"I don't expect trouble from the military, but the civilians may be something else. I need all the help I can get selling the idea, and after 'Tanni, you're the best salesman I've got."
Adrienne made a face, but she knew it was true. She was the only living officer to have commanded a capital ship throughout both the Siege and the Zeta Trianguli campaign. More than that, she'd led the task force that died in Earth's last, hopeless counterattack, and hers had been the only ship to survive it. She was Battle Fleet's most decorated officer, belonged to more Terran orders of chivalry than she could count, and was the only person in history to have received the highest award for valor of every Terran nation, as well as the Golden Nova. It embarrassed her horribly, but it was true.
All of which meant Colin was right. If he was trotting out the big guns, she was going to have to come to battery.
"All right," she sighed finally, "I'll do it."
Francine Hilgemann took her time locking the car doors while she scanned her surroundings. She'd seen no sign of surveillance on the drive here, but paranoia was a survival tool which had served her well over the years.
She ambled across the parking lot to the pedestrian belt serving the enormous, brightly-lit Memorial complex. She was uneasy at the thought of meeting in the very heart of Shepard Center, but she supposed it made sense. Who in his right mind would expect a pair of traitors to make contact here?
She stepped off the belt into the people flowing past the fifty-meter obsidian needle of the Cenotaph and the endless rows of names etched into its unadorned battle steel plinth. Those names listed every individual known to have fallen in the millennia-long battle against Anu, and even Hilgemann wasn't quite immune to the hush about her. But time was short, and she worked her way briskly through the fringes of the throng.
Another, even quieter crowd surrounded the broken eighty-thousand-ton hull that shared the Memorial with the Cenotaph. The sublight battleship Nergal remained where Fleet Captain Robbins had landed her, resting on her belly and ruined landing legs, preserved exactly as her final battle had left her. She'd been decontaminated; that was all, and crippled missile launchers and energy weapons hung like broken teeth from her twisted flanks. How she'd survived was more than Hilgemann could guess, and she couldn't even begin to imagine what it had taken to bring that wreck home and land her under her own power.
She turned away after a moment, walking to the service exit she'd been told to use. It was unlocked as promised, and she slipped through it into the equipment storage room and closed the door behind her.
"Well," she said a bit tartly, looking around at the deserted machinery, "I must say this has all the proper conspiratorial ambience!"
"Perhaps." The man who'd summoned her stepped out of the shadows with a thin smile. "On the other hand, we can't risk meeting very often... and we certainly can't do it in public, now can we?"
"I feel like an idiot." She touched the brunette wig which hid her golden hair, then looked down at her plain, cheap clothing and shuddered.
"Better a live idiot than a dead traitor," he replied, and she snorted.
"All right. I'm here. What's so important?"
"Several things. First, I've confirmed that they know they didn't get all of Anu's people." Francine looked up sharply and received another thin smile. "Obviously they don't know who they didn't get, or we wouldn't be having this melodramatic conversation."
"No, I suppose we wouldn't. What else?"
"This." A data chip was handed over. "That little item is too important to trust to our usual pipeline."
"Oh?" She looked down at it curiously.
"Indeed. It's a copy of the plans for Marshal Tsien's newest toy: a gravitonic warhead powerful enough to take out an entire planet."
Francine's hand clenched on the chip, and her eyes widened.
"His Majesty," the man said with a soft chuckle, "has decided against building it, but I'm more progressive."
"Why? To threaten to blow ourselves up if they ID us?"
"I doubt that bluff would fly, but there are other ways it might be useful. For now, I just want the hardware handy if we need it."
"All right." She shrugged. "I assume you can get us any military components we need?"
"Perhaps. If so, we'll handle that through the regular channels. In the meantime, how are your action groups coming along?"
"Quite nicely, actually." Hilgemann's smile was unpleasant. "In fact, their training's developing their paranoia even further, and keeping them on a leash isn't the easiest thing in the world. It may be necessary to give them the odd mission to work off some of their... enthusiasm. Is that a problem?"
"No, I can pick a few targets. You're certain they don't know about you?"
"They're too well compartmented for that," she said confidently.
"Good. I'll select a few operations that'll cost them some casualties, then. Nothing like providing a few martyrs for the cause."
"Don't get too fancy," she cautioned. "If they lose too many they're likely to get a bit hard to control."
"Understood. Then I suppose that's about it... except that you'll want to get your next pastoral letter ready."
"Oh?"
"Yes. His Majesty's decided to bite the bullet and begin enlisting Narhani in the military." Hilgemann nodded, eyes suddenly thoughtful, and he smiled. "Exactly. We'll want something restrained for open distribution—an injunction to pray that His Majesty hasn't made a mistake, perhaps—but a little furnace-fanning among the more hardcore is in order, I believe."
"No problem," the bishop said with an equally thin smile.
"I'll be going, then. Wait fifteen minutes before you leave."
"Of course." She was a bit nettled, though she didn't let it show. Did he think she'd lasted this long without learning her trade?
The door closed behind him, and she sat on a floor cleaner, lips pursed, considering how best to fill her pen with properly diffident vitriol, while the hand in her pocket squeezed the data chip that could kill a world.
Chapter Five
Sean MacIntyre landed neatly in the clearing and killed the power.
"Nice one, Sean," Tamman said from the copilot's seat. "Almost as nice as I could've done."
"Yeah? Which one of us took the top off that sequoia last month?"
"Wasn't the pilot's fault," Tamman replied loftily. "You were navigating, if I recall."
"He couldn't have been; you got home," a female voice said.
Tamman smirked, and Sean raised his eyes to the heavens in a plea for strength. Then he punched Tamman's shoulder, and the female voice groaned behind them as they grappled. "They're at it again, Sandy!"
"Too much testosterone, Harry." The younger voice dripped sympathy. "Their poor, primitive male brains are awash in the stuff."
Tamman and Sean paused in silent agreement, then turned towards the passenger compartment with vengeful intent, but their purposeful progress came to an abrupt end as Sean ran full tilt into a large, solid object and oofed.
"Damn it, Brashan!" he complained, rubbing the prominent nose he'd inherited from his father to check for damage.
"I'm simply opening the hatch, Sean," a mechanically produced voice replied. "It's not my fault you don't watch where you're going."
"Some navigator!" Harriet sniffed.
"Fortunately for a certain loudmouthed snot," Tamman observed, "she's a princess, so I can't paddle her fanny the way she deserves."