Starhold (33 page)

Carr moved to take a seat on the ground and leaned back against the rock. “Yeah, the Gerrhans are going to be pissed, and so will a lot of the other starholds. They’re not going to just sit back and let the Union grab that kind of a tech edge.”

“The whole thing’s a bloody war just waiting to happen. And then, there are those aliens. Just because the people in the Otherverse ran into them in the twenty-eighth century doesn’t mean we’re going to. What happens if we bump into each other sooner?”

“OK, my friend, now you’re starting to depress me. Let’s just enjoy this nice, beautiful Earth day.”

Pettigrew grabbed the bag of garbage, rose, and put his other hand into his pants pocket. The day was beautiful, but the autumn wind was chilling the air. The captain looked around at the pristine surroundings. “It’s all quite unbelievable. Humans from another universe, a massive space battle, the rejuvenation of Earth. Wait until the newsnets start telling this story back home.”

“Yeah,” agreed Carr. “It’ll be a little bigger news than who won the Pan-Union Cup. They’re probably starved for a big story back on Sarissa.”

Pettigrew and Mullenhoff went for a walk after lunch, while Sanchez returned to the place where Carr was relaxing, sitting down on the ground beside him.

“Mind if I use some of your rock?” she asked, leaning back. Both of them sat for a while without speaking, until Sanchez worked up the nerve to say what was on her mind. “Governor Goran asked me to stay here in Bakkoa for a while, two months or so. He wants one of us to help mediate between him and Korab’s group so they can form a government.”

“I know,” said Carr.

“You know? How do you know?”

He tilted his head sideways and looked at her. “I’m a spy, remember?”

“Korab wants one of us to stay—he trusts us. I know you need to get back, to help your sister I mean, so I volunteered. I’ll return to Union space later in
Kite
. So…”

The sun was bright, but the breeze was picking up and driving the temperature down. Leaves blew by them as Sanchez began to shiver. Carr sat forward, took off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders, along with his right arm. She closed her eyes and leaned against his shoulder. His left hand reached to take hers and he rested his head back against the rock, shutting his eyes as well.

When Pettigrew and Mullenhoff returned, their friends were still at the rock. Pettigrew started to say something to them, but Mullenhoff silently grabbed his arm, wagged her index finger at him, and pulled him back in the direction of the groundcar.

* * * *

Back on
Tempest
the following morning, Sanchez entered Carr’s cabin and found him packing. He wouldn’t require much for his return journey home aboard the destroyer
Goshawk
, but there were a few necessary items: clothing, toiletries, and such.

“You ready to head dirtside?” he asked, walking over to her.

“Yeah,
Kite’s
refueled and waiting in the shuttlebay.” Clumsily, they stood facing each other, neither one of them certain how to say goodbye. She glanced over at the box near the wall. “Don’t forget to take the Dragoneer Vase,” she teased.

“Yeah, I think I can remember it. Speaking of Goran’s gift, I keep wondering how much you had to do with that whole business.”

“Honestly, it was Goran’s idea to give you the vase. Let’s just say I filled him in on how valuable it might really be to you. I hope you don’t mind.”

He smiled and shook his head. “Blabbing state secrets. I suppose I can let it pass, just this once.”

“A shame about the vase though, that you have to sell it, I mean.”

Carr made a face. “The only shame is that I’ll be giving all the money to doctors and hospitals, but it will be worth it. This will give Shannon a fighting chance.”

“But if you didn’t need the money for your sister, you’d keep the vase wouldn’t you?”

“Hell, no,” he scoffed. “I’d still sell it to the highest bidder. Antiques are just things, commodities to be bought and then sold at a higher price.”

She moved over to him and placed her hands on his shoulders. “Don’t give me that bullshit. You’re just like Pettigrew—you’re both Old Souls. You love art and history and all that stuff, admit it. It’s not just your business, it’s your passion.”

“Hey—since when do you know so much about what I like?” he said, placing his hands on her hips and pulling her closer to him.

Sanchez ran one hand across the side of her face, brushing back some loose hair. “Over the last month, I’ve seen who you really are. How you were with Mumphrey at the end, and… how you are with me sometimes. You pretend to be this arrogant badass, but inside you’re more complex, aren’t you?”

“I appreciate beautiful things.”

“I know, and thank you for letting me see that part of you. So when I get back to Sarissa,” she said softly, as he wrapped his arms around her, “we’ll meet at Bismarck’s for a drink.”

