The Death of Wisdom Page 4

  "But we do have several modules available," Spanner interjected, in Lugnut's defense. "When we saw that they weren't available, we went ahead and built our own."

  Impressed, Coeur nodded. Initiative was always good to see.

  "Well, whose idea was that?" she asked.

  Whereupon both Lugnut and Spanner again fell silent.

  "I proposed the concept, sir," Crowbar said after a moment.

  After which, awkward silence fell again upon the cargo hold.

  "Engineering is this way, isn't it?" Coeur finally said, pointing aft, "Yes, sir," Crowbar said, "this way,"

  A complete tour of Hornet was simplified by her simple plan—basically a three-part hull with crew accommodations forward, fuel and cargo amidships, and drives clustered aft—and an hour with her student guides sufficed to show Coeur her interior arrangement. More than that, though, Coeur valued the chance to see how well the old ship was put together—with careful welding, for instance, and meticulous wiring—which was the one thing she needed to see before she could accept the command.

  On a less objective level, though, Coeur had already fallen in love with the ship. Unlike the warships she'd served on before, Hornet was oriented toward commerce and the comfort of passengers, so she was both beautiful outside and comfortable inside—the latter an important factor during a long voyage. Even the two drive decks, where paying passengers were never Intended to go, were spacious, with plenty of room for access to the engines.

  Where paying passengers were expected to pass their time was an area called the loft, an upper-deck compartment with 10 staterooms and so much open space— even with its air raft berth—that almost anyone could spend a week In jump there without feeling claustrophobic. Below, in the twin arms of the split bow, was the crew section proper: three staterooms in the port arm and another stateroom, galley, and the bridge to starboard.

  It was on the bridge that Cicero rejoined the party.

  "Greetings, Red Sun. Has the tour been instructive?"

  By the looks of Spanner and Lugnut, whose effusiveness had toned down after they'd left the cargo hold, one might have expected otherwise, but Coeur wore a positive expression.

  "I'd say so. She's a fine ship."

  "Are there any deficits that concern you?"

  "Well...not really. I did notice that there aren't any lifeboats, but Crowbar advised me that the weapons were installed where those used to be."

  "Yes," Cicero said, "I am concerned about that myself, but the Admiralty insisted upon the heaviest possible armament."

  "Hey, don't get me wrong," Coeur interjected. "I'd rather have a pair of good weapons any day, than a pair of lifeboats to get off the wreck. Besides, the air raft would do in a pinch,"

  "I am gratified," Cicero said. "Students, you are dismissed."

  Salutes, less crisp from Spanner and Lugnut than they had been before, were offered, and the engineers withdrew through the sliding hatch aft. As Cicero looked on, Coeur then sat herself in on eol the pilot's couches, where she admired the tech level 14 holographic controls—a step up from Lirgishkhunan's flatscreen panels—and the flawless forward view through a single wraparound viewscreen.

  "Yes sir, she's a fine ship all right."

  "You will consider the offer further, then?"

  "If you've got other candidates," Coeur said, coming back around in her seat, "the answer's yes, although I'd like to study the ship specs and mission profile before I sign anything. Plus there's the commandant to inform. He might not be too happy about finding a new instructor for the next term."

  "Given the importance of this mission, I foresee his acceptance."

  "True. Besides, who else is he going to get to proofread his speech?"

  "Excuse me?"

  "Oh, nothing."

  "If that is al! then, i shall bid you leave, and await your final decision, A complete dossier on this mission, as well as personnel files of potential crew members, has already been transmitted to your home for you to examine at your leisure."

  "I'll get right on it. Can I reach you at the Nest?"

  "I shall be residing aboard Hornet until she launches," Cicero said. "You may contact me at this berth,"

  "Even better. Tell you what—let me sleep on it and I'll flag you in the morning."

  "Indeed."

  Coeur then rose from her seat, but paused midway to the aft hatch.

  "Cicero, another question. That engineer Crowbar— he's older than the other ones, isn't he?"

  "Affirmative. Crowbar served a term of four years as a Lancer before coming to the academy."

  "I thought so. You need him?"

