Alarm of War, Book II: The Other Side of Fear (6 page)

The man studied him frankly.  “You Hiram Brill?” he asked pointedly.

Hiram nodded.

“I’m Dov Tamari.  I’ve got news of Sergeant Maria Sanchez.”

For a moment Hiram just stared at him, fear and hope battling for control.  His face must have given him away.  “No, no, she’s alive,” Tamari spoke quickly.  He looked abashed.  “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.  Look, can we go inside, I really don’t want to get into this out here.”

Inside, Hiram numbly poured himself a small Scotch, and then offered some to Major Tamari, who shook his head.  “I don’t drink alcohol, but if you’ve got some tea?”  Hiram filled a mug with hot water and put out a tea bag, then looked up at Tamari.  “Tell me.”

“I am a Colonel in the Fleet Marines,” Tamari said.  “Are you familiar with the Long Range Reconnaissance forces?”

Hiram thought for a moment.  The LRR were used by the Fleet to penetrate deep into the sectors of other worlds and snoop, taking pictures and vids or intercepting communications.  They mostly used modified corvettes with small crews that relied on stealth instead of arms.   They often had oversized inertia compensators that permitted very rapid acceleration. They concentrated on ports, shipyards, military bases, and communication networks and liked to get close to any new class of enemy warship, sending back pictures of its exterior to give the Fleet some hints about its armaments and performance.  It required nerves of steel to sneak into restricted areas, monitor transmissions and take videos and then sneak out again.  It called for a cool head, comfort with a high level of risk and the ability to work independently without support for long periods of time.  More than one corvette had been forced to play hide and seek with hostile forces for weeks or even months.

The fatality rate was sobering.

Hiram nodded.  “I’ve heard of you.  What’s this got to do with Cookie?”

Colonel Tamari shook his head.  “Commander, when the Dominion kicked the door in, we had about thirty corvettes out on assignment, including a bunch in the Dominion sector, most of them near Timor.  We lost touch with all of them for a while, but some of them are reporting in via courier drone, while some others have actually come all the way to Refuge to rejoin the Fleet.”

Hiram was getting impatient.  “I don’t mean to press you, Colonel, but what does this have to do with Cookie?”

Colonel Tamari fixed him with a look that made it clear he was not used to being rushed.  “We had a dozen LRR corvettes in the Dominion sector.  They often work together as a team.  About four days ago the corvette
Laughing Owl
was monitoring ship departures from a military base on Timor, the home world of the Dominion.  It picked up a ship called the
Tartarus,
which we know to be a prison ship for very sensitive political prisoners.  By itself that would not be very important, but it intercepted a transmission from the
Tartarus
to the military picket stating it was in route to “Siegestor.”  The captain of the
Laughing Owl
couldn’t find any reference in the database to “Siegestor,” which made her very curious.  Then two more things happened.  First, the
Tartarus
turned away from Timor and away from the route that would lead to the wormhole to Victoria.  Instead it turned into deep space.  To the best of our knowledge, there isn’t much of anything out there, so the captain of the
Laughing Owl
decided to tag along.”

Now Hiram could feel his pulse quicken.

“The second thing is that the captain of the
Laughing Owl
decided to risk a very low sensor pulse on a special frequency.  I don’t know if you are aware of this, but some of our Marine personnel have small responder device implanted in them.  It’s useful during search and rescue missions to be able to locate a Marine, even if he’s lost his combat helmet.  For LRR personnel, it is sometimes helpful to quickly determine who is a friendly and who is not if a team is working planetside.”

Hiram closed his eyes and unconsciously held his breath.

“Maria Sanchez is on the
Tartarus
, Commander.  The responder device is powered by a nerve connection with the person it is embedded in, so we can tell if the person is alive or dead.  As of four days ago she was alive.  We can’t tell anything more than that, but she was alive.”

Hiram opened his eyes and slowly let out his breath.  “And?”

Tamari shrugged.  “The
Laughing Owl
is still following them.  They’re not in any hurry, but they are definitely moving deeper and deeper into space that is, as far as we know, empty except for some asteroid clusters.”

