He handed the data disk across at last; Miles's hand closed over it itchily. Ivan now looked envious. Destang produced another object, which he handed to Miles with a little of the air of a man having his liver torn out. "The courier also delivered yet another credit chit for eighteen million marks. For your next six month's operating expenses."
"Thank you, sir!"
"Ha. When you're done you're to report to Commodore Rivik at Sector IV headquarters on Orient Station," Destang finished. "With luck, by the time your irregulars next return to Sector II, I will have retired."
"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."
Destang turned his eye on Ivan. "Lieutenant Vorpatril."
"Sir?" Ivan stood to attention with his best air of eager enthusiasm. Miles prepared to protest Ivan's complete innocence, ignorance, and victimhood, but it turned out not to be necessary; Destang contemplated Ivan for a moment longer, and sighed, "Never mind."
Destang turned to Galeni, who stood stiff-legged—and stiff-necked, Miles guessed. Having beaten Destang back to the embassy that morning, they had all washed, the two embassy officers had changed to clean uniforms, and they had all filed laconic reports, which Destang had just seen. But no one had slept yet. How much more garbage could Galeni absorb before reaching his explosive limit?
"Captain Galeni," said Destang. "On the military side, you stand charged with disobeying an order to remain confined to your quarters. Since this is identical to the charge that Vorkosigan here has managed to so luckily evade, this presents me with a certain problem of justice. There's also the mitigating factor of Vorpatril's kidnapping. His rescue, and the death of an enemy of Barrayar, are the only two tangible results of last night's . . . activities. All else is speculation, unprovable assertions as to your intentions and state of mind. Unless you choose to submit to a fast-penta interrogation to clear up any lingering doubts."
Galeni looked revulsed. "Is that an order, sir?"
Galeni, Miles realized, was about two seconds away from offering to resign his commission—
now,
when so much had been sacrificed—he wanted to kick him,
No, no!
Wild defenses poured through Miles's mind.
Fast-penta is degrading to the dignity of an officer, sir!
or even,
If you dose him you must dose me too—it's all right, Galeni, I abandoned dignity years ago—
except that Miles's idiosyncratic reaction to fast-penta made that a less than useful offer. He bit his tongue and waited.
Destang looked troubled. After a silence he said simply, "No." He looked up and added, "But it does mean that my reports, and yours, Vorkosigan's, and Vorpatril's, will all be bundled up together and sent to Simon Illyan for review. I will refuse to close the case. I didn't arrive at my rank by shying away from military decisions—nor by involving myself gratuitously with political ones. Your. . . loyalty, like the fate of Vorkosigan's clone, has become too ambiguously political a question. I'm not convinced of the long-range viability of the Komarr integration scheme—but I wouldn't care to go down in history as its saboteur.
"While the case is pending, and in the absence of evidence of treason, you'll resume your routine duties here at the embassy. Don't thank me," he added glumly, as Miles grinned, Ivan choked back an out-loud laugh, and Galeni looked fractionally less black, "it was the ambassador's request.
"You are all dismissed to your duties."
Miles squelched the impulse to run before Destang changed his mind; he returned Destang's salute and walked normally with the others toward the door. As they reached it Destang added, "Captain Galeni?"
Galeni paused. "Sir?"
"My condolences." The words might have been pulled out of Destang with pliers, but his discomfort was perhaps a measure of their sincerity.
"Thank you, sir," Galeni's voice was so devoid of inflection as to be deathly, but in the end he managed a small, acknowledging nod.
The locks and corridors of the
Triumph
were noisy with returning personnel, the final placement of equipment and repairs by tech teams, and the loading of the last supplies. Noisy, but not chaotic; purposeful and energetic but not frantic. The absence of frantic was a good sign, considering how long they'd been on station. Tung's tough cadre of non-coms had not permitted routine preparations to slide till the last minute.
Miles, with Elli at his back, was the center of a hurricane of curiosity from the moment he stepped on board—
What's the new contract, sir?