“A drink and…”

“Dinner.”

“Dinner and …”

“And we’ll see where it goes from there,” she whispered. “I told you, my career scares all the good men away.” She gave him a soft kiss on the cheek. “Maybe you’ll be different.”

He held on to her, not wanting to let go. “You know, there are company rules about operatives becoming involved with each other,” he said, kissing her on the cheek before they separated.

“And we both know you never break the rules.” Sanchez winked as she turned to leave, looking back just before going through the hatchway. “Two months on Earth and a month’s travel home.” She raised a hand and extended three fingers. “See you in three months.”

He returned the gesture. “Three months.”

Carr sat on the edge of the bunk after Sanchez left, staring at the container holding the Dragoneer Vase. A lot could happen in three months. Three months ago, he was empty and lost, but now he felt alive again, rejuvenated like the planet some forty thousand kilometers below. He and Earth had been given a second chance, and he hoped they could both make the best of it.

Epilogue

City of Beresford

Planet Gerrha

Commonwealth homeworld

It was a dive. There was no other way of looking at it. The fancy sign outside read
Raymond’s,
and from the street it looked like it might be a hidden gem, but inside it was just another shabby bar. Tucked away in the Little Cardea section of the capital city, the only advantage to being here was that they weren’t up there, on that damned space station they’d been stashed away on for the last month.

Pathin Chopra and Emma Harper ordered another beer and waited. The boss was late, but that might not be a bad thing. They and their comrades had been stuck on Gerrha, or rather above Gerrha, for a month now. What were a few more minutes if it got them somewhere, anywhere but here? Hell, they couldn’t even go to a nice watering hole for fear of being recognized for who and what they really were. At least the Admiralty building was only a few blocks from here, so when the meeting—

“Here they come,” said Harper, nudging her colleague as she watched the door open. “Straighten up, dammit! You look like you’re buzzed.”

“Relax, I’m fine,” he assured her.

The slender newcomer slid into the booth opposite Chopra and Harper, while her male companion went to the bar to order a beer. As he waited, he swiped his m-card across an old-fashioned music player and it began to blast out a random tune. The noise would help cover their conversation.

“Well?” asked Chopra, his pleading expression showing his anxiety.

“Well, I’m thirsty,” said the woman across the table. Her companion arrived back with a bottle of Hiwassee Stout and placed it in front of her, sitting down with nothing for himself. She took a swig. “Not bad.”

Chopra rolled his eyes in frustration and then felt a sharp kick from Harper under the table. She knew he was upset and a little drunk, but there was going to be trouble if he didn’t settle down.

“We’re just a little anxious,” said Harper, trying to keep the situation under control. “So how did the meeting go, Admiral?”

Brin Choi had just met with the Gerrhan Space Service, her fifth such meeting since arriving in the Eupraxa system four weeks ago. After surrendering her two Union destroyers to the Gerrhans, she and her crews had become ‘guests’ of the Commonwealth. A temporary setback, she told herself, but she also knew that this was the price of failure and that her options were limited—for the time being.

Choi swallowed another mouthful of beer. It was odd, all of them sitting here wearing civilian clothes, drinking beer—all of them except her chief bodyguard, the ever-vigilant Major Seydoux. Her people were under house arrest on Halcyon Starport. The Gerrhans had secured a large block of hotel rooms for the crews of her two ships. A comfortable cage, but a cage nevertheless.

“They won’t let us defect, and they won’t grant us political asylum,” she finally answered.

Chopra slammed an open hand down on the table. “Damn! What’s wrong with them? We could all get commissions in the GSS. We’d be valuable assets, don’t they understand that?”

“Calm down, Commander,” Choi said in an unruffled voice. “You’re drawing unwanted attention.” Of the few patrons in the establishment, a couple had glanced over briefly, but then settled back into their alcohol-induced stupor.

“So we’re just screwed now, is that it?” said Chopra in a quieter but still panicked voice. “That damned Canizares. It would have all worked if that bastard had followed orders and brought Second Fleet to Artemis.”

“Easy, Pathin,” said Harper, placing her hand on her fellow ship captain’s arm to calm him. “Ma’am, I’m more worried about our crews. They can’t go home, and it seems they can’t start a new life here. What’s to become of us?”

“May I ask the Admiral,” Chopra interrupted in an acerbic tone, “if the Gerrhans gave any reason for denying us asylum?”

