Cobra Alliance

Statesman: 2432

The bedside phone's signal was a loud, directional buzz scientifically designed to wake even deep sleepers. But it had been months since Jonny slept merely deeply, and his mind barely noticed the sound enough to incorporate it into his current dream. It wasn't until Chrys's gentle prodding escalated to a vigorous shake that he finally drifted up to partial wakefulness. "Um?" he asked, eyes still closed.

"Jonny, Theron Yutu's on the phone," she said. "He says it's urgent."

"Uff," Jonny sighed, rolling heavily onto his side and punching at the hold-release button. "Yeah?"

"Governor, I'm at the starfield," Yutu's voice came. "A Dominion courier ship's on its way in—ETA about an hour. They want you, Governor-General Stiggur, and as many syndics as possible assembled here when they arrive."

"At—what is it, three in the morning? What's the rush?"

"I don't know, sir—they wouldn't say anything more than that. But the starfield night manager said they wanted no more than a twelve-hour turnaround."

"They want to leave in twelve hours? What the hell is—? Oh, never mind; I'm sure they wouldn't tell you." Jonny inhaled deeply, trying to clear the ground clutter from his brain. "Have you gotten in touch with Stiggur yet?"

"No, sir. The Hap-3 satellite's still out, and it'll be another half hour before Hap-2 is in position to make the call."

And once he was notified it would be another three hours before he could get back from the outland district he was touring. Which meant the whole burden of greeting this mysterious and apparently impatient Dominion representative was going to fall on Jonny. "Well, you'd better get some people calling all the syndics—even the ones who can't get here in an hour should come as soon as they can. Uh... any idea of what rank this guy is?"

"No, sir, but from his attitude I doubt he's looking for much in the way of ceremony."

"Well, that's one bright spot, anyway. If it's efficiency he wants, we'll give it to him with spangles. We'll skip the Dominion Building altogether and meet at the starfield's entrypoint building. Can you get us a decently sized office or conference room and set up some security around it?"

"Almo Pyre's already down there—I'll have him find you a room."

"Good." Jonny tried to think of anything else he should suggest, but gave up the effort. Yutu generally knew what he was doing, anyway. "All right, I'll be at the starfield in half an hour. Better get out there yourself—I might need you."

"Yes, sir. Sorry about all this."

"S'okay. See you."

Jonny flicked off the phone with a sigh and lay quietly for a moment, gathering his strength. Then, trying not to groan audibly, he sat up. It wasn't as bad as he'd expected: he felt the usual stiffness in his joints, but only one or two actual twinges of pain. The lightheadedness left quickly, and he got to his feet. The hemafacient pills were on his nightstand, but he technically wasn't supposed to take one for another four hours. He did so anyway, and by the time he finished his shower the last remnants of his anemic fatigue were gone. At least for a while.

Chrys had been busy in his brief absence, finding and laying out his best formalwear. "What do you think it's all about?" she asked, keeping her voice low. The eight-year-olds, Joshua and Justin, were in the next room, and both had a history of light sleeping.

Jonny shook his head. "The last time they sent someone without at least a couple months' warning, it was to stick us with the Cobra factory. I suppose it could be something like that... but a twelve-hour turnaround sounds awfully ominous. He either wants to get back home as fast as possible or doesn't want to spend any more time here than absolutely necessary."

"Could some disease have shown up in our last shipment?" Chrys asked, holding his shirt for him. "A lot of those commercial carriers only take minimal precautions."

"If it had, they'd probably have specified that they'd stay aboard their ship while it was being serviced." Jonny grimaced as he backed into the sleeves, trying to keep the sudden pain from showing.

Chrys noticed anyway. "Dad called this afternoon to remind you again about getting that checkup," she said.

"What for?" Jonny growled. "To hear him tell me my anemia and arthritis are still getting worse? I already know that." He sighed. "I'm sorry, Chrys. I know I should go see Orrin, but I truly don't know what good it would do. I'm paying the price for being a superman all these years, and that's all there is to it."

She was silent for a long moment, and in a way her surface calm was more disturbing than the periodic outbursts of bitterness and rage that had occurred over the first months of his condition. It meant she'd accepted the fact that he couldn't be cured and was sublimating her own pain to help him and their three sons handle theirs. "You'll call when you know what's going on?" she asked at last.

"Sure," he promised, relieved at the change of subject. But only for a moment... because there was only one reason he could think of for the behavior of that ship out there. And if he was right, progressive anemia was likely to be the least of his worries.

Five minutes later he was driving toward the starfield. Beyond the glow of the streetlights, in the darkened city, the ghosts of Adirondack seemed to be gathering.

Tammerlaine Wrey was the image of the middle-level Dome bureaucrats that had been the favorite target of political caricaturists when Jonny was growing up. Paunchy and soft, with expensive clothes in better shape than he was, he had that faintly condescending air that frontier people often claimed to sense in all mainstream Dominion citizens.

And his news was as bad as it could possibly be.

"Understand, we'll be doing what we can to draw off the bulk of the Troft forces," he said, waving a finger at the curved battle front on the Star Force tactical map he'd brought with him. "But while we'll be keeping them pretty busy, it's unlikely they'll forget about you completely. The Joint Command's best estimate is that you can expect anywhere from twenty to a hundred thousand troops on your three planets within a year."

"My God!" Syndic Liang Kijika gasped. "A hundred thousand? That's a quarter of our combined populations."

"But you have nearly twenty-four hundred Cobras," Wrey pointed out. "A hundred thousand Trofts shouldn't be too much for them to handle, if past experience proves anything."

"Except that almost seventy percent of those Cobras have never seen any sort of warfare," Jonny put in, striving to keep his voice calm as the memories of Adirondack swirled like swamp vapor through his mind. "And those who have are likely to be unfit for duty by the time the attack comes."

" 'Those who can't do, teach,' " Wrey quoted. "Your veterans ought to be able to whip them into shape in a few months. Gentlemen, I didn't come here to run your defense for you—it's your people and your world and you'll undoubtedly do a better job of it than I or anyone else on Asgard could. I came here solely to give you a warning of what was coming down and to bring back the dozen or so Dominion citizens that the ban on commercial travel has stranded here."

"We're all Dominion citizens," Tamis Dyon snarled.

"Of course, of course," Wrey said. "You know what I mean. Anyway, I'll want those people packed and on my ship within six hours. I have their names, but you'll have to find them for me."

"What's being done to try and prevent the war?" Jonny asked.

Wrey frowned slightly. "It's beyond prevention, Governor—I thought I'd made that clear."

"But the Central Committee is still talking—"

"In order to delay the outbreak long enough for you to prepare."

"What do you mean, prepare?" Dyon snapped, rising half out of his seat. "What the hell are we going to do—build antiaircraft guns out of cyprene trees? You're condemning us to little more than a choice of deaths: murder by the Trofts or the slow strangulation of a closed supply pipeline."

"I am not responsible for what's happened," Wrey shot back. "The Trofts started this, and you ought to be damned glad the Committee was willing to back you up. If it hadn't, you'd have been overrun years ago." He paused, visibly regaining his control. "Here's the list of people I'm authorized to bring back," he said, sliding a magcard across the table toward Jonny. "Six hours, remember, because the Menssana's leaving in—now—eleven."

Slowly, Jonny reached across the table and picked up the magcard. The die was apparently cast... but there was too much at stake to just sit and do nothing. "I'd like to talk to Governor-General Stiggur about sending an emissary back with you," he said. "To find out what's really going on."

"Out of the question," Wrey shook his head. "In the first place we stand an even chance of getting hit by the Trofts before we ever reach Dominion space; and even if we get through, your emissary would just be trapped there. The Corridor hasn't a prayer of staying open long enough for him to return, and he'd just be dead weight on Asgard."

"He could function as a consultant on conditions here," Jonny persisted. "You admitted yourself you don't really know us."

"A consultant to what end? Are you expecting the Star Force to launch a backup assault through a hundred light-years of Troft territory?" Wrey glanced around the table at the others and stood up. "Unless there are any more questions, I'm going back to the Menssana for a while. Please inform me when Governor-General Stiggur arrives." Nodding, he strode briskly from the room.

"Doesn't care falx droppings for us, does he?" Kijika growled. His fingertips were pressed hard enough against the tabletop to show white under the nails.

"It's not going to matter much longer what he or anyone else in the Dominion thinks about us," Dyon said grimly.

"Maybe we can postpone that a bit," Jonny told him, handing Dyon the magcard. "Would you give this to Theron Yutu and have him start locating these people? I have an important call to make."

Governor-General Brom Stiggur was still en route to Capitalia, but he was within constant range of the Hap-2 communications satellite now and the picture was crystal clear. Not that it mattered, really—Stiggur's expression was exactly as Jonny had expected it to be. "So that's it, then," the other said when Jonny had summarized Wrey's doomsday message. "The Trofts have finally gotten their courage up for round two. Damn them all to hell." He snorted. "Well, what's it going to take to get us ready for a siege?"

"More time than we've got," Jonny said bluntly. "To be brutally honest, Brom, I don't think we've got an icecube's chance on Vega if the Trofts decide they really want us. The new Cobras are our only defense and they know less than nothing about warfare."

Stiggur grimaced. "Should we be discussing this on a broadcast signal—?"

"We're going to keep all this a secret?"

"Not hardly," Stiggur conceded. "All right, Jonny—you didn't call just to give me advance notice of Armageddon. What do you want?"

Jonny swallowed hard. "Permission to return with Wrey to Asgard and see what can be done to hold off the war."

Stiggur's eyebrows lifted toward his hairline. "Don't you think they've done everything possible in that direction already?"

"I don't know. How can we unless we talk directly to the Central Committee or Joint Command?"

Stiggur exhaled loudly. "We need you here."

"You know better than that. I can't fight worth a damn anymore, and there are a lot of First Cobras with better military and tactical knowledge."

"What about your family, then?" Stiggur asked quietly. "They need you."

Jonny took a deep breath. "Twenty-nine years ago I left all the family I had then to fight for people I didn't even know. How can I pass up even the slimmest chance now to save the lives of not only my wife and children, but virtually all the friends I've ever had?"

Stiggur gazed at him for a long minute, his expression giving away nothing of what was going on behind it. "Much as I hate to admit it, I suppose you're right," he finally said. "I'll recommend to this Wrey character that he take you along. Uh... another half-hour to Capitalia, looks like. I should have his answer in an hour or so. In the meantime—" He hesitated. "You'd better let Yutu handle things and go discuss this with Chrys."

