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be blamed. Very complicated. Don't endanger yourself." The officer's
expression conveyed that it didn't mean much to him. Hunt persisted,
"Freskel-Gar should know that ships of other visitors have limited power.
Cannot be refilled. Soon useless. Bad bargain. The large ship is good . . .
for a long time. Without limit. The Giants have returned."
The girl's eyes widened. "The colonel says yes, he will pass that back. Is
that all? From the stars?"
"Freskel-Gar must stand by Perasmon. War will be . . . ruin, end . . . of
Minerva. We know your future. Bad. Trying to change it. Please stress
urgency."
The officer listened, nodded, and went back through the inside door.
"How can you know the future?" the translator asked.
"No talking now," the woman escorting her snapped.
* * *
"Putting you through to General Oodan now."
"Oodan."
"Hovin Lilesser of NSRO for you, General."
"Hello? Lilesser here." Lilesser was the person Oodan had tasked to try and
locate the member of the National Science Research Office's delegation in
Melthis who was allegedly responsible for originating the warning.
"Yes. Oodan speaking."
"This is uncanny. We've been trying to contact the delegation in Melthis for
almost an hour. Communications seem to be out. The Lambians say there's a
computer down or something. But how did you know?"
"What do you make of it?" Oodan asked.
"I'm not really sure. It's very unusual. They should have backup for this kind
of thing."
"There could be something strange going on, then?"
"Well, I don't know. That's not really for me to say. Why? Is something else
happening?"
"I'm not sure. . . . Leave it with me. Thank you. You've helped as much as you
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can."
"Any time."
Oodan replaced the phone and stared at it for almost a minute. A remarkable
coincidence, he decided. Coincidences always made him suspicious. The Internal
Security people needed to be in on this. They were the ones who dealt directly
with the President's Office. He picked up the phone again.
"General?"
"Who do we know at DIS? I need to talk to somebody there right away. Find out
who handles the President's personal security, or someone to talk to whoever
does. This can't wait."
"At once, General."
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Prince Freskel-Gar watched the screen showing the Giants' ship while he
listened to the colonel's summary of the message from the human accompanying
them who had called himself Hunt. With all that was going on that day, he
hadn't had time yet to discover what the story was behind this awesome-looking
vessel whose appearance had troubled even Broghuilio. It was coasting in
space, maintaining a position that kept the Moon interposed between it and
Minerva. The view was being captured by one of the Broghuilio's ships on the
Farside surface. It was being relayed too, from the Agracon, to Wylott and his
advance group of Jevlenese at Dorjon. The Jevlenese were also human, but they
seemed different from the two who had landed with the Giants. It sounded as if
this was going to be a complicated story.
The last-minute decision to bring forward the takeover at the Agracon had been
pulled off surprisingly smoothly, with the world outside still unaware that it
had happened. It was important that news of Perasmon's end be known first,
before Freskel-Gar began moving overtly to consolidate his position. As
expected, there had been a barrage of calls and messages querying the apparent
hitches with communications, and some visitors had been inconvenienced, but by
and large the cover stories had stood. Later, an explanation could be
concocted attributing the early moves in the Agracon to security precautions
taken in response to an intelligence alert that had been recognized only later
as pertaining to the assassination. To minimize the time for which the action
at the Agracon would need to be concealed, Hat Rack had also been brought
forward and would now be executed over mid-ocean. That part of the operation
was being directed by Freskel-Gar's deputy, Count Rorvax, from Dorjon. For
obvious reasons the details had been made available only to an absolute
minimum who had a need to know.
All in all, Broghilio's show of nerve had paid off. His improvised amendment
to the plan to accommodate the sudden change in the situation appeared to be
working. This surely wasn't a time for Freskel-Gar to be losing his nerve and
over-reacting. So the big news from Hunt, the colonel was telling him, was
that the Giants knew about "an action" and "who was responsible." All very
vague, with nothing specific stated explicitly. Freskel-Gar didn't see how
they could know even the colonel who was delivering the message didn't know
what it was in reference to. Most likely, Freskel-Gar, thought, with their
advanced surveillance resources the aliens had detected the Hat Rack flight
climbing and moving on an interception course, made a lucky guess, and the
rest was pure bluff. So Broghuilio was intending to scrap his ships because
Minerva didn't have the resources to refuel and maintain them. Well, wouldn't
that apply equally well to the ship that the Giants had arrived in too? Hunt
said no, but that was no doubt just another part of the bluff. And if their
ship was so superior, why were the Giants evacuating it right now, as he
watched? They didn't seem to have much ability to resist whatever Broghuilio
was threatening. No, just at the moment Freskel-Gar saw no reason to reverse
his decision.
Broghuilio appeared on the channel being maintained to Farside and announced
that he intended taking command of the Giants' starship. "I will inform you
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when I have completed my assessment," he said. And with that, the link cut
out.
* * *
The essence of gaining the controlling hand in this kind of situation lay in
assertiveness. Freskel-Gar had acquiesced when Broghuilio tested his mettle by
presuming to give orders. The thing now was to keep to the precedent. To have
consulted first about taking over the Shapieron would have been tantamount to
seeking approval, conceding Freskel-Gar the territory. Keeping the channel
open would have been fitting for a subordinate reporting progress. Broghuilio
would decide his course of action independently, in his own time as it suited
him, and then announce it.
"Auxiliary compensators stabilized. . . . Thrust vector balanced," the
computer advised. "All ships ready to lift off."
The captain scanned the bridge-deck readouts. "Proceed."
Broghuilio stood watching, arms folded, as the side-view displays showed the
other four craft shedding their coatings of rubble and dust as they rose from
the lunar surface. Although the altering surface perspective showed his
flagship to be climbing too, with inbuilt Thurien-type g-localizers there was
no sensation of movement. The five ships formed into a V with the flagship at
the head and turned onto a course directly outward from Luna, in the direction
of the Shapieron. If he transferred his followers and installed the armaments [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]