“They say if they granted us asylum, it would seriously damage already strained relations with the Sarissan Union.”

Harper looked pained, but Chopra hooted. “I bet it would,” he said before draining his glass. “Guess we’re just too inconvenient for them.”

“Not totally so,” said Choi. That got the two destroyer captains’ attention.

“What do you mean?” asked Harper.

“They’ve made us an offer. It’s not great, but it’s the best I could manage given our limited bargaining position. We get
Ivar
back and we do some privateering for them—anti-piracy work. They have some trade routes they want us to clean up. We depart in two days for a base in the Barataria system.”

“What about
Astaroth
?” asked Chopra, the vessel’s skipper.

“They’re keeping
Astaroth
. Going to rip her apart, trying to find Union tech secrets.”

Chopra shook his head in disgust. “Great, just bloody great.”

Choi stared at the man with cold eyes. “Don’t worry Commander, you’ll have another ship very soon. I’m sure of it.”

Chopra seemed beyond caring, but that last comment piqued Harper’s curiosity. “What does that mean, ma’am?”

“Something’s going on, Harper. Today’s meeting was different from the others. The officer I’ve been meeting with, this Vice Admiral Bettencourt, he wasn’t as cocky today as he’d been in the past. There was something else too…”

“What?” asked Harper.

“Fear,” Choi said thoughtfully. “If there’s one thing I know, it’s the scent of fear. Today at the Gerrhan Admiralty, the air was thick with it. Lots of people running around and lots of hushed conversations in groups of threes and fours. Something is going on—something big. I don’t think we’ll be privateering for long.”

Harper’s face morphed into one of excitement, but Chopra rubbed his eyes and moaned. “I’m sorry, Admiral, no disrespect meant but hunting pirates wasn’t what we had in mind when my people and I signed on for this.”

Choi lifted her bottle. “Nor I, Commander Chopra, nor I,” she said just before she killed it.

Chopra tapped Harper on the arm. “Let me out, will ya? I gotta hit the head.”

As Pathin Chopra searched for the men’s room, Harper saw Choi give Seydoux an oblique glance. The Marine rose to go to the restroom as well. Harper was alone with the Admiral and extremely uncomfortable. She began tapping her fingernails nervously on the tabletop.

“Please stop that tapping,” said Choi sharply.

“Sorry, ma’am, it’s just that…”

“That?”

“Well, it’s been a stressful situation,” Harper said, not really knowing what to say. “Commander Chopra means no harm, ma’am. He’s just, ah, well…”

“An ass,” Choi helped.

“Yeah, he is actually. But he’s—oh, hey, let me pay our tab,” blurted out Harper, bolting from the booth toward the bartender. She had a weird but relieved expression when both Chopra and Seydoux returned from the men’s room.

“Let’s head for the shuttleport. You two grab us a taxi,” ordered Choi. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

As Harper and Chopra left the bar, Seydoux sat down across the table from his commanding officer.

“Major, did you not understand my signal? You were to kill that fool.”

“I understood, ma’am, but there’s a complication. Don’t turn around, but there’s a man at the end of the bar that I’m sure followed us here. He’s probably our shadow, courtesy of Gerrhan Intelligence.”

“Oh, I see. You showed good judgment then, Major. Leaving too many bodies in our wake might cause our new Gerrhan masters to have second thoughts about us. Nonetheless, Chopra has become a liability, and I want him dead by week’s end.”

Seydoux nodded. “Do you want him to have an accident, or do you want me to send a message?”

“Neither. Just make him disappear. It will look like he deserted. Hell, if anything, I’ll wager Chopra’s absence actually raises morale.”

“Understood, ma’am.”

As they rose to leave, they saw through the front window that a taxi was secured and waiting. It would take them to the spaceport, where they would catch a commercial shuttle up to the station. Just before going through the door, Choi stopped and turned to Seydoux.

Choi liked Seydoux. He was extremely competent and very attractive. She knew he was loyal to her, and on a personal level, she could tell he wanted her badly. Maybe she’d indulge him one night as a special treat for both of them. However, for right now, Maurice Seydoux was the closest thing she had to a friend.

“After we return to the station, we need to start calling in some of our old associates. I want to be ready when the Gerrhan Admiralty comes crawling to me. There’s a storm coming, Major, and one way or another, I’m going to be at the center of it.”