"Thanks, Brom. I'd already planned to do that."

"I'll talk to you whenever I know something." He nodded and the screen went blank.

Sighing, Jonny carefully flexed his rebellious elbows and punched for Yutu.

They all sat quietly in the softly lit living room as Jonny explained both the bad news and his proposed response to the crisis; and as he gazed at each member of his family in turn, he was struck as never before by the contrasting personalities their expressions revealed. Justin and Joshua, huddled together on the couch, showed roughly equal parts of fear and unquestioning trust, a mixture that was painfully reminiscent of his sister Gwen's childhood hero-worship. By contrast, Corwin's face belied his thirteen years as he clearly struggled to find an adult perspective into which he could submerge his own feelings of dread. Very like Jame, who'd always seemed older than his own biological age. And Chrys...

Chrys was as she always was, radiating a quiet strength and support toward him even while her eyes ached with the fear and pain a permanent separation would bring her. An acceptance of his plan based not on submission of any kind, but on the simple fact that her mind worked the same as his did and she could see just as clearly that it was something that had to be tried.

He finished his explanation, and for a few moments the silence was broken only by the soft hum of the air conditioning. "When'll you be leaving, Dad?" Corwin asked at last.

"If I go, it'll be today," Jonny answered. "They'll want to leave as soon as the ship's refueled and all."

"Are you going to take Almo or someone with you?"

Jonny smiled briefly. Almo Pyre had been one of the first volunteers through D'arl's Cobra factory, and with his fierce loyalty toward Jonny and the entire Moreau family, he'd been a natural role model for Corwin to latch onto. "I don't think we'll have any problems on the way back," he told his son. "Besides which, your father's not that helpless yet." Steeling himself, he turned to Chrys. Her loyalty toward him deserved at least as much back. "I've explained all of what I know and think, and why I feel I should go," he told her. "But if, after hearing it, you think I should stay, I'll do so."

She smiled sadly. "If you don't understand me better than that by now—"

The abrupt ring from the phone made them all jump. Getting carefully to his feet, Jonny went to his desk and flipped the instrument on. "Yes?"

It was Stiggur. "Sorry, Jonny, but no go. Wrey steadfastly refuses to clutter his ship with useless colonial officials. His words."

Jonny exhaled slowly. "Did you explain how important it could be?"

"Loudly enough to scare a gantua. He simply refuses to consider anything even marginally outside his orders."

"Then maybe I'd better talk to him again myself. Do I still have your authorization to go?"

"I guess so. But it's all academic now."

"Perhaps. I'll get back to you."

He disconnected and started to punch for the starfield... but halfway through the motion he paused and turned to look at Chrys.

Her eyes gazed at his, and through them to whatever pain she saw in the future. But though her lips seemed made of wood, her voice was firm enough. "Yes. Try."

He held her eyes another second, then turned back to the phone. A few moments later Wrey's face appeared. "Yes? Oh, it's you. Look, Governor—"

"Mr. Wrey, I'm not going to repeat Governor-General Stiggur's arguments," Jonny interrupted him. "I don't care whether you can't see past your own nose and understand why this is important. The fact of the matter is that I'm coming with you to Asgard, and you can like it or not."

Wrey snorted. "Oh, really? They call that a Titan complex back in Dome, Moreau—the belief that you can go ahead and defy authority any time you want to. I suggest you check on my status here and consider what would happen if you tried to barge past my Marines against my orders."

Jonny shook his head. "I'm afraid it is you, sir, who's misunderstanding the legal situation here. Our charter clearly states that the governor-general may requisition a berth on any outgoing ship for purposes of consultation with Dominion officials. The charter makes no provision for exceptions."

"I claim an exception anyway. If you don't like it, you can file a grievance with the Central Committee when the war's over."

"I'm sorry, but it doesn't work that way. If you want to claim a legitimate exception, you'll have to present your case here, to Aventine's Council of Syndics."

Wrey's eyes narrowed. "What does that entail?"

Which meant the other had been on Asgard so long he'd forgotten how planet-level politics worked. For an instant Jonny was tempted to spin a genuine horror story, but quickly decided against it. Playing it straight was safer, and the truth was bad enough. "We'll first need to assemble all the Syndics—that's the easy part; they're all on the way here already. Then you'll present your credentials and your case and Governor-General Stiggur will present his. The council will discuss the situation and probably recess to make individual studies of the charter and try to find precedents in whatever Dominion records we have on file. Then they'll reassemble for a full debate, and when that's finished they'll vote. If the law seems to allow both sides of the case, a simple majority will suffice; but if the charter regulation I mentioned seems unopposed, then you'll need a three-quarters vote to grant you a one-time exception. The whole process will take—oh, maybe three to five days, minimum."

From the look on Wrey's face, the other had already added up the times. "Suppose I refuse to cooperate with this little delaying tactic?"

"You're free not to cooperate... but your ship doesn't lift until all this is resolved."

"How are you going to stop me?"

Reaching to the phone, Jonny tapped some keys, and a second later a new voice joined the circuit. "Pyre here."

"Almo, this is Jonny Moreau. How's security setup going?"

"All locked down, Governor," the younger Cobra told him.

"Good. Please inform the night manager that there's no longer any rush to service the Dominion ship. It won't be leaving for a few more days."

"Yes, sir."

"Hold it, soldier," Wrey snapped. "I am a direct representative of the Central Committee, and on that authority I'm countermanding that order. Understand?"

There was a short pause. "Governor, is his claim legitimate?"

"Yes, but this specific action seems to violate a clear charter provision. It looks like it'll be going to the council."

"Understood, sir. Servicing operations will be suspended immediately."

"What?" Wrey barked. "Just a damned—"

"Out, sir."

A click signaled Pyre's departure, leaving the rest of Wrey's outburst to expend itself in thin air. He broke off, fixing Jonny with a furious glare. "You're not going to get away with this, Moreau. You can throw your Cobras against my armored Marines all day without—"

"Are you suggesting a firefight in the vicinity of your ship, sir?" Jonny asked mildly.

Wrey fell suddenly silent. "You won't get away with it," he repeated mechanically.

"The law is on my side," Jonny said. "Frankly, Mr. Wrey, I don't see why this is really a problem. You obviously have the room to spare for me, and I've already showed you that you'll be both morally and legally in the clear if your superiors become annoyed. And who knows? Maybe they'll actually be glad I came along... in which case you'll get all the credit for such foresight."

Wrey snorted at that, but Jonny could see in his face that he'd already opted for the simpler, safer course. "All right, what the hell. You want to cut out and spend the war on Asgard, that's none of my business. Just be here when the rest of the passengers show or I'll leave without you."

"Understood. And thank you."

Wrey snorted again and the screen went blank.

Jonny exhaled slowly. Another minor victory... and as emotionally unsatisfying as all such political wins seemed to be. Perhaps, he thought, it was because no opponent was ever fully vanquished in this form of combat. They always got back up out of the dust, a little smarter and—often—a little madder each time. And Jonny would now be spending the next three months heading straight for Wrey's political domain, while Wrey himself had those same months to plan whatever revenge he chose.

So much for victory.

Grimacing, Jonny punched again for Almo Pyre. His order halting the ship's servicing would have to be rescinded.

There was a great deal of work involved in turning over his duties on such short notice, and in the end Jonny wound up with far less time than he'd wanted to tell his family good-bye. It added one more shade of pain to the already Pyrrhic victory, especially as he had no intention of letting Wrey know how he felt.

The worst part, of course, was that there was very little aboard ship to occupy his thoughts. On the original trip to Aventine a quarter century earlier, there'd been fellow colonists to meet as well as magcards of information compiled by the survey teams to be studied. Here, even with the fourteen business passengers Wrey was bringing home, the ship carried only thirty-six people, none of whom Jonny was especially interested in getting to know. And if the ship carried any useful information on the impending war, no one was saying anything about it.

So for the first couple of weeks Jonny did little except sit alone in his cabin, reread the colonies' data he'd brought to show the Central Committee, and brood... until one morning he awoke with an unexpected, almost preternatural alertness. It took him several minutes to figure out on a conscious level what his subconscious had already realized: during ship's night they had passed from no-man's space into the Troft Corridor. The old pattern of being in hostile territory evoked long-buried Cobra training; and as the politician yielded to the warrior, Jonny unexpectedly found his helpless feelings giving way to new determination. For the time being, at least, the political situation had become a potentially military one... and military situations were almost never completely hopeless.

He began in the accepted military way: learning the territory. For hours at a time he toured the Menssana, getting to know everything about it and compiling long mental lists of strengths, weaknesses, quirks, and possibilities. He learned the names and faces of each of the fourteen crewers and six Marines, evaluating as best he could how they would react in a crisis. Doing the same with the passengers actually proved a bit easier: with the same excess of free time he himself had, they were eager to spend time with him, playing games or just talking. More than once Jonny wished he'd brought Cally Halloran along, but even without the other's knack at informal psych analysis, he was soon able to divide the passengers into the old "float/freeze" categories: those who could probably deal with and adapt to a crisis, and those who couldn't. Heading the former were two executive field reps Jonny soon learned to consider friends as well as potential allies: Dru Quoraheim, a pharmaceutical company executive whose face and dry humor reminded him vaguely of Ilona Linder; and Rando Harmon, whose interests lay in rare metals and, occasionally, Dru Quoraheim. For a while Jonny wondered if Dru had latched onto him to use as a partial shield against Harmon's advances, but as it became clear that those advances were entirely non-serious he realized the whole thing was an elaborate game designed to give the participants something to concentrate on besides the mental picture of silent Troft warships.

And when his survey was complete... it was back to waiting. He played chess with Dru and Harmon, kept abreast of the ship's progress, and—alone, late at night—tried to come up with some way to keep the war from happening, or at least to keep it from happening to Aventine. And wondered if and when the Trofts would move against the Menssana.

Twenty-five light-years from Dominion space, they finally did.

It was evening, ship's time, and most of the passengers were in the lounge, grouped in twos and threes for conversation, social drinking, or the occasional game. At a table near the back Jonny, Dru, and Harmon had managed a synthesis of all three in the form of a light Aventine sherry and a particularly nasty round of trisec chess.

A game Jonny's red pieces were steadily losing. "You realize, of course," he commented to his opponents, "that such friendly cooperation between you two is prima facie evidence of collusion between your two companies. If I lose this game, I'm swearing out a complaint when we get to Asgard."

"Never stand up in court," Harmon rumbled distractedly. His attention had good reason to be elsewhere; Dru was slowly but inexorably building up pressure on his king side and too many of his own pieces were out of position to help. "Dru's the one who's apparently moonlighting from the Joint Command's tactical staff."

