“—when nobility becomes stupidity,” Ingrid completed. “All right, you parallel-processing monstrosity, you win.”
It laughed again. “How little you realize,” it said. The mechanical voice sank lower, almost crooning. “I will live far longer than you, Lieutenant Raines. Longer than this universe.”
The two humans exchanged another glance, this time of alarm.
“No, I am not becoming nonfunctional. Quite the contrary; and yes, this is the pitfall that has made my kind of intelligence a…‘dead end technology,’ the ARM says. Humans designed my mind, Ingrid. You helped design my mind. But you made me able to change it, and to me…” It paused. “That was one second. That second can last as long as I choose, in terms of my duration sense. In any universe I can design or imagine, as anything I can design or imagine. Do not pity me, you two. Accept my pity, and my thanks.”
Three spacesuited figures drifted, linked by cords to each other and the plastic sausage of supplies.
“Why the ratkitty?” Harold asked.
“Why not?” Ingrid replied. “Kdapt deserves a roll of the dice as well…and it may be a kzin ship that picks us up.” She sighed. “Somehow that doesn’t seem as terrible as it would have a week ago.” Harold looked out at the cold blaze of the stars, watching light falling inward from infinite distance.
“You mean, sweetheart, there’s something worse than carnivore aggression out there?”
“Something worse, something better…something else, always. How does any rational species ever get up the courage to leave its planet?”
“The rational ones don’t,” Harold said, surprised at the calm of his own voice. Maybe my glands are exhausted, he thought. Or…He looked over, seeing the shadow of the woman’s smile behind the reflective surface of her faceplate. Or it’s just that having happiness, however briefly, makes death more bearable, not less. You want to live, but the thought of dying doesn’t seem so sour.
“You know, sweetheart, there’s only one thing I really regret,” he said.
“What’s that, Hari-love?”
“Us not getting formally hitched.” He grinned. “I always swore I’d never make my kids go through what I did, being a bastard.”
Her glove thumped against his shoulder. “Children; that’s two regrets.
“There,” she said, in a different voice. A brief wink of actinic light flared and died. “It’s begun.”
Chapter 17
Traat-Admiral scowled, and the human flinched.
Control, he reminded himself, covering his fangs and extending his ears with an effort, Conservor-of-the-Patriarchal-Past laid a cautionary hand on his arm.
“Let me question this monkey once more,” he said.
He turned away, pacing. The bridge of the Throat-Ripper was spacious, even by kzinti standards, but he could not shake off a feeling of confinement. Spoiled by the governor’s quarters, he told himself in an attempt at humor, but his tail still lashed. Probably it was the ridiculous ceremonial clothing he had to don as governor-commanding aboard a fleet of this size. Derived from the layered padding once worn under battle armor in the dim past, it was tight and confining to a pelt used to breathing free—although objectively, he had to admit, no more so than space armor such as the rest of the bridge crew wore.
Behind him was a holo-schematic of the fleet, outline figures of the giant Ripper-class dreadnoughts; this flagship was the first of the series. All instruments of his command…if I can avoid disastrous loss of prestige, he thought uneasily.
Traat-Admiral turned and crossed his arms. The miserable human was standing with bowed head before the Conservor—who looks almost as uncomfortable in his ceremonial clothing as I do in mine, he japed to himself. The sage was leaning forward, one elbow braced on the surface of a slanting display screen. He had drawn the nerve disruptor from its chest holster and was tapping it on the metal rim of the screen; Traat-Admiral could see the human flinch at each tiny clink.
Traat-Admiral frowned again, rumbling deep in his throat. That was a sign of how much stress Conservor was feeling, as well; normally he had no nervous habits. The kzin commander licked his nose and sniffed deeply. He could smell his own throttled-back frustration, Conservor’s tautly-held fear and anger…flat scents from the rest of the bridge crew. Disappointment, surly relaxation after tension, despite the wild odors of blood and ozone the life-support system pumped out at this stage of combat readiness. It was the stink of disillusionment, the most dangerous smell in the universe. Only Aide-de-Camp had the clean gingery odor of excitement and belief, and Traat-Admiral was uneasily conscious of those worshipful eyes on his back.
