give the yard dogs a chance to work for the Federation—and therefore contribute to rebuilding the local economy—but if someone happened to want to sabotage the ship, they’d have a clear shot. The Marines had secured the shipyard, of course, but they weren’t experts in repairing starships. They might well miss something, and if they did, the results would be disastrous.

Still, he wanted the entire fleet repaired as quickly as possible. There were other warlords out there…and then there was the ever-present threat of the Outsiders.

“I believe that we can take the risk of repairing the ships here,” he said. “Just ensure that the fleet train’s repair men work with them. It should make sabotage harder.” He smiled and turned to Vaughn. “Toby?”

“There has been little change from my last report,” Vaughn said. The Marine looked tired, but confident. “My Marines have occupied the orbitals and various locations on the planet’s surface. There has been no sign of overt resistance beyond some grumbling and street protests, which we have ignored as long as they stayed peaceful. The bad news is that we still haven’t been able to locate the heavy weapons that vanished from planet-side arsenals prior to our arrival in the system, nor have we been able to locate the Planetary Guard personnel who were wiped from the records. I believe they may be preparing for an insurgency.”

“Which is why your orders, admiral, are thoroughly unwise,” Williams said. The political commissioner raised the same issue at every status meeting. “Your refusal to allow the Internal Security troopers to land on the planet is contributing to their willingness to defy us, and is placing your men at risk.”

Marius kept a tight grip on his temper. After hearing about Bester, he’d unilaterally banned the Internal Security troops from Harmony and ordered them to remain in their transports. Williams had protested, loudly, but the authority Marius had received from the Senate—if looked at in the right way—authorized him to take command of the Internal Security contingent if necessary. Which might have been the only thing that had prevented an immediate explosion.

“That decision is mine to take, and I took it,” he said, his tone brooking no argument. He purposefully looked away from the commissioner. “Is there any other business?”

There was none, thankfully. Marius hated status meetings and tried to avoid them where possible, but it was hard to find a workable excuse when they were simply orbiting Harmony and attempting to secure and rebuild an entire sector. At least it would be over soon; once the remainder of Admiral Justinian’s little empire had been secured, the Grand Fleet could move on to deal with another warlord. They’d always have work to do.

“Dismissed,” he said, as he rose to his feet. “Toby, I need a word…”

Something was wrong. Time seemed to be slowing around him, as if it were pressing against his head. He saw Blake Raistlin pull a tiny weapon from his jacket and point it at him. The weapon fired…

… And then, Vaughn was covering him, protecting him with his own body.

Marius snapped out of it as Vaughn was blown back into him, knocking him to the floor. And then Raistlin fired again.

A horrific burning sensation flared down his left arm, just before Admiral Mason tackled Raistlin and knocked the weapon to the ground.

Marius tried to pull himself to his feet, but his left arm wasn’t working.

“Medic,” Admiral Mason shouted.

It was hard to hear him through the haze of pain that burned through his mind. His implants were dulling the pain, yet he could still feel it…and his left arm was completely useless.

“Get a medic here, right now!” Mason yelled urgently.

Someone helped him to his feet. Marius struggled to focus his mind, almost stumbling over something on the deck. It took him minutes to realize that he’d stumbled over his best friend’s body. Vaughn’s expression made it appear as if he’d died in horrific agony. The treacherous bastard Raistlin must have used a punch disruptor, Marius realized. It was so hard to think properly, but the effects were unmistakable…and Vaughn had taken the full brunt of the blast. Every cell in his body had been ripped open. The shock alone would have killed him, even if the pain hadn’t.

Toby, Marius thought drunkenly. I’ll drink to your memory…

An injector was pressed against his neck; cold numbness spread through his body. It brought clarity of a sort, a dull realization of what had happened. Blake Raistlin’s family hadn’t wanted him out of the firing line to keep him safe, he realized. Instead, they’d set him up as an assassin.

That meant that the Senate’s response to his demand that Colonel Scudder be punished was clear—they’d ordered his death. And Williams had been in on it. No doubt the Internal Security troops were in on it, too.

“Admiral, stay still,” one of the medics said.

Tiffany walked toward him, but was held back by one of the medics. He knew she must be in shock. Tears were running down her lovely face. She looked almost like an angel in that moment, his angel.

“Admiral…” someone said, he didn’t care who.

“Admiral Mason,” Marius said. His voice felt thick and unwieldy in his ears. “Arrest the commissioners and their troops. Arrest them all and seal them away from everyone else, quickly!”

“You can’t,” Williams said desperately. The commissioner must have thought he was immune. “You can’t…”

One of the Marines hit him with a stun-rod and he collapsed to the deck.

I need to promote that man, Marius thought, before a second injector pressed against his neck.

As he crashed into the painful darkness, he thought desperately. Most of the Internal Security troopers should be on their transports. If Admiral Mason could hold them there, they couldn’t take over his ships. There was still a chance…

For what?

No matter how far he looked, he could only see one answer.