"I wish I was," Dru shook her head. "At least I'd have something to do during the war. Market developers don't get much work when the market shrinks."

For a few minutes the only sound was the click of chess pieces as Dru launched her attack, Harmon defended, and Jonny took advantage of the breather to reposition his own men. Harmon was a move behind in the exchange and wound up losing most of his cozy castle arrangement. "Tell me again about this collusion," he said when the flurry of moves was over.

"Well, I could be mistaken," Jonny admitted.

Harmon grunted and took a sip of his drink. "Going to be the last Aventine sherry anyone back home gets for a long time," he commented. "A real pity."

"War usually is." Jonny hesitated. "Tell me, what does the Dominion's business community think of the upcoming hostilities?"

Dru snorted. "I presume you're not talking about the shipyards and armaments manufacturers?"

"No, I mean companies like yours that've been working with Aventine. Maybe even the Trofts, too, for all I know. Like you said, Dru, you're losing a growing market out here."

She glanced at Harmon. "With Aventine, yes, though I'll point out for the record that neither of our companies deals with the Trofts—Dome is very stingy with licenses for that kind of trade. You're right, though, that the Outer Colonies are going to be missed."

"Anyone who deals with you feels pretty much the same way," Harmon added. "But there's nothing obvious we can do about it."

"About all we can do is hope our first attack is so brilliant and decisive that it ends the war before too much damage is done." Dru moved a pawn, simultaneously opening Harmon's king to a new threat and blocking an advance from Jonny's remaining rook.

Harmon waved at the board. "And if the Star Force has any brains, they'll put Dru in charge—what was that?"

Jonny had felt it too: a dull, almost audible thump, as if someone had dropped an exceptionally heavy wrench in the Menssana's engine room. "We've just dropped out of hyperspace," he said quietly, sliding his chair back and looking around. None of the others in the lounge seemed to have noticed the jolt.

"Out here?" Dru frowned. "Aren't we still two weeks inside Troft territory?"

"It may not have been voluntary." Jonny stood up. "Stay here; I'm going to the bridge. Don't say anything to the others yet—no sense panicking anyone until we know what's going on."

He reached the bridge to find Captain Davi Tarvn presiding over a scene of controlled chaos. "What's the situation?" he asked, stepping to the other's command station.

"Too soon to really tell," Tarvn replied tightly. "Looks like we hit a Troft flicker-mine web, but so far the usual spider ships haven't shown up. Maybe they won't."

"Wishful thinking."

"Sure, but that's about all we've got," Tarvn nodded. "If a Troft shows up before the drive's recalibrated, we've had it. You know as well as I do how long our weaponry and plating would hold against attack—you've been studying the ship enough lately."

Jonny grimaced. "About half a minute if they were determined. What can I do?"

"You can get the hell off the bridge," a new voice snapped, and Jonny turned to see Wrey crossing the floor toward them. "Status, Captain?"

"Minimum of an hour before the drive can be fixed," Tarvn told him. "Until then we try to be as inconspicuous as possible—"

"Hostile at ninety-seven slash sixty," the navigator interjected suddenly. "Closing, Captain."

"Battle stations," Tarvn gritted. "Well, gentlemen, so much for staying inconspicuous. Mr. Wrey, what do you want me to do?"

Wrey hesitated. "Any chance of outrunning him?"

"Second hostile," the navigator said before Tarvn could reply. "Two-ninety slash ten. Also closing."

"Right on top of us," Tarvn muttered. "I'd say our chances are slim, sir, at least as long as we're stuck in normal."

"Then we have to surrender," Jonny said.

Wrey turned a murderous glare onto him. "I told you to get lost," he snarled. "You have no business here—this is a military situation."

"Which is exactly why you need me. I've fought the Trofts; you almost certainly never have."

"So you're an overage reservist," Wrey grunted. "That still doesn't—"

"No," Jonny said, lowering his voice so that only Wrey and Tarvn could hear. "I'm a Cobra."

Wrey's voice died in mid-word, his eyes flicking over Jonny's form. Tarvn muttered something under his breath that Jonny didn't bother notching up his enhancers to catch. But the captain recovered fast. "Any of the passengers know?" he murmured.

Jonny shook his head. "Just you two—and I want it kept that way."

"You should have told me earlier—" Wrey began.

"Be quiet, sir," Tarvn said unexpectedly, his eyes still on Jonny. "Will the Trofts be able to detect your equipment, Governor?"

"Depends on how tight a filter they put all of us through," Jonny shrugged. "A full bioscan will show it, but a cursory weapon detector check shouldn't."

Behind Jonny the helmsman cleared his throat. "Captain?" he said, his voice rigidly controlled. "The Trofts are calling on us to surrender."

Tarvn glanced at his screens, turned back to Wrey. "We really don't have any choice, sir."

"Tell them we're an official Dominion courier and that this is a violation of treaty," Wrey said tightly, his own eyes on the displays. "Threaten, argue—do your damnedest to talk our way out. Then—" He exhaled between clenched teeth. "If it doesn't work, go ahead and surrender."

"And try to get terms that'll leave all of us aboard the Menssana," Jonny added. "We may need to get out in a hurry if we get an opening."

"We damn well better get that opening," Wrey murmured softly. "All of this is your idea, remember."

Jonny almost laughed. Middle-level bureaucrat, indeed—the operation had barely begun and already Wrey was scrambling to place any possible blame elsewhere. Predictable and annoying; but occasionally it could be used. "In that case, I presume I'm authorized to handle the whole operation? Including giving Captain Tarvn orders?"

Wrey hesitated, but only briefly. "Whatever you want. It's your game now."

"Thank you." Jonny turned back to Tarvn. "Let's see what we can do now about stacking the deck and maybe providing a little diversion at the same time."

He outlined his plan, got Tarvn's approval, and hurried to the Marine guardroom to set things up. Then it was back to the lounge and a quiet consultation with Dru and Harmon. They took the news calmly, and as they all collected and put away the chess pieces, he outlined the minor and—theoretically—safe roles he wanted them to play. Both agreed with a grim eagerness that showed he'd chosen his potential allies well.

He was back in his cabin fifteen minutes later, hiding the most sensitive of his Aventine data on random sections of unrelated magcards, when Tarvn officially announced the Menssana's surrender. Obeying the captain's instructions, he went to the lounge with the others and tried to relax. He succeeded about as well as everyone else.

A half hour later, the Trofts came aboard.

The lounge was the largest public room on the ship, but fifteen passengers, thirteen crewers, and four Marines made for cozy quarters even without the seven armed Trofts lined up along the wall. Wrey and Tarvn were absent, presumably having been taken elsewhere; Jonny kept his fingers crossed that anyone who noticed would assume the two missing Marines were with them.

There had been few communications with the Trofts during the war to which Jonny had been privy, but back then he'd gotten the impression the aliens weren't much for social or even political small talk, and the boarding party's spokesman did nothing to shake that image. "This ship and its resources are now possessions of the Drea'shaa'chki Demesne of the Trof'te Assemblage," the alien's translator repeater stated in flat tones. "The crew and passengers will remain aboard as tokens of human consensus-order violations. The so-named Trof'te Corridor has been reclaimed."

So they were to be held aboard. That was a stroke of luck Jonny had hoped for but not dared to expect. If Wrey had wangled this concession, perhaps he was good for something, after all—

His thoughts were cut off abruptly as an armored but weaponless Marine was hauled through the door by two Trofts and put into line with the other prisoners. Mentally, Jonny shrugged; he'd expected the better equipped of his two sleepers to be found fairly quickly. The other Marine, in shirtsleeves and armed only with a knife and garotte, should withstand the search somewhat better. Not that his freedom or capture ultimately made much difference. As long as he drew the Trofts' attention away from the civilians, he was serving his purpose. Though Jonny doubted that he realized that.

The prisoners were kept in the lounge another hour, leading Jonny to wonder whether they would be staying there until the Trofts were satisfied everyone had been found. But as they were led back to the passenger cabin section without the second Marine making his appearance, he decided the reason for the delay was probably more prosaic: that the aliens had been conducting careful sensor searches of their rooms with an eye toward turning them into cells. The guess turned out to be correct, and a few minutes later Jonny found himself back in his cabin.

Though not quite alone.

The three sensor disks the Trofts had attached to selected sections of wall and ceiling were rather conspicuous as such things went, nearly two centimeters across each with faintly translucent surfaces. A quick check showed that the bathroom and even the closet were equipped with disks of their own. What they might pick up besides an optical picture Jonny didn't know, but it hardly mattered. As long as they were in place, he was unable to act; ergo, his first task was to get rid of them.

It was probably the first time in twenty-seven years that his arcthrower might have done him some good; but then, he hardly could have used it without announcing in large red letters that he was a Cobra. Fortunately, there were other ways to accomplish what he had in mind. Returning to the bathroom, he selected a tube of burn salve from the cabinet first-aid kit. He was in the process of coating the second of the main room's disks with a thick layer of cream when the inevitable Troft charged in.

"You will cease this activity," the alien said, the monotone translator voice editing out whatever emotion lay behind the words.

"I'll be damned if I will," Jonny snarled back, putting all the righteous indignation he could into both voice and body language on the off-chance this was one of those Trofts who could read such nuances. "You attack us, pirate our ship, paw through our cabins—just look at the mess you left my magcards in—and now you have the damned nerve to spy on us. Well, I'm not going to stand for it—you hear me?"

The alien's upper-arm membranes rippled uncertainly. "Not all of you seem bothered by our security needs."

Not all of you... which implied Dru and Harmon had followed his instructions to kick up similar fusses. Three wasn't a very big crowd to hide in, but it was better than being blatantly unique. "Not all of us grew up with private bathrooms, either," he retorted, "but those who did can't do without them. I want my privacy and I'm going to get it."

"The sensors will remain," the Troft insisted.

"Then you're going to have to chain me up," Jonny snarled, crossing his arms defiantly.

The alien paused, and Jonny's enhanced hearing caught a stream of high-speed Troft catertalk. It was another minute before the translator came back on-line. "You spoke of privacy in the bathroom. If the sensor is removed from in there, will that satisfy your needs?"

Jonny pursed his lips. It would, actually, but he didn't want to accept the compromise too eagerly. "Well... I could try that, I suppose."

The Troft stepped past him and disappeared into the bathroom, returning a moment later with the sensor disk in one hand and some tissues from the dispenser in the other. He offered the latter to Jonny. It took the Cobra a second to understand; then, taking them, he proceeded to wipe clean the two disks he'd disabled. When he was finished, the Troft strode to the door and left.