The speed with which the rumor mill cranked out speculation both shrewd and absurd was amazing. He sent the speculators on their way with a repeated,
Yes, we have
a
contract—yes, we're breaking orbit. Just as soon as you're ready. Are you ready, Mister? Is the rest of your squad ready? Then maybe you'd better go assist 'em. . . .
"Tung!" Miles hailed his chief of staff. The squat Eurasian was dressed in civilian gear, carrying luggage. "You just now back?"
"I'm just now leaving. Didn't Auson get hold of you, Admiral? I've been trying to reach you for a week."
"What?" Miles pulled him aside.
"I've turned in my resignation. I'm activating my retirement option."
"What? Why?"
Tung grinned. "Congratulate me. I'm getting married."
Stunned, Miles croaked, "Congratulations. Ah—when did this happen?"
"On leave, of course. She's actually my second cousin once removed. A widow. She's been running a tourist boat up the Amazon by herself since her husband died. She's the captain and the cook too. She fries a moo shu pork to kill for. But she's getting a little older—needs some muscle." The bullet-shaped Tung could certainly supply that. "We're going to be partners. Hell," he went on, "when you finish buying out the
Triumph,
we can even afford to dispense with the tourists. You ever want to try water-skiing on the Amazon behind a fifty-meter hoversloop, son, stop by."
And the mutant piranhas could eat what was left, no doubt. The charm of the vision of Tung spending his sunset years watching—sunsets, from a riverboat deck, with a buxom—Miles was sure she was buxom—Eurasian lady on his lap, a drink in one hand and scarfing down moo shu pork with the other, was a little lost on Miles as he contemplated a) what it was going to cost the fleet to buy out Tung's share of the
Triumph,
and b) the huge Tung-shaped hole this was going to leave in his command structure.
Gibbering, hyperventilating, or running around in small circles were not useful responses. Instead Miles essayed cautiously, "Ah . . . you sure you won't be bored?"
Tung, damn his sharp eyes, lowered his voice and answered the real question. "I wouldn't be leaving if I didn't think you could handle it. You've steadied down a lot, son. Just keep on like you've been." He grinned again and cracked his knuckles. "Besides, you have an advantage not shared by any other mercenary commander in the galaxy."
"What's that?" Miles bit.
Tung lowered his voice still further.
"You
don't have to make a profit."
And that, and his sardonic grin, was as close as cagey Tung was ever likely to admit that he had long ago figured out who their real employer was. He saluted as he left.
Miles swallowed, and turned to Elli. "Well . . . call a meeting of the Intelligence department in half an hour. We'll want to get our pathfinders en route as quickly as possible. Ideally, we want to put a team inside the enemy organization before we arrive."
Miles paused, as he realized he was now looking into the face of the most wily pathfinder in his fleet for people-situations, as versus terrain-situations which called for the talents of a certain Lieutenant Christof. To send her ahead, out of reach, into danger—
No, no!—
was compellingly logical. Quinn's best offensive talents were largely wasted bodyguarding; it was merely an accident of history and security that threw her into that defensive job so often. Miles forced his lips to move on as if never tempted to illogic.
"They're mercenaries; some of our group ought simply to be able to join up. If we can find someone to convincingly simulate the low criminal-psychotic minds of these pirates—"
Private Danio, passing in the corridor, paused to salute. "Thanks for bailing us out, sir. I . . . really wasn't expecting that. You won't regret it, I swear."
Miles and Elli looked at each other as he lumbered on.
"He's all yours," said Miles.
"Right," said Quinn. "Next?"
"Have Thorne pull everything there is off the Earth comm net on this hijacking incident before we quit local space. There might be an odd angle or two not apparent to Imperial HQ." He tapped the data disk in his jacket pocket and sighed, marshaling his concentration for the task ahead. "At least this should be simpler than our late vacation on Earth," he said hopefully. "A purely military operation, no relatives, no politics, no high finance. Straight-up good guys and bad guys."
"Great," said Quinn. "Which are we?"
Miles was still thinking about the answer to that one when the fleet broke orbit.
