Yet another screen showed Flight Two, with the hatch closing on one of the shuttles. As the launch hatch opened, the elevator began raising the shuttle. Arly could just see some part of the Station through the open hatch.
"… no authorization for such deliberate violation," the Insystem voice droned on. "Return to inactive status at once or regulations will require that force be used."
Arly's temper flared. "You have a hostile Seti fleet incoming," she said slowly, biting off each word. "You have traitors letting them past the defenses. Don't threaten me. So far I haven't hurt the Station."
Perhaps not all the Insystem Security were in the plot. This one looked as if he'd just been slugged.
"But… but there's no evidence. None of the detector nets have gone off…"
"Maybe someone's got his finger on the buzzer."
The shuttle cleared the Zaid-Dayans hull, and disappeared. Arly sent a silent prayer after it.
"If I were you, I'd start looking at the systems with redundancies."
By now, the Zaid-Dayan's own powerful scans were unlocked. Nothing would show, yet. The enemy was too far out. Arly glanced around and saw that the regular bridge crew was now in place. It felt very strange to be in Sassinak's place, while Tenant Yulyin sat at 'Tier' board, and stranger to see that board mostly dark, after a'ship's alert. She pointed to Gori, who transferred the Insystems Security channel to his board.
"Ensign Gori will stay in contact with you."
"Fleet Regulations, Volume 21, article 14, grants authorization to commanding officers of vessels on temporary duty away from normal Sector assignment…" Gori sounded confident, and as smooth as any diplomat.
Arly left him to it. The combination of a surprise Seti fleet and Gori's zeal for regulations should keep trigger-happy fingers off the buttons until they could get away and raise shields.
"Docking bay secure, Captain!"
Arly nodded to Engineering. Critical as the situation was, she could not justify destroying the Station to jump-start the Zaid-Dayan and bringing the insystem drive up was a delicate operation. Centimeter by centimeter they eased away from the Station, adding just enough thrust at first to let rotational inertia begin their outward spiral.
"Weapons still locked down," Yulyin reported, at the two-minute tick.
"Right. Sassinak and I did some fancy stuff that should unkink by the time we can use them -" She wondered if this Ssli and that distant one were still in contact. And what was Dupaynil doing there? No time for that, though: her weapons had to come first.
She keyed in the code Sassinak had left with her, the captain's access to the command computers, the master controls of all weaponry. Then she explained what they'd done, and as quickly crew and marines began scurrying around the ship to restore it to fall fighting capability. One hundred kilometers from the Station, Arly notched up the insystem drive.
So far, if the invaders were getting scan on her, she would look predictable. A rising spiral, the usual departure of a large ship from anything as massive as a planet. Then she engaged the stealth gear, and the Zaid-Dayan passed into darkness and silence, an owl hunting across the night.
FedCentraclass="underline" Fleet Headquarters
Coromell swung to face Lunzie. "I never thought of that. My mind must be slowing!"
"What?" Lunzie hadn't heard what Arly said, had only seen its effect in the changes on Coromell's face.
"A Seti fleet, inbound -" He told her the rest, and began linking it to what they'd learned elsewhere. "This Iretan thing… you must have come very close to the bone somehow."
"Unless they had it planned and we just showed up in the middle of it."
"True. I keep forgetting you were sleeping away the past forty-three years. Like a time-bomb for them. Come to think of it, without the Iretan's trial, the Winter Assizes were mostly commercial cases this time. And nothing coming up before Grand Council but a final vote on some financial rules affecting terraforming. Not my field: I don't know a stock from a bond."
"So if they wanted a quiet session, they could have arranged that… and we really are a time-bomb."
"Which they set for themselves, I remind you. Very fitting, all this is."
"If they don't blow us away," said Lunzie. "That's not Sassinak up there."
"She'd have left the ship to her most competent combat officer. The best we can do now is make sure whatever was planned down here doesn't work."
Lunzie was unconvinced. "But what can one cruiser do against a whole fleet?"
"Buy us time, if nothing else. Don't worry about what you can't change. What we'll have to do is make sure Insystem has the alarm, and believes it, and get Sassinak out of whatever trap she's in."
The tiny clinic attached to Fleet Central Systems Command had but one corridor that opened directly into the back offices of the Command building. Lunzie followed Coromell, noticing that the enlisted personnel looked as stunned to see him as he had looked when he heard about the Seti fleet.
"Sir? When did the Admiral arrive?" asked one, almost but not quite barring the way to the lift marked "Admiral's use only."
"About thirty hours ago. Apparently our security confused at least a few people." He punched the controls and the lift door sighed open.
"But, sir, that commander… the murder…"
"Put a lock on it, Algin. Who's been speaking for us?"
"Lt. Commander Danish, sir. He's up…"
But Coromell had closed the lift door, and now gave Lunzie a rueful smile.
"I knew that. But he doesn't know that Dallish is the one officer here I really trust. His father and I were close friends, years ago. Dallish has been covering for me."
"Shouldn't you have stayed under cover longer?"
"With Sassinak still accused of murdering me? No. Showing up alive should shake them up just as much as you shook the conspirators by waking up in the midst of their plot. Whoever thought he killed me will wonder who the victim was. And whoever sent the victim to take my place will wonder if we're onto him. We soon will be."
Lunzie found Coromell's office a relief after the pastel-walled, determinedly soothing atmosphere of the clinic suite. A great arc of desk took the place of the command module onboard a ship. He grinned when he saw her expression.
"Yes, it's an indulgence. But one which keeps me thinking like a deepspace admiral, and not a planet-dweller."
A younger man, whom Lunzie assumed was Dallish, stood aside as they entered, then handed Coromell a sheaf of thin plastic strips. One wall had a window looking out across the city - Lunzie's first live view of the hub of interplanetary government. It looked, to her, like any other large city. Below, a broad street had both slideways and vehicular traffic: bright blue and green monorail trains. She glanced around Coromell's office again. The dark-blue flat-piled carpet that seemed to be favored by Fleet officers, a bank of viewscreens on the opposite wall, racks of datacubes, fichefiles, even a row of books bound in plain blue. "Lunzie!"
She looked away from a row of exquisitely detailed model ships, displayed against a painted starscape. Coromell and Dallish had tuned in one of the civilian news programs, now showing a view that Lunzie realized was the docking tube of a ship at Station. At first she did not hear whatever the news commentator was saying. Over the tube, the electronic display had gone from green to orange; the ship's name Zaid-Dayan and status "Un-dock: Warning" blinked on and off
A commentator stepped in front of the vicam, and Lunzie made herself listen to the sleek-haired woman with the professional frown.