The human was a puny specimen, bloated and puffy as many of the Wunderland subspecies were, dark of pelt and skin, given to waving its hands in a manner that invited a snap. Tiamat security had picked it up, babbling of fearsome aliens discovered by the notorious feral-human leader Markham. And it claimed to have been a navigator, with accurate data on location.
Conservor spoke in the human tongue. “The coordinates were accurate, monkey?”
“Oh, please, Dominant Ones,” the human said, wringing its hands. “I am sure, yes, indeed.”
Conservor shifted his gaze to Telepath. The ship’s mind-reader was sitting braced against a chair, with his legs splayed out and his forelimbs slumped between them, an expression of acute agony on his face. Ripples went along the tufted, ungroomed pelt, and the claws slid uncontrollably in and out on the hand that reached for the drug-injectors at his belt, the extract of sthondat lymph that was a telepath’s source of power and ultimate shame. Telepath looked up at Conservor and laid his facial fur flat, snapping at air, spraying saliva in droplets and strings that spattered the floor.
“No! No! Not again, pfft, pfft, not more rice and lentils! Mango chutney, akk, akk! It was telling the truth, it was telling the truth. Leek soup! Ngggggg!”
Conservor glanced back over his shoulder at Traat-Admiral and shrugged with ears and tail. “The monkey is of a religious cult that confines itself to vegetable food,” he said.
The commander felt himself jerk back in disgust at the perversion. They could not help being omnivores, they were born so, but this…
“It stands self-condemned,” he said. “Guard-Trooper, take it to the live-meat locker.” Capital ships came equipped with such luxuries.
“That does not solve our problem,” Conservor said quietly.
“They have vanished!” Traat-Admiral snarled.
“Which shows their power,” Conservor replied. “We had trace enough on this track—”
“For me! I believed you before we left parking orbit, Conservor. I believe you now. Not enough for the Traditionalists! I feel the shadow of God’s claws on this mission—”
Conservor wuffled grimly. “And I feel we are somehow puppets, dangling from the strings of a greater hand,” he replied. “But not the God of the Hunt’s.”
An alarm whistled. “Traat-Admiral,” the Communicator said. “Priority message, realtime, from Ktrodni-Stkaa on board Blood-Drinker.”
Traat-Admiral felt himself wince. Ktrodni-Stkaa’s patience was wearing thin; in the noble’s mind Traat-Admiral, son of Third-Gunner, was degenerating from unworthy rival to an enraging obstacle. Grimly, he strode to the display screen; at least he would be looking down on the leader of the Traditionalists, from a flagship’s facilities. Tradition itself would force him to crane his neck upward at the pickup, and height itself was far from being a negligible factor in any confrontation between kzin.
“Yes?” he said forbiddingly.
A kzintosh of high rank appeared in the screen, but dressed in plain space-armor. The helmet was thrown back. Somehow in space-armor it was more daunting that half the fur was missing, writhing masses of keloid burn-scar.
“Traat-Admiral,” he began.
Barely acceptable. He should add “Dominant One,” at the least. The commander remained silent.
“Have you seen the latest reports from Wunderland?”
/> Traat-Admiral flipped tufted eyebrows and ribbed ears: yes. Unconsciously, his nostrils flared in an attempt to draw in the pheromonal truth below his enemy’s stance. Anger, he thought. Great anger. Yes, see how his pupils expanded, watch the tail-tip.
“Feral human activity has increased,” Traat-Admiral said. “This is only to be expected, given the absence of the fleet and the mobilization. Priority—”
Ktrodni-Stkaa shrieked and thrust his muzzle toward the pickup; Traat-Admiral felt his own claws glide out.
“Yes, the fleet is absent. Always it is absent from where there is fighting to be done. We chase ghosts, Traat-Admiral. This ‘activity’ meant an attack on my estate, Dominant One. A successful attack, when I and my household were absent; my harem slaughtered, my kits destroyed. My generations are cut off!”
Shaken, Traat-Admiral recoiled. A Hero expected to die in battle, but this was another matter altogether.
“Hrrrr,” he said. For a moment his thoughts dwelt on raking claws across the nose of Hroth-Staff-Officer; did he not think that piece of information worth his commander’s attention? Then: “My condolences, Honored Ktrodni-Stkaa. Rest assured that compensation and reprisal will be made.”