The row of comconsole booths lining the passenger concourse of Escobar's largest commercial orbital transfer station had mirrored doors, divided into diagonal sections by rainbow-colored lines of lights. Doubtless someone's idea of decor. The mirror-sections were deliberately set slightly out of alignment, fragmenting their reflections. The short man in the gray and white military uniform scowled at his divided self framed therein.
His image scowled back. The insignia-less mercenary officer's undress kit—pocketed jacket, loose trousers tucked into ankle-topping boots—was correct in every detail. He studied the body under the uniform. A stretched-out dwarf with a twisted spine, short-necked, big-headed. Subtly deformed, and robbed by his short stature of any chance of the disturbing near-rightness passing unnoticed. His dark hair was neatly trimmed. Beneath black brows, the gray eyes' glower deepened. The body, too, was correct in every detail. He hated it.
The mirrored door slid up at last, and a woman exited the booth. She wore a soft wrap tunic and flowing trousers. A fashionable bandolier of expensive electronic equipment hanging decoratively on a jeweled chain across her torso advertised her status. Her beginning stride was arrested at the sight of him, and she recoiled, buffeted by his black and hollow stare, then went carefully around him with a mumbled, "Excuse me . . . I'm sorry. . . ."
He belatedly twisted up his mouth on an imitation smile, and muttered something half-inaudible conveying enough allegiance to the social proprieties for him to pass by. He hit the keypad to lower the door again, sealing himself from sight. Alone at last, for one last moment, if only in the narrow confines of a commercial comm booth. The woman's perfume lingered cloyingly in the air, along with a
frisson
of station odors: recycled air, food, bodies, stress, plastics and metals and cleaning compounds. He exhaled, and sat, and laid his hands out flat on the small countertop to still their trembling.
Not quite alone. There was another damned mirror in here, for the convenience of patrons wishing to check their appearance before transmitting it by holovid. His dark-ringed eyes flashed back at him malevolently, then he ignored the image. He emptied his pockets out onto the countertop. All his worldly resources fit neatly into a space little larger than his two spread palms. One last inventory. As if counting it again might change the sum . . .
A credit chit with about three hundred Betan dollars remaining upon it: one might live well for a week upon this orbital space station for that much, or for a couple of lean months on the planet turning below, if it were carefully managed. Three false identification chits, none for the man he was now. None for the man he was. Whoever he was. An ordinary plastic pocket comb. A data cube. That was all. He returned all but the credit chit to various pockets upon and in the jacket, gravely sorting them individually. He ran out of objects before he ran out of pockets, and snorted.
You might at least have brought your own toothbrush . . .
too late now.
And getting later. Horrors happened, proceeding unchecked, while he sat struggling for nerve.
Come on. You've done this before. You can do it now.
He jammed the credit card into the slot and keyed in the carefully memorized code number. Compulsively, he glanced one last time into the mirror, trying to smooth his features into something approaching a neutral expression. For all his practice, he did not think he could manage the grin just now. He despised that grin anyway.
The vid plate hissed to life, and a woman's visage formed above it. She wore gray-and-whites like his own, but with proper rank insignia and name patch. She recited crisply, "Comm Officer Hereld,
Triumph
, Dendarii Free . . . Corporation." In Escobaran space, a mercenary fleet sealed its weapons at the Outside jumppoint station under the watchful eyes of the Escobaran military inspectors, and submitted proof of its purely commercial intentions, before it was even allowed to pass. The polite fiction was maintained, apparently, in Escobar orbit.
He moistened his lips and said evenly, "Connect me with the officer of the watch, please."
"Admiral Naismith, sir! You're back!" Even over the holovid a blast of pleasure and excitement washed out from her straightened posture and beaming face. It struck him like a blow. "What's up? Are we going to be moving out soon?"
"In good time, Lieutenant . . . Hereld." An apt name for a communications officer. He managed to twitch a smile. Admiral Naismith would smile, yes. "You'll learn in good time. In the meanwhile, I want a pick-up at the orbital transfer station."
"Yes, sir. I can get that for you. Is Captain Quinn with you?"
"Uh . . . no."
"When will she be following?"
" . . . Later."