"You bet it's ironic, Skipper," Tissaurd said firmly, "sending all these ships to provide trials facilities at one of the most significant military bases in the known Universe. The Admiralty should never have closed Gimmas in the first place. Someday, we'll be sorry we let Amherst and his CIGAs get away with it."
"A lot of us were sorry way back when it happened," Brim replied. "I wasn't even in the service then. I got bumped in the first Reduction In Force."
"The first RIF—after the Treaty of Garak?" Tissaurd asked.
"That's the one," Brim said, banking into a course paralleling the long strip of ice mush that was now churning wildly from tremendous convection currents. "I'd been in enough action to know the Leaguers for the zukeeds they really are, so I wasn't exactly in a mood to stop fighting."
Tissaurd laughed wryly. "That must have been just about the time I graduated from the Helmsman's Academy," she said. "I suppose we cadets were more acceptable to them. We hadn't seen much of the real war."
Brim chuckled. "Well, you've certainly sullied your acceptability now, shipping out in Starfury the way you have," Brim observed. "The CIGA factions in the Admiralty are really upset about Starfury —they'll be keeping a sharp eye on anyone associated with her."
"That's what I wanted," Tissaurd replied. "You know, you've only a few Standard Years on me, Skipper—I've been around awhile myself. It was about time I declared a choice."
"A declaration, unfortunately, for Right, not Might," Brim observed, glancing into the rearview monitor. "Those CIGAs all but run the Admiralty these days.'' Nearly ten c'lenyts distant now, the patch of slush was now turned to water and the convection currents had already subsided. He pulled off power and rolled into a bank, hauling the big starship around in a tight curve until she lined up with the strip of gray water, already speckled with whitecaps from Gimmas's constant wind. "I'll have the landing checklist now, Number One," he said, men pushed the nose over and started for the surface.
When the last mooring beams had flashed out to Starfury's optical bollards and the ship was secure on her gravity pool, Brim switched the controls to Strana' Zaftrak and winked at Tissaurd. "I think we're getting the hang of this, Number One," he quipped.
Tissaurd grinned. "Best team in the Fleet"—she chuckled, sliding out of her seat—"and damned quickly, if I do say so myself."
"Just the same, we ought to keep on practicing for a while," Brim called over his shoulder as he looked out at the little group waiting at the entrance to the brow. Even in heated battlesuits, the few humans who had ventured into the frigid wind looked miserably cold huddled in the lee of the brow entrance.
The Bears who waited with them, however, were waving heartily at the big warship. Dressed in colorful Sodeskayan winter garb, they looked right at home in the driving snow. Sodeskaya, "Mother Planet" of the G.F.S.S. (Great Federation of Sodeskayan States), orbited a cool dwarf star named Ostra that meted out little more energy than Gimmas itself.
Brim quickly donned his heated Fleet Cloak and followed Tissaurd off the bridge, clapping Zaftrak on the shoulder as he passed. "Best damned team in the known Universe, Skipper," she called after him.
"Unknown Universe, too," Brim added from the companion way. "Don't sell us short!"
Nikolai Yanuarievich Ursis, one of Brim's oldest friends and Dean of the famous Dytasburg Academy on the G.F.S.S, planet of Zhiv'ot, met him at the end of the brow with an authentic Bear hug.
Standing a quarter again as tall as Brim, he had small gray eyes of enormous intensity, dark reddish-brown fur, a long, urbane muzzle that terminated in a huge wet nose, and a grin so wide that fang jewels on either side of his mouth blazed out in the light of the doorway. Although a Polkovnik in the Sodeskayan Home Guard (and an equivalent full Captain in the Imperial Fleet), he was dressed in his civilian persona. On his head he wore a colossal egg-shaped hat of curly wool that covered his ears and added at least an iral to his already formidable height. His black, knee-length greatcoat—embellished by two rows of huge gold buttons and jasmine waist sash—was cut in the old military style with a stiff collar, embroidered cuffs, and a wide skirt. Crimson trousers bagged stylishly over his thick calf-length boots, the latter of black leather so soft that it bunched at the ankles. His hands were protected by delicately embroidered, six-fingered gloves of ophet leather. "Wilf Ansor, my old comrade!" he roared- "Grand Duke Anastas Alexyi sends regards."
"Nik!" Brim exclaimed through a happy grin, "what in the Universe are you doing here? I thought you'd be tied up in Zhiv'ot this time of year."
Ursis looked serious for a moment. "Matter of relativity, Wilf Ansor," he said soberly. "Old Dytasburg Academy will survive well enough without me for little while—but not without Starfury, here," he said, gazing past Brim at the ship, "I doubt Nergol Triannic would permit such academic liberty as students there presently enjoy." He scowled grimly. " 'Freedom,' they say, 'is sure possession only of those who can defend it.' "
"I'm glad you're here," Brim said with feeling.
The Bear grinned, this time with good humor. "You will be lot more glad to learn that I am accompanied by large contingent from Krasni-Peych you see trooping across brow toward Starfury.
They, not I, will attempt to remedy any problems you may experience with new Reflecting Drive that gives them so much pride." He motioned toward a low building just visible through the driving snow.
"Operation's headquarters," he explained. "Come. I show you where you officially sign in your ship.
Then, you buy us both goblet of Admiralty's rather modest meem."
Brim nodded as the Bear led off along snowdrifted walkways toward the headquarters. "I've done my best to stock Starfury's wardroom," he said, "but I'll never do even half so well as Utrillo Barbousse—remember him?"
"But who could forget Barbousse?" Ursis mused with a grin. "Truly, I have lost track of that splendid individual. Greatest of all ratings. In midst of most austere wartime shortages he could supply literally anything—as if magic." He kissed the tips of his fingers. "Logish Meem that would make Universe itself jealous."
" 'Shortage' is only a relative term to people like Barbousse," Brim interjected, "like 'impossible.'
You knew he sent a message of congratulations when I took over Starfury, didn't you?"
"He did?" Ursis said with an interested frown. "And how did this missive arrive?"
Brim shrugged. "One of the ancient Cerendellian COMM channels. I'd never seen it used before."
Ursis smiled. "Impossible to trace, of course."
"Absolutely," Brim replied. "I tried. The last time I heard from him, he was in the Helmsman's Academy. Then after I was RIFed, I lost track of him. Something happened there, but I don't know what it was. He certainly wasn't able to finish school."
"I doubt if our one-time associate Amherst and his CIGAs had much use for ex-ratings," Ursis offered.
"Too much of a free thinker, anyhow," Brim added as they reached the building. "Whatever it was that happened to him, he disappeared. Completely."
"Somehow," Ursis mused, opening the door for Brim and stamping snow from his boots, "I have feeling we've not seen last of Mr. Barbousse. He will turn up when he can do some good; mark my words."
Brim never got a chance to answer. Before he could open his mouth, he was cut off by the familiar twang of Mark Valerian, chief designer for the Sherrington Starship Works and the virtual creator of Starfury.
"Brim, this is absolutely horrible!" me little man growled with a twinkle of laughter in his eye. "If I'd had any idea they'd pick an orbiting iceberg like this for the trials, I'd never have designed the xaxtdamned ship in the first place." Valerian was almost painfully slim with a sizable nose; damp, humorous eyes; and a drooping black mustache of truly prodigious size. As usual, his coat and trousers were made of soft-looking wool. These were coupled with an old-fashioned white shirt, necktie, and high, pointed boots cut in the Rhodorian style.