Something was bothering him.  “I thought the transporters would not transport metal.  How did the responder chip make it?”

Tamari shook his head.  “I didn’t say ‘chip,’ Commander, I said ‘device.’  The responder is organic.  We designed it so that it would not appear on any body scans the enemy might make.”

Hiram turned to his computer and typed in “Siegestor” with a general search.  Nothing came back on any of the military or intelligence databases, but the general civilian database returned an article about a city gate in Munich, one of the cities on Old Earth.  In 1852 (Old Calendar) the King of a country named Germany built a “Victory Gate” in Munich in honor of the Bavarian army.

“Victory Gate?” Hiram murmured.  Why would they name something Victory Gate? The gateway to the Dominion’s victory over Victoria?  He
wanted
it to be the secret Dominion shipyard, but shook his head. Mustn’t jump to conclusions.  Nowhere near enough information.

“Colonel, who is now the ranking officer for the Long Range Reconnaissance force?”

Tamari looked wary.  “Well, the command staff were all on Cornwall.  The only reason why I wasn’t there was a family emergency here on Refuge, so I guess I am.”

“Colonel Tamari, you now report to me,” Hiram told him. “Sit down; we have a lot to discuss.”

* * * *

As they climbed higher, the vistas to the east were breathtaking.  They stopped for lunch in an alpine meadow, hobbled the horses and let them graze on the knee high grass and unpacked some cold chicken and fruit and a bottle of water.  Rafael spread a blanket over the grass and they sat on it, hunger making the food delicious, and watched flocks of birds beginning their winter migrations south to the equator.

“When my ancestors first moved here, there were only thorny bushes in this part of the mountains,” Rafael told her as they ate.  “They planted pines and other evergreens from Old Earth and they’ve spread out into forests.  Over the years they added oaks and elm, ash and birch.  They tried maples, but for some reason they didn’t take.  There are native trees of course, but you see them mostly in the lowlands, usually by rivers and streams.  They’ve even imported some of the tall redwoods from Darwin. Beautiful trees, incredibly tall and majestic. They’re hardy enough, but they spread slowly; we’ll see some further up the mountain above Ouididi.”

“You still have family here?” Emily asked.

He nodded, smiling.  “Oh, yes.  My three mothers are still in Ouididi, along with my three fathers – by custom we call them uncles – and some of my sisters and brothers.  Some of my brothers have gone into the Marines.  A couple of my sisters have joined marriage families in other villages, although two started a new marriage home in Ouididi.”

For a moment Emily though she had misheard him.  “Raf, did you say your
three
mothers?”

Raf looked confused.  “Of course, Emily, this is where I was born.  This is where my mothers live, and my uncles.”

It was Emily’s turn to be confused.  There was something on the fringes of her memory, something from a sociology course she’d taken in college.  Communal families in other worlds or something like that.  “Raf, do you mean that you lived with your mother and father in some sort of commune with other families?”

Raf laughed.  “You Vickies!  No, Emily, when my ancestors first landed on Refuge and moved up into the mountains, life was very hard.  We lost a lot of people in the first few years.  Husbands were killed by grogin, wives died from the stilla virus, children died in the winter.  There were a lot of broken families, widows, widowers, orphans.  Somewhere along the way a married couple took in a husbandless woman and she joined them as a wife, to help them and be helped by them.  Another couple took in a man who had lost his wife and he became their husband.”

Emily tried to digest his.  “But—but, you mean the new wife or husband was integrated sexually into the household as a full husband or wife, not just taken in as a guest?”

Rafael nodded, his eyes light with amusement.  “My ancestors were fighting for their survival, Emily.  The notion of ‘family’ evolved to ensure that they would survive even if one or two family members were lost.”

“But you said you have
three
mothers!  How does that work?”

He laughed at her confusion.  “Oh, Emily, I wish you could see your face right now.  What started with small families of three adults evolved.  Two women with one husband brought in another man to join them.  The women considered themselves wives to both men as the men considered themselves husbands to both women.  When the really bad times came, about thirty years after we settled here, family size grew out of need and the desire for greater security.”  He smiled.  “And we would say it grew out of love.”

