USS Zumwalt Ship Mission Center
“Fire again,” said Captain Simmons. He stood with the weight fully on the balls of his feet, willing the ship to make every shot count. The steady explosions of the rail gun releasing rounds continued. One round every six seconds, with a metronome’s precision.
With all auxiliary power dedicated to the weapons systems, the ship continued to drift, but ATHENA had that under control, adjusting the fire solution.
In the distance, small bright flashes and then black plumes began to appear, the only visual indicators of the steady rail-gun shots working their way through the enemy task force.
Cortez approached Simmons and kept his voice low. “Sir, water level’s rising below decks. We need to get those pumps back on before we lose her,” he said.
Simmons stared at him briefly and then responded. “Continue firing. We don’t know if the gun will work once we stop. We just need to trust the ship.”
He could hear his father speaking through him.
Epilogue
Remember those not here today,
And those unwell or far away,
And those who never lived to see,
The end of War and Victory.
The fifteen senators stared at the piece of parchment folded into a square and covered with what looked like nineteenth-century English script.
“You see, ladies and gentlemen, this is the actual letter of marque. The one your president signed. There is a copy in one of my vaults and a third, as you might know, has been donated to your Smithsonian Institution for its historic significance.” Sir Aeric Cavendish then playfully tapped the paper to make it spin weightlessly in front of the view screen. “It is a binding legal document. What you are asking of me is not based on, my legal team informs me, any law, terrestrial or otherwise.”
“Nobody is questioning your contribution to the war effort,” said Senator Bob Courtenay, the California Republican who chaired the committee. He tried not to show his frustration. Witnesses at congressional hearings were supposed to be intimidated, not showboating on a video screen from two hundred and fifty miles overhead. And they were supposed to be in clothing appropriate to the occasion, not in a baby-blue jumpsuit with the name Zorro embroidered on it. “But the past notwithstanding, you have to understand the present seriousness of our position.”
“What I understand is that I delivered on all terms of a business agreement, and now my partners seek to change that agreement,” said Sir Aeric. “Highly disappointing, but to be expected of politicians.”
Senator Courtenay leaned forward, twirling a ballpoint pen in his hand. It was his signal for the media cameras to focus tightly on him because he was about to drop the hammer on a witness.
“Let me be explicitly clear about what the legislation this committee is considering means: You will agree to give the space station you now occupy back to its rightful owners,” said Senator Courtenay, raising his voice. “Or, Mr. Cavendish, your properties inside the United States will be seized, and a warrant for your arrest will be issued.”
“Senator, it seems you are having trouble with a great many things, from the nuances of business to the basic matter of getting my title correct.” Sir Aeric Cavendish floated up and then steadied himself in front of the camera.
“So let me simplify this for you. You can make all the empty threats that you desire. I rather like it up here and I don’t expect to come down there in the foreseeable future.”
She stayed to the shadows on the edge of the woods. They provided good cover, were familiar, comforting. They were also cool and didn’t make her sweat as much in the wool blanket she’d cut a poncho slit into and wore in order to break up her heat signature.
From her vantage point, she could see the children in the field. Only children could be so brave, so oblivious to it all, running about in the open like that. An adult was pulling soccer balls out of a bag as the children lined up.
Suddenly, the back of her neck tingled, a sixth sense telling her that something wasn’t right. She heard it before she saw it. It was one of the new electric versions. Lightweight and cheap, but largely autonomous, able to pick up and track human signatures on its own. A shot of adrenaline, almost like an electric shock, pushed through the handful of calmers she’d taken that morning. Her pores opened up and she began to sweat profusely.
At first, she thought it would track her, but then the drone locked in on the children in the open field. She focused on the child closest to her, a little boy around six years old. He didn’t notice the drone at first. It stalked him, just thirty feet in the air, hovering at the corner of the field and then slowly moving closer until it was right above him. Then, finally, he saw it.
Her jaws clenched, locking, teeth pressing hard against each other. She wanted to run out there. But she couldn’t. Every instinct told her not to move.
The little boy was now running, the other children following him, all screaming. As fast as they were running, the drone easily kept pace.
She knew she shouldn’t stay there in the woods. She should be out there, among them, doing something. But she couldn’t. Her body wouldn’t let her move.
The drone pulled ahead of the running children and then stopped and raised a few yards to get a better shot. It steadied, fixing its position, as the children continued to run, screaming as loud as they could.
She felt cold. In the space of just a few seconds, she’d sweated through her clothes underneath the wool blanket; the rough fabric was starting to absorb the wet and stick to her. Damn it, get your ass out there, she could hear her old drill instructor screaming. But she couldn’t move.
She closed her eyes. She couldn’t watch it all anymore. Her head began to pound, the noise of the children screaming combining with the drone’s rotors. Then it was all drowned out by the dull roar of white noise that began to build in her eardrums, the blood rushing in. She couldn’t move.
And then she felt it. Conan opened her eyes and saw the little boy. Her little boy. Liam was standing there, holding her hand, squeezing it, tears in his eyes.
“Mommy, please won’t you come play with us? You said you’d try this time.”
Markov shook the snow from his thick jacket’s shoulders. As he began to peel off his layers of fur and wool, he caught a whiff of butter and onions. The widow upstairs cooked nonstop. For whom, he did not know. She clearly did not eat it; she was an elderly little wisp of a woman
The smell made him feel trapped in the small apartment. The main living space contained only a heavy pine chair, a matching footstool, and a cabinet that against the wall. With only enough room for him to read and pace, it was a retreat in both meanings of the term.
They had acknowledged his effort in Hawaii with a medal and then had made it clear that the episode was best forgotten by all, the various old alliances no longer seeming so wise after the coup had toppled the old spy. He’d traded the medal at the flea market for a 130-year-old book of Mikhail Lermontov’s poems, including “Death of the Poet,” about Pushkin’s demise, and told his bosses he would like to be discharged so he could become a policeman. They thought it was a joke at first. The pay is terrible. Nobody is good for bribes anymore. You’ll have to drive a dented Lada, and even the little kids will throw rocks at you. Better that than strutting around the Alpha Group compound like an old cock with tattered feathers and nothing to do. Three months later, he walked out into a cold Moscow evening with a badge and an ID identifying him as a junior-grade detective on the city police force. It meant a life of small apartments filled with the smell of neighbors’ cooking, but also a constant supply of mysteries that made life worth living.