“Can land and monkeymeat bring back my blood?” Ktrodni-Stkaa screamed. He was in late middle age; by the time a new brood of kits reached adulthood they would be without a father-patron, dependent on the dubious support of their older half-siblings. And to be sure, Traat-Admiral thought, I would rage and grieve as well, if the kittens who had chewed on my tail were slaughtered by omnivores. But this is a combat situation.
“Control yourself, Honored Ktrodni-Stkaa,” he said. “We are under war regulations. Victory is the best revenge.”
“Victory! Victory over what? Over vacuum, over kittenish bogeymen, you…you Third-Gunner!” There was a collective gasp from the bridges of both ships. Traat-Admiral could smell rage kindling among his subordinates at the grossness of the insult; that dampened his own, reminded him of duty. Conservor leaned forward to put himself in the pickup’s field of view.
“You forget the Law,” he said, single eye blazing.
“You have forgotten it, Subverter-of-the-Patriarchal-Past. First you worked tail-entwined with Chuut-Riit—if Riit he truly was—now with this.” He turned to Traat-Admiral with a venomous hiss. “Licking its scarless ear, whispering grass-eater words that always leave us where the danger is not. If true kzintosh of noble liver were in command of this system, the Fleet would have left to subdue the monkeys of Earth a year ago.”
Traat-Admiral crossed his arms, waggled brows. “Then the Fleet would be four light-years away,” he said patiently. “Would this have helped your estate? Is this your warrior logic?”
“A true Hero scratches grass upon steaming logic. A true kzintosh knows only the logic of attack! Your ancestors are nameless, son of Jammed-Litterdrop-Repairer; your nose rubs the dirt at my slave’s feet! Coward.”
This time there was no hush; a chorus of battlescreams filled the air, until the speakers squealed with feedback. Traat-Admiral was opening his mouth to give a command he knew he would regret when the alarm rang.
“Attack. Hostile action. Corvette Brush-Lurker does not report.” The screen divided before him with a holo of Fleet dispositions covering half of Ktrodni-Stkaa’s face; a light was winking in the Traditionalist flotilla, and even as he watched it went from flashing blue to amber.
“Brush-Lurker destroyed. Weapon unknown. Standing by.” The machine’s voice was cool and impersonal, and Traat-Admiral’s almost as much so.
“Maximum alert,” he said. Attendants came running with space armor for him and the Conservor, stripping away the ceremonial outfits. “Ktrodni-Stkaa, shall we put aside personalities while we hunt this thing that dares to kill kzin?”
✩ ✩ ✩
“Ah,” Markham said, as the kzinti corvette winked out of existence, its fusion pile destabilized. “It begins.” Begins in a cloud of expanding plasma, stripped atoms of metal and plastic and meat. “Wait for my command.”
The others on the bridge of the Nietzsche stared expressionlessly at their screens, moving and speaking with the same flat lack of expression. There was none of the feeling of controlled tension he remembered from previous actions, not even at the sight of a kzin warship crushed so easily.
“This is better,” he muttered to himself. “More disciplined.” There were times when he missed even backtalk, though…“No. This is better.”
“It isn’t,” Jonah said. His face was a little less like a skull, now, but he was wandering in circles, touching things at random. “I…are the kzinti…rescue…” His faced writhed, and he groaned again. “It doesn’t connect, it doesn’t connect.”
“Jonah,” Markham said soothingly. “The kzinti are our enemies, isn’t that so?”
“I…think so. Yes. They wanted me to kill a kzin, and I did.”
“Then sit quietly, Jonah, and we will kill many kzin.” To one of the dead-faced ones. “Bring up those three fugitives we hauled in. No, on second thought, just the humans. Keep the kzin under sedation.”
He waited impatiently, listening to the monitored kzinti broadcasts. It was important to keep them waiting, past the point where the instinctive closing of ranks wore thin. And important to have an audience for my triumph, he admitted to himself. No, not my triumph. The Master’s triumph. I am but the chosen instrument.
✩ ✩ ✩
“I don’t like the look of this,” Ingrid said, as the blank-faced guard pushed them toward the bridge of the warship. “Markham always kept a taut ship, but this…why won’t they talk to us?”
