It stood like the lower half of some early ICBM missile, a vaned cylinder at the center of great ribbon loops of elevated roadway. There had been some nonsense about putting the council up here, but with pressure tactics and backstage maneuvering, Edwards had gotten his way. That was becoming more and more the case.
Edwards wasn't altogether satisfied that some resources were being diverted into urban renewal, rather than into building the fleet of starships he meant to commandeer for his own designs, but some things couldn't be helped. At least it was making the Tiresians more tractable and grateful, and they, too, would have their uses, not far down the line.
Of course, Lang, and the sprawling research complex he was setting up with Exedore, were necessary inconveniences. He had to be kept pacified and working on the SDF-3 and the fleet above all.
A buzz from his aide announced that Lynn-Minmei was waiting to see General Edwards. He acknowledged, then flicked the control in his chair's arm, spinning back to look across a gleaming, polished desk as big as a landing field.
Lynn-Minmei? Now what in-
It was a bit of a shock when she stepped through the door in a cadet uniform, halted before his desk, and saluted smartly. He still didn't think of her as military. "Cadet Lynn, requesting permission to speak to the general, sir."
He returned the salute slowly. "Permission granted. Stand at ease."
She only relaxed a little. "General, I know something about people, and while everybody's been working like dogs to accomplish our mission here, time's been passing and, well…"
"I haven't got all day, Cadet," Edwards grated. "Spit it out!"
He was pleased to see he had made her flinch. "People need something to keep them going,"
she burst out. "I know! I saw it in SDF-1! They're sort of coming up with what recreation they can now, of course, but that's very makeshift and haphazard."
"What we need is an organized program of entertainment, and some kind of center where people could go to unwind, no matter what shift they're working or who they are. So they could forget their troubles and have their spirits lifted. A place where they could remember-remember why we all came here in the first place."
She said that last softly, she who hadn't been invited on the REF mission in the first place.
Edward's own voice took on a softness, a dangerous tone from him. "Let me be clear on this.
Knowing your past, do I assume you're suggesting we open up a cabaret?"
"No, a service club!" she corrected. "People need their morale kept up, sir!"
"And you're just the one to organize it, hmm?"
She couldn't meet his gaze for a moment. She knew that all her arguments were true, but Edwards had seen right through her. When she had sung that last good-bye aboard the superdimensional fortress when the Farrago left, she had sworn she wouldn't sing in public again.
But bit by bit, her resolve had crumbled. She missed it too much. She missed the good things her songs did for people, the happiness they brought. But she had to admit that she missed the spotlight, too, the applause and adulation and attention. They were in her blood. She needed them.
The REF's situation was so much like Macross's in the old SDF-1 that it was as if her life were a Mobius strip. And so she found herself following old forms, feeling old longings and dreaming dreams she had told herself to bury.
"I'm more knowledgeable about show business than anybody else we've got, sir," she pressed on. "I'll do it on my off-duty time! But I was hoping you'd speak to the council, General."
It all sounded like something out of one of those twentieth-century films for which he had such utter contempt. Hey, I've got it, we'll put on the show in the barn! Yeah, you can make the costumes!
Swell; they can build the sets!
He almost ridiculed her out loud, would have enjoyed it, but at the last second held back.
There was something about her presence, her gamine appeal and wide-eyed winsomeness. Where other men might have felt attracted to her, and suddenly protective toward her, Edwards began to feel possessive.
He knew she had been courted by hundreds of love-struck admirers, worshipped by thousands, perhaps millions, of fans. And none had had her, none had really touched her, save only two.
One of those, Lynn Kyle, her distant cousin, was long since missing and presumed dead back on Earth.
Edwards also knew that Minmei had once been Hunter's passion. He was aware, too, through his spies, that that fool Wolff had a hopeless crush on her.
Minmei wasn't sure what reactions or thoughts she was seeing cross Edwards's face; the gleaming half cowl and scintillating lens-eye made it difficult to tell.
Edwards steepled his hands before him and tilted his chair back. "This idea may have some merit, Cadet. We'll discuss it further over dinner."
In Edwards's mind, she was already his, body and soul.
Kami realized blearily that he was being borne along to the clanking of mecha. Reviving a little, he saw to his horror that he was in the grip of a Crann Inorganic.
The memory of being jumped, mixed with his Vision, began to sort out as he struggled like a wild thing to no effect. The dreadful recollections of being caged by Tesla made him look about for a way to take his own life. The Inorganic's armor and grotesque design screamed mindless hatefulness; the sky was screeching a death song at him.
But he was held fast and couldn't squirm free. That changed in a few moments, though, as he was dropped without ceremony. He landed in a heap on hard, gritty soil, dazed, the Vision almost clouding over into unconsciousness. He could hear the Invid marching away, and could make no sense of it.
Something prodded him. Kami rolled over with a sharp yip of alarm, to find himself looking up at a ring of furry faces. "What are you?" one of them said. "Are you an Invid, then?"
One of the others made an exasperated sound and jabbed the first with an elbow. "Stupid!
How could he be an Invid?"
"Well, he's no Karbarran!" the first shot back, and they seemed about to scuffle.
"I'm a Gerudan," Kami said tiredly. "Don't they teach you whelps anything in school?"
He could see he had found the Karbarran children, even if he had arrived in somewhat ignominious fashion.
They started to babble, and a few of them worked up the courage to actually give him a hand getting to his feet. The Karbarran children were roly-poly versions of their elders, some of them nearly as tall as Kami himself; but unlike their parents, the cubs wore no goggles. Their eyes were round, dark, and moist.
He groaned, trying to bring things into focus. One of the cubs tried to touch his mask and he gave the paw a little slap; it was withdrawn. Kami couldn't understand why the Invid had taken his weapons and gear and yet left him his mask and tank. Perhaps they knew that they wouldn't have a sane prisoner for very long-or a live one-if they took the breather from him.
There were some hundred or so miniature Karbarrans around him, and many, many more walking around an extensive barracks area. From the size of the place, he was prepared to believe that just about every cub of the planet's reduced population was there. Most of them seemed listless though, not caring that something was going on.
Kami squinted a bit in the early light of Yirrbisst, glancing around to orient himself to the landmarks he had seen on the map and get his bearings. It wasn't long after sunrise; the raiders would be here soon and he must prepare the cubs as best he could. But the three-in-a-row spike crags weren't there; the broken butte was nowhere in view, the foothills covered with scrub growth couldn't be seen.
His blood suddenly went cold. The Invid have moved them! This isn't the place on the map!
"Where are we?" he asked the first cub who had spoken to him, a tubby little male with streaked highlights in his pelt.