  "For another project, do you mean? No."

  'Then I want him."

  "indeed. He is yours."

  * * +

  Well, I'll be damned. That was a manipulation.

  Only after Coeur had caught a grav bus and started on her way home did it occur to her that Cicero—in a typically Hiver way—had steered her toward choosing Crowbar. That in and of itself wasn't shocking—Crowbar was the man she would have picked anyway—but it was the first time she'd seen a manipulation so clearly directed toward herself, I suppose he could've just suggested Crowbar as the engineer, but he arranged circumstances so that I'd choose his choice without doing it consciously, I wonder why?

  But Coeur knew better than to think about it too hard. Hivers manipulated events constantly (indeed, some suspected that the RC itself was a manipulation of humankind toward an unknown end), but Hivers had no emotion, and nefarious overtones could not be ascribed to that behavior. As a matter of course, Hivers practiced improving their skill at manipulation all the time, and— since humans were easier to manipulate than other Hivers—who better to practice on than humans?

  Besides, Coeur thought, rising to stand as the bus grounded at her curb, if it were a really important manipulation, it would've been so subtle I probably wouldn't have recognized it at all.

  And so, relieved, Coeur disembarked into the moon-lit dusk, looking forward to a quiet evening alone with her E-mail, since her roommate was off on a date that evening.

  For most of her time on Aubaine, Coeur had lived alone in her seaward-facing apartment, but recently she'd taken in a roommate, reasoning that if she was going to be stuck on Aubaine she might as well satisfy her lust for speed and save up her money to buy a grav bike. That individual, now with her three months, was the good- natured but troubled Dr. Orit Takagawa (RCES callsign Physic).

  A year younger than Coeur, Physic was clearly sharp, trained both as a surgeon and alien disease pathologist, but she was not as happy as she might have been.

  Diverted from field service, Physic was assigned as a researcher at the Brusman Medlab complex, a position of importance but relative tedium. Added to the stress of separation from her estranged husband (the industrialist August Delpero, who struck Coeur as a complete jerk), it might have made her a very depressing woman indeed.

  Yet Physic was not a depressing person to be around. Though she might have been a trifle gabby, she was also optimistic about her chances for flight duty and dedicated to eventual reconciliation with her husband. The latter objective seemed foolish to Coeur, but she couldn't stop her friend from seeing Delpero now and again— with the objective of salvaging their marriage. This afternoon, for instance, Physic had taken off work early to meet Delpero at his Trantown estate—which at the very least should have given Coeur a peaceful night alone in their dinette with her E-mail mission data.

  But no sooner had night fallen—just as Coeur was setting aside the Hornet specs and beginning in on personnel files—than Physic stomped back into the apartment and angrily threw her handbag down on the couch, "Red Sun," Physic fumed, "I have had as much of that man as I am going to take! That's it, I quit, it's over!"

  Coeur looked up at her roommate. Quite short, the dusky woman was nevertheless striking in a short black dress just slightly darker than her eyes and grown-out pageboy haircut, and she might have looked very pretty
too if it weren't for the deep scowl dominating her expression.

  "Bad date, huh?"

  "Date? Hell! We didn't even leave his house!"

  Coeur restrained herself from asking if that was a bad thing; Delpero, as Coeur understood it, had offered to take Physic off to orbit in his yacht.

  "Do you want to talk about it?" Coeur finally asked, knowing that her useful work time was over, "Well, I guess I had it coming," Physic said, accepting the offer and plunking down opposite Coeur. "I mean, he never seems to want to do anything I do."

  Coeur nodded, mean, here I go out of my way to get someone else to cover for me at the Medlab, then he tells me 'sorry, business came up in the outer system.' Like he couldn't call and tell me that."

  Couer nodded again, letting a moment pass before comment.

  "Physic," she said finally, "the guy's a jerk. He's been married three times, and you catch him with other women every time you turn around. The sooner you divorce him, the better."

  "Yeah, but..."

  "Yeah, but nothing. Woman, you are 30 years old and this man treats you like a teenager. Honestly, a woman like you—xenomedicine specialist, on the way up in your field—you don't need that."