“But if two wives had a single husband and then brought in another husband, why wouldn’t they split off into two couples?”

Rafael shrugged.  “Because they didn’t want to.  Because the women loved both men and the men loved both women.  Because it made sense for them to live in a larger family unit, with more hands to do chores and take care of the children.”

Emily took a deep breath.  “But how would a woman know who the father of her children was?”

Rafael smiled gently.  “Emily, she
does
know.  The father of her children are her husbands.  All of them.  And each man is ‘uncle’ to the children.”

Emily struggled for a moment with the subject-verb agreement, then gave it up.  It must have shown on her face, for Rafael continued, “Each man in the family views all of the children as his.  Each mother views all of the men as the father of her birth children and views herself as mother to all of the children.  And the children grow up with many loving parents instead of just two.”

“And you grew up in a family like this?” Emily asked cautiously.

Rafael nodded.  “I was very happy, Emily.  I had my Uncle Amin to teach me how to hunt in the mountains, my Uncle Yael to teach me languages, my birth mother Leila to teach me how to cook and mend clothes, my mother Aicha to teach me how to read and about art, my Uncle Danny to tell me about other worlds and what life as a Marine was like, my mother-“

“Stop!” Emily laughed, holding up her hands.  “Okay, I get the idea!”   she shook her head.  “I just have to digest this a bit.”

“So I shouldn’t tell you now about ‘Flower Rooms’ when girls turn fifteen?” he teased.

Emily clapped her hands over her ears.  “I was a history major, not a budding anthropologist!” she said pleadingly.  “If you overload me, I am going to curl up in a ball and suck my thumb.”

“Peace, Emily!  Peace!  My mother Leila will be very unhappy with me if I don’t deliver you intact and smiling.”

A thought stuck her.  “Am I going to meet
all
of your mothers and fathers?”  The thought was a little daunting.

Rafael laughed out loud.  “Oh, yes, Emily, all of them.  And my brothers and sisters, the ones who live in Ouididi anyway.   There will be a big meal in your honor, yes?”

Emily blinked.  “But Rafael, I’m not your girlfriend or your fiancée.  I’m just a tourist here.”

Rafael shook his head.  “No, no, Emily, you don’t understand.  You are from Victoria.  Anyone from Victoria would be an honored guest, but on top of that you are a soldier who has fought against the Dominion.”

“But the Dominion isn’t your enemy,” Emily protested.

Now Rafael was deadly serious.  “The Dominion is Victoria’s enemy, and the enemy of Victoria is the enemy of Refuge.  Refuge pays its debts.”

Chapter 5

On Space Station Atlas, in Refuge Sector

Hiram Brill sat at his desk for a long time, sipping endless cups of Darjeeling tea.  He thought about the lesson in diplomacy and psychology he’d learned from Queen Anne and Sir Henry, about Emily Tuttle on leave on Haifa, about Grant Skiffington trying desperately to keep his unexpected captaincy of the
Yorkshire.
 

He thought of Cookie on the Dominion prison ship.

And Brother Jong of The Light, and his ability to travel without detection.

And a place called Siegestor that was not on any map.

When he was ready, he carefully put down his tea mug and placed a call.

“Yes?”  A woman’s voice, fuzzy with sleep.

“Specialist Romano?” he asked.  “Lori Romano?”

“Yeah.”  There was the sound of a yawn.  “What time is it?”

“You’re the one who has been working on the Tilleke teleportation ships,” he said.  Not a question.

“Who is this?” Romano asked, suddenly more alert and more guarded.

“I apologize for calling you this late,” Hiram said softly.  “I am Commander Brill, Queen Anne’s adjutant and Intelligence Officer.”  He could hear a rustle of bed sheets as Romano suddenly sat upright in her cabin.  “I want you to meet me at 0700 in my office.  I’ll have some breakfast for us both.  I have a little job for you.”

“But, sir, I-“

“No buts, Romano.  My office, 0700.  Go back to bed and get some rest.”  He hung up, replacing the phone gently in its cradle.  He made another cup of tea and called up a holo display of the Dominion Sector, paying particular attention to the wormhole entrance from Victoria into the Dominion.

He sat there a long time.