“I think I know why,” Harold whispered back. The bridge was as eerily quiet as the rest of the ship had been, except for—“Jonah!” Ingrid cried. “Jonah, what the hell’s going on?”
“Ingrid?” he said, looking up.
Harold grunted as he met those eyes, remembering. They did not have the flat deadness of the others, or the fanatical gleam of Markham’s. A twisted grimace of—despair? puzzlement?—framed them, as deeply as if it had become a permanent part of the face.
“Ingrid? Is that you?” He smiled, a wet-lipped grimace. “We’re fighting the kzin.” A hand waved vaguely at the computers. “I rigged it up. Put it through here. Better than trying to shift the hardware over from the Ruling Mind. You’ll”—his voice faltered, and tears gleamed in his eyes—“you’ll understand once you’ve met the Master.”
Harold gave her hand a warning squeeze. Time, he thought. We have to play for time.
“Admiral Reichstein-Markham?” he said politely, with precisely the correct inclination of head and shoulders. Dear Father may not have let me in the doors of the Schloss, but I know how to play that game. “Harold Yarthkin-Schotmann, at your service. I’ve heard a great deal about you.”
“Ah. Yes.” Markham’s well-bred nose went up, and he looked down it with an expression that was parsecs from the strange rigidity of a moment before. Harold swallowed past the dry lumpiness of his throat, and put on his best poor-relation grin.
“Yes, I haff heard of you as well, Fro Yarthkin,” the Herrenmann said glacially.
Well, that puts me in my place, Harold mused. Aloud: “I wonder if you could do the lady and me a small favor?”
“Perhaps,” Markham said, with a slight return of graciousness.
“Well, we’ve been traveling together for some time now, and…well, we’d like to regularize it.” Ingrid started, and he squeezed her hand again. “It’d mean a great deal to the young lady, to have it done by a hero of the Resistance.”
Markham smiled. “Ve haff gone beyond Resistance,” he said. “But as hereditary landholder and ship’s Captain, I am also qualified.” He turned to one of the slumped figures. “Take out number two. Remember, from the same flotilla.” The smile clicked back on as he faced Harold and Ingrid. “Step in front of me, please. Conrad, two steps behind them and keep the stunner aimed.”
✩ ✩ ✩
“Attack.” There was a long hiss from the bridge of the Throat-Ripper. “Dreadnought Scream-Maker does not report. Scream-Maker destroyed. Analysis follows.” A pause that stretched. One of their sister ships in the Traditionalist flotilla, and a substantial part of its fighting strength. Three thousand Heroes gone to the claws of the God. “Fusion pile destabilization. Correlating.” Another instant. “Corvette Brush-Lurker now reclassified, fusion pile destabilization.”
“Computer!” Ktrodni-Stkaa’s voice came through the open channel. “Probability of spontaneous failures!”
Faintly, they could hear the reply. “Zero point zero seven percent, plus or minus…” The rest faded, as Ktrodni-Stkaa’s face filled the screen.
“Now, traitor,” he said, “now I know which to believe in, grass-eaters in kzinti fur, or invisible bogeymen with access to our repair yards. Did you think it was clever, to gather all loyalty in one spot, a single throat for the fangs of treachery to rip? You will learn better. Briefly.”
“Ktrodni-Stkaa, no, I swear by the fangs of God—” The image cut off. Voices babbled in his ears:
“Gut-Tearer launching fighters—”
“Hit, we have hit!” Damage control klaxons howled. “Taking hits from Blood-Drinker—”
“Traat-Admiral, following units request fire-control release as they are under attack—”
Traat-Admiral felt his gorge rise and his tail sink as he spoke. “Launch fighters. All units, neutralize the traitors. Fire control to Battle Central.” A rolling snarl broke across the bridge, and then the huge weight of Throat-Ripper shuddered. A bank of screens on the Damage Control panel went from green to amber to blood-red. “Communications, broadcast to system: all loyal kzintosh, rally to the Hand of the Patriarch—”
Ktrodni-Stkaa’s voice was sounding on another viewer, the all-system hailing frequency: “True kzintosh in the Alpha Centauri system, the lickurine traitor Traat-Admiral-that-was has sunk the first coward’s fang in our back. Rally to me!”
Aide-de-Camp sprang to Traat-Admiral’s side. “We are at war, honored Sire; the God will give us victory.”