He gave in awfully easily, was Jonny's first thought. A careful check of the bathroom, though, showed it was indeed clear of all sensors. Returning to the main room, he sat back down with his comboard—remembering to maintain an air of discomfort—and pretended to read.

He waited an hour, ten minutes of which time was spent in the bathroom to see if the Trofts would get nervous and send in a guard. But they'd evidently decided there was nothing dangerous he could do in there and no one disturbed him. Taking slightly higher than normal doses of his anemia and arthritis medicines, he returned to his comboard... and when the drugs took effect it was time to go.

He began with the normal human pattern for a pre-bedtime shower: pajamas carried into the bathroom accompanied by the hiss of water against tile. But under cover of the sound, Jonny's fingertip lasers traced a rectangular pattern on the thin metal panel between sink and shower stall, and within a minute he had a passable opening to the cramped service corridor behind the row of cabins. Leaving the water running, he squeezed into the corridor and began sidling his way forward.

The Menssana's designer had apparently felt that separate ventilation systems for the various service lane levels would be a waste of good equipment and had opted instead for periodically spaced grilles to connect all of them together. It was a quirk that would ordinarily be of no use to anyone in Jonny's position, as the cramped quarters and high ceilings discouraged vertical movement almost as much as solid floors would have. But then, the designer hadn't been thinking about Cobras.

Jonny passed three more cabins before finding a grille leading to the deck above. Bending his knees the few degrees the walls allowed, he jumped upward, stifling a grunt as a twinge of pain touched the joints. Catching the grille, he hung suspended for a moment as he searched out the best spots to cut. Then, with leg servos pressing his feet against the walls in a solid friction grip, he turned his lasers against the metal mesh. A minute later he was through the hole and sidling down that level's service corridor; two minutes after that he was peering out the corridor's access door at the darkened equipment room into which it opened. Next door would be the EVA-ready room. Beyond that was the main hatch and the probable connection to the Troft ship.

Jonny eased out the equipment room door into the deserted corridor, alert for sounds of activity that weren't there. The main hatch was indeed open, the boarding tunnel beyond snaking enough to block any sight of the alien ship's own entryway. Whatever security the Trofts had set up was apparently at the far end of the tunnel, an arrangement that would be difficult but not impossible to exploit. But any such operation required first that the Menssana be under human control again... and to accomplish that, he would have to retake the bridge. Passing the hatch, he continued on forward.

The spiral stairway leading to the bridge had not been designed with military security in mind, but the Trofts had added one of their sensor disks to the spiral in a position impossible to bypass. From a semi-shadowed position down the hall, Jonny gritted his teeth and searched his memory for a way to approach the stairway from behind. But any such route would take a great deal of time, and time was in short supply at the moment. On the other hand... if the Trofts saw an apparently unarmed man approaching their position, they were unlikely to greet him with an automatic blaze of laser fire. They would probably merely point their weapons and order him to surrender, after which they would return him to his cell and find out how he'd escaped. If they followed safe military procedure and called in before confronting him... but he'd just have to risk that. Now, while the Menssana was still in or near the Corridor, was their best opportunity for escape. Gritting his teeth, he started for the staircase.

He moved quickly, though no faster than a normal human could have, and no challenges or shots came his way before he reached the stairs and started up. His catlike steps were small bomb blasts in his enhanced hearing, but between them he could hear the unmistakable sounds of sudden activity overhead. He kept going... and when he raised his head cautiously above the level of the bridge floor he found himself facing a semicircle of four Troft handguns. "You will make no sudden movements," a translator voice ordered as he froze in place. "Now: continue forward for questioning."

Slowly, Jonny continued up the stairs and into the bridge, keeping his hands visible. The four guards were backed up by three more at the Menssana's consoles, armed but with weapons holstered. Sitting atop the communications board was a small box of alien design. The Trofts' link with their own ship and translator, most likely... and in a highly vulnerable position.

"How did you escape from your quarters?" one of the guards asked.

Jonny focused on the semicircle. "Call your captain," he said. "I wish to speak to him about a trade."

The Trofts' arm membranes fluttered. "You are in no position to trade anything."

"How do you know?" Jonny countered. "Only your captain can make that assessment."

The Troft hesitated. Then, slowly, he raised a hand to a collar pin and let loose with a stream of catertalk. Another pause... and the communications box abruptly spoke. "This the Ship Commander. What do you propose to trade?"

Jonny pursed his lips. It was a question he'd been working on since the Trofts first came aboard... and he had yet to come up with a really satisfactory answer. Trade back the Trofts aboard the Menssana? But the aliens didn't think of hostage as a word applicable to living beings. The Menssana itself? But he hardly had real control of the ship. Still, if politics had taught him anything, it was the value of a plausible bluff. "I offer you your own ship in return for the humans you hold plus the release of this vessel," he said.

There was a long pause. "Repeat, please. You offer me my own demesne-ship?"

"That's right," Jonny nodded. "From this ship I have the power to destroy yours. For obvious example, a hard starboard yaw would tear out the boarding tunnel, depressurizing that part of your demesne-ship, and a simultaneous blast with the drive at this range would cause extensive damage to your own engines. Is this possibility not worth trading to avoid?"

His captors' arm membranes were fluttering at half-mast now. Either the room temperature had risen dramatically or he had indeed hit a sensitive nerve. "Commander?" he prompted.

"The ability you claim is nonexistent," the box said. "You are not in control of that ship."

"You're wrong, Commander. My companion and I are in full control here."

"You have no companion. The soldier hiding in the dining-area ventilation system has been returned to his quarters."

So the other Marine had been found. "I'm not speaking of him."

"Where is your companion?"

"Nearby, and in control. If you want to know any more you'll have to come here and negotiate the trade I've suggested."

There was another long pause. "Very well. I will come."

"Good." Jonny blew a drop of sweat from the tip of his nose. Perhaps it was just getting hot.

"You will reveal your companion to us before the Ship Commander arrives," one of the guards said. It didn't sound like a request.

Jonny took a careful breath... prepared himself. "Certainly. She's right here." He gestured to his left, the arm movement masking the slight bending of his knees—

And he ricocheted off the ceiling to slam to the deck behind the four guards, fingertip lasers blazing.

The communications box went first, fried instantly by a blast from his arcthrower. Two of the guards' guns hit the deck midway through that first salvo; the other two guards made it nearly all the way around before their lasers also erupted with clouds of vaporized metal and plastic and went spinning from burned hands. A sideways jump and half turn and Jonny had the last three Trofts in sight. "Don't move," he snapped.

With the translator link down his words were unintelligible, but none of the aliens seemed to mistake his meaning. All remained frozen where they stood or sat, arm membranes stretched wide, as Jonny disarmed the last three and then tore the communicator pins from the uniforms of all seven. Herding them down the staircase, he got them into a nearby water pumping room—spot-welding the latch to make sure they stayed put—and hurried aft toward the main hatch. The Troft commander wasn't likely to come alone, and Jonny needed at least a little advance notice as to what size force he'd have to handle. The possibility that the other would simply veer off, trading his occupation force for two humans, wasn't one Jonny wanted to consider.

He heard them coming down the boarding tunnel long before they actually appeared: ten to fifteen of them, he estimated, from the sound. Hidden in an emergency battery closet a dozen meters down the hall, he watched through a cracked door as they approached. The commander was easy to spot, keeping to the geometric center of his guard array: an older Troft, by the purple blotches on his throat bladder, his uniform fairly dripping with the colored piping of rank. Six guards ahead of him, six behind him, their lasers fanned to cover both directions, the procession moved down the corridor toward Jonny's hiding place and the bridge. The vanguard passed him... and Jonny slammed open the door and leaped.

The door caught the nearest Troft full in the back, jolting him forward and clearing just enough room for Jonny's rush to get him through the phalanx unhindered. With one outstretched arm he caught the commander around his torso, the action spinning them both around as Jonny's initial momentum drove them toward the far wall. Slipping between the two guards on that side, they slammed against the plating, Jonny's back screaming with agony as it took the brunt of the impact.

And then, for a long moment, the corridor was a silent, frozen tableau.

"All right," Jonny said as his breath returned, "I know you don't apply the idea of hostage to yourselves, Commander, so we'll just think of this as a matter of your personal safety. All of you—lay your weapons down on the deck. I don't especially want to hurt your commander, but I will if I have to."

Still no one moved, the twelve laser muzzles forming shining counterpoint to the arched arm membranes spread out behind each of them. "I told you to drop your guns," Jonny repeated more harshly. "Don't forget that you can't hit me without killing your commander."

The Troft leaning against him stirred slightly in his grip. "They have no concern for my life," the translator voice said. "I am not the Ship Commander, merely a Services Engineer in his uniform. A crude trick, but one which we learned from humans."

Jonny's mouth went dry. His eyes swept the circle of Trofts, the steadiness of their weapons an unspoken confirmation of the other's words. "You're lying," he said, not believing it but driven to say something. "If you're not the commander, then why haven't they opened fire?" He knew the answer to that: they wanted him alive. History—personal history, at least—had repeated itself... and even more than on Adirondack, he knew the knowledge he held this time was too valuable to allow the enemy to have. Chrys, a detached fragment of his mind breathed in anguish toward the distant stars, and he prepared for his last battle—

"They will not shoot," the Troft in his grip said. "You are a koubrah-soldier from the Aventine world, and if killed you would merely fight on until all aboard were dead."

Jonny frowned. "How's that?"

"You need not deny the truth. We have all heard the report."

What report? Jonny opened his mouth to ask the question aloud... and suddenly he understood.

MacDonald. Somehow they'd heard about MacDonald.

He looked at the circle of Trofts again, seeing their rigidly stretched arm membranes with new eyes. Determination, he'd thought earlier, or perhaps rage. But now he recognized the emotion for what it was: simple, naked fear. D'arl was right, that same detached fragment of his mind realized. They are afraid of us. "I don't wish to kill anyone," he said quietly. "I want only to free my companions and to continue on my way."

"To what end?" the same flat voice came from the direction of the boarding tunnel. Jonny turned his head to see another middle-aged Troft walking slowly toward them. His uniform was identical to the one wrapped in Jonny's arms.

"That of protecting my world, Commander," Jonny told him. "By diplomatic means if possible, military ones if necessary."

