Merrick sat back in his chair, his mind a churning, confused mess.
At every point in his life he had known what he had to do and where he had to go, but not anymore. The Mumtaz project, his master plan, the biggest risk of his life, was the only piece of his world that was going according to plan, and he thanked Kraa for giving him Digby to make it all happen. But as the moment approached when he could reveal the project to an amazed and grateful Council before telling the tired peoples of the Hammer that there was hope for them and their families, that there was room to grow and flourish, that there was a new planet to take the pressure off the Hammer Worlds, Faith looked like it was about to go over the cliff. And if it did, it would drag the Hammer into another Great Schism and him to his fate in front of a DocSec firing squad.
So what was he doing now? He was getting ready for yet another Kraa-damned useless Supreme Council meeting.
As Merrick scanned the agenda, he could see nothing but bad news. Faith of course, as usual, headed the list, followed by the even worse than expected economic results for the July-September quarter. Unemployment up, consumer confidence down, business investment down, inventories up, and capital markets fragile as Faith’s battered economy, in theory the Hammer Worlds’ second largest, went into free-fall.
Then there was the arrest of a senior DocSec officer for a particularly nasty rape-murder on Fortitude that had brought the people of the capital, Mardoz, out in the streets in protest. Thank Kraa, DocSec had been sensible for once and had not indulged in the usual brutal street-clearing tactics. Must find out who the incident commander was and promote him, he thought in passing. Then there was the usual industrial unrest in the star shipyards of Commitment, the spiraling cost of the subsidies for unprofitable interplanetary space lines, allegations of corruption in the contract administration branch of the defense department.
On and on it went, a never-ending nightmare. By Kraa, he was tired.
Worst of all, he couldn’t begin to think how to make things work anymore. He sighed deeply. More of the same, it would have to be. Maybe things would settle down; they always had in the past. But Faith was a real worry. Perhaps he could remove some heads, especially the moron who had sent the 2/22nd to their deaths. What was his name? Oh, yes, Brigadier General Abinse. A spell on Hell would fix him. Might even have the useless bastard shot. And Abinse’s senior staff officers as well. Why not? Why not indeed?
Somewhat cheered by doing what he enjoyed best-the brutal exercise of his authority-Merrick picked up the phone.
Sunday, October 25, 2398, UD
Hell-14
Michael watched as Chief Petty Officer Mosharaf raised his right hand in victory, the remote holovid feed picking up the broad grin that split his face.
A herd of space-suited elephants could now tap-dance in lead boots in front of the massive sensor tower, and the Hammer’s operators would see only what the Feds wanted them to see: nothing but shattered rock and a star-studded sky.
Safely tucked away under a broad chromaflage net secured to the rock walls of a deep depression well out of sight of the tower and its deadly array of sensors, Michael and his team of sherpas had looked on in horrified fascination as Mosharaf and his team had worked with infinite care and patience to place suppressors on the tower’s infrared sensors and holocams, their every move in full sight of the tower’s antipersonnel lasers. Michael had practically died as he’d watched them cross the open ground, protected by nothing more than a smart screen, a milky-gray net supported by hair-thin gas-filled ribs tuned by its onboard AI to blend perfectly with the rock surface around it; surface-mounted emitters had adjusted the screen’s signature until it did not exist even to the most discriminating eyes.
As Ng’s people completed the laborious process of installing the massive active radar suppressors, Michael and his sherpas began the weary process of recovering all the equipment used to get Ng and her teams safely up to the towers. As the last load began its long trek back to 387, Michael completed his final task-putting in place and arming demolition charges, enough boosted chemex to flatten the tower and destroy everything on it-before he, too, with one last tired look around, set off.
Back onboard 387 and with no reaction from the Hammer to indicate any problems, Ribot flashed a pinchcomms message to Fleet to report Ng’s success. That’ll cheer them up, Michael thought as he turned in for a well-earned rest.
Tracking through deepspace 120 million kilometers out from Hell at a sedate 150,000 kph, Lieutenant William Chen, captain of DLS-166, smiled broadly as he read the latest pinchcomm broadcast from Fleet, his pride mixed with anxiety at the thought of the mission that lay ahead. Ribot’s team had done the job, and finally 166 was on its way in.
Comming the officer in command to finalize 166’s vector, he made his way to the combat information center for the microjump that would drop them a safe 18 million kilometers from Hell-14 en route to his rendezvous with Ribot and 387.
After dropping out of pinchspace 18 million kilometers from Hell, DLS-166 coasted in unseen.
Even though 387 had done all the heavy lifting, the nerves of all onboard were stretched tissue-thin as the pressure of dropping so deep in Hammer space built up. Thank Christ he didn’t have to do it like 387, Chen thought gratefully. Going in second was bad enough: hour after hour of slow deceleration right into the face of the Hammer’s sensors, not knowing if at any moment a great Hammer heavy cruiser would go active and smash the ship into a cloud of battered and twisted metal.
“Captain, sir. Krachov shields deployed and in position. Final deceleration burn in two minutes ten seconds.”
“Roger that.”
Two minutes later, with 166’s driver efflux safely blocked from view by Krachov shields positioned with exquisite care top and bottom, left and right, and now by Hell-14 itself, so close directly ahead so that every possible intercept angle between 166 and the Hammers’ surveillance satellites was blocked, Mother fired the main engines. The ship bucked and heaved in the face of the sudden deceleration, the drivers pouring hundreds of kilos of ionized mass per second out into space, the pencil-thin plume of plasma reaching out toward the waiting moon.
Finally, Mother shut down the main engines. 166 hung motionless for a few seconds before Hell-14’s tiny gravitational field took hold of her; the ship drifted down to the moon’s surface with painful slowness as Mother rolled it belly down in preparation for landing. Long minutes later, 166 had settled down alongside 387, and Chen felt his breathing and heartbeat return to normal.
Friday, October 30, 2398, UD
Offices of the Supreme Council for the Preservation of the Faith, City of McNair, Planet Commitment
Merrick massaged temples split by the sudden onset of yet another in a long line of shockingly intense headaches as the Council erupted around him in a storm of furious argument.
The issue of the moment-what else did they talk about these days? Merrick thought morosely-was Faith’s continuing slide into anarchy. Merrick watched through pain-slitted eyes as Polk defended himself furiously against the charge leveled by Merrick’s supporters that the entire situation had been caused by Polk’s protection of Herris and the stinking web of corruption that Herris had woven through the entire fabric of Faith’s economy.