The Blackcollar

CHAPTER 26

"Incredible," Colonel Eakins murmured, staring into his mug and shaking his head slowly. "Sitting out there right under our noses. Do you suppose they're still operational?"

"Probably." Galway felt cold inside; his own mug sat ignored on the desk in front of him. You'll find out some day, Lathe had said to him at the Plinry 'port, and from that he'd assumed the blackcollars were on the trail of something big. But not something like this. "With all their systems off or on low/standby, all that could go wrong would be fuel or air leakage or slow interior corrosion—and that last will be negligible if they were left unpressurized."

"You seem to know a lot about the subject," Apostoleris commented as he hung up the phone he'd been talking on.

"My father was in the Star Force," Galway explained briefly. "Jensen still holding out?"

Apostoleris nodded. "We'll break him, though."

"Why bother? Your spies have already given you everything he's likely to know. Why not just kill him and get it over with?"

"Dead bait doesn't attract any fish," the other countered. "Or are you forgetting Skyler and Novak?"

"They wouldn't know he was dead until it was too late."

Eakins looked up from his mug. "You keep implying they might actually get that far," he said, sounding a little annoyed. "This is not like Cerbe, Galway—we're on top of them this time."

Tired, Galway rubbed his forehead. "I know. I just don't want to underestimate them again."

"We won't." Apostoleris was grimly confident. "You're right about Jensen—I don't think he knows anything useful. But Skyler and Novak have been with Lathe this whole time; they're bound to know more about his plans."

"Your spies in Radix have a better chance of getting that information," Galway insisted.

Apostoleris snorted and shook his head in disgust. "You just don't have the stomach for this, do you?" he said bluntly. "Maybe that's why they got away with all their crap on Plinry. Hey?"

Galway didn't answer. Belatedly, he realized that Apostoleris was taking the blackcollars' operation on an intensely personal level, almost as if he were engaged in a private duel with Lathe. It was a dangerous trap to fall into—the Security prefect could easily lose sight of the war even as he concentrated on winning minor skirmishes. In many ways Apostoleris was behaving like an amateur chess player, equating board strength with number of pieces taken.

Sighing, Galway looked down at his watch. Forty minutes to sunset, the earliest Skyler was likely to move. The blackcollars had their explosives and false IDs, and latest reports indicated Apostoleris's three-level trap was ready. It would work... and would surely cost a great deal of human life. Perhaps Apostoleris was right, he thought; perhaps he didn't have the stomach for unnecessary death. But then, life on Plinry forced a somewhat more frugal view of one's resources.

Shifting in his chair, Galway picked up his mug and sipped at the cooling drink. Thirty-eight minutes to sunset.