The other said something in catertalk, and slowly the circle of laser muzzles dipped to point at the floor. His eyes on the Troft commander, Jonny released his captive and stepped out from behind him. A trick to put the Cobra off-guard, perhaps; but the politician within Jonny recognized the need to respond to the gesture with a good-faith one of his own. "Have we any grounds for negotiation?" he asked.

"Perhaps," the commander said. "You spared the lives of the Trof'tes in your control center when you could as easily have killed them. Why?"

Jonny frowned, realizing for the first time that he had no idea why he'd handled things that way. Too long in politics, where one never killed one's opponent? No. The real reason was considerably less colorful. "There wasn't any need to kill them," he said with a shrug. "I suppose it never really occurred to me."

"Koubrah-soldiers were created to kill."

"We were created to defend. There's a difference."

The other seemed to ponder that. "Perhaps there are grounds for compromise," he said at last. "Or at least for discussion. Will you and your companion come to my bridge?"

Jonny nodded. "Yes... but the companion I mentioned won't actually be there. She's an insubstantial entity we humans call Lady Luck."

The commander was silent a moment. "I believe I understand. If so, I would still invite her to accompany us."

Turning, he disappeared into the boarding tunnel. Hesitating only a moment, Jonny followed. The escort, weapons still lowered, fell into step around him.

He was back on the Menssana side of the tunnel four hours later when Wrey and Tarvn were brought aboard. "Good evening, gentlemen," Jonny nodded as their Troft escort silently disappeared back down the tunnel. "Captain, if you'll seal that hatch we're almost ready to be on our way."

"What the hell happened?" Wrey asked, his bewildered tone making the words more plaintive than demanding. "No questioning, no demands—no talk, period—and suddenly they're letting us go?"

"Oh, there was talking, all right," Jonny said. "Lots of it. That hatch secure? Good. Captain, I believe the drive repairs are finished, but you'll need to confirm that from the bridge. And make sure we're all ready before you pull away—the other Troft ship isn't in on this and they might try and stop us."

Tarvn's eyebrows arched, but all he said was, "Got it," before heading forward at a fast trot.

"What's going on?" Wrey demanded as Jonny started to follow. "What do you mean, there was lots of talking?"

"The Ship Commander and I had a discussion, and I convinced him it was in his best interests to let us go."

"In other words, you made a deal," Wrey growled. "What was it?"

"Something I'll discuss only with the Central Committee and only when we reach Asgard," Jonny told him flatly.

Wrey frowned at him, irritation and growing suspicion etching his face. "You're not authorized to negotiate for the entire Dominion of Man."

"That's okay—the Ship Commander wasn't authorized to negotiate for the Troft Assemblage, either." A gentle thump rippled through the deck and Jonny relaxed muscles he hadn't realized he'd had tensed. "But what authority he did have seems to have been adequate to get us away."

"Moreau—"

"Now if you'll excuse me, it's been a long night and I'm very tired. Good-night, Mr. Wrey; you can figure out on your own how you'll write this incident up. I'm sure you'll come out the hero in the final version."

Which was a rather cheap shot, Jonny admitted to himself as he headed aft toward his cabin. But at the moment his body was aching more than Wrey would ever know and he had no patience left for mid-bureaucratic mentality.

Or, for that matter, for illegal business practices and deliberate evasions. Which was why he planned to take a few days to recuperate before confronting Dru and Harmon with the half-truth the Troft Ship Commander had popped. Allies they had been; allies they might yet be... and he would like if possible to also keep them as friends.

It was another two weeks' travel to the Troft-Dominion border, fourteen of the longest days Jonny had ever suffered through this side of the last war. The cooling attitude toward him aboard the Menssana was part of it, of course, bringing back painful memories of those last months on Horizon. Jonny had all but forgotten the fear mainstream Dominion society felt toward Cobras, and on top of that he suspected Wrey of spitefully dropping hints that he'd made some terrible deal to buy their freedom. Only Harmon and Dru seemed relatively untouched by the general aloofness, and even with them Jonny could tell their friendliness had a large wedge of self-interest mixed in. After the long and painful confession session Jonny had forced them through shortly after their escape, he had the power to bring a fair amount of official flak down on them, and they both knew it.

But the social isolation was only a minor part of the frustration Jonny felt with the slowness of their progress. He had a real chance of sidetracking the war completely, but only if he could get to Asgard before the actual shooting began. To Asgard, and in front of the Central Committee. He hoped Jame would be able to arrange that; Wrey wasn't likely to be of any help.

And at last the Menssana touched down on Adirondack, the terminus point for Corridor traffic... and Wrey played his trump card.

"I'm sorry for whatever inconvenience it'll cost you to have to find your own ways back to your ultimate destinations," Wrey told the group of passengers as they gathered in the Dannimor starfield's customs building. "Unfortunately, the fast courier I'll be taking to Asgard hasn't room for anyone besides myself and Captain Tarvn."

"And me, I presume," Jonny spoke up.

"Afraid not," Wrey said blandly. "But then, you'll remember I warned you against inviting yourself along."

For a heartbeat Jonny simply stood there, unable to believe his ears. "You can't do that, Wrey—"

"Can't I?" the other retorted. "I suggest you check the statutes, Moreau—if you know how to look up real law, that is."

Jonny gazed at the other's self-satisfied expression, the small gloating smile playing at the corners of the paunchy man's mouth—the small mind having its big moment. And Jonny, his own mind occupied by too many other things, had failed completely to anticipate this move. "Look," he said quietly, "this is foolish, and you know it. The Committee needs to hear what the Troft Ship Commander told me—"

"Oh, yes—the 'secret plan' to stop the war that you won't tell anyone about," Wrey almost-sneered. "Maybe you'd better finally loosen up and give me at least the basic outline. I'd be sure and mention it to the Committee."

"I'm sure you would," Jonny grated. "You'll forgive me if I don't trust you to do the job right. Of course, you realize leaving me stranded here with vital information is likely to land you in very deep water very fast."

"Oh, I wouldn't worry about that." Wrey raised a finger and four men in Army uniforms detached themselves from various walls and stepped forward, halting in a loose box formation about Jonny. "I wouldn't worry about yourself, either," Wrey added. "You're going to be well taken care of."

Jonny glanced at the guards, his eyes slipping from the quietly alert faces to the collar insignia beneath. Interrorum, the Army's crack anti-espionage/anti-terrorist squad. "What the hell is this?" he demanded.

"You'll be getting a first-class military ride to Asgard," Wrey told him. "After you've been checked for hypnotic and subliminal manipulation, of course."

"What? Look, Wrey, unless basic citizen rights have been suspended recently—"

"You were alone with the Trofts for several hours, by your own admission," Wrey interrupted harshly. "Maybe they let us go because you'd been programmed for sabotage or assassination."

Jonny felt his jaw drop. "Of all the ridiculous—you can't make a charge like that stick for ten minutes."

"Take it easy, Governor. I'm not trying to make anything 'stick'—I'm merely following established procedures. You'll be released in—what were those numbers? Three to five days minimum? It takes a three-quarters majority of the examiners to clear you, of course."

Jonny ground his teeth. Wrey was really taking his pound of flesh. "And suppose while I'm sitting around hooked to a biomedical sensor your news of the Troft hijacking starts a war that could have been prevented? Or didn't that occur to you?"

For just an instant Wrey's eyes lost some of their insolence. "I don't think there's any danger of that. You'll get to Asgard in plenty of time." He smiled slyly. "Probably. All right, take him."

For a long second Jonny was tempted. But the soldiers were undoubtedly backed up by plainclothesmen elsewhere, and there were lots of innocent civilians in the building who'd be caught in any crossfire. Exhaling through his teeth, he let them take him away.

The first part of this kind of testing, Jonny remembered from his Cobra lectures, was to establish a physiological baseline by giving the subject several hours of solitary while hidden sensors piled up data. A side effect, especially for those who didn't know the procedure, was to raise the subject's tension level as he contemplated the unknown future awaiting him.

For Jonny, the wasted hours ticking by were maddening.

A dozen times in the first hour he seriously considered breaking out and trying to commandeer a star ship, and each time it was the sheer number of uncertainties that finally stopped him. By the end of the second hour the first twinges of pain began to intrude on his planning. He called the guard, was politely but firmly told his medicine would be returned once it had been analyzed. Protests were of no avail, and as he settled back on his cot to wait, the simmering anger within him began to slowly change into fear. In a very short time he would lose the ability to function... and when that happened he truly would be at Wrey's mercy.

He'd been in the cell nearly three hours when a shadow passed across the observation window and his enhanced hearing picked up a quiet click from the direction of the door.

He turned his head to see, muscles tensing... but the door wasn't being opened. Instead, a small hemispherical dome near the floor beside it rotated open to reveal a tray of food.

At the observation window a guard's face appeared. "Thanks," Jonny said, easing from the cot and retrieving the meal. The old familiar Adirondack cooking, his nostrils told him as he carried the tray back and sat down.

"No problem." The guard hesitated. "Are you really one of the Cobras that saved Adirondack from the Trofts?"

Jonny paused, spoon halfway to his mouth. "Yes," he acknowledged. "Are you a native?"

The guard nodded. "Born and raised right here in Dannimor. Where were you stationed?"

"Over in Cranach." The mesh in the window made the guard's face hard to see, but Jonny estimated his age in the low thirties. "You were probably too young to remember the war much."

"I remember enough. We had relatives in Paris when it was destroyed." He pursed his lips at the memory. "I had an uncle in Cranach then, too. Did you know a Rob Delano?"

"No." Memories flooded back of the people he had known... and with the mental pictures came an idea. "Tell me, just how isolated am I supposed to be?"

"What do you mean—visitors or something?"

"Or even phone calls. There are people probably still living nearby who I once thought I'd never see again. As long as I'm stuck here for a while maybe I can at least say hello to some of them."

"Well... maybe later that'll be possible."

"Can you at least get me a directory or something so I can find out who still lives in the area?" Jonny persisted. "This dose of solitary isn't a punishment, after all—it's just part of the deep-psych test preparation. I ought to be allowed to have reading material in here."

The guard frowned at that, but then shrugged. "I'm not sure that really qualifies as reading material, but I'll check with the guard captain."

"Be sure to remind him that I am a high Dominion official," Jonny said softly.

"Yes, sir." The guard disappeared.

Jonny returned his attention to his dinner, striving to keep his new spark of hope in check. What he could accomplish with a directory—or even with the hoped-for contact with his old allies—wasn't immediately clear, but at least it was somewhere to start. If nothing else, it might give him a feel for exactly how big an official cloud Wrey had put him under.