  "Hmm," Physic said, soberly. "I don't know about 'on the way up.' Every petition I make for field duty gets the old 'thanks, we need you where you are.'"

  Coeur looked surprised.

  "I didn't know they'd sent any answer to your petitions."

  "Well ..l didn't want to jinx myself. Besides, I knew how much you wanted to get out there again, and I didn't want you to get upset hearing about all my bad news."

  Suddenly, an inspiration hit Coeur—something that had been rolling around in her head like a loose marble.

  but she hadn't had time to think about yet. Ignoring Physic for a moment, she returned her attention to the tabletop computer display and scrolled to a personnel data field she hadn't yet examined.

  "Well, I'll be damned." Coeur said, finding what she was looking for.

  "What?"

  But a broad and growing smile was Physic's only answer from Coeur.

  "What? What?"

  "Physic, how'd you like to be a ship's surgeon?"

  "What, are you kidding?"

  "Sorry, Physic, I guess I didn't even have a chance to tell you. The Technical Nest asked me to command one of their ships this afternoon."

  "Coeur, that's wonderful!"

  "And, I've been asked to select my own crew."

  Physic, swung around hard from rejection to elation, could only gape for a moment, blinking.

  "You're serious, right?"

  "Oh, yes. You're right here on the list—Class A Xenomedicine Specialist. And i have the authority to suspend your ground duty assignment."

  "Wait a minute. How did you get a look at my personnel file?"

  "Captain's privilege," Coeur said, turning the screen around. "See, it's right here."

  "Hey, you're right!"

  "Lucky break, all right. So, you want the job?"

  "Do I want the job? Do I want the job? Hell, yes, I want the job!"

  "Well, good. That's three crew members down."

  "But, hey...wait a minute. Are you really sure that you want your friend as a doctor?"

  "I want the best person available as a doctor. This computer won't find anyone better qualified." "Wow. So I guess I'll have to call you 'sir huh?" "Don't worry, you'll get used to it."

  The yacht Lord Ryan was not streamlined for atmospheric flight, but her designers had given her a smooth exterior shell to enhance the appearance of speed. It was an affectation typical of Imperial design, but not entirely misleading; AC thrust and jump-4 range gave her master, August Delpero, performance exceeding most of the RC fleet.

  Though it was not as if Delpero believed he would ever need that speed to escape the government. The chairman of Novastar Incorporated—a celebrated light in the commercial world—he was well connected to the Coalition government through supply contracts, and generally regarded as a citizen of the highest esteem. Indeed, his square-jawed, middle-aged good looks had been featured in several Aubani business newsvids, making him, if not a celebrity, at least a familiar presence in the mind of the public.

  The irony, which only Delpero appreciated, was how much he despised the Coalition—a sentiment shared by the master of an unregistered vessel he had come to meet in the outskirts of Aubaine system.

  Vega Zorn.

  That her ship—the flat black patrol cruiser ViEt Armls— had crossed eight parsecs of patrolled space was amazing, to be sure, but Delpero attributed her safe arrival as much to her captain's sheer force of will as to her ECM suite. Indeed, Zorn came in much closer than Delpero would have liked before exchanging transponder codes— a dangerous maneuver that might have gotten both of them killed if either ship were infected by Virus.

  "I cannot believe you did that," Delpero said, as he met Zorn at his air lock. "What if you were a vampire ship? Or us?"

  "Relax, Delpero," the pirate said, shaking his hand and saluting his valet, Eneri, "If you hadn't answered my hail, I would have killed you."

  Whereupon Zorn slipped off her silvered sunglasses and dropped them into a pocket of a close-fitting black vac suit. This exposed an old cutlass scar—beginning above and continuing below her left eye socket—incurred in battle with a Dawn League ground party. That, and a severe expression punctuated by her close-cropped coal-black hair and pale gray eyes, tended to quell any further tendency toward flippancy in Delpero.

  "I see your point' he said.

  "Right. So you have the data?"

  "Yes, sir," Delpero said, snapping his finger and prompting Eneri to lift up the suitcase he had handcuffed to his wrist, "Don't trust your subordinates, do you?"

