“Why didn’t they hire you?” Pordre asked.
“No data, Captain. Could have been cost—Mackensee doesn’t come cheap. Or knowing we’d been part of Admiral Vatta’s forces at the Battle of Nexus. It was fairly clear in the celebrations afterward that the admiral and I were acquainted, and that she’d been involved with Mackensee more than once. An employer might have had doubts about us in that instance. Or maybe they asked and our senior staff refused, for the same reason.”
“But you know this outfit they did hire? The… uh… Black Torch?”
“Suspected of being pirate-connected, Captain. Bad rep in terms of discipline and higher military science, but tough dirty fighters. Hard to control, for their employers.” They’d had almost this conversation when she first came aboard, but if he chose to fill the necessary hours on insystem drive with things he’d already asked and she’d already answered, it was not her problem. Lavin and Cotter, over on the Mackensee troopship, were taking care of the mission planning. She would transfer back when they went into Slotter Key Local, and Ofulo, whose leg was still not 100 percent, would come here in her place. There’d been some commentary about the irregularity of changing liaisons right before action, but her history with Ky Vatta had prevailed. She knew she’d never get Ky into Mackensee, as she’d once hoped, but she felt a connection to the young woman and hoped to meet her again. As well, her own daughter was in the hero-worshipping phase and had begged for an autograph.
“Ah—” Captain Pordre tapped his earbug. “Good news. Master Sergeant MacRobert, the Rector’s personal assistant, has been extricated.”
“I can’t say I’m surprised, sir,” Pitt said. “But pleased, of course. In good health, I hope?”
“Apparently, yes. You met him, I believe?”
“Yes, on Cascadia, after the destruction of the pirate fleet. Very capable person.”
He looked away again for a moment, then turned to her. “Master Sergeant, your CO wants to speak with you. I will inform Communications that you have permission to use a unit in the shack.”
“Thank you, Captain.” Pitt saluted and left the bridge, wondering what the colonel wanted this time. She wasn’t due to transfer for another day and a half, and she already knew MacRobert had been found alive and well. She had transmitted her post-downjump report the day before; perhaps he had some comments on it.
“It’s encrypted,” the com chief said. “You have the key?”
“Yes, Chief.” She always had the key. It would have been a breach of security to have the key anywhere but on her person at all times when away from Mackensee. She slid it into the holder, and the holder into the port, wondering once again why, when every ordinary computer she’d ever seen used the same two dataports, every shipboard communicator manufacturer had its own proprietary encryption slot. She nodded to the com chief, closed the privacy screen, and in a few seconds the document appeared.
CONTENTS:
1) SITREP received K. Vatta at 1320 Ship Standard this day via Office of Rector of Defense G. Vatta.
2) SITREP received Office of Rector of Defense G. Vatta 1320 Ship Standard this day.
SECURITY LEVEL DAGON
ACTION REQUIRED: Analysis & Recommendations for Assault Group Meeting by 2200 Ship Standard this day. Acknowledge receipt.
She entered the correct code. The message went on its way and she started reading, then stopped, blanked the viewer, and opened the privacy curtain.
“Chief?”
“Yes, Master Sergeant?”
“This message is big and I need to be here awhile, and then I’ll need a wipe. And I have an equally big encrypted reply I have to send by 2200 this evening. How inconvenient is that going to be?”
“Not bad. Better now than tomorrow morning. I can have someone bring you a sandwich later—”
“I’ll need to lock this terminal if I leave.”
“Fine. I’ll tell Lieutenant Garth when she returns.”
Pitt sealed the curtain again and started reading. Admiral Vatta’s sitrep was concise, clear, laying out the conditions of the survivors, the resources they had found, and her plan to keep them alive under attack.
Pitt ran a hand through her hair. Given the small number of survivors, what they expected to face, and the resources they’d been told the opposition had, it was probably the only possible thing to do, but it was risky. She pulled up the enclosed satellite scans of the continent. She’d been imagining “barren terraforming failure” as a simple chunk of rock, pretty much the same from end to end, but it wasn’t. The poleward side was bleak—probably a glacier had scraped over it at some point—with cliffs to the ocean below, but the other side had actual mountains with forests on them.
She read through the rest as fast as she could.
The passenger compartment of Vatta Transport’s night flight to Portmentor was a roomy area with seating for fourteen that converted into bunks, a conference area with a table, a good-sized galley, and even a shower as well as two toilets. The only difference from luxury passenger travel was the lack of windows. Forward, the door to the flight deck was open; a crew compartment offered two bunks for the crew, with one already curtained off. The reserve pilot had gone straight to bed. Pilots were already aboard, running through checklists and rechecking the flight plan.
MacRobert, who had been invited forward, saw a squat little tractor approaching. “Our tug?”
“Yeah. Though we’re waiting for a last arrival. It’s almost to the gate.”
The tug moved into the hangar; its driver hopped down and hooked the towbar to the nose wheel of the small plane below them. “That still seems like a risky flight to me.”
“Shouldn’t be. There’s additional cover, but I’m not supposed to talk about it.”
“Never mind,” Mac said. He saw a big dark car come around the curve of the drive, stop at the checkpoint, and approach. It certainly looked official—long, black, mirrored windows. It eased in between their plane and the small one. The view darkened as a screen unrolled from the hangar opening.
“Doors take too long,” the pilot said. “And we can still see out.”
Mac looked out the side window. Two men got out, one shorter and plumper than the other, then two women—one of them Grace, in one of the dresses she wore to work, and the other in a very similar dress, who looked to be about the same height, same skin color, and white hair cut short and tousled, like Grace’s. All but Grace got into the smaller plane; the door closed; within thirty seconds the tug’s warning lights came on, the curtain at the hangar opening lifted, and the tug pulled the smaller plane out onto the apron in front of the hangar. Mac watched the little gust of exhaust out the back of each engine as it started, as the first prop began to turn, sped up, then the second. The hangar attendant, now with signal cones in hand, ran to unhook the tug, backed up, and waved signals at the plane’s pilot.
“Vatta EX-1’s signaled Tower,” the pilot said. “Tower’s asking for passenger manifest; Lunnell said ‘As forwarded.’”
The small plane taxied away, moving toward the secondary runway. The tug, already moving, came toward them.