“Retired,” said Kassad.
“I’m sorry, sir,” said the lieutenant, stumbling over his words as he fumbled the visas back to everyone. “I had no idea you were with this party, sir. That is … the Captain just said … I mean … my uncle was with you on Bressia, sir. I mean, I’m sorry … anything I or my men can do to …”
“At ease, Lieutenant,” said Kassad. “Is there any chance of getting some transport into the city?”
“Ah … well, sir …” The young Marine started to rub his chin and then remembered that he was wearing his helmet. “Yes, sir. But the problem is, sir, the mobs can get pretty nasty and … well, the damn EMVs don’t work for shit on this … uh, pardon me, sir. You see, the ground transports’re limited to cargo and we don’t have any skimmers free to leave the base until 2200 hours but I’ll be happy to get your party on the roster for …”
“Just a minute,” said the Consul. A battered passenger skimmer with the gold geodesic of the Hegemony painted on one flare skirt had landed ten meters away. A tall, thin man stepped out. “Theo!” cried the Consul.
The two men stepped forward, started to shake hands, and then hugged each other instead. “Damn,” said the Consul, “you look good, Theo.” It was true. His former aide had gained half a dozen years on the Consul, but the younger man still had the boyish smile, thin face, and thick red hair that had attracted every unmarried woman—and not a few married ones—on the consulate staff. The shyness which had been part of Theo Lane’s vulnerability was still there, as evidenced by the way he now needlessly adjusted his archaic horn-rimmed glasses—the young diplomat’s one affectation.
“It’s good to have you back,” said Theo.
The Consul turned, started to introduce his friend to the group, and then stopped. “My God,” he said, “you’re Consul now. I’m sorry, Theo, I wasn’t thinking.”
Theo Lane smiled and adjusted his glasses. “No problem, sir,” he said. “Actually, I’m no longer Consul. For the last few months I’ve been acting Governor-General. The Home Rule Council finally requested—and received—formal colonial status. Welcome to the newest world in the Hegemony.”
The Consul stared a second and then hugged his former protégé again. “Congratulations, Your Excellency.”
Theo grinned and glanced at the sky. “It’s going to rain in earnest before long. Why don’t we get your group aboard the skimmer and I’ll drive you into town.” The new Governor-General smiled at the young Marine. “Lieutenant?”
“Uh … yes, sir?” The officer had snapped to attention.
“Could you get your men to load these good people’s luggage, please? We’d all like to get in out of the rain.”
The skimmer flew south above the highway at a steady sixty meters. The Consul rode in the front passenger seat; the rest of the group relaxed in flowfoam recliners behind. Martin Silenus and Father Hoyt appeared to be asleep. Weintraub’s baby had ceased crying in favor of nursing on a soft bottle of synthesized mother’s milk.
“Things have changed,” said the Consul. He rested his cheek against the rain-spattered canopy and looked down at the chaos.
Thousands of shacks and lean-tos covered the hillsides and gullies along the three-klick ride to the suburbs. Fires were being lighted under wet tarps and the Consul watched mud-colored figures moving between mud-colored shacks. High fences had been rigged along the old Spaceport Highway and the road itself had been widened and regraded. Two lanes of truck and hover traffic, most of it military green or shrouded with inactive camouflage polymer, moved sluggishly in both directions. Ahead, the lights of Keats seemed to have multiplied and spread across new sections of the river valley and hills.
“Three million,” said Theo, as if reading his former boss’s mind. “At least three million people and growing every day.”
The Consul stared. “There were only four and a half million people on the planet when I left.”
“Still are,” said the new Governor-General. “And every one of them wants to get to Keats, board a ship, and get the hell out. Some are waiting for the farcaster to be built, but most don’t believe it’ll happen in time. They’re afraid.”
“Of the Ousters?”
“Them too,” said Theo, “but mostly of the Shrike.”
The Consul turned his face from the coolness of the canopy. “It’s come south of the Bridle Range then?”
Theo laughed without humor. “It’s everywhere. Or they’re everywhere. Most people are convinced that there are dozens or hundreds of the things now. Shrike deaths have been reported on all three continents. Everywhere except Keats, segments of the coast along the Mane, and a few of the big cities like Endymion.”
“How many casualties?” The Consul did not really want to know.
“At least twenty thousand dead or missing,” said Theo. “There are a lot of injured people but that isn’t the Shrike, is it?” Again came the dry laugh. “The Shrike doesn’t just wound people, does it? Uh-uh, people shoot each other by accident, fall down stairways or jump out windows in their panic, and trample each other in crowds. It’s a fucking mess.”
In the eleven years the Consul had worked with Theo Lane, he had never heard the younger man use profanity of any sort. “Is FORCE any help?” the Consul asked. “Are they what’s keeping the Shrike away from the big cities?”
Theo shook his head. “FORCE hasn’t done a damn thing except control the mobs. Oh, the Marines put on a show of keeping the spaceport open here and the harbor landing zone at Port R. secure, but they haven’t even tried to confront the Shrike. They’re waiting to fight the Ousters.”
“SDF?” asked the Consul, knowing even as he spoke that the poorly trained Self-defense Force would have been of little use.
Theo snorted. “At least eight thousand of the casualties are SDF. General Braxton took the ‘Fighting Third’ up the River Road to ‘strike at the Shrike menace in their lair’ and that was the last we heard of them.”
“You’re joking,” said the Consul, but one look at his friend’s face told him that he wasn’t. “Theo,” he said, “how in the world did you have time to meet us at the spaceport?”
“I didn’t,” said the Governor-General. He glanced in the back. The others were sleeping or staring exhaustedly out windows. “I needed to talk to you,” said Theo. “Convince you not to go.”
The Consul started to shake his head but Theo grasped his arm, squeezed hard. “Now listen to what I have to say, damn it. I know how hard it is for you to come back here after … what happened but, goddamn it, there’s no sense in your throwing everything away for no reason. Abandon this stupid pilgrimage. Stay in Keats.”
“I can’t …” began the Consul.
“Listen to me,” demanded Theo. “Reason one: you’re the finest diplomat and crisis manager I’ve ever seen and we need your skills.”
“It doesn’t …”
“Shut up a minute. Reason two: you and the others won’t get within two hundred klicks of the Time Tombs. This isn’t like the old days when you were here and the goddamned suicides could get up there and even sit around for a week and maybe even change their minds and come home. The Shrike is on the move. It’s like a plague.”
“I understand that but …”
“Reason three: I need you. I begged Tau Ceti Center to send someone else out. When I found that you were coming … well, hell, it got me through the last two years.”
The Consul shook his head, not understanding.
Theo started the turn toward the city center and then hovered, taking his eyes off the controls to look directly at the Consul. “I want you to take over the governor-generalship. The Senate won’t interfere—except perhaps for Gladstone—and by the time she finds out, it will be too late.”