He had finished his meal and returned the tray to its place by the door, and was considering lying down again, when the guard returned. "The captain wasn't available," his disembodied voice came as the tray disappeared and a small comboard showed up in its place. "But since you're a Dominion official and all, I guess it'll be all right." His face reappeared at the window, and he watched as Jonny brought the instrument back to his cot.

"I really appreciate it," Jonny told him. "The directory's on the magcard here?"

"Yes—it covers Cranach, Dannimor, and the ten or so smaller towns around." He paused. "You Cobras were pretty effective, from all I've read about you."

Something in his tone caught Jonny's attention. "We did all right. Of course, we couldn't have done it without the civilian underground."

"Or vice versa. We're not going to have Cobras for the next war—did you know that?"

Jonny grimaced. "I didn't, but I guess I'm not surprised. The Army just going to set up normal guerrilla teams if war breaks out?"

"When, not if," the other corrected. "Yeah, we've got a whole bunch of Ranger and Alpha Force groups here now, some of them setting up civilian resistance networks."

Jonny nodded as he finally placed the guard's tone. "Scary, isn't it? War always is... but this one doesn't have to happen."

"Yes, I heard the Interrorum guys talking about that. They said a Cobra would blow up if he'd been hypno-conditioned."

"No, they took those self-destruct triggers out right after the war. But I wasn't hypno-conditioned; by the Trofts or anyone else."

"That Committee man, Wrey, seems to think so."

Jonny smiled bitterly. "Wrey's a short-sighted idiot who's nursing a bruised pride. I had to practically force him to bring me from Aventine in the first place, and then I saved his spangles for him when the Trofts captured the Menssana. This is his way of putting me in my place."

"But would you necessarily know if your mind had been tampered with?"

"I would, yes. That kind of thing requires that the subject be put into an unconscious or semiconscious state, and I've got internal sensors that would warn me of any chemical, optical, or sonic attempts to do that."

The guard nodded slowly. "Does Wrey know that?"

"I wasn't given the chance to tell him."

"I see. Well... I'd better get back to my duties. I'll be back later for the comboard."

"Thanks again," Jonny said; but the other had gone. Now what, he wondered uneasily, was that all about? Information? Reassurance? Or was someone pulling his strings, trying to see how much I'd say? Maybe Wrey had decided to hang around a few more hours hoping to be spared the trouble of shipping Jonny to Asgard. If so, Jonny knew, it would be a long wait. Balancing the comboard on his knees, he started his search.

Weissmann, Dane, Nunki; the names of a dozen temporary families and twice that many temporary teammates; the names and faces of Cobras living and dead—all of them tumbled out together with an ease that belied the twenty-six-year gap. For nearly half an hour he bounced back and forth through the directory as fast as his stiffening fingers would allow; for an hour after that he went more slowly as the flood of names became a trickle and finally ceased entirely.

And none of them were listed.

He stared at the comboard, mind unwilling to accept the evidence of his eyes. Adirondack was still classified as a frontier world, yes, with new areas constantly being developed—but even in twenty-six years how could everyone he'd known here have moved somewhere else?

He was still trying to make sense of it all when a movement outside his cell made him look up. The click of multiple bolts being withdrawn gave him just enough time to slide the comboard under his pillow before the cell door opened to reveal a young woman. "Governor Moreau?" she asked.

"Yes," Jonny nodded. "I hope you're someone in authority here."

Something crossed her face, too quickly to identify. "Not hardly. Thank you," she said, turning to the guard hovering at her shoulder—a different one, Jonny noted, than the one he'd talked with earlier. "I'll call when I'm done."

"All right, Doctor." The door swung shut behind her.

"Well, Governor, your medicine's been cleared," she said briskly, reaching into a pouch on her belt and producing the two vials that had been taken from him earlier. "I imagine you'd like to get some into your system before the examination."

Jonny frowned. "Examination?"

"Just routine. Take your pills, please."

He complied, and she sat down beside him on the cot. "I'll be taking some local/gradient readings," she said, producing a small cylinder from her pouch. "Just hold still and don't talk."

She flipped the instrument on and an oddly pervasive humming filled the room. "You've changed a lot," she said, just barely over the noise. "I wasn't sure it was you until I heard you speak."

"What?"

"Talk without moving your lips, please." She moved the instrument slowly across his chest, eyes on the readout.

Jonny felt a cold sweat break out on his forehead. Again, the possibility that this was a test sprang to mind... but if so the stakes had been jumped immensely. Even passive cooperation with this woman might be worth a conspiracy charge. "Who are you?" he mumbled, lips as motionless as he could keep them.

Her eyes met his for the first time and a strangely mischievous smile tugged at the corners of her lips. "Don't you remember your star geometry pupil?"

Geometry? "Danice? Danice Tolan?"

Her smile widened a bit. "I knew I hadn't changed that much." Abruptly, she became serious again. "Now: what are you doing in a Dominion military prison?"

"Officially, I'm here because I've been talking about peace with the Trofts and am therefore considered a security risk. In actuality, I'm here for stepping on a little man's pride."

"Peace." Danice said the word as if tasting it. "Anything come of those talks that could be considered progress?"

"It wasn't exactly a formal negotiation: but yes, I think I can keep the war from happening. If I can get the Central Committee to go along, that is."

"Which you obviously can't do from here." Her eyes were hard, measuring. "How long are you in for?"

"Wrey said three to five days or more. But he's already gone on to Asgard and there's no telling what the Committee'll do when he tells them we were stopped and boarded by the Trofts."

"You think they might declare war right then and there?"

"You tell me—you must know more about Dominion politics these days than I do."

Danice chewed gently at her lip, and for a long minute the only sound in the cell was the hum of her probe. Twice she paused to reset the instrument, and Jonny noticed a worried frown gradually spreading across her face. "All right," she mumbled abruptly. "We'll do it now. I'm registering a possible aneurysm in the hepatic artery—that should buy us a trip to the hospital for a closer look. Just try and play off of any cues." Without waiting for a reply she flicked off the instrument and called for the guard captain.

The captain wasn't wildly enthusiastic about her proposed hospital trip, but it was clear from his tone and worried glances that he considered the Cobra an important prisoner. Barely fifteen minutes later Jonny and Danice were heading under heavy guard through the gathering dusk toward the city's newest and best-equipped hospital.

Jonny's last experience with full mainstream medical care had been just before leaving for Aventine, and he was thoroughly impressed by the added sophistication and power the equipment had achieved in the intervening time. Multiple-layer, real-time holographic displays of his body were available at anything from a quarter- to twenty-thousand-power magnification, with structural and chemical highlighting available. Danice handled the controls with the skill of obvious practice, locating and displaying the alleged aneurysm so clearly that even Jonny could spot it in the holo.

"We'll have to operate," Danice said, turning to the senior guard who'd accompanied them. "I suggest you check with your superiors for instructions—see if there's a particular surgeon they'd prefer to use or whatever. In the meantime I'm going to sedate him and give him a shot of vasodepressor to relieve pressure on that aneurysm."

The guard nodded and fumbled out his phone. A floating table, looking uncomfortably like a coffin with a long ground-effect skirt, was brought up. Jonny was hoisted onto it and strapped down, and from a cabinet in its side Danice withdrew a hypospray and two vials. Injecting their contents into Jonny's arm, she replaced the hypospray and brought out a full-face oxygen mask. "What's that for?" one of the guards asked as she slipped the milky plastic over Jonny's head.

"He needs a slightly enhanced air supply to compensate for his suppressed circulation," she said. "What room, orderly?"

"Three-oh-seven," the man who'd brought in the floating table told her. "If you'll all get out of the way... thank you."

Danice at his side, Jonny was pushed out into the hospital's corridor maze, arriving eventually at room 307, the numbers barely legible through the mask. "Wait here until he's settled," Danice told the guards curtly. "There's not enough room to accommodate spectators in there."

Jonny was maneuvered alongside a bed in a crackerbox-sized alcove. Stepping to the far side of his table—the side between him and the guards at the door—Danice and the orderly reached down—

And he was flipped over into total darkness.

The action was so unexpected that it took Jonny several heartbeats to realize exactly what had happened. The flat top of the floating table had apparently rotated a half turn on its long axis, concealing him in a hollowed-out part of the table's upper section. Above him he could hear the faint sounds of something heavy being lifted from the table... felt the table moving away from the bed... indistinct voices holding a short conversation... then moving again, through several turns and a long elevator ride....

When he was finally rotated into the open again, he and Danice were alone in an underground parking garage. "Hurry," she whispered, her hands shaking as she unfastened his restraints. "We've got to get you off-planet before they realize that's not you in that bed."

"Who is there?" Jonny asked as they jogged to a nondescript gray car.

"Fritz—one of the hospital's medical practice robots." She got behind the wheel, took a deep breath. "We had a few minutes to touch up his features a bit, but the minute someone pulls off that mask, it's all over."

"You want me to drive?" Jonny asked, eyeing the tension lines in her face.

A quick shake of the head. "I need to get used to this sometime. It might as well be now."

She drove them through the garage, up a ramp, and out into the bustle of early-evening traffic. Jonny let her drive in silence for a few minutes before asking the obvious question. "Where are we going?"

"There's a freighter leaving for Palm in about two hours," she said, not looking at him. "We've bumped some ungodly number of high-stress plastic whosies to put aboard a yacht and pilot for you—you can tell him exactly where and when to part company with the freighter."

Jonny nodded, feeling slightly dazed by the speed at which this was all happening. "Do I get to ask who I have to thank for all this?"

"Do you really want to know?" she countered.

Jonny thought that one over. It wasn't a trivial question. "Yes," he said at last.

She sighed. "Well. First of all, you can lay your worst fears to rest—we're not in any way a criminal group. In fact, in one sense we're actually an official arm of the Dominion Joint Command." She snorted. "Though that may change after this. We're what's known as the Underground Defense Network, an organization that's supposed to do in this war what you and my parents' underground did in the last one. Except that we won't have any Cobras."

"You sound like one of my guards," Jonny murmured. "He the one who told you about me?"

Danice glanced at him in obvious surprise. "You're as quick as I always remembered you being. Yes, he's one of the handful of quiet liaisons between the military and the UDN, though I don't think his immediate superiors know. He's the one who put word of your arrest on our communications net."

"And convinced all of you I was worth defying the authorities over?"

She smiled bitterly. "Nothing of the kind. Everyone helping us thinks this is just another training exercise. Rescuing Prisoner From Under Enemy's Nose 101; final exam."

"Except you." The question was obvious; he didn't bother to voice it.