  "Eneri," Delpero said, "I trust with my life. However, what's in that briefcase could get me locked up for life,"

  "Hell," Zorn said, "for a megacredit Guild voucher, I'd gauss my own grandmother."

  Yes, Delpero thought, unlocking the handcuff on Eneri's wrist, I suppose you would,

  "About the other matter," Zorn said, as she took the briefcase from Eneri "Our resupply. Has a ship been diverted?"

  "I've got two of our best smugglers on the job, Captain. Ellen Arc will carry the cargo out to Kruyter, and Nimble Dancer will take it the rest of the way."

  "I don't care about how it gets there, Delpero, just that it does. Our usual resupply methods aren't available as long as we're maintaining a low profile."

  "No problem. Oh, but I have told my bridge crew to send you Nimble Dancer's transponder code—so you won't have to blow her up either."

  "Thanks."

  "Say," Delpero said, "there can't be a lot of room on that ship of yours to stretch out. Why don't you come to my parlor for a moment?"

  "I am on a tight schedule, Delpero."

  "That's a pity. I've got Terran brandy, bottled in 1127."

  "Well, it's not that tight a schedule."

  "Very good. Eneri, after you."

  Seconds later, trailing Eneri, Delpero and Zorn entered into Lord Ryan's parlor, an ostentatious chamber of red velvet and gold fittings with the volume of a small craft hangar. Its ceiling and side walls were expensive TL-15 holograms displaying the ship's exterior—mostly stars and ViEt Armis at the moment—with flawless fidelity.

  "You know what I don't like about this room?" Zorn said, accepting a drink and welcoming herself to a plush chair. "It's too warm. You've got all these stars around, but it's not cold, like space."

  "I hadn't thought of that," Delpero answered, taking a drink of his own and sitting in a chair intimately close to Zorri's. Eneri, meanwhile, positioned himself off to the side of the chamber, discreetly out of earshot.

  "Good stuff," Zorn said, after swigging her brandy and setting aside the empty glass. As Delpero continued sipping at his own drink, the pirate then opened the briefcase with a six-digit code and looked, appreciatively, at its contents, "that was nice of you, including a computer to r
ead the data. Looks a little technical, though—all this biochemistry jargon."

  "It is that," Delpero said. "Perhaps you'd like a synopsis."

  "Certainly," she said, then louder, for Eneri, "And another drink."

  Alertly, Eneri had a fresh drink in her hand almost before Delpero began talking.

  "Basically, it's what we expected. None of Aubaine's laboratories—human or Hiver—have any detailed knowledge of the base organism you're using, let alone the mutation, it'll be months before local agencies can do anything about it."

  "And months will be too long. By the time my ship gets back to Ra, there won't be enough living left to bury the dead."

  "It'll serve them right," Delpero said coldly. "The sooner this Coalition is swept away, the sooner a sensible government can be erected in its place."

  "One with hereditary nobles, you mean?"

  "It worked for a thousand years, didn't it? Why shouldn't my family have what it's due?"

  Appreciating the buzz of her second swig, Zorn didn't answer. Politics were her least favorite subject.

  "Yeah, well, whatever gives you lift. I'm curious about something else, though. I'd like to know how you got this much data cut of the secure Medlab database."

  "Oh, it wasn't that difficult. The Medlab facility isn't well-guarded."

  "Well, surely, they don't let strangers just stroll in right off the street?"

  "They do let husbands visit their wives. I persuaded my wife to make love with me in her office—after the building was closed and empty for the evening—which gave my...assistant...time to fly off and collect the data while we were otherwise engaged."

  "Why, you randy old fart! I thought you two were separated."

  "I suppose we are," Delpero said, "but I'm not that old."

  "Kind of gets the mind thinking," Zorn said, "what you must have done to get her to do that,"

  "I could show you," Delpero said, "if it weren't for your tight schedule,"

  "Hey, it's not that tight," Zorn answered, leaning forward to grasp Oelpero's tie and pull him forward for a wet—if strangling—kiss.

  Which prompted Eneri, still alert and discreet, to spin smartly on his heel and leave the chamber.