"I was just a kid in the last war, Jonny," she said quietly, "but I remember enough about it to haunt two or three lifetimes. I don't want to go through it again... but if the Dominion goes to war I'll have to."

"Maybe not—" Jonny began cautiously.

"What do you mean, 'maybe not'?" she flared. "You think they're going to all this trouble for the fun of it? They know Adirondack's going to be a major Troft target, and they've as good as admitted they won't be able to defend us. The plain, simple truth is that they're writing our world off and preparing us to sink or swim on our own. And for nothing."

She broke off and took a deep breath. "I'm sorry, Jonny. I'm sure Aventine means a lot to you. But I just can't see sacrificing Adirondack and maybe Silvern and Iberiand too in what amounts to a war of retribution."

"No need to apologize," he assured her. "No world should have to fight for its life twice in one generation."

Danice shook her head wearily. "You don't know the half of it. The social upheaval alone... There were a lot of books written about us after the war, you know, books that listed a lot of the underground people by name. Well, the Joint Command decided those people's lives might be in danger when the Trofts came in again, so five years ago they took everybody mentioned in any of the books and gave them new identities somewhere else on the planet. I was just barely able to find my own parents, and they still don't know where half of their oldest friends are."

Ahead, Jonny could see the starfield's control tower silhouetted against the last traces of red in the southwestern sky. "This pilot you've picked out also thinks this is a training exercise?"

"Theoretically. But Don is pretty smart—he may have figured out something else is up. Anyway, you'll have several days to discuss it." She favored him with a thoughtful look. "You really don't like this business of trusting other people with your life, do you? I suppose the habits of being a Cobra die hard."

"Not as hard as you'd think," Jonny shook his head. "You're remembering me with the eyes of a ten-year-old. Even then, I wasn't really any less dependent on other people than you are now."

Which was not, of course, an answer to her question. He didn't like depending on others, especially with so much at stake.

But it was something he could get used to.

"Committé Vanis D'arl's office," the bored face in the phone screen announced.

"Jame Moreau," Jonny told her, watching her closely. If she gave even the slightest indication she recognized him...

"Who's calling, please?" she asked.

"Teague Stillman—I used to be mayor of his home town. Tell him it's important."

Jonny held his breath; but, "Just a minute, please," was all she said before her face was replaced by a stylized dome. The local "hold" symbol, Jonny supposed, automatically starting his nanocomputer clock circuit. He'd give Jame two minutes to answer before assuming the woman had called the cops instead and getting the hell out of the area—

"Hello, Jonny."

Jonny wrenched his gaze back from its survey of possible escape routes. If Jame was surprised to see him, it didn't show. "Hi, Jame," he said cautiously. "Uh..."

"The line's secure," his brother said. "You all right?"

"I'm fine, but I need your help. I have to—"

"Yeah, I know all about it. Damn it all, Jonny—look, where are you?"

Jonny felt icy fingers closing around his gut. "Why?"

"Why do you think?" Jame waved a hand in irritation. "Never mind—do it your own way. My neck's stuck far enough out as it is."

Jonny gritted his teeth. "I'm at a public phone on V'awter Street, just north of Carle Park."

Jame sighed. "All right. I'll be there in half an hour or less to get you. And stay put this time—understand?"

"Okay. And—thanks."

Some of the steel seemed to go out of Jame's backbone, and a small, guarded smile even touched his face. "Yeah. See you soon."

He was there in twenty minutes flat, and even with Jonny's lack of familiarity with current styles, it was obvious the younger Moreau's car was a top-of-the-line model. "Nice," Jonny nodded as he got in beside Jame and sank into the rich cushioning. "A step or two up from Dader's old limper."

"It won't stay that way long if anyone spots us," Jame replied tartly as he pulled into the traffic flow. "We're just lucky the alert on you was limited to the military and not made public. What did you think you were up to, anyway, breaking confinement like that?"

"What did you expect—that I'd just sit there in Wrey's private limbo while the pompous idiot got a war going?"

"Granted Wrey's a self-centered grudge-holder, credit him with at least the intelligence to guard his own skin," Jame growled. "He wouldn't have left you there more than two days at the most—and he'd arranged for a Star Force scoutship to bring you here after you'd been cleared. With the extra speed scouts can make, you'd have been here four days ago—barely a day, if that, behind Wrey."

Jonny's hands curled into fists. Could he really have misread Wrey that badly? "Damn," he murmured.

Jame sighed. "So instead of being brought before the Committee to have your say, you're right up there on the military's must-find list. I don't think even Wrey really believed his innuendo about you making a private deal with the Trofts, but the ease with which your friends got you loose has a lot of people very nervous. How'd you organize all that, anyway?"

"I didn't." Jonny sighed. "Okay. I admit I crusked up good. But it doesn't change the fact that the Committee needs to hear what I've brought."

Jame shook his head. "Not a chance. You wouldn't get past the first door of the dome."

Abruptly, Jonny realized that they were heading further out of the city instead of inward. "Where are we going?"

"To Committé D'arl's country estate."

Jonny's mouth went dry. "Why?"

Jame frowned at him. "You're the one who just said you wanted to talk to someone. Committé D'arl's agreed to hear you out."

"At his private estate." Where Jonny could quietly and conveniently disappear, if necessary, with no one the wiser.

Jame sighed. "Look, Jonny, I know you don't like the Committé, but this is the only way you're going to get a hearing. And I'll tell you flat out that you couldn't find a more receptive audience anywhere in Dome." He glanced at his older brother. "Come on—settle back and relax. I know it probably looks like the whole universe is against you right now, but if you can't trust your old pillow-fight partner, who can you trust?"

Almost unwillingly, Jonny felt a smile touch his lips. "You may be right," he admitted.

"Of course I'm right. Now: we've got just under an hour for you to bring me up-to-date on the Aventine branch of the Moreau family. So start talking."

D'arl's country estate was at least as large as the entire city of Capitalia; a rich man's version, Jonny thought once, of the Tyler Mansion and grounds of Adirondack. With a rich man's version of security, too. The car was stopped six times by pairs of variously armed guards, and at each roadblock Jonny's enhanced vision picked out hidden remotes and backups lurking near trees or oddly-shaped statues. But the Moreaus were clearly expected, and the guards passed them through without question.

The main house was as impressive as the grounds, its exterior magnificent and imposing, its interior carrying the same underplayed sense of luxury Jonny had noticed on the Committé's star ship so long ago. Personal taste, he'd thought then; but with eleven more years of politics behind him he could now recognize the additional subtle warning the decor conveyed: its owner was not a man who could be bought.

D'arl was waiting for them in a small study clearly designed for personal work rather than for public or private audiences. He looked up as they entered, waved them silently to the chairs already pulled up to face his. They sat down, and for a moment the Committé gazed at Jonny. "Well, Governor—it is Governor, isn't it?" he said at last. "You seem to have made a genuine mess of your little diplomatic trip. I presume your brother has already dragged you through the roasting pit over that asinine escape from Adirondack, so I'll dispense with any further remarks about that. So now tell me why you're worth sticking my neck out."

"Because I have information about the Troft Assemblage I think you don't," Jonny said calmly. "And what may be a good chance to prevent a war. The greatest good for the greatest number—wasn't that the criterion you've always followed?"

D'arl's lip twitched in a brief smile. "Your political skills have definitely improved, Governor. All right. Let's start with why you called the Troft Empire an Assemblage a minute ago."

"Because that's what the Trofts call it, and because that's exactly what it is. There's no centralized government, at least nothing corresponding in authority to Dome or the Committee. The Assemblage is actually nothing more than a loose-knit fraternity of two- to four-planet demesnes."

D'arl frowned. "You'll forgive me if I'm skeptical. A collection of systems working at cross-purposes could hardly have held off the Dominion's military might for three years."

"True—but I never said they always worked at cross-purposes."

D'arl shook his head. "Individual self-interest alone would guarantee disunity among that many demesnes."

"Unless there were some issue of overriding importance to all of them," Jonny said quietly. "Such as an invasion by an alien race. Us."

"Jonny, the Trofts started the war, not us," Jame spoke up. "That's not just an official line, you know—I've personally seen the records."

"Then perhaps you've also seen the records of the 471 Scorpii exploration," Jonny said. "That, according to the Trofts, is what started the war."

D'arl started to speak, reached instead for a comboard resting on a low table beside his seat. "I don't think I know the reference," Jame said.

"It was a minor double star system the Dominion thought might be worth a mining development," D'arl told him. "But according to this, the initial probe took place almost ten years before Silvern was hit."

"Yes, sir," Jonny nodded. "It took the affected demesnes that long to convince the others a war was necessary."

For a moment D'arl gazed at the comboard, fingers drumming on the chair arm. "You're implying the Committee's been blind for the past thirty years." His tone was less accusing than it was thoughtful.

Jonny shrugged. "The Trofts would hardly have advertised what they probably saw as a major military disadvantage. And any dealings since then on a planetary scale or less really would look very similar to how the Dominion does things, too. But the indications were there, if the figures the Troft Ship Commander gave me are correct. Do you have the number of representatives the Trofts sent to the peace talks after the war?"

D'arl busied himself with his comboard. "They had—let's see: twenty-six Senior Representatives. Another eighty-four aides and support personnel came to Iberiand with them."

"Twenty-six. What size team did the Dominion send, about ten?"

"Twelve—and I remember Committé H'orme complaining at the time that that seemed top-heavy." D'arl's eyes met Jonny's. "Twenty-six Troft demesnes?"

Jonny nodded. "One each from the border demesnes, the only ones whose territory would be directly affected by any settlement. But then a year later you began negotiations for the rights to the Troft Corridor, which I estimate affected eighty or so additional demesnes."

D'arl was already punching keys. "One hundred six Senior Representatives," he said, shaking his head slowly. "Eighty more, exactly."

"There were other indications, too," Jonny said into the silence that followed. "The Ship Commander who let us go obviously felt entitled to disobey his orders when he had sufficient reason to do so. And even during the war I was captured by a local officer who kept me alive almost certainly against orders. You may remember me telling you about that one, Jame."

The younger Moreau was frowning. "I remember... but I don't buy your explanation. This wide-open autonomy between demesnes is bad enough, but if you run it to upper military command level, too, you're going to wind up with complete anarchy."

Jonny shrugged. "I frankly don't understand it myself," he admitted. "The Ship Commander tried to explain how a graduated system of respect or obedience based on an individual's past record kept their society running smoothly, but it still sounds like magic to me."

"All right," D'arl said abruptly. "Assume for the moment all this is true. Then what?"

Jonny turned back to face him. "Then avoiding a war becomes simply a matter of removing the issue the demesnes are uniting over. Specifically, allowing them to close the Corridor."

"Out of the question." D'arl's voice was flat. "Official Dominion policy says the Corridor stays open or the Trofts pay heavily for closing it."

"Dominion policy isn't carved into bedrock," Jonny countered. "The purpose of that threat was to protect Aventine from attack. Fine—but right now we have a better chance of surviving without your protection; and if loss of contact with you is the price, we're willing to pay it."

"Are you, now," D'arl said. "And what happens when your machines and electronics start breaking down? Aventine hasn't got an extensive enough technological base to maintain things for long."

"No, but the Trofts do. We can undoubtedly trade with them as well as you do."

"Our trade has been extremely minimal, for intelligence purposes only—"

"Oh, come on," Jonny snorted. "We both know what I'm talking about. Practically every one of your licensed carriers routinely stops off for trade en route to Aventine. Why else do you think the Corridor demesnes have put up with the arrangement all these years? They get goods and information that they would normally have to buy—with heavy tariffs, no doubt—from their brother demesnes."

D'arl had a sour look on his face. "As it happens, we've been trying to come up with a good way to end that clandestine trade for years."

Jonny spread his hands. "Well, here's your chance."

D'arl sighed. "Governor, you still don't understand the political realities here. The Committee has taken a stand; we cannot back down without a damn good reason."

"So make one up," Jonny snapped, his patience beginning to fray. "You're a consummate politician—surely you won't let a little matter of truth stand in the way of what you want." D'arl's brow darkened, but Jonny rushed on before the other could speak. "Aventine doesn't want war, the Trofts don't especially want war, your own people don't want war. Is the Committee so hell-bent on fighting someone that not even that will stop them?"

"Jonny!" Jame snapped.

"It's all right, Moreau, I'll handle it," D'arl said. "Governor, I'll take your recommendation to the Committee tomorrow. That's the best that I can do."

"A Committé with your experience?" Jonny scoffed. "You can do better than just playing court reporter."

"I can push any solidly-based, politically plausible reason for closing the Corridor," D'arl bit back. "You've yet to give me anything that qualifies."

"You want a good political reason? Fine; I'll give you one right now." Jonny stood up, dimly aware that his anger was near to overwhelming all control over it. "What do you think the Committee would do if a visiting dignitary from Aventine shot down one of its members?"

"Jonny!" Jame jumped to his feet.

"Stay back, Jame." Jonny kept his eyes on D'arl. "Well, Committé? It would mean economic sanctions against the colonies, wouldn't it, which for all practical purposes means closing the Corridor."

"It would." D'arl was glacially calm. "But you wouldn't shoot me down in cold blood just for that."

"Wouldn't I? The greatest good for the greatest number, remember? What does it matter that you and I would be sacrificed? And I've got more than just that, anyway. For what you've done to thousands of Aventine boys alone I could hate you enough to kill. Jame, get back."

The younger Moreau ignored the order. Quietly, he walked over to stand squarely between the other two men. For a long moment the brothers locked gazes. Then Jonny reached forward and effortlessly lifted Jame into the air by his upper arms, setting him to the side. The brief burst of anger was gone, leaving only determination and the cold knowledge that he'd come too far to back out now. "Committé, I want you to get on the phone and start calling in all the favors you've undoubtedly been accumulating through the years," he told D'arl grimly. "Now. You are going to get the Corridor closing accepted."

D'arl didn't move. "Under threat to my life? No. And certainly not because of your unreasonable feelings about the Aventine Cobra project."

He said the last so casually that Jonny was taken aback. Fury threatened to drown him... but abruptly he understood. "You don't know, do you?" he said, more in bitterness than in anger. "I suppose it hasn't happened yet to your own Cobras."

"Know what?"

Jonny dug into his pocket for his medicine, tossed the two vials into D'arl's lap. The Committé frowned at the labels and keyed the names into his comboard. A moment later he looked up to meet Jonny's eyes. "Anemia and arthritis," he almost whispered.

"Yes," Jonny nodded, wondering at the oddly intense reaction. "Every one of the First Cobras in the colonies is coming down with those diseases, as a direct result of our implanted servos and laminae, and there are indications our immune systems are starting to be affected, as well. Best estimates give me barely twenty years left to live, if that long. That's the ultimate legacy your Cobra project has left on Aventine."

D'arl stared down at the vials in his hand. "It's starting here, too, Governor. Reports of chronic Cobra illnesses have dribbled in for the past year or so. Statistically inconclusive as yet... I'd hoped my suspicions were wrong." He looked up at Jame's stunned expression. "I ran the reports through Alveres, Moreau—I didn't see any point in worrying you about your brother's health."

Jame took a deep breath. "Committé... if what Jonny said about secret trade helping to keep the Corridor open is true, then it follows that the whole Aventine Cobra project was indeed unnecessary, or at least premature."

"The Cobras will be needed now."

"No," Jonny shook his head. "We'll be maintaining the trade relationship with the Trofts, and with the Corridor closed we're no longer a military threat. They won't attack us—and we won't provoke them, either. There's another point for you, Committé: if war starts, you won't be able to count on those hundred thousand Troft troops being tied up on Aventine."

"My point, sir—" Jame cut off as D'arl raised a hand.

"Peace, Moreau," the Committé said quietly. "I never said I didn't want to help, just that I needed a stronger case. And now I've got it. Excuse me."

Standing, he brushed by Jonny and stepped to a small desk off to one side. "Starport," he said to the phone screen. "...This is Committé D'arl. Number one star ship is to be prepared for travel, under the direction of Jame Moreau. Passenger and cargo lists to be supplied by him; ultimate destination Adirondack.... Thank you."

He keyed the phone off and turned to face the two Moreaus. "I'm heading back to Dome to get things started. Governor, you and your brother need to make a list of whatever you'd like as your last shipment of goods to the Outer Colonies. You can go whenever you're ready; I'll contact you on Adirondack before you leave there with any final messages." He turned to go.

"Committé," Jonny called after him. "Thank you."

The other turned back, and Jonny was surprised to see an ironic smile tugging at his lips. "I'll stop the war, Governor. But save your thanks until you see how I do it." He left the room, closing the door gently behind him. Jonny never saw him again.

It was the end of the road for them, and both men knew it. So for a long moment they stood beside the Menssana's entry ramp and just looked at each other. Jonny broke the silence first. "I saw on the newscast this morning that Aventine's apparently starting to complain about the way Dome's been running the Outer Colonies. The announcer seemed a bit on the indignant side."

Jame nodded. "It's going to get worse, too, I'm afraid. By the time we're finished with you, banning all trade or other contact with the colonies is going to seem like a remarkably restrained response by the Committee."

"In other words, history's going to put the blame squarely on Aventine."

Jame sighed. "It was the only way—the only political way—to let the Committee back away from such a long-established stance. I'm sorry."

Jonny looked back across the city, his memory superimposing Adirondack's battered wartime appearance against what was there now. "It's not important," he told his brother. "If vilifying us is what it takes to save face, we can live with it."

"I hope so. You haven't heard yet one of the more secret reasons the Committee accepted Committé D'arl's proposal."

Jonny cocked an eyebrow. "Which is...?"

"A slightly edited version of your confrontation at the estate. He convinced them the Aventine Cobras might get angry enough to seek revenge against them in the near future if contact with the Outer Colonies was maintained." Jame snorted gently. "It's strange, you know. Almost from the end of the last war the Committee's been trying to figure out a safe way to get rid of the Cobras; and now that they've got one, it had to practically be drop-kicked down their throats."

"No one said politics was self-consistent," Jonny shrugged. "But it worked, and that's all that matters."

"So you heard the courier report already," Jame nodded. "The Troft response was very interesting to read—the experts say the phrasing indicated our capitulation on the Corridor issue really caught them off-guard."

"I'm not surprised," Jonny said. "But I wouldn't worry about this setting any precedents. Remember how hard it is for the demesnes to get together on any future demands." He glanced around the visible sections of the starfield, hoping against hope that Danice Tolan would make a last-minute appearance.

Jame followed his gaze and his thoughts. "I wouldn't count on seeing your friend before you have to go. She's probably up to her cloak and laser in the Joint Command's decommissioning procedure—I think they've suddenly decided they don't like having independent paramilitary units running around the Dominion." He smiled briefly, but then sobered. "Jonny... you're not condemning your own world to slow death just to prevent a war, are you? I mean, trading with the Trofts is all very well on a theoretical level, but none of you has ever actually done it before."

"True, but we'll pick up the techniques fast enough, and with the Menssana to double our long-range fleet, we'll have reasonable capacity. Besides, we're not exactly starting cold." He patted his jacket pocket and the list of Troft contacts and rendezvous points Rando Harmon and Dru Quoraheim had supplied. "We'll do just fine."

"I hope you're right. You haven't got much going for you out there."

Jonny shook his head. "You've been on Asgard too long to remember how it feels to be a frontier world. Horizon, Adirondack, and now Aventine—I've never lived on anything but. We'll make it, Jame... if for no other reason than to prove to the universe that we can."

"Governor Moreau?" a voice drifted down from the ship beside them. "Captain's compliments, sir. Control's given us permission to lift any time."

And it was time to say good-bye. "Take care of yourself, Jonny," Jame said as Jonny was still searching for words. "Say hello to everyone for me, okay?"

"Sure." Jonny stepped forward and wrapped his brother in a bear hug. Tears blurred his vision. "You take care of yourself, too. And... thanks for everything."

Two minutes later he was on the Menssana's bridge. "Ah—Governor," the captain said, attempting with only partial success to hide his bubbling enthusiasm beneath a professional demeanor. The entire crew was like that: young, idealistic, the whole lot barely qualified for the trip. But they were the most experienced of those who'd volunteered for this one-way mission. The last colonists the Dominion would be sending for a long, long time—they, like the Menssana and its cargo, a farewell gift from D'arl and the Committee. "We're all set here," the young officer continued. "Course is laid out, and we've got the special pass the Trofts sent already programmed into the transmitter. Whenever you re set, we can go."

Jonny's eyes searched out a ground-view display, watched the tiny image of Jame just disappearing into the entrypoint building. "I'm ready any time," he told the captain quietly. "Let's go home."

Copyright © 1985 by Timothy Zahn

Cover art by Vincent DiFate

ISBN: 0-671-65560-4

The chapters "Veteran" and "Loyalist" appeared in slightly different form in Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, © 1981 and 1983 by Timothy Zahn.